! & f*r*- _/ 157 ...-,-, GEOKGE WASHINGTON. After the painting by Stuart. CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. BY EDMUND OLLIER. VOL. I. ILLUSTRATED. CASSELL FETTER & GALPIN; LONDON, PARIS > NEW YORK. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGB Where the History of the United States begins The Northern Parts of America colonised much later than the Southern Charac teristics of North American Scenery Indolent and Unprogressive Nature of the Red Man The First English Settlers- Spreading of the Anglo- American Eace Westward The Story of a New People Quickness with which the American Colonies acquired the Art of Self-government Virtual Independence iu the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries Progress and Development of the Americal Nationality Increase of Territorial Possessions and Population The Cities of the West What American History should teach ............... 1 CHAPTER II. The Discovery of America Expeditious of the Cabots Awful Character attributed to the Unknown Parts of the World Death of Sebastian Cabot Spanish, Portuguese, and French Settlements in America Backwardness of England in this respect English Maritime Expeditious The North-west Passage to the Indies Augmentation of English Spirit after the Accession of Elizabeth Voyages of Frobisher to the Northern Parts of America Drake s Voyage round the World Sir Humphrey Gilbert Patent granted to him by Queen Elizabeth for making Settlements Gilbert s First Expedition to North America His Second Expedi tionDeath of Gilbert on his Return to England Sir Walter Raleigh Romantic Conceptions of Foreign Lauds Patent granted to Raleigh Expedition to the more Southern Parts of North America Arrival at Ocracoke Inlet Friendly Reception of the Colonists by the Natives .............. 7 CHAPTER III. Granganimeo and his Indians Fertility of the Soil Return of the Explorers to England Raleigh s Projects for the Future Fresh Expedition under Sir Richard Gren^ille Lamentable Incident Capabilities of Virginia The English regarded by the Natives as Gods Cupidity of the Colonists False Reports of the Indians Ascent of the River Roanoke by the English Abandonment of the Country by the Savages Failure of Supplies The Explorers fall into an Ambush Imminent Peril of Famine Dis sensions with the Natives Treacherous Massacre of Indians by the Settlers Arrival of Drake in the Harbour of Roanoke Departure of the Colonists for England Governor Lane s Discoveries Harriot s Report on Virginia A New Colony sent out under Governor White Deserted State of Roanoke Renewed Conflicts with the Indians Birth of the first American Child of English Race Governor White returns to England The Colony not Relieved Mystery concerning its Fate Melancholy Interest surrounding the Island of R.oanoke " Raleigh " the Capital of North Carolina ...... 15 CHAPTER IV. English Colonising of America again suspended Voyage of Bartholomew Gosnold across the Atlantic Discovery of Cape Cod- Characteristics of that Region Temporary Settlement on Elizabeth Island Revival of Schemes of American Colonisation in the early years of James s Reign Poverty of the Working Classes in England Poetical Prophecies of the Greatness of the United States Richard Hakluyt Charter granted to two Companies (160C) for Settling in America Terms and General Character of the Charter Despatch of Three Vessels with Emigrants Bacon on " Plantations "Discovery of the Bay of Chesapeake Foundation of James Town Dissensions in the Ruling Council Failure of Food Terrible Pestilence among the Colonists Death of Gosnold Captain John Smith invested with Special Powers Romantic Career of that Adventurer His Vigorous Conduct in Virginia Remarks on the Treatment of Aboriginal Races by European Nations . . . .24 CHAPTER V. Smith s Voyage up the Chickahominy His Capture by the Indians Preparations for Slaying him His Life Saved by Pocahontas, Daughter of Powhatan Friendly Conduct of Pocahontas to the Settlers Romantic Story of the Indian Princess Her Conversion to Christianity, and Marriage to an Englishman Her Visit to England, and Early Death Dissensions in the Colony at James Town Arrival of New Settlers Their Indifferent Character Gold-mining Fever Smith s Two Voyages of Explora tion in Chesapeake Bay His Discoveries and Adventures in the Surrounding Country He succeeds to the Presidency of the Council Further Arrival of Settlers Disagreements between Captains Newport and Smith Embassy to Powhatan A Sylvan Masquerade Difficulty of dealing with Savages Smith s daring Treatment of an Indian Chief . . . .31 CHAPTER VI. Energetic Rule of Captain Smith in Virginia Reform in the Constitution of the London Company Lord Delaware appointed Governor of the Colony Despatch of Five Hundred Emigrants Bad Character of the New Settlers Anarchical State of Affairs at James Town Accident to Captain Smith His Return to England Another Famine among the Colonists Souiers, Gates, and Newport Shipwrecked on the Bermudas Evil Reputation of those Islands Their Real Character Dissensions among the Shipwrecked Sailors and Emigrants Their Escape from the Islands Desperate Condition of the Virginian Colony- Arrival of Lord Delaware Daily Life at James Town Lord Delaware s Return, owing to Illness Sir Thomas Dale and Martial Law Further Despatch of Emigrants Formation of a New Settlement Missionary Efforts Another Reform of the London Company Private Property in Land Submission of Indian Tribes $739783 vi CONTENTS. CHAPTER VII. Expedition against French Settlers Grants of Land to Emigrants Cultivation of Tobacco -Death of Lord Delaware Unsparing Administration of Martial Law Reforms introduced by Yeardley An Elective Colonial Council summoned to assist the Governor Increase in the Number of Colonists Jealousy of King James at the growing Power of the London Company and of the Plantation Introduction of Slavery into the Settlement Origin of that System on the American Continent The Indians incapable of Hard Work Virginia under the Government of Sir Francis Wyatt A Coming Tragedy The Native Population of America: their Personal Appearance, Habits, Warfare, Religion, and Arts Reasons for their desiring to Exterminate the English Settlers ........ ..... > r >2 CHAPTER VIII. Injudicious Treatment of the Indians Neglect of Self-defence Treacherous Designs of the Natives The Massacre of March, 1C22 Effect of the News in England Acts of Retaliation Renewed Dissensions between King James and the London Company Determination of the King to Sequestrate the Patent of the Company Arbitrary Measures The Former Charter superseded by a New One Virginia again placed under Royal Control Resistance of the Loud m Company Royal Commissioners sent out to the Colony Proceedings of the Colonial Legislature Judicial Decision in favour of James Dissolution of the London Company Death of James I. Unprosperous State of Virginia up to 1625 Liberal conduct of Charles I. towards the Virginians Misapprehensions of some Historians Freedom in Virginia coeval with Despotism in England Disputes about Land Tenure Happy Condition of the Colony Another Massacre by the Indians Death of Opechancanough Devotion of the Virginians to the Cause of the Stuarts Measures of the Commonwealth Snbmission of the Plantation to the Rule of Cromwell Its complete Self-government State of Society in Virginia in the Second Half of the Seventeenth Century . . . . C2 CHAPTER IX. First Colonisation of Maryland Explorations of William Clay borne George Calvert, first Lord Baltimore His Career as an English Politician, and Conversion to Roman Catholicism The Newfoundland Plantation Maryland bestowed by Charles I. on Lord Baltimore Terms of the Charter Provision against the Introduction of Papacy - Powers granted to the second Lord Baltimore Rights of the Emigrants Departure of the Colonists from England, and Formation of the Settlement Claims of the Virginians and of William Clayborne Dissensions and Collisions Celebration of Public Mass in Maryland Ambitious Designs of Baltimore Leonard Calvert s Attempt at Arbitrary Power Successful Opposition of the Colonists Roman Catholics and the Rights of Conscience Disturbances in the Plantation The Ordinance of Toleration Civil War between the Partisans of Lord Baltimore and the Adherents of the Commonwealth Settlement of Affairs Death of the second Lord Baltimore . . fin CHAPTER X. Projects of the Plymouth Company for colonising North Virginia Failures and Disappointments Survey of the Country by Captain John Smith The Territory re-designated New England Labours, Sacrifices, and Death of Smith Granting of a New Patent by King James The Puritans Their Origin to be found in the Defective Character of the Reformation Principles of the extreme Protestant Party Inclination of Queen Elizabeth towards a Romanising Policy The Acts of Supremacy and Uniformity The Court of High Commission for Ecclesiastical Affairs Formation of Dissenting Bodies The Brownists Tyrannical Act against Nonconformity in Religion Spread of Puritanism Persecution of the Dissenters by James I. Colony of English Puritans settled at Leyden, in Holland General Character of the Nonconformists in the Seventeenth Century Desire of the Leyden Puritans to settle in America Parting Words of Pastor Robinson Sailing of the Pilgrim Fathers in the Mayflower .................. 75 CHAPTER XI. Arrival of the Puritan Emigrants at Cape Cod Compact signed before landing Dismal Prospect Explorations on Land A Dangerous Voyage in the Shallop Lauding of the Pilgrim Fathers on Plymouth Rock Mortality among the Settlers- Negotiations with the Indians Creation of Private Property Ineffectual Attempts at Colonising Massachusetts Bay Progress of the New Plymouth Colony Taxation of Fishing Vessels by the Plymouth Company Debates on the Subject in the English House of Commons -Arbitrary Conduct of James I. Sir Ferdinando Gorges and the Planting of New Hampshire and Maine- Sir William Alexander and Nova Scotia War with France, and temporary Seizure of Canada by the English Slow Develop ment of the Northern Parts of New England ........... gg CHAPTER XII. The Settlement of Massachusetts Bay Creation of a New Company Terms of the Charter granted by Charles I. Captain Wol- laston s Attempt to Plant a Colony at Braintree Arrival of a Party of Puritans in the Bay Foundation of the Town of Salem Public Confession of Faith, and Signature of a Covenant Imposition of Hands Expulsion of Members of the Church of England Intolerance of the Puritans Fair Treatment of the Indians Transfer of the Government of the Massachusetts Bay Colony from England to America John Winthrop and his Son Address of the Settlers under Winthrop to the Church of England Hardships of the Colonists Foundation of Boston A Secret Romanist ....... 99 CHAPTER XIII. Laws and Ordinances of the Massachusetts Colonists Changes in the Composition of the Governing Body Stipulation as to Church Membership Religious Bigotry and Exclusiveness Friendly Relations with the Indians Rise of a Representative System of Government Consolidation and Organisation of a New England Commonwealth Jealousy of the Home Government aroused Order in Council, and Detention of Emigrant Ships Extension of the Popular Power in Massachusetts Character of the Local Parliament Winthrop and his Accounts Number, Condition, and Appearance of the Towns Proposals for an Aristocratic Republic Growing Prosperity of the Colony Commission appointed by the King for governing the American Plantations Preparations for Resistance Self-extinction of the Council for New England Gorges and Mason Suppression of the Massachusetts Company . . 106 CONTENTS. vii CHAPTEE XIV. PAGE Character of Early Colonial History New England Puritanism Arrival of Roger Williams in Massachusetts Previous Career of Williams His Assertion of the Principle of General Toleration Collisions with the Civil Power Strange Contradictions in the Character of Williams His intense Dogmatism Inconsistency of Puritan Pers cutors Fanatical Outrage on the English Flag Further Dissensions of Williams with the Magistrates Sentence of Banishment Project of sending Williams hack to England His Flight into the Woods Foundation by him of the Town of Providence A purely Democratic Rule Amiable Character of Williams Cruelty of his Treatment Life at Providence Mrs. Hutchinson and her Heresies . . . us CHAPTER XV. The Religious Dissensions of New England Omens and Portents Arrival in Massachusetts of Henry Vane the Younger His Election to the Post of Governor Singular Character of Vane He upholds the Religious Ideas of Mrs. Hutchinson Excited State of the Colony Vane s Unpopularity and Return to England The Rev. Hugh Peters Reforms in the State of Massachusetts Dutch Designs on Connecticut English Explorations of that Territory and Attempts at Settlemeut-^The Colonisation of Connecticut undertaken by Winthrop the Younger Antagonistic Claims to the Land A Pastoral Journey through the Forest Murders committed by the Pequot Indians Gallant Action of an English Sailor Military Operations against the Pequots Services of Roger Williams Dangerous Situation of tfie English Colonies Native Alliances Vigorous Campaign against the Pequots, and Extermination of the Tribe . . . 124 CHAPTER XVI. Foundation of Concord Colonisation of Rhode Island Mrs. Hutchinson seeks refuge among the Dutch Her Assassination by Indians Dissensions in the Rhode Island Colony Agreement as to the Heads of a Constitution Beginning of New Haven Colony John Davenport and Theophilus Eaton Theocratical Government of New Haven Spread of the Settlement on the Shores of Long Island Sound Large Emigration from England Anticipated weakening and impoverishment of the Mother Country Issue of Orders by the Government of Charles I. for the Checking of Emigration Injury inflicted on England by the Tyranny of Charles and Archbishop Laud English Character of much of the American Population Prosperous State of the New England Colonies in 1643 Establishment of Harvard College Legal Provision for the Instruction of the Commonalty . 133 CHAPTER XVII. The New England Colonies towards the Middle of the Seventeenth Century The General " Body of Liberties " of 1641 Nature of that Ordinance Determination to enforce Religion by Law Austerity of the New England Rule of Life Effect of this on Morals Prevalence of Vice in New England after the Early Days of the Settlement Overstraining of Religion Ordinance for the Reformation of Manners Opposition to Romanism Secular Marriages and Funerals The Manner of Public Worship Sympathy of the New England Settlers with the Popular Opposition to Charles I. Implied Revival of the Massachusetts Patent Augmentations of the Territory of Massachusetts Death and Character of William Brewster Proposed Federation of the New England Colonies Preamble to the Articles of Agreement creating the Federation General Provisions of the Agreement " The United Colonies of New England " established in 1643 Commission for the Government of the American Colonies instituted by the Long Parliament of England ........... 141 CHAPTER XVIII. Dissensions between the Narragansetts and Mohegans Apprehended Plot to Assassinate the English Samuel Gorton and the Familists Disturbances at Providence caused by Gorton Appeal of Roger Williams to Massachusetts for Assistance Cession of Territory in Narragansett Bay to Massachusetts Lands bestowed by Miantonomoh, Chief of the Narragansetts, on Gorton The Validity of the Transfer contested Battle between Miantonomoh and Uncas Defeat, Capture, and Execution of the Former Contest between the Massachusetts Authorities and Gorton Trial and Conyiction of Gorton Questionable Proceedings of Massachusetts Endeavours of Gorton and his Associates to obtain the Mediation of the King of England Transactions of New England with the French Colony of Acadie Disputed Questions of Jurisdiction, and Difficulties of International Law growing out of them Domestic Politics of Massachusetts in 1613-4 . . , ._ . . . 150 CHAPTER XIX. The Council for New England The Three Plymouth Patents Early Difficulties of the Colony Hard Treatment of the Settlers by the London Capitalists Death of Robinson Further Removal of English from Leyden to Plymouth Poverty of the Plantation Steady Progress in Trade Visit of an Agent of the Dutch Company to Plymouth His Description of the Town, and of the Manners of the Inhabitants Persecution less in the Plymouth Colony than in Massachusetts - Perils, real and imaginary- Territorial Appropriations Formation of New Towns in the Plymouth Patent Collisions with French and Dutch Death and Character of Bradford Edward Winslow in England Political Reforms in New Plymouth Visits of Winslow to Massasoit Fidelity of some of the Indians to their Professions of Friendship ... ....... I 59 CHAPTER XX. Agitation against the Governments of Plymouth and Massachusetts William Vassall Demand for Complete Religious Toleration- Petition to the English Parliament threatened Presbyterians and Independents Distinctions in their Methods of Church Discipline Tyranny of the Presbyterians in England under the Long Parliament Supremacy of the Independents in New England Determination to call a Synod The Synod of 164C Punishment of Presbyterian Agitators Winslow again in England His Defence of the New England Governments Distrust of Democracy in Massachusetts Speech of Winthrop on the Subject Instructions to Winslow as to his Conduct before the Parliamentary Commission on the Plantations Remon strance of the Massachusetts Government to tke Commissioners Decision of the Disputed Points The Synod of 1648 Platform of Church Discipline then established Roger Williams and the Narragansett Plantations Dissensions and General Progress . .... 161 viii CONTENTS. CHAPTEE XXI. PAGE Efforts for the Conversion of the Indians to Christianity Their Susceptibility to Beligious Impressions John Eliot, the Apostle of the Bed Man His first Attempts at Conversion Grant of Land to the Indians by the Central Court of Massachusetts Establishment of a Court of Judicature for the Converted Natives Spread of Civilisation Self-devotion of Eliot Jealousy and Opposition of Many of the Indian Chiefs Commencement of a Town of Christianised Indians, and Formation of a Native Church Mattha s Vineyard Missionary Exertions of Thomas Mayhew in that Island Society for the Promoting and Pro pagating of the Gospel in America, created by an Ordinance of the English Parliament Daniel Gookin Progress of Conversion to the End of the Seventeenth Century Dislike of Christianity amongst several of the Tribes Degraded Condition of the Converted Indians Present State and Opinions of the Bed Men Their Fondness for Raising Questions in Theology Roman Catholic Conversions Decay of the Indian Race ......... 176 CHAPTER XXII. Religious Persecution in Massachusetts The Anabaptists, or Baptists Their appearance in New England Severe Treatment of the Sect Various Opinions as to the Conduct of the Colonial Authorities Rise of the Quaker Sect The Insanities of James Naylor Life and Opinions of George Fox The Earlier and Later Doctrines of the Friends First Arrival of Quakers at Boston Laws against them passed by the New England Legislatures Mutilation of Quakers at Boston Quakers condemned to Death after return from Banishment Rhode Island Legislators on Toleration Execution of Quakers Unpopularity of the Law, and its subsequent Mitigation Abatement of the Religious Persecution Letter of Robei t Boyle on the subject . .184 CHAPTER XXIII. Renewed Troubles with the Indians -Major Edward Gibbons Operations against the Narragansetts Outrages committed by the Natives Relations of Foreign Nationalities with the Indians Dissensions among the Members of the Confederacy Settlement of the Pequot Tribe Operations against Acadie Proposals from Oliver Cromwell to the New England Colonies Deaths of New England Settlers Protectorate of Richard Cromwell Accession of Charles II. First Measures of the Restored Monarchy Addresses from Massachusetts to the King and the English Parliament Reply of the King Escape of Regicides to New England Attempts to discover and arrest the Fugitives Their Flight and Concealment Report of Massachusetts Committee on the Relations between the Colony and the Mother Country Acknowledgment of Cliarles II. by the Four Confederated Plantations of New England . . . . . . . . . . . . , . 19 1 CHAPTER XXIV. Despatch of John Winthrop the Younger to England, to solicit a Royal Charter for Connecticut Grant by Charles II. of an Ample Patent Liberal Terms of that Document Character of the Second John Winthrop Absorption of New Haven into Connecticut Questionable Conduct of Winthrop Opposition of New Haven to the Proposed Incorporation The Union finally effected Happy Condition of Connecticut Claims of Rhode Island Proceedings of its Agent in England Grant of a Charter with very extensive Privileges Provision in favour of Religious Toleration Exception as regards the Roman Catholics The Exception annulled at a later date Despatch of Agents from Massachusetts to England Letter of Charles II. to the Massachusetts Colony Stipulations of the King on behalf of Liberty of Conscience Death of the Rev. John Norton Proceedings of the General Court with reference to the King s Letter The American Policy of Charles II. ..... . 202 CHAPTER XXV. Opening of the Year 1664 Position towards one another of Massachusetts and England -Military Strength of Massachusetts Want of a Circulating Medium in the Colony Coinage of Money Suppression of a Politico- Religious Treatise by Eliot Sir Thomas Temple, and his efforts at London for the Interests of Massachusetts Appointment by Charles II. of Four Commissioners for inquiring into the Condition of the New England Colonies Arrival of the Commissioners in America State Paper on the Object of their Appointment Character and Antecedents of the Four Commissioners Letter of the King to the Governor of Massachusetts Instructions of the Royal Agents Antagonistic Views as to the Character and Design of the Intervention- False Position of Massachusetts, and Errors in the Policy of the King Petition of the General Court of Massachusetts to Charles II 209 CHAPTER XXVI. Theories of the General Court of Massachusetts with regard to the Connection between that Colony and the Mother Country Truisms and Falsities involved in the Argument-Doubtful Position of the Plantation-Endeavour of Massachusetts to be entirely independent of England-Policy of Charles II. towards the New England Colonies-Opinion in the Colony and m England Collisions between the Royal Commissioners and the Massachusetts Authorities Death of John Endicott Letter from Charles II. to the General Court of Ply mouth Proposals of the Commissioners to that Government General Assent of Plymouth to the Royal Wishes The Commissioners in the Narragansett Plantations, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Provi denceOpening of Negotiations with the Massachusetts M-igistrates Threatened Appeal of a Criminal to the Commissioners Divisions of Opinion between the Commissioners and the Magistrates The Book of Common Prayer Oath of Allegiance ordered by the General Court Further Dissensions An Appeal forbidden and prevented by the Rulers of Massachusetts- Departure of the Commissioners from Boston ..... CHAPTER XXVII. Claims of Robert Mason and Ferdinando Gorges The Provinces of New Hampshire and Maine The Royal Commissioners in the Northern Towns Proceedings of the Massachusetts Government for Asserting their Authority in the Disputed Territories- Arbitrary Prosecutions Royal Government established in Maine Military Preparations of Massachusetts Last Official Visit of the Commissioners to Boston Demand of the King that Massachusetts should send Agents to England Collision of Can- with a Boston Constable Determination of Massachusetts not to send the required Agents Le^er from the Central Court io Charles II. Opposition of a Minority in the Colony to the Resolution of the General Court Opinions expressed in Course of the Debate Imprudent conduct of the Authorities Letter to Secretary Morrice Suggested War with the French in Canada Weakening of the New England Confederation Revival of the Quarrel between Charles II. and Massachusetts New Plan of Action The Navigation Laws Despatch of Edward Randolph to New England .... 226 CONTENTS. ix CHAPTER XXVIII. PAGE Situation of New York City Dutch Origin of the State Maritime Enterprise of the Dutch Republic Henry Hudson, the English Navigator His Expedition, in the Service of a Dutch Company, to discover the North-east Passage to Asia His Voyage diverted to the North-west Discovery of the Bay of New York, and of the Hudson River Character of the Scenery Tragic Fate of Hudson Colonisation of the Country by the Dutch Manners and Habits of tie Natives Claim to the Territory set up by the English Progress of the Dutch Colony of New Netherland Negotiations with the Colony of Plymouth A Charter, with Feudal Provisions, imposed on the Dutch Colonists by the Home Government Collisions between Dutch and English- Peopling of Delaware by Swedes Sanguinary Feuds between the Dutch of New Netherland and the Indians Massacre of Indians Their Retaliations, and Ultimate Conclusion of Peace ...... ... 236 CHAPTER XXIX. Peter Stuyvesaiit, Governor of New Nelherland His Claim to Lands occupied by the English Violation of English Jurisdiction by Stuyvesant Negotiations between New Netherland and New England The Question referred to Arbitrators Decision of the Arbitrators against New Netherland Conquest by the Dutch of the Swedes in Delaware Flight of Dutch Colonists on the Delaware into New England Prosperity of New Amsterdam Large Immigration from various Parts of Europe Popular Assemblies Decliration of Political Rights Opposition of Stuyvesant to the Wishes of the Commonalty Contemplated Expedition by Cromwell against the Dutch Settlements New Netherland and Maryland Revolutionary Condition of the Dutch Colony Charles II. a Claims against the Dutch Conquest of New Netherland by the English . . . 246 CHAPTER rax. New York in 1664 New Boundaries of Connecticut Liberal Treatment of the conquered Dutch Territory Separation of New Jersey from the Rest of the Dutch Possessions A Free Constitution granted to New Jersey Population of that Province Growth of a Feeling of Discontent Colonel Nichols Deputy-Governor of New York Claims of Maryland Arbitrary System of Govern ment in New York Resistance of the People to excessive Taxation Renewed "War between England and Holland Reconquest of New York by the Dutch Jealousy in England of the Dutch and the New Eoglauders Major Edmund Andros Dispute between the Dutch and the Government of Connecticut Determination of the Federal Council to resist the Aggressions of the Dutch Extensive Military and Naval Preparations Extensive Seizure of English Ships Contention for the Command of English Villages at the East End of Long Island Further Proceedings of Connecticut on the same Island Fury of the Dutch at the Restitution of New York to the English Claims of Andros on Connecticut Territory Encounter at Fort Saybrook Policy of the Duke of York in the Government of his Province Grant of a Constitution, and its Subsequent Abolition .................. 255 CHAPTER XXXI. Exploration of Unknown Regions an important Part of the Early History of America Course of the Potomac Henry Fleet, English Navigator of the Early Years of the Seventeenth Century His Examination of the Potomac The Mohawks, and their reputed Habits of Cannibalism Second Visit of Fleet to tha Potomac Trading with the Indians for Beaver- skins The Nacostines, or Anacostians Indian Towns on the Potomac The Falls of that River Fleet and the Natives Departure of an English Seaman with Cannibals Appearance of a Strange Pinnace Fleet s Apprehensions, and the Cause of them Arrest of Fleet by Order of the Council of Virginia His Courteous Reception by Governor Harvey Conclusion of the Explorer s Journal Questionable Conduct of Fleet towards his Employers General Character of Early American Explorers Tha Potomac in the Seventeenth and in the Nineteenth Century ....... ... 265 CHAPTER XXXII. The Quakers in New Jersey George Fox in America Early Life and Character of "William Penn Vicissitudes in the Political State of New Jersey The " Holy Experiment " Penu s Grant beyond the Delaware Scenery and Native Inhabitants of the Land Preparations for a New Colony The Founder s Charter and Free Constitution for Pennsylvania Estimate of his Motives The Emigrants and Planters Penn s Letter to the Earlier Settlers His Arrival in America- Dealings with the Colonists Purchase and Disposal of Lands Humane and Friendly Treatment of Indians Conference with the Sachems of the Lcnni Lenape at Shackamaxon Progress of the Colony Its Political Constitution Territorial Dispute with Lord Baltimore Founding of Philadelphia City Political Arrangements in the Colony Penn s Return to England Macaulay s Charges against Penn Second Visit of Penn to America Later Aspects of Pennsylvania down to 1703 . . . .270 CHAPTER XXXIII. New England involved in an Indian War Condition of the Natives as affected by Civilisation Fairness of their Treatment by the New Englanders Feeling of Uneasiness among the Tribes at the Continued Advance of the White Men Alexander, Sachem of the Pokanokets His brief Reign and early Death Su=:p:ciou^ Conduct of Philip, his Successor Negotiations between him and the Government of New Plymouth Murder of a Christianised Indian Execution of Three Indians for the Fact Philip in Open Rebellion against the English Prodigies and Portents English Troops taken in an Ambush - Desperate Assault of Indians on a House at Brookfleld, Massachusetts Attack on the Town of Hadley A Mysterious Stranger Rapidity of the Indian Movements Measures of Defence taken by the United Colonies Disastrous Affair near Deerfield Scattered Actions, and Spread of the Rebellion Proceedings against the Narragansetts . . . . . . . . 280 CHAPTER XXXIV. Continuation of Philip s War A Native Fort Attack by the English on the Narragansett Position Burning out of its Defenders- Terrible Return March of the Conquerors through Snow and Darkness Sufferings of the Indians Failure of Food Resources in the English Colonies Assault on the Town of Lancaster Atrocities of the Insurgents Mrs. Rowlandson and her Child A Piteous Narrative Famine among the Rebels Desperate Fighting Capture of Canonchct Serious Defeat of the English near the Upper Falls of the Connecticut Attack on Hatfleld Vigorous Measures against the Revolted Tribes Decline of the Movement Position of the Praying Indians Their Asserted Treachery Indiscriminate! Revenge Continued Disasters nmong the Insurgent Ranks Death of Philip, the Pokanokot Sachem Insurrection in Maine Restoration of Peace Sufferings and Loss resulting from the War . 288 x CONTENTS. CHAPTER XXXV. PAGE Charles II. on the Indian Troubles Injuries inflicted by the War on the New England Colonies Seizure by Massachusetts of Territory claimed by the Duke of York Progress of the other Plantations from 1665 to 1676 Arrival at Boston, in the latter Year, of Edward Randolph, Charles II. s Agent John Leverett, Governor of Massachusetts Randolph s First Interview with the Massachusetts Magistrates His Operations in the Colony His Interview with Leverett Reception of Randolph by New Hampshire and Plymouth His Departure for England Agitation in England against the Breach of the Navigation Laws by Massachusetts Petition and Address of Massachusetts to the King Agents sent to England Randolph s Report on the New- England Plantations Prosperity of Boston Proceedings in England with respect to the Illegal Position and Acts of Massachusetts ...... ........... 297 CHAPTER XXXVI. Partial Submission of Massachusetts Purchase of Maine by that Colony from Gorges Offers made to Mason in Respect of New Hampshire Andros and the Puritans Complaints of Quakers The King s Determination to alter the Constitution of Massachusetts The Oath of Allegiance Reply of Massachusetts to the English Government Position of the Colony on the Religious Question Return of the Agents and of Randolph to America Death of Governor Leverett, and Position of Parties in Massachusetts State of Morals in New England in 1679 Sins and Judgments Massachusetts and the King Treatment of Randolph Renewed Demands of the Royal Government Randolph in England His Third Visit to America Another Letter from the King Despatch of Fresh Agents to England Randolph in Fear of his Life Position of Personal Hostility towards one another of Randolph and Danforth .............. 335 CHAPTER XXXVII. An Altercation on the Boston Exchange Divisions in the General Court The New Agents in England Letter from Danforth to Randolph Issue of a Writ of Quo Warranto against the Corporation of Massachusetts Proceedings in the General Court Determination of the House of Deputies not to submit Arguments of the Party of Resistance Relative Position of Charles II. and the Massachusetts Colony Opinion in Boston and the other Towns Judgment in the Court of Chancery New Constitution for Massachusetts devised by the King Events in Maine and New Hampshire Edward Craufield Governor of the Latter Province Disputes between him and Mason Disturbances in New Hampshire Despotism of Cranfleld Petition against him His Ignominious Flight from New England . . . . . . . . . 11 CHAPTER XXXVIII. Accession of James II. State of New England in 1685 Proclamation of the New Monarch at Boston Determination of James to rule arbitrarily Creation of a Provisional Government in New England Joseph Dudley made President Protest and Dissolution of the General Court of Massachusetts Previous Career and Character of Dudley His Letter to Increase Mather- First Acts of the New Government Difficulties with regard to Religion Quarrels of Randolph and Dudley Church of England Services derided by the Mob Progress of Episcopal Views Renewed Immigration of Dissenters Proceedings against Rhode Island and Connecticut Arrival of Sir Edmvind Audros at Boston as Governor-General of New England The Religious Difficulty again foremost Arbitrary Taxation Resistance of Massachusetts Towns, and Severe Punishment of the Offenders ................. 322 CHAPTER XXXIX. Consolidation of the New England Colonies under Andros Annexation of Rhode Island to the United Government Divided and Disorganised State of Opinion in New England Character of Sir Edmund Andros Dissolution of the Separate Government of Connecticut The Charter Oak King James s " Declaration of Indulgence," and its Reception in New England Oppressive and Vexatious Legislation The Question of Land Tenure Expedition to the North-east Extension of the Rule of Sir Edmund Andros Increase Mather in Eng .and Troubles with the Indians Expedition of the Governor against the Indians of Maine Its Unsatisfactory Results Accusations against Andros Arrival of News of the Landing of William of Orange in England Outbreak of Revolution in Boston Reinstating of the Old Magistrates Arrest of Andros and Others Calling of a Conven tionCommencement of the Reign of William III. ............ 330 CHAPTER XL. Virginia and Maryland at the Restoration Period Aristocratic Character of the Ruling Class in Virginia Provincial Government, Institutions, Manners, and Social Life Conflicting Powers of the Governor and the Assembly Dissatisfaction with Sir William Berkeley Thg Court Intrigues at Whitehall Lords Colepeper and Arlington An Indian Incursion The Colonial Militia Nathaniel Bacon, the popular Commander His Quarrel with Berkeley Revolt in his Favour The Dictator and the Democratic Convention Outbreak of Civil War Burning of James Town Death of Bacon Suppression of the Revolt Berkeley s Severities Change of Government Lord Colepeper a Rapacity The Proprietary Grant revoked Lord Howard of Effingham State of Maryland under Lord Baltimore Gradual Deterioration of its Government Unpopularity of Roman Catholic Patrons of Toleration Enmity of the Protestant Clergy in England Agitation in the Colony Charles, third Lord Baltimore, revisits America His Title attacked at Westminster His Rule opposed by the Colonists The English Revolution of 1688 The Revolution in Maryland . . ........ 310 CHAPTER XLI. The Southern Atlantic States Massachusetts, and Bar John Locke concerned CONTENTS. xi CHAPTER XLII. Arrival at Boston of Sir William Phipps Previous Career of that Gentleman His Expedition to a Spanish Wreck State of Boston after the Revolution Turbulence of the Mob Feebleness of the Government Eevolutionary Movements in Plymouth, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey Fresh Outbreak of Indian Troubles in the North-east The Five Nations of Iroquois and the French Atrocities of the Indians in Maine A Congress held at New York Acadie Reduced by a Naval Expedition Combined Operations against Montreal and Quebec Disastrous Failure of Sir William Phipps before the latter City Indian Ravages in Maine Decline of New England Spirit and Ability Tiuce with the Natives Renewal of the War- Proposals of Sir William Phipps for the Conquest of Canada Death of John Eliot, the Apostle of the Indians . . .380 CHAPTER XLIII. Endeavours of Sir William Phipps to obtain a New Charter for Massachusetts A Charter granted Doubts on the part of the Agents as to whether they should accept it Nature of its Provisions In what Respects it differed from the Old Charter Boundaries of the New Province, Forms of Government, &c. Appointment of Sir William Phipps as Governor of Massachusetts His Expedition against the revolted Indians in the North-east Conclusion of a Peace Deplorable Condition of the Province Dealings of Phipps with the Indians The Governor recalled His Death in England Renewal of the Indian War The Adventure of Hannah Dunstan Peace of Ryswick between England and France Boundaries between the English and French Possessions in North America Predominance of France in the Region of the Great Lakes The Earl of Bellamont, Governor of New England and New York Political Fortunes of New Hampshire Condition of New England at the Close of the Seventeenth Century .... ........... 369 CHAPTER XLIV. Unsettled State of South Carolina after the Revolution of 1688-9 Extinction of the Constitution of Shaftesbury and Locke Joseph Archdale, the Quaker His wise Government in South Carolina Illiberality of the Proprietors Prosperity of the Planters Condition of North Carolina Tyranny and Turbulence Popular Rising Sir Edmund Andros Governor of Virginia The William and Mary College Deficiency of Education in Virginia, and General State of the Country Characteristics of the Government of Andros Position of the Church of England in Virginia and Maryland Establishment of the Royal Govern ment in the Territory of the Baltimores Unjust Treatment of the Roman Catholics Life in Maryland Effect of the English Revolution of 1688 in New York Insurrection under Jacob Leisler, and Subsequent Course of Events Disagreements between New York and Connecticut ............... 377 CHAPTER XLV. Outbreak of Superstition in New England The Belief in Witchcraft Circumstances which conduced to that Belief in Massachusetts Agency of Cotton Mather in spreading the disease Character of his Life and Writings Case of Mrs. Glover Witchcraft Crusade instituted by Cotton Mather His Proceedings and Motives Outbreak of Witchcraft in the Family of the Rev. Mr. Parria The Witch Mania at Salem Tituba, the Indian Woman Mather s Account of the Sufferings of the Bewitched Explanation of some of the Phenomena Trial and Condemnation of the Alleged Sorcerers Judicial Murders and Reign of Terror Publication by Mather of his "Wonders of the Invisible World "Reaction against the Witch Mania Recantation of the Confessing Witches, and Remorse of the Jurors Final Views of Mather on the Subject . . CHAPTER XLVI. The Buccaneers of America Origin of the Term "Buccaneer" Piracy in the Roman Empire Claim of Spain to the entire Sovereignty of America Resistance to this Claim the Beginning of Buccaneering- Extreme Cruelty of the Spaniards towards all but Spanish Settlers in the West Indies English, French, Portuguese, and Dutch, in the West Indian Seas Sacking of Spanish Towns and Spanish Ships "The Brethren of the Coast," or Early Buccaneers Laws by which the Fraternity was governed Attractive Character of the Lives led by West Indian Sea-Rovers Head-quarters of the Buccaneers in the Islands of St. Christopher and Tortuga Career of Francis Lolonois Henry Morgan s Exploit at Maraeai bo Pillage of Panama by Morgan Second Expedition of Buccaneers to Panama Adventures of Captain Dampier and Others Division between the English and French Buccaneers Pirates in the Eastern Seas The Earl of Bellamont and William Kidd Execution of Kidd, and Inquiry into the conduct of Lord Bellamont Subsequent History of the American Pirates ..... 401 CHAPTER XLVII. Death of James II. in 1701 Resumption of the War with France in 1702 Effect of this on the Prosperity of New England Hostilities between the English of South Carolina and the Spaniards of Florida Unsuccessful Attack by the English oa St. Augustine Conquest of the Appalachian Indians, and Extension of the English Boundaries to the Borders of the Gulf of Mexico Desolation of the Northern Parts of New England by the Allied French and Indians Selfish Policy of New York Protest against the Barbarities of the War Attacks on Acadie Proposal of the English Government to effect the Conquest of Canada Disappointment of the Colonies at the Abandonment of the Design Visit of Indian Sachems to the English Court Final Conquest of Acadie Relative Position of the French and English in North America English and French Colonial Policy, and the Causes of its Distinctions Determination of the English Government to send an Expedition against Canada Preparations for the Attack Mismanagement of Admiral Sir Hovenden Walker Failure of the Expedition . . .415 CHAPTER XLVIII. Attack on the French Position of Detroit Termination of the War by the Peace of Utrecht Clauses of that Treaty aa affecting America Transfer from France to England of the Slave Trade with the Spanish Colonies The French Position in America after the Treaty of Utrecht Submission of Hostile Indians in the North-eastern Parts of New England Loss of Population in Massachusetts and New Hampshire consequent on the War Domestic Legislation in Connecticut Act of the English Parliament for the Importation of Naval Supplies from America Insurrection of Indians in North Carolina Restoration of Peace by the Aid of South Carolina Addition of the revolted Tuscaroras to the Five Nations Wise Government of Colonel Spotswood in Virginia Discovery of a Passage over the Appalachian Mountains Previous Attempt under the Governorship of Sir William Berkeley Deaths of Queen Anne and Louis XIV. Succession of the House of Hanover to the English Throne, and its Effects on the American Colonies Removal of Dudley from the Government of Massachusetts and New Hampshire Contemplated Abolition of the American Charters Tyrannical Acts of the Deputy-Governor of New Hampshire Results of the Peace between England and France . ... 425 xii CONTENTS. CHAPTER XLIX. PAGE Rising of the Yamassees against the South Carolinians Intimation of the Plot to a Trader Massacre of English on Good Friday, 1715 A Race for Life Devastation of a Large Extent of Country Measures of Defence Total Defeat of the Savages by Governor Craven Dissensions between the South Carolinians and the Body of Proprietors Despatch of Commissioners to England to remonstrate against the Conduct of Chief Justice Trott Refusal of the Proprietors to interfere The Proprietary Government upset by the People James Moore elected by the Assembly to the Governorship, in place of Robert Johnson Opposition of Governor Johnson to the Revolution Success of the Popular Movement Threatened Attack by the Spaniards Forfeiture of their Charter by the Proprietaries Government of Sir Francis Nicholson Reforms in the Two Carolinas English Opinion on the Subject Interviews of Sir Alexander Gumming with Indian Chiefs Visit of Cherokees to England, and Conclusion of a Treaty with George II. Answer of the Chiefs Progress of North and South Carolina after tho Establishment of the Royal Government .......... ... 435 CHAPTER L. Pennsylvania in the latter part of the Seventeenth Century Dissensions in tho Province during Penu s Absence in England- Alterations in the Mode of Government Rumour of an Indian Insurrection Misgovernment of Captain Black well, Penn s Deputy Resignation of Blackwell, and further Reforms in the Government Separation of Delaware from Pennsylvania- Schism in the Quaker Body created by George Keith Persecution of Keith and Others Conversion of Keith to the English Church Position of Penn in England His Proprietary Government taken from him Government of Colonel Fletcher, and Dissensions with the Assembly Restoration of Penn s Powers Renewed Reforms In what way Pennsylvania contributed to the Expenses of the War with the French Colonists Return of Penn to America Bickerings with the Assembly Slavery among the Quakers Further Dissensions between Pennsylvania and Delaware after their Reunion Penn s Loss o Popularity His Final Scheme of Government, and Second Departure for England . 415 CHAPTER LI. Peun s Disappointment wif-h the Results of his Experiments Second Dissolution of the Union between Pennsylvania and Delaware Government of John Evans Conflicts with the Quaker People on the subject of Military Measures Resistance to an Obnoxious Impost Unpopularity of Penn Charges brought against him by the Assembly Government of Charles Gookin, and Renewed Dissensions Votes of Money to the Queen Penn s Letter of Reproach to his Colonists His Defence of his own Conduct, and Counter-charges against the Pennsylvanians Failing Health and Death of Penn Progress of the Settlement after his Decease Condition of Pennsylvania in tbe Early Part of the Eighteenth Century Quaker Government and Quaker Usages Humane Treatment of the Indians Interview of Sir William Keith with the Five Nations -Speech of an Indian Sachem Politics and Literature in Pennsylvania Social Condition of the Colony Large Immigration Visit of the Younger Penns to Philadelphia Trade of the Province The " Tunkers ". ........ 455 CHAPTER LII. Progress, of England in North America Jealousy of France and Spain Sebastian Rabies, the French Missionary to the Indians His Incitement of the Natives in their Opposition to the English Renewed War with the Indians Attack by the English on Norridgewock Death of Rasles Conclusion of a Peace Establishment of Trading Houses on the North-eastern Frontier- Territorial Disputes The Red Man always the Loser Supremacy of the French on the St. Lawrence The Shawnees and tho French Advance of the French Westward Establishment of their Rule in Louisiana Visions of a Boundless Empire . .4(31 CHAPTER LIII. John Law, the Originator of the Mississippi Scheme His Early Life and Travels Visit to Paris, and Gambling Speculations there Financial State of France at the Death of Louis XIV. Law s Plan for Paying off the National Debt Gigantic Financial Operations The Mississippi Scheme Fabulous Narratives, and General Delusion of the French People Incidents of the Frenzy at Paris Forced Colonisation of Louisiana Decline in the Fortunes of Law His Final Struggles Louisiana as affected by the Bubble Speculation Enormous Fortunes, and Consequent Ruin France and the Natchez Dispersion of that Tribe -Later Annals of Louisiana ......... ..... 470 CHAPTER LIV. Progress of Affairs in New York Government of William Burnet Interference of the Home Government Arbitrary Rule of Colonel Cosby in Now York His Quarrel with a New York Journal Trial of Zenger, the offending Journalist, and Defence by Andrew Hamilton Acquittal of tho Accused Evil Effect on the American Colonies of English Attempts at Despotism Governmont of George Clarke at New York Supposed Discovery of a Negro Plot Government of Colonel Shuto in New England Disputes with the Assembly Departure of Governor Shuto for England Disputes between the Massachusetts Government and the Crown An Explanatory Charter Accepted Appointment of William Burnet to the Governorship of Massachusetts Renewed Disputes with the Crown respecting a Fixed Salary for the Governor Death of Bnrnet, and Settlement of the Dispute under the Eule of Jonathan Belcher Entire Separation of New Hampshire from Massachusetts ...... 477 CHAPTER LV. Situation and Topographical Characteristics of Georgia Its Wild and Exposed Condition in the Early Part of the Eighteenth Century General Oglethorpe, the Founder of Georgia His Benevolent Efforts on behalf of Insolvent Debtors Formation of ^ Schemo of Colonisation ThR Moravians, or Herrnbutters ; their Religious Principles and Practice The Royal Charter of rg.a -Pr vi-ion of that D cument, and Character of the Chief Trustees Hopeful Anticipations of the New Project ug of the First Body of Emigrants Commencement of the City of Savannah Oglethorpe s Life in the Woods - Employ ments of the Settlers Conference with Indian Tribes Cession of Territory, and Conclusion of a TreatyVisit of Indians to George II. Oglethorpe s Remarks ou the Native Character Good Effect of his Generosity ...... 481 CONTENTS. xiil CHAPTER LVI. PAGE Arrival of Moravian Emigrants in Georgia Founding of the Town of Ebeuezer Energy and Benevolence of Oglethorpe Defective Laws of the Colony The Question of Slavery- -Colony of Highlanders established on the Alatamaha Religious Revival in England John and Charles Wesley Return of Oglethorpe to Georgia, after his Visit to England, in Company with the Wesleys Incidents of the Voyage John Wesley and the Moravians Wesley s Contentious Habits in Georgia The occasion of his Sudden Departure for England Temporary Estrangement of Oglethorpe from the Wesleys Military Measures taken by Oglethorpe, and Enlargement of the Boundaries of Georgia Interview of a Spanish Messenger with Oglethorpe Threaten- ings of War Preparations for Encountering a Spanish Invasion Second Visit of Oglethorpe to England Dissensions and Discontent in the Province State of Opinion in England Return of Oglethorpe to Georgia with a Regiment of Six Hun dred Men Conference with the Indians, and Final Arrangements for Defence .... . 495 CHAPTER LVII. Demand in England for War with Spain Mutual Complaints of Spain and England Convention with the Spanish Government Dissatisfaction of the English People with the Convention Declaration of War against Spain Measures taken by Oglothorpe in Georgia His Expedition into Florida Blockade of St. Augustine Ineffectual Bombardment, and Abandonment of the Attempt Dissension between Oglethorpe and the Carolinians Unfortunate Character of the War generally Measures of the English Government South Carolina and her Slav.es Cruelties practised on the Negroes Invasion of Georgia by the Spaniards Oglethorpe at Frederica Defeat of the Enemy at Bloody Marsh Attempted Attack on the Spaniards defeated by Treachery Oglethorpe s Stratagem Retreat of the Invaders Return of Oglethorpe to England Changes in the Constitution of Georgia Progress of that Province and of South Carolina Minnera and Habits of the Georgians .... 503 CHAPTER LVIII. General State of America at the breaking out of the War of 1714-8 English Legislation for the Repression of American Manufac tures Liberal Views of Sir Robert Walpole on the Subject Condition of the Colonies in the Reign of George II. Project for establishing the Church of England in America Subsequent Abandonment of the Scheme State of Opinion in the Plantations with Reference to Dependence on the Mother Country Testimony of the Swede, Peter Kalm Encroachment and Resistance Royal Prerogative at New York Attempts of the English Government to Destroy the Privileges of the Colonies State of Farming in America in the Middle of the Eighteenth Century Rapid Increase of the Population New England Misaious to the Indians Cultivation of Literature and Science in the New World Bishop Berkeley and Auievica . . . . 513 CHAPTER LIX. Outbreak of War bet ween England and France in 1741 French Attack on Nova Scotia Treaty between the Indians and the Provinces of Philadelphia, Maryland, and Virginia The Fortress of Louisburg, Cape Breton Determination of the New Englandars to effect its Reduction Discussion of the Project in the Massachusetts Legislature Sailing of the Expedition Reduction of Louisburg, and Surrender of the Island of Cape Breton Incidents of the Siege of Louisburg Jealousy of the Provincial Troops felt by the English Government Further Plans for the Subjugation of the French in America Despatch of a French Fleet aad Army for the Conquest of the English Settlements Dispersion of the Fleet by Tempests Renewed Attempt of the French, and its Defeat Predatory Warfare Establishment of a, Militia in Pennsylvania Riots in Boston, owing to Naval Impressment The Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle ......... ... 521 CHAPTER LX. Disagreement between the French and English as to the Boundaries of Nova Scotia French Claims to the Western Territory Alliance between the English and the Six Nations Conference at Albany Memorial of Massachusetts Commissioners to the Home Government on the Subject of a Common Defence against the French Intrigues of the French with the Native Popula tionAlleged Supremacy of the English Parliament over the Colonies American Repudiation of the Claim The Question as it appeared from the American and from the English Point of View Position of England in the Middle of Last Century Mode in which the Colonies were governed at that Period Project for the Settlement of the Ohio Valley Formation of a Colony of Disbanded Soldiers and Sailors in Nova Scotia Founding of the Town of Halifax Dissensions with the French Population and the Micmac Indians Colonisation of Vermont Encroachments of the French in Nova Scotia Collision on the Messagouche ................. 531 CHAPTER LXI. Meeting at Paris of the Commission for the Settlement of Boundaries Vicissitudes of Nova Scotia The Arguments of the English and of the French Proceedings of the Ohio Company Explorations of Christopher Gist in the Western Territory Interview of Gist with the Indians Repudiation of the French Alliance Dissensions in the English Ministry Resignation of the Duke of Bedford Collision at Sea with French Vessels Dealings of French and English with the Indians Proceedings in England with reference to the American Colonies Representations of the English Ambassador at Paris Illusive Promises of the French Government Tragical Incident at New York Early Life of George Washington His First Military Employment Expedition to Fort Le Bcenf- Interview with the French Commanding Officer Perils and Hardships of the Return Journey 512 CHAPTER LXII. Benjamin Franklin His Early Career, Genius, and Character Congress at Albany in 1751 Franklin s Proposals for a Federal Union of the Provinces Chief Features of the Plan American and English. Objections to it Franklin s Opinion of the Project in Later Yi. fti H Plan of the British Government Proposals by Franklin for the Representation of America in the British Parliament Franklin on the Prospects of Western America Want of Union among the Colonists on tho Subject of Colonial Defence- Hostile Movement of the French Despatch of Washington to the Great Meadows His Defeat of tho French, and Subsequent Surrender at Fort Necessity Warlike Preparations of the English Government Despatch of Troops to America Plan of a Campaign Negotiations between France and England, and Actual Commencement of Hostilities . . 551 xir CONTENTS. CHAPTER LXIII. PAKE Position of France and England in America in the year 1755 Preparations for the Coming Struggle Discontent among the Colonists at some of the Measures of the English Government State of Parties in England Demand of the King that the Colonies should establish a Common Fund for the General Defence Opposition on the Part of the Plantations Arrival of General Braddock in America Demand of Colonial Governors for Taxation by the English Parliament Relative Position of England and the Colonies on this Question Plan of a Campaign Character of Braddock His Arrogance and Boastfulness The March from Will s Creek towards Fort Duquesne Neglect of Proper Precautions Attack on the Advancing Column by an Enemy in Ambush Desperate Struggle Defeat of the English Forces, and Death of Braddock Incidents and General Results of the Action ................... 560 CHAPTER LXIV. Preparation of an Expedition against the French iu Nova Scotia The Original Colonists of that Part of America Habits and Customs of their Descendants -Longfellow s Description of Acadie and the Acadians Treatment of the French Colonists by their English Conquerors Appearance of the English Fleet and Army oft Beau-Sdjour Capture of French Forts, and Establishment of English Rule over the Whole of Acadie East of the St. Croix Determination of the English Authorities to remove the Native Population The People assembled on the Sea-shore, and driven on board Ship Hardships suffered by the Acadiaus in their Dispersion over the English Colonies Operations of the French and Indians on the Frontiers of Virginia and Pennsylvania- Shirley s Unsuccessful Expedition against Niagara Advance of General Johnson against Crown Point Collision with the French under Dieskau Death of Heudrick, the Indian Chief Defeat of Dieskau s Troops Inaction of Johnson, and Abandon ment of the Crown Point Expedition ............ 569 CHAPTER LXV. Relative Position of France and England in the Summer of 1755 Actual War and Nominal Peace Seizure of French Ships and Merchantmen Withdrawal of the French Ambassador from London Endeavours of the English King to obtaiu Allies Opposition of the Elder WilUam Pitt to the Policy of the Court Acts of Parliament for increasing the Military Forces in America Discontent in the New England Colonies at the Results of the War Neglect of American Officers by the English Government Growth of Population in America Shirley on the Future of the Colonies Treaty between South Carolina, and the Cherokees Dissensions in Pennsylvania Franklin and Governor Morris Increase of the Military Feeling in Philadelphia Precautions against the French and Indians Further Demands for Taxation by the English Parliament Plan for a New Campaign Lord Loudoun appointed to the Chief Command of all the North American Forces Del ly and Disappointment Loss of Oswego Renewed Disasters .............. 573 CHAPTER LXVI. The MJitary Situation iu America in the Latter Part of 1756 Troubles with the Indians Colonisations in Georgia and Tennessee Loudoun s Arbitrary Enforcement of Free Quarters for his Troops in New York and Pennsylvania Recall of Governor Shirley to England Unpopularity of the English Ministry Position towards Political Parties of the Young Prince of Wales, after wards George III. Influence of the Earl of Bute Character and Objects of the Elder William Pitt Resignation of the Duke of Newcastle, and Accession of Pitt to Power His Energetic Rule Liberality of his Ideas towards America State of Affairs at Fort William Henry The Campaign of 1757 decided on Unpopularity of Lord Loudoun Contemplated Expedition against Louisburg Delay at Halifax Abandonment of the Expedition Fort William Henry reduced by Montcalm Massacre of English Troops by the French Indians Gloomy Apprehensions in the Anglo-American Colonies Continued French Successes Spread of Republican Sentiments Dispute with Lord Loudoun as to the Billeting of Officers Address of the Massachusetts Assembly ................... 585 CHAPTER LXVII. Rjcall of Lord Loudoun Desperate Condition of the English in America at the Beginning of 1758 Policy of Pitt the Elder on the Continent of Europe and in America The American Provinces invited to Assist in a New Campaign against the French- Raising of a Fresh Colonial Army Arrival of English Troops in America General Wolfe Famine in Canada Lord Howe Attack on Louisburg Gallant and Able Conduct of Wolfe Capitulation of Louisburg, and Abandonment of the City- Expedition against Ticoudero, a Situation of the Fort Advance of the English Forces Encounter with the French in a Wood, and Death of Lord Howe Desperate Struggle before the Fort Defeat of the English, and Abandonment of the Expedition- Taking of Forts Frouteuac and Duquesne by the Americans Honours paid to Washington Search for the Remains of Braddock s Troops Dramatic Incident Turn in the Tide of Fortune ......... 598 CHAPTER LXVI1I. Designs for the Conquest of Canada in 1759 Votes of Parliament Pitt s Scheme for the Prosecution of the War Wolfe s Final Interview with Pitt previous to leaving England Warlike Preparations in the Colonies Weak State of Canada Advance of General Amherst, and Abandonment of Ticonderoga by the French Further Proceedings of Amherst Expedition against Fort Niagara Total Defeat of the French, and Surrender of the Fort The Movement under Wolfe against Quebec Situation of that Town First Proceedings of the English General Position secured on the Montmorenci A. Reconnoitring Expedition Attack on the French Lines, and Failure of the Attempt Illness of Wolfe The Situation growing Serious Plan of the Three Brigadiers for carrying on Operations above Quebec Wolfe s Alternations of Hope and Despair Removal of the English Army across the St. Lawrence Wolfe s Despatch to the Earl of Holderness Rival Claims to the honour of originating the Scheme for the taking of Quebec -Feigned Attacks and Delusive Movements "Wolfe s Cove "Presentiment of Death- Passage of the River Scaling of the Heights of Abraham The Battle before Quebec Defeat of the French Death of Wolfe and of Montcalna . 604 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Portrait of George Washington . . . Frontispiece. Martin Frobisher . . ...... 6 Rapids of Labrador . . . . . . ... 7 The Last Moments of Sir Humphrey Gilbert . . .12 Map to show Position of the Early Settlements . . .13 Sir Francis Drake ........ 18 Murder of White s Assistant 19 View on the Coast of Florida ...... 24 Captain Smith 25 Powhatan in State ........ 30 Pocahontas saves Captain Smith s Life . . . .31 Captain Smith taken Prisoner by the Indians . . .36 Map of Virginia ......... 37 Indian Weapons ......... 42 Somers runs his Ship on S o e 43 View in the Bermudas ....... 48 Mount Desert Isle 49 Red Indian Warriors ........ 55 Massacre of Settlers ........ 60 View on the Susquehanna . . . . . . .61 67 . 72 . 73 78, 79 View on the Potomac ..... Flight of Indians after the Massacre . Cecil, second Lord Baltimore .... Parts of Captain J. Smith s Map of New England Puritans before James I. ....... Brewster s House at Scrooby, Notts ..... Pilgrim Fathers round a Watch-fire ..... View in New Hampshire ... ... Salem, Massachusetts ....... Portrait and Autograph of Winthrop .... Reception of a Narragansett Warrior by Winthrop . Archbishop Laud ........ Williams in the Forest ....... Providence. Rhode Island ....... Sir Harry Vane ..... .... Attack on the Pequot Fort ...... New Haven ......... Monument at New Plymouth to mark the Site of the Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers ..... Brewster s Chair preserved at Pilgrim Hall, New Ply mouth . . . . . . . . . .138 North-American Indian Types ...... l. J t Monument over Bradford s Grave at New Plymouth . . 144 Bible brought over in the Mayjlower in Pilgrim Hall, New Plymouth ........ 145 Tomb of the Mate of the Mayflower ..... 145 Uncas and Miantonomoh . . . ... . . 151 Old Map of Acadie 156 View on the Coast of Massachusetts 157 Winslow s Visit to Massasoit 163 Edward Winslow ........ 168 House lately standing at Providence, said to have been used for Prayer Meetings by Williams . . .169 Gorton s Landing ........ 175 Converted Indian and " Powows "..... 180 Mnvhow and the Nnrragansett Sachem . 181 85 91 9(5 97 103 108 101) 115 120 121 127 132 133 PAGE George Fox 186 New Plymouth 187 Indian Medicine Bag, Mystery Whistle, Rattles, and Drum 192 Map of Connecticut .... .... 193 Indian Scalp 198 Colonel Atherton and the Indians ..... 199 Miles Standish s Sword, Pot, and Platter preserved in Pilgrim Hall, New Plymouth 204 Fort Dumpling, New Plymouth . ** .... 205 Massachusetts Coinage ....... 210 Commissioners Landing at Boston ..... 211 Charles II. . . 216 Hartford, Connecticut .... John Endicott ...... The Fracas at the "Ship" Tavern Map of Hudson s Bay ..... View on the Hudson Mutiny on Hudson s Ship .... Map of Canada and Nova Scotia Peter Stuyvesant ..... The Earliest Map of the New Netherlands View on the Delaware .... View in Delaware ..... Long Island ...... Indians bringing Beaver-skins to Fleet Falls of the Potomac ..... Penn s Treaty with the Indians . William Penn ...... View on the Schuylkill .... William Penn s Book-plate Map of Pennsylvania and West New Jersey Indian Scalp Dance Indian Chief ...... King Philip s Arms ..... Mrs. Rowlandson and the Indians Turner s Falls ...... View on the Coast of Maine Randolph Threatened .... Map of New England in 1660 217 223 228 229 234 235 240 241 247 252 253 259 264 2(io 271 276 277 279 282 283 289 294 295 300 301 307 312 View in New Hampshire 313 James II. Proclaimed at Boston 319 Increase Mather . ...... 324 Sir Edmund Aridros 325 Map of New England in 1684 330 Valley of the Connecticut ....... 331 View in Hartford, Connecticut 336 Indian Burial Ground . 337 A Road in Maryland 342 Attack on the Captain of the Rose ..... 343 On the Savannah River ....... 349 Sixpence and Shilling of the earliest Maryland Coinage . 351 View on the Ashley River ....... 354 Old View of Charleston 355 Gay s Head, Martha s Vineyard ..... 361 Lamberville sent away by the Onondagas .... 367 Old View of Quebec ........ 372 XVI LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. A Vista in South Carolina . ; ; . . . . . 378 Mrs. Dunstan Escaping down the Mcrrimao . . . 379 Source of the Koanoke, Virginia 384 Yale College 385 The Eev. Cotton Mather . . . . ". . .390 Indian Medicine-man . . . ^ . . . . 391 Martha Cory and her Persecutors . . . . . 396 Lolonois, the Buccaneer . . . . f . . 397 Morgan s Defeat of the Spanish Fleet . . ." 403 Sack of Puerto del Principe . ..... 408 Morgan, the Buccaneer 409 Islands at the mouth of the St. Lawrence River . . 414 Harbour of St. Augustine . . ,* .... 415 The Harbour of Annapolis Royal . . . . . 417 The Course of the River St. Lawrence as far as Quebec . 420 The Alleghany Mountains 421 Tuscaroras Indians tracking Fugitives .... 427 A Draft of the Town and Harbour of Charleston . . 432 A Race for Life . . . ... . . .433 Map of South Carolina in 1730 439 Sir Alexander Gumming on his way to visit the Cherokees 444 William Penn. (sEtat. 50) 445 Old Market House at Philadelphia . . . . . 450 Map of Pennsylvania at the beginning of the Eighteenth Century 451 Penn s House, Philadelphia 456 Source of the Juniata, Pennsylvania ..... 457 Death of Rasles . . . . . . . . .463 View in Pennsylvania 468 John Law 469 Indian Pipe . - ; . .471 Indian Burial Ground on the Mississippi .... 474 The Course of the Mississippi ...... 475 Old View of New York 480 General Oglethorpe 481 New England Paper-money 486 A View of the Town of Savannah (South Carolina) . . 487 New York at the beginning of the Eighteenth Century . 492 John Wesley 493 Visit of Oglethorpe to the HigHand Colony . . , 499 Emigrants in Georgia 504 A Planter s House in Georgia 505 Sir Robert Walpole 510 Chickasaws with Spaniard s Head . . . . 511 Map of New England at the beginning of the Eighteenth Century 516 George Whitefield 517 Map of Cape Breton . 522 New Englanders before Louisburg 523 Louisburg, Cape Breton 528 Impressment of Bostonians by Knowles .... 529 Halifax . 535 Canseau Point . 540 Niagara and the Beaver Dams 541 George Washington .- 546 Washington crossing the Alleghany . . . . . 547 Autograph of Washington . . . * . . . . 550 Fac-simile of the Original Headline of the Button News- Letter . . . . . . . . . .552 Fac-simile of the Title-page of " Poor Richard s Almanack " 553 Printing-press used by Franklin ..... 556 Autograph of General Braddock ..... 558 Franklin s First Electrical Machine ..... 559 Braddock s Forces surprised by an Ambuscade . . . 564 Ruins of Ticonderoga Fort ...... 565 Winslow Reading the Royal Proclamation . . . 571 View in Acadie 576 View on Lake Ontaiio ....... 577 Falls of the St: John River . . . . . .583 Arrival of Indian Auxiliaries at the French Camp . . 588 View on Lake George . . ... . . 589 Wolfe Landing at Louisburg 595 William Pitt, Earl of Chatham ... . . .609 Quebec 601 Fort Duquesne . . 606 Washington Planting the British Flag at Fort Duquesne . 607 Battle-field of Abercrombie s Defeat 612 Montcalm . 613 Plan of the Siege of Quebec 615 Monument to Wolfe 618 The Death of Wolfe . . 619 View in Quebec . 622 UNITED STATES. Where the History of the United States begins The Northern Parts of America colonised much later than the Southern Characteristics of North American Scenery Indolent and Unprogressive Nature of the Bed Man The First English Settlers Spreading of the Anglo-American Eace Westward The Story of a New People Quickness with which the American Colonies acquired the Art of Self-government Virtual Independence in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Cen turiesProgress and Development of the American Nationality Increase of Territorial Possessions and Population-Thc Cities of the West What American History should teach. QUEEN ELIZABETH had been on the throne of England about a quarter of a century, when one of the most adventurous and highly gifted of her subjects conceived a project, from which, no doubt, he augured great things, although the ultimate results could scarcely have been anti cipated even by his vivid imagination and daring soul. He was taking the first step in a series of colonisations destined to spread the CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1584. English language and the English race oyer half a continent ; to give to the principles of English law, and the spirit if not the forms of English govern ment, a far wider sphere of action than they had ever before enjoyed ; to add new riches and distinc tive territories to English literature; and in the end to establish a Republic mightier than any of ancient Italy or Greece, more full of hope and promise for universal humanity, more largely endowed with the powers of self-renewal and self-preservation, and, despite temporary misunderstandings, more in clined to harmonious co-operation even with those political organisations to which its own i >eories and precedents are the most opposed. Sir Walter Raleigh s attempted colonisation of North Carolina, in 1584-5, is the real commencement of the History of the United States. At that period, the vast territory now occupied by the great Republic of the West was nothing better than a wilderness, thinly peopled by savages. Very little was known of its boundaries, its products, its capabilities, its climate, or its inhabitants. Although nearly ninety years had elapsed since the discovery of the coast of Labrador by the Cabots, and although other voyages to North America had taken place from time to time, the country itself had been but slightly examined beyond the shores, and scarcely anything had been done towards the formation, of colonies. Even so late as the year 1633, New England was by some believed to be an island. Of the more southern part of what is now the United States, many wild and extravagant ideas were entertained. It was held to be a land abounding in gold-mines, in pearls, and in all those material riches which can be turned to immediate profit. The earliest of the English adventurers thought that Virginia might be to them as Mexico and Peru were to the Spaniards; but they only imagined what the Spaniards knew. Peru and Mexico were already the seats of an established European civilisation when Raleigh conceived his project of a settlement to the north. The country man of Montezuma and Atahualpa had for many years been slaves to the countrymen of Cortes and Pizarro. The old dynasties, the old religions, and the old social forms, had given place to new ; and the descendants of those who had worshipped the sun in temples of barbaric splendour, now knelt before the cross of Jesus or the shrine of Mary in cathedrals such as might have been found in any Catholic city of the Old World. By 1584) the gorgeous edifices of Peruvian and Mexican monarchy \vero crumbling to decay, or sinking into the dim entanglement of tropical vegetation. Towns that reproduced some of the gloiies of Madrid and Seville had been built and settled. The Spanish tongue was heard in many centres of colonial life, and commerce was established in several thriving ports. But the Indian of more northern lands knew little or nothing of the white man, and still roamed free and unmenaced through pathless forests, of which from time immemorial he had held undisturbed possession. Between the North Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans extended a vast domain, the splendid capabilities of which were made of no account by the ignorance of the tribes which inhabited it. Dense woods covered much of the ground ; prairies, stretching far out like grassy seas, diversified in many parts the sylvan monotony of over-hanging shades; in others, wide marshes and desolate heaths afforded covert for wild fowl and the shy creatures of the desert. Yet it was a region highly favoured in many ways. Magnificent rivers, superb lakes, harbours of unsurpassed capacity, mountains and hills, valleys that required nothing but labour to become Paradises of fertility, whatever could minister to the purposes of an industrious race, whatever was necessary to the seat of a great empire, lay within the bounds of that immense and varied territory. But these natural riches of the land were wasted by disuse. The savages scattered over the country had no means of turning such endowments to advantage ; nor does there seem the least reason to suppose that they would ever have acquired them. Savages are generally characterised by mental indolence ; and to this rule the red man appears to be no exception. The Indians of North America in the sixteenth century were probably a finer race physically than the miserable remnant that now remains ; but they had no greater power of self-improvement than their descendants at the present day. They cultivated the ground only so far as was necessary to provide them with their small stock of maize and vegetables. They drew from the soil none of its hidden riches. They made no attempt to reduce the ferocity of untamed nature to the order and subjection of civilised societies. The forests were not felled ; the marshes were not drained ; the prairies and the plains saw no cities rising out of their broad expanse ; the harbours were im visited by ships ; the livers ran from their sources to the sea, and carried on their breasts no freight of vessels laden with the produce of a land which might have supplied the wants of Eiirope. The Indian cared not to be any better than his fathers had been before him. It was enough for him if he could preserve his hunting-ground from the invasion of hostile tribes ; if he could prevail in battle, and 1584.] PROGRESS OF COLONISATION. adorn his belt with the scalps of slaughtered enemies ; if he could sing his savage songs, and dance his savage dances, and bring up his sons to a warrior s contempt of pain, and smoke his calumet, and rest in his rude wigwam after the fatigues of the chase. A few rough skins were sufficient to protect him from the cold ; a few feathers and coloured shells abundantly satisfied the female vanity of his squaw. He was content to live this simple life, and to dream of some red man s heaven beyond the grave, without a thought of bettering his earthly state, or turning the riches of the earth and the forces of the elements to the service of his will. When the first Englishmen settled in these wild lands, the natives regarded them as gods. Their powers were so far superior to anything which had been hitherto experienced, that the ordinary nature of human beings seemed inadequate to account for them. They had weapons which breathed fire and smoke ; they could smite their enemies with sudden death at an immense distance, and in some unknown way ; they came and went in vessels of enormous size ; they had coverings to their bodies of such hardness that a dart or an arrow glanced off them : in all respects they were wonderful and mysterious. What followed was perhaps the inevitable consequence of the condi tions thus established. The inferior race, after a few spasmodic struggles for the mastery, gave way before the superior. The rod man, sullenly refusing to be civilised, exasperated by the cruelty and injustice of which he was frequently made the victim, or incapable by his very nature of receiv ing the impress of European ideas, retired from the shores of the Atlantic, and sought refuge in the wide regions of the west. The history of the United States, reduced to broad and general terms, is the history of an energetic nation of white men gradually spreading farther and farther into the desert, and pursuing the retreating footsteps of several nations of red men, who, after falling back from forest to forest, and from waste to waste, now nutter like a waning phantom between the Rocky Mountains and the western sea. Yet, however rapid this advance during the present century, it was comparatively slow in earlier days. For many generations, the colonists and their descendants kept to those portions of the continent which border on the Atlantic. Georgia, the Caro- linas, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, New England all the older parts of the modem Union lie on or near the great body of waters connecting America with Europe. At the period of the War of Independence, very little ground was occupied by Anglo-Americans west of the Alleghany Mountains. The Mississippi formed the extreme western boundary of the fede rated colonies. Beyond that magnificent stream lay the dominions of the Spaniard, and on both sides were the camping-grounds of Indians, and the solitary expanses of the wilderness. It was not until the colonies became entirely free to form their own government, and to transact their own affairs, that this immense expansion towards the Pacific set in with vigour. The young nation felt its strength, and leapt with gigantic bounds towards the regions of the setting sun. In regarding Virginia and the New England States, we see countries and cities which, for the New World, have already acquired an aspect of antiquity. In Boston there are houses, and indeed whole streets, which present the appearance of an old English town. Memories of the seventeenth century hang about some of its thoroughfares and public buildings ; ghosts of sedate old Puritans in doublet and hose, or in steel cap and breastplate, are visible to the mind s eye in that ancient capital of Massachusetts. All down the coast, from Maine to Georgia, are cities which have a name and place in history. In the annals of the world there is no other record of so rapid a development of a nation from a beginning so feeble and unpromising. Of the incidents of its early years it may be safely said that they have no parallel in the pages of the wildest romance. The simple narration of them would form volumes as attractive as the fictions of Robinson Crusoe or the Arabian Nights, while the numerous episodes of savage brutalities vie in horror with the most repulsive tales of the pirates and buccaneers of past ages. But the practical interest of the stoiy is more modern. It is the story of a new people winning their way through rough and stormy paths to wards a future of unparalleled grandeur. It is a story of contest with the elements, with tempest, with hunger, with cold, with the primeval forest, with the tameless ocean, with savage foes, with inter necine troubles, with despondency, and inexperience, and distrust. It is a story of free communities learning the difficult art of self-government under circumstances which, however favourable in some respects, were in others especially trying. It is a story of difficulties surmounted by the sheer force of manhood ; of growing cities, of dwindling de serts, of augmenting commerce, of ever-multiplying population, of new principles in politics, of new opportunities for humanity, of influences which the Old World feels more and more strongly as the years pass by. This land, of which we propose to write CASSELL S HISTOBY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1584. the History, is pre-eminently the land of Hope. The future of the United States, now that the last obstacle to perfect freedom is removed, shines forth among the brightest of the world. It is menaced with fewer dangers than most others; and it holds out to the toiling millions of the earth, but especially to those of English speech, the most numerous points of interest and attraction. A living American poet has proudly addressed his country us that " strange New World, that yet wast never young, Whose youth from thee by griping need was wrung, Brown foundling of the woods, whose baby-bed W;is prowl d round by the Indians crackling tread, And who grew st strong through shifts and wants and pains, Nurs d by stem men with empires in their brains, Who saw in vision their young Ishmael strain With each hard hand a vassal ocean s mane, Thou, skill d by Freedom and by great events To pitch new States as Old-World men pitch tents, Thou, taught by Fate to know Jehovah s plan, That only manhood ever makes a man, And whose free latch-string never was drawn in Against the meanest child of Adam s kin."* Nothing is more remarkable than the quickness with which the Anglo-American colonies acquired the habits and asserted the rights of self-govern ment. Virginia had a local assembly, for the making of laws and the redress of grievances, as early as 1619, though the settlement was then but twelve years old. The Virginia Company, sitting in London, successfully resisted the interference of one of the most despotic of British monarchs, until its dissolution in 1624, the year before the death of James I. In the reign of Charles I., the self- governing powers of the colony became even greater than they had been before. Although, by the sup pression of the Company, Virginia was made de pendent on the sole will and pleasure of the King, Charles had the good sense to allow the colonial assembly to continue its sittings. That body even elected the Governor on more than one occasion, and the mother country acquiesced. While England was being ruled without a Parliament, Virginia was practically a free State. New England Avas for several years as completely independent of all control from London as it is now. The Puritans of Massachusetts considered themselves as forming a distinct sovereignty; appointed their own chief magistrates, made their own laws, imposed their own taxes, organised their own army, and even prepared for resistance when they feared a diminu tion of their freedom. It was the same with most * The Biglow Papers, by James Kussell Lowell (1864). The New England provincial spelling of the supposed writer has been here omitted, as interfering with the grandeur and beauty of the passage. of the other colonies. During the troubled times of Charles I., a sentiment of independent national life grew up with the necessity of providing the forms of local government by the unaided efforts of local patriotism. With the more settled days of Charles II., the connection between the old country and the new, which had been allowed to lapse, was once more established ; but it was a connection of the slightest kind, such as now exists between England and Canada, or England and the Austra lian colonies. A Governor appointed by the Crown in each of the States (for such they may in truth be called) maintained the reality of Imperial dominion, and held in check any tendency to entire separation. But the several Legislatures, elected by the people themselves, transacted in perfect freedom the business of the communities which they were chosen to represent. The charters under which these settlements were established, generally contained a clause forbidding the colonists to make any enactments contrary to the laws of England ; and in the reign of William III. an Act of Parliament was passed, enforcing the prohibition. But this was no great restraint on American, liberty, and the colonies were virtually in possession of independence when the ill-judged attempt to tax them against their will, in the time of George III., led to the revolutionary war, and to the establish ment of the Federal Republic. In surveying the whole course of American History, then, what do we observe 1 We observe, in the first place, a few colonies of Englishmen surrounded by savages in a desert country, where it was often no easy matter to obtain the barest necessaries of life. In the second place, we find these struggling communities growing up into young commonwealths, full of strength and hope and audacity commonwealths so intimately asso ciated with the contests of parties and principles in the land from which they sprang, that the progress of events in that land for nearly two hundred yearfj cannot be fully understood without a knowledge of what was being done in the provinces of English America. In the third place, we see a mighty .Republican. Federation stretching its gigantic limbs from ocean to ocean, and from the frigid regions of the North to territories that border on the tropics ; perpetually engaged in new colonisa tions, perpetually reclaiming fresh soil from the barrenness of solitude and savagery ; spanning the desert with 1 ailways and telegraphic lines ; covering the seas with ships; conducting a princely commerce with all the world in cities of stately magnificence ; receiving every year an immense stream of emigration ; assimilating all things to a 1874.] GROWTH OF THE STATES. new type of national character, which yet has some affinity with the old ; treating on equal terms with the proudest empires of Europe ; reaching out one hand to an immeasurable Future, and with the other holding firmly to a venerable Past. The United States are in many respects the most stupendous, the most important, and the most interesting political fact of the present day. The country thus built up consists of thirty-seven States and twelve Territories, as against only thirteen States and a few dependencies when the Republic was acknowledged by Great Britain.* In 1790, when the first Census was taken, the whole, popula tion (white and coloured) did not count more than 3,929,827 a total not very greatly exceeding that which is now included in the aggregation of towns and villages forming the metropolis of the British Empire. In 1800, the population of the United States had risen to 5,305,925 ; in 1810, to 7,239,814; in 1820, to 9,638,131; in 1830, to 12,866,020; in 1840, to 17,069,453; in 1850, to 23,191,876; in 1860, to 31,443,322; in 1870, to 38,558,371. It is now probably 42,000,000. This enormous progressive development is due partly to the natural increase of what may be called the native American population ; partly, and in no small measure, to the extraordinary in-pouring of emigrants from the old world. The total immigration since 1820 has been set down by Mr. Edward Young, chief of the American Bureau of Statistics (writing in April, 1871), at 7,553,805 persons. Of these, more than half were of British origin ; and for several years the Irish contingent has been particu larly large. But the Germans in 1871 numbered more than two millions and a quarter, and there were large bodies of Scandinavians, French, and Asiatics. Germany, indeed, has sent so many of her people that New York is the third largest German city in the world, having within its compass more persons of Teutonic origin than any town excepting Berlin and Vienna. But the territories of the Republic are so vast that, for many years to come, immigra tion will be a source of strength to the whole com munity. The area of the United States at the conclusion of peace with the mother country, in 1783, was only 820,680 square miles; it is now 3,611,849 square miles. At the present moment, the great Western Republic has four hundred million acres of land enclosed, and a billion and a half still unenclosed, t A large territorial acqui- * The original States were fourteen in number if we include Vermont ; but that part of America was then claimed as belonging to New York, though the citizens themselves re pudiated the claim. t Latest Census Returns of the United States, and other statistical documents. MS. Journal of a Tour in America, 1874. sition was made in 1867 by the purchase of the Russian- American possessions in the extreme north west of the continent ; but this added very little to the population. In more favoured regions, how ever, the progress has been marvellous. Chicago, notwithstanding the terrific fire of 1871, and another only less disastrous in 1874, is believed to have 400,000 inhabitants, though forty years ago it was simply a small Indian trading-post, situated on a desolate swamp. Where, in the youthful days of men who are scarcely old, the wandering savage trafficked in skins, and bought blankets, cheap cutlery, and fire-water of American pedlars, a stately town now rears its warehouses, hotels, and mansions of sculptured marble, and gives promise of being one of the great commercial cities of the world. San Francisco, in California, of which no one had any knowledge a generation ago, is a populous and wealthy seat of trade, where Christian churches stand side by side with the idol-temples of Chinese immigrants, and where all the languages of the earth may be heard among the busy crowds that throng the streets, or chaffer in the public places. Beyond the Rocky Mountains, the great Salt Lake City, with its strange population of Mormons, has grown up within the last thirty years. In many parts of the far west, new centres of life are rising into prominence ; and the writer of a generation hence will be called on to describe places of distinction which are now unknown. The records of such a nationality must be of absorbing interest wherever the English language is spoken. The story, however, has never yet been told with sufficient fulness of detail, from its humble commencement to the magnificent facts which we see around us at the present day. We propose so to tell it in these pages. In tracing the career of this young nation of the West, we shall pass through many scenes of good and evil fortune, and shall see the chequered lights and shadows of humanity projected on a vast field, in proportions as gigantic as the objects by which they are sur- i-ounded. We shall read the history of men and of institutions. We shall have to consider not merely the intrigues of politicians and the struggles of armies, but the efforts of men to conquer a position in the woi ld ; not merely the aggrandise ment of Governments, biit the life of individuals. Side by side with the action of States, the social aspects of a great and various community must be depicted. The growth of this wonderful American people the reclaiming of the desert, the rise of cities, the development of industry, the unfolding of mighty principles, the successive modifications of manners, the achievements of literature and art 6 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1874. must be made to move before the reader s view. From 1584 to 1874 is but a brief period in the existence of a nation ; but, as regards the United States, it is a period full of concentrated activity, and of the most instructive information. In telling this story we shall help to make the two branches of the English race better known to one another, nation is inseparably connected witli that of the other. The English element has always been predominant in the United States, and, to all human appearance, always will be. It is the history of parent and child, and, however widely dissevered by physical distance, the relationship still exists, and the heart of the one must yearn MARTIN FKOBISHER. and may thus even contribute to a more solid and sober friendship. For, although Governments may differ, and privileged classes may be mutually jealous, there is no root in the past which should be productive in the future of anything but cordial good-will and esteem between the great body of Englishmen and the great body of Americans. Let it never be forgotten that the history of the one fondly towards the other, in spite of occasional dif ferences more sentimental than real. In short, Eng land ought to be, and really is, proud of the lusty offspring of her loins, whose unexampled career of greatness reflects glory upon herself ; and that full- grown offspring, in all the dignity of his manhood, cannot and does not, in his inmost heart, fail to re cognise and revere the venerable author of his being. 1492.] DISCOVERY OF AMERICA. CHAPTER II. The Discovery of America Expeditions of the Cabots Awful Character attributed to the Unknown Parts of the World Death of Sebastian Cabot Spanish, Portuguese, and French Settlements in America Backwardness of England in this respect English Maritime Expeditions The North-west Passage to the Indies Augmentation of English Spirit after the Accession of Elizabeth Voyages of Frobisher to the Northern Parts of America Drake s Voyage round the World- Sir Humphrey Gilbert Patent granted to him by Queen Elizabeth for making Settlements Gilbert s First Expedition to North America His Second Expedition Death of Gilbert on bis Return to England Sir Walter Raleigh Romantic Conceptions of Foreign Lands Patent granted to Raleigh Expedition to the more Southern Parts of North America Arrival at Ocracoke Inlet Friendly Reception of the Colonists by the Natives. WHEN Sir Walter Raleigh s expedition to North Carolina set forth, in 1584, America had been known to the nations of Europe the best part of a century. It was more than a century since Columbus, in his dreamy moods betwixt voyage and voyage, first contemplated the possibility of passing beyond the mysterious Atlantic, and in that way reaching the eastern shores of Asia. It was the ninety-second year since that memorable 12th of October when the great Genoese navigator, after a voyage of up wards of two months, saw in the faint dawn the glimmer ing coast line of an unknown land. There are, indeed, tra ditions of much earlier discove ries of Ameiica than this of 1492, which, as well as the se cond expedition, in 1493-6, conducted Columbus only to some of the outlying islands, though the continent itself was the reward of a third voyage, in 1498. Welsh legends speak of a Prince Madoc, who, with a small fleet, put out to sea in 1170, landed on the western continent in the part we now call Virginia, and peopled it. A more reliable story, the authenticity of which, however, has never been fully established, affirms that, as far back as the year 1000, or a little earlier, the Scandinavians extended their maritime explorations from Green- CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1498. land, where they undoubtedly had settlements, to a point on the main American coast near New Bedford, Massachusetts, or even farther south. It is added that colonies were planted there, which maintained communication with Greenland, Ice land, and Norway, down to the fourteenth century, when all knowledge of the new country was in some way lost.* The honour of discovering America, a few years before the first voyage of Columbus, has been claimed by the Spaniards for one of their own countrymen, by the Germans for one of theirs, by the Venetians, the Portuguese, and the Poles ; but on grounds the most vague and unsatisfactory. It is a weakness with some persons never to leave a great man undisturbed in the en joyment of his fame. The stories put forward by the Spaniards and others seem to be as fabulous as that legend of the lost island of Atlantis (sometimes identified with South America) which is related by Plato, with much romantic and poetical embel lishment, in the " Timseus " and the " Critias." The claim most worthy of consideration is that on behalf of the Northmen ; but, even allowing this discovery to have taken place, it does not detract from the glory of Columbus as the man who first really united America and Europe. He was probably unaware of any previous voyages to the same quarter of the globe, and his wonderful adventure has led to the most important results, while the others, granting them to have occurred, have ended in nothing but subjects for antiquarian research. The enterprise of Spain in fitting out expeditions for Columbus resulted in the predominance of that coimtry in the New World. Mexico was subju gated by Cortes, and Peru by Pizarro. By 1584, when Raleigh s expedition set sail for the west, the Spanish tongue was spread over a large part both of North and South America. In the time of Columbus, and for more than a century later, Spain was the greatest of European Powers, and so large an addition to her strength soon excited the envy or the emulation of other countries. Portugal made discoveries in the south, and France in the north ; and after some years the foundations of the * Mr. Bancroft, in his "History of the United States" (Vol. I., chap. 1), expresses great doubt as to the story of the Nor wegian discovery ; so also does Robertson, in his " History of America" (Note xvn. to Vol. I.). The latter authority like wise gives several reasons why the Welsh legend is highly improbable, though other writers consider it to be established by good evidence. The Scandinavian claim, also, has found supporters, including the illustrious Humboldt. See supple mentary chapters, by I. A. Blackwell, to Mallet s "Northern Antiquities," edition in Bonn s Antiquarian Library, 1847; and Mr. J. G. Palfrey s "History of New England " Vol I chap. 2, 1859, Brazilian and Canadian colonies were laid. En-- O land was one of the very earliest of the exploring nations. Indeed, it was an English expedition which first discovered the continent of America. A Venetian merchant established at Bristol, whose real name was Giovanni Gaboto, but who is gene rally known as John Cabot, obtained from Henry VII. a patent (dated March 5th, 1496) empowering him and his three sons to sail into the eastern, western, or northern sea, with a fleet of five ships, at their own expense, to search for islands, countries, provinces, or regions, not before seen by Christian people ; to plant the English flag on any city, island, or continent, that they might find ; and, as vassals of the English crown, to possess and oc cupy the territories so discovered. In return for these anticipated services, the patent conferred on the family of the Cabots and their assigns, for ever, the exclusive right of frequenting all the countries that might be found. Such a privilege could not have been permanently maintained ; but the age was one of restrictions and monopolies, and the patent granted to the Cabots was in harmony with many other acts of the same age, and of much more recent times. The expedition set sail from Bristol in May, 1497, and on the 24th of June the Cabots sighted the coast of North America, in that portion to which has been given the name of Labrador. This was nearly a year before the dis covery of South America by Columbus on his third voyage, and less than five years after the noble Genoese seaman, in the prosecution of his first voyage, had landed on San Salvador, one of the Bahama Islands. There can be no doubt that it was the great success of 1492 which suggested to John Cabot the expedition sanctioned by Henry VII. in 1496 ; yet it should not be forgotten that the first revelation to Europe of the American continent was the result of English enterprise, acting, it is true, under the direction of a foreigner, but deriving its main strength and resources from a mercantile city in the counties of Somerset and Gloucester. The Cabots made a second voyage to America in 1498. The patent in this instance bears date the 3rd of February in that year, and grants to " John Kabotto " permission to take six ships in any haven of the realm, of the burden of 200 tons and under, "to convey and lecle to the londe and isles of late founde by the seid John in oure name and by our commaundemente." The King himself was a partner in the new adventure, and the object was not merely exploration, but commerce, and the making of inquiries as to whether the countries before examined presented opportunities for colo- 1517.] SEBASTIAN CABOT. iiisation. As in the previous year, Cabot and his sons left England in May. The number of men forming the expedition was three hundred, and the exploit was attended" by some success. Labrador was again visited, but, the cold proving extreme, the ships turned southward, and, proceeding along the eastern coast, reached the southern boundary of what is now Maryland, if not farther. They then returned to England, owing to a scarcity of pro visions ; but a third voyage, extending to the Gulf of Mexico, appears to have been made in 1499. In these expeditions, the chief lieutenant of John Cabot (who died about the close of the century) was his son Sebastian, then a very young man, but, it is said, the most scientific navigator of the family. Sebastian must be regarded as to some extent an Englishman, for he was born at Bristol. In early years he was instructed in geography, navigation, and mathematics, and throughout his long life was one of the greatest explorers of an age especially distinguished in that respect. The unflinching courage of Sebastian Cabot, the cheerful self-reliance of his nature, the gaiety of his heart (which seems to have possessed all the charm of the best Italian dispositions), the suavity of his manners, and the honourable spirit which marked his acts, make this hero of the sea a figure of singular attraction to those who follow with any interest the great de velopments of the world. After the death of Henry VII. , Sebastian Cabot took service under Ferdinand of Spain, and in 1512 received from that monarch the title of Captain, with a liberal salary. Subsequently he became a member of the Council of the Indies, and was to have headed a new expedition to the west, when the death of Ferdinand, early in 1516, put an end to the project. It is said that Cabot settled in Spain because he was disgusted by his treatment in England. He now returned to England because he was offended by his treatment in Spain. In the reign of Henry VIII. he commanded an expedition in search of the North-west Passage into the Pacific Ocean that dream of all the greatest navigators since the close of the fifteenth century, the fulfil ment of which has been delayed to our own times. This was probably in 1517. It unfortunately happens that few authentic memorials of the life of Sebastian Cabot can now be discovered. After his death, at an advanced age (in what year is not precisely known, though it was probably in the reign of Queen Mary), several documents by him were placed in the hands of one William Worthing- ton, by whom, it has been suggested, they were either destroyed, or made over to Philip of Spain. There seems, however, to be no doubt that on this expedition Cabot sailed through the straits which have since been named after a later navigator. Hudson, and reached the bay beyond. It iri probable that the straits had already been entered, in 1501, by Gaspar de Cortereal, a Portuguese; but he did not get so far north as Cabot. The Eng lishman penetrated to lat. 67^- degrees, and would have gone farther, as the sea was quite open, had not his fellow-commander, Sir Thomas Perte, lost courage, and his crew proved mutinous. The region in which they found themselves was in truth calculated to strike all but the boldest with dismay. The loneliness of the seas, the wildness of the lands by which they were surrounded, the rigour of the climate, the uncertainty of all before, and the doubt as to whether retreat would be practicable if the exploration were prolonged, must have contributed to produce a very powerful effect on the minds of Cabot s companions. Those were days when the distant parts of the earth were credited with a supernatural and awful character. As the ancient Greek regarded the pillars of Her cules, beyond which lay nothing but a watery void, wherein the chariot of the sun-god descended nightly to some dim under -world, so did the mariner of the sixteenth century regard the myste rious and melancholy wastes of sea and ice which spread towards the Pole. Many ages before, Taci tus, describing the ocean north of Sweden and Norway according to popular report, said that it was held to be the end of nature and of the world ; that many shapes of gods were to be seen there, and that the sound of the sun was to be heard as it rushed out of the waves. Ideas of a similar character were probably present to the minds of Cabot s sailors on that adventurous voyage, as they had been present to the Spaniards on the first expedition of Columbus across the Atlantic. Those strange, dark, weird solitudes were not to be trusted. They might lead beyond the limits of the natural earth ; they might lure the wanderers into .some moonstruck land of monsters, ghosts, and devils, like the enchanted isle of Prospero, as it appeared to the eyes of Alonzo and his companions. At any rate, both Sir Thomas Perte and the crew refused to go any farther, and Sebastian Cabot, a man of more heroic mettle, was compelled to put back to Europe. The remainder of the life of Cabot was passed partly in the service of Spain, and partly in that of England. He was very much a citizen of the world, but one of the best order. Always planning voyages of discovery, or carrying them out with various degrees of success, his mind lived more upon the ocean than upon the land, and in his last 10 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1555. moments he babbled, not of green fields, but of the weltering main. On his death-bed he told his friend Eden that a certain peculiar mode of finding the longitude had been communicated to him by Divine revelation, yet under such conditions that he might not repeat it to any one. Eden says he thought that " the good old man in that extreme age somewhat doted, and had not yet, even in the article of death, utterly shaken off all worldly vain-glory." We may interpret his wandering thought even more charitably. It was the dream of a mind familiar with many great and strange expeditions, and now on the eve of departure for the greatest and the strangest of them all. England had at that time, as at all times, nume rous skilled and daring sailors, whose craft were to be seen on all the ocean highways of the world ; yet for many years the English Government, while encouraging enterprises such as those of John and Sebastian Cabot, omitted to establish any settle ment in America. Spain, Portugal, and France divided the newly-found territories amongst them selves, not without mutual jealousies and quarrels ; but England remained unaggrandised by those dis coveries in which she had taken a prominent part. The reason of this negligence is probably to be found in the agitation of the country consequent on the change of religion. It was in 1534 that Henry VIII., after seven years of angry argument with the Pontiff as to the validity of his marriage with Catherine of Arragon, caused the Papal power in England to be annulled by Parliament. The remaining years of his reign were years of disruption and of bitter religious feud. Those which, followed were no better. The Protestant Church of England was hardly established under Edward VI. when it was upset, in the midst of flame and bloodshed, by Mary and her Spanish husband. Nevertheless, though colonies were not founded, maritime ad ventures were pursued with spirit. English ves sels shared with those of France the fisheries of Newfoundland, an island discovered by the Cabots in their voyage of 1497. In the reign of Edward VI. these fisheries were protected by a special Act of Parliament, the preamble to which recited that the navigation had been burdened for years by ex actions from the officers of the Admiralty, while the body of the Act prohibited the continuance of all such irregular imposts. The national desire for further discoveries was stimulated in the third year of Queen Mary s reign (1555) by the publication of Richard Eden s " Decades " a volume containing O the history of remarkable maritime expeditions. The English flag was to be seen in many directions, and in climates the most various. In the search for a north-east passage to that goal of all endeavour, the Indies, the Arctic provinces of Russia were first made generally known to Western Europe a result for which the brave Willoughby and his comrades paid the price of their lives, being frozen to death in a harbour of the North Sea, in 1554. Africa, Asia, and America were visited by the trading vessels of London, Bristol, and other cities. In 1555 a company of merchant-adven turers was incorporated for the discovery of un known lands ; and the problem of the north-west passage, from which the minds of men had been for a time diverted by attempts in an easterly direction, again excited general attention. This desire of discovering a shorter route to the Indies acquired additional force in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Ever since the latter part of the fifteenth century, events had been tending towards a more vigorous development of the English nation. With the accession of Henry VII. a new era began. The destruction of the Anglo-Norman nobility in the insane wars of the Roses once more brought the true English race to the head of affairs. For the first time since the Norman Conquest in 1066 (allowing for a few rare exceptions), men with names of native origin were to be found directing the national fortunes in politics, in war, in sea manship, in commerce, and in all the great concerns of life. In the later Tudor reigns, this tendency became still more manifest ; under Queen Elizabeth it was marked in the highest degree. Protestantism the religion that seems natural to all races in which the Teutonic element predominates was established ; the foreign despotism of the Pope was finally cast off; the ravages of civil war and of ecclesiastical dissension were in part repaired ; a wealthy and powerful middle class was formed ; and the energy of the Anglo-Saxon blood asserted itself in many ways. Elizabeth had the sagacity to perceive that the greatness of her kingdom a dominion not very extensive in itself, nor yet very richly endowed by nature, as men then understood its capabilities must be founded principally 011 commerce. The English people were equally quick to understand this truth, and the extension of their ocean trade became the chief object of the national ambition. The poet Drayton, in a passage of singular perverseness and want of foresight, has spoken of " The gripple merchant, born to be the curse Of this brave island."* The merchant was really born for veiy different * Elegy "Upon the Xoble Lady Aston s Departure for Spain," 1627. 1578.] ENGLISH EXPLORATIONS IN AMERICA. 11 ends. He was bom to make the island mightier and better than it had been before, to found new Englands beyond the main, and to give to English blood, English thought, and English speech, an extension far greater than the haughtiest Csesar, in his dreams of empire, had conceived for the future of the Latin genius. Sir Humphrey Gilbert, half-brother to Raleigh, was one of those who felt most enthusiastically about the north-west passage. He wrote in favour of that enterprise a discourse which will be found printed in Hakluyt s collection. The idea was warmly taken up by one of the greatest of the old English sailors, Martin Frobisher. At a later period, Frobisher distinguished himself in the operations against the Spanish Armada ; but his most remarkable achievements were as a navigator and explorer. In June, 1576, after fifteen years meditation on the great geographical problem, varied by vain attempts to obtain assistance, he sailed from Deptford in command of two barks and a pinnace, which had been fitted out for him by the liberality of Ambrose Dudley, Earl of War wick, and some other noblemen. The pinnace foundered at sea ; one of the barks turned back, the sailors being terror-stricken ; but Frobisher went on alone, discovered new lands in the neigh bourhood of Hudson s Straits, and returned to England. He repeated his voyage in the two following years, and in the name of Queen Eliza beth took possession of a territory to which he gave the designation of West England, while one of the high cliffs he christened Charing Cross. This was on the third voyage, when Frobisher, with the title of Lieutenant-General, had under his command fifteen vessels, and a certain number of soldiers. Hopes of discovering gold, some grains of which had been found in stones picked up on those inhospitable shores, were as much con nected with the second and third voyages as antici pations of passing through the icy portals of the North into the warmth and affluence of Cathay. The expense of the final expedition was borne in part by the Government, and a hundred persons were sent out to form a colony, and to keep posses sion of the land. Such was the popularity of this adventure, from which countless wealth was ex pected, that the sons of noblemen embarked as volunteers, and money was easily found to defray those charges which were not undertaken by the State. But all ended in failure and disappoint ment. The fleet, after leaving West England, fell in with vast moving icebergs, was involved in continual fog*, got confused in the dim and wintry bolitud.es, and drove in various directions. The auriferous country was missed ; great dangers were narrowly escaped ; a vessel was crushed by the ice, and the sailors with difficulty scrambled on board another. But at length, when a ship laden with provisions for the colony had deserted, and symp toms of mutiny were apparent among the seamen generally, the fleet was re-united in the Countess of Warwick s Sound, and a large quantity of ore was discovered in a neighbouring island. With a heavy freight of this useless commodity, the ships set sail for home. At the same period that is to say, in the years 1577-80 Drake performed his voyage round the world, in the course of which he explored a large portion of the north- western coast of America. The north-eastern, coast, extending the whole distance now included within the United States, had been previously examined and defined by Spanish and French navigators, who planted colonies there in several places. The achievements of the English had been principally in the North ; and it was again to those forbidding regions that attention was turned, when Sir Humphrey Gilbert set out on the first of his colonising expeditions. Sir Humphrey was a man of great ability and of admirable coxmige, who had distinguished himself as a soldier both in France and Ireland. He now formed a pro ject for establishing an English colony in America, and in 1578 obtained from Queen Elizabeth a patent vesting in him full powers for the purpose. Gilbert was herein authorised to discover and take possession of all remote and barbarous lands un occupied by any Christian prince or people. In him, his heirs and assigns, for ever (as in the previous case of Cabot), was vested a full right of property in the soil of all such lands. Any English subject who might be willing to accompany the commander on his voyage was at liberty to settle in the countries which he should plant ; and to all such persons Gilbert was empowered to dispose of any portions of the new lands he should judge meet, in fee-simple, according to the laws of England. All the lands granted to him were to be held of the crown of England by homage, on pay ment of the fifth part of the gold or silver ore found there. The complete jurisdictions and royalties, as well marine as other, within the said lands and the seas thereunto adjoining, were conferred on Gilbert, his heirs and assigns, on whom were bestowed full power to convict, punish, pardon, govern, and rule, by their good discretion and policy, as well in causes capital or criminal as civil, both marine and other, all persons settling within the said countries, according to such laws and ordinances as might be established for their 12 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1583. THE LAST MOMENTS OF SIR HUMPHREY GILBERT. 1583.] SIR HUMPHREY GILBERT. 13 better government. The settlers were to enjoy the privileges of free denizens and natives of England, any law, custom, or usage to the contrary notwithstanding ; and all persons were prohibited from attempting to set tle within two hundred ^ leagues of any place which Sir Humphrey Gilbert or his associates had occupied during the space of six years.* It will be seen that the powers thus vested in the leader of the expe dition were somewhat despotic, though tem pered by the immemo rial liberties of England. A company of volun teers was soon collected by Gilbert ; but the pro ject seemed ill-omened from the first. Dissen sions arose before the ships sailed, and several of the adventurers re coiled from their original intention of accompany ing Sir Humphrey. At length, however, in 15 71), the emigrants set out for their distant home. One of the vessels was lost on the voyage, and it is said that the remainder had an encounter on the seas with a Spanish fleet, and were worsted. These en terprising colonists (of whom Raleigh seems to have been one) ulti mately reached New foundland, where they remained a short time ; but the expedition soon returned to England, an admitted failure. Gil bert and his half-brother, Raleigh, however, were not men to be easily disconcerted. They equipped another squadron, and in 1583 Gilbert again started for America, with the specially-expressed good wishes of the Queen. Raleigh remained in England, * Robertson s History of America, Book IX. MAP TO SHWW 1 OSITION OF THE EARLY SETTLEMENTS. but the fleet, having such a commander as Gilbert, stood in 110 need of guidance. Insubordination, nevertheless, was rife among the seamen. The squadron had not left Plymouth more than two days when the largest of the ships that which had been fitted out by Raleigh put back to harbour, under pretext of an infectious disease having broken out. Not withstanding this discou ragement, Gilbert once more gained Newfound land. Here, in the presence of Spaniards, Portuguese, and other foreigners, he took for mal possession of the island, in the name of his sovereign, by erect ing a pillar with the arms of England at tached ; and he pro ceeded to grant lands in fee to the fishermen, on condition of their paying a quit-rent. Afterwards, one of the ships was freighted with a quantity of ore which was sup posed to contain silver; and the adventurers set out in three vessels for discoveries 011 the main land. They sailed along the coast of the conti nent in a southerly di rection, until the largest of the ships was by some carelessness wrecked, with the loss of nearly a hundred men. Sir Humphrey then turned towards England, with only two ships the Squirrel and the Him?. The weather was ex tremely tempestuous, and the Squirrel, in which Gilbert sailed, was so small as to be quite unfit for battling with such violent seas. But the gallant commander, scorning to desert the crew whom he had with him, refused to shift his flag on board the larger of the vessels. The Ia3t that was seen of hi in was on the i)th of September, CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1584. 1583, when, though the bark was in manifest danger of foundering, he was observed by the crew of the other ship sitting in the stern with a book in his hand. " Courage, my lads !" he cried, across the noise of the storm, to the sailors on board the Jfiml ; " we are as near to Heaven by sea as by land." About midnight, the lights of the smaller vessel disappeared; all had sunk into the raging waves. The Hind weathered the tempest, and returned to England to tell the story of another and yet more disastrous failure. Sir Walter Raleigh did not permit himself to be disheartened by the death of his half-brother, and the ruin of so many previous attempts to form settlements in America. He was a man in whom the spirit of adventure was strongly developed, and among the many projects of his life none was dearer to him than the creation of a great colonial empire which should make England the equal of Spain. No doubt, motives of personal ambition, the desire to amass an enormous fortune by the discovery of some marvellous land of gold, and even the mere love of daring exploits for their own sake, mingled with the higher promptings of this remarkable man. Raleigh was to some extent a pirate, and his morality in all such matters was of the lowest. But he was likewise a statesman of large and comprehensive views, and it cannot be doubted that a regard for the greatness of his country influenced his mind together with other considera tions. He was a sincere Protestant, and Spain, as the powerful upholder and zealous propagator of Roman Catholicism in the New World, was the object of his almost fanatical hatred. To build up a strong English power on the other side of the Atlantic, seemed to him an admirable device of policy. It would spread the principles of the reformed religion in distant lands, add to the dignity of the English crown, be a grand inherit ance to the English people in times to come, and probably open boundless wealth even in the present. We must bear in mind also that, besides being ;i soldier, a mariner, a politician, and a fortune- seeker, Sir Walter Raleigh was a poet. His was a poetical age ; everything remote took a rich and romantic hue from the glancing lights of fancy. Cathay was an empire of fabulous opulence, of necromancy, and of cities such as Coleridge imagined in his visions of Kubla Khan. India and Africa were the fruitful mothers of monsters and genii. The Bermudas were peopled by Sycoraxes and Calibans. El Dorado was a city or a kingdom of gold : Raleigh himself has left us a prodigious account of the place and of its sumptuous monarch, the naked bodies of whose courtiers, after bein" rubbed with fragrant oils on festive occasions, were powdered with golden dust,* so that they glittered in the sunshine, and gave back light for light. The very discovery of America had its root in dreams; and dreams preceded the footsteps of its explorers. Columbus imagined that the river Orinoco flowed from the Tree of Life in the midst of Paradise : Pizarro and Cortes passed ever on wards from one marvel to the expectation of a greater. This spirit was fully shared by Raleigh. He set out on his expeditions with hopes almost as lofty as those with which Sancho Panza started for the island of Barataria ; and it must be added that, in the result, he fared as badly as the poor squire in his illusive governorship. Resolved not to risk again the dangei S of the extreme North, Raleigh turned his thoughts to wards a portion of the American coast far south of that where his half-brother, and, at an earlier date, the Cabots, had made examinations, with a view to forming a colony. On the 26th of March, 1584, he obtained from the Queen a patent similar to the one which had been granted to Gilbert. By this document he was created a lord-proprietary, holding his territories by homage, and by the payment of a small annual rent. He was invested with the right of making grants of land according to his pleasure, and his powers were in most respects those of a sovereign prince. The religion of the colony was to be the religion of the Church of England. It was determined that the new attempt should be made at or near an inviting region of Florida, where the French Protestants had recently formed some settlements, from which they were expelled by the Spaniards with circum stances of great cruelty. Two well-equipped vessels left England on the 27th of April, under the command of Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlow, acting on behalf of Raleigh. They set sail in a south-westerly direction, passed the Canaries, and reached the Caribbean Sea and the West India Islands ; going greatly out of their course, from ignorance of navigation. In the West Indies they stayed a short time ; then turned to the north west, and presently sighted the shores of Florida. The voyage was one of enchantment. A blue sky hung over the blue waves ; the vivid sunlight of day was succeeded by the brilliance of starry nights, greatly surpassing anything that the ex plorers had ever seen in their native country. A picturesque and woody coast glided like a panorama on their left ; and soft winds bore from the land, far out to sea, the odours of a thousand flowers. * Discovery of the Large, llicli, and Beautiful Empire of Guiana, 1590. 1584.] RALEIGH S EXPEDITION TO NORTH CAROLINA. 15 After sailing for a hundred and twenty miles in search of a convenient harbour, they entered a haven, and gave thanks to God for their safe deliverance from the perils of the deep. The haven was Ocracoke Inlet (now included in North Carolina), and the voyagers proceeded to land on the island of Wocoken, the southernmost of the group which at that point shuts out the Atlantic from Pamlico Sound. The month was July, and sea and land appeared in their most seductive loveliness, bright, calm, peaceful, and presenting nothing but the happiest auguries. Magnificent trees, of extraordinary proportion s, reared themselves into the sky ; grapes hung heavily from the ever-present vines, which, running from trunk to trunk, approached the shore so near that the purple fruitage took the salt breathings of the sea ; flocks of white cranes rose from the woods with rmiltitudinous cries at every discharge of a gun; and the human inhabitants of this paradise received the strangers with every appearance of hospitality and good-will. The little party of Englishmen, however, saw nothing of the natives until the third day after their landing, when they perceived three in a canoe. One of these went ashore, and waited quietly until the English came up to him. He talked a good deal in his unknown tongue, and at length, without any signs of misgiving, went with them on board one of their vessels. They gave him a shirt, a hat, wine, and meat, with which he seemed greatly pleased ; and, having gone away, he returned in half an hour in his canoe with a present of fish, which he divided between the greater and the lesser of the two vessels. The account which the ex plorers afterwards gave of their adventure speaks of the wild people as " most gentle, loving, and faithful ; void of all guile and treason, and such as lived after the manner of the Golden Age ;" though in war they were cruel to their enemies, treacherous, and remorseless.* Human nature is full of incon sistencies ; but for the present all looked well. Dark days were in advance ; yet, in that summer hour, the emigrants saw only the glittering waters and the flowery land, the vista of a great colonial empire, and the Indians offering homage. CHAPTER III. Granganimeo and his Indians Fertility of the Soil Return of the Explorers to England Raleigh s Projects for the Future- Fresh Expedition under Sir Richard Grenville Lamentable Incident Capabilities of Virginia The English regarded by the Natives as Gods Cupidity of the Colonists False Reports of the Indians Ascent of the River Roanoke by the English Abandonment of the Country by the Savages Failure of Supplies The Explorers fall into an Ambush Immi nent Peril of Famine Dissensions with the Natives Treacherous Massacre of Indians by the Settlers Arrival of Drake in the Harbour of Roanoke Departure of the Colonists for England Governor Lane s Discoveries Harriot s Report on Virginia A New Colony sent out under Governor White Deserted State of Roanoke Renewed Conflicts with the Indians Birth of the first American Child of English Race Governor White returns to England The Colony not Relieved Mystery concerning its Fate Melancholy Interest surrounding the Island of Roanoke " Raleigh " the Capital of North Carolina. THE day after that on which the friendly native came with his offering of fish, several canoes arrived at the island, in one of which was the king s brother. His name was Granganimeo, and he stated that the king was called Wingina, and the country Wingandacoa. The king himself lay at his chief town, ill of woiinds lately received in battle. Granganimeo, advancing some way inland, spread a mat, sat down on it, and awaited the approach of the English. The white men came forward with their weapons ; bxit the savage, making no show of fear, signed to them to sit down, stroking first his own head and breast, and then theirs, apparently to express an amicable intention. Presents were exchanged between them, and on subsequent days the visit was repeated. Great numbers of people arrived from all parts of the island, with leather, coral, and several kinds of dyes. But when Granganimeo was present, 110 one dared to trade but himself and those who wore red copper on their heads, as he did. The prince was very anxioxis to exchange a bag of pearls for a suit of armour ; but the English refused, pretending to set no value 011 the stones, that they might the better learn where they were to be found. It is confessed by the explorers that Granganimeo was always faithful to his engagements, and never failed to appear at any place where he had pro mised to meet the new-comers. He sent to the English every day a brace of bucks, rabbits, hares, and fish ; and sometimes melons, walnuts, cucum bers, peas, and various roots. Indeed, the conduct * Amadas and Barlow s account in Hakluyt, Vol. III. Ban croft s History of the United States, Vol. I. , chap. 3. 16 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1585. of the savages seems to have been better than that of their English visitors, by the account of the latter themselves. Such was the fertility of the soil, that on some of the peas being planted by the English they grew almost immediately, and were found in ten days time to be fourteen inches high. The adventurers took advantage of their friendly reception to explore Pamlico and Albemarle Sounds and Roanoke Island; but little else was done. Amadas and Barlow, after awhile, set sail for England, where they arrived in September, 1584, accompanied by two of the Indians. Elizabeth was delighted with the glowing accounts given by the explorers of the country they had discovered, and directed that, in recognition of her xinmarried life, it should be called Virginia a name for some time applied to the whole of that part of America, but now confined to the State lying between North Carolina and Maryland.* Raleigh, being resolved to push forward with his enterprise, obtained from Parliament a Bill confirming his patent of discovery, and at the same time acquired a monopoly of wines, which yielded him a large revenue. The money he was thus enabled to amass, by means of the thoroughly vicious restrictive principles of those days, he devoted to the promotion of his great scheme. All his personal views had a lofty and imperial character ; and the hope of becoming little less than the sovereign of a beaiitiful and fertile land, the future greatness of which might well have seemed almost boundless, was a sufficient induce ment to make him work with the xitmost zeal. He fitted out a squadron of seven small ships, under the command of Sir Richard Grenville (or Green ville), a relative of his, who afterwards distinguished himself by his adventurous and high-spirited life, and by the gallantry with which he met his death in a naval action against the Spaniards. This valorous captain was accompanied by several subordinates, who also became famous in later years. One of the vessels, a barque of 120 tons, was fitted out by Thomas Cavendish, a gentleman of good family in Suffolk, but a sea-rover and buccaneer by nature, whose life was destined to be passed in an extraordinary succession of good and ill fortune. The historian of the new expedition was Thomas Harriot, a native of Oxford, who in after days devoted himself to science, won a great name as an algebraist, and practised astronomy with so much success that he is thought to have * Originally, even New England was included in Virginia, as appears by a passage in Peter Heylyn s "Little Description of the Great World " (fourth edition, 1629) : " The northerne part of this Virginia, being better discovered then the other, is called New England : full of good new townes and forts , and is likely to prove aii happie plantation." anticipated Galileo in certain discoveries. Amongst the voyagers was also an artist, a painter of the name of With, whose sketches of the natives are still esteemed for their truthfulness. The expedition sailed from Plymouth on the 9th of April, 1585, and again sought the American shores by the circuitous route of the West Indies. Grenville spent some time cruising among the islands, and taking prizes from the Spaniards ; and June was near its close when he arrived at the point which he desired to attain. The fleet, after narrowly escaping shipwreck on a headland, to which the sailors in consequence gave the name of Cape Fear, came to an. anchor at Wocoken. The largest of the ships struck as it entered the harbour, but was not lost. So far all looked well ; but the course of events was soon darkened by a lamentable incident. The commander of the fleet, accompanied by liis chief officers, made an eight days excursion along the coast of the mainland, and got as far as Secotan, in the present county of Craven, between the Pamlico and the Neuse. It was afterwards admitted by them, in their official report of the expedition, that they were well received by the natives. But one day a silver cup was stolen, and not restored immediately on being demanded ; upon which, Grenville ordered the offending village to be burnt, and the standing corn to be destroyed. The dealings of civilised men with savages are generally characterised by cruelty, and it is too often the case that the first provocation comes from the former. This was so in the settlement of North Carolina. The Indians had previously ex hibited a spirit of friendliness : they were now to learn the bitter lessons of distrust and revenge. After leaving on Roanoke Island a small colony of one hundred and eight men, Sir Richard Gren ville sailed foi* England, where he arrived in the autumn. The command of the colony was given to Captain Ralph Lane, a military man, who had xuider him Philip Amadas (now dignified by the title of Admiral), Harriot, and others of note. The island, which is situated at the mouth of Albemarle Sound, was almost uninhabited, and served as a base of operations. The chief employment of the colonists was to examine the country on the neigh bouring continent ; and this they did, for a time, with considerable enterprise. All they saw of the land confirmed the first impressions of its excellence. "It is the goodliest and most pleasing territory of the world," wrote Captain Lane to Richard Hakluyt ; "for the continent is of an huge and unknown greatness, and very well peopled and towned, though savagely, and the climate so wholesome that we had not one sick since we INTERCOURSE OF ENGLISH AND INDIANS. 17 touched the land here. To conclude, if Virginia had but horses and kine in some reasonable pro portion, I dare assure myself, being inhabited with English, no realm in Christendom were comparable to it." Han-iot made a very careful examination of the natural productions of the country. In particiilar, his attention was directed to the cultiva tion of tobacco, maize (or Indian corn), and the potato, all of which were at that time unknown in Europe. He likewise took note of the native inhabitants, of whose modes of living, methods of warfare, and religious ideas, he gave an interesting account in his history of the voyage. To these simple creatures the colonists displayed their mathematical instruments, burning-glasses, guns, clocks, and other wonders of skill and mechanism ; and the savages were so struck with astonishment that they took the new-comers for gods. Harriot was also in the habit of producing a Bible whenever he entered any little town or Indian village, and of endeavouring to explain its doctrines ; but, as there could hardly have been much community of lan guage between the two races, it is not surprising that the wild men failed to become at once imbued with the theology of the Old and New Testaments. Nevei-theless, they seemed to regard the book itself as a kind of amulet, probably because of the veneration in which it was mani festly held by the god-like strangers ; and some few expressed a desire to join in the worship of the " God of England." They embraced the volume, kissed it, and held it to their breasts and heads. Observing that the English had no women with them, they inferred that they were not born of women ; and this of course added to the super stitious awe with which they looked upon the strange beings who had come to them across the seas. But the burning of the village had intro duced a feeling of suspicion and fear on the part of the Indians ; and the cupidity of the settlers soon created other elements of a nature unfavourable to the prospects of the colony. In the sixteenth century, Englishmen had not fully comprehended the truth that the prosperity of a nation depends on industry and commerce, rather than on any sudden accession of the precious metals. The torrent of wealth which had flowed over Spain from her South American possessions, acted as a great temptation to all who would grow rapidly rich ; for the evil results of that unnatural prosperity were not yet clearly visible. It was thought that, as Peru had yielded boundlesss trea sure to the Spanish Monarchy, Virginia might be made equally productive to the English Government and people. Accordingly, the settlers searched for gold and silver mines when they ought to have been laying the bases of their colony; and in the pursuit of this chimera they actually neglected to sow any crops, so that in the end they narrowly escaped death from famine. The Indians, seeing what the English were mainly desirous of discovering, flat tered their avarice with marvellous tales of pearl- fisheries and mines of exhaustless wealth. The river Roanoke, on the mainland, was described in the most glowing colours. It sprang, they said, from a rock, in such abundance that it forthwith made a violent stream ; and this rock, it was added, stood so near to a sea (the Pacific Ocean seems to have been meant, if anything at all was meant) that, in storms, the salt waves were frequently beaten into the fresh current, which was thus rendered brackish. The banks teemed with ore, and the waters yielded the most resplendent pearls in such large quantities that the skins worn by the king of the country and the higher order of his "gentlemen" (as the account in Hakluyt phrases it) were adorned with orient gems, and the beds and houses were garnished with the same. Lured by these baseless narratives, Lane, in the spring of 1586, resolved on ascending the Roanoke with two double wherries and forty of his colonists. Unfortunately, he counted on getting food from the savages, and therefore took but a small store with him. This reliance proved baseless. The king, Wingina, who now went by the name of Pemisapan, first encoiiraged the English to ascend the river, and then treacherously acted against them. He seems to have feared that the intention of the strangers was to destroy him and his people an apprehension to which the burning of the village gave some colour of probability ; and he sought to ward off this dreaded evil by those devices of double-dealing which are the usual resource of savages against the organised strength and intellectual superiority of civilised men. As the English sailed up the river, they perceived that the Indians had abandoned the towns along the banks, and retired inland with their corn. This had been done so thoroughly that the explorers, in the course of three days voyage up the stream, did not see a man, nor find a grain of corn, anywhere. They had but two days food left, and Lane, fearing actual death from hunger, and possibly some ambush on the part of the savages, put it to his companions whether they should risk the con sumption of their whole remaining stock of victuals in a further examination of the river, or return to their settlement. It was almost unanimously determined that, whilst there was left one half- pint of corn for each man, they would not abandon 18 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1586. their design. The voyagers had with them two mastiffs, and they resolved that, should the worst ensue, they would make a pottage of them with sassafras-leaves. Upon this they could manage to live two days, which time would suffice to bring them down the current to the mouth of the river and the entry of Pamlico Sound, and in two more days they hoped to cross the Sound. If need were, the following year, and always showed himself a faithful ally of the strangers, was among the English in the boats, and was directed to answer his country men in their own language. He did so, and the Indians responded with a song, which the voyagers regarded as an expression of welcome. To the better-informed judgment of Manteo, however, the matter presented itself in a very different light. SIR FRANCIS DRAKE. they were prepared to fast the latter of those two days, rather than draw back a foot until they had seen the Indians, either as friends or foes. So they went on, sleeping at night on the shore, all along which, and far up into the countiy, the watch-fires of the savages were continually burning, though not a living soul was to be seen. On the evening of the second day after the cour ageous resolution of the little party, the voices of Indians were heard calling to them from the shore. Manteo, one of the natives who had been taken to England after the voyage of 1584, and who returned It was the terrible war-song that they had heard. Manteo seized his gun, assuring the English that the Indians meant to fight them. The next moment, a volley of arrows poured into one of the boats, but fortunately struck no one. A discharge of musketry from the English carried consternation among the savages, and, upon a detachment of the explorers landing on a steep bank, the enemy took to flight. After a brief pursuit, it was determined to encamp for the night, and early the following morning to return homeward. By the ensuing night they had arrived, by dint of hard rowing, within four or five 1586.] ATTEMPTS TO STARVE THE ENGLISH. 10 Mfunr.it (>: W.IITI. s ASSISTANT. 20 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1586, miles of the river s mouth. They were now living on the two dogs, and next day even this resource failed them. They had still to cross the Sound before they could reach Eoanoke Island; and unluckily the wind was so strong, and the sea so heavy, that they were delayed a whole day, during which they lived entirely on the leaves of the sassa fras-tree. This was upon Easter Eve, "which," says Lane in his interesting narrative, " was fasted very truly." On Easter Day the wind permitted them to set sail, and, having caught some fish in a weir belonging to the Indians, they were rescued from imminent death, though several of the com pany were far spent when, on the morning of Easter Monday, they reached the wished-for settle ment.* The exploration of Lane and his companions on this ill-starred voyage did not extend much higher up the river than a point near the present village of Williamstown. The attempt was an utter failure, and it had the disastrous result of establishing a feeling of suspicion and antagonism on both sides. The Indians now determined to leave their fields implanted, hoping to starve out the unwelcome strangei-s. This plan, however, was abandoned by the advice of an aged chief, and renewed courtesies in the matter of food were shown by the Indians to the English ; but the latter could not be convinced that there was not a plot to destroy them all. Cap tain Lane asserts (on the faith of statements made to him by two or three Indians in his interests) that the plan of the savages was to set fire to the reeds with which the huts of the colonists were thatched ; to do this in the dead of the night, and, as the alarmed dwellers rushed out in their shirts, to despatch them. As a means of facilitating the de sign, the English were to be deprived of their usual food-resources, so that they should be compelled to break up into small parties, searching for shell-fish, and camping where they could. To that extent the project was carried out, if we may rely on Lane s narrative. The weirs for fish were destroyed by the Indians, and it was resolved that no food should on any account be sold to the strangers. Hereupon the famine grew so extreme among the English that Lane was compelled to send Captain Stafford, with twenty men, to the island of Croatan, to feed him self and his company, and at the same time to keep watch if any shipping came towards the coast. Another small body he despatched with the pin nace to Cape Hatteras; and every week he sent sixteen or twenty of the rest of his company to the mainland, to live on casada and oysters. * Report of Captain Lane to Sir Walter Raleigh, in Hakluvt Vol. III. J Matters continued in this state for some time ; during which period, negotiations, marked appa rently by bad faith on both sides, were carried on between the savages and the colonists. In answer to a message from Lane, falsely stating that an English fleet had arrived in the roads, that he de sired to borrow some of the natives for fishing and hunting, and that he would like to purchase some provisions, Pemisapan sent word that he would go over to Roanoke and meet the English ; but when Lane discovered that he was coming with a large assembly, he determined to anticipate the visit. Shortly afterwards, the settlers, while seizing some canoes belonging to the natives, in order to prevent their having communication with the continent, cut off the heads of two of the savages, and subsequently, in a brief skirmish, shot three or four of them. Lane and some of his companions went on the fol lowing morning (June 1st) to a place on the mainland, and requested an interview with the king. This was granted ; and the English, being in much greater force than the Indians, who did not count more than about eight or nine, suddenly fell on them at a preconcerted signal which consisted of the words " Christ our victory ! " and slaugh tered all. It is difficult to judge with certainty how far the allegations brought by the English against the Indians were true, and how far exaggerated. Doubtless, the natives were very desirous of getting rid of strangers whose superior powers they had every reason to dread. They regarded the colonists with a superstitious fear, counting them either as gods, or as men risen from the grave, who brought with them the secrets of a mysterious and awful world. The inexplicable character of the European fire-arms appalled these warriors of the bow-and- arrow. They persuaded themselves that the English could shoot people at the distance of a hundred miles ; that they filled the very air with pestilence and death ; and that their object was to exterminate the aborigines, and take their places. Possessed by these ideas, which, extravagant as they were, had some degree of foundation, the Indians undoubtedly looked upon the white men with disfavour. The friendship of the savages soon grew capricious, and it is possible they harboured a design of massacre. Yet, upon the whole, their conduct, bad as it was in some respects, was better than that of the English settlers. "With more considerate treatment, their first impulses of kind ness might have been confirmed, and fair dealing have made allies where violence and craft found only foes. At any rate, nothing can excuse the treachery of the attack on Pemisapan and his 1586.] ABANDONMENT OF THE COLONY. 21 companions, at a time when they were giving proof of entire confidence in the good faith of the strangers. Besides, it should never be forgotten that in all such matters the blame lies more with those who invade a territory where their presence was never required, than, with those who defend what from time immemorial they have possessed.* After the perpetration of this massacre, Lane seems to have retired to Roanoke Island, where, on the 8th of June, word came to him from Captain Stafford, who was still on the island of Croatan, that a great fleet of three-and-twenty sail was discernible on the outer seas, but whether _it belonged to friends or foes he as yet knew not. On the 9th, Captain Stafford himself arrived at Roanoke, with the welcome information that the ships were English, being no other than the fleet of Sir Francis Drake, who was returning from a suc cessful expedition against the Spaniards in the West Indies. Drake cast anchor, on the 10th, in the roadstead of the harbour, and offered to do all in his power to assist the distressed colonists. After conference with Lane, he undertook to supply him with a bark of seventy tons, two pinnaces, four small boats, provisions for a hundred men to last four months, and two of the most experienced masters in. his fleet, who were to remain with the colony, and assist in the work of exploration. Unfortunately, a great storm arose, lasting from the 1 3th to the 1 Gth of June, which scattered the fleet and deprived Lane of the expected assistance. Drake, returning after the tempest had spent itself, made fresh offers for supplying the necessities of the colony, and enabling it to continue its work ; but the adventurers were out of heart, doubtful of the future, and desirous of home. They therefore requested to be conveyed to England ; and on the 19th of June all set sail for Portsmouth, w r here they arrived on the 27th of July, 1586. Only a few days later, a ship containing supplies, which Sir Walter Raleigh had promised to send by the spring, but which was not ready to start until after Easter, arrived at the settlement, and found all abandoned. The mariners spent some time search ing for their countrymen on the mainland, but, not * In the days of Queen Elizabeth, when there was no Aborigines Protection Society, the rights of feeble races were not so tenderly looked after as they are now ; but even at that time the conduct of Lane and his comrades found some severe impugners. Hakluyt, describing the embarkation of the colonists on board Sir Francis Drake s fleet (Vol. III., p. 323, cd. 1810), says : "For feare they should be left behinde, they left all things confusedly, as if they had been chased from thence by a mighty army : and no doubt so they were ; for the hand of God came upon them for the cruelty and outrages com mitted 1 y some of them against the native inhabitants of that coiiutrcy." finding them, returned to England. In another fortnight, Sir Richard Grenville appeared off the coast with three well-appointed ships, and, after seeking for the vanished colony, left fifteen men on the island of Roanoke, furnished with stores for a couple of years, that the possession of the country might still be retained for Queen Elizabeth. This garrison, if it can be so called, was far too small, and the wretched men were soon overcome by the Indians, and killed. Lane, on his return to England, introduced the Indian practice of smoking tobacco, which spread with extraordinary rapidity, as it had already done among the Spaniards and Portuguese. As an ex plorer, Lane had not done much. To the south, as we have seen, his discoveries extended to Secotan ; to the north, they were bounded by the small river Elizabeth, which flows into Chesapeake Bay below Norfolk, Virginia; while, in the interior, the Chowan had been examined beyond the jiinction of the Meherrin and the Nottaway.t This was biit little, yet it was something. The settlers, moreover, had by their sojourn in the laud acquainted themselves with most of its qualities. The report by Harriot is an admirable accoiuit of the country, its products, its climate, and its native population. The writer gives a veiy high idea of the capabilities of Virginia, and is eloquent as to the fertility of the soil and healthfulness of the air. The ground was never manured, and was cultivated in the rudest fashion ; yet it appeared amazingly fruitful. The climate was so excellent that, notwithstanding the hardships the colonists were often compelled to endure the change of temperature and of food, frequent deprivation, and occasional camping out in the open air, even in winter the number of deaths, during the whole year of their stay, was not more than four out of a party of a hundred and eight. Of these four, all were feeble and sickly before they left England ; and the wonder to Harriot was that they had lived so long. The account of Virginia furnished by the colonists to Sir Walter Raleigh was such as to encourage that enterprising speculator to make another attempt. The faults of the previous expedition were now apparent, and could bo guarded against. It was true that the Indians were not to be relied on, and that their hostility had resulted in very serious disaster ; but the country itself was a prize worth Avinning. Raleigh, therefore, determined on an effort of a more elabo rate character. This time the male emigrants t Bancroft s History of the United States, Vol. I., chap. 3. CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1587. should be accompanied by their wives and children, and a real colony, not merely a settlement of explorers, should be formed. To the community thus about to be created, Sir Walter granted a charter of incorporation, and at the same time established a municipal government for a contem plated city, Avhich was to be called after the great adventurer himself. The Governor was to be one John "White, and under him were placed twelve assistants. The fleet of transport ships consisted of three vessels, all fitted out at the charge of Raleigh, for the Queen declined to bear any portion of the expense. Implements of husbandry were supplied to the emigrants ; and when the ships set sail from Portsmouth, on the 26th of April, 1587, it might well have seemed that fortunate days were in store for the party. They arrived oif the coast of North Carolina in July, and, on reaching Roanoke Island, made search for the fifteen men left there the year before by Sir Richard Grenville. But all was desolate and solitary. A few human bones lay scattered about, and, at the north end of the island, the fort erected by Lane was found levelled with the earth. The dwelling-houses of his men were still standing ; but the lower rooms were overgrown with melons, already springing up in rank luxuriance under the enchantment of that exquisite climate ; and deer were couched within, feeding on the fruit which there were no hands to gather. This was far from an encouraging commencement ; but the colonists set to work repairing the houses and building new ones. They had not been there many days when one of the twelve assistants of Governor White was slain by a party of savages who came over to Roanoke, and, hiding themselves among the tell reeds on the shore, transfixed the poor Englishman (who was alone, and two miles away from his comrades) with sixteen arrows, and then beat in his head with clubs. A good under standing was for a time established between the settlers and a certain tribe of Indians connected with Manteo; and it was agreed that the latter should wear a particular badge, to distinguish them from the tribes against which the English had grievances. But the distinction proved to be in sufficient, or was not properly observed ; for on one occasion the colonists, desiring to revenge them selves on the savages who had murdered the Englishmen left by Sir Richard Grenville, fell upon a company of the friendly natives, as they were sitting at night by their fires, and slaughtered at least one before the mistake was discovered. Not withstanding- these unhappy incidents, some ap proach was made towards organising a civilised state of society. Manteo, by the express direction of Sir Walter Raleigh, received Christian baptism, and was created a feudal baron, with the title of Lord of Roanoke. The colonists settled down in their houses, as far as the Indians would permit them to do so, and on the 18th of August the first child of English parents ever born in America drew its earliest breath. The mother was Mistress Eleanor Dare, daughter of Governor White, and wife of one of his assistant counsellors. The infant, which was a girl, was christened Virginia, after the country of her birth. A second child was born to the colonists shortly afterwards, and the community now consisted of ninety men, seventeen women, eleven children (including the two born there), and two friendly Indians Manteo and another. But the affairs of the colony did not prosper. Raleigh had directed that the settlement should be made in Chesapeake Bay, considerably to the north of Pamlico Sound ; but the chief naval officer of the fleet, a man with the foreign name of Ferdinando, who seems to have acted throughout in a treacherous and underhand way, refused his assistance in ex ploring the coasts, being desirous to depart with the largest of the ships for the West Indies, on one of those expeditions which had much the character of buccaneering. White was therefore compelled to remain at Roanoke. When the time arrived for the return of the other two ships to England, the Governor was urgently requested to go back in one of them, and obtain further supplies; which he ultimately consented to do, though reluctant to leave the infant colony at so early a date. Shortly after his arrival in England, in November, 1587, the country became so agitated by the threatened Spanish invasion as to feel little disposition to consider schemes of colonisation. Nevertheless, Raleigh, in spite of the preoccupation of his mind by the national plans of resistance to the Armada, in which he was largely concerned, managed to fit out two vessels with necessaries for the colony. In charge of these, White once more set his face to the West; but during the outward passage the ships were tempted, according to the fashion of those days, to go in chase of prizes, and one of them, after a des perate battle Avith men-of-war from Roche! le, was boarded and rifled. Both ships were obliged to put back to England, and Raleigh, though greatly dis pleased at the result, was unable at the time to do anything more for the settlers. This was in 1588, the year of the Armada. In the following year, Raleigh made over his Virginian patent, with some reservations, to a company of merchants; being unable, after an expenditure of 40,000 out of his own purse, to prosecute the scheme any further. 1587.] FATE OF THE SETTLERS OF 1587. 23 Amongst these new adventurers was Richard Hak- luyt, to whose enthusiasm on behalf of maritime discovery we owe that interesting and valuable collection of early English voyages which goes by his name. A fifth part of all the gold and silver ore raised in Virginia was reserved by Raleigh to himself; but in other respects the speculation was transferred to the company, In 1590, White made another attempt to relieve the settlers left at Roanoke ; but on arriving at that island he found, by an inscription on a tree, that the colony had removed to Croatan. Thither he set sail, and would probably have reached the spot, had not A -violent storm induced the commander to put back to Europe. A singular fatality attended all these early efforts for the colonisation of America. Mis management, cupidity, bad faith, and insufficient resources, conspired with the rage of the elements, the cruelty of the Indians, and the distraction of the public mind at home, to ruin a project which at first promised well. Over the ultimate fate of the colonists sent out in 1587 hangs a cloud of mystery, through the obscurity of which we can dimly discern the outlines of a tragic catastrophe. The settlers were never heard of more. Either they were murdered by the Indians, or they perished of hunger ; unless we adopt the suggestion of an American writer, that these deserted English men, with their wives and children, coalesced with the Hatteras Indians, and adopted their mode of life. This, it appears, was the tradition of the tribe at a subsequent period, and it is said that something of the English type of physiognomy was long observable among the members of that body. But in such a case it seems strange that none of the settlers should have been found, or even heard of as living, when Virginia Avas again colonised, twenty years after the attempt of White and his companions. Raleigh has sometimes been charged with neg lecting thci unfortunate men whom he had trans planted to a distant and savage land ; but the accusation does not serin just. Purchas, the compiler of two collections of voyages similar to Hakluyt s, says that Sir Walter made five attempts, at his own expense, to discover and rescue the fellow- colonists of Governor White. In 1595, on his return from Guiana, Raleigh intended to go in search of them, but was driven from the coast by stress of weather ; and as late as 1 602 he despatched thither Samuel Mace, mariner, of Weymouth, with no result. The end of the settlers must for ever remain an uncertainty ; but that it was violent and terrible seems only too likely. The celebrated chieftain Powhatan. afterwards told Captain Smith, whose romantic adventures we shall shortly have occasion to relate, that he was present at tho murder of the colonists ; and he showed him certain articles which had been theirs. William Strachey, one of the settlers of King James s reign, records that the Englishmen were slaughtered by Powhatan after having for many years " peaceably lived in termixed " with the savages. But, whatever their fate, the story of this desperate attempt at colonisa tion must always possess a melancholy and romantic interest, both for Englishmen and their descendants in the New World. The almost deserted island of Roaiioke, where now are to be found only a few pilots and wreckers men rugged with constant subjection to the fiercest moods of Nature will remain through countless ages a place of pilgrimage for all who would trace the planting of English nationality in the great Republic of the West. The ruins of the fort erected by Lane are yet visible ; and, by the spell of imagination and sympathy, tho visitor may repeople the waste land with those settlers from afar who marvelled at the great cedars a,ncl the rich vegetation, the Bacchanal prodigality of the vines, and the flashing movements of the snow-wliite birds. But the colonising of English America was the work of others ; and the genius of Raleigh, which conceived the design, was not destined to effect its fulfilment. None the less, however, must we regard him as its author ; and when, the Legislature of North Carolina, in 1792, determined that the capital of the State should be called by the name of Raleigh, they did no more than justice; to one of tho greatest intellects of a great age a man, doubtless, with many moral blemishes on his public life, but one whose dominant mind was large enough to embrace two hemispheres, and prescient enough to anticipate the work of ages then unborn. 24 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1603. VIEW ON THE COAST OF FLORIDA. CHAPTER IV. English Colonising of America again suspended Voyage of Bartholomew Gosnold across the Atlantic Discovery of Cape Cod- Characteristics of that .Region Temporary Settlement on Elizabeth Island Revival of Schemes of American Colonisation in the early years of James s Reign Poverty of the Working Classes in England Poetical Prophecies of the Greatness of the United States Richard Hakluyt Charter granted to two Companies (1GOG) for Settling in America Terms and General Character of the Charter Despatch of Three Vessels with Emigrants Bacon on " Plantations "Discovery of the Bay of Chesapeake Foundation of James Town Dissensions in the Ruling Council Failure of Food Terrible Pestilence among the Colonists Death of Gosnold Captain John Smith invested with Special Powers Romantic Career of that Adventurer His Vigorous Conduct in Virginia Remarks on the Treatment of Aboriginal Races by European Nations. SOME years elapsed before renewed attempts were made by Englishmen to obtain a permanent position on the North-American continent. The company of merchants formed by Sir Walter Raleigh for prosecuting the Virginian scheme, confined their operations to carrying on a petty traffic with the natives in such articles of commerce as the country yielded, and took no steps towards establishing a colony an enterprise which previous misadventures not unnaturally discouraged. "Thus," says Robert son, "after a period of a hundred and six years from the time that Cabot discovered North America, in the reign of Henry VII., and of twenty years from the time that Raleigh planted the first colony, there was not a single Englishman settled there at the demise of Queen Elizabeth, in the year 1G03."* This was partly owing to untoward circumstances, such as could hardly have been avoided without the help of previous experience, but more to the want of sufficient means for prosecuting such vast under takings. In our days it is an accepted truth that the colonisation of new regions must be aided by the State, while in the sixteenth century it was left entirely in private hands. Elizabeth would grant nothing out of the public funds towards the forma tion of new English communities in America, The * History of America, Book IX. 1602.] DISCOVERY OF CAPE COD. 25 consequences were, that the colonies sent out were too small to cope successfully with the difficulties by which they were surrounded, and that they languished and died for want of due assistance. From 1590 to 1602, little was done in the way of American exploration ; but in the latter year, ever touched the soil of what is now Xew England. Cape Cod has been described by a recent American author as "the bared and bended arm of Massa chusetts," of which " the shoulder is at Buzzard s Bay, the elbow at Cape Mallebarre, the wrist at Truro, and the sandy fist at Provincetown."* The CAPTAIN SMITH. (From the portrait in his "Virginia") very near the end of Elizabeth s reign, a voyage undertaken by Bartholomew Gosnold was attended by important results. This bold navigator sailed, as nearly as the winds would permit, due west across the Atlantic, instead of going in a south westerly direction, and in seven weeks reached the Bay of Massachusetts. Turning then to the south, for want of a good harboiir, he discovered a promon tory which he called Cape Cod, from the abundance of cod-fish which he found there. On this rocky point, he and four of his men landed on the 14th of May ; and they were the first Englishmen who land is for the most part desolate and uncultivated, though dotted here and there with widely-separated towns and villages, small in size, and inhabited by a hardy and humlle population. Wild and sandy plains are succeeded by sterile hills, intersected by ravines of rock. In some parts, nothing will grow but a species of grass which the inhabitants call " poverty-grass." Along the savage and dangerous coast, bleak beyond expression in winter, and at no season of the year vary inviting, stand the solitary * Cape Cod. by Henry D. Thoreau, 1865. 26 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1609. lighthouses which hold their warning beacons out to sea, and the lonely huts that serve as dwellings for the pilots, fishermen, and sailors of that mari time land. Talk with these men, and they will tell you of nothing but storms, shipwrecks, and mar vellous escapes the perils of the great deep, or the feats of daring and heroic self-devotion by which men rescue their fellows from the fury of the winds and waves. It is here that the rugged Scandinavians of Norway and Iceland are said to have come in the tenth century ; but, whether or not they really reached Cape Cod, it is certain that this particular part of the American coast was not generally known to Europe until the voyage of Bartholomew Gosnold in 1602. On returning to his vessel, Gosnold pursued his course in a south-westerly direction, and touched at two islands, to one of which he gave the name of Martha s Vineyard, and to the other that of Eliza betha designation now applied to the whole group of islands in that vicinity. He next visited the continent, and traded with the Indian inhabitants. The savage character of Cape Cod had given place to softer and richer scenery. Magnificent forests clothed the shores ; delicate flowers sprang forth in abundance, recalling the fairest blooms of the old country ; and strawberries, raspberries, and grapes gave promise of a fruitful land. The commander and his fellows took up their residence on an islet in the midst of a small lake in Elizabeth Island. They built themselves a storehouse and a fort, and, thus entrenched, carried on their traffic with a sense of security. It was originally intended by Gosnold to leave a small colony on this islet, while he him self returned to England ; but the natives in a little while ceased to be friendly, and the small party of Englishmen, fearing an assault by the savages, and being doubtful whether there would not be a failure in the food-supplies, refused to remain. Accordingly all returned to England, which they reached in. five weeks, after an absence of about four months, and a stay in Massachusetts of little more than one month. Several other voyages to the north-eastern shores of America followed in rapid succession in the early years of King James s reign, and resulted in the discovery of many new portions of the continent. The attractive description of Massachusetts given by the original explorers was fully confirmed ; and the great shortening of the voyage between England and America, effected by the more direct route first followed by Gosnold, considerably mitigated the reluctance of untravelled Englishmen to quit their country for the western world. Schemes of colon isation began once more to be formed. The pacific policy of James I. threw a number of active and adventurous spirits out of employ. Rough soldiers, who had seen active service in Ireland and the Netherlands, found themselves suddenly deprived of means ; and the favouritism of the monarch, extended chiefly to his own countrymen, disgusted a large number of the English gentry. Writers for the stage took up the great question of the day, and vaunted the attractions of Virginia in a tone half playful, half serious. In. " Eastward Ho ! " a comedy by Chapman, Ben Jonson, and Marston, first published in 1605 some of the characters are introduced talking in a London tavern about the land that had been christened after Queen Elizabeth. A roysterer tells his companions that there is a whole country of English there, descended from the earlier colonists, who had married with the Indians ; that the latter had given up to them all their treasure ; that gold was more plentiful than copper in England ; that the very prisoners were fettered in gold ; and that rubies and diamonds were gathered on the sea-shore, to stick on the coats and caps of children. The clergy advocated emi gration as a means of converting the heathen ; and many thoughtful observers favoured the transplanta tion of some part of the English race, on the ground that the pressure was too great at home. Even in that age, England had a larger population than she could well support out of existing resources. We are apt to think of the tyranny of capital, the fierce eagerness of competition, and the painful contrasts of excessive wealth and extreme poverty, as charac teristics of comparatively recent times ; but the disease existed even in the reign of James I. Although the population of England and Wales at the beginning of the seventeenth century must have been under five millions, while it is now nearly twenty-four millions, the pressure on the means of life was relatively as great at that period as in the present, or probably greater. Some remarkable evidence of this is to be found in a sermon by William Symonds, preacher of St. Saviour s in Southwark, delivered on the 25th of April, 1609, at Whiteehapel, before " the adventurers for the plantation of Vii-ginia." The great object of this sermon was to impress on the congregation the miserable state of many Englishmen, and the ne cessity of seeking relief by emigration. The people, said the preacher, swarmed in the land, so that there was hardly room for one man to live by another. The mightier thrust the weaker out of their hives. Great lords of manors had converted populous townships into sheep-walks. The labour ing husbandman, who had formerly employed many poor, and paid more taxes for his small proportion 1622.J PROJECTS OF COLONISATION. 27 of earth than his landlord paid for ten times as much, could hardly escape the statute against rogxies and vagrants. The landowner had got the soil of the country into his possession, and sold his produce at such a price that the people would have starved had not "the honest and Christian merchant" (we have seen that Drayton denounced the merchant as " grippH" or grasping) imported corn, for which he had "many a bitter curse of the cursed corn- mongers." The rich shopkeeper had the poor labourer at such advantage that he could grind his face when he pleased. The mechanic worked his bones out, and could barely keep himself from the alms-box. The poor woman toiled at her needle early and late, " often deluding the bitterness of her life with sweet songs, that she singeth to a heavy heart " yet at the end of the week she could scarcely earn salt to her water-gruel. Therefore did worthy Master Symonds exhort honest labourers, who brought all the honey to the hive, to take the opportunity which offered, of bettering their fortunes in Virginia. In a similar strain, the Rev. Patrick Copland preached at Bow Church, on the 18th of April, 1622, a sermon in aid of Virginian colonisa tion, in which he said that many starved daily in. the streets of London, and that he had heard several of the best labourers of the city bemoan, with tears in their eyes, the desolate state of their wives and children, for whom, with their utmost exertion, they could hardly obtain the barest necessaries ; " and all because work is so hard to be come by, and there be so many of the same trade that they cannot thrive one for another."* Men had been taught by the great success of Spain to seek a natural outlet for their cooped-up energies in the virgin lands of America. Sir Walter Raleigh s voyage to Guiana in 1595, and the allur ing account of that land which he published the following year, fired the popular imagination with dreams of empire and riches, not to be paralleled but in a fairy tale. " Sail like my pinnace to these golden shores," exclaims Sir John Falstaff in " The Merry Wives of Windsor," deriving his metaphor from the recent explorations of Raleigh in the country of El Dorado. Shakespeare s contemporary, Samuel Daniel a writer whose powers of thought were stronger than * Both these sermons are quoted at considerable length in " The English Colonisation of America during the Seventeenth Century," by Edward D. Neill, United States Consul at Dublin (1871) a work of interest and value, supplying the omissions and correcting the errors of previous American historians, by a reference to the manuscript transactions of the London Com pany of Virginian Adventurers, and other documents before passed over. his fancy contemplated America with a prophetic glance, and in some striking lines anticipated the vast expansion of the English race on the further side of the Atlantic. He asks : "\Vlio, in time, knows whither we may vent The treasure of our tongue ? To what strange shores This gain of our best glory shall be sent, T enrich unknowing nations with our stores ? What worlds in the yet unformed Occident May come refined with the accents that are ours?"f In a similar spirit, Shakespeare, in "Henry VIII." (Act V., sc. 4), makes Cranmer, at the christening of the infant Elizabeth, predict the coming of James I., and say of him : " Wherever the bright sun of heaven shall shine, His honour, and the greatness of his name, Shall be, and make new nations. He shall flourish, And, like a mountain cedar, reach his branches To all the plains about him." Other authors of the time wrote in the same vein, and Dr. Donne, Dean of St. Paul s, said in a sei mon to the Vii-ginia Company : " You shall have made this island, which is but as the suburbs of the Old World, a bridge, a gallery, to the New, to join all to that world that shall never grow old, the kingdom of Heaven." The sentiments thus expressed must have been strongly felt by Richard Hakluyt, who, though a clergyman, seems to have given his chief attention to the encouragement of maritime enterprise and colonisation. His first production was a small set of " Voyages and Discoveries," issued in 1582 ; and his better-known work of the same nature appeared in 1589, 1599, and 1GOO. He also translated books of travel from foreign authors, and, as we have seen, was one of the company formed by Raleigh for carrying on the plantation of Virginia. Such was his repute in these matters that he was frequently consulted by Elizabeth s ministers with regard to the establishing of colonies, and he corresponded with the officers of the various expeditions, whom he aided by his counsel and his scientific knowledge This energetic Londoner, whose thoughts Avere as much upon the ocean, and in the strange places beyond the main, as if he had been a native of f From the poem entitled "Musophilus: containing a General Defence of Learning " first published in 1599. Daniel was a man in whom the feeling of nationality was very strongly developed. The growing prospects of the English race in those days form frequent subjects of allusion in his poems. In his "Panegyric Congratulatory," addressed to James I. on his accession to the united thrones, he says : " The pulse of England never more did beat So strong as now ; nor ever were our hearts Let out to hopes so spacious and so great As now they are." 28 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1606. some sea-washed town, died in 1616, at the age of sixty-three ; and, though he had been so long endeavouring to advance his favourite views, he only just saw the beginning of a lasting English settlement in America. Towards that settlement lie contributed largely ; and at the present day we think of him, not as a prebendary of Westminster, but as a citizen of the world, who promoted the intercourse of nations, and helped to found the United States. His grave in Westminster Abbey should be a place of interest to all Americans in England. To two distinct associations of speculators, James I., in the year 1606, granted a charter authorising them to settle in Virginia. But the territory was previously divided into two nearly equal portions : one called the first or south colony ; the other, the second or north colony. It was in the first that the association of which Hakluyt was a member, and which consisted of persons chiefly resident in London, was to carry on its experiment. The second district was allotted to certain knights, gentlemen, and merchants of Bristol, Plymouth, and other towns in the West of England. The conditions of tenure in. each case Avere homage and rent ; and the rent was to consist of one-fifth of the net produce of gold and silver, and one- fifteenth of copper. To the settlers was conceded the right of coining money. The government of both the colonies to be thus created was vested in a council resident in the parent country, to be named by the King according to such laws and ordinances as should be given under his sign manual ; and the subordinate jurisdiction in each settlement was committed to a council resident in America, which might likewise be nominated by the King, and which was to act conformably to his instructions. The emigrants and their descen dants were to enjoy all the rights of denizens, as much as if they had remained or been bom in England ; and they were to hold their lands in America by the most free and least burdensome tenure. Whatever was necessary to the sustenance or commerce of the new colonies was to be exported from England, during the space of seven years, without paying any duty. Moreover, the colonists were to have liberty of trade with other nations ; and, finally, a duty to be levied on foreign com modities entering the harbours of the two Virginias was, for twenty-one years, to be made over to the infant communities for their exclusive benefit. At the close of that period, the duty was to be appro priated by the King. The lands which by this charter were assigned to the two companies extended from Cape Fear in the south to Halifax in the north, with the excep tion, probably, of the part called Acadia, then in actual possession of the French. The London Company had an exclusive right to occupy the regions from the thirty-fourth to the thirty-eighth degrees of north latitude, of which the northern boundary was the south of Maryland. The other body of adventurers were free to colonise between the forty -first and the forty-fifth degrees, including the whole of the present New England States. The intermediate district was open to both Companies ; but the proviso that each was to possess the soil for fifty miles north and south of its first settlement, acted as a safeguard against collisions. The most questionable element in this charter was the arbitrary nature of the government appointed for the colonies. The emigrants were to be without the slightest voice in the management of their own affairs. They were to be ruled by a council resident in England, and by sub-councils resident in America, the members of which were to be nominees of the throne; and, in general terms, the King reserved to himself supreme authority over the settlements, in every particular. A constitution so framed must in time have led to abuses and to tyranny ; and it is a singular com ment on the state of political opinion in England in that age, that the terms imposed by the King should apparently have met with not the least objection. It is possible, however, that such a mode of rule may have been the best adapted for the early days of a colony, especially in times when representative government was not under stood. This remarkable charter bears date the 10th of April, 1606; but the expedition did not immediately start. The patentees spent some months in making preparations, and in the meanwhile James I., by a stretch of the Royal prerogative which has been questioned as illegal, framed a code of laws for the new colonies. The superior council at home was permitted to name the local councils. The religion was to be that of the Church of England. No emigrant was allowed to withdraw his allegiance from the British Crown, or in any way to dissent from the established creed. Lands were to descend according to the common law of England. Death was to be the punishment for murder, manslaughter, adultery, dangerous tumults, and political seditions; bxit against extreme exercises of power, the colo nist, as in his native country, had the protection of trial by jury. Civil causes entailing corporal punishment, fine, or imprisonment might be sum marily dealt with by the president and council. The Indians were to be converted by all proper 1606.] BACON ON PLANTATIONS. 29 means, but at the same time were to be treated with kindness. The industry and commerce of the respective colonies were, for five years at least, to be conducted in a joint stock ; and all future legislation was to be the exclusive right of the King. Under these regulations, three vessels (of which the largest did not exceed 100 tons burden) .set sail from England on the 19th of December, 1606, carrying one hundred and five emigrants, belonging to the London Company, for settlement in Virginia. This was an extremely small number for so large ail undertaking ; but the speculators seem to have wanted means for doing more. Amongst the emigrants were a brother of the Earl of Northumberland, and several officers who had served under Elizabeth. But the men move especially required for the rough work of colonising were present in but spare numbers. Of labourers there were only twelve ; of mechanics very few. The men were not accompanied by their wives and families ; and the first essentials of a prosperous new community were absent. When Bacon, several years later, wrote his essay " Of Plantations," he gave some excellent advice as to the proper ordering of a colony, which it would have been well if the adventurers of 1606 could at that time have read. " The people wherewith you plant," he observes, " ought to be gardeners, ploughmen, labourers, smiths, carpenters, joiners, fishermen, fowlers, with some few apothecaries, surgeons, cooks, and bakers." Bacon evidently thought the mere dilettante or fine gentleman adventurer a superfluous being in such under takings ; though he preferred that the governing body should consist of noblemen, rather than of merchants, " for they look ever to the present gain." He gives it as his opinion that "the base and hasty drawing of profit in the first years " had been the destruction of most plantations ; and he re commends that there be freedom from custom till the plantation be of strength, " and not only freedom from custom, but freedom to" carry their commodities where they may make their best of them, except there be some special cause of caution." In other respects, also, his counsel is admirable. " Moil not too much underground, for the hope of mines is very uncertain, and useth to make the planters lazy in other things." " Cram not in people, by sending too fast company after company; but rather hearken how they waste, and send supplies proportionally ; but so as the number may live well in the plantation, and not by surcharge be in penury." " If you plant where savages are, do not only entertain them with trifles and gingles, but use them justly and graciously, with sufficient guard nevertheless ; and do not win their favour by helping them to invade their enemies, but for their defence it is not amiss." It is probable that in some important respects Bacon approved of the charter granted by King James to the new Virginia Companies. His instincts were despotic, and he would have had colonies governed by martial law, "with some limitation." He was also in favour of sending out none but men in the first instance. "When the plantation grows to strength, then it is time to plant with women as well as with men; that the plantation may spread into generations, and not be ever pieced from without." His final words convey a serious reproach, the application of which it is not difficult to guess. " It is the sinfullest thing in the world," he exclaims, " to forsake or destitute a plantation once in forwardness; for, besides the dishonour, it is the guiltiness of blood of many commiserable persons." Who can doubt that, when he wrote this, Bacon was thinking of the culpable apathy of Queen Elizabeth s Government with respect to the unhappy men, women, and children left by Governor White at Eoanoke in 1587? The expedition of 1606 was under the command of Captain Newport, who, neglecting the more ex peditious route discovered by Gosnold, sailed by the circuitous course of the Canaries and the West India Islands, and consequently did not reach the coast of North America until four months had elapsed. The voyage promised ill for the future colony; for the instructions to the Provincial Council, and even the names of the councillors, had by the orders of the King been enclosed in a box, which was not to be opened until after the arrival of the expedition in Virginia. The motive for this vexatious concealment it is impossible to divine. Jealousies and dissensions sprang up amongst the emigrants, and no one was in a position of sufficient power to repress them. Nevertheless, a fortunate circumstance occurred towards the latter end of the passage. A violent storm drove the three vessels to the north of Roanoke, and, passing two pro montories, to which the names of Cape Henry and Cape Charles were given, in honour of the King s sons, they entered the bay of the Chesapeake, towards the end of April, 1607. The magnificence of that vast natural basin, receiving the waters of many great rivers, and offering the most admirable harbours for shipping, greatly impressed the voyagers ; and the appearance of the surrounding country was such that it seemed to be one of the chosen spots, for utility and delightfulness, of all the world. Sailing along the southern extremity 30 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1607. of this bay, Newport entered a river called by the natives Powhatan, but by the English redesignated James River. They continued up the stream for about forty or fifty miles from its mouth, and at length determined that here would be the best locality for their projected settlement. Having accordingly landed, they explored the country for seventeen days, during which they had a slight hostile en counter with one of _ . the smallest of the Indian tribes, but were otherwise not molested. The few rough houses of wood which they began to build, and which were situated on a peninsula con nected with the north bank of the liver, received the name of James Town; and this was the first city of English origin ever established in America. It re mained the chief seat of the colonial government of Vir ginia until the latter part of the last century, and was at one time a place of considerable size and importance ; but in more recent days it was abandoned, and not a house now remains. The United States are so wanting in places of old historic interest, that the loss of this particular town is to be regretted. The Royal deed containing the names of the Provincial Council, and the instructions for their guidance, was opened the day after the landing of the emigrants. The Council, after being duly constituted, chose for their president a West of England merchant of good family, named Edward Maria Wingfield. Their next act was one of which the reasons and motives are not very apparent. They excluded from the legislative body one of their number, with respect to whom a feeling of jealousy prevailed. The person so stigmatised was TOWHATAN" ffy t finfr &. fii/ltiim -.i /ief? CyF Sntif/i : d&iltftwte POWHATAN IN STATE. (From Smith s " Virginia." ] Captain John Smith, a promoter of the London Company, and afterwards a distinguished hero of Anglo-American adventure. Smith was accused of sedition, and subjected to the indignity of being watched. It is said that he contemplated a mutiny at sea ; but the facts are not clear. His colleagues proposed to bring him to trial an intention which was ultimately abandoned, and, by the per suasions of Robert Hunt (an excellent clergyman attached to the expedition), Smith was restored to his former rank. In May he accom panied Captain Newport and twenty others in an ascent of the James River as far as the falls near the present city of Richmond, where the explorers had an interview with the chief Powhatan, who, dissembling his dislike of the strangers, received them in a friendly manner. The day before their return, however, two hundred savages attacked the settle ment, and, in repel ling their assault, Wingfield displayed great bi*avery. On the 22nd of June, Newport set sail for England. He left the colony in a state which threatened the worst results. The Indians made continual attacks on the settlers ; and although, owing to the small num bers of each tribe, and their own internecine feuds, they could not inflict the most serious disasters, they were capable of causing 110 little annoyance and alarm. What was of nuich graver consequence was the discovery that the store of provisions, left for the subsistence of the colonists on the departure of the three vessels, was insufficient in quantity and bad in quality. It was found necessary to put the whole body on short rations ; and the want of proper nourishment, combined with 1507.] HARDSHIPS OF THE COLONISTS. 31 POCAHONTAS SAVES CAVTAIX SMITH S LIl E. 33 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1607. other influences, brought on a deadly epidemic. The heat of the climate was intolerable to English men unprovided with shelter, and compelled to labour at the cutting down of timber and the con struction of temporary houses. The vast and melancholy forest, cloud-like, impenetrable, myste rious, full of lurking possibilities of danger, full of strange noises, and stealthy movements, and inexplic able shadows, spread around them. The country which had looked so inviting from the deck of a ship bscame mournful and ominous on a closer inspection. The men grew depressed and homesick. Their drink was unwholesome water ; their food, a small dole of humble fare (consisting for the most part of bran), such as the authorities could afford to serve out from the resources of their scanty stock. They would probably have perished to a man, had not the Indians from time to time voluntarily relieved them with provisions a fact which should always be recollected to the credit of that oppressed race. The humidity of the air, caused by the rank luxu riance of wood that covered the whole face of the land, added to the unhealthy conditions from which the white men were suffering. In less than a fort night after the departure of the fleet, hardly ten of the number were able to stand. The fort which had been hastily erected resounded night and day with the groans of the afflicted. Many died during the hours of darkness, and in the morning their bodies were dragged out of the miserable cabins where they lay, and buried in the quickest and most unceremonious manner. George Percy, one of the survivors, who relates these particulars in a narrative to be found in Purchas s " Pilgrims " (Book IX., chap. 2), says that these unfortunate men died for the most part " of mere famine," though some succumbed to violent attacks of disease. " We watched every three nights," says the same authority, " lying on the bare, cold ground, what weather soever came ; which brought our men to be most feeble wretches." The bulwarks of the fort were left almost entirely unguarded, for at no time during the pestilence could so many as five hale soldiers be got to man them. No crops could be planted, for want of hands ; the necessary works of the colony were at a standstill while the little party of emigrants were fighting for life. Nearly half the entire colony died in this grim struggle, and among those who thus perished was the bravo and enterprising Gosnold, one of the originators and animating spirits of the expedition. As the summer advanced, the dissensions existing in the Council reached their climax in the deposi tion of Wingfield from the presidency, on charges of misappropriating the chief stores, and meditating an escape to the West Indies. He was for a time imprisoned on board the pinnace, but whether justly or not it seems now impossible to determine. In the defence of his conduct which he afterwards sub mitted to the London Company, Wingfield asserts that the opposition of the others was owing to his refusing them a larger daily allowance of food, which he saw the slenderness of the stores could not afford, and to their desire to feast on the sack and aqua vitre which he had reserved for the sick, and for sacramental purposes. Whichever side spoke the truth, one thing is certain that the highest degree of rancour prevailed among the leading men of the settlement. Smith lost no opportunity of vilifying Wingfield, and Wingfield gave Smith the lie to his face, and afterwards told the London Company that it was proved " he begged in Ireland, like a rogue, without a licence." Another president, named Ratcliffe, proved a failure, and he was glad to confer a kind of dictator ship on Smith, who had preserved his health during the sharpest visitations of disease, and whose fertility of resource, calm self-reliance, and brilliant audacity pointed him out as the fittest person for restoring the damaged fortunes of the colony. This man with the humblest and commonest of names is really one of the most romantic figures in history; at least, he is the reputed hero of a number of adven tures of a highly exciting description. H was a native of Willoughby, in Lincolnshire, where he was born in 1579 : his family on the father s side belonged to Lancashire ; on the mother s, to York shire. His parents dying while he was still a youth, he was enabled to indulge in that love of strange and perilous adventure which was a passion with him throughout his life. Ere he had full} attained to manhood, he fought, as the heroic Sidney did, for the independence of the Dutch. After wards he ti-avelled in France, sailed along the Barbary coasts (at that time infested with Moham medan pirates, as they were in the later days to which Defoe refers in his immortal work), made the voyage of the Levant, and passed through Italy. Then he took service under the German Emperor, and, on the borders of Hungary, " Defied the best of Paynim chivalry To mortal combat, or career with lance ;" comporting himself, in comparatively modern times, like a Roland of the days of Charlemagne. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the very exist ence of Christendom was threatened by the Turks, whose fiery attacks on the south-eastern parts of Europe spread terror even into the north and west. It was therefore considered a virtuous act in any 1607.] CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH. 33 spirited young man to go forth, and help to van quish the common enemy. Smith was a crusader at a date when crusades after the old fashion were out of date. He repeatedly engaged in single combat with Turkish warriors, and brought away the heads of three whom he slew on the field. For this achievement he was presented by the general with a horse richly caparisoned, a scimetar, and a costly belt ; and Sigismuiid Bathori, the Yaivode of Tran sylvania, conferred on him a patent of arms, viz., a chevron in combination with three Turks heads. This was allowed by the English heralds a fact which seems in some degree to warrant the truth of the story. One day, however, he and others were overpowered in a wild valley in Wallachia; and Smith, being sorely wounded and taken prisoner, was publicly sold by his captors, and sent as a slave to Constantinople. Here he fell into the hands of a benevolent Turkish lady, who removed him to a fortress in the Crimea, intending ultimately to release him ; but, her commands being disregarded, he was treated with so much brutality that he turned on his oppressor, slew him, and escaped into Russia. Again he passed into the south-east, and, bidding farewell to his old companions in Transylvania, set his face towards England. On his way home, however, he heard of fighting in Morocco, and went thither in search of new adventures.* When, after many delays and feats of arms, he once more reached his native land, nothing was so much talked of as the planting of colonies in America ; and into these plans he threw himself with all the ardour of his temperament. At the time when practically, though not nomi nally, lie was called to the head of affairs in Vir ginia, Smith was still under thirty years of age. * See that strange collection of wonderful experiences, "The True Travels, Adventures, and Observations of Captain John Smith, in Europe, Asia, Africke, and America : beginning about the Yeere 1593, and continued to this Present 1G29." Fuller, in his " Worthies of England," throws great discredit on the statements in this book, and, speaking of the captain, says that "it soundeth much to the diminution of his deeds, that he alone is the herald to publish and proclaim them. " The work, however, was issued under distinguished auspices, being written at the retpuest of Sir Kobert Cotton, the antiquary, and dedicated to the Earl of Pembroke (Lord Steward of the lloyal Household), the Earl of Lindsay (Great Chamberlain of England), and Lord Hunsdon. In this dedication, Smith speaks of having written the book himself ; but it is mostly composed in the third person. It is not improbable that Smith put his materials into the hands of a professional book-maker, who may perhaps have coloured and heightened some of the details ; but the record of the captain s career in the south east of Europe is for the most part in harmony with known historical facts. In the present work, the edition consulted is that reprinted at Richmond Virginia, in 1819, from the London edition of 1029. Long acquaintance with the world, nowever, had fitted him for his new position. He inspired con fidence by the promptitude, vigour, and good sense of his administration. The attacks of the Indians were repelled, and the colonists grew more united under the firm hand which now guided them, though this result was not attained without a col lision, in which one of the malcontents was killed. The little nucleus of a town was surrounded by fortifications of sufficient strength to serve as a protection against the savages ; and, in order to raise the spirits of his men, and at the same time to relieve their necessities, Smith led a small detach ment into the forest in quest of the enemy. The, policy was successful. To any tribe which showed a disposition to friendliness, Smith made presents and flattering speeches, and so procured in exchange a supply of provisions. The hostile tribes he attacked, and struck such terror into them that they were glad to purchase peace by giving up a portion of their winter stores. The milder air of advancing autumn at the same time improved tho health of the settlers, and the good fortune of these dashing raids restored their self-reliance. They were now fairly provided with food, and a still further stock was obtained in the early days of winter, when wild fowl and game were added to the resources of the colony.t Such was the state of matters at the close of 1607. Smith appears to have proved himself the fittest man for the conduct of affairs. Though disposed to deal in a soldier-like style with the Indians, he did not treat them with treacherous double-dealing. From a strictly moral point of A iew, all such violent incursions into other people s territory, for the sole benefit of the invaders, are unjustifiable ; but in the days of Smith scruples of this nature troubled the minds of few. It was, indeed, generally accepted as an irre fragable truth that Providence had given the waste regions of the earth, and the wild races inhabiting them, to the monarchs and nations of t The authority for these assertions with regard to Captain Smith s conduct of affairs in Virginia, and to the antagonism which he experienced at the hands of his fellow-councillors, is to be found in the statements of several of the emigrants, contained in Book IX., chap. 4, of Purchas s "Pilgrims," and in a relation of "The Proceedings and Accidents of tho, English Colony of Virginia," extracted from the narratives of various persons concerned by William Simons, Doctor of Divinity, and forming Book III. of "The Generall Historic of Virginia, New England, and the Summer lies " a work pub lished, and to some extent compiled, by Smith. The edition here referred to is that reprinted at Richmond, Virginia, in 1819, from an early London edition, issued in Smith s life time. The book is dedicated to the Duchess of Richmond and Lennox ; for Smith seems never to have wanted high patrons. CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1607. Christendom. Had the seizure of such countries resulted in the civilisation of their savage denizens, there would have been much to say in favour of this theory. It may fairly be questioned whether a few barbarous tribes, thinly distributed over a vast expanse of land, living in abject ignorance and superstition, ferocious, unprogressive, idle, dis gusting in many of their ways, constantly engaged in desolating wars with one another, and doing little more than camp on the ground whose varied capabilities they possess no skill to develop, have any right to exclude for ever those higher races which can show the sovereign prerogatives of know ledge and power. They have every right, however, to fair and even generous treatment ; and this they hare very seldom obtained. The colonising countries of modern Europe have rarely educated the savages they have vanquished. They displace the aborigines, or exterminate them ; they do not add new com munities to the domain of culture. The ancient Romans had small regard for the independence of other peoples; but they could at least plead in justification that the Slave and the German, the Iberian, the Gaul, and the Briton, were rescued by them from the death of savagery, and brought within the light and warmth of civil government, literature, and the arts. In the later ages of their majestic rule, Christianity was unquestionably spread by those legions which marched under the banner of Constantine, as the pure Theism of Islam was imposed on many idolatrous nations (to the benefit of themsleves and of the world) by the fiery valour of the Saracens. But Spain, Portugal, France, and England have little to say in palliation of their rapacity ; England, perhaps, least of all. In America the red man has dwindled, degenerated, and decayed before the advance of the white, and is now nothing but a miserable wreck. Yet for this result no special blame can be charged on Smith, who acted according to the ideas of his time, and in a better spirit than some of his pre decessors and followers. CHAPTER V. Smith s Voyage up the Chickahominy His Capture by the Indians Preparations for Slaying him His Life Saved by Pooahontas, Daughter of Powhatan Friendly Conduct of Pocahontas to the Settlers Romantic Story of the Indian Princess Her Conversion to Christianity, and Marriage to an Englishman Her Visit to England, and Early Death Dissensions in the Colony at James Town Arrival of New Settlers Their Indifferent Character Gold-mining Fever Smith s Two Voyages of Exploration in Chesapeake Bay His Discoveries and Adventures in the Surrounding Country He succeeds to the Presidency of the Council Further Arrival of Settlers Disagreements between Captains Newport and Smith Embassy to Powhatan A Sylvan Masquerade Difficulty of dealing with Savages Smith s daring Treatment of an Indian Chief. CAPTAIN SMITH was not to continue long without another of those perilous adventures of which, if we may believe his own account, his life was made up. One of the duties imposed on the colonists by the superior Council in England was to seek a communication with the Pacific Ocean, then gene rally called the South Sea ; and accordingly Smith sailed up the Chickahominy as far as he could advance in boats, when, leaving them in a sheltered bay, with strict commands to his men that they should not TO on shore till his return, he proceeded still further np the stream in a canoe, accompanied by two of the settlers and two Indians. The men left in the boats disregarded orders, got into a collision with the natives, and lost one of their number, from whom, just before his death, the savages obtained news of the direction in which the captain had gone. In the meanwhile, Smith had reached the marshes at the river s head, twenty miles in the desert, and, while engaged fowling, was beset by two hundred savages. He killed two of the enemy, and so intimidated the rest that he was enabled to draw off towards the river, but, while keeping a watchful eye . on the Indians, fell into an oozy creek, and, being after a time numbed with cold (for it was near the close of the year, and therefore in the dead of winter), was compelled to throw away his arms, and solicit a parley. The Indians then dragged him out, and conducted him to their chief. The cool intrepidity of Smith was now shown in a very striking manner. Though he had every reason to fear the worst, he bore himself in so unconcerned a fashion that the savages were im pressed by his gallantry. He displayed to them a small mariner s compass. " Much they marvelled," says the account compiled by Dr. Simons, " at the playing of the fly and needle, which they could see so plainly, and yet not touch, because of the glass that covered them. But when he demonstrated by 1607.] SMITH AND POCAHONTAS. 35 that globe-like jewel the roundness of the earth and skies, the sphere of the sun, moon, and stars, and ho\v the suu did chase the night round about the world continually, the gi-eatness of the land and sea, the diversity of nations, variety of complexions, and how we were to them antipodes, and many other such like matters, they all stood as amazed with admiration." About an hour afterwards, they tied their captive to a tree, and prepared to shoot him; but the chief, holding up the compass, com manded them to lay down their bows and arrows. The Indians appeared divided in their minds between admiration of this extraordinary English man and desire to put an end to him. They permitted him to send a letter to the fort at James Town, in which he conveyed to his countrymen in timation of an intended attack ; and they wondered at the strange way in which he seemed to impart his mind and will to the paper on which he wrote. Next they conducted him from their settlements on the Chickahominy to villages on the Rappahanock and the Potomac, and subsequently to the residence of the chief Opechancanough, at Pamunkey. There lie was well fed and strictly guarded, yet with a certain honourable state and ceremony; and during three days a series of frightful incantations and mysterious rites was gone through, probably Avith a view to testing the courage of the prisoner. It was left to Powhatan to decide whether he should live or die ; and to the seat of that potentate Smith was conducted through the forest. In a description of Powhatan afterwards Avritten by Smith, and published in Purchas s collection, he is described as a tall, well-proportioned man, with a sour look ; his head somewhat grey, his beard so thin as to be almost none at all (which is generally the case with Indians) ; his age near sixty, but his constitution still vigorous and fresh, so that he was able to endure any labour. He was usually attended by a guard of thirty or forty men, and the watch at night was set with as much regularity and obser vance of form as in the palaces of civilised roonarchs.* On the pi-esent occasion Powhatan sat before a fire on a high seat, surrounded by his chief warriors, and himself arrayed in skins of animals with the tails attached. Many women were present, with their faces and shoulders painted red, their heads crowned with white feathers, and chains of white beads round their necks. On Smith being brought in, the people gave a great shout ; one of the squaws offered him water to wash his hands, and another brought him a bunch of feathers with which to dry them. Afterwards he was * Purchas s Pilgrims, Book IX., chap. 3. feasted with barbarian hospitality, and then a long consultation began as to his fate. It might have been supposed from this mode of treatment that they intended to spare the captive s life, and to advance him to some position of dignity ; but they probably held him in more fear than reverence, and it was decided that he should die. A number of the savages seized him, fastened him to the ground, and were about to dash in his head with their clubs or tomahawks, when Pocahontas, the daughter of Powhatan, begged that he might be spared, and, not meeting with a favourable response, threw her self upon the prostrate Englishman, and laid her head upon his to save him from the threatened blows. At the sight of this devotion, even those ferocious warriors were touched. They consented that Smith should live, and Powhatan comforted himself with the thought that the man who under stood so many singular arts and sciences might make hatchets for himself and his warriors, and bells, beads, and copper ornaments for his daughter. In a letter to the Queen of James I., written about eight years later, and published in the account of Captain Smith s adventures already alluded to, Smith describes Pocahontas as being, at the period in question, " a child of twelve or thirteen years of age ;" and other narratives speak of her beauty, wit, and spirit. It is not unlikely that Pocahontas, young as she was, felt a tender regard for the hand some, brave, and strangely -gifted young Englishman who was doomed to a cruel death before her eyes. The love of Indian women for Europeans has been frequently exhibited ; and ultimately Pocahontas was wedded to an Englishman, thotigh not to him whom she had saved. A strange accoimt is given by one of the early colonists of the wild gambols of this Indian girl with the English boys at James Town ; from which it would appear that she had in. her something of the mad frolic and joyous animal audacity of Mrs. Stowe s little negress, Topsy. Smith being thus rescued from death, the savages sought to make him one of themselves, and tried, by promises of great rewards, to gain his assistance in an attack on his fellow-countrymen at James Town. This atrocity being of course rejected, they allowed him, by the persuasion of Pocahontas, to return to the settlement in tb/-> early part of 1608, after an absence of six weeks. Here he found the colonists once more in want, and wo have the testimony of Smith himself that, had the Indians not fed them, they would have starved. " And this relief," he continues, in the letter to the Queen pi eviouly referred to, " was commonly brought us by this lady, Pocahontas. Notwithstanding all these passages, when inconstant fortune turned our peace 36 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1608. to war, this tender virgin would still not spare to dare to visit us, and by her our jars have been oft a})} teased, and our wants still supplied. Were it the policy of her father thus to employ her, or the ordinance of God thus to make her his instrument, or her extraordinary affection to our nation, I know was still the instrument to preserve this colony from death, famine, and utter confusion." Such is the account given in " The Generall Historic of Virginia," &c., first published in 1624, and partly compiled by Smith himself from the writings of several colonists. Its authenticity has CAPTAIN SMITH TAKEN PRISONER }JY THE INDIANS. not ; but of this I am sure : when her father, with the utmost of his policy and power, sought to surprise me, having but eighteen with me, the dark night could not affright her from coming through the, irksome woods, and with watered eyes gave me intelligence, with her best advice to escape his fury; which had he known, he had surely slain her. James Town, with her wild train, she as freely fre quented as her father s habitation ; and during the time of three or four years, she, next under God, been questioned by Mr. Neill, United States Consul at Dublin,* on the ground that a precisely opposite statement is made by Smith himself in a work of his issued in 1608, under the title of "A True Relation of such Occurrences and Accidents of Noate as hath happened in Virginia since the first planting of that Collony." The statement here is * The English Colonisation of America during the Seven teenth Centxiry, 1871. 1608.] CONVERSION OF POCAHONTAS. 37 that Smith was kindly received by Powhatan on the occasion in question, and was sent home with an escort and a large quantity of bread. It is not certain, however, that this earlier account is by Smith himself, some copies of the volume having on the title-page the name of Thomas Watson as the author, though other copies state that the work was " written by Captaine Smith." The apparent contradiction, also, seems capable of explanation by supposing some error as to date. It is known, on ledge of the English language, and was converted to Christianity. The story of her conversion is as romantic as that of her previous adventures. The foraging party who had captured Pocahontas demanded of her father a ransom, which he indig- O iiantly refused. One of the Englishmen who sought an interview with Powhatan about the matter was a young man named John Rolfe. He had conceived a strong affection for the Indian girl, and he was also powerfully moved to convert her to Christianity. j{ cu{crivtion of parl of trie, cvf of Cap Smith. inVirainia. MAP OF VIRGINIA. (sifter Smith.} the authority of Captain George Percy, whose narrative is published in Book IX., chap. 2, of Purchas s " Pilgrims," that in May, 1607, Smith and Newport were well received by Powhatan ; and this may have been the interview referred to in " The True Relation " as having occurred at a later period of the year. The story of Smith s rescue from death by Pocahontas has been received by the best historians, and is sculptured over one of the doors of the Capitol at Washington. In the course of some transactions with the Indians after Smith s departure, Pocahontas was treacherously seized by the settlers, and detained two years ; during which time she acquired a know- This design haunted his thoughts night and day, and caused him much trouble and agitation of soul. There were times when he remembered that the Israelites of old had been frequently punished for allying themselves with strange women. Might he, then, lawfully marry with one of a cursed race ? for so he chose to regard these poor children of the wilderness, who on many occasions had shown themselves more humane, considerate, and mag nanimous than their English invaders. He con ferred much with himself upon the subject ; wi-estled with the spirit in prayer, like a Puritan of Crom well s army ; and finally came to the conclusion that he was bound to save this maiden from the 38 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G08. corruption of heathenism. Pocahontas was as much attached to him as he to Pocahontas. He had daily opportunities of seeing the girl during her detention at James Town, and he at once gained her affections and persuaded her mind. A woman but seldom remains apart from the faith of him whom she really loves. Pocahontas soon accepted the religion of the stranger ; and in the small church of James Town, constructed in primitive fashion out of timber hewn, from the adjacent forest, and in which the font was hollowed from the trunk of a tree into the shape of a canoe, this princess of the desert, whom the colonists delighted to designate as such, openly renounced the faith in which she had been brought up, and was baptised a Christian by the name of Rebecca. The marriage followed shortly afterwards. It took place early in April, 1613, when Pocahontas must have been about seventeen or eighteen years of age ; and it had the entire approval of her father and other relatives, who were represented at the ceremony by Opachisco, the brother of Powhatan. The conduct of Rolfe, however, lies under a serious imputation. From a passage in Purchas (p. 1746), and from certain entries in the books of the London Company, it would appear that this gentleman had a white wife at the time he was married to Pocahontas, and that at his death in 1622 he left a widow and children. It is possible, however, that there were three wives in succession an Englishwoman, Pocahontas, and again an Englishwoman. In 1616, the year of Shakespeare s death, Rolfe returned to England with his Indian wife. It was then that Captain Smith wrote his letter to the Queen, the object of which was to recommend the converted heathen to her Majesty s favour. Poca hontas was by this time a mother ; and Smitli describes her as " the first Christian ever of that nation, the first Virginian ever spake English, or had a child in marriage by an Englishman." He pleaded her cause with fervour. He spoke of her " exceeding desert," her " birth, virtue, want, and simplicity," and of " her husband s estate not being able to make her fit to attend " upon the Queen personally. He feared that, " being of so great a spirit, however her stature," her love of England and of Christianity might turn to scorn and fury if she were not well received ; whereas, if she were kindly and honourably treated, she and all her kindred would be so well affected towards the conquering race as to aid in the complete establish ment of English rule in Virginia. Smith has also given a veiy striking and dramatic account of his last interview with the Indian princess a little before he returned to America. Hearing that she was at Brentford, with several of his friends, he went there to see her. " After a modest salutation, without any word, she turned about, [and] obscured her face, as not seeming we-11 contented." Whether this was coquetry, or was attributable to some rush of old emotions, or to a sense of difficulty in the use of English, it is impossible now to say ; but after Smith and the other gentlemen had left her for two or three hours, they found 011 their return that she was willing to talk. Addressing Captain Smith, she said, " You did promise Powhatan that what was yours should be his, and he the like to you. You called him father, being in his land a stranger ; and by the same reason, so must I do you." Smitli replied that he durst not accept such a title from her, because she was a king s daughter ; but to this she responded, " Were you not afraid to come into my father s country, and cause fear in him and all his people but me ; and fear you here that I should call you father 1 ? I tell you, then, I will, and you shall call me child ; and so I will be for ever and ever your countrywoman. They did tell us always you were dead, and I knew no other till I came to Plymouth ; yet Powhatan did command TJttamatomakin to seek you, and know the truth, because your countrymen will lie much." It is to the credit of the Londoners of those days that they treated Pocahontas with kindness and courtesy. She was received at court and at the houses of the nobility, and was a spectator of the masks and other stately entertainments of that pompous epoch. Her manners, which doubtless retained something of the simplicity of the forest and the wild grace of desert ways, charmed all who saw her, and for a season she was the most popular of ladies. She was about to return to America, when, while waiting for the ship at Gravesend, the rigour of the English climate struck her with a mortal malady, and she died, in 1617, at not more than two-and-twenty years of age, leaving behind her a son, from whom some of the best families in Virginia are descended. There are grander female figures in history than that of Poeahontas ; none with a sweeter bloom and freshness, nor with a more unbroken sanctity of love and truth. The brief story of this interesting woman has obliged us to anticipate the course of events by a few years; we must now return to 1608, when Smith, released from captivity by Powhatan, re- entered James Town, and found all in disorder. The colony was reduced from one hundred and five to eight-and-thirty or forty men, and the strongest of these were once more preparing to escape in the pinnace. Smith was again compelled to stop the 1608.] PROCEEDINGS OF CAPTAIN SMITH. design by firing on the fugitives ; but on the fol lowing day some of the emigrants sought to put him to death by the Levitical law, for having, by his mismanagement, caused the slaughter of those of his companions who were killed by the Indians on the recent occasion. In this distracted condition the colony continued for some time ; but help was approaching. The Council in England was enlarged, both in its numbers and its powers, and it deter mined to send out new settlers and fresh supplies. Newport was again despatched this time with a hundred and twenty emigrants. A very ill-judged selection, however, had been made. The newly- arrived colonists proved to be for the most part broken-down tradesmen and gentlemen of ruined fortunes, who Aveiit to Virginia in the same spirit in which they might have sought for the philoso pher s stone with the hope of becoming suddenly rich, and at one blow retrieving the injury of many wasteful years. Here, again, Bacon s advice might well have been followed, had it then been published. " It is a shameful and unblessed thing," he writes, " to take the scum of people, and wicked, con demned meM, to be the people with whom you plant ; and not only so, but it spoileth the planta tion ; for they will ever live like rogues, and not fall to work, but be lazy, and do mischief, and spend victuals, and be quickly weary, and then certify over to their country to the discredit of the plantation." It would, perhaps, be too nuich to say of the new emigrants that they were " the scum of people, and wicked, condemned men " but they were a demoralised, improvident set of waiters upon fortune adventurers in the bad modern sense of the word, not in the honest old sense. Captain Smith, in a report on the character of Virginia and on the pi ogress of events there, says of some of those over whom it was his difficult task to rule, that " though they were scarce ever ten miles from James Town, or at the most but at the Falls," they exclaimed against all things, without doing anything themselves but devour the fruits of other men s labours. Because they found not English cities and fine mansions, feather-beds and down-pillows, taverns and ale-houses, prodigality of gold and silver, and the dissolute liberty they expected and desired, their principal care, after a little while, was to escape in the pinnaces, and get back to England. " For the country was to them a misery, a ruin, a death, a hell."* Newport brought out with him from England an ample stock of implements for clearing and cultivating the ground ; but an unforeseen cii-cumstance turned * Smith in Purck-as s I ilgrims, Book IX., chap. 3. the attention of the idlers to considerations of a different nature. A shining mineral sediment was one day dis covered in a small stream of water issuing from a bank of sand near James Town. It was at once inferred that the soil abounded with gold. The fury that was always so ready to possess men in those days, seized on the whole colony, with but few exceptions. Smith was opposed to mining, and in favour of regular industry ; but he was not listened to, and, as Dr. Simons records in his account of the colony previously quoted, " there was no talk, no hope, no work, but dig gold, wash gold, refine gold, load gold." The mineral turned out to be worthless ; though, when Newport re- embarked for England, he fancied himself a man of enormous wealth. Smith would have sent back in the ship a load of cedar, or some other useful commodity ; but he was over-ruled, and a quantity of glittering rubbish was despatched to the mother-country, as the first yield of mines which soon proved to be imaginary and vain. Shortly after this, Captain Smith started upon an expedition which, more than any of his previous adventures, showed the sterling character of his genius, whatever may have been its drawbacks in the way of violence and haughtiness. He under took to explore the immense Bay of the Chesapeake, and the rivers which flow into it ; and this task he accomplished under circumstances of the greatest difficulty. He made two voyages in an open boat, with a feeble crew and an insufficient stock of provisions, and during the summer months of 1608 traversed nearly 3,000 miles. Chesapeake Bay was surveyed to the Susquehamiah ; the countries on both shores were examined ; the most considerable of the creeks were entered ; and many of the great rivers (including the Potomac) were ascended as far as was practicable. Some islands were discovered in the bay, and a great many tribes of Indians hitherto unknown were encoun tered. These for the most part showed a friendly feeling towards the explorers : even when for a time they exhibited signs of hostility, it seems to have been rather from fear than from actual malice. They would come dancing out of the woods, making strange gestures of surprise or invitation ; but, with fair treatment, and sometimes with the persuasion of a little force, they generally manifested a disposi tion to enter into negotiations, and to exchange water and other commodities for small pieces of copper, beads, bells, and looking-glasses. One of the greatest difficulties which Smith had to en counter was the half-heartedness of some of his fine gentlemen companions. They had started with CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1608. a vain expectation that the captain woxild soon turn back ; but when, after twelve or fourteen days, they perceived that he had no such intention, the continual labour at the oars, and the poorness of their food (which had become mouldy with the salt washings of the sea), broke their spirits, and induced them to beseech an abandonment of the design. Smith replied by reminding them of the noble resolve of Lane s men in 1586, when, rather than give up their exploration, of the Roanoke, they supported themselves on the flesh of a dog, boiled with sassafras-leaves. "You cannot say," he added, "but I have shared with you in the worst which is past ; and for what is to come, of lodging, diet, er whatsoever, I am contented you allot the worst part to me. As for my losing myself in these \inknown, large waters, or being swallowed up in some stormy gust, abandon these childish fears ; for worse than is past is not likely to happen, and there is as much danger to return as to proceed. Regain, therefore, your old spirits, for return I will not (if God please) till I have found the head of this water, which you conceit to be endless." Two or three days later, however, Smith was compelled by the illness of some of his men to put back to the settlement ; but, after a brief rest, this energetic voyager again started in his open boat, and, penetrating farther than before, discovered the warlike tribe of the Mohawks, explored a large tract of country, and accumu lated a vast amount of information with respect to the natural products of the land and the habits of the people. With some of the tribes Smith laid the bases of friendly relations ; others he cowed by the vigour of his action. Occasionally a hostile en counter would take place ; but oftentimes, when the English were on shore, the savages would gather about them while at prayers, and respond to their psalms with strange outcries and gesticulations, embracing Smith, and offering to adore him as a god. Returning from their second expedition, the little party of explorers reached James Town on the 7th of September ; and so exact were the observations they had made, that the map which Smith at once prepared and sent to the Company in London a map comprehending the modern States of Virginia and Maryland is said to be the original upon which all subsequent delineations and descriptions have been founded. Although Smith had in effect been head of the colony ever since a period shortly after the deposi tion of Wingfield (the first president), the nominal direction of affairs was still in the hands of that officer s weak and incompetent successor, Ratcliffe. A change, however, now took place. Smith was made president of the Council three days after his return from the second voyage of discovery in Chesa.peake Bay and its tributary streams. It was but a small body of colonists which he had to rule, but the work was no light or easy charge. The question of food was still one of the most engrossing importance. Hardly thirty acres of ground were yet cleared so as to be capable of culture. The colonists were thinking of gold mines rather than of regular industry : and the most desperate privations would once more have been endured, had not Smith, by his dealings with the natives, provided for the necessities of his countrymen. The civil and military government of the little community was also reformed by being rendered more exact and regular, and the vigour of the new administration was soon felt in the greater comfort and self-reliance of the colony. James Town now consisted of some forty or fifty timber houses with thatched roofs, a wooden church, and a strong fort well provided with cannon ; the whole surrounded, as a protection against sudden attacks, by high palisadoes. All the materials employed were very combustible ; and at one time a fire broke out, which consumed the little town, and inflicted severe loss on the settlers. Shortly after Smith had been raised to the presidency, Newport again returned with a fresh contingent of settlers. They were about seventy in number, and included two women. This acces sion of strength might in itself have been an advantage ; but, unfortunately, the two captains, Newport and Smith, did not agree. The former had been instructed by the London Council to demand of the local Council a lump of gold, a certainty of the South Sea, or one of the lost company left by Governor White at Roanoke, more than twenty years before. The expenses of this new voyage of Captain Newport were nearly 2,000 ; and Smith was given to under stand that, if commodities to that extent were not sent back by the ship, the settlers woiild perhaps be left to themselves as banished men. Smith wrote a letter to the governing body at home, severely criticising these demands, and accusing Newport of circulating extravagant reports, and acting to the injury of the colony. He also com plained of the kind of emigrants that were sent out to him, and, using language similar to that of Bacon, wrote : " When you send again, I entreat you rather send but thirty carpenters, husbandmen, gardeners, fishermen, blacksmiths, masons, and diggers tip of trees roots, well provided, than a thousand of such as we have ; for, except we be able 1608.] TRANSACTIONS WITH THE INDIANS. both to lodge them and feed them, the most will consume with want of necessaries before they can be made good for anything." The fine gentlemen and mined traders were not fit hands at cutting down forests, tilling the land, building houses, and doing the other rough work of an infant settlement in the wilderness. Among the commissions of Captain Newport was an embassy to Powhatan, with divers presents. The savage chieftain was to be crowned, as a means, it would appear, of gaining his good-will by flattery ; and Captain Smith undertook to visit him, and request that he would come to James Town to receive his gifts. Powhatan, however, would not consent to any such course : the presents must be sent to him. " Your father," he said to Smith, "is to come to me, not I to him, nor yet to your fort ; neither will I bite at such a bait." Ultimately the presents were despatched to the woodland court of this petty monarch, and with much ado he was invested with a scarlet cloak and a copper crown. This idle and ridiculous ceremony, the only effect of which must have been to increase the arrogance of the old chieftain, was much against the wishes of Smith, and, in writing to the London Council, he expressed a fear that it would lead to unfortunate results. The expeditions to Powhatan, however, had the advantage of adding to the settlers knowledge of the Indians whom he ruled ; and on one occasion a singular piece of savage life was presented to their view by Poca- hontas and her women. The account of this incident given by Dr. Simons in Book III., chap. 7, of his work on Smith, is so curious as to demand quotation in full. " In a fair, plain field," says the doctor, " they made a fire, before which, he [Smith] sitting upon a mat, suddenly amongst the woods was heard such a hideous noise and shrieking that the English betook themselves to their arms, and seized on two or three old men by them, supposing Powhatan with all his power was come to surprise them. But presently Pocahontas came, willing him to kill her if any hurt were intended ; and the beholders, which were men, women and children, satisfied the captain there was no such matter. Then presently they were presented with this antick : thirty young women came naked out of the woods, only covered behind and before with a few green leaves ; their bodies all painted, some of one colour, some of another, but all differing. Their leader had a fair pair of buck s horns on her head, and an otter s skin at her girdle, and another at her arm, a quiver of arrows at her back, a bow and arrows in her hand ; the next hud in her hand a sword, another a club, another a pot-stick : all homed {dike : the rest, every one with their several devices. These fiends, with most hellish shouts and cries rushing from among the trees, cast themselves in a ring about the fire, singing and dancing with most excellent ill variety, oft falling into their infernal passions, and solemnly again to sing and dance. Having spent near an hour in this mascarado, as they entered, in like manner they departed. Having reaccommodated themselves, they solemnly invited him to their lodgings, where he was no sooner within the house, but all these nymphs more tormented him than ever, with crowding, pressing, and hanging about him, most tediously crying, Love you not me 1 ? love you not me? This salutation ended, the feast was set, consisting of all the savage dainties they could devise ; some attend ing, others singing and dancing about them : which mirth being ended, with firebrands instead of torches they conducted him to his lodging." Captain Newport had imprudently given swords and muskets to the savages in exchange for what he wanted ; and the ill effect of this was seen when hostilities again broke out between the settlers and the Indians. Who was chiefly to blame for these hostilities which occurred fre quently, and sometimes gave considerable trouble it is impossible to say. Powhatan seems often to have manifested a friendly disposition. ; but he was certainly very exacting on the score of personal dignity, and may perhaps have been treacherous in his designs. On the other hand, Smith was rather too peremptory in his mode of dealing with the native tribes, and may sometimes have imagined an evil intention when it did not exist. By his personal enemies in the London Council, he was even accused of treating the Indians with cruelty ; but the charge seems to have been a malicious exaggeration. The intercourse of civilised men with savages is always a matter of extreme difficulty. Self-interest, it is to be feared, is the leading principle with both ; and this, the only idea which they have in common, is the very thing most likely to bring them into collision. In all other respects, their notions, principles, and motives of action are as distinct as they can be. The want of a common language leads to endless misunder standings ; and fear and suspicion on both sides exasperate small differences into open broils. In their transactions with savages, civilised men should observe a mean between indulgence and rigour but this advice it is easier to give than to follow. The fault is generally on the side of cruelty ; but there may be a feeble pampering also. It cannot be doubted that the extraordinary 42 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1608. boldness and audacity of Smith often prevented disasters by striking a panic into the savages. One day towards the latter end of 1608, he and fifteen others -went to Pamunkey, with a view to obtaining supplies of Opechancanough, the ruling chieftain in Englishmen an equal value in copper ; the con queror to take all. He was answered by fair speeches, but immediately afterwards it was found that the wigwam was beset by armed men, with their bows ready prepared for shooting. Angered K WEAPONS. (After Cat I in and Schooler aft. that direction, from whom he had been led to expect some assistance of this nature. The savage appeared with a warlike array, but with so poor a stock of provisions that it was not worth having. Smith, suspecting treachery, addressed his followers first, and, having obtained their promise to stand fast even in the greatest danger, challenged the chieftain and his com panions to fight him and his men openly ; the Indians to stake a large quantity of corn, and the at the manifest intention of the savages, Smith seized Opechancanough by the long lock which Indians wear in front of their heads, presented a pistol to his breast, and dragged him out into the midst of his armed followers, whom he reproached with their design, daring them to shoot him, and vowing to exterminate the whole tribe if one of his men were hurt. At the same time he professed his friendly intentions, if he were allowed to trade peacefully for their commodities. This produced 1608.] SMITH S ENERGETIC RULE. 43 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1609. the desired effect ; though, later in. the day, a renewed demonstration of a threatening character obliged Smith once more to make a display of force. Such were the incidents which distinguished the early days of the English in Virginia. They form the romance of American history, and belong to tke heroic ages of New World adventure. Moreover, they reveal in very striking colours the difficulties and dangers which beset those men who go out into the wilderness to found new states and nations. CHAPTER VI. Energetic Rule of Captain Smith in Virginia Reform in the Constitution of the London Company Lord Delaware appointed Governor of the Colony Despatch of Five Hundred Emigrants Bad Character of the New Settlers Anarchical State of Affairs at James Town Accident to Captain Smith -His Return to England Another Famine among the Colonists Somers, Gates, and Newport shipwrecked on the Bermudas Evil Reputation of those Islands Their Real Character Dissensions among the shipwrecked Sailors and Emigrants Their Escape from the Islands Desperate Condition of the Virginian Colony Arrival of Lord Delaware Daily Life at James Town Lord Delaware s Return, owing to Illness Sir Thomas Dale and Martial Law Further Despatch of Emigrants Formation of a New Settlement Missionary Efforts Another Reform of the London Company Private Property in Land Submission of Indian Tribes. UNDER the guidance of Smith, the colony of Vir ginia acquired greater cohesion with each successive week. Even the fine gentlemen from London, who in happier days had lounged with other gallants in Paul s Walk, or hung about the court at West minster, became expert woodcutters after awhile ; though the pain of their blistered hands forced from them many an oath, until Smith put a stop to that practice by ordering that, for every profane exclamation uttered during the day, the offender should at night have a can of cold water poured down his sleeve. Six hours a day were to be spent in toil ; the rest was given to pastime and manly exercises. Smith plainly told his countrymen that he who would not work (unless he were ill) should not eat ; that authority rested solely with himself ; that he would use his powers to the utmost to repress offences ; and that he would not suffer the labour of thirty or forty industrious men to be consumed by a hundred and fifty idlers. At the same time he had many collisions with the Indians, who, having obtained swords and guns from certain Dutchmen introduced into the colony for the prosecution of glass-making and other industrial arts, and from some injudicious Englishmen, seem to have meditated an attack on the settlement. In these encounters Smith exhibited all his wonted vigour ; but it is to be feared that his actions were some times more hasty and violent than the present age would approve. His government was in truth a despotism ; but it had the effect of preserving the young colony from internal dissolution and external treachery. Whether by fear or by policy, the savages were reduced to submission; food was obtained from them in abundance : additional ground was brought under cultivation ; new dwell ings were built, together with block-houses and a strong fort ; some useful manufactures were begun ; weirs for fishing were constructed ; and various other operations of a serviceable character were diligently prosecuted. Not to trench too much on the stock of provisions in hand, some of the colonists were billeted on the natives ; and such was the dread which Smith had inspired, that these solitary Englishmen placed in the midst of savages were in no case molested. The colony, also, was now healthy; and, by the spring of 1609, only seven or eight men out of two hundred had died natural deaths since the pestilence of 1607. In the meanwhile, a great change was taking place in England in the constitution of the London Company to which this part of Virginia belonged. It was felt that the association had not sufficient powers to induce men of rank and property to embark their fortunes in it. The King, it will be recollected, had reserved to himself the supreme control of all operations ; and this was seen to be too great a tie on the discretion of those who had the more immediate management of affairs. James was accordingly induced to grant a new charter with more ample privileges. The document bears date May 23rd, 1609, and is no less important than its forerunner. The boundaries of the colony were enlarged ; the jurisdiction of the colonial Council was abolished, and the government was vested entirely in a Council resident in London. To the proprietors of the Company was conceded the right of electing, by a majority of votes, the persons who were to compose the Council, which was to establish such laws, orders, and forms of 1609.] LORD DELAWARE. government and magistracy as should appear best. A Governor was also to be appointed by the Council ; in short, the complete direction of affairs was handed over to the proprietary body and the committee of management appointed by them. The powers of the Governor were to be very great. He was to rule the colonists according to the tenor of the instructions given by the Council, but, failing such instimctions, was to act according to his own pleasure, in capital and criminal cases as well as civil. In the event of mutiny and rebellion, he might declare martial law without consulting any other authority, and proceed to carry it out by his own immediate orders. So despotic a power could only be properly used by a man of high principle and exalted wisdom. Even in the hands of the wisest and best, it could not endure beyond the early days of a colony, when concentration of rule is of greater value than individual rights and the principles of popular government. After this reform in the constitution of the Com pany, the number of proprietors increased, and the nobility and gentry of England (amongst whom was Cecil, the Prime Minister of James I.) joined tfie association in large numbers, together with the merchants of London. It is painful to be obliged to record that Sir Walter Raleigh, the originator of all schemes of Virginian colonisation, had no share whatever in the body which was now mainly concerned in the planting of the English race in America. The daring and romantic adventurer of Elizabeth s reign had fallen beneath the malice of James, and was a prisoner in the Tower. Had he been free, he would not improbably have received the appointment of Governor, to which, in many respects, his antecedents entitled him. Yet, on the whole, such a choice would hardly have been the best. Raleigh was not a man of the highest principle, and his genius seemed often to want the balance of sober sense. He was at the mercy of a brilliant conception, and could never entirely rid himself of the instincts of the sea-rover, and the habits of the soldier of fortune. This important post was conferred by the Com pany on a nobleman of unexceptionable character. The firs* Governor of the colony was Thomas West, Lord Delaware, who was appointed for life, with the additional title of Captain-General, and whose semi-regal state was surrounded by a retinue of officers with pompous titles and high-sounding functions. It was a mistake to import the para phernalia of an ancient monarchy into a remote and humble settlement; but against Lord Delaware himself nothing was to be alleged. He was a man of ability, integrity, and honour, not unacquainted with affairs of state, and prepared to sacrifice his comforts at home, and his prospects of advancement, in an honest attempt to promote a speculation which pi omised great results for the country. The clergy took up the idea of colonisation with enthusiasm, as a means of converting the heathen ; and, with this especial view, William Crashaw, preacher at the Temple, and father of the poet, delivered before Lord Delaware, on the 21st of February, 1610 (for the Governor did not leave England until several months after his appointment), a very eloquent sermon, enlarging on the noble opportunities of spreading the Gospel which lay before the settlers. Many persons professed a desire to join the expedition, and even contributed free will offerings to the general fund. M&re than five hundred emigrants (including women) were despatched in a fleet of nine vessels, of which the chief officers were Sir Thomas Gates (Lieutenant- General), Sir George Somers (Admiral), and New port (Yice- Admiral), who were authorised to ad minister the affairs of the colony until the arrival of Delaware. The expedition set sail from England on tlte 8th of June, 1609. The three commissioners, Gates, Somers, and Newport, were all in the same vessel, and it unfortunately happened that a hurri cane, which came on near the coast of Virginia, separated that particular ship from the rest, and drove it towards the rocky shores of Bermuda. A small vessel perished in the storm ; the other seven arrived safely at James Town in the month of August. It soon proved that they brought with them nothing but the elements of discord. The new settlers were even worse in character than those of the previous year. They consisted of libertines and desperadoes, many of whom, it is plainly hinted in Dr. Simons s account, lay in peril of criminal sentences at home. The natural tendency of such men is towards anarchy, and circumstances favoured their disposition. It was known by report that the government of the colony had been remodelled, and that the old officials were superseded ; but neither the new Governor nor the three commissioners who represented him had yet appeared, and all the legal documents necessary for the transfer of power were with the latter. Every thing, therefore, was thrown into a condition of uncertainty, and the new-comers vexed the settle ment with continual factions, and with the tur bulence of their ill-regulated desires. Smith was not the man to endure this state of things. He asserted his own authority in the absence of any other, sternly repressed the mutinies of the disaffected, and projected new expeditions to give occupation to the restless spirits who had 46 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1609. descended on the colony. But shortly afterwards he was so much injured by an accidental explosion of gunpowder that he found it necessary, about Michaelmas, to return to England for better surgical aid than Virginia could afford. This, at least, is the reason given by Smith and his friends vrhy the former quitted the plantation which he had done so much to establish. But Mr. Neill, in the work before alluded to, says that Smith was sent to England to answer several charges, one of which was that he had a design of wedding Pocahontas, and forming an alliance with Powhatan, for the purpose of building up an Anglo-Indian nobility in America. If so, it does not appear that any proceedings were taken upon these charges, and in after times Smith was consulted by the Government on Virginian affairs. But it is certain that everything like an endeavour to form an alliance with the natives was regarded with great jealousy at home. It was doubted for awhile whether Rolfe might not be prosecuted for high treason on account of his marriage with Pocahontas. Such unions, never theless, occasionally took place, and Sir Thomas Dale, when Governor, is said to have made pro posals to Powhatan for his youngest daughter, though his wife was still living in England. Pow hatan refused the offer.* According to a statement made by Smith some years later, -j- the colony, at the time of his leaving it, owned three ships, seven boats, commodities for trade, a newly -gathered harvest, eight weeks pro vision of corn and meal, nets for fishing, tools of all sorts, a large quantity of apparel, six mares and a horse, five or six hundred swine, many more poultry, three hundred muskets, shot, powder, and match, with arms for more men than they had. The manners and language of the Indians wei e known to two hundred expert soldiers, and the plantation altogether was in a more hopeful state than had been seen since the beginning of the enterprise. A fellow-emigrant of Smith lias described him as one who "in all his proceedings made justice his first guide, and experience his second ; even hating baseness, sloth, pride, and indignity, more than any dangers ; that never allowed more for himself than his soldiers with him ; that upon no danger would send them where he would not lead them himself; that would never see ITS want what he either had, or could by any means get us; that would * " A True Discourse of the Present Estate of Virginia," by Ralph Hamor, junior (for a time secretary of the colony, and son of a member of the London Company), 1615. t Brief Relation written by Captain Smith to the Royal Commissioners for the Reformation of Virginia, 1G23, rather want than borrow, or starve than not pay ; that loved action more than words, and hated falsehood and covetousness worse than death ; whose adventures were our lives, and whose loss our deaths. "J There may be something of the exaggeration of eloquence and of friendship in this really splendid eulogy ; but it seems to have had a solid basis of truth. We shall see more of Smith farther on, but for the present he disappears from the scene. In his own day he enjoyed great popularity in his native country, and his mar vellous adventures were even brought on the stage with many embellishments, much to Smith s annoy ance ; but in modern times a strange neglect has settled on this remarkable man, and it may be safely affirmed that a large rmrnber even of well- read persons kjaow nothing of the fiery soldier and courageous explorer who is so intimately associated with the English colonisation of America. His name is not to be found in some of the Biogi-aphical Dictionaries, and even such a work as the "Biographia Britannica," the object of which is to commemorate all the worthies of England, Scotland, and Ireland, passes him over in silence. He is better known in the United States than in the country which gave him birth. The excellence of Smith s rule in Virginia was convincingly shown by the terrible results which followed his departure. The turbulence of the last settlers increased with the absence of a strong con trolling will. Idleness and profligacy prevailed. The stock of provisions left by Smith was rapidly consumed, and the Indians refused to supply the colony with more. In a little while, scarcely anything remained but the stores brought out from England, and the domestic animals which had been imported with a view to breeding, but which were now devoured from sheer necessity. When these were gone, utter and desperate famine seized on the community. The miserable creatures were com pelled to eat such horses as they possessed, or to keep body and soul together with roots, herbs, berries, acorns, and starch. It is even recorded that cannibalism was practised ; but one of the stories to that effect is at least of doubtful accuracy. " This was that time," says a survivor, " which still to this day we call the starving time." Numbers died of exhaustion and disease. Some, who strayed from the town in search of provisions, + "The True Travels, Adventures, and Observations of Captain John Smith," &c. The horrible assertion, contained in this work, that some of Smith s enemies plotted, when he was distracted by the torment of his injuries, to murder him in his bed, may be lightly passed over ; as, without more cer tain evidence, we should not be justified in assuming the truth of so dreadful a charge. 1609.] THE BERMUDAS. were decoyed by the savages ; others, who humbled themselves so far as to beg for food in the cabins of Indian warriors, received no answer but the blow of a tomahawk. Thirty men took possession of a ship, escaped to sea, and lived as buccaneers. From four hundred and ninety persons, the colony dwindled in six months to sixty; and into the hearts of this unhappy remnant, sick, feeble, and demoralised, despair itself had entered when two barks arrived. The tempest which separated the chief vessel of Somers s fleet from its companions, had spared the lives of those on board. When it became evident that the ship could not float much longer, owing to the vast body of water which poured in through her shattered timbers, Somers, Gates, and Newport, perceiving land ahead, determined, as being the lesser of two evils, to run her on the shore. It was a resolution requiring great courage ; for the commanders judged that the craggy land they saw was that of the Bermudas, and it was known that those islands were most dangerous to approach, by reason of the broken cliffs by which they were girdled. Moreover an important consideration in superstitious days the islands had the reputa tion, according to an old writer, of being enchanted, "and inhabited with witches and devils, which grew by reason of accustomed monstrous thunder storm and tempest."* Nevertheless, as there was plainly no chance at sea, the captains resolved to dare the perils of the land, and accordingly made for the coast. A high tide bore the vessel between two rocks, where it stuck fast withoiit breaking ; and the whole ship s company, to the number of about one hundred and fifty, landed safely in their boats on the 28th of July, 1609. Very little was at that time known of the islands, though an English sailor, named Henry May, had been ship wrecked there in 1593, and an account of his experiences had been published by Hakluyt in his great work. The original discovery of the Ber mudas dates as far back as 1503, when they were named after the Spanish navigator who lit on them; but they were not taken possession of by Spain or any other Power, and in 1609 they lay as waste and desolate as Robinson Crusoe s island before the coming of the savages. Where there is no human life, men are apt to imagine the presence of supernatural beings ; for the mind shrinks from vacuity, and peoples with airy phantoms, with visions and mysterious influences, the desert or Jtbandoned regions of the earth. This probably had as much to do with the particular character * Addition by Howes to Stowe s Anaale. imputed to the Bermudas as the frightful storms which glared and clamoured about their coasts. To the ancient Greek or Roman, Thule was the land of the gods. Marco Polo records of the desert of Lop that it was believed to be inhabited by por tentous shades, and filled with delusive voices. In like manner, the voyagers of the sixteenth and seven teenth centuries looked with dread towards the Bermudas, as being the scene of wicked necro mancies. What, then, must have been the surprise of Somers and his companions when, advancing inland, they found that the unruly violence of those seas encircled a Paradise ! Cedars and palmettos clothed the sides of the rising grounds, or over arched the valleys with buoyant shadows and the play of broken light. Laurels set forth their shining leaves beneath the statelier foliage ; oranges, pears, figs, olives, and other fruits, offered themselves unsought ; the ground was richly carpeted with creeping plants ; and no savage beast or venomous reptile appeared, to mar the beauty of that happy land. When the storm had abated, a mild and delicate air breathed over hill and dale, and birds were vocal in every leafy path and every bowery hollow. Herds of swine roamed about the sheltered places, the progeny of some which in former years had swum ashore from a Spanish wreck ; turtles and turtles eggs were numerous among the rocks ; and the fish that swarmed among the bays and creeks were so tame that they were caught with the greatest ease. A sky of exquisite blue was reflected in waters as cerulean, and everything spoke of peace and security to the storm-beaten mariners who had suffered shipwreck in that lonely archipelago. Several years after this landing of English sailors on one of the Bermudas, Edmund Waller wrote a poem on the group, in which he described the largest as " That happy island where huge lemons grow," and commemorated its beanty, fruitfulness, and enchanting climate, with the pleasant lives passed there by the descendants of English settlers. But a much greater poet than Waller is thought to have derived some hints for the wondrous isle of Prospero, and for its wild and supernatural popula tion, from tke island where Sir George Sorners landed, and the stories that had been current of its monstrous dealings with the infernal world. Be this as it may, the Bermudas are now insepai-ably associated with the most exquisite creation of Shakespeare s fancy; and to a lettered mind the mention of the one calls up at a touch the varied enchantments of the other. 48 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1610. Delicious as the land and climate were, the three commissioners were naturally desirous of commu nicating with their countrymen in Virginia. As there was very little chance of any vessel passing by the Bermudas, they provided their long boat with a deck made out of the ship s hatches, and sent her with nine men to the settlement at James Town, to require a vessel of sufficient size to take off the whole shipwrecked party. It was but a few days sail to the Virginian coast, yet months passed away without tidings or assistance. The probability is certain Puritans, who objected to conformity in religion, and who were probably inclined to Re publican ideas in matters of state. The rebellion was quelled with some difficulty, only to burst out attain with greater force. It is said that the lives o o of Gates and others were to be attempted; and a gentleman named Paine was shot for attacking his commanding officer, and insulting the Governor. But ultimately all the disaffected save two returned to their obedience, and were restored to favour.* While these events were proceeding, the adherents VIEW IX THE BERMUDAS. that the boat foundered at sea ; at any rate, nothing "more was ever known of her or of her crew. In the meanwhile, a quarrel arose between Gates and Somers on the question of authority ; and the ship- Avrecked men divided themselves into two antago nistic sections, and lived apart in a sullen enmity, which even community of misfortune could not assuage. The situation was rendered still more painful by the mutinous conduct of some of the crew ami of several of the colonists, who, desiring to settle permanently in the islands, defied the authority of Sir Thomas Gates, and talked of esta blishing a government of their own like Trinculo, Stephano, and Caliban in the enchanted isle. It would appear that amongst this party there were of Gates and of Sorners were engaged in building two vessels of cedar-wood, aided by the wreck of the old ship. The artificers having an insufficient stock of tools, no iron bolts, and no pitch, the con struction of these barks (which were called the Patience and the Deliverance] was an affair of great difficulty ; but it was accomplished by amazing per severance and fertility of resource, and on the 10th of May, 1610, the two parties set sail. During their stay in the Bermudas (now alternatively designated * A full account of these transactions will be found in Purchas s "Pilgrims," Book IX., chap. 6. Further details of the doings of this body of Englishmen in the Bermudas are contained in " The Generall Historic of Virginia, New England, and the Summer lies " (1G29), compiled by Captain Smith. 1610.] ARRIVAL OF LORD DELAWARE. 49 the Somer Islands, after the brave Admiral who, on a subsequent visit, died there), they had had factions and tumults, a marriage, a birth, two christenings, and five deaths, including a murder ; so that their history was very much that of the great world in little. Reaching James Town 011 the 23rd of May, they found, instead of the prosperous colony which they expected, a handful of miserable men, reduced by famine and disease to the utmost extremity. Captain George Percy was acting as president of the colony, and was at the time living in a fort which had been erected on a point of land some way from famine appeared but four days off, to remove the whole colony to Newfoundland, where it was hoped that assistance might be obtained from the English fishermen who frequented that island. All had, in fact, embarked on the 7th of June in two pinnaces which lay in the roads, and in the vessels from Bermuda, and had reached the mouth of the James River on the following morning, when, to their great joy, they were met by Lord Delaware, with three ships, a large quantity of provisions, and a considerable number of new settlers. By night they were once more at the fort of James Town, MOUNT IJESEUT ISLE. from the town. The fort and the town itself were in a state of great dilapidation ; for the settlers had used for burning whatever spare wood they could get, rather than venture into the woods for fuel, knowing that the Indians were always lying in wait to murder them. Of provisions there was so scanty a store that it could not have lasted more than ten days, and that which was brought by the two vessels from Bermuda was insufficient to satisfy for long the needs of the additional numbei-s who came with it. Sir Thomas Gates, having assumed the govern ment of the place, determined, when actual death and on the next day but one Sunday, June 10th the restoration of the colony was signalised by a solemn religious service held in the wooden church, for the repairing of which Lord Delaware gave im mediate orders. The new Governor then caused his commission to be read, and a consultation took place on the affairs of the settlement. A few weeks showed that the helm was in firm hands. Every thing brightened under the change. Two new foi-ts were built, commanding a large tract of country. Faction was repressed, authority was asserted, and all set to work with renewed heart. A very interesting account of the daily lives of 50 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1611. the colonists at this period is given by a gentle man named Strachey, who was shipwrecked with Somers on the Bermuda Islands, and whose narra tive is published in Purchas, Book IX., chap. 6. The church, by the directions of Lord Delaware, was always " kept passing sweet, and trimmed iip with divers flowers." In this edifice, which was built of cedar and black walmitwood, sermons were preached twice every Sunday ; a sermon was also delivered on Tlmrsdays ; and every morning, at the ringing of a bell, about ten o clock, each man ad dressed himself to prayers, and again at four o clock in the afternoon, " before supper." When the Lord Governor went to church on Sundays, he was accom panied by his councillors, officers, and gentlemen, and by a guard of halberdiers in the Delaware livery and red cloaks, who stood, to the number of fifty, on each side of and behind the Governor s seat. The Governor himself sat in the choir, in a green velvet chair, with a velvet cushion before him, on which he knelt ; and, on returning to his house, he was always waited on to the door by his chief advisers and military captains. The town soon began to recover a look of prosperity. The houses were better built than before the fire, and were now roofed with the bark of trees, which was said to be as proof against winter weather as tiles, and to repel the heat in summer much better than the mixture of bitumen and clay which had at first been used. In the principal chambers were wide and large country chimneys, filled in the cold weather with immense wood fires, and the walls were fre quently adorned with a fine kind of mats made by the Indians. At the middle of the town was the market place, guarded by a demi-culverin ; and all round the habitations, at a little distance, ran a circle of pulisadoes, with gates, bulwarks, and planted cannon. The vigorous rule of Lord Delaware, his willing ness to investigate the grievances of the colony, his care to prevent similar misfortunes in the future, the dignity of his manners, mingled with natural kindness, and his determination to maintain order and encourage industry, led to the most happy results. The violence of the Indians was restrained by military expeditions in various directions,* and * In " The Generall Historic of Virginia," mention is made of an act of great atrocity towards the Indians, which, for the credit of Lord Delaware, it is to be hoped is not true. "To correct some injuries of the Paspaheghs," says the writer, "he [Lord Delaware] sent Captain Percy, Master Stacy, and fifty or three-score shot, when, the savages flying, they burnt their houses, took the queen and her children prisoners ; whom not long after they slew." As this most infernal deed is not alluded to in other accounts, and as Lord Delaware has the credit of being a just and even an amiable man, it is but fair to suppose that the circumstances were not precisely as alleged, or that, at least, they had not his sanction. prosperity returned to the little settlement, which had suffered so many and such various misfortunes. It is impossible, however, not to condemn the frightful severity of the code of laws established by Lord Delaware, and enlarged by some of his suc cessors. Crashaw, in his sermon preached before the Governor ere he had yet left England, had re commended him to make Atheism and other blas phemies capital offences; and Delaware unfortunately acted on the cruel and foolish advice. We all know what factious and intolerant preachers too often mean when they talk of " Atheism " and " blasphemies : " they mean any opinion which does not harmonise with their own. The religion of the colony was to be that of the Church of England, and all departures from it were to be severely punished. Death was the penalty for blaspheming " the Trinity or the King," for profane swearing (on a third conviction), and for persistent non-attendance at church, or at the Sunday catechetical lesson. Disrespect to a clergy man was punished by whipping, and so was the re fusal of a colonist on his arrival to give an account of his faith. In the latter case, the offender was to be flogged daily until he complied. Such a code is given over to reprobation in the mere act of stating it ; but it appears to have been tempered and re strained by the goodness of Lord Delaware s dis position. Fortunately for the world, human nature is often a great deal better than the theological standards it sets up. After a while Lord Delaware fell ill, and with much reluctance was compelled to return, to England in March, 1611, leaving the government in the hands of Captain Percy. His reappearance in the mother country produced a most disastrous effect on the public mind with reference to Virginia. It appears to have been assumed that the colony lay under an evil fate, and that nothing would make it succeed. The London Company lost heart. Many of the subscribers sought to withdraw their payments. The little community at James Town was held up to ridicule by the wits and playwrights of London ; and in that dark hoiir it seemed as if everything would have gone to wreck. Lord Dela ware considered it necessary to make an explanation of his conduct to the Company. In this document, which was read at a court held on the 25th of June, 1611, and which was afterwards printed in a tract preserved in the British Museum, and in cluded in Purchas s " Pilgrims " (Book IX., chap. 8), the writer speaks of his having been, attacked by ague, dysentery, cramp, gout, mid scurvy. " These several calamities," he adds, " I am the more de sirous to particularise unto your Lordships (-although they were too notorious to the whole colony), lest 1611.] PROGRESS OF VIRGINIA. 51 any man should misdeem that under the general name and common excuse of sickness I went about to cloak either sloth or fear, or any other base apprehension, unworthy the high and general charge which you had entrusted to my fidelity." Notwith standing the ill effect of the Virginian climate on his health, Lord Delaware expressed his willingness to lay all he was worth " upon the adventure of the action, rather than [that] so honourable a work should fail ; and to return with all convenient expedition." This resolution he afterwards endea voured to carry out ; but in the meantime the management of the colony was placed in other hands. The provisional Governor was Sir Thomas Dale, a soldier of experience in the Low Countries. Before the arrival of Lord Delaware, he had been despatched from England in command of three ships, with men, cattle, and provisions for a year ; all which arrived on the 10th of May, 1611. He immediately took the management of affairs out of the hands of Captain Percy, and was afterwards con firmed by the London Company in his post. It happened at the same time that the treasurer of the Company, Sir Thomas Smith, sent out to Dale, solely on his own authority, a code of martial law, with instructions to govern the settlement 011 that basis. This code was in the main a translation from the rules of war enforced in the army of the Low Countries the most rigid military school then to be found in Europe. The power conferred upon Dale Avas a fearful one ; but, 011 the whole, he appeal s to have used it with discretion, tender ness, and good effect, though not without some cases of hardship. The prospects of the colony seemed to Dale excellent. He wrote home to the Council, urging them to pursue the enterprise with their utmost endeavours, and assuring them that they might take four of the best kingdoms in Christendom without equalling Virginia, either for commodities or goodness of soil. This report, which was confirmed by Lord Delaware, and by Sir Thomas Gates (who had now returned to England), did much towards removing the feeling of despond ency which had lately prevailed. In the councils of the King, the great influence and authority of Cecil were given in favour of maintaining the American possessions of the country ; and it was quickly resolved to despatch Gates to Virginia with six ships, three hundred emigrants, provi sions, ammunition, one hundred kiue, and other cattle. These arrived about the commencement of August, 1611 less than three months after Dale had written to the Company. Gates assumed the government, and Dale, with his consent, sailed up the river to found a new plantation, the old colony now consisting of seven hundred men. The settlement thus commenced was called Heiirico, after the eldest son of King James, a great favourite of the English people up to the time of his premature death in the following year. In this remote situation some attempt at mission ary work was made by Alexander Whitaker, who has been called the Apostle of Virginia. But savages are not readily converted to the religion of those who are evidently bent on appropriating their possessions. It is easy to bring charges of treachery against Powhatan and other Indian chiefs ; and doubtless it is true that, finding themselves weaker than their adversaries, they fell back on the great resource of feebleness, a temporising craft. But let us be just to human nature, whatever its colour or its faith. No people can be expected to see with equanimity an alien race seizing its lands, disputing its predominance, and driving it farther and farther into the wilderness. It is idle to vituperate ene side where the motives on both sides are the same, and 011 neither very exalted. When Lord Dela ware sent a message to Powhatan, requiring him to release certain English prisoners, with their arms, and to punish, or deliver up for punishment, some of his own people who had offended, the savage returned for answer a demand that the settlers should quit the country, or confine them selves to James Town, without searching further into his lands or rivers ; otherwise, he would do them all the mischief that he could. This was the defiance of a race sure to be beaten in the long run ; yet it was not unnatural, nor want ing in a kind of proud heroism. In the interests of civilisation, we may be justified in subduing an inferior people ; but it should be done after the old Roman fashion by military occupation, by in dustrial instruction, by a severe yet beneficent discipline, and by a constant regard to the interests of the vanquished. Preaching on the one hand, and rapacity on the other, are poor arguments for Christianity, or for anything else. The interest felt by the King in his western settlement seems by this time to have been fairly roused; and in March, 1612, a third patent was granted, by which the Bermudas, and all islands within three hundred leagues of the Virginian shore, were made over to the London Company. These acquisitions, however, were soon after transferred to another association. By the new charter, James confirmed all the former privileges of the adven turers, prolonged the term of exemption from pay ment of duties on the commodities exported by them, and granted to the Company more extensive CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1613. lights than it had previously possessed. The supreme power was now vested in the corporation at large, and not simply in a council. Weekly or even more frequent meetings of the whole body might l>e convened for the discussion of ordinary affairs, while all questions respecting government, commerce, and the disposition of lands were reserved for four general courts, at which all officers were to be elected. The constitution of the London Com pany was thus reformed in a popular sense ; and at a little earlier date the right of private property had been authoritatively recognised by Sir Thomas Dale. In the first years of the settlement, no in dividual property in land had been permitted. The woods had been felled and the fields cultivated by the joint labour of the emigrants ; the crops (such as were produced) were carried to the common storehouse, and a weekly distribution was made to every family in proportion to its numbers. It was a perfect system of communism, such as modern speculators have frequently desired, and occasion ally attempted. But such a system is not suited to human nature, which needs the incentive of personal reward to bring out all its powers of exertion. So strongly did the communistical prin ciple operate in the promotion of idleness that, as we find related in " The Generall Historie of Virginia," many would escape from their labour, or slumber over their tasks, knowing they would be fed out of the common store ; while even the most honest would hardly take so much pains in a week as they would afterwards take in a day. To each man three acres of ground were allotted by Dale, on condition that he gave to the colony, every year, a month s labour, and two barrels and a half of com, to be kept in store for the use of new settlers ; and in a little while it was seen that the labour of three or four men, working for themselves, produced more corn, than that of thirty under the previous arrangement. A servile class, however, still re mained. Those who were sent out at the cost of the Company were compelled to give for the benefit of their employers the labour of eleven months in the year. The remaining month belonged to themselves, together with three acres of land, and an allowance of two bushels of corn from the public store. The additional expenses incurred by the London Company were defrayed by a lottery, which was specially authorised for the benefit of the colony, and which produced 29,000. Lotteries, however,, were always regarded with disfavour in England, and in 1621 were suspended by an Order of Council, in consequence of complaints in Parliament. All this while, the colony increased in strength. By one of those acts of injustice common in colonial histories, the lands, cabins, and granaries of the Appomattocks were seized ; and, shortly after the marriage of Pocahoiitas, a treaty of amity was concluded with her father, Powhatan, by whose influence the Chickahomiiiies, in 1613, consented to acknowledge themselves subjects of the King of England, to assume the name of Englishmen, to refrain from all acts of enmity, to deposit in the English stores, at the beginning of harvest, a tribute of two bushels of corn for each fighting- man (receiving so many hatchets in exchange), and to be always ready to furnish the settlers with three hundred men against the Spaniards, or any other enemy : all which was to be rewarded by a gift to each of the eight chieftains of a red coat, a copper chain, a portrait of King James, and the title of one of his noblemen ! CHAPTER VII. Expedition against French Settlers Grants of Land to Emigrants Cultivation of Tobacco Deatli of Lord Delaware - Unsparing Administration of Martial Law Reforms introduced by Yearclley- An Elective Colonial Council summoned assist the Governor Increase in the Number of Colonists Jealousy of King James at the growing Power of the London Company and of the Plantation Introduction of Slavery into the Settlement -Origin of that System on the ncan Continent The Indians incapable of Hard Work Virginia under the Government of Sir Francis Wyatt A Coming Tragedy The Native Population of America : their Personal Appearance, Habits, Warfare, Religion and Arts Reasons for their desiring to Exterminate the English Settlers. THE Virginian colonists, being now restored to heart and confidence, would not permit any foreign rival near their dominions. In the year 1613, Sir Thomas Dale, understanding that there was a plantation of Frenchmen in what was then called North;- Virginia (though the part indicated was in the modern State of Maine, and therefore in land belonging to the Plymouth Company), sent Samuel Argall, a young sea-captain, to Mount Desert Isle, near the Penobscot, to put an end to the colony in the most summary manner. He at once sailed to the spot, cannonaded the entrench- 1614.] GOVERNMENT OF SIR THOMAS DALE. 53 raents, and gained possession of an infant hamlet, which had already received the name of St. Sauveur. The cottages on shore, and a French ship in the harbour, were pillaged. Some of the colonists were put on board a vessel for their own country, while others were transported to the Chesa peake. For these actions Argall was afterwards called to account in England, but does not seem to have been subjected to any punishment ; and on a second expedition to the same part of America, he raised the arms of England where those of France had been planted, demolished some fortifi cations that had been built on the Isle of St. Croix, and set fire to the deserted settlement of Port Royal. In 1614, Sir Thomas Gates embarked for England, leaving the government of the James Town colony, as well as that of Henrico, to Dale. Gates, on arriving in the home country, did his utmost to promote the interests of the settlement. A petition for aid was presented to Parliament, and found an earnest supporter in Lord Delaware, who moved for a committee to consider the question of relief. Nothing, however, came of it, and the colonists were left to their own energies for extending the prosperity of the plantation. As an inducement to emigrants, large grants of land were made to those who came themselves, or who sent others, at their own expense at first, a hundred acres to each person, afterwards fifty, with the understanding that the actual occupation and culture of those would confer a right to another fifty at some future time. Land was also apportioned, to an extent not exceeding two thousand acres, to persons who had greatly distinguished themselves in the colony; and, by a payment to the Company s treasury of 12 10s., any one could obtain a title to a hundred acres of such land as was not already granted or possessed, with a reserved claim to as much more. * Sir Tl lomas Dale was the author of these enactments, which show the wisdom, and the essentially popular character, of his rule. As if* with a prophetic feel ing that the future communities of America must be democratic, he made provision for giving to the people themselves the ownership of the territory. The essence of feudalism consists in granting to a small privileged class the entire soil of a country, on which the mass of the population labour for bare subsistence. In America, amongst men of English race, there could be no privileged orders And no feudalism. A new nation was being founded in the virgin lands of the West, and it was the policy of a statesman to invest those who laboured on that fruitful earth with the fullest title * Bancroft s History of the United States, VoL I., chap. 4. to the raw material of their skill and toil. The farmers of America, cultivating their own land, have always been among the most respectable, courageous, and reliable classes of the United States. Dale returned to England in 1616, after having appointed George Yeardley deputy-governor. The latter was succeeded in 1617 by Captain Argall, who was also created Admiral of the country and of the surrounding seas. At this time great atten tion was given to the cultivation of tobacco. The manufacture of ashes and soap, of glass and tar, which had been practised for some few years, was abandoned for a branch of industry that seemed likely to be much more profitable. Tobacco was planted everywhere in the fields, in the gardens, in the very streets of James Town. When Captain Argall arrived in the colony to take the governor ship, he found the settlers dispersed about the open country, planting and tending the Indian, weed, and James Town itself almost deserted, and partially in ruins. Only five or six of the houses remained. The church was tlown, the palisadoes were broken, the bridge lay in pieces, the well of fresh water was spoiled, and savages loitered at their pleasure within the limits of the settlement. Everything was neglected for the sake of tobacco, the sale of which in England yielded the planters a fail- return for their labour, although it fetched no more than three shillings a pound, while that imported from the Spanish West Indies commanded as much as eighteen shillings for the same quantity. That tobacco was destined to be the staple of Virginia was very evident ; but its cultivation was now being pursued to the injury of more immediate and more vital interests. The growing of cereal crops was abandoned, and the colonists were com pelled once more to trust to the Indians for necessary supplies. This condition of things would probably have been amended by Lord Delaware, who in 1618 was again appointed to the governor ship of the colony ; but unfortunately he died 011 his passage out, according to most authorities on the subject, though it has likewise been reported that he died on his passage home after a second time reach ing Virginia, and also that his demise took place on the 7th of June, 1618, near his seat at Wherwell, in Hampshire. However this may have been, the colony had not the benefit of his renewed direction, and the conduct of affairs remained in the hands of Argall, a man of violent and arbitrary character, who administered martial law (then the only law of the colony) with unsparing rigour. The most trifling offences were punished with servitude, and death was decreed with a readiness which nothing 54 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1619. but the preservation of the state from ruin would have justified. Argall, too, was not only a tyrant, but a man of loose principles. He extorted various sums of money from the colonists, took advantage of his position to trade on his own account, and misappropriated the property of the Company. Finally he withdrew from Virginia, leaving it without a Governor. An order had previously been issued by the Company to send him back to England under arrest ; but this he managed to evade. Argall was superseded by Yeardley, who returned to his former post as captain-general. His rule was distinguished by important reforms. Martial law was quietly laid aside, and trial by jury introduced. The planters were confirmed in the possession of their estates, and compulsory service to the colony was abolished. Yeardl?y also summoned a local council, which was to be elected by the colonists. The first of these assemblies met in June, 1619. It was returned by eleven separate communities, scattered in different pai-ts of Virginia ; for the territory occupied by the English was now very extensive, and the planters were dispersed far and wide in the pursuit of tobacco- culture. Yeardley seems to have introduced this popular element on his own responsibility; but in July, 1621, an ordinance of the London Company created for the colony a written constitution. The model of the English constitution was closely followed. The legislative authority was vested in the Governor, who was equivalent to the monarch, though in fact he represented the general body of the proprietors ; in a Council of State, nominated by the Company, which was the colonial House of Lords ; and in a General Assembly, or House of Commons, to be convened annually, and to consist of the members of the Council, and of two burgesses for each of the plantations, who should be elected by the inhabit ants. All laws passed by this Parliament for such it really was were to be sent over to England for ratification by a general court of the corporation ; and without such ratification they were null and void. But. on the other hand, no orders of the court in London were to bind the colony unless they were sanctioned by the local assembly. The courts of justice were to conform to the laws and manner of trial existing in England. The colonists expressed the utmost thankfulness for these con cessions, and set to work with renewed vigour under the stimulus of free institutions. Several fresh emigrants were sent out from England, owing mainly to the exertions of the new treasurer of the Company, Sir Edwin Sandys, who exhibited great energy, judgment, and good feeling in connection with the affairs of the plantation. The number of colonists at the beginning of 1619 was no more than 600. Sandys, in the course of that year, provided for the passage of 1,261, in cluding ninety young women, who soon found husbands. Sixty more women were despatched two years later, and it was stipulated that, when married, their husbands should repay to the corporation the costs of their transmission from the old country. The colony had now been in exist ence nearly fifteen years. It had already cost more than .80,000, and had undergone a career of varied fortune. Pestilence, famine, open warfare, secret treachery, internal dissensions, repeated changes of government, ill-directed industry, and mis takes innumerable, had been survived, and it seemed at length as if the settlement would really be con solidated. The new arrivals were to be counted, not by hundreds, but by thousands. Fifty patents for land were granted in three years. The delibe rations of the London Company, at their meetings for the despatch of business, were second in. import ance only to those of Parliament. Attention was very generally directed to the affairs of the colony, and people at home began to believe in its success. Unknown well-wishers sent sums of money to the ti-easurer, and several person? at their decease left large bequests to the plantation, for building churches, opening colleges and schools, educating the children of Indians in the Christian religion and in industrial arts, and promoting the general good of the new society. The Rev. Patrick Cop land, chaplain of the East India Company, was particularly earnest in these works. The prosperity of Virginia was indeed already producing some jealousy in the mind of King James, whose arbitrary instincts were irritated at the rise of what even then seemed likely to become a rival power to the power of princes a common wealth founded on labour and on trade, without noblemen, and without Divine-right theories of kingcraft. This jealousy was exhibited on two occasions. The first had reference to the commerce of the colony, and the question of its liability to or immunity from Imperial taxation. Virginia coiild now produce such large quantities of tobacco that, besides supplying the home market, it sent a con siderable amount to Holland, in which country some warehouses were opened for its sale. To this, James and his Privy Council objected, on the ground that the divergence of the trade into a foreign channel operated to the injury of the English revenue, which derived great profit from duties on the Vir ginian product. The colonists contended that their charter secured to them freedom of trade ; and in 1620.] INTRODUCTION OF SLAVERY. the end the matter was adjusted by a species of compromise. The other difference had to do with the powers of the London Company. When Sir Edwin Sandys resigned his office as treasurer, the King endeavoured to appoint his successor, giving the association four names to choose from. This interference was resented and successfully opposed : the King s nominees were passed over, and the Earl of Southampton, the illustrious friend of Shake speare, was elected in 1621. One of the earliest from the coast of Guinea brought a cargo of negroes, to the colony, and a certain number were sold to. the planters. A year earlier, some had been brought to James Town by the captain of an English vessel belonging to Argall, but were not landed. The Dutchman, however, found a market for his human freight, and it was soon perceived that these children of a tropical climate were better adapted to work under the violent heats of Virginia than a number of Englishmen reared in the mild,. RED INDIAN WARRIORS. victories of English popular rights over monarchical aggression was thus gained in connection with Virginia. It is a strange and mournful circumstance that, about the very time when these great advances were being made towards free government in the New World, and in the English corporation which had formed the settlement, an accidental occur rence laid the foundations of a system which is the greatest outrage on natural rights that human beings can commit, which for many generations continued to be the curse of English America, and which nothing but a long and bloody civil war could eradicate. In the year 1G20, a Dutch ship moist air of a northern island. Slavery has certain superficial advantages in all hot climates, and its enormous evils are either not seen, beneath the allurements of wealth and ease which it brings to the master, or remain unobserved until custom has rivetted the system, and vested interests are opposed to change. This detestable institution, the parent of crimes innumerable, and of mischiefs which hyperbole itself could hardly exaggerate, was first brought into the Anglo-American plantations without the consent, or even the knowledge, of the London corporation ; and it was afterwards con firmed and extended out of a false idea of policy, and the greed of present gain. But negro bondage 56 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1621. was no new principle in America. It was almost coeval with the presence of Europeans in that quarter of the globe. The Spaniards and the Por tuguese had been, accustomed, from a period rather earlier than the middle of the fifteenth century, when the western continent was still unknown, to traffic with the African Moors for negroes, who were held in a sort of qualified serfdom in the cities of Andalusia, When, therefore, Columbus dis covered portions of insular America, in 1492 and 1493, the great nation which acquired those new countries was thoroughly familiar with the practice of enforced labour by an inferior race, the very colour of whose skin seemed to mark them out as hardly belonging to the human family. Even so soon as 1503, negroes swarmed in the infant colony of Hispaniola, and were actually a drug in. the market. The system was perpetuated and spread abroad wherever the Spaniards or the Portuguese obtained possessions ; for it enabled the conquerors to live in luxurious idleness, and to wring from the toil and suffering of many miserable creatures the wealth which otherwise they must have won by the sweat of their own brows. The oppressors sought to cover the naked brutality of their act by a specious pretence of proselytism. It was said that none but Christianised negroes were sent out to the plantations, and it was suggested that they would be useful in converting the native population. But historians concur in representing that a perfectly unscrupulous trade in African slaves was carried on for purposes of gain. A brief experience showed that the feeble race of Indians could not perform the terrific tasks required of them in the mines. This did not have the effect of restoring them to their native liberty, for they were con stantly sold into bondage in foreign lands, and, in English as well as in Spanish America, the red man was frequently kidnapped for service abroad, during a period of nearly two centuries. Let it be remembered, to the credit of a religious community which has often been the remorseless persecutor of men, that the crime of slavery Avas on several occasions denounced by the Church of Rome, though without effect. The Spaniards and Por tuguese of the sixteenth century were certainly not wanting in devoted submission to the Papal See ; but in this particular case interest was stronger -than faith and duty. When Catholic countries were thus regardless of the fulminations of the Vatican, it was not to be expected that Protestant England would be deterred from dealing in slaves, or employing them, by the opposition of a priestly power no longer recognised as possessing any authority over men s consciences and souls. That brave and in many respects noble sailor, Sir John Hawkins, engaged in a regular trade in negroes with the Spanish colonies of the New World. He set tire to the thatched dwellings of Africans, seized as many of the dismayed wretches as he could secure, and sold them to the planters of Hispaniola.* Queen Elizabeth was not ashamed to share in the profits of this abominable traffic ; and the Virginian colonists of 1620, in buying slaves of a Dutch merchantman, only followed an evil precedent with which the annals of their own country had made them acquainted. The ordinance of the London Company establish ing the new colonial constitution was brought to the plantation in 1621 by a new governor, Sir Francis Wyatt. He found the English communities in a more prosperous condition than they had ever before enjoyed, and everything seemed full of pro mise. A terrible tragedy, however, was being prepared with fatal secrecy and consummate craft. Before relating the massacre of the English, which throws a lurid stain over the followng year, it may be as well to consider the general character and posi tion of the native tribes, and in what way they were affected by the foreign occupation of their country. In the opinion of most ethnologists, the abori ginal population of America (with the exception, perhaps, of the Esquimaux, who, it is thought, belong to the North Asiatic stock) form a distinct division of the human race. This great branch includes several varieties, though probably not a larger number than may be noted in the Caucasian division, nor more strongly discriminated than the highly-cultured Greek, Roman, or Western. Asiatic of the ancient world from his barbarous and distant relatives in the forests of Germany and Britain. The Peruvians and Mexicans were*people possess ing arts and sciences, cities and buildings of con siderable splendour? an elaborate religious system, a pompous ritual, and a settled polity in affairs of state. The Indian, of most other parts was a savage, but a savage with some capacity of civilisa tion. The term " Indian," it should be observed, is a misnomer, which neither on geographical nor ethnological grounds conveys any true idea of the race. It was first used by Columbus, who, on discovering the outlying islands of America, sup posed them to be portions of Asia, and so entitled them the West Indies. The designation, in spite of its absurdity, has continued to the present day ; but, without a due consideration of the facts, it is * Mr. Bancroft lias given an excellent summary of facts on the question of slavery in Vol. I. , chap. 5, of liis History. 1621.] THE VIRGINIA INDIANS. 57 likely to mislead. When the English settled in North America, the native tribes with whom they came in contact dwelt apart from one another in the midst of great woods and wilds, and each claimed an extensive tract of land as its peculiar hunting-ground claims which often conflicted, and led to war. They formed seven distinct groups, but were characterised by a general similarity. All were of a reddish or copper hue, though with some diversity of shade ; the hair black, long, coarse, and shining ; the beard thin, and growing in tufts ; the forehead low ; the cheek-bones pro minent ; the nose aquiline. In figure they were well-proportioned and active, and their lives were such as to develop some of the physical facul ties of man to the highest extent. They ran with the swiftness of roes ; they crept through the matted overgrowth of woods with the noiseless stealthiness of cats ; their hearing and their sight were rendered exquisite by a constant habit of watchfulness, by the practice of savage warfare, and by the necessity, for sheer subsistence, of out witting the wild creatures of the forest and the prairie. The missionary, Alexander Whitaker, gave rather a good account of them in some re spects. " These men," he wrote, " are not so simple as some have supposed them They are a very understanding generation, quick of apprehension, sudden in their despatches, subtle in their dealings, exquisite in their inventions, and industrious in their labour Finally, there is a civil government amongst them, which they strictly observe, and show thereby that the law of Nature dwelletl> in them : for they have a rude kind ot commonwealth, and rough government, wherein they both honour and obey their kings, parents, and governors, both greater and less. They observe the limits of their own possessions. Murther is scarcely heard of ; adultery and other offences severely punished." The last two sentences are contradicted by a great mass of testimony ; and it must be said of the Indians that they had the virtues and the vices that are commonly found among barbarians. To those who trusted them, and whom they in turn trusted, they would exhibit kindness and hospitality; and there is something touching in the readiness of the Virginian Indians to receive the colonists of 1584 in a friendly spirit. But they were suspicious and cunning when once their apprehensions were aroused ; their enmity was bitter, their vengeance remorseless. The methods of life among these savages were of the simplest. Their clothing consisted chiefly of deer-skins, covering the body, and leaving the amis and legs naked. The humbler orders, indeed, had little else on them but leaves and grass ; but the bodies of all were to some extent protected against weather by the unguents and colours with which they were liberally plastered. The more dignified among them wore mantles of feathers, ingeniously and even elegantly wrought. The women were often tattooed, and loved to wear beads, bits of copper, and such other adornments as they could obtain. The men tricked themselves out with the wings of birds, the skins of hawks, dead rats tied by the tail, live snakes, or the dried and bony hand of some vanquished enemy. Their weapons were bows of witch-hazel and arrows of reeds, truncheons of wood, and tomahawks made of sharpened bones stuck through wooden handles. Of defensive armour, they had nothing but targets of bark, and some few coverings fashioned out of sticks wickered together with thread. Except on special occasions, they were indolent, listless, addicted to gambling and to smoking, and oppressed with that tcediuiti vitce which is common among savages. The little villages in which they lived consisted of a few cabins constructed of wooden stakes covered with bark or with matting. So small were these to wns (if such a term can be applied to them) that Thomas Harriot, in the expedition of 1585, saw none con taining more than thirty houses. The greatest chiefs at that time had but eighteen towns under their command, and could not bring into the field above seven or eight hundred fighting men at the most. Very little intercourse existed amongst the tribes, so that the language of every government, according to the same authority, was distinct from all tin- others, and the farther they were apart the greater was the difference. When at war with one another, they generally operated by sudden surprises, in the dawn or by moonlight. Ambuscades were fre quently resorted to, and pitched battles very seldom risked, unless where there were many trees, behind which the combatants could leap after the delivery of every arrow. On some occasions, however, they seem to have shown a good deal of military skill and capacity. These contests were chiefly for revenge, or for the possession of women and chil dren; and it appears to have been an understood thing that the victor should make prize of what belonged to the vanquished. Their warlike customs were cruel, and some of the early English explorers mention the habit of scalping. On all important occasions they painted themselves with more than usual care ; but the war-paint was peculiar, and designed to strike terror by its exaggeration of ferocity. The men were essentially warriors and hunters, looking on all peaceful pursuits as dero gating from their dignity, and leaving to their 58 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1621. women not only tlie management of the house hold, but the cultivation of the ground. Speaking generally, the relations of the males to the females were singularly passionless. The women were regarded simply as drudges and bearers of children, and were the objects neither of profligate desire nor of caressing tenderness. The attacks of the Indians on their enemies were made to the accompaniment of hideous cries, and they had a war-song and a war-dance, which were distinguished by every circumstance of horror. In the fight itself, their actions were those of infuriated demons, or of men wild with some fierce intoxica tion. They would drink the blood of the slain, and then rub their faces and mouths with vermilion, so that the dreadful fact might be made known to all their comrades. The wounded of their own party were very carefully removed in litters ; those of the adversary were killed on the field, and sub jected after death to revolting outrages. Prisoners were sometimes allowed to live ; at other times they were put to death deliberately, and in cold blood. In the latter case, death was generally preceded by the infliction of frightful tortures. The victim was bound naked to a stake, and sub jected, at the l>ands of men, women, and children, to the utmost refinements of cruelty. As his per secutors were careful, at this stage of the proceed ings, not to injure any vital organ, though the most sensitive parts were those chiefly attacked, they often prolonged the sufferings of the captive for several days. All this while, the victim, with a fortitude which it is difficult to realise, continued to sing his death-song, to boast of his own exploits, to insult his executioners, and to threaten them with future vengeance. When at length he was despatched, his body was eaten ; for, although not cannibals habitually, the Indians considered it a noble form of triumph to devour their enemies. It is a strange but well-ascertained fact, that the savage tribes who practise cannibalism are not the lowest, but the highest, in civilisation. This is seen in New Zealand, and, according to a living traveller (Dr. Schweinfurth), among the com munities in the heart of Africa. The extraordinary patience of the Indians under torment was a result of their physical education. The utmost pains were taken in youth to inure them to suffering, and they were taught that it was disgraceful in men, whose chief occupation in life was to prevail in battle, to shrink from any anguish which it was in the power of other men to inflict. The discipline of the ancient Spartans did not equal theirs in severity. This was especially the case in some of the South American tribes : but amontr the * O North American Indians also, boys and young men were compelled to submit to trials of their constancy of a very sharp and painful nature. The punishment of malefactors was generally such as to tax the powers of endurance to the utmost. Captain Smith relates that Powhatan, whose rule was of a most despotic kind, caused certain per sons who had offended him to be slowly broiled to death, by placing them in the centre of a ring of fire. When he would take vengeance on his enemies, he commanded them to be tied to a tree, and ordered the executioners to cut off their joints one by one, to strip the skin from their heads and faces, and finally to disembowel and burn. them. In this way, as the Indians themselves reported, they executed an unfortunate Englishman whom they had seized. Sometimes Powhatan directed that the heads of prisoners or criminals should be laid upon the altar or sacrificing-stone, and that their brains should be beaten out with clubs. We have seen that Captain Smith himself would have suffered this fate had he not been saved by Poca- hontas. For ordinary offences, men were beaten with cudgels till they fell senseless, yet without making the slightest cry or complaint. The execution of prisoners was often preceded by wild and mystical ceremonies, or by certain processes of divination, as in the case of Captain Smith ; and it was debated in full conclave whether or not the captive should be saved. When the question was decided in the affirmative, it was expected that the warrior so spared should make himself in every respect one of the tribe into which he was adopted. This adoption of former enemies (which, however, was not general until a period later than the early part of the seventeenth cen tury) seems to have been a matter of policy, prompted by a desire to fill up gaps left by war or other casualties. Indian women are not prolific ; the families of Indian coiiples are but small ; and in days of frequent warfare it often became necessary, in order that communities might be saved from total extinction, to resort to this method of recruiting. It would seem that the fighting men thus spared always acted with fidelity to their new comrades. Treachery to foes appears to have been reckoned by the Indians as a virtue ; but they were faithful to one another, and the respited prisoner made the interests of the adopting body his own, knowing that, even if he could escape, he would be killed by his former associates for the disgrace of having been captured. Protes tations of friendship among these savages often taxed to the utmost even the extravagant oratory of the race. In their addresses, the speakers would 1621.] RELIGION OF THE INDIANS. rave and gesticulate u-ntil they dropped with exhaustion. The religion of the native Virginians, at the time to which we are referring, was a species of Poly theism. If we may rely on the accounts handed down to us by early settlers (which, however, were liable to error, owing to want of familiarity with the Indian languages, and to the prepossessions of the narrators), they believed in several gods, having various degrees of power, but subject to one Great Spirit, who had existed from all eternity, and who, when he purposed to fashion the earth and stars, created the inferior deities to serve as his instruments and agents in the making and government of the iiniverse. The sun, moon, and planets were a kind of petty gods, considerably removed from the Supreme Being. The waters were made first, and out of these all kinds of living creatures, visible and invisible, were derived. The gods of this system were, among some tribes, repre sented by images of human shape,, to which offerings were made in a kind of rude temples. Mr. George Catlin, the author of a work on the North Ameri can Indians published in 1841, states that at that time no idolatry was to be found amongst them ; that all worshipped a single god ; that they knew nothing of any mediator ; and that they were a highly moral and religious people. But this was apparently not the case at the period of the English settlements. We have the testimony of Harriot, of Smith, of Whitaker, and of others, that the Indians who came under their notice were idolaters ; and indeed this is the iiatxiral tendency of all savage races. It requires a high degree of mental culture to conceive the abstract idea of a Divine Intellect, to be worshipped in the spirit, and not in any material form. A savage oppressed by the mystery of creation takes refuge in the visible shape of some monstrous image, and thinks that the work of his own hands is invested with a mysterious power to bless, to save, or to punish. The theology of the Indians, however, partook in some degree of characteristics which we observe among the Greeks of old. The system of many gods working under one Supreme Deity was that of Olympus ; and if the savage of Virginia was an idol ater, so also was the politw Athenian, whose fellow- citizens have given laws to the art, the literatxire, and the intelligence of Europe and America. The Indians, moreover, believed in the immortality of the soul, and that after death the spirit of the deceased was carried, in accordance with the deeds he had done while in the flesh, either to a place of per petual bliss, or to a great pit which they thought to be in the remotest regions of that part of the world, towards the sunset, there to burn continually. Such is the account given by Thomas Harriot, who adds that the Indians told him two stories of men who had returned to life from, the grave, one of whom had been saved from the place of torment by the interposition of a god, while the other had travelled far in. a delightful country, planted with pleasant fruit-trees, and abounding in fine houses. Captain Smith paints a darker picture of the Vir ginian faith. He says that the people adored all things that were able to do them hurt beyond their prevention ; that their chief god was the devil, and that him they served more out of fear than love. From the same principle, they paid a kind of divine worship to fire, water, lightning, and thunder, and even to the ordnance, arquebusses, and horses of the English strangers. According to Whitaker, their religious services were performed with a great fear and attention, and with many strange dumb shows, " stretching forth their limbs and straining their body, much like to the counter feit women in England, who feign themselves be witched, or possessed of some evil spirit." Their priests he described as "a generation of vipers, even of Satan s own brood." These men went naked, and lived alone in the woods, after the manner of hermits, no one being permitted to approach them unless called. Yet that there was a degree of scepticism among the Indians as to the reality or all-sufficiency of their deities, seems evident from the readiness they manifested to acquire some knowledge of the religion of the colonists, and to admit that the God of so powerful a race must exceed their own in mightiness as much as guns exceeded bows and arrows. They would frequently send to the Governor at James Town with entrea ties that he would pray to his God for rain, as theirs would not grant them any. This, however, may have been nothing more than a prudent de ference to the stronger power ; and, from whatever cause, Christianity lias never made much progress with the North American Indians, notwithstanding the devoted exertions and temporary success of Whitaker, Eliot, and even more recent missionaries. The Indians of New England were perhaps even more rude and savage than those of Virginia. By some writers it has been doubted whether they had any religion at all. Thomas Morton, one of the early settlers, writes : " Methinks it is absurd to say they have a kind of worship, and not able to demonstrate whom or what it is they are accus tomed to worship." But there is a great deal of testimony to the effect that they had religious ideas similar to those of the Virginians. Edward Win- slow, in a letter to a friend, took the same view as MASSACRE 01 SETTLEK8. 1622.] DREAD OF THE WHITE SETTLERS. 61 Morton ; but afterwards, in his " Good News from New England," confessed that ho was in error. His account is too detailed and precise* to permit the supposition that he spoke merely from vague impressions. All tho North American Indians, moreover, had a species of magical ceremonies for the casting out of devils, which implied the ele ments of religious belief. degree of civilisation varied in the several tribes, and differences of manners were observable in different localities. Setting aside the Mexicans, however, the divergence was not very great among the Indians of North America ; and in this brief sketch we have in the main noted what was common to the numerous bodies of savages with whom the English and their descendants in Art was in a very rudimentary state among the natives of this part of America ; but it was not wholly wanting. The dresses of the people, their ornaments, their weapons, their canoes, their houses, their temples and idols, all showed a cer tain amount of constructive skill ; and we read in Purchas of a kind of palace belonging to Powhatan, which war; fifty or sixty yards in length, and which had at the four corners images of a dragon, a bear, a leopard, and a gigantic man. This house was situated in the midst of a wood, and, excepting Powhatan, was approached only by priests. The 6 America have been brought into frequent juxta position.* Such were the people who in 1622 secretly plotted the destruction of the white-faced settlers. That they should desire to be rid of these innovators was not surprising. They per ceived themselves being driven every year more and more into the wilderness. They found their cultivated lands taken from them by a race possessed of powers and resources so much beyond their own as to be absolutely mysterious and inex plicable. They had seen their customs derided, * Thomas Harriot, in Hakluyt, Vol. III. ; Captain Smith, in Purdias, Book IX., chap. 3 ; Alexander "\Yhitaker, in Purchas, P>ook IX., chap. 2: The True Travels, Adventures, and Observations of Captain John Smith ; Robertson s History of America, Book IV. ; Catlin s North American Indians ; Neal s and Palfrey s Histories of New England ; Edward Winslow s Good News from Xew England ; and some minor authorities. 62 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1622. and their beliefs set down as folly. They had felt the heaA iness of the white man s hand when he would chastise them, and they had little to expect from his generosity. They knew that they were weak. Even the great Powhatan, who had brought several tribes under his sway, and who enjoyed a sort of imperial position and dignity, could not count on more than 2,400 warriors, and these were so widely dispersed over a large extent of country as to have but little strength for a concerted move ment. The Indian chief, therefore, was compelled to use dissimulation ; and in silence and deceit the terrible catastrophe of 1G22 was matured and brought to bear. CHAPTER VIII. Injudicious Treatment of the Indians Neglect of Self-defence Treacherous Designs of the Natives The Massacre of March, 1622 Effect of the News in England Acts of Retaliation Renewed Dissensions between King James and the London Company Determination of the King to Sequestrate the Patent of the Company Arbitrary Measures The Former ( barter superseded by a New One Virginia again placed under Royal Control Resistance of the London Company- Royal Commissioners sent out to the Colony Proceedings of the Colonial Legislature- -Judicial Decision in favour of .Tames Dissolution of the London Company Death of James I. Unprosperous State of Virginia up to 1625- Liberal conduct of Charles I. towards the Virginians Misapprehensions of some Historians -Freedom in Virginia coeval with Despotism in England Disputes about Land Tenure Happy Condition of the Colony Another Massacre by the Indians Death of Opechancanough Devotion of the Virginians to the Cause of the Stuarts Measures of the Commonwealth -Submission of the Plantation to the Rule of Cromwell Its complete Self-government State of Society in Virginia in the Second Half of the Seventeenth Century. MISMANAGEMENT and undue confidence were largely instrumental in bringing about the massacre which we have now to relate. Owing to the rage for tobacco - planting, the emigrants were scattered abroad throughout the open country, from the banks of the James and York Rivers very nearly to the Rappahaniiock and the Potomac ; so that all concentration of numbers had ceased. In James Town there were as many Indians as English. The savages made familiar acquaintance with the superior race, and acqiiired a knowledge of some of their arts, including the use of tire - arms. Several European weapons had by this time found a way into their hands, partly by the folly of Captain Newport, partly by the treachery of the Dutch settlers. Indians were even employed by the English as fowlers and huntsmen, though it had formerly been death to show a savage how to use a musket. For some time, an appearance of great friendliness had existed between the colonists and the natives. It was thought that the latter were on the eve of being converted to Christianity, and they were permitted to come and go as they liked. One worthy gentleman, inflamed by mis sionary zeal, treated the red men like spoiled chil dren, whose idlest caprices were to be gratified. The solitary houses of the tobacco-growers were at all hours open to Indian stragglers, who were fed at the tables and lodged in the bed-chambers of their former enemies. The emigrants of the last few years, moreover, were a different set of men from those who had preceded them. They worn a<m- culturists rather than soldiers, and they neglected the commonest precautions of self-defence. Captain Smith, in his answers to certain questions put to him by the Royal Commissioners for the reforma tion of Virginia, said that in his opinion the causes of the massacre were the want of martial discipline, the dispersion of the colonists, the false security that prevailed, and the permission to thu natives to nse English arms. In another docu ment, addressed to the same Commissioners, he complains that during his rule in Virginia his hands were tied by instructions from England not to hurt the savages ; that they knew this, and presumed upon it ; and that he was compelled to break his orders, and take severe measures after which he had not a man slain in two years. Captain Smith was above all things a soldier ; but his instructions in this respect (though rightly sot aside upon provocation) may have been necessary to restrain the cruelty and greed of some of the settlers. What added to the peril of the situation in 1(322, was the fact that the Indians in that part of the country had fallen under the rule of one who neither loved the English nor dreaded them. Pow hatan, who since the marriage of his daughter to John Rolfe had shown uninterrupted good-will towards his civilised allies, died in 1618, and WHS succeeded by Opechancanough, who is said to have, been a man of great courage, ability, and craft, and who appears to have resolved on the extermination of the English shortly after his accession to power. 1622.] THE MASSACRE OF 1622. 63 During four years he cherished this design, and prepared for its execution ; perhaps recollecting, and desiring to avenge, his humiliation by Captain Smith in 1 608. The secrecy of his proceedings was so perfect, that not the slightest suspicion of a plot was entertained until the moment that it burst. It was concealed with entire success even from such of the Indian tribes as were suspected of an attachment to the strangers. All the other tribes were gained over, and to each was allotted the station it was to occupy and the part it was to act. At the same time, a treacherous show of good feeling towards the intended victims was sedulously main tained. Some of the colonists having occasion to send to Opechancanough about the middle of March, 1622, he used the messenger well, telling him he held the peace so firmly that the sky should fall before he would dissolve it. Only two days before the massacre, some Indians guided a pai-ty of English through the woods with much kind ness. They borrowed boats of the settlers, in order to cross the James River and consult with tribes on the other side as to the coming tragedy. They went unarmed into the houses of the tobacco- planters on the very morning of the murderous outbreak, to sell provisions ; and in every con ceivable way promoted an impression amongst the English that their desires and their interests were alike in favour of amity. After marketing with several of the settlers on the morning of March 22nd, and eating at their tables, they returned about noon day, and fell simultaneously on the defenceless people, whom they slaughtered without distinction of age or sex, some in their houses, some at their work in the fields. The blow was so sudden, and so entirely unanticipated by those on whom it fell, that little could be done in self-protection. The massacre extended over one hundred miles on both sides of the river, and in a single hour three hundred and forty-seven persons were pitilessly slain. Even men who had on several occasions shown kindness to the savages were murdered with the rest ; and the dead bodies were subjected to all those brutal indignities which are common to barbarian tribes when once the spirit of ferocity is fully roused. The horrible plot, however, was far from a com plete success. It had been hoped that the whole body of colonists would bo swept away ; but the larger number were saved. Some few defended themselves with firearms and other weapons, and so intimidated the Indians that they fled; for in no case did they dare to encounter the slightest re sistance. The majority of the settlers those at James Town and the stations nearest to it wen- by a converted Indian, who disclosed the plot to his English master. This Indian was made aware of the design only the night before its partial execution; but he had sufficient time to put several of the settlements on their guard. They were hastily prepared for an attack, and the murderers, finding on their arrival that the colonists were ready to receive them, took to flight without strik ing a blow. The effect of these disastrous events was very prejudicial to the colony. The cultivation of the fields was abandoned ; people crowded into the town for protection ; sickness supervened ; and many returned to England. The settlements were reduced from nearly eighty plantations to less than eight. Nevertheless, the emigrants, in the main, were not disheartened, but after awhile engaged in expeditions which had for their object the extermi nation of all the neighbouring tribes. In England, the news of the massacre only intensified the national determination to prosecute the colonisa tion of Virginia with the utmost vigour. The King made a present of arms from the Tower to aid in the subjugation of the savages. The City of Lon don sent one hundred fresh emigrants at its own cost. Several persons of wealth came forward with funds ; and Captain Smith made an offer to the Company to go out to Virginia with one hundred soldiers and thirty sailors, to be employed first as a flying army to scour the country and subdue the natives, and then to settle in some place, which should remain as a strong garrison for the defence of the possessions, and as a school of in struction in military matters for the English planters. This offer was not accepted, the Company being short of funds ; but it was intimated to Captain Smith that he might engage in the project on his own responsibility, if he would yield to the corpora tion half the pillage. As the whole amount of pillage, in. Smith s opinion, would not have been worth 20 in twenty years, the suggestion of the Company was declined. The colonists, however, were quite equal to fighting their battles for them selves ; and for nearly ten years the Indians were hunted down by continual and remorseless attacks, sometimes accompanied by circumstances of trea chery equal to their own.* The year 1022 and the following year mark an * Some details of these atrocities may be read in "Tho Generall Historic of Virginia, New England, and the Summer lies," where the writer (apparently, in this instance, not Captain Smith himself, but one of those from whom lie com piled) observes : " It seems God is angry to see Virginia made a stage where nothing but murder and indiscretion contends for victory." 64 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1623. eventful period for the colony. Besides the massacre of March, the first of those years saw a renewal of former dissensions between King James and the London Company. Repeating his unsuccessful attempt of 1621, the monarch once more sought to control the election of the treasurer by restricting the choice of the proprietors to one of a number of names supplied to them. Notwith standing this dictation, or perhaps rather in conse quence of it, the Earl of Southampton was in 1623 re-elected by a large majority. Exasperated by his second defeat, James now resolved to sequestrate the patent of the Company. He had many reasons for wishing to get rid of the power he had created. The general courts of the Virginian proprietors had been distinguished by a freedom of debate surpassing that of Parliament. The Company consisted of a thousand adventurers, and the courts were usually attended by not less than two hundred persons. It was evident that a popular force was growing up, in England and America, which might prove a formidable rival to the throne. Large commercial corporations, possessed of extensive tracts of land in other parts of the globe, and endowed with certain independent powers of government, occupy, it must be confessed, a somewhat equivocal position towards the State, and also towards those who are in a manner their subjects. In our own times it has been found necessary to take the administration of East Indian affairs out of the hands of the Company which had so long held sway in Hindostan ; and this was what James proposed to do with the Virginia Association. But the reform in the government of India was effected by Parliament, and the powers forfeited by the Company were transferred to a Minister responsible to the repre sentatives of the English people. This was a very different thing from that exercise of the Royal prerogative which James contemplated, and in the result carried out. The first of the Stuarts was despotic in all things, and, with a kind of fatal success, prepared the way for his son s execution a generation later. Yet it cannot be denied that in the present instance he had at least some plausible grounds of justification for his act. It was alleged that the disasters of Virginia were caused by the misgovernment of the Company ; and in some respects this was true, though it was true rather of earlier than of later years. The Royalist party In the general courts got up a petition to the King, alleging certain grievances; the opposing party replied ; and James, on the 9th of May, 1623, appointed a number of commissioners, con sisting of some of the judges and other persons of note, to investigate the affairs of the corporation. The records were seized, and two of the officers imprisoned. Private letters from Virginia were intercepted and read ; and the proceedings were in all respects carried on in the most high-handed manner, as if the Company had been a set of criminals, who had foz-feited all civil rights and all claim to decent treatment. Seven questions were addressed by the commissioners to Captain Smith, who was required to give his opinion on the causes of the colony s misfortunes, and the most likely way of remedying them. He pronounced against the Company, and recommended that the direction of affairs should be taken into the King s own hands. An Order in Council was accordingly issued on October 8th, setting forth that his Majesty had resolved to supersede the former charter by a new one, by which he would reserve to himself the appointment of the officers in England, a veto on appointments in Virginia, and the supreme control of the colony. The administration of the Company was to be vested in a Governor and twelve assist ants, to be resident in England ; and the executive power in Virginia was to consist of a council of twelve, to be chosen by the Governor and his colleagues. In the first instance, the governing body of the Company was to be nominated by the King ; but it was afterwards to have a power of self- renewal, though in this, as in all other matters, both in England and in the colony, the decisions of the constituted authorities were to be subject to nullification or revision by the Privy Council that is to say, by the sovereign himself. Private property was declared sacred, and all grants of land already made Avere to be renewed and confirmed. In virtue of these reforms, James commanded the proprietors at once to surrender their charter into his hands ; but this was refused with a spirit and courage remarkable in those times, when so many asserted the will of the monarch as superior to all law. They required a month s delay for delibera tion, but were met by a peremptory demand for the surrender of the charter within three days. The mandate was resisted, and both sides prepared for war. The popular form of government existing in the Company itself, and in the legislative assem blies of Virginia, had been set aside by the King in favour of a system which was purely arbitrary. The proprietors determined to oppose this change to tho utmost of their power. They denied the right of the King to deal v\ith them and their property as he pleased ; and they resolved to defend their privileges by process of law, if those should be called in question in any court of justice. James, there fore, on the 10th of November, 1623, directed that a writ of quo warranto should be issued against the 1624. !. AND THE VIRGINIA COMPANY. G5 Company, .so that the validity of its charter might be tried in the Court of King s Bench; he also despatched a body of commissioners to Virginia, to examine into the state of the plantation, and to re port on its prospects. At the next general court of the Company, the proprietors, with only seven dis sentients, confirmed the former refusal to surrender the charter ; and, to enable them to conduct their defence, their papers were for a time restored to them. The Virginian commissioners arrived in the colony early in 1624, but soon found that the opposition of the General Assembly was equal to that of the London Company. An agent was sent to England, to represent in the home country the views of the settlers ; but he died on his passage. The commissioners from England in vain endea voured to intimidate the Colonial Legislature by threats of what the King would do, or to cajole them by promises of Royal favour, if they would advance his projects. They asserted the excellence of popular assemblies, as the best means of promot ing the interests of the community. They severely punished a clerk who, for a money bribe, had revealed their consultations to the King s repre sentatives. .They passed several acts confirming the right of the colony to levy and apply its own taxation. They insisted on the principle of personal freedom, and defined the powers of the executive. They established the practice of free trade, by re moving restrictions on production, and leaving commerce to the operation of natural laws. And they made an enactment " that no person within the colony, upon the rumour of supposed changa and alteration, presume to be disobedient to the present Government."* Nothing, in short, could be more admirable than the bearing of the colony under the difficult circumstances of the time. The Royal Commissioners, on returning to England, re ported in favour of abrogating the powers of the Company, and of once more vesting supreme authority in the hands of the King. Shortly afterwards, the judges pronounced for the sovereign in respect to the matters at issue between the throne and the Company a foregone conclusion in days when the exponents of the law, holding their seats at the monarch s pleasure, usually interpreted doubtful ] joints in accordance with the wishes entertained at court. This decision was given during the Trinity term of 1624, and in July of that year th charter was forfeited, and the Company dissolved. Tt is worthy of note, however, that the judgment of the Court of King s Bench, as against the Com- * Bancroft s History, Vol. I. , chap. 5. puny and their charter, \s-;is bused simply on the technical ground of a mistake in pleading ; which would seem to imply that in more vital respects their case was a good one. The power with which James thus became in vested he used with moderation and some liberality. Sir Francis Wyatt, who had been appointed to the governorship of the colony in 1621, was retained in his post, though he was known to have been a warm supporter of the London Company. In appointing the new Council in Virginia, the King omitted the more extreme members of the court party; and the Colonial Legislature was not inter fered with. James was still proceeding with his work of reconstruction, and was contemplating a code of fundamental laws for the plantation, such as he may have hoped would add to his title of the British Solomon that of the British Justinian, when death brought his projects and labours to an end. He expired on the 27th of March, 1625 ; but the principles of government by which his conduct had been swayed were in the main adopted by his son. Charles declared Virginia to be a part of the Empire annexed to the Crown, and immediately subordinate to its jurisdiction ; at the same time, he conciliated the planters by confirming to Virginia and the Somer Isles their monopoly of the supply of tobacco to the English market. It was hoped that in this, way the prosperity of the colony would at length be secured ; for, in those days, protection to industry, which at the present day is very differently regarded on the two sides of the Atlantic, greatly to the detriment of both nations, was an accepted principle in the fiscal policy of England. The Virginian colony certainly required help of some kind, though this was not the wisest form in which to give it. The enterprise had never been a success. At the dissolution of the London Company, more than 15 0,000 had been expended in the attempt to found another England beyond the Atlantic. Upwards of nine thousand persons had been sent out to the wilderness ; of whom, many had died of sickness, many had been slaughtered by the Indians, and not a few had returned disheartened to their native land. Yet the annual importation of commodities from Virginia did not exceed an average of 20,000 in value ; and the population of the colony diminished instead of increasing. Smith attributed these evils and short comings to the idleness and improvidence of the emigrants, the frequent changing of Governors, the multiplicity of officers in the colony, leading to endless delays and formalities (so that "as much time was spent in compliment as in action "), the rapacity of some of the speculators, and the absence 66 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1629. of martial precautions against the savages.* His views in many respects were just ; yet the destruc tion of self-government would not have been the O best way to amend the errors of colonial adminis tration. This course, however, Charles did not adopt, He suffered the Legislative Assemblies still to meet ; he sent out as Governor Sir George Yeardley, who had been the first to introduce those Assemblies, and who, to the great grief of the colonists, died in 1627 ; he permitted the Council to supply vacancies in their ranks ; and in 1628, when making an offer to contract for the whole crop of tobacco, he desired that a representative body should be convened to consider his proposal. The Assembly which met in the following year protested against this monopoly, rejected the proffered terms, and for a time at least put a stop to the scheme. The reply was signed by the Governor, by fiA r e members of the Council, and by thirty-one burgesses, a j the members of this colonial House of Commons were called, it is remarkable that, at a time when Charles I. was governing without a Parliament in England, and doing his utmost to suppress the principle of popular representation at home, he suffered a democratic body in his American dominions to exercise con siderable power. The Virginian Council frequently elected their own Governor, while the Legislative Assemblies levied and appropriated the tax as, made all necessary local enactments, and maintained, paid, and managed the small army necessary for the protection of the infant state. On this point there has been considerable misapprehension. Robertson and other historians, American as well as English, have stated that for several years Charles governed in Virginia as despotically as in England, and that taxes were imposed and laws made with out the representatives of the people being asked for their sanction. But Mr. Bancroft, by an appeal to early records, has convincingly proved that this was not the case. The Virginians were virtually independent, and enjoyed all the substantial benefits of freedom with the advantages necessarily resulting from connection with an old and powerful monarchy. Why Charles I. should have been thus friendly to the principles of liberty in a distant possession, while he was doing his utmost to ti-ample them out at home, is a problem not easily solved ; but the fact appears unquestionable. Perhaps he thought it a matter of slight importance what was done so far from the centre of government, and 011 so small a stage ; perhaps, absorbed in his struggle with the popular party in the old country, he had no time * Answers of Smith to the seven questions of the Koyal Commissioners, 1623. to follow a similar course in America. Be that as it may, Englishmen in Virginia enjoyed the conduce of their own affairs while, from March, 1629, to April, 1640 a period of eleven years English men in England were taxed and governed without a Parliament, by the arbitrary will of the monarch, and by the devices of those whom he selected to do his bidding. This is a very instructive fact. It shows how soon the theory and practice of popular liberty took root in America ; how early the colo nists were taught to value the right of self-taxation ; and how infatuated were the Ministers of George III. in seeking to destroy a privilege which had then existed for nearly a century and a half. With settled government, and that interest in the maintenance of social order which freedom generally creates, Virginia prospered. In one year alone, a thousand emigrants arrived ; the commerce of the plantation increased ; and internal peace was for a time secured. Continual attacks upon the Indians had had the effect of entirely extir pating some of the tribes, and of driving others into the woods at a considerable distance from all but the most recent of the English settlements. Everything looked bright and hopeful when, in the autumn of 1629, John Harvey, who had been one of the commissioners sent by James I. to Virginia in 1623, arrived in the colony as Governor. His antecedents were such as to render him unpopular, and it soon became evident that he entertained de signs not in accordance with the general interests. He was specially appointed by the King to act on behalf of those noblemen and gentlemen 011 whom Charles had bestowed grants of land. Some of these territorial gifts wei e of immense extent, and, as their boundaries had in several instances been inaccurately defined, they frequently conflicted with estates already in the possession of others. Con tentions thus arising signalised the administration of Harvey for some years ; and the same cause of bitterness existed in other plantations as well. In Maryland (the progress of colonisation in which we shall have presently to relate), a hostile collision took place in 1635, in connection with this very question ; and one of the colonists, named Clay borne, was banished from the colony for having killed a man. Coming to Virginia, he was seized by Harvey, and sent to England to answer for his alleged crime. The Virginians were so indignant at this that, by their own authority, they deposed their Governor, and summoned an Assembly in May, 1635, to i-eceive complaints against him. Resolving to anticipate the action of that body, Harvey signified his willingness to return to Eng land and meet his accusers ; and the latter were 1639.J VIRGINIAN PROGRESS. (57 received with so very little favour in the mother country that they were not even admitted to a hearing. Harvey returned to his post in 163G, and remained there until 1639. His rule was bv acting, for the most part, on principles of liberality, they were nevertheless highly loyal. The respect ful obedience which Charles I. forfeited in England by his tyranny, he still received in Virginia because he had acted there in a precisely opposite spirit. The Church of England went to wreck in its ancient home because it was associated with cruel oppres sions; but in Virginia, while as yet it had acquired no such evil reputation, it nourished with a scarcely disputed sway. Puritans were indeed to be found in the colony ; but at first they were quietly tolerated, and do not appear to have aimed at vii:\v ox Tin: VOTOM.U . means a happy one, but he was succeeded by other Governors who repaired the mischief he had done. The disputed questions about the titles of land were now adjusted, and Virginia, every year acquired a. more perfect command over the machinery of self- government. For a time the King took away from the Executive Council the privilege of supplying its own vacancies, and reserved that power to himself; but the former state of things was soon restored. A vei-itable England of the untrodden West sprang up daily into stronger life. The courts of justice enforced laws, and acted on principles of jui is- prudence, similar to those which were declared at Westminster. Together with a very natural feeling of local patriotism, the colonists retained a strong affection for the country of their birth. Whilo any disturbing influence. Unfortunately, however, this condition did not last long. In 1G43, when nonconformity in religion began to be identified with revolutionary principles <in politics, it was ordered that no minister should preach or teach, publicly or privately, othei-wise than in harmony with the doctrines and practices of the Church of England ; and all Dissenters were banished from O * the colony. Some ministers, who had been invited from Boston by the Puritans of the more southern settlement, were ordered to leave, notwithstanding that they carried with them letters of recommenda tion from the governing authorities of New England to those of Virginia. This, no doubt, shows that the rulers of the latter colony still held to the absurd opinion that, in a free state professing Pro- CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1052. testantism, the minds of men. can be crushed into uniformity on a subject the most volatile, eccentric, and difficult to fix, of any that can engage their thoughts. But it also proves the loyalty of the Virginians to the established order of things. In the civil war between Charles and the English Parliament, their sympathies, with but few excep tions, were with the monai-ch. They had no desire for change, but were satisfied with their growing fortunes and their sober liberties. Another massacre by the Indians was attempted on the 18th of April, 1644. The attack was made on the frontier settlements ; but the savages seem this time to have been frightened at their own act, and at the contemplation of that vengeance which would surely follow. They suddenly broke off the work of carnage, after three hundred of the colo nists had been killed, and, flying into the woods, endeavoured to escape detection. A war of re taliation at once set in ; armed bodies marched up and down the border lands, slaying whatever Indians they could find ; and Opechancanough himself was taken, and some time after died, in captivity, of wounds inflicted by a soldier. The vigorous measures of the English struck such terror into the native tribes that ten men were considered sufficient to protect any threatened locality. In 1646, articles of peace were agreed to between the colonists and the successor of Opechancanough. Submission to the superior race was promised by the savages, and a large quantity of land was ceded. The Indians retired still farther inland, and the supremacy of the conquering nation became still more absolutely assured. So satisfied were the people of Virginia with their condition, that, after the execution of Charles I., they at once recognised his son. Large numbers of cavaliers emigrated to the newly-settled lands on the Bay of Chesapeake, and received a welcome of the heartiest description. The exiled Charles Stuart regarded Virginia as a part of his dominions over which he could still exercise the rights of sovereignty. From Breda, in the Netherlands, he sent a new commission to Sir William Berkeley, the then Governor of the colony, confirming him in his office ; and this act was cheerfully recognised by the Virginians. The Commonwealth, however, very naturally resisted such assertions of power, and prepared to vindicate its own authority. A fleet was despatched to the New World in October, 1650, to reduce to obedience those colonies which had shown a disposition to acknowledge as still valid the I ule of the Royal fugitive. An ordinance was also issued, by which it was declared, that, as the plan tations had been formed by the people of England at their own cost, they ought to be subordinate to and dependent on the English Commonwealth, and subject to such laws and regulations as might be made in Parliament ; that, instead of this dutiful submission, certain of the colonists had disclaimed the authority of the State, and audaciously rebelled against it ; and that on this account they were to be regarded as notorious traitors. All vessels, either of English ownership or belonging to foreign nations, were by the same ordinance prohibited from entering their ports, or carrying on any commerce with them, unless by virtue of a licence from Parliament or the Council of State. This ordinance had the desired effect : and, though in f o itself a severe measxire, it was accompanied by signs of a disposition on the part of the English Govern ment to adopt a conciliatory course if met in a similar spirit by the colonists. Three commissioner,-; were appointed to arrange matters pacifically with the Virginians, if that were possible; and two of these were selected from among the planters them selves. They were instructed to offer the Vir ginians the entire management of their own affairs, on condition of their acknowledging the Common wealth ; in the contrary case, a state of war was to be considered as established. After but slight deliberation, the local authorities determined on acceding to the demands of the mother country, and, by the articles of capitulation agreed to in 1652, it was stipulated "that the plantation of Virginia, and all the inhabitants thereof, should enjoy such freedom and privileges as belong to the free people of England ; that the General Assembly should convene as formerly ; that the people of Vii-ginia should have free trade, as the people of England, to all places and with all nations; that Virginia should be free from all customs, taxes, and impositions whatsoever; that none should be imposed on them without the consent of the General Assembly; and that neither forts nor castles should be erected, nor garrisons maintained, without their consent." Moreover, the colonists were not to bo questioned for their past loyalty to the Stuarts. The* submission of the Virginians was followed by a state of profound peace. During the whole of the Commonwealth and Protectorate, the planta tion was virtually independent. The people elected their own Governor, together with members of the Council ; and, for the former office, their choice repeatedly fell on adherents of the Republican party in England. Cromwell, in the plenitude of his power, never appointed any officers ; and when a disputed question arose between the House of Burgesses and the Governor, and the latter proposed to refer the case to tho Protector for settlement by 1655.] PROSPERITY OF VIRGINIA. him, the popular body resisted any such reference, deposed the Governor, and, after completely esta blishing their own views, re-elected him as a proof of their confidence in his probity and honour. Nevertheless, a certain right of suzerainty on the part of the mother country was acknowledged by the colonists. On the death of the great Oliver, the rule of his son Richard was recognised, though not without a fresh assertion of popular privi leges, which the new Protector fully granted ; a similar course was taken on the restoration of the monarchy. The political condition of Virginia was that of a perfect democracy. Manhood suffrage, with certain exceptions, was established by the colonists, and worked so well that, after a tempo- jury limitation, in 1655, of the right of voting to householders, the broader system was reverted to in the following year, on the express ground, as the statute set forth, that it was " hard, and un agreeable to reason, that any person should pay equal taxes, and yet have no votes in elections." The exceptions to manhood suffrage indicate a serious blot in the social condition of Virginia. Those who could not vote were persons held in bondage ; and this servile class included not merely negroes and Indians, but Englishmen, who were purchased in England, and resold by auction in Virginia, to act as menials to the wealthy colonists. The period of service, however, was limited, and at its expiration the servant at once became an elector, and might be chosen a burgess. The Legislative Assembly was convened once a year, or oftener if occasion required, and it was the supreme judicial tribunal of the settlement. What rendered this highly-popular constitution a safe one also, was the fact that, although there was a wealthy class, pos sessing in some instances estates of 2,000 acres, O there were no paupers. A vast new country, of a most fruitful character, spread before the settler, and work freely offered itself to all who would do it. No great temptation to dishonesty existing, offences against property rarely occurred ; and, under the benign influence of equal laws, rich and poor lived side by side without envy or distrust. Religious freedom existed with but few drawbacks ; and commerce was in so flourishing a condition that, as early as 1648, trade was carried on with ten ships from London, two from Bristol, twelve from Hol land, and seven from New England. A few years later, notwithstanding Cromwell s Navigation Act, the object of which was to confine the traffic of the colony to English vessels, or to those of the settlers themselves, trade continued practically un fettered, for the Act was not enforced. Even during the war between England and Holland, Dutch vessels traded with the American plantations. The population of Virginia at this period is sup posed to have been about 30,000. It had been largely augmented by a considerable importation of Royalist prisoners taken by the Republican forces in England, including several Scotch and Irish ; and, as we have already stated, many of the aristo cratic adherents of the fallen monarchy voluntarily exiled themselves to the New World, to escape the misery of their broken fortunes in England. The colony had also received several very questionable contingents, in batches of loose characters, male and female, sent out from time to time from London and other large towns, simply to get rid of then). Moreover, young marriageable girls were sometimes kidnapped, and conveyed to Virginia against their will : it is on record that a man was arrested in Somersetshire for this species of impressment.* Exit a large number of native Virginians had now grown up to maturity ; families increased and multiplied; and the foundations of a new nationality had been fairly laid. * Memorandum of Sir Edward Hext, Justice of the Peace of Somersetshire to the Privy Council, quoted in NeilTs " English Colonisation of America. " CHAPTER IX. First Colonisation of Maryland Explorations of William (. lay-borne George Calvertj first Lord Baltimore His Career as uii English Politician, and Conversion to Roman Catholicism The Newfoundland Plantation Maryland bestowed by Charles I. on Lord Baltimore Terms of the Charter Provision against the Introduction of Papacy Powers ; granted to the second Lord Baltimore RightH of the Emigrants Departure of the Colonists from England, and Formation of the Settlement Claims of the Virginians and of William Clayborue Dissensions and Collisions Celebration of Public Mass in Maryland Ambitious Designs of Baltimore Leonard Calvert 8 Attempt at Arbitrary Power Successful Opposi tion of the Colonists Roman Catholics and the Rights of Conscience Disturbances in the Plantation The Ordinance of Toleration Civil War between the Partisans of Lord Baltimore and the Adherents of the Commonwealth Settle ment of Affairs Death of the second Lord Baltimore. THAT part of Virginia which now forms the State Charles I. There had been previous explorations of Maryland was colonised early in the reign of of the country towards the head of Chesapeake 70 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1620. Bay, and small settlements wei-c planted here and there for the purpose of trading with the Indians in furs j but nothing like systematic colonisation on a large scale took place during those earlier years. In 1625, however, William Clayborne, a man of some mark in American history, received authority from the rulers of Virginia to discover the limits of the great bay, together with any part of the province lying between the thirty-fourth and forty- first degrees of latitude, the latter of which had been included within the new boundaries of Virginia granted by James I. in 1609. Clayborne was by profession a surveyor, who in 1621 had been sent out to America by the London Company to make a map of the country, and who subsequently became a member of the colonial Council. His investiga- < ions in the countries bordering on Chesapeake Bay led to his forming a strong opinion in favour of pursuing commercial relations with the natives. A company was accordingly started in England for trading with the Indians, and a Royal licence was issued, conferring on Clayborne powers of govern ment over those who should accompany him. In virtue of the authority thus bestowed, he planted a colony -on Kent Island in Chesapeake Bay, and another near the mouth of the Susquehanna. These new settlements formed a part of Virginia at the time of their establishment, but did not long continue under that jurisdiction. They fell into the possession of a powerful nobleman, who gave to the territory a separate colonial existence. This was George Calvert, first Lord Baltimore a man of intelligence, of varied capabilities, and of interesting life. His father was a Yorkshire farmer, living at Kipling, in the valley of the Swale, where the family, originally of Flemish extraction, had been settled for several generations. Having re ceived a good education at Oxford, George Calvert became secretary to the famous Cecil, the clear sighted, energetic, and intriguing Minister of James I. This gave him an introduction to public life, and in 1604 he was elected to Parliament by the borough of Bossiney, in Cornwall. He was aftei 1 - wards sent by Cecil on a mission to the English Ambassador at Paris, and on his return was em ployed in several capacities, both in England and Ireland. Becoming very quickly a favourite with the King, he was knighted in 1617, and in 1619 made pi-incipal Secretary of State, in which post, as one of the followers of Cecil, who died in 1612, he had a difficult task to discharge. Whatever his faults, the Earl of Salisbury was certainly one of the most masterly and successful administrators that England has ever known ; and his unsleeping vigi lance kept at bay the ambitious designs of Spain and the plots of the Roman Catholics. Calvert had been educated in his school ; but he acted from different motives, and to different ends. It was the policy or the humour of the King to be friendly to Spain ; and this disposition, which Cecil had checked, Calvert did his utmost to gratify. He was, in truth, a courtier to the very depths of his nature. Whatever seemed good to the monarch, seemed good to him. Towards the latter end of James s reign, a strong opposition to arbitrary power arose both in Parliament and in the nation. Calvert devoted himself with fervour to the Court party, and did all he could towards counteracting the demand for popular liberties. He and Sir Thomas Wentworth (afterwards Earl of Strafford) were elected for Yorkshire in 1620, by an extravagant use of undue influences ; and, as a member of Parliament, Calvert supported the Royal pretensions whenever there was an opportunity. His abilities as an ad ministrator were considerable, and his business habits were so exact that he submitted to the King every night a well-digested account of the progress of public affairs during the day. He worked hard to bring about the match between Prince Charles and the Infanta of Spain : that it failed was no fault of his. The failure, however, was a great mortification to him, and a few weeks before the death of King James he sold his office (according to the corrupt practice of those days) to Sir Albert Morton, for 3,000. Some time before, he had be come a Roman Catholic, having been converted by Count Gondomar, the Spanish Ambassador, and by the Earl of Arundel, whose daughter had married Calvert s eldest son. His intimacy with Gondomar, and his leaning towards the Spanish alliance, told greatly against him in the popular estimation; and when he openly confessed his adoption of the Papistical faith, people saw in the change a natural consequence of too much familiarity with the great Romanist Power. It was rather, perhaps, the natural consequence of opinions held by Calvert all his life, though, but for the particular opportunity, those opinions might never have reached their legitimate development. What is to his credit is, that he did not show the usual bitterness of a convert. Jeremy Collier, the non-juring clergy man of William and Mary s reign, speaks of the temperate way in which he held his views, and adds that he was so little Avedded to his own opinions that he could better bear a moderate censure than an affected applause.* On resigning his place as Secretary, Calvert re ceived the title of Lord Baltimore, after a town in * Collier s Dictionary, 1701. Art. "Calvert." 1632.] COLONISATION OF MARYLAND. 71 Ireland. He resided fur some time in the sister kingdom, and then, finding all public employment closed against him, as a Romanist, resolved to go to America. He had been a member of the Virginian Company, and had taken an active part in the man agement of its affairs. In 1620 he had purchased .n interest in the Newfoundland Plantation, and shortly after the accession of Charles I. he resolved to go thither himself. His first visit to the island was in the summer of 1627 ; he was there again in the following year. One portion of his design was evidently to convert the colonists to his own faith; and much offence was given by the proselytising efforts of the priests by whom he was accompanied. But, apart from this vexed question, Lord Baltimore seems to have acted in Newfoundland with vigour, prudence, and good effect. He fitted out at his own expense two ships, with which he fought three hostile French ships, and compelled them to give up six fishing vessels which they had captured. By this spirited action, he delivered the colony from the piratical inroads with which it had been vexed ; und he would probably have won the affection of the islanders but for the unfortunate difference of religion. He went to Virginia in 1629, with intent to settle there, but, refusing to take the oaths of supremacy and allegiance, on the ground that they were opposed to his conscience as a Catholic, he was informed by the Council that he must depart by the first ship. Nevertheless, he soon went there again, and in 1631, when once more in England, obtained from King Charles a grant of lands north and east of the river Potomac, in the parts most remote from that portion of Virginia which was already settled. To this region, at the suggestion of the King, was given the name of Terra Marine Maryland in honour of the Queen, Henrietta Maria. The first Lord Baltimore died in London on the 13th of April, 1632; on the 20th of June in the same year, the charter of the new colony was made out iu the name of his son Cecil, the second baron. This document contained a clause in-anting O O to the said Lord Baltimore; the patronage and advowsons of all churches to be built within the limits of the new colony, " together with the licence and faculty of erecting and founding churches, chapels, and places of worship in convenient and suitable places within the premises, and of causing the same to be dedicated and consecrated according to the ecclesiastical laws of our kingdom of O England." The object of the last twenty words (which do not occur in a similar charter granted three years earlier to Sir Robert Heath, for colo nising another part of America) was undoubtedly to restrain Lord Baltimore from establishing Roman Catholicism in the territory which had been made over to him. Such a restraint sounds in the pre sent more tolerant days extremely illiberal ; but it should be recollected that the circumstances of the seventeenth century, in regard to such affairs, were totally different from those of the nineteenth . Not more than seventy-four years had passed since the complete establishment of Protestantism in Eiigland. The ferocious persecutions of the last Papistical sovereign, Queen Mary, were yet fresh in the popu lar mind. It was believed that the Catholics were still plotting for a restoration of their supremacy ; and it was only too clear that they had a powenul ally in Spain. All asserted the superiority of the Pope over the State, and many claimed for the faithful the right of assassinating heretic kings and magistrates. It is therefore not surprising that precautions were taken for preventing this eiiemv of the Reformation from getting a foothold in English dominions. Nothing, indeed, can excuse the cruelties that were frequently practised on Catholics ; but some degree of restraint may at that time have fairly appeared justifiable. It was a question of life or death. Either the one religion or the other was to predominate. In those dog matic times, a neutral course may well have seemed impossible. We can now afford to be tolerant, and are wisely and properly tolerant, because there is a third party to keep the peace between contending factions. The secular arm of the State is strong enough to bridle fanaticism and repress persecution, in whatever direction they may appear ; whereas, in the seventeenth century, the State, though extremely powerful in many respects, was always in alliance with some religious body, whose support was necessary to its authority. Moreover, all the tendencies of the modern mind the freedom of discussion, the spread of education, the increase of popular self-government, the power of the press, the growth of science, the progressive dilution and weakening of dogma in matters of faith and specu lation are such as to render safe the granting of entire religious liberty. But this was not the case in 1632. The boundaries of the new colony, speaking roughly, were defined by the Atlantic Ocean on the east, the fortieth parallel of latitude on the north, the river Potomac 011 the west, and the lower part of the Bay of Chesapeake on the south. The country was granted to Lord Baltimore, his heirs and assigns, to be held by the tenure of fealty only, and by the payment of a yearly rent of two Indian arrows, and a fifth part of all the gold and silver ore which might be found. The proprietor and his -*- -. -. J _ , /._.--, ; ^-.^--C. J ^ (. . TLIGHT 01 INDIANS Al TtU THE .MASSACRE 1632.] THE BALTIMORE CHARTER. 73 heirs were created true and absolute lords and pro prietaries of the province, with free, full, and abso lute power to ordain, make, and enact laws (with the advice, assent, and approbation of the freemen of the province), and with authority to appoint all judges, justices, and constables. The freemen, however, could only meet in assembly with the permission of the proprietor ; and it was provided that the latter the sole will of that potentate. Still, there was the nucleus of a free system of government ; and that counted for something. In other respects, Charles may be said to have conceded too much. Lord Baltimore was excused from the necessity of ob taining the Royal assent to his own appointments, or to the legislation of the province ; and, by an express stipulation, the King covenanted that CECIL, SECOND LOUD UALTTMORE. might of his own authority make laws from time to time, on the ground that it might be necessary to exercise such a power before the freeholders could be convened for the purpose. On the other hand, the jurisdiction of the proprietor was not to extend to the life, freehold, or estate of any emigrant. The charter, it will thus be seen, contained a popular element ; but this element was to a considerable extent neutralised by the restrictions imposed on it. The legislative power of the freemen was made de pendent on the power of the great territorial lord, and laws might at any moment be promulgated at neither he, nor his heirs, nor his successors, should at any future time set any imposition, custom, or tax whatsoever, on the people of Maryland. The second of these provisions was wise, liberal, and just ; but the renunciation of all control over the govern ment of the plantation was not fair to the mother- country. A colony should be bound by some ties to the Power which created it, that the interests of the whole Empire may not be sacrificed to those of a small outlying department, but that all may work harmoniously for the common good. Far too much credit luu; been given to this Balti- 74 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1634. more charter, as if it were the beginning of political freedom and religious toleration in America. A Representative Assembly had met at James Town thirteen years before, and it was certainly no part of Charles I. s intention, in granting the charter, to establish universal toleration in the new province. We have seen that a special proviso was made, to the effect that the religion of the colonists was to be that of the Church of England. This stipulation appears to have been inserted on the advice of the King s Attorney-General ; and several years after wards, the then chief law-officer of the Crown gave it as his opinion that the proprietor of the province of Maryland was, by virtue of these words, precluded from doing anything contrary to the ecclesiastical laws of England. No doubt, the desire of the first Lord Baltimore was to secure a place of refuge for the Catholics of his own country ; and this was afterwards effected, with some degree of tolerance for other religious bodies. But the charter included no such provision. The rulers of Virginia were greatly displeased at the formation of a new State out of a portion of their territory. They made some attempt to contest the grant by process of law ; but their en deavours were of no avail, and in November, 1633, after some delays, the emigrants set sail. It is generally stated that the party consisted of two hundred gentlemen belonging to good Catholic families ; but Lord Baltimore, in a letter to the Earl of Strafford, said that he had despatched his two brothers, nearly twenty other gentlemen, and three hundred labouring men, well provided in all things. The gentlemen were probably Romanists ; but Mr. Neill * believes that the labouring men were chiefly Protestants, though for this conclusion he does not give his authority. The colonists arrived at Point Comfort, Virginia, on the 24th of Feb ruary, 1634, after pursuing a circuitoiis route by the West Indies. They were well received by Harvey, the then Governor of Virginia, but did not stay long. Sailing up the Potomac in their pinnace, they came to an island, to which, in token that they claimed it alike for the Christian religion and for the English race, they gave the title of St. George s Isle. At the same time, they planted a cross. The government of the colony, it had been arranged, was to be conducted by Leonard Calvert, assisted by Thomas Cornwallis and Jerome Hawley, both of whom were Protestants. From St. George s Isle, Calvert ascended the stream to Paschatoway, a few miles below the site of what is now the Federal capital of the United States. Here he conferred * English Colonisation of America. with Henry Fleet, an enterprising navigator, who, a short time before, had made a minute exploration of the Potomac and the adjacent country. Under the guidance of this experienced sailor, Calvert descended the river to an Indian village situated on a small tributary of the Lower Potomac. The ground was purchased of the Indians a piece of common honesty and justice not always practised in colonial affairs, though the New England Puritans had already done the same ; and on the 27th of March Calvert took possession of the spot, and named it St. Mary. Three days later, the adven turers began to erect a stockade and storehouse, and, shortly afterwards, Harvey arrived from James Town on a visit. The native chiefs exhibited every token of amity. They joined the new-comers in the chase, and pointed out in what portions of the great forest the best game was to be found; while the Indian women taught the wives of the English how to make bread of maize. Harvey, unlike those whom he governed, was favourably disposed towards the new colony ; and for awhile the settlers of Maryland were fed by supplies sent to them from James Town. They were thus spared the sufferings that had fallen to the share of other colonists, and the plantation flourished with a rapidity which sin- . gulaily contrasted with the slow and painful growth of Virginia. In two years from the first arrival of the colo nists, Lord Baltimore had expended upwards of 40,000 in prosecution of the undertaking. In less than a year, a popular assembly was convened, and one of the subjects it had to consider was the claim of William Clayborne to a part of the terri tory which the King had made over to Lord Balti more. Clayborne had already represented to the Council of Virginia that his rights were being invaded by Leonard Calvert, and the Council had replied that they would maintain the privileges of the colony while the claims of Lord Baltimore were still being disputed in England. In the 2-esult, it was decided by the Commissioners for the Planta tions that the King was entitled to confer the soil and the jurisdiction of Maryland on whomsoever he pleased. This may have been legal, so far as it can be said that there was any law at all in a matter resting on arbitrary power ; but it certainly in volved a great injustice to the Virginians in general, and to Clayborne in particular. At the dissolution of the London Company, the Virginians naturally relied on their former possessions being left intact. Clayborne had received a Royal licence from Charles, empowering him to settle in the territories near Chesapeake Bay, vhich he was the first to discover. Furthermore, the Privy Council had stated, on the 1637.] THE CALVERTS IN MARYLAND. 75 22nd of July, 1634, that it was not intended that the interests which had been acquired by the Virginians, when the colony belonged to a company, should be injured. It was therefore a serious hard ship to Clayborne when, in 1639, his claims were set aside. Previous to that decision, a deplorable event had occurred. In the spring of 1635, Clay- borne sent a pinnace to trade with the Indians near his plantation at Accomac, which was within the territory claimed by Lord Baltimore. The vessel was seized. Clayborne despatched another to recover the first, and a fight occurred between the second ship and one belonging to the Mary- landers. Two of Clayborne s men wei*e killed, and a sailor on the opposite side shared the same fate. This was the affair which led to the arrest of Harvey, the Governor of Virginia, who was sus pected of acting secretly on behalf of Leonard Calvert. The King s decision was in favour of Harvey, and in 1636 he returned to Virginia. In the discussions preceding this judgment, it came out that public mass was celebrated in Maryland, in defiance of the laws of England and of the charter of the province. Such a result might have been anticipated, and it would be idle and ungenerous to blame the Calverts for acting as they did. They of course desired that those of their followers who agreed with them in religion should have the benefit of all Catholic observances, and they hoped, by these alluring ceremonials, to gain converts to the Romish creed. Yet their proceedings were none the less illegal none the less a violation of the charter under which their colony was formed. The position of the Calverts towards the planta tion is not very clear. Regarded from some points of view, it seems to be that of far-sighted and liberal statesmen, with ideas beyond the age in which they lived ; but a consideration of the whole body of facts gives an impression much less favour able. It has been shown that to Maryland was granted, excepting in the matter of religion, an almost entire independence of the mother-country. Lord Baltimore was likewise invested with the power of creating a colonial aristocracy on the system of sub-iiifeudation. It seems to have been his design to erect in America a great Roman Catholic power, with a territorial nobility, perhaps in time supporting a local throne. He was cer tainly ambitious and grasping. In 1637, ho sent a letter to the Secretary of the Privy Council, suggesting a way of advancing the King s service in Virginia. This proposition, an it appears from a memorial in file, was to increase the revenues from Virginia by 8,000, on condition that lie was made Governor of that colony, with a salary of 2,000 a year.* The proposal was not agreed to ; but Jerome Hawley, one of the Councillors of Maryland, had already been appointed by the King Treasurer of Virginia, with instructions to examine all land-patents, and demand thereupon a yearly rental for the Crown. This post he held while re taining his former connection with Maryland ; so that Lord Baltimore had now two of his own partisans at the head of affairs in Virginia. The conduct of Leonard Calvert in the new settlement was equally suspicious. He proposed to a thin assembly of delegates, in January, 1638, that the laws which had been prepared in England by his brother, Lord Baltimore, should be assented to after a first reading. This, however, was re fused by a considerable majority, on the ground of so few members being present. After an ad journment to the following month, the delegates resolved that all proposed laws should be read three times on three several days before the vote should be taken ; and they expressed a wish that all bills might emanate from a committee of their own choice. The Governor was visibly annoyed at this spirit of independence. He protested that he would be accountable to no man, and adjourned the Assembly. It was evidently not intended by the Calverts that the government of the colony should be on a popular basis. The people, how ever, were little inclined to vote simply as they were told. They rejected the code which Leonard Calvert submitted to them, and brought forward another instead. He in his turn refused to accept what the Legislative Body proposed, and the infant community remained for some time without a definite system of laws. In a subsequent Assembly, held in 1639, the representatives of the people emphatically asserted their rights. "While acknow ledging their allegiance to the English Crown, and fully admitting the prerogatives of Lord Baltimore, they affirmed on behalf of the inhabitants of Mary land all the liberties which an Englishman could enjoy at home, pronounced in favour of a system of representative government, and claimed for the Assemblies of the province all such powers as might be exercised by the Commons of England. The constitution was afterwards formed on the basis of an Upper and a Lower House, the members of the first of which were called by special writ, while those of the second were chosen by the hundreds. It is said that in the oath taken by the Governor of Maryland occurred the words : " I will not, by myself or any other, directly or indirectly, molest * Xeill. 7G CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1649. any person, professing to believe in Jesus Christ, for or in respect of religion." Under protection of this promise, not merely Roman. Catholics, but various Protestant dissenters from the Church of England, found a refuge in Maryland. It may seem strange that, in an age remarkable for in tolerance, the principle of toleration should have been affirmed and carried out by a Papistical ruler ; but the reason is not difficult to discover. There is nothing unusual in Roman Catholics demanding liberty of conscience when they themselves suffer or dread persecution. The Calverts were glad to build up in the wilderness a place of rest for the persecuted of their own faith, and, being weak, numerically and in all respects, they found it convenient to extend to others the freedom they required for themselves. The early colonisers of Maryland were for the most part Protestants, and in their first Legisla tive Assembly they expressed adhesion to the doctrines of the Church of England. But there were some Jesuit priests among them, and these emissaries, finding that they could do little with the Indians, who exhibited a hostile front, turned their attention towards the Protestant settlers, and made numerous conversions. The matter at length attracted the attention of the English Parliament, and on the 1st of December, 1641, the House of Commons presented a remonstrance to the King at Hampton Court, in the course of which they com plained that his Majesty had permitted another State to be moulded within the English State a political organisation " independent in government, contrary in interest and affection, secretly corrupt ing the ignorant or negligent professors of religion, and clearly uniting themselves against such." In October of the following year, Lord Baltimore wrote to the Jesuit Fathers in Maryland, checking their zeal, and reminding them that they must conform to the laws of England. The receipt of this com munication greatly depressed the spirits of Father White, one of Lord Baltimore s pi-iestly agents in the propagation of the faith. With sadness of heart he wrote in his journal: "Occasion of suffering has not been wanting from those from whom rather it was proper to expect aid and pro tection, who, too intent upon their own affairs, have not feared to violate the immunities of the Church." The sorrow and gentle indication of O O this zealous priest were certainly not at all un natural, nor, from his point of view, in the slightest degree blameable. It is evident that Lord Balti more was more fearful lest his property should be taken from him, than solicitous for the advancement of his Church. During the civil war between Charles and the Parliament, disturbances occurred in Maryland. A party in favour of the English Roundheads gained temporary possession of the Government, and Leonard Calvert was driven, into exile. While the revolutionists were in power, they arrested Father White, who belonged to the Jesuit Order, and sent him to England, where, in 1645, he was tried, and found guilty of teaching doctrines contrary to the statutes of the realm. Very little can be said for the republican sympathisers in Maryland. They appear to have acted with violence and bitter partisanship, and the majority of the colonists were doubtless glad when the more easy rule of Calvert was restored. This gentleman died in 1647, very shortly after his resumption of power; and in 1648 Lord Baltimore, who found it politic to ingi-atiato himself with the anti-Papal party, now triumphant in England, placed a Protestant and Parliamentarian, named William Stone, of Virginia, in the position of Governor of Maryland. Between two and three years before, the Committee on Plantations in. the House of Lords had reported that it would be very proper that the government of Maryland should be settled in Protestant hands by order of Parliament. This feeling doubtless increased in force in subse quent years, and Baltimore probably thought it advisable to anticipate the action of the State. In 1649, the celebrated ordinance of toleration was sent out to the colony by its proprietor ; but this act also had been anticipated, two years before, by a law of a similar nature passed by the English House of Commons. The document transmitted to Maryland by Lord Baltimore was remarkable as much for what it forbade as for what it allowed. It provided that any one who denied the Trinity should be punished with death and confiscation of goods. It declared that Sabbath-breakers, and those who profaned the Lord s Day by frequent swearing, drunkenness, or uncivil and disorderly recreations, should be fined, and for the third offence publicly whipped. And it prohibited the use of any reproachful words con cerning the Virgin Mary, the Apostles, or the Evangelists, and the calling of any one in a reproach ful way heretic, schismatic, idolater, Presbyterian, Independent, Popish Priest, Jesuit, Jesuited Priest, Lutheran, Anabaptist, Brownist, Antinomian, Barrowist, Roundhead, Separatist, or any other name of an insulting character. Some of these provisions were unexceptionally good ; but to make denial of the Trinity a capital offence was a singular feature in an ordinance of toleration. The principles thus set forth were adopted by the Maryland Assembly in a statute, the preamble to which stated 1051.] MARYLAND UNDER THE COMMONWEALTH. 77 that " the enforcing of the conscience in matters of religion hath frequently fallen out to be of dangerous consequence in those commonwealths where it hath been practised." Therefore, "for the more quiet and peaceable government " of the province of Mary land, " and the better to preserve mutual love and amity among the inhabitants," liberty of conscience was ensured to all persons professing to believe in Jesus Christ. This was much ; but it was far from being a complete assertion of the great principle of intellectual freedom. The rights of conscience were extended only to Christians, and not even to all of those, since the clause against denying the Trinity would, if strictly interpreted, have handed over to the executioner all who followed Unitarian views. Persons not professing Christianity were still more likely to suffer. A Jew would have had no title to practise his religion in Maryland under the Act of Toleration. A Theist or an Atheist would have shared the fate of Servetus or Giordano Bruno. Religious toleration is a principle which cannot be expected to grow to full maturity at once ; but it must be admitted that a good deal was secured by the Maryland ordinance. Members of the Church of England excluded from Massachusetts, and Puritans expelled from Virginia, alike found refuge in this intermediate province. Yet to this state of things there were very considerable and serious exceptions. The Quakers were persecuted in Maryland as badly as in Virginia and Massa chusetts. In 1658, Josiah Coale and Thomas Thurston, preachers belonging to that body, were treated by the Maryland authorities with great severity, and compelled to flee the country. They made their way to the north, and lived for some time in the forests on berries and chestnuts, re ceiving, as they afterwards declared, more kindness and mercy from the heathen savages of the wilder ness than from their fellow Christians. On the whole, however, the colony prospered and was happy, and the Assembly placed upon its records an expression of gratitude to Lord Baltimore, that posterity might know what he had done for the peace and well-being of the infant State. But this did not prevent tike Government of the Commonwealth from asserting its authority over the settlement. The Commissioners who, in 1651, were appointed to conduct negotiations with the colonies, and amongst whom was Clayborne, confirmed Stone in his place as Governor of Mary land, on his promising submission to the Parlia ment. Lord Baltimore afterwards wrote to the English Government, deprecating any reuniting of Maryland to Virginia, and contrasting the Royalist tendencies of the latter plantation with the readi ness of Maryland and New England to obey the Commonwealth. Considering that this nobleman owed his American possessions to Charles I., his eagerness to stand well with that monarch s deadly enemies was not very creditable. Nor was the alleged fact strictly true. A great deal of disaffec tion existed in Maryland, and Governor Stone, under instructions from Lord Baltimore, issued an order that no persons should hold lands who did not take the oath of fidelity to the proprietor. In other respects, Stone exhibited a spirit of insubordination to the home authorities, and, after the proclamation of Oliver Cromwell as Protector, at the close of 1653, endeavoured to setup an independent Govern ment in the interests of Baltimore. A state of civil war ensued ; severe fighting took place ; and finally the popular party prevailed. It is painful to be obliged to add that the Puritans, when they had gained the upper hand, persecuted and dis franchised the Romanists ; but it should not be forgotten that Cromwell disapproved of the decree by which this intolerance was enforced. A disturbed state of affairs continued for some time. Lord Baltimore commissioned one Josias Fendall to act as his representative ; and a part of the colony gave its allegiance to him, while another remained true to the Commonwealth men. On the accession of Charles II., in 1660, the representatives of Mary land met in a private house, voted themselves a lawful assembly, without dependence on any other power in the province, and refused to acknowledge the rights of the body claiming to be an Upper House. Their next act was to make it felony to disturb the order which they had established ; and in a little while the authority of the King was re cognised, and peace returned to the colony. The second Lord Baltimore died on the 19th of November, 1675, at an advanced age. He was in some respects a man of liberal ideas for the seven teenth century ; yet nothing was stronger in him than a regard for his own interests. His allegiance shifted from one side to the other with the airy facility of the Vicar of Bray, or of Dryden and Waller in their poetic eulogies ; and if he loved toleration much, he loved his revenues more. The last we hear of him previous to the restoration of Charles II. is in connection with an order of the Council of State directing his arrest, and that of his associates, on a charge of coining and exporting large sums of money. 78 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1GOG. PART OF CAPTAIN J. SMITH S MAP OF NEW ENGLAND. (From "Advertisements for the-unexperienced Planters of New England or any*c?iere.") CHAPTER X. Projects of the Plymouth Company for colonising North Virginia Failures and Disappointments Survey of the Country by Captain John Smith The Territory re-designated New England Labours, Sacrifices, and Death of Smith Granting of a New Patent by King James The Puritans Their Origin to be found in the Defective Character of the Reformation Principles of the extreme Protestant Party Inclination of Queen Elizabeth towards a Romanising Policy The Acts of Supremacy and Uniformity The Court of High Commission for Ecclesiastical Affairs Formation of Dissenting Bodies The Brownists Tyrannical Act against Nonconformity in Religion Spread of Puritanism Persecution of the Dissenters by James I. Colony of English Puritans settled at Leyden, in Holland General Character of the Nonconformists in the Seventeenth Century Desire of the Leyden Puritans to settle in America Parting Words of Pastor Robinson Sailing of the Pilgrim Fathers in the Mayflower. As Virginia was the result of a Church of England movement, and Maryland of a desii-e on the part of Roman Catholics to secure to themselves a territory in which they might be free to practise the rites of their religion, so were the New England States the children of Protestant Dissent. The advancement of religious nonconformity, however, formed no portion of the original design as regarded those colonies. In the first instance, nothing more was intended than, the foundation of a new settlement, and the prosecution of a lucrative trade : the in fusion of a Puritan element into the undertaking 1606.] NEW ENGLAND. 79 was a consequence of after events. The grant of nation of Virginia, and the two portions were at first lands in America made by James I. in 1606 was distinguished in name by their geographical posi- shared between two companies. The southern half tions. To the exertions of Sir John Popham (Chief NEW ENGLAND (Jtu tnos~l rtmarqueatli fjrn t/iui namiJ ty the /<;>/< and mt<j/it\ Pn PAET OF CAPTAIN J, SMITH S MAP OF NEW ENGLAND. was that which, as we have seen, was colonised by Justice of England), and of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, the London Company ; the northern division fell to the earliest attempts at colonising North Virgfnia the lot of various gentlemen belonging to the West were due. Gorges had taken into* his house three of England, whose head-quarters were at Plymouth. Indians who had been brought from America, The whole country at that time went by the clesig- and from whom (after he had instructed them in 80 CASSELL S HISTORY OF TIfE UNITED {STATES. [1G20. the English language) he received such glowing accounts of their native land that he resolved to turn his thoughts in that direction. The first vessel fitted out by the western adventurers left England in 1606, but was seized by the Spaniards, who claimed an exclusive right of navigation in the seas of the New World a preposterous claim, capriciously advanced, and in this instance enforced with the violence of a free-booter. Another vessel, despatched about the same time, was more fortunate, and the voyagers, on their return, gave such satisfactory reports of the country that many persons were induced to join the undertaking. Three more ships were sent in 1607, and it is said that the emigrants included some convicts taken out of the prisons. The party landed near the mouth of the Sagadahoc, or Kennebec, in the present State of Maine, and set to work building cabins, storehouses, and rude for tifications. The attempt, however, was doomed to failure, like so many other endeavours in the way of colonisation. Winter set in ; the weather was terribly inclement ; various misfortunes befel the little community; and in the eaiiy part of 1608 they determined to abandon the spot. It was con sidered that this desertion evinced a cowardly and contemptible spirit ; and the feeling of mortification, increased when it became known that the French had about the same time succeeded in establishing a colony in a still more northern locality, near what is now the city of Quebec. No further attempts at colonisation were made for about six years, though English vessels visited the coast of Massachusetts for traffic with the Indians, and once, if not oftener, wintered in the desert. Sir John Popham was now dead, but his son, Sir Francis Popham, showed great interest in the enterprise, and, though it was considered by many that the country was too cold to be inhabited by Englishmen, he continued to send out vessels, but found all fruitless. Gorges, too, clung to the hope of o;7ccting something, but was doomed to frequent disappointment. The man who gave a fresh impulse to North Virginian enterprise was Captain John Smith. In 1614, after an absence from America of five years, he started for the west in command of two ships, fitted out by four London merchants and himself. It was not proposed to make a settlement at that time ; but Smith, while the merchants were effecting their exchanges, exa mined the shores from Penobscot to Cape Cod, and prepared a map of the coast. On returning home, he had an interview with the Prince of Wales (after wards Charles I.), and obtained his sanction for calling the country New England, and changing the native names of places into such English designa tions as Boston, Plymouth, Oxford, Cambridge, Fal- niouth, Bristol, Hull, &c. ; though, of these names, only Plymouth is still attached to the locality with which Smith associated it. Early in the following year, this energetic explorer made an attempt to establish a colony, but was driven back by the vio lence of the weather. In June, 1615, he again sailed on the same enterprise ; but his crew proved muti nous, and he at length fell into the hands of French pirates, from whose custody he ultimately escaped on a dark night in an open boat, which drifted towards the French coast. Returning to England, he exerted himself to create amongst the gentry and merchants of the western counties a feeling of interest in the prospects of American colonisation. In this he succeeded so well that vast plans began to be entertained, and Smith was appointed Admiral of New England for life. He does not seem, how ever, to have done much after this date in the pro motion, of American colonisation; and in 1623, in " a brief relation " written by him to the Royal Commissioners for the reformation of Virginia, we find him complaining that his undertakings in the New World had been, pecuniarily, a failure. Having, he states, warned all persons concerned of the disasters that would overtake the plantations if they were not better governed, and finding his advice disregarded, he had abandoned colonial en terprise, rather than risk more money on such uncertain issues, as he had already spent about a thousand pounds on Virginia and New England. " In neither of those two countries," he adds, " have I one foot of land, nor the very house I builded, nor the ground I diggc-1 with my own hands, nor ever any content or satisfaction at all, though I see ordinarily those two countries shared before me by them that neither have them nor know them but by my descriptions." Smith seems to have been a man of a somewhat quarrelsome disposition, with a high opinion of his own powers ; but he is un doubtedly the chief hero of early Anglo-American adventure. He died June 21st, 1631, and was buried in the church of St. Sepulchre, London. The designs of the Plymouth Company wero vigorously opposed by the London Association, which dreaded a rival. Nevertheless, King James, in the year 1620, granted to the former body a new patent, with enlarged powers. The adven turers were forty in number, and included members of the Royal household and of the Government, as well as some of the most influential of the nobility. The territory conferred upon this Company ex tended in bi-eadth from the fortieth to the forty- eigiith degree of north latitude, and in length from the Atlantic to the Pacific ; comprising, as Mr. 1620.] RISE OF THE PURITANS. 81 Bancroft explains it, nearly all that portion of the continent which is now known as British America, all New England and New York (according to the modern divisions and designations), half of New Jersey, very nearly all Pennsylvania, and the whole of the country to the west of those States : a domain of more than a million square miles, capable of supporting far more than two hundred millions of inhabitants. This enormous region was made over to the patentees as an absolute property, and the Company was invested with unlimited jurisdiction, with the sole powers of legislation, and with the right of appointing all officers, and of settling all forms of government. The land and its adjacent islands, the rivers, the harbours, the mines, and the fisheries, were be stowed without reservation on the proprietors. The rights of traffic, navigation, and colonising were at the disposal of the Plymouth Council ; and the emigrants were to be governed, without any voice of their own, by the corporation in England.* The provisions of this patent were afterwards further enforced by a Royal proclamation ; but the validity of the grant was questioned by the House of Commons, and the French asserted their own right to a portion of the lands thus bestowed by the British monarch. Neither circumstance, how ever, influenced the event. The English colonisa tion of North America was destined to succeed, and to produce resiilts of the utmost importance to the human race. But the real colonisation of the New England States was reserved for the despised and persecuted sect of the Puritans. No religious body has had a greater influence on modern English history than that to which (though by way of nickname, given by its enemies) the term Puritan was applied, from its members pro fessing to restore the pure doctrines of Christianity. It was the child of the Reformation, though a child not born until some years after the Protestant movement had begun. The last thing which Henry VIII. desired to establish was liberty of conscience ; and some of the greatest leaders of the revolt against Rome were far from recognising in its fulness the freedom of the intellect from clerical dictation. The Church of England took the place of the Church of Italy. Men were still to obey their spiritual pastors and masters. The King was to be the motive force of the ecclesiastical body, as the Pope had been before ; very little was to be altered in point of dogma ; and all matters of belief were to be humbly received by the laity, as principles which it was beyond their competence to estimate * Bancroft s History of the United States, Vol. L, chap, 8. or judge. But, the emancipation of the European mind having once commenced, it Avas not in the power of any sovereign on earth to set bounds to its action, or measure the strength of its ever- increasing impulse. The distinctly Protestant character of the Church of England was de veloped under Edward VI. to an extent which would have angered or alarmed the youthful monarch s father. A Calvinistical party arose, and the mere denial of Pontifical supremacy was held to be insufficient. The followers of Cranmer were in favour >f retaining some of the old doctrines and several of tho old observances of Rome ; but a sterner and more vehement set of thinkers in sisted on tearing off from the new Church every rag of Papacy. These were the first Puritans a body within the Established Churcli, yet dissenting from much which the chief leaders of the Anglican community thought desirable, or at least expedient. In the opinion of the extreme reformers, nothing should be admitted which could not be justified by the Bible. Everything which could only appeal to tradition for its warrant was valueless, or even pernicious. They denied the apostolic succession of bishops ; they refused to acknowledge the supre macy of the King in matters of faith in this respect agreeing with the Catholics, though for very different reasons ; they asserted that all ministers of the Gospel were equal, and that none possessed any authority which was not immediately derivable from the Scriptures. Wherever any number of Christians, however small, assembled for religious exercises, there, they contended, a perfect church existed, and the community so formed might right fully proceed to appoint its own ministers and frame its own rules of government, without any interference on the part of either ecclesiastical or lay authorities. In the fervour of their zeal, they quarrelled with external observances which to others seemed indifferent or trivial. The wearing of a surplice and a square cap was Popish, and was denounced with almost as much acrimony as the worship of images or the granting of absolution. Hooper was the head of this party, and such was his objection to the episcopal dress that, when appointed Bishop of Gloucester, he for a long while refused to wear it, and suffered imprisonment for some months rather than yield. Under the rule of the Papist, Mary, both parties in the Church of England suffered equally : Cranmer and Hooper were alike burnt at the stake as heretics in the eyes of Rome. Elizabeth, when she restored Protestantism, favoured those of the reformers who had most affinity with the old faith of western Christendom ; and the Puritanical section (many of CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1593. whom, in the preceding reign, had sought refuge in Germany, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, where the most pronounced forms of Protestantism pre vailed) became more confirmed in their opposition to the views of sacerdotalism. Early in 1559, a few months after the accession of the Queen, the supre macy of the Crown in matters of religion was again established by law, and the Act of Uniformity was passed, in the vain hope of preventing dissensions. This act forbade, under severe penalties, the per formance of divine worship except as prescribed in the Book of Common Prayer, and empowered the Queen and her Commissioners to ordain and publish such further ceremonies and rights as might be considered decent and edifying. By a clause in the Supremacy Act, a tribunal was established, called the Court of High Commission for Eccle siastical Affairs ; and to this court were confided powers as arbitrary as those of the dreaded Star Chamber. The Commissioners (consisting partly of laymen and partly of ecclesiastics) were directed to visit, reform, redress, order, correct, and amend all errors, heresies, schisms, abuses, offences, contempts, and enormities whatsoever, which by any ecclesiastical authority might be lawfully ordered or corrected. Any three out of the forty-four Commissioners formed a quorum, and from their decisions there was no appeal. They proceeded, not by the statute law of the realm, but by the canon law. They were authorised to con duct their inquiries by " all means and ways which they could devise." They might act, not merely on sworn information and the testimony of wit nesses, but on rumour and suspicion. They could bring a suspected person before them, administer to him an oath, and compel him to criminate himself, on pain of being sent to prison if he refused to swear. They were permitted to use the rack and other forms of torture ; indeed, their power was so great that it was said to exceed that of the Spanish Inquisition itself. It was not until 1565 that the Act of Uniformity began to be rigidly enforced ; and it then became apparent that the Church was split into two wholly irreconcilable sections. In 15G7, about thirty ministers of London refused submission to the Act ; a separate congregation was set on foot, and from that hour Nonconformity commenced. The persecution of Protestants by Protestants began at the same time. Many of the Puritan clergy were deprived of their benefices, imprisoned, and fined. The Court of High Commission exercised its exceptional powers with vigour, and the Queen amply fulfilled her promise to the Archbishop of Canterbury that she would suffer no man to diverge either to the left hand or the right. But the breach between the High and Low Church parties was widened by the very efforts to close it up. As the reign of Elizabeth advanced, the noncon- forming bodies gathered strength. At first, the more moderate of the Puritans desired rather to reform than to destroy or even leave the established communion ; but the violent section, headed by one Robert Brown, denounced the Church of England as corrupt in its very nature, and fit only to be rooted out. So severe was the persecution of this sectary s followers that two men were hanged for distributing a tract by him. Brown was a fanatic of the purest water, as well as a man of domineering and irritable temper. After officiating for some time as a clergyman of the Church of England, he seceded, about 1571, on the question of uniformity, and established the Independent body. Some ten years later, at the head of fifty or sixty others, he settled at Middle- burgh, in Zealand, but in three months quarrelled with his associates, and went to Scotland. There, owing to the arrogance of his disposition, he again got into trouble, and returned to England, where he was excommunicated. In 1589, he rejoined the Church, and remained in its ministry to the end of n long life. But the Nonconformist movement, of vdiich he had been one of the chief agents, con tinued to increase. Puritanism more and more detached itself from the Church, and assumed a dis tinct position, or rather many distinct positions, for the sects v/ere numerous. On the other hand, the State, in alliance with the Church, persecuted the ob stinate Dissenters with an equally obstinate cruelty. In 1593, Parliament passed an Act declaring that all persons above sixteen years of age who should absent themselves for one month from the parish church should first be fined and imprisoned, and afterwards, in case of continued disobedience, be banished the kingdom, their return to which with out a licence entailed on them the death of felons. This atrocious statute was levelled equally against the Roman Catholics and the Nonconformists. It was dictated by the absurd belief that the religious ideas of men can be arbitrarily forced into a pre determined channel; that that which depends on sentiment, conviction, and conscience (all of which are antecedent to authority, and in fact create what they afterwards obey) can be manufactured by Act of Parliament ; that faith can be made by law, or, at the least, uniformity be enforced by terror. The only logical ground of opposition to the Church of Rome is the religious freedom of the individual ; yet Elizabeth and her counsellors preferred to take their stand on the principle of infallibility, in 1603.] JAMES I. AND THE PURITANS. 83 regard to which they were poor rivals to the ancient and historic Church "which issues its edicts from the Vatican. Puritanism was rather strengthened than checked by the ferocity of the Queen s attempts to trample it out. Many of the Nonconformists took refuge at Amsterdam, but others remained in England, and spread their principles widely amongst the humbler orders. Two were hanged at Tyburn, under the detestable law of 1593; but the Puritans were not intimidated. Elizabeth afterwards re gretted that she had permitted these executions ; yet, in acting as she did, she was merely carrying out a principle which she had long before laid down. In a speech delivered by her at the close of Parliament in the year 1585, she alluded to the schisms and heretical errors which had crept into the Church, and told the clergy that she would depose them if they looked not well to their charges ; adding, " I see many overbold with God Almighty, making too many subtle scannings of his blessed will. The presumption is so great that I may not suffer it." It was a hopeless struggle, and, in the latter years of her life, Elizabeth to some extent relaxed the rigour of her policy. During the whole of her reign, Puritanism, though subjected to fierce persecution, was an important power in the Church and in the nation. At the first con vocation of the English clergy, held in 1561, a motion to do away with the ceremonies to which the extreme reformers objected was defeated by a bare majority of one. The Puritans were largely represented in the House of Commons ; in the poorer classes of society their teaching was gene rally received and fondly cherished; and Sir Walter Raleigh told his fellow-members in 1580 that he believed the Brownists alone numbered nearly twenty thousand. When Elizabeth died, in 1603, the whole Nonconformist body must have reckoned many more. The Puritans themselves, as early as 1585, spoke of being a hundred thousand strong; but this may have been an exaggeration. It was hoped by the Dissenters that the rule of James would be more favourable to them than that of Elizabeth had been ; but the event soon showed they were mistaken. The King, it is true, had been brought up as a Calvinist in a Calvinistical country; but on removing to England he found the High Church party so favourable to his kingly pretensions that he supported their views, and sharply discouraged all forms of dissent. In answer to a petition from the Puritans for a redress of ecclesiastical grievances, he appointed a conference at Hampton Court, being probably glad of an opportunity for displaying those powers as a contro versialist on which he greatly prided himself. The conference took place on the 14th, 16th and 18th of January, 1604. It is ill arguing with a sovereign, who can at any moment silence an awkward opponent by the voice of authority. James asserted his pretensions after as lofty a fashion as Henry VIII. or Queen Elizabeth. He vowed that he would have but " one doctrine, one discipline, one religion, in substance and in ceremony." He denied the Puritans the right of occasional assembly and the liberty of free discussions, and he plainly told them that he would make them conform, or harry them out of the land, or else worse ; which, in a spirit of vulgar jesting, he afterwards explained by the words " only hang them; that s all."* Further conference led to no better result, and the Puritans must have left with the darkest fore bodings. The clergy complimented the King on his marvellous learning, penetration, and skill, and the King plowed -with self-congratulation and vanity. He perhaps recollected that Knox had been one of the chief opponents of his mother, and rejoiced that he had ridden, so roughly over those who held the theological opinions of that reformer. James was as good as his word. He persecuted the Puritans with the utmost severity, and at the same time evinced a strong desire to come to terms with the Romanists. In his speech at the opening of Parliament, on the 19th of March, 1604, he said : " I acknowledge the Roman Church to be our mother Church, although defiled with some infirmities and corruptions, as the Jews were when they crucified Christ." He spoke of ameliorating the laws against the Catholics, and expressed a wish to meet them half way, and to effect a general Christian union, which he thought might be done, if the Papists would lay aside their claim to Pontifical supremacy, and cleanse their communion of such errors as had arisen in the course of time. In the same speech he alluded to the Puritans as " a sect rather than a religion " a body " unable to be suffered in any well-governed commonwealth;" so that his friendliness towards the Catholics pro ceeded from no general love of toleration (though he disavowed any desire to restrict the minds of his people to his own private opinions), but rather from a hatred of those principles of individual freedom in matters of religion which the Noncon formists favoured. Speaking to the same effect in the following session of Parliament, immediately after the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, he still * Such is the account given in Barlow s "Sum and Substance of the Conference at Hampton Court," cited in his History by Mr. Bancroft, who refers to another report still more disgrace ful to James. PURITANS BEFORE JAMES I. 1604.] ENGLISH PURITANS IN HOLLAND. 85 gave the Catholics, as a body, credit for being good and loyal subjects, while he denounced the Puritans as " worthy of fire " for not allowing salvation to any Papist a strange piece of intolerance in the rebuking of intolerance. Yet, with the double dealing common to all weak natures, he had assured his Council in 1604 that he had no inten tion of granting toleration to the Catholics, and that he would strengthen the laws against them, and put those laws in force with the utmost rigour. eloquent minister named John Robinson ; another was William Brewster, a member of a Nottingham shire family connected with Virginian emigration. Under the guidance of these devotees, several In dependents resolved, in 1607, to settle in Holland, where, for about a quarter of a century, small colonies of English Dissenters had been established under protection of the equal laws passed by the Dutch Republic. The attempt to leave England was prevented by the authorities ; for the pleasure BKEW8TER S HOUSE AT SCKOOBY, XoTT: The animosity of the King to the dissenting body was fully shared by the heads of the Church of England. They imprisoned the Puritan ministers, or drove them into exile. They flattered the absolutist ideas of the monarch with disgraceful subserviency. They asserted his superiority to Parliament and the law, and preached up the doctrine of passive obedience on the part of the people, as though it had been a new Gospel. But the Puritans were neither convinced nor intimi dated. In private houses and secret spots they continued to hold their religious services, and their numbers multiplied with every fresh effort to crush them. One of the leaders of the party at that time was an 8 of persecution was too great to be relinquished. In 1608 another attempt was made, and successfully, though only after much dif ficulty. The intending emi grants gathered on a lonely heath in Lincolnshire, near the mouth of the Humber, and put off in a boat towards the ship, which lay not far distant. But before some of the women and children could leave the .shore, they were seized by a company of horsemen who suddenly appeared in pursuit. The male emigrants, however, having got away, and it being no easy matter to deal with the women and children, they were released, and ail English religious community was formed at Amsterdam. The situation of these poor fugitives was forlorn in the extreme. They knew nothing of the Dutch language ; the manners of the people were strange to them : under every disadvantage they had to find work for their support ; and it was not long before poverty, in the words 86 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1608. of one of their mimber, came upon tliem like an armed man, from whom they could not fly. The brotherhood soon after removed to Leyden, where, in the pursuit of their secular callings, they became prosperous, and acqitired a great reputation for holiness. None the less it was a fact of ill omen to England, as the course of events afterwards showed, that these men were, for 110 crime or misdemeanour, thus driven from their homes. "Let the astrologer," said Milton, in a noble burst of indignation, " be dismayed at the portentous blaze of comets, and impressions in the ah-, as foretelling troubles and changes of states: I shall believe there cannot be a more ill-boding sign to a nation (God turn the omen from us!) than when the inhabitants, to avoid insufferable grievances at home, are enforced by heaps to for sake their native country."* In the meanwhile, the Puritans remaining in England patiently endured the cruel sufferings which arbitrary power imposed on them. These persecutions increased under the reign of Charles I., owing mainly to the evil promptings of that mitred fanatic, Archbishop Laud, whose object was to establish a spiritual or ecclesiastical despotism differing in no essential respect from that of Rome. Doubtless the Puritans were fanatics too, and, in the day of their power, both in England and America, many of them proved as tyrannical as those against whom they had asserted the rights of their own conscience in the day of their weakness. But this will not in any degree excuse the im prisonments, floggings, mutilations, and varied tortures, inflicted on a set of men who at first asked no more than to be allowed to follow their own mode of worship in peace, and who did not resort to rebellion until after three-quarters of a century of insult and oppression. Attempts have been made to show that the Puritans were executed simply for talking treason and breaking the laws;t but, it must be remembered, they talked 110 treason until they were exasperated by tyranny, and broke no laws but such as were an outrage oil the spirit of English jurisprudence. They had begun with moderation ; they were goaded by injustice into more extreme forms of dissent. At the beginning of Elizabeth s reign, they might have been conciliated, and, if not retained within the Church, suffered to exist quietly as independent bodies. They were not Republicans until monarchs and bishops made them so. They vaunted no * Of Reformation in England (1641), Book II. t Dictionary of Sects, Heresies, Ecclesiastical Parties, and Schools of Religious Thought, edited by the llev. John Henry Blunt, M.A. (1874). allegiance to a foreign prince, as the Catholics did ; they claimed no right of deposing or assassinating the sovereign; the democratic sentiments of 1649 were unknown when the Court of High Commis sion was established, and for many years later. These men, in the agonies of torture, and even with the hangman s rope about their necks, prayed God to defend and prosper the Queen and State. A great deal of extravagant doctrine was no doubt put forward ; pamphlets may have been issued which would have jiistified a moderate correction by the law, after a fair and open trial ; for the Nonconformists had their errors of judgment and temper, like other men. But the fault lay far more with the allied Church and State than with the poor enthusiasts against whom every engine of remorseless power was brought to bear. The tyranny of Elizabeth and her two successors over all who in any way disagreed with the law- established Church, is hardly to be surpassed in the miserable history of religious persecution. As might be imagined, the Puritans found their chief supporters among the working and trading classes. The nobles and gentry, for the most part, disliked a system which was opposed to privileged orders, to external pomp, and to the luxury of titled leisure ; yet several men of high position, in the first half of the seventeenth century, were either Puritans themselves, or inclined to a liberal treatment of that body. In a certain sense, however, the religious reformers were generally unpopular. They were regarded with distaste wherever there was no great enthusiasm about spiritual affairs. The austerity of their manners ; the gloom of many of their opinions ; the grotesque extravagance of their costumes, phraseology, and names ; the rancour with which they denounced all amusements, and even such harmless observances as Christmas sports and May-day gambols ; the bitter disputatiousness of their tongues, and the frequency with //hich they got into collision with the civil magistrate all this brought them into evil odour with s, great many well-meaning people, who wished nothing more than to live in quiet and cheerfulness, as well as with the profligate and depraved. The poets and dramatists were their sworn enemies, for they were the sworn enemies of the poets and dramatists. Spenser, though known to have been a very decided Protestant, spoke of them as "that ungracious crew which feigns demurest grace." Shakespeare declared that honesty was no Puritan, and laughed at the sour formalist who sang psalms to hornpipes. Ben Jonson frequently burlesqued the malcontents in religion. In a later age, Butler made them the subjects of the longest satirical poem in the Ian- 1608.] THE PURITANS. 87 guage the witty but one-sided " Hudibras." it was customary to say of them that they were either hypocrites or madmen ; and both accusations were partially true. A thorough Puritan Mrs. Hutchinson remarks, in the Memoirs of her hus band, a Parliamentarian officer, that many of her co-religionists " suffered their zeal to run out into bitter personal hate," and that some were deluded with the idea that they were born to set up Christ s kingdom upon earth. The record of their endless divisions and sub-divisions, their dreary subleties of theological dogma, their sombre warfare against natural and innocent gaiety, their fractiousness, and their intolerance, is a melancholy chapter in the annals of the human race ; but to the extent that they were vilely used they must receive our sym pathy, and it should never be forgotten that their assertion of the right of the individual to follow what seems good to him in matters of faith, without interference on the part of the State, or of any church whatever, is the groundwork of the perfect toleration which we enjoy to-day a toleration which has added incalculably to the happiness of the English race on both sides of the Atlantic. At a later period than that with which we are now concerned, the Nonconformists, and especially the Presbyterians, were corrupted by power. More over, many hypocrites joined their ranks out of mere servility and time-serving, and thus added to the discredit of the whole body. But in the reigns of James I. and his son, the religious reformers con sisted of three classes vulgar and embittered fanatics on the one hand, educated gentlemen on the other, and an intermediate body of moderate enthusiasts. The Puritan gentry, though distin guished by a certain gravity of demeanour, and by a hatred of licentiousness, were far from being the gloomy Mawwonus of the satiric poet, the carica turist, and the stage. They dressed with a sober gallantry, which paid some heed to ornament and effect ; and they were not insensible to the charms of life. Colonel Hutchinson was a lover of music and the fine arts, formed a collection of paint ings, sculptures, and engravings, and caused his children to be taught languages, science, music, and dancing. The Earl of Essex who fought on the side of the Parliament was a man of refined tastes and graceful modes of living. Milton was a poet in his habits no less than in his genius. Oliver Cromwell, in the days of his Protectorate, made "Whitehall a scene of elegant culture, such as many monarchs have not equalled ; and Whitelock, who represented the Commonwealth at the Court of Queen Christina of Sweden, amused his subordinates, during the lonsr winter nights of that northern land, by music, dancing, disputations in Latin, and declamations upon words. The English settlers at Leyden were men of a different stamp, and were doubtless charac terised by an austere demeanour. But they were enthusiasts rather than fanatics, and by their industry and inoffensive conduct won the regard and respect of the Hollanders. Nevertheless, they felt their isolation in a foreign country, where the language and manners of the people were strange to them. They wished to preserve some connection with their native land ; to live once more under the rule of their own sovereign ; to hear only the accents of their mother-tongue, and to enjoy the protection of English laws, as far as that might be consistent with religious freedom. They were in truth home-sick, and appear to have actually suffered in health from their long exile. They feared that their children would, as they grew up, lose all knowledge of the English speech, and be merged in the Dutch nationality. Some had already entered into the Dutch army and navy ; others, corrupted by bad examples, had fallen into dissolute ways. The emigrants desired, above all things, to preserve their nation and their language. Accord ingly they formed a design of settling in Virginia, and in 1617 opened negotiations with the London Company for forming a distinct plantation in some part of the Virginian territory remote from that which Avas already inhabited. The disturbed and revolutionary state of Holland at that time was probably another reason why the English emigrants sought to shift their quarters ; though the perils of a long voyage across the ocean, followed by settle ment in a wild land peopled by savages, were not unconsidered. The leading men of the London Company were favourable to their request ; the King made some difficulties with regard to religion, but ultimately consented to lave the settlers alone, though the Bishops demurred ; and, after a great deal of discussion and delay, the Company, in 1619, granted a large patent. The English colony at Leyden was to be transformed into an English colony of the New World, where the historic life of the race might be continued under fresh con ditions. The emigrants proposed to engage in fishing, which King James, in his fantastic way, approved of, as " an honest trade," and the " Apostles own calling." With this view, they formed a partner ship with certain men of business in London, who undertook to provide them with the capital they lacked, on conditioii that everything accruing from their services should be thrown into u common stock for seven years, at the end of which period all CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1620. profits were to be divided among the shareholders (inchiding the settlers) in proportion to their respec tive investments. This was an agreement which, like most others of a like nature, was more favour able to the money-lender than to the borrower; but it was accepted, because some assistance was necessary to start the expedition. Even as it was, the emigrants were so straitened in their means that it was only with great difficulty they could make the requisite preparations. For trans porting them across the Atlantic, they procured two vessels called the Speed well and the Mayflower. The former, which was of sixty tons burden, was purchased in Holland, and was designed to take in as many of the congregation as were willing to embark ; the latter, of a hundred and eighty tons, lay in the Thames, to be freighted with necessaries. These could only accommodate a minority of the English settled at Leyden. The majority, therefore, remained behind, under the guidance of Robinson, while the rest were committed to the care of Brewster, a man of mature years and large expe rience. After a solemn fast and religious service, Robinson addressed some farewell words to the emi grants, in which he charged them, before God and his angels, to follow him no farther than they had seen him follow Jesus Christ. He bewailed the condition of the reformed churches, which had come to a full stop in religion. Luther and Calvin, he remarked, were great and shining lights in their times ; but they had not penetrated into the whole counsel of God. It was an article of their church covenant, which ho besought them to remember, that they were to be ready to receive whatever truth should be made known to them from the study of the Bible. On subsequent days, those who were to leave were feasted by those who stayed behind. Many tears were shed at the unavoidable parting ; many psalms were sung ; and Edward Winslow, one of the colonists, and afterwards a principal man in the Plymouth plantation, has recorded that these devout songs, skilfully delivered, were the sweetest melody that ever his ears had heard.* The night previous to departure was spent by most rather in leave-taking than in sleep ; and many were the expressions of brotherly love and tender farewell that were uttered in those hours of darkness. The Speedwell lay at Delft-Haven, where, after prayer had been offered on the shore by the pastor, the emigrants were accompanied to the ships by their faithful fellow- exiles, who were not able to speak for the abun dance of their sorrow. Even the Dutch spectators * Brief Narration of the True Grounds or Cause of the First Planting of New England. 104G. who stood about the quay were powerfully affected as Robinson, kneeling down on the very margin of the water, invoked on them the blessings of God. "But we only, going aboard," says Winslow, "gave them a volley of small shot and three pieces of ordnance ; and so, lifting up our hands to each other, and our hearts for each other to the Loi d our God, we departed." The day on which they quitted Delft-Haven was the 22nd of July, 1620. It was one of those memorable days which must be ranked among the turning-points of history, for it saw the commence ment of an enterprise which was to aggrandise the nations of the earth. The material details of the scene were not pre-eminently striking. Of external grandeur there was absolutely nothing. The formal architecture of a Dutch town, the dull hues of a Dutch sky, the vague outlines of an amphibious soil ; a sluggish river, a leaden-tinted canal, a crowded wharf; to right and left the lines of weary dykes that flank the wide, dim flats of mead and marsh, of inland sea and oozy stream, that make up Holland ; in front, the ordinary business of a commercial quay; a ship that swings at anchor to the lapping wave ; a praying figure kneeling on the stones ; a group of weeping voyagers parting from old friends and fellow-sufferers as they enter the vessel which is to waft them to a doubtful future and a savage realm these things make up the picture of that memo rable embarkation. But what splendour of Im perial pride, what trappings of the car of state, what pageantry of Avealth, what blaze and blare of military power, made manifest on some trivial or immoral oc casion, could equal the interest of that scene, wherein the performers were poor and obscure men, but of which the issues have acted with incalculable force on the whole after-development of the English race 1 The majority of those men were of such humble origin that it is not even known from what towns or villages of England they came. At Leyden they had toiled with their hands for daily bread ; in America they were compelled to cut down forests, and build themselves rude huts for shelter against the cold. But they created the most distinctive of the American States ; they gave a new application to the old principles of English freedom; their example, in later ages, reacted 011 the Old World which sent them forth. There are few spots, even on English earth, more interesting from an English point of view than that harbour on the slowly- moving Maas, where Robinson poured forth his soul to God, and Brewster marshalled his Pilgrims for the distant West. They stayed for awhile at Soiithampton, where they were joined by the Mayflower, and then set 1620.] SAILING OF THE EMIGRANTS. sail for America. Twice they were compelled to put back, on account of the Speedwell needing re pairs ; at length they resolved to dismiss that vessel, and send those who were in it to London. It afterwards came out that the unseaworthiness of the smaller craft had been exaggerated by the master, who repented of the bargain he had made. The Mayflower a name famous in history, and already gathering about it the tender and poetic associations of a noble past finally left England, on its solitary way, the 6th of September, 1620. Before those adventurous men lay the wide deserts of the ocean, and beyond the ocean lay the deserts of a savage land. But they were sustained by courage, and reliance, and high hope by the faith which makes light of hardships, and the spirit which can subdiie a world. One of the finest of living American writers Oliver "Wendell Holmes has commemorated the event in a few touching stanzas. After reproducing the words of Robin son, in which lie told his followers that their task was not to build by Haarlem Meer, nor on the banks of the Zuyder-Zee, but to bear the Gospel to far-off tribes, and to welcome all new truths that might be drawn from its words, the poet continues : "He spake : with lingering, long embrace, With tears of love and partings fond, They floated down the creeping Maas, Along the isle of Ysselmond. " They pass d the frowning towers of Briel, The Hook of Holland s shelf of sand, And grated soon with lifting keel The sullen shores of Fatherland. "No home for these ! too well they knew The mitred king behind the throne ; The sails were set, the pennons flew, And westward ho ! for worlds unknown. " And these were they who gave us^birth, The Pilgrims of the sunset wave, Who won for us this virgin earth, And freedom with the soil they gave. " The pastor slumbers by the Rhine, In alien earth the exiles lie, Their nameless graves our holiest shrine, His words our noblest battle-cry. " Still cry them, and the world shall hear, Ye dwellers by the storm-swept sea ! Ye have not built by Haarlem Meer, Nor on the land-lock d Zuyder-Zee !" CHAPTER XL Arrival of the Puritan Emigrants at Cape Cod Compact signed before landing Dismal Prospect Explorations on Land A Dangerous Voyage in the Shallop Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers on Plymouth Rock Mortality among the Settlers Negotiations with the Indians Creation of Private Property Ineffectual Attempts at Colonising Massachusetts Bay Progress of the New Plymouth Colony Taxation of Fishing Vessels by the Plymouth Company Debates on the Subject in the English House of Commons Arbitrary Conduct of James I. Sir Ferdinando Gorges and the Planting of New Hampshire and Maine Sir William Alexander and Nova Scotia War with France, and temporary seizure of Canada by the English Slow Development of the Northern Parts of New England. SIXTY-FIVE days, rendered especially trying by a good deal of imigh weather, and by a scarcity of provisions and other necessaries (poverty having compelled the emigrants to sell some portion of their original stock to raise ready money), were passed by the Pilgrim Fathers at sea, between their final starting from England and their arrival in America. Their intention was to settle in the country near the river Hudson ; but they were either driven out of their right course by the violence of the seas, or, as some historians state, though apparently without sufficient proof, were purposely taken northward by the captain, in con sequence of his having been bribed by the Dutch, who designed to plant a colony in the very region selected by the English Puritans a design which they afterwards carried oiit. The first land descried was Cape Cod: this was in the early morning of the 9th of November, 1020. The vessel anchored in the harbour two days later, and the emigrants, before transacting any other business, considered what kind of government they would establish among themselves, some members of the party having been observed to be not well-inclined to amity. They accordingly drew up the following compact : - "*In the name of God, amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our dread sovereign lord, King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, &c., having undertaken, for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith, and honour of our King and country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the northern parts of Virginia, do, by these presents, solemnly and mutu ally, in the presence of God and of one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic, for our better ordering and pre servation, and furtherance of the ends aforesaid ; 90 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1620. and by virtue hereof do enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, con stitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony ; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience." This document sufficiently proves that, though desirous of freedom, the settlers generally were loyal to the throne and to their native country. The reason for making so formal a declaration was that there had been suggestions on the part of some few for setting up a perfectly independent govern ment. Their patent, it was argued; had been drawn out for territory belonging to the London Company, whereas they were now in the dominions of the Western Company, and might therefore consider themselves free from all authority. It would have been very dangerous, however, to assume such a position ; especially as the emigrants, before leaving Holland, had, in order to remove the objections of the King and the Bishops, agreed to a set of seven articles assenting to the confession of faith published in the name of the Church of England, acknow ledging the King as " supreme governor in his dominion, for all causes, and over all persons," affirming that it was " lawful for his Majesty to appoint bishops, civil overseers, or officers in authority under him," and otherwise promising peaceable obedience to the existing state. To the New England compact, which is dated " Cape Cod, November llth, 1620," were appended forty-one signatures, those of the men forming that little community : the rest of the party consisted of women and young persons. The number has been variously stated at a hundred and twenty, and a hundred and two : it seems probable that it was the latter. On the passage out, there had been one birth and one death ; so that the sum- total was the same at landing as at starting. John Carver, one of those who had conducted the original negotiations with the London Company, was unanimously chosen Governor for the year. It was near the middle of November a period later in the season then than now, owing to the subsequent alteration in the style ; and on the eastern shores of America the winters are colder than in corre sponding latitudes of western Europe. Nothing, therefore, could exceed the discomforts under which these English people began an enterprise which proved to be the foundation of a great and flourish ing community, one of the component parts of the mightiest Republic in the world. They saw before them only a desert land, covered with gloomy forests. Except on board ship, they had no shelter from the storms and inclement air of winter, nor could the roughest cabins be constructed until they had first hewn wood wherewith to make them. Tli ere was reason to fear attack if they went on shore ; the supply of food was precarious ; and the precise spot at which the settlement should be made had not yet been determined. To add to their misfortunes, the shallop, in which they proposed to cruise along the coast on a voyage of discovery, needed so much repair that it WHS sixteen or seventeen days before it could be made fit for service. In. the meanwhile, an adventurous party undertook to explore the land, though danger was apprehended from savages. Armed with mus kets, and protected by steel caps and corselets, some sixteen or twenty men set out on the loth of November. The place appeared to be almost unpeopled, and the few Indians they saw fled from them in fear. On the following morning they ventured higher up the country, and came to a deserted and ruined house, in which, and in certain heaps of sand hard by, which they dug up, they found baskets of corn, and a great kettle that had evidently belonged to some European ship. The corn they carried away in the kettle, intending to pay the natives at the first opportunity. They also opened a few old graves, but covered them up again, not liking to violate the sepulchres of the dead. On the 17th of November they returned to their comrades, and, towards the end of the month, four-aiid-twenty men started in the shallop. A few of these were afterwards put on shore, and the explorations continued for some days. The prospect every way was dreary beyond expression. It snowed and blew incessantly. The frost was hard and stern ; and the land-explorers were almost exhausted with marching up and down barren hills and solitary valleys buried deep in snow. The white expanse was here and there broken by a deserted wigwam, or by the scattered gmves of Indians ; but scarcely any human beings were to be seen, and those who were occasionally encoun tered took to flight, as before. The investigators had a rough task before them. Sometimes tearing their way through tangled woods and thickets, sometimes toiling across large open plains, now climbing hills, and then descending into deep glens, they surveyed a wide extent of country ; but all was waste and desolate. They discovered further stores of corn buried in the ground, and in some empty houses found other provisions, together with a few domestic utensils of European manu facture. The graves, however, were more numerous than the habitations of the living ; but some of the former, on being opened, were found to contain, besides the remains of bodies, a number of trays, PILGBIM FATHERS ROUND A WATCH-FIRE. 92 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1620. dishes, and bowls, which the explorers, overcoming their scruples about the sacredness of the tomb, took away with them.* It afterwards appeared that the land had recently been swept by a great pestilence. All this while the weather was at its worst, and those who remained in the shallop suffered even more severely than those on shore. It was now December. The spray of the sea froze as it fell on them, till their clothes became as stiff as iron. Several deaths from pulmonary disorders which occurred during the winter were partly attributed to the terrible exposure of those days. Two expeditions were made by the shallop, and on the second voyage the explorers reached the bottom of the Bay of Cape Cod, on the western side of Wellfleet Harbour. On the morning of the 8th of December, the party on. shore, who were encamped near the sea, were attacked by several Indians, who, however, were speedily put to flight. Again taking to the boat, the voyagers sailed along the coast for many miles, in search of a harbour which the pilot (who had been in those seas before) said he knew was within reach ere night should once more close in upon them. In the afternoon the weather grew tempestuous, with much snow and rain. The sea ran so high that the rudder was broken off, and it became necessary to steer the boat with oars. As the early twilight of winter came stealing along the waters, a fear fell on those storm-beaten men lest they should not gain the promised harbour by night. They crowded all sail ; but the mast broke into three pieces, and the sails went overboard. Fortunately they had the benefit of the flood-tide, on the top of which they struck in towards the shore. The pilot and mate were for running the boat before the wind into a cove full of breakers ; but a sailor at the broken helm saw the madness of such a course. " If you are men," he cried, " about with her, else we are all cast away !" They put her about, and in a little time, though it now rained hard and was very dark, got her under a lee-shore, where they disembarked, and passed the night in safety, lighting a fire on the rocks, that they might dry their clothes, and restore warmth to their benumbed frames. With the morning O light they perceived that they were on a small island within the mouth of a harbour; to this island they gave the name of the mate (Clark), who was the first man on shore. After two days rest, the second of which was the Sabbath, they sounded the harbour, which they found well- * A very minute, interesting, anil picturesque account of these explorations, by one who took part in them, is printed in Purchas, Book X. , chap. 4, adapted to shipping. The following day (Monday, December llth) they proceeded up the country on the mainland, and discovered several corn-fields, intersected by little running brooks. This appeared to them so good a spot for a settlement that they returned to the Mayflower, and reported what they had observed to the rest of the company. On the 15th of December, 1620, the ship weighed anchor, and on the 16th arrived in the harbour.* A wild and rocky coast rose from the tumultuous ocean, but rose out of water so shallow that the vessel was obliged to ride at anchor more than a mile from the shore. To land their goods, the emigrants were compelled to wade through the cold wash of the sea ; and the chill thus taken by the more delicate was such as to sow the seeds of consump tion in frames already ill-calculated to resist the effects of hardship. The place where the wanderers thus settled they called New Plymouth, in memory of the English town, they had last quitted after having a second time put back on their outward voyage. Such was the famous landing from the Mayflower on Plymouth Rock. It is probable that the explor ing party which went ashore on the mainland, five days earlier, disembarked on the same cliff ; but all the popular associations are with the later event, as being the more dramatic of the two. Universal history presents few incidents of greater beauty, if we have regard, not to outward show, but to the tenderness of human affections, and to the whole train of consequences which have sprung from that memorable day. Brewster, the grave Elder of the church, Bradford, afterwards Governor of the colony, Winslow, one of its principal founders, and Miles Standish, the rough but kindly-natured soldier, are the four most distinctive figures of the group ; but the imagination takes in all those forlorn outcasts, and embraces alike the famoiis and the obscure in the warmth of its sympathy. They had come, at the bidding of their conscience, to found a new community in a savage place ; and, had they not been sustained by trust, and reliance, and the passion of great deeds, they might well have recoiled from that to which they had set their hands. For the cloudy heavens, the wintry seas, the dark and frowning land, the inclement air, the utter loneliness and want of shelter of their situation, the vague fear of Indians which must have possessed their hearts, and the doubt whether food itself would be found in the unknown deserts beyond, all this might have seemed like the very declaration of Nature herself that the enterprise should not * History of New England, by Daniel Neal, 1720. 1620: EARLY DAYS OF THE PLYMOUTH COLONY. 93 succeed. Yet the emigrants were steadfast in their purpose. They had sailed across the wide Atlantic to find themselves on a rock, with nothing between them and the skies. But that rock was the birth place of New England. At the present day it is regarded by the descendants of the colonists with religious veneration ; yet this feeling is of com paratively modern birth. In 1741, part of the stone was covered by a wharf which was then built on the spot. By 1775, when the revolutionary war had given an impulse to national feeling, it had become an object of interest ; and in an attempt to remove it to the town square it was broken into two pieces. The larger of the fragments, however, was preserved, and in 1834 was set up before Pilgrim Hall, and enclosed within an iron railing. Upon examination, the country appeared more inviting than it had seemed from the spot on which the settlers had first stepped. The favourable report of the explorers was confirmed in a few days. The harbour was evidently commodious. Large woods, offering a good supply of timber, clothed the rising grounds, and four or five little running brooks gave assurance that fresh water would not be wanting. After prayer, the emigrants, on the 20th of December, determined to raise then- first rude dwellings in the neighbourhood of a rivulet and of several springs, not far from a hill which seemed suitable for a look-out and defence. Just as they were beginning work, a storm fell on them, and delayed their operations. On the 23rd of December they cut a quantity of wood, and made ready for building. The next day was Sun day and Christmas-eve. A cry was heard, as of savages, and the men stood to their arms ; but nothing followed. Great as was the necessity for some kind of shelter, no work was done that day, as it was the Sabbath ; but all toiled long and wearily on the following day, the 25th. While their countrymen in England were celebrating the great anniversary of the Christian world by religious rites and joyful gatherings, these exiles were sternly engaged in a struggle for mere life. On that day they began to erect a storehouse for their goods, and some small wooden huts for living in. The weather for some time was so severe that they were often obliged to return to the ship for protection against the cold. On the 28th, they measiircd out the ground, and divided their whole company into nineteen families, allotting to every person half a pole in breadth, and three in length, for lodging and gardens. They also agreed on a body of laws for their civil and military government ; and thus the commonwealth of New England was commenced. Every man was to build his own house ; but this most necessary task was delayed by the roughness of the weather, and by a lament able mortality which broke out among the settlers, owing to cold, fatigue, and want of necessaries. Many still lived on board the ship; others lay sick and helpless in the half-built cabins, tended by their faithful comrades, who spared no service, however painful, which could lessen the misery of that doleful time. The sailors of the Mayflower selfishly refused any aid from their stores, but afterwards, being themselves afflicted by an epidemic, were glad to accept assistance from those whom they had denied. In three months, half of the small community were dead, and of those who remained few were sufficiently well to help the others in the work of construction. " If the Indians," says the historian of New England (following a treatise of Increase Mather s), "had been apprised of their circumstances, they might have cut them off without any trouble." Amongst those who thus died was a son of Governor Carver, who succumbed shortly after landing. Carver himself died in April, 1621, and his widow soon followed him. William Bradford was the next Governor a man then in the prime of life, who lived to see the colony well established, many years later. The bitter weather, however, had ceased some time before the death of Carver ; for on the 3rd of March a south wind suddenly turned winter into spring, so that the birds sang pleasantly in the woods. On the 16th of the same month, an Indian named Samoset, who had learned a little broken English from fishermen trading on the north-eastern shores of America, approached the settlement, exclaiming " Welcome, Englishmen ! " He belonged to the tribe of Wam- panoags ; and in the name of his nation he bade the new-comers possess the soil. Ultimately, a sachem named Massasoit came to visit the colonists; and, at the head of a file of musketeers, Captain Miles Standish one of the most valorous soldiers of the small community, and a man whose name will probably recall to the reader s mind a poem of Longfellow s escorted the savage chieftain to a seat of state, composed of three or four cushions piled on a green rug. An Indian who had been in England acted as interpreter, and, after some presents had been made, an alliance was formed, of which the chief conditions were that the English and the Wampanoags were to abstain from mutual injury ; that the latter should deliver up all offenders against the colony ; that the two parties to the agreement should support each other in case of attack from tribes unfriendly to Massasoit ; and that whenever any of Massasoit s men visited the CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [16! English they were to leave their weapons behind them. The peace thus established was kept for more than fifty years. Other tribes were at first inclined to threaten hostilities, but were so intimi dated by the courageous bearing of Bradford that nine chieftains were glad to subscribe an instrument of submission to King James. At the same time, the infant settlement was palisadoed, provided with gates which were locked every night, and so well guarded that any attack would have been instantly repelled. The Mayflower returned to England in the spring of 1621, and in the course of the summer and autumn fresh colonists arrived ; but, being unpro vided with food, they made serious demands on the resources of those already there. The scarcity was so great that the unfortunate people were half starved, and men staggered in the faintness of hunger. The fishermen on the coast helped them a little, and they sometimes bought provisions, at an exorbitant rate, of the captains of vessels ; but as late as 1623 they Avere for some months without corn, and obliged to subsist solely on fish, without any other form of animal food, and withoiit bread. Yet these devoted men did not lose heart, but set themselves seriously to work to amend whatever was amiss in their social arrangements. Up to the spring of 1623, the property of the colonists had been in common ; and this system produced the same effect in New England that it had already produced in Virginia, and that it always will pro duce wherever it is tried, unless the very elements of human nature are changed. Relying on the guaranteed proportion of food, the idle gave them selves no trouble, and even the industrious were deterred from doing their utmost under an arrange ment which deprived a man of the fruits of his own toil. It was now agreed that each family should plant for itself; and such was the stimulus and exertion arising out of this new rule that the very women and children went into the fields to work. After a few years, so much corn was raised that the colonists were enabled to supply the Indians, with whom a not inconsiderable traffic was soon established, European manufactures being ex changed for the sskin of beavers and other animals. A fresh colony was formed in Massachusetts Bay in 1622 by a merchant named Thomas Weston, aided by some newly-arrived colonists belonging to the Church of England. These men appear to have been a rough and disorderly company, very different from the original settlers, and the latter were probably glad to get rid of them. In the neighbourhood of the present city of Weymouth they lived in a riotous, improvident manner, and soon began to want food. The Governor of New Plymouth assisted them, but they continued in distress, and, having bartered away their goods for Indian corn, were compelled to sell their very clothes and bedding, and to hire themselves to the savages for the performance of menial work, in exchange for food. Some lived by theft ; some died of hunger and cold ; others suppoiied a miserable existence by gathering ground-nuts in the woods and shell-fish on the shore. After a time, the Indians formed a design of murdering them, and would probably have effected it, had not the plan been disclosed by Massasoit. Thereupon, Captain Standish was sent with eight men to the rescue of the imperilled colonists, and a sharp fight took place between the English and the savages. Some of the Indians had been boasting of what they would do, and had insulted Standish on account of his being a small man. The captain, therefore, seeing four of them in a wigwam, went in with three of his own men, shut the door, and, without a moment s parley, began the attack. He himself fell on one, got him down after a long struggle, and cut his throat with his own long knife. Two others were also slain on the spot ; the fourth was taken alive, and afterwards hanged. " Tis incredi ble," says Neal, Avho relates this horrible incident with a sort of admiration, " how many wounds these valiant savages received before they died ; how they struggled and catched at the weapons to the last breath, and died without any unmanly noises or signs of fear." The rest of the Indians endeavoured to revenge the fall of their comrades by a flight of arrows ; but they were soon driven off. Weston s men returned to England, and thus ended this ill-fated attempt to establish a plantation in Massachusetts Bay. The small party of Puritans at New Plymouth eagerly desired to be joined by the brethren they had left behind at Leyden. This wish was earnestly reciprocated by the English congregation in that Dutch town ; but the capitalists in England who had advanced money to the Pilgrim Fathers refused to provide the remaining exiles with a passage. After a period of contention, in which the colonists were treated with much harshness by the moneyed men to whom they were bound, the former were enabled in 1626 to purchase the entire rights of the latter ; and thenceforth every man was granted a little land in perpetual fee. The settlers had in 1621 acquired a patent from the Plymouth Company, to which that part of the American continent belonged. Thus securely established in its possessions, the small community showed itself 1624.] TAXATION OF THE FISHERIES. 95 equal to tlie task of self-government. The ruling power consisted of an elected Governor, Council, and General Court, who made and executed the laws judged to be necessary for the public good; but at the same time the sovereignty was reserved to the Crown of England. The laws were severe in themselves, but were enforced with a good deal of mildness. Death, though nominally the punish ment for several crimes, was carried out only in the case of murder. Housebreaking and highway robbery were unknown. The first and most serious difficulties of the plantation had been overcome ; yet population increased but slowly. At the end of nine years, the colony consisted of barely three hundred persons. The land was not fertile, and the opportunities for trade were slight ; but the energy of the settlers overcame all obstacles. In four or five years after the arrival of the Mayflower, the town of New Plymouth consisted of thirty-two dwelling-houses, in the midst of which, on a rising ground, was the fort, furnished with a watch-tower, whence the sentinel could command a great many leagues of sea and land. Fires are the special scourge of all new and hastily-built towns ; and this experience was not escaped by the little Puritan hamlet. It was partly burnt down on the 5th of November, 1624, under circumstances suggestive of incendiarism ; but the damage was soon repaired. At this time the population con sisted of one hundred and eighty persons. They had started a manufactory of salt, and in 1624 freighted a ship with fish cured with their own commodity. They lived together as one family or household, every man having his special trade, either by sea or land ; and in their workshops were several boys and young men, acting as apprentices and servants. A small trading community had been established, in spite of numerous difficulties. In the meanwhile, the Plymouth Company, which owned the whole vast territory then included under the general designation of New England, endeavoured to turn their property to account by laying a tax on the vessels of English fishermen. The House of Commons opposed these exactions, and demanded for all English subjects entire freedom from duties in the prosecution of their trade. Sir Edwin Sandys, the treasurer of the Virginia Company, argued that a privilege which the French and Dutch enjoyed should not be denied to Englishmen. The fisheries, he observed, cost the kingdom nothing but labour, employed shipping, and furnished the means of a lucrative commerce with Spain. On the other hand, it was urged by Sir George Calvert that the fishermen hindered the plantations, choked the harbours with their ballast, and wasted the forests by improvident use. This was a strange position to be assumed by one who had a large interest in Newfoundland, where the fisheries were the chief source of wealth; but Calvert had no personal reason for caring about the fisheries of New England. The argument as to wasting the forests was ridiculous ; for, as Captain Smith observes in his book of travels, " all the country was nothing but wood, and none to make use of it." Nevertheless, the patentees affixed a heavy penalty to the cutting of timber without giving satisfaction. They also forbade any one to fish without their licence ; and on every thirty tons of shipping they laid a tax of five pounds. The debate in Parliament ended in the restrictions on the right of free fishing being declared illegal ; but the House was dissolved before a bill could be passed for placing matters on a different footing. It is remarkable that, in the course of this discus sion, Calvert, the advocate of the Company in their taxation of the fisheries, used the argument that the American colonies, not being annexed to the realm, were beyond the jurisdiction of Parliament ; while the opponents of taxation contended that they might make laws for the plantations, and that a bill passed by the Commons and the Lords, and receiving the King s assent, would control the patent. Nearly a century and a half later, the same assertion of the supremacy of the English Parliament in American affairs was used in support of the proposition for taxing the colonists, and was the first cause of revolution. The debate took place in 1621. In the following year, five-and-thirty sail of vessels went to fish on the coasts of New England, and, relying on what had been declared to be the law, paid no duties. The Company appealed to the King, who, in pur suance of the favourite Stuart maxim, that the sovereign may do whatever seems good to him, issued a proclamation forbidding any one to approach the northern coast of America without special leave of the Plymouth Company, or of the Privy Council. A seaman named Francis West was in 1623 sent out with a commission as Admiral of New England, for the purpose of excluding from the American seas all who came without a licence. But the fishermen easily evaded this single ship, and successfully resisted the payment of the tax. The attempt at coercion was a failure ; but the Plymouth monopolists were not discouraged. Having in 1622 conferred on llobert Gorges, son of Sir Ferdinando (who belonged to the Plymouth Council), ft patent for a tract extending ten miles along the Bay of Massachusetts and thirty miles into the interior, they now appointed him Lieutenart- 96 CASSELL S HISTOEY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1621. General of New England, with power to restrain interlopers. Gorges and his followers made another attempt to settle at the place where "Weston s men had planted themselves ; but this project was just as unsuccessful as the former. With the later colonists was associated a clergyman named Morrell, who came armed with an ecclesiastical commission for thffi superintendence of the churches meaning, of coxirse, those of New Plymouth ; but of this he made no use, and in a few months the colony broke always before been free. The bill on this subject which passed both Houses of Parliament was refused the Royal assent, so that it never became law ; but the discussion of the case by the repre sentatives of the nation resulted in the laying down of great principles which bore their fruit in time. The upshot of the debates was very displeasing to the Plymouth Company. The patentees, finding themselves unable to levy their exactions on the fisheries, appear to have lost heart ; several of them VIEW IN XLW HAilPSIIItiE. up, some of the emigrants returning to England, and others removing to Virginia. The discussion as to the right of the Company to tax the fisheries was resumed in the House of Commons in 1624, when Sir Edward Coke re inforced the arguments he had advanced thi-ee years before against the pretensions of the patentees. Speaking in the name of the House, he told Robert Gorges that his patent contained many par ticulars contrary to the laws and to the privileges of the subject ; that it was a monopoly which con cealed the ends of private gain under colour of advancing colonisation. If the claim to, tax the fishing vessels could bo maintained, it would be the creation of a monopoly on the seas, which had abandoned their interest in the speculation ; and the peopling of New England was left almost en tirely to private enterprise. To Sir Ferdinando Gorges must be ascribed the credit of actively promoting the colonisation of some portions of North America. In this enter prise he took into partnership with himself Captain Mason, who had been governor of a plantation in Newfoundland, and who was now an associate and secretary of the Plymouth Council. To him the Company made in 1621 a grant of lands between the river Salem and the farthest head of the Merri- mac ; and Gorges and Mason, in the following year, took a patent for what was then called Laconia, a country bounded by the sea on the south, the St. 1635.] SETTLEMENTS IN THE NORTH. Lawrence on the north, the Merriinac on the west, and the Kennebec on the east. A company of merchants was formed for developing the resources of the territory (which is now included within the States of New Hampshire and Maine), and settle ments were made on the banks of the Piscataqua in 1623. Six years later, Mason received from the Plymouth Company a fresh title to the country which he had occupied; but this title seems to have been of doubtful validity, and numerous suits Gorges ; and he therefore proposed to Sir William. Alexander (afterwards Earl of Stirling), a Scotch gentleman in favour with King James, to plant a colony of his countrymen there. Sir William thought well of the design, and in 1621 obtained from James a patent (to be held of the crown of Scotland) for the country east of the river St. Croix and south ot the St. Lawrence. To this large domain was given the designation of Nova Scotia, and it was hoped to form a hardy colony of the SALEM, MASSACHUSETTS. at law took place in consequence of rival claims. In other respects the settlements were unfortunate, and, at the death of Mason, which occurred in London in December, lG3f>, the inhabitants of New Hampshire were left to manage for them selves. Thinly-scattered villages of fishermen had, however, been rising along the coast in that part of America for several years, and to these were gradually added the more permanent habita tions of other adventurers. In this way, Maine the most northerly State of the Union was first peopled. A portion of the territory, east of the Kenuebec river, was already occupied by the French, who gave to it the name of Acadie. The presence of a foreign Power in these lands was regarded with great jealousy by Sir Ferdinando 9 King s noi-thern subjects in a region the rigours of which their own severe climate naturally qualified them to withstand. But the grant was little better than an act of piracy ; for not only had the country been originally discovered by the French, but some portion of it was at that very time in their actual possession. Nevertheless, a ship with several Scotch emigrants on board was despatched in 1622, but turned back within sight of the coast, and proceeded to Newfoundland. Being joined the following year by another ship, the two vessels made a partial survey of the harbours, and of the country lying immediately on the coast ; but no plantation was begun. After the accession of Charles I., a new patent was issued to Sir William Alexander, with the additional right of creating an order of baronets.. 98 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1640. The patentee who is chiefly known at the present day as the author of several tragedies, once admired, but now seldom read wrote a pamphlet in 1625, called "An Encouragement to Colonies," in the hope of exciting an interest in his Ameri can possessions ; but very little was done, and Alexander found so much profit in selling the titles he was empowered to create, that he seems after awhile to have been indifferent to other con siderations. Although, as we have seen, the territory con ferred on Sir William Alexander was really a dependency of the crown of France, that country did not resist its appropriation. But when, in 1627, war broke out between France and England, notwithstanding the marriage of Charles I. to a French princess, the northern part of America became one of the battle-grounds of the contending nations. Port Royal, now Annapolis, on the east side of the Bay of Fimdy, was at once taken by the English, and a naval force, ascending the St. Lawrence in 1628, summoned Quebec to surrender. The French commander refused, though his position was really one of extreme weakness, and the Eng lish sailed away, but only to return the following year, and receive the submission of the garrison, who were on the point of famine. The whole of Canada followed, and thus the rule of England was for a brief period extended over the greater part of the North American continent. Peace, however, was concluded between France and England while these events were proceeding, and it was agreed that all acquisitions made subsequent to April 14th, 1629, should be restored. Canada, therefore, reverted to France, together with Cape Breton (an island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence), and Acadie, the limits of which were never strictly defined. During the progress of the war, the lordship of Canada, as it was called, had been conferred on Sir William Alexander; but after the peace he was glad to sell Nova Scotia to the French. The colonial baronets thus lost their territorial grants ; and Sir Thomas Urquhart, the translator of Rabelais, at tacked his countryman with much bitterness for fiis bad faith towards those who had relied on his promises. The colonisation of Maine and New Hampshire still engaged the attention of Gorges, but with very indifferent results. The settlers, such as there were, lived by fishing, by the chase, and by the exportation of pine- wood, and laughed at those who arrived with the intention of farming. William Gorges, nephew of Sir Ferdinando, was in 1636 sent by his uncle to organise something like a regular government for the divided communities of this wild northern territory, but left in less than two years. In 1639, the elder Gorges was by a Royal charter created Lord Proprietary of the country, and he formed a great scheme for the administration of his dependency. He was himself to enjoy a species of regal state and power. Boroughs were to be established, and a code of laws to be enacted ; but death interrupted his plans. Some time before his decease, John Wheelwright, a Puritan minister who had been banished from the settlements on Massachusetts Bay for reasons to be hereafter related, proceeded northward, and, entering New Hampshire, founded the town of Exeter on a small river flowing into Piscataqua Bay. He was accompanied by those who thought with him, and their numbers were afterwards augmented by others of the same religious views. Their plantations were thinly dispersed over a wide tract ; but they brought some additional strength to the colonies in that part of America. The authorities of Mas- sacluisetts Bay claimed jurisdiction over them, as occupying lands situated within the limits of their grant ; and when Gorges resisted the claim, Wheel wright and his associates governed themselves, in quiet disregard of the disputants. Thomas Gorges, son of Sir Ferdinando, went to Maine in 1640, as the representative of his father. He was sup ported by a retinue of grand officials with high- sounding titles, and, in pursuance of instructions from the Lord Proprietary, endeavoured to esta blish a mockery of English forms in a territory so poverty-stricken that it would hardly yield him the necessaries of life. On arriving at his official residence at Agamenticus (now York), he found nothing in the way of household furniture but an old pot, a pair of tongs, and a couple of cob-irons, the property of previous settlers ; so that his Chancellor, Field Marshal, Master of the Ordnance, Admiral, and other great dignitaries, had to make shift after a sorry fashion. It was not until a com paratively recent period that New Hampshire and Maine became States of importance, or shared in that prosperity which fell sooner to the lot of lands more richly endowed by Nature, and possessed of a more genial climate. 162G.] SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY. 99 CHAPTER XII. The Settlement of Massachusetts Bay Creation of a New Company Terms of the Charter granted by Charles I. Captain Wollaston s Attempt to Plant a Colony at Braintree Arrival of a Party of Puritans in the Bay Foundation of the Town of Salem Public Confession of Faith, and Signature of a Covenant Imposition of Hands Expulsion of Members of the Church of England Intolerance of the Puritans Fair Treatment of the Indians Transfer of the Government of the Massachusetts Bay Colony from England to America John Winthrop and} his Son Address of the Settlers under Winthrop to the Church of England Hardships of the Colonists Foundation of Boston A Secret Romanist. AFTER two previous failures, a fresh attempt to colonise Massachusetts Bay was begun in 1623, and stimulated into active life by the zeal of a Puritan minister of the Church of England, named "White, the rector of Trinity Church, in Dorchester. Many sea-faring people of that town were engaged in the New England fisheries; and White, knowing that they were often for months upon the coast without means of worship or instruction, made proposals to the shipowners to establish in those distant regions a settlement where the mariners might have a home when not at sea, and be at the same time brought under the influence of religious training. It was also proposed that farming and hunting operations should be earned on, so as to make the little community self-supporting ; and with this view an unincorporated joint-stock asso ciation was formed, under the name of the Dor chester Adventurers, with a capital of .3,000. In 1623 a number of men were sent out with live stock, together with various necessaries for prose cuting a trade in dried fish ; but the colonists were ill-selected, and the attempt was a failure. Next year, the Dorchester speculators acquired of the New Plymouth people a piece of land near Cape Anne, on the north side of Massachusetts Bay ; and some seceders from the older colony, who did not carry their Puritanism quite so far as their former associates, were in 1625 requested by White and his friends to undertake the conduct of the new plantation. Of these settlers tlie leader was one Roger Conant, a man of prudence and good Character. The greater number of the colonists deserted in 1626; but Conant and three others remained, removing to a more convenient place three or four leagues to the south-west of Cape Anne. While White was maturing his plans at Dorchester, Roger Conant and the other three were laying the bases of the colony in America itself. The difficulties presented by the wilderness ami the severe climate were, however, so great that even Conant and his companions had at length resolved on returning when they received letters from White, saying that, if they would delay a little longer, he would procure them a patent, and send over colonists, provisions, and stores. Some Dissenters in Lincolnshire had formed a resolution of emigrating to America, in order that they might follow their consciences without persecution. This design was communicated to sympathisers in Lon don and the western counties ; but White appears to have reckoned on the Lincolnshire enthusiasts for forming the nucleus of his plantation. In the year 1627, the Plymouth Council sold to Sir Henry Roswell, Sir John Young, Thomas Southcot, John Humphreys, John Endicott, and Simon Whet- combe, gentlemen, all that part of New England stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and extending three miles south of the river Charles and the Bay of Massachusetts, and the same dis tance north of every part of the river Merrimac, on terms similar to those which had been introduced into other charters. White soon obtained the co operation of persons interested in the spread of Puritan opinions, including some who still cherished their connection with the Church of England. Of the original purchasers, Sir Henry Roswell, Sir John Young, and Thomas Southcot, afterwards parted with their rights ; the others retained their interest in the speculation, together with a number of new proprietors, who were placed on the same footing as the original shareholders. The patent given by the Plymouth Council con ferred considerable privileges on a large body of men ; but, being simply the grant of a private com pany, it was obviously insufficient to invest the patentees with any legal power of governing the contemplated settlement when formed. The specu lators therefore sought to obtain a Royal charter which should render their position secure ; and in this design they were aided by the Earl of War wick, Lord Dorchester (one of the Secretaries of State, and in former years a bitter persecutor of the Puritans), and other gentlemen of high position. Their efforts, after much delay and considerable expense, were crowned with success ; and on the 4th of March, 1629, Charles I. granted a charter for planting the province of Massachusetts Bay, by which the adventurers were made a body corporate and politic, by the name of the Governor and Com pany of the Massachusetts Bay, in New England. They were empowered to elect annually a Governor, Deputy-Governor, and eighteen Assistants, to whom the executive power was committed ; but the first 100 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1629. Governor and Assistants were to be nominated by the Crown. Four times a year, or oftener if desired, a general assembly of the proprietors was to be held, at which such laws might be made as should seem necessary to the good of the plantation. The assent of the King to these acts was not required by any stipulation in the charter ; but it was pro vided that the laws to be passed should not be repugnant to the laws of England. By the terms of this charter, the Company (the head-quarters of which were at London) was permitted to transport to its American territories any persons, whether English or foreigners, who desired to go, were willing to become lieges of the English monarch, and were not specially disqualified. For liberty of conscience there was no guarantee, either expressed or implied ; and, though not actually required, the Governor was empowered to administer the oaths of supremacy and allegiance. In other respects, the position of the proprietors was good. They were exempted from all subsidies for seven years, as well as from duties on goods, exported or im ported, for twenty-one years, excepting the five per cent, custom on imports after the expiration of the seven years ; and they and their descendants were declared to be entitled to all the rights of natural- born subjects. The first body of settlers started in 1628. Two years previously, there had been a third attempt to people the bay, which lasted until about the time when "White s recruits arrived in the territory as signed them. A Captain Wollaston, together with some other gentlemen of good substance, and a great many servants, made a settlement at a place now called Braintree, near the scene of the two former attempts. The speculation not turning out well, the captain and several of his companions left for Virginia ; whereupon, one of the shareholders, named Morton, a pettifogging lawyer of Furnival s Inn, turned out Wollaston s representative, and erected a government of his own. Neal, the his torian of New England, speaks of these rebellious adventurers suffering themselves to be led into " all sorts of debaiichery and wickedness." It appears that, at a place which they appropriately called Merry Mount, they set up a May-pole, and danced round it which was no great sin, except from the Puritan point of view; that they drank strong liquors to such excess that they consumed ten pounds worth in one morning a statement the value of which cannot be estimated without knowing the number of drinkers ; that they gambled, sang ribald songs, and led scandalous lives with the Indian women. They were doubtless an idle, thriftless set; and to support their extravagances they sold fire-arms largely to the savages, and taught them how to use those weapons. This might have led to dangerous consequences ; and the governors of the New Plymouth colony accord ingly sent a messenger to Morton to expostulate with him, and to call his attention to the procla mation, of King James, forbidding any one to trade with the Indians in warlike stores. Morton replied by a defiance, and the Plymouth men then sent Cap tain Standish with a party of soldiers to bring him dead or alive. Barricading himself in a house with some of his companions, Morton threatened to shoot his opponent ; but, coming out at the door shortly afterwards, with his piece in his hand, he was dis armed and seized by Standish. The rest surrendered at discretion. Morton was sent to England, but afterwards returned to America, and died there. His revolt proved the ruin of "Wollaston s under taking, in 1628, The superintendence of White s colony was en trusted to John Eiidicott. He was accompanied by his wife and children, and by a number of emigrants, who found Conant and his three com rades much reduced by the hardships they had undergone. The new arrivals were themselves O speedily weakened by maladies incident to a change of climate, and to the trials of a wild and comfort less life. Many deaths occurred, and it was found necessary to send to the New Plymouth colony for a physician, who stayed with the sick people throughout the winter. Not long after the arrival o of Endicott s party, a small number penetrated by uncertain paths through the woods, and established themselves on the neck of land where the city of Charlestown has since been built. Waste and desolate as the spot then was, it had already been discovered by an Englishman, who was found there living in a hovel. Further colonists were sent out from England in 1629, the enterprise exciting the liveliest sympathy on the part of dissenting ministers and their flocks. A fleet of six ships (including the Mayflower} sailed from the Isle of Wight on the 1st of May, and conveyed to the shores of the New World about three hundred and fifty men, women, and children, together with several horses, cows, goats, and other animals, six pieces of cannon for a fort, muskets, pikes, drums, colours, and a large quantity of ammunition and provisions. The vessels arrived at their place of destination on the 24th of June, and about a hundred of the emigrants proceeded to Charles- town, while the rest remained with Endicott. The locality where Endicott and his followers were planted, had, by Conant and his companions, been called by its Indian name of Naumkeag ; but 1629.] FOUNDATION OF SALEM. 101 it was afterwards christened Salem, a Hebrew designation signifying Peace. The name was sub sequently very ill borne out, for we shall find that some of the most painful incidents of early American history were connected with this town. There is a Salem in Hindostan, and another in Persia ; but the Puritan settlers in Massachusetts Eay thought little of th&se, if they knew of them. Everything in their young community was to take a Biblical tone and colour ; and, as Salem was a Hebrew word, and expressed that kind of religious concord Avhich they vainly hoped to establish in the wilderness, they conceived that no better title could be found for the little city which was to rise up under the shadow of primeval forests. The Salem of Massachusetts is at the present day a small town and port of entry, the prosperity of which consists chiefly in its numerous manufac tories. It had formerly a good foreign trade, but now does little in mercantile transactions, and pre sents something of the melancholy and forsaken air which belongs to all places that have seen better days. Nathaniel Hawthorne, who was a native of this city, and a descendant of one of the original Puritan settlers, describes in his " Scarlet Letter " the dull, listless appearance of the place, the flat, unvaried surface, the wooden tenements of homely fashion, the long and lazy street stretching the whole length of the peninsula on which the town is built, the almost deserted wharf (submerged at high water), the infrequent barks or brigs discharg ing their cargoes, the decayed warehouses, and the lines and borders of unheeded grass which have sprung up about the buildings, and even, between the stones in front of the Custom House itself, where the novelist once had a post. But Salem must always be an interesting place. For America, it is rather ancient. The shadow of the grave old Puritan spirit hangs over its weedy ways, and memories of a wild and mournful character are associated with its name. The settlers at Salem lost no time in communi cating with their brethren at New Plymouth as to the nature of their church discipline. After an interchange of ideas on this subject, the Salem colonists agreed with those of the older New England settlement on the forms most consonant with their conceptions of religious truth, and ac cordingly appointed the 6th of August, 1629, for creating among themselves a church body similar to that which already existed in the more southern plantation, though the setting up of any such spiritual association was a violation of the charter under which they had emigrated, as being contrary to the laws of England. The church of New Ply mouth was represented on the occasion by some of its own ministers ; and, after the day had been spent in fasting and prayer, thirty persons who desired to be of the communion publicly signified their assent to a confession of faith, and then signed a covenant, in which it was written : " We avouch the Lord to be our God, and ourselves to be his People, in the truth and simplicity of our spirits. We give ourselves to the Lord Jesus Christ and the Word of his Grace, for the teaching, ruling, and sanctifying of us in matters of worship and con versation, resolving to cleave unto him alone for life and glory, and to reject all contrary ways, canons, and constitutions of men in worship. We promise to walk with our brethren with all watch fulness and tenderness, avoiding jealousies and suspicions, backbitings, censurings, provokiiigs, secret risings of spirit against them ; but in all offences to follow the rule of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to bear and forbear, give and forgive, as he has taught us." They also promised that they would do nothing to the offence of the church ; that they would not, in the congregation, be forward in show ing their own gifts in speaking or in raising objec tions ; that they would not discover the weaknesses or failings of their brethren ; that they would study the advancement of the Gospel in all truth and peace, without slighting their sister churches, but using the counsel of those churches when need should be ; that they would promote the good of the Indians; that they would carry themselves in all law ful obedience to those who were over them in church. or commonwealth ; that they would shun idleness as the bane of any state ; and that they would not deal hardly or oppressingly with any one. Finally, they undertook to teach their children and ser vants, to the best of their ability, the knowledge of God and of his will, so that they also might serve him ; and these promises, they expressly declared, they made not by any strength of their own, but by the Lord Christ, whose blood they desired might sprinkle their covenant made in his name. This general confession of principles being agreed upon, a pastor, a teacher, and a ruling elder of the new church were chosen, and qualified for their offices by imposition of hands of a few of the brethren appointed to that work. Dissen sion soon, arose. It has been seen that some of the colonists were members of the Church of England, though belonging to that section which inclined towards the views of the Sepa ratists, and was usually called Puritanical. Dr. Cotton Mather relates that when the emigrants of 1629 were off the Land s End, their pastor, Francis Higginson (who had been driven from 102 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G29. the Anglican Church for his opinions), said to his flock, as the cliffs of the old country dwindled from their view, " We will not say, as the Sepa ratists were wont to say at their leaving of England, Farewell, Babylon ! farewell, Rome ! But we will say, Farewell, dear England ! Fare well, the Church of Clod in England, and all the Christian friends there ! We do not go to New England as separatists from the Church of England, though we cannot but separate from the corruptions in it. But we go to practise the positive part of church reformation, and to propagate the Gospel in America," * Some who held opinions of this nature objected to the non-employment of the Book of Common Prayer by the others, to the administration of baptism and the Lord s Supper without the usual ceremonies, and to other matters. They accord ingly held religious meetings of their own, in har mony with the usages of the Anglican Church. A great deal of angry bickering ensued, and in the end the chief objectors were violently seized and sent back to England, in accordance with certain general directions issued by the Company. They were charged with endeavouring to raise a mutiny; but their rebellion appears to have consisted in nothing more than a desire to follow their own forms of worship with as much freedom as the Nonconformists followed theirs. The incident would hardly be worth recording, were it not a singular comment on the visionary hopes with which the settlement Avas formed. New England was to be a species of religious Utopia. All the colonists were to live in brotherhood, and to worship God accord ing to their own consciences. No tyrannical Act of Conformity or of Supremacy, no unconstitutional High Commission Court, was to lord it over the minds of men. The infant community was indeed to be submissive in all things to the Word of God ; but then every one was to be at liberty to interpret for himself what the Word of God meant. Such was the dream which had been dreamt by the sluggish canals of Leyden, in many English towns and villages, and on the broad Atlantic between shore and shore. The first contact with the reali ties of actual government dispelled the illusion. The Puritans were not true to their own principles. The history of their domination in New England shows that they repeatedly contradicted that great doctrine of religious liberty, the violation of which at home had made them martyrs and exiles. The fine promises of their covenant were forgotten as * Mather s Magnalia Christ! Americana ; or, the Ecclesi astical History of New England, Book III., Part II., chap. 1. London, 1702. The authority of Mather, however, is not now regarded as very excellent. soon as uttered. They desired uniformity as much as Laud himself; only it was uniformity it) favour of their own interpretation of Scripture. It is clear that they would tolerate the Church of England no more than the Church of Rome. Later on in their history, they quarrelled with various forms of dissent ; and at all times they showed that the spirit of dictation was stronger in them, than the spirit of freedom. This will invariably be the case where men make their own opinions an infalli ble standard. As the Puritans would not allow to others that liberty of judgment which they had asserted for themselves, every little colonial com munity set Tip for its own Pope, and persecution followed as the bitter fruit of self-contradictory principles, and of the striving of old ideas with new. At this period the settlers at Massachusetts Bay had very slight powers of self-government. The Company of proprietors in England had deter mined that the local authorities should consist of a Governor and thirteen counsellors, of whom eight were appointed by the corporation in the parent country, three were named by those eight, and the remaining two were to be chosen by the colonists themselves. The terms of this constitution were sent over by the emigrants who left the Isle of Wight on the 1st of May, 1C 29 ; and these pilgrims to the distant wilds also conveyed with them in structions to Endicott with respect to the savages. If, according to these directions, the Indians pre tended a right of inheritance to all or any part of the lands granted in the Company s patent, the colonists were to endeavour to purchase their title, so that the least scruple of intrusion might be avoided. It was to be particularly and publicly insisted oil that no wrong or injury should be offered to the natives an injunction which was fairly observed. The Puritans of Salem were always ready to resist any attack that might be made on them ; but they forbore from outraging the comparatively feeble tribes by whom they were surrounded. A good deal of land was rendered desolate by the pestilence to which allusion has before been made ; and it was no difficult matter to persuade the Indians, by a few gifts, to renounce their title to territories which their failing numbers did not suifice to populate. In all new colonies, this question of the abori gines and their rights is a difficulty of a very per plexing kind. It has often been evaded often been made an excuse for violence and disregard of natural justice. Civilised men are generally in clined to assume, with a facile readiness which is prompted and quickened by self-interest, that their greater powers are sufficient warrant for dispossess ing a savage race, and for seizing on tkeir lands 1629.] TREATMENT OF THE INDIANS. 103 without even the offer of compensation. The career of Spain in the New World is a record of cruel spoliation and tyranny, carried on for years by .methods the most remorseless for objects the most sordid. The colonial history of England is likewise full of melancholy chapters, in which the rise of new communities of civilised men is seen side by side with the extermination of wretched barbarians, motives, and too hastily inferred an evil design from words or actions which they did not rightly comprehend. On the other 1 hand, it must not be forgotten that, while some of the Indian tiibes were sincerely friendly, others were wholly irrecon cilable to, the presence of the stranger, and omitted no opportunity of plotting the destruction ef the white race which had shown itself so vastly superior -whom a more humane and considerate policy might have raised to higher levels. The settlers in New England are less blameable in this respect than many of their countrymen. They may at times have been too suspicious and too arrogant. Assuredly it cannot be said that their mode of dealing with the Indians was very successful. But at any rate they did not act towards them as pirates. It is probable enough that, from imperfect acquaintance with the language and customs of ~the natives, they sometimes misunderstood their to the old nomadic population of the prairie and the forest. When civilised people encamp on the borders of savagery, they nmst often fight for their existence against sudden incursions of the jealous power they have displaced. But they are in a better moral position for such encounters if they have first of all established themselves on a clear ground of right, by recognising the claims of the original possessors of the soil. This was done in. the case of Massachusetts by a scrupulous observ ance of the injunction just mentioned, not to occupy 104 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1630. lands without previously purchasing a title from the Indian tribes which held them. The colonists, desirous of reinforcing their small community, circulated among the Nonconformists of England certain statements of their objects in going to America, their condition in the wilderness, the nature of the country, and the prospects which the new plantation held out to all who would escape persecution at home, and spread the principles of Calvinism abroad. A description of New England by Francis Higginson, who died of the rigours of the climate during the first winter, was printed in London, and ran through three editions in a few months. Another exposition was privately circu lated among the Puritans, and a large number of enthusiasts became inflamed with the desire of propagating their views in America. Several gentlemen of fortune and intellectual culture, re siding at Cambridge, and holding stock in the Massa chusetts Company, agreed to join the settlement, on condition that the government of the colony should be transferred to themselves, and to other members of the Company who should take up their abode in the lands newly planted. Matthew Cradock, the Governor of the corporation, was well inclined to this plan ; and, the question having been fully de bated for two days in a court of the proprietors, it was unanimously resolved that the government and charter should be shifted from London to Salem, if it might be done legally. Some days later on the 29th of September, 1629 a committee was formed to take counsel s advice as to whether such a course were permissible. It would appear that the opinion thus sought was favourable to the con templated measure, for the transfer eventually took place, while to the members of the corporation who remained in England a share in the trading-stock and profits of the Company was reserved for a period of seven years. The legality of any such transfer was questioned at a later period, but for the present it passed unchallenged. Massachusetts thus ob tained a more authoritative local government than it possessed before ; but the colonists, as such, re ceived no powers of self-rule. The managing body of the corporation was transferred from England to America that was all. The new Governor of the Company, elected by the general court of proprietors to proceed with others to Massachusetts Bay, was John Wintlirop, a man of great and deserved distinction in the early history of English America. He was the .son of Adam Wintlirop, of Groton in Suffolk, where he Avas born in 1588. His education was that of a lawyer, and it is said (though the state ment is difficult of belief) that the gravity of his character recommended him to the position of justice of the peace when only eighteen years of age, at which time he had certainly been, married a year. The interest he took in the Massachusetts plantation was so great that he threw the whole of his moderate fortune into the undertaking. Himself a member of the Church of England, he was nevertheless a Puritan in his theological views.. Though naturally a man of mild and benevolent character, he was liable to be swayed by others, and, while under corporate influence, could be as bigoted and unjust as persons of less amiability. A tinge of superstition coloured his religious views, and in politics his position was somewhat hesi tating. He was a Royalist rather than a Republican a thinker who inclined more to aris tocratic than to democratic forms of government, but who desired to see the principles of freedom extended, and the welfare of the people secured. This able man was subsequently joined in New England by his son, John Wintlirop the Younger, then about twenty-five years of age another here of American colonisation. A short time before the transfer of the Massachusetts government from London to Salem, the son had written to the father from the family seat in Suffolk: "I shall call that my country where I may most glorify God, and enjoy the presence of my dearest friends. There fore herein I submit myself to God s will and yours, and dedicate myself to God and the Company, with the whole endeavours both of body and mind." By the close of 1630, from a thousand to fifteen hundred emigrants (male and female) had been conveyed in seventeen, vessels to the territories of the Massachusetts Company. A few days after the embarkation of the first detachment, in April, a paper, previously drawn up, it is said, by Mr. White of Dorchester, was put forth 011 behalf of the emigrants. It was entitled " The Humble Request of His Majesty s Loyal Subjects, the Governor and Company lately gone for New England, to the rest of their Brethren in and of the Church of England, for the obtaining of their Prayers, and the removal of Suspicions and Misconstructions of their Intentions." The terms of this document are noteworthy, as showing that the leaders of the new emigration were not pro fessedly animated by any hostility to the English Church or State. They acknowledged that such hope and part as they had obtained in the common salvation they had received in her bosom, and sucked in from her breasts. They blessed God for their parentage and education as members of the same body. They entreated the reverend fathers and brethren of that Church to recommend them 1630.] EARLY TRIALS OF THE SETTLEMENT. to the mercies of God in their prayers, as a religious community springing out of the bowels of the older one. " For you are not ignorant," they continued, " that the Spirit of God stirred up the Apostle Paul to make a continual mention of the Church of Philippi, which was -a colony from Rome. Let the same spirit, we beseech you, put you in mind, that are the Lord s remembrancers, to pray for us without ceasing. And what goodness you shall extend to us, in this or any other Christian kind ness, we, your brethren in Christ, shall labour to repay in what duty we are, or shall be, able to perform ; promising, so far as God shall enable us, to give him no rest on. your behalfs ; wishing our heads and hearts may be fountains of tears for your everlasting welfare, when we shall be in our poor cottages in the wilderness, overshadowed with the spirit of supplication, through the manifold necessities and tribulations which may not alto gether unexpectedly, nor we hope unprofitably, befall us." The subsequent acts of these emigrants were certainly not in harmony with this declara tion. They would receive no one as a minister without newly ordaining him according to their own ceremonies ; they excluded all semblance of episcopal government from their church order ; and they expelled those of their number who desired to live in communion with the Church of England. It is evident that they had from the first resolved to follow a totally different path from that of the Episcopalians. Governor Winthrop and his companions arrived at Salem in the summer of 1630. They were them selves in a sickly state, and found the colonists who were already established there in no better condition. Many had died during the previous winter ; the rest were weak and spiritless ; and so great was the scarcity of food that they eagerly de manded fresh supplies of the new-comers. One division of the emigrants settled at Charlestown ; another chose a place at the bottom of Massachu setts Bay, which they called Dorchester. But wherever they went, ill-health pursued them. In the first six months of their sojourn more than two hundred died. As December advanced, the im perfect shelter of booths and tents added greatly to their hardships ; for Massachusetts, though lying in the same degree of latitude as the north of S]mm, is in winter much more inclement than England, owing to its greater exposure to the northern, seas. A failure of provisions ensued, and the colonists were compelled to seek assistance of the settlers at New Plymouth. At one time they lived mainly on mussels and clams picked up on the sea-shore when the tide was low ; on ground-nuts and acorns. Governor Winthrop meted out the public food with the utmost frugality ; but it was almost exhausted when, on the 5th of February, 1631, a ship arrived from England with the stores that were so much needed. During the whole of that trying time, the colonists, with a few exceptions, never once lost heart, or faith, or the spirit of self- reliance. About a hundred, some of whom be longed to the board of Assistants, did indeed desert the infant settlement, and return home, scared by the prospects of famine which spread before them. But the greater number remained, and opposed brave hearts to the utmost turbulence of Nature. Their meetings for worship were held in the open fields ; for they had no buildings, even of the rudest kind, sufficiently large to hold their congregations. Their daily lives were spent in toil, and prayer, and meditation. Death was frequently in their midst ; deprivation was the rule of their existence ; danger lay around them in the shadowy forest the blind lurking-place of Indian warriors. Yet they held on through all, in the assured conviction that their work was of God, and must needs stand. "Win- throp wrote to his wife that he did not repent of his coming ; that he would not have altered his course even had he foreseen all his afflictions ; and that he had never had more content of mind than he enjoyed in the wilds of Massachusetts. Some manifestations of a hostile disposition on the part of the Indians gave additional trouble to the settlers in the first days of their enterprise. One of the tribes talked of driving out the English, and would probably have made an attempt of this nature had it not been weakened by a violent epidemic of small-pox, which greatly thinned its numbers. The emigrants assisted these miserable creatures with medicine and other comforts, and fairly pur chased of them the several tracts of land which were required for the plantation. This conciliated the natives, and the fear of a massacre gradually passed away. The colony, however, grew but slowly. During the whole of 1631, only ninety new-comers arrived to fill the gap caused by the defection of the hundred in 1630. Two luindred and fifty followed in 1632; but the colony required replenishment in a much greater degree. Thomas Dudley, the Deputy-Governor of Massachusetts, a man of melancholy and rigid temperament, who from an early date repented that he had com mitted himself to the hazards and discomforts of a solitary land, wrote home in a discouraging strain. Men in England saw before them the uncertainties of a hard, dreary, and perilous life, and preferred to remain where they might indeed suffer many privations, but where they could at any rate feel 106 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G33. safe from the vague dangers of the impenetrable forest, the uncultured desert, the gloomy or threatful ocean, and the remorseless savage. Towards the latter end of 1630, the town of Boston, destined in time to become one of the most famous cities of the United States, was founded by a part of the colony of Charlestown, who removed to a narrow peninsula on the southern side of Massachusetts Bay, which appeared to them more commodiously situated for trade and commerce than any other locality they had examined. The Indian name of the place was Shawmut a word indicating the presence of numerous springs. The colonists originally gave it the designation of Tri- mountain, from three lofty hills in the vicinity ; and it is said to have been afterwards called Boston in compliment to the Rev. John Cotton, a clergy man of Boston in Lincolnshire, who emigrated to Massachusetts, where his influence became so great that he was styled the patriarch of New England. The land was already in possession of an Epis copal minister, who, having slept in a hovel on this point of land, alleged a property in the whole peninsula ; but his claim, preposterous as it seems to have been, was bought off. This individual, as Dr. Mather records, was a gentleman of very independent humour ; for he would never join any of the colonial religious bodies, saying that as he had come from England because he did not like the Lord Bishops, so he could not join the local churches, because he would not be under the Lord Brethren : a remark which, taken in conjunction with the course of ecclesiastical history in that settlement, proves him to have been, in such matters, one of the most sensible men then in Massachusetts. His name deserves to be com memorated: it was Blaxton. That we should hear no more of him is matter of regret. Amonsr the minor incidents of these times was an O attempt on the part of the Roman Catholics to gain a footing in the little Puritan colony of Massa chusetts. Sir Christopher Gardiner, a Knight of Jerusalem, and a member of the same family as that of the celebrated Bishop of Queen Mary s reign, made his appearance in New England in 1632, calling himself a Puritan, and alleging that, after having travelled over the greater part of the world, he desired to spend the remainder of his days in retirement in the west. Soon after his arrival, he committed a misdemeanour, and, flying from justice, took refuge among the Indians of Plymouth colony. A proclamation was issued by the Governor of Mas sachusetts (Winthrop), offering a reward to those who should apprehend him ; and he was ultimately surprised and seized by some Indians, after a sharp contest. Under his pillow, in the house where he slept, was found a little pocket-book, containing memoranda which showed that he had recently been converted to Romanism. He was sent back to England, where he joined with Sir Ferdinando Gorges, Captain Mason, and others, in a petition to the King against the colonial authorities. The cause was heard before the Privy Council, and resulted in a reprimand to the petitioners, and in the publication of an order, dated from Whitehall, January 19th, 1633, promising that his Majesty would not only maintain the liberties and privi leges already granted to the New England planta tions, but would supply anything farther that might tend to the good government, prosperity, and comfort of those colonists. The summary dis missal from Massachusetts of this wandering knight was far more justifiable than that of the adherents of the Church of England. Gardiner came as the secret emissary of a Church which the colonists had every reason to dread. His object was to plot and imdermine the State by dishonourable pre tences and fraudulent assumptions. Such a man is. a traitor, and has no right to complain if the com munity against which he conspires casts him forth. CHAPTER XIII. Laws and Ordinances of the Massachusetts Colonists Changes in the Composition of the Governing Body Stipulation as to- Church Membership Religious Bigotry and Exclusiveness Friendly Relations with the Indians Rise of a Represen tative System of Government Consolidation and Organisation of a New England Commonwealth Jealousy of the Home Government aroused Order in Council, and Detention of Emigrant Ships Extension of the Popular Power in Massa chusetts Character of the Local Parliament Winthrop and his Accounts Number, Condition, and Appearance of the Towns Proposals for an Aristocratic Republic Growing Prosperity of the Colony Commission appointed by the King for governing the American Plantations Preparations for Resistance Self -extinction of the Council for New England Gorges and Mason Suppression of the Massachusetts Company. WITHOUT loss of time, the Massachusetts colonists began to lay the basis of their commonwealth. Several courts, consisting of the Governor, the Deputy-Governor, and the Assistants appointed by charter, were held at Charlestown. In the year of Winthrop s arrival 1630 a great many laws and 1631.] CHURCH MEMBERSHIP. 107 ordinances were passed ; provision was made for the clergy ; civil officers were appointed, and severe punishments were decreed against evil-doers. During that year, and long after, whipping was freely resorted to ; but this infliction was performed with due regard to the protection of the criminal from individual caprice or malice. Thus, one of the Assistants, Sir Richard Saltonstall, was fined five pounds for whipping two persons without the presence of another Assistant. Justice was im partially administered; for on one occasion the former Governor, John Endicott, being charged with striking a man, was amerced in forty shillings, though he appears to have received considerable provocation. That the emigrants were not all saints is evident from the fact that it was found necessary to seize a large quantity of strong waters, which had been sold to servants to such an extent as to cause " much disorder, drunkenness, and mis demeanour." One man was whipped for fowling on the Sabbath ; another for stealing a loaf of bread ; another for striking an overseer " when he came to give him correction for idleness in his master s work ; " another for uttering scandalous speeches against the court. Thomas Gray was ordered to quit the colony within a certain term, on account of " divers things objected against him." John Goulburn and three others were sentenced to "be whipped and set in the stocks for committing a feiony. Adultery was punished with death, and the chastity of Indian women was protected by severe penalties against those who tempted it. We read of a case of suspected incon- tinency, and of persons possessing cards, dice, and gambling tables, which they were ordered to destroy forthwith, on pain of punishment.* Amongst the most honourable of these edicts were those which required compensation to be made to Indians for wrongs done to them by the settlers. The composition of the colonial governing body was altered several times in the early years of the plantation. In 1G30 the number of freemen was largely increased, and, legislation by so unwieldy a body being found difficult, it was determined to hand over a good deal of power to the chief officers of the commonwealth. For the future, therefore, the freemen were to elect only the Assistants ; the latter were to elect the Governor and Deputy- Governor from their own number, and the select body thus created was alone to have the power of making laws, and choosing those who were to * Massachusetts Collection of Records, quoted in Mr. John Gorham Palfrey s " History of New England during the Stuart Dynasty " (1859-C4) a work of great value and interest, full of Varied information. execute them. This, however, was soon found to be too oligarchical a system; and in 1G31 the freemen reserved to themselves the right, if they cared to exercise it, of making annual changes in the magistracy. At the same time it was decreed that thenceforth no one should be admitted to the freedom of the body politic, or be entitled to any share in the government, or be capable of acting as a magistrate or serving as a juryman, but such as were members of some one of the churches within the limits of the colony. All these churches, it must be remembered, were congre gations professing the same theological views ; so that every Christian community but one was per manently excluded from any share in the manage ment of the State or the privileges of citizens. Such a provision laid the bases of a very extreme form of tyranny. The rulers of the colony were Calvinists ; and it was part of their creed that those whom God had from all eternity elected to save, were, by a mysterious inward monition, conscious of their own state of grace (which was in no degree affected by their acts, whatever those might be), and that to such specially-favoured beings the government of commonwealths was of right con signed. Pretensions of this character are equally beyond proof and beyond refutation. But it is obvious that, if admitted, they are fatal to the most elementary liberties. They differ in no es sential respect from the claim of the Divine-right monarch, who says that, by some internal evidence wholly incommunicable to anybody else, and cer tainly not at all visible on the face of things, he knows that he is invested with a supernatural com mission to dispose of other men s lives and goods. The Puritans of Massachusetts reached at OIK; bound the utmost altitudes of spiritual despotism. The arrogant Churchman Laud asserted no more for the hierarchy to which he belonged. The Pope himself makes no greater demand on the submission and the credulity of men. Mr. Palfrey, in excusing, if not actually defend ing, the action of the Massachusetts Puritans, says that, "by charter from the English Crown, the land was theirs as against all other civilised people," and that " they had a right to choose according to their own rules the associates who should help them to occupy and govern it." But neither the charter nor the patent conferred on them any right to set up independent churches, and to make agreement with their tenets the exclusive foundation of civil rights. On the contrary, the charter appears to have assumed that the emigrants were members of the Church of England, as indeed many of them were, tkough of that section which desired reform ; Of A NAKKAGANSETT WARRIOR, BY WINTHKOP. 1632.] PEOGRESS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 109 it authorised the administration to freemen of the oaths of supremacy and allegiance, and it forbade till laws and ordinances repugnant to the laws of England, which, so far from giving any privileges to Dissent, did not even allow its existence. The Puritans of Massachusetts, therefore, in setting up such a test of citizenship, acted illegally as two men, to appear at the next Court of Assistants, and concert a plan for a public treasury. This, it is true, did not in terms do away with the re ligious qualification, or disqualification ; but every extension of the elective principle is a guarantee of future liberties. While these changes were being made, the rulers ABCHBISHOP LATTD. well as Tinjustly. Fortunately, however, there were other influences at work, which mode rated, though they could not entirely neutralise, the mischievous fanaticism of the leading colonists. The rank and file of the settlers brought out with them from England ideas of political freedom which asserted themselves in spite of all drawbacks. It was agreed at a General Court held in 1632 that the Governor and Deputy, as well as the Assist ants, should be annually chosen by the whole body of freemen ; and at the same time each town (of which there were now many) was ordered to depute 10 of the colony entered into friendly relations with the Indians, many of whose tribes solicited English assistance against their enemies. A great warrior of the Narragansetts was hospitably received by Governor Winthrop, and attended a sermon to gether with the regular congregation. Intercourse was also carried on with the settlers at New Ply mouth. In October, 1632, Winthrop, and the pastor of Boston, Mr. Wilson, travelled on foot from the south shore of Boston harbour to the capital of the older colony. There they were cor dially received and gravely feasted, with Abundance 110 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1634. of preaching and other religious exercises. The first troubles of the Massachusetts colony were by this time overcome. Two hundred additional emigrants arrived in one ship in 1633, and the settlers began to require more convenient powers of legislation. In 1634, the freemen, by some pre vious concert, the precise nature of which does not appear in any existing record, determined to meet by deputies not merely for the assessment of taxes, as by the rule of 1632, but for general purposes. Accordingly, at the fifth General Court held in Massachusetts, twenty-four persons, dele gated by eight towns, appeared, charged to consider such matters as should be brought forward for dis cussion. The advocates of the existing state con tended that this was a violation of the charter, and argued that, if all the freemen could not assemble, the chief power lay with the Assistants. In vain, however, was this view put forward. In vain also, about the same time, did the Rev. Mr. Cotton, with the tendency common amongst fanatics to support arbitrary authority, endeavour to impress on his congregation, that the right of an honest magistrate to his place was like that of a proprietor to his freehold ; that is to say, it was indefeasible. The freemen, who now amounted to not far short of four hundred, persisted in their determination to be masters of the State, and, as an assertion of their power, elected Dudley as their Governor, in place of Winthrop. On this occasion the ballot was introduced for the first time in the colony, instead of election by show of hands. It was like wise settled that the whole of the freemen should be convened only for the election of the Magistrates, and that the ordinary work of legislation should be performed by deputies chosen by the several towns, acting in concert with the executive officers of the colony a reform rendered necessary by the great increase in the number of freemen, and by the fact of their being scattered over a wide extent of country. Much agitation had been caused by an attempt on the part of the Assistants to levy taxation by their own exclusive authority, and by their lavish grants of land ; and it was found ex pedient to affirm that none but the immediate representatives of the people should dispose of lands or raise money. A true commonwealth was beginning to issue out of the chaos of colonisation by a commercial body ; yet it can hardly be denied that this was only by an evasion of the regulations enjoined by the charter. Such an evasion, how ever, was natural, and even inevitable. A political state cannot long be controlled by rules applicable to a small corporation of shareholders in a joint- stock speculation. Larger interests must of neces sity arise, and be dealt with after a broader fashion. That the change should have taken place so early in Massachusetts is a singular proof of the quick ness with which habits of self-government spring up on American soil. It was not to be expected that the rulers of the mother country would long permit the colonists to go on quietly in their own course. For a little while, indeed, Charles I. and his advisers seem to have been indifferent to what passed in New England. They probably thought it a convenient thing that there should be waste regions far away on the other side of the Atlantic, where trouble some Puritans felt content to bury themselves, and to cease from vexing princes and prelates. The Order in Council of January 19th, 1633, to which reference was made at the close of last chapter, was conceived in a friendly spirit towards the Mas sachusetts settlers ; and Governor Winthrop, in his work on New England, avers that on. that occasion the King told his counsellors that it was not his intention to impose the ceremonies of the Church of England on the colonists, as he was aware that it was for freedom in such things that the planta tion was formed. But this feeling was not likely to last. Charles and his Ministers had penetra tion enough to see what might in time come of such experiments. After the death of Abbot, who leant somewhat to wards the Puritan party, Laud, in August, 1633, became Archbishop of Canterbury, and his influence over the King was always exerted in the most ar bitrary directions. The New England provinces were not long in feeling this. An Order in Council was published in February, 1634, setting forth that " the Board is given to understand of the frequent transportation of great numbers of his Majesty s subjects out of this kingdom to the plantation called New England, amongst whom divers persons, known to be ill-affected, discontented not only with civil but ecclesiastical government here, are observed to resort thither, whereby such confusion and dis traction is already grown there, especially in point of religion, as, beside the ruin of the said planta tion, cannot but highly tend to the scandal both of Church and State here." The Council therefore commanded the detention of certain ships then lying in the Thames, ready to set sail for New England. It also required the attendance of the masters of those vessels, with a list of the passengers in each, and the production of the charter of the Massachusetts Company by Matthew Cradock, the Governor of that body. With respect to the last point, the reply was simple and direct : the charter had gone to America when the governing powers of 1634.] POLITICAL REFORMS. Ill the corporation were transferred thither. Several ships, however, were temporarily detained; and, before being suffered to depart, the masters were required to give bonds to cause all persons on board their vessels who should "blaspheme, or profane the holy name of God," to be severely punished ; to cause the prayers contained in the Book of Common Prayer to be read twice a day in presence of all the passengers ; to receive aboard no passenger not certified, by the officers of the port of embarkation, to have taken the oaths of allegiance and supre macy ; and to signify, upon their (the masters ) return to England, the names of all the persons who had been earned, with their proceedings in relation to the foregoing articles. These bonds were cancelled about a year after; but the mea sures of the Privy Council, in the meanwhile, put a check on emigration, and constituted a note of warning to the colonists that their position of vir tual independence would not be suffered to remain unquestioned. Following out the policy of previous years, the Massachusetts settlers next demanded of then- officials a written constitution. It was a reason able demand, which could not with decency have been refused ; and a commission was accordingly appointed in 1635 to frame a species of Magna Charta or Bill of Rights. In the composition of this important document, the clergy as well as the laity were consulted ; and the Rev. Mr. Cotton, actuated by sentiments which were at that time common among the Puritans, insisted that the province should be governed by the laws of Moses a body of ordinances having in many respects a local character, and being marked by the influences of a primitive and imperfect civilisation. To some extent he succeeded, and the laws of New England were long celebrated for their severe and rigid character. But the popular power was constantly, and on the whole beneficially, exer cised. The General Courts secured to themselves, in 1634, the right of decreeing their own dissolu tion ; and they controlled the judicial power of the Magistrates by an order that no one should be con demned to death or to banishment unless by the action of those Courts, or by the verdict of a jury. They also drew up a form of oath to be taken by the freemen, the remarkable feature of which is that it prescribes allegiance to the local Govern ment, but says nothing whatever of allegiance to the King of England. The colony, indeed, seems to have been quite united in its views with regard to the old country, for the Assistants had shortly before enjoined an oath which was equally silent with respect to the monarch at "Whitehall ; but amongst themselves there was considerable contest for authority. For ten years from 1634 to 1644 the relative powers of the Assistants and of the Deputies were in somewhat angry dispute. The two bodies sat together in convention ; but the Assistants claimed and acted on. the right to veto the joint proceedings of the whole Parliament, for such it may be truly called. Thus, if they were outvoted in the general assembly, they fell back on their separate vote, and nullified what had been, previously determined. The Deputies resisted this exceptional power; and in 1644 a compromise was effected, by which the Court was divided into two branches, each armed with the right of negativing the action of the other. In some matters, the legislative body was unjust. With that jealousy of individuals which is often evinced by popular assemblies, the General Court appointed a committee in 1634 to receive the accounts of ex-Governor "Winthrop, in a manner which seemed to imply some distrust. He pre sented them, together with a writing in which he remarked that he would have been content to say nothing of his personal outlay for the good of the public, but that, being called to account, he was compelled to mention it. It appeared that his dis bursements exceeded his receipts by more than a thousand pounds. " It repenteth me not," he said in his message to the Court, " of my cost or labour bestowed in the service of this commonwealth, but do heartily bless the Lord our God that he hath pleased to honour me so far as to call for anything he hath bestowed upon me for the service of his church and people here, the prosperity whereof, and his gracious acceptance, shall be an abundant recompense to me. I conclude with this one re quest, which in justice may not be denied me : that, as it stands upon record that upon the dis charge of my office I was called to account, so this my declaration may be recorded also ; lest hereafter, when I shall be forgotten, some blemish may be upon my posterity, when there shall be nothing to clear it." The request was granted as a matter of course ; and in the Massachusetts Records appears this dignified and high-spirited reply. Massachusetts Bay could now boast of about twenty towns, so widely distributed over the land that Ipswich was thirty miles from Boston, which, even as early as 1632, seems to have ben regarded as the capital of the whole plantation, and the fittest locality for public meetings. These towns (all situated on or near the sea) were of course as yet very small and primitive collections of dwell ings. The houses, with a few exceptions, were no better than cabins, and even the churches had n>ud CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1634. walls and thatched roofs. Oiled paper was used in" the windows instead of glass, and the furniture was generally as rough as the chambers. The surrounding country, in many parts, was so savage that it was necessary to take precautions against the attacks of wolves, by setting up palings round the small settlements. Close at hand was the dark and murmuring forest, with all its energies of savage nature ; by day, inviting the adventurous to explore its winding paths, in the evening, chilling the hearts of the superstitious by its mysterious shades. Yet many of these little towns, thus isolated in the midst of a wilderness, were destined to become places of importance, and had already acquired great influence in the affairs of the colony. The towns elected the Deputies who were to assist in the government of the whole commonwealth : only the Magistrates were chosen by the votes of all the freemen. Municipal bodies were very soon esta blished. In 1633, Dorchester designated twelve of its inhabitants to meet weekly, and consult on public affairs. "Watertown made the same arrange ment about the same time. Boston followed in 1634, and in 1635 Charlestown appointed eleven men to transact the local business for a year, it having been found that " things were not easily brought to a joint issue " when the citizens met in unmanageable numbers.* Thus, each town looked after its special affairs in a special court (the powers of which were progressively enlarged), and con tributed to the formation of a general government for the colony. The discussion of public interests in tumultuous meetings of the whole community, is fit merely for barbarian tribes. In civilised states, the only choice is between, the representative system and despotism. A remarkable set of propositions was carried over to New England in 1634 by a Mr. Humphrey, who acted as the mouthpiece of Lord Say, Lord Brooke, and some other gentlemen of high position, who shared in the religious feelings of the Puritans. These persons were prepared to remove into the colony, on condition that two Houses of Legisla ture, the first to consist of an, hereditary peerage, were established there, together with a division of the commonwealth into two distinct ranks of men a class of gentry and a class of freeholders ; the Governor always to be chosen from the former. The design, in short, was to create an aristocratical republic a species of government generally result ing in the most selfish of tyrannies. That such a proposal was inadmissible, needed no long delibera tion to discover. The rulers of Massachusetts, with * Palfrey s Xew England, Vol. I., chap. 9.- many expressions of thanks, replied by a respectful negative. " When God," they wrote, " blesseth any branch of any noble or generous family with a spirit and gifts fit for government, it would be a taking of God s name in vain to put such a talent under a bushel, and a sin against the honour of magistracy to neglect such in our public elections. But, if God should not delight to furnish some of their posterity with gifts fit for magistracy, we shoxild expose them rather to reproach and pre judice, and the commonwealth with them, than exalt them to honour, if we should call them forth, when God doth not, to public authority." Thus early was it seen that the future of American insti- tutions must be democratic. The number of colonists in 1634 was between, three and four thousand, including nearly three hundred and fifty freemen. The ground about the small towns was being steadily cultivated. Of cattle, goats, and swine there were large numbers. Roads were being cut though the forest to connect the settlements, and the emigrants, devoting them selves to various forms of industry, were beginning to establish several prosperous trades. They ex ported cured fish, furs, and timber to England, and for their subsistence depended on the fish which they caught, on the animals which they hunted, and on the corn which they raised. The majority of these emigrants were Puritans, heartily agree ing with the theological views and ideas of church discipline entertained by the ruling men of the community ; yet it is clear from the decree of 1631 that there were some who followed a different law. The clergy did not number more than, fourteen j but what they lacked in multitude they made up for in zeal and energy. The progress which had marked the short space of five years was truly surprising. The English monarch, looking across the Atlantic, saw a little republic rising up on the opposite shores, on territory which he claimed for himself a republic formed by his discontented subjects, who were carrying out in that distant land the very principles which it was treason to profess at home. There were not wanting those who, from envy of the plantation, were forward to represent to the King and his Ministers that the Puritans of Massachusetts desired nothing less than to throw off their allegiance to the crown, and establish a perfectly independent rule. For this imputation the colonists themselves had furnished some grounds. They had departed in several important respects from the charter under which their com munity was formed. They had proceeded, un authorised, to make various arrangements tending to the creation of a political power. They had 1034.] A THREATENED DANGER. 113 established Nonconformity, which was against the laws of the parent country, and they had proscribed the worship of the Church of England. Lastly, they had exacted an oath of allegiance which made no mention of the King. Some of these acts may Have been the natural results of their position ; but, taken altogether, they may fairly have appeared to the authorities at home significant of intentional disloyalty. At all events, the King resolved that the settlers should no longer be left quietly to themselves. In 1634 it was determined that a General Governor should be sent over ; that a special commission should be formed for the management of all the colonies, and for the revocation of their charters ; and that Archbishop Laud, of all men, should be at the head of this body. Cradock sent out to Massachusetts the Order in Council, already men tioned, requiring the production of the charter ; to which the rulers of the colony replied that they could not give it up without the authorisation of the General Court, which would not meet for two months. At the same time they despatched Win- slow to England, to mediate between them and the Royal advisers. "VVinslow was not connected with Massachusetts, but with the Plymouth Govern ment. The latter colony, however, had business to transact as well as the former, and Winslow was held to be a man well adapted to represent the interests of both. He had already in 1623 and 1624 been twice to England on the affairs of New Plymouth. His third visit, begun in 1634, did not terminate until the following year. The Commission appointed to govern the colonies was to consist of the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, of six lay peers, and of three other high functionaries. They, or any five of them, were invested with power of protection and government over all English colonies. They had authority to make laws, orders, and constitutions ; to provide for the maintenance of a clergy by tithes, oblations, and other profits ; to inflict various kinds of punish ment ; to remove and appoint governors and other officers ; to establish ecclesiastical courts ; to hear and determine complaints against either the whole colonies or any private individual ; to call in all letters-patent, and, if any were found to convey privileges hurtful to the crown or prerogative royal, to cause them to be legally revoked. When intelligence of these measures reached Massachu setts, the news aroused a feeling of alarm, followed by a movement of resistance. In the autumn of 1634, steps were taken for repelling any attack that might be made by the forces of the King. Orders were jriven for the erection of fortifications in Boston harbour, at Charlestown, and at Dor chester, and for the training of civilians to the use of arms. Dudley, Winthrop, Endicott, and some others, were directed to make provision for any war which might befal the plantation for the space of a year ; and arrangements were entered into for the collection and custody of arms and ammunition. These preparations for a state of hostility were augmented in the beginning of 1635. On the 19th of January of that year, a consultation of the Governor, the Assistants, and the ministers of religion, was held at Boston, and the advice of all present was, that if a General Governor were sent he ought not to be accepted; that they should defend their lawful possessions if they were able, and, if not, that they should temporise. The Boston fortifications were mounted with ordnance, and men were pressed for the necessary service. It was directed that a beacon should be erected on the sentry -hill near the town. Musket -balls were made a legal tender for payments, at the rate of a farthing apiece, to the end that they might be collected in the public stores ; the oath of fidelity to the local Government was rigidly exacted ; and a military commission was appointed, armed with very great powers, including the right to imprison any who should be judged enemies of the common wealth, and even to put them to death, should they continue refractory. Massachusetts, in short, completely assumed the position of an independent State menaced by a foreign enemy. This position was unquestionably illegal. The colonists, it is true, were by their charter empowered to " encounter, repxilse, repel, and re sist by force of arms, as well by sea as by land, and by all fitting ways and means whatsoever, all such person and persons as should at any time there after attempt or enterprise the destruction, invasion, detriment, or annoyance of the said plantation or inhabitants." But it clearly could never have been intended to confer on them a right to resist the authority of him from whom the very charter itself proceeded. All such documents must be construed by the rules of common-sense, and by the whole tenor of their provisions. The emigrants were to do nothing contrary to the laws of England ; and to resist the King by force of arms was certainly a violation of those laws, not to speak of other acts which had gone before. In some cases, rebellion may be justified by necessity by the excessive tyranny of the ruling power, or by persistence in a course of illegal government ; and, having regard to the known character of Laud, and to the tendency of English legislation with respect to Dissenters for nearly a century, the Puritans of 114 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1635. Massachusetts may well Lave doubted whether the time had not come for resisting an imminent attack on their liberties. But the charter afforded them no warrant or protection ; they were not fulfilling but defying the law, such as it was. What they contemplated was sheer insurrection against the national flag, in the event of any demands being made of which they disapproved. It is singular that the conflict resulting in the independence of the colonies should have narrowly escaped being anticipated a hundred and forty years before ; and that the first mutterings of the civil war which presently desolated the old country should have come from the other side of the Atlantic. In 1635, Charles I. had been governing without a parliament for six years ; yet not a sign of resistance to liis despotism was apparent. The Englishmen in America prepared for action before their kinsmen at home. Had a collision really ensued, the first blow against dominant preroga tive would have been struck in the remote west, instead of in the fields of England. Happily, however, the cloud passed over. The Commission for the government of the colonies was not proceeded with to any great extent probably because Laud and the other abettors of Charles s tyranny were too much engaged with domestic affairs. But an Order was issued, prohibiting emigration excepting under certain conditions designed to secure complete subjection to the sovereign and the Church. The same year (1635) was signalised by the self-extinction of the Council for New England, formerly the Plymouth Company. The Council had granted lands with such profuse liberality that its property was exhausted and its credit ruined. Accordingly it was resolved (after some previous solicitations from the court) that the charter should be resigned to the King, and that the administration of the Company s domains should be surrendered to a General Governor appointed by his Majesty, on condition that the territory should be conferred by the monarch, in certain proportions, on the members of the corpora tion individually. As a good deal of this property had already been granted to several persons, the stipulation was of a dishonourable character ; but it was agreed to, and the land was distributed in shares. The territory thus disposed of included what had been made over in 1628 to the colonisers of Massachusetts Bay; and the New England Council, anticipating a powerful resistance on the part of the settlers, made an allegation beforehand that the charter under which Endicott, Winthrop, Dudley, and the rest, formed their plantation, had been surreptitiously obtained in derogation of the rights of Robert Gorges and others, although the patent of the younger Gorges had been declared by the House of Commons, through the mouth of Sir Edward Coke, to be contrary to the laws and privileges of the subject. It was also represented that the Massachusetts colonists had made them selves a free people, and that they could not be reduced to their former allegiance unless the King took the business into his own hands. For three years before 1635, the Council seem to have been contemplating some interference with the New England emigrants. At a meeting held on the Gth of November, 1632 (as appears by a Journal of the Council, a portion, of which, or a copy of it, is preserved in the State Paper Office), it was pro pounded for consideration " that no ships, passen gers, or goods be permitted to be transported for New England, without licence from the President and Council, or their deputy or deputies ; . . . . that a surveyor speedily be sent over, for settling the limits of every plantation according to the patent ; also, commissioners to be sent over, to hear and determine all differences, and relieve all grievances there, if they can ; if not, to certify the President and Council here in whom the fault is, that speedy order for redress may be taken." But it does not appear that anything was done in pur suance of these resolutions. Sir Ferdinando Gorges whose fortunes were mixed up in a remarkable degree with colonial speculations was appointed by the King Governor- General of New England, and sixty miles were added to the territories which he already held as his individual property. Captain John Mason, long associated with Gorges in the settlement of lands bordering on Canada, was made Vice- Admiral of the colonies now engrossing so much attention ; and it seemed for awhile as if some vigorous action would be directed against the little noncoiiforming republics of America. A ship was built on pur pose to convey Gorges, at the head of a thousand soldiers, to the seat of his government ; but it fell to pieces on being launched a circumstance which the Puritans interpreted as a miracle specially worked in their favour. About the same time, Mason died another event on which the colonists congratulated themselves ; and nothing more was done in the way of active operations. A little before the death of Mason, however, legal proceed ings were taken against the Massachusetts Company. In September, 1635, Sir Henry Roswell, Sir John Young, and twelve more of the original associates, pleaded in the Court of King s Bench in answer to a writ of quo warranto brought in by the Attorney General against the corporation. Writs of this WILLIAMS IN THE FOREST. 116 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. 11638. nature are directed against persons supposed to have usurped any office, franchise, or liberty, and are issued with a view to compelling an explanation as to the authority by which such powers have been exercised. The law has been modified in more recent times ; but in the reign of Charles I. there was little to stand between the people and the crown. Judgment was given against the patentees, and Cradock, who failed to appear, was convicted of the usurpations charged in the information, and made answerable for them to the King. The char ter was forfeited, and the Massachusetts Company ceased to exist, after a brief life of only seven years. Its extinction had but little effect on the colony it had fashioned. That colony had now acquired an independent strength of no slight degree. Had the settlers been attacked, they would certainly have fought ; and, in the event of a de feat, they would probably have emigrated again. Mr. Palfrey quotes from an anonymous letter " to Mr. Comptroller, from New England," dated July 28th, 1636, in which the latter course is plainly intimated ; in which case, says the writer, the plan tation would in all likelihood be rendered desolate within two years. "For it is not trade that God will set up in these parts, but the profession of his truth and therefore, if God s ends be not followed, man s ends will never be blessed nor attained." 1 In 1638, a renewed demand for the charter was- sent out from England to Massachusetts; but Winthrop was directed to return a courteous refusal, and to allege reasons against complying with the order. Amongst these was the fear lest, if the document were sent back, the mass of the emigrants would suppose that the King had cast them off, and would thereupon create an indepen dent government, to his Majesty s displeasure. This, however, was a little piece of diplomatic hy pocrisy. For the independent government was- already established, and in active force. CHAPTER XIV. Character of Early Colonial History New England Puritanism Arrival of Koger Williams in Massachusetts Previous Career of Williams His assertion of the Principle of General Toleration Collisions with the Civil Power Strange Contradictions in the Character of Williams His intense Dogmatism Inconsistency of Puritan Persecutors Fanatical Outrage on the English Flag Further Dissensions of Williams with the Magistrates Sentence of Banishment Project of sending Williams back to England His Flight into the Woods Foundation by him of the Town of Providence A purely Democratic Rule Amiable Character of Williams Cruelty of his Treatment Life at Providence Mrs. Hutchinson and her Heresies. THE history of the early days of a State is neces sarily a history of events trivial in themselves, and interesting mainly because they unfold the germs from which after-greatness has proceeded. The reader must be content to follow those to whom the formation of a rrmnicipal board is a triumph of policy, and the arrival of a batch of emigrants a me morable event. Instead of the collisions of mighty monarchies, in the council-chamber or on the battle field, he will hear only of the rivalries of small bands of pioneers, numbering not many hundreds, and divided from one another by leagues of forest, by desert plains, or by the reaches of a stormy sea. He will be told of no traditions of ancient glory, perpetuated or forgotten in the doings of later days ; of no vast designs, Stirling the pulses of a multi tudinous nation ; of no haughty conquests and no tragic failures; of no sumptuous pageants, where nobility and wealth and intellect combine to swell the splendours of some Imperial scene ; pf no famous cities, the seats of art and learning ; of no centres of teeming human life, big with the virtues and the wickedness which such centres can alone develope in their highest degree. The story con cerns itself with humbler actors on a stage less gorgeously set out. It traces the fortunes of men who have entered into a struggle with wild Nature ; who see in the ocean, and the moorland, and the untraversed wood, the antagonists whom God has appointed them to subdue ; who encounter the maladies of summer, and the rains of autumn, and the snows of winter, as soldiers going to the battle which may mean victory or death ; who parley with hunger as with the enemy at the gate ; who sleep with the ready musket close at hand, lest the savage descend on them in the night ; who live oil hope more than on fruition, and in the future more than in the present ; who bear within them the possibility of worlds unborn, and rear the infancy of new commonwealths in the shadow of a planter s hut. Such a narrative should have an interest of its own, full of a tender and heroic element : but the details are sometimes petty and almost vulgar. The colonist is provincial in all his ways, and lacks 1631.] ROGER WILLIAMS. 117 the graces and the superb proportions of the civilisa tion he has left behind. The early history of New England, however, is powerfully characterised by the religious principles with which it is associated. The emigrants left their native country that they might enjoy freedom of worship ; and, having obtained this, they denied it to others. It has been already related that they expelled certain emigrants who had formed a small congregation in accordance with the usages of the Church of England : they were now to be equally despotic with respect to Dissenters who were so unfortunate as to dissent in a manner different from their own. The Rev. Mr. Cotton wrote to Ids friends in Holland that " the order of the churches and the commonwealth " was so settled by the " common consent " of the colonists that it brought to his mind " the new heaven and new earth where in dwells righteousness." The " common consent," if it ever existed in reality, did not last long. In February, 1631, a young minister of the name of Roger Williams arrived in Massachusetts. He was by birth a Welshman, but had been brought up in London at the Charter House. While a youth, he had been in the habit of taking short-hand notes of sermons and speeches which attracted his attention. He is supposed to have studied at Cambridge, and to have been admitted to orders in the Established Church. But it was not long ere his disagreement with the ceremonies and principles of that com munion became so wide that he quitted its fold, and fled to America. Williams had been kindly brought forward by Sir Edward Coke ; and in a letter to Coke s daughter, Mrs. Sadleir, preserved in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge, lie says that, as he rodo past Windsor, to take ship at Bristol, it was "bitter as death" to him to see Stoke House, the seat of his patron, and feel that he durst not acquaint him with his flight. Mrs. Sadleir, in a note prefixed to this and some other letters from the same hand, speaks of Williams as " a rebel to God, the King, and his country," and charitably adds that she has preserved his letters in order that, if ever he had the face to return to his native land, Tyburn might "give him welcome." Such were the weapons of controversy in those days. Sir Edward Coke, when acting as Attorney-General at the trial of Sir Walter Raleigh in 1603, reviled him as a viper, an odious man, a damnable atheist, a monster, and a spider of hell; the grea.t lawyer s daughter treasured up in cold blood the letters of a Dissenter, in order that some day she might have the satisfaction of hanging him for his heterodoxy. Williams, however, escaped hanging; but, in the country where he took refuge to shun the persecu tions of the old land, he found himself still the object of bitter religious animosity. The fact is that this thoughtful man had arrived at the great principle of toleration a principle which his fellow-Puritans never imderstood, but regarded as the mere licence of wickedness. The doctrine was not new ; it had been, advanced before by a few extreme reformers ; but Williams gave it practical application. This daring speculator has been de scribed as a rigid Brownist, precise, uncharitable, and afflicted with turbulent and boisterous passions. He seems, however, to have been more charit able than those who judged him ; though doubtless his championship of toleration proceeded rather from a rooted dislike to the interference of the civil magistrate in matters of opinion than from that spirit of kindly interpretation which is willing to admit that one s intellectual adversary may perhaps be in possession of some measure of truth, and is not necessarily either a fool or a scoundrel because he differs on points of doctrine. Williams, it ap pears, refused to communicate with the Boston congregation because they would not make a public declaration of repentance for having communicated with the Church of England while they remained in the old country. On his arrival in New England, Williams was invited by the people of Salem to assist the Rev. Mr. Skelton in his ministrations; but the authorities of Boston, not liking his assertion of the freedom of conscience, required the Salem congregation to desist from receiving him as their teacher. He accordingly went to New Plymouth, where he remained about two years, and was then invited by his former flock to return to them. While at Plymouth, he had caused considerable irritation by presenting to the Governor and Assistants of that colony a treatise in which he disputed their right to the land they held by the King s grant ; asserted that they could acquire a legitimate title only by compounding with the natives ; and indulged in a good deal of fiery invective against the late and the reigning sovereign. For this imprudence he was summoned before the Massachusetts Magistrates, though it is evident that they could have had no legal power in a case occurring out of their juris diction. The matters complained of were ulti mately declared to be " not so evil as at first they r-eemed ; " but the treatise was condemned, and Williams, making his submission, consented that the manuscript should be burned. On returning to Salem, it was not long before he again came into collision with the civil power. The laws of Massa chusetts required the regular attendance of every man at public worship, under a severe penalty. 118 CASSELIAS HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1633. Williams denied the right of the magistrate to enforce any such attendance, and argued that, as the unbelieving soul was dead in sin, to drag an unwilling person to church was " like shifting a dead man into several changes of apparel."* Be sides, to act toAvards him in this way was an in fringement of his natural liberty. No one, he said, should be bound to worship, or to maintain a wor ship, against his own consent. He was asked if the labourer (meaning, of course, the minister of religion) were not worthy of his hire. " Yes," he replied, " from those that hii-e him." With equal boldness he denied that there was any reason why the Magistrates should be selected exclusively from members of the church : as well select a doctor of physic or a pilot for his skill in theology. The office of a magistrate, he affirmed, is simply to maintain order, and to protect the goods and out ward estate of men. It is not for him to meddle with the conscience, since that belongs to the individual, and not to the body politic. From these general propositions Williams advanced to the more particular assertion that all religions should be equally allowed, and that none should be supported by forced contributions from those who disagreed. The exact limits of his doctrine of toleration are not easily ascertained. That there should be no punishment for idolatry, perjury, blasphemy, or Sabbath-breaking, was deduced by his adversaries as a necessary consequence of his contention that the civil governor should take no cognisance of breaches of the first table of the Decalogue, consisting of the first four command ments ; but whether he actually went so far as this does not clearly appear. We seldom find vehement dogmatic belief com bined with toleration ; yet such was apparently the case with Williams. At the very time when he was courageously fighting for freedom of conscience, he loudly proclaimed that it was not lawful for an tmregenerate man to pray, nor for a good man to join in family prayer with those whom he judged un- regenerate. His was not a nature to remain long at peace, and he soon gave great offence by refusing to take the oath of allegiance to the civil Magistrates, on the ground that all such oaths were anti-Chris tian. Bradford, the Governor of New Plymouth, described him as " a man godly and zealous, having many precious parts, but very unsettled in judg- * The account of Williams here set forth is partly based on that given by Mr. Bancroft, who quotes largely from a very rare tract by the person concerned, printed in 1644, and from other works by the same pen. Mr. Bancroft s estimate of Williams, however, is too favourable, and it has been corrected by reference to other authorities. ment;" and he gave the Salem people, on Williams s return to them, a warning that they should use some caution with regard to him. Cotton Mather, not withstanding his strong bias against Williams, admits in his "Ecclesiastical History" that in some things he acquitted himself laudably, and in his later years used many commendable endeavours to convert the Indians ; but he characterises him as a disputatious, restless, fanciful, Quixotic sectary. To some extent this appears to have been true ; but when Mather conceived it to be his duty to " set a mark upon that man who was one of the first that made themselves notable by their opposition to the church order of these plantations," and referred for his justification to the injunction (contained in the sixteenth chapter of Paul s Epistle to the Romans) to " mark them which cause divisions and offences, contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned," he was unconsciously condemning the whole movement out of which the New England colonies and churches had arisen. If it was a sin in Williams to dissent from the doctrines professed by the religious com munities of Massachusetts, because those doctrines were established, it was equally a sin in the Puritans to dissent from the established order of the Church of England. To say that the one order was wrong and the other right, is simply to beg the question, which every side in every dispute may do with equal reason ; and it was to the discomfiture of all such mischievous assumptions, whether on. the part of Prelacy against Puritanism, or on that of Puritanism against its own seceders, that Roger Williams advanced his doctrine of general toleration. But in the seventeenth century hardly any one had the wit to see what Williams saw. The difference between him and the authorities of Massachusetts may be resolved into a very few words. The main body of the Puritans regarded persecution as in itself neither good nor bad. It was very bad indeed when directed against themselves, and equally good when wielded on their behalf. To Williams it was bad at all times and for all purposes a cruel enemy, and a dangerous and disreputable ally. It is much to be regretted that a man with so clear a perception of principles should in some matters have been so fanciful, contentious, and extravagant. An act in which he is said to have been concerned, and which certainly occurred after his return to Salem, led to great commotion and excitement. In the year 1634, John Endicott, inflamed, as it is alleged, by the fiery declamation of Williams, publicly cut out the red cross of St. George from the English standard hanging before the Governor s gate. As Endicott was at that- time a member of the Court of Assistants, the act 1635.] FLIGHT OF WILLIAMS. 119 derived the greater importance as coming from one in authority. It was indeed a most imprudent outbreak of fanaticism ; for such a defacement of the national flag might well have been construed by the Home Government as a manifestation of rebellion, and have led to the gravest consequences. Endicott was therefore reprimanded by the superior authorities, turned out of his position, and disabled from bearing any office in the State for a year. That those who sentenced him secretly sympathised with his motive, and acted only out of fear of what might be thought in England, is highly probable. A degree of mischief had been done, however, which it was not easy to repair. The people, who before had thought nothing about the cross in the banner, now began to be divided as to the lawful ness of following such a symbol. Some of the militia refused to march under a flag which dis played what they regarded as an idolatrous figure ; others saw in the excision a renunciation, of alle giance to the mother country, and feared being involved in some signal punishment. A vehement controversy on the subject was carried on by means of pamphlets ; and at length, by way of compromise, it was agreed that the cross should be retained in the banners of forts and ships, but omitted from the colours of the militia. Nevertheless, the question of the flag, and of the degree of respect to be shown to it, continued to give a good deal of trouble for a long while. That Williams, by exaggerated denunciations of idolatry, was the prime mover in this matter, seems only too probable. By 1635, the fiery Welshman had got into such disgrace with the ministers and Magistrates of Massachusetts that the former declared him worthy of banishment for his opinions, and the latter prepared to deal with him according to law, or that which they enforced as law. In the meanwhile, the people of Salem were punished for their choice of such a pastor by being denied a tract of land for which they had asked. To this, Williams replied by causing his church to write letters of admonition to other churches, that they might reprove the Magistrates for their injustice. He also directed his own congregation to renounce all communica tion with the other churches of the colony, and, on their declining to do so, ceased to have any inter course with them, and refused to join in family prayers or grace at table with his wife, because she continued to frequent their communion. It is clear that, in place of the secular tyranny which he so courageously opposed, he would have set up a spiritual tyranny of a very onerous kind. At the next General Court, Salem was disfranchised till an ample apology for the letter of reproof should be made by the municipality. This was shortly done, and Williams was left without a supporter in the course on which he had entered. He declared himself no longer subject to the spiritual jurisdiction of the colonial churches. In a similar strain he defended his opinions before the General Court to which he was summoned, and declared his readiness to die, or suffer banishment, rather than renounce them. But the case was predetermined against him. On. the 3rd of September, a majority of the court not a very large majority, however ordered that, for his dangerous opinions against the authority of magistrates, and for his contumacious letters, he should leave the jurisdiction of the colony within the ensuing six weeks. The liberty to remain was afterwards extended to the following spring ; and Williams began to make preparations for founding a new settlement in the vicinity of Narragansett Bay. His popularity with the people of Salem, however, was so much increased by the prospect of his persecution, that the autho rities of Boston (now the recognised capital of the plantation) considered it unsafe to allow his pre sence in a locality so near the older settlement as that where he proposed to start afresh. For this reason they sent Captain Underhill to put him. on board a vessel about to sail for England ; but Williams anticipated the arrival of that officer by flying, alone and in the depth of winter, into the woods about Salem. It was bitter weather, thick with snow and wild with wind. The unhappy fugitive has left a written account of his sufferings, from which it appears that he encountered as many hardships as a man could well live under. For fourteen weeks he wandered up and down in the wilderness, a for lorn and friendless man. With a pathetic play on words, after the fashion of his time, he says that during that terrible season he had no knowledge either of bread or bed. In the stormy nights he was often destitute of fire or food ; often he strayed without a guide, and had no house but a hollow tree. He would probably have perished but for the kindly succour of the Indians. We have seen that he had asserted the right of the natives to their own soil, unless compensation were made to them for taking it. He reaped the advantage of that recognition of natural justice in the generous treatment which he experienced at the hands of these poor savages. Massasoit, the great chieftain from whom the whole territory of Massachusetts took its name, gave him welcome ; and Canonicus, the head of the Narragansetts, received him with a love which never changed. Shortly after his arrival in America, Williams had instructed himself 120 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1636. in the Indian language, and was now a master of it. This enabled him to do much in inducing some of the natives to accept Christianity ; it also esta blished and confirmed a friendly feeling between himself and them, which was of the highest service to both. To the end of his life he was a friend to the Indians, always ready to affirm their rights in the face of unscrupulous power. The first settlement made by Williams, which was early in 1636, was at a place called Seekonk, colony, which should be as a harbour to all oppressed men and to all proscribed opinions ; and in such a task he believed himself to have the special counte nance of God. Crossing the stream, he landed on a jutting point separating the river from the upper most inlet of NaiTagansett Bay. The precise spot, near to a spring of water, is still shown. Williams called the place Providence, and here the city so named is situated. The river also has received the same title. It was a wild and lonely spot, and the PROVIDENCE, EHODE ISLAND. near the mouth of a river which discharges itself into Narragansett Bay a situation to the south of Boston, and to the west of Plymouth. But See konk being found to be within the patent of the latter colony, the adventurous explorer removed to the other side of the water, where the ground was as yet unappropriated by any European. Winthrop, it appears, pointed out this locality to Williams, as being uncomplicated by English claims ; so that the former Governor of Massachusetts was not one of those who regarded the preacher of toleration with entire disfavour. In June, 1636, Williams embarked in a canoe on the river, which runs south ward into the bay. He had with him only five companions ; but his courageous and hopeful spirit bore him on. His work was to establish a new new settlers had to work incessantly to bring it into anything like cultivation. Williams says that he himself toiled day and night, at the hoe and at the oar, for bread. But he was not unmindful of what he had always asserted in respect to other settlers the prior right of the natives to the land, and the dishonesty of seizing on their territory without first obtaining their leave, and giving them an equivalent. He made a bargain with the Narra- gansett Indians, and fulfilled it with money borrowed on a mortgage of his house and land at Salem. In. this way the soil became truly his own ; yet he reserved nothing to himself, but freely gave lands to all who came. Nor did he assert, or endeavoiir to exercise, any special political power whatever. In. two 1638.] THE SETTLEMENT OF PROVIDENCE. 121 years time lie had gathered <i small community about him. A constitution of a purely democratic nature was established, and tl>3 compact to which settlers were required to subscribe made provision for the rights of conscience. " We do promise," said this undertaking, " to subject . ourselves in active and passive obedience to all such orders or agreements as shall be made for public good of the treasurer was the only officer appointed during the first four years of the new colony ; and the people of Massachusetts were led to suppose that Williams and his companions would have no magistrates at all.* If, however, they ever entertained such an intention, it was brushed aside by time and practical necessity, those great correctors of all extravagances and utopias. Unfortunately, scarcely any records SIE HARRY VANE. body, in an orderly way, by the major consent of the present inhabitants, masters of families, incor porated together into a township, and such others whom they shall admit into the same, only in civil things." Thus, the dominion of the magistrate over the intellectual or spiritual opinions of men was in express terms excluded. The government was of the simplest kind. Everything was decided in meetings of the entire population a method feasible enough when the whole number is very small, but at once impracticable and undesirable at a more advanced stage of political life. A town 11 of the settlement at Providence for the first ten years are now in existence. It appears, however, from some fragments still remaining, that in 1640 a form of government was devised by four arbi trators chosen for the purpose, and agreed to by thirty-nine freemen. The main feature of this * The word "Magistrate, 1 as here used, must be understood as including the sense which is often attached to it that of a governor or ruler. Tims, the king is the first magistrate in a monarchy ; the president, in a republic. But the governors in New England acted also as justices of the peace, for the correction of offences a combination of functions not unnatural in the beginning of new communities. 122 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1638. constitution was a provision for the adjustment of disputes by means of a permanent board of five dis posers, to be chosen by the inhabitants. Whatever his faults, of intellect or temper and his repeated changes of doctrinal opinion were neces sarily very trying to those with whom he associated the thorough excellence of Williams s nature can not be denied. It is evident that he deeply desired to live according to what he conceived to be the will of God ; that he was a painful searcher after truth ; that he reverenced the moral law as superior to that which is declared in statutes and enforced by magistrates ; that he was placable, humane, and forgiving. He never expressed himself with the slightest bitterness towards his persecutors. He always regarded the authorities of Massachusetts with personal respect, while dissenting entirely from their political ideas. He was ever ready to do a kindness to others, and to forget himself in the general good. The hearts of many melted to wards him. Wiiislow, one of the leading men in the Plymouth colony, visited him at Providence, and put a piece of gold into the hands of his wife for their support, though his view of the dispute between "Williams and the Governors of Massachu setts was in favour of the latter. The banishment of this singular man from the colony where he first settled was a mistake and even a crime, but one which finds some excuse in the sentiments of the period, and in the really vexatious character of much of Williams s opposi tion. On the other hand, its injustice is heightened by the fact that his persecutors were men who had themselves suffered for conscience, and had fled their country because they denied the right of the civil power to coerce their souls. To banish a man from a new colony may be a less hardship than to drive him from the land of his birth, of his ancestry, and of his family connections ; but the distinction is not BO extreme as to render venial in the one case what is heinous in the other. The two acts are essen tially the same ; and nothing can be urged on be half of the Massachusetts Government that may not be advanced with equal force in defence of the monarch, the Parliament, and the prelates of England, in their dealings with the Puritans. The argument of Mr. Palfrey,* that the people of Mas sachusetts had a right to choose their associates, and to expel any one who seemed to them likel} r to cause trouble, will not bear examination. It can not rest on any ground of natural right, unless it be applied to all nations equally ; in which case the representatives of the English people were within * History of Xew England during the Stuart Dynasty, VoL L, chap. 10. their privilege in proscribing the founders of New England. Nor can it be based on any special pro vision of the Royal charter, conferring on the colo nists power to exclude all persons of whom they disapproved ; for, although the instrument in ques tion contains words to that effect, the charter had been so frequently violated by the colonists as to have lost all validity. Indeed, it was forfeited about the time when the expulsion of Williams was ordered ; and, a year and a half before, it had been announced that all such charters would be called in. Besides, it must be recollected that the Government of Massachusetts broke their promise of allowing the offender to remain till spring, and that they not merely prohibited him from sojourn ing amongst them (according to the original sen tence), but endeavoured to effect his removal to England, where his opinions and previous career would have exposed him to severo penalties per haps even to that death at Tyburn for which the daughter of Sir Edward Coke had made such careful provision. When we consider that the persecutors of Williams were themselves liable in England to the same punishments for the same class of offence, it must be allowed that a more cruel or odious instance of religious enmity is not on record. That this act of persecution was really, though not nomi nally, based on theological considerations, is evident from the whole course of the story. The gravamen of Williams s transgression was that he had denied the right of the magistrate to punish a man for entertaining ideas on religion which the State might choose to regard as heterodox. The Puritan leaders of Massachusetts, who had held exactly the same opinion in England, where they suffered from the interference of the civil power with their peculiar views, would not hear of any such freedom when the means of repression had passed into their own hands. It is the old story repeated for the thou sandth time. " The abuse of greatness is, when it disjoins Remorse from power But tis a common proof That lowliness is young ambition s ladder, Whereto the climber-upward turns his face ; But when he once attains the utmost round, He then unto the ladder turns his back, Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees By which he did ascend." f The court at Boston may have alleged civil turbu lence as their reason for punishing Williams ; but it is clear that his insubordination, however vexa tious and improper it may have been, was provoked by previous ill-treatment on religious grounds, and that, for such unruliness as he had manifested, f Shakespeare s Julius Caesar, Act II. , sc. 1. 1636.] THE ANTINOMIANS. 123 transportation to England, where death probably awaited him, was a sentence of iniquity, such as the High Commission Court itself could hardly have surpassed. How little inclined were the Massachusetts au thorities to anything like religious liberty, may be seen, not merely in their conduct towards indi viduals, but in a law passed in 1636, after a year s deliberation, which set forth that " Forasmuch as it hath been found by sad experience that much trouble and disturbance hath happened, both to the church and civil state, by the officers and members of some churches which have been gathered within the limits of this jurisdiction in an undue manner, and not with such public approbation as were meet, it is therefore ordered that all persons are to take notice that this Court doth not, nor will hereafter, approve of any such companies of men as shall henceforth join in any pretended way of church- fellowship, without they shall first acquaint the magistrates, and the elders of the greater part of the churches in this jurisdiction, with their inten tions, and have their approbation herein. And further it is ordered that no person, being a member of any church which shall hereafter be gathered without the approbation of the magistrates and the greater part of the said churches, shall be admitted to the freedom of this commonwealth." Here was an Act of Uniformity passed by the very men who had protested against the English Act of the same nature as a cruel tyranny and a godless coercion of souls. The spiritual rebellion of Roger Williams was doubtless the occasion out of which it arose. But the principle of a State Church was affirmed by this law only seven years after the Puritans of Massachusetts had fled from the State Church of England. The theory of religious toleration with which "Williams started his colony was very fairly carried out. Those who could not understand religion without strict observances enforced by law, regarded the little settlement of Providence as a chaos, and the citizens as so many madmen. " Proceeding from one whimsey to another," writes Neal, " they soon crumbled to pieces, every one following his own fancy, till at last religion itself grew into con tempt, and the public worship of God was generally neglected." Cotton Mather represented them as a generation of sectaries, whose posterity, for want of schools and of a public ministry (for which they entertained an extreme aversion), had become so barbarous as not to be capable of speaking either good English or good sense. But that these ac counts were exaggerated is evident from the further testimony of Neal, who in the second volume of ^lis History says of the people of Providence and War wick : "They now [1720] live in great amity with their neighbours, and, though every man does what he thinks right in his own eyes, it is rare that any notorious crimes are committed by them, which may be attributed in some measure to their great veneration for the holy Scriptures, which they all read, from the least to the greatest, though they have neither ministers nor magistrates to recom mend it to them. They have an aversion to all sorts of taxes, as the inventions of men to support hirelings, as they call all such magistrates and ministers as won t serve them for nothing. They are very hospitable to strangers : a traveller passing through these towns may call at any house with the same liberty as if he were at an inn, and be kindly entertained with the best they have, for nothing." Whatever the " whimseys " of these colonists, and however impracticable their scheme of government in any but a small and primitive settlement, it is evident that they had not lost sight of some of the best virtues of humanity. Shortly after the escape of Roger Williams into the wilds of the Narragansett country, Massachu setts was disturbed by another religious commotion, more serious than that which had preceded it. Some of the later emigrants had brought with them ideas of religious reform much bolder and larger than those of the original founders. To these ex treme theorists, the more cautious Puritans, who looked to Winthrop and his companions as their leaders, appeared as a set of priest-ridden persecu tors, as men corrupted by the remains of Popish doctrine, as hypocrites, Pharisees, and tyrants. The leader was Mrs. Anne Hutchinson (whose mother was great-aunt of the poet Dryden), a Lincoln shire woman, who, after acqiiiring great influence over a number of other women, found herself at the head of a large band of enthusiasts, male and female. Her principles were those which are sometimes called Antinomian ; that is to say, she denied the need of good works, and asserted that justification was by faith alone. A sanctified life, she contended, was not the slightest evidence or guarantee of a state of acceptance with God. The command to work out their salvation with fear and trembling, applied to none but such as were under the covenant of works. The true believer in Christ was personally united with the spirit of God ; and all such were saved by special grace, withoiit any reference to what they might do or leave undone. A doctrine so favourable to laxity of living is liable to degenerate into the grossest self-indulgence and the wildest anarchy. It thus degenerated in the early Christian ages, 124 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1637. and again in the sixteenth century, both in Ger many and Holland ; leading several to the monstrous absurdity that not merely might men sin and yet be saved, but that they must sin, and in the highest degree, to make the sacrifice of Christ of any avail. The opinions of Mrs. Hutchinsoii with regard to prevenient grace, justification by faith, and the vanity of works, could hardly in themselves (though mingled with others of a less acceptable nature) have raised against her the ire of the rulers of Massachusetts, since similar views are embodied in Calvinism, which was the creed of New Eng land. The real cause of quarrel probably lay in the pertinacity with which this gentlewoman assailed several ministers and Magistrates as godless hirelings, and asserted the right of all people to follow their own religious convictions, without oificial licence or restraint. The matter was further complicated by her putting forth some fantastical notions about an immediate revelation of future events, to be believed as equally infallible with the Scriptures, but to be communicated in a way other than miraculous. A relation by marriage of Mrs. Hutchinson, the Rev. John "Wheelwright, formerly a Lincolnshire clergyman, shared in her religious conceptions, and the commonwealth was divided into two factions, which conducted their dis putes with so much vehemence and self-absorption that even, necessary public business was for a time neglected. Wheelwright was censured for sedition, and threatened to appeal to England a menace which was denounced as involving perjury and treason. At length, after a synod of the ministers of New England had condemned the Antinomian heresies, in 1637, Mrs. Hutchinson (who partly re tracted her opinions, partly denied the accuracy of the charges brought against her), her kinsman, and a man named Aspinwall, were exiled from the territory of Massachusetts by a sentence of the Magistrates, and their adherents were required to deliver up their arms, to prevent the possibility of a riot. Peace was thus restored, but at the ex pense of another violation of the right of private judgment a violation, however, for which there is certainly much more to be said than in the case of Williams, for the Antinomians had both preached and spoken with such heat and acrimony that the danger of civil disruption was by no means slight. CHAPTER XV. The Religions Dissensions of New England Omens and Portents Arrival in Massachusetts of Henry Vane the Younger His Election to the Post of Governor Singular Character of Vane He upholds the Religious Ideas of Mrs. Hutchinson Excited State of the Colony Vane s Unpopularity and Return to England The Rev. Hugh Peters Reforms in the State of Massachusetts Dutch Designs on Connecticut English Explorations of that Territory and Attempts at Settlement The Colonisation of Connecticut undertaken by Winthrop the Younger Antagonistic Claims to the Land A Pastoral Journey through the Forest Murders committed by the Pequot Indians Gallant Action of an English Sailor Military Operations against the Pequots Services of Roger Williams Dangerous Situation of the English Colonies Native Alliances Vigorous Campaign against the Pequots, and Extermination of the Tribe. RELIGIOUS dissent having been the motive which led to the establishment of the New England colonies, the history of those settlements for several years has reference mainly to the contentions of opposing sects. A plague of theological subtleties descended on the unhappy people. On the slightest provocation, men fell into fierce dispute about doctrines which neither side understood, and both claimed a peculiar faculty to interpret. An enthu siastic woman could bring a whole commonwealth to the verge of civil war. A hot-headed preacher could create a schism in the church, and almost a mutiny in the army. A question which no one could solve, and which every one lost his temper in discussing, was sufiicient to divide magistrate from magistrate, and to part friend from friend. Persons asked one another whether they walked under a covenant of works or a covenant of grace; and were prepared to love or hate according to the answer. They sat out sermons of inordinate dura tion, and afterwards, in their own homes, debated every principle that the preacher had laid down. They sounded the entire gamut of Calvinistical divinity, and tortured every note into a separate discord. Predestination, particular redemption, particular reprobation, original sin, effectual grace, justification by faith, regeneration and baptism, were the subjects on which these people incessantly talked, wrote, declaimed, and wrangled. The early divisions of Christendom were repeated in lands which were to have witnessed the unity of the true faith, and scarcely any distinction was too exquisite to be the subject of angry bickerings. Cotton Mather has related in his New England History 1635.] SIR HENRY VANE. 125 that, in the colony of Connecticut, a dispute, arose between the Rev. Mr. Stone and a ruling Elder of his church, which speedily set the whole settlement in a flame, though the multitude had no distinct knowledge of what the quarrel was about. Yet the disputants were often kindly, honourable, and conscientious men. Many of the ministers, disliking this indepen dence of thought as much as if they had been Bishops in the old country, lamented the rapid progress of heresy, and eluded the amateur theo logians for meddling with matters which they did not understand. They should have recollected that they had themselves contributed to the result by exaggerated, overwrought, and unceasing appeals to the religious sentiment. By the continual provo catives of preaching, exhortation, discussion, and extempore prayer-making, together with the use of a phraseology specially contrived for the same end, they had created a morbid appetite, which found no satisfaction in any of the ordinary afi airs of life, but was constrained to seek perpetual excitement in the hottest and most pungent dogmas it could discover or devise. Gloomy depression alternated with spiritual exaltation. In the shadow of New England forests, men indulged in strange visions, and imagined omens and portents of particular application, to themselves. Like the "godless regent " of Pope s line, they " trembled at a star," and ordered a reformation of manners because a meteor had appeared in the heavens.* A fight be tween a mouse and a snake, which ended in the death of the latter, was interpreted as a sign that the poor fugitive people of Massachusetts, who were represented by the mouse, should vanquish Satan, who of course was symbolised by the snake. Such was the explanation of the phenomenon given by the Rev. Mr. Wilson, of Boston, who, according to Cotton Mather, had a remarkable gift of prophecy ; and the same minister told the Governor of the State that, before he had resolved to settle in. America, he had dreamt he was there, and saw a church rise out of the earth, which became a marvellous goodly church. When such were the teachers, who can wonder at the vagaries of the taiight ? At the period of the Hutchiiisonian controversy, the religious excitement of the colony was intensified by the presence of a remarkable man, destined in after years to play a prominent part in England a man who was above all things an enthusiast in matters of faith. Henry Vane the younger had, for conscience sake (being a Puritan), emigrated to America, where he arrived in 1635. His father was at that tune a Privy Councillor and one of the Secretaries of State ; but the son preferred his free dom to his prospects of advancement. He was but three-and-twenty when he reached Massachusetts, and his father had given him permission to remain three years. Scarcely three months had passed ere he had acquired such an influence amongst the politicians of the little commonwealth, that his voice was listened to on every important question. In the course of a few more months he had attained to the highest honour of the infant settlement, being elected Governor in May, 1636, with Winthrop for his deputy. For this office he was in many respects unfitted. He was undoubtedly a man of greac Ability. Clarendon has borne high testimony to his intellect, though not to his character. Milton, writing several years afterwards, addressed him as " Vane, young in years, but in sage counsel old, Than whom a better senator ne er held The helm of Rome, when gowns, not arms, repell d The fierce Epirot and the African bold. " f But he was then much older than in the days of his New England experience, and even in his mature years Vane was one of those men who find it impossible to work long in harmony with any party. He it was from whom Cromwell, when expelling the House of Commons in 1653, prayed the Lord to deliver him as by a special mercy. He could not coalesce with the Protector; he could not coalesce with the Protector s son ; he could not coalesce with the Long Parliament; he could not coalesce with the restored monarchy. He was at issue with them all by turns, and he fell a sacri fice to the anger of Charles II., whose accession to the throne had certainly been facilitated by the impracticable nature of such visionary Republicans as he. From Vane s first entrance into political life, in New England, to his death on Tower Hill seven-and-twenty years later, he was constantly in antagonism to the ruling authority or dominant party of the hour. His nature was so secretive that it was said 110 one could penetrate his designs ; but it is probable that he never clearly understood them himself, and that he was less a dissimulator than a monomaniac. Amongst many singular opinions, he held the unorthodox view that even the devils and the damned would ultimately be saved. Yet he belonged to the most fanatical and least reasonable of all the sects then existing that of the Fifth Monarchy Men, the men who refused to obey any rule but that of Jesus Christ, and who proclaimed that the Messiah was shortly to establish on earth that empire which they rather irreverently * Xcal s History, under date 1GG8. t Sonnet XVII. 126 OASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1637. numbered as one of the same series with the Assyrian, Persian, Greek, and Roman. He con ceived that he himself was to act as Viceroy for a thousand years ; and on the scaffold he compared Tower Hill to Mount Pisgah, and expressed a full assurance of being immediately placed at the right hand of Christ. It was the insane outbreak of the Fifth Monarchy Men in 1661 that sealed the fate of Vane; though it does not appear that he had anything to do with it, and the condemnation was avowedly in respect of his conduct ever since the day of Charles I. s execution. A person of this unsettled order of mind was not the best man for conducting the affairs of a new colony; especially when to his natural defects was added the inexperience of youth. Vane had not been long in office when the troubles consequent on Mrs. Hutchinson s movement broke out. . He enlisted himself warmly on the side of that en thusiast, though a due consideration of his office and its responsibilities would have dictated a more reserved and cautious policy. Massachusetts, on the whole, was against Mrs. Hutchinson ; but the majority in Boston supported her views, and the countenance of Vane was of course a great encou ragement to her. A period of agitation ensued, and Vane found that colonial opinion generally was opposed to 1 him. When the main body of ministers determined to inquire into the heresy which Boston had favoured, the young Governor, in December, 1636, called a Court of Deputies, and in formed the representatives of the people that he had received letters from England which necessitated his return. Being exhorted to remain, he declared with many tears that, although the causes for his departure were such that the entire ruin of his worldly estate was involved, he would willingly have risked it rather than have left his new home, had it not been that he feared the judgments of God on the plantation, in consequence of the dis sensions he saw amongst them, and the imputations cast upon himself, as if he were the cause of all. For the time he appeared to be unshakably resolved; but, after expostulations on the part of the Boston church, of which he expressed himself an obedient child, he gave up his intention, which, perhaps, may have been rather professed, with a view to extorting some manifestation of confidence, than really entertained. The dissensions continued; the meetings of the General Court were transferred from Boston to Newtown, on account of the agi tated state of the former place ; and in May, 1637, Winthrop was again elected Governor, and Dudley Deputy-Governor. At the same time, other elec tions occurred, of a nature entirely favourable to what may be called the orthodox party. Matters very nearly came to a street riot ; but the malcon tents were at length pacified. Vane was elected one of the body of Deputies, and, after a paper war with Winthrop as to the propriety of a measure which was passed by the General Court for the purpose of temporarily expelling all who should be judged dangerous to the commonwealth, he returned to England in the early part of August, 1637. The military honours attending his embarkation show that, notwithstanding special grounds of difference, he was regarded with respect. Vane had been accompanied to New England by a man destined, like himself, to become eminent in the old country, and in the end to be executed for his republicanism. He had for one of his fellow- emigrants the celebrated minister, Hugh Peters, afterwards chaplain to Oliver Cromwell. Peters did not support Vane in his view of the Hutchin- sonian controversy, and, on one occasion, during his Governorship, publicly reproved him for opposing the ministers, and besought him to consider his youth, and to beware of peremptory conclusions, to which he had shown himself too apt. All Vane s difficulties were with respect to the religious ques tion. On other grounds he got on very well with his colleagues. During his rule, some changes were introduced into the institutions of the colony, which seem to have given general satisfaction ; and a military system was organised, with the Governor for the time being as Commander-in-Chief, which furnished the plantation with something like an effective army. The experiment of a Council ap pointed for life an innovation which proved very unpopular, and was therefore allowed to drop does not appear to have been any plan of his. If he could have kept his mind clear from those clouds of mysticism which made the pamphleteers of a later day call him " Sir Humorous Vanity," he would have better deserved the compliment which Milton paid him in the Sonnet before quoted, when he wrote : " To know Both spiritual power and civil, what each means, What severs each, thou hast learn d, which few have done." But even as it was he deserved it to some extent, in spite of his faults. When conducting his controversy with Winthrop on the measure for ex cluding from the colony the holders of obnoxious opinions, he used language which did him honour. "Scribes, and Pharisees, and such as were confirmed in any way of error," he argued, were to be pitied and reformed, rather than denied cohabitation. While these difficult questions of religious doc trine, secular law, and private conscience were con- 128 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1636. vulsiiig the territory of Massachusetts, the work of extended settlement was still proceeding. As early as 1633, John Olclham, formerly a member of the Plymouth colony, from which he had been expelled for sedition, penetrated by land, together with three companions, to the Connecticut river, which, flowing from the north many miles to the west of the older settlements, empties itself into the sea opposite the eastern, extremity of Long. Island. On the return of these explorers, they reported that they had lodged at Indian towns all the way, and they brought back with them some beaver, hemp, and black lead. A vessel which had been built by Governor Winthrop coasted Long Island, sailed a short distance up the Connecticut, and visited the Dutch settlement at the mouth of the Hudson. Some jealousy of the Dutch was not iinnaturally felt by the English, and it was resolved that at any rate the Connecticut should not fall into their hands, notwithstanding that for a little while they had hud a small fort there. The Plymouth people established a factory on the banks of the river, and in 163i several persons belonging to the towns of Massa chusetts resolved to remove thither. Their con templated departure was opposed by some of the Boston people, on the ground that so considerable an emigration woidd weaken the infant colony from which it was drawn, and that the enterprise might lead to a collision with the Dutch, with whom the Plymouth explorers had already had a few slight passages of arms. For some time it was doubtful whether permission would not be refused, in virtue of a power to forbid such expeditions which was claimed by the Magistrates ; but the opposition of those authorities (who in this respect were at issue with the majority of the Deputies) was afterwards withdrawn, and, in the summer of 1635, emigrants from Dorchester found their way to the spot where the Plymouth factory had been established, and were followed by others from Watertown. Sixty men, women, and children, driving cattle before them, set out in the autumn, and pitched their tents in the wilderness. Winter came on with unexpected suddenness. Six weeks after their departure, twelve of their number appeared at Boston, and reported that they had left the river frozen over (though it was only November), that on this account no supplies could be received by water-carriage, and that on their return journey, which had occupied ten days, one of their com pany had been lost in the ice, and they would all have starved, had they not lighted on an Indian wigwam. Those who remained at the settlement suffered terribly for want of the barest necessaries, and at length several of them struggled down to the river s mouth, where they fell in wrbh a vessel, which took them to Boston. The rest supported themselves on acorns, malt, and grain, until relief arrived. The loss in cattle was very great. The original proprietor of the valley of the Con necticut was the Earl of Warwick. This nobleman afterwards assigned the territory to Lord Say and Seal, Lord Brooke, John Hampden, John Pym, and others, who were associated in a patent for the colonisation of the country. In October, 1635, John Winthrop the younger returned to New England after a visit to the old country, bearing with him a commission from the patentees, by which he was constituted Governor of the region in. O question for a year, with instructions to build a fort at the river s mouth, to employ a party of fifty men in the execution of that work, and to erect houses within the circuit of the fort. All settlers, in the early days of the colony, were to plant them selves either at the harbour, or near the mouth of the river, that they might be the better able to protect one another from possible attacks by the Dutch. For the carrying out of these designs, young Winthrop was provided with men and am munition, and with two thousand pounds in money. At the beginning of November he despatched a party of twenty men, who with two pieces of cannon drove off a Dutch vessel which had been sent to assert a claim to the possession of the river. A small fort was then erected in a favourable spot afc the mouth of the stream. Vane and Peters were associated with the younger Winthrop in the management of the new colony ; and these three made proclamation, of the rights of their princi pals, and required a recognition of them 011 the part of those who had already gone there, together with an explanation showing by what authority they had begun their settlement. It thus appears that at this time there were four claimants to the Connecticut territory : the Dutch ; the Plymouth colonists, who alleged that they had purchased certain lands from the Indians, and defended them against the Hollanders ; the settlers from Massa chusetts ; and the patentees. But all these claims, with the exception of the Dutch, were soon amicably adjusted, and the colonisation of Connecticut pro ceeded for awhile with 110 more than the usual difficulties of life in a savage and unknown region. A larger emigration than, those which had pre ceded it took place in June, 1636. It was led by Thomas Hooker, a preacher who has been termed " the light of the western churches." A hundred adventurers, including women and children, and accompanied by large herds of cattle, set out on their pilgrimage to the new land of promise. The 1637.] THE PEQUOTS. 129 difficulties of progression were great. The thick and intertanglecl woods were threaded by numerous streams, which it was necessary to cross by the felled trunks of trees. Swamps occasionally spread themselves out beneath the overarclmig shades ; there were steep hills to be surmounted, wide valleys to be passed. The settlers advanced at the rate of less than ten miles a day ; but the season was summer, and hope was buoyant in the hearts of all. They steered their way through the leafy wilderness by means of a compass, as if they had been sailing across the ocean. By day they sub sisted on such humble fare as they carried with them, on the berries of the woods, and on the milk of the kine which plodded by their side. By night they slept in tents and waggons beneath a pen dent canopy of boughs which had scarcely before sheltered any but the red man and the wild creatures of the desert. Their minister frequently halted in mid-forest, and preached some animating dis course, while the cattle quietly browsed upon the trees, or sought the refreshment of a bubbling runnel. To those Scripture-reading men, it must have seemed like the journey of Abram with all his flocks into the land of Canaan. The distance to be traversed was scarcely a hun dred miles; but it took a fortnight to reach the place of settlement a spot on the western bank of the Connecticut river, near the present city of Hart ford. Here the caravan finally halted, and a number of small towns presently rose up with the rapidity that is observable in colonies. The rulers of the settlement acted in virtue of a commission granted them by the General Court of Massachusetts to govern the people of Connecticut for the space of a year. This, however, was an exercise of authority on the part of Massachusetts which could not have been justified had it been challenged, for the newly- settled territory was beyond the border of the older colony ; but the commission seems to have been issued in concert with the younger Winthrop, who represented tlie patentees, and it may have been the only way, for the time being, of securing an effective and orderly government. At the end of the year, the commission was not renewed, and the little community thenceforward took the manage ment of its affairs into its own hands. The settlers were soon gladdened by the presence of John Haynes, a member of the Court of Assistants of Massachusetts, and at one time Governor of that colony. Haynes, a man of ability, and of expe rience as a ruler, was a great accession of strength to the young plantation, and affairs speedily pros pered. By the middle of 1637, the population of the three lower towns 011 the Connecticut (Windsor, Hartford, and Wethersfield) amounted to about eight hundred, comprising two hundred and fifty men. There were also a few other settlers in localities somewhat removed. The peace of the colony was not to last long. In proximity to the English adventurers was a populous tribe of Indians, called the Pequots. These savages occupied a tract of country lying between the river Pawcatuck, forming the western boundary of the present State of Rhode Island, and another river, at that time named after themselves, but now desig nated the Thames. They could muster a formid able army of warriors, and had for some time past inspired so much terror among the neighbouring tribes that the latter requested Governor Winthrop, in 1631, to make a settlement in their country, as a protection. Two years later, some Englishmen fell victims to the ferocity of the Pequots. Certain traders, led by two men named Stone and Norton, sailed up the Connecticut river, with a view to trafficking with the Dutch, and, having taken some of these Indians on board, were murdered in the night. The Pequot chief afterwards sent represen tatives to Boston ; excused the murder, on the ground that it was partly accidental, partly pro voked by ill-treatment from Stone ; agreed to surrender the only two of the assassins who were then living ; and engaged to pay a considerable tribute of wampum and furs, and to cede ground for a settlement. This was in 1634, at which time the Pequots were threatened both by the Narra- gansetts and the Dutch, and were desirous of ob taining English support. When their troubles had passed over, they broke their promises, and in the summer of 1636 murdered John Oldham, whose chequered career has been previously alluded to. The fact was discovered in a way which strongly marks the adventurous character of early colonial life in America. On the 20th of July, John Gallup, of Boston, while sailing in a small fishing vessel with a man and two boys, observed, in the neighbourhood of Block Island, another little boat, the awkward management of which attracted his notice. He recognised the vessel as belonging to Oldham, but, upon approaching, saw a canoe put off from her, find at the same time perceived that her deck was covered with Indians, who appeared to be well armed with pikes, guns, and swords. Gallup suspected foul play, and resolved, though his numbers were so few, to attack the savages forthwith. He had with him two guns, two pistols, and some duck-shot ; and, opening fire 011 the Indians, he forced them to seek shelter below deck. Next, he ran his vessel into theirs with so violent a shock that six of the Indians jumped overboard in 130 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1637. a panic. On a second collision, four more savages threw themselves into the sea, leaving only four on board ; and Gallup, springing on to Oldham s boat, received the submission of two of the intruders, while the other two were fastened down under hatches. On the deck lay the dead body of Old- ham, fearfully mutilated, but still warm. The Government of Massachusetts, on hearing of this murder, at once determined to conduct active operations against the Pequots. Vane despatched ninety men to Long Island Sound, in three small vessels, under the command of Endicott, Captain John Underbill, and some others. Underbill was a soldier of experience, who had followed the fortunes of war in Ireland, Spain, and the Netherlands, and who on many stirring occasions had proved himself one of the most successful military leaders of the early Colonial period. In subsequent years, he fell into contention with Massaclmsetts, sought a reconciliation, and confessed himself guilty of adultery, pride, hypocrisy, and persecution of God s people. In 1642 he took service under the Dutch, and signalised himself in wars with the Indians ; and in 1672 he died on Long Island. At present, however, he was in favour with Massachusetts. He and Endicott attacked the savages of Block Island, and, after a sharp skirmish, burned their houses, sank their canoes, and cut down their com. Some further operations took place, vaiied by a futile attempt to come to terms, and the English returned to Boston, without loss. The expedition, however, seems to have been feebly conducted, and the Pequots were rather exasperated than cowed. They now endeavoured to effect an alliance with their former enemies, the Narragansetts, with the expressed intention of exterminating the whole of the New England settlements. To those less war like savages they represented, not withoxit reason, that the English were overspreading their country, and, if not checked, would speedily seize on the whole, and destroy or enslave all the native in habitants. In opposing their formidable enemies, the Pequots added, it would not be necessary to fight a pitched battle : it would be sufficient to fire their houses, to kill their cattle, and to lie in ambiish for themselves when they went abroad upon their business. These menacing negotiations came to the knowledge of Roger Williams, then established at Providence, to whom, as the reader is aware, the Narragansetts had always been very friendly, and who had treated them with a considerate kindness which bore the best fruit. He lost no time in communicating the news to the Governor of Massa chusetts, who requested him to use his utmost and speediest endeavours to frustrate the contemplated league. Entering a fragile canoe, he sailed along the coast to a part of the territory where dwelt the sachem of the Narragansetts ; and at the wigwam of that barbarian potentate he found the Pequot emissaries already assembled. In a letter to Captain Mason, preserved in the Massachusetts Historical Collections, he expresses his horror at coming into contact with these wretches. " Three days and nights," he observes, " my business forced me to lodge and mix with the bloody Pequot ambassadors, whose hands and arms, methought, reeked with the blood of my countrymen, murdered and massacred by them on Connecticut river, and from whom I could not but nightly look for their bloody knives at my own throat also." The service which "Wil liams thus rendered, at the peril of his life, not only to Connecticut, but to all English colonies in that part of America, was of the highest value. The Narragansetts were wavering when he arrived, he did not leave them until he had obtained an assurance that they would not join the Pequots, together with an expression of their views as to the best manner of conducting a campaign against those courageous warriors a statement which he trans mitted to Winthrop. The Pequots were equally unsuccessful in their advances to the Mohegans. Nothing remained to them but their own unaided strength ; and, though the odds were desperate, they were too high-spirited to shrink from a contest on which they had long resolved. In the autumn of the same year (1636), the savages captured a few isolated stragglers belonging to the Connecticut settlement, and murdered them with every circumstance of barbarity and elaborate torture. By February, 1637, they had put to death thirty of the English, and carried away two women. The little town of "VVethersfield was attacked by a band of Pequots, numbering a hun dred, and suffered severely. A thousand fighting men of that tribe were already in the field, and three or four thousand more could have been sum moned to their assistance. The situation was growing most serious. Massachusetts and Plymouth were solicited for aid ; and it was agreed, at an extraordinary session of the General Court of the former colony, that in aid of the people of Connec ticut there should be a levy of a hundred and sixty men, and that six hundred pounds should be set aside for the expenses. Plymouth made a levy of forty men. The arrival of these reinforcements was delayed by the almost incredible fanaticism of some Boston men, who refused to muster because they believed their chaplain to be too much under a covenant of works that is to say, 1637.] THE PEQUOT WAR. 131 not a follower of Mrs. Hutchinson. Ninety soldiers, however, were despatched from the infant settlement under the command of Captain Mason, who in former years had served in the Netherlands with Sir Thomas Fairfax, afterwards the Parlia mentarian General. The expedition started from Hartford on the 10th of May, after nearly a whole night spent in prayer, in which the soldiers were led by the Rev. Mr. Stone. The English were accompanied by a body of native allies, seventy in number, selected from the Mohegans, and com manded by Uncas, the sachem of that tribe. It was feared they would prove treacherous ; but to have refused their proffered aid would have offended the whole community, and led to fresh dangers. As the event turned out, the Mohegans were of no great use ; but their fidelity was unimpeachable. Mason, having been joined by Underhill, who had been stationed at the fort near the mouth of the Connecticut river, determined, after anxious con sideration and debate, to attack the Pequots through the Narragansett country in their rear, instead of on their western front that side which was nearest to the Connecticut settlements. The orders given to the English commander were that the enemy should be assaulted on the western side of his position ; but Mason, knowing that that was the quarter where they expected invasion, con ceived that a movement of a different nature would be most likely to succeed. Quitting the mouth of the river, therefore, on the morning of May 19th, the little squadron of three vessels proceeded along the coast in an easterly direction. On the evening of the 20th, they arrived near the entrance to Narragansett Bay. The next day was the Sabbath, and was devoted to religious exercises on shipboard. A violent storm on the 22nd prevented the disembarkation of the troops, which was delayed until the evening of the 23rd. Mason then obtained the assistance (if it ought not rather to be called the encumbrance) of two hundred Narragansetts, who told him that his forces were too weak in numbers to encounter such renowned and mighty warriors as the Pequots. On the following day his army was further recruited by a large body of Nyantics, and all advanced towards the encamp ment of the Pequots, lying to the west. By dark on the 25th, the forces were within sight of a formidable stronghold, situated on high groxmd on the banks of the river Mystic. From a skilfully constructed fort the noise of savage revelry ascended into the night. The Pequots had seen the English vessels coasting along to the east, and had taken it for granted that the expedition was abandoned. They did not know that the avengers were watching them in the darkness, and only waiting for the best opportunity of dealing their meditated blow. The fort consisted of a nearly circular enclosure, more than an acre in extent, the outer wall of which was composed of trunks of trees, about twelve feet high, seu so closely together as to prevent the passage of a human body, but with sufficient space between to allow the marksmen to discharge their arrows against an attacking force. Within were lanes of wigwams, covered with matting and thatch. The entrances, which were opposite one another, consisted of two openings, slightly protected by bushes. These two vulnerable points it was determined to assault simultaneously. The English had to rely on themselves almost entirely ; for the Indians, with a very few excep tions, had stolen away in extreme trepidation. The Nyantics, while they were still within their own country, had boasted how gallantly they would behave themselves, and how many of the enemy they would kill ; but on gaining the Pequot frontier they and the Narragansetts rapidly melted away. Uncas and his Mohegans still held 011, declaring that they would live and die with the English ; yet, after marching some time in the van, they fell into the rear, and only a few co-operated in the attack on the Pequots. The soldiers slept for a space ; then, rousing themselves, joined in prayer, and set forward. It was two hours before dawn, on the 26th of May ; the moon was shining brightly, but Mason and his companions had advanced to within a few feet of the eastern sally-port ere their presence was dis covered. A watch-dog barked, and woke some of the Indians. Then rose a cry of " Englishmen ! Englishmen!" from the Pequot sentinels. Mason leaped into the enclosure singly, and held his ground until his men could pull the bushes away from the opening, and get in after him. At the same time Underhill entered at the western side. A desperate struggle ensued. The Pequots were all asleep when the alarm was given ; but they fought valorously in their houses. The attacking forces found themselves overmatched in point of numbers, and were driven to the horrible expedient of burning the Indians out. Mason seized a lighted brand from a wigwam, and threw it on the matted roof: Underhill set fire to las quarter with a train of powder. The village, constructed entirely of combustible materials, was quickly in flames from end to end. The English stationed themselves outside, and shot down those who, in their frantic efforts to escape, were seen darkly relieved against the glare. Others, who managed to burst through 132 CASSELL S HISTOEY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1637. the burning palisadoes, were despatched by the sword ; while a few stragglers fell into the hands of the native allies, who stood safely aloof, dancing and whooping with joy, and not at all disposed to deal mercifully with any whom they could seize. By dawn the tragedy was finished. It is said that more than six hundred Indians, including women and children, were killed in this dreadful affair. The conquerors lost only two men, but carried away with them numerous wounded. warriors, who, on beholding the destruction which had been wrought by the white men, stamped and tore their hair with rage. Mason, getting to the rear of this body, retreated fighting for six miles, and at ten o clock in the morning came in sight of the harbour, with the vessels at anchor there. On board was a detachment from Massachusetts, which proved of great service. All the Con necticut towns were now efficiently protected, and Mason, with a flying column, overran the whole NEW HAVEN. Some eight miles to the west of this fort was another, which had been made the head-quarters of Sassacus, the sachem of the Pequots, of whom the Narragansetts, in the exaggeration of fear, reported that he was a god, and could not be killed by any one. In Pequot Harbour, beyond this second fort, Mason had appointed his vessels to meet him. Towards that spot, accordingly, he moved; but the wounded soldiers hampered his march, and his surgeon had been thoughtlessly left behind when the forces landed at Narragansett. The supply of food and ammunition was spent, and the weather was so oppressive that several of the men fainted with heat. On their way, they saw approaching more than three hundred Pequot country from the vicinity of New London to the English fort at Saybrook. The Pequots were hunted down remorselessly ; their wigwams burned, their cornfields laid waste, and themselves killed. Sassacus was murdered by the Mohawks, to whom he fled for protection ; and the work of extermina tion spread over many weeks. On the 13th of July, the English fell in with a body of eighty men and two hundred women and children in a small Indian town near an extensive swamp, into which the savages rushed for shelter. The soldiers sur rounded the swamp, and, after some fighting, pro mised the red men their lives if they would lay down their arms, and deliver up any murderers of the colonists they might have among them. They 1637.] EXTINCTION OF THE PEQUOTS. 133 replied by a refusal; and in. the night several escaped, while others were shot down. Of those who surrendered during these operations, some were sent to the Bermudas, some were enslaved in the Christian, and (until he was poisoned) a missionary among his own countrymen, as a consequence of Mason s victories. A salutary and lasting effect was produced by the military strength and promptitude MONUMENT AT NEW PLYMOUTH TO MARK THE SITE OF THE LANDING OF THE PILGEIM FATHERS. towns of Connecticut and Massachusetts, and some were incorporated, under English super vision, with the Mohegan, Narragansett, and Nyantic tribes. The New England colonies were saved by the succession of vigorous but remorseless acts which stamped out the Pequots as a nation. One of the savage allies of the colonists became a of the settlers ; and many of the Indian tribes, struck with terror, begged the protection of those whom perhaps they would more willingly have de stroyed.* CHAPTER XVI. Foundation of Concord Colonisation of Rhode Island Mrs. Hutchinson seeks refuge among the Dutch Her Assassination by Indians Dissensions in the Rhode Island Colony Agreement as to the Heads of a Constitution Beginning of New Haven Colony John Davenport and Theophilus Eaton Theocratical Government of New Haven Spread of the Settle ment on the Shores of Long Island Sound Large Emigration from England Anticipated weakening and impoverish ment of the Mother-country Issue of Orders by the Government of Charles I. for the Checking of Emigration Injury inflicted on England by the Tyranny of Charles and Archbishop Laud English Character of much of the American Population Prosperous State of the New England Colonies in 1643 Establishment of Harvard College Legal Provision for the Instruction of the Commonalty. NOTHING, it was evident, could stop the progress of the English race in America ; neither their own internal dissensions, nor the attacks of Indian savages. From year to year, colonisation spread, and even the quarrels of rival sects contributed to the dissemination of that great nationality which had been designed for predominance in the 12 northern division of America. So rapidly did the older settlements increase that, in a few years, it * Palfrey s, Bancroft s, and Neal s Histories. Sparks s American Biography, Vol. XIII. (Life of Mason.) Contempo rary accounts of the war were written by Captains Mason and Underbill, Lieutenant Gardiner, and the Rev. P. Vincent, a clergyman of the Church of England who visited the American settlements. 134 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1643. was found desirable to ease the pressure on them by the formation of new communities in more dis tant parts of the wilderness. In this way the State of Connecticut was established, as related in the last Chapter. To the same necessity must be referred the origin of Concord, the founders of which emigrated from the Bay of Massachusetts, and, forcing a toilsome path through woods and thickets, came to a fair stretch of green meadows on the banks of a stream flowing into the Merrimack. Here, in 1G35, they began a town, which for some time could barely maintain its existence against the savage forces of Nature. Before houses of any kind could be erected, the emigrants were compelled to live in caves, which with their own hands they delved out of a hill-side. Even after they had hastily put up a few wooden hovels, their condition was not much better. The rainy season was a terrible trial to these pioneers of civilisation. A deluge poured through the frail roofs of their cottages, and invaded the poor enclosures where they had vainly hoped to find shelter. Wolves howled about them in the winter nights, and destroyed their sheep and swine. The cultivation of the soil presented many difficulties, owing to the frequency of tree-roots and bushes, so that the early crops were of necessity meagre and insufficient. Many of the cattle died, and the colonists, with their wives and children, lived for the most part on game. Yet they worked on in the spirit of hope and reliance, and Concord prospered, in spite of the rains and of the wolves. The colonisation of Rhode Island the island itself, as distinguished from the modern State of which it forms part sprang from the Antinomian controversy originated by Mrs. Hutchinson. On being expelled by the Massachusetts authorities, she herself, with the larger number of her followers, turned to the south ; at the same time, Wheel wright, moving northwards, founded the town of Exeter, on the Piscataqua, as already mentioned. Mrs. Hutchinson had at first designed to join her relative in the latter locality ; but afterwards conceived that a better spot for beginning the world afresh would be Long Island, or the neigh bourhood of Delaware Bay. This intention was in its turn abandoned on the persuasion of Roger Williams, with whom the exiles had a conference at Providence, on their way towards the south. By him they were induced to form their plantation on the largest of the islands in Narragansett Bay, then called by its Indian name of Aquetnet, now Rhode Island a beautiful and inviting territory, which the Plymouth people declared to be beyond the bounds of their patent. Williams also prevailed on Miantonomoh, the chief of the Narragaiisetts, to make a gift of the island to the intending settlers, in exchange for forty fathom of white beads. This transfer of the territory being made, nineteen persons went thither and on the 7th of March, 1638, entered into a mutual engagement in the fol lowing terms : " We, whose names are underwritten, do hereby solemnly, in the presence of Jehovah, incorporate ourselves into a body politic, and, as he shall help, will submit our persons, lives, and estates unto our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords, and to all those perfect and absolute laws of his, given us in his holy word of truth, to be guided and judged thereby." The principal persons who signed this document were William Hutchinson (the husband of Mrs. Hutchinson), his sons Edward and William, William Coddington, John Clarke, John Coggeshall, William Aspiiiwall, and Thomas Savage, the last of whom married the elder Hutchinson s daughter. Coddington (who had formerly been one of the Court of Assistants at Boston, where he was a person of consequence) was chosen to be " Judge " over the colony ; for these Scriptm-al enthusiasts preferred to call their chief ruler by a designation which had been sanctified by its use among the chosen people of Israel. Aspiii wall was made secretary, and others were appointed Elders. Mrs. Hutchinson herself joined her friends on the island shortly after they had esta blished themselves there. With regard to her peculiar views, she seems to have recanted the re cantation which she made when in the power of the Massachusetts Magistrates, and to have re asserted and reinforced her original convictions to an extent which brought her many converts. The rulers and ministers of the older colony from which she had emigrated, suspected her of witchcraft ; but that was the commonly-received method in those days of accounting for any unusual influence exer cised by one person over the minds of others. One of her sons, and a son-in-law named Collins, ventured, in 1641, to remonstrate with the Boston authorities on the treatment of this singular enthusiast, and were punished with a long term of imprisonment. The family 011 Rhode Island feared they would not be safe even there, and accordingly, about 1642, removed beyond New Haven into the territory of the Dutch. Here, during an insurrection of the Indians in 1643, Mrs. Hutchinson, now a widow, was murdered, together with the whole of her family, excepting a daughter eight years old, who was carried into captivity, but, after four years de tention, was recovered by the General Court of Massachusetts. Her relative, Wheelwright, ulti mately made his submission to the Massachusetts 1639.] RHODE ISLAND COLONY. 135 Government, confessed himself grievously misled, and in 1644 obtained a revocation of his sentence of banishment. He afterwards sailed for England, but subsequently returned to America, and lived there until his death in 1679. Before her departure from Rhode Island, Mrs. Hutcliinson had managed to get into several of those commotions for which, like Williams, she seems to have had an aptitude. It is even said by some authorities that her motive for leaving the island was because she could not agree with the people, nor the people with her. Be that as it may, the little colony was rent with dissensions very shortly after its establishment. At the beginning of 1639, Hutcliinson and his sons, together with Aspinwall, were passed over in an election of Elders who were to assist Coddington, the Judge, in the execution of justice and the management of affairs. The choice of the colonists fell on Nicholas Easton, John Coggeshall, and William Breretoii ; and at the same time the magistrates were directed to deal with William Aspimvall concerning certain defaults. Aspinwall was afterwards proceeded against as a person suspected of sedition against the State. A constable was appointed to repress un lawful meetings, or anything tending to civil disturbance ; and a sergeant was charged with the duty of informing the superior authorities as to all breaches of the laws of God that might lead to a disturbance, and to keep the prison and such prisoners as should be committed to his custody. On the 6th of April it was thought advisable to set up an alarum for the summoning together of the populace for defence of the island, or for the quelling of any insolences that might be tumult- uously raised within the plantation.* It would seem that a party had been formed among the settlers who espoused the cause of Hutcliinson, and caused a good deal of tumult. Ultimately they deposed Coddington. from his judgeship, and set up Hutcliinson, whom Winthrop has described as " a man of very mild temper and weak parts, wholly guided by his wife." Afterwards, if we may credit a contemporary writer and there is nothing in the statement at all improbable Mrs. Hutcliinson took a fancy into her head that the office of magistracy was in itself unlawful, and therefore persuaded her too pliant husband to resign his position. But for a time he certainly performed the duties of a ruler. Deprived of authority in the first settlement, Cod dington and his supporters went to a fine harbour at the southern end of the island, and bewail a new O plantation which they called Newport. Hutchin- * Rhode Island Collection of Records, quoted by Mr. Palfrey. son s town received the name of Portsmouth. It is noteworthy that Coddington s party professed them selves natural subjects of King Charles, and obedient to his laws. The breach between the two sections of the Hutehinsonians was not of long duration. They were re-united in March, 1640, on the motion of Hutcliinson himself; and the colonists next year agreed upon a constitution for the whole island. It was unanimously determined that this consti tution should be a democracy, or popular govern ment. Such are the words used by the colonists, as they appear in the records preserved at Provi dence ; . and the expression is defined as meaning that it should be in the power of the body of freemen, assembled in an orderly manner, or the major part of them, to make the laws, and to de pute such ministers as should see them faithfully executed. It was expressly decreed that " none be accounted a delinquent for doctrine, provided it be not directly repugnant to the government or laws established," and that liberty of conscience be re spected. The signet for the state was ordered to be a sheaf of arrows, with the motto " Amor viiicit omnia." Love, in their free community, was to- conquer all opposition a noble theory, but one- which, unfortunately, is not fitted to the rough and selfish character of human societies. As a protec tion against intruders who might prove inimical to the new settlement, it was ordained "that none should be received as inhabitants or freemen, to build or plant upon the island, but such as should be received by the consent of the body;" but it does not seem that this proviso was intended to confer a power of excluding those who might differ with the original colonists on matters of faith. Indeed, such an interpretation is forbidden by the stipulation in favour of religious liberty, which was. not greatly qualified by the saving clause. It is, probable that the power of exchision was introduced as a protection against loose, disorderly, and immoral characters. But even had it been designed to shut out the holders of obnoxious doctrines those who walked under a covenant of works, as opposed to those who submitted themselves to a covenant of grace it may still be contended that it is less des potic and unjust to deny people admittance to a settlement which they have not yet joined, than to drive them out of one where they have already formed their homes, made their connections, and begun their work. In the one case there may be an error ; in the other there is a substantial wrong. New Haven colony was commenced about the same time as Rhode Island. The chief founders were John. Davenport, a Puritan minister, and 136 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1639. Theophilus Eaton, who acted as Governor for twenty years, being re-elected annually until his death. The former of these able and eminent men. was the son of a Mayor of Coventry, and originally a clergy man of the Church of England, in which capacity he attracted the notice of Laud. But he was an uncompromising opponent of that prelate, and of the ecclesiastical views which Laud forfeited his head in endeavouring to promote. Davenport was compelled to resign his cure and fly into Holland, where for a few years he preached to the English congregation at Amsterdam; but in 1637 he and Eaton went to Massachusetts, arriving there at the time of the Hutchinsonian controversy and the Pequot war. Eaton was the son of a clergyman at Stony Stratford, in Buckinghamshire, and had been employed by the English Government in a diplomatic capacity in Denmark. Both Eaton and Davenport had ideas as to a model state, founded on Scriptural rules to the minutest particulars, such as even Massachusetts did not fully satisfy. They therefore proceeded in March, 1638, to a harbour in Long Island Sound, thirty miles west of the mouth of Connecticut river. A few trusted friends accompanied them, and the little brotherhood held their first meeting of a formal character under the branches of an oak, when Davenport preached to them a sermon. 011 the temptations of Jesus Christ in the wilderness. A few days later, after fasting and prayer, they formed a political association on the basis of a submissive reference to the Bible in nil things. The settlers consisted for the most part of London tradesmen. Davenport had formerly been vicar of St. Stephen s, Coleman Street a thoroughfare connected in many ways with the Puritan and republican movements of that epoch, perhaps owing to the pulpit exhortations of this eloquent pastor. It was there that the five members of the House of Commons accused of treason con cealed themselves. It was there, at a tavern called the Star, that Oliver Cromwell, Hugh Peters, and others, determined on the death of Charles I. It was in Swan Alley, turning out of the same street, that Venner, the Fifth Monarchy Man, oiicocted that insurrection against Charles II. which seems to have been made the pretext for executing Sir Henry "Vane. The Londoners generally were in clined to support the revolutionary party ; and the citizens of Coleman Street Ward appear to have had a special tendency that way. It is probable that Davenport induced several of his parishioners to accompany him, first to Massachusetts, and then to that region of the desert where they were to begin a fresh society after the severest Gospel models. The planters of New Haven obtained a title to their lands by purchase from the Indian tribe whom they found already in possession, and whom they protected against the ferocious Mohawks. The territory thus acquired stretched from the Connecticut river westward to the river Hudson. Some of the Connecticut people afterwards planted themselves on a portion of this land, and the whole is now included in the State of Connecticut ; but for a time it maintained its independence. In 1639, the colonists held their first constituent assembly in a barn. It was then again resolved that the Scriptures should be the rule of the new commonwealth, and it was determined that only church members should be free burgesses. Eaton, Davenport, and five others were appointed to organise the government ; and in August these seven met for the first time, charged with absolute power. Unlike the settlers at Newport, they made 110 reference whatever to the supremacy of the mother-country. They regarded themselves as subjects, not of King Charles, but of King Jesus, whose second coming, to reigii over the earth a thousand years, they expected as an event that would speedily occur. A self-governing state was formed, and, the necessary officers being appointed, Davenport delivered a charge, in which he told the chief magistrate, Theophilus Eaton, that, if he found anything too hard for himself to decide, he was to lay it before him, the minister. This was in imitation of Moses, who used similar words to the people of Israel ; * so that Davenport evidently regarded himself as occupying a position analogous to that of the great Hebrew law-giver. Annual elections were ordered, and the colony, which started with not many more than a hundred settlers, increased so rapidly that in a few years several villages had sprung up on the shores of Long Island Sound, and the followers of Eaton and Davenport talked of planting Delaware. The names of the little towns thus established were all derived from the old country, as in many other parts of English America. Milford, Guildford, Stamford, and Greenwich, are titles which pleasantly recall some of the ancient and memorable sites of England. They were probably given to the new localities by settlers who had come from corresponding places in the ancient home of that race which was now rapidly appropriating to itself the wilds of a vast and virgin continent. To fill these new settlements, and to replenish the old, a large outflow of English population continued for some years. All the Puritan part of * Deuteronomy, i. 17. 1638.] OFFICIAL INTERFERENCE WITH EMIGRATION. 137 the nation and it was no inconsiderable part felt, as might be expected, a profound interest in the great Puritan experiment which was being carried out on the opposite shores of the Atlantic. The write-r of a contemporary work on colonial affairs, quoted by Mr. Bancroft, says that a letter from New England was venerated by the Noncon formists of Old England " as a sacred script, or as the writing of some holy prophet, and was earned many miles, where divers came to hear it." The dissenting clergy lost no opportunity of exhorting their flocks to transport themselves to America, if they could not live at home without a violation of their conscience. The religious believed they saw a special hand of God in the matter ; and even the more worldly-minded were attracted by the prospect of a new home, free from many of the inconveniences of the old. To Charles I. and his ministers, how ever, the emigration appeared in a very different light. In its earlier days it had been regarded with a kind of satisfaction, as opening a channel for the escape of turbulent spirits ; but it soon be came apparent that a political power was growing up in America, that might become a formidable rival to the regal and hierarchical systems which had long existed in. Britain, but which men were now beginning to question. On the 17th of March, 1638, Lord Maynard wrote to the Archbishop of Canterbury that fourteen ships were lying in the Thames, readj to depart for New England, and that " mcrediule ~?".mbers of persons" of good position had sold their land, and were preparing to follow. It appears to have been really apprehended that several parishes would be so greatly impover ished as to be unable to relieve their poor, or discharge their other duties towards the State. Large sums of money were carried over by the emigrants, as well as stores of corn and herds of cattle ; and it was feared that the currency would be deranged and a famine created at the same time. In consequence of these repre sentations by Lord Maynard, the Archbishop brought the matter before the attention of the Privy Council, and another detention of ships was ordered. Looking at all the facts of the case, it can hardly be doubted that a dangerous depletion of English population and English wealth was going on, or was at least imminent. Milton did not exaggerate when he spoke of the people deserting their native country "by heaps." The same effects were being produced, and from similar causes, that were observable nearly half a century later in France, when Louis XIV. revoked the Edict of Nantes. But Charles was as blind as Louis to the only proper way of remedying such evils. They were brought about in both cases by gross injustice by the tyranny of the monarch and the priest. They could only be cured by a more liberal system ; but liberality, and even common fairness, were the last things thought of. It will be recollected that in 1634 the stilling of emigrant vessels from the Thames was temporarily suspended, and then only permitted under certain conditions designed to embarrass the Puritans. On the 30th of April, 1637, a Royal proclamation was issued, the object of which was to re-impose a licence on all emigrants, " because of the many idle and refractory humours, whose only or principal end is to live without the reach of authority." An Order in Council was issued about the same period " to step all ministers unconformable to the disci pline and ceremonies of the Church [of England] ; and that no clergyman should be suffered to go to the foreign plantations withoiit approbation of the Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop of London." This was followed, on the 30th of March, 1638, by an Order in Council, directing that the Lord Trea surer of England should take speedy and effectual measures for the stay of eight ships then in the Thames, bound for New England, and for putting on land all who were 011 board. On the 1st of April it was ordered that the same course should be taken with those who might afterwards be found preparing for the same voyage. A further docu ment, dated April 6th, 1638, speaks of his Majesty " well knowing the factious disposition of the people (or a great part of them) in that plantation, and how unfit and unworthy they are of any support or countenance from hence, in respect of the great dis orders and want of government amongst them, whereof sundry and great complaints have been presented." Four days later, the ships then under restraint were allowed to proceed ; but the system of licensing was maintained. During the summer of 1638, twenty ships, containing at least three thousand persons, went over to New England.* The loss to the old country of so many industrious, respectable, and well-meaning men, was an evil loudly lamented in Parliament. Even Lord Digby, a Royalist, complained that men of the best con science were ready to fly into the wilderness for religion. The leaders of the revolutionary party made this vast emigration one of their chief grounds or accusation against Laud. Pym, in the speech which he delivered at the bar of the House of * The story related by Cotton Mather, in his Xew England History (Book I., chap. 5), and repeated by other writers, to the effect that Hazelrigg, Hampden, and Oliver Cromwell were amongst the intending emigrants who were turned back, ap pears to rest on insufficient foundation. If true, it would be one of the most striking facts in history. 138 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1641. Peers on carrying up the Commons impeach ment against the Archbishop, observed that, owing to the prelate s persecution of loyal subjects on the score of religion, the industry of many thousands of Englishmen had been carried out of the land. This tide of emigration ceased a little before the breaking out of the civil war, when, the Star Chamber and High Commission Court were put down, and Puritans were permitted to practise their religious forms. But between 1620 and 1641, and especially from 1630 to the latter date, a con siderable proportion of the English population passed over to New England. It is calculated that rather more than 21,000 persons (a large number consideiing the then population of England, and the drain to other parts of America as well) thus transported themselves to Massachusetts and the adjoin ing colonies, taking with them money and property to the value of nearly.500,()00.* These men and women were English, with scarcely an ex ception. They came probably from all the forty counties into which the country is divided, but chiefly from the north, east, and west. There was talk at one time of Scotland, and of Protestant Ulster, sending large contin gents but they do not appear to have done so. Cromwell despatched some of his Scotch prisoners of war to Boston ; a hundred and twenty Scoto-Irish families settled in New Hampshire in 1719; and the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, in 1685, caused a small French emigration into Massachusetts. Yet these impor tations did not qualify to any serious extent the prevailing English character of the race. During the * This, however, was a small loss compared with that of France after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, when it is supposed that the population of the country was reduced to the extent of between three and four hundred thousand ; to which are to be added many thousands who perished on the scaffold, in prison, at the galleys, and in attempting to escape. The loss in money has been calculated at sixty millions. (Smiles s Huguenots.) Even assuming the population of France in 1685 to have been sixteen millions (for which there seems some warrant), as against five millions in England in 1G41, the de pletion was much greater in the former country than in the latter. BBZWSTEKH CHAIlt I llESEKVEl) AT PILGRIM HALL, XEW 1 LYMOrTH. course of later years, a large number of Irish have settled in New England, as well as in other divisions of America ; but they are a nation apart, forming the lowest stratum of the population, intermarrying amongst themselves, retaining their religion and their national ways, and regarded with suspicion and dislike. The New England States are rightly so called. "There is probably not a country in England," says Mr. Palfrey, " occupied by a popu lation of purer English blood than theirs." t Vir ginia and its neighbours are also mainly of English stock ; and from these early colonies, in the north and in the south, a Large part of the population of the United States has sprung. Successive emigrations have spread over the whole vast area the descendants of the original settlers from England, mixed very largely in certain quarters with French, Spanish, Dutch, German, and many other foreign elements. A further emigration from England took place in the reigns of Charles II. and James II., when the Nonconformists again felt their position un safe at home ; but from 1688 to about the close of the eighteenth century, New England received no great accessions from abroad, and during the Common wealth there had been a reflux from the Puritan colonies to the mother-country. Never theless, the six States comprised under the designation of New England were capable, in the year 1798, of furnishing an army of 165,000 men; so that the people must have multiplied at a considerable rate, seeing that 165,000 was the total population in 1720, according to the highest calculation of Neal. It was reckoned, some years ago, that more than 750,000 natives of New England were living in other parts of the Union. The New England race, according to Mr. Palfrey, has contributed largely to the population of the State of New York, and makes a majority in some of the newly-planted western States ; and the same author, writing in 1859, compiited that one-third of the people forming t Preface to the History of New England during the Stuart Dynasty. 1341.] ENGLISH POPULATION OF AMEKICA. 139 NORTH AMERICAN INDIAN TYPES. (After Catliil.} the Englisli-American Republic were descended from the Pilgrim Fathers, their associates, and their followers. That the men who crossed the Atlantic in the first half of the seven teenth century came from the most essentially .English part of the population of their native countiy, may be inferred from the remarkably Anglo-Saxon names borne by most of the settlers, and from the fact that they were members of the middle and lower classes, where there had been but little admixture of Norman blood. Some of these names have survived in America, and died out in 140 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1643. England ; and there is probably a greater infusion of foreign blood in the large towns of the old country (owing to the French emigration of 1685, and various subsequent inroads) than in the towns and villages of Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. It may be added that the very cattle of New Eng land come from the old English stock ; that the very herbage of the meadow s springs from English roots. The English feeling of the New England States continued in unabated force for several generations, and is not yet extinct. Daniel Neal, whose history was published in 1720, speaks very emphatically on this head. He records that, in the concerns of civil life (their religious practices being another matter), the New Englanders affected to be as English as possible. "There is no fashion, in. London," he adds, " but in three or four months is to be seen at Boston ; nay, they are fond of the very name and person of an Englishman ; insomuch that some who have had no great affection for the people, on the account of their preciseness" (i.e., their Puritanical austerity), " have yet been so agreeably entertained by them as to leave the country with regret." This admirable Dissenting minister, whose views are generally characterised by a liberality beyond his age, goes on to observe that it would be impossible for New England to subsist of itself for some centuries to come, as the people must starve without a free trade with Europe ; " so that," he proceeds, " if we could suppose them to rebel against England, they must throw themselves into the arms of some other potentate, who would protect them no longer than he could sell them to advantage. The French and Spaniards are enemies to their religion and civil liberties, and the Dutch are too cautious a people to run the hazard of losing their own country for the alliance of another at so great a distance. Tis therefore the grand interest of New England to remain sub ject to the crown of England, and by their dutiful behaviour to merit the removal of those few hard ships and inconveniences they complain of They love the English Constitution, and would live and die in the defence of it, because, when that is gone, they know their own must soon follow." Though Neal was an excellent man, he was 110 prophet. The rebellion against the mother-country, and the achievement of independence, were events much nearer than he supposed. They were pre cipitated by the injustice of the Imperial policy, and they created for a time a feeling of alienation and anger which opened a wide breach between the parent and the child. It is much to be regretted that this feeling has been so often envenomed by incon siderate writers on both sides of the Atlantic. The two divisions of the English race are natural allies, whom 110 idle jealousies of State, or petty differences of manners, should be allowed to part. When the old land was preparing for civil war in 1643, the New England settlements were in a con dition of internal peace, comfort, and prosperity. The fanaticism of the early settlers derogated not a little from their wisdom as statesmen, and from their worth as human beings ; yet it left them in possession of many sterling qualities. They created in the wilderness, in less than a quarter of a century, a civilised community, occupying a large extent of country, and distinguished by some of the best features of long-established empires. By 1643 they had planted fifty tow-ns and villages; had built thirty or forty churches, together with a large number of ministers houses and other dwell ings, a castle, a college, prisons, and forts ; had made roads and causeways ; had turned large spaces of primeval forest into corn-fields ; and had en closed many gardens and orchards.* Before that date, vessels of four hundred tons had been con structed in the harbours of New England, and the manufacture of cotton and woollen had been com menced. The college established in Massachusetts was one which has since become famous. In October, 1636, the General Court of Boston agreed to give 400 towards a place of superior tuition. This was during the governorship of Henry "Vane, and it has been remarked by the celebrated American orator, Edward Everett, that this Massachusetts Assembly was the first body in which the represen tatives of a nation freely voted their own money for founding an educational institute. The fact was the more praiseworthy on account of the cir cumstances under which the colony was then placed. Massachusetts was at that moment threatened by the interference of the mother-country, convulsed by the Antinomian heresy, and involved in a war with the Pequots for the defence of Connecticut. Newtown tlu-ee miles from Boston was fixed on as the site of the college, and the project received material assistance from the Rev. John Harvard, who by his will left 779 17s. 2d. being half of his estate, and no inconsiderable sum in those days for erecting the college. Harvard died not long after, and the Court, in 1639, ordered that the institution should be called by his name. Newtown was rechristened Cambridge probably because Harvard was a graduate of Emmanuel College in the ancient Cambridge. The new college was opened in 1640, and ten years * New England s First Fruits. 1643. 1647] THE NEW ENGLAND COLONIES. 141 later was incorporated by a charter from the Govern ment of Massachusetts. The liberal benefactor who had helped to establish it bequeathed his library to this seat of learning, as well as the moiety of his possessions. The books consisted of two hundred and sixty volumes, comprising classical and patristic works, modern theology, and general literature ; but, unfortunately, all were destroyed by a fire in 1770, with the exception of one volume. The conductors of Harvard College set up a printing press as soon as they got into working order, and issued a number of small tracts, as well as a new version of David s Psalms. But New England did more for education than the mere establishment of a college, which, after all, cannot advance the humble instruction of humble people, however much it may promote the ends of scholarship. It was determined that no child should be allowed to remain in ignorance of the rudiments of knowledge. In 1647 it was ordered in all the Puritan colonies "that every township, after the Lord hath increased them to the number of fifty householders, shall appoint one to teach all children to write and read ; and where any town shall in crease to the number of one hundred families, they shall set up a grammar-school ; the masters thereof being able to instruct youth so far as they may be fitted for the University." Tinder this excellent system, the New Englanders became an intelligent and a thinking race, and were formed to the responsible duties of self-government. Their faults were chiefly those of religious bigotry and intellectual narrow - miiidediiess certainly very grave and important faults, productive of many tragical results ; yet it would be a fanaticism equal to their own to deny that the New Englanders exhibited some of the best qualities of the race to which they belonged, and vindicated their right to take a place among the nations of the world. CHAPTER XVII. The New England Colonies towards the Middle of the Seventeenth Century The General "Body of Liberties" of 1641 Nature of that Ordinance Determination to enforce Religion by Law Austerity of the New England Kule of Life Effect of this on Morals Prevalence of Vice in New England after the Early Days of the Settlement Overstraining of Religion Ordinance for the Reformation of Manners Opposition to Romanism Secular Marriages and Funerals The Manner of Public "Worship Sympathy of the New England Settlers with the Popular Opi>osition to Charles I. Implied Revival of the Massachusetts Patent Augmentations of the Territory of Massachusetts Death and Character of William Brewster Proposed Federation of the New England Colonies Preamble to the Articles of Agreement creating the Federation General Provisions of the Agreement "The United Colonies of New England" established in 1643 Com mission for the Government of the American Colonies instituted by the Long Parliament of England. TOWARDS the middle of the seventeenth century, the New England colonies had acquired a certain consistence and a definite character which marked them out as homogeneous, and distinct from the other communities of the world. The two facts which gave form and colour to their corporate life, were their Puritanism, and their position as rising States established in the wilderness. With the growth of revolutionary principles in England, after the assembling of the Long Parliament in. 1640, the New England plantations entered on a period of peace. They had no longer reason to fear the capricious jealousy of the King. Their theo ries of religion and government rapidly acquired ascendancy in the old country, and there was every disposition to leave the colonists to themselves. In this way they established a number of perfectly inde pendent commonwealths, in all of which, though with suffrages of various degrees of liberality, the great principle of popular self-government was asserted and carried out. The deliberations of the several local Assemblies touched on all subjects which concerned the worldly fortunes or spiritual estate of the people; and in Massachusetts, in December, 1641, a general " Body of Liberties " was determined on, which formally guaranteed the citizen those rights that beforehand he had held only by favour. From the first peopling of Massachusetts by Englishmen down to the date in question, there had been 110 set of statutes for the regulation of justice, nor had the Common Law of England been recognised as of force in the colony. The Magistrates, in their judicial capacity, had acted in accordance with their own sense of right, and had doubtless in many instances exhibited a regard for equity. But it has been seen that they were as liable as other men to be inflamed by passion or warped by prejudice, and the people veiy naturally wished to obtain some security for the freedom which they had quitted their native country to enjoy. The governing body, however, were for the most part opposed to this desire, and, under various pretexts, delayed its 142 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1641. accomplishment for several years. Tlieir objection was based on the consideration that the framing of a code of statute law would transgress the limits of their charter, since they must needs make some provisions that would be " repugnant to the laws of England;" and it was therefore held by these cautious legislators to be safer to create a system of jurisprudence by the gradual, stealthy, and un noticed means of practice and custom, as they had already done in matters of church discipline. This reason no longer existed when the altered state of affairs in England removed the former dread of interference. Accordingly, in a session of three weeks duration, the General Court of Massachusetts established a hundred fundamental laws (including the preamble and close), which were the Magna Charta of the settlement. At the same time it was resolved that these enactments should be read and considered in every General Court that should be held within the ensuing three years, and that only then, in the event of their not being altered or repealed, should they become law. The first paragraph of this code states : " No man s life shall be taken away ; no man s honour or good name shall be stained ; no man s person shall be arrested, restrained, banished, dismembered, nor anyways punished ; no man shall be deprived of his wife or children ; no man s goods or estate shall be taken away, nor any way endangered, under colour of law, or countenance of authority ; unless it be by virtue or equity of some express law of the country warranting- the same, established by the General Court, and sufficiently published, or, in case of the defect of the law in any particular case, by the word of God ; and in capital cases, or in cases concerning dismembering or banishment, according to that word, to- be judged by the General Court." The laws thus created were to some extent based on the legislation of Moses, but not slavishly so, for there were many points of dissimilarity. The punishment of death was not decreed in so many instances, though to modern critics it will appear to have been too frequently resorted to. Ten offences were declared capital; amongst which were included idolatry, witchcraft, blasphemy (when " direct, express, presumptuous, or high-handed" a rather vague and elastic qualification), and treason against the commonwealth, which seems to have comprised, by implication, allegiance to the English King. The privileges and duties of freemen were defined by these enactments ; the liberties and prerogatives of churches were set forth ; and women, children, servants, foreigners, and brute animals, were pro tected by various penalties. Bond-slavery, villanage, and captivity, were declared unlawful, except in the- case of prisoners taken in war, or of persons who sold themselves, or were sold by others. "And these," it Avas added, "shall have all the liberties and Christian usages which the law of God, established in Israel concerning such persons, doth morally require." Here, however, was the ugly fact of slavery acknowledged and sanctioned in the Massa chusetts Bill of Rights. This body of laws was the production of Nathaniel Ward, formerly a Puritan clergyman in the old country, and in his early life a student and practise! 1 in the Common Law courts. His experience as a lawyer corrected his intolerance as a minister. Considering the general tone of opinion in his day, and the character of the com munity for which he legislated, his code was distin guished by much liberality. Yet in certain respects the laws of Massachusetts were not such as would now be generally approved. The founders of the State held and acted on the usual opinion of that age, that religion was to be enforced by law. Everybody was to attend church, under a penalty for omitting to do so. The rule of life was strict and austere, and opinion allowed but little relaxation from the routine of work and devotion. The picture presented to us by Haw thorne in his " Scarlet Letter " is no exaggeration of the truth. Some of the early writers on the American colonies assert that these restrictions resulted in a highly virtuous state of society. One authority, in a work published in 1641, remarks on the rarity of profane swearing, drunkenness, and beggary in New England. Another states that the soil of that plantation would 110 more tolerate vile persons and loose livers than that of Ireland would brook venomous creatures. Nathaniel Ward, in a tract- issued after his return to England, bears similar testimony ; and other writers give evidence to the same effect. No doubt, a great deal of ex ternal decorum prevailed, and this is an. advantage as far as it goes ; but the universal experience of humanity proves that over-strictness has its dangers, and the history of New England is no exception to the rule. Immorality lurked beneath the solemn and restrained Puritan manner, and in some instances struck very deep indeed. Denied the harmless pleasures of less starch societies, perplexed by theological problems which he was often unable to solve, and continually frowned upon by a gloomy and threatening interpretation of religion, the New Englaiider sometimes sought relief in secret profli gacy. Cotton Mather, in two sermons preached at Boston in 1697, comments, with many details, 011 the extreme corruption which had by that time entered into the community ; and he adds an 1641.] CHARACTER OF THE NEW ENGLANDERS. 143 Appendix derived from a History of Criminals pub lished by another minister.* The murdering of illegitimate children was frequent. Adultery was not uncommon. Enormities of which we read but little in the records of the worst Pagan ages were committed by New Englanders of grave repute, whose regular attendance at church, and godly exhortations to sinners generally, had furnished matter of edification, for years. Drunkenness, impiety, and hardness of heart, seem to have been rife. The worst vices of old and wealthy cities were combined with an extravagance of wickedness such as, it might be supposed, only the savage free dom of the desert could produce. All this occurred Ji generation or two after the planting of Puritan bodies in the northern parts of America. It is not difficult to see that such outbreaks were attributable quite as much to the undue pressure which had been brought to bear upon men as to natural depravity ; yet the rulers of the commonwealth, whenever startled by any abnormal case, were for curing the disease by still greater strictness and still more incessant preaching. Dr. Sangrado killed his patients by excess of bleeding and warm, water ; yet he was always ready to maintain that they died because they had not been bled and drenched enough. The early settlers in New England were un doubtedly sincere enthusiasts, with many noble, if impracticable, aspirations. They looked for a state of perpetual grace, and for a government of miracles. Everything was to be granted to prayer, and the riches of the land were to be the heritage of the saints as long as they did not forget their sainthood. It was soon found that positive laws were as neces sary in a brotherhood of saints as in any other com munity; and it ought to have been equally apparent that the human mind will not bear so continual and severe a strain on the sentiment of religious re verence. Attempts of this nature result either in a callous and avowed indifference to all such con siderations, or in the substitution of hypocritical profession for truthful feeling. Governor Bradford, in his "History of Plymouth Colony," quotes a passage from a Nonconformist divine, who, describ ing the state of affairs in England in the early days of Puritanism, remarked: "Religion hath been amongst us this thirty*five years ; but the more it is published, the more it is contemned and reproached of many. Thus, not profaneness nor wickedness, but religion itself, is a by-word, a mocking-stock, and matter of reproach ; so that in England at this day the man or woman that begins to profess re- * Mather s Magnalia Christi Americana, Book VI., clnp. 5. ligion, and to serve God, must resolve with himself to sustain mocks and injuries, even as though he lived among the enemies of religion ; and this common experience hath been too apparent." If the same results were not visible in New England in the following century, it was only because a severe system of repression was in force. Nevertheless, in spite of all checks, the Massachusetts Magistrates, in 1668, conceived it necessary to promote a re formation of manners, having observed that the youth of that age had degenerated from the strict ness of their fathers. They accordingly issued a circular to the elders and ministers of all towns in the colony, exhorting them to be diligent and care ful in catechising and instructing the people under their charge in the principles of the Christian reli gion, "and that not only in public, but privately from house to house." The elders and ministers were likewise to inform themselves how their hearers profited by these discourses, and whether their con versations agreed therewith ; moreover, they were to take advantage of all occasions for applying suit able exhortations for the rebuke of evil-doers and the encouragement of those who lived well. That is to say, the Sangrado system, having already failed, was to be applied with redoubled force. Neal says that the measures taken by the Magistrates proved effectual in restraining vice, and keeping alive the dying power of religion. Yet, in less than thirty years, Cotton Mather bewailed the abnormal de pravity of New Englanders, and threatened the special judgments of God on such hardened sinners. With all this excess of religious feeling, the manners of the colonists must have seemed to many in the old country very irreverential. There was no special observance of Christmas, or of other seasons regarded by the majority of Christians as holy. As these Puritan reformers endeavoured (but with only temporary success) to call the months and the days of the week by their simple numerical sequence, in order that they might suppress the memory of heathenish or idolatrous names ; so, that they might root out all Romanising tendencies, they forbade any recognition of the accustomed feast-days and fast-days of the Church from which they had seceded, though they had similar observances for special occasions, and the Sabbath (as being the day of Christ s resurrection) was kept with great strictness. Marriage was with them a civil contract, performed by a magis trate ; and they even objected to sermons at such a time, as being a pretext for returning to the custom of the Anglican and Roman communions. Some generations later, however, marriages were per 1 - formed by the ministers. Their funerals were 144 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1641. conducted without any religious ceremonial what ever, and in silence, though the ministers were generally present. These ministers were chosen by the body of worshippers whose spiritual affairs they looked after ; and they were denied all clerical character with relation to other bodies, or to society as savouring of idolatrous practices. Facility of exhortation was necessary to a New England pastor ; but there were some who thought that religious exercises might be overdone. Bradford relates of Elder Brewster, in his memoir of that truly excellent man, that "he always thought it C MOXUMEXT OVER BRADFORD S GRAVE AT NEW PLYMOUTH. at large. The manner of worship was simple even to barrenness. In the plain unornamented meeting houses, the men (who were generally completely armed) sat on one side, the women on the other, and the boys between. Before bells Avere common, the worshippers were summoned by beat of drum. The prayers were extempore ; the length of the sermon (also extempore) was arbitrarily determined by the sands of an hour-glass ; psalms were sung to a few tunes, but instrumental music was prohibited. were better for ministers to pray oftener, and divide their prayers, than to be long and tedious in the same : his reason was that the heart and spirits of all, especially the weak, could hardly continue and stand bent (as it were) so long towards God, as they ought to do in that diity, without flagging and falling off." The observation sufficiently implies that others thought and acted differently.* * Palfrey s and Neal s Histories of New England ; Cotton Mather ; Bradford s History of Plymouth Colony. 1641.] NEW ENGLAND MANNERS. Apart from religion, the laws of New England were rather mild than severe. Burglary and high way robbery were not punished by death, as they were in the old country down to a rather recent period. Adultery, indeed, was capital ; but the great evil of ill-assorted marriages was met by a legal provision for divorce, though this appears to have been very seldom set in motion. In cases of seduction of unmarried girls, the law compelled the seducer to marry the victim of his unbridled where. Captain Underhill, a man confessedly of loose and immoral conduct, is stated by Winthrop to have been " accustomed to take great pride in his bravery and neatness." It was found necessary, in the early colonial days of Massachusetts, to make laws against the ordinary wearing of gold, silver, and silk lace, embroidered caps, immoderately large sleeves, slashed apparel, and other eccentricities of costume which were considered either ostentatious or immodest. Yet, some years afterwards, Nathaniel BIBLE BROuairr OVER IN THE " MAYFLOWER," IN PILGRIM HALL, NEW PLYMOUTH. TOMB OF THE MATE OF THE " MAYFLOWER." passion ; and the woman herself was treated with a leniency which was equally honourable and wise. These are facts which should always be recorded to the credit of the New Eng- landers. They qualify what, after every allow ance has been made, must still be regarded as the prevalent harshness of colonial manners, and gather these nigged Puritans into the common fold of humanity. That the demeanour of the New England people Avas generally grave and sedate, has appeared in the course of this narrative. But there were ex ceptions to the rule. Roysterers occasionally found their way even into those staid communities, and the little vanities of life sprang up there as else- 13 Ward, author of the Body of Liberties, rebuked the love of dress which lie found among the women of his day. In 1638, great astonishment was created in the streets of New Plymouth by the apparition of a gentleman in red silk stockings ; indeed, the sight was so extraordinary that it led to an investigation, when it appeared that the gar ments had been stolen in Boston. The "abominable practice of drinking healths " was subjected to a fine by a law of Massachusetts, passed in 1639; and the observance of the Sabbath was so rigidly en forced that walking in the streets and fields, or travelling from town to town, on that day, was a punishable offence. Amusements and games were forbidden. The diet of the people was simple, but 145 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1653. sufficient. Household furniture amongst the better classes was not wanting in a certain stately pomp ; but with the humbler it was bare and primitive enough. Nevertheless, existence was easily borne and exceptionally prolonged. Mr. Bancroft re cords that the average duration of life in New England compared with Europe was doubled ; that, of all who were born in the colonies during their early years, full four in nineteen attained the age of seventy ; and that, of those who lived beyond ninety, the proportion was still more re markable. Communities so highly imbued with republican and anti-prelatical ideas were certain to sympathise very warmly with the popular movement in the old country. As the Virginians and Marylanders generally ranged themselves 011 the side of the monarch, the New Englanders identified their interests with those of the Parliament. Several of their leading men returned to the land which had sent them forth, and took service with the soldiers of liberty. When the "Westminster Assembly of Divines was first contemplated, three eminent New England ministers Cotton of Boston, Hooker of Hartford, and Davenport of New Haven were invited to join, with a view, it is supposed, to their strengthening the Independent element, which was then weaker than that of the Presbyterians. The invitation was contained in a letter written in September, 1642, and signed, amongst others, by Oliver Cromwell, Nathaniel Fiennes, Sir Arthur Hazelrigg, and Oliver St. John. The ministers addressed were unable or unwilling to leave their brethren ; but about a year and a quarter earlier, four New England colonists of good position, including the celebrated Hugh Peters and the younger John Winthrop, had been despatched to ihe mother country, to congratulate the reforming party there on the favourable turn in their affairs, to represent and advance colonial interests, and to give any advice that might be required as to the settling of church discipline in England. As a consequence, apparently, of this mission, the New England colonies were in 1643 relieved from the payment of customs and other duties till the further directions of the House of Commons. An order was also made that the Massachusetts people should enjoy all liberties according to their patent ; whereby, as the elder Winthrop observes in his Journal, " our patent, which had been condemned ;and called in upon an erroneous judgment in a quo warranto, was implicitly revived and confirmed." This was in consequence of a petition to the House of Lords presented by some of the colonists then in England, though without autho rity from the Massachusetts Court. Winthrop and his coadjutors were unwilling to do anything which should seem to acknowledge the right of the mother country to exercise jurisdiction over them. They desired complete independence ; though upon what ground of right, considering the origin of the colony, it would be hard to say. As the rival parties in England were fighting out their battles, the New England plantations, with occasional disagreements among themselves, were pursuing a course of natural development. Massa chusetts was augmented by the accession of New Hampshire in 1641, and by the annexation of Maine arid Lygonia some years later. Maine be longed to Sir Ferdinando Gorges ; Lygonia, to Alexander Rigby, a Republican member of the Long Parliament.* The former plantation, being neglected by its proprietor during the civil troubles in England, instituted a government of its own ; while George Cleaves, with a Council of Assistants, carried on the affairs of Lygonia as the representa tive of Rigby. The two provinces adjoined one another, and questions of boundary arose between them, which were referred to the arbitration of Massachusetts. These, however, were soon swallowed up by the claims of that colony on its own account. Interpreting the phraseology of its patent in a way the most favourable to itself, Massachusetts asserted a right to the territories of Gorges and Rigby. After a good deal of resistance, the people of both plantations those of Maine in 1652, and those of Lygonia in 1653 consented to what they could no longer prevent, and were united with the powerful commonwealth which had its seat of government at Boston. The terms granted them were liberal, but the arrangement did not escape dispute after the accession of Charles II., as we shall find further on. Other augmentations of the territory of Massachusetts, both to the north and to the south, took place about the same period, and the pre-eminence of Avhat is sometimes called the Bay State was thus firmly secured. Connecticut and New Haven also enlarged their boundaries by purchase from the Indians ; the other settlements continued to increase in num bers ; additional towns Avere founded, and the English race and language pushed their way farther and farther into the wilderness. * The territory of Lygonia included the lower part of the river Saco, and extended in a north -eastward direction along the coast, ne?.rly to Casco Bay. (Palfrey s New England.) Ifc must not lie confounded with Laconia, to which allusion has previously been made, and which was bounded by the sea, the St. Lawrence, the Merrimac, and the Kenncbec. (Bancroft s United States. ) Both names have long since disappeared, and the lands been otherwise incorporated. 1644.] DEATH OF BREWSTER. 147 In 1644, Plymouth sustained a loss in the death of William Brewster, who had come out to America with the original body of emi grants conveyed by the Mayflower, and who pre viously to that date had formed one of the English congregation in Holland. At the time of his decease he was seventy-eight years of age, and therefore already elderly on the formation of the colony in 1620-21. More than twenty years of life and active work, however, remained to him, and he was justly regarded as the patriarch of the little commonwealth. Up to a few days of his death, which occurred on the 16th of April, he worked in the fields, as well as performed the duties of his office. His last sickness was brief, and until the final day of his life he did not wholly keep his bed. After a few hours of failing speech, he departed without any pangs, about nine or ten o clock at night. His fellow-worker, Bradford a much younger man than Brewster, whom he had known from his own days of boyhood writes of the departed worthy in his history of the colony : " I should say something of his life, if to say a little were not worse than to be silent ; but I cannot wholly forbear." The character which he proceeds to give bears eloquent testimony to the many virtues of this Pilgrim Father to his piety, innocence, wisdom, cheerfulness, sociability, tender heartedness, fortitude, and courage. Even if we allow a little for the kindly exaggeration of friend ship, we must acknowledge in William Brewster a man of men. Opinions may differ as to his theo logical views, and many may think that, like most of his contemporaries, he insisted too much on the outer forms and set phraseology of religion ; but it can hardly be doubted that his spirit was illuminated by all that is best in religion by love, and reverence, and trust. His admirable capacity of endurance, and easy contentedness of nature, were in themselves of the highest value to the young colony. When, in the early days of privation, bread itself failed, and nothing but oysters and clams were set on his table, he would express himself in the words of Deuteronomy, giving thanks that they could " suck of the abundance of the seas, and of treasures hid in the sand." Yet Brewster was no mere enthusiast or visionary, but a man acquainted with the affairs of this world. In his youth he had been employed by William Davison, Secretary of State to Queen Elizabeth, with whom he went on an embassy to the Low Countries, to take possession of the three fortified towns which were consigned to the English Government as security for the repayment of money advanced to the United Provinces in their struggle with Spain. After his return to England, he was one of the Puritan party who suffered persecution. Ultimately he fled into Holland, where he maintained himself by teaching English, and afterwards by printing. The books he printed were for the most part such as could not have been issued in London, because of their discussing ecclesiastical and political ideas that were fox-bidden in Brewster s native country a fact which gave great offence to the English authorities, as these books were frequently smuggled into England. Sir Dudley Carleton (afterwards Viscount Dorchester), King James s Ambassador in Holland, watched the printer very closely, and at one time endeavoured to arrest him, but withoiit success. Brewster was a ruling " Elder " that is to say, an overseer in John Robinson s church, and, though he never assumed the pastoral office, was himself a fervid and effective preacher. He had the satisfaction of seeing the infant colony of Plymouth, which he had helped to found, grow ing up to maturity ; and he died at peace with all men, in gratitude and in hope. With the increase of their strength, and the con tinual approximation of their interests, which nevertheless clashed at times for want of a common understanding, the New England colonies became sensible of the need that existed for some bond of union. The conception had arisen a few years before it was carried into execution, but the par ticular circumstance which called it into life was the necessity of greater protection against the Dutch felt by the settlers in Connecticut. The English colonists were, indeed, menaced by foreigners in varioits directions ; for, in addition to the Dutch and French on the western and eastern frontiers, some Swedes had established themselves in Dela ware Bay, to the south. With the Dutch there were frequent collisions, and their power was mani festly such as to be formidable. Moreover, the Indians were again threatening hostilities. It accordingly occurred to certain of the Magistrates and ministers of Connecticut, who were at Boston at the close of August, 1637, to propose some kind of federation to the authorities of Massachusetts, in which, if they pleased, the people of Plymouth might join. Difficulties delayed the realisation of this idea ; but it was revived two years after, and again in 1642. At the latter date, Massachusetts, which had previously exhibited great lukewarm- ness in the matter, began to take up the project with zeal, moved, perhaps, by the growing troubles in England, and the advisability of con centrating all the force of the Puritan colonies in case the Royal and prelatical cause should triumph. In May, 1643, a General Court was held at Boston, 148 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1643. at Avhich the colonies of Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven were represented by two com missioners for each. Massachusetts, as being the largest and most important of the New England settlements, was represented by the Governor, two Magistrates, and three Deputies. A Mr. Fenwick also appeared, in the interests of the fort of Saybrook and the adjacent lands, which by the Connecticut people were held to be a portion of their territory, but which were also claimed by the Earl of Warwick and his fellow-patentees as belonging exclusively to them. It does not appear, however, that Fenwick took any active part in the discus sions, or that he voted, or signed the document ultimately drawn up ; and at the close of the following year he conveyed to the Connecticut jurisdiction, in consideration of certain money payments, the ground in dispute. The result of the deliberations on the Federal question, in May, 1643, was the creation of a species of union amongst the four colonies, the terms of which union were expressed in an Agreement consisting of twelve -articles. In the preamble to these articles it was stated : " Whereas we all came into these parts of America with one and the same end and aim namely, to advance the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to enjoy the liberties of the Gospel in purity with peace ; and whereas in our settling (by a wise providence of God) we are further dispersed upon the sea-coasts and rivers than Avas at first intended, so that we cannot, according to our desire, with convenience communicate in one govern ment and jurisdiction ; and whereas we live en compassed with people of several nations and strange languages, which hereafter may prove injurious to us, or our posterity; and forasmuch as the natives have formerly committed sundry in dolences and outrages upon several plantations of the English, and have of late combined themselves against us ; and seeing by reason of those sad distractions in England which they have heard of, and by which they know we are hindered from that humble way of seeking advice, or reaping those comfortable fruits of protection which at other times we might well expect : we therefore do conceive it our bounden duty without delay to enter into a present consociation amongst ourselves, for mutual help and strength in all our future concernments ; that, as in nation and religion, so in other respects, Ave be and continue one." The Federation thus established received the de signation of the United Colonies of New England. By the articles of agreement, the plantations in question entered into a firm and perpetual league of friendship and amity for offence and defence, mutual advice and succour, upon all just occasions. Com plete jurisdiction in local affairs was secured to each of the contracting settlements ; but the charge of all just wars, on whatever part of the Federation they should fall, was to be borne by the entire body in due proportion, and, except in sudden exigencies, no one member of the Federation should make war solely on its own account and by its own authority. Any material gain proceeding from wars, whether in lands, goods, or persons, was to be proportionably divided among the confederates. At the same time it was agreed that, if any one of the colonies should be invaded in consequence of wrongful acts of its own, the said colony should make just satisfaction to the party wronged, and should bear all the charges of the war. The Federal GoA-ernment was vested in the hands of eight commissioners (two for each of the four colonies), deputed by their several General Courts, who were to determine on all affairs of Avar and peace, leagues, aids, charges, and numbers of men to be employed in hostilities ; the di\-ision of spoils ; the receiving of more plantations into the union ; and all other matters proper to a Federation exclusive of such as belonged solely to the individual jurisdictions. In the event of an agreement not being arrived at by these eight commissioners, or by six of them, the business was to be referred to the General Courts of the seA^eral colonies. The Com missioners Avere to meet regularly once every year, besides holding extraordinary meetings if found necessary ; and the place of assembly Avas to be alternately Boston, Hartford, NCAV Haven, and Ply mouth, thus giving each settlement the honour in rotation, until some central place should be agreed upon, which might be found equally convenient for all the jurisdictions. The deliberations of the Commissioners were to be directed by a president chosen by themselves from among their OAvn number, Avho, hoAvever, Avas to be invested \vitli no extraor dinary powers for hindering the progress of business, or casting additional weight into any scale. The matters to be considered were to include the framing and establishing of agreements and orders in general cases of a civil nature, and the best mode of dealing Avith the Indians, so that they might neither gw\\ insolent, nor be injured without satisfaction. It Avas also agreed that servants running aAvay from their masters, and prisoners escaping from justice, slumld, after due process of law, be delivered up by the colony where they had taken refuge to that from which they had fled. Provision was likewise made for cases of sudden Avar, Avhere the occasion could not be delayed until the assembly of all the Commissioners, and for such proceedings as might be 1643.] THE UNITED COLONIES. H9 rendered necessary by any breach of the articles of agreement by one or more of the contracting pai-ties. This important document was signed by the Secre tary of the General Court of Massachusetts, and by the Commissioners for Connecticut and New Haven, on the 19th of May, 1643; but the Com missioners from Plymouth, having brought with them no instructions to sign, but only authority to discuss, desired time for consulting with their principals. The result of the deliberations of the General Court for that colony was that the articles were ratified, without reserve ; and the signatures of the Plymouth representatives were appended on the 7th of September in the same year. The four New England colonies which were parties to this undertaking must be regarded as having created the germ of what afterwards became the United States of America. The general idea was doubtless suggested by the example of the United Provinces of the Netherlands ; but the connection established amongst themselves by Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven, was of a looser kind. It did not produce a separate nationality, but it led to the formation of a colonial commonwealth more powerful, and more exactly organised, than any hitherto existing in that part of America. Experience showed that it sufficiently answered a real and legitimate want, for it lasted until 1684, when the authority of the mother country was completely reasserted in the closing days of Charles II. s reign. Yet the Federation did not increase the number of its members. The settlements of Gorges beyond the Piscatacpaa were refused admission, because the ideas of the colonists, both in religion and civil administration, were antagonistic to those of the Puritans. The plantations of Providence and Rhode Island were also rejected, on account of their unsettled condition, and perhaps also out of a fear that Antinomianism might thus be rein- troduced. But the four allied States maintained their federal bond for several years, and Oliver Cromwell, in the height of his power, did not venture to disturb the league. Although it had passed away for a century when the final inde pendence of the colonies was achieved, it furnished a precedent for the greater and broader Union of that age. Very shortly after the conclusion of these articles of agreement, the Parliament of England instituted a Commission for the government of the American colonies, with a view to re-establishing that Imperial authority which had been allowed to lapse. The governing body so formed consisted of six lords and twelve commoners, with the Earl of Warwick (one of the popular party) at its head. The Commissioners were authorised to "provide for, order, and dispose all things which they should from time to time find most fit and advantageous o to the well-governing, securing, strengthening, and preserving of the said plantations ;" and they were to make official appointments in those distant dependencies, and to remove such persons as should appear objectionable. Amongst the Commissioners were Lord Saye and Sele, Sir Arthur Hazelrigg, Heiuy Vane the Younger, Sir Benjamin Kudyerd, Pym, Cromwell, and Samuel Yassall. These men were not very likely to coerce the colonies, or to proceed in a reactionary spirit ; and in fact they do not appear to have taken any measures for the vindication of their authority. It was on the 2nd of November, 1643, that the Commission was issued, and by that time England was in the throes of civil war. Even had there been any disposition to carry matters with a high hand, such a course would have been impossible when the form of government at home was doubtful from day to day, when the energies of the nation were being con sumed in internecine struggles, and when the attention of politicians was absorbed by matters of more immediate import. Yet the assertion of power was a very natural one, and it can hardly be impugned, unless on principles leading to the ut most extremes of disintegration. The colonists on the other side of the Atlantic were Englishmen settled on English territory in virtue of a charter issued by the English Government. It was not to be expected that the mother country should, with out being consulted in the matter, and without having committed any gross injustice, quietly see its rights and jurisdiction set aside, as if it had had no more to do with the plantations than the Great Cham of Tartary. That the rule of a parent State should be lightly exercised over its depen dencies, is undoubtedly one of the leading truths of political science. But an Empire with any sense of its dignity cannot consent to its own dismem berment, or see its subjects setting up distinct and perhaps rival governments. The Long Par liament was unable to cany out its ideas of colonial management ; but it was proper not to allow the light to lapse, for want of a definite assertion of its existence. In more settled times, the predominance of the nation over its Transatlantic possessions was effectually maintained ; yet the liberty of the plan tations was not vitally injured until the period of George III. s disastrous policy. The proposed action of the Long Parliament is sufficiently justified by the fact that, in. the ordinance establishing the 150 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1643. commission of 1643, it is mentioned that petitions had been received from certain of the plantations, requesting that " they might have some such Governor and Governments as should be approved of and confirmed by the authority of both Houses of Parliament." CHAPTER XVIII. Dissensions between the Narragansetts and Mohegans Apprehended Plot to assassinate the English Samuel Gorton and the Familisls Disturbances at Providence caused by Gorton Appeal of Roger Williams to Massachusetts for Assistance Cession of Territory iu Narragansett Bay to Massachusetts Lands bestowed by Miantonomoh, Chief of the Narragansetts, on Gorton The Validity of the Transfer contested Battle between Miantonomoh and Uncas Defeat, capture, and execution of the Former Contest between the Massachusetts Authorities and Gorton Trial and Conviction of Gorton Questionable Proceedings of Massachusetts Endeavours of Gorton and his Associates to obtain the Mediation of the King of England Transactions of New England with the French Colony of Acadie Disputed Questions of Jurisdiction, and Difficulties of International Law growing out of them Domestic Politics of Massachusetts in 1043-4. AFTER an interval of quiet, the Indians, in 1643, began once more to create uneasiness among the New England colonies. This proceeded in the first instance from dissensions between two native tribes the Narragansetts and the Mohegans. Now that the Pequots were subdued, the tribes just mentioned were the two most powerful in that part of North America. Their possessions, formerly separated by those of the Pequots, were by this time conterminous, and a state of mutual antagonism and jealousy was the result. That open hostilities did not sooner break out, was due to the intervention of Connecticut, by the rulers of which colony the Narragansetts and Mohegans were induced to give tin undertaking that they would not make war on one another without the consent of the settlers. Both tribes had furnished a little aid to the Eng lish in the war with the Pequots, and for some few years seemed desirous of promoting friendly relations with the formidable strangers who had established themselves on American soil. But the feeling among themselves was far from amicable, and it was not long before the Narragansetts were suspected of a design against the English. Mian tonomoh, one of the chiefs of that body, was in 1 640 taxed with treacherous intentions by messengers from Massachusetts; but he disavowed any evil project. In 1643 these fears were renewed. The English, it was said, were to be massacred imme diately after the harvest, and it was further alleged that several attempts had been made to assassinate Uncas, the Mohegan sachem, who had always shown himself well disposed towards the white men. So great was the alarm amongst the English settlements that troops were trained, arms were supplied to the colonists generally, parties travelled with convoys, and watch was kept in the villages by day and night. Miantonomoh was requested to appear at Boston, with a view to vindicating himself, if he could ; and before the Governor and Magistrates of that colony he denied the charge that had been brought against him. The authorities of Connecticut and Plymouth, however, still insisted on the reality of the plot, and shortly afterwards Miantonomoh gave further cause of offence by allying himself with certain Englishmen who had separated from the colony of Providence, and were regarded as dangerous and lawless heretics. The leader of these disaffected settlers was ono Samuel Gorton, originally a London clothier, who arrived at Boston in 1636, during the Antiiiomiaii controversy. In a little while he removed to Ply mouth, where he got into disputes with the Magis trates, and was ultimately fined and expelled the settlement. After wandering about for some time in an uncertain way, he took up his residence at the north end of Rhode Island, among the followers of Mrs. Hutchinson, who, it will be remembered, had established there a small commonwealth on the basis of unlimited toleration. Even in so favour able a spot, however, he could not keep out of broils, and on one occasion was moved to deny the power of the Magistrates, and to assail them with abusive language. For this offence he was whipped ; whereupon he went to the colony of Providence, and was soon at issue with Roger Williams and his friends. Williams s theories in favour of liberty of speech were sorely tried by this wild fanatic. Gorton seems to have been what, in the religious phraseology of that time, was termed a Familist one of a so-called "Family of Love." His principles were those of extreme Antinomianism, and were therefore similar to the views of Mrs. Hutchinson, if they were not even more extrava gant. It was part of the contention of the Familists that they alone had any true knowledge of Jesus UNCAS AND MIANTOXOMOH. 152 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1643. Christ or of the Scriptures (in which respect they did not differ from most other religious bodies); that it was their special mission to teach love ; that the doctrines of Christianity were to be interpreted in a mystical and shadowy way, instead of literally (a method similar to that of the Gnostics of early Christian ages); and that all existing religious forms were superstitious. Some of these enthusiasts were understood to deny that there was any such thing as sin, or at least to assert that they, being rendered perfect by their union with God through the fulness of love, could without evil commit acts which in others would be the height of enormity. It was alleged that immorality was frequent among them ; but charges of this kind are so commonly and readily brought against religious heretics that it is dangerous to assume their truth without specific evidence. Nevertheless, it is easy to see that an alleged privilege of sinning is not unlikely to lead some at least to the commission of vicious irregularities. By the orthodox, these strange theorists were often said to be mere infidels, though their use of Scriptural language was abundant. Many of the Familists questioned whether there were any heaven or hell beyond the pleasures or pains of the present life. Gorton himself used to say that there was no heaven but in the hearts of good men, no hell but in the mind. Hoger Williams wrote to Wiiithrop, on the 8th of March, 1641, that Gorton was "bewitching and bemadding poor Providence " with his strange ideas in religion, and by his " unclean and foul censures " of the ministers. That is to say, he was now vexing Williams and the Providence authorities much as Williams himself, five or six years before, had vexed the Magistrates and ministers of Massa chusetts. Williams added that the majority of his people were infected by these wild doctrines, and that he contemplated removal to a small neigh bouring isle. Before this design could be carried out, those of the settlers who felt themselves more particularly aggrieved sent an appeal to the Govern ment of Massachusetts for assistance. The petition, which bore date November 17th, 1641, alleged many acts of disorder and violence against Gorton and his friends, and accused them of designing " to have no manner of honest order or government, either over them or amongst them." The com plainants accordingly besought the Massachusetts authorities, out of considerations of courtesy, and for the preservation of mankind, to consider their condition, and lend them a helping hand. The prayer was refused, on the ground that Massachu setts had no jurisdiction ; and the troubled settlers of Narragansett Bay, seeing no other waj out of their miseries, made over the territory which they occupied, and which was situated to the north of the river Pawtuxet, to the powerful colony they had before addressed. This was in September, 1642. The Massachusetts Government then sent a notice to Gorton s party, to the effect that the earlier colonists would be supported in their lawful rights, and that the new-comers must abstain from violence, and appeal to the regular courts of law in. support of any claims they might have to urge. To this intimation Gorton and his companions sent ii reply in the nature of a defiance, but, fearing military action on the part of Massachusetts, with drew, early in 1643, to the southern side of the river, where they bought lands of Miantonomoh at a place called Shawomet. The authorities at Boston were displeased with the Narragansett chieftain on account of this cession. Moreover, it was doubtful whether the land did not belong to two other Indian chiefs, whose followers dwelt on irt. It was even a question whether the disputed territory was not included in the Plymouth plantation, the limits of which were ambiguously and obscurely defined. The sachems who conceived themselves wronged by the Narragansett chief, and who repudiated the authority of Miantonomoh, appealed to the Government of Massachusetts for redress, and submitted themselves and their lands to that jurisdiction. Their submission was not accepted without a previous inquiry into the rights of the case, during which Miantonomoh, who had been sent for to Boston, defended his claims, though not to the satisfaction of those who sat in judgment between the rivals. The cause was decided against the Narragansett chief; the disputed territory passed into the possession of the leading New England colony; and Miantonomoh retired into the wilderness in a dissatisfied and wrathful mood. Very shortly afterwards in. July, 1643 he attacked the Mohe- gan sachem, Uncas, near the site of what is now the city of Norwich. A proposal made by Uncas, that the quarrel should be determined by single combat between, the two chieftains, was refused by Miantonomoh; and the issue of the fight was a speedy and complete victory to the Mohegans. The Narra gansett sachem fled for his life, but was seized by two of his own warriors, and dragged before Uncas. Disgusted by their treachery, the Mohegan struck them dead ; then, turning to the captive, who sat sullenly on the ground, he observed, " Had you taken me, I should have besought you for my life." Miantonomoh returned no answer, and was con ducted to Hartford, where he was left in custody of the English, to be disposed of by Uncas, according to the advice of the Commissioners of the United 1643.] MIANTONOMOH AND GORTON. 153 Colonies. Gorton, recollecting who had advanced his interests, endeavoured to obtain the liberation of the fallen chief, and threatened Uncas with the vengeance of the English if he did not release his prisoner ; but his menaces were unheeded. It has been alleged as a crime against Gorton that lie thus allied himself with a savage who was opposed to the English, in opposition to one who was their friend. But it should be recollected that, if Uncas was friendly to the Englishmen settled in Massa chusetts, Miaiitonomoh had been equally so, and with unvarying faithfulness, to the Englishmen settled in Rhode Island. In supporting one Indian chieftain in his quarrel with another, there is no proof that Gorton was abetting any plots against his own countrymen. His subsequent conduct, however reprehensible, was due to a sense of in justice committed against him by the authorities of Massachusetts. The fate of Miantonomoh was one of the earliest subjects that engaged the attention of the Federal Commissioners. It was debated by them at their first meeting, which took place on the 7th of Sep- zember, 1643. They came to the conehision that there was proof sufficient of a conspiracy among the Indians to cut off the English, and that Miantonomoh was the prime mover in this design. They also found that the Narragansett chief had on several occasions plotted against the life of Uncas, and had finally attacked him in a sudden and treacherous manner. They persuaded themselves that Uncas would not be safe while Miantonomoh continued to live ; and they ended with a resolution, affirming that the Mohegan chief might justly put such an enemy to death. This being the universally-admitted Indian law in all such cases, Miantonomoh had no cause of complaint from his own point of view; but on higher grounds the judgment was questionable. The Commissioners added that the execution must be in the territory of Uncas, and not within the English jurisdiction ; and they advised that, in the manner of inflicting death, all tortures and pro longed cruelties, after the Indian fashion, should be omitted. Not only did they give this advice, but they sent two Englishmen with Uncas and his cap tive, to see that the latter was really treated with as much humanity as the penalty of death allowed. Some forty miles beyond Hartford, and within the then dominion of the Mohegans, a blow from a hatchet on the back of his head laid the prisoner low. It is believed that he was purposely killed on the precise spot where he was captured, in a field in the neighbourhood of Norwich, Connecticut, known as " Sachem s Plain," where a mound of loose stones long existed, which has in modem times been replaced by a block of granite, marked witli his name a name which, in that vicinity, i odious to this day. The conduct of the New England authorities in the matter has been both condemned and defended. Allowing that the charges against Miantonomoh were clearly esta blished (as to which no positive opinion can now be expressed, the whole of the evidence having disappeared), the Federal Commissioners were within their right in giving up tlte captive to the vengeance of Uncas ; and something is to be said in their justification on the score of self-defence. Yet, after all possible allowances have been made, it is difficult to resist a feeling that the action of the colonists was marked by a certain hardness and want of generosity. As one who had conspired against the English (if such were really the fact), Miantonomoh might fairly have been held a prisoner for life ; but the rendering of him into the hands of his enemies, with a view to his being slaughtered, is but poorly justified by the fact that he was the prisoner of Uncas, who had a right to his life under the laws of Indian warfare, or by the con sideration that it was not expedient to risk the defection of Uncas and the Mohegans by interfering with that right. While these events were going on, the General Court of Massachusetts took a somewhat peremptory measure with respect to the followers of Gorton. They issued a warrant against the settlers at Shawomet, commanding them to appear at Boston, to answer the complaints of Pomham and Sacoiioiioco, the two petty chieftains who laid claim to the ground which liacl been alienated by Miantonomoh. The reply to this warrant was a piece of outrageous defiance and objurgation, not more extreme, how ever, than the language which religious fanatics are in the habit of applying to one another. Nothing, certainly, could be in worse taste than this answer, which was characterised neither by sense nor civility. It was the composition of excited and illiterate men, who, as Winthrop remarks? did not know how to spell, nor how to use correctly the commonest English words. But the right of Massachusetts to take proceedings against these men was by 110 means certain, and w r as by them not unreasonably disputed. Whether the land on which they were settled belonged originally to Miantonomoh, who had disposed of it to Gorton s party, or to the other two chieftains, by whom it had been made over to Massachusetts, was a matter still in doubt. Massachusetts, acting as judge in what was really her own case, had decided in her own favour ; but Gorton and his fellows may be excused for corning to a different conclusion. The 154 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1644. Magistrates at Boston, however, were not inclined to be set at naught. Accordingly, after due notice had been sent, they despatched to the new settle ment three commissioners, accompanied, as a pro tection, by an escort of forty armed men. This* was in truth an invasion, and assuredly a very high handed assertion of a doubtful authority. It was met by the Gortoiiites with threats of resistance and retaliation ; but, after their position had been blockaded for a few days, they surrendered without any loss of life, and, in the early part of October, 1643, were carried prisoners to Boston. They counted only ten, including Gorton himself, and do not seem to have made up for their numerical weakness by any great exhibition of spirit beyond the use of fiery language. At the next meeting of the General Court of Massachusetts, these men were arraigned on a charge of being " blasphemous enemies to the true religion of our Lord Jesus Christ and all his O holy ordinances, and also to all civil authority among the people of God, and particularly in this jurisdiction." Specifications, to the number of six as regards the alleged blasphemy, and to more than fifty with respect to the defiance of civil authority, were produced from the writings and speeches of Gorton and his friends. Of the charge of blasphemy it is sufficient to say that it was one of those beggings of the question which the founders of Massachusetts had been among the foremost to resist when used against themselves in the old country. Gorton had as good a right to his inter pretation of Scripture as Winthrop and his asso ciates to theirs, especially when the former was no longer disturbing the earlier communities, but was endeavouring to establish a commonwealth of his own in a remote wilderness ; and it is wonderful that the Massachusetts people did not see how completely their tyranny, if its principle was to be accepted, justified the English Bishops in per secuting the Puritans, the Roman Catholics in burning the Protestants, and the Pagans of ancient Rome in throwing the Christians to the liofis.* As to the refusal of the Gortonites to submit to the authority of Massachusetts in civil matters, it has already been shown that it was doubtful whether that colony had any right to the allegiance which it claimed. * The several heresies imputed to the Familists are set forth by Cotton Mather (who works himself into a fever of indigna tion and reviling on the suhject) in his "Magnalia Christi Americana, or the Ecclesiastical History of New England" (London, 1702), Book VII. , chap. 2. The opinions are foolish enough, a wild farrago of mystical extravagance; but they cannot, properly be called " blasphemous," since they express a reverential belief of some kind. One main cause of the bitterness of Massachusetts against Gorton, is to be found in the readiness of that person to threaten an appeal to the English Government. He had done this before his capture ; he repeated the threat when on his trial. It was doubtless a very imprudent step, for the authorities at Boston had determined, if it were possible, to esta blish an independent Republic, in which it should be treason, to recognise the King or Parliament of England. But Gorton had certainly a right, in a case of disputed jurisdiction, to invoke the arbitra tion of that Power which had equal authority over both parties to the dissension. The absolute sove reignty whch Massachusetts had for some time exercised was in defiance of English law, and of the particular charter under which the colony had been created. The settlers possessed no authority but what they had derived in the first instance from the Government of the mother country; and the juris diction of England had been allowed to lapse simply because of the disturbed condition of affairs at home. Yet when Gorton, on his trial, again talked of appealing to England, he was plainly told that no such appeal would be allowed him. After several examinations, and a good deal of controversy, Gorton, having been found guilty, was sentenced to be confined, dining the pleasure of the Court, at Charlestown, where he was to be set to work, and at the same time to wear such bolts or irons as might hinder his escape. If he published any more of his blasphemous or heretical opinions (which under the circumstances would have been no very easy matter), he was to be put to death ; indeed, as it was, it was only by a majority of two votes that he had been saved from the extreme penalty. Of Gorton s followers, nine were confined in different towns ; one was ordered to remain at Watertowii ; one was bound over to appear again, should he be so required ; and one was released. Such were re ligious liberty and civil freedom as interpreted by the leading men of Massachusetts, who had quitted their own land to escape the unscrupulous dictation of authority. Gorton and his friends were no doubt a troublesome, ill-conditioned, and even dangerous set of men ; but this does not excuse the illegality of their treatment. It is satisfactory to be enabled to add that the mass of the population sa,w the flagrant injustice of these sentences, and openly ex pressed their dissatisfaction. Their murmurs seem to have had a good effect ; for in March, 1644, the prisoners were released, but at the same time ordered to leave Massachusetts, and not to settle in or near Providence, or on any of the lands of Pomham or Sacononoco. Disregard of these conditions was to entail the punishment of death. After a brief 1641.] PEOCEEDINGS OF GOKTON. attempt to re-establish themselves at Shawornet, they retired to Rhode Island on the 1st of April, And at once set to work in furtherance of their designs. Desirous of enlisting the Indians in their favour, and at the same time of bringing their case before the English Government, they opened negotiations with the Narragansetts, and prepared for an appeal to England. Six or seven of Gorton s party crossed over to the mainland, and on the 19th of April concluded a treaty with the chieftains of that tribe, the effect of which was to transfer the whole of the Narragansett people and territory to the protection and government of King Charles and his successors. In this document, the chieftains spoke of having "just cause of jealousy and sus picion of some of his Majesty s pretended subjects ;" and by the same instrument they appointed Samuel Gorton and three of his adherents as their attorneys and commissioners to represent them at the English Court. The treaty was obviously the composition of the white men at whose instigation it was made. To the same hands must be attributed a letter ad dressed by the chieftains to the General Court of Massachusetts, in which they declared that the death of Miantonomoh would be revenged on Uncas, who, they alleged, had taken a ransom for his life. They added that they were now subjects of the same .King and State as the people of Massachusetts ; and expressed an opinion that it would be fit to refer any difference that might be between them to the settlement of their common sovereign. The despatch of this letter was followed by another, signed by one of the Gortoriites, who called himself Secretary to the Commissioners charged with the publication of the act of cession. It was evident from the terms of this letter that the followers of Gorton were prepared to abet the Indians in their worst acts of ferocity, rather than forego their designs. This cannot be made to serve retrospectively as a justification of the persecution they had suffered : it is very probable that that persecution had in flamed its victims with a feeling of wild animosity against their own countrymen. But the letter of John Warner, the so-called Secretary, shows how fierce were the passions evoked amongst rival parti- s-ans by the ill-defined position of the New England colonies towards the mother country. Warner en deavoured to frighten the authorities of Boston by threatening them with the vengeance of King Charles and of the Mohawks if they should inter fere with the proposed arrangement. He flourished in their eyas the greatness and power of the Mohawks; alleged that those savages had 3,700 #uns, men expert in the use of them, and plenty of powder and shot, together with defensive armour for their bodies ; and related with a kind of gloating delight that they had recently slain a hundred French and several of their Indian allies, putting many of them to cruel tortures, Avhile of their own men they had lost but two. The spirit of such a communication was detestable ; but it failed to in timidate the Magistrates of Massachusetts. Pre parations to resist any contemplated attack were quietly made; and, after some ineffectual negotiations, the Narragaiisett chiefs consented to submit their grievances to the Commissioners of the Federal Union. They sent a sagamore and other persons of consideration to represent their case, and the matter s in dispute were argued at considerable length. The Commissioners could not find that Uncas (who was present at the inquiry) had re ceived any ransom for the life of Miantonomoh ; and finally a truce between th : nnT> tending parties was agreed upon in September, 1G44. Nothing more was done against Gorton and his friends, who co.n- tinued to live on Rhode Island.* The determination of the Massachusetts people to disavow that allegiance to the old country which Gorton so eagerly proclaimed, was evinced in an order of the General Court, issued on the 20th of May, 1G44, which, after making reference to the civil war then raging in England, decreed that any one who should, by word, writing, or action, endea vour to create a party in favour of the King and against the Parliament, should be accounted a high offender, and be proceeded against, either capitally or otherwise, according to the degree of his offence. It will be observed that the order contained no pro hibition against forming a party in favour of the Parliament. The sympathies of the Puritan settlers were necessarily and naturally in favour of the op ponents of Charles I. ; but they sometimes carried their favouritism too far. They allowed the captain of a Parliamentarian vessel from London to seize a Royalist vessel from Bristol in Boston waters, and, when the captain of the latter created a disturbance in the town, arrested him and his friends. This proceeding of the local authorities at Boston was supported by a majority of the Magistrates, on the express ground that to have done otherwise would have been inconsistent with the openly-declared affec tion of the }>eople towards the English Parliament. But many objected to the action of the London captain, as being a violation of the independent jurisdiction of Massachusetts; and shortly after wards, in another case, it was found necessary to * These events are very fully related by Mr. Palfrey, in his "History of New England," Vol. II., chap. 3, but in a way too favourable to Massachusetts. 156 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1642. restrain such interferences. The shore-battery of Boston fired into a Parliamentarian vessel, the commander of which had refused to go on shore when summoned. On the captain making his sub mission, he was discharged, after paying a small fine ; but he was forbidden to take any action against a Royalist ship then lying in the harbour. A year or two before this, objection had been made events having almost the character of a foreign, war. A divided rule had for some time existed in the French colony of Acadie (now Nova Scotia and New Brunswick) ; for the two representatives of the French monarch D Aulnay de Charnise and La Tour had quarrelled about their respective jurisdictions, and were at open feud. Each believed he had the superior position ; but D Aulnay had OLD MAP 01 ACADIE. to that part of the oath taken by the Governor and the rest of the Magistrates which ran : " Yoii shall bear true faith and allegiance to our sovereign lord. King Charles." It was argued that the King had violated the privileges of Parliament, made war on his subjects, and thereby lost much of his king dom. The Court therefore resolved to omit that portion of the oath for the present ; and the Royal authority ceased to be even nominally recognised in Massachusetts. The attention of Massachusetts was partly diverted from internal matters by a series of received instructions from the King which showed that his adversary was regarded as a rebel by the parent State. La Tour, seeking to support himself in his fortified position, at St. John, situated at the mouth of the river of that name, sent a messenger to Boston, by whom an arrangement was concluded for a free trade between the ports held by La Tour and those of New England. When this fact came to the knowledge of D Aulnay, he forwarded a letter to Winthrop, in November, 1642, denouncing his rival as a traitor, and threatening to make prize of any Massachusetts vessel engaged in the trade 1644.] NEGOTIATIONS WITH ACADIE. 157 with him. In the following year, La Tour escaped from St. John, presented himself at Boston, and so far interested the authorities in his favour that they permitted him to charter vessels in the ports of Massachusetts, and to enlist volunteers. With this assistance, La Tour prosecuted the war with some success, and compelled D Aulnay, in the autumn of 1643, to return to France for reinforce ments ; but in July, 1644, La Tour again appeared at Boston, requested further aid, and alleged that without the substantial assistance which he had come to solicit, and of which he now stood in need. Very shortly after his departure, an envoy from D Aulnay arrived at Boston, with offers of peace and amity. The result of the negotiations which ensued was that the Massachusetts Magistrates agreed to present for the approbation of the Federal Commissioners, at their next meeting, a treaty of peace and commerce between the jurisdictions of Massaclrusetts and of D Aulnay, the terms of which, VIEW OX THE COAST OF MASSACHUSETTS. the place where his fort was built had been pur chased by his father of Sir William Alexander, and that he had a free grant of it, and of the adjacent territory, under the great seal of Scotland. Some discussion ensued among the Massachusetts rulers us to whether the case of La Tour should be vigor ously and openly taken up. Many were in favour of such a course ; but, as all were not agreed, it was resolved to do nothing more than write to D Aulnay, demanding satisfaction for his hostile behaviour and language, and for sundry malpractices of his officers, and announcing a resolution to maintain the com mercial relations which had been instituted with La Tour. That potentate if such he can be called was dismissed with a great deal of ceremony, but 14 however, were not to restrain the merchants of tli3 English colony from trading with whomsoever they pleased, whether French or not. Pending the con sent of the Commissioners, this treaty was to be provisionally binding. Yet the Massachusetts Go vernment continued to exhibit a certain degree of friendliness towards La Tour, and it would seem that, in their desire to stand well with both parties, they were not very faithful to either. Massachusetts had clearly been carrying on a species of covert war with tlie representative of the French King in Acadie; and the complaints of D Aul nay were so obviously just that the Federal Com missioners, at their second meeting, on the 5th of September, 1644, passed a general order forbidding CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G44. the confederated colonies to permit any volunteers to go forth in a hostile manner against any people whatever, without the order and direction of the Commissioners. This was an implied censure on the conduct of Massachusetts in respect of the affair just brought to a temporary arrangement. The Magistrates of that colony, however, do not seem to have construed the prohibition in a very strict spirit ; for, in the following year, D Aulnay seized a Boston vessel which was engaged carrying pro visions to La Tour in his blockaded stronghold a species of trade which the Federal Commissioners could hardly have intended to allow. It is not surprising that under such a provocation D Aulnay should have sent a letter of remonstrance, in \vhich he charged the Government of the chief New Eng land colony with breach of neutrality. This covert assistance to the rebel cause did not prevent the capture of the fort. There were traitors to La Tour within the walls ; and during the absence of the commander himself, on a third visit to Boston, the place was taken, and the garrison put to the sword. Madame La Tour, who had exhibited great heroism throughout, died in less than three weeks probably of mortification, though it has also been said that she was treated with cruelty by the victor. The ruin of La Tour involved several of the Boston merchants in very heavy losses ; and the vanquished rebel soon after showed that they had put their trust in a thoroughly worthless object. His English friends (some of them deluded, per haps, by his professions of Protestantism, though these were disbelieved by many) fitted him out, in 1646, with commodities to the value of four hun dred pounds, that he and several of his countrymen might make a trading voyage. In the winter, the French rose on the English members of the crew, and set them ashore on a desert part of the coast near Cape Sable. "Winthrop, in recording th? fact, be wailed the confidence he and others had placed in a carnal man. The Bostonians certainly seem to have been throughout a little too intent upon carnal profits. The original dispute between Massachusetts and D Aulnay was taken up by the Federal Com missioners, who, at their third meeting, ratified the treaty that had been made between those parties. But the Governor of AcacJie refused to renew his subscription until the later dispute should be settled. The General Court of Massa chusetts accordingly determined to send the Lieu- tenant-Governor and two other Commissioners to treat with him at Penobscot, in May, 1646; but D Aulnay preferred to despatch three envoys to Boston. There they were received with a good deal of state and ceremony, and on Sunday kept themselves quiet indoors, so as not to give offence to the Puritan feelings of the people. A week s discussion led to an agreement, which provided that all injuries and demands were to be remitted, on a small present being made to M. D Aulnay in satisfaction of an act of violence committed by a Boston shipmaster, which the Magistrates did not undertake to justify. About the same time, and for a couple of years later, New England was en gaged in a dispute with the Dutch of New Nether- land on questions of boundary and jurisdiction ; but it was settled to the advantage of the former. Although the clandestine dealings of Massachu setts with La Tour had had the support of Governor Winthrop and other influential persons, making in all a majority of the colonial counsellors, the minority opposed to such proceedings was not incon siderable. It comprised several men of distinction and weight, who, in July, 1643, joined in a written, remonstrance to "Winthrop on the subject, to which he replied with warmth. The feeling embodied in this remonstrance acquired force with time ; and, at the annual election of Magistrates for 1644, Win throp was deposed from the chief place, and elected to the second. The post of Governor was con ferred on Endicott, who had partially dissented from the policy of his pi-edecessor, while retaining, and generously expressing, the heartiest confidence in the excellence of his motives. Winthrop and Dudley were also deprived of their positions as Federal Commissioners, and two young and rising men were deputed instead. Jealousy of the power of the Magistrates was strongly developed at this period. The Deputies, for instance, proposed that seven of the Magistrates, and three of their own body, in combination with Mr. Ward, a pastor, should arrange all affairs of the commonwealth in the vacancy of the General Court. The Magistrates were strongly disinclined to this measure, since it deprived them of the sole authority, hitherto enjoyed by them, of acting as the standing council of the colony when the General Court was not in session. They suggested a compromise, but it was not listened to ; and, previous to the prorogation of the Court, the Deputies wished the Magistrates to give a promise not to exercise any powers of government during the recess. They declined to make such an engagement, and the prorogation took place amidst signs of a division that threatened unpleasant con sequences. When the next General Court met, the ministers of religion were requested to state their formal opinion on the question in dispute ; and their judgment was in favour of the Magistrates. This settled the matter, though the Deputies continued to object, and two of the Magistrates sided against 1621.] THE THREE PLYMOUTH PATENTS. 159 their colleagues. It seems probable, however, that the latter body had the support of the majority among the colonists themselves. Although the position taken up by the Deputies was ostensibly of a popular character, it was in truth an attempt to usurp a function that did not belong to them. The Magistrates exercised their powers by virtue of the charter which created them ; and if this was to be altered, it should, from the popular point of view, have been by a vote taken immediately from the constituencies. The Deputies wished to effect the change by their own motion and authority, and argued that the charter had been violated often before. This, no doubt, was true enough ; but the frequent repetition of a wrong, or of an illegality, will not suffice to make it more lawful or more just. CHAPTER XIX. The Council for New England The Three Plymouth Patents Early Difficulties of the Colony Hard Treatment of the Settlers by the London Capitalists Death of Kobinson Further Removal of English from Leyden to Plymouth Poverty of the Plantation Steady Progress in Trade Visit of an Agent of the Dutch Company to Plymouth His Description of the Town, and of the Manners of the Inhabitants Persecution less in the Plymouth Colony than in Massachusetts Perils, real and imaginary Territorial Appropriations Formation of New Towns in the Plymouth Patent Collisions with French and Dutch Death and Character of Bradford Edward Winslow in England Political lleforms in New Plymouth- Visits of Winslow to Massasoit Fidelity of some of the Indians to their Professions of Friendship. WHILE the plantation of Massachusetts was strug gling through the difficulties of its early years, the older settlement of New Plymouth was progressing with greater tranquillity towards an established and prosperous condition. The important events oc curring in the colony founded by Winthrop and Endicott, by which it was enabled to assume the lead in New England, have too long detained us from the humbler but still deeply interesting fortunes of the small community under Bradford and Winslow. Three patents had been succes sively issued to the latter colony by the Western Company to which the whole of New England be longed one in 1621, one in 1622, and one in 1630; and the position of the Pilgrim settlers was thus rendered far more assured than it had been in the winter of their landing, when, having been taken or driven out of their course, they found themselves in a country belonging, not to the London Company, from which they had obtained their grant, but to that of Plymouth. This might have been fatal to their prospects, had they not met with more favour than they perhaps expected. The Plymouth Com pany, after its fresh incorporation, with enlarged powers, in November, 1620, was officially entitled "The Council established at Plymouth, in the County of Devon, for the planting, ordering, ruling, and governing of New England, in America." Capricious and even menacing as their conduct sometimes was, the members of the Council, though they had interests of their own in. New England, seem, on the whole, to have been not unjust to the Puritan settlers who had sailed in the Mayflower. The first patent for New Plymouth was made out in the name of John Pierce, citizen and cloth-worker of London, one of the capitalists who had lent money to the emigrants. Pierce was to hold this patent in trust for his fellow-capitalists, or " Adven turers " as they were called ; but the interests of the colonists were also considered, and their privileges affirmed. In 1622, Pierce dishonestly contrived to get the patent superseded by one which made him little less than absolute proprietor of the whole territory ; but, on the remonstrance of the other Adventurers, the original document was reverted to in 1623. By the terms of that document (the patent of 1621), a hundred acres of land were allowed to every colonist, at a yearly rent of two shillings an acre after seven years. Fifteen hundred acres were set aside for public use, and the colonists were em powered to make such laws and ordinances as might be necessary for their good government, to elect their own officers, and to resist all invaders by force of arms. The third patent (counting that surreptitiously obtained by Pierce as the second) bore date January 13th, 1630. It conveyed to William Bradford, his heirs, associates, and assigns, a vaguely-defined tract of land, including New Ply mouth and certain territory on the Kennebec ; and it conferred all requisite powers of government on the chief officers of the colony. This patent was in 1641 transferred by Bradford to the whole body of freemen. Bradford and his friends greatly de sired to possess in addition a Royal charter similar to that of Massachusetts ; but this, though often solicited, and at one time with prospects of success, was never obtained as long as Plymouth continued a separate government. During the whole of this time, dating from the death of Carver, who expired in April, 1621, 160 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1625. Bradford had occupied the post of Governor. He had been re-elected each year, though more than once begging to be excused so onerous a charge. The difficulties of his post were indeed considerable. Poverty and famine in the earlier years of his rule were succeeded by the usual troubles of an infant settlement. Emigrants of an inferior character followed the first pure-hearted enthusiasts. Factions and conspiracies were from time to time discovered, and could only be dealt with by severe and per emptory measm-es. Those whose projects were thus defeated returned in some cases to England, and used their utmost influence to prejudice the colony. Thomas Westoii, whose unhappy attempt to establish a settlement in Massachusetts Bay, in 1622, necessitated the interference of the New Ply mouth authorities, lost no opportunity of decrying the Puritan plantation. Lyford and Old ham, two persons who were sent over in 1623 by the London capitalists, with a view to advance their special interests, as well as to introduce the forms and doctrines of the Church of England, and who were ultimately expelled for their share in a plot and mutiny against the existing government, were ever afterwards an adverse influence to the fortunes of the colony. The Adventurers in London thought more of themselves than of their fellows on the opposite side of the Atlantic, who had staked not only fortune, but life itself, upon the issue. Yet even these prudent men of business had words of sympathy for the settlers. "Let it not be grievous to you," they wrote, " that you have been instru ments to break the ice for others who come after with less difficulty : the honour shall be yours to the world s end. "We bear you always in our breasts, and our hearty affection is towards you all, as are the hearts of hundreds more which never saw your faces, who doubtless pray for your safety as their own, that the same God which hath so marvellously preserved you from seas, foes, and famine, will still preserve you from all future dangers, and make you honourable among men, and glorious in bliss at the last day." Expressions such as these would have been more gratifying if the same sympathy had been declared in action as well as in words. The Plymouth colonists always regarded their treatment by the London capitalists as hard and exacting, and were glad, even at a sacrifice, to be rid of so irksome a partnership. It is certain that the Adventurers were, from motives of policy, though perhaps in some instances not from innate conviction, strongly opposed to the settlement retaining its Puritan character. The Episcopalian Church was still dominant in Eng land ; it had the support of the King and of the nobles ; and it was feared that if New Plymouth succeeded in establishing an independent religious community, it would draw down upon itself some signal check. For this reason the Adventurers constantly endeavoured to hinder the English who had been left behind at Ley den from joining their comrades in America. Robinson was the acknow ledged head of the English Independents, and his presence at New Plymouth was anticipated by the Court of St. James s with dislike, if not with dread. From all uneasiness as regards Robinson, how ever, the English Church and aristocracy were soon relieved. That admirable minister died at Ley den. on the 1st of March, 1625. It had been amongst the dearest wishes of his heart to follow his old friends to their new home beyond the waves, and to assist in propagating the religious ideas of the new Reformation in the wilds of America. But this was not to be, and his ashes now lie amongst those of alien race. In later years, however in 1629 and 1630 further members of the English colony in. Holland were enabled to transport them selves to New Plymouth. They were brought over at the expense of their friends already established there, who paid for their outfit and conveyance .550, and a sum not much less for their maintenance until they could support themselves. The outlay was not lost. The Leyden immigrants were men of high character, whose views were in harmony with the rulers of the colony ; and they acted as a counterpoise to the mere stragglers and fortune- seekers who had arrived from time to time, and who were frequently at issue with Bradford and his companions. But it was only at great sacrifices that the older colonists were able to meet so great an expense. Their poverty for a long time was extreme. As late as 1626, when they bought up the claims of the Adventurers for .1,800, and en deavoured to raise money in the commercial circles of London, they could procure no more than 200, and that at the rate of thirty per cent. ; so low was their credit, and so little was. thought of their prospects. When the support of the Leyden people was thrown on their hands, they were obliged to borrow at forty and even fifty per cent. Bradford and eight others gave bonds for the payment of the eighteen hundred pounds in annual instalments of two hundred ; and, to enable them to discharge this obligation, they obtained of the colonists an exclu sive right to the trade of the plantation for six years. The London claimants were not finally got rid of until 1641, when, having received tAvelve hundred pounds, they gave a receipt in full. These charges could not have been borne, had not the settlement made considerable progress in 1627.] LIFE IN NEW PLYMOUTH. 161 material prosperity. In 1624, fifty English ships were on the coast, engaged in fishing, and these contributed to the formation of a trade with the colonists. Winslow and some others, in the following year, made a voyage up the Kennebec in an open boat, and brought back with them seven hundred pounds of beaver, besides other furs, which they had received from the Massachusetts Indians in exchange for corn of their own growing. In successive years the emigrants sent to England furs, timber, and sassafras. They built themselves shallops, pinnaces, and lighters, and performed voy ages both of trade and discovery. Their fisheries were established at various points on the coast ; though, owing to the competition of others, they became after awhile less profitable than at first. Their industry showed itself in many ways. When Isaac de Rasieres, agent of the Dutch Company which had possessions at Manhattan (now New York), visited Plymouth, in September, 1627, to make arrangements for mutual commerce, he observed an ingenious dam constructed by the English in a small river at the south side of the town. Here the colonists caught multitudes of herrings, which they used as manure, the soil being incapable, withoiit that assistance, of producing the requisite crops of maize. The same observer has left a curious picture of the appearance of the town, and of the manners of the people, seven years after the formation of the colony. It appears that New Plymouth then consisted of two streets on the side of a hill, crossing each other at right angles. The houses were constructed of hewn planks, and were enclosed in gardens, and protected by stockades against any sudden attack. At the ends of the two streets there were wooden gates. In the centre of the cross street stood the Governor s house, before which was a square enclosure planted with four guns, so disposed as to flank the streets. On the lull above was a species of fort, from the flat timber roof of which six cannons commanded the surround ing coxmtry. The lower part of this building was used as a church, and the manners of the wor shippers were as martial as the structure in which they met. They assembled by beat of drum, each man in his cloak, and with his musket or firelock, and took up their station in front of the captain s door. Thence they mai-ched to the church in mili tary order, three abreast, but without beat of drum. Behind came the Governor, in a long robe ; to his right was the preacher, also robed, and to his left the captain, with his side arms, and a small cane in his hand. In the church itself, each man set his weapons down beside him. " Tints," says de Ra sieres, " they are constantly on their guard, night and day."* They were on their guard also against other dangers besides the assaults of Indians, or the menace of foreign foes. They had made strin gent laws for the repression of immorality. Even the native tribes who lived in association with them felt the force of these laws ; and nothing roused the indignation of the English settlers more than to hear from the savages that the neighbouring Dutch disregarded decency, and were allowed to go un punished. Indians brought into contact with the Puritans were, on the testimony of this Dutchman, better conducted than those with whom his own countrymen, had to deal, because the English gave them the example of better ordinances and of a better life. Yet the Puritanism of Plymouth was never so extreme as that of Massachusetts; at any rate, it was less infected with the venom of persecution. This may perhaps be attributed to the larger knowledge of the world, and of its religious sects, which the emi grants had acquired at Leyden ; perhaps also to the influence of the kindly-natured and liberal-minded Robinson. It was a sorrow to Robinson that the colonists had been compelled to kill any Indians while as yet they had converted none. He was not likely, therefore, to breathe into his followers a sentiment of bitter religious animosity ; and in fact he had cautioned the Pilgrims, before they left Delft-Haven, to beware of narrowness and sectarian jealousy. Accordingly, though the spirit of persecution is not entirely absent from their annals, it is not so frequently displayed, nor cha racterised by such a deadly rancour, as in the neighbouring colony to the north. The settlers of Plymouth were less disposed to proselytism than their brethren. They were content to cultivate their ground, to trafiic in such commodities as they had, and to enjoy in quiet the spiritual freedom which was denied them in their native land. Their life was not without that charm, made up of wildness and of danger, which belongs to all new \ conditions and all untried experiments. The virgin forest came lip almost to their doors ; cer tainly to the borders of their fields and garden- plots. Its murmurs were for ever in their ears ; the precise nature of its dangers was for some time a mystery. Two men lost in the woods, in January, 1621, thought they heard during the night the roaring of lions. Several of the early explorers firmly believed that there were lions in those parts ; though it is obvious that no such animal could exist in so cold a country as New England. An * Letter from de Easieres, translated by Mr. Brodhead from the archives of the Hague, and published in the second series of the Isew York Historical Collections. 162 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1624. old writer remarks that the roarings frequently heard in the forests by those who had gone astray must have been caused by either lions or devils ; " there being no other creatures which use to roar, saving bears, which have not such a terrible kind of roaring." Many of the settlers, doubtless, were quite as well disposed to believe that the cries proceeded from devils as from lions. It is not difficult to imagine that on winter nights, as these strange howlings came out of the blackness and solitude of the woody distance, even brave men drew closer to their fires, and were thankful for the protection, of the rude timber house which preserved a little centre of warmth, light, and civilised society, in the midst of savage nature and satanic power. Men in those days heard much of the unhallowed meetings of witches and demons in lonely places between dusk and dawn ; and if ever such stories were to be believed, it was there, on the borders of a vast empire of heathenism, lying under the shadow and mystery of unsubdued creation. But, though there were no lions, no witches, and no devils, there were perils of other kinds. Wolves were numerous, and stragglers were sometimes obliged to defend themselves against their attacks. Prowling Indians, stealing out of the woods or between, the trees with the noiseless step peculiar to their race, would cause sudden alarms, and hasty preparations for defence. The elements were unfriendly, and put the settlers to the utmost trials of cold and tempest. The necessaries of life were hard to get; trade was scanty and precarious ; and men who had other and anta gonistic designs to promote, secretly plotted the overthrow of the infant commonwealth. Not the least of these dangers were those which were constantly being incubated in the old country. The Council for New England, or former Plymouth Company, determined, in October, 1622, that an order should be solicited from the Lords of his Majesty s Council for bringing back such as had, in contempt of authority, settled in New England ; and it was afterwards proposed that the King should issue a proclamation prohibiting all persons from resorting to that part of America without sanction. In January, 1623, it was propounded in the New England Council that a settlement should be made in their possessions by three classes of men gentlemen, handicraftsmen, and husband men.* The object of all these suggestions was to create a state of things hostile to the Puritan settlement at Plymouth ; and the various colonisa tions by Gorges and his friends in the northern * Journal of the Council for New England in the State Paper Office, London. parts of New England were animated by the hope of setting up aristocratical and Church of England provinces in opposition to the scarcely- disguised Republicanism and openly-avowed Non conformity of the emigrants from Leyden. The Council for New England had in 1622 divided their territory among individual members of the cor poration ; and in this way twenty noblemen and gentlemen shared amongst themselves the country along the coast from the Bay of Eundy to Narra- gansett Bay including the very lands on which the Puritans had established themselves. Con sidering that the Council had already granted a patent to the capitalists by whom those settlers had been sent out, and had recognised the colony itself, this appropriation was not honest ; but no attempt was made to oust the persons in possession. The vicinity of Cape Anne was assigned to Edmund, Lord Sheffield, afterwards Earl of MuWave, an. * O " adherent of the Parliament during the civil wars ; but it was not long ere he parted with his property. Winslow, during one of his visits to England on the business of New Plymouth, purchased the land of him, at the beginning of 1624, for the colony which he represented ; and when the Massachusetts planta tion was beginning, a portion of the ground was granted by the New Plymouth Government to the Rev. Mr. White and his associates. In spite of all difficulties and obstacles, New England was to receive, with but slight exceptions, the impress and the colour of Puritanical ideas. Every year, the colony founded by the Pilgrim Fathers advanced in prosperity, notwithstanding that Isaac Allerton, a son-in-law of Brewster, charged t o with the management of the settlers business affairs in England, entered without due authorisation into transactions which in two years raised the colonial debt from four hundred to four thousand pounds. He was discharged from the agency of the plantation in 1630 ; but by that time the fortunes of the little commonwealth were secure. The formation of the Massachusetts colony was a help to the older com munity, for it furnished them with customers for their corn and cattle, which in. consequence rose to a great price, so that, as Bradford relates, many were much enriched, and the comforts of life became attainable where men, a few years before, had been thankful if they could get the barest necessaries. Winslow, on his return from England in 1624, had brought with him three heifers and ; one bull, the first cattle imported into New England. The in habitants of the town of Plymouth were so numerous in 1632 that several of them went in search of other quarters. A town named Duxbury was established on the north side of the harbour, and pastures were WIN SLOW S VISIT TO MASSASOIT. 164 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1634. assigned at Marshfield to such as engaged to keep them by servants, so as not themselves to remove from the original settlement. Bradford regarded this dispersion with uneasiness, fearing that it would be the ruin of New England, or at least of the churches there. Plymouth was indeed so reduced in population that it was left almost desolate. In. 1633, the few remaining inhabitants were still further diminished by an infectious fever ; and in 1651 Bradford spoke of the local church as an ancient mother, grown old, and forsaken of her children. Among the other troubles of the colony were collisions resulting from the uncertain cha racter of the boundaries assigned, and from the claims of rival settlers. Thus, the Plymouth people "were at issue with the French on the Penobscot, with the Dutch on the Connecticut, and with certain English traders on the Kennebec ; and, on some of these occasions, affrays took place, with loss of life. Bradford continued in office as Governor uninter ruptedly until 1632, when, at his earnest request, he was transferred to the inferior position of Assistant, while Winslow, who had been one of the Assistants, was advanced to the Chief Magistracy. At sub sequent periods, however, Bradford was again Go vernor ; and he held the post continuously from 1639 to 1643, and from 1645 to 1657, when he died, in the sixty-ninth year of his age. He was one of the principal founders of Plymouth colony, and is deservedly held in the highest respect by New Englanders to the present day. The little village of Austerfield, near Bawtry, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, enjoys the honour of his birth, which took place in 1588. Mr. Palfrey, the recent historian of New England, who visited this primi tive hamlet in 1856, describes it as consisting at that date of about thirty brick houses, roofed with tiles, at least two of which dwellings looked as if they might have been standing in Bradford s time. The church, which will contain no more than a hundred and fifty persons, is in some parts as old as the thirteenth century, and until 1835 had no other than an earthen floor. When Bradford was a boy, a congregation of Puritans used to meet at the village of Scrooby, in Nottinghamshire ; and it is probable that the future Governor of New Plymouth, whose attention was attracted to religious subjects very early in life, joined this congregation, and in that way made the acquaintance of Brewster, with whom he was afterwards to be so intimately asso ciated. He was an orphan, of feeble constitution, with but slight opportunities of education ; yet by his own diligence he acquired a knowledge of Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, and Dutch. The first-named was his principal study, because, as he said (according to the report of Mather), " he would see with his own eyes the ancient oracles of God in their native beaxvty." His writings consist of " A History of Plymouth Plantation," the manuscript of which, after being lost for nearly ninety years, was discovered in 1855 in the Bishop of London s library at Fulham ; a descriptive and historical account of New England in verse, the poetical merit of which cannot be ranked high ; and some controversial treatises. But his chief works were works of action. He was one of the English exiles in Holland, where he followed some industrial occupation; and he sailed in the Mayflower for the western world. In every relation of life he showed himself one of God s- gentlemen a man of truth, honour, courtesy, firmness, gentleness, and simplicity. His merits as a Governor have already appeared in the course of this narrative ; and it is sufficient to add that New Plymouth was indebted to no man more than to him. Of his personal life a curious incident is re corded. While the Mayflower was lying off Cape Cod, previous to disembarking the main body of the emigrants, his wife fell overboard and was drowned, while he himself was away on one of the exploring expeditions. His second wife, a widow r is said to have been his first love ; and, a corre spondence between them having been renewed, the lady went out from England, and married Bradford at New Plymouth. Such lights of tenderness and romance fall into lives the most sedate, Avhen they are true, not only to abstract standards of right, but to the warmth and constancy of affection. Bradford left four children (one by his first wife, and three by his second), several of whose descendants are still found in the United States. A marble monument was erected in 1825 on the burial Mil at Plymouth, over the grave of this excellent man, and of his son William, at one time Deputy-Governor of the colony. After Brewster and Bradford, the most important man among the early Plymouth settlers was Edward Winslow, who had attained a very high reputation in New England generally when, in 1634, he was for the third time sent to the mother country, as the agent not merely of Plymouth, but of Massachusetts as well. One of his first acts on arriving in London was to present a petition to the Lords Commissioners for Foreign Plantations, in which he set forth the encroachments of the French and Dutch, and prayed, on behalf of the New England colonies, that the Commissioners, would either procure their peace with those foreign settlers, or give special warrant to the English to defend themselves against all enemies. Winthrop afterwards expressed himself greatly dissatisfied 1636.] PROGRESS OF PLYMOUTH COLONY. 1G5 with this request, and in his Journal censured the proceeding as undertaken by ill advice, as such precedents might endanger their liberty by con ceding that nothing could be done but by com mission out of England. It may be doubted, however, if the Massachusetts policy of almost complete independence and scarcely-veiled defiance were any the wiser. Perhaps, under the difficult circumstances then existing, no course would have been entirely free from objection. Certainly WinsloAv was not successful. Some members of the board received his proposals favourably ; but the supporters of Gorges and Mason, who desired to establish a general government for New England, having its origin in the King s own appointment, violently opposed the suggested authorisation. Archbishop Laud, the President of the Commission, put a stop to "Window s suit by questioning the colonial representative on various matters touching his personal conduct in America. He was charged with having, though a mere layman, taught pub licly in the church, and officiated in the celebration of marriages. To the first of these accusations Winslow replied that sometimes, when the church was destitute of a minister, he had exercised his gift for the instruction of his brethren. As regards the second, he said that he regarded marriage as nothing more than a civil contract, and that at such ceremonies he had officiated simply as a magistrate ; that the people of Plymouth, having for a long time been without a minister, were com pelled by necessity to have recourse to the secular power on these occasions ; but that this was no novelty to them, as they had been accustomed to it in Holland, where he himself had been married by a Dutch magistrate in the Stadt- House. The furious Archbishop hereupon pronounced Winslow guilty of separation from the Church of England, and persuaded the other Commissioners to commit him to the Fleet Prison, where he was detained four months. The agent for New England returned to his adopted home without having effected any good. Succeeding years were signalised by legal and political reforms in the Plymouth colony. The laws were codified and reformed in 1636, and at the same time the form of government was revised in such a manner as to confer on the body of freemen the chief share both of legislation and administration. The colony of Plymouth did not assume towards the mother country that position of disloyalty which from the very first marked the policy of Massachusetts. In the former plantation, the oaths to be taken by freemen, residents, and officials, included a recognition of the Royal authority, and the courts were ordered to be held in the King s name. But, as in the case of Massa chusetts, the colonists asserted, by a rule passed in 1637, their right to exclude from the jurisdiction any one of whom they disapproved. Masters of vessels bringing passengers into the plantation without leave were obliged to keep them while they stayed, and ultimately to re-carry them and their goods to the place Avhen.ce they came. In 1638, a species of representative body was formed, to share with the Governor and Assistants the task of ruling the settlement ; and tax-paying masters of families, though not freemen (that is to say, persons invested with special privileges), were per mitted to have a vote in the election of these deputies. Laws, however, might still be enacted or repealed by the whole body of freemen convened in their Courts of Election.* Thus, the govern ment rested on a popular basis in the main, though a privileged order was not unknown. The relations of the Plymouth colonists with the natives were, on the whole, more friendly than we have seen in other quarters. It is true that troubles in this direction were not wholly wanting. Westoii s attempt to form a plantation in Massachusetts Bay had been one cause of a collision between the settlers of 1620 and the Indians. The former were at times threatened by some of the minor tribes of the vicinity, and, in 1621, Standish, with about twelve men, was compelled to strike terror, by a vig orous movement, into certain enemies of Massasoit, an ally of the English. Standish was the military commander of the colony, and on several occasions dealt with the savages after the dashing and peremp tory style of Captain Smith in Virginia, for he was a man of great courage, of fiery temper, and of re markable promptitude. But Massasoit was always faithful in his friendship ; and between his people and the colonists many kindly offices Avere inter changed. That powerful chieftain visited the settle ment in March, 1621, and, after some formal interviews, concluded a treaty of alliance, to Avhich reference Avas made in Chapter XI. In the following summer, Winslow visited Massasoit at his woodland court. Accompanied by Stephen Hopkins, and by an Indian named Squanto, AV!IO had been kidnapped in former years by one Captain Hunt, and, luw- ing thus learned English, acted as interpreter, Winslow made his Avay across solitary and deserted lands, SAvept bare by the recent pestilence ; now resting at an Indian Aillage, now sleeping in the open fields ; sometimes Avading across streams, at others toiling through Aveeds Avhich greAv above his * Palfrey, Vol. I., chap. 13. 166 [1615. head, and again passing by forests of umbrageous trees. Except in one place, where a momentary alarm as to their intentions led to a feeble show of defiance, the natives manifested the utmost kindness to their white visitors, together with a touching reliance on their good intentions and superior knowledge. Win slow and his companions were treated with all the hospitality of which the poor savages were capable ; though the fare was so poor that the two Englishmen were almost starved by the time they got home again. Speeches, conversation, and trials of skill at shooting, beguiled the time ; and when Massasoit was invested in a coat of red cotton, laced, and a copper chain (the latter to be used as a credential by any messenger who might in future be sent to the colony), the flattered chieftain felt proud and happy in the extreme. In 1623, when Massasoit was dangerously ill, Winslow paid him another visit ; "it being," according to an old account, " a commendable manner of the Indians, when any, especially of note, are sick, for all that profess friendship to them to visit them in their extremity." * On his way, "Winslow was informed that Massasoit was already dead : upon which, the Indian guide, Hobbamock, exclaimed that his equal would never again be seen ; that he was no liar, nor bloody and cruel, like other Indians ; that in anger he was soon pacified ; that he was easy to be re conciled towards such as had offended him that he was so ruled by reason that he did not scorn the advice of meaner men ; and that he overiied his people better with few strokes than others did with many. It afterwards turned out that Mas sasoit was still living, though his illness would very probably have resulted in death, but for the kindness, care, and medical skill of Winslow. On his recovery, he said, "Now I see that the Eng lish are my friends, and love me ; and while I live I will never forget the kindness they have shown me." To this promise he faithfully adhered to the end of his life, which did not terminate till 1660 ; and it was he who, immediately after his sickness, gave Winslow intelligence of the Indian plot against Weston s company. The red men were sometimes treacherous - sometimes simply bewildered and frightened ; but they often exhibited a degree of generosity and faithfulness which induces a fear that their harsh treatment by the settlers had less justification than is commonly supposed. Their re ception of the missionaries who from time to time undertook to convert them attempts of which we shall presently have to speak at large showed that they were at least ready to listen to the message of their conquerors. As he advanced, Bible in hand, the preacher was generally treated with respect ; sometimes was rewarded with submission. CHAPTER XX. Agitation against the Governments of Plymouth and Massachusetts William Vassall Demand for Complete Religious Tolera tion Petition to the English Parliament threatened Presbyterians and Independents Distinctions in their Methods of Church Discipline Tyranny of the Presbyterians in England under the Long Parliament Supremacy of the Independents in New England Determination to call a Synod The Synod of 1646 Punishment of Presbyterian Agitators Winslow again in England His Defence of the New England Governments Distrust of Democracy in Massachusetts Speech of Winthrop on the Subject Instructions to Winslow as to his Conduct before the Parliamentary Commission on the Plantations Remonstrance of the Massachusetts Government to the Commissioners Decision of the Disputed Points The Synod of 1648 Platform of Church Discipline then established Roger Williams and the Narragansett Plantations Dissensions and General Progress. HOWEVER determined the ruling class in New England might be not to admit the authority of the mother country in the administration of colonial affairs, several of the commonalty looked to the interposition of the Home Government as a resource against tyrannies little less than those from which they had fled during the early years of the reign of Charles I. These men were not long before they found a voice. In October, 1645, William Vassall, brother of Samuel Vassall, commenced a movement which gave considerable trouble to the * Narrative, perhaps by Winslow himself, in Mourt s Journal (1622). persons against whom it was directed. William Vassall had been one of the original Assistants named in the charter of the Massachusetts Company; but, after returning for awhile to England, he again crossed the Atlantic, and found a home at Scituate, in the Plymouth colony. His brother Samuel, who had also been one of the Massachusetts Assistants, likewise returned to England, and at the date in question was a member of the Parliamentary Com mission for the Government of the Plantations. Counting, perhaps, on the help of Samuel, William Vassall proposed to certain, malcontents in Plymouth to petition the General Court that the distinctions 1646.] PRESBYTERIANS AND INDEPENDENTS. 167 maintained both in civil and church estate might be done away with, and that the people might be governed wholly by the laws of England. It was demanded that " a full and free tolerance of religion to all men, without exception against Turk, Jew, Papist, Ariaii, Socinian, Familist, or any other," be established ; and it was declared that, if this petition failed, the English Parliament should be appealed to. Winslow, who relates these facts in a letter to "VVinthrop, says that the " carrion " of universal toleration was relished by the ma jority of the Court; yet nothing was done, and the agitation then, passed into Massachusetts. The petitioners stated, in a remonstrance which they addressed to the General Court of that colony, in May, 1646, that many thousands in the New England plantations were debarred from all public employments, and even denied the right of voting for civil and military officers ; and that numerous members of the Church of England, who agreed with the latest religious reformation in England and Scotland, were prohibited the Lord s Supper on account of doctrinal differences, but were neverthe less compelled under a severe fine to appear every Sunday at the congregation, and in some places were forced to maintain the very ministers who would not admit them to their flocks. From these grievances they craved relief, ac the same time intimating a determination to carry their complaints to the Parliament at London, if satisfaction were denied them in the colonies. The persons interested in this movement were Presbyterians, and their hope of success $n England lay in the ascendency of the Presbyterian body in the old country. The leaders of Massachusetts were Independents, or, as they called themselves, Congregationalists ; so that the action, of "Vassall s friends threatened a conten tion on religious grounds those grounds on which most of the New England feuds were fought out. To understand the full force of the distinction thus indicated., it will be advisable to examine in brief the characteristic views of these two bodies of extreme Protestant reformers. The root of both sects, as regards theology, is to be found in the teachings of Calvin ; yet, in respect of church discipline, the true Calvinists are the Presbyterians. In the system of the great French man who settled at Geneva, each separate church or congregation is governed by its own Presbyters or Elders, who are either teachers (that is, ministers) or lay rulers, and who are all of equal rank and authority. But these separate bodies, taken to gether, form a National Church, which . in its corporate capacity has supreme authority over the individual or local churches. The general govern ment is vested in a Consistory, omposed of laymen and ecclesiastics (but chiefly of the former), who are elected from year to year. The office of Bishop, together with all hierarchical distinctions, is ex cluded from this system, the chief features of which are democrat ical. The principles of Calvin s method were introduced into Scotland by John Knox and Andrew Melville, but with some modi fications, rendered necessary by the larger sphere to which the system was to be adapted. Those great reformers established a mode of church government consisting of the Kirk Session, elected by the single parish or congregation; the Presbytery, formed of all the ministers of a certain district, and one ruling Elder from each parish ; the Provincial Synod, composed of all the Presbyteries within a given province; and the General Assembly, em bodying, as far as religion is concerned, the whole nation. In all these councils, lay members sit side by side with ministers. During the civil war, a similar regimen was established in England by the Long Parliament, acting in obedience to the cele brated Westminster Assembly of Divines, which first met in July, 1643, and sat until the autumn of 1647. But the Presbyterians were now to encounter considerable opposition from the growing strength of the Independents. The distinctive tenet of that body was that every church by which they understood every properly organised congregation of people for the purposes of religious worship has a complete and independent existence of its own, which should be as free from control by any Presbytery or General Assembly as from the dictation of Bishops or the interference of the State. The only thing in the nature of corporate jurisdiction which they allowed was in the case of any church giving offence, when, if it refused to hearken to the monition of neighbouring churches, the latter were empowered, after a meeting of their representatives to discuss the question, to withdraw from such church the right hand of fellowship, and to hold the offender no longer in the communion of saints. A Synod of this nature (the earliest in the history of New England) was held in 1637, with reference to the Hutchinsonian heresy. The Inde pendent view of church government was first put forth, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, by Robert Brown, to whom allusion has been made in an earlier Chapter ; and it gathered force in the reigns of James I. and his son. The Presbyterian system, in the opinion of the Independents, had a dangerous tendency to ally itself with the secular arm, and from this they feared as much violence to the individual conscience as from sovereigns and prelates. The leaders of 168 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1647. the Presbyterians had already evinced a disposition to come to terms with the King ; and, some years later, it was owing partly to their instrumentality that Charles II. was placed upon the throne. Nothing in the Presbyterian system is necessarily incompatible with the idea of a Church Establish ment, supported and enforced by law. Such an Establishment has existed in Scotland ; such an Establishment was imposed by the Long Parlia- than to him is due the triumph of Independency under the Protector. In his irregular Sonnet " On the New Forcers of Conscience under the Lono- o Parliament," the composition of which is referred to the year 1646 or 1647, he accuses the dominant theologians of the day of envying rather than abhorring the sin of those who in the Episcopal Church had practised pluralism ; of adjuring the civil sword to force the consciences which Christ EDWAUD WIIS SLOW. ment upon England. Against this arrangement, the English Independents always directed the utmost strength of their party organisation. They had some men of the very highest mark among their ranks. Not to speak of professed theologians, they could reckon 011 the countenance of Oliver Cromwell, Sir Henry Vane the Younger, Lord Saye and Sele, Nathaniel Fiennes, Oliver St. John, Bulstrode Whitelocke, Selden, and Milton. The great poet of the Commonwealth was one of the most efficient champions of their cause. Both in prose and verse he held up the Presbyterians to the detestation of Englishmen ; and to none more had set free ; and of stigmatising as heretics men whose life, learning, and faith would have placed them high in the estimation of Paul. " New Presbyter is but old Priest writ large," is his scornful conclusion. In his Sonnet to Crom well, belonging to the year 1652, he implores that great soldier to save free conscience from the grasp of hireling wolves, who had no other gospel than their maw. And in his " Areopagitica " (1644) he exposes the inconsistency of the Presbyterians, who, as long as the Bishops were to be baited down, were in favour of a free press, but who, now that 1646.] THE INDEPENDENTS OF NEW ENGLAND. 169 power had passed into their own hands, resolved to reimpose on human thought the fetters of Episco palian tyranny. " Bishops and Presbyters," lie writes, " are the same to us, both name and thing." The Presbyterians of England, in short, had adopted all the old intolerance of the Romish and Anglican Churches ; and the Independents, being as yet the weaker body, were compelled to iise the utmost exer tions to save their principles from being crushed. In New England, the relative position of the two sects was reversed. There the Independents joint and public agreement and consent of churches, and ty the sanction of civil authority." It was clearly seen by the leading men of Massachusetts that they needed, on religious grounds, some system of concerted action, such as the Presbyte rians enjoyed in England; but the admission of this want, followed by the calling of a Synod which was to create a general body of laws for the govern ment and discipline of individual congregations, implied a direct violation of the very principle of Independency. The Synod, however, met at Cam- HOUSE LATELY STANDING AT PROVIDENCE, SAID TO HAVE BEEN USED FOB PRATER MEETINGS BT WILLIAMS. were in a majority, and the ruling power was in their hands. They frequently used that power with the same disregard of the individual conscience which marks the policy of all fanatics when their turn of domineering arrives. The movement of the Presbyterian agitators was provoked by this tendency to exclusiveness and petty despotism. It was sufficiently formidable to create serious un easiness in the rulers of Massachusetts. The General Court, a few days after their receipt of the remon strance, passed a vote for assembling a Synod of Elders and messengers of the churches in all the confederated colonies, with a view to settling " the right foi m of government and discipline, by the 15 bridge, Massachusetts, on the 1st of September, 1646. More than three years earlier, a meeting of Elders had taken place in the same town, at which there had been considerable discussion, but without any result, as to whether or not some mode of Presbyterial government would be advisable. The meeting of 1646 was not more fruitful. After fourteen days debate, in which nothing was settled, the Synod was adjourned to the following- spring. In November, the General Court answered the remonstrance and petition of the malcontents, by a published declaration, in which they main tained (with some boldness, considering the whole course of events) that their government was framed 170 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1647. in accordance with their charter, and with the fundamental laws and customs of England. They also replied to the complaints of the remonstrants, and defended the policy they had adopted in the administration of colonial affairs. This, of course, gave no satisfaction to the objecting party, and it became known shortly afterwards that two of the number were about to embark for England, to make that appeal to the Parliament which had been threatened. They were summoned before the General Court, to answer for their share in the petition ; and, on showing an inclination to dis pute the order, were committed to custody until they gave security for future appearance. All who had signed the petition seven in number, of whom, however, Vassall was not one were ulti mately arraigned on a charge of making false and scandalous accusations against the churches of Christ and the civil government of the colony ; ac cusations which derogated from the honour and authority of that government, and tended to sedi tion. But the malcontents refused to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the Court, declined to answer, and again talked of appealing to England. The Court therefore found them guilty, and imposed lines of varying amounts, to be remitted upon their making public acknowledgment of their mis demeanours. This sentence might certainly have been far more harsh ; but, even as it stood, it was a question able exercise of power. Four of the Deputies and three of the Magistrates dissented from the judg ment ; and there can be no doubt that Vane, had he still been in the colony, would have thrown all Ids influence into the scale against punishing these agitators for expressing opinions contrary to those of the ruling authorities. On the 10th of June, 1645, that benevolent but eccentric politician had written a letter to Winthrop, expressing a fear lest the Independents of New England, while backed with power, should, by their own principles and practice, teach their opponents in the old country how to root them out. The case of the Massachu setts Presbyterians fully justified this fear. Their prosecution was an act of oppression, proceeding from a sentiment of intolerance, and committed in the idle hope of constraining every one in the settle ment to an exact conformity in religion. The attempt was a failure, as all such attempts must necessarily be. The offer to remit the fines on con fession of guilt was unanimously rejected by the accused, and two of their number prepared to leave for England with a petition to Parliament, in which they and their coadjutors requested that settled churches might be introduced into the plantation ; that the laws of the realm might be established there; and that a Governor or body of Commis sioners might be appointed. As a punishment for this fresh offence, additional fines were inflicted; but one of the petitioners Robert Child, a doctor who had taken his degree at the University of Padua departed for England early in 1647. He had been preceded a few weeks before by Edward Winslow, of Plymouth, who, though not belonging to Massa chusetts, had been chosen by the rulers of that colony to represent their cause at London, because of his known abilities and high character. These two had no sooner arrived in their native country than they fell to pamphleteering, after the fashion of those days. Child s brother, inspired no doubt by Child himself, and he perhaps by Vassall, published a trenchant assault on the Massachusetts Government, and Winslow replied in a tract which had for its main purpose a defence of that Govern ment against the charge of persecuting the Presby terians. A further defence from the same pen was contained in a work called " Hypocrisie Unmasked," which Winslow put forth early in 1647,* as an answer to Gorton s " Simplicitie s Defence," issued a few months before. In an Appendix to " Hypo crisie Unmasked," Winslow gives what he terms a " Briefe Narration " of the disputed facts, in which he endeavours to show that several Presbyterian ministers, and even some of Anabaptist views, were suffered to live and exercise their calling in Massa chusetts. Biit the charge with regard to the Pres byterians was not that they were denied the right of living or preaching in the colony, but that they were excluded from divers privileges enjoyed by the Independents ; and this is not even touched upon by Winslow. As respects the Anabaptists, it is beyond question that many were "harried out of the land," to iise the expressive phrase of King James, when intimating his own intentions with regard to the whole body of Dissenters in England ; and to point to a few capricious instances of indul gence does not constitute any real answer to the accusation, as far as they were concerned. Winslow admits that Massachusetts had a law decreeing the banishment of Anabaptists, but denies that it was ever executed upon any, excepting those who be haved insolently to the magistrates a futile dis tinction, when it was the magistrates themselves who * As Winslow did not sail for England until the middle of December, 1646, and the book in (question was printed in London, and even written there, it is clear that the "Hypc- crisie Unmasked " must have been issued in what we should now call 1647. But at that period the legal year commenced on the 25th of March ; so that "Winslow s reply to Gorton, being published some time before the 25th, is on the title-page dated 1640. 1645.] POWER OF THE MAGISTRATES. 171 determined what was unbecoming behaviour, and who could always, when they pleased, cloak religious enmity under a pretended regard for the dignity of the civil power. Even the cases of two Presbyterian ministers, mentioned by Winslow as instances of toleration, are found, on examination, to bear a different complexion ; for one of these ministers was described as "a lover of the New England churches according to the New England model," so that his Presbyterianism could not have been ex treme ; while the other, being "a bold man" who "would speak his mind," was, according to Win- throp, forbidden to preach at Boston at the marriage there of one of his congregation.* The position of the Presbyterians in New England was similar to that of all Nonconformists in the old country down to a very recent period. If not actually op pressed, they were subjected to political disabilities of a vexatious and insulting nature. This feeling of sectarian jealousy was accompanied, in the minds of many, by a distrust of the people as the source of political power. The rulers of Massachusetts showed on several occasions how little they were disposed to yield up their authority into the hands of the electors, and to receive from them, at short intervals of time, a renewal of their com mission. The course of events was too inevitably democratic for any such resistance to be successful ; but some of the Fathers of New England testified strongly against the popular tendencies, and did their best to restrict the suffrage in many ways. Their object was to establish a species of aristocratic republic, with a narrow theological basis. Win- throp, in a letter which he addressed to the founders of Connecticut, uttered an emphatic warning against what he conceived to be the dangers of democracy, and observed : " The best part of a community is always the least, and of that best part the wiser is always the lesser ; wherefore the old law was, choose ye out judges, &c., and tliou shalt bring the matter to the judge. " And in 1G45, when Deputy-Governor, he gave expression to somewhat similar sentiments in a speech which he delivered after his acquittal on a charge of unjustly com mitting to prison certain offenders who refused to produce bail in a case arising out of military dis turbances at Hingham. "You," he said, directly addressing the people assembled in open court, " have called us to office ; but, being called, we have our authority from God : it is the ordinance of God, and hath the image of God stamped on it, and the contempt of it hath been vindicated by God with terrible examples of * Xotes in Young s "Chronicles of the Pilgrim Fathers" (Boston, 1841) to Winslow s " Briefe Narration." his vengeance The covenant between us and you is, that we shall govern you and judge your causes according to the laws of God and our best skill. As for our skill, you must run the hazard of it ; and if there be an error, not in the will, but the skill, it becomes you to bear it. Nor would I have you mistake in the point of your liberty. There is a liberty of corrupt nature, which is inconsistent with authority, impatient of restraint, the grand enemy of truth and peace ; and all the ordinances of God are bent against it. But there is a civil, moral, federal liberty, which is the proper end and object of authority a liberty for that only which is just and good.f For this liberty you are to stand with your lives ; and whatever crosses it is not authority, but a distemper thereof. This liberty is maintained in a way of subjection to authority, and the authority set over you will, in all administrations for your good, be quietly sub mitted to by all but such as have a disposition to shake off the yoke, and lose their liberty by mur muring at the honour and power of authority."! There was a great deal of truth, nobly expressed, in these thoughtful sentences ; yet it is not difficult to see in them a rooted dislike of popular criticism on the acts of men. in power. Nevertheless, Win- throp was re-elected to the post of Governor in the following year (1646), and every year after until his death in 1649. With this Hingham case were mixed up con siderations touching the jurisdiction of the mother country over the colonies. That jurisdiction had been asserted by the creators of the disturbance, and was of course denied by the authorities, who were always ready to punish severely any appeal to the English King or Parliament. The question was fully argued by the Government of Massa chusetts in a remonstrance and petition to the English Commissioners for the Plantations, carried with him to Europe by Winslow when he left, iv. 1646, to repel the charges of Gorton, Child, and others. In his private instructions (as Winthrop relates in his Journal) Winslow was enjoined to maintain that the freemen of Massachusetts had a right to omit the King s name from legal processes, in order to avoid appeals, and because the Company claimed to exercise its powers " by a free donation of absolute government." He was also to submit t "- - "Who loves that must first be wise and good." MILTON. J Belknap s American Biography, edited by F. M. Hubbard (New York, 1843), Vol. III., Art. "Winthrop." Belknap appears to have followed the report in the Massachusetts Historical Collection. "VVinslow himself gives in his Journal a report of his own speech which to some extent differs in phraseology, but is substantially to the same effect. 17-2 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1647. "that the colonies had always shown their subjection to England by framing their government according to the patent received from her ; that their political constitution was in accordance with the charter ; and that the same document, by granting absolute powers of government to the colonists, secured them against the imposition of a General Governor. " We conceive," said the Elders of Massachusetts in a formal declaration drawn up at the request of the General Court, "that, in point of government, we have, granted by patent, such full and ample power of choosing all officers that shall command and rule over us, of making all laws and rules of our obedience, and of a full and final determina tion of all cases in the administration of justice, that no appeal or other ways of interrupting our proceedings do lie against us." To like purpose wrote Winslow in his reply to Child, where he canteiids that, if the English Parliament should impose laws on the colonies, they having no bur gesses in the House of Commons, nor being capable of a summons, by reason of their separation from London by a distance of three thousand miles, the settlers would be deprived of their liberties as Eng lishmen. In their remonstrance to the Parliamentary Commission, the rulers of Massachusetts took very high ground. They asserted their independence in plain terms, but at the same time adopted a studiously courteous, and in some respects deferen tial tone. "An order from England," they wrote, " is prejudicial to our chartered liberties, and to our well-being in this remote part of the world. Times may be changed, for all things here below are sub ject to vanity, and other Princes or Parliaments may arise. Let not succeeding generations have cause to lament, and say, England sent our fathers forth with happy liberties, which they enjoyed many years, notwithstanding all the enmity and opposition of the prelacy, and other potent adver saries ; and yet these liberties were lost in the season when England itself recovered its own. We rode out the dangers of the sea ; shall we perish in port ? We have not admitted appeals to your authority, being assured they cannot stand with the liberty and power granted us by our charter, and would be destructive to all government. The wisdom and experience of that great council, the English Parliament, are more able to prescribe iiiles of government, and judge causes, than such poor rustics as a wilderness can breed up ; yet the vast distance between England and these parts abates the virtue of the strongest influences. Your councils and judgments can neither be so well grounded nor so seasonably applied as might either be useful to us or safe for yourselves in your discharge in the great day of account. If any miscarriage shall befall us when we have the government in our own hands, the State of England shall not answer for it." * Such were the views which Winslow was in structed to urge and defend before the Commis sioners for the Plantations. The matter ended in a kind of compromise. By consenting to plead their cause before the officials of the English Parlia ment, and thus soliciting a favourable consideration of their case, the New England colonies conceded in effect that jurisdiction which they denied in terms. On the other hand, the Commissioners showed every disposition to be conciliatory. With reference to the question of appeal, they declared that they would not encourage any appeals from the judicial decisions of the colonial authorities, nor restrain the bounds of their jurisdiction to a narrower compass than was indicated by their letters patent, but would leave to them that free dom and latitude which they could in any way duly claim, since a limitation of their power in such matters might be very prejudicial, if not destructive, to the government and public peace of the settle ments. Respecting Gorton and his friends, the Commissioners followed a somewhat hesitating course. On the 15th of May, 1646, before the arrival of Winslow in England, they had issued an order to the Government of Massachusetts, com manding them to permit Gorton, and all the late inhabitants of Narragansett Bay, to live and plant on the disputed lands at Shawomet, till such time as the adverse claim of Massachusetts could be presented and considered. In May, 1647, when the final decision was given, after the representa tions of Winslow had been heard, the Commissioners simply recommended that the government within whose jurisdiction the Gortoiiites should appear to be, should allow them to remain in their settle ments, and encourage them with protection and assistance, provided they demeaned themselves peaceably, and did not endanger any of the English colonies by a prejudicial correspondence with the Indians. Gorton accordingly returned to America, but, on landing at Boston, would at once have been apprehended, had he not produced a letter from the Earl of Warwick, head of the Parliamentary Com mission, requesting that he might be suffered to pass to his home. Child was even less successful than Gorton. He found no support in his com plaints, and was ultimately prevailed upon by his friends to give an undertaking not to cause any * Bancroft s History of the United States, chap. 10. 1648.] SYNOD OF INDEPENDENTS. 173 further trouble to the New England colonies. The truth is that the federated plantations were reaping the benefit of their friendliness to the Republican party in the mother country, and were also favoured by the recent turn of events. The English Presby terians were not so strong in 1647 as they had been in 1646 ; they were beginning to feel uneasy at the increasing influence of the Independents ; and they probably thought it bad policy to provoke a power ful opposition for the sake of a distant quarrel. At all events, New England went her way unmolested. Very few persons in Massachusetts ventured to raise the disputed questions anew, and at the next elections the candidates of the discontented party were defeated by large majorities. Nevertheless, it can hardly be doubted that the Presbyterians of New England had some real grievances for redress, though it is possible that these may have been exaggerated, as such complaints often are, by irritable or ambitious men. While these matters were being debated in England, the Synod of divines which had met at Cambridge, Massachusetts, was continuing its sittings. It had been adjourned in September, 1646, to the ensuing spring, and, having then again assembled, was once more broken up, after a few days consultation, by the outbreak of an epidemic. Its third session took place in the summer of 1648, and, by an unanimous vote passed on the 6th of August, the Westminster Confession of Faith was approved of, excepting with regard to such matters as concerned the Presbyterian disci pline. The question of church government, however, was not evaded ; for the Synod published in October a system of discipline, which they desired might be presented to the several churches, and to the General Court, for their consideration and acceptance. The authors of this document recog nised the authority of occasional Synods, composed of Elders and other messengers of churches, to give advice and admonition, or, in extreme cases, to withhold fellowship from an offending church ; but not to pronounce church censures in way of disci pline, nor to perform any other act of church authority or jurisdiction. They also conceded to the civil power a considerable latitude in the punish ment of offences against received ideas in religion. The acts that were to be thus restrained were described as "idolatry, blasphemy, heresy, venting corrupt and pernicious opinions, open contempt of the word preached, profanation of the Lord s Day, disturbing the peaceable administration and exercise of the worship and holy things of God, and the like." Schismatical churches, and those obstinately adhering to any corrupt way of their own, were to be subject to the coercive power of the magis trates. The General Court took time to consider this "Platform," as it was called;* but in October, 1649, they resolved to commend it to the discus sion of the several churches within the jurisdic tion, at the same time desiring to know whether they thought it suitable, before the Court pro ceeded any farther. Two years later in October, 1651 a brief declaratory vote of the General Court gave expression to their agreement with the substance of what the Synod had set forth. In later years, however, the system of church govern ment thus created was modified in several par ticulars ; and indeed it is obvious that the genius of Independency was opposed to so strict a limita tion of individual churches. It is difficxilt to see in what essential respect the regimen differed from Presbyterianisin, or, excepting in the introduction of a popular element, from church government by Bishops. That it tended to persecution for con science sake, is apparent at a glance ; though the agency for persecution, and the responsibility for it, were cunningly divided between occasional Synods and the civil magistracy. In point of fact, neither was to persecute, but both were to do it together. They were like the two nuns in " Tristram Shandy," who, by sharing the pronunciation of the objection able words, hoped to avoid the sin of those who were less scrupulous, while reaping all the advan tages of its commission. The visit of Roger Williams to England, and its results, were circumstances relating to the same period. That single-hearted enthusiast departed for his native land in 1643, with the intention of soliciting a charter for the government of Rhode Island and the adjacent country on the continent. This he obtained partly through the influence of Sir Henry Vane, who remembered him as an old friend, partly on account of his merits as a mis sionary among the Indians. The patent which was granted him associated the towns of Providence, Portsmouth, and Newport in one community, by the name of the Incorporation of Providence Plan tations, in the Narragaiisett Bay, in New England. In 1644, he returned to America, carrying with him. the charter, and a letter from certain members of Parliament, requesting that he might receive friendly treatment from the Magistrates of Massa chusetts. Passing through that colony without molestation, he reached his own province in Sep- * The word " Platform," in the sense of a general declara tion of principles, is sometimes regarded as of modern and American growth ; but it was used in England as far back na the sixteenth century. 174 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1654. tember, and was received with demonstrations of the liveliest joy. As he approached his capital, the waters of Providence River were seen to be covered with a fleet of fourteen canoes. Williams was taken on board one of these small craft, and conveyed in triumph to Providence. It is related by a contemporary writer that the successful nego tiator was " elevated and transported out of him self;" and well he might be, for the hunted fugitive of 1636 had in less than nine years become the honoured head of a rising colony. Nevertheless, he had still many troubles. Ply mouth and Massachusetts laid claim to certain portions of the Narragansett territory, and the various settlements included in the patent were distracted by internal quarrels. An attempt to establish a regular and orderly government under the Patent of Providence Plantations was made in May, 1647 ; but it proved a failure. Three Assemblies were called in three successive years, and a General Court was created on the basis of repre sentation certainly a great improvement on the disorderly assemblages of the whole people which had formerly been held. But, after much wrangling and personal jealousy, the Assemblies came to an end in 1650, and Roger Williams was compelled once more to go to England. Coddington, who had already caused disturbances on Rhode Island, had been invested by the Council of State in the old country with the government of the islands in Narragansett Bay, though these were generally re garded as forming part of the Providence Planta tion. The division threatened a serious weakening of the little State, and Williams, on again reaching England, obtained, in 1652, a revocation of the commission granted to Coddington, a confirmation of the charter, and a union of the territories noAv forming the State of Rhode Island.* ,On this as on * While in England the second time, Williams had a corre spondence with Mrs. Sadleir, Sir Edward Coke s daughter, to which reference has before been made. To this lady, Williams the former occasion, Sir Henry Vane proved him self the chief friend of the colony, though he was so little blind to its faults that he wrote a letter reproving the settlers for the want of harmony which prevailed among them. His interest, how ever, was not wholly misplaced; for, despite the dissensions so frequently arising among its lead ing men, the plantation prospered. "We have long been free," said the colonists, in an address of thanks which they sent to Sir Henry in 1654, " from the iron yoke of wolvish bishops. We have sitten dry from the streams of blood spilt by the wars in our native country. We have not felt the new chains of the Presbyterian tyrants, nor, in this colony, have we been consumed by the over- zealous fire of the (so-called) godly Christian magis trates. We have not known what an excise means ; we have almost forgotten what tithes are. We have long drunk of the cup of as great liberties as any people that we can hear of under the whole heaven." Such were the contributions which Rhode Island brought to the sum-total of American freedom. sent a copy of a devotional work of his, written when among the Indians, and followed it up by another of his productions, directed against persecution. Mrs. Sadleir returned the latter without reading it, and begged her correspondent to trouble her no more in that kind. Nevertheless, he wrote to her again ; to which she replied : " It seems you have a face of brass, so that you cannot blush ;" adding that such foul and false asper sions as he had cast upon Charles the Martyr " could only have proceeded from such a villain as himself. Thence she launched out into the general polemics of the time, and, alluding to Milton, remarked :" If I be not mistaken, that is he that hath wrote a book of the lawfulness of divorce ; and, if report says true, he had at that time two or three wives living. This, perhaps, were good doctrine in New England, but it is most abominable in Old England. For his book that he wrote against the late King, that you would have me read, you should have taken notice of God s judgment upon him, who struck him with blindness. . . . God has begun his punish ment upon him here : his punishment will be hereafter in hell." She further told Williams that he and a certain theological trea tise would " make a good fire ;" and she finally expressed a wish that he were back in "the place " whence he came by which this energetic lady may have meant either New England, or that region where the punishment of Milton was to be completed. -^- -T~~ -~~~~~ _:__ . / UORTON S LANDING. 176 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. CHAPTER XXI. Efforts for the Conversion of the Indians to Christianity Their Susceptibility to Ealigious Impressions Jqhn Eliot, the Apostle of the Red Man His first Attempts at Conversion Grant of Land to the Indians by the General Court of Massachusetts Establishment of a Court of Judicature for the Converted Natives Spread of Civilisation Self-devotion of Eliot Jealousy and Opposition of Many of the Indian Chiefs Commencement of a Town of Christianised Indians, and Formation of a Native Church Martha s Vineyard Missionary Exertions of Thomas Mayhew in that Island Society for the Promoting and Propagating of the Gospel in America, created by an Ordinance of the English Parliament Daniel Gookin Progress of Conversion to the End of the Seventeenth Century Dislike of Christianity amongst several of the Tribes Degraded Condition of the Converted Indians Present State and Opinions of the Red Men Their Fondness for raising Questions in Theology Roman Catholic Conversions Decay of the Indian Race. THE missionary efforts of Eliot, tlie Mayliews, and other apostles of Christianity among the Indians, must not be overlooked in any record of the progress of New England. It has been shown that the native populations of America had a religion of their own, which, however imperfect and deformed by superstition, prepared their minds for the re ception of spiritual influences. Roger Williams has testified that he never knew a red man who denied the existence of a God. Most of the early English settlers confess that the aborigines had a form of worship and a definite belief; though some, refusing to see even the rudiments of religion in anything which differs from their own creed, have denied that these wanderers of the desert had the least con ception of Deity, or of an existence prolonged beyond the grave. One thing is clear that, both in Virginia and the more northern settlements, the Indians occasionally sought the English settlers, and requested instruction in their tenets. The thoughtful and melancholy character of the North American savage would naturally predispose him to the con sideration of doctrines appealing powerfully to the conscience and the soul ; and, though it by no means necessarily follows that he would adopt them, AVO find that in New England some of the natives were . . * readily and quickly imbiied with the Sabbatarian ideas of the Puritan settlers. That this was often merely the submission of fear to strength, is certain. It is recorded that a Connecticut Indian, named Wequash, was convinced that the God of the English was a most dreadful God, because he had seen the courage, fury, and success with which the white men had fallen on their enemies during the Pequot Avar. But a similar feeling has probably been at the root of many conversions, and the spread of Christianity in the early ages was due in some degree to the power of the sword. The religious enthusiasts who founded the States of New England were not likely to pass over any opportunity for spreading a knowledge of the Gospel ; and towards the close of 1 644 the General Court of Massachusetts made an order for throwing on the several County Courts the responsibility of civilising the Indians, and instructing them in the worship of God. Two years afterwards it Avas determined that two persons should every year be chosen by the Elders of the churches, and be commissioned, Avith the agreement of those churches, and in association -with whomsoever Avould freely offer themselves for the service, to make knoAvn the principles of the Christian faith among the aboriginal tribes. But a Aveek before the passing of this order, John Eliot, minister of Roxbury, Massachusetts, and formerly a student at Cambridge in England, had already begun the work. He had for some time given attention to the study of one of the Indian languages a task in which he derived considerable help from a young native Avho had been servant in an English house, and was therefore acquainted Avith both tongues. This man he took into his own dwelling, and, by conversing with him, acquired a facility in the use of Avords Avhich to a European are particularly harsh and difficult. In a preli minary intervieAV with some iiatiA-es, he told them that they and the English were all one, with two> exceptions : A iz., that the English kiieAV, served, and prayed to God, and the Indians did not ; and that the English laboured in building, planting, and clothing themselves, and the Indians did not. If the Indians would do as the English in these matters, there Avould no longer be any distinction betAveen them. They aiiSAvered that they kne\v not IIOAV to pray to God, nor IIOAV to serve him.. Eliot rejoined that he would go to their wigwams,, and teach them. On the !28th of October, 1646, he Avent forth, in company Avith three others, and was met by five or six natives at a little distance from the falls of Charles River. In a hut not far off, many Indians, including women and children, were found as sembled. After a short prayer in English, Eliot preached for an hour and a quarter in the Indian language, repeating and explaining the ten Ccm- mandments, and setting forth as plainly as he could the chief doctrines of Christianity. This exposition,. 1647.] JOHN ELIOT, THE MISSIONARY. 177 on that and subsequent occasions, lie accompanied by vehement persuasions to repentance, and then answered such questions as the listeners had to pro pose, some of which wandered from religious grounds to matters of physical geography and science. These efforts induced a certain number of Indians, despite the opposition of their priests, to express some desire to accept Christianity, or at least to have their children brought up in that faith. It came to be a popular opinion among the colonists that the barbarians were descended from the ten lost tribes of Israel, and that they were to be brought back to the true fold before the commencement of the millennial age. In more recent times, the English themselves have been traced up to these lost tribes ; the subject being one on which more than the Israelites have gone astray. But the fancy was doubtless not without its effect in quickening missionary zeal, and its somewhat visionary cha racter was checked by the practical genius of Eliot, That enterprising minister directed his attention to the training of his converts in agriculture and the simple mechanical arts ; he also suggested the pro priety of their being concentrated in compact settle ments, where they would be removed from the adverse influences of their heathen fellow-coimtry- men. The General Court, in consequence, gave the Indians of Massachusetts some land to build a town upon, which they thankfully received, and called it by a name which signifies " rejoicing." A number of these proselytes held a meeting, and agreed on a set of laws tending to the formation of a decent and well-regulated society ; and on the 26th of May, 1647, the General Court made an order, decreeing that, in consequence of some of the Indians having expressed a desire to see a court of ordinary judicature set up among them, one or more of the Magistrates should keep sxich a court every quarter, with permission to the sachems to hold a court of their OAVII once a month. The ground 011 which the native town was to be built having been marked out, Eliot supplied the Indians with implements of labour, and bestowed money on those who worked hardest. In a little while, a number of wigwams, much superior to the gene rality of Indian hovels, and divided into separate rooms, arose in the solitude. The women learned to spin, and in time were seen at the markets of the white men, with brooms, staves, baskets, fish, poultry, and the fruits of the season. Others laboured with the English in the hay-fields or at harvest ; but the native dislike of severe work, or physical inability to perform it, was frequently apparent. Nevertheless, the good example spread, and the Indians near Concord expressed a wish to be civil ised, and to receive the Christian religion. These also agreed on a system of laws, and petitioned the Government to grant them a piece of land for the beginning of a settlement. Eliot was indefatigable in the work which he had taken up. The spirit of the ancient Apostles was strong in him, and no danger, no fatigue, no suffering, was sufficient to prevent his prosecution of a task with which he be lieved himself to have been divinely charged. He travelled all over the Massachusetts and Plymouth plantations, and even preached to Indians in the remote places about Cape Cod. In. a letter to Win- slow, he mentions that he had not been dry, day or night, from a certain. Tuesday to the following Saturday, but had travelled from place to place in that condition, pulling off his wet boots at night, wringing out his stockings, and so putting them on again. At such seasons he had considered the ex hortation of the Apostle Paul to his son Timothy, that we should " endure hardness, as good soldiers of Jesus Christ." He usually went on his mis sionary work once a fortnight, and it is said that on these occasions he often narrowly escaped death at the hands of some of the Indian princes and priests. In records of this nature, one never knows how much to allow for the afflatus o e religious writers. But all established religions are fond of persecuting their adversaries, if not restrained by the power of the State ; and when we find the various sects of Christians condemning one another to the block or the fire, it does not seem at all improbable that many Indian sachems would have been gratified by scalping an English minister, if they could have found an opportunity, or had they dared to rouse the vengeance of English commu nities. The converts were few in comparison with the unconverted. The ruling men among the tribes especially those in the New England colonies south of Massachusetts were jealoiis lest their privileges shoxild be taken away from them ; and the mass of the natives were not so much out of love with their savage freedom as to desire to exchange it for siibjection to the stranger. But dislike of religious innovation one of the most powerful feelings in the human breast, whether civilised or barbarian was the sentiment chiefly concerned in the opposition to Eliot. The Mohegan Indians were so much annoyed at being compelled by the General Court of Connecticut to pray to God, that Uncas himself went to the seat of govern ment at Hartford to protest against it. Another sachem attended one of the missionary lectures, and strongly opposed the building of an Indian town, 178 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1644. assuring Eliot that those who prayed according to the Christian belief did not pay him as much tribute as before. The same chief became himself a Christian not long after ; but in the case of such a man it is perhaps excusable to suspect an in terested motive. Philip, ruler of the Wampanoags, told Eliot that he cared no more for his Gospel than for one of his buttons. Massasoit, sachem of the Pokanokets a very faithful friend of the English desired on one occasion, though of course without obtaining his desire, that a clause should be inserted in a treaty with the Plymouth settlers, to the effect that the English should never attempt to convert the warriors of his tribe from the religion they professed. All who favoured Christianity were banished from the society of their own people ; some were put to death ; and a general massacre of the proselytes would perhaps have taken place, but for fear of the consequences. Many of the Christianised Indians still retained a dread of the powows, or sorcerers a set of men who were thought able to cure or to inflict diseases, to bewitch the living, and to raise the dead to life. Others braved the mysterious incantations of these impostors. Jaccomes, a Chris tian convert, having been, threatened by some of the powows with sudden destruction unless he re turned to his old religion, replied, at a great assembly of his countrymen, that, although the deity they worshipped had great power, he was subservient to the Christian God. This mingling of the old opinions with the new is remarkable, and curiously illustrates that process by which an. element of ancient Paganism crept into primitive Christianity, and became perpetuated in certain forms of ritual, and perhaps some shades of doc trine. In spite of menaces and discouragements, the missionary movement made progress, and, by the direction of Eliot, the Praying Indians, as they were called, built themselves a town on Charles River, about eighteen miles west of Boston. This town they called Natick, and it was commenced in 1650. It consisted of three long streets, with several small houses, a fort, a bridge, and one large hall, which served as a meeting-house and school room, and in which Eliot had a bedchamber. Thither the reclaimed Indians of the earlier settle ment were removed, and Eliot proposed that they should be governed by the Scriptures in all things, whether of church or state, and that, like the Israelites of old, they should elect a ruler of a hundred, two rulers of fifties, and ten rulers of tens.* * Exodus xviii. 2123. This was done, and, in that primitive state of society, the plan appears to have answered. The new converts continued several years in the position of catechumens, during which time they were visited once a week by an English minister, who preached to them, and answered such questions as they might propose; and on the 13th of October, 1652, about fourteen or fifteen Indians made distinct and open confession of their faith. That the number should have been so few, after six years of zealous ministry by Eliot and others, says little for the disposition of the Indians in those parts to profess unequivo cally the doctrines of their conquerors. The confes sions of faith were communicated by the examining ministers to the several colonial churches ; but the latter hesitated about admitting the converts to communion with themselves. The formation of these Christianised Indians into a regular church did not take place until 1660, and, although there was much rejoicing over the fact, both in England and America, the result seems to have been but small. The conversions were almost entirely among those Indians who were the most dependent on the English, the most broken-spirited, and the most miserable. The number of proselytes, when at its largest, about 1674, was returned at four thousand ; but it is to be suspected that several of these were not veiy earnest in the faith. To the more sober- minded it appeared at an early date that many of the Indians simply acted a part to please the English, and it was feared, after awhile, that even the most sincere had somewhat cooled in their enthusiasm. Still, it is probable that some of them were in earnest, and hopes were entertained of the con version of the entire race. A " Praying Indian " became a bachelor of arts at Cambridge. Little villages of Indian converts arose on Cape Cod, in Martha s Vineyard and Nantucket, and about the neighbourhood of Boston. Missionary success was more particularly observable in Martha s Vineyard a small island off the coast of Massachusetts, for which a patent had been obtained from the Earl of Stirling by a settler named Thomas Mayhew, who had originally come from Southampton in England, and who was admitted a freeman of Massachusetts in 1634. Ten years afterwards, this gentleman left Watertown, on the mainland, for Martha s Vineyard, to which both the Earl of Stirling and Sir Ferdinando Gorges made a claim, and with suffi cient plausibility to render it prudent on the part of Mayhew to pay both. His son had established himself on the island a year or two before the father- settled there ; and it was not long ere the latter trans ferred Martha s Vineyard, the adjacent island of 1619.] THE SOCIETY FOR PROPAGATING THE GOSPEL. 179 Nantucket, and the Elizabeth Isles all of which came within the patent to the Government of Massachusetts. Nothing could exceed the wretched ness of the Indians in Martha s Vineyard ; and the two Mayhews, moved by compassion, soon turned their attention to these miserable creatures, in the hope of bettering their condition. Like Eliot, the younger Mayhew acquired a knowledge of the na tive tongue, and in 1644 two years before the apostle of the continental Indians had begun the work of conversion he commenced his missionary labours. These he continued for about thirteen, years, but in 1657 embarked for England in a ship which appears to have been lost at sea. Mayhew s zeal and industry in his self-appointed task were equal to Eliot s. He had a wife and three children, for whom he was obliged to toil with his hands while he was at the same time engaged in the difficult enterprise of civilising a number of debased and furious savages. His earnings were small, and his life was passed in a truly apostolic poverty. Yet by 1650 he had persuaded eight powows, and two hundred and eighty others, to adopt Chris tianity ; and after his death his father, though seventy years of age, continued the son s work, and <lid not cease until his own death at ninety-two. In consequence of what was occurring in America, the English Parliament, in March, 1648, instructed the Commissioners for Foreign Plantations to pre pare and bring in an ordinance for the encourage ment and advancement of learning and piety in New England. Nothing, however, was immediately done, owing, doubtless, to the revolutionary condi tion of affairs; but in July, 1649, another ordinance provided for the promoting and propagating of the Gospel in the northern colonies of America by means of a corporation in England, to consist of a president, a treasurer, and fourteen assistants, with authority to hold lands, goods, and money in the old country. With a view to starting this society in its operations, it was ordered that a general col lection should be made throughout England and Wales ; and the Federal Commissioners of New England, with such agents as they should appoint, were nominated for receiving and disposing of the money thus acquired. This was an assumption of jurisdiction over the New England States, such as the Governments of those States, considering the very high ground which some of them had assumed, might have been expected to resist ; but they do not seem to have done so. The elder Mayhew told the Indians with whom he was concerned that he was ""deputed by the King of England to govern all who should settle in those islands ; and ho persuaded the native princes not only to adopt English laws and methods of rule, but to submit themselves to the English monarch. No question of jurisdiction was permitted to interfere with the work of conversion. The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel sent from England to the colonies large remittances of money, tools, and commodities, and the New Englaiiders them selves supplied funds in a still larger proportion. These resources were laid out by the Federal Com missioners of New England in the remuneration of missionaries and their assistants (the latter including some natives) ; in the training of young men to be useful in teaching such Indian children as should be taken into the college at Cambridge; in the erection of a building in that college for the accom modation, of native pupils ; in the printing of catechisms and other books in the Indian tonmie ; O and in the encouragement of deserving Indians by small pecuniary bounties. Eliot was not always satisfied with the way in which the funds were dis tributed, and made so nrach opposition even at times communicating direct with the society in England that the London corporation, while ac knowledging the excellence of his work and of his nature, and recommending an increase of his salary (which was done), bewailed his "turbulent and clamorous proceedings," in a letter to the Federal Commissioners. The knowledge of these dissensions seriously diminished the flow of contributions from England ; yet the work of conversion in America went on with a fair degree of success. In process of time, the labour of the English missionaries was shared by native preachers ; but it was necessary to keep the Indians strictly under English authority. To this end, Commissioners were appointed to hear and determine all judicial matters. As early as 1656, Daniel Gookin, a man of considerable position in the governing body of Massachusetts, was chosen ruler over the Praying Indians of that colony an office which, with a brief exception, he held to his death. Gookin went to Boston from Virginia in 1644. He seems to have been a Kentish man, belonging to a family of which some members had settled in Ireland. His father, in 1621, arrived in Virginia from that island, with a large number of cows and goats. The son was too much a Puritan to live conifortably in the episco palian colony of the south, and therefore removed to Massachusetts. His services in the conversion of the Indians were great, and he has left a treatise on the history of these Christianised savages, which is among our chief sources of information on the subject. After the accession of Charles Stuart to the throne of England in 1660, the charter of the cor- 180 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1695. poration for propagating the Gospel, having been granted by the Commonwealth, became void, and Colonel Beddingfield, a Roman Catholic officer in the King s army, of whom a considerable part of the land possessed by the company had been pur chased, seized it for his own use, alleging that he had sold it under the value. A fresh charter was granted by the King, and the celebrated Robert Boyle was appointed first governor of the new association, which at once made an attempt to latter island five assemblies were held, some of which had native preachers. Schools for the in struction of the young, and justices of the peace for the management of native affairs, were to be ftmnd in various parts of Massachusetts, and at the close of the seventeenth century it might have appeared probable to a sanguine mind that the whole body of Indians in New England would in time be con verted to Christianity, though the total number of converts was then less than it had been a quarter CONVERTED INDIAN AND " 1 OWOWS." recover the lands seized by Beddingfield. The latter was favoured by the Attorney-General and other influential men ; but the decision of the Court of Chancery was in favour of the corpoi-ation. Under the direction of the reinstated Society, the conversion of the Indians proceeded steadily for some years. In 1687, Dr. Increase Mather, minister of Boston, stated in a letter to Dr. John Leusden, Hebrew Professor in the University of Utrecht, that there were then six churches of baptised Indians in New England, and eighteen assemblies of cateclmmens professing the name of Christ. Cotton Mather, son of Increase Mather, relates that in 1695 three thou sand adult Indian converts were established in Martha s Vineyard and Nantucket, and that in the of a century before. But the tribes inhabiting the southern, parts of the Federation were not so tract able as their northern, brethren. The Mohegaus, Narragansetts, Wampanoags, and Nyantics, were more powerful and united than the Indians of Massachusetts ; their spirit consequently was much higher, and they resented any interference with their ancient gods and immemorial customs. Roger Williams, with all his knowledge of the Indian tongue and of the Indian character, with all his devotion to the native cause, and with all that influence over the savages which his benevolence, truthfulness, and courage had secured, could not make many converts among the Narragansetts he so frequently visited. He was even reproached MAYHEW AND THE NAEKAGANSETT SACHEM. 16 182 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1674. 011 this score, as if lie had been wanting in zeal, which does not seem to have been the case. The truth is, there is something in the Indian nature, and in the theological views inherited or acquired by the Indian race, which does not har monise with Christianity. These savages are not merely indifferent to that religion ; as a rule, they positively dislike it. Some curious particulars on this head are given by the Rev. Experience May- hew in a journal of his visits to the remains of the Pequot and Mohegan Indians in the years 1713 and- 1714. He records that those tribes were greatly prejudiced against the Christian faith, though they appear to have received him with much courtesy, and to have thanked him for his good will. A sachem of the Narragansetts bid the same preacher go and make tho English good first, and observed that, owing to the many religious divisions among the conquering race, his people would not know what sect to follow, if they were inclined to adopt Christianity at all. He then upbraided the mis sionary for hindering him from his business, and in an angry humour turned awaj r . In the following year, a member of the same tribe told Experience May hew who appears to have met with no great success in his missionary projects that he and his comrades believed in a God, and worshipped him ; that there were various modes of worshipping, but that, as they conceived their own to be good, they saw no reason for changing it. Another remarked that the difficulties of the Chris tian religion were such as the Indians could not endure. Others again contended that the English, for all they could see, were none the better for being Christians, as they would cheat the Indians of their land, and wrong them in many ways. These heathens, however, seem to have been acquainted with the virtues of tolerance and candour ; for they confessed that, having heard Mr. Mayhew, they were not sensible that it had done them any hurt. They consented to hear the preacher again ; but, in the end, the utmost that could be effected was to induce the people to admit a school for their children. Notwithstanding what looked like a hopeful com mencement, these attempts to Christianise the red man were little better than failures. After 1G74, the number of converts diminished, and every year the Praying Indians sank deeper into the slough of idleness, poverty, vice, and degradation. "Whatever savage virtues they may have had in their unre claimed condition were lost; whatever vices belonged to them by nature were aaigmented and intensified by those which they acquired from their conquerors. Sloth and drunkenness had them by the throat, and would not be shaken oft*. They wandered about the country, ragged, abject, disconsolate, and con temptible, ready to sell their lands, and the very clothes off their backs, for a few bottles of that fiery potation which soothed to forgetfulness, or maddened to a transient fury. It is recorded . of them that they observed pretty well one part of the Fourth Commandment, to keep holy the Sabbath Day, but neglected the other, which enjoins six days of labour. The college for the education of Indian youth, established with a view to preparing them for the ministry, was abandoned after awhile, because it was found to be utterly useless. The task of preaching to the Indians devolved entirely on the English, and, although some still devoted themselves to the work with exemplary enthusiasm and industry, it must have been with dwindling hopes each year.* The number of Christian Indians at the present day is but small. Roman Catholics and Protestants have alike failed, as to any broad and lasting results. The aboriginal races of America retire before the advance of a superior race ; but in retiring they preserve in the main the faith of ancient times. Their contact with Europeans, how ever, has insensibly modified that faith, rendering it more pure, exalted, and refined than it had originally been. The Indian conception of God is more spiritual now than it was- in the seventeenth century ; and this improvement is doubtless to be attributed in part to the teaching of the mission aries, in part also to the slow and subtle influences of civilisation. Idolatry has 110 existence among these people, if we may trust Mr. George Catlin.t That inquirer into Indian life and habits derides the opinion of those who say that the red man has no religion worthy of the name. He asserts that the North American Indian is everywhere, in his native state, a highly moral and religions being, possessing an intuitive knowledge of some great Author of his being and of the universe, and living in the hope or the apprehension of a future state, in which he will be rewarded or punished according to his actions in this world. Yet he will not listen to the missionary. The Christian religion is in his mind identified with the rapacity, cruelty, and many vices of the white man. A Sioux chief 011 * Cotton Mather s Magnalia Christ! Americana (Books III. and VI.) ; Real s and Palfrey s Histories of New England ; Bancroft s History of the United States ; Neill s English Colo nisation of America during the Seventeenth Century ; etc. The original materials of all later accounts are to be found in the pamphlets and books on the subject issued at the period of the conversions. f Letters and Notes on the Manners, Customs, and Condi tion of the North American Indians. Third Edition, 1842. Vol. II., Letter 58. 1674.] INDIAN THEOLOGY. 183 the Upper Missouri made, in the course of conver sation with Mr. Catlin, a series of comments which showed that the weak points of civilisation were not unknown to him. He thought it disgraceful that white men should hang their criminals like dogs ; cruel that they should imprison debtors who could not pay j immodest that male doctors should be present at the period of child-birth ; inhuman that parents should whip their children. The difficulty of explaining a new set of religious principles to people having a definite faith of their own, which they regard as superior to any other, is strikingly illus trated by a remark of the same chieftain. He said he had heard that the Great Spirit of the white people was the child of a white woman, and that he was at last put to death. The Great Spirit of the Indians, he added, had got no mother ; the Indians had never killed him, and in fact he could not die. These were the remarks, not of a scoffer, or of a man indifferent to religion, but of one who believed himself to be already in possession of the truth. Even in the time of Eliot, the Indians showed that their minds were acutely sensible to those subtle questions which have always formed the difficulties of theology and morals. The savages on the banks of the Charles asked their instructor why God did not give all men good hearts, and why, if he were omnipotent, he did not kill the devil, who made men so bad. They required to know whether God foresaw who should repent and believe, and who not an evident dallying with the terrible problem of predestination and free will. They demanded to be informed where their little children, who died before they had sinned, went after death, and where those went who had never heard of Christ. When Eliot preached .against polygamy, an Indian convert propounded to him this case of conscience : Suppose a man had had two wives before he knew God the first childless, the second the mother of many children whom he exceedingly loved : which of those two wives was he to put away 1 It was also inquired whether a squaw who had deserted her husband, and lived with another man, was to be re ceived again if she repented after her conversion to Christianity. Other questions, touching on morals and even politics, were asked ; but theology was the favourite. The fondness of the Indian mind for mooting points of the utmost refinement, such as have puzzled acute thinkers, and divided the Christian world from very early times, is a note worthy feature in the spiritual history of the race. On the whole, the Roman Catholics have done more than the Protestants in converting the North American Indians, though even in their case the results are but small. In Louisiana, Acadie, Canada, and other parts of the Continent, the French Jesuits worked industriously in the field of missionary labour, and some proselytes were made. The his torian Neal is indignant with these priests for instilling idolatrous ideas into the minds of tho savages ; but it is possible that what to an extreme Protestant susceptibility may have seemed like idolatry, was really influential in attracting a set of barbarians to the more esoteric doctrines of Chris tianity. Cotton Mather quotes from a catechism used by the Jesuits in their instructions, and ia shocked that in this composition Heaven should be described as a place having a very fair soil, the in habitants of which want neither for meat nor clothes ; and Hell as a fiery pit in the centre of the earth, where it is always dark with smoke, where the eyes of the damned are always in pain from the effects of the vapour, where the devils are very ill- shaped things with vizards on, and where the damned feed 011 hot ashes, serpents, and melted lead. The puerility of such descriptions is of course obvious ; but it is not worse than many things touching the supernatural world which the Puritans themselves believed. The conversion of the Indians was often effected by means which will not bear strict exami nation. In Maryland, a great number of savages submitted to be baptised by the Catholics for the sake of some new shirts which were promised them 011 that condition ; but the converts, not knowing how to wash them when dirty, required a fresh supply after a few weeks, with the threat of re nouncing their baptism if the demand were refused. At the present time, numerous societies in the United States prosecute the work of conversion. ; but their efforts are rewarded with slight success. The Indian seems to resent the religion of his van quishers, as if it were part of the injury which he has suffered at their hands. He refuses to worship with the Christian, or to be civilised by him. He has adopted the vices of the stranger, but will not profit by his higher qualities and his larger powers. Retreating each year more and more towards the west seeking in the ever-dwindling forests, and in the prairies that are destined to be seats of future civilisation, that independence which he has lost for generations on the Atlantic the red man still O feebly struggles for the historic life of his race, but struggles vainly. He presents the melancholy picture of a nationality devoted to extinction. He has some qualities which make such a fate dis tressing even to those who supplant him ; but a people which, whether from its own fault or that of others, does not advance with the advancing ages, is doomed. It vanishes before the more complex organ- 184 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1651. isation which presses on its path ; and in time its existence is to be traced only in a few mounds and scattered graves, in single words, in fading legends, in the wandering echoes of a pathetic past, and in those ineradicable names which cling to hill, and stream, and cataract, like the memory of the dead. CHAPTER XXII. Keligicus Persecution in Massachusetts The Anabaptists, or Baptists Their Appearance in New England Severe Treatment of the Sect Various Opinions as to the Conduct of the Colonial Authorities Rise of the Quaker Sect The Insanities of James Naylor Life and Opinions of George Fox The Earlier and Later Doctrines of the Friends First Arrival of Quakers at Boston Laws against them passed by the New England Legislatures Mutilation of Quakers at Boston . Quakers condemned to Death after return from Banishment Rhode Island Legislators on Toleration Execution of Quakers Unpopularity of the Law, and its subsequent Mitigation Abatement of the Religious Persecution Letter of Robert Boyle on the subject. IT is not improbable that one reason why the pro selytising of the Indians was attended by such slight and temporary success is to be found in the bitter religious dissensions constantly occurring amongst the colonists, and of which the natives were cer tainly not ignorant. When the Narragansett sachem bid Experience Mayhew reform his own people before he thought of converting others, and said that if an Indian were desirous of becoming a Christian he would not know what form of Chris tianity to follow, he gave expression to feelings which had long been familiar to his race. The theological quarrels of the New Englanders have already occu pied our attention to a painful degree ; but the record is not yet finished. The evil spirit of re ligious persecution still darkened the minds and hardened the hearts of the rulers of Massachusetts men otherwise of clear intellects and noble natures. Mr. Bancroft believes that the elder Winthrop, some time before his death, professed himself weary of banishing heretics ; but the ma jority of his colleagues were sensible of no such fatigue or remorse. Dudley shrank with dismay from the thought that their love of truth should be so cold as to tolerate error ; thus repeating the old trick of all persecutors, that of begging the entire question as to what is true and what false in the region of religious faith. Cotton thought it better to tolerate hypocrites than opponents. Another minister affirmed that what he rather ingeniously called " Polypiety " was the greatest impiety in the world, and that it was sacrilegious ignorance to say that men ought to have liberty of conscience. A third declared that religion admitted of no eccentric notions a saying which puts into admirably pithy form the most vital principle of Roman Catholicism. Such were the dogmas of Puritan Papistry, as enunciated by men of the highest mark in the plantation; and, although several doubted their validity, they were for a time triumphant. In 1651, Massachusetts was the scene of a la mentable collision with the Anabaptists, or, as the members of that body preferred to call themselves, the Baptists. The distinguishing tenet of these sectaries was that baptism should be administered only to adults. As, where this had been performed in infancy, they baptised again in mature life, they were called by their opponents Anabaptists, Re- baptisers ; but, according to their own. contention, the rite that had taken place in childhood was 110 baptism at all, so that the prefix indicating re petition was discarded by them as involving an incorrect statement. A great deal of discredit at tached to the sect and its opinions, owing to the wild doctrines and insane excesses committed by the Anabaptists of Germany and the Netherlands in the first half of the sixteenth century, when the incendiaries Miinzer and John of Leyden lieaded two successive rebellions at Muhlhauseii and Minister, and caused a terrible effusion of blood. But the English Anabaptists, though it is probable they drew some of their principles from certain Dutch fanatics who settled in England in large numbers during the reigns of Henry VIII. and Queen Elizabeth, were men of much cooler minds and much more blameless lives. They were an offshoot from the followers of Robert Brown, the father of Puritanism, but were not formed into a distinct community before the reign of Charles I. In New England they soon acquired importance. Roger Williams was for a time of this opinion, though the views which constituted his religious individuality, and brought him into collision with the autho rities, were of a different nature. The New Eng land Anabaptists were men rather difficult to deal with, owing to the whimsicality of some of their i :>!.] THE ANABAPTISTS. 185 ideas ; but tliey do not seem to have been guilty of any culpable extravagances. In the Plymouth Government, in 1650, a number of these sectaries, headed by one Obadiah Holmes, were subjected to the usual kind of persecution. They were summoned before the General Court, and ordered to desist from their peculiar practices ; but they answered as the more orthodox Puritans had answered the Bishops in England : they appealed to the law of their consciences, and said it was better to obey God than man. Holmes went next year into the Massachusetts jurisdiction, accompanied by a minister named Clarke, from Rhode Island, and another Baptist named Crandall. These men could not have made a more unfortunate selection, if their design was to find a place where they could live in peace. As far back a.s 1644, the Massachusetts Magistrates had made an order for banishing such as continued obstinate in their heresy after due con viction. In this statute, the persons struck at were identified with the German Anabaptists who had created so much mischief in the previous century. They were described as "incendiaries of common wealths," " infectors of persons in main matters of religion," and " troublers of churches in all places where they have been." Even bf/ore the passing of this law, an unfortunate man had been whipped for affirming that infant baptism was anti- Christian " not for his opinion," says Winthrop, in a most remarkable piece of casuistry, "but for his re proaching the Lord s ordinance, and for his bold and evil behaviour, both at home and in the Court." The General Court of Massachusetts, in a De claration published in November, 1646, said that the order in question Avas passed only as a pro tection against possible disturbances of the peace, and that it had then ncA^er been put in execution against any of the Anabaptists, although such were known to live among them. It even appears that at that very time the head of Harvard College was a minister holding the condemned views ; but it is probable that he forbore from making any promi nent display of his opinion, or endeavouring to convince others ; and ultimately he felt compelled to resign, owing to the objection made to his tenets. The law expressly forbade all open con demnation of the rite of infant baptism, and all attempts at conversion ; it simply left unpunished that which the greatest tyrant cannot touch a private opinion. The reason why Clarke, Holmes, and Crandall went to Massachusetts is not clear. At any rate, from whatever motive, they put themselves in the power of the oppressor, and were of course oppressed. Having taken up their residence at Lynn, a little town about ten miles from Boston, ostensibly for the purpose of visiting a sick and aged friend of their own persuasion, they were arrested the very next day, when, it being the Sabbath, they were as sembled for religious exercises. In the afternoon they were taken to the church meeting of the town ; but Clarke declared that he could not join in the service, persisted in wearing his hat, and endeavoured, at the conclusion of the sermon, to address the congre gation. On the following morning the offenders were carried l>efore the magistrates, who sent them in custody to Boston. There they were tried and sentenced to various fines, or in default to be whipped. In the true spirit of aggressive martyr dom, they elected not to pay the fines, but to submit to the flogging. Some of Clarke s friends paid the penalty for him, without his knowledge; Crandall was released, on promising to appear at the next Court ; but Holmes received thirty lashes at the whipping-post. This was bad enough ; but what followed was worse. Two of Holmes s friends, who were spectators of his punishment, took him by the hand in the market-place, and praised God for the sufferer s courage and constancy. For this they were summoned before the General Court, and fined, with the alternative of whipping. The treatment of Clarke, Holmes, and Crandall is sufficient proof that the Massachusetts authorities would suffer 110 real or effective dissent from their own interpretation of religion. The charges on which the three Baptists were convicted were that they had held a private religious meeting on the Lord s Day ; that they had offensively disturbed the peace of the congregation of Lynn ; that they had denied the orthodoxy of the said church ; that they had endeavoured to seduce and draw aside others ; and that they had administered the sacrament of the Lord s Supper to various persons. Their conduct seems to have been blameable simply with respect to their behaviour at the meeting-house ; but even this is susceptible of excuse, for it should be recollected that they were forcibly taken there against their will, and in violation of their conscience. As for the rest, it was a mere repetition of what had happened in England in the days of Elizabeth and Janies I. The shade of Archbishop Laud might have considered itself avenged. The rebels against the Act of L T ni- formity, the martyrs of the High Commission Court, had their own Act and their own Court, for doing the same thing in the same way. They were falsi fying their main principle, that every distinct body of Christians is a legitimate church, and may proceed to organise its own ministry and forms of worship, without either the sanction or the interference of the State. 186 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1651. Even Cotton Mather, the zealous advocate of Massachusetts orthodoxy, admits that the New England churches gave some provocation to the Baptists, by their ministers passing severe censures on those of that persuasion who went out of church whenever infants were brought in to be baptised ; following the law of their consciences. The Baptists were in truth held responsible for all the frantic excesses of the German Anabaptists more than a hundred years before, though it was never shown that they sympathised with those extrava gances. The prejudice against them was deep and GEOKGE FOX. which exasperated them to so great a degree that they withdrew wholly from the communion to which they had previously belonged, and set up for themselves. But the more liberal and tolerant Daniel Neal leaves it to his readers to judge for themselves who had most reason to complain : the New England churches, which would suffer the Baptists neither to live qiiietly in the old commu nion, nor to separate from it peaceably; or those unhappy persons who were treated so roughly for long-lived, and they were again subjected to per secution in the early years of Charles II. s reign. From that period, however, the spirit of religious rancour abated somewhat of its vehemence. The re-establishment, or rather the complete establish ment for the first time, of the mother country s jurisdiction, had a tendency to mitigate local tyrannies. The oppression of the Quakers was still more severe than that of the Baptists ; but it should be 1652.] THE QUAKERS. 187 added that there was more to justify or at least ex cuse it. The singular body of people called Quakers by their opponents, and Friends among them selves, first arose in the north of England about the year 164-4. Under the leadership of George Fox, who began preaching in 1647, when he was only twenty-three years of age, the sect attracted to itself many followers, and challenged the attention of the authorities. At first, these enthusiasts called themselves " The People of the Lord," " Children the three, and also the most extravagant. It is indeed impossible to regard him as anything but a madman. Fox and his followers were at length compelled to cast off their associate, and in 1655 he was imprisoned in Exeter gaol for opinions and conduct which the law regarded as blasphemous. While in prison, he was addressed by his converts as "the Everlasting Sun of Righteousness, the Prince of Peace, the Only Begotten Son of God, the fairest among ten thousand," &c. On being XE .V ri/i JIOUTH. of Light," and other such terms ; but the designa tion of Quakers, though originally applied to them in derision by those who were not of their way of thinking, was soon used by themselves in a serious spirit. They were fond of quoting from the Bible numerous passages which refer to the operation, of religious awe and rapture in causing men to tremble. Hence they were popularly called Quakers or Shakers, in a ludicrous or scoffing sense ; but they retorted that Christ had bidden his disciples quake for fear, and that therefore all men ought to be Quakers. By 1652 the new sect was well known all over England, owing to the exertions of George Fox, Richard Farnworth, and James Naylor. The last-named was for a time tlie most influential of released, he passed through Glastenbury and Wells in a sort of triumphal fashion. Large numbers of men and women paid him almost divine honours. At Bristol, the crowds shouted " Hosanna ! " before him, and applied to him the language of the Song of Solomon. It was clearly necessary to put down such insane and anarchical pretensions; but the Government of the Commonwealth proceeded after the old cruel fashion of the monarchy it had sup planted, and sentenced Naylor to a punishment of terrible severity. He was tried before the House of Commons in 1656, and a considerable minority were for condemning him to death. As it was, he was pilloried at Westminster, whipped, pilloried arrain, bored through the tongue with a hot iron, 188 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1652, and branded on the forehead. Then he was taken down to Bristol, conveyed through the city on a horse s back with his face to the tail, and publicly whipped in five different localities. Finally he was sent back to London, and shut up in solitary con finement, with only such food as he could earn by his labour. Soon afterwards he recanted, and, before his death in 1660, was reunited to the less extreme body of Quakers who followed the guidance of George Fox. Fox was not quite so great a fanatic as Naylor ; but he used to force himself into churches, to in terrupt the services, and to insult the magistrates before whom he was brought. He was by trade a shoemaker at Drayton in Leicestershire, and, like many persons of sedentary occupation and defective mental training, was subject from an early age to religious melancholy a tendency fostered to rank exuberance by the acrid and stimulating air of theological controversy breathed at that time by all Englishmen. His brain was slightly touched, and he wrote a species of jargon such as defies inter pretation. None of the religious sects satisfied his requirements. The Puritanical habit of appealing to the letter of Scripture on every occasion seemed to him only another form of spiritual slavery. He looked for some light within the soul itself, which, after due searcliing, he conceived might be dis covered. Wandering alone among the hills of Derbyshire, sitting in hollow trees and solitary places until night came on, walking mournfully about during the hours of darkness, as one possessed of many sorrows (such is the pathetic account given by an early historian of the Quakers), he was lifted into regions of mystical reverie, and had strange in timations touching the things written in the Apocalypse. Visions were vouchsafed to him, and he asserted a power of casting out devils. He felt a disgust for all manner of forms. The being bred at Oxford or Cambridge was not, in his opinion, enough to make a man a minister of Christ. A hireling priesthood was an abomination. God did not dwell in temples made with hands. The Lord forbade him to put oft his hat to any one. The Lord commanded him to Thou and Thee every man and woman without distinction. The Lord would not suffer him to bid people " Good morrow " or " Good evening," since all such expressions implied that there were bad days ; nor might he bow, or scrape with his leg. He went into the law courts, crying for justice. He fasted with severity; he clothed himself in leather. Churches he called idol-temples or steeple-houses ; the bells he likened to market bells, and the priest to the chapman who desired to set forth his wares.* He was frequently flgged and imprisoned ; but his proselytes became so numerous,, especially among the soldiers, that the Government, hoping to silence him by favours, offered to give Mm a captaincy. This of course he refused, and the Quaker movement went on, despite all efforts to suppress it. The mob often treated the poor en thusiasts with brutal violence, and the authorities emulated their roughness. From 1651 to 1657 as many as 1,900 Quakers were imprisoned in England; and twenty-one died in gaol. In at least one instance, however, death was owing to the man s own folly. Evelyn relates that a prisoner in Lon don made an attempt to emulate the feat of a co religionist, who was said to have fasted twenty days ; and that he died on the tenth. The early Quakers were indeed a sore trouble to all decent communities. Some of them went abroad stark naked "for a testimony," according to the cant of their sect ; though what it testified, beyond the madness or moral corruption of the actors and their abettors, it would be hard to say. A woman presented herself in this state before the Protector in Whitehall Chapel ; and the same thing was done in America. By some singular process of reasoning, many persons took it into their heads that the Quakers were Pvomish emissaries in disguise, and they were even so described in a warrant for the apprehension of some of their number. They themselves, on the other hand, conceived that they were divinely com missioned to convert the Pope and the Sultan, and actually sent members of their body to Home and Adrianople for that purpose. When Charles II. 2,-scended the throne, he seemed disposed, with the indolent good nature which at times distinguished him when nothing was to be gained by a contrary course, to leave dissenting sects quietly to them selves ; but the Quakers, having refused to take tho oath of allegiance, on the ground that all oaths are illegal, were again persecuted with much rigour. Men and women were transported to the West Indies, where they were sold into slavery for terms, of various duration. In the course of a few years,, the Friends fell under the influence of men possess ing higher mental powers, greater cultivation, and cooler heads, than the early devotees. By the efforts of Penn, Barclay, and some others, the society ac quired a distinct organisation and a definite set of religious principles. Previous to the appearance of those comparatively sober writers, Quaker theology * Among the chief authorities as to the early doings of the Friends, are Fox s own "Journal," and Sewel s "History of the Quakers." Lord Macaulay (History of England, chap. 17) gives a striking specimen of the confusion and incoherence of Fcs s style. 1656.] QUAKERS IN NEW ENGLAND. 189 had presented nothing but a cloudy haze of mystical sentiment, not greatly, if at all, superior to the ravings of Liulovick Muggleton. It spoke in a vague way of inward Light, and of the movements of the Spirit ; but, being in its very essence a protest against formalism, it was wanting in exactness and definition. In some respects it had an analogy with the doctrines of those numerous sects which, in former ages, sprang from the xmion of Christianity with Neo-Platonism ; but, after its first wildness was spent, it assumed the proportions and characteristics with which we are all acquainted. The protesters against formalism became the greatest of formalists ; and a certain pugnacity of conduct has long been noted in men who deny the lawfulness of war, even for purposes of self-defence. Yet ever since the days of Penn, Quakers have stood high in the esti mation of all liberal and candid observers. They have some of the best and most genuine qualities of human nature. Philanthropy has received no greater services than from the Society of Friends ; while politics and social usage have been raised to higher levels by the sedate ideals of a sect which, on account of a few harmless eccentricities and a few exaggera tions of principle, has at all times been the favourite butt of caricature. Unfortunately, the era of insane extravagance had not passed when Quakers found their way into America. It was in 1656 that they first appeared among the colonists of the New World, to the con sternation equally of Episcopalians and Puritans. We have already seen that they were treated with great cruelty in Virginia and Maryland. The schismatical new-comers were scourged, pilloried, imprisoned, and hunted out of the country; yet their opinions made progress in those southern settlements, and in twenty years Maryland had a large number of Quakers among her population. In New England, the followers of George Fox were persecuted with greater severity than elsewhere. Their approach had been heralded by an influx of their literature, and the authorities of Massachu setts, not liking the tenets so ostentatiously ad vanced, resolved to exclude the authors, should they follow. In July, 1656, a vessel arrived in Boston harbour from Barbadoes, carrying among its other passengers two Quaker women, named Mary Fisher and Anne Austin. They were searched for marks of witchcraft, and then expelled ; but in less than a month another ship brought five male and four female Quakers. These also were denied a residence, and were again put on board the vessel, to be taken back to England. During a brief de tention in prison, they increased the prejudice against them by applying insulting terms to the magistrates and ministers of Boston. The General Court of Massachusetts retorted in kind by calling the Quakers a " cursed sect of heretics," retailers of "blasphemous opinions," and walkers in "per nicious ways." Certainly, some of the views put forward by these Children of Light were of a nature to startle a community whose reverence for the very letter of the Bible was extreme. Though there can be 110 doubt that the Friends were Chris tians in their own estimation, they seemed at times to deny or explain away the most distinctive doc trines of Christianity. One of them Samuel Fisher said that the Scriptures were not God s voice ; that in some things they were fallible, and so were not fit to be the rule ; and that the only real guide and law was the light of Christ in the heart which of course might mean anything that anybody supposed that light to signify. The faith ful were bidden to seek Christ within, rather than Christ without. The obligation of the Sabbath, the sacraments of baptism and the Lord s Supper, the prayers and preachings of public ministers, even the doctrine of the Trinity, were repudiated by these innovators. George Fox appears to have bordered on Pantheism, if he did not more than border on it. He taught that the " imagined God beyond the stars," and the " carnal Christ," were falsities ; and, with his usual love of coarse and offensive language, declared that to speak of Christ as God and man in one person was a lie.* These, and such as these, were the opinions which alarmed the people and rulers of New England. At the instigation of Massachusetts, the General Courts of all the united colonies passed laws against the Quakers. The unwelcome intruders were to be driven out of the several jurisdictions, and to be imprisoned until that could be accomplished. But the Massachusetts law was much more severe than those of the other three confederated plantations. It imposed a fine of a hundred pounds on any ship master who should bring Quakers into the territory, and required security for the re-transportation of such passengers to the port whence they came. It likewise enacted that all Quakers should be impri soned aiid severely whipped; that the circulation and even concealment of Quaker books should be visited by a fine of five pounds ; that persons pre suming to defend the incriminated opinions should be sharply punished ; and that any person reviling the magistrates or ministers, after the manner of the. hated sect, should be both fined and flogged. This law was soon enforced. One Mary Clarke, * Fox s work, "The Sword of the Lord drawn," as quoted by Daniel Neal in his "History of New England," Vol. I., chap. 7. 190 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1658. from London, was whipped in. the month of August, 1657. Christopher Holden and John Copeland, who had come to the colony the previous year, had been sent back to England, and had reappeared at Salem (where they addressed the congregation in the meeting-house), were scourged and sent to gaol, and a man and his wife who had harboured them were imprisoned. At a later period, some Quakers in prison were, for refusing to work, subjected to such repeated and merciless floggings that one of them nearly died beneath the lash. It was also proposed that those who refused to pay their fines should be sold to Virginia or Barbadoes, where they would have lived in a servitude not greatly differing from slavery ; but, though an order to this effect was issued, it was never carried out. Still, the difficulty was not overcome, and more severe laws were passed. The fine for harbouring Quakers was increased to forty shillings for each hour ; and it was ordered that every Quaker coming into the jurisdiction after having been expelled, should for the first offence suffer the loss of one ear, for the second lose the other, and for the third be bored through the tongue with a hot iron. In 1658, Holden, Copeland, and John Rouse, hav ing twice returned from banishment, were deprived of their right ears by the knife of the hangman. After the sentence was executed, they said: " Those who do it ignorantly, we desire from our hearts the Lord to forgive them; but for them that do it maliciously, let our blood be upon their heads, and such shall know in the day of account that each drop of our blood shall be heavier than a mill stone." This was the only time that such an act of mutilation was committed in New England, and it would appear that the punishment of boring through the tongue was never put in force. In deed, the colonists were so much ashamed of the law that it was soon repealed. The authorities, however, were far from inclined to leniency. The Federal Commissioners, when in session at Boston in the autumn of 1658, voted a set of resolutions recommending the General Courts of the four colonies to make a law condemn ing to death such Quakers as should return to the several jurisdictions after being twice expelled. From this fate nothing was to save them, but a public renunciation of their " cursed opinions and devilish tenets." The colonies of Plymouth, Con necticut, and New Haven did not proceed so far as this recommendation suggested ; but Plymouth treated the heretics with so much rigour that Captain James Cudworth, one of the Magistrates, repeatedly protested against it, and was at last deprived of his captaincy for entertaining a Quaker at his house, though he differed from the Quaker doctrine. It would appear from a letter of this gentleman to a friend in London, dated December 10th, 1658, that the Government of Plymouth had forgotten the milder spirit of its early days, and was inclined to a despotic and vexatious policy. " Our civil powers," he writes, " are so exercised in matters of religion and conscience that we have no time to do anything that tends to promote the civil prosperity of the place. We must now have a State religion, such as the powers of this world will allow, and no other ; a State ministry, and a State way of maintenance ; and we must worship and serve the Lord Jesus as the world shall appoint us. We must all go to the public place of meeting in the parish where we dwell, or be presented." He goes on to say that they were so wrapped up in a labyrinth of confused laws that the power of the freemen was quite lost. Sandwich men might not go to Massachusetts, lest they should be taken up for Quakers. Nay, they might not go about their occasions in other towns of the Plymouth colony, because of warrants which lay in ambush to ap prehend and take them before a magistrate, so that they should give an account of their business. The situation altogether inspired Captain Cudworth with so gloomy a feeling that he could derive com fort only from the fact that they had still among them " worthy Mr. Dunster, whom the Lord hath made boldly to bear his testimony against the spirit of persecution."* This was the Anabaptist Presi dent of Harvard College, who, on account of his opinions, resigned that position in 1654, and went to live in Plymouth colony. Massachusetts, true to its habit of religious despotism, bated not one jot of the severity ad vised by the Commissioners. No doubt the early Quakers were a troublesome set. Some amount of supervision over a people who made it part of their conscience to disturb congregations and revile judges, and who thought it edifying to march through towns and villages stark naked, was im peratively required. But to thrust them out of the commxmity, to subject them to torture, to threaten them with death, and to forbid all dis cussion of their opinions, was a grievous error. It is possible that the authorities hoped the mere threat of death would be sufficient. Capital punishment had before then been denounced against Antino- mians and other troublers of the commonwealth ; and the passing of a law to that effect had been found to have a deterring influence. But it is always dangerous to calculate on. such a result, and * Neal s History of New England, Vol. I., chap. 7. 1659.] EXECUTION OF QUAKERS. 191 the Quakers had given abundant proof that they had the courage and the obstinacy of martyrdom. They positively courted the most extreme forms of persecution, and were discouraged only by neglect. The Magistrates of Rhode Island, happily remem bering the principles of complete toleration on which that State had been founded, were quick to discover this fact. We have a very remarkable testimony as to their views on the subject, and it would be impossible to find, even in modern times, a more admirable exposition of the safety as well as reason ableness of allowing a free vent to all opinions. In September, 1057, the Federal Commissioners sent a letter to the Chief Magistrate of Rhode Island, desiring that some measures might be taken for excluding Quakers from that jurisdiction, whence, it was said, they found their way into Massachusetts. The authorities thus addressed replied that they had no law among them whereby they could punish any one for only declaring by words, &c., his con victions " concerning the things and ways of God as to salvation and an eternal condition." More over, they had found that in those places where Quakers had been suffered to declare themselves freely, and were opposed simply by arguments, they had the least desire to intrude. The preachers of the new doctrine had actually begun to loathe Rhode Island, because they were itot opposed by the civil authority, but were permitted quietly to repeat their pretended revelations and admonitions. " Surely," concluded the Rhode Island Magistrates, " we find that they delight to be persecuted by civil powers ; and when they are so, they are like to gain more adherents by the conceit of their patient suffer ings than by consent to their pernicious sayings." This was in spite of the writers opinion that the doctrines of the Quakers tended to " very absolute cxitting down and overturning relations and civil government among men, if generally received." * It was seen that Quaker doctrine was bad, but that persecution for the sake of conscience was worse. The first six Quakers banished, after the passing of the law punishing those who returned with death, did not again appear in Massachusetts. So far, the Act seemed to be working well ; but the ap pearance was a delusion. A fanatic named William Robinson, living in Rhode Island, conceived that the Lord had commanded him to go to Boston, and lay down his life there. Marmaduke Stevenson, a fellow-believer, felt equally moved to accom pany him. They left together in the summer of 1659, and were joined at Boston by Mary Dyer {formerly an adherent of Mrs. Hutchinson) and * Rhode Island Eecords. Nicholas Davis. All four were at once appre hended, sentenced to banishment, and informed that they would be put to death if they returned. The two last departed ; but Robinson and Steven son resolved to defy the law to the utmost. After an absence of four weeks, they returned to Boston, together with a woman from Salem, who showed the Governor of Massachusetts some linen, which she said she had brought for the winding-sheets of those who were to suffer. Mary Dyer also came back to the colony, when the three were arraigned before the General Court, and, upon their own confession that they had returned from banishment, were sentenced to be hanged 011 the eighth day following. So unpopular was this sentence that a riot and rescue were apprehended The law in virtue of which it was pronounced had been so vehe mently opposed in the House of Deputies that it was carried by a bare majority of one, and then only with the addition of a clause requiring trial by jury in all such cases. The authorities now thought it necessary to appoint a guard of a hundred soldiers, fully armed, for escorting the prisoners to the place of execution ; to set a watch in and about the town ; and to protect the gaol. If it was hoped that the mere passing of the sentence of death would cause the Quakers to beg for mercy, the hope was without foundation. The sectaries were determined to die ; the rulers of Massachusetts were not greatly inclined to baulk them of their wish. On being condemned, Stevenson pro nounced a curse upon his judges, and a little before his death put forth a paper stating that, as he was following his plough in the East Riding of York shire, he fell into a sort of rapture, and heard a secret voice in his conscience, saying, " I have ordained thee a prophet to the nations ;" that accordingly he went first to Barbadoes, and then to Rhode Island ; and that in the latter place he again heard the voice of the Lord commanding him to go to Boston with his brother William Robinson. Mary Dyer wrote a remonstrance from gaol, and, with a strange ignorance of the whole course of what is called modern history, asked if ever such laws had been known among a people professing Christ come in the flesh. On the 27th of October, 1659, the three were led forth to execution. They made some attempt to address the crowd, but their voices were drowned by a rattle of drums. Yet Robinson and Stevenson were heard to say that they died for Christ, and that they suffered for the sake of conscience. While the sentence was being earned out 011 these two men, Mary Dyer stood below the gallows with a halter round ker neck ; and, after the bodies were CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1661. cut down, was told that she might depart under the care of her son, who had come from Rhode Island to intercede on her behalf. She at first exclaimed, " Let me suffer as my brethren, unless you will annul your wicked law ; " but ultimately she permitted herself to be led away, and taken out spread among the masses that the Magistrates felt compelled to issue an apology for their conduct, In 1661, another execution took place. "William Lecldra, a foreigner, having returned from banish ment, was hanged at Boston. During Ms trial, one Weulock Cliristison came into court, appealed INDIAN MEDICINE BAG, MYSTERY WHISTLE, RATTLES, AND DRUM. (After Catlin.) of the jurisdiction. In the following spring (1660), she again entered Massachusetts, was again sentenced to death, and at the foot of the gallows was once more offered her life, if she would promise thence forth to keep out of the colony. She replied that she had come in obedience to God, and would abide faithful to the death ; and, so replying, perished. Even before this lamentable event, the feeling of animosity to the law had become so widely to the law of England, disputed with the judges on the justice of their proceedings, and seems to have had the best of the argument. Three months later, he was himself brought to trial. The Ma^is- O o trates debated for two weeks what they should do with him ; and Governor Endicott was very much annoyed at the avowed disinclination of several of his colleagues to pass sentence of death, and furiously declared that he could find it in his heart to go back to England. At length, Cliristison 1661.] END OF THE QUAKER PERSECUTION. 193 was condemned to die; but when tlie General Court town towards tlie frontier ; and on the last of these met, the opposition to any further infliction of the three occasions the flagellation was to be accompanied capital sentence was so great that the life of the by branding. No further capital punishments took CONNECTICVT. (From the " Mupp of New England, by John Seller"} offender was spared. Soon afterwards, an alteration place, and branding was not inflicted under the was made; in the law. Quakers were not to be later act. The Quakers, though their opportunities hanged unless they returned to the colony four times for realising the joys of martyrdom were thus after being expelled. For the first three offences they reduced, continued none the less to disturb the were to Ix? whipped at the cart s tail from town to towns of Massachusetts by their denunciations, 17 194 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1647. tlieir threatenings of fire and sword (in a spiritual sense), their mountebank exhibition of themselves in sackcloth and ashes, and their parading of young women in a, state of nudity. The Massachusetts authorities, indeed, seem to have passed from an extreme of severity to an extreme of mildness, resulting, perhaps, from th_e embarrassment caused by a mandate from Charles II., dated September 9th, 1661, commanding that Quakers under sentence should be transmitted to England. The laws in force were in consequence suspended for about a year, as far as respected corporal punishment and death, and were then revived to the extent of a<mru O imposing the penalty of whipping. No Quakers were sent to England for trial, and the madness died out in time. But the persecution of these poor fanatics was a lasting disgrace to Massachu setts, and drew from the illustrious Robert Boyle some words of just condemnation in a letter to John Eliot, the missionary of the Indians. CHAPTER XXIII. Renewed Troubles with the Indians Major Edward Gibbons Operations against the Narragansetts Outrages committed by the Natives Relations of Foreign Nationalities with the Indians Dissensions amongst the Members of the Confederacy Settlement of the Pequot Tribe Operations against Acadie Proposals from Oliver Cromwell to the New England Colonies Deaths of New England Settlers Protectorate of Richard Cromwell Accession of Charles II. First Measures of the Restored Monarchy Addresses from Massachusetts to the King and the English Parliament Reply of the King- - Escape of Regicides to New England Attempts to discover and arrest the Fugitives Their Flight and Concealment Report of Massachusetts Committee on the Relations between the Colony and the Mother Country Acknowledgment of Charles II. by the Four Confederated Plantations of New England. INDIAN wars are among the most exciting events of New England history. The struggle with the Pequots assured the safety of the colonies for a time ; but in 1 645 the Narragansetts caused some alarm by attacking the Mohegans, who were in. alliance with the Massachusetts Government. In the first instance, the Federal Commissioners of the four united colonies sent messengers to the hostile sachems, requiring their presence at Boston, either in person or by ambassadors, to declare the grounds of the state of war existing between them. The Narragansett chief replied by a defiance, and the colonies decided for war. A force of three hundred men, well armed, at once took the field, under command of Major Edward Gibbons, of Massachusetts, assisted by a council of war, com prising the commanders of the several colonial contingents. The previous life of Gibbons was not such as to give him a very high moral standing. He had been one of Thomas Morton s riotous set of bacchanalians at Merry Mount. He afterwards professed repentance and conversion, and became a freeman of Boston. But his old habits clung to him, and on one occasion he was fined twenty shillings for being drunk and disorderly. Never theless, he was a courageous and skilful soldier, who had filled several military appointments in the colony to which he had attached himself. In his private capacity as a merchant, he had not been very fortunate, though his speculations do not appear to have been hampered by over-nice scruples. Some suspicion of having acted as a buccaneer attaches to this roving adventurer, in the opinion of Mr. Palfrey ; and wonderful stories are told by Cotton Mather of miraculous events performed at sea to save Gibbons and his crew from starving when all their stores had run out. In his operations against the Narragansetts, Gibbons was well supported. The troops were equipped and sent out with remarkable promptitude, and in a few days had assembled near the tribe against whom it was proposed to act. It is recorded by Gorton that Captain Standish, who was in com mand of the Plymouth contingent, threatened to disarm the Providence plantation, on account of the neutrality of Roger Williams. That minister had always been on good terms with the Narragansetts, and he refused to be a party to any attack on them. He gave his services, however, as a negotiator between the army of the federated colonies and the refractory savages. Before any blows were struck, the latter were induced to send some of their sachems to Boston, where a treaty of peace between the Narragansetts and Nyantics, on the one part, and the English and their native allies on the other, was speedily concluded. By this treaty, the sachems agreed to reimburse the charges of the expedition in four instalments, and to leave four children of their chiefs as hostages. The first instalment was not paid. More than a year passed away, and in 1647 intelligence arrived at Boston, indicating the commencement of fresh plots. Renewed interviews led to evasive explanations, and to promises that were always broken. A 1653.] TROUBLES WITH THE INDIANS. 195 Narragansett Indian made an attempt to assassinate Uncas, and, on being seized, declared that he had been bribed to the act by his chiefs. The Federal Commissioners, now thoroughly alarmed, determined to send twenty men to demand the indemnity, and upon refusal to seize the value in anything they could find. Captain Atherton accordingly passed through the woods at the head of a small force, entered the sachem s wigwam alone, seized the chief by the hair of the head, dragged him out, and with a cocked pistol threatened the other Indians with death if they interfered. Such, at least, is the account given by Cotton Mather ; but the incident bears a suspicious resemblance to one related of Captain Smith, in his dealings with Opechancaiiough, in Virginia. At any rate, the indemnity was paid. Whether or not the Indians were really concerned in a conspiracy on a large scale, it is certain that they were often very dangerous neighbours, espe cially in the western settlements of New Haven and Connecticut. An Englishman was murdered by them at Fairfield. The crew of a shipwrecked ves.sel were killed by the savages on Long Island. A woman at Stamford was so beaten on the head with a hammer by a native that she lost her reason ; and when the assailant was about to be executed, his comrades made a hostile demonstration, and it was found necessary to summon aid from New Haven and other towns. Incendiarism was not infrequent, and the wrongdoers were sometimes able successfully to resist the colonists.* In many places the inhabitants were obliged to be perpetually on the watch against these red-skinned warriors, who, with a whoop and a sudden rush, would come pouring into the little frontier towns, scattering dismay and death, until the white men, rallying, would drive them back into the forest, beaten and cowed for the moment, yet nourishing in their hearts projects of a speedy revenge whenever they could surprise the English at a disadvantage, or fight them on unequal terms. The relations of foreign nationalities with the Indians proved a fruitful cause of trouble to the English planters. The French in Canada were in 1649 so alarmed at the power of the Iroquois, who had almost exterminated the Hurons, and pursued the remnants of that tribe to the very walls of Quebec, that they solicited aid from Massachusetts and Plymouth, but without obtaining what they desired. During the war between the English Commonwealth and Holland, in 1653, the colonies of New Haven and Connecticut were troubled by a * Palfrey s New England, Vol. II., chap. 5. rumour that the Dutch had enlisted against them a joint force of Mohawks, Nyantics, and other savages. The feeling of apprehension was so great that the Federal Commissioners held a special meet ing at Boston, and the implicated chiefs were sum moned to give an account of the matter. They of course denied any such design; but the Commis sioners were still far from satisfied, and, on the suggestion of the Dutch Governor himself, a magis trate and two military officers were despatched from the united colonies to New Amsterdam, to receive the explanations of that functionary. In the mean while, preparations were made for a war with the Dutch ; but no war ensued. It was not thought by any one that the Dutch Governor had completely cleared himself of the crime imputed to him ; but, although the colonies of Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven were sti ongly in favour of hostili ties, the opposition of Massachusetts by far the most powerful and important member of the Con federation prevented the taking of any rash step. The alleged conspiracy had certainly not been proved with that absolute fulness which would alone have justified an appeal to the sword; and the event showed that the colonists lost nothing in safety by abstaining from a hasty attack. But it required some moral courage to abstain ; for, during the time that the negotiations were pending, the con duct of the Narragansetts and Nyantics was such as to induce the Federal Commissioners to call upon the respective chiefs to appear at Boston, and clear themselves of the charges brought against them. This they refused to do, and the Commissioners talked of coercing them by force of arms, but were again checked by the prudence of Massachusetts. These matters led to considerable discussion among the Confederated States. Plymouth, Con necticut, and New Haven were unanimously in favour of war, first with the Dutch, and afterwards with the suspected Indians : Massachusetts alone refused, and, by so refusing, prevented a resort to hostile measures, for which her assistance was absolutely necessary. The three smaller colonies were exceedingly incensed at this, and accused the larger plantation of having broken the covenant of association. There had been a previous disagree ment in the Confederacy on a question of imposts ; but the present quarrel was of a more bitter nature. For a time, it seemed doubtful whether the league established in 1 643 would not be dissolved after its ten years existence. It may perhaps be questioned whether the Articles of Confederation, strictly con strued, were not against Massachusetts. By those Articles the four colonies were to support one another in any just war. Massachusetts, it is true, 196 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1655. denied the justice of the proposed wars. But it may fairly be asked whether any one member of the Confederation had a right to determine that a war was unjust, and to refuse its aid, when all the other members had voted that it was both just and necessary. That Massachusetts was really in the right, and was following the most prudent and honourable course, does not affect the question as to her duty as one of a political league which had contracted certain general obligations. The governors of Massachusetts believed that it would be against their consciences, and a defiance of God, to engage in a war which they considered uncalled- for. Their case was certainly a hard one, and it is not to be regretted that they persisted in their refusal ; yet it is difficult to blame the three other Governments, who thought themselves in peril, and conceived that they had been deserted in their need by one who was bound to aid in their defence. In 1654, however, the quarrel was accommodated by mutual concessions, and Massachusetts joined in an expedition against the Nyantics, which, without any fighting, resulted in those savagas giving an engagement for more regular conduct in the future. In the following year, the survivors of the Pequot tribe, who had been distributed among the Mo- hegans, the Narragansetts, and the Nyantics, and on account of whom those bodies had under taken to make a yearly payment to the English for their services, were established by the colonists in settlements of their own, to be governed by a simple system of laws, administered by native magistrates. The oppression of these wretched savages by their own countrymen was the reason for taking this humane course ; and it appears to have led to satis factory results, and to something like a well-ordered society. During the time of the Commonwealth, New England was concerned in some operations against Acadie which cannot be considered creditable. After the death of D Aulnay, La Tour married his widow, made his submission to the French monarch, and was again received into favour. He was in renewed command in Acadie when a sudden and quite unjustifiable attack on the French settlements in North America once more changed his fortunes. In 1654, towards the close of the Dutch war, three or four English ships, with a few troops on board, were sent to take possession of New Netherland. Intelligence of the treaty of peace with Holland arrived soon after the expedition had reached the western hemisphere. Disappointed of their first object of attack, the commanders turned their forces now strengthened by recruits enlisted in New England against the French in the north, although England was at that time at peace with France. La Tour was not sufficiently strong to resist, and he seems, moreover, to have been secretly intriguing with the English for some time. The whole country was speedily in the hands of the attacking party. The French King complained, and not without reason, of this piratical outrage ; but Cromwell refused to restore the spoil, and France did not dare to draw the sword in vindica tion of her rights. The province, which again received the name of Nova Scotia, was bestowed by the conqueror on La Tour, Thomas Temple, and William Crowne ; but the traitorous Frenchman sold his share to Temple, and died not long after. Despite occasional dissensions, the New England colonies pursued their way without serious inter ruption. The Governments of the Commonwealth and the Protectorate did not interfere with their growing fortunes, and they in their turn were pleased to find their own political and religious principles predominant in the old country. It was, indeed, at one time in contemplation by the rulers of the Commonwealth to impose a new patent on Massachusetts, and to require that colony to keep its courts and issue its warrants in the name of the English Parliament. But the General Court re monstrated against the design, and it was not pur sued. Massachusetts, though in a perfectly inde pendent way, was very favourable to the new Government in England, and prohibited all trade with the Royalist colonists until they submitted to the Commonwealth. Oliver Cromwell thought so highly of the Puritan settlers that, after his sub jection of Ireland, he proposed to them, in 1651, to remove to that island, as a strong Protestant guard against the Romanist and Celtic popula tion. Some few of the Massachusetts people were in favour of accepting this offer ; but Endicott, writing to Cromwell on behalf of the General Court, said that, although the authorities would not prevent any persons or families from removing, they were not favourable to the project. In their American home, they were in the enjoyment of health, plenty, peace, liberty, and an opportunity for spreading the Gospel among the heathen ; and they felt no desire for change. Their decision was wise ; for in Ireland their descendants would have been speedily merged in a race which, notwithstanding the brilliant gifts and attractive qualities of individuals, has never been able, collectively, to occupy a successful position in the world. Cromwell, however, did not lose sight of the New Englanders. Undeterred by th^ refusal of his first offer, he asked them, in 1655, to settle in Jamaica, whicli island had just been con quered by his fleet. Emigrants thither were to 1655.] DEATHS OF EAELY SETTLERS. 197 have lands free of rent for a term of seven years, and afterwards to pay at the rate of only a penny an acre per year. No custom, excise, impost, or duty, was to be demanded of them for four years ; and in other respects the terms proposed were of the most favourable kind. Six vessels were to be provided for the transportation of the colonists ; but the Pro tector was from time to time to appoint their Governor, Assistants, and Commander-in-Chief. The General Court of Massachusetts took eight months to consider the letter in which these offers were put forth. They then ordered that a reply should be sent ; but five months more elapsed ere it was composed and despatched. In October, 1656, they informed his Highness that they had doubts as to the climate of Jamaica suiting the English race. This did not amount to a positive refusal ; but it was evident to Oliver that the colonists were not willing to change their position of independence for one of subjection to the Protector s Govern ment. Plymouth showed a more submisssive spirit towards the English Commonwealth, and the Pro tectorate of Cromwell, than Massachusetts. It acknowledged the paramount authority of both, and made preparations for an attack on New Nether- land in aid of the English war against the Dutch. In 1652 the colonists applied to the Council of State at London for a confirmation f of their property on the Kennebec, where some independent settlers had established themselves ; and, having obtained this, they forced the people to take an oath of fidelity to the Commonwealth of England and the colony of Plymouth. But Plymouth was always faithful to the mother country. The original founders of the New England States were now rapidly passing away in the course of nature. The deaths of Brewster in 1644, of Win- throp in 1649, and of Bradford in 1657, have already been noticed. Edward Winslow died two years earlier than Bradford. His final days were sad dened by a melancholy incident. He appears to have settled in England on the fourth occasion of his going there the visit of 1646, when he was charged with the duty of replying to the accusations of Samuel Gorton and others. Tin s business being settled, Winslow interested himself in the formation of the Society for propagating the Gospel among the Indians, and in 1654 was one of the commissioners appointed by Cromwell to determine the value of the English ships seized and detained by the King of Denmark, for which restitution was to be made, according to the treaty of peace concluded with the English Government. In the following year, Winslow was one of the three commissioners who were to superintend and direct the operations of the expedition despatched against the Spaniards in the West Indies. The design was ill-planned, and led to failure. The commanders Admiral Perm (father of the celebrated Quaker) and General Yenables disagreed as to the proper mode of pro ceeding; the commissioners were unable to compose their differences ; the troops were landed too far from St. Domingo (the city they proposed to assault), and a vigorous attack by the enemy drove back the weary and ill-provided soldiers to their ships, with a loss of six hundred men. The fleet then sailed to Jamaica, which surrendered without a blow. On the passage from Hispaniola, Winslow breathed his last, exhausted by the heat of the climate, and by the dejection of his spirits consequent on the recent defeat. His death took place on the 8th of May, 1655, in the sixtieth year of his age. He was a native of Droitvrich, in Worcestershire, and was only five-and-twenty when he arrived at Cape Cod in the Mayflower. The records of New England present no gentler, finer, or more honourable nature than his. Captain Staiidish died in 1656, at an .advanced age. He was a member of an old Lancashire family, and carried into the middle of the seven teenth century all the dashing boldness and knight- errantry of an earlier race of adventurers. In peaceful negotiations he was less successful than in the exploits of guerilla warfare. He was sent tcr England in 1625, as agent for the colony of Ply mouth in the settlement of affairs with the capitalists who had advanced money for commencing the plan tation ; but the conclusion of the business was- reserved for Allerton. It is said that Staiidish was; interrupted by the plague which was then raging in London ; but he was not sent again in the following- year. A romantic story, told of this hero, has. been reproduced by Mr. Longfellow in a poetical form. Having been left a widower in 1621, he conceived an affection for Priscilla Mullins, who lived at a distance from his residence. He there fore sent a young man named John Alden to make proposals for him. John Alden was agreeable and handsome, and the maiden did not care to be wooed by deputy. " Prithee, John," she is reported to have asked, " why do you not speak for yourself 1 " Thus challenged, the young man spoke to so much purpose that Priscilla soon became his wife. Stan- dish is said never to have forgiven his friend to the day of his death ; but Longfellow has represented his conduct in a more generous light. In religion he was anything but a fanatic, and never sympathised with the theological views of his comrades. He was a little man, quick of temper and sudden in 198 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1660. action, but helpful and kindhearted on all serious occasions of need. When many of his fellow-emi grants were lying sick and feeble in the maladies of their first dreadful winter, he nursed them with the devoted tenderness of a woman. But if there Avere Indians to be attacked, or English roysterers to be overawed, who so fit for the purpose as Captain. Miles Standish, chief soldier of the colony of Plymouth 1 The other deaths of remarkable men about the same period were those of John Cotton, one of the original pastors of Boston (1652) ; Thomas Dudley, Deputy-Governor, Governor, and Major-General of Militia in Massachusetts (1653) ; John Haynes, one of the founders and Governors of Connecticut 1654) ; Edward Hopkins, also Governor of Connecticut (1657); Theophilus Eaton, Governor of New Haven (1657) ; and Ralph Partridge, minister of Duxbury (1658). Dudley was one of those men who helped to stamp a character of intolerance on the infant colony of Mas sachusetts. He was both honourable and sincere, but very gloomy, narrow-minded, opinionated, and unlovable. He would not allow that anybody could possibly be in the right, or otherwise than heinously in the wrong, if he differed in any way from himself, and his voice was at all times for deadly war with any sect which did not rigorously conform to the standard of Mas sachusetts orthodoxy. After his decease, which took place in the seventy-seventh year of his age, some lines of his own composition were found in his pocket, which show how strong and lasting was his love of persecution. Having reckoned up the usual signs of approaching dissolution, and moralised after the accustomed fashion, he pro ceeds : " Farewell, dear wife, children, and friends ! Hate heresy, make blessed ends. Bear poverty, live with good men ; So shall we live with joy agen. Let men of God in courts and churches watch O er such as do a toleration hatch, Lest that ill egg bring forth a cockatrice, To poison all with heresy and vice. If men be left, and otherwise combine, My epitaph s, I died no libertine. " * * Cotton Mather s Magnalia Christi Americana, Book II., chap. 5. INDIAN SCALP (After Cattlii.) The death of Oliver Cromwell, and the accession to power, for a few months, of his feeble-minded son Richard, made no difference in the fortunes of New England. None of the confederate colonies had proclaimed Oliver; none proclaimed Richard, though an order to do so was sent out by the Council of State. The second Protector professed himself the " very loving friend " of Massachusetts, and, in recommending to the favour of the General Court an acquaintance of his who had an estate to admin ister within their jurisdiction, assured them that a compliance with his request would be esteemed as a particular respect done to him self, which he would always be ready to return on any occasion when he might further their good and welfare. But he made no attempt to establish the authority of the mother country over the colonies. When Charles II. as cended the throne in 1660, how ever, another era began, both for the old country and the new. Much of what had formerly existed was restored ; but the political state could not be entirely brought back to that which had preceded the great civil war. A fresh generation had arisen ; larger and more liberal princi ples had been proclaimed and enforced j and even the most despotically-inclined monarch could not altogether disregard the lessons of the past twenty years. Though the Government of Charles II. was often tyrannical, and always corrupt, it made some important concessions to the interests of English freedom. But in the colonies of New England the change was not un reasonably regarded with alarm. The Royalist settlements of Virginia and Mary land had nothing to fear, but on the contrary everything to hope, from the re-establishment of ancient forms. Massachusetts, and the other members of the Confederacy, saw in the reinstated fortunes of the Stuarts and of the Episcopal Church a danger which might in a little while become serious. All those theories of social freedom and religious independence for which the Puritans left their native country, might fairly be expected to be flouted and prosci-ibed by the son of him who had lost his head in the attempt to crush them out by the grandson of that regal pedant who confuted his theological opponents by driving them into foreign lands. The leaders of the New England COLONEL ATHEKTON AND THE INDIANS. 200 CASSELL S HISTOEY OF THE UNITED STATES. 1661. colonies awaited in a watchful spirit the first mea sures of that Government which the duplicity of Monk had established at the seat of empire. One of the earliest of these measures was the supercession. of the Parliamentary Commission for the management of colonial affairs (established several years before) by a Council of Foreign Plan tations. This made no essential difference in the position of the growing American communities ; but it showed that the King and his advisers did not intend to leave those little republics to conduct their own business without check. In May, 1661, twelve Privy Councillors were nominated as a Committee for settling the government of New England ; yet no immediate result was the con sequence. Massachusetts had at that time an agent at London, named Leverett. At an early period, this person informed his principals that the Quakers and other enemies of the Puritan settlers had been making a great display of their grievances ; that a petition had been presented for setting a General Governor over the colonies ; and that, with the restoration of Episcopacy, various Popish obser vances had again become common. On the receipt of this letter, the Massachusetts Magistrates con voked an extraordinary General Court, at which it was ordered that addresses should at once be made to "the King s most excellent Majesty" and to " the High Court of Parliament." That which was transmitted to the King prayed for his "gracious protection of them in the continuance both of .their civil privileges and of their religion and liberties, according to the grantees known end of suing for the patent conferred upon the plantation by his royal father." The authors of this address alluded to the reasons why they had transported themselves across the ocean, from the pleasant land where they had been born, to " the vast and waste wilderness " they had subdued. They referred to the complaints of the Quakers, and asserted that those sectaries could only be restrained by death, and that their lives would gladly have been spared, had they con sented to depart the jurisdiction, and not return without authority. Finally, they appealed to " the head and heart of that great King who was some time an exile as they were." The address to the Parliament was equally submissive, and professed the willingness of the petitioners to give an account of the trust committed to them, and of the powers they had exercised. Some of the complaints made against them were briefly noticed ; and the favour and encouragement of Parliament were humbly begged. Nothing is more remarkable than the tone of these memorials. There was evidently no longer any thought of defying the authority of the mother country, as in the time of Charles I. The pretension to entire independence was abandoned - by implication, at any rate, if not in direct terms. The colonists probably felt that the reaction in England would be too strong to contend against ; that the republican party at home had been ruined by its own dissensions and mismanagement ; and that the restored monarchy would for years be far more powerful than the monarchy which was tottering to its fall. Such may have been the con siderations which dictated these two very dutiful addresses. The agents appointed to present the addresses were instructed to obtain the favour and good opinion of gentlemen of position, whether in Par liament or about the King s person. ; to collect in formation as to how the great powers of the State stood affected towards the memorialists ; to explain that what they desired was a continuance of the privileges they had received by their patent, and had hitherto enjoyed, including freedom from appeals to England in any case civil or criminal ; and a renewal of the Act that freed from customs. The memorialists specially deprecated any measures tending to the re-appearance of the Quakers ; and they charged their agents to proceed with caution and privacy. Much xincertainty was naturally felt as to Low the King would receive the advances thus made ; and great was the relief of the settlers on the arrival of a despatch from Secretary Morrice to Endicott (dated February 15th, 1661), full of friendly expressions towards the colonies in general, and New England in. particular. Liberty, and a tender regard to consciences, were especially promised, and the petitioning plantations were com plimented on the long and secure establishment Avhich had existed there. But about the same period an order was transmitted to New England for the apprehension of two fugitive regicides Colonel Whalley and Colonel GofFe, both of them religious enthusiasts, filled with the mystical ideas, prevalent among the Puritans of that day who had sought shelter in Boston. There could be 110 doubt as to the intention with regard to those offenders. Ten of their comrades one of whom was the Rev. Hugh Peters, for some time an important man in Massachusetts, and who, after his return to England, fought on the side of the Parliament, and ultimately became chaplain to Oliver Cromwell had been executed in October, 1660. On the arrival of the fugitive regicides in Massachusetts, a person who knew them took them before the Governor : told him that they were two of the late King s judges, who had been declared traitors and mur derers ; and advised him to secure them. Endicott FUGITIVE REGICIDES. 201 replied that, without a commission from England, none should meddle with them. For this inter ference, the informant was called a " malignant " a word at that time employed to designate adhe rents of the Royalist party. It is probable enough that the regicides were greatly caressed by the leading men of Boston, for their deeds were in har mony with the principles which Massachusetts had always maintained. But when the Act of In demnity came over, and it was found that the two fugitives were excepted from its terms, some members of the General Court were in favour of hinting to them the expediency of removing to another jurisdiction. A Court of Assistants re fused to give Endicott authority to secure the refugees ; and, after four days delay, they set off for Ne*w Haven, where they were concealed in the house of Davenport, their hiding-place in the cellar -of which dwelling is still shown. In about a month s time, information arrived that the King had sent a peremptory order to the colonial Governments for their apprehension. Endicott, therefore, despatched two agents with a commission to search Massachusetts (where he knew they would not be found) for the runaways, and to convey letters of recommendation to the Governors of the other plantations. These agents were two young men lately arrived from England, and holding Royalist opinions; but Endicott probably calcu lated on the colonists baffling their zeal. Many, however, thought that the Governor had gone too far in what he had done, having acted without the sanction of the Federal Council. The two young Royalists Thomas Kellond and Thomas Kirk left Boston on their difficult quest, and, after a brief visit to Connecticut, proceeded to New Haven. There they had several interviews with Deputy-Governor Leete, from whom they could get neither information nor assistance, though they plainly told him they believed he knew where the missing colonels were. It cannot be doubted that he was really in possession of this knowledge, and that he communicated with the fugitives, to let them know that the pursuers were upon their track. The messengers upbraided Leete with his disloyalty in sheltering such heinous malefactors, threatened him with the King s vengeance, and set before him the danger incurred by any one who concealed or abetted traitors. In vain : Leete was not to be moved. From New Haven, Kellond and Kirk went to New Netherland, where the Dutch Governor promised assistance in case he should be in a position to render any. The Royalist agents then returned to Boston, where they made a report of their proceedings, which is now in the State Paper Office, London. In the meanwhile, tho regicides were shifted aboitt from place to place ; living sometimes in houses, sometimes in a mill, and for four weeks in a species of cave near a lonely farm-house, whence they received their food, and to which they sometimes resorted for better shelter in stormy weather. Lai ge rewards for their appre hension were offered by Kellond and Kirk ; yet they remained undiscovered, and for two years lived quietly in a house in or near Milford. Growing emboldened by impunity, they at length appeared in public, and conducted the devotions of a few neighbours. But, more vigorous measures for their arrest being apprehended on the arrival of Commissioners from the King, armed with extra ordinary powers, they were again compelled to take flight, and now found a refuge in the town, of Hadley, on the north- western frontiers of Massa chusetts. Here they lived in obscurity for several years, and died at an advanced period of life. The bones of Goffe who was the son-in-law of Whalley are thought to have been discovered, in 1795, in the cellar of the house at Hadley, when that edifice was being demolished.* The General Court of Massachusetts, perceiving that the time had passed for assuming a position of complete internal sovereignty, appointed, in August, 1661, a day of public thanksgiving for the many mercies which God had bestowed on them, espe cially in giving them favour in the eyes and heart of their sovereign lord, the King. They then passed a resolution appointing a committee for considering and debating such matters as might concern their patent, laws, privileges, and duty to his Majesty. The intention of this step was defined to be the creation of unity among themselves in the due observance of obedience and fidelity to the authority of England, and in the assertion of their own just privileges. The report of the committee was soon presented at a special session of the General Court, when it was allowed- and approved. It affirmed the patent to be (under God) the foundation, of their civil polity ; that by the powers thus bestowed a Government had been created, which had full authority, legislative and executive, for ruling the people there, both in ecclesiastical and civil affairs, without appeal, excepting in the case of laws repugnant to those of England ; that the plantation had the right of self-defence against all who should attack it, whether by sea or land ; that any imposition prejudicial to the country was an infringement of their right ; that they were bound to uphold the power of the King, and, as * Palfrey s History of New England, Vol. II., chap. 13. 202 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1662. far as possible, to discover and prevent all plots and conspiracies against that power; that they should punish all crimes, and uphold the true Christian or Protestant religion ; that they were entitled to plead with their Prince against all such as should at any time attempt the violation of their privileges ; that the warrant and letter from the King for the apprehension of Colonels Whalley and Goffe ought to be diligently and faithfully executed by the authorities of the colony ; and that the General Court would do well to declare that, in case, for the future, any persons legally obnoxious, and flying from the civil justice of the State of England, should arrive in those parts, they might not there expect shelter. After considerable delay and hesitation, the King was formally proclaimed, though all drinking of his health was forbidden. Plymouth, New Haven, and Connecticut also acknowledged the authority of Charles II. in terms of effusive, but perhaps not very sincere, loyalty ; and from 1661 the history of New England entered on a new staije. CHAPTER XXIV. Despatch of John "Winthrop the Younger to England, to solicit a Koyal Charter for Connecticut Grant by Charles II. of an Ample Patent Liberal Terms of that Document Character of the Second John "Winthrop Absorption of New Haven into Connecticut Questionable Conduct of "Winthrop Opposition of New Haven to the Proposed Incorpora tion The Union finally effected Happy Condition of Connecticut Claims of Rhode Island Proceedings of its Agent in England Grant of a Charter with very extensive Privileges Provision in favour of Religious Toleration Exception as regards the Roman Catholics The Exception annulled at a later Date -Despatch of Agents from Massachusetts to England Letter of Charles II. to the Massachusetts Colony Stipulations of the King on behalf of Liberty of Conscience Death of the Rev. John Norton Proceedings of the General Court with reference to the King s Letter The American Policy of Charles II. UP to the time at which we have now arrived, the colony of Connecticut had possessed no Royal charter. The lands which formed the nucleus of the plantation had been obtained from the assigns of the Earl of Warwick ; and to these were added certain territories purchased from Uncas, and those which had been taken from the Pequots after the war. But the settlers were still devoid oi all chartered rights, and it was thought advisable to procure some such basis for their political state. John Winthrop the younger, one of the founders of the colony, was accordingly sent to London in 1661, to ask this favour of the King. It must have been a painful journey to him ; for, not many months before, his relative by marriage, Hugh Peters, had been executed for his share in the death of Charles I. But the younger Winthrop had bound up his for tunes with those of Connecticut ; he was de votedly attached to its interests ; and he was not likely to allow a consideration of this nature to stand in the way of such a design. All accounts repre sent him as a man of blameless private chai acter, of experience as a statesman, of thoughtful and culti vated mind, and of pleasing manners. In. his youth he had travelled over a large part of the continent of Europe, including Constantinople ; and he was still quite young when he joined his father in Massachusetts. His association with the colony of Connecticut dates from the year 1635; so that. when he was sent on his mission to England, he had been connected with the settlement for the long period of six-and-twenty years. No man was regarded by the plantation with greater favour ; no man. was better calculated to promote its general interests. His knowledge of local affairs, personal identity with the ends to be served, breadth of in tellect, and suavity of demeanour, pointed him out as the fittest person to conduct so delicate a business. His instructions were to solicit the assistance of the former patentees of Connecticut ; to obtain a copy of the patent granted by the Earl of Warwick to Lord Saye and Sele and his associates ; to solicit a confirmation of its provisions from the King ; and, above all things, to procure, if possible, a Royal charter, conferring liberties and privileges equal to those of Massachusetts. Winthrop arrived in England in August, 1661, and at once experienced the good will of Lord Saye and Sele (then very old), and of the Earl of Manchester, a member of the Puritan party, and a man known for his generous services to all who upheld the liberal cause. By May, 1662, he had pushed his business so well that the King granted the colony a charter of a highly valuable kind. The corporation established by this instrument consisted of nineteen patentees, with such associates as they should from time to time elect. The Company s territories were so defined 1062.] CONNECTICUT AND NEW HAVEN. 203 as to include the whole colony of New Haven; certain lands claimed by the people of Providence and Rhode; Island, and also by the Dutch; and ground to the east of the Pequot river, which Massachusetts regarded as her own. Here was a vast domain marked out for the future a domain reaching towards the Atlantic on the east, and touching the Pacific on the west. The direction of the reconstituted colony was vested in a Governor, Deputy-Governor, twelve Assistants, and a House of Representatives, to which each town was to send two members. The elections were to be annual, and the Legislature was to meet twice a year. Two Assistants were empowered to administer the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy ; but there was no positive injunction that those oaths should be taken. The King reserved to himself no right to negative the acts of the colonists ; he did not even require that they should be submitted for his inspection : the constituted authorities of the plantation were free to make their own laws, to administer justice without appeals to England, to inflict punishments, and to confer pardons.* The concessions, in short, amounted to very little less than complete inde pendence. So satisfactory a result was due partly to the adroit management of Winthrop ; partly to the friendly feeling of Charles II., whose father is said to have been well-disposed to Winthrop s grandfather. It is thought that Winthrop himself had Royalist leanings, and was doubtful as to the justice of the Republican party in the late civil wars. A letter printed in Thurloe s State Papers, addressed by one John Maidston in London to Winthrop in Connecticut, during the month of March, 1660, seems to favour this supposition by the nature of the arguments employed, apparently in reply to remarks or questions by the writer s correspondent. The second John Winthrop was a man of a more graceful, pliant, and accommodating habit of mind than his father. Fond of study, of science, and of general investigation, he may not improbably have disliked the turbulence of revolu tionary conditions, and may have preferred the prospects of assured repose under an ancient mon archy to perpetual change under a republic which was the sport of factions and of sectaries. He was one of the earliest correspondents of the Royal Society, and, while in England, was the friend of men eminent in letters and in arts. In one respect, the conduct of Winthrop in these negotiations has been questioned as not strictly in accordance with honour. The absorption of New Haven into Connecticut was very much against the wishes of the former colony, and seems to have been an arbitrary and unjust act. New Haven was not represented before the King, and Winthrop had no authority to make any arrangement involving its extinction as a separate province. But a dispute as to jurisdiction had for some years existed between the two colonies, and Winthrop seems to have taken advantage of his position to secure the interests of the plantation which he represented. The assertion of Connecticut was that the New Haven settlers had sat down on lands forming part of those which had been conveyed to Lord Brooke, Lord Save and Sele, and others, by the Earl of Warwick. t Allowing this to have been so, the claim had never been admitted by New Haven, and, as Mr. Palfrey justly points out, that colony belonged to a confederacy of which Winthrop was one of the chief Magistrates, and which, in its articles of agreement, recognised and guaranteed the independence of the plantation now obliterated. The colony of New Haven had arisen in an irregular way from several scattered settlements, which after awhile found it convenient to coalesce ; but by 1662 it had acquired a distinct corporate existence. Before leaving New England, Winthrop is said to have assured a friend, who had expressed some fears on the subject, that no exten sion of Connecticut so as to include New Haven was contemplated, " but rather the contrary ; " and that, even if the old patent should be found to include that plantation, the colonists should be at liberty to join or not at their pleasure. It is probable he was sincere in these promises, for, after the charter had passed the seals, he wrote to the General Court to respect his pledge. But, the matter being once settled, it was not likely to be disturbed. The case of New Haven, therefore, seems to have been peculiarly hard, and the conduct of Winthrop, so far, of doubtful justice. Connecticut, however, rejoiced greatly^ in its good fortune, and the people expressed their gratitude towards Winthrop by electing him Governor during the remainder of his life, which was extended to 1676. The citizens of New Haven were equally displeased. They declared their intention of re sisting the absorption of their colony, at least until some arrangements could be made with Connecticut. Winthrop, Avho remained in England until 1663, heard before he left of the agitation excited in the smaller colony by the charter he had obtained. He wrote to Deputy-Governor Mason, recommending that, if there had been any unjust intermeddling with New Haven, such acts should be forthwith re called, and in no case repeated. But the General. * Bancroft s History of the United States, Vol. I., chap. 11. "New Haven s Case stated " in New Haven KecoiV* 204 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1664. Court of Connecticut declined to accept this advice. They took steps for promoting what they conceived to be their right ; and, although the representatives of Massachusetts and Plymouth in the Federal Council gave their judgment in favour of New Haven, the influence of Connecticut was too strong to be resisted. Some of the towns in cluded in. New Haven had from the first placed themselves under the Government of Connecticut ; and the former colony, thus weakened and im poverished, was unable successfully to resist, espe cially as her adversary was supported by the Royal power and authority. Winthrop, on his return from England, used his influ ence to mitigate the destiny of the smaller settlement, but without effect. Connecticut was resolved to enjoy to the very utmost the privi leges conferred by her charter, and would not listen to any suggestions of compromise. Only three towns now adhered to the fortunes of New Haven colony. The yearly allowances for the Governor and Deputy- Governor were, from sheer necessity, reduced to forty pounds and ten founds respectively; and it was evident that the plantation must shortly succumb, if only from want of means. For some time longer, however, it maintained the struggle with admirable spirit, and even issued a proclamation calling upon seceders to return to their obedience, and pay their arrears of rates. But the majority of those who had once been its citizens were in favour of union with Connecticut. The advantages of association were numerous. A state possessed of considerable power and wealth would thus be created, and the political system of Connecticut was more liberal than that of New Haven. In Connecticut, church membership was not a necessary condition of the franchise ; whereas in New Haven the principle of exclusion dear to Massachusetts was enforced. It has been sug gested that the existence of this distinction was one of the reasons which inclined the Government of Charles II. to support the larger plantation at the expense of the smaller. New Haven would have MILES STANDISH S SWORD, POT, AXU PLATTER PRESERVED IX PILGRIM HALL, NEW PLYMOUTH. been the natural ally of Massachusetts in all reli gious questions ; and her absorption in Connecticut neutralised one element of opposition to the policv of the monarch a policy which, whatever the motives that prompted it, was liberal in its ultimate effect, and therefore very likely to command the support of a considerable number. However this may have been, the submission of the weaker colony was a foregone conclusion ; yet the end was for a while delayed. The General Court of New Haven, in response to a suggestion from the Governor to open another negotiation, expressed a determination not to treat until the usurpations committed on their territory were at an end. The vigour of this proceeding led to a short-lived triumph. Connecticut, being de sirous of a treaty, and doubtless ashamed of proceeding to measures of coercion, consented, in 1664, to a provisional restitution of the local authority in those towns which had seceded, and to a continuance for some time longer of the colonial government. The Gene ral Court elected under this agreement drew up a powerful statement of grievances as against Connecticut ; but this did not suflice to change the current of events, and in 1665 New Haven perforce consented to a union which she found it impossible any longer to oppose. After the settlement of this strife, the united colonies of Connecticut and New Haven proceeded on their way with tranquillity and success. The Government appears to have wisely applied the exceptional powers which Charles II., on the advice of Lord Clarendon, had granted it. Educa tion was promoted by useful laws, and religious liberty was cherished as one of the greatest pos sessions of the people. The citizens lived chiefly by agriculture, and, though their existence may seem dull and uninteresting to the dwellers in large cities, it had the charm of repose and security, and of freedom from wasting vice. These tillers of the soil were in the happy condition of being neither rich nor poor. Want was a thing wholly un known; on the other hand, there were not those 1665.] HAPPY PROGRESS OF CONNECTICUT. 205 morbid accumulations of wealth which engender wickedness and tempt to crime. During this truly <* olden, ao-e of colonial life, the motive to theft was DO * so entirely absent that houses remained all night with no other fastening than an ordinary latch. Bolts and locks were regarded as superfluities, and Most of the necessaries of life were produced within the limits of the plantation itself. While the men were working in the fields, the women were spinning all needful articles of dress at home. Yet, with this idyllic simplicity, the graces. of learning were not forgotten; and Yale College, established FORT DUMPLING, NEW PLYMOUTH. the Connecticiit farmer had no fear of burglars or rick-burners, as the Connecticut labourer had no fear of poverty during his manhood, or of the workhouse in his old age. Indeed, the farmer and the labourer were identical. The soil was divided among the inhabitants, with the exception of a part which was held as the common property of the State, or for the endowment of new-comers. Liti gation was so seldom resorted to that a lawyer could hardly be found in the whole province. 18 in 1 700, has a high reputation to this day. Relieved from all anxiety as to the future, the people of Connecticut were prone to enter into the married state, and for a century the population doubled itself once in every twenty years, though emigration was frequent. Towards the close of the seventeenth century, there were probably 17,000 inhabitants of the colony. The government was a little democracy, or rather a collection of little democracies. The town meetings were almost as important as the 206 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G63. gatherings of the General Court. Every inhabitant possessed a vote, and the local assembly had power over the local taxes, the choice of officers, the making of roads and bridges, and the appointing of ministers of religion.* Connecticut was a perfect commonwealth, with whose condition the mother country in no way interfered. Rhode Island, which had recognised with assiduous readiness the Protectorates of Oliver and Richard Cromwell, was equally quick to proclaim Charles II. as soon as the news of his accession reached that part of America. At the same time, the Government instructed their agent in England, John Clarke, to take whatever steps might to him seem necessary for the preservation of their privileges, liberties, boundaries, and immunities. Durig the progress of Winthrop s negotiations with respect to the Connecticut charter, Clarke made some antagonistic claims in. regard to boun dary. The matter was ultimately arranged by a compromise suggested by four arbiters, and agreed to by Clarke and Winthrop. Clarke, who seems to have represented Providence as well as Rhode Island, managed to ingratiate himself with the King, who was well disposed towards the Narra- gansett plantations, on account of Gorton having induced a large tribe of neighbouring Indians to submit themselves and their lands to the Royal authority. Taking advantage of this fact, and of the generally loyal tendency of the colonists, whose conduct in this respect was strikingly different from that of Massachusetts, Clarke, in a memorial to his Majesty, referred to the dutiful way in which, as true natives of England, they had adhered to their allegiance. He did not miss his reward. On the 8th of July, 1663, the King granted to Rhode Island and Providence a charter creating a body corporate and politic, the features of which were similar to those of the Connecticut charter, with the addition of a proviso that " no person within the said colony, at any time thereafter, should be anywise molested, punished, disquieted, or called in question, for any difference of opinion in matters of religion which did not actually disturb th<j civil peace of the said colony ; but that all and every person and persons might from time to time, and at all times thereafter, freely and fully have and enjoy his and their own judgments and consciences in matters of religious concernments." This clause, so remarkably establishing the freedom of the intellect on a subject the most delicate and difficult to deal with of any, was doubtless procured by Clarke in obedience to instructions issued to him by his principals in 1658, when they wrote : " Plead our case in such sort as we may not be compelled to exercise any civil power over men s consciences : we do judge it no less than a point of absolute cruelty, "t The motive of Charles II. in granting so highly liberal a provision is not easy to determine. It may possibly have been that he desired to create a political condition in Rhode Island and Providence which would give him a legal title to introduce Roman Catholicism there when ever he pleased, and which would at the same time effectually close the mouths of the colonial leaders. It may have been that he hoped to checkmate the Government of Massachusetts, which had always been exclusive and tyrannical as regards religion, holding in equal horror the Church of Rome, the Church of England, the Quakers, the Antinoniians, and the Anabaptists. It may have been mere good nature, of which, in a thoughtless way, the monarch had a fair share. But in any case the gain to humanity was great. Providence and Rhode Island recollected, to their honour, that from the first they had been harbours of refuge to the perseciited. Massachusetts forgot, or wantonly violated, the principle which had led her people across the sea. It is difficult to attribute any really noble motive to Charles II. ; yet, as a matter of fact, he helped to redress the intolerance of successful Puritans. The other features of the charter were equally liberal. No oath of allegiance was prescribed, and the conduct of affairs was left in the hands of the colonists. The gratification of the people on recep tion of the news was great. The document Avas publicly read, and the broad seal held up in view of the populace, that all might behold it. Thanks were voted to the King for his grace and favour to the united colonies, and also to Lord Clarendon ; and gratuities were granted to Clarke, and to the gentleman who brought the charter over. Clarke was certainly in an especial degree worthy of the affectionate regard of those whom he had so well served. He had been twelve years in England, doing the work of the two plantations ; and the result of his labours was a boon which the colonists described as inestimable and incomparable. Yet the town of Warwick objected to pay its share of the assessment levied for Clarke s benefit, on the ground that, while in London, he had exercised his calling as a minister of religion, and that he had doubtless in this way found good means for liis maintenance. If anything could add to the mean ness of this objection, it would be the fact that * Bancroft. Massachusetts Historical Collection. 1G63.1 RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE. 207 Clarke had been compelled, during his mission, to eke out his scanty resources by a mortgage on his estate, and that at his death in 1676 he bequeathed all his possessions to the poor, and for the education of the humble. The miserly spirit of "Warwick, however, was not shared by the other towns, and the name of Clarke was honoured both by Rhode Island and Providence. The two colonies made good use of the privileges bestowed on them, of which the greatest was religious freedom. That freedom was so wide that it included pagans and infidels ; but in process of time one noteworthy exception was introduced. The Roman Catholics were, by the laws of Rhode Island, denied the same liberty which all other bodies enjoyed. This seems hard, and, unless on the ground of necessity, it was unjust. "Whether such ground really existed, may be doubtful ; but it must be recollected that Ro manists too often aim not merely at freedom, but at domination. In old-established and powerful States, so many counter-forces can be brought to bear against this design that freedom may be as safely granted to Papists as to Puritans ; and wherever this is the case, the denial of freedom is a crime. But it may have appeared to the Rhode Island assertors of conscience that they were not strong enough for so doubtful an experiment, and that they might endanger all by too liberal a concession. At any rate, if Charles II. really had any hope of making a path for the triumph of Papacy in Providence and Rhode Island, by granting the rights of conscience, he signally failed in his intent. It is not clear when this exception was made. That it was enacted by special law is certain, for the charter contains no such limitation. In May, 1664, the first regular session after the granting of the Royal patent was held by the General Court, and religious freedom was established in the identical words of that instrument. In the following year, the Legislature expressly put on record that liberty as to the worship of God had been a prin ciple of their colony from the beginning, and that they hoped to preserve it to the end. Fifteen years later in 1680 the Government of Rhode Island boasted, not without reason, that all their people enjoyed freedom of conscience. It seems probable that the restriction with respect to the Catholics was a result of James II. s attempt to introduce the religion of Rome into the British dominions. But, as there were no Papists in the colony, the excep tion could only have been designed as a protection against possible encroachments in the future. This invidious distinction was at once removed when sorna French ships arrived in the harbours of Rhode Island during the war of independence, as there was no longer even the smallest necessity for its retention, and it might then have acted injuri ously. The traditions of Rhode Island were not easily forgotten, and were but seldom violated even in a slight degree. Massachusetts did not find so much favour with the King as Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Pro vidence. This was not unnatural ; for the latter colonies had always been loyal to the English Go vernment, while Massachusetts had never neglected an opportunity of defying it. After the Restoration, however, it was resolved to send two agents to England with an address to the sovereign. These agents were Bradstreet and Norton. They received their instructions from a committee consisting, nomi nally, of the Governor, the Lieutenant-Governor, two Magistrates, and three Deputies, though the Governor and his substitute were so much opposed to the contemplated proceeding that they refused to be present at the meetings. Bradstreet and Norton were almost equally unwilling to undertake the mission ; for they feared the great responsibility of such negotiations as were contemplated, and more over dreaded lest they should be detained as hostages for the good conduct of the plantation, or subjected to punishment for their share in those transactions such as the despotic treatment of Gorton and the persecution of the Quakers against which com plaint was made. To the last they hesitated and raised difficulties, expressing a doubt whether so rash a step was consistent with what, in an odd phrase, they described as " Christian prudence." The Rev. Mr. Norton took advantage of a violent cold and fit of sickness with which, as the records state, the Lord was pleased to visit him, to recede from his engagement, and the ship was actually discharged. But a few days later, " the Lord so en couraged and strengthened the heart " of this great advocate of persecution (for it was he who had been chiefly instrumental in the ill-usage of the Quakers) that he expressed himself willing to go at once. The messengers departed in February, 1662. In England, they encountered George Fox and some of his associates ; yet they met with greater success than was expected. Lord Saye and Sele did his utmost to advance their suit, which Avas for a formal recognition of their liberty and privileges, especially of their freedom from appeals to England. Other Puritans of distinction helped to support their cause. The King, in a letter to the envoys, dated June 28th, 1662, told Bradstreet and Norton that the address of Massachusetts had been very acceptable to him ; that he received them into his protection, confirmed their patent and charter, and was ready 208 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1662. to renew those documents, if desired ; and that he pardoned all his subjects of that plantation for crimes and offences committed against him during the late troubles, excepting any persons (if any there were in the colony) who stood attainted of high treason. With these assurances was coupled an ex pression of his Majesty s desire that from that time forward the oath of allegiance should be taken by the colonists; that the administration of justice should be in his name ; and that all laws and ordi nances contrary to or derogatory from his authority and government should be repealed. He emphati cally required and, whatever we may think of his character and usual motives, he was here acting on behalf of those principles of religious liberty which Massachusetts was foremost to assert, and first to outrage that settlers who wished to use the Book of Common Prayer, and to perform their devotions after the manner established in England, should not be denied that freedom, or undergo any prejudice or disadvantage on account of it, provided they acted peaceably, and without disturbance to others ; more over, that all persons of good and honest lives should be admitted to the sacrament of the Lord s Supper, according to the said Book of Common Prayer, and that their children should be admitted to baptism. The King likewise commanded all concerned that, in the election of the Governor and Assistants, the only consideration should be the wisdom and integ rity of the persons to be chosen, and not the par ticular character of their opinions ; and that all duly qualified freeholders, not vicious in their lives, should be allowed to exercise their vote in the election of civil and military officers, without re ference to their ideas concerning church government. The King, however, made exception with regard to the Quakers, " whose principles," he wrote, " being inconsistent with any kind of government, we have found it necessary, with the advice of our Parliament here, to make a sharp law against them, and are well content you do the like there." The followers of Fox and Naylor had themselves to thank for this. The supporters of the popular cause in days of civil strife had not lived in vain. The violent deaths of Strafford, Laud, and Charles I., had borne their fruit. Here was the grandson of James I. preaching toleration to the descendants of the men whom James had hunted across the ocean for con science sake ! Charles II. could have had no real regard for the principle involved; but he had to some extent learned the lesson which his father perished on the scaffold for his inability to learn. The very levity of the restored monarch helped on the same result. To his profligate, easy, cynical disposition, all religions were pretty much the same. When he was out of spirits or out of health, he was inclined to be a Catholic, and there cannot be a doubt that he died in tjiat faith ; but in ordinary seasons he wished not to be troubled by such con siderations, and was willing that men should think as they pleased, so long as they did not interrupt his pleasures or endanger his throne. Another motive, in the case of Massachusetts, was doubtless a desire to punish that colony for its aggressive Puritanism and republican, independence. Political freedom is in truth nothing but a system of checks and counter-checks ; and the jealousy of a monarch may sometimes act as a salutary balance to the absolutism of triumphant demagogues. Humanity is but little concerned in modes of government or forms of ritual ; but it is very much concerned in the reality of freedom, and in the breadth and charity of the religious sentiment. In transmitting his views to the Massachusetts authorities, the King gave orders that his letter should be communicated to and published at the next General Court. This was done, but the mis sive gave no great satisfaction. Some of those who heard it did not hesitate to say that Norton had laid the foundation of the ruin of their liberties. The liberty of tyrannising over those who differed in religion was of course very hard to be lost, for, as a rule, there is rio privilege which men more dearly prize ; but it might surely have been remembered that Massachusetts had other liberties, less exquisite perhaps, but more substantially valuable, which the sovereign s letter did not touch. Norton, how ever, who had previously been, one of the most popular men in the colony, was so overwhelmed with obloquy that he retired into solitude, and brooded on his griefs until his health was broken. On Sunday, the 5th of April, 1663 rather more than half a year after his return from England- he attended public worship, and, on reaching home, was struck down by a sudden and fatal attack of apoplexy. The Quakers, in a representation of their hardships to the King, made some time after, spoke of this death as a judgment on the sufferer. They wrote : "John Norton, chief priest in Boston, by the immediate power of the Lord was smitten, and, as he was sinking down by the fireside, being under just judgment, he confessed the hand of the Lord was upon him ; and so he died." It is to be feared that, if his words had any more than a general signification, he meant that he was stricken, not for having persecuted the Quakers, but for being concerned in a negotiation which tended to diminish the power of persecuting anj one. We cannot do better than adopt the remark of Daniel Neal, who observes : " Though this reflection of 1662.] MASSACHUSETTS AND CHARLES II. 209 the Quakers is very unjust, it being impossible for us to distinguish between a natural and judicial death, yet I heartily wish that neither he nor anybody else, by their unchristian severities, had given them occasion to make it." * The General Court of Massachusetts did not well know what to do with reference to the King s letter. They disliked its injunctions, but at the same time felt the danger of defying them. In October, 1662, however, they directed that the missive should be published, and that all writs, processes, and indictments should be made and sent forth in his Majesty s name, ; any usage or custom to the contrary notwithstanding." As to other matters, especially religion, it was ordered that all action should be suspended until the next General Court, so that the persons principally concerned might have time and opportunity to consider what was best to be done. The Court then appointed a day of public thanksgiving for the safe and speedy return of the agents to England, and for the con tinuance of peace, liberty, and the enjoyment of the Gospel ; also, a month later, a day of fasting and humiliation, " on account of the afflictive and low estate of the cause and people of God universally, with the prevailing power of Antichrist over the reformed churches beyond the seas," as well as " some public rebukes of God " among themselves. But, though inclined to temporise, the Massachu setts authorities asserted their independence in various ways. The law for flogging Quakers, which had for a time been suspended in consequence of the King s recommendation to that effect, was revived, with a few modifications; though this may perhaps have been regarded as a fulfilment of Charles s later suggestions with reference to those frantic enthusiasts. A censorship of the printing press was for a short time established ; and a Captain Breedon, recently come from England, was punished for insolent and contemptuous conduct towards the General Court. The next meeting of the Court was in May, 1663, after the annual elections. A long debate took place as to what was necessary to be done with reference to the Royal letter. A committee was appointed to draw up an answer, which was to be presented at the next session ; and permission was given to the Elders, the freemen, and the inhabitants generally, to send in their opinions on the matters at issue. The American policy of Charles II. was singularly capricious. In some respects it was liberal ; in *some respects it was reckless. Lands were given away like coin ; whole provinces were granted as if they were small estates. Considerable portions of Virginia were bestowed on. needy courtiers ; large regions in the north were made over to the Duke of York, who also received the country from Connecticut river to Delaware Bay, though a portion of it had been, secured by charter to Winthrop, and another portion belonged to the Dutch. The proprietary rights to New Hampshire and Maine were revived for the benefit of the Duke of Monmouth. Acadie was restored to the French, while Prince Rupert and his friends were aggran dised with a monopoly of the vast and savage territories of Hudson s Bay. Thus, some of the worst precedents of preceding reigns were revived ; yet the several colonies, now populous and wealthy, continued their career of vigorous life with but slight drawbacks. CHAPTER XXV. Opening of the Year 1C64 Position towards one another of Massachusetts and England Military Strength of Massachusetts- Want of a Circulating Medium in the Colony Coinage of Money Suppression of a Politico-Religious Treatise by Eliot Sir Thomas Temple, and his efforts at London for the Interests of Massachusetts Appointment by Charles II. of Four Commissioners for inquiring into the Condition of the New England Colonies Arrival of the Commissioners in America State Paper on the Object of their Appointment Character and Antecedents of the Four Commissioners- Letter of the King to the Governor of Massachusetts Instructions of the Royal Agents Antagonistic Views as to the Character and Design of the Intervention False Position of Massachusetts, and Errors in the Policy of the King Petition of the General Court of Massachusetts to Charles II. IN the early part of the year 1664, the position towards one another of Massachusetts and England was that of mutual distrust of the desire to take * Neal s History of Xcw England (1720), chap. 8. Even Cotton Mather thinks the Quakers were persecuted a little too much. (Magnalia, Book III., Part I., chap. 2.) some hostile action, combined with a feeling of perplexity as to what would be advisable or safe. Massachusetts would fain have thrown off the yoke of the old country altogether ; but she feared the power of the restored Stuarts, with the nation at their back. England would gladly have put an. 210 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1664. end to all republican experiments in America, had she not been filled with a vague, and doubtless salutary, dread of armed resistance from one end of the coleny to the other. It may at first sight seem absurd to talk of so young a settlement resisting the country which sent it forth ; but the power of Massa chusetts alone and in such a contest she would probably have had the alliance of some of the other New England States was far from inconsiderable. The population is thought to have amounted at that time to about 25,000. Of these, many must have been of native birth, for the colony had now been in existence nearly five-and-thirty years; and, were similar to those of Oliver Cromwell s fighting men ; and it is certain, that, in the event of a collision, they would have shown equally good qualities in the field. It is true that they were rather a militia than a regular army ; but England itself had very few professional soldiers at that date. Charles II. maintained about 5,000 regular troops to serve as body-guards, and to do duty in the garrisons which were then permanently esta blished in England ; but even this was looked upon as an innovation. For any foreign war he must have depended on hasty levies, which would have been mainly recruited from classes where the repub- MASSACHUSETTS COINAGE. although the descendants of the emigrants were them selves called English (the term "American" being for some generations applied exclusively to the Indians), they had a very marked feeling of local patriotism. This feeling, indeed, was strongly developed even among those who came from the old country ; and nothing was more likely to call it forth to the utmost than any inconsiderate opposition. As all males of the age for military service (which was from sixteen to sixty) were required to be provided with arms and a certain qiiantity of ammunition, and to understand at least the rudiments of warfare, a fair-sized army must at that time have existed on the soil of Massachusetts. The infantry consisted of musketeers and pikemen ; the mounted troops were derived entirely from the propertied classes. These soldiers were well protected, after the fashion of the time, by steel corselets, buff leather jerkins, or quilted coats. Their character and organisation lican feeling of Cromwell s days was still dormant. The danger of openly attacking Massachusetts was therefore too great to be lightly risked. The mili tary power of that colony was in truth not con temptible, and rumours which found their way to England represented it as much greater than it really was. In many respects the conduct of Massachusetts was such as to offend the mother country. The assumptions of independence were continual ; and even while the two commissioners, Bradstreet and Norton, were in England, a proceeding was sanc tioned which was very likely to prejudice the settlement still further in the mind of Charles II. This was the issue of a new coin an act of sove reignty not tli en for the first time committed, but one the repetition of which at that particular junctui e was injudicious. It must be acknowledged, however, that the colony was in a difficulty in this COMMISSIONERS LANDING AT BOSTON. 212 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1661.. respect. The early settlers had taken over with them a certain amount of English coin ; but a con siderable portion of this soon made its way back to the old country in payment for supplies. Com modities were obtained from the natives by means of barter ; and in a little while the emigrants found a sort of available circulating medium in what the Indians call wampum or wampumpeag a collec tion of cylindrical pieces of the shells of testaceous fishes, a quarter of an inch long, less than the stem of a pipe in thickness, and strung lengthwise on a thread. Each piece was at first estimated by the English at a farthing if white, at a halfpenny if black or violet; but a Massachusetts law of 1641 ordered that these shells should pass current at six a penny for any sum under ten pounds, in payment of debts subsequently contracted. Indian corn, beaver-skins, and other produce, were also received as money, at fixed rates ; yet the want of a regular coinage became every year more pressing. A good deal of Spanish silver flowed into New England from the West Indies, and several counterfeit coins thus got into circulation. In 1652, the necessity for some legitimate coinage was so great that the General Court of Massachusetts established a mint, and ordered John Hull, goldsmith, the newly- appointed mint-master, to receive bullion, plate, or Spanish coin, and convert it into twelvepenny, six penny, and threepenny pieces. This money, to gether with English coin, was declared to be the only legal tender after three months from the date of the Act. Each piece had the name "Massa chusetts " (spelt " Masathusets "), with a tree in the centre, on one side ; on the other, the inscription "New England," and the date, 1652. Although this coinage continued in use for more than thirty years, and different dies were employed at different times, the date always remained the same. The coinage of 1662 was of twopenny pieces in silver, and the object of producing these pieces was stated to be the necessity of answering " the occasions of the country for exchange." It is recorded, in an anec dote of rather doubtful authenticity, that Charles II., on complaining of the presumption of the Massachusetts people in coining money, was re conciled to the fact by being told that the tree on the obverse represented the " Royal Oak" in which the Prince had hid himself after the battle of Worcester. Whether this be true or not, it would seem, from a statement contained in the Massa chusetts Archives, that, during the stay of the agents in England, some colonial money was ex hibited at the Council table, and not objected to. Yet the issuing of a fresh coinage at such a time was a hazardous step. As regards some other matters, the General Court showed a disposition to conciliate the home authori ties. Eliot, the Apostle of the Indians, published in London, in 1659, a work entitled " The Christian Commonwealth, or the Civil Policy of the Rising Kingdom of Jesus Christ." The dedication is " To- the Chosen, and Holy, and Faithful, who manage the Wars of the Lord against Antichrist in Great Britain, and to all the Saints, Faithful Brethren,, and Christian People, of the Commonwealth of England." A certain suggestion of Fifth Mon archy views is apparent in this treatise, where the author remarks that the time had come when the Lord was " about to shake all the earth, and throw down that great idol of human wisdom in govern ments, and set up Scripture government in the room thereof? When news arrived in Massachusetts- of Yenner s Fifth Monarchy insurrection at the commencement of 1661, less than a year after Charles s accession to the throne, it was thought advisable to take some action against Eliot s book, which, though published in London, had been written in New England. The authorities of Massachusetts were as little inclined to Fifth Mon- archism, or to anything which savoured of it, as the King of England himself; for such views struck at the jurisdiction of Magistrates equally with that of regal governors. Here, then, the Magistrates had a good opportunity of obliging Charles, and at the same time of supporting their own power by rebuking one who seemed by implication to call it in qxiestion. They accordingly took notice of th& work, and found it to be full of seditious principles, and of ideas tending to discredit all established governments in the Christian world, especially that of England. Before the meeting of the next Court, to which all proceedings were deferred, Eliot had made a recantation. The treatise had been written some years, and, xipon re-perusing it, the author found, or professed to find, that he had " too mani festly " scandalised the government of England by King, Lords, and Commons, which he now admitted to be " not only a lawful, but an eminent, form of government." The Court thereupon ordered that the acknowledgment should be recorded, and the book be totally suppressed. Eliot was just about to publish a translation of the Bible into the Indian tongue. This work was to be dedicated to the King, and commended to the favour of English divines ; so that the author had very particular reasons for desiring to remove any cause of offence in the high circles of the mother country. Some other books, of a character deemed heterodox, were also suppressed about the same time ; for the rulers of Massachusetts were not of Milton s opinion, that- [1662. PROCEEDINGS IN ENGLAND. 213 we might almost as well kill a man as kill a book.* While matters were still in suspense between New England and the court, Massachusetts had an efficient friend at London in the person of Sir Thomas Temple, on whom Cromwell had bestowed a large part of Nova Scotia after the conquest of that territory in 1654, and who was now in England looking after his colonial interests. Temple had done his best to ingratiate himself with the King by exhibiting great solicitude, when in New England in August, 1661, as to the arrest of the fugitive regicides, Whalley and Goffe, for whose capture he associated himself in a secret design with two other gentlemen. -After this display of offi- ciousness, the motive of which could only have been selfish, Temple was greatly surprised and dis appointed, on arriving in England early in 1662, to find himself received very coldly. Represen tations had been made in London to the discredit both of him and of the colony of Massachusetts. He was at first so overcome by despair at this, that, as he relates in a letter preserved in the Massa- chusetts Archives, he began to think of ending his days in an obscure cottage. Afterwards, however, lie did what was much wiser : he made a personal .appeal to the Earl of Manchester, and thus obtained 4in audience of the King. By his Majesty he was well received. He used his utmost skill and eloquence to set forth the happy and flourishing condition in which Massachusetts then was. So excellent was the progress he seemed to make, that he hoped very shortly to get the former charter re newed, and confidently reckoned 011 having settled everything satisfactorily by the time any other agent arrived. He found the King, the Chancellor (Lord Clarendon), and all the great Lords, zealous for the welfare of New England. The Chancellor, he reported to the authorities at Boston, com manded him to assure them of his love and friend ship to the country, and to say that neither in their privileges, their charter government, nor their church discipline should they receive any preju dice. He added that the King, in sending a message about the Quakers, in September, 1661, did not intend that those troublesome enthusiasts should not be punished, but only that they should not be put to death. There is no ground for supposing that either Charles or his Lord Chancellor had any design of deceiving Temple ; but it is certain that the latter took too sanguine a view of the situation. On the 10th of April, 1663, his Majesty in Council declared that he would preserve the charters of * Areopagitica. New England, but that he intended to despatch Commissioners there, to inquire how those instru ments had been observed by the colonists, and to reconcile existing differences. It was some time before action was taken on this resolve. The King was desirous of moving cautiously; but in May, 1664, the General Court of Massachusetts received intelligence that certain Royal ships were on their way to New England, carrying in them the long-expected Commissioners. The Court, accordingly, ordered that the Captain of the Castle (a fortification in front of Boston towards the sea) should, on the first sight and knowledge of their approach, speedily notify the fact to the Governor and Deputy-Governor. Two other captains were to go on board the ships, and, having given expression to the respectful greetings of the Court, were to make arrangements that the under-officers and soldiers, on landing to refresh themselves, should at 110 time exceed a convenient number, should leave their arms behind, and should be careful of giving offence to the people and laws of the place. In this order, the colonists spoke of themselves as " his Majesty s good subjects ; " yet the position assumed was one of almost complete independence. A day of humiliation and prayer was commanded. The train-bands in and near Boston were called out ; and the patent of the colony, together with its duplicate, was entrusted for safe custody to the Lieuteiiaiit-Govemor, Major-General Leverett, and two Deputies, who were to keep its place of deposit a secret. Rather more than two months still elapsed before the Royal ships appeared in sight. It was on the evening of the 23rd of July, 1664, that the Guinea, carrying thirty-six guns, and the -Elias, carrying- thirty, cast anchor off Long Wharf, Boston. They had sailed from England ten weeks before, in company with two others of less size, from which they had parted a week or two earlier, during bad weather. The fleet altogether had on board three or four hundred troops, together with four Com missioners Colonel Richard Nichols, Sir Robert Carr, Colonel George Cartwright, and Mr. Samuel Maverick. The instructions given to these Commissioners were in general accord with certain suggestions on the mode of dealing with the New England colonies contained in a long memoir in the English State Paper Office. The author of this document (whether Lord Clarendon or another) recommends that the agents to be sent should proceed at first with caution and insinuation. Afterwards his Majesty could be guided by new considerations, and might issue fresh instructions based on the 214 CASSELL S HISTOEY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1664. greater amount of knowledge obtained. " It may be presumed," continues the writer, " that they [the New England colonies] will harden in their constitution, and grow on nearer to a common wealth, towards which they are already well-nigh ripened, if, out of present tenderness, the attempt shall be neglected or deferred, whilst this and that Government are at present under such and so many circumstances that look and promise fairly towards the effecting what is aimed at. If we consider present peace, present concurrence of patentees, pre sent inclinations in the oppressed there, the present settlements in relation to the trades of the plan tations, and no present obstacle, which is like to be more favourable hereafter, or that scarce any future accident or state of affairs can in any pro bability render the reduction of that doxibtful people more feasible than at this point of time they may be found to be by the easy methods here proposed (which, being rather means of in sinuation than of force, cannot put his Majesty s interests there into a much weaker condition than they are at present, should they fail of their effect), surely the attempt is prudent, seasonable, and necessary, and the success will be of so manifold advantage to his Majesty and his dominions, that they seem worthy of present pursuit." The first of the four Commissioners, Colonel Richard Nichols, had fought on the side of Charles I. during the civil war, when he was a youth not out of his teens. After the utter ruin, of the Stuarts, he had served in the wars of the Fronde under Marshal Tureiuie, and subsequently under the Prince de Conde. In these warlike exploits he was associated with the Duke of York, afterwards James II. ; and he was now not only to act as one of the Commissioners for inquiring into New England affairs, but to administer the Duke s newly-created province in the vicinity of Delaware Bay. He was an honourable man, though a cour tier, and his position as Commissioner was objec tionable only on the ground that he had interests antagonistic to those of the plantations whose future he was to help in determining. Sir Robert Can- was a Northumberland knight, whose character does not stand very high. Cartwright was suspected in Boston to be a Papist ; and Maverick had been already associated with New England, but in ways which brought him into collision with the autho rities there. He was one of that body of malcontent Presbyterians who in 1646 threatened to appeal to England against the General Court of Massachu setts, if their grievances were not redressed. When in London at the time of the Restoration, he seems to have interested lu mself to obtain a General Governor for New England ; and it was doubtless the known character of his opinions which recom mended him to the post he now filled. But this very fact disqualified him from acting fairly, or at least laid him open to a reasonable suspicion of being unduly swayed by personal feeling. He had been fined and imprisoned, and otherwise harshly dealt with, by the colonial authorities ; and it was not in human nature that he should bring to his present task a perfectly judicial mind. Lord Clarendon himself feared that he would act with too much heat and animosity. He wrote to him, on March 5th, 1665, several months after his arrival with the other Commissioners at Boston : " If you should revenge any old discourtesies at the King s charge, and, as his Commissioner, should do anything upon the memory of past injuries, the King would take it very ill, and do himself justice accordingly." Nothing could be fairer or more honourable than this ; but it would have been better had the possi bility been recognised a little earlier. A Mr. Curwen, of Salem, who was in London in 1663 or- 1664, wrote home that Maverick had publicly de nounced the New Englanders as rebels, and had boasted of having told the Council so. The vessels which arrived at Boston on the 23rd of July had Nichols and Cartwright on board. Three days earlier, Maverick and Carr had landed at Portsmouth, on the Piscataqua, from the other two vessels, the Martin and the William and Nicholas. Maverick at once assumed a very dicta torial manner; wrote to Boston, suggesting that the Governor and Council should be warned how they dealt with matters that were out of their bounds ; and menaced a constable of Portsmouth while he was in the execution of his office. Nichols and Cartwright proceeded with greater consideration. They had a conference with the Magistrates on the third day after their disembarkation, and presented to them a letter addressed to the Governor by the King, his commission to themselves, and a portion of their instructions. In the letter from the King, which bore date April 23rd, 1664, his Majesty de clared that he desired to obtain such information as might guide him in his endeavours to advance the well-being of his subjects in New England. He wished also to extinguish " those unreasonable jealousies and malicious calumnies " which found expression in the statement that his subjects in those parts did not submit to his rule, but regarded themselves as independent. He likewise proposed to reconcile such differences as existed upon ques tions of boundary between the several colonies. The Commissioners were to assure the native tribes of his Majesty s protection, and to overthrow the IGG-i," THE ROYAL COMMISSION. 215 usurped authority of the Dutch. They were, more over, to confer with the colonial authorities of Massachusetts on the matter of his Majesty s former letter (that sent by Bradford and Norton), and their reply to the same, which, the King observed, had not answered his expectations, nor the professions made by the messengers. The Royal missive, it was added, was to be forthwith communicated to the Council, and, within twenty days, to a General Assembly. The Commission, which was dated April 25th, gave authority to the four persons named therein to visit the New England colonies, with a view to hearing, receiving, examining, and determining, complaints and appeals in civil, criminal, and mili tary matters. They were to proceed in all things so as to settle the peace and security of the country, acting according to their discretion, as modified by such communications as they might receive from time to time. The Instructions were contained in two distinct documents. One of these was to be considered public, and to be communicated to the Magistrates ; the other was private. It seems pro bable, however, that the Massachusetts authorities were surreptitiously made acquainted with the con tents of the latter as well as of the former, and that they were even in. possession of a copy before the original left London.* The open Instructions directed the Commissioners to define the lines of boundary of the several chartered jurisdictions, sub ject to the approval of the King. They were to give redress to any native princes who had been injured. They were to report on the progress of education, and of the conversion of the Indians. Accusations against persons in power Were to be treated with caution and leniency ; but, in any case that was well proved, the Commissioners were to proceed according to the rules of justice, without respect to persons. His Majesty s representatives were to urge on the colonial authorities a com pliance with the King s requisitions made in 1662. They were also to inquire whether any persons attainted for high treason were then within the colony, or had at any time been entertained there, and were to apprehend such persons if they could be discovered. Care was to be taken that the Act of Navigation should be punctually observed ; and a report of the constitution of the local government in church and state, of the military force, of the walled and fortified places, and of other matters of detail, was to be sent to the Government at home. In the private Instructions, the Commissioners were * Mr. Palfrey (Vol. II., chap. 15, of his History) quotes a passage from a letter of Colonel Nichols, which seems to establish this fact. informed that the main end and drift of their em ployment was to inform themselves, and ultimately the King and his Government, of the true and whole state of the New England colonies ; to in sinuate themselves, by a kind and dextrous carnage, into the good opinion, of the principal persons there ; to observe the humour and interest both of those in power, and of the people generally ; and to create in the colonists a desire to renew their charters, with an eye to the introducing of various altera tions. These charters were to be examined by the Commissioners, who were to ascertain in what respects they had been disregarded. Some annual tribute of the products of the country, for the Royal revenue, was to be required ; and two other points of a delicate character were to be approached as the agents best could, though they were of so difficult a nature that the King s Ministers confessed they could not give any particular directions as to how the desired result was to be brought about, but were compelled to leave it to the skill of the asso ciated emissaries. The first of these was that the King should have the nomination of the Governor, or at least the approbation of him when chosen by the colonists. The second was that the militia should be put under an officer nominated or recom mended by his Majesty ; and a strong desire was expressed that the people might be so wrought upon at the General Assembly as to choose Colonel Nichols for their Governor, and Colonel Cartwright for their Major-General. It is easy to understand that these designs were very distasteful to the rulers of Massachusetts. They had so. long regarded the plantation as an independent State, and, owing to the troubles of the parent country, had been so completely left in the undisturbed enjoyment of that idea, that to have it suddenly called in question was mortifying to their pride. In addition to this feeling, in itself not unnatural, they may very reasonably have feared that some invasion of their liberties, either political or religious, or perhaps both, was con templated by the restored monarchy of England. The founders of those little commonwealths of northern America had fled thither from persecution under the two first Stuarts of the United Kingdom ; and it was difficult to regard the existing monarch as other than antagonistic to principles which the Puritans had suffered imprisonment and exile to maintain. At the same time, it is impossible to deny that Charles II. had very strong grounds of right for the course he was now taking. The Government of Massachusetts, in as far as it affected independence, was an usurpation. It existed on territory which was undoubtedly part 216 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1664. of the dominion of England. It had been formed under a charter granted by the King of England. The colonists, beyond all question, owed allegiance to the English sovereign ; but that allegiance they had for some years practically denied, and now only confessed in terms, while acting in a very different sense. The charter had been repeatedly was impossible that England, now that her internal affairs were again settled, could suffer any longer the denial of her sovereignty over her own posses sions. Charles II., it must be confessed, showed himself on several occasions not very solicitous for the national honour ; but he would have been a traitor of the deepest dye had he permitted the CHAKLES II. violated, and often in ways involving substantial injustice to many persons. Dissensions had no toriously existed for a long time among the several colonies; and it was better that these should be composed by some one outside the circle of dispute than be left to the arbitrary and self-interested decision of the strongest plantation in other words, of Massachusetts. The assumption of that Government, that its sentences were to be without appeal, was a monstrous pretence, compatible with nothing but absolute dominion, and asserted for the maintenance of a tyrannical power. It vigorous and expanding colonies of New England to be lost to the Empire for want of a definite and decisive policy. Nevertheless, objection must be made to some features of the scheme which he proposed to carry out. The determination to enforce the Navigation Act was likely to be exceedingly unpopular, for that measure involved great hardship to the colo nists. Even as originally passed by the Common wealth, it was sufficiently stringent, its object being to confine, or very nearly confine, the cany- ing trade of commodities to English vessels a 1664.] COLONIAL LIBERTIES. 217 monopoly which necessarily resulted, wherever en forced, in the enhanced price of all importations. But the operation of the Act was made still more severe after the accession of Charles II., when the import trade of the plantations was restricted to a direct commerce with England, even in the pro ducts of foreign countries, with few exceptions. Cromwell had suspended the Act as regarded the New England colonies; but it was now to be put in active operation. The King s desire the monarch, and thus guarantees the substantial unity of the Empire, is not likely to prove any serious detriment to colonial liberty, while it may prevent those collisions of antagonistic interests which might otherwise occur. To refer to the Canadian, Australian, and other colonies of Great Britain at the present day, would be idle when considering the conduct of men more than two hundred years ago ; but the settlers of New England had before their eyes the example of HAKTFOBD, CONNECTICUT. to wring a paltry revenue from the colonists by au annual tribute was grasping and injudicious ; and the suggestion that the militia should be placed under an officer of the monarch s own choosing, though not necessarily tending to any injury, was of a character needlessly to arouse colonial jealousies. The wish to retain in his own hands the appointment of the Governor, was, however, far from unreasonable. No other way of maintaining the connection between a parent State and a colony is so convenient, or so little open to objection, as this. Where the colony is ruled by a freely-elected House of Burgesses, which makes the laws and regulates the taxes, the slight check imposed by a Governor who represents 19 Virginia, where the appointment of a Governor by the Crown left the people in the enjoyment of prosperity and freedom. It is impossible to understand the dislike of Massachusetts to the presence of such an official, except on the as sumption that the existing powers shrank from any modei ating influence between themselves and the various religious bodies which they delighted to persecute. On the 3rd of August, the General Court assem bled at Boston, when, after protesting their alle giance to the King, and asserting their determina tion to adhere to their patent, " so dearly obtained, and so long enjoyed by undoubted right in the sight of God and men," they passed an order calling for 218 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1664. two hundred volunteers, and providing for their organisation and supply, with a view to a war against the Dutch. They then repealed the law by which the elective franchise was conferred only on church members, and to which the King had taken exception in his letter of June 28th, 1662 ; but they put in its place another of a very similar character, since it required that all persons claiming political power should, before being allowed to vote, present a certificate from their ministers, testifying to their being " orthodox " in religion, when it would be for the General Court to determine whether or not they should receive the desired privilege. Finally, a committee was appointed for preparing a petition to the King, which should solicit a con tinuance of the liberties granted by charter. Two months were spent in preparing this petition ; but the time was not thrown away, for the document, when produced (which was on the 19th of October, 1664), was certainly a masterly work. It began : " Dread Sovereign, The first undertakers of this plantation did obtain a patent wherein is granted full and absolute power of governing all the people of this place by men chosen from among themselves, and according to such laws as they should see meet to establish. A Royal donation, under the great seal, is the greatest security that may be had in human affairs. Under the encouragement and security of the Royal charter, this people did, at their own charges, transport themselves, their wives and families, over the ocean,- purchase the lands of the natives, and plant this colony with great labour, hazai ds, costs, and difficulties ; for a long time wrestling with the wants of a wilderness, and the burdens of a new plantation ; having also now above thirty years enjoyed the aforesaid power and privilege of government within themselves." The authors of the petition went on to assert that to be governed by rulers of their own choosing, and by laws of their own making, was the funda mental privilege of their patent. But now they were threatened with an arbitrary and alien power, and with the subversion of their liberties, through the agency of " four persons," one of whom was their professed enemy, who were empowered to receive and determine all complaints and appeals according to their discretion. If such things were to go on, the colonists would either be forced to seek new dwellings, or would sink under intoler able burdens. Supposing the aim to be to gratify particular gentlemen by revenues drawn from the land, such a design, the General Court argued, would be a failure, for the colony was much too poor to answer such expectations. If the making of any such attempt should result in driving the people out of the country, it would be difficult to find another people that would stand under any con siderable burden, seeing that that was a land where men could subsist only by hard labour and great frugality. " We came not into this wilderness," proceeded the petition, " to seek great things to ourselves, and, if any come after us to seek them here, they will be disappointed. We keep ourselves within our line, and meddle not with matters abroad. A just dependence upon, and subjection to, your Majesty, according to our charter, it is far from our hearts to disacknowledge." They would gladly embrace any opportunity of testifying their dutiful affection to the King ; but they felt it a great unhappiness to be reduced to such an alterna tive that they must either destroy their own being, which Nature taught them to preserve, or yield up their liberties, which were dearer to them than their lives. "Royal Sire," they wrote in conclusion and the passage is assuredly one of singular elo quence " it is in your power to say of your poor people in New England that they shall not die. If we have found favour in the sight of our King, let our life be given us at our petition (or rather that Avhich is dearer than life, that we have ven tured our lives, and willingly passed through many deaths, to obtain) ; and our all, at our request. Let our government live, our patent live, our magis trates live, our laws and liberties live, our religious enjoyments live ; so shall we all have yet further cause to say from our heart, Let the King live for ever ; and the blessing of them that were ready to perish shall come upon your Majesty, having de livered the poor that cried, and such as had none to help them."* The whole argument is certainly most impressive. It only wants a more unexcep tionable basis of facts to be overwhelming. * Massachusetts Records. Bancroft s United States. Pal frey s New England. 1601.] MASSACHUSETTS AND ENGLAND. 219 CHAPTER XXVI. Theories of the General Court of Massachusetts with regard to the Connection between that Colony and the Mother Country- Truisms and Falsities involved in the Argument Doubtful Position of the Plantation Endeavour of Massachusetts to be entirely independent of England Policy of Charles II. towards the New England Colonies Opinion in the Colony and in England Collisions between the Royal Commissioners and the Massachusetts Authorities Death of John Endicott Letter from Charles II. to the General Court of Plymouth Proposals of the Commissioners to that Government General Assent of Plymouth to the Royal Wishes The Commissioners in the Narragansett Plantations, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Providence Opening of Negotiations with the Massachusetts Magistrates Threatened Appeal of a Criminal to the Commissioners Divisions of Opinion between the Commissioners and the Magistrates The Book of Common Prayer Oath of Allegiance ordered by the General Court Further Dissensions An Appeal forbidden and prevented by the Rulers of Massachusetts Departure of the Commissioners from Boston. AY HEX the members of the General Court of Massa chusetts were debating the important question of the relations existing between that colony and the parent State, raised by the arrival of the four Royal Commissioners, they laid down certain general principles of the utmost gravity. Repeating those theories of local independence which they had long formed, they averred that, although the child born on English soil was indisputably an English sub ject, he possessed, when arrived at mature years, a natural right of expatriation. Thus, every man might withdraw from the land of his birth, and re nounce the duty of allegiance together with the claim to protection. The Puritans of New England had emigrated to America because, in the matter of religion, they found the laws of their own country intolerable. In this new world they had established a new, and in some degree independent, political state, on the basis of natural rights. A slight con nection with the mother country had been retained, for the sake of convenience ; but this connection was purely voluntary. At the same time they ad mitted what is in truth destructive of the volun tary theory that the connection was originally established, and its nature defined, by the charter, which was the only compact attaching them to England. They rejected as a Popish doctrine the right of England to the soil, on the ground of dis covery ; and they contended that the just and legitimate right belonged to them, because of their having purchased lands from the natives, and esta blished settlements on the territory.* Such, as stated by a modern American, who regards the argument from a favourable and sympathetic point of view, were the ideas on this subject expressed by the rulers of Massachusetts at a very important crisis of their colonial affairs. The contention was of a character which no sovereign State, whether monarchical or republican, could admit, excepting on compulsion. It rests partly on truisms and partly on falsities. Nothing can be more obviously true than that all people have a natural right of expatriation. When first James, and then Charles, endeavoured to violate this right, they committed an act of gross injustice and tyranny. But the asseveration that the person thus expatriating himself is placed beyond the jurisdiction of his native country, is true only of him who settles in a foreign land. In removing from England to Massachusetts, the emigrants of 1628, and those who followed them, were as much within the sphere of English dominion as if th< j y had simply shifted their homes from Sussex into Yorkshire. It was far too late in 1664 to contend that they had a better right to the territory than the King of England ; for, by soliciting a charter from the Royal Power, they had from the very first confessed the sovereignty of the monarch. Their purchase of lands from the Indians gave them, no doubt, the same property in those lands, and in all that could be raised from them, that any gentle man has in his estate ; but it conferred no right of independent government. The right of colonial administration, as far as it existed, was derived from the charter; it might be revoked- by the Power that conferred the charter ; and it certainly implied no privilege of denying the axtthority of the parent country. On the contrary, the continuance of that authority was in express terms secured. It was provided by the document in question that if any person or persons belonging to the Company, or appointed by it, should rob or despoil by land or sea, or should do any hurt or violence to any of the King s subjects, or the subjects of any other Prince or State in amity with England, the King of Eng land might, in any part of the realm, proclaim that the said offender or offenders should, within a limited time, make restitution or satisfaction ; fail ing which, the said person or persons, so offending, should be outlawed. f * Bancroft s History of the United States, Vol. I., chap. 12. f See text of the charter in Massachusetts Records, Vol. I. 220 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1665. If the limits of the existing connection of Massa chusetts with England were defined for the colonists by the charter, as Mr. Bancroft asserts, it is clear that the connection, whether it were much or little, was not voluntary, but was a matter of allegiance, per petuating under new conditions the old allegiance of English subjects to the English monarch.* It may perhaps be a question whether the charter still existed. The proceedings in the Court of King s Bench in 1635, consequent on the writ of quo ivarranto, were supposed at the time to have re sulted in the forfeiture of the patent ; but that instrument appears to have been implicitly revived, as Winthrop points out, by the order, issued some years later, declaiing that the Massachusetts people shoiild enjoy all the liberties therein granted. Certainly, the letters and other official documents of Charles II. recognised its existence ; but the question of allegiance remained the same, whether, as a strict matter of law, the charter existed or not. On the one hand, tnere was nothing in the docu ment which relieved the colonists from their duty as English subjects ; on the other, the extinction of the charter, supposing it to be extinct, left the King s power over his subjects exactly where it was, unless, indeed, it rendered that power still greater by the abolition of colonial privileges. Moreover, the colonists were in a bad position to take the charter as their standard of legality ; for they had violated it so frequently for their oAvn purposes that they were not entitled to quote its terms as a provision against the designs of others. Finally, there was nothing to prove an intention on the part of the King to destroy or abate the liberties of the settlers, excepting the false and fatal liberty of tyrannising over others. * In an earlier part of his History (chapter 9), Mr. Bancroft Says of the charter : "The instrument confers on the colonists the rights of English subjects ; it does not confer on them new and greater rit/htn. On the contrary, they are strictly forbidden to make laws or ordinances repugnant to the laws and statutes of the realm of England." Nothing can be more true or more convincing. Further on, the same writer observes: "The charter on which the freemen of Massachusetts succeeded in erecting a system of independent representative liberty, did not secure to them a .single privilege of self-government ; but left them, as the Virginians had been left, without one valuable franchise, at the mercy of a corporation within the realm. This was so evident that some of those who had already emigrated clamoured that they were become slaves." Even the transfer of the governing body to Massachusetts conferred, in the opinion of Mr. Bancroft, "no new franchises or power on the emigrants, unless they were already members of the Company." These admissions do not harmonise with the later argument of the American historian. The fact is, that the creation of a political state, distinct from the legislative power of the Company, was one of many violations of the charter, and therefore could not be pleaded as a matter of right against the King. When it is argued that the Massachusetts people were willing to retain some connection with England, and for this reason confessed their allegiance to Charles II., it is clear that they could not in the same breath maintain that their allegiance had ceased, and that a perfectly independent govern ment had been established. It must also be recol lected that this acknowledgment of subjection to the English State had been made only after the accession of Charles II., when it was feared that measures would be taken for enforcing loyalty. In the reign of the first Charles, the oath of allegiance had been deliberately, and even ostentatiously, omitted. Even during the Commonwealth and Protectorate, when a party favourable to the Puritan settlers was in power, the authority of the mother country had been recognised scarcely more than that of the King of Spain or the Grand Signior. Nothing can be more certain than that the colony of Massachusetts desired to be entirely independent, in name and in fact ; that for a time it really was so ; and that it would never have admitted the slightest or most nominal dependence, but for fear of consequences which it was not strong enough to resist. The conduct of Charles II. was therefore justifiable. It may have been prompted by selfish motives by love of dominion, or dread of repub lican, example ; but it took a form to which, in the main, no objection can fairly be in-gcd, and it opened the possibility of really greater freedom to the colonists of a freedom not narrowed by sec tarian jealousy, nor embittered by the memory of old feuds. It was indeed the beginning of a new day for those remote settlements, but one not neces sarily overshadowed by evil or by serious loss. Opinion in Massachusetts was considerably divided as to the policy of resisting the Royal Commis sioners. A party of privilege and a party of pre rogative arose in the settlement ; but it must be admitted that the former counted far more adherents than the latter. Any one who appeared to pay court to the Commissioners became very generally unpopular. The agents of the King were regarded with suspicion and dislike ; the rulers of the colony were greeted with every evidence of popular re liance. A majority in favour of the Government was obtained in the elections during the spring of 1665 ; yet the colonists cause did not make any material progress. Letters to influential friends of the plantation were sent to England ; but they brought little comfort. Robert Boyle, one of these friends, observed that, although the Commissioners were not accused of one harmful thing, even in private letters from Massachusetts, they were made the subjects of complaint. It was t the very fact 1665.] DEATH OF ENDICOTT. 2"21 of their official existence in tlie colony that the leaders of colonial opinion demurred. But the King s right to send them there could only be questioned by denying to the monarch all practical control over the plantation ; and this denial was not likeLy to be supported by many politicians in the old country. The Commissioners at first acted, as a, body, with scrupulous care to avoid giving offence, though some members were individually truculent. They refused to support a claim advanced by the Duke of Hamilton, who demanded a large tract or land in the possession of Connecticut. In other respects they showed considerable favour to that settlement, and so won upon the good feeling 01 the people that they soon found in them, as they pointed out in their reports to Charles, a favourable contrast to the disobedient community of Massa chusetts. "With the latter colony, the Royal agents quickly came into collision. In the absence of Nichols, who was engaged in other affairs, Carr, Cartwright, and Maverick told the Magistrates, in February, 1665, that they wished an order to be issued for assembling all the inhabitants on the day of the elections, to the end that they might be in formed of his Majesty s grace and favour. The Magistrates declined to issue any such order, as being unreasonable, which it certainly was ; where upon, Colonel Cartwright, in a biirst of ill-temper, exclaimed that he who would not attend to the request was a traitor. Maverick was even more offensive than Cartwright. The Massachusetts Archives contain an affidavit of Captain James Oliver and his wife, in which they aver that this gentleman on one occasion denounced the colonists as rebels and traitors for coining money and print ing, and added that they (the Commissioners) were the persons to be obeyed. Maverick was a bully, with personal grievances to revenge; but his bad manners did not materially affect the general course of affairs. About this time, Massachusetts lost the counsels and guidance of one of her very oldest and most con spicuous public servants. John Endicott died on the ir>th of March, 1665, at the age of seventy-seven. His life was coeval with the whole history of the plantation ; for he was one of the original patentees to whom the grant of lands had been made by the Council for New England in 1028, and he was in command of the little band of emigrants who went over in the same year, and, in conjunction with Roger Conant and his three companions, laid the foundations of the colony. He was the friend and fellow-worker of the great spirits now departed the heroes of New England s dawning life. He had passed safely through the famine and pestilence of the terrible early days at Salem ; and he had borne an important part in all the events which had stamped on Massachusetts its most distinctive character. He lived to see the settlement become prosperous and powerful ; he lived also to see the beginning of changes of which it was then impos sible to forecast the issue, but which must necessarily have filled him with apprehension. He was a man of many excellent qualities ; but tolerance was not one of them. No one did more than he to procure the expulsion of the Episcopalians who settled at Salem in 1629. The cutting out of the red cross from the banner of St. George was the work of his hands ; and the Quakers felt the bitterness of his persecution when others were inclined to take a more lenient course. Fanaticism was the most strongly-developed quality of his nature ; but he was honest, able, courageous, and, as far as his bigotry would permit him, benevolent. Charles II. did not like him ; but the disapprobation of that monarch will do little harm to the posthumous repute of any one. A few weeks before the death of the veteran, the King, speaking through the pen of Secretary Morrice, expressed his suspicion that Endicott was not a person well affected to his pel- son or his government. He even went so far as to intimate to the four Commissioners that he would take it very well if, at the next election, any other person of good reputation were chosen Governor in his place. It was so but at the order of Provi dence, not of Charles. Shortly after their proposal that all the people of Massachusetts should be summoned to Boston to hear the words of the King, the Royal Commissioners de parted for the Plymouth jurisdiction, where they presented a letter from Charles, similar in its general effect to that which had been addressed to Massa chusetts. In this letter the monarch said he had instructed his Commissioners to give him a full and particular account of the present state and condition of the colony, and how the same might be advanced and improved by any further acts of grace and favour. His Majesty desired the colonists to know that he took them under his imniediate protection, and would no more suffer them to be oppressed or injured by any foreign Power or ill neighbour than he would pei-mit his other subjects to be so injured or oppressed. "And as," the letter continued, " our care, and protection will (we doubt not) be sufficient, with God s blessing, to defend you from foreign force, so our care and circumspection is no less, that you may live in peace among yourselves, and with those our other subjects who have planted themselves in your 222 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1665. neighbour colonies, with that justice, affection, and brotherly love, which becomes subjects born under the same Prince, and in the same country, and of the same faith and hope in the mercies of our Lord Jesus Christ. And to the end there may be no contentions and differences among you, in respect of the bounds and jurisdictions of your several colonies, the hearing and determining thereof we have referred to our Commissioners, as the right appears by clear evidence and testi mony before them, or that they can settle it by your mutual consent and agreement ; otherwise, in case of difficulties, they shall present the same to us, who will determine according to our own wisdom and justice." His Majesty added that the Commissioners would intimate his resolve to preserve without the least violation all the liberties and privileges, both ecclesiastical and civil, already possessed by the colonists an assurance which, he presumed, would dispose them to exhibit as much loyalty and affection to the throne as if they had continued in their natural country. In presenting this letter, the Commissioners made certain proposals, which were that all householders should take the oath of allegiance ; that justice should be administered in the King s name ; that the liberty of voting for civil and military officers, and of being chosen to such positions, should in future not be confined to persons of one form of religious faith ; that all men and women of orthodox opinions, competent knowledge, and lives not scandalous, should be admitted to the Lord s Supper, and their children to the rite of baptism ; and that all laws, and expressions in laws, dero gating from the King s Majesty, should be repealed or altered. These suggestions were in accordance witli the tenor of Charles s missive to Massachusetts, written, in June, 1662, and conveyed with them to America by Bradstreet and Norton on their return from England in the autumn of the same year. The General Court of Plymouth assented to the proposals submitted to them ; adding, with regard to the oath of allegiance, the administration of justice in the King s name, and the granting of the suffrage to persons of varying religious belief and practice, that such had always been their custom ; and, with respect to laws and expressions dis respectful to his Majesty, that they were not aware of their existence. The stipulation as to the Lord s Supper and baptism was also conceded, but on the understanding that all persons should continue to pay their due proportion of maintenance to the existing ministers until they had one of their own, and even then in all places that were capable .of maintaining the worship of God in two distinct congregations.* Cartwright desired in writing that the General Court, when sending in their adhesion, should add something to the effect that the Articles of Confederation, binding together the four chief New England colonies, would not be construed by New Plymouth as obliging it to refuse his Majesty s authority, even though any one of the others, or all three, should do so. The King, re marked Cartwright, had been informed " that that union was a war-combination made by the Four Colonies when they had a design to throw off then- dependence on England, and for that purpose." It is uncertain whether or not Plymouth did as she was desired with regard to the Federation ; but Charles was so pleased with the ready obedience of the authorities in that colony that he sent them a letter of commendation. They had, indeed, never assumed so directly rebellious a position towards the mother country as Massachusetts had done, and were now less animated by a spirit of sullen, resist ance. Nevertheless, the General Court, with many expressions of thanks and protestations of loyalty, declined to accept a charter which was offered on condition that the King should be permitted to select their Governor from three candidates nomi nated by themselves. From Plymouth, the Commissioners proceeded to the settlements on Narragansett Bay, where oi! course they were well received, as the colonists, in their differences with Massachusetts, had always paid great court to the authority of the mother country. Samuel Gorton and others approached the Royal agents with a petition setting forth their grievances, and entreating that some satisfaction for them might be made. The Commissioners, knowing that the territory had in 1644 been ceded, by Gorton s own act, to the English Crown, replied in a way which was perhaps not very satisfactory to the petitioners. They commanded that the country should thenceforward be called " the King s Pro vince," and that no person, of any colony what soever, should presume to exercise any jurisdiction there, unless appointed by themselves, the Com missioners. The Magistrates of Rhode Island were provisionally authorised to administer the province until the Royal pleasure should be known. Various arrangements with Indians, and with scattered bodies of settlers, who made conflicting claims to particular territories, were entered into ; but in this direction, as in others, difficulties and delays were of frequent occurrence. Roger Williams wrote to Carr : "Your Honour will never effect by force * Such, at least, appears to be the ineaijing of u rather obscure passage. 1665.] RETURN OF THE COMMISSIONERS. 223 a safe and lasting conclusion until you have first minced the Massachusetts to the obedience of his Majesty ; and then, these appendants, towed at their stern, will easily, and not before, wind about also." After paying a brief visit to Connecticut (where their demands were cheerfully complied with), the Commissioners returned with all speed to interests to the utmost of their power, on all occa sions whatsoever ; and in memorials to the English Government they detailed their wrongs and suf ferings in. the past, laid claim to the whole Narra- gansett country, and craved a rectification of their frontier towards New Plymouth. On the 2nd of May, 16G5, the four Commissioners JOIIX ENDICOTT. Rhode Island, which they had visited but shortly before, and from which they received a scarcely- qualified submission: Here the agents entertained appeals in litigations between private parties, but referred the greater number of them to the General Court or the Governor. Several months later, they reported to the King that the rulers of Rhode Island and Providence approved, as highly reasonable, the Royal demand that appeals should be made to his Majesty s Commissioners. The General Court of Rhode Island, in September, 1GG6, transmitted an address to the sovereign, promising to promote his (for Nichols had now rejoined them) arrived a second time in Boston, and it became evident that matters were tending to an issue. The Magistrates <y o of Massachusetts had recently received from the King s Seci-etary, Morrice, a letter informing them that his Majesty was not pleased with their petition, which was thought to contain frivolous and ground less complaints. In this despatch, reference was made to many allegations of injustice committed by the Government of the colony upon various persons; and the writer concluded : " I can say no more to you, but that it is in your own power to be very CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1GG5. happy, and to enjoy all that hath been granted to you ; but it will be absolutely necessary that you perform and pay all that reverence and obedience which is due from subjects to their King, and which Ids Majesty will exact from you." This was the manifest forerunner of a storm, and the receipt of such a letter must have greatly disheartened the colonial authorities for the approaching contest. The first discussion after the return of the Com missioners took place in the Court House, where the Royal agents met the Lieutenant-Governor, some Magistrates, and a few Deputies, and presented to them five several writings. Four of these were recapitulations of parts of the King s Instructions to his agents ; the fifth was a manifesto of those agents, remarking, amongst other things, on the unreasonableness of the opposition they had expe rienced in that colony. They utterly denied the truth of a statement which had been circulated, to the effect that the King had sent them over to raise five thousand pounds a-year out of the plantation for his Majesty s use ; to demand, besides, twelve- pence for every acre of improved land ; and to annul many civil liberties and ecclesiastical privi leges. They remarked on the excellent opportunity now presented to the colonists for casting to the father of lies, from whom it came, the often-repeated assertion that the people of Massachusetts regarded themselves as independent of the Royal Govern ment. And they concluded by explaining the principles on which, in his Majesty s opinion, the elections of the following day ought to be conducted. The elections resulted in the choice of Richard Bellingham as Governor, and Francis Willoughby as Deputy-Governor. The first of these had been a leading man for several years, and had once before been elected to the chief post, as far back as 1641, when his administration had proved very unpopular and unsatisfactory. He was now, however, of riper years and longer experience, and no one in the colony was better acquainted with the course of its affairs and the nature of its rights. He had been instrumental in procuring the charter of 1629, and was perhaps concerned in drawing it up. Willoughby was one of those who had formed the committee for framing the petition to the King in 1664; and both officials were animated by a strong feeling of local patriotism. On the first day of the ensuing Court, seventy new freemen were admitted, several of whom were not members of any particular church. This was a piece of liberality for which the unorthodox members of the community had to thank the interposition of the Royal Government. The negotiations with the Commissioners were resumed on the 4th of May. The members of the General Court were not wanting in abundant ex pressions of loyalty ; but the Commissioners were dissatisfied with mere lip-service, and expressed themselves displeased with the long neglect of the King s demands sent by Norton and Bradstreet. They communicated other portions of their Instruc tions, made various suggestions for the future, and spoke of examining a case upon appeal. A person named John Porter, recently imprisoned for mis conduct in Massachusetts, had been released on giving a bond to quit the jurisdiction. He com plained to the three Commissioners, who took up his case, and gave directions that he should not be molested while further investigations were being made. The Massachusetts authorities were much offended at this proceeding, by which, they sub mitted, their patent, and his Majesty s authority committed to them by that instrument, had been seriously infringed. Hereupon, the Commissioners asked a conference with a committee of the Court, when the gentlemen forming the committee sub mitted that the charter gave to the Governor and Company full and absolute powers of ruling the colony, and enlarged on the " insufferable burden " that would result from the admission of appeals from their judgments. They required to know whether, in any trials which the Commissioners proposed to conduct, they meant to empannel a jury; by what law they would proceed ; and whether or not they would admit new evidence. The Commis sioners replied that there would be no jury ; that the law would be that of England ; and that fresh evidence would be received. It is not surprising that the colonists felt aggrieved at this. To revise the verdict of a jury, in a criminal cause, by the action of four officials appointed by the Crown, and subject to no -species of popular responsibility, was a great invasion, not only of colonial privileges, but of the rights of Englishmen, and was a matter totally distinct from any appeal which might have been made to the Commissioners from alleged acts of oppression by the colonial Government itself, having relation to questions of jurisdiction, of territorial possession, or of disputed boundary.* The committee protested against such an abuse of power ; but the Commis sioners declined to modify their action in the least. In some other respects, the General Court complied with the demands made by the Royal agents. They furnished various details of information with respect to the political, ecclesiastical, social, military, * It is not precisely stated in the Massachusetts Records that Porter was tried by jury ; but such seems to be the natural inference from the context. 1665.] CONTENTION WITH THE COMMISSIONERS. and educational condition of the colony; and, as regarded transactions with the natives, referred the Commissioners to the official record of the dealings of the United Colonies with Indian tribes. The Act of Navigation they professed to be unconscious of having greatly violated ; and, after glancing at other of the Royal commands (such as the requisi tion for taking the oath of allegiance, and the ad ministering of justice in the King s name), which had by that time been fulfilled, they came to the difficult subject of the Common Prayer Book. The use of the forms therein prescribed, they argued, would disturb their peace, as they would never have left their native country had it appeared to them consonant with the word of God to per form their devotions in that way. They seem to have forgotten, or purposely to have confused the truth, that the King required nothing more than that those who wished to use the Prayer Book of the Church of England should not be debarred from doing so, or subjected to penalties on that account. To refuse them this right was precisely the same kind of tyranny, though directed to an opposite purpose, that the Puritans had themselves suffered at the hands of James and Charles. It was the old, arrogant assumption that everybody is bound to do as we do, and think as we think, in the matter of religion. The rulers of Massachu setts were not satisfied with the liberty of going their own way. They clung to the vicious pre rogative of forcing all men, as far as it was possible, into the same path. The oath of allegiance put forth by the General Court, and of which they furnished the Com missioners with a copy, ran as follows : " Whereas I, A. B., am an inhabitant within this jurisdiction, considering how I stand obliged to the King s Majesty, his heirs and successors, by our charter and the government established thereby, do swear accordingly, by the great and dreadful name of the ever-living God, that I will bear faith and true allegiance to our sovereign lord the King, his heirs and successors; and so proceed as in the printed oaths of freedom and fidelity."* The Commissioners did not admit the sufficiency of this oath. They per ceived in it too many qualifications and saving clauses, such as might afterwards be used for pur poses of evasion. They complained also of the restrictions on liberty of worship which the autho rities were evidently resolved to maintain as long as they could ; and objected to the new franchise, which, while granting greater privileges to the holders of obnoxious opinions, made the concession * Massachusetts Records. in a manner so hedged about by conditions that the gain was but slight. The Court had confined the suffrage to those who paid ten shillings and upwards to a single rate, though, according to the Com missioners, not one church member in a hundred paid so much, and scarcely three such men were to be found in a town of a hundred inhabitants. " These answers," said the representatives of the Crown, " are so far from being probable to satisfy the King s expectation, that we fear they will highly offend him. Abuse not the King s clemency too much." They again affirmed, in writing, their competency as a Court of Appeal, and asked in direct terms whether the Government of Massa chusetts acknowledged his Majesty s commission to be of full force to all the intents and purposes men tioned in it. To this question they expected a positive answer, which they would faithfully report to his Majesty. The Court replied by simply repeat ing a former request that they might bo informed of complaints against them. The Commissioners reiterated their question in a letter consisting of a single sentence, but received no other response than an expression of the Court s opinion that it was beyond their line to declare their sense of the power, intent, or purpose of the commis sion. It was enough for them, they thought, to acquaint the Commissioners with what they con ceived to be granted them by the charter. Here upon, the Commissioners sent notice to the Court that on the following day they *would hear and determine the cause of Thomas Deane and others, plaintiffs (who had a grievance in connection with alleged breaches of the Navigation Laws), against the Governor and Company of Massachusetts, and Joshua Scottow, merchant, defendants. This brought matters to a crisis. The appeal was to be investigated at the house of one Captain Thomas Breedon, who, a few years before, had given information against the fugitive regicides, and had always shown himself favourable to the Royal interests. The authorities of Massachusetts forbade the procedure ; but the Commissioners would not yield. The Genei al Coiirt then determined on a very bold and high-handed step. At eight o clock on the morning of May 24th an hour before the time at which the proceedings were to commence M messenger from the General Court stationed himself before the dwelling of Captain Breedon, and, with sound of trumpet, delivered a proclamation, in which, after relating the pro posed action of the Commissioners, the General Court declared to all the people of the colony, in the name of his Majesty, and by the authority committed to them by him through the charter, CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [16G5. that, in the observance of their duty to God, to the King, and to the trust committed to them by the electors, they could not consent to the contem plated appeal ; and that it did not consist with the allegiance they owed his Majesty to countenance any who should in such a manner go contrary to his Majesty s direct charge, or be the abettors or consenters thereunto. The same proclamation was delivered in two other parts of the toAvn, and was probably received with a good deal of exulta tion. On the same day, Daniel Gookin, the well-known ruler over the converted Indians, declared, on taking the oath of allegiance as Magis trate, that he was to be so understood as not to infringe the liberty and privileges granted in the Royal charter. Two days later, another Magistrate made a similar qualification of the oath. The precaution was needless from any honest point of view. There was nothing in the oath which really affected the charter ; and the proviso seems to have been intended to cover some strained in terpretation of colonial rights. The action of the General Court with reference to the case of appeal placed the Commissioners in a position of great difficulty. They had no power to enforce their commands, and yet could not admit the validity of what had been done. They accord ingly wrote that, since the Court would needs mis construe all his Majesty s letters and endeavours, and would make use of that authority which he had given them to oppose the sovereignty he exercised, they would lose no more of their labour, but refer the matter to the King, who had power to make himself obeyed in all his dominions. They also furnished the Court with a list of amendments which they desired to see effected in the existing laws, in order to a better recognition of the King s authority. The Court, on the other hand, sum moned Deane and his associates before them for a re-examination of their complaint, and on the 26th of May sent a notice to the Commissioners, so that they might be present if they pleased. Of course the Commissioners declined. They declared to the General Court, in his Majesty s name, that it was con trary to the King s will and pleasure that the cause should be examined by any other court than them selves ; and immediately afterwards left Boston. Thus ended the first act of a very eventful drama. CHAPTER XXVII. Claims of Robert Mason and Ferdinando Gorges The Provinces of New Hampshire and Maine The Koyal Commissioners in the Northern Towns Proceedings of the Massachusetts Government for Asserting their Authority in the Disputed Territories Arbitrary Prosecutions Royal Government established in Maine Military Preparations of Massachusetts Last Official Visit of the Commissioners to Boston Demand of the King that Massachusetts should send Agents to England Collision of Carr with a Boston Constable Determination of Massachusetts not to send the required Agents Letter from the General Court to Charles II. Opposition of a Minority in the Colony to the Resolution of the General Court Opinions expressed in Course of the Debate Imprudent conduct of the Authorities Letter to Secretary Morrice Suggested War with the French in Canada Weakening of the New England Confederation Revival of the Quarrel between Charles II. and Massachusetts New Plan of Action The Navigation Laws Despatch ef Edward Randolph to New England. Ox the Royal Commissioners leaving Boston, in May, 1665, Carr, Cartwright, and Maverick pro ceeded to the northern towns of Massachusetts, while Nichols quitted the jurisdiction altogether, and resumed the prosecution of another business with which he had for some time been charged. The object that the three associated agents now proposed to accomplish, was to inquire into the pro prietary claims made to particular portions of the Massachusetts territory. One of these claims was advanced by Robert Mason, grandson of the Captain John Mason to whom reference has before been made. It had for some years been a matter of doubt whether certain lands on the Piscataqua, now included in the State of New Hampshire, wei-e or were not comprised within the region assigned to Massachusetts by its charter 1 . The General Court of that colony, deciding the cause in its own favour, in 1652, after the peremptory fashion which was its wont in all cases where self-interest was con cerned, had been in undisturbed possession of the country for thirteen years ; for when the Provincial Court of Maine (which had been equally despoiled) appealed to the English Parliament for redress, Winslow, at that time in London as agent of Mas sachusetts, was enabled to procure the rejection of the appeal by representing that all such complaints proceeded from a band of malcontent royalists. The General Court of the successful plantation, taking into consideration, in 1653, that Mason had 1665.] CLAIMS OF MASON AND GORGES. 227 acquired some rights in the soil, ordered that a quantity of land, with privilege of the river, should be laid out for the benefit of his heirs. This, how ever, was by no means satisfactory to those heirs ; and Robert Mason, having petitioned the King on tho subject, was referred to the Attorney- General, who decided that he had a good and legal title to the Province of New Hampshire. Such was one of the disputes on which the Royal Commissioners were empowered to adju dicate, subject to the approval of the King ; another was the claim made by the heir of Gorges to the Province of Maine. The grandson of Sir Ferdinando himself bearing the same Italianised Christian name was encouraged by the counten ance of Charles II. to take measures for the restoration of his authority in that direction. The settlers in. Maine had shown themselves disinclined to the rule of Massachusetts; and in May, 1664, the General Court had found it necessary to put a new officer in command of their militia, and to send a committee of three to the insubordinate possession, to require all persons belonging to that district to return peaceably to their former obedi ence, and all officers to attend to the faithful discharge of their duties. Almost at the same time that this step was taken, Secretary Morrice was directed by the King to acquaint the inhabi tants of the province with his Majesty s views on their legal position. They were to the effect that, in the opinion of competent advisers, the claim of Gorges was valid, and the government of Massa chusetts usurped. The people were accordingly to make immediate restitution of the province to the rightful owner or his representatives. A year later, the General Court of Massachusetts, while at strife with the Royal Commissioners at Boston, took into consideration the distracted condition of the county of York (the name then given to the province), "occasioned by some persons presuming to claim and exercise government amongst them by a pretended power derived from Ferdinando Gorges, Esq." Immediately afterwards, the Magis trates despatched a proclamation, requiring all the inhabitants of York county to remain in their duty and obedience to his Majesty, subject to the authority of the General Court of Massachusetts. Here were fresh grounds of dissension between the colonists and the Royal agents. The subject was one very proper to be investigated by repre sentatives of the parent State ; for, as a plain matter of fact, there was a dispute between Massachusetts and two private individuals as to the ownership of certain lands, and it was the height of injustice for the plantation to decide the case on its own authority and to its own advantage, and at the same time to deny the other parties all right of appeal. Taking advantage of the existing state of affairs, the Com missioners worked on the disaffected in the Pisca- taqua or New Hampshire towns, and obtained their signatures to a petition to the King, praying for relief from the rule of Massachusetts. It is alleged on the one hand that the conduct of the three Commissioners was so violent that the people were terrified, and knew not what to do ; on the other, that the loyal were threatened, and put in. great fear. The probability is that the leaders on both sides used their influence to obtain support, and were not scrupulous about the means. The Com missioners formed extreme views as to the best mode of conducting 1 their business with the rulers of Massachusetts. " The readiest and surest way," they wrote to their Government in Jxily, 1665, "is for his Majesty to take away their charter, which they have several ways forfeited." Charles I., they added, was about to revoke that instrument, when the Scottish war broke out in 1639.* It was felt, however, that no such plan could be attempted "without a visible force;" and therefore it was necessary to proceed more discreetly. The towns of Portsmouth and Dover, in New Hampshire, applied to the General Coxirt for assistance ; and, as in the case of Maine rather more than a year earlier, a committee, consisting of three Magistrates, was sent thither, with power to act according to discretion. The Magistrates reported to their princi pals that the majority of the New Hampshire people Averc opposed to any change. The Commissioners thought differently ; and Carr, writing to the three Magistrates from the town of Kittery, at the mouth of the Piscataqua, in the province of Maine, en joined them to forbear from troubling or molesting the petitioners to the King. So little attention was paid to this requisition, that the committee took very vigorous action against one Abraham Corbet, of Portsmouth, who had been instrumental in ob taining subscriptions to the petition. For this offence he was summoned before the General Court, and condemned to pay a fine of twenty pounds, to be incapable of bearing any office, and to give a bond of a hundred pounds, with sufficient additional security, for his peaceable demeanour in the future. In the Massachusetts Records, tke man is spoken of as "a nourisher of much vice and wickedness, by giving irregular entertainment of loose persons in his house;" but it is clear that the condemna tion was for his share in promoting the petition. * The Commissioners say, "in 1G3G or 1637; but this ia manifestly an error, 1665.J THE COMMISSIONERS IN THE NORTH. 229 Whatever his general conduct may have been, he with a warrant to forbid those towns, at their was certainly treated . in a very despotic manner, utmost peril, to meet, or to do anything commanded West Sleeper,? Hudson s Bay LABARADOR or BRITAIN MAP OF HUDSON S BAY. (from Debits "Hudson s Bay," 1744.) and there is only too much reason to believe that them by the King s representatives ; and, although the Massachusetts authorities exercised a species this statement does not seem to be confirmed by of terrorism over the populations of the northern the official Records of the colony, it is so much in towns. The Royal Commissioners alleged that two harmony with acknowledged acts as not to be in marshals were sent from the Governor and Council, itself improbable. 20 230 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. Arriving in Maine, the Commissioners determined to organise a Government independent both of the Proprietary and of Massachusetts. The motive they alleged for so doing was the fact that several petitions had been received from the inhabitants, in which they expressed a desire to be taken under the King s immediate protection. The new Govern ment was established at York in June, 1665, and the Commissioners appointed Magistrates for each of the eight towns contained in the province, with authority to the whole body to meet as a board for the transaction of general affairs. Having so far settled matters, the Royal agents proceeded in Sep tember to the new province beyond the Kennebec, which the sovereign had recently conferred on his brother the Duke of York, and to which they gave the designation of Cornwall, and a system of local government similar to that just established in Maine. The inhabitants of this region were few in number, and very poorly off; but they were at any rate not vexed by questions of disputed juris diction. On returning to York, in October, the Commissioners held a court, at which they denied the validity of all titles to land acquired from the natives, or under the Lygonia patent issued in 1630 by the Council for New England. In the meantime, the Massachusetts authorities were preparing for a more extreme struggle, such as they feared might possibly ensue. Under pre tence that the Dutch Admiral, De Ruyter, was approaching their coasts, but in reality, there can be no doubt, from a different apprehension, they directed that the castle in Boston harbour should be strongly garrisoned, and that other military precautions should be taken. They made laws for the assertion of their authority ; and in August despatched another address to the King, complain ing of the conduct of his Commissioners, repudia ting their malign representations, and affirming that they could see no reason, for submitting them selves to the " arbitrary, absolute, and unlimited power" which his Majesty s representatives would impose. Not long afterwards, the Commissioners appeared once more in Boston ; but, though the General Court proposed a conference, no meeting took place, and Can-, Cartwright, and Maverick again left the jurisdiction, their latest official visit to which seems to have had no very definite object. The matters at issue now returned into the hands of the Home Government, and Secretary Morrice wrote to the General Court of Massachusetts (under date April 10th, 1666) that, after consider ing the statements submitted to him from both sides, his Majesty could not but see that the colonists denied his jurisdiction, and affirmed in effect that all persons must acquiesce in their judg ments, however unjust, and had-iio right of appeal. The King had consequently resolved to recall his Commissioners, that they might make their report in person. They were to be accompanied by five, or at least four, persons, as representatives of the plantation, of whom Mr. Richard Belliiigham and Major Hathoriie were to be two, while the other three, or two, were to be selected by the Massachu setts Council. In the same despatch, the King ordered the liberation of all persons imprisoned for petitioning or applying themselves to the Royal Commissioners, and directed that the Government of Maine, and the boundaries of the several colonies as established by those officials, should be. observed until his Majesty should further de termine. Before Can- quitted Boston, he wrote a letter to Lord Lauderdale, in December, 1665, in which he suggested that his Majesty should unite the country to the east of Connecticut River with Rhode Island and the King s Province, and thus form a receptacle for loyal subjects, which would be a great check to Massachusetts, if that colony should rebel. Carr seems to have been one of the most zealous of the Commissioners ; but he was not a man of very reputable character. The last we hear of him curiously illustrates the manners of those free-living days. In January, 1667, he was again in Boston, apparently with a view to embarking there for England. He seems, as a solace for his past vexations, to have resolved 011 a carouse before bidding adieu to the Puritan colony where he had had to endure so much morti fication. On a certain Saturday evening he was drinking and rioting at the Ship Tavern, in company with Maverick and Temple, when a constable looked in, and, hinting that it was the eve of the Sabbath, desired the revellers to disperse. The injunction was answered by a shower of blows, which compelled the officer to retreat ; and the party then adjourned to a private house, where Arthur Mason, another constable, found them still enjoying themselves. An altercation ensued, and Mason took very high ground, in answer, probably, to some vapouring 011 the part of Carr, on the score of his being, or having been, a repre sentative of Royalty. The constable perhaps emulating a speech of Cromwell s, that, on the field of battle, he would as soon fire his pistol against the sovereign as against a private soldier told Carr that he would have taken away tho King himself, had he found him noisy 011 Saturday evening in Boston. Upon this, Maverick com plained to the Governor, and Mason was informed 1666.] MASSACHUSETTS AND THE KING. 231 against, before the Grand Jury, fov " maliciously uttering treasonable words." The man having been found guilty, the Magistrates referred the question of further proceedings to the General Court, and finally Mason was solemnly admonished by the Governor. As a set-off against these proceedings, Carr was summoned to answer for riotous and abusive carriage to one of his Majesty s officers ; but the termination of the later case is not on record. Maverick had been in Boston in the previous August (1666), when he was again, occupying an official position. In that month he received a letter from Morrice, in obedience to which he required the Governor, in his Majesty s name, to convoke the Council immediately. Maverick shortly afterwards wrote to Governor Prince, of Plymouth, that he feared his discourse with Bellingham that morning had taken off his stomach for breakfast, and that his contemplated discourse with him and his Council in the following week would put him in a like dis temper. The Council was not summoned until some weeks had elapsed, and in a little while the General Court voted that the persons cited to England by the King should not be sent. It was also deter mined, after consultation with the Elders, and a forenoon spent in prayer, to address a letter to Secretary Morrice. In this letter (which was despatched in September) the Court said: "We may not omit to acquaint your Honoxir that a writing was delivered to the Governor and Magis trates by Mr. Samuel Maverick, the 6th September, without direction or seal, which he saith is a copy of a signification from his Majesty of his pleasure concerning this colony of the Massachusetts, the certainty whereof seems not to be so clear unto us as former expresses from his Majesty have usually been. We have in all humility given our reasons why we could not submit to the Commissioners and their mandates the last year ; which we understand lie before his Majesty ; to the substance whereof we have not to add, and therefore cannot expect that the ablest persons among us could be in a capacity to declare our cause more fully."* Although a majority of the Court resolved upon sending the letter (which had been pre pared by a committee with Willoughby for its chairman), there were some dissentients. Deni- son and Bradstreet, two of the Magistrates, were in favour of obeying the King s commands. Bradstreet had probably brought back with him from England, when he went there with Norton as agent for Massachusetts, a more correct judgment * Massachusetts Records, Vol. IV. , Part 2. than his colleagues could form of the detennination of Charles to exact sxibmission from his expatriated subjects. Lord Clarendon had written to Nichols on the 13th of April, 1666, that, if the colonists did not fulfil the King s command to send agents to London, the Government would give them cause to repent it, as his Majesty would not sit down under the affronts he had received. And, although 7 O it is not likely that Bradstreet was aware of this communication, he probably knew, from what he had observed when on his mission, that the King woxild hardly be trifled with beyond a certain point. Denison and Bradstreet were not alone, as far as the whole colony was concerned, in objecting to a policy of continued defiance. The four principal commercial towns Boston, Salem, Newbury, and Ipswich sent in petitions, more or less numerously signed, praying for sxibmission to the sovereign s demands. The General Court was as angry at these peti tions as at those which had been circulated in the northern towns with a view to substituting the King s Government for the rule of Massachusetts. It was alleged that the petitioners had unjustly charged, threatened, and reflected upon the Court, to the dishonour of its members ; and it was accord ingly ordered that four of the Boston signers, and one from each of the other four towns, should appear at the next Court, and answer for their imputed offence. Apparently, however, no further action was taken in the affair. During the debate which preceded the sending of the fresh letter to the King, Willoughby spoke very strongly against yielding to the Royal demands. He said they must consider God s displeasure as well as the monarch s, their own interests, and the interests of God s things, as well as his Majesty s preroga tives. If, he argued, the King might send for him then, and for another on the mon ow, they were a miserable people. The remark that they must consider God s displeasure in the matter, was one of those easy assumptions of enjoying the special favour of Providence which at that time were commonly made by both sides in every dispute, and usually with as much right by the one as by the other. The Boston petitioners employed the very same argument, if such it may be called. They observed that they and their contemporaries were no less concerned than the people of former ages " in that advice of the wise man, to keep the King s commandment because of the oath of God." Both sets of disputants seem to have lost sight of the true principles at issue. The just liberties of the colonists were undoubtedly to be protected by all legitimate means ; but it is to be feared that it 232 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1CG7. was rather the right to tyrannise that was now being struggled for. The appointment of the four Commissioners had not in itself threatened a single liberty, political or ecclesiastical ; and a judicious and temperate mode of dealing with those officials might have prevented any questionable application of their powers. The summoning of Massachusetts officials to England was undoubtedly an extreme step ; but it was provoked, and almost necessitated, by the defiance of the Commissioners. That de fiance was succeeded by others indicating the same resolve, and the breach was widened every day. In November, 1666, Maverick came to Boston with a letter signed by Nichols, Carr, and himself, protest ing against the action taken by the Court with respect to the signers of the petitions from Boston and the other commercial towns, and soliciting a reconsideiution. To this the Magistrates replied that what they had to say tipon the subject had already been communicated to Secretary Morrice. Mr. Palfrey calls attention to a letter to Morrice preserved in the English State Paper Office, which seems, though unofficially, to express the views of the colonial rulers at that time. It is dated October 26th, 1666, and is signed "Samuel Nad- horth." There appears to be no other record of any person bearing that name then in Massa chusetts ; and Mr. Palfrey believes that it was an anagram of Hathorne or of Danforth.* The writer, whoever he may have been, states that he spoke simply for himself, and without the know ledge of the authorities. " I clearly see," he observes, " that the body of the people have a higher esteem of their liberties than of their lives. They well know they are such twins as God and Nature have joined together, and are resolved to bury their estates and liberties in the same grave." If, it was urged, the malicious accusations of their adversaries should prevail with the King, and his Majesty should impose hard measure upon them, the plantation would be ruined. The colonists might feel compelled to desert the country in large numbers, and in that case the French, who much coveted the land, might occupy it. Referring to the demand for the presence of the Governor and others in England, the writer states that the Governor was an ancient gentleman, nearly eighty years old, and afflicted with many infirmities, such as often incapacitated him for the public service of the country. The correspondent adds : " Had the Governor and all the leading men of the colony * Danforth was a Magistrate, and a person of great political importance, who in 1CG1 was largely concerned in the Declara tion of Liberties and Duties drawn up by a committee of the General Court. adhered to the Commissioners mandates, the people were so resolved that they would, for the generality of them (some discontents, Quakers, and others excepted) have utterly protested against their concession." The exceptions would perhaps have proved more numerous than the writer supposed, or cared to allow ; but there is nevertheless no room to doubt that the majority of the Massachu setts people felt strongly 011 the subject of colonial independence, and would have supported the autho rities in any measure of resistance which might have been considered necessary. About the time that the King required the General Court of Massachusetts to send representa tives to England, he made proposals to the northern colonies generally to join in an invasion of Canada. Louis XIY. had allied himself with the Dutch, and declared war against England ; and it seemed to the Government of Charles II. advisable to seize, if that could be accomplished, on the American, pos sessions of France. But to the rulers of New England the plan appeared far from feasible. They knew that, to effect it, a land-march of four hundred miles must be made over rocky mountains and wide deserts, and that the perils of such an expedi tion, were many and serious, to say nothing of the French strength in the region to be attacked. Boston, however, sent out several privateers, which were of considerable service. The Government of Massachusetts also despatched provisions to the English fleet in the West Indies, and made the King a present of masts for the use of the Royal navy, to the value of two thousand pounds. The masts proved very useful in the war, and Pepys who, in consequence of his connection with the Admiralty, had good means of knowing declares that without them they must have failed the next year. On the 31st of July, 1667, peace was made at Breda, and among the stipulations of the treaty was the retransfer of Nova Scotia to France. These matters delayed the further consideration of the quarrel between the King s Government and Massachusetts; but time, though it might soften animosities , could not reconcile so wide and serious a divergence of principles. In some respects, thirj postponement told against the New England colony ; for the Confederacy which had been established ill 1643, and which gave to each member the guarantee of general support in cases of emergency, was much weaker than it had been, and seemed likely, in the further progress of years, to sink still lower. By the absorption of New Haven into Connecticut, the league now consisted of three instead of four States ; jealousies and misunderstandings had existed for some time ; and it was doubtful if concerted action 1671.] POSITION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 233 could be depended on with the same certainty as before. When the Commissioners met, in September, 1667, the representatives of Massachusetts and Ply mouth stated that they had no further authority than to treat as to the Indian affairs of the corporation, and to consider any propositions that might be made for entering into a new confederation. These matters were in consequence debated pretty nearly to the exclusion of all others ; and, as regards the second of the two, it was resolved to bring the pro posal before the Legislatures of the colonies, with suggestions for an alteration of the original articles of agreement. In the meanwhile, the position of Massachusetts towards the mother country was not forgotten in England. Lord Clarendon fell from power in 1666, and the ministers forming the celebrated Cabal Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley, and Lauderdale, the initials of whose several designa tions made up the word now forming part of the political vocabulary of England were not suffi ciently in harmony with one another to determine on any vigorous policy. The King, however, did not forget his affront, and frequently brought the subject of Massachusetts before the attention of his advisers. The Council of Foreign Plantations, which in 1660 succeeded to the Parliamentary Commission for the supervision of the colonies, seriously debated what should be done. They saw that the colony was rich, strong, and able to coerce its neighbours. They feared that the people would break away from all dependence on England ; and they perceived the desirability of asserting the Royal authority. But it was not so clear what was the best course to take. Some of the Council, according to Evelyn, proposed sending a menacing- letter, which those " who better understood the peevish and tetchy humour " of Massachusetts strongly opposed. At length it was determined to adopt a conciliatory plan, so as not to irritate still further a people already on the very brink of re nouncing their allegiance to the Crown. Cart- wright, one of the four Commissioners, was sum moned before the Council to give information ; and it was then resolved to send a letter of amnesty. A plan was also proposed for despatching a deputy to New England, under pretence of adjusting boundaries, but with secret instructions to report home as to the condition of the country, and whether it was strong enough to resist the King. This was in 1671 ; but the scheme languished for some time, and the position of Massachusetts to wards the mother country still remained undeter mined. Availing itself of this pause, that colony continued to assert its pretensions with vigour and success. In 1668, the General Court issued a pro clamation to the inhabitants of Maine, commanding them to yield obedience to the colonial laws and officers. Two Magistrates and two Deputies were sent to York, to hold a court and reconstruct the government, which had been superseded in 1665 by the state of things established by the Royal Com missioners. Some opposition was experienced by the Massachusetts authorities ; but it was over come by an exhibition of force, and in the middle of the year Maine once more confessed the rule of Boston. Yet, although the chief New England colony was thus able for a time to over-ride all opposition, the dangers by which it was threatened still con tinued to exist. Ferdinando Gorges and Robert Mason were not likely to forget their claims, or to renounce those territorial possessions and promising revenues to which they asserted a right. They did not see their way, however, to actually repossessing themselves of the provinces in which they had an hereditary interest, and accordingly, in 1674, adopted a plan of a different nature. Together with Lord Stirling, heir of the patentee of Nova Scotia, they presented to the King a memorial in which they proposed to surrender to him their re spective patents, on condition of having secured to them a third part of all the customs, rents, fines, and miscellaneous profits of the plantations, or some other reasonable compensation. They also suggested the sending over of a Royal Governor, who would not only hinder the encroachments and usurpations of Massachusetts, but in time reduce that plantation to the King s immediate govern ment. The claims of Gorges and Mason having been submitted to the Attorney-General and Solicitor- General, those functionaries reported in 1675 that the claimants had a good and legal title to the provinces in question ; thus confirming the previous opinion of some years before. By this time the conduct of colonial matters had been again trans ferred to fresh hands, being now restored to the Privy Council, from which a standing committee was formed, with the designation of " The Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations." The members of this committee, having considered the grievances of Gorges and Mason, presented to the King in Council, on the 20th of December, 1675, a report on the subject, in which they said that, however fair the proofs of the petitioners titles might seem to be, they could not undertake to advise his Majesty to determine anything ex parte, and without hearing what the people of Mas- sachusetts had to say. They therefore recommended that the rulers of that colony should be required to CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1675. send over agents sufficiently empowered to answer for them. The Privy Council adopted this sugges tion of its committee, and determined that the agents should be allowed six months for making their appearance. A few days before, the coun cillors had agreed that it would be unwise to send out Commissioners a second time, because of the Majesty would then know better how to proceed. The general plan of operations having been shadowed forth, and accepted by the King, a circular letter to the several New England colonies was composed after much deliberation ; but it was determined not to recommend the King to appoint a Governor, or to impose any taxes or other contributions. expense, the uncertainty of success, and the danger of receiving some fresh affront. Besides, it would look like awarding execution before the colonists had been heard. It was therefore, they considered, more advisable to require the plantation to send its representatives to England. If it refused, his The advice thus given seems to have been moderate and fair. The colonists were not to be condemned unheard, or on one-sided infor mation; nor were hard terms to be exacted from them in any case. The recommendation, not to tax the plantations was especially wise ; for those distant settlements had already suffered from a revenue law passed in February, 1673, by which, for the benefit of the English Exchequer, duties were imposed on certain commodities conveyed from one plantation to another. Considerable irritation, moreover, had been produced by the Navigation Act, which had been contrived with the selfish view of feeding the commerce of the mother country Ml TIXV OX HVDSOX S S1II1 . 236 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G76. at the expense of its dependencies. It lias been previously explained that tlie object of that Act, as originally passed during the Common wealth, and enlarged in its operations by the early Parliaments of Charles II., was to confine the trade of the colonies, except in a few special instances, to English ports, and to articles carried in English vessels. The natural effect of mono polies is to enhance the price of commodities to an almost indefinite extent, and thus to aggran dise the small body of dealers to the disadvantage of the much larger body of purchasers. The people of Massachusetts resented the Navigation Act, and evaded it whenever they could. They were a com mercial people, placed under circumstances which rendered freedom of trade particularly desirable. The harbour of Boston was crowded with vessels from all the leading nations of Europe. Massachusetts, in its turn, sent out its merchant- ships to the most promising regions of the world, and enjoyed the carrying trade of the chief Anglo-American colonies. Wealth was rapidly accumulating, and it was con sidered a great hardship that the industry of a people which had nothing but industry to depend on should be crippled, to swell the profits of English capitalists. In effect, the Navigation Act was not greatly felt, because the colonists contrived for the most part to escape its provisions. But the law was against them, and it was feared that it might soon be enforced with stringency. Some men of business in England, it is true, doubted whether the law was not more prejudicial than advantageous in its operation ; but these were the exceptions. The greater number conceived that their profit lay in a rigorous application of the statute, and clamoured with no uninfluential voice for a sharp account with the defaulting traders of Boston. Among the persons so thinking was the eminent merchant, Sir Josiah Child, who expressed himself, in a treatise on commercial subjects, strongly in favour of maintaining the existing restrictions on the trade of New England. He was of opinion that foreign plantations do a positive injury to the country which sends them forth, if their trade be not confined to that country by good laws (by which he meant prohibitory laws), and the severe execu tion of all such enactments. If, he contended, the New England colonies were not kept to the rules of the Navigation Act, the benefit which they might otherwise yield to the parent State would in a few years be wholly lost. Thus it happened that commercial interests, as then, understood, conspired with political reasons to determine the English Government, in 1676, to take up once more those questions of jurisdiction over the North American colonies which had been so unsatisfactorily discussed ten or eleven years earlier. It was thought that the period was a very convenient one for renewing the former attempt, as the Dutch, on whose assistance the Massachusetts men might possibly have reckoned, were engaged in a serious war with France. The King therefore despatched his new demands by an agent who, until then but little known, soon acquired a reputation for the vigour of his proceedings. This was Edward Randolph, a relative of Robert Mason, and pre viously, it would appear, a dependent on the Duke of York. But it is necessary that we should now for awhile turn our attention from the affairs of New England, to trace the progress of important events in an other direction. CHAPTER XXVITI. Situation of New York City-Dutch Origin of the State-Maritime Enterprise of the Dutch Republic-Henry Hudson tlm English Navigator-ms Expedition, in the Service of a Dutch Company, to discover the North-east Passage to Asia-His Voyage diverted to the North-west-DiscOTeryof the Bay of New York, and of the Hudson River-Character of the Scenery -Tragic Bate of Hudson-Colonisation of the Country by the Dutch-Manners and Habits of the Natives-Claim to the Territory set up by the English-Progress of the Dutch Colony of New Netherland-Negotiations with the Colony of Plymouth-A Charter, with Feudal Provisions, imposed on the Dutch Colonists by the Home C4overnment-CollisUs between Dutch and English-Peopling of Delaware by Swedes-Sanguinary Feuds between the Dutch of New Netlierlaml and the Indians Massacre of Indians Their Retaliations, and Ultimate Conclusion of Peace. ON a small island, situated at the confluence of the Hudson with the East River, or strait of Long Island Sound, rise at the present day the mansions, the humbler dwellings, and the wharfs of a great city, which, though non-existent two centuries and a half ago, is now one of the chief seats of trade, and one of the largest and most remarkable centres of population in the world. New York ranks with the principal cities of either hemi sphere. Its commerce is already so vast, and 1609.] NEW YORK. 237 increases at so rapid a rate, that in the ensuing century it will probably exceed the dealings of any community on the earth. A narrow bay extends in front of this city, and emigrants from all parts of the globe, arriving in those shallower waters from the wide surges of the Atlantic, see before them the towers and steeples of what is to many a place of refuge from the storms of life. Beyond the most prominent and distinctive objects, which seem to start out of the grey environment of sea and frith and river, stretch the pastures, the forests, and the mountains, varied by shining mere and rushing stream, which form the State of New York, and extend from Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Ver mont, on the east, to the Canadas on the north and north-west, to Lakes Erie and Ontario on the west, and on the south to Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and the Atlantic Ocean. This State, now one of the most important in the Union, was early in the seven teenth century in the possession of savage tribes, and a generation later was a dependency of Holland. Dutch blood still mingles largely in the race that peoples it. Dutch names are to be found scattered about its towns and villages. Dutch forms of architecture yet linger in quiet, out-of-the-way locali ties ; and something also of the Dutch spirit for mal, sedate, industrious, mechanically ingenious, and solidly respectable is apparent in the manners of the country folk. New York city is cosmopolitan, and at the same time distinctively American. New York State is even now to a certain extent Dutch. Yet for two hundred years it has formed part of that great association of American commonwealths which own kinship with the English nationality. The region to which our attention is now directed was for many years a battle-ground of races. The Bay of New York is believed to have been dis covered by Verazzano, an Italian in the service of France, who in 1524 performed a journey to that part of North America. But neither France nor Italy acquired any possessions on the shores of the Bay. Italy, indeed, is unrepresented in the New World which the maritime genius of her citizens did so much to reveal ; and the settlements of the French were in other directions. Those who con tended for the mastery in what is now the State of New York were the English and the Dutch ; and, strange to say, the first effectual exploration of the land was due to their united efforts. After the Republic of the Seven United Provinces of Holland had been formed, in the latter part of the sixteenth century, the people of that Confederation turned their thoughts to commerce and marine adventure, as the most likely methods of consolidating their power by the acquisition of wealth. Even while their desperate struggle with Spain was going on, they were forming plans of colonisation or discovery in the West Indies, in the north of America, and in the south of Africa. The same eager desire to find a northern, passage to the distant shores of Asia which had fired the souls of so many Englishmen, and had led to some of the boldest expeditions of that epoch, was then excited in the minds of Dutchmen. They made two attempts, a little before the close of the century, to pass by Nova Zembla and Muscovy to the half- fabulous empire of Cathay, and suffered as Wil- loughby had suffered before them, though without so fatal a result. The establishment of the Dutch East India Company, in 1602, increased the wish of all speculators to shorten the route to China, Hindostan, and the adjacent countries ; and a com pany of London merchants fitted out an expedition which they placed under the command of an English seaman whose name is now famous in. two continents Henry Hudson. That dauntless navigator started in the year 1607 with his only son, and sailed along the eastern coast of Greenland beyond the 80th degree of latitude, when he was stopped by the ice. He had, however, advanced to within eight degrees of the pole (though his crew consisted of only ten men and a boy), and had thus reached a point never before attained by any sea man. He saw before him the white and silent mystery of the extreme North ; then, returning to England, made preparations for another attempt. In the following year he was again exploring the same perilous and gloomy wastes ; but the longed- for secret was not discovered. The London mer chants would not risk their capital on a third adventure ; and Hudson, whose spirit was as hopeful as ever, offered his services to the East India Company of Holland. By that body a small vessel of discovery was equipped, placed under the command of Hudson, and manned by a crew partly English and partly Dutch. The Crescent, as this ship was called, sailed from Amsterdam on the 4th of April, 1609, and fell in with masses of ice in the neighbourhood of Nova Zembla. The design was to find a passage by the north-east ; but, this being hindered by the frozen condition of the seas, Hudson resolved on turning to the west. The coast of North America iimst have been in some degree known to him, and he thought that, if his original object could not be secured, discoveries of value might be made in another direction. Accord ingly he followed the eastern shores of Greenland with his face to the soxith, passed Newfoundland, coasted by Acadie, and anchored, it is believed, at the mouth of the Penobscot, in what is now the 238 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1611. State of Maine. Continuing liis voyage, he sighted the promontory of Cape Cod, which Gosnolcl had discovered seven years before. Hudson was not aware of this previous discovery, and therefore gave to the craggy peninsula the name of New Holland. It is singular that, by the enterprise of an English man, the Dutch Republic thus acquired, as against England, an apparent claim to Cape Cod as the north-eastern boundary of New Netherlaiid. The voyage of Hudson was prolonged southward as Air as the entrance to Chesapeake Bay, when, recollecting that a colony of his countrymen was established in the neighbouring lands of Virginia, he veered to the north, discovered Delaware Bay, and proceeded on his route. It was the 3rd of September when the Crescent came to an anchor off Sandy Hook, at the opening to those inland waters where the city of New York now stands. About the same time, and again six or seven years later, the French colonists of Canada entered the same pait of America from the north ; but their attempts led to no permanent result, while that of Hudson has borne important fruit, first to the nationality which he then served, and afterwards to the race to which he belonged. A magnificent scene spread all around. The neigh bouring shores were covered with noble oaks, and the winding inlet of the sea appeared to tempt the voyager into promising regions of fertility. The savages paid him many visits ; but Hudson did not care to be detained more than a week. Sailing then through the Narrows, he found himself in a convenient harbour at the mouth of a river which he proceeded to explore. This was the stream which has since been known by the great navi gator s name. For ten days he proceeded up the river, at first admiring the rich woods, grasses, and flowers which clothed its banks, and the odours which were wafted on the still autumn air towards his ship, but at length oppressed by the melancholy overgrowth of the desert. He advanced so far that a boat which he sent off got a little beyond the site of Albany. The Indians inhabiting the land belonged for the most part to the great Algonquin family, and Hudson, communicated with them as well as he could. But the land was so thinly peopled as to be in a great degree solitary. Inter minable forests, which no axe had ever touched, burdened the ground, springing rankly from the marshy soil which spread its ooze about their roots. Successive generations of these trees lay prone beneath the shade of those which had succeeded them ; the pools and swamps were alive with reptiles ; and wild animals, devoid of fear where man so seldom came, saw the passage of Hudson s ship along the channel with quiet wonder. Every thing was lonely, neglected, and strange. Vines were to be seen festooning many of the trees ; yet the general aspect of Nature was not cheerful. The river, often choked by vast beds of reeds, diverted by sand-bars, or hindered by the dull growth of willows and sycamores, formed, at ir regular intervals of its progress, dismal swamps, the malarious air of which was dark with mosquitoes, weaving their airy dances with the incessant activity of insect life. Rotting waters and decaying vege tation made every breath a peril. The land was beautiful, but deadly ; and Hudson, satisfied by the examination he had made, retraced his course down the river, and once more gained the ocean.* He returned, not to Amsterdam, but to Dart mouth, whence he forwarded to his employers an account of the voyage he had just concluded. The liver he had explored was not, however, revisited by him ; but the Dutch at once claimed sovereignty over the territories now laid open to them. The tragic fate of Hudson, though it draws us momen tarily aside from the history of New York, must not be here omitted. In 1610 an English company was formed for once more attempting the north west passage. Hudson, who was then about sixty years of age, sailed in a ship worked by twenty- three men, and in the summer months made his way through a strait opening westward from the Greenland Sea into a bay of vast dimensions. Both strait and bay are now known by the name of him who thus discovered them, though it would appear that they had been entered nearly a century before by Sebastian Cabot, if not still earlier by the Portuguese, Gaspar de Cortereal. The first impression of the navigator was that he had at length found that long-expected entrance to the Pacific which was to lead the nations of north western Europe by a shorter route to the east. When, however, he perceived that he was really in- no open sea, but in a land-locked bay, he re solved to winter in the southern part, hoping to pursue his discoveries in the spring. He anchored his ship in a small creek, and made the best arrangements that his small resources allowed for meeting the rigours of the advancing season. His remaining stock of food was for a time eked out by wild fowl from the coast ; but at the approach of spring the crew were reduced to great extre mities, and were glad to feed on. frogs and moss. Nevertheless, Hudson would not relinquish his attempt. He fitted out his shallop for further discoveries, but found that he could not open * Bancroft s History of the United States, Vol. II., chap. 15. 1614.] NEW NETHERLAND. 239 communications with the natives, and was there fore unable to revictual his ship. He divided his last store of bread among his men, and wept as he gave it them. Sadly setting his face towards home in the summer of 1611, he re-entered the narrow seas, and was suddenly confronted by a new danger. The men, rendered wild by distress, proved muti nous. Hudson became angry, and threatened to set the insubordinate on shore. The sailors anti cipated any such action by invading their com mander s cabin in the night, binding him, and putting him 011 board the shallop, together with his son and seven others, four of whom were sick. Then ensued one of those acts which raise our common nature to the level of the divine. Philip Staffe, the ship s carpenter, insisted on being put on board the shallop also, saying he would share his captain s fate. The little vessel was cut loose, and drifted with the wind into immeasurable fields of ice. At that midsummer season, in such lati tudes, there is no night ; but there is desolation unspeakable, and scarcely the possibility of succour to a crew of wandering wretches in an open boat. As those ten men passed out of sight of their assassins, they passed out of all human record. Their end is a mystery. They may have starved with utter hunger; they may have foundered in the icy seas. In any case, they were never heard of more. The mutineers, on their return voyage to England, suffered terrible hardships, and were in the last stage of weakness when picked up by a fishing smack. Four had been killled by savages ; one died of want ; and all were compelled, when their stores ran out, to live on the fried bones of fowls, on offal, and on candle-grease. Even their prolonged misery, however, will not save them from the detestation of succeeding times. But the name of Hudson, will live for ever in the glorious history of maritime adventure.* The Dutch, in the first instance, sought to turn their new possessions to account by simply traf ficking with the Indians. It is generally stated that in 1613 Captain Argall, when returning to Virginia from his attack 011 the French settlement at Port Royal, found a few rough hovels erected on the island of Manhattan by Dutch mariners and traders in fur ; and that, having informed them that the land was a portion of the King of England s territory of Virginia, they made their submission. A modern historian, however, has shown that the relation is improbable.t At any rate, the Dutch men were soon followed by others. A fort was * Purchas (Pilgrims and Pilgrimage). Biograpliia Britaiinica. Art. " Hudson." t Brodhead a History of New York, Vol. I. erected, about 1614, on the shores of Manhattan, and Dutch navigators, pursuing the investigations which Hudson had commenced, made various dis coveries in that part of America. Adriaen Block, in a vessel built at Manhattan, explored Long Island Sound and Narragaiisett Bay, and is thought to have sailed into Massachusetts Bay as O far as the promontory of Nahant. Block Island, to the south-Avest of the former bay, takes its name from this seaman. In 1615, the States-General granted to a company of Amsterdam merchants a charter conferring a three years monopoly of trade in these regions, which were defined as ex tending between Virginia and New France, from the fortieth to the forty-fifth degree of north lati tude, thus including the whole of what was after wards called New England. During the same year, a settlement was begun 011 an island in the Hudson, a little below the present town of Albany. This river was for a time named after Prince Mau rice, the Stadtholder of Holland, who favoured colonisation in America; and in 1621 the Dutch West India Company was formed, with a view to carrying out such projects. The association, which was incorporated for four-and-tweiity years, re ceived from the Government the exclusive privilege of trafficking and planting colonies on the coast of Africa from the tropic of Cancer to the Cape 01 Good Hope, and on that of America from the Straits of Magellan to the Arctic Ocean that is to say, the entire length of the continent. This was manifestly an invasion of the previously-acquired rights (such as they were) of other States ; but the Dutch Government conferred on the Company no political power or standing Avhatever. The States- General, it is true, gave the shareholders half a million of guilders, to help them in starting, and held stock to the amount of another half-million ; but they did not guarantee any possessions that might be acquired, and declined beforehand to engage actively in any war in which the colonists might be concerned. If the Company conquered territory, the risk must be its own. Of the five branches into which this body corporate was divided, that which was seated at Amsterdam took charge of the contemplated settlements, which now received the name of New Netherland. The Indians with whom the colonists were to come in contact, differed but little from those of Virginia. Their dwellings were commonly tents, which they moved thrice a year to the quarters assigned to planting, hunting, and fisliing. Acco; ing to old accounts (which, however, were ofu>r coloured by the preconceptions of the writers, or distorted by insufficient knowledge and the want of 1621.] THE NEW YORK INDIANS. 241 a common language), these savages worshipped the <levil, and, when they met about Michaelmas to engage in hunting, performed a remarkable cere mony of a sacrificial order. The priest first col lected money (wampum) from the people. This he set on the top of some flat-roofed house, and, re turning to the interior of the building, called upon their god to take it, the worshippers in the mean- the dead man upright, with his weapons, money, and goods, for use in the other world, painted their faces black, and lamented at the grave at stated intervals. The grave itself they continued to keep trim, fenced it with a hedge, covered it with mats, and suffered no grass to grow near it. The name of the deceased was not to be mentioned, lest it should renew the grief of his relations. All of the same name PET El! 8TCTVE8ANT. while howling, and beating both the ground and themselves, until, as we are told, a devil appeared in the likeness of a man, a bird, or a beast. The people being then unable to stir for fear, the priest would go out, secure the money, and return to lay the spirit. The Indians of these tiibes were much addicted to warfare, which, however, they conducted on a very insignificant scale, counting it a great fight if seven or eight were slain. Their customs with re gard to the dead were singular, and suggest a greater amount of tenderness than is usually attributed to savages. In common with other tribes, they buried 21 changed it for another; and if the name was a word of common speech, they invented a new one, that the mournful sound might not be perpetuated.* Whether the story about Argall be tme or false, it is unquestionable that the English Government always regarded the presence of the Dutch on the river Hudson as an invasion of English territorial rights. Captain Dernier, a companion of Captain Smith, touched at the Dutch settlement in 1615, and reported that the Indians had forbidden tl:d * Jeremy Collier s Dictionary, 1701. Art. "New York." 242 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [162: Hollanders to settle there, the country being in possession of the English. They answered that they had understood no such thing ; that they had found 110 English there ; and that they hoped they had not offended.* Six years later in 1G21 Sir Dudley Carleton, the English Ambassador in the Low Countries, was instructed to remonstrate with the States-General against intrusions in New England, as that part of North America began now to be called. The Dutch Government promised to look into the matter, but nothing was done. It is doubtful whether, as alleged by some early writers, the Dutch ever opened negotiations with James I. for a station in the harbour where New Amsterdam (now New York) was erected shortly after the supposed transaction. They seem to have quietly assumed that, as the ground was not previously occupied, except by scattered tribes of Indians, they had as good a right as anybody eke. The cele brated Dutch seaman, Cornelius Mey, was there in 1623, when he explored the southern part of New Jersey, ascended the river Delaware, and took pos session, of the adjacent lands. He built a fort (called by him Fort Nassau) on Timber Creek, a stream flowing into the Delaware, which by the Dutch was designated the South River. The whole country between the southern shore of Delaware Bay and Cape Cod was now included in New Netherland ; and serious efforts at colonisation were commenced. The nucleus of New Amsterdam soon grew up on the island of Manhattan, which was purchased of the natives for a small sum. In 1624, Peter Minuits, the commercial agent of the West India Company, was made governor of the settlement, and continued in that office eight years. A family was planted on Long Island, which ex tends eastward from the mouth of the river Hudson ; and symptoms of a vigorous life were everywhere apparent. Holland, while its own existence as an independent State was as yet unassured, was creating new political organisations beyond the Atlantic. The Batavian Republic was not fully recognised until the Peace of Minister, in 1648. Spain still asserted her sovereignty over the United Provinces, though ineffectually ; yet Dutchmen were founding fresh States in America, and inflict ing such reprisals on Spanish commerce, by means of chartered privateers, that in 1628 the Spanish prizes thus taken were almost eighty-fold more valuable than the whole amount of exports from New Netherland for the four preceding seasons.-j- * Briefe Narration of the Original Undertakings, &c. , by Sir Ferdinando Gorges, in Massachusetts Historical Collection. Vol. XXVI. f Bancroft s History of the United States, Vol. II. , chap. 15. The visit to New Plymouth of Isaac de Rasieres r chief of the Dutch merchants at New Amsterdam, and second to the Governor, allusion to which has been made in Chapter XIX., occurred in the year 1627. His arrival was preceded by a letter from Minuits to Bradford, informing him of the esta- lislmient of the Dutch colony, and assuring him of a wish to cultivate relations of commerce and friendship. Bradford wrote in reply, promising the neighbourly good- will of his fellow-emigrants, and offering business intercourse, but at the same time warning the new-comers against encroaching 011 any territory north of the fortieth degree of latitude, which belonged to the Council for New England. The Dutch courteously maintained their right to trade in those parts a right which they derived from the authority of the States-General, and which, they added, they would defend. To this rejoinder Bradford responded by reiterating his statements with greater amplitude and emphasis, and by suggesting a reference of the matters in volved to the Governments of England and Holland. A request that the Dutch would send some envoys, for conference on their affairs of business, led to the visit of de Rasieres, who left his settlement about the end of September. The authorities of New Amsterdam were very anxious to prevent the Ply mouth people from sending expeditions to the west, lest they should discover the large trade in furs which their neighbours were carrying on, and should get it into their own hands. The English had recently built a shallop, in which they proposed to cruise about, and open a trade in wampum. De Rasieres, in a letter preserved in the national archives at the Hague, and written after he had returned from Plymouth, says that the English had threatened that, if the Dutch would not leave off dealing with the Indians, they (the English) would be obliged to use other means. The Dutch envoy came up Buzzard s Bay, early in October, with trumpets blowing, and several attend ants about him. He sold various commodities to the Plymouth people, especially wampum, hoping in this way to prevent their seeking a direct trade in that article with the Indians. But the discus sion of the matters in dispute does not seem to have been very satisfactory. In returning, de Rasieres took with him another remonstrance against the alleged intrusion on English ground. Never theless, there had been some interchange of courtesies. The Pilgrims assured the Dutch that they would never forget the kindness they had received in Holland; and the Dutch told the Pilgrims where they would find the best market for the wampum they had bought. The Hollanders 1029.] THE DUTCH SETTLEMENTS. 243 .suggested to the English that they would advance their own interests by removing to the lands about the Connecticut; and the English begged the Hollanders not to interrupt their trade in beaver- skins on the Narragansett. Each set of colonists seems in truth to have been afraid of the other. Bradford, in writing to the Council for New England about the state of affairs, said he had been informed that the Dutch far exceeded, all the other settlers in that part of America, both in strength of men and in fortifications. The countrymen of de Rasieres evidently thought the same of their rivals. It is a noteworthy fact that, before the Pilgrim Fathers left Holland, the Dutch, on two occasions in 1617, and again in February, 1620 urgently desired them to join in a common settle ment on the river Hudson. But Robinson s congre gation could not forget that they were Englishmen; and one of their chief reasons for wishing to go to some part of America belonging to the English Crown was that they might not be lost in the Dutch nationality. New Amsterdam had by 1628 acquired a popula tion of two hundred and seventy persons. It is said that the Indians treated the first settlers with kind ness, and gave them their daughters in marriage ; but the authority for this statement is itself Indian. The plantation thus growing in importance, the Dutch Government, in 1629, determined to intro duce some check on that condition of freedom which they at first encouraged. The States-General subjected the colonists to a Council of Nine, and imposed on them a charter of privileges contrived for the benefit of those who proposed to plant colonies in New Netherland. Holland, though she had thrown off her foreign tyrants, was a Republic of the aristocratic order ; and the political state established in her American dependency by this charter was one strongly imbued with feudalism. It created a number of lords of the manor, with large territorial possessions, and considerable power over the humbler colonists. A creditable feature of the document was the stipulation that the soil was to be purchased of the Indians. One of its bad provisions was that in which, in order to protect the manufactures of the mother country, the colonists were forbidden, on pain of banishment, to make any woollen, linen, or cotton fabric. Yet there was a worse feature than this the introduction of negro bondage, which, however, was made conditional on the slave trade being found profitable. Under the charter, many large estates were purchased of the natives by wealthy Dutchmen ; but, as several of ; Speech of an Indian chief in 1043. the earlier settlers had already established them selves on some of these territories, disputes fre quently arose. The favoured proprietors acquired land in Delaware and New Jersey, as well as in what is now the State of New York. De Vries, an early Dutch writer 011 America, planted a colony of thirty persons on the southern shore of Delaware Bay in 1631, and in the following year Harvey, the Governor of Virginia, recognised the plantation in a grant of commercial privileges to Clayboriie. After the return of De Tries to Holland, Osset, his successor, got into collision with the Indians, and brought a great calamity on the little settlement. The savages, enraged at the death of one of their chiefs, laid an ambush, and succeeded in murdering every one of the emigrants. Delaware soon after wards passed into the hands of a few Swedish settlers, and ultimately, after another period of Dutch occupancy, into the possession of the English. De Vries, 011 once more seeking the western hemi sphere, in 1633, settled at New Amsterdam. Minuits had been removed from his position of Governor in the previous year, and, on his way back to Holland, was driven by stress of weather into Plymouth, in England, where his ship was seized by Captain Mason, for carrying on an un lawful trade in a country belonging to the English King. The captain also made a representation on the subject to Sir John Coke, Secretary of State. The Dutch Ambassador remonstrated, and the vessel was xiltimately released as an act of favour ; but the English Government emphatically asserted its right to the territory about Hudson s River. The successor to Minuits in the government of New Netherland was Walter Van Twiller. Under his administration, a trading house was erected on the Delaware, or Soxith River, and another on the Connecticut, which brought the Dutch colonists into disputes with the English. Van Twiller was succeeded by William Kieft, in whose time the contentions between the English and Dutch were carried to considerable lengths. Armed collisions were not uncommon, for Kieft dealt in summary fashion with all whom he deemed intruders. In 1642 he drove off a party of English who attempted to settle at the north-western end of Long Island, where they had purchased some land of the Indians, and of a person, who pretended to be an agent of the Earl of Stirling, patentee of the Council for New England. The Dutch, to mark their sovereignty over the place, set up the arms of the Prince of Orange on a tree. The Englishmen, disregarding this intimation, began to build, took down the Prince s arms, and got one of the Indians to draw a grotesque visage in its place. Kieft was 244 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1633. equally peremptory with a factory established on the Delaware by emigrants from New Haven. He destroyed the property of these men, and made the people themselves prisoners. He was also accused of disregarding complaints against the Dutch for harbouring fugitives from justice and runaway servants, for furnishing the Indians with arms and ammunition, and for purchasing goods stolen from the English. In 1643, Kieft made a counter-complaint to the federated colonies of New England, alleging encroachments on the part of Connecticut, and desiring to be informed whether, if he were to come to blows with that colony, he should draw upon himself the hostility of its fellows. Some correspondence ensued, with out anything being settled ; and shortly afterwards the Dutch, finding themselves pressed by the In dians, applied to New Haven for armed assistance. This was refused, but an offer of provisions was made instead. The temporary colonisation of Delaware by the Swedes took place in the year 1638. Twelve years earlier, Gustavus Adolphus, turning his mind to the advantages which might be derived from colonisation, had encouraged the formation of a commercial company with that object. The settle ments which it was hoped to effect in the New World were to be free from the curse of slavery, and to be open as places of refuge to all Protestant countries, and to oppressed Christendom generally. European wars, and the complications of European politics, delayed the realisation of this scheme ; but in 1638 a small number of Swedes and Finns were conducted to the Bay of Delaware by Peter Miiiuits, the first Governor of New Amsterdam, who conceived himself to have been ill-used by his own country. Lands were purchased of the natives, and a fort was erected, which the emi grants entitled Christiana after the infant Queen of their native land. The Dutch were not slow to remonstrate against this invasion of what they regarded as their own province ; for, although they would not admit the English claim of prior pos session, they were ready enough to advance a similar title themselves. Kieft sent a formal protest against the Scandinavian irruption, but did not dare to make any attempt at ousting the new comers. In a few years, upwards of a hundred families from the same northern, kingdom had arrived in Delaware ; and the official residence was established a few miles below the site of Phila delphia, in the present State of Pennsylvania. Some English also settled in the same parts ; but they were compelled to submit to Swedish juris diction. The first discovery of the Delaware is one of the many disputed questions of early American history. The Dutch claimed it for themselves, as against the Swedes ; but it seems probable that it was really due to the English. In 1610, Captain Argall entered the Bay, and called it after Lord Dela ware, who was at that time Governor of Virginia. Three years later it was found that, by a short cut, a passage for boats could be opened from the tribu taries of the Chesapeake to the Delaware River. In 1619, Captain Dernier coasted from Cape Cod to Cape Henry, explored the Delaware and the Hudson, and perceived that the Dutch had already opened a trade in furs with the Indians. This shows that the Dutch were acquainted with the country as early as 1619; but it does not prove that they knew or suspected its existence in 1610, or even in 1613. In 1631, Nathaniel Basse, a councillor of Virginia, was authorised to invite New Englanders who disliked " coldness of climate or barrenness of soil " to settle in Delaware Bay. Some Englishmen ascended the river in the fol lowing year, and were murdered by the Indians near the site of Fort Nassau, now Gloucester, in New Jersey. English enterprise was just then greatly attracted towards this part of North America.; and Sir John Lawrence, Sir Edmund Plowden, and others, petitioned the King for a grant of Long Island and thirty square miles on the mainland, to be called Sion. This petition was renewed at a subsequent date, together with a request for the small isles lying between thirty and foi*ty degrees of latitude, six leagues from the shore in Delaware Bay, and forty square leagues of the adjoining coast, to be held as a county palatine, and called New Albion,* with privileges similar to those which had been granted to the first Lord Baltimore in New foundland. The request was granted by King Charles I. on the 24th of July, 1632, when he ordered Secretary John Coke to give directions for the issuing of a patent for Long Island and the ad jacent country to Sir Edmund Plowden and his associates. Charles was anxious for an extensive examination of North America, which was still only known in a very general and imperfect way. In September, 1633, he issued to Captain Thomas Young, gentleman, of London, a special commis- sion,t authorising him to fit out ships and appoint officers for exploring all temtories of America that * Sir Edmund Plowden, in his will, dated July 29th, 1655, had the audacity to style himself "Lord, Earl Palatine, Governor, and Captain -General of the Province of New Albion in America ;" but his claim to the title of " Earl of Albion " was never recognised by the College of Arms. f Eymer s Foedem, Vol. XIX- 1638.] ENGLISH AND DUTCH ON THE DELAWARE. 245 lie wished to examine. So ample were the powers granted to this adventurer tliat English subjects were commanded not to impede his movements, even though they had received patents before the date of his commission. The expedition started in the spring of 1634, under command of Young him self, and of Lieutenant Robert Evelyn, a relative of John Evelyn, the author, and also of Young. During the same year, the explorers appear to have sailed up the Delaware in a shallop, and to have established a post at Eriwomeck, not far from the mouth of the Schuylkill, and another at a spot within the limits of the present city Of Philadelphia.* English and Dutch were now fairly struggling for the mastery in the vicinity of the Delaware. The Dutch position, Fort Nassau, was seized, in Sep tember, 1635, by Captain George Holmes and a party from Virginia. These persons were after wards captured by the Hollanders, and carried to Manhattan, whence they were sent back to James Town. Young, 011 his return to England, asked permission of the King, on behalf of himself and his associates, to take possession of any such inland countries as they might discover. Jerome Hawley, councillor of Maryland, seems to have been in some position of authority on the Delaware in 1638; for when the Swedes entered that territory, he wrote to Secretary Windebank : " Right Honourable, Upon the 20th of March last, I took the boldness to present you with my letters, wherein I gave only a touch of the business of our Assembly, referring your Honour to the general letters sent by Mr. Kemp from the Gover nor and Council. Since which time, here arrived a Dutch ship with commission from the young- Queen of Sweden, and signed by eight of the chief Lords of Sweden, the copy whereof I would have taken to send to your Honour, but the captain would not permit me to take any copy thereof, except he might have free trade for tobacco to carry to Sweden ; which being contrary to his Ma- je -ty s instructions, the Governor excused himself thereof. The ship remained here about ten days, to refresh with food and water, during which time the master of the said ship made known that both himself and another ship of his company were bound for Delaware Bay, which is the confines of Virginia and New England ; and there they pre tend to make a plantation, and to plant tobacco, which the Dutch do also already in Hudson s River, which is the very next river northward from Delaware Buy. All which being his Majesty s * NeilVs English Colonisation of America during the Seven teenth Century. territories, I humbly conceive it may be done by his Majesty s subjects of these parts making use only of some English ships that resort hither for trade yearly, and be 110 charge at all to his Ma jesty." This probably called renewed attention to the country which Dutch, Swedes, and English were alike endeavouring to monopolise; and in 1641 Evelyn, Clayborne, and two others, published in England a statement setting forth the advantages of the country north of the entrance to Delaware Bay. In this document it was alleged that Clay- borne had traded on the spot since 1627 (eleven years before the appearance of the Swedes there), and that Evelyn had resided in the region four years, and traded near the Schuylkill. Evelyn, returned to America in the following year, and Sir Edmund Plowden visited the place called Eriwo meck, and took possession of it. The Dutch, how ever, sent two .sloops from Manhattan to Fort Nassau, with orders to the commissary to enter the Schuylkill, and dispossess the English.-]- The day of English domination in this part of America had not yet arrived, and for the present the land was shared by the Dutchmen and the Swedes. In the meanwhile, affairs were not going on well in the Dutch territories. Sanguinary feuds broke out between the Europeans and the Indians. Acts of violence were committed on both sides, and a regular vendetta, after the Corsicaii fashion, set in. White men and red men alike revenged the deaths of their relatives. A bounty of ten fathom of wampum was offered for every member of the tribe of Raritans ; but severity only increased the mis chief. A popular assembly was summoned to assist the Governor with its advice, and De Vries urged the propriety of cultivating friendly relations with the natives. A deputation of Algonquin chieftains expressed their sorrow at the continual shedding of blood, and offered to pay a fine for the recent killing of a Dutchman ; but at the same time blamed the colonists for selling brandy to their com rades. The Dutchmen themselves, they ventured to remark, would fight with knives when they were drunk, and they could not expect the Indians to do better. Shortly after this interview, a party of Mohawks, armed with muskets, burst upon the Algonquins, and claimed them as tributaries. The latter begged assistance of the Dutch, and Kieft availed himself of the opportunity to attack the wretched savages, with a view to their extermina tion. On a dark winter s night in 1643, a party of soldiers from the fort at New Amsterdam, strengthened by sailors from some Dutch privateers f Xeill. 246 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1647. then lying in the harbour, crossed the Hudson, and, guided by one who was well-acquainted with the haunts of the Algonquin?, suddenly attacked the unsuspecting men, Avomen, and children encamped in the woodlands. Nearly a hundred were shot down ; children were thrown into the river, and all attempts to rescue them prevented. Dawn revealed a horrible scene of carnage ; but Kieft, so far from repenting of his atrocity, greeted the returning troops with exultation. The colonists, however, denounced the massacre as a shameful crime, and the Algonquins, made remorseless by their wrong, instituted a series of reprisals so widespread, per sistent, stealthy, and successful, that the Dutch plantations were in a little while almost ruined, and the remnant of the population talked of re turning to Holland. Many of the settlers were murdered, others carried into captivity ; while whole villages were laid in ashes. It was in one of these raids that Mrs. Hutchiiison was killed. The state of things at length became so serious that the colonists were compelled to send a deputation to the Indians to sue for peace, which it is doubtful if they would have obtained, had it not been for the mediation of Roger Williams. As it was, the peace did not last long. War again broke out, and contimied for two years. The Dutch were com manded by John Underbill, formerly of Boston, the eccentric but courageous soldier who had already distinguished himself in the English hostilities against the Pequots. The war threatened to be one of extermination ; but in 1645 peace was once more concluded. A general thanksgiving was appointed by the colony, and it was resolved to repudiate Kieft, the chief author of the mischief. He was deprived of the Governorship in 1646 ; and in 1647, or the following year, left America for his own country. Whether he would have been punished on arriving there, may be doubtful ; but he did not live to put it to the test. The ship was wrecked upon the coast of Wales, and Kieft perished in the angry sea. CHAPTER XXIX. Peter Stuyvesant, Governor of New Netherlaud His Claim to Lands Occupied by the English Violation of English Jurisdiction by Stuyvesant Negotiations between New Netherland and New England The Question referred to Arbitrators Decision of the Arbitrators against New Netherland Conquest by the Dutch of the Swedes in Delaware Flight of Dutch Colonists on the Delaware into New England Prosperity of New Amsterdam Large Immigration from various Parts of Europe Popular Assemblies Declaration of Political Eights Opposition of Stuyvesant to the Wishes of the Commonalty Contemplated Expedition by Cromwell against the Dutch Settlements New Netherland and Maryland Revolutionary Condition of the Dutch Colony Charles II. s Claims against the Dutch Conquest of New Netherland by the English. AFTER the deposition of Kieft from the Governor ship of New Netherland, the post was occupied by a man of higher character Peter Stuyvesant, a valiant soldier who had served with distinction, in the West Indies, and had also some reputation as a scholar.* He assumed office in 1646, and at once began a policy of justice towards the Indians. He likewise urged on the mother country, and at length obtained, the substitution of free trade for that system of monopoly which had previously been enforced for the advantage of the home merchant. Under his rule, the colony soon, more than recovered the prosperity it had lost. The greater part of the small island of Manhattan was still covered by primeval forest ; but the port was busy with * Stuyvesant is perhaps best known to the general reader through the amusing fictitious History of New York, written by Washington Irving in the person of a supposed Diedricli Knickerbocker. arriving and departing ships, and the merchants of Amsterdam looked forward to the day when the commerce of this remote settlement would be suffi cient to attract to itself the eager regard of Europe. Yet New Netherland had its troubles, qxiite apart from those which resulted from the hostility of Indians. The colonists were threatened towards the east by the rivalry, and as they regarded it by the encroachments, of a race to the full as enter prising and as apt to trade as themselves. The disputes with New England as to territorial rights, which had signalised previous years, broke out again under the government of Stuyvesant. As early as 1647, that official sent his Secretary to Boston, with a letter to the Governor (the elder Winthrop), expressing the good will of the Dutch towards the English community, but at the same time laying claim to all lands between the Connec ticut and the Delaware. To this letter a somewhat 248 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1650. distant answer was returned, as the western colonies of New England feared to say anything which might have the effect of barring their own claims by a seeming recognition of others. Stuyvesant, however, was invited to an interview ; and com plaint was made of the sale of arms and ammu nition by the Dutch to the Indians, and of the extortion by them of high duties from English traders. Very shortly afterwards, Stuyvesant committed an act which was a glaring violation of the English jurisdiction. He captured a Dutch vessel in the harbour of New Haven for an evasion of dues claimed by New Amsterdam. It may have been that the claim was just ; but the Dutch authorities had no more right to effect such a seizure in the waters of an English colony than to commit a similar act in the river Thames. What rendered the matter still more serious was that Stuyvesant, in writing on the subject to the aggrieved planta tion, made an implied claim to the whole territory, and directed his letter to " New Haven in the Netherlands." The authorities of that settlement were not slow in carrying out reprisals. They im prisoned three of Stuyvesant s servants who were within their government. Stuyvesant demanded their restitution, but was refused. This occurred in the autumn of 1647 ; and in March, 1648, the Dutch Governor wrote to John Winthrop, pro posing to submit the matters in dispute to him and the Governor of Plymouth, coupled, he added, " with some sort of retractation of his former claim." He had, upon, reconsideration, perceived the false situation he had blundered into, and was desirous of a reconciliation with New England, especially as the "West India Company had fallen into difficulties, and his own people were getting unruly. The Federal Commissioners, in the fol lowing September, addressed to him a joint letter, requiring to be informed what it was he proposed to refer, and what were his credentials ; reiterating former complaints; and asserting the English juris diction within the English settlements in the most emphatic manner. Perplexed as to what course he should pursue, Stuyvesant, at the close of 1648, wrote home for instructions. The execution of Charles I. in January, 1649, led to a rupture be tween England and Holland, owing to the support which the latter gave to the Royalist fugitives ; and the West India Company, doubtless fearing to bring about any further complication between the two countries, simply instructed their agent in America to live with his neighbours as amicably as he could. After one or two failures in the arran<re- o inent of preliminaries, Stuyvesant went to Hartford in September, 1650, while the Federal Commis sioners were in session there, and addressed to them a letter which he dated as from " New Nether- land." The Commissioners refused to treat until the implied pretension was abandoned. Stuyvesant acquiesced by dating his next letter " Connecticut ;" and a correspondence then ensued. Besides minor grievances, the Dutch Governor complained of the English occupation of lands lying 011 the river Con necticut. The Commissioners, on the other hand, asserted the right of English settlers to plant in that region, and derived the right from "patent, purchase, and possession." Ultimately, Stuyvesant proposed that the Commissioners should delegate two unprejudiced persons out of the colonies of Massachusetts and Plymouth, who, with two referees to be named by himself, should pronounce a judgment to be accepted as final. This was agreed to, and the arbitrators appointed were Simon Bradstreet and Thomas Prince, on the part of Mas sachusetts and Plymouth respectively, and Thomas Willett and George Baxter, English residents at New Amsterdam, on behalf of the Dutch colony. They were to bring to a conclusion the existing differences between the two parties ; to make a pro visional definition of boundaries; to determine on some course concerning fugitives; and to lay the bases of a neighbourly union. These four negotiators did not- take long in considering their award. It was made the very day after the issue of their commissions. In all essential respects the decision was against the Dutch ; and the definition of boundaries was such as to give to the English the larger part of the disputed territory, though the Dutch were allowed to push their settlements as far as Oyster Bay on Long Island, and to the neighbourhood of Greenwich on the mainland a very slight con cession, scarcely affecting the demands of the English. The settlers at New Amsterdam were greatly annoyed at this conclusion of the business, and Stuyvesant became unpopular in consequence. But it is not easy to see how lie could have acted otherwise. His cause was weak ; his resources for the assertion of a more aggressive policy were weaker still. He had no power at his disposal at all equal to that which New England could have brought into the field ; and he had every reason to believe that he would have obtained no material support from the Government of Holland in the event of an armed collision. The treaty, if such it can be called, received the approbation of the West India Company, the directors of which doubtless saw the futility of resistance ; and it was conditionally sanctioned by the States-General in a paper which 1655.] PETER STUYVESANT. 249 is the only document wherein the Dutch Republic recognises the boundaries of the settlement on the Hudson. The arrangement was never ratified in England ; but, as the reader is aware, the New England colonies were in 1650 almost entirely independent of the country which had sent them forth. Notwithstanding the arrangement dictated by the arbitrators, and submitted to by Stuyvesant, disagreements continued to arise. The New Haven people still prosecuted their colonising schemes on the Delaware, and came into frequent collisions with the rival nationality. But the chief oppo nents of the Dutch in that direction were the Swedes. The former built a fort, which they called Fort Casimir, on the site of Newcastle, within five miles of Christiana, as a protection against the Scandinavians. The Swedes, regarding this as a menace, sent a strong force against the place, and overpowered the -garrison ; but their triumph was short-lived. The Dutch West India Company gave directions to Stuyvesant to revenge their wrong, to drive the Swedes from the river, or to compel their submission. In September, 1G55, the Dutch Governor sailed into the Delaware at the head of more than six hundred men. The expedition was one unbroken series of successes ; in a little while, the whole of New Sweden, as it was called, submitted to the stronger. It had existed for about seventeen years, and the colonists, at the period of their subjection, fell short of eight hundred in number. Yet they have left some admixture of their blood among the heterogeneous elements that make up the population of the United States. They were an industrious, simple-minded, moral, and religious race, not without some clash of that wild and turbulent spirit which showed itself, centuries before, in the feats of Vikings and Berserkers. For some generations they cherished the old national sentiment, and were objects of tender interest- to the Scandinavian race. Even now, their descendants in America point with a certain pride to the tradition of their northern origin. A large portion of Delaware was shortly aftei-- wards purchased by the city of Amsterdam, which, in accordance with what in those days was con sidered good political economy, instituted a strict monopoly in its own favour. The burgomasters required of the colonists an oath of absolute obedi ence to all their past and future commands ; but this grasping policy defeated itself. The colonists, finding in a little while that the conditions under which they had emigrated were too hard to allow them any cliauce of success, fled in large numbers to the neighbouring English colonies of Maryland and Virginia. Even soldiers in garrison took every opportunity of leaving, so as to better their fortunes in lands that were less oppressed. To check this oxit-pouring, the proprietary made a law punishing with death any attempt to quit the province ; but the flight continued, and by 1657 Delaware was almost deserted. New Amsterdam fared better. It still suffered occasionally from Indian attacks ; and during the absence of Stuyvesant, on his ex pedition, to New Sweden, the Algonqnins appeared before the town in sixty-four canoes, and committed great havoc in the unprotected country. Yet, on the whole, the prosperity of the older Dutch settlement increased under the rule of Stuyvesant. The number of colonists rapidly augmented after 1650 ; commerce was pursued on a large scale, and the West India Company exercised a wise super vision over those errors of policy which the Governor at times committed, and those faults of temper into which his soldierly character occasionally betrayed him. A paternal despotism seems to have been Stuyvesant s ideal of government, and in working out this conception he arbitrarily interfered with taxation, the price of labour, the conduct of business, and the practice of religion. The Governor, as a rigid Calvinist, persecuted both Lutherans and Quakers. But the West India Company frequently interposed to moderate his crotchets and his zeal. The directors bid him strictly observe every contract, treat the merchants well, and leave to each honest citizen the peaceful enjoyment of his conscience. Religious toleration was established at an earl}- date, and Jews were permitted to settle on the island, and join in its trade. New Amsterdam speedily became a place of refuge for the oppressed of Europe, and of some parts of America too. So many English settled on Manhattan that they were provided with an English secretary, with preachers who understood the English language, and with ah English translation of the body of civil laws. These Englishmen formed an important part of the com munity, and it was probably owing to their initia tive that the Dutch acquired such liberties as they were afterwards enabled to wring from their governors. The remnant of the Piedmontese Pro testants, whose massacre moved the indignation of Milton in one of the noblest of his Sonnets, were invited by the municipality of Amsterdam to settle in New Netherland. A free passage v.-as provided for them, and several joined their fellow-believers in the New World. French Protestants also went thither, and in such large numbers that it was found necessary to issue the public documents in French, as well as in Dutch and English. Holland CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. was by this time overpeopled, and the authorities were glad to send off* the poor and unfortunate in large numbers, paying for their transit, and giving them a fresh chance in life under more favour able conditions. Farmers, mechanics, labourers, foreigners, and exiles, were the persons chiefly chosen ; for it was wisely seen that mere gentry are of little use in an infant colony. Thus stimu lated, population rapidly increased; and by 1664 New Amsterdam was a city of some importance. Unfortunately, the plantation did not escape the blight of slavery. Africans were introduced into the settlement in large numbers, and the miserable barbarian from a distant quarter of the world had no rights but such as his oppressor granted him out of mere grace and favour. But the white man himself possessed very small political influence. As previously stated, a kind of consultative assem blies, consisting of a few members deputed by the towns, had been called into existence in 1641, to assist the Governor with advice during the Indian troubles ; but these assemblies exercised little or no legislative power. Arbitrary imposts, however, were occasionally resisted by the commu nity, or by the particular interests affected. Men were not wanting who for awhile talked of opposing all popular movements by the force of cannon; but the pressure of the commonalty soon became too great to be resisted. The movement against inconsiderate and unchecked taxation was so strenuous, earnest, and general, that in 1647 a compromise was proposed and accepted, by which it was agreed that certain persons should be nomi nated by the villages, from whom the Governor should appoint tribunes, to act as magistrates in trivial cases, and, on behalf of the towns, to give their opinion when consulted. This concession was followed in 1652, after an appeal to the mother country, by further privileges, granting to the towns some kind of municipal functions ; yet the gain wa r ; not very considerable, and was limited by the controlling power of the State. In 1653, a general assembly of two deputies from each village of the colony assembled at New Amsterdam ; and Stuyvesant, though he did not like such an inno vation, was unable to gainsay it. The remonstrance and petition to which this assembly agreed, and which was drafted by the Englishman George Baxter, was a firm expression of political principles, such as the popular party in England had already triumphantly asserted in the House of Commons and on the field of battle. In effect, it ran : "The States-General of the United Provinces are our liege lords ; we submit to the laws of the United Provinces ; and our rights and privileges ought to be in harmony with those of the Father land, for we are a member of the State, and not a subjugated people. We, who have come together from various parts of the world, and are a blended community of various lineage ; we, who have at our own expense exchanged our native lands for the protection of the United Provinces ; we, Avho have transformed the wilderness into fruitful farms, demand that no new laws shall be enacted, but with consent of the people ; that none shall l>e appointed to office, but with the approbation of the people ; that obscure and obsolete laws shall never be revived."* A more decided expression of popxilar rights could not be found, even in the annals of revo lutionary France. The principles of government to which modern Europe is every day rapidly approximating had their birth, or at least their first practical application, in America more than two hundred years ago. Englishmen and Dutchmen, beginning the world there under fresh conditions, freed from the trammels both of monarchy and feudalism, sought their ideal of government in the consent of the governed. But in New Netherland the attempt met with strong opposition. The petition of 1653 was not favourably received by Stuyvesant. He looked with contempt on the no tion of men governing themselves ; denounced the wishes of the petitioners as absurdly extravagant ; asked if they would set their names to the visionary aspirations of New Englanders ; and demanded \vhether none of the Dutch nation could be found to draft their petition. He stated in his reply that laws would continue to be made by the Governor and Council ; and added that, as evil manners led to good laws for their restraint, the institutions of New Netherland must be good a compliment to the manners of the settlers which could hardly have repaired the damaged popularity of Stuyvesant. If, said the Governor, the people elected their own officers, every man would vote for one of his own stamp the thief for a thief, the smuggler for a smuggler ; so that fraud and vice would be authorised. This is the fundamental argument of all who deny popular rights an argument as confi dently advanced to-day as in previous ages, though probability was against it from the first, and ex perience has again and again shown its falsity. Communities are seldom so depraved that the smuggler and the thief form a majority ; and it is a fact within the observation of most men that the collective sentiment of societies is generally on the side of what is fair and reasonable, and always in * As quoted by Mr. Bancroft, who has compressed as well as translated the original Dutch- 1653.] NEW ENGLAND AND NEW NETHERLAND. 2-51 advance of tliat of their worst members. It is the unrestrained despots, the privileged aristocracies, the little coteries that are banded together for purposes of self-interest, the demagogues who make street revolutions in the name of the masses they afterwards dread to consult, it is these who are the real dangers to a State, the real supporters of whatever is false, and cruel, and dishonest. If there is one lesson to be derived from history, it is that nations may be trusted with their own interests. Yet it is a lesson which the privileged and the timid seem never capable of learning. In their rejoinder to Stuyvesant s reply, the petitioners said that they designed nothing but the good of the country and the maintenance of freedom. Nature, they urged, permits all men to constitute society, and assemble for the protection of liberty and property a democratic doctrine, anticipating those declarations of the Rights of Man which dis tinguished the close of the eighteenth century. This was perhaps taking rather higher ground than was prudent. Stiiyvesant was probably alarmed, fearing some incursion of that Deluge which it is the self-appointed task of men such as he to fend off with little molehills of sand. He pronounced the dissolution of the assembly, and commanded its members to disperse on pain of severe punishment. In his farewell message he haughtily observed that he derived his authority from God and the West India Company a conjunction which might savour of irreverence, if it were possible to suspect so grave a Calvinist of any such feeling. This time he had the support of liis principals, the West India pro prietors. They wrote to him that they approved of the taxes he proposed to levy. They exhorted him to have no regard to the consent of the people ; to let them no longer indulge the idle dream that taxes could be imposed only by the consent of the governed. Here was imprudence on the part of the Company. The people would not submit to so high-handed a policy, expressed with so much insolence. The taxes were refused, and thoughts were entertained of soliciting the more liberal rule of England. It so happened that at this very time a feeling of animosity against the Government of New Netherland was strongly excited in the confede rated colonies of New England. To the grievances of former years was added a suspicion that Stuy- vesant had entered into a plot with the Mohawks, the Nyantics, and other Indians, to attack the colonies of Connecticut and New Haven. We have related in a previous Chapter the discussions which took place in the Federal Council on this subject, and have shown how the desire for imme diate war, which was shared by three out of the four members of the League, was restrained by the greater coolness and prudence of Massachusetts. Though the Federation was thus withheld from going to \^ar in its corporate capacity, individunj colonies still thirsted for revenge. In October, 1653, the General Court of New Haven determined to seek the assistance of the mother country in chastising the New Netherlander. Connecticut was equally well-disposed to the same plan of action ; and circumstances favoured it. Cromwell, in the prosecution of his war with Holland, thought it would not be bad policy to strike a vigorous blow ngainst the Dutch plantations in America, and ac cordingly sent a small fleet across the Atlantic, to take possession of New Netherland. It was under the command of Robert Sedgwick and John Leverett, both of them Massachusetts colonists, who had recently been in England. On . the arrival of these ships at Boston, in June, 1654, both Con necticut and New Haven offered every assistance in their power for furthering the design, whether with or without the co-operation of Massachusetts ; and considerable preparations for war were being made when news arrived that peace had been concluded between the two parent States. Stuy- vesant was alarmed when he heard of the projected blow, and in great haste sent off to New Haven to inquire if the statement were true ; but by that time the proclamation of peace had altered the position of affairs. A few months previously, however, Underbill, who in former years had fought on the side of the Dutch, sailed up the Connecticut to the Dutch house at Hartford, and posted a notice that, by permission of the Genera! Court of Connecticut, he seized upon the place as belonging to enemies of the Commonwealth of England. But the General Court of Connecticut afterwards repudiated his act. All this while, New Netherland continued on very good terms with Virginia, whose interests in no respects clashed with her own. Even during the war between England and Holland, Virginia and the Dutch settlement . on the banks of the Hudson preserved the most perfect amity and good will. With Maryland, however, there was a cause of disagreement. The agent of Lord Bal timore claimed the southern bank of the Delaware, as being included in the Maryland patent. To this the Dutch replied that they had purchased the land from the natives, and colonised it, before the patent to the first Lord .Baltimore was issued.. It was not denied that such was the case ; but the representatiA-e of the Mai-yland proprietor still urged his claim, and hinted at maintaining it by 1663.] DECAY OF NEW NETHERLAND. 253 force. Interviews between the contending parties took place in 1659 and subsequent years, but no agreement was arrived at. The West India Com pany (which had not yet sold that particular part of Delaware to the city of Amsterdam) refused to yield an inch of territory, and resolved to defend its possessions, even to the shedding of blood.* The colony of Maryland was unable to seize on the coveted territory, and the two disputants continued to watch one another with a wary eye. equivalent to saying that New Netherland had, of right, no separate existence at all a conclusion to which that plantation could not be expected to accede. The time was a very harassing one for the Dutch. The settlers on the banks of the Esopus were attacked by savages, and murdered or carried into captivity. A state of war ensued, and was stopped only by the approach of winter. Inter nally, the colony was in a rotten and dangerous condition. It swarmed with poor so much so, VIEW IN DELAWARE. After the restoration of Charles II., the prospects of New Netherland became very unpromising. Massachusetts and Connecticut urged their claims to certain portions of the Dutch territory, and the latter of those two English colonies even proceeded to take actual possession of lands towards the Hudson. Stuyvesant complained to the Council of the United Colonies more than once in the year 1663, but without obtaining redress. He was told that the original grant from the States-General bestowed no more than commercial privileges, and that Con- A O f necticut by its charter extended to the Pacific. This, as the agents of Connecticut frankly avowed, was * Albany Records. 22 according to the Albany Records, that it was difficult to provide for their relief. Education languished, and almost died out. The settlers, knowing they were little better than the property of a corpora tion, hung back from going to the relief of villages that were threatened by the Indians, and demanded protection of the paid soldiers which the Company maintained. Such was the inevitable effect of a political condition which denied to men their natural rights, and made them the instruments by which other men, thousands of miles away, were enabled to get rich. Stuyvesant at length felt compelled, notwithstanding his horror of popular legislation, to summon an assembly. It met in 1663; an other and larger diet followed in 1664; but the 254 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATICS. [166-1. deliberations of the Governor and delegates resulted in no harmony of feeling or unity of aim. There was every reason to believe that the colony would soon be invaded by England ; yet nothing was agreed on as to the method of defence. The people still looked to their proprietors and to the home Govern- meiit for protection against both internal and external enemies. On the other hand, Stuyvesant expected the people to help themselves. Matters grew worse every day. Portions of the colony were in open revolt, or in a mood of sullen dis content. The Connecticut men continued their advance, and purchased lands of the Indians with out paying the least heed to the jurisdiction of the Hollanders. Danger from without was met by yet more fatal dangers from within.* Charles II., forgetting his hospitable treatment by the Dutch Republic when he was an exile, seems to have resolved, shortly after his accession, to attack the Low Countries, and wrest from them whatever possessions they held in the New World. Pretexts were easily found, and a war ensued which is one of the least glorious in English history. Hostilities were still going on when the small fleet containing the four Royal Commissioners was de spatched to New England in 1664. Three or four hundred troops were on board the vessels, and it was part of the instructions issued to the Com missioners that they were to overthrow the usurped authority of the Dutch, and, if they could manage it, obtain the co-operation of the New England colonies to that end. The King s claim was founded on the discovery of the mainland of North America by the Cabots, which certainly preceded that of any other navigators, and on the fact of James I. having, in 1606, granted the whole continent be tween the 34th and 45th degrees of latitude to the London and Plymouth Companies. This grant was prior, by about three years, to Hudson s dis covery of the river now called after him, and of the adjacent country. The policy of the English Government was no doubt grasping, but it cannot be said to have been wholly devoid of reason and justice, as States at that time judged such matters. Not only had the Cabots, at the head of an English expedition, been the first to reveal the northern half of the western continent to European eyes ; not only had James, on the faith of that discovery, assigned the land to certain corporations ; but particular discoveries of regions now claimed by the Dutch such as Gosnold s about Cape Cod had been made from time to time. If a general discovery of lands on the Hudson gave the Dutch * Banoroft s History of the United States, Vol. II., chap. 16. a pretext for excluding the Swedes and New Englanders from special localities, although un occupied by any white people, the general discovery of North America by English seamen gave the Government of England a right to exclude the representatives of other Powers. The argument was ungenerous and impolitic all round ; but, as against the Dutch, Charles II. had some case. What made the position of the Hollanders still weaker, if not in strict international law, yet in the estimation of ordinary Englishmen, was the circum stance that the discovery of the Hudson had been made by an Englishman in command of a vessel partly manned by Englishmen, though belonging to a Dutch Company. This, perhaps, was not much. The elder Cabot was a Venetian acting in the service of England. Columbus was a Genoese acting in the service of Spain. Such instances of sea-rovers giving their courage and ability to what ever nation would employ them, were frequent in the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries, and were not understood to invalidate the right of any Power under whose flag a discovery was made. Yet the fact in cjuestioii introduced an apparent flaw into the claim of Holland. As regards the Connecticut River, there was some doubt as to whether the Dutch or the English had the better title to its possession. It is probable, though not certain, that the former were the first to explore that stream ; but, according to one of the early settlers, Morton, they told the Plymouth people that they would find it a good place for planting and trade, and thus parted with their exclusive right. In consequence of these repre sentations, confirmed by the reports of Indians, some adventurous spirits from the Pilgrim colony undertook the plantation in 1633. The Dutch, who had already built a fort a little above the present town of Hartford, threatened to fire 011 the emigrants ; but they proceeded in spite of these threats, erected a trading-house at Windsor, pur chased lands of the Indians, and established settle- ments.t The contention of the Dutch that they alone were entitled to Connecticut was therefore doubtful, to say the least. However these matters may have been, Charles II. determined to make himself master of New Netherland. He had granted to his brother, the Duke of York, the whole territory from the Connec ticut to the Delaware, though this was a violation of the alleged rights both of the Dutch and English settlers. As soon as the Royal Commissioners had arrived at Boston, they informed the authorities f Belknap s American Biography, the Editor to Art. "Bradford." Edition 1843. Note by 1664.] CAPTURE OF NEW AMSTERDAM. 255 there of his Majesty s design to attack the -Dutch, and solicited assistance from Massachusetts. The General Court accordingly made an order for calling out two hundred volunteers, with proper organisa tion and supply, much to the surprise and chagrin of the Hollanders, who expected that the request would be refused. A curious proof of this is to be found in a letter addressed by the Directors of the Dutch West India Company to the Directors and Council of New Netherlaud, April 21st, 1664. " His Royal Majesty of Great Britain," they wrote, " being inclined to reduce all his kingdoms under one form of government in Church and State, hath taken care that Commissioners are ready in England to repair to New England to install Bishops there, the same as in Old England. We believe that the English of the North [i.e., to the north of New Amsterdam], who mostly left England for the afore said causes, will not give us henceforth so much trouble, and will prefer to live under us with freedom of conscience, rather than risk that in order to be rid of our authority, and then again to fall under a government from which they formerly fled."* Events showed that the Directors were quite mistaken in their forecast. The people of Massachusetts, much as they suspected the Govern ment of Charles II., had no reason to believe that they would be better off under the arbitrary rule of colonial Dutch. Moreover, they did not forget that they were Englishmen. Pride of race had prob ably its share in the determination of their course. Stuyvesant, having reason to anticipate the im pending attack, was in some degree prepared for it. New Amsterdam was not ill fortified, and might perhaps have held out against an enemy, if the Governor could have depended on the spirit of the people. But the colonists were alarmed and dis affected, and Stuyvesant, however well inclined to fight, knew that he had not at his command the stuff of which soldiers are made. The English fleet, having passed up the Narrows, moored off the battery in August, 1664, while a camp of New England volunteers was formed on the opposite shores of Long Island. The four Commissioners were on board the fleet, together with John Win- * O Callaghan s Documents relative to the Colonial History cf New York, Vol. II. throp the Younger, and two officers from Massa chusetts. A joint committee, appointed by the Governor and the city, demanded of Nichols, the principal Commissioner, the cause of his presence. He replied by sending Colonel Cartwright and a party of soldiers with a summons to surrender, in immediate acknowledgment of English sovereignty ; on which condition the security of the inhabitants, in life, liberty, and property, would be guaranteed. Winthrop advised his personal friends, of whom he had many in the town, to accept these terms. Stuyvesant a man who had already lost a leg in the wars of his country answered that such an act would be reproved in Holland. For himself, he declared his willingness to die rather than yield ; but the people were of a different mind. The burgomasters required a copy of the letter sent by Colonel Nichols, and, not being able to obtain it, called the principal inhabitants to the town hall, where a resolution was carried, to the effect that the community ought to know all that concerned its welfare. The letter was again demanded, and Stuyvesant passionately tore it into pieces. The burgomasters then drew up a protest against their Governor, and the general disaffection grew more serious every hour. The citizens refused to be en rolled as volunteers in defence of the place ; in the small body of regular troops, amounting to no more than a hundred and fifty, symptoms of mutiny became apparent. After negotiations with the English Commissioners on board their vessel, a capitulation was agreed to on the 29th of August, and unanimously accepted at a meeting of the people, though it was not ratified by Stuyvesant until the surrender had virtually been made. The customs, religion, and municipal institutions of the Dutch were left intact, and the people were so well satisfied that only a small proportion returned to Holland. A few days later, Fort Orange surren dered, and was renamed Albany from the Scotch title of the Duke of York.t This was followed, early in October, by the capitulation of the Dutch and Swedes on the Delaware ; and the English flag now floated over the whole Atlantic coast, from the northern extremity of Maine to the southern limits of Virginia. f Albany is an old traditionary or poetical name of Scotland. CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1661 CHAPTER XXX. New York in 1664 New Boundaries of Connecticut Liberal Treatment of the conquered Dutch Territory Separation of New Jersey from the Eest of the Dutch Possessions A Free Constitution granted to New Jersey Population of that Province Growth of a Feeling of Discontent Colonel Nichols Deputy-Governor of New York Claims of Maryland Arbitrary System of Government in New York Resistance of the People to excessive Taxation Renewed War between England and Holland Reconquest of New York by the Dutch Jealousy in England of" the Dutch and the New Englanders Major Edmund Andros Dispute between the Dutch and the Government of Connecticut Determination of the Federal Council to resist the Aggressions of the Dutch Extensive Military and Naval Preparations Extensive Seizure of English Ships Contention for the Command of English Villages at the East End of Long Island Further Proceedings of Connecticut on the same Island Fury of the Dutch at the Restitution of New York to the English Claims of Andros on Connecticut Territory Encounter at Fort Saybrook Policy of the Duke of York in the Government of his Province Grant of a Constitution, and its Subsequent Abolition. NEW AMSTERDAM became New York the moment the English flag floated over its public buildings. The population of the place at this period has been estimated at fifteen hundred,* and the town itself was not without some slight pretensions to dignity of appearance. It was built, not of timber or lath- and-plaster, like the majority of new colonial settlements, but of brick and stone, roofed with red and black tiles.t The Dutch sense of substantial domestic comfort had shown itself thus early, and old Amsterdam might not have been ashamed to confess kinship with its humble namesake at the mouth of the Hudson. Colonel Nichols, as soon as he had taken military possession of the town, was proclaimed Deputy-Governor : it was the dis charge of his duties in this capacity that kept him so much away from Boston and the other New England towns when his fellow-Commissioners were afterwards endeavouring to fulfil the commands of the King. In 1667, at the peace of Breda, New York was confirmed to the English, who, in exchange, ceded Surinam to the Dutch. The country now forming the State of New Jersey was called Albania, and Long Island was redesignated York shire. Connecticut hoped to receive some benefit from the conquest, and sent Winthrop and four others to New York to argue the question of boun daries with the representatives of his Majesty. The decision of the latter was, that the southern boundary of Connecticut was the sea, and that Long Island (which Connecticut would fain have possessed) was to be under the Government of the Duke of York. The western boundary was to be defined by a creek or river called Momo- ronook (reputed, according to the Commissioners, to be about twelve miles to the east of West Chester), and by a line drawn from its east point or side in a north-north-westerly direction towards the limits of Massachusetts. It was this decision * Brodhead s History of New York. t Neal s History of New England, Vol. II., chap. 8. which made it manifest to the General Court of New Haven that the incorporation of that colony with Connecticut had the support of the Royal agents, and could no longer be resisted. The transfer of New Netherland to English dominion proved very generally satisfactory to the inhabitants. They acquired in this way a greater amount of liberty than they had possessed under Dutch rule, and their sense of nationality was not violently outraged. The towns were allowed to choose their own magistrates, and Manhattan was permitted to elect deputies for the discussion of public affairs. The Navigation Act was not to come into operation for six months, and during that period direct inter course with Holland remained open. That portion of New Netherland which lay between the Hudson and the Delaware was assigned by the Duke of York to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Carteret, proprietors of Carolina ; and to this new province, which received the name of New Jersey, very con siderable liberties were granted. An assembly, composed of the Governor and Council, and of an equal number of popular delegates, was summoned, and security of person and property was guaranteed by laws thus made. There was to be no taxation except by the assembly ; and civil and religious freedom received every guarantee which it is pos sible for a body of proprietors to give. It was, indeed, provided that the proprietors should have a veto on provincial enactments, and on the appoint ment of judicial officers and executive authorities; biit the substantial rights of the colonists were secured by express stipulations. The Indians were to receive satisfaction for their lands, and these were to be leased to the settlers at a moderate quit- rent, which was not to be collected until the expira tion of six years after the conquest. Unfortunately, however, the introduction of slavery was permitted, and even encouraged. The population of New Jersey in 1664 was very small. A few Swedes were there, and a few Dutch. The land had been sighted by Verazzano as early as 1675.] NEW JERSEY AND NEW YORK. 257 1524, and Hudson had landed some of his men on its shores when exploring the great river in 1609. But several successive attempts at colonising had either failed, or but partially succeeded. In 1663, some of the New England Puritans, who had been Jiving on Long Island, solicited of the Dutch per mission to establish an independent colony, with powers of self-government, on the banks of the Raritan and the Minnisink. After the transfer of the territory to an English company, these Puritans were permitted to settle on Newark Bay, although, as the lands had been previously disposed of to a Dutchman, the later grant was open to question, and became the subject of much dispute. A few Quaker families found their way to the province in 1664. Other patents w^ere issued with an almost prodigal liberality, and by 1665 the coast of New Jersey was dotted over with small plantations and little villages, the scattered outworks of civilisation. Philip Carteret was appointed Governor, and re ceived the submission of the colonists. Four houses were erected into the dignity of a town, which became the capital of the province ; and this so-called town was entitled Elizabethtown, in honour of Lady Carteret. A number of Puritans from New Haven established themselves in the colony, and succeeded in giving a decidedly Puritan colour to its institu tions. New Jersey in a few years began to acquire importance ; but in 1670 an unlucky dispute broke out. The quit-rent Avhich was due to the proprietors at that date was disputed by many of the colonists. They had paid the Indians for their land, and did not see why they should give any thing further to a body of proprietors from whom they did not appear to receive the least equivalent. Both Nichols and Carteret had authorised the purchases from the natives, and therefore could not now plead ignorance of the arrangement. Never theless, the rents were demanded, and as persist ently refused. Great discontent was excited in the colonists, and in May, 1672, they sent deputies to a constituent assembly, which deposed Philip Carteret, and transferred his office to James Car teret, a natural son of Sir George, the co-proprietor of New Jersey. Philip returned to England for fresh instructions, leaving a deputy in the nominal occupation of his place. He resumed his government in 1675, and from that time followed a very liberal course. The pay ment of the quit-rents was postponed ; liberty of conscience was granted, together with representative institutions. Trade with England, being unen cumbered with customs, sprang up into active life ; and the commerce of New York suffered so much in consequence, that the la.tter settlement required the ships of its neighbour to pay tribute. The Governor of New York even entered New Jersey, and endeavoured to override its Assembly by the King s patent to his brother. The members, how ever, replied that they were the representatives of the freeholders of the province, and that they found the guarantee of their liberties, not in his Majesty s patent, but in Magna Charta. The connection of New Jersey with William Penn, after the sale of the province by the trustees of Sir George Carteret, we shall have to describe at large in a future chapter. But it should here be added that this part of America received an accession to its popula tion, in 1 685, by the arrival of a number of Scotch emigrants, who had left their own country after the cruel persecution by which Charles II. endeavoured to supplant Presbyterianism by Episcopacy. In 1688, New Jersey, having been menaced by King James with a diminution of its liberties, in con sequence of infringements of the Navigation Laws, surrendered its independent existence, and was annexed to New York. The remainder of the colony of New Nethei*- land, after the severance of New Jersey, continued under the direction of Nichols, who was much annoyed at the dismemberment. Nichols, though an honourable man, was inclined to despotic ideas in government, and New York did not share all the liberties of its neighbour on the other side of the Hudson. The Deputy-Governor had enough to do to keep things quiet, and resist rival claims. Lord Baltimore continued to assert his right to Delaware ; but Nichols denied it as strenuously as the Dutch had done before him. The Mary landers at one time endeavoured to settle the matter by force, and made an armed attack on Lewistown, situated on Delaware Bay. But the country was immediately reclaimed, as belonging to the Duke of York, and the Marylanders did not renew their attempt. The rule of Nichols was firm, but not very liberal. The city of New York and the town of Albany were left in the enjoyment of their municipal franchises ; but the province itself re ceived no political constitution. It was governed by Nichols, assisted by a council devoted to his views. The judges were appointed by himself, and removable at his pleasure. The laws, therefore, and the application of those laws, were mainly in the hands of the Deputy-Governor, who ruled his little subject population according to what seemed good in his own eyes. In the year 1665, an elective assembly was held at Hempstead, in Long Island, for the settlement of some trifling local questions ; but this is the only instance of the kind under the supervision of Colonel Nichols. It is thought that 258 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1673. on the same occasion the rate of public charges was determined ; it is certain that the deputies, before separating, agreed to a very loyal address to the Duke of York, for which they were afterwards ridiculed by their constituents, among whom were many holding republican views. Nichols became unpopular, and added to his ill-repute among the multitude by requiring fresh title-deeds from those who held their lands under Dutch patents, and levying heavy fees for their renewal. He was suc ceeded, in 1667, by another Deputy-Governor, who was even more absolute. This official laid it down as a principle in politics that the best method for keeping people in order is to act with severity, and to impose such taxes as should leave them no liberty for thinking, except as to how they should discharge their debt to the State. The fate of Charles I. had evidently been wasted on the new Deputy-Governor, who could not think of the people in any other light than as a vile body upon which to make curious experiments. He very nearly drove the Swedes and Finns on the southern shore of the Delaware into rebellion ; but, his power being greater than theirs, he managed to carry out his experiments, and get in his taxes. This condition was not likely to last. It was openly challenged in 1670. The towns began to c bject to so arbitrary a rule, and the villages, taking courage from their example, demanded legislation by annual assemblies. Lovelace, the Deputy- Governor, would not listen to these complaints and requisitions, but at once resorted to his favourite panacea of imposing taxes. He issued an order for a large sum of money, to be expended in defence of the possession against the attacks of ex ternal enemies. The purpose was a legitimate one, but the people were not inclined to fulfil it without some guarantee that their rights would be respected in the future. Three of the towns in Long Island expressed their willingness to contribute, if they were at the same time granted the privileges of New England. Other municipalities in the same island refused to pay anything, and denounced the decree of the Deputy-Governor as an outrage on the liberties of Englishmen, and a violation of English law. When the votes of these towns were presented to Lovelace and his Council, they were received with the utmost indignation. It was de clared that they were scandalous, illegal, and sedi tious, and an order was made that they should be publicly burnt before the town hall. Lovelace had already discovered that people are not neces sarily restrained from murmuring because they have received sufficient cause to murmur. Whether from want of funds or from maladmin istration, the defences of New York were left unrepaired, and the city was in a very exposed condition when, in 1672, war again broke out between England and the Dutch Republic. Charles II. had entered into an alliance with the King of France, and the destruction of Holland was one of the designs which both hoped to accomplish. The English monarch, even before the declaration of war, perfidiously attacked a convoy of Dutch mer chant-ships while in the Channel returning from a voyage to the Levant ; and when it was openly announced that a state of hostilities was to be considered as existing between the two Powers, the reasons given were so frivolous as to create a feeling of shame in all just men. The Dutch had abundant cause to consider themselves outraged, and they seized on the opportunity for regaining possession of their American colony. On the 30th of July, 1673, a small Dutch squadron, commanded by Cornelius Evertsen and Jacob Binkes, arrived at Staten Island, and prepared to attack the out works of New York, when the captain of a volun teer company, who had command of the fort, sent a messenger to the fleet, and suggested terms of surrender. The two Dutchmen had already made a descent on Virginia, without effecting any thing ; but they were now to succeed in their design. Lovelace was absent at the time ; the garrison of New York was not strong enough to resist with any chance of success ; the fortifications Avere weak ; and the people were disaffected towards their rulers, because of the grasping and selfish tyranny to which they had been subjected. In short, the same causes which led to the easy conquest of the Dutch settlement by the English, now favoured its return into Dutch hands. The people had no heart to fight, for they had little which they could call their own. The material defences had been neglected by the very authorities who had arrogated so much power to themselves ; and the day of retribution came with a swiftness and strength which nothing could gainsay. Eight hundred men were landed by the Dutch, who, after a short and almost bloodless struggle, which can only be regarded as a feigned defence, entered the city. Fort Albany was speedily conquered ; New Jersey and Delaware cheerfully submitted to the stronger ; and nearly all the territory formerly constituting NCAV Netherland returned to itn former allegiance.* The component parts of this territory received many privileges which reconciled them to the change in their condition. In England, the news was of * Bancroft, Palfrey, and other authorities. 1074.] VICISSITUDES OF NEW YORK. 259 course received with much annoyance. The Council for Trade and Foreign Plantations proposed a plan for the recovery of the province or provinces ; but no attempt was made to put it in execution. In the paper containing the particulars of this plan, Lord Shaft esbury wrote, with reference to the New Englanders : " If the Dutch shall continue to be their neighbours, they may enter into commerce that this was in a great degree the result of mis management did not mitigate the gravity of the political state. The foreign policy of the restored monarchy had been marked by so much that was unfortunate and disgraceful that England could not afford many more disasters. The loss of New Netherland, had it not been redeemed, would have endangered the English power over the whole of LONG ISLAND. with them, whereby it is to be feared they will at present divert a great part of the trade of England into those countries, and lay a foundation for such a union hereafter between them and Holland as will be very prejudicial to all your Majesty s plan tations, if not terrible to England itself."* The return of New Netherland into Dutch hands, coming at a period when disaffection was rife in New England, was certainly a serious fact. English influence on the North American continent was threatened to an extent which naturally excited the apprehensions of the King s Ministers ; and * O Callaghan s Documents relative to the Colonial History of New York. America; and with the loss of dominion in tho New "World the growing fortunes of England would have suffered an eclipse, from which it would have taken years to recover. It was thus a relief to Charles II. and his advisers when, at the peace of 1674, a clause was agreed to, by which the parties to the war were to make restitu tion to one another of all conquered places. In accordance with this stipulation, New Netherland returned to English dominion, and was again de signated New York. It had been fifteen months in the military occupation of the Dutch ; but its semi-English character was not greatly affected by this episode. The province was now placed under the direction of Major Edmund Andros, a gentleman thirty-seven years of age, belonging to a Guernsey family, of English origin. In his youth he had been a page in the Royal service, and during the Common wealth had fought in the army of Prince Henry of Nassau. He was for a time attached to the house- J60 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1674. hold of the Princess Palatine, grandmother of George I., and after the accession of Charles II. exhibited his military qualities to some effect in the first Dutch war. In 1672 he was made Major in a regiment of dragoons; and, having married an heiress, he was, at the period of his appointment to the Lieutenant- Governorship of New York as deputy of the King s brother, a man of personal influence, and of considerable wealth. In subsequent years he acted a very important part in American history, and his memory has hitherto been hateful to most New England ers.* But in 1674 he was an untried man, and his experience of the world, together with the fact of his being placed by fortune above the temptation of enriching himself by arbitrary or exceptional means, appeared to give him many favourable qtialifications for the fulfilment of an office which required firmness, business faculty, temper, and some power of judging the varied characteristics and humours of men. While the Dutch were at New York during their brief second occupation, a dispute arose between them and the rulers of Connecticut, which to some extent involved the other colonies also. The towns at the west end of Long Island, nearest to New York, submitted to the Hollanders ; but those at the eastern extremity refused to become the subjects of a foreign. Power, and desired to be reannexed to Connecticut, to which they had for merly belonged. Connecticut soon found cause of offence against the Dutch, of which she was not slow to avail herself. Dutch cruisers sailed up and down the Sound, capturing English vessels. This was resented by Connecticut, and the General Court authorised a levy of five hundred dragoons, and appointed officers for a force which might be drafted for foreign service. Allyn, the Colonial Secretary, wrote to the Dutch commander at New York, re monstrating with him on his seizure of English ships, and setting forth that the United Colonies of New England were keepers of the liberties of King Charles s subjects in those parts, and hoped to acquit themselves of that trust, for the preservation of his Majesty s colonies in New England. To this th Dutch very reasonably replied that they had been sent out for the express purpose of doing as much injury as they could to the enemies of Hol land. Thus baffled, Connecticut convoked a special meeting of the Federal Commissioners, which took place at Hartford. Their deliberations resulted in * A great deal of the odium heretofore attached to his cha racter has been recently removed hy the publication of a series of "Andros Tracts," in 3 vols., by the Prince Society of Boston, U.S. The editor, Mr. William H. Whitmore, has shown conclusively, in a, careful memoir, that he was liot so black as he had been painted. an expression of approval of the course followed by Connecticut, and in a recommendation to each of the three colonies to adopt military precautions against any invasion of the territory which might be attempted. The General Court of Massachusetts, which met in. September, 1673, took a very sceptical view of the crisis, declared that they did not see sufficient occasion for being called away from their homes at so busy a period of the year, and finally determined to do nothing further in the business than to make provision for their own safety. In other words, they believed in the danger sufficiently to prepare for their separate defence, but not sufficiently to join in any general defence of the Federation. Connecticut, displeased with this selfishness, wrote to the defaulting colony on the subject in October ; and Massachusetts replied in a tone of great irritation. By December, the General Court of Boston had been brought to a different state of mind. They now perceived that it was necessary to take active steps for encounter ing the Dutch, and accordingly, in March, 1674, gave order,? that the fortifications at Boston, Charles- town, Salem, and Portsmouth, should be repaired, and that a force of five hundred and fifty foot soldiers, and a hundred and ten horse, should be placed under the command of Major -General Denisoii. They also commissioned two armed vessels, one carrying twelve guns, the other eight, for the vindication, as they expressly stated, of the honour and reputation of themselves and of their nation, for securing their peaceable trade in the Sound, and for repressing the insolence of the Dutch. These vessels are said to have been the first regular cruisers employed by the American colonists. The Massachusetts authorities had already directed the importation of sixty pieces of artillery from Bilbao, and five hundred firelocks from England. Plymouth refused to take any part against her old friends," the Dutch, although every day must have shown that the danger was real and serious. English ships were seized wherever they could be found, and no distinction was made between the merchant-vessels of Old and those of New England. The Dutch, indeed, were perfectly justified, accord ing to the law of nations, in refusing to recognise any such difference. But they were certainly not justified in a breach of good faith which a contem porary writer imputes to them. It is alleged that they promised to exchange some English vessels which they had taken against an equal number of their own, but that, after obtaining the latter, they refused to give up the former. However this may have been, a state of war between the Dutch com manders at Amsterdam and the English colonies 1674.] THE ENGLISH AGAIN AT NEW YORK. 261 was in full force before the end of October, 1673. On the 21st of that month, Allyn addressed another letter on behalf of the Connecticut Govern ment to the commander at New Amsterdam, threat ening that, if he went too far in provoking the English colonies, they would attack him at his head-quarters. The messenger who took this letter was forcibly detained by the Dutch for a fortnight, and then sent back with a reply from Anthony Col ve, the Governor of the rival settlement, addressed to Winthrop. Colve affected to discredit the authen ticity of the communication, which he said was too impertinent and absurd to have emanated from the Governor and General Court : consequently, he deemed it unworthy of an answer. It appeared from the report of the messenger that Colve was a resolute and passionate man, and that he had boasted that perhaps erelong he should be in pos session of Hartford. The vapouring, therefore, was not confined to Connecticut. The Dutch, possessing considerable power, acted witli vigour, though with no great success. On the 6th of November, they had an encounter in the Sound. A ship was despatched from New Am sterdam, carrying three commissioners charged with the duty of reclaiming the English towns at the east end of Long Island. It so chanced that they fell in with a vessel from New London, in which were Fitz-Jolm Winthrop, son of the Governor, and Mr. Wyllys, a Magistrate of Connecticut, who showed the Dutch commander a commission which they wei e to execute, and which directed them to go to the island in question, and treat with any Dutch forces they might find there, so as to divert them from resorting to hostilities against the people, on pain of provoking the Government of Connecticut to a due consideration of what they should next do. The Dutch do not seem to have been at all awe struck at the prospect of Connecticut s considering what its next step should be. They allowed the English Commissioners to land at Southold, near the east end of the island, where they also landed themselves. The people were found under arms, and they resolutely rejected the demand of the Hollanders. Some Aallagers from Southampton, situated on the southern shore, were also present, and spoke in language of the utmost boldness. Pointing to the flag of the Prince of Orange, one of them said, "Take care that you come not Avith that thing within range of shot of our village." Wiuthrop then asked the Dutchmen where they intended to go next, for that he and his associate would go to the same place too. It was apparent to the Hollanders that they could effect nothing by visiting the other two villages, and would cause awkward collisions by so doing ; accordingly, they returned to New Amsterdam on the following day. Some months afterwards in February, 1674 a party under the command of Fitz-Jolm Winthrou went ovfer to Southold, at the request of the English colonists in that vicinity. The official designation of the commander was "Sergeant-Major over the military forces of his Majesty s subjects oil Long Island ; " and it soon became evident that his presence was not superfluous. Intelligence came to him that four Dutch vessels, bound for Southold, were lying at New York, waiting only for a favour able wind to carry them eastward along the Sound. Fitz-Jolm Winthrop prepared for resistance, and called for reinforcements from the neighbouring English settlements. On the vessels appearing, their commander summoned the colonists to submit, and threatened, in the event of a refusal, to exter minate all with fire and s\yord. As the small force 011 shore disdained to-yi^ld, the ships opened fire 011 the town ; the town replied, and, after a bloodless interchange of shots, the little squadron sailed off. The Dutch had met with more resistance than was probably expected, and they did not renew the attempt. The spirits of the two commanders at New Amsterdam were much depressed at this time, though from what cause is not apparent. When intelligence of the conclusion of peace arrived at that settlement on the 7th of May, and it was found that the province was to be restored to England, the rage of the Dutch populace knew no bounds. They were distracted with grief and passion. With the unreasoning emotion of an excited mob, they conceived that they had been betrayed, and poured forth curses and execrations against the Prince of Orange, the States-General, the Dutch Admirals, and the Governor, vowing that they would not surrender even at the command of the home authorities, but would continue the struggle as long as they could stand on one leg, or fight with one hand. They assembled in tumultuous crowds, crying, " We ll fire the town, pull down the fortifications, and tear out the Governor s throat ! " So serious was the disturbance that Colve found it necessary to propitiate the people by imprisoning the bearer of the news a step which probably saved his life. He was thrown into the dungeon of the fort, and told to prepare himself for death, for in two days he should die. At the same time, the Governor confiscated the goods and effects of English colonists found within his jurisdiction, together with all outstanding debts due to them. A fortnight later, three New England vessels were brought in by Dutch cruisers, and 262 CASSELL S HISTORY OP THE UNITED STATES. [1675, condemned as lawful prize, notwithstanding that peace was then known to be concluded.* Before the end of June, the Governor had re tracted his sentence of confiscation, and it does not appear that the unhappy bringer of the bad news was siibjected to the death with which he had been menaced. The transfer of the city and of the whole colony to the representatives of England followed at the beginning of November, 1674. Manning, the captain who treacherously or weakly surrendered the fort to the Dutch in the previous year, was arraigned for his act, and publicly disgraced : he would indeed have been shot, but for the interces sion, of Major Andros. An interchange of letters between Andros and John Winthrop, of Connecticut, occurred in the earlv days of the new rule. The Duke of York had taken out a new patent on the recovery of his province ; and by this instrument the original boundaries were re-established. Andros was thus invested with command over a country extending from the west side of Connecticut River to the east side of Delaware Bay ; in other words, he obtained a portion of territory which, ten years before, had been declared by the Royal Commissioners them selves to be a part of Connecticut. This led to a correspondence ; and in the summer of 1675 an unexpected incident brought the matter to a curious issue. Some Indians having created a disturbance at the head of Narragansett Bay, information of the fact was sent to Andros. Writing on the 4th of July, he returned for answer that he would that evening set out with a force such as might enable him to act as circumstances should require, and that he would make the best of his way to Connecticut River, his Royal Highness s bounds in that direc tion, though this was a long way from the scene of the outbreak. The Government of Connecticut was at once roused to action by so audacious an attempt to effect a surprise. The Magistrates lost no time in sending Captain Bull, of Hartford, to occupy the fort at Saybrook with a hundred men. On the General Court coming together, the proceed ings of the Magistrates were approved, and it was resolved to protest against the designs of Major Andros, and to defend the people of Connecticut from all such endeavours. Andros, on his part, followed out his plan with promptitude. On the 8th of July, he arrived at the mouth of the Con necticut River with two small vessels, and from that spot wrote a letter to the Magistrates at Hart ford, informing them that he had found no occasion for dealing with the Indians (whom he had not come near), but that he required a direct and posi tive answer to his former demands with reference to the frontier which he claimed towards the east namely, the line of the Connecticut. For this answer, he added, he would wait in discharge of his duty ; and a reply from the General Court was despatched to him on the 10th. Bull had reached the fort of Saybrook a few hours before the arrival of his adversaries. His instructions were to allow Andros s people to land for refreshment, but only on condition of their coming unarmed, and of their stay being short. He was to avoid striking the first blow, but, if assailed, was to do his best to repel the aggression, so as to secure his Majesty s interests and the peace of the colony. Early on the morning of July 13th, Andros landed with a party of men, demanded the sur render of the fort, and had an interview with the officei-s of the garrison. He began by directing that the Duke s patent should be read, and, after that, his Royal Highness s commission. The Con necticut officers protested against this in the King s name, but, finding their protests disregarded, with drew to a little distance during the recital, as a matter with which, they declared, they had nothing to do. Andros then intimated that he should set sail immediately, unless desired to stay. He was answered that the representatives of Connecticut had no orders to desire him to stay, but must now in their turn read something to him. They then read, in the hearing of himself and his officers, the protest to which the General Court had agreed. Andros characterised it as a slander, and an ill requital for his intended kindness. Shortly after wards he asked for a copy of it, but was refused. Nevertheless, the parting of the antagonists was peaceable and even courteous, with abundant obser vance of ceremony on both sides. The Deputy- Governor of New York was escorted by the Connecticut soldiers to the water-side, and, having gone on board, fired a complimentary salute of guns, which was returned from the fort. The Connecticut Magistrates, in reviewing the whole course of the transactions, conceived that their officers had been a little too civil. While expressing a general approval of what had been done, they felt some regret that Andros had not been interrupted in. doing the least thing which might favour his pre tence of authority on that spot. They thought that, without violence, the reading of the Duke of York s patent and of the commission might have been drowned by shouts, or sound of drum.* Finally they drew up a narrative of recent events, and a * Palfrry s History of New England, Vol. III., chap. 3. Connecticut Kecords. 1676.] REFORMS AT NEW YORK. delaration of their wrongs, which they transmitted to the neighbouring plantations and to England. The claim to jurisdiction set up by Andros had no solid foundation, and, by the feebleness of his proceedings, he himself seems to have thought so. Even the Duke of York was far from emphatic on the subject. On the 6th of April, 1675, he wrote to Andros that, in his opinion, it was best to make arrangements of this kind only temporary, though his deputy was to preserve to him the utmost limits that his patent conferred. By this vague and rather contradictory language it was possibly in tended to leave the whole matter to the discretion of his representative ; and James expressed himself satisfied with what had been done. His secretary informed Andros by letter on the 28th of January, 1676, that his Royal Highness was willing things should rest as they were, but that he was not sorry the .Deputy-Governor had revived the claim, as some good use might be made of it in the future. The Duke was inclined to govern his dependency on easy terms, though without the smallest conces sion to the more liberal tendencies of the age. Andros was instructed to act with humanity and gentleness towards his subjects, and to resort to punishments rather as a means of inspiring terror than for the infliction of absolute cruelty. But mere sentiments of general benevolence are of little value when unrestrained power is lodged in the hands of one man. The lieutenant of the Duke of York would not permit any representative assembly to meet within his jurisdiction, and taxed the people without their having a voice in the matter. After a time, however, he appears to have felt some doubt as to the right, or at any rate the policy, of continu ing in this course ; and, urged to action by the complaints of Long Island settlers (who cried out that they were being deprived of their English birthright), and by the open discontent of the whole province, he advised the Royal proprietor, in the course of 1676, to grant legislative franchises to the people. James replied, in the following year : " I cannot but suspect [that] assemblies would be of dangerous consequence ; nothing being more known than the aptness of such bodies to assume to themselves many privileges which prove destruc tive to, or very often disturb, the peace of govern ment when they are allowed. Neither do I see any use for them. Things that need redress may be sure of finding it at the quarter-sessions, or by the legal and ordinary ways, or, lastly, by appeals to myself. However, I shall be ready to consider of any proposal you shall send." Dissatisfied with this answer, which was cer tainly ambiguous, and characterised both by the despotism and the irresolution of the writer s father, Andros went to England, and endeavoured personally to influence the Duke ; but without success. He was ordered to continue the existing duties, which at the time of the surrender had been imposed for only three years. According to the original understanding, they expired towards the close of 1677 ; but Andros, on his return to New York in 1678, had no choice but to levy the same taxes in the same way. The sum thus accruing to the exchequer was but slight, and in truth insuffi cient to meet the expenses of the colony. It was not the amount at which the people murmured, but the fact of taxation without representation the very grievance which, in the following century, led to the war of independence. Sir Edmund Andros was unfortunate in other respects. He made an attempt to interfere in the discipline of the Dutch Reformed church ; and was obliged to retreat before the opposition he had excited. He dealt tyrannically with those who demanded popular rights, casting into prison the leaders of a convention which met in 1681; and was compelled to alter his course by the pressure of public opinion and the decision of a grand jury. In 1683, on the advice of William Penn, the Duke of York consented to grant reforms. He sent over a new Governor in the person of Colonel Thomas Dongan, a Papist, who was instructed to convoke a free legislature. The first assembly met on the 17th of October, 1683, and established a Charter of Liberties, which provided that supreme legislative power should for ever reside in the Governor, Council, and people, met in general assembly ; that every freeholder and freeman should vote for representation without restraint ; that no freeman should suffer but by judgment of his peers ; that all trials should be by n. jury of twelve men ; that no tax should be assessed, on any pretence whatever, but by the con sent of the assembly ; that no seaman or soldier should be quartered on the inhabitants against their will ; that no martial law should exist ; and that no person professing faith in God by Jesus Christ should at any time be in any way disquieted or questioned for any difference of opinion in religion. This constitution was more liberal than some others in America ; and James was alarmed at what he had himself created. He abolished the Charter of Liberties directly he ascended the throne, and New York passed once more under the rule of arbitrary decrees. THE RIVER POTOMAC. CHAPTER XXXI. Exploration of Unknown Regions an important Part of the Early History of America Course of the Potomac Henry Fleet, English Navigator of the Early Years of the Seventeenth Century His Examination of the Potomac The Mohawks, and their reputed Habits of Cannibalism Second Visit of Fleet to the Potomac Trading with the Indians for Beaver-skins The Nacostines, or Anacostians Indian Towns on the Potomac The Falls of that River Fleet and the Natives Departxire of an English Seaman with Cannibals Appearance of a Strange Pinnace Fleet s Apprehensions, and the Cause of them Arrest of Fleet by Order of the Council of Virginia His Courteous Reception by Governor Harvey Conclusion of the Explorer s Journal Questionable Conduct of Fleet towards his Employers General Character of early American Explorers The Potomac in the Seventeenth and in the Nineteenth Century. EXPLORATIONS of unknown regions, of rivers run ning up into the heart of mysterious lands, of seventy miles, forming the boundary between the two States just mentioned ; while the south branch, FALLS OF THE POTOMAC. winding creeks and spreading bays, form a very important part of the early history of America. At this period of our narrative, we may turn aside for a space to relate the adventures and discoveries of a little-known navigator to whom is mainly due the laying open of the Potomac River, and of the countries boi-dering upon it. The Potomac is a stream of considerable length and breadth, belong ing equally to Maryland and Virginia. It rises in two branches in the Alleghany Mountains. Of these branches, the northern flows from the eastern declivity of the Backbone Range, and runs for the most part in a north-eastern direction for about 23 rising in the centre of Virginia, runs north-east for above a hundred miles, in a valley formed by the Alleghany and Kittatinny ranges of mountains, before it unites with the other division. The river then flows in an eastern direction with a rapid current through a mountainous country, until it turns towards the south-east. At this part of its course it is joined from the south by the Shenaii- doah, the largest of its. affluents, which rises in Virginia, and runs for about a hundred and eighty miles through a valley of the Kittatinny and Blue ridges. In this way acquiring greater volume and force, the augmented river breaks 266 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1632. through the Blue Mountains at Harper s Ferry, streams across a level country in a south-east direc tion, passes "Washington, and finally empties itself into Chesapeake Bay. The Potomac, which has a conspicuous name in American history, is diversi fied throughout its course by many falls, in connec tion with which canals have been constructed. Its total length exceeds five hundred miles. At its mouth it is seven miles across. Large boats ascend fifty or sixty miles above Harper s Ferry, and smaller ones still higher.* This is the river which Henry Fleet, an English seaman of the early part of the seventeenth century, helped to render available to emigration and to commerce. The narrative of his voyages in that direction is contained in a journal written by himself, the manuscript of which is preserved in the Library of Lambeth Palace, and was never printed until brought to light in the year 1871 by Mr. Edward D. Neill, Consul of the United States at Dubliii.t Fleet was in command of the bark Warwick, in which he set sail from the Downs on the 4th of July, 1631. He arrived at New England on the 9th of September, and ten. days later sailed for Virginia, which he reached on the 21st of October. Making little stay on the coast of that plantation, he entered the Potomac, and on the 26th of October came to an Indian town near the mouth of the river. Here he found that the savages, instead of preserving some beaver which he had expected to obtain, had burnt it ; and, to relieve his disappointment, felt tempted, according to the adventurous spirit of a roving sailor, to run up the river to the heads, that he might trade with " a strange populous nation." (the Mohawks), who were reputed to be man-eaters. This design, however, he gave up after due delibera tion, conceiving that many inconveniences might result from it. The inconvenience of being eatan by cannibals does not appear to have been one .of those dissuasive considerations which altered the resolve of Fleet. He called to mind that he had engaged to pay a quantity of Indian corn in New England at some early period, and that he might be hindered in the discharge of that imdertaking. He observed also that winter was rapidly advancing, and feared that if he proceeded he might be frozen in. On these accounts he forbore, and, making all convenient haste, took into Ids bark a lading of Indian corn, weighed anchor on the 6th of De cember, and shaped his course for New England. The wind was contrary ; a fearful storm came on ; and the ship was driven back, and forced into the * English Cyclopnedia. Art. "Maryland." t English Colonisation of America during the Seventeenth Century. James River. Symptoms of mutiny among the seamen, who for awhile refused to proceed until the spring, alleging that the passage was not possible in winter, delayed the further progress of Fleet until the 10th of January, 1632, when he set sail from Point Comfort. After staying the rest of the winter in various parts of New England, he departed on the 9th of April on the return voyage to Vir ginia. Fleet and his crew had now with them a small pinnace of twenty tons burden ; but it soon parted in the stormy weather they encountered on their passage. On the 1 6th of May they shaped their course for the Potomac, and next day saw a sail making to wards them. This proved to be the pinnace, which, having made a shorter passage, had been some way up the river. Fearing from what he heard that the Indians might be persuaded to dispose of all their beaver before he could get to them, Fleet came to an anchor at the mouth of the river, where, hastening ashore, he sent two Indians, in company with his brother Edward, to the chief of the tribe, whom, in accordance with the complimentary habit of his time, Fleet calls " the Emperor," and who was then at a place three days journey towards the Falls. Then sailing to the other side of the river, Fleet despatched two more Indians, with express directions not to miss an Indian town, but to certify his arrival at all places they came to. Unfortu nately for Fleet, it turned out that those who had been before him had cleared fourteen towns, situated on both sides of the river, of their stores of beaver ; but, as there were yet three more towns at the dis posal of the same chief, the enterprising navigator pushed on. Passing by several villages, he came to a place called Potomac, after the river. There he loaded the pinnace with Indian corn, and sent her away 011 the 1st of June, with letters for England. Three days later, he arrived off the chief town, and was met by the sachem, who was paddled towards them by a petty king in a canoe. Going aboard the English vessel, he used many compli mentary speeches, and greatly comforted Fleet by a liberal present of beaver-skins. At a little town further on, called by this explorer Nacostiiies, almost eight hundredweight of skins was obtained. The o o town so designated was the seat of the Anacostians, and stood on the site of the United States Federal capital, the Navy Yard of which is on the Anacostia, or eastern branch of the Potomac. Fleet reports that there was but little friendship between " the Emperor " and the Nacostines (Anacostians), that potentate being afraid to punish them, because they were protected by the Massomacks, or " Cannyda" Indians. In a previous year, these Nacostines had 1632.] DEALINGS WITH INDIANS. killed twenty English, on which occasion Fleet himself was taken prisoner. This was during the time that Sir Francis Wyatt was Governor of Virginia ; and, as Fleet was detained by the savages five years, he had good reason for recollecting both the circumstance and the date. "The 13th of June," continues Fleet in his Journal. " I had some conference with an inter preter of Massomack and of divers other Indians that had been lately with them, whose relation was very strange in regard of the abundance of people there, compared to all the other poor number of natives which are in Patomack and places adjacent, where are not above five thousand persons, and also of the infinite store of beaver they use in coats. Divers were the imaginations that I did con ceive about this discovery, understanding that the river was not for shipping, where the people were, nor yet for boats to pass, but for canoes only. I found all my neighbour Indians to be against my design, the Pascattowies having had a great slaughter formerly by them to the number of one thousand persons in my time. They coming in their birchen canoes did seek to withdraw me from having any commerce with the other Indians, and the Nacostines were earnest in the matter, because they knew that our trade might hinder their benefit. Yet I endeavoured to prosecute iny trade with them nevertheless, and therefore made choice of two trusty Indians to be sent along with my brother, who could travel well." The Indians of that vicinity, who were very numerous, Fleet found to be governed by four kings, whose four several towns were reported to contain more than thirty thousand inhabitants, though this was probably an exaggeration. It was also said that the towns were palisadoed with great trees, and had scaffolds on the walls. To the four kings Fleet sent presents of beads, bells, hatchets, knives, and coats, to the value of 8 sterling. " On Monday, the 25th of June," says the writer, pursuing his narrative, " we set sail for the town of Tahoga, when we came to an anchor two leagues short of the Falls, being in the latitude of 41, on the 26th of June. This place, without all question, is the most pleasant and healthful place in all this country, and most convenient for habitation, the air temperate in summer and not violent in winter. It aboundeth with all manner of fish. The Indians in one night commonly will catch thirty sturgeons in a place where the river is not above twelve fathom broad. And as for deer, buffaloes, bears, turkeys, the woods do swarm with them, and the soil is exceedingly fertile ; but above this place the country is rocky and mountainous, like Cannyda. The 27th of Jiine I manned my shallop, and weni up with the flood, the tide rising about four feet in height at this place. We had not rowed above three miles, but we might hear the Falls to roar about six miles distant, by which it appears that the river is separated with rocks, but only in that one place, for beyond is a fair river. The 3rd of July, my brother, with the two Indians, came thither, in which journey they were seven davs going, and five days coming back to this place. They all did affirm that in one palisado, and that being the last of thirty, there were three hundred houses, and in every house forty skins at least, in bundles and piles. To this king was delivered the four presents, who dispersed them to the rest. The entertainment they had I omit, as tedious to relate. There came with them, one-half of the way, one hundred and ten Indians, laden with beaver, which could not be less than four thousand weight. These Indians were made choice of by the whole nation, to see what we were, what was our intent, and whether friends or foes, and what commodities we had ; but they were met with by the way by the Nacostines, who told them we purposed to destroy those that came in our way, in revenge of the Pascattowies, being hired to do so for one hundred and fourteen skins, which were delivered as afore said, for a present, as a preparative." This story pretty nearly cost Edward Fleet his life. On the following day, Henry Fleet Avent to the Nacostines to know the reason of their sudden hostility. They replied evasively, but said that if their English visitor would make a firm league with them, and give their king a present, they would undertake to hunt the other Indians down. "The refusal of this offer," says Fleet, "was the greatest folly that I have ever committed, in mine opinion." They proceeded on their way, and on the 10th of July discerned an Indian on the other side of the river, who in a shrill voice cried out " Quo ! Quo ! Quo ! " holding up a beaver-skin on a pole. " I went ashore to him," says Fleet, " who then gave me the beaver-skin, with his hatchet, and laid down his head, with a strange kind of behaviour, using some few words, which I learned, but to me it was a foreign language. I cheered him, told him he was a good man, and clapped him on the breast with my hands. Whereupon he started up, and used some complimental speech, leaving his things with me, and ran up the hill. Within the space of half an hour, he returned, with five more, one being a woman, and an interpreter, at which I rejoiced, and so I expressed myself to thorn, showing them courtesies. These were laden with beaver, and came from a town called Usserahak, 268 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1632 where were seven thousand Indians. I carried these Indians aboard, and traded with them for their skins. They drew a plot [plan] of their country, and told me there came with them sixty canoes, but were interrupted by the Nacostines, who always do wait for them, and were hindered by them. Yet these, it would seem, were resolute, not fearing death, and would adventure to come down. These promised, if I would show them my truck,* to get great store of canoes to come down with one thousand Indians that should trade with me. I had but little, not worth above one hundred pounds sterling, and such as was not fit for these Indians to trade with, who delight in hatchets, and knives of large size, broad-cloth, and coats, shirts, and Scottish stockings. The women desire bells, and some kind of beads." Seven " lusty men " presented themselves on the 11 th of July from another place. They were strangely attired, with red fringes to their gar ments. Notwithstanding that they gave Fleet some beaver, their language was haughty, and they demanded to see what commodities he had brought with him for barter. On being shown the whole stock, they expressed themselves scornfully as to its value. But, having gone aboard, they seemed to be fair-conditioned, and one of them, taking a piece of chalk, drew a map of their country, which corresponded with what had been sketched by the other Indians. " These people," it is added, " de light not in toys, but in useful commodities." One of Fleet s men was very desirous of going with them ; but the captain advised him not, as they had the credit of being cannibals. Finally, how ever, on the sailor s urgent importunities, he consented to let him proceed, and gave him a pre sent for their king. This man, William Elderton by name, acted as interpreter to the others ; and when the Indians returned with their own inter preter, according to promise, they greatly lamented the loss of Elderton, saying that the men with whom he had gone would eat him, and that those people were not well-disposed to the rest. Fleet gave the friendly Indians some commodities, and dismissed them with a request that they would follow the other savages, and get Elderton away. By this time provisions were running short, and Fleet was compelled to exchange his store of goods for food instead of skiiv, as before. In this way he obtained from the natives a quantity of fish, beans, and boilod corn. On the 18th of July, he went to the Pascattowies, and excused himself for trading with their enemies. From this tribe he hired * Commodities for bartering. sixteen men, and took them to the ship, making one of them his factor, and delivering to them, equally divided, the best part of Ids remaining merchandise to barter on his account, with injunctions to find out where Elderton was, and bring him with them when they returned. They came back on the 7th of August, with eighty skins from a tribe called by Fleet the Tahogas, who promised to come, together with three other nations, to trade with the Englishmen. Fleet was well pleased with the project, but was unwilling to lose time, because his stock of food was small, and he had now but few commodities left for exchanging with the Indians. He therefore sailed down the river to Pascattowie, and so on to a town still nearer to the mouth, where he was visited by three cannibals, who, with many ceremonious speeches and rude orations, desired the strangers to stay fifteen days, and they would bring a great number of people to trade with them. Shortly afterwards, Fleet re ceived news of a small pinnace with eight men, who had been making inquiry in all places for him. On the morning of the 28th of August, he sighted this vessel, and, having with him a shallop which he had built among the Indians, manned her with ten men and all requisite munitions, resolving to discover who were on board, and what were their intentions. It would appear that Fleet had been trading in an irregular way, having with him only a copy of the necessary commission, instead of the document itself. He had been acting, more over, on his own account, although sent out as the agent of a firm of London merchants. For this reason he had avoided other traders as much as possible, especially as he knew that the then Governor of Virginia, John Harvey, had expressed displeasure at his conduct. However, he asserts in his Journal that he was ready to meet the strange sail, and confront all on board, as lie could have shifted away in the night, had he pleased. Having come near the shallop, he divined who the strangers were, and, going aboard, found there Captain John Uty, one of the Council of Virginia. After a stay of two hours, he invited Captain Uty and his friends into his own vessel. On entering Fleet s cabin, Uty, after a short pause, said : "Captain Fleet, I am sorry to bring- ill news, and to trouble you in tlieso, courses, being so good ; but, as I am an instrument, I pray you to excuse me, for, in the King s name, I arrest you, your ship, your goods, and likewise your company, to answer such things as the Governor and Council shall direct." To this intimation Fleet submitted, though, he adds, as most of Uty s crew were men who believed themselves to be ill-used, they were willing 1631.] HENRY FLEET. 269 to follow him (Fleet), oven had he resolved upon returning to England. On the 6th of September, 1632, they arrived at the mouth of the James River, and on the following day anchored at James Town. Fleet went ashore the same night, and the Governor, "bearing himself like a noble gentle man," showed him much favour, and used him with unexpected courtesy. Captain Uty acquainted the Council with the success of the voyage, and every man seemed desirous of being a partner with Fleet in his speculations. He, in his turn, nattered them in every way he could, that he might bring his ad venture to a favourable termination. The Court was called on the 14th of September, when an order was made, in which the Governor exhibited the utmost civility to the adventurous seaman, and left him at liberty to dispose of himself as he would. That he resolved to sail up the river once more is not surprising, for to such a man gain and excite ment are the two chief attractions of life. " And so, beloved friends that shall have the perusal of this Journal," writes Fleet in conclusion, " I hope that you will hold me excused in the method of this relation, and bear with my weakness in penning the same. And consider that time would not per mit me to use any rhetoric in the form of this discourse, which, to say truly, I am but a stranger unto as yet, considering that in my infancy and prime time of youth, which might have advantaged my study that way, and enabled me with more learning, I was for many years together compelled to live amongst these people, whose prisoner I was, and by that means am. a better proficient in the Indian language than mine own, and am made more able that way. The thing that I have endeavoured herein is, in plain phrase, to make such relation of my voyage as may give some satisfaction to my good friends, whose longing thoughts may hereby have a little content, by perusing this discourse, wherein it will appear how I proceeded, and what success I have had, and how I am like to speed, if God permit. All which particulars, the whole ship s company are ready to testify on behalf of this Journal." Mr. ISTeill observes that Governor Harvey appears to have colluded with Fleet in defrauding the owners of the Warurick. He points out that in a communication to the Admiralty, dated July 10th, 1634, the proprietors stated that, three years before, they had sent a ship to Virginia for trade and dis covery, of which Henry Fleet was factor, with com mission to return in a year, but that, by authority of Governor Harvey, Fleet had kept both the vessel and the profits, to their great loss. After the Maryland colony was planted, Fleet, according to the same authority, became a member of its Assembly, and a person of some influence. It is unhappily but too clear that he was a man of indifferent character ; but he had the virtues of courage, self-reliance, and enterprise. The heroes of American discovery were often distinguished by their wild, irregular, and stormy lives ; but it is possible that men of nicer ways could not have encountered the rough work of exploration and planting, unless, as in the case of the Puritans, under the stimulus of religious enthusiasm. Fleet may have dealt dishonestly by his employers, but he examined a scarcely-known river for many miles above its mouth, revealed the nature of the country on its banks, showed what were its capabilities for trade, and ascertained, at his own risk, the cha racter of the fierce nations which roamed about the soil, or inhabited the little settlements of wigwams that were dignified by the name of towns. The Potomac now flows through the heart of a great Republic, adorned with the triumphs of civilisation, of intellect, and of art. The Federal city of Wash ington, where the highest life of that Republic is centred, whence its laws go forth over half a con tinent, and to which foreign nations look for the ex pression of its collective policy, rears its facades, its terraces, and its domes on the shores of the river which Fleet explored less than two centuries and a half ago, in the midst of savage scenery and more savage men. At the present day, he who floats down the Potomac sees mountain-peaks and solitary passes, where sun and shadow dapple with quick, aerial change the changeless substance of the land ; sees dusky glens and lonely woodwalks, where the ways of men might be forgotten ; sees stretches of pastoral meadows, where the herds wander undis turbed. But he also sees cities, and haunts of in dustry, and the fulness of a mighty life. The uii- progressive red man has given place to a people which compels the earth to yield her utmost abund ance, which turns the forces of Nature into its slaves, which has science for its handmaiden, and which makes its power felt in all the marts and harbours of the world. That river was opened to that race by the humble and perhaps not very scrupulous seaman, Henry Fleet ; and for this reason we have paused awhile in the more general track of our History, to trace the windings of what, in a monarchical country, would be called the Imperial stream, and to show the beginning of our knowledge of its course and character. 270 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1673. CHAPTER XXXII. The Quakers in New Jersey George Fox in America Early Life and Character of William Penn Vicissitudes in the Political State of New Jersey The " Holy Experiment "Penn s Grant beyond the Delaware Scenery and Native Inhabitants of the Land Preparations for a New Colony The Founder s Charter and Free Constitution for Pennsylvania Estimate of his Motives The Emigrants and Planters Penn s Letter to the Earlier Settlers His Arrival in America Dealings with the Colonists Purchase and Disposal of Lands Humane and Friendly Treatment of Indians Conference with the Sachems of the Lenni Lenape at Shackamaxon Progress of the Colony Its Political Constitution Territorial Disputo with Lord Baltimore Founding of Philadelphia City Political Arrangements in the Colony Penn s Return to England Macaulay s Charges against Penn Second Visit of Penn to America Later Aspects of Pennsylvania down to 1700. THE Quakers, though banished from Massachusetts by the intolerance of a Puritan ministry and its followers, had survived persecution in the other English settlements along the Atlantic coast. In 1672, when George Fox, the author of their sect, visited America to inspect and encourage its widely- scattered flocks of believing people, they were found pretty numerous in Maryland, with some offshoots in Virginia ; but it was in Rhode Island, in Long Island, and on the eastern shore of New Jersey, that the Quaker refugees had chiefly settled. Fox, on his return home from America in 1673, brought to the Friends in England a favourable account of their fellow-religionists in the last-named territoiy. A few months later, he was staying with William Penn, at Rickmansworth ; and William Penn was presently engaged to act as trustee for a Quaker purchase of New Jersey. This eminent and estimable man, despite the mistaken accusations too hastily cast against him by Macaulay, deserves high honour among the founders of the English American Republic, and the moral reformers of society in Europe. He was the son of Admiral Sir William Penn, whose dis tinguished naval services and zeal for the Stuart monarchy had won him the favour of Charles II. and his brother James, with lucrative offices and Irish estates. A brilliant worldly prospect had therefore been opened to yoxing Penn ; but he re jected it without hesitation, disdained every temp tation of pleasure, gaiety, or advancement at the profligate Court of the Restoration, and braved at once the anger of his parents, the King s express disapproval, and the contempt or dislike of his powerful acquaintance. William Penn had freely made these sacrifices to an earnest and impassioned love of those ideas of a Divine Humanity embodied in Jesus Christ, which for him were associated with Quaker doctrines and customs. He had first listened to Quaker preaching while yet a student of Christ Church College at Oxford ; and the serious impressions thus made upon him could not be effaced by the example of coarse and reckless dissi pation then in fashion. After two years of travel and study in France, Switzerland, and Italy, he attended his father and the Duke of York, in 1665, on board the flagship of the English fleet contend ing with the Dutch in the North Sea. He was next attached to the Viceregal Court of the Duke of Ormonde in Dublin, and joined as a volunteer, with Lord Arran, in suppressing a revolt or mutiny of troops at Carrickfergus. Taking military rank, as ensign of horse, the young man for a time seemed to have got rid of his Quaker scruples ; and, while free from the vices and follies, displayed the gallant accomplishments of his age. He iindertook the management of his father s lands at Shangarry Castle, in the county of Cork, and obtained from the Crown a valuable offiee, the Clerkship of the Cheque at the port of Kinsale. But having, as it were by accident, met again at Cork with the same Quaker preacher he had heard at Oxford, William Penn s religious sensibilities were revived to en thusiastic fervour. Harsh treatment, if not from his own family, yet from other persons claiming authority over him, with the indignation and sym pathy roused by still worse persecution of his fellow-believers, soon confirmed in his mind that zeal which covets the martyr s crown as well as cross. He was arrested and imprisoned, first at Cork, and a few months afterwards in London, for taking part in forbidden religious meetings ; and he began writing pamphlets of theological contro versy, which dealt too rudely with the clergy, the creed, and the ritual of the Established Church. One of these crude essays, entitled " The Sandy Foundation Shaken," was denounced by his oppo nents as blasphemous, since it impugned the Atha- nasian definition of the Trinity. Penn, when his printer had incurred a prosecution by issuing this tract without the Bishop s licence, went to Lord Arlington, Secretary of State, and almost invited the severity of the law. But Arlington, who hated the favourite Admiral and was eager to inflict dis grace upon his son, exceeded the law in committing the headstrong youth to the Tower. This error of the Minister being repaired by an irregular order which he procured from the careless King, 272 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1674. they kept Perm in the Tower seven or eight months, to his father s great vexation and distress. Clergy men, one of whom was the famous Stillingfleet, were sent to remonstrate with the, prisoner, but could not shake his resolute convictions. He still wrote and published manifestoes, such as "No Cross, no Crown," against every compromise, even in non- essential matters, with the unconverted world and its allies in Church and State. No legal indictment, however, could be framed against him ; and, when at length released without a trial, he was suffered to return to Ireland, more intimately associated with the Quakers than before. Called back to London by Sir William s, embarrassed affairs and declining health, this devout enthusiast, in the twenty-sixth year of his age, incurred a fresh im prisonment, this time in Newgate, with a trial at the Old Bailey, for preaching at the door of the Friends meeting-house in Gracechurch Street, which had been closed under the new Conventicle Act. Penn was acquitted by the jury, who were fined by the Court for their verdict. He was liberated just in time to be at his father s death- K. "bed, and he was not waiting in any duty of filial affection. Inheriting a fortune of 1,500 a year, equal to 5,000 a year in these days, Penn became more inclined to prudent and moderate behaviour. Though he remained true to his Quaker profession, and cheerfully endured another six months im prisonment for its sake, he 110 longer sought to give offence to its adversaries by an ostentatious challenge of their power. He cultivated the friend ship of the Duke of York, who esteemed him not only for his father s sake, but for his own merit ; and James, also felt, as an unpopular Roman Catholic Prince, some kind of sympathy with the unpopular sect of Quakers, and even with the more heterodox Socinians, then exposed to clerical and official persecution. This was the position and attitude of William Penn, when he first engaged in the task of American model colonisation. He was, at the same time, though not a courtier, the personal friend of a Royal Duke who stood next to the throne, and a most active leader of the zealous evangelical reformers inspired by George Fox Avith a solemn disdain for all temporal pomps and power. With Fox, and Avith Barclay the "Apologist," he travelled through Holland and Germany to dis seminate their ideas among people accustomed to the Lutheran or Calvinistic formulas of Protestant faith. Another set of ideas, derived from the lofty scheme of philosophic republicanism propounded by his friend Algernon Sydney, the mirage of a perfect Commonwealth, affected the mind of Penn scarcely less than his religious persuasion. With characteristic generosity, he threw himself and all his connections, as a Sussex country gentleman, into Sydney s electioneering contests, to the in creased displeasure of everybody at Court. Indeed, the whole conduct of Penn, during the reign of Charles II., was marked, so far as we can see, by a noble disregard of selfish interests, at least of worldly gain and preferment. It cannot be other wise explained. The project entertained in 1674 by some disciples of George Fox, upon his return from America, could not fail to engage the ardent practical imagination of young William Penn. His early occupation as steward of his father s Irish estates having formed him to the business of agricultural improvement, was no bad preparative experience for the founder of a. new community in the remoter western wilds. The examples both of the New England Puritans in the preceding generation, and of the scattered Quaker settlements already existing on those shores, were constantly kept before him. In his conversa tions with friends of the same evangelical senti ments, and not less in other eloquent prophecies of an ideal society pre-figured in Harington s romance, " Oceana," on the secular basis of perfect institu tions, Perm was still imbibing a stimulant to the destined work of his life. It was what he and his associates called " the Holy Experiment " of creating a new world of piety and virtue upon the free soil of America ; like the visions of some later poetical enthusiasts, Coleridge and Southey among them, after the collapse of the French Revolution. The Earl of Berkeley s share of the New Jersey territory was sold for the small price of one thousand pounds to John Fenwick and Edward Byllinge, or Billing, contractors for a new settle ment of Quakers. Billing got into pecuniary difficulties, and three trustees, one of whom was William Penn, were put in charge of his property for the creditors. Fenwick, with several Quaker families and a number of labourers, next year sailed in the Griffith, went up the Delaware inlet, and landed at Salem, on the west side of New Jersey. But the territory so designated yet re mained -subject to the title of ownership in Sir George Carteret, as joint grantee with Lord Berke ley. Negotiations conducted by Penn, a year or so later, procured a division of the entire pro perty, leaving West New Jersey to the company of settlers under Billing s trustees, and to another company formed by Penn in London and Middle sex. A provisional government was appointed, consisting of ten commissioners, who were nomi nated by Perm and Fenwick, and by the emigrants 1677.] THE "HOLY EXPERIMENT." or capitalists associated with them. They wrote to those who had by this time arrived in the country, assuring them of a sufficient charter to protect their social freedom and the rights of conscience. " The concessions," it was said, " are such as Friends approve of; we lay a foundation for after-ages to understand their liberty as Christians and as men, that they may not be brought into bondage but by their own consent ; for we put the power in the people." In this spirit, on March 3rd, 1677, the funda mental laws of West New Jersey were promulgated by its enlightened founders. They had been, care fully discussed and meditated at Perm s house in Worminghurst, near Shoreham, where he now resided with his young wife and new-bom son. Their principles were thoroughly liberal, and even democratic. It was declared that no person should at any time, in any way, or on any pretence, be in the least punished, or hurt, or called in question, for his religion. " All and every person in the pro vince," thus ran another proviso, " shall, by the help of the Lord and these fundamentals, be free from oppression and slavery." The legislative authority was to be vested in a General Assembly of representatives, elected by universal ballot suffrage ; but every member of this body was to be bound, as the agent of his constituents, to vote according to their specific instructions. The General Assembly was to appoint ten Commissioners, who should form the executive government. It was like wise to appoint the judges, who were to hold office bat two years at a time, and to act only as legal assistants of the jury ; the sentence, as well as the verdict, being at the discretion of the sworn twelve in every trial. No professional advocate or solicitor was to be employed in judicial proceedings ; minor cases were to be decided by magistrates, whom the people would elect ; there was to be no imprison ment for debt. Such was Penn s first draft of a con stitution, inexpedient, perhaps, with regard to the independence of the legislative and judicial autho rities, but of a character truly republican. Yet he was, and continued to be, a loyal subject of the monarchy ; and its next inheritor, then Duke of York, never had cause to doubt the fidelity of his Quaker friend, though also the friend of Algernon Sydney. The first party of emigrants sent out by Penn was composed of two hundred and thirty persons, including the Commissioners of the provisional government for New Jersey. As their ship, the Kent, was lifting her anchor in the Thames, it was approached by the royal barge conveying his Majesty down the river ; and when King Charles was told that the people on board were all Quakers going to America, he dismissed them with an easy blessing. Two other vessels followed ; one from Hull, with the Yorkshire emigrants, and the third with more than a hundred from the southern counties. They all crossed the ocean in safety, and disembarked in their land of promise. Their reli gious worship, performed under a sail-cloth spread from tree to tree in the forest at Burlington, was attended by a congregation of four hundred men and women freshly arrived. The native tribes presently came forth to meet these peaceable strangers, and heard with satisfaction their professions of good will. " You are our brothers," replied the Indian sachems ; " and we will live like brothers with you. There shall be one broad path for you and us to walk in; this path shall be plain, without a stump in it to hurt the feet ; and if an English man fall asleep in this path, the Indian shall pass him by, and say, He is an Englishman ; he is asleep; let him alone. " They agreed with the English on the sale of such lands as were re quired ; the price was fairly paid, and the land was taken and cleared, to be sown or built upon. The " Holy Experiment " had so far a good beginning. Its prosperity soon tempted those who before had proprietary rights in that region to set up claims of taxation or jurisdiction. Sir Edmund Andros, the Governor of New York, first asserted a territorial supremacy over West New Jersey, which the Quaker settlers denied ; and this question, was re ferred to the English Courts of law. The Duke of York s agent at Newcastle, on the western shore of the Delaware inlet, pi*etended to exact toll or customs dues of the ships entering that river. This was disallowed by a fair arbitration in Eng land, to which the Duke not unwillingly yielded. Again, there was a reappaarance of Billing, as the original purchaser of Lord Berkeley s rights in New Jersey, assuming to himself the privilege of nomina ting a Deputy-Governor. To meet this demand, an amendment was made, with Penn s approval, in the constitution of the province, so that the people might themselves elect their Governor, instead of a nomination by the proprietors. By these steps, in the western division of New Jersey, the settle ment for a time maintained its independence. Its government, in a few years, had passed from the nominee Commissioners, who were at first Governor Jennings, Thomas Olive, Daniel Wills, Joseph Helrnsley, Stacey, Kinsey, and others, to those constitutionally appointed by the General Assembly. New Jersey, indeed, was yet subject to the territorial lordship of Sir George Carteret, re presented then: by his brother Philip. This did CASSELL S HidTUEY OF THE UINIT.&D STATES. [1681. not terminate until 1682, when the Carterets were bought out, to the relief of five thousand settlers, by an association of twelve Quakers, with William Penn at their head. The capital and the number of shareholders were doubled in the following year. Those who now joined the proprietary of New Jersey were persons in Scotland desiring to make a place of refuge for the persecuted Covenanters. Multitudes of these people, and some of the fugi tives from the West of England after Monmouth s rebellion, found their way to the shores of America. In this manner, New Jersey was colonised ; but it had to experience, during twenty years longer, ;rying vicissitudes in its legal condition. At the period of the English Revolution of 1688, it was actually under the rule of Governor Andros, to gether with New York and New England. After that period, New Jersey fell off from New York, and seemed to do without a regular government. The old proprietary titles of jurisdiction were not formally abolished till the reign of Queen Anne, when East and West New Jersey were united in one province. Pennsylvania, the second field of William Perm s beneficent labours for Christian civilisation in America, was the peculiar creation of his genius, and is the perpetual monument of his fame. It was in June, 1680, six years after the first Quaker purchase of New Jersey, that Penn applied to the Crown for a grant of territory beyond the Delaware, and north of Maryland. Penn had a legal and equitable claim, as heir to his deceased uncle George, who had been a merchant in Spain, to a large sum of money due in redress of in juries done to him by the Spanish Government, for which the English Government should have long since obtained satisfaction. He now proposed to accept the grant of that unexplored country in full discharge of his private claim, which could not be estimated, by any reckoning, at less than 16,000. The land in question had but one access from the sea, which was by the Delaware gulf and mouth of the Delaware river ; as it lay behind New York and New Jersey, the provinces on the Atlantic coast. Its extent was nearly three hundred miles in length, and a hundred and sixty, in width. The tracts lying around the mouths of the Delaware and Schuylkill were known to be fertile ; but much of the interior was mountainous, or covered with primeval forest. In several places on the shores, both east and west, of Delaware Bay, and on the banks of that river, while comprised in the former Dutch American dominion, settlements, as the reader is aware, had long existed, not only of Dutch colonists, from the Brandywine down to Cape Henlopen, but also of Swedes and Finns. The native inhabitants of this region were a branch of the Lenni Lenape, a widely -spread Indian race speaking- various dialects of the Algon quin tongue. They were less fierce in disposition than the Iroquois farther north, or the tribes in New England already described ; but their manners were simply those of the untutored savage, not yet provoked by cruelty and perfidy to hate the in truding white man. William Penn s suit to King Charles II. for the grant of this extensive territory met with much opposition at the Court of Whitehall. Its chief supporters were the Earl of Sunderland, Secretary of State, who was a personal friend of the suitor ; the Hydes, brothers-in-law to the Duke of York ; Chief Justice North, afterwards Lord Guildford and Lord Keeper of the Great Seal; and the cleverest of liberal politicians, Lord Halifax. The bigoted zealots of the Tory party, who idolised the Royal prerogative and the ecclesiastical hier archy, wanted to inflict the mortification of a defeat on the Quaker ally of republican philosophers and reformers. But King Charles was neither zealot nor fanatic, and was persiiaded, with the consent of his brother James, to bestow the new country on Penn, in order to be quit of a troublesome debt. This transaction was ratified by his Majesty s signa ture on February 24th, 1681. The Royal Patent, written on sheets of parchment in old English manuscript underlined with red ink, and headed by the King s portrait, may yet be seen in the State archives of Pennsylvania. That name was one of the King s invention ; it was not agreeable to Penn himself that his name should have so pretentious a commemoration. But somebody had proposed to call the new province " Sylvania," because of its sylvan aspect ; and Charles, in a pleasant mood, insisted on forcing the complimentary prefix upon the acceptance of the modest Quaker. The govern ing powers entrusted to Penn were made subject to reservations, suggested by the Lord Chief-Justice and Attorney-General to secure the prerogatives of Crown and Parliament in the sanction of colonial laws, the levying of rates and taxes, and the regula tion of trade. At the request, moreover, of the Bishop of London, Penn. was made to promise that he would not hurt the Church of England. The boundaries assigned to Pennsylvania were of precise definition. It was to form an oblong, which would include three degrees of latitude by five degrees of longitude; only the eastern line of frontier would be irregular, following the Delaware river, which divides this State from New Jersey. The shores of the estuary 1681.] FOUNDING OF PENNSYLVANIA. and bay lower down, which now form the State of Delaware, and of which the town of Newcastle was the chief place at that time, were at first to be kept under the Duke of York s paramount lordship. This arrangement was altered, six months later, by the Duke ceding to Penn all the Delaware shores ; but there was still an obstruction in Penii s way, in the shape of an unfounded claim by Lord Balti more, to some of this territory as part of Maryland. " At length," wrote William Penn, " after many waitings, watchiiigs, solicitings, and disputes in Council, my country was confirmed to me tinder the Great Seal of England. God will bless it and make it the seed of a nation. I shall have a tender care of the government, that it be well laid at first." A month or two after the Royal Patent was signed, the enterprising founder of the Pennsylvanian commonwealth sent out his cousin, Colonel William Markham, to take possession, and to make ready for his own coming there. He stayed in England till September of that year, to arrange terms of partner ship with the company of adventurers, who would go out with him, or follow him, or invest their stock in the projected colony. Meanwhile, the following proclamation, was addressed by him to the people in occupation of his newly-acquired land : " My Friends, I wish you all happiness, here and here after. These are to let you know that it hath pleased God in His Providence to cast you within my lot and care. It is a business that, though I never undertook before, yet God has given me an understanding of my duty, and an honest mind to do it uprightly. I hope you will not be troubled at your change and the King s choice ; for you are now fixed, at the mercy of no Governor that comes to make his fortune great. You shall be governed by laws of your own making, and live a free, and, if you will, a sober and industrious people. I shall not usurp the right of any, nor oppress his person. God has furnished me with a better resolution, and has given me His grace to keep it. In short, what ever sober and free men can reasonably desire for the security and improvement of their own happi ness, I shall heartily comply with. I beseech God to direct you in the way of righteousness, and therein prosper you, and your children after you. I am your true friend, WILLIAM PENN. London, 8th of the month called April, 1681." The summer was busily occupied with the despatch of two vessels from London, the Amity and the John tiara/t, and one called the Bristol Factor from the Avon, conveying people and stores to Delaware Bay. Penn went to Bristol, where a " Free Society of Traders in Pennsylvania " was quickly organised, and a number of woollen manu facturers, from the neighbourhood of Stroud, were found willing to emigrate, with their spindles and looms. Nicholas Moore, a lawyer, who bought 20,000 acres of land, was the leader of this Bristol party ; but one of its members, Philip Ford, after wards caused Penn a great deal of trouble and loss. Liverpool also, emulating the Severn port, was ready to send forth, not yet a ship, but a party of settlers and traders. In the cities of Holland and the Rhine provinces of Germany, where Penn had taught, with Fox and Barclay, the mild and peaceful doctrines of his sect, men of character and substance were eager to join him beyond tire Atlantic. One of these foreigners, Franz Pastorius, of Frankfort, at once purchased a tract of 15,000 acres on the banks of a navigable river, and 3,000 acres more of town-land. The integrity of Penn s motives was now signally tested by an incident shortly before his own departure from London. An offer was made him by the agents of a mercantile company to pay him an annual revenue of 6,000, with a share of their yearly profits, for the exckisive right of trading with the Indians for beaver-skins be tween the Delaware and the Susquehannah. Penn was an avowed champion of Free Trade, holding every commercial monopoly to be unjust and mis chievous to the public welfare. He therefore, in spite of the hazard to which his private fortune was then exposed, felt it right to decline the splendid offer, which any other territorial lord would have gladly accepted. " I will not abuse the love of God," wrote this upright man, " nor act unworthy of His Providence, by defiling what came to me clean. No ; let the Lord guide me by His wisdom, to honour His name and serve His truth and people, that an example and a standard may be set up to the nations." This was indeed the aspiration of the virtuous Founder of Pennsylvania, when he observed to another Friend, " There may be room there, though not here, for the Holy Experiment." Assisted by Algernon Sydney once more, at his rural mansion in Sussex, he drew up a political constitution, which, excellent though it was, was nevertheless subject to amendment by the colonists in their general assembly. " For the matter of liberty," said he, " I purpose that which is extraordinary to leave myself and my successors no power of doing mis chief; that the will of one man may not hinder the good of a whole country." He therefore provided that the sovereign power should be vested in the governor and freemen of the province. There was to be a Council, of seventy-two members, in which the territorial proprietor or his deputy would pre- 276 CASSELL:S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1681, side, with three votes instead of one ; and this was all the power lie wanted for himself. The Council was to be elected by universal suffrage, a third part of its members retiring in each year, so as to sit for three years. They were to look to the execution of the laws, and to the peace, good order, and safety of the province ; to the construction of roads, the improvement of harbours, the establishment of and the recovery of debts; and freedom of conscience was amply secured. Colonel Markham, having landed in the Delaware country, met the Indian sachems, and bought of them a site for Penn s future abode, called Penns- bury, far up the river towards Trenton Falls. The building of a spacious and stately manor-house was commenced there. Before the summer ended, three WILLIAM PENN. markets, courts of justice, and schools, and the relief of the poor ; they were also to take care of the finances. The Legislative Assembly was to be elected annually by universal suffrage, but it was merely to approve or reject, with a vote by ballot, the bills prepared by the Council, and to present double lists of persons nominated for judges, or magistrates and sheriffs,, of whom the Governor must select one half. This constitution was better, in several respects, than what Penn had designed for New Jersey. It further contained some pro visions for judicial business, fines and punishments. other commissioners of the Founder, William Cris pin, John Bezar, and Nathaniel Allen, came out with authority for the purchase of lands. The ship which finally brought William Penn himself was the Welcome, of three hundred tons. Arriving on October 27, 1681, after a nine weeks voyage, with much suffering on board and many deaths from smallpox, this vessel, next only to the Mayflower in historic interest for English America, put him ashore at Newcastle, in Delaware. He was not accompanied by his wife and family ; but a nume rous train of servants, with horses, furniture, and 1081.] PENN AND HIS EMIGRANTS. 277 provisions, attended to the comfort of liis new house hold. Calling together the people of Delaware next daj , in the old Dutch courthouse at Newcastle, he exhibited the Koyal Patent, the deeds and charters, and then received from the Duke of York s agents a formal surrender and transfer of dominion. up the river to the Swedish town of Upland, since named Chester. Here, in. company with his friend Pearson, a fellow-voyager from England, and with Nicholas Moore and his host Wade, he met the other English Pennsylvania settlers of that year, headed by his cousin Markham. Their iirst General VIEW ON THE SCHTJTLKILL. In a brief and straightforward speech, he told the settlers what he had before said to them in his letter, that he meant not to rule over them, but to work and plan for their good ; and he explained the principles of his offered scheme of government. They all, Dutchmen and Swedes as well as English, listened with pleasure to his statement, and begged that Delaware might become part of the province of Pennsylvania ; which he promised to consider. Taking leave of Newcastle for a short time, he went 24 Assembly, held in the Friends Meeting-house at Chester, was joined by the Delaware settlers. The draft of a constitution prepared in England was provisionally accepted by them; and Penn, with his accustomed liberality, said, " You may amend, alter, or add ; I am ready to settle such foundations as may be for your happiness." He was some weeks engaged in the inspection and distribution of the lands already purchased, assisted by Markham and the other Commissioners, 278 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. and by Thomas Holme, the surveyor. Eight thou sand acres round Pennsbury were reserved for the .Pounder, whose three infant children were each to obtain a share. For his Royal patron, the Duke of York, he set apart two estates, each of ten thou sand acres. A choice lot of one thousand acres, free of erery cost and charge, was designed by Penn as a tribute of reverent affection to George Fox, his religious instructor. The other lands were put up to sale at fourpence an acre, to be held subject only to a yearly quit-rent of one shilling for each hundred acres, as a source of revenue to the Governor. Having so disposed of his business as proprietor, he visited the adjacent provinces of New Jersey and Maryland, and had an interview with Lord Balti more at West River, or at Colonel Tailler s house, in Anne Arundel county. The two colonial poten tates were unable to agree about their boundary ; and the question whether Delaware was or was not part of Maryland had to be decided in London. An interview of a more romantic character, the exact date of which is not recorded, was that which is represented in the well-known painting by Benjamin West. It is commonly styled " Penn s Treaty with the Indians," but was a conference which Penn held in the autumn of 1682, with the Lenni Lenape sachems, warriors, and sages, at Sakimaxing or Shackamaxon, 011 the banks of the Delaware. This locality, afterwards called Kensing ton, was formerly a northern suburb, but is now included in the City of Philadelphia; and the gigantic elm-tree, a century and a half old, beneatli which Penn met the Indians as a Friend, was to be seen, or some remnant of its trunk and branches, at the American Revolution a hundred years later. The group was doubtless as picturesque as the artist has fancied it ; but the details are scarcely to be ascertained. "We meet," said this leader of English Christians in the wilderness, addressing its native people, " on the broad pathway of good faith and good will. No advantage shall be taken on either side, but all shall be openness and love. I will not call you children, for parents sometimes chide their children too severely ; nor brothers only for brothers differ. I will not compare the friendship between me and you to a chain, for that might be rusted by the rain ; or a falling tree might break it. But let us feel that we are the same as if one man s body were to live in two separate parts ; for we are one in mankind ; we are all one flesh and blootl." This was the purport of Ids speech, inter preted easily enough to the Lenni Lenape chiefs, whose almost naked figures, painted red, blue, and yellow, decorated with belts of hides and fur, or with shells and the plumage of birds, must have con trasted with the European dress, the large-flappo coats and waistcoats, the broad hats, the knee- breeches and boots, of Penn and his comrades. " Taminent " is the name given to the presiding sachem, who wore a kind of chaplet, decorated with a horn. The Indians, it is certain, were most favourably impressed by Penn s manner and address, and by what they understood of his inten tions, confirmed by the utter absence of military parade among his followers. The peaceful inter course, during many years, between the two races in this part of North America, is a gratifying ex ception to their history, as regards mutual rela tions, in other provinces of the same continent, and in Puritan New England before all of them. For the capital of Pennsylvania, the " City of Brotherly Love," which is " Philadelphia " in New Testament Greek, a site was chosen by William Penn at a place named by the Indians Wicocoa, situated at the junction of the Delaware and the Sclmylkill. It was bought of three Swedish colonists, by whom it had been occupied before. The projected city was to cover twelve square miles : Penn would have liked every house to be surrounded by its large garden, so that the whole might be "a green country town." The colonial surveyor very soon laid out his plan for the making of this town, with a series of parallel roads or streets across the neck of land between the two rivers, intersected at certain angles by another series, equally straight, but in general following the lines of the rivers course to their junction. The streets being wide, and well planted with a variety of fine trees, the effect is rather pleasing. Philadelphia, as an infant* city, grew very rapidly and healthily from its birth in the summer of 1682. Two years after that time, it contained six hundred houses. It had a riverside quay, where vessels of five hundred tons burthen could be unladen at the wharf ; a, commo dious inn, the " Blue Anchor," built in the old Cheshire style of a timber frame filled up with brickwork, which served also for the corn-exchange and the post-office ; chapels and schools, and even a printing office. The population was increased by the arrival of two or three vessels monthly, bringing families who soon made themselves at home. The political institutions, however, which had been at the outset devised for Pennsylvania, needed some modification to suit the wishes and circum stances of its actual settlers. Their first legislative assembly at Philadelphia met in March, 1683, when the city consisted of only a few huts or cottages. Instead of the full numbers proposed for the Council and Assembly, each county, of bix com- 1684.] CHARACTER OF WILLIAM 279 posing the province, was able to send only three deputies to the Upper House, and nine to the Lower; so that it was necessary to reduce their normal dimensions. The Assembly, however, insisted upon having a right to initiate new laws, and to discuss measures of government. A veto, indeed, upon all legislation was to belong to the Governor of the province. But he could perform no act without the advice of his Council, and he could not appoint any officer of the administration. There were, magistrates and constables ; but, to prevent litiga tion, three " peacemakers " in each county were to hear disputes between the citizens, and to act by way of arbitration before an appeal to the law. A court for the protection and relief of widows and orphans was to be held locally twice a year. " I desire," said Penn, " to show men as free and as happy as they can be." He would not allow taxes to be levied in his colony, and refused the offer of a revenue from export duties, such as Lord Baltimore obtained in Maryland. Meanwhile, the contro versy with that nobleman about the Delaware terri tory resulted in a decision of his Majesty s Govern ment against Lord Balti more ; yet the territory was not annexed to Penn sylvania, but was formed into a separate province. William Penn, having done this great work in America within less than three years, was called home to England, in August, 1684, by the misfor tunes and dangers of some of his intimate friends, one of whom, Sydney, had died on the scaffold. It does not belong to this History to examine the conduct of Penn under the reign of James II., or to discuss the probability of Macaulay s accusations, to which Mr. Hepworth Dixon has replied. There is strong reason to conclude that Macaulay fell into a mistake of identity, upon more than one occasion, with regard to this illustrious Englishman, con founding him with George Penne, the mercenary pardon-broker after the Monmouth rebellion, and with Neville Penn, the agent of a Jacobite conspiracy in the time of William III. It is undeniably true that William Penn, as a friend of James II. from WILLIAM PENN S BOOK-PLATE. his youth, as a Dissenter who could never approve of the Church Establishment, and as a Quaker advocate of non-resistance by armed force, was heartily averse to the Revolution of 1688. For this cause he was obnoxious to Lord Macaulay ; but a severe scrutiny can discover no action in his whole life, public or private, that is not consistent with strict integrity. If his behaviour in some instances, as in the affair of Magdalen College, Oxford, was rather officious and ill-advised if he now and then betrayed a slight degree of fussiness and self-complacency in the exercise of his supposed influence at Court these were but the faults of a sanguine temper in one of the most candid, im pulsive, and open-hearted of men. Such, in fact, appears to be the character of William Penn ; and, despite his want of attach ment to the Whig party, his services to the progress of civil and religious liberty should be remembered to his honour. The founder of Penn sylvania, living to 1718, was enabled to revisit his colony, staying nearly two years, in 1700 and the next year, when he found the young commonwealth in a thriving condition. But his own authority there had been destroyed. In the war between England and France, our American pos sessions being exposed to attack, King William had found it needful to put all these detached provinces, including Pennsylvania, under a military Governor at New York. This was only for a time, from 1692 to 1694; but it entailed financial charges and political dissensions upon the community at Philadelphia. Colonel Markham, again the acting deputy-governor for Penn, did not conciliate the party who were jealous of every privilege retained by the territorial lord. Their opposition was fomented by agents of the Crown, seeking to create a pretext for converting the pro prietary colony into a mere dependency of White hall. Conflicts were frequent, in which, during Penn s long absence, the moral power he alone relied upon was lost. He displayed, in his mansion at Pennsbury, a fair degree of lordly dignity among the colonists of 1700, for whose benefit he had 280 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1675. sacrificed a large share of his piivate fortune. But they grudged the efforts required to maintain their charter of corporate freedom, and he returned in much disappointment. Some of his latest acts in America were the emancipation of the negro slaves on his own estates, the extension and con firmation of his humane dealings with the native Indians, and the proposal of a league among the American colonies for their common defence and convenience. CHAPTER XXXIII. New England involved in an Indian War Condition of the Natives as affected by Civilisation Fairness of their Treatment by the New Englanders Feeling of Uneasiness among the Tribes at the Continued Advance of the White Men Alexander, Sachem of the Pokanokets His brief Reign and early Death Suspicious Conduct of Philip, his Successor Negotiations between him and the Government of New Plymouth Murder of a Christianised Indian Execution of Three Indians for the Fact Philip in Open Rebellion against the English Prodigies and Portents English Troops taken in an Ambush Desperate Assault of Indians on a House at Brookfield, Massachusetts -Attack on the Town of Hadley A Mysterious Stranger Rapidity of the Indian Movements Measures of Defence taken by the United Colonies Disastrous Affair near Deerfield Scattered Actions, and Spread of the Rebellion Proceedings against the Narragansetts. IN returning to the changeful fortunes of New England, we find that part of America desolated by an Indian war of long continuance and terrible ferocity. For several years there had been peace between the English and the natives. The latter appear for a time to have been convinced that the white man was too strong for them ; and it may be also that they felt the advantages resulting from his presence, as much as the grievance of having to retire before a more energetic nationality. Those advantages were certainly not few, nor slight. The Indian was actually getting rich upon the stranger. Not only did the colonists pay for the lands they occupied (though probably the price given was far from a real equivalent), but a continual trade was carried on between English speculators and native tribes. The red man sold all his surplus corn to the white-faced dwellers in the towns. He disposed of the rich furs of beavers and other animals in the same market, and received in exchange commodities which made his life far more endurable than it had been before. He was taught to cultivate English vegetables ; he became acquainted with the use of English domestic and farmyard animals ; he acquired by barter a number of manufactured articles, such as added greatly to his personal comfort, and the decency of his mde abode. On the whole, he Avas treated fairly by the Puritan settlers, though of course there were times when lie was cheated by men who had more shrewdness than conscience. So much care was taken of him in this respect that any unfair engagement into which he may have been betrayed was declared by law to be null from the beginning ; and special ordinances were passed to protect him from ill- usage, whether of violence or cajolery.* On one occasion, three Englishmen wei e hanged for the murder of an Indian and, notwithstanding that some foolish people were found to murmur at the sentence, it received the support of the majority. Josiah Winslow, Governor of Plymouth at the period we have now reached, wrote to the Federal Commissioners, on the 1st of May, 1676, with reference to the Indian rebellion : " I think I can clearly say that, before these present troubles broke out, the English did not possess one foot of land in this colony but what was fairly obtained by honest purchase of the Indian proprietors. Nay, because some of our people are of a covetous disposition, and the Indians are in their straits easily prevailed with to part with their lauds, we first made a law that none should purchase or receive of gift any land of the Indians without the knowledge and allowance of our Court. . . . And if at any time they have brought complaints before us, they have had justice impartial and speedy, so that our own people have frequently complained that we erred on the other hand in showing them overmuch favour." Such being the condition of the native population in the year 1675, it might reasonably be supposed that they had little or no cause to break faith with their English rivals, and thus draw down upon their heads the vengeance of a race Avhich they had learned to fear as well as to admire. But the feeling of nationality is one of the most powerful sentiments in the breasts of most communities, whether civil ised or barbarian. The Poles of the present day * Palfrey s New England, Vol. III., chap. 4. 1662.] POSITION OF THE POKAXOKETS. 281 ai-e probably much better off than their ancestors of the last century, when the peasants lived in abject misery beneath the heel of feudal lords who rated them but as beasts, and probably cared for them less ; yet the detestation of the foreign ruler knows no bounds. The Clmstians of Turkey are not now materially injured ; but the government of Mohammedans is to them hateful in itself. In like manner, the Indians of America seem to have chafed under the dominion of an alien people. Their laws, their i-eligion, their traditions, their ancient habits, their very existence on a continent which they might have supposed to be theirs by natural right, all seemed imperilled. To this general feeling were added from time to time those collisions of interest, those individual instances of wrong-doing on the one part and of suffering on the other, which the most fairly-devised code of laws, and the most careful supervision of authority, can never entirely prevent. After the arrival of the Pilgrim Fathers at Plymouth, Massasoit. sachernof the Wampanoagsor Pokanokets, made a treaty with the settlers, which he maintained unbroken during the remainder of his long life. He died in 1660, and was succeeded by his sons, Wamsutta and Pometacom. The elder of these was afterwards called Alexander, having requested of the General Court of Plymouth the gift of an English name. At the same time his brother was called Philip. In the year 1662 it was reported at Plymouth that Alexander was plotting with the Narragansetts ; and, on his neglecting to appear befoi e the General Court to declare his intentions, in accordance with an order to that effect which had been sent him, an armed party under Majors Winslow and Bradford was despatched to compel his attendance. He at once consented to go to Plymouth, where he gave satis factory explanations, but, on getting back to his own home, died of a slow fever, brought on, according to some accounts, by a sense of mortified pride. His position as chief sachem of the tribe was then assumed by his brother Philip. Doubts were felt as to the disposition, of this savage, and he in his turn was summoned to Plymouth, to make answer to such questions as might be put to him, and to deliberate with the authorities there on matters tending to a further settlement of peace, and to the renewal of former amicable under standings. On going there, he solemnly denied being concerned in any plot against the English, or having any knowledge of such a plot, and proffered his younger brother as a hostage until the Court should have more certainty of the ti-uth of what he said. This offer was declined ; and the business was concluded by the renewal of previous covenants, by Philip and five of his subordinate sachems signing an instrument binding them to peaceful and loyal conduct as subjects of the King of England and neighbours of the settlers, and by the Court agreeing to furnish Philip and his tribe with assistance in case of need. It is probable that the Indian chief was sincere when he entered into this compact. Five years elapsed without any untoward event; and if he had had a design against the English in 1662, it is not likely that the powerful sachem of the Pokanokets would have been unable to make any attempt to carry it out during so long a period. Yet he may all that while have been nursing a feeling of enmity against the strangers, and brooding over wrongs whether i-eal or imaginary. The position of his people was becoming worse and worse every year. They were gradually losing all their best lands ; and, although this was by their own act, and they received in exchange what they consented to regard as an equivalent, it is easy to understand that they were often oppressed as if by threatenings of an advancing doom, which must be repelled at once, or not at all. The English had so managed as continually to drive the savages into those little peninsulas which are to be found scattered along the New England coast. Here, with the sea on all sides but one, and that one shut against them by the watchful Europeans, the Pokanokets must have felt as if caught in a trap, and handed over to certain if slow extinction. Without supposing that they were .subjected to any ill-usage, we are bound, in common fairness to our common human natui e, to admit that their position was painful, and might to them selves have seemed little short of fatal. Whether the war now to be described originated in any widely-spread conspiracy may perhaps be doubted. More probably it was a sudden flame bursting out of a long-fermenting heap of combus tible materials. ; The first intimation of anything wrong which came to the General Court of Plymouth was on the 5th of June, 1667, when an Indian of Philip s tribe made a charge against his sachem of having expressed a readiness to combine with either the French or the Dutch against the English, so as to recover all lands sold by the natives to the settlers, and at the same time to obtain possession of their goods and other valuables. Philip was questioned on the subject, but repudiated the state ment as a calumny originating with Ninigret, the Nyantic sachem. Further investigations led to a more deliberate repetition of the charge, to a more emphatic and earnest denial of its truth, to a temporary rendering up of their arms by Philip CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1671. and his men, and to the restoration of their weapons on the General Court being satisfied that there was no sufficient proof of the alleged design. The matter slept for another four years, when suspicion was again excited. This time Philip appeared at Taunton before three Boston men, who seem to have been chosen as umpires, and the Pokanoket chieftain, with four of his subordinates, his arms forfeited, and nominated eight persons to be associated with the Magistrates as a Council of War. That the Indians should have been in posses sion of fire-arms at all may seem a proof of great remissness on the part of the English authorities ; but in truth it had been found impossible to prevent it. Although the trade was illegal, rapacious specu lators, English, French, and Dutch, had sold them MAP OF PENNSYLVANIA AND WEST NEW JERSEY. (From T/iomas s " History of Pennsylvania.") signed a paper admitting that they had taken up arms against their friends the English with an evil intent, and without any just cause. On the same occasion, Philip expressed a desire to renew his covenant, and engaged to resign to the Govern ment of New Plymouth all his English arms. But a few months later it became apparent that the sachem had secreted several guns, had neglected to give orders to his people to render up their weapons, and had traduced the colony of Plymouth to its neighbours. The General Court thereupon declared muskets in abundance, and they had by this time learned to use them with consummate skill. Having declared this forfeiture of arms, Plymouth next sought the co-operation of Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Philip also went to Massachusetts, alleging many complaints against the Government of the adjoining plantation. To some extent he obtained credence and sympathy from the persons lie addressed, who, however, offered their assistance in bringing about a friendly settlement of the quarrel ; and this renewed mediation ended in a 284 CABSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [in; fresh engagement on the part of Philip, one of the stipulations of which was to the effect that lie Avould pay a hundred pounds in three years, to defray the charges he had occasioned. Another long period elapsed without any dis turbance of the peace. In 1674, however, the old rumours came up again. The informant this time was a converted Indian named Sausaman, who had been brought up at the college at Cambridge. He could both write and speak English, and had been employed as a schoolmaster at Natick. Afterwards he resided for a time with Philip, and then, returning to Natick, was baptised, and officiated as a preacher. On giving information to the authorities at Plymouth with regard to the Pokanoket chieftain, he begged that his name might not be mentioned in connection with the matter, for that if it were known he would assuredly be killed. The event showed that his fears were not ill-founded. A few days after Philip had voluntarily presented himself at Plymouth, in March, 1675, to protest his innocence once more, Sausaman was found dead beneath the frozen surface of a pond, and the body presented marks of violence clearly indicating that he had been murdered. Three Indians were arrested on a charge of com mitting the crime, and the jury who tried them were assisted in their deliberations by six natives. The chief witness was an India 1 !!, who averred that from a hill not far off he had seen the murder done, but was afraid to reveal it lest he should lose his own life too. A verdict of guilty was returned by the jury, with the full concurrence of the six native assessors. Of the three prisoners, two were hanged, and the other was shot ; and one of the former confessed on the ladder that he had stood by, and seen his comrades kill Sausaman. Cotton. Mather and other early writers relate a circumstance which curiously illustrates at once the superstitious feelings still rife in society, and the growing hesitation as to admitting them in judicial processes. It is stated that when Tobias, one of Philip s counsellors who was suspected of the murder, approached the body, it burst out bleeding, and that on several repetitions of the experiment it always bled afresh.* The Justice of the Peace before whom the charge was brought did not think fit, however, to commit on such evidence ; and Tobias would probably have escaped but for the testimony of the Indian who saw the murder from the adjacent hill. Fifty years earlier, judges and juries would probably have convicted on no better grounds. Even as late as 1658 or 1659, a coroner s jury in London put a suspected person to this test, * Ma^nalia Christ! Americana, Book VII., chap. G, but without producing any fresh flow of blood, though the accused afterwards confessed the crime. | Philip now began to throw off the mask, and to place himself in a position of open hostility to the English. He and his men appeared in arms, marching about towards the head of the peninsula where they dwelt a narrow ridge of woody hills situated near the town of Bristol. It was resolved to keep a watch on him, but not as yet to take the offensive. The excitement, however, continued. Numerous Indians from other places flocked in to the Pokanoket chief; the native women were sent aAvay to Narragaiisett ; and a perpetual sound of guns and drums in the night showed that some warlike design was on foot. Savages need the stimulus of noise and showy demonstrations to quicken their resolution on great occasions ; but, fortunately, what excites them gives warning to those whom they would attack. The Plymouth Magistrates wrote a friendly letter to Philip, ad vising him to dismiss his strange Indians, and keep the peace ; but to this no answer was returned. Alarm now became general throughout the colony. The agitation and suspense of the public mind created a readiness to discover portents and prodi gies in earth, air, and sky. Men brooded over vague terrors until the whole universe seemed but as a magic mirror, reflecting ghastly forms of approaching trouble, or shadowy intimations of dangers too ap palling to be distinctly revealed. Cotton Mather gives a relation of these strange signs, which he says he had received on incontestable assurance. "In a clear, still, sunshiny morning," he writes, " there were divers persons in Maldon who heard in the air, on the south-east of them, a great gun go off, and presently thereupon the report of small guns like musket-shot, very thick discharging, as if there had been a battle. This was at a time when there was nothing visibly done in any part of the colony to occasion such noises ; but that which most of all astonished them was the flying of bullets, which came singing over their heads, and seemed very near to them, after which the sound of drums passing along westward was very audible ; and on the same day, in Plymouth colony in several places, invisible troops of horses were heard riding to and fro."+ Still more dismal tokens were not wanting as time went on. Some people vowed that they saw, during an eclipse of the moon, the figure of an Indian scalp darkly relieved against the centre of the disc. Others declared that an Indian bow had t Case of Major Strangeways, related in Vol. IV. of the " Harleian Miscellany." Bacon gives some amount of credence to the belief. (Natural History, Century X., par. 958.) 1 Mflgnalia Christi Americana, Book VII., chap. G, 1675.] A BELEAGUERED HOUSE. 285 been visible to them in the heavens ; while to many the howling of wolves at night came fraught with dire suggestions of disaster and ruin. Whatever we may think of these fears, the danger was real and serious. On the 20th of June, a party of Indians attacked the little town of Swan/ey (the nearest town to Philip s territory), burnt two houses, and withdrew. A dozen more were rifled three days later ; and shortly afterwards several Englishmen were suddenly killed in the same town, and their dead bodies subjected to horrible mutilations. But help was rapidly ap proaching. A combined force of soldiers from Plymouth and Massachusetts, small, but effective, arrived on the evening of June 28th by a forced march of more than four-and-twenty hours. It was during this march that the eclipse of the moon took place to which allusion has just been made ; and it was as the soldiers were halting by the roadside, for a hurried repast while the luminary was recovering her light, that the more melancholy and appre hensive spirits of the company transformed the central blackness into an ominous sign. Shortly after the arrival of the column at Swanzey, a recon noitring party was fired upon from the bushes. Some lighting took place the following clay, and Philip, finding his position growing serious, fled with his companions in canoes to the eastern shore of the bay, near the present town of Tiverton. Here they had a wider sphere of action before them, and, descending like a torrent on the settlements of Dartmouth, Taunton, and Middleborough, they burnt the houses and massacred the people. The fear of other Indians joining the movement was now so considerable that commissioners were sent from Massachusetts and Connecticut, accom panied by a strong military force, to obtain from the Narragansetts a renewal of former guarantees of friendship. The negotiation was apparently successful, though it was necessary to promise these savages a money payment as a reward for delivering up to the English, either living or dead, whatever subjects of Philip should come within their country, and for resisting the Pokanokets by force of arms, if need were. By the beginning of August, the Nipmuck Indians, inhabiting the central parts of Massachusetts, had joined the insurrection. ( aptain Edward Hutchinson and a party of twenty t roopers were proceeding to a conference with that tribe (whose disaffection was not yet known), when they fell into an ambush near Brookfield, at a spot where the path lay between a rocky hill on the right hand and a swamp on the left. The little force was driven back, with the loss of eight men killed and four wounded. The day before this untoward event, Philip, who had been sheltering in a marshy thicket, from which he was enabled occasionally to do some mischief to the English skirmishers, had effected a junction with the Nipmucks. The force that had been defeated near Brookfield, or rather the remnant of that force, got back by a circuitous route to the little town whence it had started. The men at once fortified them selves in a large house, into which most of the inhabitants soon crowded for safety. It was not long before they were surrounded by the furious Indians, who, assembling to the number of three hundred, burnt all the buildings in the outskirts, and fired into the house, mortally wounding one of the men in it. They then seized on an unfortunate person who had ventured out of doors, cut off his head, kicked it about like a ball, and finally set it up on a pole before the door of his father s dwelling. Two attempts to communicate with Boston were defeated by the messengers being driven back. Through the whole of that terrible night, the angry and excited savages surged and yelled about the little garrison, pouring in their shots so fast dining the hours of darkness that the beleaguered Englkh had enough to do to reply to them. The moon rose at three o clock on the following morning, and showed the Nipmucks busy in heaping up a quan tity of combustible matter at one corner of the building. To this they presently set fire ; but a sallying party from the house, under cover of marksmen from above, issued forth, and dashed out the flames. The attempt was twicer renewed and twice defeated ere dawn ; then, just before the early light of an August morning crept over the smoke and tumult of the scene, a messenger got away 011 the* road to Boston, to summon assistance. Under the most favourable circumstances, assist ance could not arrive for many hours. Brookfield was a long way from the capital, and the messenger had to go on foot. In the meanwhile, the siege continued, and the Indians displayed a pertinacity and a fertility of resource such as they were not commonly in the habit of exhibiting. They con- tinued, throughout the whole of that day and the ensuing night, to send volleys of musketry into the house, and to endeavour to set it on fire. Arrows tipped with burning rags were shot into the roof, and the besieged English were obliged to cut holes in the thatch to extinguish the flames. A ball of wild-fire reached the garret, the floor of which was heaped witli flax and tow ; but the danger was prevented by a timely discovery of its existence. The walls of the house were frequently pierced by the musket-balls of the attacking party; and as about tiftv women and children were in the 286 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1675. dwelling at the time, the confusion and terror were extreme. On the 4th of August the third day of the siege the Indians constructed a sort of carriage, about fourteen yards long, with a barrel for a wheel, the fore part of which was loaded with hay, flax, chips, and other inflammable substances, with which it was evident they intended to make another attempt to fire the house. But a shower of rain fell very opportunely, and prevented the materials from readily kindling. Relief was now at hand. On the forenoon of the same day, Major Simon Willard was pursuing his Avay from Lancaster to Groton in command of forty-seven heavy-armed horsemen, when a mes senger from Maryborough overtook him with the news, which had been brought to that town by the man who had escaped from Brookfield. Thirty miles of bad road lay between the little troop and the garrison which so urgently needed relief. But Willard, though an old man of seventy, did not hesitate for a moment. He and his comrades at once galloped to the rescue, and an hour after nightfall they came clattering into Brookfield, to the dismay of the Indians, who, having offered some show of resistance, during which they wounded two of Major Willard s men, escaped in the night. So determined had been the resistance during those three days that the savages sustained a loss of eighty in killed and injured. Philip now proceeded, with forty of his men, and some women and children, to a swamp about twelve miles from Brookfield, where he made presents to the Nipmuck chiefs, as a reward for their services in the recent encounter. About a fortnight later, the savages massacred a whole family at Lancaster, and on the 25th of August a body of Indian auxiliaries went over to the enemy, and gave battle to the pursuing English in a swamp. The settlements on the Connecticut, in that part of the river which runs through Massachusetts, were particularly threatened, and a desperate attack was made upon Hadley on the 1st of September. The people, who were observing a fast at the time, were assembled in their meeting-house when they were startled by the war-whoop of the ad vancing savages. The men hastily seized their muskets, rushed out into the street, and fell into line. But the Indians had closed all round them, and symptoms of a panic were visible. At that moment, an ancient man, dressed in old-fashioned garments, appeai-ed among the wavering townsfolk, and, assuming the command as by a natural right, and with a precision which showed that he was well accustomed to the ordering of troops in the face of the enemy, restored confidence and order. The stranger was totally unknown to the people of Hadley, and, in the surprise and excitement of his unlooked-for appearance, they regarded him as an angel sent by Heaven for their deliverance. Ral lying under his vigorous leadership, they drove the Indians out of the town ; then, turning to question their mysterious friend, found that he had dis appeared as strangely and suddenly as he had come. It was no other than Colonel Goffe, the fugitive regicide. He had for some time been living in strict privacy in the house of a Mr. Russell. While sitting at a window in that house, he had seen the savages pouring over the hills, and, knowing the gravity of the danger, had flung him self into the combat with all that passion and daring which thirty years before had helped to win victories for Cromwell. Without waiting for acknowledg ment or thanks, he quietly regained his friend s house as soon as the peril was over ; and this most dramatic incident is the last we hear of him. He never again, as far as history or even legend enlightens us, emerged from the privacy of the hospitable dwelling that sheltered him.* Many other actions occurred in the vicinity of the Connecticut, in which the English, attacked by lurking foes, or overmatched in numbers, were sometimes defeated. The town of Northfield it was found necessary to abandon. The rapidity of move ment by which the savages were enabled to appear at short intervals of time at widely-separated places, and which gave them the appearance of being omnipresent, was one of the most alarming circum stances with which the colonists had to deal. The scattered townships were taken in quick succession, and the bewildered English did not know in what direction to concentrate their efforts. The nature of the country favoured the operations of the Indians, and proportionately embarrassed those of the white men. Large spaces of wood and marsh land parted the settlements from one another, and hindered concerted action. But the savage, to whom the forest and the swamp were native, who found in them his home, and could track his noise less way across the wilderness with something like an instinct, turned them to the utmost advantage as a means of effecting surprises, and, after inflicting damage on his enemy, of escaping readily and mys teriously to some fresh scene of carnage. The English were never beaten by the Indians in a fair, open fight ; but they were sometimes worsted by secret and unforeseen attacks. * Mr. Palfrey, in relating this story in his " History of New England" (Vol. III., chap. 4), throws some doubt on its authenticity. It does in fact rest only on tradition ; but tradition is not always a liar. 1073.] DISASTROUS AFFAIR. The situation became so serious in the autumn of 107.") that when the Federal Commissioners met at Boston, on September 9th, the necessity of taking more energetic measures against the danger was at once acknowledged. The Federal Council had been remodelled in 1672, after a long course of negotiations, in which Connecticut made much of her old grievance that Massachusetts would not help her against the Indians and the Dutch in I 5fi3. and Massachusetts and Plymouth alleged that Connecticut had broken the original pact in absovbing New Haven without the consent, and indeed against the wishes, of the other members of the league. By the new Articles of Federation, the war-making power of the Commissioners, which had been one of the chief subjects of dissension, was restricted by a provision that the determination of an offensive war, properly so called, so as to engage all the colonies, should lie with the several General Courts. The war with the revolted Indians was, however, a defensive Avar ; and the six Commis sioners (two for each colony) unanimously declared it to be both just and necessary, and such as should be jointly prosecuted by all the United Colonies. They accordingly ordered the raising of a thousand .soldiers, half of whom were to be dragoons, or troopers with long arms. Days of fasting and humiliation were observed in the several colonies; and the favourite Puritan idea, that all disasters are special judgments of God for the correction of special sins, was brought prominently forward. One Solomon Stoddard, of Northampton, detected these special sins in fine clothes, long hair, and the toleration of many taverns, especially in Boston. Increase Mather was of a like opinion, and, having found that, of nine Englishmen killed in a certain action, each belonged to a separate town, advanced to the conclusion that the Lord desired in this way to intimate that ho had a controversy with every plantation. It is a curious instance of that solemn frivolity of mind which is the parent of such ideas, that, while the country was in the crisis of a tragedy, people could occupy their minds with supposing that God had purposely contrived the massacre of men, women, and children, because some people wore *Jieir hair too long and dressed too gaily, or because the magistrates of Boston issued too many licences to publicans. The Federal Commissioners met repeatedly during the next ten weeks. Doleful intelligence poured in upon them fast. Deerfield, on the Connecticut, was broken up, the inhabitants withdrawing to wards the lower towns after having been fired upon as they were going to worship. Their abandonment of the place was HO precipitate that they left behind them a large quantity of wheat, just reaped and partly threshed. As it was highly undesirable to let this fall into the hands of the enemy, soldiers were sent from Hadley, with eighteen wagons and their teamsters, to bring it in. The threshing of the grain was finished, and the loaded wagons, <-> OO escorted by the convoy of ninety men under Captain Lothrop, started on their return journey. At seven o clock on the morning of September 18th, they reached a little stream, to which, in memory of what occurred, the name of the Bloody Brook has since been given. Thick woods hung heavily on the banks, and the soldiers, in view of this fact, ought to have been especially cautious. It would appear, however, that they forgot all rules of prudence, put their arms in the wagons, and dis persed about the banks, to gather grapes from the wild vines. Suddenly a terrific fire opened on them from the right-hand side, and a throng of savages leapt out of the woods. The Volley laid several of the English low ; the others, before they could form and regain their weapons, found themselves beset by a number of Indians, estimated at seven hundred. Lothrop was speedily shot dead. Many others shared his fate, after desperate endeavours to re trieve the fortunes of the day ; only seven or eight escaped from the fatal snare. The disaster was terrible, but it was due less to the prowess of the Indians than to the indiscretion of the English troops. The New Englanders of that date had had little or no experience of warfare, and in this respect were inferior to the generation which pre ceded them. Though courageous, they were liable to sudden alarms, and had not yet acquired the virtue of constant vigilance. Lothrop had left behind him at Deerfield a few men under Captain Mosely, who undertook to send forth scouts, and secure the rear of the returning teamsters and military. The latter were about four or five miles from Deerfield when the attack took place. Mosely heard the noise of the firing, and hurried to the relief of his countrymen. He found the Indians in possession of the ground, scalping the dead bodies of the English. The fight was at once renewed, and many of the savages were killed. From the shadowy recesses of the woods, however, they kept up an Irregular fire until evening, when Mosely was reinforced by a hundred Englishmen and fifty friendly Mohegans, who had been higher up the river, and now dispersed the lingering enemy. Yet, in a general sesise, the latter remained masters of that part of the country. On the oth of October, Springfield, on the Connecticut, was attacked by the savages, who burnt thirty houses before they were driven off. The colonists in that 288 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1675. town had always lived on friendly terms with the natives during the whole forty years of their set tlement, and since the beginning of the war had received from the neighbouring Indians every assurance of friendship ; yet the storm burst upon them none the less. The situation of Springfield being very near the borders of Connecticut colony, this sudden outbreak of the adjacent tribes caused great alarm in that plantation, and Secretary Allyii wrote to the Magistrates of Massachusetts that it was high time for New England to stir up all her strength, and make war her work and trade, for the suppression of such remorseless enemies. The Massachusetts General Court, agreeing with the views of Solomon Stoddard and Increase Mather, that the Lord had incited the Indians to commit wholesale murder because some people in Boston and other towns wore their hair too long, and spent too much money on their tailors, passed certain measures of reformation, wliich included a " testi mony " against " proud excesses in apparel, hair, &.c.;" against "false worshippers, especially idola trous (!) Quakers;" and against swearing and excessive drinking. Mather was of opinion that the Lord was sufficiently satisfied with these con cessions to allow the people of Hatfield to repulse an attack ; though, judging by the same vicious mode of reasoning, which has in truth nothing of religion about it but the name, he was not sufficiently satis fied to prevent the attack altogether. After this affair at Hattield, the insurgents dispersed towards the country occupied by the Narragansetts. Those savages had not fulfilled their agreement to sur render, for a money payment, such enemies of the English as should fall into their hands. It was not denied by them that several of Philip s followers had found refuge among them ; and Canonchet, sachem of the tribe, and son of Miantonomoh, went to Boston in October, and promised the Federal Commissioners that they should be surrendered within ten days. The promise was broken, like that which had preceded it. Five days after the stipulated time had expired, the Commissioners, considering that the hostility of the Narragansetts was now certain, resolved to raise an additional force of a thousand men, for operations against the offending tribe. The troops were to be ready for the field within six weeks, were to be strong, active, and courageous men, and were to be well provided with all necessaries for active service. Connecticut hung back from these arrangements, notwith standing the recent letter of Secretary Allyu, and the Connecticut troops generally exhibited a disposi tion to retire from the field, alleging that they were being used only to garrison Massachusetts towns. It was obvious, however, that a concentrated move ment on a large scale a measure of unusual force and promptitude was necessary, if the English colonies were to be preserved from total extinction. The winter was the best season for such an attack, for the forest, being then bare of leaves, would offer less covert to the stealthy foe. The troops, therefore, being ready for their march by the second week in December, set forth 011 their perilous ex pedition ; and at the season when the days are at their shortest, and the weather is at its coldest, the blow that was to crush the Narragansetts was suddenly and silently struck. CHAPTER XXXIV. Continuation of Philip s War A Native Fort Attack by the English on the Narragansett Position Burning out of \ ,K Defenders Terrible Return March of the Conquerors through Snow and Darkness Sufferings of the Indians Failure oi Food Eesources in the English Colonies Assault on the Town of Lancaster Atrocities of the Insurgents Mrs. Rowland- son and her Child A Piteous Narrative Famine among the Rebels Desperate Fighting Capture of Canonchet Serious Defeat of the English near the Upper Falls of the Connecticut Attack on Hatfield Vigorous Measures against the Revolted Tribes Decline of the Movement Position of the Praying Indians Their asserted Treachery Indiscriminate Revenge Continued Disasters among the Insurgent Ranks Death of Philip, the Pokanoket Sachem Insurrection in Maine Restoration of Peace Sufferings and Loss resulting from the War. THE forces from Massachusetts having effected their junction with the Plymouth levy at the north eastern corner of the Narragansett country, the united army proceeded to the little town of Wick- ford, which they made their head-quarters. Affairs were looking grave. The savages in the neighbour hood had for some days been in open insurrection, and had murdered several men, women, and chil dren ; so that the troops did not arrive at all too soon. The several companies of Massachusetts and Plymouth, which seemed at first destined to bear the whole burden of the war, received infor mation, on the 13th of December, 1675, that Major Treat, of Connecticut, had reached Pettyquamscott 1675.1 THE NARRAGANSETT POSITION". 289 with five companies of English and fifty Mohegan warriors. Their allies immediately moved to that spot, and the whole force was placed under the command of Josiah Winslow, Governor of Ply- month, a New Englander by birth. Provisions were getting short, and it was resolved to act at once, and with the utmost decision. Winslow had been told by a prisoner where the principal force of tion the English forces at once set out, determined to lose no time in the execution of their design. They started while it was yet dark, at five o clock on a winter morning, after lying for some hours in the open field. The night was stormy. Snow lay thickly on the ground. The air breathed ice, and the soldiers were compelled to push forward at a rapid march, in order that they might sur- N INDIAN CHIEF. (After Catlin.) the Narragansetts was to be found. The insur gents, he said, were assembled, to the number of 3,500, at a spot about eighteen miles distant in a north-westerly direction. Their camp, which had been fortified to the greatest extent of native skill, was advantageously situated on a plot of rising ground, insulated by a swam}). Rows of palisades had been driven into the earth round the entire circuit of the stronghold, to which the only entrance was over a bridge roughly constructed of a felled tree four or five feet from the surface of the marsh, and protected by a blockhouse. Towards this posi- 25 prise the enemy. Scarcely halting to refresh themselves, they gained the encampment at one o clock P.M., and immediately advanced to the attack. The forces from Massachusetts led the van, followed by the Plymouth division, and then by that of Connecticut. Thus the position of the Indians was attacked by the associated strength of New England. The watchful Narragansetts within were ready to receive their assailants. They poured a raking fire into the English ranks, instantaneously killing Captain Johnson, of Roxbury, as he rushed across 200 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. the bridge. Four more captains were shot clown within the enclosure ; other officers were seriously, and some fatally, wounded. The privates, how ever, dashed forward, and a desperate struggle ensued. It lasted two or three hours, and the savages fought so well that for a little while they drove out the attacking force. But the English soon rallied, and again burst into the encampment. Hand to hand, the opposing forces strove for the mastery, and the snow was crimsoned with the blood of white men and of red. The English at length resorted to the same expedient that had proved so successful at the storming of the Pequot fort. They set fire to the wigwams, and burnt out the frenzied wretches who had battled vainly, but gallantly, for their position. At this moment, Samuel Hall, of Fail-field, one of the English com batants, lay bleeding in the snow. He heard the command given, to apply the match to the hovels, and, fearing that he should be burned alive by the act of his own countrymen, struggled to his feet, and cut his way out of the enclosure, though he had received two bullets in each thigh. The com bined forces of Massachusetts, Plymouth, and Con necticut lost seventy men killed, and a hundred and fifty wounded. One of the chiefs of the Narragan- setts, who was taken prisoner, reported that on their side seven hundred fighting men were slain, and three hundred fatally Avounded. This may or may not have been correct ; but in any case the victory was complete. An officer of the attacking army, named Church, who many years afterwards wrote *, gossiping work on the war, strongly pro tested in the interest of the soldiers against the burning of the wigwams. He went to the General, and told him that the wigwams had been rendered musket-proof by being lined with baskets and tubs of grain, and other provisions sufficient to supply the whole army until the spring. Besides, he added, the wounded might be warmly lodged, if the wigwams were spared, instead of running the risk of perishing in the cold. The army was now getting very near the end of its food-stores, and the Plymouth contingent, in particular, had served out its last biscuit. But Winslow refused to listen to the suggestion. He probably saw that there was no other way of completely subduing the enemy. It was a desperate measure, however. The wigwams being destroyed, the exhausted soldiers were, as Church pointed out, left without protection against the inclemency of the advancing night. Snow was again falling thickly. The wounded had to be conveyed a distance of many miles on the return march, and it was feared that their wounds would stiffen as they went. In those days there were 110 such appliances for mitigating ths sufferings of the wounded as there are in these. Everything was done for the unfortunate men that kindness could suggest; but the snow-drifts deepened as the army pursued its toilsome way across the desert, and several died before morning in the freezing air. It was two hours after midnight when the forces at length got back to Wickford. On the following day, several more succumbed to the injuries they had received and to the bitter weather, and a large grave was dug for the reception, of their remains. Joseph Dudley, one of the persons engaged in the action, stated in a letter to Governor Leverett that the whole army, especially the contingent from Connecticut, was much disabled, unfit to march, and afflicted with frozen and swollen limbs. But the condition of the Indians was worse than that of their conquerors. They had lost their winter dwellings, and the food they had stored up for months of inaction. Many of their old men, women, and children had perished in the burning wigwams. They themselves were driven into the dismal swam}), where they had 110 protection against the cold but the boughs of cedars growing out of the marshy soil. In a little while, famine reduced their numbers still further by repeated deaths. The cruel season spent its utmost fury on them, and many sank down from utter feebleness. It would be ungenerous not to sympathise with a brave people thus reduced to dire extremities in the prosecution of a war which they believed to be necessary to the salvation of their race. Yet, on the other hand, it must also be admitted that the blow which humbled their pride was imperatively required, if the prospects of civilisation in New England were not to be annihilated in one fatal and bloody convulsion. That the Narragansetts were really conspiring with the Nipmucks seems to be conclusively proved by the fact that some English muskets lost at Deerfield, when that town was attacked by the latter tribe, were found in the fort belonging to the former. Although the power of the Narragansetts was broken, the war was not at an end, and the danger was far from over. Friendly Indians were sent out as scouts, and came back with intelligence that the enemy professed to be expecting assistance from the French, and meant soon to fall on the western line of the seaboard settlements. The allied forces accordingly remained for some weeks at Wickford, recruiting their strength, and watch ing the still threatening tribes. Fortunately, a vessel arrived at the spot the night after the battle, 1676.] A PITEOUS NARRATIVE. 291 with provision for the relief of the troops. After awhile, however, when it was found that nothing but unimportant skirmishes took place, and that the Indians were dispersed in many directions, the English army gradually withdrew from the field. This disbanding was hastened by commissariat con siderations. Bread had totally failed, and food in general was so short that the men were obliged to kill their horses to live on them. The ordinary course of industry and commerce had, indeed, been so interrupted by the war, that in Boston itself there was a great scarcity of provisions. But the Federal Commissioners, perceiving that it would be necessary at no distant date to resume the offen sive, called on the colonies for another levy of six hundred men, to meet at Brookfield, Massachusetts, in three weeks from the 8th of February, 1676. It was not long before the rebellious Indians re covered their spirits. They are said to have received recruits from Canada, with the connivance of the French authorities there ; and Canonchet, the Narragaiisett sachem, was resolved to struggle to the last, rather than see his tribe become slaves to the English. He gave directions for continuing the war with as much vigour as was possible to his shattered forces, and on the 10th of February the town of Lancaster, situated in a woody valley thirty-five miles west from Boston, was attacked with great fury. The place contained from two hundred and fifty to three hundred inhabitants, living in about fifty houses ; and the people, dread ing what might happen to so exposed a place, and knowing that the Indians had threatened a descent, requested assistance to be sent from Boston. It was despatched, but came too late. The troops were still on their way when the savages burst upon the town. They appeared at sunrise, and at once set fire to the houses in the outskirts. Several of the people were murdered, with prolonged and savage cruelty ; others were carried into captivity. One of the female inhabitants of the town Mrs. Rowlandson, wife of the resident minister wrote an account of her experiences in that dreadful time, in which some of the chief incidents are related with a quiet pathos that is extremely touching. Her house was burning above her head while the men within it were fighting for their lives, or lying where they fell in pools of blood. The bullets of the Indians rattled against the walls like a shower of stones ; and six stout dogs on the premises cowered with fear. Mi s. Rowlandson was at last taken prisoner by the Indians. She followed them, carrying in her arms her little girl, six years and five months old, when a bullet struck them both. Next morning, she records, " one of the Indians carried my poor wounded babe upon a horse : it went moaning all along, I shall die, I shall die. I went on foot after it with sorrow that cannot be expressed. At length I took it off the horse, and carried it in my arms till my strength failed me, and I fell down with it. ... After this it quickly began to snow, and when night came on they stopped. And now down I must sit in the snow, by a little fire, and a few boughs behind me, with my sick child in my lap, and calling much for water, being now, through the wound, fallen into a violent fever ; my own wound, also, growing so stiff that I could scarce sit down or rise up ; yet so it must be that I must sit all this cold winter night upon the cold snowy ground, with my sick child in my arms, looking that every hour would be the last of its life, and having no Christian friend near me either to comfort or help me. Oh, I may see the wonderful power of God, that my spirit did not utterly sink under my affliction; still the Lord upheld me with his gracious and merciful spirit." The piteous narrative goes on to state that for three days neither mother nor child received any thing but a little cold water. From time to time, the Indians, provoked by the lamentations of the poor woman, threatened to knock the child on the head. They moved about from place to place, and on one occasion halted near an empty wigwam. Thither, continues Mrs. Rowlandson, "I went with a very heavy heart, and down I sat with the pic ture of death in my lap. About two hours in the night, my sweet babe like a lamb departed this life. It was nine days from the first wounding in this miserable condition. I cannot but take notice how at another time I could not bear to be in a room where a dead person was ; but now the case is changed : I must and could lie down with my dead babe all the night after. I have thought since of the wonderful goodness of God to me in preserving me so in the Tise of my reason and senses in that distressed time, that I did not use wicked and violent means to end my own miserable life. . . . I went to take up my dead child in my arms to carry it with me, but they bid me let it alone. There was no resisting, but go I must, and leave it." After the death of her child, Mrs. Rowlandson was carried about by the Indians for two months, for the most part in the neighbourhood of the Connecticut river. The stores of food which the savages had brought with them from the sack of Lancaster were recklessly wasted, and they were soon visited by severe privations. Acorns and 292 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1676. ground-nuts (which they scratched up, like Caliban, with their hands), roots, weeds, and the bark of trees, formed a principal part of their food ; unless when they could get hold of any portion of a dead horse the flesh, the liver, the hoofs, the entrails, or even the bones, out of which they made a dis gusting species of broth or could snare the wild animals and snakes of the desert. Poor Mrs. Rowlandson was compelled by sheer necessity to feed on these revolting substances, and, having one day dined with Philip himself, thought a pancake which he gave her, and which was made of parched wheat, fried in bear s grease, as pleasant meat as she had ever tasted in her life. She remained with the savages eleven weeks and five days ; and she records that not a week passed without their wreaking their fury, by fire and sword, on one place or another. At length, however, her miseries were ended, she was ransomed for twenty pounds, and joined her husband at Boston. A son and daughter, carried off at the same time, were also redeemed.* During all the early months of that black year 1676, the Indians made attacks, which were gene rally successful, on the frontier settlements of New England. Whole towns were destroyed, innumerable houses burnt, several persons mur dered, and others captured and borne off into the wilderness. Flushed with their successes, the Indians assumed a tone of insolent mockery, and, on burning the town of Groton to the ground, called out to the English in the garrison, "What will you do for a house to pray in, now that we have burnt your meeting-house 1 ? " On the 26th of March, fifty Englishmen belonging to Plymouth colony, accompanied by twenty native allies, were lured into an ambush near Pawtuxet, and defeated by superior numbers. The Indians, who were headed by Canonchet, did not purchase their victory without considerable loss. Of the English, it is said in some accounts, only one escaped. The same desul tory but disastrous warfare was continued through out April and May ; yet, as the spring advanced, the tide of native successes began to ebb. Con necticut again sent a body of troops into the field, and reinforcements of the other divisions were pro vided as often as they were required. Places that had been abandoned by the whites a little before were once more occupied, and the retreating foe was hunted down with steady determination. Early in April, Canonchet was captured near the Blackstone, in the Narragansett country. He pre served his haughty spirit to the last, and, on being * Pala-ay * History of New England, Vol. III., chap. 5. questioned by a young man, replied, " Child, you do not understand war : I will answer your chief." Being offered his life if he would procure a treaty of peace, he refused the favour with disdain, be cause of the condition. The Indians, he averred, would never yield. He expressed himself content to encounter death, and said that he would speak nothing which should be unworthy of himself. He was taken to Stoiiington, and there executed by the Mohegans and Pequots, who had taken him prisoner. It was thought that the act would engage those native allies more firmly against the mutinous Indians. A few successes, however, still remained to the insurgents. On the 20th of April,, they inflicted a severe defeat on Captain Wadsworth, near Sudbury, to the west of Boston, and killed a number of prisoners, with every circumstance of diabolical torture. Another reverse, of a still more serious nature, took place 011 the 18th of May near the upper falls of the Connecticut. Captain Turner, of Boston, having been informed by an inhabitant of Hadley, who had been taken prisoner, and had afterwards escaped, that several Indians were plant ing and fishing on the banks of the river, deter mined on an attack. At the head of a hundred and eighty troopers, he marched twenty miles during the hours of darkness, and came in sight of the Indians at dawn. The soldiers then dismounted, and crept on foot, silently and uiiperceived, to the edge of the camp. A sudden volley of musketry startled the Indians from their repose. They made a brief and ineffectual attempt at resistance, but perished in large numbers, either by the sword and musket, or by drowning in the river, towards which they fled in the hope of escaping by their canoes. Several were carried over the falls ; others were shot down as they struggled in the water. While the English lost only one man, three hundred Indians were killed, and large quantities of food and ammunition were destroyed. The troopei s also demolished two forges which the savages had used for mending their arms, took away all their tools, and threw two pigs of lead, intended for the casting of bullets, into the river. The expedition so far appeared to be a triumphant success ; but an unexpected reverse was at hand. The noise of the firing had been heard by another party of Indians in the neighbourhood, who Imrried to the spot in large numbers. Th.e English, finding themselves overmatched, rushed to where their horses were tied up, and hastily began their return march. But nearly the whole way back they were galled Icy the fire of their concealed enemies, operating from various points. A panic set in when intelli- 167G.: DECLINE OF THE WAR. 293 gence spread among the ranks, derived from the information of an Indian prisoner, that Philip him self was close by with a thousand warriors. The rear of the retreating column, was harassed by in cessant attacks, and the troops under Captain Holyoke, the second in command, whose duty it was to protect this portion of the little army, were nearly surrounded. The whooping and excited savages were close upon the captain, when, by shooting down the foremost, he kept the others at bay. The military order of the column, however, was destroyed. It broke up into fragments, and suffered severe losses ; one small knot of men being cut to pieces in passing through a morass, while another was forced to surrender, and reserved for death by torture. A hundred and forty weary and dispirited men. marched into Hatfield in the course of the day ; the other forty were either slain or in the hands of the enemy. Captain Turner was among the dead. He had recently been ill, and is thought to liave lost his presence of mind with fatigue and excitement. Holyoke was cool and self-possessed throughout ; but the anxiety of the day told so severely on his strength that he died a few months later, at the early age of twenty- eight. This disastrous action was followed by an attack on Hattield, when six or seven hundred Indians fired several of the buildings, but were ultimately driven oif. Many other scattered actions took place ; but, notwithstanding their successes at Sud- bury and on the Connecticut, the native tribes could not recover the position which for a brief while they had held. The General Court of Mas sachusetts passed laws for impressing soldiers and supplies for the camp, for preventing all traffic with the revolted Indians, and for otherwise con ducting the war with firmness and resolution. The savages began once more to lose heart. As the summer approached, their attacks were confined to descents on small villages lying in exposed situa tions, where they might hope to spread a momen tary panic by setting fire to a few houses, or where the possibility of plunder was a sufficient induce ment to run the chance of defeat. Lurking in the thick woods, they issued out of them every now and then to make these assaults, and then retired with precipitation into their gloomy fastnesses. It was impossible to act against such foes by a large and concentrated army. The several colonies therefore acted separately, each guarding its own frontiei-s, and joining its allies whenever there was any special reason for concerted measures. To hunt the Indians out of their accustomed quarters, to prevent their planting corn in the spring, and to stop their fishing iu the summer, were the chief designs of the English. The plan succeeded so well that the Indians were exterminated by famine and disease as much as by open warfare. Many, however, were surprised by flying columns of troops, and pitilessly slain. Church, who had now recovered from a wound he had received at the storming of the Narragansett Fort, captured a large number of Philip s tribe who from time to time wandered from the main body. The same enterprising officer undertook, in the cour.se of the summer, an expedition into the country of the female sachem of Saconet (Little Compton), to endeavour to detach her and her people from Philip ; and this he effected. The Massachusetts Government, animated by repeated successes, made an advance towards the conclusion of peace by issuing a proclamation intimating that such Indians as should submit themselves within fourteen days might hope for mercy. In consequence of this announcement, a great many of the insurgents came in, and laid down their arms ; and by July it was evident that the worst of the war was over, though Philip and the more devoted of his followers still kept possession of the field. One of the savages who surrendered was a con verted Indian known by the name of James the Printer, because of his having been employed as an assistant at Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the printing of Eliot s translation of the Bible. The defection of this man, and of several of his fellow- converts, led to considerable discussion as to how far the Praying Indians, as a body, were woi thy of confidence. At the beginning of the war, they had been implicitly trusted ; and a company of fifty was raised to serve against the rebels. But many proved treacherous, and joined the enemy ; when suspicion was not unnaturally aroused against the whole body. Community of blood was found in numerous instances to be a firmer bond than community of faith, if, indeed, the faith of the converted Indians had, in the majority of cases, any very real existence. They behaved badly at Brookfield and at Springfield ; and Mrs. Rowland- son, in the work before quoted, says that they were among the most cruel and remorseless of the wretches with whom it was her ill fate to sojourn. One of the Praying Indians, according to this authority, sold his father into the hands of the English, in order to save his own life. Another wore a necklace of fingers cut from the bodies of Christians. Daniel Gookin, the famous ruler over the Praying Indians, denied the truth of these statements, except in a few instances. In a treatise on the subject, he says that the small company 294 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED of Christianised Indians, acting as allies of the colonists, captured or slew, in the summer of 1676, as many as four hundred of the enemy. " It may be said in truth," he adds, "that God made use of these poor, despised, and hated Christians to do great service for the churches of Christ in New England in this day of their trial." The Nipmucks, into whose hands Mrs. Rowlandson fell, had amongst them, according to Gookin, only some few waverers, who, because they inclined to Christianity, were reckoned among the Praying Indians. But he denies that the marauders in that part of the country made any pretence to the Clnistian faith ; while the Old Praying Indians of the coast ren dered important aid to the English, and were disgraced by scarcely an instance of unfaithfulness. The testimony of Gookin, though that of an honest and estimable man, must be received with some abate ments, because of his strong interest in the converts over whom he presided. It is certainly contradicted by the evidence of others, as well able to judge as he ; and it can hardly be doubted that the very general dis trust of the Praying In dians had a considerable basis of fact, though it is likely enough that appre hension and anger after- KING PHILIP 8 ARMS. wards exaggerated the truth. As in the case of the mutiny in British India in 1857-8, public opinion, having been once excited by instances of treachery and fero cious hate, fell into a mood of indiscriminate revenge, and counselled a greater degree of re taliation than was just. John Gorham, sent into the Nipmuck country, in Septembei% 1675, to destroy the standing corn of the natives, was blamed by Gookin for making no distinction be tween friends and enemies, and thus giving offence to those who were well-disposed. On one occasion, the Massachusetts Magistrates were obliged to in terfere to protect the Indians at Tewksbury, on the Merrimac, from undeserved oppression. Gookin and others, who did their best to moderate popular wrath against the Praying Indians, were exposed to contempt and insult ; and the walls of Boston, in Jamiary, 1676, were placarded with an announce ment that some " generous spirits " had " vowed the destruction " of Gookin and Danforth for their conduct in the matter.* Still, unjust and mon strous as all this was, it could not have originated without cause. It was thought by the Magistrates especially necessary to take precautions against the Christianised Indians of the Nipmuck tribe. In August, 1675, they were ordered to concentrate themselves at five specified places, and not to move from them beyond a mile, unless accompanied by an Englishman, on pain of death, or at the least of imprisonment. Yet, notwithstanding this severe edict, two hundred converts went off to the enemy s camp in November. Others changed sides as often as they thought it to their material interests to do so. Distrust became general, and several of the native converts, who had given 110 occasion for uneasiness, were confined for some months to two small islands in Boston and Plymouth harbours, but were ultimately employed with good effect in the mili tary service of the colonies. During the whole of the war up to this point, Philip had contrived to keep him self out of sight of the Eng lish. About midsummer, 1676, his followers attacked Taunton, in Plymouth colony; but the inhabitants, having received notice be forehand from an escaped negro, were so well prepared that the savages were driven off. The revolted In dians were now flying in all directions from the pur suing forces, or humbly submitting themselves to the power they had defied. The Narragansetts and the Nipmucks were alike routed, slain, or compelled to surrender. No hope of retrieving his false step coidd have remained to Philip. On the 30th of July, he narrowly escaped being taken prisoner near Bridgewater, Plymouth ; and his sister was actually captured in a fight which proved fatal to his uncle. His wife and son, with nearly a hundred and fifty more, were seized by Captain Church on the following day. The operations of this officer towards the frontiers of Plymouth colony were signalised by repeated engagements, in which large numbers were killed. Disasters crowded on the miserable fugitives in the day of their waning for- * Palfrey, Vol. III., chap. 5. MRS. UCCVVLANDSON AND THE INDIANS. 293 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATED [1076. tunes, and the faint-hearted wero eager to desert their cause, and make friends with the English. The female sachem of Pocasset, widow of Philip s brother Alexander, and the ally of Philip himself, was found drowned in the river Taunton ; and a few days later the head of the whole movement was to perish hi the field. Despairing of success, Philip returned to his own coiintry. Passing by Bridge-water, Middleborough, Taunton, and Tiverton, he crossed the water to the narrow peninsula, now associated with the town of Bristol, which had for some time been the seat of the Pokanokets. Church had for several days been in hot pursuit, and the actions of the 30th and 31st of July showed how near he was to the flying anil disheartened chief. The English blocked \ip the land-approaches to the small, sea- washed territory of Philip s tribe, and rendered difficult any second escape into a larger field. In his rage and desperation, the arch-rebel one day killed a follower for advising submission to the English. The brother of the man thus slain re venged his relative s death by going over to the pursuing force, and offering to guide them to Philip s hiding-place, which was in a marshy thicket. The wearied fugitive seems by this time to have accepted his fate. "My heart breaks," he is reported to have said: " I am ready to die." He fancied that his dreams were ominous : the facts of his life wero certainly so. Church marched a strong force to the spot which had been indicated by the traitor, and before dawn, on the morning of August 12th, his men were lying down in the bushes, waiting for the appearance of the sachem. At daybreak, the Indians rushed tumultuously from their covert, and Avere met by a heavy fire from the surrounding- ambuscades. An Englishman and a friendly Indian, stationed at a point where escape might have been possible, saw Philip running towards them, half dressed. The Englishman fired, and missed. The Indian struck his countryman through the heart with a well-directed bullet. He fell on his face, with his gun under him. The greater aiumber of his followers escaped ; but the death of the chieftain was triumph enoxigh. On hearing the news, the whole army gave three loud huzzas ; then, imitating the savage s evil habit of mangling the slain, they cut off the hands of the dead sachem, and sent them to Boston. The head was displayed on a pole at Plymouth, and a day was appointed for public thanksgiving. The war was now nearly over. Some of the adherents of Philip, who had managed to get off, prolonged the struggle for a little longer ; but they were soon hunted down, Many of the rebels fled to Canada, or found an asylum among the Mohawks. The offending tribes were utterly crushed, and Ply mouth, Connecticut, and Massachusetts proper, once more enjoyed peace. In Maine, however, a hostile movement among the Eastern Indians, which had been excited by the risings to the south-west, con tinued to give a good deal of trouble. The war in this direction was characterised by the same general features as elsewhere. The savages attacked small towns and detached residences, burning, plundering, and killing wherever they could. Many of the settlers were thus exterminated, and Massachusetts, which at that time held sway over the sometime province of Gorges, sent commissioners to the devastated districts, in October, 1675, with instructions to take measures for a pacification, and to commence arrangements for military operations, should such be found necessary. With the coming on of winter, snow fell so heavily that the Indians, being com pelled by dread of famine to obtain food from the English settlers, made a treaty in which they stipulated to restore their captives without com pensation, and to be peaceful in the future. They complained, however, of wrongs done to them by the colonists, and were particularly annoyed at restrictions being placed on their purchasing powder and shot, which they said were necessary to them for the chase. After the dispersal of Philip s followers, some found their way into Maine, and rekindled the flame of disaffection. Successful attacks were made on various places in the late summer of 1C 76, and a little fort at Arrowsick, an island in the Kennebec, was taken after a desperate fight. A romantic incident occurred in this neighbourhood. The family of Mrs. Anne Brackett were captured at the sack of Falmouth. She herself escaped, and on the banks of the Kennebec perceived the wreck of a tattered birchen bark, which she patched and darned with needle and thread from a. deserted house. She, her husband, her infant, and a negro servant, put off to sea in this frail boat, which had neither sail nor mast, and, crossing Casco Bay, arrived at Black Point, where they were so fortunate as to find a vessel from Piscataqua. So great was the panic in Maine that every English settlement between Casco Bay and the Penobscot was deserted. A military force was sent into the country, and, after some trifling actions in the autumn months, another peace was agreed to in November. But in the early part of 1677 hos tilities again broke out, and a large part of Maine was forsaken by the English, and left a prey to the fury of the savages. The war did not finally terminate until April, 1678, when a treaty was concluded, by which the Indians promised sub- 1676.] EFFECTS OF THE WAR. 297 mission, and the authorities undertook that, for every English family established in the province, the tribes should receive annually a peck of corn. This part of New England had, in proportion, suffered more from the Indian rising than any other. Beyond the Piscataqua, hardly a settle ment escaped destruction. Nearly three hundred Avhite men were killed or carried into captivity, and the loss of property and damage to the pro spects of the colony were immense. The Indians, moreover, though quelled, were not entirely dis abled. But Massachusetts and Plymouth had also been sorely injured by the treachery of Philip and its consequences. Ten or twelve towns were wholly burnt, and forty others more or less damaged by fire, making altogether nearly two-thirds of the entire number. The deaths were so numerous that scarcely a family could be found which was not in mourning. More than six hundred men nre sup posed to have perished, giving a proportion of one in every twenty of the able-bodied male popula tion. One family in every twenty had been burnt out. The expenditure in money of the three united colonies has been stated at more than n hundred thousand pounds ; and at the termination of the struggle the debt which had been incurred by Plymouth colony alone is believed to have exceeded the value of the whole personal property of its people.* When such was the provocation, it is not surprising, however deplorable, that the victors should have taken a stern revenge ; that many of the Indians should have been executed, and others, according to the bad custom of the time, sold into a slavery that was not likely to find many mitigations. CHAPTER XXXV. Charles II. on the Indian Troubles Injuries inflicted by the War on the New England Colonies Seizure by Massachusetts of Territory claimed by the Duke of York Progress of the Other Plantations from 1665 to 1676 Arrival at Boston, in the latter Year, of Edward Randolph, Charles II. s Agent John Leverett, Governor of Massachusetts Randolph s First Interview with the Massachusetts Magistrates His Operations in the Colony His Interview with Leverett Reception of Randolph by New Hampshire and Plymouth His Departure for England Agitation in England against the Breach of the Navigation Laws by Massachusetts Petition and Address of Massachusetts to the King Agents sent to England Randolph s Report on the New England Plantations Prosperity of Boston Proceedings in England with respect to the Illegal Position and Acts of Massachusetts. BETWEEN the departure of the Royal Commissioners in 1665, and the arrival of Edward Randolph in 1676, New England had been virtually an indepen dent Federal Republic. It had elected its own officers, passed its own laws, and conducted, from its own resources and by its own men, the bloody struggle with revolted Indian tribes. The very fact that the colonies made no appeal to the mother country was taken ill by the home authorities, as another proof of the desire for complete separation. Lord Anglesey, a friend of the Puritan plantations, wrote to them from London that they were at once poor and proud. It would have become them, he said, to make their addresses to the King, that he might be authentically informed of the proceedings of their enemies and of their own state, by what means they had been brought so low, and Avhat were the most proper and hopeful measures for their recovery. His Majesty had sufficient power and sufficient will to help his colonies in distress. He could send ships or men to assist the New Knglanders ; he could furnish them with ammuni tion, or by a general collection open the purses of his people towards them, as there were many who mourned for their distress. But all this was con ditional on their not failing in that dutiful applica tion which, said his Lordship, subjects ought to make to their sovereigns in such cases. The letter was written while the Indian war was yet proceed ing ; but the colonies made no application to the Imperial Government in the dark hour of their affliction. It was their habit to be self-reliant; they had been tutored in a stern school, and knew the great secret of extorting success from the most unpromising conditions. Besides, they anticipated some further action on the part of Charles, arising out of the negotiations with the Commissioners, and they did not care to lay themselves under any obligation to a Power which they regarded as their enemy. Nor did they, after the termination of the war, request anything of their fellow-countrymen across the ocean in mitigation of the exj>enses to which they had been put. The chief part of the burden * Palfrey, Vol. III., chap. 5. 298 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1676. fell on Massachusetts and Plymouth ; and the latter colony, being small and poor, was almost ruined. Taxation in Massachusetts was increased so enor mously that in 1676 the poll-tax and property- tax, instituted in 1646, were sixteen times as heavy as in ordinary years. The Colonial Treasurer, more over, was obliged to borrow largely from the merchants ; and the law gave him power, if those capitalists proved niggardly (which, however, was far from being the case), to oblige them to take his notes at six months in payment for supplies. Ply mouth had no such ready resources; but in the course of years, by a system of rigorous economy, she paid off her debt, both principal and interest, as completely as the richer plantation to the north. Connecticut was not disturbed by any Indian rising or invasion ; yet towards the general defence she contributed both men and money. She also fur nished the houseless in Plymouth with more than a thousand bushels of corn a good work in which she was emulated by Boston ; and she released to her more suffering neighbours her share in a dona tion of nearly a thousand pounds which had been contributed by some generous spirits in Ireland. Rhode Island and Providence suffered considerably from Indian ravages, but sent no troops to the war. The insular portion of that territory was guarded by a circle of patrol-boats constantly in motion ; and the savages did not venture 011 any attempt to break through so formidable a barrier. At the period in question, Massachusetts was even more than ever the leading colony in New England. She had obtained a further increase of her territory in 1673 by appropriating a portion of the Duke of York s province of Cornwall lying east- yard of the river Kennebec. The representatives of the Duke had disregarded this part of his Royal Highness s possessions, and they do not appear to have protested against the action of Massachusetts. The authorities of that colony had caused a new survey to be made of the territory in question, to which they conceived that the terms of their charter gave them a claim. The result of this survey was to show that a line running east and west, three miles north of the river Merrimac (which was what the charter set down as their boundary in that direction), would include the southern part of the country beyond the Piscataqua, as far east as to the outlet of Penobscot Bay. The General Court of Massachusetts therefore incorporated the land so indicated with their own plantation, and appointed commissioners to organise it as the county of Devon shire. This was not merely an increase of material resources, but it gave additional importance to Massachusetts, as showing that her will was law, and that her interpretation of a doubtful question of boundaries could be made to prevail. The other New England communities pursued their way, during the eleven years alluded to, without any remarkable events, excepting the great struggle which the ambition of Philip had provoked. They had their disagreements as to boundary, and their small internal troubles. Roger Williams, in Rhode Island, got into hot dispute with the Quakers, and argued theological questions with George Fox, who visited the colony in 1672. Other settlements, including Massachusetts itself, were vexed, as in former days, by religious dissensions, resulting in the establishment of new churches and the irritation of old. But it may be stated in. general terms that, but for the convulsion of Indian warfare, the colonies enjoyed considerable prosperity, and were not materially altered, in constitution or in manners, during the time that elapsed between the earlier and the later date. Edward Randolph, the agent appointed by Charles II. for transmitting to New England the demands which he had finally determined on making, arrived at Boston in the early part of June, 1676, while the war with Philip was approaching its final stages. By that time there were necessarily fewer of the early colonists surviving, in any of the plantations affected, than in the days of Nichols, Carr, Cartwright, and Maverick. The founders of Massachusetts, Plymouth, and Connecticut had, for the most part, quitted the scene. Another race of men occupied the stage, and many of these were of native birth. But the old traditions were pre served with but slight variations, and in Massa chusetts the desire for independence had been fos tered rather than discouraged by the progress of events. The Governor of that plantation in 1676 was John Leverett, an Englishman, but an old colonist, and one with every disposition to push colonial rights to the utmost extreme. For many years he had held positions of importance, both military and civil, in Massachusetts and in England. In 1653 he had been one of the Commissioners for conferring with Stuyvesant on his alleged attempts to stir up the Indians against the English ; and in the following year he and Robert Sedgwick were in command of the fleet designed by Cromwell for an attack on New Netherland, but which, on the conclusion of peace with Holland, effected the conquest of Acadie. In the early years of Charles II. s reign, he Avas agent for Massachusetts in London ; and he it was who, shortly after the Restoration, warned the Genei al Court of his colony that an unfavourable feeling towards that plantation was apparent iu 167G.] RANDOLPH IN NEW ENGLAND. 299 high circles. In earlier days he had been a subaltern in Cromwell s army, and was deeply imbued with anti-monarchical and anti-prelatical views. Randolph did not long remain in ignorance of his disposition and political tendencies. The Royal envoy attended a meeting of the Council on the 10th of June, and presented to the Governor a letter from the King, which Leverett read aloud. In this communication, Charles alluded to the complaints of Gorges and Mason, and stated that he had in consequence determined on requiring the colony to send agents to England to answer those charges. While the letter was being read, Randolph took off his hat, and three of the Magistrates followed his example ; but the Governor, with the rest, continued covered. As no important principle was involved, this piece of churlishness was both imprudent and in bad taste. When the reading of the letter was finished, Leverett told the Council, in the hearing of Ran dolph, that the matters contained in it were very inconsiderable things, easily answered, and such as it did not concern that Government to take any notice of. Randolph replied that he had the King s orders to require an answer, and to wait a month for it. The Governor then intimated that the in considerable things would be considered, and that notice would be taken of that which was not worth noticing.* On withdrawing from the Council-chamber, Randolph could not have carried with him a very exalted idea as to the conciliatory nature of the Magistrates in general, or of Leverett in particular. But he must have seen that a determined front was quickly operative in changing an attitude of deliance into one of surly assent. While waiting for his answer, the busy envoy delivered to several Boston citizens of good position certain letters with which he had been furnished by Mason. These citizens, he afterwards reported to the King, received him with much kindness, and expressed great loyalty to his Majesty. They also circulated information concerning his errand to other well-wishers of the King, who showed much satisfaction at the news. Some notice of the sove reign s letter was taken a few days after the inter view of the Royal agent with the Colonial Council. The Magistrates having resolved to return their thanks to the King for his "gracious letter" that letter which Leverett had said was beneath notice Randolph was called in, and informed that an * " The Governor told the Council that the things therein contained were very inconsiderable things, . . . and it did in no way concern that Government to take any notice there of." " The Governor answered that they should consider of those things." (Original documents quoted by Mr. Pulfrey.) answer to the communication in question would be sent by a vessel which was then about to sail for London. The envoy of course was not disposed to start so soon, and he hinted a doubt whether in so short a time the Council had fully considered the contents of the missive, and of the memorials of Gorges and Mason, copies of which had been trans mitted by the King. He also inquired Avhether the Council had determined on their agents, and on the time of their leaving for England. To these questions no answer was returned, and on the following day (June IGth) Randolph visited the Governor at his house, and made formal complaint of infractions of the Navigation Laws, of which he had himself observed several instances since his arrival in Boston. Leverett s reply, according to Randolph, was singularly plain-spoken and bold. He said that the laws made in England bound the people of Massachusetts in nothing but what con sisted with their interests ; that the legislative power resided solely with them, by virtue of the charter granted by Charles I.; and that all matters in dispute were to be concluded by their final determination, without any appeal to the King. His Majesty, he added, ought not to retrench their liberties, though he might enlarge them if ho pleased. He had confirmed their charter and their privileges by his letter of the 2.8th of June, 1GG2 ; and he could therefore do no less in reason than let them enjoy their liberties and trade, since, at their own expense, and without any contribution from the Crown, they had made so large a planta tion in the wilderness. Matters did not improve as time went on. After having been a fortnight in Boston, Randolph wrote to the Governor reminding him of the King s demand for agents to be sent to England, advising him to call a General Court to settle the business, and proposing to wait a fortnight longer for the decision of that Court, when he would be the bearer of the reply to his Majesty. Leverett was highly offended at this interference, and rebuked the envoy for the disrespectful abruptness of his behaviour. The answer, it appeared, had already been de spatched, and Randolph was told that lie might have a duplicate whenever he was ready to leave. Then; was plainly nothing more to be done at Bos ton then, and the Royal agent accordingly turned his attention to New Hampshire, the territory to which Mason laid claim. He travelled through the most considerable towns of that province, and, as he relates, met with a cordial welcome from a population complaining loudly of the usurpation and oppression of Massachusetts. At Portsmouth Lo received a deputation from Muine (the country 300 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G7G. claimed by Gorges), who made complaints similar to those of the New Hampshire people. After his peregrinations in the north, and another brief visit to Boston, Randolph went to Plymouth, on the invitation of the Governor, Josiah Window, whom he found a gentleman of loyal principles. In the course of conversations on the state of affairs, Win- slow told his guest that he greatly disliked the conduct of the Massachusetts Magistrates towards th.e King, and expressed his opinion that New England would never be secure, would never parties, while it is certain that both Plymouth and Connecticut were desirous of retaining a definite and positive connection with the Royal Government of the mother country. Randolph remained in New England rather more than the stipulated time. On the 20th of July he went to the Governor of Massachusetts for his despatches. The final interview was not more pleasant than those which had preceded it. Leverett sharply reproved the Royal messenger for publish ing the substance of his errand to the colonies, TURNER S FALLS. nourish nor be serviceable to his Majesty, until the several colonies were placed under the immediate government of the Crown. To such an arrange ment, he said, the plantations of New Plymouth and Connecticut would willingly submit. This, of com*se, confirmed the impression that Randolph had already formed. He stated in his reports that, even in Boston itself, the generality of the people, including the chief officers of the militia, and other persons of note, complained of the arbitrary govern ment and oppression of the Magistrates. It is very probable that this zealous agent exaggerated the degree of adherence to his views existing in the chief New England colony; yet it cannot be doubted that Massachusetts had its disaffected telling him that he designed to make a mutiny and disturbance in the country, and to withdraw the people from their obedience to the local authorities. A duplicate of the reply addressed to Secretary Coventry was then handed to him, and he was bidden to report to the King that the English in Massachusetts were a people fearing the Lord, and very obedient to his Majesty. Whether or not he credited the first of these statements, Randolph must certainly be excused if he doubted the second, as far as the Governor and Magistrates were con cerned. He answered in a tart letter, and sailed for England towards the end of the month. During his absence, the question of the Naviga tion Laws had been much discussed at London. 1676.] THE NAVIGATION LAWS. 301 Various traders had been making loud complaints of breaches of those laws constantly committed by the New England colonies. A petition from the mercers and silk- weavers of the metropolis had been presented to the King; and the Privy Council Com mittee of Trade and Plantations had gone into the matter, and taken the evidence of the persons principally concerned. One of the reasons given for maintaining and enforcing the law is a singular comment on the absurd injustice of what, at a demand, and for which it was admitted they could find no purchasers in the open market. Yet the law undoubtedly gave the home producer the right to inflict this wrong ; and of the breaking of that law by New England there was abundant evidence/ The colonists were forbidden to make their im portations in any but English ships sailing from English ports ; but they traded Avherever they liked for whatever they wanted. The Committee, on hearing of these facts, determined that, although it VIEW OX THE COAST OF MAINE. period within the memory of the existing genera tion, used to be called protection to native industry. The mercers and silk-weavers alleged that they had been accustomed to send to New England great -" stuffs (either made in England quantities 01 w/ .. " -^mn: but or imported from abroad) when out 01 i*. , that, since the colonies had, contrary to the law, made their own foreign importations, they (the peti tioners) had been greatly injured, and many totally ruined, by their inability to get rid of these com modities. It does not appear to have occurred to these worthy manufacturers and merchants that they had no moral right to force upon the colonists, whether they would or not, goods no longer in 26 was not expedient to inquire into past illegalities, some vigorous action in the future was requisite. They therefore advised the King to demand from every plantation an Act to enforce the laws of trade ; to appoint revenue officers in those planta tions ; and to issue orders to the commanders of the Royal Navy to seize offending vessels. The Committee were probably as well persuaded of the justice of the Navigation Acts as the traders whose interests were prejudiced by their violation ; but at any rate they could not do otherwise than recom mend that the Law should be enforced. _ ..rj^i, j iaf i be en despatched to Secretary The letter wu*v~ .. Coventry by the Massachusetts Council was very brief, and consisted of little more than an intimation that a detailed reply would be sent as soon as a General Court could be convened, and a repudiation of the charges made against the colony as "imper tinences, mistakes, and falsehoods." A General Court was convoked in August, and the matter at 302 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1676. issue was debated with the assistance of tlie Eldei s. After an adjournment of a month, a committee to which the question had been referred presented the draft of a petition and address to the King. The petitioners herein alluded to the controversy thrust upon them with respect to their eastern possessions, but at the same time expressed their willingness to offer pleas and produce evidence in defence of their position. From this evidence they believed it would abundantly appear that they had a right to the territory in question, according to the plain intent and necessary sense of the words contained in their patent. They furthermore protested that "no intention of wrong to the claimers, no unlawful design of enlargement of their borders, no profit or advantage thereby accru ing (the contrary whereto they had hitherto found), but a grounded apprehension of their interest, real compassion to the petitioning inhabitants in an unsettled and suffering condition, together" with a sense of duty incumbent to be faithful to their patent trust, did cause them to receive those inhabitants under the wing of his Majesty s Govern ment in this colony established. " They concluded by begging, with most humble prostration, his Majesty s countenance and favour for themselves, and for the agents they had appointed. The address having been adopted, its presentation was confided to Mr. "William Stoughtoii and Mr. Peter Bulkley, both persons of importance in the colony : the former, a member of the Magistracy ; the latter, Speaker of the House of Deputies. StougLton, the elder of the two though both were in the prime of life was believed to be somewhat favourable to the views of the home Government ; while Bulkley had the credit of being a supporter of popular principles and colonial pretensions. These officials were furnished with a statement of the case of Massachusetts as against Gorges and Mason ; with letters to the two Secretaries of State, Henry Coventry and Sir Joseph "Williamson; and with two sets ef Orders and Instructions. They were to confine themselves to the dispute concerning Maine and New Hampshire, and, as regarded all other accusations, were to answer that they had no instructions a,s to proceeding with them. They were to report home on their doings, and were to return as soon as possible. In a private commu nication to the envw ^ - --j ,, *^e ueneral Court made certain suggestions which betray a conscious weak ness in their cause. They were to represent to the King and Council the inconsiderableness and small worth of the two provinces, but were to purchase the alleged rights of Gorges and Mason, if those gentlemen were willing in that way to compromise the case. Mr. Palfrey says he is uncertain whether these instructions are not to be considered as a portion of the original draft, and the rest as the amended form finally adopted. But the mere fact of such an arrangement being at any time enter tained shows a lurking doubt on the part of the Massachusetts authorities as to the sufficiency of their argument. If, beyond a question, the charter gave them a right to Maine and New Hampshire, there could have been no necessity for even thinking of buying off the rival claimants. If there were any doubt at all, it was obviously most improper that the decision should lie with one of the interested parties. After his return to England, which he reached on the 10th of September, 1676, Randolph made a report of his visit to the colonies, the second part of which contains a somewhat elaborate account of the condition and laws of Massachusetts. The object of the writer, of course, was to give the King as vivid an impression of the disloyalty of that plantation as he could produce. He therefore dwelt much on the church discipline of the colonists, which was unquestionably so ordered as to confer peculiar privileges on those who conformed strictly to the Independent system, and to place under a species of ban all who followed different ideas. He spoke of the authorities disallowing any one to appeal in any matter to the laws of England. He referred to their concealment of "Whalley and Goffe r the regicides ; described the solemnisation of mar riages by the civil magistrates; and remarked on the suppression of all observance of Christmas Day and other ecclesiastical festivals. Of the general con dition of the colony he reported : "The number of the churph-members and freemen, compared with the rest of the inhabitants (who are termed the dissenting party), is very inconsiderable, not being reckoned above one sixth part ; the most wealthy pei-sons of all professions being men of good prin ciples and well affected to his Majesty The inhabitants within the government, including Hampshire and Maine, are computed to be upwards of one hundred and fifty thousand souls There are rich men of all callings and professions, and all mechanical arts and professions thrive -w<J> The farmers are nurn-"~-- v- - _^,3 anu wealthy, live in good Bouses, are given to hospitality, and make good ad vantage of their corn, cattle, poultry, butter, and cheese. There are about thirty merchants that are esteemed worth from ten to twenty thousand pounds There are no servants but upon hired wages, except some few, who serve four years for the charge of being transported thither by their masters, and not above two hundred slaves in the 1676.] NEW ENGLAND IN 1676. 303 colony, and those were brought from Guinea mid Madagascar. There are men able to bear anus between thirty and forty thousand, and in the town of Boston about four thousand Their trained bands are twelve troops of horse, and six thousand foot ; each troop, consisting of sixty horse besides officers, are all well mounted, and completely armed with back, breast, head-piece, buff-coat, sword, carbine, and pistols, each troop distinguished by their coats. The foot also are well furnished with swords, muskets, and bandoleers. There are no pikemen, they being of no use in the wars with the Indians."* Randolph proceeded to dilate on the strong forti fications with which Boston was furnished ; on the laa-ge number of guns with which these works were armed ; on the accumulation in the public stores of a thousand barrels of powder, with other ammuni tion, and arms proportionable ; and on the warlike resources of the country generally. At Dorchester, seven miles from Boston, he had found a powder- mill, well wrought and in good repair. The land furnished abundance of saltpetre, especially on islands where fowl frequented, and in swamps which were the haunts of pigeons. Of iron-ore there was plenty ; and as good iron, in the opinion of Randolph, was made in Massachusetts as in Spain a reference which sounds oddly at the present day. The colony had six forges for the production of this metal. Boston contained about two thousand houses, mostly built of timber, roofed with shingles of cedar, though some few were brick buildings, roofed with tiles. In harping so much 011 the military resources and power of the recal citrant plantation, Randolph would almost seem to have been serving the cause of the colonists, and discouraging the Royal Government from any attempt at subjugation. But of course he had no .such design, and in succeeding paragraphs he did his utmost to raise the King s ideas of the value of the colony, and the advantages that might be derived from it. New England, he remarked, had all things necessary for shipping and for naval equipments, so that his Majesty need not be beholden to any other nation for such kinds of stores. It had, besides, horses, beeves, sheep, hogs, and goats, with large numbers of wild beasts, the skins of which produced a great yearly profit. The land yielded wheat, rye, barley, oats, pease, and most sorts of fruit ; the sea, every variety of fish. The export trade of the colonies, Randolph described as very considerable, and he spoke of " houses ready framed " among the articles that were sent to * AB quoted in Pulfrey s History of New England, Vol. III., chap. 7. Barbadoes, Nevis, St. Christopher, and other islands. Boston he described as " the mart-town of the West Indies." It had a large import trade, both for home consumption, and for transport to other parts. English laws for the regulation of trade were entirely disregarded ; and, in that as well as other things, Massachusetts endeavoured tg make the world believe that she was a free State. She was in possession of thirty vessels measuring between a hundred and two hundred and fifty tons, together with seven hundred ef smaller size. Many vessels were built there every year, at a cost of four pounds a ton ; and these were sold in England and other countries. The people of Massachusetts, according to this authority, were for the most part well affected to the King. They were groaning under the yoke of the existing rulers, and in daily hope of a change by his Majesty reassuniing authority, and settling a general government over the whole country ; in default of which, it was feared that civil war would in a short time break out among the several colonies, owing to the encroachments of Massa chusetts. Even among the Magistrates of that plantation, said Randolph, some were well-affected towards the sovereign ; but the greater number were of a different opinion. Plymouth and Con necticut were loyally disposed ; and in those colonies all civil and military officers, and all freemen, took the oath of allegiance, and commissions and writs ran in the King s name. The Act of Navigation was duly observed, and no stranger was admitted to come into their ports. The population was almost entirely engaged in agriculture, and was supplied from Boston with foreign commodities. Of ships of burden there were none ; but there were a few fishing smacks for trading along the coast. Tins account of the state of New England in 1676, though doubtless coloured as regards some of its details by the official views of the writer, and perhaps even by a feeling of resentment at the treatment he had experienced in Massachusetts, gives an interesting picture of colonial ways after the first trials of a new life in the wilderness had been passed. It bears very remarkable testimony to the rapidity with which the largest of the plantations had, in less than fifty years, raised itself from a condition of poverty to one of affluence, and had attained a position in the political world which the monarchy at home was already regarding with per plexed anxiety. Randolph s statements as to the prosperity of Massachusetts are confirmed by the testimony of other observers about the same period. The merchants of Boston were rich men, and their houses, says one writer, were as handsomely fur- 50-1 CASSELL S. HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1677. iiished as those of most merchants in London. The style of living was even luxurious, though the early Puritan austerity was so far maintained that the whole colony had not one professional musician, and a dancing-school which some speculator ventured to open was at once put down. A fencing-school was allowed, as tending to the encouragement of martial exercises. Military costume and military habits had still the picturesqueness of an earlier day, and were not as yet debased by the least touch of that grotesque shabbiness which characterised, the eighteenth century. At the funeral of Leverett, who died in the early part of 1679, the hearse of the doughty old Cromwellian officer was attended by twenty gentlemen, preceding, flanking, and following it, one of whom bore his helmet, ne his sword, two a gauntlet each, and two a spur each. This knightly ceremony was usual at the burial of Governors of Massachusetts at that epoch. The pomp of martial display was the only relief which Massachusetts permitted to the formal gravity of public manners. The rich fed well, and drank Madeira at two shillings a bottle ; but out of doors they observed a solemn simplicity. In 1675, the only person in Boston who kept a coach was the Rev. Mr. Thacher, one of the principal preachers of the city. But poverty, with its ugly and menacing contrasts to extreme wealth, was absent. There were uo beggars in New England, and the humblest cottages had something of the decencies of life. William Stoughton and Peter Bulkley, the envoys of Massachusetts, arrived in England in December, 1676, and on the 10th of January, 1677, presented to the Privy Council a memorial in which they set forth that, after due search, they had been unable to find a record of the alleged grants to Mason and Gorges ; and they accordingly prayed that an order should issue to those persons to furnish them with copies of the documents in question. This request does not seem to have been complied with ; and, the matter being referred to the Committee of Privy Council for Trade and Plantations in June, the Lords of that Committee reported in a few days that the colony of Massachusetts had in their judgment broken the laws of Trade and Navigation. They recommended that the Government of that plantation should be informed of the King s plea sure that the said Acts should be duly executed, and that the Lord Treasurer should appoint such officers of the customs at Boston and other parts of New England as the Acts prescribed. The Chief Justices of the Court of King s Bench and of the Court of Common Pleas (Rainsford and North) gave judgment shortly afterwards on the matters sub mitted to them. They considered that the patent (i.e., the charter) of 1629 was good, notwithstanding the grant made by James I. in 1620 to the Council of Plymouth (the English corporation so called), since it appeared to them that the said Council had parted with all their interest in the lands in ques tion the year before the date of the later patent. It was therefore to be presumed that they had de serted the government ; whereupon it was lawful and necessary for King Charles I. to establish a suitable mode of nale, which was done by the patent of 1629, "making the Adventurers a corporation upon the place." These words were important, as seeming to imply that the early colonists were justified in removing the- charter and the colonial government from England to America. With re spect to the eastern territories, the Justices decided that neither Maine nor New Hampshire was in cluded within the chartered limits of Massachusetts ; that the government of Maine belonged to the heir of Sir Ferdinando Gerges ; and that the govern ment of New Hampshire had never been granted to- John Mason, nor was lawfully vested in his heir. This judgment was approved of by the Privy Council, and a day was appointed for hearing the parties. Ultimately, the whole matter was referred back to the Committee of Trade and Plantations. It was already sufficiently clear that the case, in all its bearings, had been decided against Massa chusetts. On the 27th of July, the Lords of the Committee told the colonial agents that the Boston authorities must thenceforward confine themselves to such bounds and limits as had been reported by the judges ; that the King would cause scrutiny to be made into their pretended property in the soil of Maine ; that they must solicit his Majesty s pardon for their offence of coining money ; that the Navi gation Laws must for the future be religiously observed ; that the general laws of Massachusetts, were in many respects very faulty, and in those- respects must be changed and reformed ; and that, with regard to what they had said as to defect of powers (that is, their having no instructions- from their principals to enter on certain matters), his Majesty could not think of treating with his own subjects as if they were foreigners who reqiiired the formality of powers. The agents Avere exhorted to do all things fit for them ts exe cute, and consistent with the service of his Majesty ; and it was intimated that it would be well for them to remind their principals of the same from time to- time. Some days later, after the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General had reported to the Committee on the legal bearings of the case, with reference to- those Acts of the Massachusetts Legislature which were repugnant to the laws of England, the agents 1677.J PARTIAL SUBMISSION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 305 >vere again called in, and were told in precise terms that the King expected a repeal of all such laws, and that Boston must receive an officer of customs, to see to the proper observance of the Act of Navi gation. The colonial authorities were rebuked for the levying of money on the King s subjects who trafficked with them, over whom, it was remarked, the General Court had not the same power as over the members of their own corporation. The neces sity of a pardon for the coining of money without the Royal authority was glanced at ; and the envoys were directed to wait on the Attorney-General for instructions as to their further proceedings. The King had spoken, and it was for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to choose between obedience and a fctate of war. CHAPTER XXXVI. Partial Submission of Massachusetts Purchase of Maine by that Colony from Gorges Offers made to Mason in respect of New Hampshire Andres and the Puritans Complaints of Quakers The King s Determination to alter the Constitution of Massachusetts The Oath of Allegiance Reply of Massachusetts to the English Government Position of the Colony on the Religious Question Return of the Agents and of Randolph to America Death of Governor Leverett, and Position of Parties in Massachusetts State of Morals in New England in 1679 Sins and Judgments Massachusetts and the King Treatment of Randolph Renewed Demands of the Royal Government Randolph in England His Third Visit to America Another Letter from the King Despatch of Fresh Agents to England Randolph in Fear of his Life Position of Personal Hostility towards one another of Randolph and Danforth. MASSACHUSETTS generally recoiled from a doubtful position when firmly dealt with. Its position with regard to the Navigation Laws was, from a legal point of view, more than doubtful, however unfair those laws may have been, and however natural the desire of the colonists to evade a selfish re striction on their freedom of commerce. Stoughton and Bulkley having informed their principals of the turn affairs had taken, an order was immediately made by the General Court, requiring all masters of vessels arriving or departing to yield obedience to the Acts in question, and instructing the Gover nor and all inferior magistrates to see to their strict observance. With a rather ineffectual attempt to save their own good faith, the authorities remarked that his Majesty s pleasure in the matter had not before been signified to them, either by the King himself, or any of his Ministers of State ; as if it were usual, when a law has been passed, to send a circular round to all whom it may concern, that obedience to the law is desired. The Court also transmitted to their agents at London a petition from the four New Hampshire towns, asking to be permitted to remain under the government of Massachusetts ; and they forwarded to the King an address of thanks for his gracious reception of their messengers, and to the Lord Chancellor, the Lord Privy Seal, and the two Secretaries of State, letters expressed in terms of great suavity, but disputing in several points the vieAvs of those dignitaries. This was in October, 1677. In respect to the Navigation Laws, the tardy action of Massachu setts had doubtless been stimulated by the coni- munications of their agents, representing how strongly English opinion had declared itself on the subject. At a later date 011 the 1st of December Stoughton wrote that every day it became clearer that, without a fair compliance in the matter, nothing was to be expected but a total breach, and all the storms of displeasure that might be. While these eA^ents were going on, Massachusetts was secretly engaged in a negotiation which, it was enabled to carry to a successful isstie, and the ac complishment of which gaA~e great offence to the King. In May, 1677, John Usher, a Boston mer chant apparently sent to London for the purpose, bought the province of Maine from Gorges, for the sum of .1,250. This method of solving the difficulty had been contemplated by the colonial authorities for years, and approaches in that direction had before been made. That any such proposal should have been put forward, is proof conclusive that the leaders of Massachusetts never felt certain of their alleged right to the territory, and were suspicious that after all the title may really haA^e lain in the Gorges family. The purchase could hardly haA-e been satisfactory to any but to him Avho received the money. The people of Massachusetts had to pay a large sum for what their rulers had long told them Avas theirs already, by right, and by the fact of possession. The King was thwarted in a design Avhich he had formed of buying the territory for his reputed son, the Duke of Monmouth ; and the English people were A-exed at finding their own 30J CASSELL S HISTORY" OF THE UNITED STATES. Government outwitted by the rulers of a distant colony. It was from Mason that the Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations first learned that such a transfer had been effected. On the 25th of March, 1678, he informed them that the bargain was completed, and that he had himself been solicited to sell New Hampshire. More scru pulous than Gorges, he had resisted such offers, and now communicated to the Committee the fact of their having been made. The intimation rekindled to a fervent heat the old feeling of animosity against the chief of the New England plantations ; and this at a period when other influences were working to the same end. Andros, of New York, was at that time in London, and, in answer to questions put to him by the Lords of the Committee, gave an un favourable account of the political tendencies of Massachusetts. He had been considerably annoyed by charges brought against him of having, together with the settlers at Albany, assisted the revolted Indians in their war against the confederated colonies charges which, after an investigation by the Privy Council, solicited by Andros while the agents of Massachusetts were still in England, were declared to be baseless.* The Quakers also were again busy in opposition to the Puritan settlers. Their sect was being once more persecuted with considerable bitterness in Massachusetts, though not with the deadly animosity of previous years. It was thought at Boston that one reason why the Lord had stirred up the Indians to do so many bad things, was because the former severity against the followers of George Fox had been too much relaxed. Stringent laws had therefore been enacted against these troublesome heretics ; and the troublesome heretics had carried their grievances to England, and raised a loud outcry against their oppressors. As if to complicate matters still further, the General Court of Massachusetts had, in October, 1677, made an order for reviving the oath of fidelity to the colonial authorities which had been required in the troubled days of Charles I. Those who were loyal to the Crown were undoubtedly disin clined to take this oath, which implied the idea of independent sovereignty ; and Randolph was care ful to make the most of the fact when it came to his * It would seem from the statements of Andros that he had even made offers of assistance to the colonies of Massachusetts and Connecticut during the war, bxit that these were rejected. He had gained the friendship of the Mohawks and other savage tribes, and would have brought them into the field against the Pokanokets and Xarragansetts, had the devastated colonies accepted his offers. As it was, he kept the friendly Indians to their allegiance, built forts and boats, and prevented any increase of Philip s army. (Memoir of Sir Edmund Andros, by William Henry \VTiitmore, A.M. Boston, U.S., 1868.) knowledge early in 1678. The result was that the King, on the recommendation of the Committee of the Privy Council, commanded that the oath of allegiance, as it existed in England, should be taken by all his subjects in Massachusetts ; and the agents, Stoughton and Bulkier, were required at once to give this pledge of good faith, which they professed to do with willingness. Shortly afterwards, the law-advisers of the Grown, having been instructed to report on questions connected with the charter, gave it as their opinion that neither the quo warranto of 1 635, nor the judgment thereupon, was sufficient to annul that instrument ; but that the misde meanours alleged against the colonists were such as to render the patent void. Thus supported in their designs, the Lords of the Committee recommended Randolph to the Lord Treasurer as a person proper to be employed as Collector of his Majesty s Customs in New England. The King conferred the appointment on him, and matters looked more serious for Massachusetts. But worse remained behind. The replies of the agents were so evasive and unsatisfactory that the Lords of the Committee of Privy Council came, in the summer of 1678, to the conclusion that the sending over of a General Governor to New England, and the establishment of a fit judicature there for the determining of differences, were steps altogether necessary. This last blow entirely broke the spiiits of the two envoys. They prayed for leave to depart, much as Shylock sought release of the Venetian senators when their decision was pronounced against him. This, however, was denied for the present, the King not choosing to part with them xintil the conclusion of the whole business. All they could do, therefore, was to write home to their employers, giving dismal accounts of the turn events had taken. Again waw seen the readiness with which Massachusetts always gave way before a determined front. Without waiting for the advice, or even the assembly, of the General Court, Governor Leverett, the Deputy- Governor, and the body of Magistrates then present in Council at Cambridge, together with their Secretary, took the oath of allegiance in totidem verbis. The Court met on the 2nd of October, at once took the oath, and ordered that it should be taken by all persons within the juris diction of sixteen years of age and upwards. To this end, constables were to convene the inhabitants of the several towns and villages with all speed, and any one failing to attend, except on the excuse f sickness, was to be punished with fine and im prisonment. Furthermore a profusely loyal address to the King was prepared, and the agents were lt.\VT>OI,riI THREATENED. 308 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1679. furnished with a new set of instructions, and with replies to the strictures of the law-officers, and of the Lords of the Committee. In the latter docu ment, Stoughton and Bulkley were exhorted not to concede anything which might endanger the charter, the preservation of which was regarded as of the highest importance ; but otherwise tVe in structions were conciliatory. The agents were informed that directions had been given to an artist to carve the Royal arms, which Avere to be erected in the court-house ; and it was intimated that the word "commonwealth," which had formerly been used in their laws, had for some time been omitted, and Avould not again be em ployed. By this word, the General Court observed, it was not intended to convey any contempt of, or opposition to, the Royal authority. No doubt, the expression is not necessarily inconsistent Avith a monarchical state ; yet it can hardly be doubted that it had been intentionally selected to suggest republican ideas. After replying to the accusations that had been made against them Avith respect to the Quakers, and the imposition of the oath of fidelity to the celonial authorities, the writers of this document touched on the Navigation Act, and remarked that, according to their humble conception of the scope of English laAvs, the effect of those laws was bounded by the four seas, and did not reach America. The subjects of his Majesty in the NCAV World were not represented in Parliament, and therefore did not anticipate being impeded in their trade by laAvs passed in England. They regarded this view as implying no abatement of their alle giance to his Majesty ; but they Avere Avilling to repeal, Avith all convenient speed, such laAvs of their own making as Avere accounted repugnant to the laws of England, excepting those which Avere neces sary to the professed cause of their first settling in the wilderness. This was an implied allusion to their ecclesiastical position, and to the pretensions of the Episcopal Church in the old country. On the ground of the NaA T igation LaAvs, the rulers of Massachusetts had a A T ery strong case ; but their frequent violations of allegiance, and the despotic character of their gOA-ernment in matters of religion, certainly weakened their general position in an in calculable degree. They considered themselves greatly Avronged Avhen, in February, 1679, the Lords of the Committee of Privy Council advised that the worship of the Church of England should be made lawful in Massachusetts ; that churchmen there should be admitted to public offices, and to the same freedoms and privileges as others; and that ministers should from time to time be appointed by the Bishop of London, to preside over such as pro fessed the Episcopalian faith : recommendations Avhich Avere afterwards adopted by the King. It must, however, be acknoAvledged that the claims of the Church of England gaA~e a peculiarity to her presence in a Puritan colony, Avhich justified some degree of apprehension and of caution. Protestant though she was, that Church perpetuated on her own behalf the claim of the Church of Rome to the alle giance of all Englishmen. She still regarded the Dissenters as her revolted children, and might some day assert a paramount jurisdiction Avhere for the present she only sought an equal right. She had mainly herself to blame if the reaction against extraA r agaiit demands led to immoderate and un fair opposition. But the only proper Avay of meeting such demands is by denying them both in word and in act ; not by at once condemning and imitating them. The leaders of Massachusetts were guilty of the folly and injustice of crying out against the cruelty of oppression, for conscience sake, and at the same time oppressing all Avho differed from the dominant party in the plantation. They Avould not concede to the Church of England the rights Avhich they denounced the Church of England for not conceding to themselves. Nor was it merely the State Church Avhich felt the heavy pressure of their hands. The Baptists and the Quakers, the Antinomians and the Presbyterians, had equal cause to complain, of their exclusiA eness. Charles II. and his Ministers cared nothing for the misfortunes of those sects, which they Avere always ready enough themselves to injure and insult; but they Avere glavl to use their Avrongs in NCAV England as a weapon against the principal New England colony. Their avoAved object Avas to protect the freedom of Church of England members in Massachusetts. Their real object may have been to secure the predominance of that Church over all the American settlements. But the rulers of Boston placed themselves, by their OAvn tyranny, in a far Avorse position for resisting subjection than if they had all along taken their stand on the only safe ground of opposition to any form of spiritu.al despotism the ground of an im partial freedom. With an indolent monarch like Charles II., a compromise would not laA T e been hopeless. But dogged resistance to demands not unfair in themselves provoked moi*e extreme mea sures than might otherwise have been conceiA^ed. Stoughton and Bulkley Avere alloAved to leaA e England in the late autumn of 1679. The alleged Popish plot, Avhich Titus Oates professed to haA e discovered, absorbed so much of the PriA T y Council s time and attention that the affairs of NCAV England Avere set on one side, as of less immediate import ance. The Lords of the Committee of Trade and 1079.] DIVISIONS IN THE COLONY. 300 Plantations, moreover, were hopeless of any good being done, unless the King would give his subjects on the other side of the Atlantic clearly to under stand that he was absolutely bent on a general re formation of abuses ; failing which, as they explained in a letter to the Earl of Danby, the Lord Treasurer, written as early as the 10th of March, any officer who might be sent would meet with nothing but contradiction and disrespect in whatever he might attempt for his Majesty s service, if the Massachu setts people could only call such endeavours an infringement of their charter. In quitting England, the agents took with them a rebuke from the Lords of the Committee for the presumption of their principals in buying the province of Maine while the complaints of Gorges were under consideration. Their Lordships had agreed to report that, upon reimbursement of what had been paid, the colony of Massachusetts should be obliged to make a sm-- render of all deeds and writings into his Majesty s hands. Randolph returned to America about the same time as his adversaries ; and all three were back again at Boston in the early part of 1680. They found that in the interval of their absence Leverett had died. That energetic Governor had breathed his last on the 16th of March, 1679, and his post Yv as occupied by Simon Bradstreet, the only one remaining of the body of Assistants chosen in England before the removal of the corporation to America. Bradstreet had always been a member of the Magistracy, and in 1662 had been co-agent with Norton in the mission to England which had had for its object the propitiation of the King. Thomas Daiiforth was now Deputy-Governor ; and it thus happened that the chief authority was divided between representatives of the two opposing parties the party of prerogative and the party of privilege. Bradstreet was inclined to yield to the demands from England : Daiifoi-th was for a policy of resistance. There was indeed a very serious division in the governing body. The singleness of aim and stem determination of purpose which had characterised the days of John Winthrop the elder, had departed. Men of various opinions in politics and religion had by this time found their way into the colony, or had arisen there in the natural deve lopment of divers interests and predilections. The consequence was seen in a degree of irresolution which greatly prejudiced the settlement during its contest with the powers at home. If there were any unsupported envoy of the Royal Government to be lectured and thwarted, the Massachusetts Magistrates were very ready to lecture and thwart. But whenever the King gave signs that he was in earnest, the Magistrates recoiled, made pretence of shifting their course, and wrote lettez-s to the sovereign oozing at every pore with unctuous flattery. Still, no substantial satisfaction was given to the requirements of England. The abuse of Puritan power continued, on the whole, as great as before, and the Government of England had again and again to consider what they should do to bring these vexatious colonists to the requisite degree of compliance. The people of Massachusetts were not very well satisfied even with themselves. They thought thei e had been a great falling off from the fervour of ancient faith and the purity of early manners. . A Reforming Synod was held at Boston in 1679, and the two ques tions which the members set themselves to consider were " What are the evils that have provoked the Lord to bring his judgments on New England ] " and "What is to be done, that so these evils may be reformed 1 " The Synod sat ten days, and in its report enumerated, among the evils that had pro voked the Lord, " a great and visible decay of the power of godliness," "abounding pride," "neglect of church-fellowship and other divine institutions," " oaths and imprecations in ordinary discourse," Sabbath-breaking, remissness in family government and family worship, "sinful heats and hatreds," intemperance, " inordinate affection imto the world," want of public spirit, and " unfruitfulness under the means of grace. "* The Quakers and Baptists were referred to in terms of reprof, but no measures of repression were recommended. Intemperance and profligacy were largely dwelt on among the sins of the time. The "heathenish and idolatrous practice of health-drinking" was denounced as a crying evil, together with immodest apparel, semi- nakedness of the person (such as we see represented in the pictures of Sir Peter Lely, but which one hardly identifies with the staid society of New England), " mixed dancings, light behaviour and expressions, sinful company-keeping with light and vain persons, unlawful gaming, and an abundance of idleness." If this indictment be not a gross exaggeration, the Puritan severity of the first generation had borne very poor fruit in the second. It is likely enough that, with the increase of popu lation and the accumulation of wealth, some of the vices of high living had crept into the state ; and this tendency may have been increased by a natural reaction against the gloom and repression of the early settlers. New England, as we have before had occasion to show, was often shocked by crimes * MS. Journal of the Rev. Mr. Peter Thnclier, summarised by Mr. Palfrey in his "History of New England," Vol. III., chap. 8. 310 CASSELL S M1STORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1680. of peculiar heinousness. Only eleven years before 1679, a reformation of manners had been ordered. Public preaching, private exhorting, days of fasting and prayer, had never been more frequent ; yet the depravity of the people, if we may believe these records, continued to increase. Cotton Mather, it is true, observes in his " Parentator " that New England still pi-eserved far more of serious religion, as well as blameless morality, than Avas to be found, proportionably, in any country on the face of the earth. But this is one of those sweeping assertions which are discredited by the fact that the writer could not possibly have known the truth of what he was saying; and Mather himself, in his " History of New England," gives a very different impression. Another writer thought that the statements of the report were to be intei preted with the utmost literality."* The judgments of Heaven were believed to have been made manifest to New England, not merely in the rebellion of the Indians and the action of the Royal Government, but in a succession of bad harvests, in the prevalence of epidemical diseases, and in the failure of trade, owing to unusual losses both by sea and land. Massa chusetts vessels had been seized by Turkish pirates, who kept the crews in miserable captivity ; and on the night of August 8th, 1679, a fire broke out in Boston, which raged for twelve hours, destroyed eighty dwelling houses, seventy warehouses, and a numl>er of vessels at the wharves, and entailed a loss of 200,000. The Massachusetts agents, in returning to their colony, carried with them a letter from the King, repeating his former demands, and requiring the despatch, within six months, of other agents duly instructed. The General Court at once assented to those demands, and even went so far as to relinquish the claim to New Hampshire. Bradstreet, on the 18th of May, 1680, replied to the King in a letter giving a detailed account of the state of the colony, from which it appeared that there were then in Massachusetts from a hundred to a hundred and twenty negro slaves, about as many Scotchmen (sold for servants during Cromwell s war with Scotland), and half as many Irish, employed in menial capacities. This letter of Bradstreet s, being unauthorised by the legislative body, can scarcely be regarded as official, and was moreover very little to the purpose. The General Court was in no hurry about replying. The members, in the first instance, sent a sort of provisional answer to the King, promising a more particular response when greater consideration had been given to the various * Dr. Wisner (History of the Id South Church), as quoted by Mr. Palfrey. topics. Some time after, the further reply was com posed. It consisted of the same sort of half-hearted vindication of the colony and its laws, combined with effusive expressions of loyalty and of desire to satisfy the King, which had formed the substance of other communications. An apology was made for the purchase of the province of Maine, and it was intimated that Massachusetts, before effecting that purchase, had been well assured of the strong inclination and desire of the majority of the inhabi tants to place themselves under the government of those of whom they had had a long and beneficial experience. With respect to the sending of fresh agents, the Court begged his Majesty s excuse and indulgence for the present, as the heavy losses and expenditure which had recently afflicted the planta tion were such as to render that step too onerous at the time. Randolph did not fare well in his attempts to enforce the Acts of Trade and Navigation. He seized several vessels with their lading; but the courts before which the cases were brought always decided against the King s representative.- He wrote home that every one was saying they were not subject to the laws of England, and that those laws were of no force in Massachusetts until confirmed by the colonial legislature. Every day made him feel more strongly against the people, or rather the ruling classes, who used their utmost endeavours to irritate his temper and frustrate his designs. Any one supporting him was accounted an enemy cf the country. He was denied the assistance of an. attorney or solicitor to guide him in any matter in the practice of the local courts with respect to which he might be ignorant. His servants were beaten while watching a warehouse containing contraband goods, and the goods were removed to another place. Going on board a vessel to seize it, accompanied by the marshal and six men, he was threatened to be knocked on the head ; and, upon leaving to inform the Governor (who ordered men to be raised to effect the seizure), the offending ship was towed away by Boston boats. In reporting these facts to his Government, Randolph said that for his Majesty to write more letters would " signify 110 more than a London Gazette." He added that he expected hourly to liave his person seized, and cast into prison. Nevertheless, he hoped in time to put an end to the illicit trade of the plantation. It is not surprising that the King was incensed when the knowledge of these matters came to him. On the 30th of September he wrote again to the authorities of Massachusetts, commanding and requiring, as they tendered their allegiance, to despatch the required agents within three months 1681.] PROGRESS OF AFFAIRS. 311 a f tor the reception of the order. " That the due obser vance of all our comiiiands above mentioned," said his Majesty, " may not be any longer protracted, we require you, upon receipt hereof, forthwith to call a General Court, and therein to read these our letters, and provide for our speedy satisfaction ; in default whereof we shall take the most effectual means to procure the same." This letter was brought by John Mason, the owner of New Hamp shire ; and, the General Court being summoned to consider it, in January, 1681, a revision of the laws was hastened, and agents were appointed to go to England. For this service William Stoughton was again selected, in association with one Samuel Nowell, in place of the former co-agent, Peter Bulkley. Stoughton, however, was so little pleased v/ith his recent experiences in England that he excused himself from going a second time ; and John Richards, a wealthy merchant, one of the Ma gistracy, and a person who had filled several im portant offices, was substituted for him. Nowell belonged to the party which favoured colonial privi lege. Richards, who was of English birth, but who had been in the colony ever since 1644, was of a more pliant disposition. The King, by his letter entrusted to Stoughton and Bulkley, had required that the number of Assistants should in future be eighteen, according to the terms of the charter, instead of the smaller number which it had been customary to elect ; and this order being com plied with, the effect was seen in the increased power of the loyal party in the General Court. After a visit to New Hampshire, Randolph returned to England in March, 1681. On reaching home, he found that the Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations were rapidly coming to the conclusion that New England could never be brought to a perfect settlement unless a General Governor were sent o:er, and maintained there at tin Kli g s charge. He lost no time in encou- ragii ^this idea, though with some qualification as to time " and, in a report which he addressed to Sir Luolii^ Jenkins, Secretary of State, hp ~ ,,,,,.-, , , ^oserted that, to iiifj kuowlf>df?e_j . .., a correspondence and com- umation existed between what he termed the fac tious parties in both Enghmds. Meanwhile, ihe appointed agents of Massachu setts remained idly at Boston; and the General Court, in a letter to Sir Leoline Jenkins, affirmed that, after many seKHonn, they were still unable to find any who were willing & go, owing to the dangers of the seas, which v\ infested with roving Algerines. In some other Tespects, how ever, they endeavoured to meet tii KnJg a views. Having carefully perused their "book of statutes, with reference to the complaints of the English law-officers, they made some progress towards repealing the enactments to which exception had been taken. At the same time it was resolved to make no change in the law as to civil marriages, or in that which forbade persons to walk in the fields and streets on the Sabbath day. These matters occupied the summer of 1681. Towards the end of the year on the 17th of December Randolph once more arrived at Boston, with power over the revenues of all the colonies of New England, excepting only his Majesty s colony of New Hamp shire. In this capacity he was to act as the Deputy of William Blathwayt, Clerk of the Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations, who had been appointed Surveyor and Auditor-General of all the King s revenues in America. Randolph brought with him another letter from Charles, for his Majesty seems never to have tired of writing. This communication contained an elaborate sum mary of all matters in controversy between the plantation of Massachusetts and the Royal Govern ment, and aimed at showing, by an appeal to facts with which the reader is by this time well acquainted, that the colonists had, from the very beginning, used methods tending to the pre judice of the sovereign s right, and of their natural dependence on the Crown. The missive wound up with an intimation that the authorities at Boston were at once to send over their agents ; in default of which, the King was fully resolved to direct his Attorney-General, in the ensuing Trinity Term, to bring a quo ivarranto into the Court of King s Bench, by which the charter might be legally evicted and rendered void. In reply to this letter, the General Cottrt, in February, 1682, sent an address co the King, entreating longer forbea;;Q, nCe; and informing his Majesty that they ^l despatched as their agents Joseph Di^y " an a j o i m Richards. Both these en- YCys were disposed to favour the Royal prerogative, and their appointment is a sign that the authorities were by this date thoroughly frightened at the probable consequences of their dilatoriness, and their evasive policy. They went 011 with their revision of the laws objected to as being contrary to the laws of England; but at the same time constituted two naval officers, one for Boston, the other for Salem and the adjacent ports, to be commissioned by the Governor for exercising a control over the Collector of Customs appointed in England. The latter post was still occupied by Randolph, and it was perhaps thought as well to substitute, for the absolute violence to vhicli lie had been subjected on bii former visit, something 3is CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. * .east a ,_ to ^ T* provided with - of TTTe committee of winch Danfortb, the cZL" v_\ \ \ I / / / / NEW ENGLAND IN 1660. From Blaew s Thtdtre du Monde. (In this curious map the north is at the bottom and the soul o a.- ic top.) the event of anything being propounded that might tend to a violation of that instrument (wliich the committee did not anticipate), to crave his Majesty s favour that they might not be constrained to make answer on a matter with respect to which they had received no instructions from their principals, Danforth perpetuated the tradition^ pf an earlier day, when Massachusetts for armed rastftnc e j rather than submit Collector, of obstructing hvr. j tl the discharge of that office, of usurping i- die, ij v^-vers in the General Court, and of disr<: axliiig t >i authority of the Sur veyor and Auditor- General of Revenue, of whom he was the Deputy. He even professed to be in fear for his l&WM he had done before. Writing to Sir Leoline Jc ikins on the llth of April, 1682, he said that /he r- uthorities were resolved to prosecute him a*^i sub verier of their government. If they 1682.] RANDOLPH AND DANFORTH. 313 could, they would execute him ; imprisonment was the least he expected. He therefore besought the Minister to send a quo ivarranto, as the only means of saving his life. That the General Court, not withstanding their smooth professions of loyalty, were still acting against the King, is certain, unless "Randolph sent home a set of fabrications having no basis of truth. He reported that a law had been revived by the Assembly to try him for his life for proceeding under his Majesty s commission before it the prerogative party, Randolph had a very poor opinion, of the results of their mission. Nothing they might promise, he advised Sir Leoliiie Jenkins, could be depended on, if they were suffered to leave England before his Majesty had received a full account that all had been regulated at Boston as promised. He thought that Danforth, Gookin, and Nowell, Magistrates, and Cooke, Hutchinson, and Fisher, members of a late General Court, should be sent for to England, to appear before the King. was allowed by them. The said commission was not suffered to be read openly in court ; and, for acting by virtue of that document, Randolph s deputies and under-ofh cers were put in prison. The Governor and some of the Magistrates opposed these proceedings as much as they could, but in many instances were overborne. Bradstreet was old, and not at any time a man of very strong character or commanding ability, though conscientious, well- meaning, and honest. Danforth was younger and more energetic ; and his influence in some degree prevailed. The new agents left Boston on the 31st of May, 1682. Though they were known as belonging to 27 Danforth was the great leader of the privilege party. He administered the oath to one James Russell, as Colonial Naval Officer (for the over looking or thwarting of Randolph in his capacity of Collector of Customs), when the Governor had refused. This and similar conduct caused him to be popular with the party of resistance, and at the election of May, 1682, a vigorous attempt was made to put him in the place of Governor. It failed, however; and to the end of the charter government, in 1686, Bradstreet and Danforth retained their relative positions in the first and second offices of the colony. From this fact alone, it is evident that the loyal party was stronger in the plantation than the dis loyal. Yet a party numerically inferior will some times exercise a very powerful influence by the ability of its members and the concentration of its purpose. It was so with the faction headed by 314 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. Danforth. If there was really a design of putting Randolph to death, Danforth was certainly the man to conceive and carry it out. He was a person of a restless and determined character, holding very extreme ideas with regard to colonial rights, and desirous of establishing for his beloved Massachu setts a position of independence, scarcely limited, if limited at all. bv the dominion of the mother country. Randolph had sent a petition to England against this energetic politician, in the early part of the year, and, by means of some agent at London, Danforth had obtained a copy of it. Hence the personal animosity of the men; and on this ac count they watched each other like t\vo gladiators who hold their lives at the sword s length, folio winf every movement with a wary eye. CHAPTER XXXVII. An Altercation on the Boston Exchange Divisions in the General Court The New Agents in England Letter from Danfortli to Randolph Issue of a Writ of Quo Warranto against the Corporation of Massachusetts Proceedings in the General Court Determination of the House of Deputies not to submit Arguments of the Party of Resistance Relative Position of Charles II. and the Massachusetts Colony Opinion in lioston and the other TownsJudgment in the Court of Chancery New Constitution for Massachusetts devised by the King Events in Maine and New Hampshire Edward Cranfield Governor of the Latter Province -Disputes between him and Mason Disturbances in Xew Hampshire Despotism of Cranfield Petition against him His Ignominious Flight from New England. PENDING the arrival of further instructions from England, the position of Randolph at Boston was a sufficiently disagreeable one, even though his life may not have been in danger, as he supposed. He was looked upon with the utmost dislike by the colonial party, and, being apparently a man of hasty temper, was engaged in constant broils. Whether this was in the greater degree his own fault, or the fault of those with whom he was in antagonism, the fact was no less lamentable, for it often led to scenes of a very indecorous character. It is recorded in the Massachusetts Archives that in June, 1682, the representative of the Crown got into an unseemly altercation on the Exchange with one Elisha Hutchinson. Randolph complained of having been subjected to an imjust rate. " Seven men," he said, " may cut a man s purse on the liighway." Hutchinson responded, " Such a knave as you may cheat twenty men." "Who are you 1 ?" retorted Randolph. Hutchinson, with a modest sense of his own position in the universe, replied, "A man." Randolph, objecting to this description a-s in excess of the truth, or requiring some sort of qualifica tion, said, "When you have your buff coat on." Hutchinson returned to the charge with the observa tion, " As good as you with your sword on." " You ai*e no commissioner here," exclaimed Randolph. Hutchinson, not to be daunted, answered, " I have as good a commission as you. My staff is as good a commission as your sword." <; Would I had you in a place where I could try it." said Randolph.. " Try now," cried the valorous Hutchinson ; and therewith Randolph departed. The Royal agent was engaged in such frequent disputes with the local authorities that the Magistrates determined on cau tioning him to behave more circumspectly in future, under pain of their serious displeasure. The De puties refused to concur in this vote, thinking the occasion called for a more vigoixnis rebuke proposed by themselves. Randolph, in fact, was looked on as a public enemy, and his manner was not such as to conciliate opponents. Though determined, at any cost, to make the colonists bow to the authority of the King, Ran dolph does not seem to have desired a total sup pression of freedom in the plantation. He advised that the sending over of a Governor should be accompanied by a declaration of liberty of conscience in matters of religion. But he found it necessaiy to keep before the attention of the home Govern ment the fact that, as long as the charter remained undisturbed, all his Majesty might command would signify nothing. GoA ernor Bradstreet, who was well enough inclined to be loyal, was over-ridden by the majority in the General Court, which, then- is reason to believe, did not at that time represent a majority among the people. Political power in Massachusetts was based on a restricted suffrage. It was from the first so ordered that it should leave the direction of affairs in tho bands of the church 1083.] THE WRIT OF "QUO WAERANTO." 315 party ; and with this party it still continued. The faction, as Randolph always called the supporters of privilege, were resolved, as he affirmed, to do nothing to oblige the Governor, or answer the King s expectations. He began to think of force as a means of coercing them. The account of the wealth and large resources of the colonists which he had written after his first visit to America, in 1676, he now con tradicted by a report in which he stated that the people were for the most part poor, and possessed of so little military strength that with five hundred of his Majesty s Guards he would undertake to drive them out of the country. Yet he feared that the menace of any such proceeding would lead to his own death, as it would at once be imputed to him, and any attempt to alter the constitution was by their laws a capital crime. The agents of Massachusetts, Joseph Dudley and John Richards, arrived, in England during the month of August, 1682. Richards immediately wrote to Increase Mather (father of Cotton Mather, whom we have had frequent occasion to quote) that lie greatly feared the dissolution of the Massa chusetts Government was intended by the powers at home. He and his colleague speedily sent in to the Privy Council an elaborate paper, asserting that the King s commands had been carried out, and denying the truth of several of Randolph s state ments. On presenting their commission to Sir Leoliiie Jenkins, they were commanded to remain for the present in England, and were informed that, unless they obtained further powers without delay, the colony would be proceeded against by a quo warranto at the next term of the Court of King s Bench. An order was simultaneously despatched to Randolph, directing his return to England, that he might give his aid in the prosecution of the writ. Intimation of these facts reached Boston in January, 1683, and, a month later, the General Court, after many sittings, and the usual observance of a day of fasting and prayer, determined on sending an address to the sovereign, a commission and letters to the agents, a letter to Sir Leoline Jenkins, and a petition (signed by the general subscription of the people) to the Throne. The address was of the usual loyal order ; but, in the new commission to the agents, directions were given tending to resistance in the matters of religion, of appeals to England, of the qualifications required by law respecting the admission of freemen, and of the constitution and seat of government. If a surrender to the King of the deeds of the province of Maine would help to save the charter, the agents were authorised by the General Court to deliver up those deeds. The Governor, in the letter to Sir Leolino Jenkins, stated that he had invited Mason to prosecute before the courts his title to the lands which he claimed, but that he had neglected to do so. The petition to the Throne, with its subscriptions, was to be presented or withheld according to the judgment of the envoys a compromise resulting from a difference of opinion between the Magis trates and the Deputies as to whether the sending of such an address was advisable. Randolph left Massachusetts early in April, and before his departure Danforth addressed to him the following letter, which should be quoted as a curious specimen of what was then considered mannerly by the Puritans of Boston: " Sir, You are now com mitting yourself to God s protection upon the mighty seas. I shall only commend and leave with you this one word of counsel. If God doth give you like visit as he did to Laban (Gen. xxxi. 2-i), be not worse than he appears to be (verse 29). God hath made you an eye and ear-witness of the sincere desire of this poor people, with whom you have sojourned some years, to serve God and honour the King. Resolve not, therefore, to be an enemy to them who have done you no wrong, lest the Lord say of you as is expressed Exod. ix. 16. I beg of you to read the nine first verses of the ninth of Acts, and muse seriously thereon in the night season, when you feel God s Holy Spirit communing with your soul. Excuse me. I beg your pardon."* At the present day, it will perhaps be generally admitted that the two sentences in this letter which do Danforth the most credit are those with which it concludes. Events, after lagging so many years, marched qxiickly after the return of Randolph to England. He arrived in London in the early days of June, and on the 27th of that month a writ of quo warranto was issued by the Court of King s Bench. A few weeks after, it was ordered by the Privy Council that Randolph should go to New England with the notification of the tlireateuecl legal pro ceedings, together with a Declaration from the King, in which his Majesty promised that, if the corporation of Massachusetts Bay made a timely submission before the commencement of the process * Massachusetts Archives. It would seem that, in the reference to Exodus, the verse intended must be "15," not " 10." The latter does not appear to have the least applicability; the former is as follows, and might very well be applied to Randolph by a man thinking as Danforth did: "For now I will stretch out my hand, that I may smite thee and thy people with pestilence ; and thou shalt be cut off from the earth." The passages in Genesis have reference to God com manding Laban to "speak not to Jacob either good or bad, " and to Laban forbearing, in consequence, to injure Jacob. The last of Danforth a three allusions is to the narrative of the conversion of Paul. 31G CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1683. at law, lie would regulate their charter in such a manner as would tend to his own service and the good of tlie colon)-, without any other alteration than such as he should find necessary for the better support of his authority there. The persons impugned by the coming suit were to defend them selves at their own personal charge, without spending any part of the public stock of the colony, or imposing any rate or levy on the people. Ran dolph wished to return to America in a frigate, so that the Bostoners might be overawed by some show of force ; but, as a frigate could not at that time be spared, he departed during August in a merchant-vessel. He landed at Boston in October, a few days after the arrival of the Massachusetts agents. The General Court at once assembled, and sat for several days in succession, but came to no other resolution than to send out a power of attorney to Robert Humphreys, a barrister of the Inner Temple, who was instructed to saA e a default and outlawry for the present, and to delay pro ceedings .as much as he could, in the hope of a better day. Though resulting in so little, the debates in the General Court were of coiirse warm and animated. Dudley, who had all along adhered to the prerogative party, counselled absolute sub mission, as the only hope that was left them. Others were for resisting ; but the Magistrates voted a humble address to the King, declaring that, "upon a serious consideration of his Majesty s gracious intimations in his former letters, and more particularly in his late declaration " (that just delivered by Randolph), they would " not presume to contend with his Majesty in a course of law, but humbly lay themselves at his Majesty s feet, in a submission to his pleasure so declared." The Deputies rejected this address after a fortnight s debate, and the views of the privilege party at this momentous crisis were set forth in a paper contained in the Massachusetts Historical Collection. The argument was based chiefly on the religious ground. It was contended that what was required ivas a "blind obedience to the pleasure of the Court ; * that nothing was said guaranteeing the religious liberties of the people ; that there was reason to fear Popish counsels ; that submission would be destructive to the interests of religion and of Christ s kingdom in the colony, and would consequently be a great sin and offence to the Majesty of Heaven; that, as the charter was not forfeited in the sight of God, it would be a sin to consent that the Court should alter it ; and that numerous passages of Scripture (which were parti cularly indicated) forbade such a course as the Magistrates desired to follow. In respect of politics, it was urged that submission would be unworthy of Englishmen, Avho lived under a limited monarchy, not an eastern despotism ; that they would suffer as much by compliance as by resistance ; and that, by availing themselves of legal and constitutional forms, they might possibly in time recover all they had lost. This is not the only presentation of the colonial case which time has spared us. In the collection of Colonial Paper.-; preserved in the British State Paper Office is a .etter from Boston dated December 14th, 1683, and evidently written by some leading politician. He -e again religion is brought to the front as the chief motive for struggling against the pleasure of the King. " Our civil government," says the writer (who does not give his real name, but simply signs his letter Phil&roy Philopatris), " is as the cabinet to keep and preserve the precious jewel of religion, which is our life : therefore we cannot consent to part with it, whatever we may suffer ; it is better to suffer than to sin and suffer too." Allusion is made to the argument of some wise men and faithful subjects in that land, that the charter was the principal bond and ligament which tied the colonists to the King and his successors, and that, the patent being once dissolved, by his Majesty, against the people s will, and withoxit their fault, no other bond would remain to oblige them to him as his subjects. This view is adopted by the writer, who adds that in the case supposed they would no more retain their allegiance to the English sovereign than the descendants of Danes and Saxons in England retained theirs to the descendants of the monarchs who ruled over their ancestors. It is surely unnecessary to point out to any intelligent reader how entirely wanting in analogy are these two cases, and how purely sophistical is the whole argument ; but it was probably received with great satisfaction by the party of privilege. The writer of the letter, after unfolding the question of right, proceeds to consider whether the King had power sufficient to coerce the colonists. " To send frigates or soldiers so far," he observes, "is a vast charge, and as it were to hunt a partridge upon the mountains ; for to such places, where they have several towns, the people may retire, and ships cannot sail thither, nor soldiers well march into the woods without great difficulty. And is there anything . here to be had to compensate such a charge 1 The people generally are very poor ; their substance is in a few poor cattle, and a little corn, and the land which they yearly lumber upon, and make but a bare shift to bring all ends together at the year s end. And if his Majesty should put them out of his protection, 1683.] CHARLES II. AND NEW ENGLAND. 317 they must and mil for the most part grieve for it, and flee under the wings of God, their old and faithful Protector; for little have they had from any earthly [protector] hitherto." If his Majesty were to prohibit their trade with other plantations, he would probably have the worst of it. The M colonists could make a shift to live poorly without much trade ; for they were in possession of wool, flax, hemp, iron, and many other useful things, together with hands enough to manufacture them. Moreover, they had many ships, which would venture abroad, and of which some would possibly return home in safety, with supplies of what was absolutely required. On the other hand, if the King would confirm them in their rights, they would prove themselves as good subjects as any he had, and would serve and obey him in all things, so far as they could with a good conscience. The determination of the House of Deputies not to make an abject submission to the demands of the sovereign, cannot be blamed. To have done so would have been a confession of weakness certain to invite aggression. The questions in dispute were legal questions, and could only be satisfactorily .settled in a court of law. To give up the whole matter into the King s hands would have been weak, ignoble, and cowardly a peril for the time being, and a dangerous precedent in the future. If such a policy had been safe with any monarch, Charles II., in the latter years of his reign, was most assuredly not the one in whom to place so extreme a confidence. He had for a long while been en deavouring, and with no small measure of success, to make himself as absolute as his father in the time of his most arrogant ascendency. His motives were ignoble ; his conduct was corrupt ; his aims were evidently such as the better order of Protestant Englishmen could not but regard with suspicion and fear. He died a Romanist, and for some time before his death had favoured Romanising tendencies to an extent which left little room to doubt that he would gladly .destroy the reformed faith if he could. All these facts justified the people of Massachusetts in not surrendering their whole case into the hands of such a King, to deal with according to his- unre stricted will and pleasure. But they did not justify the previous neglect, through many years, to satisfy the fair and reasonable demands of Charles ; the long equivocations, the dishonourable evasions, the pretence of acquiescence accompanied by no veal satisfaction, the perpetuation of proved abuses, the tardy and grudging surrender of despotic powers. However right the colonists were in resolving to defend their charter by all legitimate means, iie.w that matters Lad come (by whatever fault or series of faults) to a life-and-death struggle, we cannot fairly blame Charles for seeking its abolition. He had certainly not acted with precipitation. He had been patient beyond the usual limits of Royal patience. The negotiations with Massa chusetts had extended over nearly a quarter of a century. They had begun, very shortly after the Restoration, and the King was by this date approaching the termination of his life and reign. He had sent letter after letter, and envoy after envoy, but could obtain little in j>ositive fulfil ment of his requirements. He had given the colonists every opportunity of retreating from their false position with the least amount of humiliation to themselves. He had at one time let the whole matter drop for eleven years from 1665 to 1676; and even then seven years more of almost fruitless endeavours passed away. The verbal communica tions of the colonial authorities were full of efl usive loyalty ; but their acts, or the acts of many of them, were of a contrary character. When the King sent over his representatives, they were in sulted, defied, threatened, maltreated, and hindered in every possible way in the execution of their offices. Barnard Randolph, who was left in Massa chusetts in 1683, as one of the deputies of his brother Edward when the latter returned to Eng land, wrote from Boston 011 the 13th of June : " I have received many affronts since my being in the office you left me, and cannot have any justice." He adds some details as to violence done to his officers 011 their attempting to search a sloop at Marblehead ; and there can be no doubt that such acts of resistance received the countenance of the rebellious party. The conduct of Massachusetts, in short, was suicidal. Had the just demands of the King been complied with at first, it is probable that the extreme step now menaced would never have been taken ; and if it had, the colony would have gone into court with far cleaner hands. The granting of religious liberty, the establishment of a broad and comprehensive suffrage, the admission of appeals where the acts of the authorities had been complained of as involving serious injury to private individuals, would have been graceful and honourable concessions to the very spirit of freedom which the leading colonists professed to be main taining. But it is to be feared that they cared less for the spirit of freedom than for the lusts of privilege. The indefatigable Randolph again left America on the 14th of December, 1683, after a stay of less than two months. His departure seems to have encouraged the advocates of resistance to fresh efforts. At the General Court for elections, in 318 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1684. May, 1684, Dudley was not again chosen as Assist ant, in consequence, doubtless, of liis disposition to support tlie Royal claims. Bvadstreet and others of the same party were elected only by a narrow majority. The Governor and several Magistrates went to the castle to see what repairs were necessary to be done. A town meeting was held at Boston, at which it was proposed that all who were for surrendering the charter should hold up their hands ; and not a hand was raised. On this occa sion; Increase Mather addressed the people, telling them that if they should deliver it up, even as Ahab required Naboth s vineyard, their children would be bound to curse them. On the 9th of July, Dudley wrote to Sir Leoline Jenkins that he and his friends had endeavoured "o persuade the colonists to cast themselves humbly at his Majesty s sacred feet (such was the servile language of loyalty in those days), but that the only result was that they were regarded as enemies to the peace and liberty of the plantation, and that several had been dis charged from their places of trust. It is a noticeable fact on the other side, however, that, although five extraordinary sittings of the General Court were held about this time, none of the Deputies would seem to have been present at any one of them ; which apparently points to a wide discourage ment of the privilege party, to which they for the most part belonged. The colony was much divided in opinion. The General Court sent a letter to Humphreys, their attorney in London, urging him to do all he could " to spin out the case to the uttermost," and calling his attention to a judgment of Lord Coke s touching the Isles of Man, Guernsey, Jersey, &c., to the effect that those places, being extra regnum, could not be adjudged at the King s Bench, nor could appeals lie from them. They also sent another address to the King, in which they prayed that he would not impute it to the perverse-ness of their minds that they could not make the submis sion which he demanded. They took encourage ment humbly to supplicate that there might be no further prosecution on the quo warranto, it being, they said, very grievous to them to think of main taining any controversy with his Majesty. Besides, they believed that in times to come it would be no distress of mind to his Majesty to reflect that his New England subjects had been relieved by his sovereign grace. This address was written in May. Before it could have reached London, a very important crisis had taken place. On the 21st of June, 1684, the Court of Chancery, to which the suit had been transferred, made a decree vacating the charter, and directing that judgment be entered for the King as far as that tenn was concerned, with leave to the defendants, however, to appear the first day of the following term, with a view to ulterior proceedings. In that case, the judgment was, with the Attorney-General s consent, to be set aside ; in the contrary case, to stand recorded. The original proceedings against the corporation were under a writ of quo warranto, returnable to the Court of King s Bench. It would seem (though the records of the transaction are rather imperfect) that some action was taken in that court, bitt with out success, and that then a new suit was begun by a scire facias in the Court of Chancery. There had been an informality in the writ, and it was thought that a decision in Chancery would carry greater weight, and be more effectual, than one in the lower court. Besides, Lord Guildford, who presided in the former, was known to have formed a very positive opinion in favour of the Royal views, and to be well prepared with legal argu ments and precedents in support of those views. In addition to these incentives were certain tech nical considerations of an important nature. A judgment for the Crown upon a quo warranto would have been only for the seizure of the franchises into the King s hands ; whereas a judgment upon scire facias would result not merely in the charter being declared forfeited, but in an order being issued that it should be vacated, restored to the Court of Chancery, and there cancelled. * The Massachusetts authorities did not hear of the provisional decree against them before the 10th of September, and then only in a private letter to Dudley. Clearly, nothing was to be done, and the General Court contented themselves with another humble address to the King, and a letter to their attorney, who subsequently told his clients that he thought they had managed their suit very unskil fully. On October 23rd, before the General Court could possibly have directed an} further proceed ings, final judgment against the corporation was pronounced in the Co\irt of Chancery. Their counsel had moved for an arrest of proceedings, on the very fair ground that sufficient time had not been allowed for procuring a power of attorney between the issuing of the writ of scire facias and the day appointed for its return. This, however, was refused, the court observing that corporations should at all times be represented by their* * Palfrey s History of New England, Vol. III., chap. 9, and the legal authorities there quoted.- The nature of writs of quo warranto has before been explained (see p. 110). A scire facias is a writ of which the most usual object is to call upon a man or ;i corporation to show cause why the execution of a judgment ] Kissed should not be made out. It is the regular process by which the frown repeals its grants or letters-patent. CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1682. aittorneys (i decision which, if good in law, was -certainly harsh and peremptory. The charter of Massachusetts being thus abro gated, and the existing form of government with it, the King turned his thoughts to the creation of .some political system to stand in its place. He deputed the care of the colony, together with the whole of NCAV England, except Rhode Island and Connecticut, to Colonel Piercy Kirke, a Tangier officer, whose name is to this day hateful in the West of England for his atrocious cruelties in sup pressing the insurrection of the Duke of Moiimouth, less than a year later. Kirke, the brutality of whose nature was already known, though it had not yet been exhibited in its full infamy, was to receive the title of his Majesty s Lieutenant and Governor-General over the newly -created province. His authority was to be unrestricted by any Colonial Assembly, and he was to appoint his own Council. The King was to receive quit-rents from certain lands, which quit-rents might at any time be .augmented ; and one of the churches in Boston was to be seized for Church of England services. This Avas a most despotic and unjust arrangement ; but it might have been averted by a few timely conces sions. Lord Halifax was the only Privy Councillor who had the courage and honesty to oppose the King s designs. It was furthermore settled that the military power was to be wholly in the hands of the Governor, and that nothing was to be printed in New England without the allowance of that functionary. Strange to say, .the news of this arbitrary revolution provoked no outburst of indig nation in Massachusetts. Dudley wrote to Ran dolph that if a general pardon were proclaimed, together with indulgence in religion and security of property, the people Avould not be persuaded to resistance. This was likewise the view of Stough- ton ; while Bradstreet humbly asked for indulgent treatment. The spirit of an earlier generation had departed, except in a few individuals ; and Massa chusetts, which was equal to worrying an unsup ported representative of the Crown, and to fencing with the Royal demands as long as it might have been supposed the King was not in earnest, now tamely saw not merely its privileges but its liberties suppressed, and the will of the monarch imposed on it as law. It was felt that the power] of England, both by land and sea, was too great to be resisted. The only hope was in the not distant dawning of a more propitious day. A. brief glance at the two proprietary colonies in the north during this eventful period will be necessary before we enter on the new condition resulting from the decision of the Court of Chancery. Maine, having been purchased by the Governor and Company of Massachusetts, in 1077, was for a little while, as in former years, governed by the General Court, which admitted deputies from the province, and established tribunals for the adminis tration of justice. A separate local government was in 1680 created under the direction of the older and more important colony. Danforth was appointed President of Maine for the first year, and in the following year he was continued in this post, though several of the people objected to being disposed of by Puritan intruders, and petitioned the King to re-establish his rule among them. Others, however, were well satisfied to live under the con trol of Massachusetts, as the chief Lord Proprietary of the province, the successor to the lights of Gorges, and the Lieutenant of the King. Thus matters remained until the forfeiture of the Massa chusetts charter. New Hampshire, after it had been legally declared in England that the govern ment of the province belonged to neither of its claimants, received a constitution from the King in 1679. Many of the features of this constitution were liberal, but it depended entirely on the pleasure of the monarch. On the members of the Govern ment assembling, they sent a letter to the Governor and Council of Massachusetts, confessing the benefits which had been derived from the ride of that plantation; but whether this expressed the views of the New Hampshire people generally, or only of a dominant faction, may perhaps be doubtful. When he left Boston in the summer of 1680. Randolph travelled into New Hampshire, and began operations at Portsmouth as Collector of the King s Customs, but met with considerable opposi tion. He was sued by the master of a vessel he had seized, who obtained a verdict, with damages to the extent of .13. His Deputy, Walter Bare- foote, was, after trial, fined for having exercised his office without leave from the President and Council. About the close of the year, Mason arrived in New Hampshire with a numdamus from the Privy Council, constituting him a member of the Govern ment. He soon got into collision Avith the colonial authorities by attempting to exercise powers the A-alidity of Avhich they denied. In a little Avhile he had publicly summoned the Council to answer him before the King Avithin three months, and they had issued their warrant for his arrest. Mason, evading the order, departed for England in 1681, and induced the Privy Council to advise a different constitution for the province. The King consented, and in 1682 sent out Edward Cnmfield as Governor, with very considerable powei-s. Cranfield, before hei left, made a good money bargain Avith Mason, TYRANNY IN NEW HAMPSHIRE. 321 who still considered himself the proprietor of the territory, although the legal decision of 1677 had removed the government from his hands. The Governor had not been in New Hampshire long before he was at issue with Mason, whom he accused of treating him unfairly, and of misrepresenting both the place and the people. He reported home that the settlers were neither so rich nor so mutinous as had been described ; that Massachusetts had exercised no authority until requested to do so, and that the province had derived great benefits from the neighbouring colony during the Indian war. This testimony would be more valuable if it were not on record that shortly afterwards Cranfield received from the Assembly a gratuity of 250. He was evidently, however, not a man very easy to deal with, for in January, 1683, he quarrelled with the Assembly respecting several measures, and went the extreme length of dissolving it. This was more than the people were disposed to suffer, and an insurrection broke out amongst the towns of New Hampshire. The province had been almost completely ruined during the Indian war ; it was still very thinly populated ; and the money resources of the people were but small. Yet the colonists were not wanting in spirit, and, under the leader ship of Edward Gove, a deputy from Hampton in the recent Assembly, and apparently a man of distracted intellect, they made a brief stand for their liberties. But in a little while Gove and eight of his associates were arrested, and arraigned for high treason. All were convicted ; but the eight were set at liberty, and Gove was despatched to England in chains, as the Governor feared a rescue if lie should keep him any longer. On. arriving in London, he was imprisoned in the Tower, and kept in irons for nearly a year. In a letter addressed " to his honoured friend, Edward Randolph, Esq." (thfii in England), he begged for a little money assistance in his necessity, solicited his interest for a pardon, and advanced the odd plea that he would not have risen in rebellion had he known it was against the law. His ignorance on this score he attributed to the fact that the like had been done every year for fourteen years, and no notice at all taken of it. He was ultimately pardoned by King James, and returned to America in 1686. The movement having been suppressed, Cranfield succeeded in establishing a pure despotism. He again acted in the interests of Mason, and, after appointing Barefoote as his Deputy, went to Boston, and employed his time, as au irregular agent of the King, in prying into the affairs of Massachusetts, and reporting on them in no com plimentary vein. On a former visit, some months before, he had induced the Massachusetts Magis trates to offer, through their agents in London, a bribe of 2,000 to Lord Hyde for a pardon. The money was refused, but the fact of its having been offered shows the low ebb of public morality at that time in Massachusetts. During his second visit, Cranfield wrote to Sir Leoline Jenkinr., on the 19th of June, 1683, and again at subsequent dates, with reference to the College at Cambridge, near Boston, which he charged with being the fount whence so much sedition was drawn. Barefoote also wrote to the Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations, condemning the ministers and church members of New Hampshire for inciting others to disloyalty. "No Pope," he said, "ever acted with greater arrogancy than those preachers- who influence the people to their fantastic humours, intermeddling in all civil affairSj and censuring all persons and actions that agree not with their principles and peevish humours." There was certainly no want of arrogance on the side which Barefoote represented. Indeed, the tyran nical proceedings of Cranfield, of Mason (now filling the position of Chancellor), and of their colleagues, were so extreme that, in the autumn of 1683, . Nathaniel Weare, of Hampton, left for England with a petition to the King from the four towns of the province. Early in 1684, want of money, and the disturbed condition of the country, which every day threatened the shedding of blood, com pelled Cranfield to convoke the Provisional Legis lature again. The members proved refractory, and the Governor, dissolving the Assembly, levied taxes by his own will, and exacted duties on vessels even within the borders of Maine. Still worse than this was his conduct to the ministers .of religion, to whom he sent a circular, threatening them with prosecution under the Act of Uniformity if they refused to administer the Lord s Supper and the rite of baptism according to the forms of the Church of England. He addressed a particular command to the Rev. Mr. Moody, requiring him to administer the Eucharist, after the fashion pre scribed by the English rubric, to himself, to Mr. Mason, and to Mr. Hinckes, a member of his Council. The minister refused, and was straight way tried for the offence, convicted, and sentenced to six months imprisonment, while at the same time his " benefice " was declared forfeit to the Crown. In the meanwhile, Weare, in England, made some way with his complaints. The Lords of the Committee wrote to Cranfield on April loth, 1684, calling him to account for allowing the claims, of Mason to be adjudicated in the province, 322 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1685. instead of referring them to England, and for pre suming to fix the value of current coin. Weare presented a memorial against the Governor to the Privy Council in July, and, this being referred to the Lords of the Committee, they sent a copy to the accused, requiring his answer, and charging him to desist from placing obstacles in the way of the party which was collecting evidence against him. Previous to receiving this order, he had written home, asking to be relieved of his post, on account of ill-health. The King permitted him to appoint a Deputy, and go to Jamaica or Barbadoes ; but ere he could depart, the long-suppressed ani mosity of the people burst out. He was severely beaten at Hampton in January, 1685, and, getting away with the loss of his sword, was escorted to Salisbury with a rope round his neck, and his legs tied under the horse s belly. The whole colony was in a ferment of petty insurrection ; and Gran- field was glad to take ship privately at Boston for the West Indies, leaving the equally unpopular Barefoote in his room. CHAPTER XXXVIII. Accession of James II. State of New England in 1085 Proclamation of the Xew Monarch at Boston Determination of James to rule arbitrarily Creation of a Provisional Government in Xew England Joseph Dudley made President Protest and Dissolution of the General Court of Massachusetts Previous Career and Character of Dudley His Letter to Increase Mather First Acts of the Xew Government Difficulties with regard to Keligion Quarrels of Randolph and Dudley Church of England Services derided by the Mob Progress of Episcopal Views Renewed Immigration of Dissenters- Proceedings against Rhode Island and Connecticut Arrival of Sir Edmund Andros at Boston as Governor-General of New England The Religious Difficulty again foremost Arbitrary Taxation Resistance of Massachusetts Towns, and Severe Punishment of the Offenders. CHARLES II. died on the 6th of February, 1685, and, in default of legitimate heirs, the sceptre passed into the hands of his brother, the Duke of York. It was well known that this Prince was a Papist, and the utmost alarm as to the future of Protes tantism not unnaturally took possession of the minds of Englishmen on both sides of the Atlantic. This apprehension was in some degree allayed by the new King declaring, at the first Council held after his accession, that he was no friend to arbitrary power, as many had asserted, and that he was resolved to maintain the liberties of Englishmen, the form of government already existing, and the Established Church. As to the New World, James had succeeded to a harvest of troubles. The abro gation of the charter of Massachusetts had left that colony in a state of incipient revolution ; and the other settlements were suffering from a general condition of uncertainty and disturbance. Ply~ mouth, notwithstanding its loyalty, was dissatisfied at never having been successful in obtaining a charter. Connecticut and Rhode Island had but recently been in a state of surly antagonism with regard to vexed questions of boundary ; though, as the disputes had in 1683 been settled by Commis sioners in favour of the former colony, the occasion of irritability lay chiefly with the latter. The united plantations of Providence and Rhode Island had lost their two most eminent citizens, the founders of those great refuges for the perse cuted. Coddington had died in 1678, Roger Williams in 1683; and 110 one of equal eminence had yet appeared. As a climax to all, the Con federacy of the New England colonies had come to an end in 1684, after a final meeting, at which the Commissioners proclaimed a day of fasting and humiliation, that the people might pray for the withdrawal of those divine chastisements under which they were still suffering, and might implore a lengthening of the life of King Charles, and the establishing of his crown in righteousness, for the defence of the Protestant religion in all his dominions. Such, then, was the disjointed and disorganised condition in which James II. found the colonies of New England on his accession to the throne. Their state in 1685 was certainly far inferior to that which had existed five-and-twenty years before, when Charles reached London from Breda, to restore the ancient monarchy of England. The death of that sovereign put an end to the Governor ship of Colonel Kirke before it had really com menced ; and for some time nothing definite took its place. On the very day that James succeeded to the crown, he issued a proclamation, directing that all persons in authority in his kingdoms and colonies should continue to exercise their functions until further orders were issued. The new monarch 1685.] PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 323 was proclaimed in the chief street of Boston during the month of April, even before the receipt of any official intimation of what had happened. The ceremony was performed by the Governor, the Deputy-Governor, and the Assistants, on horseback, .accompanied by a troop of cavalry and eight foot companies, with drums beating and trumpets sound ing. As the mounted troops were a hundred in number, and the infantry a thousand, the military display was sufficiently imposing, and such as to convey no mean idea of the position and resources of this colonial city, not much more than half a century after its foundation in the wilderness. A large piece of ordnance was discharged after the volleys of horse and foot ; the people burst into as loud acclamations as if they had been Londoners, hearing the proclamation read at Temple Bar or Charing Cross ; and the soldiers, followed by num bers of the principal gentlemen and merchants of the place on horseback, finally made a procession through the town. So far as ceremony is of any value, the reign of James II. had made a good beginning at Boston. Nevertheless, the general feeling amongst the colonists was one of gloom and anxiety. Every thing was unsettled, and the arrival of Colonel Kirke as Governor was daily expected with a feel ing of nervous dread. It was probably known in Massachusetts that, when in command of the African garrison of Tangier, that officer had behaved with a fantastic cruelty which augured ill for those over whom it was expected he would soon be placed. So great was the sentiment of despondency, of listless indifference to all political considerations, that at the annual elections several towns neglected to send Deputies to the General Assembly, and were rebuked by the Court for their want of spirit. The outbreak of the Duke of Mon- mouth s rebellion, in June, 1685, gave other and more congenial employment to Kirke than that of worry ing refractory colonists ; and we hear no more of his filling the post to which the late King had appointed him. When the rebellion was put down, and James had time to think about other matters, Randolph presented a petition praying for the creation of a temporary government over Massa chusetts and its dependencies, and that he might be sent OA er with the necessary commissions, together with writs of quo warranto against Rhode Island and Connecticut. The constitution he suggested was not illiberal in its features. The Governor was to be assisted by a House of Assembly, in which Massachusetts should be represented by twenty Deputies, Plymouth and New Hampshire by nine each, and Maine by eight. But the King refused to allow of any House of Assembly, although hi Attorney-General and Solicitor-General laid themselves reported that, notwithstanding the with drawal of the charter, the people of Massachusetts had still the right of deiberating on such laws and taxes as should be made or imposed on them. While James was busy contriving how he should introduce the Church of Rome into England, his Privy Council were making arrangements for intro ducing the Church of England into the Piiritaii colonies. It was ordered that several Common Prayer Books, together with books of the Canons and Homilies of that Church, copies of the Thirty- nine Articles, and Tables of Marriage, should be sent over to New England, to be used according to the directions of the Bishop of London, in whose diocese the colonists were supposed to be. Randolph arrived once more in Boston on the 14th of May, 1G8G. He brought with him com missions for the functionaries of a Provisional Government. A President, Deputy-President, and sixteen Counsellors, were to rule over Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, and the King s Province or Narragansett Country, pending the arrival of a Governor- General to be sent out from England. But they were not charged with any legislative authority, nor could they collect taxes, except such as had already been levied by law. They could only carry on the ordinary routine of government, and, as no provision was made for an Assembly, their position must be regarded as anomalous, and not very en viable. The office of President was conferred on Dudley ; that of Deputy-President on Stoughton : both supporters of the prerogative party. Ran dolph and Mason were members of the Council, and Randolph also held the appointment of Secretary and Registrar of the four united provinces. He had solicited the office as a reward for his exertions in causing the " liberties and privileges " of Massa chusetts to be " forfeited to his Majesty." It proved a good source of profit, for he claimed for himself and his Deputy an exclusm r e right to register wills, deeds, and all evidences of contracts, to issue licences of marriage, and to certify such copies of legal documents as should be valid in law. Three of the Counsellors Bradstreet, his son, and Saltonstall refused to assume the trust ; the others, together with the President and Deputy-President, laid their commission before the General Court, declining, however, to recognise the members of that Court in an official capacity, and simply addressing them as some of the prin cipal gentlemen of the towns of Massachusetts. It is the uneasy fate of every impartial observer of human events to be obliged to shift hi.s svin- 324 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1686. pathies from side to side, according as the turn of fortune ranks men with the persecuted or the persecutors. When the English Puritans of the reigns of Elizabeth and of the first James and Charles were suffering from the oppression of the Bishops, the balance of sympathy was naturally with these humble followers of conscience. When they themselves, spoiled by the evil influences of undivided power, erected a selfish tyranny where they prated of a free commonwealth, the kindly regard that had been theirs passed away to those whom they had wronged. They regain it now in President and Counsellors, in which they said : " We conceive First, that there is no certain, deter minate rule for your administration of justice ; and that which is, seems to be too arbitrary . Secondly, that the subjects are abridged of their liberty, as Englishmen, both in the matters of legislation and in laying of taxes ; and indeed the whole un questioned privilege of the subject transferred upon yourselves, there not being the least mention of an Assembly in the commission. And therefore we think it highly concerns you to consider whether such a commission be safe for you or us." The) INCREASE MATHER. the hour of their new trial and oppression. In these changes there is no inconsistency : they but express fidelity to the highest laws of humanity and morals. Charles II. had combated, not unfairly or unreasonably, whatever his ulterior designs, the exclusiveness and petty despotism of the chief New England colony ; but, on succeeding to his triumph, the poor and shallow nature of his brother could not refrain from striking at the very heart of all noble and manly life in the settlement whose errors had brought it low. The General Court of Massa chusetts met this outrage with a dignified protest. On the 20th of May, 1686 the third day after the communication of the Royal commission the Court abdicated the government provisionally, after sanctioning, by an unanimous vote, a reply to the added that if the persons so commissioned should take upon themselves the government of the colony, they (the members of the General Court then about to be dissolved) would demean themselves as true and loyal subjects to the King, and would humbly make their addresses to God, and in due time to their Prince, for relief. This document was de scribed by the Council as a libellous paper, and they summoned Edward Rawson, Secretary of the Colony, before them, for having signed it. In the very outset of their career, they made it plain that no criticism on their acts would be permitted. Joseph Dudley, President of the United Colonies of New England, was the son of Thomas Dudley, one of the early settlers in Massachusetts Bay, a Deputy-Governor several times, and the Chief 1686.] JOSEPH DUDLEY. 325 Governor more than once ; a man of honest and unswerving principles, but harsh, intolerant, and disposed to persecute for the sake of religion. His son, now advanced to the important and influential post authorised by James II., was a person of a very different character. The father was seventy years of age when his child was born, and lived not more than live years later ; so that Joseph Dudley could have received no direct influence from his Commissioner of the United Colonies, and had tilled various temporary posts in connection with the political affairs of Massachusetts. Able, versatile, well-educated, energetic, and ambitious, he was just the man to rise to the highest place in a period of revolution and disturbance. Randolph, in a letter to the Bishop of London, written in 1682, said of him that he was a great opposer of " the faction " in Massachusetts, and, if he found things resolutely progenitor. In Thomas Dudley we see a stern, inflexible Republican, of the stamp of those who fought under Cromwell, and forsook him when he showed a hankering after the flesh-pots of mon archy. Joseph Dudley was more courtly more desirous of making a path for himself by submission to the dominant power in the old country. He was one of the prerogative party in the disputes with Charles II., and was soon selected by Ran dolph as a useful ally. In 1682 he was sent to England as co-agent with John Richards in re presenting the case of Massachusetts before the King. He had been a Deputy, a Magistrate, and a 28 managed, would cringe and bow to anything ; that he had his fortune to make in the world, and that if his Majesty, upon alteration of the government, would make him captain of the castle at Boston and of the forts in the colony, he would gain a popular man, and oblige the loyal party. When Dudley was omitted from the Magistracy in 1684, Randolph declared himself well satisfied, because Dudley would then become the fitter man to serve the King in some position of his Majesty s appoint ing. Events and his own nature had marked him out for the elevation to which he had now attained. 326 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1680. His affection for the place of his education Harvard College, established at Cambridge, near Boston continued to be a strong feeling with Joseph Dudley, even at this period of disruption. On the morning of the day when he and his col leagues laid their commissions before the General Court, he wrote a letter to Increase Mather at the house of that minister, in which he said : " Reverend and dear Sir, I rose this morning with full intention to wait on you by eight of the clock, before I had your letter to put me forward, and am sorry to find you from home. I am very solicitous, whatever be the issue of the present hurry, for my dear mother at Cambridge, and cannot be happy if it do not nourish. I never wanted your favour and advice so much as now, and would pray an oppor tunity with you this evening, if possible. Sir, for the things of my soul I have these many years hung xipon your lips, and ever shall ; and in civil things am desirous you may know with all plainness my reasons of procedure, and that they may be satis factory to you." This looks like the utterance of an honest man; and it is possible that Dudley began by desiring the good of his native land, as well as the gratification of his own ambition. He may in the first instance have been dissatisfied with the unsettled state into which the colony had drifted, from whatever causes ; and may then have hoped that in the complete establishment of the Royal power the ultimate prosperity of the English Americans would be best secured. But in acting as the tool of such a monarch as James II. (if, indeed, he had not some hidden design of his own) he placed himself in a false position, and must bear the judgment of posterity for his mistake. The President s speech, delivered at the first meeting of the Council, which took place on the 25th of May, was temperately and judiciously con ceived. Addressing the assembled functionaries and people, Dudley exhorted them to observe a loyal and dutiful demeanour towards his Majesty s Government, as the plainest path to their own happiness. He said he would keep their welfare constantly in view ; professed to be a true and sincere lover of his coxmtry and averred that he had utterly forgotten the injui-ies lately offered to himself by his fellow-colonists. The Council fol lowed up this speech by a report to the Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations, in which they expressed an opinion that it would be "much for his Majesty s service, and needful for the support of the Government and prosperity of all these plantations, to allow a well-regulatetl Assembly to represent the people in making needful laws and levies :" a recommendation which conclusively proves that the new rulers were not well-disposed towards the despotic experiments of James, nor unregardful of the interests of colonial freedom. Arrangements were made for the administration of justice according to the ancient forms ; and the change in the constitution of Massachusetts pro ceeded so quietly that nothing approaching to a public disturbance is related. Indeed, it is evident that there was a party among the Bostonians who rejoiced over the in-coming of the new Govern ment; for in the Council Records is to be found an entry of 21 expended in wine, which was drunk in celebration of the change that had just been effected. But the religious difficulty made its appearance without delay. The Rev. Mr. Ratcliffe, a clergyman of the Church of England, who had been sent over by the Bishop of London to institute Episcopal worship in Boston, waited on the Council on the 26th of May, when Mason and Randolph proposed that he should have one of the three meeting-houses of the city to preach in. This was denied, and he was granted the east end of the town-hall (where the Deputies had been in the habit of meeting) until those who desired his minis try should provide a fitter place. Mr. Ratcliffe conducted his services in the place appointed, and some time after applied to the Council for main tenance, according to the letters of the Lords of the Committee ; in response to which it was ordered that the contribution-money collected in the place where he performed his ministrations should be solely applied to him. The old jealousy about the red cross in the banner reappeared ; and on the llth of November Judge Sewall resigned his com mission as captain of the South company of Boston, on account of an order to put the cross into the colours. Marriage by ministers (it had formerly been performed by the magistrates) was authorised by a proclamation of the Governor on the 29th of May. Prayer began to be used at funerals, con trary to the strict Puritanical habit ; and it was feared that the people would be compelled to go. the (to them) idolatrous length of observing Christ mas Day. The co-operation of President Dudley in these reforms was not sufficient to satisfy the require ments of Randolph. The two quarrelled a good deal about their respective authority, and on the 28th of July Randolph wrote to the Lords of the Committee to complain of Dudley and the Council thwarting him in his efforts to establish the Church of England in the colony. They acted, he said, in the interests of the Independents, and openly dis countenanced Mr. Ratcliffe and all who dared pro fess themselves members of the Episcopal Church, THE ENGLISH CHURCH IN BOSTON. The immigration of Nonconformist ministers from England was encouraged by giving them good livings and lucrative salaries ; and these men dis seminated the most seditious principles. Randolph accordingly suggested that no minister should be allowed to land without the licence of the Governor- dene ral (when that functionary should arrive), and that there should be power to restrain from preach ing such as were already there. In a letter to a friend in London, Randolph declared that he was treated by Dudley (whom he designated " the false President") worse than by his old enemy, Danforth, though under the pretence of friendship. The Rev: Mr. Ratcliffe found he had undertaken a very diffi cult and thankless task. He preached twice every Sunday in the town-hall, and on Wednesday and Friday mornings administered baptism and read prayers in the Exchange. That he found some followers is certain ; but the mob were against him. They interrupted his ministrations, much as the turbulent Anabaptists and Quakers had inter rupted the services of Puritan pastors in days gone by. They insulted and mocked at him, calling him Baal s priest \ and some of the ministers had the bad taste to denounce the English clergyman from their pulpits, and to describe the prayers which he offered up as " leeks, garlick, and trash." The matter was made worse by the importunity with which Randolph required a maintenance for this alien minister ; on one occasion even suggesting that the three meeting-houses of Boston should each pay twenty shillings every week, out of their contributions, towards the support of Mr. Ratcliffe. It does not appear that he gave any reason why they should lay this tax upon themselves for the maintenance of a minister whom they did not desire, and whose doctrine and practices they regarded as pernicious. The townspeople veiy fairly replied that those who hired him should supply his necessities an argument which, many years before, Roger Williams had advanced against the dominant Puritans, but without finding any acceptance for it. In the midst of these bickerings, Mr. Ratcliffe pursued his course with much courage and spirit, and, if Randolph may be tnisted, with no little success. The Registrar reported to Archbishop Bancroft, on the 27th of October, 1686, that there were at that time four hundred persons who were daily frequenters of the Church of England services, and that as many more would follow their example, but that, some being tradesmen and others mechanics, they were threatened by the Congrega tional men with arrest by their creditors, or with the loss of their work, if they showed any sign of going to church. Randolph evidently thought this, and certainly most rightly thought it, a very im proper interference with mental freedom and per sonal independence ; yet, with the inconsistency of most men in those times, he recommended a similar interference on behalf of his own party. He flatly stated to Lord Danby his belief that liberty of conscience would continue to obstruct the settle ment of the place, unless " duly regulated by the authority of a prudent Governor" from England. The Nonconformists of the colony were receiving reinforcements from the Old World. Great numbers of persons, holding opinions opposed to the English Church, were arriving in Massachusetts from Eng land, Scotland, and the Protestant parts of Ireland. Emigration to New England was being again stimu lated by the dread of Popish innovations, and the Puritans of the far West found themselves strength ened by the fears inspired by James II. Among the persons who repaired to Boston under this influence was Captain John Blackwell, one of Oliver Cromwell s officers and Parliament men, a son-in- law of General Lambert, and one of the persons excepted from the general pardon at the Restoration. On arriving at Boston, Dudley and his Council made Blackwell a Justice of the Peace ; which looks as if the new rulers of the colony were as little inclined to loyal submission as their predecessors. Randolph, indeed, said that Dudley intrigued with private cabals, with factious ministers, and with others who, in the time of Monmouth s rebellion, refused to pray for the King ; and that he neglected to intei*fere when told that some of the ministers had spoken treasonable words in their pulpits. The real designs of Dudley at this period it is hard to unravel. Rhode Island and Connecticut fared no better than Massachusetts in the refashionings of the time. They had always been loyal to the throne ; but Randolph had in 1685 exhibited Articles of Mis demeanour against them to the Lords of the Com mittee of Trade and Plantations, the general effect of which articles was to charge the two colonies with passing laws contrary to those of England, disregarding their allegiance, and acting as if they were entirely independent. The complaint resulted in the issue of writs of quo warranto against both plantations. Rhode Island at once submitted to the Royal pleasure ; Connecticut determined to make a stand, being almost compelled to such a course by the insolence of Randolph s language. The leading men of that colony were told by their accuser that, should they dare to defend their case at law, they would lose all that part of their colony lying between the river Connecticut and New CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE, STATES. [1687. York, which would in that case be annexed to the last-named government. "I expect not," he wrote to the Governor and Magistrates on the 27th of May, 1686, " that you trouble me to enter your colony as a herald to denounce war." Nothing could excuse such arrogance ; but Randolph had a very particular reason for it. He had been so long on his voyage from England that the time for the colony to appear by its counsel and contest the writ had already expired ; and he probably hoped, by pursuing a course of intimidation, to avoid the necessity of producing the document. The hope, however, was vain. Connecticut was not inclined to yield without a struggle, and on the 20th of July Randolph was obliged to go to Hartford, and serve the writ in person on the Secretary and one of the Magistrates. Dudley tried to persuade the Governor of Connecticut to seek a union with Mas sachusetts. But the General Court of the southern colony desired no such union, and empowered an agent to go to London, and represent their case before the King. Nothing resulted from this step, and Connecticut awaited with much anxiety the further development of events, not without some leaning towards incorporation with New York, rather than with the province ruled over by Dudley. Colonel Dongan, the then Governor of New York, was very desirous of such an arrange ment, and had even made proposals to that effect. The poverty of the revenue in his own province induced him to tell the Lords of the Committee that there was an absolute necessity for the annexa tion of Connecticut. At the same time, Dudley and his Council were representing in the same quarter that Connecticut and Rhode Island should be united with Massachusetts, as Massachusetts de pended on them for agricultural supplies, and they on Massachusetts for imported commodities. These, however, were only the strivings and rivalries of a provisional state of things, and that state was now on the eve of closing. On the 20th of December, 1686, Sir Edmund Andros, the former Governor of New York, arrived at Boston with a commission for the government of the colonies in that part of America. The commission bore date June 3rd of that year, and he was offi cially entitled " Governor in Chief in and over the territory and dominion of New England." Andros was to have the assistance of a Council, the first members of which were appointed by the King. The Governor might displace them at pleasure, but the vacancies could be filled only by the monarch. The laws, to be made by the Governor and his Council, were to conform to those of England, and to be sent to England for the Koyal sanction. By virtue of this commission, Andros was empowered to exact the oath of allegiance, if lie thought fit, of any and every person within the jurisdiction ; to. reprieve and pardon ; to regulate trade ; to consti tute courts of justice (the decisions of which were to be subject to an appeal to the King) ; and to appoint judicial, executive, military, and naval officers. He was not permitted to establish a Mint, but might by proclamation regulate the value at which Spanish dollars and other foreign coins should pass in the New England colonies. He was constituted commander of the militia and of tho forts, Vice-Admiral, and Admiralty Judge. He might agree with the colonists for the payment of qiiit-rents. Liberty of conscience was to be pro tected, and the Church of England to be coun tenanced and encouraged. Taxes might be imposed with the advice of the Council ; but the old laws and customs for raising money were to continue till set aside by further legislation. Andros was granted a salary of twelve hundred a year, to be paid out of the English Treasury \intil a revenue should be settled ; and this was subsequently increased to fourteen hundred. He brought with him a flag, showing a red cross on a white ground, a crown wrought in gold, and the Royal initials "J. R.;" also a seal for the official acts of his Government, engraven with his Majesty s effigies, standing (robed, crowned, and sceptred) under a canopy, his right hand extended towards an Englishman and an Indian, both kneeling, over whose heads appeared the inevitable cherub of the period, with scroll and motto complete. The King s arms, crown, sup porters, and other insignia, appeared on the other side of this seal, which must have seemed to the colonists like the outward and visible sign of their complete subjection to the Court at London. Andros also had with him what was more impor tant than a flag or a seal. He was accompanied by a guard of about sixty soldiers a small mimber, it is true, but probably sufficient to overawe any resistance that was at that moment likely to be made. These troops, according to a work in vindi cation of New England published at the time, were a disorderly, dissipated set of profane swearers, who corrupted the morals of the Bostonians, and provoked continual riots and tumults amongst a peace-loving people. On landing at Long Wharf, Andros was met by a number of merchants and others, with all the militia, both horse and foot, who escorted him to the town-hall, where his com mission was read, and the oaths of office were administered to eight councillors. Nine or ten days later, the first Council was held, at which representatives from Plymouth and Rhode Island 1687.] CREATION OF A DESPOTISM. 329 were present; and on January 28th, 1687, Dudley \va.s appointed censor of the press. He was also made, with Stoughton, a Judge of the Superior Court, with a salary which, though small, was worth having in addition to other sources of emolument. Arrangements for the collection of taxes were O made early in March, and in a little while the religious difficulty again arose. On the very day of his landing, Andros had sounded the ministers about the possibility of contriving so that one meeting-house should, at different hours of the day, accommodate the Puritan clergy and those of the Church of England. The ministers replied next day, after having met to consider the subject, that they could not consent to their meeting-houses being made use of for Common Prayer worship. Nevertheless, when the Good Friday of 1687 was approaching, Andros sent Randolph to demand the keys of the Old South Meeting-house, that it might be opened for a service of the Episcopal Church on the day in question. It was replied by a com mittee of the congregation that the land and house were theirs, and that they could not part with them to such a use. The sexton, however, was frightened into opening the doers and ringing the bell ; and Andros carried his point. Church of England services were held there on Sundays, alternately with the meetings of the body to whom the building belonged. The regular congregation was shocked and scandalised ; but the misfortune was beyond remedy. Another cause of offence was found in the introduction of the custom of kissing the Bible in taking an oath (which the Puritans regarded as idolatrous), instead of the established form of lifting the right hand. Sooner than adopt the method now imposed, many persons declined to serve on juries, although the refusal entailed on them a process for contempt. The folly of irri tating people on a point so utterly devoid of impor tance should have been evident to men of ordinary sense ; but the desire to tyrannise is always pam pered to unnatural growth by the opportunities of indulgence. In other respects, also, the conduct of the new rulers was injudicious. They multiplied grievances with a fatal facility. Inordinate fees were demanded for various processes which had before been free ; and a number of insatiable place- lumters were fetched from New York, to enrich themselves by exactions which had no warrant in law, and 110 justification in necessity. The fees were farmed out by the Secretary, Randolph, to a merchant named John West, who, having to pay a considerable sum for the privilege, was obliged to extort as much as he could possibly wring from the unhappy people to make a profit out of the transaction. The laws were now not printed as they had formerly been, and the colonists were left in the dark as to what was legal, and what not. Added to these troubles were the arbitrary imposi tion of taxes, and a demand that new patents .should be taken out for the ownership of land. It had been determined by the Council early in the year that there should be a compulsory assess ment of taxes by commissioners chosen by the several towns. When this arrangement came into effect, which was in the month of July, several places in Massachusetts, including every borough in the county of Essex but three, refused to proceed to the required election. Ipswich was particularly emphatic in resisting the demand. John Wise, minister of the place, met several of the principal inhabitants at the house of John Appleton, formerly an Assistant in the General Court, when the result of the discussion was a resolution that it was not their duty to assist in raising money without a General Assembly. A town-meeting on the follow ing day ratified the decision, and the election of a commissioner was refused. For this offence, the pel-sons principally concerned were taken to Boston, and there kept in gaol seme weeks on a charge of contempt and high misdemeanour. They were denied the privilege of habeas corpus, and were ultimately brought to trial before a court constituted by special commission, and consisting of Joseph Dudley, William Stoughton, John Usher, and Ed ward Randolph. In connection with this affair, Andros asked whether Joe and Tom were to tell the King what money he should have ; forgetting that, as Joe and Tom are the persons whose business it is to pay, it is not unreasonable that they should have some share in determining the amount. Dudley, addressing the Ipswich minister, is reported to have said, " Mr. Wise, you have no more privileges left you than not to be sold for slaves." The laws of England, he told the prisoners, would not follow them to the ends of the earth ; and, in summing up, he plainly directed the jury to find a verdict of guilty, which they were not slow to do. The unfortunate accused were then remanded to prison, and kept there oiie-and-twenty days before judgment. By the sentence, when passed, Wise was suspended from the ministerial function, fined fifty pounds, condemned to pay costs, and ordered to enter into a thousand-pound bond for his good behaviour during one year. The others were fined in various amounts, condemned in costs, required to enter into bonds, and disqualified for bearing office. The six sufferers afterwards calcu lated that, with fines, costs, and other charges, they were the poorer by more than four hundred pounds. 330 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1687. NEW ENGLAND IN 1684. (From rt Map engraved by Michault.) So severe a punishment intimidated the other towns. The assessments were made, the money flowed into the treasiuy, and the Government scored one of those triumphs which are more fatal than many defeats. At the same time, lands were taken away from their proprietors unless when sums were paid, in the forai of quit-rent, for the confirmation of the original title. The theory was that the King was sole proprietor and landlord in the province ; and on this assumption lands were freely disposed of to the supporters of the Govern ment, often to the injury of those already in posses sion. Portions of the common lands of Lynn, Cambridge, and other towns, which had been devoted to the service of the poor, were enclosed, and granted to private individuals : a state of feudal lordship was established in the chosen home of Puritanism. The fees remvpcl for the orantinf t> o of fresh titles to land wei-e at ~rst not serious in amount ; but as soon as the principle had been established, the exactions became more heavy. James was as despotic in New England as in Old ; and in both countries he prepared the way, with the unerring instincts of tyranny, for that reaction which must surely come when the first pi inciplies of freedom are defied. CHAPTER XXXIX. Consolidation of the New England Colonies under Andros Annexation of Rhode Island to the United Government Divided and Disorganised State of Opinion in New England Character of Sir Edmund Andros -Dissolution of the Separate Government of Connecticut The Charter Oak King James s " Declaration of Indulgence," and its Keception in New England Oppressive and Vexations Legislation-- The Question of Land Tenure- Expedition to the North-east Exten sion of the Rule of Sir Edmund Andros Increase Mather in England Troubles with the Indians Expedition of the Governor against the Indians of Maine Its unsatisfactory Resiilts Accusations against Andros Arrival of News of the Landing of William of Orange in England Outbreak of Revolution in Boston Reinstating of the Old Magistrates Arrest of Andros and Others Calling of a Convention Commencement of the Reign of William III. THROUGH good report and evil report for he had his proceeded in his task of consolidating the New- partisans as well as his enemies Sir Edmund Andros England colonies under his personal rule, 1687.] CONSOLIDATION OF NEW ENGLAND. 331 terms of his commission included the province of Maine, which was now held to comprise more territory than had hitherto been associated with the name, being understood as extending to that region beyond the Kemiebec, then called the county of Cornwall, which had been granted by the late to the present King. New Ply mouth and New Hampshire were placed under the rule of Andros equally with Massachusetts ; and when Rhode Island, in June, 1686, sent an address to James, praying for a continuance of the privileges granted by his brother, but at the same time submitting increased the number of the Governor s supporters. The Narragansett countiy was administei-ed on the assumption that it had been ceded to the Crown by VALLEY OF THE CONNECTICUT. all things to his discretion, th< answer took the form of an immediate annexation of the colony to the government of Andros, who was directed to require the surrender of the charter. Whether the charter was ever really surrendered seems doubtful ; but the people of Rhode Island proved very compliant, and, sending five members to the General Council, the Indians ; and Andros drew up and sent to England a memoir of the several conflicting claims to the land which had from time to time been urged, and maintained that the title of the King had never been alienated. Having thus established his sway, as the agent of his Royal master, over the greater part of New England, including some out lying districts as well, Andros turned his attention to Connecticut. On the 22nd of De cember, 1686, he sent a letter to the Governor of that colony, demanding the surrender of the charter, and intimating the King s pleasure that the colonists should submit themselves to the Government of New England. Connecticut, how ever, hesitated. In January, 1687, the Governor summoned the General Court ; the General Court left the matter in the hands of the Governor and 332 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1687. Council, yet gave certain instructions for an answer to the message of Andros, and for a letter to Lord Simderland, Secretary of State. In addi ess- ing Lord Sunderland, the Connecticut authorities iised language of such plenary loyalty as to amount to a complete surrender of their independence. They even, said that it would be much more pleasing to them to be united with the colonies and provinces under Andros than to be joined to any other juris diction. Yet what they desired above everything was to retain their separate existence ; and this view they expressed to Andros. Robert Treat, the Governor, was all this while conducting a private and personal correspondence with his powerful rival, whom he addressed in a conciliatory and almost apologetic style. Treat was disposed to sur render, but could not at once see his way, owing to difficulties raised by the Assembly, the members of which were to a great extent influenced by the clergy. The divided and disorganised state of New Eng land is strikingly shown in the proceedings of this period. The Confederation had never enjoyed a very vigorous life ; it had soon, fallen into jealousies and angry bickerings ; and it was now extinct. To the early simplicity of the Puritan emigration had succeeded the mixed opinions, the antagonistic interests, the heterogeneous composition, of a more advanced form of society. The several colonies represented different phases of religious thought, different sets of political ideas. Even within the compass of each plantation, great diversity of sentiment had arisen in the course of half a century. There was a Royalist as well as a Repub lican party. The weak points in the colonial sys tems had had time to unfold themselves. The enthusiasm of the original emigrants had died away: a generation of pilgrims had been supplanted by a generation of merchants and agriculturists. Abuses in the government of some of the colonies undoubtedly existed. Massachusetts was too rigid ; Rhode Island and Providence suffered from a feeble rule, and a freedom that verged on licence. The entire want of unity in the colonists of any clear purpose and single aim led to hesitation and weakness in opposing the designs of English Royalty. The King, on the other hand, knew perfectly well what he wanted, and how best to obtain it. He had at least a show of justice on his side ; in some respects he had actual justice. Un doubtedly he used his power rigidly when he had got it ; but he represented the supremacy of the English State over its own possessions, and that supremacy he was entitled to assert. The time had come when a combination of the whole of the New England colonies under one Governor appointed by the Ci-own, supposing him to have the check of a freely-elected Assembly, was probably the best development of political affairs in that part of America. From this, however, it does not follow that the acts of the Governor, when at length he appeared, were such as they should have been. He was without the curb of a popular legislative body; he was there as the representative of a despotic monarch ; it is very possible that his own personal inclinations were despotic also ; and ho governed with little regard to the feelings, or even the substantial rights, of the people who passed under his rule. Few men have had a worse name with modern Americans than Sir Edmund Andros. He is held by every American schoolboy to have been a villain, for whom no terms of reprobation are too strong. This view is derived, through many intermediate channels, from various contemporary accounts of his proceedings published after the cessation of his power. By the writers of those works he is accused of brow-beating the members of his Council who tried to shield the people from oppression; of bringing in men who by reason of their poverty were likely to act as his tools ; of suppressing the freedom of debate ; of disregarding the Council s advice whenever it went against his own wishes ; of evading a fair and open method of taking the votes, so that the majority might be known ; and of omitting to give due notice of the assembling of the Council, so that many were often absent through ignorance, and affairs were in effect managed by four or five persons, who were of course devoted to the Governor. It is probable that these accounts were exaggerated by partisan feeling. Andros was not a dishonourable man. He was a gentleman of high character, whose actions were consistent with an honest sense of what he believed to be right. That it was sometimes wrong none the less, is equally true. Many a man has thought it fit, on grounds of loyalty, and with out any personal self-seeking, to do the bidding of a tyrant ; but his individual sincerity does not annul the offence against a whole community. Besides, such men are always served by contemptible agents ; and this was the case with Andros. West, to whom Randolph farmed out the fees which were exacted on every conceivable occasion, was con demned by Randolph himself for his scandalous extortions, by which he rendered the new govern ment " grievous ;" and West was not the only one who squeezed the unhappy people, and made their lives a burden to them. It should be recollected to the credit of Andros, 1687.] ANNEXATION OF CONNECTICUT 835 or at least in mitigation of our judgment on the errors of his rule, that no person was executed for a political offence during the time of his power ; that no extreme cruelties can be laid to his charge ; that 110 one was fined or imprisoned by him for nonconformity with the Church of England ; that ho does not appear to have been in the slightest degree a gainer by the several fees extorted from the people; that lie was not even taxed with misappropriation of the public funds ; and that he took no pains to revenge himself on his many enemies.* He had an ungracious office to fulfil ; and he was a gentleman of the old school, proud of his lineage, and possessed of very high ideas of the prerogatives of monarchs and their deputies. But to rank him with the worst of tyrants is a thoughtless over-statement. The negotiations with Connecticut continued through the greater part of 1687. They were managed by a certain Captain Palmer, and by a Scotchman named Graham, the Governor s Attorney -General, and were rendered all the more difficult by the fact (probably unknown to Andros) that New York was at the same time making a bid for the colony ruled by Treat. Dongan, the Governor of the former Dutch settle ment, had a great desire to augment his dominions, and the Connecticut Assembly was now more inclined to absorption in New York than to annexation to New England. Andros at length grew tired of waiting, and determined on bringing the matter to a close. Acting with the advice of his Council, and having previously despatched a letter announcing his coming, he approached Hartford on the 31st of October, attended by a company of about sixty gentlemen and grenadiers. Crossing the ferry at Wethersfield, he was met by a troop of horse, who escorted him into the chief town, where lie found the train-bands waiting to piy him their respects. He had a discussion with the Governor that evening, and it is probable that all the details were then settled. The conference took place in presence of a numerous company, and, according to accepted tradition, the charter of Connecticut was on that occasion mysteriously conveyed away. It had been brought in, and laid on the table, when suddenly the lights were extinguished, and, on their being rekindled, the document had vanished. Captain Wads worth, says the legend, had taken it out of the house, and hidden it in the hollow trunk of an oak standing in the neighbouring grounds of Sauuiel Wyllys, a magistrate. The tree associated * Memoir of Sir Edmund Andros, by "William Henry AVhit- xnore, A.M. Boston, U.S. lbG8. with this romantic story (possibly true, though it is not to be found in any contemporary record) was blown down on the 20th of August, 1856. Whether the charter was thus saved or not, the independent existence of Connecticut came to a close on the following day (November 1st, 1687). Andros was conducted by the Governor, Deputy-Governor, Assistants, and Deputies, to the Court chamber, where, being seated in the Governor s chair, and the room thronged with people, he declared that his Majesty had, according to their desire, given him a commission to assume the government of Con necticut. The commission was then read ; Secretary Allyn (who, together with the late Governor, was straightway sworn in as one of the Council) deli vered up the common seal, and the old chirter government was at an end. A partisan of Andros says that no dissenting voice was raised in the whole large assembly ; and at any rate there is nothing to contradict this. Andros proceeded to the other principal towns of Connecticut, establishing courts of judicature, appointing sheriffs in each of the counties, commis sioning justices of the peacej and instituting military and revenue officers. He is said by the same partisan writer (Gershom Bulkley, a brother of tho Massachusetts messenger to England in 1676) to have been everywhere cheerfully arid gratefully received. Shortly after his return to Boston, to wards the close of 1687, he received the celebrated Declaration of Indulgence, by which King James suspended the exaction of all penalties for religious offences, and forbade the imposition of religious oaths or tests as qualifications for office. Super ficially considered, this measure looked extremely liberal ; but there can be no doubt that it was intended by the monarch to promote the re-establish ment of Romanism as the predominant religion of England. At any rate, the act was glaringly un constitutional, seeing that, by a Royal edict, several laws (which, whether good or bad, had been duly passed i v Parliament) were arbitrarily swept away. What a .Royal edict could do, a Royal edict could also undo ; and a precedent of a very dangerous nature was thus created. Toleration itself was to be cunningly employed to help forward the reign of the most extreme intolerance. Both in England and the colonies, some Dissenters were to be found who were deceived by the King s apparent generosity. Andros ordered a general thanksgiving throughout his jurisdiction, and a good many of the Puritans felt truly, and not merely officially, grate ful. Increase Mather induced several of the ministers, together with the members of his own congregation, to join him in an address of thanks- 334 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1088. giving to the sovereign. Dantbrtli, however, vrote to Mather that he dreaded the consequences of the King s act, as the removal of the only wall against Popery ; and events BOOH showed that he had formed the wiser judgment. The gift, good in itself, wa* discredited by the giver. The colonies of New England being now united under one rule, Andros began to develop those internal reforms which had for their object the diminution of popular liberties. Town-meetings for the choice of officers were restricted to one a year ; the previous vote by ballot was suppressed ; and the officers thus appointed were in some respects placed under the control of the justices of the peace, who were created by the Governor. The military force of the country was brought into subordination to Aiidros. It was officially au- nounced that all local laws had ceased to have any force, and that the people of the jurisdiction were to be guided by such orders as were made and pub lished by his Excellency and Council, or, in default of those, by the laws of England. Education was entirely neglected, and left without means. The holding of meetings for the redress of grievances was forbidden ; and a law wa-s passed that no man should be permitted to quit the country without the Governor s leave. The people regarded this as intended to prevent the seeking of redress in England ; but when we recollect how often, in previous years, they had themselves prevented others from obtaining relief in a similar way from their own tyrannies, it is difficult not to see some thing like a judgment in the restriction to which they were now subjected. Much legislation of a vexatious character sig nalised the year 1688. The business of travelling mei-chants or peddlers was prohibited, and the sales of every dealer were confined to his own town. Heavy duties were levied on commerce, and the people were subjected to taxes, the amount and nature of which were no longer de termined by a free repi-esentative Assembly. The concentration of legal powers at Boston was felt as a great hardship by persons in the remoter parts of the province, who were now compelled to journey many miles to the capital for the ti ansaction of affairs which could fonnerly be settled in their local courts. All this while, the master-grievance of the whole the interference of the new Government with the ancient titles to land was going on with great vigour. The case of one Lynde is related in a writing of the time with much particularity. Andros, it is alleged, inquired of Lynde what title he had to his lands, and was shoAvn several deeds, which were pronounced by Sir Edmund to be well expressed, and recorded in harmony with New England custom. But the derivation of his right did not give so much satisfaction. Lynde had bought his land of a man who had it of his father- in-law, who received it from the municipality f>f Charlestown. Charlestown had received it from the General Court of Massachusetts, and the General Court had purchased it of the natives. To Lynde the chain appeared complete ; but Andros told him that his title was worth nothing if that were all. West afterwards said that Lynde must have as many patents as there were counties in which he held portions of land. Lynde delayed taking any steps, because of the charges to which he would be exposed ; and he was accordingly served with a writ of intrusion. Andros said of an Indian deed that it was worth no more than the scratch of a bear s paw. The holders of estates were informed that they only took possession for the King. The town of Lynn, having produced its records to show that it was legally in possession of certain lands, was told that such evidence was not worth a rush. In a dispute with reference to Deer Island, in Boston harbour, Graham, the Attorney- General, even went the length of asserting that there was no such thing as a town, in a legal sense, in the whole country. Worried by subtleties of law, the people sometimes fell back on imprudent and un wise arguments. John Higginson, minister of Salem, appealed from the law of England, of which he probably knew little, to the law of God. of which, in such matters, he possibly knew less. Quoting from the Book of Genesis, he said that the earth had been given to the sons of Adam to be subdued and replenished, and that therefore the people of New England held their lands by the grand charter from God. It does not seem to have occurred to this respectable minister that King James was as much a son of Adam as were the people of New England, and that the question simply was, whether or not he had a claim prior to theirs. Andros, not admitting the validity of the argument from Genesis, bade Higginson declare himself a subject or a rebel ; and, hard as the case was, there was really no other course open. It was sought to turn aside the popular wrath from accumulating grievances by the amusement of a distant expedition. Starting for the north-east, in April, 1688, Andros ascended the Kennebec, and proceeded to Pemaquid, where a frigate awaited him. In this he sailed to the Penobscot, where he designed to hold a conference with a Frenchman named Castine, who, having adopted savage man- net s, was living among the Indians, and had established a little independent dominion of his 1688.] PROCEEDINGS OF ANDROS. 335 own, in defiance of the asserted rights of the Eng lish monarch. The frigate was anchored before the rude lint of Castine, who, seeing an officer landing from the vessel, rushed with his retinue into the woods. The Governor and some other gentlemen went into the house, and found a small altar in the common room, together with pictures and ornaments. They took away all the arms, powder, and shot they could discover, a few iron kettles, and several other things, and departed, after leaving with some Indian messengers an intimation that the property should be restored as soon as Castine had presented himself at Pemaquid, and confessed his allegiance to the King of England. Randolph met the Governor at sea, and returned with him to the place indicated, where the Indian chiefs of the neighbourhood were treated with rum, shirts, and cloth, and exhorted by the Governor not to fear the French, from whom he would defend them. In the county of Cornwall, Andros found important work awaiting him. The representatives of Governor Dongan, of New York, who for some time governed that portion of North America, had oppressed the colonists with a rapacity so insatiable that Randolph himself, who was not over-scrupulous in such matters, said they were as arbitrary as the Grand Turk. These agents were at one time the same Mr. West and Captain Palmer who after wards unpleasantly distinguished themselves by arbitrary proceedings in Massachusetts and else where. They had terrified the inhabitants into taking new grants for their lands on the payment of exorbitant lease-money ; and the wretched people were now told by Andros that the patents they had thus purchased of West and Palmer were of no validity, the commission from Dongan being illegal. The uncertain boundaries of the several jimsdic- tiorfi proved a frequent source of misery to the settlers. On again reaching Boston, Sir Edmxmcl Andres found that King James had constituted him Governor of all the English possessions on the main land of America, excepting Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia, He was thus restored to his old dominion of New York, and his sway was to extend from the fortieth degree of latitude to the river St. Croix, so as to include a portion of that territory which the French had always claimed as theirs, though the Duke of York had been equally positive as to its lying within his own juris diction. The seat of Government of this immensa province was still to be at Boston ; but a Lieu tenant-Governor was to reside at New York, and take charge of the settlements in that direction. The powers to be exercised by Andros in his new capacity were as despotic as before, and, although his Council was to consist nominally of forty-two members, five were sufficient to constitute a quorum. The laws passed by the Governor and Council were to be sent over to England, for approval or repeal by the Privy Council. The Governor was authorised to dispose of lands for a moderate quit-rent. Liberty of conscience was to be allowed, according to the Declaration of Indul gence ; but freedom of the press was forbidden. Nothing was to be printed without the special licence of authority. As these events were progressing in America, efforts were being made in England for a miti gation of the state of tyranny established in the colonies. Increase Mather had taken refuge in the old country, in consequence of some legal pro ceedings with Randolph in which he had become involved, and which were still hanging over his head. Shortly after arriving at London, Mather obtained several audiences of the King at White hall, and was directed to present in writing a statement of the grievances alleged against Andros. The King received him very graciously ; but the upshot of the whole matter was that Mather resolved to go no more, as he perceived that he was not likely to get anything better than fair words. He and his friends presented a petition to the Lords of the Committee of Privy Council, praying for a restoration of the Legislative As sembly ; but the King had no mind to any such arrangement. As a last resoui ce, they begged that the Council should consist of persons who were considerable proprietors of land, so that they might be more independent of patronage; that each county might have one at least of such inhabitants in the Council ; that no acts should pass for law but such as should be voted by the manifest consent of a majority of the Council ; and that all laws, so made, should be published for the general instruction of the inhabitants. But they do not appear to have received any satisfaction. The aborigines were now again giving trouble. On returning from New York, where he had paid a visit, Andros had an interview, at Albany, with the Indians of the Five Nations, who were paying too much heed to the solicitations of the French. France was beginning to erect fortresses along the English frontier and at the heads of the great rivers, and was sending out missionaries whose teachings were probably not altogether con fined to religion. In some directions these foreign emigrants encroached on English lands. One motive for the consolidation of all the New England settlements under a single rule was that a strong CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1688. and united Power might thus be created for resisting the advances of the rival nationality ; and the more recent annexation of New York and New Jersey to the jurisdiction of Sir Edmund Andros was partly dictated by the same motive. Whether as the effect of their communication with the French, Andros had a friendly consultation with several of the native chiefs at Hartford, as well as with the representatives of the Five Nations at Albany. He appears to have thought the Indians generally could be conciliated, and lie was vexed when, on reaching Boston, he found that the Pro- or simply in obedience to their own savage impulses, the Indians had of late been guilty of many excesses. At Springfield and Northfield, situated on the Connecticut River, and within the bounds of Massa chusetts, several Englishmen had been treacherously killed ; and at Casco Bay, in Maine, the native tribes had conducted themselves in a riotous and insolent manner. They alleged, in common with the French borderers, various breaches of faith and acts of injustice against the English ; the English retorted with counter-accu sations ; and it was not long before collisions took place, in which the Indians succeeded in killing some and capturing others. VIEW IN HARTFORD, CONNECTICUT. visional Government had during his absence sent a force to Maine to repress the malcontents in that quarter. He said it was not a war, but a succession of murderous acts ; and he released some Indians from prison, suspended the military movement, and issued a proclamation calling on the savages to set at liberty their English captives, and give up to justice every one of their number who had killed a settler. It was not loner before Andi-os discovered 1G88.] UNPOPULARITY OF ANDROii that his pacific policy was a mistake. The Indians, thinking they perceived signs of weakness in the action of the (rovernor, and being excited by the exhortations of Castine, who could not forget his recent treatment, became still more turbulent. The demands of the proclamation were disregarded, and it was evident that the natives contemplated some serious movement. Sir Edmund lost no time in taking the necessary measures. At the head of nearly a thousand men, including some regular infantry from England, he advanced into the His unpopularity was increased by the ill-success of his military exploit, for men will forgive anything rather than failure. Since his arrival in New England, Andros had never been so boldly con demned as now. When imposing arbitrary taxes, and requiring landowners to pay heavy fees for the peaceable possession of their estates, he was at least successful, and the sufferers themselves scarcely dared, after the experience of the Ipswich citizens, to open their lips against him. But now he had re vealed a weak point, and the muffled hatred of the INDIAN Hl KIAL-GKOrN]). threatened districts. The month was November, and the weather severe. The country through which the troops had to march was savage and unsettled. The enemy fled into the woods, and evaded the pursuing force. Shelter was not to be obtained in so solitary a desert ; hospital stores had been insufficiently provided, and the soldiers suffered much from sickness. All that Andros could do was to establish eleven forts, at convenient distances from one another, for over-aweing the savages, and to garrison them through the winter with nearly six Irundred men. Then he returned to Boston, wearied, disappointed, and little inclined to bear the criticisms on his expedition which began to be freely uttered. 29 New Englanders found vent in .audible murmurs. It was said that the Governor had a treacherous design in his expedition that he had brought about a peace between the Five Nations and the French, in order to act with greater vigour against the New England colonies ; that he had led Mas sachusetts troops into a wilderness in the depth of winter on purpose to effect their ruin ; that arrangements had been made for the French seizing on Boston in the spring ; and that the Mohawks had been hired to attack the English.* Reports got abroad that some French men-of-war were hovering about the coast ; and this confirmed the * Palfrey s History of New England, Vol. III. , chap. 14. 338 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1689. popular fears that Puritan New England was about to 1)0 handed over to the Papistical subjects of Louis XIV. But it need hardly be said that these apprehensions were only the result of an epidemic of distrust and dislike ; though it should be added that the Governor himself gave some colour to the story about treacherous dealings with the Indians, by treating -with great severity some inhabitants of Sudbury who carried before him a native who had made the accusation. Andros, on his pai-t, feared a descent on the coast by adherents of the Prince of Orange, to whom it was by this time known that the people of England were looking, as a protector from existing tyrannies. A circular from the Government of King James had been received by Sir Edmund, informing him that a Dutch invasion of England was contemplated. He therefore issued a proclamation on the 10th of January, 1689, com manding his Majesty s subjects in New England to be 011 the alert against the approach of foreign fleets, so as to resist any landing that might be attempted. The Governor returned to Boston in the month of March. On the 4th of April, news first reached that town of the landing of William of Orange in England on the 5th of November, 1688, and of the Declaration which he had issued to the people. This startling intelligence was brought by a young man named John Winslow, who had just come from the island of Nevis, in the West Indies, where a ship had arrived from England, conveying copies of the Declaration. Young Winslow bought one of these for four shillings and sixpence, and, refusing to give it up to the Governor, was arrested, and committed to prison on a charge of circulating traitorous and treasonable libels. But the news had got abroad, was buzzed up and down from tongue to tongue, and at once kindled the most intense interest, and the most lively hopes for the future. People began to think that the old charters were about to be restored, and they became every day less inclined to brook the dictation of their rulers. The situation was already sufficiently serious to induce Andros to retire within the walls of a palisado fort of four bastions which, some time previously, he had erected on Fort Hill. This work stood at the south end of Boston, and com manded the harbour. Barracks for a garrison had also been built at the same spot ; and the Governor had now under his command two companies of regular troops. He needed whatever help he could obtain, for a revolutionary movement was on the eve of break ing out. The colonists hoped everything from the action of the Prince of Orange, and were resolved to anticipate the result. The insurrection began in that undetinable way which generally characterises popular uprisings. On the morning of Thursday, April 18th, 1689, a large concourse of men from the neighbouring towns had gathered in Bosto n, to hear the usual weekly lecture on religious topics. Wild rumours of impending change Moated about. Something was being done, though nobody knew where. At the south end of Boston, the rising was believed to be at the north ; at the north end, it was said to be at the south. Captain George, of the Rose frigate, being found on shore, was seized by a party of ship-carpenters, and given over to a guard. The people demanded colours and drums of the military authorities ; this was at first refused, and the mob uttered threats. At nine o clock the drums beat through the town ; an ensign was run up at the beacon ; boys ran to and fro with clubs ; several companies formed under their old com manders ; and Captain Hill marched his men through King (now State) Street, escorting Brad- street, Danforth, Richards, Cooke, Addington, and other of the old Magistrates, to the Council- chamber. By a simultaneous movement, Secretary Randolph, Justices Bullivant and Foxcroft, Sheriff Sherlock, and many more of the Governor s party, were arrested and thrown into gaol. The delibera tions of the Magistrates in the town-hall, at the head of King Street, lasted some three hours ; and about noon the revolutionary leaders appeared in the eastern gallery of the building, and read to the assembled people a political Declaration, setting forth the oppressions to which the colony had been subjected, and alluding to "the noble undertaking of the Prince of Orange " to rescue the three king doms from Popery and slavery, and to bring to condign punishment those men by whom English liberties had been destroyed. It was carefully pointed out that all of Governor Andros s Council were not concerned in the ill actions of their chief; that many were true lovers of their country, but were seldom admitted to, and less often consulted at, the debates. The arrest of the evil-doers, however, had, in the view of the Magistrates, become a duty both to God and to their country ; and they would be detained until orders had been received from England as to their ultimate fate. It is thought that the author of this document was Cotton Mather. Whether it was composed on the spur of the moment, or had in the main been written some time before, is a point which cannot now be settled ; though its length, consisting of twelve rather elaborate articles, is against the first sup position. There is reason to suppose that an insur rectionary movement had been in contemplation for 1(389.] THE REVOLUTION IN BOSTON. ;139 several months, before any account of the Dutch landing at Torbay could possibly have been received in America. In that case, the Declaration may have been deliberately prepared, to be xised when the right opportunity should occur ; and the allusion to William of Orange may have been added on the memorable 18th of April. Two days before this rising, Andros, having reason to fear that something was contemplated, gave orders that the authorities should be vigilant, and that extra rations should be served out to the troops, who were to be kept in readiness. He could scarcely, however, have anticipated that the revolu tion would be so rapid and complete. The Magis trates at the town-hall felt themselves in a position of command, and accordingly sent to Sir Edmund Andros a summons to surrender, after refusing an invitation from the Governor to hold a conference with him in his stronghold. They professed to have been surprised at the people s sudden resort to arms, and alleged that they were wholly ignorant of any such intention. Similar disclaimers have been made by the leaders of other revolutions ; but the statement is always doubtful, , or is capable of explanation only in some Jesuitical sense.* Andros and his officers were promised security from violence, if they made no opposition ; other wise, the people would probably attempt the taking of the fortification by storm. The Governor not unreasonably refused to obey this summons, but sent to the Kose frigate for firearms, hand-grenades, and matches. The boat that was bringing them was seized by the popular party, and, long before the day was over, the military strength on the side of the revolution was so great that all opposition was rendered vain. The signal at the beacon had roused the surrounding country, and citizen soldiers came pouring into Boston. There were twenty companies under arms in the town by two o clock in the afternoon, and many more were seen on the CharlestoAvii side of the bay, waiting for an oppor tunity to cross over the ferry. Captain Nelson, who was in command of the party sent with the summons to surrender, resolved to attack the fort as soon as the Governor s determination to resist was made known. He planted his men on two sides of the work, and, seizing sonic heavy guns, brought them to bear against the walls. Finding that he could not rely on his soldiers, Andros, after parleying with the new authorities, consented to accompany a few of his followers to the town-hall, for the purposw of consulting with the Magistrates * The course of tliis Boston revolution is very like that of 1 aris, oil the 4th of September, 1870. on the new posture of affairs. He was there seized, and sent under guard to a private house. Some of the others were confined in the common gaol, and the fort shortly afterwards surrendered. By night fall, the government of Boston had changed hands. The castle was given up on the following day. It has been said that Andros was induced to order its surrender by a threat that if he did not he would be exposed to the rage of the people ; but a narra tive written in his interest, and presented in the following July to the Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations, gives a very different version of the facts. From this it would appear that the insurgents took Randolph down to the castle, and, putting a pistol to his breast, forced him to deliver a false message from the Governor, ordering the surrender ; that the soldiers, suspecting the message to be fraudulent, refused ; that the insurgents then threatened to expose Andros to the first shot which came from the castle, and put all his adherents to the sword, if he did not order the work to be delivered up ; that he still refused ; but that some gentlemen, seeing the futility of resistance, per suaded the commander of the castle to yield. The same writer (who calls himself a servant of Sir Edmund) relates that possession of the fort had been previously obtained by a false order from the Governor, delivered by Randolph under terror of immediate death.* According to some accounts, Captain George, of the frigate Rose, consented that his vessel should be dismantled ; but in a communi cation to Pepys, as Secretary of the Admiralty, that officer denies that he ever authorised any such act, and says that the first lieutenant, while he himself was a prisoner on shore, was persuaded to declare for the Prince of Orange. The revolution was now assuming proportions and developing tendencies which alarmed even those who were at its head. The country people who had come armed into Boston were in so fierce a mood of excitement that it was not known where the movement would stop. The windows of an Episcopalian church were broken, and the Avails defiled with filth ; threats of personal violence were uttered, and it was found necessary to guard the prisoners, lest they should be torn in pieces. Andros made, an attempt to escape from the fort (where he Avas now confined) disguised as a woman, but was recognised, and taken back to durance. Dudley Avas captured in the Narragansett country. The insurrection was com pletely successful, and the onlv difficulty was to * Narrative in the State Paper Office, London. 010 OASSELIyS HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1689. prevent its passing into murderous excesses and blind revenge.* A Provisional Government for Massachusetts was formed on the 20th of April, under the title of the Council for the Safety of the People and Con servation of the Peace. Bradstreet, now eighty- seven years of age, one of the original emigrants, and a former Governor, in favour rather of the Royal prerogative than of colonial privileges, was elected President. The next step was to summon a convention, to consist of two delegates from each town iu the jurisdiction, excepting Boston, which was to send four. The first sitting of this assembly took place on the 9th of May, and, after some discussion, it was resolved that, of right, the old charter was still in force. This, as Neal justly observes, was a very questionable conclusion to arrive at ; for the charter had been taken from the colonists by due course of law (not by an arbitrary act, as in the case of Ehotle Island and Connecticut), and such a decision could only be reversed by the English Parliament, The Massachusetts men, however, were in no mood to consider niceties. They issued a declaration, the effect of which was to restore the old state of things ; but the Magis trates elected shortly before the government of Dudley declined to exercise the power entrusted to them in combination with the delegates recently chosen. The convention was therefore dissolved, and another elected, that more precise instructions from the people might be received. The result was that the resumption of the charter was once more affirmed, against the wishes of the governing Council. A General Court was formed after the old model, and the venerable Bradstreet was made Governor. Nothing now seemed wanting to the popular satisfaction but favourable news from England ; and that came in a day or two. On the 26th of May, 1689, a ship arrived from the old country, Avith an order to the Massachusetts authorities to proclaim King William and Queen Mary. This was done on the 29th ; and grave, Puritanical Boston went wild with joy. The town was bright and loud with military pageant ; throngs tilled the streets ; wine was served out to the humbler folk ; the great people dined together at the town-hall ; and all thanked God that a Protestant sovereign once more ruled in England, and that the nightmare of Papacy had fled. CHAPTER XL. Virginia and Maryland at the Restoration Period Aristocratic Character of the ruling Class in Virginia Provincial Government, Institutions, Manners, and Social Life -Conflicting Powers of the Governor and the Assembly Dissatisfaction with Sir William Berkeley The Court Intrigues at Whitehall Lords Colepeper and Arlington - An Indian Incursion The Colonial Militia Nathaniel Bacon, the popular Commander -His Quarrel with Berkeley Revolt in his Favour The Dictator and the Democratic Convention Outbreak of Civil War -Burning of James Town Death of Bacon - Suppression of the Revolt -Berkeley s Severities -Change of Government Lord Colepeper s Rapacity The Proprietary Grant revoked Lord Howard of ErHngham State of Maryland under Lord Baltimore- -Gradual Deterioration of its Government Unpopularity of Roman Catholic Patrons of Toleration- -Enmity of the Protestant Clergy in England - Agitation in the Colony Charles, third Lord Baltimore, revisits America His Title attacked at Westminster Hb Rule opposed by the Colonists The English Revolution of 1G88 The Revolution in Maryland. THE condition of Virginia and Maryland, the tobacco-planters colonies 011 the shores of Chesa peake Bay, has been viewed, in Chapters VIII. and IX. of this History, as they existed at the period of the Stuart Restoration in 1660. Their social progress during the English Commonwealth had been favoured by the enjoyment of practical self-government in Virginia by virtue of a dcmo- * Several accounts of this movement, written at the time, are extant. Some are on the side of the revolution ; others on that of Andros and Randolph. One is by Andros himself. In many respects their statements are so contradictory that it is difficult, if not impossible, to reconcile them. But the above description is probably faithful to the main course of events. cratic constitution, and in Maryland by the com parative degree of religious toleration, which the pliant policy of the Catholic Lord Baltimore con sented to allow, while neighbouring communities still wanted an equal measure of freedom. It w;is probably from the depression and weakness, at that time, of the aristocratic and High Church party in the old country, and from the consequent intimidation of its offspring or political allies in America, that this easy concession of wholesome liberties proceeded so long as the monarchy was held in abeyance. Yet the character of Virginian society, from its earliest foundation, was such as 1661.] VIRGINIA AT THE RESTORATION. 341 contained within its own bosom the most perilous elements of discord, which might remain latent or passive when Cromwell ruled England at home, but would break out the more furiously at a signal from the new Court of Whitehall. JWost of the noblemen and gentlemen introduced to the colony by grants of land from Charles I., after the suppression of the London Company in 1624, had brought with them, and transmitted to their sons, an exaggerated opinion of their class autho rity, and a detestation of popular ideas. These landowning planters on the banks of the James River and the Potomac exercised a patriarchal sway, like that of their ancestors for ages in the 1 Mick ward agricultural shires of England, over a peasantry whom they kept in dependence. In many instances, they had, upon their arrival in the colony, imported a considerable following of labourers con nected with their paternal estates, or those of their respective families, availing themselves of the offei-ed grant of fifty acres to the patron, or employer of eudi immigrant working man. A powerful squire archy was thus formed in Virginia, and was con tinually increased by the numbers of defeated and disgusted Royalists who left this kingdom after the Civil War. The whole tract of country, for example, called the Northern Neck, between the Rappahan- nock and the Potomac, was occupied by a company of those Cavalier partisans who were fain to yield submission, and to sue for leave to emigrate, upon the execution of King Charles. There was not in this Southern province, as in New England, an active and intelligent middle class engaged in trading or seafaring business. Commerce was in the hands of some factors resid ing there on behalf of merchants in Europe. James Town, the seat of government, was a place of twenty houses, including the State-house and the church ; and throughout all Virginia, at that time, not another village or hamlet could be found. Each planter in the forest, like the Australian squatter of our days, lived far apart from others of his class, in a big wooden house rudely built on the bank of some river, using his boat, or riding on horseback, perhaps once a month, to visit his neighbour on the adjoining estate. There were neither roads nor bridges, but mere bridle-paths and fords, by which the colonial gentry travelled to their meeting at the county court, a long day s journey, or more rarely to James Town. The train of their English house hold and farm servants consisted of poor men and women, bound to the master by strict indentures for a term of years. Some of these were paupers, who had sold their personal freedom, to that extent, for the rust of their emigration and a promise of maintenance. Some were convicts or vagrants, transported from England and assigned to private service, as in the penal settlements of Australia within the memory of the present generation. Hence the contempt for manual industry which was long entertained, and which was fostered by the institution of negro slavery, in the Southern States of the American Union. It was expressed, until very recently, by the appellation of " mean whites" commonly bestowed on the labouring class of English race, or rather those who should have laboured, but who were lazy and beggarly, while the bondsmen of African race performed all the hard work in those States. Negro slavery, indeed, was early developed in the plantations of Virginia, as it suited the convenience of the ruling class, it was guarded by laws of extreme rigour ; the eman cipation of slaves was discouraged by a fiscal impost, while the killing of them, by excessive punishment or otherwise, was not accounted felony in their master, since no such malice prepense could be imputed as would induce him to destroy his own property. Virginia had no common schools for its people, no printing-press, and a very imperfect establishment for religious worship, so late as 1671, with a population of 40,000 whites, and probably as many negroes and Indians. In that year, however, the Governor, Sir William Berkeley, thanked God that they had " no free schools nor printing; and I hope," added he, " we shall not have any, these hundred years ; for learning has brought disobe dience, and heresy, and sects into the world, and printing has divulged them, with libels against the best government. God keep ITS from both ! " As for the church, there were barely ministers for a fifth of the parishes, and they were difficult of access ; yet, after the Restoration, all Nonconformist worship, teaching, or preaching, was forbidden, and everybody was compelled to pay church-rates. Notwithstanding the democratic element which had lately prevailed, some of the institutions of Virginia were adverse to the interests of the people. The vestrymen for each parish, who formed a close corporation, filling up any vacancy by their own appointment, had the administration of local affairs, with the justices of the peace, at their county sessions, levying and expending the county rate. The same class held all commissions in the militia. Landowners only, from and after the reactionary movement of 1660, sat in the Legislative Assembly at James Town, and were nominated to the Pro vincial Council of Government, to the exclusion of those popular representatives who had been admitted during the Commonwealth. This Assembly was summoned, in the name of the King, bv r Sir 342 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1661. William Berkeley, acting under a Royal Com mission, and 110 longer with reference to his election as Governor by the previous Assembly which had just been dissolved. The claim of Virginia to self- government was thereby dropped, as it were by a tacit compact of the provincial aristocracy with the agents of the Crown. Sir William Berkeley to return home as agent foi the colony at the Court of Charles II., for the purpose of explaining those grievances, and soli citing redress. He made use of the opportunity, as we have seen in another Chapter, to request and obtain vast portions of territory, both to the north and to the south, in New Jersey and in Carolina, /-/ If-li} fi A ROAD IN MARYLAND. It seemed, in the first three or four years of the Stuart Restoration, that no great opposition would be made to this retrograde policy. The colonists were more bent on resistance to the Navigation Act, and to the imposition by the home Govern ment of fiscal burthens on their exports and imports of merchandise. The Assembly, in its session of March, 1G61, after deposing a magistrate "for factious and schismatical demeanour," appointed for himself and partners. The New Jersey grant, indeed, came three years later, after the conquest of the Dutch provinces by the Duke of York. Among his associates in these great land -jobbing transactions at Court, so far as concerned the grant of Carolina, were the Chancellor (Lord Clarendon), General Monk, now Duke of Albemarle, Sir Ashley Cooper, afterwards Lord Chancellor and Earl of Shaftesbury, Lord John Berkeley, a brother of Sir William, and Sir George Carteret, whose share of New Jersey has been mentioned. This wholesale exhibition of personal covetousness, while the Governor neglected or failed to obtain any security for the public rights of Virginia, soon turned the feelings of the planters against him. They con trived, indeed, to evade the intolerable operation of the English Navigation Act, by putting their tobacco on board vessels which merely touched at New England ports, and then unloaded at New Amsterdam for the Dutch purchasers. Since tobacco had become, in England as well as in ATTACK. OX THE CAl TA-lN Ol THE "RUSK." 344 CASSELL S HISTORY 0V THE UNITED STATES. [1673. Holland, almost a necessary of life to many consumers, it was proposed in the colonies to punish and correct the unfair commercial policy of England by stopping the culture of that favourite herb for a whole year. This menace was never carried into effect, and colonial trading interests began, to decline ; while the import and export duty of five percent, on the value of all merchandise passing in or out of the province was a burthen severely felt. But the legislators at James Town, oppressed as they were by harsh measures at Westminster, had nevertheless not the wisdom to foster a unity of social welfare by dealing justly with every class of their own people. In 1663, after Berkeley s return to the colony, they enacted yet more strin- gent laws against the Baptists, Quakers, and other religious separatists, whom the statutes describe as tilled with the new-fangled conceits of their own heretical inventions." The meetings of these Non conformists were now punished with heavy tines, and they were not eA*en allowed to give religious instruc tion in private. Absence from the established church worship on Sundays, during one month, was an offence nominally incurring the penalty of .20. Every shipowner who brought to Virginia any Bap tist, Independent, or Quaker passengers was liable to a pecuniary mulct, while they were to be deported in perpetual banishment. The bond-servants, too, of English race, toiling side by side with the negro slaves, were kept by aristocratic legislation in a painfully depressed condition. Some of them, who had been Roundhead soldiers of Cromwell, exiled and doomed to servitude for their political instibor- di nation after the fall of the Commonwealth rule in England, could ill brook the galling yoke of their new colonial masters. They plotted, and attempted in 1663, an insurrection which was easily suppressed, but which gave example to other classes of discon tented colonists rising a few years later in opposition to persistent misrule. It is manifest from the above instances, however, that the bad government of Virginia at the Re- storation was due not wholly to the corrupt and profligate Court of Whitehall, nor yet wholly to the self-seeking conduct of Governor Bei-keley, who has, indeed, been falsely praised by some writers because he is not to be blamed for every wrongful act. He took excellent care, with the other Royal officers, to provide for his own emolument ; and the Virginia Legislature in 1662 endowed him with a perpetual revenue of 1,000 a year, exceeding the whole yearly expenditure of Connecticut. Each of the Councillors got .350 a year. Both in their appointment and tenure of office, and in the enjoyment of their salaries, the Governor and Coxmcil were beyond the control of the representa tive Assembly, and independent of popular con fidence or approval. They exercised, through justices and sheriffs of their own choice in each county, a predominant authority over the local administration. But at the same time, on the part of the landowners and planters who formed the Assembly, we find an equal disposition to consult their particular class interests,, rather than the public good. They soon repealed the rule of biennial election ; and, having expelled the very few old partisans of the Commonwealth who had been re-elected in 1661, this Assembly proceeded to sit in permanence, as the Restoration Parliament in England was then doing, and continued to do for eighteen years. One personal motive for this reso lution was probably supplied by the extravagantly high allowance paid to members of the Assembly, its rate being the value of 250 Ibs. of tobacco daily, which has been reckoned as equivalent to nine dollars a day. The elective suffrage was often nullified by the connivance of the sheriffs in false- returns of elections. When tumults and disturbances had been provoked by such irregularities, it was declared that the common voters were unfit to possess the franchise. In 1670, it was conse quently enacted that " none but freeholders and housekeepers shall have a voice in the election of any burgesses." The reaction now appeared to be complete. A fresh incident, however, which showed again to the indignant colonists what use the King and his courtiers still meant to make of their country, took place in 1673. The district between the Rappahannock and the Potomac, oddly styled the Northern Neck, had been sold by its associated proprietors, who were loyal gentlemen impoverished by the English Civil War, and who lacked capital for its profitable cultivation. Its purchaser in 1669 was Lord Colepeper, a very grasping and in triguing person, who held the office of a Lord Commissioner for Trade and Plantations at White hall. This Lord Colepeper, after four years pos session of his Virginian domain, bethought himself of a scheme for converting the entire Crown Dominion of that province into a seignorial pro perty, like that of New Jersey or that of Carolina, to the profit of himself and of a most powerful friend at Court. His friend at Court was the Secretary of State, the too famous Henry Bennet, Earl of Arlington, the second name in the Cabal Ministry, the prime favourite and flatterer of King Charles, to whose illegitimate son, by Lady Castle- niaine, Lord Arlington had given his daughter in 1074.] PISTURBANCES IN VIRGINIA. marriage. Nothing that belonged to his own Crown, estate, and dignity, or that belonged to the realm and nation, would Charles ever deny to hir; male or female parasites, if the giving cost him 110 j>ersonal trouble. Arlington had only to ask, for himself and Colepeper jointly, a grant of " all the dominion of land and water called Virginia," to be enjoyed by their lordships during a term of thirty- one years. This boon was granted by the easy and e ireless monarch without any deliberation. But it astounded the Virginia Provincial Assembly, when they heard of the concession reducing their entire country to a feudal dependence 011 two courtiers in London. They drew up, in 1674, a protest or memorial, which they sent to England by three envoys, Francis Morisoii, Thomas Ludwell, and Robert Smith. In this memorial they said, " We are unwilling, and conceive we ought not, to submit to those to whom his Majesty hath, upon misin formation, granted the dominion over us. We humbly request not to be subjected to our fellow- subjects, but for the future to be secured from the fears of being enslaved." They solicited, to this end, the grant of a charter of incorporation, which should bestow on the colonial community privileges and rights that might be defended in the English Courts of law against further encroachment. In token of deserving this recognition, it was stated that the people of Virginia, at that time, were ac customed " most contentedly to pay to his Majesty more than they had themselves for their labour." They wished to be yet more advantageous to the King and the nation; but it was their birthright iis Englishmen to be free, and they demanded lo In- allowed self-government, and to be exempt from arbitrary taxation. They expressed, however, a willingness to purchase of Colepeper and Arling- lon. if the Crown would bestow a charter of corpo rate rights on Virginia, the renunciation of those proprietary claims which his Majesty had been so ill-advised as to give. It would appear that this memorial from the protesting colony was supported by communications to the Crown from Sir William Berkeley, as the Assembly voted him an increase of salary, and proposed that he should be appointed Governor during his life. His tenure of office, nevertheless, remained but for ten years. The envoys of Virginia were in England, still busied with their mission, and finding powerful hecret opposition, as might be expected, to the prayer for a corporate charter, when new dangers and causes of excitement suddenly arose. The Indian tribes in Maryland had been at war with each other ; those of the. Seneva tribe, one of the Five Nations, had driven the Susquehannahs from the head of the Chesapeake down its western shore to the Potomac, where they pressed on the frontier tribe of the Piscataways, and some were killed in Virginian territory. It was therefore needful to place a Virginian militia force on the banks of that frontier river. The commander, it is in teresting to note, was an English land-surveyor or farmer, named John Washington, who had emigrated to America some years before : he was the great grandfather of George Washington, a hundred years later the hero of the American Revolution. But it is with the more regret that one has to confess an act of inexcusable cruelty perpetrated by this detachment of colonial militia, in putting to death six Indians who had crossed the river to offer terms of peace. The act was said to have been done in retaliation for the murder bv* Indians of several English settlers ; but it was hmdly disapproved by Governor Sir William Berkeley. On the other hand, as too often happens in these rude conflicts between colonists and natives of a, different race, the general opinion of Virginia rather approved of such an example. Sir William Berkeley was accused of undue clemency, and eA r en of favouring the savages for the sake of his monopoly in the beaver-trade. The militia having been recalled, there was a terrible incursion of exasperated Indians along the frontier. Many settlers farms and houses were destroyed, and rifty or sixty of the English were slain. Other Indian tribes, hitherto subject to Virginia, were soon incited by the Susquehannahs to join in the attack on the colony. It was an emergency of real peril and extreme distress Avhicli in 1676 thrust forward a popular dictator and champion of the Virginian community upon this critical occasion. Nathaniel Bacon, a lawyer and planter who had come out from the old country in his youth, filled with enthusiasm for the principles of the Common wealth, had already gained social influence and distinction in the land of his adoption. He was prompt in speech and in action, somewhat choleric and rash in the suddenness of his purposes, and had the spirit, if not the skill, of a political and military leader. A member of the governing Council, and commander of a militia regiment, he was yet dis trusted for his democratic inclinations by Sir William Berkeley. The dislike was mutual, and Bacon spared not to denounce the Governor s mis chievous apathy or negligence when the northern districts were ravaged by a horde of savage in vaders. He vowed that, if another English settler were murdered, he would summon the forces of the province, by authority of their natural right 346 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1674. of self-defence, to act independently of the Governor s Royal commission. Soon after this declaration he received news that his own planta tion up the James river, not far from the site of Richmond, the present capital of the Stat.-:. had been attacked by the Indians, and some ot his own servants killed. Bacon quickly began the task he had promised, collecting five or six hundred of the backwoodsmen, armed with their firelocks, and practised as keen marksmen in their sylvan sports. He met the Indians, and defeated them in more than one sanguinary skirmish, disregarding the Governor s prohibition of these unauthorised hostilities. Sir William thereupon procluii i 1 -id Bacon and his followers a band of outlawed rebels, and presently set forth to pursue them with a regular militia force. But he was compelled, by an insurrection of the lower counties in Bacon s favour, to return almost immediately to James Town. The insurgents clamoured for the dissolution of the Provincial Assembly, which had been sitting, as was remarked, since 1661, continually devising more vexatious infringements of popular freedom. Berkeley \vas in no position, just then, to resist this constitutional demand, and writs for a new general election were presently issued. The lately dis franchised freemen now insisted on again exercising their former suffrage : Bacon, returning triumphant from his campaign against the Indians, was chosen for Henrico county, with a majority in the Assembly of his political party. The ensuing session at James Town, like the first of the English Long Parliament, commenced with a summons of manifold abuses and usurpations to the reckoning so long due and so long de ferred. Bacon indeed first made a formal acknow ledgment of his error in taking up arms without a regular commission ; he then received the appoint ment of Commander-in-chief, and was hailed by the acclamations of the people. The Governor, how ever, refused to sign this new commission for Bacon, who thei-eupon withdrew to muster his armed volunteers, while his friends in the Assembly pur sued their debates and resolutions. They demanded of the Governor and Coxmcil a strict account of the public expenditure ; they voted the abolition of some oppressive taxes, and of the monopoly in the Indian trade of beaver-skins ; they reduced the scale of official fees, deprived the councillors of their invidious exemption from burthensome levies, deposed two magistrates proved guilty of corrupt practices, transferred the management of county rates from the nominee justices to elective boards, made the parish vestries likewise elective for a term of three years, and lastly forbade the sale of wine and spirits at inns or taverns, allowing no strong drink but ale and cider. The franchise was restored to every freeman in the country, and the sheriffs were made liable to severe penalties for any tam pering with fair elections. Such were the acts of the Virginia House of Assembly, ratified at James Town, by a singular coincidence, on the 4th of July, 1676, exactly one hundred years before the memor able Declaration of American Independence at Philadelphia, by the first Congress of the United States. The Indian war, checked but for a moment, was still raging up the country, and Bacon sought the ratification of his military command over the eight thousand colonial militia. As this commission was yet refused him by Governor Berkeley, he again presented himself at James Town, with his troop of fighting men, insisting, as they said, for leave to save their lives from the Indians. Sir William, in passion of pride or anger, bared his own breast to Bacon s musketeers, and bade them shoot him if they would ; but their leader answered that they would on no account hurt a hair of the old Governor s head, or harm any other Englishman. This did not appease the wrath of Berkeley, who presently got across the Chesapeake, away from James Town, and collected in the district of Acco- mack a numerous band of adherents. He seduced many bond- servants of planters in Bacon s party to quit their masters and repair to the Governor s camp, promising them both emancipation and the chance of plunder. The measures of severity which he threatened to enforce against Bacon were strongly disapproved by a popular convention, to which the Governor himself had appealed, in the loyal county of Gloucester ; but Berkeley did not suffer this to alter his purpose. Mean while, as the partisans of the opposing leader were not less active, preparations began for a civil war. At a place then called Middle Plantations, Avhere is now the town of Williamsburg, the convention of Bacon s party held its deliberations, in the open air, from noon to midnight of a long summer day. With Bacon stood Richard Lawrence, an Oxford scholar and thriving colonist of Virginia ; William Drummond, the devout Scottish Presbyterian, whom Sir William Berkeley had once made his deputy in North Carolina ; Thomas Hansford, a gallant young Cavalier, but ardent for the liberties of Virginia, where he was born ; Thomas Wilford, the son of a Royalist Knight who had fallen in battle for King Charles ; John Washington, of Westmoreland county, the progenitor of a far nobler champion of freedom ; and other men deter mined to vindicate the risjht of self-government for BACON S INSURRECTION. the Old Dominion. They made oath in common to protect .Bacon from arrest, to join liis forces in the .Indian Campaign, to prevent a civil war if they could, bnt in any case to resist Berkeley s arbitrary power, even though it were supported by troops and ships from England, till an appeal against his pro ceedings should have reached the King. It was also recommended by Drummond that they should formally depose Sir William, and nominate Sir Henry Chicheley as Governor in his stead. The term of ten years, during which Sir William s last appointment held good, had in fact nearly ex pired. The convention decided, however, to regard .Berkeley s flight from James Town as a virtual abdication of his rule. Bacon, with four other members of the Provincial Council, thereupon took it upon themselves to issue writs for the election of a constituent Assembly, to provide for a new govern ment. Some apprehensions were felt of the King yet sending from England a fleet and army, either to aid Governor Berkeley, or else to put in exeution the Colepeper and Arlington grant, in spite of the colonists, whose defeat would then be their utter ruin. Their wives, if not the men, were fain to keep up their courage with boasting;* and some predicted a speedy relief, by means of a political revolution, from the Navigation Acts and other English laws of unjust effect. " Now we can build ships," said they, " and trade, like New England, to any part of the world." The forces meanwhile gathered by Sir William Berkeley, on the opposite side of the Bay, were augmented by those of five English ships and ten sloops arriving in the harbours there. With his mixed army of Royalist partisans, escaped bond servants, hireling adventurers, sailors, and Indians, lie embarked and sailed over to James Town. Bacon, with the colonial volunteers or militia, had then just returned from a victorious expedition against their savage enemy. He led his troops, or those remaining after a partial disbandment, to besiege the ex-Governor in the provincial capital. This took place in September, 1670. Sir William had no military talent, and was unable to command discipline or obedience in his motley host. Some of them, having failed disgracefully in an attempted sally, deserted in search of easy plunder. Only the * Bancroft here cites, from Berkeley s narrative, an anecdote of Mrs. Surah Drummond. She lifted from the ground a small stick and broke it in two, comparing it to the hostile factions of the Duke of York and the Duke of Monmouth, then sup posed to he near breaking England asunder. " I fear the power of England, said this woman, "no more than a broken straw. The child unborn here shall have cause to rejoice for the good that shall come by the rising of this country. (History of the United States, Vol. I., chap. 14.) .seamen showed a little valour ; the garrison proved wholly inefficient, and Sir William was compelled to take to his ships, leaving James Town to the besiegers. A stern and hard duty, as he probably deemed it, was now laid upon Bacon, who found himself unable to occupy James Town, but who was unwilling to let it remain a shelter for his antagonist in the civil war. We have seen that it was the only town existing at that time in Virginia ; and it was associated with memories of the first English settlers, of Gosnold and John Smith, as well as of the friendly natives, Powhatan and the fair Pocahontas. But antici pating a conflict of some length with such military forces as might be given to aid Berkeley, it seemed to Bacon most expedient that this little town, really a village or hamlet, should be destroyed. Lawrence and Drummond, owners of the two best houses, set them on tire by way of example ; the church and the State-house were next committed to the flames, and soon only some heaps of ruins Avere left at James Town. Having executed this painful and ungrateful task, Bacon marched towards the Rappahannock, to encounter a renewed advance of Berkeley s forces, under a leader named Brent, from the head of the Bay. They did not await his meeting them, however, with a hostile intent, but, deserting Berkeley s cause, joined the colonial revolt, with all the inhabitants of Gloucester county. The triumph of Bacon now appeared to be almost certain, when he was stricken by a. fever, ascribed to the dam]) ground of his autumnal encampment, though some rumours were current of his being poisoned. He died at the beginning of October, and no man arose equal to the com mand left vacant at this crisis of the perilous struggle. The colonial forces, after a few days of vague expectancy, broke into loose detachments, and were scattered about the country. Meantime, those of Sir William Berkeley obtained sundry reinforcements, and were now placed under the command of Robert Berkeley, a more able and energetic leader. With the aid of the naval squadron entering York River, Robert Berkeley succeeded before long in subduing the insurrection, and cutting off its divided parties in detail. After a conflict of seven months, the final victory remained with Sir William Berkeley ; the assertors of colonial freedom were crushed once more. This result was followed by some acts of ven geance or excessive chastisement, which disgraced the previous reputation of the Governor for mild ness, if not for integrity and wisdom. Hansford, Wilford, and Edmund Cheeseman, among the ear liest victims, were not only hanged with a, short CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1084. shrift, but were needlessly insulted tit their trial, which was conducted by court-martial. Drum- inond, when arrested and brought into Sir William s presence, in 1677, Avas received by him with more emphatic derision. " You are very Avelcome," said the Governor, bowing to his prisoner ; " I am more glad to see you than any man in Virginia; you ohall be hanged in half an hour."* But three hours were allowed before he died on the gibbet ; his wife and children, deprived of till their property, were reduced to beg their bread. Twenty-two of the insurgents were hanged, while three died in prison ; live, whose lives would not have been spared, escaped by flight. When these severities were known in England, it is said they were highly disapproved by King Charles. That old fool Berkeley," his Majesty complained, " has taken away more lives in that naked country than I have done here for the murder of my father." The representations of Arlington and Colepeper, we may suppose, would set the conduct of Berkeley in no favourable light before the King. A Royal proclamation was there fore sent out, by which the colonists were assured that Charles did not like them to be treated with so much harshness. Commissioners of inquiry at the same time arrived, to learn the causes of their discontent ; but with them came some regiments of English soldiery, to prevent another rebellion. The Assembly of the province, readily adapting its legis lation to the changed state of affairs, had soon repealed all the liberal acts it passed in the hour of Bacon s ascendency. None of the old grievances were ultimately redressed; but losses and bur thens, entailed by the Indian war and the civil com motions, weighed upon Virginia worse than before. There was no longer any question of granting a charter and constitutional franchises to the unhappy province. Sir William Berkeley returned to Eng land, and his departure was greeted as a joyful event by the firing of guns and kindling of bonfires, despite the new laws which ordained a fine or a whipping for every person who spoke ill of the Governor or his friends. He was coldly welcomed in London ; and when the commissioners of inquiry sent home a report which censured his proceedings, he died of shame and vexation, having had no oppor tunity of defending himself before the King. The governorship Avas now bestoAved on Lord Colepeper. Avho seems to have been in no hurry to undertake its labours. He lingered three years at home, Avhile Sir Henry Chicheley ruled as his lieutenant in Vir ginia; but in 1680, compelled by an express order from his Majesty, the indolent peer crossed the * Bancroft s History of the United States, Vol I., chap. 14, quoting the local and contemporary writers. ocean to look upon his American province. He remained only during the summer of that year, which he employed in various devices for extolling the largest possible revenue, not merely from his own purchased estates beyond the Rappahaimock, and from his share Avith Arlington of the general lordship under the grant of 1673, but also from legislative and administrative acts of government. The Assembly Avas induced, as a condition of the Royal pardon, to settle upon the Crown in perpetuity tin export duty of tAvo shillings on each hogshead of tobacco, and to double the Governor s salary, raising it to .2,000, besides an allowance for house-rent- The prerogative of granting naturalisation or citizen ship to alien settlers in Virginia was .secured to the Governor, Avith the receipt of fees in cases of that kind. The coinage Avas also tampered Avith, so as to enable him to gain some profit at the cost of the soldiers Avhose Avages he had to pay. Having achieved these feats of statesmanship, Lord Cole peper Avent home to England in the month of August ; but an outbreak of dissatisfaction in the colony followed his hasty visitation. Riots took place next year in several districts, and petitions for relief Avere addressed to the King. In 1682, liis appointment being for life, the noble absentee Governor Avas again ordered to repair to Virginia, where the symptoms of a fresh rebellion reined o be alarming. He arm-ed there, and had sufficient force to put down all opposition, after which he made a few examples on the gallows, and summoned the Assembly to give up the small remnant of poli tical rights. Appeals from the Governor and Council, in judicial procedure, had lain hitherto either to the Assembly of the province, or to the King in London. They were IIOAV abolished, so far as concerned the Assembly, and Avere preserved, with regard to the Crown, only for cases involving a certain amount of property. It appears, however, that Lord Colepeper, in his greediness for money and pOAver, at length Avent beyond eA-en the tolera tion of Charles II. for his courtiers public and private vices. HaA ing again returned to England, after a visit as brief as the first to this lucra tive post of misrule, he found the King no longer inclined to leaA^e Virginia, noAv almost ruined, a mere prey to individual rapacity and licence. At the earnest prayer of the colonists, but agreeably to the policy of his Majesty s advisers in 1G84, the grant of 1673 to Arlington and Colepeper Avas re voked. Virginia thus became once more a Crown province; and, what Avas more, the office of Governor was taken from Colepeper, by Avhom it had been so grossly abused. His appointed successor namely, Lord Howard of 1685.] STATE OF VIRGINIA. 349 Kffingham retained this office during the reign of James 11., and three or four years after the Revolution of 1 688. But the colonists had still to rndure a grievous system of oppression and extortion, which would have broken the spirit of any other people than Englishmen. It is not unlikely that the popular party in Virginia was in the colony as convict slaves. From the time of their importation, whatever the cause, an influence seemed to be working in the Virginian community which tended towards the renewal of that pro test against despotism personified in Nathaniel Bacon. The provincial Legislature even ventured to dispute the King s power to negative a law ON THE SATANNAH RIVER. reinforced by the transportation thither, under penal servitude for a prescribed term, of several hundred partisans of Monmouth s rebellion in 1685, when Judge Jeffreys made his famous circuit of cruelty through the West of England. These were mostly persons of intelligence, of character, and of previous social position, who could scarcely be treated 30 which they had passed. Lord Howard of Effingham, intent like the preceding Governor upon getting money from the administration of his office, was not always capable of silencing malcontent voices though he allowed no printing-press at James Town, and would sometimes put a citizen in gaol for audacious use of the tongue. His lordship was summoned to England after the Revolution of 1688, to account for his manner of government. But he retained office, nominally at least, until Virginia and the other Middle Provinces of North America were placed for a time under one general adminis tration. It is a relief to turn from this dismal review of affairs in Virginia during the Restoration period, and contemplate the comparatively tranquil progress of Maryland under the management of 350 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1681. Cecil Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore, and of Jus son Charles, who took its charge from Philip Calvert in 1662, till the death of his father in 167o. The toleration, rare in that age, of different forms of religious doctrine and worship, though not nearly so complete as some Avriters have supposed, was a boon to many fugitives from ecclesiastical persecution. It is with regret one has to observe that the zealous and orthodox Protestants of the time were most reluctant to admit the concession by any Roman Catholic Government of such . general liberty of conscience. Clergymen of the Church of England in the reign of Charles II. denounced Maryland as " a pesthouse of iniquity," because Papists were not disfranchised, in that province, under a territorial lord and Governor of their own religious persuasion. The Quakers like wise, who had, even in Maryland, suffered a season of trouble during the austere Puritan rule in the mother country, were unmolested at the date of George Fox s visit to America. His journal of 1673 describes their public meetings as held in full safety and convenience, attended sometimes by members of the governing Council and the Assembly, by magistrates, and once by Charles Calvert himself. They were, indeed, liable upon certain occasions to personal loss and hardship, owing to scruples which debarred them from taking an oath in legal and civil procedure, and from military service. But this condition, though incon sistent with perfect freedom, is not exactly that of persecution. The principles of the Society of Friends have never stood in the way of their obtaining support from any quarter which was likely, from whatever cause, to yield them the assistance they needed. That stiffness of dogma which characterised the Puritans, and forbade the slightest co-operation with men of antagonistic faith, was to the followers of George Fox at once uncharitable and impolitic ; and this tendency to an accommodating line of conduct bore its fruit in the quiet progress of the sect. The singular alliance of interests, so far as concerned liberty of con science for the individual, which prevailed in those times between Romanists and Quakers in England, was exemplified by William Penn s attachment to the Duke of York, afterwards King James II. It was likewise exhibited in Maryland to a certain degree, which further scandalised the supporters of a Protestant hierarchy. On these grounds, they constantly sought, with very questionable justice, to raise an opposition, by whatever pretext could be invented, to the government of Lord Baltimore. It is true that the feudal jurisdiction of a seignorial proprietor was not to be reconciled with the growing demand for social freedom and equality of civil rights ; but the Calverts had prudence enough to make a reasonable use of their hereditary power. While levying tolls upon com merce and navigation, coining money at his private mint, and exercising other claims of sove reignty, Lord Baltimore agreed to a definite limi tation of his taxing prerogative. He consented also to an arrangement for the easier discharge of quit-rents due from the settlers under his rule. These concessions were received with gratitude by the inhabitants of Maryland, and were rewarded, if they had not been purchased, by establishing, as in Virginia, a customs duty of two shillings the hogshead 011 exported tobacco ; but with the stipulation that half should be applied to the expenses of government. In 1676, Avhen Charles Calvert, 011 his becoming the third Lord Baltimore, left the colony for England, attempts were made to introduce yet larger measures of reform. The influence of Bacon s Virginian party, inspired with democratic ideas, was already felt in the adjacent province. It was now said, in an expression cited by Bancroft from a contemporary letter, "The maxims of the old Lord Baltimore will not do in the present age." Protestant intolerance of the Calverts faith, and the intrigues of a clerical clique in England to procure the establishment of their privileged Church beyond the Atlantic, also lent aid to provincial disaffection. The fair aspects of the Maryland Government and society were clouded, like those of Pennsylvania, by grudges and dissensions arising from private interests or from class pretensions. Baltimore was from 1676 an absentee proprietor, and one in that position is apt to be unfairly judged by the men who dwell upon his estates. We may also conjecture that here in Maryland, as in the case of Berkeley s rule in Virginia, difficulties were aggravated by the covert practices of some Crown agents or courtiers, who designed to subvert the proprietary, and to substitute an official system for their own profit. The democratic movement in the colonies Avas apparently turned to this account by the sinister statecraft of the King s advisers at Whitehall, toAvards the end of the Stuart dynasty ; and the process was continued after the accession of William III. Hence the decline and fall of Baltimore s authority in Maryland. The Provincial Assembly, in 1678, enacted that every man should possess the electoral suffrage. This was negatived by the governing proprietor, AV!IO thought it need ful, after much angry correspondence, to revisit his colony in 1681, and to reverse that legislative act 1687.J DISTURBANCES IN MARYLAND. 351 by an arbitrary decree of hi.s own, limiting the suf frage to fifty-acre freeholders, and persons having 10 a year from other sources of income. The malcontents provoked by such an ordinance were further stirred up by the reappearance of Fendall, the old agitator of the Commonwealth period, but now a conspirator against Lord Baltimore. Se vere penaltievS, imprisonment, whipping, mutila tion, banishment, and death on the gallows, were threatened in vain by a Government which lacked the force to put down insubordinate subjects. A dispute between the Custom-house authorities of Maryland and those of Virginia, who claimed some power to control the ad ministration of the ii rst - named officers , had been attended with fighting and bloodshed. This drew upon " Maryland and her Governor the attention of King James s Ministry in London; when James, having no particular goodwill to Lord Bal timore, although a Romanist like him self, resolved to imitate what Charles had done with Vir ginia, and reduce Maryland to a pro vince of the Crown. For this purpose, in 1687, a writ of quo ivarrcmto against Lord Baltimore was issued by the Court of King s Bench. His lordship, hastening back to England, prepared as best he could to defend his privileged territorial supremacy before the Westminster legal tribunals. At James Town, in the following year, his Deputy President of the governing Council, William Joseph, con vened an extraordinary meeting of the Provincial Assembly. The people of Maryland were invited to rally as faithful and loyal subjects around their lord proprietor, as representative of the King and of God- The language of the Deputy President on this subject was sufficiently clear and precise. " Divine Providence," he remarked, " hath ordered us to meet. The power by which we are assembled here SIXPENCE AND SHILLING OK THE EARLIEST MARYLAND COINAGE. is undoubtedly derived from God to the King, and from the King to his Excellency the lord proprietary, and from his said lordship to us. The power, therefore, whereof I speak, being, as said, firstly in God, and from God, secondly in the King, and from the King, thirdly in his lordship, fourthly in us, the end and duty of, and for which this assembly is now called and met, is that from these four heads, to wit : from God, the King, our lord, and selves."* This gentleman seems to have prided himself on a severely logical frame of mind ; but however cogent an argument may be to those who admit the first prin ciple from which it starts, it is a mere rope of sand to others who deny the pos tulate. Joseph held by the ancient idea that political power is a sort of sacrament, mysteriously derived and imparted. The popular representa tives of Maryland adopted the more modern view that self-government is the inherent right of all communities, and that princes are to be obeyed only so far as their acts are legal, and of a nature to promote the general good. They flatly refused the oath of allegiance which Joseph proffered in the name of Lord Baltimore ; and when the news arrived that King James had been dethroned by a national rising against Popery and tyranny, with the assistance of free Holland, there were no bounds to the exultation of the Protestant and popular party. Rumours having been spread, whether ignorantly or artfully, that the Papists were plotting to bring the savage Indians into the colony and terrorise its people, a call to arms was sounded all over Maryland, under the direction of John Coode, who had been one of Fendall s associates in the former revolt. The friends of Lord Baltimore could offer no effectual * Bancroft s History of the United States, Vol I., chap. 14. CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1660. resistance, and soon capitulated, with a surrender of the governing powers. These were assumed by a convention of the associated colonists, and were so administered during the next three years, until Maryland, as well as Virginia, camo under a new government provided by King William ill. CHAPTER XLI. The Southern Atlantic States Region of North America Long-delayed Occupation of Carolina Isolated settlements from Virginia, Massachusetts, and Earbadoes Grant of the whole Territory by Charles II. to Eight Proprietary Lords Lord Shaftesbury and John Locke concerned in devising a Constitution Its complicated and rigidly oligarchical Design Actual Condition of Carolina at the Time The Free Settlers of Albemarle Sound Aversion of Puritans and Quakers to the Parade of Aristocracy Sympathy with the Democratic Party in Virginia Resentment of Fiscal Oppression Resistance to the proposed Constitution The Governor expelled by his Subjects Seth Sothel and his Peculations Revolution of 1688, and Recovery of Provincial Self-government Social Progress of South Carolina The City of Charlestown Fatal Vice of the industrial System there Quick development of Negro Slavery Unfitness of the Shaftesbury Model Constitution Its final Repudiation by the Colonists. THE lower region situated between the Allegheny mountains and the Atlantic seacoast, extending over nearly five degrees of latitude south of Chesa peake Bay, has its distinctive natural features, which have determined its economic and social conditions. Its shores, which project into the ocean at Cape Fear, Cape Lookout, and Cape Hatteras, so far as to turn the northward now of the Gulf Stream in the direction of Europe, are remarkably furnished with several ranges of small flat islands, divided by narrow lagoons or sounds from the adjacent mainland. A belt of IOAV and often swampy ground, from sixty to eighty or a hundred miles wide, lies inside the chain of these "Sea Islands," as they are called; and is succeeded, going inland, by a middle country of pine-barrens, low sand-hills, and upland moors, only here and there inviting culture. Within and above this zone of less available soil, which may, however, be fertilised by skilful treatment of the native marl and other ingredients, rises a pleasant and salubrious land of hill and dale, watered by abun dant streams, at the foot of the Blue Ridge. The height of the mountains, in the northern part of the territory here described, reaches from 6,000 feet to 6,700 feet ; their rock-formations are rich in gold and copper, while the carboniferous beds yield iron- ore and coal. The pine-forests, with their timber, pitch, and turpentine, also constitute a. natural source of wealth. A variety of crops, tobacco in the middle districts, maize and sweet potatoes, the best of rice in those moist lowlands, and the finest long-staple cotton in the Sea Islands, besides ordinary grain and grazing products in the high land districts, contribute to the resources of this country. It now forms the wealthy States of North and South Carolina and Georgia, in the present American Union. But in the seventeenth century, till the reign of Charles II., it lay an unexplored desert, with the exception of a few puny settlements that were painfully struggling on the coast between Albemarle Sound and Cape Fear. The former name, derived from the ducal title of General Monk after the Restoration, had not yet been conferred on that fine inlet of the sea which enters north of Pamlico Sound, receiving the waters of the Roanoke, the Chowan, and other considerable rivers. Roanoke Island, near its mouth, had long been known but too well as the scene of those disastrous colonising expeditions, from 1584 to 1587, commissioned by Sir Walter Raleigh and conducted by Sir Richard Grenville, Captain Ralph Lane, John White, and others, which were related in our third Chapter. There was another point, far away to the south of these intricate and rather perilous shores, and towards the Spanish dominion of Florida, which had, since the time of Elizabeth and the French Huguenot religious strife, been terribly associated with tales of murderous warfare and destruction. In the harbour of Port Royal, near Savannah, as well as farther down, on th banks of the St. John s or River of May (called by Spaniards the San Matteo), the French Protestant emigrants sent out by Coligny had cruelly perished. But the name of Carolina, which they gave to tho whole of this vast region as a compliment to their King, Charles IX., was destined to remain when, a hundred years later, it formed a province granted to certain courtiers by the English King, Charles II. Little had been done, in the meantime, for the actual possession and use of Carolina by men of a 1660.1 SETTLEMENT OF THE CAROLINAS. 3.33 civilised nation. One of t.b^ earliest attempts from the district of the Nansemond in Virginia WHS made in 1622 by Porey, the Secretary of that pro vince, who travelled overland to the South Chowan, and made a favourable report of the country, hi 1030, a patent for the proprietary occupation of all Carolina, between the 31st and 30th parallels of latitude, was granted to Sir Robert Heath ; but it is doubtful whether he or Lord Maltravers, to whom his patent was subsequently assigned, really attempted to plant a settlement there. The patent seems to have lapsed, or to have been cancelled. A company of adventurers in 1042 obtained from the Virginia Legislature, for a term of fourteen years, the privilege of occupying some territory south west of the Appomatox. It was to be inhabited by a hundred persons from Virginia, " freemen, being single, and disengaged of debt," with William 11 a \vley for their Governor. But it was not till 10") 3 that a company from Nansemond, led by Roger Green, traversed the border forests, which single travellers had before explored, to the banks of the Roanoke and the Chowan. They were re warded with a grant of a thousand acres by the Virginia Provincial Assembly, and ten thousand arms were offered to those who would commence a plantation in that territory. Some three years after this proposal, which appears to have scarcely taken effect, Thomas Dew, Speaker of that Assem bly, formed a plan for exploring the rivers farther south, between Cape Hatteras and Cape Fear. It is not unlikely that the few scattered families, out of Virginia, who moved southward before the Restoration, considered themselves at first in a half- independent position, beyond the ordinary jurisdic tion of that province. They dealt with the Indian chiefs as George Durant, for example, with the chiefs of the Yeopim tribe for the lands which they desired to occupy. Some of the uncompromising foes to prelacy and monarchy remaining after the fall of the Commonwealth, who dreaded the reaction expected in Virginia under the new Stuart reign, may have augmented this emigration to Carolina. It certainly derived, about the same time, from two other and more distant sources, several distinct accessions. One was that of a party from New England, who found their way up the Cape Fear River, and established on Oldtowii Creek, early in the reign of Charles II., a settlement which en dured but six or seven years. It fell into distress, which had to be relieved by a friendly subscription among the more prosperous colonists of Massachu setts. In the opposite direction, from the isle of Barbadoes, came a society of West Indian planters, headed by Sir John Yeamans, who purchased of the Indians thirty-two square miles of land on the south bank of the river at Cape Fear. These were the precursors or founders of the English colonisation which at length, after the usual trials, proved suc cessful in that great region of the Atlantic cotton- growing States. The political separation of Cai-olina from Vir ginia, and its constitution as a new province, may have been an indirect consequence of Sir William Berkeley s election, in 1000, to the Governorship of Virginia. Sir William Berkeley, as we have seen, together with his brother Lord Berkeley, and with Sir George Carteret, also his partner in a grant ot New Jersey some time later, procured for them selves, and for certain peers or Government officials, the grant of all that lay south of Virginia belonging to King Charles II. These men of rank and influence in his Majesty s Court and Council were General Monk, now the Duke of Albemarle ; Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, afterwards Lord Ashley, and finally Earl of Shaftesbury ; and the Lord Chancellor Clarendon. They were probably, of all men in England, those three to whom Charles was most deeply indebted for contriving and effect ing the Restoration ; and the grant of Carolina, was part of the price they asked for open and secret ser vices to his crown and person. With them were associated Sir John Colleton, another zealous Royalist of that date, and Lord Craven, an elderly Cavalier returned from military service in Germany, who had accompanied the Queen of Bohemia, King Charles II. s aunt, iipon her coming home at the Restoration. To the eight lords and gentlemen above mentioned, the vast territories of North and South Carolina, and what is now called Georgia, were given in 1603 by that too liberal or too lavish monarch s favour, moved, perhaps, by the devices of Sir William Berkeley, then in London as agent for the Virginian remonstrance against the Navigation Act. Sir William Berkeley, though representing the Government of Virginia, did not hesitate, or think of consulting the Legislature of that province, before he procured tht severance of Carolina from the territorial jurisdiction often styled " the Old Dominion." He had to satisfy, by particular land grants, the private claims of such persons as George Cathmaid, who proved in 1003 that he had settled sixty-six persons in the new territory, and demanded the reward promised by the Virginia Government. The north or left bank, indeed, of the river Chowan, where the settlers and the lands named in this request were situated, lay beyond the 36th degree of latitude, which was the northern limit originally iixed by the Royal patent for Carolina, and would 354 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1GG7. therefore have still belonged to Virginia, but for the enlargement of that limit, two years later, by a second grasping performance of the noble proprietors at the King s Court. All the northern portion of Carolina, including Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds, was now placed under the administration of William Drummond, the Scottish Presbyterian of Virginia, as deputy for Sir William Berkeley ; while the southern portion, from Cape Fear to the former Spanish settlement of the San Matteo, received the name of Clarendon, and was put under Sir John Yeamans. territories of Florida and of the Mississippi, was no longer maintained. Its assertion was waived or dropped in the treaty concluded at Madrid in 1667; and Florida, with the Bahama Islands, was given te William Sayle by King Charles in the same year. An immense continental area, but with a few points only, at the edge of its Atlantic side, inhabited by small communities of planters, now lay before the corporate lords of Carolina. It was a tempting opportunity to indulge the taste for doctrinal statesmanship, applied to schemes of con stitution-making, which had been fostered by the vr">v ox iiir. ASHLEY UIVER. But no sooner had the new proprietary province, enormous as it was in extent, been provided with a governing staff, than its greedy owners proceeded to solicit, and easily obtained, a fresh charter of larger concessions. The boundaries of this pre posterous gift of territory, bestowed in 1665, were, to the southward, the 29th degree of latitude, including the Spanish town and harbour of St. Augustine, the oldest European settlement on the North American mainland ; to the northward, the parallel of 36 deg. 30 min., taking in the Roanoke and Chowan districts of Virginia ; the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Pacific to the west, comprising nearly all the Southern States of the present Union, with a great part of New Mexico. The title of Spain, indeed, recognised during a century and a quarter of previous history, to the endless political and ecclesiastical debates of that age. The most famous of the eight proprietors was the well-known Lord Shaftesbury, the Lord Chancellor of a later date, whom Dry den has reviled and praised in the same breath, with admirable force and skill of language, but with little regard to truth of judg ment, in the famous character of Achitophel. His biography, recently published, by the late .Mr. W. D. Christie, is a convincing defence of Antony Ashley Cooper against the more heinous imputa tions that party and personal spite had cast upon his public conduct. He appears to have been a man of restless and morbid activity of mind, craving ever-fresh occasions for the. exercise and display of his great abilities ; the victim of inor dinate self-esteem, and of a passion for the sharp 356 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G70. joys of controversial strife, with its intellectual and moral exaltation. But lie was not the fool of mere vanity, or of vulgar worldly ambition. It was because he was quite capable of renouncing the esteem and defying the hatred or contempt of his neighbours, more than compensated by the delight of self-applause, that Shaftesbury incurred so much personal ill-will. Compared with other men of his time and rank, he was free from the baser vices of mercenary corruption and servility, as well as from those of darker hue, malignity and thirst for revenge. If he was addicted to deceitful and underhand practices in the choice of means, he was nevertheless tolerably consistent in the pursuit of those ends which he believed to be for the common good, and which were in no instance postponed by him to any private interests. The maintenance of civil and religious liberty, broadly viewed from a stand-point like that of the modern Whig party, was to be secured, in his opinion, by connecting its principles with the ascendency of the aristocratic class in England, to restrain the excesses both of Royal prerogative and of democratic violence. Shaftesbury was an ardent champion of individual and social freedom, and a guardian of the national welfare, as far as they were compatible with the rule of an oligarchy enjoying a monopoly of power in the State. In our own days we have seen more than one similar example of a profound aversion to the popular element in politics, combined with an enlightened and earnest appreciation of other Liberal maxims, especially with respect to free thought and the rights of con science. Such a disposition is apt to result from over-refinement and subtlety of mind, and to be accompanied with a fatal predilection, for the crafty arts of intrigue and finesse, which are cherished the more fondly because they are reserved from the vulgar understanding. Shaftesbury was a man of this stamp, a statesman of right purposes and wrong procedure, now and then false to his in cidental engagements, but faithful to his general notions of patriotic duty. He undertook, in 1668, the task of preparing a constitution for the new American province, which he and his partners held in territorial lordship, and of which he had gained a minuter knowledge by his official labours at the Board of Trade and Plantations. With this clever and public-spirited nobleman was associated in domestic and studious intercourse one of the most eminent mental philosophers whose original investigations have aided the correct guid ance of modern thought. John Locke, a physician and University scholar of retired habits, whose mind and character attract our regard by the moral graces of purity, equity, and temperance, not less than by his intellectual powers, was called to help his patron., Lord Shaftesbury, in the ambi tious work now proposed. Their joint production, which was presented to the world in 1670, is a striking instance of the very unpractical determina tions at which men of clear and strong intelligence O O will arrive, when dealing with the affairs and passions of actual human life by formal precepts, rules, and doctrines, instead of by a tentative, sympathetic process. It was, in every respect, a signal failure in constructive and constituent legis lation, though greeted by the friends of its authors in England, but not in Carolina, with extravagant commendation. The corporate firm of chartered proprietors were legally empowered to devise laws and government for that vast and almost empty land, subject to the consent of its freemen. Their own prerogatives of delegated sovereignty were ample, including those of levying troops, erecting fortresses, imposing martial law, and carrying on war by sea or land ; those of creating new orders of nobility, constituting shires and cities, manors and baronies ; and the more substantial power of fixing customs duties on the colonial imports and exports. The actual government, then administered by Stevens, who succeeded Drummond as Berkeley s deputy in North Carolina, was of a simple and convenient form, with a council of twelve persons, six chosen by the Assembly (which consisted of twelve elected freeholder delegates), the other six by the Governor for the superior lords. The land tenures of the colonists, their freedom of religion, and exemption from other taxes than such as their own. representa tives might approve, were expressly guaranteed. There was really no need at all for such a complex political machine as the constitution invented by Locke and Shaftesbury. As an object of historical and literary curiosity, we may briefly notice the leading provisions of this abortive design. The projected constitution would have vested the joint viceregal sovereignty of Carolina, to all perpetuity, in the heirs of those eight original pro prietary lords, Albeniarle, Shaftesbury, Clarendon, Craven, the two Berkeleys, Carteret, and Colleton, to whom it was granted by King Charles. If any one hereditary line should fail, the other members of this close corporation were to appoint and admit some person to an equal share of their dignities, emoluments, and powers. They were to be the first estate of the provincial realm, to wield all the powers of executive government, and to form the supreme court of appeal in judicature. Their original iiumber of eight could never be increased or 1670.] SHAFTESBURY S CAROLINIAN CONSTITUTION. 357 reduced, and the entire territory was divided into as many counties, with a proprietor to be the ruler of each county, and to preside in its local court. Two orders of nobility were created ; namely, those of landgraves or earls, one for each county ; and caciques or barons, for each county a pair : these were hereditary titles. Below them were the lords of manors, not limited to a rule of hereditary succession, and not, like the superior aristocracy, fixed at a certain invariable number. All the lands in the province were to te divided into five equal parts. The first part was to be the inalienable property of the eight sovereign lords ; the second part was to belong for ever, in strict entail, to the landgraves and caciques, otherwise styled the earls and barons ; the remaining three- fifths would go among the lords of manors and the ordimuy freeholders, these last two classes being the third and fom"th estates, respectively, of the enfranchised commonwealth. Freeholders of five hundred acres were eligible, and those of fifty acres were electors, for sending representatives to the Par liament, or grand Assembly, where the deputies of the people were to meet the deputies of the proprie tary, the landgraves and the caciques, all sitting together in one chamber. A grand council of fifty, formed of the sovereign lords and aristocratic classes, with fourteen nominees for life of the lower order, had the sole privilege of devising new laws, or pro posing subjects for the Parliament to consider. The reigning proprietors, of course, reserved to themselves a veto on all legislative acts ; but either of the four estates could forbid any change in the constitution. The judicial tribunals, above those of mere manorial jurisdiction, were the coxinty courts, each consisting of six councillors, four of whom were nominees of the lords and nobles, with a ruling proprietor to head the table ; and there were courts for the regula tion of different matters, from trade and navigation down even to pedigrees, ceremonies, fashions of dress, sports and entertainments. Trials by jury were to be decided by the verdict of a majority, and no hired advocates were allowed, because the philosophic authors of this constitution deemed it "a base and vile thing to plead for money or reward." The Protestant Church of England was to be established, with grants from the public revenue, but there was complete toleration of all other creeds and forms of worship. The condition of the lowrr industrial classes was to be no better than in the least free countries of Europe. Leet- men or serfs attached to the manors, with an allotment of ten acres belonging to each peasant labourer, woiv bound to perpetual Hervicc 1 , and so were their children after them, to all generations. Negro slavery, a still deeper state of social oppression, was also provided for in the laws of Carolina. Such was the model of wise and beneficent govern ment devised two hundred years ago by the most famous political thinkers of that age, one of whom, as a great philosopher, divides with the great poet Milton, his contemporary, the reverence of his countrymen. Meantime, on the quiet shores of Albemarl*; Sound, where Stevens acted as Deputy-Governor, the colonists, reinforced by a company of ship-builders from Bermuda, were taking care of themselves. With a fee of thirty pounds of tobacco for the con duct of legal and administrative proceedings, the Governor and Council supported their simple state. Their laws seem to have been judicious and con venient : new settlers were exempt for one year from taxation, but could not obtain a final grant or purchase of land till after the second year; yet they were protected from suits for debts incurred out of the colony. The trade with the Indians was pro hibited to strangers. These provisions were calcu lated to invite an enterprising though needy clasti of immigrants, but to restrain them from practices of a fraudulent, reckless, or mischievous character. Religion was left entirely free, and marriages could be performed before the civil magistrate. It was in a community already exercising, in this manner, its natural powei s of self-government, that the cumbrous structure of Locke s and Shaftesbury * constitution was to be erected, with its rigid politi cal hierarchy and close monopoly of every public right. The Duke of Albemarle, as Prince Palatine, was to be the nominal head of the Carolina Govern ment. The community consisted of a few villages of Quaker or Presbyterian farmers, wood-cutters, and sea-faring men, on the maritime fringe of a vas\, continental region, then all but unexplored. The total population may have numbered four thousand, in the northern part of Carolina. It was just at this period, in the same year (1670) when the Con stitution was published for the entii e province, that the first emigrants to South Carolina, led by Joseph West and William Sayle, entered the Ashley river, so named, as well as its confluent stream the Cooper, from that notable person, Lord Shaftesbury, of whom we have spoken. They had first entered Port Royal, and surveyed the old deserted site of Beaufort, where the French Protestants of 1-36:2 had attempted to form a settlement. Leaving this party in the act of making for them selves an abode on the banks of the Ashley and Cooper, where now stands the city of Charlestown, we turn once inoie to th> inf.int commonwealth of Albemarle Sound. It Mas IKMV tlut the arbitrary 358 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1680. imposition of such a government as their lordships in England had deemed it proper to decree was felt to be an intolerable wrong. By a peremptory decree in 1670, the existing local institutions were superseded, in spite of a pledge given to the colonists, and without consulting their will. Their indisposition to welcome this aristocratic pomp of new-fangled lords palatine, landgraves and earls, caciques, barons, and manorial lords, was per haps increased by the visit of George Fox, the apostle of Quakerism and Christian Republicanism, when he came to America in 1672. In North Carolina, as Avell as in Virginia, Maryland, and New Jersey, he met with not a few people of simple manners and sincere hearts, willing to be enrolled citizens of that divine kingdom which he set above all titles of earthly origin. His mission had been preceded, however, by that of William Edintindson, who had formed an organised society of Quakers there. As the Tory reaction in the neighbouring province of Virginia, under Sir William Berkeley s government, provoked more and more discontent, Nonconformists, and those who clamoured for popular rights and interests, often passed into North Carolina, The grievous operation of the Navigation Acts, and of the fiscal arrange ments designed to compel a direct trade of each southern province with England, by laying an exorbitant tax upon their trade with Boston, in creased their dislike of the government proposed by the lords proprietors in London. An agent of this government, named Miller, was driven away by the hostility of his neighbours. In 1674, the political question remaining still in abeyance, Stevens, the Governor of Albemarle, died, and was succeeded by Cartwright, Speaker of the Assembly. Two years more elapsed without a definitive acceptance of the constitution. The administration finding itself weakened by this delay, Cartwright and Eastchurch, another ex-Speaker, were sent to confer with the proprietors in England. It appears from extant letters that they deplored the growing disaffec tion of the province, saying that it was " in ill order and worse hands." The hands into which they preferred to deliver it were not much better. It fell into those of the obnoxious Miller; for, though Eastchurch was nominated Governor at first, he stayed in the West Indies, while Miller took the actual government, with the offices of secretary to the proprietary and collector of their revenue. This administration was regarded, of course, with very great disfavour by the colonists. They re sented, too, more bitterly than ever, the restrictions and burthens upon their small commerce with New England ; and they were both excited and alarmed, in 1676, by the spectacle of Bacon s revolt in A r irginia, and the sanguinary vengeance that ensued. One of its victims, the respectable Scotchman, Drummond, was well known in North Carolina as its former Governor, preceding Stevens. The refusal of Deputy-Governor Miller to convene an Assembly became the occasion for a deliberate rising of the people at Albemarle, headed by John Culpeppcr. It was joined by at least one member of the govern ing Council, and encountered 110 valid resistance on the part of Miller, who was imprisoned for a time, and then permitted to sail for Europe. Eastchurch next arrived on the borders of the province, claim ing to enter and rule it as the Governor whom their lordships of the proprietary had appointed. But he was denied admission, and the colonists, having again set up their own government and courts of justice, chose for their president the oldest landholder in Albemarle. He was that George Durant who had bought the Yeopim district of the Indians before the date of King Charles s grant. Culpepper Avas now sent to explain or defend their case in England. He found his colonial antagonist, Miller, appeal ing to mercantile jealousy against the free-trade party in America, and to royalty and aristocracy by denouncing mob-rule in North Carolina. By the influence of the proprietors with Lord Lauder- dale and other courtiers, and upon the representa tions of Miller, a criminal prosecution was set on foot against Culpepper. This was in 1680, when he was about to sail on his return voyage. It furnished a new incident, worthy of passing remark, in the busy life of Lord Shaftesbury, who had by this time quite broken off his alliance with the Court party. As a leader of the Opposition and champion of popular interests, he took the opportunity to appear in defence of Culpepper on his trial before a jury, and won for him a triumphant acquittal. The remaining lords proprietors of Carolina were left at a loss for the means of enforcing their im practicable mode of government. Their board of joint sovereignty, in spite of the sublime pretensions with which it began, had in ten or fifteen years undergone some personal changes. The old Chan cellor Clarendon, long since departed, had sold his share to a person named Seth Sothel, who was a sordid rogue. This man persuaded his co-proprietors, when they knew not what else to do, that he could restore their authority and put the Shaftesbury constitution in force, if they would send him out with full governing powers. He sailed on that errand, but his ship was captured by Algerine pirates, and ho was detained two or three years. North Carolina, in the meantime, after the brief endeavoui-s of Harvey, Jenkins, and Wilkinson, on 1683.] PROGRESS OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 359 behalf of the proprietary, to assume and conduct its administration, was left to the colonists own dis cretion. It throve none the worse for that until the arrival of Seth Sothel in 1683 ; and civil peace was made by the passing of an amnesty for the late bloodless insurrection, in return for a formal sub mission to the territorial lords. But Sothel, like the contemporary Governors of Virginia, was eager to get money out of the province by various tricks of corrupt administration or fraudulent extortion. It seems, indeed, that he was equally prone to dishonest contrivances for enriching himself at the cost of his seven partners in the ruling corporation. After bearing five years with this discreditable Governor, who was rather despised than hated, the colonists at the Revolution of 1688 sent him away in unpitied disgrace ; and their little rustic community remained in a state of practical independence. We have now to observe the early fortunes of South Carolina, from the first settlement, above mentioned, in 1670, on the banks of the Ashley river. This province, with great advantages of Boil and climate for planters having capital at their disposal, does not invite the actual labour of the white man. It was destined to become the most lucrative field for cultivating semi-tropical produce by negro labour. The other colonies had negro slaves ; but here they were made the prin- cipnl instrument of agricultural enterprise. The baneful system was introduced by Sir John Yeamans, with a cargo of black labourers from Barbadoes. Large supplies were very soon brought in from the African Gold Coast by the Dittch merchants of New York. No moralist, economist, or statesman of that age foresaw its effects on the social and political condition of the English-speaking world in America. John Locke himself, who with Yeamans and James Carteret enjoyed the title of a South Carolinian landgrave, was not able to per ceive the fatal error of the industrial organisation provided for that fertile land and genial clime. In this part of Carolina, as in the settlements on the Roanoke and Albemarle Sound, there was no likelihood of success for the highly artificial scheme of government which Shaftesbury and Locke had framed in their scholarly wisdom. " The Grand Model," as it Avas called, was a machine that would never work among hard-living toilers in the forests and swamps or upon the sea-shore of America. They preferred, following the example of North Carolina, to set up a more convenient form of mixed nominee and elective delegation, which was adopted by a popular convention for the pur pose. The Grand Council, to advise the Governor and to restrain him from any wrong act, was to be composed of five members appointed by the pr- prietary of the province, and five others chosen by the people. These ten councillors again, when joined with twenty more elected deputies of the commonalty, would compose the provincial legis lative Assembly. It was as good as anything the most profound political thinker could have ex- coo itated, or borrowed from ancient and modern o history for the needs and uses of a young colony. Pedantry, then so rife, and the .bigotry of zealots for aristocratic, feudal, and monarchical forms or titles, could alone object to this accommodating plan for the secure and moderate progress of public interests, in harmony with those of the territorial lordship. To relate the controversy that ensued in South Carolina upon the question here raised, might be felt a tedious repetition, after that of North Carolina before presented to the reader. It may nevertheless be stated that the colonists never could be forced to put up with the fantastic Shaftesbury Constitution. They wrangled about it with the proprietors during eighteen years, till the Revolution of 1688, upsetting nil that had stood on the jobbing favours of the Whitehall Court in the Stuart reigns, enabled South and North Caro lina to possess their full self-government without molestation. The social advance, meantime, of the southern territory had been far more rapid than in the earlier years of the other provinces. On a piece of land between the tAvo rivers, Avhich was called Oyster Point from the gathering of those bivalves, like manna in the wilderness, to feed the hungry emigrants of 1670 on their first landing. Avas founded the city of CharlestoAvn, named after their careless King. It stands amidst groves of delicious verdure, commanding an excellent, harbour for Atlantic commerce. People of every country, class, and condition, soon hearing of South Carolina Avith its natural and social attractions, began to think of it as an inA iting abode. Dutch men came from their former colony of New Amsterdam, which had been converted by an English conquest into NAV York : and Avere followed by other Dutchmen from Holland. A. feAv score of Protestants from Southern Europe, skilled in the culture of the vine, the mulberry, the olive, and the orange, or in the care of silkworms, were sent over by King Charles at his own expense. Cavaliers and courtiers of England, who sought to repair their wasted estates after the Restoration ivA el, disdained not to emigrate under the patronage; of noblemen, the owners of Carolina. Shaftesbury himself begged leave to go and end his days in the colony, Avhen he was imprisoned in the Tov. cr of 360 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [168 ( J. London ; and if lie had gone, it is probable that John Locke might have gone with him. English Dissenters galled by High Church ascendency dur ing the reign of Charles II., English Protestants dreading the establishment of Popery under that of James II., went out to Carolina, where religious freedom at least was secured to all. Scottish Covenanters who fled from persecution, and the defeated partisans, both in Scotland and in Somer setshire, of Monmouth s and Argyll s rebellion, were mingled with this overflow of the wearied Old World, cast out of Europe by manifold sources of disgust. There was a colony of Irish, too, under Ferguson ; and the land also received a French Protestant emigration, after the wicked act of Louis XIV. in revoking the Toleration Edict of Nantes. South Carolina was found a country most suitable for the resort of the persecuted exiles of Languecloc, of Touraine, and of the western provinces of France. Their personal adventures have been told in many an interesting story. Some of their descendants, bearing French names, have contributed greatly, by their virtues and abilities, their liberal spirit and American patriotism, to the prosperity of the United States. The complete naturalisation of foreigners, how ever, was necessarily deferred till after the vexatious constitutional question was settled. A summary account of what took place in the politics of South Carolina will suffice to end this chapter. Sir John Yeamanswas Governor from 1671 to 1674, effecting little to the public advantage. His successor, Governor West, held office during nine years, but was dismissed by the proprietors for being too much a friend of the colonists. Disputes arose between the Executive, or the Crown, and the Provincial Assembly, upon the treatment of the Indians, the enforcement of the Navigation Laws, the attacks of colonial sea-rovers on Spanish maritime trade, the representative system in the colony, and the litiga tion of claims for debt contracted abroad. No Governor there ever possessed the actual force that Avould have been required, and that was employed by Sir William Berkeley in Virginia, to put down the opposition of his subjects. The brother of Sir John Colleton, one of the lords proprietors, was appointed in 1686, with the grant of a large estate and the title of landgrave, to execute their decrees if he could. He found himself unable even to collect their quit-rents. Having rashly attempted, by an act of violence, to exclude from the Legisla tive Assembly those members who disowned the unhappy Constitution of 1670, James Colleton was speedily upset. The Assembly took possession of the Government, records, imprisoned the secretary, and placed its own committee-men in the public offices. The colonial militia, to whom a summons was addressed by the Governor, would not serve him against these representatives of the popular will. At the proclamation of King William lll. s reign in the old country, they finished by sending Governor Colleton away from Carolina. The new era- had begun for all English citiztau on both sides of thy Atlantic. CHAPTER XLII. Arrival at Boston of Sir William Phipps Previous Career of that Gentleman His Expedition to a Spanish Wreck State of Boston after the Revolution Turbulence of the Moh Feebleness of the Government Revolutionary Movements in Plymouth, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey Fresh Outbreak of Indian Troubles in the North-east The Five Nations of Iroquois and the French Atrocities of the Indians in Maine A Congress held at New York Acadie reduced by a Naval Expedition Combined Operations against Montreal and Quebec Disastrous Failure of Sir William Phipps before the latter City Indian Ravages in Maine -Decline of New England Spirit and Ability Truce with the Natives Renewal of the War Proposals of Sir William Phipps for the Conquest of Canada Death of John Eliot, the Apostle of the Indians. THAT William of Orange had become William III* of England tha,t the Papist James had fled to France, and that the future of Protestantism in the British Isles was once more assured were facts of the most profound interest to the people of Massa chusetts and the neighbouring colonies ; but they did not of themselves settle the question as to what form the government of the New England planta tions should assume. At Boston, it had been decided that the old charter of 1629 was again in force ; but it remained to be seen whether th new monarch would recognise this interpretation of facts an interpretation which was certainly opposed to English law. It was therefore with mingled feelings of hope and fear that the colonists received an envoy from England in the person of Sir William 1687.] SIR WILLIAM PHIPPS. 361 Phipps, who arrived in a ship which entered Boston harbour three days after that bringing news of the accession of William and Mary. Phipps was a native of the Duke of York s territory of Cornwall, and had made his way upward from humble beginnings. His previous career is worth relating. Though now a knight, lie had in his youth, after serving as a shepherd, worked as apprentice to a ship-carpenter ; and, though greatly wanting in book-education, he had managed, by his spirit, enterprise, and business crew to abandon the effort for a time, but he still cherished the project as one that must at length sxicceed. With extraordinary courage and self- reliance, he quelled two attempts at mutiny on the part of his men, and then, returning to England, persuaded the Duke of Albeniarle and some other noblemen to advance him money for a second adventure. In 1687 he again, sailed for Port de la Plata. There he went up singly into the woods, and with his own hands built a stout canoe, large enough to carry eight or ten oars, which GAY S HEAD, MAKTHA S VINEYA1U). faculty, to become a man of importance. Obtaining some property by marriage, he set up a ship-yard at Sheepscote, in Maine, and afterwards another at Boston. He himself commanded a trading vessel, and, hearing it the Bahamas that a Spanish galleon, with a vasl amount of silver on board, had been lost near Port de la Plata about fifty years before, he resolved to attempt the recovery of the treasure. To obtain money assistance in the prosecution of this design, he went to England in 1683, and, being encouraged by the countenance of Charles II., sailed with two frigates to the spot which had been indicated, and endeavoured to discover the sub marine mine of wealth. After much fruitless labour, l.e was compelled by the impatience of his 31 he sent, together with the tender of his vessel, to search for the wreck, while he himself lay at anchor in the port. For awhile, nothing was discovered but a reef of rising shoals, and the crew were returning, weary and dejected, when one of the sailors, looking over the side of the canoe into the clear, transparent sea, saw a feather under water, growing, as he imagined, out of the side of a rock. A number of Indian divers had been taken out in the little vessel, and one of them was now ordered down to make investigations. He reported that he had found many great guns, and, being sent down a second time, brought up a pig of silver, of the value of two or three hundred pounds. Having buoyed the place, the crew returned to port, and at 36-2 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1689. first misled the captain by pretending that they had had 110 success ; but while Phipps was ex pressing hi* determination to persevere until the providence of God gave them better fortune, his men brought into view the great mass of silver that had been discovered by the diver. " Why, what is this 1 ? Whence comes this?" cried Phipps in a sudden transport ; and, being then told all that had happ< ne 1, he lifted his hands to heaven, and ex claimed, "Thanks be to God, we are all made!" A more elaborate search soon followed, and the divers, descending into the dark recesses of the wreck, discovered tons of silver, bags of coin, and a large store of gold, pearls, and other jewels. When he had sufficiently laden his vessel, Phipps sailed for England, cairying with him treasure amounting in value to 300,000 sterling, of which, after all charges had been met, and gratuities had been paid to the sailors, Phipps himself received .16,000.* James II. was so much pleased with this exploit that he knighted the captain, and, to his great credit, refused the advice of his courtiers to appropriate the whole sum to his own use. In consequence of this success, Phipps became a favourite at court, and used his influence in soliciting a restoration of the charter of Massa chusetts. But he might as well have asked the King to make over his crown to him. " Anything but that, Sir William," was James s reply. Phipps then procured a patent constituting him High Sheriff of New England, hoping, it is said, to be able in this way to supply his country with honest juries. He landed at Boston about the middle of 1688, but met with so much opposition from Andros and his subordinates that he again went to England, where he was residing when the arrival of the Prince of Orange changed the dynasty, and opened new prospects to the English nice. Though lie had been on good terms with James, Phipps soon got into coinnumication with the new ruler, and joined with Increase Mather in urging the rights of the colonies. At fii-st there was some fear lest matters should be left unaltered. An order was actually issued, in January, 1689, for the government of New England to continue for awhile in the hands of Andros ; but Mather and Phipps, by vigorous representations against such a course, succeeded in obtaining its annulment. The two friends then joined in a petition for the restoration of the ancient privileges of Massachusetts, Plymouth, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, and for the recog nition of the late Governors of those colonies as * Cotton Mather s Life of Sir "William Piiii^s, in Magnalia Chriati Americana, Book II., Appendix. still in power. King William, however, would not promise so much without inquiry ; but he gave an assurance that Andros should be removed from hin post (which had already been done by the populace), and that he should be called to account for his mal administration. At Boston, the Council made certain proposals with respect to the late Governor and his friends, which resulted in the Deputies- sending up various charges against Andros, Dudley, Randolph, Palmer, West, Graham, and some others. Dudley begged for release, and, being ill, was allowed by the Council, with the consent of some of the Deputies, to go to his own house at- Roxbury, under a guard, on his giving a heavy bond not to leaA~e it, except on Sundays. The populace did not at all approve of this leniency, and a mob proceeded from Boston the same night (July 13th),. broke open the house, and took the sick man back to gaol. The keeper of the prison would not receive him, and the rioters then earned him to the house of a Mr. Paige, a brother-in-law of Dudley. Not satisfied with his custody there, they broke into Paige s houso two nights later, and searched for the object of their fury. On the 16th, Dudley voluntarily walked to the prison, accompanied by several gentlemen, as the only means of stilling the people. It was, in fact, the safest place for him. In the absence of all settled government, the worst of the populace were exhibiting the worst of their passions. When the authorities determined to release Dudley provisionally, on his giving sureties in the enormous sum of 10,000, neither Bradstreet, the Governor,, nor Addington, the Secretary, would sign the paper, for fear they should themselves be imprisoned for so doing. The order, which is without any signa ture, was carried to the gaol by the Marshal. Bradstreet Was old, and probably timid. His. subserviency to the mob would be disgraceful,, if it were not sad. The rioters who went from. Boston to Roxbxiry, to drag Dudley away from his house, took with them a letter from the Governor (another brother-in-law of the offender), entreating him, for the safety of himself and family, and the welfare of the whole country, to yield quickly to the existing stress, as the tumult in the town was so- great and sudden that no reason would be regarded. " Have respect, I pray," Bradstreet piteously con cluded, " to the glory of God, and the welfare of this, people." Dudley s resolution to submit himself to renewed imprisonment was hastened by another letter from the Governor, dated July 16th, in which he described himself as being filled with grief and sorrow for the condition both of his brother-in- law and of the country generally. He had certainly 1089.] THE REVOLUTION IN NEW ENGLAND. 363 great occasion for the depression under which he laboured. The mob met, whenever they pleased, in a tumultuous fashion, plundering all who had favoured the late Government, sometimes committing thefts indiscriminately, and on one occasion attempt ing to cany oft" sheep from a little island near Martha s Vineyard inhabited by Indian converts an outrage which drew from the ruling sachem a dignified protest.* The insolence of the ill-disposed among the Bostoners was such that the more decent citizens feared a Reign of Terror. The mer chants began to complain bitterly. " Tis a ques tion," wrote James Lloyd to Thomas Brinley, on the 10th of July, "whether 100,000 will make good the damages, and settle the land in so hopeful a way as it was at the time the Governor [Andros] lost his authority." Francis Brinley wrote to the same Thomas Brinley, five days later : " Should this place be governed as in old times " (he must have alluded to the days before the charter was forfeited), "there can be no living for sober people. To be governed amongst ourselves by some chosen among us, is nearest unto an anarchy." " I am afraid," said Benjamin Davis to Edward Hall 011 the 31st of July, "that this people will grow so unruly that nothing but an immediate Governor from the King will or can rule them. . . . They are daily expecting Mr. Mather with a charter. If it pleases them, well ; if not, they will despise it, for they are not afraid to say, in some towns of the country, that the crown of England hath nothing to do with them." The conclusion of this writer was that they were not bettered by the pulling down of Sir Edmund Andres s Government, but much worse otf than before.f Men who have large fortunes at stake are too apt to subordinate political considerations to the insuring of that quiet which is necessary to their business transactions. This may have been the case with the traders whose opinions have just been quoted. The deposed Government was certainly tyrannical, and a violent change had been provoked by the fatal resolve to multiply rather than redress grievances. But it cannot be doubled that the revolution had, up to the summer of 1689, resulted in nothing but the substitution of one despotism for another ; and it may well have seemed that the change was the very reverse of an improvement. The movement in Massachusetts was followed by similar action in the colonies of Plymouth, Rhode [sland, and Connecticut, where the former Govern ments were at once reinstated by popular votes, * Neiil s History of New England, chap. 10. t Colonial Papers quoted by Mr. Palfrey, Vol. III., cliap. 15. and without any disturbance. King William and Q\ieen Mary were peacefully proclaimed, and men awaited with curiosity, rather than in fear, the arrival of orders from the new Government in Eng land. At New York there was much division of opinion. James II. and his representative were not without their adherents ; but the Dutch popula tion were greatly excited by the news that the Stadtholder of Holland had been asked to rule over England, and, after a deplorable series of events, to be related hereafter, William of Orange was pro claimed King. In New Jersey matters passed off more quietly : but the subordinates of Andros were compelled to yield up their power, and a Provisional Government was formed, in the absence of instruc tions from the mother country. Thus the rule of James fell to pieces in the New World, in some places with scarcely a touch ; and that of his successor was established by the necessity of the times, and by a general agreement as to what was most likely to promote the freedom of the settlers. In the autumn of 1689, the authorities at Boston received a communication from the King and Queen of England, bearing date August 12th, in which the recent proceedings of the colony were allowed and approved, and the Magistrates then in power were authorised to continue the administration of affairs until their Majesties, by the advice of their Privy Council, should settle them on such a basis as might satisfy all their subjects in that plantation. The position of Sir William Phipps in the settlement was rather anomalous. He had been sent over by the new Government of England, and was there fore to some extent charged with an official character; but he held no distinct office. James II., after reaching France, had offered him the Government of New England ; but he had refused to accept it, preferring to cast in his lot with the Revolution. On reacliing Massachusetts, he found the country in a state of apprehension as to a new Indian war. A devastating struggle was on the eve of breaking out, and Phipps was destined to take an important part in it. But before we proceed to relate the incidents of that struggle, a brief retrospect will be necessary. The relations of the colonists to the natives were difficult under the best of circumstances ; and they were still further complicated by the rivalry of the French. Both French and English sought, and from time to time obtained, the co-operation of Indian allies ; but such assistance was precarious, and jealousies were constantly arising between the .savage and the civilised races. The Canadian colonists had from an early period endeavoured to subjugate the warlike tribes to the south of their 364 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1687. line, and those tribes had at times given their sup port to the English and Dutch, when they thought it their interest to do so. The Five Nations, known by the general designation of the Iroquois, wielded a power of no inconsiderable character ; and the white men, finding it impossible to crush such numerous and warlike opponents, were not unwilling to bid for their favour. The Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas, formed a vigorous race of warriors, not without some of the sterner virtues of humanity, nor altogether devoid of political principles in the management of their little commonwealths. They were the especial terror of the French in Canada, whose fruitless attempts to conquer them in the early part of the century pro voked, through a long course of years, many san guinary reprisals. Quebec itself was besieged ; large tracts of country were laid waste ; and the subjects of Louis XIV. were glad to mitigate the ferocity of these barbarians by commercial treaties. When, however, it was found that the English dealt with them more liberally than the French, they took their beaver-skins to the south rather than to the north. This led to a firm alliance between the Five Nations and the English of New York and Virginia, which was concluded in. 1684, after a period of hostility attended by much bloodshed. The Governor of Canada, exasperated at what he regarded as treachery, attacked the tribes on the borders of Lake Ontario, but, after losing many of his soldiers by the marshy exhalations of a desolate country into which he had advanced, was compelled to sue for peace. At the solicitation of the English, the Mohawks refused to grant his prayer ; but the other four tribes were inclined to make terms with the French, that they might play them off against the English. Peace was dictated by the victorious red men, and, in the following year, De la Barre, the Canadian Governor, was superseded by Denoii- ville, an officer of high repute, who brought with him a reinforcement of soldiers. Disputes continued between the representatives of France and England as to the extent of their dominions, and Louis XIV. determined to break the power of the Iroquois, as the barrier which prevented his advancing south ward. He instructed his lieutenant in North America to take a large number of these savages prisoners of war, and ship them to France, where they could be made useful as galley-slaves. Deiioii- ville, who in his day was commended as a virtuous and religious man, matured and carried out, in 1687, a piece of execrable treachery. It was im possible to capture the savages by force. Accord ingly, a missionary named Lamberville was employed (without being informed as to the design) to decoy the Iroqiiois chiefs into a French fort on Lake Ontario, under pretence of concluding a treaty. On entering the stronghold they were seized, put in irons, hurried to Quebec, and thence despatched to Europe. The treason of Denoiiville might have cost Lamberville his life, but for the generosity of the Onondagas. The old men of that tribe sent for the missionary, and told him that, although he had in fact betrayed them, they knew that treason was not in his heart. They exhorted him to fly at once, ere the vengeance of the younger men should be roused ; and they conducted him by unfrequented paths into a place of safety. War with the French immediately ensued. Denoiiville for a time gained possession of the western part of the present State of New York, and erected a fort at Niagara ; but the Five Nations rallied, and threatened the French so seriously that Denoiiville begged Dongan, the Governor of New York, to act as mediator. Their negotiations failed for a time; but in 1688 the French were obliged to accede to the Indian terms, which included the ransom of the captured chiefs. The country south of the chain of lakes, which had been temporarily occupied by the French, although claimed by the English, was rescued from the grasp of Canadian settlers by the valour of the Iroquois ; and the soldiers of Deiionville reaped nothing but mortification from their operations against a savage foe. It was the policy of James II. to be on good terms with Louis XIV. ; and in 1686, while the- struggie of the French with the Five Nations was going on, he made it a condition of amity between the colonies of the two States that neither should assist the Indian tribes with whom the other might be at war. As the English in America had as much reason to fear the French as the aborigines, this provision gave no great satisfaction, and the colonists believed it to be frequently broken or evaded by their rivals. It was always supposed in New England that the North-eastern Indians were encouraged in their turbulence by the French of Canada ; and it was the North-eastern Indians who were now again causing alarm. By an act of treachery, the garrison of Cocheco was surprised and massacred in the course of 1689. Houses were burnt, and nearly thirty people carried into captivity. The Government of Massachusetts sent, a force into the disturbed country ; but only slight successes were obtained, and shortly afterwards Pemaquid Fort was taken, and the greater part of the garrison butchered. Several desultory murders- were also committed, and the inhabitants of Sheeps- cote and Kemiebunk abandoned those places, and retired to Falmouth, together with many planters, 1690.] WAR WITH THE FRENCH, 365 in other pails of the exposed districts. The rising of the Indians spread far and wide with great rapidity, and, after the English Revolution which deposed James, the French openly engaged in the movement. France and England were by this time .at Avar, and Count Fronteiiac, the Governor of Canada, was charged to recover Hudson s Bay, to protect Acadie, and to assist a French fleet in con quering New York. The French claimed the whole of the North American continent north and west of New England, on dubious grounds of early dis covery ; and they now determined by a desperate -effort to assert their alleged rights. They were once more being harassed by the Five Nations, who were regarded as the allies of the English ; they had been compelled to retire from several of their posi tions ; and they seem to have considered them- . selves justified in aiding the Eastern Indians to exterminate the English in their northern settle ments. Massachusetts and Plymouth joined in operations against the rebels ; but the troops were so ill -commanded, and so hampered by the presence of faithless native auxiliaries, who managed to give intelligence to the enemy, that they did nothing but furnish garrisons to Wells, York, Berwick, and some other frontier towns. As the winter came on, they returned to their homes, and the Indians, emerging from the woods and swamps in which they had taken refuge, committed a number of atrocities unchecked. By February, 1690, the war had reached the province of New York. A body of French and Indians descended from Canada on the Dutch town, of Schenectady, where they killed sixty of the in habitants, and carried off other s into captivity. On the 18th of March, another descent was made by the allies, and Salmon Falls, on the Piscataqua, Avas bunit, Avith the massacre of thirty persons, and the capture of fifty. The prisoners Avere treated with the utmost barbarity. They Avere stripped of their clothes, and allowed no other covering than a blanket. Barely enough food to support life Avas given them. Laden with baggage, they Avere driven on at the rate of twenty or thirty miles a day, and all who lagged behind Avere instantly slain by a LloAv of the hatchet. A man who had endeavoured to escape was roasted alive at a sloAV fire ; and women and children were killed or tortured on the least complaint. Many of these horrors Avere com mitted by Indians converted to Catholicism by the French Jesuits, AV!IO prepared them for their savage work by confession and absolution. At the Penob- scot village of Canibas, whence issued the Avarriors Avho massacred the garrison of Pemaquid, and .committed other murders in the neighbourhood, a little chapel Avas established, at Avhich Indian savages Avere being continually purified, at all hours of the day, for the murder of Protestant heretics, that so, if they chanced to fall, their spirits might at once ascend to bliss. It Avas now evident that the utter destruction, or at least the partial ruin, of the English power in America Avas contemplated by the French and their native supporters. The Moluuvks had refused an active alliance with the New Englaiiders against the Canadians and Abenakis, though promising a nega tive friendship ; and it became necessary to take some vigorous measures for the common defence. At the suggestion of Massachusetts, a congress was held, on the 1st of May, 1690, at New York an event important in itself, as well as in its conse quences, since it Avas another step (the NCAV England Federation being the first) toAvards the formation of the Union Avhich arose at a later epoch. Aftor discussion, it -was resolved to attempt the conquest of Canada by sending an army against Montreal, while a fleet from Massachusetts should attack Quebec. As a preliminary, Sir William Phipps, at the head of seven hundred men and a small fleet, Avas sent against Acadie, Avhich had remained in undisputed possession of the French since the Treaty of Breda in 1667. The Governor of the province in 1G90 had built a little fort at Port Royal for the security of the plantations along the coast. The population of French origin num bered from six to seven thousand, who enjoyed a considerable trade in lumber, furs, and fish. The conquest of this region proved an easy affair. Phipps appeared before Port Royal on the llth of May. The garrison, being unprepared for a defence, surrendered after a short resistance, on condition of a safe-conduct. The feeble palisadoes Avhich guarded the place Avere destroyed, and the country Avas declared by Sir William part of the possessions of the English CroAvn. On his Avay home, he destroyed another French settlement, situated at St. John s River in the Bay of Fundy ; and by the 30th of May he Avas again at Boston, Avith IICAVS of his success. This encouraged the confederated colonies in their great design of attacking Canada itself. In the summer months, an army of English and natiA^es pursued its Avay across the deserts in the vicinity of the great lakes, and it was reported to the French that their enemies Avere building canoes 011 Lake George. Frontenac immediately called on his Indian allies for assistance, and, seizing a tomahawk, himself chanted the Avar-song and danced the Avar-dance, though he was then an old man. But the land attack came to nothing. The army Avas defeated by mismanagement Avithout 36G CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1690 being once in sight of tlie foe, and was compelled to return to Albany, whence it had started. On the 20th of August, Phipps was despatched, with a fleet of thirty-four sail, manned by two thousand citizens of Massachusetts, to effect the reduction of Quebec. If valour in the commander could have secured the success of this enterprise, it would have been a triumph. Courage was certainly not wanting in Phipps, and he had on several occasions exhibited much energy and resource. But it may be questioned whether his abilities were equal to such an undertaking, and in some respects he was unfortunate. His attack on Quebec was to take place simultaneously with the assault of the land forces on Montreal. A diver sion would thus have been created, and the French army have been divided. But the utter failure of the English troops to reach Montreal enabled the French to concentrate their forces in the chief city ; and this necessarily embarrassed the naval com mander. The fleet, moreover, was delayed by bad weather and contrary winds, so that the squadrons did not come within sight of Quebec until the 16th of October a bad time of year for operations in that northern latitude. On the 17th, Sir William sent to Count Frontenac a summons to surrender, expressed in rather boastful language ; offering the garrison mercy if they complied, but threatening, in the event of a refusal, to revenge all wrongs and injuries by force of arms, and to bring them under subjection to the Crown of England, when, too late, they would wish they had accepted the offered favour. A positive answer was to be returned in an hour, on peril of what would ensue. The officer who took this summons was conducted to the Governor s chamber blindfolded. On hearing tl>e letter read, Frontenac was so enraged that he ordered the captain of his guards to erect a gibbet, and hang the messenger. From this, however, he was dissuaded by the Bishop of Quebec, and he then returned an answer, in which he said that Sir William Phipps and his companions were here tics, as well as traitors to their King ; that they had ranged themselves under an usurper, the Prince of Orange, and had made a revolution but for which New England and New France would have been all one. He added that no other answer was to be expected from him but what should come from the mouths of his cannon. It was part of the contention of the French commander that the English forces were simply pirates, as they had no commission from their lawful sovereign, the deposed James. On the 18th of October, Phipps made an attempt to land, but the weather was too rough to permit of its being carried out. The attempt was renewed on the 19th, when fourteen hundred men were put on shore about a league and a half from the town. The French retreated, and drew their adversaries into an ambuscade, from which they poured so galling a fire into the English that the latter retreated in confusion, and regained their camp, with the loss of three hundred men. Next day, Phipps landed four pieces of cannon, and the troops made a fresh attempt to force their way towards the town, but were again repulsed with heavy loss, and pursued to Mieir camp, which the French prepared to attack. The English were now thoroughly disheartened, and at midnight re- embarked, but in such haste and confusion that they lost fifty men in the act of getting into their boats. It was afterwards admitted by the French that the little army had shown no lack of courage : but their proceedings indicated a total failure of dis cipline, an entire ignorance, on the part both of officers and men, of the science of war, and a want of concert between the land forces and those on board the fleet. It had been agreed that Phipps should bombard the town on the western side, while the troops delivered their assault on the east. All during the night following the 19th of October, and part of the next day, the ships poured a heavy fire into Quebec ; but no corresponding- action could be observed on shoi-e, and Phipps sent to inquire the reason. The commander of the land forces replied that he dared not venture within sight of the town, having been assured by a French deserter that Count Frontenac had three thousand men with him in garrison. The troops had suffered much on their tempestixous voyage ; some were ill with small pox, and all were depressed and daunted by the extreme cold of the advancing winter, against which they were not properly provided. The blame of failure must be divided amongst the commanders and those who sent them forth so ill-equipped for an expedition of great difficulty and hazard. The New Eiiglanders had committed the serious fault of undervaluing their enemy. As a natural con sequence, they lost heart when they found that he was much stronger than they had supposed. Nothing could be more unfortunate than the O result ; for it depressed the spirits of the English, proportionately elated those of the French, and encouraged the Indians to make renewed attacks 011 the north-eastern settlements. A violent storm shortly afterwards separated the fleet. The greater number of the vessels, includ ing Phipps s, arrived at Boston 011 the 30th of November, but others were not so fortunate. Some were driven as far south as the Bermudas ; three or four were lost ; and a brigaiitine, with sixty men I.AMHERYILI.E SENT AWAY HY THE OXOXIUGAS. 368 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [161)0. on board, struck on the desolate island of Auticosti, in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and became a total wreck. The captain and his men wintered on the island, enduring great hardships from cold and insufficient food, until they were rescued in the following May. In every respect, the expedition to Quebec had been disastrous. It cost the lives of a thousand men, and entailed 011 the people of New England a money loss of 140,000 a liability which it was found necessary to spread over a number of years by the issue of bills of credit, which passed current among the people until they were redeemed. The English were equally unfortunate in other directions. In May, 1690, a body of French and Indians crossed the Bay of Casco in canoes, and lay concealed in the woods. The inhabitants of the neighbouring town went out against them, but were repulsed, and driven back to their houses. The whole place was then burnt to the ground, and the garrison in the fort was obliged to surrender. This was at once followed by the abandonment of other positions in the north -eastern settlements. A panic-stricken flight to the south took place, and the scared and bewildered fugitives were hotly pursued by the Hurons, who devastated the open country, burnt several houses, and*killed or captured many of the scattered inhabitants. At this period there seems to have been a total want of capacity in the New Englanders. No man of conspicuous mark arose among them ; even second-rate men were rare ; a kind of languor and debility settled on the people, and the extraordinary vigour and decision of the early Puritan settlers gave place to distracted councils, embarrassed and feeble action, perpetual failure, and an accumulation of misery such as bid fair for a time to ruin the prospects of the associated colonies. Some brave men, however, remained ; and two of these Captains Floyd and Greenleaf routed the Hurons, and drove them northwards to a considerable distance. Still, the country remained unsafe. Parties of Indians moved to and fro with that startling rapidity which distin guishes savages. The husbandman was murdered in his field; even, the towns afforded but little protection against the sudden descents of a foe who neither gave nor desired quarter. The natives had been drilled and instructed in military manoeuvres by the French, and, being well supplied with fire arms, were no contemptible adversaries, even on open ground. A council of war was called at Portsmouth, in New Hampshire, and it was re solved that a body of men should scour the woods u far as Casco ; but the expedition had no better success than others, and the force was compelled to retreat. Major Church, at the head of three hundred soldiers, was rather more fortunate in the early autumn ; and shortly afterwards a party of Indians came to Wells with a flag of truce, and proposed a temporary cessation of the war. On the 10th of December, the commissioners on both sides signed articles for a suspension of hostilities for five months. By this instrument the Indians bound themselves to refrain from all injury of the English during the prescribed time ; to give timely notice of any plots on the part of the French of which they might have knowledge ; and, on the expiration of the truce, to bring into Wells all the English captives in their hands, and there treat for a perpetual peace. The truce failed to bring about that permanent amity which was anticipated and desired. Wai- broke out once more in 1691 ; Acadie again passed into the power of the French ; and the frontier towns of the English settlements suffered as they had done in former years. In the early part of 1692, a party of French and Indians crossed the wintry deserts in snow-shoes, and. suddenly bursting on the town of York, killed fifty of the inhabitants, and carried off a hundred. A large force of English was afterwards sent to the spot, and arrangements were made which prevented the renewal of such attacks. At Wells, a gallant action took place between a party of Indians and two English sloops which lay in the river, and which the savages attacked from a platform on wheels, driven out on to the sands until it was within fifteen yards of the little vessels, and afterwards by a kind of fire-ship, which the wind fortunately carried in the opposite direction to that of the sloops. The English now rallied from the depression of previous years. To many it appeared a necessity that Canada should be conquered, as the only means of per manently securing New England from continual attacks ; and, to enforce these views at court, Sir William Phipps returned to London in 1691, and solicited the assistance of the home Government in fitting out an expedition. In a paper which he submitted to the King and Queen, ho argued that it was for the interest of the English Crown and nation to reduce that dependency of France, because they would thus not only engross the beaver trade, but secure the territory of the Hudson s Bay Com pany, some of whose factories had lately fallen into the hands of the French ; and because the possession of Canada would increase the English shipping by gaining the fisheries of Newfoundland, and thus diminish the number of French seamen, as well as cut off a great revenue from the French Crown. The failure of the recent expedition against Quebec 7691.] THE NEW MASSACHUSETTS CHAKTER 369 was attributed by Sir William to the lateness of the season, the roughness of the passage, and the sickness of the crew and army ; and he concluded by stating that the Jesuits endeavoured to draw the natives into their interests by incessantly suggesting the greatness of Louis XIV., and the inability of King William to do anything against the French in those parts an impression which in time of war was very prejudicial to all the English plantations in America. But, however well-considered these plans may have been, the King was obliged to decline them, owing to the heavy pressure of the continental war with France. In the midst of war and calamity, on the 20th of May, Ib90, John Eliot, the Apostle of the Indians, quietly died in his house at Roxbury, in the eighty-sixth year of his age. He had done everything that intelligence, zeal, and devotion could do to Christianise and educate the savages ; O yet in his declining days he had the misery to see the Indians of the north-east engaged in a vast and bloody conspiracy against liis countrymen. We may be sure, however, that he had his reward even in this world, since goodness is its own light and its own comfort. The noblest fruit of know ledge remained to him when all the lesser fruits had gone. One of his latest utterances was " I have lost everything. My understanding fails me, my memory fails me, my utterance fails me ; but I thank God my charity holds out still. I find that rather grows than fails." CHAPTER XLIII. Endeavours of Sir William Phipps to obtain a New Charter for Massachusetts A Charter granted Doubts on the Part of the Agents as to whether they should accept it Nature of its Provisions In what Respects it differed from the Old Charter Boundaries of the Xew Province, Forms of Government, &c. Appointment of Sir William Phipps as Governor of Massa chusetts His Expedition against the revolted Indians in the North-east Conclusion of a Peace Deplorable Condition of the Province Dealings of Phipps with the Indians The Governor recalled His Death in England Renewal of the Indian War The Adventure of Hannah Dunstan -Peace of Ryswick between England and France Boundaries between the English and French Possessions in North America Predominance of France in the Region of the Great Lakes The Earl of Bellamont, Governor of New England and New York Political Fortunes of New Hampshire Condition of New England at the Close of the Seventeenth Century. DISAPPOINTED in his endeavours to engage the English Govemnient in an attack on Canada, Sir William Phipps turned his attention to the political constitution of New England. The unsettled state of the colonies for several years was such as to demand a change of some kind. It is certain that the revolution at Boston had no efficacy to upset a decision in an English court of law, and reinstate the charter of 1629. Everything, therefore, was in a provisional state in Massachusetts, if not in the other colonies of that part of America; and Phipps not unnaturally desired to place the new order on a legal basis. He and the other agents lost no opportunity of bringing the subject before the attention both of the monarch and Parliament ; but matters of more immediate urgency prevented the consideration of their plans. They were not without friends in England. The Convention Parliament voted that the abrogation of the New England charters was a grievance. The Presby terians solicited their restoration. Lord Wharton, a relic of the old Commonwealth days, used his influence to the same effect. Tillotson and Burnet the two most prominent Churchmen of the time urged the policy as well as justice of keeping faith with the colonists. But neither William nor his Minister, Somers, was inclined to the restoration of the old charter of Massachusetts, to which, in truth, there were many objections; and in 1691 the agents agreed that, instead of seeking a renewal of that charter, they would petition for another, with more ample privileges than the last. That they had the support of Mary was made evident at an interview with the Queen. She said that she had spoken several times to the King on behalf of New England, and that she desired the people might receive not only justice, but favour. William was not so readily moved. With the phlegmatic caution of his race and of his personal character, he hesitated as to giving an answer, and it was whispered that the King had been prejudiced against the New Englanders by persons about the court. Fears were entertained by the Massachu setts agents that a Governor would again be set over the colonies, and that some one would bo chosen who would be distasteful to the people. Mather represented to the King the unfitness of an "Episcopalian, for exercising the chief authority in a nation of Dissenters; but William desired to re tain the privilege of appointing the Governor, 370 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1691. and inquired of his Council whether he might legally make sxich an appointment. The Council told him in effect that, as the charter wsis vacated, lie might institute what form of government he pleased. Thus fortified, he resolved to nominate a Governor, but to do so with due regard to the inclinations of the people themselves, according to what had been suggested by Increase Mather. At the same time, he promised to grant a new charter, and, departing for Holland, left instructions with the Attorney-General for drawing up a document such as he could sign on his return. The change of dynasty, and the political revolu tion by which it was accompanied, soon proved less satisfactory to the rulers of Massachusetts than they had anticipated. King William was as anxious to retain a firm hold over the New England colonies, and to reserve to himself a right of veto, as Charles or James. He would grant them privileges, but would permit nothing like a position of indepen dence. The draught of the Attorney-General gave .so much dissatisfaction to Mather that he protested against it, and was told by the Council that the agents of New England were not plenipotentiaries from a sovereign State, but subjects who must sub mit to the King s pleasure. Nevertheless, Mather, Phipps, and the other representatives of Massachu setts in England, sent over their objections to the King himself, but could obtain nothing more than the addition of a few articles of a nature to please the popular party in the colonies. The agents were in considerable doubt as to whether they should accept the proposed charter, or stand a trial at law for reversing the legal judgment by which the former had been annulled. The new patent was in some respects less favourable than the old, in some re- .spects more so ; and it seemed a moot point on which side the balance of advantages lay. At length, however, it was determined to receive what was offered, and make the best of it. The better- instructed politicians wisely reflected that the chatter of 1629, even if it could be regained, was a very unsatisfactory instrument when strictly con strued ; that it made no provision for a House of Deputies ; that it conferred no power to impose taxes on the inhabitants who were not freemen ; that it did not include the provinces of Maine and New Hampshire; and that the liberties which Massachusetts enjoyed had been acquired rather in defiance of the original patent than by means of it. If, then, that patent should be restored, and the colonial Government should exercise the same powers as before, the plantation might be subjected to pains and penalties against which there would be no sufficient defence. These were the main con siderations which led to the acceptance of the charter of "William and Mary. Instead of a mere trading corporation, as in the earlier patent, the later document (which is dated Westminster, October 7th, 1691) erected the colony into a province, and conferred on the General Court as much power within its jurisdiction as the Parlia ment of England possessed in the parent country. All the liberties and privileges of Englishmen were granted to the colonists, and they could be touched by 110 law or tax but of their own making. The freedom of their religious worship was for ever secured, and the titles to their lands, the disputing of which had been so great a grievance under the rule of Andros, were permanently confirmed. The Governor, though appointed by the Crown, could not make a Counsellor, a Judge, a Justice of the Peace, nor even a Sheriff, without the consent of the local authorities. In all important respects, the government of the settlement remained in the hands of the people ; and no power was wanting either to the creation or the upholding of a state of freedom. On the other hand, the almost com plete independence of earlier years was prevented by special provisions. The nomination and powers of the Governor, Lieutenant-Governor, Secretary, and Officers of the Admiralty, were wholly reserved to the Crown. The Militia was placed under the command of the Governor, who had the ordering of all military affairs. All Judges and Justices, whether of a superior or inferior order, as well as the Sheriffs, were to be nominated and appointed by the representative of the sovereign, though only with the advice and consent of the Council of Assistants, to be chosen annually by the General Court. To the Governor was granted a veto 011 all laws, elections, and Acts of the General Assembly and Council ; and even after the laws had been approved by the Governor, it was necessary that they should be transmitted to London for ratifica tion by the King, who might disallow them at any time within the space of three years. There were here, undoubtedly, some rather con siderable limitations of the popular power, but none such as seriously endangered the self-govern ment of the plantation. The machinery for retaining a distinct connection between the colony and the mother country was similar to that which exists at the present day in Canada, Australia, and other British possessions, and which has been found consistent with a political condition of perfect freedom and prosperity. The appointment of superior officers, and the command of the forces, could not result in the creation of a despotism as long as the people themselves were virtuous and 1691.] THE NEW MASSACHUSETTS CHARTER. 371 resolute. The Governoi* s veto might at times be vexatious, but could hardly prove an insuperable barrier to any policy on which the colonists had earnestly set their hearts ; nor was the prerogative of the sovereign likely to be exercised except in extreme cases, where the interests of the Empire might seem to be imperilled. It must be admitted, however, that the extension of the King s veto over so long a period as three years was a real grievance and practical hardship. That there was the possibility of an xmwise and unjustifiable nse of these powers will of course be conceded. But colonies cannot reasonably expect the absolute independence which belongs to sovereign States ; and the dis advantages of partial subjection are counterbalanced by the benefits to be derived from association with Imperial rule. The petty tyrannies of Massachusetts, in the days of her unchecked power, were the faults of a petty provincialism, which had been so long cut off from the great world of varying intei^ests and diverse views as to be incapable of sympathy with the largest interests of a commonwealth. The elder "VViuthrop, Endicott, Leverett, and the other early Governors, were far from being unjust men in desire or intention. They were certainly not self-seekers. In many respects they were liberal and statesmanlike. But they needed the check of a higher and broader organisation ; and it was be cause they had no such check that they committed acts which entailed a certain, if tardy, retribution, and placed them at the mercy of men like the second Charles and James. "William III. a man of honour, of probity, of political wisdom, and of a solid and sedate liberalism avoided the errors of the two last monarchs ; yet lie felt compelled in some degree to adopt their colonial policy. He had to preserve the integrity of the great English Empire which had been committed to his charge, and to consider, not the predominance of a particular party in one section of that Empire, but the interests of the whole. That the charter of 1691 gave sub stantial guarantees for the well-being of Massa chusetts, is proved by the course of affairs in that colony for some generations. A document which had Somers for its chief author was not likely to do less. The province ci-eated by this patent included Massachusetts proper, New Plymouth, Maine, Acadie or Nova Scotia (which had not then again passed under French rule), and all the territories lying between Nova Scotia and Maine. The whole was to go under the general designation of the Province of Massachusetts Bay in New England. By this arrangement, New Hampshire was separated from Massachusetts ; but the division did not last long. The Governor, the Lieutenant-Governor r and the Secretary, were to act in conjunction with eight-and-twenty Assistants or Counsellors, nomi nated in the first instance by the King, but after wards to be chosen annually by the General Court, consisting of the Assistants themselves and the- Deputies. The Deputies were to be in the propor tion of two members to each town or place, with liberty to the Court to revise that number in sub sequent years, as it might be found necessaiy. The qualification for voting was the possession of a free hold estate in land, within the province, to the value of forty shillings a year, or of some other estate to the value of .50 sterling. The suffrage, consequently, was not universal; the old English principle of basing representation on property was studiously preserved. The members s*o elected were, together with the Governor and other officials, to take the oaths which, by an Act passed in the first year of the existing reign, were substituted for the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy ; and the oaths thus substituted might be administered to any per son within the colony. To the Governor was given full power to adjourn, prorogue, and dissolve the General Court, and, with the advice and consent of the Council of Assistants, to appoint Judges and other officers of justice. Liberty of conscience in the worship of God was allowed to all Christians, excepting Papists. The General Court was invested with aiithority to erect and constitute Judicatories, Courts of Record, and other Courts, to be held in the King s name, for the trial of crimes and offences, and the heai ing of civil causes ; but the claim of the earlier colonists to act in such matters without any appeal to England was not recognised. "Whereas," said the new charter, " we judge it necessary that all our subjects should have liberty to appeal to us, our heirs and succes sors, in cases that may deserve the same," it was ordained that, in ca.se either party should not rest satisfied with the judgment or sentence of any of the provincial Judicatories or Courts, in any per sonal action wherein the matter in difference ex ceeded the value of .300 sterling, such pei-son might appeal to the King in Privy Council, which might be either the Provincial Coimcil or the Coun- O cil in England. The laws which the General Court was to have power to enact were to be such as should not be repugnant to the laws of England. The said Court was to have full power to nominate annually all civil officers within the province, ex cepting such as were to be appointed by the King or his representatives ; to levy all necessary taxes ; and so to dispose all matters and things as to insure the religious,- peaceable, and civil government of the 1692.] GOVERNMENT OF PHIPPS. 373 colony, that thus the good life and orderly conver sation of the people might win the Indians to the profession and practice of the Christian faith, which, it was observed, was avowedly the principal design of the plantation when it was first set on foot. With respect to military service, it was expressly provided that the Governor should have no power to transport any of the people beyond the limits of the province without their own consent, nor to exercise martial law on them without the advice and consent of the Council of Assistants. The power of Admiralty Courts was reserved to the sovereign ; but nothing in the charter was to be taken as barring or hindering any of the King s siibjects in the trade of fishing on the coasts of New England, or in the salt-water rivers. Lastly, for the better providing and furnishing of masts to the Royal Navy, the charter reserved to the Crown, all large-sized trees growing on any tract of land not previously granted to any private person. Conscious, perhaps, that, notwithstanding the liberality of many of its provisions, there were some things in this patent which would hurt the self-love of the New Englanders, the King con ferred on the Massachusetts agents the favour of appointing their first Governor. Their choice fell on Sir William Phipps, and the hei o of the expedi tion to the Spanish wreck kissed hands on his eleva tion to this new dignity. He was not the most fortunate selection, for, though an honest man, he had rather the qualities of a sea-captain than a statesman. Rough in his manners, fanatical in his religious views, uninstructecl in the arts of govern ment, and identified with a disastrous failure, he was hardly the person to give dignity to the post he was called on to fill. Yet, on landing at Boston in May, 1692, he was received with acclamations by the majority of the people. His first act was to call a General Assembly of the province, which he opened with a speech urging the deputies to pre pare a body of good laws with all despatch, and promising that whatever Bills they might offer to him, consistent with the honour and interest of the Crown, he would readily pass. " Whenever," he said, " you have settled such a body of good laws that no pei-son coming after me may make you uneasy, I shall desire not to continue one day longer in the Government." It was not merely law-making, how ever, that the new Governor had to consider. The country was still devastated by the Indians of the north-east, and it was necessary to take measures for the better protection of the outlying settlements. The savages of Maine and the neighbouring terri tories knew Phipps well. They had fished and hunted with him in his youth ; they did not forget 32 that he was a native of that part of America, and was intimately acquainted with their haunts ; and they saw in his appointment a sign that the war would be carried on with greater vigour. Phipps was always better inclined to engage in daring enterprises than to sit quietly at home. At the head of four hundred and fifty men, he marched to Pemaquid, and gave orders for the building of a strong fort. It was finished in a few months, and had twenty-eight port-holes, with fourteen guns in position, and a garrison of sixty men. Being situated in the heart of the enemy s country, it produced a considerable effect in overaweing the savages \ but the cost of erecting this stronghold was so great that the people murmured at the ad dition to their taxes, and Phipps speedily lost the popularity with which he started. Another fort was built at Saco in 1693, and the Abenakis, being defeated in several scattered actions, and hunted from place to place, began to lose heart. They Avere by this time deserted by the French, Avho had more important work to do in other quarters; and they feared an invasion from the Maquas, a powerful tribe to the west, who had learned the use of fire-arms earlier than their neighbours, and, by one of the usual exaggera tions of fear, enjoyed the reputation of having killed more than two millions of natives inhabiting the country on the borders of the Mississippi. The rebels were therefore disposed to peace, and the English were equally well-inclined to an under standing. A French friar who was with the Indians at the time did his utmost to dissuade them from coming to an agreement ; but negotia tions were opened at Fort Pemaquid, and in August, 1693, peace was concluded on favourable terms. By the articles, the Indians confessed that they had been led astray by the French, submitted themselves to the government of England, promised to oppose the Canadian tribes, and renounced their claim to lands already occupied by the Eng lish. It was further agreed that all trade and commerce which might subsequently arise between the Indians and the English should be under settled rules of management, and that, in case of any con troversy arising, or any real or supposed wrong, proper application should be made to the Govern ment for remedy in a court of justice. For the due execution of these terms, hostages were delivered to Sir William Phipps. All looked well for the time ; but the prospects of a permanent peace were illu sory. The condition of the newly-created province of Massachusetts Bay was at this period deplorable. Trade had greatly diminished ; taxation had equally 374 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1696. increased ; apprehension and discord spread through out the colony; and Sir William Pliipps, less from faults of his own than from the difficulties of the situation generally, soon came to be regarded as a failure. Cotton Mather had from the first desired to see some post of importance conferred on AV^illiam Stoughtoii, who had acted as Deputy- President under Dudley, and who had made himself so unpopular that, in the election of judges shortly afterwards, he was passed over without a vote! Why Cotton Mather, who belonged to the opposite party, should have been so solicitous for his advance ment, does not appear; but he urged his father, Increase Mather, while the matter was yet pending, to do something for Stoughtoii, who shortly after wards received the appointment of Deputy-Governor. Of the twenty-eight Assistants nominated by the King, the elder Mather wrote that every one was a friend to the interests of the churches. The younger Mather cried exultingly that the time for favour had come ; that, instead of his being made a sacrifice to wicked rulers, he was in a position of command, as several of his relatives, and many brethren of his own church, were in the Council, while the Governor of the province was a member of his flock, and one of .his dearest friends. Yet the new Government was scarcely more popular than that of Anclros. It was wanting in marked ability ; it had to encounter difficulties of no ordinary kind ; and its failures made it disliked by those who could probably have done no better. In his dealings with the Indians, Sir William Pliipps is certainly deserving of praise. He threw a new vigour into the war with the Abeiiakis, and, having extorted a peace, exerted himself to remove any grievances of which they may have had just cause to complain, and to wean them from their attachment to the French. Early in 1694, in the midst of a very hard winter, he journeyed into the north-eastern districts, and, haA r ing sent for several of the principal sachems, gave them presents, and treated them with great respect. Proposals were made for opening a lucrative trade, and Pliipps offered to leave behind him an Indian preacher, who would give instruction in tho Protestant faith. The Abenakis were glad of the trade, but cared not for the missionary. They had been converted to Roman Catholicism by French priests, who had assured them (so at least they stated) that Christ had been crucified by English men. Phipps was not successful in his endeavours to detach the Indians from their French allies. They were afraid of offending such powerful neighbours, especially as the English were not in a position to offer them armed assistance. The attempt, therefore, came to nothing; btit it was well- meant, and not badly conceived. The Governor, however, could ill afford another failure. His unpopularity was becoming every day more serious, and at length his enemies drew up articles of impeachment, and sent them over to the King, with a request for his displacement, and for the appointment of a committee to take depositions against him for maladministration. The King, determining to hear the case himself, recalled the Governor, and cited his accusers to appear at Whitehall in prosecution of their charges. Phipps embarked for England towards the end of November, 1694, carrying with him an address from the General Assembly, commending his faithful services to the country, and begging that he might not be displaced. The accusations against him were in fact never examined. The accusers did not appear in support of their imputations, and it is probable that Phipps would have been restored to his post had not death terminated his career. He caught a malignant fever, and expired on the 1 8th of Febru ary, 1695, in the forty -fifth year of his age. Cotton Mather s friend, Stoughtoii, the Deputy- Governor, now succeeded to the chief post. He found the colony in the midst of a renewed Indian war in the north-east. The French had again ex cited the tribes to fury, and the usual atrocities of savage warfare were committed in many lonely settlements. The chiefs of the Micmacs presented to Frontenac, the Governor of Canada, a grisly trophy of English scalps, taken from the heads of those who had been killed on the Piscataqua. French priests encouraged these horrors by exhorta tion and by praise. Charlevoix, the Jesuit historian of his countrymen s colonising efforts in North America, eulogises the valorous feats of the Abena kis, who burnt towns and villages, murdered men, led women into captivity, and behaved with un checked barbarity to inoffensive children. No great successes were obtained in the open field, but the country was kept in a state of alarm for years, and the English power was compromised by its manifest inability to prevent such disasters. The worst thing that happened was the surrender of Pemaquid fort in 1696. The French had taken an English man-of-war, with which they appeared before the fort, and landed a body of soldiers, who ,were soon joined by a party of Indians. This struck so much terror into the commander that he surrendered his stronghold without firing a gun. The French then demolished the works, and retired. Chub, the commander, was temporarily arrested for dereliction of duty, and, being ultimately deprived of his commission, was sent home to hia house at 1697.] THE INDIAN WAR. 375 Andover, where, a year or two later, he was killed, together with his wife and some others, by a party of Indians. Misfortunes continued to thicken on the English, and ill-success attended all their measures. To wards the close of 1696, the Indians were so inspirited by their good fortune that they threatened to nrin the whole country in the following summer. A bad harvest, resulting in a scarcity of bread which amounted almost to a famine, added to the other calamities of the time ; and political discon tent took the most dangerous of all forms that of the clamorous demand for food. The savages re mained quiet during the winter, but with the spring of 1697 were again in arms, pouring down on small settlements with the terrific war-whoop, and murdering indiscriminately all whom they did not capture. At Haverhill a tragical incident occurred. Hannah Dunstaii, a married woman, was lying in bed with an infant not more than a week old, when the Indians burst upon the town. No man was in the dwelling at the time ; only Hannah Dunstan, the nurse, and eight young children. The husband was at work in the fields, but, seeing the enemy approaching, he rode home in the hope of repelling the attack. The children were bidden at once to fly to the neai est garrison, and Dunstan then warned his wife of her danger ; but before she could rise the savages were so near that, finding it im possible to carry her off, he rode after the little ones, who had crept into the surrounding forest. Some times facing back on the pursuing Indians, and pointing his gun at them, sometimes cheering the frightened children as they fled through the tangled wood-paths, Dunstan hurried on, and gained a place of safety. The savages wreaked their vengeance where they could be less opposed. The house was rifled and burnt ; the new-born infant was dashed against a tree, and killed ; and Mrs. Dunstan, the nurse, and several of the neighbours, were carried off by the attacking party. They were forced to march at so great a pace that in a few days they had travelled a hundred and fifty miles ; and any one who lagged behind was immediately slain. Mrs. Dunstan and the nurse were to serve an Indian family consisting of two men, three women, and seven children, all of them Roman Catholic converts, very particular in their religious observances. Their master resolved to carry them to an Indian rendezvous beyond Penacook, about two hundred miles from the place where he lived, in order that, in accordance with a native custom, they might run the gauntlet through the whole army. Ultimately, Mrs. Dunstan, her nurse, and a boy from Worcester, Massachusetts, found them selves on an island in the Merrimac, above Concord. A little before daybreak, one spring morning, Mrs. Dunstan, observing the family asleep, proposed to the nurse and the boy to put them all to death. The plan had been discussed for some days, and the boy, Samuel Leonardson, had asked his master where he would strike to kill instantly. The Indian told him where, and also how to scalp. When the right moment arrived, the two women and the boy took each a tomahawk, and smote with stern resolve at the sleeping barbarians. Ten speedily lay dead ; one of the squaws was wounded, but not mortally ; a child Avas spared because of its infancy. Then the three English people escaped in a bark canoe, floated down the Merrimac to the settlements of their country people, and exhibited, in a grim spirit of rivalry to the savages themselves, the scalps of the enemies they had slain. A reward of 50 was voted for them by the General Assembly, and presents from private hands gave expression to the popular satisfaction. Aided by the French, the Indians continued throughout 1697 to give trouble to the English colonists ; but they did not succeed in obtaining complete command of Maine. An alarming rumour, however, led to serious preparations for resistance. It was said that the French King intended to send a fleet to ravage the coast of New England, and to conquer New York. But the design, if ever entertained, was not carried out; and at the close of 1697 the Peace of Ryswick put an end to the war. By the terms of the treaty, France was allowed to retain Hudson s Bay, a moiety of Newfoundland, the whole of Canada, the valley of the Mississippi, and the entire eastern coast, with its adjacent islands, from Maine to beyond Labrador. Such was to be the French territory in America, stated in general terms ; but the precise lines of demarcation were left to be settled by com missioners. It was ultimately proposed that the boundary to the east should be the river St. George, as a compromise between the French claim to the Kennebec on the one hand, and the English claim to the St. Croix on the other ; but peace did not last long, and the question remained unsettled. The boundary between New France and New York led to a long and excited discussion, which did not terminate in favour of the English. Both the English and French laid claim to the domains of the Five Nations. During the last few years of the war, Frontenac had conducted several operations against those tribes ; had burnt many villages, slain many warriors, and left the remainder to suffer from a famine, brought about by the destruction of their crops. Notwithstanding this treatment, the Iroquois 376 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, [1698. now inclined rather to the French than to the English alliance, because the religious converts among them were lioman Catholics rather than Protestants. On commercial grounds, the interest*) of these savages were on the side of England ; but religious conviction is one of the strongest motives that influence mankind. The moral power of the Jesuits over the Five Nations was so great that in 1700 the Legislature of New York made it death to any Popish priest who should enter the province. Nevertheless, the French were able, in that very year, to effect a peace between the tribes of the Iroquois on the one side, and themselves with their native allies on the other. It was declared at the same time that hostilities should cease between the Sioux and the Indian tribes in amity with the French, and that this peace should reach beyond the Mississippi. The English still continued to trade with the Five Nations ; but France was supreme on the great lakes, and in June, 1701, a French Jesuit, accompanied by a hundred of his country men, formed a settlement at Detroit, in the present State of Michigan. The Earl of Bellamont was now Governor of New England and New York. He arrived in America in 1698, and in the following year recommended to the General Court of Massachusetts the repair of their fortifications, the accumulation in them of warlike stores, the settling of a free trade with the Indians, and the passing of laws agreeable to those of England. Quitting Boston for New York in the summer of 1699, he marie the latter city the place of his official residence to the end of his life, leaving Lieutenant-Governor Stoughton to repre sent him in the capital of Massachusetts. New England and New York were thus once more united, but only so far as the personal rule of the Governor was concerned. To Lord Bellamont was also assigned the direction of affairs in New Hamp shire. The condition of that province long con tinued very unsettled. In 1690, the colonists had, by the solemn vote of a popular convention, united themselves with Massachusetts ; but, by the charter granted to the latter colony in 1691, the right to the soil claimed by Samuel Allen, of London, who had purchased it of Mason, was fully recognised. Allen himself received a Royal commission to govern the people, and his son-in-law, John Usher, of Boston, Colonial Treasurer of Massachusetts under Dudley, and afterwards one of the adherents of Sir Edmund Andros, acted as Lieutenant- Governor. Usher organised a government ; but it gave no satisfaction to the people, and the legal position of the colonists was for years made the subject of lawsuits which wasted large sums of money without settling anything. The conduct of Usher was resented by the people as tyrannical ; that of the people was denounced by Usher as tur- bulentj and in 1699 the home Government placed the colony under the rule of Lord Bellamont, assisted by a judiciary composed of men who had the confi dence of the popular party. Although this put an end to political disquietude, it did nothing towards solving the question of proprietary rights. Those rights were frequently urged in the colonial courts, where the verdict was always given against the, proprietor. Appeals were made to the English sovereign in council, but without any conclusive result. Records of the court under Cranfield, the Governor of the province in the time of Charles 11. , were destroyed, and other documents withheld. Orders from the Committee of the Privy Council for Trade and Plantations were disregarded, and every device that quick and not very scrupulous wits could imagine was resorted to for defeating the rights of Allen and his heirs. At length, in 1715, the claim was abandoned in despair of enforcing it. The people of New Hampshire thenceforth enjoyed quiet possession of the soil, and the ivaste domains reverted to the Crown. A descendant of Mason subsequently renewed the original claim, on the ground of a defect in the con veyance to Allen ; but the litigations were finally closed by a relinquishmeiit, 011 the part of the claimants, of all but the unoccupied portions of the territory. In 1741, New Hampshire was finally disjoined from Massachusetts ; but even previous to the separation the former province had had a distinct legislative Assembly, and was the author of its own laws. The death of Simon Bradstreet, in the spring of 1698, removed the last of the original colonists of Massachusetts. Dying in the ninety-fifth year of his age, he connected the widely-separated epochs of Charles I. and William III. Born in the year that Queen Elizabeth expired, he missed by only four years seeing the commencement of the reign of Anne. It is said that at ninety his intel lectual force was hardly abated ; but in his failing days he earnestly desired to be at rest. Cotton Mather tenderly and beautifully observes that it seemed as if death were conferred on him, rather than life taken away. The great age to which several of the early colonists and their children attained is worthy of note ; yet we find Increase Mather remarking in 1684 on the frequency of sudden deaths in New England.* The state of New England at the close of the * Ksaay for tlio Recording of Illustrious Providences, chap. 12. 1700.] NEW ENGLAND PROSPECTS, 377 seventeenth century was of a nature to excite mingled feelings of apprehension and hope. The colony had for several years been desolated in its more iiimote parts by a savage war, stimulated and aided by a civilised but hostile neighbour. It was burdened by a debt which for a country not rich was heavy. Its trade, which forty years before had been considerable, was now greatly reduced. A succession of misfortunes had diminished the wealth of its merchants, and broken the spirits of its commonalty. The independence of a previous generation had been forced to give way, first before the legal proceedings of Charles, then before the tyranny of James, and lastly before the new charter of William and Mary, which, while it respected the rights of the people, was not forgetful of prero gative. Internal dissensions were more rife than in. the primitive times ; a class of poor had arisen to trouble the repose of the rich. On the other hand, the plantations were firmly established. There was no longer any room to doubt that the great experiment of another England beyond the seas was destined to succeed. Numerous towns had sprung up in the wilderness. From the Penob- scot to Long Island Sound, from the Atlantic to tho Hudson, the territory had been reclaimed from the forest and the morass, and made to yield crops, of which the Indians before the coming of the English had known nothing. Civilised societies had taken the place of barbarian federations, which had wasted the capabilities of the soil by the ignorance and anarchy of savage life. A love of reading was very common among the people, and as early as 1686 a large number of Boston book sellers had made considerable fortunes by their trade. Lord Bellamont, a few years later, remarked with agreeable surprise on the graceful and courteous demeanour of the gentlemen and clergy of Connec ticut. Yet, although these artificial charms of the old society lived again in the thinly-populated tOAva- ships of America, it could not be doubted that new political ideas were being developed under the new conditions of colonial existence ; and, despite tempo rary failures and local drawbacks, it was evident that a great commonwealth, of English origin, was shaping itself in the western world, the future of which was already beginning to trouble jealous observers in the old domain. It was anticipated by sevei al that the colonists would in time throw off their allegiance to the mother country, and esta blish a republic. They had come very near doing so in the time of Charles L, and on the face of things it was not unlikely that, with increasing numbers and greater self-reliance, they would again place before themselves the goal of independence as the promised land of their national pilgrimage. There were those in England who had the blind ness to recommend a total subjection to the Crown as the only way of checking this tendency. They ought rather to have aimed at a continually in creasing development of the principle of local self- ride, combined with the personal tie of a Governor appointed by the sovereign, and representing the grandeur and stability of the whole Empire. CHAPTER XLIV. Unsettled State of South Carolina after the Revolution of 1688-9 Extinction of the Constitution of Shaftesbury and Locke Joseph Archdale, the Quaker His wise Government in South Carolina Illiberality of the Proprietors Prosperity of the Planters Condition of North Carolina Tyranny and Turbulence Popular Rising Sir Edmund Andres Governor of Virginia The William and Mary College Deficiency of Education in Virginia, and General State of the Country Characteristics of the Government of Andros Position of the Church of England in Virginia and Maryland Establish ment of the Royal Government in the Territory of the Baltimores Unjust Treatment of the Roman Catholics Life in Maryland Effect of the English Revolution of 1088 in New York -Insurrection under Jacob Leislcr, and Subsequent Course of Events Disagreements between New York and Connecticut. THE two Carolinas passed through a period of con siderable agitation after the Revolution of 1688-9. In South Carolina, much internal disturbance re sulted from the bickerings of the Church of England emigrants with those who professed Presbyterian views. The first-named formed the minority, and were for the most part free-livers, and men opposed to popular }K)wer. The latter were persons of mory liberal ideas, yet inclined to support the proprie taries as the legal holders of authority. Persistent injustice, however, at length converged the Presby terians into opponents of the existing order ; and when Colleton was deposed, Seth Sothel, though one of the body of proprietors, and not favourably known by his prevkms rule in North Carolina, was in 1690 chosen by the people to succeed liim. His adnmuV 378 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1693. tiution was at first conducted in accordance with the expressed will of the commonalty, meeting in a freely-elected Assembly. Measures of defence were adopted ; military stores were acquired ; a revenue was established; and in 1691 the Huguenot refugees were placed on the footing of freeborn citizens. But, notwithstanding these just and reasonable provisions, the colony remained in a very unsettled "that, as the people had declared they would rather be governed by the powers granted by the charter, without regard to the fundamental constitution " that of Shaftesbury and Locke, which has already been described " it would be for their quiet, and for the protection of the well-disposed, to grant their request." Philosophical constitutions, the work of scholars sitting in their studies, and A VISTA IN SOUTH CAROLINA. state. The people were split into factions, and the acts of the Legislature were rejected by the proprietors. After a time, Sothel became as despotic as his predecessors ; and on his deposition by the people, in 1692, Philip Ludwell, formerly Collector of Customs in Virginia, and more recently Governor of North Carolina, was sent to the southern plantation to re-establish the supremacy of the proprietary body. But he was quite incap able of effecting such a result, and, withdrawing into Virginia, he left the South Carolinians to that condition of anarchy which now seemed chronic. The proprietors at length opened their eyes to the necessity of concession. In April, 1693, they voted elaborating details out of certain general principles, the truth or falsity of which, under particular conditions, can only be tested by experience, seldom survive the rough collision of ordinary needs. It was so with this ingenious production of two of the most eminent men of the seventeenth century. The people of South Carolina wanted a plain, workable government, with reasonable provision for the maintenance of their interests ; and this was not furnished them by Shaftesbury and Locke. Thomas Smith, who in a former year had advised the establishment of martial law as a means of suppressing the populace, was appointed Govei-nor L 380 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1706. after the abrogation of the constitution. He was of course the nominee of the proprietary, and us such was unable to agree with the people, who, having set on foot a system of biennial Assemblies, were in a position to dispute his policy with great effect. Smith was an honest, well-meaning, and personally blameless man, despite his leanings to wards martial law as a ciire for disaffection ; and, finding that he made no progress towards the pacification of the country, he suggested, in 1694, that one of the proprietors should visit the settle ment, with powers of inquiry and redress, This resulted in the selection of John Archdale, a Quaker, and one of the body appealed to, as a species of dictator over the turbulent and uneasy colonists. He acted with exemplary fairness and liberality. Being himself a Dissenter, he did not pass over Nonconformists in the filling of oflices ; hut High Churchmen also were employed. He laid it down as a rule that men should always find an enlargement of their native rights in a wilderness which they have left their own country to colonise. He foi med his Council in such a way as to reflect the predominant feeling of the settlement. He remitted quit-rents for a term of years ; he regulated the price of land and the form of conveyances ; and by other concessions and re-arrangements he soon established a state of comparative concord. A board was created for settling disputes between the Indians and the Europeans, and the former were treated with so nruch consideration that, with the generosity of which red men are not incapable, they always behaved with exemplary kindness towards any unfortunate sailors who might be shipwrecked on the coasts. Archdale exhibited those political virtues which are so often found amongst Quakers. A House of Assembly was elected by the people, who, by means of a militia, were allowed to retain their own defence in their own hands. Friendly relations were maintained with the Spaniards at St. Augustine ; and Archdale, as a proof that he had none but kindly feelings towards a nation at that time regarded as the hereditary enemy of Eng land, and with whose religious opinions he could assuredly have had no sympathy, ransomed four Indians, converts of the Spanish priests, who had been taken captive by a hostile tribe, and sent them to the Governor of the Spanish settlement. On leaving South Carolina to retum to England, in 1G9G, Archdale had the satisfaction of knowing that he had established the prosperity of the planta tion on a sure foundation. The representatives of the people gratefully acknowledged the fact, and New England men, seeking a more genial climate, found in this luxuriant and beautiful land a placo where they could live under political institutions not inferior to their own. After the departure of Archdalo, and probably as a consequence of his wis dom, the Huguenots, who had again been subjected to disabilities, were once more enfranchised by the colonial Legislature. With the exception of Papists, liberty of conscience was granted to all Christians. The proprietary body in England were not inclined to endorse in all respects the liberal ideas of Archdale. They passed a new code, in which they asserted that the natural foundation of political power is in property. The expression is a strange one ; for even if it be advisable, on grounds of expediency, to associate the suffrage with some form of property, this surely cannot be called a natural foundation. It is in fact an artificial basis for an exclusive superstructure ; as men build their houses on piles where the soil is naturally infirm. The laws which the English proprietors deduced from their very questionable maxim were rejected by the Provincial Assembly in 1702, after a pro longed debate. But the colony was not in accord with itself on the subject of religion, and the dis agreement led to unfortunate results. Although the Dissenters were in a considerable majority among the people, the followers of the Church of Eng land contrived, in the year 1704, to obtain one more representative in the Assembly than their opponents. They used the power thus acquired in the most tyrannical manner. Disfranchising all who held Nonconformist views, and creating an arbitrary Court of High Commission for the trial of ecclesi astical causes and the preservation of religious uniformity, they established a political monopoly on their own behalf. This revolution was eagerly approved by the proprietors, although Archdale did his utmost to oppose it. Its effect was speedily seen in the legal establishment of the Church of England in South Carolina, as a specially privileged body ; but a number of lay commissioners were appointed to exei cise- supre/nie authority over the colonial clergy. Some such check was necessary to restrain a spiritual despotism which othei-wise would have been perfectly uncurbed ; but at best it could only confine within .somewhat straiter bounds an evil which was perfectly gratuitous. Even with this extraneous chock, the evil became so serious, and the means of redress in the colony itself were so entirely wanting, that the South Carolinian Dissenters appealed to the House of Lords in 1706, and obtained the powerful advocacy of Comers. The Peers agreed to a resolution condemning the attempt to establish religious uniformity in South Carolina as "an 1711.] DISSENSIONS IN NORTH CAROLINA. 381 ment to Atheism and irreligion, destructive to trade, and tending to the ruin and depopulation of the province." The Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations reported that the proprietaries had forfeited their charter, and the acts of which complaint had been made were declared by Queen Anne to be null and void. The colonial Assembly had no choice but to give way, and the Dissenters again acquired their political rights, though the Church of England retained its position as the established religion of the colony. It had hitherto done very little towards the support of religion in the colony, which had only one e:lince belonging to the Church of England at the close of the sevententh century. The Dissenters were equally ill-provided ; and outside of Charles ton there was no place of worship whatever in the whole of South Carolina. The colony, however, enjoyed a period of comparative repose, and its prosperity, which had steadily increased even during the era of disruption, advanced with still more rapid strides. One of the principal productions of the country was rice, which had been introduced from Madagascar. It soon came to be regarded as the best rice in the world ; but the fields were cul tivated by negi o slaves, and the wealth of the planters was built up by a form of labour which was destined to become the special curse of America. Both the Carolinas had a considerable trade in the skins of wild animals and in timber. For the former, adventuroxis traders penetrated into the interior many hundreds of miles, and the glades of distant forests were thus made known for future colonisation. In North Carolina very few slaves were to be found, and the white people enjoyed a state of almost boundless liberty. At that time, the more northern of the two Carolinas was described as a country in which there was scarcely any govern ment ; where laws hardly existed ; and where every one did what was right in his own eyes, without paying tribute either to God or Csesar. The people were denounced by royalist writers as an evilly-disposed crew of Quakers, Deists, and Atheists : they were in truth a motley gathering of Nonconformists of all shades of opinion, the wild freedom of whose sylvan lives did not permit of much formal or public worship. The proprietors determined, therefore, to set up the Church of England among them. It waw enacted by the local Legislature that every one holding a place of trust must take an oath acknowledging the supremacy of that Church. Places of worship were erected at the public cost, and the Dissenters were discouraged by every means that could be devised. But the established form of religion made no progress. The opposition to its ministrations was deep and earnest, and the Quakers were accused of fomenting distractions in North Carolina, and spreading their anarchical views into Virginia. It is certain that for several years the colony was torn by dissensions which amounted almost to a civil war. The pro prietors appointed a Governor whom the majority of the people would not receive. The popular party elected their own Governor and their own representative Assembly; so that two authoritative bodies were ruling at the same time. Com promise was impossible, and the Government of the proprietary, wanting the support of all but a few, was scarcely able to maintain itself. Violent and revengeful enactments were passed by what must perhaps be called the legal Legislature ; but tho would-be tyrants had 110 power to enforce their own laws. It was a common practice of the North Carolinians to imprison their Governor (who was generally a deputy of the Governor of South Carolina) whenever he was displeasing to them ; and this they seem at length to have regarded as one of those customs that by repetition acquire the force of law. Doubtless they were a rough, turbu lent set of men ; but they were treated in a manner likely to exasperate them to the utmost. By 1711, the antagonism of the two parties had reached an alarming point. The malcontent--, headed by Thomas Gary, who in 1705 had been deputed to the Governorship by South Carolina, but who was afterwards deposed by the proprietors, took up arms, and, it was said at the time, w.ere prepared to ally themselves with the Indians. Edward Hyde, the ruler appointed in England, called to his aid a veteran soldier named Spotswcod, at that time the Governor of Virginia. Spots- wood was inclined to assist. He regarded the rebels as incendiaries, and believed, not without reason, that their success might endanger the whole of the Queen s dominions in America. But his military judgment told him that a country so cut up by rivers and creeks, so burdened with forests, and so ill-provided with ordinary modes of inter communication, was not fitted for the operation of large forces. A detachment of marines from the guard-ships was all the assistance sent by Spots- wood, and nothing was effected, or even attempted. Cary and his friends, on the other hand, went into Virginia, and were despatched by Spotswood to England in a man-of-war, that they might lay their case before the home Government. But it was long ere the pacification of the province was brought about. The popular leaders continued to resist the nominees of the proprietary ; the latter continued 382 OASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED (STATES. [1692. to denounce the majority as criminals for whom no treatment could be too severe. Undeterred by these intestine feuds, emigrants still sought the fertile lands of North Carolina in large numbers. Swiss established themselves at New Berne, and Germans from the Palatinate added to the rapidly increasing population of the land. There was also a rather considerable Scotch immigration into several of the southern colonies. All this while, Virginia pursued its course of prosperity without any material check. Beverley, a Virginian historian who wrote early in the eighteenth century, says there was such an entire absence of want in the province that, when five pounds were left by a charitable testator to the poor of the parish in which he lived, the sum lay nine years before the executors could find any one poor enough to be entitled to part of the legacy, and at last it was all given to one old woman.* The rich were so hospitable that they would post their servants on the main roads for the purpose of bringing to their houses any travellers who might chance to pass that way a custom arising from the want of society in a country where there were few opportunities of amusement, and which lasted to a much later period than we are now considering. One of the earliest Governors of the Old Dominion under William III. was Sir Edmund Andros, who arrived there in 1692. The fortunes of that much- reviled gentleman had been singularly checkered during the previous few years. After his seizure by the insurgents of Boston in April, 1689, he was kept in prison until February, 1690. In accordance with an order from England, he was then sent home, together with his former colleagues, for trial. To prosecute the charges against him, Massachusetts commissioned Elisha Cooke and Thomas Oakes as assistants to their representatives in England, Sir Henry Ashurst and Increase Mather. The agents, however, do not appear to have even alleged any thing against Andros; at any rate, they proved nothing ; and the accused persons were at once acquitted. Hutchinson, one of the older historians of Massachusetts, says that this miscarriage was owing to the bad management of Sir John Somers, the counsel employed by the agents ; but the pro bability is that Andros and his friends, however objectionable their policy, and however likely that policy to provoke a revolution, had not exceeded their legal powers. It certainly speaks well for Andros that he should so soon have received from the Whig monarch a new colonial appointment in America. A college had been * History of Virginia, 1705. established at Williamsburgh, in Virginia, during the rule of the last Governor ; and for this institu tion Andros brought over a charter. The college received the name of William and Mary, and the new representative of royalty laid the foundation- stone of the building. The King gave endowments to this seminary, and its funds were augmented by a tax of a penny a pound on all tobacco exported to other plantations. The William and Mary College was due to the energy of the Rev. James Blair, a Scotchman, but a minister of the Church of England, who in 1685 was sent out to Virginia by Archbishop Sancroft. In the reign of James I., Patrick Copland, chaplain of the East India Company, had made great efforts for the advancement of education in Virginia ; but his project of a college for that plantation had not met with success. It was revived with better results by Blair. The state of the settlement was such as to render some special provision for in tellectual culture highly necessary. Even as late as the beginning of last century, there was not one bookseller s shop in all Virginia, Maryland, and Carolina, Sir Josiah Child, writing in 1698, observed that "Virginia and Barbadoes were first peopled by a sort of loose, vagrate people, vicious, and destitute of means at home, being either unfit for labour, or such as could find none to employ themselves about, or had so misbehaved themselves by thieving and debau chery that none would give them work ; which merchants and masters of ships, by their agents, or spirits as they were called, gathered up about the streets of London and other places, to be employed upon plantations." This account must not be received without exceptions ; but it was true to a considerable extent. The descendants of the original emigrants shared the wildness of some among their ancestors. Their magnificent climate disposed them to indolence ; their possession of slave labour enabled them to be idle. The in humanity with which the negroes were treated moved the indignation of an English clergyman, the Rev. Morgan Godwyn, who had been in Virginia, and who on his return to England, about 1680, drew attention to the wrongs of these unhappy beings. Pi-ofligacy was rife among the people ; drinking, card-playing, horse-racing, cock-fighting, and sensual indulgence, occupied their time. The towns were so small and scattered that the coun try had the appearance of a wild desert. The condition of society was so primitive that tobacco was used as the ordinary currency, for lack of coin. Virginia was not likely to care much about scholar ship, nor were there any means of gratifying s.ich 1698.] VIRGINIA TINDER ANDROS. 383 a desire, had the colonists possessed it. In the preamble to the Statutes of the William and Mary College, the state of education in Virginia is de picted in the darkest colours. " Nowhere," says this document, " was there any greater danger on account of ignorance and want of instruction than in the English colonies of America, in which the first planters had much to do, in a country overrun with weeds and briars, and for many years infested with the incursions of the barbarous Indians, to earn a mean livelihood with bard labour. There were no schools to be found in those days, nor any opportunity for good education. Some few, and a very few indeed, of the richer sort, sent their childi-en. to England to be educated ; and there, after many dangers from, the seas and enemies, and unusual distempers occasioned by the change of country and climate, they were often taken off by small-pox and other diseases. It wa,s no wonder if this occasioned a great defect of understanding and all sort of literature, and that it was followed with a new generation of men far short of their forefathers, which, if they had the good fortune, though at a very indifferent rate, to read and write, had no further commerce with the Muses or learned sciences, but spent their life ignobly with the hoe and spade, and other employ ments of an uncultivated and tinpolished country." The rule of Andros in. Virginia was in many fespects wise and liberal, though not of a nature to enlarge popular freedom. The Governor encouraged manufactures and the cultivation of cotton, and introduced reforms into the administration of affairs. He directed that all the public papers should 1)0 sorted and kept in order in the Secre tary s office, and, when the State House was de stroyed by fire, took measures for their careful preservation. In time he gained the respect and regard of the people ; yet his powers were to some extent despotic. He was Lieutenant-General, Admiral, Lord Treasurer, Chancellor, Chief Judge, President of the Council, and head of the Church. The members ofylfhe Council wore appointed by his recommendation, and could be removed at his plea sure. He had, together with the Crown, a veto on the acts of the Assembly. He was empowered to appoint a clerk to watch over the proceedings of the Legislature. He had the right of dissolving the representative chamber whenever he chose ; and, as a perpetual revenue had been established some time before, he was net controlled by the necessity of asking from year to year for the means of mooting current expenditure. Still, the existence of a Parliamentary body of any kind is always a guarantee of liberty a germ from which any people of sense may develop an ever-increasing mass of privileges. The Virginians, though pleased with many of the acts of Andros, were not inclined to let him have his way in all things. When special funds were wanted, they refused to supply them unless they were permitted to nominate a treasurer of their own, whose orders should not be interfered with by the Governor. The Assembly gave ex pression to its opinion that it was entitled to all the rights and privileges of the English Parliament ; and it acted consistently on this view. Andres, however, had no serious difficxilty with the Virginia Assembly. His recall, which took place in 1698, was owing to a quarrel with Blair as to the admin istration of the college. The religion of Virginia was that of the Church of England as regards the major part of the popu lation. The settlement had been a royalist colony from the first, and its faith was as courtly as its politics. Yet it was not without a Puritan element as well. In 1610, when Sir Thomas Dale, who had served in the army of the States-General, was ap pointed provisional Governor of Virginia, the Nether lands made proposals for joining in the settlement of the country, and several Dutchmen planted themselves about Henrico. They were Lutherans, .".ind their minister was the Rev. Alexander Whitaker, an English Puritan, who has left some curious accounts of the native tribes, their manners, morals, and beliefs. Dissenters, therefore, were to be found in Virginia, as elsewhere; but the greater number of the people were Episcopalians. In the early days of the colony, the Virginia Company sent over clergymen to look after the settlers, but not in sufficiently large numbers, so that many were left without pastoral care. The General Assembly stated in 1623 that several of the ministers officiating in the plantation were lay men. That they were not invariably treated with respect appears from an official record stating that in 1632 a man was placed in the stocks for calling the Rev. Mr. Cotton, of Accomac, " a black-coated rascal." The Puritans flf Virginia received their preachers from New England, but in the reign of Charles I. these were expelled. The Episcopalians were equally under a cloud while the English Commonwealth lasted; but the habitual tendency of the principal Virginians reasserted itself after the restoration of the monarchy. The right of presentation to livings lay with the parishes. The clergyman was recommended by the Governor, and licensed by the Bishop of Lon don; but the actual choice was that of the parochial representatives. The hiring was from year to year; and, though English lawyers pronounced that the 384 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1688. ministers were in every case incumbents for life, The planting of the Church of England in the vestries claimed and exercised the light of dis- America was a work in which many joined with missing them at pleasure. Thus the Church of zeal, but which in some quarters made very slow England received in America a democratic element. progress. In the northern and middle colonies, it It would seem that the provision for religion was was not until the latter end of the seventeenth SOURCE OF THE ROANOKE, VIRGINIA. not very liberal. There were instances in which only one place of worship existed in parishes extend ing fifty miles in length. Often the minister was only a lay reader, chosen because he could be had at a cheap rate, and James Town itself had no preacher for more than twenty years, except at brief intervals. century that clergymen of the national Church began to obtain a recognised position. The first Episcopal society in Massachusetts was formed in 168G; and the first Episcopal chapel at Bos ton was erected in 1688. Even in the south, where the people were on the whole better in clined to such ministrations, the hindrances were 1085.] THE ENGLISH CHURCH MARYLAND. 385 numerous. It was stated by the Bishop of London in 1677 that Maryland had no settled main tenance for the ministry, the consequence of which was seen in a total absence of divine worship, except among those of the Romish belief, who, as was at that time conjectured, did not amount to one in a hundred of the population. To these representations of the Bishop, Charles, Lord Balti more, replied : "The Act of 1647, contirmed in 1676, tolerates and protects every sect. Four ministers of the Church of England are in posses sion of plantations which afford them a decent condemned to infidelity or apostasy. This lady rather pointedly reminded the Archbishop that the commission to baptise and teach all nations was large enough, to say nothing of the Marylanders being subjects of the King of England, and members of the English Church. An incidental allusion in the letter gives some idea of the difficulties which clergymen have to contend with in a voung colony. It was not to be expected, said thoughtful Mrs. Taney, that a minister should ride ten miles in a morning, and ten more before he could dine, going from house to house even in the hottest YAI.E CGI.LEGE. subsistence. From the various religious tenets of the members of the Assembly, it would be ex tremely difficult, if not impossible, to induce it to consent to a law that shall oblige any sect to main tain other ministers than its own." Anglican clergymen were sent out to Maryland by the Bishop of London ; but they either died speedily, or removed into Virginia, In 1685, the rites of the Church of England were not observed anywhere in the colony of the Baltimores, and a Mrs. Taney, wife of the Sheriff of Calvert County, wrote a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury (ISancroft), in which she said that she and her family were seized with extreme horror when they reflected that for want of the Gospel they were in danger of being 33 weather, because of the want of churches, the large extent of parishes, and the insufficiency of pa-stors. Mrs. Taney accompanied her letter with a petition to the heads of the Church, from which it appears that she had in a former year petitioned Charles II. on the subject, and that a minister had accordingly been sent out, but had died shortly after. In consequence of these representations, several clergymen were despatched to Maryland, and the Church of England acquired a hold on the people. An Act was passed by the colonial Legislature for establishing and endowing the Episcopal Church ; but the opposition of the Quakers and the Romanists was so great that this law was not enforced. In 1702, however, the 38G (JASSKLL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1714. Church of England was finally and successfully established in Maryland, together with special pro vision for the toleration of Protestant Dissenters. The transfer of power from Lord Baltimore to the representative of William III. was preceded by some disturbance. The proprietary ruler omitted to proclaim the new sovereign, even after it was officially known that James II. had been succeeded by the Prince of Orange. The people took up arms, and the deputies, who sided with Baltimore, were compelled to seek refuge in a garrison standing some little way above the mouth of the river Patuxent. Being unable to maintain themselves in this position, they capitulated, and at the same time consented to the exclusion of Papists from all offices in the colony. The government was then assumed by a convention for the defence of the Protestant religion, and an address was transmitted to King William, charging the Catholics with a series of crimes, for which there appears to have been no foundation. The Privy Council advised the forfeiture of the charter by process of law ; bxit the monarch would not risk any such method of procedure. By an arbitrary exercise of his own authority, William constituted Maryland a Royal Government under the direction of Sir Lionel Copley. The act was perhaps one of doubtful legality, though sanctioned by the opinion of Chief Jtistice Holt; yet it was a step in a good direction, since the rule of a constitutional sovereign is better than that of a proprietary lord. The investigation into the conduct of Lord Baltimore failed to esta blish the charges that had been brought against him ; and he was suffered to retain his patrimonial interest in the province, while deprived of his political powers. The democratic convention in Maryland was dissolved by Sir Lionel Copley immediately on his arrival in 1692 ; an Assembly was elected, and Annapolis was now made the seat of government. The provincial Legislature did not get 011 very well with the mother country. An Act, containing a clause which established Magna Charta as part of the public law of the province, was rejected by the Crown in 1692; and in 1696 the claim of the colony to English rights and liberties, as introduced into another Act, was similarly disallowed. Yet, in the main, the Mary- landers enjoyed a large amount of freedom. The one great exception to that condition was due to the colonial Legislature itself. The treatment of Catholics was cruel and unjust. The public pro fession of their tenets was forbidden, and they were subjected to every kind of disability ; so low had the power of Romanism fallen in a colony that had been founded by a Romanist ; so imbued with the spirit of intolerance were those who objected to intolerance in others. These tyrannical laws were suspended in 1714 by an express mandate from Queen Anne; but in the meanwhile they had done much mischief. The hardship was especially serious in Maryland, because the province had been originally colonised as a place of refuge for Catholics, and still contained a large number of persons pro fessing that form of faith. In other colonies, where Papists were not to be found, the prohibition had no worse effect than to keep them away. But in Maryland a population already Catholic in some degree was injuriously affected as regarded certain of its members. The Protestants, however, had a powerful majority, and they did what seemed good in their own eyes. Their action in the matter was not without one noteworthy effect. Benedict, son of the existing Lord Baltimore, renounced the Church of Rome for the Church of England. The physical condition of Maryland at this period, and the character of its people, were similar in many respects to those of Virginia and the Carolinas. In the southern colonies, population did not increase so rapidly as in the northern. The towns were less numerous, smaller, and not nearly so important as seats of industry and centres of political life. The pursuits of the Marylanders, as of their southern neighbours, were for the most part agricultural. They grew tobacco, and hemp, and flax. A few manufactories of linen and woollen were established for supplying the actual needs of the population : but manufacture was not what the Marylaiiders aimed at. They were content to sell their raw material to others. They were a race of landowners, cultivating whatever the soil would produce. Living on their estates, they were isolated from one another, and congregated but little in urban communities. The primitive forest, even in the early part of the eighteenth century, still divided settlement from settlement by wide inter spaces of uncoiiquered desert. The roads to the capital were marked by notches on trees, as the children s path through the forest in the old fairy tale was identified on the return journey by a trail of shining stones that had been dropped along the way. Postal communication between Maryland and Philadelphia took place only eight times a year. It was necessary to wage a constant war with wolves, as the English did in the days of Edgar. Beyond the little towns and the enclosed settle ments, savage life was fierce and triumphant. But the Indians gave the white men very little trouble, and peace for a long term of years was the rule in Maryland. 1080.] INSURRECTION IN NEW YORK. The power of the proprietary was restored in 1716, on the death of Lord Baltimore, and the succession of his Protestant heir. At the same time, however, the Royal sanction was declared to be necessary, in all the feudatory principalities of North America to confirm the nomination of the proprietary Governors. This political state was not again interrupted until the period of inde pendence ; but it seems to have had the effect of checking the development of Maryland. Govern ment hardly existed at all in the plantation of the Baltimores. If to be lawless is to be happy, a great measure of happiness should have been the portion of the Mary landers. In 1729 they were so turbulent and averse to authority that they would not allow even a militia to be established. To grow and sell their commodities, to enjoy their rough pleasures, and to tyrannise over their negro slaves, made up for them the sum of felicity. No great measure of pi-ogress was possible under such conditions. A Governor appointed by the Crown, and acting in concert with an Assembly, might have promoted a higher social life; but the people desired no such change, and it was not thrust upon them. As it was, Maryland went on in its sluggish way, without many events of importance, until drawn into the vortex of the republican war. The English Revolution of 1G88 led to some deplorable events at New York. On information reaching that city as to what had happened in the Old World, a man named Jacob Leisler, of Low Country origin, placed himself at the head of the Dutch masses, and commenced a movement in favour of William of Orange. He was a captain of militia, and therefore possessed of influence with a number of men bearing arms, and trained to the use of them. But it was only the lower orders of his countrymen whose confidence he won. The wealthy Dutch landowners looked on him with distrust as a demagogue, and the English members of the population, excepting a few I Hssenters, were heartily opposed to his designs. Leisler, like most Dutchmen, was a Presbyterian, and some of the English who shared his religious views gave a degree of support, though in no very earnest spirit, to the insurrection lie had begun. In June, 1G89, a body of armed men seized the fort at New York, and issued a declaration in support of the Dutch Prince. A committee of safety, ten in number, assumed the powers of government. Leisler took command of the fort, and despatched to King William in London a letter which was at any rate not repudiated. The province was at that time nominally under the rule of Andros ; actually, under that of his deputy, Francis Nicholson, who had declared himself in favour of a pure despotism. The known principles of Nicholson made him un popular, and he was not able to stem the tide of disaffection. In a little while, Leisler received from the insurgents the post of temporary Governor of the province of New York. The Mayor of the city, and several of the local council, protested against so illegal a proceeding, but, finding they were powerless to resist the revolution, retired to Albany. The magistrates, sitting in convention at that town, proclaimed their allegiance to William III., and with equal unanimity rejected the rule of Leisler. Milborne, a son-in-law of the chief revolutionist, was accordingly sent to Albany to demand the surrender of the fort, but met with so determined a resistance that he was compelled to return without having accomplished anything. The position of the King towards Leisler was clearly embarrassing. The humble Dutchman of New York was the fellow-countryman of the powerful monarch who now filled the throne of England. He had made his revolution on behalf of that monarch, and perhaps as much out of a sentiment of nationality as from either political or religious predilections. It was difficult, therefore, for the King to disavow him altogether, especially as he had read his communication without any signs of displeasure. But sovereigns, even when they have received their sceptres from the managers of a revolution, are jealous of any power created by a popular rising. William was disposed to support Nicholson, though he could not entirely ignore Leisler. He despatched to New York letters addressed to the former, or, in his absence, to such as were for the time being in command at the scat of government. These letters, which arrived in December, were accompanied by a commission to Nicholson to act as Governor. But the late deputy of Andros had some time previously stolen oil hoard a ship, and sailed for England. Leisler, con ceiving that the alternative direction of the letters contained a recognition of himself in the absence of Nicholson, assumed the title and authority of Lieutenant-Governor; and something like a regular government was formed in the spring of 1 GOO. A House of Representatives was elected ; measures were taken to protect the frontier against the Indians ; and Albany about the same time yielded to the new rule. Leisler confiscated the estates of the leaders who had opposed him, and by his financial operations gave great offence to numerous classes. At the commencement of his revolution, he had received some promises of support from both Massachusetts and Connecticut : he was now threatened by the secession of Long Island, which 586 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1701. solicited annexation to the latter of those two colonies. B\it events were hastening to a miserable ter mination. The King bestowed the government of New York on Colonel Sloughter, a man of small means and ill repute. His arrival was preceded by Captain Iiigoldsby, who appeared before New York in January, 1691, and, without producing any written order, demanded possession of the fort. He also issued a proclamation requiring submission; but Leisler refused to comply, while promising obedience to Sloughter as soon as he should reach the colony. When the Governor at length arrived, Leisler endeavoured to open communications with him : but Sloughter, entirely disregarding such ad vances, ordered Iiigoldsby to arrest the revolutionary leader at once, together with the persons calling themselves his council. They were tried before Joseph Dudley, formerly of Boston, and now Chief Justice in New York, who gave it as his opinion that Leisler had never possessed any legal authority whatever. Six of the council were found guilty of high treason, but reprieved. Leisler and Milborne refused to plead, and were condemned and sentenced to death. With the sanction of the Council and Legislative Assembly, they were hanged on the 26th of May, acknowledging the error they had committed through ignorance, rashness, misinforma tion, and misconstruction, but asserting the purity of their motives, their loyalty to the King and Queen, and their devotion to the Protestant religion. The original intention of Sloughter was to await the Royal pleasure as to their doom ; but it is said that the party most opposed to Leisler, after vainly endeavouring, by ordinary means of persuasion, to hasten the action of the Governor, invited him to a feast, plied him with wine until he \vas in toxicated, and thus obtained his signature to the death-warrant, which was carried out before he had recovered from the effects of his debauch. The, estates of the two victims were afterwards restored to their families, and an Act of the English Parlia ment reversed the attainder. It cannot be questioned that the treatment of Leisler was in the last degree cruel and ungrateful. His conduct may have been, imprudent, but lie rose in the interests of the very power which slew him. and he had throughout shown his readiness to act with loyalty when assured of the legal powers of those who summoned him. His sad fate, however, was due as much to the vindictive fears of his fellow-colonists as to the ort ended pride of authority at home. The Legislative Assembly contained a large proportion of men having very aristocratic inclinations, and tii^v tV;n-fd tl IP results of a popular insurrection such as that which the Dutch Pres byterian and his son-in-law had for a time made suc cessful. Yet the Legislature was regardful of the interests of freedom after its own fashion. Its members declared, in successive years, that the right to a representative Assembly and to the privileges of Englishmen was inherent in the community, not the result of Royal favour ; that supreme legislative - power belonged to the Governor, the Council, and the representatives of the people ; and that no taxes ought to be imposed but such as they levied. The King vetoed these propositions ; but he could not destroy their effect. Sloughter died suddenly on. the .2nd of August, 1691, not many weeks after the execution of Leisler and Milborne. He was followed in his office by Beirjamin Fletcher, under whose rule the people of New York began once more to think of extending their territory to the Connecticut River in one direction, and Delaware Bay in another. The King was requested to command that the neighbouring colonies should contribute towards the protection of Albany against the combined attacks of French and Indians. Orders to this effect were transmitted from England, but some of the colonies disobeyed the injunction. The administration of Fletcher was distinguished by angry contests with the Colonial Assembly regarding the position of the Church of England, to which the Governor woidd have given more exclusive privileges than the Legislature cared to sanction. When the repre sentatives of the people resisted these encroach ments, Fletcher roundly scolded them for unman nerly conduct ; said the}- were endeavouring to usurp all the functions of Government ; and asked why, when they exhibited so much zeal in reducing the salaries of others, they did not relinquish some part of their own allowance of ten .shillings a day. In 1698, the Earl of Bellamont, an Irish peer of liberal and conciliatory disposition, suc ceeded to the Governorship, with a commission which included all the northern plantations, excepting Connecticut and Rhode Island. He coalesced with the popular representatives in a very friendly spirit, and was generally regretted at his death, which took place in March, 1701. Lord Cornbury, a nobleman allied to the Royal Family, was the next ruler of New York and New Jersey ; a man the reverse of his predecessor- haughty, despotic, and unprincipled. Being grand son of the great Earl of Clarendon, nephew to the first wife of James II. when Duke of York, and cousin to Queen Aime : he considered that his relationship to Royalty gave him a right to brow- heat all who stood in his \v-tv. While still a 1709.] 389 young man, in command of a detachment of cavalry in the west of England, he betrayed the monarch whose commission lie held, by deserting to the Prince of Orange. Self-seeking was the rule of his life, and tyranny his only idea of political wisdom. He found the colony in a state of fiery -agitation, owing to a contest between the party of prerogative and the partv of privilege; and the latter had succeeded in procuring the condemna tion to death of two members of the unpopular faction for a political libel against the Lieutenant- Governor (Nanfan) and others. Lord Cornbury reversed this decision, and at once placed himself at the head of the party opposed to the majority. One of his great objects at New York was to secure the predominance of the English Church ; and this he -sought to effect by acts of the most arbitrary character, in which lie was constantly defeated by the verdicts of juries or the decisions of judges. He put Episcopalians in possession of ecclesiastical edifices which had been built by Dissenters, and thus provoked disgraceful scenes of riot and con tention. He was at issue also with the Assemblies of NCAV York and New Jersey with respect to the right of taxation, but was unable to prevail against the spirited yet temperate opposition of the people. His repeated dissolutions of the Assemblies only made his discomfiture the more complete, and at length, after threatening the Assembly with the application of certain secret powers with which he said the Queen, had armed him, he was com pelled to give way. The contest turned on the desire of Lord Cornbury to obtain a permanent revenue, over which the Legislature should have no control, and the determination of the popular repre sentatives to keep the colonial expenditure within their own power by annual grants. Lord Cornbury is accused of actually embezzling the public funds. He is also said to have emulated one of the in famous freaks of Nero, by wandering abroad dis guised in women s clothes. He was a man of profligate habits, and personally so much in debt that, on being deprived of his office in 1708, he was thrown into prison, where he remained until he succeeded to the Earldom on the death of his father, the second Lord Clarendon, in 1709. He died in Kiiglaiid in 1723. The struggle with regard to the popular control over taxation was prolonged under his successors, but always to the advantage of the colonists. Connecticut received its original charter again after the accession of William and Mary, and the thoroughly democratic constitution of the colony was once more in force. A collision, however, occurred in connection with the militia. In 1692, the command of that force was by the King conferred on the Governor of New York, Benjamin Fletcher. The people petitioned the home Govern ment against uch an interference ; but Fletcher, not choosing to wait for the decision, went to Hartford, and ordered the militia under arms. At their head appeared William Wadsworth, the senior captain of the town. He ordered the drums to beat. Fletcher commanded silence while his commission and the Royal instructions were being read. Wadswoi-th bid his men beat all the louder, and threatened, if lie were interrupted again, to make the light shine through Fletcher s body with his sword. The Governor of New York thereupon desisted, and shortly afterwards left for his own province. The question was virtually decided, and Connecticut pursued its way with much internal tranquillity. One of the happiest incidents in it.s domestic history was the founding of Yale College, in 1700, by a few small contributions of books from certain associated pastors. CH AFTER XLV. Outbreak of Superstition in Now England The Belief in Witchcraft Circumstances which conduced to that Belief in Massachu setts Agency of Cotton Mather in spreading the Disease Character of his Life and Writings Case of Mrs. Glover Witchcraft Crusade instituted by Cotton Mather- His Proceedings and Motives Outbreak of Witchcraft in the Family of the Rev. Mr. Parris The Witch Mania at Salem Tituba, the Indian Woman- Mather s Account of the Sufferings of the Bewitched -Explanation of some of the Phenomena Trial and Condemnation of the Alleged Sorcerers Judicial Murders and Reign of Terror -Publication by Mather of his "Wonders of the Invisible World "-Reaction against the "Witch Mania Recantation of the Confessing Witches, and Remorse of the Jurors Final Views of Mather on the Subject. DURING the closing years of the seventeenth century, Massachusetts was infected with a, strange epidemic of superstition, the (it-rails of which must not be passed over in this History. The belief in witch craft is as old as human records. We read of it in the Bible, and the Pagan n.-itinns of antiquity 390 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. conceived that under certain conditions men and women could acquire u command over spirits and devils. Yet the ancient world was much less affected by this particular form of superstition tlum the modern world at several periods of its his tory. The nations of the extreme north of Europe, dwelling under a dismal climate in the midst of the land, and led to vindictive acts of repression. The perverted learning of James I. did much to foster these ideas ; and the men who founded the New England colonies must have carried to the Western world a lively impression of scenes which had happened in their native country when every ugly and grotesque old woman was regarded as an THE 1!EV. COTTON MATH Eli. sombre forests and threatening wastes, were pecu liarly oppressed by a sense of diabolical mystery, and of the commerce of the known with the un known. The impish horror of the fancies which oppressed the minds of Scandinavians in Norway, Sweden, and Iceland, is unparalleled in the aberra tions of the human intellect. Some taint of this melancholy and brooding fear seems to have been transmitted to the English people from their Gothic ancestors ; and at various epochs a sudden accession of witch-fever has spread a general panic through agent of Satan for the accomplishment of dark and foul designs. The Puritan tendency to dwell at all seasons on spiritual questions, and to con template man as a being exposed to the perpetual temptation of evil powers, encouraged whatever disposition to believe in witchcraft the settlers may have derived from their early recollections, or from the opinions they bixmght out with them from England. This belief must have been still further increased by contact with the native tribes of America. As a race of Pagans, the Indians were 1683.] DESERTS AND DEMONS. regarded as being specially iu the grasp of Satan ; and there were ceremonies in connection with their religion and their social life which would be likely to prompt the idea of diabolical intercourse. We have seen that Alexander Whitaker, the missionary, called their priests a generation of vipers, of the brood of hell itself. The powows, or medicine-men, employed many conjurations in the practice of their Devils. Cotton Mather made no doubt that the powows were actually able to work a mysterious kind of mischief on the bodies of those whom they designed to injure : and many others were of the same opinion. The proximity of wide and gloomy forests in creased the original disposition of the settlers to credit whatever marvels they might hear. Any- INDIAN MEUKINK-MAX. art, and were believed to have conti-ol over the elements, and over the lives of human beings. The Indians generally \rere people oppressed by a sense of the spiritual world, which to them more fre quently took an evil than a benign aspect. They were observers of omens, dreamers of fatal dreams, the sport of ghosts and goblins, the inheritors of a mournful knowledge pointing to some occult wicked ness at the heart of things. They professed to have dealings with the unseen. Several English ministers who talked with them about such matters believed in the reality of what \vas asserted, and of course attributed it to the direct agencv of the Prince of thing that was terrible or infernal might well go on in those dim recesses, where the whisper of restless leafage, and the cries of birds and beasts not well understood, seemed always suggestive of a mys terious life beyond the life of flesh. Even the least superstitious are sometimes conscious of a certain in communicable strangeness a muffled vitality that may possibly be antagonistic to human interests in those forms and manifestations of savage nature which are not yet subdued to the purposes of man, not yet i-escued from the primeval wonder of creation. As we build cities, and enclose waste lands, and cut down, forests, the supernatural with- CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE USJTKl.) STATES. [1688. draws more and more into tlie distance. The face of earth becomes familiar ; the old chaos, with its shadows arid its voices, passes into the limbo of half- forgotten dreams ; the external world is annexed to the homestead. But where a small handful of people dwell on the skirts of a vast unreclaimed territory, human life seems almost overwhelmed by the blank awe of solitude. If men are superstitious at all, they will be super stitious here : for to such minds it is not unnatural to suppose that a land biit thinly peopled by man is occupied by spirits.* To them, the very silence of the desert is threatening ; the very emptiness makes shapes and visions out of its airy substance. The enigma of existence presses more nakedly upon the soul ; and there is little to relieve the burden of sue! i thoughts, or to "lull the sharpness of the spiritual sense. These feelings had doubtless something to do with the lamentable events which occurred during the reign of William and Mary ; but the events could never have been developed to the extent we find recorded, had not a mischievoiis superstition been stimulated to fever-heat by men whose ediica- tioii should have taught them better. One of the principal agents in spreading the belief in witch craft, and bringing a number of miserable people to a violent and ignominious death, was the cele brated minister, Cotton Mather on all accounts, a singular figure in the colonial history of New O O * England, and the most important member of a family in itself remarkable. Richard Mather, the founder of the race in America, was a Noncon formist divine who emigrated to Massachusetts in 1635, and died there after many years. His son, Increase Mather, was of American birth, and during a long life held a position of great influence in the little commonwealth which had its centre at Boston. He was for sixty-two years pastor of the North Church in that city, and was regarded by the political rulers of the community as their principal guide, not merely in questions of faith, but in affairs of state : for. the government of Massachu- * Cotton Mather dwells on this point. " In the days of Moses, it seems deserts were counted very much an habitation of devils. Yea, they really were what they were counted ; and for that cause the names of SJtediin and Zijim were put upon them ; and when the Scriptures foretel desolations to .such and such places, they still make the devils to be their inhabitants. Who can tell whether the envy of the devils at the favour of God unto men may not provoke then) to affect retirement from the sight of populous and prosperous regions, except so far as they reckon their work of tempting mankind necessary to be carried on? . . . . The devils often recede much from thence into the wilderness. (Magnolia Christ! Americana ; or, the Ecclesiastical History of New England, 1702. Book VI., chap. 7.) setts being to a great extent theocratical, the clergy were consulted on all serious issues. It was not until 1723 that Increase Mather reached the close of his life, at the age of eighty-four : but, though discharging his pastoral duties to the last, he had for a long while given place in all other matters to his son. Cotton Mather, a man of a more energetic and vehement nature, desirous of exercising a con trolling force over the minds of his fellow-citizens and the fortunes of the colony. The early annals of Massachusetts present no moi e curious subject of study than ( otton Mather. He was a true child of the socifil state which his father and grandfather had done so much to fashion. Being called to the ministry at twenty-one years of age, as an assistant to his father, he was accustomed while still a youth to regard everything from the religious point of view. Yet he was no illiterate ranter. He had received a scholarly education at Harvard College, of which institution Increase Mather was the President ; and he taught as much through the press as from the pulpit. The catalogue of his printed works, enumerated by his son Samuel at the close of his memoir of his father, numbers 382, bearing date from 1686 to 1727. Some of these, it is true, were only sermons and pamphlets; but others were large and elaborate books. The "Eccle siastical History of New England " of Cotton Mather is a perfect reflection of the odd, contradic tory nature of the man. It shows him in his strength and his weakness ; with all his acumen and all his credulity. Notwithstanding his literary skill, of which he was not without a fair measure, Mather was totally devoid of the power of selection. His net dragged high and low, and took in every thing that it found. His book is a heap of hetero geneous materials, without law or method, or witli only such law and method as still further confuse those who would consult it. With an affectation of learned elegance, he calls the several divisions by such designations as "Polybius," "Sal Gentium," " Thaumatui-gus," " Ecclesiarum Pra-lia." and so on. He distributes his matter into Books, Parts, Chapters, Sections, and Appendices ; and yet. with all this accumulation of detail, or perhaps even, by virtue of it. he leaves the casual reader almost pathless in the midst of a wild desert of information. History, biography, anecdote, and sermonising, are jumbled together in one distressing folio. Garrulity itself could not be more full of unnecessary particulars ; yet sometimes the portraiture is vivid and alive. Cotton Mather was a man of the world, though a saint ; a scholar, though a Puritan minister. He would quote stories from Pagan history to illustrate the lives of bis modern Christians; he would 1688.] WITCHCRAFT IN NEW ENGLAND. chatter about all the odd things he had ever heard, to advance the cause of the true church in Massa chusetts. He could even make his joke upon occasion, after the quaint fashion of the seventeenth century, which sxirvived in America after its decline in England. He wrote verses ; he loved anagrams ; iie could sedately sport, demurely toy, with a subject if he pleased. He gives one the impression of a man having in him the capacity of an amusing and even genial companion, yet of one who might at any moment flame forth into the controversialist and the persecutor. That New England was the sole place of refuge for genuine Christianity, and that Satan was perpetually contriving to destroy that refuge, and corrupt the people in it, were his two dominant ideas. Such was the man who fanned the fires of superstition in the country of his birth. Instances of witchcraft, of diabolical possession, of ghostly appearances, and of houses supposed to be haunted by demons, occurred from time to time in Massachusetts before the date to which we are about to refer. The solitary life of many of the colonists, the melancholy influences by which they were surrounded, the constant peril from savage Indians, and the habitual excitement of the mind on religious topics, seem not (infrequently to have produced a species of mania which perverted the senses and the perceptions of its victims. It would appeal- that the children of the English settlers -had acquired probably from Indian ser vants -a foolish habit of small conjurations and fortune-telling ; and this prepared them for a belief in necromancy. In 1688, a girl of thirteen years of age, the daughter of one John Goodwin, charged a laundress with having stolen some linen. The mother of the laundress, an old Irishwoman, better acquainted with her own language than with English, retorted by a flood of abuse. Shortly afterwards the child was taken with fits, which were at once assumed to be demoniacal. Then her sisters and brothers were afflicted in the same way. Sometimes they were deaf, sometimes they were dumb, sometimes they were blind. Their faces and bodies were distorted ; the}" would purr like cats, or bark like dogs. The history of medi cine abounds with instances of similar hysterical maladies, which are to be accounted for by certain mental arising out of certain physical conditions : but until comparatively recent times it has been usual to attribute them to sorcery. The Irish woman was set doAvn as the cause of all the sufferings of John Goodwin s children. She was put on her trial, and a witness was readv to swear that Le had heard some one else allege that old mother Glover had been seen to come down a chimney. Her house being searched, several images, made of rags, and stuffed with goats hair, were found in it ; and by means of these, according to the wretched creature s confession, she produced convulsive effects upon the children. What still further prejudiced the case against this poor woman was the discovery of the fact that she was a Homan Catholic. Thus, she was not only a witch, but a heretic ; so that to get rid of her would be a double service to the community. She was accordingly condemned and executed; but her death gave no relief to the children. On the contrary, their torments grew worse than before ; a child of other parents began to suffer; and Cotton Mather, that he might be a critical eye witness of facts that would enable him to confute the Sadducisni of a debauched age (the expressions are his own), took the eldest daughter of John Goodwin to his house, and made a study of her. He found amongst other wonderful things that the possessed girl, or rather the demon which guided her actions, had no objection to Quaker literature, the Roman Catholic services, or the Common Prayer Book of the English Church, but was much tortured by hearing the Bible read, or a prayer delivered after Puritan fashion by Cotton Mather himself; all which greatly confirmed this zealous minister in the infallibity of his own way of thinking. It may, perhaps, be some little excuse for his folly that he was at that time a very young man, not yet six-and-twenty ; but it is to be feared that at no period of his life would he have acted other wise. He has put on record a minute account of the actions of this hysterical girl, whose disease was probably mixed up with some amount of con scious deception, as such complaints not seldom are. At length the children got well ; but Mather was not inclined to let the matter rest. He had observed in the people of Massachusetts a growing tendency to resist that excessive influence of the clerical body which earlier generations had received with an awful satisfaction. He regarded this falling off as a sign of extreme wickedness, and as evidence that Satan was doing his best to break up the kingdom of the saints. The sorceries of old mo ther Glover were only another proof of the machi nations of their infernal enemy; and it would there fore be good policy to excite a species of crusade against witchcraft. He lost no opportunity of preaching or writing on the subject. He kept the idea of diabolical enchantments constantly before the popular mind. The disposition of some among the educated to doubt such narratives, or to explain 394 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1002, them on purely natural grounds, he denounced as corrupt and blasphemous. Glancing, apparently, at some of the subtleties of Quakerism, he com plained that, in the opinion of certain philosophers, the devil Avas 110 more than a quality or a distemper; that presently they would come to have no Christ but a light within, and no heaven but a frame of mind; that men counted it wisdom to credit nothing but what they saAv and felt; and that they pronounced there were no witches simply because they had seen none. Other ministers took up the same note ; but none sounded it is so loudly and persistently as Cotton Mather. He was probably sincere; yet sincerity alone is not enough to excuse a series of outrages 011 humanity and sense. In the midst of his abstract devotion to Avhat in his blindness he believed to be true and pious, it is impossible not to see a considerable regard for the interests of his order and of himself. He announced that, after his published relation of all he had observed in the case of Qoodwi& a children, he should look on the denial of devils and witches as a personal affront, resulting from ignorance, incivility, and dishonest impudence. This attempt to turn an intellectual discussion on a very recondite subject into a personal quarrel, strongly exemplifies the arrogant character of the man. Despite the \vide divergence of their eccle siastical vieAvs, the nature of this Puritan divine had many points of .similarity Avith that of his contem porary, Jeremy Collier. The book in which Mather set forth his alleged facts, and made the announcement of his mighty resolve on the subject, Avas published at Boston in 1689, and reprinted at London, Avhere the cele brated Richard Baxter prefixed to it a Preface, in whicli he declared that the evidence was so coiwiiic- ing that none but a very obdurate Sadducee would disci-edit it.* In NBAV England, the seed found a more congenial soil than in the old country. Mather s Avork circulated in large numbers, and undoubtedly had a A T ery pernicious effect on the public mind. Excitable persons began to think themselves the objects of supernatural malignity, and children, in particular, Avere affected by the prevailing fear. The next outbreak of the epidemic took place about the latter end of 1691, or be ginning of 1692, in the household of the Rev. Mr. * The work was entitled "Memorable Providences relating to Witchcraft and Possessions ; with Discoveries and Appendix." The substance was repeated by Mather in his "Magnalia. rhristi Americana," Book VI., chap. 7. Mather also published at Boston, in 1692, "The Wonders of the Invisible World," together with "Observations upon the Nature, the Number, and the Operations of the Devils," &c. ; and in the Life of Sir Willi;un Phipps (Magnalia, Book II., Appendix) the same ifj are gone into. Parris, minister of Salem, between whom and a part of his congregation there had been for some time a bitter feud. The daughter and the niece of this gentleman, both of them children not yet in their teens, began to play singular antics, afterwards fell into convulsions, and then complained of being pinched and bitten by invisible agents. The phy sicians who were consulted could make no better diagnosis of the case than that the children were under the influence of an evil tongue. At first, Parris could do 110 more for the cure of this evil tongue than to fast and pr.iy; but afterwards his suspicions fixed on an Indian Avoman, named Tituba, who lived in his house, and on her husband. The children themselves soon accused the Indian woman, and tAA o English Avomen, of persecuting them ; and all three Avere thrown, into prison. Tituba after aAvhile confessed to having acted as was alleged, and at the same time implicated the other tAvo, but, mi being released, alleged that the confession Avas ex torted from her by Mr. Parris, Avho had beaten and otherwise ill-used her until she said Avhatever lie Avanted. The infection, however, grew : Tituba herself began to suffer in ;ui unaccountable way ; numerous persons in the to\vn were taken with fits; the contagion spread into the surrounding country ; and in a feAv Aveeks the prisons were hardly able to contain the number of the accused. No fact is better ascertained than the tendency of such mental distempers to propagate themselves like any other infectious disease. A depraved state of the intellect and the moral sense is created in a given centre, and is communicated, in ever-widening circles of indefinite extent, ty contact, by rumour, by exaggerated reports, by excitement, and by fear. In the instance we are considering, the operation of this natural laAv Avas quickened by the ceaseless provocations of Cotton Mather and other clergy men. A little before the outbreak at Salem, Mather besought God that he would aAvaken the churches by some remarkable thing ; and he says that he obtained of the Lord to use him as a herald of the holy kingdom which lie believed to be ap proaching. After the accusation of Tituba and the others, he prayed for what he called a good issue by which of course he meaJit the conviction and execution of the persons cL;<rged. At service, at prayer-meetings, at fasts, the people were lashed into a state of morbid heat by the perpetual discussion of this one topic. Vanity, of a spiritual character, was no small element in Mather s disposition. He described the assault of Satan 011 the virtue of Massachusetts as a "particular defiance" to himself. It was therefore, to his-; perverted reasoning, a necessity that he should take up the gage, and fight THE TKIALS FOR W1TCHCJKAFT. the devil by every means in his power. A hearty coadjutor was found in Parris, who informed against the suspected, questioned them before the magis trates, acted ;>s witness, and exerted himself to the utmost to obtain convictions. It is said that in charging particular individuals he was guided by personal enmities arising out of the disputes in which he had been involved, and that he passed over others against whom he had no grudge. The accu sations rapidly increased in number, and the slightest circumstance was sufficient to bring a woman under the ban of this clerical informer. Men also were proceeded against, especially if they had the courage to express disbelief in the reality of the possessions. George Burroughs, a clergy man, whom some of the Salem people had desired to be their pastor instead of Parris, was one of those who were committed to prison for doubting the truth of what was alleged. Cotton Mather is very precise in his descriptions of the way in which the afflicted Avere made to suffer. He says that their limbs were horribly distorted and convulsed ; that they were pinched black and blue ; that pins were invisibly run into their flesh : and that they were scalded till blisters were raised. One of the bewitched was assaulted by a spectre armed with a spindle, which no one else in the room could see, till the afflicted per son, in one of her agonies, snatched it out of the phantom s hand, when it became visible. Another was haunted by a spectre in a sheet, of which the sufferer tore away a corner, and then showed it to the others. Sometimes poison was forced on the afflicted by a hand which could not be seen ; and after they had drunk it they became swollen, and were relieved bv the medicines usually given in J O such cases. Poison was seen to drop \ipon their pillows, and the smell of it was detected. Some times they complained of burning rags forced into their mouths ; and, although no such thing was observable by others, the burns presently appeared about their lips. Invisible brands would be heated at the fire, for searing the flesh ; and the sufferers were subsequently found to be marked as by red- hot iron. These injuries, were produced by a sort of ghostly double of the witch, which could be seen by no one but the afflicted ; and if this diabolical shadow was wounded by the person haunted, a corresponding hurt would be found on the suspected sorcerer. It was often perceived that the flesh of the afflicted wan bitten, so that the print of teeth was visible, corresponding to the teeth of the accused. In the beginning, the sufferers would be tendered a book, and asked to sign their names in it ; when, if they refused, the spectres under com mand of the Black Man would commence a series of prodigious tortures.* These were the phantasies or the impostures which Cotton Mather put forth for facts. A sensible merchant of Boston one Robert Calef published an answer to Mather s state ments, in which he alleged that the story of the sheet was a palpable forgery, the corner having been provided by the afflicted person the day before. The print of teeth was produced by the patients biting themselves ; and sometimes the accused, instead of having a set of teeth, were destitute of even one. The same writer mentions a remarkable circumstance which took place at the trial of Sarah Good. During the progress of the trial, one of the afflicted fell into a fit, and cried out that the prisoner s spectre was stabbing her with a knife, and had broken it in her body. In proof of the reality of this assertion, she pulled a piece of the blade out of her breast, and showed it in court. A young man Avho was present, however, said that the knife was his; that he had broken the blade the day before, and thrown away the piece in the presence of the afflicted person. He then produced from his pocket the corresponding por tion, which was found to fit exactly. But the judge simply reprimanded the witness, and bade her tell no more lies. The accused got no benefit from the proved cheat. Bradstreet, who was occupying the post of Go vernor at the time the Salem witch-fever broke out, conceived that the evidence against the accused was insufficient. But on the 14th of May, 1692, Sir "William Phipps arrived from England with the King s Commission as Governor of the colony; and Mather, with his friends, received a powerful reinforcement. On all such subjects the mind of Phipps was of the weakest. He was one of those men whose religion runs into fanaticism, and whose thoughts of the spiritual world are qualified by a large element of the slavish. Moreover, he permitted himself to be swayed by Mather in matters of which he sup posed himself to be ignorant; and, arriving in the midst of the excitement about sorcery, he adopted the views of his pastor. A court of over and terminer was at once instituted by the new Governor to try the persons suspected of witchcraft. Stoughton was made the Chief Judge ; and the coiu-t opened on the 2nd of June. The first trial was that of Bridget Bishop, an old woman, who, being speedily condemned, was hanged on the 10th of the month, protesting her innocence. At the next session of the court, five more women were * Magnalia Christi Americana, Book II., Appendix. 3UG CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1692. sentenced. One of these, Rebecca Nurse, was at first acquitted ; but, the court objecting to the verdict (being, as it would seem, frightened by the hideous outcries of the accusers and the afflicted), and the prisoner making use of some ambiguous -words which were interpreted as an admission of the alleged fact, the jury, after some hesitation, found her guilty. The evidence brought against the accused persons was quite worthless. It comprised all the old stock horrors about super- swear that some wretched old woman had be witched it, though he had held his tongue upon the subject for half a generation.* Many of the accused loudly denied the truth of what was stated against them. Sarah Good, who had long been accounted a melancholy, distempered woman, was urged at the gallows to confess ; where upon she turned fiercely on the minister of Salem, who had remarked that she was a witch, and that she knew it, and exclaimed, " You are a liar ! I MARTHA CORY AND HER PERSECUTOR?. natural appearances, malicious injuries done to the witnesses themselves or to their cattle, diabolical gatherings, and so on. Some of these stories seem to indicate that the persons relating them were asleep at the time, or under the influence of nightmare, or afflicted v. ith epileptical fits ; and that the visions thus induced received the shape and colour of the prevailing superstition. Others, doubtless, were sheer inventions, put forward with the design of revenging old quarrels. The court allowed the witnesses to ransack their memory for circum stances, or alleged circumstances, of twenty or thii-ty years back ; and some of the testimony was simply hearsay, or conjectural. Any man whose cow or whoso pig had had a fit, was permitted to am no more a witch than you are a wizard ; and if you take away my life, (loci will give you blood to drink." But sevei al of the accused confessed a fact not at all surprising when we know that con fessions were actually purchased by the promise of immunity from death, while it was evident that the non-confessors would be hanged without the slightest hope of mercy. The prisoners who admitted the truth of the charges made against them, became in * Daniel Neal, whose good feeling and good sense rarely deserted him, discredited all these absurd stories of witch craft. (History of Xew England, Vol. II., chap. 7.) He also spoke of the powows as a set of impostors, having no claim to supernatural knowledge or influence. (Vol. I., chap. 1.) But in 1720 opinion had advanced a long way beyond 1C92. 1692.] WITCH CONFESSIONS. 397 their turn accusers, and sought to gain favour by the reality of witchcraft. So great a height did implicating others in the alleged conspiracy of the insanity reach, that a dog belonging to a Satan. A regular trade of accusations sprang up, gentleman accused of witchcraft was hanged as as in England during earlier times. All the an accomplice of its master. In some cases, the most sordid passions of human nature were required evidence was extorted from unwilling mmW^&^^m^im lltfflWllllllilltll U !II!UIIII!U!I :r- :i!": ,iin;ii NKI .(.; . Bill "MII limn 111 mill Illll III i HIM II mi llh 11 ,nu<iu nut .HUM IIIHIIMIII iiiln,n inmnmti nniiilUii FRANCIS IXXLOJSTOIS* LOLON OIS THE Ht CCAN EER. aroused, and fear and suspicion prompted cruelties beyond measure. No man was safe unless he fell in with the prevailing mood. A constable who had been ordered to arrest some suspected witches re fused to do so, owing, probably to scruples of sense and humanity. He was immediately denounced by the afflicted, tried, convicted, and hanged. The clergyman Burroughs met with no better fate ; he had committed the unpardonable offence of doubting 34 witnesses by threats, or by actual torture ; and the persons bearing this perjured testimony after wards acknowledged the fraud with deep contrition. A girl, whose evidence had led to the conviction of her grandfather, retracted her statements in a little while. The magistrates cast her into prison, and proceeded to hang the old man without fur ther delay ; while the girl herself and both her parents had a narrow escape. 398 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1692. In all, twenty-eight persons were sentenced to death, upon insufficient evidence, for an impossible offence. Of these, nineteen were hanged, and one a man of eighty was pressed to death for refus ing to plead. He had seen that all the previous trials had ended in convictions, and, knowing that the same witnesses would be produced against him, declined to submit to such a prejudiced tribunal. The death of this man by the process known as the peine forte et dure a relic of Anglo-Norman cruelty was the only instance of the kind that has ever occurred in New England. Samuel Wardell, who had confessed and received the promise of his life, withdrew his admissions, and was executed. Martha Cory, when visited in prison by Parris and other clergymen, rebuked her persecutors in lan guage of terrible sternness, and was excommuni cated before being hanged. Maiy Easty, who is described as a woman of great sweetness of disposi tion and of earnest piety, was equally firm in exposing the cruelty and falseness of the testimony upon which she and others had been convicted. She sent a petition to the judges and ministers, praying that further inquiry might be made, not into her own case, but into those of the others, that no more innocent blood might be shed ; for, said she, "I know you are in the wrong way." The Rev. Mr. Burroughs made a powerful impression by his demeanoiir at the foot of the gallows. He asserted his innocence in a touching and solemn speech, and repeated the Lord s Prayer with so imich fervency and exactness that many were moved to tears, and it was feared that a rescue would be attempted. But Cotton Mather, who was riding about on horseback among the crowd, insisted on the guilt of Burroughs, and bid the spectators remember that the devil himself could sometimes assume the appearance of an angel of light. The fickle people were persuaded, and in a little while the lifeless body of Burroughs was tumbled into a grave together with several more. Among the other persons hanged was Rebecca Nurse, who had in the first instance been ac quitted. Sir William Phipps was induced to grant a reprieve in the case of this unhappy creature, who seems to have been a person of exemplary life. But Parris exerted himself against any mercy being shown ; and the reprieve was recalled. Throughout the whole miserable business, the clergy were the most remorseless of the persecutors. Noyes, one of the ministers of Salem, gloated over the execu tions with an unnatural joy. " There hang eight firebrands of hell ! " he cried, pointing to the dangling bodies. The trials and executions lasted throughout the summer and early autumn. By the close of Sep tember, 1692, twenty persons had been put to death, and fifty-five had been tortured or threatened into making confessions. A hundred and fifty persons were in prison, and above two hundred more under accusation. Several of the accused managed to make their escape ; and the lives of those who confessed were invariably spared. But the consistent assertors of their innocence received the hardest measure ; and no subsequent admission of witnesses that they had perjured themselves, no acknowledgment of the jury that they had erred in their verdict, sufficed to save a non-confessing pri soner from the gallows. Everything was done to envenom the cases for the prosecution, and to dis courage and browbeat all who hung back from aiding the convictions. Perjury, however obvious and undoubted, was no bar to the same witness testify ing against others. Terrorism was the only law, and no position was a safeguard against the denun ciations of madmen or of scoundrels. Dudley Bradstreet, a Jxistice of the Peace at Andover, who had granted warrants against thirty or forty sup posed witches, was accused, together with his wife, of killing nine persons by enchantment, and was forced to fly the country. He had given offence by refusing to grant any more warrants, and, being no longer a friend, was at once reckoned among the enemies of Mather and his party. But the evil at length reaclfed a point at which reaction was inevitable. Cotton Mather found antagonists who disputed his reasonings and denied his conclusions. The sentences at Salem were openly canvassed, and Mather considered it neces sary to make a special effort against the growing opposition to his infatuated cruelty. In October, 1692, he published his "Wonders of the Invisible World," one of the most melancholy exhibitions- of elaborate folly, tending to a malignant purpose, that literature can show. It is painful to be obliged to add that Increase Mather was 110 wiser than his son. He had in 1684 put forth "An Essay for the Recording of Illustrious Pro vidences, especially in New England," in the course of which he gave his sanction to the belief in wizardry and devilish enchantments ; and when the son published his account of the witch-trials at Salem, the father, in his capacity as President of Harvard College, conveyed to him his appro bation. Shortly afterwards, Increase Mather himself printed " A Further Account of the Trials of the New England Witches," to which he added " Cases of Conscience concerning Witchcrafts and Evil Spirits personating Men, written at the Request of the Ministers of New England." The 1692.] DECLINE OF THE WITCH-MANIA. 399 fact is that only a few men in those days had suffi cient courage to question such diabolical agencies. Divines were never weary of asserting that he who denied witchcraft must in his heart deny God ; and inquiry was stifled by the assumption that the mere wish to inquire was evidence of a nature utterly depraved. But the very extravagance of the belief in New England, as manifested by the outbreak of 1692, conduced to its ultimate decay. Notwithstanding all the power of the Mathers, the reaction, having once begun, gathered force with every day. Phipps might praise Cotton Mather for his literary performance, which was published by the special command of the Governor; Judge Stoughtoii might consider that a wonderful service had been rendered to New England, as he declared in an epistle to his reverend friend, pre fixed to the book ; but the mass of the people were not persuaded. The first awakening of the popular conscience took place at Andover, in October, 1692, about the time that Cotton Mather published his report of the trials. The town of Andover had been the scene of a particularly violent outbreak of the witch-mania. A man, fancying his wife was bewitched when she was sick of a mortal distemper, sent to Salem for some of the experienced witch- tinders of that town ; and, in a few weeks, more than fifty persons were accused. Upon this, the people of Andover, with their minister at their head, appeared before the General Assembly at Boston, and presented a remonstrance against the doings of the court at Salem. The Assembly was not indisposed to listen to such representations. The whole question of witchcraft had been discussed at a meeting of ministers which the Governor had summoned in the middle of June, when several of the clergymen present gave it as their opinion that the apparition of persons afflicting others was 110 proof of their being witches ; that it was not incon sistent with the righteous government of God to permit the devil to assume the shape of good men ; that a good name obtained by a good life ought not to be forfeited by mere spectral accusations ; and that alterations made in the sufferers by a look or a touch of the accused were 110 infallible evidences of guilt, seeing that they might be brought about by the devil s legerdemain. At the same time, the ministei-s recommended to the Government "the speedy and vigorous prosecution of such as had rendered themselves obnoxious, according to the direction given in the laws of God, and the whole some statutes of the English nation for the detec tion of witchcrafts." Fortified by these opinions, which Increase Mather says he and his son agreed to, the General Assembly, while adopting the old English law on the subject in the autumn of 1692, abrogated the special court at Salem (a court that had really no legal existence at all), and established, another tribunal, which, that the prevailing fever might have time to spend itself, was not to meet for some months. Stoughtoii was to preside in the new as in the former court ; but it was probably hoped that juries would be less subser vient. The matter began to look serious when the afflicted actually accused the wife of Sir William Phipps, and near relations of the Mathers them selves, of being concerned in witchcraft. The new tribunal met early in January, 1693, when, out of fifty-six bills brought in against per sons for witchcraft, the grand jury ignored thirty ; and, of the twenty-six persons tried, the petty jury convicted but three, whom the Governor pardoned. The delusion had passed ; sanity and right feeling had returned to tlie people.* A gentleman of Boston, who had been accused by the afflicted of Andover, sent a writ to arrest his ac cusers in an action for defamation for 1,000; and from that time the accusations at Andover gradually ceased. The confessions of so-called witches were no longer received as of any worth. In the case of one Mary Watts, who confessed, the grand jury, looking upon her as a [>e rson demented, threw o\it the bill ; and, although the court bent them back to reconsider their decision, they stoutly adhered to it. Six women who had previously confessed to witchcraft now withdrew their confessions in a cer tificate in which they stated that they had been induced to criminate themselves in the hope of being spared, and because they had been so ques tioned, talked at, and Ijewildered by a number of gentlemen, that at length they hardly knew what they said, but assented to whatever was suggested to them by the examiners. The torture, however, was not simply mental in all cases. John Procter, one of the convicted, affirmed in a letter to the ministers of Boston that several of the accused, including his son, were tied neck and heels till the blood was ready to gush from them, in order to extort a confession. This was before the * Mr. Bancroft very disingenuously insinuates (History of the United States, Vol. II., chap. 19), that the temporary insanity which produced so much evil was due to a few offieials appointed by the English Crown. It is true that Phipps, and Stoughton, and the judges generally, were at that time appointed by the parent State ; but the superstition had been mainly encouraged by Cotton Mather, his father, and some of the other ministers, who had nothing to do with the old country. The jurors who convicted were Massachusetts men no doubt, good average specimens of the race ; and the feeling they represented was one which at that time was dying out in England, though it is evident that in America it had an acrid intensity of life. 400 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1693. tide began to turn; and Procter was hanged, to gether with the others. Efforts were made, early in 1693, for the convic tion of Sarah Daston, who had had the reputation of a witch for twenty years. A very large body of evidence was brought against her; but a verdict of acquittal was the only result. Cotton Mather then made a great noise about a case of witchcraft occurring in his own parish, which he alleged he had cured by his prayers ; but the state ment was exposed to ridicule by Robert Calef, whom Mather afterwards described as "a coal from hell." All further prosecutions were now stopped ; per sons who had escaped were not searched after; those still in prison were set free ; and in a little while Sir William Phipps pardoned all who were under sentence of condemnation. It is worthy of note that in the height of the persecutions witch craft was supposed to be of daily occurrence, and that when the persecution ceased there was an end of the alleged cases of devilish malignity. Cotton Mather says that, as a consequence of the prosecutions, Satan was tied up in tighter chains, and thus withheld from vexing the land ; and that the accused had generally been quiet since their pardon.* He could not see that the delu sion vanished with the excitement which he had so sedulously kept up. Parris, notwithstanding a humble confession of his wrong-doing, was driven out of Salem by the popular indignation. Noyes, the fellow-minister of Parris, acknowledged his cruelty, prayed for forgiveness, and gave up his life to works of charity. Stoughton passed the remainder of his days in sullen isolation from the majority of his countrymen ; acknowledging, indeed, that he might perhaps have been in error, but contending that, as he had acted to the best of his understanding, and with the fear of God be fore his eyes (a phrase often used to cover a vast amount of wrong-doing), he did not feel called on to express any contrition. Sewall, another of the judges, made a public recantation in the South meeting-house at Boston; and the Salem jurors of 1692 published a paper, in which they said: " We confess that we ourselves were not capable to understand, nor able to withstand, the mysterious delusions of the Powers of Darkness and Prince of the Aii*, but were, for want of knowledge in our selves, and better information from others, prevailed with to take up such evidence against the accused as, on further consideration and further informa tion, we justly fear was insufficient for the touching the lives of any (Deut. xvii. 6) ; whereby we fear we have been instrumental with others, though igno- * Magnalia, Book VI., chap. 7. rantly and unwittingly, to bring upon ourselves and this people of the Lord the guilt of innocent blood, which sin the Lord saith, in Scripture, he would not pardon (2 Kings xxiv. 4) ; that is, we suppose, in regard of his temporal judgments. We do therefore hereby signify to all in general, and to the surviving sufferers in especial, our deep sense of, and sorrow for, our errors, in acting on such evidence to the condemning of any person. And we do hereby acknowledge that we justly fear that we were sadly deluded and mistaken, for which we are much disquieted and distressed in our minds ; and do therefore humbly beg forgiveness, first of God, for. Christ s sake, for this our error, and pray that God would not impute the guilt of it to our selves nor others ; and we also pray, that we may be considered candidly and aright by the living sufferers, as being then under the power of a strong and general delusion, utterly unacquainted with and not experienced in matters of that nature. We do heartily ask forgiveness of you all whom we have justly offended, and do declare, according to our present minds, we would none of us do such things again for the whole world ; praying you to accept of this in way of satisfaction for our offence, and that you would bless the inheritance of the Lord, that he may be entreated for the land." Even Cotton Mather, some years afterwards, admitted that things had been carried too far, as appeared to him from the great number of persons accused ; from the characters of those persons, several of whom were of blameless and holy lives ; from the number of the afflicted, which increased to about fifty, and gave just ground to suspect some mistake; from the conduct of the prisoners at their execution, where they denied their guilt with great solemnity, which could hardly have been a falsehood in all cases ; and from the fact that similar mistakes had been made in other parts of the world, t Besides, he had by this time discovered (perhaps from the teachings of his father, who was very learned on the point, or perhaps from certain Dutch and French ministers in the province of New York, who during the height of the epidemic were consulted on the subject) that Satan could assume the shape of an innocent person, and in that shape do mischief to the bodies and estates of mankind ; and he even granted that some of the confessing witches (he would not allow the observation to apply to all) had been in a sort of preternatural dream, wherein they had said of themselves they knew not what.:}: t Magnalia, published at London iu 1702, and written a few years earlier. Book VI., chap 7- J Ibid. Book II., Appendix. 1565.] THE BUCCANEERS OF AMERICA. 401 The question has been raised whether, in these terrible prosecutions, Cotton Mather acted with sincerity, or was swayed throughout solely by the desire of increasing his personal and professional influence. The point is one very difficult, if not absolutely impossible, to determine ; and it is there fore wiser, as well as more charitable, to give the offender the benefit of whatever doubt may natu rally exist in the mind on a subject so dark and perplexed. Mr. Bancroft appeal s to take the most unfavourable view ; and it is, indeed, a hard matter to resist a feeling of indignant scorn at so much cruelty, so much intellectual blindness, so much ignorance where a liberal education seemed to give men a right to expect knowledge, so much which in effect was criminal and disastrous in the highest degree. That Mather hoped to turn the witch- mania to the advantage of the body he belonged to that he saw, in the excitement which he partly created, and in a great degree sustained, a means of re-establishing the waning power of the clergy in all its old force is certain ; and to that extent a taint of self-interest attaches to his conduct. But it is very possible, or perhaps we should rather say it is probable, that he was really convinced of the reality of the supposed witchcrafts. We must not judge the men of one age by the standards of another ; or at least we should judge them with all due allowance for the influence of recognised ideas. Some children had, in the first instance, been strangely affected ; and it was usual in those days to attribute these maladies to a diabolical source, and to suspect particular persons of being the agents by which the malignity of Satan was brought to bear on the afflicted. Medical science was in a very backward state ; such disturbances had not been watched with a view to discover in them a natural cause ; it was taken for gi anted that they lay within the sphere, not of the physician, but of the divine. Some years afterwards, Cotton Mather gave a certain degree of attention to medical sub jects, and was instrumental in introducing into Boston the practice of inoculation for small-pox recently brought to England frorii Constantinople by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. But in 1692 he had probably thought of little else than the doc trines of religion, and to the end of his life he would have held such cases to be supernatural. The whole tenor of New England life helped to foster the state of mind out of which such fears arise ; and it is likely that Cotton Mather could no more help believing in witchcraft than the ignorant Neapolitan peasant of our own day can help be lieving in the Evil Eye. The minds of men &re in a great measui-e formed by inherited opinions ; and superstition is a plant which dies down slowly. It appears from the diary of Cotton Mather that there were times when he had temptations to Atheism, and to the abandonment of all religion as a mere delusion. The revelation bears a terrible commentary on the man, and on the age and country in which he lived. Such misgivings were owing, not to any spirit of intellectual scepticism, for that had not yet appeared in America, but to the natural revulsion of the mind from a system of religion morbidly overstrained, and arrayed in the most gloomy colours and the most forbidding forms. Mather had placed his religion in antagonism to natural feeling, to intellectual progress, to inquiry, to sense, to joyfulness and beauty, to art and science, to all that is noblest and sweetest in the human soul. What wonder if those deathless foes rose up sometimes, and smote him to the heai t 1 ? What wonder if, in mere blind and casual obedience to outraged principles, he reeled back from his own false standard, and, seeing for the moment nothing but chaos, doubted of that which the more temperate and rationally pious never dream of questioning 1 CHAPTER XLVI. The Buccaneers of America Origin of the Term "Buccaneer" Piracy in the Roman Empire Claim of Spain to the entire Sovereignty of America Resistance to this Claim the Beginning of Buccaneering Extreme Cruelty of the Spaniards towards all but Spanish Settlers in the West Indies English, French, Portuguese, and Dutch, in the "West Indian Seas- Sacking of Spanish Towns and Spanish Ships" The Brethren of the Coast," or Early Buccaneers- -Laws by which the Fraternity was governed Attractive Character of the Lives led by West Indian Sea-Rovers Head-quarters of the Buc caneers in the Islands of St. Christopher and Tortuga Career of Francis Lolonois Henry Morgan s Exploit at Maracaibo Pillage of Panama by Morgan Second Expedition of Buccaneers to Panama Adventures of Captain Dampier and Others Division between the English and French Buccaneers Pirates in the Eastern Seas The Earl of Bellamont and William Kidd Execution of Kidd, and Inquiry into the conduct of Lord Bellamont Subsequent History of the American Pirates. AMERICA in the seventeenth century would not be completely described without some notice of the Buccaneers those daring and often bloodthirsty rovers of the sea who made a prey of Spanish mer- 402 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1565. cantile vessels, and, while acting simply for tlieir own private gain, restrained tlie egregious pre tensions of a grasping and selfish Power. Although comparatively few of these criminals were American by birth, and although the scene of their exploits was often far to the south of the United States, the English colonies were so much affected by their operations that it will be advisable to trace their whole career from its beginning. A large part of the romance of American annals is asso ciated with freebooters of the ocean, whose flags carried terror along the Atlantic and other coasts, and whose leaders often exhibited a degree of genius which, in the service of regular Governments, would have given them high rank as naval or military commanders. The Buccaneer of the New World had much the same characteristics as the Corsair or Algerine pirate of the Mediterranean; and the same kind of sentimental admiration generally quite misplaced has gathered about the one as about the other. Adventurous deeds, whatever the motive, or however great the cruelty by which they may be accompanied, will always excite the sympathy of the young and quick-blooded. One thinks of figures like those of Henry Morgan, Richard Sawkins, William Kidd, and others of the same era, as of the banditti described in "Gil Bias." They are robbers, but they are pic turesque. They are ruffians, yet they do not lie entirely beyond the sphere of a reasonable interest. They may be vicious, but they are not vulgar. The wild blood of the old Vikings throbs again in their veins. The gust of fighting, the passion of freedom, the appetite to acquire, the large capacity to enjoy, were theirs; and if their lives were deeply stained with crime, so were the lives of men of much greater position in the world, whose history has in it nothing of the sharp sting of ocean winds, the salt and savour of the variable sea. The term Buccaneer is derived from a Caribbee Indian word, denoting a peculiar way of curing and preserving the flesh of cattle. The flesh so cured was called Boucan, whence the French, who had dealings with the Caribbees, made the verb boucaner, to dry red without salt. The earliest Buccaneers, so called, were French settlers in that part of Hispaiiiola which the Spaniards had de serted in the second half of the sixteenth century. These Frenchmen at first employed themselves in hunting and taking the black cattle that ran wild there, the flesh of which they dried after the Indian method ; but, being joined by large numbers of English, Dutch, and other seamen, all of whom had a strong feeling of enmity towards the Spaniards, they built ships, aad carried on pri vateering expeditions against Spanish commerce, without being very particular if chance threw the ships of friendly nations also in their way. By the French, these sea-rovers were commonly called Flibustiers, from which the Americans in modern times have made the well-known, designation of Filibuster. The origin of the expression is to be found in our own word " freebooter; " so that the English and the French have to some extent inter changed terms in the designation of these marine robbers. Piracy is a very old form of crime. It existed in the ancient as in the modern world ; and the sea-rovers of Asia Minor, in the later days of the Roman Republic, carried their depredations to such lengths that the commerce of the Mediterranean was to a great extent crippled. They seized on Julius Csesar when, as a very young man, he was returning from the court of Nicomedes, King of Bithynia, and did not release him until they had been paid an enormous ransom. Csesar afterwards took their fleet, and executed several of the free booters ; but the mischief was only checked for a time. These desperadoes did not confine their operations to the sea. They are reported to have sacked four hundred cities, laid several others under contribution, plundered the temples of the gods, and ransacked the houses of noblemen on the Tiber. Persons of high position were seized on shore, with a view to their redemption by a money payment; and the power of the robbers grew so great, and was so well supported by for tresses and castles along the coasts, that it was found necessary to send Pompey against them with a large fleet and an equally large army.* In this Avay they were subdued ; but the evil became as bad as ever in the decline of the Roman Empire, and so continued for many centuries. The Greek islands, owing to the security offered by their narrow and sinuous waters, were perfect nests of pirates; a Greek sea-rover established him self on the throne of Algiers; and the Barbary freebooters were long the terror of the ocean. The Sea-Kings of Scandinavia were little better than robbers on a large scale ; and the Saxon tribes who conquered England might have carried on their flags the Buccaneers insignia of a death s head and crossed bones. It was to be expected that this institution of the Old World would pass the Atlantic, and germinate anew on the shores of America. The preposterous assumption of Spain, to be * Plutarch : Lives of Pompey and Julius Caesar. 404 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1565. considered the sole and undisputed mistress of all America, had much to do with the origin of Buc caneering. This assumption was based on alleged priority of discovery ; though it is very certain that the American continent (setting aside the outlying islands) was first revealed to an English ship, as far as any exact historical knowledge will take us.* Spain, however, was supported in her rapacity by Pope Alexander VI., who, by a famous bull, handed over the whole vast territory to the sway of Madrid. It was of course impossible to make good such a claim; but Spain did her utmost to exclude other nations from trading or settling in the West Indies. The English and French were the most enterprising of all in their attempts to establish themselves there, and the Spaniards treated them with merciless severity. They were literally murdered wherever they could be found. When an English ship, in 1517, appeared at St. Domingo with a request for liberty to trade, the Spanish Governor opened fire on her, and was afterwards reproved by the authorities at home for not seizing the vessel, and destroying all on board. When the French Protestants, in 1564-5, endea voured to plant a colony in the southern portion of what is now South Carolina, the Spaniards pur sued them there, and slew the greater number. Every foreigner seen on the coasts in that part of the world was punished as a robber ; and the mere spirit of opposition and retaliation caused a large number of enterprising sailors to defy such tyrannical ordinances, and to treat the wrong-doers with the same severity that they meted out to others. The attraction to those regions was of course very great. Immeasurable wealth was to be discovered there; the opportunities for adven ture and for gain were boundless. Countries like England, France, and Portugal were not likely to submit to the selfish policy of Spain. They had ships in plenty, and daring hands to navigate them. The thoughts of all the chief European nations were being directed to commerce and colonisation as the great regenerators of a world which had out grown feudalism, and was compelled to seek for some new order that might supplant the old. The West offered more openings than any other quarter of the globe ; and it was not in the power of any Papal bull or Spanish decree to curb the enterprise of races to whom it was natural to be foremost in all the great struggles of life. The West Indies swarmed with alien fleets not long after the discovery of America. In 1526, Thomas Tyson, an English mariner, was sent out * See p. 8 of this volume. there as factor to some merchants. Then the French penetrated into Brazil ; the Portuguese followed, and, as the century advanced, the Dutch, who were beginning to assert their separate exist ence, and to share the trade of the world, made their appearance in those western seas which Spain was vainly endeavouring to close against all vessels but her own. By the second half of the sixteenth century, several cities of importance had sprung up along the coasts of Spanish America. They abounded in precious metals, in jewels, and in the most costly articles of commerce. Between these cities and the ports of Spain, numberless ships, laden with the riches of the wealthiest lands, were constantly passing to and fro. The temptation was too great to be resisted. Treated as pirates even when they desired nothing but fair and equal trade, it is no wonder if the interlopers turned on their enemies, and considered it no great sin to sack and destroy a town, or to seize a merchant- vessel. They knew that in any case they might be condemned to an ignominious death, and they considered that their adversary s own acts had established a state of war between them, of which they were entitled to take every advantage. It fared ill with the single galleons of Spain when they encountered the adventurers of England or France. Those " pageants of the sea," those " sig- niors and rich burghers of the flood," had to fight hard for their existence, and did not always prevail. The cities were scarcely more safe than the floating argosies. The Spaniards trembled for their possessions, and found it necessary to employ guarda-costas (guard-ships) for the protection of their commerce and their shores. The commanders of these vessels were instructed to massacre all their prisoners ; nevertheless, piracy was far from being suppressed. It had not yet become the institution into which it was afterwards developed, nor was the term Buccaneering invented until early in the seventeenth century ; but in the reign of Queen Elizabeth Spanish ships and Spanish towns were attacked by roving Englishmen, who regarded them as perfectly fair game. Raleigh, in some of his expeditions, was in no respect to be distinguished from a pirate. Grenville, Cavendish, Gilbert, Drake, and other famoiis seamen of that time, were never very scrupulous in their dealings with Spaniards. The feeling of national enmity was greatly exasperated after the attempted invasion of England by the Armada, and it came to be considered almost a point of patriotism to vex the subjects of Pl:ilip II. wherever they could be found. It cannot be denied that many acts were committed bv these adventurers which are not to be justified 1C50.J BUCCANEER LIFE. 405 either by international law or by morals ; but the provocation given by Spain must always be borne in mind in considering the aspects of the case. At a somewhat later period, the English, French, Dutch, and other sea-rovers, coalesced in a kind of guild or fraternity sometimes called " The Brethren of the Coast," and Buccaneering became a regular profession, sustained by a spirit of corporate honour (whatever the crimes of individual members), and governed by a fixed code of laws. To some extent, these pirates held their property in common ; but prizes were distributed in proportion to the rank of each man. All the necessaries of life were to be equally shared. As a rule, each robber had a declared comrade, and the two divided their entii-e property as long as they lived together. When either died, the other took the whole ; but this extreme form of comradeship did not always exist, for Buccaneers have been known to bequeath pro perty by will to their friends in Europe. Amongst themselves, no bolts, locks, or other modes of fastening, were to be used, since such things would imply a doubt as to each other s honour. That they were not without a genuine sentiment of mutual obligation is certain, and their vices were relieved by the virtues of courage and self-reliance. They were not unfrequently religious, after the fashion which use and custom had recommended to them. A French flibustier shot one of his crew in church for behaving irreverently during mass. The English pirates were often Puritanical, and were very particular that the Sabbath shoiild be kept holy. It might have been supposed that such wide divergences of religious belief, amongst men to whom religion was not indifferent, would lead to constant and sanguinary dissensions ; but such does not seem to have been the case. The interests of the community held them together, and the activity of their lives stifled the more intense and acrid forms of theological controversy. Endless change, perpetual adventure, the excitement of danger and of gain, gave a charm to their existence, which to many a wild spirit seemed irresistible. When not at sea, they were hunting cattle on the islands, preparing their boucan, or leading lives of almost savage freedom in groves of tropical splendour, or in the winding folds of valleys where the moan of the encompassing sea was hushed or sweetened by the inland calm valleys so exquisitely beautiful, so rich with pendent foliage, so bright with flowers, so musical with gliding streams, so sumptuous with the jewellery of painted birds, that mortal men might well be excused if they expected or desired no more in the valleys of Paradise itself. Then, when those voluptuous delights began to pall, there was the ready vessel close at hand, in which to cruise from shore to shore across waves of luminous- purple, with some ever-new delight of battle to break up the stagnancy of peace with Spanish argosies to be seized, with Spanish towns to be plundered, with Spanish girls to be shared among, the victors who survived. Dwelling always on the very edge of death, these men made a quintessence of life, and drank it concentrated and sparkling. To be dull, was with them to taste beforehand the torments of the condemned.* Many men of good birth and education joined these sea-rovers, from sheer love of adventure, from desire of repairing their broken fortunes, or from hatred of the Spaniards. Their golden age was the second half of the seventeenth century, but they had become a formidable power even before 1650. Narratives of the cruelties committed by Spaniards on all intruders in the West Indies were circulated in Europe, and undoubtedly had a great influence in exciting the desire of revenge. Montbars, a Frenchman, was stimulated by these stories into quitting his own country, becoming a Buccaneer, and inflicting the utmost amount of injury on the persecutors. He killed so many of the offending nation in the Western seas that he acquired the name of " the Exterminator ; " and the freebooters generally were little inclined to mercy. There was a time, however, when the Buccaneers seemed disposed to settle down to peaceful modes of occupation. Several of them, in the latter part of the seventeenth century, became logwood-cutters in the Bay of Campeachy, where for awhile they carried on a good trade with European ships, not only in timber, but in cured meats, hides of animals, and other commodities. The Spaniards, however, would not let them rest in quiet. They slaughtered them on every opportunity, burnt their log-huts, and hunted them down with pitiless ferocity. The * The shore-life of a later race of Buccaneers has been described by Canon Kingsley in a spirited ballad : " Oh, the palms grew higli id Aves, and fruit as gay as gold, AVitli parrakeets and humming-birds most beauteous tc behold ; And the negro girls to Aves from bondage fast did flee, To welcome gay young mariners, a-sweeping in from sea. " Oh, sweet it was in Aves to hear the landward breeze, A-swing with good tobacco in a net between the trees ; With a negro lass to fan you while you listened to the roar Of the breakers on the reef outside, that never came to- shore. " But Scripture saith, an ending to all fine things must be ; So the King s ships sail d on Aves, and quite put down were we. All day we fought like tigers, but they burst the booms at night, And I fled in a piragua sore wounded from the fight. " 406 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1669. folly of such conduct Avas soon made apparent in the wider extension of freebooting, and the greater savageness with which reprisals were con ducted. As early as 1625, the English and French sea- rovers took possession of St. Christopher, and in 1630 they seized on Tortuga. These two West India islands became the head-quarters of the Buccaneers, and are associated with many wild stories of adventure. Thenceforward the business of piracy was carried on with greater regularity and system. When England and France were at Avar Avith Spain, freebooters obtained letters of marque from their respective GoA-ernments, so as to acquire an acknowledged position as privateers. But their operations did not terminate on the conclusion of peace ; for to the Buccaneer Spain Avas always an enemy, and pillage Avas always an attraction. After England had gained possessions in the West Indies, her representativei in that part of the Avorld sometimes connived at the doings of these brigands of the sea, for the sake of what they themsel\*es got out of the plunder. Tortuga, hoAveA^er, was not .secured by the Buccaneers Avithout a struggle. In 1638, Avhile a number of the pirates Avere away in Hispaniola, hunting Avild cattle, a lai-ge force <>f Spaniards landed on the island, and massacred all whom they found there. But the freebooters speedily retook Toiluga, fortified it strongly, and made it their base of operations. Their organisation became more perfect every year ; their attacks on commerce greAv more frequent and more bold ; and in time not merely the West Indies, but a large part of America, paid unwilling tribute to their flag. One of the most famous of the early Buccaneers Avas Francis Lolonois, a Frenchman, AV!IO had been sent to the Caribbec Islands, early in life, as a bond servant. When his time of sein r ice had expired, he Avent to Hispaniola, and liA*ed for awhile among the hunters; tkcn took to the sea, and, having ulti mately obtained a ship, made piratical Avar on the Spaniards, Avhom he ahvays treated with extreme cruelty. The city of Maracaibo, in Venezuela, Avas sacked by this miscreant, Avho aftenvards, at the head of his A ietorious freebooters, advanced toAvards Gibraltar. The Governor of the latter place Avas a military officer Avho had served in Flanders ; and, putting himself at the head of eight hundred men, half of Avhom Avere regular soldiers, Avhile the rest were civilians armed for the occasion, he made vigorous preparations for defence. A battery was raised toAvards the lake, and mounted with twenty guns, masked Avith baskets of earth. In the rear of this Avas placed another battery, consisting of eight guns ; and the chief higliAvay into the town Avas barricaded. On arriving with his fleet before Gibraltar, Lolonois saw that a serious resistance Avas intended, and, calling a council of Avar, he sought advice as to what course should be taken. His own voice Avas for an immediate attack, and he had no great difficulty in communicating his resolu tion to the others. All promised to follow him, and on the following day they landed, to the number of three hundred and eighty, well armed, and each man provided Avith poAvder and shot for thirty charges. Finding the ordinary entrance into the town obstructed by the barricade Avhich had been throAvn up, they Avent round by a narrow and tortuous path through the Avoods, Avhere they Avere fired into by the Spaniards. The ground Avas so miry that the Buccaneers Avere obliged to cut down branches of trees, so as to make a someAvhat firmer road for marching on. Advancing through the noise and smoke of the cannon which the Spaniards brought to bear against them, the brigands, as soon as they had cleared the wood, came upon a battery, the defenders of which, after a raking fire, darted forth Avith so much fury that the pirates were driven back. Lolonois, hoAvever, rallied his forces, and again led them forward, but without success. He then, ordered his men to make a pretence of flying, and in this Avay dreAv the Spaniards some distance from their batteries. Facing round Avhen they thought they could do so Avith effect, the Buccaneers fell upon their opponents with the SAvord, killed above tAvo hundred, and, fighting their way back to the batteries, took possession of them. The main body of the Spaniards now fled into the Avoods, and the rest surrendered on the promise of their lives. The toAvn of course Avas sacked ; the citizens Avere tortured to make them disclose their hidden Avealth ; many of the inhabitants perished of hunger, OAving to a scarcity of provisions, which the invaders seized for their own necessities ; and several died in the forest, of wounds received during the fight, in addition to upAvards of five hundred Avho fell sword in hand. The loss on the side of the Buccaneers Avas much smaller ; but they did not gain the day Avithout paying for it. After many similar exploits, and the commission of numerous horrible cruelties, Lolonois Avas torn to pieces by the savage Indians of Darien, into Avhose hands he had chanced to fall.* * The adventures of this worthy are related with much ful ness in a scarce volume entitled "Bucaniers of America: or, a True Account of the Most Remarkable Assaults committed of Late Years upon the Coasts of the West Indies by the Bueaniers of Jamaica and Tortuga, both English and French," 1684 a work originally written in Dutch. The author (John Ksqucmeling) was himself one of Henry Morgan s pirates. 1669.] MORGAN AT MARACAIBO. 407 Several more of these robbers have won for themselves a permanent name in history \ especially Henry Morgan, a Welshman, who, whatever his crimes, possessed some of the qualities of a great military leader. Having succeeded to a sort of general direction of the West Indian pirates, he plundered the town of Puerto del Principe, in Cuba, attacked the strong position of Puerto Bello, and then directed his course towards Maracaibo and Gibraltar, towns situated on opposite sides of the lake of Maracaibo. This lake is entered by a narrow passage from the Gulf of the same name, which opens out of the Caribbean. Sea ; and the passage in Morgan s time was defended by a strong castle. The commander made but a poor defence, and forsook the position as soon as darkness came on. Morgan possessed himself of a large quantity of powder left in the aban doned works, spiked the cannon, partially demo lished the walls, and sailed into the inland waters. Both Maracaibo and Gibraltar were sacked, and at these places, Morgan, who had the Buccaneer vice of cruelty in full measure, committed or sanctioned the most frightful atrocities, to force the people into giving up their treasures. While at Gibraltar, a negro slave promised to conduct him to a river flowing into the lake of Maracaibo, where he would find a ship and four boats laden with valuables belonging to the inhabitants of the adjacent city. He also revealed to him the place where the Governor of Gibraltar lay hidden, together with most of the women, who had man aged to escape. Assigning to a detachment the task of capturing the boats, and leaving the rest of his fleet in the lake, Morgan himself, with a party of two hundred and fifty men, went over land in search of the Governor. That officer had retired to a small island seated in the middle of the river, where he had hastily built a little fort ; but, on hearing that Captain Morgan was coming in person against him, he moved farther off* to the top of a mountain, the only ascent to which was by a very narrow passage, that would not admit of two men going abreast. The position was so strong that Morgan, with all his daring, recoiled from attacking it; particularly as his powder had been wetted by a heavy rain, and he had lost several of his men in fording a swollen river. He therefore retreated, first to Gibraltar, and afterwards to Maracaibo, having reason to apprehend that the Spaniards were pre paring to despatch a strong force against him. His men were by this time laden with riches ; yet they were greedy of every opportunity of acquiring more. It soon became apparent, however, that they would have enough to do to secure what they had already got, and to save themselves from a great reverse. At Maracaibo, the Buccaneers learned that three Spanish men-of-war had arrived at the lake, and that the castle by which the entrance was guarded had been repaired and put in a good state of defence. They were in fact hemmed in by a force much stronger than their own, and could only get from the inland lake into the more open waters by conducting their little fleet of small ships through a narrow channel, where they could hardly escape being crushed by the fire of the Spanish men-of-war and of the fortress. For a little while, Morgan seemed to lose heart ; but, soon recovering his spirits, he sent a Spaniard to the Admiral of the three ships, demanding of him a ransom for not setting fire to the city of Maracaibo. The man returned two days after, bringing a letter from the Admiral, who threatened the pirates with extermination, unless they made an immediate and absolute surrender. Morgan sub mitted this letter to the judgment of his men, asking them whether they would yield or fight ; and, the reply being unanimous that they would struggle to the last, he made arrangements for an attack upon the enemy. Previous to taking active measures, however, he sent proposals of accommo dation to Don Alonso, the Spanish commander. He promised that, if allowed to pass out of the lake without molestation, he would quit Maracaibo without doing any damage to the town, or exacting any ransom ; that lie would set at liberty half the slaves he had taken, and all the other prisoners ; and that he would send home freely the four chief inhabitants of Gibraltar, whom he had seized as hostages for the contributions promised by that city. The Spaniard refused to enter into any nego tiations, and Morgan resolved to proceed at once to extremities. By the advice of one of his men, he made a fire-ship, the combustibles on board of which were cleverly concealed by counterfeit can- iion, while the deck was covered with logs of wood, rudely fashioned into the shape of men with high- crowned hats. This ship was sent forward, and, being kindled, set fire to the largest of the Spanish vessels, which was burnt to the water s edge. The second man-of-war was sunk by her own crew, to prevent her falling into the hands of the Buccaneers ; the third, being unable to escape, was taken by Morgan. The scene of this action was the narrow channel communicating with the gulf, the approach to which was guarded by the castle. To get past that fortress was now the great difficulty. The pirates, going ashore, made an attempt to take it, 408 CASSELL S H1STOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1669. but found the work far too strong to be carried by assaiilt. Morgan, however, continued to conduct himself like a conqueror, and not only demanded but obtained an enormous ransom from Maracaibo for not tiring the town. He also got up from guns, swept out into the gulf. Before the Spaniards could re-shift their cannon, and fire on the free booters, they were beyond reach, speeding with a favourable wind towards the freedom of the great deep. * SACK OF PUERTO DEL rRixcirE. (Froiii t/ic Histortj of the Buccaneers.) beneath the lake an immense amount of treasure belonging to the ship that had been sunk ; and then, after causing a division of the total booty, concocted a stratagem by which he might escape. He made a feint of landing his men on the opposite side of the castle ; and when the Spaniards, fearing an attack in that direction, had transferred their cannon from the walls commanding the lake to the landward walls, the pirate vessels spread sail by moonlight, and, with a parting salute of seven i This exploit took place in the spring of 1669, and was in time followed by another still more extrS- ordinary, for which the most elaborate preparation s were made. One of the richest places in Spanish America was the city of Panama, situated on the Pacific coast of the Isthmus bearing the same nancie. Morgan designed to pillage the town, and resolved to lead his men over the wild, jungly tract of land * Bucanicrs of America (1684), Part II., chap. 7. 1670.] MORGAN AT PANAMA. 409 which separates the eastern from the western ocean a territory even now but imperfectly known, and at all times rendered perilous by lurking savages, by pathless ways, and by a deadly climate. and fourteen Spaniards whom he found in this castle, he put two hundred to the sword. Five hundred men were left at San Lorenzo, together with the fleet; and the remaining freebooters, The, expedition was conducted on no mean scale. numbering some twelve hundred, began their land MORGAN, THE HUCCAXEEK. Thirty-seven vessels, carrying about two thousand men (English and French) were brought together at Cape Tiburon in December, 1670, and Morgan speedily attacked the island of Santa Catalina, which he took. Leaving a strong garrison there, he pushed on to the mouth of the river Cliagre, 011 the Atlantic side of the Isthmus, where, after a desperate fight, he seized the strong castle of San Lorenzo, situated in a position which might fairly have been reckoned impregnable. Of three hundred 35 march across the Isthmus. They suffered terribly from fatigue, weather, and deprivation, being at times reduced to the utmost extremities for want of food; and when, after ten days, the goal of their enterprise appeared in sight, a Spanish army, com posed of two thousand foot and four hundred horse, was found drawn up in battle-array to dispute any further advance. The wearied brigands were greatly overmatched ; but they fell on their adver saries with so impetuous a fury that the defendei S 410 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1681. of the town were driven back, and Panama fell into the hands of Morgan and his comrades. A sack, accompanied by horrible atrocities on the part of the Buccaneers, followed as the inevitable result. The city, in which there were about seven thousand houses, was finally burnt, and the attacking forces then made their way back to San Lorenzo, each man carrying with him his share of the spoils. Morgan, who was accused by his comrades of cheat ing them out of the greater part of what had been taken, afterwards sailed to Jamaica, and became a person of high position. It is said that he thought at one time of setting up an independent State among the islands of the Pacific ; but he pro bably saw that his real interests lay in another direction. Charles II., who is suspected to have shown, on more than one occasion, a disposition to encourage piratical adventures in the hope of personal gain, made him a knight; and he suc cessively occupied the posts of Commissioner of the Admiralty Court in Jamaica, and Deputy-Governor of the island. Yet some of the inferior pirates were hanged, as a sacrifice to the wrath of Spain. Nearly ten years after Morgan s achievement, it was repeated, as far as crossing the Isthmus was concerned (though not in precisely the same part), by a band of three hundred and thirty -English Buccaneers. These men took the town of Santa Maria, but did not feel themselves in sufficient force to make another attack on the city of Panama, which had by that time been rebuilt. The captain of the expedition was Richard Sawkins, a man of ability and courage, who, being asked by the Governor of Panama why, during a time of peace between England and Spain, Englishmen should enter those seas to commit depredations, and from whom they had received their commission, replied that he and his comrades came to assist their friend, the native king of Darien, who was the rightful lord of Panama, and of all the country thereabouts. They had in fact formed an alliance with the Darien Indians, from whom they had obtained a number of small canoes, which proved extremely useful. An attack which they made on Puebla Nova resulted in a disastrous failure : several of their men were killed, and Sawkins himself was among the slain. Some of their opera tions, however, were successful. Pushing out into the open seas in their Indian canoes, they attacked and captured a few Spanish traders, and at length, relinquishing their design on Panama, stood away to the south. They cruised for some months along the coast of Peru, plundered a small town, and passed the Christmas of 1G80 on the island of Juan Fernandez, celebrated as the scene of that adventure of Alexander Selkirk s which was made by Defoe the groundwork of his " Robinson Crusoe." This was the farthest point in that direction to which they attained. Their voyages, whatever the object of undertaking them, resulted in a considerable addition to the existing stock of knowledge with respect to what was then called the South Sea that is, the South Pacific. Many of this company of Buccaneers were men of good education, and, apart from their piratical doings, of respectable character. One of the number was the celebrated Captain William Dampier, a Somersetshire man who afterwards attained great fame as a navigator. He has left an admirable account of his adventures ; and so have three other members of the expedition Basil Ringrove, Barty Sharp, and Lionel Wafer. Shortly after quitting Juan Fernandez, the Buc caneers were repulsed with heavy loss from the town of Arica, and dissensions then broke out among their ranks. One party would have re- elected Barty Sharp to the chief command, which he had filled for a short time after the death of SaAvkins. Another faction accused him of want of courage, and refused to sail under his orders. After much quarrelling, they agreed to part com pany. Sharp and his adherents retained posses sion of a large vessel, and continued to cruise in the South Sea. Dampier, Wafer, and a few others, took the long-boat and the canoes, in the early part of 1681, and made for the Isthmus of Darien. Of this latter party, the white men numbered only forty-four, to whom were added a Spanish Indian, two Mosquito Indians, and five slaves, whom they had taken while cruising about. On coming in sight of the Isthmus, they perceived two Spanish men-of-war, of large size, supported by detachments of soldiers at different posts along the shore. Knowing that they were quite incapable of coping with such adversaries, the Buccaneers exercised their utmost skill in eluding the enemy, and, though pressed very hard, contrived to land in a small creek of the Bay of Panama. Sinking their canoes, to destroy all trace of their whereabouts, they struck across the savage and inhospitable country which separated them from the Atlantic. By the aid of pocket-compasses, they shaped their way across the desert ; but it was no easy task to accomplish. The physical difficulties of the route, in the shape of dense woods, torrents, swamps, and rugged mountains, tried them severely. De luging rain fell for days ; the lightning was terrific ; food was scarce, the Indian tribes were unfriendly, and there was always the danger of falling in with Spaniards. For a time the party was separated, and it was not until after many adventures and 1695.] THE PIRATE, WILLIAM KIDD. 411 perils that they were reunited on the shores of the Atlantic. Dampier engaged in other piratical ex peditions for some years ; but he was too good a man for such work. To cover the infamy of their occupation, he called his companions privateers, which they cannot fairly be considered. In 1684, he and some others sailed down the whole eastern side of South America, passed round by Cape Horn into the Pacific, surveyed the coasts as far as California, and then stretched across the vast ocean to China and the Indies. The Spaniards suffered so much from these Buc caneers that, at the treaty concluded between England and Spain in 1667, they introduced a clause for the entire suppression of piracy. This had not the slightest effect, for the freebooters refused to be bound by it. In 1673, the Spaniards killed three hundred French flibustiers who had been shipwrecked at Puerto Rico. Frightful re prisals followed, and it seemed as if the trade of Buccaneering would have received a yet deeper tinge of atrocity. But it was not only the subjects of the Spanish King who suffered from the depre dations of these ruffians. The commercial ships of New England and other of the American colonies were sometimes attacked, and men of American birth occasionally joined the desperadoes, or traded on their own account. Persons of good social position and staid religious life, in various cities of the New World, were strongly suspected of being interested in these ventures ; and hatred of the Navigation Acts had much to do with the encouragement of piracy. The Buccaneers were sup ported in their enterprises by the people of South Carolina, who maintained friendly relations with the sea-rovers, opened their ports to them, furnished their ships with supplies, and were glad to make money out of their vices. The Governor himself, and the principal inhabitants, were on familiar terms with these criminals, and were even suspected of a desire to engage in their enterprises. The proprietors remonstrated against such disgrace ful habits and inclinations, and Charles II., in 1684, transmitted to the colony a law against pirates, which the proprietors required the Assembly to enact, and their executive officers strictly to execute. The law was passed, but evaded, and James II., in 1687, found it necessary to send out an expedition against the pirates of the West Indies, which the .South Carolinians were compelled to aid, and which proved temporarily successful. When war broke out between England and France, in 1689, the English and French Buccaneers took the sides of their respective countries, and, being commissioned as privateers, fought with oiui another as ferocioiisly as if they had never been the best of friends. This broke up the once-formidable con federacy ; yet piracy still continued, though on a less serious scale. On the Earl of Bellamont being appointed Governor of New England and New York, he was told by the King that one of his special offices would be to suppress the piracy which was disgracing America. His appoint ment to this post was as early as 1695, though he did not go out till 1698. In the meanwhile, he was recommended to employ, in the contemplated operations against the pirates, a veteran sailor named William Kidd, who had fought with the French, and had now retired on a pension. The exploits of the Buccaneers had by this time been transferred to the eastern seas to the Indian Ocean, and its various gulfs and straits. Bellamont was assured that no man was better acquainted with those seas than Kidd. He knew all the haunts of the pirates, and would undertake, if provided with a single ship of thirty or forty guns, to hunt down and destroy the whole gang of robbers. The lawful spoils of such an expedition, it was urged, would more than defray all expenses. Such a scheme appeared to Bellamont both prac tical and desirable, and he spoke to that effect to the King. The Admiralty demurred to the plan, and the Earl then thought that the same results might be accomplished by a privateer, to be fitted out by a few gentlemen of wealth. On communicating this idea to wealthy friends, and stating that six thousand pounds would be enough, several noblemen, including Lord Somers, contri buted various sums of money, and a ship called the Adventure Galley was equipped in the port of Lon don. Kidd was placed in command of this vessel, and, besides ordinary letters of marque, carried with him a commission under the Great Seal, em powering him to seize pirates, and to take them to some place where they might be dealt with accord ing to law. Whatever right the King might have to goods found in the possession of the free booters, he granted, by letters patent, to the persons who had been at the expense of fitting out the expedition, reserving to himself no more than a tenth part of such profits as might accrue from the adventure, which proportion was to be paid into the Treasury.* Kidd could not fully man his ship in the Thames ; but his complement was soon made up at New York, and, sailing from the Hudson in February, 1697, he proceeded to the coast of Madagascar. It was a long voyage, which took about five months * Macaulay a History of England, chap. 25. 412 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1718. to perform. Whether in the course of that voyage the designs of Kidd underwent a change, or whether he started with a deliberate intention of violating the trust that had been reposed in him, can never be known. But it is certain that, on finding him self in the oriental seas, he determined to plunder the merchant-vessels he had been sent out to protect. Kidd and his seamen had probably very loose and accommodating ideas on the subject of freebooting. They were not disposed to run the risk of fighting with the Buccaneers of those waters, especially as by making terms with them they might enrich themselves to an indefinite amount. Having established friendly relations with the sea-rovers already on the spot, Kidd robbed every ship he felt strong enough to attack. The gains of this in famous expedition were enormous. Even the com mon sailors grew rich, and the commander laid up stores which many a poor nobleman might have envied. Kidd behaved on all occasions with the utmost cruelty. Whenever he went ashore, he burnt houses and massacred peasantry. One of his crew, who had reproached him with his deeds, he struck dead withoxit a moment s notice. Intelli gence having at length reached London that Kidd had turned pirate on his own account, orders were despatched to the Governors of English colonies to look out for and arrest him; but the freebooter had already burnt his ship, and dispersed his men amongst the other pirates. He had by this time made enough to satisfy him, and, going to Boston in 1699, he endeavoured to deceive Lord Bellamont with a false account of his proceedings. For ti little while he succeeded; but, suspicion being aroused, the pirate was apprehended, and ultimately sent to England, where he was tried and hanged in 1701. The participation of Bellamont and other great lords in the expedition of this scoundrel was made the subject of inquiry in Parliament. The opponents of the Government seized with eager delight on so good an occasion for discrediting their political enemies, and it was more than hinted that Lord Bellamont, Somers, and the rest, had a guilty knowledge of Kidd s designs, and hoped to share the profits. There is no real ground, however, for supposing any such thing. The in quiry resulted in a vindication of the characters of those who had fitted out the privateer ; and of all the Governors of New England none has left a better reputation behind him than the Earl of Bellamont. Buccaneering, as a highly-organised institution, came to a close with the seventeenth century. Several of the freebooters turned planters or negro- drivers in the West India islands, or served as sailors in the mercantile marine. But others held to their original calling, and, ranging over the waters of the world, plundered any vessels they could find. Spain was no longer the special object of their antagonism ; they would as soon rob from one nationality as from another. The term Buc caneer fell into disuse; the men were simple pirates, and appear to have called themselves such. The slight excuse of patriotism, derived from the neces sity of resisting the arrogant assumptions of Spain, no longer existed, and a lower class of sailors engaged in the traffic. They were mere vulgar ruffians, whose actions made them the common enemies of mankind. Englishmen, West Indians, and natives of the American continent, joined in the perilous trade of pirating, and the chief haunts of commerce were kept in terror by the extraordinary daring and ferocity of these men, who sometimes took fortified positions on shore, and pretended to a kind of sovereignty. The pirates, like their predecessors the Buccaneers, con sorted a good deal with one another ; yet they were under no general government, each ship s company being regulated by its own laws, independently of the rest. The authority of the captain was by no means absolute, for all concerns of moment were determined by the voice of the crew, though to the captain was given a double vote in elections. Prizes were divided amongst the men who took them, the captains receiving two shares, the officers a share and a half, and the private sailors a single share. On great occasions, the commanders would often give away an additional quarter or half-share to men who had specially distinguished themselves, deducting it from the profits of those who had been remiss in their duty. The execution of Kidd, and of many other of these miscreants, seems to have had no effect in deterring the survivors. In 1717, the coasts of New England were kept in terror by a Captain Bellamy, who commanded a vessel carrying twenty- three guns, and a crew of one hundred and thirty men. It was a relief to the colonists, and to the merchants who traded with them, when this ship was wrecked on Cape Cod, with the loss of the captain and all his men save six, who were after wards executed at Boston. Virginia also suffered much from the depredations of these robbers ; and South Carolina, which had by this time broken off its friendly relations with the freebooters, was vexed by the piratical operations of Steed Bonnet and Richard Worley, the first of whom, a man of liberal education, had formerly been a major in the British army. An expedition was sent against these marauders, in 1718, by the then Governor of the colony, Robert Johnson, and they were forced to 1718.] THE LATER PIRATES. 413 surrender, after a severe engagement. North Caro lina was still more seriously devastated by marine banditti, the leader of whom was a West Indian named Edward Theach, commonly known by the designation of Black Beard, because, in an age when it was usual to shave the whole face, it was his humour to grow a portentous beard of very dark hue, which he twisted with ribbons into small tails, after the manner of a Ramilies wig. This man seems to have had a touch of actual madness in his composition. He would go into battle with lighted matches under his hat, which, says a somewhat admiring biographer, gave him the appearance of a fury from hell ; and his conduct was of a nature to keep up the impression thus produced. His cruelties were often purely wanton. On one occasion, while drinking in his cabin, he blew out the lights, took a pistol in each hand, and fired right and left under the table among a number of his companions, one of whom was wounded for life. Another time, he exclaimed to his comrades, " Come, let its make a hell of our own, and try how long we can bear it." He then, with two or three more, went down into the hold, and closing up all the hatches, lighted a large quantity of brimstone and other combustible matter, in the suffocating air of which he continued until some of the men cried out for air, when he reopened the hatches, rejoicing greatly that he had held out the longest. His habit was to drink to excess, and he en- couraged his men to do the same, as a stimulant to their ferocity. A smack of grim and ferocious humour, not unfrequently dallying with the idea of infernal experiences in the life to come, gave a sort of pungent flavour to the speeches of this half-insane wretch, who for some years pursued a career of great prosperity. When he desired to refit his vessel, or to amuse himself on shore, he retired to the mouth of Pamlico Sound, and, ranging about the country, made the acqiiaintance of the gentry, and enjoyed the protection of Charles Eden, the Governor, and Tobias Knight, the Secretary, of North Carolina. After a brief submission to the King, and a short period of gambling and dissipa tion, he again took to his old trado of piracy, and at length drew down upon himself tho active inter ference of Governor Spotswood, of Virginia. That energetic official despatched two small ships under Lieutenant Maynard, who discovered the robber in Pamlico Sound on the evening of November 21st, 1718. Black Beard prepared himself for action by a night of debauchery, and the fight next day was obstinate and bloody. Theach manoeuvred about the narrow inlets with considerable skill, main tained the contest for some hours, and boarded Lieutenant Maynard s sloop under the smoke of hand-grenades ; but at length, finding the day turn ing against him, he made preparations for blowing up the magazine. His orders in this respect, how ever, were not carried out, and Black Beard, who had already been desperately wounded in many places, suddenly fell dead while in the act of cocking a pistol. The others surrendered, and the greater number were afterwards hanged. The pirates found it convenient, as the Buc caneers had done, to have some place for their head-quarters, where they might store their gains, repair their ships, and concert fresh plans of action. They accordingly fixed on New Providence, the second of the Bahama Islands in point of size, the situation of which, to the east of Florida, was well adapted to their purposes. The Spanish convoys, carrying silver from the South American mines, were in the habit of passing that way in their homeward voyage ; and the island presented many remarkable advantages for the objects in view. The Bahamas were taken fi-om the English in the year 1700, when a combined force of French and Spaniards invaded them, seized the fort and Governor in New Providence, broke up the settle ments, carried off half the blacks, and so dis mayed the rest of the population that, after hiding for a time in the thick woods, they retired to the Carolinas. New Providence, therefore, lay waste when the pirates, in 1716, made it their place of resort. It is about thirty miles in length, and from eight to eleven in breadth, and has a harbour large enough to hold five hundred sail of ships. Before this harbour lies a small island, making two inlets from the outer sea ; and each of these is protected by a bar, over which no vessel of five hundred tons burden can pass. The pirates craft were chiefly light brigantines, and, having once got into the harbour, they felt secxire against any large ships that might be pursuing them. In the time of Captain Bartholomew Roberts, one of the most famous of these criminals, the pirates under his command agreed to certain general laws, by which they undertook to be bound. These laws provided that every man was to have a vote in affairs of moment, and an equal title to the fresh provisions or strong liquors at any time seized ; that every man was to have his fair share of prizes; that any one who defrauded the ship s company to the value of a dollar was to be punished by marooning that was, by being put on shore in some uninhabited part of the world, with a gun, a few shot, a flask of powder, and a bottle of water, to shift for himself, or starve, as might be ; that no person was to gamble at cards or dice for 414 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1718. money; that all lights were to be put out at eight o clock at night, and any of the crew who were still inclined for drinking after that hour were to do so on the open deck, and in the dark; that the men were to keep their pieces, pistols, and cutlasses clean and fit for service; that any one who should desert the ship or his proper quarters in battle should be punished with death or marooning; that every man s quarrels were to be settled on shore with sword and pistol; that no man Avas to think of giving up his way of living till he had shared a hunted down like wild beasts, and no criminal found less commiseration than the robber of the sea. Execution Dock, at Wapping, was the place where these wretches were commonly hung in chains ; but many were executed in the colonies. The profession became desperate, and was pursued with all the more ferocity because of the perils by which it was encompassed. It is said that the pirates themselves did not desire the punishment to be less than death, for that, were it so, every cowardly fellow would turn freebooter, and the ISLANDS AT THE MOL TIt OF THE ST. LAWRENCE RIVER. thousand pounds ; and that any man who should lose a limb or become a cripple in the service was to have eight hundred dollars out of the general stock, and for lesser hurts proportionally. It would seem that these ordinances were not accepted by the whole body of pirates, but were made for the special government of Captain Roberta s crew. The sea-rovers of the eighteenth century were held to gether very loosely, and did not long retain pos session of their island. A strong naval force was sent against them in 1718, and a Royal Proclama tion was issued, promising pardon to those who sur rendered by a certain date. Some of the freebooters were taken, some accepted the pardon, and others escaped. For many years the evil continued in full force ; but on every opportunity the offenders were trade in time would be so depreciated as to be not worth following. * This might at a first glance seem to be mere bravado; but it is very possible that a certain aristocracy of crime may have been held to be preserved by the penalty of death. The Pirate fought with the rope about his neck, and it is not to be denied that he sometimes fought with signal courage. He held his position as a power on the seas through the greater part of last century, and was occasionally heard of even in later times. * An amusing but catchpenny work on this subject was published in 1724, under the title of "A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most Notorious Pyrates, and also their Policies, Discipline, and Government, from their First Rise and Settlement in the Island of Providence, in 1717, to the Present Year 1724, "by Captain Charles Johnson. RESUMPTION OF WAR WITH FRANCE. 415 CHAPTER XLVIL Death of James II. in 1701 Resumption of the War with France in 1702 Effect of this on the Prosperity of New England- Hostilities between the English of South Carolina and the Spaniards of Florida Unsuccessful Attack by the English on St. Augustine Conquest of the Appalachian Indians, and Extension of the English Boundaries to the Borders of the Gulf of Mexico Desolation of the Northern Parts of New England by the Allied French and Indians Selfish Policy of New York Protest against the Barbarities of the War Attacks on Acadie Proposal of the English Government to effect the Conquest of Canada Disappointment of the Colonies at the Abandonment of the Design Visit of Indian Sachems to the English Court Final Conquest of Acadie Relative Position of the French and English in North America English and French Colonial Policy, and the Causes of its Distinctions Determination of the English Government to send an Expedi tion against Canada Preparations for the Attack Mismanagement of Admiral Sir Hovenden Walker Failure of the Expedition. THE eighteenth century, though bom in peace as between France and England, soon saw a resump tion of that war which had desolated the latter years of the seventeenth, and had brought so much troiible on the American colonies. James II. died at St. Germain s on the 16th of September, 1701, and Louis XIV., con trary to a promise which he had given William III., immediately recog nised as King of Eng land the eldest surviving son of the deposed mon arch by his second wife, Mary of Modena, al though the succession had by the English Par liament been settled on Anne. This boy of HAHBOXJB, OF thirteen James Francis Edward, afterwards known as the First Pretender was insolently flaunted in the face of the English people as their rightful king, in virtue of the mysti cal absurdity called divine right. The new King of Spain (grandson of the French sovereign, and first of the Spanish Bourbons), the Pope, and the Duke of Savoy, joined with Louis in the commission of this outrage ; and William III., acting in harmony with the very general wishes of the English nation, determined once more to draw the sword against his old enemy. War, however, was not declared im mediately. On the 8th of March, 1702, in the midst of his endeavours to form a powerful alliance against France and Spain, the great Dutchman at the head of affairs in England reached the termination of his career. But Anne found the country too much in earnest to hesitate as to her course ; and within a few weeks from the date of her accession she signified the commencement of hostilities, in com bination with Austria and Holland, against the offending Powers. The succession of a Bourbon Prince to the Spanish Crown, on the death of Charles II. of Spain in 1700, afforded another motive for the war which was now begxm ; for this alteration of the dynasty was held to up set one of the favourite political arrangements of that time, the balance of power, and was certainly a violation of treaty en gagements on the part of the French King. The new direction of affairs was not without a very important in fluence on the condition and prospects of the ST. AUGUSTINE. English colonies in North America. The return to a state of war was particularly unfortunate for Massachusetts and the adjoining provinces the part of English America most seriously affected by the change. The plantations were beginning to recover from the disastrous results of former struggles. Prosperity once more seemed to be within reach of the people. At a rather later period, the annual imports into New England from the mother coxtntry amounted, it was supposed, to about 100,000 a sum indicating the possession by the colonists of considerable means. The exports consisted of 100,000 quintals (each quintal weighing 112 pounds) of dried cod-fish, sold in Europe for .80,000 ; and of three thousand tons of naval stores. But this was not the whole of the export trade of the northern colonies. They sent out to the other American plantations, and to the West Indies, lumber, fish, and various pro visions, to the value of 50,000 annually. These HARBOTJIt of StAUGUSTJ. 416 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1703. figures will give some idea of the imports and exports of 1702. Skilled industry was also pro gressing in several directions. Irish Presbyterians from Ulster had established in New England the manufacture of linen cloth. Ship-building was carried on to a great extent at Boston and other sea-port towns. In New Hampshire, a large quan tity of tar was manufactured every year, and this was encouraged by a law of that province which permitted the people to pay their taxes in tar, rated at twenty shillings per barrel. This paying of taxes in commodities was not unusual in the New England plantations, owing to the scarcity of money. The want of a sufficient circulating medium was inconvenient, but did not seriously hinder the industrial progress of the country. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, the colonies which regarded Boston as their capital were attracting very general attention by the rapid development of their trade and of their social well- being. The witch-frenzy of a few years earlier is thought to have worked off a good deal of the bigotry and superstition of the people, to have taught them a more free and vigorous use of their reason, and to have resulted in. a very desirable softening of manners. Religious intolerance was certainly much less than in previous generations. The community was on several accounts one to be envied, for there were few drawbacks from the many advantages which it enjoyed. The worst blot on its institutions was the existence of slavery ; but this great offence against human nature never struck very deep root in New England. The law neither sanctioned nor prohibited the bondage of man to man. The custom grew up, as in other parts of America, from opportunity and supposed convenience ; but slaves were not numerous, and were generally treated as well as white servants. In Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, they did not exceed a fiftieth part of the whole population ; and in the first-named of those pro vinces their increase was discouraged by the imposition of a duty of 4 on every negro imported into the jurisdiction. The blacks were protected in life and limb by proper enactments, and the evil had at no time the same far-reaching and deadly influence in the northern that it exercised in the south em plantations. * It will be readily understood that a country thus devoted to regular and peaceful industry must have been greatly affected by the resumption of colonial hostilities consequent on the renewed war * Neal s History of New England, Vol. II. , chap. 14. Grahame s History of the United States (1836), Book II., chap. 5. between England and France. The central settle ments New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina were but slightly touched by the struggle ; but South Carolina and New England, especially the latter, suffered severely. The colonial war began with South Carolina, the Governor of which, James Moore, led an expedi tion against St. Augustine, a Spanish settlement in Florida. This military operation was undertaken in the summer of 1702, at the wish of the Legisla tive Assembly, though there were some who saw its peril. While Moore proceeded with the main body of the forces by sea, Colonel Daniel marched over land at the head of a detachment. The harbour was speedily blocked by the Governor, and the town ravaged by his troops ; but the Spaniards, taking with them their chief valuables and a large stock of provisions, retired into the castle. This fortifi cation, it was evident, could not be reduced without heavy artillery. Daniel was therefore despatched in a sloop to Jamaica for cannon and mortal s ; but intelligence of the impending danger had already been conveyed to the Spanish Viceroy, who speedily sent two ships of war to the threatened stronghold. On the appearance of these vessels in the harbour, Moore, with discreditable precipitancy, abandoned his ships and stores, and hastily retreated by land. Colonel Daniel, standing in for the har bour on his return, was very nearly captured by the enemy. The conduct of the Governor was severely censured by the people of South Carolina, and it was certainly not without reason that they complained. This unfortunate expedition cost the colony a heavy sum of money, which could only be met by the issue of bills of credit to the amount of 0,000 the first paper money put forth in that part of America. But the disgrace of so signal a failure was to some extent redeemed, in December, 1703, by a successful attack on the Appalachian Indians in alliance with the Spaniards. These native tribes had been gathered into towns, and instructed in the Christian religion, by Franciscan priests, and their scattered habitations reached from St. Augustine to the French settlements of Louisiana. A detachment of fifty volunteers, under the command of Moore, accompanied by a thousand Indian allies, burst upon the native towns near the port of St. Mark, after a toilsome march across territories which were but slightly known to any European. The clmrch was set on fire, and a large number of warriors, women, and children were seized, and kept as prisoners for the slave-market. On the following morning, the Spanish commander in the bay attacked the Carolinians with twenty- three soldiers and four hundred Indians, but waa 1704.] INCIDENTS OF THE WAR. 417 defeated. The Spanish fort was too strong to be carried by storm ; yet the situation seemed so desperate to the natives that the chief of one of the towns was glad to purchase peace with the plate of his church, and ten horses laden with provisions. In 1704, five other towns submitted; many of the natives were received into South Carolina as emi grants ; and English jurisdiction was extended to the borders of the Gulf of Mexico. A French squadron from the Havannah unsuccessfully at tempted, in 1706, to invade Charleston, but met with so vigorous a resistance (in which the Huguenot emigrants joined with all the passion of remembered Avrongs) that one French ship was captured, and, of eight hundred men who landed, three hundred were killed or taken prisoners. The Spaniards claimed South Carolina as a part of Florida. The English frustrated all attempts at reprisals. One of the most tragic incidents of the war took place at Deerfield on the Connecticut River. In the winter of 1704, two hundred French, and a hundred and forty-two Indians, marched in snow-shoes over the white and freezing desert from Canada to the north-west parts of Massachusetts. On the last night of February, they sheltered themselves in a pine-forest near the town they proposed to attack. Deerfield, which consisted of a few scattered dwelling-houses, was feebly protected by palisades, and a number of pickets kept watch every night. When these had retired in the early morning of March 1st, the savages burst with hideous cries out of the pine-forest, broke through the palisades, and set fire to the place. Forty-seven of the people were killed, and a hundred and twelve, including THE 1IAKBOUK OF AXNAPOLIS ROYAL. had practically asserted their title to territory hitherto Spanish. In the northern parts of New England, events did not move so favourably. The French in Canada succeeded in establishing a state of neu trality on the part of the Iroquois ; the English, on the other hand, failed in securing even the negative friendship of the Abenakis, notwithstanding that those savages vowed, at the outbreak of hostilities between England and France, that the sun was not more distant from the earth than their thoughts CT from war. They had evidently come to a good understanding with their old colleagues, the French, and the territory of Maine, from Casco to Wells, together with Massachusetts and New Hampshire, was soon desolated by the ferocious tribes of the north, acting in concert with their civilised allies. The frightful atrocities of Sir William Phipps s time were renewed ; neither infancy nor age Avas spared ; men were carried into captivity, and the Indians, by the celerity of their movements, the minister and his family, were seized and hurried away. The horrors of the return march were extreme. Two men died of cold and hunger. Women who lagged with fatigue were slain by a blow of the tomahawk ; children were cast out on to the snow to perish. Some of the younger women, however, were afterwards converted to Roman Catholicism, and became the wives of Chris tianised Indians ; and it is a remarkable fact that, at the conclusion of the war, several of the English and French prisoners taken by the Indians refused to quit their barbarian life, while all the savages so captured returned with eagerness to their comrades. Owing to this circumstance, and to the alliances with Indian women formed by French traders, the Indians of Canada at the present day are in some degree of European descent. Similar disasters to the attack on Deerfield were of frequent occurrence, and, although no collisions of a very important character, taken singly, occurred, the total loss of lifo was great, and the 418 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1709. disturbance to industry little short of ruinous. So little could the English colonists do against a foe who could scarcely ever be approached in open fight, that the Assemblies of Massachusetts and New Hampshire offered a bounty of 50 for every Indian, scalp, and do not seem to have been called on for any large disbursements in this respect. What made the case worse for the New England colonies was the selfish and cruel policy of New York. The neutrality of the Iroquois, or Five Nations, by which the New Englanders were deprived of the active assistance of those martial tribes, was suggested by the Government of New York as a means of protecting their own territory ; the French, in return, undertaking to direct no attacks against the province ruled over by Lord Cornbury. But this was not all. The Dutch merchants of Albany actually carried on a trade in arms with the Indian allies of the French, purchased of them the spoil which they took from the unfortunate people of Massachusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire, and suffered marauding parties to march through the neighbourhood of then- town in order to attack the New England frontiers. Very different was the conduct of Connecticut, which rendered valuable assistance to the devastated colonies by contributions of men and money. Reprisals were resolved on in 1704, and Colonel Church, the veteran officer of Philip s war, was despatched at the head of six hundred men, with an auxiliary naval force, against the French in Acadie. The enemy was attacked with vigour, and suffered some sharp chastisement ; but Joseph Dudley, at that time Governor of Massachusetts, forbade any attack on Port Royal, the capital of Acadie. To Church, who earnestly desired to make the assault, Dudley replied that he could not venture to undertake so important an operation without express instructions from England. Being an unpopular man, owing to his association with Andros, and his conduct as Chief Justice at New York, his refraining from the suggested attack on Port Royal was attributed to unworthy and treacherous designs. It is possible, however, that fear of failure, such as Phipps had encountered at Quebec, may have been the real motive. All parties grew weaiy of the struggle after awhile, and in 1705 the Marquis de Vaudreuil, Governor of Canada, sent a commissioner to Boston, with proposals for a treaty of neutrality between his province and New England. Dudley favoured this suggestion, being, according to the representa tions of his enemies, interested in an illicit traffic in militaiy stores carried on with the French by some Boston merchants. But the General Court of Massaclmsetts refused to entertain the project, and the war continued for some years in a succession of vindecisive forays, in which the ferocity of the French and of their savage allies knew no abate ment. In 1708, the town of Haverhill, Massachu setts, was the scene of a horrible massacre a massacre so atrocious that Peter Schuyler, an officer from the province of New York, who had given his services to the New Englanders, and who frequently exercised a remarkable influence over the tribes of the Five Nations, sent a remonstrance on the subject to the Marquis de Vaudreuil. " I hold it my duty towards God and my neighbour," he wrote, " to prevent, if possible, these barbarous and heathen cruelties. My heart swells with indigna tion when I think that a war between Christian princes, bound to the exactest laws of honour and generosity, which their noble ancestors have illus trated by brilliant examples, is degenerating into a savage and boundless butchery. These are not the methods for terminating the war. Would that all the world thought with me on this subject ! " It does not appear that this appeal to the humanity of the French Viceroy had any effect. The war was not one of pitched battles, but of petty surprises ; and the unchecked barbarity of Indian hordes was the most powerful weapon of offence against the peaceful inhabitants of New England towns and villages. During these eventful days, frequent but in effectual attempts were made by the English to seize the French fortress on Newfoundland. In 1707 another expedition was sent against Acadie, and Port Royal was twice attacked, but without success. The addition to the public debt of Massa chusetts resulting from this failure, caused great discontent among the people, who saw with alarm a large increase in the paper currency of the province. Nevertheless, when the English Govern ment, in 1709, proposed to effect the conquest of Canada with the aid of the northern and middle colonies, New England, New York, and New Jersey supported the scheme with enthusiasm. It was at first proposed to send out a fleet and an army from England ; but it was found impossible to spare any of the troops employed at that time in Europe. Before this change of intention was known in America, the colonists had made con siderable preparations for the contemplated expe dition. Pennsylvania, indeed, as a settlement of Quakers, refused to furnish the required contingent of men. The Assembly at Philadelphia urged that the object of the colonists in that part of America was to afford a place of refuge for the principles of 1710.] INDIANS IN LONDON. 419 peace and philanthropy. They could not, therefore, be concerned in the slaying of men ; but, cherishing a dutiful attachment to the Queen, they voted her Majesty two sums of 500 and 300. With the use of this money they did not concern themselves, and seem, with that casuistry which Quakers are not incapable of exhibiting, to have considered that their responsibility ended with the simple declara tion that they would have nothing to do with the objects to which the contribution might be applied. The other colonies performed even more than was required. Tkey raised independent companies in addition to the quotas that had been demanded. Thanks were voted to the Queen, for the promised armament, and every disposition was manifested to support a design which promised to rid the plan tations of a dangerous and deadly enemy. New York now ruled over by Ingoldsby, the Lieu tenant-Governor of Lord Lovelace, who succeeded to Lord Cornbury, and died suddenly after a very brief administration exhibited especial zeal in the matter, as if to atone for its misconduct a few years before. The colony at once took measures which entailed an expenditure of 20,000. Nego tiations were opened with the Five Nations, who were induced to violate their neutrality, and to provide an auxiliary force for the assault on Mon treal. The army assigned to that particular feature of the campaign was commanded by Colonel Nicholson, and in May, 1709, marched to Wood Creek, there to await the arrival of the English forces. After remaining until October, and losing a large number of men by sickness, Nicholson, on the receipt of intelligence from England that the troops could not be sent, retreated to New York, where the utmost indignation was excited at the disappointment of the general hopes. This feeling of indignation found expression at a congress of the Governors and delegates of the colonies concerned, which met at Rehoboth, in Massachusetts, and at which it was recommended that petitions to the mother country should be adopted by the several local Governments. Nicholson left for England, for the purpose of presenting these petitions, and aiding them by his own influence; and Colonel Schuyler, about the same time, also departed for London, taking with him five sachems of the confederated Iroquois, who were presented at court on the 19th of April, 1710, dressed in English court costume. These barbarian deputies were prepared with a speech, which was interpreted by one of the officers who came over with them, and which ran : " Great Queen, We have undertaken a long voyage, which none of our predecessors could be prevailed on to undertake, to see our great Queen, and relate to her tho^e things which we thought absolutely necessary for the good of her, and of us her allies on the other side of the water. We doubt not but our great Queen has been acquainted with our long and tedious war in conjunction with her children against her enemies the French, and that we have been as a strong wall for their secu rity, even to the loss of our best men. We were mightily rejoiced when we heard our great Queen had resolved to send an army to reduce Canada ; and immediately, in token of our friendship, we hung up the kettle and took up the hatchet, and with one consent assisted Colonel Nicholson in making preparations on this side the lake ; but at length we were told that our great Queen was by some important affairs prevented in her design at present; which made us sorrowful, lest the French, who had hitherto dreaded us, should now think us unable to make war against them. The reduction of Canada is of great weight to our free hunting ; so that, if our great Queen should not be mindful of us, we must with our families forsake our country, and seek other habitations, or stand neuter ; either of which will be much against our inclinations. In token of the sincerity of the Five Nations, we do, in their name, present our great Queen with the belts of wampum, and, in hopes of our great Queen s favour, leave it to her most gracious consideration." These Indians were for a time the chief attrac tions of the London season. They were followed about the streets by wondering crowds. Their portraits were engraved, and exhibited in the shop-windows. The nobility invited them to their houses, and entertained them at sumptuous ban quets. They were present at a review of the Guards in Hyde Park by the Duke of Ormonde, and were feasted on board the Admiral s ship in the fleet then riding at anchor off Southampton. The entreaties of the native envoys, and probably still more the representations of Nicholson, induced the English Government to reconsider its former plan for the conquest of Canada ; but the project was still delayed. Later in the year, however, Nicholson returned to New England with six small ships of war. To these were added thirty colonial vessels, and the whole squadron, having 011 board four regiments raised by the plantations, sailed in Sep tember from Boston, and in six days anchored before the fortress of Port Royal. The French garrison here was so weak in numbers, and so depressed in spirits, that the Governor perceived he cotdd make no effectual resistance. After a few shots had been fired by the English, Subercase, to the great satis faction of his soldiers, consented to a capitulation on the 13th of October, and the French troops, K r-.r . i Tn !^wftii \ x < 1710.] ENGLISH SUCCESS IN ACADIE. 421 numbering a hundred and fifty-six, marched out colonists, was never carried into effect. Acaclie again with the honours of Avar, and were glad to receive received the name of Nova Scotia, and from that food from the hands of their conquerors. The day to this has remained beneath the English flag, place was then rc-iiamcd Annapolis, in honour of Nicholson now returned to England, to urge the THE ALLEGHANY MOUNTAINS. the reigning Queen, and word was sent to Vau- dreuil that if he should continue to despatch his Indian allies to murder the colonists of New England, reprisals would be inflicted on the French settlers of Acadie. The threat was disregarded by Vaudreuil, and, to the honour of the New England 36 Government to carry into immediate effect its plans for the conquest of Canada. The success in Acadie was a powerful argument in his favour; and the Legis lature of New York, in an address to the Queen, set forth with great emphasis the necessity of doing something to counteract the pro gress of the French in the northern and western parts of America. " It is well known," said this ad dress, "that the French can go by water from Quebec to Montreal. From thence they can do the like, through rivers and lakes, at the back of all your Majesty s plantations on this continent, as far as 422 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1710. Carolina ; and in this large tract of country live several nations of Indians who are vastly nximerous. Among those, they [the French] constantly send emissaries and priests, with toys and trifles, to insinuate themselves into their favour. Afterwards they send traders, then soldiers, and at last build forts among them ; and the garrisons are encour aged to intermarry, cohabit, and incorporate amongst them ; and it may easily be concluded that, upon a peace, many of the disbanded soldiers will be sent thither for that purpose." The question was indeed one of the gravest importance to the interests, perhaps even to the existence, of the English race in America. The French, by an exhibition of energy and organisation to which it would be illiberal not to give the highest praise, had com pletely outflanked the English on the North American continent. Taking Canada as their base of operations, they pushed on in a south-westerly direction to the Mississippi, assumed possession (about 1698) of the whole vast country formed by the valley of that river, and, descending to the mouth of the stream, where it empties itself into the Gulf of Mexico, joined their colonies to those of the Spaniards, who by the commencement of the eighteenth century had become their intimate allies. The English, therefore, had the ocean in front, and a combination of vigorous enemies to the north, west, and south of their plantations. That this position of command might ultimately enable the French and Spaniards to engross the Indian trade, was but too obvious ; and it was not less apparent that the independence of the English settlements might be threatened in time of war, while at all periods the spread of colonisation in any one direction would be effectually barred, unless the environment could at some point be broken through. Simultaneous with this vast expansion of the French towards the west and south, was an active renewal of their claim to the territory east of the Kennebec, and to the sole enjoyment of the fisheries on the adjoining coast. It had been supposed by the English Government that by the treaty of Ryswick all the country in question was admitted to be the property of England, as being included within the Massachusetts charter ; but the French interpreted the treaty in a different sense) and, towards the close of the seventeenth century, even sent some of their Indian dependents to take possession of the lands thus claimed. These were the facts which excited the not unreasonable apprehensions of the people of New York and New England, and which made them eager for the subjugation of Canada. The proceedings of the English and of the French in North America were in the main determined in each case by the political character of the mother country. The English went to the New World as private adventurers, sometimes helped and directed by a commercial company, sometimes by a lord-proprietary, sometimes only by their own wits. In no case did the monarch take any pains beyond granting a charter, and securing certain revenues for his private purse. Arrived on the spot, the emigrants were left to choose for themselves the locality where they would settle, the precise amount of ground they would reclaim from the desert, the directions in which they would move, the alliances they would form, and the political institutions they would establish. The authorities at home scarcely recognised their existence. They had all the honours of freedom, and all the perils. In New England there was not even an attempt to send a Royal Governor xintil after many years. Virginia, with all its loyalty, enjoyed for a long while something very nearly approaching com plete independence ; and, in all the colonies, the Governors, when at length they came, brought with them no definite policy. With France, 011 the other hand, colonisation was a branch of the State. The emigrants were governed by a Lieutenant of the King. They were sent out, not merely to promote their own interests, but to advance the interests of the monarchy. Their whole course was shaped and directed for them, and, with the vast Atlantic between, their lives were as imich controlled by the ideas of Versailles as if they had remained in the fields and villages of their native land. A consistent scheme of action thus governed all the operations of the French planter, and the predominance of the nation was the great object in view, whether the settler built cities in the snows of Canada, or trapped beavers in the wilds of Hudson s Bay, or explored the great lakes of the interior, or floated down the Mississippi to the warmer and sunnier regions of the south. Each system had its advantages. That of the English trained a number of men in the habits of self-government and self-reliance. That of the French subordinated individual selfishness to Imperial aims, and enabled a few scattered pioneers of civilisation to do wonders in the way of concerted action and successful policy. Events have since shown that the English method was the best on the whole; yet in the meanwhile it led to many failures, provoked many perils, and was characterised by something pettifogging, paro chial, and temporary. Whatever the faults of the French method, it cannot be said to have repressed 1711.] EXPEDITION AGAINST CANADA. 423 personal energy. A large part of North America has been revealed to Europe by the courage, daring, and vigour of Frenchmen, and nothing can be more admirable than the bright and cheerful heroism with which these emigrants from the old land, and their immediate posterity, invaded the prairies and forests of the West, examined mighty rivers and mysterious lakes, and carried civilisation into the heart of barbarism. It cannot be denied that, while the English still kept close to the Atlantic sea-board, the French plunged boldly into the interior. They managed, too, in general, to be on better terms with the natives, and to do more towards their conversion ; for the Romish form of Christianity had greater attraction for savage minds than the gloomy strictness of the Puritans, or the decent formalism of the Church of England. The great fault of the French colonists was the un scrupulous readiness with which, in times of war, they directed the ferocity of Indian tribes against their English neighbours. The prayer of the Anglo-Americans, that the French might be struck in Canada, received a favourable hearing from the Tory Ministry of 1711. One of the principal members of that Ministry was the celebrated Henry St. John, afterwards Viscount Bolingbroke a man of brilliant gifts and varied powers, a politician, a statesman, an author, and a speculative philosopher, who at the period in qviestion occupied the position of Foreign Secretary under the premiership of Harley, Earl of Oxford. He took up with much zeal the pro ject for the conquest of Canada, and arranged all the details. A fleet of fifteen ships of war and forty transports was fitted out for Sir Hovenden Walker. Seven veteran regiments from the Duke of Marlborough s army, and a battalion of marines, were placed under the command of Briga dier-General Hill, a brother of Mrs. Masham, one of the Queen s favourites. Hill was a boon com panion over the bottle ; but, though in his needy youth he had been patronised by the Duchess of Marlborough, the great Duke, her husband, had subsequently refused to grant him a colonelcy, on the ground that he was totally unfitted for it. The departure of the fleet was delayed while con tractors and other favoured parties were enriching themselves at the public expense; and when at length the vessels sailed, they were neither sufficiently victualled nor furnished with pilots. The Queen was uneasy at the stay which Sir Hovenden Walker made at Portsmouth, and it was probably the intimation of this fact by St. John that at last quickened his movements. On healing of the arrival of the expedition at Boston, St. John wrote to the Earl of Orrery that there was now no doubt as to the English becoming masters of all northern America. The people of Massachusetts were much dis appointed and annoyed at the incomplete appoint ment of the ships. They were required to furnish a supply of provisions to the men for a period of ten weeks ; and, although this was not considered fair, the stores were provided, and everything was done to ensure the success of the attempt. All the other colonies aided with a zeal which even outran what was demanded of them. Pennsylvania, again equivocating with its conscience in the matter of carnal warfare, voted the Queen a present of 2,000 ; and New York prevailed with the Five Nations to send six hundred warriors to the general armament. The necessary preparations were rapidly pushed forward ; and on the 30th of July, little more than a month after the arrival of the English fleet in America, the ships left Boston for Canada. On the same day, Nicholson, now ad vanced to the rank of General, commenced his march from New York to Albany, at the head of four thousand provincial troops, which, in the event of all going well, were to be directed against Montreal. But the French authorities had received timely notice of the contemplated attack, and active measures were taken for repelling it. The friendly league between the colonists and the surrounding Indian tribes was renewed, and the influence of the Jesuits was again exercised, as on many former occasions, to sway the waverers to the side of France. Among the colonists themselves, even the women aided the preparations for defence, and parties of men watched from the heights of Quebec the approach of hostile vessels. They watched in vain. No sail was seen on the horizon, and people began to wonder what was intended by the enemy, or whether the danger had ceased before it had actually appeared. The truth was, that the same dilatoriness which delayed the departure of the expedition had again made itself disastrously felt. The squadron, without any apparent reason, had loitered near the Bay of Gaspe before entering the St. Lawrence. The Admiral was considering what he should do with his ships during the rigours of a Quebec winter. He feared, according to the account which he himself has left of the enterprise, that the ice in the river would freeze to the bottom, though he knew the water to be a hundred fathoms deep ; and in that case the vessels would be crushed as much as if they were squeezed between rocks. It would therefore, he thought, be advisable to dismantle his ships, and secure them on dry ground in frames 424 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1711. and cradles until the thaw should come. By thus too curiously speculating on a comparatively remote and doubtful future, he was compromising a future more immediate. On the evening of the 22nd of August, as the fleet was ascending the St. Lawrence, a fog came on, with an easterly breeze. The vessels lay to, with their heads to the south ; nevertheless, all were carried towards the northern shore. There seems to have been a conflict of opinion among the pilots, some of whom were New England men, while others were Frenchmen supplied by Walker himself. It would appear, however, that the Admiral paid no great heed to either. As he was going to bed, the captain of the flag-ship entered his cabin, and reported that land could be seen to the north. The Admiral, without making any personal investigations, directed that the ships should head in that direction. This order was so manifestly absurd that Captain Goddard, of the land service, who was on deck at the time, went below, and begged the Admiral to go above. Walker refused. Goddard left, but immediately afterwards rushed into the cabin, exclaiming, "For the Lord s sake, come on deck, or we shall certainly be lost ! I see breakers all around us." Walker put on his gown and slippers, and did as he was desired. The truth of what Goddard had asserted was not to be denied; yet the infatuated Admiral still doubted the existence of land to the leeward. He said he could see none ; which was not at all surprising in the thick condition of the atmosphere. The presence of the breakers should have been evidence suflicient ; but Walker was not satisfied unless he could actually behold what, as a seaman, he ought to have known must be there. The moon shortly afterwards broke through the mists, and showed that the fleet was close on the northern shore of the St. Lawrence, among the Egg Islands. The Admiral now made sail for the middle of the river ; but the movement came too late for eight of his ships, which, as the light of morning presently revealed, had been hopelessly wrecked. A terrible disaster had taken place in those hours of darkness and misdirection. Eight hundred and eighty-four men had been drowned, and the expedition was at one blow rendered abortive. The wind immediately afterwards shifted to a point which would have conveyed the fleet rapidly to Quebec ; but the commanders, crippled in their operations by the serious loss they had sustained, had no choice but to retreat. Walker sailed to Spanish River Bay, where a council of war was held, at which it was iinanimously resolved that nothing farther could be done. The fleet had but. ten weeks provisions on board, and no more supplies could be expected from the colonies.* On the return of Walker to England, a disgrace ful scene of recriminations ensued. The Admiral and his captains reproached the provincial autho rities with d|lay in raising forces and victualling the fleet, and with supplying unskilful pilots a charge for which there seems to be not the slightest justification. The colonists in due time retorted that they had been betrayed by the Queen and her officers, and that the disaster in the St. Lawrence had been purposely contrived. Harley, Earl of Oxford, accused his colleague, Henry St. John, of having so managed the whole affair as to defraud the public of 20,000. In a subsequent year (1717), Harley himself was taxed by the House of Commons, in the articles of impeachment then brought against him, with sanctioning an ex pedition which he knew had been formerly laid aside as dangerous and impracticable. The Whigs, glad of an opportunity of discrediting the Tories, suggested that the success of the expedition would have hindered the negotiations for peace at Utrecht, which the Government of the day was anxious to promote ; and that Walker, who was deeply en gaged in intrigues for the termination of the war, really desired the failure of the attempt on Canada. The strangest part of the business is that Walker himself regarded the loss of the eight vessels, and the drowning of nearly nine hundred men, as a kindly interposition of Providence for saving the lives of ten or twelve thousand soldiers and sailors, who would otherwise have perished of cold and hunger before the walls of Quebec. The official papers of this calamitous enterprise were destroyed on board a ship which blew up shortly after the return of the fleet to England ; and there were those in America who did not scruple to say that the explosion was purposely caused, to get rid of compromising documents. The precise course of events is removed from our knowledge by the unfortunate, and no doubt accidental, loss of these papers ; but it is certain that, whatever the motive, the mismanagement of Walker was extreme. * Sir Hovcndcn Walker s Journal. 1713.] THE PEACE OF UTRECHT. 425 CHAPTER XLVIIL Attack on the French Position of Detroit Termination of the War by the Peace of Utrecht Clauses of that Treaty as affecting America Transfer from France to England of the Slave Trade with the Spanish Colonies The French Position in America after the Treaty of Utrecht Submission of Hostile Indians in the North-eastern Parts of New England Loss of Population in Massachusetts and New Hampshire consequent on the War Domestic Legislation in Connecticut Act of the English Parliament for the Importation of Naval Supplies from America Insurrection of Indians in North Carolina Restoration of Peace by the Aid of South Carolina Addition of the revolted Tuscaroras to the Five Nations Wise Government of Colonel Spotswood in Virginia Discovery of a Passage over the Appalachian Mountains Previous Attempt under the Governorship of Sir William Berkeley Deaths of Queen Anne and Louis XIV. Succession of the House of Hanover to the English Throne, and its Effects on the American Colonies .Removal of Dudley from the Government of Massachusetts and New Hampshire Contemplated Abolition of the American Charters Tyrannical Acts of the Deputy- Governor of New Hampshire Results of the Peace between England and France. THE total failure of the expedition against Quebec necessitated the abandonment by Nicholson of his contemplated attack on Montreal, and before he had reached the frontiers of Canada he was com pelled to return to New York. In the year 1713, the French position of Detroit was besieged by a party of the Ottagamies, or Foxes a tribe remarkable for the military energies and savage ferocity of its members. The French stationed at this post numbered but twenty-one, including their commander, Du Buisson ; but that officer put the fort into the best state of defence he coiild effect, and summoned to his assistance the Indian allies of France who were then hunting in the surrounding lands. The position was very important, for it commanded the great lines of intercourse with the Upper Indians, and the chief highway to the Mississippi. The settlement was claimed by the English ; and had the Ottagamies succeeded in driving out the French, it would doubtless have passed into the possession of their rivals. But Detroit was saved by the devotion and active assistance of the Ottawas, Hurons, and other Indian tribes, who obeyed with alacrity the summons of Du Buisson. These nations had come under the influence of the Jesuit missionaries of France an influence truly remarkable for its strength, depth, and extensive range ; and they expressed to the French commander their determination to die, if need were, in defence of him and of his flag. The words were not idly spoken; for they pre sently attacked the hostile Indians with so much fury that the latter were compelled to surrender at discretion. All found in arms were massacred, and the rest were distributed as slaves among the conquerors. During the remainder of the war, the frontiers of New England were frequently ravaged by incursions of the Indian allies of the French. No action of special importance took place ; but a great deal of misery was inflicted, for which the colonial authorities seemed quite incapable of finding a remedy. This disastrous condition was brought to a close by the Peace of Utrecht, which was concluded on the llth of April, 1713. That treaty, in the clauses relating to America, provided that Newfoundland, the Hudson s Bay Territories, and the conquered settlement of Annapolis (formerly Port Royal), with the whole province of Nova Scotia, or Acadie, to which Annapolis belonged, should remain in the- possession of England; but the French were per mitted to retain a settlement at Cape Breton. To the English also was assigned supremacy in the fisheries; and freedom of trade with Spanish America was amply secured. The Five Nations now called the Six Nations, in consequence of the Tuscaroras having united with them were recog nised as subjects of the English monarch ; and the French and English Governments mutually bound themselves not to molest or interfere with the other Indian tribes claimed as the subjects of either. The precise definition of the boundaries of Nova Scotia, and of the territories of the subject tribes, was deferred for future arrangement, and became the subject of many fruitless discussions and of much prolonged contention. One very disgraceful feature in this treaty had reference to the slave-trade. Since 1701, the Spanish settle ments in South America had been supplied with iiegroe. by a French mercantile corporation called the Assiento Company, or Royal Company of Guinea, the operations of which were sanctioned by a treaty between the Crowns of France and Spain. By the Treaty of Utrecht, the Assiento contract was transferred from the merchants of France to those of England, who were to enjoy a complete monopoly. The King of Spain now granted to the latter the exclusive privilege for thirty years of supplying his colonies with African slaves ; and Queen Anne, on her part, engaged that her subjects should, during that period, transport to the Spanish Indies 144,000 negroes, on certain specified terms, at the rate of 4,800 of these imhappy creatures a year. It was stipulated that the English merchants 426 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1713. should have leave to erect a factory on the Rio do la Plata, and that, in case of war between England and Spain, eighteen months should be allowed them for the removal of their effects. But, on the breaking out of the next war, the persons and property of the traders were seized at once, in violation of this engagement, and the dealers in human cattle were entirely ruined a result for which it is impossible to feel any but a lively satisfaction. What rendered this disgraceful com pact still more disgraceful was that the sovereigns of England and Spain were themselves shareholders in the infamous traffic. Queen Anne (who had on a previous occasion interested herself in the slave- trade, by countenancing the operations of the Royal African Company for the transportation of negroes from Africa to America) was to receive one quarter of the common stock, and Philip V. another quarter : the remaining moiety was divided among the English merchants who cared to engage in the business. The territorial gain to England from the Treaty of Utrecht, as far as America was concerned, was considerable ; yet France was left in undisturbed possession of the valley of the Mississippi, to which the name of Louisiana had now been given. By means of their missionaries, their traders, and their energetic political and military leaders, the French had for several years, as previous Chapters have more fully shown, been appropriating this immense region ; and both the English Government at home, and the English colonies in America, had passively seen that advance, with scarcely an effort to hinder it. Penn had expressed his opinion that the wild coimtry in question should be included in the colonies of England ; Spotswood, the energetic Governor of Virginia, had several times called the attention of the home authorities to the spread of French power towards the west ; and Henry St. John viewed the same fact with apprehension. But nothing was done, and the peace of 1713 left matters, so far, where it found them. Even in the noi*th, the position of France remained more favour, able than might have been supposed, considering that, on the whole, the successes of the allies on the continent of Europe had been greater than those granted to the armies of Louis XIV. As already stated, the French were allowed to retain the island of Cape Breton, situated to the east of Nova Scotia, at the south-eastern limit of the Gulf of St. Lawrence; and colonisation was at once prosecuted there with great vigour. In 1714, persons who had quitted Newfoundland and Acadie, in consequence of the change of masters, formed settlements along the coasts ; and by 1720 a line of fortifications had arisen at Louisburg, to guard the entrance to the St. Lawrence. Canada remained to the countrymen of Jacques Cartier, who had been one of its principal discoverers ; the valley of the Mississippi formed the western boundary of their possessions ; and in the south they had planted themselves on the Gulf of Mexico, in close proximity to the Spaniards, who held the peninsula of Florida. Three great European nations had posted their advanced guards in the wilderness ; and these were separated by the forest, the prairie, and the encamp ments of the yet-unsubdued barbarian. The terms of peace were far from being com pletely satisfactory to the Anglo-Americans. They left the French in much too strong a position ; and they gave no sufficient guarantee of the neutrality of the Indians in case of renewed hostilities. One effect of the peace, however, was to induce the Indians on the eastern frontier to seek a better understanding with the New Englanders than had existed for a long while, if we except a few brief and delusive periods of apparent amity. They sent a deputation to the Government of New Hamp shire, to propose that friendship should be re-esta blished between the English and themselves, and that to this end a conference should be held at Casco. Dudley, the Governor, preferred that the natives should attend the English commissioners at Portsmouth. At Portsmouth, accordingly, the chiefs assembled on the 13th of July, 1713, and there executed a formal treaty, in which they acknowledged their former breaches of faith, asked pardon of the Queen for their unprovoked rebellion, and promised to act for the future as faithful and obedient subjects of the English Crown. The pro vincial Governments of New England, hoping to prevent those causes of quarrel which arose from sordid and unscrupulous bargainings, forbade the colonists to conduct any private traffic with the Indians, and undertook to establish barter-houses, where public agents should superintend all com mercial transactions ; but the idea was not at that time carried out. A period of repose was sorely needed by the colonies of New England, especially by Massachu setts and New Hampshire, which had suffered in the highest degree from the effects of the war. The population of the North American colonies generally doubled itself in five-an.d-twen.ty years by the natural process of increase ; but Massachusetts had not doubled its inhabitants in twice that period, dating backwards from 1713. From the beginning of Philip s war to the close of the war terminated by the Peace of Utrecht aboiit eight-and-thirty years a state of hostilities had existed, with but 428 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1711. few and short intermissions. It is calculated that during that time six thousand young men perished in the field, or of diseases produced by warfare. The New Englanders married early, and had large families, as commonly happens in countries where the means of life are abundant ; and their posterity, had they lived, would have added largely to the resources of the land. The colonies to the south were better protected, and therefore lost far fewer men ; but all the plantations suffered more or less in their finances. In most instances, the local Govern ments had recklessly drawn on the future by a copious issue of paper money, which, soon becoming depreciated in its value, as such currency generally does, entailed a heavy loss on the community. The evil was carried to a greater extent in Massachu setts than in any of the other provinces, and a great deal of commercial fraud and gambling was the result. It was found necessary, in the course of a few years, to suppress the institution of lotteries by a special Act, and to revive a former law against idleness and immorality, which enacted that no single person of either sex, under the age of twenty- one years, should be permitted to live separately, but should be included in some orderly family government. Connecticut seems to have accepted the war as a special rebuke from heaven, according to the old Puritan idea that Providence, after a period of indolent acquiescence or of good-natured indulgence, is prone to sudden fits of anger at the wickedness of men, and requires some special legis lative exertion for the appeasing of its wrath. One of the measures passed by the Connecticut Assembly towards the promotion of this object was an Act for exempting clergymen from all taxes, and for placing infant towns and settlements in a similarly favoured position, on their undertaking to establish institutions for religious education. The rulers of Connecticut, however, did not entirely confine their efforts for the public good to measures such as these. They did much for the spread of secular knowledge, and arranged for the equitable discharge of all obligations resulting from the issue of paper money, and for the creation of a stable currency, not liable to the fluctuations which attend a circu lating medium of doubtful value.* An Act of the English Parliament, passed in 1 704, during the progress of the war with France and Spain, had been directed towards utilising some of the productions of the New England States, of New York, and of New Jersey. The chief sup plies of pitch and tar employed by English ship- * Grahamc s History of the United States, Book VIII., chap. 1. builders had, up to 1703, been derived from Sweden. But in that year the Swedish Govern ment granted to a mercantile corporation a monopely in the sale of these productions ; and this led to so great an increase in the price of the commodities, that English purchasers began to consider whether they could not get what they wanted elsewhere on more reasonable terms. The Queen s Ministers took up the question, and Parliament enacted a law by which premiums were to be tendered to all persons who should import (in vessels manned according to the reqiiirements of the Navigation Act) into England from America masts, tar, hemp, and other naval stores. The colonists of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecti cut, New York, and New Jersey, were prohibited, under severe penalties, from cutting down any pitch, pine, or tar-trees, of certain dimensions, growing on lands not appropriated by private owners, and actually enclosed within their fences. A later Act, passed in 1710, threw on the surveyor- general of the Royal woods in those parts the duty of affixing a mark on such trees as he considered fit for naval purposes ; and all persons presuming to cut down trees so marked were subjected to a heavy fine. The northern parts of Anglo- America were capable of supplying any requisite amount of naval stores of this nature ; and it was certainly folly to continue to look to Sweden for supplies which an English colony could so amply furnish. Yet the restrictions with regard to the Royal trees led to a great deal of discontent among the colonists. The province of North Carolina had enjoyed a perfect immunity from the state of war established between England and France ; but in the course of that struggle she had to sustain a trouble of her own. The tribes of the Tuscaroras and Corees found their accustomed lands encroached upon by a number of German emigrants, fugitives from the Palatinate, which had been devastated and ruined by years of war. These emigrants were under the direction of one of their countrymen, Baron Graff enried, who, in September, 1711, ascended the river Neuse in a small boat, to examine the neigh bouring country, and to discover how far the stream was navigable. He was accompanied by Lawson, the surveyor-general of North Carolina, and both were seized by a party of sixty armed Indians, and com pelled to travel through the night until they reached a village of the Tuscaroras. A council of chieftains from several villages was held, and Lawson was accused as the chief agent in the greed and cruelty of the English. The discussion lasted two days, and at its close both prisoners were condemned to death. In the case of Lawson, this sentence was 1713.] PROGRESS OF THE SOUTHERN STATES. 429 carried out ; but on Graffenried representing that he belonged to a nation quite distinct from the English, and promising that no land should be occu pied by his people excapt with the consent of the natives, his life was spared. After a captivity of five weeks he was released, and wearily made his way back through the woods to the infant settlement he had left. But in the meanwhile all had been destroyed. On the 22nd of September, a party of Tuscaroras and Corees crept noiselessly and secretly towards the small cabins of the Germans, situated along the Roanoke and Pamlico Sound, and at night fall burst like a hurricane on the doomed white people. A dreadful massacre followed, and the carnage did not stop there. The Huguenot refugees at Bath, and the settlers at other localities in the vicinity, were also murdered ; and the savages pursued their victims into the obscurity of the sur rounding forest by the glare of lighted pine-branches. The slaughter was prolonged three days, during which all the country lying on Albemarle Sound was visited by the vengeful Indians, who dealt death and misery wherever they appeared. The blow was sudden and unexpected, and it might have been crushing but for the aid of South Carolina. A party of English and native allies, headed by one Barnwell, was sent by the southern province to the banks of the river Neuse in 1712, and attacked the Indians entrenched in a rude fort at the tipper part of Craven county. The army, however, was not properly supported by the northern province, which was torn by internal dis sensions consequent on the popular dislike of the proprietary. Barnwell, unable to punish the Indians, negotiated with them a treaty of peace, which the troops of South Carolina violated on their return home, by seizing as slaves the inhabi tants of several villages. This led to a renewal of the massacres, and in the autumn of 1712 yellow fever bi-oke out with great malignity, so that the country south of Pamlico Sound was nearly de populated. The attitude of the Indians was so threatening that it became necessary to despatch another army against them. In. 1713, an expedi tion was undertaken by the combined forces of the two provinces, under command of James Moore, the Governor of South Carolina ; the insurgents were pursued to their fort on the Neuse, and defeated with great slaughter ; and eight hundred prisoners remained in the hands of the English. The Assembly of South Carolina appi-opriated 4,000 to the service of the war, and that of North Carolina issued bills of credit to the amount of 8,000. The flying savages were hunted across the open country by the English forces, and in the defiles of the woods by their Indian allies, who received a money payment for as many scalps as they could bring, or as many captives as they could offer for slaves. In this way, peace was at length restored; but before the danger was quelled, the colonists of North Carolina had fled from the ravaged districts in such numbers that a law was passed, prohibiting any one from quitting the terri tory without a passport from the Governor; and the operation of this statute was aided by an edict of the Government of Virginia, commanding that all fugitives from the neighbouring province not so provided should be arrested and sent back. To meet the expenses of their military operations, and to encourage domestic trade, the Assembly of South Carolina established a public bank, which issued bills of credit, lent at interest on landed or personal security. The tribe chiefly concerned in the rebellion was expelled from North Carolina ; and it was then that the Tuscaroras, uniting with the confederacy of the Iroquois, to which they were supposed to have some affinity, caused the desig nation of the Five Nations to be altered to that of the Six Nations. The Corees w;re subsequently permitted to establish themselves in the neighbour hood of Hyde. Virginia, like North Carolina and Maryland, was perfectly untouched by the war between the monarchs of France and England. Thus left to the quiet development of its resources, the Old Dominion increased in riches and power, but did not escape being made the prey of rapacious politicians at home. When Nicholson quitted the post of Governor, in 1 704, the office was conferred as a sinecure on George, Earl of Orkney, who held it for thirty-six years, and received in all 42,000 for doing nothing.* The annual salary of this fortunate peer was 2,000 ; but of this he had to set aside 800 for the Lieutenant-Governor, who was also appointed by the Crown. Sir William Keith thought this arrangement a very good one, because it gave to the Virginians a powerful courtier for the advocacy of their interests in England. But the historian Oldmixon very pro perly doubted the fitness of a home-staying noble man to be the agent of a distant colony ; and it does not appear that the lai ge sum which Lord Orkney received for the use of his name as Governor ever produced the slightest good to Virginia. One of his representatives, however, was really serviceable to the colony by the vigour of his character, the strength of his understanding, and the honesty of his nature. Tliis was Colonel * Grahame, Book VIII., chap. 2. 430 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1714. Alexander Spotswood, a Scotch gentleman, favour ably known, even before he left Europe, by scientific attainments and military skill. On arriving in Virginia, he promoted the formation of roads, and the construction of other public works of utility ; he also took measures for the education of the Indians, and for the regulation of the trade carried on with them by the colonists. But one of the most important acts of his administration had reference to the growing power of the French in the western parts of the continent, which he saw the necessity of checking. Before anything could be done for extending the limits of Virginia towards the Mississippi, it was necessary to find a practicable route over the Appalachian or Alleghany Mountains, then, though not now, forming the western boundary of the plantation. This was a matter which had pre viously attracted the notice of Sir William Berkeley; but he had not accomplished much, and the long ridge of highlands still remained an obstacle to the expansion of the Virginians in that direction. The French were well acquainted with these mountains, and with what lay beyond them; but they took every means to keep other nations in ignorance, even to the extent of publishing false maps and false descriptions of the country, and of designating the Indian tribes of those parts by misleading names. To the Virginians the Appalachians had long seemed an insurmountable barrier a savage and stejtile region, full of prowling beasts and tame less Indians. Spotswood was not content that this should be for ever assumed as an incontestable fact. He suggested to the Assembly an expedition to the hilly country, and a sum of money for the purpose was voted by the popular representatives in 1714. A passage across the ridge was soon discovered, and from the summit of the highlands a vast stretch of beautiful country was beheld, spreading towards the dimness of the far horizon. Spotswood sent a memorial on the subject to the home Government, pointing out the threatening advances of the French, and urgently suggesting the construction of forts along the mountain line, the proper positions for which he indicated. He also counselled the English Government to repay the Virginians the expense of the Appalachian expedition; but on neither point was his advice taken. It was too often the policy of English Ministers to act towards the American colonists as if the interests of the plantations and the interests of the Empire were entirely distinct, if not actually antagonistic ; and it should be added that American colonists were but too ready to reciprocate the sentiment. Nothing is more remarkable in the history of the English race than the absence of the Imperial spirit. The habits of local self-govern ment have fostered an inclination to sectional development, and the feeling of individual freedom has always been more or less opposed to central control, and even to central aid. In this respect, the people and their rulers have generally been at one; and it is possible that the Virginians were as little disposed to receive assistance from London as the Ministers were to grant it. So many valuable results have flowed from the English love of personal independence, and from the indisposi tion of English Governments to exaggerate their functions, that it would perhaps be unwise to quarrel seriously with either tendency ; yet it can hardly be denied that the want of a larger and grander policy has been productive of special evils, which it would be folly to underrate. What added to the mischief in the case of America was the fact that the attempts at Imperial rule, which from time to time broke up the sluggishness of indifference, were generally made in a selfish and one-sided spirit ; so that the principle was discredited by the methods of applying it. The ultimate inde pendence of the United States was secured equally by the neglect and by the tyranny of the parent State. Although Spotswood deserves credit for effecting a passage across the Appalachians, we must not magnify his claims in this respect. The concep tion was due to Sir William Berkeley, who, about the year 1674, despatched a small company of fourteen English and as many Indians, under the command of Captain Henry Batt, to explore the mountains. They started from Appomattox, and after a seven days march reached the rising grounds. Passing the first ridge, they encountered other eminences that reached a very considerable height, and were so perpendicular and full of precipices that sometimes, in a whole day s march, they could not travel three miles in a direct line. In other places they found wide savannahs, where the solitude was broken by large numbers of turkeys, deer, elks, and buffaloes, so tame and gentle that they exhibited no fear of men, but suffered them to approach within a short distance. When they had traversed this region, and crossed one of the spurs of the great mountain range, they came to another level country, and then descended a rivulet till they found themselves in cultivated fields, dotted with uninhabited Indian cabins. Further on was a tract of marsh-country, where the native members of the party refused to proceed any further, saying that not far off was a tribe who always murdered strangers. Captain Batt was therefore com- 1714.] ACCESSION OF GEORGE I. 431 polled to retxirn, without accomplishing his design. It is not known how far he penetrated the moun tains ; but it seems probable that he never crossed the main ridge, which he apparently skirted to the south. Butt s report, however, encouraged Sir William Berkeley to form a plan for another expedition, under his own command ; and prepara tions were already in a very forward state when the outbreak of Bacon s rebellion put an end to the project.* The two great monarchs whose subjects had con tended for mastery on the soil of America, were now on the eve of passing away from this world. Queen Anne died on the 1st of August, 1714, and Louis XIV. on the 1st of September, 1715. The demise of Anne was followed by a momentary crisis, which, had it resulted in a different way from that which actually came to pass, might have had very serious consequences for the American colonies. The Whigs had been in power for the first eight years of the late reign ; but in 1710 the Tories succeeded to office, and the Tories were secretly opposed to the Act of Parliament by which the succession to the Crown was vested in the House of Hanover. Their most cherished object was to restore the direct line of Stuarts in. the person of James II. s eldest surviving son, afterwards the First Pretender. With this view they had manoeuvred and plotted for years, not without the connivance of the Queen herself, who would gladly have seen matters so arranged tl.i.t her half-brother should succeed her on the throne, had he consented to renounce the Roman Catholic faith. The young Prince refused to accept any such condition, and, if accepted, it could hardly have possessed much value; but, though Harley, Earl of Oxford, equivocated in his allegiance, and seemed ready to serve either the Pretender or the Elector of Hanover (a piece of duplicity which caused his fall from power a few days before the death of Anne), Bolingbroke pur sued with unswerving singleness of aim his plans for restoring the Jacobite line. The peace of 1713 had been brought about by him and his colleagues, to the end that France, the supporter of the Stuart Prince, might not be too much humbled ; and there seems no room to doubt that the second Duke of Ormonde, who at the close of 1711 succeeded the great Duke of Marlborough in the command of the English troops in Flanders, betrayed the allies by a calculated inaction, to which Anne herself was privy, in order to force on a cessation of arms. But the intrigues of Bolingbroke and his party were defeated by the promptitude and decision of * Moll s Modern History, or the Present State of all Nations (Dublin, 1739), Vol. V., Part II. : America. the Dukes of Argyll, Somerset, and Shrewsbury, aided by the mature wisdom and long-tried pa triotism of Lord Somers, who re-entered the active field of politics to help in securing the future of liberal progress in England. With the accession of George I. , the Whigs returned to power ; and the late Ministers were impeached, and compelled to seek refuge in flight. Had the Jacobite plot suc ceeded, despotism would have been re-established in the old country, and have spread with the utmost rapidity to the new. In Massachusetts and the other Puritan colonies, the quiet succession, of the House of Hanover to the English throne was hailed with great satisfac tion. It was the triumph of Protestantism, which would undoubtedly have been imperilled in the contrary case. The Government of Massachusetts and New Hampshire was soon afterwards trans ferred from the hands of Dudley to those of Colonel Burgess, an English officer who had served with distinction in the continental campaigns. The administration of Dudley had not been popular a fact which was to some extent owing to the ill- repute of this politician, consequent on the events of an earlier day. He had for a time voluntarily quitted America, and, settling in England, had sat in the Hoiise of Commons, and occupied the post of Lieutenant-Governor of the Isle of Wight. But his greatest desire was to be Governor of his native colony, and, after some disappointments, he obtained the position at the death of Lord Bella- mont, in. 1701, owing, in a great degree, to the exertions of the English Dissenters, whose favour he had secured. Massachusetts and NCAV Hampshii-e were now separated from New York and New Jersey, and the two former were placed under the rule of Dudley, who retained his power about thirteen years. They were years of almost perpetual contention with the Assembly ; for Dudley sought on every occasion to enhance the Royal prerogative, and the popular party opposed him with a vehemence which was sometimes com mendable, and sometimes simply factious. He was known to have expi essed a wish that the province might again be deprived of its charter ; and he joined Lord Cornbury, in 1704-5, in supporting a design of the English Government for taking away the charter of Connecticut an attempt which that energetic and really well-governed colony success fully resisted. The political life of Dudley ended in 1715. He was now old ; he could hardly hope for a renewal of office ; and he finally withdrew from public life. He connects the New England of the reign of Charles II. with the New England of the time of 432 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1715. George I. ; but lie cannot be reckoned among the fortunate traditions of Puritan America. He may not have been so bad a man as partisanship has made out ; but he was a powerful ally of despotism, and did much to justify the dislike with which he was generally regarded in his own country. Yet towards the close of his rule he acted with a degree of mildness which showed that the better part of humane disposition. He also had acquired a de servedly high reputation for valour in the recent war; but what chiefly recommended him to the provinces were the facts that he was a Dissenter in religion, O a member of a family long connected with Dissent, and a supporter in England of those views of colo nial government which were most agreeable to the colonists themselves. He began his rule under very Cooper Pviver A DRAVGHT OF THE TOWN AND HARHOUR OF CHARLESTON. (From " -1 Map of the Dominions of the King of Great Britain on the Continent of North America," oy If. Mo!/, 1715.) 1. Johnson s ravcliue. 2. Drawbridges. . !. Colleton s bastion. 4. Carterct s bastion. 5. Craven s bastion. 6. The half-moon. 7. Granville s bastion. 8. Ashley bastion. 9. The palisados. 10. Blake s bastion. 11. The creek on both sides. 12. The English church. 13. The French church. 14. Presbyterian meeting-house. 15. Anabaptist meeting-house. 16. Court of guard. 17. Col. Ehett s bridge. 18. Anothea Kea. 19. The minister s house. 20. The Quakers meeting-house. his nature had not been wholly extinguished by years of ignoble warfare ; and he was beginning to increase the number of his supporters when, in 1715, he was obliged to resign. He died in 1720, at the age of seventy-three. His successor in the Governorship of Massachusetts and the allied pro vince did not long retain his position. The New England agents in London Sir William Ashurst and Jeremiah Dummer had some reason for sup posing that Burgess woukl not be acceptable to the colonists. They induced him, for a consideration of 1,000, to relinquish his office, which was con ferred on Colonel Shute, a man of liberal views and favourable circumstances ; but it was not long ero the policy of the Government at home again led to a feeling of distrust and annoyance in America. The question of the charters had once more arisen that same question which had caused so much bitterness in the days of Charles II. and his brother, and which William III. had made an effort to arrange. At the very beginning of the reign of George I., in 1715, a Bill was introduced into Par liament for abolishing all the charters of the several colonies of New England. As soon as the fact was known in the plantations threatened, considerable agitation was excited, especially in Connecticut, 1715.] THE NEW ENGLAND CHARTEKS. 433 where, however, the measure was supported by a descendant of John Winthrop. The popular party was headed by Governor Saltonstall, another name famous in the annals of early English colonisation in America. This official placed his private fortune at the disposal of the agents in England, who were who had purchased it of the Indians, and not to England, which had given nothing for it. The second of these arguments, when employed as a bar to political interference on the part of the mother country, was a manifest fallacy ; for the possession of certain estates, however good the title A KACE FOR LIFE. instructed to employ every possible means, tit whatever expense, to defeat the Bill. Dummer was desired to write and publish a defence of the New England charters, which he did to the satisfac tion of the Connecticut people. His contention was to the effect that the colonies had been made by the energy of the colonists themselves, who had relied on the charters as guarantees of their provincial pri vileges ; and th at, as far as property was concerned , th o land belonged to the settlers and their descendants, 37 may be as a matter of property, can never in itself annul the right of the Imperial Government to effect changes in the mode of ruling a colony. In this as in other cases, any proposed change is to be judged on its own merits ; and, in the last resort, if the parent State persists in forcing an unjust measure on its dependencies, there is the indefeasible right of revolution, to which, some sixty years later, the Americans were driven by the attempt to tax them without their consent. But to base a claim 434 CASSELL S HISTOEY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1717. to something very like legislative independence on the fact of lands having been purchased in a distant part of the realm, was an idle assumption, which in 110 respect strengthened the position of the New Englaiiders. The truth is, however much Dummer strove to deny it, that ideas of complete indepen dence were beginning to form themselves in the minds of many of the American colonists. Colonel Nicholson wrote to the Board of Trade in 1698 that " a great many people of all the colonies, especially in those under proprietaries, think that no law of England ought to be binding on them without their own consent ; for they foolishly say that they have no representatives sent from them selves to the Parliament of England, and they look upon all laws made in England, that put any restraint upon them, to be great hardships." Three years later, the Lords of Trade, writing to Lord Bellamont, instructed him to watch and curb this humour, and added that the independence which the colonies thirsted after was so notorious that it had been thought tit to lay the matter, together with other objections, before Parliament. A Bill for the withdrawal of the colonial charters, inti O- clucecl in 1701, was the result of these views on the part of the home Government ; but the measure was ultimately dropped. It was not prudent in the English Government to provoke a feeling of distinct nationality by repeated interferences ; but in New England the feeling had originated at a very early date. Dummer s arguments, backed by the influence of the Dissenters, procured the withdrawal of the proposed Bill. The fact of its ever having been brought forward, however, left a disagreeable impression in America, which was not easily removed. At the same period, a spirit of opposition was excited in New Hampshire by the conduct of one of her own citizens, George Vaughan, who had for some time acted as the agent of the colony at London. He seems to have turned his opportu nities in this position to the disadvantage of the community which employed him. Apparently with a view to ingratiating himself with the court, lie suggested a number of measures calculated to enhance the Royal authority, and, in a memorial to the King and his Ministers, recommended the extension of the land-tax of Great Britain to New England. Fortunately his advice in this respect was declined ; but he was shortly afterwards made Deputy-Governor of New Hampshire, as the lieu tenant of Colonel Shute. On arriving at the seat of his delegated power, he gave great offence to the Assembly by requiring it to establish a perpetual revenue for the Crown, and, when this was refused, by rebuking and threatening those who opposed his wishes. He plainly told the members that he was a superior match to them, as being armed with power from his prince, who could do execution at the utterance of a word. This was language entirely out of date ; but Vaughan, an American of the eighteenth century, was desirous of acting over again, on a small scale, the tyrannical antics of a James I. or Charles I. He suspended coun cillors and dissolved the Assembly ; then, flushed with his petty success, set himself in opposition to his superior, Colonel Shute, and resisted his orders in so insolent a manner that Shute suspended him. Vaughan probably thought he should have the support of the King against the Governor ; but he was mistaken. He was removed from the position he had abused, and in 1717 John Wentworth, a wealthy native of New Hampshire, received the appointment. Wentworth s commission is counter signed by Addison, then Secretary of State. A period of amity between England and France succeeded to the deaths of Queen Anne and Louis XIV. Sir Robert Walpole, the great Minister of George I. . and Cardinal Floury, who was called to the head of affairs under Louis XV., were both inclined to a pacific policy ; and the exhaustion of France, from the long wars which she had lately passed through, formed a powerful argument in favour of quiescence. America for some time shared in the benefits of this peace. The old quarrel as to boundaries was far from settled ; but for the present it was laid aside. The frontiers of the English colonies were no longer ravaged by parties of French and Indians, and the settlers were left to pursue in comparative quiet, save for a few native outbreaks, their great work of peopling the desert, and preparing the commonwealths of the future. During this interval, population largely increased ; the feeling of American nationality grew stronger; and the foundations were laid though perhaps unconsciously for that great Federation which is now among the leading Powers vt li;e world. 1715.] RISING OF THE YAMASSEES. 435 CHAPTER XLIX. .Rising of the Yamassees against the South Carolinians Intimation of the Plot to a Trader Massacre of English on Good Friday, 1715 A Race for Life Devastation of a Large Extent of Country Measures of Defence Total Defeat of the Savages by Governor Craven Dissensions between the South Carolinians and the Body of Proprietors Despatch of Commissioners to England to remonstrate against the Conduct of Chief Justice Trott Refusal of the Proprietors to interfere The Pro prietary Government upset by the People Jamea Moore elected by the Assembly to the Governorship, in place of Robert Johnson Opposition of Governor Johnson to the Revolution Success of the Popular Movement Threatened Attack by the Spaniards Forfeiture of their Charter by the Proprietaries Government of Sir Francis Nicholson Reforms in the Two Carolinas English Opinion on the Subject Interviews of Sir Alexander Gumming with Indian Chiefs Visit of Cherokees to England, and Conclusion of a Treaty with George II. Answer of the Chiefs Progress of North and South Carolina after the Establishment of the Royal Government. NORTH CAROLINA, we have seen, suffered from an Indian insurrection, from 1711 to 1715: in the latter of those years, South Carolina was visited by a similar trouble. The settlers had for some time been. on. very friendly terms with a tribe called the Yamassees. who occupied a large territory stretching nlong the north-east side of the river Savannah, in the vicinity of Port Royal Island. These savages, who were a branch of the Muscogees, had been originally planted in Florida, from which they fled in disgust at the persistent attempts of the Spaniards to convert them. They were regarded by the colonists as a people very well inclined to be friendly with Englishmen. At the same time, they nursed a furious hatred of the Spaniards, into whose dominions they made repeated incursions, for the purpose of waging war at once on the subjects of Philip V., and on the hostile tribes of their own race. On these occasions, they would carry off Spanish prisoners, and, conveying them to their towns in the midst of the thick forests, would put them to death with prolonged and hideous tortures. Such frequent atrocities moved the commiseration of the South Carolinians, and the Legislature generously passed a law offering a reward of five pounds for every Spanish prisoner whom the Indians should surrender alive and unhurt at Charleston. The then Governor of South Carolina, Charles Craven, sent back the captives thus ran somed to the Spanish settlement of St. Augustine, charging the authorities there with the amount of their redemption and the expenses of the journey. This led to an intercourse of a friendly nature between the Yamassees and the Spaniards, and at length a peace was concluded, which the Spanish Governor had not the courtesy to communicate to the South Carolinians, to whom his countrymen were indebted for the termination of the former state of animosity. The Yamassees now transferred to the Governor of St. Augustine the title of king, which they had previously bestowed on the Governor of the English province. The circum stance ought perhaps to have aroused suspicion; but the colonists, not intending any ill, anticipated none. A distinct revelation of what was brooding was made, however, a short time afterwards. Among the traders to the Yamassees was a Scotch High lander named Fraser, who had become very inti mate with the leading men of the tribe, especially with a chief called Samite. Fraser had a wife, to whom, after the Indian ceremony of washing her face, as a token of peculiar friendship and confi dence, had been performed, Sanute communicated the fact that the Yamassees had placed themselves under the rule of Spain, had accepted the Roman Catholic faith, had been taught to regard the English as heretics doomed to eternal fire, and wero afraid of sharing their fate if they hung back from exterminating all the Protestants they could reach. He added that the Spaniards had entered into a confederacy with the Yamassees, the Creeks, the Cherokees, and other Indian tribes, to commence a desolating war with South Carolina, and that they only awaited a particular signal from the Creeks to strike the first blow. That Fraser and his wife might escape the impending danger, Sanute urged them to fly at once, and offered them the use of his own boat for the purpose. If, however, they re solved on remaining, he promised that he would himself, when the crisis arrived, act as their execu tioner, and, by the infliction of instantaneous death, save them from the nameless agonies of torture. Fraser at first discredited the story ; but at length the terrors of his wife induced him to O take flight to Charleston. For some reason probably from a fear of being disbelieved and laughed at he refrained from saying a word to any one as to what he had been told ; yet the danger, despite his scepticism, was very real and very serious. Not only the Yamassees, but several other Indian tribes, were inflamed against the English. They were heavily in dwbt to the traders, and were being pressed for payment. Bienville, a 436 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1715. French settler in Louisiana, had persuaded the Choctaws to drive the English from their villages ; and the natives over a large extent of country were in a state of manifest excitement. The Yamassees had sent round to the neighbouring communities the warlike symbol of a bloody stick, which, like the chupatties circulated in Hindostan a little before the rebellion of 1857, was understood as a call to arms, and an offer of alliance in the achieve ment of some notable enterprise. It was for the return of this stick from the Creeks that the Yamassees waited before beginning operations ; and they had not to wait long. About a week after the appearance of Fraser in Charleston, Captain Nairne, the provincial agent for Indian affairs, residing, together with many traders, at Pocotaligo, the largest town of the Yamassees, observed a strange degree of agitation, mingled with gloomy reserve, amongst the savages by whom he was surrounded. He requested an explanation, and promised that they should receive ample satisfac tion if they had any real cause of complaint against the people of South Carolina. The chiefs replied that they had nothing to allege, but that they were busy preparing for a great hunt on the following morning. The statement was believed in the simple sense which it seemed to convey, and the English at night went to sleep in their rude huts without taking any precautions. The next day, which was Good Friday, the well-known Indian war-cry was heard ; the savages burst upon the unsuspecting white men, and a dreadful massacre ensued. Ninety persons were murdered in Pocota ligo and the surrounding country ; but fortunately several escaped. A boy ran into the forest, and, after wandering nine days, at length reached a garrison. A captain of militia, named Seaman Burroughs, broke through the ranks of the Indians, and rushed off in the direction of Port Royal. The savages immediately started in hot pursuit, dis charged their arrows at the fugitive, and wounded him in two places ; but, being a man of great strength and endurance, gifted with a remarkable power of running, he held on, and baffled his pur suers. It is related that he ran ten miles, and swam one, ere he reached the town. But he gained it at length, and gave the first intimation of the Indian treason. An English ship happened to be in the harbour at the time ; and the inhabitants of the place were at once removed on board this vessel, and in a number of canoes, to Charleston. The rebels, however, advanced towards the capital, carry ing their prisoners with them, and at length halted at Stono, that they might torture the unhappy men, women, and children, without interruption. The whole province was by this time in a flame. Every tribe from Florida to Cape Fear was in arms. Emissaries from the Yamassees had penetrated into the interior and to the extreme north, rousing the passions of their fellows, and drawing them into the conspiracy. A large extent of country was ravaged, and it was doubtful whether Charles ton itself would escape attack. The muster-roll of the capital showed that there were only about twelve hundred white men fit to bear arms ; but Craven, the Governor, determined to do the best he could with the small force at his disposal. Martial law was proclaimed. An embargo was laid on all ships, to prevent the transportation of anything that might be required for the defence of the city. An Act was passed by the Assembly empowering the Governor to impress men, to seize weapons, ammunition, and stores, and to arm negroes who could be trusted. Application was made for assis tance from England ; but the proprietors, who seldom thought of their colonial possessions except as a source of profit, sent neither men nor funds. North Carolina, however, remembering the help she had received in the period of her own trouble, despatched a body of troops to the assistance of her southern neighbour, who, but for the aid thus gratefully proffered, would probably have beeij over whelmed. New England, likewise, sent a liberal contribution of arms and ammunition ; and the South Carolinians soon presented a determined front to the enemy. Though worsted in two or three encounters, they succeeded, on the whole, in check ing the advance of the Indians, and in delivering the capital from the immediate dread of assault. The principal action in this war was fought under the personal command of Governor Craven. The savages had taken up their chief position at a place on the banks of the Salke-hachie, where a thick entanglement of trees and bushes afforded them convenient cover ; and towards this spot Craven, at the head of a numerous body of militia, cautiously advanced, scattering before him on the road several straggling parties of the foe. When at length he reached the point of attack, he encountered a most formidable resistance. The Indians advanced again and again ; hideous yells rent the air, and showers of arrows and bullets issued from behind the trees. But the forces under Craven displayed admirable firmness and discipline ; and in the end the con federated barbarians were driven from their ambush, and pursued beyond the present limits of the pro vince. The Yamassees, 011 retiring into Florida, were welcomed by the authorities of St. Augustine by the ringing of bells and the firing of guns ; and it was now evident, beyond the possibility of doubt, 1718.J TROUBLES IN SOUTH CAROLINA. 437 that the Spaniards had boon privy to the rising, and desired its success. But the brilliant victory of Craven completely crushed the conspiracy, though not before the colony had lost at least four hundred of its population, and a large amount of property. The conqueror was received at Charleston with every demonstration of honour, and the name of Craven has always remained one of the most popular in the list of South Carolinian Governors. The lands that had belonged to the Yamassees were appropriated, by two Acts of the Assembly, to the use of such British subjects as cared to occupy them. Five hundred men from Ireland accordingly Avent out to Carolina; but shortly afterwards the proprietors, with that extreme selfishness which generally characterised their actions, caused the whole district to be converted into baronies. The unfortunate Irishmen, thus dispossessed of estates which they had left their own country to culti vate, died of want and misery in large numbers, while the rest emigrated to the northern colonies, where their labour insured them more considerate treatment. The success of the South Carolinians in suppress ing a formidable rebellion by their own unaided powers, seems to have encouraged them to the assertion of a greater degree of political independence than they had hitherto exhibited. Craven had now been sxicceeded in the Governorship by Robert Johnson, the son of a previous Governor, Sir Nathaniel Johnson. The new officer was a man of great integrity and of popular principles ; but he was hampered by instructions from England, and a condition of social irritability was thus produced. The popular representatives set themselves in oppo sition to the grasping policy of the proprietaries; the proprietaries retorted by straining their influence to the utmost, so as to defeat the wishes of the colonists. In 1718, it was decreed by the ruling body in England that the Governor should not accept any law passed by the Assembly until after a draught of it had been, submitted to themselves, and had received their sanction. Several laws, passed some time before, and now in actual opera tion, were repealed by these irresponsible legislators, and others which the Assembly desired to enact were disallowed. Amongst the latter was an Act for setting a distinct exchangeable value on country com modities, and declaring them a legal tender for the payment of debts. Some such arrangement had been rendered necessary by the great expenses of the war ; but the proprietors, though they had contributed neither a man nor a shillingtowardsthe prosecution of that war, and were indebted for the preservation of their estates and revenues to the unaided exertions and sacrifices of the colonists, refused to assent to the proposed edict. Desiring to have some agent in the plantation who should represent their interests, and act as a spy on the people, they chose for this purpose a lawyer named Nicholas Trott, who had previously been regarded by the South Carolinians as a man of liberal and popular ideas. On being appointed by the proprietaries Chief Justice of the province, Trott forgot his former principles, and supported his employers in their most despotic designs. He was accused by the Assembly of corruption in the dischai ge of his functions, and it was proposed to impeach him ; but he assumed a tone of defiance, and declared that he was answerable only to those who had appointed him. Technically, he was right in this contention, and Governor Johnson and the Council found that they could do nothing more than send a commissioner to England, to solicit the removal of the Chief Justice. The effort was fruitless. After a delay of three months subsequent to the arrival of the commissioners in London, in 1719, they were told that the proprietaries had received letters from Trott, in which he said that the com plaints against him originated solely in a political faction. The statement was accepted as conclusive ; inquiry was denied ; and the Governor of the province, the Council, and the Assembly were in formed, through the colonial agents, that the pro prietors had received their disloyal and presumptuous application with the highest displeasure and sur prise. The same body likewise commanded the Governor to displace all the Councillors who had united with himself and the Assembly in demanding the removal of Trott, and to fill the vacant posts with certain persons recommended by the unpopular Chief Justice. Johnson, on receiving these orders, felt assured that they would cause a serious commotion amongst the people ; but, seeing clearly that his duty lay in executing the will of the proprietoi s, by whom he was himself appointed, he did as he was directed, though with a reluctance which his own political wisdom and liberal sympathies must have rendered doubly keen. The popular discontent declared itself very soon. A dread of invasion from Spain, consequent on the outbreak of hostilities between that Power and England, was seized on as a con venient opportunity for extorting reforms. John son summoned the Assembly, and required of it sufficient means for putting the colony in a state of defence. The Assembly refused to vote a penny, but, at the same time resolving not to leave the country without protection, took measures for organising and arming the people. The association 438 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1719. thus formed, to which the vast majority of the colonists acceded with enthusiasm, concerned itself as much with politics as with military arrange ments, and the movement soon acquired a very threatening character. At the last general election, the supporters of the proprietaries had found them selves completely outvoted, and the elected members now declared, at private meetings, that they would have no more to do with their oppressors. The people were determined to stand by their rights and privileges, and recalled the fact that the Com mittee of Trade and Plantations had on a former occasion declared the charter forfeit. Finally, the Assembly resolved to disregard the officers of the proprietary, and begged Johnson to hold the reins of power for the King. Johnson, who seems to have been actuated throughout by a high sense of personal honour, refused the offer, and, after an altercation with the Assembly, dissolved it, and retired into the country, in the hope that his absence for a little while woxild have the effect of calming the storm. The Assembly, however, refused to accept the decree of dissolution ; ordered the proclamation to be wrested from the marshal s hands; and proceeded to take special measures for meeting the crisis. The members voted themselves a convention delegated by the people, and elected James Moore to the post which Johnson was held to have forfeited. Moore had been their Governor in earlier years, and was popular as a military officer and a man of spirit, under whose rule the arms of England had been carried in triumph to the Gulf of Mexico. It was expressly declared that he was to exercise his powers in the name and on the behalf, not of the proprietaries, but of the sovereign. Twelve councillors were next appointed for carrying on the business of the State ; and the presidency of this body was conferred on Sir Hovenden Walker, the unlucky hero of the expedition against Quebec in 1711, who had since emigrated to South Carolina. A considerable force of militia was now under arms ; the country was in a good state of defence ; and it was resolved to review the citizen soldiery on the 21st of December, 1719, and on the same day to pro claim the new chief magistrate, Colonel Moore. The revohition was completely successful, and for the present no attempt had been made to question its right, or to obstruct its progress. Opposition, however, was now to be experienced at the hands of Johnson. That official, conceiving that his duty to the proprietors required that he should make an attempt to stay the revolution, reappeared at the capital, and exerted himself to the utmost to restore his authority. Previous to the muster of militia, he gave particular orders to Parris, the commanding officer, to delay the assembling of the companies, and not to allow a drum to beat in the town. But the orders were disregarded. The militia drew up in the public square; the colours flew from the fort. In the King s name, Johnson commanded Parris to dis perse his men. Pan-is replied that he would only obey the Convention. The deposed Governor then induced the commanders of some English ships of war to bring their vessels in front of Charleston, and threatened to bombard the city unless imme diate submission were made to the dominion of the proprietary body, as represented by himself. But the people were in possession of the fort, and made light of the ex-Governor s menaces. Unable to do anything more, and perhaps really unwilling to take active measures against the people, Johnson again withdrew, and the revolution went its way unchecked. Captain Rhett, of the Royal Navy, who had won a great name for courage and capacity in his operations against the pirates, acted with apparent friendliness to the popular cause, though there is reason to suppose that he so managed as to stand well with both sides, so as not in any case to be absolutely committed to the loser. Before the revolt, he was held to be a partizan of Trott ; and he filled offices of emolument under the proprietors. After the rising of the people, he sided with them, and kept his offices ; bxit at the same time lie took care to represent to the governing body in England that he had allied himself with the populace in order that he might secretly counteract their designs. He blamed Johnson for needlessly pro voking the malcontents by the inflexibility of his conduct; and, with a Machiavellian subtlety, argued that lenity must sometimes be shown, the better to re-establish power. In the midst of these events, intelligence arrived that the Spaniards had despatched a fleet and a land force from the Savannah against South Carolina. The revolutionary Governor and the revolutionary Convention at once took measures of defence ; pro claimed martial law, summoned all the inhabitants of the province to Charleston, and levied heavy taxes. Johnson in vain represented to the popular leaders that, as they would be conducting warlike operations under an illegal authority, they would be liable, in case of defeat, to the treatment of pirates. The Convention went on with its work, but, retaining a friendly feeling towards the former Governor, exempted his estates from the special taxes which had been voted. The anticipated attack by the Spaniards never took place. Four teen ships, carrying an army of twelve hundred men, started on the expedition that was to subdue 440 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1729. South Carolina. But in. the first instance they directed their operations against the island of New Providence, in the West Indies, the haunt, a few years before, of the pirates whose history has been traced. Here they were utterly defeated by Com modore Rogers ; and shortly afterwards the greater portion of the fleet was lost in a storm. The men at the head of affairs at Charleston were not unaware of the necessity of defending their exceptional power before the authorities of the parent State. They accordingly instructed their agent at London, in 1720, to plead their cause, and obtain, if possible, a recognition of their acts. At that time, George I. was absent in Hanover, and the supreme power was temporarily lodged in a Council of Regency. By this body, the arguments of the South Carolinian agent and of the proprietaries were heard with becoming im partiality, and the result was a decision that the latter had forfeited their charter. The Attorney- General was therefore ordered to institute legal proceedings for effecting the changes which it was proposed to carry out ; and in the meanwhile Francis Nicholson, who had already been at the head of affairs in New York, Virginia, Maryland, and Nova Scotia, and who had since been made a knight, received a Royal commission as pro visional Governor of South Carolina. Nicholson was a man inclined to despotic principles in govern ment, with a temper somewhat irritable ; yet he was not devoid of better qualities, and the people over whom he was now placed accepted his appoint ment as a pledge that the King s Government was desirous of promoting a higher social state in their colony than had prevailed iinder the proprietary rule. Their confidence proved not to be misplaced. Men are often influenced in their views by the prevalent feeling of the time ; and this appears to have been the case with Nicholson. In the days of James II. he could declare that the people of New York were a conquered race, whom the sovereign might lawfully govern by his sole will in any way he pleased. Under George I. his ideas were more liberal, and his administration in South Carolina gave entire satisfaction. He arrived at Charleston early in 1721, and his first act was to confirm peace with the natives. The chiefs of thirty-seven villages were met by him in congress on the borders of the territory occupied by the Cherokees, a nation of a pacific disposition, though with warlike capabilities and resources. The boundaries that were to divide the domains of the white from those of the red men were marked out ; and a treaty of commerce and peace was also concluded with the Creeks, whose hunting-grounds, it was agreed, should extend to the Savannah. The friendship of the Cherokees, who numbered twenty thousand, was especially cultivated, as a protection against the Yamassees, whose remaining members were now permanently re-established on the soil of Florida, and were encouraged by the Spaniards to make frequent attacks on the frontier settlements of South Carolina. A fort with a small English garrison, was established on the high grounds in the neighbourhood of the river Alatamaha, now included in the State of Georgia a proceeding which led to unavailing remonstrances from Spain, which still asserted a title to that part of America. But Nicholson, busied himself with internal improvements, as well as with questions of defence. He established schools, and gave not only his time, but his money, to the spread of education, which was certainly in a very backward state among the South Carolinians. Though per sonally rather a free liver, he seems to have been sincerely attached to the Church of England ; and he induced the London Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts to send a number of clergy men to the province, with liberal salaries in addition to what they received from the colonists themselves. Nicholson did not retain his government more than four years ; but he left behind him a high reputa tion for his intelligent and considerate administration. of local affairs. Although the proprietors of South Carolina were practically deprived of their governing powers in 1720, it was not until 1729 that they ceased to hold the land as a private estate, nor indeed was it until then that the question of jurisdiction was fully and legally settled. In the latter of those years, an Act of Parliament recognised and sanctioned a treaty, which had been concluded with all the proprietaries but one, for the surrender to the Crown of their teriitory, their title to exercise the functions of government there, and all arrears of quit-rents. For this transfer, the sum of 22,500 was paid ; but Lord Carteret, afterwards Earl Granville, who possessed an eighth share, was alloAved to retain his property in the soil. The treaty and the Act of Parliament affected the northern as well as the southern colony ; and North Carolina now for the first time received a Royal Governor. The consti tution of each province under the new arrangement consisted of a Governor and Council appointed by the King, and an Assembly elected by the people. The Carolinians were further gratified by an Act of Parliament which permitted their planters and merchants to export rice directly to any part of Europe southward of Cape Finisterre, in vessels manned according to the requisitions of the Naviga- 1730.] NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE INDIANS. 4-11 tion Acts. The quiet and almost eventless history of the Carolinas, from this period to the epoch of the War of Independence, proves that the change in their condition, consequent on the downfall of the proprietary body was a benefit of no slight degree. A monarchy may represent, protect, and develop the interests of a commonalty, with which, wisely considered, its own interests are bound up. An aristocracy seldom considers any interests but its own ; and of all aristocracies the very worst is an absentee proprietary. The two Carolinas had from their first settlement suffered from this bad form of government ; and they welcomed the representa tives of the Crown as the guardians of colonial liberty, too long restricted by the deliberations of an irresponsible board, sitting in London, and having regard to little but immediate profit. A geographical and historical writer, whose work was published ten years after the final settlement of the Carolinas, gave expression to the satisfaction at the change which was felt in the old country. His Majesty, he apprehended, was thus rendered sole proprietor or ground-landlord of those pleasant and fruitful regions, and was thereby possessed of the largest and fairest demesne of any prince in Europe. The two provinces, he remarked, were of much larger extent than any possession previously held by the greatest of the Kings of England ; and posterity, if not the existing generation, might pos sibly see the Crown so much enriched by the purchase as to defray all the ordinary charges of government out of the revenues of the Crown- lands, as the English sovereigns anciently did, without depending on the contributions of the sub ject. This sanguine anticipation was a little dashed by the inability of the writer to determine whether his Majesty purchased the provinces as King of England, or only as a private gentleman. In either case, however, he begged leave to congratulate the King and the nation on what had occitrred, since it had in that way become the joint interest of prince and people to encourage those plantations, which, if well managed, might in years to come furnish Great Britain with naval stores, silk, wine, oil, and other things for which she was beholden to foreigners, and weald at the same time advance English manufactures by taking them in exchange for their own commodities.* One of the earliest proceedings of the Royal Government, after the settlement of the proprietary question, was to enter into negotiations with the Indians on the frontiers, with a view to securing their submission as subjects, or at least their friend- * Moll s Modem History (Dublin, 1730), Vol. V., Part II. ship as allies. This, as we have seen, was to some extent accomplished by Sir Francis Nicholson ; but it was determined to make farther advances in the same direction. In 1730, a special envoy was sent out by George II., in the person of Sir Alexander Gumming, a Scotch baronet, who, starting from Charleston towards the latter end of March, with a few companions, was guided by Indian traders to Keowee, the first town of the Cherokees, about three hundred miles west of the capital. He had already been informed, at the plantation of a Mr. Russell, which was situated much nearer to Charles ton, that the French had for two years been en deavouring to bring over the Lower Cherokees to their interests ; that they had long ago built forts in the territory of the Creeks, and were steadily encroaching on grounds not before occupied by them. At Keowee, a trader named Barker told Sir Alexander that, a few weeks before, messengers had arrived from the Lower Creeks to the Chero kees, inviting them to form an alliance with the French, which the Cherokees, after the receipt of presents, had shown a disposition to do. Indeed, they had been so unruly that Barker expected they would ere then have risen against the English, and the traders at that time hardly dared speak to them. That very night, however, three hundi ed natives made their submission to King George on their knees, and Gumming summoned a general assembly of Cherokee chiefs at Nequassee, in the valley of the Tennessee. The goodwill of the Indians was forwarded by a circumstance which acted on their superstitious fears. One night, after Sir Alexander had arrived at a native settlement in the wilderness, a terrific storm of thunder and lightning came on, and struck so much dismay into the hearts of tho savages that on the following morning their chief priest told the English envoy he knew he had come to govern their nation, and they must submit to whatever he commanded. The chiefs and great men of all the tribes met at Nequassee in the course of April, where, with much ceremony, Sir Alexander Gumming was placed in a chair by Moytoy, the principal warrior of the Cherokees, and was stroked with thirteen eagles tails. The minstrels sang from morning till night, and, as was usual with Indians on solemn occasions, all fasted the whole day. After a speech from Sir Alexander, in which he magnified the power of his sovereign, and required all the warriors to acknow ledge themselves the dutiful subjects of George II., the chiefs made their submission by kneeling, and imprecating on their heads the most frightful consequences if they violated the promise of obe dience. On the following day, the royal crown 442 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1730. of the Cherokee monarch was brought from one of the settlements, and, together with live eagles tails and four scalps of enemies killed in battle, was pi-esented to Sir Alexander, with a request that he would lay these trophies at the feet of King George. Seven of the chiefs shortly afterwards accompanied the envoy to England, where they had an audience of the King, and were so astounded at the splen dour of the court that, with the hyperbole of their race, they compared the sovereign and his consort to the sun and moon, the princes to the stars of heaven, and themselves to invisible motes in a great ray of light. In September, 1730, they affixed their marks to a treaty of alliance, which recited that the great King had commanded his lords commissioners to inform the Cherokee am bassadors that the English everywhere, on all sides of the great mountains and lakes, were his people ; that their friends were his friends, and their enemies his enemies ; and that he took it kindly that the great nation of the Cherokees had sent them so far to brighten the chain of friendship between him and them, and between their people and his people. The treaty proceeded to observe that the chain of friendship between the great King and the Cherokee Indians was like the sun, which shone both in England and upon the great moun tains where they lived, and equally warmed the hearts of the Indians and of the English ; that as there were no spots or blackness in the sun, so was there no rust or foulness in the chain ; and that, as the King had fastened one end of it to his own breast, he desired the envoys would carry the other end of the chain, and fasten it well to the breast of Moytoy, and to the breasts of their old wise men, their captains, and all their people, never more to be broken or made loose. Thereupon the Indians were presented with two pieces of blue cloth. The great King and the Cherokee Indians being thus fastened together (the treaty continued) by the chain of friendship, the King had ordered his people and children, the English in Carolina, to trade with the Indians, to furnish them with all manner of goods that they might want, and to make haste to build houses, and to plant corn from Charleston towards the town of the Cherokees behind the great mountains ; for the King desired that the Indians and the English might live together as the children of one family, whereof the great King would be a kind, loving father ; and as the King had granted his land on both sides of the great mountains to his own children, the English, so he now conferred on the Cherokee Indians the privilege of living where they pleased. Thereupon he gave them one piece of red cloth. The treaty then went on to say that, the great nation of Cherokees being now the children of the King of Great Britain, and he their father, the Cherokees must treat the English as brethren of the same family, and must be always ready, at the Governor s command, to light against any nation, whether they were white men or Indians, who should dare to molest or hurt the English ; and thereupon the King gave them twenty guns. The nation of the Cherokees should on their part take care to keep the treading-path clean, so that there should be no blood on the path where the English white men trod, even though they should be accompanied by any other people with whom the Cherokees were at war ; whereupon, his Majesty gave four hundred pounds weight of gunpowder. It was also agreed that the Cherokees should not suffer their people to trade with the white men of any nation but the English, nor permit the white men of any other nation to build any forts or cabins, or plant corn amongst them, or near any of the Indian towns, or upon the lands which belonged to the great King ; and if any such attempt should be made, the Cherokees were to acquaint the English Gover nor therewith, and to do whatever he might direct, in order to maintain and defend the great King s right to the country of Carolina. With this were given five hundred pounds weight of swan-shot, and five hundred pounds weight of bullets. Fur thermore, it was stipulated that any negro slaves who should escape into the woods from their English masters were to be delivered up to the plantation to which they belonged ; and for every negro so* apprehended and brought back, the Indian so returning him should receive a gun and a watch- coat. In connection with this clause, the King gave a box of vermilion, ten thousand gun-flints, and six dozen hatchets. If by any accidental mis fortune it should happen that an Englishman killed an Indian, the chief of the Cherokees should first complain to the English Governor, and the author of the fact should be punished by the English laws ; and if an Indian killed an English man, the Indian also should be delivered up to the Governor, to be punished by the same English laws. Upon this were presented six dozen spring- knives, four dozen kettles, and ten dozen belts. The treaty concluded : " You are to understand all that we [the commissioners] have now said to be the words of the great King whom you have seen ; and, as a token that his heart is open and true to his children and friends, the Cherokees, and to all their people, he gives this belt, which he desires may be kept and shown to all your people, and to their children and children s children, to 1730.] TREATY WITH THE INDIANS. 443 confirm what is now spoken, and to bind this agreement of peace and friendship between the English and Cherokees as long as the mountains and rivers shall last, or the sun shine. "Whereupon we give this belt of wampum." It is a painful feature in this treaty of friendship and alliance tJiat it should have included a clause for the return of runaway slaves. In order to recover their escaped negroes, the colonists were ready to reward the Indians with weapons which might at any time be used against themselves. The savages had a very poor opinion of English morality in this respect ; yet they were willing to act as police to the slave-owners, for the sake of what they could get by it. While the seven Cherokees were in England, they were taken about London, and shown, the public buildings ; and, having received several presents from the court and private gentlemen, they returned to their own. country in. one of the King s ships. Their answer to the treaty of alliance, delivered on the day that document was dated, and addressed to the King s representative, was as follows : " We are come hither from a dark, mountainous place, where nothing but darkness is to be found, but are now in a place where there is light. There was a person in our country with us : he gave us a yellow token of warlike honour that is left with Moytoy of Telliquo, and as warriors we received it. He came to us like a warrior from you : a man he is ; his talk is upright, and the token lie left preserves his memory amongst us. We look upon you as if the great King George were present, and we love you as representing the great King, and shall die in the same way of thinking. The crown of our nation is different from that which the great King George wears, and from that which we saw in the Tower ; but to us it is all one, and the chain, of friendship shall be carried to our people. We look upon the great King George as the sun and as our father, and upon ourselves as his children ; for, though we are red and you are white, yet our hands and hearts are joined together. When we have acquainted our people with what we have seen, our children, from generation to generation, will always remember it. In war we shall always bo as one with you ; the great King George s enemies shall be our enemies ; his people and ours shall be always one, and shall die together. We came hither naked and poor as the worm of the earth ; but you have everything, and we that have nothing must love you, and can never break the chain of friendship which is between us. Here stands the Governor of Carolina, Avhorn we know. This small rope we show you is all we have to bind our slaves with, and may be broken ; but you have iron chains for yours : however, if we catch your slaves, we shall bind them as well as we can, and deliver them to our friends again, and ask no pay for it. We have looked round for the person that was in our country ; he is not here ; however, we must say he talked uprightly to us, and we shall never forget him. Your white people may very safely build houses near us ; we shall Imrt nothing that belongs to them, for we are the children of one father, the great King, and shall live and die to gether." Then, laying down his feathers upon the table, the speaker added : " This is our way of talk ing, which is the same thing to us as your letters in the book are to you ; and to you, beloved men, we deliver these feathers in confirmation of all that we have said." The good understanding thus established was maintained for several years, and it had the effect of interposing between the English and the French, in that part of America, a powerful nation of Indians pledged to support the interests of the former people. The native envoys Avere accom panied in their homeward voyage by Robert Johnson, the deposed Governor of South Carolina, who was again deputed to that post by the King. He took with him the welcome boon of a total remission of arrears of quit-rents, together with a gift from the sovereign of seventy pieces of cannon for the defence of the colony. South Carolina now advanced rapidly in wealth and population. An addition was made to the latter, about 1733, by the arrival of three hundred and seventy Swiss, who, upon a grant of land being made to them by the English Government, together with some money assistance, planted themselves in a part of the province not previously settled, and founded a town, to which, in recognition of their leader and countryman, John Peter Puny, they gave the name of Purrysburgh. In North Carolina, the Royal Government did not at first succeed so well, owing to an unfortunate selection of officials ; but when these had been removed, and the conduct of affairs had been entrusted to more honourable hands, the colony underwent a natural and happy development. The Carolinas had been fairly started as members of the great Anglo- American family. 1G34.] DISSENSIONS IN PENNSYLVANIA. 445 AV I L L I A M CHAPTER L. Pennsylvania in the latter part of the Seventeenth Century Dissensions in the Province during Penn s Absence in England Alterations in the Mode of Government Rumour of an Indian Insurrection Misgovernment of Captain Blackwell, Penn s Deputy Resignation of Blackwell, and further Reforms in the Government Separation of Delaware from Pennsylvania Schism in the Quaker Body created by George Keith- -Persecution of Keith and Others Conversion of Keith to thr English Church Position of Penn in England His Proprietary Government taken from him Government of Colonel Fletcher, and Dissensions with the Assembly Restoration of Penn s Powers Renewed Reforms In what way Pennsyl vania contributed to the Expenses of the War with the French Colonists Return of Penn to America Bickerings with the Assembly Slavery among the Quakers Further Dissensions between Pennsylvania and Delaware after their Reunion Penn s Loss of Popularity His Final Scheme of Government, and Second Departure for England. WHEN tracing the early annals of Pennsylvania, in Chapter XXXII. of this History, we related the personal connection of William Penn with his Quaker colony down to the close of that great philanthropist s life, in 1718 ; but it will be neces sary to consider more in detail the progress of events in the plantation itself after the departure of its foundei in 1684. Penn had left his infant settlement with words of affection and blessing with fond recollections of the past, and passionate 38 aspirations for a future of grace, niercy, and peace. A very little while showed that those hopes were not to be fulfilled. He had been in England only a few months when a serious quarrel broke out amongst the colonists. Nicholas Moore, the Chief Justice of the province, and Robinson, the clerk of the local Court, were regarded with dislike by the community generally, partly because they were not Quakers, partly also because they were believed to be guilty of various improprieties which do not CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1G8G. seem to have been proved against them. Penn, writing from England, in vain endeavoured to com pose these discords. " For the love of God, me, and the poor country," he said in one of his letters, written in 1685, "be not so government ish, so noisy, and open in your dissatisfactions." But the spirit of disputatiousness had got possession of the people. They complained of abuses and extortions committed by the officers whom Penn had appointed to conduct the sale of his lands, and exhibited the utmost reluctance to pay the arrears of quit-rent due to the proprietary. The councillors to whom Penn had delegated his powers took no steps towards the collection of these sums of money; and the remon strances addressed to them were entirely unheeded. In 168G, the mild Quaker was moved to write a letter of sharp reproach to his people, whom he taxed with ingratitude and disregard of his just claims. He had been tempted more than once to annul the charter he had bestowed on them ; but from this he forbore, while giving free vent to his sense of injury. His detention in England he attributed to the failure of remittances from America, which had caused him much embarrassment ; and he averred that he was more than ,6,000 out of pocket by his connection with the colony, to say nothing of his labour, care, and hazard of life itself. The letter in which he made these statements produced no better effect than those which had preceded it. The people complained of the hardship of having to pay rents to an absentee proprietor, when they were already at a great charge for cultivating the land; and, as thei e was no power to compel them to pay, the ftmnder s demands remained unsatisfied. Annoyed at the conduct of the provincial coun cillors, Penn appointed in their place, in December, 1686, five Commissioners of State, of whom the un popular Nicholas Moore was one. To these Com missioners he issued his commands that they were, at their first sitting, to abrogate every act that had been passed in his absence. They were to do their utmost to check any tendency to disorder, dispute, or collision of powers between the several depart ments of government, and, to this end, were to con fine the Council to its function of proposing laws, and the Assembly to its privilege of accepting or rejecting them. They were to have a diligent care for the proprietor s interests, and to be regardful of their own dignity. " I beseech you," he wrote, dravr not several ways ; have no cabals apart, nor reserves from one another ; treat with a mutual simplicity, an entire confidence in one another; and if ut any time you mistake, or misapprehend, or dissent from one another, let not that appear to the people : show your virtues, but conceal your in firmities ; this will make you awful and reverent with the people." The advice was good ; but, like all similar exhortations, it took little account of the varied elements of human nature. The pro vince, however, enjoyed a period of repose during which the moral power of the Quakers in dealing with the Indians was shown in a remarkable way. It was rumoured in 1688 that the savages were preparing a general massacre of the colonists. Dis may seized on the people ; but Caleb Pusey volun teered to go to the spot where the conspirators we re said to have assembled, on condition that five others, deputed by the Council, should accompany him, and that all should be unarmed. The six set oxit on their perilous mission into the wilderness, and at some distance from the English settlements found an Indian chief at the head of a small retinue. The chief confessed that his countrymen had been disappointed at finding that the price of a recent occupation of land had not by that time been fully paid them ; but he added that they had complete faith in the honesty of the English, and were quite willing to wait. The story of the projected mas sacre he characterised as a wicked falsehood ; and he told the colonists to get their corn in with out fear, as the Indians intended them no harm. The dealings of the Pennsylvania!! settlers with the native tribes contrasted very favourably with the bearing and policy of other colonists ; and the fruit of this was seen in the freedom of the Qxiaker plantation from sanguinary wars and insurrec tions. It is said that the Friends never converted a single Indian to Christianity, though some efforts wei e made by them in that direction. At any rate, they gave the red men a practical example of benevolence and justice, which was not withoi.it results. Penn did not get much more satisfaction out of his Commissioners than out of his Council. The quit-rents were not paid ; the colonists were either really or apparently forgetful of the services of their benefactor. He described himself as " one of the unhappiest proprietaries with one of the best people." The truth is that he had established a little democratic republic, while retaining for himself the position of a species of feiulal lord. The people did not hesitate to use the freedom he had given them, and this led to collisions. The members of the Assembly, in the course of 1685-G, originated Bills on their own account, without waiting to receive them from the Council ; refused to vote taxes when they considered them unnecessary ; and introduced a variety of reforms into the constitxition which Penn had devised. It cannot be doubted that 1690.] POLITICAL REFORMS. 447 Penn was sincerely desirous to see his commonwealth self-governing; but he not unnaturally wished to retain some share in the direction of a scheme which had originated in his own mind. In July, 1688, another change in the form of government took place, and Captain John Blackwell, one of Cromwell s officers, and a son-in-law of the Parlia mentarian General, Lambert, received from Penn the rank of Deputy-Governor of his province. Blackwell, who was at the time a resident in New England, speedily went to his seat of government, and as quickly got into angry disputes with the settlers. He seems to have taken his old chief, the great Protector, as his model in affairs of state as well as in affairs of war. In order to exclude from the Assembly a man named White, who was re garded as an opponent of Penn, he caused him to be imprisoned on a frivolous pretext, and then obstructed the execution of the writ of habeas corpus which had been procured on behalf of the accused. After the commission of other acts of a similar nature, he deferred the convocation of the Assembly as long as he could, and, when at length the mem bers came together, in March, 1689, he opened the session with a speech of a very imperious character. The Assembly remonstrated, and Blackwell, to weaken the opposition, persuaded some of the members to absent themselves. Exasperated by such attempts at coercion, the popular representa tives declared the secession of all such members a treacherous desertion of the public service, and passed a series of resolutions setting forth that the proprietary s absence might be a disappointment to him, but was certainly a prejudice to the people ; that he had no right to decree the abrogation of all laws passed in his absence ; that even with the con sent of the freemen the proprietary could make no laws to bind the province, except in the way pre scribed in the charter ; and that it was both desir able and to be hoped that no laws of any other kind would be imposed on the people. Blackwell found that he could not stem the tide that had set in against him, and, resigning his office, he left the province in December, 1G89. The executive power again passed into the hands of the Council, the president of which was Thomas Lloyd, a gentle man from North Wales, formerly a scholar of Oxford, and a person of the highest character for learning and moral goodness. Penn now resolved to reform the government of his plantation in a more popular spirit than he had hitherto shown. " Friends," he wrote to the colon ists in 1690, "I heartily wish you all well, and beseech God to guide you in the ways of righteous ness and peace. I have thought fit, upon my further stop in these parts, to throw all into your hands, that you may see the confidence I have in you, and the desire I have to give you all possible contentment." A Council chosen by the people Avas made collectively his deputy, and for a little while all seemed to go fairly. But a new disturb ance speedily arose, owing to jealousy of the superior position enjoyed by the upper counties, or Penn sylvania proper, felt by the lower counties, now Delaware, which had recently been united with the territory of Perm. After much contention, the lower counties assumed to themselves distinct executive powers, and proceeded to act on that assumption in a way which the others declared to be illegal. Penn was greatly annoyed at the rupture when he heard of it. He desired the contending parties to make choice of any one of the three forms of executive government Avhich had been successively tried in the Quaker plantation. The people of Delaware, however, would accept nothing which did not recognise at least a partial severance from Pennsylvania, and in 1691 they were placed under the government of Colonel Markham, Penn s relative. At the same time, the supreme charge of Penn sylvania proper was put into the hands of Thomas Lloyd ; but the work of legislation in the two colonies was still performed by a single Council and Assembly. Such an arrangement did not, on the face of it, seem very likely to be successful ; but the friendly co-operation of Lloyd and Markham smoothed away difficulties, and the two colonies were more friendly after their qualified divorce than during their brief union. Political troubles were soon succeeded by religious strife. Amongst the Quakers of Pennsylvania was a certain Scotchman named George Keith, who to the disputatiousness of his countrymen generally added the particular pugnacity of a Friend. He was a man of ability and of strong convictions, but of an irritable temper, an aggressive disposition, and a mental habit that delighted in nothing so much as theological warfare. He had travelled in New England as a Quaker preacher, and had engaged in many controversies with the Puritanical divines of that part of America, between whom and the followers of George Fox a feeling of bitter animosity still subsisted. His hatred of the New England form of Christianity was shown in several publications, in which he denounced the people of Massachusetts with all the resources of a vitupera tive genius ; and his performances in this respect recommended him to the favour of those who shared his views. Quitting the northern colonies, Keith was appointed surveyor-general of East Jersey, and was afterwards made president of the Friends 448 CASSELL S HISTORY OK THE UNITED STATES. [169-2. Public School of Philadelphia, established in 1G89. He had not been, in this position very long when his old love of argument and censure again declared itself. He could agree no better with his fellow- Quakers than with the Independents who followed the teachings of the Mathers. In 1692 he dis covered that Quakerism in Pennsylvania had become much depreciated. He maintained that loose and erroneous doctrines were taught by the preachers, and that the discipline of the body had of late been grievously relaxed. No Quaker, he said, should be concerned in the compelling part of government ; and on this ground alone he con demned the holding of negroes in a state of bondage. His objections to slavery were strongly reinforced by the German colonists, who had always been very decidedly opposed to the principles which that detestable institution embodies. Such a view, how ever, did not sxiit the majority of Quakers in the province of William Penn. They replied with bitterness : Keith responded with all the vehemence of his controversial nature. The dispute having gone on for some time, the opponents of Keith published what they called a declaration or testi mony of denial against him. They stated herein that Keith had brought upon them a "tedious exercise and vexatious perplexity ;" had assailed them with " such unsavoury words and abusive language as a person of common civility would loathe ;" and had exercised his talents that way by by calling them " fools, ignorant heathens, silly souls, rotten ranters, and Muggletonians." Amongst his other sins they set down a statement of his opinion that Quakerism was too often a cloak for heresy and hypocrisy, and that more diabolical doc trine passed current among the Quakers than among any other description of Protestants. "When the objects of all this reviling rebuked the reviler for his uncharitableness, he answered that he trampled their judgment under his feet as dirt; and shortly afterwards he started a separate meet ing, the proceedings of which, in the estimation of the majority, rendered Quakerism " a scorn to the profane, and the song of the drunkard." The un savoury language of Keith had doubtless as much to do with exciting the ire of other Quakers as the vexatious principles which he vaunted ; but it must be recollected that this kind of language was natural to the sect, and had been frequently em ployed by George Fox. About the time of Keith s schism, a Quaker named Bugg, whose unfortunate appellation certainly laid him open to numerous and effective assaults, deserted the society, and was plentifully bespattered by his former associates. Whether thc -e was anything particularly unsavoury about Bugg does not clearly appear, but may perhaps be inferred from general probabilities. Though in the minority, Keith had a good many followers, whom he designated Christian Quakers, of course implying that the others were Quakers without being Christians. He answered the decla ration of his enemies in an address which contained particular charges of apostasy against those from whom he had separated, and which indicated, in a very pungent and exasperating way, the strong- contrasts existing between the professions and the practice of the majority. This provoked the holders of power to such a degree that they determined on a prosecution a thing imtil that time unknown in the Quaker community in connection with the expression of opinion. They now discovered what they would not concede to others when they were a persecuted sect in England and New England that, however much they were bound, as Quakers, to bear with meekness all offences committed against themselves individually, it was their duty as magistrates to visit with sternness anything which tended to lessen " the lawful authority of the magistracy in the view of the baser sort of the people." Keith was accordingly sent to prison ; so was Bradford, the printer of the address, whose presses were seized ; and both Keith and Bradford were denounced by proclamation as seditious persons, and enemies of the Royal autho rity in Pennsylvania. The printer, not choosing to submit to an arbitrary exercise of power when ho could appeal to the principles of English law, demanded a trial, and obtained a verdict which set him free ; yet he felt obliged shortly afterwards to quit Pennsylvania, where the petty persecutions of his enemies deprived him of all chance of gaining a peaceful livelihood. Keith and one Francis Budd were then tried for being the joint authors of a little book in which they described a certain Quaker magistrate as " too high and imperious in worldly courts." It was a part of the general argument of Keith, who in. this respect strictly followed the principles of Fox, that a true Quaker could not act either as a lawgiver or as a magistrate. Such employments implied a resort to carnal weapons, and were therefore an abandonment of the most essential theory of Quakerism, which taught that evil was to be passively resisted and meekly borne. On their trial, the grand jury found Keith and Budd guilty, and they were sentenced to pay a fine of five pounds, which, however, was afterwards remitted as an act of grace. It Avas altogether an unfortunate affair, and, according to a letter from Penn to a friend in America, excited so much disgust in England that many persons doubted 1692.] TROUBLES OF PENN. 419 the fitness of Quakers to administer municipal authority. Keith was heartily sick of Pennsylvania, and, taking ship for England, he published there an account of the proceedings against him, in a pamphlet entitled " New England Spirit of Per secution transmitted to Pennsylvania, and the Pretended Quaker found persecuting the True Quaker." Some of the weak points of Quakerism had undoubtedly been hit by this vigorous con troversialist, who might have effected considerable good, had he proceeded with less acrimony and venom. He soon acquired a large number of adherents on both sides of the Atlantic ; but his experiences of Quaker ways, and liis minute discussion of the whole body of Quaker doctrine, gradually created in his mind so great a dissatisfac tion with the sect that he abandoned the communion altogether, and declared himself a convert to the Church of England, in which capacity he went back to America as a missionary to the Indians.* He subsequently returned to England, became rector of Edburton, in Sussex, and died about 1710. The controversy in which Keith involved the Quaker settlement led to consequences which probably none of the parties to the dispute ever anticipated. King William was not well disposed to the proprietary governments of America, and was probably glad of any opportunity of putting an end to them. Pennsylvania had given but too clear a proof that its political state required some species of reform, and the prolonged absence of Penn himself placed him almost out of view as an active agent in the conduct of affairs. Besides, the Quaker chief had fallen into great discredit with the court. His friendly relations with James II., before the flight of that monarch, had laid him open to the suspicion of being a Papist in disguise ; and he was three times arrested on charges of this nature, from which, however, he was always able to clear himself. But in 1690 he was accused of being concerned in a plot to restore the deposed sovereign ; and, being afraid of meeting a charge which he had good reason to believe would be supported by perjured testimony, he got out of the way, and lived in retirement until 1G93, when, through the mediation of friends, he was admitted to plead his cause before the King and Council, and was honourably acquitted. Before his acquittal, Penn was an object of great dislike to the monarchy of the Revolution. He was entirely out of harmony with the aristocratical ideas in politics, and the Episcopalian ideas in religion, * Graharne s History of the United States, liool VII., cliap. 2. which guided the great Whig movement of 1688-9; and, with all respect for his honest and benevolent character, it must be added that his championship of James II., under a most mistaken idea that he was thereby promoting the interests of religious freedom, had not unnaturally created in the minds of many Englishmen a distrust of his designs a distrust really ill-founded, but having at the time a considerable show of justification. In Pennsyl vania, the laws had been administered in the name of James long after the Government of William and Mary had been proclaimed in the other colonies ; and it may fairly have seemed to the politi cians now at the head of the State in England, that the Deputies of Penn were not fit persons to exercise power in a British colony. For these reasons, William III., on the 31st of October, 1692, issued a warrant by which he deprived Penn. of all authority in America, and conferred the administration of his territories on Colonel Fletcher, who had shortly before been appointed Governor of New York. Penn, considering himself aggrieved, wrote to Fletcher, beseeching him, on the score of private friendship (which, however, could never have been very earnest between men of such different minds), to disregard the King s commands ; but the request was of course unheeded, and Fletcher appointed, first Lloyd, and afterwards Markham, to act as his deputy while he conducted in person the govern ment of New York. Among the other features of his rule was a decree by which he reunited Delaware to Pennsylvania. Fletcher was frequently at issue with the people of the Quaker settlement, whose disinclination to contribute to the defence of the English colonies, when threatened by the French and their Indian allies, seemed to him unreasonable, and whose resolution to maintain their privileges he regarded as disloyal. When the Royal com mission was first published, in April, 1693, some of the officials who held commissions from Penn withdrew in silence, and others refused to act under the power newly created. At a later date, the popular representatives seemed inclined to withhold supplies, as a means of enforcing com pliance with their wishes. They asserted that the laws founded on the charter of Penn were yet in force, and they desired that the same might be confirmed to them as their right. Fletcher replied, If the laws made by virtue of Mr. Penn s charter be of force to you, and can be brought into com petition with the great seal which commands me hither, I have no business here." The .Royal prerogative, he added, was inalienable. But John Growdon. the Speaker of the Assemblv. reniiuiiod 450 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1694. him that the grant of King Charles was itself under the great seal, and Growdoii asked whether that charter had been legally annulled. Fletcher thought to reconcile the representatives to his rule by proposing to re-enact the greater number of the former laws ; but he was answered that, if they passed one Bill for the re-enacting of laws already in force, they wcmlcl by so doing declare the rest void. It was then hinted by the Governor that the old laws were invalid, because they did not appointment of Fletcher to the Governorship, however willing that official may have been to bring about a more courtly conduct of affairs. In the following year (1694), the contention was re newed. Fletcher wanted a contribution towards the expenses of the war with the French colonists, and the Pennsylvanians would only grant it under certain conditions, which were disagreeable to the Royal representative. It was not unknown to Fletcher, as he admitted, that Qxiakers declined OLD MARKET-HOUSE AT PHILADELPHIA. bear the great seal of the proprietary; but this was denied as strongly as the preceding representations. The indej>endence of the Assembly was fully main tained, and its legislative rights were ultimately recognised by Fletcher. It also obtained the privilege of originating Bills, a power which was never afterwards lost.* On the other hand, the Assembly thought it prudent to acknowledge that the liberty of conscience then existing in the province was due to the grace and favour of the King. Altogether, Pennsylvania lost nothing by the * Bancroft, Vol. II., chap. 19. to make, not only offensive, but even defensive war ; and that they would never grant money for any such purposes. Still, he urged, they could hardly refuse to feed the hungry, and clothe the naked, which were eminently Christian, virtues ; and the Indian allies of New York were then in a condition to require such help. The members of the Assembly saw the real drift of this argument, and refused to be blindly led by it. They said they were very willing to give alms to the suf ferers round Albany, but must retain in their own hands the specific appropriation of such alms. This demand was rejected, as an infringement of prerogative, and, after a fortnight s altercation, the S AS qua. liana <tn Indian fort PEXXSYLTANTA AT THE BEGINNING OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. (From Il/ lHJJ/ircys ^.CCOJOlt of the 452 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1697. Assembly was dissolved. At a subsequent date, Peun reproached the representatives of the people Avith their refusal to contribute towards the com mon defence of the northern and middle colonies, and desired that a sum of money should at once be levied, and sent to New York. Yet it is difficult to .see how the Quakers were to be blamed, from the Quaker point of view, for declining to vote money in connection with the war until they had obtained an absolute assurance that it should be applied in none but works of charity. Still remaining in England, and lying concealed from the plots of his enemies, Perm had the mor tification to find that he was losing credit among the members of his own sect, who reproached him with meddling more with politics, and with the concerns of the English Government, than became one of their body. He was shortly, however, to regain the position he had lost. The friendship of Locke, of Somers, and of other eminent men, enabled him to remove the suspicion under which he had lain, as regards the alleged plot to restore James II., and to show that the charge rested on the evidence of an impostor. His acquittal was followed, in August, 1694, by the restoration of his proprietary functions and authority. "Wil liam III. spoke of him with kindness; the Quakers once more rallied to their old leader, and the fortunes of Peiin were again in the ascendant. He was so poor, however, that he was not at first able to rejoin his people in America ; and he therefore appointed Markham to the post of Deputy-Governor to the whole of the territories, including Delaware. But affairs did not go oil smoothly. The Assembly, in 1695, framed a Democratic Constitution, and refused to vote any money until the desired privileges had been granted. Markham, not knowing whether such a change would be approved by his kinsman, dis solved the Assembly ; but in 1696 the Legislature again voted the reforms of the previous year. It was determined that the Governor should be nothing more than the chairman of the Council : that the entire functions of government should be placed beyond the power of the Executive, and be at the sole disposal of the popular representatives ; and that even the judiciary should depend on the Legislature. Agreement with this new constitu tion was made by the members a condition of their granting to Markham the sums in aid of the Indians which Perm, writing from England, insisted on being voted, as, in case of a refusal, he feared that the proprietary government would again be imperilled. Markham was obliged to give way, and, on the opening of the session of 1097, lie said to the assembled legislators, " You are met, not by virtue of any writ of mine, but of a law made by yourselves." The times of assembling and adjourn ment were among the many powers which, by the new constitution, the representatives of the people retained in their own. hands. The popular cause had triumphed, and Markham made no further attempts at resistance. The sum of .300 which the members voted when, at the close of the session of 1696, they found that Markham was no longer bent on oppos ing their wishes, was applied by Fletcher (\vlio still occupied the post of Governor of New York) to the relief of the Indians then suffering from the inroads of hostile tribes and of the French. At least, such was Fletcher s report in 1697; but the Assembly, in expressing its thanks to Fletcher for his "regard and candour" in applying the subsidy to the use designed for it, refused to send the additional sum for which he asked. Nevertheless, the legislators assured him, they would always be ready to observe the King s further commands, " according to their religious persuasions and abilities." It is to be feared that the Quakers of Pennsylvania were not unwilling to cheat their consciences by granting, under a variety of easy subterfuges, the warlike contribu tions which were occasionally demanded of them. They would refuse the money for the alleged pur pose, but vote it for some other, though they might have every reason to believe that it would in reality be applied to the ends for which it was wanted. Several instances of this subtle casuistry are on record ; and in the revolutionary struggle a sect of American Quakers even went so far as to assert the lawfulness of defensive hostilities, and to take up arms against the English soldiers sent to put down the movement for independence. Such equivocations are inevitable when men array their principles in opposition to the hard facts of life. The conditions of existence cannot be alto gether escaped. They may be defied for a little while in the first warmth and enthusiasm of a new sect ; but when the sect is once established when it has passed out of the stage of reverie into that of practical action the necessity of either frankly and openly submitting to the nature of things, or of conforming under some colourable pretence of evasion, is seen to be imperative. Theorists, when they become responsible rulers, are always compelled to make many concessions to the mere stress and rigour of the world. At length Penn returned to his province. He arrived there, accompanied by his family, in the latter part of ] 699, and found the land prosperous 1700.] QUAKERS AND SLAVERY 453 in a political sense, Imt afflicted by si terrible out break of yellow fever the first of a long series of visitations of the like character, which from time to time desolated the Quaker colony. " Great was the majesty and hand of the Lord," wrote Thomas Story, a distinguished preacher of the com munity of Friends, and afterwards Recorder of Philadelphia; "great was the fear that fell upon all flesh. I saw no lofty or airy countenance, nor heard any vain jesting to move men to laughter ; nor extravagant feasting to excite above measure the lusts of the flesh : but every face gathered pale ness, and many hearts were humbled, and counten ances fallen and sunk, as such that waited every moment to be summoned to the bar." The pre valence of this dreadful disease, however, did not put a stop to pxiblic life. Penii, 011 arriving in his colony, considered it necessary to renew a complaint which he had already made in writing during his stay in England. The citizens of Pennsylvania, like those of some of the other American settle ments, were suspected of being favourably inclined to the pirates who infested the seas of that con tinent. While protesting earnestly against the truth of this accusation, the Assembly passed laws against the imputed offence , but Peiin, after he had again reached the seat of government, ex pressed himself not fully satisfied with what had been done, and his remonstrances resulted in the expulsion from the legislative body of a son-in-law of Colonel Markham, who was thought to be un duly interested in the proceedings of the freebooters. Another source of dissension was found in the demands for pecuniary assistance, in support of a military establishment at New York, which Penn was compelled by the English Government to address to the Assembly, but which the representa tives of the people were certainly unwilling, and perhaps tumble, to meet. A still more serious sub ject for discussion was presented by the institution of slavery. That the Quakers had no insuperable objection to slavery is certain. George Fox, on visiting Bar- badoes in 1671, exhorted his followers to bring up their negroes in a religions way, to use them mildly, and, after certain years of servitude, to sot them free. They appeal- to have acted conscientiously on this advice ; but their considerate treatment of the poor Africans raised against them so violent a feel ing on the part of the less humane, who did not desire that their slaves should be educated or ac customed to gentle usage, that several of the Quakers left the West India islands for the mainland, and settled there. Still, they did not renounce slavery itself ; and, although the Pennsylvania^ niny have acted with more kindness to their black labourers than the people of other plantations, the institution was not suppressed. The German settlers, as already stated, opposed themselves to its continued existence; and in 1688, owing to their representa tions, a resolution declaring the unlawfulness of slavery was passed at the annual meeting of the Quakers of that province. This declaration was repeated in 1696, with the addition of an earnest exhortation to the whole body of Friends in that part of the world to refrain from all further impor tation of negroes. Yet the fact of slavery remained, though the blacks were treated with still greater care, and were sometimes allowed to attend worship in the same meeting-houses with their owners. If slavery in Pennsylvania was not so revolting]} cruel as slavery in the more southern plantations, that was the most that could be said of it. Corrupt in its nature, it abounded in abuses even under the shadow, or rather in the light, of Penn s universal benevolence. To Penn himself, the fact was most distressing ; and he was still further pained by dis covering that many of the colonists had been guilty of numerous frauds in their transactions with the Indians. He therefore presented to the Assembly, in 1 700, three Bills which he had prepared on these subjects : the first, for regulating the morals and marriages of the negroes ; the second, for regulating their trials and punishments ; and the third, for preventing abuses in the intercourse between tho Indians and the colonists. The Assembly would only adopt the second of these meastu-es ; and Penn had the grief of seeing a peremptory negative given to his proposals for rendering more tolerable the condition of the Africans and aborigines. The- attempt, however, bore fruit in time. Some regard was paid to the religious and moral training of the former, and regular conferences were established with the latter, in the hope of winning them to civilisation. Penn himself concluded a treaty with the Indians, into which he introduced certain regu lations for their protection against fraudulent bar gains, and which also contained an acknowledgment on the part of the natives that they were subjects of the English monarch, and amenable to the pro vincial laws.* The old disagreement of Delaware with Pennsyl vania gave renewed trouble in 1700. The counties embraced under the former designation feared that they would be overwhelmed by the greater numbers of Pennsylvania. In the Assembly, the represen tatives of Pennsylvania were almost invariably opposed, in whatever they desired to do, by the * Omhame, Book VII., ch:i;>. -. 454 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1701. representatives of Delaware ; and at length Penn, after vainly endeavouring to satisfy the weaker party by various concessions, convoked at Newcastle, the capital of Delaware, a separate Assembly, which met towards the close of the year. But harmony was not re-established ; on the contrary, great irritation resulted from the proprietary s demand of a subsidy amounting to 2,000, in the proportion of .1,573 for Pennsylvania, and 427 for Delaware. It was openly asserted that Penn was taking advantage of the public distractions to tax the people for his own enrichment,, and for the increase of his political power; and although he obtained the money, it was at a considerable loss of popularity. The purity of his motives cannot be questioned. So far was he from making a profit out of the colonists that he was obliged, in 1708, to mortgage the province for 6,600. He was subsequently disposed to sell all his rights to the English Government for 12,000, and would have completed the bargain but for a series of apoplectic fits which impaired his ijusiness faculty. But it was certainly unfortunate that he should have required a subsidy at the very time when both his colonies were in a state of irrita tion and discontent. Another visit to England now engaged the thoughts of Penn. He had heard of the project of the English Ministry for converting all the pro prietary governments of America into regal govern ments ; and he determined to oppose in person a .scheme which might injuriously affect his pro perty. Previous to his departure, he summoned an Assembly in September, 1701, but found its members in no very tractable mood. He had great difficulty in preventing their assuming a control over his interests in the sale and lease of vacant lands ; but, on the other hand, he persiiaded them to accept a new constitution, by which it was pro vided that a Legislative Assembly should be annually elected by the freemen, and should consist of four persons from each county, or of a greater number if that should be found desirable ; that this Assembly should nominate its own officers, and decide absolutely all questions relating to the qualifications and election of its members ; that it should possess complete legislative powers, and be competent to redress grievances ; that the Governor should convoke, prorogue, and dissolve the provin cial Legislature, should nominate his Council, and should discharge singly the whole executive func tions of government ; and that to the same officer should be reserved the right of affirming or reject ing the Bills of the Assembly. It will be seen that this constitution was less popular than some of those which had preceded it ; that it left more power in the hands of the Governor ; and that it substituted a Council of nominees for an elected Council. It presented, however, greater guarantees of solidity and permanence, and it was well received by the colonists. Liberty of conscience was to be the right of all, and Christians of every denomina tion were to be qualified for office. Sheriffs and coroners were to be chosen by the people, and the appointment of judges was vested in the Legislature. No act or ordinance was ever to be made, to dimi nish the form or effect of the charter, without the consent of the Governor for the time being, and of six parts in seven of the Assembly. Pennsylvania and Delaware were to be allowed to separate within three years of the date of the charter ; and, in the event of such separation, taking place, each was to en joy the same privileges as when the two were united. Having thus re-settled the constitution of his province, and appointed Colonel Andrew Hamilton (formerly at the head of affairs in New Jersey) his Deputy-Governor, Penn started for England, where he arrived in December, 1701, and where his opposition, and that of others, procured the abandonment of the Bill by which the proprietary governments had been threatened. 1701.] PENNSYLVANIA AND DELAWARE. CHAPTER LI. Perm s Disappointment with the Results of his Experiments Second Dissolution of the Union between Pennsylvania and Delaware Government of John Evans Conflicts with the Quaker People on the subject of Military Measures Re sistance to an Obnoxious Impost Unpopularity of Penn Charges brought against him by the Assembly Government of Charles Gookin, and renewed Dissensions Votes of Money to the Queen Penn s Letter of Eeproach to his Colonists His Defence of his own Conduct, and Counter-charges against the Pennsylvanians Failing Health and Death of Penn Progress of the Settlement after his Decease Condition of Pennsylvania in the early part of the Eighteenth Century Quaker Government and Quaker Usages Humane Treatment of the Indians Interview of Sir "\Villiam Keith with the Five Nations Speech of an Indian Sachem Politics and Literature in Pennsylvania Social Condition of tlie Colony Large Immigration Visit of the Younger Penns to Philadelphia Trade of the Province The "Tunkers." AFTER his second return to England, Penn never again went to America. He was received with great favour by Queen Anne, and apparently had no desire to exchange a comparatively easy life in the old country for the continual troubles which beset him in his distant possessions. The personal embarrassments into which he afterwards fell, owing to the bad faith of a steward, may to some extent explain his remaining in England ; but the explanation covers only a rather brief period. Altogether, he lived sixteen years after his second quitting of the colony he had founded ; yet he made 110 attempt to visit it again. The most natural explanation of the neglect is that he was somewhat disappointed with the results of his experiment. It was not that he had ceased to believe in the people, or that he regretted having commenced a government on the broadest principles of humanity and justice. But he had discovered that new social conditions are not established without a great deal of fretfulness and heart- 1 mrning ; he had found amongst his own sect as many jealousies and ignoble suspicions as among men of more worldly profession ; he had himself been regarded with distrust, and treated with ingratitude; and some of his highest designs had been thwarted, at least in part, by the selfishness of his followers. Reviewing all these facts in the quiet of his English home, Penn may have felt disinclined, now that he had past the middle time of life, to encounter the fatigue and perils of a long sea-voyage, in order that he might once more be plunged into an abyss of petty vexations. He had created a political system which was sufficient for all the needs of a self-managing community ; and it was perhaps better that he should not be on the spot, to bring his personal authority into collision with popular powers. He retained his interest in the young plantation to the end of his days ; but after 1701 he saw it no more. The second dissolution of the union between Pennsylvania and Delaware, which Penn had anti cipated and provided for in his last constitution, was speedily brought about. The Delaware repre sentatives, in 1702, protested against the charter,- refused to sit in the same Assembly with the Penn sylvanians, and met separately in another part of Philadelphia, Hamilton, the Deputy-Governor, made strenuous but unavailing efforts to effect a union of the tAvo colonies ; but he died in about a year after the departure of Penn. His successor, John Evans, who was not appointed until Decem ber, 1703 (the Council in the meanwhile exercising the chief executive power), was very favourably received by the Delaware members, and was able to persuade them to propose a reunion with the Peimsylvaman Assembly. But the latter body was by this time so irritated by the frowardness of its old coadjutors that a return to the former condition w as refused, and in 1704 the separate Legislature of Delaware was permanently established at Newcastle, though the two colonies still continued under the same Governor. In many respects Evans was un successful in his rule. He was soon at issue with the Pennsylvanians on the question of establish ing a militia. The war with the French was going- oil in the north, and Evans conceived that it was the duty even of a Quaker community to arm itself in view of possible invasion. Finding that the people refused to adopt his ideas on this subject, he resorted, in 170G, to a stratagem. According to Proud, the Quaker historian of Pennsylvania, and other writers of the same creed, he contrived that a messenger should hastily arrive in Philadelphia from Newcastle, with information that the French were coming up the river Delaware. Then, putting on an appearance of the greatest alarm, he rode through the city with his sword drawn, calling oil the inhabitants to arm themselves, and follow him. The people seem really to have believed the truth of what they were told, and the utmost conster nation fell upon the town. Some burned their goods, many fled into the neighbouring forest, and about three hundred seized on such weapons as they could find, and placed themselves under the com mand of the Deputy-Governor. Bi t it is said that 456 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1706. those who so acted were not Quakers. The Friends indeed gathered together, but it was in their meeting house. Only four persons who had any pretence to be considered members of that body appeared under arms. Evans had gained nothing by his stratagem, except a more certain knowledge of the determination of Quakers not to fight with swords and muskets. With the people of Delaware, the Deputy- Gover nor got on much better. He persuaded them to erect a fort at Newcastle, and to provide funds for and Norris, going on shore, demanded as their right the liherty of proceeding without interruption. This was refused ; upon which Richard Hill took the helm, and, in spite of the cannon, which opened fire from the walls, passed down the river. The only shot which took effect was one through the mainsail ; but the vessel was pursued by the com mandant in an armed boat. As he came alongside, the crew assisted him on board, and then cut the rope, so that the boat fell astern, leaving the com- FENN S HOUSE, PHILADELPHIA. its maintenance by levying a tax on all inward- bound vessels passing its walls, while all vessels mailing down the Delaware were, under certain penalties, to drop anchor, and ask pel-mission to proceed. The Pennsylvanians protested against this as a direct violation of their charter ; but their remonstrances were unheeded. Three Quaker merchants of Philadelphia Richard Hill, Isaac Norris, and Samuel Preston accordingly deter mined to sail past the fort without paying the required impost, let the consequences be what they might. They informed Evans of their intention, find orders were given by him to the commandant of the fort to keep watch for the ship. On near- ing the fort, the vessel cast anchor, when Preston mandant helpless on board the merchant-vessel. Evans, who had watched the proceedings from the fort, now gave chase in another boat, but could not overtake the Quakers, who, on arriving at Salem, in New Jersey, presented their prisoner to Lord Cornbury, then the Governor of that colony. Cornbury was not usually inclined to support popular resistance to the exactions of power ; but he claimed to be vice-admiral of the river, and therefore regarded the action of the commandant as an invasion of his prerogative. For this reason he severely reprimanded the officer, but, on re ceiving a promise that he would act differently for the future, dismissed him. The obnoxious im post Was never again demanded of Philadelphia!! 1709.] COMPLAINTS AGAINST PENN. 457 vessels.* Such were the contentions in which the Quaker opposition to physical force embroiled the Pennsylvanians and their acting Governor. The fraud with respect to the alarm of invasion was soon discovered, and popular indignation was so great that Evans was impeached, together with James Logan, the secretary of the province, a man of perfect integrity, in no respect connected with the plot, but who had given offence by endeavouring to palliate the wrong-doing of his principal. Though fices " that the constitution of the province had l>een subjected to so many alterations; that, in violation of the original compact, he had augmented his powers to a very serious extent ; and that, on his second visit to the settlement, he had received large sums of money in consideration of his procur ing from the English Government certain benefits which had never been obtained. In the same document, Penn was also blamed for the annexa tion of Delaware to Pennsylvania, and for allowing SOURCE OF THE JUNIATA, PENNSYLVANIA. not a Quaker, Evans had been, appointed by Penn to the office he held, and was now supported by his patron. This increased the feeling of antagonism towards the proprietary which had been growing up in his colony for a long while. Returning to that old subject of disagreement, the quit-rents, the As sembly demanded that those payments, instead of being made over to him, should be appropriated to the support of the local government; and a re- juoustrance was addressed to Penn, under the title of " Heads of Complaint," in which the members of die Legislature affirmed that it was by his " arti- * History of the Society of Friends in America, by James Uuwden (1854), Vol. II.. chaj.. G. 39 the privilege originally granted to the latter to perish by association with the institutions of the former. It was evident that the City of Brotherly Love was in a very bad temper. Penn supported Evans as long as he could ; but after the affair on the Delaware he instituted an inquiry into his conduct, and found that the colo nists had real cause of offence. Evans was there fore superseded by Charles Gookin, who arrived in 1709, carrying with him a letter from Penn to the Assembly, in which, without any particular allusion to the late differences, its members were reminded of the duty of charitable construction. It would have been more satisfactory if, instead of these generalities, Penn had given a specific answer to 458 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1710. the specific complaints that had been made ; but this he made not the slightest approach towards doing, and the Assembly, not unnaturally, con sidered itself still more aggrieved. The former charges were reiterated, and Gobkin was almost as unpopular as Evans. He had been a soldier, and perhaps was not disinclined to make demands on the Legislature for money in aid of the war with France ; at any rate, he was compelled to submit those requisitions to the representatives of the people, and to support them to the utmost of his power. He was even commanded by the English Government to provide a hundred and fifty men, together with officers, to join in the expedition against Canada ; but feeling certain that the men could not be obtained, he proposed, as a compromise, that the Legislature should vote 4,000 instead. This was refused ; but the Assembly, as related in a previous Chapter, gave .500, afterwards 300, and again 2,000, as presents to the Queen, apart from military purposes. The easy argument of the Quakers was that they were not responsible for the ultimate application of the money after they had declared that they did not give it for a certain pur pose ; but the evasion is transparent.* The man who lends another a bludgeon, when he has every reason to believe that it will be used to knock out the brains of a third person, might as fairly say he was free from blame because, in giving the weapon, lie distinctly stated that it was not to be used for the purpose of murder. The question of war- supplies led to considerable disagreement between Gookin and the Assembly ; but the difference of opinion did not, as in the case of Evans, end in an absolute rupture. At length, in 1710, Penn thought it right and necessary to take some notice of the accusations re peatedly made against him. In a letter which bore date the 29th of April in that year, he repudiated the injurious charges of the Pennsylvanians ; and in a very touching strain reproached them for their ingratitude. " I cannot but think it hard measure," he wrote," that, while that has proved a land of freedom and flourishing, it should become to me, by whose means it was principally made a country, the cause of grief, trouble, and poverty." Penn was now in the sixty-sixth year of his life ; old age, with its infirmities, was pressing upon him ; and the "We did not see it to be inconsistent with our principles," said Isaac Norris, "to give the Queen money, notwithstandinff .ny use she might put it to ; that not being our part, but hers." When the pocket of Isaac Norris was more immediately touched, as in the case of the fort to which passing vessels were to pay toll for the maintenance of a warlike establish ment, his principles were not so flexible. assaults of those whom he had a right to regard as in some degree his children, weighed heavily on his spirit. The attacks on. his reputation; the many indignities put upon him in papers sent over to England, and circulated among those who could not be expected to make the most discreet or charitable use of them; the secret insinuations against his justice; the attempt made on his estate; the determination of the Assembly to turn his quit- rents to the support of the government; his lands entered upon and his manors invaded by professed enemies; a right to his overplus land unjustly claimed; his private estate continually exhausted for the support of Pennsylvania; and, lastly, the violence shown to his secretary, James Logan, who had been impeached for an alleged endeavour to deprive the people of their political rights; these were the matters of which "William Penn more particularly complained. " I must desire you all, " he said, "in a serious and true weightiiiess of mind to consider what you are, or have been, doing; why matters must be carried on with these divisions and contentions; and what real causes have been given on any side for that opposition to me and my interest which I have met with, as if I were an enemy, and not a friend, after all I have done. I am sure I know not of any cause whatsoever. "Were I sensible you really wanted anything of me, in the relation between iis, that would make you happier, I should readily grant it, if any reasonable man would say it were fit for you to demand." He added that he could not but mourn the un- happiness of his portion at the hands of those from whom he had reason to expect much better tilings ; and he lamented the misery which the colonists were bringing on themselves by forsaking the principles of peace, love, and unity, for a spirit of contention and opposition. "Friends!" he ex claimed, "the eyes of many are upon you. The people of many nations of Europe look on that country as a land of ease and quiet, wishing to them selves in vain the same blessings they conceive yon may enjoy; but to see the use you make of them, is no less the cause of surprise." With regard to the alterations in the constitu tion, Penn argued that each had arisen out of inconveniences which at the time no one had dis puted, and which all had united in correcting. The proprietor of the province being responsible to the Crown for establishing an administration in har mony with the provincial charter, it was but right, he contended, that he should retain the executive power in his own hands. This was certainly true, and the jealousy of Pemi s just authority was one of the most ignoble features in the conduct of the 1713.J 1 ENN S DECLINING YEARS. Pennsylvanians. There was nothing to show that lie had even the desire to use that authority hi a <lespotic manner ; and if he had, despotism is impos sible under a representative Assembly elected on a broad suffrage, without any powerful aristocratic or military body to over-rule its decisions by physical violence. The executive and legislative functions should always be distinct : it is the mistake of sham democracy to confound them. Summing up his whole case at the close of his letter, Perm said that the opposition of the colonists had compelled him to consider more closely his relations to the province. He was willing to continue as of old, if the people still thought him deserving of regard. If the majority thought otherwise, he desired them frankly to say so, and he should then understand his position ; though even in that case the hope would remain to him that, by the special direction of God, they might once more meet good friends, iind so remain to the last. The founder of Pennsylvania did not appeal in vain to the consciences of those whom he had bene fited. Even before the arrival of his letter, a reaction, in his favour had commenced. His friends warmly took up his cause, and represented the injustice of the treatment he had received. Their <>xpostulations had a marked effect, and the impres sion was deepened when Penn s address reached the colony. The next elections took place in October, ;md not one of the proprietary s enemies was returned to the Assembly. The event must have been most gratifying to Penn ; but he had now nearly reached the limits of his active career. He was attacked shortly afterwards by a succession of apoplectic or paralytic seizures, which so greatly impaired the powers of his mind that he was never ; i gain, equal to the discharge of business matters. Thomas Story, a Quaker who had emigrated from the north of England to Pennsylvania, and who visited his own country in 1713, gives a sad yet Kweet account of this excellent man in his declining years. His memory was almost entirely gone, his speech affected, and his understanding weakened; yet he seemed wrapped in a tranquil happiness. "Wherein," writes Story, "appeared the great mercy and favour of God, who looks not as man looks. For, though to some this accident might look like judgment, and no doubt his enemies so iiccounted it, yet it will bear quite another inter pretation, if it be considered how little time of rest be ever had from the importunities of the affairs of others, to the great hurt of his own, and suspension of all his enjoyments, till this happened to him, by which he was rendered incapable of all business, and yet as sensible of the enjoyment of truth as at any time in all his life. When 1 went to the house, I thought myself strong enough to see him in that condition ; but when I entered the room, and perceived the great defect of his expressions from want of memory, it greatly bowed my spirit under a consideration of the uncertainty of all human qualifications, and what the finest of men are soon reduced to by a disorder of the organs of that body with which the soul is connected, and acts during this present mode of being." Bui that he had still a good sense of truth was plain by some very clear sentences he spoke on the life and power of truth in an evening meeting we had together there, wherein we were greatly comforted ; so that I was ready to think this was a sort of sequestration of him from all the concerns of this life, which so much oppressed him, not in judgment, but in mercy, that he might have rest, and not be oppressed thereby to the end." Gookiii was recalled in 1717, in consequence of some disagreements with the Assembly, and was succeeded by Sir William Keith. In the following year, the life of Penn came to a close, and the government of his province was then claimed by his eldest son, William, and, on his death, in 1720, by the second son, Springett Penn. This, however, was contrary to the founder s will ; for, the eldest son being provided for by a settlement of his mother s, Penn devised the whole of his property in America, with the exception of twenty thousand acres of land, to the children of his second wife, who was appointed sole executrix. By a decision in Chancery, the will was confirmed, and the government of Pennsylvania was vested in the widow and other trustees, for the benefit of his children. The province thus became the property of John, Thomas, and Richard Penn ; but they were represented on the spot by Deputy-Governors, and the affairs of Pennsylvania went on for a long while without many events of note. The attempts of former years to create a military establishment in the colony of William Penn were renewed with great persistency, but were opposed with so much resolution, both in the province itself, and by its agents in England, that in 1744 the law-officers of the Crown gave it as their opinion that the matter could only be determined by the local Legislature, unless a special law 011 the subject were made by the English Parliament. This put an end to all such attempts ; and the Church of England was . equally unsuccessful in its endeavours to establish a privileged Episcopalian body in the head-quarters of Quakerism. The principles of Fox and Penn triumphed in their chosen homo. At the death of Penn, the European population 400 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1703. "f his province is supposed to have amounted to ;:bout 40,000, a quarter of whom were inhabitants <>f Philadelphia. Those who were not concentrated in the city, cultivated the soil over a territory xtending a hundred miles along the banks of the Delaware, and from twenty to thirty miles west of rliat river. According to Proud, about one-half the community were Quakers; the rest were for the most part Presbyterians, Lutherans, and Episco palians. A Quaker historian says that these differences in religious belief did not interfere with the concord of society, as the colonists, without distinction of sect, appeared to delight in being kind and helpful to each other.* But the statement is much too favourable. Law-suits were so fre quent and so virulent as to move the special regret of the less quarrelsome. The unjust and impolitic attempt of the Church of England to obtain pre dominance in the colony, roused, as might fairly have been expected, a bitter sentiment against Kpiscopalians; and the compulsory substitution, from 1705 to 1725, of the usual oath in courts of justice for the simple affirmation which is all that i lie Quaker conscience allows a substitution arbi trarily imposed on the people by the English < Tovernment produced much ill-feeling towards those whose religious views were in favour of the oath. On the other hand, the Episcopalians com plained of despotic treatment at the hands of the ruling sect. A great riot was at one time occa sioned by the trial before Quaker judges of a clergyman charged with immorality. His alleged offence was described in the indictment as having been committed "against the King s peace and the law of this province:" but the King s peace was broken much more at the trial. The rioters, who must have belonged to the Church of England, en deavoured to prevent the judicial proceedings, on the ground that Quakers had no right to convert a charge which in England was reserved exclu sively for ecclesiastical inquiry and censure into an ordinary felony and misdemeanour. The argument was absurd; for, even if the excellence of ecclesi astical courts be granted, they did not exist in Pennsylvania, where the position of the Church of England and of its ministers was totally different from that which it enjoyed in the mother country. The disturbance occurred during the governorship of Clookin, who promptly put it down; yet such was the irritation of Quaker feeling at the incident that Gookin was accused of being in some way in strumental to its occurrence. The administration of * Tiowi leu s History of the Society of Friends, &c., Vol. II., chap. 0. this gentleman was so continually vexed by the peevishness of the Assembly that, in his parting address before leaving the province, he spoke of his spirits being quite broken. Amongst other things, he was charged with unduly favouring, in the dis tribution of offices, the recent settlers and poorer classes of people, in preference to the more sober and substantial Quakers. Of these new settlers,, some were persons of very lax morals; but the Friends themselves did not always come up to their own high ideal. Colonel Quarry, an Admiralty officer, stated, in a Memorial to the Lords of Trade in the year 1 703, that the gaol of Philadelphia was then crowded with felons, and that justice was greatly obstructed by the refusal of Quaker judges, jurymen, and witnesses to administer or take an oath, the result of which was seen in the discharge of numerous persons, Quakers and others, who were accused of serious crimes. This, however, may be objected to as the testimony of an opponent, for Quarry was an Episcopalian, and not at all well affected towards the Pennsylvanians ; but Thomas Chalkeley, a Friend, mentions in his journal that Governor Lloyd was in the habit, before going to rest, of visiting the taverns in Philadelphia, and ordering the people he found there to their own houses; by which means, it is added, he did in a great measure suppress vice and immorality in the city. The rigid social laws observed in New England were also observed in Pennsylvania. The Sabbath was very strictly kept, and all who laboured 011 that day were liable to fines. Theatres and dancing-schools were disalloAved ; lotteries were forbidden ; horse-racing and all brutal sports were suppressed ; and drunkenness and profane swearing were punishable by law. Some of these restrictions were excellent ; yet preciseiiess was carried too far. On the whole, it must have been a monotonous and colourless state of society ; and universal experience shows that a community bound by so many restrictions, and based on so much repression of ordinary human instincts, never main tains its original characteristics for many generations. Pennsylvania no longer proscribes dancing-schools, and Philadelphia has its theatres and its concert- halls. But in the early part of the eighteenth century the province of "William Penn and the City of Brotherly Love were strongly imbued with the Quaker spirit. The dominant sect was much scandalised by the proposal of the Episco palians to erect an organ in their place of worship. As the members of other religious bodies joined the community, this exclusive spirit was obliged to a;i ve wav. The religious freedom guaranteed bv 1722.] THE SIX NATIONS. 401 the institutions of Penu attracted a large number of sectaries from various parts of Europe ; and the natural result of so wide a comparison of principles was to create a greater practical charity than at first existed. The frequency of law-suits, to which allusion has been made, led to the appointment in every county- court of three functionaries called Peace-makers, whose duty it was to mediate between contending parties, and to accommodate their differences, if possible, by the friendly process of arbitration. Twice a year, an orphan s court was held in every county, for the inspection and regulation of the affairs of widows and orphans. In the courts of law, oaths would seem to have been administered to those who did not object to take them, though the statement of Colonel Quarry is to the contrary effect ; but the followers of George Fox had their privileges. It was determined by the provincial Government, after solemn debate, that Quaker lawyers should not be obliged to uncover their heads in addressing the judges. Although the establishment of a militia was successfully resisted, all who considered the use of arms lawful were permitted to train themselves, and to adopt every military precaution for their defence that was not inconsistent with the general peace and order of the province. However much Quaker writers have exaggerated the excellency of the social state established in Pennsylvania, it was certainly successful in many respects, and did honour to the principles of William Penn. The greatest triumph of Penn s policy is to be seen in the dealings of the colonists with the Indians, the justice, humanity, and consideration of which established so perfect a feeling of confidence and good will between the natives and the settlers that no serious rupture ever took place, and the province was spared those frightful scenes of barbarian warfare which occurred in other plantations. The Six Nations, it is true, were a superior race to the tribes of other localities ; but their higher spirit and greater resources would have made them all the more formidable, had they been provoked. They were always, however, very accommodating, because they were treated in a spirit of fairness and brotherhood. In 1722, they agreed with Sir William Keith to remove farther into the woods with their families, and to leave a tract of 100,000 acres of land to be cultivated by the English. They likewise assented to a perpetual peace and friendship between themselves and the colonists, and, referring to the accidental killing of an Indian by an Englishman, expressed a hope that the unwitting offender would be release* 1 from prison by his countrymen, and not be subjected to any punishment whatever. This, they added, they would esteem a mark of regard and friendship for the Six Nations, and as a further confirma tion of the treaty. The chief sachem, addressing Sir William Keith, is reported to have said : "You have told us how William Perm, that good man, did, on the first settlement of the pro vince of Pennsylvania, make leagues of friendship with the Indians, and treated them like brethren ; and that, like the same good man, he left it in charge to all his Governors who should succeed him, and to all the people of Pennsylvania, that they should always keep the covenant and treaties he had made with the Six Nations, and treat them with love and kindness. We acknowledge that his Governors and people have always kept the same honestly and truly to this day. So we, on our part, always have kept, and for ever shall keep, firm peace and friendship with a good heart to all the people of Pennsylvania. We thankfully receive and approve of all the articles in your pro position to us, and acknowledge them to be good, and full of love. We receive and approve of the same with our whole hearts, because we are not only made one people by the covenant chain, but we also are people united in one head, one body, and one heart, by the strongest ties of love and friendship." The whole course of Pennsylvania!! history show* that these words were not the mere rhetoric of an Indian orator, but the calm expression of actual truth. The reliance of William Penn on simple justice had been admirably vindicated by the testi mony of events. Politics occupied no small part of the attention of Pemisylvanians, and their ideas on this subject were very democratic. The Assembly maintained its control over the Governor by the system of pay ing him in sums of money voted from time to time, instead of granting a regular salary, which would have set him above the necessity of pleasing tin- provincial legislators. The members of the Assembly received a salary, consisting of six shillings a day for attendance, and threepence a mile for travelling charges. The Speaker had a daily allowance of ten shillings. Any member entering the chamber half an hour after the time appointed for the com mencement of business, was fined tenpence. Learning was not forgotten in this land of Quakers. A printing-press was established at Philadelphia as early as 1686, under the direction of the unfortu nate Bradford, who was afterwards so sharply treated for printing one of George Keith s pro ductions. James Logan, the secretary of the province, gave much attention to scientific litera ture, was a good writer in Latin, corresponded 462 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1734. with the chief scholars and philosophers of Europe, and bestowed 011 Philadelphia a valuable library. Another Quaker scholar Avas Thomas Makin, one of the original settlers, who wrote a descriptive and historical account of the province in a Latin poem. Many of the early emigrants to Pennsyl vania were persons of ancient family, and they tempered the severity of Quaker manners by the grace of culture. The hospitality of these high born members of the body was so great that it was their custom every night, after supper, to make a large fire in the hall, and to set out a table with refreshments for such travellers as might pass during the night ; and it is said they generally found in the morning that their kindness had not been in vain. The people of Delaware were rougher and less refined, but possessed of many sterling virtues. The Swedes and Dutch of that region were a hardy race of agriculturists, who passed their lives in labour and simplicity, varied, it must be said, by no little wrangling with the Pennsyl- vanians. To the working people of those days, Penn sylvania was a Paradise of high wages. Both men and women could earn three times as much there as in England, and the cost of living was not great. Gabriel Thomas, one of the early settlers, who wrote a book on the subject in 1698, says that, if they were refused those large stipends, they would quickly set up for themselves, as they could obtain land for a very small sum, and provisions were cheap. The same authority speaks with admiration of the wharfs of Philadelphia, and of the large and fine timber-yards, where ships of considerable burden were built. At that time, more than a thousand houses had been erected in the city, most of which were substantial structures ; and the number was constantly increasing. When we recollect that the colony had then been established only seventeen years, it must be allowed that the rate of progress had been very rapid. Several manufactures were already established, and druggets, crapes, camlets, and serges were produced in large quantities. A few years later, the resources and productions of Pennsylvania were largely augmented. Immigra tion was constant from all parts of Europe, and the natural increase of the population, irrespective of these extraneous additions, is believed to have been greater than any other society of the modern world has ever exhibited. The women, with scarcely an exception, married young, and had large families; and the infants born in Perm s colony were, according to the enthusiastic Gabriel Thomas, remarkably beauti ful and well-made, and were generally observed to be "better-natured, milder, and more tender-hearted, than those born in England."* Pennsylvania established a prosperous colony sooner and with less cost than the other American settlements. In 1729, as many as 6,208 European emigrants settled in Pennsylvania. The alluring accounts put forth by Thomas, and his exhortations to the poor of England, Scotland, and Ireland, to seek such golden shores, instead of idling about or thiev ing, had had their effect. Of these emigrants, by far the largest number were Irish ; the rest were English, Welsh, Scotch, and German. The Penn- sylvanians were not disposed to receive such numerous hordes, and the Assembly passed an act " to prevent poor and impotent persons from being imported into the province," which was to be accom plished by the imposition of a tax of five shillings per head on all new-comers. The consequence of this measure was to divert emigrants bound for Pennsylvania to other parts of America; biit the Pennsylvanians soon perceived the mistake they had made. The practice of negro slavery was con firmed by the difficulty of obtaining free labour, the wages for which ran up to so great a height that it was found necessary to repeal the act, and once more encoxirage immigration. The German settlers at New York being about the same time treated with injustice by the local Legislature, many trans ferred themselves to the Quaker province, and proved a very useful element in the population. It is curious to find that, even at that rather early period, as at the present day, Germany and Ireland supplied a large proportion of the emigrant popu lation of America. Thomas Penn, a son of the great founder of the plantation, arrived on a visit to his dependency in 1732, and was received with the honour and affec tion due to his ancestry. He entered Philadelphia at the head of a cavalcade of eight hundred horse men, and was presented with an address from the Assembly, expressing the utmost reverence for the memory of William Penn. The Indian tribes were equally emphatic in their congratulations ; and it might at first have seemed probable that the presence of one of the proprietaries at the seat of government would have had a beneficial effect. But his dis position was illiberal, and his manners were so reserved and cold that he failed to make friends,, even among his own sect. His elder brother, John Penn, followed him in 1734, and, being a man of a more genial nature, was generally liked ; but his return to England was hastened by the * An Historical and Geographical Account of the Province and Country of Pennsylvania and of "West New Jersey, in America, by Gabriel Thomas, who resided there about fifteen years. London, 1G98. HEATH OF RASLES. 4G4 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1720. renewed attempts of Lord Baltimore to obtain from the English Government the annulment of the decree by which the Delaware territory had been transferred from his ancestor to William Penn. The province, however, was now so thoroughly esta blished that it did not need the support of any one man. In 1731, Philadelphia was at least double the size it had been at the time when Gabriel Thomas wrote ; and in 1736 its custom-house books contained entries of two hundred and eleven vessels arriving with cargoes at the port, and of two hundred and fifteen departing with cargoes from it. The goods imported from Great Britain at the same period .are said to have reached the annual value of 150,000. But it must always be borne in mind that most of these statements are only approximate or inferential. The age of accurate statistics had not yet come. Among the numerous Germans who. helped to swell the population of Pennsylvania in the first half of the eighteenth century, were certain reli gious sectaries who arrived in. the year 1724, and who obtained great notoriety under the name of " Tunkers." They dressed after the fashion, of the monks and nuns of the order of White Friars, and the men generally wore their beards. Their tenets were similar in some respects to those of the Ana baptists ; in some others, to the views or practices of the Quakers themselves. Community of goods was strictly observed by them ; the sexes were kept separate ; and although marriage was not absolutely forbidden, it was discouraged. These singular enthusiasts set great store by the practice of non- resistance to oppression ; refrained from litigation under any circumstances whatever ; and endured insult and injury without complaint. They at first settled at a place called Ephrata, but they had their followers elsewhere, even in Philadelphia. After a time, their original austerities, and some of their peculiar tenets, were softened, and they gradual ly vanished in the mass of the population ; but the sect appears to have been in some degree revived at the present day in the community called Shakei s. That they might not be bound by formal rules, but be free to advance without hindrance in the develop ment of truth, the Tunkers always refused to com mit their principles to writing. If other sects had been equally discreet, the world might have been saved much irritating controversy. CHAPTER LII. Progress of England in North America Jealousy of France and Spain Sebastian Easles, the French Missionary to the Indians His Incitement of the Natives in their Opposition to the English Renewed War with the Indians Attack by the English on Norridgewock Death of Easles Conclusion of a Peace Establishment of Trading Houses on the North eastern Frontier Territorial Disputes The Red Man always the Loser Supremacy of the French on the St. Lawrence The Shawnees and the French Advance of the French Westward Establishment of their Rule in Louisiana Visions of a Boundless Empire. THE progress of the English in. North America was not viewed with favour, or even with quiescence, by the maritime Powers of Europe. Spain saw in the multiplication of English settlements in the south a menace to her influence and prosperity ; and France, though more compliant under the pressure of the Treaty of Utrecht, still raised serious ques tions of frontier right, which were not compromised until after long and elaborate negotiations. In the meanwhile, a fresh pretender appeared to the rich tract of country extending from the Kennebec to the St. Croix. This was no other than the Abenaki nation, which appealed to the Great Spirit and to natural right in vindication of its claims. Yet the whites never slackened their advance; the General Court of Massachusetts declared itself supreme over the province ; the fishermen rebuilt their hamlets on the coast and rivers ; the traders restored their stations in the forests, and protected them by .forts ; and the men of the red race were in a state of partial panic. The Indian chiefs who gathered at Quebec in 1720 inquired whether their lands had been made over to England by an arbitrary convention, and were answered that they had not. They were thus indirectly encouraged and guided to resistance ; and they were not slow to act on the suggestions they received. The lands had long before been purchased of the natives by the people of New England ; but they had to a great extent lain unoccupied, and the Indians had been allowed, as a matter of kindness and courtesy, to hunt and fish over the parts not actually in cultivation. This at length created a confused sense of right to the regions in question, the limits 1721.] SEBASTIAN RASLES. 465 of which, a.s between the English and the Indians, were not clearly denned, or had been forgotten. It is at this point that we have a glimpse of missionary life in the woods of the New World, which is singularly picturesque. The veteran Sebastian Basics, a native of Franche-Compte, had at an early age carried his learning and piety across the Atlantic, and devoted himself to the teaching and conversion of the dwellers in the valley of the Kennebec. His first appointment was to the Abenakis, and his own account of his work among them is a narrative of surpassing interest.* The community was small, but it in creased ; the church was in the wilderness, but it was a structure not unworthy of its use ; and here Rasles (whose name is variously spelt) built his own little house, lived chiefly on bruised Indian com, touched no wine as a rule, but the rule was not invariable f cultivated his plot of garden, studied the aboriginal language, and became the pastor of a people already to some extent Christian ised. A constant companion of the savage in his wigwam, he was his own hewer of wood and drawer of water, his own cook, and the almoner rather than the official of the Society which commissioned him. He studied, to great purpose, the Indian tongues and the Indian nature ; he could write poetry in the red man s language; he painted his shrine in the forest to satisfy the barbaric love of colour ; he attired his neophytes in surplice and capote, tluis ministering to their love of ceremony ; he organised processions, erected chapels of bark, and excited the rivalry of the Massachusetts missionaries. It may be doubted whether he owed his influence so much to his religious instructions as to his pure manner of life, skill in the use of snow-shoes and canoes, and compliance with customs that were slightly repugnant to him at first. He had now been in the wilderness forty years, and the Indians regarded him with so much love and veneration that they were prepared at all times to execute his commands, even at the hazard of their lives. There cannot be a question that this fanatical priest excited the barbarians over whom he had gained ascendency to make war on the New Eiiglanders, who, he constantly alleged, had systematically cheated them, and were destroying their morals by selling them spirituous liquors an oft ence, however, of which it is certain, that his own countrymen were equally guilty. " We have found, by more than three-score years experience," wrote Governor Shute to Rasles, on the 21st of February, * Lettrcs Kdifiantes et Curieuses, Vol. XXIII. t Massachusetts Historical Collection, 2nd Series, Vol. VIII. 171U, "that we had always lived in perfect peace with our neighbouring Indians, had it not been for the instigation, protection, supply, and even per sonal assistance, of the French ; so that, in case any unjust war or breach should happen (which God forbid!), we shall look upon the French, and principally the Popish missionaries among them, as the main cause thereof, "f Hoping to neutralise the influence of this Romanist missionary, Shute held a conference with the chiefs of the Eastern Indians, and requested them to receive the ministra tions of a resident New England pastor. Rasles was present at this interview, and warmly declared that the French King, in ceding Acadie, had never intended to include any territory which the Indians might justly claim. The tone adopted by the tribes on this occasion was at first angiy and threatening. Encouraged in their truculence by the countenance of their Jesuit friend, they re claimed a great part of the territory with which they had formerly parted ; but the older chiefs afterwards apologised for the language used by the younger ones, and the reclamation was abandoned, in spite of all that Rasles could do to prevent such an issue. Thus this Frenchman lived, the virtual chief of Norridgcwock ; but in 1721, when the New Eng land Government had, with questionable faith, seized several warriors as hostages, extorting a ransom without setting them free, and further continuing to occupy the hunting and fishing grounds of the Abenakis, the quarrel came to a head, and broke out in a threat of reprisals. The Indians, liOAvever, would probably have remained quiet but for the continual incitements of Rasles, and of Vaudreuil, the Governor of Canada. The former mingled warlike symbols and martial exhor tations with the religious services he conducted among the Indian converts ; and the latter prevailed on some of the Canadian tribes to offer their sup port to the malcontent natives of the New England frontier settlements. Instead of conciliating the tribe, the English captured a young half-breed noble man, son of the Baron, de Castine, who gave some trouble in the time of Andros, and proceeded to attack Rasles in his isolated stronghold. The fighting men were absent ; the priest escaped, with the infirm and the children, leaving behind him a number of highly compromising papers ; and war burst forth with fury. The hatchet along the border was everywhere dug up ; the war-song was sounded far and wide ; vengeance was attempted, and some settlements were destroyed by fire. But 1 Massachusetts Historical Collection. 466 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1726. the English were impregnable in their forts ; Rasles could obtain no alliance from the French ; at Nor- ridgewock, he foresaw the doom of the settlement mid sent away into Canada those who would go, refusing to abandon the place himself, and awaiting at his post the final conflict. The spirit of that age, and the passions evoked by the implacable warfare of those regions and races, were fitly illustrated by an English pro clamation denouncing the Eastern Indians as outlaws (which some American writers consider them to liave been), and setting prices upon their scalps. The Massachusetts people were aided, both with men and money, by Connecticut, though that colony was not immediately concerned in the struggle ; and thenceforth the banks of the Kennebec added another to the sanguinary records of Indian strife. The contest, however, lasted during three years, at the end of which, in the autumn of 1723, the Abenaki defences, dwellings, church, and chapels, were assailed and burnt to the ground ; a quiet and secret march brought the invaders to Norridgewock itself; its slender Indian garrison came out with the courage of despair to protect the flight of their families ; numbers and superiority of arms pre vailed ; and Sebastian Rasles, refusing to surrender, was slain by a soldier (although orders had been given by the officers that he should be spared), and, nfter lying among the ashes and the ruins, scalped ;ind mutilated, was buried by the savages at the foot of the altar whence, from his point of view, he had taught them to worship. His chapel was .stripped of its plate, and his images and crucifixes were destroyed, by the infuriated conquerors, whose actions moved the converted Indians to the utmost horror. Nevertheless, although this had been clearly n struggle for ascendency between France and Eng land, England and France were still ostensibly at peace. As for the Indians, a strong opinion, existed that they had been averse from hostilities, and were only goaded into them by the influences operating from Canada. Rasles died in his sixty-seventh year, after nearly forty years of missionary life, and to the last loved the work he had undertaken. The Governor," he wrote, "has set a thousand pounds upon my head ; but I shall not part with it, nevertheless, for all the sterling money in England." His death, coincident with a final overthrow of the missions, went far to reduce the power of France in the New World, though efforts were still made to adjust the boundary question, complicated as it was by egregious pretensions on both sides. The complicity of the French, at a time when England and France were at peace, was so flagitious & fact that in 1726 the New Englanders determined. in spite of a previous failure, to send a mission to "Vaudreuil, to remonstrate with him 011 the policy which had been adopted. The Canadian Governor at first denied his alleged connection with the war; but the envoys produced such overwhelming and unexpected documentary evidence of the fact some of it in his own handwriting, addressed to Rasles that he seemed struck with shame, and at length promised that he would do all in his power to bring the Indians to an accommodation. In this pacific disposition he was much discouraged by the Jesuit priests, who possessed great influence over Vaudreuil ; but the revolted Indians were persuaded to make terms, and a treaty of peace with them was soon after signed by Dunimer and Wentworth (the Deputy-Governors of Massachusetts and New Hampshire), and by a Government officer of Nova Scotia. The treaty was followed by the passing of a law, long considered to be necessary, for restraining private traffic with the natives, and by the establishment of trading-houses 011 the fron tier, where the Indians could exchange their furs and skins for European goods, which were supplied to them at the same price at which they were sold in Boston. The measure was an expensive one, for the cost of trading-houses, truck-masters, gar risons, and other matters, was found to be much greater than the profit derived by the Government from making wholesale purchases of goods, and selling them to the Indians at the retail price. It was thought, however, that the arrangement pro moted a pacific disposition among the savages, and the expense was not objected to. But for a long while the people of New Hampshire, remembering all they had been made to suffer, retained a passionate hatred of the red man, which was ex asperated by the Indians frequently entering the houses of settlers, and boasting of the tortures they had inflicted 011 their relatives. These wan dering barbarians were sometimes killed by those whom they had taunted, and the offenders, if appre hended, were either rescued by their friends from the hands of the officers, or acquitted at their trial, it being (as Belknap relates) impossible to impanel :i jury, some of whom had not suffered by the Indians, either in their persons or families. After this, the Eastern Indians no longer sought the war-path. The treaty of peace signed by them in 1726 included all territories as far as the St. John. The missionary was replaced by the trader; and the eastern boundary of New England was formally and authoritatively traced 011 the political map. Beyond it, no collisions had occurred ; yet, from the Kennebec to Nova Scotia, the French supremacy was 1727.] TERRITORIAL DISPUTES. 4G7 maintained, though under no distinct treaty right, and, indeed, in spite of a clause in the Treaty of Utrecht. France asserted her claim to the entire basin of the St. Lawrence ; and the principal hope of peace between the champions of these rival pretensions consisted in the wild and difficult country that divided them. Nevertheless, the debateable ground did not prevent a commerce being carried forward between Albany and Mont real, through the agency of the converted Iroquois Indians ; but this had been arbitrarily interrupted, in 1722, and advantage was taken of the circum stance, by the enterprising traders of New York, to advance their outposts, and to establish a station at Oswego, on the south-eastern shore of Lake Ontario thus approaching the borders of Michigan, and opening a way into the great North-west. The Iroquois were angry ; the French warmly protested ; but the red man had long commenced his retreat before English power, and France could not adopt his cause. Against both, a few years later (in 1727) fortifications were raised at the young port, destined, at a future day, to absorb nearly one-half of the trade of the United States with Canada. The white men pushed westward ; the Miamis and the Hurons, from the west, found their way in a south-easterly direction to Albany; and still the two dominions of Europe in America were separated by an uncertain line. Canada was by the French understood to comprise the whole valley and region of the St. Lawrence, and a part of the water-shed of New York and "Vermont, as being tributary to the great river. Hudson had ascended the North River, and Champlain had navi gated the lake bearing his name ; and here the Dutch had never ousted the French. Consequently, when New Netherland was subdued and ceded, the settlement so called carried with it none of this enormous territory. But the Treaty of Utrecht was interpreted by England as a partial renun ciation by France of the regions in dispute. The tribes were to some extent wanderers, whose territories had no geographical extension or limit ; and certainly neither disputant took much heed, except for purposes of political stratagem, of the red man or his lights. The English represented themselves as patrons and protectors of the Six Nations a term which, ten years after the peace was signed, had its meaning disputed ; the French, on the other hand, .stood upon discovery, early possession, historical grants, and their State Calen dars. The Indians, however, had in some degree settled the point for themselves at the time of the Treaty of Ryswick, when the French occupation became disturbed, and the English claim enlarged, in Upper Canada. The Mohawks and Oneidas. if not other native tribes, had been registered, twelve years before the Peace of Utrecht, under an English protectorate at Albany, though no signatures, or ratifications in any form, were exchanged. By the Treaty of Fal mouth, between the Eastern Indians and Massachusetts sometimes praised as the most judicious convention ever made by the white with the red man * a long tranquillity was established on that border. It was followed by an agreement with the Senecas, Cayugas, and Onon- dagas, on the same terms as with the Oneidas and the Mohawks ;t the Iroquois lands west and north of Erie, and north of Ontario, were acquired in 1726 ; other cessions came in the train of these ; and, in the confusion of claims asserted and surrenders made, only one truth was evident that the red men were sacrificing the region of their birth, and their own existence, piecemeal. The episode of the Five Nations (ultimately the Six Nations) does not read, in fact, like a very honest page in history ; but it is a mistake to suppose that the Federation was originally suggested in the interest of any European power. It had existed, on the contrary, from an unknown date. To the French, this Federation, with the Protectorate accepted by it, was always a source of jealousy ; but it was too late in 172C to attempt stemming the tide of English aggrandisement, either by establishing flotillas and fortresses on Lake Champlain, erecting batteries on the water-route to Montreal, or mount ing cannon at Niagara. The Six Nations con stituted the real barrier between the two dominions, and through them English influence spread among the Indians. At the same time, the French were not without agents and supporters of great ability. Joncaire, with twenty years of Indian experience, adopted by a tribe, a dweller among the wigwams, and a man with a keen appreciation of what might be possible in the future, had built a blockhouse at Lewiston, obtained an influence over the Iroquois, and was endeavouring with all his energies to create a monopoly of the fur-trade. The fort at Niagara materially aided this plan ; but the challenge was immediately answered by a new fort at Oswego, rapidly becoming an emporium and point of strength. Still, the peltry furnished by the Ottawas found its market at Montreal, while that coming by the lakes was conveyed by way of the Falls j so that the * Abiel Holmes : Annals of America, Vol. I. t Townall : Administration of the Colonies. Copy of Agreement with the Sachems, 1G9 174. 468 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1698. French had really, for a period, locked against all rivals the gates of that gigantic Par-bearing region. Their skiifs, and theirs only, glanced along its waters ; their missionaries taught, and morally con trolled, the hunting-tribes at all the outposts ; those which proved beyond the reach of conciliation were decimated or driven away ; and the French had made good their pretensions, so far. They were lords over the splendid region of the St. Lawrence. This had been one of their projects, and had pros- was claimed as being within the French Empire. It was French water that people drank at Herbert s spring, half a mile from the southern arm of the Savannah river ; it was ail-but French water that they tasted at the head-fountains of the Ohio. But though still geographically far apart, at many points, with a wilderness between them, the interests of the two colonial and conquering dominions clashed frequently, and it was invariably the red man in whose name the torch of war was kindled. :/? v\ i**";^o^oi:T-V *&%. .. H-- ^V^^^BPFCT:: // , / <* VIEW IN PENNSYLVANIA (ALLEGHANY MOUNTAINS IN THE DISTANCE). pered exceedingly within their traditional borders. Another was the creation of similar privileges, from the Gulf of Mexico, across a wide area from east and west, to an indefinite frontier to the north-west, inland. Here was a problem which no treaties, commissions, or mutual understanding had solved ; but none the less was the Hudson s Bay Company prompt to resent any aggressions by a power which had already evinced so egotistic a disposition beyond the valley of the St. Lawrence. The assumptions of France, upon maps of her own delineation, were, indeed, so extensive as to possess a certain grandeur. Louisiana was held to embrace the whole valley of the Mississippi. Not a foun tain bubbled on the west of the Alleghanies, but it The martial and powerful nation of the Shawnees had, for a considerable time, and in large numbers, been neighbours, and almost subjects, of the French; but in 1698 they struck their tents, and went to settle at Coiiestogo, a creek of the Susquehannah, where Lancaster is now situated. Two years later, William Penn welcomed them into his province when he had only just returned from England, and they planted themselves in the valleys of the Quaker State. But, with the restlessness of their race, they followed, before long, the Indians of the Delaware to the banks of the Ohio, where the French thought the opportunity a favourable one for tempting them back to their allegiance, deputing Joncaire, the astute half-breed already spoken of, 1730.] FRENCH PROGRESS IN THE WEST. to visit their sachems, and invite them to Montreal. They accepted the invitation, crowded to the Cana dian city, acknowledged the Protectorate of the Bourbon flag under Louis XV., and were ostenta tiously flattered as makeweights to those tribes which had concluded English alliances. They were to that of the Ohio, and mastered the three main approaches from the St. Lawrence to the Mississippi, with only a few tribes of uncertain temper in their way. Their positions upon the lines of the Fox and Wisconsin, of Chicago, Wabash, and the Ohio, were not, indeed, entirely new; but the dangers JOHN LAW. offered assistance in strengthening their positions wherever, inside the French frontier or its border land, they chose to settle ; they were loaded with gifts, including arms, and were gradually won over from their former English sympathies. The episode, although not of grand dimensions, is important, as opening a distinct chapter in the history of the races concerned. At a somewhat later date, the French had pushed their influence along the valley of the Alleghany 40 they ill-concealed were the offspring of a fresh ambition, and one which foreshadowed another strenuous effort, on each side, to preponderate on the American continent. At home, however, the energetic remonstrances of the Pennsylvania!! colonists met with little attention from a Govern ment just then too deeply engaged in manipulating its majority in Parliament to bestow much thought upon the merchants and settlers of the New World. It is difficult, amid the contradictions of the local 470 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1717. archives, to determine exactly what were the griev ances alleged, since the dates are confused, and the authorities not unanimous, as, for example, with respect to the town of Vincens, or Vincennes, at the gateway and seed-plot of the future State of Indiana. Not there, however, did the ambition of the French adventurers contemplate creating more than a link in the great chain they were eager to forge from the St. Lawrence to the Mississippi. It was to Louisiana that their most brilliant anti cipations were turned, and it was upon the history of La Salle that their principal hopes were grounded. That intrepid Norman had tired the imaginations of his countrymen by his descriptions of a paradise compared with which Canada was little better than a desert, and of a river which, commencing in a rivulet running out of a pool, gathered force and volume until, four thousand three hundred miles from its source if geography be a reasonable science it rolled its mighty waters into the Gulf of Mexico. His ultimate fate is involved in obscurity ; but there can be no doubt as to the influence exercised by him over the fortunes of the indefinite territory then known as Louisiana. The trade of this, in complete monopoly, had been assigned by Louis XIV. to a wealthy merchant, Anthony Crozat, whose subsequent partner, La Motte Cadillac, led him into dreams of gold-mines and silver-mines, and of a- success which would exas perate the rival monopolists of Spain. The Spaniards were indeed indignant at the French usurpations, as they considered them, in the valley of the Missis sippi ; but they avenged themselves by closing every port along the shores of the Mexican Gulf against the flag of France ; and when it was sought, in compensation for this, to penetrate by a land or river route to the forbidden markets, repulse and imprisonment encountered the adventurers every where. Still, the alluring vision continued to gleam before the eyes of the traders and settlers. They had heard of rich ores from Illinois, which were, in reality, specimens from the mines of Mexico ; they sought the localities reputed to bo thus favoured, but discovered only that which, in itself, was very valuable ample quantities of pure lead ; and the enterprise of Crozat and his coadj u- tors was thus wasted upon similar futilities to those that so often and so long disappointed the early ex plorers of India. Worse than this, their patent trade destroyed the humbler enterprises of the old settlers, whose barterings with the Indians and the small neighbouring communities of Europeans had hitherto been successful enough. The Indians, in fact, too strong to be coerced, transferred their cus tom to the English, and disaffection, was thus bred against the privileges of France in her own ter ritories. Louisiana, comparatively flourishing in 1714, was impoverished and thinned of its French population by the year 1717, when, in all that immense land, more than tropically fertile, includ ing persons of every age, and of both sexes and colours, there were barely seven hundred inhabitants, scattered from the Creeks to the Natch itoches, on the Bed River. At the spot, however, where now stands the city of Natchez, which ranks in antiquity beyond every other settlement in the valley south of Illinois, the Indians had helped the French to construct a fort, which protected their establish ment, and became the handsome and opulent capital of Adams county. But there was a tragedy to be enacted there before long, a notice of which must be deferred, in order that the narrative may follow, in proper sequence, the vicissitudes of one among the most extraordinary delusions that ever captivated the human mind, the Mississippi Scheme. CHAPTER LIII. John Law, the Originator of the Mississippi Scheme His Early Life and Travels Visit to Paris, and Gambling Speculations there Financial State of France at the Death of Louis XIV. -Law s Plan for Paying off the National Debt-Gigantic Financial Operations The Mississippi Scheme Fabulous Narratives, and General Delusion of the French People -Inci dents of the Frenzy at Paris Forced Colonisation of Louisiana Decline in the Fortunes of Law His Final Struggles- Louisiana as affected by the Bubble Speculation Enormous Fortunes, and Consequent Ruin France and the Natchez Dispersion of that Tribe Later Annals of Louisiana. JOHN LAW, sometimes called Law of Lauriston, at a time when goldsmiths were often bankers also ; was a Scotchman, born at Edinburgh in 1671. and he bequeathed to him, with the estate of He claimed descent from the ancient family of Lauriston, a genius for that form of speculation, Argyll j but his father was a wealthy goldsmith early pointed to, perhaps, by his precocious skill in 1715.] EARLY LIFE OF LAW. 471 all games requiring powers of combination. At twenty-three years of age he appeared in London, where the Bank of England had just been projected, with the reputation of a man rich, highly culti vated, and foppish in dress and manner, who soon acquired the title of " Beau Law," a circumstance which brought him into rivalry with "Beau Wilson," with whom, as might have been expected, he quarrelled and fought, killing him. That incident closed his career, for awhile, in the English metropolis, and, escaping to the continent, he visited in succession Paris, Amsterdam, Genoa, Venice, Naples, and Rome, returning to Edinburgh in 1 700, with a full knowledge of banking principles as they were developed in the great country of bankers, Holland. This he turned to account by contriving a grand system of credit to supply the deficiency of coin by an establishment authorised to hundred thousand pounds. This success coming to the ear of M. D Argenson that celebrated Lieu tenant of Police, who made so many subjects of the Great King uncomfortable he politely ordered the lucky Scot out of Paris, telling him that he knew too much of the science of hazard, t The faro bank had therefore to be given up ; but Law had not abandoned his greater schemes, and the situation of France was precisely such as to encourage them. Not while the Fourteenth Louis lived, however. That veteran monarch, who, what with his magnifi cence, his profusion, and his persecution of the most industrious, and at the same time the most religious, classes in the country, had created a stupendous debt, would not retrench, drove his Finance Minister to despair, and yet had not a word of favour for John Law, notwithstanding that the Scotchman s offers were sufficiently alluring. He INDIAN PIPE. (From Schoolcraft s "History of the Indian Tribes."} issue a paper currency equivalent to the whole landed estate of the kingdom. The commercial classes in Scotland were astounded ; and though his ideas were not absolutely refuted, neither were they adopted. In effect, he proposed to unite the profits of discount, carried on by a bank, with those of an administration, carried on by farmers of the public revenue, and those of trade, carried on by a chartered company.* The Scottish Parliament rejected his plans, as did the Parliament of England, where, moreover, he had not obtained a pardon for the affair of the duel ; so that he once more set up his standard in the French capital, playing high at the green, tables, courted by the Academies and in circles of Royalty, and astonishing everybody by the magnificence of his ventures in gambling. The story runs that one day he had two sacks of gold carried to the Hotel de Soissons, threw down memoranda instead of money, because his hand could not hold the coins he staked, and won a suspected him, indeed, of belonging to the Huguenot party. On the other hand, his son-in-law, the Duke of Orleans, listened with delight to schemes of limitless wealth to flow from a National Bank, though Demarets, the Comptroller-General, did his utmost to check this enthusiasm. In vain. Law, after trying his chance with the King of Sardinia (who said, " I am not sufficiently powerful to ruin myself"), and after being, on account of his happy fortune at play, expelled from Venice and Genoa, had his opportunity at last. The Fourteenth Louis died ; the Fifteenth a mere child succeeded him ; the Duke of Orleans assumed the Regency, and, to quote Washington Irving, " Law had found his man." The dead King had left a debt at which all ordinary financiers stood aghast. To the lord of Lauriston it appeared a trifle, and, still enormously rich, he returned to Paris. The Regent, now despondent, now sanguine, welcomed him eagerly. The fairies present at the birth of this prince, his * Histoire du Systeme de Law, par Duliautchamp, Vol. I. f Thiers, Revue Progressive. 472 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1717. mother had said, conferred upon him all the talents, except the one by which he would have been enabled to make a good use of the rest. The pupil of Dubois, fond of pleasure and indolence, was no match for the Edinburgh economist. He had tried some old arts of finance, and they had failed ; he had tampered with the coinage, calling in the metal currency, re-stamping and re-issuing it, with a loss to the nation of twenty per cent, of its capital ; he had even thought of a State Bankruptcy ; but, in a golden moment, John Law came forward with his incomparable projects and prospects, and the Duke was dazzled out of his senses. So much it has been necessary to relate by way of preface to a most extraordinary interlude in the annals of America. The scheme was that of a bank, to pay off the National Debt, augment the revenue, and simul taneously diminish taxes. There were to be no loans, burdened by interest ; no fresh imposts, to distress the people ; but a process which should concentrate in the hands of the Government all the money in France, on deposit. The currency of a country, Law argued, is simply the representative of its moving wealth, and it mattered nothing whether this was in gold, silver, shells, or paper. He therefore proposed, notwithstanding the deter mined opposition of the Due de Noailles and the Chancellor D Aguesseau, and with the assistance of the supple priest, Dubois, to establish a bank of deposit, discount, and circulation, with an original capital of six millions of livres, the notes of which, at first, should be exchangeable for cash, and bear a reasonable premium. For awhile all ran smoothly. The artificial currency was not in excess of the specie in the vaults; public confidence was esta blished ; and there was a run on the bank, not, however, to draw out money, but to put in money, and draw out notes. The basis of action was, at that date, stock in two hundred thousand shares, of five hundred livres each the livre, however, being a very different coin from the pound sterling. Thus, an immense amount of the paper represent ing the public debt was practically absorbed by the public treasury ; the interest, at starting, was punctually paid ; the value of securities rose, and then the Charter of Crozat, for the commerce of Louisiana, was transferred to " John Law and Company s" Bank, afterwards styled the Royal Bank and, ultimately, the Bank of France, which had its branches everywhere. Gradually, three sets of bills were issued, the first nick named " mothers," the .second "daughters," the third "grand-daughters." So far, however, all had gone well, and might possibly have continued to go well, had it not been for the amazing Mississippi Scheme. Where La Salle, Iberville, and Crozat had seen their illusions vanish, it was still believed that El Dorado existed. The English had speculated on the fanciful wealth of the South Seas : why not the French on the trade of the Mississippi region 1 The mines of St. Barbe might yet be discovered; and, by some sleight-of-hand, ingots of gold from Louisiana were exhibited to the incredulous at Paris. The perspective opened up had a fascination for every class : Law had redeemed credit at home, and was about to create boundless wealth on th^ other side of the ocean. The Western Company obtained its grant for colonising Louisiana, with a monopoly of its commerce and resources, and of the beaver and fur trade Avith Canada, in September, 1717. These privileges were to last twenty-four years ; and, in the following August, the first emigrants, eight hundred in number, in three ships, landed in Louisiana. Never were settlers more favoured. They might sell the entire region, if they liked ; they might launch ships of war for its defence, if they pleased ; in fact, a more splendid prospectus it would be impossible to find in the chronicles of speculation. Nothing was wanting to stimulate the enthusiasm of the future founders of New Orleans, of others who cast their bread upon the inland waters, and of others, again, who undertook to clear the forests. Among these last a considerable number were convicts, while, of the rest, many, undeterred by the knowledge they acquired, persisted in neglecting the true riches of the country, and in following fantastic visions. The wanderers who came from Canada knew better, and acted more wisely. They were not the dupes of tales that had been told in France, and illustrated by florid pictures, of an enchanting region, peopled by picturesque savages crowding impatiently to greet their new masters an ideal which had its commentary, before long, in the tragedy of the Natchez. They had not been misled by descriptions setting forth that " there are to be seen mountains full of gold and silver, copper, lead, and quicksilver;" and that, "as the metals are very common, and the savages know nothing of their value, they exchange lumps of gold and silver for European manufactures, such as knives, cooking-utensils, spindles, small looking- glasses, and even a little brandy." La Motte Cadillac, already mentioned, was bold enough to denounce these stories as false, and expiated his candour in a dungeon of the Bastile. Europe heard of fleets on the way laden with merchandise, of ships bearing bullion, of Indian factories with a THE MISSISSIPPI SCHEME. 473 thousand women engaged in making silk. There was said to be a rock of emerald in Arkansas, of which Captain de Laharpe, with twenty-two settlers, was about to take possession ; while, in reality, the facts were that half the region was a scarcely habitable desert ; that the foundations of New Orleans were hardly laid; that agriculture was despised, while mines were sought; and that the prospects of the Mississippi Company, and in con sequence of Louisiana, were undergoing a calamitous change. Yet up to September, 1719, the Company s shares had been allotted with something like principle and order. The southern valley of the Mississippi having been conceded to the great Company, or to indi viduals who sought estates, or even principalities, in the New World, Law himself took a prairie, whereupon he designed to erect a city surrounded by clusters of villages, and to carry on an exten sive slave-trade, buying hundreds of negroes, attracting mechanics from France, bribing the Indians, and keeping up the false appearances with which his entire career was vitiated. It was, nevertheless, not in Louisiana, but in. France in Paris itself that the crisis arrived and the dis solution took place. The sordid passion of that time has been made familiar by vivid pens and graphic pencils. The temporary madness of the Rue Vivienne has passed into a proverb. We may see once more the Paris of that day, with its struggling crowds, its hungry schemers bending under bags of gold, its plethora of pocket-books, and its eternal rush to " the street " the Rue Guincampoix, where the market of money was held ; where a kind of financial exchange improvised itself; where all classes mingled in their riotous greed of gain ; and where the Mis sissippi bonds were fought over with frantic rage. Those were the days in which ten square feet of ground brought in the rent of an old patrimony; when wooden boxes, erected above the garrets, were Jet for startling sums, and when a cooked partridge was sold by auction for two hundred francs. While all this went on, the bubble burst, even sooner than was feared, in Louisiana. The bank at home, by depreciating every kind of specie value, had given to Mississippi shares the equiva lent, for the time, of actual money. The sale of tobacco, the trade of the Indian seas, the trade in Africa, the profits of the Royal Mint, the profits of farming the entire revenues of France, promised a splendid ]>er-centage on the stock ; but the sham had grown too colossal. " New Orleans," as Mr. Bancroft phrases it, "was famous at Paris as a beautiful city before the cane-brakes began to be cut down;" and, to sustain the falsehood, an arti ficial colonisation of the unpeopled countiy was attempted. An edict was issued for the gathering and transport of emigrants to the Mississippi. The police gave their assistance. The streets of Paris and the provincial cities were swept of mendi cants and vagabonds of all descriptions, who were dragged to Havre-de-Grace, forced six thousand of them on board pestiferous vessels, and shipped off, with an ostentatious parade of mining imple ments, to El Dorado, which many of them reached to find in it only their graves.* A violent end to this financial frenzy was in evitable. The Chancellor, D Aguesseau, had never ceased his protest against both the paper plans of Law and his colonising system ; and there were found honest voices to tell the public that he was paying tenfold the value of his stock. That of the Due de Noailles, among others, reached the very foot of the throne, where it deeply offended the Regent ; and yet, for another twelve months, the imposition gave few outward signs of collapse. In the course of less than a year and a half, two thousand millions of bills, and upwards, had been put in circulation. As suspicion grew up, indeed, the mania became more feverish; in faet, at an even earlier date, Law had been driven to his last desperation of ingenuity to keep ixp the tremendous deception. For, notwithstanding that D Aguesseau and De Noailles had been dismissed from office, the hostility of the Parliament was implacable. It hated Law as a religious reformer. Law turned aside the blow by declaring himself, forthwith, a faithful son of the Church. The Par liament, not to be deterred, threatened to hang him for deceiving the nation. Flying to the Palais Royal, he besought the protection of the Regent, which was granted. Affairs went on swimmingly again; the Regent s mother wrote that " all the King s debts were paid ; " but still the imperative necessity remained of stifling the public doubts. Law, appointed Comptroller-Gene ral, prohibited the holding of specie by any indi vidual or corporation beyond a particular, and that a small, amount : its exchange for paper was made compulsory ; the bank coffers were filled ; but the crash could not much longer be postponed. The slmdow of the Chancellor D Aguesseau once more alarmed the adventurous financier, who in vain resorted to new artifices, splitting his fifty millions of stock into a hundred shares each, like the tickets in a lottery ; stirring up the very humblest and poorest of society to support him 5 * Washington Irving; Cochut, 474 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1722. creating the class knovm as " Mississippi Lords," who did not disdain to haggle in a market now made unutterably common; and, before the year 1722, precipitating all" in one grand ruin, which left France poorer, more discredited, more hopeless, than she was when the Fourteenth Louis lay dying, but with the result of having enriched a few, and reduced Loiiisiana to a very inferior rank among the colonies of Europe. waiting for hours in the ante-chamber of John Law, exulted when they saw liis wife, who had " collected all the duchesses around her " at one time, pining in poverty at Brussels. Such is the close put by history to a time of unexampled prosperity. Nevertheless, two Mississippians at least caught the contagion, and, while it lasted, revelled in its results. The one was Denis Leroche ; the other, a man mentioned by Duhautchamp, the pitiless historian of Law and his INDIAN BUKIAL-GROUND ON THE MISSISSIPPI. Still, it was a colony. Its scanty population 1 1 ad not been altogether extirpated ; and its for tunes were destined to no more than a temporary eclipse, due to the exorbitant frauds of the Mis sissippi schemers. The anecdotes of that period, in the transactions of which this noble American territory was so deeply concerned, may in part be apocryphal, but, in all likelihood, were generally illustrative of the truth. There were men who mounted behind their own carriages, from habit ; who slept in the attics of their own houses, for the same reason ; who deferentially took their seats at the tables of their own lacqueys ; and who, after scheme, who lived the life of an Aladdin at Paris, leaving his Louisianian property to be cared for by slaves and thieves, and of whom a single jeweller declared that he sold him three millions worth of jewels, besides the diamond of the Count de Noce, for which he paid 500,000 livres, and a girdle- buckle which he bought of a Jew for the same sum. He had eighty horses and ninety servants, and, when the bubble burst, was glad to work on one of his own farms in the valley of the Mississippi. Another Louisianian, a j T oung lady two years old, was betrothed by her father to a French Mar quis, for a consideration in stock. St. Simoij THE COVRSE OF THE MISSISSIPPI. (From the Map of North America by De Lisle, 1703 ) 476 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1700. observes in his Memoirs that " by turning and hoisting this Mississippi scheme about in all ways, not to say by playing all sorts of juggleries under its name, they wished, after the example of the English, to make effectual establishments in those vast countries." It was to people them that they sent off male and female convicts, chained two and two as husbands and wives, many of whom were shipwrecked on the passage. Fifteen hundred French of both sexes, landing in Louisiana, were immediately attacked and slaughtered by the natives. The voyage was popularly called " the pilgrimage ; " but the reaction, unquestionably, pro duced its crop of exaggerations. Still, the " ban doliers of the Mississippi," as they were termed, undoubtedly carried on a nefarious business, though St. Simon may have gone too far when he affirmed that " it was only necessary to slip a pxirse into an archer s hand, and whisper a word in his ear, to get any enemy of whom you wished to be rid carried off." One further incident must be mentioned as occurring in the strange chronicles of John Law s audacious project. It was a part of that project to make the public in the Old World believe in the people of the New. Therefore, ten men were brought to Paris, with one woman, a " daughter of the Sun ; " and it was determined to marry her. Unfortunately, the end of the romance seems apocryphal. She did many, according to good evidence, a sergeant of the Royal Guards ; but the testimony is weak which asserts that she killed and helped to eat him, upon returning to her own country.* The tide of encroachment upon the hunting- grounds of the red men continued. It flowed until, as at a turning-point, it reached the villages of the Natchez, at that time scattered along the Mississippi. These savages were among the most ancient, in their traditions, of the red tribes ; their manners still bore a reverential character ; their abodes and their burial-grounds woro alike, in a special sense, sacred. In the eight of other than their own tribes, their chief, surnamed tho Great Sun from his temple erected on an artificial mound of earth, dispensed prophecies and interpretations, established a kind of friendly confessional, or listened to stories of love-sickness, boasts of warriors returning from battle, rejoicings over plentiful harvests, mournings for the dead, and the songs which silenced the despair of human victims. There alone, almost, except through distinctions conferred by prowess in war, the red noble stood apart from the red plebeian. The chief was the master ; but the French hankered * Cochut. after the soil possessed by these warriors, and a bloody plot was laid by the aborigines against the stranger. France, in 1729, was ripe for an aggres sion upon the Natchez; the Natchez, in the November of that year, rose, and assassinated nearly every Frenchman in the colony. The act only provoked a terrific retribution. The Great Sun smoked in confidence, while the heads of the Frenchmen were laid at his feet, and their bodies thrown, to birds and beasts of prey. He and his young men, visiting the whites at New Orleans, two or three years previously, had been hospitably treated by them ; their fires had been kindled, their meals had been eaten, together ; together they had built their hoxises, and planned the settlement of Natchez. Yet now the Great Sun himself was headless in his grave ; the envoy of his nation was insulted and slain ; the French had suffered retri bution, and they, in their turn, were resolved upon vengeance. It was not difficult to excite the pas sions of the emulous tribes. To give a gun and a pouch of ammunition to a red man, was to propose to him a campaign, A terrible and not unjustifiable alarm was spread; the Choctaws and Cherokees were put under arms ; the streets of New Orleans were barricaded ; measures were taken to quell an apparent spirit of disaffection among the negroes ; and then the work of retaliation was undertaken. An expedition, secretly planned, and as secretly con ducted, reached the Natchez in the noontide of their triumph. They had caroused over their victory, or massacre, and were asleep in their bark-bxiilt hamlets. At daybreak one morning in January, 1730, their old foes, the Choctaws, fell upon them, liberated the prisoners, took sixty scalps, and retired with a nominal loss. A few days after wards, the assault was renewed ; the Natchez were desolated in their own abiding-place ; some took refuge with their neighbours ; others fled across the Mississippi to the ill-omened vicinity of Natchi- toches, whither they were followed, and where they were exterminated. A fov fled still further west ; another few, harbouring themselves in alien wig wams, submitted to bo tolerated where they had been accustomed to ._ onqucr ; their chief and then- captive warriors were sold into servitiide, and the nation of the Natchez was at an end. When we consider how fallen is the Indian race, com puted to number, at the date of the first European contact with the continent of America, sixteen millions, but since reduced, by a civilisation that too often put forth its power without its mercy, to less than a million and a half, the tale is a melan choly one indeed. Perhaps it was inevitable. The red men occupied a vast soil, for the possession of 1732.] PROGRESS OF LOUISIANA. 477 which great nations of Europe have contended ; and if their doom be among the enigmas of history, its consequences have, at any rate, rendered it less lamentable to the mind. But the dissipation, if not absolute extinction, of the Natchez was in many respects to be deplored. La Salle spoke well of them; Rasles, though with little reason, pleaded strongly in their favour; and, for historians, the obscurity of their origin will always invest them with that mystery which clouds the annals of the most important races of mankind. It is time, however, after their final slaughter and dispersion, to turn from them to the wavering annals of Louisiana. Almost parallel, yet by no means identical, with the Western Company, had arisen the Company of the Indies, adventuring on the coasts of Guinea, and of several Asiatic coun tries. This association was supreme, in its own way, over the unhappy province of Louisiana during a period of fourteen years ; but in April, 1732, the sovereignty of that region reverted, un questioned, to the Crown of France. France had not even then shaken off its dreams. Emigrants were still flocking, though in sparse numbers, to the wil derness, and were engaged more fiercely than ever in conflict with the autochthonal tribes. The Natchez had been subdued nay, exterminated ; but the Chickasaws remained, harrying the commerce and border population of Mississippi, making their last and sorrowful efforts for independence, terrifying the English and the French alike out of their settle ments, endeavouring to entice the Indians friendly to Europeans into alliances of conspiracy, and eliciting from the chief Chicago, in an interview with the envoy Perrier, the unusual words, as he smoked his calumet, "This is the pipe of peace or war." It meant war, in one sense. The land of the Chickasaws was invaded, after two years of preparation, from Mobile and the settle ments on the shores of the Wabash. The advance was irresistible ; the hostile bands were dealt with under military law, as though they were insurgents; every scalp was paid for ; and, the real motive of the war being still the competition between French and English, the former succumbed, in the spring and summer of 1726. Overleaping some further monotonous episodes of warfare with the red race, we pass on to the Edict for free commerce between Louisiana and the West India Islands, in 1737, and to the Red Protectorate established so strangely, in place of the White Pro tectorate, over the nominally French country be tween Lower Louisiana and the Illinois. The popu lation of Louisiana, a little more than half a century after the first attempt at colonisation by La Salle, may have been five thousand whites, and half that number of blacks. Louis XV. had fostered it with pride and liberality. He had been enticed towards the scheme by the most triumphant speculator of the age ; but it is sad to think that he made use of every influence to control, in his own interest, the embarkation of European capital and confidence. In 1737, Louisiana enjoyed no promise beyond that which it derived from the goodwill of William Penn. CHAPTER LIV. Progress of Affairs in New York Government of William Burnet Interference of the Home Government Arbitrary Rule of Colonel Cosby in New York His Quarrel with a New York Journal Trial of Zenger, the offending Journalist, and Defence by Andrew Hamilton Acquittal of the Accused Evil Effect on the American Colonies of English Attempts at Despotism Government of George Clarke at New York Supposed Discovery of a Negro Plot Government of Colonel Shute in New England Disputes with the Assembly Departure of Governor Shute for England Disputes between the Massachusetts Government and the Crown An Explanatory Charter Accepted Appointment of William Burnet to the Governorship of Massachusetts Renewed Disputes with the Crown respecting a Fixed Salary for the Governor Death of Burnet, and Settlement of the Dispute under the Rule of Jonathan Belcher Entire Separation of New Hampshire from Massachusetts. NEW YORK, in the early pai-t of the eighteenth century, pursued a career of varied calm and storm. In 1720, the post of Governor was conferred on William Burnet, a son of the celebrated Bishop of Salisbury, whose " History of his own Time " is one of the chief authorities on the events of an im portant and interesting epoch. The administration of the younger Burnet at New York was very suc cessful. He was a genial and yet judicious man, and a good deal of his attention was given to esta blishing friendly relations between the colonists and the Indians. Certain functionaries had recently been appointed under the title of Commissioners for Indian Affairs, whose station was at Albany, and who were empowered to maintain communication with the natives, to receive intelligence from them, 478 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1735. and to treat with their leaders in sudden emer gencies. They had no salaries, but were en trusted with considerable sums of money for occasional presents to the red men. Through these officials, as well as by personal intercourse with the leading sachems, Burnet exercised great influence over the Indians, and endeavoured in this way to counteract the continual advance of the French. His removal from power, in the year 1727, was the result of intrigues in which the merchants of London and the traders of Albany had engaged, in consequence of a disagreement with the Governor us to some parts of his policy. He was succeeded by Colonel Montgomery, who had been groom of the bedchamber to George II. when Prince of Wales. In 1729, during the rule of this Governor, the King in Council issued an order, by which certain acts suggested by Burnet, and passed by the As sembly of New York, with refei-en.ee to the trade with Canada, were repealed. As the operation of these acts was to restrict that trade, in the hope of damaging the French, the law had met with great opposition from the dealers whose transactions were affected. But the repeal of the enactments gave offence to the Six Nations, from whom many com modities were now diverted to the better market of Canada. Montgomery died in 1731, and [affairs did not improve after the arrival of his successor, Colonel William Cosby. That officer reached New York towards the close of 1732, and soon got into a vio lent dispute with the senior member of the Council, Rip Van Dam, who had carried on the Government .since the death of Montgomery. From this sub stantial burgher he had borrowed a large sum of money, and, apparently in the hope of evading re payment, he brought a suit against him, in 1734, for recovery of all the official fees and perquisites which Van Dam had received during his provisional conduct of affairs. In an arbitrary and arrogant way, Cosby insisted that the charge should be tried by the judges of the common-law tribunal of New York, without the assistance of a jury. Chief Jus tice Morris said that this was not within the competence of the court , and he was immediately displaced, to make room for James Delancey, who was known to entertain a different view. As no such change could be legally made without the con sent of the Council, great indignation was felt at so despotic an assumption ; and Cosby did nothing to conciliate either the people or their representatives. He offended the Assembly by the insolence of his demeanour ; he alarmed the colonists by the eager ness with which he attacked their privileges, and the safeguards of their liberty. A state of sullen and angry discontent was created, which threatened to explode in some unfortunate collision. Van Dam and Morris published statements of their cases, which still further excited the public mind ; and a printer named Zenger established in 1735 a newspaper, which he called the New York Weekly Journal, for the purpose of opposing the Governor s attempts at absolutism. An article in this paper contained so severe an attack on Cosby s principles and conduct, which were described as endangering public freedom, that the person con cerned obtained of the Council a request for the concurrence of the Assembly in an order for burning the publication in the market-place by the hands of the common hangman. The Assembly refused to make any such order, and Cosby and the Council proceeded to act for themselves. They required the Mayor and aldermen of New York to super intend the operations of the hangman ; but their orders were disobeyed. Not only did the civic magistrates decline to take part in the ceremony, but even the executioner refused to perform that portion of his office. The burning was at length carried out by a negro boy belonging to the sheriff; and the force of Zeiiger s criticisms was rendered all the more telling by the absurd and spiteful performance by which it was made so widely known. Cosby and the Council now determined to arrest Zenger, and bring him to trial on a eharge of libel ; but here again they met with difficulties. The grand jury threw out the bill ; upon which Bradley, the Attorney-General, brought in an ex qfficio information. The counsel employed by Zenger disputed the validity of the commissions held by the judges, Delancey and Phillipse, on the ground that they had been granted by the Governor without the concurrence of the Council. Of course the judges over-ruled the plea, and, not satisfied with so doing, punished the offending lawyers by denying them the right of further practice in the court. Zenger then put his csiwe in the hands of Andrew Hamilton, of Philadelphia, who had for several years been Speaker of the Pennsylvanian Assembly, and was at that time the most distinguished lawyer in America. Hamilton was old and infirm ; but he did not hesitate to undertake the commission, and 011 the day of trial (August 4th, 1735) was present in court for the gratuitous defence of an imperilled journalist. The case excited very general interest in the city, for it was felt that the immediate future of American liberty was involved in the decision. At the outset of the proceedings, Hamilton admitted the fact of publication, and challenged the prosecutor to support the charge of libel by proving the false- L 1730.] DESPOTISM IN AMERICA. 47 J liood of the statements contained in the incriminated publication. The challenge was declined, and Hamilton then proposed to call witnesses to prove that the criticisms of Zenger were true and well-founded. But he was told that, by the prin ciples of English law, the truth itself was a libel when its tendency was to discredit the members of a Government, or the institutions of the State. Hamilton disputed this dictum, which, however, was certainly maintained in English courts of law until a comparatively recent period ; and, pointing out that the Attorney-General had stated in the information that Zenger had been guilty of "a certain false, malicious, seditious, and scandalous libel," required that he would either explain the meaning of the word "false," or admit that it had been erroneously introduced, and suffer the record to be altered so far as to express that Zenger was the author of "a certain true, malicious, and seditious libel." But the court, fortified by the arguments and precedents of the Attorney-General, reiterated its maxim that the truth of a libel cannot be pleaded in excuse for its publication. In his speech for the defence, Hamilton contended that it was the right of freemen to publish to their fellow- citizens every truth that concerned the general weal, and every grievance by which the privileges of the subject were abridged or injured. The Governors of American colonies, he admitted, were liable to be sued in the King s courts at West minster for any wrongs they might have inflicted ~>n the colonists ; but the expense of this process was so great as to deter men from adopting it, and the public security was best promoted by an open discussion of all alleged misdoings. It was im possible, he urged, that a jury of free and honest men would affirm the charge of falseness which was recorded in the information, but which the prose cutor would neither undertake to prove, nor suffer to be disproved. In the end, notwithstanding an injunction from the Chief Justice that they should leave the question of libel to the court, and simply return a verdict as to the fact of publication, the jury declared the accused "not guilty." The result of the trial was received with delight throughout the province. Hamilton s speech was printed and circulated in all the American colonies; and the corporation of New York presented the successful lawyer with the freedom of the city in a gold box.* Cosby did not long survive his defeat. He died in 1736, and was succeeded by George Clarke, who acted on principles similar to those which had met with a severe defeat at the trial of Zenger. It was * Grahame s History of the United States, Book X., cbap.l. certainly a most unfortunate circumstance that so many of the Governors of American colonies should have been needy or unprincipled adventurers, utterly unacquainted with the principles of constitutional liberty, and indifferent to everything but the oppor tunity of making money. The War of Indepen dence was not provoked simply by the attempt to tax the colonists without granting them represen tation in. the English Parliament : it had been prepared during a long course of years by the misgovernment of men like Lord Cornbury and Colonel Cosby. The effect of the Zenger trial, and of Andrew Hamilton s eloquence, was most damaging to the rule of the parent State, not merely because the popular cause had triumphed, but because a popular cause had been created in opposition to the Government, and in consequence of the Govern ment s own folly and injustice. The American people for such they had now become were taiight to regard England rather as their tyrant than as their mother. They could not but see that their English relatives took no interest in them, excepting in as far as they could wring some miser able profit out of their expanding commonwealths. While a great English-speaking community was growing up beyond the Atlantic, the people out of which it had arisen seemed perfectly indifferent to this most interesting experiment of the reproduction of their old historic life under new conditions and in a new hemisphere. The almost entire suspension of English emigration for many years was another cause of the growing estrangement of the younger from the older branch of the national family. For a long while, the settlers in the colonies subject to the British Crown had been mostly Germans, Irish, and Scotch ; and, of these, probably not one enter tained a friendly feeling towards England, or cherished any other sentiments than such as were likely, on the first provocation, to develope into bitter hatred. Perhaps the Germans were the least unfriendly of the three, and the Scotch the most, owing to their disaffection to the House of Hanover. But even had Englishmen, in the reigns of Queen Anne and of the first Georges, gone out to America in numbers equal to those of the seven teenth century at the most enterprising era of coloni sation, they could not have neutralised, though they might have mitigated, the evil effects of a vicious habit of government, which defied all the best traditions of the nation s freedom, and sought to reduce American colonists to the level of a con quered race. This it was which alienated -the child from the parent, and sowed the seeds of anger and of war. The principles of common fairness and common sense were outraged, and the suffereis 1741.] SUPPOSED NEGRO PLOT. 181 learned in bitterness the lessons they had been too well taught. One of the worst acts of Governor Clarke was a breach of faith with certain colonists whom he had invited over. Desiring to create some check 011 the French fort at Crown Point, he proposed that a body of Scotch Highlanders should emigrate to the province, and establish themselves on the frontier territory near Lake George. A proclamation em bodying this scheme was sent to Scotland, and 1741, when the Governorship was conferred on George Clinton, uncle to the Earl of Lincoln. The same year was painfully distinguished by the sup posed discovery of a negro plot in the city of New York. The frequent occurx-ence of fires, apparently caused by design, excited a suspicion that the slaves, who were numerous both in the town and the province, were concocting some mischief. A pro clamation was therefore issued by the magistrates, promising pardon, freedom, and rewards to any GENEUAL OGLETHOUFE. (J tWit d Pwtnilt by Captain Lachlan Campbell, starting for New York, had an interview with Clarke, who promised him a. grant of thirty thousand acres of land, free from all but necessary charges. On the faith of this assurance, Campbell returned to Scotland, sold his paternal estate, and, at his own expense, took over to New York, in 1737, eighty-three Highland families. Exit, on again arriving in America, he found that the grant of land could only be had on condition of his admitting to a share in the profits several dependents of the Governor. The condition was refused, as being a violation of the original compact; and Campbell was obliged to leave his fellow-emigrants to shift for themselves, and to seek his own living by cultivating a small farm with the means at his disposal. Clarke was displaced in 41 slave who would bear witness against incendiaries and conspirators. Some women of bad character shortly afterwards came forward, and declared that the negroes had combined to burn the city, and set one of their body at the head of aflairs. Other witnesses, equally valueless, were soon found to support this charge ; the number of the accused was augmented day by day, till it reached an alarming point ; and even white men were com- proniised, as well as the blacks. A wave of terror and suspicion passed over New York, similar to that which, some fifty years earlier, resulted in the Massachusetts trials for witchcraft. Men lost their judgment and their humanity in the universal fear; and, before the excitement had spent itself, more than thirty persons had been executed (of whom 482 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1723. several were burnt at the stake), and many had been transported. At a subsequent and calmer time, it came to be doubted, considering the bad character of most of the witnesses, whether there had really been any plot at all. New England was not without a history in the reigns of George I. and George II. Colonel Shute, who was Goveriir in 1720, came into collision with the people on the subject of the pine-trees reserved for the use of the Royal Navy on vacant lands. Shute did his best, as he was bound to do, to enforce the law, and, getting into a dispute with the Massachusetts Assembly with respect to a remonstrance which it was proposed to print, was so inconsiderate as to say that the King had committed to him the power of the press, and that nothing could be lawfully published without his permission. In other ways he managed to vex and irritate the Assembly, who in turn made their power felt by diminishing his salary, and that of the Deputy-Governor, William Duinmer, to so low a pitch that the latter at length refused to accept it, as involving an insult to the King. Shute, though an irritable, was not an ill-mean ing man, and before his arrival had been regarded as a supporter of liberal and dissenting views. But the distrust of the Massachusetts Assembly had now been excited against him to so extreme a degree that he appears to have been made the object of substantial injustice. With the old bitterness of their predecessors in the seventeenth century, the leaders of the popular party opposed Shute and all his supporters at every point, as if they had been the greatest criminals. In England, even the friends of Massachusetts re gretted the course that was being pursued, and feared it might lead to mischievous results. Jere miah Dummer, the provincial agent at London, who had written the defence of the New England charters when their existence was threatened in 1715, gave so much oifence to these irritable poli ticians by simply notifying to them that Shute s conduct was generally approved in England, and that serious measures would cei-tainly be taken against the people of Massachusetts unless a more reasonable temper were shown, that he was dis missed from his office. The Assembly repeatedly forced Shute into doing as they wished, by refusing him any salary at all until he had made his submission. During the Indian war which occurred at this period, and of which we have related the events in a previous Chapter, they assumed the direction of the military operations, which of right belonged to the Governor, and required the officers to correspond with them ; but for this they afterwards apologised, and prudently retreated from an untenable position. The danger to the colony was increased by these xinfortunate disputes, and the Governor at length determined to withdraw from a position in which his actions were continually paralysed by the jealousy of his associates. Having previously, but in a private way, obtained permission of the King to return to England, he suddenly departed towards the close of 1722, leaving the conduct of affairs in the hands of the Lieutenant-Governor, William Dummer. Though a friend of Shute, Dummer had the credit of being a patriotic citizen. Aided by the advice and support of the aged judge, Sewall the only person then living who had held office under the original charter, and who retained in his views and his modes of speech much of the old Puritan character the new head of the colony succeeded in establishing a friendly feeling between himself and the Legislature. The object of Governor Shute s visit to England was to lay before the King a series of formal complaints against the Massachusetts Assembly. The result, in 1723, was a summons to the As sembly to answer this indictment, which charged that body with committing various encroachments on the Royal prerogative, as represented by the Governor. On receiving the summons, the House of Representatives passed a vote to the effect that the allegations were groundless, and that an agent should be empowered to employ lawyers to defend their proceedings. So sharp, abrupt, and lofty a mode of meeting the King s complaints would have been most imprudent, and the Council wisely refused to concur in any such course. Ulti mately, the Assembly transmitted a particular answer to the several charges, together with an address to the King; and at the same time des patched an agent to England, to explain and justify their conduct. Jeremiah Dummer was also re- appointed as the resident colonial agent at Lon don ; so that the cause of Massachusetts did not suffer from want of advocacy. But the colonists had so clearly exceeded their powers, and so mani festly violated the charter, that the provincial agents, by the advice of their English friends, acknowledged the Assembly to have been wrong in relation to the Iloyal woods and the command of military operations, and promised that such acts should not be repeated. Another subject of complaint on the part of the Crown had refer ence to certain assumptions of independence by the Massachusetts Assembly; and, in respect of these, the Government of Sir Robert Walpole proposed that an explanatory charter should be 1727.] BURNET IN MASSACHUSETTS. 483 accepted by the colonial Legislature, declaring in express terms the Governor s power to negative the Speaker when presented to him after election, and limiting the adjournment of the Assembly by its own act to two days. The explanatory charter, when laid before the House of Represen tatives, in January, 1726, gave great discontent to many. Thirty-two members out of eighty voted that it should be rejected, and four members of the Council a body much more inclined to sup port Royal prerogative than the popular branch of the Legislature gave their votes to the same effect. The majority, however, were on the side of acquiescence; and the charter was adopted by a resolution expressed in terms of marked loyalty. When, on the death of George I., in 1727, Colonel Montgomery, as already related, was sent out as Governor of New York, Burnet, thus displaced, received the chief post in the New England colo nies, and Sliute did not return to the office he had quitted. Burnet entered on his new duties with uneasy forebodings as to his relations with the Assembly. He had been popular with the people of New York and New Jersey, to whom he had commonly appeared as a ruler of great liberality, and a man of kind and generous feeling. But the Massa chusetts people had long been noted for a certain querulous and froward spirit of opposition ; and Burnet feared that he should experience what most other Governors had experienced before him. His reception by the Bostonians was reassuring. He entered the capital city, in 1728, in the midst of a splendid cayalcade ; but it soon appeared that his character was not calculated to harmo nise with the rigid Puritanism of New England. Though the son of a Bishop, and himself not otherwise than religious, he hated formalism, and was a man of gay and convivial habits. To Colonel Taller, one of the committee who went from Boston to meet him on the borders of Rhode Island colony, he complained of the long graces that were said by the clergymen on the road, and expressed a desire to know when they would shorten. Tailer, who was of a humorous disposi tion, answered, " The graces will increase in length till you come to Boston ; after that, they will shorten till you come to your government of New Hampshire, where your Excellency will find no grace at all." Burnet imprudently let the people see how great was his indifference to their cherished ideas on this subject. One day, when dining at the house of an old senator, who was in the habit of saying grace sitting, his host courteously asked if he would prefer that it should be delivered standing; to which Burnet bluntly replied, "Stand ing or sitting, any way or no way, just as you please." It is obvious that such a man, however excellent his qualities in some respects, was not fitted for the Governor of a Puritanical colony. He soon quarrelled with the Assembly on the subject of remuneration. Pecuniary embarrass ment compelled him to be very solicitous on this subject, and he hinted that, as the people were rich enough to give him so fine a reception, they were rich enough to afford him a handsome salary. The Massachusetts Assembly voted him 1,400, besides other sums for his travelling expenses ; but they refused a permanent income. A sharp dispute followed, in which Burnet, losing his tem per, reproached the members with their conduct towards Shute; intimated that the English Par liament would allocate a fixed salary on the pro vince if the colonists continued obstinate ; and uttered a vague threat that it might perhaps do " something else besides." He subsequently ex plained that in this phrase he alluded to the possi bility of the provincial charter being withdrawn altogether, if the home Government were provoked beyond a certain point. Assuming high ground, he refused to accept the special sums that had been voted him, and declared that he would be satis fied with nothing but a fixed salary. In virtue of the powers conferred on the Governor by the supplementary charter, he refused to prorogue the deputies until they had done as he wished ; and shortly afterwards he adjourned them, first to Salem, and afterwards to Concord, observing in his jocular way., that the names of both those towns inclined to amity. The names, however, had no such subtle in fluence as Burnet s jest implied. An agreement could not be arrived at, and the Assembly sent an address to the King, expressing their desire and resolve to provide amply and honourably for the support of his Majesty s representative, but arguing that, by renouncing control over the Governor, they would separate his interests from those of the province. This address was not favourably received by the King, and the Lords of Trade went so far as to report to the Privy Council that Massachusetts was endeavouring to wrest from the sovereign the small remnant of prerogative he had retained, and to make itself entirely independent. It was also recommended that the whole subject should be submitted to the judgment of Parliament a step which, had it been taken, would probably have resulted in some extreme measure. Nevertheless, the Massachusetts Assembly refused to give way, and the controversy might have led to serious 484 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1740. issues but for the sudden death of Burnet in 1729. One of the London agents of the colony at that time was Jonathan Belcher, a New Englander, held in much regard by his countrymen for the zeal with which he advocated their privileges. He had supported the recent address to the throne, and he now solicited and obtained the vacant post. But with his elevation to office his views underwent a change. It is believed that he gave some assur ance to the Government that he would use his influence to procure the concession of a fixed salary ; at any rate, his first address to the Assembly, on arriving in America in 1730, con veyed an urgent application for a permanent provision. The Royal instructions which he brought out with him, and which he read to the members, contained an intimation that, if the demand were any longer resisted, his Majesty would feel compelled to lay the undutiful behaviour ofthe province before Parliament, not only in that particular instance, but in many others of the same nature and tendency, from which, his Majesty observed, it manifestly appeared that the Assembly had for some years past attempted to weaken, if not cast off", the obedience they owed to the Crown, and tho dependence which all colonies ought to have on the mother country. If the Assembly still proved non-compliant, Belcher was immediately to return to England. After reading this address to the members, the new Governor made a speech explaining his conduct, which was certainly the very reverse of what the colonists had reason to expect. He said that his views on the abstract question were still exactly what they had been, but that further resistance was useless, and might endanger all. "With an elaborate com parison drawn from the struggles and xiltimate fate of Cato, after the pedantic fashion of those times, he implored the Assembly, now that it had sufficiently contended against power, not to commit the folly of self-murder. Notwithstanding these exhortations, the Assem bly declined to provide the required salary, but voted Belcher a handsome reward for his services in England, and the sum of 1,000 (unconnected with any definite period) for the conduct of public affairs in the province. Perplexed by the situation in which he was placed, Belcher persuaded the Assembly to present an address to the Crown, soliciting permission for him to accept the sums that had been voted. The permission was granted, on condition of his continuing to urge the Royal in structions ; but xiltimately the English Government gave a general sanction to Belcher s accepting any grants the Assembly might choose to make. The mother country, in fact, abandoned its position, and Massachusetts secured another triumph one of those triumphs which, by revealing the hesitation of the parent State, prepared for the War of Independence in the next generation. For the fol lowing ten years, Belcher retained his position, though involved in controversies with the Deputy- Governor of New Hampshire as to the King s woods, and in the wranglings of that colony with Massachusetts on a disputed question, of boundary, which was at length decided by the Royal Govern ment in favour of the former. By this decision New Hampshire got even more than she claimed ; and so did Rhode Island in a similar dispute. Mas. sachusetts had always been grasping as to territory; but in these instances she was signally discomfited. Belcher was recalled, in 1 740, owing to the intrigues of certain speculators in paper money, whose plans he had opposed ; and after that date the Governor ship of Massachusetts and New Hampshire was placed in separate hands. CHAPTER LV. Situation and Topographical Characteristics of Georgia Its Wild and Exposed Condition in the Early Part of the Eighteenth Century General Oglethorpe, the Founder of Georgia His Benevolent Efforts on behalf of Insolvent Debtors Formation of a Scheme of Colonisation The Moravians, or Herrnhutters ; their Eeligious Principles and Practice The Royal Charter of Georgia Provisions of that Document, and Character of the Chief Trustees Hopeful Anticipations of the Xew Project Sailing of the First Body of Emigrants Commencement of the City of Savannah Oglethorpe s Life in the "Woods Employments of the Settlers Conference with Indian Tribes Cession of Territory, and Conclusion of a Treaty- Visit of Indians to George II. Oglethorpe s Remarks on the Native Character Good Effect of his Generosity. GKORGIA, the last-founded of the original colonies of English America, was comprised within the limits of South Carolina until its division from that territory in 1732. The present State so called, which has been lessened by the formation, out of its first dimensions, of the States of Mississippi and 1732.] THE PROVINCE OF GEORGIA. 485 Alabama, extends along the Atlantic, from Florida in the south to South Carolina in the north-east, a distance of one hundred and five miles ; but north of this coast-line the boundary strikes inland with a westerly inclination, skirting the side of South Carolina. Its area is 58,000 square miles, which is about three hundred square miles more than England and Wales. The northern parts of the State are hilly ; the south is one long, dreary flat, stretching from the shores of the ocean to the Mississippi, far beyond the existing limits of Georgia. The loose and friable soil will grow no trees except the pine and the palmetto ; but this arid region is varied by large swamps, which absorb many streams into their silent and me lancholy expanse, and in the rainy season pre sent the appearance of inland seas, out of which rise bay-trees and underwood a mesh of tangled vegetation, holding malaria and disease. The chief river of the State is the Savannah, which rises on the most southern declivity of the Appala chian Mountains, and, running in a south-south easterly direction for nearly four hundred and fifty miles, forms the boundary between Georgia and South Carolina. The climate of this extensive tract of country is of course various. In the higher lands of the north, the air is cold in winter ; frosts are common, and snow falls to the depth of several inches. In the more southern parts, on the plain and in the marshes, the heat in summer is intense, and the rainy season, which is in the spring, has a character of almost tropical vehemence. The hilly regions abound in extensive forests, containing numerous wild boars and deer ; alligators frequent the larger streams, and bees murmur about the swamps east of Flint River, collecting honey from the luxuriant flowers which the heat and moisture develope into life. Agriculture is the principal employment of the people, and cotton, tobacco, and rice are the chief products of the land ; but the large supply of water-power, furnished by the hill- streams in the northern part of the State, has led to the establishment of several manufactures. Such is Georgia at the present day. In 1732, its natural characteristics had not been modified by the action of civilised races. The country to which a separate existence was given at that period, was a wilderness of indefinite extent, claimed on the one hand by the Spaniards as a part of Florida, and on the other by the English as a portion of the Carolinas. In point of fact, neither nation put the land to any practical use ; but each valued it as a frontier. The English were under the impression that the Spaniards, by the treaty of Madrid in 1GG7, had waived all claim to this savage territory ; but the Spaniards them* selves acted as if their title were still in full force. The whole region was little better than a desert. Of white inhabitants it had none, and even the Indians were not numerous. In one quarter, called Yamacraw, on the river Savannah, a small native tribe had been planted sir.c 1 1703, when James Moore, the Governor of South Carolina, transported its membei-s thither as a sort of garrison against the tribes in alliance with Spain. The Indians thus settled between the Carolina* and Florida acknowledged their dependence on the former, but did nothing to secure English predominance in the disputed territory. The representatives of Spain encouraged the other Indian nations in frequent attacks on the English settlements of South Carolina; and the waste territory was known only as a land of prowling savages, who made irruptions into the struggling plantations to the north, and against whom it was occasionally found necessary to sally forth with fire and sword. But in the early part of the reign of George II. it appeared to many politicians a matter of vital consequence that the desert portions of Carolina should be occupied by men of English race, and thus saved from the domination of the Spaniards, who were advancing from the south, and of the French, who were approaching from the west. The idea was much discussed, but it was some time before a feasible project could be matured. At length it occurred to a brave and humane military officer of that day that a colony of distressed persons in Great Britain and Ireland might be formed, expi^essly with a view to peopling these wastes, and keeping out rival nationalities. The conversion of the Indians was another design which it was hoped to realise by the speculation ; but this, no doubt, was not the strongest motive. James Edward Oglethorpe, the founder of Georgia, was a member of a Yorkshire family, but was born in St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Middlesex, December 22nd, 1696. When yet a mere lad, he served under Prince Eugene, and, on a certain occasion, as he related some sixty years after to Johnson, Goldsmith, and BosAvell, avenged with ad mirable tact and spirit an affront which had been offered him by the Prince of Wurtemburg. The Prince had taken up a glass of wine, and by a fillip caused some of it to fly into the youth s face. Not liking to get the character of a quarrelsome fellow by challenging the high-born bully at once, and yet feeling that it was absolutely necessary he should take some notice of the act, Oglethorpe fixed his eye upon the Prince, and, smiling all the time us if 486 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1732. the whole thing were a pleasantry, said, " Mon Prince, that s a good joke, but we do it much better in England " and so threw a whole glass ful of wine in his adversary s face.* Surviving to a great age, for it was not until 1785 that he died, Oglethorpe is identified with the personal history of nearly the whole of last century ;f Thomson spoke of him with much praise ; Joseph Warton with some exaggeration, it must be ad mitted declared that he was at once a great hero and a great legislator ; and Johnson held him in high esteem. " I know no man whose life would be more interesting," said Johnson one day; and he expressed his willingness to write NJTW ENGLAND PAPER MONEY. and he was on intimate terms with some of its most eminent literary men. Pope has written : " One, driven by strong benevolence of soul, Shall fly, like Oglethorpe, from pole to pole." J * Boswell s Life of Johnson. \ There has been some discrepancy, in the various accounts of Oglethorpe, as to the year in which he was born ; but it appears, from some inquiries recently made by Colonel J. L. Chester, that he was born in 1696, as stated in the text ; so that he was in his eighty-ninth year when he died, J Imitations of Horace, Book II., Epistle 2, it, if furnished with the materials. The unusual variety of his experiences gave the conversation of Oglethorpe a rather desultory character, and Johnson complained of his never completing what he had to say. But when he got on topics of which he had special knowledge, he was full of entertainment and information. It must have been pleasant to hear him, after dinner, describing, at Johnson s request, the siege of Belgrade (at which he had been present fifty-fire years before), explaining the various operations, and illustrating 488 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, [1732. the positions of Turks and Austrians by means of a little wine poured upon the table, from which his wetted finger formed parallels and batteries, forts and canips. He could repeat to Johnson his father s disapproval of the Revolution of 1688, and could tell young Samuel Rogers that, when young himself, he had shot snipes in the meadows since covered by Conduit Street and its vicinity. His contemporaries found in Oglethorpe a man well- read, scholarly, conversant with affairs, amiable, and brave, a Tory in politics, yet one who took thought for the needy and distressed ; and certainly no man was better fitted than he to lead a colony of poor adventurers into a wilderness, where they might have to fight for their possessions, and where courage, self-reliance, and knowledge of the world, were indispensable in the leader. In early life, Oglethorpe was a member of Parlia ment ; and one of the subjects which attracted his particular attention was the state of gaols. In 1728, he moved in the House of Commons for a committee of inquiry into abuses which were known to exist ; and, as the chairman of this com mittee, he presented in the following year a report which led to some very necessary reforms. Those were days long before the philanthropist, John Howard, had begun his humane labours ; and the condition of English prisons was so atrocious that at the present time it would be difficult to believe such statements as have been made, if they did not come to us 011 the best authority. The treatment of insolvent debtors was nearly as bad as that suffered by convicted criminals. The gaolers in both instances were often tyrants of the most cor rupt and pitiless order ; and while, for a bribe, they would permit all kinds of debauchery, they wreaked the vengeance of their cruelty on those who could not or would not purchase their favour. The indiscriminate herding together of men of every description of character, from the reckless and de praved to the simply unfortunate, generated a frightful amount of vice; and the overcrowding, combined with a total absence of sanitary precau tions, resulted in contagious diseases which often spread beyond the enclosure of the prisen walls. As regards prisoners for debt, the members of the Parliamentary Committee obtained by Oglethorpe discovered, in the course of their inquiries, that long detention in a gaol produced a degenerate habit of mind which it was exceedingly difficult to shake off. Dickens, in his story of " Little Dor- rit," has described with subtle discrimination the slow but certain loss of self-respect and indepen dence which comes upon the old inhabitant of a gaol the listless indifference to change, the shrink ing from exertion, the dread of the external world, the fatal gravitation again and again to the same wretched home, the familiarity with miserable shifts and ignoble arts, which come at length to bo considered the most easy and natural way of meet ing daily necessities. This effect was apparent in the prisoners who came under the observation of Oglethorpe and his fellow-members ; and it was thought that notliing would be so likely to over come their vicious tendency as a total change of scene, and the excitement of life in a new country. A rich citizen of London had recently bequeathed his fortune to the Government for the purpose of liberating insolvent debtors from prison. One of the duties of the Parliamentary Committee was to select the most fitting objects for the receipt of this bounty ; and Oglethorpe persuaded his associates to apply the money to a plan of colonisation, of which the southern deserts of Carolina should be the scene. The idea having been communicated to the Government, it was determined that the territory in question should be erected into a separate pro vince, and called Georgia, in honour of the reigning King. The House of Commons passed successive votes of money, to be added to the sum left by the London citizen ; and other resources were also forthcoming. A directly religious character was given to the movement by the proposal to convert the Indians, and by a public announcement that the right of citizenship in the new province, and all the pecuniaiy assistance which it was proposed to bestow on the original emigrants, would be equally conferred on Protestant settlers from any nation of Europe who might seek in those distant wilds a refuge from persecution. The offer was speedily accepted by a body of religious enthusiasts in Germany, known as the Moravians, Herrnhutters, or United Brethren of the Protestant Episcopal Church. The members of this body asserted of themselves that they had received, through succes sive generations which had always renounced the corruptions of Rome, the very principles of the primitive Apostolic Church. They were certainly in existence before the reformation of Luther, and were apparently a branch of the Hussites, or fol lowers of the great Bohemian, John Huss. With the German reformers of the sixteenth century they speedily coalesced, while retaining some distinctive doctrines ; and many of them settled in Moravia, and thus acquired the name by which they are most commonly known. Ultimately, their tenets took a strong Calvinistical colour, though they held to the Bohemian forms of discipline. In the Thirty Years War, their settlements in Bohemia and Moravia were destroyed, and, after many migra- 1732.] THE MORAVIANS. 489 tions, they were allowed, in 1722, to settle on the estate of Bethelsdorf, in Upper Lusatia, belonging to the celebrated Count Zinzendorf, who became their bishop. It was from the neighbouring hill of Hutsberg, and the little town of Herrnhut, after wards established at its base, that they derived the title of Herrnhutters ; but they preferred to be known as the United Brethren. This designation arose from their admitting Protestants of all deno minations into their confraternity, without requiring them to renounce their respective creeds, on con dition that they conformed to the Moravian (or, more strictly speaking, Bohemian) rules of disci pline. The principles of the Moravians do not seem to differ materially from those of most Protestant bodies ; but their practice is in some respects pecu liar. Believing that the Spirit of God continues to enlighten inwardly those who pi-ay for it, for the purpose of regulating their conduct, they invoke it in all circumstances of perplexity before coming to any decision. Each community is self-supporting and self-governing. It was at one time supposed that the Moravians held their goods in common ; but this appears to have been an eiror, arising from the first settlers in America, who were poor men, put ting their earnings into one stock, with a view to economy. The Moravians have some points of re semblance to the Quakers, but are pei-haps, on the whole, more like the English Methodists, though their habits of life differ from those of all other sects. They hold every kind of war to be unlawful Industry they regard as a branch of religion ; and they retain the primitive practices of washing feet, and saluting with the kiss of holy love. Gaudiness of apparel, personal adornment, plays, games, danc ing, and all promiseuous assemblages of the sexes, are strictly forbidden by their ordinances. The unmarried men and women live apart in separate assemblages, in each of which one of the members in rotation passes the night in watching and prayer. Religion is the rule of their life, and a certain sequestration from the world, though not to the extent that has been encouraged by the monastic orders of Roman Catholicism, is a distinguishing feature of their communities. Their intense and concentrated enthusiasm has enabled them to do much in the way of converting the heathen ; but religious bodies so entirely at issue with the ordi nary habits of human beings must always remain isolated from the mass of mankind. The Moravians are the gentlest of fanatics, yet they are fanatics none the less. They still exist in large numbers in the United States, and about the middle of last century acquired a considerable influence in Eng land. That airy trifler, Christopher Anstey, made game of them in " The New Bath Guide." " I m sorry to find, at the city of Bath, Many folk are uneasy concerning their faith : Nicodemus, the preacher, strives all he can do To quiet the conscience of good sister Prue ; But Tabby from scruples of mind is releas d Since she met with a learned Moravian priest, Who ays there is neither transgression nor sin, A doctrine that brings many customers in." The ode which this learned Moravian priest com posed on the death of his new-born infant, and which Anstey appends, was pronounced by Horace "VValpole to be incomparable.* It appears to be founded on a real production of Count Zinzendorf s, contained in his Book of Hymns. The Royal Charter of Georgia bears date the 9th of June, 1732. The separate province which it created was to extend from the Savannah in the north to the Alatamaha in the south, and from the head-springs of those rivers due west to the Pacific. Its government was vested for twenty-one years in a corporation of twenty-one noblemen and gentle men, amongst whom were Anthony Ashley Cooper, fourth Earl of Shaftesbury (a descendant of the nobleman who played so important a part in the reign of Charles II., and who was concerned in the forma tion of the Carolina colonies), John Lord Percival, John Lord Tyrconnel, James Loi d Limerick, George Lord Carpenter, James Edward Oglethorpe, and Stephen Hales. The last-named was a clergyman of the Church of England, who gave a large part of his mind to the study of science, and to its practical application to the needs of life. Some years later, Hales, like Oglethorpe, devoted much attention to the state of prisons ; and a ventilating apparatus which he introduced into Newgate, and which was also employed in hospitals, the holds of ships, and other close and malarious places, reduced the mor tality in a very remarkable degree. At the present day, Oglethorpe and Hales are the best-known members of that body to which were confided the early fortunes of Georgia. The legislative powers conferred on the corporation were to cease at the expiration of the prescribed term, and a permanent form of government was then to be established by the reigning monarch. In the meanwhile, the rule of the trustees was autocratical, and the common council which was to carry out their views on the spot was entirely the creation of their own will, without any admixture of a popular element. But these trustees were, by the terms of the charter, to hold their territory in trust for the poor ; and they seem to have been, without an exception, men of * Horace Walpole to George Montagu, June 20th, 170G. 490 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1733. the highest benevolence and honour. By their own request, they were restrained from receiving any grants of land, or any emolument whatever for their labours. The motto adopted for the colonial seal N&n sibi, sed aliis (Not for themselves, but others), in connection with a group of silkworms truly expressed the position of the trustees towards the colonists. Not only did these disinterested workers give their time and trouble for nothing ; they furnished large sums of money from their private fortunes for the maintenance of the settlers until they could create their own means of living. This benevolent example was followed by the titled and the rich ; and by the late autumn of 1732 the new project was amply endowed with funds. It was hoped that the plantation would be use ful to the country in many ways. Wine was to be produced from the grapes which grew luxuriantly in that warm and brilliant climate. The silk-worms in the provincial seal were to be no vain device ; for it was anticipated that raw silk, to a large annual value, would soon be imported from Georgia, the pec-pie of which would take English manu factures in exchange. At that time, England paid 500,000 a year to Piedmont for unmanufactured silk ; and men persuaded themselves that this large sum would shortly l>e saved by the more profitable transactions of English manufacturers with English colonists. The olive also was to be cultivated, and Great Britain was to be supplied with oil from one of her own possessions, instead of seeking it in Italy. With these grand visions in his head, Oglethorpe undertook to accompany the first band of emigrants to their new home, and to act gratuitously as their Governor. He sailed from Gravesend on the 6th of November, 1732, together with about a hundred and twenty emigrants, including a few Piedmontese silk- workers, who took with them a quantity of silk-worms eggs produced in their native land. The Moravian brethren formed no part of this small body. They were delayed in their passage from Germany to England, and in fact did not start until very nearly a year later. As it was thought imprudent to allow the public enthusiasm to cool on the subject of Georgian colonisation, Oglethorpe determined not to await their arrival, but to let them follow at their own convenience. The English families under the direction of Ogle thorpe included a number of bricklayers, carpenters, farmers, and other persons accustomed to industrial pursuits, who were provided with the tools and im plements necessary to the exercise of their respec tive crafts. They were also furnished with fire-arms and swords, in the use of which they had been pre viously disciplined ; and seventy -four pieces of cannon, together with a proportionate amount of ammunition, and materials for building forts, were sent over by the King. Supplies for a year after their reaching the colony, or until they should be able to provide for themselves, accompanied the adventurers. After a voyage of fifty-seven days, they arrived, early in 1733, off Charleston, where a cordial welcome awaited them. Governor John son recommended the Assembly of South Carolina to vote the emigrants a large supply of breeding cattle and various provisions ; and the suggestion was cheerfully complied with. Attended by mounted rangers and scout-boats, furnished by the Carolinians, the strangers who were to form the advanced guard of Carolina against Spaniards and natives resumed their journey, and sailed f )r Port Royal, near the southern limits of South Carolina. The party landed at Beaufort, also within the same province ; and Oglethorpe, ascending the Savannah, fixed 011 a high bluff overlooking the river as the most fitting situation for his contemplated town. On the 12th of February, according to the new style, the colonists arrived at the appointed spot in a small sloop and a few piraguas, and before evening they had encamped on the shore. A tent, protected by four pine-trees, formed for nearly a year the dwelling of Oglethorpe. A fort was speedily erected, and the men, aided by some skilled artisans from South Carolina, and amply supplied with provisions from the same source, were sent into the woods to fell trees for the building of huts. Thus began the town of Savannah ; but, humble as were the original structures, a plan was syste matically pursued from the first. The streets were laid out with regularity ; a public square formed the central point of each quarter; and all perplexing tortuosities were avoided. This character of pre cision attaches to the city at the present day. The houses consisted of a timber frame, measuring twenty -four feet by sixteen ; the floors were of rough deals, the sides of unplaiied boards, and the roofs of shingles. These dwellings did not vary as to size or appointments : Oglethorpe himself had no better residence than his carpenters and husband men. Five-and-forty years after, this hero of the desert inveighed, in the presence of Dr. Johnson, against luxurious indulgences, and quoted with enthusiasm certain lines from Addison s " Cato," in which Syphax praises the life of the Numidian hunter : " Coarse are his meals, the fortune of the chase. Amidst the running stream he slakes his thirst, Toils all the day, and, at the approach of night, On the first friendly bank he throws him down, Or rests his head upon a rock till morn : 1733.] TREATY WITH THE CREEKS. 491 Then rises fresh, pursues his wonted game ; And if the following day he chance to find A new repast, or an untasted spring, Blesses his stars, and thinks it luxury."* Johnson properly objected that refinement and elegance are the qualities which distinguish the civilised man from the savage ; but the ability to lead a life not very dissimilar from that of the Numidian is a most useful accomplishment in the leader of a small band of men whose task is to conquer the desert. Such a life Oglethorpe followed in the woods and wilds of Georgia ; and he was probably thinking of the old bygone days on the banks of the Savannah, when, having finished his quotation from Addison, he exclaimed, "Let us have tfiat kind of luxury, sir, if you will ! "t The city of Savannah, when founded, was backed by the illimitable forest ; but a portion of the cleared space was soon formed into a large garden, where fruits and vegetables some introduced from Europe, others natural to the soil and climate were grown by the colonists. The small band of Englishmen pursued an industrious life, for Oglethorpe was not the man to let them rust in idleness. In addition to their house-building and their cultivation of the ground, they had military duties to discharge. Their leader formed them into a militia, and exercised them frequently : a wise precaution in lands where hostile attack was at no time improbable. The tribe dwelling half a mile off, at Yamacraw, was not inclined to forget its allegiance; but the country generally was occupied by the Upper and Lower Creeks, whose disposition was as yet uncertain. An Indian woman, married to a Carolinian trader, undertook to act as interpreter, and Oglethorpe despatched by her an invitation to all the chiefs of the Creeks to hold a conference with him at Savannah. Fifty Indian sachems accordingly assembled in the month of June, and were addressed by Oglethorpe in a speech which vaunted the great power, wisdom, and wealth of the English nation, and set forth the many advan tages that might result to the Indians from a friendly connection with the strangers. As the Indians had a superfluity of land, Oglethorpe hoped that they would not object to part with Home of it for the benefit of the new-comers, This was granted, though the country south of the Savannah was claimed by the Creeks as belonging to them by right. So eager were these savages to prove their friendship that they offered to revenge the deaths of some Englishmen who had * Act I., "sc. 4. t BoswdlL been killed by the Cherokees, if Oglethorpe would authorise it. But the offer was declined, and in the following year friendly relations were established with the Cherokees. At the conference with the Creeks, reference was made by the principal of the Indian sachems to Tomo-chichi, the leader of the small tribe settled at Yamacraw an old warrior, separated, together with his followers, from the main body of the Creek nation by the policy of Governor Moore, but regarded with general respect as a man of capacity and courage. Being summoned to appear, he approached timorously, and, addressing Ogle thorpe, said, " Here is a little present." It consisted of a buffalo-skin, painted on the inside with the head and feathers of an eagle. The eagle, he remarked, signified speed, and the buffalo strength : the eagle s feathers were soft, and signified love ; the buffalo s skin was warm, and denoted protection. The English were as swift as the bird, and as strong as the beast ; since, like the first, they could fly from the uttermost parts of the earth over the vast seas, and, like the second, were so strong that nothing could withstand them. He hoped the English would accept the emblems of the eagle s feathers and the buffalo s skin, and extend their love and protection to the families of the Indians. The Great Power which dwelt in heaven and all around had endowed the English with wisdom and riches, so that they wanted nothing ; while the same Power had lavished great territories on the Indians, who yet were in want of everything. It was therefore wise, in the opinion of Tomo-chichi, that the Creeks should resign to the English the lands they needed not for themselves, and, by permitting the English to settle among them, should create an opportunity for acquiring the arts of civilised life, which would add greatly to their comfort. A treaty was accordingly concluded, by which the English obtained sovereignty over the lands of the Creeks, as far south as the St. John s. Rules of commerce, and for the adjustment of disputes in conformity with the laws of England, were agreed to. The English undertook to form no new townships without previously giving notice to the Indian chiefs ; the Indians promised that they would not permit any other race of white men to settle in the country. During this interview, the native chiefs were pre sented with laced coats, hats, and shirts, and their attendants with some cloth. In addition to these presents, the Creeks had likewise given to them a quantity of gunpowder, bullets, pipes, tobacco, dif ferent coloured tapes, Irish linen, and eight kegs of 1734.] INDIANS BEFORE GEORGE II. 493 rum, to take home to their several towns. An jilliance was concluded in 1734; with the Natchez an arrangement which greatly enhanced the security of the colony. The first crop of Indian corn, yielding a thousand bushels, was reaped by the planters the same year ; two additional bodies of emigrants arrived from the old country ; and the people. I am come for the good of the whole nation called the Creeks, to renew the peace which was long ago made with the English. I am come over in my old days, though I cannot live to see any advantage to myself; I am come for the good of the children of all the nations of the Upper and Lower Creeks, that they may be instructed in the JOHN WESLEY. town of Augusta was laid out. Returning to England in the spring of 1734, Oglethorpe was accompanied by Tomo-chichi, his wife, Senauki, their son, Tooanakowki, and Hillispilli, one of their war-captains. On the 1st of August, Tomo-chichi had an interview with the King at Kensington Palace, when he is said to have made the following speech : "This day I see the majesty of your face, the greatness of your hou.se, and the number of your 42 knowledge of the English. These are the feather* of the eagle, which is the swiftest of birds, and which flyeth all round our nations : these feathers are a sign of peace in our land, and have been car ried from town to town there; and we have brought them over to leave with you, O great King, as a sign of everlasting peace. O great King, whatso ever words you shall say unto me, I will tell them faithfully to all the kings of the Creek nations." To this speech the King replied :~" I am glad of 404 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1734. this opportunity of assiiring you of my vegarcl for the people from whom you come, I am extremely well pleased with the assurances you have brought me from them ; and accept very gratefully this pre sent as an indication, of their good disposition to me and my people. I [shall always be ready to culti vate a good correspondence between them and my own subjects, and shall be glad of any occasion to {how you a mark of my particular friendship and esteem." The old chieftain, then addressed the Queen say ing : " I am glad to see this day, and to have the opportunity of seeing the Mother of this great people. As our people are joined with your Majesty s, we humbly hope to find you the common mother and protectress of us and all our children." Tomi-chichi and his wife were dressed in scarlet and gold ; but Hillispilli, the war captain, and the other attendants, were extremely desirous of appear ing at court in their national costume, or rather semi-costume, for their entire clothing consisted of nothing but a covering round the waist. From this, however, they were dissuaded by Oglethorpe ; yet they presented themselves with their faces fantastically painted with bearded arrows and other devices, according to the custom of their coiintry. During their stay in England of about four months the Creek visitors were very sumptuously enter tained both at court, and at the houses of the nobility and other distinguished persons. Twenty pounds a week were allowed them for the expenses of the table. When they left England for America, on the 30th of October, they took back with them presents to the value of .400, including a gold watch, which the young Duke of Cumberland gave to Tomo-chichi, with an exhortation to him to call upon Jesus Christ every morning when he looked at it. For these and all the other favours shown them, the Creeks promised eternal fidelity to England. On their return to America, they were accompanied by Sir Francis Bathurst with his family and servants, besides many of the relations cf the planters already settled in Georgia. In speaking of the government and religion of the Creek nation in a letter from the new colony, Oglethorps observed that there seemed to be a door open for the conversion of the Indians there. " I have had," he wrote, " many conversa tions with their chief men, the whole tenor of which shows thei e is nothing wanting to their con version but one who understands their language well, to explain to them the mysteries of religion ; for as to the moral part of Christianity, they under stand and assent to it. They abhor adultery, and do not approve of plurality of wive s." Oglethorpe further remarked that theft, though frequent among the Uchees, was unknown amongst the Creeks, and that the latter looked upon murder with abhor rence, although the killing of an enemy they did not consider murder. The two great obstacles to their becoming Christians appeared to him to bo revenge, which they termed honour, and drunken ness, which they had learned from our traders. " But upon both these points," continued Oglethorpe, " they hear reason; and with respect to drinking of rum, I have weaned those near me a good deal from it. As for revenge, they say, as they have no executive power of justice amongst them, they are forced to kill the man who has injured them, in order to prevent others from doing the like ; \>ui they do not think that any injury, except adultery or murder, deserves revenge." With the courage of the Indians, Oglethorpe seems to have been much impressed. He relates in the same letter that one of the Cherokees who had come to him upon a rumour of war was told that he need fear nothing, but might speak freely ; to which he replied, " I always speak freely ; what should I fear? I am now among my friends, and I never feared even among my enemies." Oglethorpe ex aggerated the virtue and capacity of the Indians ; but the mistake was characteristic of the generous nature of the man ; and it was at any rato far better than the opposite error of an ignorant or jealous depreciation, the natural fruit of which is seen in tyranny, injustice, and bloodshed. 1734.] MORAVIANS IN GEORGIA. 495 CHAPTER LVI. Arrival of Moravian Emigrants in Georgia Founding of the Town of Ebeuezcr Energy and Benevolence of Oglethorpe Defective Laws of the Colony The Question of Slavery Colony of Highlanders established on the Alatamaha Religious Kevival in England John and Charles Wesley Return of Oglethorpe to Georgia, after his Visit to England, in Company with the Wesleys Incidents of the Voyage John Wesley and the Moravians Wesley s Contentious Habits in Georgia The Occasion of his sudden Departure for England Temporary Estrangement of Oglethorpe from the Wesleys Military Measures taken by Oglethorpe, and Enlargement of the Boundaries of Georgia Interview of a Spanish Messenger with Oglethorpe Threatenings of War Preparations for Encountering a Spanish Invasion Second Visit of Oglethorpe to England Dissensions and Discontent in the Province State of Opinion in England Return of Oglethorpe to Georgia with a Regiment of Six Hundred Men Conference with the Indians, and Final Arrangements for Defence. PREVIOUS to Oglethorpe s starting for England, in April, 1734, the Moravian emigrants had arrived in Georgia. They left their German home on the "31st of October, 1733, conveying their few chattels in one wagon, and their wives and children in another. Making their way by slow stages to Frankfort, they passed down the Maine, the Rhine, and the Maas, to Rotterdam. From Rotterdam they sailed to Dover, where several of the Georgian trustees visited them, and provided for their wants; but their stay in that town was not prolonged. In January, 1734, they quitted England for America, and on arriving at Charleston were received by Oglethorpe, who conducted them to the infant settlement of Savannah. But it was determined that they should form a distinct colony apart from that of the English ; and Oglethorpe, having furnished them with horses, placed himself at their head, and, with the aid of Indian guides, conducted them across morasses and swollen streams, which it was necessary to bridge with the trunks of fallen trees, to a spot which appeared fit for the contemplated purpose. A little stream crept through the shadowy silence of the forest, and a clear space of ground offered itself for the erection of huts. Since the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers on the rock of Plymouth, no colonists in America had sat themselves down in a wilder and less hopeful locality. But while, in the earlier settlement, the English Puritans had the great highway of the world, the ocean, at their feet, and were placed under a climate which was healthy in its very rigour as soon as fitting shelter could be procured, the Moravians in Georgia found themselves in a Avoody and watery solitude, removed from the sea, and surrounded by climatic influences unfavourable to any human beings, and especially to those of European origin. Neverthe less, the poor wanderers were glad to reach a place of rest, where they could hope to turn their labour to account; They called the little stream, and the town that was to arise on its banks, Ebenezer a name importing that the Lord had helped them thus far. In imitation of Samuel after his dis comfiture of the Philistines,* they raised a column of stone in gratitude to God for having brought them in safety to that distant land. - . -,*-d The absence of Oglethorpe in England was felt by his colonists in Georgia. His activity, benevo lence, and spirit were of the highest service to the struggling settlement, and he kept all in heart by his own energy and determination. Johnson, the Governor of South Carolina, said he was certain to succeed, because he nobly devoted all his powers to serve the poor, and rescue them from their misery. The Moravian pastor at Ebenezer testified that he bore a great love to the servants and children of God, and that others coxild not in many years have accomplished what he had brought about in one. His absence was rendered all the more unfortunate by the total want of self-governing powers among the colonists. The laws which the trustees had imposed on the emigrants were not in all ways the best-fitted for a new community in a new land. They had in them too much of the mediaeval spirit of feudalism, and in some matters interfered too strictly with personal freedom. The trustees could not get rid of their old English notion that colonies should be governed in a parental way by arbitrary edicts. In one respect, the very excellence of the laws was against them. Slavery was prohibited in Georgia, and the people in a little while began to desire its introduction. Oglethorpe said that slavery was opposed, not only to the fundamental law of England, but to the Gospel; and the trustees refused to pass any law permitting so great a crime. Besides, it was intended to make Georgia a place of refuge for the distressed, and slaves ruin the free labourer by a disastrous com petition. But the better class of emigrants that is to say, those the least accustomed to hard work asked for the assistance of servile hands in little more than two years from the beginning of the colony. * I. Samuel vii. 12. 40G CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1734. One of the worst provisions of the trustees, in the exercise of their legislative powers, was that which enacted that grants of land should be made only in tail male ; in other words, that women should be rendered incapable of succeeding to landed property. By virtue of this ordinance, the estate of any deceased proprietor dying without sons was to revert as a lapsed fief to the trustees, in order to be again granted to another colonist ; but compensation was to be given to the unmarried daughters of those proprietors who had improved their lands. The widows also were entitled during their lives to the mansion house (a rather delusive term in a young colony of wooden hovels), and to one-half of the land improved by their husbands. This regulation was introduced in order to hinder the accumulation of many estates in the hands of one person a result which might have been better effected by the equal division of landed pro perty among all the childi en of a proprietor ; but, whatever the motive, the practice was felt to be a .great hardship by those who had only female chil dren, and it had the effect, in time, of driving many colonists out of Georgia into other provinces. To several it was a cause of complaint that they could only hold their lands as a military fief, for which they were bound, whenever called on, to appear in arms and take the field ; but this seems to have been necessary to secure one of the chief objects for which the colony was established ihat is, the defence of the southern frontiers igainst the Spaniards and their Indian allies. Other enactments were to the effect that every inhabitant must have a licence before he could quit the pro vince ; that a licence was necessary for trade with the Indians ; that there was to be no trade with the West Indies ; and that rum was not to be imported into the colony. The regulation of com merce with the Indians may have been justifiable as a means of preventing those instances of rapacity and unfair dealing which had so frequently led to bloody reprisals ; but the other restrictions were unwise. The prohibition of trade with the West Indies was in order to enforce the exclusion ot rum, and rum was excluded in the hoj)e of enforc ing temperance. The hot, humid, and depressing climate of Georgia, however, rendered some iise of ardent spirits a necessity to men who had to toil at exhausting labours in steaming swamps, or in the heavy air of semi-tropical vegetation. As might have been expected, the prohibition could not be maintained, and smuggling was carried on with success, as the only means of evading an irksome though well-meant law. The people of South Carolina were so struck with the impolitic nature of these restrictions, that they reckoned on the willingness of many of the Georgian settlers to escape their operation, and accordingly invited them to cross the borders into the older settlement. Some accepted the invita tion ; others remained, but in a mood of discontent which took away from their capacity of hearty work. They complained in particular of the denial to them of negro slaves, alleging that men of Eng lish birth were unable in such a climate to hew down the immense forests by which the ground was covered, and to perform the other operations necessary to the growth of crops. A few years before, an Act had been passed by the English Parliament for encouraging the trade of Carolina, by permitting the merchants and planters of that province to export rice directly to any part of Europe southward of Cape Finisterre. The cul ture of rice is especially trying to European consti tutions, and therefore likely in a particular degree to encourage a . resort to slave-labour. It had had that effect in the Carolinas ; yet the trustees of Georgia, while forbidding slavery in their domain, applied for and obtained an extension of the Act to the province newly settled. The colony was in truth not very wisely ruled, excepting in the personal superintendence of Oglethorpe ; and want of political wisdom in the governors was met by deficient energy in the governed. The listless habits engendered by long imprisonment for debt did not readily yield, as had been hoped, to the stimulus of a new colony. The emigrants were ill-fitted to the task they had undertaken, and, in the absence of Oglethorpe s directing genius, the experiment lan guished. The best settlers were the Moravians, of whom an additional number went over in 1735. All of these religious enthusiasts made it a stipula tion with the trustees that they were not to be employed in war, and that they should be exempted from military service. While in England, Oglethorpe lost no oppor tunity of advancing the interests of his colony. Parliament voted more money for carrying out the project, and new emigrants were despatched to the banks of the Savannah. Among these were some from Scotland. It had been thought advisable to commit the defence of the settlement to a bold and hardy race of men ; and as there was a fashion in those days, of considering that bold and hardy men were only to be found in the Highlands (though Dr. Johnson once observed that a number of boys chosen at random out of the streets of London would cuff an equal number of Highland boys), a hundred and fifty Gaelic peasants were despatched to Georgia, to flourish their claymores, 17;H.J JOHN WESLEY. 197 if need were, in tha face of all comers. To these .adventurers was assigned a tract of land on the Alatamaha, the boundary, as England contended, between her territories and those of Spain. Here they built a town, to which they gave the name of New Inverness, and a fort, which, in memory of the unsuccessful attempt at colonisation made several years before by Paterson and his country men, they called Darien. They were followed by other Scotch settlers, who formed a little clan apart from the English and German emigrants, pre served their national manners, and rejoiced in their national dress, which, probably from a certain affinity to their own, moved a profound admiration in the minds of the savages. After the return of Oglethorpe to Georgia, he visited these Scotchmen at Darien ; and, perhaps because his mother was connected with the house of Argyll, appeared before them in kilt and bonnet. Among the acquaintances made by Oglethorpe in England was one of the most remarkable men of that era. From age to age, society is agitated by what are called religious revivals, when a sudden and passionate impulse is given to the devotional sentiment- a sentiment that is prone, when not specially stimulated, to fall into routine ways, and decent languors of acquiescence. Action and re action are the great rules of human progress, if that can be called progress which so often consists in undoing what has been done during the last iifty years, and doing over again what had been accomplished in the iifty years before. In the early part of George II. s reign, there had been 110 great religious revival in England since the days of the Commonwealth. The country seems to have been exhausted by the fanaticism which had found its vent in such a Babel of sects, such a wrangle of creeds, such a riot and hubbub of contentious, em bittered, and sometimes insane voices. With the return of Charles II., the swing of the pendulum inclined to repose, and long continuance of repose begot a species of indifference. The Church of England required little else than that people should pay their tithes, and acknowledge, or at least not openly dispute, her supremacy. Even the Dis senters were a much more quiet set of preachers than the sectaries of an earlier time. As Defoe to Banyan, so were the Nonconformists of the post- Ilestoration period to the Puritans of the days when New England was founded, and when Presby terian divines held session at Westminster. The High Church movement of the reign of Anne, when Sacheverell was the idol of mobs and Tories, was political, not religious. It scarcely even affected to touch any of the great feelings which lie at the heart of belief. The age was one in which people were not enthusiastic about any tiling. Compromise and expediency ruled the political world ; wit, cor rectness, and sense, were the three deities of litera ture. Even poetry, the most emotional of the arts next to music, partook of the general frigidity and restraint. Since the last organ-notes of Milton, there had been hardly a line in English verse which could be said to throb with the passion of beauty, of grandeur, of terror, or of love. Society shrank from all vehement manifestations of power ; and this fastidiousness was to the full as observable in religion as in anything else. A set of writers had arisen, who, under the name of Deists, sought to give to religion the character of philosophy. The teachings of Hobbes of Malmesbury had had a great effect of this nature ; and the writings of men like Blount, Toland, Collins, Tindal, Chubb, Lord Bolingbroke, and the third Lord Shaftesbury, showed how deep an influence such opinions had exercised over the intellectual world. Even so de cided a Christian as Locke based his faith on reason rather than 011 ecstasy. When a student at Oxford, he commended the ancient religion of Pagan Rome for its avoidance of multifarious and perplexing tenets, its simplicity, rationality, and toleration.* Later in life, he defended the freedom of the intel lect with a boldness which was displeasing to the bigots of all schools ; and, at the very same epoch, the Latitudinarian clergy, led by Cudworth, Which- cote, Henry More, Tillotson, and others, and pre ceded by Chillingworth, were weakening the force of dogma by the infusion of charity. That the religious bodies generally felt these influences in. some degree, can hardly be questioned. It woi /ld almost seem as if they had endeavoured to disarm opposition by conceding something, both in spirit and manner, to the ideas and methods of the ad versary. In the midst of so profound a calm, the voices of John Wesley and of his younger brother, Charles, were heard speaking with a startling earnestness. These young men had been fellow-students at Christchurch, Oxford, where they were members of a small body of enthusiasts known to the less devout as the Holy Club, the Godly Club, the Bible Moths, the Bible Bigots, the Sacranientarians, and the Methodists. The persons so called communi cated once and fasted twice a week. They visited the prisons and the sick, gave largely in charity, and devoted much of their time to prayer, medita tion, and self-examining. One of the members of * Mr. H. K. Fox Bourue has brought to light an essay on this subject written by Locke about the year 16CO, while studying at Christchurch, Oxford. 498 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [173-3, this body is said to liave shortened his life by the severity of his mortifications ; and with all of them religion was as much a disease as a conviction. The T\VO Wesleys came of a family which had long been connected with the Church, and they resolved to give their own lives to the ministry. Both were in holy orders when Oglethorpe, during his stay in England, made their acquaintance. Though very much a man of the world and of society, and not entirely free from faults of disposition and temper, Oglethorpe was charmed with the character of the Wesleys. Speaking on behalf of the Georgian trustees, he begged of them to accept ecclesiastical appointments in the new American colony. To this proposal they assented ; and Dr. Burton, a clergyman much older than themselves, and better acquainted with the complexities of human character, urged them to observe some moderation in their zeal, and not to risk the oppor tunity of doing good by unnecessarily opposing themselves to the habits of the society they found. He might have spared himself his trouble. The brothers Wesley were not the men to mitigate their zeal in the hope of effecting a compromise. They were for lashing what they regarded as the criminal lethargy of the age into a delirium of spiritual ex citement ; and there can be no doubt that they left- England with the full intention of creating in Georgia a great religious revival, such as might react on the country that had sent them forth. They set sail in October, 1735, together with Oglethorpe arid about three hundred passengers, amongst whom were a hundred and seventy German Moravians. The vessel also carried a large quan tity of military stores, and wisely, as the event afterwards proved, for the Spaniards were not inclined to give up Georgia without a struggle. The voyage of the emigrants was long and tedious? and afforded the Wesleys a favourable opportunity of impressing their religious ideas on the uncon verted. John Wesley kept a Journal throughout his long life, and, writing of this voyage, he says : " Our common way of living was this. From four of the morning till five, each of us used private prayer. From five to seven, we read the Bible together, carefully comparing it (that we might not lean to our own understandings) with the writings of the earliest ages. At seven we breakfasted. At eight were the public prayers. From nine to twelve, I usually learned German, and M. Delamotte Greek. My brother writ sermons, and Mr. Ingham in structed the children. At twelve we met to give an account to one another of what we had done since our last meeting, and what we designed to do before our next. About one we dined. The time from dinner to four, we spent in reading to those of whom each of us had taken charge, or in speaking; to them severally, as need required. At four were the evening prayers ; when either the second lesson was explained, or the children were catechised and instructed before the congregation. From five to six, we again used private prayer. From six to seven, I read in our cabin to two or three of the English passengers, and each of my brethren to a few more in theirs. At seven I joined with the Germans in their public service ; while Mr. Iiigham was reading between the decks to as many as desired to hear. At eight we met again to exhort and instruct one another. Between nine and ten we went to bed, where neither the roaring of the sea, nor the motion of the ship, could take away the refreshing sleep which God gave us." A terrible storm took place while they were at sea, and Wesley was humiliated to find that ho shrank from death, and that in this respect he was far below the Moravians. " I had long before," he writes in his Journal, "observed the great serious ness of their behaviour. Of their humility they had given a continual proof, by performing those servile offices for the other passengers which none of the English would undertake ; for which they desired and would receive no pay, saying, It was good for their proud hearts, and their Saviour had done more for them. And every day had given them occasion of showing a meekness which no injury could move. If they were pushed, struck, or thrown down, they rose again and went away ; but 110 complaint was found in their mouth. There was now an opportunity of trying whether they were delivered from the spirit of fear, as well as from that of pride, anger, and revenge. In the midst of the psalm wherewith their service began, the sea broke over us, split the mainsail in pieces, covered the ship, and poured in between the decks, as if the great deep had already swallowed us up. A terrible screaming began among the English. The Germans calmly sung on. I asked one of them afterwards, Was you not afraid 1 He answered, I thank God, no. I asked, But were not your women and children afraid 1 He replied mildly, No ; our women and children arc not afraid to die. " One may see in these extracts the determination of Wesley to subordinate the whole life to religion ; although at that time he had not, according to his own subsequent opinion, attained to true ideas of Christianity had not passed through that "new birth" which, in the phraseology of Methodism, is necessary to the state of grace. His influence in Georgia was not, on the whole, very happy. u v-_. v\--v >-- VISIT OV OCr.KTKORPl? TO THE HIOIII..VXI) COLONY. 500 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1736. He did not possess the art of conciliation ; or rather he scorned and repudiated all such arts, as a renunciation of principle, and a concession to the devil. His enthusiasm and industry effected some lonversions, but his intellectural arrogance, im petuous temper, and harsh rigidity of morals, offended many who might perhaps have been won by a softer method. "Wesley was a man of great earnestness and sincerity, with many noble qualities of mind and soul ; but he had the faults of fanaticism. The advice of Dr. Burton, who, as President of Christ Church, Oxford, was well acquainted with the nature of the two brothers, would have saved a great deal of painful dissension had it been followed. It was contained in a letter to John Wesley a lettter characterised by excellent sense and feeling, to which the position of the writer, as one of the trastees for Georgia, should have given additional weight. "You will keep in view," said Dr. Burton, "the pattern of the Gospel preacher, St. Paul, who became all things to all men, that he might save some. Here is a nice trial of Christian prudence. Accordingly, in every case you will distinguish between what is indispensable and what is variable; between what is divine, and what is of human authority. I mention this because men are apt to deceive themselves in such cases ; and we see the tradition^ and ordinances of men freqiieiitly insisted on with more rigour than the commandments of God, to which they are subordinate. Singularities of less importance are often espoused with more zeal than the weighty matters of God s law. As in all points we love ourselves, so, especially, in our hypotheses. Where a man has, as it were, a property in a notion, he is most industrious to im prove it, and that in proportion to the labour of thought he has bestowed upon it ; and, as its value rises in imagination, he is, in proportion, unwilling to give it up, and dwells upon it more pertinaciously than upon considerations of general necessity and use. This is a flattering mistake, against which we should guard ourselves."* It is much to be regretted that these suggestions were not more taken to heart. The Wesleys, how ever, were bent on having their own way, and the elder brother, in particular, made himself disliked by his intemperate zeal. He got into vehement personal disputes with several of the colonists, and attracted to himself a number of hypocritical con verts, who soon contrived to make a world of mis chief. Though afterwards instrumental in founding a great nonconforming sect, the Wesleys were * Memoir of General James Oglethorpe, by Robert Wright (1867), Appendix. clergymen of the Church of England, and John was at this period disposed to assert the claims of that Church with much haughtiness. His father, it is worthy of note, had been so high a churchman that he composed the speech delivered by Sacheverell before the House of Lords. Sacheverell, on the other hand, was the grandson of a Puritan minister. At a later period of life, John Wesley would pro bably have acted with more discretion ; but he was never much disposed to compromise. In the days of his youth, he seems to have regarded himself as a kind of spiritual knight-errant. He rebuked his people in the sharpest way for their sins, real or supposed. He set one against another by his in furiate innuendoes ; all Savannah was in a flame of anger, jealousy, and recrimination. Added to this, the doctrines he preached were so strange and mystical that no one could understand what he meant. Not long afterwards he discovered that, although he had gone out to America to convert others, he was not himself converted. He certainly had not been converted to the practice of Paul by the exhortations of Dr. Burton. The fruit of his error was seen in the multiplication of disputes and quarrels, in which he and others were concerned ; and at length he found it advisable to quit the plantation. His stay in Georgia extended over nearly two years from the early part of 1736 to December, 1737, when, as he says, he shook the dust of the colony off his feet, and returned to England. His brother Charles, who acted as Oglethorpe s secre tary, had left nearly a year before, with despatches for London ; gladly abandoning a land the hardships of which he was not fitted to endure, and where the solitude depressed him with the yearnings of home-sickness. Neither brother did anything to wards converting the Indians, as the agitated con dition of the colony rendered such an enterprise very difliciilt. The character of the English settlers, also, was a poor inducement to the red men to follow the religion they professed ; and Tomo-chichi, when solicited on the subject, spoke very pungently in that sense. The influence of the Wesleys oil Georgia was slight, and for the most part vexatious. Before the departure of John Wesley, Oglethorpe, while giving him a general support, had endea voured, though in vain, to mitigate the acrimony of his zeal, and to warn him against the danger of being misled by hypocritical pretenders to sanctity. Unfortunately, Oglethorpe shortly afterwards put himself in a position not the best fitted for an adviser, however excellent the advice itself. Among the emigrants were two women whom miscon duct had driven out of England, but who now professed great penitence and religious fervour. 1736.] OGLETHORPE S SURVEY OF GEORGIA. 501 Wesley was entirely persuaded of tlie sincerity of their conversion : Ogletliorpe doubted it, ajid wai ned his clerical friend that he would have cause to re pent his credulity. Strange to say, if we may rely on the statements of Charles Wesley, Oglethorpe himself, not long after, fell completely under the sway of one of these women, who persuaded him that the Wesleys were libelling his character, conspiring against his power, fomenting mutiny and rebellion among the colonists, and intriguing with the Spaniards. Under the influence of these delusions, he treated the Wesleys with harshness and violence ; but the fever of injustice was of short duration. A serious illness, which endan gered his life, brought him to a more fitting con dition of mind, and, making his peace with the Wesleys, he continued through life a devoted and affectionate friend.* With the colonists generally, Oglethorpe got on not much better than with the clerical brothers. He attempted to rule despotic ally, and provoked a degree of opposition which he could not control. The planters were often at issue with the Governor, and were not always in the wrong as regards their view of affairs. Yet the founder of Georgia made himself popular in some quarters. We have seen that he flattered the Highlanders ; he also took care to visit the Moravians at Ebenezer, and to praise their hus bandry, which seems to have been excellent. These quiet and industrious Germans gave themselves largely to the culture of raw silk, of which, in a few years time, they exported ten thousand pounds annually. Indigo was also grown by them ; and whatever they did was done by their own free hands. Negro slaveiy they consistently opposed, and always contended that the white man was able to toil even in the exhausting heat of that portion of America. The visit of Oglethorpe to this settle ment was in the year 1736. One of his objects in the general survey which he at that time undertook, was to adopt measures for the defence of the colony against a contemplated attack by the Spaniards. After quitting the Moravian towns, he turned southward, passing in a scout-boat through narrow inland channels between the sea-islands and the continent, where the brilliant green of the salt tide was overhung by drooping woods of pine, cedar, and evergreen oak. On St. Simon s Island he cleared a site for the future city of Frederica, by setting fire to the long grass of a deserted field. A fort was then constructed on the centre of a bluff " The circumstances attending this painful rupture are related by Mr. Robert "Wright, in his "Memoir of General James Oglethorpe " (1867), with some fulness. There appears to have been a great deal of misapprehension on both sides. commanding the principal mouth of the Alatamaha. It consisted of four bastions, and was built of a substance called tabby, formed by mixing water and lime with shells or gravel. This, when dry, makes a hard rocky mass, and the ruins of Frederica fort may still be seen, or at least were in existence not many years ago. The work served to protect not only the entrance to the river, but the newly-formed town, the streets of which, consisting of rows of huts, covered by the smooth and shining leaves of the palmetto, and backed by the heavy umbrage of ancient forests, soon rose along the western side of the small island. Leaving this spot, Ogle thorpe proceeded still farther south, accompanied by some of the Highlanders from Darien, and, on the island now called Cumberland, near the mouth of the St. Mary s, marked out a fort which was to receive the designation of St. Andrew s. Again proceeding on his way, Oglethorpe claimed the St. John s river as the southern boundary of the Eng lish possessions. This was including much more than the Georgian charter had asserted ; for the St. John s is far south of the Alatamaha, and is com prised in what is still regarded as Florida. At the mouth of this river the Governor erected another fort, called Fort St. George ; but it was subse quently abandoned, and the river St. Mary s be came the southern limit of Georgia. The more extreme claim was based by Oglethorpe on the fact that the territory in question was in possession of Indian subjects of England at the time of the Treaty of Utrecht ; but Spain of course did not admit such an argument as of any worth. Her representatives in Florida prepared to resist the pretensions of the English Governor of Georgia. Oglethorpe s messengers to St. Augustine, by whom a statement of the English claims was conveyed, were detained as prisoners. It was evident that a collision between the two races was close at hand. In the latter part of 1736, Oglethorpe received a message from the Governor of St. Augustine (the garrison of which had been largely reinforced), in forming him that a Spanish commissioner had arrived from Havannah, charged with a communica tion which he desired to deliver personally to the Governor of Georgia. Oglethorpe gave him an interview, and the question of boundaries was dis cussed, but without effect. The Spaniard peremp torily demanded that the English should evacuate the entire country south of St. Helena s Sound that is to say, the whole of Georgia, and a small portion of South Carolina ; failing which, the King of Spain would at once take measures for the vin dication of his rights. So excessive a demand was immediately rejected, and the envoy departed with 502 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1739. renewed menaces. The situation was rendered more serious by the fact that a war had broken out in Europe between France and the German Empire, and that, as Great Britain was expected to take the side of the latter, the Governors of Canada and Louisiana had received orders to invade the least defensible frontiers of the English possessions in America. Had events in Europe followed the anticipated course, it is probable that the French would have joined the Spaniards in attacking Georgia ; but peace was fortunately restored before the mischief could be effected, and Oglethorpe had only to guard his colony against an inroad from the south. Still, the danger was considerable, as the defensive force of the province was but slight. The home Government had recently granted an addi tional sum of 10,000, to defray the expenses of the forts which Oglethorpe had built at Augusta, Darieii, Frederica, and the two southern rivers, and to maintain garrisons in them ; but of thoroughly trained soldiers the colony had none, and not much material out of which they could be fashioned. The Governor had been promised succours from England, but they had not yet arrived ; and his chief dependence for the time was on the Indian tribes who had vowed friendship two or three years before, and who now renewed their expressions of devotion by appealing in war-paint at the English settle ments, and dancing the war-dance. Conceiving that it was absolutely necessary to rouse the King s Ministers to more energetic exertions, Oglethorpe left Georgia for England on the 23rd of November, 1736. Dissensions and discontent marked the period of his absence. A rupture nearly occurred between Georgia and South Carolina in 1737, owing to the magistrates of Savannah seizing and imprisoning certain Carolinian traders who were smuggling rum up the river to Augusta ; but the matter was settled by a compromise. The grievances of an oppressive land tenure, and of the prohibition of slavery, still rankled in the minds of the English settlers ; and emigration to South Carolina went on to a serious extent. The freeholders of Savannah and its vicinity drew up a remonstrance to the Georgian trustees, in which they argued that they could never successfully cultivate their estates unless they Avere placed on a footing of equality with the Caro- linas. They therefore solicited, with much urgency, a free title of absolute property to their lands, and permission to import negroes. At the very time when the people of Savannah were making these representations, the other colonists were giving practical evidence that the alleged necessity was not real. The successful industry of the Moravians moved John Wesley to an expression of delighted astonishment. These religious brethren had by 1737 established a school and mission among the Creek Indians, had repaid to the Georgian trustees the money advanced to enable them to emigrate, and had even assisted others less fortunate or less careful than themselves. The Scotch at Darien also made progress without the aid of servile labour, and even protested against its introduction as at once a wickedness and a danger. But the indolent and shiftless settlers whom Oglethorpe had selected from among the London prisoners for debt, wanted to lead the lives of territorial lords on the compul sory toil of miserable bondsmen. Oglethorpe did not make very rapid progress with his affairs in England. The national feeling- was strongly aroused by the pretensions of Spain, and by the frequent seizures of English vessels trading between the West Indies and Spanish America, on the plea that they were engaged in smuggling contraband articles. But Sir Robert Walpole was eminently a peace Minister. He disliked the expense of war, and perhaps also its bloodshed and cruelty, for he was a good-natured, thoiigh a profligate, man. Nevertheless, Ogle thorpe received a commission as Brigadier-General, and was appointed to a command extending over South Carolina as well as Georgia. He himself raised and disciplined a regiment of six hundred men, to each of whom the Georgian trustees assigned twenty-five acres of land as the price of seven years service. Parliament voted an additional sum of 20,000; and in 1738 Ogle thorpe returned to his province. He was welcomed at Savannah by salutes and bonfires ; but when it was found that he brought with him no con cessions as regarded either the tenure of land or the importation of negroes, and that, with respect to the latter in particular, he declared that he would leave the colony if slaves were introduced into it, his popularity in some degree declined. By the native tribes, however, he was regarded with the utmost enthusiasm. He had by this time acquired some knowledge of the Indian language, and the red men appealed to him, as to a father, whenever they needed counsel. The Chickasaws and the Creeks, about a couple of years before, had repelled an attack of the French with great valour and signal success. This had greatly increased their self-confidence, and they were pre pared to give Oglethorpe the utmost assistance in their power in any struggle with Spain. In the summer of 1739, the English Governor attended the war-council of the Muscogees at Cusitas on the Chattahouchee. and, advancing into the largo 173 J.J DEMAND FOR WAR WITH SPAIN. 503 square of the council-place, distributed presents, talked with the warriors in friendly language, drank with them, and smoked with them. The result of the interview was an agreement that the ancient friendship of the tribes for the English should be continued ; that the lands from the St. John s to the Savannah, and between, the sea and the mountains, should be considered as belonging of ancient right to the Muscogees ; that the cession to the English of the lands on the Savannah as far as the Ogeechee, and along the coast to the St. John s as far into the interior as the tide flowed, should be renewed, with a few reservations ; and that the entrance to the rest of the domain should be barred for ever against the Spaniards.* During the absence of Oglethorpe, the officials at St. Augustine had made several attempts to corrupt the Creeks, but without effect. The tribes were personally attached to Oglethorpe, and the kindness with which he treated them confirmed their amity. It was now certain that they could be relied on as a faithful and an efficient force against the enemy. The colony was provided with several forts, of not contemptible strength ; six hundred effective soldiers were at the General s command ; and Oglethorpe felt that he was in a position, to encounter the Spaniards with a fail- probability of success. CHAPTER LVII. Pamand in England for War with Spain Mutual Complaints of Spain and England Convention with the Spanish Government Dissatisfaction of the English People with the Convention Declaration of War against Spain Measures taken, by Ogle thorpe in Georgia His Expedition into Florida Blockade of St. Augustine Ineffectual Bombardment, and Abandonment of the Attempt Dissension between Oglethorpe and the Carolinians Unfortunate Character of the War generally Measures of the English Government South Carolina and her Slaves Cruelties practised on the Negroes Invasion of Georgia by the Spaniards Oglethorpe at Frcderica Defeat of the Enemy at Bloody Marsh Attempted Attack on the Spaniards defeated by Treachery Oglethorpe s Stratagem Eetreat of the Invaders Return of Oglethorpe to England Changes in the Constitution of Georgia Progress of that Province and of South Carolina Manners and Habits of the Georgians. WHILE Oglethorpe was making his preparations in Georgia for repelling the contemplated attack of the Spaniards, the question of peace or war with Spain was being fiercely agitated in England. Sir Robert Walpole had the iitmost difficulty to withstand the attacks of the war-party, headed by Pulteney, for the country was in a fury of excitement on the alleged outrages of the Spaniards on English merchant-ships and English sailors. It is unques tionable that the King of Spain had, by his repre sentatives in the New World, committed some very high-handed acts of search and confiscation, and it is probable that, in several instances, entirely inno cent persons had been made to suffer. But it is equally clear that a great many English merchants had for years been largely engaged in illicit traffic with the Spanish colonies. An immense contraband trade had arisen, and was assiduously carried on by slave-ships and coasting vessels, under every pre text which ingenuity could suggest. The colonial commerce of Spain was nearly ruined, and it is not surprising that the Spanish monarch, after complaints which met with no response, should have directed his officers to take measures of protection said redress. Yet when, in the execution of these orders, the naval commanders of Spain proceeded to board and search every English vessel entering the Gulf of Mexico, and to seize and appropriate several ships the cargoes and destinations of which were per fectly regular, it is easy to understand that the anger of the English nation was roused to an almost uncon trollable height. It is said that many English sailors were forced to work as slaves in the mines of Potosi, and that ships were searched even when sailing to and from British plantations. Yet the Government did nothing but make feeble repre sentations, which received only evasive replies. Pope satirised the timidity or want of patriotism of the Ministry, and Johnson, then a young man, exclaimed in indignant verses that English honour had grown a standing jest, and asked whether there was " no peaceful desert, yet unclaimed by Spain," to which the poor and the oppressed could have recourse, t The popular feeling was at this time much inflamed by a story told at the bfir of the House of Commons by a certain Captain Robert Jenkyns, who alleged that, on his vessel being * Bancroft. t London, a Poem in imitation of the Third Satire of Juvenal ; written in 1738. 504 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1739. searched, the Spaniards had cut off one of his ears. He was asked by a member of the House what were his feelings when in the hands of such bar barians. He replied, " I commended my soul to God, and my cause to my country." The story, the exhibition of the mutilated ear, and the terse solved, if it could possibly be effected,, to baffle the national desire for war. The case was eminently one for compromise, since neither side was entirely in the right. In the first instance, certain Englishmen had committed a series of wrongful acts, of which Spain was the EMIGRANTS IN GEORGIA. little epigrammatic sentence, were worth an army of votes to the leaders of the Parliamentary Oppo sition. "We have no need of allies," said Pulteney, " to enable us to command justice : the story of Jenkyns will raise volunteers." On the other hand, the Ministerialists insinuated that Jenkyns was no better than a pirate and a vagabond, and had pro bably on some occasion lost his ear in the pillory. Walpole, however, found he could no longer resist the popular feeling altogether, though he still re- victim ; and then Spain had protected herself by measures which were beyond all reason and justice, and to which no nation of spirit could submit. Negotiations were accordingly opened with the court of Madrid, and on the 14th of January, 1739, a convention was signed by the two nations, by which the King of Spain, while demanding of the South Sea Company 68,000 due to him for his share of their profits, agreed to pay, as an in demnity to British merchants for losses sustained by 1739.] WAR WITH SPAIN. 505 unwarranted seizures, .95,000. As regards the question of boundaries, it was provided that the actual possessions of each nation were to remain without change until commissioners could make a final settlement. But Spain gave not the slightest intimation of a willingness to withdraw her ex treme territorial claims, and Y/alpole so far con ceded them as to engage that the fortifications in Geonria and Carolina should be arrested until the O commissioners had come to their decision. Nor did contempt and ridicule ; caricatures represented the well-known figure of Walpole doing all kinds of disgraceful acts; and ballads and pamphlets out of number contributed still further to bring the existing Government into odium. The Georgian trustees, together with the merchants of London, Liverpool, and Bristol, addressed the House of Commons against the convention ; and the former presented a petition for assistance to the King, who commanded his Ministers to take effectual measures A I LAXTEll s liOVSE IN GEORGIA. the Spanish sovereign renounce his right to board and search English merchant-vessels. The conven tion was therefore held by the English nation to be one-sided and unsatisfactory, and the cry for svar rose louder than ever. The Opposition in Par liament made furious assaults on the unpopular Minister, and the first William Pitt, afterwards Lord Chatham, delivered some of his early speeches in antagonism to the powerful Whig Premier. For a time, Walpole continued to hold his own ; but the national sentiment could not be suppressed for ever. A periodical paper called the Craftsman, to which Bolingbroke and Pulteney frequently contributed, covered the Ministry with 43 for the security of the province. Spain, as if duter- mined to provoke the English nation to the utmost, delayed the payment of the pecuniary indemnity she had undertaken to make ; and the demand for war now became so urgent that it could no longer be evaded even by the practised arts of the most dexterous Minister that ever held power in Eng land. War was declared on the 19th of October, 1739, and the announcement was hailed with shouts of delight all over the land. It does not concern our History to follow the general course of that war, the results of which, as regards the English operations in Spanish South America and the West Indies, were disastrous. But 506 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1740. the events in Georgia and Florida must l>e related in detail. Before hostilities commenced, Ogle- thorpe discovered that the Spaniards, after having vainly endeavoured to seduce his Indian allies, were making advances of a similar nature to the English soldiers he had brought out with him. Some of these men had formerly done duty on the rock of Gibraltar, where they had picked up a little Spanish; and they now listened to offers which compromised their allegiance. An attempt even was made on the General s life, but it happily failed. Oglethorpe tried the accused by court- martial, and caused the ringleaders to be shot ; and, having thus re-established discipline, proceeded to concert his plans for the future. But events did not move very rapidly. It was in 1738 that the attempt was made on his life ; it was not until the close of 1739 that, on receiving news of the declara tion of war with Spain, he began to put his plans in execution. He then once more extended the bounds of Georgia to the St. John s, in Florida, and recommended to the province of South Carolina a joint expedition against St. Augustine. He represented that the Spaniards would speedily send a large body of troops from Cuba to that settlement, and that therefore it would be prudent to make the attack at once. So eager, indeed, was lie to commence operations that, without waiting for the reply of South Carolina, he at once stai-ted at the head of his Georgian forces and Indian allies, and entered Florida in the early days of 1740. Dressed after the same fashion as the common soldiers, and undertaking as many irksome duties, he animated all by the cheerful activity of his example. He had receiA ed information that the Spanish garrison at St. Augustine was short of provisions, and he therefore made haste to invest Diego, a small fort, about five-and-twenty miles from the more important position. It surrendered after a very short resistance ; and Oglethorpe, leaving behind him a garrison of sixty men, advanced to Fort Moosa, within two miles of St. Augustine. On reaching that work, he found it had been evacuated : the garrison had fallen back on the neighbouring fortress, where the Spaniards were concentrating all their strength. Seeing the necessity of obtaining reinforcements, Oglethorpe departed for Charleston in March, to urge the South Carolinians to send a contingent. The Assembly passed a vote to that effect in April, and also made a grant of money ; and in May a body of North and South Carolinians and Virginians accompanied the General back to Florida. But the Spaniards had by that time given to the fortifications at St. Augustine so formidable a character that the English commander saw he had no chance of taking the place by storm. Ho accordingly resolved to blockade the enemy, with the assistance of some English ships of war, which were then lying at anchor off the bar. To the detachment which he left at Fort Moosa, and which consisted of ninety-five Highlanders and forty-two Indians, he gave orders that they were to scour the woods round the town, and intercept all supplies of provisions. Colonel Yanderdussen, at the head of a mixed regiment from the Carolinas and Virginia, was despatched to occupy Point Quarrel, a neck of land about a mile from the castle of St. Augustine, and to erect on it a battery. Oglethorpe himself, with his own regiment, and the main body of the Indians, crossed the water to the island of Anas- tatia, which lay opposite the castle; and from this position he resolved to bombard the town. Batteries were speedily erected, and the English ships were now so arranged as to block up the mouth of the harboiu*. St. Augustine was there fore invested both by land and sea; and a summons to surrender was sent to the commandant, Mon- teano, in the hope that he would be pleased to escape from his position. But he had received fresh supplies before the blockade was complete, and he simply answered that he would be glad to shake hands with Oglethorpe in the castle. Upon this, the English General opened his guns on the fortress, and threw shells into the town ; but, although the fire was returned by the enemy, and the artillery duel continued for some days, very little damage was done, owing to the distance from one another of the opposing batteries. Oglethorpe had miscalculated his resources, and his position was becoming critical. Montcano had observed the smallness of the force stationed at Fort Moosa under Colonel Palmer, and a sally directed against this detachment proved so successful that most of the Highlanders were slain. On this occasion, some of the Chickasaws caught a straggling Spaniard, killed him, and cut off his head, which they pre sented to Oglethorpe in his tent. The General expressed horror and disgust at the sight, denounced the Chickasaws as "barbarous dogs," and com manded them to quit his presence. The rebuke, well-merited as it was, would have been better suppressed under the circumstances of the time. The savages angrily retorted that they would have met with a very different reception from the French, had they carried to them the head of an English man ; and immediately afterwards the whole detachment of the tribe abandoned the expedition, and marched home. At a somewhat later date, large bodies of the Carolinian troops, unable to bear 1740.] OGLETHORPE S FAILURE. 507 up against the heat of the climate, the sickness which it induced, and the disappointment of repeated efforts leading to no favourable issues, left the spot, and returned to their own provinces. On the other hand, the Spanish garrison received a reinforcement of seven hundred men, and a further stock of provisions, conveyed to them in some small ships from Havannah, which had managed io run the blockade. The English naval com mander now represented to Oglethorpe that his vessels were not sufficiently victualled for a longer stay, and that, in any case, the approach of the season of hurricanes made it imperative on him to depart. There was no choice but to raise the siege. Diminished in numbers, weakened by sickness and fatigue, and disheartened by ill-success, the regi ments were of little worth. Oglethorpe himself was .suffering from a fever; and in utter dejection of spirit he retired in July to Frederica. The expedition may have been rashly under taken ; but its failure cannot be imputed to any remissness on the part of the commander. It has been recorded of him that he bore more fatismes o than any of his soldier;, and that, in spite of ill- health, he was always at the head of his men when there was any necessity for his presence. His benevolence was equal to his martial cpualities. He treated his prisoners kindly, repressed the cruelties of the savages, and issued strict orders that the fields, gardens, and houses about St. Augustine .should not be injured. The collapse of the enter- ] n-ise gave great annoyance to the Carolinians, who, forgetting that the desertion of their own men had contributed in 110 small degree to the result, taxed the General with want of skill and courage. Ogle thorpe, owing probably to a rather imperious and fiery temper, was never without enemies. A few years later, when he failed in some operations Mgainst the Second Pretender s forces in Scotland, .Did was tried by court-martial for neglect of duty (a charge of which he was honourably acquitted), Horace Wai pole said of him that " he was always u bully."* Yet no one who carefully follows his history can for a moment believe that he had any thing of the coward in his nature. He was bold even to rashness, and there can be no better proof of this than the expedition against St. Augustine. He retorted the charges of the Carolinians by hotly condemning the insubordination and pusillanimity < ! their soldiers, who had deserted his camp ; and in fruitless wranglings many months passed away. The war altogether was most unfortunate, and the American colonies bore their full share of the suffer- * Walpole to Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 14 tb, 1746. ing. Volunteers from several of the plantations had joined the fleet under Admiral Vernon, which, after an unavailing attack on Carthagena in 1741, resulting in a terrible loss of life from pestilence, made an equally fatal demonstration against Cuba in the same year. New England, which had fur nished the largest number of colonial troops and seamen, was thrown into almost universal mourning by the results of these calamitous enterprises ; and discontent was general over the whole Empire. As it was by this time evident that France would join Spain in her quarrel with England, a Bill was introduced into Parliament, the object of which was to prohibit the exportation of all kinds of provisions, especially rice, from any part of the British dominions to the dominions of the enemy. South Carolina protested, and with success, against that portion of the measure which had reference to rice. The prohibition of the export of that commodity, said the Carolinians, would be perfectly harmless to the enemy, while it would so cripple the trade of South Carolina that the planters there would be unable to pay their debts, and the local Government would be reduced to such difficulties for want of money as to be incapable of repelling any attack by the Spaniards and Indians. The same protest spoke of the planters own negroes as " yet more danger ous enemies" than their external foes. They were ready, it was added, to revolt on the first oppor tunity, and were eight times as many in number as the white men qualified for bearing arms. The danger had increased since the unfortunate ex pedition to St. Augustine, owing, probably, to the weakening of the colonial forces ; but it was very great even before that event. There had been a negro insurrection in South Carolina in 1738. The slaves in the province amounted at that time to forty thousand ; and the Spaniards, in view of the coming war, had sent emissaries amongst them, promising liberty and protection if they woidd desert the English. Several accepted the offer, and five hundred were settled in a colony near St. Augustine, where lands were granted them. The Governor of Florida even formed a regiment out of these African fugitives from South Carolina, and, clothing them in the same uniform as the regular troops of Spain, allowed them to elect their own officers. The perpetual incitements of the Spaniards, and the example of this success, led to a rising of the whole body of South Carolinian negroes. Having plundered a magazine, and possessed them selves of arms, they made an attack on the white population, several of whom were murdered. But their triumph was short-lived. They speedily gave way to intoxication, and, in the midst of a wild 503 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1742. revel, were routed by Governor Bull at the head of a strong force. Many were afterwards executed, and the immediate peril was thus suppressed ; but in slave-communities the danger of revolt is always latent. It was particularly menacing in South Carolina, owing to the shocking barbarity with which the negroes were treated. The worst forms of cruelty are natural to a state in which one class is vested with such absolute power over another. In some slave-holding coun tries, particular circumstances may keep the bru tality of the master in check : for instance, where slaves are not numerous, they will be the more valued, and therefore the better used. But the general tendency of this institution is to demoralise those who take advantage of it ; and in South Carolina the immense number of slaves, and the facility of obtaining them, lowered their value as property, and at. the same time exasperated the despotism of their owners by the fear of retribu tion. In that province, a man might kill his slave with something little short of impunity. He was simply fined seven pounds of the depreciated Cai*o- linian. currency, and only half that amount if he in formed against himself. Charles Wesley, who visited South Carolina on his return from Georgia in 1736, has recorded that it was a common thing to give a young slave to a child of its own age, to abuse and beat out of sport. One mode of punishment was to draw the teeth of these unhappy creatures ; but there were others much worse. A certain Colonel Lynch, to whom Charles Wesley alludes, and who was said to kill several of his slaves every year, once cut off the legs of a negro who had offended him. These cruelties were often so extravagant and so unprovoked as to suggest that the persons who committed them were more fitted for a lunatic asylum than for a prison. A frightful instance of the prolonged torture of a negres.-* at Charleston is related by Charles Wesley ; and it appears that the poor creature s only crime was overfilling a tea cup.* Such acts are indeed evidence of a certain kind of madness the dreadful madness of unre strained will and unmitigated power. Under such a condition it is not surprising that attempts to escape were numerous. The miserable fugitives skulked about in the woods, living on whatever they could find, and were generally, in the end, shot down like wild beasts. As negroes were held to be an inferior race, not fully human in their nature, they were denied all intellectual culture, and all moral and religious instruction; the real object, of course, being to keep them from a know- * Journal of Charles "\Veslev. ledge of their powers and their rights. To the dis grace of England, it must be said that slavery was always fostered by her Government until compara tively recent times. When the Assembly of South Carolina, several years before the War of Indepefc.- dence, passed a law forbidding the further importa tion of negroes, it was disallowed by the Governor, on the ground that it was contrary to the policy and injurious to the trade of Great Britain. A similar law was made after the colonies had achieved their freedom ; but the evils of slavery continued in force in South Carolina until the civil war of 18615. Indeed, it was to maintain that system that the whole of the southern States rose in rebel lion against the central Government. Two years of quiet succeeded to the abortive attack 011 St. Augustine. As long as Admiral Vernon s fleet remained in American waters, the Spaniards forbore from reprisals ; but, on the withdrawal of the English ships, they considered that the time had arrived for making an inroad into their enemy s possessions. In May, 1742, two thousand troops were embarked at Havannah, under the command of Don Antonio de Rodondo, and sent under a .strong convoy to St. Augustine. Oglethorpe, 011 coming to a knowledge of the fact, which he saw pointed to a speedy invasion of Georgia, sent for aid to South Carolina, but was refused, in consequence of the disagreement of two years before. Thus left to his own resources, ho made the most of them. He gathered about him, at his head-quarters in Frederica, a force consisting of his own regiment, a few provincial rangers, some Highlanders, and numerous Indians. With a party of soldiers in two boats, he fought his way through the Spanish fleet near the mouth of the St. Mary s, and reinforced the garrison at Fort Wil liam; but, though he delayed the advance of tho enemy, he could not altogether prevent it. About midsummer, the Spanish fleet, consisting of thirty- two vessels, and carrying upwards of three thousand men, under the command of Monteano, sailed past the batteries of Fort William, at the southern ex tremity of Cumberland Island, and of Fort Simon, on St. Simon s Island, where the invaders disem barked and erected a battery. Feeling his position at Fort Simon insecure, Oglethorpe spiked his guns, and retreated to Frederica. Here he was soon attacked by the enemy. The road to Frederica had a morass on one side, and a dense wood of oaks on the other ; it was therefore well adapted to defence. After one detachment of Spaniards had been driven back within a mile or two of the town, another moved forward ; and as they came to a place where the narrow avenue, bending with the edge of tho 1742.] THE SPANISH INVASION OF GEORGIA. .509 morass, formed a crescent,* a body of Highlanders suddenly started up in the wood, and poured down on the advancing column. The Spaniards wheeled half round, and sent several volleys into the ranks of their adversaries ; but the ardour of the Scotch men was not to be resisted, and after awhile the Spaniards broke and fled, with the loss of about two hundred men. The ground has ever since been known as the Bloody Marsh. Several pri soners were taken, and some of the Spaniards aid that the devil himself could not make his way to Frederica. Oglethorpe was loved and respected by his men, and not without reason. His courage, self-reliance, and ready invention were qualities which all could appreciate, and he made himself one with the whole army by sharing with the rank and file all the labours and hardships of the day. He now determined to take the offensive, and attack the enemy. It was a daring design, but he was in receipt of information which justified the attempt. An English prisoner who had escaped from the Spanish camp brought intelligence that a disagree ment had arisen between the forces from Havamiah and those from St. Augustine, and that it had proceeded to so great an extent as to cause a separation of their encampments. Acting imme diately on this information, Oglethorpe started in the night with three hundred regulars, the High land company, and a troop of provincial rangers, and made his way through the woods until he was within about a couple of miles of the Spanish position. He then halted his troops, and went forward himself with a small corps to reconnoitre ; but the whole design was frustrated by the treachery of a Frenchman, one of Oglethorpe s attendants, who discharged his musket to alarm the Spaniards, and, escaping in the darkness, reached the enemy s lines. A hasty retreat to Frederica was rendered necessary by this unfortunate circumstance ; but Oglethorpe, resolving not to be entirely baffled, hit on a very ingenious plan. In the assumed character of a friend, he wrote a letter to the Frenchman, addressing him as if he were a spy in the employ of the English. He instructed him to assure the Spaniards that Frederica was in a defenceless state, and that its garrison might be cut to pieces ; to urge them to an immediate attack, or, failing that, to detain them at least three days more in the situation they then occupied, as within that time the Georgian troops would be reinforced by two thousand auxiliaries, accompanied by six ships of war. Allusion was also made to an ap- * Bancroft. proaching attack on St. Augustine by Admiral Vernon ; and the deserter was promised an ample reward if he could prevent the escape of the Spaniards from Georgia. The letter, when finished, was given to a Spanish prisoner, who, for a small reward and the boon of his liberty, promised to carry it privately to the Frenchman, but who in fact delivered it to Mon- teano. This was exactly what Oglethorpe expected and desired. The Spanish commander at once put the Frenchman in irons as a detected spy, and any information he might really have given as to the state of affairs at Frederica became tainted by the suspicion of trickery. What to do as respected the enemy was far from clear, for it was impos sible to divine whether Oglethorpe s letter was to be regarded as a piece of genuine information, or a stratagem. By a singular coincidence, which proved a very fortunate one for the Georgians, three ships, despatched to Oglethorpe s aid by the Governor of South Carolina (who had at length opened his eyes to the fact that his own province would be endangered by the conquest of its southern neighbour), appeared off the coast. There could no longer be any doubt as to the meaning of the letter. Here was a detachment of the English fleet already in sight. The Spaniards were seized with a panic. They at once set fire to the fort they had built, re- entered their ships, and bore away, leaving behind them a great quantity of artillery, provisions, and military stores. Moiiteano was severely blamed for the utter failure of his plans, and Kodondo, on ai*- riving at Havannah, was thrown into prison, and afterwards dismissed the service for his share in a disaster which was generally regarded as disgraceful, The Spanish expedition into Georgia had lasted about a month, from the latter end of June to the closing days of July, 1742. It was never renewed, and English America was safe from further attack. Oglethorpe soon afterwards left the province, and i-eturned to England. He had been accused of fraud and embezzlement by Colonel Cook, one of his officers, and he sought his native country that he might repel those charges. The inquiry by court-martial which afterwards took place resulted in a declaration that the charges were utterly false and malicious, and Cook was dismissed the army, and declared incapable of serving the King. Ogle thorpe continued to take a kindly interest in his plantation, and to render it any services that were in his power ; but he never again visited America. It is possible that he was in some degree disappointed with his colonial experiment, as Penn was with his. Affairs had scarcely taken the course he intended, and the province was to undergo still further 510 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1752, changes, some of which could not have met with his approval The semi-feudal system under which Georgia had been governed from the period of its first settle ment, was found, as time went on, to be unstated to the needs of a young colony in the eighteenth century. The plantation had decidedly languished. penditure. The right of absolute property in land,, on payment of a small quit-rent, was at the same time conceded, and the obnoxious system of tail male came to an end. Yet the people, who were for the most part an idle and dissolute race, con tinued to repine, and in 1752 the Georgian trustees- surrendered their charter (which had indeed only SIR ROBERT WALPOLE. It had scarcely any commerce, and even as regards agriculture was in a very backward state. War, and the apprehension of war, had something to do with this condition ; but defective institutions were at least equally to blame. Accordingly, in 1742, the trustees established a system of government, consisting of a president and four assistants, who were to act in conformity with instructions from London. These five officers were to hold four General Courts a year at Savannah, for the trans action of all public affairs ; and they were to transmit to England a monthly account of their ex- another year to run) to the Crown. A government similar to what existed in the Carolinas was then created in Georgia ; the importation of rum was permitted, and negro slavery was sanctioned. The demand for slave labour was so urgent that it would have been difficult any longer to resist it, even had the English Government felt an inclination to do so r which assuredly it did not. Almost every one in the province had been saying for several years that Georgia could not compete with her slave-holding neighbours unless she enjoyed the same baleful pri vilege as they. Whitefield, who went out to that 1752.] SLAVERY IN GEORGIA. 511 part of America just as John Wesley quitted it, persuaded himself, as many other sincere and well- meaning men have done, that the bondage of the At first, slaves from South Carolina were hired for a short period; then for a hundred years, or during life : at length, negroes were freely imported African was a means appointed by God for the con- from Africa, and the evil assumed the same propor- version of the race to Christianity. He pleaded on behalf of slavery before the trustees, on his return tions in Georgia as in other provinces. The colony, however, prospered no better than before, and the CHICKASAW3 WITH SPANIARD S HEAD. (Sec p. 506.) to England ; but, by basing his argument partly on the assertion that negro servitude was essential to the prosperity of Georgia, showed that his motive was not wholly religious. Even the Moravians began to waver, and at length abandoned their former hatred of the institution, on the fallacious pretext that they were leading souls to Christ. Of the injury they were doing to the souls of the slave holders, they appear to have taken no account. Georgians, with all their slaves, were still heard complaining. After the rebellion of the Second Pretender, many of the Highland adherents of that prince were transported to Georgia and the Caro- linas, where they formed a considerable population, bound together by a common sentiment of na tionality (or at least of clannishness), and a common hatred of England. South Carolina also received a large number of emigrants from Germany and 512 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [17GO. Holland, and in the middle of the eighteenth cen tury the prosperity of the province had reached a very high pitch. The discovery by the colonists of indigo, growing wild in the open spaces of their forests, led to the cultivation of that plant, for the sake of the dye which was obtained from it ; and, the manufacture being fostered by the English Par liament with special bounties, a large trade soon sprang up. In 1750, South Carolina had a popu lation of 64,000 persons. It remains to give some details of Georgian life, as brought together by an industrious compiler.* The chief articles of cultivation in this pro vince were indigo, cotton, tobacco, and rice. The restrictions on trade to the West Indies being removed, large quantities of lumber were exported to those islands. In 1755, the exports of Georgia amounted in value to 15,744 sterling. In the following year, their total value was 16,776, the articles of exportation, in addition to a quantity of skins, furs, lumber, etc., being 9,395 Ibs. of indigo, 2,997 barrels of rice, and 268 Ibs. of raw silk. The first issue of paper money, or bills of credit, amount ing to about 8,000, was sanctioned by the Georgian Legislature in 1760. Amongst other innovations, already glanced at, which the home Government had introduced into the policy of the trustees, the restriction on the importation of rum was removed. The consequence was that enormous quantities both of this and other ardent spirits were consumed by the colonists, who attempted to palliate their intemperate habits by the plea that the universal brackislmess of the Georgian waters required to be mitigated by an infusion of spirituous liquors. Georgia being peopled from various parts of the world, its population was necessarily a very mixed one, and also of a very diversified character. The original Scotch emigrants are described by William Bartram, a traveller who visited the province in 1773, as an industrious, hospitable, religious, and happy race, living in the utmost enjoyment of rural ease and luxury, and practising every Christian virtue. But it has been remarked that the common characteristics of the Georgians were a natural indolence and aversion to labour, greatly aggravated by the hot climate of the country and the frequent use of spirits. Governor Ellis re marked, in a letter to a friend in England, written in July, 1758, and published in the "Annual Register" for 1760, that "one cannot sit down to anything that requires much application, but with extreme reluctance; for such is the debilitating quality of our violent heats in this season, that inexpressible * Grahame : History of the United States, Book IX. languor enervates every faculty, and renders even, the thought of exercising them painful." The Georgians were greatly addicted to cock- fighting, horse-racing, hunting, gambling, and pugilistic exercises. Whitefield, who arrived in Georgia shortly after John Wesley had left it, was very instrumental in the spread of Methodism throughout the province, and this, doubtless, had some influence over the manners of the settlers. Although a number of religious sects arose in Georgia previous to the American Revolution, the greater number of the people were Presbyterians or Methodists. The Moravians deserted the colony in 1739, and transferred themselves to Pennsylvania, because of their disinclination to join in the war which was then on the eve of breaking out. It was not until after the period of independence that any seminary of education was founded in Georgia, with the exception of Whitefield s Orphan-house, which was unfortunately burnt* down. To the Indian tribes by whom they were surrounded, the Georgians always behaved with courtesy, and showed an equitable spirit in all transactions with their savage neighbours. This was prudent, especially when they had within their own community many elements of danger. In common with other English colonies, Georgia received a large influx of convicted felons from the old country, and a social state was thus created which often threatened the most serious results. An American statistical writer has ob served that " Georgia was at one time the principal retreat of a race of men called Crackers, who were chiefly descended from convicts, and led a wild and vagrant life, like the Indians, with no other effects than a rifle and a blanket, and subsisting upon the deer, turkeys, and other game which the woods fur nish." The same writer, however, goes on to say that, as the country became more settled, these migratory hordes disappeared. Nevertheless, society in Georgia, as in most slave States, continued in a wild and rough condition, for many years. Another American, writing towards the close of the eighteenth century, gives a curious picture of a Georgian planter s life. " About six in the morning," says this authority, " the planter quits his bed, and orders his horse to be got ready : he then swallows a dram of bitters to prevent the ill effects of the early fogs, and sets out upon the tour of his plantation. In this route he takes an opportunity to stop at the negro-houses; and if he sees any lurking about home, whose business it is to be in the field, he immediately inquires the cause : if no sufficient cause be given, he applies his rattan whip to the shoulders of the slave, and obliges him instantly to decamp. If sickness be 1750.] AMERICA ABOUT 1750. 513 alleged, the negro is immediately shut up iii the sick-house, bled, purged, and kept on low diet, till he either dies, or gets into a way of recovery. After having examined the overseer relative to the wel fare of the poultiy, hogs, ca,ttle, &c., he proceeds round the farm, takes a cursory view of the rice, corn, or indigo fields, and examines into the state of the fences and other enclosures. About the hour of eight, his circuit is finished, when, before he alights at his own door, a tribe of young negroes, in the primitive state of nakedness, rush out to meet him, and receive the horse. Breakfast being over, lie again mounts a fresh horse, and rides to the county-town, or the first public house in the neigh- bourhoocl, where he talks politics, inquires the price of produce, makes bargains, plays a game at all- fours, or appoints days for horse-races or boxing- matches. About four o clock he returns, bringing with him some friends or acquaintance to dinner. If the company be lively or agreeable, he rarely rises from table before sunset. If it be a wet even ing, or the weather veiy disagreeable, cards or con versation employ him till bed-time. If it be fair ;?nd no moonlight, after an early supper a fire is- kindled in a pan, and two or three of them set out r stored with some bottles of brandy, preceded by a negro who carries the fire, in order to shoot deer in the woods ; as these creatures are so attracted by a light that they constantly stand still, and fix their eyes upon the blaze, by the reflections of which from the eye-ball they are easily discovered and shot. About midnight they return, according to luck, with or without game ; their shins and faces sadly scratched, and themselves fit for nothing but to be put to bed. This is the general routine of existence among such of the Georgians as live in the more retired and woody parts of the State. Others have their weekly societies for sentimental and colloquial amusement. As to trade and business, it is entirely managed by overseers and factors."* In descrip tions such as this, we see the beginning of that state of society which fostered so much political and moral corruption, and which found its climax in the slave-holders rebellion of 180 1-5. CHAPTER LVIII. General State of America at the breaking out of the "War of 1744-8 English Legislation for the Repression of American Manu factures Liberal Views of Sir Robert "Walpole on the Subject Condition of the Colonies in the Reign of George II. Project for establishing the Church of England in America Subsequent Abandonment of the Scheme State of Opinion in the Plantations with Reference to Dependence on the Mother Country Testimony of the Swede, Peter Kalm En croachment and Resistance Royal Prerogative at New York Attempts of the English Government to Destroy the Privileges of the Colonies State of Farming in America in the Middle of the Eighteenth Century Rapid Increase of the Population New England Missions to the Indians Cultivation of Literature and Science in the New "World Bishop Berkeley and America. BEFORE describing the wars of 1744-8, and of 1754-63, it will be desirable to consider at some length the political and social state of America in the middle of the eighteenth century. The English race was by that time firmly planted on the Atlantic sea-board, from Nova Scotia in the north to Georgia in the south. English power had extended only a little way into the interior ; but it held the coast between those two settlements with a firm grip. A great English- speaking community, mixed with some alien nation alities, had been formed; and it was created almost entirely by the energy of the people themselves. Georgia was the only one of the plantations that had been founded, even in part, by the aid of funds pro vided by the home Government. Provincial manu factures or productions were sometimes encouraged by special bounties, or by an exemption from custom house duties ; but for the most part England was not an indulgent mother to her offspring. The favourite idea throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was that colonies were valuable to a parent State only so far as they supplied the traders of that State with customers ; and for this reason any American manufactures which might come into competition with those of Great Britain were dis couraged, hampered, or even forbidden, with a total disregard of the convenience of the colonists. The House of Commons expressly declared, by a resolu tion passed in 1719, that "the erecting manufac tories in the colonies tended to lessen their depen dence upon Great Britain." The acts by which this policy Avas carried out were frequently most unjust and oppressive. In the early part of the eighteenth century, the manufacture of hats had *" The American Museum for 1790. CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1750. arisen in several of the American settlements, for the supply of the people of those settlements, for sending into other ctlmies, and for foreign exporta tion. This diminished the trade of the English liat-makers, and was therefore to be suppressed. Accordingly, in 1732 an Act of Parliament was passed, prohibiting the exportation of hats made in America, even from one province to another, re- .straining all American colonists from undertaking the manufacture without a previous apprenticeship of seven years, and forbidding all provincial hat ters to engage more than two apprentices at a time, or to employ or instruct negroes to aid them in their business. The law was very generally broken, but it irritated none the less. To foster the trade of the English West Indies, such heavy duties were, in 1733, imposed on all commodities imported into the continental provinces from the French West Indies, that the trade would have entirely ceased had the Act of Parliament been enforced. The Americans had for some time obtained large supplies of rum, sugar, and molasses from the West Indian possessions of France, and had sent thither, in exchange, their own lumber and provisions ; so that the commerce benefited them in two ways. Incited to resistance by the fear of losing a lucrative trade, the colonists dis regarded this law, and so successfully evaded its application that the English Government itself at length instructed its custom-house officers not to levy the prescribed duties. The object of the Act was defeated ; yet the spirit which dictated it remained in full force for many years. Some statesmen of that age, however, were wiser. The greatest of all, Sir Robert Walpole, saw the reasonableness and good policy, as well as justice, of developing the trade and enterprise of America, and gave expression to his views in some very remarkable words. When Sir William Keith, in 1739, suggested to the powerful Whig Minister a plan for taxing the American planta tions, he replied with a smile, " I will leave that to some of my successors who have more courage than I have, and are less friends to commerce than I am. It has been a maxim with me during my administration to encourage the trade of the American colonies in the utmost latitude : nay, it has been necessary to pass over some irregularities in their trade with Europe ; for, by encouraging them to an extensive, growing foreign commerce, if they gain 500,000, I am convinced that, in two years afterwards, full 250,000 of their gains will be in his Majesty s Exchequer, by the labour and produce of this kingdom, as immense quantities of every kind of our manufactures go thither- and, as they [the Americans] increase in their foreign trade, more of our produce will be wanted. This is taxing them more agreeably to their own con stitution and ours." Such, at least, is said to have been the reply of Walpole, and, if really delivered, it showed the spirit of a wise and prudent statesman, who could see where the true policy of England really lay. Yet it was under the rule of this Minister that the vexatious measures to which allusion has been made were carried. Walpole himself was to a great extent a supporter of free trade. As regards taxation and commerce, his ideas were far beyond those of the age in which he lived ; but, for that very reason, the opposition he encountered, both in Parliament and the country, was so great that he was sometimes compelled to give way. The mistaken system of earlier years was perpetuated after his fall from power and his death. In 1750, the manufacture of iron in New England, which had already been started with some prospect of success, was forbidden by an Act of the English Parliament, under very severe penalties. The ironmongers and smiths of Bir mingham were in favour of the importation into England of American iron in an unmanufactured state, on the ground that all the ironworks in Great Britain were inadequate to supply even half the quantity of that metal required in the several manufactures, and that the colonists would be encouraged to take English goods in exchange for their raw material.* This importation was permitted as far as the port of London was con cerned, but not as regarded the other ports of the kingdom; and the iron manufacture of America was entirely suppressed. It was the same with respect to other things. Native enterprise was stifled, and the price of commodities in America was enhanced, in order that English manufacturers might be protected, and English merchants might grow rich. In spite of all these restrictions, the more energetic of the American settlements continued to prosper. Among the towns and villages of the New England colonies, an industrious people cultivated the land with success, and maintained a social state free for the most part from the curse of poverty. In 1738, American navigation took a start, with a rush, from the ship-yards of Boston. Twenty-one top-sail vessels, of the total burden of 6,324 tons, left that port, in which they had been built, for the other havens and harbours of the world. Pennsylvania, in the political language of the day, continued to be the refugium peccatorum of free * Smollett s History of England. 1750.] AMERICA ABOUT 1750. 515 opinion ; and German colonists, in masses, invaded New York. The transition period had come, in which the colonies of North America felt the promptings and yearnings of an independent and a national life within themselves. They had been tutored in social liberty ; they were, upon the whole, free from Indian alarms; they had learned the lessons of Penn and Locke ; they knew what the old and the new philosophers had thought and written ; and they had quickened into a full and expansive existence, with newspapers, colleges, and schools. " It were no difficult task," said Jeremy Dummer, in his defence of the New England charters, written in 1715, "to prove that London has arisen out of the plantations, and not out of Old England. Tis to them we owe our vast fleets of merchant-ships, and consequently the increase of our seamen, and improvements of our navigation. Tis the tobacco, sugar, fish, oil, logwood, and other commodities, which has enabled us to support our trade in Europe ; to bring the balance of some countries in our favour, which would otherwise be against us ; and to make the figure we do at present, and have done for near a century past, in all parts of the commercial world." It appears from the same authority that, during the war then recently concluded, so many New England sailors served in the Royal Navy that the New England merchants were obliged to man their ships with Indians and negroes. The population of Massachusetts, in 1742, was 164,000, and in another eleven years it had reached 220,000, whereas, at the close of the previous cen tury, it had been only 70,000. The other New England colonies likewise had largely augmented their numbers, and in all a state of society existed which was said by some observers to be equal to that of the Old World. Men of high family not unfrequently settled in the American plantations, and helped to give an artificial polish to the man ners of the people. In the middle and southern provinces, with the exception of Georgia, progress was as marked as in the north ; indeed, the increase of population and wealth was greater in Pennsyl vania and Delaware than anywhere else. But literary culture was far less visible in the south than in the northern or intermediate plantations. Vir ginia, Maryland, and the Carolinas were peopled by a race which was originally more inclined to ease than were the earnest and stem enthusiasts of New England and its vicinity ; and this tendency was increased by an enervating climate and the abun dance of slave-labour. Boston had a newspaper as early as 1704 the Boston News-Letter, the first journal ever published in America ; and the print ing-press had then been at work in Massachusetts for several years. Virginia had no presses till 1729, and no newspaper till 1736. On the other hand, a theatre had been opened in the Old Dominion by 1724; while in New England the Puritanical feeling against dramatic entertainments was still so strong in 1750 that when some young Englishmen and their American friends endeavoured to perform a tragedy in a coffee-house at Boston the first time such a thing had even been attempted a disturbance occurred, and the Legislature passed an Act forbidding such amusements, as tending " greatly to increase impiety and a contempt for religion." No theatre was permitted in Massachu setts till 1794; and Connecticut held out to the early part of the present century. The origin of the American people was very mixed, as the course of this narrative must already have shown ; and the habits of the several com munities were in some measure determined by their derivation. The most English sections of the population were those of New England and Vir ginia, In New York, the Dutch abounded ; in Delaware, the Dutch and Swedes ; in Pennsylvania, the Germans ; in many of the southern and middle colonies, the Scotch and Irish ; not to speak of several immigrations of French Protestants in various parts. Yet England gave the final and most distinct characteristic to this heterogeneous compound. The different settlers fell, so to speak, into an English mould, and became, in a generation or two, a kind of Englishmen, modified, of course, by the changed circumstances by which they were surrounded. The New England colonies have always furnished a large body of emigrants to the other parts of North America, and have thus helped to maintain the English character of the whole Federation. So much were the American plantations regarded as a part of England, that in 1749 a project was entertained by the Government of George II. for introducing into them an ecclesiastical establish ment, with Bishops and other dignitaries, after the model of the English Church. It was alleged that several non-jurmg clergymen, belonging to the Epis copal institution, had emigrated to America, owing to the failure of their hopes after the defeat of the Second Pretender, and that a clerical body of a more loyal order would be desirable, as a counter acting influence. The leaders of the Church of England had long desired to establish her power in America, and ineffectual efforts in that direction had frequently been made. The reason now put forth for renewing them was probably a pretext : the real motive was the- wish to repeat on the 516 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1750. Boston Haroor -SMvhnPvirJ. \ C<7ncIiMf3&t or j /,- *"" ;; -.^/^;/ , . JM ^ L7>* r 7 ,.f ^^~v:-V" / ^ ?I ; t^Xf ^ x J ) f 9 ^ MAP OF XEW ENGLAXU AT THE BEGINNING Of THE EIGHTEENTH CENTVUY. (l ruilt Matter s opposite side of the Atlantic a privileged system which had been very profitable to its followers in the old country. Dr. Butler, then Bishop of Bristol, appears to have been the originator of this scheme, which was actively supported by Dr. Seeker, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, and by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. New England very speedily took the alarm ; and, on behalf of the whole body of the American colonies (for by this time even the 1750.] AMERICA ABOUT 1750. 517 southern plantations had received so large a number of Presbyterian Dissenters as to be disinclined to an Episcopal hierarchy), opposed the design with all the energy of its hereditary Puritanism. A promise to exempt New England from the scope of the measure failed to buy off this op position, which was intensified and embittered by Church of England was not badly represented in America. In 1752, there were in Pennsylvania nine Episcopal ministers, and twenty-seven churches where they officiated ; in New Jersey, eight of these ministers ; in New York, twelve ; in Con necticut, eight ministers and sixteen churches ; in Rhode Island, five ministers and six churches ; in CEORGE WHITEFIELD. a schism that had broken out in Connecticut as far back as 1722, and was not yet exhausted. In that year, several clergymen had publicly retracted their Puritanical views of church government, and announced their adhesion to the Church of Eng land. The party thus established was of course strongly in favour of the plan proposed at London ; but neither in numbers nor in social influence had its members any great power, and the English Cabinet at length saw the prudence, and even the necessity, of abandoning the design. Still, the 44 Massachusetts, ten ministers and ten churches ; and in New Hampshire, one minister and one church. * This ecclesiastical difference had the effect of calling attention once again to a question often before discussed viz., whether or not the colonies were desirous of shaking off the yoke of the mother country, and establishing a perfectly independent government. The Americans themselves generally denied any such imputation ; but the ruling classes * Abi"l Holmes ; Annals of America. 518 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1750. in England had believed it for many years in the case of Massachusetts, ever since the time of Charles II. and there cannot be a doubt that they reasoned correctly. Unfortunately, they often acted as if they desired to bring about such a con summation, or as if they wished to provoke some ineffectual attempt, in order that they might show with what ease it could be put down. When Francis Nicholson was at the head of affairs in Virginia, in 1698, he drew up, in conjunction with his friend Colonel Quarry, also employed in an official capacity by the Crown, a set of Memorials which were presented to the Commissioners of Trade and Plantations in England. The American colonists in general, and the Virginians in par ticular, were here represented as deeply imbued with republican principles ; and the authors of the paper strongly recommended that all the English colonies in North America should be reduced under one government and one viceroy, and that a stand ing army should be maintained there, to subdue the enemies of Royal authority. The suggestion was not adopted ; but it long rankled in the minds of the colonists. Sometimes by neglect, sometimes by injudicious interference, the Ministers of England taught the Americans to look forward to a future of republican freedom as the coming golden age of their land. The cynical indifference with which American interests were sacrificed to English in terests ; the vexatious endeavours to impose the ecclesiastical hierarchy of England on communities which abhorred it ; the repeated despatch to America of Governors who, bankrupt in the old country, shamelessly abused their power in the new, as a means of filling their pockets against the day of their recall ; the naked brutality with which, on several occasions, the colonists were told that they had no rights but what the King chose to grant them as a mere matter of grace and favour, which he might withdraw, if he pleased, the next day ; all these things helped to overcome the natural feeling of affection towards the mother country which, with better treatment, the Americans would probably have shown. It is certainly true that the Royal Government was superior to most of the proprietary Govern ments. It was amenable to public opinion, which the others generally were not ; and it would fre quently retrace its course when met by a suffi ciently strong resistance. But the Americans, according to the usual custom of human nature, judged it by the worst, and not by the best, of its results ; and the bad results were bad indeed. Even in the matter of slavery, England pursued her own ends with perfect disregard to the real prosperity of America; in some places forcing the institution of negro bondage on unwilling populations, and in others pampering a perverted sentiment, in order that her merchants might obtain at a cheaper rate the productions of American soil. In 1745, an anonymous writer, styling himself "A British Mer chant," published at London a treatise in which he undertook to show that the African slave-trade was the great pillar and support of the general trade with America. If, he argued, the supply of negroes were thrown entirely into the hands of England s rivals, so that the colonies were obliged to depend on the labour of white men, they would be ruined, or compelled to shake off their dependence on the Crown. Black labour was cheaper than white labour; besides, the supply of free workers to the plantations in sufficient -numbers woxild drain Eng land of husbandmen, manufacturers, and mechanics, and would so interfere with the productions of the parent State that Englishmen would have just cause to dread the prosperity of their colonies. Such were the views of English merchants in the middle of last century. On one side of the Atlantic, then, was a settled purpose of domination, for reasons of avowed selfishness ; on the other was a half-de veloped wish for independence, as the only escape from systematic injustice. Yet it must not be sup posed that at the period we have now reached this desire had taken the form of any definite project. Dr. Johnson once remarked that, by a merciful dispensation of Providence, mobs have- no power of combination, or they could very easily seize 11 the possessions of the rich ; and that a similar defect keeps soldiers in due subordination to their officers. It was so with the American colonies in relation to the State which governed them. They had, at the present stage, no principle of co hesion. The northern settlements Lad nothing in common with the southern ; the middle plantations were equally foreign to both. Even the Federal union of the New England colonies, a century previous, had long ceased to exist. There was con sequently an absence, in its fullest manifestations, of the national spirit, which was, indeed, contra dicted in several directions by the large admixture of many distinct races. At the same time, there was a very general and not at all unreasonable fear of the French and Spaniards, and a prudent reliance on the Imperial power of England for resisting the ambitious designs of those nations. This point was touched upon by Peter Kalm, a Swede who visited North America in 1748, in a passage of his book of travels which is well worth reproducing. 1750.] AMERICA ABOUT 1750. "It is of great advantage to the Crown of England," writes this observer, "that the North American colonies are near a country under the government of the French, like Canada. There is reason to believe that the King of England never was earnest in his attempts to expel the French from their possessions there, though it might have been done with little difficulty; for the English colonies in this part of the world have increased so much in their number of inhabitants, and in their riches, that they almost vie with Old England. Now, in order to keep up the authority and trade of the mother country, and to answer several other purposes, they are forbidden to establish new manu factures, which would turn to the disadvantage of British commerce : they are not allowed to dig for any gold or silver, unless they send it to England immediately ; they have not the liberty of trading to any parts that do not belong to the British dominions, excepting some settled places ; and foreign traders are not allowed to send their ships to them. These and some other restrictions occa sion the inhabitants of the English colonies to grow less tender for their mother country. This coldness is kept up by the many foreigners, such as Ger mans, Dutch, and French, settled here, and living among the English, who commonly have no par ticular attachment to Old England. Add to this, likewise, that many people can never be contented with their possessions, though they be ever so great, and will always be desirous of getting more, and of enjoying the pleasure which arises from change ; and their over-great liberty and prosperity often lead them to licentiousness. I have been told by English subjects, and not only by such as were natives of America, but even by those who had emigrated from Europe, that the English colonies in North America, within the space of thirty or fifty years hence, would be able to form a State by themselves, entirely independent of Old England. But as the whole country which lies along the sea shore is unguarded, while on the land side it is harassed by the French in time of war, these .dangerous neighbours are sufficient to prevent the connection of the colonies with their mother country from being quite broken off. The English Govern ment has therefore sufficient reason to consider the French in North America as the best guardians of the submission of their colonies." * The proposal for establishing a Governor-General over the whole of the American plantations, which Francis Nicholson had made in 1698, was repeated in 1741 by one Daniel Coxe, who wrote a work on * Kalm s Travels, quoted l>y OraLamc, Book X., chap. 2. the French and Spanish parts of North America to the west and south of the English settlements. The details of Coxe s plan were not illiberal, for tho Governor-General was to act in harmony with a Council to be elected by the local Legislatures. But the scheme was regarded by the Americans with suspicion and dislike, as involving an increase of the Royal prerogative ; and it came to nothing. So great was the feeling of jealousy at English in terference that the colonists sometimes refused to entertain even suggestions of probable advantage when they came from the Royal Government. In 1751, the King recommended to the Assembly of Massachusetts a general revision of the laws, such as had just been carried out by the Virginian Assembly. But, although it was admitted by all parties that several legal reforms were much needed, the majority of the Legislature refused to comply with the King s suggestion, because they feared that it covered some secret design of a despotic character. This, no doubt, was an irritable excess of caution, calculated to induce a feeling of unfriend liness on the part of the mother country ; but it had been in some measure provoked by frequent encroachments. The same conflict of popular senti ment with regal power was seen at New York. Smith, the historian of that colony in the last century, remarks : " Our representatives, agreeably to the general sense of their constituents, are tena cious in the opinion that the inhabitants of this colony are entitled to all the privileges of English men ; that they have a right to participate in the legislative power ; and that the session of Assemblies here is wisely substituted instead of a representation in Parliament, which, all things considered, would at this remote distance be extremely inconvenient and dangerous. The Governors, on the other hand, in general entertain political sentiments of a quite different nature. All the immunities we enjoy, ac cording to them, not only flow from, but absolutely depend upon, the mere grace and will of the Crown." The trial of the printer Zenger, in 1735, showed how strongly these high-prerogative views were held by the representatives of the sovereign 011 the banks of the Hudson. The writer of a pamphlet pub lished at London in 1752, and quoted by Smith, advised the popular leaders in the New York Assembly to drop their " Parliamentary ail s and style about liberty and property, and keep within their sphere," for that the King s commission and instructions were their charter, and if they abiised his Majesty s favours they were but tenants-at-will. That this was not merely the rash exaggeration of an irresponsible pamphleteer, but the deliberate conviction of English statesmen, had been made 520 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1750. apparent three years earlier (in 1749) by a Bill introduced into the British Parliament, the object of which was to abolish all the American charters, and to render the King s instructions to the pro vincial Governors equivalent to legal enactments. Such a law, had it been sanctioned, would have created in America a mere despotism, and would doubtless have reacted on the liberty of England herself. But it was opposed with great earnest ness by the colonial agents in London, and by the more far-sighted among English politicians; and the Act was withdrawn. In the same year, the English Ministry entertained for awhile that fatal idea of taxing the colonies which Sir William Keith had suggested nine years before, which "Walpole said he had neither the wish nor the courage to undertake, but which, a little later, was adopted by Ministers of less power and capacity, with the ultimate result of losing the whole of America from Maine to Georgia. Shirley, the Governor of Massachusetts, had suggested that, as a protection against the French, a series of frontier fortresses should be erected under the supervision of Royal engineers and officers, and that a tax for their maintenance should be imposed by Parliament, without which it would not be done. Other Ameri can Governors sent home alarming reports of the growing disloyalty of the colonies, and begged that a permanent salaryfor their offices might be provided. The head of the Government in 1749 was Henry Pelham, one of Walpole s chief opponents. It would have been wiser had he never entertained the pro posed scheme ; but it must be admitted that in doing so he acted with fairness towards the planta tions. He communicated his plan to the several provincial Governments, and solicited their opinions. Those opinions were of course adverse to the design, and Pelham had the sense and good feeling to abandon what he had contemplated. The English Government was at this time generally disposed to accommodation ; but the folly of making such attempts, and then retreating from them, is obvious. It was not surprising that the Americans should desire to retain the management of their own affairs in their own hands, with little more than the personal tie of subjection to the Crown, as represented by the Royal Governors ; for they had created by their unassisted industry a number of flourishing commonwealths, free from many of the evils that afflicted Europe. Life was simple and easy in those infant States. In Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jei*sey, and New York, as Peter Kalm reports, and probably in other colonies also, which did not come within the scope of his observation, even the humblest peasants had their orchards. This profusion led to a correspond ing hospitality on the part of the people, and wayfarers were permitted, and almost invited, to help themselves from the produce of the gardens. Kalm was astonished one day when his guide leapt over a hedge which divided the public road from a private orchard, and gathered some fruit for him and his companions ; and his surprise was still greater when he saw that the people in the enclosure were so little concerned in the fact as to- pay not the slightest attention to it. " We after wards found very frequently," says this writer, " that the country people in Sweden and Finland guarded their turnips more carefully than the people here do the most exquisite fruits." The soil was so fertile, and the price of land so cheap, that a careless system of husbandry was the result. The farmer would cultivate his ground only as long as he could do so without the aid of manure ; then he would leave it fallow, or convert it into pasture,, arid, enclosing a new piece of land out of the virgin forest, would draw upon a fresh stock of natural fertility. "We can hardly," said Kalm, "be more lavish of our woods in Sweden and Finland than they are here. Their eyes are fixed upon the present, and they are blind to futurity. I was astonished when I heard the country people com plaining of the badness of their pastures ; but I likewise perceived their negligence, and often saw excellent plants growing on their own grounds, which only required a little more attention and assistance from their inexperienced owners." Kalm was a friend of Linnaeus, and therefore probably knew something of such matters. One great disadvantage of the American farmer was in cidental to the half-unpeopled state of the land which had existed from time immemorial, and had resulted in a vast excess of animal, and especially of insect, life. Wild beasts frequently burst out of the woods, destroyed the cattle, and ravaged the plantations. Creatures which in England are regarded as graceful and harmless playthings, became formidable in America from their countless numbers. In Pennsylvania, so much damage was done to the crops of maize by the foraging of squirrels that, in a single year, 8,000 were expended by the colonial Govern ment in rewards for the destruction of this animal, at the rate of threepence for each head. In the neighbourhood of Providence, 11,588 squirrels were destroyed within ten days by a party of hunters. Early marriages were usxial in the American colonies, owing to the ease of living, and the posi- 1750.] AMERICA ABOUT 1750. 521 five advantages of a family in a newly-settled country, where labour was scarce. Some writers have asserted that these unions took place at too early an age, and that their bad effect was seen in physical and mental deterioration. However this may have been, they resulted in a large and rapid increase of population, particularly in New England and the middle provinces. It is said to have been not uncommon for parents to be surrounded by descendants to the number of eighty or a hundred. Cases are recorded where as many as five hundred -descendants, extending to the children of great grandchildren, have gathered about their patriarchal ancestor. In New Hampshire, three generations would often be seen tilling the ground in the same field ; and, at the commencement of the present cen tury, Dwight, an American clergyman and author, met with a New Englander who had seen his de scendants amount to more than fifteen hundred. With so great a natural increase, immigration from abroad was not needed in provinces which, by the middle of the eighteenth century, had been so long settled as those of New England ; nor did any great addition from the Old World take place in them at the period of which we are now treating. A number of German Protestants, however, were invited to Massachusetts in 1749 and 1751, for the purpose of founding manufactories. Those who arrived in the latter year left their native country under a misapprehension that their future was guaranteed to them by the Assembly, whereas the project was that of a number of private individuals, who had contrived to obtain, in an irregular way, the countenance, and to some extent even the assistance, of the Legislature. The plan turned out a failure, and the emigrants bitterly com plained of the refusal of the Assembly to assist them. The religious character of Massachusetts con tinued to be strongly developed long after the age of militant Puritanism had passed away. Great efforts were made for the conversion of the Indians, in addition to those of an earlier date which have been described in a previous section of this work. In 1737, the Massachusetts Legislature granted to a body of the Housatonic Indians a settlement in the western part of the province (now called Stock- bridge), where the native converts to Christianity gathered in large numbers. The superintendence of the various missions and their establishments was confided to a board called the Commissioners for Indian Affairs, sitting at Boston, and receiving occasional grants from the Legislature, and still larger sums from voluntary contributors. Among the early pastors of this body was the celebrated Jonathan Edwards, one of the most remarkable religious and metaphysical writers that America has produced : a man who from his boyhood had been subject to the most extreme afflatus of devout enthusiasm ; who as a child used to retire into woods and swamps, like an anchorite of the first Christian ages, that he might wrestle with the Spirit in prayer; and who as a man was instrumen tal in a great religious revival in the years 1740 and 1741. Edwards was an uncompromising Calvinist, and his essay on the Freedom of the Will is generally held to be a masterly exposition of the great dogma of his sect, that the ultimate salvation or perdition of every individual was predestined from all eternity, and cannot be in the least affected by human conduct. This work, and another on Original Sin, he wrote during his residence among the Indian converts, in 1751 and subsequent years. But his ministrations among the savages were not very successful. Though in many respects an esti mable, and certainly a highly conscientious, man, he was austere, reserved, and somewhat arrogant in his manners. Like the Mathers, and many more of the Puritan body, he had an overweening sense of the importance of the ministerial office, and his life affords some curious proofs of the revolt against such pretensions which in his time was growing up even in New England, aided by the progress of secular knowledge and widening intellectual power. Shortly before join ing the Indian mission, he had been dismissed from his charge at Northampton, Massachusetts, on. account of his refusing to admit to the sacrament those persons who did not completely satisfy him as to their religious condition. Yet the " revival " had been very strong under Edwards s ministrations, and he had himself published " A Faithful Narra tive of the Surprising Work of God, in the Conversion of Many Hundred Souls in Northamp ton." One of the most successful missionary labourers of that epoch was David Brainerd, who lived in the wilderness with the simplicity of a patriarch, preached with the passion of an apostle, and was rewarded by numerous conversions among the Six Nations. He died young in 1747, but he had done more than most others. Still, the Indians, as a rule, held aloof from the religion of the Avhite man. The missionaries by whom they >vere ap proached did not always, or often, equal Brainerd in dignity of character or purity of life. A few years before, some of the Six Nations told Governor Hunter, of New York, that several of the ministers who had come to them from that province had encouraged them in the habit of drinking brandy. It is noticeable that the Indians generally assumed 522 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1750. towards the Europeans a tone of moral superiority ; and sometimes not without reason. The first roughness of American society had passed away by the middle of the eighteenth cen tury. Literature and science were beginning to be valued and cultivated. In the universities of New England, in the college of Virginia, in the elemen tary schools scattered over the country, and in the philosophical societies which now began to be numerous in several of the provinces, a race of thinkers was being trained for the future a race like that which Milton, glancing only at his own immediate countrymen, described in one of the most labourers were already gathering. Theologians, historians, and men of science were already native to the soil, and others, native to Europe, took in terest in the grand experiment. Even as early as 1728, Berkeley, afterwards Bishop of Cloyne, the great exponent of the Idealistic philosophy, visited America, with the view of starting a college there a scheme which, after receiving the support of the King and Parliament, fell through, owing to- the indifference of Sir Robert "Walpole. This remarkable man was so impressed with the splendid future of the new continent that, in the only verses he ever wrote, he hailed that future as MAP OF CAPE BRETON. (Fl 0111 Popple H Atlc S.} eloquent passages of that triumph of impassioned reasoning, the " Areopagitica." Of the Americans of that day,* as of their English ancestors a hundred years before, Milton might have said : " The shop of war hath not more anvils and hammers waking, to fashion out the plates and instruments of armed justice in defence of beleaguered truth, than there be pens and heads there sitting by their studious lamps, musing, searching, revolving new notions and ideas, wherewith to present, as with their homage and their fealty, the approaching reforma tion : others as fast reading, trying all things, assenting to the foi ce of reasoning and convince- ment. What could a man require more from a nation so pliant and so prone to seek after know ledge 1 What wants there to such a towardly and pregnant soil, but wise and faithful labourers, to make a knowing people, a nation of sages, of prophets, and of worthies?" The wise and faithful far surpassing anything in the past. The verses are not of the best ; but there is one line in them which is deservedly a common-place. In his vision of the coming time, Berkeley exclaims : "In happy climes, the seat of innocence, "Where Nature guides, and virtue rules, Where men shall not impose for truth and sense The pedantry of courts and schools, " There shall be sung another golden age, The rise of empire and of arts, The good and great inspiring epic rage, The wisest heads and noblest hearts. " Not such as Europe breeds in her decay ; Such as she bred when fresh and young, When heavenly flame did animate her clay, By future poets shall be sung. Westward the course of empire takes its way. The four first acts already past, A fifth shall close the drama with the day. Time s noblest offspring is the last." NEW EXGLAN-DERS BEFORE 524 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1744. CHAPTER LIX. Outbreak of War between England and France in 1744 French Attack on Nova Scotia Treaty between ihe Indians and the Provinces of Philadelphia, Maryland, and Virginia The Fortress of Louisburg, Cape Breton Determination of the New Englanders to effect its Keductioii Discussion of the Project in the Massachusetts Legislature Sailing of the Expedition Keductioii of Louisburg, and Surrender of the Island of Cape Breton Incidents of the Siege of Louisburg Jealousy of the Provincial Troops felt by the English Government Further Plans for the Subjugation of the French in America Despatch of a French Fleet and Army for the Conquest of the English Settlements Dispersion of the Fleet by Tempests Renewed Attempt of the French, and its Defeat Predatory Warfare Establishment of a Militia in Pennsylvania Riots in Boston, owing to Naval Impressment The Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle. IN 1744, France and England had been at peace since the conclusion of the Treaty of Utrecht, in 1713. Mutual exhaustion had had much to do with this desirable state of repose ; but the per sonal inclinations of leading Ministers on both sides of the Channel of Cardinal Fleury and of Sir Robert Walpole were in favour of a pacific policy, even apart from motives of immediate pru dence. Still, the seeds of future wars lurked in. many dangerous questions, and France viewed with apprehension the growing power of England in the West Indies. Louis XV., in 1740, promised his relative, the King of Spain, fifty ships of the line, to aid him in maintaining his predominance in that direction ; and Fleury, then a very old man, indis posed to recommence hostilities, was nevertheless moved to say that he must prevent England from accomplishing her great purpose of appropriating to herself the whole of the West Indian commerce. France, he said, could not consent to the Spanish colonies falling into English hands. While the peace still continued, France was suspected by England of giving covert assistance to Spain in her hostility to English power in America ; but no rupture took place on this account. It was a totally different question which once more brought the two nations into military array against one another. The death of the Emperor Charles VI. , in 1740, left the House of Hapsburg without any male heir, and thus raised a question as to the Austrian succession. By the Pragmatic Sanction, the Emperor had settled his dominions on his daughter, the Archduchess Mai-ia Theresa, wife of Francis of Lorraine, whose succession, in due course, was guaranteed by Great Britain and other European Powers. She accordingly ascended the throne in October, 1740, but was at once encoun tered by a host of enemies. The King of Prussia, the Electors of Bavaria and Saxony, and the Kings of France, Spain and Sardinia, laid claim, on divers grounds of genealogy or marriage, to various parts of the Austrian monarchy. Maria Theresa de fended herself with great spirit, and the Austrian dominions were soon devastated by a furious war. George II. supported the Pragmatic Sanction, and on the 27th of June, 1743, at the head of an English and Hanoverian army, fought on the side of the Austrian Empress at the battle of Dettingen ; but as yet he was acting only as Elector of Haii- over, and his troops, though partly English, were fighting under the banners of Austria. France and England were still nominally at peace ; but the feeling between them was of course anything but friendly, and on the 15th of March, 1744, France declared war on Great Britain, who retorted by a counter declaration on the 9th of April. The French colonists in America received in telligence of the rupture sooner than the people of the English provinces. They at once commenced hostilities, without giving notice of the state f war-, and directed their attention to Nova Scotia, formerly their own province of Acadie, as the most vulnerable point for attack. The English had a garrison, with a Governor and Council, at Anna polis ; they had also a settlement on the small island of Canseau, lying off the eastern coast of Nova Scotia ; and between that islet and New foundland lay the French insular territory of Cape Breton. The settlement of Canseau was much resorted to by New England fishermen, and was defended by a small fortification garrisoned by a detachment of troops from Annapolis ; but, having the French of Canada in one direction, and the French of Cape Breton in another, its position was insecure. Duquesnel, the Governor of the latter colony, resolved to strike a blow at the fishing establishments of the English, and accordingly sent against them a few armed vessels, carrying a force of nine hundred men, who seized on the island of Canseau, burned the fort and houses, and took the garrison prisoners. The onslaught was quite un expected, and met with no resistance. Duquesnel afterwards attacked Placentia, in Newfoundland, and Annapolis, in Nova Scotia, but without sue- ( cess. The garrison taken at Canseau were kept during the summer at Louisburg, in Cape Breton, and then sent to Boston on parole. The accounts they gave of the condition of Louisburg and its 1744.] THE FORTRESS OF LOUISBURO. fortifications led to an expedition against that place in the following year, which resulted in a signal success. Before the close of 1744, an arrangement was come to between the Six Nations and the represen tatives of Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. The meeting took place at Lancaster, in the first- named of those provinces, and a deed was signed, by which, for about 400, the Indians disposed of large tracts of land in the western parts of Virginia and Maryland, and came to an amicable arrange ment with Pennsylvania as to certain matters that had been in dispute. For a long time past, the old feeling of friendship which during several years had subsisted between the red men and the Quakers had suffered considerable diminution. The former complained that they were not fairly treated in their trade bargains ; the latter felt it a grievance that, whenever land was purchased from the natives, the community had to furnish the money, whilst the estates went to the proprietary. Governor Thomas had oflicially declared himself apprehensive of "some fatal quarrel," which was rendered all the more probable by the drunkenness to which the Indians were now prone, and which the traders habitually encouraged, that they might drive more profitable bargains. But the effect of this interview was to renew, at least in terms, the good relations of former days, and a great many important matters were talked over between the white men and the red. The claim of England to the basin of the Ohio was recognised by the savages in their cession of territory ; and, the relations between France and England being referred to, the leaders of the Six Nations informed the commissioners of Virginia and Maryland that they had engaged the Praying Indians and other tribes, who stood " in the very gates of the French," not to join any confederacy against the English. Feeling that their position had been made as safe as was practicable, the New Englanders re solved on instituting reprisals. They declared war against the Indians of Nova Scotia, who had assisted in the attack on Annapolis, and it was not long ere they determined on subduing Louisburg. It was indeed a necessity that this formidable stronghold should, if possible, be taken out of the enemy s hands ; for the English fisheries on the coasts of Nova Scotia were being destroyed by the operations of the French, and throughout the summer the merchant- vessels of New England were so frequently captured, and carried into Louisburg, that all maritime enterprise was threatened with extinction. Yet it was a very serious matter to attack so strong a position. The chief town of Cape Breton had been fortified by the French with great care and skill. In front were a rampart of stone and a ditch eighty feet wide. Six bastions and three batteries contained embrasures for a hundred and forty-eight pieces of cannon ; and it was stated at the time that to walk all round the ramparts was to traverse a distance of at least two miles and a quarter. A battery of thirty cannon commanded the entrance to the harbour from the vantage-ground of a small island ; and further down was another battery of twenty-eight heavier guns, which gave immediate protection to the town. The inside of the citadel was a square, measuring nearly two hundred feet each way, three sides of which were taken up with bomb-proof barracks, while the north side was occupied by the Governor s house and the church. The road from the country to the town was by the west gate over a drawbridge, which was defended by a circular battery of sixteen guns ; so that, whether by sea or by land, the approaches to Louisburg were dominated by works of the best engineering skill, which it had taken France five- and-twenty years to construct, and which, though not yet complete, had cost thirty millions of livres. In the estimation of many, Louisburg was one of the strongest places in the world. By some it was compared to Dunkirk, by some to Gibraltar ; and, if not really the equal of those celebrated fortresses, it was at any rate a position of great importance, any attack on which involved considerable hazard, and many possibilities of failure. New England had no place which could at all be set in comparison with Louisburg. It is true that some steps had recently been taken for put ting the country in a position of defence. The frontier garrisons had been reinforced ; new forts had also been erected at exposed situations; and the King had sent a present of artilleiy to his American, subjects. But no fortress of a first-class character protected the English possessions in that part of the world ; the fortifications of Annapolis were in so dilapidated a state that the place very nearly fell before the combined French and Indian assault ; and if the enemy should renew the offen sive, there was every reason to fear that he would prevail. The English in Nova Scotia were merely a garrison. The people of the province were French, by origin and by sympathy ; they numbered sixteen thousand, and it was proved that they could depend on the assistance of the native tribes, who, having been converted by Jesuit priests, were of the same faith as the great majority of the white inhabitants. William Shirley, the Governor of Massachusetts, perceived the danger of allowing such a basis for hostile proceedings as Cape Breton to remain in the 526 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1745. Lands of the French, and he solicited help from .England to effect its reduction. But before any answer could be received, he was pushed into more immediate action by the impatience of the New England fishermen and merchants. Towards the close of the year, it began to be generally believed that Louisburg might be taken by surprise during the severity of the winter season. To some, the design seemed in the last degree imprudent ; but Shirley, and several of the most influential men in Massachusetts, thought differently. A circumstance which favoured the project was the recent death of Duquesnel, the Governor, who had been succeeded by a general advanced in years, and of no great capacity. Duvivier, who led the attack on Canseau, and whose abilities were of a much higher order, had lately sailed for Europe ; and, from information given to Shirley by those who had been in captivity at Louisburg, it appeared that this officer had gone to beg immediate succour from his sovereign, that the stores of the garrison were scanty, that the troops were discontented and inclined to mutiny, and that in some places the works were already crumbling to decay. If these accounts were to be relied on, it was a matter of policy to attack the place as speedily as possible ; and such was the opinion of Shirley and his friends. The discussion of the project in the Massachu setts Legislature, consisting of the Provincial Council and the representatives of the people, was carried on, at the request of Governor Shirley, under an oath of secrecy a circumstance perhaps unparalleled in the history of Parliamentary pro cedure. The Governor had stated in his message that he was prepared to communicate a matter of the utmost importance, but of such a nature that the disclosure of it to the public at that period anight be highly detrimental to the general interest. The oath of secrecy was well kept for some time ; and the fact was then accidentally divulged by a member of the Legislature, who, while conducting the family devotions at his lodgings, inadvertently prayed for a blessing on the attempt. The debate .spread over several days, and, in the first instance, resulted in a vote adverse to the design. Shirley, however, induced several of the most wealthy inhabitants of Boston, and nearly all the merchants of Salem and Marblehead, to send in petitions, earnestly entreating the Legislature to save the fisheries from entire ruin by consenting to the expedition. The consideration of the question was therefore reopened, and the daring project was at length sanctioned by a majority of one. Even that bare majority was the result of an accident. A mem- !>er of the Assembly who afterwards became famous Andrew Oliver was going down to the House on the day the final debate took place, with the intention of voting against the proposal, when he fell and broke his leg. When the House divided, the numbers on both sides were equal; and the Speaker, though personally inclined to a negative, gave his casting vote in favour of the expedition, because he conceived that such was the general desire of the people. It was therefore with considerable misgivings on the part of many that the coming blow was pre pared. Once determined on, however, the plan was forwarded with great vigour. New York was solicited to send assistance, and did so to the extent of providing a small amount of artillery. Even Pennsylvania aided ky the contribution of a stock of provisions; but only the New England provinces furnished men. Massachusetts equipped an army of three thousand soldiers. Connecticut raised five hundred and sixteen ; New Hampshire, three hundred and four ; and Rhode Island, three hundred, who, however, sailed too late to be of much service. The united force thus consisted of three thousand eight hundred and twenty men, with a small reserve of three hundred, though some accounts place the active total at more than four thousand. A few colonial sloops were already on the spot, and had done good service in capturing several French vessels laden with provisions for the garrison of Louisburg, and in repulsing a ship of war. Commodore Warren, who was in the West Indies with an English fleet, was invited to join the ex pedition ; but this he at first refused to do in the absence of orders from England : however, he sub sequently met the other forces (unexpectedly by them) at the island of Canseau, having been ordered to sail for Boston, to concert measures with Governor Shirley for general service in North America. The New England forces sailed for Louisburg in April, 1745, under William Pepperell, commander-in-chief, and Roger Wolcott, second in command. They came within sight of their place of destination on the llth of May, and landed on the east coast of Cape Breton in Gabarus Bay. In the early morning of the 12th, a detachment of four hundred men marched towards the Royal bat tery, burning all the houses and stores they met with on their way. Seeing them approach, and imagining that the entire army was in sight, the French (who were completely taken by surprise) spiked their guns and abandoned the battery, of which the New England troops immediately took possession, turning its guns upon the town, and against the island battery in the harbour. The siege-guns, being placed on sledges, were dragged 17 45.] THE SIEGE OF LOUISBURG. 527 with ropes across a morass by the soldiers, as it was found impossible, owing to the nature of the soil, to employ either horses or oxen. In con veying them over, the men sank to their knees in the mud, but nevertheless performed their task successfully. A French ship of seventy-four guns, containing a quantity of military stores for the supply of the garrison, and having five hundred and sixty men on board, was captured by Commodore Warren s fleet towards the end of May. The English fleet was soon after augmented by the arrival of fresh ships, and the operations were now pushed forward with great vigour. The island battery was overpowered by the siege- works ; the circular battery was nearly destroyed ; within two hundred yards of the city, trenches were opened near an advanced post, the guns of which played upon the north-west gate ; and, although no breach had been effected, and the gar rison were making the fortifications still stronger, the town itself had suffered considerable damage. It was aiTanged that on the 29th of June a com bined attack by the sea and land forces should take place ; but on the previous day the whole island of Cape Breton, including the city, fort, and batteries, surrendered to the invaders. The conquest of Louisburg was remarkable, for it was the triumph of citizen soldiers over an army posted behind walls in a position of considerable strength. It is true that a large part of the French force consisted of Breton militia ; but they had the protection of their fortresses, and were under the control of regular troops. The New England levies were entirely unprofessional. Pepperell, the chief commander, was simply a militia colonel, whose usual pursuits were those of a merchant. Wolcott, the second in command, was the Lieu tenant-Governor of Connecticut. The rank-and- file of the expedition were fishermen, mechanics, and lumberers. Some, indeed, had not long been connected even with the provincial militia, but had enlisted for this particular service. Yet most of them had been accustomed from boyhood to the use of arms, and many had led lives of toil, of activity, of hardship, and of danger, in the back woods of New England. The army was pervaded by strong religious zeal ; and as its religion was the child of Protestant Dissent, while the religion of the French was Popish, another feeling of anta gonism was added to that of race. George White- field, who was then preaching in New England, suggested a pious motto for the flag of the New Hampshire force, which caused many to enlist in that regiment, as if it were set apart for some specially sacred service ; and one of these volun teers, a regimental chaplain, carried with him a hatchet, with which he vowed that he would de stroy all the images he found in the French churches. Seth Pomroy, a major in one of the Massachusetts regiments, and a gunsmith, wrote to his wife from before the walls of the fortress, " It looks as if our campaign would last long ; but I am willing to stay till God s time comes to deliver the city into our hands." His wife was equally cheerful. " Suffer no anxious thought to rest in your mind about me," she wi-ote in reply. " The whole town [Northampton, in Massachusetts, from which Pomroy came] is much engaged with concern for the expedition, how Providence will order the affair, for which religious meetings every week are maintained. I leave you in the hand of God." The siege was conducted in the most irregular fashion. The usual modes of working up to a fortress, by trenches, parallels, and covered approaches, seemed mere foolishness to these unprofessional fighters. They did indeed erect fascine batteries batteries reared on timber- work at two ends of the city; but for the most part the siege proceeded in a loose, haphazard way, as if it were resolved to leave all things to the chapter of accidents. What ever was methodically executed was done under the superintendence of marines from Admiral Warren s fleet The men had no fixed encamp ment, and very little discipline. Being unprovided with tents, they were compelled to improvise for themselves houses of turf and brushwood ; and at night they slept on the bare earth, or advanced their siege-works under cover of darkness. During the day, they amused themselves in any vigorous manner they could devise in firing at marks, in fishing, fowling, wrestling, racing, or run ning after spent balls. The season, fortunately, was singularly fine and dry ; so that the army did not suffer nearly so much as it might have done. Still, its position was perilous in a military sense ; and had not the French garrison been so weak, a great disaster might have been the result. The besieged, however, dared not venture on any sallies, owing to insufficient numbers, still further enfeebled by a mutinous spirit ; and the fleet of Admiral Warren kept the seas. The religious sentiment which animated the men was maintained throughout the whole operations). William Vaughan, after taking the grand batteiy, wrote to his commander, " May it please your honour to be informed that, by the grace of God and the courage of thirteen men, I entered the lloyal battery aboiit nine o clock, and am waiting for a reinforcement and a flag." When a particu larly desperate attempt was made to take the island 528 CASSELL S HISTOEY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1745. battery, after several previous attacks, the discom fited troops said that Providence seemed remarkably to frown upon the affair, and it had indeed resulted in nothing but a savage fight on the island, a wild rush for the boats, and the loss of nearly two hundred men in killed, wounded, and captured. On the other hand, when the capitulation at length took place, and the victors saw the immense thick ness of the walls, and the general strength of the fortress, they said that God had gone out of the numerous French vessels which at that time of the year were expected to arrive. In this way many captures were made, and the prizes altogether were valued at upwards of a million sterling. Although the co-operation of Commodore Warren had been of great service, it would be unjust to deny that the chief share in the success was due to the military forces of New England, which had exhibited some of the best qualities of soldiership, however much they may have been wanting in LOUISBVRG, CAPE BRETON. way of his common providence, in a remarkable and almost miraculous manner, to incline the hearts of the French to deliver into their hands so formidable a position. The surrencler certainly did not come a minute too soon. The powder of the besiegers was beginning to fail ; disease was spreading among the troops ; and very shortly after they had got housed, the periodical rains set in with great violence. Duvivier was already on his way back from France with large reinforcements, but, learning on his passage that Louisburg had fallen, he returned to the seat of government for fresh orders. The fortress was manned for nearly a year by the New England troops, and the French flag was kept flying on the ramparts to decoy into the harbour the technical acquirements. That this fact was not recognised by the English Government can only be attributed to a mean jealousy of provincial efforts a feeling rendered all the more bitter by the irritating consciousness that this American, triumph was the one fortunate feature of a war which in all other respects had been discreditable. It is painful to be obliged to add that the colonial troops, and the crews of the New England vessels, were denied all share in the prize-money resulting from captures; and that the official accounts of the victory pub lished in England suppressed the merits of the provincials with studied neglect. The colonies had been put to a heavy expense in effecting the re duction of Louisburg ; yet it was only with great 45 530 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [17-10. difficulty that they obtained from the English treasury a reimbursement of their charges. Pep- perell was made a baronet ; but that was the only honour conferred on New England. This ungenerous conduct did much to foster a feeling of antagonism towards the mother country; and the sentiment was kept alive and intensified by large transportations of Scotch High landers to various parts of America, and especially to the southern provinces, after the suppression, of the Second Pretender s rebellion in 1745. But as long a>s the war with France continued, the colonists had something else to do than to think of compara tively private quarrels. Governor Shirley was not at all content to rest satisfied witli his achievement. He contemplated the complete destruction of French power in America, and the transfer of the French possessions to England ; and he did his utmost, early in 1746, to induce the English Government to despatch a sufficient armament for the safe keep ing of Cape Breton and Nova Scotia, and for the conquest of Canada. France, it was known, was preparing a great expedition, which was to recover Louisburg and Acadie, to bombard Boston, and to devastate the whole Anglo-American coast to tke utmost limits of Georgia. Alarmed at this project, the Ministers of England sent a circular to the Governors of most of the American provinces, re quiring them to enlist soldiers for co-operating with a British army in a general attack on the American possessions of France. The colonies thus addressed voted a military force, in the proportion of 3,500 from Massachusetts, 1,600 from New York, 1,000 from Connecticut, 500 from New Hampshire (accord ing to Belknap, 800), 500 from New Jersey, 400 from Pennsylvania (a voluntary contribution from the non-Quaker part of the population, with which the Legislature had nothing to do), 300 from Rhode Island, 300 from Maryland, and 100 from Virginia. But no British force arrived, nor did the fleet of nearly thirty ships of war, which had also been promised, appear in any American waters. The colonists were loud in their complaints of what they regarded as treachery on the part of the mother country; but there is some reason for believing that the army was kept at home from a fear of Fremch invasion. At length, despairing of assistance, Shir ley determined on attacking some part of the French territory with his own troops. The fort at Crown Point, in the province of New York, was at one time thought of; but intelligence from Nova Scotia, to the effect that that territory was in danger, induced a change of plan. The scheme had scarcely been matured ere news of a very alarming character reached America. A French fleet and army had arrived at Chebucto Bay, in Nova Scotia. The Duke D Anville was at the head of no less than 3,000 disci plined and well-appointed troops ; and these were to be joined by an allied force of Canadians and Indians. A momentary panic spread throughout New England. It was feared that the whole of the British colonies in America would be subjugated ; but the feeling of despondency was soon succeeded by one of courage and self-reliance. Many days had not elapsed before 6,400 of the Massachusetts militia marched into Boston, and joined the troops already there. Connecticut intimated that she would be ready, if need were, to furnish 6,000 ad ditional soldiers. The coasts were protected by new forts and batteries ; and it was generally held to be certain, that England would despatch an army and a fleet to the aid of her threatened possessions. So confident was Shirley of this assistance arriving, that he addressed letters to the garrison of Louis- burg, announcing as a fact that succour was on its way from the parent State. By a most fortunate chance, these letters fell into the hands of the French commander. His fleet had sustained con siderable damage by severe storms, which had caused numerous shipwrecks ; and the spirits of all on board were already greatly depressed by the scattering of several vessels, and by the ravages of a pestilential fever which had broken, out among the troops, when the arrival of this piece of intelligence introduced a new element of despondency into their minds. The commanders were divided as to whether they should pursue their enterprise, or return to France ; and in the midst of this hesita tion D Anville suddenly died. By some, his death was attributed to apoplexy ; by others, to poison wilfully taken. D Estournelle, his successor, on learning that a reinforcement of French ships, which had been expected from the West Indies, had returned to France, proposed to a council of his officers that they should follow the same course, and, on being outvoted, threw himself on his sword, after the old Roman fashion, and expired. That which he had counselled was soon brought to pass by the elements themselves. Another tre mendous tempest swept the seas, and raged for maiiy days ; the vessels of the fleet were driven far apart, with great loss ; and, a:-; the autumn was now considerably advanced, those of the ships which survived the storm made their way back separately to Europe. English America had been saved by the chamless fury of the winds and seas ; and the New Eiiglaiiders saw in such assistance the special favour and protection of God. To the English Government they certainly owed no thanks. 1747.J MILITARY PREPARATIONS IN PENNSYLVANIA. 531 The despatch of D Anville s ^expedition was known in London ; yet the Ministers dkl no more than send a squadron to aid in the protection of Louisburg, leaving the colonies exposed to the danger of ravage, or even of conquest. Towards the close of the year, the Canadian troops had established themselves in Nova Scotia, and in the winter of 1747 they were unsuccessfully attacked by a Massachusetts regiment, which, after . sanguinary struggle, was compelled to surrender. A new danger now threatened the colonists. The French Government, exasperated by repeated failures, resolved to make one more effort for the destruction of English power in America. A strong naval force was despatched from France, with orders to subdue the colonies of Great Britain ; but it was encountered by Admirals Anson and Warren, and compelled to surrender, after a desperate re sistance. The commander of the Canadian troops in Nova Scotia, on hearing of this disaster, led his men back to their own province, but subsequently, in conjunction with his Indian allies, made repeated sallies across the borders of New England and New York, and inflicted great misery on the settlers by unrestrained havoc and cruelty. So great was the dread of these incursions in New Hampshire that the people fortified their houses, and dared not stir abroad unarmed. Plantations were laid waste, and large numbers were massacred, or carried into cap tivity. The prisoners, however, were treated by the Indians with a degree of humanity which contrasted very favourably with what had been experienced in .previous times. On the part of the New Englanders, the wai~, at this date, was managed with great feebleness. The first flush of enthusiasm had passed ; the division of power amongst several petty Governments resulted in confusion, contra dictory orders, and vacillation of purpose ; and commands were often bestowed on incompetent men, in order to conciliate political opponents, or reward political partizans. The fear of French attack had a remarkable effect on Pennsylvania in the course of 1 747. By that year, the non-Quaker part of the population had increased so largely that the Friends formed no more than a third of the total.* The Quakers, by dint of wealth and social influence, still main tained their ascendency in the Legislature ; but even there it was dwindling. The mass of the people complained loudly that they were left with out protection against possible or even probable assaults. Many of the Quakers themselves ad mitted the lawfulness of defensive war; others, * Bowden s History of the Society of Friends in America, Vol. II., chap. 7. not liking to contradict any opinion put forward by the founders of their sect, and yet feeling the practical difficulties into which an extreme punc tiliousness would carry them, seemed desirous of shirking the whole question, and of letting others have their way, provided they were not called on to pronounce an opinion on the subject. The ingenious shifts by which they managed to supply the war-requisitions of the English Government, without seeming to do so for military purposes, have already been noted. "In 1745," said Dr. Johnson to Bos well, " my friend Tom Gumming, the Quaker, said he would not fight, but he would drive an ammunition-cart ; and we know that the Quakers have sent flannel waistcoats to our soldiers, to enable them to fight better." By the aid of this equivocating policy, and by the strong determination of the non-Quakers not to be left defenceless, the Governor of Pennsylvania was enabled, though in an irregular way, to obtain, in 1747, the establishment of a militia. The chief agent in bringing about this result was a man whom we shall hereafter have frequent occasion to mention, as being one of the great central figures of American society during the eighteenth century. Benjamin. Franklin, was at that time living in Philadelphia, and, by his pen as well as his tongue, did more than any one to mature the scheme for a militia, and bring it into action. He suggested a lottery for providing the needful funds for forming a military body, and planting batteries on the river; and, as James Logan wrote in his Journal, he " found a way to put the country oil raising above one hundred and twenty companies of militia, of which Philadelphia raised ten, of about a hundred men each." The women were particularly zealous in the matter, and furnished ten pairs of silk colours, wrought with various mottoes. Franklin said he estimated the propor tion of Quakers sincerely against defence as only one to twenty-one. Yet the Assembly refused to sanction the scheme for a militia, and it was carried out entirely as a private undertaking. The com mand of a regiment was offered to Franklin ; but he declined it, and preferred to serve in the ranks. Rumours of peace obtained very general cur rency as the summer passed into autumn ; and in September the provincial army was disbanded, by order of the Duke of Newcastle, Secretary of State. The New Englanders were now possessed by the conviction that the home Government did not wish to destroy the French power in America, but cal culated on the dread which it inspired for keeping the English colonies in a state of dependence on the mother country. This tendency to insubordina- CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1748. tion "was increased during tlie autumn to a rather alarming extent by an incident which roused the Bostonians to a degree of excitement such as had not been eqxmlled since the time when Andros and his subordinates were seized by the populace, and thrown into prison. It was the custom in those days, and even down to the la,ter period of the war which terminated in 1815, for the English Govern ment to man the Royal navy by the forcible im pressment of able-bodied persons supposed to be fit for that service. The practice a relic of feudalism was commonly, and very justly, regarded as a monstrous and peculiarly cruel violation of the liberty of the subject; and it was the height of folly and rashness to extend such a system to the colonies, where it was without even the feeble war rant of ancient usage and historic precedent. Yet the Ministers of the Crown had obtained from their law-officers an opinion in favour of so extending it, and on two or three occasions attempts at impress ment had been made in Virginia, but had always been defeated by the populace. A similar attempt occurred in New England in the November of 1747, though not by direction of the home Govern ment. Commodore Kiiowles was at that time lying with some English ships of war off Nantasket, in Massachusetts. Several of his sailors deserted, and, to fill up the gaps, he sent off his boats to Boston at an early hour of the morning, seized all the sea men whom he found in the vessels lying in the harbour, and even carried off from the wharfs a large number of apprentices to ship-carpenters, and other landsmen. As soon as the fact became generally known, the townspeople were transported with rage. Several armed themselves, and pro ceeded to the Governor s house, where some of the captains, of the English squadron were assembled. The officers, seeing the threatening action of the mob as they gathered in front of the building, pre pared to defend themselves with carbines, and a mur derous collision seemed imminent. The people, how ever, were dissuaded from breaking into the house ; but a deputy-sherirt , who made some ineffectual attempts to restore order, was ignominiously set in the stocks. At night, the rioters assembled about the town- hall, where the General Court was sitting, flung stones and brickbats against the doors and windows, and demanded the restoration of the impressed men. Governor Shirley addressed them in a re assuring speech from the balcony; but the more extreme leaders of the popular party insisted that the English officers should be detained as hostages. Shirley had great difficulty in getting from the town-hall to his own dwelling without ill-usao-e ; and the aspect of the mob became so menacing as the night wore on, that the militia were next morn ing summoned to assist in quelling the disturbance. They refused to act, and the insurgents, now almost complete masters of the town, secured the officers who were on shore, and placed a guard over them. Shirley took refuge in the castle, as Andros had done in the eventful days of April, 1689, and thence wrote to Commodore Kiiowles, begging the release of the impressed men, as the only means of restoring tranquillity; but Kiiowles replied by vow ing that he would bombard the town unless his officers were released. The Assembly found it necessary to take some steps for the restoration of tranquillity. They accordingly passed a series of resolutions, declaring that the conduct of the insurgents (amongst whom there appear to have been several negroes) was repugnant to municipal government and order ; requir ing all officers, civil and military, to aid in suppressing the tumult ; and, while promising to adopt means for redressing the original wrong, pledging themselves, their lives and estates, to support the authority of the Governor. It has been thought that several members of the Assembly secretly encouraged the rioters in their proceedings ; but the movement had become too grave to be trifled with any longer. The Council aided the resolutions of the Assembly by an order for the liberation of the naval officers then in the hands of the insurgents, who were declared to be under the protection of the Government. The better classes of Bostonians held a meeting, at which the act of Commodore Knowles and the conduct of the dis affected were equally condemned. The popular rage had by this time burnt itself out after three days of violence and menace. The Governor was conducted from the castle back to his own house by the militia ; the English officers were released from their irregular imprisonment ; and the greater number of the impressed citizens, if not all, were then returned. No proceedings were instituted against the rioters by the local authorities, nor did the English Government take any notice of the affair.* The war, which had been languishing for some time, came to a close in 1748. It had, 011 the whole, been very unfortunate for England, nor was it productive of much advantage to any of the hostile Powers. The proposal for a peace came from the French monarch, who found his kingdom threatened with general bankruptcy, owing to the expenses of the war, and who saw a large part of his fleet in possession of the English. A congress was opened at Aix-la-Chapelle, and the plenipo tentiaries, after sitting several months, concluded * Hutchinson ; Burk ; Graliamc ; Bancroft. 1748.] CLOSE OF THE WAR. 533 a pence, which was signed on the 18th of October. By this treaty it was agreed that all conquests on every side should be given up ; so that the acquisi tion of" Cape Breton, due in a great degree to the valour of the New Englauders, was sacrificed for no corresponding advantage, since the French had nothing to restore in respect of British territory, excepting the small factory of Madras, belonging to the East India Company. The war had in creased the national debt from about fifty millions to nearly eighty millions ; yet it had resulted in no substantial gain to the English people, who were none the better for the Pragmatic Sanction being affirmed, and the Empress Maria Theresa secured in her dominions. Spain did not relinquish her claim to search the commercial ships of England; and neither Spain nor France withdrew from territorial pretensions on the American continent which had been sources of trouble for many years. All ques tions of boundary were left to be determined, at some ulterior date, by commissaries provided with special powers ; and, as this plan had already been tried with no good result, it was evident that the disputes were simply handed over to the arbitra tion of another sanguinary and expensive war. The retrocession of Louisburg and the accom panying territory was felt by the New Englanders as a great grievance, since it exposed them to a renewal of all the dangers from which they had already suffered so much, and which they had fought so hard to remove. They now asked for a reimburse ment of their expenses, and obtained it, though not without some hesitation, and grudging. At the suggestion of leading men in Massachusetts, the indemnity was paid in silver and copper , all bills of credit were withdrawn, and in 1749 a vigorous attempt was made to substitute a money for a paper currency, which was ultimately done. Salutary, however, as tkis change was generally admitted to be, it was not effected without considerable opposition on the part of several stock-jobbers and traders on borrowed capital. In resisting the withdrawal of the paper currency, they were supported by popular feeling, and meetings were held in Boston and the sur rounding country, at which, notwithstanding that a majority of the Assembly were in favour of passing measures necessary to a healthy condition of the currency of Massachusetts, an outcry was raised that the only advantageous currency for the poor was the circulation of paper money. A gold and silver currency, it was alleged, would be ex clusively confined to the wealthy and upper classes, and the humbler or working portion of the com munity would be in no way benefited by it, but would either be thrown altogether out of employ ment, or be compelled to accept necessaries at an estimated value in payment for their labour. A faint attempt at insurrection was made in the province, but it was immediately suppressed. The working classes soon learned that they had no more difiiculty in obtaining silver than they had previously had in obtaining paper money, nor was it long before they changed their minds, and became as averse from a paper currency as they had hitherto been in favour of it.* An Act of Parliament to ensure the permanence of tho money currency of New England, and prevent a return to paper, was passed about 1751. Any colonial Governor who should affirm an Act of Assembly at all deviating from the Parlia mentary statute (unless in cases of extraordinary emergency) was to incur a penalty of perpetual incapacity for public office. The Act passed by the home Government was, however, confined to the New England colonies, the various Assemblies of which were ordered to call in and discharge all bills of credit that had been issued by them, and to refrain from issuing others. Thus a great evil in the social state was removed, and commerce was placed on a safer footing by being delivered from the dangers of too facile speculation. The bad effects of paper money had been experi enced in all the American colonies excepting Vir ginia, -where the system was not adopted. Coin was scarce, and the ready creation of a paper cur rency was a temptation which could not easily be resisted. The first operation of tkese emissions was to stimulate enterprise, and add, apparently, to the wealth of the country. But the prevalence of paper kept specie out of the colonies ; the circu lating medium was quickly depreciated in value ; fresh issues added to the evil ; business was un naturally inflated; and, as the value of the notes was perpetually falling, debtors delayed payment as long as they could, in order that they might pay the less. The depreciation was so excessive that, in 1738, the New England currency was Avorth but one hundred for five hundred ; that of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, one hundred for one hundred and sixty or seventy, or two hundred ; that of South Carolina, one for eight ; that of North Carolina, in London but one for fourteen, in the colony but one for ten.t If was therefore high time for the question to be dealt with firmly, and the best results ensued from the reforms now carried out. New England was rescued from the hectic fever of a false prosperity, find placed once more beneath the natural laws of trade. * Grahame. t Bancroft. 534 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1748. CHAPTER LX. Disagreement between the French and English as to the Boundaries of Nova Scotia French Claims to the Western Territory- Alliance between the English and the Six Nations Conference at Albany Memorial of Massachusetts Commissioners to the Home Government on the Subject of a Common Defence against the French Intrigues of the French with the Native Population Alleged Supremacy of the English Parliament over the Colonies American Kepudiation of the Claim The Question as it appeared from the American and from the English Point of View Position of England in the Middle of Last Century Mode in which the Colonies were governed at that Period Project for the Settlement of the Oliio Valley Formation of a Colony of Disbanded Soldiers and Sailors in Nova Scotia Founding of the Town of Halifax Dissensions with the French Population and the Micmac Indians Colonisation of Vermont Encroachments of the French in Nova Scotia Collision on the Messagouche. THE Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, as concerned the rival claims of France and England in America, was little better than a truce ; and to observant politicians it could have appeared in no other light. The great questions in dispute were left unsettled, and were not likely to be adjusted by the methods proposed for that end. Both Powers sought for absolute predominance in the northern division of the New World ; and each, distrusting the events of a not distant future, prepared for the renewed struggle which was all but inevitable. To the English Government it was obvious that Nova Scotia must for many years to come be a danger in itself, however useful it might be as a frontier towards Canada. The people were almost wholly French ; they earnestly desired to be reunited to their brethren beyond the St. Lawrence, and they embraced every opportunity that seemed to promise the least chance of throwing off the foreign yoke which galled them. The undefined limits of the province, which left it still uncertain where the respective jurisdictions of France and England terminated, increased the dangers of a sudden rupture. It had been, agreed by the plenipoten tiaries at Aix-la-Chapelle that the respective boundaries should be as they had been before the war ; but this was saying nothing, as no approach to a definition accepted by both sides had ever been made. Acadie, beyond all question, had been ceded to England by the treaty of Utrecht, in 1713 ; and the territory was admitted, by the French them selves, to comprise all that had ever lain within its boundaries. But the two Powers were entirely at issue as to what its ancient boundaries were. The French alleged that the term Acadie had never extended beyond the peninsula lying to the south east of the Bay of Fundy, to which at the present day (though such was not the case at the time of which we are writing) the name of Nova Scotia is confined. The English, on the contrary, argued that it included a considerable tract of land on the continent, reaching to the limits of Canada on the north, and touching the borders of New England on the west, the country now designated New Brunswick. Each party to the dispute determined,, whenever the opportunity offered, to act on his- own interpretation of the doubt. Even before the restoration of Cape Breton, at the peace of 1748,. the French occupied the isthmus connecting the peninsula with the mainland ; a small colony was established at the mouth of the St. John s River ;. and the entire country to the Kennebec, far within the present State of Maine, was still claimed as a portion of French territory. These encroachments were regarded by the English with jealous dis favour ; and they prepared to dispute with their rivals the possession of so important a region. As respected the western territories, France asserted a title to the whole basin of the St. Law rence and the Mississippi. She had erected a chain of forts from Quebec to New Orleans, and in 1731 had even planted a work of this nature at Crown Point, on Lake Champlain, within the province of New York, and 011 ground belonging to the Six Nations, who had been recognised at the Peace of Utrecht as being under the protection of Great Britain. The English authorities were determined not to relinquish the support of those tribes with out an effort to retain it. In July, 1748, Admiral Clinton, a connection of the Dukes of Newcastle and Bedford, and now Governor of New York, proceeded to Albany, in order to confirm the alliance with the confederated tribes by a joint treaty between their chiefs and the commissioners from several colonies, and to check the assumptions- of France by a concerted defence. Clinton, and the leading member of the Royal CoTincil, Cadwallader Coldeii (who was also present at the conference), had up to that time been chiefly occupied in oppos ing what they regarded as the tendency of the New York Legislature, together with the Legis latures of other American colonies, towards repub lican independence; in declaring to the home Government that little more than a shadow of Royal authority still remained in the northern plantations ; and in soliciting the assistance of 1748.] CONVENTION AT ALBANY. 535 regular troops, to tlic number of two thousand men at least, as much for the repression of faction within, as the defeat of foreign intriguers. But for the present their minds were absorbed by the necessity of securing the friendship of the Six Nations, and counteracting the designs of France. The convention at Albany was also attended by William Shirley, the Governor of Massachusetts, and by Andrew Oliver and Thomas Hutchinson, commissioners from the same province. Many chiefs of the Six Nations and of their allies were French, the charge of defending their frontiers ought not to rest on them exclusively ; that the other Governments had been invited to join in concerting measures, but that all, with the excep tion of Connecticut, had declined. They therefore counselled an earnest application to the King so far to interpose as to compel the remoter colonies, as long as the French were in Canada, to contri bute in a just proportion to the expense of pro tecting the inland territories of New England and New York. Clinton and Shirley despatched the present ; and all resolved to have no French within their borders, and not even to send deputies to Canada for the release of their brethren taken in the late war, which was now known to be virtu ally at an end, in consequence of the preliminaries signed in April. It was agreed that the recovery of the captives should be effected through the mediation of the English; and the representatives of the several provinces were assured that the tribes of the Far West were well inclined to friend ship. At the close of the conference, the Massa chusetts commissioners presented a memorial to Governors Clinton and Shirley, setting forth that, as Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and New York formed the barrier of English America against the memorial to the Board of Trade, with an intimation of their entire agreement. The resolution of the Six Nations to seek the restoration of their captured warriors through English agency, was entirely repudiated by the French. La Galissoniere, the Governor-General of Canada, insisted on treating with those Indians as the common allies of France and England, and denied that they were the subjects of the latter. The tribes about Onondaga, on their part, refused to admit that they owed allegiance to any foreign Power. They haughtily declared that they had ceded their lands to no one ; that they held them of Heaven alone. The friendship of the Six Na tions wavered between the two antagonistic races 536 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [171-3. of white men, and could never be confidently assumed as a certain fact by either. In 1748, some inclined to the French and some to the English alliance ; and the disposition of the former was fostered by the exertions of the Abbe Fraiicis Picquet, who established an Indian mission on the southern bank of the St. Lawrence, at a place then called Oswegatchie, now Ogdensburg, where, under the shadow of immense oak-forests, near the head of the Rapids, and in close vicinity to an admirable liiu- oour, he formed a little village of native con verts, and preached to them reliance 011 Christianity and devotion to France. In October, 1748 the month in which peace was definitively concluded, and long after it was known in America that pre liminaries had been signed orders were sent to the commandant at Detroit to oppose, even by force, all English establishments on the Maumee, the Wa- bash, and the Ohio ; and in every direction the French, as if to compensate themselves for the loss of Acadie and Cape Breton, were manifesting the most aggressive spirit and the most ambitious designs. In forwarding the memorial of Hutchinson and Oliver, the Governors of New York and Massa chusetts gave it as their opinion that the colonies, as regarded the contributions to a common defence, would never agree on quotas, which must therefore be settled by Royal instructions ; and they added that it would be necessary to enforce those instruc tions by some exercise of power, since, on former occasions, several of the plantations had paid little heed to the instructions sent out from England. This was touching on a dangerous question of pre rogative. The government of the plantations, even at a period subsequent to the Revolution of 1688, was held to belong, of right, exclusively to the Crown, which might depute its powers to local Councils and Assemblies, but could at any time rescind them at the mere will and pleasure of the monarch. In 1724, however, the Crown lawyers laid it down as a constitutional axiom that English colonies could be taxed only by some representative body of their own, or by the Par liament of England. Yet even the supremacy of Parliament was distasteful to the Americans, who persistently, and very naturally, asserted their right to determine such matters for themselves. Clinton and Shirley, on the other hand, relied a good deal on this Parliamentary authority, and resolved, with the concurrence of the home Govern ment, to use it as a means of forcing the colonists to do what was desired. The plan was to be first tried in New York. On the meeting of the As sembly of that province, in October, 1748, Clinton demanded a revenue for the King for at least five years. The Assembly replied that, from recent experience, they were convinced that the method of an annual support was the most wholesome, and they were confirmed in their opinion that the faithful representatives of the people would never depart from it. Clinton warned them of the anger of Parliament, and straightway prorogued the Assembly. He then wrote to the Secretary of State, the Duke of Bedford, saying that the repre sentatives of the people had set up themselves as the high court of appeal in American affairs ; that they had virtually taken all the public money into their own hands, and issued it without warrant from the Governor ; and that, by granting or with holding it according to their pleasure, they were creating a state of independence. He told his principal in plain terms that he could not again meet the Assembly without danger of exposing the King s authority and himself to contempt, unless his Majesty made a good example for all America by regulating the government of New York. We are too apt, in criticising the events of that most pregnant epoch, to estimate the conduct of men in accordance with certain fixed principles, or rather prejudices, derived from the political ideas of a much later time. To judge with reason and with fairness, we must endeavour to throw our minds back to the middle of the eighteenth century, and to place ourselves, by a process of imaginative sympathy, in the position occupied by the chief actors 011 both sides of the Atlantic. In. America, a number of communities had arisen, with interests to some extent distinct from those of the mother country, with perfectly legitimate and natural aspirations after the substantial part of self-govern ment, and with a proved capacity of administration which fairly took them out of the state of tutelage. In England was a government partly liberalised by the Revolution of sixty years before, and by the traditions of that earlier day which had been moulded by the great characters of Hampden, Cromwell, and Milton ; in part, still influenced by mediaeval conceptions of aristocratical predominance, by the mitigated divine right of kings, and the qualified prelacy of a Protestant State Church. England and America were in fact preparing to fight over again, as between one another, the same battle of prerogative and privilege which, a hundred years before, had been fought out between contend ing parties in England itself, and which had resulted in a species of compromise. But the governing classes in England could not see this, and their blindness is not very surprising. We judge America by all that it has since become, and by the aid of 1748.] ENGLAND AND AMERICA. 537 that plenitude of knowledge which facility of inter communication, newspaper correspondence, and the wide diffusion of literature, have secured to us. They judged by the existing state of things, and by a very imperfect knowledge even of that. The men of those days saw in the American colonies so many offshoots from the main English trunk, and offshoots which had evinced a very unmistakable dis position to live a separate life. They found beneath the shadow of the English Crown a set of nascent republics, which, together with many republican virtues, had some republican failings. A turbulent commonalty not unfrequently rather oppressed than controlled the Executive. Jealousy of the parent State was carried, on some occasions, to the extent of petulant defiance. That quality of " peevish ness " wliich English agents had discerned in Mas sachusetts in the days of Charles II., was now very generally apparent in the plantations both of north and soxith. Even in South Carolina, which was not the province most inclined to democratic ideas, levelling principles prevailed (according to the report of the Governor to the Duke of Bedford), and the frame of civil government was unhinged. In North Carolina, the servants of the Crown were often left unpaid for a long while, and at best were rewarded but parsimoniously ; while in many of the colonies the salary of the Governor was voted from year to year, and made more or less, according as he pleased or displeased the majority of the Assembly a position of ignominy which the home Government should never have allowed to grow into a precedent. The local administrations, more over, could agree amongst themselves as little as with the mother country. In the face of imminent danger from the French, they could not determine on any common measures of protection ; and, while the enemy was at the gates, they were engaged in disputations which an English Minister may fairly be excused for considering factious, however plainly they may have seemed to American eyes essential to the freedom and well-being of the citizen. It must also be recollected that the position of England at that date was such as to encourage a certain haughtiness. A cai-eer of extraordinary prosperity was opening before her. Her trade partly, no doubt, through these very American colonies had increased enormously within the century. The seat of commerce was shifting from Amsterdam to London. The English navy, wliich less than a hundred years before had scarcely been able to cope with that of Holland, had now no equal on the seas. The English army, if not very successful in the late war, enjoyed at least the brilliant traditions of Marlborough s repeated vic tories, as the bequest of a generation immediately preceding that which then occupied the stage. England, long shut up within her insular limits, and reckoned of small account in the politics of Europe, had become a Power on the continent, with which other Powers knew they would have to reckon in the prosecution of any design they might conceive. Scotland and Ireland, the former sources of her weakness, were now adding to her strength, however reluctant, or even sullen, may have been their mood. Colonies of English growth were rising up in various parts of the globe. Even in India there were prospects of a great trading empire. In America the horizon was boundless, if only the rivalry of the French could be evercome. Then, the forests and prairies of the illimitable West might be made to feed the omni potence of English commerce, and English work shops might produce the manufactures that would be needed in towns yet unbuilt, on the sites of which the Indian still hunted, and wild beasts still found their lairs. But, to accomplish that end, it was necessary, in the opinion of English Ministers, that there should be greater unity of power, and a more assured subjection of the circumference to the centre. Their conception was far from wrong, though they did not go the right way to carry it out. At any rate, it clashed with colonial objects, and was doomed to failure. The desire in England was for dominion, to wliich no strong and spirited race, in the season of its adolescence, has ever been indifferent. In America, the instinct was for in dependence. Each feeling was natural where it existed ; and each was mingled with that alloy of selfishness which is common to all human policies and motives. The representations addressed to the English Government by Clinton, Shirley, and persons of equal authority in other colonies, had a great effect on the Duke of Bedford, and a still greater on the Earl of Halifax, President of the Board of Trade and Plantations. The management of the colonies, which in the reign of Charles II. had been in the hands of a Committee of the Privy Council, and which for many years had been shifted about from one body to another, was, in lf>96, confided by William III. to the Board of which Lord Halifax was now the head, and which was created especially for the purpose. But in some respects it was not well adapted to its ends. The Commissioners forming this Board had no seats in the Cabinet, and no access to the King. They could advise, but they could not decree ; they could deliberate, but they could do nothing to carry their deliberations into effect ; thev could issue instructions to the 538 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1749. colonies, but they were void of all power to enforce them. The Ministerial control of the plantations belonged to one of the sovereign s immediate ad visers. At that time, the foreign affairs of England were managed by two principal Secretaries of State, who were called the Secretaries of the Northern. and of the Southern Department ; and the latter was responsible for the Colonies as well. In Feb ruary, 1748, the Duke of Bedford succeeded the Duke of Newcastle in the Southern Department ; and he and the Earl of Halifax agreed that some thing should be done to vindicate the prerogative of the Crown in the plantations, and to redress the abuses in their constitutions. But it was first essential to take measures to check the alarming advance of the French in the western and northern parts of America. The valley of the Ohio, west of the Alleghany or Appalachian chain of mountains, was at that time almost unpeopled by white men. The expedi tion across the range, xindertaken by the Virginians in 1714, at the instigation of Governor Spotswood, had resulted in the planting of a few trading-houses and log-cabins in that wild region ; but scarcely anything had been done in the way of actual settle ment. The Earl of Halifax, with the sanction of the Cabinet, determined in 1749 that the territory should be colonised by England. The project had been suggested by Lawrence and Augustine Wash ington, of Virginia (relatives of the great man who was soon to render himself so illustrious), and by others acting with them ; and the King s instruc tions to the Governor of Virginia directed him to grant to John Hanbury and his associates in Mary land and Virginia five hundred thousand acres of land between the Monongahela and the Kanawha, or on the northern margin of the Ohio. The members of the association, which went by the name of the Ohio Company, were to pay no quit-rent for ten years ; within seven years they were to settle at least one hundred families in the territory indi cated ; and they were immediately to build a fort at their own cost, and to garrison the same.* The privilege of exclusive trade with the Indians was conferred on the company a favour which excited great anger in the private traders of Virginia and Pennsylvania who had already, at great risk to themselves, penetrated into the desert. The Indians also were offended by the way in which possession was taken of their grounds, without any equivalent being offered, or permission asked; and the sus picions of the red men were aroused by the myste rious manner in which the English agents answered * Bancroft. their questions as to the object of the sudden inroad. As these tribes were not well-disposed towards the French, and could therefore have been easily conciliated by a few presents and a courteous demeanour, it was the more regrettable that their ill-will was thus unnecessarily provoked. Their alliance against the French was certainly desirable; for the latter had taken up a position in advance of the English, whose project had come to their knowledge. Early in 1749. La Galissoniere sent a party of men to trace and occupy the valley of the Ohio, and that of the St. Lawrence as far as Detroit, and formally to take possession of the whole region for the King of France. With respect to Nova Scotia, it was considered advisable by the Ministers of George II. to intro duce a considerable English element into the population, as a check upon the French. A large number of soldiers and sailors had been discharged from service at the peace. Unaccustomed for some years to industrial occupations, and disposed to the wild and adventurous habits which war engenders, these men, in many instances, became a danger to the community, and, for want of regular employ ment, not seldom fell into crime. The English Ministers of that day, and particularly the Earl of Halifax, President of the Board of Trade and Plantations, conceived that the establishment of a strong force of disbanded fighting-men in Nova Scotia would at once promote their own good and that of the colony, considered as an appendage of the British Crown. The design was supported both by the King and Parliament, and the latter- voted, in the first instance, the sum of 40,000 towards the execution of the plan. It was hoped in this way to clear large tracts of ground still covered with primeval forests, to form new com munities of English origin, and to develops the fisheries of the coasts. The proposals publicly put forward in 1749 promised to every private soldier or seaman who was willing to settle, with or without a family, in Nova Scotia, the fee-simple, or perpetual possession, of fifty acres of land, free for ten years from the payment of any quit-rents or taxes, and at no time liable to ;t higher tax than one shilling per annum for every fifty acres. In. addition to the original grant, each head of a family was to receive another allotment of ten acres for every individual, in cluding women and children, belonging to his family. Further grants were to be made as the number increased, and were to be proportioned to the degree f ability in agriculture exhibited by the colonists. Officers were to receive a larger number of acres, according to the rank which they 174. FOUNDING OF HALIFAX. 539 had held in the army or navy. It was further guaranteed that the lands should be parcelled out as soon as possible after the arrival of the colo nists, and the establishment of a civil government which would secure to them all the liberties and privileges of British subjects ; that they and their families should be conveyed to Nova Scotia, and supported for a year, at the expense of the Go vernment; and that they should be supplied with arms and ammunition, and with such materials and implements as might be necessary for the pro secution of the fisheries aud of agriculture.* Nearly four thousand adventurers, with their families, sailed from England in the early summer of 1719, under the direction of Colonel Edward Cornwallis (uncle of the celebrated Lord Cornwallis), and arrived in the harbour of Chebucto, situated about midway between Cape Canseau and Cape Sable. As a haven, for ships, the harbour could not readily be surpassed ; but the surrounding country presented the most gloomy prospect to the emigrants, even at that season of the year. Vast woods of oak, fir, pine, and birch, spread down to the water s edge with one sombre continuity of shadow. Beneath the wild and dusky canopy of entangled branches, a soil sterile and rocky seemed to defie culture. The land was a solitude ; not a clear spot was visible in the whole dreary waste of forest. It was necessary to begin the work of colonisation from the very beginning ; and it was also desirable to be pi epared, in a military sense, against all emergencies. Two regiments of infantry from Cape Breton, and a company of rangei s from Annapolis, joined Governor Cornwallis in a little while ; and the site of a new town was ultimately decided on. It lay close to the harbour, on an ascent which commanded a prospect of the entire peninsula, and which was well supplied with rivulets. Before the approach of winter, at least three hundred timber houses had been roofed in, and the whole had been surrounded by a strong palisade. The town thus commenced was called Halifax, after the President of the Board of Trade and Plantations. At another locality, now called Lower Horton, a blockhouse was raised, and roughly fortified ; and a second fort was erected at Pcsaquid, near Windsor. The settlers maintained their ground, but for a long time the scheme did not answer. This was certainly owing to no want of liberality on the part of the English Parliament ; for pecuniary grants in aid were made year after year, and in 17-35 had amounted to 400,000. The failure was partly to be attributed to the hostilities of the Indians, who * Smollett s History of England, were incited by the French to make frequent attacks on the emigrants ; partly to the want of familiarity with regular occupations which might have been anticipated in a number of disbanded soldiers and sailors. The fisheries were neglected ; agriculture made no progress ; and the colony was maintained by the bounty of Parliament, and the expenditure of the military and naval forces stationed there. The French population of Nova Scotia had in 1730 taken an oath of fidelity and submission to English rule, and had received a promise of freedom in the exercise of their religion, and of exemption from bearing arms against their own countrymen or. the Indians. They were called the French Neutrals, but their neutrality was of a very questionable order. Being, as regards religion, considered as belonging to the diocese of Quebec, they had frequent relations with Canada, and of course sided with their comrades on every occasion of dispute. In time of war, they co-operated with the Indians, furnished intelligence to the authorities in Canada, harassed the English settlers, and plotted to undermine the English power. However natural this conduct on their part, it was equally natural for the new possessors of the soil to object to such intrigues, and to seek means of self-protection. The French colonists were therefore informed, shortly after the arrival of the English colony, that they would be required to take an unconditional oath of allegiance. Sooner than do this, they professed their willingness to sell their lands and effects, and depart for France, where new homes would be pro vided for them. But Cornwallis would not listen to such terms, and demanded unconditional allegi ance, on pain of confiscation of all their property. The Micmac Indians were at the same time required to conduct themselves with greater circumspection : they replied in a tone of defiance. " The land on which you sleep," said the Micmac chief to Corn wallis, "is mine. I sprang o\it of it as the grass does ; I was born on it from sire to son ; it is mine for ever." Thus bearded, the council at Halifax the infant town, then only just beginning to take form out of the dense woods, for it was no later than the 1st of October, 1749 voted a resolution describing all the aborigines of the peninsula as " so many banditti, ruffians, or rebels ;" and Corn wallis offered for every one of them, alive or dead, ten guineas, to be paid on producing the savage or his scalp. It was a cruel and disgraceful measure ; but it had not been passed without provocation. The same year saw th? first actual colonisation of Vermont. As early as 17-H, the Massachusetts Government had established Fo.i Diunmer in this 540 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1750. territory : but the region was claimed by the French, who gave to it, on account of the green mountains scattered over its surface, the name by which it is still known. Nothing like a regular settlement took place ; but the land was coveted by many. New Hampshire and New York also con ceived that they had a claim to the country ; and, in 1749, Benning Wentworth, the Governor of the former of those colonies, assigned to certain persons a township, six miles square, situated four-and- twenty miles to the east of Hudson s River, and the south-eastern with the noith-western part of Nova Scotia a force of soldiers under the command of La Corne, a man of extreme views and violent passions. The French inhabitants of the village or small town of Chiegnecto, or Beaubassin, now Fort Lawrence, had given shelter to La Corne through out the winter of 1749-50; and, although the place lay beyond the limits which that officer was directed to defend, he required the people to take the oath of allegiance to Louis XV. The inhabi tants of even remoter settlements were commanded C.&NSEAU POINT. six miles north of the northern boundary of Mas sachusetts. He continued for some years after to confer grants of land on the western side of the river Connecticut, being under the impression that New Hampshire extended by right as far west as Massachusetts. Vermont, therefore, became the subject of complicated disputes, which were not finally adjusted until after the War of Independence. But the cession of the township in 1749, by the act of Governor Wentworth of New Hampshire, must be regarded as the commencement of what after wards developed into a separate State. The establishment of the English colony at Halifax greatly annoyed, and even alarmed, the French. They planted on the isthmus connecting to renounce subjection to England, and to seek re fuge with the French. Thus, at the commencement of 1750, a French army, strengthened by Indian auxiliaries, occupied the whole tract of country from Chiegnecto along the north side of the Bay of Fundy to the river Kennebec ; and the French Neutrals in territory confessedly English were in cited to quit their lands, and reinforce the rival Power. The Indians, also, had again appeared in arms against the settlers in Halifax and the vicinity; and the situation seemed so menacing that Cernwallis contemplated making a speedy attempt to recover Chiegnecto. He needed assis tance, however, and he sought for it from the Government of Massachusetts. It was answered 1750.] COLLISION ON THE MESSAGOUCHE. 541 that, by the constitution of the province, the Assembly could do nothing without being first con vinced of the necessity of raising supplies. Such a conviction, it might have been supposed, would not have been very difficult to arrive at ; but Mas sachusetts was content to do nothing, though its that province had just been made by the French, in the direction of the Penobscot ; and that attempts to seduce the Six Nations were being renewed. Cornwallis was therefore left to do what he could with the force at his disposal. He sent from Halifax a party of four hundred Vieu of v Industry cfyZtavtn erf Canada in makina 3>ams to Stop y Coune of .ivultt . in ordtrlo -form ajntatlrakt , abcut u> . tftev tuild their afabitations. la ifect thin they jell tarae Trees with theirTeeth. in Jtuh A manner at to make them came CrcJiyJiivu \let. to lay v foundation ofy Z>am: they makeJtortar. work up, and finish v ifMe tirith jreat order and. uvnderfull Zte *av*n hare two l>oors to their l^otlaes , one to tfm water and the other to thtZand Jtde .A NIAGARA AND THE BEAVER DAMS. (From Moll s " Neio and Exact Map," 1715.) own safety was not very remotely concerned. Shirley had by this time gone to Europe, to act as one of the English commissaries in the approaching discussions with France as to the disputed boundaries in America ; and Spencer Phipps, the Lieutenant- Governor, had no great influence with the Assembly at Boston. In reply to his suggestion that an expedition should be sent to Nova Scotia, it was stated that Massachusetts itself would need all its forces for self-protection ; that an encroachment on 46 men, who, at sunset on the 20th of April, 1750, arrived not far from the entrance to what is now called Cumberland Basin, near the little town of Chiegnecto. On the following morning, the French priest, La Loutre, set fire to the church ; the in habitants burnt their houses to ashes ; and all escaped across the river Messagouche into a district less certainly English. Lawrence, the English commander, landed on the northern bank of this stream on the 22nd, and had an interview with La 542 CASSELL S HISTOBY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1750. Corne, but without obtaining any satisfactory assurances. The position held by that officer was a very strong one ; he was said to have under his command two thousand five hundred fighting men, including Indians ; and Lawrence felt that he had no choice but to withdraw, leaving the French in possession of the isthmus. In the following August, Chiegnecto, which had by that time been again occupied by the Acadians, was seized by another military force from Halifax, after a sharp skirmish ; and Fort Lawrence was built by the English on the southern bank of the Messagouche. The French, however, were strongly fortified on the op posite bank, and they held with a firm grasp the whole of continental Nova Scotia. Thus, while negotiators were preparing to discuss the question of boundaries, blood had already been shed, and the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle was virtually at an end. CHAPTER LXI. Meeting at Paris of the Commission for the Settlement of Boundaries Vicissitudes of Nova Scotia The Arguments of the English and of the French Proceedings of the Ohio Company Explorations, of Christopher Gist in the Western Terri tory Interview of Gist with the Indians Repudiation of the French Alliance Dissensions in the English Ministry Resignation of the Duke of Bedford Collision at Sea with French Vessels Dealings of French and English with the Indians Proceedings in England with reference to the American Colonies Representations of the English Ambassador at Paris Illusive Promises of the French Government Tragical Incident at New York Early Life of George Washington His First Military Employment Expedition to Fort Le Bceuf Interview with the French Commanding Officer Perils and Hardships of the Return Journey. ENGLAND and France had, by their military repre sentatives, already come to a rupture in Nova Scotia when, in September, 1750, the commissioners appointed by both Powers to settle the question of boundaries met at Paris. The shedding of blood at Chiegnecto rendered a peaceful settlement of the disputed points all the more unlikely ; but in truth it was at no time probable. Each side was avari cious of terrritory and influence ; neither side was disposed to bate a jot of its most extreme preten sions. The original rights of the two Powers were extremely difficult to ascertain, and the artificial rights conferred by treaties had inherited some portion of the primitive obscurity. It is probable that the whole coast of that part of America was discovered by the Cabots in 1497 ; but the English neither explored nor took possession of the disputed country, which was first examined and colonised by the French in 1604. The land called by the French Acadie, and by the English Nova Scotia, was granted in 1621 to Sir William Alexander; but the French held their ground, and, by the Treaty of St. Germain, in 1632, the territory was made over to them. It was again seized by the English under the rule of Cromwell, and again handed over to France by the Treaty of Breda in 1667. The country once more passed into the hands of the English during Queen Anne s war, and was ceded to Great Britain by the Treaty of Utrecht, in 1 7 1 3. But the definition of boundaries was at that time left to be settled by some future arrangement, and had ever since remained un determined. Shirley, the Governor of Massachusetts, was placed at the head of the English commission of 1750, and at the first sitting he presented a memo rial claiming for his country all the land east of the Penobscot and south of the St. Lawrence, on the ground that it was included within the ancient limits of Acadie. The French, on the other hand, not only denied that the north-western or con tinental part of Nova Scotia (now called New Brunswick) formed at any time a part of Acadie, but laid claim even to a large portion of the penin sula as well, urging that the term Acadie never extended beyond a narrow strip of land lying on the Atlantic between Cape St. Mary and Cape Canseau. On behalf of the English, it was shown that the French themselves, in various official documents treaties, commissions to local officers, despatches from ambassadors, &c. had given to Acadie the very limits for which Great Britain was now contending. In particular, it was proved that, in the year 1662, when France revived her claim to the province in question, after its conquest by Cromwell, which had been neither adopted nor .repudiated by the restored monarchy, the French Minister at the court of London assigned the river St. Lawrence as the northern boundary of the country, and Pentagoet, on the borders of New England, as the western. At the Treaty of Breda, France thought her right to this ter ritory, and the general designation of Acadie, so clear that she desired no specification of limits in that document, but was content with the simple statement that Acadie should be re- 1750.] FRENCH AND ENGLISH CLAIMS. 543 stored ; and, in a dispute which afterwards arose as to the execution of the treaty, France reasserted the foregoing as the limits of Acadie, and ultimately obtained possession of the country so denned. On many other occasions, she either alleged or admitted the same boundaries ; and by the Treaty of Utrecht she was understood to transfer, as Acadie or Nova Scotia, the same tract of country as that she had previously received. The French commissioners of 1750, however, contended that the ancient limits of Acadie, referred to in that treaty, were different from those contemplated by the Treaties of St. Germain and Breda, and were to be interpreted by old maps and the statements of historians, from which, they said, it appeared that the geographical term in dispute was originally restricted to the south-eastern part of the peninsula. They added that the commissions of the French Government to which the English agents had referred were to be understood as indicating Acadie and the surround ing country, not Acadie only ; that New France was a province in itself; and that many places claimed by the English as parts of Acadie were named in French commissions of government as belonging to New France. Furthermore, they argued that the opinions of a State with regard to the limits of any country could not be inferred from declarations made during the negotiation of a treaty ; and that the express restitution made by the Treaty of St. Germain, and the possession taken by France in conseqxience of the Treaty of Breda, were facts of no import or value in the matter then under discussion.* These arguments were very far from convincing the English commissioners, who showed that the French historians, Champlain and Denys, them selves assigned to Acadie the very limits now asserted by England. Even some of the French maps confirmed this view, though others gave different boundaries to the disputed territory. Smollett, who writes with considerable heat and vehemence on this question, charges the French with having used every art of cavilling, chicanery, and procrastination, to defeat the manifest justice of the English claim, and with producing false maps and charts of the country, in which the rivers and boundaries were misplaced and misrepresented. The same assertions are made by another historian with more detail. It is alleged that M. Bellin, the geographer, who had published a set of maps of the countiy, afterwards issued another set, as the first were held to be too favourable to the English contention. Shirley pointed out this valuation to M. Bellin, and told him that a hundred copies of the first maps were dispersed in London ; on which the geographer, after a momentary start of sur prise, observed, " We in France must follow the commands of the King."t It is well known that the French were in the habit of putting forth false maps, to confuse the real boundaries of their possessions, and mislead rival claimants ; and it is very possible that the trick was resorted to on the present occasion. The English claim certainly seems much better supported than that of the French. In the estimation of the latter, the name Acadie meant two very different things, according as they were to receive or to relinquish territory. While these matters were being discussed at Paris, events in America were drawing nearer to a climax. The occupation of the Ohio valley by the English was regarded by the French with great jealousy, and the tribes in alliance with the former were threatened with serious consequencea To many in New York it seemed a necessity to form some species of union among the several colonies, as a measure of self- protection, or Ohio would be lost. Clinton, the Governor of New York, pro posed to the Governors of other colonies in alliance with Indian nations that they should send com missioners to meet the native chiefs at Albany; but the invitation was not generally accepted, owing, as Clinton expressed it, to the penurious temper of the American Assemblies. The territory granted to the Ohio Company, and the savages inhabiting it, were thus endangered ; but the members of the association made the most of their opportunities. The Indian hunters, who had traversed the whole country, and knew every wind ing of its streams, and every fold of its woody hills, pointed out to the white men a passage to the river Ohio by Will s Creek. Other discoveries followed, and the directors of the Company gave instructions to a well-known explorer, named Christopher Gist, to examine the western country to the Falls of the Ohio, to collect whatever in formation might be required by intending settlers, and to look out for a large tract of level land. He started from the Potomac on the 31st of October, 1750, crossed the Alleghanies, and plunged into a wide country, scattered over with the villages of Indian tribes, some adhering to the English, and others to the French. But the Governor of Canada had by that time announced that he would treat as enemies any English subjects who should settle near the Ohio, or even trade with the Indian inhabitants of that region ; and he had already * Smollett s History of England. t Smith s History of New York. 544 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1751, seized and imprisoned some of the traders. The forts erected by the French between Quebec and New Orleans were being turned to account as places of confinement for adventurous Englishmen and Anglo-Americans who presumed to trade with the natives beyond a certain limit. The Wyandots urged Gist to make a similar stand on behalf of his own nationality ; to bring great guns, and build a fort. They were so angry at the capture of the English traders that they would have revenged it by killing three French deserters, if Gist would have allowed them. Yet the question of giving support to the English they referred to the decision of a general council. In the early part of 1751, Gist, now accompanied by Croghan, the representative of Pennsylvania, whom he found among the Wyandots, pursued his way, and, crossing the Scioto, entered a region which had never before been traversed by white men. The country for the most part was level and richly wooded. Small streams, welling from unknown sources, seemed to thread the land with silver ; here and there, large prairies spread out from the edges of the woodlands, presenting a fair expanse of wild grasses and wild flowers ; turkeys, deer, elks, and herds of buffaloes, were to be seen in every direc tion. Still pressing westward, the explorers swam their horses over the Great Miami, and floated their goods and saddles across on a raft of logs. Entering a village of the Picqualennees, with the English colours flying, they were received as honoured guests in the house of the sachem, and were allowed to plant their flag upon the roof. The friendship of these Indians was an important point to secure ; for the Miamis formed a confede racy even more powerful than the Six Nations, with whom they were in amity. Their influence reached to the Mississippi, and, having long traded with the English, they were disposed to a friendly alliance. A grand council was held ; speeches were made, explanations given, and presents ex changed ; the calumet was smoked ; and, finally, articles of peace and mutual support were drawn up between the English of Pennsylvania, on the one side, and two of the Indian tribes, on the other. Four Ottawas now approached with a present from the Governor of Canada. Being admitted to the council, they desired a renewal of friendship with the French ; to which the chieftain of the Piankeshaws replied, " The path to the French is bloody, and was made so by them. We have cleared a road for our brothers, the English, and your fathers have made it foul, and have taken some of our brothers prisoners. This we look upon as done to us." Subsequently, in the presence of the Ottawa ambassadors, the war- chief of the town of Picqua (which contained some four hundred families, and, for an Indian town, was a place of considerable strength) stood up, and, apostrophising the French as if they were present, said : " Fathers ! you have desired we should go home to you ; but I tell you it is not our home, for we have made a path to the sun-rising, and have been taken by the hand by our brothers the English, the Six Nations, the Dela wares, the Shawnees, and the Wyandots ; and we assure you that in that road we will go. And as you threaten us with war in the spring, we tell you, if you are angry, that we are ready to receive you, and resolve to die here before we will go to you. That you may know this is our mind, we send you this string of black wampum," The French colours, which up to that moment had been standing side by side with the English in the chief house of the town, where the council had been held, were taken down, and the Ottawas were dismissed. Then the confederated tribes burst into the raging war-dance and the wild music of their race, and the warriors recited their martial deeds, and boasted of what they would do in the future. Gist left on the 1st of February, and, after examining a good deal more of the magnificent country now included in the western States of the American Union, returned to the eastern settlements in the early spring.* The action of the English Government with respect to France and Nova Scotia was hampered by dissen sions among the Ministers, and by considerable doubt as to what should be done with the colonies them selves in the matter of their internal order. The Duke of Bedford, Secretary of the Southern Department, and therefore Minister of the Colonies, was at issue with the Duke of New castle, who held the seals of the Northern Depart ment. Newcastle had himself presided over the former from 1724 to 1748. He had been appointed by Sir Robert Walpole, and had carried out his illustrious master s policy of interfering as little as possible with the American plantations more, perhaps, from indolence than from liberality of sentiment. It is asserted that during his whole term of office he believed New England to be an island, and sent despatches to it under that desig nation ; and Horace Walpole whose statements^ however, are always open to the suspicion of badinage says he did not know but that Jamaica was in the Mediterranean. However this may be, he had no serious rupture with the colonies, and, on finding the conduct of affairs growing difficult, * Bancroft, and the authorities cited by him. 1751.] COLONIAL AFFAIRS. 545 he prudently withdrew from the Southern to the Northern Department. His successor in the ad ministration of the plantations was a man of superior ability, of more force of character, of greater industry, and of more distinct ideas as to how the dependencies of the Crown should be managed. In place of the easy acquiescence of Newcastle, he exhibited a restless desire to assert in America the authority of the mother country. It was not long before the two Secretaries, New castle and Bedford, were at issue with one another. Newcastle greatly desired to get rid of his colleague ; and the Prime Minister, Henry Pelham (the Duke of Newcastle s brother), thought the Earl of Hali fax the person best adapted to the post. On the subject of war with France, Halifax had very dif ferent ideas from his superior, the Duke of Bedford. He was in favour of a vigorous policy in support of the English claims with respect to Nova Scotia, and would at once have sent ships of war to the spot, without waiting for the chance of an accom modation by the commissioners at Paris. Bedford dreaded the expense of a war, and thought that some pacific compromise might be reached. But it so happened that the Colonial Minister was no favourite with the King. Newcastle, therefore, found in the Royal ear a ready recipient of all his complaints, which he lost no opportunity of deposit ing there ; and Bedford, coming to a knowledge of these intrigues, obtained an audience of the sove reign, in June, 1751, denounced the conduct of his fellow-Minister, and resigned. Halifax, however, did not obtain the seals of the Southern Depart ment, as he had hoped. Newcastle was jealous of his rising talents, and the Earl of Holderness was appointed to the vacant place ; but Halifax was at the same time assured that the whole patronage and correspondence of the colonies should be vested in the Board of Trade and Plantations, of which he was the President. The Ministerial dissensions culminating in these changes led to the abandon ment of those measures for the abolition of the American charters, and for the introduction of the Church of England into the colonies, which had formed part of the policy of the Duke of Bedford, and of which some account has been given in a previous Chapter. The chances of war were increased by a collision at sea which occurred, towards the close of 1750, between a French brigantine and an English ship of war off Cape Sable, on the south coast of Nova Scotia. The French vessel, which was accompanied by a schooner laden with provisions and warlike stores, was proceeding from Quebec to the river St. John s, when she was encountered by the Albany, commanded by Captain Rous. Not taking any heed of the guns which were fired to bring her to, and showing signs of resistance, the brigantine received a broadside and a volley of small arms. A sharp fight ensued, and in a little while the French vessel was compelled to strike her colours. On the side of the English, three men had been killed ; on that of the French, five. Thus, blood had been spilt, both on land and by sea, while the negotia tions of the commissioners were yet undetermined. The brigantine was afterwards taken to Halifax, and condemned in the Admiralty Court. The French were furious at this act of war while peace was yet nominally existing between the two nations. They complained that they - had been insulted and plundered, and that their countrymen had been slain in resisting a piratical attack. But it should not be forgotten that the vessels were engaged in the transport of warlike stores; that they refused to stop when required to do so after the usual fashion in such cases ; that they prepared for action before the English fired in anger ; and that the whole conduct of the French in Nova Scotia, for some time past, had been such as to create a virtual state of war. France, consequently, seems to have had small ground for just complaint; but it is obvious that such an incident made the final rupture all the more certain. Still, both sides hung back from avowed hostili ties ; yet they made their preparations none the less. The Iroquois, assembling in council at Albany on the invitation of Clinton, the Governor of New York, promised eternal fidelity to the Eng lish ; while, on the other hand, the French made attempts, through the agency of their ever-active priests, to convert the Six Nations. In 1751, they launched an armed vessel on Lake Ontario; they fortified their trading-house at Niagara, and en deavoured forcibly to prevent the congress of the Indians at Albany ; and they concerted plans for taking vengeance on the Miamis, whom Gist had brought to the English alliance. Two Frenchmen, at the head of two hundred and forty converted Indians, with . thirty Frenchmen as a reserve, appeared before the town of Picqua one morning in the summer of 1752, while the greater number of the people were away hunting, and required the surrender of the English traders. It was refused, and the French then attacked the native fort (which had recently been strengthened by the English), and got possession of it, after a gallant defence. One of the English traders was killed, and five were taken prisoners. Fourteen of the Miamis fell during the action, and the ruler of the Piankeshaws, who had supreme command of the whole con- 546 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1752. federacy, was seized by the Indian allies of the French, slaughtered in cold blood, and eaten. This act of treacherous ferocity made the Miamis, the Delawares, and the Six Nations, still more deter mined to stand by the English, and a special messenger was despatched to the Lieutenant- Governor of Virginia with a belt of wampum, the scalp of a French Indian, and a feathered pipe, Lord Halifax was eager for an aggressive policy, and he was warmly supported by one of his col leagues at the Board of Trade, the brilliant and energetic Charles Townshend, author of the me morial on the limits of Acadie which Shirley had presented at the Paris conference, and, in the opinion of competent judges, the greatest living master of American affairs. Chiefly by his per- GEOKUE WASHINGTON. together with assurances of friendship, and earnest entreaties for arms and assistance. The Lieutenant- Governor at that time was a certain Scotchman, named Dinwiddie a man of intelligence and vigour. In December, 1752, he made a report to the Board of Trade on the state of affairs, asking for instructions as to his conduct towards the French, recommending a barrier of western forts, and xirging the advantage of cultivating the friend ship of the Miamis. The western tribes had already given permission to the Virginians to build a fort at the junction of the two rivers the Alleghany and the Monongahela which form the Ohio. suasion and that of Halifax, the Board advised the Secretary for the Southern Department to occupy the eastern bank of the Ohio at once, in anticipa tion of the manifest designs of France. It was at the same time suggested that taxes should be laid on North America by the mother country. A general stamp-act for America, and a modification of the acts of trade, were among the expedients proposed. It was desired to obtain a revenue, out of which settled salaries could be fixed on the Governors, and the cost of Indian alliances might be defrayed. In the prosecution of these ideas, the wise maxims of Sir Eobert "Walpole (then dead) WASHINGTON CROSSING THE ALLEGHANY. 548 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1753. were forgotten or disregarded. It must be admitted, however, that the Americans had done much to provoke this mistaken policy by their parsimonious and disrespectful treatment of the representatives of the Royal authority, and their lamentable want of union among themselves. The projects of colonial taxation were much discussed before Parliament took any steps in the matter ; but at length, in the spring of 1753, it was proposed in the House of Commons to abolish the export duty in the British West Indies, and to substitute imposts on all "West Indian produce brought into the northern colonies. The measure was not then passed. It was post poned, that various necessary inquiries might be made ; and in the meanwhile the colonies went on in their state of chaotic independence, threatened by the encroaching power of the French, yet un determined in their own minds as to how they should resist it. The Imperial Government was as much at fault as were those of the plantations. The King in Council decided that the valley of the Ohio was in the western part of Virginia, and that the attempts of the French to erect a fort in those parts were to be treated as an act of hostility. The Governor of Virginia was directed to call out the whole or a portion of his militia ; to build forts on the Ohio at the expense of the colony ; and to repel the enemy. But no assistance was sent over in the shape of troops, ships, or money; nothing but a few guns from the ordnance stores reached Virginia from England. The other colonies were required to render mutual aid in resisting all encroachments of France on the territory of England ; yet the King s Government did not even give the promise of assistance. The hands of the Ministry were tied by the fact that war had not yet been declared between France and England ; but events were moving towards that end. In the latter part of 1753, Lord Albemarle, the English Ambassador at Paris, presented to the French Government a memorial requiring in peremptory terms that satisfaction should be afforded to the inj Tired subjects of Great Britain; that the fort erected at Niagara should be evacuated and destroyed ; that positive orders should be issued to the French commanders in America to desist from further encroachments and attacks on the British settlements and colonists ; that all Englishmen taken prisoners should be set at liberty and in demnified ; and that the wrong-doers should be severely punished. Still, the French monarch hesitated as to war. His Ministers returned a courteous but evasive reply. The English Ambas sador was assured that orders should be sent to the Governor of Canada, of such a nature as would infallibly prevent all future cause of complaint and the British subjects seized in America, and then in France, were at once released. The instruc tions sent to Canada, however, were violated by the local authorities, and it is probable that this was done in accordance with a .private intimation to that effect. A tragical incident at New York gave a sombre colour to the closing months of 1753. SirD Anvers Osborne, brother-in-law of the Earl of Halifax, was appointed Governor of that province, and left Eng land with instructions originating with Lord Halifax and Charles Townshend, and confirmed by the Privy Council in presence of the King. The mind of the new Governor had, previous to starting, been to some extent unhinged by a private grief ; and during the voyage he seems to have been over come by a feeling of nervous apprehension as to the impossibility of his carrying out the policy he had been appointed to enforce. The preamble to the written instructions he carried with him described the New York Assembly as an undutiful, disloyal, and factious body, which had repeatedly violated the Royal prerogative by usurping a control over the expenditure of the public money. Osborne was to insist on the reformation of all such abuses, and particularly to require the establishment of a definite revenue for the service of the Govern ment, and the appropriation of a fixed salary to his own office. All money raised for the support of Government was, by his Majesty s express com mand, to be disposed of by wan-ant from the Governor, with the consent of the Council, and not otherwise. The money was to be levied, as before, by the Assembly, the members of which were from time to time to see the accounts of expenditure ; but if any member of the Council, or Ministerial officer holding a place of trust or profit, should in any manner whatever encourage, advise, or concur with the Assembly in passing, any act or vote whereby the Royal prerogative might be limited or impaired, or any money be raised or expended by methods different from those prescribed, the func tionary so offending should be degraded from his office by the Governor.* In the prolonged leisure of his passage across the Atlantic, Osborne had time to think over these instructions, and to discover in them the danger of a rupture with the colonists, such as he might not be able to deal with successfully. The people of New York equalled those of New England in the tenacity with which they clung to their privileges, and the stubborn determination with which they * Smollett. 1753.] GEORGE WASHINGTON. 549 resisted whatever appeared to them an excess of the Royal prerogative. Osborne began his work in a mood of despondency. On the 10th of October he took the oaths of office at New York, and the very same day received an address from the city council, plainly intimating that they would not suffer any infringement of their liberties, civil or religious. Next day, Osborne met the Council of the province, and communicated his instructions to them. With an expression of face and a tone of voice indicating great mental distress, he asked if those instructions would be obeyed. He was told that the Assembly would never comply with such requisitions. Heaving a deep sigh, he turned round, leant against the window-frame, and in a bewildered way exclaimed, " Then, why have I come here?" The task was impossible to a man of his nature, or to one in his then condition of mind. He spent the night in arranging his private affairs, and was found next morning hanging in the garden attached to his residence.* The chief authority then devolved on the Lieutenant- Governor, James Delancey, a native of New York, of Huguenot origin. The custom of annual grants, he assured the home Government, could never be surrendered; but the popular party in the Assembly relinquished their former claims to executive power, and consented that all disbursements of public money (excepting for the payment of their own clerk and their agent in England) should require the warrant of the Governor and Council, t The instructions to Osborne were in some improper way made public, and a feeling of bitter antagonism to England was thus aroused. The New York Govern ment shortly afterwards replied to the strictures of the mother country by charging Clinton with em bezzling public funds, and concealing the fraud by false accounts ; with deriving undue profits from extravagant grants of land, and from grants to him self under fictitious names : and with selling civil * O and military offices. These accusations, however, were never investigated. The province, likewise, made complaint that its Legislature had been directed to obey the King s instructions, which, though a rule of conduct to the Governor, could not be made the measure of obedience to the people, to whom the rule of obedience was positive law. The English Government signified its displeasure at this complaint by rejecting the address which * Smith s History of New York. The notification of the death in the Obituary of the Gentleman s Magazine for 1753 is curiously expressed. It runs : " Sir D Anvers Osborne, Bart., Governor of New York, soon after his arrival there ; in his garden. " The italics appear in the original. t Bancroft. contained it; but nothing was done towards enforc ing the King s orders. Amidst all this indecision and wrangling, the Government of Virginia made one vigorous attempt to counteract the movements of France an attempt especially worthy of remark from the fact of its first bringing on the scene the most conspicuous figure of American history. The illustrious George Washington was at that time a young man in the twenty-second year of his age. He is supposed to have descended from an old English family, con nected with the counties of Northampton, Lancas ter, and Durham; but his precise ancestry is now a matter of doubt. J His great-grandfather had settled in Westmoreland county, Virginia, about the year 1657. The father of the future first Presi dent died while George was only ten years old, and his education was conducted partly by his mother, and partly at one of the ordinary schools of the province. It was nothing more than the usual middle-class education of the eighteenth cen tury; but it included enough of mathematics to enable Washington to act as a land-surveyor. Of the classical languages he did not even learn the rudiments; and although, at a subsequent date, he endeavoured to acquire a knowledge of French, he appears to have failed, either from natural inaptitude, or from want of time. Those were days in which mere acquisition was not so highly valued as it is now ; yet future generations may think themselves fortunate if they have always a George Washington to their needs. The boyhood of this great man showed many evidences of that methodical precision which was always one of his characteristics. While yet quite early in his teens, he constructed diagrams and prepared tabular state ments. He wrote a neat, stiff hand ; he compiled " Rules of Behaviour in Company and Conversa tion " ; he surveyed the fields and plantations about the school where he was staying, and entered his measurements and calculations in a field-book with great exactness. In athletic exercises he was always foremost, and it was a favourite diversion, of his to form his schoolmates into companies, and engage them in sham fights. His ambition was to enter the English navy ; but his mother dissuaded him, and he began his work of land-surveying. When only sixteen, he was employed to examine the valleys of the Alleghany mountains a task t See "An Exposure of a Serious Error in the Pedigree of Washington," by Colonel Joseph Lemuel Chester, published in the Herald and Genealogist, Vol. IV., pp. 49 G3 (London, J. G. Nichols, 1867), wherein the author disproves the descent of Wasliington as hitherto accepted, and leaves the illustrious President, for the time, without an ancestor. 550 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1753. which was continued during the next three years, and performed with admirable skill and complete ness. It was no light or easy task, for the country was a wilderness, and the severities of the weather had no mitigation in those wild passes and un sheltered glens. He wrote to a schoolboy friend that on such occasions he was his own cook, and had no spit but a forked stick, no plate but a large chip ; that he rarely slept on a bed, and regarded a bear-skin as a splendid couch; that he frequently passed the night on a little hay, straw, or fodder; and that he often camped in the forest, and was glad to warm himself by the bivouac-fire. It was only for a few weeks at a time that he could en dure this life of hardship and deprivation; but after an interval of comparative rest and com fort, he would again seek the desert, carrying his instruments of science into the region of savage mountains, and the neighbourhood of savage men. When Washington was about nineteen years of age, Virginia was divided into mili tary districts, as a mea sure of protection against the advance of the French. Over each di vision an adjutant-gene ral, with the rank of major, was appointed. Washington was com missioned to one of these districts, and set dili gently to work to study military tactics under his brother and some other officers who had served in the expedition against Carthagena and in the West Indies. He was so good a soldier two years later (though part of his time had been spent in a voyage to Barbadoes, and a residence there of some months) that, when the number of mili tary divisions in Virginia was reduced to four, he was still left in command of one, and in this capacity had to train and instruct mili tary officers, to inspect men, arms, and accou trements, and to establish a uniform system of manoeuvres. At one-and-twenty years of age, he was performing the work of an experienced major- general ; and he was now selected by Governor Dinwiddie for a service which demanded great skill as well as daring. He was required to make his way across a mountainous desert, inhabited by Indians whose friendship could not, in all cases, be depended on ; to penetrate to the frontier sta tions of the French ; and to bring back information concerning their position and military strength, together with an answer from the French com AUTOGRAPH OF "WASHINGTON. mander as to why he had invaded the British dominions during a time of peace. The expedition was all the more onerous as winter was coming on. It was the 31st of October, 1753, ere Washington started from Williamsburg ; it was the middle of November when, with an interpreter, four attend ants, and Christopher Gist as a guide, he left Will s Creek, and followed an Indian trail into the dim mysteries of an unknown forest. The path took the little company farther and farther into the wilderness of fallen leaves and arching shades ; carried them over deep ravines and swollen streams, made additionally desolate by the sleet and snow which then began to fall ; and at length brought them, after a hurried ride of nine days, to the fork of the Ohio, where the penetrating glance of Washington saw the finest capabilities for planting a commercial city.- The party swam their horses across the Alleghany, and slept that night on "^ the north-west bank of the river. On the fol lowing morning, the chief of the Delawares conducted them through _JX* -rf^ an open country to the ^ Cf/^^~^^ valley of Logstown, / where they were cor- ,Sj dially received by the Indians, with whom they planned a series of operations against the French, in the event of the latter still refusing to quit the country. Accom panied by several of the natives, Washington and his friends again set forward, and reached the French post at Venango, where the officers very frankly avowed their resolve to take possession of the Ohio. They boasted of their forts at Le Bceuf, Erie, Niagara, Toronto, and Frontenac, and said that the English, owing to their dilatori- ness, would be unable, though two to one, to prevent any enterprise of the French. From this point, the Virginian envoys made their way, across creeks so swollen by the December rains as to be passable only over felled trees, towards the fort of Le Bceuf, situated at Waterford. Rain and snow fell on them with pitiless severity ; they were often engulfed in miry swamps, and were so ill-provided with food as to be compelled to kill bucks and bears for their sustenance. On gaining Fort Le Bceuf, they found it surrounded by the rough, log-built barracks of the soldiers. In front lay fifty birch- bark canoes, and a hundred and seventy boats of pine, ready for the descent of the river; while, close by, materials were collected for building more. 1754.] BEN J AMDT FRANKLIN. 551 St. Pierre, the commander of the fort, was a man of great courage, of large experience, and of so much integrity that he was at once feared and beloved by the savages. With the loyalty of a soldier, he refused to discuss with young Washington the abstract question of right. He had been placed there by his chief, and would execute the orders he had received. To the letter from Dinwiddie which Washington delivered, requiring the evacuation of the place, and the relinquishing of other recent en croachments in the same quarter, St. Pierre replied by a direct refusal, and an intimation of his purpose to seize every Englishman within the Ohio valley. Having executed his commission, Washington, with his companions, turned homeward. The return journey was worse than the journey out; for it was now the depth of winter, and, having to cross many creeks and small rivers, the envoys suffered severely from the rigour of the season. Once, a canoe which they now had with them was driven against the rocks ; at other times they were obliged to carry it across the half-frozen streams ; often they waded through water which congealed upon their clothes. Snow fell heavily, and a bitter frost set in. Washington and Gist, separating themselves from the others, struck across the open country towards the Fork of the Ohio, steering their way by the compass. But the deadly cold was not the only peril they had to encounter. Hostile Indians lay in wait for the travellers, and one fired at Washington as he passed. He was taken prisoner, and Gist was for putting him to death, but his companion would not allow it. The captive was released at night ; but the two white men, dreading further treachery, continued walking throughout the hours of darkness, and all next day until the night again closed in. Then, lying down under the shelter of the forest, they slept for awhile, feeling safe now from the attack of lurking foes. The Alleghany was crossed on a raft laboriously constructed out of trees which they had first to fell. The passage of the river was rendered difficult and dangerous by floating ice, and Washing ton, in manoeuvring the raft, was thrown into the benumbing current. He and his companion got to a small island, and passed the night there : in the morning, the river was entirely frozen over, and they crossed on foot.* On the 16th of January, 1754, Washington again found himself at the Virginian capital. The journal of his expedition, which was published shortly afterwards, gave his countrymen a very high idea of his sagacity, self- reliance, and powers of observation ; and his minute description of the fort which he had visited of its form, size, construction, and number of cannon advanced his reputation as a military critic. That winter s journey had brought a new actor on the stage of the woi ld. CHAPTER LXII. Benjamin Franklin His Early Career, Genius, and Character Congress at Albany in 1754 Franklin s Proposals for a Federal Union of the Provinces Chief Features of the Plan American and English Objections to it Franklin s Opinion of the Project in Later Years Plan of the British Government Proposals by Franklin for the Representation of America in the British Parliament Franklin on the Prospects of "Western America Want of Union among the Colonists on the Subject of Colonial Defence Hostile Movement of the French Despatch of "Washington to the Great Meadows His Defeat of the French, and Subsequent Surrender at Fort Necessity Warlike Preparations of the English Government Despatch of Troops to America Plan of a Campaign Negotiations between France and England, and Actual Commencement of Hostilities. WHILE the boy George Washington was studying at school, surveying the outlying fields, or mar shalling his young comrades in the ranks of mimic battle, a man old enough to be his father, but who nevertheless lived to see the Federal Republic of America fairly launched, was already exercising a remarkable influence on the course of affairs in that part of the world. In Benjamin Franklin we have a type of the young American genius, unfettered by tradition, unimpressed by authority, trying all things by the simple rule of utility, believing nothing but the actual and the rational, not much inclined to reverie, yet seeing with clear eyes the future greatness of the land. It was fit that this representative of a trading community should come of plebeian stock. Washington, who was to be the sword of the Republic, and in a certain sense its king, belonged to the landed gentry of Virginia to that body which has always been the aristocracy of America, Franklin, who was to head the long and ever-increasing list of its authors and its men of science, was born of homely parents in the country of equality and toil, of thought and speculation in that New England which Puritans had founded, but which was fast outgrowing the arbitrary bounds of Puritanism. He was the son of Josiah Franklin, a native * Bancroft. 552 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1754. of Ecton in Northamptonshire, who, flying from the ill-usage of the Dissenters in the reign of Charles II., settled at Boston, where he engaged in the business of a soap-boiler and tallow-chandler. In the chief city of Massachusetts, Benjamin was born in January, 1706. When a boy, he, like "Washington, had a wish to go to sea; but love of books lured him from that desire, and he became a printer in the office of his elder brother. He was an author at fifteen years of age, writing sharp little satirical pieces for the columns of his brother s newspaper, the New England Courant the fourth journal established in America. It is a curious sign of the advance which had by that time been made in freedom of expression, that this paper spoke of religious knaves as the worst of all. The Puritan circles were in a ferment at suoh audacity. Old Increase Mather, dreaming of compositor, had been worked at press by the same hands, and again by the same hands had been de livered at the houses of the subscribers. Never theless, Benjamin did not get on well with his brother. The boy occupied the position of an apprentice, and it is said that James exercised the rights which were at that time commonly supposed to be inherent in a master, and beat the lad when ever he thought him remiss in his duty. A clever young fellow, strong enough to make a little commotion in the state, will not submit to be beaten, even by an elder brother; and Benjamin Franklin fled from the printing office and from his native city, to seek his fortune elsewhere. Failing to get employment at New York, he walked to the city of Burlington, in New Jersey, rowed himself down the Delaware to Philadelphia (a distance of fifteen miles), and, with no more than a dollar in The Bofton News*Letter Prom 17.1:0 Apii Printed by B.Grct* SoW "by yr at J 5Kop Tiejrtfc FAC-SIMTLE OF THE ORIGINAL HEADLINE OF THE BOSTON NEWS-LETTER. the fine persecuting days of his youth and middle age, said he could well remember when the civil government would have taken effectual means to suppress " such a cursed libel." In spite of this reminiscence, the cursed libels went on ; and when the Council appointed a censor over James Franklin s press, the Representative Assembly refused to sanction it. At length, however, in January, 1723, the clamours of the frightened ministers compelled the Legislature to appoint a committee of inquiry, who summoned the printers to appear before them. Benjamin was dismissed with an admonition ; but James was kept in gaol for a month, and his paper was censured, and forbidden to reappear without being pi-eviously supervised. This was the first conflict of Benjamin Franklin with authority on a matter of speculative opinion. But the young thinker had not merely been amusing his time in the composition of irritating remarks on sanctimonious wrong -doers. The very same papers which contained these exercises of a pungent wit, had been in part set up by the clever young his pocket, landed at the Quaker city, half ex hausted with hunger and fatigue. He was but seventeen years old at the time, but his whole previous life had been a training for great things. From his childhood he had been a persistent reader. Often sitting up half the night, that he might devour whatever books he could procure, at one time depriving himself of animal food, that he might devote his savings to the purchase of litera ture, perpetually studying the Spectator, that he might form a pure and correct style, acquiring the Socratic method of argument from a translation of the " Memorabilia " of Xenophon, and using that formidable weapon of confutation with so much effect as to make himself a very alarm ing antagonist to all who were less skilful, this son of the Boston tallow-chandler was an in tellectual force of a certain kind long before he was twenty. No doubt he had the conceit and pre sumption which are common in clever youths ; but he was storing up, after his own fashion, the power that was to operate in many ways on the rising Republic of the West. No doubt he was blamable 1754.] BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 553 Poor Richard* in some important respects ; but the substantial integrity of his nature survived his faults, and las cheerful serenity of soul never deserted him. The father of Franklin was a rigid Calvinist ; but the boy very soon abandoned the parental faith. From writing philippics against hypocritical professors of religion, young Franklin soon went on to question the received bases of religion itself. He doubted the truth of Chris tianity, and made no con cealment of the fact. While yet a mere youth, he wrote A pamphlet to prove that, as God is absolutely good and wise, as well as power ful, there can be no such thing as evil in the world ; and that consequently vice and virtue are not real dis tinctions, but merely dis tinctions in terms.* He held this absurd doctrine, however, in common with many religious sects of former times; and he soon abandoned it. His hetero doxy on other points was far more deep-seated. At the head-quarters of Puri tanism, he converted enthu siastic young men to the principles of infidelity, but was afterwards dissatisfied with their conduct under that new impulse. He him self formed a connection which had the sanction neither of law nor of reli gion ; and the offspring of this union was the William Franklin to whom the cele brated autobiographical Memoirs were addressed. AN Almanack For tlie Year of Chtift 1 7 3 3> Being the Firft after LEAP YEAR: jfndmakei Jince the. By th -Account of the By tKe Latin, Church, vrhen Q enl By the Computation of W~W. By the Roman Chronology By Ihe JwlJ-t Wherein is cctttAinecL The Lunations,. Eclfpfes, Judgment of tht. Weather. Spring Tidt, Plane* Mat-low fc Tnutiial^A(perfs, 5un.and Moon j Riling And Set- ting. E,*jgt)v of Days, Time of Fain, Court;, and ofc/ct-vubk Daj* Fitted to {he Latitude of Forty Degrees and & Mcrlditn of FiVe Hours Wift front LnA* f "but may without fenfble Errw fer* ailtfte Act jacenk rlacas, even fre>n.Net*fw*&MJ to Soutl- &a near FAC-SIMILE OF THF. TITLE-PAGE OF RICHARD S ALMAXACK." balanced, self-centred, unexcitable character could see nothing but hysterical exaggeration in those trans ports of the devotional mood which are natural to a Pascal or a Wesley. He was mainly interested in the practical business of life, and was content to leave the deeper matters of the spirit to the elucidation of a future state. With the Socratic method of arguing, he had acquired something of the mental habits of So crates, and seems to have adopted, in effect, the reply of the latter to the ques tion of Phsedrus, whether he believed Boreas carried off Orithya from the banks of the Ilissus : "I have no leisure for such matters ; I am not yet able, accord ing to the Delphic precept, to know myself." The nature of Franklin was de ficient on the poetical side ; but he came at a time when prosaic work was needed. After the turmoil of reli gious disputation by winch the seventeenth century had been agitated through out its entire course, espe cially in America, this calm, clear, cold intellect was an admirable corrective and tonic. It was in Philadelphia that Franklin first became a printer on his own ac count ; but he had previ ously visited England, and worked as a journeyman in a London office. This was in 1725, when he was only nineteen : by the middle of 1726 lie was Yeaw 7H 1 6932- Yet Benjamin Franklin back in Philadelphia, and it was in that city that was no voluptuary ; nor, though he had repudiated he made his first advances to independence. His Christianity, was he an Atheist. A belief in God and in the immortality of the soul remained with industry was boundless ; no labour that was honest he considered beneath him ; he never stooped to him to the close of his life. But the practical genius the vulgar folly of setting himself above his work. of the man disinclined him to mysteries; his evenly * Of this pamphlet, only a hundred copies were printed, for private distribution; and Franklin afterwards destroyed as many as lie could get at, thinking the dissertation might do harm. It is believed that only one copy of the original edition is now in existence ; but the essay has been reprinted as a cariosity. 47 The ingenuity of his mind and the readiness of his hands made him so varied a master of his craft that he could cast types, make printer s ink, cut wood-engravings, and execute vignettes in copper. Opening an office of his own, he was chosen by the Pennsylvanian Assembly to be their printer. Philadelphia was his foster-city, and he owed to it 554 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1754. more than to the city of his birth. It was there that he speculated and wrote ; it was there that he started a newspaper ; it was there that he published " Poor Richard s Almanack," and de lighted the thrifty with the proverbial philosophy of money-getting. In Philadelphia he resided the greater part of his life, advancing education, found ing libraries and philosophical societies, promoting social improvements, and making those experiments in electricity which have tamed the lightning, and converted it from the brilliant terror of the heavens into the orderly servant of man. He was not an idealist in science ; he brought it down, literally, to the fireside, and to the lamp upon the table. But, though nothing of a poet, he loved music, and in vented the harmonica, the knowledge of which he is said to have concealed from his wife until the instrument was perfect, when, waking. her with it at night, she thought it was the music of angels. In America, most men are politicians. .Franklin had too wide a sympathy with his fellow-men not to take a deep interest in the forms and principles of political life. He was what in these days is called a Liberal ; but he was not a demagogue. In the outset of the dispute between the colonies and the mother country, he was in favour of some arrangement by which the connection of the child with the parent might be maintained. When in London in 1768, he wrote with indignation of the mob-law then prevalent, and spoke of George III. as the best king with whom any nation was ever blessed (an opinion which he afterwards retracted), and the political constitution of England as the most admir able in the world. In 1754 the year at which we have now arrived in the progress of American History the thoughts of Franklin were engaged on a scheme for the union of the colonies of North America, which appeared to him a result very necessary to be effected in the existing state of affaire. The disunion of the plantations was becoming a scandal to the old country, and a danger to themselves. The French, with the unity of aim and concentration of power which belong to despotism, were making such rapid advances, both in the north and west, that the very existence of the English settlements was threatened. Besides their contention with respect to Nova Scotia and Louisiana, they claimed half of New York, and a large portion of New England ; and it was obvious they would leave no device untried, whether of artifice or force, for securing the triumph of their alleged rights. Yet the English colonies were wanting in the spirit of co-operation. They could not agree with one another ; they could not agree even in matters of internal administration. While the enemy was almost at their doors, they wrangled over the conditions of the common defence; and while the urgent question of the hour was how to resist a foreign conquest, they thought it the highest evidence of patriotism to humiliate the servants of the Crown, and irritate the Govern ment at home by displays of ill-timed opposition. A movement in a better direction was at length begun. A congress of commissioners from every colony north of the Potomac met at Albany on the 19th of June, 175 4, for the consideration of measures of defence. At this congress it was agreed that a union of the colonies was absolutely necessary ; and a committee was- appointed to prepare a con stitution for a perpetual confederacy of all the provinces. Franklin, who appeared as the re presentative of Pennsylvania, in the Assembly of which he had for some time sat, had already meditated on this subject, and had brought the heads of a plan with him. The idea was one which ho had long favoured. When a young man, nearly twenty years before, he had formed a species of club, called the Junto, the members of which were limited to twelve, who were all to do their utmost towards the promotion of patriotism and the virtues of citizenship. When it was desired by some that more members should be introduced, Franklin opposed the suggestion, arid, instead of it, made a proposal in writing that every member, separately, should endeavour to form a subordinate club with the same rules, but without any hint of its connec tion with the Junto. The plan was carried out, and five or six sub-societies were established. These were secretly influenced, in their view of public affairs, by the opinions of the central body, which they unconsciously supplied with information on a good many special subjects. There was here the germ of that idea of federal union, combined with local independence, which Franklin was after wards to apply to the art of government. The plan for a union of the American colonies which he now suggested, and which in its general provisions had been anticipated by Dr. Coxe s scheme, put forth in 1741,* and to some extent by a proposal of William Penn s in 1697, was an elaborate pro duction, containing what may fairly be regarded as the first draught of the constitution ultimately adopted by the United States. The discussion of this plan was suspended while negotiations were carried 011 with the representa tives of the Six Nations who had been invited to attend the congress. The native warriors were * Preface to "A Description of the English Province of Carolana, by the Spaniards called Florida, and by the French La Louisiane," by Daniel Coxe. 1754.] THE ALBANY PLAN OF UNION. S55 urgent for immediate union and action. " Look at the French," they said ; " they are men ; they are fortifying everywhere, while you ai e like women, without any fortifications. It is but one step from Canada hither, and the French may easily come, and turn you out of doors." The lamentable hesitation and division of the English colonies had had a very prejudicial effect on some members of the Six Nations. Half of the Onondagas had withdrawn from the English alliance, and gone over to the French ; and the Mohawks were beginning to complain that their lands had been taken from them by the Ohio Company without compensation. The good understanding with the Western Indians was therefore in great peril of being destroyed, and the danger of French successes grew all the more alarming and imminent. The chiefs who attended at Albany, however, gave the most earnest assurances of their fidelity, and at length departed with numerous presents, and many expressions ot good will. When the Federal scheme was again brought forward, the project of Franklin was accepted, and its author was instructed to put it into definite shape. On the 10th of July, he produced the finished plan, which was read paragraph by para graph, and closely debated. By this plan it was proposed that application should be made to the English Parliament for an act to establish in the colonies a general government, to be administered by a President appointed by the Crown, and by a Grand Council, consisting of members chosen by the several provincial Assemblies. The number of representatives from each province was to be directly proportioned to the amount of its con tributions to the general treasury ; yet no colony was to have more than seven representatives, nor fewer than two. Thus, Massachusetts and Vir ginia were to have seven members each at the Federal Council ; Pennsylvania, six ; Connecticut, five ; New York, Maryland, North Carolina, and South Carolina, four each ; New Jersey; three ; New Hampshire, two ; and Rhode Island, two : in all, forty-eight. The whole executive authority of the Federation was committed to the President, whose consent was also necessary to the sanction of bills passed by the Council. The functions and prerogatives of the Federal Government were to declare war and make peace with the Indians ; to conclude treaties with the tribes ; to regulate trade with those bodies, and to purchase lands from them; to settle new colonies, over which a controlling legislative authority was to be exercised until they should be erected into separate provincial govern ments ; and to raise troops, build forts, fit out armed vessels, and pursue ail other measures necessary to the common defence. The expenses of this establishment, and of its several operations, were to be provided for by laws enacting such duties, imposts, and taxes as, in the opinion of the President and the Grand Council, might seem to be least burdensome to the people. These legislative ordinances were to be transmitted to England for the approbation of the sovereign, and, if not dis allowed within three years, were to be considered as passed. All officers in the naval and military service of the colonies were to be nominated by the President, and approved by the Council ; but in the case of civil officers this process was to be reversed. The Council was to be elected triennially, to meet once a year, to choose its own Speaker, and neither to be dissolved nor prorogued, nor to be kept sitting longer than six weeks at any one time, without its own consent, or the special command of the Crown. The domestic constitution of each province was to remain untouched, and every colony was to retain the right of defending itself on sudden emergencies the expenses, if approved of, to be afterwards defrayed by the Federal Government. Much debate ensued on these propositions, which found their warmest supporters among the delegates from New England, and their most uncompromising opponents in the representatives of Connecticut. To the latter it appeared that the authority conferred on the President, and the power of general taxation, were highly objectionable. They feared that so concentrated a government would prove detrimental to the liberties of the colonies, and at the same time unfit them to conduct with vigour a defensive war along a frontier so extensive as their own. The requisite revenue, it was suggested in the course of the debate, might be derived from a -duty on spirits, and a general stamp-tax ; but Connecticut liked neither. Franklin himself saw faults of detail in the scheme ; but he could not at the time get it into better shape. At length, the Commissioners agreed to the proposal by a large majority, and copies were ordered, that every delegate might lay the plan before his constituents. A copy was also to be transmitted to the Governor of each colony not represented in the congress, and in a little while the subject was debated by the provincial Legisla tures. By them it was received with unanimous disapproval. They regarded with the utmost jealousy what they appear to have considered an attempt to abridge their individual liberties by the domination of a central power. They even resolved to oppose the expected endeavours of the English Government and Parliament to carry the project into effect. But it soon appeared that the Ministers 556 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. of the Crown were equally inimical to Franklin s idea, though for reasons totally different. To the rulers of England it seemed that the plan would confer too much power on the representatives of the American people. It was looked upon as the first step towards the entire independence of the colonies ; an unfortunate error in some respects, for it can hardly be doubted by any thoughtful politician that, if the scheme had been adopted by the several provinces and by the home Government, and if it had been fairly carried out, without any undue interference by the mother country, the colonies now forming the United States might still be possessions of the British Crown. But the Ministers of George II, were incapable of taking a states manlike view of colonial affairs, and the plan was destroyed in its inception. Franklin, however, obtained great popularity in one quarter for the suggestion he had put forth. Although the Legisla ture of New York, in common with all the other Legislatures, rejected the proposed Federa tion, the people of New York, in many instances, saw in it a noble idea, full of grand possibilities for the future. In returning to Pennsylvania from Albany, Franklin stopped at the former capital of New Netherland, and received a large number of visits from gentlemen who desired to con gratulate him on his plan. Franklin always retained a liking for the Albany project ; and, writing in his Memoirs even after the independence of his country had been accomplished, he said: "The different and contrary reasons of dis like to my plan make me suspect that it was really the true medium ; and I am still of opinion it would have been happy for both sides if it had been adopted. The colonies, so united, would have been sufficiently strong to have defended themselves : there woflld then have been no need of troops from England; of course, the subsequent pretext for taxing America, and the bloody contest it occa sioned, would have been avoided." This opinion of one of the chief actors in the American revolution is especially noteworthy, as showing that even Franklin desired to perpetuate the union of the colonies with the parent State, if the latter would only consent to recognise the just and reasonable PRINTING PRESS USED BY FRANKLIN. liberties of the provincials. The Albany scheme was the work of a far-seeing statesman. It may have required amendment in some of its details ; but in the main the plan was excellent, and it was a mistake on both sides, as far as events could then be apprehended, to reject it. The necessity of combination was urged by Franklin in his newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette. In the issue for May 9th, 1754, he observes, with reference to the capture of some Anglo-Americans at the Fork of the Ohio : " The confidence of the French in this undertaking seems well grounded in the present disunited state of the British colonies, and the extreme difficulty of bringing so many different Govenments and As semblies to agree in any speedy and effectual measures for our common defence and security ; while our enemies have the very great advantage of being under one direction, with one council and one purse." At the end of the article is a woodcut represent ing a snake separated into parts, to each of Avhich is affixed the initial of one of the colonies, while at the bottom, in large capitals, is the motto, JOIN OR DIE a device after wards adopted with much effect at the beginning of the Revolution.* The idea of some species of union was not altogether repu diated in England. The Cabinet conceived a plan, whereby the general defence of the colonies was to be entrusted to an Assembly consisting of all the Governors and a certain number of the Provincial Councillors, who were to draw bills of exchange on the English Treasury for whatever money might be requisite for carrying their measures into effect, the mother country to be reimbursed by taxes imposed on the colonies by Act of Parliament. This scheme was communicated by the Government to Shirley, of Massachusetts ; but the latter refrained from sub mitting it to the Legislature, knowing that its unpopular provisions would excite the most vehe ment opposition. He nevertheless mentioned the heads of the project to Franklin, who strongly condemned a measure which would have taxed the American people without their consent, and would * Works of Franklin, edited by Jared Sparks, Vol. III. Boston, 1840. 1754.] FRANKLIN ON COLONIAL REPRESENTATION. 557 have handed over to a body composed of Governors and other officials, the greater number of whom were appointed by the Crown, the conduct of all affairs bearing on the general interests of the provinces. The letters from Franklin to Shirley, in which the matter was discussed, brought out some fresh ideas of the great American, which, however worthy of consideration, were not so practicable as those embodied in the Albany pro ject. Setting forth with the proposition that the restrictions imposed by Parliament on the com merce of the provinces were a species of secondary taxes, which, being submitted to by the colonists, should be accepted by England as an equivalent for direct Parliamentary imposts, Franklin ai gued that, if the home Government desired to impose direct taxes on the colonies, representatives from America shoxild be admitted into the British Par liament, and that at the same time all the old sta tutes that had been passed in restraint of American trade and manufactures should be repealed until the new Parliament, with its American members, should think fit, for the general good, to re-enact some or all of them. By this method, Franklin thought that American interests would be suf ficiently represented to prevent flagrant acts of injustice, and he hoped to create a great English Empire, governed, in an Imperial sense, from Lon don, with local Legislatures for local needs, and the whole bound together by common laws and common liberties, and by the cohesion of mutual profit and support. In one of his letters to Shirley on this subject, Franklin expounded, with that admirable clearness and force of illustration for which he was remark able, the principles that should govern the commer cial relations between a mother country and her colonies. "It is, I suppose," he wrote, "agreed to be the general interest of any state that its people be numerous and rich; men enow to fight in its defence, and enow to pay sufficient taxes to defray the charge : for these circumstances tend to the security of the state, and its protection from foreign power. But it seems not of so much importance whether the fighting be done by John or Thomas, or the tax paid by William or Charles. The iron manufacture employs and enriches British subjects; but is it of any importance to the state whether the manufacturer lives at Birmingham, or Sheffield, or both, since they are still within its bounds, and their wealth and persons still at its command ? Could the Goodwin Sands be laid dry by banks, and land equal to a large country [query, county ?] thereby gained to England, and presently filled with English inhabitants, would it be right to de prive such inhabitants of the common privileges enjoyed by other Englishmen, the right of vending their produce in the same ports, or of making their own shoes, because a merchant or a shoemaker, living on the old land, might fancy it more for his advantage to trade or make shoes for them] Would this be right even if the land were gained at the expense of the state 1 And would it not seem less right if the charge and labour of gaining the addi tional territory to Britain had been borne by the settlers themselves ] And would not the hardship appear yet greater if the people of the new country should be allowed no representatives in the Parlia ment enacting such impositions?"* Franklin was here employing his favourite Socratic method of arguing with great force and point. The theory of colonial representation in the Im perial Parliament had in it something grand and lofty ; but it is doubtful whether it would have worked well in practice. Under the best of circum stances, America could hardly have received repre sentatives sufficient to give her much influence in the English House of Commons. The distance from one country to the other was too great to admit of an active interchange of ideas between the American members and their constituents ; and the division of interests was too marked to allow of all being properly managed by a single Parliament. At a later date, Franklin saw that this plan of Imperial representation was not adapted to the conditions of the case. The English Government also, after a few attempts to induce the colonists to accept its views, relinquished its plans for raising a revenue in America, the administration of which was to be in the hands of Crown officers. The intellect of Franklin was at all times much concerned in the growing fortunes of Iris native land. At the period of the Albany congress, he was very solicitous that tho grand region behind the Appalachian Mountains should be cultivated and turned to account. In less than a century, he prophesied, it must become a populous and important dominion. He advised that two new colonies should be formed in the west, with governing powers for the direction of their own affairs ; and he indicated Lake Erie as the fittest site for one, and the valley of the Ohio for the other. The American mind was beginning to be penetrated with a desire to spread beyond the sea-board into the interior of the continent. While the Albany congress was sitting, further measures were being taken by the Virginian * This short scries of letters first appeared in a London paper in 176G, during the dispute between the mother country and the colonies. It is included in Sparks s edition of the Works of Franklin. 558 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1754. Government to resist the progress of the French in those western territories ; and, still earlier in the year, the general subject of French aggression was discussed, though without much effect, by the Governments of other provinces. Some of these voted money for defensive operations ; others refused to do anything. Virginia resolved on borrowing 10,000, and at the same time appealed to the Royal bounty for assistance. The English Ministers ordered two independent companies, stationed at New York and Charleston, to take part in the defence of Western Virginia ; but such a force was quite inadequate to meet the danger. In Massachusetts, Hutchinson and Oliver the commissioners from that province to the Albany convention of 1748 -joined in soliciting the inter position of the King for the removal of the French forts erected within Anglo-American territory ; and Shirley assured the home Government that there would be no general plan for the defence of America unless his Majesty himself fixed for each colony the quota of men or money which it was to contribute to the com- s-~\ . ^- mon cause, and the whole C^"^ // were compelled, by some f^ effectual method, to con- t9 form to that determina tion. Pennsylvania and Maryland were at issue with their proprietaries in regard to internal regulations, and did nothing towards the defence ; and although New York voted a thousand pounds to Virginia, it refused to assist in repelling the French from a post which lay within the boundaries of Pennsylvania. New Jersey would not even send commissioners to the congress at Albany.* What wonder if American officials, perceiving such a total defect of voluntary unity, wrote home to the Government that an en forced unity was indispensable to save the English possessions from utter ruin 1 The French were not long before they struck a blow. Thirty-three men had been stationed by the Ohio Company in the fort at the junction of the river Ohio with the Alleghany and the Monon- gahela ; and while the Virginian Government was thinking about sending a small force under Wash ington to strengthen the position, the French com mander, Contrecoeur, marched down to the spot on the 17th of April, and summoned the English to surrender. Being far too feeble to resist, the thirty-three occupants of the fort capitulated and withdrew. Contrecoeur then occupied the post, strengthened it, and gave to it the name of Du- quesne, after the Governor of Canada. Information * Bancroft. AUTOGRAPH OP GENERAL BRADDOCK. of the fact was speedily conveyed to Washington by the Indians, who implored succour. Washing ton had by that time been made a lieutenant- colonel, and had under him a small regiment of a hundred and fifty men, ill-disciplined and in subordinate. At the head of this company he started for the scene of action. The men were in sufficiently supplied with clothes and food ; they had no tents with them, and it was the wet season. Washington, however, pushed on, and, guided in his actions by repeated intelligence from the In dians, took up a position on the Great Meadows, where he cleared the ground of bushes, and formed an entrenchment. On the 27th of May, Gist, the explorer, joined him, and reported that he had seen the trail of the French within five miles of the American camp. The enemy was reported to be six hundred strong, with eighteen pieces of cannon. It seemed to Washington, however, that the safest plan would be to attack the detachment of French troops which was said to be then marching toAvai ds the Great Meadows ; and accordingly, with only forty of his own men, he started on a dark and rainy night, con ducting his little force in single file along a narrow track to the camp of a native ally, who furnished a contingent. Again the party set out, and discovered the position of the French, concealed among bushes. The Virginians sought to surprise them ; but the French, seeing the approach of a hostile body, ran to their arms. Washington promptly gave the word to fire, and, rushing forward at the head of his men, compelled the French to surrender, after a fight lasting a quarter of an hour. The French commander and nine others were killed, and twenty-one made prisoners. Washington afterwards erected a small stockade fort on the Great Meadows, and, having received an accession of troops from New York and South Carolina, advanced towards Fort Duquesne. The addition to his numbers was not an unmixed good ; for the captain of the Carolinians who formed what was called an independent corps, with a commander appointed by the King quarrelled with Washington on the ground of precedency, and this necessarily led to a weakening of the little army, and a derangement of plans. With great rapidity, the Virginian lieutenant-colonel made a road of about thirteen miles, through a gorge in the mountains, to Gist s settlement ; but on the 1st of July he was compelled, by informa tion that the French had been largely reinforced, 1754. WASHINGTON S EXPEDITION. 559 to fall back to Fort Necessity, the stockade at Great Meadows, which he endeavoured to strengthen by the formation of a ditch. On the 3rd of July he was attacked by six hundred French and one hundred Indians, who, securing one of the emi nences by which the position was flanked, po\u*ed a consider it prudent to make these concessions, but they undertook not to advance any farther, nor even to retain the evacuated fort, but to retire to their former station at Monongahela. Two officers were left by Washington in the hands of the French, as hostages; and he then began his retreat, FRANKLIN S FIRST ELECTRICAL MACHINE. galling fire into the fort. It was returned with great spirit ; but the position of the French was so much superior to that of the English, that of the former only three were killed to thirty of the latter. The French commander at length proposed a parley, fearing that his ammunition would run out. On the following day, the 4th of July a day shortly to be made famous in American annals the Virginian garrison, with their arms ami eifects, withdrew from the fort, and were allowed to retire within the undisputed frontier of the English possessions. Not only did the French but was terribly harassed by the hostile Indians, who plundered his baggage, and killed several of his people. Although, on the whole, Washington had failed in his enterprise, he had exhibited so much courage and capacity that the Virginian Assembly passed a vote of thanks to him and his troops. But the first operations on the English side foreboded ill. The valley of the Mississippi was now solely in the possession of France. As soon as the collision was known at London, the English Ambassador at Paris was instructed to complain of it to the French Ministry as an open 560 CASSELL S HISTOEY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1755. violation of the peace ; but no satisfaction was offered. French writers have alleged that the Vir ginians, in the first instance, treacherously fell on a detachment of the Canadian forces proceeding to deliver a summons to Colonel Washington to quit the fort he had built on the Great Meadows, and that that officer even acted with great and wanton barbarity. It would be a vain task to inquire into the contradictory statements put forth by both sides on this comparatively minor question. The main, fact with which history is concerned is, that an actual state of war had been created be tween England and France while their respective Governments were still deliberating in the hope of a pacific settlement. The situation was full of peril for England. She had no military force of any consequence in America. She was on bad terms with several of the colonies ; and the colonies were wrangling among themselves as to which should do the least towards repelling the enemy, or were quar relling with their Governors on matters of internal rule which might have been proper subjects for discussion at another time, but which surely could have been postponed to a more fitting season. The time, however, had now come when the English Ministry determined to send a military force to the plantations. In January, 1755, General Braddock was de spatched from Ireland with two regiments of infantry ; and, at the request of the English com mander, a convention of the provincial Governors assembled at Annapolis, in Maryland, to settle a plan of military operations. The French Govern ment still continued to give pacific assurances to the Government of England, and was told, in reply to inquiries, that the armaments de spatched to America were intended only for defence. Proposals were made on both sides for an adjust ment of boundaries, and for the creation of a neutral territory between the possessions of the two States. But no agreement could be arrived at, and every day brought the inevitable war still closer. So full of dissimulation were the French Ministers that their own Ambassador at London, the Marquis de Mirepoix, was convinced, by proofs submitted to him by the English Government, that he was made the instrument of a deception. Being per sonally a man of high honour, he immediately left for Versailles, and reproached the Ministry with their misconduct ; but he was ordered to return to London with fresh asseverations of the most friendly feeling. Immediately afterwards, however, the English Government was informed that a powerful French squadron was ready to sail for America from Brest and Rochefort ; and in fact the ships soon departed, carrying four thousand troops, and a large quantity of military stores. They were followed by an English fleet under the command of the celebrated Admiral Boscawen, by whom a portion of the French squadron was attacked oft Newfoundland, and captured. Yet all this while no declaration of hostilities had been made on either side, and diplomatists still talked of peace, as if war were not already a fact. CHAPTER LXIII. Position of France and England in America in the year 1755 Preparations for the Coming Struggle Discontent among the Colonists at some of the Measures of the English Government State of Parties in England Demand of the King that the Colonies should establish a Common Fund for the General Defence Opposition on the Part of the Plantation* Arrival of General Braddock in America Demand of Colonial Governors for Taxation by the English Parliament Relative Position of England and the Colonies on this Question Plan of a Campaign Character of Braddock His Arrogance and Boastfulness The March from Will s Creek towards Fort Duquesnc Neglect of Proper Precautions- Attack on the Advancing Column by an Enemy in Ambush Desperate Straggle Defeat of the English Forces, and Death of Braddock Incidents and General Results of the Action. To a disinterested observer in the year 1755, the chances of victory in the approaching struggle on the continent of America must have seemed to lie with France rather than with England. The French monarch had a far larger army at com mand than his rival. He was already in possession of the greater part of the disputed territory ; and his actions had the force and concentration which belong to undivided counsels. Whether he could boast the additional strength of a just quarrel, will always be a subject of difference. His claim to Acadie was of the most doubtful merit; but something was to be said in favour of his pretensions to Louisiana. The French had cer- 1755.] PREPARATIONS FOR WAR. 561 tainly been the first to penetrate into the vast region which went under that general designation ; and it may have seemed hard that they should not be suffered to retain what they had won from the desert. But the term Louisiana was applied in a vague and uncertain way to a territory of inde finite extent and unexplained limits. When the English passed beyond the Appalachian Mountains, they found themselves in a country unpeopled save by wandering tribes of Indians. A few forts had been erected by the French at great distances, not only from one another, but from any of their settlements, with the design, there could be no doubt, of menacing the English colonies, and for bidding their people to make advances west ward. But the red men denied that the country belonged to either France or England, and many were disposed to favour the latter rather than the former. The land, they said, was theirs, to sell or to give away as they pleased ; and their support was courted equally by both parties to the quarrel. It was in truth a struggle for absolute supremacy in America between two great and jealous Powers; and it was not likely to be settled by the special pleadings of diplomatists sitting round a table, and intei-preting, with the ingenuity of lawyers, the doubtful words of treaties, and the obscure geo graphy of unexamined lands. After the attack by Admiral Boscawen on the French squadron despatched to America, Louis XV. recalled his Ambassador from London; yet he did not declare war. George II. assured his Parlia ment, when bringing the session to a close on the 25th of April, that the hope of peace was not even then abandoned, but that he would never purchase it at the expense of submitting to encroachments on his dominions. So real was the state of Avar, notwithstanding these pacific asseverations, that the English Government gave orders that all French ships, whether outward or homewai d-bound, should be stopped, and brought into British ports. The dockyards rang with the industry of ship wrights, building in all haste additional ships, for which the House of Commons had made special provision. The press for seamen was car ried on with extraordinary vigour, and premiums were offered by the Government, and by many of the large cities and towns, to all who should volun tarily enlist as soldiers or sailors. One fact is certain that the war was in the highest degree popular. The Government asked for a loan of a million, to be raised by way of lottery : nearly four millions were at once subscribed. The old national feeling of antagonism to France again burst out with renewed fury; and the only fear was lest the Ministry should not be sufficiently prompt in vindicating the national claims. In America, however, the proceedings of the Government were not in all respects approved. An Act of Pai liament extending the provisions of the English Mutiny Act to North America, and declaring that all troops raised by any of the colo nial Governors or Assemblies should, whenever they acted in conjunction with the Royal forces, be subject to the same system of martial law and discipline as that which existed in the British army, excited great discontent in the colonies. The measure, in its passage through the two Houses, had been strongly opposed by the Massachusetts agent in England, who, in a petition to Parliament, represented "that his Majesty s American sub jects were generally freeholders, and persons of some property, and enlisted not for a livelihood, but with intent to return to their farms or trades as soon as the particular services for which they might enlist should terminate ; that the officers were persons in similar, though better, circumstances ; and that all of them, being chiefly influenced to take up arms by a regard to the honour of the King, the defence of their country, and the preserva tion of their religion and liberties, had but little preparatory exercise for war, and were therefore un suitable subjects for the operation of the rigorous code of discipline adapted to the government of his Majesty s standing forces." The argument was plausible ; but it is difficult to see how a proper degree of discipline could have been maintained by a system of greater laxity and indulgence. Another cause of vexation to the Americans was found in a communication made some time before to the provincial Governments, by which it was ordered that all officers commissioned by his Majesty, or by his commander -in-chief in North America, should take precedence of those whose commissions were derived from the colonial Gover nors or Assemblies, and that the general and field- officers of the provincial troops should have no rank when serving with the general and field- officers commissioned by the Crown. Many of the American officers were very indignant at this arrangement, and Washington resigned his com mission, but shortly afterwards accepted the appointment of aide-de-camp to General Braddock. A change in the English Ministry had taken place in the spring of 1754. The Premier, Henry Pelham, died on the 6th of March in that year, and was succeeded in the chief position by his brother, the Duke of Newcastle, who had for some time held the seals of the Northern Department. The Earl of Holderness, who had followed the 562 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1755. Duke of Bedford in the Southern Department, where he proved very inefficient, was transferred to the corresponding Secretaryship, and his recent post was filled by Sir Thomas Robinson, a subor dinate at the Board of Trade, who now became the leader of the House of Commons. Pitt, afterwards Lord Chatham, thought so meanly of Robinson s abilities that he said the Duke might as well have sent his jack-boot to lead the popular representa tives. Newcastle had offered the post to Henry Fox, afterwards Lord Holland ; but that statesman declined to accept it unless he were made acquainted with the names of those who received the secret service money. It was not long ere Pitt and Fox, though both holding office under Government (the first as Paymaster General, and the second as Secretary-at-War), formed a private coalition against their superiors, which Newcastle, on discovering its existence, broke up by introducing Fox into the Cabinet as Secretary of State for the Southern Department, and leader of the House of Commons, in both of which capacities Robinson had proved a failure. Pitt still maintained his attitude of hos tility to the general policy of the Government under which he filled a subordinate position, and the greater part of 1755 passed away in the dis tinction of cabals and intrigues, which seriously diminished the national force at the commencement of a very grave conflict. The old King himself disliked Newcastle, but did not see his way to getting rid of him. The Duke was not popular witli the nation ; he was thought to be too subser vient to the French, and to hesitate about declaring war, out of timidity or interested motives. But he had a great majority in Parliament a majority secured, so far as the Lower House was concerned, by that affluence of bribery which Hogarth so admirably satirised in his Election Carica. tures. The Whig party was still predominant in the aristocracy and in Parliament, and neither the King nor the nation was strong enough to resist the combination of a few titled families. The Cabinet was divided between Ministers in clined to war, and Ministers disposed to compromise in the hope of preserving peace. But there was little or no difference of opinion with respect to the necessity of compelling the colonists to make provision for their own defence. The mutual jealousies and factious opposition of the provinces had in truth forced on the mother country a degree of interference which might not otherwise have been adopted, and which at any rate would have had far less justification. Men of very different views felt the truth of this. Thomas Perm wrote from England, on the 10th of June, 1754, that if the several Assemblies would not make provision for the general service, an Act of Parliament might oblige them. James Delancey, of New York, reported that in all probability the colonies would differ in their measures and disagree about their quotas, and that without the interposition of the English Parliament nothing would be done. Din- widdie, of Virginia, advised a poll-tax on all the colonists, " to bring them to a sense of their duty ;" and other Governors wrote home, begging for com pulsory legislation. These representations had their effect. By a circular from Sir Thomas Robinson, dated October 26th, 1754, the Governors of all the colonies were informed of the King s pleasure that a fund should be established for the common benefit ; and when Braddock went out with his army, he was furnished with orders to exact such a revenue. During the winter months of 1755, the necessity for some rigorous measure became still more apparent. The Indians of Canada had tampered with the Six Nations so effectually that some had already forsaken the English alliance, and were sending English scalps into the dominions of the enemy ; yet the provincial Governments were sitting absolutely still. The French were already, at two or three points, drawn up in hostile array on soil which was claimed as Anglo-American ; yet, after the feeble attempt of the Virginians, they were allowed to do as they pleased, and the disunion of the colonies grew every day more extreme. Mr. Bancroft, who writes with a very strong feeling against the English Govern ment and in favour of his own countrymen, has nevertheless shown how complete was the dead-lock to which, in the face of imminent danger, the frowardness of the local Legislatures had brought the affairs of the country. Sharpe, of Maryland, who had been temporarily appointed to the chief command in America, vainly solicited aid from one province after another. New Hampshire took every opportunity to pass acts contrary to the King s instructions. New York was disinclined to pro vide quarters for the Royal troops, and intimated that she would contribute to a general fund only when others did. New Jersey treated with the utmost contempt the repeated solicitations of the Governor.* Pennsylvania, Maryland, and South Carolina did indeed vote sums of money, but coupled the grants with conditions, trenching on the Royal prerogative, which they well knew beforehand would not be accepted. If the design of the colonists had been to lay themselves at the * Bancroft s History, Vol. III., chap. 7. POSITION OF THE COLONIES. 563 feet of France, and invite subjection, they could hardly have acted differently. Geiieial Braddock reached America towards the end of February, 1755, and on the 14th of the following April held a congress at Alexandria, in Virginia, at which Commodore Keppel also was present. The provinces represented were Virginia, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. The first subject discussed was the vexed question of a colonial revenue. Braddock was a man of violent temper, and he expressed himself angrily that no such fund was already formed. The provincial Governors replied that the Assemblies had opposed all their representations oil the subject, and that such a fund could never be established in the colonies without the aid of Par liament. Having, they added, found it impossible to obtain, in their respective jurisdictions, the pro portion expected by his Majesty towards defraying the expenses of his service in North America, they were unanimously of opinion that it should be pro posed to his Majesty s Ministers to find out some method of compelling the colonies to do as desired, by assessing the several governments in proportion to their respective abilities.* The upshot of the discussion was that Shirley assured his colleagues, on the authority of the English Government, that a common fund must either be voluntarily raised, or assessed in some other way. The opinion on this point was unanimous among men holding any official position. The testimony of the authority already cited may again be referred to, as embody ing facts contrary to the writer s sympathies and leanings. "I have had in my hands," says that authority, " vast masses of correspondence, includ ing letters .from servants of the Crown in every lioyal colony in America ; from civilians, as well as from Braddock, and Dunbar, and Gage ; from the popular Delancey and the moderate Sharpe, as well as from Dinwiddie and Shirley; and all were of the same tenor. The British Ministry heard one general clamour from men in office for taxation by Act of Parliament. Even men of liberal tendencies looked to acts of English authority for aid. I hope that Lord Halifax s plan may be good, and take place/ said Alexander of New York. Hop kins, Governor of Rhode Island, elected by the people, complained of the men who seemed to love and understand liberty better than public good and the affairs of state. little dependence, said he, can be had on voluntary union. In an Act of Parliament for a general fund, wrote Shirley, I * Minutes of Council held at the Camp at Alexandria, Virginia, April, 1755. have great reason to think the people will readily acquiesce, "t There was really some ground for supposing that the opposition of the Assemblies did not express the unanimous feeling of the colonists. Huske, an American then in London, wrote a work in which he advocated a moderate taxation of the plantations by Parliament. The idea continued to gain ground in England. In July, 1755, the Earl of Halifax pressed on the Cabinet the adoption of a general system of taxation, to ease the mother country of the heavy expenses with which it had recently been burdened. Various plans were suggested, but a stamp-duty seems to have been that which was most favoured, Rumours of what was contemplated soon got over to America, and Massachusetts instructed its agent in England to oppose anything that should have the slightest tendency to the raising of a revenue by the act of the English Parliament. The dislike to such a measure, though it may have had its sup porters, was most natural in any American colony ; and nothing could be said against the indignation it aroused, if the plantations had done what they oiight in the matter of defence, and had not ex hibited, on every possible occasion, such an eager readiness to defy the representatives of the Crown, and thwart the most reasonable expectations of the parent State. It is easy to argue as if the colonies alone had any interests or rights in the matter. They had indeed interests and rights of a very important kind ; but the mother country likewise was concerned. If the American, settlements had lapsed into a state of anarchy for want of some bond of union among themselves, or had been con quered by the French in the absence of all means of self-protection, the consequences, in respect of mere physical suffering, would doubtless have rested mainly on themselves ; but a blow of a very serious nature would at the same time have fallen upon England, and it was not to be expected that she Avould stand calmly apart, and risk the chances of such a blow, without making any attempt to ward it off. No dependency has a right to divorce itself entirely from the interests of the Empire to which it belongs; but this was what the American colonies were now doing. They had been required to raise a revenue for defence against a foreign enemy by taxing themselves. They not only neglected to do so ; they refused. The enemy was within the gates, and the Imperial Government was driven to think of some other method. Taxa tion without representation is certainly a most undesirable expedient : when resorted to, as it was t Bancroft. BRADDOCK S FORCES SVRPRISED BY AX AMBUSCADE. 1755.] PLAN OF THE CAMPAIGN. 565 a few years later, to relieve the taxation of the parent State, it is tyranny. But exceptional measiires may sometimes be justified by exceptional circumstances, and it must be acknowledged that the position of England was at this time most perplexing. Before the breaking up of the conference at Alexandria, the general plan of a campaign was matured. It was resolved that four simultaneous expeditions should be undertaken. The first was quantity of provisions for the troops, nor an ade quate supply of carriages for the transport ol materials. A mistake had been made in not select ing Pennsylvania, rather than Virginia, as the base of operations ; for the former province was in a much better condition to supply what was wanted than the latter. Owing to this unfortunate blunder, the regiments lingered at Alexandria for several weeks, during which time the men were in actual distress for want of necessaries ; and May had RUINS OF TICOJfDEROOA FORT. to be directed against Fort Duquesne, in the Ohio valley, by Braddock himself at the head of the Royal troops ; the second, consisting of American regulai S and Indians, commanded by Governor Shirley, on whom the King had conferred the rank of a British General, was to attempt the reduction of the French fort at Niagara ; the third was to be sent against Crown Point, and was to be composed of militia drawn from the New England colonies ; while the fourth, under Lawrence, the Lieutenant- Governor of Nova Scotia, was to reduce that pro vince. The departure of Braddock was delayed by the default of the Virginian contractors for the army, who, when the commander was ready to march, were found not to have provided a sufficient 48 arrived ere they set out for the Ohio. The expedi tion was ill-omened from the first, and it was fated to a melancholy termination. It was only by the help of Pennsylvania, obtained through the agency of Franklin, that the supplies were at length fur nished, and it was not until after the army had started that its necessities were fully provided for. The soldiers were unfortunate in their commander. Nothing could be said against the courage of Brad- dock, whose intrepidity was equal to anything that might be required of it ; nor was he deficient in a technical knowledge of the formalised rules of warfare. But he was entirely wanting in that intuitive genius which enables a man to adapt himself to new conditions, and delivers him from 566 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. the tyranny of routine. He had been brought up in the English Guards, and would have had actual hostilities conducted after the manner of a review- His ideas of discipline were so strict and despotic that he was very unpopular with his men ; and he was so confident in the infallibility of his own judgment that he would not listen to the advice of others. Of his character as a man, Horace Walpole gives some details which would make out that he was utterly depraved and brutal, without honour and without natural affection.* But Walpole was a scandal-monger, and it would not be fair to accept all his stories with, absolute reliance. He admits that, when Governor of Gibraltar, Braddock made himself adored where scarce any Governor was endured before.t While still in England, the General had received a set of instructions from the Duke of Cumberland, Comman.der-iii-Chief of the British army, specially warning him against falling into an. ambush. The caution was reiterated, after his arrival in America, by Franklin, who pointed out the skill with which the Indians contrive these hidden dangers. But Braddock only laughed at the advice. The savages, he told Franklin, might be formidable to the raw militia of the colonists, but not to regular troops, highly disciplined in all the methods of warfare. Instead of making use of his Indian allies to guard against the tactics of hostile Indians, with which they were necessarily better acquainted than he could be, he so disgusted the native warriors by his arrogance that the greater number forsook his army, and returned to their own tribes. He sub sequently irritated the colonists by describing them as devoid of courage, or of any military qualifica tion. He wrote home that he expected little assistance from them ; and to Washington he ex hibited the most unreasoning obstinacy and the most irascible temper. In the fulness of his self- confidence, he had announced to the English Ministry in the early spring that he should be beyond the Alleghanies by the end of April, and that they might expect tidings of his success in June. Notwithstanding the delay which incom moded his plans, he boasted to those aroxind him of all that he was about to do. He told Franklin, while halting for carriages- at Fredericktown, that after taking Fort Duquesne he should proceed to Niagara (though this was to be Shirley s exploit), and, having taken that, should advance to Fron- tenac. General Duquesne, he added, could hardly detain him above three or four days, and then he could see nothing which need obstruct his march to * Horace Walpole to Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 21st, 1755. f The same to the same, Aug. 28th. Niagara. His overweening conceit counted on victories for which he had made no due provision. The march was long and toilsome. TAventy- seven days elapsed ere the army had reached Will s Creek (now Cumberland), on the borders of Vir ginia and Maryland; but, when there, it was reinforced by two independent companies from New York, under the command of Horatio Gates, an Englishman who was afterwards to play an important part in the War of Independence. Here also Washington joined the expedition, and matters at length seemed in training for effective action. On the 31st of May, five hundred men were sent forward to open the roads, and to store provisions at Little Meadows. Sir Peter Halket followed with the first brigade, and Braddock himself started on the 10th of June. The force altogether consisted of about two thousand two hundred men, and, if it could have started earlier in the year, would probably have accomplished valuable results. The garrison of Fort Duquesne at that time was known to consist of no more than two hundred men ; but in the intervening period the French had been strongly reinforced, and friendly Indians had been summoned to their assistance. The English forces moved forward in a thin, extended line, nearly four miles long. It was a difficult and a dangerous march. Thick woods shrouded the path to right and left, and the chance of a surprise by lurking Indians was never absent. The road passed over mountains and across deep ravines, frequently intersected by rivers and creeks. A rapid and dashing movement, as far as the cir cumstances of the case permitted, would have been the best policy; but Braddock must have everything done according to .the military code. Washington, who was very ill at the time, but whose faculty of observation seems never to have deserted him, wrote to his brother that, instead of pushing on with vigour, without regarding a little rough road, they were halting to level every mole hill, and to erect bridges over every brook. On the 19th of June, however, the General found it necessary to proceed with greater despatch. On arriving at the Great Meadows, he learned that the French were expecting a further reinforcement of five hundred troops ; and he therefore resolved, on the advice of Washington, to advance rapidly at the head of twelve hundred picked men, together with ten pieces of cannon and the necessary ammu nition and provisions, leaving the remainder of the army, under Colonel D unbar, to follow with the heavy baggage by slow and easy marches. Having previously acted with undue particu larity, Braddock now erred as much on the side of 1755.] ATTACK ON BRADDOCK S ARMY. 567 carelessness. He took scarcely any precautions in the way of reconnoitring the dense woods which tlanked his road, though his devotion to military punctilio was still apparent in other matters. The distance from Cumberland to the fork of the Ohio is nearly a hundred and thirty miles, and a large part of this had yet to be traversed. On the 8th of July, the army arrived at the junction of the Monongahela and the Youghiogeny. Fort Duquesne was then only twelve miles off, and the perils of the expedition were obviously increased by the proxi mity of the enemy, and by the distance of Braddock from his supports, which were nearly forty miles behind him in the heart of the forest through which he had come. Halket entreated him to proceed with caution, and to employ his Indians in scouring the thickets, so as to guard against any ambuscades that might have been formed. But Braddock, as if under the influence of some fatality, resumed his march early on the following morning, without obtaining information as to the French position, or sending out scouts to reconnoitre the woods which still burdened his track with their ominous and secret shadows. Washington in vain represented to him that the silence and apparent solitude of that leafy desert could not be accepted as any evidence that danger was far removed. In vain did he offer to search and occupy the woods in front and on the flanks Braddock s professional pride would not permit him to accept the help of Indians in guarding the progress of a regular army, or to adopt the advice of an amateur soldier and an American. Weary and out of condition, owing to the bad food they had had on the march, the troops pur sued their way towards the catastrophe which pedantry and presumption had prepared for them. Twice fording the Monongahela, owing to the windings of the stream, they stood at noon between that river and the Alleghany, about seven miles from the junction of the two in the greater current of the Ohio. The chief commander now threw forward a detachment of three hundred and fifty men, iinder the direction of Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Gage, who was accompanied by a working party of two hundred and fifty, with guides and flanking parties. Along a path not more than twelve feet wide, this detachment advanced into the uneven, woody country lying in the direction of Fort Duquesne. Braddock himself was following, with the artillery, the baggage, and the main body of the army divided into small columns, when the Indian war-cry burst forth from the surrounding thickets, and from the high grass which closely covered the more open ground, while at the same moment a heavy and quick fire struck the front and the left flank of the advanced guard, and drove them back on a party which was being formed in the rear. The adversaries were so well con cealed that not a man could be seen, even at the moment when their fire leapt flaming and echoing out of the dim recesses of the surrounding cover ture. The vanguard left two six-pounders behind them, and in their hurried retreat spread confusion amongst their comrades of the second detachment, who were trying to form near a rising ground to the right. Both companies soon lost cohesion, and were scattered wildly amongst the trees, their movements having no other unanimity than that of flight. Thus the first party drove in the second, and the two together, in their united recoil, shat tered and dismayed the rest. Braddock placed himself at the head of his ti oops, and behaved with desperate but unavailing courage, though, it is said, not with the necessary coolness, nor with that judgment which could alone have retrieved the for tunes of the day. A stand, however, Avas made for some time. The artillery opened fire into the woods, aiming at random against a foe who even now could not be seen. The French-Indians wavered and broke as the roar and blaze of the great guns startled the dusky lairs in which they couched. De Beaujeu, the French commander, was killed, and Dumas assumed the direction of the attack. He rallied the savages, and sent them to make a second assault on the English flank; but for a time the issue was doubtful. It even seemed as if the English might prevail ; for, having now recovered their self-possession, they presented a compact body* to the enemy, and maintained their ground, firing with regularity, but receiving much more mischief than they dealt. For two hours there was scarcely any change in the position of the armies. Now that the English had re-formed, they showed no lack of courage ; but considerable lack of discretion was still apparent. Bewildered by the murderous fire which smote them on all sides from the ambush of the forest, and which proceeded from an enemy whose numbers and precise position were a mys tery, they gave little heed to the commands of their officers, but fired in platoons as fast as they could load, and with so random an aim that many of their shots were lost. Braddock s orders were that the infantry should form in line, and advance. But the circumstances did not permit of this pre cision of movement. The General was thinkin^ of o his review tactics, and either could not or would not adapt himself to the unwonted circumstances with which lie had to deal. A rapid and irregular charge, without regard to the exactness of military 568 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. routine, might have resulted in the dispersion of the adversary s forces; but this did not suit the formalism of Braddock s mind. The consequences were fatal. Men and officers fell in great num bers ; the officers, in particular, were picked off by the Indian marksmen, and suffered terribly. The valour of these gentlemen was magnificent, but useless. Again and again they re-formed the front ranks, organised small charging parties, and advanced at their head, in the hope of seizing on the hill which overhung their right flank, and recovering the lost cannon. But their men would not always follow, and it is even asserted that they fired on them from the rear, though this may have been accidental, in the confusion of the struggle. Out of eighty-six officers, twenty-six (including Sir Peter Halket) were killed, and thirty-seven wounded. Half the men were dead or disabled ; yet Bracldock held his ground with desperate tenacity. "Wherever the danger was most extreme, he was present; but his courage could not make up for his want of judgment. He had five horses shot under him; his secretary was killed at his side; both his English aides-de-camp were disabled early in the engagement ; the American alone re mained to convey his orders. That Washington should have escaped is wonderful, for the savages singled him out for attack, and four balls lodged in his coat. " Some spirit guards his life," exclaimed an Indian warrior. If it were permissible to speak after Pagan fashion, one might say that it was the young Genius of America. At length, when the action had gone on for about three hours, Bracldock received a shot through the right arm and the lungs, and was carried off the field by Colonel Gage. With the fall of the Gene ral a complete rout ensued. " What makes the rout more shameful," said Horace Walpole to Sir Horace Mann (August 28th), "is, that instead of a great pursuit, and a barbarous massacre by the Indians, which is always to be feared in these rencontres, not a black or white soul followed our troops, but we had leisure two days afterwards to fetch off our dead." The provincial forces were among the last to leave the field, and, being rallied by Washington, covered the retreat of the regulars. The flight of the latter was in the last degree dis creditable. Panic had seized on them, and they rushed precipitately along the path. by which they had come, leaving in the hands of the enemy their artillery, their provisions, their baggage, and even the private papers of their commander. All attempts to rally them were vain: they imagined dangers where none really existed, and did not feel even partially reassured until they had re joined the camp under Dunbar. " Pray don t let any detachment from Pannoni s be sent against us," wrote Walpole to Mann, our Minister at Florence; "we should run away." Pannoni s was a coffee-house frequented by the Florentine nobility, who at that time were not famous for valour. The charge of cowardice, however, was unfair. Troops who, under such circumstances, could stand their ground for three hours could not have been wanting in courage, however much, when all was lost, they gave way to that sense of panic which sometimes visits the best soldiers in moments of disaster. Yet it must be admitted that Wolfe had a very poor opinion of the British Infantry of that day. Speaking of Braddock s defeat, in a letter to his father, he said that he knew their discipline to be bad, and their valour to be precarious. " They are easily put into disorder," he added, " and hard to recover out of it. They frequently kill their officers through fear, and murder one another in their confusion. Their shameful behaviour in Scotland, at Port L Orient, at Melle, and upon many less important occasions, clearly denoted the extreme ignorance of the officers, and the dis obedient and dastardly spirit of the men." It would appear, however, that the inability to see where the enemy lay concealed was the real cause of Braddock s defeat. During the whole action, not more than a hundred French and Indians were seen by any of the English army ; some de clared that they saw not one. The French at Fort Duquesne had been made aware of Braddock s advance by their scouts, and they resolved to meet the adversary on the road. Their Indian allies at first shrank from joining them 011 such an expedition, but were at length persuaded by the representations of De Beaujeu. The force detached for this purpose consisted of barely two hundred and thirty French and Canadians, with six hundred and thirty-seven natives. They fell in with the English earlier than they expected, at a point about seven miles from Fort Duquesne. The favourable position they occupied enabled them to escape with a small loss in killed and wounded ; while the English and American ranks were thinned in a fearful proportion. Seven hundred and fourteen privates were killed or wounded. The Virginians, who showed great valour, were mown, down like grass ; in one of their companies, only a man was left. Washington behaved throughout with that extra ordinary coolness which was among his most ad mirable qualities. Lord Halifax, a few months afterwards, spoke of him with high praise; but as yet his name was unknown in England. 1755.J EXPEDITION AGAINST THE ACADIANS. 569 Braddock, mortally wounded, beaten, and humili ated, was carried to the spot where Dunbar had been left in command of the reserve. During the greater part of the first day he remained silent and depresssed, overwhelmed by the terrible misfor tune which had visited him. At night he roused himself, and exclaimed, like one waking from a dream, " Who would have thought it 1 "We shall know better how to deal with them another time." Many had thought it, and had anticipated what would happen ; but he would not be ruled. Now, with life fast ebbing, he calculated on turning his experience to advantage in the future. The " other time," however, was not to come for him. It is said that he employed his last breath in dictating a panegyric on his officers a trait of generosity which in part atones for his faults. After lingering four days in great agony, he expired ; and his grave may still be seen, about a mile west of Fort Necessity. The day before his death, Dunbar, after destroying the remaining artillery, and burn ing the public stores and the heavy baggage to the value of .100,000, had begun a further retreat to Fort Cumberland. Thence he fell back hastily to Philadelphia, finding his troops still infected by the unreasoning fear which had winged their flight. The Governors of Virginia, Maryland, and Penn sylvania besought him to assist in defending their frontiers, and offered him aid in men and money if he would once more advance against Fort Duquesne ; but this he refused to do. The first important operation of an English army upon American soil had ended in nothing but disgrace and ruin. CHAPTER LXIV. Preparation of an Expedition against the French in Nova Scotia The Original Colonists of that Part of America Habits and Customs of their Descendants Longfellow s Description of Acaclie and the Acadians Treatment of the French Colonists by their English Conquerors Appearance of the English Fleet and Army off Beau-Sejour Capture of French Forts, and Establishment of English Rule over the Whole of Acadie East of the St. Croix Determination of the English Authorities to remove the Native Population The People assembled on the Sea-shore, and driven on board Ship Hardships suffered by the Acadians in their Dispersion over the English Colonies Operations of the French and Indians on the Frontiers of Virginia and Pennsylvania Shirley s Unsuccessful Expedition against Niagara Advance of General Johnson against Crown Point Collision with the French under Dieskau Death of Hendrick, the Indian Chief Defeat of Dieskau s Troops Inaction of Johnson, and Abandonment of the Crown Point Expedition. THE mortification felt both in England and America at the failure of Braddock s expedition, was in some measure soothed by a success which was obtained in the north, though this was followed by an exer cise of power involving misery and suffering to a large number of persons. The New England colonies had agreed with the mother country, on condition of being reimbursed their expenses, to despatch an army against the forts and settlements established by the French in Nova Scotia, Massa chusetts alone equipped about 7,900 "men, amounting to nearly one-fifth of the able-bodied males in the jurisdiction. A detachment of these took part in the movement, and the colonial forces altogether, including those furnished by other plantations, con sisted of three thousand militia, to which were added three hundred regular troops and a small train of artillery. The chief command was in the hands of Colonel Monckton, an English officer of experience, while the New England levies were led by Colonel Winslow, a descendant of the famous Edward Winslow -who took so large a part in the formation of "the New Plymouth settlement. With this force it was resolved to strike a blow at the French, such as might make them recede from the position that they had taken up on soil which the English claimed as theirs under the Treaty of Utrecht. The encroachments of the French had been so systematic and audacious that it was high time to resist their manifest design of gradually winning back, in defiance of express engagements, the whole province which had formerly gone under the name of Acadie. At a time of peace, and while the conflicting claims were still being debated at Paris, they had adopted military measures for vindicating their alleged rights ; and they could not with reason complain if the sword to which they were so ready to appeal was drawn against them, though war was not yet declared, and the nionarchs of England and France still professed their willing ness to avoid a rupture. Acadie had been originally peopled by Breton 570 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1755. peasants, who must have found in the indented bays, the rocky coasts, the jutting promontories, the inland forests and desolate tracts, of the penin sula and its adjoining territories on the continent, much to remind them of the wild and picturesque land from which they came. They had settled there as early as 1604; other French people fol lowed ; and their descendants, though made English subjects by the Treaty of Utrecht, still retained their French language, customs, and dress, as well as the religion of their ancestors. So little were they interfered with by their new masters that they were not even called upon for taxes, or required to maintain any magistrate of alien race. A small English garrison and a few English families at An napolis kept up the show of British dominion ; but in the interior the French colonists were left en tirely to themselves. Their trifling affairs were managed by the parish priest ; for M. le Cure was a great man amongst those simple villagers, with whom religion was a profound and active influence, and the most abiding sentiment of their natures. Primitive in all their ways, and leading pastoral and rustic lives between the forest and the sea, they were a happy and a virtuous people, to whom the anxieties of cupidity and the heat of licen tiousness appear to have been totally unknown. Like the New Englanders, they married at an early age ; and when a youth grew up to maturity, a house was built for him by the general contributions of his neighbours, a portion of land was cleared and sown for his use, and he was supplied with all the necessaries of existence for a year. Persistent industry had made Acadie a habitable and in some respects a pleasant country. Dykes shut out the salt tides from the marshes which bordered them. The pastures were rich with herds and flocks, and the cultivated fields bore heavy crops of grain, which rendered famine an impossibility. In front was the fierce Atlantic, pouring, in noise and foam perpetual, into the rifts and creeks of a precipitous and shattered coast ; behind was the primeval forest, full of obscurity and dread, yet waiting to be explored by man. Between the two were the small villages and clustered farms of a race whose men subdued the ground by plough and spade whose women faehioned at the spin ning-wheel and the loom the coarse but service able stuffs which formed the garments that they wore. The chief of American poets has described this pastoral country with so pictorial a pen that every detail rises before us as we read : " In the Acadian land, on the shores of the Basin of Minas, Distant, secluded, still, the little village of Grand Pre Lay in the fruitful valley. Vast meadows stretched to the eastward, Giving the village its name, and pasture to flocks without number. Dykes, that the hands of the farmers had raised with labour incessant, Shut out the turbulent tides ; but at stated seasons the flood gates Opened, and welcomed the sea to wander at will o er the meadows. West and south there were fields of flax, and orchards, and corn-fields, Spreading afar and unfenced o er the plain ; and away to the northward Blomidon rose, and the forests old, and aloft on the moun tains Sea-fogs pitched their tents, and mists from the mighty Atlantic Looked on the happy valley, but ne er from their station descended. There, in the midst of its farms, reposed the Acadian village. Strongly built were the houses, with frames of oak and of chestnut, Such as the peasants of Normandy built in the reigns of the Henries. Thatched were the roofs, with dormer-windows ; and gables, projecting Over the basement below, protected and shaded the doorway. There, in the tranquil evenings of summer, when brightly the sunset Lighted the village street, and gilded the vanes on the chimneys, Matrons and maidens sat in snow-white caps, and in kirtles Scarlet and blue and green, with distaffs spinning the golden Flax for the gossiping looms, whose noisy shuttles within doors Mingled their sound with the whir of the wheels and the songs of the maidens. " * The number of the Acadians in the middle of the eighteenth century has been so variously stated, and on information so imperfect, that it is not worth while to repeat the doubtful and contra dictory figures. It was certainly not a large com munity, yet it counted several thousands. The sentiment of French nationality was very strong amongst the people, and there can be no doubt that they aided their countrymen beyond the borders whenever there was any mischief to be inflicted on the English. They were called the French Neu trals, because, while professing loyalty to the foreign rule, they refused to fight at any time against the soldiers of France. This reservation they were permitted to make, and they seem to have been treated by their conquerors, up to the present date, with great consideration, and even with generosity. Their priests, however, probably thinking that no faith should be kept with heretics, constantly incited them to conspire against the English ; and they obeyed their priests in all things. Accordingly, their neutrality was a delusion, and the English authorities, after a long period of for- * Longfellow s Evangeline. W1NSLOW READING THE ROYAL PROCLAMATION. 572 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. bearance, were compelled to regard them as enemies. The military commander at Annapolis began to treat them with haughtiness and rigour. Their property was occasionally seized for the public ser vice, and they were not permitted to make bargains for compensation. Once, when some of them de layed in supplying the Annapolis garrison with firewood, they were told that if they did not comply within a reasonable time the soldiers should seize their very houses for fuel. It was found necessary to take from them their boats and fire-arms, lest they should assist the French ; and the resort to these measures, inevitable as they may have been under the circumstances, necessarily increased the disaffection of the Acadians. At length, orders were sent out to the English military officers to punish the people at discretion if they behaved ill, and, if the troops were annoyed, to take vengeance on the nearest person, whether the offender or not. An alien and hated rule is certain to result in tyrannies such as these, which are of course quite beyond defence ; but, in fairness to the authorities, it should be recollected that the Acadians had done their utmost to forfeit the previous kind ness of their masters, and that the English would probably never have been in Acadie at all, had not the French, by their egregious pretensions to lands already belonging to their rivals, and by the ferocity with which, through a long course of years, they desolated New England villages and massacred their inhabitants, compelled the seizure of some outlying territory as a simple measure of protection. In the spring of 1 755, the French were established in two forts on the isthmus which connects the peninsula of Nova Scotia with the mainland. One of these forts was a small stockade at the mouth of the little river Gaspereaux, near Baie Verde ; the other was the fortress of Beau-Sejour a work of some importance, mounted with twenty-six pieces of cannon, and standing 011 an eminence to the north of the river Messagouche, on the Bay of Fundy. De Vergor, the commander of the latter, took no proper measures for strengthening his works ; and he was much disconcerted when, at the close of May, 1755, he saw the English fleet sailing into the bay. The forces were disembarked without molestation, and, after a short period of rest, were led across the Messagouche towards the fortress they had come to attack. The passage of the river was disputed by a number of soldiers, of ; Acadian fugitives from English rule, and of Indians, who fired on the advancing force from a blockhouse and a strong breastwork of timber which they had planted on the farther bank. The New England troops attacked these obstructions with great spirit, forcing their defenders to fly; and here all active resistance terminated. The French now seemed paralysed. They did nothing more to repel the danger, but, after suffering an investment of four days, surrendered the position by which they had hoped to defend the isthmus. The garrison of Beau-Sejour were sent to Louisburg ; the Acadian fugitives received an amnesty. The name of the place was changed to Fort Cum berland, in honour of the Royal Duke then at the head of the British army ; and shortly afterwards the little post near Baie Verde capitulated on the same terms. The French fort on the St. John s, against which three frigates and a sloop were sent, was abandoned and burnt by its occupants, who destroyed their cannon, devastated the surrounding country, and left the English in possession of a waste. The whole of Acadie east of the St. Croix had been rapidly subjugated ; and only twenty men had been killed only twenty wounded. Yet the danger to English rule continued, owing to the antagonism of the Acadians themselves, fomented and embittered by the bigotry of the priests. Lawrence, the Deputy-Governor of Nova Scotia, had written to the Lords of Trade, nearly a year before, that if the people refused the oaths of allegiance they would be much better a way; and the Board had replied that by the Treaty of Utrecht they were to continue in the occupation of their lands only on condition of their becoming British subjects. They could not, it was added, place themselves in that position without taking the oaths required of subjects ; and it might there fore be a question whether their refusal to take such oaths would not invalidate their title to the lands they held. The opinion of the Chief Justice of Nova Scotia was to be consulted on the point, and " future measures " were hinted at, for which that opinion might serve as a foundation. Lawrence remembered this in the summer of 1755, and intimated to such of the French colonists as had openly appeared in arms that they could not be allowed to keep their lands unless they took the oaths of allegiance to the English monarch without those qualifications by which they had previously retained, to some extent, their character as French men. They unanimously refused a decision to their credit, when we recollect what their nationality and their sympathies really were, but one which imposed on the English authorities the necessity of self-protection against avowed disloyalty. It was therefore resolved to remove the offenders, and disperse them among the English colonists, where they could not combine to the injury of their conquerors. The French Ambassador in London, 1755.] DEPORTATION OF THE ACADIANS. 573 taking up their case in May, 1755, begged that they might have time to remove from the peninsxila voluntarily, carrying their effects with them; but this was refused. It is obvious that, had the request been granted, the Acadians would have gone to Canada, and, in the war which had now virtually commenced, would have recruited the hostile ranks of the adversary. A French historian (Eaynal) even affirms that the French colonists, fearing that their religion would be subverted by the English, were already preparing to emigrate to the banks of the St. Lawrence. The resolution of the English authorities was one of a very exceptional and painful character ; but it had been provoked by the bad faith of the colonists themselves. In July, the inhabitants of Minas and the adjacent country, pleading with Lawrence for the restitution of their boats and guns, declared that, notwithstanding their possession of weapons, their consciences would engage them not to revolt. Their consciences, however, had not restrained them before, and in all probability would have been equally powerless in the future. Law rence upbraided them in terms of unnecessary sharpness ; said that they wanted their canoes for conveying provisions to the enemy ; and reminded them that by the law of England Roman Catholics were not permitted to carry arms. At the eleventh hour, the Acadians offered to take the oath uncon ditionally, but were told that, having once refused, it was not competent to them to alter their resolve. Assxiredly an oath taken under such circumstances could have had very little value ; but its value would have been of the slightest under any cir cumstances. It would have been more gracious, and perhaps wiser in the highest sense of wisdom, to accept the oath, and keep a strict watch on the malcontents. The danger was now less than it had been, because of the expulsion of the French from the north-western parts; yet it was impossible to feel assured that the/ would not come back in force, and in that case they would have found active allies in the Acadians of the peninsula. Chief Justice Belcher, in the opinion for which he had been asked, spoke strongly in favour of removing the French colonists. They were rebels, he said, and had now become recusants ; they had forfeited their possessions to the Crown by their non-compliance with the conditions of the Treaty of L T trecht ; and on the departure of the fleet and troops they might again become dangerous. It was therefore finally determined to transport them else where. Notice having been given to the Governors of the several colonies to prepare for their recep tion, a proclamation was issued, ordering the whole of the offending population to assemble on the 5th of September at their respective "villages. At Grand Pr6, four hundred and eighteen men came together, and were marched into the church, the doors of which were closed and guarded. Winslow then placed himself in their" midst, and said : " Gentlemen, I have received from his Excel lency Governor Lawrence, the King s commission, which I have in my hand, and by his orders you are convened together to manifest to you his Majesty s final resolution as to the French inhabi tants of this his province of Nova Scotia, who, for almost half a century, have had more indulgence granted them than any of his subjects in any part of his dominions; what use you have made of it you yourselves best know. The duty I am now upon, though necessary, is very disagreeable to my natural make and temper, as I know it must be grievous to you, who are of the same species. But it is not my business to animadvert, but to obey such orders as I receive. I shall therefore, without hesitation, deliver you his Majesty s orders and instructions, namely: That your lands and tene ments, cattle of all kinds, and live stock of all sorts, are forfeited to the Crown; with all other your effects, saving your money and household goods; and you yourselves to be removed from this his province. Thus it is peremptorily his Majesty s orders that the whole French inhabitants be re moved; and I am, through his Majesty s goodness, directed to allow you liberty to carry off your money and household goods, as many as you can, withoiit discommoding the vessels you go in. I shall do everything in my power that all those things be secured to you, and that you be not molested in carrying them oft"; also that whole families shall go in the same vessel, so as to make this remove, which I am sensible must give you a good deal of trouble, as easy as his Majesty s ser vice will admit ; and I hope that, in whatever part of the world you may fall, you may be faithful subjects, a peaceable and happy people. I must also inform you that it is his Majesty s pleasiire that you remain in. security, under the inspection and direction of the troops that I have the honour to command."* This announcement took the unhappy people by surprise. If they had ever had any suspicion that they were to be dispersed over the continent, their doubts had been removed by the time that had elapsed since the subject was last discussed. The authorities had purposely suspended the execution of their design until the harvest had been gathered * Minot s History of Massachusetts. CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1755. in, as the crops would be useful to the ariny; and the villagers seem to have been quite ignorant of the object for which they were called together. The blow was terrible in its completeness and its suddenness. They were never to return to their homes; never again to see the fields they had cultivated. Surrounded by soldiers, they were kept to one spot until the day of embarkation, and were presently joined by their wives and families. On the 10th of September they were drawn up by the soldiery six deep, and as many as could then be moved were compelled to go on board the vessel waiting for them. Husbands and wives, parents and children, were separated from one another, and in some instances, it is said, were separated for ever. This was probably unintentional ; one cannot imagine a motive for such cruelty, and the em barkation took place under the direction of Win- slow, who did the utmost he could to soften the stem instructions of Lawrence. But the hardship was none the less because it was not designed, and it is probably this circumstance, as depicted by Longfellow in his pathetic poem, that has drawn such a flood of indignation on the heads of the English officials, even in England itself, and has prevented so many people from looking at the facts with any calmness of judgment. Those who remained behind were kept near the sea-shore, wait ing for other ships, until December. Insufficiently supplied with food, half-clad, and with very im perfect shelter against the savage cold of that northern region, these miserable wretches suffered alike in body and in mind. Before the last were got on board, several had attempted to escape, and some had actually fcmiid their way to Canada, and other places where they were able to evade their pursuers. Near Annapolis, a hundred heads of families fled to the woods, and were hunted down by soldiers. Many were shot, and an officer has left it on record that the troops hated the un fortunate peasants so much that they were glad of any pretext for killing them. Some lurked in the forests of Nova Scotia, or found refuge in O the huts of friendly Indians. But nothing was spared by Lawrence and his colleagues to drive them back again. The country was laid waste to prevent their obtaining food, and several were in this way forced to deliver themselves up. Even if we admit that the deportation was justifiable in itself, as a measure of protection against persons who neglected no opportunity of opposing English rule, it cannot be denied that the act was carried oiit in the most cruel and relentless spirit. Altogether, nearly seven thousand persons were transported. They were scattered amongst all the English colonies, from New Hampshire to Georgia. One thousand arrived in Massachusetts Bay, where, being entirely without means, and incapable of earning their living among a people sper.king a foreign tongue, and following ways very different from their own, they became a public charge. In South Carolina, more than a thousand were cast on shore, to seek their fortunes as they could. None of them would ask for compensation from the British Government, for they indulged a hope that the King of France would never make peace until he had effected their re-establishment in Acadie. Those who had been sent to Georgia escaped to sea in boats, in the hope of getting to their native country, but, on reaching New England, were stopped and turned back by orders from the north. Those who dwelt in Pennsylvania presented, in 1757, a petition to the Earl of Loudoun, then the English commander-in-chief in America, praying for some redress ; but the only reply was that the Earl seized five of their principal men, and sent them to England with a request that they might be kept from ever again becoming troublesome by being consigned to service as sailors on board ships of war. The Lords of Trade regretted that the whole French population of Acadie had not been removed to other lands ; but it would appear that in the end the greater number were dispersed. Large tracts of land were left so utterly desolate that the forest once more asserted its mastery, and the ocean, breaking through the dykes, spread itself at will over cultivated fields. The live stock be longing to the people were seized by the English, and large numbers of horned cattle, hogs, sheep, and horses fell into the hands of the military, and were disposed of to advantage. For some years, the unfortunate Acadians pined in want and misery in the English colonies of America. Some managed to get to France, or to the French settle ments ; but the greater number died of sorrow in the land of their exile.* It is one of the saddest stoi-ies in history. The defeat of Braddock laid the frontiers of Virginia and Pennsylvania open to the desolating incursions of the combined French and Indians, who, dividing themselves into small bodies, inflicted great injury on the more scattered and less pro tected townships. A large addition to the Vir ginian militia was made by the Assembly, and the force thus raised was commanded by Washington. But the Legislature grudged the necessary outlay for adequately meeting the necessities of the time, and little was done towards repelling the invaders. * Minot. Bancroft. Grahame. Notes to Longfellow. 1755.J EXPEDITION AGAINST CROWN POINT. 575 The men were badly clothed, without tents, and exposed to all extremes of weather. On one occa sion they clamoured loudly for permission to return to their families, when William Winstone, a lieu tenant of one of the companies, mounted the stump of a tree, and poured forth such a passionate harangue, made up of rebuke and exhortation, that they begged to be led against the enemy. Washing ton did all that was possible under the circumstances; but the French continued to prevail. Another disappointment was to be experienced in connection with the enterprise against Niagara under the command of Shirley, who since the death of Braddock had become chief commander of the forces in North America. The troops designated for this expedition, and the regiments set apart for the attack on Crown Point, were ordered to assemble at Albany. Those whom Shirley was to conduct in person, consisted of various regiments of regulars from. New England, New York, and New Jersey, and one corps of Indian auxiliaries. As the General was advancing on Oswego, his progress towards which had been greatly retarded by several causes, his army was dismayed by hearing of the defeat of Braddock. In consequence of this dis astrous news, the sledgemen and boatmen, who had been engaged in the transport of stores and provisions, began to desert in large numbers. The Indians also showed great reluctance to follow their commander, and it cost Shirley no small amount of time and trouble to regain their favour and restore their confidence. His efforts in the end were only partially successful. So greatly was his army reduced by desertion, and so little were his Indian followers to be depended on, that when he arrived at Oswego, on the 21st of August, a further delay was found to be indispensable. After a time, he pressed on towards Niagara ; but a succession of heavy rains, the breaking out of sickness in his army, and the dispersion of those few Indians who up to that point had been more faithful than their countrymen, obliged him to abandon the expedition. He therefore returned to Albany with all his forces, leaving Colonel Mercer at Oswego, with seven hundred men in garrison, and instructions to de fend the place by the erection of two additional forts. Not much better fortune attended the expedition against Crown Point. General (afterwards Sir William) Johnson, the commander of this expedi tion, was au Irish gentleman, long settled on the Mohawk river, in the western parts of New York, where he was universally respected for his bene volence, and much loved by the Indians, whose language he had acquired, and whom he always treated with a humane regard to their interests and feelings. Johnson was a member of the New York Council, and a man of considerable influence in tho affairs of the province ; but he was not in all respects well fitted to the post he was about to occupy. In June and July, some six thousand troops under General Lyman assembled at a spot between the river Hudson and Lake George, about forty-five miles north from. Albany, where they built a fort, first called Fort Lyman, and after wards Fort Edward. The French, on their part, were far from inactive. Numerous regulars, Cana dians, and Indians were gathered together in the fortress at Crown Point, then in a very dilapidated condition. Dieskau, their commander, determined to lead an expedition against Fort Edward ; but his guides took the wrong route, and at nightfall on the 4th of September the men found themselves on the road to Lake George. Johnson, with the main body of his forces, had already been moving in that direction for some days, and, learning from his scouts that the French were approaching, he sent out a party, consisting of a thousand provincials, under the command of Colonel Williams, and of two hundred Indians, led by Hendrick, an old Mohawk sachem, with instructions to intercept the return of the French, whether they succeeded or failed in their attack on the camp at Fort Edward. For the defence of the camp itself, Johnson made no provision, beyond sending orders to the com mander there to call in. all his out-parties, and keep his whole force within their entrenchments ; nor did lie ascertain the number of troops whom Dieskau had under his command. The party despatched by Johnson on the 8th of September marched on till they came to a defile, where the French and their Indian allies had con cealed themselves on both sides of the way, in the midst of trees, brushwood, and rocks. Before the Americans were well within the defile, the French Indians suddenly started up before their brethren, the Mohawks, but forbore to fire. The Canadians, however, attached with great spirit, and the Ame ricans were driven back. Colonel AVilliams was killed on the spot ; so also was Hendrick, who, being mounted on horseback, presented an easy mark. An American writer says of this brave warrior that " his head was covered with white locks, and, what is uncommon among Indians, he was corpulent. Immediately before Colonel Wil liams began his march, he mounted a stage, and harangued his people. He had a strong, masculine voice, and, it was thought, miglit be distinctly heard at the distance of half a mile. Lieutenant- Colonel Pomeroy, who was present, and heard this 576 CASSELL S HISTOEY OF THE UKITED STATES. [1755. effusion of Indian eloquence, told me that, although he did not understand a word of the language, such was the animation of Hendrick, the fire of his eye, the foi ce of his gesture, the strength of his em phasis, the apparent propriety of the inflexions of his voice, and the natural appearance of his whole manner, that himself was more deeply affected with this speech than with any other which he had ever heard. In the Pennsylvania Gazette, September 25th, 1755, he is styled the famous Hendricks, a a breastwork, and these, with the waggons and baggage, formed an extempore defence. Two or three cannon were placed in position ; but the soldiers were ill-armed, being totally unprovided with bayonets. As the sound of the firing grew nearer and nearer, it became evident that the de tached party was in full retreat to the camp ; and shortly afterwards the discomfited troops came rushing into the enclosure. Dieskau s men were not far behind. They soon appeared, marching in \ VIEW IN ACADIE. renowned Indian warrior among the Mohawks ; and it is said that his son, being told that his father was killed, gave the usual Indian groan upon such occasions, and, suddenly putting his hand on his left breast, swore that his father was still alive in that place, and that there stood his son." * The retreat of the Americans, though rapid, was not disorderly. Nathan Whiting, of Newhaven, took command of the troops, and kept them well in hand, rallying them every now and then, and turning to fire. The camp formed by Johnson was without any entrenchments ; but, on the noise of musketry being heard, trees were hastily felled for * Dwight s Travels. regular order up to the English position ; and so great was the confusion amongst those who defended that position that it would probably have been taken with but little trouble, had it been attacked at once, as Dieskau desired and intended. The Indians, however, hung back ; then the Canadians hesitated ; finally, all but the regular troops dis persed themselves among the pine-trees, or crouched among the brakes, Avherc they fired from a safe distance. With the professional soldiers who re mained, Dieskau bravely attacked the works, and the fight was prolonged for some hours, with great courage and determination on both sides. The New England soldiers proved excellent marksmen, and the French regulars suffered terribly. Dieskau 1755.] CLOSE OF THE CAMPAIGN. 577 was three times wounded the last time mortally. He was found leaning against the stump of a tree, and was feeling for his watch, to surrender it, when the soldier who had discovered him, thinking he was searching for a pistol, fired, and inflicted a fatal injury. On the English side, Johnson was wounded, though not seriously, early in the action. Retiring to the rear, he left the command to Lyman, and, after an obstinate struggle, the success by pursuing the disheartened French, and investing Crown Point, which had now only a small garrison. Shirley pressed him to resume active operations, and at least to dislodge his adversaries from Ticonderoga before they had time to fortify that post. But he lingei-ed at his camp, keeping las men needlessly employed in routine diities that ended in nothing; and finally erected a useless fort of wood (Fort William Henry) VIEW OX LAKE ONTAKIO. Americana leaped over their defences, and drove back the enemy. The unfortunate Dieskau, now dying, was left, with the whole of the baggage and ammunition, in the hands of the victors. Towaixls sunset, the defeated forces were rallying some distance off, when they were routed by a small party of New York and Now Hampshire militia, commanded by Captains Folsom and M Ginnos, who were proceeding from Fort Edward to the relief of the camp. But M Ginnes paid with his life for his share in this crowning glory. , Johnson should at once have followed up his at the southern extremity of Lake George. As winter approached, he determined, by the advice of a council of war, to abandon until a more favour able season the contemplated attack on Crown Point, and all other active operations ; then, having left six hundred men as a garrison in Fort William Henry, he dismissed the New England militia to their homes. The enterprise had certainly been signalised by a temporary and brilliant success ; but, as regards its main design, it was as great a failure as Braddock s or Shirley s. 49 578 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1755. CHAPTER LXV. liclative Position of France and England in the Summer of 1755 Actual War and Nominal Peace Seizure of Frencli Ships and Merchantmen Withdrawal of the French Ambassador from London Endeavours of the English King to obtain Allies- Opposition of the Elder William Pitt to the Policy of the Court Acts of Parliament for Increasing the Military Forces in America Discontent in the New England Colonies at the Results of the War Neglect of American Officers by the English Government Growth of Population in America Shirley on the Future of the Colonies Treaty between South Carolina and the Cherokees Dissensions in Pennsylvania Franklin and Governor Morris Increase of the Military Feeling at Philadelphia Precautions against the French and Indians Further Demands for Taxation by the English Parliament Plan for a New Campaign Lord Loudoun appointed to the Chief Command of all the North American Forces Delay and Disappointment Loss of Oswego Kenewed Disasters. IN the middle of July, 1755, England and France had, as a matter of fact, beeii at war in America for more than five years, counting from the first hostile operations of the French in Nova Scotia ; and during the latter part of that time the struggle had assumed formidable dimensions. Yet the two nations Avere still nominally at peace. Battles had been fought, both by sea and land, armies and fleets had been engaged, fortified positions had been attacked and defended, ships and merchant- vessels had been seized, and blood in no small measure had been shed ; and still no declaration of war had been made still the respective Ambas sadors of the two Powers remained at the Courts to which they had been accredited. In attacking French ships at sea, and in ordering the capture of French trading vessels, England had certainly pro ceeded after a very high-handed fashion ; but it is undeniable that the series of military aggressions had been begun by France, and that the French Government, after many hostile acts in Nova Scotia, had sent out a large armament to America for the furtherance of its designs. The operations of the English fleet were consequent on these pro ceedings of the French ; but of course it was not to be expected that the latter would admit their justice. They protested against the capture and confiscation of their ships in time of peace as a system of piracy on a grand scale ; and the King of France withdrew his Ambassador from London on the 22nd of July. -The energy of the English navy, however, suffered no abatement. Eight thousand French seamen were t;on in captivity ; immense numbers of French merchantmen, whalers, and fishing-smacks were seized, and the English King s share of the spoils amounted, in itself alone, to nearly 700,000. On the 21st of October, Loxiis XY. wrote personally to George II., de manding ample reparation for what he described as Boscawen s insiilt to the flag of France, and for the piracies of the English men-of-war, committed, as he expressed it, in defiance of international law, the faith of treaties, the usages of civilised nations, and the reciprocal duties of monarchs. It was evident that an open rupture could not be long delayed ; yet both sides continued to hesitate. The French hoped to recover in a clandestine way, and without the risks of avowed war, the territory they had lost in America by treaty engagements. The English were glad to procrastinate, in order that time might be found for concluding alliances against France on the continent of Europe. Allies were not easily obtained. The Ministry were ready to subsidise Russia by heavy annual payments, and a treaty to that effect was actually ratified; but the arrangements never came into operation. The support of the German Powers was also sought, but at the expense of driving the elder William Pitt into confi rmed opposition. He had for some time, as the reader is aware, dissented from much of the policy of the Duke of Newcastle, though holding the post of Paymaster of the Forces in the Government of that nobleman ; and he now became still more violent in his antagonism. Fox was won over from a similar posture of hostility by being made Secretary of State ; but Pitt, notwith standing offers of preferment and flattering messages from the King, denounced the contemplated treaties with the utmost passion of his eloquence. He enlisted Legge, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, on the same side, and on the 20th of November both were dismissed from office. It was the great object of Pitt so to develops the resources of the country as to make it independent of entangling alliances with continental Powers, and able to dis pense with the disgrace of paying Hessian and Hanoverian troops to fight the battles of England. His policy was essentially an English policy, as opposed to the German tendencies of the King. It had the support of the great majority of the nation; but for the present the interests of the Coiirt pre vailed. An Act of Parliament was now passed, enabling the King to grant the character and pay of military officers to a small number of foreign Protestants residing and naturalised in the colonies. It was proposed to incorporate thase emigrants into a separate regiment ; and it was urged in support of 1755.] DISCONTENT IN NEW ENGLAND. 579 the Act that many of the foreigners settled in America had served in foreign countries, and acquired experience in the military profession. The plan provoked considerable dissent on the part of a minority in the English Parliament, and the agent for Massachusetts joined in the opposition. The malcontents alleged that the employment of foreigners would be viewed vvitli jealousy by the native Americans, and that the Bill was incon sistent with the Act for the further settlement of the Crown, and the better securing of the rights and liberties of the subject, which expressly pro vided that no foreigner, even though he should be naturalised or made a denizen, should be capable of enjoying any office or place of trust, civil or military. The objections, however, were ineffectual, and the measure was carried. Another Act em powered the King s officers to recruit their regiments by enlisting the indented servants of the colonists, on compensation being given to the masters ; and the naval code of England was extended to all pei-sons employed in. the King s service on the lakes, great waters, or rivers of North America. New England was bitterly disappointed at the results of the war thus far. She had of late aban doned the hesitating policy to which for a time her Governments seemed committed, and had exhibited energy, devotion, and liberality. When Johnson, alarmed at the intelligence of Dieskau s advance, communicated the news to the provinces whose troops he commanded, Massachusetts raised, with remarkable expedition, a lai ge subsidiary force, and despatched it to the aid of the General ; and although the danger was over before these auxiliaries could reach the scene of action, the promptitude with which they had been organised and sent out spoke well for the spirit of the people. The defeat of Dieskau created for a brief season the most san guine expectations ; but the subsequent inaction of Johnson speedily dashed these brilliant prospects to the ground. The French, with their usual celerity, strengthened the fortress of Ticonderoga, and their Indian allies ravaged the frontiers of Massachusetts and New Hampshire after the merciless fashion of their race. Excepting in Nova Scotia, therefore, the situation was actually worse than it had been, instead of better. The associated colonies, more over, were offended by the demeanour of Johnson. In his reports of the action at Lake George, he wrote as if the whole merit of the victory belonged to himself ; although his wound had compelled him to retire early in the contest, and the direction of affairs had then devolved on General Lyman, a native American. The mother country, impru dently as well as ungenerously, conspired in this neglect of the colonial officers. Johnson was made a baronet, obtained the appointment of Royal superintendent of Indian affairs, and received from Parliament a grant of 5,000. But the American commanders received neither honours nor reward, and the money presented to Johnson was in fact paid by the colonies, since it was deducted from a sum of 115,000 voted by the House of Commons to New England, New York, and New Jersey, in consideration of the burdens entailed on them by the war, and in acknowledgment (as the King ex pressed it in his message on the subject, early in 1756) of their faithful services. Even without this deduction, the amount was considered by the colonists very inadequate ; but what annoyed them more was the slight put upon their officers. Ame rican commanders had displayed the most soldierly qualities, but were denied the recognition which would have been dearer to them than anything else. This jealousy of the colonies proceeded in a great degree from fear. It was seen that a separate na tionality was slowly struggling into existence in the western world; it was apprehended that that nationality might become the rival and the enemy of England. In 1755, Franklin had published at Boston and the production had been reprinted at London some observations on the existing state of affairs, which attracted very considerable attention. The rapid increase of the American population was one of the topics touched upon. Shirley was directed by the English Government to make inquiries, and he reported that the calculations appeared to be quite right. The people doubled themselves every twenty years. He added that, as the demand for British manufactures, with a corresponding employment of shipping, increased with even greater rapidity, the country possessed inexhaustible sources of wealth for a maritime Power.* Nevertheless, Shirley did not feel, or professed not to feel, those alarms as to the designs of the colonists which had disturbed the peace of English Ministers. He wrote to the Southern Secretary: -" Apprehensions have been entertained that they will in time unite to throw off their dependency upon their mother country, and set up one general government among them selves. But if it is considered how different the present constitutions of their respective govern ments are from each other, how much the interests of some of them clash, and how opposed their tempers are, such a coalition among them will seem highly improbable. At all events, they could not maintain such an independency without a strong naval force, which it must for ever be in the power * Bancroft. 580 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1755. of Great Britain to hinder them from having. And whilst his Majesty hath seven thousand troops kept up within them, "with the Indians at command, it seems easy, provided his Governors and principal officers are independent of the Assemblies for their .subsistence, and commonly vigilant, to prevent any step of that kind from being taken." In that same year 1755, John Adams, the future successor of "Washington in the Presidency of the United States, but then a humble teacher in a New Eng land free school, wrote to a friend that, if they could only remove the turbulent "Gallics," the people of the American colonies would in another century become more numerous than the population of England, and that then all Europe would not be able to subdue them. " The only way to keep us from setting up for ourselves," he added, " is to disunite us." The idea of independence was now being openly avowed : it had been cherished with greater caxition. for many years, even for some gene rations. That it should have acquired so much force by 1755, was attributable, in part, to the encroaching policy of the mother country, and to the sense of her own power which America was rapidly ac quiring. Braddock s defeat had shown that English troops were not invincible. Lyman s success had proved that American officers and American soldiers could scatter the trained levies of France. "While the colonists were dreaming their grand dreams of the future, the French were preparing for further operations. In particular, they exerted their utmost arts to win over to their side as many as possible of the Indian nations. They sent their emissaries among the Cherokees a tribe previously attached with firmness to the English alliance. Observers have noted in the Cherokees a greater constancy than usually distinguishes the red race. They were not given to roving ; indeed, they appear to have been established from time immemorial on the lands they occupied in the middle of the eighteenth century. The French they greatly disliked for their fickleness and levity ; yet now they listened to the envoys of that nation, and began to speculate on a change of friendship. The chief warrior of the Cherokees, not approving of these tactics, sent a message to Glen, the Governor of South Carolina, informing him of what was going on, and advising a conference with the tribe, with a view to the renewal of former treaties. The advice was taken. In the course of 1755, a con ference was held in the country of the Cherokees, at a distance of two hundred miles from Charleston, and lasted about a week. It terminated in a fresh agreement of amity, and in an arrangement by which a large tract of territory was ceded by the Indians. This cession, resulted in the removal of the tribe to a greater distance from the English, and enabled the Carolinians to spread far inland. Governor Glen built a fort, to which he gave tho name of Fort Prince George, at a spot on the Savan nah three hundred miles from the capital of South Carolina, and within gunshot of the Indian town of Keowee. The renewal of the old friendship with the Cherokees was exceedingly opportune. It checked the French in one direction, and excluded a danger which for a moment had seemed imminent. The difficulties of the time were increased by political dissensions in Pennsylvania. Governor Hamilton had resigned his office in. 1754, and had been succeeded by Robert Hunter Morris, son of a former Governor of New Jersey. Morris held his position about two years, and by 1755 had got into a series of violent disputes with the Assembly, owing to the resolution with which he endeavoured to enforce the unpopular edicts of the proprietaries, who, acting in concert with the Board of Trade at London, sought to take into their own hands the management of the revenue from excise, to restrain and regulate the emissions of paper money, and to exempt their own large revenues and estates from all taxes on provincial property. Popular power, however, was very strong in Pennsylvania, and the arbitrary designs of the proprietaries were defeated. It would have been better could this result have been brought about with less of personal acrimony; but Morris and the Assembly indulged in furious abuse of one another, and in the most ample imputations of corrupt motives. Franklin, who as clerk to the Assembly drew up its official utterances on the several points in dispute, has himself recorded that each side laboured hard to blacken its adversary, bixt that the Assembly had the best of it. Strange to say, Morris and Franklin were all this while on very friendly terms, apart from their official characters. Morris was a lively, good-natured man, though fond of disputation a habit which his father had encouraged from his childhood. Franklin also loved an argument, and was blessed with an imperturbable temper. Thus, as the latter has related in his Memoirs, they would interchange, in their public capacity, messages and answers that were always tart, and sometimes even indecently abusive ; and then would meet at dinner, and bandy jokes over their wine.* In one respect, the Assembly gave way. The Quakers themselves, alarmed at the advances which * In "An Historical Review of the Constitution and Govern ment of Pennsylvania " (London, 1759), Franklin relates with great minuteness the progress of these controversies. 1756.] MILITARY ARRANGEMENTS, 581 the French were making, passed bills, in 1755, levying 1 0,000 for purchasing provisions for the troops appointed to march against Crown Point, and .50,000 in aid of Braddock s expedition against Fort Duquesne. When the unfortunate issue of the latter enterprise became known in England, it was said by many that the proprietaries, by with holding from the general defence of the colonies, in obedience to their Quaker notions, had contributed to the disaster, and ought thenceforth to be deprived of all governing power. The Penn family became alarmed, and sought to appease the popular wrath by directing their receiver-general to add 5,000 of their own money to whatever sum might be levied by the Assembly for the common defence. Upon this, the Assembly passed a new Bill, impos ing an assessment of 60,000 on the province for military purposes, with an exemption of the pro prietaries, in consideration of the sum granted by them. Another Act provided for the embody ing and training of a regiment of provincial militia, to be raised by voluntary enlistment. The influence of the Quakers was rapidly declining, owing to the relative decrease in their numbers as colonists of other creeds established themselves in the province. A military feeling had grown up even in the City of Brotherly Love ; and it was greatly increased by the state of affairs existing in 175G. The wild Indians on the frontier had in vaded the remoter settlements, and murdered the defenceless white people ; and there was no knowing how soon French drums might be beaten in the streets of Philadelphia, and French priests be seen administering the sacraments o/ the Romish Church. Even the Moravians, or at any rate several of them, expressed their adherence to the principle of defen sive war, and erected fortifications about their settlements. At the same period, the Quakers of New Jersey consented, in numerous instances, to serve in the militia, and to march against the French and Indians. Franklin was one of the Commissioners deputed to apply the money voted by the Assembly of Pennsylvania. The north western border was committed to his charge, and under his direction a fort was built among the dangerous defiles near the river Lehigh. The site of the fort was the village of Gnadenhutten. Ife had recently been desolated by the Indians, and the murdered inhabitants were found lying unburicd near the ashes of their homes. On being afterwards recalled to Philadelphia, Franklin was chosen colonel of a regiment of twelve hundred men. The war-party had now a complete ascendency in the plantation that had been founded by William Penn; and the Quakers felt that they could no longer, in conscience, take part in the administration of affairs. They gradually resigned their seats in the Assembly, and refused to accept offices of govern ment under a system which had departed so com pletely from what was intended by the author of their sect. Meanwhile, the most important of the colonial Governors appointed by the Crown continued to urge the home Government to tax the plantations, as the only means of creating a military force of suincient size and character to resist the encroach ments of the French. Dinwiddie, of Virginia, even urged the dissolution of the local Governments. He told the Secretary of State for the Southern Depart ment, in a despatch written in 1756, that nothing- would be done to remedy the disunited and dis tracted condition of the colonies until his Majesty took the proprietary Governments into his own hands. Without some such step, he observed, all expeditions would prove unsuccessful ; but, if properly protected, those dominions might be the western and best empire of the world. As Virginia was not a proprietary but a Royal- Government, Dinwiddie would seem to have contemplated a very general subversion of the independent administra tions of America. Shirley, who now, in virtue of his new position as commander-in-chief of the forces in America, took precedence of all the Governors, suggested that a stamp-duty should be imposed, together with an excise and a poll-tax. As a measure of conciliation to the colonies, he desired that each colony should be left to raise at its own discretion the sum assessed on it ; failing which, proper officers should be appointed to collect the revenue by warrants of distress, enforced by the imprisonment of defaulters. Such were the opinions which encouraged English statesmen to enter on the fatal path of colonial taxation. But they had acquired a disastrous force from the procrastination of the colonists in providing for their own defence. Shirley did not long enjoy the chief military position. He was a civilian a lawyer, more accustomed to the condiict of arguments than to the ordering of armies ; and, although as a soldier he had exhibited some spirit and aptitude, it was thought advisable to supersede him by an officer of experience. He was succeeded, about the middle of June, 1756, by General Abercrombie, who was despatched to America with a reinforcement of troops, as the temporary representative of the Earl of Loudoun. On the 29th of July, that nobleman reached Albany, invested with exceptionally great authority. He had been appointed commander-in- chief of all the English forces on the continent of North America, an-d also Governor of Virginia, 582 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1756. England thus established in the New World a con solidated military power, co-extensive with the colonies themselves, independent of the colonial Governors, and superior to them.* Loudoun was instructed to make it known to the Assemblies that the King required of them a general fund, to be issued and applied as the commander-in-chief should direct, and provision for all expenses that might arise from furnishing quarters for the troops. The appointment was regarded in America as an exercise of arbitrary power, and the quartering of troops on the people, without the consent of the local Assemblies, was bewailed as an extreme hard ship. But it is difficult to deny that the necessities and dangers of the time rendered such a measure unavoidable, and that the factious conduct of the colonists for years, together with their backward ness in providing for their own defence, left them little right to complain. Before the arrival of Loudoun, it had been settled, in order to avoid the necessity of placing the pro vincial levies under English officers an arrange ment to which the former greatly objected that the American companies should advance against the enemy, and that the regulars should follow, and occupy the forts and posts which the others had progressively quitted. Lord Loudoun was at first disposed to set aside this concession in the most peremptory manner ; but at length a com promise was agreed to, and the native Americans were for the present allowed to act separately, as far as the interests of the service would permit. The plan of operations for the next campaign had been settled by Shirley at a council of provincial Governors held at New York towards the close of the previous year. Renewed attempts were to be made against Crown Point, Niagara, and Fort Duquesne, by large masses of men. The French settlements on the river Chaudiere were to be destroyed ; Quebec was to be threatened by an army which should advance to within three miles of its walls, and thus distract the French from succouring other points ; and Ticonderoga was to be seized by a force proceeding over the ice during the period when the lakes are usually frozen. The last feature of the project was rendered impossible by the unwonted mildness of the winter ; the others were delayed by a variety of causes, and it was August before Loudoun felt satisfied as to the num bers and condition of his army, and before he had received from England the arms, ammunition, im plements, and other appliances necessary to warlike operations on a large scale. But even then nothing was done. * Bancroft, War had been formally declared in May, 1756 first by England, and shortly afterwards by France. It was evident that England meant to put forth her utmost maritime power against the enemy. She made it known that she would not permit neutral vessels to carry merchandise belonging to her antagonist. Frederick the Great of Prussia contended for the principle that free ships make free goods a principle which has always been dear to the Americans, and which was adopted by the chief European Governments at the Peace of 1856, exactly a hundred years after the period we are now considering, t But in the reign of George II. very few Englishmen admitted the validity of such a position. The great strength of England was at sea, and she would not consent to give up the power of seizing her enemy s property wherever she could find it. Murray (afterwards Lord Mans field), one of the greatest English lawyers of that time, had laid it down, some three years before, while occupying the position of Solicitor-General, that the effects of an enemy could be seized on board the vessel of a friend ; and, acting on this advice, England declared all the harbours of Franco to be in a state of blockade, and all vessels bound to them to be lawful prizes. Holland especially suffered from the enforcement of this edict. Her ships were largely employed in carrying the colonial products of France, and in supplying that country with naval stores ; and they were seized without mercy by English men-of-war, though the Treaty of Commerce between England and Holland, concluded in 1674, contained stipulations to the effect that the neutral flag should cover the enemy s goods, and that contraband of war should be limited to arms, artillery, and horses. The Government of George II. was equally de termined to be supreme in a military sense over the American colonies. The militia law of Pennsyl vania was repealed by the King in Council during the year 1756, and the companies were broken up and dispersed. Volunteers were not allowed to organise themselves for defence, and various arrangements made between the Pennsylvanians and the Indians, for securing the frontier, were condemned by Lord Halifax as violations of the Royal prerogative. The northern provinces were forbidden to negotiate with the natives, and the relations of the colonists with the red man were f "II. The neutral flag covers the enemy s goods, with tlie ex ception of contraband of war. III. Neutral goods, with the exception of contraband of war, are not liable to capture under the enemy s flag." (Declaration respecting Maritime Law, signed by the "Plenipotentiaries of Great Britain, Austria, France, Prussia, Russia, Sardinia, and Turkey, assembled in Congress at Paris, April 16th, 1856.) 1756.] FRENCH MOVEMENT ON OS W EGO. 583 entrusted to Sir William Johnson, who, in this matter as in others, was subordinate to Lord Loudoun.* Not long before, England had com plained, and with justice, that the colonists would take no steps to protect themselves against the common enemy. It would seem as if she were now doing her utmost to break down the spirit of self- reliance. That, in a time of war, all the forces should have been placed under one command, and that, in a matter affecting the character and sta bility of the whole empire, the command should round by Abercrombie ; but no orders for a for ward movement were given, either by him or Lou doun, though more than ten thousand men stood in arms at Albany. The usual effects ensued. The soldiers got out of heart, and disease in a little while wasted their ranks. Great things were promised for the future ; but there were those who apprehended a repetition of the disasters that had saddened the previous year. The French, as usual, took advantage of their adversary s inactivity. Oswego appeared to them FALLS OF THE ST. JOHN HIVEll. have been conferred on a professional soldier and a Royal officer, were reasonable and proper arrange ments. But in some other respects the interfei ence of the home Government with the colonists was arbitrary -and impolitic ; and it added largely to the feeling of disaffection which had been growing up for many years. The despotic method had not even the merit of success. Dilatoriness was the order of the day at Albany. Forty German officers were there, with a view to raising recruits for a Royal American regiment of four thousand men, to be commanded by Loudoun himself ; but very little was done. The town was ditched and stockaded * Bancroft, a vulnerable point, and they determined to attack it with vigour. Situated on the south-east side of Lake Ontario, one hundred and sixty miles west- north-west from Albany, it was far removed from the English base of operations. The means of commu nication, however, were not difficult. The greater part of the distance could be performed by water-carnage, in a species of light, flat-bottomed boats, widest in the middle, and pointed at each end, called by the inhabitants bateaux. These boats, which were of about fifteen hundredweight burden, were managed by two men with paddles and setting-poles, the rivers in many places being too narrow to admit of oars. A good waggon-road existed from Albany 584 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1756. to the 1 village of Schenectady, a distance of about sixteen miles. From that point the passage was by water-carriage sixty-five miles up the Mohawk river to the little falls, within a mile of which was a portage or land-carriage. The stream, though rapid in some places, was so shallow in others that at low water the boatmen were obliged to get out of their bateaux, and draw them over the rifts. The ground about the falls was too marshy to admit of the passage of any wheel-carriage ; but some German settlers there had provided sledges, by means of which the loaded bateaux were drawn to the next place of embarkation on the river. They then proceeded up the Mohawk to the carrying- place near the head of the stream, fifty miles distant. Here there was a second portage, which in the summer months was generally about six or eight miles across; but this depended greatly on the state of the weather, varying according as it was wet or dry. The bateaux were then again carried on sledges, and afterwards floated about forty miles on the narrow stream called Wood s Creek, until they came to Lake Oneida, which in calm weather could be crossed with perfect ease and safety. From the western extremity of this lake issues the river Oneida, which, after uniting with the Seneca, about thirty or forty miles further on, forms the Oswego, which flows into Lake Ontario. But the stream, besides being full of rifts and rocks, was sometimes dangerous from the rapidity of its current ; and, about twelve miles from Oswego, a fall of eleven feet perpendicular added to the perils of transit. At this point there was another short portage ; after which the rest of the way to Oswego was quite easy. On Lake Ontario, the French had erected two strong forts : viz., Frontenac, which commanded the St. Lawrence, where that river and the lake communicate ; and Niagara, commanding the com munication between Lakes Ontario and Erie. The English had been in possession of Fort Oswego for a considerable time ; but, though its situation was peculiarly exposed to attack, nothing had been done to render it capable of defence, nor had any vessels fit for navigating the lake been con structed until the arrival of Braddock in 1755. By the summer of 1756, these preparations had been, carried forward sufficiently to offer some hope of a successful resistance to any attempt that might be made ; yet the subsequent course of events showed that appearances were deceptive. On the 12th of July, Colonel Bradstreet returned from Oswego, where he had left six months pro visions for five thousand men, and a great qxiantity of stores, though the garrison consisted of hardly sixteen hundred men. The French were determined to put forth all their power, while the English ex hibited the most extraordinary apathy. General Webb, with the forty-fourth regiment, was ordered to hold himself in readiness to inarch to the defence of the imperilled position; but he never stirred until it was too late. Oswego was left to take care of itself, though the designs of the French were by this time manifest. They had already made advances in that direction, and taken up positions which intercepted the communications. When the new French commander, the Marquis de Montcalm, arrived at Quebec, it was evident that operations would be pushed forward with resolution and auda city. Montcalm was a Field Marshal of France ; a fiery little man, active, restless, daring, intelli gent, and possessed of military skill and knowledge. During the next three years he was to occupy a conspicuous position in the history of North America ; and he perished, simultaneously with the English hero, Wolfe, at the taking of Quebec. But in 1756 he had only just arrived in Canada, as the successor of Baron Dieskau ; and in the western world he had his reputation to make. The activity with which he laid his plans, and proceeded to carry them out, should have been at once a warning and an example to the English. Without a moment s pause, either by night or day, he proceeded to Ticonderoga, and by two long marches on foot made himself and his troops acquainted with the ground they had to defend. Next, determining to reduce Oswego, he collected at Montreal three regiments from Quebec, together with a large body of Canadians and Indians, and immediately crossed Lake Ontario to the south eastern shore. By the 10th of August, his army of about five thousand fighting men had arrived before the position they were to assail ; and at mid night on the llth, Montcalm opened his trenches. But in the first instance he directed his attack, not against Oswego itself, but against an outwork which Shirley had built on some high ground on the opposite bank of the Oswego river, and which went by the name of Fort Ontario. Into this fort the French commander poured a steady and con tinuous fire, to which the garrison replied with spirit until evening of the following day (the 12th), when, having exhausted their ammunition, they spiked their guns, and retreated to Fort Oswego. The height was at once occupied by Montcalm, who proceeded to attack the other and principal fort with great energy. Both works had been hastily and flimsily built of logs of wood ; the collateral defences were unfinished, and the position altogether was ill-adapted to withstand a serious 1756.] SURRENDER OF OSWEGO. 585 attack. By this time it would have been a diffi cult matter for the commanders at Albany to send any succour to the besieged; for Montcalm had posted a strong body of Canadians on the road between Albany and Oswego, and had closed the lake by two large armed vessels, assisted by a buttery which he had planted on the shores of a creek within half a league of the forts. The advantageous ground from which he now directed his operations, enabled the French Marshal to concentrate a very destructive fire on the re maining position. Mercer, the commandant at Oswego, was speedily killed, and a breach was made in the outer walls. The garrison hoped for a while to procure aid from Fort George, situated about four miles and a half up the liver, and occupied by a force under Colonel Schuyler; but, the attempt to open communications having failed, there remained no alternative but to surrender. The situation was hopeless. The men, as they stood at their guns, were destitute of cover; the works were incap able of resisting the French fire; the commander was dead, together with eleven others ; the remain ing officers were divided in their views, and the soldiers were in confusion. Montcalm was pre paring to storm the entrenchments on the morning of the 14th of August, when the garrison demanded a capitulation, and siirrendered as prisoners of war, on condition that they should be exempted from plunder, conducted to Montreal, and treated with humanity. It has been asserted by Smollett, and by other historians who have followed him, that Montcalm shamefully violated these engagements ; that British officers and soldiers were insulted by the Indians under liis command, who robbed them of their clothes and baggage ; that several defence less men were massacred as they stood on the parade ; that all the sick people in the hospital were scalped ; and that the Marshal delivered up above twenty men of the garrison to the Indians, in lieu of the samQ number lost by them during the siege. But it would appear that these statements were exaggerated, though it is not likely that they were altogether false. Lord Loudoun considered that the rumour of a massacre had no good founda tion ; but it is not denied that three-and-thirty of the prisoners were killed by the Indians in attempt ing to escape through the woods ; and, knowing what we do of the habits of these savages, it is probable that wanton cruelties were inflicted. "When the garrison arrived at Montreal, however, they had no occasion to complain of their treatment. The spoils of the victors at Oswego included a hundred and twenty cannon, six vessels of war, three hundred boats, large accumulations of ammu nition and provisions, and three chests of money. To satisfy the Indians of the Six Nations, within whose territory the forts at Oswego had been built, much to their annoyance, Montcalm demolished the works, and left the place a desert. Webb was by this time on his way to the relief of Oswego ; but, on arriving at the carrying-place between the Mohawk river and Wood s Creek, he learned that the fort had already surrendered. Fearing that he would himself be attacked, he made the creek im passable, even to canoes, by felling trees, and throwing them into the stream. By a rather ludicrous coincidence, the French, believing that they were in danger from the English, resorted to the same device. Webb then retired to Albany, and the campaign of 175G, from which so much had been hoped, was at an end. CHAPTER LXVI. The Military Situation in America in the Latter Tart of 175G Troubles with the Indians Colonisations in Georgia and Tennessee Loudoun s Arbitrary Enforcement of Free Quarters for his Troops in New York and Pennsylvania Recall of Governor Shirley to England Unpopularity of the English Ministry Position towards Political Parties of the young Prince of "Wales, afterwards George III. Influence of the Earl of Bute Character and Objects of the Elder William Pitt Resigna tion of the Duke of Newcastle, and Accession of Pitt to Power His Energetic Rule Liberality of his Ideas towards America State of Affairs at Fort "William Henry The Campaign- of 1757 decided on Unpopularity of Lord Loudoun Contemplated Expedition against Louisburg Delay at Halifax Abandonment of the Expedition Fort William Henry reduced by Montcalm Massacre of English Troops by the French Indians Gloomy Apprehensions in the Anglo- American Colonies Continued French Successes Spread of Republican Sentiments Dispute with Lord Loudoun as to the Billeting of Officers Address of the Massachusetts Assembly. LOUDOUX had proved a failure whether principally owing to his own incapacity, or to the incapacity of others, or to divided counsels, need not now be inquired. He had wasted the best period of the 586 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1756. year in hesitation and abortive attempts ; and, as the autumn advanced, he found it prudent to dis miss his provincials, and send his regulars into winter quarters. The end of the campaign, if such it can be called, saw the French in a better, and the English in a worse, position than they had occupied at its commencement. Oswego had been lost, and the French had shown so marked a superiority during two successive years that it seemed only too likely they would assume the offensive in a third. Lord Loudoun admitted that he feared an attack, and, conceiving that his first duty was defence, he commanded Window not to proceed with his intended expedition against Ticon- deroga and Crown Point, but to fortify his camp. General Webb, at the head of fourteen hundred English troops, and Sir William Johnson, with a thousand militia, were ordered to support Wins- low ; and the various commanders, concentrating their forces, stood in readiness for an assault which never came. For the present, the Anglo-Americans were more in danger from the Indians than from the French. On the western frontier, the savages, incited by their white allies, made a series of on slaughts of the most ferocious character, killing or carrying into captivity more than a thousand people. The advanced posts of Virginian settlers, beyond the Blue Mountains, were so devastated, despite the efforts of Washington to protect them, that the people fled in large numbers to the more eastern parts. Pennsylvania suffered equally, and found itself compelled to take military measures against the Delawares. A regiment of fifteen hundred men was raised, and about three hundred were sent against Kittaning, the principal Indian town on the Alleghany liver, where the red men suffered a severe defeat. But in many localities the depre dations continued, and the local Governments, for the most part, showed their usual disinclination to military expenditure. Even on the confines of Pennsylvania, the Indians, notwithstanding their discomfiture at Kittaning, continued to give trouble. Aided by the French, they sacked a small fort and settlement called Grenville, and carried fire and sword into the adjoining country. With the Delawares, however, a treaty of peace was con cluded by the Governor of Pennsylvania ; and at the same time Virginia effected an. alliance with the Cherokees and Catawbas. Thus the year wore on towards its close, without any material change in the position of the two belligerents. The general uncertainty of affairs did not entirely stifle the energy of colonising speculators. A band of private adventurers formed a settlement beyond the Alatamaha, and, creating an independent government, which they called New Hanover, held possession of the country as far as the St. Mary s, to the great indignation of the Spaniards, who complained that their territory had in this way been violated, though the lands were really within the limits of Georgia. A number of Carolinians penetrated into the interior of what is now Tennessee, and a little band of two hundred men constructed, on the river of the same name, at a distance of five hundred miles from Charleston, a fort which was called Fort Loudoun. The King s independent companies of infantry, embodied for the protection of the Carolinas and Georgia, were sent to garrison this position, and also the forts of Frederica and Augusta, together with Fort Prince George and Fort Moore, on the river Savannah. These secured the south ; in the north, Fort Edward and Fort William Henry were put in a state of defence, and furnished with strong garrisons ; and the Commander-in-chief then turned his thoughts towards the campaign of the following year. But before he could give his entire attention to this matter, he was compelled to encounter the colonists on the difficult subject of quartering his troops. Both in New York and Philadelphia he encoun tered considerable opposition to his orders in tins respect. He was reminded in the former city that the billeting of troops on private citizens was opposed to the privileges of Englishmen, to the provisions of the common law, to the Petition of Right, and to specific Acts of Parliament. Loudoun averred on his honour which he said was the highest evidence they could require that free quarters were everywhere usual. The citizens still persist ing in their opposition, the Earl retorted, with an oath after the fashion of those days, that if the people of New York would not billet his officers at once, he would order there all the English troops in North America, and quarter them himself upon the city. This put a stop to the matter. New York was compelled to submit, and Philadelphia, similarly threatened, was glad to effect a com promise. Towards the end of the year, large bodies of troops, with a considerable supply of warlike stores, were despatched to America in four teen transports, under convoy of two British ships of war. Shirley, the Governor of Massachu setts, to whom some blame seems to have been attributed on account of the recent calamities though he had really far less to do with them than others was recalled to England, and soon after wards appointed to the Government of the Bahama Islands. His sixteen years connection with the affairs of Massachusetts had created in him a re- 1756.] THE MILITARY SITUATION. 587 gard for that province, and at a subsequent date he returned to it in a private capacity, and died there. His official character combined in an unusual degree a sincere respect for colonial liberties with a sense of what was due to the Royal authority, or rather to the predominance of the Empire over its depen dencies. Shirley wished the Americans to be free and self-governed ; but he did not forget that he was an Englishman. He thought there was an obligation of the colonists towards the mother O country, as well as an obligation of the mother country towards the colonists. When he found so much remissuess in the local Governments with regard to defence against the foreigner, he urged the King s Ministers to make provision by their own act for a proper military esta blishment, and to tax the colonies by the agency of the English Parliament, since they would not tax themselves for any such purpose. Yet, unpopular as this suggestion was, it does not seem to have diminished the general confidence in Shirley. In some respects he took the American side. He supported the military claims of Washington against the arrogance of professional military officers ; and his zeal for the prosperity of the colonies seems not to have been doubted. It should be remembered to his honour, whatever his mis takes, that he never turned his lucrative offices to the enriching of himself. The Americans now looked forward to the speedy opening of a more successful campaign ; but the conduct of affairs in England was still in feeble hands. Newcastle became every day more unpopular. His Government, while preserving a majority in Parliament by the help of bribery, as many said could hardly keep itself together, for want of a definite policy and of mutual reliance. Henry Fox, the most capable man in the Cabinet, and the one in best esteem with the people, quitted his colleagues in October, 1756, finding he could do nothing to stem the tide of disgrace which was gathering round the Ministry. Murray, the Attorney-General, insisted on being made a peer and Lord Chief Justice, and was thus lost to the House of Commons. In Europe, as well as in America, the arms of England had met with failure and repulse. Vast expense was incurred ; expedi tions were sent out in vain ; fortified places were surrendered; and even on the sea the favourite element of Englishmen no great success compen sated for the numerous reverses that had occurred on land. Only in Hindostan was the grandeur of Englund asserted in power and in splendour. There, the genius of Clive flashed forth with sudden yet sustained brilliance, and made Englishmen once more the conquerors of Frenchmen, as in the days of Cressy, of Agincourt, and of Blenheim. But the achievements of Clive flowed from the enter prise of a private Company, and reflected little credit on the Ministry. The Duke of Newcastle had fallen on evil days, and possessed none of those faculties by which evil itself is made the stepping- stone to supreme fortune. He was a Whig, coming at a time when Whiggism, after its really important services to the people and to liberty at the periods of the Revolution and of the Hanoverian succes sion, was growing effete, corrupt, and official. He was an aristocrat, removed by time and circum stances from the better traditions of the aristocracy, and retaining only its love of dominion and its con tempt of the populace. His failure was due partly to himself, partly to the inherited difficulties of a system which was ripe for change. He had the support of the King ; but the King was old and infirm, and the rising men of the day were thronging about the rising star. The young Prince of Wales, George, son of the deceased Frederick, came of age in June, 1756, being then eighteen, the period at which princes attain their majority. Newcastle, acting on the wishes of his Royal master, would have separated his establish ment from that of his mother. The youth vehe mently opposed any such design, and, with the support of Pitt, declared that he would have the free choice of his own servants. The King reluctantly consented, and the coming Power scored a triumph over that which was departing. It was evident that the new King, whenever his reign began, would not favour the old Whigs. He had from an early age conceived a dislike to that party. To him it appeared t hat the Whig aristocracy was too powerful that ever since 1688 the monarch had been little better than a gorgeous pxippet in the hands of a few great families professing a cer tain set of opinions. To counteract this influence, which had unquestionably proceeded too far, he was not disposed to call on the .people. Of the aristo cracy he was jealous ; bait the people, as a political body, inspired him with alarm. His plan was to increase the power of the Crown while refusing additional power to the commonalty ; to make the sovereign once more what he had been from the days of Henry VII. to those of James II. That in effecting this reactionary change he desired to preserve the accustomed forms of the Constitution that he had no wish to do away with either the House of Commons or the House of Lords does not disprove the reality of his design. Though a dull man, he had sense enough to discern the impossible. That he was dealing with an actual 1756.J BUTE AND THE ELDER PITT. 589 evil in the political state, and had some degree of justice on his side, does not show that his policy was good in the main, or other than a conspiracy against the liberties of Englishmen. The agent by whom he hoped to carry these ideas into effect was a Scotch peer, the Earl of Bute, who had been one of the lords of the bed-chamber to Frederick, and who, after the death of that Prince, had been much consulted by his widow in the the present monarch. When his household was organised, the Prince of Wales retained this Scotch peer about his person, and showed him the greatest favour. In a few years he was to be the successful rival of Pitt ; but for the moment he was glad of the friendship of that superb debater, and Pitt was glad of his. The future Earl of Chatham was at that time the most masterly speaker in the House of VIEW OX LAKE GKOKGK. education of the youthful heir to the throne. Frederick had said of Bute that he was a tine, showy man, who would make an excellent Ambas sador in any court where there was no business.* George II. called him a puppy ; but perhaps that was only saying with blunt directness what the son had more civilly expressed by a periphrasis. Bute was a man who made great pretensions to learning and wisdom ; but his pretensions were not very generally recognised. There could be no doubt, however, that he was a thorough courtier, and he saw that his interests would be better served by attaching himself to the future than to * Memoirs from 1754 to 1758, by the second Earl of Waldegrave. 50 Commons. Murray had been his equal, but Murray was now Lord Mansfield, and in the Upper Chamber. Pitt had been in the House for rather more than twenty years, and had been slowly winning his way, in spite of the opposition of the Court, whose enmity he had provoked in consequence of his taking the side of the late Prince of Wales against the King, in the quarrel which broke out between father and son. In subsequent years ho increased this sentiment of personal dislike by the vehemence with which lie opposed the Hanoverian leanings of the monarch ; yet he had held subordi nate positions in the Ministry from 1746 to 1755, and Newcastle now saw the necessity of obtaining his support, if he would save his Government from 590 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1757. utter ruin. The powerful Duke, with his large majority in Parliament, besought the assistance of the comparatively humble Cornish gentleman in managing his Administration. But Pitt refused to connect himself with a rotten, and foundering bark. He saw that the day of his power was not far off, and he could afford to wait. In December, 1756, the Duke of Newcastle, yielding to his un popularity in the country, and to the difficulty of carrying on his Government now that Fox had resigned, gave up his powers into the hands of the King, who, after a brief struggle with his antipa thies, made Pitt Secretary of State for the Southern Department, with the Duke of Devonshire for nominal Premier, and a Cabinet composed of friends of Pitt and Bute, and of members of the party to which they belonged. The arrangement did not last. The King could not forget his old animosi ties, and in March, 1757, left Pitt no alternative but to resign. During the best part of a quarter of a year, the coimtry was without a Government. No one would undertake the management of affairs, and at length the King was compelled to form an Administration in which the Duke of Newcastle resumed his old post of First Lord of the Treasury, with Pitt once more Southern Secretary, sur rounded by his friends and supporters in the chief offices of the Government. This placed the con duct of the war, both in the Old and New World, almost entirely in his hands, and gave him virtu ally, though not nominally, the position of Premier. In the forty-ninth year of his age at a time of life when the judgment is mature, the intellect at its strongest, the experience of the world neither contracted nor superficial, and the energies as yet unimpaired the elder William Pitt undertook to dii-ect the fortunes of England during a crisis of great difficulty and no small discouragement. He was undoubtedly the favourite of the people. Though connected with the aristocracy through his mother (a sister of the Earl of Grandison), he was himself a commoner, the son of a simple country gentleman. He had always taken the patriotic side in the great qiiestions of the day, and he was generally regarded as the only Englishman of note who was disposed to follow a thoroughly English policy in the relations of the country with foreign Powers. In his previous occupation of secondary posts, he had shown an honourable superiority to the corruption which then so generally prevailed. While far from wealthy, he had refused to enrich himself by indirect means ; and no man ever en tered on the service of the Crown with a more un stained reputation. His eloquence had been known for years ; he was now to prove his capacity as an administrator. It was no easy task that he had undertaken. In feeble health, he had to encounter the enmity of the Court, the distrust of a House of Commons elected under different auspices, the jealousy of colleagues who were not always willing to act as subordinates, the opposition of defeated factions, and the innumerable and secret influences which conspire to fetter the hands of a Minister who is known not to enjoy the confidence of the King. George II,, in moments of private confidence with his favoui ites, did not scruple to call Pitt a scoundrel. But he had the countenance of the Prince of Wales ; and the Prince s private adviser told the new Minister that they thought alike. Bute, however, was a totally different man from Pitt, and shared neither his genius nor his liberality. The country had been reduced by imbecility to the depths of degradation. Pitt resolved that it should once more take its proper stand among the nations of the world. He communicated his own energy to the several departments of State, and to the leaders of the armies. With the accession to power of the new Secretary, the long series of reverses soon began to decline, and victory again fell to English valour. America was not the first to feel this change of fortune ; but in other matters she shortly experienced the excellence of the new rule. It was no part of the policy of Pitt to vex and irritate the colonies by needless interference. He opposed the projects of Lord Halifax for taxing the people of those provinces without their consent. It was at that time believed by many that a revenue of more than 60,000 a year might be obtained from a stamp-duty on vellum and paper, rendered the less unpalatable by a reduction of the duty on foreign rum, sugar, and molasses imported into the plantations. But Pitt refused his sanction to the scheme, conceiving that it would be both ungenerous and impolitic to take advantage of the Americans while they were engaged in a deadly struggle. He had the same feeling on the subject as Sir Robert Walpole, and left the taxation of America to Ministers of more courage and less sense than himself. At the seat of war in the western world, the winter passed without any event of importance. The garrison at Fort William Henry maintained themselves in their position, and even made occa sional sallies over the snowy desert and across the frozen surface of the lakes, attacking such French stragglers as they could find. The French, on their part, undertook to assault the fort, advanc ing by day and night over the icy expanse of Lake Champlain and Lake George, sleeping occa sionally in the open air on bearskins spread on the 1757.] LOUDOUN S MISMANAGEMENT. 591 beaten snow, carrying their provisions in sledges drawn by dogs, but failing in their attempt, owing to the vigilance of the defenders. These, however, were but trifling incidents : operations on a large scale were necessarily postponed until the arrival of a milder season. Plans for a campaign were discussed at a council of Governors which assem bled at Boston in January, 1757. Lord Loudoun attended this conference, and gave great offence by attributing all the recent disasters to the misconduct of the American troops, or to the remissness of the provincial Governments, and by ascribing whatever safety was enjoyed to the superior conduct and discipline of the English regulars. With respect to the future, he required the New England provinces to provide an army of four thousand men, to be despatched to New York, where they were to unite with the quotas to be furnished by that province and New Jersey, and whence they would be conducted on an enterprise the nature and destination of which were for the present to be kept secret, but which, the Earl assured the council, would not be uncongenial to the views and wishes of the people of New Eng land. This requisition, which was more moderate than had been expected, was agreed to ; but Lou doun, who had never been liked, became still more unpopular, owing to the arrogance of his manners, and the total want of success which had attended his command. As in all men devoid of real energy, there was a fussy haste and air of despatch about him, which ended in nothing. A Philadelphian wittily said to Franklin, " He is like St. George upon a sign-post always on horseback, but never advancing." He was such an utter disbeliever in public honesty, that when Franklin, in reply to some insinuations of his, gave him to understand that he had really not abused his position as a contractor for the army to fill his own pockets, Loudoun laughed at the assertion as a thing utterly incredible. It was an age of corruption and of de ficient morality ; and the Earl was quite in harmony with his time. To the general armament, North Carolina, Vir ginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania added con tingents, and, early in the spring, six thousand American troops were ready for action. It was very generally expected that this force would be sent against Ticonderoga and Crown Point; but, on the arrival in Nova Scotia of a large armament, consisting of sixteen ships of the line, besides transports and bomb-ketches, commanded by Ad miral Holborne and Commodore Holmes, and con taining six thousand soldiers under the direction of Viscount Howe, it was determined to effect the conquest of Louisburg. Loudoun departed for Halifax on the 20th of June, and arrived there on the 30th. He was now at the head of twelve thou sand men, and a large and well-appointed fleet was at hand to second his efforts. At Halifax he dawdled away the summer, doing nothing of any consequence. He levelled the ground for a parade ; he planted a vegetable garden as a precaution against scurvy; he exercised his men in mock battles and sieges ; he did everything but enter on the real work of war. The men grew out of heart ; the officers became scornful. Major-General Lord Charles Hay expressed his contempt so loudly as to be arrested ; and the whole army was in a mood of muffled indignation.* Loudoun had discovered that Louisburg was stronger than he had supposed ; and while he was making inquiries as to the exact position of the enemy there, it became stronger still. At length the army was embarked for its place of destination ; but, before the ships sailed, the commander received information which deter mined him to relinquish the expedition altogether. The French were in force which seemed to him too great to cope with, and he departed for New York. On his way he was met by intelligence of a fresh disaster, to which his own bad management had contributed. Montcalm, taking advantage of the exposed state of the English provinces, owing to Loudoun hav ing drawn oft* his troops 011 an expedition which after all he never prosecuted, had advanced with an army of nine thousand men against Fort Wil liam Henry (situated at the south end of Lake George, a little east of the village of Caldwell, in Warren County, New York), and had reduced it. In the first place, previous to starting on this enterprise, he made his court to the Oneidas, the Senecas, and other savage tribes, and gained them over to his interests. These native warriors crossed the waters of Lake Champlain. in two hundred canoes, with pennons flying, and all the pomp of savage warfare. Assembling beneath the battle ments of Ticonderoga, in the midst of woods and mountains, they sang the war-song, danced the war-dance, and listened to the eloquence of their orators. Mass was chanted for the benefit of the converts ; Montcalm harangued his officers on the necessity of braving all hardships in the accom plishment of their design ; some of the savages, who had been sent out against Fort Edward, ex cited the ferocity of their comrades by returning with a trophy of forty-two English scalps. In the latter days of July they defeated a party of American boatmen on Lake George, and took a * Bancroft. 592 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. U757, great many prisoners. On the 31st they embarked on the lake, and rowed nearly all through the night in the midst of a drenching rain. At North-west Bay, near the encampment of the French commander, De Levi, they held a council of war, and then proceeded on their route. Ar riving in front of the English position, they found * the plain covered with tents, and everything indi cating that the defenders of Fort William Henry were taken by surprise. General Webb, who was stationed at Fort Edward with a force of four thousand men, and who had reason to knoAV that the enemy was astir, might have taken measures to repel the attack on the other position ; but he seems to have shared the imbecility of Loudoun. The two forts were separated by a distance of only fourteen or fifteen miles ; yet Webb did nothing. He went to Fort William Henry, but left it again almost directly, with a large escort, shortly before the place was invested. The French commander disembarked without interruption about a mile and a half below the fort which he had come to attack, and on which his army moved forward in three columns. While the Indians burnt the barracks of the English, seized their cattle and horses, and, in combination with the Canadians, took up a position on the road leading to the Hudson which enabled them to cut off communications, the main body of the army, under the dii-ection of Montcalm himself, occupied the skirt of a wood on the west side of the lake. De Levi was to the north, and the doomed fort was nearly surrounded. On the 4th of August, the French summoned Monroe, an English officer in command of the Anglo-American forces, to surrender ; but the stout-hearted soldier refused. Montcalm therefore determined on a bombardment. His heavy guns were dragged from the shores of the lake over the intervening rocks, and planted in position. The Avails of the fortress were approached by zig-zags, and the heavy artillery opened fire amidst the excited screams of the Indians. Webb, from his comparatively safe position at Fort Edward, despatched a letter to Monroe, giving an alarming account of the French force, and counsel ling an immediate surrender. The missive was intercepted by Montcalm, who was of course glad to send it on to the English commander; but it produced no effect. On the very day he invested the place, Montcalm had endeavoured to intimidate his adversaiy by threats of Indian vengeance. He addressed him by letter, saying he felt obliged in humanity to desire he would surrender the fort, and not provoke the great number of savages in the French army by a vain resistance. "A detachment of your garrison," he said, " has lately experienced their cruelty. I have it yet in my power to oblige them to observe a capitulation, as none of them hitherto are killed."* But Monroe met such ad vances with defiance, and for six days replied with energy to the fire of his assailant. On the 9th of August, having by this time received positive in formation that no relief would be attempted, the gallant commander hung out a flag of truce. Half his guns had burst, his ammunition was nearly exhausted, and all chance of saving the place was at an end. The terms of surrender -were that the garrison should not serve against the French for eighteen months ; that they should march out with the honours of war ; that they should be allowed to retain their private baggage ; and that they should be escorted to Fort Edward by French troops, as a protection against the ferocity of the Indians. A horrible tragedy ensued. The savages unfortunately obtained some strong liquors from the English (who probably hoped to conciliate them in this way), and passed the night in a fury of excitement and revelry, dancing their barbarous dances, and singing their maddening songs. The Abenakis of Acadie inflamed the passions of their comrades by recount ing what they had suffered at the hands of the English ; and at dawn all were ready for the work of murder. As, in the grey light of daybreak, the unfortunate soldiers filed out of the fort, the drunken wretches, whom French priests had blessed not many days before, began an indiscriminate attack on officers and men. Several were killed, others wounded, others taken prisoners, in defiance of the terms of capitulation. It is said that alto gether as many as fifteen hundred suffered in their persons or their liberty. A number of Indian allies of the English, who had formed pai-t of the garrison, were reserved for lingering torture. Little more than half the entire army gained the shelter of Fort Edward, plundered of everything they pos sessed, and horrified by the massacre which they had barely escaped. How far the French were privy to this frightful massacre cannot be exactly determined. Montcalm, in reporting the matter to his Government, and in writing to Lord Loudoun, asserted that he and De Levi did their utmost to check the Indians ; that French officers received wounds in rescuing the captives, and stood at their tents as sentries over those they had recovered ; that they urged the English troops to defend themselves against the savages ; and that those who were carried away were soon afterwards ransomed by the French. * Smollett. 1757.] DISPUTES WITH LORD ! LOUDOUN. 593 One is not willing to think ill of a gallant officer and the brave troops he commanded ; but the facts have an ugly and suspicious look. The English were to march out under a French escort ; but it appears that hardly any escort was provided. It is difficult to believe that Montcalrn could not have stopped the butchery had he been really determined to do so. A few rounds of shot would have speedily cooled the ferocity of the savages ; but this might have endangered the Indian alliance. Montcalm preferred the friendship of his painted warriors to the vindication of his good faith and the claims of humanity. Mr. Bancroft, whose sympathies are visually with the French rather than with the nation whence he derives his origin, gives a high-flown version of this affair, but leaves it very much where he found it. The reputation of Montcalm has received a stain from which no partisanship has yet succeeded in rescuing it. The fort was demolished immediately after its reduction, and the French retired with the stores they had taken from the enemy. "Webb, at Fort Edward, was struck with dismay. He sent off his baggage to a place of security, and talked of retreat ing to the highlands on the Hudson. Loudouii O O proposed to encamp on Long Island ; Pownall, the new Govenor of Massachusetts, ordered the inhabi tants west of the Connecticut river to destroy their wheel-carriages, and drive in their cattle. It was feared by many that the end of British power on the continent of America was close at hand. The English had been completely beaten out of the valleys of the Ohio and of the St. Lawrence. France, supreme upon the lakes, had fastened a firm grip (or such, at least, it seemed) on the north and on the west. England appeared to be on the lii-ink of reverses even more disastrous than those which had already occurred ; whereas she was really on the eve of the most brilliant and substan tial success. For the moment, gloom and appre hension prevailed ; but the people of New England roused themselves to meet the danger. A portion of the militia of Massachusetts and Connecticut was despatched to check the progress of the French ; and the first of those two provinces was so denuded of troops as to be placed in a position of some danger. Fortunately, however, Montcalm pursued his successes no further on any scale of importance. An expedition of French and Indians was sent against the settlement at German Flats, in the province of New York, which was iitterly destroyed with fire and sword, together with other small plantations along the Mohawk river. But this terminated the land operations for the season. The results had been altogether discreditable to the English ; even at sea, disasters had not been wanting. A fleet of twenty-one merchant-vessels, homeward-bound from the Carolinas, was attacked by the French, who took nineteen, each loaded with a valuable cargo. The mortificatioiis of the time increased the republican tendencies of the American people ; but they cannot be said to have created those ten dencies, for they existed long before. In New Hampshii e, according to the report of the Governor, the Royal prerogative was treated with contempt, and all instructions from the home Government were disregarded ; yet New Hampshire used to be one of the most loyal of all the provinces. In New York and North Carolina, the same feelings were said to prevail ; and Loudoun did the most he could to intensify the disaffection by his violent enforcement of the measure for billeting troops. Some English officers who had arrived in Boston from Nova Scotia, for the purpose of recruiting their regiments, required the justices of the peace to quarter them on the citizens. The justices refused, contending that the Act of Parliament on the subject did not apply to America, and that they had no authority to grant billets without the sanction of the Legislative Assembly of the pro vince. The officers complained to Loudoun ; Loudoun wrote to the Governor in peremptory language, commanding that the quarters should be furnished ; the Boston authorities still resisted, and the Earl wrote again in November in still more angry terms. All this while the officers were lodging in barracks at the Castle ; but they required accommodation in the town, as affording them greater facilities for pursuing their work. Loudoun now declared that his patience and gentleness were exhausted ; that he had no leisure for further parley, and that, unless the justices averted ex tremities by immediately doing their duty, he would take measures for ensuring obedience, and for preventing the whole continent from being thrown into confusion. " I have ordered the mes senger," he wrote, " to wait but forty-eight hours in Boston ; and if on his return I find things not settled, I will instantly order into Boston the three regiments from New York, Long Island, and Connecticut ; and if more are wanted, I have two in the Jei-seys at hand, besides three in Pennsyl vania." The Assembly attempted a compromise. They passed a law, the provisions of which were similar to those of the English Act of Parliament, though not identical with them ; but this only served to increase the irritation of Loudoun. He wrote to Pownall, affirming that the Assembly had no concern in the dispute, and that "in time of 594 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1757. war the rules and customs of war must govern ; " and lie concluded by stating that the troops had received their orders, and were already marching on Boston. Hereupon, in December, the Assembly voted an address to the Governor, in which, though in very temperate language, they maintained their right under the charter to arrange for them selves all matters of domestic government, reasserted their former opinion that the English Act did not extend to America, and averred that they had been governed by a sense of duty to his Majesty, and of fidelity to the trust reposed in them. Lord Loudoun affected to see in this Address some concession to his assumptions, though it really contained none. He countermanded his orders for the military occupation of Boston, and wrote that he could now depend on the Assembly making the matter of quarters easy in all coming time. The English commander had met with another defeat this time in the field of politics, and on a matter which every Englishman should have under stood. The colonists were following a thoroughly English precedent in objecting to the quartering of soldiers on private citizens. In the celebrated Peti tion of Right framed by the first Parliament of Charles I., it was required among other things " that persons be not compelled to receive soldiers and mariners into their houses against the laws and customs of the realm ; " and the Commons refused to grant supplies until they got a satisfactory answer, which the King at length reluctantly gave. The matter of billeting has since been regulated by particular Acts of Parliament ; but the colonists might well doiibt whether in such a matter they were to be coerced by a law in the making of which they had no share. Still, Loudoun may have felt that he was bound by his instructions, and the recent extension of the Mutiny Act to America put him technically in the right. His chief fault was in the temper he exhibited. As, however, he had now retreated from his position of antagonism, the General Court of Massachusetts resolved to be conciliatory, and accordingly sent to the Governor an addi*ess which afterwards led to considerable discussion. This message was the composition of Thomas Hutchinson, a gentleman who had filled hisch official situations in Massachu setts for several years, and who subsequently was Governor of the province during the earlier days of the revolutionary struggle, when he became very generally detested as the advocate and agent of English designs on American liberty. The two Houses forming the General Court (the Assembly and the Council) thanked the Governor for his good offices on their behalf, but at the same time protested that their recent measure was intended, not to give force to an Act of Parliament (as Lord Loudoun had insinuated), but to regulate a case to which no Act of Parliament was applicable. " We are willing," they declared, " by a due exercise of the powers of civil government (and we have the pleasure of seeing your Excellency concur with us) to remove, as much as may be, all pretence of necessity of military government. Such measures, we are sure, will never be disapproved by the Parliament of Great Britain, our dependence upon which we never had a desire, or thought, of lessen ing. . . . The authority of all Acts of Parlia ment which concern the colonies, and extend to them, is ever acknowledged in all the courts of law, and made the nile of all judicial proceedings, in the province. There is not a member of the General Court, and we know no inhabitant within the bounds of the government, that ever questioned this authority. To prevent any ill consequences which may arise from an opinion of our holding such principles, we now utterly disavow them, as we should readily have done at any time past, if there had been occasion for it ; and we pray that his lordship may be acquainted therewith, that we may appear in a time light, and that no impressions may remain to our disadvantage." When the contest between Great Britain anil her colonies broke out, this address was often re ferred to in England as ft formal acknowledgment by Massachusetts of the supremacy of Parliament ; and such it seems really to have been, though the American patriotic party contended for a pi ecisely opposite interpretation. But the time was fast coming when the dispute between the mother country and her children would be too serioiis and too vehement, to be determined by such slender considerations, or such subtleties of argumentative .skill. WOLl- E LANDING AT LOUISBURO. 596 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1758. CHAPTER LXVII. Recall of Lord Loudoun Desperate Condition of the English in America at the Beginning of 1758 Policy of Pitt the Elder on the Continent of Europe and in America The American Provinces invited to Assist in a New Campaign against the French Raising of a Fresh Colonial Army Arrival of English Troops in America General Wolfe Famine in Canada- Lord Howe Attack on Louisburg Gallant and Able Conduct of Wolfe Capitulation of Louisburg, and Abandonment of the City Expedition against Ticonderoga Situation of the Fort Advance of the English Forces Encounter with the French in a Wood, and Death of Lord Howe Desperate Struggle before the Fort Defeat of the English, and Abandon ment of the Expedition Taking of Forts Frontenac and Duquesne by the Americans Honours paid to Washington Search for the Remains of Braddock s Troops Dramatic Incident Turn in the Tide of Fortune. IT was by this date quite evident that the conduct of affairs in America must be taken out of the hands of Lord Loudoun, if the cause of England was to have the least chance of succeeding, or the colonies were to be protected against the dangers by which they were threatened. His mismanage ment, his hesitation, his blundering, Ms ill-success, made him the common scoff of the people ; his arrogance caused him to be detested wherever he appeared. In the early part of 1758 he was at Boston, endeavouring to obtain assistance from the local Government in the prosecution of a further campaign; but he had the humiliation of finding that neither the Governor nor the Assembly would consent to place the most trifling force at his disposal, unless he stated beforehand all the par ticulars of the service in which he proposed to employ it. Before he could determine what he would do in answer to this demand, an express arrived with intelligence that he was superseded, and that the command of the army was conferred on General Abercrombie. Any change seemed to promise an improvement. Abercrombie himself was an officer of very poor ability ; but he was at any rate a comparatively untried man, and it was a relief to be rid of Loudoun. The Earl had brought English power in America to the verge of ruin. France was in a position of such marked superiority that her entire predominance on the North American continent must have seemed a contingency very far from improbable. The possession of the lakes, which were now completely in her hands, gave her an immense preponderance over the English colonies. The Indians, always inclined to the stronger side, were either entirely in her service, or disposed to receive her offers of friendship ; and the vast region beyond the Alleghanies seemed hopelessly lost to England, and to all men of English race. Pitt perceived that it was vain to expect any other state of things while Loudoun retained command of the English forces. That nobleman, moreover, had offended the new Minister by the negligent manner in which he conducted his official correspondence. Pitt said he could never ascertain what Lord Loudoun was doing. Those who watched him from the spot were equally at a loss. It was no light boast when Pitt observed to the Duke of Devonshire, " I am sure I can save this country, and that nobody else can." Great men are conscious of their strength, and, whenever there is real occasion, will frankly say so. Great fools are boastful also, and to that extent there is a similarity between them and great men. But the William Pitts speak what they know, and what in the end they do ; the fools speak only what they think, and prepare with fatal certainty the ruin of themselves and others. The Minister who now held power in England understood the conditions of success, and did not scruple to use them. On the continent of Europe he beheld the great Ca tholic Powers bound together by a common league to support the principles of absolutism in Church and State ; sworn to oppose, either actively or pas sively, all the aspirations of freedom; and receiving, in the execution of that design, the countenance of Protestant Governments not strong enough to resist such a combination, or loving tyranny so fondly for its own sake as to welcome its advance ment even from Romanist hands. Frederick the Great a man of heroic temper, whatever the faults of his disposition, his rule, or his policy withstood this plot with admirable daring and extraordinary genius ; but Prussia had 110 other allies than Hanover, Hesse, and Brunswick. Pitt resolved on giving her the support of England. He saw that Protestantism must once more be mili tant against Roman Catholicism, since the Catholic Powers had evidently drawn the sword 011 heresy. In this way he touched one of the deepest notes in the English nature, and rallied to his side the two great divisions of the English race. In the House of Commons, Pitt openly and sharply condemned the inaction of Loudoun during the period of his command in America, He showed that the authority of Great Britain in the western world had been seriously endangered ; that she had been driven from the inland waters, and that every door was opened to France. He equally 1758T OPENING OF THE NEW CAMPAIGN. 597 disapproved the policy adopted by his predecessors towards the American colonists. While prepara tions for a more vigorous prosecution of the war were being made, Franklin happened to be in London, charged with a mission from the Pennsyl- vanian Assembly, which had again come into colli sion with the proprietaries on the subject of taxing their estates a constant source of irritation until 1759, when the proprietaries finally abandoned their claim to exemption. Franklin, in addition to his particular duties in this respect, concerned him self in the promotion of American interests gene rally ; and it is believed that, although unable to obtain a personal interview with Pitt, he communi cated to him, through his under-secretaries, several useful suggestions with regard to the conduct of affairs. On Pitt s advice, the King issued an order that every provincial officer of no higher rank than colonel should have equal command with British officers, according to the date of their commissions ; and the same express which carried the notifica tion of Loudoun s recall, early in 1758, conveyed a letter from the Minister to the provincial Governors, informing them that it was the inten tion of the Cabinet to send a powerful armament to operate by sea and land against the French in America, and inviting them without giving any instructions for a common fund, or hinting at taxa tion by Parliament to raise as numerous levies of auxiliary troops as the population of their respec tive provinces could afford. Arms, ammunition, tents, provisions, and boats, would be furnished by the Crown ; and the provincial Governors were desired to levy, clothe, and pay their troops, and appoint the regimental officers. It was the King s determination (said this circular) to repair the losses and disappointments of the late inactive and unhappy campaign, and to repel the dangers im pending over the British possessions in North America. To that end, the war, which had hitherto been defensive on the part of the English, was to be carried into the heart of the enemy s territory ; and, for the greater encouragement of the colonists, his Majesty was prepared to recommend to Ms Par liament the granting to the several provinces of such compensation as their exertions might seem to merit. This intimation had the effect that was desired and expected. The colonies at once recovered from their mood of despondency and anger. Massachusetts raised 7,000. men ; Connec ticut, 5,000 ; New Hampshire, 900. A voluntary subscription for the encouragement of recruits was opened at Boston, and in one day 20,000 were subscribed. The other provinces also answered to the call that had been made on them, though their respective quotas have not been recorded. Alto gether, more than 20,000 troops Avere in this way called to arms by the northern colonies for an ex pedition against Montreal and Quebec. To Penn sylvania and the southern provinces was assigned the task of conquering the west to the line of the Mississippi. In the spring of 1758, Boscawen arrived at Halifax with a considerable fleet, carrying 12,000 troops under the command of General Amherst, an officer who had served with distinction at the battles of Dettingen and Fontenoy. A subor dinate command in Amherst s army was held by the heroic James Wolfe, now a Brigadier- General a man as yet little known, but for whom were reserved the greatest achievements of the war. He had been in the unfortunate expedition against Rochefort in 1757, and had shown so much ability and daring, and so quick a penetration, while his superiors were quarrelling and doing nothing, that Pitt, with his usual discernment, fixed on the young officer as a fitting object for promotion, and as one of the most likely agents for carrying out his designs in America. It is thought to have been by Wolfe s suggestion that Pitt raised, for service in America, those two regiments of Highlanders who afterwards so brilliantly distinguished them selves. When he arrived in Nova Scotia, as one of the commanders in Amherst s army, Wolfe was only two-and-thirty years of age ; yet he had already given some indications of the greatness that was in him. England was now in a position to confront the French with a veiy formidable force the largest she had ever assembled in that part of the world. It consisted of 50,000 soldiers, of whom 22.000 were regular troops. The chief command was in the hands of Abercrombie ; but Pitt after wards had reason to regret that he had committed the fortunes of the war to an officer of whom he had very little knowledge, and who soon proved himself incompetent to his post. The French also could muster in great force; but they were stricken with a famine. The Canadians had been so much employed in military expeditions that they had not been able to cultivate their lands, and the fleets of England cut oft all supplies from France. So great was the scarcity that the army, and the people generally, were put on short allow ance. Montcalm was in a mood of depression and anxiety, in spite of the splendid military position he held. " For all our success," he wrote to his Government at home, "New France needs peace, or sooner or later it must fall ; such are the numbers of the English, such the difficulty of our receiving supplies." The dearth grew more severe 598 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1758. as the year progressed, and at length the soldiers received but half a pound of bread daily -the inhabitants of Quebec not more than two ounces. Owing to the want of forage, domestic animals perished in large numbers, and meat became as scarce as bread. The people were enfeebled by insufficient diet, and staggered with debility. They were in the very worst condition for en countering the well-fed hosts of England ; yet they prepared with spirit for the encounter. The friendly Indians were alert and eager, and in March a body of these savages waylaid a detachment of two hundred New England rangers in the forests about Ticonderoga, and took back with them a hundred and forty-six scalps, with three prisoners. The employment of native warriors by both sides in these wars between France and England gave a peculiarly horrible character to the struggle, and led to the commission of acts from which civilised nations should have shrunk in disgust. France, however, was always more blamable than her rival in this respect. The English plan of operations included three expeditions. Amherst s division was to besiege Louisburg, in conjunction with the fleet under Boscawen. The conquest of the Ohio valley was entrusted to General Forbes ; while Abercrombie was to move against Ticonderoga and Crown Point. One of Abercrombie s subordinates was Lord Howe an officer not much older than Wolfe, and, like him, endowed with true military genius. Pitt relied on Howe as the moving spirit of the enter prise ; and such he proved to be, until his death in action removed one of the most valuable leaders of the English forces. Howe and Wolfe added to their merits as soldiers the virtues of honour, of benevolence, and of courtesy. Both were highly popular with the troops they commanded winning the respect of their men, not by laxity of rule or vicious indulgence (for they were strict discipli narians), but by a due consideration of whatever could be fairly required, and by sharing their hardships and dangers whenever they were in the field. Wolfe was the son of an officer who had himself won renown in the army during the campaigns of Marlborough. Howe came of a family which had been distinguished for some generations. His father, the second Viscount, had married the eldest daughter of Baron Kiel- mansegge, a Hanoverian nobleman who was Master of the Horse to George I. before he succeeded to the English throne. The Howes were a martial race. The brother of the Lord Howe to whom we are now referring was the celebrated Admiral who did so much towards sustaining the honour of the English navy ; and another brother was the Sir William Howe whom we shall have frequent occasion to mention in connection with the War of Independence. The simple Kentish gentleman, James Wolfe,* and the man of title, Lord Howe, had much in common. Both found their glory and their death in America ; but it was the fortune of the one to be struck at the climax of a brilliant success, while the other expired in the midst of doubt and confusion. The fleet containing the expedition against Louisburg left Halifax on the 28th of May. In nearly forty armed vessels were from twelve to fourteen thousand men, chiefly regulars, and great hopes were entertained of what they would effect. A high wind and heavy sea delayed the progress of the ships, and the French were thus enabled to strengthen and extend their lines. The water was still rough when, a little before daybreak on the 8th of June, the troops began to land in Gabarus Bay. Wolfe (carrying in his hand nothing but a cane) led the first division, and at once secured the confidence of all by the singular coolness and intrepidity of his conduct. He would not suffer a gun to be discharged in reply to the French fire, but, coming to shoal- water, jumped into the sea, and bid his men follow him. The surf on shore was so violent that it broke several boats, and upset others ; yet the troops got to land (with the exception of a few who were drowned), and advanced against the French batteries. The ram part of felled trees which had been erected in front of the position was carried, the batteries were taken, and the French, after a sharp fight, were driven in. The landing had been successfully accomplished, but it was at a considerable distance from the town ; for the harbour had been secured by five ships of the line, one fifty-gun ship, and five frigates, three of which had been sunk across the mouth of the basin. The scene of the disembarka tion was the creek of Cormoran, to the west of the town ; and as soon as the artillery had been got on shore, it was determined to seize a post which had been occupied by the enemy at the Lighthouse Point, on the north-east side of the entrance to the harbour, and from which the attacking force would be enabled to annoy the French ships and the fortifications of Louisburg itself. In the early morning of the 1 2th, Wolfe, with a party of Light * Wolfe s family appears to have been, remotely, of "Welsh origin, and for some generations it was settled in Ireland. But the great-grandfather of the hero of Quebec married and took up his abode in the north of England ; and the father, after marrying a Yorkshire lady, established himself at "U esterham, in Kent, where James Wolfe was born on the 2nd of January, 1727 (Xew Style). 1758.] FALL OF LOUISBURG. 599 Infantry and Highlanders, took the position by surprise, and all the smaller works in quick suc cession. Here he erected a battery, which played with great effect on that of the French situated on o the island in the mouth of the harbour. Approaches were also made towards the opposite side of the town, and the siege was pressed with vigour, yet with caution. The strength of the place, and the (skill and valour with which it was defended, necessitated great care in the management of the attack ; and the English commanders showed them selves equal to the serious responsibilities of the enterprise. The French ships in the harbour suffered terribly. One of them caught fire from the explosion of a bomb, and blew up, on the 21st of July. The flames were communicated to two others, which were also destroyed ; and Boscawen resolved on endeavouring to take the two remaining ships of the line. He therefore, on. the 25th of July, sent six hundred men into the harbour, to make the attempt under cover of darkness. Despite a tremendous fire of cannon and musketry, one of the ships was taken and towed out of the harbour, while the other, which had run aground, was sunk. One of the petty officers in this expe dition was the celebrated Captain Cook, as he afterwards became the great navigator and explorer, who did so much to reveal the unknown parts of the world. He wrote an account of the exploit to a friend in England, and was made a lieutenant for the gallantry of his conduct. By this time, Louisburg was little better than a heap of ruins, owing to the terrible concentration of the English fire. The walls were breached in two or three places, and forty of the French cannon out of fifty-two were disabled. The soldiers could not repose anywhere out of range of the English artillery, and the Chevalier do Drucour, the com mander of the fortress, perceived that he had no choice but to propose terms of capitulation. It was answered that he must surrender at discretion, on peril of an immediate assault by land and sea. Drucour at first refused, but soon saw that he could resist no longer, and Louisburg, its artillery, provisions, and military stores, the whole of Cape Breton, and Prince Edward s Island (then called St. John s), were surrendered on the 26th of July to the English. The French loss was fifteen hundred in killed and wounded ; that of the Eng lish did not exceed four hundred. Two hundred and twenty-one pieces of cannon, eighteen mortars, and a large quantity of stores and ammunition, fell to the lot of the conquerors. The town was almost entirely destroyed, and was not considered worth re-establishing in its original strength. It is now simply a collection of hovels, serviceable to the storm-pressed mariner, but having no longer the character of a fortress, even of the second class. The civilians of Cape Breton were conveyed to France in English ships, and the French garrison and naval forces were sent to England as prisoners of war. Wolfe shortly afterwards returned to his own country, where he was received with acclamations. Amherst, a fellow-Kentishman, generously gave the young hero almost the entire credit of the success that had been obtained. The French colours taken by the victorious army were carried in solemn procession from Kensington Palace to St. Paul s Cathedral, and Boscawen received a vote of thanks from the House of Commons. It was the first success of the Avar, and the people felt as if they could hardly make too much of it. The expedition against Ticonderoga and Crown Point was attended by very different results. The army assigned to this exploit amounted to more than 15,000 men, commanded by General Aber- crombie. On the 5th of July, the troops were embarked on Lake George in a hundred and thirty- five whale-boats, and nine hundred bateaux, with the artillery on rafts. With banners flying and music sounding, they proceeded along the lake, and halted in the evening at Sabbath-day Point. Ticon deroga was situated near the junction of Lake George with Lake Champlain. It stood west of the latter expanse of water, and was flanked on the south and south-west by the narrow and tortuous channel through which the one lake flows into the other. On the north, a tract of marshy meadows forbade approach ; but, from the north- west, access might be had by land. On this side, therefore, Montcalm had placed his outworks. The river connecting the two lakes, if river it can be called, has a fall of one hundred and fifty-seven feet in a course of scarcely four miles ; and, bending with a wide .sweep in front of the French position, it offered great facilities for a prolonged defence. A French look-out party on the mountains gave notice by a white flag that the English had embarked ; and a guard of three pickets was accordingly sta tioned at the landing-place, while another small body was thrown forward to watch the approach of the invaders. The English army re-embarked about eleven o clock at night, and, continuing their course along Lake George in a north-easterly direction, arrived, by nine o clock next morning (July Gth), in a cove on the west side, about a mile above the rapids. The French pickets at once drew back, burning the two bridges which crossed the river on the road from Lake George to Ticonderoga. The invading GOO CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1758. force was therefore compelled to follow the bend of the river, leaving behind its artillery, heavy bag gage, and provisions. It was now disposed in four columns, the regulars forming the centime, and the provincials, who were the most numerous, occupying the two flanks. The ground was rough and woody; the guides were very imperfectly acquainted with very outset of the action, Lord Howe was struck by a ball, and instantly died. The consternation excited by this untoward event, and the terror inspired by the demoniacal yells of the savages, led to a brief panic on the part of the English troops ; but, the flanking parties of provincials coming to their assistance, the army rallied, and completely WILLIAM PITT, EARL OF CHATHAM. the paths they should follow ; confusion in a little while broke up the order of the regiments ; and the right-centre column, commanded by Lord Howe, unexpectedly fell in with the advanced guard of the French, now precipitately retiring, but so be wildered by tangled thickets that they had been wandering for twelve hours in utter inability to find their way back to the fort. Wearied and worn out, this small body of three hundred stragglers, consisting of regular soldiers and a few Indians, fought with determined courage, and very nearly inflicted a defeat on the English. At the crushed the enemy. Some were driven into the river, and drowned ; others, to the number of one hundred and fifty-nine, gave themselves up as prisoners. The English were masters of the forest, and encamped that night beneath its shades. Abercrombie on the following morning recalled his troops to the landing-place, and Colonel Brad- street, of New York a very able and dashing ofiicer, whom Wolfe described as an extraordinary man rebuilt the bridges, and took possession of a piece of ground less than two miles from the French encampment. Here he was joined by the 1758.] ATTACK ON TlOONDEROGA. 601 whole army, and, on the 8th, Abercrombie, after bending out reconnoitring parties to scan the French lines, and obtaining very contradictory judgments as to their strength, ordered his troops to storm the breastworks at once. He would not even wait for his cannon to be brought up, but, believing that De Levi was hurrying forward with reinforcements for Montcalm, whose force already he thought to be about twice the strength that it really was, conceived that his only chance outwards, of stumps and rubbish. In combina tion with this barricade were other works; and, thus protected, 3,650 men, including a small re inforcement by De Levi, stood to their arms on the morning of the 8th of July. The English advanced at the bayonet-charge with great steadiness, the regulars taking the lead. Montcalm, with his coat off, stood just within the trenches, in a position of considerable danger. He forbade his men to fire a single musket till he of success, or even of safety, was in immediate attack. He formed his troops in three lines, with a rear-guard in addition, and directed them to march up briskly, to rush on the enemy s fire, and to reserve their own until they had passed the outer breastwork. Unfortunately, Abercrombie had leant to the opinion of those officers who de scribed the French lines as flimsy and vulnerable, rather than to that of more acute judges who saw that they were really very strong. Montcalm, as soon as he perceived that he was about to be attacked, had added to his defensive preparations with masterly energy and quickness, and was now enabled to draw up his troops behind a barricade formed of felled trees, with their branches pointing 51 commanded, and allowed the assailants to gain the very edge of the breastwork. As they were endeavouring to clamber over the logs of wood, and were getting entangled among the outlying boughs, he took advantage of their broken order to pour a terrific fire into the ranks. The attacking troops behaved with the utmost intrepidity, and per sisted for four hours in their endeavours to carry the breastwork. Their losses were very heavy 4 but did not in the slightest degree affect their re solution. On the right, the Grenadiers and High landers charged again and again with unshaken discipline ; on the left, an attempt was made to turn the French position, and it might have suc ceeded but for the rapidity with which Montcalm, 602 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1758. whose eye was everywhere, sent reinforcements to strengthen the weak point. The right, the left, the centre, and all intermediate places which ap peared to ofi er any chance of success, were re peatedly assaulted, but in vain. Towards the close of the engagement, the English, in a moment of confusion, tired on one of their own advanced parties ; and shortly afterwards, seeing the utter hopelessness of the enterprise, they retired with precipitation. In killed and wounded they had lost nearly two thousand of their number; the regulars, in particular, suffered severely. It is said that the provincials tired wildly, and injured many of their friends. One half of a Highland regiment, with twenty-five of its officers, were either killed or badly wounded ; while, on the other hand, the French, protected by their works, lost very few men. All this time, Abercrombie re mained at a considerable distance in the rear, and was not forthcoming when his presence would have been of service to cheer and reassure his men. He still had more than thirteen thousand troops at his disposal ; and, had he rallied his companies, and ordered up his artillery, he might have retrieved the fortune of the day. But contemporary accounts seem to show that he was overcome by positive terror. Montcalm said that, had it been his busi ness to besiege the fort, he would have asked for nothing more than six mortars and two pieces of artillery. Abercrombie, however, declined to make any further attempt, and, by a hurried march, gained the landing-place that same evening. The soldiers, unrestrained in their panic by any better example on the part of their chief, would have rushed headlong into the boats, had not Bradstreet infused a little order into them by his calmness and ready resource. All that night, the troops of Mont- calm were busy adding to the strength of their posi tion in anticipation of a renewed attack. But the British commander had retired to the southern extremity of Lake George ; and in a little while he sent his artillery and ammunition to Albany for safe keeping. It may certainly be doubted whether they were safe in his hands. The design against Ticonderoga and Crown Point was entirely relinquished, and Bradstreet suggested to Abercrombie the feasibility of an attack on Fort Frontenac, which he offered to conduct in person. The plan was accepted, and Brad- street, at the head of three; thousand men, nearly all of whom were Americans, started on the expedition. He was accompanied by two-and-forty Indians, and the party moved by rapid marches to Oswego, where scarcely a vestige was found of either the French or English fort which had so recently stood there. They embarked 011 Lake Ontario in open boats, and on the evening of tho 25th of August landed within a mile of Frontenac. The fort was a quadrangle, mounted with thirty pieces of cannon and sixteen small mortars. Brad- street opened his batteries at so short a distance from the walls that almost every shot took effect, and, towards the close of the second day, the gar rison, several of whom had fled, surrendered at dis cretion. In the fort were found a large number of great and small guns, and an immense collection of military stores, provisions, and merchandise. Nine armed vessels on the lake, each carrying from eight to eighteen guns, were also seized, and two of these were sent to Oswego. The rest were burnt, the fortress was razed, and the stores which could not be removed were destroyed. Having accomplished this exploit, the detachment returned to Lake George, where the main body of the army was stationed, recovering its self-possession, after the defeat at Ticonderoga. In the autumn, Abercrombie s forces were strengthened by some regiments which Amherst sent from Louisburg ; and early in November that cautious and able commander was placed at tho head of the entire army, instead of the incompetent Abercombie, who was recalled. Another success of the year was the capture of Fort Duquesne. The attack on that place was entrusted to General Forbes, who, early in July, set out from Philadelphia at the head of 9,000 men, mostly provincials. In command of two regiments from Virginia, Washington joined the expedition, and contributed greatly to its success. Regarding Fort Duquesne as the key to the west, Washington desired to march quickly along Braddock s road ; but more dilatory counsels prevailed, and a fresh route was slowly constructed. Forbes was so ill as to be near his death, and by September they had got no farther than Raystowii. On the 13th of that month, a party of eight hundred Highlanders and a company of Virginians were sent forward ill the hope of taking the place by surprise ; but they suffered a severe defeat. On the 5th of November, Forbes was at Loyal Hanna, whence, although it had been determined at a council of war that the season was too late for further opera tions, Washington obtained permission to make a further advance. Fifty miles of hills and deserts, now beginning to be covered with snow, lay be tween the small band of troops and the French fort ; but, animated by Washington s zeal, the men marched with rapidity, and, towards the end of the month, the post they had come to conquer rose before them. But the garrison, who were only five hundred in number, did not care to abide an attack. 1758.] A DISMAL SEARCH. 603 Setting fire to the fort on the night of the 24th of November, they descended the Ohio in their boats, and so escaped capture or pursuit. They had been much disheartened by the desertion of their Indian allies, who, alarmed at the approach of the hostile force, declared that the Great Spirit had evidently withdrawn his favour from the French, and his protection from their fortress. On the 25th, Washington planted the British flag on the smoking ruins which the French had abandoned ; and the place was thenceforward called Pittsburg, in honour of the great English Minister whose energetic policy was effecting the subjugation of the West. It is now the chief city of Western Pennsylvania, and is often likened, in its general characteristics, to Birmingham. Washington received universal honour for his brave exploit. He was elected as the representative of Fredericktown in his native province, and the Speaker of the House of Burgesses, in the name of the Chamber, publicly thanked him for his achieve ments. The young man hesitated for words as he rose to reply, and the Speaker, bidding him resume his seat, added, " Your modesty is equal to your valour, and that surpasses the power of any language I possess." Washington, who had recently married, now retired to his estate at Mount Vernon, livin^ o the life of a country gentleman, entertaining his friends with that hospitality for which Virginians were so widely famed, following the chase with all the ardour of his nature, exporting the produce of his fields to England, gathering objects of elegance and intellectual value about him, and engaging largely in public affairs. But from that time to the period of the Revolution, he did not again appear as a soldier. The success at Fort Duquesne was followed by the submission of numerous tribes of the Ohio Indians (with whom treaties of friendship were con cluded), and by the death of Forbes, who expired on the march back to Philadelphia. With the assistance of the Indians, some English soldiers were sent to explore the woods where Braddock had been defeated, and to inter the bones of those who had fallen in the struggle. Captain West, the elder brother of West the painter, accompanied the party with a number of American sharpshooters, who were better acquainted with the ground than the regular forces. Among the officers engaged in this service was Major Sir Peter Halket, who had lost his father and a brother in the destruction of the army. One of the Indians told him that he had seen an officer fall near a remarkable tree, and that at the same time a young subaltern ran to the officer s assistance, was himself shot, and fell across the other s body. The Major believed these two to be his father and brother, and resolved to make particular search for their remains. The progress through the forest was profoundly mournful. In the dim shadow of those obscure recesses, bones were often found scattered on the earth, and it was thought that the unhappy men had been devoured by wild beasts. Across the trunks of fallen trees were skeletons, which, it was feared, were the relics of men who had slowly starved to death. In other places, ashes were mingled with charred bones a sign that some of the wounded had been burned by the savages. " At length," says a modern biographer, " they reached a turn of the river not far from the principal scene of destruction, and the Indian who remembered the death of the two officers stopped ; the detachment also halted. He then looked around in quest of some object which might recall, dis tinctly, his recollection of the ground, and suddenly darted into the wood. The soldiers rested their arms without speaking. A shrill cry was soon after heard ; and the other guides made signs for the troops to follow them towards the spot from which it came. In a short time they reached the Indian warrior who by his cry had announced to his companions that he had found the place where he was posted on the day of battle. As the troops approached he pointed to the tree under which the officers had fallen. Captain West halted his men round the spot, and, with Sir Peter Halket and the other officers, formed a circle, while the Indians removed the leaves which thickly covered the ground. The skeletons were found, as the Indian expected, lying across each other. The officers having looked at them some time, the Major said that, as his father had an artificial tooth, he thought he might be able to ascertain if they were indeed his bones and those of his brother. The Indians were therefore ordered to remove the skeleton of the youth, and to bring to view that of the old officer. This was immediately done, and, after a short examination, Major Halket exclaimed, It is my father ! and fell back into the arms of his com panions. The pioneers then dug a grave, and the bones were interred with the customary honours."* Notwithstanding the repulse at Ticonderoga, the events of 1758 had, on the whole, been favour able to the cause of England. The tide of fortune had turned against the French, and it had been made evident that, as soon as English power should be energetically put forth, the power of France would begin to wane. The explanation of this fact may easily be discovered. The strength of * Gait s Life of Benjamin West. CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. Prance in America was almost solely military. Her colonies were but feeble in comparison with those of England. They had no powers of self- government no principle of national life. The despotism by which they were administered had done wonders in the early days of the settlements, when the desert was to be explored, and. the In dians were to be converted or subdued. But when this despotism came in contact with the vital forces of a free nation, it staggered backwards, and gave way. The strength of English America was in its liberty and its youthful spirit. Those were the qualities which shattered the advancing lines of France ; those were the possessions which conferred new honour on the ancient glories of the race. CHAPTER LXVIII. Designs for the Conquest of Canada in 1759 Votes of Parliament Pitt s Scheme for the Prosecution of the War Wolfe s Final Interview with Pitt previous to leaving England Warlike Preparations in the Colonies Weak State of Canada Advance of General Amherst, and Abandonment of Ticonderoga by the French Further Proceedings of Amherst Expedition against Fort Niagara Total Defeat of the French, and Surrender of the Fort The Movement under Wolfe against Quebec Situation of that Town First Proceedings of the English General Position secured on the Montmorenci - -A Reconnoitring Expedition Attack on the French Lines, and Failure of the Attempt Illness of Wolfe The Situation growing Serious Plan of the Three Brigadiers for carrying on Operations above Quebec Wolfe s Alternations of Hope and Despair Kemoval of the English Army across the St. Lawrence Wolfe s Despatch to the Earl of Holderness Rival Claims to the Honour of originating the Scheme for the taking of Quebec Feigned Attacks and Delusive Movements "Wolfe s Cove " Presentiment of Death Passage of the River Scaling of the Heights of Abraham The Battle before Quebec Defeat of the French Death of Yv r olfe and of Montcalm. PITT was resolved to follow up with vigour the successes Avhich had been obtained. He saw the necessity of America to England ; he saw that, with the French in Canada, in Nova Scotia, and on the Ohio, there was no security for the English colo nies ; perhaps he did not see that on the removal of that danger the Americans would be less likely to remain contentedly in subjection to the mother country. They had already given abundant evi dence of their growing estrangement of their desire to lead a separate and independent life. But the fact may never have come under Pitt s notice ; or he may have thought that a policy of justice and consideration for the colonists, such as he desired to carry out, and in part effected, would prevent the further development of any such feeling. At any i*ate, he addressed his utmost energies to the crippling of French power in the West. Plans of great importance and of unwonted scope were formed for the year 1759. It was resolved to reduce Canada ; and Parliament was solicited to meet the extraordinary expenses of such a cam paign by proportionate grants. On the part of the national representatives there was eveiy dis position to aid the efforts of the Government. The enthusiasm of Pitt was contagious : he was one of those men who have the highest art of genius the art of impressing others with their own ideas, and of moulding them, almost insensibly, to their own purposes. Parliament, in. an address to the throne on the opening of the session, in Novem ber, 1758, expressed complete approbation of the policy of the Cabinet, applauded the recent con duct of the war, and pledged themselves to support its further prosecution. In reply to a message from the King in the early part of 1759, they voted 200,000 for enabling his Majesty to give compensation to the several American provinces for the expenses they had incurred in levying and maintaining troops for the public service. Twelve millions were provided for the general service of the year, and an immense armament, both by sea and land, was prepared for the reduction of the French power in America. The details of the plan embraced three distinct expeditions, which were to enter Canada by different routes, and simultaneously attack all the French strongholds in that part of the world. General Amherst was to retain the chief command, together with the nominal Governorship of Virginia, and was to subdue Ticonderoga and Crown Point, to establish a naval force on Lake Champlain, and to penetrate by the rivers Richelieu and St. Law rence to Quebec, there to form a junction Avith a division of the army which had been conferred on Wolfe. That distinguished commander was to ascend the St. Lawrence with an English fleet, as soon as the channel was free from ice, and to besiege Quebec. The third army was to consist chiefly of provincials, and to be commanded by 1759.] THE CAMPAIGN IN CANADA. 605 General Prideaux. It was to be strengthened by a large body of friendly Indians, under the command of Sir William Johnson, by whoso influence with these barbarians the subsidiary force was to bo collected. The task of this last division was to attack t-lie French fort situated about fifteen miles from the Falls of Niagara, the possession of which gave a great command over tho interior parts of North America, overawed the Six Nations, and secured tho inland trade, tho navigation of tho great lakes, and the communication between Canada and Louisiana.* In addition to these three large armies, Colonel Stanwix was to hold himself in readiness, at the head of a smaller detachment, to reduce the less important forts, and to scour the country about Lake Ontario. Prideaux, having effected the reduction of Fort Niagara, was to embark 011 that lake, to descend the St. Lawrence, to take Montreal, and finally to unite his forces with those of Amherst and Wolfe before Quebec. It was hoped, by so many attacks in widely-separated directions, to distract the enemy, and dissipate his powers of defence ; and, with regard to Prideaux s operations, it was ex pected that, even if they should not facilitate either of the other projects (which were of course the principal features of the whole design), they would probably have the effect of Inducing the French to concentrate all their troops stationed on the borders of the lakes, with a view to attempting the relief of Fort Niagara a movement which would leave the other forts on those lakes exposed.t This actually happened, and the scheme, in the main, was crowned with a brilliant success. Yet it w r as not unattended by partial failures, and Smollett has condemned the whole plan, of the campaign as rash and perilous. It certainly involved many dangers, as the places to be attacked were extremely strong, the French forces numerous and well-commanded, and the regions to be traversed very extensive and full of obstacles. But the conception was justified by the result, and in war much must always be hazarded in the attainment of great ends. The scheme had been elaborated by Pitt himself, who in early life had held a commission in the r.rmy for a short time, and who seems always to have possessed a genius for tactical combinations. In making his arrangements, he disregarded, as far as influences to the contrary permitted him, the spurious claims of seniority, and gave the chief commands to those whom he thought most fitted. His sagacity perceived that no man was better * Smollett. t Grahame s History of the United States, Book X., chap, 5. qualified for the expedition against Quebec than the young soldier, James Wolfs ; and to Wolfe he accordingly assigned it. Yet, if we may believe a singular anecdote recorded by an eminent historian of our own times, he had momentary causo to doxibt the reasonableness of his selection when it was too late to alter the appointment. Wolfe, it will be recollected, was in England when the command was conferred on him ; and, on the day preceding his embarkation for America, Pitt invited him to dinner, that he might give him his last verbal instructions. Lord Temple, one of tho Ministers, whose sister Pitt had married, was the only other guest, and through him the anecdote has como down to posterity. Towards the latter end of tho evening, Wolfe burst forth into a strain of the most extraordinary gasconade. He drew his sword, rapped the table with it, nourished it about the room, and boasted of the mighty deeds it should achieve. His strange and unseemly con duct could not be attributed to excess in wine, for he had drunk but little. Whatever the cause, the effect was so staggering that the two statesmen looked at each other aghast ; and when Wolfe had taken his leave, and his carriage was heard to roll from the door, Pitt lifted up his eyes and arms in horror, and exclaimed, " Good God ! that I should have entrusted the fate of the country and of the Administration to such hands ! " J The accuracy of this story has been doubted by a recent biographer, who contends that it is quite out of keeping with the invariable modesty of Wolfe s character ; that Lord Stanhope may have unconsciously, heightened the narrative ; that Mr. Grenville s memory was probably at fault in som? details ; and that Lord Temple was not a trust worthy recorder of facts. But it is difficult to believe that either Lord Stanhope or Mr. Gren- ville has materially altered the circumstances ; nor does there seem any sufficient reason for sup posing that Lord Temple would have told a purpose less falsehood to the disci-edit of a man who never injured him, and whom he could hardly have had any desire to hurt. It is very possible that Wolfe yielded to some momentary access of excite ment, which altered his usual habits. One has only to read Wolfe s letters, admirable as they are in many ways, to see that their author was a man of a somewhat emotional and impulsive nature. One has only to look at his portrait to be confirmed J Earl Stanhope s History of England, Vol. IV., chap. 35. The stoiy was told to the noble historian by the Right Hon. Thomas Grenville, who died in December, 1840, in his ninety- first year, and who had it from his relative, Lord Temple. $ Life of Major-General James Wolfe, by Robert Wright. 1804. 606 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. in that impression. A soft, smooth, mild face pretty, and almost girlish looks out from under its powdered wig. In one of his letters to his mother, Wolfe speaks of himself as a " wandering lump of idle errors ; " and, although this was doubtless the exaggeration of a conscientious and truly amiable disposition, it may have had some reference to truth. He also confessed that in the common occurrences of life he was not seen to advantage. It appears, therefore, not improbable and seventy-two pounds on two hundred pounds income from real estate, besides various excises, and a poll-tax of nineteen shillings on every male over sixteen.* The compensations occasionally voted by the British Parliament were considerably less than the actual expenses of the colonies ; and the help, insufficient in itself, was rendered still more unsatisfactory by delay in the transmission of the sums. Massachusetts at first refused to raise more than 5,000 men, but was ultimately induced that the story is substantially correct, nor, although one could wish it away, does it detract very seriously from the hero s reputation. The dismay of Pitt could not have lasted long. He knew what "Wolfe had done at Louisburg. The exertions of the parent State were seconded in the colonies, though not without some murmur ing in New England, on account of the additional levies which were required for the campaign. The northern provinces were suffering considerably from heavy taxation. In this same year, 1759, a colonial stamp-tax was imposed by the local Legis lature on the Massachusetts people. Their taxes in one year of war were, on personal estate, thirteen shillings and fourpence on the pound of income, by Amherst, who was much respected by the colonists, to make the total 6,500. In an address to Governor Pownall, who had communicated the wishes of the Commander-in-chief, the Assembly observed : " We acknowledge with gratitude that the interest and ease of the people lias been con sidered byyoiir Excellency in making the last levy, as far as could consist with his Majesty s service, and the purposes for which the men are raised. The distress brought upon the inhabitants is not withstanding extremely great. The number of men raised this year, we are sensible, is not equal to that of the last. The Assembly then made the * Bancroft. WASHINGTON PLANTING THE BRITISH FLAG AT FORT DVQUESNE. 608 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. greatest effort that lias ever been known in the province. They looked upon it to be their last effort ; they had no expectations that it would be repeated ; and it was really so great as to render it impracticable for us to make the like a second time. The number of our inhabitants is, since then, nrncli lessened : some were killed in battle ; many died by sickness while they were in service, or soon after their return home ; great numbers have enlisted as rangers, artificers, recruits in his Majesty s regular forces, and for other branches of the service. The unprecedented charge of the last year also tends to increase the distress of the province. The expense of the regiments raised for his Majesty s service amounted to nearly 120,000 sterling : besides this, the inhabitants of the several towns in the province, by fines or by voluntary contributions to procure men for the service, paid at least 60,000 sterling more ; which was in all respects as burden some as if it had been raised as a tax by the Government. The defence of our own. frontiers, and the other ordinary charges of government, amount to at least 30,000 sterling more. Because the province last year raised 7,000 men, it is inferred that it is able to raise the same number this year, and no allowance is made for its being so much reduced in its estate and number of inhabitants. We have generally been the first in proposals for public service, and have determined what force we would employ : other Governments have followed after us in just what proportion they pleased ; and we wish it had been an equal one. We are now lessened, and they are increased ; and we are yet urged to continue the same proportions." Pt was only with difficulty that Connecticut could be persuaded to repeat her previous year s contingent of 5,000 men ; but, on the other hand, New Hampshire made even greater exertions than the year before, and a formidable armament was ready for action as the spring advanced. Against this attacking force, amount ing altogether to nearly 50,000, Montcalm could muster not many more than three thousand regular troops ; and the thin population of Canada could not furnish above seven thousand in addition. The scarcity of food continued with great severity ; the currency of the province was almost entirely paper money ; the resources of the people were nearly exhausted ; and Montcalm told his Govern ment that, in all probability, the conquest of Canada was but an affair of time. In May, General Amherst transferred his head quarters from New York to Albany ; but some weeks elapsed before he was in a condition to cross Lake George, and it was not till Ihe 22nd of July that he reached the vicinity of Ticonderoga. Under his command he had by this time rather more than 5,700 regular soldiers, including some Royal Americans; and to these were added about an equal number of provincials, and of Gage s Light Infantry. Disembarking on the eastern shore of the lake, nearly opposite the landing-place of Abercrombie, his troops lay that night under arms at the advanced post of the saw-mills, in front of the fortress. A feeble attempt to oppose their progress had been made by the French; but, seeing the overwhelming force of their adversaries, and having been ordered to fall back from point to point towards Quebec, rather than risk the chances of a serious engagement, the garrison dismantled a part of the fortifications, evacuated Ticonderoga during the night of Jxily 26th, and retired to Crown Point. Amherst immediately occupied the aban doned post, repaired the works, and placed a strong garrison in them. He then slowly advanced towards the remoter fortress, encountering no oppo sition from the French, yet guarding his progress with all that caution which was a feature in his military character, and which the surprise and defeat of Braddock made imperative on any com mander. The French continued their movement of retreat until they reached Isle-aux-Noix, a small island in the river Sorel, or Richelieu, not far from the northern extremity of Lake Champhiin. Here they proceeded to entrench themselves, and Amherst speedily received information that the enemy had concentrated on this spot about 3,500 men, with a numerous train of artillery, and that he also possessed four large armed vessels on the lake. The English General at once set to work with great energy to build two vessels with which to encounter those of his adversary. With these ho took two of the French ships an exploit in which Colonel Israel Putnam, of Connecticut, who after wards earned for himself a great name, exhibited the daring spirit for which he was noted. Montcalm was now stationed with the main part of his army near Quebec, where Wolfe was pressing him. All the young and vigorous men in Canada had been called to arms, leaving the fields to be cultivated by women, old men, and children ; yet the numbers of the French were still greatly inferior to those of the English. It was thought by the Anglo-Americans that Amherst would at once have advanced to Montreal, in support of Wolfe ; but the Commander-in-chief, who was always more remarkable for prudence than for enterprise, thought it advisable to strengthen the English positions at Crown Point and Ticonde roga, and in this way the summer and early part of 1759.J CAPITULATION OF FORT NIAGARA. COO the autumn were consumed without any forward movement beyond Lake Champlain. On the llth of October, the army embarked on that water, with a view to attacking the French in their insular position, but were twice driven back by storms. The favourable season of the year had now passed, and Amherst found it necessary to relinquish the further prosecution of his designs, and to establish his troops in winter quarters at Crown Point. Thus, although his movements had resulted in the withdrawal of the French from two important strongholds on English territory, they were to some extent a failure. He had been tillable to effect his junction with Wolfe, nor could he open the slightest communication with him. It was only through some vague hints, contained in letters from the Marquis de Montcalm relative to an exchange of prisoners, that Amherst knew of the arrival of Wolfe before the capital of Canada. The expedition against Niagara was attended by fortunate results. Prideaux s brigade consisted of two battalions from New York, a battalion of Royal Americans, and two British regiments, with a detachment of Royal artillery, and reinforcements of Indian auxiliaries under Sir William Johnson. These emburked on the 1st of July 011 Lake Ontario, and on the 6th landed without opposition near the fort, which they shortly invested on all sides. To rescue so important a position, which commanded the intermediate country between Lakes Ontario and Erie, and could protect or hinder the fur-trade of the west, the French com mander, D Aubry, collected from various scattered posts an army of twelve hundred men, and advanced on Niagara. Prideaux was killed on the 15th of July by the bursting of a gun ; and Amherst, on hearing of this untoward accident, detached General Gage to assume the command of the army. The direction of affairs was in the meanwhile exercised with great judgment by Sir William Johnson, who followed out the plan that had been formed by Prideaux. Immediately on succeeding to the command, he heard of the approach of the French relieving force, and made his dispositions to oppose it. He ordered his Light Infantry, supported by a body of Grenadiers and other regulars, to occupy the road from the Falls to the fortress by which the enemy was advancing ; protected his flanks by Indian warriors; and at the same time secured his working parties in the trenches ngainst any sally from the garrison. On the morning of the 24th of July, the French were seen approaching, to the number of 1,700, com posed partly of Europeans, partly of provincials, and partly of savages. The Mohawks, who were fighting on the English aide, made a sign to the French Indians, denoting a desire for a parley. It was not returned, and the Mohawks then raised the war-whoop, which was answered with hideous clamour by the hostile barbarians. The two armies rushed at each other with impetuous fury, and a frightful struggle ensued, in which the horrible cries of the Indians were mingled with the roar of artillery and the sharper report of the small-arms. The regulars and provincials en countered the French in front, while the native hordes fired upon their flanks, and threw them into disorder. In less than an hour, the assailants were completely routed, and, flying in head long confusion, were pursued by the English and Americans for many miles through the woods. The French General and all his officers were taken prisoners, and a terrible number of dead and wounded lay scattered over the ground, and in the recesses of the neighbouring forest. The victory was due to the courage and steadiness of the troops, and to the excellent generalship of Sir W T illiam Johnson, who, though a civilian, and not very fortunate in his operations during an earlier campaign, had by this time acquired a thorough mastery of the practice of war. On the following morning, Johnson sent an officer to the commandant of the garrison at Fort Niagara, to inform him of the failure of the previous day s attempt to raise the siege, and to recommend an immediate surrender, while it was yet in the power of the English officers to restrain the ferocity of the Indians. The result was a capitulation on the same day (July 25th). The garrison marched out with the honours of war, and were sent prisoners to New York, under a sufficient escort to protect them from the vengeance of the native allies of England. A repetition of the dreadful massacre of English prisoners at Fort William Henry, in 1757, was thus avoided. The influence of Johnson over the savages was very great ; and so completely did he curb their disposi tion to frenzied excitement that not one regrettable incident occurred, though eleven hundred of these barbarous warriors marched under his flag. The women and children found at Niagara were sent to Montreal at their own request, and the sick and wounded were treated with humanity. The surrender of tMs fort, followed by the abandonment of all the French posts as far as Erie, severed the communication between Canada and Louisiana a communication which had long threatened the independence of English America, and had given to France a position of predominance which she had shown every inclination to use to the injury of her 610 CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. rival. Here, then, was a solid and important triumph ; yet the ultimate object of that portion of the general campaign was not carried out. No attempt was made to reach Montreal, or to unite with the army of Wolfe before Quebec ; and when De Levi, Montcalm s second in command, endea voured to protect the former of those cities by occupying the passes of the St. Lawrence near Ogdensburg a result which he was unable to accomplish, owing to the small number of his men Gage, who was ordered by Amherst to take possession of the post, omitted to do so, and passed the rest of the summer effecting nothing of impor tance. To Wolfe alone was due the great success of the war. That youthful commander had under his orders some eight thousand men, consisting chiefly of English regulars, with a contingent of American troops. The fleet, under Admiral Saunders, com prised two-and-twenty ships of the line, and an equal number of frigates and armed vessels. On board one of these vessels was John Jervis, after wards Earl St. Vincent, who, at a much later date, rendered many brilliant services during the war with revolutionary France. The master of another vessel was James Cook, the navigator. On the 26th of June, the whole armament arrived off the Isle of Orleans, situated in the St. Lawrence a little below Quebec that is to say, to the north-east of that city. The troops disembarked on the following day, and encamped on the island ; and Wolfe now saw clearly before him the formidable position he had come to seize. Quebec is situated on a lofty promontory formed by the junction of the St. Lawrence and the St. Charles. It is divided into a Lower and an Upper Town ; the latter built upon a rising ground, which attains a considerable height. The most elevated part of the Upper Town, on which stands the citadel, is three hundred and forty -five feet above the level of the river ; and the fortifications, extending nearly across the penin sula, enclose a circuit of about two miles and three- quarters. Westward of the fortifications are the Heights of Abraham, where Wolfe made his final attack a precipice rising to an altitude of more than three hundred feet, and presenting great diffi culties when approached from the river St. Law rence. The position was defended by Montcalm, under whom was a mixed force of French soldiers, Canadian militia, and Indian warriors, giving a numerical superiority over the English in that particular locality. The Indians were but few ; the Canadians were not the best of troops ; and the regulars were worn out with fatigue and insufficient food. Nevertheless, the position was so strong, both by nature and art, that it might have seemed, to any one of less genius than Wolfe, a hopeless task to endeavour to take it. At midnight on the 28th of June, a number of fireships came down with the tide towards the Eng lish ships; but, the men in charge lighting the matches too soon, and hastening back to shore, the explosions took place before the anticipated time, and the greater part of the destructive fury of these machines was spent before they reached the fleet. Several, however, were still blazing and exploding as they drifted on ; and the English sailors, putting forth in their boats with great coolness and courage, grappled the fiery messengers, and towed them on shore, where they continued to burn until five o clock the next morning. Their approach in the darkness of night, with the terrific discharges that burst from them, caused a momentary panic among the troops on the island, one party falling back upon another until the whole army turned out, and pre pared for action. Wolfe, who never excused a want of discipline, issued an order on the 29th, severely rebuking the men who had abandoned their posts, and thus spread alarm among the camp; and the officer who commanded the advanced parties was for awhile put under arrest. On the 30th, Wolfe sent Monckton s brigade across the river to Point Levi, south of the Isle of Orleans, where the English seized on a church, and posted up a proclamation in French, promising the people protection if they refrained from taking any part in the war, but threatening severe measures in the contrary case. "France, unable to support Canada," said the document in conclusion, " deserts her cause at this important crisis, and during the whole war has assisted her with troops, who have been maintained only by making the natives feel all the weight of grievous and lawless oppression." At Point Levi, Wolfe constructed batteries of mortar and cannon. The citizens of Quebec volun teered to cross the river and destroy these works, but speedily retreated before a broadside from the fleet. In the early days of July, the English, from their position of vantage, sent red-hot balls and shells into the city, where many houses were set on fire. The Lower Town was speedily demo lished, and the Upper considerably injured; but the citadel was as yet beyond reach. In the mean while, the Canadians, rejecting the proffered good will of the English commander, and listening to the exhortations of their priests, who described the invaders as the most cruel and faithless people on earth, joined the scalping parties of the Indians, prowled among the woods, and killed all the English stragglers they could find, with circumstances of 1759.] PROCEEDINGS BEFORE QUEBEC. 611 Hi-eat barbarity. Wolfe sent a letter to Montcalm O on the subject, remonstrating with him on such enormities ; but the butcheries continued, and the English General felt compelled to resort to reprisals, and to burn the detached houses, the barns, stables, and standing corn, on both sides of the river. These, however, were among the trifling incidents of the siege. The thoughts of Wolfe were always con centrated on the great operations of the expedition; and he was zealously seconded by his three Brigadier- Generals, Monckton, Towiishend, and Murray. After awhile, the Commander-in-chief perceived that the eastern bank of the Montmorenci a stream llowinnr from the north into the northern channel o of the St. Lawrence, as it sweeps past the Isle of Orleans -was higher than the ground occupied by Montcalm. On the 9th of July, accordingly, he crossed the north channel, and encamped in. a locality which seemed to offer several advantages. With the tireless energy that belqiiged to his nature though his health was far from strong, and he was at the time suffering from constitutional maladies which would probably have shortened his life, had the chances of battle spared it Wolfe determined to reconnoitre the shores in the vicinity of Quebec. On the 18th of July, he and Admiral Saunders sailed along the western side of the St. Lawrence from the Montmorenci to the St. Charles, and, passing the wide and deep harbour, sighted the precipitous cliff of Cape Diamond, crowned by the highest portions of the Upper Town, and by the citadel. Thence coasting along the wall of rock in a south-westerly direction, Wolfe took note of the elaborate defences which his opponent had erected on every available spot. The river, which up to the Isle of Orleans is of great breadth, suddenly contracts, above the inlet of the St. Charles, and in front of Quebec, to a channel scarcely a mile across. At this part, indeed, it is greatly narrowed by the jutting promontory on. which the city stands, and which is to some extent answered by Point Levi, on the opposite shore, where Wolfe had planted his batteries. Further on, the stream .again expands somewhat, without, however, recovering its former breadth ; but for several miles above Quebec in the one direction, and in the other direction as far as the spot at which the Montmorenci pours into the St. Lawrence by a fall of three hundred feet, the left bank of the latter river is extremely rugged and difficult of access. The position, therefore, was one offering many natural facilities for an obstinate defence ; and Montcalm had availed himself to the full of the advantages which he found. In the harbour he had more than twenty ships, which had sailed from France with reinforcements before the blockade of the French ports, and had entered thd St. Lawrence before the arrival of the English armament. Under his command he hrd about 10,000 men, to whom Wolfe refused the designation of an army. The English General, moreover, thought but poorly of the defences of the city itself ; but all around were the most formidable works, which, taken in conjunction with the natural fea tures of the country, presented a series of obstacles such as many commanders might have considered insuperable. Entrenchments, boats, and floating batteries guarded the approaches to the Canadian capital ; and on the most accessible line of com munication, running through the village of Beau- port from the St. Charles to the Montmorenci, Montcalm drew up his army, maintaining his con nection with Quebec by means of a bridge of boats over the former of those tributary streams. The front of this position was protected by the St. Lawrence and its sandbanks ; the rear, by forests of indefinite extent. The month of July drew towards a close, yet nothing of importance had been accomplished. A squadron of the English fleet under Admiral Holmes was despatched past Quebec, to take up a position above the city, so that the St. Lawrence might be blockaded in both directions. Detach ments of the army were frequently sent along the Montmorenci, to make a feint of passing the river beyond the falls ; and Wolfe, by all the means at his disposal, tried to lure the enemy away from his entrenchments, so that a battle might be fought on open ground. But the French commander was too wary to accept the challenge. The Indians and Canadians, constantly hovering about the outskirts of the English position, occasionally came into collision with exploringx parties ; once, Montcalm sent a detachment of his army across the St. Law rence to attack the assailants batteries at Point Levi ; and, on the night of the 28th of July, another little fleet of fireships was launched against the English vessels, without doing any damage. But no action of a serious nature had yet taken place, and Montcalm was evidently resolved, for the pre sent, to stand on the defensive, as the safest policy he could pursue. Wolfe, who had now returned to the banks of the Montmorenci, conceived the plan of crossing that river, and attacking the French, whose left rested on the right or southern bank. For a few hours of the day, the Montmorenci may be forded not far from its junction with the St. Lawrence. It was accordingly determined to take advantage of the circumstance, and by a bold movement to force the French commander to an action. For the accomplishment of this purpose, G12 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. thirteen companies of Grenadiers of the 22nd, 40th, and 45th regiments, and a part of Brigadier Monck- ton s brigade from Point Levi, were to land at the mouth of the Montmorenci, while the two brigades under Generals Townshend and Murray were to cross by the ford. The original design was to carry a redoubt close to the water s edge, which from the opposite bank appeared to be out of reach of fire from the enemy s entrenchments. Wolfe hoped in this way to compel the French to support their out- Perceiving some symptoms of confusion among the French, Wolfe now changed his plan, and resolved on attacking the entrenchments without delay. The troops who had already crossed were directed to form on the beach, and await the arrival of Monckton s division, which had not yet landed; but, unfortunately, they acted in a directly contrary sense. Nothing is so trying to soldiers not tho roughly seasoned to Avar as to remain quiet and impassive under fire. The Grenadiers now stand- BATTLE-FIELD OF ABERCKOMBIE S UEl EAT. work, by which a general action might be brought on ; or, failing this, the redoubt, remaining in the hands of the English, might be advantageously used as a position from which the French lines could be surveyed, with a view to ulterior operations. A disastrous repulse, however, was the only fruit of the attempt. The movement took place on the 31st of July. Some of the boats in which the Grenadiers, with a few Royal Americans, were crossing the St. Law rence, grounded on a ledge of rocks, and were exposed to a storm of shot and shell, which, how ever, did but little mischief. The boats having been got off, the soldiers advanced towards the redoubt, which was abandoned as they approached. ing 011 the French side of the Montmorenci felt that they must do something, and accordingly made a wild rush towards the enemy s entrenchments, but were speedily driven back in disorder. Crowding into the redoubt, in the hope that they would there be sheltered from the scathing fire of the French, they were dismayed to find that the bullets of the adversary still reached them. Several officers, in endeavouring to rally their men, were killed ; the troops could not again be got into line ; and even the arrival of Monckton s regiment, which formed with the utmost coolness under fire, failed to restore the confidence of the others. As night drew on, a dreadful thunder-storm burst forth, adding to the confusion of the English troops, 1759.] DESPONDENCY BEFOHE QUEBEC. 613 without diminishing the efforts of the French. The latter are accused of having fired on the wounded who were lying disabled on the field; but, in. answer to remonstrances on the subject, they stated that the offenders in this respect were not the regulars, but the Canadians and Indians, whom no discipline would restrain. The tide now rapidly rising, Wolfe ordered a retreat, and, repass- ing the river, got back to his original positions, western shore, and only gained a small success at Deschambault, where he learned from some prisoners that Niagara had surrendered, and that the French had abandoned Ticonderoga and Crown Point. Fatigue, excitement, and vexation, acting on a frame weakened by internal disorders, threw Wolfe into a fever, and for a time pre vented his taking the field. The situation was becoming very serious. It was now past the MONTCALM. with the loss of more than four hundred men. In conducting this movement, Wolfe exposed his life with dauntless courage, and set an admir able example to his troops. The French did not attempt to pursue ; but some of the savages came down from the heights, to murder and scalp such of the wounded as could not be brought away. The army was greatly dispirited by so signal a failure. Wolfe anxiously watched for the appearance of Amherst, or of the division originally under the command of Prideaux ; but no succour approached. Murray was sent with twelve hundred men to destroy the French ships stationed above Quebec, and to open communications with Amherst ; but he was foiled twice in trying to land on the north- 52 middle of Atigust ; the army and navy had been before the city since the end of June ; it was evident that the expeditions which had been so long expected would not arrive ; the troops were getting out of heart, and were reduced in numbers ; and it was impossible to tell when the French would consider it advisable to assume the offensive. Day after day went by, without any result of im portance being secured, and even Wolfe began to take a gloomy view of affairs. The seemingly impregnable fastness still rose from the shores of the river in grim and sullen defiance. The army of France still stood unscathed behind their entrench ments. Montcalm still held the city that gave the command of Canada; and the English General, 614 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. baffled at all points, looked up at the towering fortress with a weary and aching heart. Towards the end of August, while still suffering from fever, Wolfe proposed to his Brigadiers three methods of attacking Moiitcalm in his entrench ments on the line of Beauport ; but they appeared to his subordinates too desperate to be adopted, and they were accordingly laid aside. At the same time, the Brigadiers gave it as their opinion, that the most probable method of striking an effectual blow would be to convey the troops over the St. Lawrence, and carry on operations above Quebec, so as to force Montcalm to fight them on their own terms. Such a movement, they observed, would have the effect of placing the English army between Montcalm and his provisions (which he derived from the ships and magazines above the town), and also between him and the army opposing General Amherst.* Wolfe had himself conceived a similar idea at an earlier date, but had discarded it as too hazardous. However, he now assented to the pro posal, and, writing to Pitt on September 2nd, mentioned that he and Admiral Saunders had examined the town with a view to a general assault, but that, after consulting with the chief engineer, they found that such a proceeding held forth little promise of success. It was therefore all the more desirable that the suggestion of the Brigadiers should be carried out, and that a fresh attempt should be made, under more advantageous circum stances, to draw the enemy into an engagement before the walls. " In this situation," said Wolfe to Pitt, in his despatch of the 2nd of September, " there is such a choice of difficulties that I own myself at a loss how to determine. The affairs of Great Britain, I know, reqxiire the most vigorous measures ; but then the courage of a handful of brave men should be exerted only where there is some hope of a favourable event." Pitt was naturally much disconcerted when he read this despatch, which seemed intended to prepare the Minister and the nation for some disaster. Its publication caused a general feeling of dismay throughout the country. In writing to Admiral Saunders on some matters of detail, Wolfe said he was very sensible of his own errors during the campaign, and spoke of him self as "a man that must necessarily be ruined." This was a mood of despondency induced by illness, and it passed away when the rigour of the malady abated. In the course of July, Wolfe had assumed a very lofty tone towards his adversary. The bearer of a flag of truce from Montcalm having observed that the English might very probably destroy the town, but that the French were deter mined that the assailants should never get a footing within its walls, Wolfe replied, " I will be master of Quebec, if I stay here until the end of November." To another French officer, who had remarked that he wondered the English were such fools as to undertake the siege of Quebec with a mere handful of troops, it was answered, " Though the English are few and subdivided, your army, notwithstand ing their superior numbers, are afraid of x;s, as is evident from your not daring to leave your strong entrenchments to attack any of our camps or batteries." This was also the opinion of the Indian allies of France ; for when Montcalm, in August, shortly after the Montmorenci affair, boasted to some chiefs that he had driven away the English, and conquered them, the savages retorted, " Con quered them ! We will never believe that until you drive them back to their ships. Are they not still firing against Quebec 1 Are they not as uncon cerned in their camps as if nothing had happened 1"t By the commencement of September, Wolfe s health was sufficiently restored to enable him to resume the command in person, though he was still liable to brief attacks of alarming illness. On the morning of the 3rd of September, the camp at Montmorenci was broken up, and the brigades of Townshend and Murray moved across the St. Law rence to Point Levi. Montcalm, observing the movement in the British camp, and apparently divining the object, marched two of his battalions towards the upper ford of the tributary stream, with the design of attacking the rear of the English forces during the embarkation ; but a feint on Beauport by Monckton s brigade induced him to withdraw his men. On successive days, a little later, the troops re-embarked at Point Levi, in separate detachments, passed Quebec, and proceeded several miles up the St. Lawrence, on the right bank of which they landed at Cape Rouge. By this time Wolfe had received messengers from General Amherst, from whose statements it appeared that there was little or no hope of his being joined by that commander. This was the more serious, as Wolfe s army was now greatly reduced by casualties and disease ; so much so, indeed, that, after the defence of the Isle of Orleans and of Point Levi had been provided for, not many more than 3,600 effective men remained for the important operations Avhich liad been commenced. To divert the attention of the French, Admiral Holmes s squadron was directed to move up and down the river for several days, as if threatening various points ; but Mont- The three Brigadier-Generals to Wolfe, Aug. 29tli, 1759. t Life of Major-General Wolfe, by Robert Wright. Siege of QUEBEC. September 1759. PLAN OF THE SIEGE OF QUEltEC. G16 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. calm, still declining to quit his lines, despatched one of his officers, at the head of 1,500 men, to follow the progress of the English, and prevent their landing. Seeing, however, that the enemy was moving towards that part of the position which was considered the most impregnable, the French conceived that the worst danger was at an end; and De Levi, the second in command, was sent to the succour of Montreal, with a considerable detachment from the army of Quebec. The spirits of the English commander varied from day to day. Amongst his more familiar com panions he was often heard to sigh, and to declare that he would never return without success, to be exposed to the reproaches of the ignorant multi tude, as many unfortunate commanders had been. At other times he would talk of relinquishing the enterprise, and carrying back his army.* But it is certain that he never really contemplated such a step, for he directed plans to be drawn for a fort on Isle aux Coudres, in which he proposed to establish himself for the winter, in case he should be detained so long. Still, he was frequently depressed by the difficulties of the position, and, in writing to the Earl of Holderness, Secretary of State for the Southern Department, on the 9th of September, he said : " I am so far recovered as to do business, but my constitution, is entirely ruined, without the consolation of having done any con siderable service to the State, or without any prospect of it." Describing in the same despatch some of the obstacles which constantly presented themselves, he wrote : " We have seven hours, and sometimes (above the town, after rain) near eight hours, of the most violent ebb-tide that can be imagined, which loses us an infinite deal of time in every operation on the water ; and the stream is so strong, particularly here, that the ships often drag their anchors by the mere force of the current. The bottom is a bed of rock, so that a ship, unless it hooks a ragged rock, holds by the weight only of the anchor. Doubtless, if the equinoctial gale has any force, a number of ships must necessarily run ashore, and be lost. The day after the troops landed upon the Isle of Orleans, a violent storm had nigh ruined the expedition altogether. Numbers of boats were lost ; all the whale- boats and most of the cutters were stove, some flat-bottomed boats destroyed, and others damaged. We never had half as many of the latter as are * One Israel Mauduit, who published at London, in 1765, "An Apology for the Life and Actions of General Wolfe," which was afterwards suppressed by desire of Grenville, says he had seen a letter of Wolfe s, in which this resolve was spoken of. necessary for this extraordinary and very important service. The enemy is able to fight us upon the water whenever we are out of reach of the cannon of the fleet." The merit of the final operations by which Quebec was taken has sometimes been denied to Wolfe, but, it would seem, with insufficient justice. It has been asserted that the plan was due to Brigadier- General Townshend, Wolfe s third in command, and that to him, therefore, the chief credit should be given. No doubt, the scheme for ascending the river above the town was revived by the three Brigadiers ; but, as before pointed out, it had already occurred to Wolfe, and, when at length executed, it was he who selected the precise point of attack, and indicated the route by which the soldiers were to advance. Still, as the movement above Quebec was finally adopted on the recommendation of the seconds in command, after it had been conceived and rejected by Wolfe himself, and as the final success grew out of that movement, some share in the glory of the achievement, and not an incon siderable share, must be apportioned to Monkton, Townshend, and Murray. The squadrons of Admirals Sauiiders and Holmes continued to make feigned attacks, or rather de monstrations, against the French army, to cover the real movements of the troops. It was on the 6th of September that Wolfe discovered the cove 1 which now bears his name, situated on the Quebec side of the St. Lawrence, less than two miles above that city ; and from this he observed the narrow path which wound up the heights towards the fortress, and saw, by the small number of tents on the summit, that the Canadians who held the position could hardly count more than a hundred. The place was deemed impregnable, and it was considered unnecessary to do more than station a mere look-out post at a locality so well guarded by nature. But Wolfe perceived that an assault at that particular point was not impossible, and he resolved to risk it. He had reconnoitred the whole of the rocky coast, and, determining to sur mount it somehow and somewhere, came to the conclusion that here was the most available spot for the desperate attempt. He continued, however, to examine the river and the shores, and to look after the minutest details of his army, as well as the personal comforts of his officers and men. The enterprise was such as to require the utmost care and forethought in its execution. It was to be commenced before daybreak ; and darkness, though offering many facilities for a secret attack, is always a possible source of error. The stream, at that part of its course, runs with a rapid pace ; the shore is 1759.] THE PASSAGE DOWN THE ST. LAWRENCE. 617 shelving, and the landing-place so narrow fhat it might easily be missed in the obscurity of an autumn night. The men had been strictly enjoined to be perfectly silent during the passage down the river, and, when about to land, not on any account to fire out of the boats. But there could be no certainty that some accident might not reveal the approach of the attacking force, or that some spy or deserter might not divulge the scheme ; in which case the rocky heights, sufficiently difficult to scale under the best of circumstances, would be rendered inaccessible by the serried phalanxes of the enemy, and a crushing defeat would be the end of all. Yet Wolfe determined to stake his fame on the issue. It was clear that he could not subdue the city from the front ; it was equally clear that something must be done to rescue the expedition from the utter failure with which it now seemed menaced. The French ships had retired to the Batiscan, a tributary of the St. Lawrence ; and Bougainville, who had been sent to watch the manoeuvres of the English army, marched thither, fearing that Admiral Holmes was about to attack the fleet. The naval squadrons were of the utmost service in distracting the attention of the enemy ; and, thus assisted, Wolfe collected, at or near his station at Cape Rouge, as many boats as he could bring to gether without exciting suspicion. The rank-and- file of the army, though told that a decisive blow was about to be struck, were not informed of the locality; and it proved very fortunate that this precaution, was observed, for a deserter from the Royal Americans, who went over to the French lines on the morning of the 1 2th of September, was unable to reveal where the threatened peril should be expected. Montcalm, indeed, was deluded into the belief that some movement on Beauport was contemplated, as Admiral Sounders had sent James Cook (afterwards the great navigator) to sound the water opposite that position, and to plant buoys along the shore. On the evening of the 12th, Wolfe invited Jervis, who was in command of the Porcupine sloop-of-\var, to spend an hour or two in his private cabin aboard the Sutherland, and mentioned to him that he had a presentiment he should not survive the morrow. Taking from his breast a portrait of Miss Lowther, to whom he was engaged, he begged his friend, should the foreboding be fulfilled, to restore that pledge to the young lady on his arrival in England. The General then added to his will a codicil disposing of his effects in America ; and all was now ready for the great and perilous attempt. The clear autumn evening deepened to a tranquil night, dark, yet thickly set with stars. A little before sunset, the ships of the line still remaining in the basin had got in close to the Beauport shore, and boats manned with sailors and marines had been lowered, so as to keep up the appearance of a descent in that direction, while the lighter ships set sail, and joined the squadron off Cape Rouge. As soon as darkness had fallen, detachments from the Isle of Orleans and Point Levi arrived by a rapid march, undetected by the enemy, opposite Cape Rouge, where they took boat, and joined the assembled army on the Quebec side of the river. The place of assembly was some way higher up than the spot selected for making the attack; and it was therefore necessary to drop down the stream with the ebb-tide in flat-bottomed boats. At midnight, the divisions began to embark. At two o clock on the momiiig of the 13th, all of the first division were on board ; the boats were formed into line, with the General s barge at the head ; and the Sutherland speedily gave the signal that had been agreed on for departure. Two lights appeared in the maintopmast shrouds, one over the other ; whereupon the flotilla moved away into the dimness of the autumn night. In deep silence for the soldiers were forbidden to speak, under penalty of death the boats glided down the sti eam on the rapid current which then set towards the sea, keeping close to the north-western bank, that the landing-place might not be missed. As the General s barge passed under those rocky shores? beneath the wide and starlit night, Wolfe, in scarcely audible tones, repeated to his officers . Gray s " Elegy written in a Country Churchyard " (which he had recently received from England), dwelling with particular emphasis on the words of pious trust with which it concludes, and on that eloquent and mournful stanza, " The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, And all that beauty, all that wealth, e er gave, Await alike the inevitable hour : The paths of glory lead but to the grave." When he had finished, Wolfe said to his com. panions, with great earnestness, " Now, gentlemen, I would rather be author of that poem than take Quebec." About an hour before daybreak, they drifted into the cove. Wolfe was one of the first who leapt ashore, and, seeing the rocky precipice towering far above his head into the waning night, he observed to an officer near him, " I doubt if you will get up ; but you must do what you can." It is said but the anecdote is given by different authorities with variations as to time and place, which throw a doubt on its accuracy that a small advanced party of English was faintly seen in the gloom by some of 61b CASSELL S HISTOKY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. the Canadian posts, and that a British officer who spoke French replied in such a way as to induce the challengers to believe that the others were of their own nationality. However this may have been, the assailants lost no time in carrying out their General s plan. The curved precipice of Wolfe s Cove rises from the narrow beach to the roots, which they grasped with their hands. At the same time, the Highlanders and other troops ascended by the narrow path, or by any passage they could find, clambering over the crags and numerous obstructions with the agility of monkeys. Before the van had got completely up, the rustling noise of their ascent alarmed the French, and the MONUMENT TO WOLFE AT QfEliEC. height of about two hundred and fifty feet. The cliff, for the most part, is almost perpendicular, though the surface is roughened by crags, stunted trees, and coarse vegetation. A winding path, so narrow that two men can barely follow it abreast, leads up to the summit ; but on that September morn ing this path was entrenched, and defended at the top by a captain s guard. The main body of Light Infantry, who were carried by the current a little further down the river, scaled the absolute wall of cliff, dragging themselves up by rocks, boughs, and officer in command of the post ordered his men to fire down the precipice. But nothing now could check the resistless advance. The English, as they gained the top, fired in return, and the picquet hastily retired. In a little while, the brigades under Wolfe, Monckton, and Murray had reached the summit of the seemingly inaccessible cliff, and formed in military order on the plain that stretched before them ; and the boats, rowing back, met the squadron under Holmes, which had sailed down the river about an hour after the starting of the first 620 CASSELL S HISTOE.Y OF THE UNITED STATES. [1759. division. The troops of the second division, under Brigadier Townshend, were on board, and, having been transferred to the boats, were carried down to the cove, whence they followed their comrades up the precipice. The great design had so far been happily achieved. When morning dawned, the English army stood embattled on the Heights of Abraham. The number of men thus drawn up was but 4,826 of all ranks. They were formed with their right towards Quebec, their left to Sillery, and their rear to the river. Only one gun was at their disposal, and that had with great difficulty been dragged up the cliff; but each man had seventy rounds of ammunition. In the widening daylight, the regiments were faced to the right, and marched in files towards the city. Light showers of rain were falling ; yet the view was not so obscured but that the soldiers could see the stronghold of their enemy rising before them. Montcalm, when informed by the routed picquets that the English army had gained the Plains of Abraham, was at first incredulous. He said it could only be a small party come to burn a few houses, and retire. But, being afterwards convinced by his own eyes of the real state of the case, he exclaimed, " Then they have at last got to the weak side of this miserable garrison ! "We must give battle, and crush them before mid-day." Mustering his troops with that rapidity of action for which he was noted, he led them over the St. Charles by the bridge of boats, and soon perceived the English advancing towards him. The battle-field was nearly level, though broken here and there by shallow ravines and rail-fences. Small copses to right and left afforded shelter to the Indian and Canadian marksmen, and the French, with the fortified city at their back, and with a superiority of numbers, were in no bad position to meet their adversaries, who, almost devoid of artillery, and entirely of cavalry, had still a difficult task before them. But many of the French soldiers were little better than ill-drilled peasantry, while the English force consisted almost entirely of veterans. The chances of success were perhaps not far from an even balance, and it was only the actual collision which could determine the isstie. The left wing of the English army was formed by Wolfe with two faces to the enemy, so as to prevent its being outflanked, of which for a moment there was danger. The General himself took his station in front of the right wing, where the hottest fire was expected. The English picquets were at first driven back in some confusion ; but Wolfe passed down the line, exhorting his men to stand firm, and directing them to reserve their fire until the enemy should come within forty yards of the muzzles of their guns. Montcalm had sent frequent despatches to his lieutenants to hurry up reinforce ments, and in the course of the morning some arrived. He then directed a forward movement, and the French, advancing with loud shouts, fired obliquely towai ds the extremities of the opposing line. The English had for some time been lying down, by Wolfe s orders : they now sprang up, and, as the enemy got within range, struck their moving ranks with such concentration, regularity, and simultaneousness, that the French officers after wards compared that terrible discharge to the shock of artillery. Before the smoke had cleared away, the men had again loaded, and Wolfe, placing him self at their head, moved forward to the charge. The ill-disciplined Canadians were by this time broken and disordered ; they fired in platoons, without unity, and could not be got into military form. Montcalm, though wounded, and deprived of his second in command, who was killed, i-ode to every point where the danger was greatest, ani mating his soldiers by the heroism of his example. But the field was strewn with dead and dying, and the French wavered and fell back before the flaming energy of the English advance. Firing with murderous pi*ecision as they moved forward, the conquering hosts for such they had now be come dashed into the reeling masses of the enemy with levelled bayonets. The force of that collision could not be resisted : regiment after regiment of the dismayed French and Canadians turned and fled. But the moments of Wolfe were numbered : the presentiment of the evening before was on the point of being fulfilled. Twice he had been struck, without taking any notice of the wound ; but now a bullet aimed, it is said, by a deserter smote him in the breast, and he felt that the end had come. " Support me," he whispered to an officer near him ; "let not my brave fellows see me drop. The day is ours keep it ! " Monckton also was wounded, and the command devolved on Towns- hend, who had been operating on the left of the English line, where, though the fighting had not been so severe as in the other direction, the French had been effectually checked in their flanking movement. After awhile, the enemy rallied at several points, and momentarily arrested the Eng lish advance. The latter were indeed threatened with an attack in the rear. Two thousand men, under the command of Bougainville, had marched from Cape Rouge as soon as intelligence was received that the English had gained the heights ; and these were now seen approaching. Townshend, 1759.] WOLFE S DEATH. 621 who had by this time re-dressed his ranks, imme diately ordered two battalions to proceed against the newcomex s, who speedily retired among the woods and swamps which lay in the direction whence they had advanced. The battle was won ; the French were once more discouraged ; and, as the lowering weather of the morning gave way to a sudden burst of sunlight, the beaten army crowded back into Quebec, with the exception of Vaudreuil s 1,500 Canadians, who fled precipitately towards Montreal. Townshend refrained from pur suit, and, bringing his regiments together, drew up on the conquered field. The chief commanders on both sides were sorely stricken. Wolfe was carried to the rear, and, on reaching a small redoubt which had been captured in the morning, he desired his attendants to lay him down. They brought him water, and some one proposed that a surgeon should be sent for. " It is needless," said the dying man ; " it is all over with me." He appeared to sink into a lethargy, when a cry was heard " They run, they run ! " Wolfe roused himself as if from sleep it was the sleep of rapidly-advancing death and anxiously asked, " Who run ? " " The enemy, sir," it was replied ; " they give way everywhere." A gleam of returning life shot momentarily into his eyes, and his last thought was a thought of duty. " Go, one of you, my lads," he said, " to Colonel Burton. Tell him to march Webb s regiment with all speed down to the river Charles, to cut off the retreat of the fugitives from the bridge." Pre sently he turned upon his side; a shudder passed through him ; and, with the words, " Now, God be praised, I die in peace ! " his spirit passed away. Very different in its mortal satisfactions, though similar in its immortal hopes, was the end of Montcalm. He too had been wounded more than once the second time fatally, in attempting to rally a body of fugitive Canadians in a copse near St. John s Gate. He was carried into the city, and was told by the surgeon in attendance that recovery was hopeless. " I am glad of it," he replied; "how long shall I survive?" He was answered that it could not be more than ten or twelve hours at the utmost. " So much the bettei-," he said : " I shall not then live to see the surrender of Quebec." He gave some instructions about renewing the attack on the English, and conducting the defence of the city, of which, however, he had evidently despaired. " As for me," he added, " I shall pass the night with God, and prepare myself for death." He then wrote a letter recommending the French prisoners to the generosity of their conquerors; and at five o clock on the mornin^ of September 14th he drew his latest breath.* Four days after, the flag of England waved in triumph above the ramparts of Quebec. The half- ruined town and fortress were during the winter months occupied by the British troops under Gene ral Murray, but without the support of the naval squadron, which could not stay to be frozen up in the St. Lawrence. The French, under the Marquis de Levi, who had succeeded Montcalm, once more advanced from Montreal in the April of next year, and appeared before Quebec. They were encountered by Murray with an inferior force outside the lines of defence ; the English com mander was defeated and driven back into the city with the loss of several guns. As soon as the ice cleared away, six French frigates came up the river, and a regular siege by land and water, with 10,000 men for the land attack, counting the Indians, was then commenced. But the recapture and loss of Wolfe s great prize was happily pre vented by the alertness and dexterity of Lord Colville with the British ships of war. He quickly followed the enemy s squadron up the St. Law rence, and destroyed or took all their frigates under the eyes of the French military commander. This was a sight which the Marquis de Levi had not expected, and which convinced him that there was no hope of accomplishing his enterprise. He now dreaded the landing of a new British army, perhaps commanded by another hero like Wolfe. Raising the siege at once, he decamped in such haste as to leave artillery and stores behind him. During the summer of 1760 there was but Mont real, the last remaining stronghold of French dominion in Canada, the head-quarters and arsenal of its forces, still held by the Governor-General, the Marquis de Vaudreuil. He was besieged by the joint brigades of Generals Amherst, Murray, and Haviland, with the aid of the ships. On the 8th of September, 1760, Montreal was given up by capitulation, and the British conquest of Canada was thereby completed. While this took place in America, and in Eng land, on the 25th of October, King George II. suddenly died, the war in Germany and elsewhere proved favourable to Great Britain and her allies. The battle of Minden, on the 31st of July in the preceding year, had inflicted a severe blow on the French invaders of Hanover ; and the valour of English soldiers was proved in that stubborn con flict, despite the cowardly behaviour of Lord * Bancroft s and Grahame s Histories of the United States. Earl Stanhope s and Smollett s Histories of England. "Wright s Life of General Wolfe. 622 CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1760. George Sackville, who disobeyed the order to lead a cavalry charge. The King of Prussia, indeed, suffered terrible losses in his defeats at Kunersdorf, at Glatz, at Liegnitz, and on the Lower Rhine, by the Russian, Austrian, and French armies which ravaged the whole Fatherland, and which upon one occasion perpetrated sad havoc at Berlin. Still, the events of those sanguinary campaigns were often such as rather enhanced the credit of the British arms, the contingent of our troops being employed in actions which happened to gain a few already begun. The mainstay of the existing Ministry was the great popularity of Mr. Pitt, whose somewhat vaunting style of statesmanship was associated with the glories of successful war. It was therefore expedient for the advancement of the Court party that the war should be stopped ; and they did not care to wait for such a turn of military affairs as would leave France utterly de feated, and place England foremost among the nations of Europe. Their cue was to depreciate the German alliances which Pitt had cherished, VIEW IN QVEItEC. partial successes. The destruction of the French fleet near Brest, by our Channel squadron under Sir Edward Hawke, was of greater importance. But England had nevertheless become quite weary of its part in the Continental war; and the English officers serving under Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick were ill content with his treatment of them. The young King, George III., now in his twenty-third year, was inclined by temperament and education to dislike the arts and triumphs of warfare, and was at least indifferent to his German family connections. His favourite courtier, the Earl of Bute, now first introduced to political business, was destined within a few months to supplant the Ministry of the Duke of Newcastle, for which purpose, through Bubb Doddington and others, a series of intrigues was and to make light of his solemn invectives against the Bourbon dynasties of Versailles and Madrid. With this predetermined line of policy, if that conduct deserve the name which was actuated by petty personal motives, the avowed or covert foes of the Ministry took advantage of every inci dent during the first two years of George III. The last subsidy paid by England to Frederick II. of Prussia was voted in December, 1760, with grudg ing reluctance. He won the battle of Torgau about that time, regained the command of Saxony, and expelled the Austrians, Swedes, and Russians from his own kingdom ; but, in the following year, Silesia and Pomerania were once more overrun by them. The forces of Brunswick, Hanover, and England could do no more than just repel the French attack in Westphalia ; the English expedition and capture 1762.] CONQUEST IN THE WEST INDIES. 623 of Belleisle, on the coast of Brittany, was of little real utility. But the surrender, early in 1761, of the last remnant of French power in India, and the capture of Dominica, in the West Indies, by a small British force, were results of considerable value. The opponents of the war policy in England watched for an opportunity of declaring or privately securing their object, with something to show in the way of achieved successes. Preliminaries of peace were, in fact, discussed between the French and English Governments in the summer of 1761, when France offered to give up Canada, to restore Minorca in exchange for Guadaloupe and Mariegalante, to renounce her claim to Cape Breton, and to cede part of her West African possessions. But France would keep, on behalf of Austria, what had been taken from Prussia and other German States, except what belonged to Hanover. England was further to make restitution of her captures at sea before the declaration of war. Finally, as the Bourbon kings of France and Spain were of near kindred to each other, the French diplomatists handed in a memorial, demanding from Great Britain the satisfaction of particular Spanish claims. It was impossible for any British Government to accept these conditions, some of which, not those concerning the territorial possessions in America, were highly injurious to the national honour. Pitt regarded the last-mentioned proposal as a downright insult, on the part both of France and Spain. He perceived, at once, that France had not offered peace in sincerity, but had designed to entangle Spain in the war against England, with the offer of restoring Minorca, and the opportunity of recovering Gibraltar, by their joint efforts. This was really the case, for Louis XV. of France and Charles III. of Spain were justaboutto sign their" Family Compact," engaging themselves to mutual assistance, by sea and land, against a maritime power which should become their common enemy. Pitt, therefore, urged in council that war against Spain should be instantly declared, and that n fleet should go to intercept the annual convoy of American silver, with separate expeditions to capture Havannah and Manilla, before the Spanish and French forces could unite. He was coolly answered, by Bute and others of the Court party, that they did not believe in the hostility of Spain, and the King sent word that he had the strongest objections to what Mi\ Pitt advised. The resignation by Pitt of the Secretaryship of State was the immediate conse quence ; it was exactly what they wanted. The King showed him personal kindness iipon his going to take leave ; and a pension of 3,000 a year was settled iipon him, with a peerage for his wife. Parliament was opened, a month later, with no allu sion in the Royal Speech to the probability of a war with Spain. Yet the end of that year proved, that Mr. Pitt had been quite in the right. The Spanish Government, in a most insolent manner, sent away the British Ambassador from Madrid and recalled its own from London. The war thenceforth included both France and Spain. But it was destined, under this aspect, to be of a brief duration ; and its results were advantageous to Great Britain. The annual treasure-ship or fleet of the Spanish American Empire had safely arrived in Cadiz before its owners thought tit to defy the British maritime power. But the remainder of Pitt s martial pro gramme was speedily executed. On King George s birthday, the 4th of June, 1762, a squadron of nineteen ships of the line and as many frigates and smaller vessels, with 10,000 troops in a hundred and fifty transpoi-ts, appeared before Havannah. We may take pleasure, incidentally, in noticing one of the humblest in rank of the many brave English naval officers serving on board this fleet ; it was James Cook, the future discoverer of New South Wales and of half the Australasian world, now colonised by the English nation. The Moro, a strong fortress commanding the port of Havannah, was besieged forty days, bombarded, and finally stormed; the city yielded on the 13th of August ; the English had won a booty of three millions sterling, and all but conquered the rich island of Cuba. This great victory of Lord Albemarie and Admiral Pococke, in the West Indies, Avas accompanied by one scarcely less valuable in the Eastern Asiatic Archipelago ; where Manilla, with all the Philippines, fell an easy prey to Sir William Draper. The French West Indies, as well as the Spanish, were doomed to pay forfeit, within a very short time, for the rashness of the two allied monarchies in their " Family Compact." Admiral Rodney was there ; and the isles of Martinique, with Grenada, Santa Lucia, St. Vincent, and Tobago, were soon in British possession. These sudden and splendid successes were capable of being made the justification of a British Govern ment already intent on retiring with fair credit from the costly European war. Omitting, therefore, some contemporary foreign transactions, the Spanish invasion of Portugal and the English help in its defence, the capture of another year s shipload of Spanish bullion, not to reckon millions of dollars and doubloons, the relief of Frederick II. by a change in the Russian Empire, and the rebuff s which France now began CASSELL S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. [1762. to suffer in the western parts of Germany, let us see the conclusion of the seven years general strife, only so far as concerns the British Em pire. The Duke of Newcastle had been jostled out of the Ministry by Lord Bute, whose supporters were Henry Fox and George Grenville. The Diike of Bedford, the most powerful man of the Whig party, had been sent to Paris as diplomatic negotiator for peace, while Bute and the King privately settled the terms of peace with him, their real object being to make him an insig nificant figure. These were matters of the greatest importance to his Majesty s Government. For the rest, England was to get all Canada, with all the shores and islands of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and Acadie or Nova Scotia ; the Mississippi Valley, and part of Louisiana, with all Floi-ida; the islands of Tobago, Dominica, Grenada, and St. Vincent ; the African territories of the Gambia and Senegal ; the undisputed power of making conquests in India, leaving but some French trading factories on the coast ; the Mediter ranean isle of Minorca ; and a pledge of demolish ing the fortress of Dunkirk. While Martinique, Havannah, and Manilla were given back, Florida and Louisiana were delivered instead. Such was the aggrandisement of the British Empire about the beginning of the reign of George III. Its older provinces, the fruit of peaceful English colo nisation, were still most worthy of regard. They might claim, at any rate, to be fairly and frankly treated by the Government of Great Britain. We have somewhat anticipated the measured course of this history, by casting here a comprehen sive forward glance over the events, at home and abroad, which terminated the foreign war at the end of 1762, and thereby introduced such adminis trative changes as could not but affect the situation, of the American colonies. Those events will, how ever, be related more circumstantially in the opening chapters of our Second Volume. END OF VOLUME I. ? *