The Project Gutenberg ebook of The Colonies 1492-1750, by Reuben Gold Thwaites.

EDITOR OF "JESUIT RELATIONS," "EARLY WESTERN TRAVELS,"
"ORIGINAL JOURNALS OF THE LEWIS AND CLARK EXPEDITIONS,"
ETC. AUTHOR OF "FRANCE IN AMERICA," "FATHER
MARQUETTE," "DANIEL BOONE," "ROCKY
MOUNTAIN EXPLORATION," "HISTORIC
WATERWAYS," "WISCONSIN," ETC.

LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.

Reprinted, September, 1891, February, 1892, (Revised), January and August, 1893, December, 1893, (Revised), August, 1894, October, 1895, July, 1896, August, 1897, (Revised), November, 1897, July, 1898, July, 1899, April, 1900, January, 1901, October, 1901, August, 1902, November, 1902, October, 1904, September, 1906, May, 1908, June, 1910, (Revised), October, 1911.

EDITOR'S PREFACE.

In offering to the public a new History of the United States,—for such the three volumes of the Epochs of American History, taken together, are designed to form,—the aim is not to assemble all the important facts, or to discuss all the important questions that have arisen. There seems to be a place for a series of brief works which shall show the main causes for the foundation of the colonies, for the formation of the Union, and for the triumph of that Union over disintegrating tendencies. To make clear the development of ideas and institutions from epoch to epoch,—this is the aim of the authors and the editor.

Detail has therefore been sacrificed to a more thorough treatment of the broad outlines: events are considered as evidences of tendencies and principles. Recognizing the fact that many readers will wish to go more carefully into narrative and social history, each chapter throughout the Series will be provided with a bibliography, intended to lead, first to the more common and easily accessible books, afterward, through the lists of bibliographies by other hands, to special works and monographs. The reader or teacher will find a select list of books in the Suggestions a few pages below.

The historical geography of the United States has been a much-neglected subject. In this Series, therefore, both physical and political geography will receive special attention. I have prepared four maps for the first volume, and a like number will appear in each subsequent volume. Colonial grants were confused and uncertain; the principle adopted has been to accept the later interpretation of the grants by the English government as settling earlier questions.

To my colleague, Professor Edward Channing, I beg to offer especial thanks for many generous suggestions, both as to the scope of the work and as to details.

AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

Upon no epoch of American history has so much been written, from every point of view, as upon the Thirteen Colonies. There has, nevertheless, been lacking a book devoted especially to it, compact in form, yet sufficiently comprehensive in scope at once to serve as a text-book for class use and for general reading and reference. The present work is intended to meet that want.

In this book American colonization is considered in the light of general colonization as a phase of history. Englishmen in planting colonies in America brought with them the institutions with which they had been familiar at home: it is shown what these institutions were, and how, in adapting themselves to new conditions of growth, they differed from English models. As prominent among the changed conditions, the physical geography of America and its aboriginal inhabitants receive somewhat extended treatment; and it is sought to explain the important effect these had upon the character of the settlers and the development of the country. The social and economic condition of the people is described, and attention is paid to the political characteristics of the several colonies both in the conduct of their local affairs and in their relations with each other and the mother-country. It is shown that the causes of the Revolution were deep-seated in colonial history. Attention is also called to the fact, generally overlooked, that the thirteen mainland colonies which revolted in 1776 were not all of the English colonial establishments in America.

From Dr. Frederick J. Turner, of the University of Wisconsin, I have had much advice and assistance throughout the prosecution of the work; Dr. Edward Channing, of Harvard College, has kindly revised the proof-sheets and made many valuable suggestions; while Dr. Samuel A. Green, librarian of the Massachusetts Historical Society, has generously done similar service on the chapters referring to New England. To all of these gentlemen, each professionally expert in certain branches of the subject, I tender most cordial thanks.

From time to time there have been several revisions of the text, so that it has been kept fairly abreast of current investigation. The bibliographies, however, have remained untouched since the tenth edition (August, 1897). The principal change in the present, therefore, consists in the introduction of new and carefully prepared references, which will render the book of greater service to the student than it has been at any time within the past ten years. In this revision, I have had the valuable assistance of Miss Annie A. Nunns.

SUGGESTIONS.

While this volume is intended to be complete in itself, compression has been necessary in order to make it conform to the series in which it appears. It really is but an outline of the subject, a centre from which to start upon a study of the American colonies. The reader, especially the teacher, who would acquire a fairly complete knowledge of this interesting period of our history, will need to examine many other volumes; from them gaining not only further information, but the point of view of other authors than the present—only in this manner may an historical perspective be obtained. The classified bibliographies, given by the author at the head of each chapter, have been prepared with much care. While perhaps few will desire to follow the topics to the lengths there suggested, it is urged that as many of the other volumes as possible be consulted, particularly those containing source material.

Following is a list of books which, even for a brief study, would be desirable for reference and comparison, or for the preparation of topics:

1-5. John Andrew Doyle: English Colonies in America. 5 vols. New York: H. Holt & Co., 1882-1907.—An analytical study, in much detail, by an English author.

6-13. John Fiske: Beginnings of New England; The Discovery of America, 2 vols.; Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America, 2 vols.; New France and New England; Old Virginia and her Neighbours, 2 vols. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1897-1902.—The best popular accounts; but while eminently readable and inspiring, not sufficiently thorough at all points, to serve as authoritative studies.

14. Henry Cabot Lodge: Short History of the English Colonies in America. New York: Harper Brothers Co., 1881.—Concise and readable.

15-17. Herbert Levi Osgood: American Colonies in the 17th Century. 3 vols. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1904-1907.—The most elaborate treatment of this period, from the American point of view.

If a detailed study is intended, the following volumes should be added to the foregoing:

A. Bibliography.

1. Edward Channing and Albert Bushnell Hart: A Guide to the Study of American History. Boston: Ginn & Co., 1896.—A well-arranged manual for both students and general readers.

2. Josephus Nelson Larned: Literature of American History. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1902.—More detailed than the foregoing. Contains critical estimates of many of the works cited, by experts in the several subjects.

B. General.

3-5. Elroy Mckendree Avery: A History of the United States and its People from their Earliest Records to the Present Time. 15 vols. Cleveland: Burrows Brothers Co., 1904+.—Volumes I.-III. cover the colonial period. Especially notable for its illustrations—for the most part, reproductions of contemporary views, maps, portraits, and articles of historical interest. The bibliographies are quite full.

6, 7. Edward Channing: A History of the United States. 8 vols. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1905+.—A calm, philosophical treatise, written with care and erudition.

8-13. Albert Bushnell Hart, Editor: The American Nation. New York: Harper Brothers Co., 1904-1907.—The latest co-operative history of the United States. Each volume is by an author who specializes in the topic treated. vols. II.-VII. are concerned with the colonial period. The bibliographical chapters are very useful.

14, 15. Woodrow Wilson: A History of the American People. 5 vols. New York: Harper Brothers Co., 1902.—Popular and readable, often brilliant. Only vols. I. and II. cover the colonial period.

16-20. Justin Winsor: Narrative and Critical History of America. 8 vols. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1889.—A co-operative enterprise, the chapters being by different hands, for the most part specialists. There is a wealth of illustrations, notes, and bibliographical references. But much of the work has been superseded by later publications. vols. I.-V. cover the colonial period.

C. Special Histories.

21, 22. Philip Alexander Bruce: Economic History of Virginia in the 17th Century. 2 vols. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1896.—A careful, detailed study.

23. Philip Alexander Bruce: Social Life of Virginia in the 17th Century. Richmond: Whittet & Shepperson, 1907.—Thorough and clear.

24, 25. Sydney George Fisher: Men, Women, and Manners in Colonial Times. 2 vols. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1898.—A readable and useful survey.

26. Frederick Webb Hodge: Handbook of American Indians north of Mexico. Washington: Smithsonian Institution, 1907.—The author, a member of the Ethnological Bureau, is an authority on this subject.

27-38. Francis Parkman: France and England in North America. 12 vols. Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1851-1892. The titles of volumes comprising this series are: Pioneers of France in the New World; The Jesuits in North America; La Salle and the Discovery of the Great West; The Old Régime in Canada; Count Frontenac and New France; A Half-Century of Conflict, 2 vols.; Montcalm and Wolfe, 2 vols.; The Conspiracy of Pontiac, 2 vols.—In spite of its age, this work remains the principal authority for the thrilling story of New France. A first-hand study, written in fascinating style.

39. Ellen Churchill Semple: American History and its Geographic Conditions. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1903.—Of first importance in understanding the causes and effects of the movements of population.

40. Cyrus Thomas: The Indians of North America in Historic Times. Philadelphia: G. Barrie & Sons, 1903.—The latest compendious treatment; somewhat repellent in style, but useful for reference. The author is a well-known authority.

41, 42. William Babcock Weeden: Economic and Social History of New England, 1620-1789. 2 vols. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1890.—An admirably executed work.

D. Sources.

43, 44. Albert Bushnell Hart, Editor: American History Told by Contemporaries. 4 vols. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1897, 1898.—Very useful for purposes of illustration. vols. I., II., are devoted to colonial material.

45-64. John Franklin Jameson, Editor: Original Narratives of Early American History. 20 vols. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1906+.—Carefully edited, and indispensable for first-hand study.

65. William MacDonald, Editor: Documentary Source Book of American History, 1606-1898. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1908.—Useful reprints of material otherwise difficult to obtain.

In addition to the above, the publications of colonial and town record commissions and state and local historical and antiquarian societies contain material of the utmost value in the study of our colonial history. Among them may especially be mentioned the volumes issued by the Prince Society, Gorges Society, American Antiquarian Society, and the state historical societies of Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia; also the colonial records of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and North and South Carolina.

CONTENTS.

THE COLONIES.

1492-1750.

CHAPTER I.

THE LAND AND THE NATIVE RACES.

Bibliographies.—L. Farrand, Basis of American History, ch. xviii.; J. Larned, Literature of American History, 21-50; J. Winsor, Narrative and Critical History, I., II.; Channing and Hart, Guide, §§ 21, 77-80; C. Lummis, Reading List on Indians.

Historical Maps.—No. 1, this volume (Epoch Maps, No. 1); T. MacCoun, Historical Geography of United States; school histories of Channing, Elson, Gordy, James and Sanford, Mace, McLaughlin, McMaster, and Montgomery.

General Accounts.—Historical significance of geography of the United States: H. Mill, International Geography, ch. xxxix.; F. Ratzel, Vereinigte Staaten, I. ch. ii.; B. Hinsdale, How to Study and Teach History, ch. xiv.; E. Bogart, Economic History of United States, introduction; E. Semple, American History and its Geographic Conditions; A. Brigham, Geographic Influences in American History; W. Scaife, America: its Geographical History.—Topographical descriptions of the country: J. Whitney, United States, I. pt. i.; N. Shaler, United States, I., and Nature and Man in America; Mill, as above; E. Reclus, North America, III.; Hinsdale, as above, ch. xv.—Prehistoric Man in America: L. Morgan, Ancient Society; J. Nadaillac, Prehistoric America; J. Foster, Prehistoric Races; Winsor, as above, I. ch. vi.; E. Avery, United States and its People, I. chs. i., ii.; Farrand, as above, ch. v.—The Indians (or Amerinds): D. Brinton, American Race; C. Thomas, Indians in Historic Times; F. Hodge, [Pg 2] Handbook of American Indians; Farrand, as above, chs. vi.-xviii.; Avery, as above, I. ch. xxii.; F. Dellenbaugh, North Americans of Yesterday; S. Drake, Aboriginal Races of America; G. Ellis, Red Man and White Man in North America; G. Grinnell, Story of the Indian. The introduction to F. Parkman, Jesuits in North America, and his Conspiracy of Pontiac, I. ch. i., are admirable general surveys. Briefer, also excellent, is J. Fiske's Discovery of America, I. ch. i. The mound-builders have now been identified as Indians. L. Carr, Mounds of the Mississippi Valley Historically Considered is the best exposition of this subject. C. Thomas, Catalogue of Prehistoric Works East of the Rocky Mountains is useful.

Special Histories.—Larned, History for Ready Reference, I. 83-115, gives brief account and bibliographies of tribes; Farrand, as above, 279-286, does the same by geographical groups. Especially notable are L. Morgan, League of the Iroquois, and C. Colden, Five Indian Nations. For detailed treatment of the aborigines of that section, consult H. Bancroft, Native Races of the Pacific Coast, II., and Mexico, I.; J. Palfrey, New England, I. chs. i., ii., describes the Indians in that region; T. Roosevelt, Winning of the West, I. chs. iii., iv., the Southern tribes; and Parkman, Pontiac, the old Northwest tribes. There are numerous biographies of chiefs, and a considerable literature on border warfare.

Whence came the native races of America? Doubtless the chain of Aleutian islands served as stepping-stones for straggling bands of Asiatics to cross over into continental Alaska many centuries ago; others may have traversed the ice-bridge of Bering's Strait; possibly prehistoric vessels from China, Japan, or the Malay peninsula were blown upon our shores by westerly hurricanes, or drifted hither upon the ocean currents of the Pacific. There are striking similarities between the flora on each shore of the North Pacific; and the Eskimos of North America, like the [Pg 3] West-Slope Indians of South America, have been thought to exhibit physical resemblances to the Mongols and Malays. a mere matter of conjecture. On the other hand, some archæologists hold that men as far advanced as the present Eskimos followed the retreating ice-cap of the last glacial epoch. In the absence of positive historical evidence, the origin of the native peoples of America is a mere matter of conjecture.

North America could not, in a primitive stage of the mechanic arts, have been developed by colonization on any considerable scale from the west, except in the face of difficulties almost insuperable. The Pacific coast of the country is dangerous to approach; steep precipices frequently come down to the shore, and the land everywhere rises rapidly from the sea, until not far inland the broad and mighty wall of the Cordilleran mountain system extends from north to south. That formidable barrier was not scaled by civilized men until modern times, when European settlement had already reached the Mississippi from the east, and science had stepped in to assist the explorers. At San Diego and San Francisco are the only natural harbors, although Puget Sound can be entered from the extreme north, and skilful improvements have in our day made a good harbor at the mouth of Columbia River. The rivers of the Pacific Slope for the most part come noisily tumbling down to the sea over great cliffs and through deep chasms, and cannot be utilized for progress far into the interior.

The Atlantic seaboard, upon the other hand, is broad and inviting. The Appalachian range lies for the most part nearly a hundred miles inland. The gently sloping coast abounds in indentations,—safe harbors and generous land-locked bays, into which flow numerous rivers of considerable [Pg 4] breadth and depth, by means of which the land can be explored for long distances from tide-water. By ascending the St. Lawrence and the chain of the Great Lakes, the interior of the continent is readily reached. Dragging his craft over any one of a half-dozen easy portages in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, or Ohio, the canoe traveller can emerge into the Mississippi basin, by means of whose far-stretching waters he is enabled to explore the heart of the New World, from the Alleghanies to the Rockies, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. The river system. A carrying trail, at the headwaters of the Missouri, will lead him over to tributaries of the Columbia, whereby he gains access to the Pacific slope; while by another portage of a few miles in length, from Pigeon River to Rainy River, he is given command of the vast basin of Hudson Bay,—a labyrinth of waterways extending northward to the Arctic Ocean, and connected by still other portages with the Pacific. The Hudson River and Lakes George and Champlain form a natural highway from the St. Lawrence southward to the ocean. By the Mohawk and a short carrying-place, the Hudson was from early times connected with the Great Lakes. The Potomac, the Susquehanna, the Roanoke, and other Southern rivers can be traced northwestward to their sources in the mountains; and hard by are the headwaters of west-flowing feeders of the Mississippi. The Appalachian valley system. The Appalachian mountains run for the most part in parallel ridges northeast and southwest; and their valley system, opening out through the Cumberland Gap upon the Kentucky prairies and the valleys of the Ohio basin, also affords a comparatively easy highway from the Atlantic sea-coast to the interior.

Thus with the entrance of North America facing the east, and with Europe lying but little more than one half [Pg 5] the distance from Boston that Asia lies from San Francisco, it was in the order of things that from the east should have come the people who were to settle and civilize the New World. Colonists could on this side of the continent found new commonwealths, yet at the same time easily maintain their connection with the fatherland. An inviting field for Aryan colonization. The march of Aryan emigration has ever been on lines little diverging from due east or west. It is fortunate that the geographical conditions of North America were such as to make her an inviting field for the further migration of the race.

The Atlantic border may be considered as the threshold of the continent. It was among its dense, gloomy forests of hard wood and pine that European nations planted their colonies; here those colonies grew into States, which were the nucleus of the American Union. The Appalachians are not high enough seriously to affect the climate or landscape of the region. Their flanks slope gradually down to the sea, furrowed by rivers which from the first gave character to the colonies.In New England, where there is an abundance of good harbors, the coast is narrow and the streams are short and rapid, with stretches of navigable water between the waterfalls which turn the wheels of industry for a busy, ingenious, and thrifty people. and of the South. The long, broad rivers of the South, flowing lazily through a wide base-plain, the coast of which furnishes but little safe anchorage, served as avenues of traffic for the large, isolated colonial estates strung along their banks; the autocratic planters taking pleasure in having ports of entry at their doors. Three grand natural divisions of the Atlantic slope. The Hudson and the Potomac lead far inland,—paths to the water ways of the interior,—and divide the Atlantic slope into three grand natural divisions, the [Pg 6] New England, the Middle, and the Southern, in which grew up distinct groups of colonies, having quite a different origin, and for a time but few interests in common. Extractive industries. The Appalachian mountains and their foot-hills abound in many places in iron and coal; works for the smelting of the former were erected near Jamestown, Virginia, as early as 1620, and early in the eighteenth century the industry began to be of considerable importance in parts of New England, New York, and New Jersey; but the mining of anthracite coal was not commenced until 1820. Soil. The soil of the Atlantic border varies greatly, being much less fertile in the North than in the South; but nearly everywhere it yields good returns for a proper expenditure of labor. Climate. The climate is subject to frequent and extreme changes. At about 30° latitude the mean temperature is similar to that on the opposite side of the Atlantic; but farther north the American climate, owing to the divergence of the Gulf Stream and the influence of the great continent to the west, is much colder than at corresponding points in Europe. The rainfall along the coast is everywhere sufficient.

Beyond the Appalachian mountain wall, the once heavily forested land dips gently to the Mississippi; then the land rises again, in a long, treeless swell, up to the foot of the giant and picturesque Cordilleras. The isothermal lines in this great central basin are nearly identical with those of the Atlantic coast. The soil east of the 105th meridian west from Greenwich is generally rich, sometimes extremely fertile; and it is now agreed that nearly all the vast arid plains to the west of that meridian, formerly set down as desert, needs only irrigation to blossom as the rose. The Pacific slope. The Pacific slope, narrow and abrupt, abounds in fertile, pent-up valleys, with some [Pg 7] of the finest scenery on the continent and a climate everywhere nearly equal at the same elevation; the isothermal lines here run north and south, the lofty mountain range materially influencing both climate and vegetation.

There is no fairer land for the building of a great nation. The region occupied by the United States is particularly available for such a purpose. It offers a wide range of diversity in climate and products, yet is traversed by noble rivers which intimately connect the North with the South, and have been made to bind the East with the West. It possesses in the Mississippi basin vast plains unsurpassed for health, fertility, and the capacity to support an enormous population, yet easily defended; for the great outlying mountain ranges, while readily penetrated by bands of adventurous pioneers, and though climbed by railway trains, might easily be made serious obstacles to invading armies. The natural resources of North America are apparently exhaustless; we command nearly every North American seaport on both oceans, and withal are so isolated that there appears to be no necessity for "entangling alliances" with transatlantic powers. The United States seems permitted by Nature to work out her own destiny unhampered by foreign influence, secure in her position, rich in capabilities. Her land is doubtless destined to become the greatest stronghold of the Aryan race.

When Europeans first set foot upon the shores of America it was found not only that a New World had been discovered, but that it was peopled by a race of men theretofore unknown to civilized experience. The various branches of the race differed greatly from each other in general appearance [Pg 8] and in degrees of civilization, and to some extent were settled in latitudinal strata; thus the reports concerning them made by early navigators who touched at different points along the coast, led to much confusion in European estimates of the aborigines. Divisible into two divisions. We now know that but one race occupied the land from Hudson Bay to Patagonia. Leaving out of account the Carib race of the West Indies, the portion resident in North and Central America may be roughly grouped into two grand divisions:—

I. The semi-civilized peoples represented by the sun-worshipping Mexicans and Peruvians, who had attained particular efficiency in architecture, road-making, and fortification, acquired some knowledge of astronomy, were facile if not elegant in sculpture, practised many handicrafts, but appear to have exhibited little capacity for further progress. Their government was paternal to a degree nowhere else observed, and the people, exercising neither political power nor individual judgment in the conduct of many of the common affairs of life, were helpless when deprived of their native rulers by the Spanish conquerors, Cortez and Pizarro. Closely upon the border of this division, both geographically and in point of mental status, were the Pueblos and Cliff-Dwellers of New Mexico, Arizona, and Southern California,—the occupants of the country around the headwaters of the Rio Grande and Gila rivers, and of the foot-hills of the Desert Range. These people, like the Mexicans, lived in great communal dwellings of stone or sun-dried brick, and were also sun-worshippers. They made crude cloth and pottery, and irrigated and cultivated large tracts of arid land, but were inferior as fighters, and occupied a mental plane considerably below the Mexicans. Allied in race and [Pg 9] similar in acquirements were the tribes inhabiting the lower Mississippi valley, the Natchez and perhaps other tribes lying farther to the east.

II. The natives of North America, called Red Indians,—a name which perpetuates the geographical error of Columbus, and has given rise to an erroneous opinion as to their color—occupied a still lower plane of civilization. Yet one must be cautious in accepting any hard-and-fast classification. The North Americans presented a considerable variety of types, ranging from the Southern Indians, some of whose tribes were rather above the Caribs in material advancement, and quite superior to them in mental calibre, down to the Diggers, the savage root-eaters of the Cordilleran region.

The migrations of some of the Red Indian tribes were frequent, and they occupied overlapping territories, so that it is impossible to fix the tribal boundaries with any degree of exactness. Again, the tribes were so merged by intermarriage, by affiliation, by consolidation, by the fact that there were numerous polyglot villages of renegades, by similarities in manner, habits, and appearance, that it is difficult even to separate the savages into families. Philological divisions of Red Indian tribes. It is only on philological grounds that these divisions can be made at all. In a general way we may say that between the Atlantic and the Rockies, Hudson Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, there were four Indian languages in vogue, with great varieties of local dialect.

I. The Algonquians were the most numerous, holding the greater portion of the country from the unoccupied "debatable land" of Kentucky northward to Hudson Bay, and from the Atlantic westward to the Mississippi. Among their tribes were the Narragansetts and Mohicans. These savages were rude [Pg 10] in life and manners, were intensely warlike, depended for subsistence chiefly on hunting and fishing, lived in rude wigwams covered with bark, skins, or matted reeds, practised agriculture in a crude fashion, and were less stable in their habitations than the Southern Indians. They have made a larger figure in our history than any other family, because through their lands came the heaviest and most aggressive movement of white population. Estimates of early Indian populations necessarily differ, in the absence of accurate knowledge, but it is now known that the numbers were never so great as was at first estimated. The colonists on the Atlantic seaboard found a native population much larger than elsewhere existed, for the Indians had a superstitious, almost a romantic, attachment to the seaside; and fish-food abounded there. Back from the waterfalls on the Atlantic slope,—in the mountains and beyond,—there were large areas destitute of inhabitants; and even in the nominally occupied territory the villages were generally small and far apart. A careful modern estimate is that the Algonkins at no time numbered over ninety thousand souls, and possibly not over fifty thousand.

II. In the heart of this Algonquian land was planted an ethnic group called the Iroquois, with its several distinct branches, often at war with each other. The craftiest, most daring, and most intelligent of Red Indians, yet still in the savage hunter state, the Iroquois were the terror of every native band east of the Mississippi, and eventually pitted themselves against their white neighbors. The five principal tribes of this family—Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas, all stationed in pallisaded villages south and east of Lakes Erie and Ontario—formed a loose confederacy, styled by themselves "The Long House," and by the whites "The Five Nations," which [Pg 11] firmly held the waterways connecting the Hudson River and the Great Lakes. The population of the entire group was not over seventeen thousand,—a remarkably small number, considering the active part they played in American history, and the control which they exercised over wide tracts of Algonquian territory. Later they were joined by the Tuscaroras from North Carolina, and the confederacy was thereafter known as "The Six Nations."

III. The Southern Indians occupied the country between the Tennessee River and the Gulf, the Appalachian ranges and the Mississippi. They were divided into five lax confederacies,—the Cherokees, Chickasaws, Choctaws, Creeks, and Seminoles. Of a milder disposition than their Northern cousins, they were rather in a barbarous than a savage state. The Creeks, in particular, had good intellects, were fair agriculturists, and quickly adopted many mechanic and rural arts from their white neighbors; so that by the time of the Revolution they were not far behind the small white proprietors in industrial or domestic methods. In the Indian Territory of to-day the descendants of some of these Southern Indians are good farmers and herdsmen, with a capacity for self-government and shrewd business dealing. It is not thought that the Southern tribes ever numbered above fifty thousand persons.

IV. The Dakotah, or Sioux, family occupied for the most part the country beyond the Mississippi. They were and are a fierce, high-strung people, are genuine nomads, and war appears to have been their chief occupation. Before the advent of the Spaniards they were foot-wanderers; but runaway horses came to them from Mexico and from the exploring expeditions of Narvaez, Coronado, and De Soto, and very early in the historic period the Indians of the far western [Pg 12] plains became expert horsemen, attaining a degree of equestrian skill equal to that of the desert-dwelling Arabs. Outlying bands of the Dakotahs once occupied the greater part of Wisconsin and northern Illinois, and were, it is believed by competent investigators, one of the various tribes of mound-builders. Upon withdrawing to the west of the Mississippi, they left behind them one of their tribes,—the Winnebagoes,—whom Nicolet found (1634) resident on and about Green Bay of Lake Michigan, at peace and in confederacy with the Algonquians, who hedged them about. Other trans-Mississippi nations there are, but they are neither as large nor of such historical importance as the Dakotahs.

The above enumeration, covering the territory south of Hudson Bay and east of the Rocky Mountains, embraces those savage nations with which the white colonists of North America have longest been in contact. Other tribes. North and west of these limits were and are other aboriginal tribes of the same race, but materially differing from those to whom allusion has been made, as well as from each other, in speech, stature, feature, and custom. These, too, lie, generally speaking, in ethnological zones. North of British Columbia are the fish-eating and filthy Hyperboreans, including the Eskimos and the tribes of Alaska and the British Northwest. South of these dwell the Columbians,—the aborigines of Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia,—a somewhat higher type than the Hyperboreans, but much degenerated from contact with whites. The Californians are settled not only in what is now termed California, but stretch back irregularly into the mountains of Oregon, Idaho, Nevada, and Utah.

But of all the North American tribes, our interest in this book is with the traditional Red Indian,—the savage of eastern North America, the crafty forest warrior whom our fathers met on landing, and whose presence so materially shaped the fortunes of the colonies.

First of all, the Indian was a hunter and fisherman. As such, his life was a struggle for existence. Enemies were to be driven from the tribe's hunting-grounds, but the game-preserves of other tribes were invaded when convenient, and this led to endless feuds. War was not only a pastime, but a necessity in the competition for food. Villages were as a consequence almost invariably built at vantage points,—at inlets of the sea, at waterfalls, on commanding banks of lakes and rivers, on portage paths between the headwaters of streams, and at river junctions. Hence we find that many, if not most, of the early white towns, built before railways were introduced, are on sites originally occupied by Indian villages.

The political organization of the Indians was weak. The villages were little democracies, where one warrior held himself as good as another, except for the deference naturally due to headmen of the several clans, or to those of reputed wisdom or oratorical ability. There was a sachem, or peace-chief, hereditary in the female line, whose authority was but slight, unless aided by natural gifts which commanded respect. In times of war the fighting men ranged themselves as volunteers under some popular leader,—perhaps a permanent chief; sometimes a warrior without titular distinction. Much which appears in the early writings about the power and authority of "nobles," "kings," and "emperors" among the red men was fanciful, the authors falling [Pg 14] into the error of judging Indian institutions by Old World standards. Around the village council-fires all warriors had a right to be heard; but the talking was chiefly done by the privileged classes of headmen, old men, wise men, and orators, who were also selected as the representatives of villages in the occasional deliberative assemblies of the tribe or confederacy. The judgment of such a council could not bind the entire village, tribe, or confederacy; any one might refuse to obey if it pleased him. It was seldom that an entire tribe united in an important enterprise, still more unusual for several tribes to stand by each other in adversity. It was this weakness in organization,—inherent in a pure democracy,—combined with their lack of self-control and steadfastness of purpose, and with the ever-prevailing tribal jealousies, which caused Indians to yield before the whites, who better understood the value of adherence in the face of a common foe. Here and there in our history we shall note some formidable Indian conspiracies for entirely dispossessing the whites,—such as the Virginia scheme (1622), King Philip's uprising (1675), and the Pontiac War (1763). They were the work of native men of genius who had the gift of organization highly developed, but who could not find material equal to their skill; hence these uprisings were short-lived.

The strength of the Indian as a fighter lay in his capacity for stratagem, in his ability to thread the tangled thicket as silently and easily as he would an open plain, in his powers of secrecy, and in his habit of making rapid, unexpected sallies for robbery and murder, and then gliding back into the dark and almost impenetrable forest. The child of impulse, he soon tired of protracted military operations; and in a siege or in the open usually yielded to stoutly sustained resistance on the part of an enemy inferior in [Pg 15] numbers. But the colonists were obliged to learn and adopt the Indian's skulking method of warfare before they could successfully cope with him in the forest.

The Indian was lord of his own wigwam and of the squaws, whom he purchased of their fathers, kept as his slaves, and could divorce at his caprice. Families were not large, chiefly owing to the lack of food and to heavy infant mortality. The wigwams, or huts,—each tribe having peculiarities in its domestic architecture,—were foully kept, and the bodies of their dirty inhabitants swarmed with vermin. Kind and hospitable to friends and unsuspected strangers, the Indian was merciless to his enemies, no cruelty being too severe for a captive. Yet prisoners were often snatched from the stake or the hands of a vindictive captor to be adopted into the family of the rescuer, taking the place of some one slaughtered by the enemy. In council and when among strangers, the Indian was dignified and reserved, too proud to exhibit curiosity or emotion; but around his own fire he was often a jolly clown, much given to verbosity, and fond of comic tales of doubtful morality. Improvidence was one of his besetting sins.

The summer dress of the men was generally a short apron made of the pelt of a wild animal, the women being clothed in skins from neck to knees; in winter both sexes wrapped themselves in large robes of similar material. Indian oratory was highly ornate; it abounded in metaphors drawn from a minute observance of nature and from a picturesque mythology. Religion. A belief in the efficacy of religious observances was deep seated. Long fastings, penances, and sacrifices were frequent. The elements were peopled with spirits good and bad. Every animal, every plant, had its manitou, or incarnate spirit. [Pg 16] Fancy ran riot in superstition. Even the dances practised by the aborigines had a certain religious significance, being pantomimes, and in some features resembling the mediæval miracle-plays of Europe. Medicine. The art of healing was tinctured with necromancy, although there was considerable virtue in their decoctions of barks, roots, and herbs, and their vapor-baths, which came in time to be borrowed from them by the whites.

In intellectual activity the red man did not occupy so low a scale as has often been assigned him. He was barbarous in his habits, but was so from choice: it suited his wild, untrammelled nature. He understood the arts of politeness when he chose to exercise them. He could plan, he was an incomparable tactician and a fair strategist; he was a natural logician; his tools and implements were admirably adapted to the purpose designed; he fashioned boats that have not been surpassed in their kind; he was remarkably quick in learning the use of firearms, and soon equalled the best white hunters as a marksman. A rude sense of honor was highly developed in the Indian; he had a nice perception of public propriety; he bowed his will to the force of custom,—these characteristics doing much to counteract the anarchical tendency of his extreme democracy. He understood the value of form and color, as witness his rock-carvings, his rude paintings, the decorations on his finely tanned leather, and his often graceful body markings. It was because the savage saw little in civilized ideas to attract him, that he either remained obdurate in the face of missionary endeavors, or simulated an interest he could not feel.

The colonists from Europe met the Red Indian in a threefold capacity,—as a neighbor, as a customer and trader, and as a foe opposed to encroachments upon his hunting grounds. At first the whites were regarded by the aborigines as of supernatural origin, and hospitality, veneration, and confidence were displayed toward the new-comers. But the morality of the Europeans was soon made painfully evident to them. Indians as foes. When the early Spaniards, and afterwards the English, kidnapped tribesmen to sell them into slavery or to use them as captive guides for future expeditions, or even murdered the natives on slight provocation, distrust and hatred naturally succeeded the sentiment of awe. Like many savage races, like the earlier Romans, the Indian looked upon the member of every tribe with which he had not made a formal peace as a public enemy; hence he felt justified in wreaking his vengeance on the race whenever he failed to find individual offenders. He was exceptionally cruel, his mode of warfare was skulking, he could not easily be got at in the forest fastnesses which he alone knew well, and his strokes fell heaviest on women and children; so that whites came to fear and unspeakably to loathe the savage, and often added greatly to the bitterness of the struggle by retaliation in kind. The white borderers themselves were frequently brutal, reckless, and lawless; and under such conditions clashing was inevitable.

But the love of trade was strong among the Indians, and caused them to some extent to overcome or to conceal their antipathies. There had always existed a system of inter-tribal barter, so widespread that the first whites landing [Pg 18] on the Atlantic coast saw Indians with copper ornaments and tools which came from the Lake Superior mines; and by the middle of the seventeenth century many articles of European make had passed inland, by means of these forest exchanges, as far as the Mississippi, in advance of the earliest white explorers. The trade with the Indians was one of the incentives to colonization. The introduction of European blankets at once revolutionized the dress of the coast tribes; and it is surprising how quickly the art of using firearms was acquired among them, and barbaric implements and utensils abandoned for those of civilized make. So rapid was this change that it was not long before the Indians became dependent on the whites for nearly every article of dress and ornament, and for tools and weapons. The white traders, who travelled through the woods visiting the tribes, exchanging these goods for furs, often cheated and robbed the Indian, taught him the use of intoxicants, bullied and browbeat him, appropriated his women, and in general introduced serious demoralization into the native camps. Trouble frequently grew out of this wretched condition of affairs. The bulk of the whites doubtless intended to treat the Indian honorably; but the forest traders were beyond the pale of law, and news of the details of their transactions seldom reached the coast settlements.

As a neighbor the Indian was difficult to deal with, whether in the negotiation of treaties of amity, or in the purchase of lands. Having but a loose system of government, there was no really responsible head, and no compact was secure from the interference of malcontents who would not be bound by treaties made by the chiefs. The English felt that the red-men were not putting the land to its full use, that much of the territory was growing up as [Pg 19] a waste, that they were best entitled to it who could make it the most productive. On the other hand, the earlier cessions of land were made under a total misconception: the Indians supposed that the new-comers would, after a few years of occupancy, pass on and leave the tract again to the natives. There was no compromise possible between races with precisely opposite views of property in land. The inevitable struggle for mastery. The struggle was inevitable,—civilization against savagery. No sentimental notions could prevent it. It was in the nature of things that the weaker must give way. For a long time it was not certain that a combined effort might not drive the whites into the sea and undo the work of colonization; but in the end the savage went to the wall.

Taking a general view of the growth of the American nation, it is now easy to see that it was fortunate that Englishmen met in the Indian so formidable an antagonist: such fierce and untamed savages could never be held long as slaves; and thus were the American colonists of the North—the bone and sinew of the nation—saved from the temptations and the moral danger which come from contact with a numerous servile race. Again, every step of progress into the wilderness being stubbornly contested, the spirit of hardihood and bravery—so essential an element in nation-building—was fostered among the borderers; and as settlement moved westward slowly, only so fast as the pressure of population on the seaboard impelled it, the Americans were prevented from planting scattered colonies in the interior, and thus were able to present a solid front to the mother-country when, in due course of time, fostering care changed to a spirit of commercial control, and commercial control to jealous interference and menace.

CHAPTER II.

DISCOVERIES AND EARLY SETTLEMENTS. (1492-1606.)

Bibliographies.—Winsor, Columbus, and Narrative and Critical History, I. xix-xxxvii, 33-58, 76-132, 369-444, II. 153-179, 205, III. 7-58, 78-84, 97-104, 121, 126, 184-218; Larned, Literature of American History, 50-68, and History for Ready Reference, I. 54-79; Avery, United States, I. 376-403; Channing and Hart, Guide, §§ 81-96; also bibliographical chapters in Bourne, Cheney, and Tyler, below.

Historical Maps.—No. 1, this volume (Epoch Maps, No. 1); MacCoun; Winsor, Narrative and Critical History, I., II.; H. Harrisse, Discovery of North America, and Découverte et Evolution Cartographique de Terre-Neuve; E. L. Stevenson, Maps illustrating Early Discovery and Exploration in America; maps in American Nation series (Bourne, Cheney, and Tyler).

General Accounts.—On geographical knowledge of ancients, and pre-Columbian discoveries: Winsor, Narrative and Critical, I. chs. i., ii.,; W. Wilson, American People, I. ch. i.; Avery, I. chs. iii.-vi.; E. Cheney, European Background of American History, chs. i.-v.—On discovery and settlement, from Columbus to Jamestown: M. Creighton, Age of Elizabeth (Epochs of Modern History); R. Hildreth, United States, I. chs. i., iii.; G. Bancroft, United States, I. chs. i.-v.; Winsor, Narrative and Critical, II. chs. i.-vii., III. chs. i.-iv., and Columbus; Avery, I. chs. vii.-xxi.; E. Channing, United States, I. chs. i.-v.; J. Doyle, English Colonies in America, I. ch. iv.

Special Histories.—E. Bourne, Spain in America; Parkman, Pioneers of France in the New World, 28-233, 296-309; Winsor, Cartier to Frontenac, chs. i.-iii.; C. Baird, Huguenot Emigration to America; L. Tyler, England in America, chs. i., ii. For lives of explorers, consult bibliographies, above.

Contemporary Accounts.—Hakluyt, Voyages; Camden Society, Publications, lxxxvii.; Relation of Captain Gosnold's Voyage (1602); Breton, Brief and True Relation (1602); Pring, Voyage for Discovery of North Part of Virginia (1603); Rosier, [Pg 21] True Relation (1605); Amerigo Vespuccius, Letters.—Reprints: Prince Society, Publications; American History told by Contemporaries, I. part ii.; J. Jameson, Original Narratives of Early American History; American History Leaflets, 1, 3, 9, 13.

The Basques, Normans, Welsh, Irish, and Scandinavians are the principal claimants for the honor of discovering America before Columbus; and there are also believers in early African migrations to the western continent, chiefly influenced by supposed ethnological and botanical evidences found in South America. The Scandinavian claim. The Scandinavians make out the strongest case. Iceland, so tradition runs, was first conquered by the Britons in the sixth century. Then followed a succession of Danish and Irish settlements. But the Celts were driven out by Ingolf, who led a colony of Norwegians thither in 875 and founded Reikjavik.

The ancient Norse sagas—oral traditions, none of which were fixed in writing until the twelfth century, and most of them not until the fourteenth—mention voyages to the west from Iceland, and the discovery of new lands in that quarter as early as 876. In 985 Eric the Red is said to have led colonies to this western land,—by this time called Greenland. The following year (986) Bjarni Herjulfson claimed to have been driven by contrary winds to a strange shore nine days' sail southwest from Greenland,—"to a land flat and covered with trees." Then comes the familiar story, that in the year 1000 Leif, son of Eric the Red, having come from Norway and introduced Christianity into both Iceland and Greenland, sailed away to the southwest with thirty-five companions, intent on visiting the country which Bjarni had discovered before him. They wintered, so the saga reads, "at a place where a river flowed out from a lake," called the region Vinland because of wild grapes growing there, [Pg 22] "erected large buildings," and then set out for Greenland with a cargo of timber,—a commodity much needed in the fishing colonies of the less-favored North. It is related that other explorations succeeded this, and that in 1007 a temporary settlement was formed in sunny Vinland, where the colonists, nearly one hundred in number, "had all the good things of the country, both of grapes and of all sorts of game and other things." Trading voyages to the new country now became frequent, say the sagas, and considerable shipments of timber were made from Vinland to Greenland. Eric Upsi, a Greenland bishop, is alleged, on doubtful authority, to have gone to Vinland in 1121; and in 1347 there is mention of a Greenland ship sailing out there for a cargo of timber,—but this is the very last reference to Vinland by the Norwegian bards.

An enormous mass of literature has been the outgrowth of these geographical puzzles in the sagas, and many writers have ventured to identify every headland and other natural object mentioned in them. It is shadowy, but not improbable. The common theory among the advocates of the Scandinavian claim is, that Vinland was somewhere on the coast south of Labrador; but as to the exact locality, there is much diversity of opinion. There may easily have been early voyages to the American mainland south of Davis Straits by the hardy Norse seamen colonized in Iceland and Greenland, and it is probable that there were numerous adventures of that sort.

The sagas, like the Homeric tales, were oral narrations for centuries before they were committed to writing, and as such were subject to distortion and patriotic and romantic embellishment. It is now difficult to separate in them the true from the false; yet we have other contemporaneous evidence (Adam of Bremen, 1076) that [Pg 23] the Danes regarded Vinland as a reality. Pretended monuments of the early visits of Northmen to our shores have been exhibited,—notably the old mill at Newport and the Dighton Rock; but modern scholarship has determined that these are not relics of the vikings, and had a much less romantic origin. It is now safe to say that nowhere in America, south of undisputed traces in Greenland, are there any convincing archæological proofs of these alleged centuries of Norse occupation in America.

But even granting the possibility, and indeed the probability, of pre-Columbian discoveries, they bore no lasting fruit, and are merely the antiquarian puzzles and curiosities of American history. American development begun with Columbus. The development of the New World began with the landing (Oct. 12, 1492) on an island in the Bahamas, of Christopher Columbus, the agent of Spain. It was an age of daring maritime adventure. India, whence Europe obtained her gold and silks, her spices, perfumes, and precious stones, was the common goal. For many centuries the great trade route had been by caravans from India overland through Central Asia and the Balkan peninsula to Italy, the Rhine country, the Netherlands, and beyond; but the raids of the fierce desert tribes and the capture of Constantinople (1453) had closed this path, and now the trade passed through Egypt. The race for India. With improvements in the art of navigation there arose a general desire to reach India by sea. Three centuries before Christ, Aristotle had taught that the earth was a sphere, and that the waters which laved Europe on the west washed the eastern shores of Asia. Here and there through the centuries others advanced the same opinion, [Pg 24] and the map which the great Italian astronomer Toscanelli sent to Columbus (1474) showed China to be but fifty-two degrees west of Europe. The idea of sailing westward to reach India not original with Columbus. The idea that by sailing west India could be reached, was therefore quite familiar to the contemporaries of Columbus, although he stands in the front as the one man who put his faith to the test. The mistake lay in the current calculations regarding the size of the earth. Instead of being only three thousand miles to the west, Asia was twelve thousand, and the continent of America blocked the way. It is probable that Columbus went to his grave still firm in the belief that he had reached the confines of India,—indeed, the names he gave to the islands and to the strange people who inhabited them stand as enduring evidence of his geographical error.

The Portuguese, on the other hand, sought India by the southeast passage, around the continent of Africa, and had been creeping southward along the African coast for several years before Spain sent Columbus to reach Asia by the west. Thus in the race for India and the discovery of intermediate lands, the Portuguese and the Spanish had adopted opposite routes. Pope Alexander's bull. Pope Alexander VI. now issued his famous bull (May 4, 1493), partitioning the un-Christian world into two parts,—Spain to have lands west of an imaginary meridian 100 leagues west of Cape de Verde islands, and Portugal those to the east—a simple arrangement, on paper. Next year, by agreement, the line was moved to 270 leagues westward, but it was still supposed to be in mid-ocean. By this change, however, the eastern part of what is now Brazil fell to Portugal.

England, although still Catholic, was not disposed to allow Spain and Portugal to monopolize between them those portions of the earth which Europeans had not [Pg 25] yet seen; and we are told that there was grievous disappointment at the court of London because Spain had been the path-breaker to the west. England sends out John Cabot. In 1497 John Cabot set sail from England armed with a trading charter, to endeavor to reach Asia by way of the northwest. He had knowledge of the exploit of Columbus, and may well have heard of the Scandinavian discovery of Vinland. Early in the morning of the 24th of June he sighted the gloomy headlands of Cape Breton,—the first known European to make this important discovery. It is on record that "great honors" were heaped upon the adventurous mariner upon his return to England, and that the generous king gave "£10 to him that found the new isle"—the equivalent of $700 or $800 of our money.

The year 1498 was one of the most notable in the long and splendid history of maritime discoveryYoung Vasco da Gama, of Portugal, turned the Cape of Good Hope, and gayly sailed his little fleet into the harbor of Calicut (May 20). At last India had been discovered by the southeast passage: Portugal had first reached the goal. In May, also, Columbus set forth upon his third voyage, during which he first discovered the mainland of South America; Sebastian Cabot's voyage. and in the same month John Cabot's second son, Sebastian, left Bristol in the hope of finding the northwest passage, which his father had failed to reach, and which was undiscovered until our own times (1850). Icebergs turned Sebastian southward, and he explored the American shores down to the vicinity of Chesapeake Bay. From this voyage sprang the claim under which the English colonies in North America were founded.

Three years later (1501) a Portuguese mariner, Gaspar Cortereal, explored the American coast south of [Pg 26] the Gulf of St. Lawrence for a long distance. Newfoundland as a colonial nucleus. By 1504 we know that fishermen from Brittany and Normandy were at Newfoundland, and from that time forward there appear to have been more or less permanent colonies of fishermen there,—French, Portuguese, Spanish, and English,—with their little huts and drying scaffolds clustered along the shores. Newfoundland proved valuable as a supply and repair station for future explorers and colonizers. It was the nucleus of both French and English settlement in America. By 1578 there were no less than one hundred and fifty French vessels alone employed in the Newfoundland fisheries, and a good trade with the Indians had been established.

The idea that America was but a projection of Asia possessed all the early explorers; and indeed it was a century and a half later (1728) before Bering sailed from the Pacific Ocean to the Arctic and proved that America was insulated. There was another geographical error, which took even a longer time to explode,—the notion that a waterway somewhere extended through the American continent, uniting the Atlantic and the Pacific. John Smith and other English colonists thought that by ascending the James, the York, the Potomac, the Roanoke, or the Hudson, they could emerge with ease upon waters flowing to the ocean of the west. Champlain sent (1634) the fur-trader Nicolet up the Ottawa River and the Great Lakes into Wisconsin, which he thought to be Asia; and Jolliet and Marquette (1673) imagined they had found the highway thither when their birch-bark canoes glided into the upper Mississippi at Prairie du Chien.

One hundred and seven years before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, Balboa scaled the continental backbone at Darien (1513), and in the name of Spain [Pg 27] claimed dominion over the waters of the Pacific. With undaunted zeal did Spanish explorers then beat up and down the western shore of the Gulf of Mexico, vainly seeking for a passage through by water. A great stimulus had now been given to the general desire to reach India by sea; for the Turks were overrunning Egypt (1512-1520) and despoiling the caravans from the East, so that the manufactures and trade of western Europe were sadly crippled. But thus far Portugal alone held the key to the sea-route to India.

This same year (1513) was notable also for the first visit made by Spaniards to the mainland of North America. Ponce de Leon in Florida. Ponce de Leon, a valiant soldier worn out in long service, and who had been serving as governor of Porto Rico, went to the Florida mainland, where a popular legend said there was a fountain giving forth waters capable of recuperating life. The country was ablaze with brilliant flowers, but the elixir of life was not there, and he returned disappointed.

In 1519 Pineda, another Spaniard, explored the northern shore of the Gulf of Mexico. Vasquez in South Carolina. The following year (1520) a slave-hunting expedition, under Vasquez, visited the coast of South Carolina, which the commander styled Chicora. The brilliant conquest of Mexico by Cortez (1519-1521) had made that hardy adventurer the hero of Christendom; and in the hope of rivalling his splendid achievement, Vasquez returned to Chicora in 1525, commissioned by Charles V. as governor of the country. But Chicora was not Mexico, and the Red Indians were of a different temper from the Aztecs. The expedition met with disaster. While Vasquez was fighting the embittered savages in South Carolina, Gomez, also in behalf of [Pg 28] Spain, was ranging along the Atlantic coast from Newfoundland to New Jersey, and instituting a successful trade with the natives.

In April, 1528, Narvaez, with three hundred enthusiastic young nobles and gentlemen from Spain, landed at Tampa Bay and renewed his sovereign's claim to Florida and its supposed wealth of mines and precious stones. Led by the fables of the wily native guides, who were careful to tell what their Spanish tormentors wished most to hear, they floundered hither and thither through the great swamps and forests, continually wasted by fatigue, famine, disease, and frequent assaults of savages. At last, after many distressing adventures, but four men were left out of this brilliant company,—Cabeza de Vaca, treasurer of the expedition, and three companions. For eight years did these four bruised and ragged Spaniards wearily roam through the region now divided into Texas, Indian Territory, New Mexico, and Arizona,—through entangled forests, across broad rivers and desert stretches beset with wild beasts and wilder men, but ever spurred on by vague reports of a colony of their countrymen in the far southwest. At last (May, 1536), the miserable wanderers reached Culiacan, on the Gulf of California, whence they were borne in triumph to the city of Mexico as the guests of the province.

Their coming revived the shadowy native tales of gold mines and wealthy cities to the north, which had for some years been exciting the cupidity of the conquerors of Mexico. In response to these rumors there had been frequent reachings out northward. In 1528 Cortez had despatched Maldonado up along the Pacific coast for three hundred miles. Two years later (1530) Guzman penetrated to the mouth of the Gulf of California and established the town [Pg 29] of Culiacan. Cortez again had vessels on the Pacific in 1532, and by 1535 his lieutenants were claiming for him the Lower California peninsula. It is possible that Spanish vessels coasted northward beyond the Columbia; but no news of their discoveries reached the geographers in Europe.

It was in 1530 that specific reports first came, through native slaves, of seven great cities of stone-built houses a few hundred miles north of the capital of the Aztecs, where the inhabitants had such a profusion of gold and silver that their household utensils were made of those metals. The "Seven Cities of Cibola." The search for "the seven cities of Cibola," as these alleged communities came to be called by the Spaniards, was at once begun. Guzman, just then at the head of affairs in New Spain, led northward a considerable expedition of Spanish soldiers and Indians, which suffered great hardships, but failed to discover Cibola.

Cabeza de Vaca and his fellow-adventurers claimed, upon their arrival, to have themselves seen the seven cities; and they enlarged on the previous stories. Coronado's march. Coronado, governor of the northern province of New Gallicia, was accordingly sent to conquer this wonderful country which Guzman had failed to find. Early in 1540 he set out with a well-equipped following of three hundred Spaniards and eight hundred Indians. The Cibola cities were found to be but pueblos in Arizona or New Mexico, like the communal dwellings of the Hopis and Zuñis, with the aspect of which we are so familiar to-day; while the mild inhabitants destitute of wealth, peacefully practising their crude industries and tilling their irrigated fields, were foemen hardly worthy of Castilian steel. Disappointed, but still hoping to find the country of gold, Coronado's gallant little army, frequently thinned [Pg 30] by death and desertion, beat for three years up and down the southwestern wilderness,—now thirsting in the deserts, now penned up in gloomy cañons, now crawling over pathless mountains, suffering the horrors of starvation and of despair, but following this will-o'-the-wisp with a melancholy perseverance seldom seen in man save when searching for some mysterious treasure. Coronado apparently crossed the State of Kansas twice; "through mighty plains and sandy heaths, smooth and wearisome and bare of wood.... All that way the plains are as full of crookback oxen as the mountain Serena in Spain is of sheep.... They were a great succor for the hunger and want of bread which our people stood in. One day it rained in that plain a great shower of hail as big as oranges, which caused many tears, weaknesses, and vows." The wanderer ventured as far as the Missouri, and would have gone still farther eastward but for his inability to cross the swollen river. Co-operating parties explored the upper valleys of the Rio Grande and Gila, ascended the Colorado for two hundred and forty miles above its mouth, and visited the Grand Cañon of the same river. Coronado at last returned, satisfied that he had been made the victim of travellers' idle tales. He was rewarded with contumely and lost his place as governor of New Gallicia; but his romantic march stands in history as one of the most remarkable exploring expeditions of modern times.

Early in the summer of 1539 Hernando de Soto, the favorite of Pizarro in the conquest of Peru (1532), anchored his fleet in the bay of Espiritu Santo, Florida, determined to gain independent renown as the conqueror of the North American wilds. His was a much larger and better-equipped party than had subjugated either Mexico or Peru. But he met the fate of Narvaez. False Indian guides led him hither [Pg 31] and thither through the swamps and moss-grown jungles of the Gulf region, and the survivors formed a sorry company indeed when the Mississippi River was reached (April, 1541),—probably at the lowest Chickasaw Bluff,—after two years of fruitless wandering. The next winter, still betrayed by his savage guides and harassed by attacks from other natives, he spent upon the Washita, but despairing of reaching Mexico by land, he returned to the Mississippi, where he died of swamp-fever (May 21, 1542). The great river he had discovered was his tomb. His wretched followers, by this time much reduced in numbers, descended the stream, and after great hardships finally reached the Mexican coast-settlements in September.

A half century had now passed since the advent of Columbus in the Bahamas; yet upon the mainland to the north, Spain as yet held neither harbor, fort, nor settlement. In the southwest, the proximity of Mexico and the milder character of the natives made it easier to maintain a settlement in what is now United States territory. Spanish friars in the southwest. In 1582, forty years after Coronado's march, Franciscan friars opened missions in the valleys of the Rio Grande and the Gila,—the Cibola of old. Sixteen years later (1598) Santa Fé was established as the seat of Spanish power in the north; by 1630 this power was at its highest in New Mexico and Arizona, fifty missions administering religious instruction to ninety Pueblo towns. In 1687 the chain of missions had reached the Gulf of California, and then slowly extended northward along the Pacific coast till San Francisco, with its system of Indian vassalage, was established in 1776. In Florida, after the extermination of the French Huguenot colony in 1564, Spain made wholesale claims [Pg 32] to all that region; but De Gourgues dealt her settlements a staggering blow, and she seemed thereafter incapable of further colonizing the province. Spain's American possessions at close of sixteenth century. At the close of the sixteenth century Spain held but few points in what is now the United States,—Santa Fé in New Mexico, a few scattering missions along the Gila and Rio Grande, and St. Augustine in Florida.

The French were not far behind the Spanish in their attempts to colonize North America. In 1524 John Verrazano, a Florentine in the employ of Francis I., while seeking the supposed water passage through America to China, explored the coast from about Wilmington, N. C., to Newfoundland. Ten years later (1534) Jacques Cartier, a St. Malo seaman, sailed up the north shore of the estuary of the St. Lawrence "until land could be seen on either side." Cartier at Montreal; The next year he was back again, and ascended to the first rapids at La Chine, naming the island mountain there, Mont-Réal. Having spent the winter in this inhospitable region, his reports were such as to discourage for a time further attempts at colonization in America by the French, who were just now engaged at home in serious difficulties with Spain.

A truce being at last declared between France and Spain, Cartier was made captain-general and chief pilot of an American colonizing expedition which Francis allowed the lord of Roberval to undertake. But this conflict of authority was distasteful to both Cartier and Roberval, and the former started off before his chief in May, 1541. and Quebec. He built a fort near Quebec, but a year later returned to France, just before Roberval arrived with reinforcements for the colony. The latter remained for [Pg 33] a year in America before returning home, and it is thought that he visited Massachusetts Bay in his voyages alongshore. France was now ablaze with civil war, and the Huguenots, with their independent notions, were engaging all the resources of the royal power, so that further American discoveries were for the time postponed. The Newfoundland industry, however, grew apace, for the Church prescribed a fish diet on certain days and at certain seasons, and the consumption of salted fish in Europe had grown to be enormous. Breton vessels were from the first prominent in the traffic.

Admiral Coligny, the great Huguenot leader, was ambitious to establish a colony of French Protestants in America which should be a refuge for his persecuted countrymen whenever it became desirable for them to seek new seats. Jean Ribaut went out under his auspices in 1562, discovered St. John's River in Florida, went up Broad River, named the country Carolina, after the boy-king, Charles IX., and left twenty-six colonists at Port Royal, on Lemon Island. But the settlers soon tired of their enterprise, and the following year set out for home. An English cruiser captured the party on the high sea when it was reduced to the last extremity for want of food. The more exhausted of the company were landed in France; the rest were taken to England.

The succeeding season (1564), another colonizing expedition, made up of Protestants, headed by René Goulaine de Laudonnière, and aided by the king, sought Carolina. Avoiding Port Royal as ill-omened, they established themselves on St. John's River. The emigrants were a dissolute set, as emigrants were apt to be in an age when the sweepings of European jails [Pg 34] and gutters were thought to furnish good colonizing material for America. Laudonnière hung some of his followers for piracy against Spanish vessels; others were captured in the act by the Spaniards, and sold into slavery in the West Indies. What remained of the colony soon lost, through dishonesty and severity, the respect of the Indians, who had at first received the intruders kindly. When, in August, 1565, Sir John Hawkins, the noted slaver and navigator, appeared with his fleet, he was able to render the now half-starved settlers most needed help. Ribaut soon came also, with recruits, provisions, seeds, domestic animals, and farming implements, greatly to the joy of the little colony.

But this happiness was not of long duration. The attention of Philip II. of Spain was at length called to this colony of French heretics which was gaining a foothold upon his domain of Florida. The Spanish massacre. In August, 1565, his agent, Pedro Melendez de Aviles, appeared on the scene and announced his purpose to "gibbet and behead all the Protestants in these regions." Melendez established St. Augustine, which is thus the oldest town in the United States east of the Mississippi, and then with blood-thirsty deliberateness proceeded to wipe the French settlement out of existence. French writers claim that nine hundred persons were cruelly massacred; and the Spanish estimate is not far below that number.

A Gascon soldier, Dominic de Gourgues, soon came over (1567) to avenge the wrong done his fellow-Huguenots. The Huguenots avenged. He captured all the Spanish establishments left by Melendez, except St. Augustine. When he found, the following year, that he could not hold his prizes, he hung the Spanish prisoners to trees and hastened back to France. His king, however, being under the influence of Spain, disavowed this act of reprisal, and relinquished all further claim to Florida.

The colonial policy of Henri IV. (1589-1610) was more progressive and enlightened than that of his immediate predecessors on the throne of France. But he had not yet learned what succeeding generations were to discover to their cost,—that criminals and paupers do not make good colonists. De la Roche's ill-fated venture. In 1598 the familiar error was repeated, when the Marquis de la Roche took out a company of forty jail-birds, liberated for the purpose, and landed them on the dreary, storm-washed Isle of Sable, off the Nova Scotia coast, where, eighty years earlier (1518), the Baron de Léry had made a vain attempt to start a colony. La Roche, beggared on his return home, was unable to succor his colonists, who on their inhospitable sands lived more like beasts than men. Five years later the twelve skin-clad survivors were picked up by a chance vessel and taken back to France, to tell a tale of almost matchless horror.

It was an age of licensed commercial monopolies, as well as of other economic experiments. In the year 1600 Chauvin obtained the exclusive right to prosecute the fur-trade in the New Land to the west, and united with him a St. Malo merchant, Pontgravé. They made two lucrative voyages, but established no settlement. Samuel de Champlain, in Pontgravé's company, went out in 1603, ascending the St. Lawrence as far as Montreal. De Monts' colony. Later (this same year) De Monts, a Calvinist, was given the viceroyalty and the fur-trade monopoly of Acadia,—between the fortieth and sixtieth degrees of latitude,—and religious freedom was granted there for Huguenots, though the Indians were to be instructed in the Romish faith. De Monts and his strangely assorted party of vagabonds and gentlemen [Pg 36] first settled on an island, near the present boundary between Maine and New Brunswick, in the fall of 1604, but the following spring moved to Port Royal,—now Annapolis, Nova Scotia. This, the first French agricultural colony yet planted in America, suffered disaster after disaster; but although Port Royal was abandoned in 1607, the germ of colonization lived. Quebec established. In 1608, Champlain—who had, four years before, while in the employ of De Monts, explored the coast as far south as Cape Cod—set up a permanent French post upon the gloomy cliff at Quebec. Soon the Jesuits came; and by the time the "Mayflower" had reached New England, New France was established beyond a doubt, and French influence was penetrating inland. Wandering savages from the Upper Lakes, nearly a thousand miles in the interior, had at last seen the white man and begun to feel his power.

England would have followed up Cabot's discovery of North America with more vigor had not Henry VII., being a Catholic prince, hesitated to set aside the Pope's bull giving the new continent to Spain. His subjects, however, made large hauls of fish along the foggy shores of Newfoundland, and in 1502 some American savages were exhibited to him in London. Henry VIII. was at first similarly scrupulous; but when, in 1533, he got rid of his queen, Catharine of Aragon, he was free from Spanish entanglements, and aspired to make England a maritime nation. Among many other enterprises the northwest passage allured him, although nothing came of his ventures in that direction. With the accession of Edward VI. (1547) a progressive era opened. The Newfoundland [Pg 37] fisheries were now so effectively encouraged that by 1574, under Elizabeth, from thirty to fifty English ships were making annual trips to the Grand Banks.

The most popular ventures among the nobles of Elizabeth's court were the northwest passage, American colonization, and freebooting voyages. Writers of voyages and travels and cartographers sprang up on every hand, the most noteworthy being Richard Eden, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Richard Hakluyt, and Martin Frobisher. Patronized by the powerful Earl of Warwick, Frobisher in three successive voyages (1576-1578) vainly sought gold in Labrador. Francis Drake, on his famous buccaneering tour around the world, explored the Pacific coast of the United States as far north as Cape Blanco (1579), unsuccessfully searching for a short cut by water through the continent.

Gilbert saw that Newfoundland must thereafter be considered as the nucleus of English settlement in America; and in 1579 Sir Humphrey, himself a soldier and a member of Parliament, accompanied by his step-brother, Sir Walter Raleigh, went out to lead the way. Storms and other disasters drove them back, and it was 1583 before another squadron could be equipped. Raleigh remained in England; but Gilbert landed at St. John's, where he found that four hundred vessels of various nationalities, mainly Spanish and Portuguese, were annually engaged in the fisheries. He took possession of the island for the queen, examined the neighboring mainland, and freighted his ships with glistening rock, ignorantly declared by an unskilful expert accompanying the expedition to contain silver. Upon the return voyage the vessel carrying Gilbert was lost, the companion ship, with its worthless cargo, reaching Falmouth safely.

Under Raleigh's auspices two vessels set out in 1584, commanded by Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe. They landed at the island of Roanoke, the southernmost of the reefs enclosing Albemarle Sound, in North Carolina; but although charmed with the country, which they declared to be "the most plentiful, sweet, fruitful, and wholesome of all the world," and well treated by the Indians,—"people most gentle, loving, and faithful,"—they made no settlement, and returned to England. Raleigh, however, was pleased by the reports brought back; he was knighted, his claim was confirmed, he named the country Virginia, in token of his virgin queen, and he entertained visions of establishing a considerable province there, and of enjoying a comfortable rent-roll.

In 1585, aided by the queen, he sent out seven vessels and one hundred and eight colonists, the fleet being commanded by Sir Richard Grenville, and the intending settlers by Ralph Lane, a soldier of much merit. Few maritime enterprises were sent out by England in the Elizabethan age that did not include in their orders a project for preying on Spanish commerce by the way; for our ancestors were as yet not far removed in this regard from the spirit of the old Norse pirates. Grenville therefore sailed around by the Canaries, picked up Spanish prizes partly to meet the cost of the undertaking, and in due time anchored at Wocoken, whence he proceeded to Roanoke island.

With the colonists was Manteo, a native who had gone to England with some former expedition; and the good-natured fellow secured for his new friends a warm reception on the part of the aborigines. But Grenville before his return treated them harshly, leaving to them and the [Pg 39] colonists a legacy of mutual distrust and grievances. In March, 1586, Lane ascended the Roanoke River, hoping to find rich ores and pearls in the upper country; for the deceitful savages, wishing to divide the white men's forces, had told him that the stream had its source near the western ocean, in a country abounding with these articles, and encouraged his expedition with promises of assistance. The enterprise proved full of hardship and peril, and the governor returned just in time to check a conspiracy to attack the garrison.

Lane had employed his men in frequent explorations, their journeyings reaching on the north to Chesapeake Bay and Elizabeth River, on the south to the Secotan. But the situation became irksome. The spirit of adventure and wealth-seeking prevailed among the colonists; it was not a community calculated for the uneventful and toilsome prosecution of agriculture; and before long the fretful disease of homesickness prevailed on the island of Roanoke.

In June, 1586, Sir Francis Drake appeared with twenty-three vessels. He had made a rich haul from Spanish treasure-ships in the West Indies, and had turned aside on his return trip, curious to see how his friend Raleigh's colony fared. Yielding to the importunities of the settlers, he took them aboard his fleet and carried them back to England. The enterprise abandoned. They had been gone from Roanoke but a few days, when a ship, bringing supplies sent out by Raleigh, sailed into the inlet, only to find the place deserted. In another fortnight, Grenville appeared with three well-furnished ships, and left fifteen men on the island to renew the colonizing experiment.

Raleigh displayed most remarkable persistence. He was undismayed by this long chapter of disasters. Raleigh's second attempt. Men on whose judgment he relied brought back good reports [Pg 40] from the site of the ill-fated colony, and again he fitted out an expedition,—this time entirely at his own charge, for Elizabeth had had enough of the experiment. It was in July, 1587, when John White arrived with Raleigh's new colonists off the shores of North Carolina. At Roanoke, deer were quietly grazing in a field fertilized by the bones of Grenville's contingent of the year before, and the fort was in ruins. Governor White re-established the settlement.

The 18th of August the daughter of White, Eleanor Dare, gave birth to a daughter, called Virginia, after the country,—the first child of English parents born on the soil of the United States. A few days later, White left for England,—ostensibly for recruits and supplies, the colony which he left behind being composed of eighty-nine men, seventeen women, and two children. But England was now threatened with invasion from Spain; the energy and resources of the island were being mustered in its defence; Raleigh, Drake, Grenville, Frobisher, Hawkins, and the rest were engaged in preparing to resist the enemy. It was no time for colonization schemes. The Armada scattered, the father of English colonization in America found himself ruined, having spent £40,000 in his several fruitless ventures. Still hopeful, he next adopted a scheme of making large grants in Virginia to merchants and adventurers, and in this manner obtained some aid.

In 1591 White returned to Roanoke, to find it again deserted, with no traces of his daughter or of the other colonists. They had probably been overcome by the Indians, and those whose lives were spared adopted into the neighboring tribes. In spite of the many costly attempts, the sixteenth century closed with no English settlement on the shores of America. [Pg 41]

Among the principal causes of this early failure in Virginia were the improper character and spirit of the emigrants, who, instead of looking to the soil as the chief source of supplies, expected to find rich mines, or tribes possessing gold, and relied upon England for the necessaries of life; they had not enough occupation to keep them from brooding over their isolation, and by their harshness they turned the Indians into harassing enemies.

Bartholomew Gosnold has had the reputation of being the first mariner who set out for America on a direct voyage from England, thus avoiding the West Indies and the Spanish, and saving nearly a thousand miles; but others before him had taken the direct course,—notably Verrazano (1524). Pring in Maine, and Weymouth at Cape Cod. In 1602, while trading with the Indians, Gosnold explored the coast from Cape Elizabeth, Maine, to the Elizabeth Islands, on his way landing upon and naming Cape Cod. The following year Martin Pring discovered many harbors and rivers in Maine. In 1605 George Weymouth, sent by the Earl of Southampton and Lord Arundel, explored from Cape Cod northward. He carried back with him several kidnapped natives, three of whom he gave to Sir Ferdinando Gorges, governor of the English port of Plymouth. Gorges becomes interested. Gorges was particularly struck with the reported abundance of good harbors in the north, compared with the scarcity of such in Virginia and Carolina, and became at once strongly interested in New England exploration.

Public attention in England had by this time become strongly attracted to the northern region as probably the most desirable for future experiments in colonization; it was pointed out with much force that the lack of good anchorage was one of the reasons why the southern [Pg 42] attempts had failed. Conditions in England, too, had at last so changed as to make it possible to undertake colonization with better assurances of success. But New England was not destined to be the site of the first permanent plantation. That honor was reserved for what is now Virginia.

In reviewing the period from 1492 to 1606,—practically the sixteenth century,—we see that it was notable for the extraordinary interest displayed in discovery and settlement. Attention has been called to the part played by the general desire of Europeans to secure the trade of India. But we must not forget as well that, as a feature of the great Renaissance and Reformation movement, the spirit of investigation was abroad, in religion, philosophy, and the arts; there had grown up great commercial and trading cities, in which the successful foreign merchant became a part of a powerful aristocracy; popular imagination had been fired by traders' stories of India, China, and Japan; there was an eagerness to reach out into the regions of mystery, to enlarge the horizon of human knowledge. The effect was greatly to increase skill in navigation, to build up a merchant marine, and—it being an age of universal freebooting—to cultivate an experience in naval warfare which was a preparation for the great sea-fights of the eighteenth century.

Of the three nations which, in the sixteenth century, attempted to colonize America north of the Gulf of Mexico, all had practically failed. Spain had with comparative ease conquered the unwarlike natives of Mexico and Peru upon their cultivated plains. Causes of failure in North American colonization. That very ease [Pg 43] took away the disposition, even had her people been capable of the effort, slowly and painfully to subdue the tangled forests and savage warriors of Florida, with no other promise of reward than the possession of unredeemed soil. Not suited to the task, she utterly wasted alike the resources of the home government applicable to colonization, and those of the established colonies. France had failed because of dissensions at home, inferior powers of organization, the want of the proper colonizing temper, and the severity of the climate in that portion of the New World which she had seized upon as the seat of her colonies. English colonization thus far had been unproductive because there was a want of understanding of the difficulties, because of the selection of colonists who lacked experience in agriculture, because poor harbors were generally chosen, because there was difficulty in keeping up communications with the mother-land, because the resident leaders lacked courage and had not the staying qualities which were in after years the salvation of the Plymouth Pilgrims. But the effect of these early English efforts was important in giving the people needed training in navigation and colonization, and a knowledge of the country.

Taking a general view of America at the close of the sixteenth century, we find Spain in undisputed possession of Peru, Central America, the country west and northwest of the Gulf of Mexico, the greater part of the West Indies, and the coast of what is now Florida; while they claimed all of the southern third of the present United States and the greater part of South America, except Guiana and Brazil. The French laid claim to the basin of the St. Lawrence and to the coast northward and southward, but their colonies were not as yet permanently [Pg 44] planted; the attempts to make Huguenot settlements in Brazil (1555) and Florida had been unsuccessful, and French claims there had been abandoned under Spanish influence. It was not until 1609, when Hudson sailed up the river named for him, that the Dutch laid any claims to American soil. Cabral discovered Brazil for the Portuguese in 1500; but when Portugal, eighty years later, became the dependency of Spain (a condition lasting sixty years), her South American colonies were harried by the Dutch, though she did not relinquish control of them. The English claimed all the North American coast from Newfoundland to Florida, and of course through to the Pacific, no one then entertaining the belief that the continent was many hundred miles in width; but as yet none of their colonizing efforts had been successful. The Bermudas, Bahamas, and Barbados were neither claimed nor settled by Englishmen until the seventeenth century. The great Mississippi basin had been visited by a few Spanish overland wanderers, but as yet was practically forgotten and unclaimed, except so far as it was included in the undefined Spanish and English transcontinental zones; the Hudson Bay country, Oregon, and Alaska were also undiscovered lands. A few thousand miles of American coast-line were now familiar to European explorers; but of the interior of the continent scarcely more was known than might be seen over the tree-tops from the mast-head of a caravel.

CHAPTER III.

COLONIZATION AND THE COLONISTS.

Bibliographies.—C. Lucas, Introduction to Historical Geography of British Colonies, vii., viii.; Winsor, Narrative and Critical History, III., V.; Larned, Literature of American History, 67-76; Avery, United States, II. 409-411; E. Greene, Provincial America, ch. xix.; Channing and Hart, Guide, §§ 92, 104, 110.

Historical Maps.—No. 2, this volume (Epoch Maps, No. 2); MacCoun, Winsor, and Avery.

General Accounts.—Colonization: Lucas, as above (colonial policies of the European states); J. Seeley, Expansion of England, chs. iii., iv.; A. Smith, Wealth of Nations, chapter "Of Colonies"; H. Morris, History of Colonization; A. Snow, Administration of Dependencies, chs. i.-v.—English movement: G. Beer, Origin of British Colonial System; H. Merivale, Colonization and the Colonies; H. Egerton, Short History of British Colonial Policy, and Origin and Growth of English Colonies; W. Woodward, Expansion of British Empire; C. Dilke, Greater Britain, and Problems of Greater Britain; E. Creasy, Imperial and Colonial Constitutions; Mill, Colonial Constitutions; J. Toner, Colonies of North America; J. Marsden, Early Puritans.—Free institutions imported by American colonists, and colonial government generally: Greene, Provincial Governor; E. Eggleston, Transit of Civilization, and Beginners of a Nation; A. Low, American People; Wilson, The State, §§ 832-864; E. Freeman, English People in its Three Homes, lecture vi.; H. Taylor, English Constitution, 15-48; Channing, Town and County Government; C. Bishop, History of Elections in the Colonies.

Contemporary Accounts.—Published records (chiefly by historical societies) of the several American colonies. See also Hakluyt, Voyages; Holinshed, Chronicles.—Reprints: E. Arber, Pilgrim Colonists; A. Brown, Genesis of United States; W. Macdonald, Documentary Source Book of American History; American History told by Contemporaries, I. part iii.

The time had now come for making the first permanent English settlement in America. Before we proceed [Pg 46] to the story of that famous enterprise, however, it will be well hastily to summarize the colonial policies of those European States which have at various times established plantations in the New World. It will be well also to know what sort of people were the seed of English colonization, and what institutions they brought with them as the foundations of American commonwealths.

Four motives, working either singly or conjointly, lead to colonization,—the spirit of adventurous enterprise, the desire for wealth, economic or political discontent, and religious sentiment. For instance, Columbus was quite as much a religious enthusiast desirous of spreading the gospel in new lands as he was an adventurer; the southern group of English colonies in America was in the main the outgrowth of a trading spirit working in conjunction with economic distress in England; and the Puritan migration to New England was impelled by economic and political causes, as well as by religious.

In a large sense the planting of a colony means merely the expansion of the parent State. But this was not the view formerly taken by European governments. For a long time colonies were treated as dependencies of the mother-country, existing chiefly to furnish revenue to the latter, either directly in taxes or indirectly in increased trade. It was because the English colonists in America, taking a broad view of their relationship to Great Britain, wished to be treated as free Englishmen in Greater Britain, and not merely as revenue-producing subjects, that they revolted in 1776. Colonial history is nearly everywhere the history of this obtuseness of vision on the part of the home government, and it is full of most painful details.

It chanced that the American discoveries made by Spain were in the region of rich and physically weak nations. Consequently she won her vast dominions on this continent by sweeping conquest rather than by commercial growth. This was in sharp contrast with the slow, steady planting of New England, where the settlers were obliged to conquer a sterile soil and brave a rigid climate, where they were hemmed about with savage neighbors who disputed their establishment, and where they met as well the sharp opposition, first of the Dutch, and then of the French,—the latter, in their desire for the Mississippi valley, jealously endeavoring to restrict Englishmen to the Atlantic slope. The Spaniards were brave, and they could rule with severity. But they thirsted for adventure, conquest, and wealth, for which their appetite was early encouraged; their progress in Mexico, Peru, and the West Indies had been too rapid and brilliant for them to be satisfied with the dull life and patient development of an agricultural colony. Had they known in advance the conditions of success on the North American mainland, it is probable that we should never have been obliged to chronicle the splendid but disastrous expeditions of Narvaez and De Soto. They would doubtless have made no attempt to subdue a land which offered nothing for such appetites as theirs. Their aims were sordid, their State was loosely knit, their commercial policy was rigidly exclusive, their morals were lax, and their treatment of the savages was cruel, despite the tendency of the colonists to amalgamate with the latter, and thus to descend in the scale of civilization. The effect of the specie so easily acquired in Mexico and Peru was to make Spain rapidly rich without manufactures; [Pg 48] but her people were thereby demoralized and unfitted for the ordinary channels of employment, and her rulers were corrupted and enfeebled; in the end the country was impoverished, declining as rapidly as it had risen. Spain's glory was fast waning both in the New and the Old World at the close of the sixteenth century, and France was ready, in the march of events, to succeed to her place as the leading nation of Europe. France was to be supplanted a century later by England, which was not known as a great power until the dispersion of the Armada. We have seen that in this historical progress Spain unwittingly helped England by driving the French out from Florida and Carolina; nevertheless the decline of Spain left France the most formidable rival of the English.

The Portuguese, though impelled by a similar passion for conquest, were more eager for trade than their powerful and often domineering Spanish neighbors. They oppressed their colonies, were greedy in their commercial strivings, maltreated the weak natives of Brazil and the West Indies, lacked administrative ability and the spirit of progress, and suffered from want of a well-balanced colonial system. The Portuguese colonies in America had much the same history as the Spanish, their situation being similar. Brazil was of no great importance until the early years of the nineteenth century, and made herself independent in 1822,—thus following the lead of Mexico, which set up an independent government the previous year.

France had no permanent colonies in America before the seventeenth century. Port Royal was planted in 1604, and Quebec not until four years later. The French were good fighters, enterprising, and while not eager [Pg 49] to colonize, were capable of adapting themselves to new conditions; they had the capacity to carry their ideas with them across the seas, and they readily assimilated with the aborigines. While freely intermarrying with the natives, unlike the Spaniards they rather improved the savage stock than were degraded by it. They had the faculty of making the red barbarian a boon companion, and of inducing him to serve them and fight for them; indeed, since their colonizing enterprises were based on the fur-trade, their opposition to the advance of English agricultural possession was, like that of the Indians, fundamental. The French and the savages were therefore united in a common cause against a common foe.

The Breton and Norman merchant-seamen who went out to Newfoundland and carried on fisheries and the fur-trade paved the way for the future throng of emigrants. As colonizers the French worked quietly and persistently, and would have succeeded, had not their enterprises been ruined by their unfortunate political and ecclesiastical policy and the mismanagement of their rulers. Louis XIV. was capricious and extravagant. His court was a nest of intrigue, corruption, peculation, jealousies, and dissensions. The Huguenots, who represented the industrial classes, began the French colonization of America; but we have seen how sadly their government neglected them in Florida. Finally, when the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685) resulted in driving them from home, and they were eager to join their lot with that of their countrymen in Canada, priest-rule prescribed their deliberate exclusion from the colonies,—which they could have made a New France in fact,—and thus forced them to contribute their strength to the rival English settlements farther down the coast. The government was in some respects over-liberal [Pg 50] to its North American colonies,—it aided them financially to an extent unknown elsewhere; but they were not self-governed, and the king continually interfered with the commercial companies, which in a large measure controlled the colonies, so that a favor granted through corrupt influences to-day might to-morrow be revoked by counter-influences equally corrupt. Paternalism, centralization, bureaucratic government, official rottenness, instability of system, religious exclusiveness, and a vicious system of land-tenure were the prime causes of the ruin of New France; although we must not forget that the centre of its power had been planted in an inhospitable climate, and that its far-reaching water-system tempted the inhabitants into the forests and cultivated the fur-trade at the expense of agriculture, thereby placing the province at a disadvantage from the start.

The burden of over-population with which Spain, France, and Portugal were troubled, and to relieve the pressure of which was one of the motives of their colonizing efforts, was not felt by Holland; for despite the fact that she sustained a more dense population than any other European State, her citizens were prosperous. They were not stirred, like neighboring peoples, by the impulse of emigration. Preeminently a trading nation, Holland sought commerce rather than extension of empire. Long the chief carrier of Europe before striking into a broader field, she followed in the steps of the Portuguese, and by the opening of the seventeenth century took rank as a colonizing power. Her most fruitful labors were in the East rather than in the West. It was in the attempt to find the northwest passage to India that Hudson discovered the river which bears his name. With the Dutch, though [Pg 51] religious reformers, religion was secondary to trade. So long as trade was good, they were patient under insult and outrage. Individually they made but little impress upon the community. Commerce was chiefly conducted through large chartered companies, minutely managed in Holland. Dutch colonies declined because their commercial system was non-progressive and unsound; they appear to have been unable to rise out of the trader state. Yet we must not forget that Holland was of small size and had overbearing, jealous neighbors; her long and heroic struggle with Spain tended greatly to delay her efforts to trade in and colonize the New World.

The Swedish colony on the Delaware was planned by authority of Gustavus Adolphus on broad, liberal principles; he hoped it would become "the jewel of his kingdom." But while it throve for a time and gave much promise of endurance, the Dutch soon overpowered it. Had the Swedish monarch lived to carry out the design, doubtless he would have proved that Scandinavians could successfully maintain an independent province in the New World. Like the Germans, however, they have in later years been in the main content to colonize as the subjects of foreign governments.

England remains the only country which planted populous colonies within the present United States and retained them long after they were planted. Her insular position and fine harbors have given her a race of sailors; her climate has proved favorable for rearing a hardy people, who, secure in their boundaries and not necessarily entangled in Continental affairs, have been left free to develop and to push independent enterprises. As regards American exploration, the fact that [Pg 52] England is the westernmost State in Europe had at first much to do with her pre-eminence. Until the close of the sixteenth century England's resources were slender, and her government was not desirous of incurring the hostility of stronger European neighbors by poaching too freely on their colonial preserves. Cabot went out at his own cost. Drake's operations, while adding to the glory of England, and directly favored by Queen Elizabeth, were continually endangering her with Spain. But in the face of all discouragements, the sixteenth century was a notable training period for English sea-rovers. The records of the age are aglow with the deeds of the Cabots, Frobisher, Davis, Drake, Cavendish, Gilbert, Raleigh, Grenville, and their like, who, while invariably failing in their persistent efforts at colonization, were charting the American coast-line, making the New World familiar to their countrymen, and striking out shorter paths across the Atlantic. At first outstripped by other European nations, England was becoming one of the principal maritime powers when the seventeenth century began. Spain, weakened by the defection of the Netherlands, and still further humiliated by the defeat of the Armada (1588), was by this time showing evidences of decay, and France was the growing rival in the West.

English occupation in North America, like the French, began with the fishermen who, following in Cabot's wake, early sought the banks of Newfoundland. The English trading spirit. They were courageous, businesslike men, who soon supplemented their calling as fishermen with a profitable native trade in peltries. The trading spirit has always been deeply implanted in the Teutonic races; when England had gathered sufficient strength to make it discreet to assert herself, we find that her reachings out for wider territory took the shape of commercial enterprise. The romantic adventurers [Pg 53] of the age of Elizabeth, as much freebooters as explorers, were now succeeded by prosaic trading companies, which undertook to plant colonies along the Atlantic coast. In doing this they were impelled in part by a desire to relieve England from some of her surplus population; but in the main the colonies were to serve as trading and supply stations.

In aiding these corporations, which succeeded after a fashion in planting colonies, but failed for the most part in reaping profits, the State expected increased revenue rather than the spread of European civilization. In England, State assistance to such undertakings was always slight and uncertain; the strength of the early colonies lay in the wealth and persistence of their promoters.

The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were full of trouble for the English people. English impulse to emigration. Religious restlessness was succeeded by revolution and civil war, while crude and oppressive economic conditions induced lawless disturbance and disaster. Colonizing schemes were readily taken up in such times of unrest. At first the notion prevailed that the colonies might profitably be utilized for clearing the mother-country of jail-birds and paupers, although with these went out many who were worthy pioneers. It remained for the Plymouth planting to demonstrate that only the honest and thrifty can work out the salvation of a wilderness. America attracted the attention alike of traders and settlers because its soil was supposed to be rich, because the climate was temperate and not unlike that of England, because there was plenty of room, and because the unknown land attracted the adventurous.

[Pg 54] Englishmen were soon found to be the best colonizers in the world. An intelligent, large, well-built, and handsome race, active in a high degree and passionately fond of out-door life and manly sports, they are brave and enterprising, will fight for supremacy, are tenacious of purpose, and carry with them in their migrations their ideas, their customs, and their laws. Their characteristics, They do not assimilate with other races,—in fact, there is inbred in them a strong disdain of foreigners, and still more of inferior races; but they rule with vigor, and make a lasting impress of their characteristics upon the communities they establish. Although Englishmen in the seventeenth century, when they colonized America, lacked many of the refinements of civilization, were coarse in their tastes and sentiments, and much given to dissipation and petty vices, a fibre of robust morality ran through the national life. The leaders were educated, they were ambitious for their race, and there was a healthy tone to their patriotic aspirations. Simple and reserved in manner, they prided themselves on repressing the utterance of their feelings, entering upon the serious business of rearing a nation in the wilds with most becoming gravity. Their conduct was often bad, but they were schooled in piety and reverence, and were steadfast in high aims.

They had been trained in self-government, and were sticklers for healthy political precedents. They were the heirs of grim and sturdy Teutonic ancestors who knew no rule but that imposed by "the armed assembly of the whole people." The germs of modern English free and representative institutions are to be plainly traced in the forest councils of the Germanic tribes. In the succeeding ages these institutions had grown irregularly, but it was a growth founded on the irresistible [Pg 55] will of the people; and their free institutions. they had descended to the men of the seventeenth century as the sacred heirlooms of generations which had freely spent blood and treasure for the rights of all Englishmen to come. The principle and habit of self-government were deep rooted in the heart of every English commoner; it was a part of his nature. And this principle, this habit, he brought with him to America. English institutions were merely transplanted to the New World, where they developed with perhaps greater rapidity than at home,—certainly on somewhat different and characteristic lines; but they were and still are English institutions.

The primary local body in the England which these first colonists to America knew, was the parish, or town, which had both an ecclesiastical and a temporal jurisdiction. Next above the parishes was the territorial division known as the county, with an independent magistracy and a judicial and military organization adapted to the needs of a large rural area. In making independent settlements on the American coast, the English commercial companies and proprietors were not establishing states; what they planted were but the germs of states. and county. Each detached colony had a distinct life, and it was natural that, despite the general rules of government established by the companies, the people should proceed at once to govern themselves in their local affairs upon either the town or the county plan, according to circumstances. The flexibility of English representative institutions has never elsewhere been so well illustrated as in the different forms they took on in the American colonies, without once departing from the integrity of historic models.

[Pg 56] In the Southern colonies the country was traversed by deep, broad river highways, leading far inland; the climate was genial, the savages proved comparatively friendly, and the introduction of slavery tended to foster an aristocratic class of landed proprietors,—large plantations, therefore, were the rule. There were a few small trading villages, but the bulk of the people were isolated, and township governments were impracticable. The settlers therefore adopted a primary government akin to the English rural county, having jurisdiction over a wide tract of country, with a commander of militia, appointed by the governor and styled a lieutenant, whose duties and authority were similar to those of the lords-lieutenant at home; judicial powers being exercised by eight or more gentlemen, also appointed by the governor, serving as a county court. It should be remembered that the Southern county was not, as in England, a group of towns,—it was itself the primary organization. The parish was sometimes, in newly settled portions, co-extensive with the county; but more often the latter was, for religious purposes, divided into parishes, the vestries of which had authority in some civil matters. Again, for the purposes of tax levy and collection, the county was divided into precincts; and in some districts conditions were such—among them the hostility of the savages—that the people of each plantation or small neighborhood assembled for worship by themselves, and thus became recognized as a separate community, in some matters self-governed. These differences in local organization account for the terms "plantation," "congregation," and "hundred," often met with in early Southern records. The tendency of the Southern political and social system was to concentrate power in the hands of a few men, in sharp distinction [Pg 57] to the New England plan, where the people governed themselves in small primary assemblies, only delegating the conduct of details to their agents, the town officers.

In New England, the narrowness of the Atlantic slope, the shortness of the rivers, the severe climate, the hostility of the savages, the neighborhood of the French, the density of the forests, and the fact that each community was an organized religious congregation,—people belonging to one church, who had "resolved to live together,"—led to the establishment of more or less compact communities, called towns; and these were the political and ecclesiastical units. Since the conditions were changed, some features of the English parish were modified to suit the more primitive necessities of life in the wilderness. Unconscious reversion to older Teutonic forms. Thus we find that here and there in New England was a reversion to older Teutonic forms, although of this significant fact the colonists themselves were unaware; for the now familiar truth that the ancestry of our institutions reaches back to the beginnings of the race, had not then been discovered. Not only was the English town government practically reproduced on American soil, with such changes as were adapted to the new environment, but the titles of the town officials were, in many cases, borrowed from the mother-land. When the first town meeting was held, English local government had been successfully grafted upon the New World.

In the middle colonies, which partook of the climatic characteristics of both their Northern and Southern neighbors, and had a population made up of various nationalities, there were compact trading towns as well as large agricultural regions; and there we find a mixed system, of both townships and counties.

[Pg 58] With all these differences in form, the principle at work was the same. From the beginning the American colonists were hampered in the work of their general assemblies, at first by commercial companies, and then by royal and proprietary interference; nevertheless, in the conduct of their purely local affairs they often exercised a greater degree of freedom than their brethren in England. It is the purpose of this and succeeding volumes to show how, amid many shiftings, unions, and divisions, these isolated, self-governing English colonies, planted independently here and there in the American wilds, unconscious of the great future before them, were, by an orderly, logical progression of events, the trend of which was often not noticeable to the men of the time, successfully merged, at first into states, and finally into a nation.

The colonists were accustomed in England to specific ranks and orders of society. In America, while there were from the first sharp social distinctions, the fact that the great body of the settlers began life in the wilderness side by side, on an equal basis, was favorable to a democratic sentiment. Nobility was connected, in English minds, with great landed estates, of which there were few in America outside of Virginia, Maryland, South Carolina, and New York. Under Locke's constitution it was attempted by the proprietaries formally to divide Carolina society into groups, with hereditary titles; but the project could not be carried out. Nevertheless, Southern society was in the main as distinctly stratified, after the introduction of slavery, as though titles had existed. New England life was calculated strongly to foster the spirit of independence; and the slave class was not large enough materially to affect [Pg 59] social conditions. Still, there was an acknowledged and respected aristocracy, founded on ancestry, education, commercial success, and individual merit, but lacking staying qualities; for it had neither large estates nor primogeniture to back it. The scheme of Lord Brooke, Lord Say and Sele, and others, to introduce hereditary rank in Massachusetts (1636) fortunately failed to receive popular approval.

Used as they were to the exercise of the royal prerogative, the colonists accepted the free exercise by the governors of the privileges of appointment and veto, whether those officials were selected by the Crown or by proprietaries. In addition to these privileges, the governor of a royal colony was the bearer of royal instructions and the medium of royal directions; he was the executive officer, the granter of pardons (except in capital cases), the commander of the military and naval forces, the head of the established church, and the chief of the judiciary; and he could summon, prorogue, and dissolve the assembly. The assembly held the purse-strings, however, and the actual power of the governor was consequently in a great degree curtailed. The record of colonial politics is largely made up of disputes between the representatives and the executive, in which the assembly usually won by withholding supplies until the governor came to its terms.

The judiciary system was alike in no two colonies, but there were certain resemblances in all. There were commonly local justices of the peace, with jurisdiction limited to petty civil cases; sometimes these were elected by the freeholders of the district, but generally they were appointed by the governor. Then came the county courts, the members of which were appointees of the governor, except in New [Pg 60] Jersey, where they were elected. These county judges were representative gentlemen, and not trained in the law. They had criminal jurisdiction except in capital cases, and final jurisdiction in civil cases not involving large amounts; the limit was £20 in Virginia and £2 in Maryland, and elsewhere between these extremes. Next was the provincial, supreme, or general court: ordinarily this was composed of the governor, as chancellor, and the members of his council; but in several colonies this colonial court was a separate body, appointed by the governor, who, with his council, constituted a still higher court of appeals and chancery. From the highest courts a suitor could, in important cases, carry his appeal to the king in council. The common and statute law of England prevailed when provincial law was silent on the subject. Sometimes questions arose upon the validity of provincial statutes: when the courts found that they were not in accordance with the charter, they declared them void; but the matter could be carried to the English Privy Council for ultimate decision. This was the germ of the power of the United States Supreme Court to decide on the constitutionality of a law.

At first American territory was granted to chartered commercial companies,—notably the Virginia Company and the Council for New England,—which sought to control their colonies from England, under the supervision of the Crown. The Virginia colony was early deprived of its charter by the Crown (1624); but members of the Massachusetts Company boldly emigrated to America, and taking advantage of the confusion in England, kept up a practically independent state for two generations; though at last (1692) the people were obliged to accept a new charter establishing a royal governor. The colonies of Rhode Island [Pg 61] and Connecticut obtained charters direct from England, with privileges of self-government, and lived under them till long after they had become States. New Hampshire, after having been governed by Massachusetts, became a royal province without having passed through the charter or proprietary stage. The other colonies were proprietary, but all finally reverted to the Crown. Maryland and Pennsylvania and Delaware were still proprietary at the outbreak of the Revolution, having been restored to the proprietors after reversion.

The two houses of Parliament had made the colonists accustomed to the bicameral system. In Virginia under company management the corporation council in England served in a measure as the upper house, with powers of general direction. In Massachusetts (where the company was technically resident in the colony), and in the proprietary and royal colonies as well, there was for a long time but one house. Finally, often as the result of dissensions between the deputies and the officials, the former came to sit apart,—the colonies thus in most cases returning to the English system of two houses; but the council was small, and had administrative functions which made it very different from the House of Lords. These colonial assemblies were schools for the cultivation of the spirit of independence. Burke said the colonists "had formed within themselves, either by royal instruction or royal charter, assemblies so exceedingly resembling a parliament in all their forms, functions, and powers that it was impossible they should not imbibe some opinion of a similar authority."

Electoral qualifications varied greatly. In the consideration of this, as well as of other institutions, Massachusetts and Virginia must be taken as types of [Pg 62] opposite systems, the other colonies departing more or less from them, according to proximity. Originally in Massachusetts, "any person inhabiting within the town" could vote at town-meetings; later, with the arrival of objectionable immigrants, this privilege was restricted (1634) to freemen,—practically all the members of the church,—and still later (1691), to "the possessors of an estate of freehold in land to the value of 40s. per annum, or other estate to the value of £40." In Virginia, at the start, all freemen were allowed to vote. But it was afterwards decided (1670) that the "usuall way of chuseing burgesses by the votes of all persons who, haveing served their time, are freemen of this country," was detrimental to the colony; and the principle was laid down that "a voyce in such election" should be given "only to such as by their estates, real or personall, have interest enough to tye them to the endeavour of the publique good." By the beginning of the eighteenth century a freehold test obtained in most, if not in all, the colonies. In 1746 Parliament added a further qualification, in the guise of a general naturalization law, providing that a voter must have resided seven years in his colony, taken the oath of allegiance, and professed the "Protestant Christian faith."

The principle of representation, by which a few are charged with acting and speaking for the many in the conduct of public affairs, has been familiar to Englishmen since the time when a parliament was convoked during the contest between John and the barons (1213). The practice was adopted early in the history of the colonies,—the first house of burgesses of Virginia meeting in 1619; while in Massachusetts, the refusal of Watertown (1632) to be taxed without representation caused the adoption of the plan of sending deputies to the General Court. The American [Pg 63] colonial assemblies were more truly representative of the great body of the people than the English Parliament of the period; to-day, male suffrage is nearly universal in England, and entirely so in all the British dependencies, with the exception of the Crown colonies.

In the American colonies the execution of the laws was as a rule comparatively an easy task. The English colonists had been trained in the political art of self-control; they had an abounding regard for just laws and the courts; they respected precedent, and stoutly stood for the common law, or recognized customs of their race. They were restive under statutes which conflicted with the customary rights of Englishmen, which had come down to them from the earliest times, and had been confirmed by Magna Charta. These rights had not been strictly observed by the Tudor sovereigns, and many of the earlier settlers had in the mother-country assisted in agitation for their renewal. Now that they were transplanted to America, the struggle was continued at long range with the Stuarts, thus developing in the colonists a habit of resistance which was to stand them in good stead in the troublous period leading up to the American Revolution.

CHAPTER IV.

THE COLONIZATION OF THE SOUTH. (1606-1700.)

Bibliographies.—S. Kingsbury, Introduction to Records of Virginia Company, 207-214; P. Bruce, Economic History of Virginia, I. xv.-xix.; N. Mereness, Maryland, 521-524; E. Whitney, Government of South Carolina, footnotes; Avery, United States, II. 411-417, 434-438, III. 407-410, 412, 413; Larned, Literature of American History, 100-106; Winsor, III. 153-166, 553-562, V. 335-356; C. Andrews, Colonial Self-Government, 351-354; Channing and Hart, Guide, §§ 97-102.

Historical Maps.—Nos. 2 and 3, this volume (Epoch Maps, Nos. 2, 3); Doyle, English Colonies, I.; MacCoun, Winsor, and school histories cited in our ch. i.

General Accounts.—Lodge, English Colonies, chs. i., iii., v., vii.; Doyle, as above, I.; H. Osgood, American Colonies in Seventeenth Century; Avery, as above, II. chs. ix., x., III. chs. i.-iii.; Channing, United States, I. chs. v.-ix.; Andrews, as above, chs. ix., xiii.-xv.; Greene, Provincial America, chs. i.-v.; Winsor, as above, III. chs. v., xiii., V. ch. v.

Special Histories.—Virginia: Brown, First Republic in America, and English Politics in Early Virginia History; Bruce, as above; Fiske, Old Virginia and Her Neighbors; J. Cooke (Commonwealths); L. Tyler, Cradle of the Republic, and Williamsburg; R. Pryor, Birth of the Nation; J. Wayland, German Element in Shenandoah Valley.—Maryland: Browne (Commonwealths), Scharf, Bozman, Mereness, as above; C. Hall, Lords Baltimore; B. Steiner, Beginnings of Maryland.—Carolinas: J. Moore, I. chs. i.-iii.; C. Raper; E. McCrady, South Carolina under Proprietary Government; S. Ashe, North Carolina, I. Lives of Smith by Bradley, Roberts, and Smith.

Contemporary Accounts.—Reprints of Smith's True Relation, and other early documents: Force, Tracts; publications of historical societies and commissions of the several states; Carroll, Historical Collections; Brown, Genesis of United States; Kingsbury and Osgood, Records of Virginia Company; Jameson, Original Narratives of Early American History; American History told by Contemporaries, I. part iv; American History Leaflets, No. 27.

By the beginning of the seventeenth century it was quite evident to thoughtful men that England needed room for growth. The population of the island had greatly increased during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The extension of the wool trade had encouraged the turning of vast tracts of tillable ground into sheep-pastures, which elbowed large communities of farm-laborers out of their calling. England at large waxed great, the condition of the merchant and upper classes was improved, but the peasant remained where he was, the gulf widening between him and those above him. The growth of the merchant class and their appearance on the scene as large landholders, still further lessened the feudal sympathy between peasant and landlord. The land abounded with idle men. Everywhere was noticed the uneasiness which frets a people too closely packed to find ready subsistence. Starvation induced lawlessness. Colonization as a means of relief. Colonization was thought by many to be the only means of obtaining permanent relief from the pressing political and economic dangers of pauperism; and naturally America, from which Gosnold, Pring, and Weymouth had but recently brought favorable reports, was deemed most available for the planting of new English communities.

But the temper of Englishmen had somewhat changed since the days of Raleigh's brilliant enterprises. A spirit of sober calculation had succeeded with the increase of the mercantile habit. Raleigh was out of favor, and there were no longer any private men who would undertake the task of colonization. If it were to be done at all, it must be by chartered trading companies; and naturally [Pg 66] they looked upon all ventures with merchants' eyes rather than statesmen's. The career of the Muscovy Company, which had been profitably trading to Russia for a half century, and the rapid successes achieved by the East India Company, founded in 1599, were pointed to as examples of what could be done in this direction; although the obvious fact that Russia and India were old and wealthy countries, while America was a wilderness peopled by savages, appears not to have been considered.

Gosnold, returning from his voyage to New England, was ardent in the desire to establish a colony in the milder climate of Virginia, and easily won to his support six representative Englishmen,—Richard Hakluyt, then prebendary of Westminster, and now famous as an editor of the chronicles of early voyages; Robert Hunt, a clergyman; Sir Thomas Gates and Sir George Somers, two "brave and pious gentlemen;" a London merchant named Edward Maria Wingfield; and John Smith, a soldier. The London and Plymouth Companies organized. As a result of their endeavors,—seconded by Sir John Popham, chief justice of England, and Sir Ferdinando Gorges (page 41),—a charter was granted by King James (April 10, 1606) to a company with two subdivisions,—1. The London Company, composed of London merchants, who were to establish a colony somewhere between the 34th and 41st degrees of latitude; that is, between the southern limit of the North Carolina of to-day and the mouth of Hudson River. 2. The Plymouth Company, composed chiefly of traders and country gentlemen in the West of England, with chief offices at Plymouth, who were to plant a settlement somewhere between the 38th and 45th degrees; that is, north of the [Pg 67] mouth of the Potomac, and south of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. But neither was to make a planting within one hundred miles of the other, although their assigned territories overlapped each other three degrees. Later (1609), the southern colony was given bounds in more specific terms,—it was to extend two hundred miles along the coast in either direction from Old Point Comfort, and "up into the land from sea to sea, west and northwest;" this latter phrase being the foundation of the later claim of Virginia to the Northwest.

King James, unlike Elizabeth, did not favor colonization; but he was induced to yield his consent to this undertaking. The colonies established under the charter were directly under the king's control, and not under that of Parliament. The government of the two proposed colonies was placed in the hands of two resident councils, of thirteen members each, nominated by the Crown from among the colonists; while above them was a general council of fourteen in England, also appointed by the king. Afterwards, eleven other persons, similarly selected, were added to the council in England.

The resident council was to govern according to laws, ordinances, and instructions dictated by the Crown. The royal instructions sent out with the first colonists to Virginia stipulated that the Church of England and the king's supremacy must be maintained, but the president of the council must not be in holy orders. The land tenure was to be the same as in England. Jury trial was guaranteed. Summary punishment must be enforced for drunkards, vagrants, and vagabonds, while the death penalty was prescribed for rioting, mutiny, and treason, murder, manslaughter, and offences against chastity. The resident council might coin money and control the extraction of [Pg 68] all precious metals, giving one fifth to the Crown. It might also make provisions for the proper administration of public affairs; but all laws were to remain in vogue only conditionally, till ratified by the general council in England or the Crown. In another clause the king declared that all ordinances should be "consonant to the laws of England and the equity thereof." All trade was to be public, and in charge of a treasurer or cape merchant,—an officer chosen by the resident council from its own membership. All the produce of the colony was to be brought to a magazine, from which settlers were to be supplied with necessaries by the cape merchant. Doyle says: "The company ... was to be a vast joint-stock farm, or collection of farms, worked by servants who were to receive, in return for their labor, all their necessaries and a share in the proceeds of the undertaking." As a pious afterthought, the colonists were admonished "to show kindness to the savages and heathen people in those parts, and use all proper means to draw them to the true knowledge and service of God."

The rights given to the patentees, represented in the general council in England, were: free transport of emigrants and goods, the right to exact a duty of two and one half per cent on trade with the colony by Englishmen, and five per cent on trade by foreigners. For twenty-one years the proceeds of the enterprise were to accrue to the company; after that, to the Crown.

It should be noted that this patent, given by James to the combined London and Plymouth companies, differed greatly from that granted by Elizabeth to Gilbert and Raleigh, for it prescribed a constitution for the colonies, and left but little to the judgment of the patentees. The latter, in their eagerness to get a commercial charter, had allowed the [Pg 69] king to assume an undue political control over their establishment. It was fortunate for Englishmen, both in America and England, that James was a weak monarch. He might readily have used his supreme power over the Virginia colonists, not only to browbeat them at will, but to tax them unmercifully for the purpose of raising money, with which he would be the better enabled to bid the home Parliament defiance while attacking the liberties of his people. He did not lack desire, but was wanting in courage and astuteness, and allowed those shrewder than himself gradually to re-shape the American charter until, within twenty years, Virginia had emerged into practical independence.

The London Company, of which Hakluyt, Somers, and Gates were the most active spirits, was first in the field. A hundred and forty-three colonists were gathered aboard three ships,—the "Discovery," the "Good Speed," and the "Susan Constant,"—which on the 19th of December, 1606, sailed down the Thames, on the way to Virginia. The composition of the party was not promising. Most of them were "gentlemen," unused to and scorning manual toil; only twelve were laborers; and among the artisans were "jewellers, gold-refiners, and a perfumer." Character of the colonists. Adventure, mines, and golden sands were in the minds of the company, and the "gentlemen" doubtless thought they were out for a holiday excursion. The fact that there were neither women nor children in the expedition shows how little conception these people had of the true mission of a colony. The little fleet was in charge of Christopher Newport, a seaman of good reputation, with whom Gosnold was associated.

[Pg 70] Among the party was one of the patentees,—Captain John Smith. He was the son of a Lincolnshire gentleman; and being a soldier of fortune, had travelled and experienced adventures in many European countries,—a brave, robust, self-reliant, public-spirited, enterprising, humane, and withal a boastful Englishman, he has come down to us as one of the most romantic figures in American history. Smith's active temperament was not at first appreciated by his fellow-colonists, and in a fit of jealousy on shipboard they put him into irons upon a silly charge of conspiracy; and though he had been named a councillor by the king, he was not allowed to participate in the government for nearly a month after landing.

On the sixteenth of April, 1607, land was sighted, and the adventurers soon entered Chesapeake Bay, naming the outlying capes, Henry and Charles, after the king's sons, and the river, which they soon ascended, the James, in honor of the monarch himself. Fifty miles above the mouth of the river is "a low peninsula half buried in the tide at high water," which they unfortunately selected as the site of a town; and landing there on the thirteenth of May, they called the place Jamestown. Wingfield, one of the patentees, was chosen president of the resident council, exploring parties were sent out, fortifications were begun, and a few log-huts reared. The colonists had been instructed by the English council to search for water passages running through to the Pacific. A party soon set out, under Newport and Smith; but on reaching the falls of the James turned back. At first they were troubled by Indians; but peace had been made with the neighboring chief before Newport left for England, the twenty-second of June.

The marshes were rank, the water was bad, and food [Pg 71] scanty at Jamestown. The colonists were for the most part a shiftless set, lacking the habit of industry. A dismal summer. The heat was so intense during the first summer that few houses were built, and the tents were rotten and leaky. The natives, being ill-treated, soon broke out again into hostilities. When autumn came, fifty of the colonists had died. "Some departed suddenly," wrote a chronicler, "but for the most part they died of mere famine. There were never Englishmen left in a foreign country in such misery as we were in this new discovered Virginia.... It would make ... hearts bleed to hear the pitiful murmurings and outcries." The only men in office who had not in some degree succumbed to the miseries of the situation were Gosnold, a man of really superior ability, and Smith himself, the latter having now attained to supreme control by common consent. Smith compelled his people to labor,—"he that will not work shall not eat," was his dictum,—maintained trade with the Indians, among whom he became popular, drilled the little garrison, kept up the fortifications, explored and mapped the country and the coast, wrote appeals for assistance to London, and was the life and soul of the colony for two years.

In 1609 Newport had come out with supplies and one hundred and twenty emigrants, who again were mainly "gentlemen, goldsmiths, and libertines;" and he promptly sailed back with a load of worthless shining earth. Smith found the new-comers seized with a frenzy for discovering gold mines, and his troubles increased. Smith the savior of the colony. The company, impatient for returns, were disappointed because he insisted on having the people cultivate the rich soil, build houses, trade with the natives, and explore, rather than go seeking for gold where there was none. He appears to have been the only man of authority in the enterprise [Pg 72] who understood the true conditions of colonization. He had repeatedly urged the patentees in London to cease sending him gentlemen, idlers, and curious handicraftsmen, and instead of such to ship "carpenters, husbandmen gardeners, fishermen, blacksmiths, masons, and diggers up of trees' roots;" and insisted that they "as yet must not look for profitable returning." To Smith we owe it that Jamestown lived through all its early disasters, so that when he left it, in October, 1609, it had acquired a foothold and was the nucleus of permanent settlement in Virginia. He never again returned to the colony, although in later years we find him diligently exploring the New England coast.

With the following year began a new order of things. The London Company, stimulated by ill success, had gained from the king many of the powers heretofore reserved to himself, and secured the appointment of Lord Delaware as governor and captain-general; he was authorized to rule by martial law, thus depriving the turbulent colonists of numerous privileges heretofore given them. Administrations of Delaware and Dale. Delaware was in Jamestown but for one year, being succeeded by Sir Thomas Dale (1611), who found the colony in ill condition; many of its servants had defaulted, and there was a large deficiency. In March following (1612), the company obtained a fresh charter, giving it still further powers of self-direction and of dealing with crime and insubordination, and adding to its domain the Bermudas, or Somers Islands,—called thus after Sir George Somers, who had touched at them in 1609 while on a voyage of relief to Virginia. Dale, now possessed of enlarged authority, met with excellent success in bringing the unruly mob of settlers under control of the military code, and induced fresh immigration of a somewhat [Pg 73] better class. He caused the abandonment of the non-progressive and unsatisfactory system of communal proprietorship, introduced individual allotment, and broadened the foundations of a prosperous State.

Samuel Argall, "a sea-captain of piratical tastes," followed Dale in the governorship (1617), but was soon recalled (1618), because the settlers complained bitterly of tyrannical and mercenary treatment at his hands. Liberals gain control of the company. The liberals in England—prominent among whom were Sir Edwin Sandys and the Earl of Southampton—had now gained control of the corporation, and were fighting the king through the colony, with the result that Virginia gained in the next few years political privileges which were never after wholly relinquished; the colonists, too, had, in the case of Argall, learned the power of organized resistance,—a lesson which long stood them in good stead.

The colony was granted a representative assembly,—the first in America,—called the house of burgesses, which was first convened in June, 1619. In the words of the "briefe declaration," written a few years later, "That they might have a hande in the governinge of themselves, y^t was graunted that a general Assemblie shoulde be helde yearly once, whereat were to be present the Gov^r and Counsell w^th two Burgesses from each Plantation, freely to be elected by the Inhabitants thereof, this Assemblie to have power to make and ordaine whatsoever lawes and orders should by them be thought good and profitable for our subsistance." In this assembly Governor Yeardley (arrived April, 1619) and his council had seats and took active part. The effect of this convention, composed of twenty-two burgesses, representing eleven "cities," "hundreds," and "plantations," was greatly to restrict the governor's power, heretofore quite absolute. Yeardley was a judicious [Pg 74] executive, and the settlement, in spite of many difficulties, prospered under his rule. Indented servants. Men with families began to come out from England; but an unfortunate element in the immigration of the time was the class of indented servants, which not only included convicts and vagabonds, but was largely made up of boys and girls entrapped on the London streets by press-gangs and hurried off to Virginia to be forcibly placed in servitude for long terms of years,—the nucleus of the "poor white" element in the South. Another and far worse disaster befell the colony this year (1619). Introduction of slavery. Twenty African slaves, the first in America, were landed and sold in Jamestown from a Dutch man-of-war. This was the beginning of a large and wide-spreading traffic in human beings throughout the Southern colonies.

In 1622 Sir Francis Wyatt succeeded Governor Yeardley, and brought out with him, as a gift to the colonists, a most unexpected political concession,—confirmation of all liberties previously granted, and definite assurances and provisions for the regular assemblage of the house of burgesses. It is no wonder that the king declared the London Company, with its free debates and bold experiments in popular government in Virginia, "a seminary for a seditious Parliament."

The following year (1623) the Indians combined against the whites, who had persistently maltreated them, and more than three hundred settlers were killed. Virginia becomes a royal province. This loss, which was a serious blow to the colony, was one of the grounds urged by James in annulling the company's charter (1624). Thereupon the settlers passed under the immediate control of the king,—which was, on principle, an improvement over government by a profit-seeking commercial company, however [Pg 75] liberal the tendencies of the latter. The growing of tobacco had by this time become an important industry in Virginia,—forty thousand pounds being shipped to England in 1620,—and both James and his son and successor, Charles, received a considerable revenue from taxes on the product.

After a succession of inefficient governors, Sir John Harvey came out in 1629, being the first serving under direct royal appointment. Harvey proved obnoxious to the colonists because of his despotic rule and constant attempt to browbeat the house of burgesses; by the latter he was "thrust out of his government" in 1635, whereupon he hastened to England to plead his cause before Charles. The king, much incensed at the unruly temper of his people, ordered the governor back; but four years later, desirous of mollifying the Virginians, upon the profits of whose tobacco-raising he had an eye, the king supplanted Harvey, and again sent out Wyatt. Under his mild rule the colony once more lifted its head.

Sir William Berkeley succeeded Wyatt in 1642. While frequently quarrelling with the assembly, as all the royal governors did, and eager for the spoils of office, he was an educated, courtly gentleman and a courageous statesman, though often unscrupulous and overbearing. A man of strong passions and convictions, he was a pitiless hater of enemies of the State; and in his estimation Puritans and Catholics were more prominent in that category than the marauding savages who skulked in the forests. A second Indian uprising (1644) was vigorously suppressed by the governor.

[Pg 76] During the great struggle in England between Charles I. and the Long Parliament (1642-1649), public sentiment in Virginia was with the king. There were but few Puritans in or about Jamestown, and they had for the most part come in from New England under Harvey's administration; their missionary labors in the conservative South were unwelcome, and they were warned "to depart the collony with all conveniencie,"—while the Papists, who had settled Maryland in 1634 under Lord Baltimore, were not tolerated in Virginia under any conditions. Virginia a refuge for Cavaliers. The execution of Charles (1649) naturally aroused deep indignation among the colonists, refugee Cavaliers from England soon joined them by thousands, and Berkeley seriously, but in vain, invited Charles II. to take up his abode among his American subjects. The extent of this sudden influx of Cavalier immigration to the colony was so great that while the population of Virginia was but fifteen thousand in 1650, it had increased to forty thousand by 1670.

Parliament, however, was not disposed to allow Virginia to become a breeding-place for disloyalty to the Commonwealth, and appointed commissioners (1652), to whom the colony was surrendered possession with surprising promptness. "No sooner," wrote Lord Clarendon, "had the 'Guinea' frigate anchored in the waters of the Chesapeake than all thoughts of resistance were laid aside." The Puritan party at once took charge of the government, ruling with moderation and wisdom; and the colony, now allowed the utmost freedom in the conduct of its home affairs, prospered politically and financially under the Protectorate.

Among the commissioners was William Claiborne, an able, resolute, and passionate Virginian, who was the leader of the Puritan party, and carried on a considerable [Pg 77] trade with Nova Scotia, New England, and Manhattan. He had been much before the public of late years. The grant of Maryland to Lord Baltimore was regarded by Virginians as an invasion of their territory; and Claiborne, holding a royal license to trade in that region, had planted a settlement (1631) on Kent Island, in Chesapeake Bay, within the limits now claimed by Baltimore. Not acknowledging Baltimore's proprietorship there, he was summarily ejected. The following year (1635) he led a party of rangers against Maryland, compelled the Catholic governor, Calvert, to fly to Virginia, and seized the government himself; being soon expelled, however, by Calvert, who had now secured Berkeley's support. As one of the Roundhead commissioners to settle the affairs of the colonies, the turbulent Claiborne proceeded promptly to pay back some of his old debts against the Maryland Catholics. In 1654, Puritan invaders of Maryland, headed by Claiborne, who was now Secretary of the Province of Virginia, met the Catholics near the mouth of the Severn River and worsted them, thus again obtaining temporary control of the northern colony. Three years later a compromise was reached between Baltimore and the Puritans.

Richard Bennett was the first governor of Virginia under the Commonwealth (1652), being elected by the burgesses and receiving his authority from them. He was succeeded by Edward Digges (1655) and Samuel Matthews (1656), both similarly chosen. They quarrelled with the burgesses, like the governors of old, but were worthy and sensible men, and when outvoted generally yielded with grace. Claiborne's affair with Maryland and an unimportant Indian panic (1656) were the only clouds upon the horizon during this tranquil period.

When Oliver Cromwell died (1658), his successor, Richard, was accepted in Virginia without question; but when the following year the latter abdicated, Berkeley was quickly recalled, as "the servant of the people," from peaceful retirement on his country estate; The Restoration. and upon the Restoration (1660) the king's party was suffered again to take control of the government, and Claiborne was dismissed from the secretaryship. The return of the Royalists to power was accompanied in Virginia by harsh measures against Dissenters, by the enforcement of the Navigation Act under which the colonists were obliged to ship their tobacco to English ports alone, and to import no European goods except in vessels loaded in England, and by the gift of the entire province to Lords Arlington and Culpeper. The Puritans, angered by the harshness and profligacy of the church, by economic distress occasioned by the navigation laws, and by the ruthless invalidation of long-established land-titles, rose against the provincial government in 1663, and were not repressed until several of their leaders were hanged. The government became corrupt and despotic, and for many years the people were denied the privilege of electing a new house of burgesses,—the Royalist house chosen at the time of the Restoration holding over by prorogation.

The Bacon rebellion (1676) was an outgrowth of the general discontent. The Indians were murdering settlers in the frontier counties; but Berkeley, accused of having fur-trade interests at stake, and perhaps fearing to have the people armed, dismissed the self-organized volunteers who proposed to go out against the savages. Nathaniel Bacon, a popular young member of the council, honest and courageous, but indiscreet, [Pg 79] took it upon himself to raise a small force for the purpose. Berkeley refused Bacon a military commission, and declared him and his rangers rebels, and sought to crush them with the regular militia. Through the succeeding four months Virginia was thrown into confusion by a warfare which resembled the stormy military duels with which the South American republics have been so often harassed. The opposing forces had varying fortunes, and the fickle militiamen rallied under one standard or the other, according to the direction of the wind. Harrying Berkeley out of Jamestown, Bacon burned the capital to ashes, "that the rogues should harbor there no more." In October he died, either from poisoning or swamp-fever. His adherents, having no other cohesion than their sympathy for him, now scattered, and were caught by Berkeley, who executed twenty-three of them, and returned to Jamestown to renew his tyrannical policy for a time undisturbed. Berkeley recalled by the king. But even Charles tired of his governor's harsh and bloody doings, saying: "That old fool has hanged more men in that naked country than I have done for the murder of my father." Berkeley was summoned to England, his departure being celebrated by the colonists with salutes, bonfires, and general rejoicings. The king refused him an audience upon his arrival in London, and Berkeley died (1677) "of a broken heart."

The Royalists were now in full power, the friends of Bacon discreetly held their peace, and the governors were allowed to browbeat and rob the province at their will. The successor to Berkeley was Colonel Sir Herbert Jeffries (1677); after him came Sir Henry Chicheley (1678), Thomas Lord Culpeper, one of the proprietors under the king's patent (1679), Lord Howard of Effingham (1684), Sir Francis Nicholson (1690), Sir Edmund Andros (1692) [Pg 80] and Nicholson again (1698). During the administration of Culpeper, who was a greedy extortionist, the tobacco-planters rose in rebellion because of the disaster to their industry brought on by the attempt of government to regulate prices and establish ports of shipment. The governor hanged a number of the offenders, and still further added to his unpopularity as a ruler and his notoriety as a rascal by arbitrarily and for his own gain raising and lowering the standard of coinage.

These closing years of the seventeenth century were sorry times for Virginia. Riots and consequent imprisonments and hangings were ordinary events. Nicholson told the gentlemen of the province that he would "beat them into better manners," or "bring them to reason with halters about their necks." The people were discontented, the province grew poorer as each new governor introduced some fresh extortion, immigration practically ceased, and the spirit of political independence was torpid.

There were two or three gleams of sunshine during this period of almost total darkness. Delegates were sent to Albany in 1684 to represent the province at the famous council to consider a plan of union for repressing Indian outbreaks. It was one of the earliest attempts at the confederation of the colonies,—a scheme which Governor Nicholson persistently fostered, in the vain hope, it is said, of being placed at the head of the united provinces as governor-general. Establishment of William and Mary College. Again, under Nicholson's rule (1691), the house of burgesses sent Commissary Blair to England to solicit a patent for a college. This was obtained, and in 1693 the agent returned with the charter of "William and Mary," the second university in America,—Harvard, in Massachusetts, being the first and Yale, founded in 1701, the [Pg 81] third. The new college was set up at Williamsburg, whither Governor Nicholson had removed the capital of the province. Arrival of Huguenots. Another event, quite as significant, signalized the close of the century. De Richebourg's colony of Huguenots settled (1699) on the upper waters of the James and "infused a stream of pure and rich blood into Virginia society."

Thus, in the ninety years from 1607 to 1697, the population of Virginia had increased from a few score to nearly a hundred thousand; the dreams of speedy wealth entertained by the patentees had been idle, but the hard labor of Englishmen, supplemented by the forced service of negroes, had built up a prosperous agricultural community. More important still was it that, through all the vicissitudes of control, of government in England, and of party in America, the germ of popular government had grown into an established system, jealously watched by the colonies.

George Calvert, Lord Baltimore, had been one of the members of the London Company as well as a councillor in the Plymouth Company. From the beginning of the century he had taken a strong interest in English colonization schemes. A staunch Roman Catholic, he was (1618-1625) principal Secretary of State to James I. Baltimore's observation of the turbulent career of Virginia had convinced him that a commercial colony could not be successful, because of divided administration and the mercenary aims of non-resident stockholders. He went out with a colony to Newfoundland (1621) under a proprietary patent, but the inhospitable climate was against the project. In 1629 he landed at Jamestown with forty Catholic colonists; but [Pg 82] the Protestant Virginians made it uncomfortable for the Romanists, and they returned to England.

Baltimore thereupon secured a charter from King Charles I. for a tract of country north of Potomac river, the limits being imperfectly defined,—on the north, the fortieth degree of latitude (the southern boundary of the Plymouth Company's patent); on the west, a line drawn due north from the head of the Potomac. The lands embraced in this grant were within the bounds of Virginia, as specified in 1609, but had thus far not been occupied. His son Cecil succeeds him. At the king's request the country was named Maryland, in honor of his queen, Henrietta Maria. Lord Baltimore died before the charter had passed the seal, and was succeeded in his rights and titles by his son Cecil. The province of Maryland being made a palatinate, Lord Baltimore was given almost royal powers, the Crown reserving feudal supremacy and exacting a nominal yearly tribute. Provisions of the charter. The proprietor could declare war, make peace, appoint all officers, including judges, rule by martial law, pardon criminals, and confer titles. He was to summon the freemen to assist him in making laws, which were to be similar to those of England, but did not require the king's confirmation, and need not be sent to England. It was therefore impossible for the Privy Council to check or inaugurate legislation in Maryland. The relations between the Crown and his lordship being thus established, it was left for the colonists and the proprietor to settle their relation under the charter; but no tax could be levied without consent of the freemen.

In November, 1633, Cecil sent out his brother Leonard with two hundred colonists,—some twenty of whom were gentlemen, and the others laborers and mechanics,—and in March following they founded [Pg 83] a town near the mouth of the Potomac, calling it St. Mary's. Quarrel with Claiborne. The troubles with Claiborne, the Virginian who had made a settlement on Kent Island, in the Chesapeake and within Baltimore's grant, have already been alluded to (page 77). The dispute was a protracted one, and gave rise to much ill-feeling and some bloodshed.

Many of Baltimore's colonists were Protestants. He was, however, sincere in his desire for complete religious toleration, and did not appear to concern himself in what his subjects believed. The Jesuit priests accompanying the party exerted their influence in behalf of a humane treatment of the Indians, and a cordial friendship was soon established with the resident tribes. The settlers of good quality. As for the settlers, they were thrifty and industrious, held their land in fee-simple, and up to the Commonwealth period there was prosperity and content.

The colonists were, however, not blind to their political rights, in the midst of this economic security. In primary assembly, in which proxies were allowed, the freemen adopted a code of laws (1635) which the proprietor rejected because the former had presumed to take the initiative, and for two years the province was self-governed under the English common law. In 1638 a set of laws drafted by the proprietor was promptly vetoed by the assembly, and thus a deadlock was created. The matter was soon arranged by compromise, with the utmost good-nature on both sides; there was created a representative house of burgesses,—in which, however, individual freemen might also appear,—Baltimore was granted a poll-tax subsidy, and the people reserved to themselves the rights of self-taxation and legislative initiative. The anomalous system of allowing both freemen—of whom there were but [Pg 84] one hundred and eighty-two in 1642—and their representatives to sit in the general assembly continued, with some variations, until 1647, when that body became truly representative. Three years later (1650), the legislature was divided into two houses, the burgesses sitting in the lower chamber, and the councillors and others especially summoned by the proprietor in the upper.

As in the other colonies, the outbreak of the civil war in England resulted in serious dissensions in Maryland. The Puritan party waxed strong, and sympathized with Claiborne's intruding Protestant colonists on Kent Island. The seizure of a Parliament ship by Deputy-Governor Brent, under orders from King Charles, resulted in popular disturbances. Claiborne drives out Calvert, but the latter eventually wins. Claiborne, taking advantage of the disorder and coming over from Virginia, seized the government at St. Mary's. Governor Calvert fled to Virginia, where Governor Berkeley gave him shelter until he was able to march back at the head of a large force and suppress the Claiborne administration, which was weak and mercenary, and had not commended itself to the people.

Leonard Calvert died in 1647. William Stone, a Protestant, appointed Governor in 1648, favored Parliament as against the king, but was sworn by the proprietor to protect Catholics and give them an equal chance with other colonists. The Protestant party grew apace; but while represented by the governor and council, was in the minority in the assembly. In 1649 a "Toleration Act" was passed, by which Sunday games, blasphemy, and abuse of rival sects were severally prohibited. "Whereas the enforcing of the [Pg 85] conscience in matters of religion," ran the preamble, "hath frequently fallen out to be of dangerous consequence, ... and the better to preserve mutual love and amity among the inhabitants of the province," no person professing to be a Christian shall be "in any ways molested or discountenanced for or in respect of his or her religion, nor in the free exercise thereof."

The Parliamentary commissioners sent to reduce the colonies (1652) displaced Stone; but his great popularity caused them to reinstate him. Stone, however, now sided with the proprietor, who wished to banish all colonists who would not take the oath of fidelity to his lordship. The governor proclaimed the Puritan leaders as seditious, and ejected many. The Puritans therefore rose and called in Claiborne, who was one of the Parliamentary commissioners, to help them. In a pitched battle at Providence (1655) the Protestants won, and followed up their victory by the execution of several of Stone's followers and the sequestration of their estates. Stone himself, though sentenced to death, was reprieved. The party of Cromwell was now in full power in the palatinate. Claiborne renewed his claim to Kent Island; but the Commissioners for Plantations do not appear ever to have recognized it.

Baltimore was finally restored to his proprietorship by the English Commissioners for Plantations (1657), the assembly accepted the situation, an Act of Indemnity was passed, the right of the colonists to self-government was reaffirmed, and the policy of toleration was again adopted. The result of the proprietor's restoration was to enlarge the political privileges of the people, and toleration succeeded Catholic supremacy in Maryland,—a reflex of the tendencies of the Great Rebellion in the mother-land.

In 1661 Charles Calvert, eldest son of Lord Baltimore, became governor of the province. His admirable administration lasted for fourteen years, during which the colony greatly prospered, there being a considerable immigration of Quakers and foreigners,—Maryland, with its religious toleration and beneficent laws, becoming widely known as a haven for the oppressed of all nations. Unhampered by the proprietor, the assembly was reasonable in its dealings with him, and harmony prevailed between them. The crops, particularly of tobacco, were profitable, the Indians were never a source of serious disturbance, and the people were contented and loyal.

By the death (1675) of Cecil, Lord Baltimore, Charles fell heir to the family title and estates. Thomas Notly was sent out from England as deputy-governor. In 1681 the new proprietor secured the passage of a law limiting the suffrage to those having freeholds of fifty acres or other property worth forty pounds. A spirit of unrest. There was some popular uneasiness over this, as well as over the encroachments on the Maryland grant made by William Penn; the Navigation Act, compelling the planters to sell their tobacco in English ports alone, was also fretting the people; while the Protestants, most of whom were now of the Church of England, and bitter against Puritans and other Dissenters, as well as Catholics, deemed the Toleration Act an impious compact. The Fendall and Coode revolt. Taking advantage of this spirit of unrest, and smarting under old grievances, Josias Fendall, an unworthy demagogue, intrigued with a retired clergyman named John Coode and instigated a revolt, in which the aid of some Virginians was obtained. The uprising was promptly suppressed; but [Pg 87] under the influence of the revolution in England (1688) Coode again headed an insurrection under the auspices of the Association for the Defence of the Protestant Religion. In 1689 the associators seized the government of Maryland, under the flimsy pretext that they were upholding the cause of William and Mary. Maryland declared a royal province. They at first won the favorable consideration of the king; but in 1691 Maryland was declared a royal province, and Sir Lionel Copley came out as the first royal governor. Baltimore's interests were respected, but he now became a mere absentee landlord. The powers of government rested in the Crown, the Church of England was established, and other Protestant sects were discountenanced while practically tolerated, but Catholics were persecuted.

The capital was removed from St. Mary's, the centre of the Catholic interest, to Annapolis,—first settled by Puritans, and now controlled by the adherents of the establishment. Maryland's prosperity, heretofore unrivalled in the colonies, now suffered a check, and for a term of years the royal administration was signalized by religious persecution and a low political and social tone, till in 1715 the proprietorship was re-established. In 1729 the city of Baltimore was founded as a convenient port for the planters. The settlement and growth of Maryland had enforced two lessons which were never wholly forgotten,—the possibility, under official toleration, of bringing members of different religious sects together in one civil community and government; and the comfort and prosperity attainable in a well-governed colony.

Between Virginia and Spanish Florida a broad belt of territory lay long unoccupied. A Huguenot colony in [Pg 88] 1562 had had a brief existence there, and in consequence France claimed the country as her share of Florida. Early colonial attempts. But the Spaniards drove out the French, and thus unwittingly left the field to the north clear for the English. In 1584 Amadas and Barlowe led a prospecting party to Roanoke Island (p. 38), and here also (1585, 1587) two of Raleigh's ill-fated colonies spent their strength. The swamp-girted coast had few harbors, the colonizing material did not possess staying qualities, the ill-treated Indians turned on the invaders of their soil, the sites of settlements were ill-chosen. For a long period of years after the failure of these enterprises a prejudice existed against the middle region as a colonizing ground.

But before Jamestown was two years old restless Virginians had explored the upper waters of some of the southern rivers, and by 1625 the region was fairly familiar to hunters and adventurous land-seekers as far south as the Chowan. In 1629 Charles I. gave "the province of Carolana" to Sir Robert Heath, his attorney-general; but nothing came of the grant. The Virginia Assembly took it upon itself to issue exploring and trading permits in the southern portion of the Virginia claims, often called Carolana, to certain commercial companies, with the result that the character of the country became generally known. Roger Green plants Albemarle. In 1653 a small colony of Virginia dissenters, harassed by the Church of England party at home, were led by Roger Green to the banks of the Chowan and Roanoke; and there they planted Albemarle, the first permanent settlement in what is now North Carolina.

Numerous colonizing parties and individual settlers ventured into North Carolina during the next twenty years, and purchased lands of the Indians. Among [Pg 89] these were many Baptists and Quakers who had found life intolerable in the northern settlements. New Englanders at Cape Fear River. The story goes that in 1660 a number of New Englanders, desiring to raise cattle, settled at the mouth of Cape Fear River; but they incurred the hatred of the Indians, and the colony soon melted away. The survivors, upon taking their departure, affixed to a post a "scandalous writing, ... the contents whereof tended not only to the disparagement of the land about the said river, but also to the great discouragement of all such as should hereafter come into those parts to settle." Colonists from Barbadoes at Clarendon. This was said to have been found in 1663 by a company of wanderers from the English community on the island of Barbados, which had been founded in 1625. These West Indian colonists, headed by a wealthy planter, Sir John Yeamans, established themselves (1664), to the number of several hundred, on the Cape Fear, in the district which soon came to be known as Clarendon.

It is probable that Charles II. knew little of these infant settlements of Virginians and Barbados men at Albemarle and Clarendon,—which were some three hundred miles apart,—or of the numerous small holdings between them; but he cautiously confirmed all private purchases from the Indians, in giving Carolina (1663) to a coterie of his favorites. Chief among these were the Earl of Clarendon, the Duke of Albemarle, the Earl of Shaftesbury, and Sir William Berkeley, then governor of Virginia. The proprietaries had been commanded to recognize the land-claims of the settlers already on the ground. William Drummond, a Scotch colonist in Virginia, was made [Pg 90] governor of Albemarle, while Yeamans remained governor of Clarendon, these two districts roughly corresponding to the North and South Carolina of to-day. Early prosperity. The proprietaries at first authorized a popular government on the simplest plan, and the settlers, particularly in Albemarle, looked forward to a prosperous career. A considerable trade in lumber and fur at once sprang up, and the crops were good; for the soil proved richer than in any other of the American colonies then occupied.

In 1667 Samuel Stephens succeeded Governor Drummond, who went to Virginia, where he became a leader in the Bacon rebellion. The Lords Proprietors in 1665 secured a charter, with enlargements of their bounds; their new grants in terms included the present territory of the United States between Virginia and Florida, to the Pacific. In 1670 was added the Bahamas,—neither the claims of Virginia nor of Spain being considered in the grants. Stephens was assisted by a council of twelve, his own appointees when the proprietaries did not choose them. The assembly, of twelve members chosen by the people, was a lower house. Immigrants attracted. This first legislature met in 1669; and actuated by a desire to attract immigrants, declared that no debts contracted abroad by settlers previous to removal to Carolina could be collected in their new home. As a consequence, along with many desirable colonists flocking in from the Bermudas, Bahamas, New England, and Virginia, came others who were not worthy material for a pioneer community. The proprietaries themselves were quite liberal in their land-grants to inhabitants.

Unfortunately for the Carolinians, the Lords Proprietors engaged John Locke, the famous philosopher, to devise for them a scheme of colonial government (1669). It was a complicated feudal structure, entitled [Pg 91] the Fundamental Constitutions, not suited to any community, old or new, and now chiefly interesting as a philosophical curiosity. The province was to be divided into counties, and they into seignories, baronies, precincts, and colonies; and the people were to be separated into four estates of the realm,—proprietaries, landgraves, caciques, and commons. Locke defined "political power to be the right of making laws for regulating and preserving property." The objects sought to be attained in his constitution were avowedly the "establishing the interest of the lords proprietors," the making of a government "most agreeable to the monarchy, ... that we may avoid erecting a numerous democracy," and the connecting political power with hereditary wealth. The leet-men, or tenants, were to be kept from asserting themselves by rigid feudal restrictions: "nor shall any leet-man or leet-woman have liberty to go off from the land of their particular lord and live anywhere else without license obtained from their said lord, under hand and seal. All the children of leet-men shall be leet-men, and so to all generations." The plan was the dream of an aristocrat; it was an attempt to reproduce the thirteenth century in the seventeenth; it was artificial and unwieldy. While the rough backwoods-men could not grasp its intricacies or understand its mediæval terms, they instinctively felt it to be a useless bit of constitutional romancing, and would have little to do with it.

The only important result of the attempt was to unsettle existing conditions and, especially in Albemarle, to create a contempt for all government; while the attempt of the proprietaries to regulate trade strengthened the too-prevalent spirit of lawlessness. Their officious lordships had set out to establish the Church of England; but the result of their interference was that the Quakers, [Pg 92] elsewhere despised, took advantage of the spirit of dissent and obtained a firm hold over the Carolinians.

During this period of unrest in the northern settlements William Sayle, who had explored the coast in 1667, planted (1670-1671) a colony "on the first highland" at the junction of the Ashley and Cooper rivers,—the site of the Charleston of to-day.

The settlements at Cape Fear and Charleston being more orderly and promising than that at Albemarle, the proprietaries were henceforth more considerate towards them. North Carolina, as it was ultimately called, was practically left to take care of itself for upwards of a decade, during which the neglected colonists made a rough struggle for existence upon their crude clearings in the wilderness, those nearest the coast eking out their scanty income by trafficking with New England smugglers. Throughout the rest of the seventeenth century the proprietaries had but a nominal hold upon the people of the northern colony. In 1676 Thomas Eastchurch was appointed governor of Albemarle, but he ruled only through deputies. Deputy Miller, collector of the king's customs, a drunken, vicious fellow, added to his unpopularity by attempting to browbeat the assembly. The colonists The Culpeper rebellion. rose in arms (1678), imprisoned Miller, chose one Culpeper as collector of customs, and convened a new assembly, which confirmed the revolutionary proceedings and controlled affairs until 1683, when Seth Sothel was sent out as governor. Sothel won the reputation of being an arbitrary and rapacious official, and in 1688 the unruly assembly [Pg 93] deposed and banished him, despite the feeble remonstrance of the proprietaries.

Meanwhile, Sayle's colony at Charleston made good progress, the proprietaries being lavish in their aid of the enterprise. While it was found that but few features of Locke's elaborate constitutions could be put into practice in a frontier settlement, their lordships minutely managed the affairs of the colony, leaving little to the judgment of the inhabitants. Sayle died the first winter, and Yeamans, the founder of the Cape Fear colony, succeeded him as governor (1672). Two years later (1674), the unpopularity of Yeamans led to his being supplanted by Joseph West, who ruled in a wholesome manner for twelve years.

In 1682 the Clarendon settlements, now chiefly centred at Charleston, which had an excellent town government, embraced about three thousand persons. Despite trade restrictions, the exports of furs and timber were large for the time, much live-stock was reared, the cultivation of tobacco was extensively engaged in, and the supply of fish was abundant.

The settlers were of various types,—among the colonists being groups of Englishmen from the Bahamas, Barbados, Virginia, and New England; while in 1679 French Huguenots began to arrive in considerable numbers, and had a permanent effect upon the character of the province. A small party of Scotch Presbyterians, flying from persecution at home, established themselves at Port Royal,—the southernmost of the English settlements. Two days' sail to the south lay the Spanish town of St. Augustine. Scotch Presbyterians routed by the Spanish. The Spaniards, jealous of this encroachment, and suffering as well from the raids of pirates who made their headquarters in Charleston, fell upon the little outpost of Port Royal (1686) [Pg 94] and completely destroyed it. It was long held as a cause of complaint in the Carolinas that the proprietaries peremptorily forbade the colonists chastising the Spanish, on the principle that a dependency had no right to carry on war against a country with which the home government was at peace.

The Huguenots, who had settled chiefly in Craven County, were for a time denied all political rights, although the proprietaries favored them. The buccaneers, who frequently appeared in Charleston, were continually preying on Spanish commerce, and causing their lordships much trepidation lest these sea-rovers should bring on a war with Spain. The dissenters, who were in the majority, were constantly warring with the Church of England party, represented by the proprietaries. The trade restrictions were exceedingly unpopular. Proprietary interference, even when well intended, unsettled the public mind. The colonists, while conducting their local political affairs on independent English models, were continually apprehensive of a change in the form of government, and in general nursed many grievances, petty and great.

After the close of West's first term (1683) there was some turbulence, and within the following seven years a succession of unsatisfactory governors. Sothel (1690) was driven out by the Southern colonists in 1691, as he had been by the Northern (page 93), and Philip Ludwell came on from Virginia to assume control. The Carolinas reunited. The proprietaries had at last changed their policy, and determined to rule both Carolinas, as one province, Ludwell being the first governor (1691) of the united colonies. He was weak, however, and unable to restore order and public confidence. Under his successor, Thomas Smith, the assembly was granted a share in initiating legislation.

[Pg 95] It was not until John Archdale, a sound-headed and conservative Quaker, himself one of the proprietaries, came out (1695) as governor that the colonists ceased their bickerings and the province settled down into a condition of peace and good order. Joseph Blake, Archdale's nephew, succeeded him (1696). Under Blake's benign rule the century closed in the Carolinas with a better popular feeling towards the Huguenots, complete religious toleration to all Christians except Catholics, and a marked increase in the material prosperity of the settlers.

The Carolinas, which had been planted sixty years later than Virginia, were in 1700 still feeble; and it was half a century before they began to be important colonies. The chief interest of the Carolinas in the development of America is the failure of the proprietors to stem or to deflect the tide of local government. Nowhere does the innate determination of the Anglo-Saxon to control his own political destiny more strikingly appear than in the contentions of the Carolinians with their rulers in England.

CHAPTER V.

SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS IN THE SOUTH IN 1700.

General Accounts.—Doyle, Colonies, I. ch. xiii.; Cooke, Virginia, ch. xxiv.

Special Histories.—Eggleston, Beginners of a Nation; Bruce, Social Life of Virginia, and Economic History of Virginia; S. Fisher, Men, Women, and Manners in Colonial Times, I. ch. i.; T. Page, Old Dominion, ch. iii.; A. Earle, Colonial Dames and Good Wives, and Home Life in Colonial Days; M. Goodwin, Colonial Cavalier; A. Wharton, Colonial Days and Dames; Hall, Lords Baltimore, lecture vi.; Channing, Town and County Government; J. Ballagh, Slavery in Virginia; S. Weeks, Quakers; G. Bernheim, German Settlements; many publications in Johns Hopkins University Studies. See also, biographies of prominent men.

Contemporary Accounts.—W. Hening, Statutes; narratives enumerated in § 27, above. Reprints in American History told by Contemporaries, I. chs. ix., xiii.; publications of historical societies and commissions.

Although of dissimilar origin, developed along somewhat different lines, and having striking individual characteristics, the Southern colonies possessed in common so many traits—climatic, geographical, social, and economic—that we may conveniently treat them as a distinct group.

Virginia and Maryland, topographically similar, have numerous large and safe harbors, and the area of cultivation extends to the coast. In the Carolinas there are [Pg 97] scarcely any good harbors; along the sea-shore are great sand-fields and pine-barrens, interspersed by swamps, but the country gradually slopes up to the Alleghany foot-hills, the soil improving with the rise in elevation. Throughout the Southern colonies the country is drained by broad rivers running down to the sea.

It is estimated that in 1688 there were but twenty-five thousand persons, white and black, in Maryland, sixty thousand in Virginia, and four thousand in the Carolinas. The English were dominant in all the colonies, but their supremacy was more strongly marked in Virginia and Maryland than in the Carolinas, where foreign elements (1700-1750) increased rapidly in numbers and variety. The North Carolina lumbering industry attracted many immigrants,—in the main French Huguenots, Moravians, and Germans, with some Swiss and Scotch-Irish interspersed. The Huguenots, a particularly desirable class, were stronger in South Carolina than in any other American colony. While Virginia and Maryland were chiefly settled by colonists direct from England, the Carolinas were largely peopled from the other English colonies in North America, the Bahamas, and the West Indies.

In the South the rich soil was widely distributed, the rivers served as convenient highways, and the climate was mild; except for protection from the Indians, there was no necessity in colonial times for the massing of the people. Villages were few, and the plantations were strung along the streams, often many miles apart and separated by dense forests. The legislatures of the Southern provinces from time to time endeavored to create trading and manufacturing towns by statute; but with few exceptions these remained, down to the Revolution, merely places [Pg 98] of resort for elections and courts, with perhaps an inn, a jail, a court-house, and two or three dwellings. What trade there was at these cross-roads hamlets was of the most petty retail character, and the traders themselves were deemed of small consequence in the community. Jamestown remained the Virginia capital until late in the century, and during the sessions of the legislature and at gubernatorial inaugurations was a favorite resort for the wealthy and fashionable from all parts of the province; but it was a small, untidy village, with few of the characteristics of a modern town except for its public buildings. Williamsburg, its successor, was but little better. The original capital of Maryland, St. Mary's, was not worthy the name of town; but when, in the last decade of the century, Providence, rechristened Annapolis, became the seat of government, the new capital soon grew into an improvement on the old, several sightly public buildings were erected, and trade expanded with the increase of fashion. Charleston, the capital of South Carolina, was the most important town in the South; the wealthiest planters in the colony lived there, leaving their estates to the care of overseers; and trade, fashion, and politics centred in the village, which was well-built and handsome.

Society was divided into four classes, social distinctions being sharply drawn.The lowest stratum was composed of the negro slaves, first introduced in 1619. For many years the number of blacks was comparatively small, servile labor being mainly performed by convicts and indented servants. At first the African slave was looked upon as but an improved variety of indented servant, whose term of labor was for life instead of a few years. In 1650 there [Pg 99] were but three hundred negroes in Virginia and fifteen thousand whites. The slave system fast extended, after this date, so that in 1661 Virginia had two thousand blacks, and by the close of the seventeenth century they nearly equalled the whites in number; in South Carolina, in 1708, two thirds of the population were of the negro race. It was not until the blacks had become a numerous class that we find the laws regarding them savoring of harshness. They were especially severe after 1687, when a negro insurrection in Virginia inspired the whites with fear. The statutes for the repression of the slaves now became fairly ferocious. In the eye of the law they were simply chattels, being hardly granted the rights of human beings. A master might kill his slave, for he was but destroying his own property. Runaways could be slain at sight by any one, the owner being reimbursed from the public treasury. The laws against racial amalgamation were savage, but the actual treatment of the slave by his owner was not so barbarous as the laws suggest,—especially in the two northern colonies of the Southern group. He was there comfortably housed, clothed, and fed, and indulged in many amusements. The raising of tobacco required constant care at certain seasons of the year, but there was much leisure, and the occupation was healthful. Work in the rice-swamps and indigo-fields, in the fierce summer heat of South Carolina, was extremely exhausting, and the negroes rapidly wore out; for this reason there was a tendency on the part of the planters of that province to work them to their full capacity while still in their prime. Nowhere else in the South was slave life so burdensome, and nowhere was the slave trade so active.

Removed from the slaves by the impassable gulf of color, but nevertheless almost as much despised by the upper and middle class whites as the blacks, were the [Pg 100] indented white servants. While here and there among them were men capable, when freed from their bonds, of rising to the middle and indeed the upper class, they were of low character frequently, such as transported convicts, the riff-raff of London, and in some cases children who had been kidnapped by lawless adventurers in the streets of the English cities. As servants they were under no gentle bonds. The laws concerning them were harsh. They might not marry without the consent of their masters; an assault on the latter was heavily punished; to run away was but to lengthen the term of service, and for a second offence to be branded on the cheek. For numerous petty offences their service could be prolonged, and masters might thus retain them for years after the term fixed in the bond.

The middle class—small farmers and tradesmen—merged into each other, so that it was often difficult to draw the line between them. In South Carolina there was practically no middle class, and indented servants were few; there existed in this colony a perfect oligarchy,—lords and their slaves. In all the Southern colonies the trader was despised by the upper class, which was composed of officials and wealthy planters. The men of the middle class were uneducated, rude, and addicted to gambling, hard-drinking, and rough sports; they were, however, a sturdy set, manly and liberty-loving, and gave strong political support to the planters.

The upper class, in dress, manners, and political thought, resembled the English country gentlemen of [Pg 101] their time. Here and there among them were men of fair scholarship, with degrees from Oxford and Cambridge, but the majority had but slight education, such as was picked up haphazard from the parish parson, an occasional tutor, or a freed servant of more than ordinary attainments. The speech and manners of the young were badly affected by being reared among slaves. The life of both men and women in these "good old colony days" was exceedingly monotonous; the chief charge of the former being the care of their plantation and negroes, and of the latter the superintendence of their domestic affairs and the training of house servants. There was much visiting to and fro among the county families, and dancing was a favorite evening amusement; and there were annual visits to the capital, where horse-racing, gambling, cock-fighting, and wrestling were favorite recreations. The Crown officers did much to keep the English fashions alive, and the inauguration of a governor was a brilliant social event.

The manners of the gentry were better than those of the middle class; nevertheless they drank overmuch, had a passion for gaming, and sometimes engaged in brawls at the polling-places. The fist, especially in Virginia and Maryland, was preferred to the duel as a means of settling controversies. The landed gentlemen, born aristocrats, were indolent, vain, haughty, arrogant, and sensitive to restraint,—a natural outgrowth of the social conditions of the times. But they had great virtues as well as great faults. There was a keen sense of honor among them, and great pride of ancestry. They were of good, vigorous English stock, especially those who came after the Restoration, and in the struggle for independence, two generations later, furnished to the patriot cause a high class of soldiers, diplomats, and statesmen.

There were practically no professions in Virginia and North Carolina. In Maryland and South Carolina a litigious spirit prevailed, and there arose a small body of lawyers fairly well equipped. Medicine was in a crude state. The clergymen of the English Established Church—except in South Carolina, to which colony the London Society for the Propagation of the Gospel sent out good material—were as a rule sadly deficient in manners and education, although there were among them many men of superior attainments and noble character. This was especially noticeable in Maryland. The dissenting ministers were often of quite inferior calibre.

Agriculture was the mainstay of the people, tobacco being the one great crop; although in the Carolinas rice and indigo came to be close rivals. Naval stores were also a staple export. In South Carolina there was a greater area devoted to mixed tillage than elsewhere in the South, and corn and cotton were raised in considerable quantities. In both the Carolinas cattle-raising was an important industry, the large branded herds roaming the glades and forests at will.

A great plantation, with its galleried manor-house, its rows of negro quarters, and group of barns and shops, was in a large measure a self-sustained community. The planter needed little that could be obtained elsewhere in his own colony or in the South, and conducted his commercial operations direct with England, the West Indies, and the Northern colonies. Vessels came to his landing, bringing the supplies which he had ordered of his correspondents, and loading for the return trip with such material [Pg 103] as he had for export. Under this independent system, whereby the rural magnate was his own merchant, and negro slaves his only workmen, neither general trade nor industries could flourish. Manufactures of every sort—even tables, chairs, stools, wooden bowls, and birchen brooms—were, along with many necessaries of life, imported from England and neighboring colonies. There were a few negroes on every plantation who were trained to the mechanic arts; and a small number of white craftsmen found work in travelling around the country, doing such jobs as were beyond the capacity of the slaves.

There was a considerable trade with the other continental colonies, as well as with sister colonies in the West Indies and with England. Small vessels were built in Virginia and Maryland for the coasting traffic, though Englishmen, New Englanders, and Dutchmen were the principal carriers. The independent methods of the planters, with their systems of barter and direct importations, suited the lordly notions prevalent among them; but the luxury was an expensive one, for it placed them quite at the mercy of their foreign correspondents. Tobacco was the chief export, and barter was based upon its value, which, despite legal restrictions, was subject to great fluctuation. The importance of the crop, as the basis of exchange, led to governmental supervision of its quality, which was uniformly excellent except in North Carolina, where public spirit was at a low stage. The importance attached by the government to this industry is illustrated by a famous remark of Attorney-General Seymour. In 1692, when a delegation from Virginia were soliciting a charter for the College of William and Mary, on the ground that a higher education was necessary as a step towards the salvation of souls by the clergy, he blurted out: "Souls! Damn your [Pg 104] souls; grow tobacco!" The Southern colonies had also a large and profitable export of lumber, tar, turpentine, and furs; from the Carolinas beef was shipped in great quantities to the West Indies; and rice, indigo, and cotton were sent to the Northern colonies and England. The trade with the Indians grew to considerable proportions in Virginia and Maryland, but was long neglected in the Carolinas.

All manner of trade, however, was more or less hampered by the Parliamentary Acts of Navigation and Trade. In the time of Richard II. (1377-1399) it had been enacted that "None of the king's liege people should ship any merchandise out of or into the realm, except in the ships of the king's ligeance, on pain of forfeiture." Under Henry VII. (1485-1509) only English-built ships manned by English sailors were permitted to import certain commodities; and in the reign of Elizabeth (1558-1603) only such vessels could engage in the English coasting trade and fisheries.

The earliest English colonies were exempted by their charters from these restrictions, but under James I. (1603-1625) the colonies were included. For many years the colonists did not heed the Navigation Acts; in consequence, the Dutch, then the chief carriers on the ocean, obtained control of the colonial trade, and thereby amassed great wealth. Jealous of their supremacy, the statesmen of the Commonwealth sought to upbuild England by forcing English trade into English channels; and this policy succeeded. Holland soon fell from her high position as a maritime power, and England, with her far-spreading colonies, succeeded her. The Act of 1645 declared that certain articles [Pg 105] should be brought into England only by ships fitted out from England, by English subjects, and manned by Englishmen; this was amended the following year so as to include the colonies. In exchange for the privilege of importing English goods free of duty, the colonists were not to suffer foreign ships to be loaded with colonial goods. In 1651, a stringent Navigation Act was passed by the Long Parliament, the beginning of a series of coercive ordinances extending down to the time of the American Revolution: it provided that the rule as to the importation of goods into England or its territories, in English-built vessels, English manned, should extend to all products "of the growth, production, or manufacture of Asia, Africa, or America, or of any part thereof, ... as well of the English Plantations as others;" but the term "English-built ships" included colonial vessels, in this and all subsequent Acts.

Under the Restoration the Commonwealth law was confirmed and extended (1660). Such enumerated colonial products as the English merchants desired to purchase were to be shipped to no other country than England; but those products which they did not wish might be sent to other markets, provided they did not there interfere in any way with English trade. In all transactions, however, "English-built ships," manned by "English subjects" only, were to be patronized. Three years later (1663) another step was taken. By an Act of that year, such duties were levied as amounted to prohibition of the importation of goods into the colonies except such as had been actually shipped from an English port; thus the colonists were forced to go to England for their supplies,—the mother-country making herself the factor between her colonies and foreign markets.

A considerable traffic had now sprung up between the colonies. New England merchants were competing with [Pg 106] Englishmen in the Southern markets. At the behest of commercial interests in the parent isle, an Act was passed in 1673 seriously crippling this intercolonial trade; all commodities that could have been supplied from England were now subjected to a duty equivalent to that imposed on their consumption in England. From 1651 to 1764 upwards of twenty-five Acts of Parliament were passed for the regulation of traffic between England and her colonies. Each succeeding ministry felt it necessary to adopt some new scheme for monopolizing colonial trade in order to purchase popularity at home. It was 1731 before the home government began to repress the manufacture in the colonies of goods that could be made in England; thereafter numerous Acts were passed by Parliament having this end in view.

In brief, the mother-country regarded her American colonies merely as feeders to her trade, consumers of her manufactures, and factories for the distribution of her capital. Parliament never succeeded in satisfying the greed of English merchants, while in America it was thought to be doing too much. The constant irritation felt in the colonies over the gradual application of commercial thumb-screws—turned at last beyond the point of endurance—was one of the chief causes of the Revolution. Had it not been that colonial ingenuity found frequent opportunities for evading these Acts of Navigation and Trade, the final collision would doubtless have occurred at a much earlier period.

The system of agriculture throughout the South was vicious. Few crops so soon exhaust the soil as tobacco; and as this staple was the main reliance of the planters, [Pg 107] it was usual to seek fresh fields as fast as needed, leaving the old planting grounds to revert to wilderness. From this, as well as from other causes already stated, the settlements became diffuse, and great belts of forest often separated the holdings. The far-reaching rivers were fringed with plantations, and the waterways were the paths of commerce. The cross-country roads were very bad, often degenerating into mere bridle-paths; there was little travel, and that largely restricted to saddle or sulky,—the former preferred; for there were numerous streams to ford or swim. It was not uncommon for travellers to lose their way and to be obliged to pass the night in the thicket. Inns were few and wretched; but the hospitality of the planters was unstinted, every respectable wayfarer being joyfully welcomed as a guest to the manor-houses.

Some glowing pictures of life in these "baronial halls," with their great open fireplaces, rich furnishings imported from England, crowds of negro lackeys, bounteous larders, and general air of crude splendor, have come down to us in the journals of pre-Revolutionary travellers. But the wealth of the large planters was more apparent than real. Their wasteful agricultural and business methods fostered a speculative spirit, their habits were reckless, their tastes expensive, and their hospitality ruinous; they were generally steeped in debt, and bankruptcy was frequent. The South Carolina planters, however, were more prosperous and independent than those to the north of them.

The means of education were limited. Governor Berkeley, in his famous report on the state of the Virginia colony (1670), said: "I thank God there are no free schools, nor printing, and I hope we shall not have these hundred years; for learning has brought disobedience into the world, and printing has divulged them, [Pg 108] and libels against the best of governments. God keep us from both!" Berkeley told the truth. There were not only no free schools, but scarcely any that were not free. Settlers were supposed to be capable of teaching their own children all that it was necessary for them to know. At the wealthiest homes tutors were kept, some of these being younger sons of good families in England who had come to America in an adventurous spirit, while now and then a freed servant who had seen better days was employed in this capacity, as was, a little later, the case in the family of the Washingtons; occasionally the parish clergyman, when fitted for the task, instructed the youth of the district, and here and there a young man was sent to England to take a collegiate course. The upper class as a rule had but meagre scholastic training and few intellectual recreations, the middle class had even a scantier mental equipment, while the poor whites were densely ignorant. Berkeley's bluntly expressed opposition to the education of the masses, as tending to foster political and social independence, perhaps reflected the sentiments of the majority of the ruling order.

In Virginia there was manifested throughout the century an intolerant spirit towards dissenters by both the ruling sects, Puritans and Churchmen. Catholics and Quakers were persecuted, pilloried and fined; but the sturdy Scotch-Irish Presbyterians made a bold stand, and were finally tolerated after a fashion. In Pennsylvania and Maryland there was more religious toleration than elsewhere in the colonies,—the Catholics were in political control until the triumph of William and Mary, when the Protestants came to the front and harassed the Catholics with exorbitant taxes. The turbulent population of North Carolina paid little attention to religious matters throughout the seventeenth century, [Pg 109] although there were some flourishing congregations. There was no settled Episcopal minister there until 1701, and no church until 1702. The majority in South Carolina dissented from the Church of England, the Puritan element holding political power, and it was 1681 before an Episcopal church was built in Charleston; the Huguenots were not at first tolerated, but in 1697 all Protestant sects were guaranteed equal rights.

The negroes and the poor whites formed the criminal class,—a not inconsiderable element in the Southern colonies. The pillory or stocks, whipping post, and ducking-stool were maintained at every county seat, and were familiar objects to all. Paupers, and indeed all persons receiving public relief, were compelled to wear conspicuous badges.

The colonists, like their brothers across sea, were eager politicians, and their political methods were much the same as in the mother-country. Attempts upon the part of England to regulate the raising and selling of tobacco, in connection with the general policy of commercial and industrial control, led to frequent quarrels with the home government, which were harassing enough to the Americans, but served their purpose as a school of legislative resistance. The gentlemen controlled colonial affairs, but found efficient support in the middle class; to these two classes suffrage was for the most part restricted.

The political organization throughout the South was closely patterned after that of England, the governor standing for the king, the council for the House of Lords, and the assembly or house of burgesses for the Commons. There were four sources of [Pg 110] revenue: (1) quit-rents, payable to the king or the proprietors; (2) export and port duties, for the benefit of the provincial government; (3) any duties levied by and for the assembly; (4) regular parish, county, and provincial levies. The last mentioned were payable in tobacco, and the others as might be specified. The system of taxation was simple, and was based chiefly on lands and negroes; it was moderate in extent, but not always paid cheerfully,—in North Carolina, especially, there was chronic objection to taxes in any form.

The salaries of the government officials were small; but the governor—who was the executive officer, and might lawfully have ruled his little realm in most despotic fashion, had not the assembly, as the holder of the purse-strings, continually kept him in check—considered the salary a small part of his income. By farming the quit-rents, taking fees for patenting lands, and assessing office-holders, he reaped a rich harvest. Broken-down court favorites considered an appointment to the colonies as governor a means of retrieving fallen fortunes, and made little attempt to conceal their sordid purpose. The members of the council were often admitted to a share of the spoils, and official morality was much of the time in a low condition.

Thus we see that in the Southern colonies, in the year 1700, there were three sharply-defined social grades among the whites,—the upper class, the middle class, and the indented servants; with a caste still lower than the lowest of these, the negro slaves. The status of the bondsmen, both white and black, was morally and socially wretched, and from them sprang the criminal class: the former were the basis of the "poor white trash," which remains to-day a degenerating influence in the South. The presence of degraded laborers made all labor dishonorable, and trade was held in contempt [Pg 111] by the country gentleman. The economic condition was bad, there were practically no manufactures, the methods of the planters were wasteful, there prevailed a wretched system of barter based on a fluctuating crop, and finances were unsettled. The manners even of the upper class were often coarse, while those of the lowest whites were not seldom brutal. The people were clannish and narrow, having little communication or sympathy with the outer world. Political power was for the most part in the hands of the aristocratic planters, backed by the middle class; the people at large exercised but slight control over public affairs. Religion was at a low ebb, especially in the established church; Bishop Meade says, "There was not only defective preaching, but, as might be expected, most evil living among the clergy." The professions of law and medicine were scarcely recognized. In looking back upon the life of the Southern colonists at this time we cannot but consider their social, economic, and moral condition as poor indeed; but it must be remembered that there was latent in them a sturdy vitality; these men were of lusty English stock, and when the crisis came, a half century later, they were of the foremost in the ranks and the councils of the Revolution.

CHAPTER VI.

THE COLONIZATION OF NEW ENGLAND. (1620-1643).

Bibliographies.—Winsor, III. 244-256, 283-294; Larned, Literature of American History, 72-92; Avery, II. 421-423; Andrews, Colonial Self-Government, ch. xx.; Green, Provincial America, ch. xix.; M. Wilson, Reading List on Colonial New England; Channing and Hart, Guide, §§ 109-123.

Historical Maps.—No. 2, this volume (Epoch Maps, No. 2); Doyle, Colonies, II.; MacCoun, Winsor, and school histories already cited.

General Accounts.—J. Palfrey, New England, I. 47-268; Winsor, III. chs. vii.-ix.; Doyle, II. chs. i.-vii.; Osgood, Colonies; Lodge, Colonies, 341-351, 373-375, 385-387, 397, 398; Avery, II. chs. v.-viii.; Andrews and Greene, as above, passim; Channing, United States, I. ch. xiv.; B. James, New England; G. Bancroft, I. 177-288; Hildreth, I. chs. vi., vii., ix.; Fiske, Beginnings of New England, I. chs. i.-iii.; Eggleston, Beginners of a Nation; L. Mathews, Expansion of New England, chs. i.-iii.

Special Histories.—Ellis, Puritan Age and Rule; E. Byington, Puritans in England and New England, and Puritan as Colonist and Reformer; D. Campbell, Puritan in Holland, England, and America; M. Dexter, Story of the Pilgrims; J. Brown, Pilgrim Fathers; W. Cockshott, Pilgrim Fathers; F. Noble, Pilgrims; J. Goodwin, Pilgrim Republic; D. Howe, Puritan Republic.—Massachusetts: W. Northend, Bay Colony; B. Adams, Emancipation of Massachusetts; C. F. Adams, Three Episodes of Massachusetts History; Winsor, Memorial History of Boston; H. Lodge, Boston.—Connecticut: C. Levermore, Republic of New Haven; E. Atwater, New Haven Colony; Andrews, River Towns of Connecticut; C. Orr, Pequot War; state histories by Johnston (Commonwealths), [Pg 113] Trumbull, and Morgan.—Rhode Island: I. Richman, Rhode Island: its Making and its Meaning; Arnold, Field, and Richman (Commonwealths).—New Hampshire: Belknap and Sanborn (Commonwealths).—Maine: Williamson.

Contemporary Accounts.—Morton, New England's Memorial (1669); Bradford, Plymouth Plantation; Winthrop, New England; Johnson, Wonder-Working Providence; Wood, New England's Prospect; New England's First-Fruits; Shepard, Autobiography.—Reprints: Force, Tracts; Arber, Pilgrim Colonists; Young, Chronicles of Pilgrim Fathers, and Chronicles of Massachusetts; Jameson, Original Narratives; American History told by Contemporaries, I. part v.; and the many publications of colonial and town record commissions, state and local historical and antiquarian societies, Prince Society, Gorges Society, etc.

It will be remembered that the commercial company chartered by King James I. (1606) to colonize Virginia, as all of English America was then styled, consisted of two divisions,—the London (or South Virginia) Company, and the Plymouth (or North Virginia) Company. We have seen how the London Company planted a settlement at Jamestown, and what came of it. The Plymouth Company was not at first so successful. The Popham colony. In 1607, the same year that Jamestown was founded, the Plymouth people—urged thereto by two of their members, Sir Ferdinando Gorges, governor of the port of Plymouth, and Sir John Popham, chief-justice of England—sent out a party of one hundred and twenty colonists to the mouth of the Kennebec, headed by George Popham, brother of Sir John; but the following winter was exceptionally severe, many died, among them Popham, and the survivors were glad of an opportunity to get back to England (1608).

In 1614 John Smith, after five years of quiet life in England, made a voyage to North Virginia as the agent and partner of some London merchants, and returned with a profitable cargo of fish and furs. The most notable result of his voyage, however, was the fact that he gave the title of New [Pg 114] England to the northern coast, and upon many of the harbors he discovered, Prince Charles bestowed names of English seaports. During the next half-dozen years there were several voyages of exploration to New England, its fisheries became important, and some detailed knowledge of the coast was obtained; but its colonization was not advanced.

Chief among the patrons of these enterprises was Sir Ferdinando Gorges. In 1620 Gorges and his associates secured a new and independent charter for the Plymouth Company, usually known as the Council for New England, wherein that corporation was granted the country between the fortieth and forty-eighth degrees of latitude,—from about Long Branch, N. J., to the Bay of Chaleurs. The region received in this charter the name which Smith had bestowed upon it,—New England. To the company, consisting of forty patentees, was given the monopoly of trade within the grant, and its income was to be derived from the letting or selling of its exclusive rights to individual or corporate adventurers. It had power, also, both to establish and to govern colonies. But the enterprise lacked capital and popular support. Virginia, founded as an outlet for victims of economic distress in England, appeared to absorb all those who cared to devote either money or energy to the planting of America. The reorganized Plymouth Company would doubtless have waited many years for settlements upon its lands, had not aid come from an unexpected source.

The persecution of a religious sect led to the permanent planting of New England. The English Protestants under Elizabeth may be roughly divided into several groups: (1) The great majority of the people, including most of the rich and titled, adhered to the Church of England; as the "establishment," [Pg 115] or State religion, it retained much of the Catholic ritual and creed, but with many important omissions and modifications. (2) Besides the Catholics, few and oppressed, there was a distinct class who wished to stay the progress of the Reformation and more closely to follow Rome. (3) The Puritans sought to alter the forms of the church in the other direction, but they were themselves divided into two camps: (a) the conformists, who would go further than the establishment in purifying the State religion and in rejecting Romish forms, yet were content to remain and attempt their reforms within the folds of the Church; and (b) the dissenters, who had withdrawn from the Church of England and would have no communion with it. The dissenters were themselves divided: (1) there were those who wished to be ruled by elders, on the Presbyterian plan, such as had been introduced by Calvin and his followers in Switzerland and France, by Zwingli in Switzerland and Germany, and by John Knox in Scotland; then there were (2) the Independents, or Separatists, who would have each congregation self-governing in religious affairs,—a system in vogue in some parts of Germany. "Seeing they could not have the Word freely preached, and the sacraments administered without idolatrous gear, they concluded to break off from public churches, and separate in private houses." Sometimes the Separatists were called Brownists, after one of their prominent teachers, Robert Browne. The Presbyterians and Independents were alike few in number in Elizabeth's time; but as the result of persecution under James I., and the impossibility of obtaining concessions to the demand for reform, these sects steadily gained strength. The Independents in particular were harshly treated, so that many fled to Holland, where there was religious toleration for all; and from this branch of the Separatists came the Pilgrims, who first colonized New England.

Among those who thus departed to a strange land, to dwell among a people with habits and speech foreign to theirs, were about one hundred yeomen and artisans, members of the Independent congregation at Scrooby, a village on the border between Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire. Headed by their wise and excellent minister, John Robinson, and the ruling elder of the church, William Brewster, the party first settled at Amsterdam (1608), The Independents in Holland. but early the following year moved to Leyden. Here, joined by many other refugees, they lived for ten years, laboring in whatever capacities they could obtain employment.

They lived peacefully enough in Holland, free from religious restraints, but remained Englishmen at heart; they saw with dissatisfaction, as the years went on, that there was no chance for material improvement in Leyden, and that their children were being made foreigners. After long deliberation they resolved to emigrate again, this time to America, far removed from their old persecutors, and there in the wilderness to rear a New England, where they might live under English laws, speak their native tongue, train their children in English thought and habits, establish godly ways, and perchance better their temporal condition. Mingled with these aspirations was a desire to lay "some good foundation, or at least make some way thereunto, for ye propagating & advancing ye gospell of ye kingdom of Christ in those remote parts of ye world; yea, though they should be but even as stepping-stones unto others for ye performing of so great a work."

Obtaining a grant of land from the London (South Virginia) Company, and a promise from the king that [Pg 117] they should not be disturbed in their proposed colony if they behaved properly, the emigrants sailed from Leyden to Southampton, where they were to take passage for the New World. These Pilgrims, as they styled themselves, were about one hundred in number, and under the excellent guidance of Brewster, Robinson remaining behind with the majority of the congregation, who had decided to await the result of the experiment.

Possessing little beyond their capacity to labor, the Pilgrims had found it necessary to make the best bargain possible with a number of London capitalists for transportation and supplies. A stock partnership was formed, with shares at ten pounds each, each emigrant being deemed equivalent to a certain amount of cash subscription; all over sixteen years of age were counted as equal to one share, and a sliding scale covered the cases of children and those who furnished themselves with supplies. All except those so provided drew necessaries from the common stock. There was to be a community of trade, property, and labor for seven years, at the end of which time the corporation was to disband, and the assets were to be distributed among the shareholders. The entire capital stock at the beginning was seven thousand pounds, from a quarter to a fifth of this being represented by the persons of the emigrants. The London partners sent out several laborers on their account.

The voyage of the "Mayflower" is one of the most familiar events in American history. Its companion vessel, the "Speedwell," was obliged to return to England because of an accident, and thus several of the original company remained behind. The adventurers first saw land on the ninth of November; it was the low, sandy spit of Cape Cod. Their purpose had been to settle in the domain of the South Virginia [Pg 118] Company, somewhere between the Hudson and the Delaware; but fate happily willed otherwise. The captain, thought to be in the pay of the Dutch, who were trading on the Hudson, professed to be unable to proceed farther southward because of contrary winds. After beating up and down the bay between the cape and the mainland, and exploring the coast here and there, the Pilgrims landed at a spot "fit for situation" (Dec. 22, 1620).

With true English instinct for combination against unruly elements, the Pilgrims had (November 11), while lying off Cape Cod, formed themselves into a body politic under a social compact. This notable document read as follows: "We whose names are under-writen, the loyall subjects of our dread soveraigne Lord, King James, by ye grace of God of Great Britaine, Franc, & Ireland king, defender of ye faith, &c., haveing undertaken, for ye glorie of God and advancemente of ye Christian faith, and honour of our king and countrie, a voyage to plant ye first colonie in ye Northerne parts of Virginia, doe by these presents solemnly and mutualy in ye presence of God, and one of another, covenant and combine ourselves togeather into a civill body politick, for our better ordering and preservation and furtherance of ye ends aforesaid; and by vertue hearof to enacte, constitute, and frame such just and equall lawes, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meete and convenient for ye generall good of ye Colonie, unto which we promise all due submission and obedience."

The compact was signed by the adult males of the company, forty-one in number, only twelve of whom bore the title of "Master," or "Mr.,"—then of some significance. They elected Deacon John Carver as their first governor, styled the place where they landed Plymouth, [Pg 119] and entered upon the serious business of building New England.

An exceptionally mild winter had opened, yet it was with difficulty that they could provide adequate shelter for themselves, much less secure comfortable quarters. The stock of food they had brought with them soon failed, and what was left was not wholesome; in consequence of hunger and exposure, sickness ensued, and about one half of the company died. Among those who succumbed was Governor Carver; in his place was chosen William Bradford, who held the office for twelve years, was the historian of the colony, and until his death (1657) the leading man among his people. Those who survived this terrible ordeal were so few and feeble that under ordinary conditions the Indians could readily have massacred them. But owing to a pestilence which, a few years before, had wasted the New England coast tribes, it was many years before the aborigines were strong enough seriously to annoy the Plymouth colonists.

Had the Pilgrims been ordinary colonists, they would no doubt have abandoned their settlement and returned in the vessel that brought them. But they were of sterner stuff than the men who succumbed to less hardship at Roanoke and on the Kennebec, and their religious conviction nerved them to a grim task which they believed to be God-given. It was not for faint-hearts to found a new Canaan.

In November, 1621, fifty more of the Leyden congregation came out. By this time the people of Plymouth had, amid many sore trials, erected log-houses enough for their use, built a rude fort on the hill overlooking the settlement, made a clearing of twenty-six acres, and had laid by enough provisions and fuel for the winter. But the addition to the number of mouths materially decreased the per capita allotment of rations.

[Pg 120] The Pilgrims having settled upon land for which they had no grant, it had become necessary for the London adventurers, who backed the enterprise, to secure a patent from the reorganized Plymouth Company. That company was working under a charter from the king as the feudal lord, giving it privileges of settlement, trade, and government; rights to colonize and trade, it was authorized to parcel out to others, in the form of patents, and a document of this character was issued to the adventurers in May, 1621.

The industrial system inaugurated at Plymouth was, like that adopted for Jamestown, pure communism. The governor and assistants organized the settlers into a working band, all produce going into a common stock, from which the wants of the people were first supplied: the surplus to be the profit of the corporation. As in the case of Jamestown, the London partners were not pleased with the results of the speculation, and in harshly expressing their dissatisfaction soon fell into a wordy dispute with the colonists.

Thirty-five new settlers came out in the autumn of 1622, and thereafter nearly every year brought increase in the number; but the partners failed to ship supplies with the new-comers, deeming it proper that the colony should be self-supporting; and this neglect still further strained existing relations.

In 1624 the communal system was partially abandoned, each freeman being allowed one acre as a permanent holding. This land was to be as close to the town as possible; for the climatic conditions, the necessity for protection against Indians, and the desire for ease of assemblage at worship, made it [Pg 121] important that the settlement should be compact,—in sharp distinction to the scattered river-side plantations of the South. In 1627 each household was granted twenty acres as a private allotment; but for many years there existed as well a system of common tillage and pasturage similar to that with which the colonists were familiar in the English villages. About the same time (1627) the colonists purchased the interest of their London partners for eighteen hundred pounds, and became wholly independent of dictation from England.

Up to this time many of the new colonists were sent or selected by the London shareholders, and were not always congenial to the Pilgrims. It now rested with them to invite whom they might; and as a result many of their faith from England were brought over. In 1643 there were three thousand inhabitants in the eight distinct towns comprising Plymouth colony; there were also several independent trading and fishing stations along the coast established under the auspices of the Plymouth Company. The colony was beyond the danger of abandonment.

The early history of Plymouth is a story full of painful details of suffering. It was a long time before the people became inured to the rigorous climate; the tedious winters were often seasons of much hardship and privation. The life they led was toilsome, but they bore up under it bravely.

The original colonists were kind and considerate to the aborigines, and for many years were the firm friends and allies of Massasoit, head chief of the Pokanokets, whose lands they had occupied. Whites were not always as comfortable neighbors as the savages. Thomas Weston, one of the London partners, sent out (1622) an independent colony of seventy men to Wessaugusset, about twenty-five miles north of [Pg 122] Plymouth. They were an idle, riotous set, and after making serious trouble with the Indians, a year or two later returned to England. Relations with white neighbors. In 1623, Robert Gorges, son of Ferdinando, was appointed governor-general of the country by the Council for New England, and in person attempted to form a colony upon land patented to him "on the northeast side of Massachusetts Bay," but soon abandoned his enterprise and returned home. In 1625, Captain Wollaston appeared with a number of indented white servants and started a colony on the site of the Quincy of to-day. But this form of slave labor not being suited to the democratic conditions of New England life, Wollaston took his servants to the more congenial climate of Virginia, and his plant was taken possession of by his partner, Thomas Morton, who styled the settlement Merrymount. Morton was much disliked by the Puritans, who were scandalized at his free-and-easy habits, regarded the apparently innocent sports in which he encouraged his people as "beastly practices," and charged him with the really serious offence of selling rum and firearms to the natives. The Plymouth militia dispersed the merrymakers and sent Morton to England (1628).

Several Church of England men, representatives of Robert Gorges,—who had a patent for a strip of territory ten miles coastwise and thirty miles inland,—had come out in 1623, among them William Blackstone, settling on Shawmut peninsula, now Boston, Thomas Walford at Charlestown, and Samuel Maverick at Chelsea. Blackstone afterwards vacated his peninsula in favor of the Puritans of Charlestown. Maverick, in his palisaded fort, was a man of importance, and afterwards a royal commissioner to the colonies. There was also a small trading station at the mouth of the Piscataqua, and another at Nantasket, with here and there an individual [Pg 123] plantation. With most of these the Plymouth people had business relations, but little else in common.

Plymouth was at first governed in primary assembly with a governor and assistants elected by popular vote. As the colony grew and new towns were organized by compact bodies of people detaching themselves from the parent settlement, it became inconvenient for all of the people frequently to assemble in Plymouth. The representative system was adopted in 1638, each township sending two delegates to an administrative body called the General Court, in which the governor and assistants also sat. It was some years later before the General Court was given law-making powers, this privilege being retained by the whole body of freemen. For sixteen years the laws of England were in vogue, but in 1636 a code of simple regulations was adopted, more especially suited to the community. The assistants, with the aid of the jury, tried cases as well as aided the governor in the conduct of public affairs. Purely local matters were managed by primary assemblies in the several towns, and petty cases were tried by town magistrates.

Many features of American government and character may be readily traced to the influence of Plymouth. It was the first permanent colony in New England; it had become well established before another was planted, and therefore served in some sense as a model for its successors. It was a community of Independents acting without a charter, working out their own career practically free from royal supervision or veto, and with an elective governor and council. The Plymouth people were closely knit: their struggle for existence had been hard, and it had taught them the value of solidarity; they set the example of a compact religious brotherhood; they were [Pg 124] good traders, cultivated peace with the Indian tribes, and advanced their towns only so fast as they needed room for growth and could hold and cultivate the land. In many respects Plymouth may be regarded as a modern American State in embryo.

Three several times (1618, 1676-77, and 1690-91) the colony endeavored, as a measure of self-defence, to obtain a charter from the Crown; but failed in each application,—at first through the influence of the prelates, and afterwards because of the jealousy of its neighbors. Finally, in 1691, Plymouth was incorporated with Massachusetts and lost its identity.

The Plymouth Company did business in a rather haphazard Way. Land-grants were freely made to all manner of speculators, many of them members of the corporation, with little or no regard to the geography of New England. These grants were dealt out to third parties, often with a lordly indifference to previous patents. The result was that holdings frequently overlapped each other, giving rise to boundary quarrels which lasted through several generations of claimants.

In 1623, an association of merchants in Dorchester, England, sent out a party to form a colony near the mouth of the Kennebec, where they had fishing interests. The master, however, landed his men at Cape Ann, in Massachusetts Bay, the site of the present Gloucester. Roger Conant, who, withdrawing from Plymouth "out of dislike of their principles of rigid separation," had made an independent settlement at Cape Ann, was appointed local manager for [Pg 125] the Dorchester merchants. In 1626 the merchants abandoned their colony as unprofitable, most of the settlers returning to England; and Conant led those remaining to Salem, then called Naumkeag.

John White, a conforming Puritan rector at Dorchester, determined to make this settlement of Dorchester men a success. To the settlers at Naumkeag he sent urgent advice to stay, while at home he set on foot a movement which resulted in a definite scheme of colonization. The arbitrary policy of Charles I. towards dissenters had greatly alarmed the Puritans, and White's plan of "raising a bulwark against the kingdom of Antichrist" in America had the support of many wealthy and influential men.

In 1628, six persons, heading the movement, obtained from the Plymouth Company a patent for a strip about sixty miles wide along the coast,—from three miles south of Charles River to three miles north of the Merrimack, and westward to the Pacific Ocean, which in those days was thought to be not much farther away than the river discovered by Hendrik Hudson in 1609. This patent conflicted with grants already issued (1622 and 1623) to Sir Ferdinando Gorges, his son Robert, and John Mason, of whom we shall hear later on.

In September, 1628, John Endicott, gentleman, one of the patentees, arrived at Salem with sixty persons, to reinforce the colony already there, and supersede Conant. The following spring, the patentees being organized as a trading company, the king granted them a charter styling the corporation the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England; their only relationship to the Plymouth Company was now that of purchasers of a tract of the latter's land.

[Pg 126] Under this trading charter the whole body of freemen, or members of the company, was to elect annually a governor, a deputy-governor, and eighteen assistants, who were to meet monthly to perform such public duties as might be imposed upon them by the quarterly meeting of the company, or "Quarter Court." There was also to be an annual meeting, known as "General Court," or "Court of Elections." Laws were to be adopted by the general assembly of "freemen,"—that is, of stockholders,—not contrary to the established laws of England. Endicott was continued as governor of the colony, which was at once recruited by three hundred and eighty men and women of the better grade of colonizing material.

Although the company was chartered as a trading corporation, its principal object was not gain, but to found a religious commonwealth. It was composed of men of rare ability and tact, as well as of consummate courage. Among them were members of parliament, diplomats, state officials, and some of the brightest and most liberal-minded clergymen in England. The church which they set up in Salem was not at first avowedly Separatist, like that of Plymouth; it was simply a purified English church, with a system of faith and discipline such as they had long insisted upon in the ranks of the mother-church. But under the circumstances this purified church was as independent in its character as the professedly Separatist congregations of Plymouth; and it was not long, as one step led to another, and persecution hurried them on, before the Massachusetts Puritans were, like their brethren in England, full-fledged Independents.

Soon there was taken the most important step of all. The Massachusetts company, in the desire for still greater independence, removed its seat of government to the [Pg 127] colony, thus boldly transforming itself, without legal sanction, from an English trading company into an American colonial government. In April, 1630, eleven vessels went out to Massachusetts Bay, with a large company of English reformers; and during the year there crossed over to America not less than a thousand English men and women who had found the arbitrary rule of Charles quite unbearable. Character of the founders. John Winthrop, a wealthy Suffolk gentleman forty-two years of age, and one of the strongest and most lovable characters in American history, was the first governor under the new arrangement. Thomas Dudley, the deputy, was a stern and uncompromising Puritan, cold and narrow-minded. Francis Higginson, the first teacher, who had come over with Endicott, but died in 1630, was a Cambridge alumnus who had lost his church in Leicestershire because of nonconformity. Skelton, the pastor, was also a Cambridge man.

There were now too many people assembled at the port of Salem for the supply of food, and sickness and hunger prevailed to such an alarming degree that many died in consequence. It became necessary to divide, and independent congregations were established, on the Salem model, at Charlestown, Cambridge, Watertown, Roxbury, and later at Boston, which soon became the capital of the colony (September, 1630). Morton, who had returned to Merrymount, was again driven from the country; Sir Christopher Gardiner, a disturbing element among the settlers, was obliged to withdraw to the Piscataqua: the Puritans now held Massachusetts Bay, and brooked no rival claimants. In [Pg 128] establishing this commonwealth in America, the Puritan founders were determined to have things their own way.

It was early decided by the General Court (1631) that none but church members should be admitted as freemen. Four times a year the freemen were to meet in quarter court, and with them the governor, his deputy, and the assistants. But, as in Plymouth, it was found after a time that the towns and the freemen had so multiplied that this primary assemblage became inconvenient. In 1630 the assistants were given the power to elect the governor and deputy governor, and also to make laws. Then it came about that in certain cases the control of the colony was in the hands of only five of the assistants, which made the government almost oligarchical. The cap-sheaf was applied when (1631) it was ordered that the assistants were to hold office so long as the freemen did not remove them.

That same year, however, came a vigorous protest against this autocratic rule. The Watertown freemen declined to pay a tax of £60, levied by the assistants for fortifications built at Cambridge. It was argued that a people who submitted to taxation without representation were in danger of "bringing themselves and posterity into bondage." The next General Court accepted this plea as valid, and a House of Representatives was inaugurated on the plan of the English Commons, each town sending two deputies, and the governor and assistants sitting as members.

For a time the freemen resumed the right of election of governor and deputy-governor, but soon handed this duty over to the representatives. Voting by ballot was introduced in 1634, and the freemen, who had become annoyed at threats from England of interference with their charter, asserted their [Pg 129] independence of the official class by rebuking the assistants, turning Winthrop out of office, electing Dudley as governor, making new rules for the election of deputies, providing for an oath of allegiance to the colony, and placing their representative system on an enduring foundation. Ten years later (1644), as the result of a quarrel between the assistants and the deputies, growing out of a petty civil suit over a lost pig, the colonial parliament became bicameral, the assistants forming one house, and the deputies the other.

There had been a healthy renewal of immigration to Massachusetts in 1633 because of increased harshness towards Puritans in England, and a number of strong men,—such as Sir Henry Vane and Hugh Peter,—destined to play no inconsiderable part in the history of America and England, were among the new arrivals. There were other Puritans higher in the social scale who would have liked to come,—such as Lord Say and Sele, and Lord Brook; but their proposition (1636) that an hereditary order of nobility be established in the province, did not meet with popular favor; a desire to be free from such distinctions was one of the causes which had impelled thousands to flee to America. A little later (1638) the freemen put down another attempt at aristocratic rule,—a movement looking to the establishment of a permanent council, whose members were to hold for life or until removed for cause.

In 1634 the colony, now firmly planted with free English institutions in full force, contained about four thousand inhabitants, resident in sixteen towns. The old log-houses of the first settlers were gradually giving way to commodious frame structures with gambrel roofs and generous gables. The [Pg 130] fields were being fenced, roads laid out between the towns, and watercourses bridged; and the farms were beginning to take on an air of prosperity. Goats, cattle, and swine abounded. Adventurous trading skippers, often in home-made boats, had cautiously worked their way through Long Island Sound as far as the Dutch settlements at New York, and up the coast to the Piscataqua, doing a small business by barter. Salt fish, furs, and lumber were exported to England, the vessels bringing back manufactured articles; for as yet the industries of New England were few and crude.

The Massachusetts colonists were for the most part middle-class Englishmen, and education was general among them. Many were graduates of Cambridge, and the clergymen had, as conscientious Reformers seeing no hope of improvement in the English Church, abandoned comfortable livings at home to take charge of rude Independent meeting-houses in America. In 1636, an appropriation of £400—a very large sum, considering the means of the province—was made by the General Court to found a college at Cambridge, that "the light of learning might not go out, nor the study of God's Word perish." Two years later (1638) the Rev. John Harvard, a graduate of Emmanuel College, who had come out in 1637, dying, left his library and a legacy of £800 to the new institution of learning, "towards the erecting of a college;" and the Court decreed that it should bear his name. For two centuries the college continued to receive grants from the commonwealth.

While the colonists were thus bravely making progress in laying the foundations of liberal institutions in America, there were troubles brewing both at home and abroad. The uncongenial spirits whom they had driven from Massachusetts [Pg 131] Bay made complaints in England of the ill-treatment they had received, and carried to Archbishop Laud and other members of the Privy Council reports that the Puritans were setting up in America a practically independent state and church. As an immediate consequence, emigrants, early in 1634, were not permitted to go to New England without taking the royal oath of allegiance and promising to conform to the Book of Common Prayer.

In April a royal commission of twelve persons was appointed, ostensibly to take charge of all the American colonies, secure conformity, and even to revoke charters; but it was well understood that Massachusetts was especially aimed at. The Massachusetts people were speedily ordered to lay their charter before the Privy Council. Their answer, however, was withheld, pending prayerful consideration. Meanwhile Dorchester, Charlestown, and Castle Island were fortified; a military commission was set to work to collect and store arms; militiamen were drilled; arrangements were made on Beacon Hill, in Boston, for signalling the inhabitants of the interior in case of an attack; the people were ordered on pain of death, in the event of war, to obey the military authorities, and no longer to swear allegiance to the Crown, but to the colony of Massachusetts.

But the men of the colony were politic as well as pugnacious, and despatched Winslow to England to make peace with the authorities. While he was in London, in February, 1635, the Plymouth Company surrendered its charter to the king, with the condition that the latter should annul all existing titles in New England, and partition the country in severalty among the members of the Plymouth council. In accordance with this arrangement, a writ of quo warranto [Pg 132] was issued against the Massachusetts charter, it was declared null and void, and Gorges was authorized to be viceregal governor of New England.

Winslow was imprisoned in England for four months for having broken the ecclesiastical law in celebrating marriages in the Plymouth colony, but upon his release did good diplomatic work and neutralized much of the opposition. Meanwhile, another and stricter order was sent out to the Massachusetts Company to surrender its charter. This again was met by silence and renewed military preparations. English Puritans were at this time attempting to leave for America in great numbers, on account of acts of royal tyranny. The difficulty with the Scotch Church ensued, and by 1640 the Long Parliament was in session. In the excitement occasioned by the Puritan rising in the mother-land, the day of punishment for Massachusetts was postponed.

The opposition at home, occasioned by differences in religious belief, was not, however, so easily thrust aside. Roger Williams, an able and learned, but bigoted young Welshman, a graduate from Pembroke College, Cambridge, came out to Plymouth in 1631. His tongue was too bold to suit the English ecclesiastical authorities, and to gain peace he had been obliged to depart for the colonies. In 1633 he went to Salem, where he became pastor of the church. Williams was fond of abstruse metaphysical discussion, and he was an extremist in thought, speech, and action; but while his arguments were phrased in such manner as often to make it difficult for us to understand him, the views he held were in the main what we style modern. He opposed the union of church and state, such as obtained in Massachusetts, [Pg 133] where political power was exercised only by members of the congregation; he was opposed to enforced attendance on church, and would have done away with all contributions for religious purposes which were not purely voluntary. Such doctrines were, however, held to be dangerous to the commonwealth; and indeed expression of them would not at that time have been permitted in England nor in many parts of Continental Europe. But this was not all. Williams in a pamphlet pronounced it as his solemn judgment that the king was an intruder, and had no right to grant American lands to the colonists; that honest patents could only be procured from the Indians by purchase; and that all existing titles were therefore invalid. This was deemed downright treason, which he was compelled by the magistrates to recant. At Salem, Endicott, who was one of his disciples, became so heated under his pastor's teachings that, in token of his hatred of the symbols of Rome, he cut the cross of St. George from the English ensign. The General Court, greatly alarmed lest these proceedings should anger the king, reprimanded Endicott; and, because of his "divers new and dangerous opinions," ordered Williams (January, 1636) to return to England. The latter escaped, and passed the winter in missionary service among the Indians. In the spring, privately aided by the lenient Winthrop, the troublesome agitator passed south, with five of his followers, to Narragansett Bay, and there established Providence Plantation.

Mrs. Anne Hutchinson arrived in Boston from England in the autumn of 1634. She was a woman of brilliant parts, but impetuous and indiscreet, and by instinct an agitator. Her religious views are described by Winthrop as containing "two dangerous errors,—first, that the person of the Holy Ghost dwells in a justified person; second, [Pg 134] that no sanctification can help to evidence to us our justification." This is cloudy to a modern layman. The theory is styled Antinomian by its enemies, and was substantially as follows: Any person in a "state of grace" or "justification" is at the same time "sanctified;" since he is both justified and sanctified, the person of the Holy Ghost dwells in his heart, and his acts cannot in the nature of things partake of sin: therefore he need have no great concern about the outward aspect of his works. This doctrine was contrary to that entertained by the Puritans, who believed that a person must be first justified by faith, and then sanctified by works. They thought the Antinomian dogma open to pernicious interpretation, and not conducive to the welfare of society. Its advocacy threw Boston into a great ferment.

Mrs. Hutchinson soon had a large following, among whom were Wheelwright, John Cotton, and Thomas Hooker, of the ministers; while among laymen who were well inclined towards her doctrine was the younger Henry Vane, then governor of the colony, who was in later years to become prominent as one of the leaders in the English Commonwealth. In the conditions then existing in Massachusetts Mrs. Hutchinson's teachings were considered dangerous to the State; they opposed the authority of the ecclesiastical rulers, and this tended to breed civil dissension. One of her supporters, Greensmith, was fined £40 by the General Court (March, 1637) for publicly declaring that all the preachers except Cotton, Wheelwright, and Thomas Hooker taught a covenant of works instead of a covenant of grace, the difference between which, the layman Winthrop said, "no man could tell, except some few who knew the bottom of the matter." At the same time Wheelwright was found guilty of sedition because in a sermon he had counselled his hearers to fight for their liberties, but with weapons spiritual, not [Pg 135] carnal. When the Boston church supported their minister, the Court responded by voting to hold its next meeting at Newtown (Cambridge), where it might deliberate amid quieter surroundings than at Boston.

When the Court of Election met at Newtown (May, 1637), Vane and his friends were, in the course of a tumultuous session, dropped out of the government, Winthrop was again chosen governor, and the uncompromising heretic-hater Dudley deputy-governor. Vane departed for England in disgust, never to return. For a time it seemed as if peace had come under the politic Winthrop, and the Hutchinsonians gave evidences of a desire to compromise. In a few months, however, the Court re-opened the whole controversy by legislating against all new-comers who were tainted with heresy. The old warfare broke out again. The charges of sedition against Wheelwright were renewed, he was banished, and fled, with a few adherents, to the Piscataqua.

Mrs. Hutchinson was placed on trial (November, 1637) and commanded to leave the colony, which she did in March following, and went to Rhode Island. Seventy-six of her followers were disarmed, some were disfranchised, others fined, and still others "desired and obtained license to remove themselves and their families out of the jurisdiction." Quiet once more prevailed. Wheelwright recanted after a time, and was permitted to resume his habitation in Boston; and many others of the disaffected were finally restored to citizenship.

The little commonwealth had been shaken to its foundations by a controversy which to-day—-when religion and politics are separated, to the advantage of both—would be considered of small moment even in one of our rural villages; but the State and the Church were one in the colony of Massachusetts, [Pg 136] and ecclesiastical contumacy was political contumacy as well. Under such conditions there could safely be neither liberty of opinion nor of speech; the welfare of a government thus constituted lay in stern repression. The suppression and banishment of Roger Williams and Mrs. Hutchinson were eminently successful in restoring order and public security, in the train of which came increased immigration and greater prosperity.

While these things were going on in Boston and Newtown, warfare of another sort was in progress to the south. In 1635 residents of Massachusetts made a settlement on the Connecticut river, on the site of Windsor, above the Dutch fort at Hartford; and later in the same year another party, under John Winthrop the younger, built Saybrook, at the mouth of the stream. These Connecticut settlements formed an outpost in the heart of the Indian country, and trouble was inevitable.

At last the attitude of the Pequods, the tribe occupying the lower portion of the Connecticut valley, became unbearable; they interfered with immigrants going overland, and rendered trade by sea dangerous. They endeavored to enlist the sympathy of the Narragansetts in their forays. Could these tribes have formed a coalition, it seems likely that the New England colonists, then few and weak, must have been driven into the sea. Roger Williams, bearing no malice towards his old enemies in Massachusetts, averted this calamity. As the result of great exertions on his part, the Narragansetts were induced to disregard the overtures of their old enemies, the Pequods, and the Connecticut Indians went alone upon the war-path. They made life [Pg 137] a burden to the settlers in the little towns of Saybrook, Hartford, Windsor, and Wethersfield. An appeal for aid went up from the colonists in the Connecticut valley to Massachusetts and Plymouth, and was promptly answered.

In the little intercolonial army of some three hundred men, Captains John Mason of Windsor and John Underhill of Massachusetts were the leading figures. The Pequods were surprised in their chief town (May 20, 1637), the walls of which were burned by the whites, while volleys of musketry were poured into the crowd of savages, who huddled together in great fear. Says Underhill, "It is reported by themselves that there were about four hundred souls in this fort, and not above five of them escaped out of our hands;" others report that seven hundred Pequods fell on that terrible day. Of the besiegers but two were killed, though a quarter of the force were wounded. From this scene of slaughter the victorious colonists marched through the rest of the enemy's territory, burning wigwams and granaries, taking some of the survivors prisoners, to be sold into slavery, and so thoroughly scattering the others that the Pequod tribe never reorganized; the expedition had thoroughly uprooted it.

For more than ten years after the planting of Massachusetts the magistrates dispensed justice according to their understanding of right and wrong; there were no statutes, neither had the English common law been officially recognized, except so far as it was understood that Englishmen carried the law of their land with them in emigrating to America. "In the year 1634," says Hutchinson, "the plantation was greatly increased, settlements were extended more than thirty [Pg 138] miles from the capital town, and it was thought high time to have known established laws, that the inhabitants might no longer be subject to the varying uncertain judgments which otherwise would be made concerning their actions. The ministers and some of the principal laymen were consulted with about a body of laws suited to the circumstances of the colony, civil and religious. Committees of magistrates and elders were appointed" from year to year by the General Court, but it was not until 1641 that a body of statutes was finally adopted.

The influence of the clergy is well illustrated in the fact that the two codes finally submitted were the work of ministers,—John Cotton of Boston, and Nathaniel Ward of Ipswich. The latter's plan, in which he received the aid of Winthrop and others of the elders, was adopted in 1641, under the title of The Body of Liberties. In England, Ward had at one time been a barrister, and was well read in the common law, on which his code was mainly based, although it also contained many features of the law of Moses. Equal justice was vouchsafed to all, old or young, freeman or foreigner, master or servant, man or woman; persons and property were to be inviolable except by law; brutes were to be humanely treated; no one was to be tried twice for the same offence; barbarous or cruel punishments were forbidden; public records were to be open for inspection; church regulations were to be enforced by civil courts, and church officers and members were amenable to civil law; the Scriptures were to overrule any custom or prescription; the general rules of judicial proceedings were defined, as were also the privileges and duties of freemen, and the liberties and prerogatives of the churches; public money was to be spent only with the consent of the taxpayers. "There shall be no bond slaverie, villinage or Captivitie [Pg 139] amongst us unles it be lawfull Captives taken in just warres, and such strangers as willingly selle themselves or are sold to us;" but all such were to be allowed "all the liberties and Christian usages which the law of god established in Israell." Notwithstanding this enlightened provision, persons continued to be born and to live and die as slaves within the boundaries of the commonwealth down to 1780. Servants fleeing from the cruelty of their masters were to be protected, and there was to be appeal from parental tyranny. "Everie marryed woeman shall be free from bodilie correction or stripes by her husband, unlesse it be in his owne defence upon her assalt." The capital offences, selected from the Scriptures, were twelve in number; among them were: "(2) If any man or woman be a witch (that is, hath or consulteth with a familiar spirit), they shall be put to death;" and "(12) If any man shall conspire and attempt any invasion, insurrection, or publique rebellion against our commonwealth, ... or shall treacherously and perfediouslie attempt the alteration and subversion of our frame of politie or Government fundamentallie, he shall be put to death." The essence of this Body of Liberties was afterwards incorporated into the formal laws of the colony. It was the foundation of the Massachusetts code.

Massachusetts was the first large colony in New England. Its people were educated, and as a rule of a higher social grade than those of Plymouth. Under a charter which contained many very liberal provisions, a highly organized government was developed, which served as a model to the other colonies, and had a wide influence in the building of a nation founded on the principles of self-government. Plymouth had, after sixteen years, separated into towns; but when organized town and church governments moved bodily [Pg 140] from Massachusetts to found Connecticut, Massachusetts became the first mother of colonies. Massachusetts was bolder, more aggressive, and more tenacious of her liberties than any other of the American colonies; her people took firm, sometimes obstinate, stand for their rights as Englishmen, and were often alone in their early contentions for principles upon which in after years the Revolution was based. In their treatment of the Indians they were inclined to be more imperious than their neighbors.

In 1633 Plymouth built a fur-trading house on the site of Windsor, on the Connecticut River. A party of Dutch traders from New York was already planted at Hartford, in "a rude earthwork with two guns," and strenuously objected to this intrusion; but the Plymouth men found trade with the Indians profitable, and stood their ground.

The same year the overland route to the Connecticut was explored by the Massachusetts trader, John Oldham, who was afterwards slain by the Pequods at Block Island. The favorable reports which Oldham carried back induced a number of people in Newtown (Cambridge), Dorchester, and Watertown, in the Massachusetts colony, to remove to the Connecticut and set up an independent State. "Hereing of ye fame of Conightecute river, they had a hankering mind after it." Ostensibly they sought better pasturage for their cattle, to prevent the Dutch from gaining a permanent hold on the country, and to plant an outpost in the Pequod country; but there also appear to have been some differences of opinion between these people and the Massachusetts authorities, growing out of the taxation of Watertown in 1631; and no doubt their [Pg 141] ministers and elders—among whom were such strong men as Thomas Hooker, Samuel Stone, and Roger Ludlow—were desirous of greater recognition than they obtained at home. These differences were not so grave but that Massachusetts, after a spasm of opposition, formally permitted the migration, gave to the outgoing colonists a commission, and lent to them a cannon and some ammunition.

During the summer of 1635 a Dorchester party planted a settlement at Windsor around the walls of the Plymouth post. Plymouth did not approve of this cavalier treatment of her prior rights by the Massachusetts pioneers, but was obliged to submit with what grace she might, as she had in many controversies with her domineering neighbor to the north.

That same autumn (1635) John Winthrop, Jr., appeared at the mouth of the Connecticut with a commission as governor, issued by Lord Brook, Lord Say and Sele, and their partners, to whom in 1631 Lord Warwick, as president of the council for New England, had granted all the country between the Narragansett River and the Pacific Ocean. Winthrop had just thrown up a breastwork when a Dutch vessel appeared on its way to Hartford with supplies for the traders, and was ordered back; thus were the New Amsterdam people cut off from a profitable commerce on the Connecticut, and from territorial expansion eastward, although their Hartford colony lived for many years.

The migration from Massachusetts to the Connecticut continued vigorously during 1636, and by the spring of 1637 the colony had a population of eight hundred souls, grouped in the three towns of Windsor, Hartford, and Wethersfield,—Winthrop's establishment at Saybrook being but a military [Pg 142] station, which had no connection with the Massachusetts settlements up the river until 1644. The Pequod war, in 1637, stirred Connecticut to its centre. A force of about one hundred and fifteen Massachusetts and Connecticut men, under the command of Capt. John Mason of Windsor, was handled with much skill, and soon nearly annihilated the Pequod tribe. The Indians crushed, immigration was renewed, and prosperity became general throughout the valley.

During the first year the Connecticut towns were still claimed by the parent colony, and were controlled by a commission from Massachusetts. At the end of that time (1637) there was held a General Court, in which each town was represented by two magistrates, this body adopting such local regulations as were of immediate necessity.

In January, 1639, the three towns adopted a constitution in which Massachusetts acquiesced, thus practically abandoning her claims of sovereignty over them. This Connecticut constitution was undoubtedly, as Fiske says, "the first written constitution known to history that created a government,"—the "Mayflower" compact being rather an agreement to accept a constitution, while Magna Charta did not create a government. Bryce characterizes the Connecticut document as "the oldest truly political constitution in America." It is noticeable for the fact that it made no reference to the king or to any charter or patent; it was simply an agreement between colonists in neighboring towns, independent of any but royal authority, as to the manner of their local and general self-government. The governor and six magistrates (another name for assistants) were to be elected by a majority of the whole body of free [Pg 143] men; but later, with the spread of the colony, voting by proxies was allowed. The governor alone need be a church member, and he was not to serve for two years in succession; but this restriction on re-election was abolished in favor of the younger Winthrop in 1660. Each town might admit freemen by popular vote; and it is noticeable that despite the fact that the original settlers of Connecticut came as organized congregations, with their ministers and elders, it was ordained there should be no religious restriction on suffrage, which was thus made almost unrestricted; the towns were to be represented in the General Court by two deputies each; the practical administration was in the hands of the governor and his assistants, who were also members of the General Court. In time the system became bicameral, the deputies forming the lower, and the council the upper house; the towns were allowed all powers not expressly granted to the commonwealth, the affairs of each being executed by a board of "chief inhabitants," acting as magistrates. The government of Connecticut was on the whole somewhat more liberal and democratic than that of Massachusetts, and was the model upon which many American States were afterwards built.

More than to any other man, the credit for this epoch-making constitution belongs to the Rev. Thomas Hooker, of Hartford, the leading spirit of the colony. He argued that "the foundation of authority is laid in the free consent of the people;" that "the choice of public magistrates belongs unto the people by God's own allowance;" and that "they who have power to appoint officers and magistrates have the right also to set the bounds and limitations of the power and place unto which they call them." These are truisms to-day, but in 1638 they were the utterances of a political prophet.

[Pg 144] Under her liberal constitutional government, based upon the voice of the people, Connecticut was from the first a practically independent republic. The public officers were plain, honest men, who acceptably administered the affairs of the colony with small cost. The colonists were shrewd in political management, frugal in their expenditures, hard-working, and ingenious. Education flourished, a severe morality obtained, and religious persecution was unknown. Connecticut was noted among the colonies for its prosperity, independence, and enlightenment.

Theophilus Eaton was a London merchant "of fair estate, and of great esteem for religion and wisdom in outward affairs." He was at one time an ambassador to the Danish court, and had been one of the original assistants of the Massachusetts Company, although not active in its affairs. John Davenport had been an ordained minister in London; he turned Puritan, and on his resignation in 1633 went to Holland. These two men formed a congregation, composed for the most part of middle-class Londoners, who resolved to migrate to America, there to set up a State founded on scriptural models. The Plymouth and Massachusetts men had started out with this same idea; but as the result of circumstances, had made compromises which Eaton and Davenport could not countenance.

In July, 1637, the two leaders arrived in Boston with a small company of their disciples, among whom were several men of wealth and good social position, but extremely narrow and bigoted in religious faith. They have been styled the Brahmins of New England Puritanism. They did not deem it practicable to settle in Massachusetts, and the following [Pg 145] spring (March, 1638) sailed to Long Island Sound and established an independent settlement on the site of New Haven, thirty miles west of the Connecticut river. For a year their only bond of union was a "plantation covenant" to obey the Scriptures in all things.

In October, 1639, there was adopted a constitution, in the making of which Davenport had the chief hand. The governor and four magistrates were to be elected by the freemen, who were, as in Massachusetts, church members; trial by jury was rejected, because it lacked scriptural authority; and it was formally declared "that the Word of God shall be the only rule attended unto in ordering the affairs of government." Eaton was chosen governor, and held the office by annual election until his death, twenty years later.

The neighborhood of New Haven was soon settled by other immigrants, most of whom were also strict constructionists of the Scriptures, while a few others were as liberal in their ideas as the people of the Connecticut valley. Guilford was established (1639) seventeen miles to the north, and Milford (1639) eleven miles westward; Stamford (1640), well on towards New York, followed, while Southold was boldly planted (1640) on Long Island, opposite Guilford, in territory claimed by the Dutch. As each town was as well a church, these were for some years little independent communities, founded on the New Haven model. In 1643, however, they formed a union with New Haven, and a system of representation was introduced. Each town sent up deputies to the General Court, in which also sat the governor, deputy-governor, and assistants, elected by the whole body of freemen; yet a majority of either the deputies or the magistrates might veto a measure. Local magistrates—seven to each town, known as "pillars of the church"—tried petty cases, [Pg 146] but important suits were passed upon by the assistants. The "seven pillars" were the autocrats of their several towns, and colonial affairs were also practically in the hands of the select few who controlled the church.

At the meeting of the General Court in April, 1644, the magistrates in the confederation were ordered to observe "the judicial laws of God as they were delivered by Moses." This injunction afterwards gave rise to an absurd report, circulated in 1781 by Rev. Samuel Peters, a Tory refugee, that the New Haven statutes were of peculiar quaintness and severity. For nearly one hundred years Peters's fable of the New Haven Blue Laws was accepted as historic truth.

At first, New Haven failed to prosper; but after a few years, with the increase of trade, better times prevailed, and by the close of the century the town was noted for the wealth of its inhabitants and their fine houses. Education was greatly encouraged, and there were considerable shipping interests; but the ecclesiastical system was peculiar, and suffrage greatly restricted. There were, in consequence, frequent outbursts of dissatisfaction among the people. The colony thus had conspicuous elements of weakness, and was finally absorbed by Connecticut.

In 1636, with five of his disciples, Roger Williams, driven from Massachusetts as a reformer of a dangerous type, established the town of Providence, at the head of Narragansett Bay.

The following year (1637) a party of Anne Hutchinson's followers—also expelled from Massachusetts because of heretical opinions—settled on the island of Aquedneck (afterwards Rhode Island), eighteen miles to the south. Mrs. Hutchinson [Pg 147] joined them in 1638, and the town was eventually called Portsmouth.

Both communities at once attracted from Massachusetts people who had either been expelled from that colony or were not in entire harmony with it, and by the close of 1638 Providence contained sixty persons, and Portsmouth nearly as many. The next year fifty-nine of the Portsmouth people, headed by the chief magistrate, Coddington, dissenting from some of Mrs. Hutchinson's "new heresies," withdrew to the southern end of the island and settled Newport; but the two towns reunited in 1640, under the name of Rhode Island, with Coddington as governor.

Each of these colonies, Providence and Rhode Island, was at first an independent body politic. It is interesting to note their original compacts. The Providence agreement (1636), signed by Roger Williams and twelve of his sympathizers, was as follows: "We whose names are hereunder, desirous to inhabit in the Town of Providence, do promise to subject ourselves in active or passive obedience to all such orders or agreements as shall be made for the public good of the body, in an orderly way, by the major assent of the present inhabitants, masters of families, incorporated together into a town fellowship, and such others whom they shall admit unto them, only in civil things." Five freemen, called arbitrators, managed public affairs, and for some years there appear to have been no fixed rules for their guidance.

At Portsmouth the people united in the following declaration: "We do here 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 [Pg 148] those perfect and most absolute laws of His, given us in His holy words of truth, to be guided and judged thereby." The freemen conducted public affairs in town meeting, with a secretary, a clerk, and a chief magistrate. Newport was similarly organized; but when Newport and Portsmouth reunited, a more complex government was instituted. A General Court was then established, in which sat the governor, the deputy-governor, and four assistants,—one town choosing the governor and two of the assistants, and the other the deputy-governor and the remaining assistants; the freemen composed the body of the court, and settled even the most trivial cases. In 1641 it was declared that "it is in the power of the body of the freemen orderly assembled, or the part of them, to make and constitute just laws by which they shall be regulated, and to depute from among themselves such ministers as shall see them faithfully executed between man and man." At the same session an order was adopted "that none be accounted a delinquent for doctrine, provided it be not directly repugnant to the government or laws established."

By the other colonies Providence and Rhode Island were deemed hot-beds of anarchy. Persons holding all manner of Protestant theological notions flocked thither in considerable numbers, and it is true that for many years there were hot contentions between them, often to the disturbance of public order. Despite these years of bickerings, Providence and Rhode Island prospered.

Through the exertions of Roger Williams, Providence, Portsmouth, and Newport, with a new town called Warwick were united under one charter (1644), as the colony of Providence Plantations. This liberal document, issued by the Parliamentary Committee on the Colonies, gave to the inhabitants along [Pg 149] Narragansett Bay authority to rule themselves "by such form of civil government as by the voluntary consent of all or the greatest part of them shall be found most serviceable to their estate and condition." Larger power could not have been wished for. By a curious provision, adopted in 1647, a law had to be proposed at the General Court; it was then sent round to the towns for the freemen to pass upon it, thus giving the voters a voice in the conduct of affairs, without the necessity of attending court. A majority of freemen in any one town could defeat the measure. A code of laws resembling the common laws of England, and with few references to biblical precedents, passed safely through the ordeal in 1647; one important section provided that "all men may walk as their conscience persuades them."

The following year Coddington, as the head of a faction, obtained a separate charter for Newport and Portsmouth,—much to the disgust of many of the inhabitants of those as well as of the other towns. A bitter feud lasted until 1654, when Williams once more appeared as peacemaker and secured the reunion of all the towns under the general charter of 1644, with himself as president. The old law code was restored.

Rhode Island was founded by a religious outcast, and always remained as an asylum for those sectaries who could find no home elsewhere. The purpose was noble, and Williams persisted in his policy, despite the fact that life was often made uncomfortable for him by his ill-assorted fellow-colonists, who were continually bickering with each other. Throughout the seventeenth century Rhode Island was a hot-bed of disorder. Fanaticism not only expressed itself in religion, but in politics and society; and no scheme was so wild as to find no adherents in this confused [Pg 150] medley. The condition of the colony served as a warning to its neighbors, seeming to confirm the wisdom of their theocratic methods.

Sir Ferdinando Gorges, governor of Plymouth in England, became interested in New England, we have seen, as early as 1605. Ten years later he assisted John Smith in organizing an unsuccessful voyage to the northern coast; in 1620 we find him a member of the council of the Plymouth Company; in 1622 he and John Mason (not the hero of the Pequod war), both of them Churchmen and strong friends of the king, obtained a grant of the country lying between the Merrimack and Kennebec Rivers; and it was Gorges who sent out Maverick to settle on Noddle's Island, and Blackstone to hold the Boston peninsula. Later (1629), Mason obtained an individual grant from the Plymouth Council of the territory between the Merrimack and the Piscataqua (New Hampshire), and Gorges that from the Piscataqua to the Kennebec (Maine); these grants were similar in character to the charter of the Massachusetts Bay Company. When the Plymouth Company threw up its charter in 1634, and New England was parcelled out (1635) among the members of the council, Gorges and Mason secured a confirmation of their former personal grants. Mason died a few months later, leaving the settlements in his tract to be annexed to Massachusetts in 1641.

In April, 1639, Gorges obtained a provincial charter from the king, conferring upon him the title of Lord Proprietor of the Province or County of Maine, his domain to extend, as before, from the Kennebec to the Piscataqua, and backward one hundred and twenty miles from the coast. He received [Pg 151] almost absolute authority over the people of his province, who were then but three hundred in number. Saco, established by him about the year 1623, was the principal settlement, and contained one half of the population; while a half-dozen smaller hamlets, chiefly of his creation, were scattered along the neighboring shore, inhabited by fishermen, hunters, and traders. The greater part of these people were adherents of the king and the Established Church. Notwithstanding Gorges's long-sustained effort to attract men of wealth to his plantations, the province was not as flourishing as its neighbors to the south.

Gorges amused his old age by drafting a cumbrous Constitution for his people. He was to make laws in conjunction with the freemen; the laws of England were to prevail in cases not covered by the statutes; the Church of England was to be the State religion; all Englishmen were to be allowed fishing privileges; the proprietor was to establish manorial courts; and he was also empowered, of his own motion, to levy taxes, raise troops, and declare war. In examining the official machinery which Gorges sought to erect in Maine, we are reminded of Locke's constitution for the Carolinas; the proprietor was to be represented by a deputy-governor, under whom was to be a long line of officers with high-sounding titles, these to form the council; with them were to meet the deputies selected by the freeholders. The provinces were to be cut up into bailiwicks or counties, hundreds, parishes, and tithings; justice in each bailiwick was to be administered by a lieutenant and eight magistrates, the nominees of the proprietor or his deputy, and under each was a staff of minor functionaries. There were almost enough officers provided for in Gorges's plan to give every one of his subjects a public position.

[Pg 152] The proprietor himself never visited America; he was represented by his son Thomas as deputy-governor. It was impossible for the latter, however, to carry all of his father's plans into effect, and gradually the province sank into disorder and neglect. Its towns were finally absorbed by Massachusetts (1652-1658).

The settlers brought out to people Maine were the servants of individuals or companies having a tract of land to be occupied and cultivated, fisheries to conduct, and fur-trade to prosecute. They did not come to found a church or build a state, and such institutions as they developed were the immediate outcome of their necessities. They had little sympathy or communication with their neighbors of Massachusetts and Plymouth.

We have seen that John Mason was given a grant in 1629 of the country between the Merrimack and the Piscataqua. In his scheme for colonizing the tract, Gorges was associated with him. But David Thomson and three Plymouth fur-traders had already gained a footing at Rye in 1622, under a grant from the Plymouth Council. Dover had been founded before 1628 by the brothers Hilton, Puritan fish-dealers in London; and some of Mrs. Hutchinson's adherents, exiles from Massachusetts, founded Exeter and Hampton. In 1630 Neal, as colonizing agent of Mason and Gorges, settled at Portsmouth, on the Piscataqua, with a large party of farmers and fishermen, all of them Church of England men; and it is probable that this colony absorbed the neighboring settlement at Rye. By the time the proprietors dissolved partnership in 1635 [Pg 153] (page 150), considerable property had been accumulated by them here, as in the inventory of their possessions at Portsmouth we find twenty-two cannons, two hundred and fifty small-arms, forty-eight fishing-boats, forty horses, fifty-four goats, nearly two hundred sheep, and over a hundred cattle. This argues a large establishment. Upon the death of Mason, later in the year, the Piscataqua colony was left to its own guidance. All of the New Hampshire towns were from the first independent communities, governed much after the fashion of the other English towns to the south of them.

The beginnings of New Hampshire were the results of commercial enterprise in England and theological dissensions in Massachusetts. The inhabitants of the several towns had little in common, and held different political and religious views. Planted under various auspices, when they grew to importance they were the subject of long struggles for jurisdiction. It would be tiresome to trace the history of these disputes; suffice it to say that after many changes the settlements on or near the Piscataqua were (1641-1643) incorporated with Massachusetts, which ruled them with marked discretion, and refrained from meddling with their religious views. In 1679, as the result of disputes growing out of the revival of the Mason claim in England, New Hampshire was turned into a royal province, but in 1685 was reunited to Massachusetts. As to the character of the people of New Hampshire, what has been said in regard to those of Maine may in a great measure also be applied to them.

CHAPTER VII.

NEW ENGLAND FROM 1643 TO 1700.

Bibliographies.—Same as § 47, above; Avery, II., III.; Channing and Hart, Guide, §§ 124-128.

General Accounts.—Doyle, Colonies, II. chs. viii., ix., III. chs. i.-v.; Lodge, Colonies, 351-362, 375-380, 387-392, 398-400; Osgood, Colonies; Avery, II. chs. xiii.-xviii., III. chs. vii., viii., x.-xii., xix.-xxi.; G. Bancroft, I. 289-407, 574-613; Channing, United States, I. chs. xv., xviii., xix.; Hildreth, I. chs. x., xii., xiv.; Palfrey, New England, I. 269-408, III. 1-386; Fiske, Beginnings of New England; Hallowell, Quaker Invasion of Massachusetts; R. Frothingham, Rise of the Republic, chs. ii., iii.; A. MacLear, Early New England Towns; Winsor, Narrative and Critical, as in § 47.

Special Histories.—Consult the numerous local histories, some of them of much importance; Winsor's Boston, and Sheldon's Deerfield are examples.

Contemporary Accounts.—Sewall, Diary; Mather, Magnalia; Bishop, New England Judged; Hubbard, Trouble with the Indians.—Reprints in publications of colonial and town record commissions, historical and antiquarian societies, Prince Society, Gorges Society, etc.; Andros, Tracts; American History Leaflets, Nos. 7, 25, 29; Old South Leaflets; American History told by Contemporaries, I. ch. xx., II.

In the preceding chapter has been sketched the origin and planting of the New England colonies. Most of those colonies maintained a separate existence and had a history of their own during the rest of the seventeenth century. But the limits of this work do not permit a sketch of the local and internal history of each colony. In this chapter will therefore be considered only those events of common interest and having a significance in the development of all the colonies.

[Pg 155] First in time and first in its consequences is the federation of the New England colonies, for which in August, 1637, the men of Connecticut made overtures to the Massachusetts General Court. Connecticut, as an outpost of English civilization in the heart of the Indian country and "over against the Dutch," had especial need of support from the older colonies to the east. The tribesmen were uneasy and the menaces of the Dutch at New Amsterdam were especially alarming. Twice had the doughty Hollanders endeavored to drive English settlers from the Connecticut valley and recover their lost fur-trade there; both attempts had been failures, but it seemed likely that in time the Dutch might summon sufficient strength to make it more difficult to withstand them. Again, the French, who had settled at Quebec in 1608, were beginning to push the confines of New France southward; and there had been trouble with them at various times for several years, the outgrowth of boundary disputes and race hatred. The Connecticut and Hudson rivers were highways quite familiar to the French Canadians and their Indian allies, and the Connecticut colonists were apprehensive of partisan raids overland from the north, which they could not hope to repel single-handed.

The proposition for union was renewed in 1639, and again in September, 1642. At first Massachusetts was indifferent; but finally "the ill news we had out of England concerning the breach between the king and Parliament" appears to have caused her statesmen to look favorably on the project. Affairs were at such a pass in the mother-country that it behooved Englishmen in America to be prepared to act on the defensive in the event of the war-cloud drifting in their direction. Should the king win, there was reason to [Pg 156] believe that he would speedily turn his attention towards the correction of New England, which had long been to dissenting Englishmen in the mother-land an object-lesson in political independence and a ready refuge in time of danger.

In May, 1643, twelve articles were agreed upon at Boston between the representatives of Massachusetts Bay, Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven. Winthrop tells us that the representatives "coming to consultation encountered some difficulties, but being all desirous of union and studious of peace, they readily yielded each to other in such things as tended to common utility." Compromises were the foundation of this as well as of later American constitutions.

The four colonies were bound together by a formal written constitution, under the name of "The United Colonies of New England," in "a firm and perpetual league of friendship and amity for offence and defence, mutual advice and succor, upon all just occasions, both for preserving and propagating the truth and liberties of the Gospel, and for their own mutual safety and welfare." Each colony was allowed to manage its internal affairs; but a body of eight federal commissioners, two from each colony, and all of them church members, were empowered to "determine all affairs of war or peace, leagues, aids, charges, and numbers of men for war, division of spoils and whatsoever was gotten by conquest, receiving of more confederates for plantations into combination with any of the confederates, and all things of like nature which were the proper concomitants or consequents of such a confederation for amity, offence, and defence." Six commissioners formed a working majority of the board; but in case of disagreement, the question at issue was to be sent to the legislatures [Pg 157] of the several colonies for decision. War expenses were to be levied against each colony in proportion to its male population between the ages of sixteen and sixty. The board was to meet at least once a year, and oftener when necessary. The president of the commissioners, chosen from their own number, was to be "invested with no power or respect" except that of a presiding officer.

The league which it represented is "interesting as the first American experiment in federation;" but it had one fertile source of weakness. There were in the four colonies represented an aggregate population of about twenty-four thousand, of which Massachusetts contained fifteen thousand, the other three having not more than three thousand each. In case of war Massachusetts agreed to send one hundred men for every forty-five furnished by each of her colleagues. In two ways she bore the heaviest burden,—in the number of men sent to war, and in the amount of taxes levied therefor. As each colony was to have an equal vote in the conduct of the league, Massachusetts was placed at a disadvantage. She frequently endeavored to exercise larger power than was allowed her under the articles, thus arousing the enmity of the smaller colonies, and endangering the existence of the union.

Nevertheless, during the twenty years in which the confederation was the strongest political power on the continent of North America, Massachusetts maintained control of its general policy. Maine and the settlements along Narragansett Bay in vain made application to join the confederation. It was objected that public order was not established in Rhode Island, and moreover the oath taken by the freemen [Pg 158] there bespoke fealty to the English king. As for Maine, its proprietor, Gorges, was enlisted on the side of the monarch, and the political system in vogue in his province differed from that in the other colonies.

The board was little more than a committee of public safety; it acted upon the colonial legislatures, and not on the individual colonists, and had no power to enforce its decrees. One of its early interests was the building up of Harvard College; and at its request there was taken up, throughout the four colonies, a contribution of "corn for the poor scholars in Cambridge."

In the articles of confederation there was no reference whatever to the home government. The New Englanders had taken charge of their own affairs, apparently without a thought of the supremacy of either king or parliament. The spirit of local independence among these people was greater than national patriotism. With Laud in prison and the king an outcast, there could be no interference from that quarter, and Parliament was too busy just then to give much thought to the doings of the distant American colonists. In November (1643) Parliament instituted a commission for the government of the colonies, with the Earl of Warwick at its head; but it was of small avail so far as New England was concerned.

Massachusetts was ever in an attitude of jealousy towards even a suspicion of interference from England. In 1644 the General Court voted that any one attempting to raise soldiers for the king should be "accounted as an offender of an high nature against this commonwealth, and to be proceeded with, either capitally or otherwise, according to the quality and degree of his offence." The colony was, however, no more for the Commons than for the king. [Pg 159] When, in 1651, Parliament desired that Massachusetts surrender her charter granted by King Charles and receive a new one at its hands, for a year no notice was taken of the command; when at last England had a war with Holland on her hands, the Massachusetts men evasively replied that they were quite satisfied "to live under the government of a governor and magistrates of their own choosing and under laws of their own making." The General Court was also bold enough to establish a colonial mint (1652), and for thirty years coined "pine-tree shillings," in the face of all objections. In 1653 Cromwell, always a firm friend to New England, was declared Lord Protector; yet Massachusetts did not allow the event to be proclaimed within her borders, and when he wished Massachusetts to help him in his war against the Dutch by capturing New Amsterdam, the colonial court somewhat haughtily "gave liberty to his Highness's commissioners" to raise volunteers in her territory. At the Restoration it was not until warning came from friends in England, that Charles II. was proclaimed in New England.

Over on Narragansett Bay the public peace continued to be disturbed by factious disputations. Because of the freedom there generously offered to all men, the settlements of Rhode Island and Providence were the harboring-place for dissenters of every class, who for the most part had been ordered to leave the other colonies. Many of these persons were of the Baptist faith, or held other theological views which would be considered sober enough in our day; but among them were numerous rank fanatics, whom no well-ordered society was calculated to please.

[Pg 160] Some of Roger Williams's adherents had built Pawtuxet. To them came a band of fanatics, headed by Samuel Gorton, described by his orthodox neighbors as "a proud and pestilent seducer," of "insolent and riotous carriage," but who was by no means so black as they painted him. The Pawtuxet settlers asked Massachusetts (1641) "of gentle courtesy and for the preservation of humanity and mankind," to "lend a neighbor-like helping hand" and relieve them of the disturber. At the same time they secured the annexation of their town to Massachusetts, so that it might be within the jurisdiction of the latter. Gorton and nine of his followers were taken as prisoners to Boston (1643), where they were convicted of blasphemy, and after four or five months at hard labor were released, with threats of death if they did not at once depart from Massachusetts soil.

Gorton went to England (1646) and appealed to the parliamentary commissioners, who declared that he might "freely and quietly live and plant" upon his land which he had purchased from the Indians at Shawomet (Warwick), on the western shore of Narragansett Bay. Edward Winslow of Plymouth was now sent over (1647) to represent Massachusetts in the Gorton case; and through him the plea was entered that the commissioners, being far distant from America, should not undertake the decision of appeals from the colonies; and moreover, that the Massachusetts charter was an "absolute power of government." The commissioners, in return, protested that they "intended not to encourage any appeals from your justice;" nevertheless, they "commanded" the General Court to allow Gorton and his followers to dwell in peace; but "if they shall be faulty, we leave them to be proceeded with according to justice." The offender was allowed to return, but his presence was haughtily [Pg 161] ignored; and when his settlement was threatened by Indians, he cited in vain the parliamentary order as a warrant for assistance.

The sturdy and independent spirit of the colonists was expressed in words as well as in deeds. While Winslow was thus representing the colonists in England he made his famous reply to those who were disposed to criticise the formation of the New England confederacy as a presumptuous assertion of independence: "If we in America should forbear to unite for offence and defence against a common enemy till we have leave from England, our throats might be all cut before the messenger would be half seas through." A similar impatience of authority from England was expressed by Governor John Winthrop. An opinion which he delivered about this time betokened the proud and independent attitude of Massachusetts, and was prophetic of the spirit of the Revolution. By a legal fiction, when the king granted land in America it was held as being in the manor of East Greenwich. It was said that the American colonists were represented in that body by the member returned from the borough containing this manor, and were therefore subject to Parliament. Winthrop held, however, that the supreme law in the colonies was the common weal, and should parliamentary authority endanger the welfare of the colonists, then they would be justified in ignoring that authority.

Religious liberty was quite as dear to the New England people as political liberty. In 1645, under Scottish influence, Presbyterianism was established by Act of Parliament as the state religion of England. Massachusetts was, however, stoutly Independent, [Pg 162] and furnished some of the chief champions for that faith during the great controversy which was then raging between the two sects on both sides of the water. A number of Massachusetts Presbyterians sought (1646) to induce the home government to settle churches of their faith in the colonies, and to secure the franchise to all, regardless of religious affiliation; but before they reached England to state their case the Independents were again in the ascendent, and the Puritan theocracy in Massachusetts was undisturbed. Two years later (1648) a synod of churches was held at Cambridge, at which was formulated a church discipline familiarly styled "the Cambridge platform." In it the Westminster Confession was approved, the powers of the clergy defined, the civil power invoked to "coerce" churches which should "walk incorrigibly or obstinately in any corrupt way of their own," and the term "Congregational" established, to distinguish New England orthodoxy from "those corrupt sects and heresies which showed themselves under the vast title of Independency." In 1649 this platform was laid by the General Court before the several congregations, and two years later it was formally agreed to.

It was hardly to be supposed that a people so little inclined to acknowledge the rights of England should treat with greater respect those of Holland; and indeed they had the countenance of the home government in encroachments upon the Dutch colonies. In 1642 Boswell, who represented England at the Hague, advised his fellow-countrymen in New England to "put forward their plantations and crowd on, crowding the Dutch out of those places where they have occupied."

The New Englanders were not slow to adopt this aggressive policy. Settlements were pushed out westward [Pg 163] from New Haven on the mainland, and southward on Long Island. Peter Stuyvesant, then governor of New Netherland, bitterly complained of these encroachments,—for the Dutch then claimed everything between the Connecticut and Delaware rivers,—and appealed to the federal commissioners to put a stop to them; but the answer came that the Dutch were selling arms and ammunition to the Indians, that their conduct was not conducive to peace, that they harbored criminals from the English colonies, and that the United Colonies proposed to "vindicate the English rights by all suitable and just means." Stuyvesant, who was a hot-headed man, would have liked to go to war with the New Englanders, but was informed by the Dutch West India Company that war "cannot in any event be to our advantage: the New England people are too powerful for us." The matter was finally (1651) left to arbitrators, who settled a provisional boundary line which "on the mainland was not to come within ten miles of the Hudson River," and which gave to Connecticut the greater part of Long Island.

War broke out between England and Holland in 1652, and the Connecticut people were anxious to attack New Netherland, which had not ceased its depredations on the outlying settlements. All of the federal commissioners except those from Massachusetts voted to go to war; there was a stormy session of the federal court, in which Massachusetts endeavored in vain to override the other colonies. Connecticut and New Haven applied to Cromwell for assistance. He sent over a fleet to Boston, with injunctions to Massachusetts to cease her opposition. The General Court stoutly refused to raise troops for the enterprise, although it gave to the agents of Cromwell the privilege of enlisting five hundred volunteers in the [Pg 164] colony if they could. But while arrangements were in progress for an attack by eight hundred men on New Amsterdam, news came that England and Holland had proclaimed peace (April 5, 1654), and warlike preparations in America ceased.

The weakness of the New England confederation was evident in domestic affairs as well as in foreign wars. Massachusetts was frequently in collision with the commissioners. An instance occurred as early as 1642-1643, when trouble broke out with the Narragansetts, who were friends and allies of the disturber Gorton at Shawomet. Massachusetts refused to sanction hostilities; nevertheless the commissioners despatched a federal force against the Indians; but the expedition proved futile, owing to lack of support from the chief colony.

Saybrook, at the mouth of the Connecticut River, was purchased by the Connecticut federation in 1644. In order to compensate herself, Connecticut levied toll on every vessel passing up the river. Massachusetts owned the valley town of Springfield, and entered complaint before the commissioners (1647) that Connecticut had no right to tax Massachusetts vessels trading with a Massachusetts town. Two years later (1649) the commissioners decided in favor of Connecticut; whereupon Massachusetts levied both export and import duties at Boston designed to hamper the trade of her sister colonies; at the same time she demanded that because of her greater size she be allowed three commissioners, and insisted that the power of the federal body be reduced. This action created great hostility, and threatened at one time to break up the union. By 1654 the contention had been allowed to drop on both sides, and duties on intercolonial trade ceased.

During the remainder of the Commonwealth period the most serious question which arose in New England was what to do with the Quakers. In the theocracy of the seventeenth century the attitude of the sect was both theologically and politically well calculated to arouse hostility. They would strip all formalities from religion, they would recognize no priestly class, they would not take up arms in the common defence, would pay no tithes and take no oath of allegiance, they doubted the efficacy of baptism, had no veneration for the Sabbath, and had a large respect for the right of individual judgment in spiritual matters. They were aggressive and stubborn, and, goaded on by persecution, broke out into fantastic displays of opposition to the State religion. In England four thousand of them were in jail at one time. When Anne Austin and Mary Fisher arrived in Boston (1656) from England, by way of the Barbados, as a vanguard of the Quaker missionary army, the colonial authorities were aghast with horror. The adventurous women were shipped back to the Barbados, and a law was enacted against "all Quakers, Ranters, and other notorious heretics," providing for their flogging and imprisonment at hard labor. Despite this harsh treatment, the Quakers continued to arrive. Roger Williams said, when applied to by Massachusetts to harry them out of Rhode Island: where they are "most of all suffered to declare themselves freely, and only opposed by arguments in discourse, there they least of all desire to come.... They are likely to gain more followers by the conceit of their patient sufferings than by consent to their pernicious sayings." Nevertheless, Rhode Island was and is the stronghold of the Friends in New England.

[Pg 166] In 1657 it was enacted that Quakers who had once been sent away and returned, should have their ears lopped off, and for the third offence should have their tongues pierced with red-hot irons. Banishment on pain of death was recommended by the federal commissioners in 1658; and in 1659-1660 four Quakers lost their lives by hanging on Boston Common. Public sentiment revolted at these spectacles, and in 1660 the Massachusetts death-law was repealed, and Quakers were thereafter subjected to nothing worse than being flogged in the several towns; even this gradually ceased, with the growth of a more humane spirit. In Connecticut the sect suffered but little persecution, and in Rhode Island none; while Plymouth and New Haven were nearly as harsh in their treatment as Massachusetts.

The restoration of royalty in England (1660) began a new epoch in the history of the colonies. Their control was placed in the hands of a council for the plantations, and twelve privy councillors were designated to take New England in charge. The Quakers had seized the opportunity of gaining an early hearing from the new king, who was charitably disposed towards them. In its address to Charles, the Massachusetts court expatiated on the factious spirit of the Quakers; but the king replied that while he meant well by the colonies, he desired that hereafter the Quakers be sent to England for trial,—a desire which was as a matter of course disregarded.

It is not surprising that the king was disposed to look with suspicion upon the men of New England. He had been told that the confederacy was "a war combination made by the four colonies when they had a design to throw off their dependence on England, and for that purpose." [Pg 167] The king suspects New England's loyalty. The New Englanders, too, had been somewhat slow to proclaim his ascendancy; while two of the judges who had sentenced his father to death, Goffe and Whalley, were screened from royal justice by the people of New Haven, and afterwards by those of Hadley, a Massachusetts town in the Connecticut valley. Massachusetts had been bold enough when the home government was so distracted by other affairs as to render attention to the colonies impracticable; now that Charles appeared to be turning his attention to America a more politic course was pursued. Simon Bradstreet, a leading layman, and John Norton, prominent among the ministers, were sent to England to make peace with the Crown, and soon returned (1662) with a gracious answer, which, however, was coupled with an order to the court to grant all "freeholders of competent estate" the right of suffrage and office-holding, "without reference to their opinion or profession," to allow the Church of England to hold services, to administer justice in the name of the king, and to compel all inhabitants to swear allegiance to him. The court decreed that legal papers should thereafter run in the king's name; but all other matters in the royal mandate were referred to a committee which failed to report upon them.

Affairs now went on peacefully enough in Massachusetts until 1664. In that year the king sent over four royal commissioners to look after the colonies, among them being Samuel Maverick, one of the Presbyterian petitioners who had made trouble for the New Englanders a few years before. These commissioners were required "to dispose the people to an entire submission and obedience to the king's government;" also to feel the public pulse in Massachusetts, in order to see whether the Crown might [Pg 168] not judiciously assume to appoint a governor for that colony. They arrived at Boston in July with two ships-of-war and four hundred troops. Obtaining help from Connecticut, the expedition proceeded to New Amsterdam and easily conquered that port from the Dutch. During the months the commissioners were at Boston they were engaged in a prolonged quarrel with the Massachusetts men, who claimed that their charter allowed them to govern themselves after their own fashion, without interference from a royal commission. The court was persistently importuned to give a plain answer to the king's demands sent out in 1662; but nothing satisfactory could be obtained, and the commissioners were obliged to return without having accomplished their mission. The Dutch war against England was now going on, and political affairs at home were unquiet. A policy of delay had been profitable for Massachusetts.

In the other colonies of New England better treatment had been accorded the commissioners. Connecticut had sent over her governor, the younger Winthrop, to represent her at court. He was well received there, being a man of scholarly tastes and pleasing manner; the king was the more disposed to favor him because by helping Connecticut a rival to Massachusetts would be built up. A liberal charter was granted to his colony; and New Haven—disliked by Charles for having harbored the regicides—was now, despite her protest, annexed to her sister colony. and of Rhode Island. Rhode Island, too, was benefited by the royal favor, and received a charter making it a separate colony. Doubtless the fact that the people of Narragansett Bay had been shut out from the New England confederacy had inclined the king to look kindly upon them. For these reasons Connecticut and Rhode Island had received [Pg 169] the commissioners with consideration, while weak Plymouth was also praised for her ready obedience.

The suppression of New Haven by the king, and the practical victory of the Quakers over the theocratic policy of Massachusetts, were staggering blows to the confederation. The federal commissioners held triennial meetings thereafter until 1684, when the Massachusetts charter was revoked; but its proceedings, except during King Philip's war, were of little importance.

The period of the decadence of the confederation, however, was in the main one of prosperity for New England. Emigration to America had almost wholly ceased after 1640, with the rise of the Puritans in England; but the restoration of the Stuarts and the passage of the Act of Uniformity, with its accompanying persecutions, caused a renewal of the departure of Dissenters, and the movement included many, both laymen and clericals, of eminent ability. New industries were introduced, commerce grew, the area of settlement extended, and wealth increased.

But the accretion of wealth and the passage of time brought changes in the attitude towards England that threatened in a measure to counteract the quiet struggle for independence which had been going on for nearly half a century. A second generation of Americans had come upon the stage, with but a traditional knowledge of the tyrannies practised upon their fathers in the old country. Larger wealth secured greater leisure, which resulted in a cultivation of the graceful arts, with a softening of the austere manners and thinking of the first emigrants. There was now manifest a desire on the part of many members of the upper class to bring about closer relations with the Old World, with its fine manners, its aristocracy, and its [Pg 170] historic associations. Opposition to England began to give place to imitation of England; colonial life had entered the provincial stage. Two parties had by this time sprung up, although as yet without organization,—one desiring to conciliate England, the other standing for independence in everything except in name. Thus far none had ventured to think of the possibility of dissolving all political connection with the mother-land.

The Indian policy of the New Englanders was more humane than that adopted in any of the other colonies except Pennsylvania. Compensation had been granted to the savages for lands taken, firm friendships had been formed between some of the chiefs and the whites, and the missionary enterprises among the red-men were conducted on a large scale and with much zeal. Martha's Vineyard, Cape Cod, and the country round about Boston were the centres of proselytism; the "praying Indians" were gathered into village congregations with native teachers, most notable being those under the supervision of John Eliot, "the apostle." Of these converted Indians there were in 1674 about four thousand; several hundred of them were taught a written language invented by Eliot, who successfully undertook the monumental labor of translating the Bible into it for their benefit.

Massasoit, head-chief of the Pokanokets, had made a treaty of alliance with the Plymouth colonists soon after their arrival, and kept it strictly until his death (1660). His two sons were christened at Plymouth as Alexander and Philip. Alexander died (1662) at Plymouth, where he had gone to answer to a charge of plotting with the Narragansetts against the whites. [Pg 171] Philip, now chief sachem, wrongfully thinking his brother to have been poisoned, was thereafter a bitter enemy of the dominant race. For twelve years there were numerous complaints against him, and he was frequently summoned to Plymouth to make answer. He was smooth-spoken and fair of promise, but came to be regarded as an unsatisfactory person with whom to deal. In 1674 it became evident that Philip was planning a general Indian uprising, to drive the English out of the land.

His territory was now chiefly confined to Mount Hope,—a peninsula running into Narragansett Bay; and here he "began to keep his men in arms about him, and to gather strangers unto him, and to march about in arms towards the upper end of the neck on which he lived, and near to the English houses." On the twentieth of June a party of his warriors attacked the little town of Swanzey, killing many settlers and perpetrating fiendish outrages. War-parties from Mount Hope now quickly spread over the country, joined by the Nipmucks and other tribes. Throughout the white settlements panic prevailed, and several towns in Massachusetts, as far west as the Connecticut valley, were scenes of heart-rending tragedies.

The Narragansetts had played fast and loose in this struggle, their disaffection growing with the success of the savage arms. It was evident that unless crushed, they would openly espouse Philip's cause in the coming spring, and the danger be doubled. A thousand volunteers, enlisted by the federal commissioners, on December 19 attacked their palisaded fortress in what is now South Kingston. Two thousand warriors, with many women and children, were gathered within the walls. About one thousand Indians were slain in the contest, which was one of the most desperate of its kind ever fought in America.

[Pg 172] The following spring and summer Philip again made bloody forays on the settlements; but he was persistently attacked, his followers were scattered, and he was at last driven, with a handful of followers, into a swamp on Mount Hope. Here (Aug. 12, 1676) he was shot to death by a friendly Indian, and "fell upon his face in the mud and water, with his gun under him; ... upon which the whole army gave three loud huzzas." His hands and head were cut off and taken to Boston and Plymouth respectively, in token to the people at home that King Philip's war was at an end, and that thereafter white men were to be supreme in New England.

During the two years' deadly struggle the colonists had been surfeited with horrors, of which the statistics of loss can convey but slight idea. Of the eighty or ninety towns in Plymouth and Massachusetts, nearly two-thirds had been harried by the savages,—ten or twelve wholly, and the others partially destroyed; while nearly six hundred fighting men—about ten per cent of the whole—had either lost their lives or had been taken prisoners, never to return. It was many years before the heavy war-debts of the colonies could be paid; in Plymouth the debt exceeded in amount the value of all the personal property.

The year before Philip fell (1675), trouble broke out with the Indians to the north, on the Piscataqua. In the summer of 1678 the English of Maine felt themselves compelled to purchase peace, thus establishing a precedent which fortunately has not often been followed in America. The home government was much annoyed at the obstinacy of the colonists in not calling on it for aid in these two Indian wars. Jealous of English interference, they preferred to fight their battles for themselves, and thus to give no excuse to the king for maintaining royal troops in New England.

Massachusetts early gave evidence of a desire to extend her territory. Disputes in regard to lands frequently gave rise to quarrels with the Indians. In 1649 the strip of mainland along Long Island Sound, between the western boundary of Rhode Island and Mystic River, was granted to her by the federal commissioners. From 1652 to 1658 she absorbed the settlements in Maine, now neglected by the heirs of Gorges, just as in 1642-1643 she had annexed the New Hampshire towns. The council for foreign plantations had been dissolved in 1675, and the management of colonial affairs was resumed by a standing committee of the Privy Council styled "the Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations." At this time the Gorges and Mason heirs renewed their respective claims to Maine and New Hampshire, which they said had been wrongfully swallowed up by Massachusetts.

Other complaints against the Bay Colony, that had been allowed to slumber for some time, were now revived, and the Lords of Trade, as they were familiarly called, were soon sitting in council upon the deeds of the obstinate colony. The king's charges of early years were again advanced: that the Acts of Navigation and Trade (page 104) were not being observed; that ships from various European countries traded with Boston direct, without paying duty to England on their cargoes; that money was being coined at a colonial mint; and that Church of England members were denied the right of suffrage. Edward Randolph, a relative of the Masons, was sent over (1676) to be collector at the port of Boston, now a town of five thousand inhabitants, and to investigate the colonies. His manner was insulting, and he was rudely treated by the people, [Pg 174] who were greatly embittered against England in consequence of his malicious reports to the home government.

In 1679 the king erected New Hampshire into a separate royal province. Edward Cranfield, a tyrannical man, became the governor (1682), but his conduct drove the people into insurrection. He was obliged to fly to the West Indies (1685), and in the same year New Hampshire was reunited to Massachusetts.

In 1665 the royal commissioners detached Maine from Massachusetts; but three years later (1668) that commonwealth calmly took it back again. Gorges was inclined to make trouble, and agents of Massachusetts quietly purchased his claim (1677) for £1,250. The skilful manœuvre excited the displeasure of the king, who had intended himself to buy out the claims of Gorges, in order to erect Maine into a proprietary province for his reputed son, the Duke of Monmouth. The company of Massachusetts Bay now governed Maine under the Gorges charter as lord proprietor, and did not make it a part of the Massachusetts colony.

It was two years later (1679) before Charles was ready again to make a movement upon Massachusetts. He demanded that Maine should be delivered up to the Crown, on repayment of the purchase money, and also that all other complaints should at once be satisfied. The General Court gave an evasive answer, and adopted its usual method of sending over agents to ward off hostilities by a policy of delay. But in 1684 the blow came: a writ of quo warranto was issued against the simple trading charter under which Massachusetts had so long been permitted [Pg 175] to grow and prosper; the charter was held to be annulled, and the colony now became a royal possession.

With the death of Charles II. (1685), James II. came to the English throne. As a Roman Catholic, and imbued with a taste of absolute power, the colonies had little favor to expect from him. In 1686, as a step towards abolishing the American charters, James sent over Sir Edmund Andros as governor of Massachusetts, Plymouth, New Hampshire, and Maine; he brought authority to ignore all local political machinery and to govern the country through a council, the president of which was Joseph Dudley, the unpopular Tory son of the stern old Puritan who had been Winthrop's lieutenant. The charters of Rhode Island and Connecticut were demanded for annulment (1686). The former colony was, as usual, obedient, and yielded up her charter; Connecticut failed to respond to the demand of Andros, and he went to Hartford (October, 1687) and ordered the charter to be produced. A familiar myth alleges that the document was concealed from him in the hollow trunk of a large tree, known ever after as the "charter oak;" nevertheless Andros arbitrarily declared the colony annexed to the other New England colonies which he governed.

The following year (1688) Andros was also made governor of New York and the Jerseys, his jurisdiction now extending from Delaware Bay to the confines of New France, with his seat of government at Boston. The government of Andros was despotic, and fell heavily on a people who had up to this time been accustomed to their own way. Episcopal services were held in the principal towns, and Congregational churches were frequently seized upon for the purpose; the writ of habeas corpus was suspended; a censorship of the press was restored, with Dudley as censor; excessive registry fees were charged; arbitrary taxes were levied; land grants [Pg 176] made under former administrations were annulled; private property was unsafe from governmental interference; common lands were enclosed and divided among the friends of Andros; the General Court was abolished, and most popular rights were ignored. Dudley tersely described the situation (1687) on the trial of the Rev. John Wise, of Ipswich, for heading a movement in that town to resent taxation without representation: "Mr. Wise, you have no more privileges left you than not to be sold for slaves."

In April, 1689, news came of the Revolution in England, the flight of the arrogant James, and the accession of the Prince of Orange. The example of revolt was already foreshadowed in Boston, where Andros and Dudley were deposed. Elsewhere in the Northern colonies the representatives of the tyrant extortioners were driven out. The Protestant sovereigns, William and Mary, were proclaimed amid great popular rejoicings.

The old charters were restored for the time. In September, 1691, Plymouth and the newly acquired territory of Acadia were united to Massachusetts under a new charter, which had been secured from the king chiefly through the agency of the Rev. Increase Mather, of Boston, now influential in colonial politics, as were also other members of the Mather family. In May following (1692) this new charter for Massachusetts was received at Boston. It was not as liberal as had been hoped. The people were allowed their representative assembly as before, but the governor was to be appointed by the Crown; the religious qualification for suffrage was abolished, a small property qualification (an estate of £40 value, or a freehold worth £2 a year) being substituted; laws passed by the General [Pg 177] Court were subject to veto by the king,—a provision fraught with danger to the colonists. Thus Massachusetts became a Crown charter colony,—a position not uncomfortable so long as the executive and the legislature could agree. The first royal governor, Sir William Phipps (1692-1695), proved to be popular, generous, and well-meaning. He had a romantic history, but was of slender capacity, and owed his appointment to the favor of his pastor, Increase Mather.

Connecticut and Rhode Island received their charters back; New Hampshire was governed by its new proprietor, Samuel Allen, but without a charter; Maine continued under Massachusetts,—the Bay Colony now extending from Rhode Island to New Brunswick, except for the short intervening strip of New Hampshire coast.

It was fortunate for American liberty that the scheme of a consolidation of the New England colonies was put forward by the Stuarts too late for accomplishment. It was also fortunate that Massachusetts was flanked by and often competed with by her neighbors, Plymouth, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire, who were protected against her by a jealous government in England, and that the Dutch cut off her ambitious territorial aspirations to the west. In the separate colonial life was sown the spirit of local patriotism which is now embodied in the American States. In New England, as in the South, there was a leading, but never a dominant, colony; the smaller colonies shared the experiences of the larger, but were freer from calamitous changes, and enjoyed in some respects governments which were more immediately under the control of the people.

The end of the century saw all the New England colonies established on what seemed a permanent basis of loyalty to the Crown and of local independence.

CHAPTER VIII.

SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS IN NEW ENGLAND IN 1700.

Bibliographies.—Same as §§ 47 and 63, above; Channing and Hart, Guide, § 130.

General Accounts.—Osgood, Colonies; Doyle, Colonies, III. ch. ix.; Lodge, Colonies, ch. xxii.; W. Weeden, Economic and Social History; J. Bishop, History of American Manufactures; American Statistical Association Publications, No. 1.

Special Histories.—Manners and customs: Earle, Costumes of Colonial Times, Customs and Fashions in Old New England, Sabbath in Puritan New England, and Stage Coach and Tavern Days; W. Bliss, Colonial Times on Buzzard's Bay, and Old Colony Town; F. Child, Colonial Parsons of New England; J. Felt, Customs of New England; Fisher, Men, Women, and Manners, I. chs. ii.-v.; Howe, Puritan Republic, chs. v.-ix.; W. Love, Fast and Thanksgiving Days; M. Ward, Old Colony Days; Wharton, Colonial Days and Dames.—Education: C. Johnson, Old Time Schools and School Books; E. Brown, Making of our Middle Schools.—Theology: B. Adams, Emancipation of Massachusetts; F. Foster, New England Theology; M. Greene, Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut; C. F. Adams, Antinomianism.—Press: C. Duniway, Freedom of Press in Massachusetts; G. Littlefield, Early Massachusetts Press; R. Roden, Cambridge Press.—Slavery: G. Moore, Slavery in Massachusetts; G. Williams, Negro Race in America, 1619-1880; W. Dubois, Suppression of Slave Trade.—On the witchcraft delusion: C. Upham, Salem Witchcraft; S. Drake, Annals of Witchcraft; J. Taylor, Witchcraft Delusion in Connecticut.—Medical practice: O. Holmes, Medical Profession in Massachusetts. See also, biographies of prominent men.

North of Cape Cod the shores of New England are rugged and forbidding, though the coast-line is indented by numerous inlets from the sea, affording safe anchorage. To the south of the cape there are also abundant harbors; but the mountains nowhere approach the shore, and the beach is wide, with a sand strip extending for some distance inland, while treacherous shoals are not uncommon. The rivers, except those in Maine and the Merrimac and the Connecticut, are small, and have their sources in innumerable small lakes; the upper streams fall in successions of picturesque cascades, the water-power of which is often profitably utilized in manufacturing; and the larger rivers are held back by great dams, about which have grown up the manufacturing towns of Manchester, Nashua, Lowell, Lawrence, Holyoke, and many others.

Two ranges of mountains traverse New England: the Green Mountains and their continuation, the Berkshire Hills, run nearly north and south from Canada to Connecticut; the White Mountains form a group, rather than a chain, nearer the coast. In the eastern half of Maine the low watershed comes down to within one hundred and forty miles of the sea-shore, and the Atlantic-coast region may be said practically to end there. The highest elevation in the Appalachian system north of North Carolina is Mount Washington (six thousand two hundred and ninety feet), in the White Mountain range. The soil of New England is for the most part thin, and interspersed with rocks and gravel. The banks of some of the principal rivers are enriched by alluvial deposits left by overflows; there are fair pasturage lands in Vermont and New Hampshire, while Maine, back from the shore, has much good soil. The New England hills are [Pg 180] rich in quarries of fine building stone. Their mineral wealth is not great; iron and manganese have been found in considerable quantities, together with some anthracite coal, lead, and copper. Originally New England was one vast forest, and the trees had to be cleared away in order to prepare the soil for cultivation. The climate is subject to rapid variations, being generally accounted superb in the summer and autumn; but the winters are long and severe, and the springs late and brief.

The natural obstacles to human welfare in New England were great; but the English settlers were men of tough fibre and rare determination. They were not daunted by rugged hills, gloomy forest, harsh climate, and niggardly soil. With courageous toil they built up thrifty towns along the narrow slope, and erected enduring commonwealths, in which the English institutions to which they had been accustomed were reproduced, and often improved upon.

The population of New England in 1700, by which time a second generation of Englishmen had arisen in America, is roughly estimated at about a hundred and five thousand souls, of whom seventy thousand were in Massachusetts and Maine, five thousand in New Hampshire, six thousand in Rhode Island, and twenty-five thousand in Connecticut. The people were almost wholly of pure English stock. Up to 1640, when the first great Puritan exodus ceased, full twenty thousand English Dissenters, mainly from the eastern counties of England, came to New England; thenceforth the population, says Palfrey, "continued to multiply on its own soil for a century and a half, in remarkable seclusion from other communities." During this time there was a small infusion of Normans from the Channel Islands, Welsh, Scotch-Irish (chiefly in 1652 and 1719), and Huguenots (1685). It is computed that at the [Pg 181] opening of the Revolutionary War ninety-eight per cent of New England people were English or unmixed descendants of Englishmen. Nowhere else in the American colonies was there so homogeneous a population, or one of such uniformly high quality. As said Stoughton, lieutenant-governor of Massachusetts (1692-1701): "God sifted a whole nation, that he might send choice grain over into this wilderness."

Social distinctions were almost as sharply drawn in New England as in the South. There was a powerful and much-respected aristocratic class, beginning with the village "squire" and ending with the Crown officials in the capital towns. "The foundations of rank," says Lodge, "were birth, ancestral or individual service to the State, ability, education, and to some extent wealth." The recognized classes were, in order of precedence, gentlemen, yeomen, merchants, and mechanics; and at church the people were punctiliously seated according to station. Down to 1772 the students in Harvard College were carefully arranged in the catalogue in the order of their social rank, the Hutchinsons, Saltonstalls, Winthrops, and Quincys near the head. There was also a distinction between new-comers and old-comers, the "old family" class laying some pretensions to social superiority. The aristocrats were not men of leisure,—everybody in New England worked; but the public offices and the professions were reserved for gentlemen. Now and then some of them conducted large estates, although aristocracy was not, as in England, supported on landed possessions and primogeniture. The force of public opinion alone separated the classes; with the growth of the democratic idea, social barriers ultimately weakened, although they continued [Pg 182] to appear in the politics of the commonwealth down to the middle of the present century.

Slaves were comparatively few in number, the greater part of them being house and body servants, and they were not harshly treated; travellers have left record of the fact that some of the humbler farmers ate at table with their human chattels. The race was, however, generally despised, and in one of the old churches in Boston is still to be seen the lofty "slaves' gallery." Judge Samuel Sewall issued the first public denunciation of slavery in Massachusetts, in a pamphlet issued in 1700, wherein he denounced "the wicked practice." For many years this distinguished jurist and diarist followed up his assaults, allowing no opportunity to escape wherein he might espouse the cause of the oppressed "blackamores" and mitigate the severity of the laws against them. But the colonists in general saw nothing in the system to shock their moral sense, and it was not until the Revolution that anti-slavery ideas began, in New England, to spread beyond a narrow circle of humanitarians.

There was a full system of courts, ranging from the colonial judges down to the justices of the peace and "commissioners of small causes," appointed by colonial authority in each town. The magistrates were uniformly men of good character, of the upper, well-educated class, and rendered substantial justice, although not specially trained in the law. The legal profession was practically neglected throughout the seventeenth century, doubtless owing in great part to lack of facilities for study and to the overtowering importance of the ministry; we do not read of a professional barrister in Massachusetts until 1688. There was, however, no lack of litigation; personal disputes were rife in Rhode Island, and in Connecticut there were frequent [Pg 183] legal contests between towns regarding lands. Between the colonies, also, there were complicated and hotly-contested boundary disputes. The bar gained strength, but it was not till about the middle of the eighteenth century that it stood beside the ministry.

We have had frequent evidences, in preceding chapters, of the large influence of the clergy in the temporal affairs of New England. The ranks of the Puritan ministry contained men of the best ability and station; they were pre-eminently the strongest class, and as the popular leaders, deeply impressed their character upon the laws and institutions of the community. They were held in great affection and reverence; but in a body of sturdy, intelligent parishioners they could maintain their supremacy only by the exercise of superior mental gifts: their calling was one offering rich rewards for excellence, and attracted to it men of the finest calibre, like the Mathers and Hooker. The sloth or the dullard was soon taught by his people that he had mistaken his calling. Jonathan Edwards, although of a later period than that of which we are treating, was a fair type, and his early resolution "to live with all my might while I do live," was an expression of the spirit which dominated his order.

It was an age in which quackery flourished. The regular physicians, though excellent men and highly regarded by the people, depended upon nostrums, and had little medical knowledge; they were in the main "herb-doctors" and "blood-letters." Many of the practitioners were barbers, and others clergymen. "This relation between medicine and theology," writes Dr. Holmes, "has existed from a very early period; from the Egyptian priest to the Indian medicine-man, the alliance has been maintained in one form or another. The partnership was very common among our British ancestors." [Pg 184] There were few facilities for the study of medicine in the colonies until after the Revolution. The first medical school in America was established in Philadelphia, about 1760.

Unlike the Southern colonists, New Englanders were dependent on England only for the most important manufactures. Mechanics were sufficiently numerous in every community. The lumber industry was important, and in Connecticut and Massachusetts there was profitable iron mining, which gave rise to several kindred pursuits. There being abundant water-power, small saw and grist mills were numerous; there were many tanneries and distilleries; the Scotch-Irish in Massachusetts and New Hampshire made linens and coarse woollens, and beaver hats and paper were manufactured on a small scale. The people were largely dressed in homespun cloth, and a spinning-wheel was to be found in every farm-house. It was not until after the Revolution, however, that New England manufacturing interests attained much magnitude; the home government, through the Acts of Navigation and Trade (page 104), had discouraged, as far as possible, American efforts in this direction.

The fisheries, particularly whale and cod, were an important source of income, those of Massachusetts being estimated, in 1750, at £250,000 per year. Fishers' hamlets, with their great net-reels and drying stages, were strung along the shores. The men engaged in the traffic were hardy and bold, no weather deterring them from long voyages to Newfoundland and Labrador, while whale-fishers ventured into the Arctic seas. From their ranks were largely recruited the superb sailors who made the American navy famous in the two wars with England.

[Pg 185] A pinnace, called the "Virginia," was constructed by the Popham colonists in 1607,—the first ocean-going vessel built in New England. Shipbuilding was first undertaken at Plymouth in 1625, and in Massachusetts six years later (1631). By 1650 New England vessels were to be seen all along the coast, and carried the bulk of the export cargoes. Before 1724 English ship carpenters complained of American competition. In 1760 ships to the extent of twenty thousand tons a year were being turned out of American shipyards,—chiefly in New England; and most of them found a market in the mother-country.

Dried fish was the chief commodity carried out of New England, and was exported in American bottoms to Spain, Portugal, and the West Indies. Fish-oil and timber were also sent out of Maine and Massachusetts to foreign countries; hay, grain, and cattle were taken to New York, Philadelphia, and the West Indies. There was an active longshore coasting service by small craft, which ascended the rivers and gathered produce from the farmers; these they took to neighboring ports, and brought back other colonial products in exchange. Larger vessels went with miscellaneous cargoes to the West Indies, and returned with slaves and sugar. New Englanders manufactured rum from West India sugar and molasses, and exported the finished product. There are instances of New England ships taking rum to Africa, where it was exchanged for slaves; these slaves were then transported to the West Indies, to be bartered for sugar and molasses, which was carried home and converted into rum. It was a day when kegs of rum and wines were given to ministers at donation parties, and ministers themselves made brandy by the barrel for domestic use, and sold it to their parishioners. Wines were imported from Madeira and Malaga, and manufactured [Pg 186] goods from England and the Continent. A very large and profitable business was done in the general carrying trade, which was developed by enterprising New England men in all the sister colonies. Boston alone employed, by the middle of the eighteenth century, about six hundred vessels in her foreign commerce, and a thousand in her fisheries and coast-trade.

At the beginning of the eighteenth century the population was in about equal degree engaged in trade and agriculture. Trade was the chief calling in Rhode Island, and agriculture in Connecticut and New Hampshire, while in Maine and Massachusetts both flourished. All of the colonies were also much interested in the fisheries.

Boston, Newport, and New Haven were the chief towns; the former was at this time the centre of political and mercantile life on the North American continent, and there were external evidences of considerable wealth and some luxury. New Haven was famed for its prosperous appearance, and the houses of its rich men were of a better style of architecture than commonly seen in the colonies. Small villages, neighborhood centres of the several townships, abounded everywhere. The houses of the minister and the school-teacher, with the little shops of tradesmen and artisans, formed the nucleus around which the farm-houses were grouped with more or less density. The village streets, overhung with arching elms, were kept in tolerable order by the "hog-reeves," "fence-viewers," and other town officials. The quaint, roomy, gambrel-roofed houses were scrupulously plain and clean, and were presided over by model housewives.

[Pg 187] The people in these rural communities were in moderate financial circumstances, neat in habit, intelligent, and fairly educated; both sexes, young and old, worked hard, were frugal, thrifty, and as a rule rigid in morals. While coldly reserved towards strangers, they were kind and hospitable, and noted far and wide for their acute inquisitiveness. They wore sober-colored garments except on Sunday, the important day of the week, when there was a general display of quaint finery of a sombre character. The men wore long stockings and knee-breeches, with buckled shoes; workmen had breeches and jackets of leather, buckskin, or coarse canvas, while those of higher degree were generally dressed in coarse homespun,—only the richest could afford imported cloths. Their great open fireplaces were ill-adapted to withstand the winter's rigor. Their churches were wholly unprovided with heating accommodations. Their diet was spare. The well-to-do prided themselves on their old silver tableware, and New England kitchens were noted for their displays of brightly burnished pewter and brasses. Cider and New England rum were favorite beverages; but drunkenness was less prevalent than in the other colonies: the New England temperament was not inclined to excesses and roistering. The general tone of life was sedate, even gloomy; the Puritans had "a lurking inherited distrust for enjoyment," yet they cultivated a certain dry humor, and for the young people there was not lacking a round of simple amusements, such as house-raisings, dancing parties, and husking, spinning, quilting, and apple-paring bees, into which the neighborhoods entered with great zest. In the towns there was more pretension and ceremonial; but taking changed conditions into account, the life of the townspeople and their habits of thought differed but little from those of their rural cousins.

[Pg 188] The highways were generally of fair character, but the larger streams were unbridged. Outside of the neighborhoods of the large towns wheeled vehicles, except for heavy loads, were not common until the time of the Revolution. Horseback was the ordinary mode of travel. A tavern kept by some leading citizen could be found in every town, with good lodgings at reasonable rates, although there was general complaint of the cookery. Nowhere else in the colonies was there so much intercommunication as in New England.

A system of public education was among the first institutions established by the Puritans. Each town had its school; by 1649 there was no New England colony, except Rhode Island, in which some degree of education was not compulsory. Deep learning was rare, but the people were well drilled in the rudiments; except on the far-off borders of Maine there was no illiteracy in New England when the Revolution broke out. Latin schools and academies soon supplemented parental instruction and the common schools. We have seen that Boston was but six years old when Harvard College was established (1636); and Yale College was opened at New Haven in the year 1700.

Crime appears to have been less frequent in New England than in the Southern or the middle colonies; the highways were safe after the close of King Philip's war and the Tarratine trouble; doors and windows were seldom barred in the country, and young women could travel anywhere with perfect safety. The list of capital crimes was a long one in that day, as well in the mother-land as in the colonies, and hangings, particularly of the pirates who infested the coast, were [Pg 189] spectacles frequently seen in New England. A more cruel form of punishment was reserved for the negro race. There were several cases of negroes being burned at the stake for murder or arson. Great publicity was given to all manner of punishments; gibbets, stocks, ducking-stools, pillories, and whipping-posts were familiar objects in nearly every town. Criminals might also be branded, mutilated, or compelled to wear, conspicuously sewed to their garments, colored letters indicative of the offences committed. Hawthorne's romance of the "Scarlet Letter" is based on this last-named custom.

Organized on the Independent, or Congregational, form, each religious congregation was a law unto itself, electing its own deacons and minister, and was but little influenced by the occasional synods, or councils of churches, which at last fell into disuse. At first the Church was bitterly intolerant; but this spirit gradually softened as it became more and more separated from the State. By the close of the seventeenth century John Eliot complained that religion had declined; in 1749 Douglass was able to write, "At present the Congregationalists of New England may be esteemed among the most moderate and charitable of Christian professions." The introduction of the Church of England under Andros aroused bitter opposition. Episcopalianism was vigorously preached against until the Revolution; but there was no great cause for complaint, as it was not sought to foist it upon the people, but to gain for it a hearing. The name "Bishop's palace," still applied to a house in Cambridge which was supposed when built to have been intended for an imported bishop, bears testimony to the popular feeling against the system. It had no success except among the Tory element in Boston and Portsmouth,—and later (1736-1750) in New Haven. In Rhode Island perfect tolerance made the [Pg 190] colony a harboring place for all manner of despised sects and factious disturbers driven out of other communities, and the spirit of turbulence long reigned there.

A "great awakening" of religious fervor affected New England between 1713 and 1744. Originating in Northampton, Mass., in revivals under Solomon Stoddard, the popular excitement became almost frenzied under Jonathan Edwards, beginning in 1734. A visit from George Whitefield, the English revivalist, in 1740 caused a great fervor of religious interest, and it is estimated that twenty-five thousand converts were made by the great agitator throughout his New England pilgrimage. By 1744, when Whitefield again visited the scene of his triumphs, the excitement had greatly subsided.

The witchcraft craze at Salem is commonly thought to have been a legitimate outgrowth of the gloomy religion of the Puritans. It was, however, but one of those panics of fear which during several centuries periodically swept over civilized lands. In the twelfth century thousands of persons in Europe were sacrificed because the people believed them to be witches, in league with the devil, and with the power to ride through the air and vex humanity in many occult ways. Pope Innocent VIII. commanded (1484) that witches be arrested, and hundreds of odd and repulsive old women were burned or hanged in consequence. From King John down to 1712, innocent lives were constantly sacrificed in England on this charge; in the year 1661 alone, one hundred and twenty were hanged there. It was therefore no new frenzy that broke out in Massachusetts. In 1648 Margaret Jones was hanged as a witch at Charlestown; in 1656 the sister of Deputy-Governor Bellingham, for [Pg 191] being "too subtle in her perception of what was occurring around her," suffered the same fate; in 1688 an Irish washerwoman named Glover went to the gallows because a spiteful child said she had been bewitched by the poor creature.

There was general despondency in Massachusetts in 1692, the result of four small-pox epidemics which had quickly followed each other, the loss of the old charter, a temporary increase in crime, financial depression, and general dread of another Indian outbreak. The time was ripe for an epidemic of superstitious fear. All at once it broke out with great fury in the old town of Salem. Despite the protest of Cotton Mather and other prominent clergymen, who, though believers in witches, condemned unjust methods of procedure, a special court of oyer and terminer was hastily organized (1692) by the governor and council for the trial of the accused. Lieutenant-Governor Stoughton, who presided over this extraordinary tribunal, was in active sympathy with the fanatics who conducted the prosecution. The witnesses were chiefly children, and the testimony the flimsiest ever seriously received in an American court of justice. But the judges, although sober and respectable citizens, were as deluded as the people; while the frenzy lasted, nineteen persons were hanged for having bewitched children in the neighborhood, and one was pressed to death because he would not plead. Of the hundreds of others who were arrested, two died while in prison.

By the following year the craze had exhausted itself, and there was a general jail-delivery. Many of the children afterwards confessed to the falsity of their testimony. Samuel Sewall was one of the trial judges. He afterwards, while standing in his pew in the Old South Church at Boston, had read at the [Pg 192] desk at public declaration expressing his deep repentance that he had been in such grievous error, and asking the congregation to unite with him in praying for the forgiveness of God. Cotton Mather, however, endeavored to vindicate himself by the statement, "I know not that ever I have advanced any opinion in the matter of witchcraft but what all the ministers of the Lord that I know of in the world, whether English or Scotch, or French or Dutch, are of the same opinion with me."

Belief in witchcraft was not confined to Massachusetts. Evidence of this superstition—childish to us of to-day, but a stern reality in the strongest minds of Cotton Mather's time—was noticeable throughout most of the colonies until the middle of the eighteenth century. In 1705 a witch was "ducked" in Virginia. There were trials for witchcraft in Maryland during the last quarter of the seventeenth century, but there is no evidence extant of an execution. In Pennsylvania in 1683 a woman was tried as a witch, and bound to good behavior. In 1779, during a similar panic among the French creoles at Cahokia, Ill., two negro slaves were condemned to be hanged, and another to be burned alive while chained to a post, on the charge of practising sorcery; there is, however, no evidence that the sentence was carried out.

The town was in New England the political unit. The town-meeting was a primary assembly, at which were transacted all local affairs,—those which came nearest to the individual. The colonial government dealt with general interests; the colonial machinery of administration might break down, and yet the immediate needs of the people would have been for a time subserved by the town governments. This was [Pg 193] the case at the beginning of the Revolution. But the indispensable function of legislation upon property and contracts, the definition of crimes, and all the judicial affairs of the people, were from the first carried out by the colony. In the town-meetings—and in church congregations, which were for a long period scarcely distinguishable from them—the people were trained in self-government; their intellects were sharpened, and there was bred a stout spirit of political self-sufficiency. By the beginning of the eighteenth century a freehold test for suffrage was common in New England, as in most of the American colonies. Taxes raised on land, polls, and personal property were not onerous, as public expenditures were carefully watched and criticised by a frugal people. The introduction of royal governors opened the door to bickerings between the executive and the legislature,—so prominent a feature in eighteenth-century colonial history prior to the Revolution. Up to 1700, with a few exceptions, the political machinery had run quite smoothly, when not subjected to outside interference. The several colonial governments in New England varied in detail, but they were alike in being largely independent of England, in being administered in a spirit of simplicity and economy, and in the extent to which the body of the people were enabled to influence the conduct of affairs.

New England men were brave and liberty-loving, stoutly withstanding any attempt on the part of the home government to curtail their rights as Englishmen or hamper their progress. They were not always successful in their resistance, but were vastly more independent than their French and Spanish neighbors; and the principles of popular government were nowhere else, even in the English colonies, so successfully put in practice. They were hard-working, frugal, [Pg 194] God-fearing, educated, and virtuous men. They sprang from a high quality of pure English stock, and they had raised indeed "choice grain." They founded an enduring empire amid obstacles that two and a half centuries ago might well have seemed appalling. The creed of the Puritans was harsh, their view of life gloomy, and their church intolerant; but their mission, as they conceived it, was a serious one, and the stormy experience of Rhode Island was not calculated elsewhere to encourage looseness in religious thinking. They were enterprising and thrifty to a high degree. In commerce, domestic trade, manufactures, and political sagacity, for nearly two centuries New England easily led all the American colonies. The nation owes much to the wisdom, the energy, and the fortitude of New England colonial statesmen; and New England institutions are to-day in large measure characteristics of the American commonwealth.

CHAPTER IX.

THE COLONIZATION OF THE MIDDLE COLONIES (1609-1700).

Bibliographies.—Larned, Literature of American History, 92-100; Andrews, Colonial Self-Government, ch. xx.; Avery, II. 417-421, 438-444, III. 413-418, 430-432, 443-445; Winsor, III. 411-420, 449-456, 495-516, IV. 409-442, 488-502; Channing and Hart, Guide, §§ 104-108.

Historical Maps.—Nos. 1, 2, and 3, this volume (Epoch Maps, Nos. 1, 2, 3); Winsor, as above.

General Accounts.—Fiske, Dutch and Quaker Colonies; Doyle, Colonies, IV.; Lodge, Colonies, chs. ix.-xvi.; Channing, United States, I. chs. xvi., xvii., II. chs. ii., iv., v., vii.; Avery, II. chs. iv., xi., xii., III. chs. iv.-vi., xv., xvii., xviii., xxvi.; Andrews, as above, chs. v.-viii., xi., xii.; Winsor, III. chs. x.-xii., IV. chs. viii., ix.

Special Histories.—New York: Roberts (Commonwealths), and Brodhead: O'Callaghan, New Netherlands; G. Schuyler, Colonial New York, I.; W. Griffis, New Netherland; histories of New York city by Innis, Janvier, Lamb, Rensselaer, Roosevelt, Stone, and Wilson.—Delaware: Conrad and Scharf; Jameson, Willem Usselinx.—New Jersey: Lee, Mulford, Raum, and Tanner; F. Stockton, Stories of New Jersey; A. Melick, Old New Jersey Farm.—Pennsylvania: S. Fisher, Making of Pennsylvania; H. Jenkins, Pennsylvania; I. Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania, and Quaker Government; A. Myers, Irish Quakers; O. Kuhns, German and Swiss Settlements; J. Sachse, Pennsylvania Germans, and German Pietists; Scharf and Westcott, Philadelphia.

Contemporary Accounts.—Josselyn, Two Voyages (1675); Dankers Sluyter, Voyage to New York (1679); Penn, Some Account (1681); Budd, Good Order Established (1685); Sewel, History of Quakers (1722); Hazard, Annals of Pennsylvania; Gabriel Thomas, West Jersey. Reprints: Colonial Documents and Records of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania; Half Moon Series; American History told by Contemporaries, I. part vi.; Jameson, Original Narratives; publications by colonial and town record commissions, and historical and antiquarian societies.

In September, 1609, Hendrik Hudson, an English navigator in the employ of the Dutch East India Company, sailed up the river to which his name has been given by the English—the Dutch called it North River—as far as the future site of Albany. He found "that the land was of the finest kind for tillage, and as beautiful as the foot of man ever trod upon." Six weeks earlier Champlain, the commander of New France, had been on the shores of Lake Champlain about one hundred miles to the north, fighting the native Iroquois. The object of Hudson's search was a familiar one in his time,—the discovery of a water-passage through the continent that might serve as a short-cut to India, where his masters were engaged in trade. He did not find what he sought, but opened the way to a lucrative traffic with the American savages, whose good graces the thrifty Dutch strove to cultivate. The French leader's introduction to the Iroquois had been as an enemy, but the explorer from Holland came as a friend: the Dutch reaped advantage from the contrast.

Dutch traders annually visited the region of Hudson River during the next few years. There was at first no attempt at colonization, for Holland just at that time was not prepared to give offence to her old enemy, Spain, which claimed most of North America by the right of discovery and Pope Alexander's bull of partition. Nevertheless, the country was styled New Netherland, and Holland recognized it as a legal dependency. A Dutch navigator, Adrian Block, as the result of an accident, spent a winter on either Manhattan or Long Island, and built a coasting-vessel (1614) for trafficking in furs. A small trading-house, [Pg 197] called Fort Nassau, was also erected this year on the site of Albany; a similar establishment, without defences, and surrounded by a few huts for traders, was built on Manhattan Island, at the mouth of the river, the following season (1615); a new Fort Nassau was afterwards (1623) set up on the Delaware River, four miles below the site of Philadelphia, but was soon abandoned.

In 1615 the New Netherland Company obtained a trading charter from the States-General of Holland. The corporation was granted a monopoly of the Dutch fur-traffic in New Netherland for three years, and conducted extensive operations between Albany and the Delaware, coastwise and in the interior. The Dutch thus far had not ventured to exercise political control over the New Netherland. The country was still claimed by the English Virginia Company. The land originally granted to the Pilgrims from Leyden by the latter company was described as being "about the Hudson's River." We have seen how the party on the "Mayflower" were prevented by storms—or possibly by the design of the captain—from reaching their destination and planting an English colony in the neighborhood of the Dutch trading posts.

In 1621 the Dutch West India Company came upon the scene as the successor of the New Netherland Company. Its charter bade it "to advance the peopling of those fruitful and unsettled parts," and to "do all that the service of those countries and the profit and increase of trade shall require." The corporation was given almost absolute commercial and political power in all Dutch domains between Newfoundland and the Straits of Magellan, the home government reserving only the right to decline confirmation of colonial officers. Three years elapsed before the company [Pg 198] attempted to plant a colony. Thirty families of Protestant Walloons—a people of mixed Gallic and Teutonic blood, living in the southern provinces of Holland, whose offer to settle in Virginia had been rejected by the English—were sent over by the Dutch proprietors (1624) to their new possessions. The greater part of the emigrants went to Albany, which they styled Fort Orange; others were sent to the Delaware River colony; a small party went on to the Connecticut; a few settled on Long Island; and eight men stayed on Manhattan. These settlements, relying for their chief support on the fur-trade with the Indians, were quite successful, and the New Netherlands soon became an important group of commercial colonies.

In 1626 Peter Minuit, then director for the company, purchased Manhattan from the Indians, united all the settlements under one system of direction, and founded New Amsterdam (afterwards New York city) as the central trading depot. In every direction the trade of New Netherland grew.

As the settlers seemed to be interested in commerce, and agricultural colonization did not flourish, the corporation secured from the States-General a new charter of "freedoms and exemptions" (1629), which they thought better adapted to the fostering of emigration. This document sought to transplant the European feudal system to the American wilds. Members of the Dutch West India Company might purchase tracts of land from the Indians and plant colonies thereon, of which these proprietors were to be the patroons, or patrons. Each patroon thus establishing a colony of fifty persons upwards of fifteen years of age, was granted a tract "as a perpetual inheritance," sixteen miles wide [Pg 199] along the river, or eight miles on both sides, "and so far into the country as the situation of the occupiers will permit." The company retained intervening lands; but no one might settle within thirty miles of a patroon colony without consent of the patroon, subject to the order of the company's officials. The patroons were given political and judicial power over their colonists; the latter might take appeals to the New Netherlands council, but the patroons were generally careful to bind the settlers before starting out not to exercise this right.

Leading members of the company were quick to avail themselves of this opportunity to become members of a landed aristocracy and absolute chiefs of whatever colonies they might plant. Small settlements were soon made on these several domains, which were taken up chiefly along Hudson River, the principal highway into the Indian country. Van Rensselaer founded Rensselaerswyck, near Fort Orange; Pauw secured Hoboken and Staten Island; while Godyn, Blommaert, De Vries, and others settled Swaanendael, on the Delaware. Many of the old patroon estates long remained undivided, and the heirs of the founders claimed some semi-feudal privileges well into the nineteenth century. Attempts to collect long arrears of rent on the great Van Rensselaer estate led to a serious anti-rent movement (1839-1846), which broke out in bloody riots and affected New York politics for several years.

The patroons, as individuals, haughtily assumed to shut out the Dutch West India Company, of which they were members, from the trade of their petty independent States. The corporation was not only torn by internal dissensions, but soon had on hand a quarrel with New England because of the establishment of a Dutch fur-trading post at Hartford, on the Connecticut (1633), and the vain assertion of a right to [Pg 200] exclude English vessels from the Hudson river. On the south, the Dutch came into collision with Virginians trading on the Delaware and the Schuylkill. Trade increased, but colonization did not thrive, owing in part to the rapacity of the patroons, and partly to the mismanagement of the governors sent out to represent the company.

The singular lack of tact displayed by Governor Kieft led to an Algonquian Indian uprising (1643-45), which resulted in the death of sixteen hundred savages, but left the border settlements in ruins, and seriously checked colonial growth for several years. The Algonkins being enemies of the Iroquois, the friendship originally formed between the Dutch and the latter was not disturbed by this outbreak.

In 1640 the company fixed the limits of a patroon's estate at one mile along the river front and two miles in depth, but did not disturb the feudal privileges. As a counter-influence, a new class of settlers was provided for. Any one going to New Netherland with five other emigrants might take two hundred acres of land as a bounty and be independent of the patroons. A species of local self-government was also provided for at this time, the officers of each town or village being chosen by the directors of the company from a list made up by the inhabitants. These inducements do not seem to have attracted many colonists, for when Peter Stuyvesant came out as governor (1647), and strutted about Manhattan "like a peacock,—as if he were the Czar of Muscovy," there were only three hundred fighting men in the entire province.

Up to this time the people had been obliged to rely chiefly on petitions as a means of presenting their political grievances. The colonists struggling for political rights. In 1641 Kieft had been forced by popular opinion to call a council of twelve deputies from the [Pg 201] several settlements to advise him in regard to treatment of the Indians, and again in 1644 to consult as to taxes; but he rode rough-shod over the deputies. The public outcry over this arbitrary conduct led to his recall and the institution of some minor reforms. Under Stuyvesant there was formed a council of nine, the members being selected by him from a list of popular nominations. The board was so arranged as to be self-perpetuating, and the people, after the original election, ceased to have any hand in its makeup. In an important struggle between Stuyvesant and the residents of New Amsterdam (1651) relative to an excise tax, the director general was obliged to yield.

A source of anxiety to the rulers of New Netherland was the heterogeneous character of the population. The first permanent settlers had been the Walloons. The Dutch themselves soon followed. Besides these were several bands of Protestant reformers who had fled from persecution in Europe, and numerous sectaries from New England who had found life intolerable there. There were so many French-speaking people in the district that public documents were often printed both in French and Dutch. In 1643 it was reported that eighteen languages were spoken in New Amsterdam.

The South Company of Sweden sent out a colony in 1638 under charge of Minuit, formerly employed by the Dutch West India Company. He built Fort Christina, on the future site of Wilmington, Del., and called the country New Sweden. The Dutch governor at New Amsterdam vainly protested against this occupation of territory claimed by his employers. Two years later (1641) a party of Englishmen from New Haven built trading-houses on the Schuylkill, and at Salem, N. J., near Fort Nassau, but were soon [Pg 202] compelled to leave. The Swedish enterprise went unchecked until Stuyvesant's rule, when a fort was built (1651) on the site of Newcastle, Del., below the Swedish fort; and four years after this (1655) the South Company was obliged, upon display of force, to abandon its enterprise.

So long as a foreign nation and a formidable commercial rival held the geographical centre, the northern and southern colonies of England were separated, intercommunication was hampered, and international boundary disputes arose. Moreover, New Amsterdam had the best harbor on the coast, and the Hudson river was an easy highway for traffic with the Indians; it was, as well, altogether too convenient for possible raids of French and Indians from the north. For these reasons England was desirous of obtaining possession of the New Netherlands. There were not wanting excuses for interference. Englishmen in Connecticut, on Long Island, and on the Schuylkill had had land disputes with the Dutch, and there had been much bad temper displayed on both sides.

In 1654 Cromwell sent out a fleet to take the country; but peace between England and Holland intervened in time to give to New Netherland a respite of ten years. In 1664 Charles II. revived the claim that Englishmen had discovered the region before the Dutch. In August of that year Colonel Nicolls appeared before New Amsterdam, then a town of fifteen hundred inhabitants, with a fleet of four ships, having on board four hundred and fifty English soldiers and Connecticut volunteers, and demanded its surrender. There was a stone fort and twenty cannon; but the enemy were too strong to be [Pg 203] profitably resisted. Despite Stuyvesant's protest, "I would rather be carried to my grave" than yield, the white flag was eagerly run up by the frightened town officers, and Dutch rule in New Amsterdam came to an end.

By October every possession of Holland in North America was in the hands of the English, who now held the Atlantic coast from the Savannah to the Kennebec. The achievement of Nicolls had rendered it possible for the American colonies to unite, and thus was of the greatest importance to the political development of the country. Had King Charles been able to foresee the trend of events, he would no doubt have been glad to allow the Dutch to stand as an obstacle to the union of his transatlantic possessions.

The Duke of York was made proprietor of the conquered territory, the province and capital being now styled New York; Fort Orange was rechristened Albany. But beyond the change of names, little was done to interrupt the smooth current of life, and Dutch customs in household and trade were retained so far as practicable; while the public offices were impartially shared, and former Dutch officials were consulted. There was one notable act of injustice: all land-grants had to be confirmed by the new governor, Nicolls, and fees were exacted for this service. Under English rule the prosperity of the colony greatly increased.

The methods of local self-government were quietly transformed. Under the Dutch, the towns, manors, and villages held direct relations with the West India Company. A systematic code drawn by Nicolls and a convention of the settlers (1665)—promulgated [Pg 204] as "the duke's laws"—provided for town-meetings for the election in each town by a "plurality of the voices of the freeholders," of a constable and eight overseers. These officers were the governing board of the town, with judicial and legislative powers, thus differing from the New England selectmen, who but carried out the mandates of the town-meeting. There was created a judicial district called a "riding," with an area embracing several towns and presided over by a sheriff. In 1683, these ridings developed into counties; afterwards (1703), it was arranged that a supervisor was to be elected by the freeholders in each town, to represent it in a county board whose duties were chiefly to levy, collect, and apportion taxes. Thus we see the genesis in the middle colonies of the mixed system of local government,—town and county being of equal importance, with elective executive officers in each: it was a compromise between the town system of New England and the county system of Virginia; and this mixed system now prevails in perhaps most of the States of the Union. The duke's charter enabled him to make all laws, without asking the advice or assistance of the freemen. By "the duke's laws," power was vested in the hands of the governor and council, the people being wholly ignored in all matters above the affairs of the riding. Perfect religious liberty was allowed throughout the province.

In 1672 England and Holland were again at war, and Francis Lovelace, then governor of New York, made such preparations as he could against anticipated attack. The Dutch colonists had had more or less trouble about taxes with the English authorities, and there had been some friction because the duke had made grants to Carteret and Berkeley in what afterwards by the release became New Jersey, and thus had still further complicated land-titles; but in general [Pg 205] the English rule had been borne with comparative equanimity. Nevertheless, the Dutch were highly delighted when a fleet from Holland appeared before the city (1673), and easily secured the surrender of the place.

Fifteen months later (1674) the treaty of Westminster ceded the province back to England, and it became New York once more. The population at this time was about seven thousand.

Edmund Andros, later concerned in the attempt to reduce New England (page 174), now came out as governor. His domestic policy was wise, and the province experienced a healthy growth, the fur-trade being greatly expanded under his administration. Both Nicolls and Andros sought to neutralize the ill effects of the New Jersey grants by contending that they were still tributary to New York, and Andros, in particular, adopted aggressive measures to maintain what he held to be his prerogative; but Carteret and Berkeley were too influential at court, and the governor was recalled (1680) and given other employment.

Under Governor. Thomas Dongan (1683-1688) the government yielded to the clamor of the people, who pointed to the greater freedom allowed the New Englanders; and an assembly was formed composed of eighteen deputies elected by the freeholders. A charter of liberties was adopted by this body, with the king's consent, making the assembly co-ordinate with the governor and council; freeholders and freemen of corporations were invested with the franchise; religious toleration was ordained for all Christians; taxes were not to be levied without the assembly's sanction: but all laws were to require the assent of the duke, who was also to grant lands and establish custom-houses. This liberal treatment was of short duration. The Duke of [Pg 206] York came to the throne in 1685 as James II., and his reign was signalized by depriving his subjects in New York of their representative government (1686). The governor and council were ordered to establish the Church of England in the province, and to refuse permits to schools not licensed by the Church.

In 1688 New York was annexed to New England under the rule of Andros, who was represented in New York by a deputy, Francis Nicholson. Later in the year news came of the Revolution in England. Jacob Leisler, an energetic but uneducated German shopkeeper, who had come out as a soldier in the West India Company's employ, headed the militia in driving Nicholson out and proclaiming the Prince of Orange. Leisler assumed the government; but his rule was rash and arbitrary, although there is no doubt of his patriotic spirit, and soon there arose a demand from the conservative element for his withdrawal. By various subterfuges, however, he retained office for three years. His term was distinguished by his issuance of a call for the first Colonial Congress held in America; it met at Albany, February, 1690, with seven delegates, chiefly from New England, and sought to organize a retaliatory raid against the French and their Algonquian allies, who had recently swept Schenectady with fire and tomahawk. The following year (1691) Leisler was forced to surrender to the royal governor, Col. Henry Sloughter, who soon after, while intoxicated, was induced by Leisler's enemies to sign the death-warrant of his predecessor.

A representative assembly was called, which annulled Leisler's proceedings and formulated a code similar to the earlier charter of liberties. Governor. Benjamin Fletcher (1692-1698) was notoriously corrupt. He levied blackmail on the pirates and smugglers who swarmed in the harbors, and intrigued for [Pg 207] money with members of the assembly; but in his dealings with the hostile French and Indians he was firm and successful. In 1698 the Earl of Bellomont was appointed governor, and New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire were jointly placed under his rule. In New York he restored order, reduced crime, and rooted out corruption and piracy, so that when he died (1701), his loss was sincerely regretted.

New York had gone through a development which down to the end of the eighteenth century marked the colony out from her sisters. No other colony had a history of any importance before the English domination; in no other colony were a foreign race and a foreign language and customs so intrenched. No colony had such an experience of control from England. The history of New York up to 1700 is chiefly a history of administrations. The commercial pre-eminence of New York was hardly shown in colonial times. Its chief importance among the colonies arose out of the relations with the Iroquois.

We have seen that the Dutch West India Company established (1623) a trading post, called Fort Nassau, on the banks of the Delaware River within the present town of Gloucester, N.J., and four miles below the future site of Philadelphia. The settlers were a portion of the party of Walloons sent out to America in that year. Eight years later (1631), De Vries, Blommaert, and other patroons (page 199) of New Netherlands founded Swaanendael, near the site of Lewes, Del.; but a quarrel soon arose between the new settlers and the Indians, resulting in the complete massacre of the Swaanendael colonists and the driving away of the garrison at Fort Nassau. In 1635 the patroons [Pg 208] owning lands on both shores of Delaware Bay and River sold their possessions to the Dutch West India Company, and a small garrison was sent by the latter to re-occupy Fort Nassau. A party of Englishmen from New Haven attempted that year to settle in the district, but were taken to New Amsterdam as prisoners.

A third nation now appeared upon the scene as a competitor for the Delaware country. The South Company of Sweden—which purposed trading in Asia, Africa, and America, but especially in the last—had been chartered in 1624, under the auspices of the enterprising and ambitious Gustavus Adolphus, by Willem Usselinx, an Amsterdam merchant, founder of the Dutch West India Company. Usselinx had become embittered against the Dutch company, which pursued a narrow and exclusive policy; and with him in this new enterprise were associated several who had been formerly connected with the Dutch corporation. Among these were Samuel Blommaert, one of the chief patroons in the Delaware region, and Peter Minuit, a Walloon, once governor at New Amsterdam. Minuit led the first Swedish trading colony to the Delaware River (1638), and erected Fort Christina on the future site of Wilmington, Del.

The governor at New Amsterdam, Kieft, protested loudly against this invasion of soil claimed by the Dutch, although it was clearly within the grant already made to Lord Baltimore by the English, who probably had as good right in the district as the Dutch. The latter had indeed for a time allowed it to revert to the Indians, after their first colonizing attempt. Kieft rebuilt Fort Nassau, a menace to which the Swedes replied by fortifying the island of Tinicum, six miles below the mouth of the Schuylkill, thus planting the first colony in Pennsylvania as well as in Delaware. [Pg 209] In 1643 this island became the seat of Swedish government.

New Sweden prospered. The settlers were industrious, thrifty, intelligent, and contented. Along the shores of Delaware River and Bay were scattered neat hamlets, and the company's fur-trade was extended far into the interior.

In 1641 two English settlements were made on the river by New Haven men; but there was good reason to distrust the new-comers, who belonged to a land-hungry race, and Dutch and Swedes united to drive them out. Possibly the Swedes might have finally settled down into friendly neighborhood relations with the Dutch, had not the Swedish governor, John Printz, adopted an aggressive attitude towards the New Netherlanders. This led to reprisals. Stuyvesant, who succeeded Kieft at New Amsterdam, built Fort Casimir, near the present city of Newcastle, Del., below the Swedish forts (1651), and thus endeavored to cut them off from ocean communication. ends in the fall of New Sweden. In 1654 a Swedish war-vessel anchored before Casimir, which was quietly surrendered. The next year (1655) Stuyvesant raised an army of six or seven hundred men, which suddenly appeared on the Delaware, overawed the Swedes, and compelled them to abandon control of the region. Thus New Sweden fell, amid a storm of protest, but without bloodshed.

Part of the Delaware country was sold by the Dutch West India Company to the city of Amsterdam (1656). The officers sent out by the municipality were as a rule inefficient, and the colony declined; bad crops, famine, disease, Indian troubles, quarrels with New Netherland, and boundary difficulties with the English in Maryland, being additional reasons for retrogression.

[Pg 210] The city had just acquired the whole of the Delaware River region, when the English took possession (1664), and Amsterdam rule was succeeded by that of the Duke of York, with laws similar to those in vogue elsewhere in his province. There were a few outbreaks, but as a rule both Dutch and Swedes prospered under English domination.

The district was for some time the object of contention by rival English claimants. Maryland and New Jersey both wanted it, but Penn finally secured a grant of the country (1682), to give his province of Pennsylvania an outlet to the sea. Delaware, now known as "the territories," "lower counties," or "Delaware hundreds" of Pennsylvania, was for many years the source of much anxiety to its Quaker proprietor, for political jealousy of the "province," or Pennsylvania proper, gave rise to much popular discontent. In 1691 the "territories" were granted a separate assembly and a deputy-governor. But the "territories" and the "province" were reunited under Fletcher's temporary rule (1693), and so remained until 1703, when Delaware was recognized as a separate colony, with an assembly of its own, although under the same governorship as Pennsylvania.

The separate existence of Delaware was almost an accident. The colony was unjustly cut out of the Maryland grant, and was little more than a strip along Chesapeake Bay. It remained down to the Revolution the smallest and least important of all the colonies.

We have already noticed the erection of Fort Nassau by the Dutch, and the struggle over the possession of the banks of Delaware River and Bay between the Dutch, [Pg 211] the Swedes, and the English. Berkeley and Carteret's grant. When the Duke of York came into possession of the country (1664), he granted the lands between the Delaware and the Hudson to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Carteret, under the name of New Jersey; this title was in compliment to Carteret, who had been governor of the island of Jersey and bravely held it for Charles II. during the Great Rebellion. New Jersey had a hundred and twenty miles of sea-coast; it was as yet sparsely settled; it had a fixed natural boundary on the west; and it was considered a particularly desirable seat for colonization.

The new proprietors agreed upon a plan of government by which the administration of affairs was placed in the hands of a governor, council, and representative assembly, as in the other colonies; the proprietors reserved the right to annul laws and to control the official appointments. There was to be religious liberty to all "who do not actually disturb the civil peace of said province;" and all who were subjects of the king and swore fealty to him "and faithfulness to the lords, shall be admitted to plant and become freemen."

Philip Carteret, a nephew of Sir George, came out (1665) as governor, and with him a body of English emigrants, who founded the town of Elizabeth. There were already on the ground, at Bergen, a number of Dutch and Swedes, while at Shrewsbury were several English sectaries, exiles from Connecticut and Long Island, who had purchased land from the Indians. Other New Englanders settled Middletown and Newark in 1666. Soon after the arrival of Carteret, several more companies came out to New Jersey from the Eastern colonies, together with a plentiful sprinkling of Scotch. In May, 1668, deputies from each [Pg 212] of the towns met at Elizabeth to frame a body of laws for the colony. The Puritan element strongly influenced the code, particularly in the penalties for crime, which were remarkable for their severity.

Throughout 1672 there was much turbulence, owing to disputes about quit-rents between the inhabitants and the proprietors. Berkeley was by this time thoroughly dissatisfied, and sold his undivided moiety of the province for a thousand pounds to a party of Quakers who desired to found a retreat for their sect; nine tenths of this purchase soon (1674) fell into the hands of William Penn and other Friends who were associated with him. Two years later (1676) the Penn party purchased the remainder of the Quaker interest.

In 1673 the Dutch recaptured the district. When they were obliged by treaty (1674) to give it back to the English, Charles II. and the Duke of York reaffirmed Sir George Carteret's claim in New Jersey. The new charter for the first time made a division of the country, giving Carteret the eastern part,—much more than one half,—and leaving the rest to the Quaker proprietors. In 1676, Carteret and the Quakers agreed upon a boundary line, running from Little Egg Harbor northwest to the Delaware, at 41° 40´.

In West New Jersey the Quakers set up a liberal government, in which the chief features were religious toleration, a representative assembly, and an executive council, whose members—"ten honest and able men fit for government"—were to be elected by the assembly. As a proprietary body, the framers of these "concessions and agreements" retained no authority for themselves; they truly said, "We put the power in the people." To this refuge for the oppressed, four hundred Quakers came out from England in 1677.

[Pg 213] Sir George Carteret died in 1680, and in 1682 William Penn and twenty-four associates—among whom were several Scotch Presbyterians—purchased East New Jersey from the Carteret heirs. A government was established similar to that in the western colony, except that the new proprietors and their deputies were to form the executive council. In neither colony were the public offices restricted to Quakers, and every Christian possessed the elective franchise.

Both the Jerseys had made excellent progress; but for several years there was difficulty with Andros (page 205), who claimed that the country was still the property of the Duke of York and therefore within his jurisdiction, and who attempted to levy taxes. There was much bitterness over the dispute, in the course of which Andros displayed a despotic temper; but in the end the duke's claims were overruled by the English arbitrator.

When the duke ascended the throne as James II., he had writs of quo warranto issued (1686) against the Jersey governments on the ground of wholesale smuggling by the residents. Under this pressure the patents were surrendered to the Crown (1688), so far as the government was concerned, but there was a proviso that the landed rights of the proprietors were to be undisturbed. Andros took the two colonies under his charge; thus he was now governor of all the country north and east of the Delaware, except New Hampshire. But though united to the northern colonies, the Jerseymen did not cease to assert their independence. Andros again attempted to levy taxes upon them, and they opposed him as stubbornly as ever, claiming that there could be no lawful taxation without representation. With the proprietors [Pg 214] also they had ceaseless bickerings over the quit-rents. Affairs were in a feverish state until the former, tired of keeping up the profitless discussion, and now rent by dissensions in their councils, surrendered all their claims to the Crown (1702). The policy of James was to unite the colonies, and bring them into greater dependence.

New Jersey, at last reunited, was made a royal colony; but until 1738, when given a governor of its own, it was under the administration of the governor of New York, who ruled through a deputy. The New Jersey council was appointed by the king, and there was a popularly elected representative assembly. All Christian sects were tolerated, but Roman Catholics were denied political privileges. There was a property qualification for suffrage,—the possession of two hundred acres of land, or other property worth £50. The inhabitants were generally prosperous. Their isolated geographical position secured them immunity from attacks by hostile Indians; they had scrupulously purchased the lands from the native inhabitants, and with the few who were now left they maintained friendly relations. The new government brought them greater political security, and under it they thrived even better than before.

The annals of New Jersey are like the population and political system,—confused and uninteresting. It was many years before a tradition of common interest could be established between East and West New Jersey. One of the most remarkable lessons in government furnished by the colony was a decision of the courts that an Act of the assembly was void because not in accordance with the frame of government.

In 1676 William Penn, prominent among the English Quakers, became financially concerned, with others of his sect, in the colony of West New Jersey, and thereby acquired an interest in American colonization. His father, an admiral in the English navy, had left him (1670) a claim against the government for sixteen thousand pounds; in lieu of this he induced Charles II. (1681) to give him a proprietary charter of forty thousand square miles in America. The king called the region Pennsylvania, in honor of the admiral, but against the protest of the grantee, who "feared lest it be looked on as vanity in me."

Penn at once widely advertised his dominions. He offered to sell one hundred acres of land for £2, subject to a small quit-rent, and even servants might acquire half this amount. He proposed to establish a popular government, based on the principle of exact justice to all, red and white, regardless of religious beliefs; there was to be trial by jury; murder and treason were to be the only capital crimes; and punishment for other offences was to have reformation, not retaliation, in view. By the terms of the charter Penn was, in conjunction with and by the consent of the free-men, to make all necessary laws. The proposals of the new proprietor were received with enthusiasm among the people of his religious faith throughout England.

In October three ship-loads of Quaker emigrants were sent out, and a year later (1682) Penn himself followed, with a hundred fellow-passengers. At the time of his arrival the Dutch had a church at Newcastle, Del., which was within his grant, the Swedes had churches at Christina, Tinicum, and Wicacoa, and Quaker meeting-houses [Pg 216] were established at Chester, Shakamaxon, and near the lower falls of the Delaware.

The constitution drawn up by Penn for his colony provided that the proprietor was to choose the governor, but the people were to elect the members of the council, and also deputies to a representative assembly; it was practically the West New Jersey plan. The laws decided upon by the first assembly, convened by the proprietor soon after his arrival, were beneficent. They included provisions for the humane treatment of Indians; for the teaching of a trade to each child; for the useful employment of criminals in prisons; for religious toleration, with the qualification that all public officers must be professing Christians, and private citizens believers in God. The principles set forth in Penn's original announcement were thus given the sanction of law.

A distinction was made between the original Pennsylvania, as granted by the king to Penn, and the territory afterwards known as Delaware, which the latter had obtained in a special grant from the Duke of York,—the royal grant being known as "the province," and the purchase from the duke as "the territories," of Pennsylvania. In the province three counties were established, and in the territories three more. These counties were given popularly elected governing boards, and were made the unit of representation in the assembly; the towns were merely administrative subdivisions of the counties, without any form of local government.

Penn was eminently successful in treating with the Indians in his neighborhood. Circumstances favored him greatly in this regard, but nevertheless much was due to his shrewd diplomacy and humane spirit; and for a long period the Quaker [Pg 217] district of Pennsylvania was exempt from the border warfare which harassed most of the other colonies.

Obliged to return to England in 1684, Penn did not again visit his American possessions until fifteen years had elapsed, and then but for a brief time (1699-1701). This intervening period was one of continuous political disquiet for the proprietor and the colonists alike, despite the fact that the material condition of the people—Quakers, Swedes, Dutch, Germans, and Welsh alike—continued to improve. A boundary dispute with Maryland required the intervention of the English government (1685) as an arbitrator; during two years (1692-1694), Penn was dispossessed of his colony by the Crown; and the turbulent "territories" gave him so much trouble that he sought peace by erecting them into the separate colony of Delaware in 1703.

Dissensions, however, did not cease either in the provinces or in Delaware. Penn died in 1718, leaving to his heirs a legacy of petty but harassing disputes which lasted until the Revolution.

Planted as Pennsylvania was, half a century after the earlier Southern and New England colonies, and aided by rich men and court favorites, its progress was rapid and its prosperity assured from the beginning. The pacific policy of Penn towards the Indians saved his colony from the expense and danger of frontier wars. Nevertheless from the beginning the colony showed the same indisposition to submit to the control of proprietors that had so disturbed Maryland and the Carolinas. Notwithstanding, Pennsylvania shortly became the most considerable of the middle colonies, and eventually equalled Virginia and Massachusetts in importance.

CHAPTER X.

SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS IN THE MIDDLE COLONIES IN 1700.

General Accounts.—Doyle, Colonies, IV.; Lodge, Colonies, chs. xiii., xv., xvii.; Andrews, Colonial Self-Government, chs. xviii., xix. See also histories of separate colonies, § 82, above.

Special Histories.—Topography: Semple, American History and its Geographic Conditions, chs. i.-iv.; Roberts, New York, I. ch. viii.; Scharf, Delaware, ch. i.—Manners and Customs: Fisher, Men, Women, and Manners in Colonial Times, I. chs. vi., vii., II. ch. viii.; Wilson, Rambles in Colonial Byways; Earle, Colonial Days in Old New York; C. Hemstreet, When Old New York was Young; T. Janvier, Old New York; E. Singleton, Dutch New York; J. Van Rensselaer, Goede Vrouw of Mana-ha-ta; A. Gummere, The Quaker: a Study in Costume; novels by S. W. Mitchell.—Industries: Bishop, History of American Manufactures.—Slavery: J. Brackett, Negro in Maryland. See also § 82, above, and biographies of prominent men.

The middle section of the Atlantic plain in the United States is distinguished by three deep indentations,—Chesapeake, Delaware, and New York bays; each of these is the expanded mouth of a comprehensive river system, and furnishes abundant anchorage,—New York bay being the finest harbor on the continent. Along the coast south of New York is a low, level base-plain of sand and clay, from twenty-five to [Pg 219] fifty miles in width, the larger towns being generally situated on the uplands beyond. The Appalachian mountains extend in several ridges across the middle district from southwest to northeast, the highest elevations being those of the Catskill group in southeastern New York, where Slide Mountain towers 4,205 feet above sea-level. New Jersey is largely occupied by the base-plain, with hills in the northwest. From the eastern range of mountains, the surface of New York slopes gently down, with great diversity, to Lake Ontario; the mountains are rent by the interesting and important water-gap of the Mohawk valley, which in an earlier geological age connected the lake basin with the trough of the Hudson. Pennsylvania has three distinct topographical divisions: (1) the highly fertile district between the Blue Mountains and the sea,—including Delaware; (2) the middle belt of elevated valleys, separated by low parallel ridges of mountains rich in anthracite coal and iron ore; (3) the upland north and west of the mountain walls, sloping down to the tributaries of the Ohio with a wealth of bituminous coal, oil, and natural gas.

In the New York and Pennsylvania hills the numerous rivers of the region have their rise. These rivers either flow westward into the Mississippi basin, northward into the Great Lakes, eastward into the deep cleft cut through the mountains by the Hudson, or southward into the estuaries of the Delaware and Chesapeake. Within a short distance of each other are waters which will reach the Atlantic ocean by three divergent routes,—through the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and the bays we have mentioned. This fact has had a potent influence on the course of American settlement and trade, which have persistently followed the water highways into the interior of the continent; and along those rivers were fought two great wars.

[Pg 220] The ease with which the French and English in America could approach each other, along the almost continuous water-route formed by Hudson River and Lake Champlain and their tributaries, made this central region the theatre of a protracted and desperate struggle throughout the French and Indian war; while we shall see that during the Revolution the Hudson was regarded as the key to the military situation. It has already been remarked (page 202) how important the English government deemed the possession of the Hudson, in 1664, as a means to the unification of the Anglo-American empire. Through its Mohawk arm, waters running into the Great Lakes could be readily reached.

The soil in the middle district, back from the sandy coast-belt, is for the most part fertile. Originally the entire country was densely wooded, even to the summits of the mountains, which nowhere rise to the snow-line. The climate is, judged by the record of average temperature, an agreeable compromise between New England and the South; although, as elsewhere on the Atlantic slope, it is subject to rapid and extreme variations. Penn wrote that the "weather often changeth without notice, and is constant almost in its inconstancy."

The population of the middle colonies was noted for its heterogeneous character. New York was first settled by the Dutch, who ruled the district for fifty years. After the English conquest (1664), Dutch immigration practically ceased; nevertheless in 1700 a majority of the whites were Dutch, although the English, more of whom had emigrated from New England [Pg 221] than from the parent isle, were widely spread and politically dominant. There were in 1700 about twenty-five thousand inhabitants, perhaps two thousand five hundred being blacks. Besides the prevailing Dutch and English, there were many French Huguenots, a number of Palatine Germans who had fled from persecution at home, and a few Jews. The New York colonists chiefly dwelt on the islands and shores of New York bay, and the banks of the Hudson and Mohawk. Beyond this thin fringe of settlement, the forest wall was for the most part still unbroken. Agricultural development was as yet slow, but the fur-trade was spreading far into the interior.

East Jersey had a population of about ten thousand, composed of Quakers, New England men, and Scotch Presbyterians. Of the four thousand inhabitants of West Jersey, the Quakers were the prevailing element. The population of New Jersey was homogeneous, being very largely English; the few Dutch, Germans, and Swedes having little effect on the character of the colony. Jerseymen were vigorous and quick-witted, although Governor Belcher (1748-1757) wrote, "They are a very rustical people, and deficient in learning."

Pennsylvania and Delaware had, together, a population of about twenty thousand in 1700, having developed more rapidly than any other of the American colonies. Somewhat over one half were English Quakers, the others being sectaries from New England, French, Dutch, Germans, Swedes, Finns, Welsh, and Scotch-Irish Presbyterians. The Germans moved in large numbers to what were then the western borders, where they evolved a distinct dialect, popularly known as "Pennsylvania Dutch." Although valuable pioneers of civilization, they exhibited a stubborn temper, which, with their strong opposition to the bearing of arms, made [Pg 222] them untrustworthy during the French and Indian wars. The rugged, liberty-loving Scotch-Irish were a later acquisition. The pure Irish, destined to become so prominent on the frontier, did not commence arriving until 1719. The Swedes were strong, sturdy, and simple agriculturists. The English Quakers were of the middle class of tradesmen and small farmers. Their prejudice against taking up arms made it difficult for the colonial military officers to defend the province against the disastrous Indian forays of the eighteenth century, and was a fruitful source of political and social disturbance.

By the close of the seventeenth century a people had grown up in most of the middle colonies which was largely English in composition, with habits of speech, thought, and manner greatly affected by English traditions, but still much modified by the liberal infusion of blood from kindred nationalities on the continent of Europe. The eager, enterprising spirit of the English, quickened by removal to the New World, had, after a generation or two of amalgamation, been noticeably tempered by the phlegmatic temperament of the German, Dutch, and Scandinavian settlers.

In the middle colonies, as in New England and the South, there existed an acknowledged aristocracy, although there was a wide gap between the haughty and elegant Dutch manor-chiefs in New York and the rude gentlemen farmers who headed New Jersey society. The servile classes common to the Southern colonies were also present here, as a foundation for aristocratic distinction; but they were comparatively insignificant in number. Nowhere in this middle group was free white labor regarded as degrading; nearly all [Pg 223] the colonists were workers, whether behind the desk or the counter, in the shop or in the field. Trade was exalted to a high station.

New York had many negroes, left over from the Dutch rule, but there was a strong physical prejudice against them, and their further importation was gradually restricted. In 1711 and 1741, on insufficient evidence, the blacks were accused of plots against the whites of New York city, and were cruelly dealt with,—on the former occasion nineteen were hanged; on the latter, eighteen suffered death by the gallows, and thirteen were burned at the stake. The laws against negroes were harsh in all of the middle colonies. But in practice, slaves were mildly treated, compared with those in the South. The Quakers were opposed to human bondage on principle, yet many employed slaves, chiefly as house-servants. There were numerous indented servants, especially in Pennsylvania, and most stringent laws were adopted for their regulation. From these and the negroes the criminal class was recruited. Among Pennsylvania Quakers were formed the first abolition societies.

No aristocrats in America so nearly resembled the nobility of the Old World as the great-landed Dutch proprietors in New York,—such as the Van Rensselaers, the Cortlandts, and the Livingstons. Their vast estates up the Hudson, granted to their fathers in the days of the Dutch West India Company, were rented out to tenant-farmers, over whom they ruled in princely fashion, dispensing justice, and bountifully feasting the tenants on semi-annual rent-days. Some of these estates were entitled to representatives in the assembly, and the lords of the manor practically held such appointments in their keeping. There was an impassable gulf between the rural aristocrats and the small [Pg 224] freeholders and tradesmen. This condition of affairs was not calculated to encourage settlement; and out of these feudal privileges, often harshly exercised, there arose conflicts which became riotous as the Revolution approached.

The aristocrats of Pennsylvania and Delaware were also the wealthy landed gentry, chiefly Penn's followers; but the class was not strongly marked, and almost imperceptibly faded away into the ranks of the merchants and small freeholders. Each village, however, had its Quaker "squire" or magistrate, in powdered wig, broad ruffles, cocked hat, and gold-headed cane, who meted out justice at the neighboring tavern and was highly regarded. Rich and poor alike, among the Quakers, were simple in tastes and habits. In New Jersey there was a mild recognition of the social superiority of the gentlemen farmers, notwithstanding a strong underlying spirit of democracy; a rude plenty prevailed, and the gentlemen's houses were not without some degree of elegance.

The judicial system was very similar to that which obtained elsewhere in America. In each province was an upper court, consisting of a chief justice and associates, appointed by the governor; from this an appeal might go in important cases to the governor and council, and in causes involving £200 or over, to the king in council. Below the upper court was a regular series of courts, ranging down to the local justices of the peace. Justice was cheap, and court practice simple. In New York, the quality of both bench and bar was inferior, and remained so down to the Revolution; the judges had often no legal training, and [Pg 225] the law was not recognized as a profession. In Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania men of ability and character were engaged on the bench and at the bar, and their calling won universal respect. Penn brought out two physicians with him, and in the Quaker colonies the art of medicine had from the first an honorable standing; but in New York physicians were not licensed until 1760. In all four colonies the clergymen for the most part were zealous, upright men, of learning and ability, and took high social rank.

Except in New York, where trade was equally important, agriculture was the chief industry; but as the soil was fertile and the average farmer consequently careless, farming was, except among the painstaking Quakers of Pennsylvania, in a low condition. The principal crop was wheat, although there was much variety in farm products, and New Jersey raised large herds of cattle on her broad lowland meadows. There were many small manufactures for domestic use, the most important being among the Germans of Germantown, who made, in a small way, paper and glass, and also some varieties of knit goods and coarse cloths; the spinning-wheel was a familiar household machine, for homespun was much worn by all except the rich. But the bulk of manufactured goods was imported from England and the continent of Europe. Little picturesque windmills, with broad canvas sails, after the Dutch fashion, were numerous. Many of the Maryland and Virginia colonists came long distances to patronize the Pennsylvania mills. It was not until 1720 than an iron furnace was erected in the latter province,—the first in the middle group of colonies.

The middle-colony people had a keen sense for trade. The fur-traffic was widespread and of the first importance, particularly in New York and Pennsylvania; [Pg 226] while the personal danger to the adventurous forest trader was very great, the profits on packs of peltries successfully landed in New York and Philadelphia were such as to warrant the hazard. The principal exports were grain, flour, and furs, and vessels with these American products sailed to England, Lisbon, Madeira, and the West Indies; the exports of goods were never equal to the imports, however, and ships bringing over wines, sugar, and miscellaneous manufactured articles often found it difficult to obtain return cargoes. There was a profitable 'longshore commerce in farm products and small manufactures, boats penetrating up the rivers far inland. New England bottoms were largely employed, although a shipbuilding industry soon sprang up at Philadelphia. New York was the chief port of the middle colonies for foreign trade; her merchants were highly active and prosperous.

In 1700 the Dutch were still the largest landowners in New York. The English and other nationalities, jealously excluded from the landed class as far as possible, were to be mainly found in the large towns in the southern portion of the province, engaged in trade. The Dutch adhered to old dress and customs with remarkable tenacity. Their farm-houses were usually of wood, with the second story overhanging; the great rafters showed in the ceilings; the fireplaces were ornamented with pictured tiles, and above were rows of great wooden and pewter dishes, and racks of long tobacco-pipes; the floors were daily scrubbed and sanded, and evidences of neatness and thrift were distinguishing features. In the little hamlets, as well as on the farms, there was plenty of good plain living; but the people, while thrifty, sober, contented, and industrious, were [Pg 227] superstitious, ignorant, grasping, and slow. Life with them was narrow and monotonous. The wealthy landed proprietors lived on their estates up the Hudson in summer, and moved to New York city in winter; their manor-houses were large and richly furnished, they had trains of servants, black and white, and maintained a degree of splendor scarcely equalled elsewhere in the colonies. The Dutch women, rich and poor, were noted for their excellence as housekeepers, their unaffected piety, and their love of flowers.

In Pennsylvania and Delaware there was a wide difference between the condition of the dwellers in the long-settled portions, where there was intelligent progress, sobriety, and neatness, and that of the western borderers, who were a rude, turbulent people, living amid wretched economic and sanitary conditions. The better class of farmers in the eastern section were prosperous but simple; men and women alike worked in the fields, and a patriarchal system of family life prevailed. The soberly attired Quakers still exercised a large influence on society, which was pervaded by a healthy moral tone; tradesmen had a particularly keen sense of business honesty. New Jersey was also a well-to-do colony; but her farms and villages long had the reputation of presenting an untidy appearance.

Although life among the middle-colony folk was sober and filled with toil, there were the customary rough and simple popular diversions of the period,—for the farmers corn-huskings, spinning-bees, house-raisings, and dancing-parties, at which hard drinking was not infrequent; for the townsfolk horse-racing, bull-baiting, cock-fighting, tavern-parties, balls, and picnics. The people were, as a whole, of a more social temperament than their New England neighbors. There was little [Pg 228] luxury within their reach, but they appear to have been as a rule satisfied in their condition, and above want.

The principal town was New York. Society there was more gay than in Boston, and more fashionable than in any other American city, except perhaps Charleston. The wealthy landed proprietors spent money freely during the winter season, and the latest London styles were eagerly sought and followed. A social polish was aimed at, clubs were fostered, and pride was taken in the fact that no other American city was so cosmopolitan in tone,—a result of its being the centre of a far-reaching foreign trade. There was much that was English in New York, yet even here the Dutch influence was strong. Visitors speak of the wide, pleasant streets lined with trees, the low brick and stone houses, with their projecting eaves and their gables to the street,—a fashion general in the colonies,—and the insignificant character of the few public buildings. Albany was the centre of the northern fur-trade, and purely Dutch in composition and architecture.

Philadelphia was the Quaker capital. Laid out like a checker-board, with architecture of severe simplicity, its best residences were surrounded by gardens and orchards. The town was substantial, neat, and had the appearance of prosperity. Germantown, near by, settled by the Germans (1683), was largely given over to small manufactures. Newcastle was ill-built and unattractive. The New Jersey towns were rather comely, but insignificant; Trenton was chiefly supported by travellers along the great highway between New York and Philadelphia.

There was little intercommunication, except between the larger towns, and the facilities for travel were meagre. Rude farm-wagons, two-wheeled chaises, and saddle-horses were the chief means of conveyance over the rough, stony roads; and on the many and [Pg 229] far-reaching rivers, travellers and traders proceeded leisurely by slow-moving craft. New Jersey was traversed by the highways between New York and Philadelphia, over which post-boys rode weekly with the mail in saddlebags. Taverns were in every town in New York and Pennsylvania, and were favorite meeting-places for the village and country folk; but in New Jersey it required legislation to induce villages to maintain "ordinaries" for wayfarers.

Under the Dutch domination common schools flourished in New York, each town supporting them by public aid. The English, however, jealous of educational enterprises under charge of a nonconforming church, suffered them to fall into neglect. Thus at the close of the seventeenth century education was neither general nor of good quality. The English Society for the Propagation of the Gospel established an excellent Church of England school in New York city (1704), but the Dutch did not take kindly to it; they long clung to their mother-tongue and the few rude schools of their own ordering. In Pennsylvania but little attempt was made by the English in the direction of popular education outside of the capital, where was opened (1698) the now famous Penn Charter School, destined for fifty years to be the only public school in the province. The Germans and Moravians maintained some good private schools in the larger Pennsylvania and New Jersey towns, but educational facilities in the rural places were generally wretched, where there were any at all.

The Church of England was nominally established in all except Pennsylvania; but it was managed with great lack of discretion, and aroused popular hostility against it and the mother-country. On Long Island and in New [Pg 230] Jersey the Puritans exerted a powerful influence on manners and thought. Everywhere the laws against excesses in amusement and Sabbath-breaking were very severe, but only in the Puritan communities were they strictly enforced, although a strong sentiment of piety was general among all respectable classes of the people. Except in New York, towards the close of the seventeenth century there was toleration for all Protestant sects, but in Pennsylvania alone were Roman Catholics entitled to equal consideration; the New York laws against "Jesuits and Popish priests" were harsh, and founded on the false notion that they incited the Indians to acts of violence. In New York the Church of England endeavored for a time (commencing in 1692), by violent persecution, to repress all forms of dissent; but the sectaries flourished despite official opposition. The leading denominations were the Dutch Lutheran, Dutch Reformed, English Independent, and English Presbyterian. The Scotch Presbyterians and New England Congregationalists were most numerous in New Jersey. In Pennsylvania and Delaware, next to the Quakers stood the Lutherans and Scotch Presbyterians, and the preachers of the latter church were vigorous proselyters, especially successful among the western borderers. The Germans, brought over, at first, largely through Penn's efforts, included a number of persecuted groups,—Quakers, Palatines, Ridge Hermits, Dunkards, and Pietists. All Christian forms and creeds were liberally represented in Pennsylvania, where there was as genuine religious freedom as exists anywhere in the United States to-day.

In none of the middle colonies was crime so prevalent as to be a troublesome question, with the one exception of piracy,—the most common and widely demoralizing of all the dangers to which the colonists were subjected. Public [Pg 231] officials often corruptly connived at the practice, and popular sentiment was not strongly against a set of men who brought wealth to the seaport towns and spent it lavishly. Hangings and whippings were not infrequent public spectacles in the colonies, and the pillory was much in use. In the Long Island towns the New Englanders, who were dominant there, faithfully reproduced their native customs in the punishment of crime as in most other particulars. The Quakers were, on the whole, the most lenient in their treatment of evil-doers, up to 1718, when the second generation of colonists abandoned the old theory of criminal legislation and adopted measures of harsh repression similar to those in vogue in other colonies. There was little pauperism, but perhaps more in Pennsylvania than elsewhere. In the treatment of this evil the Quakers were also wise, and in Philadelphia they established the first hospital for the insane, on the continent.

New Jersey having no foreign trade and but little manufacturing, her people were without experience of the harshness of the English Acts of Navigation and Trade (page 104). Since there was not much to complain of regarding treatment by the mother-country, they were generally loyal. Taxes were light, public salaries small, and the colony, with Pennsylvania and New York as buffers, was in no danger from Indians.

On the other hand, New York was constantly subjected to border warfare, which proved a serious financial burden; taxation, levied by duties on slaves and imports, and on real and personal property, was clumsy and oppressive, and the government corrupt and expensive. English officials and wealthy Dutch [Pg 232] were loyal because it was their interest to be so; but the mass of the people, rich and poor, favored liberal candidates to the assembly. The men from New England exerted a strong influence on the general trend of political thought. Elections excited great bitterness and often rioting, and they were made an excuse for the usual holiday excesses. There was a strong feeling of resentment against the home government, growing out of the Navigation Laws and the impressment of seamen.

In Pennsylvania there prevailed a similar attitude of opposition to England; the Quakers were, however, conservative, and slow in action, and their dislike to bear arms made the colony a drag upon all attempts at continental union for common defence. As in New York, local politics ran in extremely narrow channels, and election riots were not uncommon.

Taking a general view of the middle colonies, we find that the fur-traffic, the fertile soil, a mixed system of agriculture, and an enterprising commercial spirit, were the chief sources of their material prosperity. There was prevalent a broader spirit of religious toleration; there was, perhaps, on the whole, a more democratic spirit among all classes of the people, than in New England or the South; except in the case of the Dutch patroons, aristocracy did not flourish among them; the state of popular education was pitiable; the population was more mixed than anywhere else in America. The continental nationalities gave a more cheerful tone to society than existed in New England and the South; the several communities varied greatly in speech, customs, and thought, according to their origin, although we find, as the eighteenth century opens, that the English Puritans from New England were coming more and more to exercise a considerable influence in political, social, and religious affairs.

CHAPTER XI.

OTHER ENGLISH NORTH AMERICAN COLONIES (1605-1750).

Bibliographies.—Larned, Literature of American History, 430-438, 458-462; Winsor, VIII. 65-80, 175-177, 188-190, 270-291.

Historical Maps.—Nos. 2, 3, and 4, this volume (Epoch Maps, Nos. 2, 3, 4); Winsor, MacCoun, and school histories already cited.

General Accounts.—H. Fox-Bourne, Story of our Colonies, chs. i.-xi.; Egerton, British Colonial Policy; Morris, History of Colonization; E. Payne, European Colonies; Cotton and Payne, Colonies and Dependencies.

Special Histories.—West Indies: Lucas, Historical Geography, II., secs. i., ii.; C. Eden, West Indies; J. Froude, English in West Indies (answered by J. Thomas, Froudacity); A. Kennedy, Story of West Indies; J. Rodway, West Indies and Spanish Main; J. Lefroy, Discovery and Early Settlement of Bermudas; J. Esquemeling, Buccaneers of America (and similar books by Archenholtz, Burney, and Pyle); J. Masefield, On the Spanish Main.—Newfoundland: D. Prowse, Newfoundland; also histories of the island by Hatton and Harvey, Smith, and Pedley; S. Dawson, Canada and Newfoundland; W. Greswell, Geography of Canada and Newfoundland.—Nova Scotia: J. Bourinot, Builders of Nova Scotia; T. Haliburton, Nova Scotia; B. Murdoch, Nova Scotia; E. Richard, Acadia.—Canada: see § 107.—Hudson's Bay Company: G. Bryce, Remarkable History of Hudson's Bay Company; L. Burpee, Search for the Western Sea; A. Laut, Conquest of Great Northwest; B. Willson, Great Company. Consult also publications [Pg 234] of Royal Society of Canada, and provincial historical and antiquarian societies.

Contemporary Accounts.—Whitbourne, Discourse and Discovery of Newfoundland (1620); Mason, Brief Discourse of Newfoundland (1620); Du Tertre, Histoire Générale des Antilles (1654); Denys, Description and Natural History of Arcadia (1672); Labat, Nouveau Voyage aux Isles d'Amérique (1724); Oldmixon, British Empire in America (1741); Dobbs, Countries adjoining to Hudson's Bay (1744); Ellis, Voyage to Hudson Bay (1748); Hakluyt, Voyages. Reprints in publications of historical and antiquarian societies.

It is usual to think and speak of the English colonies in North America as though they included only the thirteen which, in 1775, revolted against the mother-country. In the eyes of the home government, however, and of the colonists themselves, the relations between the mother-land and the English West India Islands, the Bermudas, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, Hudson's Bay, and, after 1763, Canada, were much the same as between it and Virginia or New Hampshire or Pennsylvania. The chief differences between the colonies were of race and occupation. Nova Scotia had, before the Revolution, but a few thousand English inhabitants; the West Indies were almost exclusively sugar-producing colonies. Both on the north and on the southeast the English colonies touched elbows with the French in active commercial and territorial competition. The West Indies were the emporium for sugar and slaves, and an extensive traffic was had in both commodities with the continental colonies. This important commerce has already been frequently referred to, particularly in the treatment of New England (page 185), whose vessels did the bulk of the colonial carrying trade.

[Pg 235] Various causes conspired to prevent Englishmen in these outlying plantations from joining their brethren of New England, the middle colonies, and the South, in the movement for independence. The West India planters were largely aided by English capital, and in England, where many of them had summer residences, they enjoyed a profitable and exclusive market for sugar, cotton, and other tropical products. It was considered good policy by English statesmen to favor the island colonies as against the continental, for the products of the former did not compete with those of Great Britain; so that while the Navigation Acts (page 104), restricting all colonial trade to British ports, at first bore heavily on the island planters, they were compensated in part by numerous discriminations in their favor. Many of these planters were the sons of Cavaliers who had fled to the islands of the Caribbean Sea to escape from the rule of the Commonwealth; or wealthy men who had, in times of popular disturbance, been made to feel uncomfortable in their old homes on the American mainland. In Nova Scotia and Newfoundland the ports were filled with English traders and officers; and a great belt of untraversed forest separated them from the New Englanders, with whom they had little in common. But perhaps above all was the fact that His Majesty's fleet easily commanded these outlying colonies, and revolt was not to be thought of within the reach of the guns of ships.

It is worth our while briefly to review the history of these British American dependencies which for one reason or another did not enter the struggle that was soon to rend the empire in twain at the moment it had reached its greatest extent.

Barbados, the easternmost of the Windward Islands, was first visited by a party of English adventurers in 1605, since which time it has been an English possession. But it was not until 1625 that a colony was planted on the island. Its plan of government was much the same as that of the mainland colonies.

During the Puritan uprising in England, Barbados was a place of refuge for loyalists, who were disposed, till the appearance of a parliamentary force (1651), to hold the island for the king. Under Cromwell's rule many prisoners of war were sent to the island, thus increasing the royalist population. The Restoration was promptly proclaimed.

The colony made rapid progress, although now and then checked by the fact that its exposed position made it in time of war a favorite point of attack by enemies of England. The numerous harbors along the coast were, in such troublous periods, infested by privateers, who seriously interfered with the commerce of the island. In the war between Great Britain and France, commencing in 1756, the West Indies was the theatre of a prolonged conflict, into which the Barbadians entered with zeal, supplying money and troops to the English side, and oftentimes suffering from reverses.

Before the Navigation Acts (page 104), by which England sought to compel all her colonists to trade with her alone, the Dutch were good customers for Barbados sugar; after that, English merchants having a monopoly of the traffic, the planters had much reason to complain. Nevertheless, the majority were stanch Tories, and remained so throughout the Revolutionary war. Many Barbadians settled from time to time upon the mainland, particularly in the Carolinas. We [Pg 237] have seen that Sir John Yeamans, a Barbados planter, led several hundred of his fellow-islanders thither (1664), and founded a town on Cape Fear river (page 89).

St. Vincent, a hundred miles west of Barbados, although discovered by Columbus in 1498 was unclaimed until 1627, when it was granted to the Earl of Carlisle by Charles I., along with others of the Windward group. In 1722, the Duke of Montagu came into possession of it; and then immigrants were introduced, who exported sugar, rum, molasses, and arrowroot.

St. Lucia was settled by the English in 1639; its ownership was long passed back and forth by France and England, but in 1794 the latter secured permanent possession. The English flag was raised over Tobago in 1580, but the island was alternately held by English and Dutch until 1814, since which date the proprietorship of the former has been undisputed. Grenada and the Grenadines, colonized by the French, first came into English possession under the treaty of 1763. Trinidad, the southernmost of the chain of islands and one of the most valuable, was occupied by the Spanish until 1797, when it was yielded up to Great Britain, under show of force; to-day it is one of the most progressive of the smaller English dependencies.

Upon the Leeward, or northern, islands of the Caribbean group are the colonies of Antigua, Montserrat, St. Christopher (St. Kitts), Nevis, Dominica, and the Virgin Islands. Antigua, the seat of the present colonial government, is the most important. English families settled there in 1632, and again in 1663. Ravaged by France three years later (1666), it was soon after restored to the English under the treaty of Breda. Montserrat, the healthiest Changes in ownership. island in the West Indies, was also colonized by the English in 1632, and remained in their [Pg 238] possession except for two brief terms (1664-1668 and 1782-1784), when the French were in control. St. Christopher and Nevis form a united English colony which traces its history back to 1628. Dutch buccaneers intrenched themselves on the rocky islets of the Virgin group as early as 1648, but were driven out by English pirates in 1666, since which date the archipelago has been the property of Great Britain; a better class of settlers came in with the eighteenth century. Dominica, the largest of the Leeward Isles, was included in Carlisle's patent (1627); but the French were already in possession, living on friendly terms with the native Caribs, just as their compatriots in New France were with the more warlike Algonkins. Ceded by France to England in 1763, Dominica was several times recaptured, and not finally relinquished to the latter until 1814.

The fertile Bermudas, or Somers's Islands,—"still vex'd Bermoothes" of Shakespeare,—lie about six hundred miles east of South Carolina. They bear the names of two navigators who were cast away upon them,—Juan Bermudez, a Spaniard (1522), and an Englishman, Sir George Somers (1609); the latter being on his way to Virginia to administer the affairs of that colony. Somers founded the first settlement.

Under the third patent to the Virginia Company in 1612 (page 72), the Bermudas and all islands within three hundred leagues of the Virginia shore were ceded to that corporation. Except Nova Scotia, therefore, the Bermudas are the only present English colony which ever formed an integral part of any of the present States or Territories of the United States. The Virginia Company afterwards (1616) parted with its [Pg 239] right to the Bermuda Company, which carried thither a considerable company of Virginians. During the Commonwealth, the Bermudas, like Barbados, were a refuge for royalists from England. Representative government, similar to that of the mainland colonies, was established in 1620, and has been ever since maintained. Tobacco was the staple of the colony until about 1707, when a salt-making industry sprang up and soon became the chief interest.

The Bermudas were from the earliest times recognized as an important marine station. During the Revolutionary war Washington wrote: "Let us annex the Bermudas, and thus possess a nest of hornets to annoy the British trade." But the place was undisturbed, and remained loyal to the king.

The first American soil trod by Columbus was an island in the fruitful Bahama group. "This country," he wrote, "excels all others as far as the day surpasses the night in splendor." The natives were numerous; "their conversation is the sweetest imaginable; their faces always smiling; and so gentle and so affectionate are they that I swear to your highness there is not a better people in the world." Yet (commencing in 1509) the Spaniards almost depopulated the islands; forty thousand of these innocent aborigines were carried away to a wretched death in the mines of Cuba.

In 1629, an English colony was planted on New Providence, in the then deserted archipelago. But the French and Spanish persisted in harrying the settlement, which was frequently the scene of stormy conflicts. At last, in 1718, the English government drove out the pirates who had come to resort there in great numbers, resettled the islands, and an era of progress opened.

[Pg 240] During the Revolutionary war many wealthy Tories went from the continental colonies to the Bahamas and opened up large plantations, with slave labor. The colony was captured by the Americans (1776),—the only conquest of British territory during the Revolution, except the Canadian campaign of 1775 and the occupation of the Northwest by Virginia troops in 1778. The Spanish took it in 1782, but it was soon retaken by the English (1783). Three quarters of a century later the islands became famous as the point of departure for blockade-runners bound into Confederate ports.

Jamaica was under Spanish control until 1655, when an English fleet under Admirals Penn and Venables—the former, father of the founder of Pennsylvania—compelled the surrender of the island to the Commonwealth. The opposition of the Spanish planters and their negro slaves—the latter were called Maroons—long made English government difficult; the Spaniards were finally driven off, but the Maroons, fleeing to the mountains, were troublesome until the close of the eighteenth century. Much annoyance was also suffered in the seventeenth century from the buccaneers, who infested the Jamaica coast and preyed indiscriminately on all West Indian commerce; they were suppressed with great difficulty. In 1728, English laws and statutes became applicable to the island.

Like other islands in the West Indies, Jamaica was resorted to by many Tory planters from the continental colonies, and apparently had no sympathy with the struggle of the latter for independence. It was a colony having a large slave population, and after the separation of the continental colonies [Pg 241] became, to some degree, a competitor with them. The abolition of slavery in the island (1830-1837) had a great influence on the slavery conflict in the United States.

Belize, or British Honduras, on the eastern shore of the Yucatan peninsula, was not occupied by Englishmen until after the suppression of freebooting in the Spanish main,—about the opening of the eighteenth century. At that time parties of English dyewood and mahogany cutters, many of whom had been pirates, established themselves at Belize. Their holdings were frequently beset by rival Spanish logging companies, but in 1798 the latter were expelled.

Since that day Belize has existed as a prosperous Crown colony, although England's legal right to the country is still questioned by some authorities, and in 1846 this fact gave rise to serious diplomatic difficulties with the United States.

Newfoundland is the oldest of the colonial possessions of Great Britain. We have seen (page 25) that John Cabot discovered it in 1497, that Cortereal was there for the Portuguese in 1500, and that by 1504 fishermen from Normandy, Brittany, and the Basque provinces were regularly engaged on its shores. It was the nucleus for both French and English occupation of the mainland, and from the first an important fishery station.

Not until 1583 did the English take formal possession, and it was much later before any of their numerous colonizing schemes attained any great measure of success.

By the treaty of Utrecht (1713) Newfoundland was [Pg 242] acknowledged as English territory, but the French were given fishing privileges on the western and northern coasts. This led to diplomatic contentions, Growth of the colony. not yet ended; nevertheless settlement at once increased, and a satisfactory growth has since been maintained. In 1728, a form of civil government was for the first time established.

During the American Revolution Newfoundland had sufficient inducement to remain loyal; since French and American competitors in the fisheries were kept out by British fleets, her merchants had a monopoly of the European markets, and were enabled to maintain high prices.

First visited by the Cabots in 1497, it was not until 1604 that European colonization was attempted in Nova Scotia, under the Frenchman De Monts (page 35). In 1613, the Virginia privateer, Argall, basing his excuse on Cabot's previous discovery, swooped down on the French settlements, demolished the cabins, and expelled the inhabitants. A grant of the peninsula—called Acadia by the French, but in this document styled Nova Scotia by the king—was made by James I. to Sir William Alexander; the latter was, however, prevented by the French (1623) from carrying out his colonizing scheme. Nevertheless, several Englishmen and Scotchmen came into the country and mingled with the French, who were slowly re-populating it.

Recaptured by an English force in 1654, Nova Scotia was, thirteen years later (1667), ceded to France. But the ease of communication by water made the colony an uncomfortably close neighbor for the English colonies farther south. In 1710 the Massachusetts men captured Port Royal; and in [Pg 243] 1713 France relinquished possession to England by the treaty of Utrecht. Again in 1745, Massachusetts volunteers captured Louisbourg on Cape Breton (§§ 111, 112).

England paid little attention to Nova Scotia until 1749, when four thousand emigrants were sent over to found Halifax. The French settlers, known as Acadians, had meanwhile become numerous, and greatly abused their privileges as neutrals by fostering and joining Indian war-parties against the New England settlers. In 1755, the Acadians were easily reduced by General Monkton, and seven thousand transported to the British provinces southward, many of them finally drifting to the French settlement at the mouth of the Mississippi.

A colonial constitution of the regulation English pattern was granted to Nova Scotia in 1758, and France formally released her claim by the treaty of 1763. At the same time Cape Breton, which had been a second time captured (1758), was added. The Englishmen in Nova Scotia were largely of the official and trading class, having little in common with their neighbors of the more southern colonies. In the Revolution several thousand loyalist refugees found an asylum in the peninsula.

The Hudson's Bay Company, from the time it was chartered by Charles II. (1670) until its lands were sold to the British Government (1869), was a joint-stock association, with exclusive commercial and political privileges, very similar to the Company of Massachusetts Bay. To-day it trades as a private corporation; its former territory—the lands draining [Pg 244] into Hudson's Bay—is now open to all on equal terms.

Fur-trade factories, protected by strong forts, were early planted by the company at the mouths of several sub-arctic rivers, such as the Rupert, Moore, Albany, Nelson, and Churchill, the only inhabitants being the small garrisons and the company's trading servants. Several expeditions were successively made to Hudson's Bay by French war vessels; much devastation was wrought and blood spilled, until in 1697 the treaty of Ryswick put an end to the trouble, and left the company in undisputed possession. It had lost more than £200,000 in this predatory warfare, but soon regained its position, through the profits of the fur-trade.

After the fall of New France (1763), the Hudson's Bay Company met formidable rivals in the enterprising Northwest and American organizations; the story of the fierce competition which ensued, with its effect on American settlement and international boundaries, belongs to the period covered by other volumes of this series.

From the foregoing sketch it will be seen that for all the American colonies to the south of Georgia the English were obliged to fight a changeful battle with the Spaniards and the French. It was not till after the Revolutionary war that the permanent ownership of the islands was assured to Great Britain. A similar struggle, though briefer and sooner concluded, went on for the possession of the colonies north of Maine. But twelve years before the Revolution the last of them had been yielded to the British. In Nova Scotia, and later in Canada, English residents were not numerous till the beginning of the nineteenth century. In Newfoundland and Hudson's Bay, in colonial times, the settlers were English, but in numbers they were few.

CHAPTER XII.

THE COLONIZATION OF NEW FRANCE (1608-1750).

Bibliographies.—Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, LXXI. 219-365, and France in America, ch. xix.; H. Biggar, Early Trading Companies, 171-296; Larned, Literature of American History, 395-421; Avery, II. 403-408, III. 436, 437; P. Gagnon, Essai de bibliographie canadienne; H. Harrisse, Notes pour servir à l'histoire du Canada. Consult also Wrong and Langton, Review of Historical Publications relating to Canada (published annually).

Historical Maps.—No. 4, this volume (Epoch Maps, No. 4); also maps in Parkman, Thwaites, Winsor, and MacCoun.

General Accounts.—Lucas, Historical Geography, V. The standard English history of Canada is by W. Kingsford. The principal French historians are M. Faillon, J. Ferland, F. Garnier (English translation by Bell), and B. Sulte. The prime authority for New France is Parkman's series (12 vols., condensed into one by P. Edgar, 1902), France and England in North America. Briefer and more recent treatment of New France will be found in Works by Bourinot, Douglas, Greswell, Laut, Roberts, Thwaites, and Tracy.

Special Histories.—Winsor, Cartier to Frontenac, and Mississippi Basin; Biggar, as above; Doughty and Dionne, Quebec under Two Flags; G. Parker, Old Quebec; Laut, Pathfinders of the West; F. Ogg, Opening of the Mississippi; C. Moore, Northwest under Two Flags; W. Munro, Seignorial System in Canada; Bourinot, Local Government in Canada.—French and Indian War: Parkman, Montcalm and Wolfe; A. Bradley, Fight with France for North America; W. Wood, Fight for Canada; A. Doughty, Siege of Quebec.—French in Northwest: Hinsdale, Old Northwest, chs. iii.-v.; Thwaites, Wisconsin (Commonwealths).—Manners and customs: C. Colby, Canadian Types of the Old Regime (1608-1698); Dunn's Indiana (Commonwealths), chs. ii., iii. for the Northwest; M. Pepper, Maids and Matrons of New France; Machar and Marquis, Stories of New France. See also biographies of prominent men.

[Pg 246] Contemporary Accounts.—For detailed list, consult Thwaites, France in America, 298-303. Numerous publications of Canadian and American historical and antiquarian societies (especially the Champlain Society) contain useful material. Relative to the Northwest, see Wisconsin Historical Collections, XVI-XVIII.

The story of early French efforts at colonization in North America, from Cartier's visit (1534) to Champlain's foundation of Quebec (1608), the first permanent French colony in Canada, has already been told (Chapter II.).

It was unfortunate for New France that Champlain incurred at the outset the hostility of the Iroquois (page 196); the French and the Algonquians with whom they maintained friendly relations were long after sorely afflicted by them. Had it not been for the Iroquois wall interposed between Champlain and the South, the French would doubtless have preceded the English upon the Atlantic plain. The presence of this opposition led the founder of New France, in his attempts to extend the sphere of French influence, to explore along the line of least resistance, to the north and west.

In 1611, Montreal was planted at the first rapids in the St. Lawrence, and near the mouths of the Ottawa and Richelieu. Four years later (1615), Champlain reached Lake Huron by the way of the Ottawa. There were easier highways to the Northwest, but the French were compelled for many years thereafter to take this path, because of its greater security from the all-devouring Iroquois.

To extend the sphere of French influence and the Catholic religion, as well as to induce the savages to patronize French commerce, were objects which inspired both lay and clerical followers of Champlain. Their [Pg 247] Explorers and coureurs de bois. wonderful zeal illumined the history of New France with a poetic glamour such as is cast over no other part of America north of Mexico. Under Champlain's guidance and inspired by his example, traders and priests soon penetrated to the far west,—the former bent on trafficking for peltries, and the latter on saving souls. Another large class of rovers, styled coureurs de bois, or wood-rangers, wandered far and wide, visiting and fraternizing with remote tribes of Indians; they were attracted by the love of lawless adventure, and conducted an extensive but illicit fur-trade. Many of these explorers left no record of their journeys, hence it is now impossible to say who first made some of the most important geographical discoveries.

We know that by 1629, the year before the planting of the Massachusetts Bay colony, Champlain saw an ingot of copper obtained by barter with Indians from the shores of Lake Superior. In 1634, Jean Nicolet, another emissary from Champlain, penetrated to central Wisconsin, by way of the Fox River, and thence went overland to the Illinois country, making trading agreements with the savage tribes along his path. Seven years afterwards (1641), Jesuit priests said mass before two thousand naked savages at Sault Ste. Marie. In the winter of 1658-1659, two French fur-traders, Radisson and Grosseilliers, imbued with a desire "to travell and see countreys" and "to be knowne with the remotest people," visited Wisconsin, probably saw the Mississippi, and built a log fort on Chequamegon Bay of Lake Superior. During 1662 they discovered James's Bay to the far northeast, and became impressed with the fur-trading capabilities of the Hudson's Bay region. Not receiving French support in their enterprise, they sold [Pg 248] their services to England. On the strength of their discoveries, the Hudson's Bay Company was organized (1670). Saint-Lusson took formal possession of the Northwest for the French king, at Sault Ste. Marie, in 1671. Two years later (1673), Joliet and Marquette made their now famous trip over the Fox-Wisconsin waterway and rediscovered the Mississippi.

Champlain died at Quebec in 1635, having extended the trade and domination of France westward to Wisconsin, by the Ottawa highway. It remained for the fur-trader, La Salle, one of the most brilliant of American explorers, to add the Mississippi valley to French territory (1679-1682), his route being up the Great Lakes and via the Chicago-Illinois portage. It was 1699 before a French settlement was planted in Louisiana (Old Biloxi), and 1718 before New Orleans was founded.

The central geographical fact to be remembered in connection with the history of New France is, that the St. Lawrence and the chain of Great Lakes which serve as its feeders furnish a natural highway to the heart of the continent (page 4).

It has been shown that the hostility of the Iroquois forced the French, in their earliest explorations westward, to take the northern, or indirect, route of the Ottawa River, and caused Huron to be the first great lake discovered; Ontario, Superior, and Michigan being next unveiled, in the order named. Erie, the last to be seen by whites, was known as early as 1640, but owing to Iroquois warriors blocking the way, was not navigated until 1669, except by coureurs de bois seeking the New York fur-markets. Thus Frenchmen were familiar with the sites of Sault Ste. Marie, Mackinaw, Ashland, Green Bay, Prairie du Chien, and Chicago before they had visited the site of Detroit (1669). But that place came to be recognized after its [Pg 249] settlement (1701) as the most important strategic point in the western possessions of New France.

The difference between the character of the English and French colonies in North America was great. Englishmen were content to sow and reap in a plodding fashion, extending their territorial bounds no faster than their settlements needed room for growth. Their acquaintance with the Indians did not, with the exception of the New York and Southern fur-traders, extend beyond the tribes which touched their borders. They were possessed of remarkable vitality and a strong sense of political and commercial independence.

The rigor of the Canadian winter, the shortness of the summer season, and persistent annoyance from the Iroquois, who at times had carried their warfare to the very walls of the settlements, combined to make the lot of the French farmer on the St. Lawrence far from prosperous. During many of its early years, New France largely depended for food upon supplies brought out from the mother-country. The fur-trader experienced but little more personal danger than the agriculturist who remained upon his narrow farmhold abutting on the St. Lawrence; while the fascination of the unbridled life of adventure led by the former, free from the restraints of church and society, was such as strongly appealed to young men of spirit. The trade of New France was farmed out to commercial companies and to favorites of the king and his autocratic colonial governors. Unlicensed traffic, such as was carried on by the coureurs de bois, was looked upon as akin to smuggling, and harsh laws were promulgated against it. Nevertheless the forests, far into the continental [Pg 250] interior, were penetrated by gay adventurers conducting illicit barter with the red barbarians, while the agriculture of the colony languished. The river-systems of the English coast colonies did not easily conduct to the interior, but the far-reaching waterways of New France were a continual invitation.

Iroquois interests were bound up with the Dutch, and after them with the English. The better to improve their own position and to keep up prices, the Iroquois sought to prevent Algonquians of the upper lakes from trading with the Canadians. But French influence in the Northwest was nevertheless strong. Colonial officials cajoled the Indians and plied them with presents; while the wandering traders and their employees dwelt in comparative harmony with the red men, were adopted into many of the tribes, and married squaws, who reared in the forest villages an extensive half-breed progeny.

The disposition of the French Crown to interfere with the fur-trade and to repress all commercial initiative not emanating from privileged circles, was but an evidence of its general colonial policy. The colony on the St. Lawrence was made continually to feel the hand of the king. In contrast to the free town and county systems of the English, the people of New France had no voice in their government or in the appointment of their officials. Even in the most trivial affairs they looked to the Crown for action.

The country was governed much like a province in France. It was divided: (1) for judicial purposes, into districts, with a judge at the head of each, from whom there might be an appeal to the superior council. Within the districts were (2) seigniories, or great estates. The seignior held his land immediately from the king, and parcelled it out [Pg 251] among his vassals, the habitants, or cultivators, who paid him a small rent, patronized his shops and mills, and owed him certain feudal obligations. Upon the estates were (3) parishes, in which the curé and the captain of militia were the chief personages. The only public duties exercised by the habitants were in connection with parish affairs, and then the initiative was taken at Quebec, where resided the central authority, vested in the governor, intendant, and council. In 1672, Frontenac attempted to set up in Canada an assembly of the three estates or orders; but Colbert, the king's prime minister, rebuked him, and gave directions for a gradual restriction of all privileges of representation. "It seems better that every one should speak for himself, and no one for all." The people were not permitted to think or act for themselves, and they did not covet the privilege. Without political training, they had no notion of what the English call political rights.

Had King Louis XIV. been a wise monarch, paternalism might not have been a disadvantage for a population of this sort. But the royal patronage of colonial enterprises was spasmodic, sometimes breaking out into extravagant aid, again remarkable for its penuriousness. There were several in the long roll of colonial governors who were men of commanding ability, and well fitted, under right conditions, to make of New France a success,—notably Champlain (1622-1635), Frontenac (1672-1682, and 1689-1698), and De Nonville (1685-1689). But the times and the material at hand were against them. Official corruption ran riot. From the monopolists, who were the present favorites of the king, down to the military commander of the most distant forest trading station, officials considered the public treasury and the resources of the colony as a source of individual profit. The priesthood held full sway; little [Pg 252] was done without the sanction of the hierarchy. The missionaries of the faith won laurels for bravery, self-denial, and hardihood, under the most adverse circumstances. But the policy of the Church was too exclusive for the good of the colony. Huguenots, driven from France by persecution, were forbidden by the bishops to reside in Canada, and thus were compelled to contribute their brain and brawn to the upbuilding of the rival English settlements. Of all Frenchmen, these were the best adapted to the rearing of an industrial empire in the New World.

In Champlain's time, while France was busy in crushing Protestant revolts at home, the settlements of Port Royal and Quebec, then wretched hamlets of a few dozen huts each, fell an easy prey to small English naval forces (1628-1629). For a few months France did not hold one foot of ground in North America. But as peace had been declared between France and England before this conquest, the former received back all its possessions, including Acadia (Nova Scotia) and the island of Cape Breton. The inevitable struggle for the mastery of the continent was postponed, and Frenchmen held Canada for four generations longer. By the close of the seventeenth century, men of New France were ranging at will over much of the country beyond the mountains, with visions of empire as extensive as the continent.

The French were not exploring and occupying the western country unwatched. English colonial statesmen understood from the first the import of the movement, and their alarm was frequently expressed in communications to the home government. While Charles II. was a pensioner of Louis XIV., the royal intendant in Canada expressed the situation [Pg 253] clearly when he urged Louis (1666) to purchase New York, "whereby he would have two entrances to Canada, and by which he would give to the French all the peltries of the north, of which the English share the profit by the communication which they have with the Iroquois, by Manhattan and Orange." In 1687, Governor Dongan of New York warned the ministry at London: "If the French have all they pretend to have discovered in these parts, the king of England will not have a hundred miles from the sea anywhere."

With the accession of Protestant William and Mary (1689), the Palatinate war broke out between England and France, and at once spread to America, where it was styled King William's War. The French had at that time colonies in the undefined region of Acadia, on Cape Breton, and along the north bank of the St. Lawrence as far up as Montreal. There were a few small stockades scattered at long intervals through the Illinois country, upon the banks of the upper Mississippi, at Chequamegon Bay of Lake Superior, at Sault Ste. Marie, on the St. Joseph's River, and elsewhere; with here and there a lonely Jesuit mission, and the movable camps of coureurs de bois. Elsewhere, north and west of the Atlantic plain, the grim solitude was broken only by bands of red savages, who roved to and fro through the dark woodlands, intent on war or the chase.

The population of New France, in this wide region, was not, in 1690, more than twelve thousand, against one hundred thousand in New England and New York. Had it not been for the help of her Indian allies, the military strength of many of her more important stations, and the fighting qualities of her commanders, aided by division in the councils of the English colonists, New France would from the first have made a feeble defence against the overpowering resources of her southern neighbors.

[Pg 254] King William's (or Frontenac's) War was costly to the colonists, and resulted in no material advantage to either side. The French, under Governor Frontenac, conducted their operations with vigor. Three winter expeditions, composed almost entirely of Indians, were sent out (1690) against the English frontier line, furiously attacking it at widely separated points,—New York, New Hampshire, and Maine. In consequence of the alarm created by these raids, the first colonial congress was held at New York (1690). A fleet commanded by Sir William Phipps (page 177), with eighteen hundred New England militiamen on board, captured Acadia and Port Royal that summer, but Acadia was retaken by the French the following season. During the five ensuing years fighting was confined to bushranging along the New York and New England border. The struggle was without further incident until Newfoundland yielded to the French (1696), and a party of French and Indians sacked the little village of Andover, Mass. (1697), but twenty-five miles out of Boston. Later in the year came the treaty of Ryswick, under which each belligerent recovered what he possessed at the outset of the war.

After the treaty of Ryswick (1697) there was peace between England and France for five years. Then broke out what is known in America as Queen Anne's War (1702-1713), and in Europe as the War of the Spanish Succession. The war originated in Europe; but one of England's objects in the struggle was to prevent the French from obtaining too firm a foothold in America. Much the same military operations as in King William's War were undertaken by both of the American opponents.

Three attempts were made by New England troops to [Pg 255] recapture Acadia (1704, 1707, and 1710), the last being successful. The peace of Utrecht (1713) recognized England's right to Acadia, "with its ancient boundaries," but it brought only nominal peace to the New York and New England colonists. Unfortunately the northern and western boundaries of Acadia were not therein fixed, and the country between the Kennebec and the St. Lawrence was in as much dispute as ever. Border settlers all along the line from the Hudson to the Kennebec were in hourly peril of their lives from Indian scalping-parties. There was abundant proof that the authorities of New France, instructed by the government at Paris, were actively inciting the red savages to forays for scalps and plunder. This fact tended greatly to embitter the relations between the rival white races, and led to measures of reprisal.

The irregular War of the Austrian Succession when it extended to America was known as King George's War (1744-1748). The principal event was the capture (1744) by New England troops of the strong fortress of Louisbourg, on the island of Cape Breton. Having achieved so heroic a victory almost single-handed, New Englanders considered themselves slighted by the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748), by which Louisbourg was surrendered to France, and in other respects the unfortunate state of affairs existing before the war was restored. Disappointment was openly expressed, and tended still further to strain the relations between the colonies and the mother-land.

An attempt had been made at the convention at Aix-la-Chapelle to settle the boundary disputes in America by referring the matter to a commission. France now asserted her right to all countries drained by streams [Pg 256] emptying into the St. Lawrence, the Great Lakes, and the Mississippi. This allowed, the narrow strip of the Atlantic coast would alone have been left to English domination. It was asserted on behalf of Great Britain that the charters of her coast colonies carried their western bounds to the Pacific; further, that as by the treaty of Utrecht France had acknowledged the suzerainty of the British king over the Iroquois confederacy, the English were entitled to all lands "conquered" by those Indians, whose war-paths had extended from the Ottawa River on the north to the Carolinas on the south, and whose forays reached alike to the Mississippi and to New England. For three years the commissioners quarrelled at Paris over these conflicting claims; but the dispute was irreconcilable; the only arbitrament possible was by the sword.

Meanwhile both sides were preparing to occupy and hold the contested fields. New France already had a weak chain of water-side forts and commercial stations, the rendezvous of priests, fur-traders, travellers, and friendly Indians, extending, with long intervening stretches of savage-haunted wilderness, through the heart of the continent,—chiefly on the shores of the Great Lakes, and the banks of the principal river highways,—from Lower Canada to her outlying post of New Orleans. Around each of these frontier forts was a scattered farming community, the holdings being narrow fields reaching far back into the country from the water-front, with the neat log-cabins of the habitants nestled in close neighborhood upon the banks. In the summer the men, aided by their large families, tilled the ribbon-like patches in a desultory fashion, and in the winter assisted the fur-traders as oarsmen and pack-carriers. Many were married to squaws, and the younger portion of the population was [Pg 257] to a large extent half-breed. They were a happy, contented people, without ambition beyond the day's enjoyment, combining with the light-heartedness of the French the improvidence of the savage.

From 1700 on, the conflict seemed inevitable. The French realized that they could not keep up connection between New Orleans and their settlements on the St. Lawrence if not permitted to hold the valley of the Ohio. Governor La Jonquière (1749-1752) understood the situation, and pleaded for the shipment of ten thousand French peasants to settle the region; but the government at Paris was just then as indifferent to New France as was King George to his colonies, and the settlers were not sent.

Of the region in which were scattered the permanent French settlements, the southern shore of the Great Lakes and the Mississippi valley eventually became a part of the United States; although these settlements were few and small, the influence of French operations in the West, on the development of the English colonies, was far reaching. New France will always be renowned for the immense area held by a small European population. She was from the first hampered by serious drawbacks,—centralization, paternalism, official corruption, instability of system, religious exclusiveness, the fascination of the fur-trade, a deadly Indian foe, and an inhospitable climate,—the sum of which was in the end to destroy her (page 49). She expanded with mushroom growth, but was predestined to collapse. Yet more than any other part of North America, the French colonies in what is now Canada preserve the language and the customs of the time of their settlement.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE COLONIZATION OF GEORGIA (1732-1755).

Bibliographies.—Avery, III. 438-440; Winsor, V. 392-406; Channing and Hart, Guide, § 103.

Historical Maps.—No. 4, this volume (Epoch Maps, No. 4), MacCoun, and school histories already cited.

General Accounts.—Avery, III. ch. xxiv.; Doyle, Colonies, V. ch. viii.; G. Bancroft, II. 268-291; Greene, Provincial America, ch. xv.; Hildreth, II. 362-377; Lodge, Colonies, ch. ix.; Winsor, V. ch. vi.; McCrady, South Carolina under Royal Government, chs. xi., xii.; W. Wilson, American People, II. 62-68; histories of Georgia by Jones, McCall, and Stevens.

Special Histories.—C. Jones, Dead Towns of Georgia; P. A. Strobel, Salzburgers; J. MacLean, Scotch Highlanders in America, ch. vi.; G. White, Historical Collections of Georgia; lives of Oglethorpe by Bruce, Cooper, Harris, and Wright.

Contemporary Accounts.—Oglethorpe, Account (1732); Martyn, Reasons for Establishing Georgia (1733); Account Showing Progress of Georgia (1741); Impartial Enquiry into State and Utility of Province of Georgia (1741); Cadogan, Impartial Account of Expedition against St. Augustine (1743); Moore, Voyage to Georgia (1744); Egmont, Journal of Trustees for Establishing Colony of Georgia; Candler, Colonial Records.

The southern boundary of South Carolina was practically the Savannah River; but the English claimed as far south as the St. John's. Just below the St. John's, and one hundred and seventy miles south of the Savannah, lay the old Spanish colony of [Pg 259] St. Augustine, founded (page 34) in 1565. The country between the Savannah and the St. John's was a part of the old Carolina claim; but when the Carolinas became royal provinces the king reserved this unsettled district as crown lands.

James Oglethorpe had been an army officer; he was a member of parliament, and was prominent in various efforts at domestic reform, particularly in the improvement of the condition of debtors' prisons. Stirred by the terrible revelations of his inquiry, he engaged other wealthy and benevolent men with him, and formed a company (1732) for the settlement of the reserved Carolina tract, which was to be styled Georgia, in honor of the king, George II. The proposed colony was to serve the double purpose of checking the threatened Spanish advance upon the southern colonies in America, and of furnishing a home for members of the debtor class, who would be given a chance to retrieve their fortunes by a fresh start in life. This scheme, half philanthropic and half military, had also in view the extension of the English fur-traffic among the Cherokees, whose trade was now being eagerly sought by the Spanish on the south, and the French on the west.

The company was given a charter under the name of "The Trustees for establishing the Colony of Georgia in America," its land-grant extending from the Savannah to the Altamaha. There were twenty-one trustees, with full powers of management; they were to appoint the governor and other officials during the first four years,—after that the Crown was to appoint. No member of the company was to hold any salaried colonial office. Never was a colony founded upon motives more disinterested. It was to be, literally, "an asylum for the oppressed." The settlers themselves [Pg 260] were not given any political privileges, for it was thought the trustees would be better managers than a class of people who had not heretofore proved their capacity for business affairs. Slavery was prohibited, because it would interfere with free white labor, and a slave population might prove dangerous in case of a frontier war with the Spanish. That immigration might be encouraged, and thus that the colony might be strong from a military point of view, it was ordered that no one should own over five hundred acres of land. It was also ordained that all foreigners should have equal rights with Englishmen, that there was to be complete religious toleration except for Roman Catholics, that none but settlers of steady habits should be admitted, that no rum should be imported, and that the colonists were to practise military drill.

In November, 1732, Oglethorpe,—appointed governor and general, without pay,—set out from England with thirty-five selected families, and in February (1733) founded the city of Savannah, on a bluff overlooking Savannah River, some ten miles from the sea. In May he made a firm alliance with the neighboring Creeks, whom he treated with great consideration. The second year (1734) there arrived a number of German Protestants, persecuted exiles from Salzburg, who had been invited to America by the English Society for Propagating the Gospel. Other settlements. The Salzburgers proved a desirable acquisition, setting a much-needed example of industry and thrift. The Germans settled the town of Ebenezer; in the same year Augusta was planted, two hundred and thirty miles up the Savannah River, as a fortified trading outpost in the Indian country; while two years later (1736), another armed colony was sent to found Frederica, at the mouth of the Altamaha, on the Spanish frontier.

[Pg 261] Augusta, which in 1741 numbered but forty-seven permanent inhabitants, in addition to a small garrison, was the chief seat of the Georgia and South Carolina fur-traffic. It was the eastern key to the Creek, Chickasaw, and Cherokee hunting-grounds. In 1741, it was estimated that about one hundred and twenty-five white men—traders, pack-horse men, servants, and townsmen—depended for their livelihood upon the traffic centring at the Augusta station; another estimate, made in the same year, placed the number of horses engaged at five hundred, and the annual value of skins at fifty thousand pounds. The profits were great, and would have been larger but for sharp competition in the far-away camps of the barbarians; there the Georgians and Carolinians met Frenchmen, who had wandered from far Louisiana by devious ways, part water, and part land, and Virginians, who found their way to the southwest through the parallel valley system, thus escaping the necessity of climbing the mountain wall.

The trustees perceived at last that men who had failed at home were not likely to be successful as colonists, and they sent over a party of Scotch Highlanders and yet more German Protestants. The colony now proved a success. Savannah was well built, courts were established, the land-system was well arranged, and Salzburgers, Moravians, and Highlanders soon came out in considerable numbers (1735-1736). Yet there was no lack of discontent. The very class for whom the colony was founded formed its most undesirable inhabitants; hardly a regulation originally established for their supposed benefit was to their taste, idle and worthless fellows were numerous, and some [Pg 262] of them, finding their complaints unheeded, fled to the Carolinas or to join the rough borderers. Among the settlers were three enthusiastic sectaries, Charles Wesley, secretary to Oglethorpe, his brother John, a missionary to the Indians, and George Whitefield, who succeeded the latter after he returned to England. Whitefield in later years deeply stirred the American colonists, from Florida to New England, in his efforts to arouse in them a strong religious conviction (page 190.)

In 1736, Oglethorpe made an expedition to the south as far as the English claim extended, and planted several forts. At the same time he made a treaty with the Chickasaws, and thus strengthened the southern line. Three years later (1739), war broke out between Spain and England. Fearing that he might not be able to withstand an attack from the Spaniards, Oglethorpe took the offensive (1740), and marching into Florida planted himself before St. Augustine, which had a garrison of two thousand men, well supplied with artillery. Troops from Carolina soon came up. Sickness breaking out in the camp, and many of the Carolinians deserting, the siege, which had been gallantly conducted, was at last abandoned.

Up to this time the Spaniards had been obliged to stand on the defensive; Cuba was threatened by a large English squadron,—but the attack there proved a failure, and opportunity was given for concentrating Spanish troops in Florida. In 1742 a heavy assault by land and sea was made on Frederica. By a combination of bravery and superior stratagem, Oglethorpe succeeded in holding the place until the enemy's fleet was frightened off by the arrival of English vessels, and Georgia was henceforth free from Spanish invasion.

Oglethorpe returned to England the following year [Pg 263] (1743), never to return to the colony. The trustees now placed the government in charge of a president and four assistants. But after the departure of its gallant and public-spirited founder the colony no longer flourished, and in a vain attempt to remove causes for dissatisfaction the company made matters worse. Slavery was introduced (1749), free traffic in rum was permitted, and restrictions on the acquisition of land were removed. Discontent grew apace among the original settlers, who were always hard to suit; only the Highlanders and Germans remained satisfied.

In 1752, the charter was surrendered by the disappointed proprietors, and Georgia became a royal province, with a government similar to that of South Carolina. The change wrought improvement in many ways.

Georgia was the last of the thirteen colonies to be founded, and remained one of the weakest until long after the Revolution. Its history is a proof that the robust growth of a colony depends, not upon the character and aims of its founders, but upon the slow accretion of public sentiment and public spirit.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE CONTINENTAL COLONIES FROM 1700 TO 1750.

Bibliographies.—Avery, III. 426-446; Greene, Provincial America, ch. xix.; Winsor, V. passim.

Historical Maps.—Nos. 3 and 4, this volume (Epoch Maps, Nos. 3, 4); MacCoun, and school histories already cited.

General Accounts.—Avery, III. chs. x.-xxvii.; G. Bancroft, II. 212-565; Channing, II. chs. xi.-xix.; Doyle, V.; G. Eggleston, Eighteenth Century; Frothingham, Rise of Republic, ch. iv.; Greene, as above; Hildreth, II. chs. xxii.-xxvii.; Lodge, Colonies; E. Sparks, Expansion of American People; Wilson, American People, II. chs. i.-iii; Winsor, V. chs. ii.-vi.

Special Histories.—Political: L. Kellogg, Colonial Charter; Channing, Town and County Government; A. Cross, Anglican Episcopate; Greene, Provincial Governor; C. Bishop, Elections in American Colonies; A. McKinley, Suffrage Franchise; McCrady, South Carolina.—Economic: Weeden, Economic History; E. Lord, Industrial Experiments; G. Beer, Commercial Policy; R. Paine, Ships and Sailors of Old Salem.—Nationalities: L. Fosdick, French Blood in America; J. Rosengarten, French Colonists and Exiles; S. Cobb, Palatines; F. Diffenderfer, German Immigration; L. Bittinger, Germans in Colonial Times, and German Religious Life; Sachse, German Sectarians; Wayland, German Element; C. Hanna, Scotch-Irish; McLean, Scotch Highlanders.—Financial: D. Dewey, Financial History, ch. i.; A. Davis, Currency in Massachusetts Bay; F. McLeod, Fiat Money in New England; C. MacFarlane, Pennsylvania Paper Currency; W. Shaw, Currency.—Taxation: F. Jones, Taxation in Connecticut.—Press: L. Schuyler, Liberty of Press; L. Rutherford, Zenger.—See also F. Dexter, Population in Colonies, and state histories.

Contemporary Accounts.—Hutchinson, History of Massachusetts Bay; Falckner, Curieuse Nachricht von Pennsylvania (1702); Madam Knight, Journal (1704); Fontaine, Diary (1710-1716); Mittelberger, Journey to Pennsylvania (1750-1754); Franklin, Autobiography; Woolman, Journal.

Up to 1700 the history of each colony is the history of a unit; the impulse of colonization came in successive waves, but each little commonwealth had its own interests, its own struggles, and looked forward to its own future. From 1700 to 1750, though the separate life and history of each colony continued, there were perceptible certain great phases of common development, which will be briefly outlined.

Although disturbed by wars with the French and Indians, by domestic political quarrels, and by disputes with the mother country regarding the regulation of commerce and manufactures, there was a steady growth of population in British North America during the first half of the seventeenth century. The rewards of industry were sufficient, coupled with considerable religious and political freedom, to entice a continuous, though fluctuating, immigration from England and the continent of Europe. In New England, where the English stock was practically unmixed with foreign blood, the rate of progress was less pronounced than in Pennsylvania and the South, which were largely recruited from other races. In 1700, the population of New England was something, over one hundred and five thousand. By the beginning of the French and Indian War (1754) it was a little less than four hundred thousand, New Hampshire having forty thousand, Massachusetts and Maine two hundred thousand, Rhode Island forty thousand, and Connecticut a hundred and ten thousand. The middle colonies commenced the century with fifty-nine thousand; but by 1750 this had, chiefly owing to the exceptionally rapid growth of Pennsylvania after 1730, increased to three hundred and fifty-five thousand, of which New York contained ninety thousand, New Jersey eighty thousand, and Pennsylvania and [Pg 266] Delaware one hundred and eighty-five thousand. In the Southern group there was a population of eighty-nine thousand in 1700, which had grown to six hundred and twenty-five thousand in 1763, not counting Georgia, settled in 1733, which in twenty years had acquired a population of five thousand; Maryland had a hundred and fifty-four thousand, chiefly Englishmen, but there was a liberal admixture of Germans and people of other nationalities. Virginia had nearly three hundred thousand, of whom the blacks were now in the majority. North Carolina, important in numbers only, had ninety thousand, of whom twenty per cent were slaves; South Carolina had eighty thousand, the blacks outnumbering the whites by two or three to one. The total for the thirteen colonies in 1750 is about thirteen hundred and seventy thousand.

For many years the New England charters were in imminent danger of annulment, the purpose apparently being to place the colonies under a viceregal government. Those of Connecticut and Rhode Island were the liberal documents granted to them early in their career; electing their own governors, they were practically independent of the mother-country, and the general movement against the charters had these two especially in view. From 1701 to 1749, the charters were seriously menaced at various times; but on each occasion the astute diplomacy of the colonial agents in England succeeded in warding off the threatened attack. Worthy of especial mention in this connection are Sir Henry Ashurst, the representative of Connecticut, and Jeremiah Dummer, his successor. In 1715, at a time when it was proposed to annex Rhode Island and Connecticut to the unchartered royal province of New Hampshire, Dummer issued his now famous Defence of the [Pg 267] American Charters, in which he forcibly argued,—(1) That the colonies "have a good and undoubted right to their respective charters," inasmuch as they had been irrevocably granted by the sovereign "as premiums for services to be performed." (2) "That these governments have by no misbehavior forfeited their charters," and were in no danger of becoming formidable to the mother-land. (3) That to repeal the charters would endanger colonial prosperity, and "whatever injures the trade of the plantations must in proportion affect Great Britain, the source and centre of their commerce." (4) That the charters should be proceeded against in lower courts of justice, not in parliament. Dummer's presentment of the case was regarded by the friends of the colonies as unanswerable, and was largely instrumental in causing an ultimate abandonment of the ministerial attack on the New England charters.

In 1728, as a consequence of popular disturbances in the Carolinas, a writ of quo warranto was issued against the charter, and the proprietors sold their interests to the Crown. A royal governor was now sent out to each province. Heretofore, North Carolina had been nominally ruled by a deputy serving under the South Carolina governor.

Boundary disputes were a constant source of intercolonial irritation. There were long and vexatious boundary wrangles between Connecticut and her neighbors, Rhode Island, New York, and Massachusetts. In 1683 an agreement reached between Connecticut and New York was the basis of the present line, surveyed in 1878-1879; it was 1826 before the final survey between Connecticut and Massachusetts; the quarrel between Connecticut and Rhode Island was protracted and [Pg 268] heated, the line between them not being definitively established until 1840. Wentworth, the first royal governor of New Hampshire (1740-1767), made large land-grants, which overlapped territory claimed by New York, and thus brought on a protracted boundary controversy between those two provinces. Patents covering both sides of Lake Champlain were alike issued by New York and New Hampshire; the settlers east of the lake organized in revolt, under the cognomen of Green Mountain Boys, and were preparing to set up a government of their own, when the Revolution broke out, and in 1777 the unacknowledged government of Vermont was formed. A settlement of the boundary was not reached until Vermont was admitted to the Union (1791). The boundary disputes of New York with Massachusetts and Connecticut were settled prior to the Revolution. In 1737 a boundary commission adopted the present line between Massachusetts and New Hampshire. The same commission established the present western boundary of Maine. In a contest between Massachusetts and Rhode Island, the former claimed a portion of the latter's territory, on the ground that it was included in the old Plymouth patent; but in the final settlement Rhode Island retained possession. The Penn and Baltimore families long wrangled over the boundaries between Pennsylvania and Maryland. An agreement was reached in 1732, and ratified by a convention in 1760: under its terms, Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon, two eminent London mathematicians, ran the famous "Mason and Dixon line" (1767), separating the southern colonies from the northern. The boundary line between the Carolinas was not defined until 1735-1746. To the north and west, English boundary disputes with the French led to protracted and harassing wars; while to the south, Georgia's claims clashed with those of the Spaniards in Florida, and during the war between Spain [Pg 269] and England occasion was taken by Oglethorpe (1740), governor of Georgia, to invade Spanish territory (page 262).

No man of his time was more energetic in pushing the confines of settlement and encouraging development than Governor Spotswood of Virginia (1710-1722), a stalwart soldier who had fought under Marlborough. He built iron furnaces, introduced German vine-growers, made peace with the Indians, and established several excellent mission schools for them upon the frontier; under his administration the fur-trade spread far inland, and he did much to extend topographical knowledge of Virginia by fostering exploration.

The Shenandoah valley, opened to settlement by Spotswood, became, after 1730, a notable home for Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, driven by English persecution from their home in Ulster. They were by this time coming over to America in two steady streams, one pouring in at Philadelphia, and the other at Charleston, S. C. Those arriving at Philadelphia pushed westward to the mountains, and drifting southwestward through the long parallel valleys of the Alleghany range, met in the Shenandoah and kindred valleys those of their brethren who had gone up into the hills of Carolina. It was from these frontier valley homes that the migration into Kentucky and Tennessee proceeded a generation later, led by such daring spirits as Boone, Sevier, and Robertson.

Schemes for a union of the colonies, to provide for the common defence and settle intercolonial differences, were numerous enough, after the example set by the New England Confederacy (Chapter VII.). They emanated almost entirely, however, from the government party, and chiefly for this reason were [Pg 270] regarded with popular suspicion. In 1690 a continental congress had been held at New York for the purpose of treating with the Iroquois against the common enemy, New France (page 206). In 1697 William Penn laid before the Board of Trade a plan providing for a high commissioner, appointed by the king, to preside over a council composed of two delegates from each province, and to act as commander-in-chief in times of war. The scheme aroused much opposition from colonial pamphleteers, and failed of adoption; other plans which were promulgated from time to time, for the next sixty years, were in the main adaptations of Penn's, some of them providing for two or three strongly centralized provinces, each to be presided over by a Viceroy, assisted by a council of colonial delegates.

While the Board of Trade, distracted by doubts whether the colonies could be more firmly held as separate governments or under a viceregal union, was engaged in considering the various propositions submitted to it, several neighborhood congresses were held by the provinces themselves, chiefly to treat with Indians or for purposes of defence. But these congresses were in no sense popular meetings; they were composed of the official class, and had little more effect on the people than to accustom them to the spectacle of colonial union for matters of common interest.

In 1754 the Lords of Trade recommended a second general congress of the colonies, to treat with the Iroquois again; they also favored "articles of union and confederation with each other for the mutual defence of his Majesty's subjects and interests in North America, as well in time of peace as war." The congress was held at Albany. Only seven of the colonies were represented,—New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, [Pg 271] Pennsylvania, and Maryland. The convention adopted a plan of union prepared by Franklin, providing for a general government that should be self-sustaining and control federal affairs,—war, Indians, and public lands,—while the colonial governments were to retain their constitutions intact. Its plan of union rejected. The plan was rejected by the colonial assemblies. Franklin himself wrote: "The Crown disapproved it, as having too much weight in the democratic part of the constitution, and every assembly as having allowed too much to prerogative." The defeat of the Albany plan marks the end of efforts at union on the part of the official class. The next movement came from the people themselves, as the result of oppression on the part of the mother-country.

The history of the English continental colonies during the first half of the seventeenth century was largely made up of petty bickerings between the popular assemblies and the royal governors. The salary question was the most prominent feature of these disputes. Acting under orders from the Crown, the governor in each colony insisted on being paid a regular salary at stated intervals; but the assembly as persistently refused, and desiring to keep him dependent upon them, voted from time to time such sums as they chose. The principle at stake was important: a fixed salary grant would have been in the nature of a tax imposed by the Crown. Had the assembly been complaisant, the government would have been thrown into the hands of the royal governor and council, through their absolute power to veto laws. The acrimonious contention was greatly disturbing to all material interests, but it served as a most valuable constitutional training school for the Revolution.

[Pg 272] At times, in Boston, excitement over this perennial quarrel ran to a high pitch, and now and then it looked as though the assembly would be obliged to yield; but the men of Massachusetts were of stubborn clay, and never displayed more bravery than when the governor, backed by writs from England, threatened them the loudest. In 1728, the assembly, defended itself, saying it was "the undoubted right of all Englishmen, by Magna Charta, to raise and dispose of money for the public service of their own free accord, without compulsion." The Privy Council at last yielded the point (1735), and left the Massachusetts governor free to receive whatever the assembly chose to grant. In some of the colonies this salary question resulted in frequent deadlocks, in which all public business was at a standstill.

Other differences between the governors and their assemblies hinged on claims of prerogative, fees for issuing land-titles, issues of paper money, official attempts to favor the Church of England at the expense of dissenters, and levies of men and money for the public defence. There were also special grievances in many of the provinces. South Carolina's experience. In South Carolina (1704-1706), the proprietors attempted to exclude all but Church of England men from the assembly. This led to a bitter controversy, in which the dissenters successfully appealed to the House of Lords, and legal proceedings were commenced by the Crown for the revocation of the Carolina charter; but they were not then pushed to an issue. In 1719 the meddlesome executive policy of the proprietors resulted in a popular uprising, in which the governor was deposed. Later, the authorities (1754-1765) attempted to resist the issue of paper money, and also to reduce representation in the [Pg 273] assembly, while at the same time the home government introduced some offensive regulations regarding land patents. Popular indignation again expressed itself in bloody turbulence, and the colony fell into great disorder.

In North Carolina the scattered colonists maintained a vigorous resistance to arbitrary authority; the tone of official life was low; corruption in office was common; contests over questions of public policy often led to rioting and anarchy; bloodshed was not infrequent in such times of popular disturbance. In the far western valleys there was for a long period no pretence of law or order, and criminals of every sort found a safe refuge there; while pirates—until Blackbeard's capture by Governor Spotswood of Virginia in 1718—freely used the deep-coast inlets as snug harbors, from which they darted out with rakish craft to attack passing merchant-vessels. From 1704 to 1711 there was practically no government in the province, owing to an insurrection headed by Thomas Carey, whom Governor Spotswood finally arrested (1710) and sent prisoner to England.

During the administration of Governor Nicholson (1698-1705) the Virginia assembly had quietly gained control of the financial machinery, by making the treasurer an officer of its own appointment. When, therefore, the customary eighteenth-century wrangling commenced, the assembly was master of the situation. The burgesses refused to vote money for public defence until the governors yielded their claims of prerogative, and land-title fees.

Nowhere was the weary disagreement between governor and assembly so harmful to provincial interests as in Pennsylvania. There were elements in the contention there not existing elsewhere. The Penn family, as the [Pg 274] proprietors, resisted the proposed inclusion of their lands in tax levies for the conduct of military operations, while the assembly for many years would vote no money for such purposes or pay the governor's salary, except on the condition that the proprietary estates paid their share in the cost of defence. The proprietors finally yielded (1759). Other points of difference were,—the assertion of the gubernatorial prerogative of establishing courts, and proprietary opposition to the reckless issues of paper money frequently ordered by the assembly. The Quakers were opposed to warfare on principle; they would neither take up arms themselves in defence of the borderers from the French and Indians, nor, except when driven to it in times of great distress, vote money to equip or pay volunteers. They had, too, a great objection to levying and paying taxes; and in this they found strong allies in the Germans, who had now come over in large numbers, chiefly to settle on wild lands in the interior of the province. Most of the Germans and Quakers would go to almost any length in compromise with the Indian and French invaders who were mercilessly destroying the pioneer settlements. The proprietors and their governors fretted and threatened; the English government sent over order after order to the stubborn legislators; the borderers plied the deputies with heart-rending appeals for aid: yet the assembly long maintained its obstinate course, now and then grudgingly voting insufficient issues of depreciated bills of credit.

Lord Cornbury, who succeeded the Earl of Bellomont as governor of New York and New Jersey (1702), was not a man to inspire respect, being profligate and overbearing; he opposed popular interests, winning especial hatred through his petty persecution of dissenters from the Church of England. He was [Pg 275] recalled in 1708, in response to general denunciation of his course. His successors were in continuous and often acrimonious controversy with their assemblies, but generally succeeded in inducing the deputies to contribute with more or less liberality to the conduct of expeditions against the French and Indians.

Governor Belcher of New Jersey (1748-1757), who had been worsted in a heated salary contest in Massachusetts (1730-1741), and had profited by experience, was now one of the few executives who understood how to handle an assembly. By an obliging temper he readily secured the passage of such revenue bills as were essential to the proper defence of the colony in the French and Indian war, and avoided serious dispute.

The brief term of Sir William Phipps (1692-1695), as governor of Massachusetts,—a province then extending all the way from Rhode Island to New Brunswick, with the exception of New Hampshire,—was filled with bitterness and disappointment. At the outset of his career and the inauguration of the new charter (page 176), the assembly in the absence of any provision under that head, enacted that taxes were only to be levied in the province with the consent of the assembly. Had this rule been accepted by the Crown it would have left little occasion for quarrels between governor and people; its rejection by the home government left the door open to a train of events which ended, eighty-four years later, in continental independence. The witchcraft delusion (page 190) had stirred the colony to its centre, and Phipps gained no friends from his attitude in that affair; he angered Boston and crippled its political influence by securing the passage of a law (1694) that [Pg 276] deputies to the assembly must be residents of the districts they represented; and his temper was so testy that at the time of his recall he was engaged in a quarrel with nearly every leading man in the province.

The Earl of Bellomont came over in 1698 as governor of New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire. In November the General Court of Massachusetts invited him to visit Boston "so soon as the season of the year might comfortably admit his undertaking so long and difficult a journey." In the following spring (1699) he responded to the call. In Massachusetts Bellomont won favor by siding, as he had in New York, with the popular party, and recommending to his government the introduction of many reforms. In Rhode Island, where he tarried by the way, he found much to dissatisfy him, and reported the people as being ignorant, in a state of political and moral disorder, with an indifferent set of public officials, who were corrupt and abetted the pirates who swarmed in Narragansett Bay. Bellomont promptly devoted himself to the suppression of these sea-robbers, and in the year of his own death (1701) brought the notorious Kidd to the gallows. Bellomont's conciliatory attitude towards Massachusetts did not please the English Board of Trade, which sent him warning that the colonists had "a thirst for independency," as was particularly exemplified in their "denial of appeals."

Connecticut and Rhode Island were left with their old charters and their popularly elected governors, and thus were happily spared those quarrels over salaries, prerogatives, and fees which elsewhere in the colonies aroused so much ill-feeling. Governor Fletcher of New York was commissioned to take military control of Connecticut. He went to Hartford (1693) to assert his right; but meeting with rude [Pg 277] treatment, felt impelled to return home, and little more was heard from him. Like Massachusetts, Connecticut was successful in preventing legal appeals to England.

In New Hampshire—which was separated from Massachusetts in 1741 and became a royal province—there had been more than a century of dispute between the settlers and the proprietors respecting the Mason claim, and much confusion had at times arisen. The matter was at last ended by the purchase of the claim by a land company (1749), which released all of the settled tracts.

The aggressions of the French and their policy of inciting the northern and western Indians to murderous attacks on the slowly advancing English frontier, kept the colonies which abutted on New France in an almost constant state of excitement. Those provinces which had no Indian frontier, such as Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, and Rhode Island, and the Carolinas,—which latter had, however, several desperate local Indian uprisings to quell,—experienced but little alarm over the common danger, viewed schemes of union with indifference, and contributed but grudgingly to the funds and expeditions for general defence. Pennsylvania was open to attack along an extended border; the Germans and Quakers being opposed to making war on Indians, her frontier suffered greatly from frequent raids of the enemy. New York, being on the highway between the Atlantic coast and the Great Lakes and Canada, was the scene of many bloody encounters. No other province was so greatly exposed, and on none did the cost of the prolonged and desperate contest between the French and English in America so heavily fall. In 1706, during Queen Anne's war (1702-1713), the French made an [Pg 278] unavailing attack on Charleston, South Carolina. In the capture of Port Royal (1710), New England men chiefly participated, and they were otherwise prominent throughout the war. In King George's War (1744-1748), New Englanders alone took part, although New York and a few other colonies contributed to the army chest. Louisburg was captured in 1745 by New England troops, who were highly elated at their brilliant conquest. England, too busy with her own affairs, could not well send protection the following year, when a French fleet threatened New England; a curious chapter of marine disasters alone saved the Americans from being severely punished in retaliation. This doubtless unavoidable neglect on the part of the mother-country, and the final surrender of Louisburg to the French by the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748), tended still further to strain the relations between England and her colonies on the American continent.

Admiral Vernon's expedition against the French in the West Indies in 1740 was participated in by men from nearly all the English colonies, island and continental. A campaign against the Spanish settlements in Florida was undertaken by Oglethorpe during the same year (page 262). The Carolinas gave somewhat tardy aid to Georgia in this daring enterprise.

Massachusetts was the first of the colonies to issue paper money. This was in 1690, to aid in fitting out an expedition against Canada. The other provinces followed at intervals. Affairs had come to such a pass by 1748 that the price in paper of £100 in coin ranged all the way from £1100 in New England to £180 in Pennsylvania. The royal governors in all [Pg 279] the colonies, acting under instructions from home, were generally persistent opponents of this financial expedient. Governor Belcher of Massachusetts, in a proclamation against the practice (1740), said it gave "great interruption and brought confusion into trade and business," and "reflected great dishonor on his Majesty's government here." In 1720, Parliament passed what was known as "the Bubble Act," designed to break up all private banking companies in the United Kingdom chartered for the issue of circulating notes; this Act was made applicable to the colonies in 1740, and reinforced in 1751, the last-named Act forbidding the further issue of colonial paper money except in cases of invasion or for the annual current expenses of the government, these exceptional cases to be under control of the Crown. In 1763 all issues to date were declared void; although ten years later (1773), provincial bills of credit were made receivable as legal tender at the treasuries of the colonies emitting them. The controversy between the colonies and the home government over these issues of a cheap circulating medium developed much bitterness on the part of the former, who deemed the practice essential to their prosperity; and it was one of the many causes of the Revolution.

Another constant source of irritation were the parliamentary Acts of Navigation and Trade (page 104). In the continental colonies there was no popular sentiment against smuggling or other interference with the operation of these obnoxious laws. In no colony were the Acts strictly observed; had they been enforced they would have worked unbearable hardship. Massachusetts particularly offended the Board of Trade by openly refusing to provide for their more rigorous execution; coupling its stubborn behavior with the bold assertion, quite contrary to ministerial ideas, that the colonists were "as much Englishmen as those in England, [Pg 280] and had a right, therefore, to all the privileges which the people of England enjoyed."

In the colonies, as afterwards in the States, there was a continual contest for supremacy between Virginia, where political power was lodged in the aristocratic class, and New England, where there was a voluntary recognition of aristocracy, but where the body of the people ruled. Virginia ideas strongly influenced North Carolina on the south, and Maryland, Delaware, and Pennsylvania on the north. The tone of life in South Carolina was purely southern, with no trace of Virginian characteristics; New York, also free from Virginian methods, was strongly influenced by New England ideas.

The governing class in Virginia were of strong English stock, and when occasion for political action offered, were ready for it, proving themselves good soldiers and statesmen, and furnishing some of the most powerful leaders in the revolt against the mother-country. Their protracted fights with the French and Indians inured them to habits of the camp; while quarrels with their governors, and bickerings with the home government over the Navigation Acts (page 104) and the impressment of seamen, furnished schooling in constitutional agitation. By the middle of the eighteenth century the majority of Virginians were natives of the soil, and their attachment to England was weaker than that of their fathers; while the considerable foreign element weakened the bond of union with the mother-country. In Maryland general hostility to the Church of England and its impolitic attempt to suppress dissent, was an important factor in widening the breach. North Carolina continued to be distinguished [Pg 281] for disorder and a low state of morals, education, and wealth, and produced no great leaders in the opposition to Great Britain. The people, having a keen perception of their rights, were eager enough in the patriot cause; but there was a large Tory party, and consequently fierce internal dissensions characterized the history of the colony throughout the Revolutionary agitation. Being dependent on England for trade and supplies, the aristocratic planters of South Carolina were drawn much closer to the mother-country than in any other continental colony. The Tory element was powerful, yet the best and strongest men of the slave-holding class were patriots, and furnished several popular leaders of ability,—the colony ranking second only to Virginia, in the southern group, during the struggle with the home government. Georgia was but newly settled, and the English colonists were still strongly attached to their native country; she was therefore more loyal than her neighbors. The settlers from New England, with the political shrewdness peculiar to their section, succeeded in committing Georgia to the patriot cause; but the mass of the people remained lukewarm, and when English rule was overturned there was much lawlessness. The community was immature, and had not yet learned the art of self-government.

The Navigation Acts and the impressment of seamen bore hard on Pennsylvania, and there was no lack of complaint against other forms of ministerial interference with colonial rights. But the Quakers, who were chiefly of the shopkeeping and trading class, had not experienced the long and painful struggle for existence that had been the lot of most of the other colonists. They had been prosperous from the beginning; and being conservative, timid, and slow in disposition and action, were not easily persuaded to make [Pg 282] material sacrifices for the sake of political sentiment. Thus Pennsylvania was an uncertain factor in the revolt. New Jersey, with no Indian frontier, no foreign trade, and but light taxes, had few causes for complaint against England. Her rulers were thrifty, conservative farmers, who were disposed to be loyal; yet as they were of pure English descent, and tenacious of their liberties, they were gradually drawn into an attitude of opposition to English rule. New York was the only one of the middle group of colonies which stood stoutly against England. Since the days of Andros the people "caught at everything to lessen the prerogative." New York city, as the second commercial port on the coast, was naturally a seat of opposition to the navigation laws. But the Tory minority were nowhere more active or determined than in New York.

The New Englanders were pure in race, simple and frugal in habit, enterprising, vigorous, intelligent, and with a high average of education. They were small freeholders, possessed of a democratic system which had powers of indefinite expansion, and were trained in a political school well calculated to produce great popular leaders. Their political principles, developed by a century and a half of contention with the home government, pervaded the colonial revolt, and were carried out in the national government in which it resulted. The New England Confederation of 1643 bore fruit in the Stamp-Act congress of 1765, and still more in the Confederation of 1781 and the Constitution of 1787.

Although the period 1700-1750 has not the interest of the previous half century of colonization, it has great constitutional importance. The colonial spirit. The rugged individuality of the [Pg 283] founders of the colonies,—New England, middle, and southern,—was beginning to give way to a distinctly American character. The colonies lived separate lives; there was little intercommunication, but their interests were much the same, their relations with the mother-country were the same, and in the intercolonial wars they learned to act side by side. More than this, they all enjoyed a greater degree of personal freedom and local independence than was known anywhere else in the world. They had no consciousness of any desire to become independent. They had their own assemblies, made their own laws, and disregarded the Acts of Trade. In population the colonies increased between 1650 and 1700 from about 100,000 to 250,000; during the period 1700-1750 they grew to 1,370,000. A few passable towns were built,—Boston, Philadelphia, and New York. Their means were small, their horizon narrow, but their spirit was large.

As the year 1750 approached, there came upon the colonies two changes, destined to lead to a new political life. In the first place, the colonies at last began to overrun the mountain barrier which had hemmed them in on the west, and thus to invite another and more desperate struggle with the French. The first settlement made west of the mountains was on a branch of the Kanawha (1748); in the same season several adventurous Virginians hunted and made land-claims in Kentucky and Tennessee. Before the close of the following year (1749) there had been formed the Ohio Company, composed of wealthy Virginians, among whom were two brothers of Washington. King George granted the company five hundred thousand acres, on which they were to plant one hundred families and build and maintain a fort. The first attempt to explore the region of the Ohio brought the English and the French traders into [Pg 284] conflict; and troops were not long in following, on both sides.

At the same time the home government was awaking to the fact that the colonies were not under strict control. In 1750 the Administration began to consider means of stopping unlawful trade. Before the plan could be perfected the French and Indian War broke out, in 1754. The story of that war and of the consequences of simultaneously dispossessing the French enemies of the colonies, and tightening the reins of government, belongs to the next volume of the series,—the Formation of the Union.

INDEX.

Transcriber's Notes:

Punctuation was standardized. Missing punctuation was added, where appropriate. Three instances of William Claiborne's name spelled 'Clayborne' were changed for consistency within the text. The index entry for Augusta, GA, is out of order in the original and was not amended. Archaic and obsolete spellings were left unchanged.

The following spelling corrections were made:
'da Leon' to 'de Leon,' sidenote, Chapter II, § 9
'Greene' to 'Green,' sidenote, Chapter IV, § 36
'Roberth' to 'Robert,' Chapter IV, § 36
'browbreat' to 'browbeat,' Chapter IV, § 38
'circumtances' to 'circumstances,' Chapter XII, § 110
'beween' to 'between,' Chapter XIV, § 121
'king Charles' to 'King Charles,' index entry for Massachusetts
'Phillip's War' to 'Philip's War,' twice, in the index only

The following hyphenated words were changed for consistency within the text:
'brow-beat' to 'browbeat,' Chapter IV, § 31
'fire-places' to 'fireplaces,' Chapter V, § 45
'foot-hold' to 'foothold,' Chapter XII, § 112
'free-men' to 'freemen,' Chapter IX, § 89
'heartrending' to 'heart-rending,' Chapter XIV, § 125
'Jersey-men' to 'Jerseymen,' Chapter X, § 92
'long-shore' to 'longshore,' Chapter X, § 94
'overpopulation' to 'over-population,' index, Portuguese and index, Spaniards
're-affirm' to 'reaffirm,' Chapter IV, § 34
'Ship-building' to 'Shipbuilding,' Chapter VII, § 77; index, Massachusetts; and index, Shipbuilding
'vice-regal' to 'viceregal,' Chapter XIV, § 120

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CHAPTER I.
THE LAND AND THE NATIVE RACES.	PAGES
1. References, p. 1.—2. Physical characteristics of North America, p. 2.—3. The native races, p. 7.—4. Characteristics of the Indian, p. 13.—5. Relations of the Indians and colonists, p. 17	1‑19
CHAPTER II.
DISCOVERIES AND EARLY SETTLEMENTS (1492-1606).
6. References, p. 20.—7. Pre-Columbian discoveries, p. 21.—8. Early European discoveries (1492-1512), p. 23.—9. Spanish exploration of the interior (1513-1542), p. 27.—10. Spanish colonies (1492-1687), p. 31.—11. The French in North America (1524-1550), p. 32.—12. French attempts to colonize Florida (1562-1568), p. 33.—13. The French in Canada (1589-1608), p. 35.—14. English exploration (1498-1584), p. 36.—15. English attempts to colonize (1584-1606), p. 38.—16. The experience of the sixteenth century (1492-1606), p. 42	20‑44
CHAPTER III.
COLONIZATION AND THE COLONISTS.
17. References, p. 45.—18. Colonial policy of European states, p. 45.—19. Spanish and Portuguese policy, p. 47.—20. French policy, p. 48.—21. Dutch and Swedish policy, p. 50.—22. English policy, p. 51.—23. Character of English emigrants, p. 53.—24. Local government in the colonies, p. 55.—25. Colonial governments, p. 58.—26. Privileges of the colonists, p. 61	45‑63
CHAPTER IV.
THE COLONIZATION OF THE SOUTH (1606-1700).
27. References, p. 64.—28. Reasons for final English colonization, p. 65.—29. The charter of 1606, p. 66.—30. The settlement of Virginia (1607-1624), p. 69.—31. Virginia during the English revolution (1624-1660), p. 75.—32. Development of Virginia (1660-1700), p. 78.—33. Settlement of Maryland (1632-1635), p. 81.—34. Maryland during the English revolution (1642-1660), p. 84.—35. Development of Maryland (1660-1715), p. 86.—36. Early settlers in the Carolinas (1542-1665), p. 87.—37. Proprietorship of the Carolinas (1663-1671), p. 89.—38. The two settlements of Carolina (1671-1700), p. 92	64‑95
CHAPTER V.
SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS IN THE SOUTH IN 1700.
39. References, p. 96.—40. Land and People in the South, p. 96.—41. Slavery and servants, p. 98.—42. Middle and upper classes, p. 100.—43. Occupations, p. 102.—44. Navigation Acts, p. 104.—45. Social life, p. 106.—46. Political life, and conclusions, p. 109	96‑111
CHAPTER VI.
THE COLONIZATION OF NEW ENGLAND (1620-1643).
47. References, p. 112.—48. The New England colonists, p. 113.—49. Plymouth colonized (1620-1621), p. 116. —50. Development of Plymouth (1621-1691), p. 120.—51. Massachusetts founded (1630), p. 124.—52. Government of Massachusetts (1630-1634), p. 127.—53. Internal dissensions in Massachusetts (1634-1637), p. 129.—54. Religious troubles in Massachusetts (1636-1638), p. 132.—55. Indian wars (1635-1637), p. 136.—56. Laws and characteristics of Massachusetts (1637-1643), p. 137.—57. Connecticut founded (1633-1639), p. 140.—58. The Connecticut government (1639-1643), p. 142.—59. New Haven founded (1637-1644), p. 144.—60. Rhode Island founded (1636-1654), p. 146.—61. Maine founded (1622-1658), p. 150.—62. New Hampshire founded (1620-1685), p. 152	112‑153
CHAPTER VII.
NEW ENGLAND FROM 1643 TO 1700.
63. References, p. 154.—64. New England confederation formed (1637-1643), p. 154.—65. Workings of the confederation (1643-1660), p. 157.—66. Disturbances in Rhode Island (1641-1647), p. 159.—67. Policy of the confederation (1646-1660), p. 161.—68. Repression of the Quakers (1656-1660), p. 165.—69. Royal commission (1660-1664), p. 166.—70. Indian wars (1660-1678), p. 170.—71. Territorial disputes (1649-1685), p. 173.—72. Revocation of the charters (1679-1687), p. 174.—73. Restoration of the charters (1689-1692), p. 176	154‑177
CHAPTER VIII.
SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS IN NEW ENGLAND IN 1700.
74. References, p. 178.—75. Land and people, p. 179.—76. Social classes and professions, p. 181.—77. Occupations, p. 184.—78. Social conditions, p. 186.—79. Moral and religious conditions, p. 188.—80. The witchcraft delusion, p. 190.—81. Political conditions, p. 192	178‑194
CHAPTER IX.
THE COLONIZATION OF THE MIDDLE COLONIES (1609-1700).
82. References, p. 195.—83. Dutch settlement (1609-1625), p. 196.—84. Progress of New Netherland (1626-1664), p. 198.—85. Conquest of New Netherland (1664), p. 202.—86. Development of New York (1664-1700), p. 203.—87. Delaware (1623-1700), p. 207.—88. New Jersey (1664-1738), p. 210.—89. Pennsylvania (1681-1718), p. 215	195‑217
CHAPTER X.
SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS IN THE MIDDLE COLONIES IN 1700.
90. References, p. 218.—91. Geographical conditions in the middle colonies, p. 218.—92. People of the middle colonies, p. 220.—93. Social classes, p. 222.—94. Occupations, p. 224.—95. Social life, p. 226.—96. Intellectual and moral conditions, p. 229.—97. Political conditions, and conclusion, p. 231	218‑232
CHAPTER XI.
OTHER ENGLISH NORTH AMERICAN COLONIES (1605-1750).
98. References, p. 233.—99. Outlying English colonies, p. 234.—100. Windward and Leeward Islands (1605-1814), p. 236.—101. Bermudas (1609-1750) and Bahamas (1522-1783), p. 238.—102. Jamaica (1655-1750), p. 240.—103. British Honduras (1600-1798), p. 241.—104. Newfoundland (1497-1783), p. 241.—105. Nova Scotia, Acadia (1497-1755), p. 242.—106. Hudson's Bay Company, p. 243	233‑244
CHAPTER XII.
THE COLONIZATION OF NEW FRANCE (1608-1750).
107. References, p. 245.—108. Settlement of Canada (1608-1629), p. 246.—109. Exploration of the Northwest (1629-1699), p. 247.—110. Social and political conditions, p. 249.—111. Intercolonial wars (1628-1697), p. 252.—112. Frontier wars (1702-1748), p. 254.—113. Territorial claims, p. 255.—114. Effect of French colonization, p. 257	245‑257
CHAPTER XIII.
THE COLONIZATION OF GEORGIA (1732-1755).
115. References, p. 258.—116. Settlement of Georgia (1732-1735), p. 258.—117. Slow development of Georgia (1735-1755), p. 261	258‑263
CHAPTER XIV.
THE CONTINENTAL COLONIES FROM 1700 TO 1750.
118. References, p. 264.—119. Population (1700-1750), p 265.—120. Attacks on the charters (1701-1749), p. 266.—121. Settlement and boundaries (1700-1750), p. 267.—122. Schemes of colonial union (1690-1754), p. 269.—123. Quarrels with royal governors (1700-1750), p. 271.—124. Governors of southern colonies, p. 272.—125. Governors of middle colonies, p. 273.—126. Governors of New England colonies, p. 275.—127. Effect of the French wars (1700-1750), p. 277.—128. Economic conditions, p. 278.—129. Political and social conditions (1700-1750), p. 280.—130. Results of the half-century (1700-1750), p. 282	264‑284

Index	285

LIST OF MAPS.
1. Physical Features of the United States	Frontispiece.
2. North America, 1650	End of volume.
3. English Colonies in North America, 1700	End of volume.
4. North America, 1750	End of volume.