for the present,' though, under a change of circumstances, it was revised at a later time.2 1664. Conveyance of the patent of Plymouth The patent from the Council for New England, under which the lands continued to be held, was a grant to "William Bradford, his heirs, associates, and assigns. The freemen, being now dispersed through seven3 towns in addition to Plymouth, desired legal possession of the common property; and Bradford executed an instrument, by which, after certain reservations for the "Purchasers or Old Comers," he surren- to dered "into the hands of the whole Court, con- 1641. sisting of the freemen of the corporation of New March 2. Plymouth, all that other right and title, power, authority, privileges, immunities, and freedoms, granted in the said letters patents by the said Right Honorable Council for New England." 5 the free men. London The vexatious business with the English partners was brought to a partial settlement by their consent to give a full discharge on the receipt of twelve hundred Settlement pounds. One of them, Andrews, "a haberdasher with the in London, a godly man," presented five hundred partners. pounds, his share of the proceeds, to the Massachusetts Colony, "to be laid out in cattle, and other course of trade for the poor." The eight men of Plymouth," having made a scrupulously low valuation, on oath, of the effects in their hands, had not only been 1 Bradford, 367-372.-The comThe commission of Plymouth to Winslow and Bradford is in the Massachusetts Archives for the year 1641. The plan of Woodward and Saffery, surveyors, is in the Archives for 1642 (June 4). 2 See Mass. Col. Rec., IV. Part II. 114-116. 3 See above, p. 547. 4 They were fifty-eight in number. (Hazard, I. 466.) Mr. Deane (Bradford, 372) gives good reasons for understanding "Old Comers" to denote the persons Oct. 15. who had purchased from the original Adventurers at the end of the seven years' partnership. (See above, p. 228.) In this he differs from Baylies (Hist. of Plym. Col., 308) and from Judge Davis (Morton's Memorial, 403). 5 Bradford, 379-382; comp. 323, 327, 331, 343, 348, 361, 365, 374. 6 Winthrop, II. 75. Beauchamp, however, continued to make difficulties, and his claim was not set at rest till ten years later. 7 See above, p. 230. great losers, but considered themselves to have been very hardly treated.1 And the case turned out still worse than their fears, when, in consequence of the arrest of emigration occasioned by the altered state of affairs in the parent country, the value of their salable property was excessively depressed. The price of a cow fell in a month from twenty pounds to five, and of a goat from three pounds to ten shillings; and the prospect was so dark, that thoughts of removal were again entertained,3 which probably nothing short of a local attachment matured under the severest experiences could have overcome. Brewster. 1643. 2 And the strength of this sentiment was tried at the critical moment by an event, which, if suited to weaken Death of it in one class of minds, would be likely to give it double force in another. "Their reverend April 18. elder," writes Bradford, "and my dear and loving friend, Mr. William Brewster," died; "a man that had done and suffered much for the Lord Jesus and the Gospel's sake, and had borne his part in weal and woe with this poor persecuted church above thirty-six years, in England, Holland, and in this wilderness, and done the Lord and them faithful service in his place and calling. And, notwithstanding the many troubles he passed through, the Lord upheld him to a great age. He was near fourscore years of age, if not all out, when he died. He had this blessing added by the Lord to all the rest, to die in his bed in peace, amongst the midst of his friends, who mourned and wept over him, and ministered what help and comfort they could unto him, and he again recomforted them whilst he could. His sickness was not long, and till the last day thereof he did not wholly keep his bed. His speech continued till somewhat more than 1 "That which made them so desirous to bring things to an end, was partly to stop the clamors and aspersions raised and cast upon them hereabout, though they conceived them selves to sustain the greatest wrong, half a day, and then failed him; and about nine or ten o'clock that evening he died without any pangs at all. A few hours before, he drew his breath short, and some few minutes before his last he drew his breath long, as a man fallen into a sound sleep, without any pangs or gaspings; and so sweetly departed this life unto a better." "I should say something of his life," the bereft friend continues, “if to say a little were not worse than to be silent." But he cannot dismiss the theme, His characand pauses with a fond detail, too earnest to ter. admit a word of ambitious eulogy, on the series of distant and long past scenes through which the writer and the departed had walked hand in hand. Then the record passes off into what is not so much a delineation of his character, as a thanksgiving to God, who, for the joy of all who knew him, and the good of all whom he could serve, made him so brave and gentle, so faithful and generous, so frank and sympathizing, so "peaceable, sociable, and pleasant," so wise, modest, devout, and useful; and it comes to a fit close with discourse on the high tendencies by which strength is unfolded from infirmity, and trouble blossoms into joy. Through the sorrows and struggles of these upright men, “it was God's visitation that preserved their spirits."1 Brewster had retired from courts before he became known to the associate of his later eventful years. When Brewster died, Bradford was fifty-three years old. The. boy, walking on Sundays along an English hedge-row path to seek unlicensed edification at the lips of Robinson and Clifton, had first looked on Brewster with the veneration which a neophyte feels for the veteran who may soon be a martyr. Then, in a company of men and women devoted like themselves, they had passed 1 Bradford, 408-415. Brewster's library was the principal part of the estate which he left. It consisted of two hundred and seventy-five volumes, sixty-four of them being in the learned languages. over the sea, through and towards many sufferings, and for ten years had earned a hard livelihood by unaccustomed labor. Next, coming to this "outside of the world," they had survived cold, famine, and a pestilence which through three months had employed them in nursing and burying as many of their associates as it left alive. With others worthy of confidence and esteem, they had given their harmonious direction to the common counsels, themselves the most trusted and revered of all, and had lived to see the issue of their generous cares in the establishment of an humble but prosperous commonwealth. All that had happened between the first meeting at Scrooby Manor and the present hour rose to the mind of the writer, who, from laying in the earth the form longer familiar to his eyes than any they could ever look upon again, turned back to duties thenceforward to be fulfilled with less experienced companionship. All this time New Haven and Connecticut lay secure from England behind the shield of Massachusetts. What relations they in their obscurity and remoteness sustained to the parent country were subject to the influences of a transmission through the older colony. Extension dation of colony. The settlers at New Haven had intended to employ themselves in the commercial industry to which and consoli- they had been used, and had chosen their site New Haven with reference to its convenience for this pur suit. With the same view, they also purchased lands and established a plantation on Delaware Bay,1 near to a fort which had been erected by some Swedes. But their commercial undertakings did not prosper; and as, one after another, agricultural communities grew up around them, their employments came to assimilate themselves to those of the rest of 1641. Aug. 30. 1 N. H. Col. Rec., 57, 106. 1638. Dec. 11. 1640. 1641. the country. They had obtained their lands of the natives by a payment of clothes, tools, and utensils, added to a promise of protection from hostile Nov. 24. tribes; a process which was repeated from time to time, in successive extensions to the immediate neighborhood, and in detached settlements. Thus, under the auspices of the government at New Haven, South-Southhold. hold was established near the eastern end of Long October. Island, by a company from Norfolk in England; Stamford. Stamford was founded, fifteen miles west of the Connecticut town of Fairfield, chiefly by a party who had taken offence at Wethersfield; and an attempt Greenwich. was made at Greenwich, still nearer to the NewNetherland border. This frontier town was, however, for some time in revolt. Captain Patrick, from Watertown,2 the principal person among its settlers, took advantage of an alarm which prevailed of a rising of the Indians, to induce his neighbors to submit themselves to the Dutch; and, going to Fort Amsterdam, he, for himself and them, took an oath of allegiance to the States-General.3 1640. April 9. 1642. It was ordered that semiannual General Courts in April and in October should be "held at New Haven for the plantations in combination with April 6. this town," which as yet (if indeed Greenwich is to be 1 "They laid out too much of their stocks and estates in building of fair and stately houses, wherein they, at the first, outdid the rest of the country." (Hubbard, 334.) 2 See above, pp. 319, 464. 3 Brodhead, History of New York, 330.- Patrick had lived in the Netherlands, where he married a Dutch wife. Winthrop says (II. 151): "This captain was entertained by us out of Holland (where he was a mon soldier of the Prince's guard) to exercise our men. We made him a captain and maintained him. After, com he was admitted a member of the church of Watertown and a freeman. But he grew very proud and vicious. And, perceiving that he was discovered, and that such evil courses would not be endured here, and being withal of a vain and unsettled disposition, he went from us, and sat down within twenty miles of the Dutch, and put himself under their protection." He did not live there long. In 1643, a Dutchman shot him dead, in a quarrel, in Underhill's house at Stamford. (Ibid.) 4 N. H. Col. Rec., 70. |
