1640. Aug. 27. main object of the institution.1 Its beginning was not auspicious. Nathaniel Eaton, the person first placed at its head, was soon deposed, having been convicted of illtreating the students, by giving them twenty or thirty stripes at a time and keeping them on scanty and unwholesome food; of beating his subordinate, Nathaniel Briscoe, in an inhuman manner; and of other misdemeanors. His successor was the learned and excellent Henry Dunster, who, when he accepted this great trust, had just arrived from England, having been there a non-conformist minister, after receiving an education at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. Under Dunster's administration a new era was inaugurated. The College soon acquired so high a reputation, that in several instances youth of opulent families in the parent country were sent over to receive their education in New England.2 Such were some of the institutions and arrangements by which the governments of the New-England Colonies aimed to build up a virtuous, intelligent, and prosperous society. To carry on their functions, safe from enemies without and from disturbers within, governments require an organized physical force. In New England this consisted of a militia, which, in the early period, was composed of infantry alone. All males of the age for military service were required to be provided with arms and a certain quantity of ammunition; those who were Military able, at their own expense, others at the expense system. of the towns. The arms of private soldiers were pikes, muskets, and swords. The muskets had matchlocks or 3 1 The list of Latin theses discussed by the first graduating class is preserved in "New England's First Fruits" (12), and is copied into Hutchinson's History (I. 444). 2 Wonder-Working Providence, 166. The military age was defined in VOL. II. 5 Massachusetts to be from sixteen to sixty by the law of May 27, 1652. (Mass. Rec., III. 268.) This was probably the law or usage in the earlier times, but I have not observed any record to that effect. * Mass. Rec., I. 84. firelocks, and to each one there was "a pair of bandoleers, or pouches for powder and bullets," and a stick, called a rest, for use in taking aim. The pikes were ten feet in length, besides the spear at the end. For defensive armor corselets were worn, and coats quilted with cotton. It does not appear that any uniform dress was attempted. The unit of the organization was a train-band, of not fewer than sixty-four men, and not more than two hundred. It was constituted of twice as many musketeers as pikemen; the latter being selected for their superior stature. The officers of a band were a Captain, a Lieutenant, an Ensign, and four Sergeants. The commissioned officers carried swords; partisans, otherwise called leading-staves; and (if they saw fit) pistols. and (if they saw fit) pistols. The sergeants 1631. 1637. Nov. 29. bore halberds. Company "trainings" were orApril 12. dered to take place, at first, every Saturday ;* 1632. Nov. 7. then, every month; then, eight times a year. At Plymouth, by law, trainings were "always begun and ended with prayer;" and it is probable that the practice was the same in the other Colonies. Military movements were enlivened by no other music than that of the drum. In the year after the confederation, Massachusetts had twenty-six train-bands, and there had been "of late a very gallant horse-troop listed." The bands were dis 1 Plym. Rec., II. 65. "Ten foot in length, at least, in What Germany, Italy, Netherlands, or Spain and the book may be safely taken as a 8 tributed into regiments; a Lieutenant, and under him a Sergeant-Major, commanded the militia of each county; and over the whole force of the Colony was a SergeantMajor-General, subordinate only to the Governor, who was Commander-in-Chief. For the present there was no appearance that field-artillery would be of service, and none was provided, except for the practice of the incorporated Artillery Company. Some heavy ordnance had been mounted at the entrance of the ports. The work on Castle Island, in Boston harbor, which had fallen into decay, had been rebuilt at an expense of four thousand pounds, and regularly garrisoned.5 It has been seen that the colonists were at first hardly tasked to procure the mere means of subsistence. But anxieties of this kind had long ago passed away, when the confederation was made. They had "builded and planted officers in Massachusetts in 1644, with eulogies of their several qualifications. The honor of an office in the militia was much esteemed. John Hull, a thriving Boston merchant, chosen a corporal in 1648, praises God for giving him "acceptance and favor in the eyes of His people, and, as a fruit thereof, advancement above his deserts." (Diary, in Archæolog. Amer., III. 145.) When, six years later, he was promoted to be an ensign, he recorded his prayer, "beseeching that the good Lord, who only can, would please to make me able and fit for, and faithful in, the place I am called unto, that I may, with a spirit of wisdom and humility, love and faithfulness, obey my superiors, so also be exemplary and faithful to my inferiors." (Ibid., 147.) 1 See Vol. I. 443, 617. Sept. 15, 1641, there was "a great training at Boston two days. About twelve hundred men were exercised in most sorts of land service. Yet it was observed that there was no man drunk, though there was plenty of wine and 5 Hubbard (Chap. XLV.) says that the Colonists were then thinking of the Dutch, and of their exposure "to the invasion of a mean and contemptible enemy." But the reader of the present day does not forget that when Boston harbor was fortified, and intrusted "to Captain Davenport, a man approved for his faithfulness, courage, and skill" (Wonder-Working Providence, 194; comp. Mass. Rec., II. 63), — and when the militia of Massachusetts were placed under the single command of a veteran of the Continental wars (Ibid.,66),—the strife had just become hot between the King and the Parliament of England. Industry. of the soil. to admiration for the time." Industry had taken the forms which are common in a settled social state; and energy, capacity, and frugality had begun to bestow their liberal recompenses. Agriculture, though never a lucrative employment in the greater part of New England, obtained better returns, on the whole, when the country presented tracts of unbroken mould, the rich accumulation of ages, than it has done since cultivation has exhausted the superficial fertility; though the contrary is true wherever proximity to great markets has offered a compensation for the expense of elaborate tillage. To the invaluable maize, or Indian corn,- nutritious, hardy, and of a bountiful increase, the planters soon reconciled themselves as a substitute for wheat, to which the soil and temperature were less propitious.2 From the natives they adopted the use of fish for manure, a practice of the continuance of which at the present day a traveller in the "Old Colony" is advertised through two senses. The native grasses were found insufficient for the sustenance of cattle. Strangely enough, the best hay is said to have been obtained from the salt marshes; but it took only a few seasons to cover the mowing lands with a rich growth of the herbage of England. Barley, rye, oats, and pease were successfully cultivated, and most of the garden fruits and vegetables common in the mother country. The squash, the pumpkin, and the sceva-bean were indigenous to the soil. The pear, the cherry, the plum, and the quince were found to take kindly to their new home. The apple-tree, set out in extensive orchards, soon produced a fruit far superior in size and flavor to what it had borne on English 1 Lechford, 47. * Indian corn is at present the great agricultural product of the United States, exceeding in value the aggregate value of the three products of next importance. In 1850, the crop of Indian corn was estimated in the decennial census at $ 296,035,552; that of wheat at $100,485,944; of cotton at $98,608,720; of hay at $ 96,870,494. (De Bow, Statistical View, &c., 176.) Hutch. Hist., I. 424. ground.1 Poultry and swine, both of which repaid so bountifully their cheap supplies of food, multiplied in great abundance; and, as pasture land was extended and improved, goats in the first place, and then sheep,2 horses, and neat cattle, became numerous. 66 Manufac 1638. It was to be expected that the manufacturing interest would be of slower growth. Thread and yarn were spun and knit by the women at their tures. homes. Twenty families, who came from Yorkshire and began the settlement of the little town of Rowley, introduced the weaving of woollen and cotton fabrics. They were the first people that set upon making of cloth in the Western world, for which end they built a fulling-mill and caused their little ones to be very diligent in spinning cotton, many of them having been clothiers in England." After a little time, "the manufacture of linen, woollen, and cotton cloth" in Massachusetts became so remunerative, that several acts of the General Court designed to stimulate it were repealed. A stock company was chartered for the smelting of iron, with a monopoly for twenty-one years; but the en- 1644. terprise was premature, and for the time proved March 7. abortive. A manufacture of salt was favored by the simplicity of the process and the constant necessity for 1 I recollect no mention of peaches in the early times. But Danforth raised apricots in 1646. (Winthrop, II. 332, note.) 2 Johnson, in the description of the industry and prosperity of Massachusetts ("Wonder-Working Providence," Book II. Chap. XXI.), has been supposed to be speaking of the year 1642, the Election of which year he mentions a little before. But I am persuaded that by "this day" he means the time when he was writing, not long before the year 1652, to which time his 1641. June 2. |