formed, both by the said Weston and others, that sundry honorable lords and worthy gentlemen had obtained a large Patent from the King for the more northerly part of America, distinct from the Virginia Patent, and wholly excluded from their government, and to be called by another name, viz. NEW ENGLAND. Unto which Mr. Weston and the chiefest of them began to incline, thinking it was best for them to go thither; as for other reasons, so chiefly for the hope of present profit, to be made by fishing on that coast. But in all business the active part is most difficult, especially where there are many agents that may be concerned. So was it found in them, for some of them who should have gone in England, fell off, and would not go; other merchants and friends that proffered to adventure their money, withdrew, and pretended many excuses; some disliking they went not to Guiana; others would do nothing unless they went to Virginia; and many, who were most relied on, refused to adventure if they went thither. In the midst of these difficulties, they of Leyden were driven to great straits; but at the length, the generality was swayed to the better opinion. Howbeit, the Patent for the northern part of the country not being fully settled at that time, they resolved to adventure with that Patent they had, intending for some place more southward than that they fell upon in their voyage, at Cape Cod, as may appear afterwards. The Conditions, on which those of Leyden engaged with the merchants, the adventurers, were hard enough at the first for the poor people, that were to adventure their persons as well as their estates. Yet were their agents forced to change one or two of them, to satisfy the merchants, who were not willing to be concerned with them; although the altering them without their knowledge or consent was very distasteful to them, and became the occasion of some contention amongst them afterwards. They are these that follow.

1. The adventurers and planters do agree, that every person that goeth, being sixteen years old and upward, be rated at ten pounds, and that ten pounds be accounted a single share.

2. That he that goeth in person, and furnisheth himself out with ten pounds, either in money or other pro

visions, be accounted as having twenty pounds in stock, and in the division shall receive a double share.

3. The persons transported and the adventurers shall continue their joint stock and partnership the space of seven years, except some unexpected impediments do cause the whole Company to agree otherwise; during which time all profits and benefits that are gotten by trade, traffic, trucking,' working, fishing, or any other means, of any other person or persons, [shall] remain still in the common stock until the division.

4. That at their coming there they shall choose out such a number of fit persons as may furnish their ships and boats for fishing upon the sea; employing the rest in their several faculties upon the land, as building houses, tilling and planting the ground, and making such commodities as shall be most useful for the Colony.

5. That at the end of the seven years, the capital and profits, viz., the houses, lands, goods, and chattels, be equally divided amongst the adventurers. If any debt or detriment concerning this adventure 2

6. Whosoever cometh to the Colony hereafter, or putteth any thing into the stock, shall at the end of the seven years be allowed proportionally to the time of his so doing.

7. He that shall carry his wife, or children, or servants, shall be allowed for every person, now aged sixteen years and upward, a single share in the division; or if he provide them necessaries, a double share; or if they be between ten years old and sixteen, then two of them to be reckoned for a person, both in transportation and division.

8. That such children that now go and are under [the] age of ten years, have no other share in the division than fifty acres of unmanured land.

9. That such persons as die before the seven years be expired, their executors to have their parts or share at the division, proportionably to the time of their life in the Colony.

10. That all such persons as are of the Colony are to have meat, drink, and apparel, and all provisions, out of the common stock and goods of the said Colony.

The difference between the conditions thus expressed

This word is trusting in the MS.; evidently a slip of the pen.-H. 2 Something appears to be wanting.-H.

and the former, before their alteration, stood in these two points; first, that the houses and lands improved, especially gardens and ||home-fields,|| should remain undivided, wholly to the planters, at the seven years' end; secondly, that the planters should have two days in the week for their own private employment, for the comfort of themselves and their families, especially such as had them to take care for. The altering of those two conditions was very afflictive to the minds of such as were concerned in the voyage; but Mr. Cushman, their principal agent, answered the complaints peremptorily, that unless they had so ordered the conditions, the whole design would have fallen to the ground; and necessity, they said, having no law, they were constrained to be silent. The poor planters met with much difficulty, both before and after the expiring of the seven years, and found much trouble in making up accounts with the adventurers about the division; at which time, though those that adventured their money were no great gainers, yet those that adventured their lives in carrying on the business of the Plantation were by much the greatest sufferers, as may easily be gathered in what follows, next to be related; for all things being now prepared, they improved their utmost endeavors to be ready to enter upon their voyage at the time agreed upon. That a Patent, as is aforesaid, was obtained, is published in print, and affirmed by such as yet survive of the first planters; but where it is, or how it came to be lost, is not known to any that belong to the said Colony. Nor is the place with the bounds particularly specified: concerning which they were notably overreached by some of their neighbors amongst the Dutch, who, understanding their design for the southern parts about Hudson's river, where some of that nation had a design to plant for themselves, secretly contracted with Jones, the master of the bigger ship employed for their transportation, who thereupon bent his course on purpose more northward, and so fell amongst the shoals of Cape Cod, to the hazard both of the lives and goods of himself, as well as his passengers and company-had not the Almighty, whose eyes run to and fro through the whole earth, || fields ||

by his merciful providence, prevented the danger, which by that false, underhand dealing they were exposed unto. For, meeting with sundry difficulties and obstructions, which is usual in things of that nature, it was long before they could all be removed; besides which they met with bad weather at first setting out to sea, which forced them to turn into harbors twice before they could clear the land's end, and at last were forced to dismiss one of the ships designed for the voyage, insomuch that it was the 6th of September before they last put to sea, which made it near the middle of November before they made any land; which after they had discovered, they were altogether ignorant where it was, or whether there was any commodious place near by, where to begin a plantation. But in all these changes, whatever were the malice or fraudulency of instruments, the over-ruling hand of Divine Providence was to be acknowledged that at the last found out a resting place for them, by sending the angel of his presence to go before them, and safely conduct them through so many dangers and deaths. It is also very remarkable and worthy of consideration, that if they had, according to their intention and desire, been carried to Hudson's River, the Indians in those parts were so numerous and sturdy in their disposition, and if they landed, so many ways enfeebled, that they could never have defended themselves against them; whereas, in the place where they were now landed, a convenient situation was prepared for their reception, by the removal of the former inhabitants, who were lately swept away by a strange kind of mortality, which happened the year before. After the disappearing of the blazing star in the west, in the year 1619, the observation of which, towards the west, made Mr. Briggs, that famous mathematician, conclude that some notable event was like to ensue, betokening the death of the natives in those parts, whatever were in his presage or in the ground thereof, the matter so came to pass, not one in ten of the Indians in those parts surviving, so that they were unable, though they had never so much resolved, to have made resistance. Our Savior Christ, foretelling the

For Gov. Bradford's account of the voyage, see Young's Chronicles of Plymouth, pp. 97-108.-H.

destruction of the Jews, yet out of humane or natural compassion, wished them to pray their flight might not be in the winter; yet such was the dispensation of the Almighty towards this poor despised company, that having hardly escaped the dangers of many violent and furious storms at sea, they were no sooner set on shore, but they were immediately called to encounter with hard and rough weather, in a desert and barren land, upon the very edge of winter. The sun had now by his late declination, withdrawn his delightful beams, giving them but short visits, after tedious long and cold nights, many times brought in with boisterous storms of snow or rain. The earth was also dismantled of all its comely and pleasant ornaments, observed by the first discoverers, in the summer time, by the early approach of hard and sharp frosts, presenting them with no other aspect than the ruthful and weather-beaten face of winter. The barbarians the Apostle Paul fell amongst after long storms and dangerous shipwrecks, as it is said in the Acts, shewed them no small kindness, kindling them a fire, and suffered them to gather bundles of sticks themselves for that end; whereas these barbarous savages were at the first not willing to spare them any bundle or stick, but such as were turned into arrows, and improved not to warm, but to wound their new come guests; the remembrance of which consideration remains yet in some of their minds; who, after a long passage over the vast and wide ocean, were at their first landing entertained with no other sight than that of the withered grass on the surface of the cold earth, and the grim looks of the savage enemies. Surely such passengers or pilgrims, had need of some other more inward support and comfort the world is not acquainted with. They had need of [a] good conscience within, to administer matter for a continual feast to feed upon, that are thus bereft of all other outward supplies wherewith to sustain their hearts, Habak. iii. 17, 18. It would have tried the faith of Abraham, when sent from Ur of the Chaldees, (a region bordering upon the confines of Paradise, as some conceive,) if he had been directed to the Arabian wilderness, and not into the land flowing with