above forty of the inhabitants at the same time. The like was done at Agamenticus the 22d of the same month, the place being afterward called York. In like manner in the year following, scil. 1653, commissioners were sent from the Massachusetts to take the town of Wells into their government, as was done in the places last mentioned the year before. And the like also was done at Saco, July 5th of the same year, and their submission subscribed by sixteen of their inhabitants, who were the principal if not the greatest part of their number. Those of Cape Porpoise did the like about the same time, twelve of which place submitted thereunto.

To all of these eastern plantations were granted, for their encouragement, larger privileges than to the common inhabitants of the Massachusetts, scil. all the privileges of the freemen, upon the taking the oath that belongeth thereunto; and for the clearing of the right and title of the Massachusetts to the said province, some skilful mathematicians were ordered that year to run the north line of the Massachusetts patent, according to the late interpretation of the bounds thereof; and the line was accordingly run October 13, 1653.

And some gentlemen about Pascataqua did, in the year 1669, raise a considerable contribution for the advantage of the college, by way of gratuity for the kindness they received by the patronage of the Massachusetts government, scil. 60 pounds per annum for seven years.

In the same year was liberty granted for several plantations within the limits of the Massachusetts colony, as at Northampton and Hadley, upon Connecticut river, and at a pleasant place upon Merrimack river, called Chelmsford. Liberty also was granted for a township, at an Indian plantation in the way towards Hadley, called by the inhabitants Lancaster. Several families had seated themselves there ever since the year 1647, but now by the addition of a convenient number of inhabitants they became a township.

* Probably

X

this is conv

May 3, 1654, Mr. Bellingham was by the freemen invited to accept of the governour's place, and Mr. Endicot called by them to be deputy. This year was the first It is generally believed, from contemporaneous statementy, this the body of Laws and Liberties" had been printed seven years befor but the enlarged edition of 1654 might be the only knowns one

time that the laws of the Massachusetts, for the better direction of the people, were ordered to be printed.

And at this court of election, Mr. Wheelwright, having given the court and country satisfaction as to those things were objected against him in the year 1636, was approved as a minister of the town of Hampton, where he had by permission preached some years before.

At this court likewise Mr. John Eliot, minister of Roxbury, that had heretofore by them been encouraged to go on with preaching the gospel to the Indians, obtained several parcels of land for the Indians, that gave any sincere hopes for their embracing of the christian religion, as at Hasanameset, a place up into the woods beyond Medfield and Mendon, and at Puncapoag, beyond Dorchester, as well as Natick, near Dedham, mentioned before.

At this time Mr. Henry Dunster, president of Harvard College, having entertained thoughts with himself for the resignation of his place, upon the account of some difference between him and some of the overseers, as being suspected for too much inclination to antipædobaptism, he had his liberty granted so to do, and the overseers took hold of the opportunity to invite Mr. Chauncey, of Scituate, to accept of the president's place, a man of great learning and worth, with incomparable diligence and labour in his study, which he held to the last, yet of the contrary extreme as to baptism, from his predecessor; it being his judgment not only to admit infants to baptism, but to wash or dip them all over; an opinion not tolerable at all seasons in a cold region, which made the notion less dangerous as to the spreading thereof, being altogether impracticable in so cold a country for the greatest part of the year. Thus are men apt to run into extremes with Peter, who would either not be washed at all, or else over his whole body.

In the last year of this lustre, the government of the Massachusetts returned to Mr. Endicot, who missed not thereof to the end of his life, after this year; the deputy's place in like manner remaining with Mr. Bellingham, till his turn came to be advanced to the high

est place, after the decease of the forementioned gentle.

man.

Two more plantations or townships were this year granted, the one at Shashin, upon a river falling into Merrimack, called Billerica; the other higher above Concord, called Groton.

Thus did the inhabitants of New England, that it might not be forgotten whence they had their original, imprint some remembrance of their former habitations in England upon their new dwellings in America.

CHAP. LX.

A quarrel between the inhabitants of New Haven and the Dutch at Manhatoes, the Massachusetts not willing to engage therein; from 1651 to 1656.

EVER since the uniting of the four colonies of New England, in the year 1643, they always had, as an obligation, so a christian inclination, mutually to assist and strengthen the hands each of other; yet they all this while enjoyed peace and tranquillity in a way of amicable intercourse with their neighbours on all sides. But in the year 1653, there arose an unhappy difference between the colony of New Haven and the Dutch at Manhatoes, who had intercepted the trading of the other at Delaware with the Indians. And indeed the principal part of the inhabitants of New Haven had some thoughts of removing thither, if they should meet with encouragement suitable to so great a change. But the Dutch governour, to prevent any such enterprize, took all opportunities to obstruct the proceeding therein, which occasioned much altercation amongst the commissioners of the colonies, so as they were constrained to adjourn their meetings from one place to another, before they could come to a settled conclusion; but at the last, those of New Haven were persuaded by reason and judgment, or else overruled by the vote of the rest of the commissioners, to surcease their quarrel, and rather put up a lesser injury of that nature, than engage themselves, their friends and allies in a difficult war, the issue of which they could

none of them at the present see, but might all in a little time have found to their sorrow. It was declared by the general court of the Massachusetts, while the matter was under debate, that a bare major part of the commissioners of the colonies had not power to determine the justice of offensive war, (which at this time might have been of dangerous consequence,) if it should have been granted, for then each colony might have been engaged in a mischievous war, without their knowledge or consent, if the commissioners of any three colonies determined thereof.

The truth is, those of New Haven and the Dutch were at variance continually, both under the former gov. ernour, Mr. William Kieft, (who returned homeward anno 1647,) and so continued under Mr. Stuyvesant, that succeeded in his place, maintaining jealousies each against other, sometimes (as was thought) upon groundless surmises. For in the beginning of the year 1653, a rumour was spread through the colonies that the Dutch had conspired with the Indians against the English, insomuch that April 19th that year there was an extraor dinary meeting of the commissioners called at Boston, by Mr. Bellingham, Mr. Hibbins, Mr. Nowell, and Mr. Glover, to consider of several rumours of reports gathered from the Indians and others, that the Dutch had plotted with the Indians, and stirred them up to cut off the English. Those who raised, or at least made this report, were seven Indians, taken in a canoe by Uncas his men, who were four of them Pequots, two were strangers, the seventh was said to be employed to poison Uncas, whom therefore they presently killed in a rage, for fear he should escape. It was said he was hired by Ninicraft, one of the Narraganset sachems, who was all the winter before at Manhatoes, and that spring sent home in a Dutch sloop. The commissioners sent sergeant Richard Way and sergeant John Barrell, of Boston, to Narraganset to inquire into the truth of those reports. The sachems there denied the thing, but the commissioners were so moved with the reports, that they urged the necessity of a war with the Dutch, and called

in the council of the Massachusetts, advising also with the ministers about the matter, but they all dissuaded from the war, although they found the presumptions to be very strong; and it could not be denied, that there was some such design in hand to destroy the English.

The commissioners, after a debate with them, were of different apprehensions, and could not all of them be induced to enter upon a war, remembering what Solomon saith, "with good advice make war." The ministers also consulted with, left it with them to consider how unexpedient and unsafe it would be for such a people as those of New England, to err either in point of lawfulness or expediency, or both, in a matter of this nature; and whether a people, professing to walk in the spirit of the gospel of peace, and having to do with a people pretending to the same profession, should not give the Dutch governour an opportunity to answer for himself, either by purgation, acceptance, or disacceptance of some satisfactory propositions for security as the matter shall require, by whose answer their call to war or peace might be further cleared, and the incolumity of the colonies in the mean time provided for; but April 28 following, they received letters from the Dutch governour, utterly denying the charge, and offering to send or come himself to clear the matter, though letters from others affirmed it, and that the execution of the Indians was bastened, and said to be on the election day when the towns were naked of inhabitants; hereupon they presently sent Capt. Leveret, Capt. Davis, and Mr. Newman, from New Haven, as their agents, with a letter to inquire more particularly into the business of the conspiracy charged, and to require satisfaction for some former injuries. They carried also copies of letters from Capt. Underhill, with the original of nine sagamores' confessions, with their names, declaring the plot. They were ordered also to desire the Dutch governour and his council that they might meet at Stamford, if they chose that, rather than at Manhatoes. Capt. Leveret and Capt. Davis returned to Boston May 21 after, and declared what propositions they made, and what answers they received for clearing