It was here, or at a spot further east, on the Paucatuck River, where Winthrop undertook a settlement at a little later time, that Williams had wisely desired to find a Governor for Rhode Island, "in case of any possible stretching the bounds" of that Colony so far.2 Legal admin Connecticut. 1646. April 9. Till now, the "rules of righteousness," as the minds of the rulers conceived them, mainly constituted the laws that were in force in Connecticut. The desirableness of a written code' had not been over- istration in looked; and Ludlow, a person eminently competent for the business, had by the Court been "desired to take some pains in drawing forth a body of laws for the government of this Commonwealth." But it was a work of time; and Ludlow, in his frontier home, had many other engagements. The records of the Colony, for the period under our notice, relate, in great part, to a judicial administration conducted upon general principles of equity. Of course it lacked uniformity, and different degrees of punishment were meted out to the same offence. But what was wanting in strictness of legal provision was more or less compensated by minute acquaintance with the circumstances of each case as it arose; and substantial justice was done. Of rules made 4 The name 1 Letters of Williams, in Mass. Hist. chase from the Indians before the [PeColl., XXIX. 279, 282. quot] wars (Records, &c., in Hazard, II. 93); but the Commissioners from Connecticut objected, and the claim was not pressed. Nyanticott designated more or less of the country between the rivers Pequot and Connecticut, including the present town of Lyme. 2 "Some were bold to use your name, and generally applauded and earnestly desired, in case of any possible stretching our bounds to you, or your drawing near to us, though but to Paucatuck." (Ibid., 286.) At Paucatuck (Stonington) it seems Winthrop had an outpost as early as March of the preceding year. "Sir, I am exceeding glad of your beginnings at Paucatuck." (Ibid., 283.) At the special meeting of the Commissioners in July, 1647, he had desired their ratification of a claim which he made "to a great quantity of land at Nyanticott by pur 3 Conn. Rec., I. 138; comp. 154. * In a case of defamation, after the offenders had been fined, an order was passed for "a writing to be prepared and openly read in the several towns for the clearing" of the injured person, and another for his special protection against a repetition of the wrong. from time to time to determine the duty of the citizen on some passing occasion, the force soon expired, either by express provision, or by the nature of the obligation imposed. Alarms from the Indians, and altercations with the Dutch, shared, in the business of the Courts, with deliberations about the disposition of lands, the control of houses of public entertainment, the supervision of weights and measures, the purchase and distribution of arms, the regulation of ferries, the registration of births and marriages, the branding of swine and cattle, the laying out of highways, the fixing of prices, the administration of estates, the maintenance of ministers, contributions for the College, and a great variety of matters incident to the internal order and daily comfort of a forming community. Administra The records of New-Haven Colony, for a period of nine years beginning with the first year of the Confederacy, are lost.2 The records of the town, which were made out in great detail, indicate a course tion in New of public administration of the same general Haven. tenor as that in Connecticut; for the condition of the two Colonies, and their occasions of legislation and of judicial procedure, were essentially alike. Something in the nature of a code, though elementary and imperfect, was produced, when the town governFeb. 24. ment of New Haven ordered a collection to be made of such orders, of earlier date, as were of a permanent nature; and there is some reason to believe, that, three or four years later, a digest was made by the colonial authority. Always wisely thoughtful for the rising 1645. 4 (Ibid., 97, 98.) "Baggett Egleston, for bequeathing his wife to a young man, was fined twenty shillings." (Ibid., 127.) Cooper, for his misdemeanor in inveigling the affections of Mr. Lee his maid, without her master's consent," was sentenced "to pay Mr. Lee twenty shillings, and twenty shillings' fine to the country." (Ibid., 142.) 1 Ibid., 105. Plymouth adopted the same useful system, and improved upon it by requiring also a registration of burials. (Plym. Rec., II. 96.) 2 The chasm is between April 3, 1644, and May 25, 1653. (N. H. Rec., I. iv.) 3 N. H. Rec., I. 191 – 219. generation, the town of New Haven, in the ninth year from its foundation, directed the reservation of a lot of land "commodious for a College, which they desired might be set up so soon as their ability should reach thereunto." But more than fifty years passed before that wish could be fulfilled. 1 The two western Colonies had been associated "in sending to procure a patent from the Parlia- 1644. ment."2 Before it could have been known that Nov. 11. the joint movement was frustrated by the disaster to Lamberton's ship, in which Mr. Gregson, charged with the application, had sailed for England, Connecticut renewed her endeavors for the much-desired object in another form. The Governor, the Deputy-Governor, Mr. Fenwick, and two other Magistrates, were ap- 1645. pointed by the General Court to "agitate the May 18. business;" and Mr. Fenwick was desired, "if his occa sions would permit, to go for England to endeavor the enlargement of the patent." But as to a patent, no one of the three unchartered Colonies of the Confederacy had any success with the Parliament. Town and Plymouth. At the end of its first twenty-five years, the importance of the town of Plymouth in relation to the rest of the Colony of that name had been much Colony of diminished. "Many having left the place, by reason of the straitness and barrenness of the same, and their finding of better accommodations elsewhere, more suitable to their ends and minds, and sundry others still tillery company was raised in 1644, and was, from time to time, encouraged by some honorable distinctions. (Ibid., 141, 156 159, 187, 203, 204.) 1 N. H. Rec., I. 376.-"Mr. Pearce," be cultivated and extended. An arof New Haven, seems to have a claim to be commemorated as an amateur teacher. He "desired the plantation to take notice that, if any would send their children to him, he would instruct them in writing or arithmetic." (Ibid., 156.) Nor did military science fail to 2 Ibid., 211; comp. 149. 3 See Mather, Magnalia, Book I. Chap. VI.; Winthrop, II. 266, 328. * Conn. Rec., I. 126, 128. 1644. 1651. upon every occasion desiring their dismissions, the church began seriously to think whether it were not better jointly to remove to some other place, than to be thus weakened, and as it were insensibly dissolved.1 Many meetings and much consultation was held hereabout;" the result of which was, that "the greater part consented to a removal," and several families established themselves at Nauset, which town- the ninth in the Colony-took, a few years later, the name of Eastham.2 “And thus was this poor church left, like an ancient mother, grown old, and forsaken of her children, though not in their affections, yet in regard of their bodily presence and personal helpfulness; her ancient members being most of them worn away by death, and these of later time being like children translated into other families, and she like a widow left only to trust in God. Thus she that had made many rich became herself poor." But if the town had suffered a decline, and the church was dispersed, the Colony, in the measure of its scanty means, was prosperous and efficient. No member of the Confederacy was more prompt in its offerings to the common welfare. At the time of the muster for the invasion of the Narragansett country, the troops of Standish's command "were at Seekonk, the place of their rendezvous, eight or ten days before the rest were ready." Plymouth was near Cape Cod, and Stamford was near Hudson's River; but no sooner was it heard at Plymouth that "injurious practices, to the murdering of some of the English," had been committed by the natives at Stamford, than forty men, with Standish at their head, were provided for a three months' campaign against the Mohawks, and received orders to be in instant readiness to march.5 4 CHAPTER VI. AN animated dispute grew up between the three smaller Colonies on the one side, and Massachusetts on the other, occasioned by a law which had been made by Connecticut in order to fulfil her contract with George Fenwick for the purchase of the fort at Saybrook.1 The reader will remember that the all-important measure of confederation had been delayed by "divers differences" between Massachusetts and the company which first emigrated from her territory to the west.2 One of these related to Pynchon's settlement at Springfield, where the Connecticut people "went on to exercise their authority," while Massachusetts claimed the place as within her chartered limits. Among other arrangements 2 See Vol. I. 626, note 2. Since the publication of my first volume, a paper of prime importance in respect to the making of the confederation has been printed in the first volume of the Collections of the Connecticut Historical Society, by Mr. J. Hammond Trumbull, from the original, disinterred by him from the chaos of the Archives of Massachusetts. It is the answer which, in the autumn of 1638, Hooker made to Winthrop's letter mentioned in my note above referred to. 1 See Vol. I. 605; comp. Conn. Rec., themselves into a war with the heathen I. 266-272. [the Pequot war], and, had we [Massachusetts] not rescued them, they had been utterly undone;" that in Massachusetts, and in England by her friends, emigrants had been dissuaded from going to Connecticut; and that the natives had been taught to hold the planters along the river in inferior respect. He disapproves the treaty which, in October, 1636, Winthrop had made with Miantonomo, and denies that any obligation was imposed by it on Connecticut. And he defends the scruples which had delayed the assent of Connecticut to the Articles of Confederation, differing from his correspondent in relation even to some statements of fact. The warmth of its tone is such as forbids the reader to wonder that some time had to pass before the confederation could proceed. Hooker complains that he and his friends were represented in Massachusetts as poor rash-headed creatures, who rushed 3 Winthrop, I. 285. Comp. Mass. Rec., I. 321; Records, &c., in Hazard, II. 81, 82, 112, 119. |