CHAPTER V
THE SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND
The Northern or Plymouth Branch of the Virginia Company, which had been chartered by James I in 1606, did, to some extent, for the north what the sister company did for the south. Sir Ferdinando Gorges was its Raleigh, and sent out a number of exploring ships, one of which made what is now reckoned the first permanent settlement in New England. Captain George Popham was in command, and in August, 1607, three months after the planting of Jamestown, built Fort Popham, or Fort St. George, at the mouth of the Kennebec. But it is not this settlement which has been celebrated in song and story. It is that made at New Plymouth in the winter of 1620 by a shipload of Separatists from the Church of England, who have come down through history as the "Pilgrim Fathers."
Driven from England by religious persecution, the Separatist congregation from the little town of Scrooby, about a hundred in number, had fled to Amsterdam, and finally, in 1609, to Leyden. But they were not in sympathy with the Dutch, and their thoughts turned to America. The Plymouth company was approached, but could not guarantee religious freedom. It gave the suppliants to understand, however, that there was little likelihood they would be interfered with, and after long debate and hesitation, they decided to take the risk.
THE WORD OF GOD TO LEYDEN CAME
[August 15 (N. S.), 1620]
The word of God to Leyden came,
Dutch town by Zuyder Zee:
Rise up, my children of no name,
My kings and priests to be.
There is an empire in the West,
Which I will soon unfold;
A thousand harvests in her breast,
Rocks ribbed with iron and gold.
Rise up, my children, time is ripe!
Old things are passed away.
Bishops and kings from earth I wipe;
Too long they've had their day.
A little ship have I prepared
To bear you o'er the seas;
And in your souls my will declared
Shall grow by slow degrees.
Beneath my throne the martyrs cry;
I hear their voice, How long?
It mingles with their praises high,
And with their victor song.
The thing they longed and waited for,
But died without the sight;
So, this shall be! I wrong abhor,
The world I'll now set right.
Leave, then, the hammer and the loom,
You've other work to do;
For Freedom's commonwealth there's room,
And you shall build it too.
I'm tired of bishops and their pride,
I'm tired of kings as well;
Henceforth I take the people's side,
And with the people dwell.
Tear off the mitre from the priest,
And from the king, his crown;
Let all my captives be released;
Lift up, whom men cast down.
Their pastors let the people choose,
And choose their rulers too;
Whom they select, I'll not refuse,
But bless the work they do.
The Pilgrims rose, at this, God's word,
And sailed the wintry seas:
With their own flesh nor blood conferred,
Nor thought of wealth or ease.
They left the towers of Leyden town,
They left the Zuyder Zee;
And where they cast their anchor down,
Rose Freedom's realm to be.
Jeremiah Eames Rankin.
A vessel of one hundred and eighty tons, named the Mayflower, was fitted out, and, on August 5 (N. S. 15), 1620, the emigrants sailed from Southampton, whither they had gone to join the ship. There were ninety persons aboard the Mayflower and thirty aboard a smaller vessel, the Speedwell. But the Speedwell proved unseaworthy, and after twice putting back for repairs, twelve of her passengers were crowded into the Mayflower, which finally, on September 6 (N. S. 16), turned her prow to the west, and began the most famous voyage in American history, after that of Columbus.
SONG OF THE PILGRIMS
[September 16 (N. S.), 1620]
The breeze has swelled the whitening sail,
The blue waves curl beneath the gale,
And, bounding with the wave and wind,
We leave Old England's shores behind—
Leave behind our native shore,
Homes, and all we loved before.
The deep may dash, the winds may blow,
The storm spread out its wings of woe,
Till sailors' eyes can see a shroud
Hung in the folds of every cloud;
Still, as long as life shall last,
From that shore we'll speed us fast.
For we would rather never be,
Than dwell where mind cannot be free,
But bows beneath a despot's rod
Even where it seeks to worship God.
Blasts of heaven, onward sweep!
Bear us o'er the troubled deep!
O see what wonders meet our eyes!
Another land, and other skies!
Columbian hills have met our view!
Adieu! Old England's shores, adieu!
Here, at length, our feet shall rest,
Hearts be free, and homes be blessed.
As long as yonder firs shall spread
Their green arms o'er the mountain's head,—
As long as yonder cliffs shall stand,
Where join the ocean and the land,—
Shall those cliffs and mountains be
Proud retreats for liberty.
Now to the King of kings we'll raise
The pæan loud of sacred praise;
More loud than sounds the swelling breeze,
More loud than speak the rolling seas!
Happier lands have met our view!
England's shores, adieu! adieu!
Thomas Cogswell Upham.
On November 19 (N. S.), nine weeks after leaving Plymouth, land was sighted, and in the evening of that day, the "band of exiles moored their bark" in Cape Cod harbor.
LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS
[November 19 (N. S.), 1620]
The breaking waves dashed high
On the stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods, against a stormy sky,
Their giant branches tossed;
And the heavy night hung dark
The hills and waters o'er,
When a band of exiles moored their bark
On the wild New England shore.
Not as the conqueror comes,
They, the true-hearted, came:
Not with the roll of the stirring drums,
And the trumpet that sings of fame;
Not as the flying come,
In silence and in fear,—
They shook the depths of the desert's gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.
Amidst the storm they sang,
And the stars heard, and the sea;
And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang
To the anthem of the free!
The ocean-eagle soared
From his nest by the white wave's foam,
And the rocking pines of the forest roared:
This was their welcome home!
There were men with hoary hair
Amidst that pilgrim band;
Why have they come to wither there,
Away from their childhood's land?
There was woman's fearless eye,
Lit by her deep love's truth;
There was manhood's brow, serenely high,
And the fiery heart of youth.
What sought they thus afar?
Bright jewels of the mine?
The wealth of seas, the spoils of war?—
They sought a faith's pure shrine!
Aye, call it holy ground,
The soil where first they trod!
They have left unstained what there they found—
Freedom to worship God!
Felicia Hemans.
Two days later, on Saturday, November 21, the Mayflower dropped her anchor in what is now the harbor of Provincetown, and a force of sixteen, "every one his Musket, Sword and Corslet, under the command of Captaine Myles Standish," went ashore to explore. The next day, being Sunday, praise service was held on board, and on the following Monday occurred the first washing-day.
THE FIRST PROCLAMATION OF MILES STANDISH
[November 23 (N. S.), 1620]
"Ho, Rose!" quoth the stout Miles Standish,
As he stood on the Mayflower's deck,
And gazed on the sandy coast-line
That loomed as a misty speck
On the edge of the distant offing,—
"See! yonder we have in view
[Bartholomew Gosnold's 'headlands.']
'Twas in sixteen hundred and two
"That the Concord of Dartmouth anchored
Just there where the beach is broad,
And the merry old captain named it
(Half swamped by the fish)—Cape Cod.
"And so as his mighty 'headlands'
Are scarcely a league away,
What say you to landing, sweetheart,
And having a washing-day?
"For did not the mighty Leader
Who guided the chosen band
Pause under the peaks of Sinai,
And issue his strict command—
"(For even the least assoilment
Of Egypt the spirit loathes)—
Or ever they entered Canaan,
The people should wash their clothes?
"The land we have left is noisome,—
And rank with the smirch of sin;
The land that we seek should find us
Clean-vestured without and within."
"Dear heart"—and the sweet Rose Standish
Looked up with a tear in her eye;
She was back in the flag-stoned kitchen
Where she watched, in the days gone by,
Her mother among her maidens
(She should watch them no more, alas!),
And saw as they stretched the linen
To bleach on the Suffolk grass.
In a moment her brow was cloudless,
As she leaned on the vessel's rail,
And thought of the sea-stained garments,
Of coif and of farthingale;
And the doublets of fine Welsh flannel,
The tuckers and homespun gowns,
And the piles of the hosen knitted
From the wool of the Devon downs.
So the matrons aboard the Mayflower
Made ready with eager hand
To drop from the deck their baskets
As soon as the prow touched land.
And there did the Pilgrim Mothers,
"On a Monday," the record says,
Ordain for their new-found England
The first of her washing-days.
And there did the Pilgrim Fathers,
With matchlock and axe well slung,
Keep guard o'er the smoking kettles
That propt on the crotches hung.
For the trail of the startled savage
Was over the marshy grass,
And the glint of his eyes kept peering
Through cedar and sassafras.
And the children were mad with pleasure
As they gathered the twigs in sheaves,
And piled on the fire the fagots,
And heaped up the autumn leaves.
"Do the thing that is next," saith the proverb,
And a nobler shall yet succeed:—
'Tis the motive exalts the action;
'Tis the doing, and not the deed;
For the earliest act of the heroes
Whose fame has a world-wide sway
Was—to fashion a crane for a kettle,
And order a washing-day!
Margaret Junkin Preston.
A shallop which the Pilgrims had brought with them in the Mayflower was put together, and in it a party explored the neighboring shores, in search of a suitable place for the settlement. They finally selected Plymouth Harbor, and on Monday, December 21 (O. S. 11), they "marched into the land and found divers corn-fields and little running brooks,—a place (as they supposed) fit for situation; at least it was the best they could find."
THE MAYFLOWER
Down in the bleak December bay
The ghostly vessel stands away;
Her spars and halyards white with ice,
Under the dark December skies.
A hundred souls, in company,
Have left the vessel pensively,—
Have reached the frosty desert there,
And touched it with the knees of prayer.
And now the day begins to dip,
The night begins to lower
Over the bay, and over the ship
Mayflower.
Neither the desert nor the sea
Imposes rites: their prayers are free;
Danger and toil the wild imposes,
And thorns must grow before the roses.
And who are these?—and what distress
The savage-acred wilderness
On mother, maid, and child may bring,
Beseems them for a fearful thing;
For now the day begins to dip,
The night begins to lower
Over the bay, and over the ship
Mayflower.
But Carver leads (in heart and health
A hero of the commonwealth)
The axes that the camp requires,
To build the lodge and heap the fires,
And Standish from his warlike store
Arrays his men along the shore,
Distributes weapons resonant,
And dons his harness militant;
For now the day begins to dip,
The night begins to lower
Over the bay, and over the ship
Mayflower;
And Rose, his wife, unlocks a chest—
She sees a Book, in vellum drest,
She drops a tear and kisses the tome,
Thinking of England and of home:
Might they—the Pilgrims, there and then
Ordained to do the work of men—
Have seen, in visions of the air,
While pillowed on the breast of prayer
(When now the day began to dip,
The night began to lower
Over the bay, and over the ship
Mayflower),
The Canaan of their wilderness
A boundless empire of success;
And seen the years of future nights
Jewelled with myriad household lights;
And seen the honey fill the hive;
And seen a thousand ships arrive;
And heard the wheels of travel go;
It would have cheered a thought of woe,
When now the day began to dip,
The night began to lower
Over the bay, and over the ship
Mayflower.
Erastus Wolcott Ellsworth.
On March 16 an Indian came into the hamlet, and in broken English bade the strangers "Welcome." He said his name was Samoset, that he came from Monhegan, distant five days' journey toward the southeast, where he had learned something of the language from the crews of fishing-boats, and that he was an envoy from "the greatest commander in the country," a sachem named Massasoit. Massasoit himself appeared a few days later (March 21), and a treaty offensive and defensive was entered into, which remained in force for fifty-four years.
THE PEACE MESSAGE
[March 16, 1621]
At the door of his hut sat Massasoit,
And his face was lined with care,
For the Yellow Pest had stalked from the West
And swept his wigwams bare;
Mother and child had it stricken down,
And the warrior in his pride,
Till for one that lived when the plague was past,
A full half-score had died.
Now from the Eastern Shore there came
Word of a white-skinned race
Who had risen from out the mighty deep
In search of a dwelling-place.
Houses they fashioned of tree and stone,
Turkey and deer they slew
With a breath of flame like the lightning-flash
Of the great God, Manitu.
Was it war or peace? The Chief looked round
On the wreck of his mighty band.
His heart was sad as he rose from the ground
And held on high his hand.
"We must treat with the stranger, my children," he said,
And he called to him Samoset:
"You will go to the men on the Eastern Shore
With wampum and calumet."
Warm was the welcome he received,
For the Pilgrims' hearts did thrill
At the message he brought from Massasoit,
With its earnest of good-will.
They bade him eat and they bade him drink,
Gave bracelet, knife, and ring,
And sent him again to Monhegan
To lay them before his king.
So the treaty was made, and the treaty was kept
For fifty years and four;
The white men wrought, and waked, and slept
Secure on the Eastern Shore;
From the door of his hut, old Massasoit
Noted their swift increase,
And blessed the day he had sent that way
His messenger of peace.
Burton Egbert Stevenson.
The colonists set about the work of planting their fields as soon as spring opened. The harvest proved a good one; "there was great store of wild turkeys, of which they took many, besides venison," the fowlers having been sent out by the governor, "that so they might, after a special manner, rejoice together after they had gathered the fruit of their labors." This festival was New England's "First Thanksgiving Day." For three days a great feast was spread not only for the colonists, but for Massasoit and some ninety of his people, who had contributed five deer to the larder.
THE FIRST THANKSGIVING DAY
[November, 1621]
"And now," said the Governor, gazing abroad on the piled-up store
Of the sheaves that dotted the clearings and covered the meadows o'er,
"'Tis meet that we render praises because of this yield of grain;
'Tis meet that the Lord of the harvest be thanked for His sun and rain.
"And therefore, I, William Bradford (by the grace of God to-day,
And the franchise of this good people), Governor of Plymouth, say,
Through virtue of vested power—ye shall gather with one accord,
And hold, in the month November, thanksgiving unto the Lord.
"He hath granted us peace and plenty, and the quiet we've sought so long;
He hath thwarted the wily savage, and kept him from wrack and wrong;
And unto our feast the Sachem shall be bidden, that he may know
We worship his own Great Spirit who maketh the harvests grow.
"So shoulder your matchlocks, masters: there is hunting of all degrees;
And fishermen, take your tackle, and scour for spoil the seas;
And maidens and dames of Plymouth, your delicate crafts employ
To honor our First Thanksgiving, and make it a feast of joy!
"We fail of the fruits and dainties—we fail of the old home cheer;
Ah, these are the lightest losses, mayhap, that befall us here;
But see, in our open clearings, how golden the melons lie;
Enrich them with sweets and spices, and give us the pumpkin-pie!"
So, bravely the preparations went on for the autumn feast;
The deer and the bear were slaughtered; wild game from the greatest to least
Was heaped in the colony cabins; brown home-brew served for wine,
And the plum and the grape of the forest, for orange and peach and pine.
At length came the day appointed: the snow had begun to fall,
But the clang from the meeting-house belfry rang merrily over all,
And summoned the folk of Plymouth, who hastened with glad accord
To listen to Elder Brewster as he fervently thanked the Lord.
In his seat sate Governor Bradford; men, matrons, and maidens fair;
Miles Standish and all his soldiers, with corselet and sword, were there;
And sobbing and tears and gladness had each in its turn the sway,
For the grave of the sweet Rose Standish o'ershadowed Thanksgiving Day.
And when Massasoit, the Sachem, sate down with his hundred braves,
And ate of the varied riches of gardens and woods and waves,
And looked on the granaried harvest,—with a blow on his brawny chest,
He muttered, "The good Great Spirit loves His white children best!"
Margaret Junkin Preston.
The colonists, through the friendship of Massasoit, had had little trouble with the Indians, but in April, 1622, a messenger from the Narragansetts brought to Plymouth a sheaf of arrows tied round with a rattlesnake skin, which the Indians there interpreted as a declaration of war. Governor Bradford, at the advice of the doughty Standish, stuffed the skin with powder and ball, and sent it back to the Narragansetts. Their chief, Canonicus, was so alarmed at the look of this missive that he refused to receive it, and it finally found its way back to Plymouth.
THE WAR-TOKEN
From "The Courtship of Miles Standish"
[April 1, 1622]
Meanwhile the choleric Captain strode wrathful away to the council,
Found it already assembled, impatiently waiting his coming;
Men in the middle of life, austere and grave in deportment,
Only one of them old, the hill that was nearest to heaven,
Covered with snow, but erect, the excellent Elder of Plymouth.
God had sifted three kingdoms to find the wheat for this planting,
Then had sifted the wheat, as the living seed of a nation;
So say the chronicles old, and such is the faith of the people!
Near them was standing an Indian, in attitude stern and defiant,
Naked down to the waist, and grim and ferocious in aspect;
While on the table before them was lying unopened a Bible,
Ponderous, bound in leather, brass-studded, printed in Holland,
And beside it outstretched the skin of a rattlesnake glittered,
Filled, like a quiver, with arrows; a signal and challenge of warfare,
Brought by the Indian, and speaking with arrowy tongues of defiance.
This Miles Standish beheld, as he entered, and heard them debating
What were an answer befitting the hostile message and menace,
Talking of this and of that, contriving, suggesting, objecting;
One voice only for peace, and that the voice of the Elder,
Judging it wise and well that some at least were converted,
Rather than any were slain, for this was but Christian behavior!
Then out spake Miles Standish, the stalwart Captain of Plymouth,
Muttering deep in his throat, for his voice was husky with anger,
"What! do you mean to make war with milk and the water of roses?
Is it to shoot red squirrels you have your howitzer planted
There on the roof of the church, or is it to shoot red devils?
Truly the only tongue that is understood by a savage
Must be the tongue of fire that speaks from the mouth of the cannon!"
Thereupon answered and said the excellent Elder of Plymouth,
Somewhat amazed and alarmed at this irreverent language:
"Not so thought St. Paul, nor yet the other Apostles;
Not from the cannon's mouth were the tongues of fire they spake with!"
But unheeded fell this mild rebuke on the Captain,
Who had advanced to the table, and thus continued discoursing:
"Leave this matter to me, for to me by right it pertaineth.
War is a terrible trade; but in the cause that is righteous,
Sweet is the smell of powder; and thus I answer the challenge!"
Then from the rattlesnake's skin, with a sudden, contemptuous gesture,
Jerking the Indian arrows, he filled it with powder and bullets
Full to the very jaws, and handed it back to the savage,
Saying, in thundering tones: "Here, take it! this is your answer!"
Silently out of the room then glided the glistening savage,
Bearing the serpent's skin, and seeming himself like a serpent,
Winding his sinuous way in the dark to the depths of the forest.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
The period of prosperity, which had been marked by the first Thanksgiving, was short-lived. Through nearly the whole of the next two years, the colony was pinched with famine. A crisis was reached in the month of April, 1622, when, so tradition says, the daily ration for each person was reduced to five kernels of corn.
FIVE KERNELS OF CORN
[April, 1622]
I
'Twas the year of the famine in Plymouth of old,
The ice and the snow from the thatched roofs had rolled;
Through the warm purple skies steered the geese o'er the seas,
And the woodpeckers tapped in the clocks of the trees;
And the boughs on the slopes to the south winds lay bare,
And dreaming of summer, the buds swelled in the air.
The pale Pilgrims welcomed each reddening morn;
There were left but for rations Five Kernels of Corn.
Five Kernels of Corn!
Five Kernels of Corn!
But to Bradford a feast were Five Kernels of Corn!
II
"Five Kernels of Corn! Five Kernels of Corn!
Ye people, be glad for Five Kernels of Corn!"
So Bradford cried out on bleak Burial Hill,
And the thin women stood in their doors, white and still.
"Lo, the harbor of Plymouth rolls bright in the Spring,
The maples grow red, and the wood robins sing,
The west wind is blowing, and fading the snow,
And the pleasant pines sing, and the arbutuses blow.
Five Kernels of Corn!
Five Kernels of Corn!
To each one be given Five Kernels of Corn!"
III
O Bradford of Austerfield haste on thy way.
The west winds are blowing o'er Provincetown Bay,
The white avens bloom, but the pine domes are chill,
And new graves have furrowed Precisioners' Hill!
"Give thanks, all ye people, the warm skies have come,
The hilltops are sunny, and green grows the holm,
And the trumpets of winds, and the white March is gone,
And ye still have left you Five Kernels of Corn.
Five Kernels of Corn!
Five Kernels of Corn!
Ye have for Thanksgiving Five Kernels of Corn!"
IV
"The raven's gift eat and be humble and pray,
A new light is breaking, and Truth leads your way;
One taper a thousand shall kindle: rejoice
That to you has been given the wilderness voice!"
O Bradford of Austerfield, daring the wave,
And safe through the sounding blasts leading the brave,
Of deeds such as thine was the free nation born,
And the festal world sings the "Five Kernels of Corn."
Five Kernels of Corn!
Five Kernels of Corn!
The nation gives thanks for Five Kernels of Corn!
To the Thanksgiving Feast bring Five Kernels of Corn!
Hezekiah Butterworth.
In June, 1622, a colony of adventurers from England settled at Wessagusset, now Weymouth, and when their supplies ran short, the following winter, broke open and robbed some of the Indian granaries. The Indians were naturally enraged, and formed a plot for the extirpation of the whites. Warned by Massasoit, the Plymouth settlers determined to strike the first blow, and on March 23, 1623, Standish and eight men were dispatched to Wessagusset. The poem tells the story of the events which followed.
[THE EXPEDITION TO WESSAGUSSET]
From "The Courtship of Miles Standish"
[March, 1623]
Just in the gray of the dawn, as the mists uprose from the meadows,
There was a stir and a sound in the slumbering village of Plymouth;
Clanging and clicking of arms, and the order imperative, "Forward!"
Given in tone suppressed, a tramp of feet, and then silence.
Figures ten, in the mist, marched slowly out of the village.
Standish the stalwart it was, with eight of his valorous army,
Led by their Indian guide, by Hobomok, friend of the white men,
Northward marching to quell the sudden revolt of the savage.
Giants they seemed in the mist, or the mighty men of King David;
Giants in heart they were, who believed in God and the Bible,—
Ay, who believed in the smiting of Midianites and Philistines.
Over them gleamed far off the crimson banners of morning;
Under them loud on the sands, the serried billows, advancing,
Fired along the line, and in regular order retreated.
* * * * *
Meanwhile the stalwart Miles Standish was marching steadily northward,
Winding through forest and swamp, and along the trend of the sea-shore.
* * * * *
After a three days' march he came to an Indian encampment
Pitched on the edge of a meadow, between the sea and the forest;
Women at work by the tents, and warriors, horrid with war-paint,
Seated about a fire, and smoking and talking together;
Who, when they saw from afar the sudden approach of the white men,
Saw the flash of the sun on breastplate and sabre and musket,
Straightway leaped to their feet, and two, from among them advancing,
Came to parley with Standish, and offer him furs as a present;
Friendship was in their looks, but in their hearts there was hatred.
Braves of the tribe were these, and brothers, gigantic in stature,
Huge as Goliath of Gath, or the terrible Og, king of Bashan;
One was Pecksuot named, and the other was called Wattawamat.
Round their necks were suspended their knives in scabbards of wampum,
Two-edged, trenchant knives, with points as sharp as a needle.
Other arms had they none, for they were cunning and crafty.
"Welcome, English!" they said,—these words they had learned from the traders
Touching at times on the coast, to barter and chaffer for peltries.
Then in their native tongue they began to parley with Standish,
Through his guide and interpreter, Hobomok, friend of the white man,
Begging for blankets and knives, but mostly for muskets and powder,
Kept by the white man, they said, concealed, with the plague, in his cellars,
Ready to be let loose, and destroy his brother the red man!
But when Standish refused, and said he would give them the Bible,
Suddenly changing their tone, they began to boast and to bluster.
Then Wattawamat advanced with a stride in front of the other,
And, with a lofty demeanor, thus vauntingly spake to the Captain:
"Now Wattawamat can see, by the fiery eyes of the Captain,
Angry is he in his heart; but the heart of the brave Wattawamat
Is not afraid of the sight. He was not born of a woman,
But on a mountain at night, from an oak-tree riven by lightning,
Forth he sprang at a bound, with all his weapons about him,
Shouting, 'Who is there here to fight with the brave Wattawamat?'"
Then he unsheathed his knife, and, whetting the blade on his left hand,
Held it aloft and displayed a woman's face on the handle;
Saying, with bitter expression and look of sinister meaning:
"I have another at home, with the face of a man on the handle;
By and by they shall marry; and there will be plenty of children!"
Then stood Pecksuot forth, self-vaunting, insulting Miles Standish:
While with his fingers he patted the knife that hung at his bosom,
Drawing it half from its sheath, and plunging it back, as he muttered,
"By and by it shall see; it shall eat; ah, ha! but shall speak not!
This is the mighty Captain the white men have sent to destroy us!
He is a little man; let him go and work with the women!"
Meanwhile Standish had noted the faces and figures of Indians
Peeping and creeping about from bush to tree in the forest,
Feigning to look for game, with arrows set on their bow-strings,
Drawing about him still closer and closer the net of their ambush.
But undaunted he stood, and dissembled and treated them smoothly;
So the old chronicles say, that were writ in the days of the fathers.
But when he heard their defiance, the boast, the taunt, and the insult,
All the hot blood of his race, of Sir Hugh and of Thurston de Standish,
Boiled and beat in his heart, and swelled in the veins of his temples.
Headlong he leaped on the boaster, and, snatching his knife from its scabbard,
Plunged it into his heart, and, reeling backward, the savage
Fell with his face to the sky, and a fiendlike fierceness upon it.
Straight there arose from the forest the awful sound of the war-whoop.
And, like a flurry of snow on the whistling wind of December,
Swift and sudden and keen came a flight of feathery arrows.
Then came a cloud of smoke, and out of the cloud came the lightning,
Out of the lightning thunder; and death unseen ran before it.
Frightened the savages fled for shelter in swamp and in thicket,
Hotly pursued and beset; but their sachem, the brave Wattawamat,
Fled not; he was dead. Unswerving and swift had a bullet
Passed through his brain, and he fell with both hands clutching the greensward,
Seeming in death to hold back from his foe the land of his fathers.
There on the flowers of the meadow the warriors lay, and above them,
Silent, with folded arms, stood Hobomok, friend of the white man.
Smiling at length he exclaimed to the stalwart Captain of Plymouth:—
"Pecksuot bragged very loud, of his courage, his strength, and his stature,—
Mocked the great Captain, and called him a little man; but I see now
Big enough have you been to lay him speechless before you!"
Thus the first battle was fought and won by the stalwart Miles Standish.
When the tidings thereof were brought to the village of Plymouth,
And as a trophy of war the head of the brave Wattawamat
Scowled from the roof of the fort, which at once was a church and a fortress,
All who beheld it rejoiced, and praised the Lord, and took courage.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
By the end of 1624 Plymouth was in a thriving condition. Its inhabitants numbered nearly two hundred, and it boasted thirty-two dwelling-houses. Other colonies soon sprang up about the Bay—Piscataqua (Portsmouth), Naumkeag (Salem), Nantasket (Hull), and Winnisimmet (Chelsea). The trials and pleasures of life in New England at about this time are humorously described in what are perhaps the first verses written by an American colonist.
[1630]
New England's annoyances, you that would know them,
Pray ponder these verses which briefly doth shew them.
The Place where we live is a wilderness Wood,
Where Grass is much wanting that's fruitful and good:
Our Mountains and Hills and our Vallies below
Being commonly cover'd with Ice and with Snow;
And when the North-west Wind with violence blows,
Then every Man pulls his Cap over his Nose:
But if any's so hardy and will it withstand,
He forfeits a Finger, a Foot, or a Hand.
But when the Spring opens, we then take the Hoe,
And make the Ground ready to plant and to sow;
Our Corn being planted and Seed being sown,
The Worms destroy much before it is grown;
And when it is growing, some spoil there is made
By Birds and by Squirrels that pluck up the Blade;
And when it is come to full Corn in the Ear,
It is often destroy'd by Raccoon and by Deer.
And now do our Garments begin to grow thin,
And Wool is much wanted to card and to spin;
If we can get a Garment to cover without,
Our other In-Garments are Clout upon Clout:
Our Clothes we brought with us are apt to be torn,
They need to be clouted soon after they're worn;
But clouting our Garments they hinder us nothing:
Clouts double are warmer than single whole Clothing.
If fresh Meat be wanting, to fill up our Dish,
We have Carrots and Turnips as much as we wish;
And is there a mind for a delicate Dish,
We repair to the Clam-banks, and there we catch Fish.
For Pottage and Puddings, and Custards and Pies,
Our Pumpkins and Parsnips are common supplies;
We have Pumpkins at morning, and Pumpkins at noon;
If it was not for Pumpkins we should be undone.
If Barley be wanting to make into Malt,
We must be contented, and think it no fault;
For we can make Liquor to sweeten our Lips
Of Pumpkins and Parsnips and Walnut-Tree Chips.
* * * * *
Now while some are going let others be coming,
For while Liquor's boiling it must have a scumming;
But I will not blame them, for Birds of a Feather,
By seeking their Fellows, are flocking together.
But you whom the Lord intends hither to bring,
Forsake not the Honey for fear of the Sting;
But bring both a quiet and contented Mind,
And all needful Blessings you surely will find.
The Old Colony's palmy days were of short duration, for it was soon overshadowed by a more wealthy and vigorous neighbor, founded by the powerful Puritan party.
THE PILGRIM FATHERS
I
Well worthy to be magnified are they
Who, with sad hearts, of friends and country took
A last farewell, their loved abodes forsook,
And hallowed ground in which their fathers lay;
Then to the new-found World explored their way,
That so a Church, unforced, uncalled to brook
Ritual restraints, within some sheltering nook
Her Lord might worship and his word obey
In freedom. Men they were who could not bend;
Blest Pilgrims, surely, as they took for guide
A will by sovereign Conscience sanctified;
Blest while their Spirits from the woods ascend
Along a Galaxy that knows no end,
But in His glory who for Sinners died.
II
From Rite and Ordinance abused they fled
To Wilds where both were utterly unknown;
But not to them had Providence foreshown
What benefits are missed, what evils bred,
In worship neither raised nor limited
Save by Self-will. Lo! from that distant shore,
For Rite and Ordinance, Piety is led
Back to the Land those Pilgrims left of yore,
Led by her own free choice. So Truth and Love
By Conscience governed do their steps retrace.—
Fathers! your Virtues, such the power of grace,
Their spirit, in your Children, thus approve.
Transcendent over time, unbound by place,
Concord and Charity in circles move.
William Wordsworth.
When Charles I came to the throne, in 1625, with the expressed determination to harry the Puritans out of England, the latter decided to seek an asylum in the New World. In 1628 John Endicott and a few others secured a patent from the New England Council for a trading-company, the grant including a strip of land across the continent from a line three miles north of the Merrimac to another three miles south of the Charles. It was into this colony, known as Massachusetts, that the older colony of Plymouth was finally absorbed.
THE PILGRIM FATHERS
The Pilgrim Fathers,—where are they?
The waves that brought them o'er
Still roll in the bay, and throw their spray
As they break along the shore;
Still roll in the bay, as they rolled that day
When the Mayflower moored below;
When the sea around was black with storms,
And white the shore with snow.
The mists that wrapped the Pilgrim's sleep
Still brood upon the tide;
And his rocks yet keep their watch by the deep
To stay its waves of pride.
But the snow-white sail that he gave to the gale,
When the heavens looked dark, is gone,—
As an angel's wing through an opening cloud
Is seen, and then withdrawn.
The pilgrim exile,—sainted name!
The hill whose icy brow
Rejoiced, when he came, in the morning's flame,
In the morning's flame burns now.
And the moon's cold light, as it lay that night
On the hillside and the sea,
Still lies where he laid his houseless head,—
But the Pilgrim! where is he?
The Pilgrim Fathers are at rest:
When summer's throned on high,
And the world's warm breast is in verdure drest,
Go, stand on the hill where they lie.
The earliest ray of the golden day
On that hallowed spot is cast;
And the evening sun, as he leaves the world,
Looks kindly on that spot last.
The Pilgrim spirit has not fled:
It walks in noon's broad light;
And it watches the bed of the glorious dead,
With the holy stars by night.
It watches the bed of the brave who have bled,
And still guard this ice-bound shore,
Till the waves of the bay, where the Mayflower lay,
Shall foam and freeze no more.
John Pierpont.
King Charles, little suspecting that he was providing an asylum for the Puritans, confirmed the patent by a royal charter to "The Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England." No place for the meetings of the company had been named in the charter, and the audacious plan was formed to remove it, patents, charter, and all, to New England. Secret meetings were held, the old officers were finally got rid of, and John Winthrop was elected governor. Winthrop sailed for America on April 7, 1630, and arrived at Salem June 12. It was the beginning of a great emigration, for, in the four months that followed, seventeen ships arrived, with nearly a thousand passengers.
THE THANKSGIVING IN BOSTON HARBOR
[June 12, 1630]
"Praise ye the Lord!" The psalm to-day
Still rises on our ears,
Borne from the hills of Boston Bay
Through five times fifty years,
When Winthrop's fleet from Yarmouth crept
Out to the open main,
And through the widening waters swept,
In April sun and rain.
"Pray to the Lord with fervent lips,"
The leader shouted, "pray;"
And prayer arose from all the ships
As faded Yarmouth Bay.
They passed the Scilly Isles that day,
And May-days came, and June,
And thrice upon the ocean lay
The full orb of the moon.
And as that day, on Yarmouth Bay,
Ere England sunk from view,
While yet the rippling Solent lay
In April skies of blue,
"Pray to the Lord with fervent lips,"
Each morn was shouted, "pray;"
And prayer arose from all the ships,
As first in Yarmouth Bay;
Blew warm the breeze o'er Western seas,
Through Maytime morns, and June,
Till hailed these souls the Isles of Shoals,
Low 'neath the summer moon;
And as Cape Ann arose to view,
And Norman's Woe they passed,
The wood-doves came the white mists through,
And circled round each mast.
"Pray to the Lord with fervent lips,"
Then called the leader, "pray;"
And prayer arose from all the ships,
As first in Yarmouth Bay.
Above the sea the hill-tops fair—
God's towers—began to rise,
And odors rare breathe through the air,
Like balms of Paradise.
Through burning skies the ospreys flew,
And near the pine-cooled shores
Danced airy boat and thin canoe,
To flash of sunlit oars.
"Pray to the Lord with fervent lips,"
The leader shouted, "pray!"
Then prayer arose, and all the ships
Sailed into Boston Bay.
The white wings folded, anchors down,
The sea-worn fleet in line,
Fair rose the hills where Boston town
Should rise from clouds of pine;
Fair was the harbor, summit-walled,
And placid lay the sea.
"Praise ye the Lord," the leader called;
"Praise ye the Lord," spake he.
"Give thanks to God with fervent lips,
Give thanks to God to-day,"
The anthem rose from all the ships,
Safe moored in Boston Bay.
"Praise ye the Lord!" Primeval woods
First heard the ancient song,
And summer hills and solitudes
The echoes rolled along.
The Red Cross flag of England blew
Above the fleet that day,
While Shawmut's triple peaks in view
In amber hazes lay.
"Praise ye the Lord with fervent lips,
Praise ye the Lord to-day,"
The anthem rose from all the ships
Safe moored in Boston Bay.
The Arabella leads the song—
The Mayflower sings below,
That erst the Pilgrims bore along
The Plymouth reefs of snow.
Oh! never be that psalm forgot
That rose o'er Boston Bay,
When Winthrop sang, and Endicott,
And Saltonstall, that day:
"Praise ye the Lord with fervent lips,
Praise ye the Lord to-day;"
And praise arose from all the ships,
Like prayers in Yarmouth Bay.
That psalm our fathers sang we sing,
That psalm of peace and wars,
While o'er our heads unfolds its wing
The flag of forty stars.
And while the nation finds a tongue
For nobler gifts to pray,
'Twill ever sing the song they sung
That first Thanksgiving Day:
"Praise ye the Lord with fervent lips,
Praise ye the Lord to-day;"
So rose the song from all the ships,
Safe moored in Boston Bay.
Our fathers' prayers have changed to psalms,
As David's treasures old
Turned, on the Temple's giant arms,
To lily-work of gold.
Ho! vanished ships from Yarmouth's tide,
Ho! ships of Boston Bay,
Your prayers have crossed the centuries wide
To this Thanksgiving Day!
We pray to God with fervent lips,
We praise the Lord to-day,
As prayers arose from Yarmouth ships,
But psalms from Boston Bay.
Hezekiah Butterworth.
But the condition of the colonists was for the most part pitiful, and food was so scarce that shell-fish served for meat and acorns for bread. Winthrop had foreseen this and had engaged Captain William Pierce, of the ship Lion, to go in all haste to the nearest port in Ireland for provisions. Food-stuffs were nearly as scarce there as in America, and Pierce was forced to go on to London, where he was again delayed. A fast was appointed throughout the settlements for February 22, 1631, to implore divine succor. On the 21st, as Winthrop "was distributing the last handful of meal in the barrel unto a poor man distressed by the wolf at the door, at that instant they spied a ship arrived at the harbour's mouth, laden with provisions for them all." The ship was the Lion, and the fast day was changed into a day of feasting and thanksgiving.
THE FIRST THANKSGIVING
[February 22, 1631]
It was Captain Pierce of the Lion who strode the streets of London,
Who stalked the streets in the blear of morn and growled in his grisly beard;
By Neptune! quoth this grim sea-dog, I fear that my master's undone!
'Tis a bitter thing if all for naught through the drench of the deep I've steered!
He had come from out of the ultimate West through the spinning drift and the smother,
Come for a guerdon of golden grain for a hungry land afar;
And he thought of many a wasting maid, and of many a sad-eyed mother,
And how their gaze would turn and turn for a sail at the harbor bar.
But famine lay on the English isle, and grain was a hoarded treasure,
So ruddy the coin must gleam to loose the lock of the store-house door;
And under his breath the Captain groaned because of his meagre measure,
And the grasping souls of those that held the keys to the precious store.
But he flung a laugh and a fleer at doubt, and braving the roaring city
He faced them out—those moiling men whose greed had grown to a curse—
Till at last he found in the strenuous press a heart that was moved to pity,
And he gave the Governor's bond and word for what he lacked in his purse.
So the Lion put her prow to the West in the wild and windy weather,
Her sails all set, though her decks were wet with the driving scud and the foam;
Never an hour would the Captain hold his staunch little craft in tether,
For the haunting thought of hungry eyes was the lure that called him home.
Sooth, in the streets of Boston-town was the heavy sound of sorrow,
For an iron frost had bound the wold, and the sky hung bleak and dread;
Despair sat dark on the face of him who dared to think of the morrow,
When not a crust could the goodwife give if the children moaned for bread.
But hark, from the wintry waterside a loud and lusty cheering,
That sweeps the sullen streets of the town as a wave the level strand!
A sail! a sail! upswelled the cry, speeding the vessel steering
Out of the vast of the misty sea in to the waiting land.
Turn the dimming page of the past that the dust of the years is dry on.
And see the tears in the eyes of Joy as the ship draws in to the shore,
And see the genial glow on the face of Captain Pierce of the Lion,
As the Governor grips his faithful hand and blesses him o'er and o'er!
Oh, the rapture of that release! Feasting instead of fasting!
Happiness in the heart of the home, and hope with its silver ray!
Oh, the songs of prayer and praise to the Lord God everlasting
That mounted morn and noon and eve on that first Thanksgiving Day!
Clinton Scollard.
In the four years that followed, the worst hardships of the new plantation were outlived, and between three and four thousand Englishmen were distributed among the twenty hamlets along and near the sea-shore. The fight for a foothold had been won.
NEW ENGLAND'S GROWTH
From a fragmentary poem on "New England"
Famine once we had,
But other things God gave us in full store,
As fish and ground-nuts to supply our strait,
That we might learn on Providence to wait;
And know, by bread man lives not in his need.
But by each word that doth from God proceed.
But a while after plenty did come in,
From His hand only who doth pardon sin,
And all did flourish like the pleasant green,
Which in the joyful spring is to be seen.
Almost ten years we lived here alone,
In other places there were few or none;
For Salem was the next of any fame,
That began to augment New England's name;
But after multitudes began to flow,
More than well knew themselves where to bestow;
Boston then began her roots to spread,
And quickly soon she grew to be the head,
Not only of the Massachusetts Bay,
But all trade and commerce fell in her way.
And truly it was admirable to know,
How greatly all things here began to grow.
New plantations were in each place begun,
And with inhabitants were filled soon.
All sorts of grain which our own land doth yield,
Was hither brought and sown in every field:
As wheat and rye, barley, oats, beans and pease,
Here all thrive, and they profit from them raise.
All sorts of roots and herbs in gardens grow,
Parsnips, carrots, turnips, or what you'll sow.
Onions, melons, cucumbers, radishes,
Skirets, beets, coleworts, and fair cabbages.
Here grow fine flowers many, and 'mongst those,
The fair white lily and sweet fragrant rose.
Many good wholesome berries here you'll find,
Fit for man's use, almost of every kind,
Pears, apples, cherries, plumbs, quinces, and peach,
Are now no dainties; you may have of each.
Nuts and grapes of several sorts are here,
If you will take the pains them to seek for.
William Bradford.
There remained but one danger, the Indians; and most feared of all were the Pequots, who dwelt just west of what is now Rhode Island, and in 1637 began open hostilities. A force of about a hundred men marched against the principal Pequot stronghold, a palisaded village which stood on a hilltop near the Mystic. The attack was made on the night of May 25, 1637, the Indians were taken by surprise, their thatched houses were set on fire, and of the six or seven hundred persons in the village, scarcely one escaped.
THE ASSAULT ON THE FORTRESS
From "The Destruction of the Pequods"
[May 25, 1637]
Through verdant banks where Thames's branches glide,
Long held the Pequods an extensive sway;
Bold, savage, fierce, of arms the glorious pride,
And bidding all the circling realms obey.
Jealous, they saw the tribes, beyond the sea,
Plant in their climes; and towns, and cities, rise;
Ascending castles foreign flags display;
Mysterious art new scenes of life devise;
And steeds insult the plains, and cannon rend the skies.
The rising clouds the savage chief descried,
And, round the forest, bade his heroes arm;
To arms the painted warriors proudly hied,
And through surrounding nations rung the alarm.
The nations heard; but smiled, to see the storm,
With ruin fraught, o'er Pequod mountains driven
And felt infernal joy the bosom warm,
To see their light hang o'er the skirts of even,
And other suns arise, to gild a kinder heaven.
Swift to the Pequod fortress Mason sped,
Far in the wildering wood's impervious gloom;
A lonely castle, brown with twilight dread;
Where oft the embowelled captive met his doom,
And frequent heaved, around the hollow tomb,
Scalps hung in rows, and whitening bones were strew'd;
Where, round the broiling babe, fresh from the womb,
With howls the Powow fill'd the dark abode,
And screams and midnight prayers invoked the evil god.
But now no awful rites, nor potent spell,
To silence charm'd the peals of coming war;
Or told the dread recesses of the dell,
Where glowing Mason led his bands from far;
No spirit, buoyant on his airy car,
Controll'd the whirlwind of invading fight:
Deep died in blood, dun evening's falling star
Sent sad o'er western hills its parting light,
And no returning morn dispersed the long, dark night.
On the drear walls a sudden splendor glow'd,
There Mason shone, and there his veterans pour'd.
Anew the hero claim'd the fiends of blood,
While answering storms of arrows round him shower'd,
And the war-scream the ear with anguish gored.
Alone, he burst the gate; the forest round
Reëchoed death; the peal of onset roar'd,
In rush'd the squadrons; earth in blood was drown'd;
And gloomy spirits fled, and corses hid the ground.
Not long in dubious fight the host had striven,
When, kindled by the musket's potent flame,
In clouds, and fire, the castle rose to heaven,
And gloom'd the world, with melancholy beam.
Then hoarser groans, with deeper anguish, came;
And fiercer fight the keen assault repell'd:
Nor e'en these ills the savage breast could tame;
Like hell's deep caves, the hideous region yell'd,
Till death, and sweeping fire, laid waste the hostile field.
Timothy Dwight.
Sassacus, the Pequot chief, escaped and sought refuge with the Mohawks, but was slain by them.
DEATH SONG
[1673]
Great Sassacus fled from the eastern shores,
Where the sun first shines, and the great sea roars,
For the white men came from the world afar,
And their fury burnt like the bison star.
His sannops were slain by their thunder's power,
And his children fell like the star-eyed flower;
His wigwams were burnt by the white man's flame,
And the home of his youth has a stranger name—
His ancestor once was our countryman's foe,
And the arrow was plac'd in the new-strung bow,
The wild deer ranged through the forest free,
While we fought with his tribe by the distant sea.
But the foe never came to the Mohawk's tent,
With his hair untied, and his bow unbent,
And found not the blood of the wild deer shed,
And the calumet lit and the bear-skin bed.
But sing ye the Death Song, and kindle the pine,
And bid its broad light like his valor to shine;
Then raise high his pile by our warriors' heaps,
And tell to his tribe that his murderer sleeps.
Alonzo Lewis.
OUR COUNTRY
On primal rocks she wrote her name;
Her towers were reared on holy graves;
The golden seed that bore her came
Swift-winged with prayer o'er ocean waves.
The Forest bowed his solemn crest,
And open flung his sylvan doors;
Meek Rivers led the appointed guest
To clasp the wide-embracing shores;
Till, fold by fold, the broidered land
To swell her virgin vestments grew,
While sages, strong in heart and hand,
Her virtue's fiery girdle drew.
O Exile of the wrath of kings!
O Pilgrim Ark of Liberty!
The refuge of divinest things,
Their record must abide in thee!
First in the glories of thy front
Let the crown-jewel, Truth, be found;
Thy right hand fling, with generous wont,
Love's happy chain to farthest bound!
Let Justice, with the faultless scales,
Hold fast the worship of thy sons;
Thy Commerce spread her shining sails
Where no dark tide of rapine runs!
So link thy ways to those of God,
So follow firm the heavenly laws,
That stars may greet thee, warrior-browed,
And storm-sped angels hail thy cause!
O Lord, the measure of our prayers,
Hope of the world in grief and wrong,
Be thine the tribute of the years,
The gift of Faith, the crown of Song!
Julia Ward Howe.