Phips returned crestfallen to Boston late in November; and one by one the rest of the fleet came straggling after him, battered and weather-beaten. Some did not appear till February, and three or four never came at all. The autumn and early winter were unusually stormy. Captain Rainsford, with sixty men, was wrecked on the Island of Anticosti, where more than half their number died of cold and misery. [24] In the other vessels, some were drowned, some frost-bitten, and above two hundred killed by small-pox and fever.
[24] Mather, Magnalia, I. 192.
At Boston, all was dismay and gloom. The Puritan bowed before "this awful frown of God," and searched his conscience for the sin that had brought upon him so stern a chastisement. [25] Massachusetts, already impoverished, found herself in extremity. The war, instead of paying for itself, had burdened her with an additional debt of fifty thousand pounds. [26] The sailors and soldiers were clamorous for their pay; and, to satisfy them, the colony was forced for the first time in its history to issue a paper currency. It was made receivable at a premium for all public debts, and was also fortified by a provision for its early redemption by taxation; a provision which was carried into effect in spite of poverty and distress. [27]
[25] The Governor and Council to the Agents of Massachusetts, in Andros Tracts, III. 53.
[26] Address of the Gentry, Merchants, and others, Ibid., II. 236.
[27] The following is a literal copy of a specimen of this paper money, which varied in value from two shillings to ten pounds:—
No. (2161) 10s
This Indented Bill of Ten Shillings, due from the Massachusetts Colony to the Possessor, shall be in value equal to Money, and shall be accordingly accepted by the Treasurer and Receivers subordinate to him in all Publick Payments, and for any Stock at any time in the Treasury Boston in New England, December the 10th. 1690. By Order of the General Court.
Seal of
Masachu-
setts.
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