Chapter V
Description of Penn’s Domain—Negotiations with the Indians by Penn’s Agent—Death of Penn’s Mother—Final Instructions to his Family—Departure of the Welcome
This newly acquired territory, which was henceforth to absorb all Penn’s attention, lay to the north of Maryland and west of New Jersey, of which Penn was now joint owner, reaching from the Delaware River on the east to the Ohio on the west, and north as far as Lake Erie. The eastern and western boundaries were well defined by these two rivers, but on the north and south the lines had yet to be agreed upon with the owners of the adjoining colonies—no easy matter where the land was largely primeval forest, untrodden by human foot save for the Indians who traversed it on their hunting expeditions. The greater part of the tract was occupied by the various ranges of the Allegheny Mountains, whose bare rocky peaks offered no very inviting prospect and held out few hopes as to a favorable climate. But wherever trees could find nourishment for their roots, dense forests extended, untouched as yet by any axe, while verdant meadows lined the countless streams that descended from the mountain heights to empty their waters into the Allegheny and Susquehanna Rivers which flowed through the middle of the State. The only outlet to the ocean was through the Delaware River, which opened into Delaware Bay, where there was a good harbor.
The climate of the country was a diversified one. While in the mountain regions the winters were severe, the eastern slopes toward the Atlantic Ocean, as well as those in the northwest toward the Ohio River and Lake Erie, enjoyed a temperate climate with often great heat in the summer. In these regions the soil was rich and fruitful, promising bountiful returns to the settler after he had once succeeded in clearing the land and making room for the plough. The forests, almost impenetrable in places with masses of sumach bushes and climbing vines, furnished almost every kind of wood already known to the English colonists: cedar, cypress, pine, and sycamore, as well as the full-blooming tulip tree, which flourished in sheltered spots. Game of all sorts abounded and the streams were full of fish. The most delicious grapes and peaches, chestnuts and mulberries grew wild in protected places, and flowers of tropical gorgeousness greeted the eyes of astonished settlers. The gold and silver of which King Charles had been so careful to reserve a share were not found in the province, but there was plenty of iron and an inexhaustible supply of the finest coal. Also there were valuable salt springs, as well as those useful materials, lime, slate, and building stone. In short, it was a country well fitted to supply every need of the settler and offering magnificent prospects for the future.
To be sure, it was inhabited by several tribes of Indians, chief of which were the Lenni Lennapes in the southern part and the Iroquois in the northern, but if they were disposed at first to regard with suspicion this invasion of their domains, they soon found the newcomers fair and honest in their dealings with them and willing to pay for the right to settle there, like the New Jersey colonists. Indeed these semi-savage natives seemed to place little value on the permanent possession of the land over which they claimed sovereignty. They had no fixed abiding place, but roamed about at will, settling down for a time where the hunting was especially good or the streams promised to fill their nets with fish. So long as they were free to hunt and fish as they chose and their women had a small piece of open ground in which to prepare the maize cakes that served them for bread, no hostile attacks were to be feared from them.
Penn himself little suspected that he had received an empire in exchange for his claim against the crown, nor did he realize as long as he lived the full value of his newly acquired territory. The idea of enriching himself or his family was as far from his thoughts as it had been close to his father’s. With him it was purely a question of obtaining a home for his ideal Commonwealth, and he refused all the offers to purchase rights of trade there that poured in upon him as soon as the patent had been granted, even though he was in great need of money at the time and although the sale of such rights was not only perfectly legitimate, but no more than any other in his position would have done without hesitation. One merchant, for instance, offered him six thousand pounds, besides two and a half per cent of the yearly profits, for the exclusive right to trade in beaver hats between the Delaware and Susquehanna Rivers. Penn was resolved that trade in his colony should be no more restricted than personal liberty or freedom of conscience, and the more widely his principles of government became known, the larger grew the number of would-be emigrants who wished to settle there. He soon found himself so overrun with agents wishing to consult him as to the sale of lands or the formation of trading companies that he scarcely knew which way to turn. There was hardly a city in the three kingdoms that did not send messengers or petitions, while offers came even from Holland and Germany, where Penn was so well known.
Emigration companies were also formed for the foundation of settlements on a larger scale. To one of these, in Frankfort-on-the-Main, Penn deeded a tract of fifteen thousand acres along the banks of a navigable river, with three hundred acres in the interior on which to found the capital of the new State. A trading company in Bristol concluded a contract for the purchase of twenty thousand acres and set to work at once to fit out a ship, while in London, Liverpool, and Bristol emigrants gathered in such numbers that Penn soon had no fear as to the settlement of his colony. Among these, it is true, were many adventurers in search of a fortune only, which they hoped to make more quickly and easily under Penn’s form of government than elsewhere. But by far the greater number were victims of oppression, seeking to escape the endless persecutions to which they were subjected at home on account of their religious opinions, and taking with them little but good resolution and a pair of useful hands.
Immediately on receiving the patent Penn despatched his cousin, Colonel Markham, with three ships to take possession of the new province in his name, to arrange with Lord Baltimore as to the doubtful boundary lines on the south, and above all to make friends with the Indians by concluding a formal treaty with them for the purchase of such lands as they laid claim to. The kindliness of his nature made it impossible for him to treat the unfortunate natives as other Europeans had done, driving them ruthlessly from their own hunting grounds wherever the land was worth taking possession of and forcing them as far as possible into slavery. The Spanish explorers especially, in their insatiable thirst for gold, had even robbed them of all the precious metals and pearls they had and endeavored by the most shameful cruelty to extort from them knowledge of the location where they found the gold of which their ornaments were made. If they offered the slightest resistance or took up arms to defend themselves or regain their liberty, they were hunted like wild beasts by bloodhounds trained for that purpose, or fell in heaps before the murderous bullets against which their arrows were of no avail. Even the Puritan settlers of New England, who should have practised the Christian virtues of justice and humanity, were guilty of many acts of cruelty and treachery toward the red men, with whom they were perpetually at warfare in consequence.
Penn hoped, by the use of gentler methods, to win the confidence of the Indians, who must have already discovered from the New Jersey settlers that all white men were by no means like those with whom they had first come in contact. It was necessary, in fact, if his colony were to enjoy permanent peace and security, and in spite of the ridicule which such humane ideas was likely to evoke, Markham was charged with the strictest instructions in this regard. He was a bold and determined man, devoted to his kinsman Penn, the wisdom and purity of whose ideas he fully appreciated in spite of his soldierly training. On his arrival in Pennsylvania he lost no time in concluding a treaty with the chiefs or sachems of the principal tribes, conveying to Penn for a fixed sum all lands claimed by them with the solemn assurance in his name that no settler should ever molest or injure them. The next two ships which came over from England brought three agents authorized to make further treaties of peace and friendship, thus strengthening the work begun by Markham, and also an address written by Penn himself to be read to the Indians, expressing it as his earnest wish “by their favor and consent, so to govern the land that they might always live together as friends and allies.”
Markham was less fortunate, however, in his negotiations with Lord Baltimore concerning the doubtful boundary lines, which, if not definitely fixed, were likely to prove a source of much contention. The existence of a Quaker colony adjoining his own province was by no means pleasing to the Catholic nobleman, who, if left to himself, would have done all in his power to prevent its foundation. The matter was only settled by the King’s personal interference in Penn’s behalf, and then only a temporary decision was arrived at, the Duke of York’s influence having finally to be brought to bear before everything could be arranged satisfactorily for the future prosperity of the new State. Pennsylvania, as already mentioned, had but one direct outlet to the Atlantic Ocean. Should this be cut off or obstructed at any time by enemies, it would be ruinous to the trade of the colony. Penn therefore determined to acquire if possible a strip of land forming the west shore of Delaware Bay on the peninsula extending between Delaware and Chesapeake Bays, the possession of which was indispensable for the protection of Pennsylvania’s trading vessels. After much negotiation this was accomplished with the Duke of York’s aid and the sovereign rights to this piece of coast granted to Penn and his heirs forever. This removed the last obstacle to his undisputed possession of the new territory and its successful development, and he was now free to cross the Atlantic and assume the government in person.
Just at this time, however, a great misfortune befell him in the sudden death of his mother, that tender guardian of his childhood, friend and mediator of his troubled youth, and devoted sharer of the hopes and plans of his manhood, whose support and sympathy had never failed him. So overwhelmed with grief was he by this loss that for a time his health was seriously affected and it was many weeks before he recovered his peace of mind. This sad event also added to Penn’s difficulties. Being unwilling to take his wife and children with him on this first voyage, he had hoped to leave them under his mother’s wise and experienced guardianship, in which case he could have parted from them with good heart, feeling sure that all would be well during his absence. This was now no longer possible, however, and another anxiety was added to his load.