Baltimore's visit to Virginia.
To this letter the king returned a gracious reply, in which he advised Lord Baltimore, for the sake of his own comfort and peace of mind, to give up such arduous kind of work and return to England; but before this reply reached Avalon, its proprietor had sailed for Virginia, with Lady Baltimore and the children, and a small retinue of servants and followers. He wished to see that country with his own eyes and learn if it were really fit for his purposes. On the first day of October, 1629, he arrived at Jamestown, where he found the assembly in session. That versatile physician, Dr. Pott, so skilled in "epidemicals" and strong waters and afterward convicted of lifting cattle, was then acting as governor. The reception given to Lord Baltimore was anything but cordial. All good Virginians hated Papists, and this particular Papist was known to stand in high favour with the king, so that he might turn out to be dangerous. He had been one of the commissioners appointed by James I. to look into the affairs of Virginia; what if he were to persuade Charles I. to turn over the colony into his hands for safe-keeping? There was really not the slightest danger of such a thing. Baltimore's wish was not to take possession of a colony already established, but to found one himself in accordance with his own ideas. It was not his purpose to become lord over the Virginians, but their neighbour, who might dwell near them on amicable terms. But the Virginians did not wish to receive him in any capacity or on any terms, except as a transient guest. There was an obvious and easy device for getting rid of him. Dr. Pott and the council tendered to him the oath of supremacy, which of course he could not take. This oath was a sworn recognition of the English sovereign as the only supreme authority throughout the British dominions in all matters ecclesiastical and spiritual. No Catholic could take such an oath. Baltimore proposed an alternative declaration of allegiance to which he could swear, but such a compromise was of course refused. Even had Dr. Pott and the council felt authorized to assume such responsibility, accommodation was not what they desired, and the royal favourite was told that he must sail for England at once. It appears that he met with some very rude treatment at Jamestown, which does not seem to have been publicly rebuked until the arrival of the new royal governor, Sir John Harvey, in the following March; for on the records of the assembly for March 25, 1630, occurs the entry: "Thomas Tindall to be pilloried two hours, for giving my Lord Baltimore the lie and threatening to knock him down." It is evident, however, that such unseemly conduct could not have met with approval among respectable people at Jamestown, for when Baltimore sailed he left his wife and children there. It is clear that he intended soon to return, and wished to save them the discomforts and perils of the double voyage. He knew that Virginian hospitality could be relied on. His purpose of returning must have been well known, for the secretary of the colony, William Claiborne, was sent to London to keep an eye upon him and thwart his schemes as far as possible. After arriving in England, Lord Baltimore found so many hindrances to be reckoned with that he sent for his family and they followed him by a later ship.
The charter of Maryland.
Baltimore's first request was for a tract of territory lying south of James River as far as the mouth of the Chowan (or Passamagnus) River in Albemarle Sound. This province was to be called Carolina, either in honour of Charles I., or because the name had been given by the Huguenots in 1562 in honour of Charles IX. of France to a point farther south on that coast and was vaguely applicable to territory between Virginia and Florida. A charter conveying this land to Lord Baltimore had already been made out when Claiborne appeared with his objections, which were supported by other persons in London who were entertaining schemes for founding a sugar-planting colony in Carolina. The matter was discussed in the Privy Council, and Baltimore's attention was called to the fact that the Dutch were taking possession of the country between the Hudson and Delaware rivers; would it not therefore be desirable to found a colony north of the Potomac, and squeeze these unwelcome intruders into as narrow a space as possible? Baltimore accepted this suggestion, and a charter was drawn up, granting to him as lord proprietor the province which received the name of Maryland, after Charles's Catholic queen, Henriette Marie, in England commonly called Queen Mary. The charter, which Baltimore drew up with his own hand, was in the main a copy of the Avalon charter; but before it had received the royal seal he died, in April, 1632. In June the charter was issued to his eldest son Cecilius Calvert, second baron of Baltimore.
Fate of the Avalon charter.
In obtaining this new grant of Maryland, the Calverts did not regard themselves as giving up their hold upon Newfoundland. Cecilius appointed a governor for Avalon as a fishing station, but in 1637, with characteristic recklessness, the king granted it to the Marquis of Hamilton and some other noblemen, on the ground that the charter had been forfeited by disuse. More or less controversy went on until 1663, when in consequence of a judgment in the courts pronouncing the Hamilton grant void, Avalon was surrendered to Cecilius. But his descendants really neglected it, until in 1754 the charter was again declared forfeited, and the crown resumed its rights over the whole of that large island.
Character of the first Lord Baltimore.
It seems to have been the physical hardships sustained in Newfoundland that cut off the first Lord Baltimore prematurely in his fifty-third year and prevented his witnessing the success of the enterprise which he had so much at heart. His plan was to found in the New World a commonwealth where Catholics might find a welcome refuge from the oppressive legislation to which they were subjected in England. It was a plan that could be carried out only by adopting a policy of universal toleration utterly unknown in that age outside of the Netherlands. It called for the utmost sagacity and tact, and was likely to require on the part of the ruler all the well-nigh royal powers with which Lord Baltimore had been endowed. Though the scheme was left for the son to put into successful operation, it was devised by the father and stamps him as no ordinary man. It is right that he should be honoured as the first founder of Maryland. His portrait, painted for Lord Bacon by the illustrious Daniel Mytens, is now in the gallery of the Earl of Verulam, and there is a fine copy of it in the state-house at Annapolis. The face is courteous and amiable, albeit somewhat melancholy, and shows refinement and intelligence, as well as the honesty for which he was noted. George Calvert's integrity was such that throughout his public life men respected and trusted him without distinction of party. Of the sincerity of his religious feelings one gets a glimpse in such characteristic passages as the following, from a letter to his friend, the great Earl of Strafford: "All things, my lord, in this world pass away; wife, children, honours, wealth, friends, and what else is dear to flesh and blood. They are but lent us till God please to call for them back again, that we may not esteem anything our own, or set our hearts upon anything but Him alone, who only remains forever."[126]
Cecilius Calvert, second Lord Baltimore.
Of the early life of the son, Cecilius Calvert, very little is known. He was born in 1606 and entered Trinity College, Oxford, in 1621, but there is no record of his having taken a degree. He was hardly more than eighteen years old when he became the husband of Lady Anne Arundel, whose name is left upon one of the counties of Maryland, and whose portrait by Vandyck, preserved in Wardour Castle, shows her to have been one of the most beautiful women of her time. An engraved portrait of Cecilius, made in 1657 and now in possession of the Maryland Historical Society, gives us the impression of great sagacity and power, with the repose that comes from undisturbed self-control. There is perhaps more astuteness than in the father's face, but the look is also frank, as well as lofty and refined. Through many difficulties the plan conceived by George Calvert was put into operation by Cecilius, who is to be regarded as preëminently the founder of Maryland. His strong personality is impressed upon the whole history of that interesting community; yet singularly enough, the second Lord Baltimore never visited the colony to which the labours of his long life were devoted. He cherished at first an intention of going out with the first party of colonists, but finding that London fairly swarmed with enemies to the enterprise, he found it most prudent to stay there and contend with them. This was only the beginning of long years of arduous work in which the right time for leaving England never came, and the Moses of this new migration and fresh departure in the way of founding states was at last gathered unto his fathers without ever having set foot in the Promised Land.