The Puritans foresaw opportunities to punish the enemy, at the enemy’s own expense. A second expedition, to go against Quebec, was planned, the patriots expecting in confidence that, like the first, it would surely succeed, if Phipps were at its head, and that the plunder would more than repay the initial expenses of the expedition.
Sir William, having expressed his doubts of the wisdom of this over-ambitious scheme, nevertheless commanded the fleet once more as it sailed away, eager for further conquest.
The enterprise was doomed to failure from the first. It dragged out interminably, it developed jealousies, it was ill-planned. Such a bedraggled, failure-smitten lot of lame-duck sloops returned to Boston that the council were simply appalled. They had expended so much of their meager hoard of funds on the venture, that the treasury was practically bankrupted.
Blame rained upon the head of Phipps, for not having succeeded against impossible conditions. Driven to extremities, by the woeful lack of plunder, the colony-fathers were obliged, for the first time in their history, to issue paper currency. The notes ranged in value from denominations of two shillings up to ten pounds.
Still an undimmed patriot, ready to serve his country in whatsoever direction an opportunity was afforded, Williams Phipps gave his gold for the colony’s bills, absorbing thus a very considerable sum. His example induced investments in the paper from all directions. Nevertheless the currency soon came tumbling down in value, till a pound in paper was worth less than three-fourths of its face.
The sailors, and other working people, lost heavily, in these times of trouble and weakened confidence. Yet eventually the money was all redeemed at par by the Massachusetts government.
Sir William, weary of being reviled for his pains, returned to England once again and resumed his labors with Increase Mather, to secure to the colony a definite charter.
CHAPTER V.
OLD ACQUAINTANCES.
Adam Rust failed, even in the intricacies of collecting violins and the pursuit of health for the old beef-eaters, to find the depths of forgetfulness she sought, but which could not come to a nature such as his had always been. Indeed seclusion, away from the gaiety of Court and his fellow-beings seemed rather to develop the old, half-forgotten memories in his brain, whereon had once been shadowed the sufferings of King Philip, his Indian foster-father, and all his race of hunted people.