The river is half a mile broad at Dighton, with low, uninteresting shores. The "Writing Rock," a large boulder of fine-grained greenstone, is submerged either wholly or in part by the tidal flow, but when uncovered presents a smooth face, slightly inclined toward the open river. When so close as to lay hold of it, you are aware, of faint impressions on its surface, yet these have become so nearly effaced by the action of the tides and the chafing of drift ice as to be fragmentary, and therefore disappointing. As is usual, the action of the salt air has turned this, as other rocks by the shores, to a dusky red color. Seventy years ago the characters or lines traced on the rock were by actual measurement an inch in breadth by half an inch in depth, and distinct enough to attract attention from the decks of passing vessels.
The rock is first mentioned, says Schoolcraft, in a sermon of Dr. Danforth, of 1680. The river had then been frequented by white men for sixty years. It is next alluded to in the dedication of a sermon to Sir H. Ashurst by Cotton Mather, in these words: "Among the other curiosities of New England one is that of a mighty rock, on a perpendicular side whereof, by a river which at high tide covers part of it, there are very deeply engraved, no man alive knows how or when, about half a score lines near ten foot long and a foot and a half broad, filled with strange characters, which would suggest as odd thoughts about them that were here before us as there are odd shapes in that elaborate monument, whereof you shall see the first line transcribed here."
In the "Philosophical Transactions" of the Royal Society of London, covering a period from 1700 to 1720, are several communications from Cotton Mather, one of which (part iv., p. 112) is as follows:
"At Taunton, by the side of a tiding river, part in, part out of the river, is a large Rock; on the perpendicular side of which, next to the Stream, are seven or eight lines, about seven or eight foot long, and about a foot wide, each of them ingraven with unaccountable characters, not like any known character."[307]
Schoolcraft believed the work to have been performed by Indians. Washington, who had some knowledge of their hieroglyphics, was of this opinion. Dr. Belknap asserts that they were acquainted with sculpture, and also instances their descriptive drawings on the bark of trees. Sculptured rocks, of which the origin is unknown, have been found in other locations in the United States. Since the unsettling of Norse traditions, the characters on Dighton Rock are generally admitted to be of Indian creation; but if the work of white men, it would strengthen the theory of Verazzani's presence in these waters.
Another link of the supposed discovery by Northmen was the skeleton exhumed about 1834 at Fall River. It was found in a sitting posture, having a plate of brass upon its breast, with arrow-heads of the same metal lying near, thin, flat, and of triangular shape. The arrows had been contained within a quiver of bark, that fell in pieces when exposed to the air. The most remarkable thing about the remains was a belt encircling the body, composed of brass tubes four and a half inches in length, the width of the belt, and placed close together longitudinally. The breastplate, belt, and arrow-heads were considered so many evidences that the skeleton was that of some Scandinavian who had died and been buried here by the natives.
An antiquary would of course prize a dead Scandinavian more than many living ones. These mouldering bones and corroded trinkets were not, however, the key to Dighton Rock. The mode of sepulture was that practiced by the natives of this continent. In Archer's account of Gosnold's voyage he speaks of the Indians on the south of Cape Cod as follows:
"This day there came unto the ship's side divers canoes, the Indians appareled as aforesaid, with tobacco and pipes steeled with copper, skins, artificial strings, and other trifles, to barter; one had hanging about his neck a plate of rich copper, in length a foot, in breadth half a foot, for a breastplate."
John Brereton, of the same voyage, tells us more of the Indians of the Elizabeth Islands: "They have also great store of copper, some very red, and some of a paler color; none of them but have chains, ear-rings, or collars of this metal: they had some of their arrows herewith, much like our broad arrow-heads, very workmanly made. Their chains are many hollow pieces cemented together, each piece of the bigness of one of our reeds, a finger in length, ten or twelve of them together on a string, which they wear about their necks; their collars they wear about their bodies like bandeliers, a handful broad, all hollow pieces like the other, but somewhat shorter, four hundred pieces in a collar, very fine and evenly set together." Were this evidence less positive, we know from Champlain that the Indians would never have permitted the body of a stranger to remain buried longer than was necessary to disinter and despoil it. Verazzani's letter mentions the possession of copper trinkets by the Indians.
About two miles and a half from Taunton Green is the Leonard Forge, the oldest in America. The spot is exceedingly picturesque. The brook, overhung by trees, which of yore turned the mill-wheel, glides beneath a rustic bridge ere it tumbles over the dam and hurries on to meet the river. James and Henry Leonard built the forge in 1652.