[466] This chapter relates to incidents of no apparent consequence, and of which there is no other record. It is not easy even to fix the time at which they occurred, and it would seem as if Morton, in his rambling, incoherent way, had confused the events of one year with those of another. The only time when “35 stout knaves” were landed, at all in the way described, at Plymouth, was in July, 1622, when the Charity brought in there Weston’s company. Yet Morton speaks of there then being “three cows” at Plymouth, which would indicate that Morton’s arrival, referred to in the text, was not in July 1622, but at some time subsequent to the spring of 1624, when Winslow brought over “three heifers and a bull, the first beginning of any cattle of that kind in the land.” (Bradford, p. 158.) Yet Weston, again, had no “barque” at Plymouth after 1623. The chapter seems to have been introduced simply for the purpose of working on the church prejudices of Laud against the Puritans. (See supra, [93-4].) There is in it a combination of “the booke of common prayer” and “claret sparklinge neate,” which is suggestive of the Book of Sports as well as of “the Word of God.”
[467] Bradford, p. 158.
[468] Facilis descensus Averno. Æneid, vi. 127.
[469] A killock is a small anchor. The phrase in the text means that the wind caused the boat to drag her anchor, and she went ashore and was stove in.
[470] The episode of Lyford and Oldham, in the history of the Plymouth plantation, is told in detail by Bradford. The account in the text differs from Bradford’s account only in that it is the other side of the story. (See Bradford, pp. 172-88.)
[471] See infra, [324], note. Though Lyford frequently exercised in the Plymouth church, as an elsewhere ordained brother, he was never installed as its pastor. When admitted to it, Bradford says he made “a large confession,” saying, among other things, “that he held not himself a minister till he had a new calling.” (Bradford, pp. 181, 185, 188.)
[473] This chapter and Chapter XIII. (pp. 273-6) relate to the same matter. It is impossible to venture a surmise even as to their meaning. It would seem clear that they have no historical value, but relate rather to some humorous incident—having the full seventeenth-century flavor of coarseness—which occurred in the settlement of Boston Bay. Apparently, judging by the expressions, “this goodly creature of incontinency” (Infra, [*129]), “that had tried a camp royal in other parts” ([*121]), some English prostitute found her way out to Mount Wollaston, in company with one of the adventurers there, and subsequently went on to Virginia. She may have come with Wollaston, and been left in Boston Bay when her companion went to Virginia, and then followed him, giving birth to a child on the way. This would explain the allusion to Phyllis and Demophoön subsequently made (p. *129). It is, however, a mere surmise on a subject not worth puzzling over.
[474] It does not need to be said that this is one of Morton’s preposterous statements. As the settlement of Virginia dated from 1607, the twenty-seven years he speaks of was equivalent to saying, “up to the time at which he was writing,” viz. 1634. Virginia was then not only a much older settlement, but it had a population largely in excess of that of New England.