Even to your worship’s bitterment, hab, nab.”
Here the Countryman makes the remark, and not the Justice; but a wholly correct allusion by Morton is not to be looked for. (Supra, [123], note 2.) The meaning of hab, nab is, of course, “hit or miss, at a venture, at random,” and is probably derived from habbe, nabbe,—“to have or not to have.” (See Nares’s Glossary.)
[562] By the General Court of May, 1644, it was ordered, that “Nantascot shall be called Hull.” (Records, vol. ii. p. 74.) Mr. Savage, in his notes to Winthrop (vol. ii. p. *175), and Mr. Whitmore (Proc. Mass. Hist. Soc. 1871-3, p. 397), think it was so called from Hull in Yorkshire. It would appear from the text that it had been locally known by that name among the “old planters” before the settlement of Boston.
[563] Sir Christopher Gardiner suddenly appeared in Massachusetts in May, 1630, and returned to England in 1632, arriving there in August. He is supposed to have come out as an agent, or emissary, of Sir Ferdinando Gorges. I had begun the preparation of a note on Sir Christopher, and “how hee spedd amongst the Seperatists,” for insertion at this point; but the subject developed on my hands until it assumed the shape of a study by itself. It can be found in the Proceedings of the Mass. Hist. Soc. for January, 1883, vol. xx.
[564] Machiavelli died in 1527, and The Prince was published in 1532. The reputation of the man and of the book were as well established in Morton’s day as they are now.
“Nick Machiavel had ne’er a trick,
(Tho’ he gave his name to our old Nick.)”
(Hudibras, p. III. can. i. lines 1313-4.)