A Book of American Explorers

by Thomas Wentworth Higginson

The form of the earth here, in the superficies of it, is neither too flat in the plainness, nor too high in hills, but partakes of both in a mediocrity, and fit for pasture, or for plough or meadow ground, as men please to employ it. Though all the country be, as it were, a thick wood for the general, yet in divers places there is much ground cleared by the Indians, and especiallyabout the plantation; and I am told, that, about three miles from us, a man may stand on a little hilly place, and see divers thousands of acres of ground as good as need to be, and not a tree in the same.…

In our plantation we have already a quart of milk for a penny. But the abundant increase of corn proves this country to be a wonderment. Thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, are ordinary here: yea, Joseph’s increase in Egypt is outstripped here with us. Our planters hope to have more than a hundred-fold this year. And all this while I am within compass: what will you say of two-hundred-fold, and upwards? It is almost incredible what great gain some of our English planters have had by our Indian corn. Credible persons have assured me, and the party himself avouched the truth of it to me, that, of the setting of thirteen gallons of corn, he hath had increase of it fifty-two hogsheads, every hogshead holding seven bushels of London measure; and every bushel was by him sold and trusted to the Indians for so much beaver as was worth eighteen shillings; and so of this thirteen gallons of corn, which was worth six shillings eightpence, he made about £327 of it the year following, as by reckoning will appear: where you may see how God blesseth husbandry in this land. There is not such great and plentiful ears of corn, I suppose, anywhere else to be found but in this country, being also of variety of colors, as red, blue, and yellow, &c.; and of one corn there springeth four or five hundred. I have sent you many ears of divers colors, that you might see the truth of it.

Little children here, by setting of corn, may earn much more than their own maintenance.…

For beasts, there are some bears, and they say some lions also; for they have been seen at Cape Ann. Also here are several sorts of deer, some whereof bring three or four young ones at once, which is not ordinary in England; also wolves, foxes, beavers, martens, great wildcats,and a great beast called a molke,[451] as big as an ox. I have seen the skins of all these beasts since I came to this plantation, excepting lions. Also here are great store of squirrels,—some greater, and some smaller and lesser: there are some of the lesser sort, they tell me,that by a certain skin will fly from tree to tree,[452] though they stand far distant.

Of the Water of New England.

New England hath water enough, both salt and fresh. The greatest sea in the world, the Atlantic Sea, runs all along the coast thereof. There are abundance of islands along the shore, some full of wood and mast, to feed swine, and others clear of wood, and fruitful, to bear corn. Also we have store of excellent harbors for ships, as at Cape Ann, and at Masathulets Bay, and at Salem, and at many other places; and they are the better, because for strangers there is a very difficult and dangerous passage into them; but unto such as are well acquainted with them they are easy and safe enough. The abundance of sea-fish are almost beyond believing; and sure I should scarce have believed it, except I had seen it with mine own eyes. I saw great store of whales, and grampuses, and such abundance of mackerels,that it would astonish one to behold; likewise codfish, abundance on the coast, and in their season are plentifully taken. There is a fish called a bass, a most sweet and wholesome fish as ever I did eat: it is altogether as good as our fresh salmon; and the season of their coming was begun when we came first to New England in June, and so continued about three months’ space. Of this fish our fishers take many hundreds together, which I have seen lying on the shore, to my admiration. Yea, their nets ordinarily take more than they are able to haul to land; and, for want of boats and men, they are constrained to let a many go after they have taken them; and yet sometimes they fill two boats at a time with them. And, besides bass, we take plenty of skate and thornback, and abundance of lobsters; and the least boy in the plantation may both catch and eat what he will of them. For my own part, I was soon cloyed with them, they were so great and fat and luscious. I have seen some myself that have weighed sixteen pound; but others have had, divers times, so great lobsters as have weighed twenty-five pound, as they assured me.…

Of the Air of New England.

The temper of the air of New England is one special thing that commends this place. Experience doth manifest that there is hardly a more healthful place to be found in the world that agreeth better with our English bodies. Many that have been weak and sickly in Old England, by coming hither have been thoroughly healed, and grown healthful and strong; for here is a most extraordinary clear and dry air, that is of a mosthealing nature to all such as are of a cold, melancholy, phlegmatic, rheumatic temper of body. None can more truly speak hereof by their own experience than myself. My friends that knew me can well tell how very sickly I have been, and continually in physic.…

And I that have not gone without a cap for many years together, neither durst leave off the same, have now cast away my cap, and do wear none at all in the daytime. And whereas beforetime I clothed myself with double clothes and thick waistcoats to keep me warm, even in the summer-time, I do now go as thin clad as any.… Besides, I have one of my children, that was formerly most lamentably handled with sore breaking out of both his hands and feet, of the king’s-evil; but since he came hither he is very well [as] ever he was, and there is hope of perfect recovery shortly, even by the very wholesomeness of the air, altering, digesting, and drying up the cold and crude humors of the body; and therefore I think it is a wise course for all cold complexions to come to take physic in New England; for a sup of New England’s air is better than a whole draught of Old England’s ale.

In the summer-time, in the midst of July and August, it is a good deal hotter than in Old England; and in winter January and February are much colder, so they say; but the spring and autumn are of a middle temper.