Mourt’s Relation is clearly a book which offers different meanings to every reader. I hope that this edition may reach a broad audience and increase popular understanding of a neglected portion of the American experience.
A Note on This Edition
My intention is to provide the contemporary reader with an appreciation of this exciting book as it was received by an eager and curious public when it was first published almost three and a half centuries ago. In keeping with this aim, the entire text is included here, in the order of the original.[6] So that the authors may speak forcefully and directly to the reader of today, I have introduced only uniform spelling, punctuation, and paragraphing, structural niceties which were of no concern to authors or printers until late in the eighteenth century. The eloquent English language of the period is familiar to us all, through the King James version of the Bible or the works of Shakespeare, and I have scrupulously left each word intact. The text, then, is reproduced verbatim, including marginalia, chapter headings, and running heads, altered only by the use of modern orthography for the sake of clarity.
I have deliberately avoided distracting the reader from the original text, by introducing a minimum of footnotes. Some annotation seems indispensable for understanding the work of another age, but this edition does not bear the tender burden of scholarly disquisition. Modern equivalents are given for archaic words and place-names, and I have offered brief explanations of a few outdated allusions. Dates are retained as in the original, so that ten days must be added to any date given in the text in order to fit it into the modern Gregorian calendar, which was not adopted by England and her colonies until 1752.
In the exacting task of collating this text with the original, I was helped by my friend and colleague, Anna Mae Cooper. We worked in the John Carter Brown Library where Thomas R. Adams kindly put excellent facilities at our disposal, including the library’s copy of the first edition of the book, as well as the Smith and Champlain maps. Lucille Hanna first introduced me to the excitement of history, and J. L. Giddings pointed out the ethnographic value of Mourt’s Relation. Miss Rose T. Briggs, Director of Pilgrim Hall, shared her enthusiasm and broad knowledge of the Pilgrims. E. Lawrence Couter, David Freeman, Arthur G. Pyle, Muriel Stefani, and the entire staff of Plimoth Plantation were helpful in many ways, and the corporation generously provided the photographs. The title page, ornamental letters and top-page designs are reproduced from a copy of the original, now in possession of the Rhode Island Historical Society. Mrs. N. Mac Donald typed from a difficult manuscript.
An adventure such as this rightfully belongs to all who would chase rainbows!
DWIGHT B. HEATH
Brown University
Providence, R. I.
SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN’S MAP OF PLYMOUTH HARBOR
Although the Pilgrims were the first Europeans to establish a permanent colony in northeastern North America, they did not come to an unknown land. As early as 1605, Samuel de Champlain had mapped Plymouth Harbor, in the course of a three-year expedition during which he explored the coast from Nova Scotia to Martha’s Vineyard. The quality of his detailed and accurate observations on the land and people appears in this map, and in his notes on the visit: “There came to us two or three canoes, which had just been fishing for cod and other fish which are found there in large numbers. These they catch with hooks made of a piece of wood, to which they attach a bone in the shape of a spear and fasten it very securely. The whole has a fang-shape, and the line attached to it is made out of the bark of a tree. They gave me one of their hooks, which I took out of curiosity. In it the bone was fastened on by hemp, like that in France, as it seemed to me, and they told me that they gathered this plant without being obliged to cultivate it, and indicated that it grew to the height of four or five feet. This canoe went back on shore to give notice to their fellow inhabitants, who caused columns of smoke to arise on our account. We saw eighteen or twenty savages, who came to the shore and began to dance. Our canoe landed in order to give them some bagatelles, at which they were greatly pleased. Some of them came to us and begged us to go to their river. We weighed anchor to do so, but were unable to enter on account of the small amount of water, it being low tide, and were accordingly obliged to anchor at the mouth. I went ashore, where I saw many others, who received us very cordially. I made also an examination of the river, but saw only an arm of water extending a short distance inland, where the land is only in part cleared. Running into this is merely a brook not deep enough for boats except at full tide. The circuit of the bay is about a league. On one side of the entrance to this bay there is a point which is almost an island, covered with wood, principally pines, and adjoins sandbanks, which are very extensive. On the other side, the land is high. There are two islets in this bay, which are not seen until one has entered, and around which it is almost entirely dry at low tide. This place is very conspicuous from the sea, for the coast is very low, excepting the cape at the entrance to the bay. We named it the Port du Cap. St. Louis...”.
