[Portland Advertiser, April 26, 1866.]
"THE LAST POPHAM ADDRESS."

Under the above caption there was printed in the Boston Daily Advertiser of the 11th instant, over the signature of "P.," what purports to be a review of Prof. Patterson's Address at the Celebration of the two hundred and fifty-eighth Anniversary of the Planting of the Popham Colony, at Sagadahoc.

At the first reading of this somewhat curious review, I supposed the writer had intended to throw ridicule on the Popham celebrations, and all concerned in them; but, on a closer perusal, I concluded that he has, to the extent of his abilities, really undertaken to overthrow the whole history of that settlement, and all that has been written about them, by the force of his arguments.

He commences his theme by ridiculing the "Popham Memorial," the "Vindication of Gorges," and some other publications; but without attempting to reply to any part of them. He next goes on to tell us that Mr. Patterson is a scholar, has been a Professor at Dartmouth College, and is now a Member of Congress; and then commences his onslaught by stating, that on that spot (Sabino) a colony of convicted criminals landed in 1607, more than half of whom deserted the next December, and the remainder left the next spring, after committing the most shocking barbarities on the Indians; and refers to Williamson's History of Maine, and Parkman's Pioneers,—neither of which authorities justify any such statement; and, although trying to ridicule some of Professor Patterson's sentiments, charges him with branching off into a subject that has no relation to the question at all.

Leaving the thirty odd pages of the Address without any remarks, he attacks a letter, written as a reply to an invitation to be present on that occasion, in which the writer notices the building of a ship by the colonists, as a fact of some importance, which, all the writers on that expedition say, took part of the colonists to England. But let us follow him through his many wild and unsupported assertions relating to that vessel. And here it may be proper to say, that the letter does not endorse the authors of the Popham Memorial, or any part of their theory, but at the outset expresses a dissent to many of the claims made by those writers, and refers almost entirely to the ship and its history. This reviewer, after some grand denunciations, finally concentrates his arguments into three stately propositions.

First, that the vessel never was built, because there was not time, and also that there was not over ten carpenters, or forty persons, in all the colony to do it,—while we know that since that day vessels of five times her size have been built with half that force, and in much less time, in that immediate vicinity. Second, that there was no need of a vessel; and third, that she was built of green pine, and no one would wish himself in her; and so the idea that she made the voyage is absurd. Now this is exactly the famous kettle argument over again, with results just as conclusive.

In reply to these three formal propositions, it is only necessary to say, that the fact of the building of the vessel rests on as good authority as any historical statement relating to that colony; that there were sufficient men and full time to do it in; and that there can be no doubt it was intended to build a ship when the expedition left England, from the fact that they brought out a master ship-builder and workmen. That she was built of "green pine" is an assumption very improbable, when we know that the growth along that shore was mainly hardwood, while pine predominates in the interior. But his most severe tirades are poured out upon the poor colonists, calling them felons, knaves, cowards, and almost exhausting the vocabulary of Billingsgate. To this I will not attempt to reply, but merely remark, that his language, style and logic, is as far removed from the "pure well of English undefiled" as a pool of stagnant water is from a perennial fountain.

A passing reader of his famous review would be at a loss to understand why this terrible onset is made on this small pamphlet,—nine-tenths of which he says does not refer to the Popham subject at all,—as though he expected to conquer them, Chinese-like, by only making a great noise. But a friend at my elbow says that this is a broadside in advance, or, rather, the fire of his skirmish line, and only preparatory to the advance of his big guns, which are to come in the shape of a preface to a reprint, in which he intended to entirely annihilate the Pophams, the Gorges, all their followers and biographers, great and small, rich and poor, so completely that our histories will have to be rewritten, and these old names that have been so prominent in our early annals obliterated entirely; and finally to destroy the granite walls of Fort Popham, memorial stone and all, and by further displays of his cut-and-thrust logic prove conclusively that it is all a myth, and nothing of the kind ever existed. Nous verrons.

Orient.