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"Give to the nymph that's free from scorn,
No Irish stuff, nor Scotch overworn ;
Lassies in beaver coats, come away.
Ye shall be welcome to us night and day.
Then drink, and to be merry, etc.,
Io, to Hymen, etc."

"This harmless mirth," continues Morton, 'made by young men* that lived in hopes to have wives brought over to them, that would save them a labor to make a voyage to fetch any over, was much distrusted of the precise Separatists that kept much ado about the tythe of mint and cumin, troubling their brains more than reason would require, about things that are indifferent, and from that time Bought occasion against mine honest host of Ma-re Mount, to overthrow his undertakings, and to destroy his plantation quite clean.

"The setting up of his May-pole was a la inentable spectacle to the precise Separatists that lived at New Plymouth. They termed it an idol; yea, they called it the Calf of Horeb, and stood at defiance with the place, naming it Mount Dagon, threatening to make it a woeful mount, and not a merry mount."

Morton proceeds, in his next chapter, to relate what the Plymouth historians do not mention-a capture previous to the final one, and his escape from it:

"Many threatening speeches were given out, both against his person and his habitation, which they divulged should be consumed with fire. And taking advantage of the time when his company, which seemed little to regard their threats, were gone up into the inlands to trade with the savages for beaver, they set upon mine host at a place called Wissaguscus, where, by accident, they found him. The inhabitants theret were in good hope of the subversion of the plantation at Ma-re Mount, which they principally aimed at; and the rather because mine host was a man that endeavored to advance the dignity of the Church of England, which they, on the contrary part, would labor to vilify with uncivil terms, envying against the sacred book of Common Prayer, and mine host, that read it in a laudable manner among his family, as a practice of pioty.

"Much rejoicing was made that they had gotten their capital enemy, as they considered him, whom they proposed to hamper in such sort that he should not be able to uphold his plantation at Ma-re Mount.

The conspirators sported themselves at mine honest host that meant them no harm, and were so jocund that they feasted their bodies, and fell to tippling as if they had ob tained a great prize; like the Trojans when they had the custody of Hippeas's pine tree horse. Mine bost feigned grief, and would not be persuaded either to eat or drink, because he knew emptiness would be a means to make him as watchful as the geese kept in the Roman capitol, whereupon the contrary part the conspirators would be so drowsy, that he might have an opportunity to give them a slip instead of a tester. Six persons of the conspiracy were set to watch him at Wissagusset, but he kept waking, and, in the dead of night, one lying on the bed, for further surety, up gets mine host and got to the second door that he was to pass, which, notwithstanding the lock, he got open, and shut it after him with such violence that it affrighted some of the conspirators. The word, which was given with an alarm, was, 'O, he's gone! he's gone! what shall we do? he's gone! The rest, half asleep, start up in a maze, and, like rams, run their heads one at another full butt in the dark.

"Their grand leader, Captain Shrimp, took on most furiously, and tore his clothes for anger to see the empty nest and the bird gone. The rest were eager to have torn their hair from their heads; but it was so short that it would give them no hold. Now Captain Shrimp thought, in the loss of this prize (which he accounted his master-piece), all his power would be lost forever.

"In the mean time mine host was got home to Ma-re Mount through the woods, eight miles round about the river Monatoquit, that parted the two plantations, finding his way by the help of the lightning (for it thundered, as he went, terribly), and there he prepared pow. der, three pounds, dried for his present employment, and four good guns for him and the two assistants left at his house, with bullets of several sizes, three hundred or thereabouts, to be used if the conspirators should pursue him thither; and these two persons promised their aid in the quarrel, and confirmed that promise with a health in good rosa salis.

"Now Captain Shrimp (the first captain in the land, as he supposed) must do some act to repair this loss, and to vindicate his reputation, which had sustained blemish by this oversight.

"He takes eight persons more to him, and (like the nine worthies of New Canaan) they embark with preparations against Ma-re Mount, where this monster of a man, as their phrase was, had his den. The whole number, had the rest not been from home, being but seven, would have given Captain Shrimp (a quondam drummers) such a welcome as would

Among these wild companions was one Edward Gibbons, destined to become one of the pillars of the colony of Massachusetts Bay, and of whom, in his character of Major General of that colony, we may hereafter have occasion to speak.

↑ Since the breaking up of Weston's colony, other adventurers had settled in Wissagusset. Such is the nom de guerre under which Morton designates our Standish, probably in derisive allusion to his small size, and whom it thus appears was the leader of the Plymouth party. This is certainly a calumny.

have made him wish for a drum as big as Diogenes' tub, that he might have crept into it out of sight.

"Now, the nine worthies are approached and mine host prepared, baving intelligence by a savage that hastened in love from Wissagussct to give him notice of their intent. One of mine host's men proved a craven, the other had proved his wits to purchase a little valor before mine host had observed his posture.

"The nine worthies coming before this supposed monster (the seven-headed hydra, as they termed him), began, like Don Quixote against the wind-mill, to beat a parley and to of fer quarter (if mine host would yield); for they resolved to send him to England, and bade him lay by his arms. But he, who was the son of a soldier, having taken up arins in his just defense, replied that he would not lay by those arms, because they were so needful at sea, if he should be sent over. Yet, to save the effusion of so much worthy blood as would have issued out of the veins of those nine worthies of New Canaan, if mine host should have played upon them out of his portholes (for they were within danger like a flock of wild geese, as if they had been tailed one to another as colts to be sold at a fair), mine host was content to yield upon quarter, and did capitulate with them, in what manner it should be, with more certainty because he knew what Captain Shrimp was. He expressed that no violence should be offered to his person, none to his godds nor any of his household; but that he should have his arms and what else was requisite for the voyage, which,

their herald returns it was agreed upon, and should be performed.

"But mine host had no sooner opened tho door and issued out, but instantly Captain Shrimp and the rest of the worthies stepped to him, laid hold of his arms, and had him down; and so eagerly was every man bent against him (not regarding any agreement made with such a carnal man), that they fell upon him as if they would have eaten him. Some of them were so violent, that they would have a slice with scabbard, and all for haste; until an old soldier (of the queen's, as the proverb is), that was there by accident, clapt his gun under the weapons, and sharply rebuked these worthies for their unworthy practices; so the matter was taken into more deliberate consideration.

"Captain Shrimp and the rest of the nine worthies made themselves, by this outrageous riot, masters of mine host of Ma-re Mount, and disposed of what he had at his plantation. This they knew, in the eyes of the savages, would add to their glory, and diminish the reputation of mine honest host, whom they practiced to be rid of upon any terms, as will ingly as if he had been the very hydra of the times."*

The expenses of this enterprise, amounting to £12 7s. 3d., were paid by an assessment on eight plantations scattered along the coast, from Piscataqua to Plymouth, but several of which appear to have been little more than single families.

*Morton was sent to England under charge of Oldham, with whom the people of New Ply. nouth seem, by this time, to have become reconciled.

Soon after his departure, Endicott, who had, meanwhile, arrived at Salem, "visiting those parts," as Bradford informs us, "caused the May-pole to be cut down, and rebuked them for heir profaneness, and admonished them to look there should be better walking; so they, now, or others, changed the name again, and called it Mount Dagon."

Morton, however, returned next year, having obtained passage with Allerton, one of the prin cipal men of New Plymouth, in the trading line, but who, by this and other proceedings, soon iell into disgrace with his fellow-colonists and removed to Manhattan, which began thus early to be a city of refuge to New Englanders, who got into trouble at home. "He gave," says Bradford, "great and just offense in bringing over, for his gain, that unworthy man and instrument of mischief. Morton, who was sent home but the year before for his misdemeanors." He not only brought him over, "but to the town," i. e., Plymouth, "as it were, to nose them, and lodged him at his house for a time, using him as a scribe to do his business, till he was caused to pack him away. So he went to his old nest in the Massachusetts, where it was not long but, by his miscarriage, he gave them just occasion to lay hands upon him; and he was by them again sent prisoner into England, where he lay a good while in Exeter jail. For, besides his miscarriage here, he was vehemently suspected for the murder of a man that bad adventured moneys with him when he first came to New England; and a warrant was sent from the Lord Chief Justice to apprehend him, by virtue whereof he was, by the Governor of Massachusetts, sent into England.' With regard to this arrest, the following entries appear in the records of the colony of Massachusetts Bay, which, since Morton's former shipment to England, had superseded Plymouth in the headship of New England affairs: “Aug. 23, 1630. It was ordered that Morton, of Mount Wollaston be sent for by process." 'Sept. 7, 1630. It is ordered by this present court, that Thomas Morton, of Mount Wollaston, shall presently be set into the bilboes, and after sent prisoner into England by the ship called The Gift, now returning thither; that all his goods shall be seized upon to defray the charge of his transportation, payment of his debts, and to give satisfaction to the Indians for a canoe he unjustly took away from them; and that his house, after his goods are taken out, shall be burnt down to the ground in the sight of the Indians, for their satisfaction for many wrongs he had done them, from time to time.'

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The charge against Morton, of murder, seems to have been unfounded; and there may be some doubts, too, as to his alleged wrongs to the Indians. He was soon released, and, along with other "old planters" whom the Massachusetts colonists had sent home, became their violent enemy, and, by representations to the privy council, caused the Massachusetts people much annoyance, and even put their charter in danger. It was at this period that he published his book, entitled "New English Canaan; or, New Canaan, containing an abstract of New England, written by Thomas Morton, of Clifford's Inn, Gent., upon ten years' knowledge and

Subsequently to this expedition, Captain Standish was annually chosen one of the governor's assistants, till 1634, when he was employed on a mission of some delicacy, both on personal and public considerations, to Massachusetts. The Plymouth people had a post near the mouth of the Kennebeck river, of which, and the territory on both sides for fifteen miles on that river, they had obtained a grant, and where they carried on a lucrative trade with the neighboring Indians. An interloping vessel from Piscataqua having attempted to participate in this trade, and refusing to leave the river, a collision ensued, in which both sides had each a man killed. The Lord Say and Seale and Lord Brook, both largely concerned in the colonization of New England, were interested in this vessel; and the colony of Massachusetts Bay, partly out of regard, to those noblemen, but still more, perhaps, from the call which the magistrates of that colony seemed to think they had to meddle with and superintend the affairs of their neighbors, undertook to arrest, at Boston, Mr. Alden of Plymouth-the very man who, in the matter of Miss Mullins, had cut out Standish-who happened to have been present at the affray, though he had taken no part in it, and who afterwards had gone on business to Boston. This was in 1634, at the time of the se

rious charges made against the colony of Massachussetts Bay, by the council of New England-of which mention is made in the former article above alluded to-and the alarm excited by which. might, perhaps, have been one reason of the sensitiveness of Massachusetts upon this affair, lest they might in some way be held responsible for it. The object of Standish's mission was, to procure the release of Mr. Alden, and to obtain from the Massachusetts magistrates an acknowledgment of the jurisdiction of Plymouth over the river Kennebecka business which, at length, after some delays, was satisfactorily concluded. It was either just after this embassy to Boston, or the year before-for Bradford gives one date, and Winthrop the other, and both are very high authorities, though, as to this matter, Winthrop would seem to be right-that Standish was sent to Boston on another public errand-the prosecution for piracy of one Captain Stone, who, after living in St. Kitts in the West Indies, had removed to Virginia, whence he had come on a trading voyage to Boston, with a cargo of cows and salt. On his way thither, he had touched at Manhattan, where at the same time lay a trading_bark from Plymouth. According to Bradford's account, Stone, who was a great roysterer, having got Governor Van Twiller drunk-for they had drunk

experiments of the country." Most of the copies purport to be "Printed by Charles Green, 1632; but a single copy, with the imprint, "Printed at Amsterdam by J. F. Stam, 1637," has led to the conclusion that this was the true date of publication, and that the other title-page is a false one. The title is not intended, as might be supposed, as a sneer; on the other hand, it expresses Morton's opinion of the country as a most inviting place for settlement. He possessed good powers of observation, considerable humor, and, as his abundant classical allusions show, was an educated person. The work is divided into three books, of which the first relates to the Indians, and the second to the "internal endowments" or productions of the country. Both these parts are curious and valuable, especially the first. In the third book, Morton gives an account of the settlements and settlers, not so much by way of continuous narrative, as in a series of satirical sketches, in which he speaks of the leading personages, not by their own names, but by nicknames of his own imposing. Thus, Standish, as we have seen, is called Captain Shrimp: Endicott is called Littleworth; Winthrop, Temperwell; and so of others. The book is dedicated to the Lords of the Privy Council, Commissioners for the Government of all His Majesty's Foreign Provinces-the same commission of which Laud was the head, and which inspired so much dread in Massachusetts. "It is," he says, in his dedication, "but a widow's mite; but all that rapine and wrong have left me to bring from thence."

Its publication did him no good in New England, where, after the breaking out of the civil war between Charles and the parliament, he ventured to return. Winthrop, under date of Dec. 3, 1643, thus notices his arrival: "At this time came over Thomas Morton, our professed old adversary, who had set forth a book against us, and written reproachful and menacing letters to some of us." He was called before the court of assistants, "presently after the lecture," and his various offenses against the colony charged upon him, and some of his own letters produced. "Having been kept," adds Winthrop, "in prison about a year, in expectation of further evidence out of England, he was again called before the court, and, after some debate what to do with him, ho was fined £100, and set at liberty. He was a charge to the country, for he had nothing; and we thought not fit to inflict corporal punishment upon him, being old and crazy, but thought better to fine him and give him his liberty, as if it had been to procure his fine, but, indeed, to leave him opportunity to go out of the jurisdiction, as he did soon after, went to Agomenticus, and, living there poor and despised, died within two years after."

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en governors in those days as well as now-had persuaded him, though there W89 no occasion at all or any color of ground for such a thing," to allow him (Stone) to seize the Plymouth vessel. "So he got on board," says Bradford, "the chief of their (i. e., the Plymouth) ship's-men and merchant being ashore, and with some of his own men made the rest of theirs weigh anchor, set sail, and carry her away towards Virginia. But divers of the Dutch seamen, who had been often at Plymouth and kindly entertained there, said one to another: 'Shall we suffer our friends to be thus abused and have their goods carried away before our faces, whilst our governor is drunk? They vowed they never would suffer it; and so got a vessel or two and pursued him, and brought him in again and delivered them (i. e., the Plymouth men) their bark and goods again." After this escapade, Stone proceeded to Boston, whither Standish was sent to prosecute him for piracy. This prosecution, however, was not proceeded with, the difficulty, according to Bradford, being made up "by the mediation of friends," though Winthrop gives as the reason, the opiaion of the Massachusetts magistrates, that the charge of piracy could not be sustained, inasmuch as the master of the Plymouth pinnace had, after she was restored to him, agreed with Stone and the Dutch governor, by a solemn instrument under his hand, to pass the matter by. "In company," says Bradford," with some other gentlemen, Stone came afterwards to Plymouth, and had friendly and civil entertainment with the rest; but revenge boiled within his breast, though concealed; for some conceived he had a purpose at one time to have stabbed the governor, and put his hand to his dagger for that end, but by God's providence, and the vigilance of some, was prevented."

This same worthless Stone, having been sent away from Massachusetts, under pain of death if he returned without permission, on his way homeward entered the Connecticut river, where he was cut off with his whole company, eleven in number, by a band of Pequods. There were various stories as to the

precise manner of his death, none very authentic; but the Pequods insisted that he had been the aggressor, a thing in itself, from what we know of the man, exceedingly probable. As Stone belonged to Virginia, the magistrates of Massachusetts wrote to Governor Harvey of that colony "to move him to stir in the matter;" but, in the disturbed state of Virginia affairs-Harvey being in the midst of a violent quarrel with his subjects-no notice appears to

have been taken of their letter, and the dubious death of this drunkard and pirate was made the occasion, two years after, for the famous Pequod war.

Meanwhile, in 1635, Standish was employed in another important enterprise. In addition to their trading-post on the Kennebeck, the Plymouth men had established two others; one at Penobscot, the other still further east, almost at the entrance of the Bay of Fundy. This latter post, however, was hardly established, when it was attacked by the French, who killed two of the men, and took all the goods at their own valuation. Not long after, the Penobscot house was rifled by another French party, piloted by a "false Scot"-probably one of Alexander's Nova Scotia settlers-and goods to the value of £500 were carried off. In 1635, Rasillai, governor of Acadie, for the company of New France, sent an armed ship to Penobscot, which took possession of the Plymouth tradinghouse. Bills on France were given for the goods, at a valuation, however, fixed by the captors. The men were sent home with a message that the company of New France claimed the coast as far south and west as Pemaquid Point (about half way between Penobscot and Kennebeck), and intended to "displant" all the English who might settle eastward of that point.

Roused by this aggression, the people of Plymouth attempted to recover their trading-house by force. They hired for the expedition an English vessel—“ a fair ship of about 300 tons and well filled with ordinance"- upon an advantageous agreement with Gurling, the master, in case of success, to pay him seven hundred pounds of beaver, worth then

He had been found, Winthrop tells us, "drunk upon a bed in the night, with one Bearcroft's wife; and when he was arrested on a warrant, just as he was about to sail, had used brawling and threatening speeches to Mr. Ludlow, one of the magistrates, for which he had been put in irons."

£350 sterling; but, in case of failure, he was to lose his labor and have nothing.

Standish sailed in company with Gurling, in the colony's bark, with twenty men, to act as pilot, and to occupy the post when it should be conquered, having, also, the beaver on board to pay Gurling if he succeeded. According to Bradford, Gurling greatly mismanaged the business, refusing to listen to Standish's advice, and the expedition was abandoned for want of powder, of which he had a very insufficient supply.

Upon this repulse, application was made to Massachusetts Bay for assistance to recover Penobscot, and upon request of the Massachusetts magistrates that "some men of trust" might be sent to Boston, to treat upon the matter, Captain Standish and Mr. Prince, another of the leading Plymouth colonists, were dispatched thither to arrange the terms of the alliance.

The Massachusetts magistrates offered to furnish men and munition, if Plymouth would pay the expense. The Plymouth commissioners insisted, on the other hand, that this was "a common cause of the whole country"-both colonies having an equal interest in maintaining the right of the English to trade with the Eastern Indians. But as the Massachusetts magistrates still declined to give aid, except at the expense of Plymouth, the negotiation fell through, and from that time forward, for the next hundred years or more, Penobscot bay remained in possession of the French.

In the Pequod war, waged during the years 1636 and 1637, upon so little ground, and prosecuted with such exterminating fury, Standish took no active part. The people of Plymouth, notwithstanding the shabby behavior of Massachusetts Bay, in the Penobscot affair, raised sixty men for the second and decisive campaign, that of 1637; but these men were placed under the command of Lieutenant William Holmes, who was better acquainted with the geography of those parts, and a man of tried bravery, too, having, in 1633, in spite of the Dutch and their display of military force to resist him, succeeded in establishing, just above the Dutch House of Good Hope, on the present site of Hartford, a Plymouth tradinghouse, the first English settlement within the limits of the present state of Connecticut. Immediately upon the break

ing out of this war, Standish and Holmes had been appointed jointly to instruct the people of the territory in the use of arms, for which they were to be paid £20 a year.

In 1637, the town of Duxbury, situato on the north shore of Plymouth bay, and by water three miles distant from Plymouth. was incorporated. There had been a settlement there for six years previously, and Standish was one of the first settlers. He lived on a farm of 170 acres on a "neck of land," in the southeast part of the town, but for several years resided, during the winter, in Plymouth, for convenience of attending to public affairs, and the oversight of the fort which he commanded. The name Duxbury was, doubtless, selected for the town in reference to one of the English residences of the family of which our gallant captain was an offshoot.

Another opportunity soon occurred for Standish to give a new display of his spirit. The eight colonists, of whom Standish was one, who had taken it upon themselves to pay off the London adventurers, had entered, in order to carry on the Indian trade, of which they had secured a temporary monopoly, into a partnership with four London merchants. This partnership having expired, the London partners, with whom there had been many disagreements, sent word that they could not make up the accounts without the help of somebody from Plymouth, designating in particular Edward Winslow. But they had formerly written such bitter and threatening letters that Winslow was afraid to go. Two years before; on a visit to England on the Colony's affairs, he had been thrown into the Fleet prison, and detained there four months through the agency of Archbishop Laud, on a charge brought against him by Morton of Merry Mount, that, though a layman, he had presumed to teach in the church of Plymouth, and to perform the marriage ceremony. With this experience, he was afraid that, if he went now, he might be arrested by his partners on a claim of so large an amount that he could not give bail, or otherwise "might be brought into trouble by the archbishop's means." Thereupon the gallant Standish volunteered to face the Fleet prison, the London partners, and the archbishop; but, on consultation with Governor Winthrop

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