Page:The works of Anne Bradstreet in prose and verse.djvu/116

 32 A line Bradjireet'' s Works.

��Vpon my dear and loving Juijhand his goeing into Eng-

land, yan. i6, 1661.*

��o

��THOV moft high who ruleft All,

��And hear'ft the Prayers of Thine; O hearken, Lord, vnto my fuit, And my Petition ligne.

Into thy everlafting Armes

Of mercy I commend Thy fervant, Lord. Keep and preferve

My hufband, my dear freind.

At thy command, O Lord, he went, Nor novght could keep him back;

��* This was in 1662 (N. S.), on occasion of Bradstreet's mission to Eng- land with the Rev. John Norton (see Introduction). Thej did not sail until the nth of February. John Hull, who was their companion out and back, says, in his Diary (Arch. Amer. iii. 205-6), " loth of Feb., Mr. Norton, Mr. Broadstreet, Mr. Davis, and myself, went on shipboard. Next morning, set sail; and, by the 2Sth March, we saw the Lizard; and, 22d of 1st, we arrived in the Downs. After a few days, the messengers addressed themselves to the Court, delivered their letters to the Lord Chancellor, re- ceived good words from him. After their minds, by several comings, fully known, they had fair promises of a full grant to their whole desire in the country's behalf. But their writing, which they drew in order thereunto, at last unsigned ; and another letter, wherein was sundry things ordered for the country to attend which seemed somewhat inconsistent with our patent and former privileges, in the beginning of said letter confirmed, and which some endeavor to take advantage from to the change [of] our good laws and customs."

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