The Founding of New England/VIII

CHAPTER VIII

THE GROWTH OF A FRONTIER

I the first chapter we called attention to the importance of the Appalachian barrier in long confining the process of colonizing within bounds, and preventing that wide dispersion which rendered so precarious the hold of France upon its far larger American empire. The relation of area to barrier, in that section chosen by the English, was, indeed, almost ideal for the formation of colonies, and, subsequently, of a nation through their union. While the mountains kept the original settlements within bounds until their population and institutions had both had opportunity to develop and take strong root, the extent of the continental mass behind, simple in its physiographic features, was sufficient for the growth of almost unlimited numbers and a unified state, and, so, for the effective influence upon the world of whatever form of culture might there arise. The West Indian colonies, on the other hand, in spite of their rapid growth, could not fail, eventually, to become politically unimportant, merely from their limited area and resulting limited population. Barbadoes, for example, comprised only one hundred and sixty-six square miles, the equivalent of one seventh of the land-surface of Rhode Island, or one fiftieth of that of Massachusetts. Within a century from its settlement, it contained no ungranted or uncultivated land&#8212;a condition which must have been approximated long before. The possibility of growth, beyond a certain point, was, therefore, lacking in the islands, and, from the same cause, their development was to a great extent uninfluenced by another factor, which was of marked importance in the continental colonies and the nation for two centuries and a half. This factor was the constantly advancing frontier, with it: radical reactions upon the thought and institutions of the also constantly expanding older settlements.

American political thought has been moulded, to a very great extent, by the two ideals, of unrestricted competition in exploiting the resources of the continent, and of a democracy fostered by the semi-isolated and self-reliant life of the frontier, with its comparative equality of opportunity and of economic status. Both these ideals, until a recent period, were developed by the presence of free land, in which they had largely had their origin. As we have already pointed out, land in New England, in the earliest period, was to be obtained without either purchase price or rent, to which fact, perhaps, had been due the large non-Puritan immigration that mingled with the religious stream from 1630 to 1640.

It is also to the influence of the frontier that the American intellect owes some of its most marked characteristics: its restlessness, its preoccupation with the practical, its lack of interest in the &#230;sthetic and philosophical, its desire for ends and neglect of means, its preference of cleverness to training, its self-confidence, its individualism, and its extreme provinciality. The influence, moreover, has been a continuing one, for almost every decade in American history, until 1890, witnessed the creation of a new frontier, which lay just a little beyond the settled regions, and reacted upon them.

In describing the first expansion of the New England frontier, therefore, we are concerned with the earliest manifestation of one of the most potent forces in American history. The fringe of little settlements along the coast had been, indeed, the frontier of Europe; but with the planting of settlements farther inland, an American frontier came into existence, to react upon what, with the rapid movement of time characteristic of a new country, soon became the conservative, older East. That frontier has always been the refuge of the restless and the discontented, of those who have desired a freer, if not greater, economic opportunity, as well as of those who have been unable to adjust themselves to the prosaic life of a settled community, with its penalties of one sort or another for such as will not yield at least lip-service to its social, religious, or political beliefs. In Massachusetts there was no more room&#8212;if, indeed, there were as much&#8212;for those who disagreed with the authorities in any particular, than there had been at home; and those who came to that colony in the hope of enjoying any larger degree of religious toleration or civil liberty than in England were promptly disillusioned. About the time of the last events described in the preceding chapter, the prospects for freedom of thought or action must have looked as dark to the dwellers in Massachusetts not wholly in sympathy with the rulers&#8217; policy, as it had looked to those same rulers in the old country, when they met at the Earl of Lincoln&#8217;s, and decided to remove to the wilderness. The opposition having become the government, it was now forcing a new opposition to follow the same course, involuntarily by banishment or voluntarily by free migration. Before continuing the story of that movement, however, we must allude briefly to that portion of the European frontier which lay northward of the Puritan settlements, and which, like them, had been formed by immigration from the Old World.

During the period we are now discussing, the history of Maine was the story of confused grants of territory and of the planting of small isolated farming, fishing, and trading communities. The existence led by the inhabitants, in their solitary shacks or little villages, was that of a rough border life in which the monotony of the hard, bitter winters, and the routine of planting, fishing, or bargaining for furs, was punctuated by an occasional murder among themselves, and by quarrels, sometimes bloody, with the Indians and the French.

In 1629, the Province of Maine, as granted to Mason and Gorges seven years previously, was divided between them, Mason accepting as his share that portion lying between the Merrimac and the Piscataqua,&#8212;which received the name of New Hampshire,&#8212;while Gorges retained the balance, extending from the Piscataqua to the Kennebec. Mention has previously been made of the small beginnings at Pemaquid, Sheepscot, and Monhegan to the eastward, and of Portsmouth and Dover in what now became Mason&#8217;s particular province. The settlements next planted, at Richmond&#8217;s Island, Pejebscot, around Casco Bay, and elsewhere, were the work of servants for English merchants or of individual emigrants, and were hampered by the conflicting claims arising from the carelessly drawn patents. Gorges himself became interested in a new attempt to colonize, and his nephew, William, was sent over as governor of a little colony planted at York, which later was to become the subject of one of those grandiose schemes of government to which the old knight was so uncontrollably addicted. All of these early plantings, however, were of slight historical importance.

Although settlement was proceeding slowly and painfully, the vast forests and many rivers of the province offered a rich field for the exploitation of the fur trade, which was the main object of the French in the north, and one of the principal resources of the English settlements as well. The traffic, indeed, had been the means by which the Plymouth Pilgrims had bought their freedom from their merchant partners, and we have already noted that colony&#8217;s activities on the Kennebec. A tragic incident that occurred at their little post on that stream, located at what is now Augusta, is of interest mainly as revealing the aggressive attitude which was later to become the settled policy of the Massachusetts colony in relation to its neighbors. Early in 1634, one Hocking, a fellow employed in an enterprise of Lords Say, Brook, and others, on the Piscataqua, tried to poach upon the Pilgrims&#8217; patented lands, and even to pass the trading station, in order to intercept the Indians carrying their furs. The Pilgrims&#8217; agents acted with restraint; but in the course of the dispute, Hocking wantonly killed one of their men; whereupon a companion of the slain man, &#8220;that loved him well,&#8221; as Bradford records, shot Hocking dead.

Although the Plymouth men had been entirely in the right, a garbled version of the affair was sent to England and also to Massachusetts. Needless to point out, that colony had absolutely no jurisdiction whatever in the quarrel, which had occurred far outside its bounds, and not even in the unclaimed wilderness, but within the legal limits of its older neighbor. Nevertheless, the authorities at Boston arrested John Alden, one of the Plymouth magistrates, who happened to be there at the moment, and who had been at the Kennebec when the affray occurred. This was naturally resented, even by the peace-loving Pilgrims, and letters requesting Alden&#8217;s release were dispatched by the Plymouth government to Dudley. One of these, at least, that governor tried to suppress, but &#8220;Captaine Standish requiring an answer thereof publickly in the course,&#8221; he was forced to produce it. Alden was released, but Standish, who had been the bearer of the letter, was bound over to appear at the next Massachusetts court, to testify to the Pilgrims&#8217; patent. Finally, after Winslow and Bradford themselves had gone to Boston and conferred with Winthrop, the matter was adjusted, and Dudley and Winthrop wrote to the Lords in England the true version of the murder; but it was not likely that the other settlements would soon forget the high-handed proceedings of the Bay Colony in an affair so obviously beyond its jurisdiction.

But the trading post on the Kennebec was not the sole concern of the Pilgrims in Maine, nor was that province the scene merely of contentions arising from conflicting English land-grants, or from rival colonial jurisdictions. It had been the stage on which the curtain had first risen in the struggle for empire between England and France, and was now to witness new episodes in that long drama. Still farther north the contest had recently become acute. Sir William Alexander, by virtue of an English grant, had claimed a large portion of French America, and Sir William Kirk had seized Port Royal and Quebec. By the treaty of St. Germain, however, in 1632, England agreed to restore &#8220;all places occupied in New France, Acadia, and Canada by the subjects of the King of Great Britain,&#8221; although the boundaries of those vaguely localized regions were not specified, and remained matters for contention, which meant raiding and Indian warfare, for over a century to come.

Meanwhile, several more places had been occupied by the Pilgrims and those associated with the Plymouth colony. In 1630, a &#8220;very profane young man,&#8221; Edward Ashley by name, had started a trading post on the Penobscot, which the Pilgrims feared might injure their fur business on the Kennebec. In spite of scruples, therefore, they joined with Ashley, and that person having been drowned at sea, after being released from the Fleet prison in London, they came into sole possession. They did not long enjoy it in peace, however, for the following year the French descended upon them and carried away all their goods, valued at nearly &#163;500, leaving word with the agents that &#8220;some of the Isle of Rey gentlemen had been there.&#8221; Allerton, who had broken with the Pilgrims, had also begun to trade, at Machias; and, a couple of years later, suffered in like manner from the French, who killed two of his men, and carried off all the others, as well as the whole stock of goods, which, as Bradford says &#8220;was the end of that projecte.&#8221;

In spite of their own heavy loss, the Pilgrims had clung to the Penobscot until, in 1635, d&#8217;Aulnay, acting under orders from the French King to clear the coast of the English as far as Pemaquid, seized the post, and shipped the local agents back to Plymouth. The Pilgrims hired a vessel, and dispatched an armed force to try to regain possession; but, owing to the conduct of the man whom they had engaged to effect the enterprise, it failed miserably, and they merely entailed upon themselves a heavy additional loss. Massachusetts, when called upon for help, though she realized the danger to herself from the increasing aggressiveness of the French, refused aid unless the infinitely poorer Plymouth colony would bear the entire expense. That colony was, therefore, obliged to desist, and Bradford bitterly complained that not only did the Bay people thus do nothing to defend the common frontier, but that, owing to their cupidity, they even sold food and ammunition to the French, and so increased the menace both from them and their Indian allies.

In Mason&#8217;s province of New Hampshire, settlement, though more peaceful, was also proceeding but slowly beyond the Dover and Portsmouth plantations already noted. As the settlers of those two places were Episcopalians, and as an opportunity was offered to buy out the Hilton interest in the former, the Massachusetts leaders urged some of their friends in England to acquire it, with the result that Lords Say and Brook, Sir Richard Saltonstall, and others came into possession, and sent out additional colonists. This pouring of new wine into the old Dover bottle produced a series of explosions, which subsequently prepared the way for annexation by Massachusetts. Mason died in 1635, and bequeathed his province to his family. Two years later occurred the Antinomian controversy in Massachusetts, and the expulsion of Wheelwright, whom, when discussing that episode, we left on his way to New Hampshire. He succeeded in making the winter trip to the settlements on the Piscataqua, and the following spring, with a few associates and the help of his new hosts, he founded the town of Exeter, the inhabitants entering into a written compact for their self-government. That the Massachusetts authorities would have preferred that he should die alone in the winter&#8217;s snow is hardly a charitable supposition; but just what they did wish for is uncertain; for they wrote a letter of remonstrance to the New Hampshire people, saying that they &#8220;looked at it as an unneighborly part&#8221; that they should help any one expelled by themselves.

One of these northern towns, from its first settlement, had been considered by Massachusetts as under its own jurisdiction. In March, 1637, the General Court had ordered that a plantation should be started at Wenicunnett,&#8212;the name being later changed to Hampton,&#8212;a little more than three miles north of the Merrimac. It was thus slightly outside of the bounds of the patent, if that were construed, as it had been construed to that time, to include only such land north of the river as lay within three miles of it. The project may mark, however, the first tentative step toward the colony&#8217;s later, and wholly unwarranted, interpretation of that instrument, so as to include all the territory lying south of a line drawn due east from a point three miles north of the most northerly part of that stream, to the ocean, thus including practically all of New Hampshire and a large part of Maine. About a year and a half after the &#8220;bound house&#8221; was built, a group of colonists went to take possession of the new site. The Exeter men at once objected to this encroachment of Massachusetts on their neighborhood; but the General Court replied that the new settlement was within their patent, and that they looked upon the protest as &#8220;against good neighborhood, religion and common honesty.&#8221; They did, however, quietly send out a surveying party, and having found that the part above Pennacook was north of the line of 43&#189; degrees, they phrased a new answer to Exeter&#8217;s renewed protest, saying that, while they relinquished none of their rights, nevertheless, as the Exeter men did not profess to claim anything which might fall within the Massachusetts patent, the matter would be allowed to rest. The way was thus left open for future aggression, and the Court immediately proceeded to erect the new settlement into a legal town.

The frontier north of Massachusetts had thus, for the most part, come into being without any action on her part, except in the two settlements last noted. Owing to the location between the French and English, and the uncompromising geographic factors of soil and climate, the vast forested area, comprising over two thirds of all New England, increased but little in population throughout the century; and by 1700 New Hampshire had but six thousand souls, or less than that of the Bay Colony at the time that Wheelwright left it. The northern provinces, unhappily for themselves, were destined to play the part of buffer states between the French, with their savage allies, and the more safely located colonies in the south.

In tracing the foundations of the latter, we find the influence of Massachusetts far more potent, for they were being laid mainly by men who found scant room in that increasingly reactionary commonwealth. The founders of Rhode Island and Connecticut alike condemned the religious and political policy that the Bay Colony had now definitely made its own; and the more democratic and tolerant forms of government, which developed in the two former, &#8220;represented more nearly the principles which underlie the government of the United States to-day than any other of the British colonies.&#8221; The seeds of both political and religious liberty had been brought to America by the Massachusetts colonists; but the leaders, partly from a dread of losing their own influence, and partly from a genuine fear of noxious weeds, had done their best to interfere with their growth. The founders of Rhode Island and Connecticut, with less desire for personal power, and greater courage as to tares in the wheat, watered and nursed the seeds of liberty, which bore an abundant harvest. In Rhode Island, indeed, the weeds flourished riotously; but the faith of the founders was justified in both colonies, and their commonwealths marched with Holland at the head of those struggling for human freedom, while England and Massachusetts yet lagged and nagged.

The lands around Narrangansett Bay had been known for some time to be attractive as sites for colonizing, when Williams made his way thither after his banishment, in the winter of 1636. In spite of frequent trading with the Indians, however, only one settler had as yet located there permanently. William Blackstone, who had left England because he disliked the tyranny of the Lord-bishops, and who had, as we have seen, an equal aversion for that of the Lord-brethren, had quietly left his plantation in Massachusetts, and betaken himself to the wilderness north of Providence. A lover at once of peace, of books, and of freedom, there is something singularly attractive in his little known personality. He called his new home &#8220;Study Hill&#8221;; and there in his orchard grew the first &#8220;yellow sweetings&#8221; ever known, which, later, when he occasionally preached to the newcomers, he handed around, &#8220;to encourage his younger hearers.&#8221;

Thus, while, owing to the great services Williams was to render the colony, he is entitled to the name of its founder, he was not its first settler, nor was the little band that planted Providence with him in 1636 the only one to lay the foundations of the future commonwealth. Nor had he himself, apparently, any intention of doing so. &#8220;It pleased the most high,&#8221; he wrote, many years afterward, &#8220;to direct my steps into this Bay, by the loving private advice of that very honored soul Mr. John Winthrop the Grandfather, who, though he was carried with the stream for my banishment, yet he personally and tenderly loved me to his last breath. It is not true, that I was imployed by any, made covenant with any, was supplied by any, or desired any to come with me into these parts.&#8221; The others came, however, and the leading idea of the settlement was reiterated four years later in the proposals for a form of government, when the &#8220;arbitrators&#8221; noted that they agreed &#8220;as formerly hath bin the liberties of the town, so still, to hould forth liberty of conscience.&#8221;

In 1638, another group, of eighteen persons, including William Coddington, settled the town of Portsmouth; and in the following year, that little hamlet planted an offshoot at Newport, while a few individuals from both Providence and Portsmouth organized Warwick. These four towns were absolutely independent of each other, and of any superior government of any sort, except England. Although Newport and Portsmouth partially combined in 1640, it was not until seven years later, when the charter of 1644 finally went into effect, that there was any colony of Rhode Island, or a united government over the several settlements. It thus offered a great contrast to the Massachusetts colony, in which the towns were the creatures of the General Court; and it was this extreme looseness of organization, combined with religious toleration, which formed the leading characteristic of the Rhode Island political experiment. Although the settlers at Providence had signed an agreement to unite for purposes of government, there were no town officers, and practically no organization, until four years later. The agreement was merely to yield obedience to such orders &#8220;as shall be made for public good of the body in an orderly way, by the major consent of the present inhabitants, masters of families, incorporated together in a Towne fellowship, and others whom they shall admit unto them only in civil things.&#8221; These masters of families met once a fortnight, discussed their common affairs, and decided them by majority vote. The government was thus almost a pure democracy, only women, minors, and bachelors being excluded. Even when the towns were united, and a more elaborate governmental machinery was set up, the extremely democratic trend of thought was evidenced in the remarkable provision that the General Assembly could not initiate legislation, but that laws were first to be considered in each town, and that only after all four had considered them, were they to be sent to be acted upon by the Assembly, all legislative initiative thus being retained in the hands of the people.

With such looseness of organization, and extreme individuality of thought and action, another characteristic was bound to be lack of harmony, with frequent bickerings and disputes. These were soon in evidence, and it was found also that a pure democracy and absence of restraint were not compatible with orderly living. As the commonwealth grew, the difficulties were met in the spirit of men who, believing in liberty and toleration, were yet forced to make concessions to human nature; while, on the other hand, the Massachusetts authorities met their difficulties in the spirit of men who honestly disbelieved in democracy and toleration, and whose concessions were forced by a growing demand for things in which they had no faith. In Connecticut, also, the leaders were, happily, on the side of that part of the people, important in all the colonies, who were struggling upward toward a larger liberty, and who, even in Massachusetts, were slowly bringing it into being.

Knowledge of the existence of the Connecticut River, and of the advantages of its rich bottoms as sites both for trading and for planting, seems to have been first acquired by the English through information given to the Pilgrims by the Dutch. Friendly intercourse between Plymouth and New Amsterdam had been opened by the latter as early as 1626; and the Dutch not only taught the Pilgrims the value of wampum in the Indian trade, but, seeing how barren a site they had chosen for their settlement, told them of the Connecticut, and &#8220;wished them to make use of it.&#8221; However, &#8220;their hands being full otherwise, they let it pass&#8221; until, having been solicited by Indians who had been driven from their homes there by invading Pequots from the West, they dispatched several exploring and trading expeditions in 1633. The same Indians had also earlier requested the Massachusetts people to make a settlement, but they had declined. The Pilgrims, having made up their minds to erect a permanent trading post on the river, also asked the Bay people to join them; and when the latter refused, alleging their poverty, they even offered to provide the capital for both if Massachusetts would assume half the responsibility. This, likewise, being refused, the Pilgrims went on with the project alone, after telling the Bay authorities that they could have no cause to complain, as they had now had ample opportunity to join; to which they assented. This was in the middle of July, and although the Massachusetts leaders had done their best to discourage the Pilgrims, by telling them the place was &#8220;not fit for plantation,&#8221; and by picking other flaws in the project, nevertheless, four weeks later, they had themselves dispatched a bark to Connecticut to trade, and John Oldham, going overland, had also spied out the resources of the place, and trafficked with the Indians there. In view of all their actions, then and subsequently, it would seem difficult to avoid the conclusion that the Massachusetts authorities, having been offered by their neighbors a chance to share in a profitable opportunity, deliberately tried, by fraud and force, not only to obtain all the profits for themselves, but to prevent the very people whose enterprise it was from retaining any share in it. Not possessing the interpretative advantages of a New England ancestry, one is, perhaps, limited to remarking that the business dealings of ultra-religious people are often peculiar.

The Dutch, meanwhile, seem to have repented of their former hospitality, probably because of the warnings that the English had early sent them of their encroachment upon English territory, and of the rapid growth of the eastern colonies, which might threaten even their occupation of the Hudson. Hearing of the projected settlement by Plymouth, a party was sent from New Amsterdam in January to buy land from the Indians, and some of the Dutch were already ensconced in a little fort, on the present site of Hartford, when the English arrived in the late summer. In spite of Dutch protests, however, the Pilgrims, in their &#8220;great new barke,&#8221; sailed past the fort, and, passing north of the bounds of the Hollanders&#8217; Indian purchase, settled at what is now Windsor, buying the soil from its savage occupants. A later attempt by the Dutch to dislodge them by threatened violence proved unavailing. Meanwhile, on the same day on which Winthrop recorded in his Journal the results of the Massachusetts expedition to Connecticut, he also entered the arrival of the ship Griffin, eight weeks from England, with John Cotton, Thomas Hooker, Samuel Stone, and John Haynes among her passengers. Cotton, as we have seen, remained in Boston, but the others immediately went on to Newtown, where a body of Hooker&#8217;s English congregation had preceded him by a year. Of this transplanted body, Hooker and Stone now became pastor and teacher. It is not likely that Hooker, with the political views he possessed, could have found the Massachusetts atmosphere congenial; and a year later, he and his congregation applied to the General Court for permission to remove to Connecticut. The reasons they gave were the lack of land for expansion at Newtown, the fear that otherwise Connecticut might fall into the hands of other English or the Dutch, and, lastly, &#8220;the strong bent of their spirits to remove thither.&#8221; The Court, however, refused the petition, alleging many reasons, which, in the main, came to the fear that such a defection would weaken the colony, and tend to draw away future emigrants from it. In the debates on the subject, a majority of the deputies were in favor of allowing Hooker and his party to leave if they wished, while a majority of the magistrates opposed it. This raised the question whether the magistrates could veto a vote of the more numerous body of deputies, which was the more popular and democratic of the two. As the result of a sermon preached by Cotton the contest, which had promised to become bitter, was postponed, and the Newtown settlers were granted additional land in their present neighborhood. The incident is interesting, not only as marking the beginning of the political struggle between the two elements in the legislature, which we shall have occasion to follow later, but also as an early example of that fear which the East has always had of the growth of its western frontier and its desire to check it. Owing to continued pressure, however, the legislature with drew its opposition the following year, and in 1635 permission was granted the towns of Watertown, Roxbury, and Dorchester to move anywhere, provided that they would continue subordinate to the Massachusetts government&#8212;a condition which that government had no legal right to impose. A few months later it went further, indeed, and passed a law that no one could leave the colony without permission of a majority of the magistrates. As, under a previous law, no one could settle in Massachusetts without the consent of the half-dozen or more men mainly in control, so now no one, however uncongenial his surroundings or urgent his need, could leave without permission from the same little group.

Parties from Dorchester at once availed themselves of the Court&#8217;s consent to leave, and by July were arriving daily on the Connecticut. On that river no spot would suit them except that already bought and occupied by the Pilgrims, from which the Massachusetts people now tried to oust them. In reply to a protest from Governor Bradford, the Dorchester men had the effrontery to answer that, as to the land settled by the Pilgrims, God &#8220;in a faire way of providence tendered it to us.&#8221; Upon this bit of fraud and hypocritical cant, Bradford caustically commented that they should &#8220;abuse not Gods providence in such allegations.&#8221; Massachusetts, however, was strong, and the Plymouth people were weak; and although the latter did finally wring a reluctant acknowledgment that the right was on their side, nevertheless they were forced to yield fifteen sixteenths of their land, and were allowed only one sixteenth and a little money, in an enterprise which was wholly theirs, in which they had courteously tendered Massachusetts a half interest, and which was located entirely outside any territory to which that colony had any legal title. There was good reason for Bradford&#8217;s note in his diary, that the controversy was ended, &#8220;but the unkindness not so soone forgotten.&#8221;

The winter was very severe, and many of the new settlers were obliged to return to Boston; but in the spring, Hooker, with most of his congregation, emigrated to the river, traveling overland, with their herds of cattle, the precursors of an endless western stream. These newcomers, Bradford carefully notes, as we also are glad to do, treated the Pilgrims more fairly. By the end of 1636, there may have been eight hundred people in Connecticut, settled mainly at Hartford, Windsor, and Wethersfield, while the little settlement of Springfield, within the legal limits of Massachusetts, had also been planted.

These settlements, at first, were merely plantations and not organized towns. They apparently had no officers, except constables,&#8212;who, Massachusetts tried to require, should be sworn by one of her own magistrates,&#8212;and the body politic consisted of the inhabitants, who met together, as we have found them doing in Rhode Island, to decide upon their common interests. The territory, however, in which they were located, was also claimed at the time by a group of patentees, including Lords Say, Brook, and others, who had been granted the lands by the Earl of Warwick in 1632, but who had made no attempt to enter upon them until three years later, when they sent John Winthrop, Jr., to act as governor, and took other action looking toward settlement. Winthrop, who had come to Boston in the ship with young Vane, was there at the time that the emigration from Massachusetts took place, and Hooker and the other emigrants consulted him concerning such rights as his principals might claim. As a result, an agreement, to last one year, was entered into between Winthrop, acting for Say, Brook, and their associates, and Hooker and his, which provided that a court of eight magistrates should be created, with power to summon a General Court, until further advices could be received from England. This agreement, for purposes of record, was ratified in the Massachusetts General Court, but was not a &#8220;commission&#8221; from that colony, as often stated. On May 31, 1638, when a new form of government was under consideration, Hooker preached his famous sermon, in which he laid down the doctrines that &#8220;the choice of public magistrates belongs unto the people by Gods own allowance,&#8221; and that &#8220;they who have the power to appoint officers and magistrates, it is in their power, also, to set bounds and limitations of the power and place unto which they call them,&#8221; because &#8220;the foundation of authority is laid, firstly, in the free consent of the people.&#8221; Neither to Hooker, nor to his fellow colonists of Connecticut, was this last principle new, either in theory or in practice. He was arguing, not for a democratic government, which they already possessed, but for a fixed code of laws to rule the magistrates in their actions. The following year, the constitution of the new government was adopted by the residents of the plantations of Hartford, Wethersfield, and Windsor. That constitution provided for a General Court, in which each of the three original plantations should be represented by four deputies, and which should pave the authority to incorporate towns. It was only subsequent to the creation of this general government by the inhabitants of the commonwealth, that the towns, as political entities, came into being. Freemen were merely required to pe passed upon by the General Court, no religious qualification being attached to the franchise. It is noteworthy that the governor was not allowed to serve for two successive terms, And that no reference was made to any external authority, rot even to that of the king.

While the descent of the &#8220;Fundamental Orders&#8221; of Conrecticut can be traced in every step from the earliest charters of the trading companies, the transition was now complete. From such as we saw Tudor monarchs granting to merchants in the fifteenth century, past all those which we have noted as milestones by the way, the progress had been as steady as it was unperceived, from the privileges possessed by a few expatriated English traders and their clerks, dwelling among foreigners, to the self-governed commonwealth of a people in a land which they had made their own. While the charters, however, served as the framework of their government, the foundation of their political philosophy was found in the church covenant, which the Separatists had used in Europe for forty years before the Mayflower sailed; and the constitution of Connecticut was thus equally descended from religious theory and from the practice of trade.

Although there was little in the Fundamental Orders, as settled in 1639, which cannot be found in previous custom or legislation in Massachusetts or Plymouth, nevertheless, only those elements which were of a democratic tendency were put into the new constitution, and there was distinctly a more democratic attitude on the part of the leaders and people than in the Bay Colony. Such provisions as that making the governor ineligible for immediate reelection, and the franchise independent of religious qualification, probably show a reaction from the rule of Massachusetts.

The contrasted influences which the new colony and its parent were bringing to bear upon the development of American thought at this time may best be illustrated by the theories of their several leaders. Perhaps the two most influential men in New England in 1640, and the two who most deserved the positions assigned them, were John Winthrop, the leader in Massachusetts, and Thomas Hooker, the leader in Connecticut. Winthrop&#8217;s opinion of democracy as &#8220;the worst of all forms of government,&#8221; we have already noted, and may contrast with Hooker&#8217;s belief that the complete control of their rulers &#8220;belongs unto the people by Gods own allowance.&#8221; In the important question whether judges should render arbitrary decisions wholly according to their personal views, or be limited by a fundamental body of laws, the two leaders were equally far apart. &#8220;Whatsoever sentence the magistrate gives,&#8221; wrote Winthrop, who opposed any such limitation, &#8220;the judgment is the Lord&#8217;s, though he do it not by any rule prescribed by civil authority.&#8221; &#8220;That in the matter which is referred to the judge,&#8221; asserted Hooker, on the other hand, &#8220;the sentence should lie in his breast, or be left to his discretion, according to which he should go, I am afraid it is a course which wants both safety and warrant. I must confess, I ever looked at it as a way which leads directly to tyranny, and so to confusion, and must plainly profess, if it was in my liberty, I should choose neither to live nor leave my posterity under such a government.&#8221;

The aristocratic and oligarchical tendencies at work in Massachusetts there received enormous additional strength from the fact that the clergy were almost a unit in their support of reactionary ideas. This was a defect which was, to a certain extent, inherent in the Calvinistic ministry; and the failure of the contemporary Puritan colony in the Caribbean was, in considerable measure, due to the outrageous claims of the Puritan ministers there upon the civil power. The influence of the Puritan clergyman upon his more devout followers could be equaled only by that of the Catholics, and it is difficult for the modern layman to realize its full extent. It came about in part from the Puritan doctrine already noted, that nothing in life was untinged with a religious aspect. If no one dreams now of any necessity of consulting the clergy, as such, with reference to the fashion in clothes or the economic and social policy of the nation, it is partly because those matters are no longer considered as religious, but purely temporal. The opinion of a clergyman, therefore, is of no more value than that of the well-informed layman, with his broader practical experience of life, if, indeed, of as much. One does, however, have recourse to a specialist, and a banker&#8217;s opinion is sought on finance, and a doctor&#8217;s on health. As, according to Puritan theory, there was no act which was not of a religious or moral character, the clergyman was, so say, a specialist on one aspect of everything, and from that standpoint his advice must be sought in every detail of life, and his influence was correspondingly great.

The individuals who emigrated to Rhode Island and Connecticut were mainly those who were dissatisfied with the restrictions imposed by Massachusetts. That process of secondary selection had now begun which was to continue to winnow out from every new community the most adventurous and independent, and to plant them again to the westward in still newer settlements, where, in turn, the process would again be repeated. In the colonies now forming, therefore, there was a freer opportunity for the seeds of liberty to grow than in the old Bay. The new commonwealths had, in addition, the great advantage that in them, at least at their beginning, the influence of the clergy was wholly upon the side of freedom; and in estimating the results of priestly power in New England, it is only just to recall that Roger Williams and Thomas Hooker were clergymen, as well as the narrower divines of Boston and her sister towns.

The westward movement of New England was to continue until her sons and her institutions were to be found in a continuous chain of communities from Portland on the Atlantic to Portland on the Pacific, and the influence of New England thought upon the life of the nation cannot be overestimated. In so far as the origins of that thought can be traced back to any definite leaders, or individual colonies, it was evidently the ideas of Williams and Hooker, rather than those of Winthrop, with all his high qualities, which were to dominate the American people, and to be absorbed into their very being.

At the same time that these new communities and influences were coming into existence, there was the possibility of another experiment being tried, in colonial matters, of a radically different sort.

The group of Puritan leaders, Warwick, Say, Brook, and others, whom we noted earlier as being interested in promoting Puritan colonization both in New England and in the Carribean, had continued to be actively engaged in colonizing the latter; while by their acquisition of the Hilton patent in New Hampshire, and the grant in Connecticut, they were still in possession of large tracts in the former. Since the emigration of Winthrop in 1630, affairs in England had not improved politically, though they had distinctly done so economically. About 1634 or 1635, nearly all of the group of leaders with whom we are particularly concerned suffered in one way and another from the influence of the Court party. Warwick, who had been forced out of the Council for New England three years earlier, was attacked under the forest laws, and also made to divide his lord-lieutenancy of Essex. Pym was sued by the Attorney-General, and Barrington, Say, and Brook suffered in their estates. In July, Humphrey, the Earl of Lincoln&#8217;s brother-in-law, arrived in Massachusetts with &#8220;propositions from some persons of great quality and estate,&#8221; who were thinking of emigrating if satisfactory arrangements could be made. In October, the younger Winthrop went to England, returning a year later with his commission as governor of a projected colony at the mouth of the Connecticut. At the end of November, 1635, twenty men arrived there, and under the direction of Lyon Gardiner, a fort was erected at Saybrook. Saltonstall, one of the patentees, had also, a few months earlier, attempted to plant some men higher up the river; but they had been driven out by the same lawless Dorchester party that had fallen on the Pilgrims, causing Saltonstall a loss of &#163;1000.

Among the proposals made by Say, Brook, and the others to Massachusetts, as conditions of their emigrating to New England, it was stipulated that there should be two ranks in the commonwealth&#8212;gentlemen and freeholders; that the power of making and repealing laws should belong to both ranks, but that the governor should always be chosen from the higher. To these and-the other proposals the authorities in the colony wholly agreed, but with the proviso that the church-membership qualification for the franchise must be retained. The theocracy of Massachusetts, under the guidance of its ministers, had drifted far from the current of English life. Englishmen have always had a thoroughly healthy hatred of ecclesiastical rule in civil affairs, and, whatever country squires, noblemen&#8217;s factors, or tradesmen and mechanics, might be willing to do, it could not be possible that such men as Warwick, Say, Brook, and Pym could place their political rights and careers wholly in the hands of the narrow-minded ministers and congregations of the little Massachusetts town churches. On that account, and because of the turn of affairs in England, the project was given up, and when, three years later, Warwick, Brook, Say, and Darley announced definitely that they were going to emigrate, it was not to New England but to their island in the Caribbean. Although they were not permitted to do so, the fact marks the distinct breach which had now taken place between the rulers of Massachusetts and the leaders of the Puritan party in England. The mistaken policy of the colony, which earlier had brought alarmed protests from her less powerful friends at home, had now definitely alienated her most influential ones. The selfish attitude toward her neighbors, already shown upon the Penobscot, the Piscataqua, and the Connecticut, and which, unfortunately, was to become more aggressive and unscrupulous, also lost her the friendship of her sister colonies. The result was that, when the real struggle came with the English government, a generation later, Massachusetts, although, thanks to her geographical position and aggressive acquisitiveness, she had become the most powerful of the New England group, found herself with hardly a friend in the old country or the new.

The work of extending the frontier was not a mere matter of discussions or of peaceful penetration into an untenanted wilderness. Owing to the great plague, which had so nearly annihilated the natives in the regions where the settlers had first planted, the Indian danger had never been a serious one, and no such massacre as almost wiped out the Virginia colony need have been apprehended. The savage, however, had been an important element in the life of the settlements. As friend or spying enemy, he was as constantly in and out of the little villages as he is of the pages of the early records. Although there was, unluckily, little that the white man could teach him that was of any service, he, on the contrary, taught the colonists many a useful lesson. He showed them how and where to plant, trapped their game and gathered in their stock of furs, guided them through the almost trackless forests, and, in a multitude of ways, gave them knowledge of the land which they had entered and of the products it might yield. In the background, nevertheless, always lurked the danger that the natives might grow tired of being slowly dispossessed, that they might decide to make an end of a situation which the more far-sighted among them could not fail to see would inevitably more and more narrow the free range for their savage life. In the fifteen years since Bradford and his little band had landed in an almost deserted spot, the white population had grown alarmingly. Moreover, their increasing numbers and desire for expansion would naturally lead the settlers to adopt a more aggressive attitude toward the natives in any dispute occurring between them. There was more and more probability of trouble, arising from individual outrage on the part of an unscrupulous or ruffianly white, or of some aggrieved or drunken Indian, of which the organized power of the former would but too likely take full advantage. The Old Testament texts on dealing with those outside the pale of God&#8217;s chosen people offered little comfort to the Indian, should the Puritan divines ever start on the war-path.

At the beginning of 1633 word was received in Boston that a certain Captain Stone had been murdered by the Pequots, or Indians allied to them, after having landed at the mouth of the Connecticut. The exact truth of what occurred is not known. Stone, who was a trader from Virginia, was a drunken, dissolute, and thoroughly worthless character, and very likely provoked the natives by some act. On the other hand, their stories of what happened did not agree, and were not above suspicion. The Massachusetts authorities reported the matter to Virginia, and no further action was taken until the following year, when an embassy from the Pequots arrived at Boston. That tribe had become embroiled in a quarrel with the Narragansetts on the east, and the Dutch on the west, and were, therefore, anxious to smooth their relations with the English. They agreed to deliver up the two men who had killed Stone, to surrender their rights to Connecticut, and to pay damages in furs and wampum. A few days later a number of Narragansetts appeared, who had come to waylay the Pequots on their way home; but the Massachusetts authorities purchased the safety of the savages and promise of peace between the two tribes, by offering the Narragansetts some of the Pequot wampum. Although the Bay Colony had thus bought the Pequot title to Connecticut with the blood of the slain Virginian, the natives had no idea, apparently, of observing the terms of the bargain, nor did the English take further steps in the matter until two years later, when the younger Winthrop, then at Saybrook, was commissioned to treat with the savages regarding rumors of recent outrages, and to declare war if he could not obtain satisfaction.

A fortnight later news came of the murder of John Oldham, and the capture of two boys, in his small boat, while off Block Island on a trading voyage. The natives of that island, who were subordinate to the Narragansetts, were the guilty parties, but the crime seems to have been committed with the connivance of the Narraganset sachems, except Canonicus and Miantanomo. Through the intercession of Roger Williams, the latter sachem secured the release of the two youngsters, while emissaries of Massachusetts, who went to treat with Canonicus, returned home fully satisfied. So far, matters had been conducted reasonably and patiently. Suddenly, however, on the advice of the Massachusetts magistrates and ministers, the policy was completely changed, and a course of blundering stupidity and criminal folly was entered upon. John Endicott, with about a hundred volunteers, was ordered to proceed to Block Island, where he was instructed to put all the men to death, without making any effort to distinguish between guilty and innocent. The women and children were to be carried off, and possession taken of the island. Thence he was to go on to the Pequots, demand the murderers of Stone and Oldham, and a thousand fathoms of wampum, and to secure, by consent or force, some of the children as hostages.

Endicott possessed none of the qualities of a military leader, and although his lack of knowledge prevented this bloody decree from being carried out, he managed to do just enough to enrage the savages without intimidating them. The party, after two days&#8217; searching, failed to find the island Indians, who were in hiding in the underbrush, but burned their wigwams, mats, and provisions, staved their canoes, and valiantly slew their dogs. They next proceeded to Saybrook, where Lyon Gardiner, who, in his little outpost, was responsible for the lives of twenty-four men, women, and children, did his best to warn Endicott of his folly. The corn-fields of the Saybrook people were two miles from the fort, and if the Indians, who had shown themselves suspiciously unfriendly of late, should be stung to revenge by Endicott, starvation and massacre would confront the settlement. &#8220;You come hither to raise these wasps about my ears,&#8221; said Gardiner, &#8220;and then you will take wings and flee away.&#8221; In spite of the dictates of common sense and humanity, Endicott proceeded to do just that. At Pequot Harbor he killed two Indians, burned many wigwams, staved the canoes, and then sailed away to the safety of Boston, leaving Saybrook and the towns on the Connecticut at the mercy of the savages, whom Massachusetts had now roused to fury.

The Pequots immediately made peace with the Narragansetts, urging them to a common war against the English. Such a combination, under the circumstances, would have meant a disaster of the first magnitude, and Massachusetts was now forced to ask the help of the only man who could avert it, but whom she had already driven from her company&#8212;Roger Williams. In response to most urgent appeals sent from the Governor and Council, he at once started, &#8220;all alone in a poore canow, and to cut through a stormie wind with great seas, every minute in hazard of life, to the Sachem&#8217;s house.&#8221; There he remained three days, and by means of his friendship with Miantanomo, he won the Narragansetts back to the side of the English, and broke up the proposed alliance between the savages. In consequence of this inestimable service, Winthrop and some of the Massachusetts council, Williams wrote, &#8220;debated whether or no I had not merited, not only to be recalled from banishment, but also to be honored with some mark of favor&#8221;; but neither the authorities nor the contemporary historians, except Winthrop, had the generosity to say a word of the man who had saved New England. In the fall, Miantanomo and other Narragansett sachems went to Boston, and signed a treaty with the English, which included an offensive alliance against the Pequots.

Meanwhile, the results of the folly that Massachusetts had perpetrated, and against which Plymouth as well as Saybrook had formally protested, now made themselves felt. Three men were killed at Saybrook, another was roasted alive, a trader was murdered at Six-mile Island, then two more at Saybrook, and another on his way up the river. At Wethersfield, nine men were slaughtered, and two young girls carried into captivity. The horrors of Indian warfare became the hourly dread of every inhabitant along the frontier, thanks to the Massachusetts magistrates and ministers. Having, as Gardiner predicted, raised the wasps about his ears and those of all the English along the river, Massachusetts now asked help of Plymouth, as she had before turned to Williams. That colony agreed to lend aid, but in doing so, recalled to her stronger neighbor how she had refused help against the French when the Pilgrims were the petitioners; how she had interfered with their trade on the Kennebec; and how she had deprived their Connecticut pioneers of their lands.

But the settlers on the latter river could not await the slow movements of the Bay Colony, if the lives of their wives and children were to be saved. At the Connecticut General Court of May 1, 1637, war was declared against the Pequots, and ninety men, from the three plantations, were levied for immediate service. The expedition, under command of Captain John Mason, with some Indian auxiliaries under Uncas, immediately proceeded to Saybrook, where they were joined by Underhill, who happened to be there, and a few additional men. A skirmish, in which the Indians, whose fidelity had been doubted, acquitted themselves loyally, encouraged them not a little. The original plan had been to sail down the coast to the Pequot River and to attack the enemy directly, but this was wisely changed at the suggestion of Mason. According to the new plans, the party set sail for Narragansett Bay, with the design of then returning overland, and making a surprise attack on the Pequots, who were expecting it from the water. After landing on the shore of the Bay, and being reinforced by several hundred Narragansetts, Mason marched his band from eight in the morning until an hour after dark, when they camped about two miles from the Pequot fort. It had been decided to attack only the larger of the two villages, a palisadoed enclosure of an acre or two. About one o&#8217;clock, the English were on the march again, but were deserted by all the Indians, Narragansetts and Mohegans alike, before reaching the fort. The palisade having two entrances, opposite one another, it was agreed that two parties, led respectively, by Mason and Underhill, should make simultaneous attacks upon them. In spite of the fact that the Indians had been warned, by the barking of their dogs, of the approach of the enemy, Mason boldly jumped over the brush piled at the entrance, and was followed by his men. The other party also entered at the opposite side, and the slaughter of the dazed and half-awakened savages began. Seeing, however, that the resistance might prove too much for his men, Mason snatched a torch from a wigwam and set fire to the village, which, owing to the strong wind blowing, was soon ablaze. The English now had only to withdraw, and to shoot any wretched savage who attempted to climb over the palisade. In the early dawn of that May morning, as the New England men stood guard over the flames, five hundred men, women, and children were slowly burned alive. Not over eight escaped, and there were but seven captives. The English lost two killed and twenty wounded. It is difficult to imagine what thoughts must have been in the minds of the Puritans as they slowly roasted the Indian women and children. Mason merely notes that, by the providence of God, there were one hundred and fifty more savages than usual in the village that night.

The English, carrying their wounded, retreated to the ships,&#8212;which fortunately had come into Pequot Harbor,&#8212;as the savages from the smaller village were hampering their movements. With the vessels had also arrived Captain Patrick and forty men from Massachusetts, that colony having voted one hundred and sixty, and Plymouth sixty, although too late to take part in the expedition. The bulk of the Pequot nation was now destroyed, and it remained only to make an end of the few hundred who had thus far escaped. Sassacus, the sachem, being repudiated by his own followers, fled with seventy warriors to the Mohawks, and the English indefatigably ran down detached parties. In a swamp twenty miles from the Dutch line, eighty of the Pequots&#8217; &#8220;stoutest men,&#8221; with two hundred old people, women, and children, made a last stand. After being subjected to the fire of the English for some hours, the two hundred non-combatants surrendered, while the warriors fought to the last man, twenty finally escaping through the surrounding lines. The other savages turned against the all but annihilated Pequots, and &#8220;happy were they,&#8221; wrote Mason, &#8220;that could bring in their heads to the English: Of which there came almost daily to Windsor or Hartford.&#8221; In all, during the campaign, over seven hundred were killed or made captive.

Of the prisoners some were divided between Uncas and the Narragansetts, while the rest were kept by the English, or sold into bondage in the West Indies. In the division of this human spoil, the clergy took its part. &#8220;Sir,&#8221; wrote the Reverend Mr. Peter to Governor Winthrop, &#8220;Mr. Endecot and myself salute you in the Lord Jesus. Wee have heard of a dividence of women and children in the bay and would bee glad of a share viz: a young woman or girle and a boy if you thinke good. I wrote to you for some boyes for Bermudas, which I thinke is considerable.&#8221; $3$ Fifteen boys and two women were sent thither as slaves, but whether for the profit of the Reverend Peter, Winthrop does not say. Roger Williams pleaded over and over again, but in vain, with the Massachusetts authorities for a more lenient course. &#8220;Since the Most High delights in mercy, and great revenge hath bene allready taken,&#8221; he advised incorporating the survivors among the friendly Indians; but though, only a short time before, the Massachusetts authorities had been pleading with Williams to save themselves, they now turned a deaf ear to his intercession for the natives. The Narragansetts and Mohegans were both anxious to adopt the few survivors of their powerful enemies, according to Indian custom, so that Williams&#8217;s suggestions were as practicable as they were merciful. Two hundred were finally so allotted by Connecticut, when the last remnants of the Pequots submitted and the River plantations entered into a treaty with Uncas and Miantanomo. From the end of the Pequot war, all the New England colonies adopted not only Indian but negro slavery, and it was wholly due to economic, and not ethical, causes that the institution did not take root. In the one small locality in all New England where it proved profitable, it did so root itself, and the importing of slaves for use in the other colonies long constituted an important part of Puritan trade.

The contest between the English and the Indians had been inevitable from the start. The murders of the two traders were but the sparks that touched off the explosive material which had long been accumulating. The struggle, with varying details and proximate causes, but based upon the unchanging fundamental conflict of the natures and economic interests of the two races, was to be repeated over and over again as the American frontier advanced. Endicott&#8217;s stupid campaign, and, perhaps the too thorough absorption of Old Testament examples, had made the struggle almost inhumanly bloody in the first advance of that frontier in New England. The effect, however, was complete. It was to be nearly forty years before the savages regained sufficient strength, and found a leader to attempt again to dispute the relentless advance of the Puritan planters [.]