That blowest to the west,
Oh, couldst thou waft me on thy wings
To the land that I love best,
How swiftly o'er the-ocean's foam,
Like a sea-bird I would sail."
--PRINGLE.
When the heart is full, there seems some relief in pouring out the story of woe into a sympathetic ear; but when one is alone, with no human being to listen or sympathize, grief is a hundredfold greater.
Day dawned and found John Stevens still kneeling by the side of the cold form of the only being who had shared his unhappy lot. How seldom we realize the worth of companions or friends until they are forever gone, and then, as if to mock our grief, each kind act, each little delicate attention seems to start out as if emblazoned on stone before us. At last the broken-hearted castaway rose and with folded arms gazed on the dead face, still beautiful and holy even in death.
"Blanche, Blanche, must I give you up, you who have so long cheered my lonely life? Must I never listen to the sweet music of your voice again?"
John roused himself at last from the feeling of despair and, taking the best boards left from the wreck, constructed a neat coffin. He dug the grave at the white stone as she had directed and laid her to rest. No one but God listened to him as he read the solemn and impressive burial service, according to the established church. No one but God saw those tears flow in silence as he gazed for the last time on her face. Then, fastening down the lid, he covered the coffin over with boards and began slowly and mournfully shovelling the earth upon it. He heaped up the earth and placed the soft green, sod over the mound. Then he cut the inscription on the stone as she had requested at the head of the grave, adding:
"Sweet sister, rest in peace, until Christ comes to claim his own, when there will be a crown given you which outshines the sun." To go about his daily routine of life, to feel that heavy aching load on his heart crushing and consuming him, made his existence almost unbearable.
He lost all interest in the little field, the tame goats and birds, and for two or three days even neglected to take food himself. An appalling silence had fallen upon the island. He seemed to still hear her voice in the house and about it, and when he closed his eyes in sleep, after being utterly exhausted, he saw her sweet face bending over him and felt the sunshine of her smile on him. It was so hard to realize that she was gone, and he could scarcely believe that he would not find her down on the beach gathering shells, as he had so often seen her.
Frequently when alone in the cabin he would start, half expecting to see her enter with her cheering smile; but she was gone forever; her sweet smiles and cheering voice would no more be heard on earth.
It required long months before he could settle down to that life of loneliness. Hitherto he had not lived the life of a Crusoe or Selkirk; but now he was destined to know what real solitude was. John Stevens at last began to take some interest in his domestic affairs. He sadly missed the thousand little attentions which feminine instincts suggested for his comfort; but anon he became accustomed to being alone. He grew morose and melancholy, even wicked, for at times he blamed Providence, first for casting him away on this lonely island, and lastly for taking from him the companion he had failed to appreciate, until he felt her loss; but soon he turned to God and prayed for light.
He read the Bible and from this living fountain of consolation drank deep draughts of that which, to his starving soul, was the elixir of life. Strange as it may seem, in the first ebullition of his grief, John Stevens seemed to forget his wife and children. So long had he been from them, that they had lost their place in his thoughts. Time, the great healer of all wounds, the great reconciler to all fates, the great arbitrator of all disputes, had almost lost to him those tenderest ties which had lacerated his poor heart.
To the fatalist, John Stevens would seem to be one of those unfortunate beings doomed to be made the sport of a capricious fortune. His domestic relations in Virginia were a strange intermixture of good and bad. His business had been decidedly prosperous, he had married into a respectable family, and his wife was popular. His children were beautiful and healthy; but his wife was extravagant and foolish and had swept away his fortune faster than he could accumulate it. Then his voyage and shipwreck seemed the hand of fate. His father had been a sailor by profession and had never been shipwrecked, while he, on his first voyage, was cast away upon an unknown island. Fate gave him at first a companion and, just as he began to appreciate her, snatched her away.
At last he became reconciled even to live and die alone on that island--to die without a friend to close his eyes, or to soothe his pillow. Horrible as the fate might seem, he was reconciled. No human hand would give him Christian burial, and the vultures which soared about the island might pluck out his eyes even before life was extinct. With this dread on his mind, he shot the vultures whenever he saw them, and almost drove them from the island.
Three years had lapsed since poor Blanche had been laid in her grave, and John was morose, silent and moody, but reconciled. It was eighteen years since he had been cast away, and he had about abandoned all thought of again seeing any other land save this.
Among other things saved from the wreck was a quantity of tobacco seed, and, as tobacco was then thought to be an indispensable article, he planted some and grew his own. He fashioned pipes from the roots of trees, as the Indians did, and his pipe became his greatest solace in solitude.
One night, a little more than three years after he had been left alone, he was lying on his well-worn mattress, smoking his evening pipe, when there came on the air far out to sea a heavy "Boom!"
The trumpet of doom would not have astonished him more. At first he could scarcely believe his ears. Starting up, he sat on the side of his bed listening.
"Boom!"
A second report, more heavy than the first, shook the air.
"God in heaven! can it be cannon?" cried Stevens. He leaped to his feet, pulled on his rude shoes and seized his musket.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
Three more shots from the sea rang on the air, and there could now be no doubt that a ship was near the island. The hope which suddenly started up in his heart almost overcame him, and he clung to the door for support.
Only for an instant did he linger thus, then he rushed to the headland from whence his tattered flag had floated all these years. The moon was shining brightly from a cloudless sky, and his vision swept the ocean far beyond the dangerous reefs which formed a natural guard about the island. There he saw a sight calculated to startle him. A large Spanish galleon was coming directly toward the island, pursued by a vessel which from the first he surmised to be a pirate. Even as he looked, he saw the flash of a gun and imagined he could hear the crash of the iron ball striking into the side of the fugitive ship. He heard the cry of dread from the poor wretches on board, as the pirate drew nearer. On the still evening air came wild shouts of the buccaneers as they fired shot after shot at the prize.
John Stevens was greatly excited. Here was an opportunity to escape or be slain, either preferable to living on this terrible island alone.
The Spanish galleon was being driven directly through the only gap in the reefs to the island. Like a bird chased by a vulture she sought any shelter. She returned the fire as well as she could; but was no match for the well-equipped and daring pirate.
John's whole sympathies were with the unfortunate Spaniards. Their vessel evidently drew considerable water, for entering the gap in the reef, the tide being low, it stranded. The pirate, being much lighter draft, came nearer and poured in her volleys thick and fast. They were so near to the headland that John Stevens, a spellbound spectator, heard the iron balls and shot tearing into her timbers. With his glass he could even see her deck strewn with dead and dying.
The foremast of the galleon was cut through and fell, and the ship's rudder was shot away. The Spaniards, evidently bewildered, lowered boats, abandoned the galleon and pulled toward a rocky promontory two miles to the south.
Their enemies saw them and, manning boats, headed them off, killing or capturing every one. The captured men were taken aboard the victorious ship.
While these startling scenes were being enacted, a great change had come over the sky. The tide began to rise and floated the galleon clear of the sand, and it drifted into the little bay not a mile from John's house. The sky was obscured with clouds and one of those tropical hurricanes called squalls swept over the island and sea. It struck the pirate broadside, and John Stevens last saw the vessel amid a mountain of waves and spray struggling to right itself. It probably went down, as he never saw or heard of it more.
For hours the amazed castaway stood in the pelting rain and howling wind, with the roaring sea below him. Was it all a dream, or was this only another freak of capricious fate, which doomed him to eternal misery. The storm roared and the hungry sea swallowed up the pirate.
Why could not one have been spared? Even a pirate would have made a companion; but fate had roused his hopes only to dash them to the earth again.
It was pitch dark save when a flash of lightning illuminated the heavens. John Stevens turned slowly about to retrace his steps homeward, half believing it was some terrible dream which had brought him from his bed into the pelting storm, when by the aid of a flash of lightning he saw the Spanish galleon, which had been again stranded within a hundred yards of the beach. The single flash of lightning revealed only her deck and rigging; not a soul was to be seen on board the ship; but the sight of the vessel roused the castaway. In eighteen years this had been the only sign of civilization which had greeted his vision, and he was nearly frantic with delight.
Some one might be on board. Some skulkers from the cannon-balls of the pirates might have sought safety in the hold of the galleon, and he would find them. His heart was full to overflowing. He even began to hope that the ship could be gotten off the bar, and could make a voyage to some land of civilization. Though the ship was between the dangerous reefs and the sea, partially protected by a small land-locked bay, yet the surf was so high that it was madness to think of reaching the vessel that night. He built a fire on shore and all night long heaped on wood in the hope of attracting attention of those on board.
Morning dawned, and he saw the galleon with her head high in the air and her stern low in the sand and water. The tide had gone out, and not more than one hundred yards of water lay between him and the ship. John stripped off his clothes and swam to the wreck.
After no little difficulty he climbed up the mizzen chains.
A silence of death reigned over the ship, and when he had gained the deck a terrible sight met his view. Five men and one boy, the victims of the pirate's guns, lay dead on the deck, which was badly splintered with balls and shot.
The ship was wonderfully well preserved, the chief damage it received being from the cannon of the enemy.
John called again and again but no voice responded. The grim silence of death was about the ship. He found a boat in fair condition, lowered it and, putting the dead Spaniards into it, pulled ashore, where he gave the dead a decent burial on the sands, too high up for the tide to reach them.
Having accomplished this sad rite, he cried from the fulness of his soul:
"Oh, that there had been but one, only one saved, with whom I might converse!"
John Stevens, however, was a practical sort of a fellow, and, instead of repining over his sad fate, he determined to bring away everything valuable on board. Consequently he launched the boat, pulled to the wreck and went aboard. Had he been able to get the ship afloat, a carpenter might have repaired it so that a voyage could have been made; but the strength and skill of a hundred men could not have moved it from the sands in which it was so deeply imbedded. The vessel had been steered through the reefs and almost into the bay when deserted. John loaded his boat with muskets, several chests and casks, which contained food and wine. There was also a powder-horn, some kegs of powder, a fire shovel, tongs, two brass kettles, a copper pot for chocolate, and a gridiron. These and some loose clothes belonging to the sailors formed the first cargo taken ashore.
Next he brought off several barrels of flour, a cask of liquor and some tools, axes, spades, shovels and saws. Every implement that might be useful to him was taken ashore and stowed away. Then he began to search the lower part.
He had been for a week working on the wreck carrying off every conceivable object which might be of any possible use. He found the ship's books; but, owing to his ignorance of Spanish, he was unable to read them.
The name on the stern of the vessel was St. Jago, therefore he reasoned that it must be a West Indian vessel. How the idea entered his mind, Stevens never knew. It came suddenly, as an inspiration, that the galleon must be a Spanish treasure ship. One day, while in the captain's cabin, he found a narrow door opening from it. It was securely locked, and though he searched everywhere for keys and found many, none would fit the lock. At last he seized an iron crowbar, with which he forced the door off its hinges. Before him was a curious sort of compartment like a vault, the inside of which was lined with sheet iron. There lay before him several large, long boxes made of strong wood. He wondered what they contained. He cleared away every obstacle to the nearest box, and saw a lock and padlock and a handle at each end, all carved as things were carved in that age, when art rendered the commonest metals precious. John seized the handles and strove to lift the box; but it was impossible.
"What can it contain, that is so heavy?" he thought. He sought to open it; but lock and padlock were closed, and these faithful guardians seemed unwilling to surrender their trust. Stevens inserted the sharp end of the crowbar between the box and the lid and, bearing down with all his strength, burst open the fastenings. Hinges and lock yielded in their turn, holding in their grasp fragments of the boards, and with a crash he threw off the lid, and all was open.
John Stevens found a tanned fawn-skin spread as a covering over the contents and he tore it off. He started up with a yell and closed his eyes involuntarily. Then he opened them and stood motionless with amazement.
Three compartments divided the coffer. In the first blazed piles of golden coin. In the second bars of unpolished gold were ranged. In the third lay countless fortunes of diamonds, pearls and rubies, into which he dived his hands as eagerly as a starving man would plunge into food.
After having touched, felt and examined these treasures, John Stevens rushed through the ship like a madman. He leaped upon the deck, from whence he could behold the sea. He was alone. Alone with this countless--this unheard-of wealth. Was he awake, or was it but a dream? Before him lay the treasures torn from Mexico, Darien and Peru. They were his--he was alone.
Alas, he was alone! What use would those millions be to him on this island? The reaction came, and, falling on his knees, he cried:
"O God, why is such a fate mine?"
Hours afterward he recovered enough to remove the gold and jewels from the treasure ship to his home on the island. With more jewels than a king, he lived the lonely life of a hermit and a pauper, dreading to die, lest the vultures pluck out his eyes.
THE ANGEL OF DELIVERANCE.
Strange that when nature loved to trace
As if for God a dwelling place,
And every charm of grace hath mixed
Within the paradise she fixed,
There man, enamoured of distress,
Should mar it into wilderness.
--BYRON.
On the restoration of monarchy in England, in 1660, the Connecticut colonists entertained serious fears regarding the future. Their sturdy republicanism and independent action in the past might be mortally offensive to the new monarch. The general assembly of Connecticut, therefore, resolved to make a formal acknowledgment of their alliance to the crown and ask the king for a charter. A petition was accordingly framed and signed in May, 1661, and Governor John Winthrop bore it to England. He was a son of Winthrop of Massachusetts, and was a man of rare attainments and courtly manners. He was then about forty-five years of age.
Winthrop was but coolly received at first, for he and his people were regarded as enemies of the crown. But he persevered, and the good-natured monarch at last chatted freely with him about America, its soil, productions, the Indians and the settlers, yet he hesitated to promise a charter. Winthrop, it is said, finally drew from his pocket a gold ring of great value, which the king's father had given to the governor's grandfather, and presented it to his majesty with a request that he would accept it as a memorial of the unfortunate monarch and a token of Winthrop's esteem for and loyalty to King Charles, before whom he stood as a faithful and loving subject. The king's heart was touched. Turning to Lord Clarendon, who was present, the monarch asked:
"Do you advise me to grant a charter to this good gentleman and his people?"
"I do, sire," Clarendon answered.
"It shall be done," said Charles, and he dismissed Winthrop with a royal blessing.
The charter was issued on the first of May, 1662. It confirmed the popular constitution of the colony, and contained more liberal provisions than any yet issued by royal hands. It defined the boundaries so as to include New Haven colony and a part of Rhode Island on the east, and westward to the Pacific Ocean. In 1665, the New Haven colony reluctantly gave its consent to the union; but the boundary between Connecticut and Rhode Island remained a subject of dispute for more than sixty years. That old charter, written on parchment, is still among the archives in the Connecticut State Department.
While King Philip's war raged all about them, the colonists of Connecticut did not suffer much from hostile Indians, save in some remote settlements high up the river. They furnished their full measure of men and supplies, and the soldiers bore a conspicuous part in that contest between the races for supremacy; but while they were freed from dangers and annoyances of war with the Indians, they were disturbed by the petty tyranny of Governor Andros, who, as governor of New York, claimed jurisdiction as far east as the Connecticut River. In 1675, he went to the mouth of that stream with a small naval force to assert his authority.
Captain Bull, the commander of a small fort at Saybrook, permitted him to land; but when he began to read his commission, he ordered him to be silent. The cowardly Andros was forced to yield to the commander's bold spirit and, in a towering passion, returned to New York, hurling the most bitter anathemas against Connecticut and Captain Bull.
It was more than a dozen years after this event before anything happened to disturb the public repose of Connecticut; but as that event belongs to another period, we will omit it for the present.
Rhode Island was favored with a charter from Parliament, granted in 1644 to Roger Williams. The charter was very liberal, and in religion and politics the people were absolutely free. The general assembly, in a code of laws adopted in 1647, declared that "all men might walk as their conscience permitted them--every one in the name of his God." Almost every religious belief might have been encountered there; "so if a man lost his religious opinions, he might have been sure to find them in some village in Rhode Island." Society was kept in a continual healthful agitation, and though the disputes were sometimes stormy, they never were brutal. There was a remarkable propriety of conduct on all occasions, and the political agitations brought to the surface the best men in the colony to administer public affairs.
Two years after the overthrow and execution of Charles I., 1651, the executive council of state in England granted to William Coddington a commission for governing the islands within the limits of the Rhode Island charter. This threatened a dismemberment of the little empire and its absorption by neighboring colonies. The people were greatly alarmed. Roger Williams and John Clarke hastened to England, and with the assistance of Sir Henry Vane, the "sheet anchor of Rhode Island, the noble and true friend to an outcast and despised people," the commission was recalled, and the charter given by parliament was confirmed in October, 1652.
On the restoration of monarchy, 1660, the inhabitants sent to Charles II. an address, in which they declared their loyalty and begged his protection. This was followed by a petition for a new charter. The prayer was granted, and in July, 1663, the king issued a patent highly democratic in its general features and similar in every respect to the one granted to Connecticut. Benedict Arnold was chosen the first governor under the royal charter, and it continued to be the supreme law of the land for one hundred and eighty years.
Slowly advancing with the other colonies, if she did not even keep abreast of them, was the colony of New Jersey, from the time it first became a permanent political organization as a British colony, with a governor and council. Elizabethtown, which consisted only of a cluster of half a dozen houses, was made the capital. Agents went to New England to invite settlers, and a company from New Haven were soon settled on the banks of the Passaic. Others followed, and when, in 1668, the first legislative assembly met at Elizabethtown, it was largely made up of emigrants from New England. Thus we see how early in the history of our country, the restless tide moved westward. The fertility of the soil of New Jersey, the salubrity of the climate, the exemption from fear of hostile Indians, and other manifest advantages caused a rapid increase in the population and prosperity of the province, and nothing disturbed the general serenity of society there until in 1670, when specified quitrents of a half-penny per acre were demanded. The people murmured. Some of them had bought their lands of the Indians before the proprietary government was established, and they refused to pay the rent, not on account of its amount, but because it was an unjust tax, levied without their consent.
For almost two years they disputed over the rents, and kept the entire province in a state of confusion. The whole people combined in resistance to the payment of the tax, and in May, 1672, the disaffected colonists sent deputies to the popular assembly which met at Elizabeth town. That body compelled Philip Carteret, the lawful governor, to vacate his chair and leave the province, and chose a weak and inefficient man in his place. Carteret went to England for more authority, and while the proprietors were making preparations to recover the province by force of arms, in August, 1673, New Jersey and all the rest of the territory in America claimed by the Duke of York suddenly fell into the hands of the Dutch, who were then at war with England.
When, fifteen months later, New York was restored to the English, Carteret had a part of his authority restored to him; but sufficient was reserved to give Andros a pretext for asserting his authority and making himself a nuisance with the people.
Massachusetts never enjoyed the full favor of the Stuart dynasty. The almost complete independence which had been enjoyed for nearly twenty years was too dear to be hastily relinquished. When it became certain that the hereditary family of kings had been settled on the throne, and that swarms of enemies to the colony had gathered round the new government, a general court was convened, and an address was prepared for the parliament and the monarch. This address prayed for "the continuance of civil and religious liberties," and requested an opportunity of defence against complaints.
"Let not the king's men hear your words. Your servants are true men, fearing God and the king. We could not live without the public worship of God. That we might therefore enjoy divine worship without human mixtures, we, not without tears, departed from our country, kindred, and fathers' houses. Our garments are become old by reason of the very long journey. Ourselves, who came away in our strength, are, many of us, become gray-headed, and some of us are stooping for age."
So great was their dread of the new king after the restoration, that, as we have seen, Whalley and Goffe were denied shelter at all the public houses in Boston. Their charter was threatened and commissioners sent to demand it; but, by one device and another, the shrewd rulers of Massachusetts managed to avert the calamity. The government at home was kept busy at this time. There was a threatened war with the Dutch, and then the whole government of England had to be thoroughly renovated. Charles II. was not much of a business monarch. His thoughts were mainly of pleasure, and, despite his merciless pursuit of the men who put his father to death, he was good-natured.
Though the colonists of Massachusetts had levied two hundred men for the expected war with the Dutch, they wished to maintain their spirit of independence, and the two hundred were only a free offering. They regarded the commission sent by the king as a flagrant violation of chartered rights. In the matter of obedience due to a government, the people of Massachusetts made the nice distinction between natural obedience and voluntary subjection. They argued that the child born on the soil of England is necessarily an English subject; but they held to the original right of expatriation, that every man may withdraw from the land of his birth, and renounce all duty of allegiance with all claim to protection. This they themselves had done. Remaining in England, they acknowledged the obligatory force of established laws. Because those laws were intolerable, they had emigrated to a new world, where they could organize their government, as many of them originally did, on the basis of natural rights and of perfect independence.
As the establishment of a commission with discretionary powers was not specially sanctioned by their charter, they resolved to resist the orders of the king and nullify his commission. While the fleet sent from England was engaged in reducing New York, Massachusetts, on September 10th, 1664, published an order prohibiting complaints to the commissioners, and at the same time issued a remonstrance, not against deeds of tyranny, but the menace of tyranny, not against actual wrong, but against the principle of wrong. On the twenty-fifth of October it thus addressed a letter to King Charles II.:
"DREAD SOVEREIGN:--The first undertakers of this plantation did obtain a patent, wherein is granted full and absolute power of governing all the people of this place, by men chosen from among themselves, and according to such laws as they should see meet to establish. A royal donation, under the great seal, is the greatest security that may be had in human affairs. Under the encouragement and security of the royal charter, this people did, at their own charges, transport themselves, their wives and families, over the ocean, purchase the land of the natives, and plant this colony, with great labor, hazards, cost, and difficulties; for a long time wrestling with the wants of a wilderness and the burdens of a new plantation; having also now above thirty years enjoyed the privilege of GOVERNMENT WITH THEMSELVES, as their undoubted right in the sight of God and man. To be governed by rulers of our own choosing and laws of our own, is the fundamental privilege of our patent.
"A commission under the great seal, within four persons (one of them our professed enemy) are impowered to receive and determine all complaints and appeals according to their discretion, subjects us to the arbitrary power of strangers, and will end in the subversion of our all.
"If these things go on, your subjects here will either be forced to seek new dwellings or sink under intolerable burdens. The vigor of all new endeavors will be enfeebled; the king himself will be a loser of the wonted benefit by customs, exported and imported from hence into England, and this hopeful plantation will in the issue be ruined.
"If the aim should be to gratify some particular gentlemen by livings and revenues here, that will also fail, for the poverty of the people. If all the charges of the whole government by the year were put together, and then doubled or trebled, it would not be counted for one of those gentlemen a considerable accommodation. To a coalition in this course the people will never come; and it will be hard to find another people that will stand under any considerable burden in this country, seeing it is not a country where men can subsist without hard labor and great frugality.
"God knows, our great ambition is to live a quiet life, in a corner of the world. We came not into this wilderness to seek great things to ourselves; and, if any come after us to seek them here, they will be disappointed. We keep ourselves within our line; a just dependence upon, and subjection to, your majesty, according to our charter, it is far from our hearts to disacknowledge. We would gladly do anything within our power to purchase the continuance of your favorable aspect; but it is a great unhappiness to have no testimony of our loyalty offered but this, to yield up our liberties, which are far dearer to us than our lives, and which we have willing ventured our lives, and passed through many deaths to obtain.
"It was Job's excellency, when he sat as king among his people, that he was a father to the poor. A poor people, destitute of outward favor, wealth, and power, now cry unto their lord the king. May your magesty regard their cause, and maintain their right; it will stand among the marks of lasting honor to after generations."
The royalists in the days prior to the American Revolution, occupied a similar position that the monopolists, and wealthy do in politics to-day. They were the aristocrats, and for the common people to clamor for political freedom was absurd. The idea of republicanism was as loathsome to them and watched with as much jealousy as an important labor movement is to-day. The royalists called the men who clamored for civil and religious liberty fanatics, just as the monopolists of to-day, who control the dominant parties, call men who cry out against their oppression fanatics. It is sometimes difficult to distinguish the instinct of fanaticism from the soundest judgment, for fanaticism is sometimes the keenest sagacity. Those men wanted liberty and struggled and fought for it until it was obtained, just as the toiling millions of the world will some day sting the heel of grinding monopolies.
From 1660 to 1671, all New England was kept in a perpetual state of alarm and excitement. Plymouth made a firm stand for independence, although the weakest of the colonies. The commissioners threatened to assume control. It was the dawning strife of the new system against the old, of American politics against European politics, and yet those men struggling for liberty were called fanatics.
Secure in the support of a resolute minority, the Puritan commonwealth, in 1668, entered the province of Maine, and again established its authority by force of arms. Great tumults ensued; many persons, opposed to what seemed a usurpation, were punished for "irreverent speeches." Some even reproached the authorities of Massachusetts "as traitors and rebels against the king"; but the usurpers made good their ascendancy till Gorges recovered his claims by adjudication in England. From the southern limit of Massachusetts to the Quebec, the colonial government maintained its independent jurisdiction.
The defiance of Massachusetts was not punished as might have been expected. Clarendon's power was gone, and he was an exile. A board of trade, projected in 1668, never assumed the administration of colonial affairs, and had not vitality enough to last more than three or four years. Profligate libertines gained the confidence of the king's mistresses, and secured places in the royal cabinet. While Charles II. was dallying with women and robbing the theatres of actresses; while the licentious Buckingham, who had succeeded in displacing Clarendon, wasted the vigor of his mind and body by indulging in every sensual pleasure "which nature could desire or wit invent"; while Louis XIV. was increasing his influence by bribing the mistress of the chief of the king's cabal, England remained without a good government, and the colonies, despite bluster and threats, flourished in purity and peace. The English ministry dared not interfere with Massachusetts; it was right that the stern virtues of the ascetic republicans should intimidate the members of the profligate cabinet. The affairs of New England were often discussed; but the privy council was overawed by the moral dignity, which they could not comprehend.
Amid all the discord and threats, the New England colonies continued to advance in population, and their villages assumed the dignity of towns. It is difficult to form exact opinions as to the population of the several colonies in this early period of their history. The colonial accounts are incomplete, and those furnished by emissaries from England are grossly false. The best estimate that can be obtained gives to New England, in 1675, fifty-five thousand souls. Of these it is supposed that Plymouth contained not less than seven thousand, Connecticut, nearly fourteen thousand, Massachusetts proper, more than twenty-two thousand, and Maine, New Hampshire and Rhode Island, each perhaps four thousand. The settlements were chiefly by agricultural communities, planted near the seaside, from New Haven to Pemaquid. The beaver trade, more than traffic in lumber and fish, had produced the village beyond the Piscataqua; yet in Maine, as in New Hampshire, there was "a great trade in deal boards."
A sincere attempt had been made to convert the natives and win them to the regular industry of civilized life. The ministers of the early emigration, fired with a zeal as pure as it was fervent, longed to redeem those "wrecks of humanity," by planting in their hearts the seeds of conscious virtue, and gathering them into permanent villages. No pains were spared to teach them to read and write, and in a short time a larger proportion of the Massachusetts Indians could do so, than the inhabitants of Russia fifty years ago. Some of them wrote and spoke English tolerably well. Foremost among these early missionaries, the morning star of missionary enterprise, was John Elliot, whose benevolence amounted to the inspiration of genius. He wrote an Indian grammar, and translated the whole of the Bible into the Massachusetts dialect. His actions, his thoughts, his desires, all wore the hue of disinterested love.
The frown was on the Indian's brow, however. Clouds were rising in the horizon. Since the Pequod war, there had been no great Indian uprising; but there was a general feeling of uneasiness which seemed to portend a general outbreak. The New Englanders were to feel the effects of it in all its fury. Neither Whalley nor Goffe had been seen since the day that Robert Stevens assisted the latter to make his escape.
The Indians, whose cupidity had been aroused by English gold, had searched the forest far and near for the regicides. Their knowledge of the forest and cunning in following a trail had two or three times brought them face to face with Cromwell's stern old battle-trained warriors. Then they had learned to their cost that they had roused a pair of lions in their lairs; but the regicides finally disappeared. They had last been seen near Hadley, and it was currently reported they were dead.
Rumors of an Indian outbreak were rife; still the good people of Hadley were living in comparative security. It was a quiet sabbath morn, and the drowsy hum of the bees made music on the air. The great meeting-house stood with its doors thrown wide open inviting worshippers. The sun, beaming from the cloudless sky upon the scene, seemed a benediction of peace. The whispering breeze on this delightful twelfth of June swept about the eaves of the church without a hint of danger.
The worshippers at the proper hour were seen thronging to the meeting-house, carrying their guns, swords or pistols with them. It seemed useless to go armed, when there was not a whisper of danger; but scarcely had the worship begun, when a terrible warwhoop broke the stillness. Immediately all was confusion. Children shrieked, some women trembled, and men, pale and stern, began to fire upon the savages, who, seven hundred strong, rushed on the place.
They fought stubbornly, driving away the enemy; but their great lack of discipline promised in the end to defeat them.
"We are lost! We are lost!" some of the weak-hearted were beginning to cry, when suddenly there appeared among them, from they knew not where, a tall, venerable personage, with white flowing beard, clad in a white robe, and carrying a glittering sword in his hand.
Illustration: You are not lost, if you follow me!
"You are not lost, if you follow me!" he cried.
"Who is he?" was the general query, which no one could answer save: "He is an angel sent by God to deliver us."
It soon became quite apparent that this celestial being was well posted in military tactics. He formed the young men in line of battle and taught them in a few moments to deploy and rally.
When the Indians again rushed to the conflict, they were met with a volley that stunned them and strewed the ground with dead. The angel leader of the whites then gave the command to charge, and, with their pistols and keen swords, they flew at the enemy before they had time to recover, and they were thrown into confusion and fled in dismay. After the departure of the Indians, nothing was heard or seen of the white angel deliverer. It has since been ascertained that Goffe and Whalley were at that time concealed at the house of Mr. Russel in Hadley, and it is inferred that Goffe left his concealment when the danger threatened, and, forming the men, led them to victory.
KING PHILIP'S WAR.
Oh, there be some
Whose writhed features, fixed in all their strength
Of grappling agony, do stare at you,
With their dead eyes half opened.
And there be some struck through with bristling darts
Whose clenched hands have torn the pebbles up;
Whose gnashing teeth have ground the very sand.
--BAILLIE.
Massasoit kept his treaty with the English inviolate so long as he lived. He died in 1661, at the advanced age of eighty or ninety years, leaving two sons whom the English named respectively Alexander and Philip. Alexander, the eldest son and hereditary sachem, died soon after his father, when Philip became chief sachem and warrior of the Wampanoags, with his royal residence on Mount Hope, not far from Bristol, Rhode Island. He was called King Philip. He resumed the covenants with the English made by his father, and observed them faithfully for a period of twelve years.
But it had become painfully apparent to Massasoit before his death, that the spreading colonies would soon deprive his people of their land and nationality, and that the Indians must become vassals of the pale race. Long did the warlike King Philip ponder on these possibilities with deep bitterness of feeling, until he had lashed himself into a fury by the continued nursing of his wrath, and resolved to strike the exterminating blow against the English.
There were many private wrongs of his people unavenged. The whites already had assumed a domineering manner, and his final resolution was both natural and patriotic. King Philip was a man of reason, and it is said he had no hope of success when he began the war. It was a war against such odds that it must have but one termination, and he had little if any faith in a successful issue.
The Pokanokets had always rejected the Christian manners, and Massasoit had desired to insert in a treaty, what the Puritans never permitted, that the English should never attempt to convert the warriors of his tribe from their religion.
Repeated sales of land narrowed their domains, and the English had artfully crowded them into the tongues of land, as "most suitable and convenient for them," where they would be more easily watched. The two chief seats of the Pokanokets were the peninsulas now called Bristol and Tiverton. As the English villages now grew nearer and nearer to them, their hunting-grounds were put under culture, their natural parks turned into pastures, their best fields for planting corn were gradually alienated, their fisheries impaired by more skilful methods, till they found themselves deprived of their broad acres, and by their own legal contracts driven, as it were, into the sea.
Mutual distrusts and collisions were the inevitable consequence. There is no authentic evidence of a deliberate conspiracy on the part of all the tribes. Bancroft, who is, perhaps, the best authority on all colonial matters, says the commencement of the war was accidental, and that "many of the Indians were in a maze, not knowing what to do, and ready to stand for the English."
There were many grievances among the Indians. The haughty chieftain, who had once before been compelled to surrender his "English arms," and pay an onerous tribute, was summoned to submit to an examination, and could not escape suspicion.
The wrath of his tribe was roused, and the informer was murdered. In turn the murderers were identified, seized, tried by a jury of which one-half were Indians, and on conviction were hanged. The younger men of the tribe were eager for vengeance, and without delay eight or nine of the English were slain about Swansey, and the alarm of war spread through the colonies.
King Philip was thus unwillingly hurried into war, and he wept when he heard that a white man's blood had been shed. It is a rare thing for an Indian to weep, least of all a mighty chief like Philip; but in the cloud of war hovering over his people, he read the doom of his tribe. He had kept his men about him in arms, and had welcomed every stranger, and yet, against his judgment and his will, he was involved in war almost before he knew it. The English had guns enough, while but few of the Indians were well armed and were without resources when their present supply was exhausted. The rifle, though not in general use, had been invented many years before, and for hunters and backwoodsmen was an effective weapon, though it was regarded as "a slow firing gun" compared with the smooth-bore. Many of the Indians had firearms and were excellent marksmen, and had overcome their superstitious dread of the white man's weapons.
The minds of the English are said to have been appalled by the horrors of the impending conflict, and superstition indulged in wild inventions. There was an eclipse of the moon at which they declared they saw the figure of an Indian scalp imprinted on the centre of the disk. The perfect form of an Indian bow appeared in the sky. The sighing of the wind was like the whistling of bullets. Some heard invisible troops of horses gallop through the air, while others found the prophecy of calamities in the howling of the wolves.
Despite all his aversion to war, Philip found it forced upon him, and when he took up the hatchet he threw his soul into the issue, and fought until death ended the struggle. There were many Christian converts among the Indians, who were firmly attached to the English. One of these, John Sassaman, who had been educated at Cambridge, where John Harvard had established a college, was a royal secretary to Philip. Becoming acquainted with the plans of the sachem, he revealed them to the authorities at Plymouth. For this he was murdered, and his murderers hanged.
Soon after the attack on Swansey, Philip left his place of residence and his territory to the English. The following is the reason of his precipitate retreat. Additional assistance being needed, the authorities of Boston sent out Major-General Savage from that place, with sixty horse and as many foot-soldiers, who scoured the country all the way to Mount Hope, where King Philip, his wife and child were supposed to be at that time.
Philip was at dinner when the news reached him of the near proximity of his enemies, and he rose with his family, officers and warriors and fled further up the country. The English pursued them as far as they could go for the swamps, and overtook the rear of the detachment, killing sixteen of them.
At the solicitation of Benjamin Church, a company of thirty-six men were placed under him and Captain Fuller, who on the 8th of July marched down into Pocasset Neck. This force, small as it was, afterward divided, Church taking nineteen of the men and Fuller the remaining seventeen. The party under Church proceeded into a point of land called Punkateeset, now the southerly extremity of Tiverton, where they were attacked by a body of three hundred Indians. After a fight of a few moments, the English fell back to the seashore, and thus saved themselves from destruction, for Church perceived that it was the intention of the Indians to surround them. Every one expected death, but resolved to sell their lives as dearly as possible. Thus hemmed in, Church had a double duty to perform--that of preserving the spirit of his followers, several of whom viewed their situation as desperate, and erecting piles of stone to defend them.
Boats had been appointed to attend the English on this expedition, and the heroic party looked for relief from this quarter; but, though the boats appeared, the bullets of the Indians made them preserve a respectable distance, until Church, in a moment of vexation, cried:
"Be off with you, cowards, and leave us to our fate!" The boats took him at his word.
The Indians, now encouraged, fought more desperately than before. The situation of the Englishmen was most forlorn, although as yet not one had been wounded. Night was coming on, their ammunition was nearly spent, and the Indians, having taken possession of a stone house on the hill, fired into the temporary barricade of the English; but at this moment a sloop hove in sight, and bore down toward the shore. It had two or three small cannon on board with which it proceeded to knock down the stone house. The sloop was commanded by a resolute man, Captain Golding, who effected the embarkation of the company, taking off only two at a time in a canoe. During the embarkation the Indians who were armed with muskets and rifles kept up a steady fire from behind trees and stones, and Church, who was the last to embark, narrowly escaped the balls of the enemy, one grazing his head, and another lodging in a stake, which happened to stand just above the centre of his breast.
Captain Church soon after joined a body of English and returned to Pocasset, and Philip, after a skirmish, retired to the swamps, where for a time his situation became desperate; but at length he contrived to elude his besiegers, and fled to the Nipmucks, who received him with a warmth of welcome quite gratifying to the ambitious chieftain.
The governor of Massachusetts sought to dissuade the Nipmucks from espousing the cause of Philip; but they could not agree among themselves, and consented to meet the English commissioners at a place three miles from Brookfield on a specified day. Captains Hutchinson and Wheeler were deputized to proceed to the appointed place. With twenty mounted men and three Christian Indians as guides and interpreters they reached the appointed place, but no Indians were to be seen. After a short consultation, they advanced a little further, when they found themselves in an ambuscade. A volley of rifles and muskets was the first intimation of the presence of Indians. Eight men and five horses fell dead, and Captain Hutchinson and two more were mortally wounded. The Christian Indians led the remnant to Brookfield.
They scarcely had time to alarm the inhabitants, who, to the number of seventy-eight, flocked into the garrison house, when the Indians assailed the town. The house was but slightly fortified about the exterior by a few logs hastily thrown up, while inside the house was padded with feather-beds to deaden the force of the bullets. The house was soon surrounded by the enemy, and shots poured in from all directions. The beleaguered English were no mean marksmen, and they soon taught the Indians to keep at a respectful distance. The Indians filled a cart with hemp, flax, and other combustible materials, which they set on fire, and pushed it backward to the building. The beleaguered people began to pray for deliverance, when, as if in answer to their prayer, a heavy shower of rain fell, extinguishing the fire, and before it could be replenished, Major Willard with a party of dragoons arrived and the Indians raised the siege.
A considerable number of Christian Indians near Hatfield were suspected of being friendly to Philip and ordered to give up their arms. They escaped at night and fled up the river toward Deerfield to join Philip. The English pursued them and early next morning came up with them at a swamp, opposite to the present town of Sunderland, where a warm contest ensued. The Indians fought gallantly, but were finally routed, with a loss of twenty six of their number, while the whites lost only ten. The escaped Indians joined Philip's forces, and Lathrop and Beers returned to their station at Hadley.
About the 10th of September, while Captain Lathrop was bringing away some provisions and corn from Deerfield, he was attacked at a place called "Muddy Brook." Knowing the English would pass here with their teams and horses, the Indians lay in ambush and, pouring in a destructive fire, rushed furiously to a close engagement. The English ranks were broken, and the scattered troops were everywhere attacked. Seeking the cover of trees, the English fought with desperation. The combat now became a trial of skill in sharp-shooting, on the issue of which life or death was suspended. The overwhelming superiority of the Indians, as to numbers, left little room for hope on the part of the English. Every instant they were shot down behind their retreats, until nearly their whole number perished. The dead, the dying, the wounded strewed the ground in every direction. Out of nearly one hundred, including the teamsters, not more than seven or eight escaped from the bloody spot. The wounded were indiscriminately massacred. This company consisted of choice young men, "the very flower of Essex County, none of whom were ashamed to speak with the enemy in the gate." Eighteen were citizens of Deerfield.
Captain Moseley arrived at the conclusion of the fight, just as the Indians began stripping and mutilating the dead. He charged the Indians, cutting his way through with his company again and again, until he drove them from the field.
The Indians near Springfield, supposed to be friendly, on the 4th of October became allies of King Philip, whose cause seemed likely to prevail. They planned to get possession of the fort, but were betrayed by an Indian at Windsor, and when the savages came they found the garrison ready to resist them. The savages burned thirty-two houses and barns, and the beleaguered people were in great distress.
King Philip next aimed a blow at the three towns Hadley, Hatfield and Northampton at once. At this time, Captain Appleton with one company lay at Hadley, Captain Moseley and Poole with two companies were at Hatfield, while Major Treat had just returned to Northampton for the security of the settlement. Philip with seven or eight hundred warriors made a bold assault on Hatfield, on the 19th of October, attacking from every side at the same moment; but after a severe struggle the Indians were repulsed at every point.
After leaving the western frontier of Massachusetts, Philip was next known to be in the countries of his allies, the Narragansetts. The latter had not heartily engaged in the war; but their inclination to do so was not doubted, and it was the design of Philip to arouse them to activity. Conanchet, their sachem, in violation of his treaty with the English, not only received Philip's warriors, but aided their operations against the English, and Massachusetts, Connecticut and Plymouth raised an army of fifteen hundred men and, in the winter of 1675, set out to attack the Indians.
Philip had strongly fortified himself at South Kingston, Rhode Island, on an elevated portion of an immense swamp. Here his men erected about five hundred wigwams, of a superior construction, in which was deposited an abundant store of provisions. Baskets and tubs of corn (hollow trees cut off about the length of a barrel) were piled one upon another around the inside of the dwellings, which rendered them bullet-proof. Here about three thousand Indians had taken up their winter quarters, and among them were Philip's best warriors.
Governor Winslow of Plymouth commanded the English. A heavy snow had fallen and the weather was intensely cold; but on December 19, the English reached the fort and, by reason of their scarcity of provisions, resolved to attack at once. The New Englanders were unacquainted with the situation of the Indians, and, but for an Indian who betrayed his countrymen, there is little probability that the English would have effected anything against the fort. The stronghold was reached about one o'clock in the afternoon, and the English assailed the most vulnerable part of it, where it was fortified by a kind of a block-house, directly in front of the entrance, and had also flankers to cover a cross-fire. The place was protected by high palisades and an immense hedge of fallen trees surrounding it on all sides. Between the fort and the main land was a body of water, which could be crossed only on a large tree lying over it. Such was the formidable aspect of the place, such the difficulty of gaining access to it.
At first the English tried to cross over on the log; but, being compelled to go in single file, they were shot down by the Indians, until six captains and a number of men had been slain. Captain Moseley and a mere handful of men finally rushed over the log and burst into the fort, where they were assailed by fearful odds. This bold act so attracted the attention of the Indians that others rushed in. Captain Church, that indomitable Indian fighter, burst into the fort, dashed through it, and reached the swamp in the rear, where he poured a destructive fire into the enemy in retreat. The Indian cabins were set on fire, and a scene of horror followed. A Narragansett chief afterward stated their loss at seven hundred killed in the fort and three hundred more who died of their wounds in the woods.
After the destruction of the place, Governor Winslow set out with his killed and wounded through a driving snow-storm for Pettyquamscott. The march was one of misery and distress, and a number of the wounded died on their march.
On the 19th of February, the Indians surprised Lancaster with complete success, falling upon it with a force of several hundred warriors. The town contained fifty-two families, of whom forty-two persons were killed or captured. Forty-two persons took shelter in the house of Mary Rowlandson, the wife of the minister of the place. It was set on fire by the Indians. "Quickly," says Mrs. Rowlandson in her narrative, "it was the dolefullest day that ever mine eyes saw. Now the dreadful hour had come. Some in our house were fighting for their lives; others wallowing in blood; the house on fire over our heads, and the bloody heathen ready to knock us on the head if we stirred out. I took my children to go forth; but the Indians shot so thick that the bullets rattled against the house as if one had thrown a handful of stones. We had six stout dogs; but none of them would stir. A bullet went through my side, and another through a child in my arms, and I was made captive, having of my family only one poor wounded babe left. I was led from the town where my captors halted to gaze on the burning houses. Down I must sit in the snow, with my sick child, the picture of death in my lap. Not the least crumb of refreshment came within our mouths from Wednesday night until Sunday night except a little cold water."
Mrs. Rowlandson and her child were afterward recovered from the savages.
Shortly after the Lancaster disaster, Captain Pierce, with fifty men and twenty Cape Cod Indians, having crossed the Pawtuxet River in Rhode Island, unexpectedly met a large body of Indians.
The English fell back and took up a sheltered position under the river bank; but here they were hemmed in and fought until all fell save one white man and four Indians, after killing more than one hundred of the enemy.
The Christian Indians of Cape Cod showed their faithfulness and courage in this melancholy affair. Four of them effected their escape and one of these aided in the escape of the only white man who survived. His name was Amos, and after Captain Pierce was wounded he remained by him loading and firing, until it was evident he could do no more. Then he painted his face black as his enemies had done, and thus escaped. Another of the Christian Indians pretended to be chasing the white man who thus escaped with upraised tomahawk. The ruse saved both.
On the 20th of April, an army of Indians made an assault on Sudbury. The people were reinforced by soldiers from Watertown and Concord. The Indians drew the Concord people into an ambuscade and only one escaped.
The best Indian warrior makes a poor general. He has no ability to preserve an organization, and soon calamities began to befall Philip. They were small at first; but they tended to discourage his followers. First the Deerfield Indians abandoned his cause, and many of the Nipmucks and Narragansetts followed. Still, Philip, though he had not been much seen during the winter, and it is doubtful where he had spent the most of it, had no intention of abating his efforts against the English.
In the month of May, 1676, he appeared at the head of a powerful force in northern Massachusetts. Large bodies of Indians about this time took up positions at the Connecticut River falls, where they were attacked and routed by Captain Turner. One hundred were left dead on the field and a hundred and forty more went over the falls. When Turner retreated from the field, the Indians rallied, fell on his rear, shot down the gallant captain and thirty-seven of his men.
On May 30th, Philip, at the head of six hundred men, attacked Hatfield, but was repulsed after a desperate struggle.
Philip's power was on the wane. He was secure in no place; but his haughty spirit was untamed by adversity. Although meeting with constant losses, and among them some of his most experienced warriors, he, nevertheless, seemed as hostile and determined as ever. In August, the intrepid Church made a descent upon his headquarters at Matapoiset, where he killed and made prisoners one hundred and thirty. Philip barely made his escape, and was obliged to leave his wampum and his wife and child, who were made prisoners.
Church's guide had brought him to a place where a large tree, which the enemy had felled, lay across a stream. Church had gained the top end of the tree, when he espied an Indian on the stump of it, on the other side of the stream. Church, brought his gun to his shoulder and would have shot the Indian, had not one of his own Indians told him not to fire, as he believed it was one of his own men. On hearing voices, the Indian looked about, and the friendly Indian got a glance at his face and discovered that it was Philip. The friendly Indian fired, but too late, for Philip, leaping from the stump, ran down the bank among the bushes and in a moment was out of sight. Church gave chase to him; but he could not be found, though they picked up a few of his followers. King Philip's war had now degenerated into a single man hunt. From this time on, Philip was too closely watched and hotly pursued to escape destruction. His followers deserted him, and he was driven like a wild beast from place to place, until at last he came to his ancient seat near Pokanoket, when one of his men advised making peace. Philip killedIllustration: He fell upon his face in the mud and water, with his gun under him.him on the spot. The Indian thus slain had a brother named Alderman, who, fearing the same fate, and probably in revenge, deserted Philip, and gave Captain Church an account of his situation and offered to lead him to his camp. Early on Saturday morning, August 12, 1676, Church, with his Indian guide, came to the swamp where Philip was encamped, and, before he was discovered, had placed a guard about it so as to encompass it, except at one place. He then ordered Captain Golding to rush into the swamp and fall upon Philip in his camp, which he immediately did, but was discovered as he approached, and Philip fled. Having been just awakened and being only partially dressed, he ran at full speed, carrying his gun in his hand, and came directly upon the Indian Alderman, who, with a white man, was in ambush at the edge of the swamp.
"There comes the devil Philip now!" cried the Englishman, raising his rifle and aiming at the king; but the powder in the pan had become damp, and he missed fire. Immediately Alderman, whose gun was loaded with two balls, fired, sending one bullet through Philip's heart and another not more than two inches from it. He fell upon his face in the mud and water, with his gun under him.
The death of Philip ended the bloodiest Indian war at that time known in the New World. A few of his confederates were captured; but there was no more fighting. Philip's son was sold into slavery in Bermuda. So perished the dynasty of Massasoit.