THE NEIGHBORHOOD OF NARRAGANSETT.

"Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart,Tarred and feathered and carried in a cartBy the women of Marblehead!"

"Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart,

Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart

By the women of Marblehead!"

He had refused to take some of his townsmen off a drifting wreck, because it would cost too much to feed them on the way home.

SALEM AND THE WITCHES.

Westward of the Marblehead peninsula, there stretches into the mainland another noted haven ofthe olden time, Salem harbor, dividing it into two arms, the North and South Rivers, having between them the town, chiefly built upon a peninsula about two miles long. This was the Indian domain of Naumkeag, a name preserved in many titles there, and meaning the "Eel-Land." It was the mother-colony on Massachusetts Bay, the first house being built in 1626, and old John Endicott having got a grant from Plymouth for the colony, he came out and founded the town two years afterwards, calling it Salem, "from the peace which they had and hoped in it." But despite this peacefulness, the people soon developed warlike tendencies. They scourged Philip Ratcliffe, and cut off his ears and banished him soon after the founding, for "blasphemy against the First Church," and when the port had got well under way, an annual trade statement showed imports of $110,000 in arms and cannon, against $90,000 in everything else. The "First Church," formed in 1629, was the earliest church organization in New England, and it still exists. There were then ten houses in the town, besides the Governor's house, which the early history describes as "garnished with great ordnance;" adding, "thus we doubt not that God will be with us, and if God be with us, who can be against us?" John Winthrop was here as Governor, briefly, in 1630, soon migrating to Shawmut, to found Boston for the capital of the colony. After the Revolution, Salem was the leading seaport of NewEngland; but its glory has departed, and the trade has gone to Boston. In 1785 it sent out the first American vessel that doubled the Cape of Good Hope, and during a half century afterwards it held almost a monopoly of the East India and China trade with the United States, having at one time fifty-four large ships thus engaged. The Salem ships also went to the Southern seas, Japan and Africa. This trade gave its people great wealth and influence, and it was said, about 1810, that a Salem merchant was then the largest shipowner in the world. But this has retired into the dim past, and now it is a restful city of about forty thousand people, its leading townsmen, the descendants of the merchants and captains, living in comfortable mansions surrounding the Common and along the quiet elm-shaded streets in the residential section. The rest of the population have gone into shoemaking and other manufactures.

George Peabody, the philanthropist, was the most noted citizen of Salem, born in the suburb of Danvers (since changed to Peabody) in 1795, and, dying in 1869, his remains rest in Harmony Grove Cemetery. In the Peabody Institute, which he founded in Danvers, is kept as a sacred relic Queen Victoria's portrait, her gift to him in recognition of his benefactions. General Putnam, Nathaniel Bowditch, William H. Prescott, the historian, W. W. Story, the sculptor, and Nathaniel Hawthorne, were natives of Salem. The East India Marine Hall is its most noted institution,a fine building filled with a remarkable Oriental collection, gathered in the many voyages made by Salem ships, and also having a valuable Natural History Museum, designed to show the development of animal life. In the Essex Institute are interesting historical paintings and relics, including the charter given by King Charles I. to the colony of Massachusetts Bay. Also, carefully kept near by, is the original "First Church," built in 1634 for the organization formed in 1629, and of which Roger Williams was the pastor before the Puritans banished him from the colony. When the enlarging congregation built a more spacious church, this quaint little house, with its high-pointed roof, diamond-paned windows and gallery, which is revered as the shrine of Salem, was removed to its present location. In Essex Street is also the old "Roger Williams House," a low-roofed structure with a little shop in front, his home for a brief period in 1635-36. This house has acquired additional fame as a relic of the witchcraft days, for in it was held the court trying some of the witches in 1692, who were afterwards taken to the gallows or Witch Hill, on the western verge of the town, to be put to death. The witchcraft delusion began in the Danvers suburb and soon overran most of New England, the prosecutions continuing more than a year. Nineteen proven witches were executed, while one, under the ancient English law, was pressed to death for standing mute when told to plead. Old CottonMather, the historian and pastor, was a leader in the movement against the witches.

The North Shore, beyond Salem Harbor, stretches far along the rock-bound coast of Cape Ann. Here all the old fishing towns have become modern villa-studded summer resorts, picturesque and attractive in their newer development. Beverley, Manchester-by-the-Sea and Magnolia all have grand headlands and fine beaches. Beverley also has shoe-factories, and is proud of the memory of Nathan Dane, the eminent jurist, who named Dane Hall, the Harvard Law School. Manchester has the "Singing Beach," where the white sand, when stirred, emits a musical sound. Magnolia, on a rocky bluff, is adjoined by the attractive Crescent Beach, and has around it very fine woodland. To the eastward is Rafe's Chasm, sixty feet deep and only a few feet wide, and off shore, almost opposite, is the bleak reef of Norman's Woe. Inland is Wenham Lake, near Beverley, noted for its ice supply, upon which all these places depend, while beyond, the Ipswich River comes down through the pleasant town of Ipswich, covering both banks with houses, and flowing into Ipswich Bay north of the peninsula of Cape Ann. To the westward is Andover, where the thrifty Puritan Fathers, having bought the domain from the Indians "for twenty-six dollars and sixty-four cents and a coat," established the noted Andover Theological Seminary of the Congregational Church, where its ablest divines have been taught inwhat has been called "the school of the prophets." Here, on "Andover Hill," abstruse theology has been the ruling influence and intense religious controversies have been waged, over three thousand clergymen having been graduated. Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe lived here after publishingUncle Tom's Cabin, and is buried here. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps was born here, and wroteGates Ajarin the venerable "Phelps House." The Seminary buildings, the local guidebook tells us, cause visitors to wonder "if orthodox angels have not lifted up old Harvard and Massachusetts Halls and carried them by night from Cambridge to Andover Hill." Ipswich, too, has a famous Seminary, but it is for the opposite sex. We are told that one reason for the popularity of Ipswich Female Seminary is that its location tends to softening the rigors of study, as this is the place "where Andover theological students are wont to take unto themselves wives of the daughters of the Puritans." The indented shore of Ipswich Bay was ancient Agawam, of which Captain John Smith, coasting along in 1614, recorded in his narrative that he saw "the many cornfields and delightful groves of Agawam." The fertile valley of Ipswich River is a veritable oasis among the rocks, moors and salt-marshes that environ it.

THE MERRIMACK RIVER.

Near the northern boundary of Massachusetts is the famous Merrimack River, flowing northeastwardinto the Atlantic, and noted for the enormous water-powers it provides for the various mill-towns that line its banks. It is a vigorous stream, having frequent waterfalls and carrying a powerful current, the name appropriately meaning "the swift water." Oliver Wendell Holmes writes of it inThe School Boy:

"Do pilgrims find their way to Indian Ridge,Or journey onward to the far-off bridge,And bring to younger ears the story backOf the broad stream, the mighty Merrimack?"

"Do pilgrims find their way to Indian Ridge,

Or journey onward to the far-off bridge,

And bring to younger ears the story back

Of the broad stream, the mighty Merrimack?"

The Merrimack drains the southern slopes of the White Mountains, and takes the outflow of Lake Winnipesaukee, a vast reservoir, the waters being regulated at its outlet to suit the wants of the mills below. It flows southward through New Hampshire into Massachusetts, turning northeast to the ocean. The river passes near Salisbury, where Daniel Webster was born in 1782; then, seventy-five miles northwest of Boston, comes to Concord, the capital of New Hampshire, which has a fine Capitol building and quarries of excellent granite; and eighteen miles below, it reaches Manchester, the chief city of New Hampshire, having sixty thousand people and many large mills owned by wealthy corporations. Here are the Amoskeag Falls (the Indian name meaning the "fishing-place"), the largest on the Merrimack, having fifty-five feet descent, and their water-power being utilized through two canals. The chief productsare textile goods, locomotives and steam fire-engines. Eighteen miles farther southward the Nashua River comes up from the southwest, having passed the industrial town of Fitchburg on the way, and here at its confluence with the Merrimack is Nashua, another busy factory town. At Amherst, not far away, Horace Greeley was born in 1811. Crossing the boundary into Massachusetts, the river comes to the Pawtucket Falls, having thirty-two feet descent, and furnishing the water-power, twenty-six miles northwest of Boston, for the great mills of Lowell, the third city of Massachusetts, having a hundred thousand people, and spreading along the Merrimack at its confluence with Concord River, coming up from Concord Bridge of Revolutionary fame. The first mill was built at Lowell in 1823, and its industries have assumed a wide range and enormous output, though the operatives are nearly all French Canadians, and the language heard in this once Yankee mill-town is now mainly French. The Merrimack, having turned northeast, next comes to Lawrence, where it descends rapids of twenty-eight feet in the course of a half-mile. Here the Lawrence family, of which the noted Abbott Lawrence was the chief, established a town of cotton and woollen mills, utilizing the rapids by constructing a huge dam nine hundred feet long and thirty feet high, in 1845, at a cost of $250,000. Here are the great Pacific Mills, among the largest textile works in the world, and thecity has over sixty thousand inhabitants. Nine miles farther down the river is Haverhill, another manufacturing town, with forty thousand people, largely engaged in shoemaking. The poet John G. Whittier was born in 1807 near Lake Kenoza, the scene of hisSnowbound, on the northeastern verge of Haverhill.

Below Haverhill the Merrimack is a navigable, tidal stream, broadening into a spacious harbor at its mouth in the town of Newbury, where the "ancient sea-blown city" of Newburyport is built on the southern shore, while five miles to the westward, on the Pow-wow River, is Amesbury, long the home of Whittier, who died in 1892, after having celebrated this whole region in his poems. His house is maintained as a memorial. Newburyport long since turned its attention from commerce to making shoes and other manufactures, and it now has about eighteen thousand population. Its splendid High Street, upon the crest of the ridge, one of the noted tree-embowered highways of New England, stretches several miles parallel to the river, down towards the sea, bordered by the stately mansions of the olden time. The Merrimack sweeps grandly along in front of them with a broad curve to the ocean, three miles below. The Newburyport Marine Museum contains foreign curiosities brought home by the old-time sea captains, and the Public Library, endowed by George Peabody, occupies an impressive colonial mansion,which has been flavored by the entertainment of Generals Washington and Lafayette. The Old South Presbyterian Church has the body of the famous preacher George Whitefield, who died in Newburyport in 1770, interred in a vault under the pulpit. In a little wooden house behind this church, William Lloyd Garrison, the Abolitionist, was born in 1805. Caleb Cushing the jurist and John B. Gough the temperance lecturer lived in Newburyport; but its resident who probably achieved the greatest notoriety in his day was "Lord" Timothy Dexter, an eccentric merchant of the eighteenth century, who made a large fortune by singular ventures, among them shipping a cargo of warming-pans to the West Indies, where they were sold to the planters at a stiff profit for boiling sugar.

Whittier's home was on the Merrimack, and he has written for the river a noble invocation:

"Stream of my fathers! sweetly stillThe sunset rays thy valley fill;Poured slantwise down the long defile,Wave, wood, and spire beneath them smile."Centuries ago, that harbor bar,Stretching its length of foam afar,And Salisbury's beach of shining sand,And yonder island's wave-smoothed strand,Saw the adventurer's tiny sailFlit, stooping from the eastern gale;And o'er these woods and waters brokeThe cheer from Britain's hearts of oak,As, brightly on the voyager's eye,Weary of forest, sea and sky,Breaking the dull continuous wood,The Merrimack rolled down his flood."Home of my fathers! I have stoodWhere Hudson rolled his lordly flood:Seen sunrise rest and sunset fadeAlong his frowning Palisade;Looked down the Appalachian peak,On Juniata's silver streak;Have seen along his valley gleamThe Mohawk's softly winding stream;The level light of sunset shineThrough broad Potomac's hem of pine;And autumn's rainbow-tinted bannerHang lightly o'er the Susquehanna;Yet wheresoe'er his step might be,Thy wandering child looked back to thee:Heard in his dreams thy river's soundOf murmuring on its pebbly bound,The unforgotten swell and roarOf waves on thy familiar shore."

"Stream of my fathers! sweetly stillThe sunset rays thy valley fill;Poured slantwise down the long defile,Wave, wood, and spire beneath them smile.

"Stream of my fathers! sweetly still

The sunset rays thy valley fill;

Poured slantwise down the long defile,

Wave, wood, and spire beneath them smile.

"Centuries ago, that harbor bar,Stretching its length of foam afar,And Salisbury's beach of shining sand,And yonder island's wave-smoothed strand,Saw the adventurer's tiny sailFlit, stooping from the eastern gale;And o'er these woods and waters brokeThe cheer from Britain's hearts of oak,As, brightly on the voyager's eye,Weary of forest, sea and sky,Breaking the dull continuous wood,The Merrimack rolled down his flood.

"Centuries ago, that harbor bar,

Stretching its length of foam afar,

And Salisbury's beach of shining sand,

And yonder island's wave-smoothed strand,

Saw the adventurer's tiny sail

Flit, stooping from the eastern gale;

And o'er these woods and waters broke

The cheer from Britain's hearts of oak,

As, brightly on the voyager's eye,

Weary of forest, sea and sky,

Breaking the dull continuous wood,

The Merrimack rolled down his flood.

"Home of my fathers! I have stoodWhere Hudson rolled his lordly flood:Seen sunrise rest and sunset fadeAlong his frowning Palisade;Looked down the Appalachian peak,On Juniata's silver streak;Have seen along his valley gleamThe Mohawk's softly winding stream;The level light of sunset shineThrough broad Potomac's hem of pine;And autumn's rainbow-tinted bannerHang lightly o'er the Susquehanna;Yet wheresoe'er his step might be,Thy wandering child looked back to thee:Heard in his dreams thy river's soundOf murmuring on its pebbly bound,The unforgotten swell and roarOf waves on thy familiar shore."

"Home of my fathers! I have stood

Where Hudson rolled his lordly flood:

Seen sunrise rest and sunset fade

Along his frowning Palisade;

Looked down the Appalachian peak,

On Juniata's silver streak;

Have seen along his valley gleam

The Mohawk's softly winding stream;

The level light of sunset shine

Through broad Potomac's hem of pine;

And autumn's rainbow-tinted banner

Hang lightly o'er the Susquehanna;

Yet wheresoe'er his step might be,

Thy wandering child looked back to thee:

Heard in his dreams thy river's sound

Of murmuring on its pebbly bound,

The unforgotten swell and roar

Of waves on thy familiar shore."

THE BRIDAL OF PENNACOOK.

It was in the valley of the Merrimack that Whittier located the scene of his famous poem, the "Bridal of Pennacook." This American epic tells—

"A story of the marriage of the chiefOf Saugus to the dusky Weetamoo,Daughter of Passaconaway, who dweltIn the old time upon the Merrimack."

"A story of the marriage of the chief

Of Saugus to the dusky Weetamoo,

Daughter of Passaconaway, who dwelt

In the old time upon the Merrimack."

Winnepurkit was the son of Nanapashemet, or the New Moon, and was the Sagamore of Saugus, Naumkeag,and the adjoining domain. He was of noble blood and valor, and for his bride chose the daughter of Passaconaway, the great chief, ruling all the tribes in the Merrimack Valley, who lived at Pennacook, now Concord. Not only was Passaconaway a mighty chief, but he was also the greatest Powah or wizard of his time, the colonial annalists gravely telling that he could make trees dance, waters burn, and green leaves grow in winter, through his necromancy. When Winnepurkit married this wizard's daughter, great was the feasting at this "Bridal of Pennacook." Then Passaconaway caused a select party of warriors to escort his daughter to her husband's home at Saugus, where they received princely entertainment. Not long afterwards the bride expressed a wish to again see her father and her home at Pennacook, whereupon her husband sent her thither, escorted by a trusty band, who were graciously received and rewarded. After some time Weetamoo desired to return to Saugus, and her father sent word of this to his son-in-law by messengers, requesting that a suitable guard be provided to escort her down. But Winnepurkit liked not this method, and bade the messengers return with this reply, "That when his wife departed from him he caused his own men to wait upon her to her father's territories, as did become him; but now that she had an intent to return, it did become her father to send her back with a convoy of his own people, and that it stood not withWinnepurkit's reputation either to make himself or his men so servile as to fetch her again." This reply, as may be imagined, ruffled the old chief, and he sent a sharp answer "That his daughter's blood and birth deserved more respect than to be slighted in such a manner, and therefore, if Winnepurkit would have her company, he were best to send or come for her." Neither would yield the point of Indian etiquette, and the colonial narrator leaves it to be inferred that she then remained with her father, though it is supposed she subsequently rejoined her husband. The poet has made good use of the story, illustrating the scenery of the region with great felicity, but giving the tale a highly dramatic ending. Whittier makes the heart-broken bride, in her effort to return to her husband, launch her canoe upon the swollen Merrimack above the falls at Amoskeag when a spring freshet was bringing down masses of ice:

"Down the vexed centre of that rushing tide,The thick, huge ice-blocks threatening either side,The foam-white rocks of Amoskeag in view,With arrowy swiftness sped that light canoe."Sick and aweary of her lonely life,Heedless of peril, the still faithful wifeHad left her mother's grave, her father's door,To seek the wigwam of her chief once more!"Down the white rapids, like a sere leaf whirled,On the sharp rocks and piled-up ices hurled,Empty and broken, circled the canoe,In the vexed pool below—but where was Weetamoo?"

"Down the vexed centre of that rushing tide,The thick, huge ice-blocks threatening either side,The foam-white rocks of Amoskeag in view,With arrowy swiftness sped that light canoe.

"Down the vexed centre of that rushing tide,

The thick, huge ice-blocks threatening either side,

The foam-white rocks of Amoskeag in view,

With arrowy swiftness sped that light canoe.

"Sick and aweary of her lonely life,Heedless of peril, the still faithful wifeHad left her mother's grave, her father's door,To seek the wigwam of her chief once more!

"Sick and aweary of her lonely life,

Heedless of peril, the still faithful wife

Had left her mother's grave, her father's door,

To seek the wigwam of her chief once more!

"Down the white rapids, like a sere leaf whirled,On the sharp rocks and piled-up ices hurled,Empty and broken, circled the canoe,In the vexed pool below—but where was Weetamoo?"

"Down the white rapids, like a sere leaf whirled,

On the sharp rocks and piled-up ices hurled,

Empty and broken, circled the canoe,

In the vexed pool below—but where was Weetamoo?"

CAPE ANN.

Out in front of the region we have been describing projects the famous "ridge of rocks and roses," the gaunt headland of Cape Ann. This is a ponderous mass of hornblende granite, advanced forward twelve to fifteen miles into the ocean, with Thatcher's Island beyond, on which are the twin lighthouses that guard the mariner, forty-two miles north of the Highland Light on Cape Cod. The granite hills of the iron-bound headland are fringed with forests, while jagged reefs and rocky islets surround it, against which the sea beats in perpetual warfare. The surface is strewn with boulders, many of large size, and beds of the finest white sand are interspersed. The Indians called this promontory Wingaersheek, and when Captain John Smith came along he named it Cape Tragabizonda, in memory of a Moslem princess who had befriended him when a prisoner in Constantinople, also calling three small islands off the cape the "Three Turks' Heads." But King Charles I. would have none of this, however, and called the headland Cape Ann, after his royal mother, and thus it has remained. The haven on the southern side, Gloucester harbor, was early sought as a fishing station, being known in 1624, and it received its name in 1642, most of the early settlers coming from Gloucester in England. Champlain found it a safe harbor when in peril, and writes of itas "Le Beau Port." In August, 1892, this famous fishery port celebrated its two hundred and fiftieth anniversary with great fervor.

Along the Shore, Cape Anne, Gloucester, Mass.

The prosperity of Gloucester has come from the fisheries, it being the greatest cod and mackerel port in America, and having the most extensive fleet of fishing-boats in the world, exceeding six hundred, employing over six thousand men. The population approximates thirty thousand, and it is said their earnings on the fishery product are over $4,000,000 annually. The earliest form of the Cape Ann fishing-smack was known as the "Chebacco," two-masted, cat-rigged, and of ten or twelve tons, made sharp at both ends, and getting the name from the first place of building, Chebacco Parish, in Ipswich, adjoining the Cape. From this was developed the popular American build of vessel known as the schooner, the first one being launched at Gloucester in 1713. After sliding down the launching-ways, she so gracefully glided out upon the water that a bystander exclaimed in admiration, "See how she schoons!" and thus was she unexpectedly named, for a "schooner" has that style of vessel been ever since called. Gloucester surrounds its spacious harbor as a broad crescent, having Ten Pound Island in front sentinelling the entrance to the inner haven, so named because that was the price said to have been paid the Indians for it. The deeply indented harbor opens towards the southwest, being protected from the ocean by thelong peninsula of Eastern Point, having a fort and lighthouse on its extremity. Some seventy wharves jut out from the circular head of the bay, with granite hills rising behind, up which the town is terraced. Shipping of all kinds are scattered about, including large salt-laden ships, while fishermen and sailors wander through the streets and assemble around the docks, spinning yarns and preparing for fishing ventures out to the "Banks." The odd old town around the harbor has seen little change for years, but the newer portions are greatly improved, having many imposing buildings, including a fine City Hall. The numerous churches have gained for it the title of "Many-spired Gloucester," and no place could disclose more picturesque sea views.

But the fishery interest pervades the whole town, dwarfing everything else. The main street winds about the head of the harbor, bending with the sinuosities of the shore, and from it other streets, without much regularity, go down to the wharves. Fishing-boats are everywhere, with new ones building, and on most of the open spaces are "cod-flakes," or drying-places, where the fish are piled when first landed, preparatory to being cut up and packed in the extensive packing-houses adjoining the wharves. Here many hundreds are employed in preparing the fish for market, both men and women working. The best fish are either packed whole or cut into squares, so they may be pressed by machinery into what areknown as "cod-bricks," one and two-pound bricks being put into forty-pound boxes for shipment. When packed whole, the best fish are known as "white clover," in this stage of what is called the fishery "haymaking." This fish-packing is an enormous industry, and the Gloucester product goes to all parts of the world. But the fishery has its sombre side; the vessels are small, rarely over one hundred tons, and the crews are numerous, so that wrecks and loss of life are frequent. Often a tremendous storm will destroy a whole fleet on the "Banks," with no tidings ever received; and scarcely a family exists in Gloucester or its neighborhood that has not lost a member at sea. Sometimes the badges of mourning are universal.

An enormous development of rocks and boulders is seen everywhere in and around Gloucester. The houses are built upon rocks, the sea beats against rocks; but though excellent building-material is here, the houses are mostly of wood throughout the whole Cape Ann district. There is almost universally an ocean outlook over a sea of deepest blue. The outer extremity of the harbor to the westward is a long granite ridge ending in the popular watering-place of Magnolia Point. Down on the Eastern Point, alongside its terminating lighthouse, is a curious granitic formation, the rocks reproducing an elderly dame with muffled form and apron, known as "Mother Ann," this rude image being locally regarded as representing,in the eternal granite, the lady who named the Cape, the royal mother of King Charles I. The white flashing light upon Ten Pound Island between them is said to have for one of its chief duties the guiding of the mariner past the treacherous reefs of Norman's Woe, just west of the harbor entrance, which Longfellow has immortalized in his poemThe Wreck of the Hesperus. One "Goodman Norman" and his son were among the first settlers near there, and hence the name, but no record is found as to the "Woe" he may have had. Neither is it known that any wreck ever occurred on this famous reef. In the winter of 1839 a terrific storm caused many disasters around Cape Ann, and forty dead bodies, one being a woman lashed to a spar, were washed on the Gloucester shore. Longfellow read in a newspaper the story of these wrecks and the horrible details, one of the vessels being named the "Hesperus," and he somewhere saw a reference to "Norman's Woe." This name so impressed him that he determined to write a ballad on the wrecks. Late one night, as he sat by the fireside smoking his pipe, he conjured up the vivid scene and wrote the ballad. He retired to bed, but, as he relates, it was not to sleep; new thoughts crowded his mind, and he rose and added them to the ballad, and at three o'clock in the morning had finished his immortal poem. There was no such wreck at the place, but his genius has associated it with the iron-bound coast of Cape Ann,and Norman's Woe is a monument consecrated to one of America's greatest poets.

"It was the schooner HesperusThat sailed the wintry sea;And the skipper had taken his little daughterTo bear him company."And fast through the midnight dark and drear,Through the whistling sleet and snow,Like a sheeted ghost the vessel sweptTowards the reef of Norman's Woe."She struck where the white and fleecy wavesLooked soft as carded wool,But the cruel rocks they gored her sidesLike the horns of an angry bull."Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice,With the masts went by the board;Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank,Ho! ho! the breakers roared!"At daybreak on the bleak sea-beach,A fisherman stood aghast,To see the form of a maiden fair,Lashed close to a drifting mast."The salt sea was frozen on her breast,The salt tears in her eyes;And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed,On the billows fall and rise."Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,In the midnight and the snow!Christ save us all from a death like thisOn the reef of Norman's Woe!"

"It was the schooner HesperusThat sailed the wintry sea;And the skipper had taken his little daughterTo bear him company.

"It was the schooner Hesperus

That sailed the wintry sea;

And the skipper had taken his little daughter

To bear him company.

"And fast through the midnight dark and drear,Through the whistling sleet and snow,Like a sheeted ghost the vessel sweptTowards the reef of Norman's Woe.

"And fast through the midnight dark and drear,

Through the whistling sleet and snow,

Like a sheeted ghost the vessel swept

Towards the reef of Norman's Woe.

"She struck where the white and fleecy wavesLooked soft as carded wool,But the cruel rocks they gored her sidesLike the horns of an angry bull.

"She struck where the white and fleecy waves

Looked soft as carded wool,

But the cruel rocks they gored her sides

Like the horns of an angry bull.

"Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice,With the masts went by the board;Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank,Ho! ho! the breakers roared!

"Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice,

With the masts went by the board;

Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank,

Ho! ho! the breakers roared!

"At daybreak on the bleak sea-beach,A fisherman stood aghast,To see the form of a maiden fair,Lashed close to a drifting mast.

"At daybreak on the bleak sea-beach,

A fisherman stood aghast,

To see the form of a maiden fair,

Lashed close to a drifting mast.

"The salt sea was frozen on her breast,The salt tears in her eyes;And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed,On the billows fall and rise.

"The salt sea was frozen on her breast,

The salt tears in her eyes;

And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed,

On the billows fall and rise.

"Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,In the midnight and the snow!Christ save us all from a death like thisOn the reef of Norman's Woe!"

"Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,

In the midnight and the snow!

Christ save us all from a death like this

On the reef of Norman's Woe!"

THE LAND'S END.

The impressive scenery and bold picturesqueness all about attract many artists, who haunt the rocks and sea views of Cape Ann. The whole district is full of summer-homes, with flower-gardens and shrubbery amid the rocks and boulders, and the cliffs and ocean presenting an endless variety of changing scenery. The outer extremity of the Cape, long called Halibut Point, has been modernized into the Land's End, thus being rightly named as the termination of the great Massachusetts granite ridge, which falls away sharply into the sea. Upon the one hand Pigeon Cove, with its adjacent Sandy Bay, indents the rocky buttress, while upon the other side is Whale Cove. Just off the Land's End is the noted Thatcher's Island, low-lying on the sea, elongated, narrow and barren, with its tall twin lighthouses, and having nearby, in front of Whale Cove, the diminutive Milk Island. To the northward, off Pigeon Cove, is another barren rock surmounted by a lighthouse, Straitsmouth Island. These three outlying islands were the "Three Turks' Heads," as originally named by Captain John Smith. Thatcher's Island has about eighty acres of mainly gravelly surface strewn with boulders, being named from Anthony Thatcher's shipwreck there in 1635 in the most awful tempest known to colonial New England. Rockport is a town of quarries extended aroundSandy Bay, protected by breakwaters, behind which vessels come to load stone almost alongside the quarry. Pigeon Cove is the port for shipping stone taken out of Pigeon Hill, where the granite ridge is humped up into a grand eminence. Lanesville, to the north, is another large exporter of paving-blocks and building-stone. Alongside is Folly Point, guarding Folly Cove, at the northeastern extremity of the Cape, and to the westward are the villages of Bay View and Annisquam, with more quarries, and having, not far away, flowing out to Ipswich Bay through a lovely valley in the very heart of the Cape, the attractive little Squam River. The people of Cape Ann outside of Gloucester are almost all quarrymen, their product, largely paving-blocks, being shipped to all the seaboard cities. So extensive is this trade that it is difficult to decide which now brings the district most profit, the granite or the fish. There is no doubt, however, that the greatest fame of this celebrated Cape comes from its fisheries and the venturesome men who make them so successful. Edmund Burke, in the British House of Commons, in 1774, thus spoke of these Massachusetts fishermen: "No sea but what is vexed by their fisheries; no climate that is not witness of their toils; neither the perseverance of Holland, nor the activity of France, nor the dexterous and firm sagacity of English enterprise, ever carried their most perilous mode of hardy industry to the extent to which it hasbeen pursued by this recent people—a people who are yet in the gristle, and not yet hardened into manhood."

For three centuries, almost, this perilous trade has been carried on, and they are fully as daring and even more enterprising now than in the colonial days. Thus Whittier describes them:

"Wild are the waves which lash the reefs along St. George's Bank,Cold on the shore of Labrador the fog lies white and dank;Through storm and wave and blinding mist, stout are the hearts which manThe fishing-smacks of Marblehead, the sea-boats of Cape Ann."The cold North light and wintry sun glare on their icy formsBent grimly o'er their straining lines, or wrestling with the storms;Free as the winds they drive before, rough as the waves they roam,They laugh to scorn the slaver's threat against their rocky home."

"Wild are the waves which lash the reefs along St. George's Bank,

Cold on the shore of Labrador the fog lies white and dank;

Through storm and wave and blinding mist, stout are the hearts which man

The fishing-smacks of Marblehead, the sea-boats of Cape Ann.

"The cold North light and wintry sun glare on their icy formsBent grimly o'er their straining lines, or wrestling with the storms;Free as the winds they drive before, rough as the waves they roam,They laugh to scorn the slaver's threat against their rocky home."

"The cold North light and wintry sun glare on their icy forms

Bent grimly o'er their straining lines, or wrestling with the storms;

Free as the winds they drive before, rough as the waves they roam,

They laugh to scorn the slaver's threat against their rocky home."

XVI.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD OF NARRAGANSETT.

The State of Rhode Island—Narragansett Bay—Point Judith—Aquidneck—Conanicut Island—Jamestown—Beaver Tail Light—Patience, Hope and Despair Islands—The Starved Goat—Durfee Hill—Narragansett Indians—Canonicus—Miantonomoh—The Narragansett Fort Fight—Uncas—Norwich—Sachem's Plain—Nanunteno—Yantic Falls—Narragansett Pier—Commodore Perry—Stuart the Artist—Wickford—Clams—Rocky Point—Blackstone River—Seeconk River—Vinland—Roger Williams—What Cheer Rock—Providence—General Burnside—Malbone's Masterpiece—Brown University—Pawtucket—Samuel Slater—Central and Valley Falls—William Blackstone—Study Hill—Woonsocket—Worcester—George Bancroft—Lake Quinsigamond—Ware—Mount Hope Bay—The Vikings—Taunton Great River—Bristol Neck—Taunton—Dighton Rock—The Skeleton in Armor—Bristol—Mount Hope—King Philip—Last of the Wampanoags—Massasoit—Death of Philip—Fall River—Watuppa Ponds—Newport—Brenton's Point—Fort Adams—William Coddington—Bishop Berkeley—The Cliff Walk—Newport Cottages—The Casino—Bellevue Avenue—Judah Touro—Touro Park—The Old Stone Mill—Buzzard's Bay—Acushnet River—New Bedford—The Whale Fishery—Clark's Point—Fort Taber—Nonquitt—Vineyard Sound—Bartholomew Gosnold—No Man's Land—Elizabeth Islands—Cuttyhunk—Sakonnet Point—Hen and Chickens—Sow and Pigs—Gay Head—Naushon—Penikese—Nashawena—Pasque Island—James Bowdoin—Wood's Holl—Martha's Vineyard—Vineyard Haven—Thomas Mayhew—Cottage City—Edgartown—Chappaquidick Island—Cape Poge—Nantucket—Manshope—Thomas Macy—Wesco—Whaling—Nantucket Sound—Nantucket Shoals—Nantucket Town—Siasconset—Wrecks.

THE STATE OF RHODE ISLAND.

Narragansett Bay is one of the finest harbors on the New England coast. It stretches thirty miles inland, the rivers emptying into it making the water-power for the numerous and extensive textile factories of Rhode Island, which embraces the shores surrounding and the islands within the bay. It opens broadly, having beautiful shores, lined with pleasant beaches which dissolve into low cliffs and water-worn crags; for the character of the coast gradually changes from the sandy borders of Long Island Sound to the rocks of New England. Its western boundary, stretching far out into the sea, is the famous Point Judith, a long, low, narrow and protruding sandspit thrust into the Atlantic, a headland dreaded by the traveller, to whom "rounding Point Judith" and its brilliant flashing beacon, thus changing the course over the long ocean swells, when voyaging upon a Sound steamer, means a great deal in the way of tribute to Neptune. This headland was always feared by the mariner, and we are romantically told that in the colonial days a storm-tossed vessel was driven in towards this shore, her anxious skipper at the wheel, when suddenly his bright-eyed daughter, Judith, called out, "Land, father, I see the land!" His dim vision not discerning it, he shouted, "Where away? Point, Judith, point!" She pointed; he was warned; and quicklychanging the course, escaped disaster. This story was often repeated, so that in time the sailors gave her name to the headland. It is an interesting tale, but there are people, more prosaic, who insist that the Point was really named after Judith Quincy, wife of John Hull, the coiner of the ancient "pine-tree shillings," who bought the land there from the Indians. But, however named, and whoever the sponsor, Judith is usually well-remembered by those circumnavigating the dreaded Point.

Within Narragansett Bay, the chief island is Aquidneck, or Rhode Island, about fifteen miles long and of much fertility, having the best farm land in New England, and at the southern end the noted watering-place of Newport. This island furnishes the first half of the long official title of the little State—"Rhode Island and Providence Plantations." The memory of the old Narragansett chieftain, Canonicus, is preserved in Conanicut Island, west of Rhode Island, and seven miles long, there being between the two islands the capacious anchorage-ground of Newport Harbor. This island in 1678 was named Jamestown in honor of King James, and at its southern end, near the ruins of an old British fort, is the famous Beaver Tail Light, the guide into Newport harbor, the oldest lighthouse in America, dating from 1667. Roger Williams, who founded the "Providence Plantations," distributed various names to the other islands, several of them nowpopular resorts, among these titles, which represent the varying phases of his early emotions, being Prudence, Patience, Hope and Despair, while some later colonists with different ideas, evidently named Dutch Island, Hog Island, and the Starved Goat. Rhode Island is the smallest State in the Union, though among the first in manufactures, and in wealth proportionately to population. It has barely twelve hundred square miles of surface, of which more than one-eighth is water, and the highest land, Durfee Hill, is elevated only eight hundred feet.

THE LAND OF THE NARRAGANSETTS.

The region back of Point Judith and around Narragansett Bay was the home of the Narragansett Indians, who were early made, by Roger Williams, the friends of the white man. When the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, there were said to be thirty thousand of them, but they were afterwards wasted by pestilence, and when Williams fled to Providence and was received by them, he said they had twelve towns within twenty miles, and five thousand warriors. They fought the Pequots, to the westward, but were friendly with the tribes of Massachusetts, to which they really gave the name, for, living in a comparatively flat country, they described these tribes as belonging "near the great hills or mountains," which is the literal meaning of the word, they telling Williams it meant the many hills of that State, includingthe "blue hills of Milton." Canonicus and Miantonomoh were the great chiefs of the Narragansetts, described by the early colonists as wise, brave and magnanimous. The former made the grant of the lands at Providence to Roger Williams, and was his firm friend. The latter, the nephew and successor of Canonicus, joined the Puritans under Mason at Pequot Hill in the attack and defeat of the Pequots. In their original theology they looked forward to a mystic realm in the far southwest where the gods and pure spirits dwelt, while the souls of murderers, thieves and liars were doomed forever to wander abroad. Their friendship with the whites ended in 1675, however, when King Philip incited them to join in his war, and the colonists attacked them on a hill in a pine and cedar swamp near Kingston, west of Narragansett Bay, where scanty remains still exist of their fortifications. It was in December, amid the winter snows, and after a furious struggle their wigwams were fired, and in the most blinding confusion a band of warriors dashed out and covered the retreat of fully three thousand of their people, leaving the whites in possession. Both sides had heavy losses, but the result was the scattering and final annihilation of the tribe. This was the famous "Fort Fight in Narragansett," of which the memorial of the Connecticut Legislature says, "The bitter cold, the tarled swamp, the tedious march, the strong fort, the numerous and stubborn enemy theycontended with for their God, King and country, be their trophies over death."

To the westward, beyond the Rhode Island border, lived Uncas, the enemy of Miantonomoh. His domain extended to the river Thames, and he had been a chief of the Pequots, who revolted in 1634 against the Sachem Sassacus and joined the Mohicans, being chosen their chief sachem. He was friendly to the colonists, and by sagacious alliances with them increased the power of his tribe, which had previously been in a relatively subordinate position. He helped defeat the Pequots, and became so strong that he was described as the "most powerful and prosperous prince in New England." He sold the shores of the Thames River to the whites, reserving a small tract on the river bank, and in 1660 disposed of the present site of Norwich, Connecticut, to a nomadic church from Saybrook, for £70. He held his people friendly to the colonists, even in King Philip's war, frequently visited their capitals at Hartford and Boston, and after reigning nearly fifty years, died in 1683. He is described as crafty, cruel and rapacious, but, as the head of a savage people, far-sighted and sagacious; skillful and fearless as a military leader. His holding aloof from the Indian alliances adverse to the colonists and fighting with the whites against the powerful hostile tribes, are regarded as having really saved colonial New England. His quarrel with Miantonomoh resulted in the battle of Sachem's Plain, on theoutskirts of Norwich, in 1643. This was then a Mohican village, and Miantonomoh marched to attack it with nine hundred Narragansetts, Uncas defending with five hundred warriors. By a preconcerted plan, Uncas invited him to a parley, and while it was going on, and the Narragansetts were off their guard, the Mohicans made a sudden onslaught, defeating and pursuing them for a long distance. Hundreds of the Narragansetts were slain, and Miantonomoh, being captured, was taken prisoner to the English at Hartford. He was ultimately surrendered back to Uncas, who took him again to the Sachem's Plain, where he was put to death, the historian says, "by the advice and consent of the English magistrates and elders." A monument marks the place of execution, inscribed "Miantonomoh, 1643." His son, Nanunteno, who succeeded, led the tribe into King Philip's war, as he hated the colonists, and being captured, he declined to treat with them for a pardon, saying, when threatened with death, "I like it well; I shall die before my heart is soft or I have spoken anything unworthy of myself," whereupon he was shot. He was "acting herein," says old Cotton Mather, "as if, by a Pythagorean metempsychosis, some old Roman ghost had possessed the body of this Western Pagan, like Attilius Regulus."

A few miles south of Norwich is the ancient fortress of Uncas on a hill, and a handful of weak half-breeds are all that remain of his famous people. Inthe city, on Sachem Street, near the Yantic Falls, is a little cemetery in a cluster of pine trees. This, centuries ago, was the burial-place of the Mohican chiefs, and the whole line of sachems is here interred, down to the last of them, Mazeen, buried in 1826 in the presence of a small remnant of the tribe. Ancient stones mark their graves, and in the centre is an obelisk in memory of Uncas, of which President Andrew Jackson laid the foundation-stone. The Yantic and Shetucket Rivers unite at Norwich to form the Thames, and the town has arisen around their admirable water-powers, which serve many mills. The city has about twenty thousand people, being in a beautiful situation between and on the acclivities adjoining the two rivers. The praises of the Yantic Falls were sung by Mrs. Sigourney and others, but their glory has departed, for the stream has been diverted into another channel, leaving a deep cutting in the hard rock, the bottom filled with curiously-piled and water-worn boulders.

ASCENDING NARRAGANSETT BAY.

On the western shore of Narragansett Bay, just inside of Point Judith, stood the little fishing village of Narragansett Pier, originally named from its ancient, sea-battered and ruined pier, built for a breakwater in early times, which has since become one of the most fashionable New England coast resorts, having many large hotels spreading in imposingarray along the shore. The smooth sands of its bathing-beach look out upon Newport far over the bay and behind Conanicut Island in front. Upon the southern border of this beach there are precipitous cliffs against which the Atlantic Ocean breakers dash, the last rocks on the coast of the United States until the Florida reefs are reached. The famous Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry was a native of this town, born in 1785, a midshipman in the war with Tripoli, and the victor in the naval battle on Lake Erie in 1813. His brother, Commodore M. C. Perry, born in Newport in 1794, commanded the noted expedition to Japan in 1852-54, and concluded the treaty with that country, cementing the friendly relations with the United States ever since existing. The celebrated portrait painter Gilbert Stuart was also a native of this place, born in 1755, his portrait of Washington being regarded as the best existing. The western shores of the bay north of the Pier are lined with coast resorts. Here is quaint old Wickford, on Coweset Bay, which has a ferry twelve miles across to Newport, and still exhibits the "Rolling Rock," where Canonicus and Roger Williams are said to have signed their compact, and the old Blockhouse built for a defense in 1641. Farther northward is the ancient Shawomet, whither Samuel Gorton came, changing its name to Old Warwick in honor of his friend and patron, the Earl of Warwick. It appears that Gorton, a layman, who had a penchantfor theological disputation, made himself obnoxious to the Plymouth Puritans in the early colonial time, and they banished him in 1637. He went to Newport and expressed his opinions too freely, and was banished thence in 1641. Wandering to Providence, he was driven from there to Cranston, nearby, the next year, and again expelled from Cranston a few months later, and he finally settled at Shawomet. But they still pursued him, and in 1643 a detachment of troops came from Boston and took him and ten others back as prisoners, and they were tried and sentenced as "damnable heretics" to banishment from America. Gorton sought Warwick's protection, and the Earl sent him back to Shawomet, where he lived undisturbed, but, after changing its name, spent the rest of his life in publishing pamphlets attacking Massachusetts and Rhode Island, among them being the "Antidote Against Pharisaic Teachers" and "Simplicitie's Defence against Seven-Headed Policy." The next thing of note occurring in Warwick was the disfranchisement, in 1652, of the clerk of the unfortunate town on seven charges: first, calling the officers of the town rogues and thieves; second, calling all the town rogues and thieves; third, threatening to kill all the mares in town, etc. In 1676 the Indians attacked and burnt it, and since, it has had little history. General Greene was a native of Warwick, born in 1742.

In sailing up Narragansett Bay, one is struck withthe universality of the prolific crop of these waters,—the clam. Many of the inhabitants seem to spend much of their time gathering them; men and boys in boats are dredging all the coves and shallows for the clams, seizing enormous numbers by the skillful use of their handy double rakes. These people are proud of their home institution, the Rhode Island "clam-bake," which is a main-stay of all the shore resorts, and is considered a connecting link, binding them to the Narragansetts, who originated it. To properly conduct the "clam-bake" a wood fire is built in the open air, upon a layer of large stones, and when these are sufficiently heated, the embers and ashes are swept off, the hot stones covered with sea-weed, and clams in the shells, with other delicacies, put upon it, being enveloped by masses of sea-weed and sail-cloths to keep in the steam. The clams are thus baked by the heated stones, and steamed and seasoned by the moisture from the salt sea-weed. The coverings are then removed, the clams opened, and the feasting begins. With appetite whetted by the delicious breezes coming over the bright waters of the bay, the meal is relished beyond description. There are millions of clams thus consumed, but their growth is enormous, and the supply seems perennial. The chief of these places is Rocky Point, a forest-covered promontory, the favorite resort of the population of the Rhode Island capital, where the "clam-bakes" have acquired great fame.

ROGER WILLIAMS.

There flows southeastward out of Massachusetts the Blackstone River into Rhode Island, and going over Pawtucket Falls it then becomes for a brief space the Pawtucket River, and finally, at its mouth, the Seeconk River, making part of Providence harbor and one of the heads of Narragansett Bay. The shores of this river swarm with industrial operatives, for its valley is one of the greatest regions of textile mills in the world, and half the people of Rhode Island live in the chief city on its banks, Providence. Nine centuries ago the Norsemen are said to have sailed up into this region, which they called Vinland, but the first settlement was not made until 1636. The brave and pious Welshman, Roger Williams, the heretical Salem preacher whom the Puritans in 1635 banished from Massachusetts, went afoot through the forest to the Seeconk Plains along the lower Blackstone River, and halting there, lived with the Narragansetts, who were always his firm friends. But the wrathful Puritans would not long permit this, and ordered him to move on, so that in the spring of 1636, with five companions, he embarked in a log canoe and floated down the Seeconk River, his movements being watched by Indian groups upon the banks. He crossed over the stream finally, and landed on what has since been called "What Cheer Rock," on the eastern edge of Providence, thusnamed because, when Williams stepped ashore, some of the Indians saluted him with the pleasant greeting, "What cheer, Notop?" (friend)—words that are still carefully preserved throughout Providence and the State in the names of banks, buildings, and various associations. He regarded this as a decidedly good omen, and started a settlement, calling it Providence, "in grateful acknowledgment of God's merciful providence to him in his distress." His exalted piety was beyond question, and not only is the religious spirit in which the city was founded indicated by its name, but even in the titles of the streets are incorporated the cardinal virtues and the higher emotions, as in Joy Street, Faith Street, Happy Street, Hope Street, Friendship Street, Benefit Street, Benevolent Street, and many more. We are told that his early colonists adopted the Indian foods, such as parched corn, which the aborigines called "anhuminea," from which has come the name of hominy, and the famous Narragansett mixture of corn and beans, the "m'sickquatash," which has become succotash.

Roger Williams in Rhode Island, in 1639, became a Baptist, and the "Society of the First Baptist Church," which he founded that year in Providence, claims to be the oldest Baptist organization in America. But Williams seems to have been somewhat unstable, for he only remained with this church as pastor four years, then withdrawing, as he hadgrave doubts of the validity of his own baptism. It appears that when this church was started, a layman, Ezekiel Holliman, first baptized Williams, and then Williams baptized Holliman and the others. When he withdrew, it was not only from the pastoral relation, but he ceased worshipping with the brethren, and his conscientious scruples finally brought him to the conclusion that there is "no regularly constituted church on earth, nor any person authorized to administer any church ordinance, nor could there be until new apostles were sent by the great Head of the Church, for whose coming he was seeking." During many years thereafter he held his religious meetings in a grove. This venerable Baptist society which Roger Williams founded built a new church in 1726, and in its honor they had a "grand dinner." The elaborate banquet of those primitive days consisted of the whole congregation dining upon one sheep, one pound of butter, two loaves of bread, and a peck of peas, at a cost of twenty-seven shillings. Their white wooden church, with its surmounting steeple, overlooks the city from a slope rising above Providence River.

THE CITY OF PROVIDENCE.

Providence is beautifully situated on the hills at the head of Narragansett Bay, and its centre is a fine new Union Railway Station, completed in 1897. Near by is the massive City Hall, one of the chiefpublic buildings in Rhode Island, a granite structure costing $1,500,000. In high relief upon its front is a medallion bust of the founder of the little State, Roger Williams, wearing the typical sugar-loaf hat. A feature of this impressive building is the magnificent stair-hall, lighted from above; and from the surmounting tower there is a wide view over the city and suburbs, and far down the bay towards the ocean. In front is the public square, with a stately Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument of blue Westerly granite, bearing the names of nearly seventeen hundred men of Rhode Island who fell in the Civil War, and guarded by well-executed bronze statues representing the different arms of the service. Facing it is a statue in heroic bronze of the Rhode Island General Burnside, who died in 1881. These works are artistic, but the priceless art gem in Providence is the exquisite little picture of "The Hours," painted on a sheet of ivory six by seven inches, in London, by the great portrait and miniature painter, Edward Greene Malbone, of Newport—the three Grecian nymphs, Eunomia, Dice and Irene, representing the Past, Present and Future. The President of the Royal Academy said of it, "I have seen a picture, painted by a young man of the name of Malbone, which no man in England could excel." This is his masterpiece, one of the most admired paintings in America, and is kept carefully in the Athenæum (to which it was presented by a public subscription in1853), a solid little granite house built on the hillside, not far from the Baptist church.

Farther up this hill are the campus and rows of buildings of Brown University, the great Rhode Island Baptist College with seven hundred students, founded in 1764, and bearing the name of one of the leading families of the wealthy manufacturing house of Brown & Ives. The campus is shaded with fine old elms, and some of the newer buildings are handsome and elaborate structures. Around this university, and all through the extensive suburbs, are the splendid homes of the capitalists and mill-owners of the State, who have made this hill, rising between the Providence and Seeconk Rivers, the most attractive residential section. Benefit Street, on the hill, is lined with the palaces of these textile millionaires. Providence is, in fact, a city of many hills, and its houses are mostly of wood. Extensive sections can be traversed without seeing a single brick or stone building. There is a large railway traffic, but only a small trade by sea, beyond bringing coal and cotton, though the city formerly enjoyed an extensive China trade. Like all the Rhode Island towns it has many mills and much wealth, and there are thirty or forty banks to take care of its money. Besides textiles, its mills make locomotives and Corliss steam-engines, silverware and jewelry, cigars, rifles and stoves, gimlet-pointed wood-screws, tortoise-shell work and cocoanut dippers, cottonseed and peanut oils, and many otherthings, not overlooking the famous "Pain-killer," for the ills of humanity, which is consumed by the hundred thousand gallons in all parts of the world. The "Pain-killer" factory was always one of the lions of the town, although now the new Rhode Island State House, finished in 1898, also commands great public admiration. This is a huge dome-surmounted building in Renaissance, constructed of Georgia marble and pink granite. But Providence, above everything else, reveres the memory of Roger Williams, who died in 1683, and is interred in the old North Burying Ground. On Abbott Street is carefully preserved, as a precious relic, a small old house with quaint peaked roof, built in the seventeenth century, and reverenced as the place where he held some of his religious meetings. His bronze statue ornaments the Roger Williams Park to which Broad Street leads, a beautiful tract of about one hundred acres, surrounding the quaint gambrel-roofed house in which lived his great-great-granddaughter, Betsy Williams, for many years, who gave this domain to the city in 1871, as her tribute to his memory. Here are refreshments served at "What Cheer Cottage." But the most treasured memorial of the founder is his original landing-place of "What Cheer Rock," where the Indians greeted him alongside the Seeconk River,—a pile of slaty rocks, enclosed by a railing, near the foot of Williams Street, down by the waterside.

PROVIDENCE TO WORCESTER.

We ascend the Seeconk River to Pawtucket, about five miles distant, a busy manufacturing town of thirty thousand people, noted as the place where Samuel Slater introduced the cotton manufacture into the United States in 1790, the original Slater mill still standing. The Pawtucket Falls of fifty feet give the valuable water-power which has made the place, and here are some of the greatest thread factories in the world. The town extends up into the villages of Central and Valley Falls, and the enormous power furnished by the river is drawn upon at different levels from several dams. All sorts of cotton textiles, muslins and calicoes are made, and the slopes running up from the valley, with the plateaus above, are covered with the operatives' houses. This town has the most attractive situation on the Blackstone River, which here changes its name to the Pawtucket, and finally to the Seeconk. Samuel Slater, who started it, was a native of Belper, in Derbyshire, England, having worked there for both Strutt and Arkwright, the fathers of the textile industries. Learning that American bounties had been offered for the introduction of Arkwright's patents in cotton-spinning, he crossed the ocean, landing at Newport in 1789. Here he heard that Moses Brown had attempted cotton-spinning by machinery in Rhode Island. He wrote Brown, telling what hecould do, and received a reply in which Brown said his attempt had been unsuccessful, and added: "If thou canst do this thing, I invite thee to come to Rhode Island and have the credit and the profit of introducing cotton manufacture into America." Slater went to Pawtucket, and on December 21, 1790, he started three carding-machines and spinning-frames of seventy-two spindles. He afterwards became very prominent, building large mills at Pawtucket and elsewhere, and the impetus thus given the place made it the leading American manufacturing centre for a half-century. The Indian name of the falls was retained by the city.

The Blackstone River was named after the recluse Anglican clergyman, Rev. William Blackstone, who, as heretofore stated, first settled Boston about 1625. When he found, after a brief experience, that he could not get on with the Puritan colonists, who came in there too numerously, he sold out and "retired into the wilderness." He wandered for over forty miles into the forests, and during more than forty years made his home on the banks of this stream among the Indians, not far above Pawtucket Falls. He lived there in his hermit home at Study Hill among his books, the river rushing by, and the Providence and Worcester Branch of the New Haven Consolidated Railroad now cuts its route deeply through his hill, running among the dams, and in some cases over them, on its way up the busy valleyof this very crooked river. Its waters, which do such good service for so many mills, become more and more polluted as they descend, so that its lower course is a malodorous and dark-colored stream. The river is about forty-five miles long, rising in the hills adjacent to Worcester and flowing in winding reaches towards the southeast, descending over five hundred feet to Providence. The mills, however, have grown vastly beyond its capacity as a water-power, so that auxiliary steam is now largely used. Numerous ponds and other feeders accumulate a vast amount of water for the Blackstone in Southern Massachusetts, and its lower course for nearly thirty miles is a succession of dams, canals and mills, making one of the greatest factory districts in existence. Over a half-million people work and live in this busy valley, the operatives being chiefly French Canadians, Swedes, and the various British races, the French preponderating in some of the towns. The Yankees long ago left, seeking better pay elsewhere, being replaced by a more contented people satisfied to work in mills. Most of the huge factories lining the river are owned by wealthy corporations having their head offices in Boston or Providence, and it is said that, the buildings being without signs or names, many of the operatives actually do not know who they work for. These mills are four and five stories high, often a thousand feet long, with hundreds of windows and ponderous stairway-towers.

Ascending the river, the factory settlements of Lonsdale, Ashton, Albion and Manville are passed, and we come to Woonsocket Hill, one of the highest in Rhode Island. Here the river goes around various bends admirably arranged for conducting its waters through the mills, and the town of Woonsocket is built where twenty thousand people make cotton and woollen cloths, the noted "Harris cassimere" having been long the chief manufacture at the Social Mills. To the northward, Woonsocket spreads into the towns of Blackstone and Waterford, also industrial hives; and finally, having followed the river up to its sources, the route leads to Worcester, the second city of Massachusetts, forty-five miles west of Boston, styled the "heart of the Commonwealth," with a population of over one hundred thousand people. Its chief newspaper, theMassachusetts Spy, is noted as having actually started as a spy upon the royalists in the exciting times preceding the Revolutionary War, and is still a prosperous publication. It was at a Worcester banquet in 1776 that the "Sons of Freedom" drank the noted toast: "May the freedom and independence of America endure till the sun grows dim with age and this earth returns to chaos; perpetual itching without the benefit of scratching to the enemies of America!" Worcester is a great manufacturing city, but has almost lost its New England population from the steady Yankee migration westward, they being replaced in its numerous mills byFrench Canadians, Swedes and Irish, the latter predominating. It has a noble Soldiers' Monument, a splendid railway station, and the fine buildings of the Massachusetts Lunatic Asylum standing on the highest hill in the suburbs. Its new white marble City Hall, completed in 1898, is an imposing edifice. The huge Washburn & Moen Wire Works are on Salisbury Pond, in the outskirts. Among the interesting old dwellings is the Bancroft House, where the historian, George Bancroft, was born, in 1800, dying in 1891. The great attraction of Worcester is Lake Quinsigamond, on the eastern verge, a long, deep, narrow loch, stretching among the hills four miles away, with little gems of islands and villa-bordered shores. Scattered over the distant rim of enclosing hills are several typical Yankee villages, with their church-spires set against the horizon. Worcester had a chequered colonial career, the Indians repeatedly driving out the early settlers, until they built a fortress-like church on the Common, where each man attended on the Sabbath, carrying his musket. These resolute colonists were Puritans, bent on enforcing their own ideas, for when a few Scotch Presbyterians came in 1720, and built a church of that creed, it was declared a "cradle of heresy" and demolished. A considerable number of the French Acadians, exiled from Nova Scotia in the eighteenth century, came to Worcester, and their descendants are now among its prominent people.

New England, as is well known, was forced to adopt manufacturing, because the inhabitants could not extract a living from the soil. It is difficult to say where is the most sterile region, but in Massachusetts it seems to be generally agreed that the town of Ware, on the Ware River, northwest of Worcester, is hard to beat in this respect. It is a picturesquely located mill-village, with a soil that is stony and sterile. The original grant of the land was made to soldiers as a reward for bravery in King Philip's War. They thankfully accepted the gift and went there, but after examination left, and sold all their domain at the rate of about two cents an acre. President Dwight, of Yale College, rode through the town, but never wanted to see it again, saying regretfully, in describing the land: "It is like self-righteousness; the more a man has of it, the poorer he is." Someone wrote a poem describing the creation of the place, of which this a specimen stanza:

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