difficulties to encounter. Instead of attending uninterruptedly to the means of providing for their future wants, they were compelled to take up arms to defend themselves against the neighbouring savages. Fortunately for the colonists, the natives had been so wasted the preceding year by pestilence, that they were easily subdued, and compelled to accept a peace which was offered them on equitable terms.

Nothing could have supported the English under these multiplied distresses, but the hope of better times, and that high gratification which those who have been exasperated by a privation of those blessings derive from the complete enjoyment of the rights of conscience, and the full exercise of all the powers of self government. From their friends in England, they received occasional but scanty supplies, and continued, with a patient and persevering spirit, to struggle against surrounding difficulties. They remained in peace, alike exempt from the notice and oppressions of government: yet, their soil being uninviting, and the pernicious policy of a community of goods and of labour, so unfavourable to population, being for some few years adhered to, they increased more slowly than any other of the colonies, and in the year 1630, amounted only to three hundred souls. Until this period they possessed no other title to their lands than is afforded by occupancy. In that year, they obtained a grant of property from the New Plymouth company, but were never incorporated as a body politic by royal charter.

Having derived no powers from the parliament, or king, and being totally disregarded by the Plymouth company, they appear to have remained a mere voluntary association, yielding obedience to laws and to magistrates, formed and chosen by themselves. In this situation they continued undisturbed and almost unknown, more tolerant and more moderate than their neighbours, until their union with a younger and more powerful sister, who, with a frame more hardy and robust, advanced, with a growth unusually rapid, to a state of maturity.f

The original company of Plymouth, having done nothing effectual towards settling the territory which had been granted to them, and being unable to preserve the monopoly of their trade and fisheries, applied to James for a new and more enlarged patent. On the third of November, he granted that territory which lies between the 40th and 48th degrees of north latitude to the duke of Lenox, the marquis of Buckingham, and several others, in absolute property; and incorporated them under the name of the "council established at Plymouth for planting and governing that country called New England;" with jurisdiction and powers similar to those which had before been conferred on the companies of South and North Virginia, and especially that of excluding all other persons whatever from trading within their boundaries, and fishing in the neighbouring seas. This improvident grant, which excited the indignation of the people of England, then deeply interested

f Robertson.... Chalmer....Hutchinson.

in the fur trade and fisheries, soon engaged the attention and received the censure of parliament. The patentees were compelled to relinquish their odious monopoly, and, being thus deprived of the funds on which they had relied to enable them to encounter the expense of supporting new settlements, they abandoned entirely the design of attempting them. New England might have remained long unoccupied, had not the same causes which occasioned the emigration of the Brownists, still continued to operate. The persecutions to which the puritans were exposed, increased their zeal and their numbers. Despairing of obtaining at home a relaxation of those rigorous penal statutes under which they had so long smarted, they began to look elsewhere for that toleration which was denied them in their native land. Understanding that their brethren in New Plymouth were permitted to worship their creator according to the dictates of conscience, their attention was directed towards the same coast, and several small emigrations were made at different times to Massachussetts Bay, so termed from the name of the sachem who was sovereign of the country; grants of land were made to the emigrants; but the conditions of them having probably never been complied with, they were afterwards totally disregarded.

Mr. White, a non-conformist minister at Dorchester, who had prevented some few of his countrymen settled around the bay of Massachussetts from returning to England, by his assurances of

procuring them relief and assistance, formed, by great exertions, an association of several gentlemen who had imbibed puritanical opinions, for the purpose of conducting thither a colony, and rendering it an asylum for the persecuted of his own persuasion. In prosecution of these views, a treaty was concluded with the council of Plymouth for the purchase of part of New England; and that corporation, in March, 1627, conveyed to sir Henry Rosewell and others, all that part of New England lying three miles to the south of Charles' river, and three miles north of Merrimack river, and extending from the Atlantic to the South sea. A small number of planters and servants were soon afterwards dispatched under Endicot, who in September laid the foundation of Salem, the first permanent town of Massachussetts."

The purchasers soon perceived their total inability to accomplish the settlement of the extensive regions they had acquired, without the aid of more opulent partners. These were soon found in the capital; but they insisted that a new charter should be obtained from the crown, in which their names should be inserted, confirming the grant to the council of Plymouth, and conferring on them the powers of government. Notwithstanding the lessons which had been given by Virginia, they likewise required that the supreme authority should be vested in persons residing in London; thus adding one other evidence to those

Robertson....Chalmer....Hutchinson.

which the history of the world continues to furnish, of the truth of the assertion, that man will seldom be taught by the experience of others. The proprietor having acceded to these requisitions, application was made to Charles for a patent conforming to them, which issued on the fourth of March, 1628.

This charter incorporated the grantees by the name of "the governor and company of Massachussetts Bay in New England."

The whole executive power was vested in a governor, a deputy governor, and eighteen assistants, to be named in the first instance by the crown, and afterwards elected by the company. The governor and seven or more assistants were authorized to meet in monthly courts, for the dispatch of such business as concerned the company or settlement. The legislative power was vested in the body of the proprietors, who were all to assemble four times a year in person, under the denomination of the general court, and besides electing freemen and the necessary officers of the company, were empowered to make ordinances for the good of the community and the government of the plantation and its inhabitants; provided they should not be repugnant to the laws of England. Their lands were to be holden in free and common soccage, and the same temporary exemption from taxes, and from duties on goods exported or imported, was obtained, as had been granted to the colony of Virginia. As in the charter of Virginia, so in this, the colonists and