THE dominions of Great-Britain in A­merica are next in extent to those of Spain. Its acquisitions there are a recompence due to those enterprising talents which prompt­ed the English to enter early on the career of discovery, and to pursue it with persevering ar­dour. England was the second nation that ventured to visit the New World. The ac­count of Columbus's successful voyage filled all Europe with astonishment and admiration. But in England it did something more; it ex­cited a vehement desire of emulating the glo­ry of Spain, and of aiming to obtain some share in those advantages which were expected in [Page 18] this new field opened to national activity. The attention of the English court had been turned towards the discovery of unknown countries, by its negociation with Barthole­mew Columbus. Henry VII. having listened to his propositions with a more favourable ear than could have been expected from a cautious, distrustful prince, averse by habit as well as by temper to new and hazardous projects, he was more easily induced to approve of a voyage for discovery, proposed by some of his own sub­jects, soon after the return of Christopher Co­lumbus.

But though the English had spirit to form this scheme, they had not, at that period, at­tained to such skill in navigation as qualified them for carrying it into execution. From the inconsiderate ambition of its monarchs, the nation had long wasted its genius and activity in pernicious and ineffectual efforts to conquer France. When this ill directed ardour began to abate, the fatal contest between the houses of York and Lancaster, turned the arms of one half of the kingdom against the other, and ex­hausted the vigour of both. During the course of two centuries, while industry and commerce were making gradual progress, both in the south and north of Europe, the English conti­nued so blind to the advantages of their own situation, that they hardly began to bend their [Page 19] thoughts towards those objects and pursuits, to which they are indebted for their present o­pulence and power. While the trading vessels of Italy, Spain, and Portugal, as well as those of the Hans Towns, visited the most remote ports in Europe, and carried on an active inter­course with its various nations, the English did little more than creep along their own coasts, in small barks, which conveyed the producti­ons of one country to another. Their com­merce was almost wholly passive. Their wants were supplied by strangers; and whatever ne­cessary or luxury of life their own country did not yield, was imported in foreign bottoms. The Cross of St. George was seldom display­ed beyond the precincts of the narrow seas. Hardly any English ship traded with Spain or Portugal, before the beginning of the fifteenth century; and half a century more elapsed before the English mariners became so adventurous as to enter the Mediterranean.

In this infancy of navigation, Henry could not commit the conduct of an armament, des­tined to explore unknown regions, to his own subjects. He invested Giovanni Gaboto, a Venetian adventurer, who had settled in Bristol, with the chief command; and issued a com­mission to him and his three sons, empowering them to sail, under the banner of England, to­wards the east, north, or west, in order to dis­cover [Page 20] countries unoccupied by any Christian state; to take possession of them in his name, and to carry on an exclusive trade with the in­habitants, under condition of paying a fifth part of the free profit on every voyage to the crown. This commission was granted on March 5th, 1495, in less than two years after the return of Columbus from America^*. But Cabot (for that is the name he assumed in England, and by which he is best known) did not set out on his voyage for two years. He, together with his second son Sebastian, embarked at Bristol, (May 1497) on board a ship furnish­ed by the king, and was accompanied by four small barks, fitted out by merchants of that city.

As in that age the most eminent navigators, formed by the instructions of Columbus, or animated by his example, were guided by ideas derived from his superior knowledge and ex­perience, Cabot had adopted the system of that great man, concerning the probability of open­ing a new and shorter passage to the East-In­dies, by holding a western course. The opi­nion which Columbus had formed, with res­pect to the islands which he had discovered, was universally received. They were supposed to lie contiguous to the great continent of In­dia, [Page 21] and to constitute a part of the vast coun­tries comprehended under that general name. Cabot, accordingly, deemed it probable, that by steering to the north-west, he might reach India by a shorter course than that which Co­lumbus had taken, and hoped to fall in with the coast of Cathay, or China, of whose fer­tility and opulence the descriptions of Marco Polo had excited high ideas. After sailing for some weeks due west, and nearly on the parallel of the port from which he took his departure, he discovered a large island, which he called Prima Vista, and his sailors, Newfoundland; and in a few days he descried a smaller isle, to which he gave the name of St. John. (June 24.) He landed on both these, made some ob­servations on their soil and productions, and brought off three of the natives. Continuing his course westward, he soon reached the con­tinent of North America, and sailed along it from the fifty-sixth to the thirty-eighth degree of latitude, from the coast of Labrador to that of Virginia. As his chief object was to disco­ver some inlet that might open a passage to the west, it does not appear that he landed any where during this extensive run; and he re­turned to England, without attempting either settlement or conquest in any part of that con­tinent.^†

[Page 22]If it had been Henry's purpose to prosecute the object of the commission given by him to Cabot, and to take possession of the countries which he had discovered, the success of this voyage must have answered his most sanguine expectations. His subjects were, undoubted­ly, the first Europeans who had visited that part of the American continent, and were en­titled to whatever right of property prior dis­covery is supposed to confer. Countries which stretched in an uninterrupted course through such a large portion of the temperate zone, opened a prospect of settling to advantage un­der mild climates, and in a fertile soil. But by the time that Cabot returned to England, he found both the state of affairs and the king's inclination unfavourable to any scheme, the ex­ecution of which would have required tran­quillity and leisure. Henry was involved in a war with Scotland, and his kingdom was not yet fully composed, after the commotion excited by a formidable insurrection of his own subjects in the west. An ambassador from Ferdinand of Arragon was then in London; and as Henry set a high value upon the friend­ship of that monarch, for whose character he professed much admiration, perhaps from its similarity to his own, and was endeavouring to strengthen their union, by negociating the marriage which afterwards took place between his eldest son and the princess Catharine, he [Page 23] was cautious of giving any offence to a prince, jealous to excess of all his rights. From the position of the islands and continent which Cabot had discovered, it was evident that they lay within the limits of the ample donative which the bounty of Alexander VI. had con­ferred upon Ferdinand and Isabella. No per­son, in that age, questioned the validity of a Papal grant; and Ferdinand was not of a tem­per to relinquish any claim to which he had a shadow of title. Submission to the autho­rity of the Pope, and deference for an ally whom he courted, seem to have concurred with Henry's own situation, in determining him to abandon a scheme, in which he had en­gaged with some degree of ardour and expec­tation. No attempt towards discovery was made in England during the remainder of his reign; and Sebastian Cabot, finding no encou­ragement for his active talents there, entered into the service of Spain ^*.

This is the most probable account of the sudden cessation of Henry's activity, after such [Page 24] success in his first essay as might have en­couraged him to persevere. The advantages of commerce, as well as its nature, were so little understood in England about this period, that by an act of parliament in the year 1488, the taking of interest for the use of money was prohibited under severe penalties.^‖ And by another law, the profit arising from dealing in bills of exchange was condemned as favouring of usury.^‡ It is not surprising, then, that no great effort should be made to extend trade, by a nation whose commercial ideas were still so crude and illiberal. But it is more difficult to discover what prevented this scheme of Henry VII. from being resumed during the reigns of his son and grandson; and to give any reason why no attempt was made, either to explore the northern continent of America more fully, or to settle in it. Henry VIII. was frequently at open enmity with Spain; the value of the Spanish acquisitions in Ame­rica had become so well known, as might have excited his desire to obtain some footing in those opulent regions; and during a consi­derable part of his reign, the prohibitions in a papal bull would not have restrained him from making encroachment upon the Spanish dominions. But the reign of Henry was not favourable to the progress of discovery. Du­ring [Page 25] one period of it, the active part which he took in the affairs of the continent, and the vigour with which he engaged in the contest between the two mighty rivals, Charles V. and Francis I. gave full occupation to the en­terprising spirit both of the king and of his no­bility. During another period of his admini­stration, his famous controversy with the court of Rome kept the nation in perpetual agita­tion and suspense. Engrossed by those objects, neither the king nor the nobles had inclination or leisure to turn their attention to new pur­suits; and without their patronage and aid, the commercial part of the nation was too in­considerable to make any effort of consequence. Though England, by its total separation from the church of Rome, soon after the accession of Edward VI. disclaimed that authority, which, by its presumptuous partition of the globe between two favourite nations, circum­scribed the activity of every other state within very narrow limits, yet a feeble minority, dis­tracted with faction, was not a juncture for forming schemes of doubtful success and re­mote utility. The bigotry of Mary, and her marriage with Philip, disposed her to pay a sacred regard to that grant of the Holy See, which vested in a husband, on whom she doated, an exclusive right to every part of the New World. Thus, through a singular suc­cession of various causes, sixty-one years elapsed [Page 26] from the time that the English discovered North America, during which their monarchs gave little attention to that country which was destined to be annexed to their crown, and to be a chief source of its opulence and power.

But though the public contributed little towards the progress of discovery, naval skill, knowledge of commerce, and a spirit of en­terprize, began to spread among the English. During the reign of Henry VIII. several new channels of trade were opened, and private ad­venturers visited remote countries with which England had formerly no intercourse. Some merchants of Bristol having fitted out two ships for the southern regions of America, committed the conduct of them to Sebastian Cabot, who had quitted the service of Spain. He visited (1516) the coasts of Brasil, and touched at the islands of Hispaniola and Puer­to Rico; and though this voyage seems not to have been beneficial to the adventurers, it ex­tended the sphere of English navigation, and added to the national stock of nautical science.^* Though disappointed in their expectations of profit in this first essay, the merchants were not discouraged. They sent, successively, se­veral vessels from different ports towards the [Page 27] same quarter, and seem to have carried on an interloping trade in the Portuguese settlements with success.^† Nor was it only towards the west, that the activity of the English was di­rected. Other merchants began to extend their commercial views to the east; and by esta­blishing an intercourse with several islands in the Archipelago, and with some of the towns on the coast of Syria, they found a new mar­ket for woollen cloths, (the only manufacture which the nation had begun to cultivate,) and supplied their countrymen with various pro­ductions of the east, formerly unknown, or received from the Venetians at an exorbitant price.^*

But the discovery of a shorter passage to the East Indies, by the north-west, was still the favourite project of the nation, which beheld, with envy, the vast wealth that flowed into Portugal, from its commerce with those regi­ons. The scheme was accordingly twice resu­med (1527 and 1536) under the long adminis­tration of Henry VIII. first with some slender aid from the king, and then by private mer­chants. Both voyages were distastrous and un­successful. In the former one of the ships was lost. In the latter, the stock of provisions was so ill proportioned to the number of the crew, [Page 28] that although they were but six months at sea, many perished with hunger, and the survivors were constrained to support life by feeding on the bodies of their dead companions.^*

The vigour of the commercial spirit did not relax in the reign of Edward VI. The great fishery on the banks of Newfoundland became an object of attention; and from some regulations for the encouragement of that branch of trade, it seems to have been prose­cuted with activity and success.^† But the prospect of opening a communication with China and the Spice Islands, by some other route than round the Cape of Good Hope, still continued to allure the English, more than any scheme of adventure. Cabot, whose o­pinion was deservedly of high authority in whatever related to naval enterprize, warmly urged the English to make another attempt to discover this passage. As it had been thrice searched for in vain, by steering towards the north-west, he proposed that a trial should now be made by the north-east; and supported this advice by such plausible reasons and conjec­tures, as excited sanguine expectations of suc­cess. Several noblemen and persons of rank, together with some principal merchants, ha­ving associated for this purpose were incorpo­rated, [Page 29] by a charter from the king, under the title of The Company of Merchant Adven­turers for the Discovery of Regions, Domini­ons, Islands, and Places unknown. Cabot, who was appointed governor of this company, (1553) soon fitted out two ships and a bark, furnished with instructions in his own hand, which discover the great extent both of his naval skill and mercantile sagacity.

Sir Hugh Willoughby, who was entrusted with the command, stood directly (May 10) northwards along the coast of Norway, and doubled the North Cape. But in that tem­pestous ocean, his small squadron was separa­ted in a violent storm. Willoughby's ship and the bark took refuge in an obscure harbour in a desert part of Russian Lapland, where he and all his companions were frozen to death. Richard Chancelour, the captain of the other vessel was more fortunate; he entered the White Sea, and wintered in safety at Archan­gel. Though no vessel of any foreign nation had ever visited that quarter of the globe be­fore, the inhabitants received their new visitors with an hospitality which would have done honour to a more polished people. The En­glish learned there, that this was a province of a vast empire, subject to the Great Duke or Czar of Muscovy, who resided in a great city twelve hundred miles from Archangel. Chan­celour, [Page 30] with a spirit becoming an officer em­ployed in an expedition for discovery, did not hesitate a moment about the part which he ought to take, and set out for that distant capi­tal. On his arrival in Moscow, he was ad­mitted to audience, and delivered a letter which the captain of each ship had received from Edward VI. for the sovereign of whatever country they should discover, to John Vasilo­witz, who at that time filled the Russian throne. John, though he ruled over his sub­jects with the cruelty and caprice of a barba­rous despot, was not destitute of political saga­city. He instantly perceived the happy con­sequences that might flow from opening an in­tercourse between his dominions and the west­ern nations of Europe; and, delighted with the fortunate event to which he was indebted for this unexpected benefit, he treated Chan­celour with great respect; and, by a letter to the king of England, (Feb. 1554) invited his subjects to trade in the Russian dominions, with ample promises of protection and favour.^*

Chancelour, on his return, found Mary seated on the English throne. The success of this voyage, the discovery of a new course of navigation, the establishment of commerce with a vast empire, the name of which was then hardly known in the west, and the hope [Page 31] of arriving, in this direction, at those regions which had been so long the object of desire, excited a wonderful ardour to prosecute the design with greater vigour. Mary, implicitly guided by her husband in every act of admini­stration, was not unwilling to turn the com­mercial activity of her subjects towards a quar­ter, where it could not excite the jealousy of Spain, by encroaching on its possessions in the New World. She wrote to John Vasilowitz in the most respectful terms, courting his friendship. She confirmed the charter of Ed­ward VI. empowered Chancelour, and two agents appointed by the Company, to negoci­ate with the Czar in her name; and according to the spirit of that age, she granted an exclu­sive right of trade with Russia to the Corpo­ration of Merchant Adventurers.^* In virtue of this, they not only established an active and gainful commerce with Russia, but, in hopes of reaching China, they pushed their discove­ries eastwards to the coast of Nova Zembla, the straits of Waigatz, and towards the mouth of the great river Oby. But in those frozen seas, which Nature seems not to have destined for navigation, they were exposed to innumera­ble disasters and met with successive disappoint­ments.

Nor were their attempts to open a commu­nication with India made only in this channel. [Page 32] They appointed some of their factors to accom­pany the Russian caravans, which travelled in­to Persia by the way of Astracan and the Cas­pian Sea, instructing them to penetrate as far as possible towards the east, and to endeavour, not only to establish a trade with those coun­tries, but to acquire every information that might afford any light towards the discovery of a passage to China by the north-east.^* Not­withstanding a variety of dangers to which they were exposed in travelling through so ma­ny provinces, inhabited by fierce and licenti­ous nations, some of these factors rea [...]hed Bo­kara, in the province of Chorasan; and though prevented from advancing farther by the civil wars which desolated the country, they return­ed to Europe with some hopes of extending the commerce of the Company into Persia, and with much intelligence concerning the state of those remote regions of the east. ^†

The successful progress of the Merchant Adventurers in discovery, rouzed the emulati­on of their countrymen, and turned their acti­vity into new channels. A commercial inter­course, hitherto unattempted by the English, having been opened with the coast of Barbary, the specimens which that afforded of the va­luable productions of Africa, invited some en­terprising [Page 33] navigators to visit the more remote provinces of that quarter of the globe. They sailed along its western shore, traded in differ­ent ports on both sides of the Line, and after acquiring considerable knowledge of those countries, returned with a cargo of golddust, ivory, and other rich commodities, little known at that time in England. This com­merce with Africa seems to have been pursued with vigour, and was at that time no less in­nocent than lucrative; for as the English had then no demand for slaves, they carried it on for many years, without violating the rights of humanity. Thus far did the English advance during a period which may be considered as the infant state of their navigation and com­merce; and feeble as its steps at that time may appear to us, we trace them with an interest­ing curiosity, and look back with satisfaction to the early essays of that spirit, which we now behold in the full maturity of its strength. Even in those first efforts of the English, an in­telligent observer will discern presages of their future improvement. As soon as the activity of the nation was put in motion, it took vari­ous directions, and exerted itself in each with that steady, persevering industry, which is the soul and guide of commerce. Neither discou­raged by the hardships and dangers to which they were exposed in those northern seas which they first attempted to explore, nor afraid of [Page 34] venturing into the sultry climates of the torrid zone, the English, during the reigns of Hen­ry VIII. Edward VI. and Mary opened some of the most considerable sources of their com­mercial opulence, and gave a beginning to their trade with Turkey, with Africa, with Russia, and with Newfoundland.

By the Progress which England had already made in navigation and commerce, it was now prepared for advancing further; and on the ac­cession of Elizabeth to the throne, a period commenced, extremely auspicious to this spi­rit which was rising in the nation. The do­mestic tranquillity of the kingdom, maintain­ed, almost without interruption, during the course of a long and prosperous reign; the peace with foreign nations, that subsisted more than twenty years after Elizabeth was seated on the throne; the Queen's attentive economy, which exempted her subjects from the burden of taxes oppressive to trade; the popularity of her administration; were all favourable to com­mercial enterprise, and called it forth into vi­gorous exertion. The discerning eye of Eli­zabeth having early perceived that the security of a kingdom environed by the sea, depended on its naval force, she began her government with adding to the number and strength of the royal navy; which, during a factious minori­ty, and a reign intent on no object but that of [Page 35] suppressing heresy, had been neglected, and suffered to decay. She filled her arsenals with naval stores; she built several ships of great force, according to the ideas of that age, and encouraged her subjects to imitate her example, that they might no longer depend on foreigners from whom the English had hitherto purchased all vessels of any considerable burden.^* By those efforts, the skill of the English artificers was improved, the number of sailors increased, and the attention of the public turned to the navy, as the most important national object. Instead of abandoning any of the new channels of commerce which had been opened in the three preceding reigns, the English frequented them with greater assiduity, and the patronage of their sovereign added vigour to all their efforts. In order to secure to them the continuance of their exclusive trade with Russia, Elizabeth cultivated the connection with John Vasilowitz, which had been formed by her predecessor, and, by successive embassies, gained his confi­dence so thoroughly, that the English enjoyed that lucrative privilege during his long reign. She encouraged the Company of Merchant Adventurers, whose monopoly of the Russian trade was confirmed by act of parliament,^† to resume their design of penetrating into Persia by land. Their second attempt, (1562,) con­ducted [Page 36] with greater prudence, or undertaken at a more favourable juncture than the first, was more successful. Their agents arrived in the Persian Court, and obtained such protecti­on and immunities from the Shah, that for a course of years they carried on a gainful com­merce in his kingdom;^* and by frequenting the various provinces of Persia, be ame so well acquainted with the vast riches of the east, as strengthened their design of opening a more direct intercourse with those fertile regions by sea.

But as every effort to accomplish this by the north-east had proved abortive, a scheme was formed, under the patronage of the Earl of Warwich, the head of the enterprising family of Dudley, to make a new attempt, by hold­ing an opposite course by the north-west. The conduct of this enterprise was committed to Martin Frobisher, an officer of experience and reputation. In three successive voyages (1576, 1577, and 1578) he explored the inhospitable coast of Labrador, and that of Greenland, (to which Elizabeth gave the name of Meta In­cognita,) without discovering any probable ap­pearance of that passage to India for which he sought. This new disappointment was sensi­bly felt, and might have damped the spirit of [Page 37] naval enterprize among the English, if it had not resumed fresh vigour, amidst the general exultation of the nation, upon the successful expedition of Francis Drake. That bold na­vigator, emulous of the glory which Magellan had acquired by sailing round the globe, form­ed a scheme of attempting a voyage, which all Europe had admired for sixty years, with­out venturing to follow the Portuguese disco­verer in his adventurous course. Drake un­dertook this with a feeble squadron, in which the largest vessel did not exceed a hundred tons, and he accomplished it, with no less credit to himself, than honour to his country. Even in this voyage, conducted with other views, Drake seems not to have been inattentive to the favourite object of his countrymen, the discovery of a new route to India. Before he quitted the Pacific Ocean, in order to stretch towards the Philippine islands, he ranged along the coast of California, as high as the lattitude of forty-two degrees north, in hopes of disco­vering, on that side, the communication be­tween the two seas, which had so often been searched for in vain on the other. But this was the only unsuccessful attempt of Drake. The excessive cold of the climate, intolerable to men who had long been accustomed to tro­pical heat, obliged him to stop short in his progress towards the north; and whether or not there be any passage from the Pacific to [Page 38] the Atlantic Ocean in that quarter, is a point still unascertained.^*

From this period, the English seem to have confided in their own abilities and courage, as equal to any naval enterprize. They had now visited every region to which navigation ex­tended in that age, and had rivalled the nati­on of highest repute for naval skill in its most splendid exploit. But notwithstanding the knowledge which they had acquired of the different quarters of the globe, they had not hitherto attempted any settlement out of their own country. Their merchants had not yet acquired such a degree, either of wealth or of political influence, as were requisite towards carrying a scheme of colonization into execu­tion. Persons of noble birth were destitute of the ideas and information which might have disposed them to patronize such a design. The growing power of Spain, however, and the ascendant over the other nations of Europe to which it had attained under Charles V. and his son, naturally turned the attention of man­kind towards the importance of those settle­ments in the New World, to which they were so much indebted for that pre-eminence. The intercourse between Spain and England, du­ring the reign of Philip and Mary; the re­sort [Page 39] of the Spanish nobility to the English court, while Philip resided there; the study of the Spanish language, which became fashion­able; and the translation of several histories of America into English, diffused gradually through the nation a more distinct knowledge of the policy of Spain in planting its colonies, and of the advantages which it derived from them. When hostilities commenced between Elizabeth and Philip, the prospect of annoy­ing Spain by sea opened a new career to the enterprising spirit of the English nobility. Almost every eminent leader of the age aimed at distinguishing himself by naval exploits. That service, and the ideas connected with it, the discovery of unknown countries, the esta­blishment of distant colonies, and the enrich­ing of commerce by new commodities, became familiar to persons of rank.

In consequence of all those concurring cau­ses, the English began seriously to form plans of settling colonies in those parts of America, which hitherto they had only visited. The projectors and patrons of these plans were mostly persons of rank and influence. Among them, Sir Humphry Gilbert of Compton in Devonshire, ought to be mentioned with the distinction due to the conductor of the first English colony to America. He had early rendered himself conspicuous by his military [Page 40] services both in France and Ireland; and ha­ving afterwards turned his attention to naval affairs, he published a discourse concerning the probability of a north-west passage, which dis­covered no inconsiderable portion both of learning and ingenuity, mingled with the en­thusiasm, the credulity, and sanguine expecta­tions which incite men to new and hazardous undertakings.^* With those talents, he was deemed a proper person to be employed in es­tablishing a new colony, and easily obtained from the Queen (June 11. 1578) letters pa­tent, vesting in him sufficient powers for this purpose.

As this is the first charter to a colony, granted by the Crown of England, the arti­cles in it merit particular attention, as they un­fold the ideas of that age, with respect to the nature of such settlements. Elizabeth autho­rizes him to discover and take possession of all remote and barbarous lands, unoccupied by a­ny Christian prince or people. She vests in him, his heirs and assigns, for ever, the full right of property in the soil of those countries whereof he shall take possession. She permits such of her subjects, as were willing to ac­company Gilbert in his voyage, to go and set­tle in the countries which he shall plant. [Page 41] She empowers him, his heirs and assigns, to dispose of whatever portion of those lands he shall judge meet to persons settled there, in fee-simple, according to the laws of England. She ordains, that all the lands granted to Gil­bert shall hold of the Crown of England by homage, on payment of the fifth part of the gold or silver ore found there. She confers upon him, his heirs and assigns, the complete jurisdictions and royalties, as well marine as other, within the said lands and seas thereunto adjoining; and as their common safety and in­terest would render good government necessary in their new settlements, she gave Gilbert, his heirs and assigns, full power to convict, punish, pardon, govern, and rule, by their good discretion and policy, as well in causes capital or criminal as civil, both marine and other, all persons who shall from time to time settle within the said countries, according to such statutes, laws, and ordinances as shall be by him, his heirs and assigns, devised and es­tablished for their better government. She declared, that all who settled there should have and enjoy all the privileges of free denizens and natives of England, any law, custom, or usage to the contrary notwithstanding. And finally, she prohibited all persons from at­tempting to settle within two hundred leagues of any place which Sir Humphrey Gilbert, [Page 42] or his associates, shall have occupied, during the space of six years.^*

With those extraordinary powers, suited to the high notions of authority and prerogative prevalent in England during the sixteenth cen­tury, but very repugnant to more recent ideas with respect to the rights of free men, who voluntarily unite to form a colony, Gilbert began to collect associates, and to prepare for embarkation. His own character, and the zealous efforts of his half-brother, Walter Ralegh, who, even in his early youth, dis­played those splendid talents, and that un­daunted spirit, which create admiration and confidence, soon procured him a sufficient number of followers. But his success was not suited either to the sanguine hopes of his countrymen, or to the expence of his prepa­rations. Two expeditions, both of which he conducted in person, ended disastrously. In the last, (1580) he himself perished, without having effected his intended settlement on the conti­nent of America, or performing any thing more worthy of notice, than the empty for­mality of taking possession of the island of Newfoundland, in the name of his sovereign. The dissensions among his officers; the licen­tious and ungovernable spirit of some of his [Page 43] crew; his total ignorance of the countries which he purposed to occupy; his misfor­tune in approaching the continent too far to­wards the north, where the inhospitable coast of Cape Breton did not invite them to settle; the shipwreck of his largest vessel; and above all, the scanty provision which the funds of a private man could make of what was requi­site for establishing a new colony, were the true causes to which the failure of the enter­prise must be imputed, not to any deficiency of abilities or resolution in its leader^*.

But the miscarriage of a scheme, in which Gilbert had wasted his fortune, did not dis­courage Ralegh. He adopted all his brother's ideas; and applying to the Queen, in whose favour he stood high at that time, he pro­cured a patent, (1584, March 26) with. ju­risdiction and prerogatives as ample as had been granted unto Gilbert.^† Ralegh, no less eager to execute than to undertake the scheme, instantly dispatched (April 27) two small ves­sels, under the command of Amadas and Bar­low, two officers of trust, to visit the coun­tries which he intended to settle, and to ac­quire some previous knowledge of their coasts, their soil, and productions. In order to avoid Gilbert's error, in holding too far north, they [Page 44] took their course by the Canaries and the West India islands, and approached the North American continent by the Gulph of Florida. Unfortunately their chief researches were made in that part of the country now known by the name of North Carolina, the province in America most destitute of commodious har­bours. They touched first at an island, which they call Wokocon (probably Ocakoke,) situ­ated on the inlet into Pamplicoe Sound, and then at Raonoke, near the mouth of Albe­marle Sound. In both, they had some inter­course with the natives, whom they found to be savages, with all the characteristic qualities of uncivilized life, bravery, aversion to labour, hospitality, a propensity to admire, and a wil­lingness to exchange their rude productions for English commodities, especially for iron, or any of the useful metals of which they were destitute. After spending a few weeks in this traffic, and in visiting some parts of the adjacent continent, Amadas and Barlow re­turned to England, (Sept. 15) with two of the natives, and gave such splendid descriptions of the beauty of the country, the fertility of the soil, and the mildness of the climate, that Eli­zabeth, delighted with the idea of occupying a territory, superior, so far, to the barren re­gions towards the north hitherto visited by her subjects, bestowed on it the name of Virginia; [Page 45] as a memorial that this happy discovery had been made under a virgin Queen.^*

Their report encouraged Ralegh to hasten his preparations for taking possession of such an inviting property. He fitted out a squadron of seven small ships, under the command of Sir Richard Greenville, a man of honourable birth, and of courage so undaunted as to be conspicuous even in that gallant age. But the spirit of that predatory war which the English carried on against Spain, mingled with this scheme of settlement; and on this account, as well as from unacquaintance with a more direct and shorter course to North America, Greenville sailed by the West India islands. He spent some time in cruising a­mong these, and in taking prizes; so that it was towards the close of June before he arriv­ed on the coast of North America. He touched at both the islands where Amadas and Barlow had landed, and made some excursions into different parts of the continent round Pamplicoe and Albemarle Sounds. But as, unfortunately, he did not advance far enough towards the north, to discover the noble Bay of Chesapeak, he established the colony (Au­gust 25) which he left on the island of Raon­oke, an incommodious station, without any safe harbour, and almost uninhabited.^†

[Page 46]This colony consisted only of one hundred and eighty persons, under the command of Captain Lane, assisted by some men of note, the most distinguished of whom was Hariot, an eminent mathematician. Their chief em­ployment, during a residence of nine months, was to obtain a more extensive knowledge of the country; and their researches were carried on with greater spirit, and reached farther than could have been expected from a colony so feeble, and in a station so disadvantageous. But from the same impatience of indigent ad­venturers to acquire sudden wealth, which gave a wrong direction to the industry of the Spaniards in their settlements, the greater part of the English seem to have considered nothing as worthy of attention but mines of gold and silver. These they sought for, wherever they came; these they enquired after with unwea­ried eagerness. The savages soon discovered the favourite objects which allured them, and artfully amused them with so many tales con­cerning pearl fisheries, and rich mines of va­rious metals, that Lane and his companions wasted their time and activity in the chime­rical pursuit of these, instead of labouring to raise provisions for their own subsistence. On discovering the deceit of the Indians, they were so much exasperated, that from expostu­lations and reproaches, they proceeded to open hostility (1586). The supplies of provisions [Page 47] which they had been accustomed to receive from the natives were of course withdrawn. Through their own negligence, no other pre­caution had been taken for their support. Ra­legh, having engaged in a scheme too expen­sive for his narrow funds, had not been able to send them that recruit of stores with which Greenville had promised to furnish them early in the spring. The colony, reduced to the utmost distress, and on the point of perishing with famine, was preparing to disperse into different districts of the country in quest of food, (June 1) when Sir Francis Drake ap­peared with his fleet, returning from a suc­cessful expedition against the Spaniards in the West Indies. A scheme which he formed, of furnishing Lane and his associates with such supplies as might enable them to remain with comfort in their station, was disappointed by a sudden storm, in which a small vessel that he destined for their service was dashed to pieces; and as he could not supply them with ano­ther, at their joint request, as they were worn out with fatigue and famine, he carried them home to England (June 19.)^*

Such was the inauspicious beginning of the English settlements in the New World; and after exciting high expectations, this first at­tempt [Page 48] produced no effect but that of affording a more complete knowledge of the country; as it enabled Hariot, a man of science and observation, to describe its soil, climate, pro­ductions, and the manners of its inhabitants, with a degree of accuracy which merits no in­considerable praise, when compared with the childish and marvellous tales published by se­veral of the early visitants of the New World. There is another consequence of this abortive colony important enough to entitle it to a place in history. Lane and his associates, by their constant intercourse with the Indians, had acquired a relish for their favourite enjoy­ment of smoking tobacco; to the use of which, the credulity of that people not only ascribed a thousand imaginary virtues, but their superstition considered the plant itself as a gracious gift of the gods, for the solace of human kind, and the most acceptable offering which man can present to heaven.^* They brought with them a specimen of this new commodity to England, and taught their countrymen the method of using it; which Ralegh, and some young men of fashion, fondly adopted. From imitation of them, from love of novelty, and from the favoura­ble opinion of its salutary qualities entertained by several physicians, the practice spread a­mong [Page 49] the English. The Spaniards and Por­tuguese had, previous to this, introduced it in other parts of Europe. This habit of taking tobacco gradually extended from the extremi­ties of the north to those of the south, and in one form or other seems to be equally grateful to the inhabitants of every climate; and by a singular caprice of the human species, no less inexplicable than unexampled, (so bewitching is the acquired taste for a weed of no manifest utility, and at first not only unpleasant, but nauseous,) that it has become almost as uni­versal as the demands of those appetites origi­nally implanted in our nature. Smoking was the first mode of taking tobacco in England; and we learn from the comic writers towards the close of the sixteenth century and the be­ginning of the seventeenth, that this was deemed one of the accomplishments of a man of fashion and spirit.

A few days after Drake departed from Ro­anoke, a small bark, dispatched by Ralegh with a supply of stores for the colony, landed at the place where the English had settled; but on finding it deserted by their countrymen, they returned to England. The bark was hardly gone, when Sir Richard Greenville ap­peared with three ships. After searching in vain for the colony which he had planted, without being able to learn what had befallen [Page 50] it, he left fifteen of his crew to keep possession of the island. This handful of men was soon overpowered and cut in pieces by the savages.^*

Though all Ralegh's efforts to establish a colony in Virginia had hitherto proved abor­tive, and had been defeated by a succession of disasters and disappointments, neither his hopes nor resources were exhausted. Early in the following year, (1587) he fitted out three ships, under the command of Captain John White, who carried thither a colony more numerous than that which had been settled under Lane. On their arrival in Virginia, af­ter viewing the face of the country covered with one continued forest, which to them ap­peared an uninhabited wild, as it was occu­pied only by a few scattered tribes of savages, they discovered that they were destitute of many things which they deemed essentially necessary towards their subsistence in such an uncomfortable situation; and, with one voice, requested White, their commander, to return to England, as the person among them most likely to solicit, with efficacy, the supply on which depended the existence of the colony. White landed in his native country at a most unfavourable season for the negociation which he had undertaken. He found the nation in [Page 51] universal alarm at the formidable preparations of Philip II. to invade England, and collect­ing all its force to oppose the fleet to which he had arrogantly given the name of the In­vincible Armada. Ralegh, Greenville, and all the most zealous patrons of the new settle­ment, were called to act a distinguished part in the operations of a year (1588) equally in­teresting and glorious to England. Amidst danger so imminent, and during a contest for the honour of their sovereign and the inde­pendence of their country, it was impossible to attend to a less important and remote object. The unfortunate colony in Roanoke received no supply, and perished miserably by famine, or by the unrelenting cruelty of those barbari­ans by whom they were surrounded.

During the remainder of Elizabeth's reign, the scheme of establishing a colony in Virgi­nia was not resumed. Ralegh, with a most aspiring mind and extraordinary talents, en­lightened by knowledge no less uncommon, had the spirit and the defects of a projector. Allured by new objects, and always giving the preference to such as were most splendid and arduous, he was apt to engage in undertaking [...] so vast and so various, as to be far beyond his power of accomplishing. He was now intent on peopling and improving a large district of country in Ireland, of which he had obtained [Page 52] a grant from the Queen. He was a deep ad­venturer in the scheme of fitting out a power­ful armament against Spain, in order to estab­lish Don Antonio on the throne of Portugal. He had begun to form his favourite, but visi­onary plan, of penetrating into the province of Guiana, where he fondly dreamed of taking possession of inexhaustible wealth, flowing from the richest mines in the New World. Amidst this multiplicity of projects, of such promising appearance, and recommended by novelty, he naturally became cold towards his ancient and hitherto unprofitable scheme of settling a colony in Virginia, and was easily induced to assign his right of property in that country, which he had never visited, together with all the privileges contained in his patent, to Sir Thomas Smith, and a company of mer­chants in London (March, 1596.) This com­pany, satisfied with a paltry traffic carried on by a few small barks, made no attempt to take possession of the country. Thus, after a period of a hundred and six years from the time that Cabot discovered North America, in the name of Henry VII. and of twenty years from the time that Ralegh planted the first colony, there was not a single Englishman settled there at the demise of Queen Elizabeth, in the year one thousand six hundred and three.

[Page 53]I have already explained the causes of this, during the period previous to the accession of Elizabeth. Other causes produced the same effect under her administration. Though for one half of her reign England was engaged in no foreign war, and commerce enjoyed that perfect security which is friendly to its pro­gress; though the glory of her latter years gave the highest tone of elevation and vigour to the national spirit; the Queen herself, from her extreme parsimony, and her aversion to demand extraordinary supplies of her subjects, was more apt to restrain than to second the ardent genius of her people. Several of the most splendid enterprizes in her reign were concerted and executed by private adventurers. All the schemes for colonization were carried on by the funds of individuals, without any public aid. Even the felicity of her govern­ment was adverse to the establishment of re­mote colonies. So powerful is the attraction of our native soil, and such our fortunate par­tiality to the laws and manners of our own country, that men seldom choose to abandon it, unless they be driven away by oppression, or allured by vast prospects of sudden wealth. But the provinces of America in which the English attempted to settle, did not, like those occupied by Spain, invite them thither by any appearance of silver or golden mines. All their hopes of gain were distant; and they saw [Page 54] that nothing could be earned but by persever­ing exertions of industry. The maxims of Elizabeth's administration were, in their ge­neral tenor, so popular, as did not force her subjects to emigrate, in order to escape from the heavy or vexatious hand of power. It seems to have been with difficulty that these slender bands of planters were collected, on which the writers of that age bestow the name of the first and second Virginian colo­nies. The fulness of time for English colo­nization was not yet arrived.

But the succession of the Scottish line to the crown of England hastened its approach. James was hardly seated on the throne before he discovered his pacific intentions, and he soon terminated the long war which had been carried on between Spain and England, by an amicable treaty. From that period, uninter­rupted tranquillity continued during his reign. Many persons of high rank, and of ardent am­bition, to whom the war with Spain had af­forded constant employment, and presented alluring prospects, not only of fame but of wealth, soon became so impatient of languish­ing at home without occupation or object, that their invention was on the stretch to find some exercise for their activity and talents. To both these, North America seemed to open a new field, and schemes of carrying colonies [Page 55] thither became more general and more po­pular.

A voyage, undertaken by Bartholemew Gos­nold in the last year of the Queen, facilitated, as well as encouraged, the execution of these schemes. He sailed from Falmouth in a small bark, with thirty two men. Instead of fol­lowing former navigators in their unnecessary circuit by the West India isles and the Gulf of Florida, Gosnold steered due west, as nearly as the winds would permit, and was the first English commander who reached Ame­rica by this shorter and more direct course. That part of the continent which he first de­scried was a promontory in the province now called Massachusets Bay, to which he gave the name of Cape Cod. Holding along the coast, as it stretched towards the south-west, he touched at two islands, one of which he call­ed Martha's Vineyard, the other Elizabeth's Island; and visited the adjoining continent, and traded with its inhabitants. He and his com­panions were so much delighted every where with the inviting aspect of the country, that notwithstanding the smallness of their num­ber, a part of them consented to remain there. But when they had leisure to reflect upon the fate of former settlers in America, they re­tracted a resolution formed in the first warmth of their admiration; and Gosnold returned to [Page 56] England in less than four months from the time of his departure.^*

This voyage, however inconsiderable it may appear, had important effects. The English now discovered the aspect of the American continent to be extremely inviting far to the north of the place where they had formerly at­tempted to settle. The coast of a vast coun­try, stretching through the most desirable cli­mates, lay before them. The richness of its virgin soil promised a certain recompence to their industry. In its interior provinces unex­pected sources of wealth might open, and un­known objects of commerce might be found. Its distance from England was diminished al­most a third part, by the new course which Gosnold had pointed out. Plans for establish­ing colonies began to be formed in different parts of the kingdom; and before these were ripe for execution, one small vessel was sent out by the merchants of Bristol, another by the Earl of Southampton and Lord Arundel of Wardour, in order to learn whether Gos­nold's account of the country was to be con­sidered as a just representation of its state, or as the exaggerated description of a fond dis­coverer. Both returned with a full confir­mation of his veracity, and with the addition [Page 57] of so many new circumstances in favour of the country, acquired by a more extensive view of it, as greatly increased the desire of plant­ing it.

The most active and efficacious promoter of this was Richard Hakluyt, prebendary of West­minster, to whom England is more indebted for its American possessions than to any man of that age. Formed under a kinsman of the same name, eminent for naval and commercial knowledge, he imbibed a similar taste, and applied early to the study of geography and na­vigation. These favourite sciences engrossed his attention, and to diffuse a relish for them was the great object of his life. In order to excite his countrymen to naval enterprize, by flattering their national vanity, he published, in the year one thousand five hundred and eighty nine, his valuable collection of voyages and dis­coveries made by Englishmen. In order to supply them with what information might be derived from the experience of the most suc­cessful foreign navigators, he translated some of the best accounts of the progress of the Spaniards and Portuguese in their voyages both to the East and West Indies, into the English tongue. He was consulted with respect to many of the attempts towards discovery or co­lonization during the latter part of Elizabeth's reign. He corresponded with the officers who [Page 58] conducted them, directed their researches to proper objects, and published the history of their exploits. By the zealous endeavours of a person, equally respected by men of rank and men of business, many of both orders formed an association to establish colonies in America, and petitioned the king for the sanction of his authority to warrant the execution of their plans.

James, who prided himself on his profound skill in the science of government, and who had turned his attention to consider the advan­tages which might be derived from colonies, at a time when he patronised a scheme for planting them in some of the ruder provinces of his ancient kingdom, with a view of in­troducing industry and civilization there,^* was now no less fond of directing the active genius of his English subjects, towards occupations not repugnant to his own pacific maxims, and listened with a favourable ear to their applica­tion. But as the extent as well as value of the American continent began now to be better known, a grant of the whole of such a vast region to any one body of men, however re­spectable, appeared to him an act of impolitic and profuse liberality. For this reason, he di­vided that portion of North America, which [Page 59] stretches from the thirty-fourth to the forty-fifth degree of latitude, into two districts, nearly equal; the one called the first or south colony of Virginia, the other, the second or north colony. He authorized (1606, April 10) Sir Thomas Gates, Sir George Summers, Richard Hakluyt, and their associates, mostly resident in London, to settle any part of the former which they should choose, and vested in them a right of property to the land ex­tending along the coast fifty miles on each side of the place of their first habitation, and reaching into the interior country a hundred miles. The latter district he allotted, as the place of settlement, to sundry knights, gen­tlemen, and merchants of Bristol, Plymouth, and other parts in the west of England, with a similar grant of territory. Neither the mo­narch who issued this charter, nor his subjects who received it, had any conception that they were proceeding to lay the foundation of migh­ty and opulent states. What James granted was nothing more than a simple charter of corporation to a trading company, empower­ing the members of it to have a common seal, and to act as a body politic. But as the object for which they associated was new, the plan established for the administration of their af­fairs was uncommon. Instead of the power usually granted to corporations, of electing of­ficers and framing by-laws for the conduct of [Page 60] their own operations, the supreme govern­ment of the colonies to be settled, was vested in a council resident in England, to be named by the king, according to such laws and ordi­nances as should be given under his sign ma­nual; and the subordinate jurisdiction was committed to a council resident in America, which was likewise to be nominated by the king, and to act conformably to his instruc­tions. To this important clause, which re­gulated the form of their constitution, was added, the concession of several immunities, to encourage persons to settle in the intended colonies. Some of these were the same which had been granted to Gilbert and Ralegh; such as the securing to the emigrants and their de­scendants all the rights of denizens, in the same manner as if they had remained or had been born in England; and granting them the privilege of holding their lands in America by the freest and least burdensome tenure. Others were more favourable than those granted by Elizabeth. He permitted whatever was ne­cessary for the sustenance or commerce of the new colonies to be exported from England, during the space of seven years, without pay­ing any duty; and as a farther incitement to industry, he granted them liberty of trade with other nations, and appropriated the duty to be levied on foreign commodities, for twen­ty-one [Page 61] years, as a fund for the benefit of the colony.^*

In this singular charter, the contents of which have been little attended to by the his­torians of America, some articles are as unfa­vourable to the rights of the colonists, as others are to the interest of the parent state. By placing the legislative and executive powers in a council nominated by the crown, and guided by its instructions, every person settling in America, seems to be bereaved of the noblest privilege of a free man; by the unlimited per­mission of trade with foreigners, the parent state is deprived of that exclusive commerce which has been deemed the chief advantage resulting from the establishment of colonies. But in the infancy of colonization, and with­out the guidance of observation or experience, the ideas of men with respect to the mode of forming new settlements, were not fully un­folded, or properly arranged. At a period when they could not foresee the future gran­deur and importance of the communities which they were about to call into existence, they were ill qualified to concert the best plan for governing them. Besides, the English of that age, accustomed to the high prerogative and arbitrary rule of their monarchs, were not [Page 62] animated with such liberal sentiments, either concerning their own personal or political rights, as have become familiar in the more mature and improved state of their constitution.

Without hesitation or reluctance the propri­etors of both colonies prepared to execute their respective plans; and under the authority of a charter, which would now be rejected with disdain, as a violent invasion of the sa­cred and inalienable rights of liberty, the first permanent settlements of the English in America were established. From this period, the progress of the two provinces of Virginia and New England form a regular and con­nected story. The former in the south, and the latter in the north, may be considered as the original and parent colonies; in imitation of which, and under whose shelter, all the others have been successively planted and reared.

The first attempts to occupy Virginia and New England were made by very feeble bodies of emigrants. As these settled, under great disadvantages, among tribes of savages, and in an uncultivated desert; as they attained gradu­ally, after long struggles and many disasters, to that maturity of strength, and order of po­licy, which entitles them to be considered as respectable states, the history of their perse­vering [Page 63] efforts merits particular attention. It will exhibit a spectacle no less striking than instructive, and presents an opportunity, which rarely occurs, of contemplating a society in the first moment of its political existence, and of observing how its spirit forms in its infant state, [...]ow its principles begin to unfold as it advances, and how those characteristic qualities, which distinguish its maturer age, are succes­sively acquired. The account of the estab­lishment of the other English colonies, un­dertaken at periods when the importance of such possessions was better understood, and ef­fected by more direct and vigorous exertions of the parent state, is less interesting. I shall therefore relate the history of the two original colonies in detail. With respect to the sub­sequent settlements, some more general obser­vations concerning the time, the motives, and circumstances of their establishment, will be sufficient. I begin with the history of Vir­ginia, the most ancient and most valuable of the British colonies in North America.

Though many persons of distinction became proprietors in the company which undertook to plant a colony in Virginia, its funds seem not to have been considerable, and its first ef­fort was certainly extremely feeble. A small vessel of a hundred tons, and two barks, un­der the command of Captain Newport, sailed [Page 64] (Dec. 19) with a hundred and five men, des­tined to remain in the country. Some of these were of respectable families, particularly a bro­ther of the Earl of Northumberland, and se­veral officers who had served with reputation in the reign of Elizabeth. Newport, I know not for what reason, followed the ancient course by the West Indies, and did not reach the coast of North America for four months (1607, April 26). But he approached it with better fortune than any former navigator; for having been driven, by the violence of a storm, to the northward of Roanoke, the place of his destination, the first land he dis­covered was a promontory which he called Cape Henry, the southern boundary of the Bay of Chesapeak. The English stood direct­ly into that spacious inlet, which seemed to invite them to enter; and as they advanced, contemplated, with a mixture of delight and admiration, that grand reservoir, into which are poured the waters of all the vast rivers, which not only diffuse fertility through that district of America, but open the interior parts of the country to navigation, and render a commercial intercourse more extensive and commodious than in any other region of the globe. Newport, keeping along the southern shore, sailed up a river, which the natives call­ed Powhatan, and to which he gave the name of James-River. After viewing its banks, [Page 65] during a run of above forty miles from its mouth, they all concluded that a country, where safe and convenient harbours seemed to be numerous, would be a more suitable sta­tion for a trading colony, than the shoally and dangerous coast to the south, on which their countrymen had formerly settled. Here then they determined to abide; and having chosen a proper spot for their residence, they gave this infant settlement the name of James-Town, which it still retains; and though it has never become either populous or opulent, it can boast of being the most ancient habita­tion of the English in the New World. But however well-chosen the situation might be, the members of the colony were far from a­vailing themselves of its advantages. Violent animosities had broke out among some of their leaders, during their voyage to Virginia. These did not subside on their arrival there. The first deed of the council, which assumed the government in virtue of a commission brought from England under the seal of the company, and opened on the day after they landed, was an act of injustice. Captain Smith, who had been appointed a member of the council, was excluded from his seat at the board, by the mean jealousy of his colleagues, and not only reduced to the condition of a private man, but of one suspected and watched by his superiors. This diminution of his influence, and restraint [Page 66] on his activity, was an essential injury to the colony, which at that juncture stood in need of the aid of both. For soon after they be­gan to settle, the English were involved in a war with the natives, partly by their own in­discretion, and partly by the suspicion and fe­rocity of those barbarians. And although the Indians, scattered over the countries adjacent to James-River, were divided into independent tribes, so extremely feeble that hardly one of them could muster above two hundred warri­ors,^* they teazed and annoyed an infant colo­ny by their incessant hostilities. To this was added a calamity still more dreadful; the stock of provisions left for their subsistence, on the departure of their ships for England, (June 15) was so scanty, and of such bad quality, that a scarcity, approaching almost to absolute fa­mine, soon followed. Such poor unwhole­some fare brought on diseases, the violence of which was so much increased by the sultry heat of the climate, and the moisture of a country covered with wood, that before the beginning of September, one half of their number died, and most of the survivors were sickly and dejected. In such trying extremi­ties, the comparative powers of every indivi­dual are discovered and called forth, and each naturally takes that station, and assumes that [Page 67] ascendant, to which he is entitled by his talents and force of mind. Every eye was now turned towards Smith, and all willingly devolved on him that authority, of which they had formerly deprived him. His undaunted temper, deeply tinctured with the wild roman­tic spirit characteristic of military adventures in that age, was peculiarly suited to such a situ­ation. The vigour of his constitution conti­nued, fortunately, still unimpaired by disease, and his mind was never apalled by danger. He instantly adopted the only plan that could save them from destruction. He began by sur­rounding James-Town with such rude fortifi­cations, as were a sufficient defence against the assaults of savages. He then marched, at the head of a small detachment, in quest of their enemies. Some tribes he gained by caresses and presents, and procured from them a supply of provisions. Others he attacked with open force; and defeating them on every occasion, whatever their superiority in numbers might be, compelled them to impart to him some portion of their winter stores. As the recom­pence of all his toils and dangers, he saw a­bundance and contentment re-established in the colony, and hoped that he should be able to maintain them in that happy state, until the arrival of ships from England in the spring: but in one of his excursions he was surprised [Page 68] by a numerous body of Indians, and in mak­ing his escape from them, after a gallant de­fence, he sunk to the neck in a swamp, and was obliged to surrender. Though he knew well what a dreadful fate awaits the prisoners of savages, his presence of mind did not for­sake him. He shewed those who had taken him captive a mariner's compass, and amused them with so many wonderful accounts of its virtues, as filled them with astonishment and veneration, which began to operate very pow­erfully in his favour. They led him, howe­ver, in triumph through various parts of the country, and conducted him at last to Powha­tan, the most considerable Sachim in that part of Virginia. There the doom of death being pronounced, he was led to the place of execu­tion, and his head already bowed down to re­ceive the fatal blow, when that fond attachment of the American women to their European in­vaders, the beneficial effects of which the Spa­niards often experienced, interposed in his be­half. The favourite daughter of Powhatan rushed in between him and the executioner, and, by her intreaties and tears, prevailed on her father to spare his life. The beneficence of his deliverer, whom the early English wri­ters dignify with the title of the Princess Po­cahuntas, did not terminate here; she soon after procured his liberty, and sent him [Page 69] from time to time seasonable presents of pro­visions.^*

Smith, on his return to James-Town, found the colony reduced to thirty-eight persons, who, in despair, were preparing to abandon a country which did not seem destined to be the habitation of Englishmen. He employed ca­resses, threats, and even violence, in order to pre­vent them from executing this fatal resolution. With difficulty he prevailed on them to defer it so long, that the succour anxiously expected from England arrived. Plenty was instantly restored; a hundred new planters were added to their number, and an ample stock of what­ever was requisite for clearing and sowing the ground was delivered to them. But an un­lucky incident turned their attention from that species of industry which alone could render their situation comfortable. In a small stream of water that issued from a bank of sand near James-Town, a sediment of some shining mi­neral substance, which had some resemblance of gold, was discovered. At a time when the precious metals were conceived to be the pecu­liar and only valuable productions of the New World, when every mountain was supposed to contain a treasure, and every rivulet was search­ed for its golden sands, this appearance was [Page 70] fondly considered as an infallible indication of a mine. Every hand was eager to dig; large quantities of this glittering dust were amassed. From some assay of its nature, made by an ar­tist as unskilful as his companions were credu­lous, it was pronounced to be extremely rich. "There was now," (says Smith) ‘no talk, no hope, no work, but dig gold, wash gold, refine gold.’ ^* With this imaginary wealth the first vessel returning to England was load­ed, while the culture of the land, and every useful occupation, was totally neglected.

The effects of this fatal delusion were soon felt. Notwithstanding all the provident acti­vity of Smith, in procuring corn from the na­tives by traffic or by force, the colony began to suffer as much as formerly from scarcity of food, and was wasted by the same distempers. In hopes of obtaining some relief, Smith pro­posed, as they had not hitherto extended their researches beyond the countries contiguous to James-River, to open an intercourse with the more remote tribes, and to examine into the state of culture and population among them. The execution of this arduous design he un­dertook himself, in a small open boat, with a feeble crew, and a very scanty stock of provi­sions. He began his survey at Cape Charles, [Page 71] and in two different excursions, which conti­nued above four months, he advanced as far as the river Susquehannah, which flows into the bottom of the Bay. He visited all the countries both on the east and west shores; he entered most of the considerable creeks; he sailed up many of the great rivers as far as their falls. He traded with some tribes; he fought with others; he observed the nature of the territory which they occupied, their mode of subsistence, the peculiarities in their manners; and left among all a wonderful admiration ei­ther of the beneficence or valour of the En­glish. After sailing above three thousand miles in a paltry vessel, ill fitted for such an exten­sive navigation, during which the hardships to which he was exposed, as well as the patience with which he endured, and the fortitude with which he surmounted them, equal whatever is related of the celebrated Spanish discoverers in their most daring enterprizes; he returned to James-Town; he brought with him an ac­count of that large portion of the American continent now comprehended in the two pro­vinces of Virginia and Maryland,^* so full and exact, that after the progress of information and research for a century and a half, his map exhibits no inaccurate view of both coun­tries, and is the original upon which all sub­sequent [Page 72] delineations and descriptions have been formed.^*

But, whatever pleasing prospect of future benefit might open upon this complete disco­very of a country, formed by nature to be the feat of an exclusive commerce, it afforded but little relief for their present wants. The co­lony still depended for subsistence chiefly on supplies from the natives; as, after all the ef­forts of their own industry, hardly thirty acres of ground were yet cleared so as to be capable of culture.^† By Smith's attention, however, the stores of the English were so regularly filled, that for some time they felt no consider­able distress; and at this juncture a change was made in the constitution of the company, which seemed to promise an increase of their security and happiness. That supreme direc­tion of all the company's operations, which the king by his charter had reserved to himself, discouraged persons of rank or property from becoming members of a society so dependant on the arbitrary will of the crown. Upon a representation of this to James, (1609, May 23) he granted them a new charter, with more ample privileges. He enlarged the boun­daries of the colony; he rendered the powers of the company, as a corporation, more ex­plicit [Page 73] and complete; he abolished the juris­diction of the council resident in Virginia; he vested the government entirely in a council residing in London; he granted to the propri­etors of the company the right of electing the persons who were to compose this council, by a majority of voices; he authorized this coun­cil to establish such laws, orders, and forms of government and magistracy, for the colony and plantation, as they in their discretion should think to be fittest for the good of the adventurers and inhabitants there; he empow­ered them to nominate a governor to have the administration of affairs in the colony, and to carry their orders into execution.^* In conse­quence of these concessions, the company hav­ing acquired the power of regulating all its own transactions, the number of proprietors increased, and among them we find the most respectable names in the nation.

The first deed of the new council was to ap­point Lord Delaware governor and captain-general of their colony in Virginia. To a person of his rank, those high-sounding titles could be no allurement; and by his thorough acquaintance with the progress and state of the settlement, he knew enough of the labour and difficulty with which an infant colony is rear­ed, [Page 74] to expect any thing but anxiety and care in discharging the duties of that delicate office. But from zeal to promote an establishment which he expected to prove so highly beneficial to his country, he was willing to relinquish all the comforts of an honourable station, to undertake a long voyage to settle in an un­cultivated region, destitute of every accommo­dation to which he had been accustomed, and where he foresaw that toil and trouble and dan­ger awaited him. But as he could not imme­diately leave England, the council dispatched Sir Thomas Gates and Sir George Summers, the former of whom had been appointed lieu­tenant-general, and the latter admiral, with nine ships and five hundred planters. They carried with them commissions, by which they were empowered to supersede the jurisdic­tion of the former council, to proclaim Lord Delaware governor, and, until he should ar­rive, to take the administration of affairs into their own hands. A violent hurricane sepa­rated the vessel in which Gates and Summers had embarked, from the rest of the fleet, and stranded it on the coast of Bermudas. The other ships arrived (August 11) safely at James-Town. But the fate of their com­manders was unknown. Their commission for new-modelling the government, and all other public papers, were supposed to be lost, together with them. The present form of [Page 75] government, however, was held to be abo­lished. No legal warrant could be produced for establishing any other. Smith was not in a condition at this juncture to assert his own rights, or to act with his wonted vigour. By an accidental explosion of gunpowder, he had been so miserably scorched and mangled, that he was incapable of moving, and under the necessity of committing himself to the guid­ance of his friends, who carried him aboard one of the ships returning to England, in hopes that he might recover by more skilful treat­ment than he could meet with in Virginia.^*

After his departure, every thing tended fast to the wildest anarchy. Faction and discon­tent had often risen so high among the old settlers, that they could hardly be kept within bounds. The spirit of the new-comers was too ungovernable to bear any restraint. Seve­ral among them of better rank were such dis­sipated hopeless young men, as their friends were glad to send out in quest of whatever for­tune might betide them in a foreign land. Of the lower order, many were so profligate or desperate, that their country was happy to throw them out as nuisances in society. Such persons were little capable of the regular sub­ordination, the strict oeconomy, and persever­ing [Page 76] industry, which their situation required. The Indians observing their misconduct, and that every precaution for sustenance or safety was neglected, not only withheld the supplies of provisions which they were accustomed to furnish, but harassed them with continual hos­tilities. All their subsistence was derived from the stores which they had brought from Eng­land; these were soon consumed; then the domestic animals sent out to breed in the coun­try were devou [...]ed; and by this inconsiderate waste, they were reduced to such extremity of famine, as not only to eat the most nauseous and unwholesome roots and berries, but to feed on the bodies of the Indians whom they slew, and even on those of their companions who sunk under the oppression of such com­plicated distress. In less than six months, of five hundred persons whom Smith left in Vir­ginia, only sixty remained; and these so feeble and dejected, that they could not have survived for ten days, if succour had not arrived from a quarter whence they did not expect it.^*

When Gates and Summers were thrown ashore on Bermudas, fortunately not a single person on board their ship perished. A con­siderable part of their provisions and stores too was saved, and in that delightful spot, Nature, [Page 77] with spontaneous bounty, presented to them such a variety of her productions, that a hun­dred and fifty people subsisted in affluence for ten months on an uninhabited island. Impa­tient, however, to escape from a place where they were cut off from all intercourse with mankind, they set about building two barks with such tools and materials as they had, and by amazing efforts of perseverance and inge­nuity they finished them. In these they em­barked, and steered directly towards Virginia, in hopes of finding an ample consolation for all their toils and dangers in the embraces of their companions, and amidst the comforts of a flourishing colony. After a more prospe­rous navigation than they could have expected in their ill-constructed vessels, they landed (May 23) at James-Town. But instead of that joyful interview for which they fondly looked, a spectacle presented itself which struck them with horror. They beheld the miserable remainder of their countrymen ema­ciated with famine and sickness, sunk in de­spair, and in their figure and looks rather re­sembling spectres than human beings. As Gates and Summers, in full confidence of find­ing plenty of provisions in Virginia, had brought with them no larger stock than was deemed necessary for their own support during the voyage, their inability to afford relief to their countrymen, added to the anguish with which [Page 78] they viewed this unexpected scene of distress. Nothing now remained but instantly to aban­don a country, where it was impossible to subsist any longer; and though all that could be found in the stores of the colony, when added to what remained of the stock brought from Bermudas, did not amount to more than was sufficient to support them for sixteen days, at the most scanty allowance, they set sail, in hopes of being able to reach Newfoundland, where they expected to be relieved by their countrymen, employed at that season in the fishery there.^*

But it was not the will of Heaven that all the labour of the English, in planting this colony, as well as all their hopes of benefit from its future posterity, should be forever lost. Before Gates, and the melancholy companions of his voyage, had reached the mouth of James-River, they were met by Lord Delaware, with three ships, that brought a large recruit of provisions, a considerable number of new settlers, and every thing requisite for defence or cultivation. By persuasion and authority he prevailed on them to return to James-Town, where they found their fort, their magazines, [Page 79] and houses entire, which Sir Thomas Gates, by some happy chance, had preserved from be­ing set on fire at the time of their departure. A society so feeble and disordered in its frame required a tender and skilful hand to cherish it, and restore its vigour. This it found in Lord Delaware; he searched into the causes of their misfortunes, as far as he could discover them, amidst the violence of their mutual ac­cusations; but instead of exerting his power in punishing crimes that were past, he em­ployed his prudence in healing their dissensions, and in guarding against a repetition of the fame fatal errors. By unwearied assiduity, by the respect due to an amiable and beneficent character, by knowing how to mingle severity with indulgence, and when to assume the dig­nity of his office, as well as when to display the gentleness natural to his own temper, he gradually reconciled men corrupted by anarchy to subordination and discipline, he turned the attention of the idle and profligate to industry, and taught the Indians again to reverence and dread the English name (1611, March 28). Under such an administration, the colony be­gan once more to assume a promising appear­ance; when unhappily for it, a complication of diseases brought on by the climate obliged Lord Delaware to quit the country;^* the go­vernment of which he committed to Mr. Percy.

[Page 80]He was soon superseded (May 10) by the arrival of Sir Thomas Dale; in whom the company had vested more absolute authority than in any of his predecessors, impowering him to rule by martial law; a short code of which, founded on the practice of the armies in the Low Countries, the most rigid military school at that time in Europe, they sent out with him. This system of government is so violent and arbitrary, that even the Spaniards themselves had not ventured to introduce it in­to their settlements; for among them, as soon as a plantation began, and the arts of peace suc­ceeded to the operations of war, the jurisdiction of the civil magistrate was uniformly esta­blished. But however unconstitutional or op­pressive this may appear, it was adopted by the advice of Sir Francis Bacon, the most en­lightened philosopher, and one of the most eminent lawyers of the age.^* The compa­ny, well acquainted with the inefficacy of eve­ry method which they had hitherto employ­ed for restraining the unruly mutinous spirits which they had to govern, eagerly adopted a plan that had the sanction of such high au­thority to recommend it. Happily for the colony, Sir Thomas Dale, who was entrusted with this dangerous power, exercised it with prudence and moderation. By the vigour [Page 81] which the summary mode of military pu­nishment gave to his administration, he in­troduced into the colony more perfect order than had ever been established there; and at the same time he tempered its vigour with so much discretion, that no alarm seems to have been given by this formidable innovation.^*

The regular form which the colony now be­gan to assume, (1612, March 12) induced the King to issue a new charter for the en­couragement of the adventurers, by which he not only confirmed all their former privileges, and prolonged the term of exemption from payment of duties on the commodities export­ed by them, but granted them more extensive property, as well as more ample jurisdiction. All the islands lying within three hundred leagues of the coast were annexed to the Pro­vince of Virginia. In consequence of this, the company took possession of Bermudas, and the other small isles discovered by Gates and Summers; and at the same time prepared to send out a considerable reinforcement to the colony at James-Town. The expence of those extraordinary efforts was defrayed by the profits of a lottery, which amounted nearly to thirty thousand pounds. This expedient, they were authorized to employ by their [Page 82] new charter;^* and it is remarkable, as the first instance, in the English history, of any public countenance given to this pernicious seducing mode of levying money. But the House of Commons, which towards the close of this reign began to observe every measure of government with jealous attention, having remonstrated against the institution as uncon­stitutional and impolitic, James recalled the licence under the sanction of which it had been established.^†

By the severe discipline of martial law, the activity of the colonists was forced into a pro­per direction, and exerted itself in useful in­dustry. This, aided by a fertile soil and fa­vourable climate, soon enabled them to raise such a large stock of provisions, that they were no longer obliged to trust for subsistence to the precarious supplies which they obtained or extorted from the Indians. In proportion as the English became more independent, the natives courted their friendship upon more equal terms. The happy effects of this were quickly felt. Sir Thomas Dale concluded a treaty with one of their most powerful and warlike tribes, situated on the River Chicka­hominy, in which they consented to acknow­ledge themselves subjects of the King of Great [Page 83] Britain, to assume henceforth the name of Englishmen, to send a body of their warri­ors to the assistance of the English, as often as they took the field against an enemy, and to deposit annually a stipulated quantity of Indi­an corn in the store-houses of the colony.^* An event, which the early historians of Vir­ginia relate with peculiar satisfaction, prepared the way for this union. Pocahuntas, the fa­vourite daughter of the great Chief Powhatan, to whose intercession Captain Smith was in­debted for his life, persevered in her partial at­tachment to the English; and as she frequent­ly visited their settlements, where she was al­ways received with respectful hospitality, her admiration of their arts and manners continued to increase. During this intercourse, her beau­ty, which is represented as far superior to that of her countrywomen, made such impression on the heart of Mr. Rolfe, a young man of rank in the colony, that he warmly solicited her to accept of him as a husband. Where manners are simple, courtship is not tedious. Neither artifice prevents, nor ceremony forbids the heart from declaring its sentiments. Po­cahuntas readily gave her consent; Dale encou­raged the alliance, and Powhatan did not dis­approve it. The marriage was celebrated with extraordinary pomp; and from that period a [Page 84] friendly correspondence subsisted between the colony and all the tribes subject to Powhatan, or that stood in awe of his power. Rolfe and his Princess, (for by that name the writers of the last age always distinguished her) set out for England, where she was received by James and his Queen with the respect suited to her birth. Being carefully instructed in the prin­ciples of the Christian faith, she was publicly baptized, but died a few years after, on her return to America, leaving one son; from whom are sprung some of the most respectable families in Virginia, who boast of their descent from the race of the ancient rulers of their country.^* But notwithstanding the visible good effects of that alliance, none of Rolfe's countrymen seem to have imitated the exam­ple which he set them, of intermarrying with the natives. Of all the Europeans who have settled in America, the English have availed themselves least of this obvious method of conciliating the affection of its original inha­bitants; and, either from the shyness conspi­cuous in their national character, or from the want of that pliant facility of manners which accommodates itself to every situation, they have been more averse than the French and Portuguese, or even the Spaniards, from in­corporating [Page 85] with the native Americans. The Indians, courting such an union, offered their daughters in marriage to their new guests; and when they did not accept of the proffered alliance, they naturally imputed it to pride and to their contempt of them as an inferior order of beings.^*

During the interval of tranquillity procured by the alliance with Powhatan, an important change was made in the state of the colony. Hitherto no right of private property in land had been established. The fields that were cleared had been cultivated by the joint labour of the colonists; their product was carried to the common store-houses, and distributed weekly to every family, according to its num­ber and exigencies. A society, destitute of the first advantage resulting from social union, was not formed to prosper. Industry, when not excited by the idea of property in what was acquired by its own efforts, made no vigorous exertion. The head had no inducement to contrive, nor the hand to labour. The idle and improvident trusted entirely to what was issued from the common store; the assiduity even of the sober and attentive relaxed, when they perceived that others were to reap the fruit of their toil; and it was computed, that [Page 86] the united industry of the colony did not ac­complish as much work in a week as might have been performed in a day, if each indivi­dual had laboured on his own account. In or­der to remedy this, Sir Thomas Dale divided a considerable portion of the land into small lots, and granted one of these to each individual in full property. From the moment that indus­try had the certain prospect of a recompence, it advanced with rapid progress. The articles of primary necessity were cultivated with so much attention as secured the means of sub­sistence; and such schemes of improvement were formed as prepared the way for the intro­duction of opulence into the colony.^*

The industrious spirit, which began to rise among the planters, was soon directed towards a new object; and they applied to it for some time with such inconsiderate ardour as was productive of fatal consequences. The cul­ture of tobacco, which has since become the staple of Virginia, and the source of its pros­perity, was introduced about this time (1616) into the colony. As the taste for that weed continued to increase in England, notwith­standing the zealous declamations of James against it, the tobacco imported from Virgi­nia came to a ready market; and though it [Page 87] was so much inferior in quality or in estima­tion to that raised by the Spaniards in the West Indian islands, that a pound of the latter sold for eighteen shillings, and of the former for no more than three shillings, it yielded a considerable profit. Allured by the prospect of such a certain and quick return, every other species of industry was neglected. The land which ought to have been reserved for raising provisions, and even the streets of James-Town, were planted with tobacco. Various regulations were framed to restrain this ill-directed activity. But from eagerness for present gain, the planters disregarded every admonition. The means of subsistence became so scanty as forced them to renew their de­mands upon the Indians, who, seeing no end of those exactions, their antipathy to the Eng­lish name revived with additional rancour, and they began to form schemes of vengeance, with the secrecy and silence peculiar to Ame­ricans.^*

Meanwhile the colony, notwithstanding this error in its operations, and the cloud that was gathering over its head, continued to wear an aspect of prosperity. Its numbers increased by successive migrations; the quantity of tobacco exported became every year more considerable, [Page 88] and several of the planters were not only in an easy situation, but advancing fast to opulence;^* and by two events, which happened nearly at the same time, both population and industry were greatly promoted. As few women had hitherto ventured to encounter the hardships which were unavoidable in an unknown and uncultivated country, most of the colonists, constrained to live single, considered them­selves as no more than sojourners in a land to which they were not attached by the tender ties of a family and children. In order to induce them to settle there, the company took advantage of the apparent tranquillity in the country, to send out a considerable num­ber of young women, of humble birth, in­deed, but of unexceptionable character, and en­couraged the planters, by premiums and im­munities, to marry them.^† These new com­panions were received with such fondness, and many of them so comfortably established, as invited others to follow their example, and by degrees thoughtless adventurers, assuming the sentiments of virtuous citizens and of pro­vident fathers of families, became solicitous about the prosperity of a country, which they now considered as their own. As the colonists began to form more extensive plans of industry, they were unexpectedly furnished with means [Page 89] of executing them with greater facility. A Dutch ship from the Coast of Guinea, having sailed up James-River, sold a part of her car­go of negroes to the planters;^* and as that hardy race was found more capable of endur­ing fatigue under a sultry climate than Euro­peans, their number has been increased by con­tinual importation; their aid seems now to be essential to the existence of the colony, and the greater part of field labour in Virginia is per­formed by servile hands.

But as the condition of the colony improv­ed, the spirit of its members became more in­dependent. To Englishmen the summary and severe decisions of martial law, however tem­pered by the mildness of their governors, ap­peared intolerably oppressive; and they longed to recover the privileges to which they had been accustomed under the liberal form of go­vernment in their native country. In compli­ance with this spirit, Sir George Yeardley, in the year 1619, called the first general assem­bly that was ever held in Virginia; and the numbers of the people were now so increased, and their settlements so dispersed, that eleven corporations appeared by their representatives in this convention, where they were permitted to assume legislative power, and to exercise the [Page 90] noblest function of free men. The laws en­acted in it seem neither to have been many, nor of great importance; but the meeting was highly acceptable to the people, as they now beheld among themselves an image of the Eng­lish constitution, which they reverenced as the most perfect model of free government. In order to render this resemblance more com­plete, and the rights of the planters more cer­tain, the company issued a charter (July 24) or ordinance, which gave a legal and per­manent form to the government of the colony. The supreme legislative authority in Virginia, in imitation of that in Great Britain, was di­vided and lodged partly in the governor, who held the place of the sovereign; partly in a council of state named by the company, which possessed some of the distinctions, and exercised some of the functions belonging to the peer­age; partly in a general council or assembly composed of the representatives of the people, in which were vested powers and privileges si­milar to those of the House of Commons. be both these councils all questions were to In determined by the majority of voices, and a negative was reserved to the governor; but no law or ordinance, though approved of by all the three members of the legislature, was to be of force, until it was ratified in England by a general court of the company, and returned [Page 91] under its seal.^* Thus the constitution of the colony was fixed, and the members of it are henceforth to be considered, not merely as ser­vants of a commercial company, dependant on the will and orders of their superior, but as free men and citizens.

The natural effect of that happy change in their condition was an increase of their indus­try. The product of tobacco in Virginia was now equal, not only to the consumption of it in Great Britain,^† but could furnish some quantity for a foreign market. The company opened a trade for it with Holland, and esta­blished warehouses in Middleburgh and Flush­ing. James, and his privy council, alarmed at seeing the commerce of a commodity, for which the demand was daily increasing, turned into a channel that tended to the diminution of the revenue, by depriving it of a consider­able duty imposed on the importation of to­bacco, [Page 92] interposed with vigour to check this innovation. Some expedient was found, by which the matter was adjusted for the present; but it is remarkable as the first instance of a difference in sentiment between the parent state and the colony, concerning their respective rights. The former concluded, that the trade of the colony should be confined to England, and all its productions be landed there. The latter claimed, not only the general privilege of Englishmen, to carry their commodities to the best market, but pleaded the particular concessions in their charter, by which an un­limited freedom of commerce seemed to be granted to them.^* The time for a more full discussion of this important question was not yet arrived.

But while the colony continued to increase so fast, that settlements were scattered, not only along the banks of James and York Ri­vers, but began to extend to the Rapahan­nock, and even to the Potowmack, the Eng­lish, relying on their own numbers and de­ceived by this appearance of prosperity, lived in full security. They neither attended to the movements of the Indians, nor suspected their machinations, and though surrounded by a people whom they might have known from experience [Page 93] to be both artful and vindictive, they neglected every precaution for their own safety that was requisite in such a situation. Like the peace­ful inhabitants of a society completely establish­ed, they were no longer soldiers but citizens, and were so intent on what was subservient to the comfort or embellishment of civil life, that every martial exercise began to be laid aside as unnecessary. The Indians, whom they com­monly employed as hunters, were furnished with fire-arms, and taught to use them with dexterity. They were permitted to frequent the habitations of the English at all hours, and received as innocent visitants whom there was no reason to dread. This inconsiderate secu­rity enabled the Indians to prepare for the ex­ecution of that plan of vengeance, which they meditated with all the deliberate forethought which is agreeable to their temper. Nor did they want a leader capable of conducting their schemes with address. On the death of Pow­hatan, in the year 1618, Opechancanough suc­ceeded him, not only as wirowanee or chief of his own tribe, but in that extensive influence over all the Indian nations of Virginia, which induced the English writers to distinguish them by the name of Emperor. According to the Indian tradition, he was not a native of Vir­ginia, but came from a distant country to the south-west, possibly from some province of [Page 94] the Mexican Empire.^* But as he was con­spicuous for all the qualities of highest estima­tion among savages, a fearless courage, great strength and agility of body, and crafty poli­cy, he quickly rose to eminence and power. Soon after his elevation to the supreme com­mand, a general massacre of the English seems to have been resolved upon; and during four years, the means of perpetrating it with the greatest facility and success were concerted with amazing secrecy. All the tribes contiguous to the English settlements were successively gain­ed, except those on the Eastern shore, from whom, on account of their peculiar attach­ment to their new neighbours, every circum­stance that might discover what they intended was carefully concealed. To each tribe its sta­tion was allotted, and the part it was to act prescribed. On the morning of the day con­secrated to vengeance, (March 22) each was at the place of rendezvous appointed, while the English were so little aware of the impending destruction, that they received with unsuspi­cious hospitality, several persons sent by Ope­chancanough, under pretext of delivering pre­sents of venison and fruits, but in reality to observe their motions. Finding them perfect­ly secure, at mid-day, the moment that was previously fixed for this deed of horror, the [Page 95] Indians rushed at once upon them in all their different settlements, and murdered men, wo­men, and children, with undistinguishing rage, and that rancorous cruelty with which savages treat their enemies. In one hour, nearly a fourth part of the whole colony was cut off, almost without knowing by whose hands they fell. The slaughter would have been univer­sal, if compassion, or a sense of duty, had not moved a converted Indian, to whom the secret was communicated the night before the massacre, to reveal it to his master in such time as to save James-Town, and some adjacent settlements; and if the English, in other dis­tricts, had not run to their arms with resolu­tion prompted by despair, and defended them­selves so bravely as to repulse their assailants, who, in the execution of their plan, did not discover courage equal to the sagacity and art with which they had concerted it.^*

But though the blow was thus prevented from descending with its full effect, it proved very grievous to an infant colony. In some settlements not a single Englishman escaped. Many persons of prime note in the colony, and among these several members of the council, were slain. The survivors, overwhelmed with grief, astonishment, and terror, abandoned all [Page 96] their remote settlements, and, crowding to­gether for safety to James-Town, did not oc­cupy a territory of greater extent than had been planted soon after the arrival of their countrymen in Virginia. Confined within those narrow boundaries, they were less intent on schemes of industry than on thoughts of revenge. Every man took arms. A bloody war against the Indians commenced; and, bent on exterminating the whole race, neither old nor young were spared. The conduct of the Spaniards in the Southern regions of America was openly proposed as the most proper mo­del to imitate;^* and, regardless like them of those principles of faith, honour, and huma­nity, which regulate hostility among civilized nations, and set bounds to its rage, the Eng­lish deemed every thing allowable that tended to accomplish their designs. They h [...]ted the Indians like wild beasts, rather than enemies; and as the pursuit of them to their places of retreat in the woods, which covered their country, was both difficult and dangerous, they endeavoured to allure them from their inaccessible fastnesses, by offers of peace and promises of oblivion, made with such an art­ful appearance of sincerity as deceived their crafty leader, and induced them (1623) to re­turn to their former settlements, and resume [Page 97] their usual peaceful occupations. The beha­viour of the two people seemed now to be perfectly reversed. The Indians, like men acquainted with the principles of integrity and good faith, on which the intercourse between nations is founded, confided in the reconcilia­tion, and lived in absolute security without suspicion of danger; while the English, with perfidious craft, were preparing to imitate sa­vages in their revenge and cruelty. On the approach of harvest, when they knew an hos­tile attack would be most formidable and fatal, they fell suddenly upon all the Indian planta­tions, murdered every person on whom they could lay hold, and drove the rest to the woods, where so many perished with hunger, that some of the tribes nearest to the English were totally extirpated. This atrocious deed, which the perpetrators laboured to represent as a necessary act of retaliation, was followed by some happy effects. It delivered the colo­ny so entirely from any dread of the Indians, that its settlements began again to extend, and its industry to revive.

But unfortunately at this juncture the state of the company in England, in which the pro­perty of Virginia and the government of the colony settled there were vested, prevented it from seconding the efforts of the planters, by such a reinforcement of men, and such a sup­ply [Page 98] of necessaries, as were requisite to replace what they had lost. The company was origin­ally composed of many adventurers, and in­creased so fast by the junction of new members, allured by the prospect of gain, or the desire of promoting a scheme of public utility, that its general courts formed a numerous assembly.^* The operation of every political principle and passion, that spread through the kingdom, was felt in those popular meetings, and influenced their decisions. As towards the close of James's reign more just and enlarged sentiments with respect to constitutional liberty were diffused among the people, they came to understand their rights better, and to assert them with greater boldness; a distinction formerly little known, but now familiar in English policy, began to be established between the court and country parties, and the leaders of each endea­voured to derive power and consequence from every quarter. Both exerted themselves with emulation, in order to obtain the direction of a body so numerous and respectable as the com­pany of Virginian adventurers. In conse­quence of this, business had been conducted in every general court for some years, not with the temperate spirit of merchants delibe­rating concerning their mutual interest, but with the animosity and violence natural to nu­merous [Page 99] assemblies, by which rival factions con­tend for superiority.^*

As the king did not often assemble the great council of the nation in parliament, the gene­ral courts of the company became a theatre, on which popular orators displayed their ta­lents; the proclamations of the crown, and acts of the privy council, with respect to the commerce and police of the colony, were can­vassed there with freedom, and censured with severity, ill-suited to the lofty ideas which James entertained of his own wisdom, and the extent of his prerogative. In order to check this growing spirit of discussion, the ministers employed all their address and influence to gain as many members of the company as might give them the direction of their deliberations. But so unsuccessful were they in this attempt, that every measure proposed by them was re­probated by a vast majority, and sometimes without any reason, but because they were the proposers of it. James, little favourable to the power of any popular assembly, and weary of contending with one over which he had la­boured in vain to obtain an ascendant, began to entertain thoughts of dissolving the com­pany, and of new-modelling its constitution. Pretexts, neither unplausible, nor destitute of [Page 100] some foundation, seemed to justify this mea­sure. The slow progress of the colony, the large sums of money expended, and great num­ber of men who had perished in attempting to plant it, the late massacre by the Indians, and every disaster that had befallen the English from their first migration to America, were imputed solely to the inability of a numerous company to conduct an enterprise so complex and ar­duous. The nation felt sensibly its disap­pointment in a scheme in which it had en­gaged with sanguine expectations of advantage, and wished impatiently for such an impartial scrutiny into former proceedings, as might suggest more salutary measures in the future administration of the colony. The present state of its affairs, as well as the wishes of the people, seemed to call for the interposition of the crown; and James, eager to display the superiority of his royal wisdom, in correcting those errors into which the company had been betrayed by inexperience in the arts of govern­ment, boldly undertook the work of reforma­tion. Without regarding the rights conveyed to the company by their charter, and without the formality of any judicial proceeding for annulling it, he, by virtue of his prerogative, issued a commission, (1623, May 9) empow­ering some of the judges, and other persons of note, to examine into all the transactions of the company from its first establishment, and [Page 101] to lay the result of their inquiries, together with their opinion concerning the most effec­tual means of rendering the colony more pros­perous,^* before the privy council. At the same time, by a strain of authority still higher, he ordered all the records and papers of the company to be seized, and two of its principal officers to be arrested. Violent and arbitrary as these acts of authority may now appear, the commissioners carried on their inquiry without any obstruction but what arose from some fee­ble and ineffectual remonstrances of the compa­ny. The commissioners, though they conducted their scrutiny with much activity and vigour,^† did not communicate any of their proceedings to the company; but their report, with respect to its operations, seems to have been very un­favourable, as the king, in consequence of it, (October 8) signified to the company, his in­tention of vesting the supreme government of the company in a governor and twelve assist­ants, to be resident in England, and the exe­cutive power in a council of twelve, which should reside in Virginia. The governor and assistants were to be originally appointed by the king. Future vacancies were to be supplied by the governor and his assistants, but their nomination was not to take effect until it should be ratified by the privy council. The twelve [Page 102] counsellors in Virginia were to be chosen by the governor and assistants; and this choice was likewise subjected to the review of the privy council. With an inten [...] to quiet the minds of the colonists, it was declared, that private property should be deemed sacred; and for the more effectual security o [...] it, all grants of lands from the former company were to be confirmed by the new one. In order to facilitate the execution of this plan, the king required the company instantly to surrender its charter into his hands.^*

But here James and his ministers encounter­ed a spirit, of which they seem not to have been aware. They found the members of the company unwilling tamely to relinquish rights of franchises conveyed to them with such legal formality, that upon faith in their validity they had expended considerable sums;^† and still more averse to the abolition of a popular form of government, in which every proprietor had a voice, in order to subject a colony, in which they were deeply interested, to the dominion of a small junto absolutely dependent on the crown. Neither promises nor threats could induce them to depart from these sentiments; and in a general court (October 20) the king's proposal was almost unanimously rejected, and [Page 103] a resolution taken to defend to the utmost their chartered rights, if these should be called in question in any court of justice. James, high­ly offended at their presumption in daring to oppose his will, directed a writ (Nov. 10) of quo warranto to be issued against the com­pany, that the validity of its charter might be tried in the Court of King's Bench; and in order to aggravate the charge by collecting ad­ditional proofs of mal-administration, he ap­pointed some persons, in whom he could con­fide, to repair to Virginia to inspect the state of the colony, and inquire into the conduct of the company, and of its officers there.

The law-suit in the King's Bench did not hang long in suspense. It terminated, as was usual in that reign, in a decision perfectly con­sonant to the wishes of the monarch. The charter was forfeited, the company was dissol­ved, and all the rights and privileges conferred upon it returned to the king, from whom they flowed (June, 1624.)^*

Some writers, particularly Stith, the most intelligent and best informed historian of Vir­ginia, mention the dissolution of the company as a most disastrous event to the colony. Ani­mated with liberal sentiments, imbibed in an [Page 104] age when the principles of liberty were more fully unfolded than under the reign of James, they viewed his violent and arbitrary proceed­ings on this occasion with such indignation, that their abhorrence of the means which he employed to accomplish his design, seems to have rendered them incapable of contemplating its effects with discernment and candour. There is not perhaps any mode of governing an infant colony less friendly to its liberty, than the do­minion of an exclusive corporation, possessed of all the powers which James had conferred upon the company of adventurers in Virginia. During several years the colonists can hardly be considered in any other light than as servants to the company, nourished out of its stores, bound implicitly to obey its orders, and sub­jected to the most rigorous of all forms of go­vernment, that of martial law. Even after the native spirit of Englishmen began to rouse un­der oppression, and had extorted from their su­periors the right of enacting laws for the go­vernment of that community of which they were members, as no act, though approved of by all the branches of the provincial legisla­ture, was held to be of legal force, until it was ratified by a general court in England, the company still retained the paramount au­thority in its own hands. Nor was the power of the company more favourable to the pros­perity of the colony, than to its freedom. A [Page 105] numerous body of merchants, as long as its operations are purely commercial, may carry them on with discernment and success. But the mercantile spirit seems ill adapted to con­duct an enlarged and liberal plan of civil po­licy, and colonies have seldom grown up to maturity and vigour under its narrow and inter­ested regulations. To the unavoidable defects in administration which this occasioned, were added errors arising from inexperience. The English merchants of that age had not those extensive views which a general commerce opens to such as have the direction of it. When they first began to venture out of the beaten track, they groped their way with timi­dity and hesitation. Unacquainted with the climate and soil of America, and ignorant of the productions best suited to them, they seem to have had no settled plan of improvement, and their schemes were continually varying. Their system of government was equally fluc­tuating. In the course of eighteen years ten different persons presided over the province as chief governors. No wonder that under such administration all the efforts to give vigour and stability to the colony should prove abortive, or produce only slender effects. These efforts, however, when estimated according to the ideas of that age, either with respect to commerce or to policy, were very considerable, and con­ducted with astonishing perseverance.

[Page 106]Above an hundred and fifty thousand pounds were expended in this first attempt to plant an English colony in America;^* and more than nine thousand persons were sent out from the mother country to people this new settlement. At the dissolution of the company, the nation, in return for this waste of treasure and of peo­ple, did not receive from Virginia an annual importation of commodities exceeding twenty thousand pounds in value; and the colony was so far from having added strength to the state by an increase of population, that, in the year one thousand six hundred and twenty-four, scarcely two thousand persons survived,^† a wretched remnant of the numerous emigrants who had flocked thither, with sanguine expec­tations of a very different fate.

The company, like all unprosperous socie­ties, fell unpitied. The violent hand with which prerogative had invaded its rights was forgotten, and new prospects of success open­ed, under a form of government exempt from all the defects to which past disasters were im­puted. The king and the nation concurred with equal ardour in resolving to encourage the colony. Soon after the final judgment in the Court of King's Bench against the com­pany, James appointed a council of twelve [Page 107] persons to take the temporary direction of affairs in Virginia, (August 26) that he might have leisure to frame with deliberate consideration proper regulations for the permanent govern­ment of the colony.^* Pleased with such an opportunity of exercising his talents as a legis­lator, he began to turn his attention towards the subject; but death prevented him from completing his plan.

Charles I. on his accession to the throne, (1625, March 27) adopted all his father's maxims with respect to the colony in Virginia. He declared it to be a part of the empire an­nexed to the crown, and immediately subordi­nate to its jurisdiction; he conferred the title of Governor on Sir George Yardely, and ap­pointed him, in conjunction with a council of twelve, and a secretary, to exercise supreme authority there, and enjoined them to conform in every point to such instructions as from time to time they might receive from him.^† From the tenor of the king's commission, as well as from the known spirit of his policy, it is ap­parent, that he intended to vest every power of government, both legislative and executive, in the governor and council, without recourse to the representatives of the people, as possessing a right to enact laws for the community, or [Page 108] to impose taxes upon it. Yardely and his council, who seem to have been fit instruments for carrying this system of arbitrary rule into execution, did not fail to put such a construc­tion on the words of their commission as was most favourable to their own jurisdiction. During a great part of Charles's reign, Vir­ginia knew no other law than the will of the sovereign. Statutes were published, and taxes imposed, without once calling the representa­tives of the people to authorize them by their sanction. At the same time that the colonists were bereaved of political rights which they deemed essential to freemen and citizens, their private property was violently invaded. A pro­clamation was issued, by which, under pretexts equally absurd and frivolous, they were prohi­bited from selling tobacco to any person but certain commissioners appointed by the king to purchase it on his account;^* and they had the cruel mortification to behold the sovereign, who should have afforded them protection, en­gross all the profits of their industry, by seiz­ing the only valuable commodity which they had to vend, and retaining the monopoly of it in his own hands. While the staple of the colony in Virginia sunk in value under the op­pression and restraints of a monopoly, proper­ty in land was rendered insecure by various [Page 109] grants of it, which Charles inconsiderately bestowed upon his favourites. These were not only of such exorbitant extent as to be unfavourable to the progress of cultivation; but from inattention, or imperfect acquaint­ance with the geography of the country, their boundaries were so inaccurately defined, that large tracts already occupied and planted were often included in them.

The murmurs and complaints which such a system of administration excited, were aug­mented by the rigour with which Sir John Harvey, who succeeded Yardely in the govern­ment of the colony,^* enforced every [...]act of power. Rapacious, unfeeling, and haughty, he added insolence to oppression, and neither regarded the sentiments, nor listened to the re­monstrances of the people under his command. The colonists, far from the seat of govern­ment, and overawed by authority derived from a royal commission, submitted long to his ty­ranny and exactions. Their patience was at last exhausted, and in a transport of popular rage and indignation, they seized their gover­nor, and sent him a prisoner to England, ac­companied by two of their number, whom they deputed to prefer their accusations against [Page 110] him to the king. But this attempt to redress their own wrongs, by a proceeding so sum­mary and violent as is hardly consistent with any idea of regular government, and can be justified only in cases of such urgent necessity as rarely occur in civil society, was altogether repugnant to every notion which Charles en­tertained with respect to the obedience due by subjects to their sovereign. To him the con­duct of the colonists appeared to be not only an usurpation of his right to judge and to pu­nish one of his own officers, but an open and audacious act of rebellion against his authority. Without deigning to admit their deputies into his presence, or to hear one article of their charge against Harvey, the king instantly sent him back to his former station, with an ample renewal of all the powers belonging to it. But though Charles deemed this vigorous step ne­cessary in order to assert his own authority, and to testify his displeasure with those who had presumed to offer such an insult to it, he seems to have been so sensible of the griev­ances under which the colonists groaned, and of the chief source from which they flowed, that soon after, he not only removed a gover­nor so justly odious to them, but named as a successor Sir William Berkeley, a person far superior to Harvey in rank and abilities, and still more distinguished by possessing all the [Page 111] popular virtues to which the other was a stranger.^*

Under his government the colony in Vir­ginia remained, with some short intervals of interruption, almost forty years, and to his mild and prudent administration its increase and prosperity is in a great measure to be ascribed. It was indebted, however, to the king himself for such a reform of its con­stitution and policy, as gave a different aspect to the colony, and animated all its operations with new spirit. Though the tenor of Sir William Berkeley's commission was the same with that of his predecessor, he received in­structions under the great seal, by which he was empowered to declare, that in all its con­cerns, civil as well as ecclesiastical, the colony was to be governed according to the laws of England; he was directed to issue writs for electing representatives of the people, who, in conjunction with the governor and council, were to form a general assembly, and to pos­sess supreme legislative authority in the com­munity; he was ordered to establish courts of justice, in which all questions, whether civil or criminal, were to be decided agreeably to the forms of judicial procedure in the mother country. It is not easy to discover what were [Page 112] the motives which induced a monarch tena­cious in adhering to any opinion or system which he had once adopted, jealous to excess of his own rights, and adverse on every oc­casion to any extension of the privileges claim­ed by his people, to relinquish his original plan of administration in the colony, and to grant such immunities to his subjects settled there. From the historians of Virginia, no less super­ficial than ill-informed, no light can be deriv­ed with respect to this point. It is most pro­bable, that dread of the spirit then rising in Great Britain extorted from Charles concessi­ons so favourable to Virginia. After an inter­mission of almost twelve years, the state of his affairs compelled him to have recourse to the great council of the nation. There his sub­jects would find a jurisdiction independent of the crown, and able to control its authority. There they hoped for legal redress of all their grievances. As the colonists in Virginia had applied for relief to a former parliament, it might be expected with certainty, that they would lay their case before the first meeting of an assembly, in which they were secure of a favourable audience. Charles knew, that if the spirit of his administration in Virginia were to be tried by the maxims of the English con­stitution, it must be severely reprehended. He was aware that many measures of greater mo­ment in his government would be brought [Page 113] under a strict review in parliament; and un­willing to give mal-contents the advantage of adding a charge of oppression in the remote parts of his dominions to a catalogue of do­mestic grievances, he artfully endeavoured to take the merit of having granted voluntarily to his people in Virginia such privileges as he foresaw would be extorted from him.

But though Charles established the internal government of Virginia on a model similar to that of the English constitution, and con­ferred on his subjects there all the rights of freemen and citizens, he was extremely solici­tous to maintain its connection with the parent state. With this view he instructed Sir Wil­liam Berkeley strictly to prohibit any com­merce of the colony with foreign nations; and in order more certainly to secure exclusive pos­session of all the advantages arising from the sale of its productions, he was required to take a bond from the master of each vessel that sailed from Virginia, to land his cargo in some part of the king's dominions in Europe.^* Even under this restraint, such is the kindly influence of free government on society, the colony advanced so rapidly in industry and po­pulation, that at the beginning of the civil war, the English settled in it exceeded twenty thou­sand.^†

[Page 114]Gratitude towards a monarch, from whose hands they had received immunities which they had long wished, but hardly expected to enjoy, the influence and example of a popular governor, passionately devoted to the interests of his master, concurred in preserving invio­lated loyalty among the colonists. Even after monarchy was abolished, after one king had been beheaded, and another driven into exile, the authority of the crown continued to be ac­knowledged (1650) and revered in Virginia. Irritated at this open defiance of its power, the parliament issued an ordinance, declaring, that as the settlement in Virginia had been made at the cost and by the people of Eng­land, it ought to be subordinate to and depen­dant upon the English commonwealth, and subject to such laws and regulations as are or shall be made in parliament; that, instead of this dutiful submission, the colonists had dis­claimed the authority of the state, and auda­ciously rebelled against it; that on this ac­count they were denounced notorious traitors, and not only all vessels belonging to natives of England, but those of foreign nations, were prohibited to enter their ports, or to carry on any commerce with them.

It was not the mode of that age to wage a war of words alone. The efforts of an high spirited government in ass [...]rting its own dignity [Page 115] were prompt and vigorous. A powerful squa­dron, with a considerable body of land forces, was dispatched to reduce the Virginians to obedience. After compelling the colonies in Barbadoes and the other islands to submit to the commonwealth, the squadron entered the Bay of Chesapeak (1651). Berkeley, with more co [...]rage than prudence, took arms to op­pose this formidable armament; but he could not long maintain such an unequal contest. His gallant resistance, however, procured fa­vourable terms to the people under his govern­ment. A general indemnity for all part of­fences was granted; they acknowledged the authority of the commonwealth, and were ad­mitted to a participation of all the rights en­joyed by citizens.^* Berkeley, firm to his principles of loyalty, disdained to make any stipulation for himself; and choosing to pass his days far removed from the seat of a govern­ment which he detested, continued to reside in Virginia as a private man, beloved and respected by all over whom he had formerly presided.

Not satisfied with taking measures to sub­ject the colonies, the commonwealth turned its attention towards the most effectual mode of retaining them in dependance on the parent [Page 116] state, and of securing to it the benefit of their increasing commerce. With this view the parliament framed two laws (1651) one of which expressly prohibited all mercantile in­tercourse between the colonies and foreign states, and the other ordained, that no pro­duction of Asia, Africa, or America, should be imported into the dominions of the com­monwealth, but in vessels belonging to Eng­lish owners, or to the people of the colonies settled there, and navigated by an English commander,^* and by crews of which the greater part must be Englishmen. But while the wisdom of the commonwealth prescribed the channel in which the trade of the colonies was to be carried on, it was solicitous to en­courage the cultivation of the staple commo­dity of Virginia by an act of parliament (1652) which gave legal force to all the injunctions of James and Charles against planting tobacco in England.^†

Under governors appointed by the common­wealth, or by Cromwell, when he usurped the supreme power, Virginia remained al­most nine years in perfect tranquillity. Dur­ing that period, many adherents to the royal party, and among these some gentlemen of good families, in order to avoid danger and [Page 117] oppression, to which they were exposed in England, or in hopes of repairing their ruined fortunes, resorted thither. Warmly attached to the cause for which they had fought and suf­fered, and animated with all the passions natu­ral to men recently engaged in a fierce and long protracted civil war, they, by their inter­course with the colonists, confirmed them in principles of loyalty, and added to their impa­tience and indignation under the restraints im­posed on their commerce by their new masters. On the death of Mathews, the last governor named by Cromwell, the sentiments and in­clination of the people, no longer under the control of authority, burst out with violence. They forced Sir William Berkeley to quit his retirement; they unanimously elected him go­vernor of the colony; and as he refused to act under an usurped authority, they boldly erect­ed the royal standard, and, acknowledging Charles II. to be their lawful sovereign, pro­claimed him with all his titles; and the Vir­ginians long boasted, that as they were the last of the king's subjects who renounced their al­legiance, they were the first who returned to their duty.^*

Happily for the people of Virginia, a revo­lution in England, no less sudden and unex­pected, [Page 118] seated Charles on the throne of his an­cestors, and saved them from the severe chas­tisement, to which their premature declara­tion in his favour must have exposed them. On receiving the first account of this event, the joy and exultation of the colony were uni­versal and unbounded. These, however, were not of long continuance. Gracious, but un­productive professions of esteem and good-will were the only return made by Charles to loy­alty and services, which in their own estima­tion were so distinguished that no recompence was beyond what they might claim. If the king's neglect and ingratitude disappointed all the sanguine hopes which their vanity had founded on the merit of their past conduct, the spirit which influenced parliament in its commercial deliberations, opened a prospect that alarmed them with respect to their future situation. In framing regulations for the en­couragement of trade, which, during the con­vulsions of civil war, and amidst continual fluctuations in government, had met with such obstruction that it declined in every quar­ter; the House of Commons, instead of grant­ing the colonies that relief which they expect­ed from the restraints in their commerce im­posed by the commonwealth and Cromwell, not only adopted all their ideas concerning this branch of legislation, but extended them far­ther. This produced the act of navigation, [Page 119] the most important and memorable of any in the statute book with respect to the history of English commerce. By it, besides several mo­mentous articles foreign to the subject of this work, it was enacted, that no commodities should be imported into any settlement in Asia, Africa, or America, or exported from them, but in vessels of English or plantation built, whereof the master and three-fourths of the mariners shall be English subjects, under pain of forfeiting ship and goods; that none but natural born subjects, or such as have been na­turalized, shall exercise the occupation of mer­chant or factor in any English settlement, un­der pain of forfeiting their goods and chattels; that no sugar, tobacco, cotton, wool, indigo, ginger, or woods used in dying, of the growth or manufacture of the colonies, shall be ship­ped from them to any other country but Eng­land; and in order to secure the performance of this, a sufficient bond, with one surety, shall be given, before sailing, by the owners, for a specific sum proportional to the rate of the vessel employed by them.^* The produc­tions subjected to this restriction are distinguish­ed, in the language of commerce and finance, by the name of enumerated commodities; and as industry in its progress furnished new articles of value, these have been successively added to [Page 120] the roll, and subjected to the same restraint. Soon after (1663) the act of navigation was extended, and additional restraints were impo­sed, by a new law, which prohibited the im­portation of any European commodity into the colonies, but what was laden in England in vessels navigated and manned as the act of na­vigation required. More effectual provision was made by this law for exacting the penalties to which the transgressors of the act of navi­gation were subjected; and the principles of policy, on which the various regulations con­tained in both statutes are founded, were open­ly avowed in a declaration, that as the plan­tations beyond seas are inhabited and peopled by subjects of England, they may be kept in a firmer dependance upon it, and rendered yet more beneficial and advantageous unto it, in the further employment and increase of English shipping and seamen, as well as in the vent of English woollen and other manufactures and commodities; and in making England a staple, not only of the commodities of those planta­tions, but also of the commodities of other countries and places, for the supplying of them; and it being the usage of other nations to keep the trade of their plantations to themselves.^* In prosecution of those favourite maxims, the English legislature proceeded a step farther. [Page 121] As the act of navigation had left the people of the colonies at liberty to export the enumerat­ed commodities from one plantation to ano­ther without paying any duty (1672) it sub­jected them to a tax equivalent to what was paid by the consumers of these commodities in England.^*

By these successive regulations, the plan of securing to England a monopoly of the com­merce with its colonies, and of shutting up every other channel into which it might be diverted, was perfected and reduced into com­plete system. On one side of the Atlantic, these regulations have been extolled as an ex­traordinary effort of political sagacity, and have been considered as the great charter of national commerce, to which the present state is in­debted for all its opulence and power. On the other, they have been execrated as a code of oppression, more suited to the illiberality of mercantile ideas, than to extensive views of legislative wisdom. Which of these opinions is best founded, I shall examine at large in another part of this work. But in writing the history of the English settlements in Ame­rica, it was necessary to trace the progress of those restraining laws with accuracy, as in every subsequent transaction we may observe a [Page 122] perpetual exertion, on the part of the mother-country, to enforce and extend them; and on the part of the colonies, endeavours no less unremitting, to elude or to obstruct their ope­ration.

Hardly was the act of navigation known in Virginia, and its effects begun to be felt, when the colony remonstrated against it as a griev­ance, and petitioned earnestly for relief. But the commercial ideas of Charles and his mini­sters coincided so perfectly with those of parli­ament, that, instead of listening with a fa­vourable ear to their applications, they labour­ed assiduously to carry the act into strict execu­tion. For this purpose, instructions were is­sued to the governor, forts were built on the banks of the principal rivers, and small vessels appointed to cruize on the coast. The Virgi­nians, seeing no prospect of obtaining exemp­tion from the act, set themselves to evade it, and found means, notwithstanding the vigi­lance with which they were watched, of car­rying on a considerable clandestine trade with foreigners, particularly with the Dutch settled on Hudson's River. Emboldened by observ­ing disaffection spread through the colony, some veteran soldiers who had served under Crom­well, and had been banished to Virginia, (1663) formed a design of rendering themselves mas­ters of the country, and of asserting its inde­pendence [Page 123] on England. This rash project was discovered by one of their associates, and dis­concerted by the vigorous exertions of Sir William Berkeley. But the spirit of discon­tent, though repressed was not extinguished. Every day something occurred to revive and to nourish it. As it is with extreme difficulty that commerce can be turned into a new chan­nel, tobacco, the staple of the colony, sunk prodigiously in value, when they were com­pelled to send it all to one market. It was some time before England could furnish them regularly full assortments of those necessary ar­ticles, without which the industry of the co­lony could not be carried on, or its prosperity secured. Encouraged by the symptoms of ge­neral languor and despondency, which this de­clining state of the colony occasioned, the In­dians seated towards the heads of the rivers ventured first to attack the remote settlements, and then to make incursions into the interior parts of the country. Unexpected as these hostilities were, from a people who during a long period had lived in friendship with the English, a measure taken by the king seems to have excited still greater terror among the most opulent people in the colony. Charles had imprudently imitated the example of his fa­ther, by granting such large tracts of land in Virginia to several of his courtiers, as tended to unsettle the distribution of property in the [Page 124] country, and to render the title of the most ancient planters to their estates precarious and questionable (1676). From those various causes, which in a greater or lesser degree af­fect [...] very individual in the colony, the in­dignation of the [...]ple became general, and was worked up to such a pitch, that nothing was wanting to precipitate them into the most desperate acts, but s [...]me leader, qualified to unite and to direct their operations.^*

Such a leader they found in Nathaniel Ba­con, a colonel of militia, who, though he had been settled in Virginia only three years, had acquired, by popular manners, an insinu­ating address, and the consideration derived from having been regularly trained in England to the profession of law, such general esteem, that he had been admitted into the council, and was regarded as one of the most respectable persons in the colony. Bacon was ambitious, eloquent, daring, and prompted either by ho­nest zeal to redress the public wrongs, or al­lured by hopes of raising himself to distinction and power, he mingled with the mal-contents, and by his bold harangues and confident pro­mises of removing all their grievances, he in­flamed them almost to madness. As the de­vastations committed by the Indians was the [Page 125] calamity most sensibly felt by the people, he accused the governor of having neglected the proper measures for repelling the invasions of the savages, and exhorted them to take arms in their own defence, and to exterminate that odious race. Great numbers assembled, and chose Bacon to be their general. He applied to the governor for a commission, confirming this election of the people, and offered to march instantly against the common enemy. Berkeley, accustomed by long possession of su­preme command to high ideas of the respect due to his station, considered this tumultuary armament as an open insult to his authority, and suspected that, under specious appearances, Bacon concealed most dangerous designs. Un­willing, however, to give farther provocation to an incensed multitude, by a direct refusal of what they demanded, he thought it prudent to negociate, in order to gain time; and it was not until he found all endeavours to sooth them ineffectual, that he issued a proclama­tion, requiring them, in the king's name, under the pain of being denounced rebels, to disperse.

But Bacon, sensible that he had now advan­ced so far as rendered it impossible to recede with honour or safety, instantly took the only resolution that remained in his situation. At the head of a chosen body of his followers [Page 126] he marched rapidly to James-Town, and sur­rounding the house where the governor and council were assembled, demanded the com­mission for which he had formerly applied. Berkeley, with the proud indignant spirit of a cavalier, disdaining the requisitions of a rebel, peremptorily refused to comply, and calmly presented his naked breast to the weapons which were pointed against it. The council, however, foreseeing the fatal consequences of driving an enraged multitude, in whose pow­er they were, to the last extremities of vio­lence, prepared a commission, constituting Ba­con general of all the forces in Virginia, and by their entreaties prevailed on the governor to sign it. Bacon with his troops retired in tri­umph. Hardly was the council delivered by his departure from the dread of present danger, when, by a transition not unusual in feeble minds, presumptuous boldness succeeded to excessive fear. The commission granted to Bacon was declared to be null, having been extorted by force; he was proclaimed a rebel, his followers were required to abandon his standard, and the militia ordered to arm and to join the governor.

Enraged at conduct which he branded with the name of base and treacherous, Bacon, in­stead of continuing his march towards the In­ [...] country, instantly wheeled about, and ad­vanced [Page 127] with all his forces to James-Town. The governor, unable to resist such a nume­rous body, made his escape, and fled across the bay to Acomack on the Eastern shore. Some of the counsellors accompanied him thi­ther, others retired to their own plantations. Upon the flight of Sir William Berkeley, and dispersion of the council, the frame of civil government in the colony seemed to be dissol­ved, and Bacon became possessed of supreme and uncontrolled power. But as he was sensible that his countrymen would not long submit with patience to authority acquired and held merely by force of arms, he endeavoured to found it on a more constitutional basis, by ob­taining the sanction of the people's approba­tion. With this view he called together the most considerable gentlemen in the colony, and having prevailed on them to bind themselves by oath to maintain his authority, and to resist every enemy that should oppose it, he from that time considered his jurisdiction as legally established.

Berkeley, meanwhile, having collected some forces, made inroads into different parts of the colony, where Bacon's authority was recog­nized. Several sharp conflicts happened with various success. James-Town was reduced to ashes, and the best cultivated districts in the province were laid waste▪ sometimes by one [Page 128] party, and sometimes by the other. But it was not by his own exertions that the gover­nor hoped to terminate the contest. He had early transmitted an account of the transactions in Virginia to the king, and demanded such a body of soldiers as would enable him to quell the insurgents, whom he represented as so ex­asperated by the restraints imposed on their trade, that they were impatient to shake of all dependance on the parent state. Charles, alarm­ed at a commotion no less dangerous than un­expected, and solicitous to maintain his autho­rity over a colony, the value of which was daily increasing, and more fully understood, speedily dispatched a small squadron, with such a number of regular troops as Berkeley had required. Bacon and his followers receiv­ed information of this armament, but were not intimidated at its approach. They boldly determined to oppose it with open force, and declared it to be consistent with their duty and allegiance, to treat all who should aid Sir William Berkeley as enemies, until they should have an opportunity of laying their grievances before their sovereign.^*

But while both parties prepared, (1677) with equal animosity, to involve their country in the horrors of civil war, an event happened, [Page 129] which quieted the commotion almost as sud­denly as it had been excited. Bacon, when ready to take the field, sickened and died. None of his followers possessed such talents, or were so much objects of the people's confi­dence, as entitled them to aspire to the supreme command. Destitute of a leader to conduct and animate them, their sanguine hopes of suc­cess subsided; mutual distrust accompanied this universal despondency; all began to wish for an accommodation; and after a short negociation with Sir William Berkeley, they laid down their arms, and submitted to his government, on obtaining a promise of general pardon.

Thus terminated an insurrection, which, in the annals of Virginia, is distinguished by the name of Bacon's rebellion. During seven months this daring leader was master of the colony, while the royal governor was shut up in a re­mote and ill-peopled corner of it. What were the real motives that prompted him to take arms, and to what length he intended to carry his plans of reformation, either in commerce or government, it is not easy to discover, in the scanty materials from which we derive our infor­mation with respect to this transaction. It is probable, that his conduct, like that of other adventurers in faction, would have been regula­ted chiefly by events; and accordingly as these proved favourable or adverse, his views and [Page 130] requisitions would have been extended or cir­cumscribed.

Sir William Berkeley, as soon as he was re­instated in his office, called together the repre­sentatives of the people, that by their advice and authority public tranquillity and order might be perfectly established. Though this assembly met a few weeks after the death of Bacon, while the memory of reciprocal injuries was still recent, and when the passions excited by such a fierce contest had but little time to subside, its proceedings were conducted with a moderation seldom exercised by the successful party in a civil war. No man suffered capi­tally; a small number were subjected to fines; others were declared incapable of holding any office of trust; and with those exceptions, the promise of general indemnity was confirmed by law. Soon after, Berkeley was recalled, and Colonel Jefferys was appointed his suc­cessor.

From that period, to the Revolution in 1688, there is scarcely any memorable occur­rence in the history of Virginia. A peace was concluded with the Indians. Under se­veral successive governors, administration was carried on in the colony with the same arbi­trary spirit that distinguished the latter years of Charles II. and the precipitate counsels of [Page 131] James II. The Virginians, with a constitu­tion which, in form, resembled that of Eng­land, enjoyed hardly any portion of the liberty which that admirable system of policy is framed to secure. They were deprived even of the last consolation of the oppressed, the power of complaining, by a law which, under severe penalties, prohibited them from speaking dis­respectfully of the governor, or defaming, ei­ther by words or writing, the administration of the colony.^* Still, however, the laws re­straining their commerce were felt as an into­lerable grievance, and nourished in secret a spirit of discontent, which, from the necessity of concealing it, acquired a greater degree of acrimony. But notwithstanding those unfa­vourable circumstances, the colony continued to increase. The use of tobacco was now be­come general in Europe; and though it had fallen considerably in price, the extent of de­mand compensated that diminution, and by giving constant employment to the industry of the planters diffused wealth among them. At the Revolution the number of inhabitants in the colony exceeded sixty thousand,^† and in the course of twenty-eight years its population had been more than doubled.^§

WHEN James I. in the year one thou­sand six-hundred and six, made that magnificent partition, which has been men­tioned, of a vast region in North America, ex­tending from the thirty-fourth to the forty-fifth degree of latitude, between two trading companies of his subjects, he established the residence of the one in London, and of the other in Plymouth. The former was autho­rized to settle in the southern, and the latter in the northern part of this territory, then distinguished by the general name of Virginia. This arrangement seems to have been formed upon the idea of some speculative refiner, who [Page 134] aimed at diffusing the spirit of industry, by fix­ing the seat of one branch of the trade that was now to be opened, on the east coast of the island, and the other on the west. But Lon­don possesses such advantages of situation, that the commercial wealth and activity of England have always centered in the capital. At the beginning of the last century, the superiority of the metropolis in both these respects was so great, that though the powers and privileges conferred by the king on the two trading com­panies were precisely the same, the adventu­rers settled in Plymouth sell far short of those in London, in the vigour and success of their efforts towards accomplishing the purpose of their institution. Though the operations of the Plymouth company were animated by the public-spirited zeal of Sir John Popham, chief justice of England, Sir Ferdinando Gorges, and some other gentlemen of the west, all its exertions were feeble and un­fortunate.

The first vessel fitted out by the company (1606) was taken by the Spaniards. In the year one thousand six hundred and seven, a feeble settlement was made at Sagahadoc; but, on account of the rigour of the climate, was soon relinquished, and for some time nothing farther was attempted than a few fishing voy­ages to Cape Cod, or a pitiful traffic with the [Page 135] natives for skins and oil. One of the vessels equipped for this purpose was commanded by Captain Smith, whose name has been so often mentioned with distinction in the history of Virginia. The adventure was prosperous and lucrative (1614.) But his ardent enterprising mind could not confine its attention to objects so unequal to it as the petty details of a trading voyage. He employed a part of his time in exploring the coast, and in delineating its bays and harbours. On his return, he laid a map of it before Prince Charles, and, with the usual exaggeration of discoverers, painted the beauty and excellence of the country in such glowing colours, that the young Prince, in the warmth of admiration, declared, that it should be called New England;^* a name which effaced that of Virginia, and by which it is still distinguished.

The favourable accounts of the country by Smith, as well as the success of his voyage, seem to have encouraged private adventurers to prosecute the trade on the coast of New Eng­land with greater briskness; but did not inspire the languishing company of Plymouth with such vigour, as to make any new attempt to­wards establishing a permanent colony there. Something more than the prospect of distant [Page 136] gain to themselves, or of future advantages to their country, was requisite, in order to in­duce men to abandon the place of their nati­vity, to migrate to another quarter of the globe, and endure innumerable hardships un­der an untried climate, and in an uncultivated land, covered with woods, or occupied by fierce and hostile tribes of savages. But what mere attention to private emolument or to na­tional utility could not effect, was accomplish­ed by the operation of an higher principle. Religion had gradually excited among a great body of the people, a spirit that fitted them remarkably for encountering the dangers, and surmounting the obstacles, which had hither­to rendered abortive the schemes of coloniza­tion in that part of America allotted to the company of Plymouth. As the various set­tlements in New England are indebted for their origin to this spirit, as in the course of our narrative we shall discern its influence mingling in all their transactions, and giving a peculiar tincture to the character of the people, as well as to their institutions, both civil and ecclesi­astical, it becomes necessary to trace its rise and progress with attention and accuracy.

When the superstitions and corruptions of the Romish church prompted different nations of Europe to throw off its yoke, and to with­draw from its communion, the mode as well [Page 137] as degree of their separation was various. Wherever reformation was sudden, and carried on by the people without authority from their rulers, or in opposition to it, the rupture was violent and total. Every part of the ancient fabric was overturned, and a different system, not only with respect to doctrine, but to church government, and the external rites of worship, was established. Calvin, who, by his abilities, learning, and austerity of manners, had acquir­ed high reputation and authority in the Pro­testant churches, was a zealous advocate for this plan of thorough reformation. He exhi­bited a model of that pure form of ecclesias­tical policy, which he approved in the consti­tution of the church of Geneva. The simpli­city of its institutions, and still more their re­pugnancy to those of the Popish church, were so much admired by all the stricter reformers, that it was copied, with some small variations, in Scotland, in the Republic of the United Provinces, in the dominions of the House of Brandenburgh, in those of the Elector Pala­tine, and in the churches of the Hugonots in France.

But in those countries where the steps of departure from the church of Rome were tak­en with greater deliberation, and regulated by the wisdom or policy of the supreme magis­trate, the separation was not so wide. Of all [Page 138] the reformed churches, that of England has deviated least from the ancient institutions. The violent but capricious spirit of Henry VIII. who, though he disclaimed the supre­macy, revered the tenets of the Papal see, checked innovations in doctrine or worship during his reign. When his son ascended the throne, and the Protestant religion was esta­blished by law, the cautious prudence of Arch­bishop Cranmer moderated the zeal of those who had espoused the new opinions. Though the articles to be recognized as the system of national faith, were framed conformably to the doctrines of Calvin, his notions with respect to church government and the mode of worship were not adopted. As the hierarchy in Eng­land was incorporated with the civil policy of the kingdom, and constituted a member of the legislature, archbishops and bishops, with all the subordinate ranks of ecclesiastics subject to them, were continued according to ancient form, and with the same dignity and juris­diction. The peculiar vestments in which the clergy performed their sacred functions, bow­ing at the name of Jesus, kneeling at receiving the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, the sign of the Cross in baptism, the use of the Ring in marriage, with several other rites to which long usage had accustomed the people, and which time had rendered venerable, were still retained. But though Parliament enjoined the [Page 139] observance of these ceremonies under very se­vere penalties,^* several of the more zealous clergy entertained scruples with respect to the lawfulness of complying with this injunction; and the vigilance and authority of Cranmer and Ridley, with difficulty, saved their infant church from the disgrace of a schism on this account.

On the accession of Mary, the furious zeal with which she persecuted all who had adopt­ed the tenets of the Reformers forced many eminent Protestants, laymen as well as eccle­siastics, to seek an asylum on the continent. Francfort, Geneva, Basil, and Strasburgh, re­ceived them with affectionate hospitality as suf­ferers in the cause of truth, and the magistrates permitted them to assemble by themselves for religious worship. The exiles who took up their residence in the two former cities mo­delled their little congregations according to the ideas of Calvin, and, with a spirit natural to men in their situation, eagerly adopted insti­tutions which appeared to be farther removed from the superstitions of Popery than those of their own church. They returned to England as soon as Elizabeth re-established the Protestant religion, not only with more violent antipathy to the opinions and practices of that church [Page 140] by which they had been oppressed, but with a strong attachment to that mode of worship to which they had been for some years accustomed. As they were received by their countrymen with the veneration due to confessors, they exerted all the influence derived from that opi­nion, in order to obtain such a reformation in the English ritual, as might bring it nearer to the standard of purity in foreign churches. Some of the queen's most confidential ministers were warmly disposed to co-operate with them in this measure. But Elizabeth paid little re­gard to the inclinations of the one, or the sen­timents of the other. Fond of pomp and ce­remony, accustomed according to the mode of that age, to study religious controversy, and possessing, like her father, such confidence in her own understanding, that she never doubted her capacity to judge and decide with respect to every point in dispute between contending sects,^* she chose to act according to her own [Page 141] ideas, which led her rather to approach nearer to the church of Rome, in the parade of ex­ternal worship, than to widen the breach by abolishing any rite already established.^* An act of parliament, in the first year of her reign, not only required an exact conformity to the mode of worship prescribed in the service book, under most rigorous penalties, but empowered the Queen to enjoin the observance of such ad­ditional ceremonies as might tend, in her opi­nion, to render the public exercises of devotion more decent and edifying.^†

The advocates for a farther reformation, notwithstanding this cruel disappointment of the sanguine hopes with which they returned to their native country, did not relinquish their design. They disseminated their opinions with great industry among the people. They ex­tolled the purity of foreign churches, and in­veighed against the superstitious practices with [Page 142] which religion was defiled in their own church. In vain did the defenders of the established system represent that these forms and ceremo­nies were, in themselves, things perfectly in­different, which, from long usage, were view­ed with reverence; and, by their impression upon the senses and imagination, tended not only to fix the attention, but to affect the heart, and to warm it with devout and worthy senti­ments. The Puritans (for by that name such as scrupled to comply with what was enjoined by the act of uniformity were distinguished) main­tained, that the rites in question were inven­tions of men, superadded to the simple and reasonable service required in the word of God; that from the excessive solicitude with which conformity to them was exacted, the multitude must conceive such an high opinion of their value and importance, as might induce them to rest satisfied with the mere form and shadow of religion, and to imagine that external obser­vances may compensate for the want of inward sanctity; that ceremonies which had been long employed by a society manifestly corrupt, to veil its own defects, and to seduce and fascinate mankind, ought now to be rejected as relics of superstition unworthy of a place in a church which gloried in the name of Reformed.

The people, to whom in every religious controversy the final appeal is made, listened [Page 143] to the arguments of the contending parties; and it is obvious to which of them, men who had lately beheld the superstitious spirit of Po­pery, and felt its persecuting rage, would lend the most favourable ear. The desire of a far­ther separation from the church of Rome spread wide through the nation. The preach­ers who contended for this, and who refused to wear the surplice, and other vestments pe­culiar to their order, or to observe the ceremo­nies enjoined by law, were followed and ad­mired, while the ministry of the zealous ad­vocates for conformity was deserted, and their persons often exposed to insult. For some time the non-conformists were connived at; but as their number and boldness increased, the interposition both of spiritual and civil autho­rity was deemed necessary in order to check their progress. To the disgrace of Christians, the sacred rights of conscience and private judg­ment, as well as the charity and mutual for­bearance suitable to the mild spirit of the reli­gion which they professed, were in that age little understood. Not only the idea of tole­ration, but even the word itself in the sense now affixed to it, was then unknown. Every church claimed a right to employ the hand of power for the protection of truth and the ex­tirpation of error. The laws of her kingdom armed Elizabeth with ample authority for this purpose, and she was abundantly disposed to [Page 144] exercise it with full vigour. Many of the most eminent among the Puritan clergy were deprived of their benefices, others were im­prisoned, several were fined, and some put to death. But persecution, as usually happens, instead of extinguishing, inflamed their zeal to such a height, that the jurisdiction of the ordinary courts of law was deemed insufficient to suppress it, and a new tribunal was esta­blished under the title of the high commission for ecclesiastical affairs, whose powers and mode of procedure were hardly less odious or less hostile to the principles of justice, than those of the Spanish inquisition. Several attempts were made in the House of Commons to check these arbitrary proceedings, and to mo­derate the rage of persecution; but the Queen always imposed silence upon those who pre­sumed to deliver any opinion with respect to a matter appertaining solely to her prerogative, in a tone as imperious and arrogant as was ever used by Henry VIII. in addressing his Parlia­ments; and so tamely obsequious were the guardians of the people's rights, that they not only obeyed those unconstitutional commands, but consented to an act, by which every per­son who should absent himself from church during a month was subjected to punishment by fine and imprisonment; and if after con­viction he did not, within three months, re­nounce his erroneous opinions, and conform to [Page 143] the laws, he was then obliged to abjure the realm; but if he either refused to comply with this condition, or returned from banish­ment, he should be put to death as a felon without benefit of clergy.^*

By this iniquitous statute, equally repug­nant to ideas of civil and of religious liberty, the Puritans were cut off from any hope of obtaining either reformation in the church or indulgence to themselves. Exasperated by this rigorous treatment, their antipathy to the esta­blished religion increased, and, with the pro­gress natural to violent passions, carried them far beyond what was their original aim. The first Puritans did not entertain any scruples with respect to the lawfulness of Episcopal go­vernment, and seem to have been very unwill­ing to withdraw from communion with the church of which they were members. But when they were thrown out of her bosom, and constrained to hold separate assemblies for the worship of God, their followers no longer viewed a society by which they were oppress­ed with reverence or affection. Her govern­ment, her discipline, her ritual, were examin­ed with minute attention. Every error was pointed out, and every defect magnified. The more boldly any teacher inveighed against the corruptions of the church, he was listened to with greater approbation; and the farther he [Page 144] urged his disciples to depart from such an im­pure community, the more eagerly did they follow him. By degrees, ideas of ecclesiasti­cal policy, altogether repugnant to those of the established church, gained footing in the na­tion. The more sober and learned Puritans inclined to that form which is known by the name of Presbyterian. Such as were more thoroughly possessed with the spirit of innova­tion, however much they might approve the equality of pastors which that system establishes, reprobated the authority which it vests in va­rious judicatories, descending from one to ano­ther in regular subordination, as inconsistent with Christian liberty.

These wild notions floated for some time in the minds of the people, and amused them with many ideal schemes of ecclesiastical policy. At length Robert Brown, (1580) a popular de­claimer in high estimation, reduced them to a system, on which he modelled his own con­gregation. He taught, that the church of England was corrupt and antichristian, its ministers not lawfully ordained, its ordinances and sacraments invalid; and therefore he pro­hibited his people to hold communion with it in any religious function. He maintained, that a society of Christians, uniting together to worship God, constituted a church, possessed of complete jurisdiction in the conduct of its [Page 145] own affairs, independent of any other society, and unaccountable to any superior; that the priesthood was neither a distinct order in the church, nor conferred an indelible character; but that every man qualified to teach might be set apart for that office by the election of the brethren, and by imposition of their hands; in like manner, by their authority, he might be discharged from that function, and reduced to the rank of a private Christian; that every person when admitted a member of a church ought to make a public confession of his faith, and give evidence of his being in a state of favour with God; and that all the affairs of a church were to be regulated by the decision of the majority of its members.

This democratical form of government, which abolished all distinction of ranks in the church, and conferred an equal portion of pow­er on every individual, accorded so perfectly with the levelling genius of fanaticism, that it was fondly adopted by many as a complete model of Christian policy. From their foun­der, they were denominated Brownists; and as their tenets were more hostile to the esta­blished religion than those of other separatists, the fiercest storm of persecution fell upon their heads. Many of them were fined or impri­soned, and some put to death; and though Brown, with a levity of which there are few [Page 146] examples among enthusiasts whose vanity has been soothed by being recognized as heads of a party, abandoned his disciples, conformed to the established religion, and accepted of a benefice in the church, the sect not only sub­sisted, but continued to spread, especially a­mong persons in the middle and lower ranks of life. But as all their motions were care­fully watched, both by the ecclesiastical and civil courts, which, as often as they were detected, punished them with the utmost ri­gour, a body of them, weary of living in a state of continual danger and alarm, fled to Holland, and settled in Leyden, under the care of Mr. John Robinson, their pastor. There they resided for several years unmolested and obscure. But many of their aged mem­bers dying, and some of the younger marry­ing into Dutch families, while their church received no increase, either by recruits from England, or by proselytes gained in the coun­try, they began to be afraid, that all their high attainments in spiritual knowledge would be lost, and that perfect fabric of policy, which they had erected, would be dissolved and con­signed to oblivion, if they remained longer in a strange land.

Deeply affected with the prospect of an event, which to them appeared fatal to the in­terests of truth, they thought themselves called, [Page 147] in order to prevent it, to remove to some other place, where they might profess and pro­pagate their opinions with greater success. America, in which their countrymen were at that time intent on planting colonies, presented itself to their thoughts. They flattered them­selves with hopes of being permitted, in that remote region, to follow their own ideas in re­ligion without disturbance. The dangers and hardships to which all former emigrants to America had deen exposed, did not deter them. "They were well weaned, (according to their own description) from the delicate milk of their mother country, and enured to the diffi­culties of a strange land. They were knit to­gether in a strict and sacred band, by virtue of which they held themselves obliged to take care of the good of each other, and of the whole. It was not with them, as with other men, whom small things could discourage, or small discontents cause to wish themselves at home again."^* The first object of their soli­citude (1618) was to secure the free exercise of their religion. For this purpose they ap­plied to the king; and though James refused to give them any explicit assurance of tolera­tion, they seem to have obtained from him some promise of his connivance, as long as they continued to demean themselves quietly. [Page 148] So eager were they to accomplish their favou­rite scheme, that, relying on this precarious security, they began to negociate with the Vir­ginian company for a tract of land within the limits of their patent. This they easily pro­cured from a society desirous of encouraging migration to a vast country, of which they had hitherto occupied only a few spots.

After the utmost efforts, their preparations fell far short of what was requisite for begin­ning the settlement of a new colony. A hun­dred and twenty persons sailed (1620, Sept. 6.) from England in a single ship on this arduous undertaking. The place of their destination was Hudson's River, where they intended to settle; but their captain having been bribed, as is said, by the Dutch, who had then form­ed a scheme which they afterwards accom­plished, of planting a colony there, carried them so far towards the north, that the first land in America which they made was Cape-Cod. They were now, (Nov. 11) not only beyond the precincts of the territory which had been granted to them, but beyond those of the company from which they derived their right. The season, however, was so far ad­vanced, and sickness raged so violently among men unaccustomed to the hardships of a long voyage, that it became necessary to take up their abode there. After exploring the coast, [Page 149] they chose for their station, a place now be­longing to the province of Massachusetts Bay, to which they gave the name of New Ply­mouth, probably out of respect to that com­pany, within whose jurisdiction they now found themselves situated.^*

No season could be more unfavourable to settlement than that in which the colony landed. The winter, which, from the predominance of cold in America, is rigorous to a degree un­known in parallel latitudes of our hemisphere, was already set in; and they were slenderly provided with what was requisite for comfort­able subsistance, under a climate considerably more severe than that for which they had made preparation. Above one half of them was cut off before the return of spring, by diseases, or by famine; the survivors, instead of having leisure to attend to the supply of their own wants, were compelled to take arms against the savages in their neighbourhood. Happily for the English, a pestilence, which raged in America the year before they landed, had swept off so great a number of the natives, that they were quickly repulsed and humbled. The privilege of professing their own opinions, and of being governed by laws of their own framing, afforded consolation to the colonists [Page 150] amidst all their dangers and hardships. The constitution of their church was the same with that which they had established in Hol­land. Their system of civil government was founded on those ideas of the natural equality among men, to which their ecclesiastical policy had accustomed them. Every free man, who was a member of the church, was admitted in­to the supreme legislative body. The laws of England were adopted as the basis of their ju­risprudence, though with some diversity in the punishments inflicted upon crimes, borrowed from the Mosaic institutions. The executive power was vested in a governor and some assist­ants, who were elected annually by the mem­bers of the legislative assembly.^* So far their institutions appear to be founded on the ordi­nary maxims of human prudence. But it was a favourite opinion with all the enthusiasts of that age, that the scriptures contained a com­plete system, not only of spiritual instruction, but of civil wisdom and polity; and without attending to the peculiar circumstances or situ­ation of the people whose history is there re­corded, they often deduced general rules for their own conduct, from what happened among men in a very different state. Under the influ­ence of this wild notion, the colonists of New Plymouth, in imitation of the primitive Chris­tians, [Page 151] threw all their property into a common stock, and, like members of one family, car­ried on every work of industry by their joint labour for public behoof.^* But, however this resolution might evidence the sincerity of their faith, it retarded the progress of their colony. The same fatal effects flowed from this com­munity of goods, and of labour, which had formerly been experienced in Virginia; and it soon became necessary to relinquish what was too refined to be capable of being accommo­dated to the affairs of men. But though they built a small town, and surrounded it with such a fence as afforded sufficient security against the assaults of Indians, the soil around it was so poor, their religious principles were so unso­cial, and the supply sent them by their friends so scanty, that at the end of ten years, the number of people belonging to the settlement did not exceed three hundred.^† During some years they appear not to have acquired right by any legal conveyance to the territory which they had occupied. At length (1630) they obtain­ed a grant of property from the council of the New Plymouth company, but were never in­corporated as a body politic by royal charter.^§ Unlike all the other settlements in America, this colony must be considered merely as a vo­luntary association, held together by the tacit [Page 152] consent of its members to recognize the au­thority of laws, and submit to the jurisdiction of magistrates framed and chosen by themselves. In this state it remained an independent, but feeble community, until it was united to its more powerful neighbour, the colony of Mas­sachusetts Bay, the origin and progress of which I now proceed to relate.

The original company of Plymouth having done nothing effectual towards establishing any permanent settlement in America, James I. in the year one thousand six hundred and twenty, issued a new charter to the Duke of Lenox, the Marquis of Buckingham, and several other persons of distinction in his court, by which he conveyed to them a right to a territory in America, still more extensive than what had been granted to the former patentees, incorpo­rating them as a body politic, in order to plant colonies there, with powers and jurisdiction similar to those contained in his charters to the companies of South and North Virginia. This society was distinguished by the name of the Grand Council of Plymouth for planting and governing New England. What considera­tions of public utility could induce the king to commit such an undertaking to persons ap­parently so ill qualified for conducting it, or what prospect of private advantage prompted them to engage in it, the information we re­ceive [Page 153] from contemporary writers does not ena­ble us to determine. Certain it is, that the expectations of both were disappointed, and af­ter many schemes and arrangements, all the at­tempts of the new associates towards coloni­zation proved unsuccessful.

New England must have remained unoccu­pied, if the same causes which occasioned the emigration of the Brownists had not continued to operate. Notwithstanding the violent per­secution to which Puritans of every denomi­nation were still exposed, their number and zeal daily increased. As they now despaired of obtaining in their own country any relaxation of the penal statutes enacted against their sect, many began to turn their eyes towards some other place of retreat, where they might pro­fess their own opinions with impunity. From the tranquillity which their brethren had hi­therto enjoyed in New Plymouth, they hoped to find this desired asylum in New England; and by the activity of Mr. White, a non-con­formist minister at Dorchester, an association was formed by several gentlemen who had im­bibed Puritanical notions, in order to conduct a colony thither. They purchased from the council of Plymouth all the territory, extend­ing in length from three miles north of the River Merrimack, to three miles south of Charles River, and in breadth from the At­lantic [Page 154] to the Southern Ocean (1627, March 19). Zealous as these proprietors were to ac­complish their favourite purpose, they quickly perceived their own inability to attempt the population of such an immense region, and deemed it necessary to call in the aid of more opulent co-partners.^*

Of these they found, without difficulty, a sufficient number, chiefly in the capital, and among persons in the commercial and other industrious walks of life, who had openly joined the sect of the Puritans, or secretly fa­voured their opinions. These new adventu­rers, with the caution natural to men conver­sant in business, entertained doubts concerning the propriety of founding a colony on the basis of a grant from a private company of patentees, who might convey a right of pro­perty in the soil, but could not confer juris­diction, or the privilege of governing that so­ciety which they had in contemplation to esta­blish. As it was only from royal authority that such powers could be derived, they appli­ed for these; and Charles granted their request, with a facility which appears astonishing, when we consider the principles and views of the men who were suitors for the favour.

[Page 155]Time has been considered as the parent of political wisdom, but its instructions are com­municated slowly. Although the experience of above twenty years might have taught the English the impropriety of committing the government of settlements in America, to ex­clusive corporations resident in Europe, neither the king nor his subjects had profited so much by what passed before their eyes, as to have ex­tended their ideas beyond those adopted by James, in his first attempts towards coloniza­tion. The charter of Charles I. to the adven­turers associated for planting the province of Massachusetts Bay, was perfectly similar to those granted by his father to the two Virgi­nian companies and to the council of Ply­mouth. The new adventurers were incorpo­rated as a body politic, and their right to the territory, which they had purchased from the council of Plymouth, being confirmed by the king, they were empowered to dispose of the lands, and to govern the people who should settle upon them. The first governor of the company, and his assistants, were named by the crown; the right of electing their suc­cessors was vested in the members of the cor­poration. The executive power was commit­ted to the governor and assistants; that of le­gislation to the body of proprietors, who might make statutes and orders for the good of the community, not inconsistent with the laws of [Page 156] England, and inforce the observance of them, according to the course of other corporations within the realm. Their lands were to be held by the same liberal tenure with those granted to the Virginian company. They ob­tained the same temporary exemption from in­ternal taxes, and from duties on goods exported or imported; and notwithstanding their mi­gration to America, they and their descendants were declared to be entitled to all the rights of natural-born subjects.^*

The manifest object of this charter was to confer on the adventurers who undertook to people the territory on Massachusetts Bay, all the corporate rights possessed by the council of Plymouth, from which they had purchased it, and to form them into a public body, resem­bling other great trading companies, which the spirit of monarchy had at that time mul­tiplied in the kingdom. The king seems not to have foreseen, or to have suspected, the secret intentions of those who projected the measure; for so far was he from alluring emigrants, by any hopes of indulgence with respect to their religious scruples, or from promising any relaxation from the rigour of the penal statutes against non-conformists, that he expressly provides for having the oath [Page 157] of supremacy administered to every person who shall pass to the colony, or inhabit there.^*

But whatever were the intentions of the king (1629) the adventurers kept their own object steadily in view. Soon after their pow­ers to establish a colony were rendered com­plete by the royal charter, they fitted out five ships for New England; on board of which embarked upwards of three hundred passengers, with a view of settling there. These were mostly zealous Puritans, whose chief induce­ment to relinquish their native land was the hope of enjoying religious liberty, in a coun­try far removed from the seat of government and the oppression of ecclesiastical courts. Some eminent non-conformist ministers accompa­nied them as their spiritual instructors. On their arrival in New England (June 29) they found the wretched remainder of a small body [Page 158] of emigrants, who had left England the pre­ceding year, under the conduct of Endicott, a deep enthusiast, whom, prior to their incorpo­ration by the royal charter, the associates had appointed deputy governor. They were settled at a place called by the Indians Naunekeag, and to which Endicott, with the fond affectation of fanatics of that age to employ the language and appellations of scripture in the affairs of com­mon life, had given the name of Salem.

The emigrants under Endicott, and such as now joined them, coincided perfectly in reli­gious principles. They were Puritans of the strictest form; and to men of this character the institution of a church was naturally of such interesting concern as to take place of every other object. In this first transaction, they displayed, at once, the extent of the reforma­tion at which they aimed. Without regard to the sentiments of that monarch under the sanc­tion of whose authority they settled in America, and from whom they derived right to act as a body politic, and in contempt of the laws of England, with which the charter required that none of their acts or ordinances should be inconsistent, they adopted in their infant church that form of policy which has since been distin­guished by the name of Independent. They united together (August 6) in religious society, by a solemn covenant with God, and with [Page 159] one another, and in strict conformity, as they imagined, to the rules of scripture. They elected a pastor, a teacher, and an elder, whom they set apart for their respective offices, by im­position of the hands of the brethren. All who were that day admitted members of the church, signified their assent to a confession of faith drawn up by their teacher, and gave an account of the foundation of their own hopes as Christians; and it was declared, that no person should hereafter be received into com­munion until he gave satisfaction to the church with respect to his faith and sanctity. The form of public worship which they instituted was without a liturgy, disincumbered of every superfluous ceremony, and reduced to the low­est standard of Calvinistic simplicity.^*

It was with the utmost complacence that men, passionately attached to their own no­tions, and who had long been restrained from avowing them, employed themselves in fram­ing this model of a pure church. But, in the first moment that they began to taste of Chris­tian liberty themselves, they forgot that other men had an equal title to enjoy it. Some of their number, retaining an high veneration for the ritual of the English church, were so much offended at the total abolition of it, that they [Page 162] withdrew from communion with the newly-instituted church, and assembled separately for the worship of God. With an inconsistency, of which there are such flagrant instances among Christians of every denomination, that it cannot be imputed as a reproach peculiar to any sect, the very men who had themselves fled from persecution became persecutors; and had re­course, in order to enforce their own opinions, to the same unhallowed weapons, against the employment of which they had lately remon­strated with so much violence. Endicott cal­led the two chief malcontents before him; and though they were men of note, and among the number of original patentees, he expelled them from the society, and sent them home in the ships which were returning to England.^* The colonists were now united in sentiments; but on the approach of winter, they suffered so much from diseases, which carried off al­most one half of their number, that they made little progress in occupying the country.

Meanwhile the directors of the company in England exerted their utmost endeavours in order to reinforce the colony with a numerous body of new settlers; and as the intolerant spi­rit of Laud exacted conformity to all the in­junctions of the church with greater rigour [Page 163] than ever, the condition of such as had any scruples with respect to this, became so into­lerable, that many accepted of their invitation to a secure retreat in New England. Several of these were persons of greater opulence and of better condition than any who had hitherto migrated to that country. But as they intend­ed to employ their fortunes, as well as to ha­zard their persons, in establishing a permanent colony there, and foresaw many inconveniences from their subjection to laws made without their own consent, and framed by a society which must always be imperfectly acquainted with their situation, they insisted that the cor­porate powers of the company should be trans­ferred from England to America, and the go­vernment of the colony be vested entirely in those who, by settling in the latter country, became members of it.^* The company had already expended considerable sums in prosecut­ing the design of their institution, without having received almost any return, and had no prospect of gain, or even of reimbursement, but what was too remote and uncertain to be suitable to the ideas of merchants, the most numerous class of its members. They hesi­tated, however, with respect to the legality of granting the demand of the intended emigrants. But such was their eagerness to be disengaged [Page 164] from an unpromising adventure, that, "by general consent, it was determined, that the charter should be transferred, and the govern­ment be settled in New England."^* To the members of the corporation who chose to re­main at home was reserved a share in the trad­ing stock and profits of the company during seven years.

In this singular transaction, to which there is nothing similar in the history of English co­lonization, two circumstances merit particular attention; one is the power of the company to make this transference; the other is the silent acquiescence with which the king permitted it to take place. If the validity of this determi­nation of the company be tried by the charter which constituted it a body politic, and con­veyed to it all the corporate powers with which it was invested, it is evident that it could nei­ther exercise those powers in any mode differ­ent from what the charter prescribed, nor ali­enate them in such a manner, as to convert the jurisdiction of a trading corporation in Eng­land into a provincial government in Ame­rica. But from the first institution of the com­pany of Massachusetts Bay, its members seem to have been animated with a spirit of innova­tion in civil policy, as well as in religion; and [Page 165] by the habit of rejecting established usages in the one, they were prepared for deviating from them in the other. They had applied for a royal charter, in order to give legal effect to th [...] operations in England, as acts of a body politic; but the persons whom they sent out to America, as soon as they landed there, con­sidered themselves as individuals, united toge­ther by voluntary association, possessing the na­tural right of men who form a society, to adopt what mode of government, and to exact what laws they deemed most conducive to ge­neral felicity. Upon this principle of being entitled to judge and to decide for themselves, they established their church in Salem, with­out regard to the institutions of the church of England, of which the charter supposed them to be members, and bound of consequence to conformity with its ritual. Suitably to the same ideas, we shall observe them framing all their future plans of civil and ecclesiastical po­licy. The king, though abundantly vigilant in observing and checking slighter encroach­ments on his prerogative, was either so much occupied at that time with other cares occasi­oned by his fatal breach with his parliament, that he could not attend to the proceedings of the company; or he was so much pleased with the prospect of removing a body of turbulent subjects to a distant country, where they might be useful, and could not prove dangerous, that [Page 166] he was disposed to connive at the irregularity of a measure which facilitated their departure.

Without interruption from the crown, the adventurers proceeded to carry their scheme in­to execution. In a general court, John Win­throp was appointed governor, and Thomas Dudley deputy-governor, and eighteen assist­ants were chosen; in whom, together with the body of freemen who should settle in New England (1630) were vested all the corporate rights of the company. With such zeal and activity did they prepare for emigration, that in the course of the ensuing year seventeen ships sailed for New England, and aboard of these above fifteen hundred persons, among whom were several of respectable families, and in easy circumstances. On their arrival in New England, many were so ill satisfied with the situation of Salem, that they explored the country in quest of some better station; and settling in different places around the Bay, according to their various fancies, laid the foundations of Boston, Charlestown, Dor­chester, Roxborough, and other towns, which have since become considerable in the province. In each of these a church was established on the same model with that of Salem. This, together with the care of making provision for their subsistence during winter, occupied them entirely during some months. But in the first [Page 167] general court (October 19) their disposition to consider themselves as members of an inde­pendent society, unconfined by the regulations in their charter, began to appear. The electi­on of the governor and deputy governor, the appointment of all other officers, and even the power of making laws, all which were granted by the charter to the freemen, were taken from them, and vested in the council of assistants. But the aristocratical spirit of this resolution did not accord with the ideas of equality pre­valent among the people, who had been sur­prised into an approbation of it. Next year (1631) the freemen, whose numbers had been greatly augmented by the admission of new members, resumed their former rights.

But, at the same time, they ventured to de­viate from the charter in a matter of greater moment, which deeply affected all the future operations of the colony, and contributed great­ly to form that peculiar character by which the people of New England have been distin­guished. A law was passed, declaring that none shall hereafter be admitted freemen, or be entitled to any share in the government, or be capable of being chosen magistrates, or even of serving as jurymen, but such as have been received into the church as members.^* By [Page 168] this resolution, every person who did not hold the favourite opinions concerning the doctrines of religion, the discipline of the church, or the rites of worship, was at once cast out of the society, and stripped of all the privileges of a citizen. An uncontrolled power of approving or rejecting the claims of those who applied for admission into communion with the church being vested in the ministers and leading men of each congregation, the most valuable of all civil rights was made to depend on their de­cision, with respect to qualifications purely ec­clesiastical. As in examining into these, they proceeded not by any known or established rules, but exercised a discretionary judgment, the clergy rose gradually to a degree of influ­ence and authority, from which the levelling spirit of the independent church policy was calculated to exclude them. As by their de­termination the political condition of every ci­tizen was fixed, all paid court to men possessed of such an important power, by assuming those austere and sanctimonious manners which were known to be the most certain recommendation to their favour. In consequence of this ascen­dant, which was acquired chiefly by the wildest enthusiasts among the clergy, their notions became a standard to which all studied to con­form, and the singularities characteristic of the Puritans in that age increased, of which many remarkable instances will occur in the course of our narrative.

[Page 169]Though a considerable number of planters was cut off by the diseases prevalent in a coun­try so imperfectly cultivated by its original in­habitants, as to be still almost one continued forest, and several, discouraged by the hard­ships to which they were exposed, returned to England (1632) recruits sufficient to replace them arrived. At the same time the small­pox, a distemper fatal to the people of the New World, swept away such multitudes of the natives that some whole tribes disappeared; and Heaven, by thus evacuating a country in which the English might settle without mo­lestation, was supposed to declare its intention that they should occupy it.

As several of the vacant Indian stations were well chosen, such was the eagerness of the English to take possession of them, that their settlements became more numerous and more widely dispersed than suited the condition of an infant colony. This led to an innovation which totally altered the nature and constitu­tion of the government. When a general court was to be held in the year one thousand six hundred and thirty-four, the freemen, in­stead of attending it in person as the charter pre­scribed, elected representatives in their different districts, authorizing them to appear in their name, with full power to deliberate and decide concerning every point that fell under the cog­nizance [Page 170] of the general court. Whether this measure was suggested by some designing lea­ders, or whether they found it prudent to sooth the people by complying with their in­clination, is uncertain. The representatives were admitted; and considered themselves, in conjunction with the governor and assistants, as the supreme legislative assembly of the co­lony. In assertion of their own rights they enacted, that no law should be passed, no tax should be imposed, and no public officer should be appointed, but in the general assembly. The pretexts for making this new arrangement were plausible. The number of freemen was great­ly increased; many resided at a distance from the places where the supreme courts were held; personal attendance became inconvenient; the form of government in their own country had rendered familiar the idea of delegating their rights, and committing the guardianship of their liberties, to representatives of their own choice, and the experience of ages had taught them that this important trust might with safety be lodged in their hands. Thus did the company of Massachusetts Bay, in less than six years from its incorporation by the king, mature and perfect a scheme which, I have already observed, some of its more artful and aspiring leaders seem to have had in view when the association for peopling New England was first formed. The colony must henceforward [Page 171] be considered, not as a corporation whose powers were defined, and its mode of proce­dure regulated by its charter, but as a society, which, having acquired or assumed political liberty, had, by its own voluntary deed, adopt­ed a constitution or government framed on the model of that in England.

But however liberal their system of civil po­licy might be, as their religious opinions were no longer under any restraint of authority, the spirit of fanaticism continued to spread, and became every day wilder and more extravagant. Williams, a minister of Salem, in high esti­mation, having conceived an antipathy to the Cross of St. George in the standard of England, declaimed against it with so much vehemence as a relic of superstition and idolatry, which ought not to be retained among a people so pure and sanctified, that Endicot, one of the mem­bers of the court of assistants, in a transport of zeal, publicly cut out the Cross from the ensign displayed before the governor's gate. This frivolous matter interested and divided the colony. Some of the militia scrupled to follow colours in which there was a Cross, lest they should do honour to an idol; others refused to serve under a mutilated banner, lest they should be suspected of having renounced their allegi­ance to the crown of England. After a long controversy, carried on by both parties with [Page 172] that heat and zeal which in trivial disputes sup­ply the want of argument, the contest was terminated by a compromise. The Cross was retained in the ensigns of forts and ships, but erased from the colours of the militia. Willi­ams, on account of this, as well as of some other doctrines deemed unsound, was banished out of the colony.^*

The prosperous state of New England was now so highly extolled, and the simple frame of its ecclesiastic policy was so much admired by all whose affections were estranged from the church of England, that crowds of new set­lers flocked thither (1635). Among these were two persons, whose names have been rendered memorable by the appearance which they afterwards made on a more conspicuous theatre; one was Hugh Peters, the enthusi­astic and intriguing chaplain of Oliver Crom­well; the other Mr. Henry Vane, son of Sir Henry Vane, a privy counsellor, high in of­fice, and of great credit with the king; a young man of a noble family, animated with such zeal for pure religion and such love of liberty as induced him to relinquish all his hopes in England, and to settle in a colony hitherto no farther advanced in improvement than barely to afford subsistence to its members, was received [Page 173] with the fondest admiration. His mortified appearance, his demure look, and rigid man­ners, carried even beyond the standard of pre­ciseness in that society which he joined, seemed to indicate a man of high spiritual attain­ments, while his abilities and address in busi­ness pointed him out as worthy of the highest station in the community. With universal consent, and high expectations of advantage from his administration, he was elected gover­nor in the year (1636) subsequent to his ar­rival. But as the affairs of an infant colony afforded not objects adequate to the talents of Vane, his busy pragmatical spirit occupied it­self with theological subtilties and speculations unworthy of his attention. These were ex­cited by a woman, whose reveries produced such effects, both within the colony and beyond its precincts, that, frivolous as they may now appear, they must be mentioned as an occur­rence of importance in its history.

It was the custom at that time in New Eng­land, among the chief men in every congrega­tion, to meet once a week, in order to repeat the sermons which they had heard, and to hold religious conference with respect to the doctrine contained in them. Mrs. Hutchinson, whose husband was among the most respectable mem­bers of the colony, regretting that persons of her sex were excluded from the benefit of those [Page 174] meetings, assembled statedly in her house a num­ber of women, who employed themselves in pious exercises similar to those of the men. At first she satisfied herself with repeating what she could recollect of the discourses delivered by their teachers. She began afterwards to add illustrations, and at length proceeded to cen­sure some of the clergy as unsound, and to vent opinions and fancies of her own. These were all founded on the system which is deno­minated Antinomian by divines, and tinged with the deepest enthusiasm. She taught, that sanctity of life is no evidence of justifica­tion, or of a state of favour with God; and that such as inculcated the necessity of mani­festing the reality of our faith by obedience, preached only a covenant of works; she con­tended that the spirit of God dwelt personally in good men, and by inward revelations and impressions they received the fullest discoveries of the divine will. The fluency and confi­dence with which she delivered these notions gained her many admirers and proselytes, not only among the vulgar, but among the princi­pal inhabitants. The whole colony was inte­rested and agitated. Vane, whose sagacity and acuteness seemed to forsake him whenever they were turned towards religion, espoused and de­fended her wildest tenets. Many conferences were held (1637) days of fasting and humili­ation were appointed, a general synod was [Page 175] called, and, after dissentions so violent as threat­ened the dissolution of the colony, Mrs. Hut­chinson's opinions were condemned as erroneous, and she herself banished. Several of her disci­ples withdrew from the province of their own accord. Vane quitted America in disgust, un­lamented even by those who had lately admired him; some of whom regarded him now as a mere visionary, and others as one of those dark turbulent spirits doomed to embroil every so­ciety into which they enter.^*

However much these theological contests might disquiet the colony of Massachusetts Bay, they contributed to the more speedy po­pulation of America. When Williams was banished from Salem in the year one thousand six hundred and thirty-four, such was the at­tachment of his hearers to a pastor whose piety they revered, that a good number of them vo­luntarily accompanied him in his exile. They directed their march towards the south; and having purchased from the natives a consider­able tract of land, to which Williams gave the name of Providence, they settled there. They were joined soon after by some of those to whom the proceedings against Mrs. Hutchin­son gave disgust; and by a transaction with the Indians they obtained a right to a fertile [Page 176] island in Naraganset Bay, which acquired the name of Rhode Island. Williams remained among them upwards of forty years, respected as the father and the guide of the colony which he had planted. His spirit differed from that of the Puritans in Massachusetts; it was mild and tolerating; and having ventured himself to reject established opinions, he endeavoured to secure the same liberty to other men, by main­taining, that the exercise of private judgment was a natural and sacred right; that the civil magistrate has no compulsive jurisdiction in the concerns of religion; that the punishment of any person on account of his opinions, was an encroachment on conscience, and an act of persecution.^* These humane principles he instilled into his followers; and all who felt or dreaded oppression in other settlements, resorted to a community in which universal toleration was known to be a fundamental maxim. In the plantations of Providence and Rhode Island, political union was established by voluntary as­sociation, and the equality of condition among the members, as well as their religious opini­ons; their form of government was purely de­mocratical, the supreme power being lodged in the freemen personally assembled. In this state they remained until they were incorpora­ted by charter.^†

[Page 177]To similar causes the colony of Connecti­cut is indebted for its origin. The rivalship between Mr. Cotton and Mr. Hooker, two favourite ministers in the settlement of Mas­sachusets Bay, disposed the latter, who was least successful in this contest for fame and power, to wish for some settlement at a dis­tance from a competitor by whom his reputa­tion was eclipsed. A good number of those who had imbibed Mrs. Hutchinson's noti­ons, and were offended at such as combated them, offered to accompany him. Having employed proper persons to explore the coun­try, they pitched upon the west side of the great river Connecticut as the most inviting sta­tion; and in the year one thousand six hundred and thirty-six, about an hundred persons, with their wives and families, after a fatiguing march of many days through woods and swamps, arrived there, and laid the foundati­on of the towns of Hartford, Springfield, and Weatherfield. This settlement was attended with peculiar irregularities. Part of the dis­trict now occupied lay beyond the limits of the territory granted to the colony of Massachusets Bay, and yet the emigrants took a commission from the governor and court of assistants, em­powering them to exercise jurisdiction in that country. The Dutch from Manhados or New York, having discovered the river Con­necticut, and established some trading houses [Page 178] upon it, had acquired all the right that prior possession confers. Lord Say and Sele, and Lord Brooke, the heads of two illustrious fa­milies, were so much alarmed at the arbi­trary measures of Charles I. both in his civil and ecclesiastical administration, that they took a resolution, not unbecoming young men of no­ble birth and liberal sentiments, of retiring to the New World, in order to enjoy such a form of religion as they approved of, and those liber­ties which they deemed essential to the well-be­ing of society. They, too, fixed on the banks of the Connecticut as their place of settlement, and had taken possession, by building a fort at the mouth of the river, which, from their united names, was called Say Brook. The emigrants from Massachusets, without regarding either the defects in their own right or the pretensi­ons of other claimants, kept possession, and proceeded with vigour to clear and cultivate the country. By degrees they got rid of eve­ry competitor. The Dutch, recently settled in America, and too feeble to engage in a war, peaceably withdrew from Connecticut. Lord Say and Sele, and Lord Brook, made over to the colony whatever title they might have to any lands in that region. Society was esta­blished by a voluntary compact of the freemen▪ and though they soon disclaimed all depen­dance on the colony of Massachusets Bay, they [Page 179] retained such veneration for its legislative wis­dom, as to adopt a form of government near­ly resembling its institutions, with respect both to civil and ecclesiastical policy. At a sub­sequent period, the colony of Connecticut was likewise incorporated by royal charter.^*

The history of the first attempts to people the provinces of New Hampshire and Main, which form the fourth and most extensive di­vision in New England, is obscure and per­plexed, by the interfering claims of various proprietors. The company of Plymouth had inconsiderately parcelled out the northern part of the territory contained in its grant among different persons: Of these only Sir Ferdinan­do Gorges and Captain Mason seem to have had any serious intention to occupy the lands allotted to them. Their efforts to accomplish this were meritorious and persevering, but un­successful. The expence of settling colonies in an uncultivated country must necessarily be great and immediate; the prospect of a return is often uncertain and always remote. The funds of two private adventurers were not a­dequate to such an undertaking. Nor did the planters whom they sent out possess that prin­ciple of enthusiasm, which animated their neighbours of Massachusets with vigour, to [Page 180] struggle through all the hardships and dangers to which society, in its infancy, is exposed in a savage land. Gorges and Mason, it is probable, must have abandoned their design, if, from the same motives that settlements had been made in Rhode Island and Connecticut, colonists had not unexpectedly migrated into New Hampshire and Main. Mr. Wheel­right, a minister of some note, nearly re­lated to Mrs. Hutchinson, and one of her most fervent admirers and partisans, had, on this account, been banished from the pro­vince of Massachusetts Bay.^* In quest of a new station, he took a course opposite to the other exiles; and advancing towards the north, founded the town of Exeter, on a small river flowing into Piskataqua Bay. His followers, few in number, but firmly united, were of such rigid principles, that even the churches of Massachusetts did not appear to them suffi­ciently pure. From time to time they receiv­ed some recruits, whom love of novelty, or dissatisfaction with the ecclesiastical instituti­ons of the other colonies, prompted to join them. Their plantations were widely disper­sed, but the country was thinly peopled, and its political state extremely unsettled. The colony of Massachusetts Bay claimed juris­diction over them, as occupying lands situ­ated [Page 181] within the limits of their grant. Gorges and Mason asserted the rights conveyed to them as proprietors by their charter. In se­veral districts, the planters, without regard­ing the pretensions of either party, governed themselves by maxims and laws copied from those of their brethren in the adjacent colo­nies.^* The first reduction of the political constitution in the provinces of New Hamp­shire and Main into a regular and permanent form, was subsequent to the revolution.

By extending their settlements, the English became exposed to new danger. The tribes of Indians around Massachusetts Bay were feeble and unwarlike; yet from regard to justice, as well as motives of prudence, the first colonists were studious to obtain the consent of the na­tives before they ventured to occupy any of their lands; and though in such transactions the consideration given was often very inade­quate to the value of the territory acquired, it was sufficient to satisfy the demands of the proprietors. The English took quiet possession of the lands thus conveyed to them, and no open hostility broke out between them and the ancient possessors. But the colonies of Pro­vidence and Connecticut soon found that they were surrounded by more powerful and mar­tial [Page 182] nations. Among these the most consi­derable were the Naragansets and Pequods; the former seated on the Bay which bears their name, and the latter occupying the territory which stretches from the river Pequod along the banks of the Connecticut. The Pequods were a formidable people, who could bring into the field a thousand warriors, not infe­rior in courage to any in the New World. They foresaw, not only that the extermination of the Indian race must be the consequence of permitting the English to spread over the con­tinent of America, but that if measures were not speedily concerted to prevent it, the cala­mity would be unavoidable. With this view they applied to the Narragansets, requesting them to forget ancient animosities for a mo­ment, and to co-operate with them in expel­ing a common enemy who threatened both with destruction. They represented that, when those strangers first landed, the object of their visit was not suspected, and no proper precau­tions were taken to check their progress; that now, by sending out colonies in one year to­wards three different quarters, their intentions were manifest, and the people of America must abandon their native seats to make way for unjust intruders.

But the N [...] [...] Pequods, like most [...] America, w [...] [Page 183] rivals, and there subsisted between them an hereditary and implacable enmity. Revenge is the darling passion of savages; in order to secure the indulgence of which there is no present advantage that they will not sacrifice, and no future consequence which they do not totally disregard. The Naragansets, instead of closing with the prudent proposal of their neighbours, discovered their hostile intentions to the governor of Massachusetts Bay; and, eager to lay hold on such a favourable opportu­nity of wreaking their vengeance on their an­cient foes, entered into an alliance with the English against them. The Pequods, more exasperated than discouraged by the imprudence and treachery of their countrymen, took the field, and carried on the war in the usual mode of Americans. They surprised stragg]ers, and scalped them; they plundered and burnt remote settlements; they attacked Fort Say Brook without success, though garrisoned only by twenty men; and when the English be­gan to act offensively, they retired to fastnesses which they deemed inaccessible. The differ­ent colonies had agreed to unite against the common enemy, each furnishing a quota of men in proportion to its numbers. The troops of Connecticut which lay most exposed to danger were soon assembled. The march of those from Massachusets, which formed the most considerable body, was retarded by the [Page 184] most singular cause that ever influenced the o­perations of a military force. When they were mustered previous to their departure, it was found that some of the officers, as well as of the private soldiers, were still under a covenant of works; and that the blessing of God could not be implored or expected to crown the arms of such unhallowed men with success. The alarm was general, and many arrangements necessary in order to cast out the unclean, and to render this little band suffici­ently pure to fight the battles of a people who entertained high ideas of their own sanctity.^*

Meanwhile the Connecticut troops, reinfor­ced by a small detachment from Say Brook, found it necessary to advance towards the ene­my. They were posted on a rising ground, in the middle of a swamp towards the head of the river Mistick, which they had surrounded with palisadoes, the best defence that their slen­der skill in the art of fortification had disco­vered. Though they knew that the English were in motion, yet, with the usual improvi­dence and security of savages, they took no measures either to observe their progress, or to guard against being surprised themselves. The enemy (May 20) unperceived, reached the palisadoes, and if a dog had not given the [Page 185] alarm by barking, the Indians must have been massacred without resistance. In a moment, however they started to arms, and raising the war-cry, prepared to repel the assailants. But at that early period of their intercourse with the Europeans, the Americans were little ac­quainted with the use of gunpowder, and dreaded its effects extremely. While some of the English galled them with an incessant fire through the intervals between the palisadoes, others forced their way by the entries into the fort, filled only with branches of trees; and setting fire to the huts which were covered with reeds, the confusion and terror quickly became general. Many of the women and children perished in the flames; and the war­riors, in endeavouring to escape, were either slain by the English, or falling into the hands of their Indian allies, who surrounded the fort at a distance, were reserved for a more cruel fate. After the junction of the troops from Massachusetts, the English resolved to pursue their victory; and hunting the Indians from one place of retreat to another, some subse­quent encounters were hardly less fatal to them than the action on the Mistick. In less than three months the tribe of Pequods was extir­pated: A few miserable fugitives who took re­fuge among the neighbouring Indians, being incorporated by them, lost their name as a dis­tinct people. In this first essay of their arms, [Page 186] the colonists of New England seem to have been conducted by skilful and enterprising offi­cers, and displayed both courage and perseve­rance as soldiers. But they stained their laurels by the use which they made of victory. In­stead of treating the Pequods as an indepen­dent people, who made a gallant effort to de­fend the property, the rights, and the freedom of their nation, they retaliated upon them all the barbarities of American war. Some they massacred in cold blood, others they gave up to be tortured by their Indian allies, a consi­derable number they sold as slaves in Bermu­das, the rest were reduced to servitude among themselves.^*

But reprehensible as this conduct of the English must be deemed, their vigorous ef­forts in this decisive campaign filled all the sur­rounding tribes of Indians with such an high opinion of their valour, as secured a long tran­quillity to all their settlements. At the same time the violence of administration in Eng­land continued to increase their population and strength, by forcing many respectable subjects to tear themselves from all the tender connec­tions that bind men to their native country, and to fly for refuge to a region of the New [Page 187] World, which hitherto presented to them no­thing that could allure them thither but ex­emption from oppression. The number of those emigrants drew the attention of govern­ment, and appeared so formidable, that a pro­clamation was issued, prohibiting masters of ships from carrying passengers to New Eng­land without special permission. On many occasions this injunction was eluded or disre­garded. Fatally for the king, it operated with full effect in one instance. Sir Arthur Hasle­rig, John Hampden, Oliver Cromwell, and some other persons whose principles and views coincided with theirs, impatient to enjoy those civil and religious liberties which they strug­gled in vain to obtain in Great Britain, hired some ships to carry them and their attendants to New England. By order of council, an embargo was laid on these when on the point of sailing; and Charles, far from suspecting that the future revolutions in his kingdoms were to be excited and directed by persons in such an humble sphere of life, forcibly detain­ed the men destined to overturn his throne, and to terminate his days by a violent death.^*

But in spite of all the efforts of government to check this spirit of migration, the measures of the king and his ministers were considered [Page 188] by a great body of the people as so hostile to those rights which they deemed most valuable, that in the course of the year one thousand six hundred and thirty-eight, above three thousand persons embarked for New England, choosing rather to expose themselves to all the consequences of disregarding the royal procla­mation, than to remain longer under oppressi­on. Exasperated at this contempt of his au­thority, Charles had recourse to a violent but effectual mode of accomplishing what he had in view. A writ of quo warranto was issued against the corporation of Massachusetts Bay. The colonists had conformed so little to the terms of their charter, that judgment was gi­ven against them without difficulty. They were found to have forfeited all their rights as a corporation, which of course returned to the crown, and Charles began to take measures for new modelling the political frame of the co­lony, and vesting the administration of its af­fairs in other hands. But his plans were ne­ver carried into execution. In every corner of his dominions, the storm now began to gather, which soon burst out with such fatal violence, that Charles, during the remainder of his un­fortunate reign, occupied with domestic and more interesting cares, had not leisure to be­stow any attention upon a remote and inconsi­derable province.^*

[Page 189]On the meeting of the Long Parliament, such a revolution took place in England, that all the motives for migrating to the New World ceased. The maxims of the Puritans with respect to the government both of church and state, became predominant in the nation, and were enforced by the hand of power. Their oppressors were humbled; that perfect system of reformed polity, which had long been the object of their admiration and desire, was esta­blished by law; and amidst the intrigues and conflicts of an obstinate civil war, turbu­lent and aspiring spirits found such full occu­pation, that they had no inducement to quit a busy theatre, on which they had risen to act a most conspicuous part. From the year one thousand six hundred and twenty, when the first feeble colony was conducted to New Eng­land by the Brownists, to the year one thou­sand six hundred and forty, it has been com­puted, that twenty-one thousand two hundred British subjects had settled there. The money expended by various adventurers during that period in fitting out ships, in purchasing stock, and transporting settlers, amounted, on a mo­derate calculation, nearly to two hundred thou­sand pounds;^* a vast sum in that age, and which no principles, inferior in force to those wherewith the Puritans were animated, could [Page 190] have persuaded men to lay out, on the uncer­tain prospect of obtaining an establishment in a remote uncultivated region, which, from its situation and climate, could allure them with no hope but that of finding subsistence and en­joying freedom. For some years, even sub­sistence was procured with difficulty; and it was towards the close of the period to which our narrative is arrived, before the product of the settlement yielded the planters any return for their stock. About that time they began to export corn in small quantities to the West Indies, and made some feeble attempts to ex­tend the fishery, and to open the trade in lum­ber, which have since proved the staple arti­cles of commerce in the colony.* Since the year one thousand six hundred and forty, the number of people with which New England has recruited the population of the parent state, is supposed at least to equal what may have been drained from it by occasional migrations thither.

But though the sudden change of system in Great Britain stopt entirely the influx of settlers into New England, the principles of the co­lonists coincided so perfectly with those of the popular leaders in parliament, that they were soon distinguished by peculiar marks of their [Page 191] brotherly affection. By a vote of the House of Commons in the year one thousand six hun­dred and forty-two, the people in all the dif­ferent plantations of New England were ex­empted from payment of any duties, either up­on goods exported thither, or upon those which they imported into the mother country, until the House shall take farther order to the con­trary. This was afterwards confirmed by the authority of both Houses. Encouraged by such an extraordinary privilege, industry made rapid progress in all the districts of New England (1646) and population increased along with it. In return for those favours, the co­lonists applauded the measures of parliament, celebrated its generous efforts to vindicate the rights and liberties of the nation, prayed for the success of its arms, and framed regulations in order to prevent any exertion in favour of the king on the other side of the Atlantic.^*

Relying on the indulgent partiality with which all their proceedings were viewed by men thus closely united with them in senti­ments and wishes, the people of New Eng­land ventured on a measure, which not only increased their security and power, but may be regarded as a considerable step towards inde­pendence. Under the impression or pretext of [Page 192] the danger to which they were exposed from the surrounding tribes of Indians, the four co­lonies of Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecti­cut, and Newhaven, (1643, May 19) entered into a league of perpetual confederacy, offen­sive and defensive; an idea familiar to several leading men in the colonies, as it was framed in imitation of the famous bond of union among the Dutch provinces, in whose domi­nions the Brownists had long resided. It was stipulated, that the confederates should hence­forth be distinguished by the name of the Uni­ted Colonies of New England; that each co­lony shall remain separate and distinct, and have exclusive jurisdiction within its own territory; that in every war, offensive or defensive, each of the confederates shall furnish its quota of men, provisions, and money, at a rate to be fixed from time to time, in proportion to the number of people in each settlement; that an assembly composed of two commissioners from each colony shall be held annually, with power to deliberate and decide in all points of com­mon concern to the confederacy; and every determination, in which six of their number concur, shall be binding on the whole.^* In this transaction the colonies of New England seem to have considered themselves as inde­pendent societies, possessing all the rights of [Page 193] sovereignty, and free from the controul of any superior power. The governing party in Eng­land, occupied with affairs of more urgent con­cern, and no wise disposed to observe the con­duct of their brethren in America with any jealous attention, suffered the measure to pass without animadversion.

Emboldened by this connivance the spirit of independence gathered strength, and soon dis­played itself more openly: Some persons of note in the colony of Massachusetts, averse to the system of ecclesiastical polity established there, and preferring it to the government and discipline of the churches of England or Scot­land, having remonstrated to the general court against the injustice of depriving them of their rights as freemen, and of their privileges as Christians, because they could not join as members with any of the congregational churches petitioned (1646) that they might no longer be bo [...]nd to obey laws to which they had not assented, nor be subject to taxes impo­sed by an assembly in which they were not re­presented. Their demands were not only re­jected, but they were imprisoned and fined as disturbers of the public peace; and when they appointed some of their number to lay their grievances before parliament, the annual court, in order to prevent this appeal to the supreme power, attempted first to seize their papers, [Page 194] and then to obstruct their embarkation for England▪ But though neither of these could be accomplished, such was the address and in­fluence of the colonies' agents in England, that no inquiry seems to have been made into this transaction.^* This was followed by an indication, still less ambiguous, of the aspir­ing spirit prevalent among the people of Mas­sachusetts. Under every form of government the right of coining money has been consider­ed as a prerogative peculiar to sovereignty, and which no subordinate member in any state is entitled to claim. Regardless of this establish­ed maxim, the general court ordered a coinage of silver money at Boston (1652) stamped with the name of the colony, and a tree as an apt symbol of its progressive vigour.^† Even this usurpation escaped without notice. The In­dependents, having now humbled all rival sects, engrossed the whole direction of affairs in Great Britain; and long accustomed to admire the government of New England, framed agreea­bly to those principles which they had adopted as the most perfect model of civil and ecclesi­astical polity, they were unwilling to stain its reputation, by censuring any part of its con­duct.

[Page 195]When Cromwell usurped the supreme pow­er, the colonies of New England continued to stand as high in his estimation. As he had deeply imbibed all the fanatical notions of the Independents, and was perpetually surrounded by the most eminent and artful teachers of that sect, he kept a constant correspondence with the leading men in the American settlements, who seem to have looked up to him as a zea­lous patron.^* He in return considered them as his most devoted adherents, attached to him no less by affection than by principle. He soon gave a striking proof of this. On the conquest of Jamaica, he formed a scheme for the security and improvement of the acquisi­tion made by his victorious arms, suited to the ardour of an impetuous spirit that delighted in accomplishing its ends by extraordinary means. He proposed to transport the people of New England to that island, and employed every argument calculated to make impression upon them, in order to obtain their consent. He endeavoured to rouse their religious zeal by representing what a fatal blow it would be to the man of sin, if a colony of the faithful were settled in the midst of his territories in the new world. He allured them with prospects of immense wealth in a fertile region, which would reward the industry of those who culti­vated [Page 196] it, with all the precious productions of the torrid zone, and expressed his fervent wish that they might take possession of it, in order to fulfil God's promise of making his people the head and not the tail. He assured them of being supported by the whole force of his au­thority, and of vesting all the powers of go­vernment entirely in their hands. But by this time the colonists were attached to a country in which they had resided for many years, and where, though they did not attain opulence, they enjoyed the comforts of life in great abundance; and they dreaded so much the noxious climate of the West Indies, which had proved fatal to a great number of the English who first settled in Jamaica, that they declined, though in the most respectful terms, closing with the Protector's proposition.^*