Historic pilgrimages in New England among landmarks of Pilgrim and Puritan days and of the provincial and revolutionary periods

Front matter

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LIBRARY

Preface

The object of the Pilgrimages to historic places in New England of which account is given in these pages was to recall the early history of our country, from the beginning of the colonial period to the Revolution, through the study and inspiration of landmarks many of which are still preserved, while the sites of many more are yet easily to be identified. In going over the course laid out for the itineracy, the chronicler of these journeyings endeavored to give the true facts of history drawn from the best authorities, and, so far as possible, from original sources. To this end he consulted historical students as well as historical publications ; and to the former he is indebted for the correction of some popular fallacies, with new readings of some important parts of the story. In the composition and arrangement of the book the effort has been made to render it acceptable both for supplementary reading in schools and to the general reader.

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CHAPTER II. Massachusetts Bay, Provincetown, Cape Cod .... 5

From Boston to Cape Cod tip. — Historic points along the waterway. — The Pilgrims in Boston Harbor before the Puritans came. — The expeditioii up from Plymouth led by Standish in 1021: Winslow’s minute narrative.— The Norsemen’s explorations of 1000-1004: legend of Thorvald’s “ Krossaness.” — Early comers to Cape Cod. — The Mayflower in Provincetown Harbor. — The Compact signed in its cabin. — First landing-place of the Pilgrims. — Quaint Provincetown and its weird sand-hills. — The path of the first Pilgrim exploration party. — By Cape Cod to

Plymouth. — Pilgrim traces along shore.

Chapter III

First impressions of the oldest town in New England. — Forefathers’ Rock and its story. — Clark’s Island, first landing-place of the Pilgrims, in Plymouth Harbor. — The voyage of the shallop which brought them here. — The subsequent coming of the Mayflower’s passengers. — Cole’s Hill and Leyden Street. — Sites of the first houses. — The sad first winter. — The sailing away of the Mayflower. — The town seven years after the landing: the procession to Sunday service. — Town Square. — Burial Hill and its memorials. — Sites of the first fort and the watch-house. — Watson’s Hill, where the first Indians appeared. — Town Brook.

Chapter IV

Old Colony mansions. — Historic manuscripts and documents in the Registry of Deeds. — Pilgrim Hall and its relics. — The national monument. — An Old Colony ride. — Plymouth Woods. — Billington Sea. — Head of Town Brook. — Rare treasures in Plymouth homes. — Percy sits in Governor Bradford’s chair.

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CONTENTS .

Chapter V

Governor Bradford’s farm. — Sites of homes of early settlers. — Elder Cushman’s Spring. — Kingston’s heroes of the Revolution. — A Revolutionary Cincinnatus. — Reminiscences of King Philip’s War: Caleb Cook and the death of Philip. — Kingston Landing. — The ancient Major John Bradford’s house: former home of the “Bradford Manuscript.” — The Governor Bradford house.

Chapter VI

Homes of Myles Standish, Elder Brewster, John and Priscilla Alden. — Captain’s Hill and the Standish monument. — “ Eagle’s Nest.” — Graves of Standish and of other first settlers. — The legend of the courtship of Myles Standish. — “ Careswell ” and the Winslows. — Peregrine White- — The Loyalists and the Marshfield affair of 1775. — Daniel Webster’s Marshfield farm. — The Webster tomb.

CHAPTER VII. Cape Ann and the North Shore ...Ill

To Gloucester by water. — Course of the incoming Puritan ships. — The “ fyne and sweet harbour ” where anchor was first cast. — The shore as it looked to Puritan eyes. — Winthrop’s first landing-place. — The ancient “ Stage Head.” — First attempts at a settlement in 1624. — Roger Conant’s plantation. — Steps to the founding of the Bay Colony. — Removal of the Old Planters to “Naumkeag.” — The Old Shore Road. — Bass River Head settlement.

Chapter VIII

Bounds of the earliest settlement. — Pictures of the Puritan town. — Town- House Square. — Sites of Endicott’s “ faire house ” and of other homes of first-comers. — The Puritan meeting-houses. — The Court House where the “witchcraft” trials were held. — Various “witchcraft” sites. — The jail and the way to Gallows Hill. — “Witchcraft” documents and relics. — Landmarks of the Revolution. — Washington’s reception in 1789. — The shop where Benjamin Thompson, afterward Count Rumford, served ; his remarkable career. — The Old North Bridge and the affair of February, 1775. — Historic houses of various periods. — On Gallows Hill.

Chapter IX

Old streets and sites. — The ancient “ Burying-Point ” and its historic graves. — Footprints of Nathaniel Hawthorne. — The Custom House and Hawthorne’s work-room. — The Old Crowninshield mansion-house. —

CONTENTS.

IX

The stately region round about the Common. — Salem Athenaeum, the Essex Institute, and the Peabody Academy of Science. — The Willows and Salem Neck. — Winter Island and its traditions.

Chapter X

Along the way to “ Salem Village ” of “ witchcraft ” times. — Monument to Danvers men of the Revolution. — George Peabody’s benefactions: story of his life. — The ancient Downing farm : boyhood home of George Downing, for whom Downing Street in London was named. — House of John Procter of the “witchcraft” victims. — Over “Governor’s Plain.” — Governor Endicott’s “Orchard Farm.” — The Collins mansion-house: Gage’s headquarters in 1774. — The old Nurse farm and its history: monument to Rebecca Nurse. — Birthplace of Judge Holten, patriot, statesman, jurist. — The old training-place of the yeoman soldiery. — Central point of the “witchcraft” outbreak. — Sites of the parsonage, Deacon Ingersoll’s house, and the meeting-house of 1692. — Scenes of the delusion recalled. — Danvers historic houses of later periods. — Oak Knoll and the poet Whittier. — Homesteads of the Putnams. — Birthplace of General Israel Putnam. — Old Danversport landmarks.

CHAPTER XI. Marblebead 189

Site first proposed for the college which became Harvard. — The “Dungeons.”— Site of the Darby Fort of 1629. — Eighteenth century landmarks. — Marblehead in the Revolutionary period and its heroes. — In the war of 1812. — The fight between the Chesapeake and the Shannon off Marblehead Neck. — The Constitution chased into the harbor. — The old-time fishers, their characteristics and their dialect. — The Mugford monument.— Old St. Michael’s Church. — The Lee mansion-house. — Homes of the “sea-kings.” — The old Custom House. — The historic Town House. — Birthplaces of eminent men. — Elbridge Gerry. — Story of the “Gerrymander.” — The Glovers, Jonathan and General John. — The Old North Church. — Ancient Fort Sewall. — Quaint by-ways. — The “Moll Pitcher house.” — The island parsonage. — Site of the Fountain Inn. — Burying Hill. — The monument to lost fishers. — Peach’s Point, place of the Puritan fishing-stages. — True story of “ Old Flood Ireson.”

Chapter XII

First movements of Winthrop’s company. — The Charlestown settlement. — Blaxton’s invitation to Winthrop. — The beginning of Boston. — The peninsula as it appeared to the Puritans. — Bounds of the original settlement.— Site of the governor’s house. — The first meeting-house. — The

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CONTENTS.

Market Place. — The first Town House and its successors. — Sites of early homesteads. — Home of Anna Hibbens, hanged for “ witchcraft ” on Boston Common. — Birthplace of Franklin. — The first South meeting-house: scene of some remarkable happenings. — John Alden (2d) and the “ witchcraft” delusion. — Home of Anne Hutchinson. — The “Antinomian Controversy.” — Sir Harry Yane. — The first schoolhouse. — The first King’s Chapel. — Sir Edmund Andros: the Revolution of 1689. — The ancient burying-grounds. — Blaxton’s cottage and garden. — The Bellingham mansion-house. — The John Cotton estate. — John Endicott’s house. — Persecution of the Quakers. — The “ King’s Missive.” — Old Dock Square. — The Brasier Inn.

Chapter XIII

The germ of Independence. — Faneuil Hall and its memories. — A bunch of old landmarks. — The “Green Dragon Tavern,” headquarters of the Revolution. — North End historic sites. — Home of Paul Revere. — The “Red Lyon Inn” and Quaker Upsall. — The Old North Church. — The Frankland house. — Hutchinson’s house, sacked by the Stamp Act mob. — “ Salutation Inn.” — Home of Sir William Phips, the first royal governor: his romantic career. — Christ Church. — Revere’s signal lanterns on the “ Old North.” — The real Major Pitcairn. — Copp’s Hill Burying-ground : ancient tombs : marks of British bullets. — The affair of Hancock’s sloop Liberty.

CHAPTER XIV. The Pre-Revolutionary Period 281

The Old State House and its associations. — The Council Chamber: headquarters of the royal governors. — Steps to the Revolution, 1761-1775. — The Writs of Assistance; the Stamp Act; the Revenue Acts; the Boston Massacre ; the Boston Tea-Party ; the Boston Port Bill. — The “ Sanctuary of Freedom” and the great town-meetings. — The Province House. — Home of Samuel Adams. — The Hancock mansion-house. — The “ Bulfinch Front.” — King’s Chapel.

CHAPTER XY.

Events preceding the “ battle-day ” of 1775. — Organization of the minute-men. — The Alarm. — The rides of Paul Revere and William Dawes. — Samuel Adams and Hancock at the parsonage. — Assembling of Captain Parker’s company. — Lexington Green. — Revere, Dawes, and Prescott on the Concord road. — Capture of Revere and his final release. — The British march out from Boston. — Story of the “battle.” — Monuments and landmarks. — The ancient Haneock-Clarke house. — Buckman’s Tavern. — Memorial Hall.

CONTENTS.

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CHAPTER XYI

The American posts before the Fight. — Along the road to the battlefield. — The Old Manse. — At the Old North Bridge. — “ The shot heard round the world.” — The “plundering party” at the Barrett Farm. — Some historic houses. — Landmarks in the village centre. — Wright’s Tavern. — Meeting-place of the Provincial Congress. — Patriots’ graves in the old burying-ground on the hill. — Graves of Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau, the Alcotts, in Sleepy Hollow.

CHAPTER XVII.

From Concord to Charlestown. — Historic points along the roads. — The “mile-long” Ridge. — Literary landmarks: homes of Emerson, Hawthorne, the Alcotts. — Merriam’s Corner. — The “Bluff” on the Lexington road. — Lord Percy’s detachment at Lexington. — Round about “ Munroe’s Tavern.” — Story of Lord Percy’s outward march. — Adventures of some Boston schoolboys. — Capture of Percy’s baggage-train by the “old men of Menotomy.” — The rout from “ Menotomy ” to Charlestown Common. — First American council of war.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Formation of the “Great American Army.” — The night march of Colonel Prescott’s detachment from Cambridge to Charlestown. — The council on the liill-top. — Choice of Breed’s Hill, nearest Boston, for the fortifications.— The grounds as preserved to-day. — The towering obelisk. — The Prescott statue and its historic site. — Lines of the redoubt. — The breastworks of the rail-fence. — Landing-place of the British. — Story of the battle. — The burning of the town. — Death of Warren. — His monument and statue. — Some Puritan landmarks. — The John Harvard monument.

CHAPTER XIX.

The American lines during the siege of Boston. — “Ploughed Hill,” “Ten Hills,” Winter-hill Fort, the Citadel, French’s Redoubt, the right wing. — Hoisting the first flags. — Quarters of Burgoyne’s captured army. — General Lee’s headquarters. — The Old Powder-House. — Cambridge Common.— The Washington Elm. — Washington in Camp. — A little tour about the University City. — Puritan landmarks. — The Colleges. — “ Tory Row.” — Historic houses. — Tracings of the Norsemen.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PAGE

PAGE

Concord Bridge .... Frontispiece

“ What a sad thing it is to see eight

Map of Boston Harbor . . .

firebrands of hell hanging there ! ”

Captain John Smith ....

Pillory and Stocks

Looking up Boston Harbor from

Count Rumford the Middle Brewster . . .

Parson Barnard, the Elder . . .

Myles Standish’s Sword . . .

Bertram Elm, Salem

Norse Vessels

Gallows Hill

Minot’s Light

Birthplace of Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Mayflower

Hawthorne at Thirty-six ....

Sand Hills of Provincetown .

•

•

Salem Custom House

A Bit of Old Plymouth . . .

Marquis de Lafayette

Canopy Over Plymouth Rock

.

.

The Old Governor Bradstreet House

Clark’s Island

Queen Victoria’s Gift to George

Burial Hill, Plymouth . . .

Peabody

The Pilgrim Exiles ....

George Peabody

Stockade

Collins House (Headquarters of

The Old Winslow Mansion-House

•

Genex-al Gage in 1774)

Indian Bow and Arrows, etc. .

•

•

Old Nurse House

Indian War Club

John Greenleaf Whittier ....

Indian Shell Axe

Oak Knoll, Whittier’s Home . . .

Elder Brewster’s Chair i

General Israel Putnam’s Birth-

Peregrine White’s Cradle J place

Governor Carver’s Chair

General Israel Putnam

Foot-wheel in Governor Brad-

Old Town Hall, Marblehead . . .

ford’s Family

Constitution (“Old Ironsides”) . .

National Monument ....

The “ F'latiron ”

Billington Sea Outlet ....

St. Michael’s Church

King Philip

General John Glover House . . .

Major John Bradford House .

Birthplace of Elbridge Gerry . .

Captain Myles Standish . . .

The “ Gerrymander ”

Myles Standish’s Grave . . .

Burying-Hill, Marblehead ....

John Alden and Priscilla . .

Governor John Winthrop ....

Laying an Atlantic Cable . .

First Town House, Boston ....

Webster’s Study

Birthplace of Benjamin Franklin .

Daniel Webster

Old South Meeting-House ....

Pond on the Webster Estate .

Interior of Old South

Manchester-by-the-Sea . . .

Statue of Sir Harry Vane ....

Stage Head, Gloucester . . .

Statue of Blaxton

Fish-Curing

Pine-tree Shilling

First Meeting-House in Salem

Statue of Governor Winthrop . .

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XIV

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

Statue of Samuel Adams .... 246 Faneuil Hall (“ Cradle of Liberty ”) 249

Boston Stone 252

Green Dragon Tavern 255

Christ Church 266

Paul Revere 268

Tomb of the Mathers 277

Old State House 282

Royal Arms 283

Liberty Tree 286

Landing of British Troops, 1768 ; by

Paul Revere 290

Crispus Attucks Monument . . . 296

Samuel Adams 300

John Hancock 318

Old Province House 324

Old Hancock Mansion 326

Boston State House, with Annex . 327

Boston Common, 1809 329

King’s Chapel 330

Battle of Lexington 349

Governor Eustis’s Monument . . 353

Hancock-Clarke House 354

Old Buckman Tavern 357

The Old Manse 362

The Minute-Man 367

Hawthorne’s Grave 376

PAGE

Emerson’s Grave 377

Emerson’s Home 380

The Wayside, Hawthorne’s Home . 381

Merriam’s Corner 383

Munroe Tavern 388

Map of Boston and Vicinity . . . 404 Statue of William Prescott . . . 406 General Joseph Warren .... 411

British Ensign 413

Revolutionary Musket 414

Battle of Bunker Hill 416

Bunker Hill Monument .... 424

Harvard Monument 427

General Nathanael Greene . . . 431 Old Powder-House, Somerville . . 433 The “Washington Elm,” Cambridge 435

General Washington 436

Harvard College Campus .... 439

Longfellow’s Home 442

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow . . 443 Elmwood, Lowell’s Home .... 445

Statue of Leif Erikson 446

Boston Public Library : Front Fa-

fade 448

Boston Public Library : Colonnade of Court 449

HISTORIC PILGRIMAGES.

i.

THE START.

AST summer at Bar Harbor I chanced to meet my old friend Denison, who after graduation from college had . gone West, and had made both a reputation and a fortune.

Denison had with him his son Percy, a high-school lad, looking forward to a college course. He was an athletic young fellow, manly in person and bearing, ardent, spirited, observing, — a genuine American boy of the best type. Drawn to him by his manner and talk, I found that among his studies at school he liked American history best, and that he had an especially keen interest in landmarks of the formative periods of his country. So our desultory talk fell upon such topics, till one night, as we sat on the hotel piazza, Percy unfolded to me a plan which he had long cherished.

This plan was to visit the home of his ancestors in Massachusetts, and to spend a vacation in pilgrimages to historic spots in

HIS TOIilC PIL G RIM A GES.

New England identified with the small beginnings of the nation. Would I not help him, he urged, systematically to carry out such a plan ?

Born and reared in the West, the East, with its wealth of historical associations, evidently had a fascination for him ; and, American to his finger-tips, he had a strong desire for a personal knowledge of the places where the steps which had led from Colonies to Provinces, and from Provinces to Republic, had been taken. He had discovered through the slight excursions into ancient records which he had made for his elder sister, who was a member of the Daughters of the Revolution, that he not only had ancestors, but that they were settled here in the “ good old Colony days,” before separation from the mother country was dreamed of. This discovery had stimulated his interest in historic New England. But with all his casual reading and study, he had found that his acquaintance with many of the most important landmarks of American history was yet but superficial. The fact had only recently been brought home to him, with a mortifying shock, by a critic’s marginal notes upon an attempt which he had made at a prize essay : exposing his confusion of seventeenth century with eighteenth century monuments, of Colonial with Provincial affairs, and his mixing of landmarks of the pre-Revolution controversies. He had indeed derived some consolation from finding himself able to enlighten the congressman for his district, and the Fourth of July orator of his city, who had confounded Pilgrim with Puritan, and almost hopelessly tangled the causes of the Revolution ; and he had also found balm for his wounded pride in the disclosures by some of the Revolutionary sons and daughters that they were hardly more accurately informed. Still, as he had said, he was obliged to confess that he was not sufficiently grounded in foundationfacts clearly to tell the story of his country and its historic sites and places, as every true American should be able to do.

All this Percy confided to me with engaging frankness ; and the outcome of our talk was an agreement to meet in Boston,

THE START.

the mecca of American historic pilgrimages, some time in the following spring, and lay out a programme.

So one fair day in May, such as occasionally bursts upon New England in that uncertain month, I received at Boston a despatch from Percy announcing his coming, and reminding me of my last summer’s promise. I found him, upon his arrival, comfortably quartered in a down-town hotel, poring over an outspread map of New England, the chairs of his room upheaped with guide-books of all sorts and conditions, and a perplexed look upon his handsome face.

“ Upon my word,” he exclaimed after our mutual greetings, “it is all so interesting I can’t make up my mind where to begin ! Shall I start with the Pilgrims at Plymouth or with the Puritans at Salem ? Or shall I begin with Revolutionary landmarks, in which interest is the keenest with us Westerners when we find ourselves in these parts, covering those of earlier days in later pilgrimages ? Shall I take historic pilgrimages alone, or combine literary pilgrimages with them, and so embrace landmarks of American literature with those of American history ? ”

I suggested that he should make Boston his starting-post, and arrange an itinerary, each pilgrimage to occupy one or two days.

“ Suppose,” I said, “ you lay out a programme including a dozen trips, covering in all, say, a fortnight. Your first pilgrimage might well be made into the Old Colony, beginning at Provincetown, at the tip of Cape Cod, and thence tracing the footprints of the Pilgrims through Plymouth, Kingston, Duxbury, and Marshfield. Then you might strike for Cape Ann, and follow the Puritans back through Salem and its neighborhood to Charlestown and Boston. At the same time you will cover landmarks of the Provincial and Revolutionary periods, and various other historic sites, recalling the stories of great men as well as of great events in our history. You might treat the Revolutionary period, so far as practicable, chronologically. Beginning here in Boston with monuments marking the preced-

HISTORIC PILGRIMAGES.

ing controversies, you can trace the several outbreaks from the earliest to the Lexington affair, the Concord Fight, the British rout, the conflict at Breed’s Hill, the Siege of Boston, the Evacuation.

“ In these and other pilgrimages into localities within easy reach of your central point will be included a variety of most interesting features, — literary as well as historic landmarks, ancient mansion houses, rich monuments of Colonial and Provincial days, and much picturesque country and coast. As an admirable finish of the series, you might take Cambridge, giving part of a day to a leisurely tour of our oldest university town, — the place also, as you know, first selected by the Winthrop party for the chief town of the Colony before Boston was determined upon.”

These suggestions Percy adopted with promptness. He proposed that we should proceed at once to outline fourteen pilgrimages, and together start upon them, weather permitting, without delay, I to act as “ guide, philosopher, and friend,” it pleased him to say. To the latter proposition I at first demurred ; but he pressed it with such urgency and winsome insistence that I at length agreed, consenting to act the friendly guide, but declining the vole of philosopher.

Our itinerary finally planned, we speedily completed our simple preparations. For equipment we provided ourselves with light haversacks in which to carry lunches and other essentials, several pocket maps, railway time-tables, and a good field-glass ; while Percy had brought with him his kodak and his sketch-book.

II. Massachusetts Bay, Peovincetowh, Cape Cod

From Boston to Cape Cod tip. — Historic points along the waterway. —The Pilgrims in Boston Harbor before the Puritans came. — The expedition up from Plymouth led by Standish in 1621: Winslow’s minute narrative.— The Norsemen’s explorations of 1000-1004: legend of Thorvald’s “ Krossaness.” — Early comers to Cape Cod. — The Mayflower in Provincetown Harbor. — The Compact signed in its cabin. — First landing-place of the Pilgrims. — Quaint Provincetown and its weird sand-hills. — The path of the first Pilgrim exploration party. — By Cape Cod to Plymouth. — Pilgrim traces along shore.

It was our good fortune to make our first pilgrimage with the opening of June. Boarding the Provincetown steamer early in the forenoon of a dazzlingly bright Monday, with a clear sky and a sparkling sea, we found seats on the forward deck, and settled down for a full enjoyment of the four or five hours’ sail over Massachusetts Bay to the end of Cape Cod.

As we steamed placidly down from the spreading city, past the harbor islands, toward Point Allerton and the broad waters of the bay beyond, Percy tried in imagination to picture the scene which these shores, islands, and waters in their natural state — a silent wilderness, without buildings, houses, or shipping — presented to the Puritan first-comers.

“ I have read,” he observed, “ that one of the early voyagers called this a paradise; but the Puritans, who came to stay, must have been most strongly impressed with its awful loneliness.”

“ True,” I answered, “ loneliness was, doubtless, an element in the scene. But it was by no means the dominant one ; and I question if it made much, if any, impression upon the pioneers. None of the chroniclers among the first-comers, either as explorers, traders, or colonists, makes mention of it. What most

HISTORIC PILGRIMAGES.

impressed them, evidently, was the attractiveness of the region ; and in the contemplation of this feature that of loneliness had slight influence. It was Captain John Smith, he of Pocahontas fame, one of the earliest to give a detailed account of this neighborhood, who described it as the ‘ paradise of all these

parts ’ ; and he was so enchanted with what he saw that he declared, ‘ Of all the four parts of the world that I have yet seen not inhabited, could I but have the means to transport a colony, I would rather live here than anywhere/ He sailed about these waters as early as 1614, a dozen years before any white settler was here, skirting the coast most closely between Cape Ann and Cohasset, and made note of ‘many lies all planted with corne, groves, mulberries, salvage [savage] gardens, and good harbors/ ‘ And as you passe,’ he further remarked, ‘the sea coast shews you all along large corne fields and great troupes of well proportioned people/

“ This was a somewhat fanciful picture, no doubt ; for the gallant Smith was an optimistic explorer, and had the sailor’s fondness for picturesque narration of adventure, with a free

MASSACHUSETTS BAY.

mingling of fact and romance. He was, moreover, concerned in an enterprise the main object of which was commercial, with colonization projects in view, so that he saw with a flattering eye. But those who came after him largely confirmed his view. Seven years later, in 162.1, within the first year of the Plymouth?"1 Colony, Myles Standish came up from Plymouth in a shallop, or large sail-boat, with ten companions and three Indian guides, on a voyage of exploration and trade. Landing, they ‘ marched in arms up the country/ and also found it fair ; for they took back to Plymouth ‘ a good report of the place, wishing we had been seated there.’

“ When the Puritans came, in 1630, what there was of loneliness in the scene was fading away. Here and there was some slight show of settlement. At the upper end of the harbor was a little plantation at Winnisimmet, now the city of Chelsea, and the ‘palisadoed’ house of Samuel Maverick, a young ‘gentleman of good estate ’ and education. At Mishawum (Charlestown) was the humbler, palisaded, and thatched dwelling of Thomas Walford, blacksmith, with his wife and children. At Shawmut, which became Boston, on the slope of its loftiest hill, was the cottage, the rose-garden, and orchard of William Blaxton [Blackstone], the ‘solitary bookish recluse.’ In the harbor was a trading and fishing

station. Along shore were captain john smith.

the straggling settlements

at ‘ Merry Mount,’ Mount Wollaston, now in Quincy, and at Weymouth. Coming in June, the Puritans found the country

HISTORIC PILGRIMAGES.

at its best, In full blossom and leaf. These now bare islands by which we are sailing were then mostly well wooded. From the shores of the mainland noble forests stretched back to the hills beyond ; and the three picturesque mounts of ‘ Shawmut,’ which the Bostonians years since reduced and levelled, rose conspicuously in the landscape. Contrasted with what they had left behind in old England, it was a scene of solitude ; but compared with that which ten years before first met the gaze

LOOKING UP BOSTON HARBOR FROM THE MIDDLE BREWSTER.

of the Pilgrims over the bleak headlands of Cape Cod, it must have been a spectacle almost animating.

“ No, I should say that the first impressions of the Puritans wrere, on the whole, altogether pleasing. They found the country beautiful, and the ‘ Old Planters,’ as the settlers already fixed here were called, disposed to be neighborly. These ‘ Old Planters ’ were the remnant of the colonies which Ferdinando Gorges and his son Robert attempted to establish in Massa-

MASS A CH U SETTS BAY.

chusetts Bay some years before, with discouraging results. They were regular Church of England men, but none the less on this account inclined to friendliness toward the incoming Puritan non-conformists. Maverick gave Winthrop a good dinner upon his arrival, and later Blaxton cordially invited the newcomers to settle on his peninsula.”

In my preparation for these pilgrimages, in order to render myself as helpful as possible to my young friend, I had made some memoranda from various historical papers, records, and authorities, and had also taken copies of a few interesting documents. Among the latter was the story of the Myles Standish expedition of 1621, written by one of the company, Edward Winslow, and especially interesting as the first authentic account which we have of a landing by Europeans, and an inshore exploration on this part of the coast. Captain Smith tells us that he passed “ close aboard the shore,” and mapped out the bay (by which term was then meant only Boston harbor), but he did not venture to land here; and it is the opinion of the best authorities that he did not come beyond the opening of the harbor, although it has been said that he“ sailed to its head. Other of the Plymouth men’s predecessors, visitors or traders, did little more than make observations in passing, unless we accept the traditions of the Northmen respecting an attempt by them at a settlement made at the dawn of the eleventh century.

Winslow’s quaint account was serviceable to us in fixing the first notable Pilgrim landmarks on the waterway down from Boston, as well as in filling out the picture of this neighborhood before the Puritan advent. So I produced it while we were discussing Puritan first impressions, and before we had passed beyond the historic harbor islands, Percy following on his map, as I read with explanatory note and comment.

• “It seemed good to the company in general,” — meaning the Plymouth Colony, — the account begins, “ that though the Massachusetts [the Indian tribe occupying this region] had

HISTORIC PILGRIMAGES.

often threatened us (so we were informed), yet we should go among them, partly to see the country and partly to make peace with them, and partly to procure their truck. For these ends the Governor chose ten men, and Tisquantum and two other savages, to bring us to speech with the people and interpret for us.”