The Greatest Works of Charles Carleton Coffin. Charles Carleton Coffin
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doomed to disappointment. The captain o£ the vessel is a knave; he has informed the constable, who comes with a lot o£ policemen, and marches them to the office of the magistrate, who thrusts them into prison, where they are kept many weeks, till he can hear from London; but after much suffering they are allowed to go at large.
Six months pass. Brewster resolves to make another attempt to reach Holland, and this time makes a bargain with a Dutch skipper to take himself and friends on board at a lonely place on the coast. One by one the people leave their homes. The women and children go in a boat. The winds are high, and they are tossed about by the waves, suffering from sea-sickness. the men, carrying heavy packs, make their way through the marshes. They reach the appointed place, but no ship is in sight. The boat runs into a creek for shelter, for those on board are in a miserable plight — sick, weary, disappointed, disheartened, with no home behind them, none before them, so far as they can see. All day, all night, they lie there. The morning dawns, and their hearts are joyful, for there is the ship riding at anchor off the shore a little distance.
The women and children have spent the night on the land. The ship's small boats come in and carry their goods on board. Some of the men are on the ship, some on the land, when a troop of men come rushing over the sand-hills, armed with spears and guns. The bishops' officers are upon them. Those on shore are seized — the women rudely assaulted. The Dutchman, seeing the commotion, and afraid that his ship will be seized and himself thrown into prison, hoists the anchor, spreads the sails, and steel's away. It is a sad hour. Husbands and wives are separated, families broken up. There is loud lamentation, for who knows whether they ever will meet again. William Bradford is on board the ship. He is only nineteen years old; he gives this account of the scene: "Pitiful it was to see the heavy care of these poor women — what weeping and crying on every side; some for their husbands carried away in the ship, others not knowing what should become of them and their little ones; others melted in tears, seeing their poor little ones hanging about them, crying for fear and quaking with cold."
The ship, instead of reaching Holland in a few hours, is caught in a tempest, and driven nearly to Norway. For seven days and nights those on board see neither sun, moon, nor stars. Many times they fear that their last hour has come; but after being tossed about for fourteen days, they are safely landed at Amsterdam.
What shall the officers do with the women and children? To imprison them because they were going with their husbands and fathers cannot be thought of; the people will not permit it. No use to send them back to Scrooby and Austerfield, for they have no homes; they can only set them at liberty. King James will gain nothing by keeping them in England; and so, after many delays, they are permitted to make their way to Holland, to join their husbands and fathers.
CHAPTER XXIX
THE STAR OF EMPIRE
A CENTURY nearly has passed since Christopher Columbus undertook to reach the east by sailing west. During this period, the Spaniards have seized the West India Islands, conquered Mexico and Peru. They have a settlement in Florida, at St. Augustine. Every ship sailing to Spain from the new Western world carries silver and gold; and the country of Ferdinand and Isabella is reaping a rich harvest. Trade and commerce feel the quickening influence of the precious metals.
Through all these years neither the French or English have made a permanent settlement in North America. Some Huguenots who settled at Port Royal, in South Carolina, have been massacred by the Spaniards; and from St. Augustine northward there is no human habitation, save the wigwams of the Indians. It is the year 1583, when Sir Humphrey Gilbert, of England, with authority from Queen Elizabeth, sets sail, with two ships and three barks, on a voyage of discovery. He drops anchor on the 3d of August, in the harbor of St. Johns, Newfoundland, and is surprised to find thirty-six French vessels at anchor there. The crews are catching fish, and drying them on the rocks. Sir Humphrey informs the fishermen that he takes possession of the island for Queen Elizabeth, and that they must obey the laws of England; and if any one says anything against Elizabeth, he shall have his ears cropped, and lose all his goods: more, they must all worship in the way prescribed by the Church of England. Sir Humphrey grants the fishermen leave to dry their fish — a privilege which they always have exercised; but now they must pay for the privilege. Having established English authority, Sir Humphrey sets sail for England ; but never again is he to see his native land : his ship goes down in a storm with all on board; but the vessel commanded by his half-brother, Sir Walter Raleigh, arrives safely in port.
The disaster does not deter Sir Walter from making another voyage. A few months later he is abroad once more, sailing south-west till he reaches the coast of North Carolina, where he drops anchor, and makes the acquaintance of the Indians, who are kind and hospitable. He makes a present of a tin pan to a chief, who bores a hole in the rim, attaches a string, and wears it on bis breast as an ornament and shield, and in return gives Sir Walter twenty skins of wild animals, worth a crown apiece; so that the Englishman gives away the tin pan at good profit. The climate is delightful, the air fragrant with flowers; and Sir Walter, who has a great admiration for Queen Elizabeth — so great that he once placed his scarlet-velvet cloak upon the mud for her to walk on when landing at the Tower — names the country Virginia, in her honor.
Sir Walter returns to England, carrying with him some of the tobacco of Virginia. Smoking is unknown in England; and one day when Sir Walter is puffing his Indian pipe, a servant coming in, thinking be is on fire, dashes a pailful of water upon him, wetting him from head to foot.
The next year Sir Walter sails once more, with one hundred and fifty men, and makes a settlement at Roanoke, leaving John White to govern the colony. Mrs. Dare, wife of one of the colonists, gives birth to a daughter, whom she names Virginia — the first child of English parents born in America.
Sir Walter returns to England, but sails again to Virginia the succeeding year, to find the houses deserted and weeds growing around them. The colonists have disappeared, no one knows whither. Never are they heard from.
On December 19th, 1606, three small vessels glide down the river Thames, spreading their sails for a voyage across the Atlantic. The largest is of one hundred tons, the next largest forty, and the smallest twenty tons. There are one hundred and five persons on board the vessels. They are leaving England to found a state in a wilderness thousands of miles away. They will find no homes awaiting them, no fields cleared, but a land inhabited by savages. Of the party, four are carpenters, twelve laborers, forty-eight gentlemen, who look upon labor as a degrading occupation. They have an indefinite idea of what is before them, and vague conceptions of what they will do in the land whither they are going; but somehow they all expect to make their fortunes, or else meet with exciting adventures, which will pay for all the hardship they may be called upon to endure.
Captain Newport, who commands the expedition, has been in the New World. lie carried two crocodiles and a wild-boar to England, and presented them to the king, and the king has lent his influence to help on their enterprise ; merchants have aided it. One of the poets of England has addressed an ode to the gentlemen:
"You brave, heroic minds,
Worthy your country's name,
What honor still pursue;
While loitering hinds
Lurk here at home with shame,
Go and subdue.
"And in the regions far
Such heroes bring ye forth
As those from whom we came,
And plant our name
Under the star
Not known unto the North."
One of the gentlemen is Captain John Smith,