THE PILGRIMS AND THE SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND.
About two hundred and fifty years ago, there was living in England a
class of people who did not think it right to worship God in the same
way that most of the English nation did: they did not believe in
building so many fine churches and cathedrals, or in having so much
chanting and singing in the service; they did not like to see the
priests, dressed in rich robes, standing before magnificent altars
whereon candles blazed and incense burned. They said that this was all
wrong, and that the money that was spent in fine churches and music and
candles was only wasted, and that such things were not pleasing to God;
and above all they did not believe many of the things which the English
Church held sacred. So all these people refused to go to church; they
stayed at home and had meeting at their houses, much in the same way
that people now, who live far away from churches, meet at one another's
houses and have prayer-meeting.
But the king of England, James I., said that these people had no right
to stay away from church, and he made a law which said that every one
who did not go to church should be punished.
These punishments were very severe, and the people were even sometimes
afraid of their lives. After this law was passed they did not dare any
more to go to meeting openly, but used to meet at night at their
minister's house.
At last things got so bad that they decided to go away from England, and
find some place where they could worship God as they thought right; so
they sold their houses and lands, gathered their families together, and
one day sailed away for Holland.
The king's officers, however, were looking out for them, and some of
them were captured before they could get on the ship and taken to
prison, where they were kept many weary months; but finally as many of
these people as wanted to found their way to Holland. Here they lived
very quietly for eleven years, the Hollanders being very willing to have
them among them, as they were a very peaceable, honest, and kindly
people.
But after a time the Pilgrims--for so these people were called--did not
like it so well in Holland as they did at first, for they found that
their children were growing up to be Dutch children instead of English;
their sons and daughters began to marry into the families of their Dutch
neighbors, and they feared that in a few years they would no longer
consider themselves English. The Pilgrims were still very fond of
England and everything English. Their language and customs were still
dear to them, and they considered themselves Englishmen in every way.
So the principal men met together and talked the matter over, and at
last decided that they would leave Holland and seek some other place
where their children would hear only English spoken and learn only
English habits.
As they could not think of any place in Europe where it would be safe
for them to go, they all agreed that the best thing for them to do would
be to sail away across the ocean to the New World, where they would be
free to worship as they pleased, and where they would make a little
colony by themselves.
There were so many Pilgrims in Holland at this time that they could not
all go to America at once, as they did not have enough ships or money to
undertake such a voyage; so they chose some of the youngest and
strongest who were most willing to go, and one sunny morning in the
month of July, 1620, a little ship sailed away from Holland, carrying
with it the brave-hearted Pilgrims who were so determined to seek a home
across the sea.
The voyage was very long, the weather cold and stormy, and many times
the little Mayflower seemed to make no headway against the rough winds
and waves; but at last, after long waiting, they saw the shores of the
New World. For a month they sailed up and down the coast looking for a
good place to land. They had expected to go to the Hudson River, but
the storms drove them farther north, and the first land that they saw
was the coast of Massachusetts.
It was not a very pleasant-looking country--with low sand hills, and no
sign of grass or flower; but the pines looked fresh and green, and the
Pilgrims were determined not to be discouraged. They sent little
expeditions to the shore to look for a good place to land, and finally
one day they all left the ship at a place which Captain John Smith had
named Plymouth, and here they resolved to stay.
If you should ever go to Plymouth you would see in the Hall there some
of the curious old furniture which the Pilgrims brought with
them--old-fashioned armchairs and queer spinning-wheels, ladles, wooden
spoons, a great iron dinner-kettle said to have been owned by Miles
Standish, and the "samplers" which little Lora Standish worked. Perhaps
the thing that you children would like best would be the old-fashioned
cradle wherein slept the little Peregrine White, who was born on board
the Mayflower. It is not a very fine cradle, not trimmed with silk and
dainty laces, but the little English baby slept in it very comfortably,
and every one will admit that it is the most interesting cradle in
America to-day.
It was on December 21st that the Pilgrims landed, and you can imagine
how cold and bleak it was down there by the sea; the first thing they
did was to build a house, a large one that would hold them all; and they
lived in this until they had time to build separate houses for the
different families. These houses were built of logs, having tiny little
windows in which oiled paper was put instead of glass. As soon as they
could they built a church, of logs also, with four cannon on the top, to
defend it from the Indians.
The Pilgrims had a very hard time of it that first winter, they suffered
very much from the cold and from sickness, and, worst of all, they had
scarcely enough to eat; nearly one half of them died before spring, but
the rest were still not discouraged. They lived on game, killing deer
and wild turkeys, and besides, being so near the sea, they could catch
fish. As soon as the weather grew warm enough they planted corn, and
after that they got along much better.
Seven or eight years after the Pilgrims landed, another company of
English people came to America; they, like the Pilgrims, left England
because they could not worship there in the way they thought right.
These people were called Puritans, but it made very little difference
whether they called themselves Pilgrims or Puritans; they were all alike
Englishmen and had come to America for the same purpose; they all
suffered the same hardships and endured them bravely, for wherever the
Englishman goes he takes a brave heart with him.
The Puritans, looking for a good place for settlement, chose the
peninsula of Shawmut, or Tri-mountain, which they found to be a place of
"sweet and pleasant springs, and good land affording rich corn-fields
and fruitful gardens," and here, in September, 1630, were laid the
foundations of the City of Boston.
For many years the colonists could not raise any cattle on account of
the wolves which roamed day and night through the forests. The Indians
were sometimes friendly and would bring them corn, which the settlers
would pay for in clothing, knives, etc.; it is said that once one of the
Indians gave a settler a peck of corn in exchange for a little
puppy-dog. Whenever food was scarce they all shared alike, so that no
one had more than another, and after a time, as they began to raise more
crops and as the forests became cleared, they got along very nicely and
lived as happily in their log-houses as if they had been marble palaces.
To-day New England is famous for its beautiful villages, with their
broad streets shaded with elms and their wide pleasant lawns and
comfortable houses; but if you could have seen a New England village two
hundred and fifty years ago, it would have been a very different thing.
If you had lived in those days your home would have been a log-house on
the edge of a great deep forest. Imagine these little English boys and
girls going to bed in a room where the snow could drift in through the
cracks, and where they could hear the wolves howling in the forests. How
afraid they must have been, and how they must have snuggled under the
covers and covered up their faces.
Imagine going to a little church built of logs and having a flag waving
from it, and cannon in front of it to protect it from the Indians.
Sometimes the people were called to church by the beating of a drum, and
every man carried his musket with him, as no one knew when the Indians
might come. In these queer little churches, families did not sit
together as they do now, but the men sat in one place, the women in
another, and the children in another. There was always a man to keep the
children in order, and well he did it too. No child dared smile in
church, or he might be rapped on the knuckles for it. Every one had to
go to church, whether he wanted to or not; if any one was absent the
"tithing man" was sent after him, and for many years after this custom
was given up, the New England mothers used to frighten their children
by telling them that the "tidy man" was coming when they were naughty.
These children used to go to school in queer little log school-houses,
and school was not the pleasant place to them that it is to you.
Everybody had to be as solemn there as possible, and all the pupils used
to sit up stiffly and primly, and look as grave as little owls, for the
schoolmaster was feared and respected next to the minister, and no New
England child in that age would have thought of even smiling if the
minister were present. The fathers and mothers were very solemn people
too--life was such a serious thing to them, they thought it wicked to
waste time amusing children. They did not even keep Christmas for many
years, and the Puritan children did not know as much about Santa Claus
as you do about the man in the moon.
You must not think, however, that they were unhappy; children always
find some means of having a good time, even if fathers and mothers are
stern and sober people; and the Puritan fathers and mothers loved their
children just as much as the Dutch fathers and mothers in New York
loved theirs, only they showed their love in a different way, that is
all. And, after all, these little log school-houses were not such bad
places--they were always sure to be near the woods, where were great
shady trees, and if the children did not sing pretty songs in school as
you do, they could at least hear the birds singing all day long; if they
had not bright pictures on the walls of the school-room, they had sweet,
dainty wild flowers just outside, and the wind and trees and blossoms
whispered their secrets to them; and that is one reason perhaps why they
grew up so good and true and brave. Thanksgiving Day was the one day in
the year on which the Pilgrims did not think it wrong to be merry. Early
in the day they went to church, which was held partly as a service of
thanks for the harvest, and partly in grateful remembrance for the
relief that came to them from England when they were suffering from
famine. When church was over the fun began. All the members of a family
from near and far were brought together on this day, and what gay times
the children had with their small cousins and nieces and nephews. What
games and romps, and what interesting talk around the fire as to who had
gathered the most nuts, who had built the strongest and swiftest sled,
and who had been bravest when the Indians came prowling around.
For of all the troubles which the settlers of New England had to bear,
the trouble with the Indians was the worst.
At first they seemed to get along quite peaceably with them; the chiefs
of some of the tribes were very friendly and were kind to the colonists;
but as time went on the Indians grew more and more unfriendly, and the
settlers lived in constant fear of them.
Sometimes they would come in the night to a house where a mother was
alone with her children, and kill them all and then set fire to the
house. Sometimes a man would be working at a distance from his home, and
go back there only to find that the Indians had been there before him,
and had taken his wife and children away with them to make slaves of
them.
The little children would go to bed at night and lie awake listening
for the Indian warwhoop, which they dreaded even more than they did the
howling of the wolves. Every woman in those days knew how to use a gun,
and many a time a mother had to defend herself and children from some
painted Indians who would come up to the house and ask to be taken in.
About forty years after Boston was settled, these difficulties with the
Indians brought about a war which extended over all that country. The
most powerful of the Indians at that time was King Philip, chief of the
Wamponoags. This tribe had always been friendly to the whites, Philip's
father, Massasoit, having formed a treaty with the Puritans soon after
their settlement in New England.
King Philip was a very brave and good man, and for a time after his
father's death he remained friendly to the whites; but he saw that, no
matter how friendly the whites seemed, they really were trying to get
all the land from the Indians that they could, and he thought if he
could drive the English away from his country it would be much better
for his own people. So he sent messengers to all the tribes from Maine
to Connecticut, asking the chiefs to join with him and drive the whites
away. All the chiefs promised to do this, and soon there was a terrible
war all over New England.
The Indians did not like to fight the whites in open field, but they
used to come at night, creeping through the forest in the shadow of the
trees, steal down the quiet little village street, and then, with
dreadful shrieks and war-whoops, begin their horrible work. Sometimes
they would not go away until everybody in the village had been killed,
and the houses all burned.
Sometimes they would go to lonely houses where the inmates were all
quietly sleeping, and forming themselves into a ring, would dance around
the house yelling and waving their torches, and the poor people would be
awakened by this noise only to know that death awaited them.
This war lasted nearly two years, and in that time many villages were
burned, and many people killed; but finally King Philip was killed, and
then the Indians lost heart, and in a short time there was peace again.
For some years after this the colonists had no trouble with the Indians,
but after a time war broke out again. This time the Indians were
stronger and better armed, and besides they were helped by the French.
For a long time the English and French had each been trying to gain
possession of North America. The English said they had the best right to
it, and the French said that _they_ had the best right; and so it went
on, until the French and Indians agreed that they would join together
and fight against the English. The Indians liked the French much better
than they did the English, as they had always treated them better.
Some of the French had married Indian wives, and they were looked upon
by the Indians as brothers. To this day in Canada you can see little
dark-eyed boys and girls, who call themselves French, but whose
ancestors were Indian and French.
You will learn later that this struggle between the French and English
lasted for more than half a century after the time of which I have been
telling, and ended in a great war between the nations, that extended in
America all over the country that was then settled. But at last the
English gained the day and the French gave up all the country that they
had owned in America east of the Mississippi to the English, and that is
how this country came to be under English rule.
After the French and Indian wars were over the colonists had very little
trouble with the Indians, and in a few years there was peace and quiet
all over New England.