colony of New Netherlands flourished. Farms were cleared and tended,
villages were formed, trade flourished, and immigration increased. But
the end of Dutch rule on the Hudson was at hand. In 1664 Charles II.,
king of England, granted to his brother James, Duke of York, the entire
territory claimed and occupied by the Dutch, which he asserted belonged
to England. England and Holland were then at peace, but the Duke of
York did not hesitate to bring on war. He fitted out four war-ships
with four hundred and fifty soldiers and sent them to America under
command of Colonel Nicolls. The Dutch were informed that the vessels
were going to the colonies in New England. Instead, they sailed to New
Amsterdam. Stuyvesant had neither powder nor provisions for a siege,
and his soldiers wished to accept English terms. Nicolls informed the
council that none of the people’s rights would be interfered with--only
the flag and the governor would be changed. Brave sturdy old Stuyvesant
tore up the letter offering these terms and wished to fight for the
rights of the Company he represented. But the council, soldiers, and
citizens would not support him, and he had to yield.
“I had rather be carried to my grave,” he said, as he ordered the
surrender.
He went to Holland to prove that he had done his best to uphold the
Company’s rights. Having done this, he returned to his home in the
New World. He led a quiet, comfortable life in his fine old country
home--in what is now the business heart of New York City,--and in the
course of time, he and Governor Nicolls became great friends.
The Dutch resented the English seizure of their colony and declared war
against England. When peace was made, it was agreed that each nation
should keep what it had won. Holland had won the most victories and so
gained most territory by this agreement; but the city of New Amsterdam
and the colony of New Netherlands--both of which were called New York
in honor of their new ruler--remained in English hands. The Dutch
inhabitants were secured in their rights and privileges, according to
Colonel Nicolls’ promise, and they went on their sober, hard-working
way. From them the English, in time, borrowed many Dutch customs and
festivals,--such as that of having Easter eggs and of celebrating
Christmas with the visit of St. Nicholas or Santa Claus.
Samuel de Champlain
The Father of New France
For years the Portuguese and the Spanish shared between them the
trading-posts and commerce of the world. Portugal controlled the
ocean route to Asia, and Spain by virtue of her early discoveries and
explorations laid claim to the whole of the New World. But as time
passed this state of affairs was changed. In the Old World, the Dutch
became the successful rivals of the Portuguese; in the New, Spain had
to contend with France, England, Holland, and Sweden, all of which were
seeking a share of the prize.
For a long time France was the chief rival with which Spain had to
reckon. Verrazano, a Florentine sailor, was sent from France in command
of four vessels to seek the longed-for westward route to Cathay. Left
at last with one ship, he reached in 1524 the coast of North Carolina,
“a new land never before seen of any man, ancient or modern,”--for in
the opinion of the Europeans the natives counted not at all. Verrazano
sailed along the coast, into the Bay of New York and out again, and
along the coast of New England to Newfoundland. Provisions giving out,
he returned to France and gave the first description of the coast of
the United States.
In the wake of Verrazano, followed other Frenchmen. One of these was
Jacques Cartier. In 1534 he came to the coast of Newfoundland and
sailed up the St. Lawrence River, hoping to find through it an outlet
to Cathay. On a second voyage, he entered and named the Bay of St.
Lawrence and ascended the great river as far as Montreal. A third
voyage he made in 1541, for the purpose of establishing a colony.
But a severe winter and much sickness and suffering discouraged the
colonists, and the next year they left New France for Old.
Years passed. Civil and religious wars laid France waste, and many
earnest men began to look to the New World for an asylum from the Old.
A band of French Protestants led by John Ribaut left their native
shores to make their home in America. Instead of sailing northward,
they landed in 1562 on the shores of Florida, which was the territory
of Catholic Spain. The colony was attacked by the Spaniards under
Menendez, and men, women, and children were killed. This terrible
slaughter was avenged by the French under De Gourges, but the tide of
French colonization was turned from the southern coast.
Five years after this massacre, there was born Samuel de Champlain, who
won the title of the “Father of New France.” His father was a French
ship captain; he himself was trained in the art of navigation and
became a captain in the royal navy. “Navigation is the art which has
powerfully attracted me ever since my boyhood and has led me to expose
myself almost all my life to the impetuous bufferings of the sea,” he
said.
Chaplain served awhile in the army; when peace came his adventurous
spirit led him to the West Indies. This was Spanish territory and the
Frenchman went thither at the risk of his life. He spent two years
in America. To him it seemed, as it had seemed to some Spanish and
Portuguese officials, that it would be a good plan to cut a canal
through the Isthmus of Panama. Champlain wrote, “If the four leagues
of land which there are from Panama to the (Chagres) river were cut
through, one might pass from the south sea to the ocean on the other
side and thus shorten the route by more than fifteen hundred leagues;
and from Panama to the Strait of Magellan would be an island and from
Panama to the New-found lands would be another island, so that the
whole of America would be in two islands.”
Always on his voyages Champlain kept a diary and made maps of the lands
he visited. When he returned to France, he gave the king a minute
account of the colonies and treasure of Spain. It was shame to France,
he thought, that on the New World, discovered more than a century
before, only their enemies had a foothold.
A French nobleman who was planning to found a colony in America decided
that this enterprising young sailor-soldier would be the man to lead
the undertaking. Champlain entered into the plan with enthusiasm. In
1603 he set out to reconnoiter the new land, following the route of
Cartier. He sailed up the St. Lawrence River, to the present site of
Montreal. During the next four years he made five voyages to the New
World, exploring the coast from New England northward. He led a band of
colonists who after a winter of hardship and sickness returned in 1607
to France. But Champlain was not discouraged. He was resolved to extend
the power of France and of the Catholic religion in the new land, to
penetrate the unknown wilds, and to seek a route to the East. He was
appointed Lieutenant-governor of the French colony, an office which
he held until his death, and came to America in 1608 to establish a
settlement on the St. Lawrence River. In July the colonists landed and
erected a store-house, the beginning of the city of Quebec.
Five discontented men in the party formed a plot to kill Champlain
and turn the fortress over to the Spaniards. One of the men, however,
betrayed the plot; the conspirators were arrested, the ringleader
was hanged, and the others were sent prisoners to France. The winter
of 1609 found the French colony one of three in the New World. At
Jamestown, in Virginia, were the English; at St. Augustine, in Florida,
were the Spaniards; and far to the north at Quebec in Canada, were
the French. No one could then guess which nation would finally become
supreme, though the chances seemed in favor of the Spaniards.
The first winter at Quebec was one of hardship and sickness, and when
spring opened only eight of the twenty-eight Frenchmen were alive. In
1609 Champlain, ever ready for adventure, accompanied some Algonquins
and other Indians on an expedition against their enemies the Iroquois,
the Five Nations. He wished to see “a large lake, filled with beautiful
islands, and with a fine country surrounding it” of which he had
been told. He reached the beautiful lake, which now bears his name;
on its banks his firearms turned the battle against the Iroquois and
begun the long warfare in which the French were opposed to this great
confederation of tribes. The very day that Champlain brought on his
nation the enmity of this deadly foe, a little Dutch vessel, the Half
Moon, was anchored on the New England coast. A few weeks later it
entered the Hudson River,--bearing a crew of English and Dutch--the two
peoples who were to be allies of the foe which the Frenchmen made that
day and to turn the tide of battle against France.
From 1609 till his death, the time of Champlain was divided between
New and Old France. Exploring, fighting, establishing trading-posts,
he was busy building up the young colony and developing its resources.
In 1620 his young wife, whom he had married ten years before when she
was a mere child, came for the first time to Quebec. After four years
of hardship, she returned to France and did not again revisit the New
World.
The French colony grew and prospered. It was on friendly terms with
its Indian neighbors with whom it carried on a flourishing fur trade.
Furs were the currency and wealth of the French colony, as of the
Dutch colony on Manhattan. The French exported every year to France
from fifteen to twenty thousand skins; the Dutch at Manhattan thought
business good when they shipped four thousand.
In 1628 the French colony was reduced to sore straits from scarcity
of food. This was increased by the English capture of the ships
bringing supplies. Winter passed and with spring the suffering
increased. “We ate our peas by count,” says Champlain. His heart was
wrung by the sufferings of the people, especially of the women and
children. “Nevertheless,” he says, “I was patient, having always good
courage,--and can say with truth that I aided every one to the utmost
that was in my power.” In this extremity in 1629 Quebec was attacked by
English war-ships and was forced to surrender.
Champlain was detained awhile as prisoner in England. Afterwards New
France was by treaty restored to France and Champlain returned to
Quebec where he died Christmas Day, 1635. “Of the pioneers of the North
American forests his name stands foremost on the lists,” says Parkman.
Robert de la Salle
The Explorer of the Mississippi River
The Spanish adventurer, De Soto, in his march westward in 1541, was
the first white man who reached the Mississippi River. Year after year
passed and the Spaniards did not occupy the land along its shores.
Instead, they settled the islands and shores to the south and sought
silver and gold in Mexico and Peru. While the Spaniards were occupying
southern regions, the French were taking possession of northern lands,
penetrating inland along the St. Lawrence River.
The French traders and missionaries who went westward heard stories of
a mighty river not far distant, which flowed to the sea. In the spring
of 1673 two Frenchmen set out in birch canoes to find and explore this
river, hoping thus to reach the Pacific Ocean. These Frenchmen were
Louis Joliet, an explorer in search of the passage to the Pacific, and
Father Marquette, a priest familiar with Indian dialects, who wished
to reach the savages of the wilderness. Joliet and Marquette went up
the St. Lawrence and through the Great Lakes. They were guided by two
Indian boys to the Wisconsin River down which they floated in their
canoes. After several days the explorers landed at a settlement of the
friendly Indian tribe, the Illinois. The peace pipe was smoked and a
banquet was served of Indian meal made into mush, boiled fish, baked
dog, and buffalo meat. Again embarking, the adventurers sailed on till
they reached the place where the Missouri empties into the Mississippi.
The Indian guides informed them that they could ascend the river and
going westward reach a prairie across which their canoes could be
carried; then they could embark on a river which flowed southwest into
a lake; from this issued a river which flowed into the western sea. The
Frenchmen did not follow the course thus pointed out and it was many
years before the truth of the statement was verified. But if you look
on a map you see the Missouri can be ascended to the Platte River, the
source of which is near the Colorado River which flows into the Gulf of
California.
The Frenchmen sailed down the Mississippi as far as the mouth of the
Arkansas River. They were convinced that the stream entered the Gulf of
Mexico and they did not care to encounter the hostile Spaniards or the
warlike Indian tribes which they were told dwelt on the banks of the
lower Mississippi. So they turned back, going up the Illinois River and
passing the marshy prairie which is now the site of the great city of
Chicago. After a journey of more than twenty-five hundred miles, they
reached in September the mission at Green Bay.
Robert de la Salle, a gentleman of Normandy, was in Canada when
Marquette and Joliet returned from their voyage. He was much interested
in their discoveries and he determined to go from the St. Lawrence to
the mouth of the Mississippi. He wished to take possession of the land
in the name of the king of France to whom it was considered that the
whole valley of the great river belonged by virtue of the discoveries
of Marquette and Joliet; he wished also to establish military and
trading posts along the lakes and the river; he hoped that he would
find a passage to the Pacific Ocean. The king gave his consent and aid
to the plan.
La Salle established a fort on Lake Ontario. Not far from Niagara
Falls, he built a vessel which he called the Griffin. This sailed
through Lakes Erie and Huron and Michigan and then was sent back richly
laden with furs. Unfortunately, it was wrecked on the return voyage
with all on board. In the winter of 1680, La Salle returned to the fort
on Lake Ontario to get supplies. In August, 1680, La Salle’s party,
consisting of twenty-three Frenchmen and thirty-one Indians, set out in
birch canoes to explore the Mississippi. Delayed by storms and tempests
and Indian wars, the voyagers did not reach the mouth of the Chicago
River until January, 1682. The canoes were dragged on sledges down the
frozen Chicago River. When they reached the Mississippi, they were
detained by the masses of ice on its waters.
As soon as possible the Frenchmen embarked and sailed down the river,
stopping to get corn and information from Indian tribes on their way
and to give religious instruction. They slept in the wigwams of the
savages and won their hearts by just and kind treatment.
They sailed down the mighty river till they came in sight of the open
sea. On the ninth of April, 1682, La Salle in the name of King Louis
of France took possession of the land which he called Louisiana. The
French flag was raised over the valley of the Mississippi--a territory
three times as large as France. The return voyage was made in safety,
though it was delayed by hostile Indians, want of food and the illness
of La Salle. He did not reach Quebec till the autumn of 1683.
He sailed for France that winter to organize a colony for settling the
southern country discovered by him. The king entered eagerly into the
plan and La Salle was sent with four vessels bearing men and supplies
to establish a colony. Ignorant of the coast, the captain went too far
west and reached Matagorda Bay in Texas early in the spring of 1685. La
Salle wished to seek the mouth of the river, but the captain, impatient
to return, landed the stores and sailed away. La Salle made the best of
matters and finding the climate pleasant and the Indians friendly, he
established a colony there.
Month after month passed, and no supplies were received from France.
Therefore he set out, January, 1687, with twenty men to find the
Mississippi River and make his way to Canada. There he hoped to get
supplies and send letters to France requesting aid for the colony. On
the journey some men rebelled against his authority, killed his nephew
and a faithful Indian, and later shot La Salle himself. “Thus died our
wise commander, constant in adversity, intrepid, generous, engaging,
dexterous, skillful, capable of everything.... He died in the prime
of life, in the midst of his enterprises, without having seen their
success.” He had laid the foundation of French power in the Mississippi
valley, and had established it upon a basis of friendship with the
natives, which made possible its growth in peace and security.
Lords Baltimore of Baltimore
An interesting figure in the Stuart court was that of the first Lord
Baltimore, the Catholic nobleman through whose interest and influence
the colony of Maryland was established. George Calvert--he was not yet
Lord Baltimore--entered public life as the secretary of Sir Robert
Cecil; he won the favor of King James I. and in 1619 he was knighted
and made secretary of state. So far from seeking office, we are
informed that “he disabled himself various ways, but specially that he
thought himself unworthy to sit in that place so lately possessed by
his noble lord and master.”
A few years later he openly connected himself with the Catholics
and resigned his office. He did not, however, lose favor with the
Protestant king who granted him the title of Baron Baltimore of
Baltimore, and confirmed his claim to large estates in Ireland. But
George Calvert’s interest lay in another direction and the remainder
of his life was given to “that ancient, primitive, and heroic work of
planting the world.”
As early as 1609 he had been a member of the Virginia Company and his
position as secretary of state made him intimately acquainted with
the course of exploration and colonization in the New World. At that
time Catholics in England were not allowed liberty of worship. Calvert
desired to establish a colony where men, especially those of his
own faith, might enjoy the free exercise of their religion. In 1620
he purchased a plantation in Newfoundland and the next year he sent
colonists with tools and supplies to found a settlement, which he named
Avalon. “Westward Hoe for Avalon,” by Captain Whitbourne, published
the next year, described in glowing terms the country with its good
fisheries, abundant berries, cherries, and pears, and “red and white
damask roses.” In 1623 the king granted a charter giving Lord Baltimore
practically royal authority over the province. As a sign of sovereign
power, the king of England was to receive a white horse whenever he
visited Avalon.
In 1627 Lord Baltimore for the first time crossed the ocean to the
province so eloquently described by Whitbourne. He found--a stormy
sea beating against a rough peninsula which was broken by stretches
of barren sand, tracts of marshes, hills clothed with stunted,
cone-bearing trees, and narrow spaces of arable land. Desolate as it
was, Lord Baltimore saw Avalon at its best, for it was summer.
In a few weeks he went back to England and the next year he returned to
Avalon with his wife and all his family except his eldest son Cecilius
or Cecil. The hardships of the long, severe winter and the contests
with the French convinced Lord Baltimore that the northern province was
no place for his colony--the twenty thousand pounds he had spent on it
were wasted. He wrote to the king, complaining that “from the middle
of October to the middle of May there is a sad fare of winter upon all
this land,” and requesting a grant of land in a more genial climate,
to which he might remove his colony of forty-six persons. At first he
endeavored to obtain territory south of Virginia, but this was opposed
by the Virginia Company which claimed the land and said it was about to
send colonists thither. Finally it was decided that it would be well to
establish an English colony north of Virginia to keep back the Dutch
and the French who were settling territory claimed by England. Lord
Baltimore received a grant of land on Chesapeake Bay, extending to the
Potomac. But this land he was never to settle or even to see. He died
in April, 1632. The grant thus devolved on his son Cecil, a young man
of twenty-eight, who carried out the plans so dear to his father.
Cecil, who was the real founder of Maryland, never visited the colony;
he sent out settlers and supplies under his younger brother, Leonard.
Leonard was the first governor of Maryland, as the land was called in
honor of the English queen, Henrietta Maria. The charter given Lord
Baltimore granted more absolute power than was ever bestowed on any
other English colonist in the New World. “Cecilius, Absolute Lord of
Maryland and Avalon,” could make peace or war; he had the law-making
power also and the people could merely advise and assent or dissent.
The only tribute required was the yearly payment of two Indian arrows
to the king and of one-fifth of all the gold and silver found in the
land. As soon as the settlers landed, Leonard Calvert established
friendly relations with the Indians whom the Englishmen found to “have
generous natures and requite any kindness shown them.” The peaceful
relations with these Indians, called “Friend Indians” in later
treaties, were never broken.
Sailing up St. Mary’s River, the colonists found a place which pleased
them as a site for a settlement. They purchased it from the Indians
for “axes, hoes, and cloth.” Here St. Mary’s was built in 1634, on the
former site of an Indian village.
From the first the policy of the Maryland colony was “peace, unity, and
religious toleration.” Until it was established, there was no place in
the English colonies in America where Catholics had religious liberty.
In the colony on the Potomac, the Catholics enjoyed the free exercise
of their religion and granted to others the same privilege. This
religious toleration was secured by law in 1649. It was agreed that “no
persons professing to believe in Jesus Christ should be molested in
their religion.”
The chief trouble of the Maryland colony in its early days was with
William Claybourne, a trader from Virginia who had established a
settlement and trading-post on Kent’s Island. This was a part of
the territory afterwards granted to Lord Baltimore. After much
contention and dissension about the matter, in 1646 Claybourne stirred
up a rebellion. Governor Calvert, armed with royal authority, took
forcible possession of the island. A few months later Calvert died,
having appointed as his successor, Thomas Greene, a Catholic and
Royalist.
This “land of the sanctuary,” as Maryland was called, grew in wealth
and prosperity. In 1656 Hammond described it for the benefit of
home-staying Englishmen: “Maryland is (not an Island as is reported,
but) part of that main adjoining to Virginia only separated or
parted from Virginia, by a river of ten miles broad, called Patomack
River,--the commodities and manner of living as in Virginia, the soil
somewhat more temperate (as being more northerly) many stately and
navigable rivers are contained in it, plentifully stored with wholesome
springs, rich and pleasant soil, and so that its extraordinary goodness
hath made it rather desired then envied.”
William Penn
A Famous Quaker
About the middle of the seventeenth century a good deal of attention
was attracted in England to the religious sect called Quakers,
Professors, Friends, or Children of the Light. One of their ablest
exponents was George Fox. He was grave and temperate in life, but so
firm that it was said of him, “If George says _verily_ there is no
altering him.” “Verily” was the strongest word of assent he permitted
himself, obeying literally the Bible command, “Swear not at all.”
The Quakers thought that the Bible only ought to be the rule for men
and churches, that there should be no set forms of worship, and that
men should pray and preach, not at appointed times, but only as moved
by the Spirit. They believed that every man is led by the “inward
light,” or the Spirit of God, saying, “He that gave us an outward
luminary for our bodies, hath given us an inward one for our minds to
act by.” The Quakers refused to pay tithes and taxes to support the
established church and, thinking it wrong to fight, they refused to
serve in the army. At that time hats were worn indoors as well as out,
and men took them off as a token of respect. The Quaker refused to pull
off their hats to men of any rank, uncovering only in prayer. “Hat
honor was invented by men in the Fall,” they said. These Quakers were
recognized by their sober attire,--broad-brimmed hats and sober-colored
clothes,--and by their use of “thee” and “thou” and “thine” instead of
“you” and “yours.” To use the plural forms in addressing one person,
they said, was contrary to grammar, to Biblical usage, and to truth.
[Illustration: WILLIAM PENN]