162

THE SHALLOP RETURNS TO CAPE COD.

CHAP. and found divers cornfields, and little running brooks,

IX.

a place very good for situation. So we returned to 1620. our ship' again with good news to the rest of our peo14. ple, which did much comfort their hearts.

Dec.

greatness is in the soul of man?
Here is a stone which the feet of a
few outcasts pressed for an instant;
and this stone becomes famous; it
is treasured by a great nation; its
very dust is shared as a relic. And
what has become of the gateways
of a thousand palaces? Who cares
for them?"-Reeves's Trans.

1 They left the Mayflower in
Cape Cod harbour, December 6,
and were three days in getting to

Plymouth. They probably started on their return to the ship on the 13th, and striking across the bay, a distance of 25 miles, reached her on the 14th. They found that the day after their leaving the vessel, December 7, Dorothy, the wife of William Bradford, who was one of the party in the shallop, fell overboard, and was drowned. See Prince, p. 165.

CHAPTER X.

OF THEIR LANDING AND SETTLING AT NEW PLYMOUTH.

X.

Dec.

On the 15th day we weighed anchor to go to the CHAP. place we had discovered; and coming within two leagues of the land, we could not fetch the harbour, but 1620. - were fain to put round' again towards Cape Cod, our 15. course lying west, and the wind was at northwest. But it pleased God that the next day, being Saturday the 16th day, the wind came fair, and we put to sea again, and came safely into a safe harbour; and within half an hour the wind changed, so as if we had been letted but a little, we had gone back to Cape Cod.

This harbour is a bay greater than Cape Cod, compassed with a goodly land; and in the bay two fine islands, uninhabited, wherein are nothing but woods,

In the original, roome; manifestly an error of the press. Clark's island is now the only island in Plymouth harbour. It has sometimes been supposed that a shoal, called Brown's island, which lies near the entrance of the harbour, about half a mile east by north of Beach point, was above water at the time the Pilgrims arrived. Gov. Winthrop, in his History of New England, i. 169, has the following record: "Octo

ber 6, 1635, two shallops going,
laden with goods, to Connecticut,
were taken with an easterly storm,
and cast away upon Brown's island,
near the Gurnet's Nose, and the
men all drowned." Dr. Freeman,
in his note on this place, considers
this passage as confirming the sup
position. But Morton, in record-
ing the same event in his Memo-
rial, p. 182, says, “the night being
dark and stormy, they ran upon
a skirt of a flat that lieth near

16.

164

PLYMOUTH HARBOUR.

sassafras, vines, and other This bay is a most hope

CHAP. oaks, pines, walnuts, beech, X. trees' which we know not. 1620. ful place; innumerable store of fowl, and excellent good; and cannot but be of fish in their seasons;

Dec. 18.

skate, cod, turbot, and herring, we have tasted of; abundance of muscles, the greatest and best that ever we saw; crabs and lobsters, in their time, infinite. It is in fashion like a sickle, or fish-hook.5

Monday, the 18th day, we went a land, manned

the mouth of the harbour." This 3 Skate and cod are still caught
seems conclusive of the point that
Brown's island was then under
water. The other island I suppose
was Saquish, which, although a
peninsula, very much resembles an
island, and may very naturally
have been mistaken for one; or at
that time the water may have
flowed across the narrow neck
which now unites it with the Gur-
net, and completely isolated it.
Oldmixon, i. 30, commits an egre-
gious blunder when he states, that
the harbour (Plymouth) was a
bay larger than Cape Cod, and two
fine islands, Rhode Island and
Elizabeth Island, in it!”

The only forest trees now on Clark's island are three red cedars, which appear to be very old, and are decaying. This wood was the original growth of the island, a tree which loves the vicinity of rocks, which abound here. A few years since, the present proprietor of the island, whilst digging out some large roots on its margin, found a number of acorns four feet beneath the surface. Blackberry vines are still found there. On Saquish there is one solitary tree, which has weathered the storms of ages. In 1815 there were two. In earlier times the town forbade felling trees at Saquish within 40 feet of the bank. See Mass. Hist. Coll. xiii. 182.

2 Wild fowl are yet abundant in Plymouth harbour.

here. The European turbot, it is
well known, is not found in our
waters. The first settlers probably
gave this name to the flounder or
small halibut. See Storer's Report
on the Fishes of Massachusetts,
pp. 140, 145, 146. Higginson, in
his New-England's Plantation,enu-
merates the turbot among other
fish. T. Morton, in his New Eng-
lish Canaan, ch. vii. says,
"there
is a large-sized fish, called halibut,
or turbot; some are taken so big
that two men have much ado to
haul them into the boat." Wood,
ch. ix. says, "the halibut is not
much unlike a plaice or turbot,
some being two yards long, and
one wide, and a foot thick." And
Josselyn, p. 26, says, some will
have the halibut and turbot all
one; others distinguish them; there
is no question to be made of it but
that they are distinct kinds of fish."
The turbot and plaice are very
much alike in appearance. See
the figures of them in Yarrell's
British Fishes, i. 209, 233.

There are muscles in Plymouth, but generally small, and clams; the Journal probably refers to the latter. Crabs and lobsters are very abundant in the summer season.

5 The form of Plymouth Bay, which includes Kingston and Duxbury harbours, is accurately described.

The words "in the long-boat" seem to be omitted.

THE TREES AND PLANTS OF PLYMOUTH.

165

X.

with the master of the ship and three or four of the CHAP. sailors. We marched along the coast in the woods some seven or eight miles,' but saw not an Indian nor 1620. an Indian house; only we found where formerly had 18. been some inhabitants, and where they had planted

2

their corn.
We found not any navigable river, but
four or five small running brooks of very sweet
fresh water, that all run into the sea.

4

The land for the crust of the earth is, a spit's depth, excellent black mould, and fat in some places; two or three great oaks, but not very thick, pines, walnuts, beech, ash, birch, hazel, holly, asp, sassafras in abundance, and vines every where, cherry trees, plum trees, and many others which we know not. Many kinds of herbs we found here in winter, as strawberry leaves innumerable, sorrel, yarrow, carvel, brooklime, liverwort, water

5

Which ever way the travellers went, they could not have walked seven miles; because northwest, at the distance of four miles, they would have come to Jones's river in Kingston, and southeast, at the distance of three miles, to Eel river. These rivers, though not large, cannot be denominated brooks. F.

North of the village, towards Kingston, there are five brooks, which were named by the original planters First Brook, Second Brook, &c. in order, beginning from the town. Half a mile south of the village is Wellingsly Brook, by the side of which dwelt Secretary Morton. Double Brook, or Shingle Brook of the first settlers, runs northerly by the post road to Sandwich, and unites with Eel river. Beaver Dam Brook is in the village of Manomet Ponds. Indian Brook is still further south on the shore. See Mass. Hist. Coll. xiii. 178, and Thacher's Plymouth, p. 322.

3 See note on page 123.

6

4 This is an exact description of
a strip of land, between the hills
and the sea-shore, where the gar-
dens now are.
The soil too is
good on Clark's Island, Saquish,
and the Gurnet.

5 The wild grape, both white
and red, the blackberry and the
raspberry, are found here now.

All the trees here enumerated are now found in Plymouth. The asp, or aspen, was probably our native poplar. The beach, about three miles long, which lies in front of the village, extending from Eel river, N. N. West, and protecting the harbour, was originally well wooded. Towards the northern part, till 1770, it was quite thickly covered with trees. The inner side of the beach was covered with plum and wild-cherry trees, and the swamp with large pitch pine and beech wood. Beech plums, wild gooseberries, and white grapes were found here in great quantities in their proper season. See a list of the trees, in Mass.

Dec.

166

JONES'S RIVER, IN KINGSTON.

CHAP. cresses, great store of leeks and onions,1 and an excelX. lent strong kind of flax and hemp. Here is sand, 1620. gravel, and excellent clay, no better in the world, excellent for pots, and will wash like soap, and great store of stone, though somewhat soft, and the best water that ever we drunk; and the brooks now begin to be full of fish.5 That night, many being weary with marching, we went aboard again.

Dec.

19.

4

6

The next morning, being Tuesday, the 19th of December, we went again to discover further; some went on land, and some in the shallop. The land we found as the former day we did; and we found a creek, and went up three English miles, a very pleasant river at full sea. A bark of thirty tons may go up; but at low water scarce our shallop could pass. This place we had a great liking to plant in, but that it was so far from our fishing, our principal profit, and so encompassed with woods, that we should be in much danger of the salvages; and our number being so little, and so much ground to clear; so as we thought good to

Hist. Coll. xiii. 165, 172, 206;
Thacher's Plymouth, p. 328.

These were probably the alli-
um Cañadense.

The Indian hemp (apocynum cannabinum.) Wood says, ch. 5, "this land likewise affords hemp and flax naturally;" and Captain John Smith mentions "a kind or two of flax, wherewith they make nets, lines and ropes, both small and great, very strong for their quantities." T. Morton too, says, ch. 2, "there is hemp, that naturally groweth, finer than our hemp of England." See Mass. Hist. Coll. xxvi. 120.

The sand, gravel and clay are aptly described. There is not much stone at Plymouth; a few bowlders of sienite.