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THEY ARE COMPELLED TO PUT BACK TWICE.

CHAP. meet oftentimes with many discouragements. For VIII. they had not sailed far, before Mr. Reynolds, the 1620. master of the lesser ship, complained that he found

his ship so leaky, as he durst not put further to sea. Aug. On which they were forced to put in at Dartmouth, 13. Mr. Jones, the master of the biggest ship, likewise putting in there with him; and the said lesser ship was searched, and mended, and judged sufficient for the voyage by the workmen that mended her. On Aug. which both the said ships put to sea the second time. 21. But they had not sailed above a hundred leagues, ere

the said Reynolds again complained of his ship being so leaky as that he feared he should founder in the sea if he held on; and then both ships bore up again, and went in at Plymouth. But being there searched again, no great matter appeared, but it was judged to be the general weakness of the ship.

But the true reason of the retarding and delaying of matters was not as yet discerned. The one of them respecting the ship, (as afterwards was found,) was that she was overmasted; which when she came to her trim in that respect, she did well, and made divers profitable and successful voyages. But secondly, and more especially by the deceit of the master and his company, who were hired to stay a whole

As this account of the voyage is substantially Bradford's, as appears from comparing it with the extracts from his MS. in Prince, and as Morton refers to his Memorial merely to save the labor of copying, and would undoubtedly have inserted it had he caused his uncle's History to be printed, I have deemed it proper to make it a part of the narrative; enclosing it, however, in brackets to distinguish

it from what is contained in the Church records.

1 Grahame, i. 190, errs in saying that "the emigrants were at first driven back by a storm, which destroyed one of their vessels; " and Gorges is wrong in stating that they sailed in three ships, "whereof two proved unserviceable, and so were left behind." See Mass. Hist. Coll. xxvi. 73.

THEY DISMISS ONE OF THEIR VESSELS.

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year in the country; but now fancying dislike, and CHAP. fearing want of victuals, they plotted this stratagem to free themselves, as afterwards was known, and by 1620. Aug. some of them confessed. For they apprehended that the greater ship being of force, and in whom most of the provisions were bestowed, that she should retain enough for herself, whatsoever became of them and the passengers. But so strong was self-love and deceit in this man, as he forgot all duty and former kindness, and dealt thus falsely with them.

These things thus falling out, it was resolved by the whole to dismiss the lesser ship and part of the company with her, and that the other part of the company should proceed in the bigger ship. Which when they had ordered matters in reference thereunto, they made another sad parting, the one ship, viz. the lesser, going back for London, and the other, viz. the MAYFLOWER,2 Mr. Jones being master, proceeding on in the intended voyage.

'Neal, in his History of New England, i. 86, says, "Mr. Cushman and his family, with some others, that were more fearful, went ashore, and did not proceed on the voyage." Baylies, too, in his Memoir of Plymouth, i. 25. says, "about twenty of the passengers were discouraged, and would not reimbark. There is no ground for such an imputation on the courage or perseverance of any of the emigrants. The dismissal of a part was a matter of necessity, as the Mayflower could not carry the whole. Bradford, as quoted by Prince, p. 161, says, "they agree to dismiss her, (the Speedwell,) and those who are willing, to return to London, though this was very grievous and discouraging; Mr. Cushman and family returning with

them." In the text, too, which is
virtually Bradford's, we are told,
"it was resolved by the whole to
dismiss the lesser ship and part of
the company with her."
It was
the captain and crew of the Speed-
well that were unwilling to go, not
his passengers; and the error seems
to have arisen from considering the
word company, in the passage "by
the deceit of the master and his
company," as meaning the emi-
grants instead of the sailors; in
which latter sense it is constantly
used at the present day by mer-
chants and seamen. -Smith and
Purchas say they discharge twenty
of their passengers.

The Mayflower is a ship of re-
nown in the history of the coloni-
zation of New England. She was
one of the five vessels which in

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CHAP.

THEIR LONG AND BOISTEROUS VOYAGE.

These troubles being blown over, and now all be

VIII. ing compact together in one ship, they put to sea 1620. again with a prosperous wind.' But after they had Sept. 6. enjoyed fair winds for a season, they met with many contrary winds and fierce storms, with which their ship was shrewdly shaken, and her upper works made very leaky; and one of the main beams of the midships was bowed and cracked, which put them to some fear that she would not be able to perform the voyage; on which the principal of the seamen and passengers had serious consultation what to do, whether to return or hold on. But the ship proving strong under water, by a screw the said beam was brought into his place again; which being done, and well secured by the carpenter, they resolved to hold their voyage. And so, after many boisterous storms, in which they could bear no sail, but were forced to lie at hull many days together," after long beating at

1629 conveyed Higginson's com-
company to Salem, and also one of
the fleet which in 1630 brought
over Winthrop and his Colony to
Massachusetts Bay. See Savage's
Winthrop, i. 2; Hutchinson's Col-
lection of Papers, p. 33; Hazard,
i. 278.

With 100 persons, besides the
crew of the vessel, according to
Smith and Purchas - which cor-
responds exactly to the number
that arrived at Cape Cod, according
to Gov. Bradford's list, preserved
by Prince, p. 172. Neal, Ilist.
N. E. i. 87, Douglass, i. 370,
Robertson, History of America,
book x., and Marshall, Life of
Washington, i. 91, and again Hist.
Amer. Col. p. 80, err in crowding
the whole 120 into the ship. Old-
mixon, i. 30, who generally out-
does all others in his blunders,
magnifies the number to 150.

2 Prince, p. 161, reads this word wracked in Bradford's MS.

3 Prince, p. 161, quotes Bradford's MS. as saying, 66 a passenger having brought a great iron screw from Holland."

"Nov. 6, dies at sea William Butten, a youth, and servant to Samuel Fuller, being the only passenger who dies on the voyage." Bradford, in Prince, p. 161. One child was born, and called Oceanus, the son of Stephen Hopkins. Bradford, in Prince, p. 172.

On Nov. 3, about a week before their arrival at Cape Cod, King James had signed the patent for the incorporation of the adventurers to the Northern Colony of Virginia, or New England. The Pilgrims, however, did not hear of this till the arrival of the next ship, the Fortune, in Nov. 1621. See Note on page 80, and Prince, p. 180.

THEY FALL IN WITH CAPE COD.

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sea, they fell in with the land called CAPE COD;1 the CHAP. which being made, and certainly known to be it, they were not a little joyful.

After some little deliberation had amongst themselves with the master of the ship, they tacked about to stand to the southward to find some place about Hudson's river (according to their first intentions) for their habitations. But they had not sailed that course

CAPE COD, the most remarkable feature in the configuration of the New England coast, and the first spot in it ever pressed by the footsteps of Englishmen, was discovered May 15, 1602, by Bartholomew Gosnold, who gave it the name on account of the abundance of cod which he caught in its neighbourhood. John Brereton, who was one of the companions of Gosnold, and wrote a Journal of the voyage, says, they first made land May 14, in lat. 43°, and "about three of the clock the same day in the afternoon we weighed, and standing southerly off into the sea the rest of that day and the night following, with a fresh gale of wind, in the morning we found ourselves embayed with a mighty headland. —At length we perceived this headland to be parcel of the main. In five or six hours we pestered our ship so with codfish, that we threw numbers of them overboard again. We sailed round about this headland almost all the points of the compass, the shore very bold, the land somewhat low, full of goodly woods, but in some places plain." Henry Hudson, Aug. 3, 1609, saw land in 41° 43', and sailing north, anchored at the north end of this headland. Five of his men went on shore and "found goodly grapes and rose trees, and brought them aboard with them." Supposing it to be an island, and that he was its first discoverer, he called it New Holland. In a Dutch map, printed at Amsterdam in 1659, by Nicholas John Vischer, the whole

Cape is called Nieuw Hollant, and the northern extremity is called Staaten Hoeck, State Point, or Witte Hoeck, White Point, probably from the white sand hills. The French called it, for the same reason, Cap Blanc. Capt. John Smith, who surveyed the coast in 1614, says, "Cape Cod is a headland of high hills of sand, overgrown with shrubby pines, hursts, and such trash, but an excellent harbour for all weathers. This Cape is made by the main sea, on the one side, and a great bay on the other, in form of a sickle. On it doth inhabit the people of Pawmet." Charles, Prince of Wales, altered its name to Cape James, in honor of his father. But the original name could not be so easily supplanted; “a name," says Cotton Mather," which I suppose it will never lose till shoals of codfish be seen swimming on its highest hills." See Purchas's Pilgrims, iv. 1647; iii. 587; De Laet, India Occidentalis Descriptio, p. 70; Moulton's N. Y. p. 206; N. Y. Hist. Coll. i. 121; Mass. Hist. Coll. xxvi. 119; Mather's Magnalia, i. 43. Brereton's Journal is printed entire in the Mass. Hist. Coll. xxviii. 83.

There can be no doubt that the Pilgrims intended to settle in the neighbourhood of Hudson's river. This is evident from the early narratives written by Bradford and Winslow. As their patent from the Virginia Company did not authorize them to plant themselves north of the 40th degree, they probably de

1620.

Nov. 9.

?

102

THEY STAND SOUTH FOR HUDSON'S RIVER.

CHAP. above half a day before they fell amongst perilous VIII. shoals and breakers,' and they were so far entangled 1620. therewith as they conceived themselves in great danger; and the wind shrinking upon them withal, they

Nov.

9.

signed to settle south of the Hudson, somewhere in New Jersey. But head winds, the shoals and breakers of Cape Cod, and the lateness of the season, conspired to prevent their original purpose. As Belknap says, ii. 188, "having been so long at sea, the sight of any land was welcome to women and children; the new danger was formidable; and the eagerness of the passengers to be set on shore was irresistible."

Morton, in his Memorial, gives another account of the matter. He says, p. 34, "Their putting into this place, (Cape Cod harbour,) was partly by reason of a storm, by which they were forced in, but more especially by the fraudulency and contrivance of Mr. Jones, the master of the ship; for their intention, as is before noted, and his engagement, was to Hudson's river. But some of the Dutch having notice of their intentions, and having thoughts about the same time of erecting a plantation there likewise, they fraudulently hired the said Jones, by delays while they were in England, and now under pretence of the danger of the shoals, &c. to disappoint them in their going thither.' He adds, in a note, "Of this plot betwixt the Dutch and Mr. Jones I have had late and certain intelligence." But the contemporary narratives, written by Bradford and Winslow, say not a word about this treachery of the captain; nor does Bradford's History, as quoted by Prince, p. 162, who is therefore obliged to derive this statement from Morton. Morton is the first to mention it, and he does it in a book printed in 1669, half a century after the event is said to have occurred. He says, it

is true, that he "had late and certain intelligence of this plot." If it had been early intelligence, it would have been more certain. But Morton was only eleven years old when he came over with his father to Plymouth in 1623; and in 1669, when he published his book, most of the first comers were dead, who could have furnished credible information on this point. They had died, and "given no sign❞— not even lisped a syllable of complaint against the master of the Mayflower. It was too late then to get certain intelligence of a fact that had slumbered for fifty years, and which, if well founded, would from the first landing have been notorious, and had a place in every account that was written of the Colony. The silence of Bradford and Winslow seems conclusive on the point. — Yet this story has been repeated from Morton in an endless series by Hubbard, Mather, Prince, Neal, Hutchinson, Belknap, Holmes, Baylies, and Grahame, down to the present time. Moulton, in his unfinished but valuable History of New York, p. 355, was the first to question it. I know not why Oldmixon, i. 29, and Grahame, i. 190, call Jones a Dutchman.

The Mayflower probably made the Cape towards its northern extremity. The perilous shoals and breakers, among which she became entangled after sailing above half a day south, (or south-south-west, as the contemporary account states, in Bradford's Journal,) were undoubtedly those which lie off the southeastern extremity of the Cape, near Monamoy Point. The Pollock Rip, the most considerable of these, corresponds to the "roaring" shoals mentioned by Bradford, in Prince,

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