that they "aimed not at new discipline, but sovereignty," and action was taken to bring them into subjection. Much had been made of the fact that Endicott had caused a part of the red-cross of St. George to be cut out of the English flag at Salem, and that many of the citizens refused to follow it *before it was so mutilated. These things were cited as evidence of disloyalty to the crown. On the contrary, it was loyalty to bigotry. Endicott regarded the cross in the flag as a "relic of Anti-Christ," because the Pope had given it to the King of England as an ensign of victory. The whole aspect of the act was theological, not political; but the royalists chose to interpret it otherwise, and it was one of the reasons for tyrannical action toward the colony, when orders were issued to the authorities of Massachusetts to produce their charter before the Privy Council in England. This was followed, in the spring of 1634, by the appointment of an arbitrary special commission for the colonies, with Laud, the primate, at their head. He and his associates received full power over the American colonies to organize new governments and dictate laws; to regulate public worship, and to inflict punishments and revoke charters.

When the news of these proceedings reached New England, with a rumor that a governor-general or viceroy was on his way, the authorities of Massachusetts took the boldest measures. Fortifications were ordered, and three thousand dollars-then a large sum for the poor colonists-were raised to pay for them; and it was resolved not to receive a governor appointed by the crown. They determined to resist as long as possible. It was at that juncture that the great emigration just spoken of took place.

CHAPTER VII.

THEOLOGICAL DISPUTES-HENRY VANE MADE GOVERNOR OF MASSACHUSETTS-MRS. HUTCHINSON AND HER FATE-ENGLISH POWER RESPECTED BY THE SAVAGES-THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERACY-FIRST COINAGE IN AMERICA THE PURITAN AND HIS WAYS-PURITAN MAGISTRATES OUTWITTED-DEALINGS WITH A THIEF-APOLOGY FOR INTOLERANCE-PERSECUTION OF FRIENDS OR QUAKERS-CHARLES I. BEHEADED-CROMWELL-MONARCHY

RESTORED

FATE OF THE KING'S JUDGES-GOFFE AND WHALLEY-MASSACHUSETTS AND CHARLES II.

W

HEN the fiery Hugh Peters and the gentler Henry Vane arrived at Boston in 1635, the colony was somewhat excited by theological disputes. The new-comers engaged in the controversy, and it soon took the form of a bitter quarrel. Peters was a rigid Puritan preacher just from a six years exile in Holland, and he was made pastor of the church vacated by Roger Williams when he was banished, whose doctrines the new preacher denounced, and whose adherents he expelled from the congregation.

Vane was only twenty-three years of age. He was a son of one of the king's high officers of state, and a young man of purest morals. Forsaking the preferments which awaited him at court, he fled to New England to enjoy the freedom of simple worship among those whose cause he had espoused. In after years Milton praised him for his goodness, and Clarendon regarded him as equal to Hampden in statesmanship.

The colonists regarded the advent of Vane as a token of the speedy emigration to Massachusetts of leading men of the realm. They received him with open arms, and in the delirium of their joy they seemed to forget their veterans, and elected him governor of the colony. With broad and generous views, he defended the tenets of Mr. Williams and Mrs. Hutchinson in the controversy-the leading points of which have been defined in the Seventh Chapter of the Second Book. This gave intensity to the partisan feeling, both in politics and theology, and a strong opposition to Vane was organized. After a tempestuous year Vane was defeated at the next annual election, when he returned to England.

Soon after Vane's departure Mrs. Hutchinson was banished, and she settled in Rhode Island. There she became a widow. Dreading the perse

cutions of bigots which menaced her, she left New England and took up her abode within the domain of New Netherland, among the sons of the forest. Her cabin was near the present village of New Rochelle, in Westchester county, and with her dwelt all her family, in peace, until the wickedness of Governor Kieft excited the wrath of the Indians. With blind fury they swept through the forest destroying every white settler and settlement. Mrs. Hutchinson did not escape. She and all her family, excepting a grand

daughter, fair and curly-haired, eight years of age, were murdered. Her house and barns were burned; her cattle were butchered, and her grandchild was carried away captive. The young warrior who spared her life took her tenderly in his arms and soothed her with caresses, while an attendant bore upon a pole the scalps of some of her kinsfolk. When, four years afterward, little Anna Collins was delivered to the Dutch governor at New Amsterdam to be sent to her friends at Boston in accordance with the terms of a treaty, she had forgotten her own language and was unwilling to leave her Indian friends.

THE LITTLE CAPTIVE.

The good results of the war with the Pequods promised future security to the New England colonists against dangers from the wrath of the savages. The power of the English manifested in that war made the Indians peacefully inclined for a whole generation of time. Emigration, stimulated by persecution, began to flow into New England in a copious stream. The exodus of Puritans from British shores, and the amazing development of a republican state in America, soon excited the jealousy and the fears of the church and the government. They put forth their strength to stay the tide, as we have observed, in vain. Other causes effected what royal decrees and armed men could not do.

CHAP. VII.

THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERACY.

385

Troubles in England which threatened the overthow of the monarchy and the hierarchy or church establishment withdrew the attention of both from the distant colonies; and when the civil war that ensued promised better times for the lovers of freedom at home, emigration to America almost ceased.

Meanwhile the ties of interest and common sympathy united the struggling colonists in New England. They were natives of the same country, and were the social and political products of persecution-alike exposed to the weapons of hostile Indians and the greed for territory and power of the French and Dutch on their eastern and western borders. They were equally menaced with punishment by the parent government for non-conformity in matters of state and religion. They were, in fact, one people, bound by interwoven interests. Therefore when the civil war in Old England broke out in 1641, and the New England colonists, numbering more than twenty thousand, with fifty villages, almost forty churches, and their commerce expanding and manufactures of cotton from Barbadoes making them independent of the mother country so far, the aspect of the present and future made them seriously contemplate the establishment of a new nation. No tie of gratitude exacted their allegiance to the British government. On the contrary, their happiness in freedom was the result of neglect and oppression, rather than of care and protection. In 1643, the British Parliament acknowledged that "the plantations in New England had, by the blessing of the Almighty, had good and prosperous success without any public charge to the parent state.'

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A confederation of New England colonies for mutual defence had been proposed by Connecticut immediately after the war with the Pequods. When the crown threatened to deprive Massachusetts of her charter, in 1638, the other colonies counselled resistance, and the people of the Bay threatened secession from the British realm. Now, relieved of the pressure of royal rule under royal displeasure, the inhabitants of New England resolved to unite in a political league. In May, 1643, deputies from the colonies of Plymouth, Connecticut and New Haven met those of Massachusetts in Boston. They very soon agreed upon twelve articles of Confederation, and constituted a confederacy under the title of "The United Colonies of New England." That written agreement was signed on the 20th of August following. Rhode Island and the settlements in New Hampshire and Maine asked to be admitted to the Union, but were denied, chiefly, as Winthrop said, "because they ran a different course from us, both in their ministry and civil administration." They would not bend to the dictates of Massachusetts in matters which concerned the conscience.

Whereupon, as we have observed, Rhode Island, which refused required allegiance to Plymouth, took immediate and successful steps to procure an independent charter. See Chapter VII, Book II.

The New England Confederacy-the harbinger of the United States of America-was simply a league of independent provinces, as were our thirteen States under the "Articles of Confederation," as we shall observe hereafter, each jealously guarding its own privileges and rights against any encroachments of the "general government." That central body was really no government at all. It was composed of a Board of Commissioners consisting of two church members from each colony, who were to meet annually or oftener if required. Their duty was to consider circumstances and recommend measures for the general good. They had no executive nor independent legislative powers, their recommendations becoming laws only after the separate colonies had acted upon and approved them. The doctrine of State supremacy was controlling.

That famous league, of which Massachusetts assumed the control because of its greater population and its being a "perfect republic," remained in existence more than forty years, during which period the government of England was changed three times. Unlike the Virginians, the New Englanders sympathized with the English republicans, and found in Oliver Cromwell, the ruler of England next to the beheaded Charles the First, a sincere friend and protector. The colony of Massachusetts, in particular, prospered. A profitable commerce between that colony and the West India Islands was created. That trade brought bullion, or uncoined gold and silver, into the colony, which led, in 1652, to the exercise of an act of sovereignty on the part of the authorities of Massachusetts by the establishment of a mint. It was authorized by the General Assembly, in 1651, and the following year silver coins of the denominations of three-pence, six-pence, and twelvepence, or shilling, were struck. This was the first coinage within the territory of the United States.

The Puritan of Massachusetts, at this time, was the straitest of his sect-an unflinching egotist who regarded himself as eminently his "brother's keeper," whose constant business was to save his fellow-men from sin and error; sitting in judgment upon their belief and actions with the authority of a God-chosen high-priest. His laws, found on the statute-books of the colony or divulged in the records of court proceedings, exhibit the salient points in his stern and inflexible character as a self-constituted censor, and a conservator of the moral and spiritual destiny of his fellow-mortals. He imposed a fine upon every woman who should cut her hair like that of a He forbade all gaming for amusement or gain, and would not allow

man.