Disregarding all evil augury, the Ark and Dove, attended by the pinnace, ascended the Potomac. Landing on an island, Calvert planted a cross, claiming the country for Christ and England, and having proceeded about 150 miles, arrived at an Indian village on the eastern bank of the river, called Piscataqua, the chief of which would neither bid him go nor stay, but told him he might do as he liked. Calvert, however, decided to establish his first settlement lower down the Potomac, which he descended, and entering a river now called St. Mary’s, above ten miles from its junction with the Potomac, purchased the little Indian town of Yoacomoco from the natives, who having suffered from the superior tribe of Susquehannahs were now about to desert it. Calvert considered this a good situation for a settlement, and by presents of cloth, axes, hose, and knives, secured the confidence and friendship of the natives, with whom a treaty was entered into, by which the English immediately obtained possession of one-half of the town, the whole of which was surrendered to them after the getting in of harvest. Good faith was maintained on both sides. On the 27th of March, the Catholics came into peaceful possession; and now, at the humble village of St. Mary, religious liberty found its first real home, its only safe home in the whole world. The Ark and Dove, fit emblems of their mission, anchored in the harbour. The native chiefs came down to see the new emigrants and to establish leagues of amity with them; all was peace and security. The Indian women taught the wives of the English strangers to make bread of maize corn, and the warriors of the tribes instructed the men in the mysteries of the chase. Corn-fields and gardens were ready for cultivation; no sufferings had to be endured, no want was apprehended; it seemed as if the colony of Maryland was founded on a blessing. Within six months it had increased greatly both in wealth and population. Memorable as was the commencement of Maryland, still more so was the spirit of her institutions. She was the first asserter of religious toleration in the New World, and whilst religious persecution had even been carried across the seas to their places of refuge by the Puritans, the very men who had fled thither to escape from it in their native country, Maryland bound her governor, by his oath of office, “neither by himself nor by any other, directly or indirectly, to molest any person professing to believe in Jesus Christ for or in respect of religion.” Under these mild institutions and the liberal expenditure of Lord Baltimore, who in the first two years of the settlement expended no less a sum than £40,000 in advancing its interests, the colony prospered wonderfully. Roman Catholics, oppressed by the laws of England, fled hither as to their natural asylum, and hither also came suffering Protestants, fleeing from the intolerance of their Protestant brethren.