And here, as illustrative of border life when Rhode Island was a border colony, comes the story of John Clawson's curse. This John Clawson was a hired servant of Roger Williams, who, at the instigation of a desperate fellow by the name of Herendeen, was attacked in the night from behind a thicket of barberry bushes, near the old north burial ground by an Indian named Waumaion. The Indian, who was armed with a broad axe, split open Clawson's chin at the first blow. The wound was mortal, but the wounded man lived long enough to utter his curse--that "Herendeen and his posterity might be marked with split chins and haunted with barberry bushes" forever. The malediction, legend says, was fulfilled, and the descendants of the murderer were still distinguished in the last century by a furrowed chin, and fired up with indignation at the mention of a barberry bush. CHAPTER XIII. COURTS AND ARMY STRENGTHENED.--COMMISSIONERS SENT FROM ENGLAND.--CHARTER REVOKED. Disputes of title fill, as we have seen, a full but monotonous chapter in this part of our history. Among them was the dispute for Potowomut, a neck of land on Coweset Bay which had been purchased of the Indians by order of the Assembly as early as 1659. Bitter disputes soon followed, Warwick claiming it, and individuals both English and Indians disputing the claim. At last the question was disposed of, as was supposed, finally, at a town meeting in 1680, in which it was divided "into fifty equal lots or rights, and the names of the proprietors were inserted on the records." But the very next year we meet it again as a contest between Warwick and Kingston. At last the Assembly interposed, forbidding all occupancy of the land till further orders, warning off intruders, but permitting the Warwick men to mow and improve the meadows as heretofore. Among the questions brought before the Assembly in the time of these disputes, was the question of the power of the Town Council to reject or accept new citizens. The question was brought up by Providence and decided in the affirmative. The form of application for leave to reside has been preserved: "To y^e Towne mett this 15th of December 1680. My request to y^e Towne is; that they woold grant the liberty to reside in y^e Towne during the Townes Approbation, behaving myselfe as a civill man ought to doe, Desireing not to putt y^e Towne to any charge by my residing here; and for what y^e Towne shall cause farther to enquire of me, I shall see I hope to give them a true and sober Answer thereunto. Y^{or} friend and servant Tho. Waters."