“For Standish no work was too difficult or dangerous, none too humble or disagreeable. As captain and magistrate, as engineer and explorer, as interpreter and merchant, as a tender nurse in pestilence, a physician at all times, and as the Cincinnatus of his colony, he showed a wonderful versatility of talent and the highest nobility of character.” John Winthrop A Puritan Governor After the death of King James, his son Charles became king. Like his father, he was bent on having his own way; as often happens, his stubbornness made those opposed to him more stubborn. The people refused to submit to his dictation, and many of those who differed from the king in matters of religion and politics came to America, where a new England was being built up. From 1628 to 1640 there were more emigrants from England to America than came during the whole of the century which followed. In 1628 a company of men secured from the Council of New England a patent to a tract of land in Massachusetts between the Merrimac and Charles Rivers and extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean which was thought to be near the Hudson River. John Endicott was sent out that year with a small colony which settled at Salem, Massachusetts. He was a self-willed, blunt man and tried to regulate the affairs of the colony according to his ideas. He made laws against wearing wigs, for instance, and required women to wear veils to church. [Illustration: GOVERNOR JOHN WINTHROP] The first winter was a hard one for the colonists and they were “forced to lengthen out their own food with acorns.” Like the Pilgrims, however, the Puritans, whose religious belief was similar to that of the Pilgrims, held fast their resolution and endured hardship rather than return to old England where they were not free to worship according to their own faith. In March, 1629, a company of prominent and wealthy Puritans secured a charter from the king, giving them the right to make for their colony such laws as they pleased provided they were not contrary to the laws of England. Under this charter six ships came, bringing men, women, children, cattle, arms, and tools, to establish a Puritan commonwealth. One of the six ships was the Mayflower which had brought over the Pilgrims nine years before. The six-weeks voyage seemed “short and speedy” in those days, and the Puritans landed on a June day when the land was fair with summer. How unlike the wintry landing of the Pilgrims! In one year the Salem colony outnumbered the Plymouth colony which had been established nearly ten years.