Nooks and Corners of the New England CoastDrake, Samuel Adams
History
Nooks and Corners of the New England Coast
Drake, Samuel Adams
New England -- Description and travel
"Sir Bernard, as was said, having taken a Portugal ship, and brought her
into one of our western ports, the seamen that were therein were sent to
the prison adjoining the Castle of Exeter. At the next assizes held at
the castle there, about the 27th of Queen Elizabeth, when the prisoners
of the county were brought to be arraigned before Sergeant Flowerby, one
of the judges appointed for this western circuit at that time, suddenly
there arose such a noisome smell from the bar that a great number of
people there present were therewith infected; whereof in a very short
time after died the said judge, Sir John Chichester, Sir Arthur Bassett,
and Sir Bernard Drake, knights, and justices of the peace there sitting
on the bench; and eleven of the jury impaneled, the twelfth only
escaping; with divers other persons."
Captain John Smith says: "The most northern part I was at was the Bay of
Penobscot, which is east and west, north and south, more than ten
leagues; but such were my occasions I was constrained to be satisfied of
them I found in the bay, that the river ran far up into the land, and
was well inhabited with many people; but they were from their
habitations, either fishing among the isles, or hunting the lakes and
woods for deer and beavers.
"The bay is full of great islands of one, two, six, eight, or ten miles
in length, which divide it into many faire and excellent good harbours.
On the east of it are the Tarrantines, their mortal enemies, where
inhabit the French, as they report, that live with these people as one
nation or family."
If the English had no special reason for self-gratulation in the quality
of the emigrants first introduced into New England, the French have as
little ground to value themselves. In order to people Acadia, De Monts
begged permission of Henri Quatre to take the vagabonds that might be
collected in the cities, or wandering at large through the country. The
king acceded to the request.[10]
[Illustration: FAC-SIMILE OF FIRST MAP ENGRAVED IN NEW ENGLAND.]
Again, in a memoir on the state of the French plantations, the following
passage occurs: "The post of Pentagouet, being at the head of all Acadia
on the side of Boston, appears to have been principally strengthened by
the sending over of men and courtesans that his majesty would have
emigrate there for the purpose of marrying, so that this portion of the
colony may receive the accessions necessary to sustain it against its
neighbors."[11]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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