[Illustration: FORT SEWALL.] Passing over the causeway and under the gate-way of Fort Sewall, said to have been named from Chief-justice Stephen Sewall,[166] who once taught school in Marblehead, I entered the spacious parade, on which a full regiment might easily be formed. The fort was built about 1742, and until what was so long known as "the late war" with England, remained substantially in its original picturesque condition. A very old man, whom I encountered on my way hither, bemoaned the demolition of the old work, which had been pulled to pieces and made more destructive during the Great Civil War. The walls were originally of rough stone, little capable of withstanding the projectiles of modern artillery. There is another fort on the summit of a rocky eminence that overlooks the approach to the Neck, built also during the Rebellion. When I visited it, the earthen walls of one face had fallen in the ditch, where the remainder of the work bid fair, at no distant day, to follow. There is still remaining in the town the quaint little powder-house built in 1755, with a roof like the cup of an acorn. Seated under the muzzle of one of the big guns of Fort Sewall that pointed seaward, I could descry Baker's Isle with its brace of lights, and the narrow strait through which the _Abigail_ sailed in 1628, with Endicott and the founders of Salem on board. Two years later the _Arabella_ "came to an anchor a little within the island." Winthrop tells us how the storm-tossed voyagers went upon the land at Cape Ann, and regaled themselves with store of strawberries. Boston was settled. The little colony gave its left hand to Salem, and its right to Plymouth. It waxed strong, and no power has prevailed against it. [Illustration: POWDER-HOUSE, 1755.] Little Harbor, north-west of the fort, is the reputed site of the first settlement at Marblehead. On Gerry's Island, which lies close under the shore, was the house of the first regularly ordained minister; the cellar and pebble-paved yard were, not long ago, identified. Near by, on the main-land, is the supposed site of the "Fountain Inn," which, like the "Earl of Halifax," has its romance of a noble gentleman taken in the toils of a pretty wench.[167] Sir Charles Frankland, collector of his Majesty's customs, visits Marblehead, and becomes enamored of the handmaid of the inn, Agnes Surriage. He makes her his mistress, but at length, having saved his life during the great earthquake at Lisbon, she receives the reward of love and heroism at the altar as the baronet's wedded wife. Arthur Sandeyn, who was the first publican in Marblehead, was allowed to keep an ordinary there in 1640. The port was fortified after some fashion as early as 1643-44.