Though much had been gained, the final settlement was not yet reached. While waiting, Roger Williams had his hands full seeing to it that his struggling province across the water was not cheated out of its rights. For one thing, war broke out between the Dutch and English. Naturally, this national struggle caused less important affairs to be pushed aside for the time being. Then the friends of the charter had to fight opposition among persons of high position and influence. So the matter dragged on. In one of his letters describing these drawbacks, Roger Williams did not forget to send his love to his Indian friends. The correspondence was not all one-sided. The people of Providence, in turn, kept Roger Williams in touch with affairs at home. Though they did not always appreciate the great, whole-souled man while he lived quietly among them, whenever they were left to their own devices, they awoke to some realization of his worth. They passed their troubles on to him and asked his advice, as if the poor man had not already enough burdens of his own to carry! They did not stop here. They wrote an earnest letter asking him to accept the governorship of the colony for a year in case the charter should be confirmed. A more ambitious man would eagerly have grasped the opportunity thus offered. He would have seen in it the possibility of power, influence, perhaps riches. Not so Roger Williams. In his own humble, modest way, he was content to go on as before, sacrificing his own interests for those of the colony, whether repaid for his efforts or not. Cromwell was not the only prominent man in England with whom Roger Williams was on intimate terms. He renewed his friendship with Sir Henry Vane and was a frequent visitor at his house--either in his lodgings at Whitehall or at his beautiful country estate Belleau in Lincolnshire. This tried and true friend, having lived in both old and New England, could understand and sympathize with Roger Williams as perhaps nobody else could. He was not only his personal friend, but a friend of the Providence colony as well. “The sheet anchor of our ship,” wrote Roger Williams, “is Sir Henry, who will do as the eye of God leads him.” John Milton was another brilliant man with whom Roger Williams associated during this period. He was the secretary of the Council of State and later became world-famous as the author of “Paradise Lost.” The condition of the great man at this time was pitiable. He was fast growing blind. He said of his affliction in after years: “...., My light is spent Ere half my days in this dark world and wide, And that one talent which is death to hide, Lodged with me useless....”