New England was at this time England in little, with troubles of its own; but, having imitated the mother country in introducing supervision of the press, it also started in to investigate the printers of the colony, two in number, seeking to win a smile of approval from the foolish man on the throne. With due solemnity the inquisition was [5]made. Green could show that all then passing through his press had been properly licensed. 1 See the chapters on Green and Johnson in Littlefield, The Early Massachusetts Press, 197, 209. 2 L'Estrange was called the "Devil's blood hound." Col. S. P., Dom. 1663-1664, 616. Johnson, less fortunate, was caught with one unlicensed piece--"The Isle of Pines." A fine of five pounds was imposed upon him, as effectual in suppressing him as though it had been one of five thousand pounds. He could now turn with relish to two books then on his press, "Meditations on Death and Eternity" and the "Righteous Man's Evidence for Heaven;" for Massachusetts Bay, with its then powerful rule of divinity without religion, or religion without mercy, held out small hope of his meeting such a fine within the expedition of his natural life. But he made his submission, petitioned the General Court in properly repentant language, acknowledged his fault, his crime, and promised amendment{1} The fine was not collected, and the principal result of the incident was to further the very natural union of Johnson and Green, but with Johnson as the lesser member in importance. No copy of Marmaduke Johnson's issue of the "Isle of Pines" has come to light in a period of 248 years. It might well be supposed that the authorities caught him before the tract had gone to press, and so snuffed it out completely. Our sapient bibliographers have dismissed the matter in rounded phrase: "'The Isle of Pines' was a small pamphlet of the Baron Munchausen order, which in its day passed through several editions in England and on the Continent,"{2} a description which would fit a hundred titles of the period. In July, 1917, Sotheby announced the sale of a portion of the Americana collected by [6]"Bishop White Kennett (1660-1728) and given by him to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts." 1 The petition it in Littlefield, i. 248. 2 Mats. Hist. Soc. Proceedings, xi. 247. Lot No. 113 was described as follows: [Neville (Henry)] The Isle of Pines, or a late Discovery of a fourth Island in Terra Australis, Incognita, being a True Relation of certain English persons who in the dayes of Queen Elizabeth, making a Voyage to the East Indies, were cast away and wracked upon the Island, wanting the frontispiece, head-line of title and some pagination cut into, Bishop Kenneths signature on title. sm. 4to S. G. for Allen Banks, 1668.