Fortunately for Standish, the Turk was satisfied with the morsel he had already gotten into his capacious maw, and did not pursue the bigger ship; so that he escaped a life of Eastern servitude, and safely reached the English soil. Wasting no time, he hastened to meet the London partners; and so skilful was his diplomacy, that he made arrangements for the gradual absorption of the Plymouth debt by the settlers, “taking up a hundred and fifty pounds of it on the spot, though at fifty per cent. interest, which he bestowed in trading and in the purchase of such commodities as he knew to be requisite for colonial use.”[525] In the spring of 1626, he returned to Plymouth,[526] bringing with him the mournful intelligence of the death of Cushman in England and of Robinson in Leyden,[527] a double bereavement to the Pilgrim pioneers. The loss of no other two men could have dealt so stunning a blow to the infant settlement. Plymouth was almost buffeted from its feet. The loss seemed irreparable to human eyes; but God, who uses his servants, delights to show the world that they are not indispensable to him. Cushman had been “as their right hand to the Pilgrims, and for divers years had done and agitated all their business with the Adventurers, to the great advantage of his friends.”[528] But Robinson was mourned with a peculiar sorrow. Attached to their great teacher by the tenderest personal ties, by many favors rendered and received, by marriage vows plighted at his altar, by mutual perils undergone for a common faith, by expectation of his arrival and reunion on the bleak New England strand, is it strange that Plymouth at large wept sore for him, and plucked its beard? “Robinson’s powerful ascendency over the minds of his associates, acquired by eminent talents and virtues, had been used disinterestedly and wisely for the common good. With great courage and fortitude, he had equal gentleness and liberality; and his intellectual accomplishments and the generosity of his affections inspired mingled love and admiration. Though he passed his life in the midst of controversy, it was so far from narrowing his mind, that his charity towards dissenters distinguished him among the divines of his day as much as his abilities and learning, while his broad and tolerant views continued to ripen and expand as he grew towards age,”[529] and bloomed into the grave. In especial he won the benediction of the seventh beatitude; for he was famous as a peacemaker, and there are many instances of reconciliation between those at variance effected by his fine Christian tact.[530] “He fell sick Saturday morning, February 22, 1625. Next day he taught twice; but in the week, grew feebler every day, and quit this life on the 1st of March. All his friends came freely to him; and if prayers, tears, or means, could have saved his life, he had not gone hence.”[531]