, and to which much more might be added,
as to the worth and private character of America's greatest statesman,
whose record of distinguished public service will adorn the pages of his
country's history with unfading lustre long after the unjust aspersions
on his character shall have passed into oblivion forever.

FOOTNOTES:

[B] The _Atlantic Monthly_.

[C] Speech at Dartmouth Webster Centennial Dinner, Boston, 1882.

[D] John Colby was the husband of Mr. Webster's eldest sister, who died
many years before the visit here referred to. He was known as a great
sceptic in religious matters in early life, and hence Mr. Webster's
earnest desire to visit him soon after he heard of Mr. Colby's
conversion.

FORTY YEARS OF FRONTIER LIFE IN THE POCOMTUCK VALLEY.

BY HON. GEORGE SHELDON.

One result of John Eliot's attempt to civilize the Massachusetts Indians
was, that in 1663 the General Court granted to the town of Dedham eight
thousand acres of wilderness, as compensation for the territory taken by
the apostle for his settlement at Natick. After an examination of
various localities, Dedham selected a tract upon the far away lands of
the Pocomtucks, bought out the rights of the Indians who claimed it, and
in 1665 laid out the grant there. This land was divided into five
hundred and twenty-three shares, or rights, called "cow-commons," and
held by each freeholder of Dedham, according to his interest in the
undivided land in the old township; and it was paid for by a general
town tax. Fractions of a cow-common were called sheep-commons, five of
which equalled a cow-common. These shares were offered for sale to such
men as Dedham should approve. The required standard of character does
not appear, but this regulation was no dead letter, as the town records
testify; and picked men only were allowed a foothold on this new
possession. We may therefore suppose that it was a goodly body of men
which gathered, about 1671-5, on the virgin soil in the lower valley of
the Pocomtuck River. Here were the headquarters of the Pocomtuck
Indians, whose chieftains were at the head of the confederate clans in
the Connecticut valley. In 1663, the date of the grant, the Pocomtucks
were engaged in a successful campaign against the powerful Mohawks; but,
before the compass and chain of the surveyor had been called into
requisition to lay out the bounds of the grant, the majority of this
tribe had been swept off by a retaliatory invasion