of fresh
water, in the waters of which is a considerable island, and it was on
this that these adventurers built the first habitation in this section
of New England of which there is any authentic account. There they were,
in a sense, safe from the Indians and from wild animals.

When Gosnold prepared to return to England in his vessel, the "Concord,"
with a cargo of native products, such as sassafras, cedar, etc., those
who had planned to remain and settle returned with him, fearing that
they might not share in the expected profits. But they could not take
back with them the cellar to the house they had built, and what little
vestige of the hole that still remains in that island within an island
is to-day pointed out as the spot where the first white settler's house
was built hereabouts. Unfortunately for the picturesqueness and poetry
of this historic incident, modern civilization has utilized the island
as a hen-yard, and the historic cellar as a chicken-roost.

[Illustration: City Hall]

[Illustration: Depot]

[Illustration: Front St.]

[Illustration: FISH MARKETS ALONG THE WHARVES.]

The real history of Southern Massachusetts began in June, 1664, when the
General Court of the Plymouth Colony passed an order that "all that
tracte of land called and known by the name of Acushena,[1] Ponogansett,
and Coaksett, is allowed by the court to bee a townshipe, and said towne
bee henceforth ... called and knowne by the name of Dartmouth." In
November, 1652, Wamsutta and his father, Massasoit, had signed a deed
conveying to William Bradford, Capt. Standish, Thomas Southworth, John
Winslow, John Cooke, and their associates all the land lying three miles
eastward from a river called the Coshenegg to Acoaksett, to a flat rock
on the western side of the said harbor, the conveyance including all
that land from the sea upward "so high that the English may not be
annoyed by the hunting of the Indians, in any sort, of their cattle."
The price paid for this tract was, thirty yards of cloth, eight
moose-skins, fifteen axes, fifteen hoes, fifteen pairs of breeches,
eight blankets, two kettles, one cloak, two pounds wampum, eight pairs
stockings, eight pairs shoes, one iron pot, and ten shillings in other
commodities. This immense tract had twenty miles of sea-coast, not to
mention harbors, etc., and represents, besides the present township of
Dartmouth, New Bedford, Fairhaven, Westport, and Acushnet.[2]

[1] In the old records