f the Puritan
exodus to America. In the next chapter we shall see how the still more
arbitrary policy of his ill-fated son all at once gave new dimensions to
that exodus and resulted in the speedy planting of a high-spirited and
powerful New England.

CHAPTER III.

THE PLANTING OF NEW ENGLAND.

When Captain George Weymouth in the summer of 1605 sailed into the
harbour of Plymouth in Devonshire, with his five kidnapped savages and
his glowing accounts of the country since known as New England, the
garrison of that fortified seaport was commanded by Sir Ferdinando
Gorges. The Christian name of this person now strikes us as rather odd,
but in those days it was not so uncommon in England, and it does not
necessarily indicate a Spanish or Italian ancestry for its bearer.
Gorges was a man of considerable ability, but not of high character. On
the downfall of his old patron the Earl of Essex he had contrived to
save his own fortunes by a course of treachery and ingratitude. He had
served in the Dutch war against Spain, and since 1596 had been military
governor of Plymouth. The sight of Weymouth's Indians and the recital of
his explorations awakened the interest of Gorges in the colonization of
North America. He became one of the most active members of the Plymouth,
or North Virginia, Company established in the following year. It was he
who took the leading part in fitting out the two ships with which John
Smith started on his unsuccessful expedition in 1615. In the following
years he continued to send out voyages of exploration, became largely
interested in the fisheries, and at length in 1620 succeeded in
obtaining a new patent for the Plymouth Company, by which it was made
independent of the London Company, its old yoke-fellow and rival. This
new document created a corporation of forty patentees who, sitting in
council as directors of their enterprise, were known as the Council for
New England. The president of this council was King James's unpopular
favourite the Duke of Buckingham, and its most prominent members
were the earls of Pembroke and Lenox, Sir Ferdinando Gorges, and
Shakespeare's friend the Earl of Southampton. This council was empowered
to legislate for its American territory, to exercise martial law there
and expel all intruders, and to exercise a monopoly of trade within the
limits of the patent. Such extensive powers, entrusted to a company of
which Buckingham was the head, excited popular indignat