his place was not near their own town, the men of Plymouth
claimed it. The dispute was amicably arranged by Roger Conant, an
independent settler who had withdrawn from Plymouth because he did not
fully sympathize with the Separatist views of the people there. The
next step was for the Dorchester adventurers to appoint Conant as their
manager, and the next was for them to abandon their enterprise, dissolve
their partnership, and leave the remnant of the little colony to shift
for itself. The settlers retained their tools and cattle, and Conant
found for them a new and safer situation at Naumkeag, on the site of the
present Salem. So far little seemed to have been accomplished; one more
seemed added to the list of failures.

But the excellent John White, the Puritan rector of Trinity Church in
Dorchester, had meditated carefully about these things. He saw that
many attempts at colonization had failed because they made use of unfit
instruments, "a multitude of rude ungovernable persons, the very scum of
the land." So Virginia had failed in its first years, and only succeeded
when settled by worthy and industrious people under a strong government.
The example of Plymouth, as contrasted with Wessagusset, taught a
similar lesson. We desire, said White, "to raise a bulwark against the
kingdom of Antichrist." Learn wisdom, my countrymen, from the ruin which
has befallen the Protestants at Rochelle and in the Palatinate; learn
"to avoid the plague while it is foreseen, and not to tarry as they did
till it overtook them." The Puritan party in England was numerous and
powerful, but the day of strife was not far off and none might foretell
its issue. Clearly it was well to establish a strong and secure retreat
in the New World, in case of disaster in the Old. What had been done at
Plymouth by a few men of humble means might be done on a much greater
scale by an association of leading Puritans, including men of wealth and
wide social influence. Such arguments were urged in timely pamphlets, of
one of which White is supposed to have been the author. The matter was
discussed in London, and inquiry was made whether fit men could be found
"to engage their persons in the voyage." "It fell out that among others
they lighted at last on Master Endicott, a man well known to divers
persons of good note, who manifested much willingness to accept of the
offer as soon as it was tendered." All were thereby much encouraged, the
schemes of White too