The Sovereign Power who nature rules
Hath said so be it
But poor blip' mortals are sic fools
They canna see it.

"Nae doubt that He who first did mate us
Has fixed our lot as sure as fate is,
An' when He wounds He disna hate us,
But anely this,
He'll gar the ills which here await us
Yield lastin' bliss."

In the early part of the eighteenth century a considerable number of
Presbyterians of Scotch descent, from the north of Ireland, emigrated to
the New World. In the spring of 1719, the inhabitants of Haverhill, on
the Merrimac, saw them passing up the river in several canoes, one of
which unfortunately upset in the rapids above the village. The following
fragment of a ballad celebrating this event has been handed down to the
present time, and may serve to show the feelings even then of the old
English settlers towards the Irish emigrants:--

"They began to scream and bawl,
As out they tumbled one and all,
And, if the Devil had spread his net,
He could have made a glorious haul!"

The new-comers proceeded up the river, and, landing opposite to the
Uncanoonuc Hills, on the present site of Manchester, proceeded inland to
Beaver Pond. Charmed with the appearance of the country, they resolved
here to terminate their wanderings. Under a venerable oak on the margin
of the little lake, they knelt down with their minister, Jamie McGregore,
and laid, in prayer and thanksgiving, the foundation of their settlement.
In a few years they had cleared large fields, built substantial stone and
frame dwellings and a large and commodious meeting-house; wealth had
accumulated around them, and they had everywhere the reputation of a
shrewd and thriving community. They were the first in New England to
cultivate the potato, which their neighbors for a long time regarded as a
pernicious root, altogether unfit for a Christian stomach. Every lover
of that invaluable esculent has reason to remember with gratitude the
settlers of Londonderry.

Their moral acclimation in Ireland had not been without its effect upon
their character. Side by side with a Presbyterianism as austere as that
of John Knox had grown up something of the wild Milesian humor, love of
convivial excitement and merry-making. Their long prayers and fierce
zeal in b