be readily seen, could not please the Virginians,
since the entire territory conveyed by it was part of the grant of 1609
to the London Company for Virginia. But as this and subsequent charters
had been annulled in 1624, the new colony was held by the Privy Council
to have the law on its side, and Lord Baltimore was left to make his
preparations undisturbed. He fitted out two vessels, the Ark and the
Dove, and sent them on their voyage of colonization. They went by the
way of the West Indies, arriving off Point Comfort in 1634. Sailing up
the Potomac, they landed on the island of St. Clement's, and took formal
possession of their new home. Calvert explored a river, now called the
St. Mary's, a tributary of the Potomac, and being pleased with the spot
began a settlement. He gained the friendship of the natives by
purchasing the land and by treating them justly and humanely.

[Illustration: Supposed Portrait of William Clayborne.]

[Illustration: Clayborne's Trading Post on Kent Island.]

The proprietary was a Catholic, yet, whether or not by an agreement
between him and the king, as Gardiner supposes, did not use either his
influence or his authority to distress adherents of the Church of
England. The two creeds stood practically upon an equality. But if
religious troubles were avoided, difficulties of another sort were not
slow in arising. About the year 1631, Clayborne, who had been secretary
of the Virginia colony, had chosen Kent Island in Chesapeake Bay as a
station for trading with the Indians. This post was in the very midst of
Maryland, and Calvert notified Clayborne that he should consider it a
part of that province. Clayborne at once showed himself a bitter enemy.
The Indians became suspicious and unfriendly, Clayborne, so it was
believed, being the instigator of this temper. An armed vessel was sent
out, with orders from Clayborne to seize ships of the St. Mary's
settlement. A fight took place, Clayborne fleeing to Virginia. Calvert
demanded that he should be given up. This was refused, and in 1637 he
went to England. A committee of the Privy Council decided that Kent
Island belonged to Maryland.

[1638]

In 1635 the first Maryland assembly met, consisting of the freemen of
the colony and the governor, Leonard Calvert, the proprietary's brother,
who was presiding officer. Lord Baltimore repudiated its acts, on the
ground that they were not proposed by him, as the charter directed. The
assembly which gathe