cause of frequent
delays) after the embarkation of the company, are gems and jewels of a
heart which was itself the pure shrine of a most fond and faithful love.
His leave-taking at Groton was at the end of February, 1630; his
embarkation was on March 22. The ships were weather-bound successively
at Cowes and at Yarmouth, whence were written those melting epistles. A
letter which he wrote to Sir William Spring, one of the Parliamentary
members from Suffolk, a dear religions friend of his, overflows with an
ardor and intenseness of affection which passes into the tone and
language of feminine endearment, and fashions passages from the Song of
Solomon into prayers. One sentence of that letter keeps sharp its
lacerating point for the reader of to-day. "But I must leave you all:
our farewells usually are pleasant passages; mine must be sorrowful;
this addition of forever is a sad close." And it was to be forever.
Winthrop was never to see his native land again. Many of his associates
made one or more homeward voyages. A few of them returned to resume
their English citizenship in those troublous times which invited and
exercised energies like those which had essayed to tame a wilderness.
But the great and good leader of his blessed exodus never found the
occasion, we know not that he ever felt the prompting, to recross the
ocean. The purpose of his life and soul was a unit in its substance and
consecration, and it had found its object. For nineteen years, most of
them as Governor, and always as the leading spirit and the recognized
Moses of the enterprise, he was spared to see the planting and the
building-up which subdued the wilderness and reared a commonwealth. He
had most noble and congenial associates in the chief magistrates of the
other New-England colonies. Bradford and Winslow of Plymouth, Eaton of
New Haven, his own son and Haynes and Hopkins of Connecticut, and
Williams of Providence Plantations, were all of them men of signal
virtue. They have all obtained a good report, and richly and eminently
do they deserve it. They were, indeed, a providential galaxy of
pure-hearted, unspotted, heroic men. There is a mild and sweet beauty in
the star of Winthrop, the lustre of which asks no jealous or rival
estimation.

* * * * *

THE PLANTING OF THE APPLE-TREE.

Come, let us plant the apple-tree!
Cleave the tough greensward with the spade;
Wide let its hollow bed be made;