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and its author has been not inaptly called the "Father of American History." Bradford was born in Yorkshire in 1590, and landed on Plymouth Rock from the Mayflower. The following year he was elected governor, and was reelected annually until his death in 1657, with the exception of a few years when by his own wish he was allowed to retire. His History covers in the form of annals the period from 1620 to 1647. It cannot be said to have greater literary merit than the narratives of Smith and Strachey. Nowhere does it approach the power and vividness of Strachey's tempest passage; but it is characterized by a uniform dignity and sincerity not found in the works of the Southern chroniclers. As might be expected, it has a religious tone throughout, as had every expression of the first century of New England life. An excellent example of the Puritan attitude toward amusements, as well as of Bradford's general style, may be found in his account of Morton's settlement at "Ma-re Mount a passage which has additional interest because of having formed the basis of one of Hawthorne's tales.1

John Winthrop (1588-1649). Hardly less important than Bradford is John Winthrop, the first governor of the Massachusetts Colony. Appointed to that position by the Company, he led the band of colonists that landed at Salem in June, 1630, and removed in September to Boston. He was repeatedly (though not consecutively) reappointed, holding the governorship for twelve out of nineteen years. His history, published under the ambitious title of The History of New England, is a diary recording the life of the colony to his death. He is quite indiscriminate in noting events, and is unintentionally amusing in the blunt and matter-offact way in which he writes of them. The death of a cow is mentioned without comment, as is that of his son; the

1 The Maypole of Merry Mount, in Twice Told Tales.

execution of a murderer, the meeting of court, his unexpectedly filling a vacant pulpit, the killing of six calves by wolves, the marriage of Captain Endicott, a debate in church all these matters are, if we may judge by the space and prominence given them, of equal consequence to future times. A sense of proportion cannot be included in the long

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list of merits attributed to him by his admirers. The book is, however, an invaluable record of the early days of the Massachusetts Colony, from which all subsequent historians have drawn. One year (1645) stands out conspicuously above the average, because in it is reported a speech of Governor Winthrop on the nature of liberty, delivered in court after acquittal of the charge of exceeding his authority. Of this speech a distinguished statesman said, "It is the best definition of liberty in the English language."

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JOHN WINTHROP.

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The Bay Psalm Book. Since there was produced almost, if not absolutely, no real poetry in colonial New England, it is on first thought remarkable that the first book printed there was a book of verse. The fact, however, becomes less striking when we discover that this production was The Bay Psalm Book, the work of several clergymen, of whom the most important were John Eliot (1604-1690) and Richard Mather (1596-1669). The extremest enthusiast for our early

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FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF The Bay Psalm Book. (New York Public Library.)

literature would not call these versified psalms poetry. The authors did not, indeed, aim to make poetry; they aimed merely to produce a hymn book which should render faithfully "David's poetry into English metre." The most that can be said for the forms of the Psalms here is that they are generally not much worse than Milton's juvenile performances in the same field. "Everywhere in the book is manifested the agony it cost the writers to find two words that would rhyme - more or less; and so often as this arduous feat is achieved, the poetic athlete appears to pause a while from sheer exhaustion, panting heavily for breath."

Apart from their connection with this work Eliot and Mather are worthy of further mention. The former gave his life to christianizing the natives, and is generally known as the "Apostle to the Indians." He translated into their language not only the entire Bible, but the Catechism, Baxter's Call to the Unconverted, and Thomas Shepard's The Sincere Convert. Richard Mather shines rather by reflected light than by any luster of his own. He was the founder of the "Mather Dynasty," which included ten clergymen, and which in the second generation produced Increase Mather, a president of Harvard College, and in the third, Cotton Mather, of whom we shall hear later.

Michael Wigglesworth (1631-1705). Besides The Bay Psalm Book the writings of two other seventeenth century verse makers should be noticed. Michael Wigglesworth was a clergyman, a physician, and a versifier. Of his worth in the first and third of these capacities a good impression may be got from his most famous production, entitled The Day of Doom, or, A Poetical Description of the Great and Last Judgment. In this all mankind are brought before the Creator to hear his judgment upon them for eternity. The "sheep," few in number, are quickly assigned to their happy places; the rest of the poem (over 1500 lines) is taken up

with the pleas of the "goats" and their condemnation by the Judge. Its vivid pictures of a future punishment of fire and brimstone are interesting as a concrete expression of the general religious conviction of the author's time. In what is perhaps the most striking passage in the poem the Judge allows to the infants who may not dwell in bliss "the easiest room in hell." As we read the work to-day, we find it hard to realize how it could have been popular, even among such religious zealots as the Puritans of New England. It is said that the first edition of 1800 copies was sold in New England within twelve months of its publication (1662), which means one copy to every thirty-five people then living there; and that the poem was memorized by children along with the Catechism.

Anne Bradstreet (1612-1672). The position of Anne Bradstreet in this period is unique: she was the only person who wrote verse for its own sake. Like all the authors so far mentioned, Mrs. Bradstreet was born in England. She married at the age of sixteen, and emigrated with her husband two years later. A delicate woman, mother of eight children, hard-working wife of a hard-working New England farmer, she wrote enough in prose and verse to fill a volume of 400 pages most of it before she was thirty. The volume, published in London in 1650, was burdened with one of those long-drawn-out titles characteristic of the time. It reads: The Tenth Muse Lately sprung up in America; or, Several Poems, compiled with great variety of Wit and Learning, full of delight; wherein is especially contained a complete discourse and description of the four elements, constitutions, ages of man, seasons of the year; together with an exact epitome of the four monarchies, viz., the Assyrian, Persian, Grecian, Roman; also, a dialogue between Old England and New concerning the late troubles; with divers other pleasant and serious poems. By a Gentlewoman in those parts.

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