But besides all this and much more, they introduced a system of espionage almost as searching as that of the Inquisition. Every man became a spy upon his neighbor, and the magistrate became omnipresent. People were sometimes arrested for criminal offences and acquitted, and yet convicted of some "indiscretion" in connection with the offence. They were often arrested on "suspicion" of committing some offence. It is but just, however, to say, that unless they were charged with being Quakers, witches, or with preaching or teaching something on doctrinal points which was supposed to be contrary to something that was usually taught, or of being in a minority, as Governor Vane and Wheelwright were, they were generally acquitted. But for this, while there could be no justification, there were circumstances in extenuation. Some seem to think that if we go back a short distance, and fail to strike the Garden of Eden in its primitive innocence, we shall at least find the appropriate home of the perfectionists, verging on a period when human nature, freed from its grossness, was arrayed in spotless robes. Whoever will study attentively the pages of Bradford, Hubbard, Winthrop, Hutchinson, and the twenty volumes of colonial records, will at least find that Plymouth and the Bay Colony were not that ideal home.

The people were the most litigious on the earth. More or less of the higher magistrates had been educated as lawyers, but for a long period, with a single brief exception in each colony, no lawyers educated as such were engaged in the practice of the law. As a consequence, whoever could read and write, and some who could not, became a sort of mermaid lawyers, and these, as was to be expected, mistook tricks, quirks, and quibbles for law, and shystering for jurisprudence. So far had this gone, that as early as 1656 the general court of Massachusetts had to apply the gag, and prohibit the parties, by themselves or their attorney, pleading for a longer time than one hour."

66

The records are tettered with charges of theft, drunkenness, and other disorders against the peace and good order of society, and fairly blotched with charges of social sins and indiscretions.

The year 1635 was one of the halcyon years in the colony. Bostonians never fail to point to it with pride, as the year of light. At that time prosecutions were barred which had been committed more than two years prior to the session of the grand jury; and yet one of your members, in a public address before

this body, has called your attention to the fact that in that very year, when there were less than 6,000 people in that colony, the grand jury found one hundred indictments at a single term. Concord has in round numbers 15,000, and Merrimack county less than 50,000 people. What would you think, what would the people of Concord think, if, after throwing out what are known as liquor cases, 250 indictments should be found at a single term, or 500 a year against the people of Concord alone, or 770 a term, or 1,550 a year against the people of Merrimack county?

With the exception named, taking ten years together, the indictments in this county will not exceed fifty on an average, and the offences of which justices of the peace, police courts, and the grand jury actually take cognizance, all told, will not average 300 a year for the central county of the state. The

stanza,—

“The good old ways our fathers trod

Shall grace their children never,"

would seem singularly inappropriate at the present time.

The apology in extenuation for this state of things, as respects Plymouth, has been given by Governor Bradford in his history. Any abridgement would impair its force, and I therefore give it entire :

"But it may be demanded how it came to pass that so many wicked persons and profane people should so quickly come over into this land, & mixe them selves amongst them? seeing it was religious men yt begane ye work, and they came for religions sake. I confess this may be marveilled at, at least in time to come, when the reasons thereof should not be knowne ; and ye more because here was so many hardships and wants mett withall. I shall therefore indeavor to give some answer hereunto. And first, according to yt in ye gospell, it is ever to be remembered that wher ye Lord begins to sow good seed, ther ye envious man will endeavore to sow tares. 2. Men being to come over into a wildernes, in which much labour & servise was to be done aboute building & planting, &c., such as wanted help in yt respecte, when they could not have such as yey would, were glad to take such as they could; and so, many untoward servants, sundry of them proved, that were

thus brought over, both men & women kind; who, when their times were expired, became families of them selves, which gave increase hereunto. 3. An other and a maine reason hearof was, that men, finding so many godly disposed persons willing to come into these parts, some begane to make a trade of it, to transeport passengers & thier goods, and hired ships for that end; and then, to make up their fraight and advance their profite, cared not who ye persons were, so they had money to pay them. And by this means the cuntrie became pestered with many unworthy persons, who, being come over, crept into one place or other 4. Againe, the Lords blesing usually following his people, as well in outward as spirituall things, (though afflictions be mixed withall,) doe make many to adhear to ye people of God, as many followed Christ, for ye loaves sake, John 6, 26. and a mixed multitud came into ye willdernes with ye people of God out of Eagipte of old, Exod. 12. 38; so allso ther were sente by their freinds some under hope yt they would be made better; others that they might be eased of such burthens, and they kept from shame at home yt would necessarily follow their dissolute courses. And thus, by one means or other, in 20. years time, it is a question whether ye greater part be not growne ye worser." Bradford's History 398-399.

A great man, equally great as an observer and thinker,—De Tocqueville, says,—

"In this part of the Union [New England], the impulsion of political activity was given in the townships; and it may almost be said that each of them originally formed an independent nation. When the kings of England asserted their supremacy, they were contented to assume the central power of the state. The townships of New England remained as they were before; and although they are now subject to the state, they were at first scarcely dependent upon it. It is important to remember that they have not been invested with privileges, but that they seem on the contrary to have surrendered a portion of their independence to the state." Democracy in America 67.

This distinguished foreigner was probably right in treating our township system and its training as the foundation on which our free institutions rest. The old world had towns, cities, and municipalities, but our township system was a New England institution. Nobody created it. Neither the Plymouth col

onists nor those of the Bay contemplated anything of the kind. Necessity sowed the seed, and the rest, like poor Topsy, "growed." Neither Plymouth nor the Bay colony has any patent on this township system, or any right to one. The necessity for it was far stronger in New Hampshire than in either. Plymouth set up, and the Bay colony imported, a central authority. But in New Hampshire there was not only no such authority at the outset, either in fact or in name, but no bond of a common interest or association. Each New Hampshire settlement, like the tub of Diogenes, stood on its own bottom. Each was in fact an independent republic. In the just sense of the term, the genuine township system originated and was developed in New Hampshire. Prior to the written articles of association there is but little evidence as to the forms of government and procedure in Dover and Portsmouth, but that little tends strongly to show that they did what on the whole was deemed best for the common welfare, without regard to the laws of England or any other law. In a word, they governed themselves. After the association, each town except Hampton was a pattern republic. Its laws were enacted by major vote in town-meeting, that being the supreme legislature, and its officers were the supreme executive authority. Each town chose a ruler or judge, with assistants or associates. These in general were the court of first instance and of last resort. These tribunals ordered what, on the whole, they thought was most fitting for honest men to do. This town legislation, in the main, as shown by Judge Smith in relation to Exeter, was not only sensible and wise, but far in advance of what we should expect. And from the little we know, we have no reason for thinking that the action of these courts was not equally sensible and just.

There was that in the settlement, babyhood, and growth of these four towns, which left a powerful impress on the future state. We have had bigotry, harshness, and intolerance enough, but as a whole New Hampshire from the outset has been preeminently the home of toleration. Georgia, for thirteen years, Maryland, with an exception which it is unnecessary to recite, and New Hampshire from the beginning, have been tolerant in matters of faith. The founders of Plymouth and the

Bay colony made the church the state. No man outside the church could vote, be elected to office, or in general exercise any of the functions of a freeman. In a word, he was a political and religious outcast. For this the founders established themselves in the New World; but New Hampshire was settled for entirely different reasons. Fishmongers, salt- and potash-makers, lumbermen, mine hunters, land speculators, and their employés, settled Dover and Portsmouth. They came here to do business and make money. It was no purpose of theirs to found a commonwealth of saints, build up a religious aristocracy, or to banish from their borders any one for a difference in matters of faith.

The Bay colony had always treated Hampton as its outpost, and as a sort of penal settlement, a species of moral Botany Bay, to which its over-religious and uncomfortable spirits might be banished.

A politico-religious or religio-political controversy had arisen in Massachusetts. Harry Vane was governor, and he and his friends, Wheelwright and Mrs. Hutchinson and others, desired that he should remain so. The contest waxed warm. If a small portion of what was said by each party of the other was true, they had little claim to be teachers of either religion, morality, or honesty. At last Vane was beaten, and the majority disfranchised the leaders of the minority, and banished Wheelwright and his gifted sister, and afterwards hunted him from Exeter to Hampton and Wells, and then gave him his certificate of good character, while they drove her among the Indians, who welcomed all her children but one "with bloody hands to hospitable graves."

The natural result was, that these towns were always tolerant so far as they dared to be, while menaced by the overgrown bully of the Bay colony, threatening to take away Dover in 1638, afterwards claiming Exeter, and in 1639 sending an expedition to what is now Franklin, for the purpose of taking the preliminary steps for committing grand larceny of a whole province.

It is worthy of note, that on September 18, 1679, this claim that the colony of Massachusetts Bay had any jurisdiction over New Hampshire, was declared by royal authority to have been