when his race shall become not only masters of the continent, but of the earth, and his mother tongue the universal language, History shall perpetuate the deeds of his genius, and Song shall make his name immortal.* The question that the European nations were called upon to solve, at the commencement of the seventeenth century, was, who should hereafter occupy and possess, the broad belt of the temperate zone of the New World, from the Atlantic to the Pacific seas. All previous explorations were preliminary efforts towards this one great object, but the question remained open and undecided. The voyages of the Northmen to these shores, interesting to the curious, are of no historic value, because not connected with the colonization of the country-unless it shall hereafter appear that Columbus obtained from them information, as to the extent of the Western Ocean. At the time of discovery by Columbus, the only races inhabiting the New World, north of Mexico, were tribes of wandering savages, incapable of accepting or acquiring habits of civilized life. An extinct race, had left their mounds in the West, and their deposits of oyster-beds along the shores of the Atlantic, and passed from traditionary story. The adventurous Magellan in 1520 proved, by the first voyage round the world, the extent of the new continent, and in 1579, Sir Francis Drake, the first Englishman that circumnavigated the globe, in that daring The Hon. John Appleton, Assistant Secretary of State, interested himself in the matter, and has forwarded us for publication the following note: WASHINGTON, April 2d, 1860. VERY DEAR SIR: I am much obliged for your note of this date. You may say to your correspondent in Maine, that the Secretary of War has ordered the fortification he refers to to be named "Fort Gorges." Yours, very truly, Hon. JOHN APPLETON, Asst. Sec'y of State. W. R. DRINKARD, -Portland Advertiser of April 10th, 1860. ** See in Note C, in Appendix, Mrs. Sigourney's admirable Poem on Gorges. voyage which excited the admiration of his country. men, gave the name of New-England to the Pacific shores of the continent, which name Captain John Smith afterwards, to strengthen the title to the country, affixed to the Atlantic slope.* But till the beginning of the seventeenth century, North-America, north of Florida, remained unpeopled by Europeans. The Spaniards, the Portuguese, the French, the Dutch, and the English, had all made voyages of discovery, and laid claims to the country. As early as 1542, it was parceled off to the three powers first named; Florida, belonging to Spain, extending as far north as the thirty-third parallel of latitude; Verrazzan, or New-France, from the thirty-third to the fiftieth parallel; and Terra Corterealis, northward to the Polar Ocean, thus named in honor of Gaspar Cortereal, a Portuguese, who explored the coast in the year 1500. The Spaniards were in pursuit of mines of gold and silver, the Portuguese in quest of slaves, and the French with hopes of profit in the fur trade, and crude but indefinite ideas of colonization. Spain and Portugal originally claimed the New World by grant from the Pope. England, practically abandoning all claim from the discoveries of Cabot on the Atlantic, and Drake on the Pacific coasts, laid down, in 1580, the broad doctrine, that prescription without occupation was of no avail; that possession of the country was essential to the maintenance of title. Prescriptio sine possessione, haud valeat. Before this time, the attention of England had been turned to the northern parts of America, with a view to colonization. As early as March 22, 1574, the Queen * John Smith's Description of New England, vol. ii. p. 2, Force's Tracts. Mass. Historical Coll. 3d series, vol. vi. p. 104. + Bull of Pope Alexander VI. 1493. Camden's Eliz. Annales, 1580. See Poor's Vindication of Gorges, p. 9. had been petitioned to allow of the discovery of lands in America "fatally reserved to England, and for the honor of Her Majesty' Sir Humphrey Gilbert's charter "for planting our people in America," was granted by Elizabeth, June 11, 1578, and in 1580 John Walker and his companions had discovered a silver mine in Norumbega. The explorations of Andrew Thevett, of John Barros, and John Walker, alluded to in the papers recently discovered in the British State Paper Office, under date of 1580, we find nowhere else recorded. The possession of Newfoundland by Sir Humphrey Gilbert, was abandoned on his loss at sea, and it was not till 1584, that the first charter to Sir Walter Raleigh was issued, by Elizabeth. Raleigh named the country VIRGINIA, in honor of his Queen. Of the two colonies sent out by him, one returned, the other perished in the country, leaving no trace of its history and no record of its melancholy fate.t Thus, at the period of Elizabeth's death, in 1603, England had not a colonial possession on the globe. Sir Richard Whitbourne had made voyages to Newfoundland in his own ship in 1588, and in 1600 there was a proposition to the Queen for planting a colony in the North-west of America,§ in which can be unmistak ably traced the agency of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who it now appears was also concerned in the voyage of Gosnold in 1602, of Pring in 1603, and of George Weymouth in 1605, the earliest ones of which we have any authentic record. That eloquent passage in Gorges' Briefe Narration, in which he gives "the reasons and * Calendar of Colonial State Papers, edited by Sainsbury, vol. i. page 1. + Bancroft's History, vol. i. pp. 102, 107. Calendar of Col. State Papers, vol. i p. 82. See this paper in full in Poor's Vindication of Gorges. Appendix. the means of renewing the undertaking of Plantations in America," deserves our highest praise; and it excites feelings of the warmest gratitude toward him, for it is a modest and touching statement, of his own heroic efforts, in the cause of American colonization.* But the Hollanders and the French were equally aroused to the importance, and inflamed with the purpose, of seizing upon these shores. The vast wealth of the Dutch, their great commercial success prior to this time in both the East and West-Indies, gave them the advantage. Champlain, with greater knowledge of North-America than any of his rivals, had accompanied Pont Grave to the St. Lawrence, by direction of the King, in 1603, when, on his return to France, he found Acadia granted to De Monts, a Protestant, and a member of the King's household, under date of November eighth, 1603, extending across the continent, between the fortieth and forty-sixth degrees of north latitude.† In the spring of 1604, De Monts, accompanied by Champlain, Pont Gravè, Poutrincourt, and the learned and accomplished historian L'Escarbot, sailed from Dieppe for the occupation of the NEW WORLD. They planted their colony at St. Croix, within the limits of our own State, in 1604, and in the spring and summer of 1605, explored the coast under the lead of Champlain, from Campseau to Cape Malabar, twelve miles south of Cape Cod, "searching to the bottom of the bays," the same year that Weymouth explored this most excellent and beneficial river of Sagadahoc. To make sure of the country, Champlain, Champdore and L'Escarbot remained three and a half years, fishing, trading with the natives, and occupying at Boston, Pis* Gorges' Briefe Narration, p. 16. L'Escarbot, p. 432, 2d edition. 1612. See Poor's Vindication of Gorges, p. 23, note. cadouet, (Piscataqua,) Marchin, (Portland,) Koskebee, (Casco Bay,) Kinnibequi, (Kennebec,) Pentagoet, (Penobscot,) and all east, to Campseau and Cape Breton. Returning to France in 1607, they found the charter of De Monts revoked,* on account of the jeal ousy of his rivals, and a small indemity from the King their only reward, for these four years of sacrifice and unremitting toil. This shortsightedness of the great Henry of Navarre, cost France the dominion of the New World. For on the return of Weymouth to Plymouth, in 1605, with five savages from Pemaquid, Sir Ferdinando Gorges gathered from them full particulars of this whole region, its harbors, rivers, natural characteristics and features, its people and mode of government.† Associating with himself the Earl of Southampton,‡ Gorges, relying upon these circumstances as a means of inflaming the imagination of his countrymen, petitioned the King for a charter,§ which he obtained, under date of April tenth, 1606, granting to George Popham, and seven others, the continent of North-America, from the thirty-fourth to the forty-fifth degrees of north latitude, extending one hundred miles into the mainland, and including all islands of the sea within one hundred miles of the shore. This charter is the basis on which rests the title of our race to the New World. It provided for a local government at home, intrusted to a *L'Escarbot, p. 460, 2d edition. 1612. Champlain, pp. 44, 45, 99. Gorges' Briefe Narration. Maine Hist. Coll. vol. ii. p. 19. Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, the friend and patron of Shakspeare, was the third earl of that name, and grandson of Thomas Wriothesley, Lord High Chancellor of England, under Edward VI. Created a peer February sixteenth, 1547, he died in 1550. His son Henry, was Lord Treasurer, and grandfather of Lady Rachel Russell. His patent of nobility was declared forfeited, under Elizabeth, but restored by James in 1603. The third earl, Treasurer of the Virginia Company, and the patron of letters and of American colonization, died in command of an English regiment, in the Dutch service, in the Netherlands, in 1624. The fourth earl died in 1667, and the title became extinct. S Strachey's Travaile into Virginia, p. 161. See this charter in full in Poor's Vindication of Gorges. Appendix. |