By The Terms Of The.
Contract With The Colonists, The Merchant Adventurers Were To Supply All
Their Actual Necessities Of Clothing Food, Clothing, Etc., For The Full
Term Of Seven Years, During Which The Labors Of The "Planters" Were To Be
For The Joint Account.
Whether under this agreement they were bound to
fully "outfit" the colonists before they embarked (and did so), as
Was
done by Higginson's company coming to Salem in 1628-29 at considerable
cost per capita, and as was done for those of the Leyden people who came
over in 1629 with Pierce in the MAY-FLOWER and the TALBOT to Salem, and
again in 1630 with the same Master (Pierce) in the LION by the Plymouth
successors to the Adventurers (without recompense), does not clearly
appear. No mention is found of any "outfitting" of the MAY-FLOWER
passengers except the London apprentices. There is no doubt that a
considerable supply of all the above-named articles was necessarily sent
by the Adventurers on the MAY-FLOWER, both for the Pilgrims' needs on the
voyage and in the new colony, as also for trading purposes. There seems
to have been at all times a supreme anxiety, on the part of both Pilgrim
and Puritan settlers, to get English clothes upon their red brethren of
the forest, whether as a means of exchange for peltry, or for decency's
sake, is not quite clear. There was apparently a greater disparity in
character, intelligence, and station between the leaders of Higginson's
and Winthrop's companies and their followers than between the chief men
of the Pilgrims and their associates. With the former were titles and
considerable representation of wealth and position. With the passengers
of the MAY-FLOWER a far greater equality in rank, means, intelligence,
capacity, and character was noticeable. This was due in part, doubtless,
to the religious beliefs and training of the Leyden contingent, and had
prompt illustration in their Compact, in which all stood at once on an
equal footing. There was but little of the "paternal" nature in the form
of their government (though something at times in their punishments), and
there was much personal dignity and independence of the individual.
An equipment having so much of the character of a uniform - not to say
"livery" - as that furnished by Higginson's company to its people
suggests the "hedger and ditcher" type of colonists (of whom there were
very few among the Plymouth settlers), rather than the scholar,
publisher, tradesman, physician, hatter, smith, carpenter, "lay reader,"
and soldier of the Pilgrims, and would certainly have been obnoxious to
their finer sense of personal dignity and proportion. Doubtless an
equivalent provision existed - though in less "all-of-a-pattern"
character - in the bales and boxes of the MAY-FLOWER'S cargo for every
need suggested by the list of the Higginson "outfit," which is given
herewith, both as matter of interest and as affording an excellent idea
of the accepted style and needs in dress of a New England settler (at
least of the men) of 1620-30.
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