That Just Such A Policy Was,
At Once And Eagerly, Adopted Toward Them, As Soon As Occasion Permitted,
Is Good Proof That The Scheme Was Thoroughly Matured From The Start.
The
record of the action of the "Council for New England" - which had become
the successor of the Second
Virginia Company before intelligence was
received that the Pilgrims had landed on its domain - is not at hand,
but it appears by the record of the London Company, under date of Monday,
July 16/26, 1621, that the "Council for New England" had promptly made
itself agreeable to the colonists. The record reads: "It was moved,
seeing that Master John Pierce had taken a Patent of Sir Ferdinando
Gorges, and thereupon seated his Company [the Pilgrims] within the limits
of the Northern Plantations, as by some was supposed,"' etc. From this
it is plain that, on receipt by Pierce of the news that the colony was
landed within the limits of the "Council for New England," he had, as
instructed, applied for, and been given (June 1, 1621), the (first)
"Council" patent for the colony. For confirmation hereof one should see
also the minutes of the "Council for New England" of March 25/April 4.,
1623, and the fulsome letter of Robert Cushman returning thanks in behalf
of the Planters (through John Pierce), to Gorges, for his prompt response
to their request for a patent and for his general complacency toward them
Hon. James Phinney Baxter, Gorges's able and faithful biographer, says:
"We can imagine with what alacrity he [Sir Ferdinando] hastened to give
to Pierce a patent in their behalf." The same biographer, clearly
unconscious of the well-laid plot of Gorges and Warwick (as all other
writers but Neill and Davis have been), bears testimony (all the stronger
because the witness is unwitting of the intrigue), to the ardent interest
Gorges had in its success.
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