pounde to furnishe himselfe for his voiage. And once within seven yeares, I am persuaded (absit invidia verbo) that the Governors place here may be as profittable as

In the summer of 1622, Pory took passage for England in the "Discovery," commanded by Captain Jones, who is supposed to have been previously master of the "Mayflower." (Young's Chron. p. 298.) The "Discovery" was employed by a number of merchants to discover all the harbors between Virginia and Plymouth and the shoals of Cape Cod, and also to trade along the coasts, where they could. In the course of these explorations, the vessel touched at the then infant settlement at Plymouth, and, by a timely supply of provisions, relieved the famishing colonists; and enabled them, by a sale of beads and knives, to trade with the Indians for corn, which they sorely needed. Bradford laments the previous famine, and not less the extortionate price of the knives and beads. Winslow dwells more on the seasonable relief of the starving community. (Good Newes.)

Bradford and Pory evidently entertained sentiments of sincere friendship and respect for each other. The Governor, in his Journal, gives part of a letter received from Pory dated 28th August, 1622, in which the latter praises the Puritan fathers and their theological writings, and subscribes himself the Governor's unfeigned and firm friend. Bradford, in turn, welcomes Pory's commendations as an honor to his compeers; and gratefully remarks, that "this gentleman, after his return, did this poor plantation much credit amongst those of no mean rank." (Mass. Hist. Coll., 4th ser., III., v. p. 128.)

Pory left Plymouth soon after the date of his letter. Whether he continued his explorations any farther is not known. His return, however, was not to be speedy. A letter of Chamberlain's to Sir Dudley Carleton, written just eleven months after Pory's letter to Bradford, says, "Our old acquaintance, Mr. Pory, is in poor case, and in prison at the Terceras, whither he was driven, by contrary winds, from the north-east of Virginia, where he had been upon some discovery; and upon his arrival was arraigned, and in danger to be hanged for a pirate." (Birch, II. James, p. 473.)

There could have been little difficulty, but, more probably, not a little delay, in satisfying the Portuguese authorities of his innocence. The documents taken with him would show both his recent official position and the legitimate character of the voyage. But Portugal had, for more than forty years, been a mere appendage of Spain; and, under the ministry of Olivares, or of his tyrannical Portuguese deputy, Vasconcelles, little mercy would have been shown to a Protestant Englishman charged with designs against the Spanish possessions in America (akin to those for which, five years before, Spain, with shameful success, demanded the head of Raleigh), had it not fortunately so happened, that, at this period and for several months after, for reasons connected with the projected marriage of the Prince of Wales with the Infanta, sister of Philip the Fourth, the policy of Spain toward England was of the most amicable character. No time, we may be sure, was lost in effecting Pory's release, and speedy return to England.

He returned to find the Company suffering from violent internal dissensions, as well as from fiscal exactions, and the machinations of the Spanish ambassador, countenanced by the King, which menaced its existence.

Pory was under very slight obligations to the party which then ruled the Company. In the second year of his secretaryship, they had abolished the fees by which his office was supported. The compensation substituted for them was five hundred acres of land and twenty tenants, for him and his successors. To his successors, it was afterwards increased by one-fourth; but all he obtained of it was the use of the land and of half his tenants for half a year. (Smith's Virginia, p. 141.)

Nor was this the only injury received at their hands. During his absence, a declaration in the name of the Council, dated the 7th of May, 1623, was issued to the public, in which several charges were made against him for acts alleged to have been done by him as an instrument of the Earl of Warwick. This declaration was a summary of the various

the lord Deputies of Irland. All this notwithstanding, I may say of myselfe, that when I was the last yeare with your lordship at Middleborough, si mens non læva fuisset,

accusations which, at the Company meetings, had been, from time to time, unsparingly vented against the Earl by his bitter enemy, Lord Cavendish, the pupil of Hobbs, and, two years later, Earl of Devonshire. Lord Cavendish was chairman of the committee in which the "Declaration" was framed, and, no doubt, the author of it; although it probably was revised, and most likely by Nicholas Ferrar, whose candor would lead him to avoid all representations of things as absolutely true when they rested on no better foundation than surmise or presumption. On the 17th of the preceding month, at a board of the Privy Council, called for the purpose of considering and providing some remedy for the existing differences in the Company, after hearing Lord Cavendish, it was ordered, with the consent of both the contending parties, that a royal commission should issue for the examination of all the affairs of the company, from the beginning of Sir Thomas Smith's administration; and a letter of Lord Middlesex to Secretary Conway states, that the commission so agreed upon was accordingly awarded to Sir William Jones, Judge of the Common Pleas, and six other knights, as early as the 18th of April, seventeen days before the "Declaration" was issued. This commission, in the close of the "Declaration," is dwelt upon in a spirit of unfairness and perversion, which more or less pervades the whole document. It is there boldly asserted, that, "under pretence of justifying . . . their manifold untruths, they (Earl Warwick, &c.) sued out a commission to examine," &c.; and that, the companies earnestly pressing them to take out their commission, they delayed the same, knowing, in their guilty consciences, that they were not able to incriminate the ruling party, or excuse themselves. As the commission was then actually passing through the ordinary official forms, and was finally issued under the Great Seal on the 9th of May, two days only after these imputations of guilty neglect, &c., were made, we have ample proof of the injustice of the imputations, and of their inconsistency with recorded facts. (State-Paper Office, Am. & W. Ind.) (I. Burke, App. p. 323.)

The first charge in the "Declaration" against Pory, a mere presumption, has also a semblance of support from the remark there inserted, that "he was recommended by the Earl of Warwick to Sir Thomas Smith, then treasurer, for the secretary's place." In the following part of the same paragraph, the accuracy of this statement is virtually disproved by a second, to the effect, that the Earl, being dissatisfied with the "proceedings against Captain Argall," sought, and finally accomplished, the removal of Sir Thomas from the place of treasurer.

Now the Earl did very warmly, in open court, oppose these proceedings from the beginning, when the instructions of the 23d of August, 1618, were issued by the Treasurer and Council, directing Lord De la Warre to seize Argall's effects, and send him back to England. But it is hardly within the bounds of probability, either that the Earl would condescend to solicit the vote of a person with whom he was so much offended, or that Sir Thomas would tamely yield to the request of one, who, at the time, was striving to dishonor and displace him. Under such circumstances, there could be little or no concert, or even intercourse, between them; and the "recommendation" would signify nothing more than that this Earl, at the time of the election, expressed to the chairman an opinion in favor of Pory as a candidate.

Pory, on his part, no doubt, canvassed all the members of the Company within his reach, and, among them, the Earl and Sir Thomas Smith. He probably could have carried the election without their aid; for neither of them had influence sufficient to control the votes of the Company. The Earl had recently been foiled in his opposition to the proceedings against Argall, and evidently could do little to effect either the election of Pory or the removal of Sir Thomas Smith: nor, at any time, did the number of those who generally voted with him exceed twenty-six (Stith, p. 187); and they, with the exception of a few family connections and personal friends were those who did not so much belong

I might have gone to the Hagh with you, and founde myselfe there nowe in far better company, which indeed is the soule of this life, and might have bene deeply in

to his ranks as they were driven into them by the hostility of the dominant party. The influence of Sir Thomas Smith, likewise, was so nearly extinct as to render his continuance in office a burden, and cause his voluntary resignation at the Easter Court, held on the 28th of April, 1619. His intention to resign had most probably been announced at the preceding Hilary Court; for the news that Sir Edwin Sandys had been chosen treasurer in his room, having been brought to Jamestown by Sir George Yeardley ten days before Sir Edwin was actually elected, could only mean, that the election of Sir Edwin was looked upon as certain, and Sir Thomas Smith's determination to retire equally so. (Smith's Va. p. 126.) Under such circumstances, it would have been useless for the Earl "to pursue with eagerness "" a purpose which was sure to be effected with the concurrence of Sir Thomas himself.

Hence we may be allowed to doubt the entire accuracy of the statement in the "Declaration" respecting the hostile conduct of the Earl in this affair. We apprehend that his vigorous resistance to the "proceedings" against Argall was misconstrued by the author of that document as evincing personal enmity towards Sir Thomas Smith. The Earl must have known, that Sir Thomas, although ever so reluctant, was obliged to yield to the will of the majority in the Council, and to give his official sanction to their acts. Nor could he expect that any successor would be more favorable to Argall than Argall's "friend and kinsman," the actual incumbent. Under such circumstances, it would be natural that he should wish to quit his office.

Again: if the Earl was so deeply offended as to "pursue with eagerness the displacing of Sir Thomas Smith," why, it may be asked, did he allow him, a week after he was displaced, to be confirmed as treasurer of the Bermuda Company, and so to remain for several years? (Birch, II. James, p. 161.) The Earl's pecuniary interests and his personal influence were comparatively greater in the Bermuda than in the Virginia Company.

It is also reasonable to presume, that the marriage of Sir Thomas Smith's only son to Isabella Rich, sister of the Earl, which took place four months before Sir Thomas quitted the treasury of the Virginia Company, would tend to allay any animosity, if it really existed, so far, at least, as to restrain the Earl from making that unseemly exhibition of family differences which the statement in the "Declaration" implies. There is no proof extant, that they ever differed in sentiment or measures, prior to the affair of Argall; and it is historically certain that they afterwards constantly acted together. (Birch, II. James, p. 122, 184.)

The premises, we conceive, warrant the inference, that the Earl was more probably the ally than the opponent of Sir Thomas Smith in regard to the retirement of the latter from office; and, likewise, that he did not obtain the place of secretary for Pory, as asserted by Stith (p. 157) and by Campbell (p. 139), or render him any service or favor for which he would be likely to barter away his personal independence, and become a subservient "instrument" and "follower" of his lordship.

It may be proper to mention here, that, at the period of these transactions, his lordship was not Earl of Warwick, but Lord Rich. The first earl, his father, died in the summer of 1619. Stith (p. 153) erroneously supposes the son to have been created Earl of Warwick. With these comments on the principal circumstance brought to support the first charge in the "Declaration" against Pory, we now proceed to consider the charge itself, which, in substance, is, that, to enable Argall, by a pinnace despatched from Plymouth, to quit Virginia before the governor, Sir George Yeardley, should arrive there to arrest and try him, "he persuaded the governor to spend much time unnecessarily on the English coast." No proof is adduced, nor any specific detail given. This persuading is imputed in general terms, not directly and plainly, as a fact, but cautiously, by insinuation, as

grafted into your lordship's service, which since I have a thousand times affected in vaine. And therefore seeing I have missed that singular happines, I must for what

"vehemently to be presumed," an equivocal mode of expression, calculated to shelter the accuser from disgrace, if the falsity of the insinuation should be detected, and, at the same time, to fulfil its purpose of leading others to believe a calumny which the author himself might know to be the creation of his own fancy. The writer of the "Declaration" would probably not have ventured even so far, had Sir George Yeardley been in London, or been called upon, as he might and ought to have been, to declare the truth; or had John Pory, after his four years' absence, been expected ever to re-appear there to defend himself.

Sir George Yeardley was a shrewd, practical man. In his previous military service abroad, and in his later passages across the Atlantic, he had had more nautical experience than Pory. It is, therefore, hardly credible, that he should forego the exercise of his own judgment, as well as that of the master, as to the control of the ship, and give it up to the blind guidance of a comparative novice.

If, as most likely at that season of the year, detentions actually occurred in the passage down channel, they were, in the entire absence of proof to the contrary, to be considered as owing to natural causes, and to be no otherwise connected with Pory than that they subsequently furnished the enemies of the Earl of Warwick with a slender pretext for ascribing them to him, in order to make it appear that was one of the "instruments" of the Earl, and acting by his direction.

Sir George Yeardley was chosen Governor of Virginia at the Quarter Court, held on the last Wednesday but one in Hilary Term, which in that year, 1619, fell on the first of February. The vessel in which he was to embark at London, with his retinue of attendants and servants, as well as agricultural and other laborers, and the various personal, household, and agricultural articles in which his £3,000, mentioned by Pory, was to be invested, could hardly be got ready to depart within the following week. The friends of Argall, on the other hand, who had personal knowledge of the designs and measures in contemplation against him, could always have had the "Elinor" in readiness, and have despatched her from Plymouth within two days after the election. But there was no necessity for haste. In those days, when the speed of vessels depended on the wind, and steam as a motivepower was unknown, it was affirmed by John Smith (Va. p. 221), that "it is neere as much trouble, but more danger, to sail from London to Plymouth than from Plymouth to New England, so that half the voyage would be saved" (that is, by starting from Plymouth instead of London). All that was requisite to enable the "Elinor" to outstrip Sir George Yeardley's vessel might be easily accomplished after the departure of the latter from London. At the slowest rate of posting prescribed at that period, five miles the hour, it would take only forty-three hours for orders from London to reach the "Elinor;" and she might begin Smith's half-voyage two days only after the governor's vessel had entered upon the doubly longer whole voyage.

Again: the "Elinor" would be almost sure to take the short, more northerly course, always taken by Argall, while the rival vessel, it is morally certain, took the more circuitous one, "tracing it through the Torrid Zoan;" for the calenture with which, Pory tells us above, he was afflicted some four or five months, is generated at sea in hot climates only. The difference in time of the two routes from Plymouth would be a fortnight or more; and the "Elinor" could easily reach her port of destination a month earlier than the governor's vessel, if started at the earliest moment possible.

Under such circumstances, any expedient for increasing the great advantage of the "Elinor," by retarding the other vessel, would be so manifestly useless and uncalled for as not to be adopted by any person of common sense.

The second charge against Pory in the "Declaration" is, that he sent "underhand," to the Earl of Warwick, copies of the "examinations" taken in Virginia respecting Argall's conduct; and he is there called a "sworn officer," to create a belief that he had violated his official oath. Stith, in his deep reverence for all that is contained in the writings and

remaines, depende upon Gods providence, who my hope is, wilbe so merciful towards me, as once more before I dye, to vouchsafe me the sight of your countenance,

records of the dominant party, repeats this statement with the virulence which usually accompanies his remarks concerning Pory. He is copied by Belknap (Am. Biog. II. p. 72), and Belknap in turn by Campbell (p. 149), both of whom add that Pory was bribed by the Earl of Warwick. Upon what authority these respected historians make this assertion, we have sought in vain to discover.

The Earl of Warwick, as one of the Council, was entitled to a knowledge of the "examinations." It was also important to him, both in point of character and personal interest, that Argall should have a fair and impartial trial. On the other hand, it was somewhat "underhand," and certainly not conducive to the attainment of impartial justice, that the treasurer and Council, in taking evidence, should exclude the defendant from all opportunity of knowing or rebutting it. It has the aspect of a sinister inquisitorial proceeding, a stratagem to procure a condemnation by surprise and on ex parte evidence. There were no cabinet, political, or corporate secrets involved in the controversy; and the disclosure, therefore, on the part of the secretary, was no more a breach of trust than it would be in a magistrate, who should furnish either party in a civil suit with the contents of an affidavit made before him, or in the clerk of a council who should inform a member of the doings of his colleagues in his absence. There was obviously nothing criminal, either in furnishing the Earl with the "examinations," or in receiving, if it really happened, a compensation for the labor. Nor, consequently, was there any reason for concealing these acts, or much opportunity for effecting such concealment. The habits of life in an infant colony rarely admit of the seclusion and freedom from interruption, which, in more settled communities, make it easy to keep the subject of a prolonged labor from the knowledge of others.

Had Pory been guilty of violating his official oath, is it in the least degree probable that the treasurer and Council, who had both the power and inclination to bring any "instrument" of the Earl's to condign punishment, would have hesitated to displace him? Why also, in the angry debates of the Company, was not the Earl at the time accused of bribery, and denounced as an accessory and the instigator of Pory's alleged transgressions? And, more than all, why does the "Declaration" itself not even allude to bribery?

Besides, if the "Declaration" correctly indicates the order in which events succeeded each other, Pory's letter above must have been written two or three months after the correspondence in question was stopped; and yet that letter does not exhibit a shadow of the alienation of feeling between Sir George Yeardley and his secretary, which would have been inevitable had the imputations in the "Declaration " been literally true.

On the contrary, Pory expresses a cordial confidence in the Governor's military skill, vigilance, and plans for the defence of the colony; respect for his great personal worth; acknowledges that to him he was indebted for all the official emolument he had received; and, by his requesting Sir Dudley Carleton to direct letters and pamphlets for him to the care of the Governor's brother, Ralfe, "to be sent with the Governor's things," proves that he was on friendly and familiar terms with the Governor himself.

The Governor's confidence in Pory likewise appears to have continued unabated. Otherwise, he would not have allowed Pory to occupy the speaker's chair in the General Assembly, or to act as his agent and representative in the expeditions to the Chesapeake and Accomack, and, even after the official term of both had expired, to be jointly concerned in exploring the natural resources of the Chowan region.

The circumstances here brought to notice naturally lead to the conclusion, that the affair, stripped of all false coloring, was simply that Pory, when preparing for the Earl of Warwick copies of the "examinations," which the Earl had a right to receive, was required by the Governor not to forward them, and of course complied with the directions of his superior.

Nothing more, probably, would have been heard of the matter, had not the Earl him