Chapter III: Part 3

The only original work or tract by which we know the character of Sir George Calvert's mind is "THE ANSWER TO TOM TELL-TROTH, THE PRACTISE OF PRINCES AND THE LAMENTATIONS OF THE KIRKE, _written by Lord Baltimore, late Secretary of State_." London, _printed 1642_:--a copy of which, in MS., is in the collections of the Maryland Hist. Soc. This is a quaint specimen of pedantic politics and toryism--larded with Latin quotations, and altogether redolent of James's Court. It was addressed to Charles I, and shows the author's intimate acquaintance with the political history and movements of the continental powers. We may judge Calvert's politics by the following passage in which he _commends_ the doctrines of his old master:--

"King James," says he, "in his oration to the Parliament, 1620, used these words _very judiciattie_; Kings and Kingdoms were before Parliaments; the Parliament was never called for the purpose to meddle with complaints against the King, the Church, or State matters, but _ad consultandum de rebus arduis, Nos et Regnum nostrum concernantibus_; as the writ will inform you. I was never the cause, nor guiltie of the election of my sonne by the Bohemians, neither would I be content that any other king should dispute whether I am a lawful King or no, and to tosse crowns like Tennis-balls."

[9] It may seem strange, that, being a Catholic, he still had the right of advowson or of presentation to Protestant Episcopal Churches; but it was not until the Act of 1st William and Mary, chapter 26, that Parliament interfered with the right of Catholics to present to religious benefices. That Act vested the presentations belonging to Catholics in the Universities. An Act passed 12th Anne, was of a similar disabling character.--_Butler's Hist. Mem. vol. 3, pp. 136, 148, 149._

[10] See Appendix No. 1, in regard to the erroneous translation of this clause from the Latin, that has hitherto been adopted from Bacon's laws of Maryland.

[11] As an illustration of this feeling, I will quote a passage showing how it fared with Marylanders in Massachusetts in 1631. "The Dove," one of the vessels of the first colonists to Maryland, was dispatched to Massachusetts with a cargo of corn to exchange for fish. She carried a friendly letter from Calvert and another from Harvey, but the magistrates were suspicious of a people who "_did set up mass openly_." Some of the crew were accused of reviling the inhabitants of Massachusetts as "holy brethren," "the members," &c., and just as the ship was about to sail; _the supercargo, happening on shore, was arrested in order to compel the master to give up the culprits_. The proof failed, and the vessel was suffered to depart, but not without a special charge to the master "_to bring no more such disordered persons!_"--_Hildreth Hist. U. S., vol. 1, 209_.

[12] See Appendix No. 2.

[13] In order to illustrate the spirit in which the region for the first settlement at St. Mary's was acquired, I will quote from a MS. copy of "A Relation of Maryland, 1635," now in my possession: "To make his entrie peaceable and safe, he thought fit to present ye Werowance and Wisoes of the town (so they call ye chief men of accompt among them,) with some English cloth (such as is used in trade with ye Indians,) axes, hoes, and knives, which they accepted verie kindlie, and freely gave consent toe his companie that hee and they should dwell in one part of their towne, and reserved the other for themselves: and those Indians that dwelt in that part of ye towne which was allotted for ye English, freely left them their houses and some corne that they had begun to plant: It was also agreed between them that at ye end of ye Harvest they should have ye whole Towne, which they did accordinglie. And they made mutuall promises to each other to live peaceably and friendlie together, and if any injury should happen to be done, on any part, that satisfaction should be made for ye same; and thus, on ye 27 DAIE of MARCH, A. D. 1634, ye Gouernour took possession of ye place, and named ye _Towne--Saint Marie's_.

"There was an occasion that much facilitated their treatie with these Indians which was this: the Susquehanocks (a warlike people that inhabit between Chesapeake Bay and Delaware Bay) did usuallie make warres and incursions upon ye neighboring Indians, partly for superioritie, partly for to gett their women, and what other purchase they could meet with; which the Indians of _Yoacomaco_ fearing, had, ye yeere before our arivall there, made a resolution, for there safetie, to remove themselves higher into ye countrie, where it was more populous, and many of them where gone there when ye English arrived."

At Potomac, Father Altham,--according to Father White's Latin MS. in the Maryland Hist. Soc. Col.--informed the guardian of the King that _we_ (the clergy) had not come thither for war, but for the sake of benevolence,--that we might imbue a rude race with the principles of civilization, and open a way to Heaven, as well as to impart to them the advantages enjoyed by distant regions. The prince signified that we had come acceptably. The interpreter was one of the Virginia Protestants. When the Father, for lack of time, could not continue his discourse, and promised soon to return: "I will that it should be so," said Archihau--"our table shall be one; my men shall hunt for you; all things shall be in common between us."

The Werowance of Pautuxent visited the strangers, and when he was about departing, used the following language, as recorded in the MS. Relation of Maryland of 1635: "I love ye English so well that if they should goe about to kill me, if I had so much breath as to speak, I would command ye people not to revenge my death; for I know they would not doe such a thinge except it was through mine own default." See also Mr. B. U. Campbell's admirable SKETCH OF THE EARLY MISSIONS TO MARYLAND, read before the Md. Hist. Soc. 8th Jan. 1846, and subsequently printed in the U.S. Catholic Magazine.

[14] In William Penn's second reply to a committee of the House of Lords appointed in 1678, he declares that those who cannot comply with laws, through tenderness of conscience, should not "revile or conspire against the government, _but with christian humility and patience tire out all mistakes against us_, and wait their better information, who, we believe, do as undeservedly as severely treat us."

[15] Preface to Frame of Government, 25 April, 1682.

[16] Those who desire to know the precise character of the celebrated Elm-tree Treaty, should read the Memoir on its history, in vol. 3, part 2, p. 145 of the Memoirs of the Pennsylvania Hist. Soc., written by the late Mr. Du Ponceau, and Mr. Joshua Francis Fisher. It is one of the finest specimen of minute, exhaustive, historical analysis, with which I am acquainted. These gentlemen, prove, I think, conclusively, that the Treaty was altogether one of amity and friendship, and was entirely unconnected with the purchase of lands.

[17] Janney's Life of Penn, 163.

[18] See 2nd Bozman Hist. Md. p. 616--note XLIII, Conditions, &c.

[19] 2d Bozman, 597, and Orig. MS. in Md. His. Soc.