ished dealings with the merchants there previous to Pontiac's conspiracy. Western New York was at that time a wilderness. There was scarcely a white resident there except at the Forts. Indian supremacy did not cease until put down by Sullivan's expedition in 1779. As late as 1763, fifty armed soldiers with their officers, in guard of twenty-five loaded teams, were moving from Fort Niagara over the newly constructed postage road at Niagara Falls, when they were surprised by a body of Seneca Indians lying in ambush, and the whole party, with only two exceptions, were either massacred on the spot, or driven down the Devil's hole in the Niagara River, perishing there.

While in the Niagara region, Major Van Schaack wrote a letter to his brother, the late Peter Van Schaack, his junior by fourteen years, and then pursuing his studies in Kings College, New York. He introduced into it a passage from one of Shakespeare's plays, being the very excellent advice of Polonius to Laertes, his son, contained in the play of Hamlet, and which Shakespeare makes the father charge the son to" character in his memory." It reads thus:

Thus we have here these two pleasing and singular coincidences, taking place in our Western wilds in the summer of 1764. While Major Henry Van Schaack was at Niagara, in the then wilderness of Western New York, on his way to Detroit, writing a letter to his young brother in the distant East, giving for that brother's instruction an admirable extract from one of Shakespeare's plays, Captain Morris, Mr. Van Schaack's personal friend, was, at the same time, in the remoter and wilder regions of the Illinois country, also on his way to Detroit, receiving at the hands of a savage, a

volume of Shakespeare's plays, and reading therein while seated at the foot of a waterfall.

Captain Morris returned to England with his regiment in 1768. He has left in print the record of a pleasing little incident, which occurred on the occasion of his embarkation at New York, strongly reminding him of his Indian experiences in the Illinois country four years before. While in the Western wilderness Morris saw a white man cutting wood, and was surprised to hear him speak English, as the Indians and French had before been the sole occupants of that wild country. "On questioning him,” says Morris, "I found he was a prisoner; had been one of Lieutenant Holmes' garrison at Miami's Fort, which officer the Indians had murdered. They cut off his head and brought it to the fort, and afterward killed all the garrison except five or six, whom they reserved as victims to be sacrificed when they should lose a man in their wars with the English. They had all been killed except this one man, whom an old squaw had adopted as her son." To this interesting history Morris makes this addition: "When I lay aboard a transport in the harbor of New York, in order to return to Europe, Sir Henry Moore, then governor of that province, came to bid me adieu, and was rowed aboard among others by this very Indian captive, whom I had seen cutting wood in the western wilderness. The man immediately recollected me, and we felt, on seeing each other, what those only can feel who have been in the like situations."

Captain Morris was in the military service about twenty years. After his return to England he seems to have given his attention to literary pursuits, for Mr. Allibone informs us that between the years 1786 and 1802, Morris published, in London, six different works. Among them was an octavo volume, published in 1791, entitled "Miscellanies in Prose and Verse." This book, among other things, contains his "Journal of his Expedition Against and Captivity Among the Indians," from which I have given several extracts. It is remarkably well written, and excites one's admiration for its naturalness, its directness and clearness of statement, its good taste, its artless simplicity, and its rare interest. Among other compositions in the volume last referred to, is one entitled "A Letter to a Friend on the Poetical Elocution of the Theatre, and the Manner of Acting Tragedy." In this masterly criticism, as I think I may venture to characterize it, Captain Morris, in whose character and history I have become deeply interested, makes marked allusion, at the expiration of a quarter of a century, to the ecstacy originally excited, and then evidently still existing in his veins, caused by his Shakespearean experiences in the wilds of America in 1764. This dramatic enthusiast, after placing in the highest position of admiration

the stage-performances of the famous French tragedienne Madam Du Menil, thus closes his criticism: "If the world ever afforded me a pleasure equal to that of reading Shakespeare at the foot of a waterfall in an American desert, it was Du Menil's performance of tragedy."

HENRY C. VAN SCHAACK

From Fort Brewerton situate, at the west end of Oneida Lake, on May 4th, and from Fort Niagara, on July 22d, Captain Morris wrote these letters to Mrs. Van Schaack:

"FORT BREWERTON, May the 4th, 1764.

"MADAM :-I did not expect that I should have occasion to write to a lady for some time, except the lady who gave me birth; but I find myself under the agreeable necessity of sending a tender phrase or two to Mrs. Van Schaack.

"I have received two reproofs, of late, on your account; the one, grave and pathetic, the other, only implied in the bare relation of your displeasure at a neglect of mine.

"As I never knowingly committed any offence in the presence of Mrs. Van Schaack; I hope I shall meet with pardon for a sin of omission against the fair absentee whom I have sainted.

"The fear of being thought importunate was the reason of my not putting your name in letter to Mant, for, I assure you, you were in my mind at the time I concluded it.

"I am a singular man, and would run the risk of losing a mistress rather than be called a troublesome suitor; judge, then, whether I would tease a friend. I will now own to you that I am very glad it has happened; it is the greatest compliment you ever paid me. I construe your discontent a thousand ways, but every way flatters me. I fear I am a very vain little gentleman-I disdain the mediation that is offered me; I apply directly to you, madam, and am very proud of your condescending to take notice of my forgetting you.

"Now I have begun to talk to you, I dont know how to leave off; I can't quit you yet. Tell me who is she? What kind of young woman does Mrs. Van Schaack think would suit me? I sometimes divert myself with seeking out quaint resemblances amongst odd characters of different sexes, and puting them in pairs, but I never could find a female unaccountable to "Your most obedient and humble servant,

**

"Mrs. JANE VAN SCHAACK."

"THOM MORRIS.

"CAMP AT NIAGARA, July the 22d, 1764.

"MADAM :-Once more a few lines to Mrs. Van Schaack; since once more she has honored me by employing her fair hand for my satisfaction and entertainment.

"As your letters, madam, yield me infinite pleasure, and as mine, at best, can afford you but little; if this correspondence should continue, what a debt should I have upon me ! But mind how cleverly I could bring myself off; generous souls receive while they give; so, kind lady, we should be on equal terms.

"From you only I heard about the Dutch letter. Swearing is the vice (and not the only one) of the men in red. I am a great swearer myself; tho not when in company with the beautiful sex.

“You say, 'You should have had no objection to have been of the party at the bowl in the rock :' Your presence would have made the water nectar to me; for I swear (since swearing is fashionable) that I would rather drink of what gushes from a rock, with good sense in petticoats, than of the best Madeira, with the dull, tho clamorous, male things, which most military meetings are composed of. I am sorry to pay you a compliment at the expense of my own sex or profession, and I must assure

you in order to make some amends that the most virtuous and most agreeable characters (for the former does not necessarily include the latter) which I have met with, are to be found among those gentlemen who wear his majestys livery.

"I am now to speak of the fair incognita to whose acquaintance I have been introduced unseen, or rather, on whose good nature I have been obtruded, by the swearing gentleman. Let her not be ashamed to tell me her wishes; but it would be needless; I can guess them. I should not say them, but it. There is but one wish for a virgin; mutual love; a valuable man, who may value her, because she is valuable, and values him. So much for the word value, and a spinster's wish. "O the naughty and intruding company, that would not let you go on! However, you have added three lines, after signing your name relating to this same

"Believe me, madam, your faithful friend, and most humble servant,

"THOM MORRIS."

LORD BALTIMORE'S COLONY OF AVALON

The following indicates the line of discussion in a paper by Professor Adams, of the Johns Hopkins University; but where is the proof that "the High Church party ever contemplated reunion with Rome?"

Contemporary with the Cape Ann plantation was Lord Baltimore's colony in Newfoundland, or Avalon. Both were economic experiments, outcroppings of the colonial enterprise of the period. Both were undertaken primarily for fishery, secondarily for agriculture. Both failed for the time being, but both succeeded by removal of the colony to a more favorable locality. At first, Massachusetts prospered more especially through fishing, Maryland, through planting. Both colonies were founded by English capital, furnished in the one case by an enterprising nobleman, in the other by a stock company of English capitalists and gentlemen. The two colonies started out with the idea of toleration as a matter of public policy. In Maryland, Protestants and Catholics settled side by side, the former, however, predominating numerically from the very outset. In Massachusetts, Episcopalians and Puritans were at first sent out together, but the latter proved the stronger party. Both colonies were captured by Puritans in spite of the efforts of liberal stock-owners. Lord Baltimore had no thought of founding a Catholic asylum, and the Dorchester Company never dreamed of a Puritan refuge when they employed Episcopalians at Cape Ann. Lingard admits that the Catholics were not persecuted in England at this period. The contest lay between the Puritans and the High Church party, whose leading prelates seriously contemplated a reunion with Rome. Lord Baltimore favored Puritans, Churchmen, and Catholics alike. His motive was a naturally broad-minded Catholic spirit, combined with a natural desire to make his colony an economic success.

VERRAZANO PROVED TO BE THE FIRST EXPLORER OF THE ATLANTIC COAST OF THE UNITED STATES

Among the corsairal squadrons, chiefly of French origin, that began to prey on Spanish homeward bound and treasure laden vessels early in the Sixteenth Century, there was one that was led by an able navigator, and a daring seaman, Giovanni da Verrazano, or Jean de Varasenne. A Floren

tine by birth, he had seen service in the Mediterranean naval combats with the Mahomedan, and may have been to India with the Portuguese. Fitted out by armateurs like Jean Ango of Dieppe, he would be put in command of four or five light, but well-armed vessels, and would then cruise off the southwestern coast of Spain for Spanish or Portuguese prizes. We have few documentary records of any of these captures, in any French archives, either municipal or national. Those of Dieppe were destroyed in the bombardment of that city in 1694, those of La Rochelle by Mazarin in 1628, and those of Brest and St. Malo have disappeared. Could the papers of the old armateurs have been preserved, they would furnish much to interest the historian, relating to early exploring voyages, commercial enterprises, and mercantile ventures, in the new seas opened to com

merce.

Owing to the division of the coasts of France among four admiralties, there were no central marine archives. The present Archives de la Marine date from the next century only, in 1673. M. Margry, in his Navigations Françaises, p. 158, refers to this want of collected information. The reports presented to the lieutenants of the admiralties were not made compulsory until the year 1543. A document in which Verrazano's name appears as about to undertake a long voyage to the East Indies in 1526, but which was probably intended to plunder the Spanish fleets, is given by Margry, p. 194, from the Fontette manuscripts in the Bibliotéque Nationale, but not with minute accuracy. Jean de Varesam was a subscriber to the expedition in a sum equal to that of Jean Ango, the merchant prince of Dieppe, and was to be the chief pilot of the expedition. The corsairs were to make prizes "on the sea of the Moors or other enemies of the faith and of the King."

Before starting on this voyage he appointed his brother Jerosme de Varasenne his heir and attorney, by a paper, bearing his signature in Latin, Janus Verrazanus, and dated Friday, eleventh of May, 1526. We shall see