culties. The decision was all the more timely, as well as the more necessary, since he had plans of his own to accomplish, which, when publicly known, would set all Virginia in an uproar.

It was in pursuit of these plans that, probably while waiting for a ship to carry him home, he sailed upon a voyage of discovery up the Chesapeake," "the mother of waters," the great bay which divides Maryland into two parts. About 1608, the celebrated Captain John Smith, Governor of Virginia, had explored this magnificent inland sea, and in the account of his voyage there is a beautiful indication of the religious character of the people that should one day dwell on its shores. "Our order," runs the record, "was daily to have prayer with a psalm." 15 Thus when upon the waters of the Chesapeake, there sailed for the first time the ship of a white man, the sound of prayers and hymns offered in the name of Jesus, the Son of the Living God, was borne by the breeze to the densely wooded shores whereon the wild Indians dwelt. Church of England men were these voyagers, Churchmen or Episcopalians, as they are indifferently termed now, who used as their book

14 Md. Hist. Soc., F. P., No. 9, P. 12, Streeter. 15 Smith, History of Virginia, P. 183.

of devotion the Book of Common Prayer. In this way it was that along with the first sail of AngloSaxons on the Chesapeake, there went the English Bible and the English Prayer Book. Now for the second time these waters were being plowed by the keel of a vessel bearing white men. It was, however, by this voyage of Baltimore's, that the suspicions of William Clayborne, Virginia's Secretary of State, were aroused. The secretary had a settlement of his own in the bay, on an island lying almost as far north as the Patapsco River, and he feared, only too reasonably as events turned out, that Lord Baltimore might cast covetous eyes upon it. As the result of his suspicions, Clayborne also resolved to visit England, that he might be on hand to protect, if need be, his interests, and safeguard his rights, a course of action the wisdom of which after events fully justified. This Clayborne was the second son of Sir Edward Clayborne, or Cleburne, of Westmoreland. He was one of the colonial officers appointed in 1621 by the London company for Virginia, and the ablest man in the Virginia colony. Accordingly when Lord Baltimore sailed away from Virginia, Clayborne seems to have sailed too.

16 Neill, Founders of Md., P. 47.

16

That Lord Baltimore did not anticipate much trouble in gaining his object is evident, since he left wife and dependents behind him, as if confident of a speedy return. Manifestly his relations with the colonists were not unpleasant, notwithstanding the well-grounded suspicions of Clayborne and perhaps a few others.

Had the Virginians known all, there might have been more than one Tindale to put into the pillory for giving my Lord Baltimore the lie, and threatening to knock him down. Meanwhile, as the colonists went down to the ship to bid him God-speed, and to wish him a safe return, they were all innocently wishing prosperity to the man who was coveting their land, and who was destined to be successful in his endeavors to rob them of many thousands of its acres. Little did they imagine, that he was not sailing to England in order to gain citizenship in Virginia without having to take the usual oath, but to secure at their expense a new province of his own. It was this design which was at the back of all his remarkable scruples. The

17 It is true that the Charter which originally conveyed this property to the Virginians had been annulled since 1624. But both James I. and Charles I. simply abolished the sovereignty guaranteed to Virginia; not interfering at all with the territorial limits of the colony-a very important, and even vital difference, but one often lost sight of.

Its will

truth is that had the Virginians been willing to present him with all the land he coveted, even to the half of their inheritance, he would in all likelihood have declined the gift for reasons not difficult to discover. There existed in England an executive committee of the Privy Council called the Star Chamber, which had the charge of all plantations abroad. This committee was absolute. was law; its judgments final. But there cannot be two Star Chambers in one country, and Baltimore's ambition was to be the Star Chamber of his new colony. He had been a monarch in Newfoundland, and he had no intention of becoming anything less in Virginia.18 He was by nature an autocrat, and his imperialistic tendencies, unchanged by misfortune, untaught by the education of travel or experience, were with him still.

"Cœlum, non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt.” But these tendencies could have no legitimate outlet in Virginia.

18 See Lodge, A Short Hist. of Eng. Colonies in America, P, 94.

CHAPTER VI.

THE DEATH OF LORD BALTIMORE.

1632.

think poor beggars court St. Giles,

Rich beggars court St. Stephen ;

And death looks down with nods and smiles

And makes the odds all even.

-PRAED: "Brazen Head."

Back again in England! Back from foreign parts! How lovely would England seem with her trim hedgerows and green fields, like some neat and well-kept garden. How his friends would crowd around him to learn the news of those strange countries of which at that time the wisest knew but little. But he could not afford to tarry among them long. He was intent on business which would take him, either to the historic home of England's kings and queens besides the royal Thames, or to that noble palace which the ambition of Cardinal Wolsey had raised as a dwelling place for himself, and which the king now called his own. He would have private interview with Charles and learn from him his fate. But even had his