Part 8 (1/2)
In whatever of old English verbiage, with quaint terms and c.u.mbersome repet.i.tion, the stipulations of this contract of were concealed, there can be no doubt that they purported and designed to ”ingage” that ”the Good s.h.i.+p MAY-FLOWER of Yarmouth, of 9 score tuns burthen, whereof for the present viage Thomas Joanes is Master,” should make the ”viage” as a colonist-transport, ”from the city of London in His Majesty's Kingdom of Great Britain,” etc., ”to the neighborhood of the mouth of Hudson's River, in the northern parts of Virginia and return, calling at the Port of Southampton, outward bound, to complete her lading, the same of all kinds, to convey to, and well and safely deliver at, such port or place, at or about the mouth of Hudson's River, so-called, in Virginia aforesaid, as those in authority of her pa.s.sengers shall direct,” etc., with provision as to her return lading, through her supercargo, etc.
It is probable that the exact stipulations of the contract will never transpire, and we can only roughly guess at them, by somewhat difficult comparison with the terms on which the LADY ARBELLA, the ”Admiral,” or flags.h.i.+p, of Winthrop's fleet, was chartered in 1630, for substantially the like voyage (of course, without expectation or probability, of so long a stay on the New England coast), though the latter was much the larger s.h.i.+p. The contract probably named an ”upset” or total sum for the ”round voyage,” as was the of the case with the LADY ARBELLA, though it is to be hoped there was no ”demurrage” clause, exacting damage, as is usual, for each day of detention beyond the ”lay days” allowed, for the long and unexpected tarries in Cape Cod and Plymouth harbors must have rolled up an appalling ”demurrage” claim. Winthrop enters among his memoranda, ”The agreement for the ARBELLA L750, whereof is to be paid in hand [i e. cash down] the rest upon certificate of our safe arrival.”
The sum was doubtless considerably in excess of that paid for the MAY-FLOWER, both because she was a much larger, heavier-armed, and better-manned s.h.i.+p, of finer accommodations, and because s.h.i.+ps were, in 1630, in far greater demand for the New England trade than in 1620, Winthrop's own fleet including no less than ten. The adjustments of freight and pa.s.sage moneys between the Adventurers and colonists are matter of much doubt and perplexity, and are not likely to be fully ascertained. The only light thrown upon them is by the tariffs for such service on Winthrop's fleet, and for pa.s.sage, etc., on different s.h.i.+ps, at a little later day. It is altogether probable that transportation of all those accepted as colonists, by the agents of the Adventurers and ”Planters,” was without direct charge to any individual, but was debited against the whole. But as some had better quarters than others, some much more and heavier furniture, etc., while some had bulky and heavy goods for their personal benefit (such as William Mullen's cases of ”boots and shoes,” etc.), it is fair to a.s.sume that some schedule of rates for ”tonnage,” if not for individuals, became necessary, to prevent complaints and to facilitate accounts. Winthrop credits Mr.
Goffe--owner of two of the s.h.i.+ps in 1630--as follows:--
”For ninety-six pa.s.sengers at L4, L384.
For thirty-two tons of goods at L3 (per ton).
For pa.s.sage for a man, his wife and servant, (3 persons) L16/10, L5/10 each.”
Goodwin shows the cost of transportation at different times and under varying conditions. ”The expense of securing and s.h.i.+pping Thos. Morton of 'Merry Mount' to England, was L12 7 0,” but just what proportion the pa.s.sage money bore to the rest of the account, cannot now be told. The expense of Mr. Rogers, the young insane clergyman brought over by Isaac Allerton, without authority, was, for the voyage out: ”For pa.s.sage L1.
For diet for eleven weeks at 4s. 8d. per week, total L3 11 4”
[A rather longer pa.s.sage than usual.] Constant Southworth came in the same s.h.i.+p and paid the same, L3 11 4, which may hence be a.s.sumed as the average charge, at that date, for a first-cla.s.s pa.s.sage. This does not vary greatly from the tariff of to-day, (1900) as, reduced to United States currency, it would be about $18; and allowing the value of sterling to be about four times this, in purchase ratio, it would mean about $73. The expenses of the thirty-five of the Leyden congregation who came over in the MAY-FLOWER in 1620, and of the others brought in the LION in 1630, were slightly higher than these figures, but the cost of the trip from Leyden to England was included, with that of some clothing.
In 1650, Judge Sewall, who as a wealthy man would be likely to indulge in some luxury, gives his outlay one way, as, ”Fare, L2 3 0; cabin expenses, L4 11 4; total, L6 14 4.”
CHAPTER IV
THE MAY-FLOWER--THE s.h.i.+P HERSELF
Unhappily the early chroniclers familiar with the MAY-FLOWER have left us neither representation nor general description of her, and but few data from which we may reconstruct her outlines and details for ourselves.
Tradition chiefly determines her place in one of the few cla.s.ses into which the merchant craft of her day were divided, her tonnage and service being almost the only other authentic indices to this cla.s.s.
Bradford helps us to little more than the statement, that a vessel, which could have been no other, ”was hired at London, being of burden about 9 score” [tons], while the same extraordinary silence, which we have noticed as to her name, exists as to her description, with Smith, Bradford, Winslow, Morton, and the other contemporaneous or early writers of Pilgrim history. Her hundred and eighty tons register indicates in general her size, and to some extent her probable model and rig.
Long search for a reliable, coetaneous picture of one of the larger s.h.i.+ps of the merchant service of England, in the Pilgrim period, has been rewarded by the discovery of the excel lent ”cut” of such a craft, taken from M. Blundeville's ”New and Necessarie Treatise of Navigation,”
published early in the seventeenth century. Appearing in a work of so high character, published by so competent a navigator and critic, and (approximately) in the very time of the Pilgrim ”exodus,” there can be no doubt that it quite correctly, if roughly and insufficiently, depicts the outlines, rig, and general cast of a vessel of the MAY-FLOWER type and time, as she appeared to those of that day, familiar therewith.
It gives us a s.h.i.+p corresponding, in the chief essentials, to that which careful study of the detail and minutiae of the meagre MAY-FLOWER history and its collaterals had already permitted the author and others to construct mentally, and one which confirms in general the conceptions wrought out by the best artists and students who have attempted to portray the historic s.h.i.+p herself.
Captain J. W. Collins, whose experience and labors in this relation are further alluded to, and whose opinion is ent.i.tled to respect, writes the author in this connection, as follows ”The cut from Blundeville's treatise, which was published more or less contemporaneously with the MAYFLOWER, is, in my judgment, misleading, since it doubtless represents a s.h.i.+p of an earlier date, and is evidently [sic] reproduced from a representation on tapestry, of which examples are still to be seen (with similar s.h.i.+ps) in England. The actual builder's plans, reproduced by Admiral Paris, from drawings still preserved, of s.h.i.+ps of the MAYFLOWER'S time, seem to me to offer more correct and conclusive data for accurately determining what the famous s.h.i.+p of the Pilgrim Fathers was like.”
Decidedly one of the larger and better vessels of the merchant cla.s.s of her day, she presumably followed the prevalent lines of that cla.s.s, no doubt correctly represented, in the main, by the few coeval pictures of such craft which have come down to us. No one can state with absolute authority, her exact rig, model, or dimensions; but there can be no question that all these are very closely determined from even the meagre data and the prints we possess, so nearly did the s.h.i.+ps of each cla.s.s correspond in their respective features in those days. There is a notable similarity in certain points of the MAY-FLOWER, as she has been represented by these different artists, which is evidence upon two points: first, that all delineators have been obliged to study the type of vessel to which she belonged from such representations of it as each could find, as neither picture nor description of the vessel herself was to be had; and second, that as the result of such independent study nearly all are substantially agreed as to what the salient features of her type and cla.s.s were. A model of a s.h.i.+p [3 masts] of the MAY-FLOWER type, and called in the Society's catalogue ”A Model of the MAY FLOWER, after De Bry,” but itself labelled ”Model of one of Sir Walter Raleigh's s.h.i.+ps,” is (mistakenly) exhibited by the Pilgrim Society at Plymouth.
It is by no means to be taken as a correct representation of the Pilgrim bark. Few of the putative pictures of the MAY-FLOWER herself are at all satisfactory,--apart from the environment or relation in which she is usually depicted,--whether considered from an historical, a nautical, or an artistic point of view. The only one of these found by the author which has commanded (general, if qualified) approval is that ent.i.tled ”The MAY-FLOWER at Sea,” a reproduction of which, by permission, is the frontispiece of this volume. It is from an engraving by the master hand of W. J. Linton, from a drawing by Granville Perkins, and appeared in the ”New England Magazine” for April, 1898, as it has elsewhere. Its comparative fidelity to fact, and its spirited treatment, alike commend it to those familiar with the subject, as par excellence the modern artistic picture of the MAY-FLOWER, although somewhat fanciful, and its rig, as Captain Collies observes, ”is that of a s.h.i.+p a century later than the MAY-FLOWER; a square topsail on the mizzen,” he notes, ”being unknown in the early part of the seventeenth century, and a jib on a s.h.i.+p equally rare.” Halsall's picture of ”The Arrival of the MAY-FLOWER in Plymouth Harbor,” owned by the Pilgrim Society, of Plymouth, and hung in the Society's Hall, while presenting several historical inaccuracies, undoubtedly more correctly portrays the s.h.i.+p herself, in model, rig, etc., than do most of the well-known paintings which represent her.
It is much to be regretted that the artist, in woeful ignorance, or disregard, of the recorded fact that the s.h.i.+p was not troubled with either ice or snow on her entrance (at her successful second attempt) to Plymouth harbor, should have covered and environed her with both.
Answering, as the MAY-FLOWER doubtless did, to her type, she was certainly of rather ”blocky,” though not unshapely, build, with high p.o.o.p and forecastle, broad of beam, short in the waist, low ”between decks,”
and modelled far more upon the lines of the great nautical prototype, the water-fowl, than the requirements of speed have permitted in the carrying trade of more recent years. That she was of the ”square rig” of her time--when apparently no use was made of the ”fore-and-aft” sails which have so wholly banished the former from all vessels of her size--goes without saying. She was too large for the lateen rig, so prevalent in the Mediterranean, except upon her mizzenmast, where it was no doubt employed.
The chief differences which appear in the several ”counterfeit presentments” of the historic s.h.i.+p are in the number of her masts and the height of her p.o.o.p and her forecastle. A few make her a brig or ”snow” of the oldest pattern, while others depict her as a full-rigged s.h.i.+p, sometimes having the auxiliary rig of a small ”jigger” or ”dandy-mast,” with square or lateen sail, on peak of stern, or on the bow sprit, or both, though usually her mizzenmast is set well aft upon the p.o.o.p. There is no reason for thinking that the former of these auxiliaries existed upon the MAY-FLOWER, though quite possible. Her 180 tons measurement indicates, by the general rule of the nautical construction of that period, a length of from 90 to 100 feet, ”from taffrail to knighthead,” with about 24 feet beam, and with such a hull as this, three masts would be far more likely than two. The fact that she is always called a ”s.h.i.+p”--to which name, as indicating a cla.s.s, three masts technically attach--is also somewhat significant, though the term is often generically used. Mrs. Jane G. Austin calls the MAY-FLOWER a ”brig,” but there does not appear anywhere any warrant for so doing.
At the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution (National Museum) at Was.h.i.+ngton, D. C., there is exhibited a model of the MAY-FLOWER, constructed from the ratio of measurements given in connection with the sketch and working plans of a British s.h.i.+p of the merchant MAY-FLOWER cla.s.s of the seventeenth century, as laid down by Admiral Francois Edmond Paris, of France, in his ”Souvenirs de Marine.” The hull and rigging of this model were carefully worked out by, and under the supervision of Captain Joseph W. Collins (long in the service of the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution, in nautical and kindred matters, and now a member of the Ma.s.sachusetts Commission of Inland Fisheries and Game), but were calculated on the erroneous basis of a s.h.i.+p of 120 instead of 180 tons measurement. This model, which is upon a scale of 1/2 inch to 1 foot, bears a label designating it as ”The 'MAYFLOWER' of the Puritans” [sic], and giving the following description (written by Captain Collins) of such a vessel as the Pilgrim s.h.i.+p, if of 120 tons burthen, as figured from such data as that given by Admiral Paris, must, approximately, have been. (See photographs of the model presented herewith.) ”A wooden, carvel-built, keel vessel, with full bluff bow, strongly raking below water line; raking curved stem; large open head; long round (nearly log-shaped) bottom; tumble in top side; short run; very large and high square stern; quarter galleries; high forecastle, square on forward end, with open rails on each side; open bulwarks to main [spar] and quarter-decks; a succession of three quarter-decks or p.o.o.ps, the after one being nearly 9 feet above main [spar] deck; two boats stowed on deck; s.h.i.+p-rigged, with pole masts [i.e. masts in one piece]; without jibs; square sprit sail (or water sail under bowsprit); two square sails on fore and main masts, and lateen sail on mizzenmast.”
Dimensions of Vessel. Length, over all, knightheads to taffrail, 82 feet; beam, 22 feet; depth, 14 feet; tonnage, 120; bowsprit, outboard, 40 feet 6 inches; spritsail yard, 34 feet 6 inches; foremast, main deck to top, 39 feet; total length, main [spar] deck to truck, 67 feet 6 inches; fore-yard, 47 feet 6 inches; foretopsail yard, 34 feet 1 2 inches; mainmast, deck to top, 46 feet; total, deck to truck, 81 feet; main yard, 53 feet; maintopsail yard, 38 feet 6 inches; mizzen mast, deck to top, 34 feet; total, deck to truck, 60 feet 6 inches; spanker yard, 54 feet 6 inches; boats, one on port side of deck, 17 feet long by 5 feet 2 inches wide; one on starboard side, 13 feet 6 inches long by 4 feet 9 inches wide. The above description ”worked out” by Captain Collins, and in conformity to which his putative model of the ”MAY FLOWER” was constructed, rests, of course, for its correctness, primarily, upon the a.s.sumptions (which there is no reason to question) that the ”plates” of Admiral Paris, his sketches, working plans, dimensions, etc., are reliable, and that Captain Collins's mathematics are correct, in reducing and applying the Admiral's data to a s.h.i.+p of 120 tons. That there would be some considerable variance from the description given, in applying these data to a s.h.i.+p of 60 tons greater measurement (i.e. of 180 tons), goes without saying, though the changes would appear more largely in the hull dimensions than in the rigging. That the description given, and its expression in the model depicted, present, with considerable fidelity, a s.h.i.+p of the MAY-FLOWER'S cla.s.s and type, in her day,--though of sixty tons less register, and amenable to changes otherwise,--is altogether probable, and taken together, they afford a fairly accurate idea of the general appearance of such a craft.
In addition to mention of the enlargements which the increased tonnage certainly entails, the following features of the description seem to call for remark.
It is doubtful whether the vessels of this cla.s.s had ”open bulwarks to the main [spar] deck,” or ”a succession of three quarter-decks or p.o.o.ps.”
Many models and prints of s.h.i.+ps of that period and cla.s.s show but two.
It is probable that if the jib was absent, as Captain Collins believes (though it was evidently in use upon some of the pinnaces and shallops of the time, and its utility therefore appreciated), there was a small squaresail on a ”dandy” mast on the bowsprit, and very possibly the ”sprit” or ”water-sail” he describes. The length of the vessel as given by Captain Collins, as well as her beam, being based on a measurement of but 120 tons, are both doubtless less than they should be, the depth probably also varying slightly, though there would very likely be but few and slight departures otherwise from his proximate figures. The long-boat would be more likely to be lashed across the hatch amids.h.i.+ps than stowed on the port side of the deck, unless in use for stowage purposes, as previously suggested. Captain Collins very interestingly notes in a letter to the author, concerning the measurements indicated by his model: ”Here we meet with a difficulty, even if it is not insurmountable. This is found in the discrepancy which exists between the dimensions--length, breadth, and depth--requisite to produce a certain tonnage, as given by Admiral Paris and the British Admiralty.
Whether this is due to a difference in estimating tonnage between France (or other countries) and Great Britain, I am unable to say, but it is a somewhat remarkable fact that the National Museum model, which was made for a vessel of 120 tons, as given by Admiral Paris who was a Frenchman, has almost exactly the proportions of length, depth, and breadth that an English s.h.i.+p of 180 tons would have, if we can accept as correct the lists of measurements from the Admiralty records published by Charnock . . . In the third volume of Charnock's 'History of Marine Architecture,' p. 274., I find that a supply transport of 175 tons, built in 1759, and evidently a merchant s.h.i.+p originally, or at least a vessel of that cla.s.s, was 79.4 feet long (tonnage measure), 22.6 feet beam, and 11.61 feet deep.” The correspondence is noticeable and of much interest, but as the writer comments, all depends upon whether or not ”the measurement of the middle of the eighteenth century materially differed in Great Britain from what it was in the early part of the previous century.”