Bradford's History of 'Plimoth Plantation' Part 3

I was fortunate in having formed the friends.h.i.+p of Mr. Grenfell, which secured to me so cordial a reception from the Bishop of London.

It was fortunate that the Bishop of London was Dr. Temple, an eminent scholar, kindly disposed toward the people of the United States, and a man thoroughly capable of understanding and respecting the deep and holy sentiment which a compliance with our desire would gratify.

It was fortunate, too, that Bishop Temple, who thought he must have the approbation of the archbishop before his action, when the time came had himself become Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of all England.

It was fortunate that Dr. Creighton had succeeded to the see of London.

He is, himself, as I have just said, an eminent historical scholar. He has many friends in America. He was the delegate of Emmanuel, John Harvard's College, at the great Harvard centennial celebration in 1886.

He received the degree of doctor of laws at Harvard and is a member of the Ma.s.sachusetts Historical Society. He had, as I have said, entertained President Eliot as his guest in England.

It was fortunate, too, that the application came in a time of cordial good-will between the two countries, when the desire of John Adams and the longing of George III. have their ample and complete fulfilment.

This token of the good-will of England reached Boston on the eve of the birthday of the ill.u.s.trious sovereign, who is not more venerated and beloved by her own subjects than by the kindred people across the sea.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.]

It comes to us at the time of the rejoicing of the English people at the sixtieth anniversary of a reign more crowded with benefit to humanity than any other known in the annals of the race. Upon the power of England, the sceptre, the trident, the lion, the army and the fleet, the monster s.h.i.+ps of war, the all-shattering guns, the American people are strong enough now to look with an entire indifference. We encounter her commerce and her manufacture in the spirit of a generous emulation.

The inheritance from which England has gained these things is ours also.

We, too, are of the Saxon strain.

In our halls is hung Armory of the invincible knights of old.

Our temple covers a continent, and its porches are upon both the seas.

Our fathers knew the secret to lay, in Christian liberty and law, the foundations of empire. Our young men are not ashamed, if need be, to speak with the enemy in the gate.

But to the ill.u.s.trious lady, type of gentlest womanhood, model of mother and wife and friend, who came at eighteen to the throne of George IV.

and William; of purer eyes than to behold iniquity; the maiden presence before which everything unholy shrank; the sovereign who, during her long reign, "ever knew the people that she ruled;" the royal nature that disdained to strike at her kingdom's rival in the hour of our sorest need; the heart which even in the bosom of a queen beat with sympathy for the cause of const.i.tutional liberty; who, herself not unacquainted with grief, laid on the coffin of our dead Garfield the wreath fragrant with a sister's sympathy,--to her our republican manhood does not disdain to bend.

The eagle, lord of land and sea, Will stoop to pay her fealty.

But I am afraid this application might have had the fate of its predecessors but for our special good fortune in the fact that Mr.

Bayard was our amba.s.sador at the Court of St. James. He had been, as I said in the beginning, the amba.s.sador not so much of the diplomacy as of the good-will of the American people. Before his powerful influence every obstacle gave way. It was almost impossible for Englishmen to refuse a request like this, made by him, and in which his own sympathies were so profoundly enlisted.

You are ent.i.tled, sir, to the grat.i.tude of Ma.s.sachusetts, to the grat.i.tude of every lover of Ma.s.sachusetts and of every lover of the country. You have succeeded where so many others have failed, and where so many others would have been likely to fail. You may be sure that our debt to you is fully understood and will not be forgotten.

The question of the permanent abiding-place of this ma.n.u.script will be settled after it has reached the hands of His Excellency. Wherever it shall go it will be an object of reverent care. I do not think many Americans will gaze upon it without a little trembling of the lips and a little gathering of mist in the eyes, as they think of the story of suffering, of sorrow, of peril, of exile, of death and of lofty triumph which that book tells,--which the hand of the great leader and founder of America has traced on those pages.

There is nothing like it in human annals since the story of Bethlehem.

These Englishmen and English women going out from their homes in beautiful Lincoln and York, wife separated from husband and mother from child in that hurried embarkation for Holland, pursued to the beach by English hors.e.m.e.n; the thirteen years of exile; the life at Amsterdam "in alley foul and lane obscure;" the dwelling at Leyden; the embarkation at Delfthaven; the farewell of Robinson; the terrible voyage across the Atlantic; the compact in the harbor; the landing on the rock; the dreadful first winter; the death roll of more than half the number; the days of suffering and of famine; the wakeful night, listening for the yell of wild beast and the war-whoop of the savage; the building of the State on those sure foundations which no wave or tempest has ever shaken; the breaking of the new light; the dawning of the new day; the beginning of the new life; the enjoyment of peace with liberty,--of all these things this is the original record by the hand of our beloved father and founder. Ma.s.sachusetts will preserve it until the time shall come that her children are unworthy of it; and that time shall come,--never.

ADDRESS

OF THE

HON. THOMAS F. BAYARD.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

ADDRESS OF AMBa.s.sADOR BAYARD.

Your Excellency, Gentlemen of the two Houses of the Legislature of Ma.s.sachusetts, Ladies and Gentlemen, Fellow Countrymen: The honorable and most gratifying duty with which I am charged is about to receive its final act of execution, for I have the book here, as it was placed in my hands by the Lord Bishop of London on April 29, intact then and now; and I am about to deliver it according to the provisions of the decree of the Chancellor of London, which has been read in your presence, and the receipt signed by me and registered in his court that I would obey the provisions of that decree.

I have kept my trust; I have kept the book as I received it; I shall deliver it into the hands of the representative of the people who are ent.i.tled to its custody.

And now, gentlemen, it would be superfluous for me to dwell upon the historical features of this remarkable occasion, for it has been done, as we all knew it would be done, with ability, learning, eloquence and impressiveness, by the distinguished Senator who represents you so well in the Congress of the United States.

For all that related to myself, and for every gracious word of recognition and commendation that fell from his lips in relation to the part that I have taken in the act of restoration, I am profoundly grateful. It is an additional reward, but not the reward which induced my action.

To have served your State, to have been instrumental in such an act as this, was of itself a high privilege to me. The Bradford ma.n.u.script was in the library of Fulham palace, and if, by lawful means, I could have become possessed of the volume, and have brought it here and quietly deposited it, I should have gone to my home with the great satisfaction of knowing that I had performed an act of justice, an act of right between two countries. Therefore the praise, however grateful, is additional, and I am very thankful for it.

It may not be inappropriate or unpleasing to you should I state in a very simple manner the history of my relation to the return of this book, for it all has occurred within the last twelve months.

I knew of the existence of this ma.n.u.script, and had seen the reproduction in facsimile. I knew that attempts had been made, unsuccessfully, to obtain the original book.

At that time Senator h.o.a.r made a short visit to England, and in pa.s.sing through London I was informed by him of the great interest that he, in common with the people of this State, had in the restoration of this ma.n.u.script to the custody of the State.

We discussed the methods by which it might be accomplished, and after two or three concurrent suggestions he returned to the United States, and presently I received, under cover from the Secretary of State,--a distinguished citizen of your own State, Mr. Olney,--a formal note, suggesting rather than instructing that in an informal manner I should endeavor to have carried out the wishes of the various societies that had addressed themselves to the Bishop of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury, in order to obtain the return of this ma.n.u.script.

It necessarily had to be done informally. The strict regulations of the office I then occupied forbade my correspondence with any member of the British government except through the foreign office, unless it were informal. An old saying describes the entire case, that "When there's a will there's a way." There certainly was the will to get the book, and there certainly was also a will and a way to give the book, and that way was discovered by the legal custodians of the book itself.

At first there were suggestions of difficulty, some technical questions; and following a very safe rule, the first thought was, What is the law?

and the case was submitted to the law officers of the Crown. Then there arose the necessity of a formal act of permission.

There could be entertained no question as to the t.i.tle to the ma.n.u.script in the possession of the British government. There was no authority to grant a claim, founded on adverse t.i.tle, and the question arose as to the requisite form of law of a permissive rather than of a mandatory nature, in order to be authoritative with those who had charge of the doc.u.ment.

But, as I have said, when there was a will there was found a way. By personal correspondence and interviews with the Bishop of London, I soon discovered that he was as anxious to find the way as I was that he should find it. In March last it was finally agreed that I should employ legal counsel to present a formal pet.i.tion in the Episcopal Consistorial Court of London, and there before the Chancellor to represent the strong desire of Ma.s.sachusetts and her people for the return of the record of her early Governor.

Accordingly, the pet.i.tion was prepared, and by my authority signed as for me by an eminent member of the bar, and it was also signed by the Bishop of London, so that there was a complete consensus. The decree was ordered, as is published in the London "Times" on March 25 last, and nothing after that remained but formalities, in which, as you are well aware, the English law is not lacking, especially in the ecclesiastical tribunals.

These formalities were carried out during my absence from London on a short visit to the Continent, and the decree which you have just heard read was duly entered on April 12 last, consigning the doc.u.ment to my personal custody, to be delivered by me in this city to the high official therein named, subject to those conditions which you have also heard.

Accordingly, on the 29th of April last I was summoned to the court, and there, having signed the receipt, this decree was read in my presence.

Then the Bishop of London arose, and, taking the book in his hands, delivered it with a few gracious words into my custody, and here it is to-day.

The records of those proceedings will no doubt be preserved here as accompanying this book, as they are in the Episcopal Consistorial Court in London, and they tell the entire story.

But that is but part. The thing that I wish to impress upon you, and upon my fellow countrymen throughout the United States, is that this is an act of courtesy and friends.h.i.+p by another government--the government of what we once called our "mother country"--to the entire people of the United States.

You cannot limit it to the Governor of this Commonwealth; nor to the Legislature; nor even to the citizens of this Commonwealth. It extends in its courtesy, its kindness and comity to the entire people of the United States. From first to last there was the ready response of courtesy and kindness to the request for the restoration of this ma.n.u.script record.

I may say to you that there has been nothing that I have sought more earnestly than to place the affairs of these two great nations in the atmosphere of mutual confidence and respect and good-will. If it be a sin to long for the honor of one's country, for the safety and strength of one's country, then I have been a great sinner, for I have striven to advance the honor and the safety and the welfare of my country, and believed it was best accomplished by treating all with justice and courtesy, and doing those things to others which we would ask to have done to ourselves.

When the Chancellor p.r.o.nounced his decree in March last, he cited certain precedents to justify him in restoring this volume to Ma.s.sachusetts. One precedent which powerfully controlled his decision, and which in the closing portion of his judgment he emphasizes, was an act of generous liberality upon the part of the American Library Society in Philadelphia in voluntarily returning to the British government some volumes of original ma.n.u.script of the period of James the First, which by some means not very clearly explained had found their way among the books of that inst.i.tution.

Those books were received by a distinguished man, Lord Romilly, Master of the Rolls, who took occasion to speak of the liberality and kindness which dictated the action of the Philadelphia library. Gentlemen, I am one of those who believe that a generous and kindly act is never unwise between individuals or nations.

The return of this book to you is an echo of the kindly act of your countrymen in the city of Philadelphia in 1866.