A boy named Lion Gardiner was born in England in 1599, toward the
end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. He was strong, active, and
energetic, and as he grew up he was trained to be an engineer.
Like a good many other ambitious young Englishmen of his day, he
took service in the Low Countries,--that is, in what is now
Holland and Belgium,--where the people were fighting against
Spain for their independence. He was employed as "an engineer and
master of works of fortification in the legers [camps] of the
Prince of Orange."

While he was in Holland he received an offer from a group of
English "Lords and Gentlemen" of the Puritan party, who were
interested in colonization in America, to go to New England and
construct works of fortification there. "I was to serve them," he
says, "in the drawing, ordering, and making of a city, towns, or
forts of defence," and "I was appointed to attend such orders as
Mr. John Winthrop, Esq., should appoint, and that we should
choose a place both for the convenience of a good harbour and
also for capableness and fitness for fortification."

Lion Gardiner signed an agreement with them for four years at one
hundred pounds, or five hundred dollars, a year and expenses paid
to America for himself and his family. He was married before he
left Holland and he and his wife sailed for London, July 10,
1635, in a small North Sea bark named the Batcheler. A month
later they left London in the same little ship bound for Boston.
The Batcheler was very small; there were only twelve men and two
women on board, and these two women were Gardiner's wife, Mary
Wilemson, and her maid, Eliza Coles. The voyage was rough and
stormy and lasted nearly three months and a half. When they