one of the colonists went back in her. By the end of the first summer a
fort had been built on a hill, seven houses had been erected along a
village street leading down from the fort to the harbor, six and twenty
acres had been cleared, and a bountiful harvest had been gathered. Other
Pilgrims came over, the neighboring Indians kept the peace, and the colony
was soon prosperous.

[Illustration: SITE OF THE FORT AT PLYMOUTH. In the old "burying ground."]

PLYMOUTH, OR THE OLD COLONY.--As soon as the colony was planted, steps
were taken to buy the land on which it stood. The old Plymouth Company
(pp. 38, 39), organized in 1606, was succeeded in 1620 by a new
corporation called the Council for New England, which received a grant of
all the land in America between 40° and 48° of north latitude. From this
Council for New England, therefore, the Pilgrims bought as much land as
they needed. The king, however, refused to give them a charter, so the
people of Plymouth, or the Old Colony as it came to be called, managed
their own affairs in their own way for seventy years. At first the men
assembled in town meeting, made laws, and elected officers. But when the
growth of the colony made such meetings unwieldy, representative
government was set up, and each settlement sent two delegates to an
assembly.

[Illustration: GRAVE OF MILES STANDISH, near Plymouth.]

THE SALEM COLONY.--Shortly after 1620, attempts were made to plant other
colonies in New England. [5] Most of them failed, but some of the
colonists made a settlement called Naumkeag. Among those who watched these
attempts with great interest was John White, a Puritan rector in England.
He believed that the time had come for the Puritans to do what the