Accordingly, on the next training day, when the able men of Salem were
drawn up in their breastplates and headpieces, with the Red-Cross flag
floating over them, and the rest of the townspeople, with here and there
an Indian among them, looking on: Endicott, in his armor, with his sword
upon his thigh, spoke in passionate terms to the assembly of the matter
which weighed upon his heart. And then, as a symbol of the Puritan
protest, and a pledge of his vital sincerity, he took the banner in his
hand, and, drawing his sword, cut the cross out of its folds. The
unparalleled audacity and rashness of this act, which might have brought
upon New England a revocation of her charter and destruction of the
liberties which already exceeded those vouchsafed to Englishmen at home,
alarmed Winthrop, and sent a thrill throughout the colony. But the deed
was too public to be disavowed, and Endicott and they must abide the
consequences. Information of the outrage was carried to Charles; but he
was fortunately too much preoccupied at the moment with the struggle for
his crown at home to be able to take proper action upon the slight put
upon his authority in Salem. No punishment was inflicted upon the bold
soldier, who thus anticipated by nearly a century and a half the step
finally taken by the patriots of 1776.

To return, however, to Endicott's arrival in Boston (as it was afterward
named, in honor of that Lincolnshire Boston from which many of the
emigrants came). There were already a few settlers there, who had come in
from various motives, and one or two of whom were inclined to assert
squatter sovereignty. The rights of the Indians were respected, in
accordance with the injunctions of the Company; and Sagamore John, who
asserted his rights as chief over the neck of land and the hilly
promontory of the present city, was so courteously entreated that he
permitted the erection of a house there, and the laying out of streets.
While these preparations were going forward, the bulk of the first