tax-gatherer and the insolent demeanor of the Crown officers, who
threaten fines and imprisonment for a refusal to obey. The people are
aroused and are united; some are hopeless, some hopeful. The Crown seems
to have its sway, but the far-sighted see the people on the coming
throne of righteous judgement. What troubles our ancestors most is the
interference with their religious life. Archbishop Laud is now supreme,
and the Pope never had a more willing vassal. Ministers are examined as
to their loyalty to the government, their sermons are read to private
judges of their orthodoxy, the confessional is established, and the
alter-service is restored. It is a time when earnest men and women
cannot be trifled with on soul concerns. Their property may perish or be
confiscated, but the right to unmolested worship is older than Magna
Charta, and as inalienable as life itself. What is to be done?
Resistance or emigration--which? Resist and die, say Cromwell and
Wentworth, Eliot and Hampden. Emigrate and live, say the men and women
who came by thousands from all parts of England during the reign of this
monarch, and made possible the permanent establishment of a new society,
on the basis of social order and family life.

* * * * *



AN INCIDENT OF SIXTEEN HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-SIX.

BY THE HON. MELLEN CHAMBERLAIN.


On the afternoon of the twenty-sixth of May, 1686, two horsemen were
riding from Boston to Cambridge. By which route they left the town is