We recommend this volume to the perusal of every person interested in rural affairs. It is written with a considerable degree of elegance, and contains all that is essential. Those who wish to see the subject minutely discussed, will be satisfied in reading the quarto work of Dr. Parry, but much of his work relates only to England. In French there is a work by Daubenton, another by M. Giraud (at present the French consul in Boston) and lastly the work of Lasteyril, Traite sur ·les betes a laine, &c. which is one of the latest. RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW. ART. 5. (Continued from page 352.) The History of New-England, containing an impartial account of the civil and ecclesiastical affairs of the country, to the year of our Lord, 1700. To which is added, the present state of New England. With a new and accurate map of the country, and an Appendix, containing their present charter, their ecclesiastical discipline, and their municipal laws. In two volumes. The second edition, with many additions, by the author. By Daniel Neal, î. м. London; printed 1747. THE second volume of Mr. Neal's history commences with Philip's war. Of this he gives a particular account, though not so minute as we learn from Hubbard's narrative, or from the journal of colonel Church*, who was one of the most active and successful military characters New England could boast off. Antiquaries will recur to these narratives, but they are too dry for the generality of readers. The fathers of New England had been frequently threatened by distinct tribes of Indians, and it had been their policy to make the most of the assistance of the friendly nations; some of whom were always at war with those who opposed the white inhabitants. Philip knew how affairs had been managed. He laid a scheme, therefore, to engage all the Indians in a fixed determination to rise, kill, and destroy, before he made the first bold attempt to cut off the people that were bordering upon his own lands. The settlers of New Plymouth and Massachusetts had enjoyed tranquillity for more than 40 years, and were now filled with grief and surprise to find, that they were called to arms; but they made every preparation to defend their own dwellings, and to carry the war into the enemy's country. Philip was a bold and daring prince, the son of A second edition of this journal was printed in Boston 1772. Massasoiet, sachem of the Wampanoags. The seat of his government was by the English called Mount Hope, which is in the town of Bristol, Rhode Island. It is said, "that he had a mortal hatred to the English, and despised their religion." Old Massasoiet himself never could be persuaded to think that his ancestors had false notions of the divinity, and continued in their religious belief; but he was fond of the English, and shewed kindness to them, though they came to settle on his domains. Philip viewed them with jealousy, and for this was called a perfidious wretch. Every epithet was applied to him, which the Roman writers apply to Hannibal, or Jugurtha, or any barbarous prince who fought in defence of his own country, or for a while kept his possessions from the mighty grasp of their iron hand. We here compare small things with great; but the sentiment applies to a savage warrior of these western regions who made every effort to prolong the existence of his own nation. It was criminal in this man, as his enemies thought, to have a different religion; or not to fall in with their ideas of property when they wanted his estate. This might have been said, if the Indians had had any friends to assert their claims; but their actions are recorded by those who wished to make them odious. It is true, that the New Plymouth settlers were very different from most who came over to New England; and from the generations that succeeded in their own plantations. The first planters were governed neither by ambition, nor avarice. Had these passions been predominant, they would never have left Europe. They had been tried in the school of affliction, and all they wanted was to enjoy their religion. As they could not enjoy it, they left the "natale solum," the " dulcia arva" of old England, for a bare subsistence in Holland, or for these shores of North America, "saxis abundans, horridis ululatibus reboans." It is no wonder that such men were indisposed to quarrel with the natives about their lands; it is no wonder that being so heavenly minded, some of the natives should think there was something divine in their religion. When Squanto was dying, he said, "oh let me go to the Englishman's God;" very different language from what a prince of Cuba addressed to a Spanish priest! The generation of Englishmen with whom Philip was most acquainted differed in many respects from their fathers; they were influenced more by worldly passions; they defrauded the Indians and provoked them to anger; and this led on to the influence of more malignant passions. Philip hated his neighbours, because he thought them more vile than Indians, who roamed through the American wilderness, but had never disturbed people in other quarters of the globe. The machinations of this prince were first discovered by John Sausaman, who had been his secretary, and admitted to all his counsels. This man became a convert to the christian faith, and was prevailed upon by the missionaries to tell all he knew. Soon after, John Sausaman was missing. Suspicions arose, and search being made, the body was found in a pond under the ice, with his hat and gun near the spot, to make it appear, as though he fell through and was drowned. There was no doubt but that he was killed by some of the Wampanoags, yet the legal evidence was wanting Recourse was had to methods to find out the murderer, which the most credulous old woman would laugh at in these times. We do not wonder that Cotton Mather fully believed the story he tells, and it is very probable that his father Increase prescribed the method; but we are astonished that a writer, of such an enlightened mind as Mr. Neal, should repeat it upon their authority. "When it was rumoured about, that Sausaman was missing, some of the neighbours went out in search of him, and finding his hat and gun near a pond, they drew out his body and buried it. But the government of Plymouth suspecting that he was murdered, ordered his body to be dug up, and impannelled a jury to set upon it, who, upon examining the body, found the neck broke, and the head very much swelled, and bruised in several parts, whereupon they gave it as their opinion that he was murdered. Dr. Mather says, that when Tobias, one of King Philip's counsellors, who was suspected of the murder, approached the body, it fell a bleeding, and that upon repeating the experiment several times, it always bled afresh. The justice of peace did not think fit to commit him upon this evidence, till one Patuckson, an Indian, came and swore, that he saw him with his son, and another Indian, called Mattashinnamy, kill Sausaman; and after a fair trial by a jury, consisting half of English, and half of Indians, were found guilty; and though they denied the fact upon the ladder, yet the last of them happening to break or slip the rope, confessed before he was turned off the second time, that the other two Indians who had suffered, did really murder Sausaman, but himself was only a spectator of it." It is not merely the language of poetry: "One murder makes a villain, Had Philip conquered the English, had he destroyed the race of strangers, who have since swept all the Indians from the country of his fathers, he would have been celebrated as the great sachem, dreaded by his enemies, and adored by all the aboriginals. In the course of this war, a great number of towns and villages were depopulated and burnt. Besides the towns laid in ashes, such as Deerfield, Marlborough, &c. terrible cruelties were committed at Andover, Chelmsford, Sudbury, Groton, Rehoboth, and several other places. The Indians often met with a warm reception, and were glad to escape by flight. When Philip had stirred up all the Indians in New England, he went to the Maquas, and contrived the following stratagem to engage them in his concerns: 'Meeting with some of these Indians, he murdered them with his own hands, and then went in haste to the prince of the Maquas, and told him, that a party of Plymouth soldiers had invaded his country, and killed several of his subjects in the woods. This raised a mighty ferment among the people, and would effectually have answered the end, if it had not happened, unluckily for him, that one of the men whom he thought he had killed, recovered so far of his wounds, as to crawl home, and inform of the truth of the matter, before he died. Upon this the nation conceived so implacable a hatred against Philip, that they resolved not only to continue their alliance with the English, but to act separately against him, and his confederates, and drive them out of the country with fire and sword." Hence the Prince of the Warriors became a fugitive, and was hunted like a wild beast in the woods and marshes of Mount Hope, till he was shot by an Indian, August 12, 1676, as he was coming out of a swamp. "His body was quartered and set upon poles, his head was carried to Plymouth, where his skull is preserved as a curiosity to be seen at this day," Page 18. One thing ought to be mentioned here which Mr. Neal seems not to have known, but which is related by Hutchinson, who took great pains to pick up what former generations had said or written, and was very conversant with people of the old colony. He says, a tradition has been handed down that Philip himself was averse to beginning a war with the white people, but was set on by his young men, whose fierce spirits he could not quell; that he was seen to weep over the calamities of his country when they told him of the first Englishman who was slain. All this might be consistent with his mortal aversion to the English. He had a full premonition that his lands would be possessed some time or other by the new inhabitants, and being a man of such foresight, he must have been persuaded that the present war would only hasten the general destruction of his race. The tenth, or succeeding chapter of Mr. Neal's history gives an account of the "Revolution of the government of New England; The reduction of L'Acadie, or New Scotland; Sir William Phips's unfortunate expedition to Quebec," &c. Chap. XI. Sir William Phips returns to England, and joins with the New England agents at the court of King William and Queen Mary, in soliciting the restoration of the charter. They obtain a new one, not so agreeable to the people as the old one. Sir William Phips appointed governor. The war renewed with the Indians. The memorable siege of Welles, &c. The twelfth chapter is a very important one, being an account of the witchcrafts of New England. We shall extract his relation of the trial of the Rev. Mr. Burroughs, which will give a just idea of these trials, the conduct of the court, the shameful testimonies that were allowed, and the melancholy consequences of the delusion which was manifested by all orders of people. "Mr. B. was brought upon his trial August 5, 1692. The Indictment. is as follows: "That G. Burroughs, late of Falmouth, in the Province of Massachusett's Bay, in N. E., Clerk, 9th of May, 4th year of the reign of our Lord and Lady, William and Mary, &c. &c. and divers other times and days as well before as after, certain detestable acts, called witchcrafts, and sorceries, wickedly and feloniously hath used, practised and exercised, at and within the township of Salem, in the county of Essex aforesaid, in, upon and against one Mary Wolcott, of Salem Village, in the county of Essex, single woman, by which said wicked acts the said M. Wolcott, the 9th of May, in the fourth year aforesaid, and divers other days and times, as well before as after, was, and is tortured, afflicted, pinced and consumed, wasted and tormented, against the peace of our sovereign Lord and Lady, the King and Queen, and against the form of the statute in that case made and provided. Witnesses MARY WOLCOTT, SARAH VIBBER, MERCY LEWIS, ANNE PUTNAM, ELIZABETH HUBBARD. Endorsed by the Grand Jury. "The bewitched persons unanimously charged the spectre of the prisoner to have a share in the torments, several declared that they had been troubled with the apparitions of two women, who said they had been the prisoner's wives, and that he had been the death of them. "Some declared that the prisoner, though a puny man, could do amazing feats, such as lifting a gun barrel upon his finger, (which the prisoner acknowledged he could do, and that several others could do the same; for it required nothing more than natural strength.) But the court thought that others may also be assisted by the black man. Robert Calef denies that Burroughs was a puny man, and in opposition to Dr. Mather, says that when he was a boy he was remarkable for his strength. But whatever he said in his defence was thought weak, though he delivered in a paper to the jury, wherein he offered to prove, "That there neither are, nor ever were witches, that having made a compact with the devil, can send a devil to torment other people at a distance." He certainly dropped oracles of wisdom from his lips, though he did not speak to wise men. "Mr. Ruck, brother-in-law to the prisoner, testified, that Mr. Bur roughs and his wife going to gather strawberries, the prisoner stepped aside a little into the bushes, whereupon they halted and halloed for him; but he not making them any answer, they went homeward with a quickened pace, not expecting to see him in a considerable time, but when they were near his house, to their astonishment they found him with a basket of strawberries. The prisoner chid his wife for what she said of him on the road, which when they wondered at, he said he knew their thoughts. Ruck replied, "That is more than the Devil himself knew; but, the prisoner replied, "My God makes known your thoughts to me." Dr. Mather says, the court were of opinion, that he then stepped aside only that by the assistance of the black man, he might put on his invisibility, and in this fascinating mist, gratify his own jealous humour to hear what they said of him. "Upon the day of execution, Mr. Burroughs was carried with others, in a cart through the streets of Salem to the gallows. When he was on the ladder, he made a speech for the clearing of his innocence, with such solemn and serious expressions, as were to the admiration of all present. He concluded his prayer with the repetition of the Lord's Prayer; he uttered himself with so much propriety, fervency, and composure, as drew tears from the spectators, insomuch that some were afraid they |