A TRIBUTE TO SQUANTO 357 



MEAGER MENTION OF SQTTANTO. 



The honor of teaching the American colonists the 

 use of artificial fertilizers belongs, without doubt, to 

 an Indian named Squanto. In Governor Bradford's 

 " History of Plimouth Plantation " is given an account 

 of the early agricultural experiences of the Plymouth 

 colonists. In April, 1621, at the close of the first long 

 dreary winter " they (as many as were able) began to 

 plant their come, in which service Squanto (an In- 

 dian) stood them in great stead, showing them both ye 

 manner how to set it, and after how to dress and tend 

 it Also he tould them, axcepte they got fish and set 

 with it (in these old grounds) it would come to noth- 

 ing; and he showed them yt in ye middle of Aprill, 

 they should have store enough come up ye brooke by 

 which they begane to build and taught them how to 

 take it." 



Another account mentioned by Goode of the prac- 

 tice of the Indians in this respect may be found in 

 George Mourt's " Relation or Journal of the Beginning 

 and Proceedings of the English Plantation settled at 

 Plimouth in New England, by certain English Adven- 

 turers, both merchants and others, London, 1622." 

 " We set the last spring some twenty acres of Indian 

 corn, and sowed some six acres of barley and pease, 

 and, according to the manner of the Indians, we 

 manured our ground with herrings, or rather shads, 

 which we have in great abundance and take with great 

 ease at our doors. Our corn did prove well, and God 

 be praised, we had a good increase of Indian corn, and 

 our barley indifferent good." 



Thomas Morton, in his " New England Canaan," 

 London, 1632, wrote of Virginia: "There is a fish 



