Evolution of Dorticulture 



and with overreaching partners in trade, 

 anxious struggles to get a living, and, at 

 most, the sufferings of men, women, and 

 children, wasting under cold, sickness, 

 and famine, feebly supply, as the staple 

 of a history, the place of those splendid 

 exhibitions of power, and those critical 

 conflicts of intrigue and war, which fill 

 the annals of great empires. But no 

 higher stake is played for in the largest 

 sphere, than the life of a body politic ; 

 nor is the merit of that constancy which 

 makes no account of sacrifice and suffer- 

 ing, to be estimated by the size of the 

 theatre on which it is displayed." l 



On November I5th, a party of fifteen 

 men under Standish as leader, armed and 

 provisioned, started off on a reconnois- 

 sance of the country. They were absent 

 three days. Proceeding southward, on 

 the second day they came to a tract of 

 land which had been cultivated for corn. 

 Here they found certain heaps of sand 

 which they supposed to be graves, also 

 1 Palfrey, New England, vol. i., p. 166. 

 56 



