HISTORY OF DERRYFIELD. lOI 



thus covering the whole of our title to Derryfield and the lands 

 immediately adjoining. It is of further interest to remember 

 that the identical territory thus acquired by purchase under this 

 deed was afterwards, in November of the same year, granted to 

 Mason by the " Council of Plymouth," at his request. No con- 

 sideration was mentioned, but the obvious inference is, in the 

 light of all the known subsequent facts, that this new grant was 

 designed not only to repudiate the Passaconaway deed but to 

 forever disallow an Indian claim of ownership anywhere. Thus 

 early did these god-fearing and land-loving people of Massachu- 

 setts covet the soil, and from that time on they grabbed what 

 was in sight and claimed the remainder. 



In the meantime the Roswell patent of 1627 had been merged 

 in an exclusive and inclusive charter from King George to the 

 "Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New 

 England." It is scarcely necessary to explain that this charter 

 included Boston. About this time the authorities discovered 

 what had long been known to hunters and rangers in the north 

 country that the Merrimack made a great right-angled bend at 

 Dracut and thereafter ran northerly, whereupon not only their 

 maps but the plan of possession was modified accordingly, and 

 a new boom of geographical discovery and exploration was born. 

 Scouts and surveyors were at once privately commissioned to 

 spy out the land and report. Some years passed, during which 

 a number of expeditions were quietly set on foot to explore the 

 country in various directions, some of which followed the coast, 

 some the Merrimack and others the Connecticut valley. 



From these various sources of information the Massachusetts 

 Bay people took their cue, and in 1638 openly sent out " a com- 

 mittee to find out the most northerly part of the Merrimack 

 River." The committee reported that "some part of it above 

 Penacook was more northerly than forty-three and a half de- 

 grees." This means literally, allowance for error considered, 

 that upon reaching Franklin the committee took the Pemige- 



