[Footnote 52: Robertson. Chalmer. Hutchison.]
The original company of Plymouth, having done nothing effectual towards settling the territory which had been granted to them, and being unable to preserve the monopoly of their trade and fisheries, applied to James for a new and more enlarged patent. On the 3d of November, he granted that territory which lies between the 40th and 48th degrees of north latitude to the Duke of Lenox, the Marquis of Buckingham, and several others, in absolute property; and incorporated them under the name of "the council established at Plymouth, for planting and governing that country called New England;" with jurisdiction and powers similar to those which had before been conferred on the companies of south and north Virginia, and especially that of excluding all other persons whatever from trading within their boundaries and fishing in the neighbouring seas. This improvident grant, which excited the indignation of the people of England, then deeply interested in the fur trade and fisheries, soon engaged the attention, and received the censure of parliament. The patentees were compelled to relinquish their odious monopoly; and, being thus deprived of the funds on which they had relied to furnish the expense of supporting new settlements, they abandoned the design of attempting them. New England might have remained long unoccupied by Europeans, had not the same causes, which occasioned the emigration of the Brownists, still continued to operate. The persecution to which the puritans were exposed, increased their zeal and their numbers. In despair of obtaining at home a relaxation of those rigorous penal statutes under which they had long smarted, they looked elsewhere for that toleration which was denied them in their native land. Understanding that their brethren in New Plymouth were permitted to worship their creator according to the dictates of conscience, their attention was directed towards the same coast; and several small emigrations were made, at different times, to Massachusetts bay; so termed from the name of the Sachem who was sovereign of the country.
[Sidenote: Sir Henry Rosewell and others.]
Mr. White, a non-conforming minister at Dorchester, formed an association of several gentlemen, who had imbibed puritanical opinions, for the purpose of conducting a colony to the bay of Massachusetts, and rendering it an asylum for the persecuted of his own persuasion. In prosecution of these views, a treaty was concluded with the council of Plymouth for the purchase of part of New England; and that corporation, in March 1627, sold to Sir Henry Rosewell and others, all that part of New England lying three miles to the south of Charles river, and three miles north of Merrimack river, and extending from the Atlantic to the South sea. A small number of planters and servants were, soon afterwards, dispatched under Endicot, who, in September, laid the foundation of Salem, the first permanent town in Massachusetts.[53]