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1626

HISTORY

PENOBSCOT CO Wi

MAINE,

W I I H

Illustrations and Biographical Sketches,

CLEVELAND:

WILLIAMS, CHASE r^ CO

1882.

^ ■

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^^Uf i^

PREFACE.

It is hoped that this book is redeemed from the
sweeping reproach of Walpole: "Read me anything but
history, for history must be false;" or the scope of
Napoleon's question; "What is history, but a fiction
agreed upon?" It will need, however, the abounding
charity of De Quincey's eloquent phrase: "Two strong
angels stand by the side of history, * * as
heraldic supporters — the angel of research on the left
hand, that must read millions of dusty parchments and
of pages blotted with lies ; the angel of meditation on
the right hand, that must cleanse these lying records with
fire, even as of old the draperies of asbestos were
cleansed, and must quicken them into regenerated life.
Willingly I acknowledge that no man will ever avoid in-
numerable errors of detail; with so vast a compass of
ground to traverse, this is impossible." That this book is
superior, in the points of accuracy and fullness, to all
others of its class, the compilers do not claim ; but it is
hoped that in these particulars the History is equal to
the best of them. It is recommended that every reader,
before entering upon the perusal of its pages, use the
table of -^rata, at the end of the work, in the careful
correction of its pages with pen or pencil. Many errors
of typography, and some of statement, will thus disap-
pear.

It will be observed, also, that important parts of the
History supplement each other. Judge Godfrey, for ex-
ample, has fortunately enlarged the scope of his Annals
far beyond the limits of Bangor; and if the separate
sketches of Brewer, Orrington, Hampden, and many
other towns, seem insufficient, additional matter of

abounding interest will be found in the Bangor division
of the book. Further histories of Dexter, Bradley,
Passadumkeag, etc., received late in the course of print-
ing, are also comprised in the Appendix.

It was inevitable, however, that parts of the book
would scarcely prove equal to the expectation of some of
its readers. An immense tract was to be traversed, in
both time and geographical area ; a large General History
was to be made up, in justice to the most important
county of Eastern Maine. Separate sketches were to be
made of the history of one city, fifty-five towns, and
seven organized plantations — a number of these settled
by civilization more than a century ago; and it soon be-
came certain, in the preparation of this work, that, within
the limits necessarily prescribed for it (large as it is, com-
prising more than a million of words), it would be simply
impossible to make the history of all localities equally
full and satisfactory. It only remained for the compilers
and their aids to do th': best that was practicable, with the
materials at hand, and leave the generosity and good
sense of their readers to accept the result as such.

Acknowledgments to books and persons are so amply
and frequently made in the course of the chapters that
it is deemed unnecessary to repeat them here. The
grateful thanks of the compilers are due to them, and to
all others who may have contributed to the literary as
well as pecuniary success of this important venture.

For the biographical feature of this book the compilers
have, with few exceptions, no responsibility.

January 3, 1882.

CONTENTS

HISTORICAL.

GENERAL HISTORY,

CHAPTER.

I. —Description of the county .
II. —The Penobscot Indians
HI.— The Discoverers
IV. — Geographical Designations
V. — Colonization and Settlement
VI. — The Mission.iries
VII.— County Organization— Civil List
VIII.— Land Titles— Growth
IX. — Military Kecoid of Penobscot County
X.— Agricultural and other Societies
XL— The Maine State College
XII.— Ecclesiastical History
XIIL— The Bangor Theological Seminary
XIV. — The Press in Penobscot County
XV.— Roads, Railroads and Telegraphs
XVI.— The Bench and Bar uf Penobscot
XVII. — Bibliography of Penobscot County

TOWNSHIPS AND VILLAGES.

Alton

Argyle .

Bradford

Bradley

Brewer

Burlington

Carmel

Carroll

Charleston

Chester

Clifton

Corinna

Corinth

Dexter

Dixmont

Eddington

Edinburg

Enfield

Etna

Exeter .

Garland

Glenburn

Greenbush

Greenfield

Hampden

Hermon

H olden

Howland

Hudson

Kenduskeag

Kingman

Lagrange

Levant

Lee

Lincoln

Lowell .

Mattawamkeag

Mattamiscontis

Maxfield

9
29
46
S'
65
70
73
77
86
164
170
176
177
185
191

19s
228

. 247
249

• 25'
255-855

. 258
269
272
276

. 279
283
290

293
306
18-861
323
333
339
340

343
869
352
359
362
366
368

379
382
387

390
391
396
398
403
884
408

415
894
419
420

CHAPTKR.

Med way

Milford

Mount Chase .

Newburg

Newport

Orono

Oldtown

Orrington

Passadumkcag

Patten

Plymouth

Plantations

Prentiss

Springfield

Stetson

Veazie

Winn

THE ANNALS OF BANGOR-l76<l-l882.
CHAPTER.

1.-1769 to 1776 .
U. — 1770 to 17B0

111.-1780101785 .

IV.— 1785 to 1800
v. — 1800 to 1805 .
VI. — 1805 to 1811
,VII. — 1811-1812-1813
VIII. — 1814

IX.— 1815 to 1816 .
X— 1817
XI. — 1818 .
XU. — 1819
XllI— 1820 .
XIV. — 1821
XV.— 1822 .
XVI. — 1823
XVll. — 1824 .
XVIII.— 1825
XIX.— 1826 .
XX. — 1827
XXI.— 1828 .
XXII. — 1829
XXIII— 1830 .
XXIV. — 183:

XXV.— 1832 .
XXVI. — 1833
XXVII. -1834 .
XXVIU.- 1835
XXIX. — 1836 .

XXX.-I837

XXXI.— Subsequent History of Bangor, 1838-188

XXXII.— The Churches of Bangor

XXXIIl.— The Public Charities of Bangor

XXXIV.— Associations and Clubs .

XXXV.— The Water Works

XXXVl.— Civil List of Bangor
XXXVl I. -Bangor Biographies .
XXXVIII— Settlement Notes

XXXIX.— Township Biographies

PAGE.
422
901
424
436
43S

■ 443
454

■ 467
475-9"

• 478

482

506-513

485

. 48B

490

• 495

497

5'7

522

52B

535

54'

547

553

557

570 •.

577

579

586

59°
S9S
601
606
610
6ts
623
632
641
646
650

653
650
662
667
672
684

697
711
718

733
738

750
753
760

787
820

CONTENTS.

APPENDIX.

Appendix to Cleneral History
Appendix to Br.idley.
Ucxtcr. .
Exeler

847

855
861
809

Lee

Mattawainkeag
Milford .
I^.issadunikeag
Addenda

§^

8S4
894
901
911
914

BIOGRAPHICAL,

Appleton, Hon. John. I.L. D

Allen, Hon. Frederick H.

Allen, Hon. Elisha H.

Abbot, Hon William

Appleton, Frederick H.

Appleton, Moses L.

Appleton, General John F.

Ayer. Horatio S.

Brown, Hon. Enoch

Barker, Hon. Lewis

Barker, Lewis A.

Fiarker, David

Bartlett, Ichabod D.

Bailey, Charles .\.

Blanchard, John .\.

Blake, William A.

Bond, Francis Eugene

Burgess, James H.

Brastow, Captain Billint;^

Barker, Hon. Lewis,

Boutelle, Captain Charles A

Brown, William H., KL D.

Beal, Flavius O.

Bryant, Charles D.

Bragg, Warren A.

Butman, Samuel

Chesley, Samuel

Cutting, Jonas, LL. U.

Chandler, Peleg

Crosby, Hon. Josiah

Chandler, Theophilus P.

Copeland, ThoniasJ.

Crosby, William C.

Chamberlain, Jlorace B.

Chamberlain, Lieutenant Colonel 1 humas U

Chamberlain, Joshua L.

Comins, Lieutenant L. \L

Case, Captain Isaac Winslow

Carleton, Brigadier General James H

Chapman, AdolphusJ.

Crosby, Captain Henry

Dutton, Hon. Samuel E

Donigan, James \.

Davis, Governor D. F.

Emery, Marcel lus

Eddy, Colonel Jonathan

Ellis, Captain Osco .A.

Egery, Hon. Thomas N

Eddy, Jonathan

Fuller, Lieutenant Colonel Geoti^e

Foster, Major Benjamin B.

Flanders, Reuben

Folsom, Dr. A. 1'.

Folsoiii, Major M. M.

Fcrnald, M. C.

Fuller, Henry 1).

Godfrey, Hon. John

Godfrey, James

Goodenow, Hon. Henry C.

Gilman, Hon. Allen

Oilman, Charles

Garnsey. Samuel

Greenwood, Charles

Gardnur, Hon. John

Halhawny, Hon. Joshua W

Hill, Hon. Thomas .\.

Humphrey, Hon. Samuel F.

r.\GK.

201 and 763
205
211
213
222
222
225
830
207
217
217
224
224
225
225
226
226
227
261
764

766 and 915
767

783
786

813
918
287
202
212
216 and 825
220
223
223
227
261
262
335
393
449
-82

372
205
227
823
224

334
410

779
842

314
450
828

833
834

83.S
314
208
208
210
212
219
219
30s

837
203
2og
210

Hamlin, Hon. Hannibal

Hamlin, Hon. Elijah L.

Hamlin, General Charles

Hilliard, William T. .

Hobbs, P>ederick .

Hill, Joshua

Hill, Colonel Francis

Hodsdon, Sergeant Israel

Hutchings, Colonel Jasper

Hill, Brevet Brigadier General J

Hill, Captain Henry V.

Hersey, General S. F.

Hunt, Abel

Haines, Dr. George A.

Hill, Hon. Francis W.

H.inimond. John R.

Huston, Nicholas R.

Haynes, George H.

Hodsdon, General Isaac

Ingersoll, George W. .

Jewett, Hon. Albert G.

Jordon. Edward

Kent, Hon. Edward, L. L. D.

Kent, Hon. Edwaid, L. L. D.

Leonard, Oliver

Ladd, Hon. George W.

Lord. Henry

Laugluon, Dr. Sumner

Laughton, Hon. Frederick M.

McGaw, Hon, Thornton

McGaw, Jacob

Moody, George B.

McCrilhs, David

McCrillis, William H.

Mitchell, Henry L.

McFadden, T. F.

Mayo, Captain Ezekiel R

Mudge Enoch R.

Morison, Hon. John

Nichols, Lemuel

Oakman, Major Ora

Oakes, Captain Samuel J.

Plaisted, Hon. Harris M.

Peters, Hon. John A.

Perham, Hon. David

Plaisted, Hon. Harris M.

Prentiss, Hon. Henry E.

Paine. Albert W.

Palmer, Surgeon Alden D.

Pullen, Colonel Frank D.

Plaisted, Hon. William

Rowe, James S.

Rogers, Jonathan P.

Rogers, Lieutenant Edwin

Ruggles, Major Huani

Ruggles, Lieutenant G. H.

Sanborn, Hon. Daniel

Stetson, Hon, Charles

Stetson, Charles P.

Sewall, George P.

Starretl, George

Sanborn, Abraharn

Stearns, Lewis C. .

Sanger, Dr. E. F.

Seavy, Dr. Calvin

Sargent, Deacon Daniel

than A

bet

HAGE.
213
760
214
214
221
223
226
917

3"4
227
492
. 492
777
786
828
829

837
838

839
840
220
211
838
203
761
218

763
766
770
771
209
218

220
222
222
225
225

• 371
472
824

784

• 311
476

ecu 64-65
204
204
211

216

222

■ 449

781
829
219
219

479
821
82a
307
aio
aio
215
219

323
338
768

• 77t

820

CONTEN'IS.

BIOGRAPHICAL.

Sprague, V'olney A.

Shaw, Hon. Charles .

Smith, Hon. Asa .

Shaw, E. W. .

Smith, Hon. Joseph I,.

Thissell, Hon. John

Vose, Hon. Thomas W. .

Veazie, General Samuel

Veazie, Jones P.

Williamson, Hon. Wilham U.

Washburn, Hon. Isniel

Wakefield, Hon. Albert G.

Wilson, Nathaniel

Map of Penobscot County .
Portrait of General Samuel Veazie
Portrait of Governor H. M. Plnisted
Portrait of D. F. Davis
County Buildings
Portr.iit of Lewis A. Barker
Residence of .\. F. Bradbury
Portrait of General Isaac Hodsdon
Portrait of Dr. E. F. Sanger
Portrait of Major M. M. Folsom
Portrait ol Lieutenant G. H. Ruggle-^
Maine State Agricultural College
Portrait of M. C. Fernald .
Portrait of C. A. Boutelle
Portrait of Noah Woods
Portrait of Hon. John Appleton
Portrait of Hon. John E. Godfrey
Portrait of Hon. Josiah Crosby
Residence of Greenville J. Shaw
Portrait of Charles P. Church
Portrait of Cyrus P. Church
Portrait of Thomas R. Kingsbury
Purir.iit of D. S. Humphrey
Portrait of Deacon Daniel Sargent
ResidenceofJ.B. Benjamin
Portrait of Major Hiram Ruggles
Potiraitof Thomas J. Peaks
\iew ol Eureka Mills
Portrait of Hon. John Thissell
Portrait of Reuben Flanders .
View ol Amos Abbott & Co's Mills
Portrait of Colonel Jonathan Eddy
I'ortrait of T. P. Bachelder
Portrait of Hon. William Plaistid
Portrait of William R. .•\yer
Portrait of E. W. Shaw
Portrait of Dr. John Benson
Residence of B. P. Gilman
Portrait of Jesse R. W,adleigh
Residence of Eben Webster
Portrait of J. L. Smith
Portrait of Dr. A. P. Folsom .
Residence of Dr. A. I'. Folsom
Residence of M. M. Folsom

PAGE.

. 827
827

. 830
831

• 832
825

217
774
• 787
206
211
215
221

Weston, Nathan Jr.
Weeks, Matthias .
Whitney, George W. .
Wilson, Franklin A.
Wilson. Joseph C.
W.ishbum, Lieutenant Israel H.
Woods, Hon. Noah
Webber, John I^rescott
Wadleigh, Jesse R.
Wadleigh, Moses P.
Webster, Eben
Wilson, Surgeon ). B.

ILLUSTRATIONS,

P.^GE.

Frontispiece

between 32

- 33

facing

between 82

- 83

facing

between 112-113 |

facing

117

between 15

2-153

facing

170

facing

172

between 186-1 87

facing

•93

facing

201

facing

208

facing

216

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244

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251

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f.icing

253

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between 2

58-259

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between 274-275

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between 3

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between 394-395

facing

409

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414

facing

437

facing

442

between

144-445

facing

448

facing

449

between 454-4=;5

between 458-459

between

458-459

facing

466

Portrait of John Gardner

Residence of John Gardner

Portrait of John R. Hammond

Rcsidenceof John R. Hammond

Cream Brook Farm .

Residence of Samuel E. Stetson.

Residence of Edward and John JorJ.jn

Residence of Porter G. Wiggin .

Portrait of Alvin Haynes

Portrait of Charles A. H.iynes .

Portrait of George H. Haynes

Portrait of N. R. Huston

Residence of N. R. Huston

Map of Bangor in 1798 .

Portrait of Hon. Lewis Barker -

Portrait of Thomas N. Egery .

Portrait of G. W. Ladd

Map of Bangor in 1820 .

Map of Bangor in 1820

Portrait of Lemuel Nichols

Portraitof J. E. Chapman .

Bangor Planing Mill

Portrait of Hon. Henry Lord

Poillait of F. O. Beal

View of Bangor House

Portrait of Jones P. Veazie

Portr.iit of .Abel Hunt

Portrait of F. V. Pullen .

I'orlrail of F. M. Laughton

St. Xavier's Convent

Portrait of Dr. Sumner t^ughlon

Portrait of J, P. Webber

Store of Thurston, Biagg & Co.

Residence of Hon. John Morison

Portr.ait of Volney A. Sprague

Portr.iit of Thomas M. Plaisted

Portrait of George A. Haines

Dexter Woolen Mills

Residence of Hon. Josiah Crosby

Portraitof F. W. Hill .

Residence and portrait of Asa Smith

Portrait of Colonel Francis Hill

Portrait of Mrs. Elizabeth Hill

223
224
227
228
228
449
773
780

831
832

83s
883

PAGE.

between 478-479
between 478-479
between 480-481
between 480-481
between 490-491
facing 492

facing 493
facing 494
between 838-839
between 838-839
between 838-839
between 500-501
between 500-501
facing 515

between 524-525
between 544-545
between 570-571
between 590-591
between 590-591
facing 592

facing 600

facing 608

between 624-625
between 644-645
between 644-64S
facing 652

lacing 656

between 702-703
helwcen 712-713
facing 731

between 734-735

facing

741

f.icing

8'3

facing

824

facing

827

facing

829

facing

8bi

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865

facing

863

facing

879

facing

897

between

916-915

between

916-917

HISTORY

Penobscot County, Maine,

CHAPTER I.

DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTY.

Geographical— Its Silunliun, Size, Boundaries, Subdivisions, and
I'opulalion— The l'enol>scot Uiver— Seenery of the Hay— Tlie Ac-
counts of Kozier. Dr. Kohl, Wells, and Williamson— Lumbering on
the Kiver— The Soil of I'enobscot— Arable and Waste Lands—
Agricullur.tl .\daptation of Wild Lands— Geology of the County —
Bangor and \'icinity— l-'rom Holden to Charleston— Argillo-niica
Schist— Mica Schist in Carroll— About Lakeville Plantation— The
East Branch of the Penobscot- Working the Slate— History of the
Hrounville (juarries—" Horsebacks "-Marble and Limestones—
The Manufacture of Lime— Trap Rock— Granite in Northern Maine
—Sundry Geological Notes — Travelers' Descriptions — Steele—
Thorneau — Audubon.

geo(;r.\phic.\l.

The county ol Penobscot, in the State of Maine, is
altogciher an inland subdivision, no part of its territory
abutting upon the seacoast. It occui)ies, however,
aUnost the whole of the valley of the Penobscot, n.arly
the whole of the main stream of that river, the entire
East branch, except its furthest headwateis, and many
miles of the West branch, lying within the borders of
this county. The lower part of the county is nearly in
the middle of the State, on an east and west line from
Passamaquoddy Bay. On a north and south line, how-
ever, its boundaries arc much nearer to the sea than to
the river St. John, the notlherii linnt o{ the State, and
the entire northern half of the county apiwaches within
thirty to fifty miles of the State line on the east, while it
is at all points more than twice as far from the western
boundaries of the State. It is the principal county of
Eastern Maine, and one of the largest and most import-
ant in the Commonwealth. It has a total area of two
thousand seven hundred and si-xty square miles, or one
million seven hundred and sixtysi.x thousand four hun-
dred acres. Its extreme length, from the northernmost
boundary, the north^line of section eight, of the eighth
range, to the southernmost point, the projection of Or-
rington town into Hancock county, is one hundred and
seventeen and one-half miles. Its breadth varies from a
little more than eighteen miles, down the county from
the north line for about forty-five miles, to fifty and one-
half miles in extreme width, on a belt of eight miles'
width from Uexter and the north part of Corinna east-
ward. The breadth from Carroll, Prentiss, and Urew
Plantation westward, is the same as that of the lower
part of the county, say the latitude of Bangor— forty

miles; which is shortened in the southernmost portion,
from Dixmont eastward, by about three miles.

The boundaries of the county, although quite irregu-
lar, are almost wholly in right lines. It has no "natural
boundaries," except at the southwest part of Orrington,
where the Penobscot separates its teriitory from the
northeast corner of Waldo county. Its entire periphery
or boundary has a length, very nearly, of three hundred
and fifty-three miles. It is bounded on the north by
Aroostook and Piscataquis counties; on the east by
Aroostook, Washington, and Hancock ; on the south —
that part of the county east of the Penobscot by Han-
cock county, that west of the river by Waldo county, on
the west (Dixmont) by Waldo, (Plymouth to Dexter),
Somerset, and (the rest of the county) Piscataquis coun-
ties. The farnous eminence of the wilderness, Mount
Katahdin, is just outside the western boundary, on the lat-
itude of Stacyville town; also Lake Seboeis, to the west-
ward of Woodville and Chester. Between these towns and
the lake is the Mattamiscontis mountain, a height of
respectable altitude, about six miles from the west line of
the county.

The organized towns of Penobscot county are Alton,
Argyle, Bangor, Ikadford, Bradley, Brewer, ISurlington,
Carmcl, Carroll, Charleston, Chester, Clifton, Corinna,
Corinth, Dexter, Dixmont, Eddington, Edinburg, En-
field, Etna, E.xeter, Garland, (;ienburn, Greenbush,
Greenfield, Hampden, Hermon, Hoklen, Howland,
Hudson, Kenduskeag, Kingman, Lagrange, Lee, Levant,
Lincoln, Lowell, Mattamiscontis, Mattawamkeag, Max-
field, Medway, Milford, Mount Chase, Newport, New-
burgh, Oldtown, Orono, Orrington, Passadumkeag, Pat-
ten, Plymouth, Prentiss, Springfield, Stetson, Veazie, and
Winn— fifty-six in all. The organized plantations are
Drew, Lakeville, Stacyville, Webster, Woodville, No. i
(North Bingham, Penobscot Purchase), and No. 2,
Grand Falls Plantation-eight in number. Unorganized
plantations are Pattagumpus, \\'hitney Ridge, West In-
dian, township A, range 7; No. 3; Nos. 2 and 3, range
3; No. 2, range 4; No. 2, range 6; No. 2, range 9 ; No.
3, range i — eleven.
I The population of the county, according to the census
of 1880, was seventy thousand four hundred and seventy-
eight.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

The great physical feature of tlie county is, of course,
the

l'K\()l;SCt)T RIVER.

The Iniliaii name of this renowned stream, which has
been taken also by an ancient tcjwn ni H.mcock county,
and by the gruat c:ounty which nearly lills its valley, is
I'enobskeag or I'enobscook — the former having the
well-known termination kcag, fountl in man)' appellatives
in this State, and meaning pku e the wlujjc word signi-
fying "the place of rocks." The French, in their efforts
to represent the Indian sounds by their alphabet, called
the river Pentacpievett, which became shortened into
Pentagoet — a designation by which the remains of the
old fort on the margin of the water at Castine are still
known. But the men of Plymouth, who established their
trading-post at or near the same spot in 1S26, are be-
lieved to have been the first to name the river as Penob-
scot. It received other titles in the course of civilized
exploration on these shores—as the river of Norumbega,
the Rio de ( lome/, and others which will appear hereafter.
The scenery of the bay and river of Penobscot is widely
celebrated for its picturesque cheuacter and beauty. The
lines of Whittier, in his musical verse embodying the
legend of the I'arratine sachem, Mogg Mcgone, furnish
a fitting introduction to the scene:

Beneath the uesiw.ird-turning eye
A Ihous.iiid wooded isl.mds lie.—
'1 lieir thoub.md tmts of beauty glow
Down ill the restless naves below.

There sleeps ri.icellli.i's yrolliJ. —
There, gloomily .ig.imst the sky
The Dark Isles rear their siimniits hiyii;
.\nd Desert Rock, abruin .ind bare.
Lifts its gray turrets 111 tlie air,—
Seen from afar, like some stronghold
Built by the oeean-kings of old ;
.And. faint as smoke-wreath, white and thin,
Swells in tlie ii,,iih x.ist K.italiJii, .
.\ih1, w.iiiariii,;; |,,„„ 1,^ m.ubliy feel.
The bi.i.ul l'cii,,l,Mol luiiies to men
.And ninigle wilh its own bnglit l,,,y

The historian of Weymouth's voyage, M. Ro/ier, eulo-
gizes the stre.tm up win, h the explorer pushed, whatever
It may have been (piuh.ihly ihc Penobscot), in the warm-
est terms. His praises are well worthy the Penobscot
waters:

As we passed with a gentle wind up w,th our .hip in this river any „, in
may coneeive with wh.u admir.ttion we all eonseiited in joy ' M „v ' f
our eompany, who had been travellers ,n sundry eouniries and'in .lu '
most fanu^ts rivers, yet affirmed them no. eomparable to this they no v '
beheld. Some that were w.th Sir Walter Raleigh in his voyage to

■e West indies, ealled Rio Crande, some before the river of I o r

The first chapter „f (,,,.<, Kohl's "History of the
n.^overy of tlie East (•,,:.st,,fN,,,U,A,nc,ua.'' pruned
•n the hrst volume of the se,:ond series of ,he .Maine
Historical Collections, contains the following interestil.,
remarks upon this great inland water, which Dr. Kohl

rightly designates as by far the most important river of
the State. He says further:

It drains the entire central part of .Maine. .Ml its heads and tribu-
taries are included in the territory of the St.ite, and this teriitory mav
be considered as having attached ilself from ,UI sides to this river sys-
tem. The State of Maine might be called the Penobscot country, this '
river being its main artery.

The reiiobscot, at its mouth, f.jrms the l.irgeM and most be.iuliful of
all the numerous bays or inlets of the eo.isl. and is very deep, and nav-
igable for the largest vessels about sixty miles from the ocean upward
to the city of H.ingor, where tides and vessels are stopped by rocks and
falls.

'1 he widely ojieii mouth attracted the attention of all the e.vploring
navigators sailing along the coast and it was visited by tlie .Sp.miards
on tlieir first e.sploring expedition to our regions. We see it depicted
on the Spanish maps as the longest river of the whole region, and they
g.ive to it names like the following: ■• Rio Grande" (the great river),
or ■ ■ Kio Hermoso " (the beautiful river). And the principal of the ear-
ly Spanish e.vploi-ers of these regions, Gomez, left his name to this
river, which, perhaps, he considered to be one of his most important
discoveries. It was sometimes called "Rio de Gomez" (the river of
Gomez). It was afterwards often visited by French navigators and
fishermen fiom the Great Rank, and they appear to have built there,
befijre the year 1555, a fort ur settlement, which must have been the
first t-:uropean settlement ever made on the coast of Maine. 'Ihe In-
di.iiis of .Maine, also, thought highly of this river, rheir principal
chief, according to the well-known Captain John Smith, an early ICng-
lish describer of the coast of Maine, resided on its shore, and even now
when everywhere else in Maine the Indians have disappeared, the few
remnants of them, the little Penobscot tribe, cling to the borders of
this their old, beloved, principal canoe trail.

The very full and interesting Report upon the Water-
power of Maine, made in 1S68 by Mr. Walter U'ells,
superintendent of the hydiographical survey of this State,
contains an elaborate and most valuable chapter upon
the .system of the Penobscot, from which we make the
following briet extracts;

The Penobscot IS the only great lluviatile district in Maine which il-
lustrates in its actual configuration the geographical idea of the river-
basin— appearing as a mere point at the mouth of the stream, thence
interior-ward, e.xpanding symmetrically upon both sides of the central
channel, presently embranching into subordinate basins, themselves
dis])osed likewise sviniiH-traally .ib,,ul tribill.iry sUe.ims. and tliem-
seKes vet luilher Im.iklng up inio still sni.illj, l,.,sins located upon
slill sm.illrr tribul.in, s, until the whole t.ikes on the .similitude ,;f a
iniglily lirr, Ui.il lioiii ,_,ne trunk r.iinilies into iiniuinerable br.inches,
and tioiii one gr.uid .lort.i div.iric.iles into numberless .irlrii,-.s and
veins, by which, upon occasion, its entire volume of lluids is conducted
to and poured into a common cliannel of circul.iiion .nul discharge.

Gre.iiest length, from north to south, 160 miles; greatest breadth
115 miles; area, 8,200 scjuarc miles, considerably the largest rivei^ dis-
trict contained wholly in the State-800 square miles discharge their sur-
plus water into the main river below its lowest water powx-r.^'at Bangor.
The so-called west branch is properly only the con-
tinuation of the main river; it is the upper Penobscot; a name applict-
ble to the stream from the Mattawamkeag to the "Forks," ,1, Pittston
townshii., where the Penobscot takes origin. The lower Penobscot
extends from the Mattawamkeag to Penobscot bay.

The east branch, so ealled, should be known as the Matta.-tmon
aftei and in common with the lake from which it issues and the^moun-
tains II, Its vicinity. The various terms west branch, east branch
northwest branch, etc., should be reserved for use about the headwa-
ters of the river, where iiuleed they are already applied. When u.sed
111 both the mid and upper section, they involve i,s iinm.-nclature in

COtlfUbUJll.

The Penobscot, from the confluence of the Mattawamkeag to the
sea, ,s .about 120 miles long; fiom the junction of the Matt.agamon to
the sea, about ,32 miles, from its extreme headwaters, .ibout 260
miles, or, including the loci windings, 300 miles. The main water-
P0W..1 sec,i„ii extends from l.,d.e Chesiincook to lUngor, 120 miles,
the fill being ,,oofeet; or v/., tlie M,.ttagamon, from Lake .Maitaganion
to liangor, 115 miles, and .1 fall of about 850 feel.

The annual di.sch.irge of the Penobscot is estimated as V9 800 000 -
000 cubic Icet. Of this, about 31,000,000,000 are reecivJd below the

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINK

lo\M-bt mill-iirivilege, yieliliny on lis p.isiagc to llie nvtr imp.irt.mt

puWlT.

The renoliscol nalur.illy, ami «illioul the assistance of man, holds
a position amongst the most highly fa\ored of the Stale in respect to
uniformity of volume at different seasons of the year. This is due in
part to the extent of its tributary aiea, in virtue of which the contribu-
tions of the various brandies do not reach its chief manufacturmg
bites at the same time. It is due also to the more uniform surface as-
pect of the basin, in respect to which it has the decided advantage over
the Saco, AndroscoggM\, and Kennebec; it is due also, in common with
the other large rivers of the State, to its c.Mensive system of lakes and
the vast breadth of forests upon its drainage surface.

A record covering the period from 1816 to 1866, shows tluil the ear-
liest opening to navigation of the Penobscot at llangor, for the period,
was on March 21, and that during the whole time registered it opened
in January and Kebru.iry but once— naiuely, in i8ji, on January 9th.
The river remains frozen over for 125 days yearly on the average.

The following excellent and detailed account of the
Penobscot waters is derived from the introduction to
Williamson's History of Maine, than which we find
nothing better in jjrint for the iiurjwse of full descrijJtion.
It was written about 1830:

The Penobscot river is the longest of any one in the State; and in its
tide-waters it is as l.irge as the Sagad.ihock after the junction of tin-
Kennebec and the Androscoggin. Its wliole length, as it runs from its
heads to Kort Point is supposed to be about two hundred miles. It has
no reservoirs, such as the great lake that yields supply to the Kennebec;
it is formed by a great number of streams, winch issue from ponds,
swamps and springs, above and below the foriy-si.\th parallel of lati-
tude, and spread the whole uidth of the State, its western sources being
more than ten liumlred miles, in a straight course, from its eastern
heads; and so much do they all, like branches of one family, converge
and aim at a general union, as to form a conlluence and constitute the
main river, ninety-tive miles from its mouth, and with about one-half a
degree only below tlie parallel aliove mentioned.

The western liranch of the Penobscot is supposed to be the largest
It rises in the highlands north of the KenmlHC, r.isl of the C'liaudiere,
and south of the St. John, .ind wli.a is nuliLiMhle, ilie head-streams of
the four rivers are tjuite near each other 111 sexer.il pi. ices. Its sources
have been explored by the surveyors under the ite.ay of tjhem, and it
is found that the road from the forks of thc> Kennebec to " Mile Tree "
crosses three primary branches of the Penobscot, two of which, one
four and the other six miles below the heights, are large nnll-streanis
where they cross the road.

I'roni the northwest branch of the Penobscot, rising between twenty
and thirty miles northeasterly of '• Mile Tree," the carrying-place into
the main St. John is only t.vo nulrs, ,ind some streams of the two rivers
are much nearer each other. This great western branch, after collect-
in" its waters from the north and south, runs eastwardly, not far from
the northern margin of Moosehe.ul Lake, and eni|)tie5 into Chesuncook
Lake, sixty miles from some of its sources. '1 he outlet river of this
lake, which is fifteen miles in length, runs southwardly and eastwardly
forty-five miles, till it embraces the great eastern branch, and forms
what is called the junction, the waters in each being nearly etiual.

The two main streams of this eastern branch rise about fifty or sixty
miles, from their heads to its union with the great western branch or the
Neketow. Twenty miles above this junction, in the west branch, are
the Grand Falls, where the waters descend over a ledge of smooth
rocks, 50 feet, through a channel 45 feet wide, into a basin of unknown
depth. In late years the eastern branch has been explored above the
junction; and of the other considerable is known to its several sources,
though neither of them has yet setllemenls on its banks. South of the
junction, two miles, the Penobscot receives from th.' nortlieasl a brook
called .Salmon stream.

Sixteen miles below the juiu tion is ihe niuuth ol the .M.Ulawaiiikcag
river, which rises on the easic-rn side of tlu- State, and Hows many miles
southeasteriy towards Schoodic Lakes; llien forms a bow and runs
southwest twelve miles, and receives the Sebascohegan, through which
t^ivellers and Indians ascend within three miles of the Schoodic Lakes.
The Matiawamke.ig is as large as the Piscatatiuis, and larger than two
of the Kcnduskeag; rapid, very rocky in several pl.ices, and frcciuent
falls and inlervening still-waters. Its mouth is about 30 miles below
that of the Sebascohegan; and the mail, first established in 18-25, passes
up these two rivers through the Schoodic Urkes to Iloulton.

From the mouth of the M.mawamkeag, the Penobscot descends in a

cool and inviting current, navigable for the largest rafts, receiving on Us
west side the Medunk.aunk, a small mill-stream, and the Madamiscon-
d.as [ Mattamiscontisl, a large one; and on the east side, the Metanaw-
cook, two-thirds as large as the Passadunikeag, and 16 miles above it.

Fiut ihe most important and considerable tributary of the Penobscot
is the Piscataiiuis, which comes from the west, and, after running too
miles from its sources, empties itself 35 miles above the mouth of the
Kenduskcag and 35 miles below the junction. Three large streams
constitute the Piscatatjuis, \iz: Pleasant ri\t'r from the northwest, which
rises on the east side of Moosehead lake; Sebcc river from the west,
which has some of its sources in the same neighborhood, and Sebec
pond in its course; and Piscataquis proper, which comes more from the
souiliucst; the killer two embrace the first, and Ihn-v miles further
tUiuii iliey rrcci\e the third, 12 miles from the mouth of the Pisc.ita-
quis. Sebec- and Pleasant rivers are about equally large, and a few
others of their size carefully compare with lliem in beauty and commo-
diousness. They afford many excellent mill-sites, and in freshets will
float large lafts. The three branches have low banks, interspersed with
rich and extensile intervales. The flowing of the Piscaiatjuis, which is
30 rods wide, is \ery quick and its waters uncommonly transparent and
pure. At its mouth it descends a fall of 12 or 15 feet in the space o{ 10
rods; and over a part of the fall the water pours in a thick and limpid
sheet. In mixing with the Penobscot it adds to it nearly a third part
of its waters.

Five miles below the Piscatatiuis, on the cast side, is the Passadum-
kc.ig, which rises near Schoodic waters and empties itself into the Pe-
nobscot. It is bo. liable about twenty miles, excepting seven carrying-
places of inconsidenible length. On this river are extensive ii.ttural
meadows, where great quantities of hay are cut every year.

The Penobscot, after flowing south five miles, receives on the east side
Olemon stream, which is little else than a large brook, and likewise em-
braces an island of excellent land, called Olemon Island, containing
three hundred acres; also Sugar Island, of like size, a little below, and
several smaller ones in a short distance. Sunkh.ize stream is rather
larger than Olemon stream, and empties into the Penobscot eleven
miles below, on the same side. Not less than two hundred tons of hay
are taken annu.iUy from its meadows, fiulh these streams together,
probably, do not contribute more water to the main river than the Pas-
sadunikeag docs itself.

One mile below Sunkhaze, and fourteen from the nioutli of Kendus-
kcag, the Penobscot is parted in a very remarkable manner, so that
about half the water next the eastern shore descends in direct course
southerly, and the other half turns a short corner and runs northwest
more than two miles, and then turning again almost as short, runs
southerly seven miles before the two branches form a junction. This
western branch is c.iUed Stillwater, and the first island it embraces
after the. divorce is Osson island, of twelve hundred acres. It then has
intercourse w ith the east branch by a southwesterly reach, tliiee miles in
length, which separates that island from Marsh island, containing Ine
thousand acres; and from this reach a passage bounds the southeast
end of Osson island, and separates it from Oldlown isl.md, of three
hundred acres, where the Indian village is. Besides these three the
•Stillwater river also embraces another one, c.ilied Orono, of one hun-
dred and fifty acres. At the upper and lower end of .Stillwater river
are falls suitable for mill-sites; and on the east br.incli— that is, the main
river— there are similar falls, viz., at the foot of Oldtown island and at
Great Works,' a mile or more below ; in each of which the descent may
be twenty or thirty feet.

.•\11 four of these islands are excellent land; and, exce|)t .Marsh island,
which is the souiliernniost one, thev are claimed by the Tarratine tribe
*of Indians. They also own the other ist.uids mentioned, which are of
a like fertile soil.

l-'n.im the reunion of the Penobscot with the Stillwater at the foot of
Marsh island, the river flows southweslwardly three miles to the head of
the tide, at "the Iiend,"so called, where its usual el>b and flow are two
feet. Small vessels may ascend in freshets and spring tides, within a
mile of it, but ship navigation is not good and safe much above Ken-
duskcag point, four miles below the liend.

The Kenduske.ig stream rises near some of the Sebasticook sources,
and after running in its southeasterly serpentine course fifty miles, and
turning the wheels of various mills and machinery, it discharges its
waters into the Penobscot, amid llmgor vill.ige, sixty miles from White
Ile.icl, iwenty-thiee miles from Fort Point, and seventy from Ihe junc-
tion. It is generally eight rods wide; its mouth, which is thirty-five
rods in breadth, and sixty rods higher up at tin- bridge is thirty rods,
forms a br.inch of the harbor; but here the ground, except in the chan-
nel, is often bare at low w.iter. Opposite to the mouth of the Kendus-

HISTORY OF PENOBSCO'l' COUNTY, MAINE.

kcij!, Ilic water in llic cli.mnd uf llie IVll<)1)^c>.t is sovc-nluLii feet when
tlie lidi! is out, ami llie widili of the main river lielinv is eighty rods.

The Peiiobscl thence descends in a deep and steady current, passing
llie moutlis of Sejicuiikedunk on llie east side, and So«ad,il)scuok on
the west shore; both beini; niiil-strcMiiis much less than Kenduske.iy,
one three and the other (nc miles beluw it ; thence one leajjue lu liald
Hill cove, on the same side, another to Huck's I-edye, covered at high
«aler; and half a mile more tu Oak Point, where the vs'ater is sixty rods
wide and deep. Uetiveen tlie latter and Dram I'oint, which are a league
asunder, is Marsh Hay, which is more than a mile wide, ornamented by
the village of Frankfort or. llie western shore. Here tlie water is very
salt, and the river is seldom fro/en as low .is buck's Ledge. Indeed,
during some winters it euiuiniies open as high as the mouth of Sowa-
dabscook.

U is about fivemiles from Dram I'oiiii to the head of Orpli.ui island,
which contains s.ooo acres or more, and divides the waters of the river
into two br.inches. The western and main one passes through the Nar-
rows opposite the northwest curve of the island, and by Oldham's
Ledge, which is half a league below, .ind a league above Fort I'oint, at
the mouth of the river. The branch which washes the other side of
the island is called Kaslon river, safely n.ivigable for small vessels;— the
island itself, ta.ted in liueks|)ort, is good land, and is owned by the de-
scendants of an or|)han l.idy who inherited a |)art of the Waldo Patent.

'I'he general breadth ol the IVnobsioi is from 80 to 100 rods, and it
is remaikable th.il, uwiiig to absorption and ev.iporation, it should be
so uniformly wide from Piscatai|uis to Orphan island; though its depths
are various, being above the tide-waters from 6 to 12 feet, not easily
fordable by a man and horse below the junction. The usu.il udes.ii and
below liangor are htteeu [eleven feet, and at low w.ilcr lis depth in the
channel is from three to si.x f.alioiiis, and in some places twenty. The
banks of the river .ire generally liigli; some projections are rock)' and
rugged, and others afford a picturesijue appearance. An enchanting ex-
panse of the river spre.ids itself before Bucksport village, and another
before Frankfort, and a beautiful country on either side, extending to the
head of the tide, fills the passengers eye from the river with captivating
views of nature and culture. As we ascend the river we find the banks less
elevated, and above the ude-w.iters we pass many extensive intervales
before we reach the Piscalaiiuis. Tlu> only fearful ledges bcliiW the
head of navigation are liuck's and Oldham's, before meniioned, and
Fort Point Ledge, half a mile from the Point, and .Steele's Letige, .1
league, southeast, covered at high water.

At and above Bangor, and below it as far as the w.iier is fresh, llie
river is generally closed by ice from the middle of Deccmher to the fore
part of April. However, the ice in 1800 did not descend till the eigh-
teenth ol -April, and on the first of January, 1805, the ruer, after Ijeing
closed three weeks, was cleai for two days, and 11 may be mentioned
as a rare instance ih.ii, on itie iweiity-sixtli of M.irch, i8u, the river
was clear of ice and fro/eii no moie during the spring, .Moreover, 111
February, 1807, the ice, winch w.is very thick and slruiig, lieing biokeii
up by an uncommon freshet on the seventeenlh of the inonlli, w.is
driven down in great cakes, and one hundred rods below Bangor vill.ige
formed an iimiiov.djle inipedimeiit to the current. By reason of this
check, the waters rose irn to melve feet higher than was before known,
filled the lower aparlineiits .,f scvcr.il buildings, and destroyed and in-
jured a great <iuantity of goods, fnunig the inh.tbit.iiusof one dwelling-
house to make their ese.ipe from llie ch.imber windows. Three davs
elapsed before ihe ice fully g.ive w.iy .iiid llie lluuil subsulei-l.

At the foot of Orphan island ihe Penobscot exp.uids, so that the dis-
tance across from Fort I'oiiu to the cistern shore is two miles or more;
and this is the head of the bay. The most noted place 011 the e.islern
shore is M.-ijor-biguyduce I'oint. fifteen miles below Orphan isl.md, a
place repeatedly mentioned in history. . . Th.it point

is the southerly projection of the peninsula, which constiiules the
greatest part of the town of Casline. On the north it has Back Co\e;
north of west it has Penobscot bay, two le.igues over, with Belfast b.iy
another le.igue on the west, .ulorned by the vill.ige of iielf.tst. On the
southwest it has the upper end of Long island [Islesborough], two
miles distant, and at the eastward it has Northern bay. It h.\s alw.iys
been considered by Kuropeans, as well as by the. Americans and natives,
to be a very eligible situation. Casline vill.ige is on the southerly side
of the peninsula; .ind westward of il one hundred rods, at some dis-
tance from the .shore, are the appearance of the old foriilic.aions. Here
the Plymouth colony had a Ir.idiiig house as early as A. D. 1626; here
D'Auhi.iy located himself in 1640; and here B.iron de C.isiine after-
wards had his residence many years. The United St.ues g.irrison is
still farther to the west and on higher land, intended to protect the town
and command the upper section of Penobscot bay.

l.LI.MUKKINt; ON THK Kl\ KR.

.•\ vivid skctcli of scenes on the I'enobscot, as the
lumbermen approach their ciestination at Bangor, is given
in the entertaining voUime on Forest Life and Forest
Trees, by i\Ir. John .S. Springer, himself a native of the
Pine-tree State. In his i ha[>ter on River-driving the
writer says :

Between the mouth of the Pisealaquis and Oldtown, 20 or 25 miles,
are numerous beautiful islands, some of them large, and generally cov-
ered with a heavy growth of hard wood, among which the elm abounds.
When the logs arrive at this point, many of the encampments are fixed
upon these islands. As the sun sinks behind the western hills, the
lengthened shadows of the beautiful island forests shoot across the
mirrored river, casting a deep shade, which soon disappears amid the
denser curtain of an advanced evening, with which they blend. The
roar of rushing waters is over, and the current glides smoothly on. No
sound is heard but the echo of the merry boatman's laugh, .ind of voices
here and there on the river, with now and then the shred of a song and
the creaking and plashing of oars. While thus passing down, as the
boats turn a sudden bend in the river, a dozen lights gleam from the
islands, throwing their lengthened scintillations over the water. Now
the ([Uestion goes round, " Which is our light?" "There's one on the
east side!" " Yes, and there's another on .Sugar island!" "And there's

one on Hemlock!" says a third. "Why the d 1 hadn't they gone

to B.mgor and done with it?" " VVangun No. i, ahoy!" shouts the
lielmsnian, a little exasperated with fatigue and hunger. Now, while
all the other cooks remain silent, No. i cook responds in turn. Another
calls out the name of their particular log-maik: "Blaze Bell, ahoy!
Where in thunder are you?" " Blaze Fielt, this way, this way!" comes
echoing from Hemlock island, and away the Blaze Belt batteau rows
with its merry-making crew. Thus each crew, in turn, is finally eon-
ducted to its respective camp-fire.

The prospect of a release from the arduous labors on the drive at
this point of progress raises the thermometers of feeling, which im-
parls a right merry interest to everything. Like sailors "homeward
bound," after a three- or nine-month's cruise, and within one day's sail
of port, relaxation and pastimes only are thought and talked of.

The mine of song and story is opened, and the r.irest specimens
of inatch-songs and stretched stories are coined and made current by
Ihe members of ihe different crews. "The smartest le.tm," "chopper,'
"barker, "" the largest tree, " the biggest log, the giealest day's shirk,
bear or moose story, the merits of crews, teamsters, brooks, creeks, and
swamps, falls and rapids, stre.iins .iiid rivers, all, all come upas themes
of coinerse, song, and story. There is less hurrying in the morning
now III, 111 111 Ihe fijiiiier p.irt of the driving. Let the water rise or fall,
Il IS .ill tin- s. line thing at this point, for the driver has reached the ample
ch.innel of the river, where neither falls nor rapids occur. A dav, and
the work is consummated — 'lis done. Crews are disbanded; they
disperse, some to their homes and farms, some to idleness ami recrea-
tion, some to hire in the mills, to saw the logs thus run others lo take
rafts of boards to the head of tide-navigation, where hundreds of vessels
are in waiting to distribute the precious results of the lumbermen's toil
lo the thousand parts of the Atlantic and Pacific coast; where the
sound of saw, planes, and hammers of a million house-wrlglils, cabinet-
m.ikers, coopers, and joiners make the air vocal with the music of
cheerful labor, giving bread to the millions, wealth 10 thousands, and
comlort .iiid convenience lo all.

THK SOIL Of PENObSCOT.

In Mr. Whipjile's Geograjihical View of the l)i.strict of
Maine, [lublished in 1816, occur the following remarks,
which need not be gieatly changed for our dav:

'that p.iri of the district of Maine which is iieaiest to the sea-coasl,
and extending its whole length and about ten miles back, is gencr.ally
inclined today, and in many pl.aces rocky, i his is reported as the nios,
oidinary part of Maine; but many parts of it, uhere well culiiv.ated,
produce most abundantly. That part of this section which exlertkls
from Penobscot to Piscalaqua is by far the most po|mlous, and piob.ibly
the best cullivated division. The next section, which is east of the
Penobscot and north of the sea-coast, comprising the million acres
called the Lottery Lands, with the land to the norlhward, has not so
good a reput.ition as many other divisions. There are some pans of it.
however, that are eullivaled, which yield hay, beef pork, buller, and

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNIV, MAINE

»3

liul ihe sipil of

cllcf.M', as :ilnin(hiiul\ a-> .inv p.ul of Ni-\s l-jiulanil
Ihis section lias piolial.ly Ixtn iiuikiraU-d. On a i.l-w road, wliicli is
locfticd by itic I'omiiuiiiHraUli from I'uiiobscol rivi;r toward dii- St
John, and uxli-ndirig tlironi;li lliis section, tlic land is rc[)Utcd to lie
gencniUy of llic lirst (lU.ility. The next section, which is comprised lie-
tween the IVnolisc.it and Kenneliec, and exter.dini; northerly to the
height of land, has a higher reputation than any other division of
Maine. It is about fifty miles in breadth by one hundred miles in length,
and contains all the variety of soil which is found in Maine. The iich-
esl part of this land is between the upper iiart of the two rivers.

The soil of the ranges of townships, north of the W.ildo Patent, which
are comprehended in this section, has generally been estimated as the
best in the district of Maine. The States land, which is nearest to the
['enobscot, is rather fiat and low, except a ridge which extends nearly
parallel with the river, over which a road has been opened at the
State's expense. It is expected that, when this tr.act is cleared, tile
high land will prove the best for tillage, and the low land for grass. In
the townships marked No. i on Carleions map, and which adjoin the
States land, the country is generally higher, and a small part of it is
inclined to be rocky, but not too much so. as it produces corn and
wheat in abundance. From this section westerly the land is rather low,
extending to the townshijis marked No. 2, wheie the land rises and
continues about llie same for many miles westerly, in swales and gradual
swells, and is generally free from ledges, and contains probably less
waste land than any other part of New Kngland. The low land, in
some inst.inees, is fouml to be wet; but the u|il.ind is gener.illy a wann
loam, incliiie<l to sand or grav.l, ami not only very congenial to grass,
but ei|ually so to tillage. Near the I'iscatacpiis and its branches are ex-
tensive intervals, which are particularly productive. The Waldo Patent,
although an excellent tract of land, probably will not average so good
as the nine ranges.

ARAULE AND WASTE LAND.

In Moses Greenleaf's Statistical View of the District
of Maine, published at Boston the same year, an esti-
mate is given of the ([uantity and proijoriions of arable
and waste land in the incorporated towns and plantations
of the several counties of Maine, in whu h I'enobscot is
set down as having four hundred and fifty-five thousand
four hundred and ninety-three acres of aiable pasture
and woodland, to but twenty thousand five hundred and
fifty-nine of waste land, six thousand two hundred and
ninety-eight covered with water, and four thousand si.\
hundred and ninety used for roads. 'I'he proportion of
improvable land was nine hundred and twenty-nine
acres in the one thousand, of waste land forty-eight, of
water covered fourteen, and occupied by roads nine.
The author says that in this county instances had oc-
curred of crops of wheat exceeding forty bushels to the
acre being harvested on land no better tlian is usually
cultivated, and, "in one or two instances, near sixty
bushels of wheat have been produced on an acre." Of
potatoes seven hundred bushels, and of tuinips thnteen
hundred bushels to the acre, had been gathered.

.\GR1CULTL-KAI. AllAPT.VriON OF WILD LANDS.

The following statements occur in the repoits ol State
Geologist Hitchcock, made in 186 1-2.

The Penobscot, passing in its general direction from a northerly 10 a
southern point, through an extent of two and a half degrees of laii-
tu<le, and in that course also rising to ciuite an elevation (rom the sea,
must exhibit, in various sections of its course, a considerable range of
climatic difference, and, consequently of agricultural capability. The
hrst c|uestion usually asked by a f.irmer, when wishing to ascertain the
agricultund character of any northern location, is-" Can you raise
Indian corn tlieie?' 'Ihis crop seems, by common consent, to be the
ciil.-rion by which to judge of the climate ami its ,,griciillural v.ilne.

We lind that the hue which bounds the northern limit of Indian
corn maturing in Maine, is a very irregular one, as, indeed, might be
expected, coinciding, as it does, with the isothermal line, and not with
the line of latitude. We find that the elevated or mountain district—

which, as we have in a former part of our report mentioned, formed a
part of a triangular belt, having its base on the western border of the
State, south and north of L'mbagog, and stretching easterly to its
apex in Mars-hill -is not a sure corn-iii,uuring region. Corn can be
r.iiscil with certainty within a few miles south of L'lubagog. It is
raiseil with less certainty on the Like shores, anil again with more cer-
tainty on the northern side, as the slope sinks down toward the shores
of the St. Lawrence. The Penobscot exteiuls into this belt, and
hence, while in its lower sections corn is a safe and profitable crop, in
its upper section we find it a precarious one; while further east, on the
same line of latitude, it is again found more cert.iin.

At the Trout Brook Farm we found two parcels of corn growing —
one of them (27tli .August) nipped by frost, while the other, on a more
elevated piece of land, was not touched. At .Monroe's farm, on the
Alleguash, we found, as we liave before stated, a small patch which
had not been frosted, but were told by Mr. Monroe that he had not
bc-en able to mature it. Still further north, .\lr. Uolton, who, as we
stated, has a fine farm at the confluence of the .Mleyiiash and St. John,
informed us that he had some years r.iised as good corn as ever he had
raised in .Augusta (his native place), although it was not a sure crop.
.Some have attributed this trouble to difference of soil, but it is more
attriliutable to mountain and lake influences on the temperature, as
well as to the fact that, owing to the immense extent of the forest, the
earth, for a great breadth of territory, is kept cool and moist. The sun
cannot penetrate among the leaves and branches of the trees to warm
the soil to any , gre.it extent. Hence it is f.iir to infer that the climate,
in this respect, will be in.iti-rially ch.iiiged should the country become
cleared. The experience of "old settlers." we beluvi.-. will corroborate
this. and. therefore, although there will probably always be a tract of
country where corn will be uncertain and unprofitable of culture, we
may predict that this anti-corn locality will be mucli reduced in extent
by the clearing up of the land, and opening it to the sun and the warm
southern breezes.

lI'/nM/. — The soil over which we passed is as a general thing well
.idapted to wheat-growing, and the climate is also favor.ible. The first
crops on burns is gener.dly heavy and remunerating, but after a year or
two the natural enemies of this valuable crop begin to multiply as on
the older f.irms. sometimes m.iking such inroads as to reduce the profits
\ery maleri.illy. Hence not so much wheat is raised where there have
been clearings is there is of some of the other cereals. In one or two
instances on the St. John we saw veiy fine fields of wheat growing in
he.dthy luxuriance in isolated clearings on top of high hiils. where a
* 'chopping" had been made in the forest and burned off for this very
purpose of wheat-growing. The reason given for growing wheat in
such out-of-the-way places was the fact that the midge and the fly and
aphis would not find the spot for several years, and the crop would not
suffer from their depredations. Still wheat is not so much cultivated as
one would suppose it would be. because the other grains, such as oats
and barley, are more productive, arc more in demand by the lumber-
men, and being, in proportiipn to the cost of r.iiMiig. a l.irger and more
remunerative price per bushel.

O.its and liarhy are therefore the princip.il gr.iin crops grown. These
grow vigorously on the new lands, have but few enemies to contend
with, often produce enormous crops, and sell readily at large prices.

Lliickwhcat. — This will grow almost spont.ineously on these lands.
It is a staple crop among the French or .Ac.idian settlers. The rough
variety, or " Indian wheat." as it is sometimes called, is the only kind
cultivated. It is a sure crop, yields large amounts to the acre, is easily
gathered and cleansed, and is much used by them as an aiticle of diet
and for fattening their hogs and poultry. It may be a m\tter of fancy
on our part, but we thought we could see some connection between the
physical energy of the fanners in that section and the crops they raise.
There was an apparent listlessness and lack of physical stamina in
those Acadians who cultivated little else than buckwheat for bread,
compared with those who paid attention to the culture of wheat and
other cereals. Whether the buckwheat diet was the cause and the de-
bility the effect, or vice versa, we will not here attempt to decide. The
flour or meal from this grain is much used by the settlers for fattening
pork, and some of the fattest hogs we ever saw were fed principally
upon buckwheat gruel.

A'w>/ t'/v/j.— The various esculent roots, such as potatoes, turnips,
rulaba"a5. parsnips, carrots, beets in all their varieties, onions. &c.. are
"at home" throughout the whole extent of the region we traversed.
Any amount of them can be produced, and would be produced for ex-
port, did the facilities of transportation warrant their being c.irried to
market at a reasonable expense. Not only is the crop generally large
in quantity, but excellent in i)uality.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

Small Ftitil^ Mubi nf ilif small fruits f;row lu.vuriuiuly in thih sec-
lion of llie cuuiiti V, and their cultivation would be eminently success-
ful. Strawberries, currants, gooseberries, blackberries, blueberries, are
all indigenous to all these lands. The wild currants, however, are not
so palatable as some others. t)iit the fact of their being native to the
laud if proof that the irnproveil and cultivated varieties will find conge-
nial soil and climate. * "heri'ies .md plums will also nourish well, tliough
we could not prouuse that the " Black-knot" would let them alone.
This singular disorder is by no means confined to civilized life. It was
frequently met with far aw.iy in the forest, thirty or forty miles from
any gardens of cultivated fruits, fastening itself upon the wild cherry
trees and disfiguring and blighting them as severely as any ever seen in
the gardens ih the oldest sections of the country.

The "high or bush cranberry" [I'iburiium Opitlm), and the com-
mon lowland cranberry {I'ltit iiiium 0.iyi'oit-iis), are found abund.iiuiy,
the first by the side of streams and swampy lands and the latter on the
wet meadows and bogs.

Stiuk A\iisi»i^^. — The wild lands which we examined, arc capable of
making an excellent stock-growing country when cleared and laid down
to grass. It is true that the length of the winters and the consequent
longer time rcc|uired to feed from the crib serve in the minds of
some as a drawback, but there is a compensating principle in the su|5e-
rior advantages for grass and hay during the summer season, brought
about in part by the covering shelter of snow, which piotects the earth
and the herbage until the se.ison is too far advanced for any injury to
arise from too much freezing and thawing, during the tiansition from
winter to summer. If it were not for the losses often occasioned by
wolves and other wild animals, the Upper Madawaska section might
grosv almost unlimited amounts of wool and mutton. The rich inter-
vals and upland, so welt .^d.qiicd for forage crops, would yield ample
supply for winter ferding, and the cool and breezy slopes and tops of
their hills would give the best of p.isturage for them. It is to be
hoped tliat in time this important branch of husbandry will receive
more attention in that part of the Slate, and their flocks increased as
fast as is compatible with safety in the investment from beasts of prey.

The abundance of pasturage and the good condition of the cattle
and horses on the few clearings now to be found along the route we
travelled, is a pr.ictical demonstration that such stock may be advan-
tageously raised in those tounships as soon as the forest can be
changed into a grass-grovMiig lield, ,uh1 that cm be done in two vears
I'rom falling and burning of trees.

GEOLOGY OF IHE COUNTY.

A vast amount of interesting matter is presented by
the geology of the great I'enobscot valley. It has as yet
been but partially e.xplorcd; but tnough has been ob-
served and described to enable an inquirer to form a
pretty good idea of the topography and rock-structure of
this county. The chief source of information is, of
course, the re[)orts made by tlie State Geologists -first,
by Dr. Charles T. Jackson, in 1838; second, by Dr.
Charles H. Hitchco( k, son of the eminent scientist. Dr.
Edward Hitchcock, of .\mhcrst College, and his co-labor-
ers, made in 186 1-2. The loUowing descri|itions and
narratives are e.xclusively from one or the other of these
sources, and generally in the very words of the authors:

The rocky strata on which rests the tertiary formation of Bangor and
Brewer are argillaceous talcose, plumbaginous and pymiferous slates.
These various slates pass into each other by imperceptible shades, so
that it is extremely difticult to define their boundaries. In some places
the slate rocks are charged with numerous quartz and calcareous spar
veins, and they frequently coiil.iin a sufficient quantity of carbonate
of lime to cause them to elti-riesce with acids. When the rock con-
tains a large proportion of silex, it passes insensibly into quartz rock
of a blue color, and occasionally beds of it are found containing a
sufficient quantity of fine scales ol nuci to convert it into mica slate
of an imperfect kind.

On the summit of Thomas's Hill, in Bangor, the slates may be seen
cropping out, their upturned edges appearing above the soil. On the
Kenduskeag, at a high ledge overhanging the river, may be seen several
varieties presented by this rock. It is there observed to be charged with
calcareous spar, and is sometimes of a green color, owing to the pres-
ence of cliloritc.

In the city the sl.ite may be (observed passing into (juartz rock on the
side of Exchange street, where the strata run E., N. li., and W. S.W.,
and dip to the N. N. W. 80". On the S. W. side of the river the strata
di|> to the north. Near Brewer bridge they lun E. by N. and dip N.
by W. 70'. A little above the bridge on the south side of the Penob-
scot, in Brewer, there is a cliff of argillaceous slate, which runs to the
tieiglu of about eighty feet, and there the strata may be obser\ed to run
N. N. E. and S. S. W. , and dip N. N. W. 65". About half a mile
south of Bangor the slate strata run N. E. and S. W., dip N. W. 60°.
There are many other places in the vicinity of Bangor where these
rocks may be seen, but it would be tedious to enumerate all the locali-
ties. A sufficient number have been noticed to show that the whole
substrata of Bangor and Brewer are composed of this class of rocks.
In some cases the surface of the plumbaginous slate is glazed with
plumbago or graphite, and owing to this circumstance such rocks have
sometimes lieen mistaken for coal. The whole mass of strata which are
above described, bear evident marks of having been exposed to the
action of heal and pressure, while from the great variety of substances
which enter into a sedimentaiy deposit, there would evidently result the
\arious metamorphic varieties of stratified rock which I have described.
It will be observed th.U all the strata now rest on Iheir edges and are
highly inclined to the horizon, and this position could not have resulted
from their original deposition, for all strata which are deposited by
water are arranged horizontally. Now it is clear that these rocks were
deposited from water in horizontal beds, and that since th.it lime they
have been thrown up by a violent subteiranean cause into their present
position. These sl.ites belong to the oldest transition form.Uion and
are generally destitute of organic remains.

The tertiary formation in Maine consists of a series of layers of clay
and sand, which have been deposited by water upon the various solid
rocks beneath. This deposit is evidently a sediment of clayey and
silicious matter, and is arranged in regular strata showing the effect of
tranquil subsidence from the waters by which it was deposited.

These beds of clay contain distinct remains of marine shell-fish in
the various strata, arranged in such a manner as to evince their having
lived and died exactly in the spots where we find them. This shows a
slow and gradual deposition of the clay, for the shell-fish lived near the
surf.ice of ihe different strata, and must have had time to live, grow,
and multiply in each stratum before the next was ileposiled.

The lower tertiary at Bangor is composed of blue clay, very ten-
acious in ils structure, tough, and .adhesive. It contains so much veg-
etable matter, derived from decomposed seaweeds, as to give it in
many places the odor of marsh mud. The shells characteristic of this
deposit are the Nucula, Saxicava, and Mya dehiscens.

There are a m.ajorily of recent species of shell-fish in this deposit,
and hence we consider it as equivalent to the pliocene formation of
Lyell. .Mjove this deposit we come to anothei mass of clayey strata of
a yellow color, and remarkable for the curious casts of vanous forms
winch it contains. Nearly all these casts have a long cylindrical tube
luniiing through them from one extremity to the other.

In Bangor, the greatest elevation which the tertiary clays attain is
not more than 100 feet above the level of the sea, or 75 feet above the
level of the I'enobscot river at that place. The hill upon which the
First Congregational church is built is tertiary, and is the highest point
which that formation attains in Bangor. The lower portions of this
clay-bed contain distinct remains of the marine shells Nucula Port-
landica, Mactia. and Venus. The upper beds contain a great abun-
dance of those strange cylindrical and conical casts, terminated some-
1 lines by a large bulb or tuber, which fossils resemble in their general
structure the siphoniie described and figured in Rozet's Geology.
There are, however, in this deposit a number of different species, and
their peculiar shapes have caused them to be mistaken for almost every
variety of plant and fruit. There is, however, good reason to believe
that they are of animal origin, and were probably once molluscous or
soft animals, having but little consistency, so as not to leave any solid
matter indicative of their comj)osition.

According to the later report of Mr. Hitchcock, the lower clays of
this group [the marine clays] at Bangor are very tenacious and adhe-
sive, with the peculiar marine odor or marsh mud, and contain as char-
acteristic shells the Nucula, Saxicava distorta, and Myaarenaria. The
upper portions of the deposit are more sandy. The clayey strata are
of a yellowish cast, containing numerous yellow, soft concretions of
clay of a cylindrical shape, and jjerforated by a long tube. Ferrugin-
ous and silicious sands alternate with the clays The lower portions of
the upper beds contain Leda I'ortlandica, Mactra and Venus. The
upper portions are filled with the concretions. Some of these cl.iys in
Bangor dip 10 degrees southwest, and others 15 degrees southeriy.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

The highest of ihem is about 100 feet above the ocean. Above the
clays are found coarse drift deposits.

There are beds of ferruginous and silicious sand, which here and
there oJternate with the upper clay-bods. In some places it is of gocid
quality for moulding. IC.xamples of this kind of sand may be seen on
the side ol Exchange street, where the strata of the clay dip to the
south 25°.

In Cumberland street the lower tertiary dt-posit may he seen with the
upper beds resting directly upon it. The strata dip to the S. W. 10*.
This deposit attaiub an elevation of fifty or sixty feet above the river's
level.

Crossing the Penobscot we enter the town of Brewer, whnre the same
tertiary clays may be seen. .A, little above the bridge, onthe river's bank,
occurs a high cliff of sand attaining an elevation of eighty-bixfeet above
the high-water mark upon the I'enobscot.

At the various brick-ynds in this town we had an excellent opportu-
nity of examining the nature of the clay and the various shells which
are contained in it. They are identical with those found in liangor.

The clay generally selected for making bricks belongs to the upper
tertiary, and is of a yellow color and contains but very few marine
shells. The blue clay answers very well for the same purpose, when
there are not too many shells, but it is lough and hard to work.

The silicious sand found alternating with those clays is used also in
brick-making. Thc-^e materials are so common in Maine that little ac-
count is made of their value, Imt they are nevertheless sources of a very
considerable mcome. Thus, for instance, in the eight brick-yards of
Brewer during 1837 no less than 3.000,000 of bricks were made and
sold — 1,100,000 machine-pressed bricks were marie in three of these
yards during the same year.

So abundant is the brick clay in Bangor that, in digging the cellars
for inoi^i of the buildmgs, a sufficiency of it is dug out to make the
bricks retjuired for the edifice, and Dr. Jackson, from whom we had
these remarks, understood thai this is frequently done.

Brick-makers are fully aware of the fact that, if clays contain any
considerable proportion of lime, they will not answer for brick-making,
since the lime is rendered caustic during the operalitjn of burning, and
when tlie bricks are moibtened by water the lime flakes, and they crack
or burst to pieces. On that account they carefully avoid any admixture
of shells, since they are composed chiefly of carbonate of lime, and pro-
duce the same effect.

These clays form extrentuly tough soils, and are hahle to bake or
harden by the action of the solar heat, so that the rools of plants are
completely imprisoned by the hardened clay, and therefore the plant
does not thrive.

In order to improve a clayey soil when it is found practicable, sand
should be mixed with it, so as to break up its cohesive properties; and
it often happens that hills of sand are found close at hand. After the
texture of the soil is sufficiently broken up, air-slaked lime may then be
used for a lop-dressing, and it will be retained for a great length of
lirae since the clay is so ini|H.Tmeuble to water.

his certainly, said Dr. J.ackson in 1838, worth the l.djor reqmrcd to
bring into a high slate of cultivation those tracl-^ of land which are in
llie immediate vicinity of the city, and their improved produce will
amply repay llic moderate expenditures which would be requisite for the
purpose.

Above the tertiary formation we have a confused mass of rounded
stones and pebbles, which bearevidenl proofs of their diluvial disposi-
tion. The current of diluvial waters, in rusliing over this district, ex-
cavated deep valleys in the tertiary deposits, and transported the detri-
tus far to the south. Near ihe court-house in Bangor may be seen beds
of coarse pebbles at the base of the hill, and the sediment becomes finer
as we ascend, until we meet wilh perfectly fine clay. This locality
shows that coarse pebbles were deposited by swift-running water, while
the fine sand and clay prove a gradual subsidence in the force of the
current. On examining these pebbles, il will be remarked ihat they
are mostly those composed of varieties of slate, which occur in places
north of the spot where ihey are now found.

FKO.M holl>p:n to CHARLKSTON.

Dr. George L. Goodale, one of the assistants of State
Geologist Hitihcock^ about the year 1S61 surveyed <:are-
fuUy a geologic section from Mount Desert west of north
and northwest across the State to the Canada line, nearly
at right angles to the strata recorded. His route crossed
the towns of Holden, Brewer, Bangor, Glenburn, Ken-

duskeag, Corinth, and Charleston, in this county, and the
results of his observations are here subjoined.

\'ery near ihe boundary line between Dedliam and Holden. the
granite disappears and ([uart^ rock succeeds, dipj)ing 70° S. 70* li.,
as it were, beneath the granite. Some planes of a jointed structure
dipped 70' S, 20^ W. in this vicinity. This rock merges into silicious
slate. At Graves' coffee-house, in the east part of Holden, considerable
mica is present in the quartz rock, with a dip of 88° S. 60"" E. Beyond
this hotel the rotk is very much contorted, and a local variation in the
dip 75^ N. 60^ W. But the real northwesterly dip is apparent near A.
B. Karringlon's house, two miles west. Here we have an argillo-mica-
ceous rock dipping 50° N. 40'' W., and a few miles furilier the ledges
are entirely ([uartz rock as far as the middle of Holden, dipping 65"" N.
40" W. Cleavage planes are also present in abundance, dipping, 80° S.
K. We regard all the rocks mentioned thus far, away from the granite
as essentially one formation of cjuartz rock and forming an anticlinal
axis. The rock in the centre of the axis is somewhat micaceous, and
more nearly resembles the rocks west of Holden village. If this is the
true order of things, then we have found a (juart/ rock underlying the
great mass of schists between Holden and Dover. Hence, if future
researches shall reveal occasional bands of quartz rock among these
schists, especially if they have an anticlinal form, we shall have a safe
criterion to inform us respecting the number of foldings in the whole
area. We do not suppose the more micaceous axis can be of precisely
the same age with the miaiceous rocks to the westward, because it un-
derlies (hem in association with quartz.

We suspect that this quartz rock is in the continuation of the cjuartz
rock of the Taconic series in Belfast, described in a previous part of
the report. That was associated with schists just like this, and we find
on a comparison of various disconnected observations made between the
two places, that a quartz rock, more or less obscure, can be traced with
its associate schists all the way from Belfast to Holden. This is a dis-
covery of some importance, as will be seen hereafter.

AK<JILLO-MlCA SCHIST.

We next come to the largest and widest-spread of any formation in
the State, — ^to a rock that would receive different names from different
geologists. It would be called clay slate, talcose schist, or mica schist,
according as the observer happened to inspect different portions of il.
Last year we ranked it all as clay slate, specifying many localities
where talcose and micaceous varieties abounded. But this year, after
a further examination of this rock, we shall call it argillo-micaceous
schst, coloring it on the map as mica schist. Inspection of all the var-
.ieties discloses the presence of minute scales of mica. Tney are found
even in ihe roofing slate of Brownville, which is associated with the
schists, and by their presence throw light upon the mineral structure of
the whole series, showing it to be micaceous rather than talcose.
What we described as one formation of clay slale lasl year, we now
divide into two, the clay slate proper and ihe argillo-niicaceous schist.
The manner in which the boundaries of this suhdivision were sug-
gested to us is (juite interesting and valu.ible, as indicating the direction
to be taken in studying these rocks in future. We possessed a series
of observations on the position of the strata, crossing llie whole argil-
laceous bell in several pl.i^^ ., and mostly radiating from Bangor. L'pon
comparing these sections with one another, we found lliem to agree es-
sentially at the same distances from Bangor, or from the southeast side
of the formation. The material from which we drew is mostly con-
tainetl in our last year's report. We there der>criljed a .section from
Bangor to Patten; another branching off at Mattawamkeag up the Kast
Branch of the Penobscot; another from Bangor to Brownville. This
year we explored one from Bangor to Moosehead I^ke; and also an-
other from Shirley to Brighton. At Bangor the dip is northwesterly,
but at a few miles' distance on every route il changed to southeasterly,
thus making a synclinal axis. Hiis synclinal line, then, we found to
run (so far as our meagre observations allowed us to judge) from llie
mouth of Sunkhaze stream in Milford westerly through the norili parts
of Oldlown and Pushaw Lake, thence curving southwesterly it passes
west of Kenduskeag village, and probably to Carmel and N. M. Dix-
mont. Upon the e;ist side of this line the dip is northwesterly, on the
line of our principal section, as far as Holden Center; and upon the
west side the dip is southeasterly as far as the north part of Charleston,
thus making an enormous basin iwenty-nine miles wide, whose thick-
ness must be seven miles on the lowest estimate. The anticlinal line
west of the first synclinal was first observed near Passadumkeag village,
and can be traced westerly through Edinburg, Lagrange, and Brad-
ford, till we find it rising into a range of mountains which continue
t.irough Charleston, Garland, and Dexter. This is a very distinct axis,

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUN'l'Y, MAINE.

as it is coincidunl with a nioiiiitainous range for so great a distance. It
runs toward llie niahS of yraniie in ICnficId, which most probaljly was
forced up alon-^ tile anticiuial line, as the rock would n.uurally be weal<-
est tliere. \'ery lii^ely ttie aniieiin.d described List year in Weston is
the coniniuation of this aniiehnal hne.

'Ihe next basin i>. very u.irrou, .uid ilie rocl% i^ more argdiaceous
than in the previous b.i^iii. llie -lynchnal line runs along the valley of
the Piscataquis river, even as far up as I'arkman, and then it must run
on the west side of I'enobscot river a great ilistauce. We think that
its position is indicated near the Kive Iblands in Winn, by the change
111 the dip. Of course these lines must e.stend further in both direc-
tions than we have in both indiciled, but we point out the hnes only so
far as we have knowledge of them.

Ne.vt we come to .iniither change in the dip, uilli clay si. lies |)re\ail-
ing on one side and argillo-micu schists upon the other. Hence we do
not regard it as aiilicliii.il, bin a change in the di|) incident to different
formations, the slates overlying the schists, perhai>b unconformably.
'I'his line, which upon our l.irge ni.ip we have tor the present estab-
lished as ihe boundary liiie betuirn llie Iwo form.itions, is first recog-
nized in the northeast, in .\o. i R. 5, in .Aroostook county, on the
.Aroostook road. It can be traced through Molunkus, the southeast
corner of Medway (formerly called .N'ickaion), thence in a straight line
to .Mcdfoid, hIrii 11 t.ikes somewh.il ul .1 westerly course through Mi-
lo, Sebec, l-o.\eroft, (Juiif.Md, .md .Abbott. Here it resumes the
southueslerly dir.cti.Mi, .iii.l we have traced it ilirough Kingsbury,
iiriglilon, ,ind liingli,iiii, lo ihe Kennebec river. The a.\e5 on the vari-
ous radi.iting sections corres|jond with one anollier no fuilher than to
this boundary, but the rock on the norlhwest side of ihis line is
most entirely clay slate, and is the only bell in Maine Inun which roof-
ing slate is now obtained. The v.irialions in dip in ibis cl.iy-sl.ite fnr-
malion we conceive lo Ij.- diie u, ^.lru>lls c.iuses ni,,re i.r less luc.il, and
not to betie.il,-d uf luuv Nc.iK.ly .inylliing h.is been discnered dur-
ing ihe survey which li.is nucn us gie.iter ple.isure ih.m these axi.il
hues. It is a \eiy iiiip..rl.inl oUH.ird step in il
knowledge of Maine rocks, .ind .1 I.hiu sh.idow of
veloped by a series of coinpiehciisnr p.ir.illel seelions.

Returning to the del.nis iipun ou. piinup.il seelion, we hnd the dip
to vary soinewliat over the Insl half uf Ihe hrsl smicIumI basin. We
h.ul just said good-bye lo ihe ,|n.,ru lock of HoUlrn; ,iii,l on the roiile
of the section to liiewei we luld sciieely any ledges, ihe comilry brm-
covered to a considerable deplh by,, lluvi.ildepuslls. as 11 is upon the
easl bank of IVnobscl river. .\l liivwer the rock is very qu.ul/.ose
dipping from 3o'-6o" .\. 20" W. .Acin,s ilie river ,n li.mgor Ihe rock
IS similar, dijipiiig from 45-50 .\. jo W. .,„d N. \v. n
li.m nf the leriii l.ilcose lo lliese sjiisis would be mor.
ll...nl..,.iiy..lherlr,lg,-s,,n ll,e ul„,|c seeliun. Vn ihc rock here is
not really lalcnse, ,1 l,,,s no i,i.,g,ic„,, m 11, as Ihe .maljsis shows and
.Ul i.ispevuon ul ni.inv uf il„. Uy,-, ,.,|„l,iis p.,rliei,-s uf ma., ,,„„„|,
slu»ed.,w,,y (.|,,n ,|„. „,,„., ,„ |.„,„„, ,,|„,„^ „,„,,,,i,„. ,^,;.;_

lures. I'luf.-ssurl). T .s,„„|,, ul iL,- I h,,,!,,..,,.,! .s,„ .,/pu„,iol

onl une such mslance to us .,l,ui,l iw,, „„l,.s wcsl .,| ihe c„v, ul„eh w ,s
ve,v „,-,U,„liv,-, shuwing .,l„, l|„, dlllelenee belw.
slMlilic.uioii .,,,.1 lull, ,!,„,, |ur ile.ii.igr). .Siiel
luon along ihc liiii' o| il„- .„■, i,,,,,

Three miles norihwesi lium I'.nubscut river ,ii
lliaise, the schists dip at ,ibuul llie -..nue .iiigli.-, N' ju
/.ler's, ,1 iiille fiiilhi'i, iiiiy br si l-ii
and slaly l.dcuse (pi.trl/. luek, ilqij

edge of Glenburnthe rock is 111., re compact, wiih ihicke
i;ienbi,rn and Kendu.ske.ig iheiv are oecasiun.il v.ui uh,
normal norlhweslerly dip, bul these ..re supposed lo be I,
The section, thus far, runs un th

progress ui uur
h.il wuuld be de-

a|iplic.i-
apiJiupri.ite

\»

in eviiibi

"IclSll-.itlllCltlull uf I
5'-;o' llultljwrslclly.

liuynlon's

.\l I. To-

ly si. lie

111 the

■Is In

the

il.lltels.

he stage-ro.iil lu K.'iiduskeag villa-e

crossing the kcmhiske.ig river in Kenduske.ig.

■ Igc dnft-ileposlls obscure the ledges fur a
■hulseb.nU " from the vib
sl.ui.e of three iiii|,.s. At a
school-house and coopers shop nearly four miles frun, Kendnske ,e i„
Boutin orililh, the first ledge with the .southeaslerlv dip of the test
sldeof the greal synclinal a.sis appe.irs, allliough 1, pribabiy bcin
much sooner. Observations on both sides of the lu.ul, which we h id
not time 10 make, will settle Ihe e.vael point where the middle of the
basm IS. Ihe .schists at llie school-liouse deeoiiipuse readily perl, ips
coii,ammgaca,T,on„ie,.i,idd,p 80 S. .5-1, A,l,,e,.|,t l.^'s l,!,
a sm.iller dip. Near ICasUonnih Ihe rock is more sl.ity .,nd aigill i-
ceous. 0,.pos,le J. M. .Sh.iw's house the layersare very much coiivolul d
o asn,.iUsc,i,,vvi,,anave,,igedipof,5.S. .5"!. .About ,1 m.le
•-'1 ■' lulf iioiil, uf l.,isi ( uiiiiih, ,,ppear ledges of bright green schiM

lieyond KendlisKi'.i
gre.il distance. The lo.iil p.isses uv
lage toa cemelerv in South 1 iMiiilh,

lie

argillaceous, and often quite micaceous, precisely idenlical lithologi-
cally wiih the gre.iler pail of the slaly rocks on the East branch of the
I'enobscol above M.iU.iwamkeag. Like them, also, these strata are
very much contorted, and their average ihp is about 55- S. E. 'Jhese
peculiar rocks continue for two or three miles.

In the norlhwest part of Charleston, at B. Bradley's, a compact
schist, resembling lalcose schist, but really a quarlzite, occurs, dipping
from 70° 75° S- 3°" K. The land here is higher than anything passed
over west of the Penobscot, and it continues to rise till the summit of
the mountain is reached, about 800 feet above the ocean. Upon the
county map it will be noticed that a r.inge of mountains extends
through Charleston and the towns adj.aceiii. The range is the one we
are now crossing, and it must all be an aiuielin,d ridge, marking the
line of Ihe most imjjorlaut of all the axi.il lines specified above. Pass-
ing down the north side of this range (for which we have no name), we
find the opposite dip, making the anticlinal. We are coming into a
narrower basm than the one just left, it being only ten miles wide, and
it has almost an east and west course. The first ob.servalion taken is
of a ledge just north of Rieker Hill, in the southeast pan of Dover;
an argillo-mieaceous schist dipping 72° N. 10° \V. In this rock the
mica is quite abundant and distinct. The dip is similar to this all Ihe
way lo the Piscataquis river.

The traveller sees at once the superior fertility of the soil 1,1 ilie Pis-
cal.uiiiis valley, when comp.ired with that passed over since leaving
Bangor. It seems to be due lo the character of the rock, and to be
confined to this b.ism of schist. The rock is often calcareous, and in-
deed certain l.iyers ,11 1 uveiolt are real limestone, and have formerly
been burnt in kilns for lime. .\s in so many other instances, the char-
acter of the rock here determines the qu.iliiy of the soil in g.eat meas-
ure. By calling this superior to that in Penobscot county, we do not
me.in to underrate the latter-only that this is belter. 'Ihat in Penob-
scot county is far superior to much that is found along Ihe seacoast and
covering granitic and gneissic regions. .And most excellent farms are
common on the ro.id all the way from Bangor.

MICA SCHIST IN I AHKOLl..
In the town of Cairoll, the principal rock is mica sehiM li js the
only rock seen up,,n the east ,iiid west road rimiiiiiL; ihicHigh ihe luwn
At Mr. H. Gatess, in the west jxirt of ihe town, is a very fine bed of
dark-bluish hmesloiu-, whose layers dip 4^" .\. W. The bed is several
rods wide and of unknown len.L;,l, Mr ( ;,,ie, m.inufaclures from 100
to 300 barrels of quicklime annu.illy out of this bed. It is capable of
producing much more, and furnishes lime equal lo the best. Ii can be
produced cheaper here than al Rockland, and can successfully com-
liele Willi Ih.il ,n the in.ukel liere.ibuuls. Hints of oilier beds of lime-
stone 111 C.rrull re.iehed us ,11 both directi,,ns, parlie-.ilarlv in Ihe nortli-
c.isl. -I here IS s.iid to be a bed un the l.ind uf .Mr. .\i„es. .A similar
bed .ilsu may be found on .Mr. Coffins l.iiid ne.ir the centre of the
luwn. These hmeslones correspond belter lu Ihe beds in ,,z,„c schists
ih.iii Willi the l:ulian limestone on Penobscot bay.

The mica sehisi uf ( ■..null extends unintcrrupledlv .,s f ,1 .,s .Xhisqu ish
l.ike in lopsliehl, 1,1 an e.isl.rly direction. In Ihe e.isl p.ui uf Carroll
there is an aiilRlm.il a.M.s, the limeslone being iip„n the western side
I he soulhe.ist dip evleiids lu .Musquash Like, and iiilu r.ihn.id-e ,i„|
the Indian township. Ihe norlhwest dips occur ,it the saw-mill' in
1 .ihiKidge and about three miles from Prmcclun m the other tuwnshiu
These observ,iiiuns indicate the presence of a synclni.il.

.\ high range of mountains in the southern part of C.irioll is evi
dently granitic, and connects as a mountain range with the syenite or
.Musquash lake, and has been traced into New Brunswick" and the pro
viiicMl geological map carries Ihis granitic bell entirely through the
Ijrovince lo the Uulf of St. Lawrence.

.\liUl i l..\Kl.vll,l.t ei..\.\TAtlu.N.

•Ihe general oiilhnc of Sclagly is given on the Penobscot county
m.ip, but It should he i^rily in No, o. We ascended a short ihorough-
f.ue lioiii the easl |..irl of .Scragly to Shaw lake, and found no lediTes
bul an immense number ul boulders of granite and trap This is a
very pretty lake, bul miieh smaller than Pleasant. It ,s not repre
senled at all on the stale m.ip. There are many islands in .Scragly and
Junior l.ikes, and a few ledges of granite.

Junior lake is connected by a short ihuroughlaie with .Scragly and it
IS six miles in length and jierhaps four miles wide. It is represented
correctly upon no published ni.qi. Two small lakes are situated near
Its north end, Duck lake ..nd .Mill Privilege l,ike, which are either omit-
ted or not named upon the maps. No ledges occur either upon luiiior
lake or any of its small tributary lakes upon the nor.li and west sides
ol which there are five, which are incorrectly located or else omiiied

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

„pon all Ihe maps. Nearer ll.e south end of Junior lake the boulders
become small and much water-worn, consisting of an mlereslmB con-
glomerate, trap, schist, and granite. Close by Junior stream they ap-
pear to be piled up in a ridge, much like a rampart. Magnil.cenl ven.s
jn.iy be seen upon any of these lakes.

Upon Junior stream l.irge boulders of gr.inite occupy the bed so
much that it is difficult to manage a heavily loaded cmuc among tliem.
Two interesting boulders attracted our attention, as they had been
w(.rn into ihc shape of an hour glass. We suppose the neck of the stone
«.is worn most because the strongest currents chiefly exert their powers
at that altitude. As is common to almost every thoroughf.ire. so here
on Junior stream the upiier part is very stony, with <|uick water, and
the lower part with very dee]i water and marshy bank, insomuch that
chietly sedges grew upon them; while the surface of the water aboumls
in white and yellow w.iter-lilies and pond-weed. .At the mouth of the
stream the land is a little higher, a coarse be.ich separ.iting the thor-
oughf.ire from Grand I..ike. in which we found boulders of metalliferous
trap, [lyrites. conglomer.ite. granite, clay skue, and schists.

Ihe char.icter of the shores of both expansions of Crand or W'ilte-
guergu.igum. I'ocumpus, and Sysladobsis lakes is uniform and may be
described as a whole. The ininiedl.lte shore is composed of angular
blocks of granite, often of maininolh dimensions, with scarcely any soil
over them. They are covered » ilh moss, and the trees of the forest shoot
down their roots among them with difficulty. The shores rise up grad-
u.dly to hills and mount.iins. without a .single clearing to give evidence
of civili/ation. Hut no ledges .iiipear, although their fragments are so
common. Ihese boulders often lie in the lakes aw.iy from the shores,
and m.iy project above the surf.ice. One such in Sysladobsis lake must
weigh many hundred tons. Where the summits of the boulders just
come to the surface they render the navigation difficult. It is extremely
rare to see any rock represented among the boulders u|)on these lakes,
except the angular granite fr.igments. Most of them are of the por-
phyrilic variety.

On Sysladobsis lake m.iy be seen die finest views of .my of the west-
ern Schoodic lakes. That part which lies in No. 5 is correctly repre-
sented upon the county map, showing the ■'Big island" at the south
end. That part of the lake which lies in .No. 4 has a due north and
south course, its northern extremity being only lialf a mile distant from
Bottle lake. The Chain lakes in 4 and 5 are mostly small and swampy,
e.xcept a single ledge of granite upon the upper or third Chain lake,
which is the largest of the three.

THK L.\sr lik.^NCH OK THE PKNdHSCOI'.

The latest, and probably the best, summary of this re-
gion was made by another of Professor Hitchcock's
assistants — Dr. E/ekiel Holmes, of Winthrop, the chief
naturalist of the ex[)loration. He was assisted, as he re-
cords, among otliers by Messrs. A. 15. Farrar and William
A. Johnston of liangor, Henjamin Thomas of Maxfield,
Manley Hardy of Brewer, and Louis Rett hum of Old-
town. Deane Murch and his canoe were also engaged
after the Hunt farm was reached. 'I'he narrative of Dr.
Holmes, aside from its scientific value, possesses consid-
erable interest. The language of the nairative is pre-
served with little change.

On the 7th of .August, 1861, the party embarkeil at Oldtown for the
contemplated survey in a balteau and three birch canoes, furnished
with the necessary tiiiantity of supplies, comprising e(|uipmeiUs and
apparatus required to facilitate researches and in<iuirieson the rivers and
lakes in the forest to be traversed.

The progress up strc.im in such a primitive craft, m a fa\or.iblc
pilch of water, must necessarily be slow and toilsome, but at low
stages it must be slower yet by reason of the delays in looking out the
deepest channels and the lime lost in working over bars and shoals where
there is scarcely sufficient depth, even for the light dr.ift of canoes. On
account of the low stage of the water at the time of embarkation, the
steamers which then plied between Oldtown and .Mattawamke.ig were
hauled up, and the facilities of transportation which they would have
afforded and the consec|uenl saving of time were denied the explorers.
They had theiefore to depend u|)on their own navigation for convey-
ance through that section of the route, thereby conMiining three il.iys of
their lime, when one would h.uc been sufficient, could they have .ivailed

themselves of the agency of steam, as is usual in the early and later
parts of the season.

On the third day from departure they arriveil at Nickatou (now Med-
way), on the west branch of the Penobscot, which, 10 those bound up
the east branch of the river, m.iy be considered the end of the road, and
the point where you bid adieu to eivili/..ation and take your plunge into
Ih; wild country. There were then but four settlers on faims above
Nickatou village and the Hunt pkrce in No. 3. and but nine in the whole
range of country between Nickatou (west branch) village and die mouth
of the AUeguash on the upper St. John— a stretch of not less than 150
miles. The cause of this was attributed to the fact that every township
in this route was owned by proprietors who had hitherto held it for
lumbering purposes. The .State, having disposed of its interest in the
lands, had not, of course, been called upon lo aid in opening it up to
settlers. The proprietors, content with llie gains given them from the
lumber, were not desirous of having them settled, thereby avoiding any
calls of taxation for ro.ads or risks from fires which might take place in
cle.iring the lands.

No particular obsiruclion was met with in the canoe progress until
the party came to Whetstone 1-alls, where it became necessary 10 un-
load and carry by, a distance of half a mile. At this place the geolo-
gist met with boulders of ••encrinal" or fossiliferous limestones and
other boulders cont.uning fossil remains which had been brought down
from sections above.

Aftei getting by Whetstone Kails, a few hours brought iliem to Hunt's
I'arm, which is situate about midway of No. 3, Range 7. For more
than thirty years diis farm had been a welcome station or resling-plate
lor the lumberman and voyageur as he passed up or down the river,
and the probability was that it would continue, for years to come, to
offer the same conveniences as iherelofore, holding the monopoly ol af-
fording entertainment to the traveller for w.int of a rival establishment
of the kind in the neighborhood. A road was some time before made
from diis place into the Aroostock Hoad .at No. 3, Range 6, some
iwelve miles dist-mt. The soil and agricultural capabilities of this farm
gave a good criterion by which to judge of the surrounding lands in
regard lo their value for agricultural purposes. A large portion of il
was interval, or alluvial soil on the margin of the river. The remain-
ing portions in the rear were high swells or ridges. The interval is well
ailapted to grass, being in its lower parts inundated in the spring of
the year, and thus fertilized by the fine particles left on the subsidence
of the waters. The higher portions are easily cullivaled and very pro-
ductive, and the swells or uplands afford excellent pastur.igc for slock.
There are immense tracts of similar interval on the Tenobscot and its
br.mches near by (the Was?aia<iuick and the Sebois), covered with
forest and wild grasses which grow there in the rankest luxuriance,
.iw.iiting the hand of hiture settlers to subdue and convert them to
smiling and productive meadows and fields, and thus enable them to
contribute to the subsistence of man and to the wealth of the Slate.

liy previous arrangement the party were here met by the Rev. Marcus
K. Keep, of Ashland, who had done so much as a pioneer explorer of
Katahdin, and made known to the public the characterisiics of that
gr.md old mount.iin, in regard to the sublime and extensive prospect
Teen from its summit, its peculiar geological structure, and the nigged
loil required to ascend to its pinnacle. A portion of the party immedi-
ately on arrival pl.iced ihemselves under the guidance of Mr. Keep,
who was also accompanied wilh Mr. Maxwell, of Ciolden Ridge, and
left for the purpose of ascending the mountain and making a recon-
noismce of the country on the way to and from il. As this would take
them three or four days, the remainder agreeil lo wait for them and
employ ihemselves in repairing boats, ex]>loring the vicinity of the farm,
and such other business as the fiirlherance of the expedition might de-
mand.

As befori! st.ited, the I'enobscot and the W,issatai|uick, which comes
in on the west side, and the Sebois, coming in on the eastern side
further up, are bordered with l.irge tracts of interval land, made up of
ilic fine alluvium brought down by the waters of Ihe respective streams.
The uiilands in ihe rear are rather stony or rocky, on account of the
boulders which have lieen strewed over them at some former period.
Among these boulders are found limestone of the description before
mentioned, and cimglomerates and old sandstone of large size, indi-
cating that they had not been removed far from their parent bed,
wheiever it might be.

The Katahdin parly returned on .Saturday afternoon, well satisfied
with the labors, as well as the results and fruits of their expedition, and
on Monday morning (181I1) all again pursued iheir voyage up the river,
iiih.re night they c.iine to the fool of IJr.inil f.ills. ami llieie camped.
The Grand falls, so c.illed, .ire a .-.erics of r.ipids and cascades exiend-

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

ing several miles, with occasional intervals of slack-water between
some of the |)itches. The whole form the most formidable obstruction
in the river between Oldtuwn and (}iand Lake. It was a good day's
work to get "luggage" and boats up to the foot of the first or upper
pitch, and it was found necessary to encamp, leserving fur the next
morning the remainder of the "carry " and the getting up tu " tamp
Johnson" in No. 5 in the 8th range.

The ne.xt morning and day proved somewliat ramy. but t.iking an
early start they accomplished the rest of the portage, and once more em-
barked. They found for a mile or two slack-water, after which a pretty
smart current met them .and continued until they came to ".Stair
Kails." An entirely different rock formation is found from the head of
Grand Falls. Granite has entirely disappeared and given place 10 trap-
rock and sandstone. Stair Falls are formed by ledges ol the latter
cro.ssing the river at right angles, and for nearly or quite a mile flooring
the river in successive steps or "stairs," In the rock of the lower step,
on the east side, were found " trilobites " and other fossil remains very
interesting to the geologists of the party. Even Louis— who. by the
way, is a shrewd and active member of the I'enobscot tribe, and no
mean representative of the aboriginal race— became very e.vperi in
hunting up specimens of the kind.

On the 23d they arrived at Johnson's Camp, in No. 5 of the 8ih.
This camp had teen constructed two years previously by one of tlie
paity (William A. Johnston) and his partner for the accommodation of
their men while lumbering on this township, and it w.is found a very
convenient stojiping-place for a few days, from which difterent parties
could proceed to e.vamine the several localities in the neighborhood
which promised to be interesting. These were the adjacent mountain,
called the "Traveller," and .some of its spurs; the rock formation at
the dam at the outlet of the lake a mile or two above; the Stair F.dls
below and liowlin I'ond; jerry Lake and Murchs or Horseshoe Lake
on the eastern section of the township. The trap-rock of the moun-
tains, the "Silurian rock of the Stair F.ills," and the fossiliferous lime-
stone in and about Murch's Lake afforded localities of interesting re-
search and employment to the geologist. Suites of specimens from
each were collected, all of which were enumerated and described in
Prof Hitchcock's final report. They also obtained many interesting
specimens in the several departments of natural history, especially in
ornithology, entomology and botany.

The ami {Corviisomx), the large red-headed woodpecker {/'/,■„,
piUatui). and several other rather rare birds, were here procured.
While I'rof H. with a parly proceeded up Grand Lake (Mont.igamon)!
the rest proceed to the exploration of the eastern portion of the town-
ship and the lakes in that section. The first point of ex.imin.iiion was
liowlin Hond. Nothing very interesting presented itself in this vicinity
except the remains of immense pines which were destroyed by the fires
m 1825, the trunks of which were mostly fallen to the ground and l.iy
quietly mouldering away. .\!1 of them were large, .md some of tliJiii
of enormous dimensions.

This was once undoubtedly one of the must he.ivily timbered sec-
tions of any part of Maine, In threading their way slowly over the
fallen inonarchs of the forest, they could not but be struck with evi-
dences of the vast loss that had accrued to the State by the sweeping
of fires through its forests and timber-lands. Millions of dollars could
not repKice the yalue or m.ike good the destiuction thus made. Some
who pretend to know the facts, asserted that the ores which caused the
destruction of the timber in this particular locality, «ere intentionally
set by w.ay of revenge for the loss of some hay burnt by some of the
employes of the Laiid.\gent, which hay belonged to .some of the tres-
passers on the public lauds. If this be true, it was a revenge the ef-
fect of which will live long after us perpetrators have passed aw.iy
and which mor.- than one generation will look upon with regret. Miidi
of this timber w.is cut and earned away soon after its being bui 111 but
thousands and thousands of these once stately jnnes l.iy strewed about
h.iving fallen m every direcuon. 'j-iie growth that has newly sprung
up on the ground thus divested of its former m.ignihcent growth is 111
strange contrast with the sue and grandeur of the dead trunks below
them. It consists principally of white birches, poplars, and wild cher-
ries. If the theory of alteriiaiiiig growth be true, thought Ur Holmes
it would well if another conllagr.ition would clear the present incum-
bents of the soil, and allow a new race of pines to begin their "rowth
and to make good, in the coiiise of years, the loss of their ancestors
The shores of this lake are low anil rocky. The rocks are principallv
tr.ip-rock. broken and strewed in profusion over the surface. Abund.int
signs of moose, deer, and be.u were met with, and occasionally an otter-
slide was seen on the margin of the lake, but the animals themselves
were careful 10 keep themselves out .,f the »ay. Sm,il.,r rock forma-

tions b-it not quite so many decaying trunks of heavy pines, were found
on the way from Howlin to Jerry Lake. The western shore of this lake
was the terminus of the r.iiiiblee.isiwar.l from the camp. Turning to a
northwesterly course, they traversed the section betueen tliis° and
" Murchs" (Horseshoe) Lake. About a mile east of the stream, ..r
outlet of the l.ist-named lake (the waters of which pass into Bowlin),
uhile travelling over a well-timbered hard-wood ridge, the party sud-
denly came to one of the l.ngest boulders they had ever seen. It stands
comparatively alone, isolated, as it were, in the midst of the forest. It
is closely surrounded by a thick and heavy growth, while from its top
have grown up another forest of stately tree,, far overtopping those of
the forest around and below them. This boulder is composed of the
encrinal or fossiliferous limestone, the site of which was afterwards
found further west. It was ascertained on measurement to be 200 feet
in circumference. Its walls or sides were nearly perpendicular, though
worn and furrowed by the abrasion of water, either before or since its
removal from its parent-bed. The height was 18 feet, and the area on
the top nearly as large as at its base and quite level, and was covered
with a small wood-lot. A soil had, by some means, been formed there
and birches, maples, and ced.ars had sprung up and grown, some of
them, to the sue of eight or ten inches in diameter. In one ot its clefts
a family of hedgehogs [ErMizon donatus] had taken up their resi-
dence, but were too snugly ensconced in their "lair" to allow intruders
to reach them. It was found that, although a "feeble folk," like the
cony of old they had "built their liouse in the rock,' and defied ene-
mies to dislodge them. So the ex|)lorers "left them .done in their
glory." and passed on.

llelore starting on this expedition they h.td received several v.igue
accounts <.f an island iua lake somewhere in the neighborhood of Bow-
lin, m which uere sundry galleries and a cave of curious form and con-
struction, "not in.rde with hands." At the Hunt farm Deane Murch
gave a new edition of the story about as indefinite as those they had be-
fore heard, ,iik1 also stated that he had himself, some thirty years be-
fore, when out hunting, seen that same island, and thought he could
again find it, and that it was in one of the Bowlin chain of lakes As
he was with the party, it was one of the objects, when they arrived "at
Camp Johnston, in No. ,. to make an exploration and ascertain the
truth in regard to the island cave, and fix its location more definitely and
certainly, if location it had. On account of the uncertainty of its
whereabouts It was thought acKisable to begin the search at the lower
li.iulin, and proceed upward, exploring the kikes u, course until they
h.ad found the island, the rock, and the eve in qii, s.iun, provided any-
thing ol the kind uere there. L'p to this point of the search they had
found nothing that h.id the most distant indication of anythin- of the
kind, and poor Murch began to think that his sight of the rock^that he
had told of was a dream or a delusive vision thrown over him by I'o-
moola [the Indian devil, who. unless i)ropitiated by s|)eci.il service was
always bringing hunters into trouble], on account of some deliniiuency
111 his service. They judged, however, th.it, from the frequent and pt
cuh.irly emphatic use of Ih. iiinie of th.u venerable old demon and the
accompanying unmistakably expressive anathemas uttered by him in
his disappointment thus fu, Pomoola could have no fault to find with
him on that score. The discovery of the huge boulder just described
confirmed the belief of the existence of the island. It «as concluded th it
this was one of its fragments, and that, judging from its sue the parent
bed could not be far oft'. It was near night when they h.ul finished the
examination. They therefore went on about a half a inile to the stream
before mentioned, and camped.

E.,iiy ne.xt morning Louis and Murch uere directed to follow up the

stream until they came to the lake, while the rest were eng.iged at the

camp, and to return and report. In the course of a couple of hours

Murch returned, .umouncing, uithgre.it glee, that he had found Jus

l„kc and the island they were 111 pursuit of-that Ins ch.iracter for truth

and ver.Kity was fully vindicated, for, strange as ,1 may seem it was

the very spot where he h.id seen it thirty years ago. The party ac

cordmgly went back with him to explore the locihty. Leaving the

stream, and |)roceedmg ,n a noithwesteily direction over a low rid"c

of hard-wood lanti, they found an abundance of boulders and also'a

Icdg.- of the fossiliferous limestone of the same ch.iracter as the large

boulder just described and as those found at the Grand Falls the

Hunt I'.irm, and as low down the river as 'Whetstone Falls After a

w.ilk of about three-fourths of a mile from camp, they came to Murch's

L.ike, usually called, from its shaiJe, Horseshoe Lake. At the westerty

end of this l.ike, and a few rods from the shore, was the long sought for

isl.ind. -I he water w.as sufficiently low to allow wading to the spot It

proved to be a portion of the limestone ledge they had just passed r,s

ing from the water about 20 feet, and say from 200 to 300 feet m cir-

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

cumference. Its lop was covered with bushes and small trees. The
caves talked about proved to be large tubes or tunnels from three to
four feet in diameter, worn smoothly, as if by running water, in a hori-
zontol position, completely through or across the island. These tunnels
are'at the base of the island, and, of course, when the water in the lake
is high, are nearly or quite submerged. They are at right angles to
each other. The water was sufficiently low to allow the visitors to
creep through them. At the place where they cross each other is a
room, or cavity, not C|Uite eight feet in diameter and about five feet in
height. There are three others commenced, but they pass only a little
way before they run mto one or the other of the main tunnels. This
lime-rock, as before stated, is fossiliferous, and contains several species
of organic remains, and the whole of this portion of the lake is floored
over, as far as e.tamined, with the same rock, the flooring being quite
level, and is covered with a fine silt or deposit of limestone particles,
which render the water turbid when disturbed at the bottom. Here,
then, is the site or parent bed of the limestone boulders, which had
Ijcen found scattered along the pathway from Whetstone Falls to the
lake. The questions, which an examination of the place gave rise to.
are: What has worn these tubes or tunnels through this solid rocky
islet? There is no current of waters in the lake, and if it had been
done by currents of water, why are they woin at right angles to each
other? Was the site of this lake, or this portion of it. once a ridge or
mountain of limestone, which has been carried away by some tremen-
dous sweep of waters and ice, and a basin thus excavated down to the
present flooring of the lake, leaving only the lonely island before us as
a witness of its former location? These queries and others of similar
import can be answered only, if answered at all, by facts obtained by
more extended and rigorous observation and research than we were
able to make at the lime of this visit to the place.

Havmg finished the brief examination, and collected specimens of the
rock, the scienti-sts went back to their tent, packed up, and started on
the return to Camp Johnston. On their arrival, they met Prof. Hitch-
cock, who, with Messrs. Goodale and Packard, had gone up the river to
Trout Brook Farm, and returned, leaving the others to await their ar-
rival. They had examined the sides and summits of the Traveller and
other mountains near by, the rock formations at the outlet of the lakes
and its shores, and the next day started again m company with others.
Two miles above the camp above the camp they came to the dam at the
outlet of the Grand Lake (Montagamon). This dam had been built by
a company of the proprietors of townships above, and was as firm
and durable a structure as could be built of timber. At this place
commences the extensive chain of lakes which are found in this
section of the wild lands, and which occupy so large a portion of the
summit territory betvseen the waters of the Penobscot. Aroostook,
Keimebec, and St. John. They also found here the commencement of
a series of dams and other improvements, built at great expense by the
proprietors above named, extending from the foot of this (Grand) lake
to the foot of Church Lake, at the head of the Alleguash, one of the tit.
John tributaries, giving them control of the waters of eight or ten lakes
and extending more than eighty miles. By ihese dams and one or two
locks, they not only husband the waters in these vast reservoirs, but are
enabled to bring great quantities of lumber from the St. John waters,
which would otherwise have to float down that river, instead of run-
ning down the Penobscot, as it now does. They are enabled to do this
by the slack water caused by the flowage of the several dams, by which
immense rafts of lumber are floated across the lakes and through their
several connecting thoroughfares. When all the logs of the winter's
operations have thus been brought down to the lower dam, the gates
are all opened and the accumulated waters let loose, which gives a
freshet sufficient to float them down to the booms above Oldtown.
where they are caught and secured for use until they are called for.
The thorough structure of these fixtures, and the liberal expenditure
over so large an area of country, reflect much honor on the enterprise
and energy of the proprietors, and the doctor had no doubt were found
to be profitable investments in a pecuniary point of view. At any rate
they are instrumental in giving the Penobscot lumberman successful
triumphs over the obstacles of nature, hardly rivaled in any other
country. They noticed, however, another inevitable result of such flow-
age. Thousands of acres of splendid interval land, on the banks of the
streams flowing into and the connecting thoroughfares of these lakes,
are submerged a great part of the year. As a natural consequence, the
beautiful forest growth, with which they were once covered, was killed
and falling in every direction. This gives an unpleasant appearance to
the otherwise beautiful scenery, and to the eye of an agriculturist seems
to be rather a wanton destruction of so much valuable soil. But it
belongs to those who flow it, and they have a right to use it in such
way and manner as shall give them the most profit.

Between Grand and Second Lake, or, as the Indians call them, Mon-
tagamon and Montagamonsis, is a wide extent of tliis now submerged
interval land. On the western upland margin of one of these tracts,
on Trout Brook, No. 7, in R. 9, the Messrs. Pingree & Co. have made
an excellent farm (Trout Brook FaJm). We found this farm under
the management of Mr. Berdeen. assisted by three hired men. It is
in rather a retired situation, being about thirty miles from any other
human abode. The soil is excellent and very productive. It is prin-
cipally devoted to the production of hay, but grain and roots are also
raised in abundance.

This is the farm more lately owned by Mr. E. S. Coe,
of Bangor, which will be found mentioned by and by, in
the narrative of Mr. Steele. The party had now passed
out of Penobscot county, beyond which we need not
follow them.

FROM M.\TTAVVAMKEAO TO THE ST. JOHN RIVER.

The description of the geology of this section of country includes
the geology of the East Branch of the Penobscot; of Mt. Katahdin;
of Webster Creek and Lake; of the Alleguash lakes, and the Alle-
guash river, or the district travelled over in August and September by
our large exploring party, whose history has already been given.

We use only that part falling within this county.

The rock at Mattawamkeag is talcose schist, a member of the clay-
slate formation, dipping 64 degrees southeast. In ascending the Pe-
nobscot we find alternating layers of clay slates, occasional talcose
schists, and grits, all the way to the Pond Pitch of the Grand Falls.
At the mouth of Salmon Stream, in the southeast corner of Nicatou,
these grits and slates dip 70 degrees northwest, making an anticlinal
axis with the rocks at Mattawamkeag. A mile above Salmon Stream
the dip is 50 degrees northwest, and still further 60 degrees north-
west.

Boulders of marble, along with slate, granite, etc., are everywhere
seen in the bed of the river. A mile and a half below the village of
N'icatou there are two small and very pretty alluvial terraces on each
side of the river. The island at the junction of the two branches of
the Penobscot is the remnant of a high gravel delta terrace, deposited
by the West branch. Another part of the same terrace is at the fork
itself Back from the river coarse drift with boulders everywhere shows

itself

Two miles up the East branch, at Ledge Falls, the rocks are slate,
grit, andconglomeiate, very much distorted, but with an average dip
of 60 degrees northwest. It is an interesting locality for examples of
small plications of the strata, and also for examples of cleavage planes
and lamiuje crossing the strata. The two planes cross the strata at
various angles from 30 to 40 degrees. The strata stand upon their
edges at the north end of the Falls. Some of the strata are bent, so
that portions of them resemble a row of fossil upright trunks of trees.
The layers are both thick and thin-bedded. A conglomerate composed
of large pebbles of calcareous slates is imbedded in the grit. A short
distance north these pebbles are flat and elongated. A quarter of a
mile north of the Falls the strata are perpendicular, running north 70
degrees west.

Two terraces are found on both sides of the river through most of
the town, and at Mr. Hiram Fish's house they are remarkably beauti-
ful. Their material is gravel. Higher up there are three and four ter-
races rising above one another in regular succession. In the south part
of No. I, "there is a patch of clay a rod long and rising 10 feet above
the water, which is set into coarse and fine gravel just as if it had been
elevated from beneath. It was probably deposited in a deep hole in
the gravel bed.

The solid rocks grow more slaty in ascending the river. At the lo-
cality of the clay in No. ., the clay slate dips 88 degrees northwest. A
few rods above is a gray grit having the same position. At the Rocky
Rips, above the mouth of Meadow Brook, the grits dip 75 degrees
northwest. Half a mile above is a band of clay slate, with the strike
north 28 degrees east, and a southeasteriy dip of 80 degrees, or making
a sharp svnclinal axis with the strata at Rocky Rips. At Grindstone
Falls the'rocks are alternating strata, as before, of clay slates, fine grits
and quartz rock, dipping from 85 degrees east to 90 degrees south-
easterly. Numerous boulders of granite fill the bed of the river at the

Falls.

On the east side of the river at the I'alls are crushed ledges of slates,
analogous to interesting examples found in Vermont. The ledge on
the east side of the river is high-say 3ofeet-and ncariy perpendicular,

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

but at its bottom at the water's edge are fragments of slate whicli have
been broken off, scattered along at intervals of 20 rods. This pile of
fragments is several feet thick, but is greatly reduced in size from what
it has been, because the spring freshets have washed away many pieces
from year to year. The force breaking off the strata appears to have
come from the southeast. If one could imagine that a great rock 20
rods long happened to fall from the skies upon this particular spot, the
results would be similar to wliat may now be seen.

The theory has been proposed that these ledges were crushed by the
toppling over of icebergs when the country was under the ocean, or
that a huge wave elevated an iceberg, so that wlien the wave receded
the iceberg fell upon and crushed the ledges. Professor Hitchcock
thought the present case could be ascribed to frost and gravity. The
water at the base wears away the bottom of the cliff and weakens the
rocks there. The water which enters the fissures of the rock weakens
the ledges still more by freezing. And as a heavy mass of snow and
ice has accumulated in the winter upon the top of the cliff, it may be
that its weight, combined with the weakening of the strata beneath,
will cause the upper part of the ledge to fall down and present this
crushed appearance. A similar example he had seen had removed all
the debris before that time. Where these examples of crushed ledges
occur upon the southeast slopes of hills, it is conceivable that the strata
were broken off by the drift.

This is a fine region for terraces, as compared with the rest of the
State. One upon the west side of Godfrey's Falls is 72 feet above the
river. From its top there is a fine view of Mt. Katahdin.

At the upper part of the falls the strata dip 60 degrees northwesterly.
At Crowfoot Rips m No. 2, R. 7, the slaty rocks dip 80 degrees south-
east. The lapids here are produced by the fall of the water over nu-
merous blocks of granite. Beautiful blue clay is found in this township.
About Brown's island the sand is cemented into alluvial sandstone by
the peroxides of iron and manganese. -At the Bear Rips the slates dip
75 degrees southeast. A large number of boulders of the Lower Hel-
derberg limestone were found at Whetstone Falls, containing in great
abundance encrinal remains and the coral Favosites Gothlaniica.
These boulders in the township above are very large, one of them being
14 feet in diameter, and it would seem as if their souice could not be
far distant. The clay slates and grits at these falls dip 65 degrees
southerly. The prevailing dip thus far is northwesterly, but we have
passed over two anticlinal .and two synclinal axes at least, since leaving
Mattawamkeag.

From Mr. Hunt's place Professor Hitchcock made a
visit to Mt. Katahdin, guided by the Rev. M. R. Keep.
He notes that —

The path traveled from the Hunt farm _to the loi> of Katahdin was
struck out by Mr. Keep, to whom the State donated a quarter of a
township in consideration of his services upon the mountain lands.

On the east bank of the river, just above Mr. Hunt's house, there is
a bank of gravel and sand whose strata are inclined at an angle of
twenty-five degrees south, and must have been deposited over a steep
slope. Some of the strata are consolidated by a ferruginous cement.
At this place we found in boulders of loose sandstone a number of
fossils of Lower Devonian type, coming probably from the Devonian
cocks above. These boulders are different from those seen on the west
side of Mount Katahdin. We suspect the range of mountains west of
the East Blanch, in Nos. 3 and 4, to be composed of trap-rock. They
have also somewhat of a sandstone aspect.

A short distance above Hunt's farm, in No. 3, the same clay slates
that were described below No. 3 occur, running north lo degrees east
and dipping 80 degrees east. Beyond, the strike is north 20 degrees
east and the dip 73 degrees east. There is a large amount of clay
along the river at the mouth of the Seboois. The boulders on the
river's banks are now mostly sandstones, conglomerates, honestones,
and slates, very rarely any of granite. A few miles higher, the granite
disappears altogether.

Professor Hitchcock ascended Lunksoos Mountain on the west side
of the river, and found its top to be 1,378 feet above the river, by the
aneroid barometer. This mountain forms the boundary line between
Townships Nos. 3 and 4, and appears to be composed of the same
rocks as the range of peaks in No. 3. Lunksoos mountain is entirely
composed of trap, a tough variety without any columnar seams. He
had a fine view of the country all about this mountain, and in his
note-book speculated "a considerable" about the geological character
of the various hills and valleys observed, but did not give his surmises
in his report. He was sure, however, that a mountain five or six miles

northwest from Lunksoos is composed of granite, as he coidd see thg
white rocks composing it both from here and from Katahdin.

In Number Four of the Seventh range, the grit-rocks dip 60 degrees
southeasterly. .A similar ledge, called Suffer's Rock, has strata dip-
ping 65 degrees southeast. At the mouth of Big Spring Brook in No*
5, R. 8, a horseback commences, which extends rather more than a mile
to Bowlin Falls. Its material is unusually coarse, and boulders of
granite predominate in it. Here the strata of slate and grit dip 50 de-
grees northwesterly, forming an anticlinal with the strata previously
observed.

The surveyors had now arrived at the Clrand Falls, which consist of
seven difterent smaller falls, all of which have different names, and are
found m a straight line, in a distance of three miles, but more than
this if the course of the river be measured. The following are their
names, in ascending order; Bowlin Falls, Hull Machine, Grand Pitch,
Pond, Upper Pitch, and Stairs Falls, which consists of two parts.
The same clay slates and grits at the Hull Machine dip 12 degrees
northwesterly. At the Grand Pitch the grits prevail, alternating with
thin bands of clay slate, standing perpendicular and running north 40
degrees east. The fall of water here is quite great and very beautiful.
Large boulders of conglomerate are common here, such as are presently
described in place. The strata of slates above the Grand Pitch dip 54
degrees southeast. Close by the Pond Pitch the last of the slates ap-
pears, running northeast and standing perpendicular. It was thought
there are two anticlinal and two synclinal axes between Hunt's Farm
and Pond Pitch, or four anticlinal and four synclinal axes observed in
this group of strata above Mattawamkeag. Hence they had crossed
the same strata eight times on this section.

.■\t the Pond Pitch trap rock is found in place, which continues to
the L'pper Falls. In climbing a hill w'est of the falls they found a few
rods' thickness of slate and quartz rock before reaching the trap con-
stituting the hill, which appears to be the continuation of the trap of
Lunksoos Mountain. The junction between the trap and conglomer-
ate above was not noticed, but they suspected the trap to be bedded
and related to the conglomerate, just as the trap rocks of Perry under-
lie the Devonian conglomerates and sandstones of that region. In a
figure of the Report is represented the relative positions of the under-
lying slates, the trap rock, and the coarse conglomerate about to be de-
scribed.

At the bottom of Upper Falls the party were struck at once by the
great change in the character of the rock. They found an exceedingly
coarse conglomerate composed of pebbles of various hornstones, jas-
pers, slates, and occasionally grknite, averaging two inches in diame-
ter, and sometimes three feet through. Rarely seams of slate, and in
one place several feet thickness of a calcareous rock, occur with the
pebbles. It is difficult to ascertain the true position of this rock, but
Prof Hitchcock considers the following as the normal one : Strike
north 65 degrees west , dip 45 degrees north. The same layers are trav-
ersed by cleavage planes running north 18 degrees east and inclined
83 degrees east. This rock must be about 150 feet thick, and is evi-
dently the base of the following series of rocks to be described. Very
large boulders of fossiliferous linrestone abound in the vicinity of the
Falls, whose course must be quite near.

.Above the Upper Falls, the rocks consist of fine-grained, dark-col-
ored sandstones, having a peculiar conchoidal fracture, like clay. On
account of the rain he had no time to stop and examine them closely.
At Stair Falls, the ledges cross the river so as to make a series of falls,
like a pair of stairs. The strata dip 40 degrees northwesterly, and are
composed of sandstones of different textures and colors. Some of the
ayers contain a Irilobite, a new species of the genus Dalmanitcs, At
the upper pitch of the Stair Falls, the dip of the strata is a httle higher.
A little yellow ochre is found in the sand ou the banks.

The party staid a few days at Johnston's Camp, in the central part of
No. 5, R. 8, partly to recruit and partly to explore the vicinity. At the
camp is the finest locality of Devonian fossils yet seen in Maine, but
the ledges do not appear — the specimens are entirely in loose frag-
ments, whose source must be very near. Among the specimens are
such characteristic forms of the Oriskany sandstone as i\\eRt-» /ischna
ovoidcs. The fossils are entirely marine mollusca. The rock is a
loosely cemented sandstone, very much like the Oriskany sandstone of
New York, but unlike the Oriskany sandstone of Maine, as already de-
described.

A very high range of mountains appeared west of the camp, one peak
of which was ascended. Boulders, frequently of enormous size, of red
sandstone, are abundant between the camp and the mountain. They
are so large that no can doubt that they came from the base of the
mountain. The mountain itself is composed of a beautiful drab-colored

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

silicious slate, weatlieriiig grayish while, whose strata at the summit
run north 70 degrees west and dip 40 degrees northerly. This Traveller
•» is the isolated conical peak lying to the northeast of a much higher
range of mountains, which has received the same name, but must be
nearly a thousand feet higher. The peak is 1,622 feet above the river
at its base; 625 feet below the summit is the lowest at which the Liri-
dta geogritphica is found. The same silicious slates were found a small
pond in No. 5, R. 6. just over the line.

Dr. Holmes made an excursion to the east part of No. 5. R. 8, and
found at Horseshoe Pond, in the northeast corner of the township, a
large mass of hmestone containing the Favositcs Golhhindica and
crinoidal joints, which belongs to the Lower Helderberg group of
Upper Silurian rocks. This rock probably crosses the East branch,
but escaped notice in consequence of being covered by alluvium. Its
strike is northeast and southwest. There is a small island in the pond,
composed of this white limestone, in which there is a cave. About a
mile west of the pond, the doctor reports an enormous boulder of
limestone, upon which trees 10 inches in diameter are growing. It is
r8 feet high, and 198 feet in circumference. It is on the top of a hil
300 feel above the pond. Between the limestone and Stair Falls, the
rocks are fine, dark-brown sandstones, somewhat similar to those at
Stair Falls.

Approaching the dam at the fool of Matagamon or Grand Lake, m
No, 6, R. 8, we find red sandstones, which are still more abundant
and bright-colored at the dam itself, although black argillaceous seams
are found with it. The strata dip 40 degrees northwesterly. Numer-
ous fossil marine mollusca are found at the dam, several of them very
large, together with some marine vegetation, while remains of land
plants are fouud further north on the west side of the lake. Half a
mile below the dam are fossils resembling those collected at Johnston's
Camp.

Passing northerly, is found a steep, high ledge or mountain, known
by an inelegant name, which is a little back from the lake, and proves
to be silicious slate, being a continuation of this rock from the Travel-
ler. Calcite, chalybite, or spathic iron, and traces of manganese oc-
cur m this slate, often in nodular masses. These slates would seem to
be the results of the alternation of the sandstones, unless there has
been a great dislocation of the strata, for the sandstone layers do not
seem to have been disturbed at all by them. The sandstone is found
to continue on both sliores about half-way up the lake. The most
northern strata seen have the strike north 70 degrees east, and dip 15
degrees northwesterly.

The geologist supposed these sandstones to be the equivalents of the
Gaspe sandstones of Canada. Theie is a very fine opportunity for
studying this group, both lithologically and paleontologically, in the
region of Grand Lake, and also its connection with the Katahdin
rocks. The Gaspe sandstones are 7,000 feet thick. The Grand Lake
strata are certainly as thick as the Gaspe.

He next came to a class of rocks entirely different from the sand-
stones, consisting of black slates and slaty limestones, often very much
permeated by cleavage planes. He referred this rock in his map to
Silurian in part and Devonian in part, with a very indistinct notion of
its proper place. The first ledge of it has the strike of north 55 de-
grees east, and its strata are perpendicular. The rocks in the neigh-
borhood are very much contorted, while the sandstones are not, just
as if the slates were largely disturbed and elevated before the deposi-
tion of the sandstones. Further north the slates dip from 45 to 50 de-
grees northwest. Numerous small curves are found among them. On
Louis Island the slates dip 42 degrees south, making a synclinal with
the strata first observed. The cleavage planes are developed in these
ledges at right angles to the strata.

On the south side of Trout Brook Farm in No. 5, R. 9, upon a hill,
a hornstone is developed, apparently dipping 45 degrees southerly.
The hill appears to be the northern terminus of the Traveller range.
It is probably underlaid by the slates just described on Grand Lake,
which crop out upon the same hill.

GEOLOGY OF THE SEBOOIS.

The Seboois river joins the East Branch of the Penobscot in No. 3,
R. 7. At its mouth the banks are alluvial. The rock first seen is the
clay slate series, which on the East branch is found to extend as high
as the Pond Pitch. This extends to the upper part of No. 4, dipping
80 degrees east. Peaked Mountain in this township is composed of a
conglomerate, i)robably a part of the series found between the Grand
Falls and Grand Lake. Large beds of limestone, containing the
Favosites Ciothlaiidica , which are probably the Lower Helderberg
series, arc also found about the mountain. The mountain has been

cut through by a huge mass of trap, which has produced changes on
the adjacent strata. The southern peak is composed of amygdaloid
and hornstone. This is supposed to be the same with the trap below
Pond Pitch. The central peak is comjrased of coarse conglomerate
traversed bv veins of calcite. Boulders of red sandstone are fijund on
the surface. The top of the mouittain is 660 feet above the river.

Above this mountain, the river finds its way among precipices of
sandstone, 200 or 300 feet high. .At the mouth of Jerry Brook, on the
west bank of the Seboois, in No. 5, K. 7, red sandstone appears, dip-
ping 75 degrees southeast. Sugar Loaf, on the east side of the Seboois,
1900 feet high, is composed of sandstone and clay .slate cut through
by a dike of trap 500 feet wide. The slates adjacent to the trap have
been changed into jasjjer, hornstone. and compact feldspar. Nodules
of calcite and epidote occur in the amygdaloid part of the ti-ap. The
jasiier bed is 10 feet wide.

At Chegalapscagos F'alls, red slate rocks are found, dipping north-
westerly 80 degrees. Above the falls luimerous dikes of trap rock and
masses of jasper abound. Large boulders of the fossiliferous Helder-
berg limestone are also found in the vicinity. In the south part of No.
6, the red slates dip 60 degrees N. W., then to the S. E., and presently
to the N. W. again. At Godfrey's Falls, in about the middle of No.
6, the rocks are slates. Near the first Seboois Lake in No. 7, there is
a fine development of the Lower Helderberg limestone. It is 90 feet
wide, a bed inclosed in sandstone and brecciated by the intrusion of
scoriaceous trap. Encrinites and the common favosite coral abound in
the rock. Some parts of the bed are described as a good marble.

The rocks upon the third Seboois Lake are argillaceous limestones,
sandstone, and trap. No rocks are observed upon the La Pompique
stream.

Dr. Holmes, in passing from Matagamon Lake, on the East Branch,
up Hay Brook, found perpendicular seams running through slate, with
an east and west direction. About a mile above the mouth of the
Mooseluck stream, in No. 8, R. 8, he found a ledge of coarse conglom-
erate.

HELDERBERC LIMESTONES AND M.\RBLES.

Dr. Holmes made a report upon these ,to Professor
Hitchcock, from which we extract soine paragrajjhs:

.Among other objects of this expedition, I was requested to trace
what I could of the localities and boundaries of the lower Helderberg
marbles, or limestone formations that occur in this section of the State,
and report to you. I have done in regard to it what the shortness of
the time and the lack of some facilities allowed me. The more and
further I searched into this branch of our geological formations, the
more impressed I became of the ultimate value they will be to this sec-
tion, and indeed to the whole State, and of the importance of longer
time being devoted exclusively to their study and examination. .\
belt or formation of rock which, as I found, stretches in a continuous
direction across not less than fi\e townships, occasionally cropping out
and at each locality of its appearance exhibiting surroundings and ac-
companiments each of different character, could not be thoroughly
explored and all its characteristics .ascertained in the three or four
weeks allotted to this section, and that lime interrupted by a search
for objects pertaining to other branches of natural history.

On page 364 of your first report, in speaking of the geology of the
VVassattiquoik while on yout way to Katahdin, you observe that 'on
the Wassittiquoik, near its mouth, we found ledges of a blueish quartz
rock very evenly stratified. . . . .Above them, on the

bank, the boulders and large masses of limestone similar to those seen
at Whetstone falls are so numerous that we believe the rock to be in
place close by, certainly less than half a mile, if indeed we did not find
it in place.'

Your conjectures were right. Had you turned and gone up the
north branch of the Wassitticjuoik a little way into townshi]) 4, in the
9th range, you would have found the site from which the boulders you
saw started. It is the first locality, or cropping out of this belt of the
lower Helderberg formation, east of Mt. K.atahdin.*

I was not able to give this locality a personal examination, but ob-
tained reliable description of its location from a person (Mr. David
Malcolm, of Pattenj who had visited the spot, clambered over the
bluff it formed on the bank of the siream, and showed me specimens
of the rock identical in their composition and structure with the rock
which I visited last year in March's lake, in the next township north-
east of this (No. 5, R. 8.).

• This is undoubtedly the first belt of rock from which the boulders of fine
statuary marble, discovered in 1861, were derived. C. H. H.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

Considering its geological position and surroundings this locality is
one of peculiar interest, situated as it is almost at the base of Katah-
din, with its granite battlements guarding it on the west and south —
the trap rocks of the Lunksoos range on the north, and the quurtz rock
of the Maine Wassattiquoik on the east. I leave it to you and other
geologists to decide the seniority of age and priority of occupation of
these several formations, and to explain by what arrangement of nature
this rock, so full of the remains of organic life, was placed in almost
juxtaposition with such azoic neighbors. The one full of tangible
proofs of an age teeming with aquatic animal and vegetable life and
ex'liibiting through its structure the outward forms and shapes of former
living tenants of an ocean in which they existed, and from which they
drew their sustenance ; the others the very reverse of this — hard, crys-
talline in feature — silent as to any definite condition of the past — giving
no sign of any association with life at any period — their clearest mani-
festations being those of an escape from heat of great intensity, and of
convulsive earthquakes which have shaken and shivered the neighbor-
ing mountains and scattered their rough and angular fragments on
every side. Whatever may be the theoretic speculations on this subject"
one thing is certain. When the advance of settlement up the Penob-
scot shall bring mankind in grearer numbers into this section, and the
accumulations of thrift and industry shall enable them to erect mills
and houses and public buildings, they will here find no dearth of most
durable material for the same — no scarcity of granite and lime and
marble to meet all the demands and purposes that may be ever required
for architectural strength, endurance and beauty.*

The general direction of the strata is northeasterly. The extent of
the formation I am not able to give. It becomes covered by the soil,
and is hidden from view. Pursuing the general course of the strike,
which leads you in a direction across the township diagonally, it
again turns up at the Tunnel rocks in Murch's or Horseshoe lake in the
next township. No. 5, R. 8. As a pretty full description of this local-
ity has been given in last year's report, it will not be necessary to sav
more here in regard to it. It is well, however, to note it, as being the
next link in the chain of these Helderberg formations, the existence of
which this survey has been instrumental in discovering.

The next show of it, on this line of strike, is that discovered by
Dr. Jackson, at the foot of first Seboois lake, an extract from whose
description you gave in your first report (page 413). On his authority
It is stated to be in township No. 7. I did not arrive at the rock in
place when at that lake, but judging from the range of the boulders
and other observations, 1 think, instead of being in No. 7, it is in
upper, or northeast part of No. 6 of the 7th range. +

Dr. Jackson also describes a locality of this rock on Peaked moun-
tain, in No. 4 of R. 7. I have not seen this, but if it is identical with
the rock in question, it must belong to another belt, as it is east of the
range of the belt we are describing.

Continuing our course, we next find a splendid locality of it crop.
ping out near the northeast corner of lot 16 in No. 7, R. 6. I explored
this ledge some years ago. It breaks up from a comparatively levej
plain, forming an abrupt, precipitous ledge on one side, fifteen or
twenty feet in height. Its true location had been lost for several years,
and some who had sought for it were unable to find it, until last autumn,
when from directions given them Messrs. Baston and Chase, of Rocka-
mabe, succeeded in again discovering it, a description of which he gave
in a letter to me published in your report (page 320). I look upon this
ledge as a very valuable one. Specimens from it were put into the

hands of a marble-worker, who found that it received a good polish

worked free and made good corners, and was compact and even or
uniform of structure. Its proximity to the Aroostook road, and the
ease with which it can be quarried, render it a feasible and valuable
source from which to obtain marble or lime, to meet the wants of a
growing community.

The next indication of this formation occurs in a line of the course
hitherto pursued fiom No. 4, on or near the northern line of No. 8, R.
5. Boulders of Helderberg rock are found here, but the true spot of
their original site has not yet been ascertained, and future explora-

"* .'Vt Whetstone Falls a kw miles below, on the Penobscot, is a splendid water
power with a good site for buildings. Had the State reserved the fee of the soil
in itself, and given proper enconragement to .settlers, there would long since have
been a thriving village here. E, H.

t It is very difficult, if not impossible, in a dense forest and in the absence of a
correct plan based upon an actual survey, to give the true geographical position
of any rock. In this particular we realized the truth of the remark of Sir Wil.
Ham Logan, Principal of the Canadian Geological Survey, in which he declares
"accurate topography is the foundation of accurate geology."

tion will be needed in that place to make it eertain. Here ended my
hurried and of course imperfect search for this species of rock forma-
tions in this part of the State. They are deserving a longer and more
careful scrutiny, which shall develope more fully both their geological
and economical characteristics. I consider these formations, or beds,
to be exceedingly interesting, not only on account of the intrinsic value
of such rocks, in and of themselves, as affording a source from which
to obtain marble for monumental or ornamental purposes, or excellent
lime for cements or agricultural applications, but also for the geological
teachings and testimonials they give of the period far back in the ages
when this portion of Maine was submerged 'neath the ocean, and
crinoid and coral and sea-fern and mollusk flourished on its shores aird
in its deep soundings, as they now do in the tropical seas of the South
— interesting, too, for the story they tell of the singular changes that
have taken place in the condition of the materials which compose them,
of the hardening into stone of the soft ooze, while full of animal and
vegetable life, embracing and still exhibiting their organic remains as
clearly and distinctly as when they flourished in it in the vigor of actual
life, for the unmistakable evidences they give of the mighty upheaving
of this ancient bed of the sea, and its disruption into mountain masses
in obedience to the laws and commands of Him

"Who thundered, and the ocean fled."

ABOUT PATTEN.

Dr. Holmes says in his report to Professor Hitchcock :

.As it required some little time, after arriving at Patten, to prepare
for a tour in the forest, what leisure I had was spent in excursions in
that vicinity. The rock formation in this neighborhood, as you have
stated in a former report, I found to be slate. In some localities I
found it to exhibit good qualities for roofing slate.

On the premises of Hon. Ira Fish, about a mile and a half from the
village, and on the north bank of the Mill stream, this slate crops out
in the form of a bluft'of moderate height, from which we obtained ex-
cellent specimens. From a cursoiy examination, as far as the sur-
rounding forest would allow, I am led to the conclusion that a good
quarry might be opened here, with a prospect of its yielding a large
supply of this useful material of very fine quality. It cleaves leadily,
giving a smooth, even surface, and possesses the requisite tenacity to
allow of its being dressed and pierced, or punched in the usual manner.

A large portion of the boulders found around the village of Patten
are conglomerate. None of this rock is found here in place except in
one locality, 'i'his was in the bed of the stream, near the lower grist-
mill. One of the abutments of the bridge, which crosses the stream
diere, is built upon it. The extent of it is not manifest, as if soon dips
below the bank and is hidden deeply in the earth. But little granite is
seen after you pass above Lincoln.

Professor Hitchcock adds the following:

Dr. Holmes has described opportunities for ciuariying roofing slate
near Patten. Our own scientific researches have led us to define more
closely the limits of the roofing-slate belt, upon which the best tjuarries
are located, from Patten to Pleasant Ridge on the Kennebeck river.

FURTHER CONCERNING SL.\TE.

Among the metamorphic rocks along the coast southeast from
Portland, patches of clay slate are occasionally seen, as in Biddeford,
Saco, and Scarborough. It was noticed by the State geologist to ex-
tend from the west line of Scarborough (on the Saco road) to a point
beyond Dunstan corner. The strata run northeast and southw'est, and
are nearly vertical.

The next deposit of clay slate is of immense extent. Beginning in
the southwest part of Waterville, it proceeds thence into Winslow, and
probably through Unity and Jackson, to the north part of Frankfort.
On the east side of Penobscot river it appears in the north part of
Bucksport, running down into the west part of Oriand, northeasterly
through Orrington, Holden, and Eddington. From this point it is not
known whether the southern border-line of the clay slate extends direct-
ly to Princeton, or whether it passes to Princeton around the west and
north sides of Hancock county. The belt of clay slate in the northern
part of Washington county is probably connected with the main de-
posit, but it must make the northeastern termini of the slate fork-
shaped. After taking up the line again at No. 10, R. 3, in Washington
county, we can carry it but a short distance on account of the unex-
plored region in the south part of Aroostook county. The slate, how-
ever, disappears before reaching Houlton. Upon the Aroostook road
we can find the northwestern side of the clay slate and carry it westerly.
The western border is found in the village of Patten, where it lies side by

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

side with talcose schist. It passes over toward the East branch of the
Penolwcot. then runs up the Seboois river to Godfrey's Falls, and crosses
over to the west side of the east branch of the Penobscot river at the
Grand'Falls. Thence it returns down the &ist branch to No. 2. when
it runs over to the North Twin Lake. Thence it proceeds in a direct
course to the south end of Moosehead Lake. From here it runs to the
forks of the Kennebec river. Changing its course it runs down the
Kennebec (or perhaps to a point near Mt. .\braham| to Bingham;
thence eastwardlv to the vicinity of Parkman; thence southwesterly to
Norridgewock, and southeasterly to Waterville, whence Professor Hitch-
cock commenced to draw the line. Those who follow this Ime upon
the map will perceive that a vast territory is enclosed by it. 'hough of
an exceedingly irregular shape. It includes all the settled portions of
Piscataciuis and most of Penobscot counties.

Much of the clav slate over this area is of a fissile and easily de-
composing character, so that it is useless for economical purposes. In
the northeastern portions it is often more properly a fine-grained sand-
stone, associated with layers of clay slate, and rarely of limestone. In
Piscataquis county there is much limestone connected with the slate.
The most valuable portion of the slate, or the variety called roofing
slate, is in Piscataciuis county, passing into the counties adjoining.
The relations of the clay slate to the more thoroughly metamorphic
rocks of the southwest and south sides, are yet unkno« n, e.fcept at
two or three localities, which are of too little value to allow of general-
ization. Occasionally a mass of granite has protruded through the

slate.

We give a few details respecting the occurrence and position of the
slate at various localities. The strata on the west side of Penobscot
river below Bangor are inclined to the northwest, and aie underlaid at
Frankfort by mica schist. The clay slate in southeast Bucksport and
tlie west part of Orland foims an anticlinal axis, which is overiaid on
both sides by hornblendic rocks— possibly metamorphosed clay slates.

The following observations of the strike and dip of the clay slates in
Penobscot county were taken by Mr. Houghton during the season of
1862 : Brewer, strike north 50 degrees east, dip 27 degrees northwest.
Orrington, north part 70 degrees east, dip from 50 to 70 degrees north-
west. Further south, strike north 80 degrees east, dip 60 degrees
northerly. Just north of the village of South Orrington, strike east and
west, dip 75 degrees north. Argillo-micaceous slate from West
Bangor to Carmel %vith the folloNving positions :— In Bangor, near J.
Eastman's, strike north 55 degrees east, dip 30 degrees northwest; in
Hermon. at Craig's house, dip 60 degrees northwest; west of do.,
strike north 63 degrees east, dip 60 degrees northwest ; at Hermon
Centre, strike north 60 degrees east, dip 75 degrees north-west ; at
East Carmel, strike north 73 degrees, dip 60 degrees northwest ; fur-
ther west, strike north 45 degrees east, strata vertical; at Carmel
Centre, strike north 70 degrees east, dip 75 degrees southeriy ; at North
Etna, strike north 70 degrees east, dip 70 degrees northerly, and also
strata vertical. The common clay slates have the following positions :
in the northeast corner of Plymouth, strike north 45 degrees east, dip
75 degrees southeast; in Northwest Plymouth, strike north 55 de-
grees rast, dip from 70 to 83 degrees southeast; in South Plymouth,
strike north 70 degrees west, dip 45 degrees southerly; in North Di.x-
mont, strike north 50 degrees east, dip 75 degrees southeast, also
north 55 degrees south; at the Newburg line, dip 70 degrees north-
west, and strike north 70 degrees east, dip 78 degrees northwest. In
Hampden Centre the dip is 35 degrees northwest. Thus it is seen
that the northwest dip is the most common for the slates near Bangor;
but it is not the only one. The presence of axes will enable us to
reduce greatly the supposed thickness of the slates.

This point is illustrated by examining the observations in a line cross-
ing the clay slate from Patten to Bucksport. From Patten to a point
three miles' north of Molunkus village the dip is northwcsteriy. Thence
to the Five Island Hotel in \\'inn the dip is southeasterly. From this
point to three-fourths of a mile below the village of Passadumkeag the
dip is northwesterly again. Thence to the south part of Milford the
dip is southeasterly. The strata for the distance to Bucksport pro-
bably dip northwcsteriy. But they dip southcasteriy as they disap-
pear in Oriand. On this section there are then five axes— three
anticlinals and two synclinals.

Some of the slates about Bangor are so thickly glazed with plumbago
as to have been mistaken for coal. They are largely talcose. and are
occasionally traversed by dikes. The following is the general structure
of the formation between Bangor and Barnard: At Bangor the dip is
the northwest. This changes soon to southeast, which continues to
Charieston. There it changes again and dips northwest. This dip is
not continued long, for the rocks soon dip southcasteriy, and do not

change again till we arrive at a point two and a quarter miles north of
the south line of .Atkinson. Then the dip is to the northwest, which
continues to Barnard. The character of the rock as far as .Atkinson is
very much like that of the strata in Bangor. The layers are often ir-
regular, and are traversed by veins of quartz. Beyond Atkinson the
strata-planes are more regular and better adapted for (luarrying. The
strata at the quarries are nearly perpendicular, and incline northerly.
The character of the rocks at Brownville and in the vicinity of the Ka-
tahdin Iron Works is essentially the same.

Rev. M. R. Keep, of .Ashland, wrote as follows to the Geologist
concerning some of the roofing slates of Northern Maine:

"There seems to be in Aroostook county a distinct variety from the
Brownsville slate and others in common use.. That which has the most
rift and seems likely lo be worked some day for use and for market, is
of a light blue color, and veiy soft, much like the Rutland freestone
pencils, that are much preferred to the bUick pencils for their softness,
and have come into use lately. My attention was first drawn to this
fact in noticing some specimens in No. 9, R. 5, near what is called the
'Hews Place,' on the Aroostook Road near Masardis. In that region
considerable quantities are found scattered over the surface, and the
main ledge is visible in several places, but has not been opened yet.
So far as the stone is concerned, some of the best writing slates I ever
saw have been made from that owned by Mr. Robert Ready and men
in his family. I have one of them in my possession, which as a speci-
men indicates the best (juality of stone for writing as \vell as roofing
slates that I ever saw. The rift is most perfect, free and even, and the
texture soft, so as to make good pencils for use on the same or other
slate. This same kind of slate and neariy the same quality is found in
No. 5, R. 5. also in Patten."

WORKING THE SI...\'1E.

Some notice of the extensive slate quarries near Brown-
ville, Piscataquis county, a locality formerly in this county,
seems proper in this history.

The Bangor or Piscataquis Slate Company opened the
first slate quarry at Brownville in 1843. I's annual pro-
duct soon amounted to twelve thousand squares, which
readily sold in Bangor for an aggregate sum of thirty to
forty thousand dollars. Sixty men were employed, and
about twenty-five thousand dollars a year were paid out
in wages.

The famous quarries of A. H. Merrill, Esq., mainly at
Brownville, were opened for trial in 1846, Mr. Merrill
then owning one fourth share. The tentative efforts
made soon warranted the expenditure of larger sums and
the production of an increased quantity. With the
changes of the year Mr. Merrill finally became sole
owner, and remains such to this day. The latest statis-
tics from his works we have seen represent a force of
eighty men as steadily employed, and a yearly i)rodu(:t
of thirty thousand squares as being turned out, invoking
an annual expenditure of seyenty-live thousand dollars.
Fifteen hundred acres of land arc occupied in the vari-
ous operations of Mr. Merrill. His quarries are two
miles from Brownville village. Until the railroad is
completed to a more convenient point, he sends his pro-
duct by teams lo Milo Station, on the Bangor & Pisca-
taquis railway.

"HORSEBACKS."

We quote from Professor Hitchcock as follows:

A curious class of alluvial ridges are found in great abundance in
Maine, and scarcely occur out of the State, which are known by the
provincial name of "horsebacks. " They are found mostly in the un-
settled districts, and have never been carefully explored by geologists.
We are not ready to theorize upon their origin until more details of
their structure and distribution are known. In general they may be
described as narrow ridges of coarse gravel and sand, from thirty to
forty feet high, situ.tted in a level conntry, with sometimes an undulat-

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

ing summit, and the two ends are of nearly tlie same elevation above
the ocean. With this general statement, we proceed to specify their
localities so far as they are known to lis.

The horsebacks are not common in the western counties.
In Charleston there is a horseback running north 15 degrees west, cor-
responding with the course of the drift stride in the neighborhood,
which is four miles long. On each side of the ridge are peaty swamps
of great e.\tent. A branch strikes off from this ridge in a curvilinear
direction.

Mr. Houghton gives tlie following account of a horseback in the
south part of Plymouth: "The horseback that runs through Plymouth
pond, over which the road passes, is interrupted just south of the pond
by several gravelly knolls, presenting an interesting field for investiga-
tion. One has an abrupt hollow in the top of it, extending, I should
think, to near the level of the pond, in the bottom of which is a clayey
puddle. To the south of tliese the horseback is continued with greater
height and steeper sides, and is said to e.ttend uninterruptedly to near
the centre of Troy. It is interrupted in the north part of Plymouth
pond, and its place as a road is supplied by a floating bridge. It is
hardly discernible to the north again till we arrive on the north side of
Plymouth hill, which has cut acioss it. From this hill it e.Ntends to
Newport pond. Its general direction is north and south. It runs a
few degrees west of north in Plymouth pond. Its total length, so far
as examined, is ten miles. In North Dixmont there is a large meadow
on the west side, and a mill stream on the east side of the ridge. Upon
the east side of the ridge there is an unfailing mineral spring eight feet
above the mill stream. It appeared to me that this spring could not
have come from the meadow upon the west side of the ridge, because
it is higher up. What, then, is its origin?"

The writer was informed of a very long horseback on the west side
of Penobscot river, commencing at Orono, and extending through
Oldtow, n.^lton, Argyle, Edinburg, Howland, Maxfield, and two N6.
3 townships to the West branch of the Penobscot. This would make
the horseback fifty miles long. Part of its course would lie along Se-
boois stream.

One of the scientific reporters says:

We rode over a large horseback in Enfield for an eighth (jt a mile,
and the ridge extended further. A smaller one runs from Lincoln into
Enfield. Rev. Mr. Keep informs us that there is a horseback extend-
ing from the Indian township at Mattawamkeag Point to Bradley, on
the other side of the Penobscot; another in Nos. 2 and 4 of Penob-
scot county west of Sisladobsis Lake, .nnd a third in Levant and
Corinth.

The stage road passes over an interesting horseback between Ken-
duskeag and Corinth. The road first strikes in the west part of the
village of Kenduskeag, and continues upon it for three miles to a cem-
etery in South Corinth, It appears to extend somewhat further in both
directions. Its general direction is northwesterly; but there are changes
and curves in it, whose precise nature may be ascertained by noticing
upon the map of Penobscot county the course of the stage road. This
ridge is wide and not so high in proportion to its width as is most com-
mon. It is of the whaleback type, like the example in Aurora, Hancock
county. Its altitude is estimated at from twenty to fifty feet, and its
width from six to fifteen rods. It starts from the lee side of a large but
low hill, and the northwest end is higher than the soutffeastern. A cut
through it reveals a section of gravel j^recisely like the ideal sketch of a
horseback.

MAKBLli AND LIMESTONES.

The marbles lo be found in Maine occur chiefly upon the belt of Hel-
derberg limestone running from Matagamon (East Branch Penobscot)
river northeasterly. Other localities of good limestones were visited
during the geological survey. That at Carroll, says Professor Hitch-
cock, surpassed anticipation; and similar beds can be fonnd in the
vicinity and in adjoining towns. Here lime was manufactured exten-
sively, three to five hundred barrels being then produced annually upon
the farm of Mr. Gates. The State Geologist also found on the east
branch of the Penobscot boulders of a very fine statuary marble, speci-
mens of which may be seen at the State House. It is, he said, one of
the most promising specimens of marble we have seen anywhere in the
State. Without doubt these boulders were derived from a strip of
Lower Helderberg limestone, running through the whole of the north-
ern part of the State, and very possibly in two or three different belts.
It may belong to the same belt with that discovered by Dr. Jackson in
No. 7, R. 7.

Beds of azoic limestone occur in Dexter, Hampden, Oldtown, Carroll,
and in boulders uiion the Penobscot river. Tho.se in Dexter and Car-

roll are of great value. In Dexter the beds are numerous. One upon
Mr. Crowell's land is blue, very extensive, with only 10 per cent, of im-
purities. It runs nearly east and west, and dips 80 degrees southerly.
Mr. Fish's limestone is similar to the preceding, but contains veins of
calcite; 89.1 per cent, of it is carbonate of lime. Another blue com-
pact of limestone, containing 78. i per cent, of carbonate of lime, is
found upon L. PuUen's farm. That on John Puffers farm contains 84
per cent, of carbonate of lime. A few calciferous slates are interstrati-
fied with these beds, but the prevailing rock is clay slate. The explorers
found boulders of a beautiful azoic marble on the Penobscot river, be-
tween Winn and No. 3. Their source cannot be far distant.

Th;re are seven patches of the Lower Helderberg group, "mostly lime-
stone;, in the north part of the State. One is at the base of Squaw
Mountain at the southwest end of Moosehead Lake, adjacent to mica
schist, and not unlikely of the same age. It is a calciferous slate,
nearly vertical, containing the Favosites Gothlandica. The character
of Squaw Mountain is not known. Another locality of the Lower
Helderberg is on an island at the lower end of Ripogenus Lake. The
rock consists of beds of gray limestone m slats, and appears both at
the lower end of the island and on the opposite shores. The limestone
contains the same coral as before. .Some of the rock is brecciated.
This locality is adjacent to novaculite slate and to granite. The report
did not say whether these two localities are isolated parts of one belt,
l)ut presumed that careful exploration would connect them together, as
well as trace the rock a great distance northeasterly beyond the Pe-
nobscot.

The other localities exhibit a limestone as the characteristic rock of
the group. Probably some of the slates and sandstones adjacent are
of the same age. One locality was discovered by Dr. Holmes, at
Horse Shoe pond, in No. 5, R. 8. It contains the characteristic coral
in abundance, and there is a great cave in the limestone. Another
limestone, probably of this age, is in No. 7, R. 7, near the mouth of
the Seboois river. It is 90 feet thick, and has been partially altered
by a trap dike. It may produce a marble when the demands of the
county shall require its use. This bed probably extends down the
East Branch of the Penobscot river, as boulders of the rock were found
as far down as Winn, which did not appear to have been transj^orted
very far.

MANUFACTURE OF LIME.

A table of localities where lime is made, with the
percentage of quicklime in the stone quarried there, was
prepared for the geological report. The finest limestone,
it was stated, can afford but little inore than fifty per
cent of lime. From this statement the relative values of
the different beds of stone may be easily ascertained.
Dexter is the only Penobscot county town named in this
table. I'Vum the stone at E. Crowell's quarry, 50.6 per
cent of quicklime was manufactured; from the Fish
quarry, 50.1 per cent; from John Puffer's, 47.2. Hamp-
den is enumerated among many places where a lime of
poorer quality, but still suitable for agricultural purposes,
may be obtained.

Observations had also been made of a belt of very
excellent lime-making limestone at the following points:
On Moosehead lake, at Ripogenus Falls on the West
branch of the Penobscot, in boulders on the East branch
of the Penobscot all the way from Winn to the Grand
Falls, on Horseshoe pond in No. 5, R. S, in No. 4, R. 7,
in No. 6, R. 7, in No. 7, R. 7, in No. 7, R. 6, in Ash-
land, in No. 13, R. 5, in No. 13, R. 7, and on the west
side of Square Lake.

TRAP ROCK.

We quote:

On the Aroostook ri\er, trap appears near Ashland and at the falls,
where it joins the St. John River. Another mass of trap appears
between the Pond Pitch and the Upper Falls on the East branch of the
Penobscot. It appears to correspond in its general character and posi-
tion with the trap in Perry, which underlies the Devonian sandstone,
for the rock at the Upper Falls, overlying the bedded trap, is a coarse
conglomerate of the same age as that m Perry.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

Boulders of a fine amygdaloidal trap are common all along the East
liranch, the Seboois, and the Upper Aroostook rivers. East of Mount
Katahdin, upon the East branch of the Penobscot, and upon the Sc-
boois-river, there are immense masses of trap, forming mountains and
perhaps ranges. Lunksoos mountain, on the Penobscot, and Peaked
mountain, on the Seboois, are examples.

Trap dikes were noticed in the following localities: In Hanipilen.
on the west side of Penobscot river, and in Hancock and Ellsworlli.

Most of the granite in Maine is found in its western and southeastern
counties, yet is by no means wanting in the more northern portions.
The region of Mt. Katahdin shows an immense development of it,
from the unexplored region cast of Mooseliead Lake to the East
branch of the Penobscot. The Katahdin mountains, rising suddenly
out of a rolling country to a great height, illustrate the topographical
mode of the development of this rock very finely.

There appears to be a range of granite and syenite from Island Falls,
N'o. 4, R. 4. on the Mattawanikeag river, to Linneus and New Limer-
ick. Boulders of granite are exceedingly numerous at the north end
of Churchill Lake, and the ledges cannot be far distant. The general
absence of granitic boulders in Northern Maine shows, as well as the
nature of the rocks in place, the great difference in the geological and
agricultural character of the two districts. The absence of granite is
generally partial evidence in favor of a good soil, which evidence is
strengthened by other considerations in the case.

We venture to assert that there is not a mountain in Maine, frag-
ments of which will not be found scattered over the country to the
south or southeast. The granite of the Katahdin region is scattered
over the soutliern part of Penobscot county, and the rocks of Mt.
.Abraham and Mt. Blue may be recognized among the boulders of
Kennebec county.

SUNDRY GEOLOGIC.\L NOTES.

From various parts of the later State Geological Re-
ports, are selected remarks concerning Penobscot county,
which have not been used hitherto in this chapter.

Terraces are not very abundant in Maine, although they
are sufficiently common to excite attention. They are
often chosen for the sites of villages or of tasteful private
dwellings. All the large streams of the State are lined
by them more or less — as the Piscataquis, the Saco, Pre-
sumpscot, .\ndroscoggin, Kennebec, Penobscot, St. John,
and St. Francis rivers. They are well develojied in Ber-
wick, Brunswick, Waterville, Lewiston, between Bangor
and Lincoln on the Penobscot, and on the east branch of
the same river between Medway and No. 4.

There is doubtless a large amount of talcose schist in
the immense clay slate formation in the central part of
the State. Over much of this area the two rocks are in-
terstratified, the latter predominating. The rock between
Mattawanikeag Point and Lincoln, on the Penobscot
river, is really more like the schist than the slate. There
is talcose schist also in Charleston and Dixmont.

The fossils from the loosely consolidated red sand-
stones of the Washington county group are scattered
along the east branch of the Penobscot river. But we
do not find them in |)lace until we arrive at the Grand
Falls in No. 5, R. 8.

.'^rgyle is named as one of several points where occur
extensive deposits of bog-ore, often of sufficient extent
for the manufacture of iron.

In Dixmont are found sulphated chalybeate springs,
containing carbonate acid in solution.

TR.WELLEKS' NOTICES —STEELE.

Some of the most vivid sketches of scenery and civili-
zation along the Penobscot and its branches are com-
prised in the narratives of tlie tourists. They arc often

men of culture, who see things with the eye of the artist
or scientist; and their relations are replete with pictur-
est|ue character and information. One of the best of
these is one of the most recent — Mr. Thomas SedgwMck
Steele, writer, artist, and active business man, of Hart-
ford, Connecticut, whose little book on Canoe and
Camera: A 200-mile Tour through the Maine Forests, is
one of the most entertaining sketches of travel in the
language. He entered the wilderness by way of Moose-
head lake and the west branch of the Penobscot, passing
across Chesuncook and Chamberlin lakes to the chain of
small lakes and rivers that brought him to the borders of
Penobscot county at Lake Matagamon. Between this
and the Matagamonsis water, upon a site just west of the
Penobscot line, Mr. Steele claims the discovery of a small
lake, about two miles in extent, not yet upon any other
map thin his, and which fitly, from him, takes the name
of Steele lake. The tourist makes pleasant notice of the
fine farm on the Trout Brook stream, owned by Mr. E.
S. Coe, of Bangor, who has extensive luinber interests in
this region. His narrative thenceforth lies altogether in
Penobscot county. We make enough extracts from it to
convey a good idea of the character of the East Branch
of Penobscot and the adjacent scenery :

.After dinner at the house, our party bade our new-found friends adieu
and paddled down the Thoroughfare into Grand or Matagamon lake,
which is about one-third longer than Lake Matagamonsis, and went
into camp at its foot, on the right bank, near another old dam.

The eastern shore of this lake (the largest body of water on our
course smce leaving Chamberlin lake) is not especially attractive to the
artist, being low and covered with meadow grass. But the western is
decidedly picturesque, being bold and rocky, which, climbing from ele-
vation to elevation, finally culmmates in the precipitous and rugged
peak of Matagamon moutain, towering above one's head to the height
of 600 feet, and is almost divested of foliage. We halted but one night
on this lake, but were well rewarded by the number and size of the fine
trout captured, adding also to our creel a small salmon.
From Grand lake to the junction of the East with the West branch of the
Penobscot it is 60 to 75 miles, the river being shut in on all sides by
lofty mountains, or heavy belts of grand old forests, through which the
swift river tumbles, with only an occasional suggestion of the lumber-
man's axe.

There are eleven conspicuous falls in this interval, varying from 20 to
00 feet in height, while the charming cascades are too numerous to
mention. The abrupt descents bear the names of Stair, Haskell Rock,
Grand, Pond Pitch, Hulling Machine, Rowling, Spring Brook Gravel
Bed, Whetstone, Grindstone, Crowfoot, and Ledge Falls, their names,
ill many cases, suggesting their wild and rugged formation.

The water swept so swiftly through this section that, with the excep-
tion of the last 20 miles, it was hardly necessary to use our paddles, but,
keeping an eye to the rocks in our path, we could silently enjoy the
many lovely changes constantly opening in the landscape.

But this also was decidedly the hardest part of the entire excursion.
.'\t most of these falls, our whole camp equipage, provisions, and canoes
had to be "packed" around the falls from one to two miles, and in
manv cases there was hard climbing along the steep, rocky sides of the
mountains which followed the river's course, while each one of us car-
ried his portion of the load. , . Along the river's bank
to the west, for many miles, are the lovely Traveller mountains, whose
rambling appearance and daily companionship are fully represented by
their name.

Stair Falls the Quartermaster and my.self ran in our canvas canoes,
but the guides, tending their birches as if they were glass, dropped them
from step to step by means of ropes. . . . After passing

Spring Brook Gravel Bed F.alls, we paddled through a mile or two of
luavy "rips " and entered some two miles of " dead water."

On turning a beautiful bend in the river, what was our surprise to ob-
serve the rugged growth of pines gradually disappear, and the landscape
immediately softened by the introduction of a den.se forest of maple,
elm, ash. and noble oak trees, whose gnarled trunks puslieil themselves

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

far into the stream, the branches overlocking above our heads and
forming a canopy that darkened the water.

Exclamations of surprise rang from our lips as all the canoes, in
"Indian file," drifted through the enchanting bower, and we thought to
ourselves, if in the quiet dress of summer this is so lovely, what must it
be when clothed in autumnal foliage ?

THOREAU.

One of the most remarkable tourists who ever inade
an excursion up or down the Penobscot valley was
Henry I). Thoreau, the self-taught naturalist and hermit-
philosopher of Concord, and author of several books —
Excursions, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack
Rivers, Walden, and The Maine \Voods — which are re-
markable for their descriptive power, and the minuteness
and clearness of observation they display. Thoreau was
here in 1846, on his way to the ascent of Mt. Katahdin.
He left Bangor in a buggy September ist, with one
companion, for Malta wamkeag Point. His narrative
proceeds :

Within a dozen miles of Bangor we passed throngh the villages of
Stillwater and Oldtown, built at the falls of the Penobscot, which fur-
nish the principal power by which the Maine woods are converted into
lumber. The mills are built directly over and across the river. Here
is a close jam, a hard rub, at all seasons; and there the once-green tree,
long since white, I need not say as the driven snow, but as a driven
log, becomes lumber merely. Here your inch, your two- and your
three-inch stuff begins to be, and Mr. .Sawyer marks off those spaces
steel which decide the destiny of so many prostrate forests. Through this
riddle, more or less coarse, is the arrowy Maine forest, from Ktaadn
and Chesuncork, and the headwaters of the St. John, relentlessly sifted,
till it comes out boards, clapboards, laths, and shingles such as the
wind can take, still perchance to be slit and slit again, till men get a
size that will suit. Think how stood the white-pine tree on the shore
of Chesuncook, its branches soughing with the four winds, and every
individual needle trembling in the sunlight; tliink hew it stands with it
now, — sold, percliance, to the New England Friction-Match Co. ! There
were in 1837, as I read, 250 saw-mills on the Penobscot and its tribu-
tories above Bangor, the greater part of them in this immediate
neighborhood, and they sawed 200,000,000 of feet of boards annually.
To this is to be added the lumber of the Kennebeck, .'\ndroscoggin,
Saco, Passamaquoddy, and other streams. No wonder that we hear
so often of vessels which are becalmed off our coast, being surrounded
a week at a time by floating lumber from the Maine woods. The mis-
sion of men there seems to be, like so many busy demons, to drive the
forest all out of the country, from every solitary lieaver-swamp and
mountain side, as soon as possible.

At Oldtown we walked into a batteau-manufactory. The making
of batteaux is quite a business here for the supply of the Penobscot
River. We e.\arrined some on the stocks. Tliey are light and shapely
vessels, calculated for rapid and rocky streams, and to be carried over
long portages on men's shouldeis; from twenty to thiity feet long, and
only four or four and a half feet wide, sharp at both ends like a canoe,
though broadest forward on the bottom. .... There
was something refreshing and wildly musical in my ears in the very
name of the white man's canoe, reminding me of Charlevoi.\ and Cana-
dian voyagers. The batteau is a sort of mongrel between the canoe
and the boat, a fur-trader's boat.

The ferry here took us past the Indian island. As we left the shore
I observed a short, shabby, washerwoman-looking Indian — they com-
monly have the woe-begone look of the girl that cried for spilt milk

just from "up river," land on the Oldtown side near a grocery, and,
drawing up his canoe, take out a bundle of skins in one hand and an
empty keg or half-barrel in the other, and scramble up the bank with
them. This picture will do to put before the Indian's history — that is,
the history of his extinction. In 1837 there were 362 souls left of this
tribe. The island seemed deserted to-day, yet I observed some new
houses among the weather-stained ones, as if the tribe had still a design
upon life; but generally they have a very shabby, forlorn, and cheerless
look, being all backside and woodshed, not homesteads, even Indian
homesteads; but, instead of home or abroad-steads, for their life is
domi aut militia:, at home or at war, or now rather venatus — that is,
a hunting, and most of the latter. Tha church Is the only trim-looking
bnilding; but that is not Abenaki, that was Rome's doings. Good

Canadian it may be, but it is poor Indian. These were once a power-
ful tribe. Politics are all the rage with them now. I even thought that
a row of wigwams, with a dance of poww'ows and a prisoner tortured
at the stake, would be more respectable than this.

We landed in Milford, and coasted along on the east side of the
Penobscot, having a more or less constant view of the river and the
islands in it; for they retain all the islands as far up as Nicatou, at the
mouth of the East Branch. They are generally well-timbered, and are
said to be better soil than the neighboring shores. The river seemed
shallow and rocky, and interrupted by rapids, rippling and gleaming in
the sun.

It was the Houlton road on which we were now travelling, over which
some troops were marched once toward Mars' Hill, though not to
Mars' field, as it proved. It is the main, almost the only road in these
parts, as straight and well-made, and kept in as good repair, as almost
any you will find anywhere. Everywhere we saw signs of the great
freshet, — this house standing awry, and that where it was not founded,
but where it was found, at any rate, the next day; and that other with
a water-logged look, as if it were still airing and drying its basement,
and logs with everybody's n;arks upon them, and sometimes the marks
of their having served as bridges, strewn along the road. We crossed
the Sunkhaze, a summery Indian name, the Olemon, Passadumkeag,
and other streams, which make a greater show on the map than they
now did on the road.

At sundown, leaving the river-road awhile for shortness, we went by
way of Enfield, where we stopped for the night. This, like most of
the localities bearing names on this road, was a place to name, which,
in the midst of the unnamed and incorporated wildness, was to make
a distinction without a difference, it seemed to me. Here, however,
I noticed quite an orchard of healthy and well-grown apple-trees, in a
bearing state, it being the oldest settler's house in this region; but all
natural fruit, and comparatively worthless for want of a grafter — and
so it is generally lower down the river. It would be a good specula-
tion, as well as a favor conferred on the settlers, for a Massachusetts
boy to go down there with a trunk-full of choice-scions, and his graft-
ing apparatus, in the spring.

The next morning we drove along through a high and hilly country,
in view of Coldstream Pond, a beautiful lake four or five miles long,
and came into the Houlton road again, here called the military road,
at Lincoln, 45 miles fi-om Bangor, where there is quite a village for this
country — the principal one above Oldtown. Learning that there were
several wigwams here, on one of the Indian islands, we left our horse
and wagon, and walked through the forest half a mile to the river, to
procure a guide to the mountain. It w-as not till after considerable
search that we discovered their habitations — small huts, in a retired
place, where the scenery was unusually soft and beautiful, and the
shore skirted with pleasant meadows and graceful elms.

There were very few houses along the road, yet they did not alto-
gether fail, as if the law by which men are disjsersed over the globe
were a very stringent one, and not to be resisted with impunity or for
slight reasons. There were even the germs of one or two villages just
beginning to expand. The beauty of the road itself was remarkable.
The various evergreens, many of which are rare with us — delicate and
beautiful specimens of the larch, arbor-vita;, ball-spruce and fir-balsam,'
from a few inches to many feet in height — lined its sides, in some
places like a long front yard, springing up from the smooth grass-plats
which uninterruptedly border it, and are made fertile by its wash;
while it was but a step on either hand to the grim, untrodden wilder-
ness, whose tangled labyrinth of living, fallen , and decaying trees only
the deer and moose, the bear and wolf, can easily penetrate. More
perfect specimens than any front-yard plot can show, grow there to
grace the passage of the Houlton teams.

About noon we reached the Mattawamkeag, 56 miles from Bangor by
the way we had come, and put up at a fret[uented house still on the
Houlton road, where the Houlton stage stops. Here was a substantial
covered bridge over the Mattawamkeag, built, I think they said, some
17 years before. We had dinner — where, by the way, and even at
breakfast, as well as supper, at the public houses on this road, the
front rank is composed of various kinds of "sweet-cakes," in a contin-
uous line from one end of the table to the other. I think I may safely
say that there was a row of 10 or 12 plates of this kind set before us
two here. To account for which, they say that, when the lumberers
come out of the woods, they have a craving for cakes and pies and
such sweet things, which there are almost unknosvn, and this is the
supply to satisfy that demand. The supply is always equal to the de-
mand, and these hungry men think a good deal of getting their mon-
ey's worth. No doubt the balance of victuals is restored by the time

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

Ihey reacli Bangor— Mattawamkeag takes off the raw edge. Well,
over this front rank. I say, you, coming from the "sweet-cake" side,
with a cheap, philosophic indifl'erenee though it may be, have to as-
sault What there is behind, which I do not by any means mean to
insinuate is insufficient in quantity or quality to supply that other de-
mand, of men, not from the woods, hut from the towns, for venison
and strong country fare. After dinner we strolled down to the Point,
formed by the junction of the two rivers, which is said to be the scene
of an ancient battle between the Eastern Indians and the Mohawks,
and searched there carefully for relics, though the men at the bar-room
had never heard of such things: but we found only some flakes of
arrow-hrad stone, some points of arrow-heads, one small leaden bul-
let, and some colored beads, the last to be referred, perhaps, to early
fur-trader days. The Mattawamkeag, though wide, was a mere rivers
bed, full of rocks and shallows at this time, so that you could cross it
almost dry-shod in boots; and I could hardly believe my companion,
when he told me that he had been fifty or sixty miles up it in a bat-
teau, through distant and still uncut forests. A batteau conld hardly
find a harbor now at its mouth. Deer and caribou, or reindeer, are
taken here in the winter, in sight of the house.

Early the ne.\t morning we had mounted our packs, and prepared
for a tramp up the West Branch, my companion having turned his
liorse out to pasture for a week or ten days, thinking that a bite of
fresh grass and a taste of running water would do him as much good
as backwoods fare and new country influences would his master. Leap-
ing over a fence, we began to follow an obscure trail up the north bank
of the Penobscot. There was now no road further, the rivet being the
only highway, and but half a dozen log-huts, confined to its banks, to
be met with for 30 miles. On either hand, and beyond, was a wholly
uninh.abited wilderness, stretching lo Canada. Neither horse nor cow,
nor vehicle of any kind, had ever passed over this giound; the cattle
and the few bulky articles which the loggers use being got up in the
winter on the ice, and down again before it breaks up. The evergreen
woods had a decidedly sweet and bracing fragrance; the air was a sort
of diei-drink; and we walked on buoyantly in Indian file, stretching
our legs. Occasionally there was a small opening on the bank, made
for the purpose of log-rolling, where we got a sight of the river — always
a rocky and rippling stream. The roar of the rapids, the note of a
whistler-duck on the river, of the jay and chickadee .around us. and
of the pigeon-woodpecker in the openings, were the sounds that we
heard. This was what you might call a brand-new country; the only
roads were of Nature's making, and the few houses were camps.
Here, then, one could no longer accuse institutions and society, but
must front the true source of evil.

There are three classes of inhabitants who eithei frequent or inhabit
the country which we had now entered — first, the loggers, who. for a
part of the year, the winter and spring, are far the most numerous,
but in the summer explorers for timber completely desert it; second,
the few settlers I have named, the only permanent inhabitants, who
live on the verge of it and help raise supplies for the former; third,
the hunters, mostly Indians, who range over it in their season.

.■\t the end of three miles we came to the Mattaseunk stream and mill,
where there was even a rude wooden railroad running down to the Pe-
nobscot, the last railroad we were to see. We crossed one tract on the
bank of the river, of more than a hundred acres of heavy timber, which
had just been felled and burnt over, and was still smoking. Our trail
lay through the midst of it, and was well-nigh blotted out. The trees
lay at full length, four or five feet deep, and crossing each other in all
directions, all black .as charcoal, but perfectly sound w ithin , still good for
fuel or for timber; soon they would be cut into lengths and burnt again.
Here were thousands of cords, enough to keep the poor of Boston and
New York amply warm for a winter, which only cumbered the ground
and were in the settler's way. And the whole of that solid and inter-
minable forest is doomed to be gradually devoured thus by fire, like
shavings, and no man be warmed by it. . . .

I walked through Salmon River with my shoes on, it being low water,
but not without wetting my feel. A few miles farther we came to
"Marm Howard's," at the end of an extensive clearing, where there
were two or three log huts in sight at once, one on the opposite side of
the river, and a few graves, even surrounded by a wooden paling,
where already the rude forefathers of a hamlet lie, and a thousand
years hence, perchance, some poet will write his " Elegy in a Country

Courchyard."

The next house was Fisk's, ten miles from the Point, at the East
Branch opposite to the island Nickatou. or the Forks, the last of the In-
dian islands. I am particular to give the names of the settlers and the
distances, since every log hut in these woods is a public house, and such

information is of no little consequence to those who may have occasion
to travel this way. Our course here crossed the Penobscot, and fol-
lowed the southern bank. One of the party, who entered the house in
search of some one to set us over, reported a very neat dwelling, with
plenty of books and a new wife, just imported from Boston, wholly
new to the woods. We found the East Branch a large and rapid stream
at its mouth, and much deeper than it appeared. Having with some
difficulty found the trail again, we kept up the south side of the West
Branch, or main river, passing by some rapids called Rock Ebeeme,
the roar of which we heard through the woods, and, shortly after, in
the thickest of the wood, some empty loggers' camps, still new , which
were occupied the previous winter. . . While's farm, thirteen
miles from the Point, is an extensive and elevated clearing, from which
we got a fine view of the river, rippling and gleaming far beneath us.
We reached Shad Pond, or Nolisumack, an expansion
of the river. Hodge, the assistant State Geologist, who passed thro'
this on the 25th of June, 1837, says: "We pushed our boat through
an acre or more of buck-beans which had taken root at the bottom and
bloomed above the surface in the greatest profusion and beauty."

We took here a poor and leaky balteau, and began to pole up
the Millinocket two miles to the Elder Fowler's, in order to avoid the
Grand Falls of the Penobscot, intending to exchange our batteau there
for a belter. The Millinocket is a small, shallow, and sandy stream,
full of what I took to be lamprey-eels' or suckers' nests, . lined
with musquash cabins, but free from rapids, excepting at its outlet
from the lake.

Old Fowler's, on the Millinocket, six miles from McCauslin's, and 24
from the Point, is the last house. Gibson's, on the Sowadnehunk, is
the only clearing above; but that had proved a failure, and was long
since deserted. Fowler is the oldest inhabitant of these woods. He
formerly lived a few miles from here, on the South side of the West
Branch, where he built his house sixteen years ago, the first house built
above the Five islands. Here our new batteau was to be carried over
the first portage of two miles, round the Grand Falls of the Penobscot,
on a horse-sled made of saplings, to jump the numerous rocks in the way.
This portage probably followed the trail of an ancient Indi-
an carry round these falls. By two o'clock we, who had walked on be-
fore, reached the river above the falls, not far from the outlet of Quak-

ish Lake, and waited for the batteau to come up

We were soon in the smooth water of the Quakish Lake, and took our
turns at rowing and paddling across it. It is a small, iiregular, but
handsome lake, shut in on all sides by the forest, and showing no traces
of man, but some low boom in a distant cove, reserved for spring use.
The spruce and cedar on its shores, hung with gray lichens, looked at
a distance like the ghosts of trees. Ducks were sailing here and there
on its surface, and a solitary loon, like a mere living wave.— a vital
spot on the lake's surface, —laughed and frolicked, and showed its
straight leg, for oui amusement. Joe Merry Mountain appeared m the
northwest, as if it were looking down on this lake especially: and we
had our first but partial view of Ktaadn, its summit veiled in clouds,
like a dark isthmus in that quarter, connecting the heavens with the
earth. After tw o miles of smooth rowing across this lake, we found our-
selves in the river again, which was a continuous rapid for one mile to
the dam, requiring all the strength and skill of our boatman to pole it

up. . ■ •

This camp, exactly 29 miles from Mattawamkeag Point, by the way
we had come, and about 100 from Bangor by the river, was the last hu-
man habitation of any kind in this direction. Beyond, there was no
trail; and the river and lakes, by batteaux and canoes, were considered
the only practicable route. U'e were about 30 miles by the river from
the summit of Kmadn, which was in sight, though not more than 20,
perhaps, in a straight line.

It being about the full of the moon, and a warm and pleasant even-
ing, we decided to row five miles by moonlight lo the head of the North
Twin Lake, lest the wind should rise on the morrow, .\fter oue mile of
river, or what the boatmen call "thoroughfare,"— for the river becomes
at length only the connecting link between the lakes,— and some slight
rapid which had been mostly made smooth water by the dam, we en-
tered the North Twin Lake just after sundown, and steered across for
the river "thoroughfare, " four miles distant. This is a noble sheet of
water, where one may get the impression which a new country and a
"lake of the woods " are fitted to create

■VVe could distinguish the outlet to the South Twin, which is said to
be the larger, where the shore was misty and blue, and it was worth
the while to look thus through a narrow opening across the entire ex-
panse of a concealed lake to its own yet more dim and distant shore.
The shores rose gen«Jy to ranges of low hills covered with forests; and

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

though, in fact, the most valuable white-pine timber, even about this
lake, had been culled out. this would never have been suspected by the
voyager. The impression which, indeed, with the fact was, as if we
were upon a high table-land between the States and Canada, the nor-
thern side of which is drained by the St. John and Chaudiere, the
southern by the Penobscot and Kennebec. There was no bold, moun-
tainous shore, as we might have expected, but only isolated hills and
mountains rising here and there from the plateau. The country is an
aichipelago of lakes, — the lake country of New England. The levels
vary but a few feet, and the boatmen, by short portages, or by none at
all, pass easily from one to another. They say that at very high water
the Penobscot and the Kennebec flow into each other, or, at any rate,
that you may lie w ith your face in one and your toes in the other. Even
the Penobscot and St. John have been connected by a canal, so that the
lumber of the Allcgu,ash, instead of going down the St. John, comes
down the Penobscot; and the Indian's tradition that the Penobscot
once ran both ways for his con\'enience, is, in one sense, partially real-
ized to-day.

AUDUBON.

In August, 1 83 1, the yet more celebrated naturalist,
John James Audubon, made a journey overland through
Eastern Maine, with his wife and two sons, to inquire as
to the birds of the wilderness. We are able, from his
narrative, to determine pretty nearly how much of his
journey lay in Penobscot county, and copy that portion
of the diary from his Life, edited by his widow and
published in 1873. The party was now on its return
from New Brunswick:

Hiring a cart, two horses, and a driver, we proceeded in the direction
of Bangor. Houlton is a neat village, consisting of some fifty houses.
The fort is well situ.ated, and commands a fine view of Mars' Hill,
which is about 13 miles distant. A custom-house has been erected here,
the place being on the boundary line of the United States and the British
provinces. The road which was cnt by the soldiers of this garrison,
from Bangor to Houlton, through the forests, is at this moment a fine
turnpike of great breadth, almost straight in its whole length, and per-
haps the best now in the Union. It was incomplete, however, for some
miles, so that our travelling over that portion was slow and disagree-
able. The rain, which fell in torrents, reduced the newly raised earth
to a complete bed of mud; and at one time our horses became so com-
pletely mired that, had we not been extricated by two oxen, we must
have spent the night near the spot. Jogging along at a very slow
pace, we were overtaken by a gay wagoner, who had excellent horses,
two of which a little "siller" induced him to join to ours, and we were
taken to a tavern at the "cross-roads," where we spent the night in
comfort.

While supper was preparing, I made inquiry respecting birds, quad-
rupeds, and fishes, and was pleased to hear that all of these animals
abounded in the neighborhood. Deer, bear, trouts, and grouse, were
quite plentiful, as was the great gray owl. When we resumed our
journey next morning Nature displayed all her loveliness, and autumn
with her mellow tints, her glow ing fruits, and her rich fields of corn,
smiled in placid beauty. Many of the fields had not yet been reaped;
the fruits of the forests and orchards hung clustering around us; and,
as we came in view of the Penobscot river, our hearts thrilled with
jay. Its broad, transparent waters here spread out their unruftied sur-
face, there danced along the rapids, while canoes filled with Indians
swiftly glided in every direction, raising before them the timorous
waterfowl that had already flocked in from the north mountains, which
you well know are indispensable in a beautiful landscape, reared their
majestic crests in the distance. The Canada jay leaped gayly from
branch to twig; the king-fisher, as if vexed at being suddenly surprised,
rattled loudly as it swiftly flew off ; and the fish-hawk and eagle spread
their broad wings over the waters. All around was beautiful, and we
gazed on the scene with delight as, seated on a verdant bank, we re-
freshed our frames from our replenished stores.

A few rare birds were procured here, and, the rest of the road being
level and firm, we trotted on at a good pace for several hours, the Pe-
nobscot keeping company with us. Now we came to a deep creek, of
which the bridge was undergoing repairs, and the people saw our
vehicle approach with much surprise. They, however, assisted us with
pleasure, by placing a few logs across, along which our horses, one
after the other, were carefully led, and the cart afterwards carried.
These good fellows were so averse to our recompdising them for their

labor that, after some altercation, we were obliged absolutely to force
what we deemed a suitable reward upon them.

Next day we continued our journey along the Penobscot, the coun-
try changing its aspect at every mile ; and when we first discovered
Oldtown, that village of saw-mills looked like an island covered with
manufactories. The people are noted for their industry and persever-
ance; any one possessing a mill, and attending to his saws and the
floating of the timber into his dams, is sure to obtain a competency in
a few years.

Speculations in land covered with pine, lying to the north of this
place, are carried on to a great extent; and to discover a good tract of
such ground many a miller of Oldtown undertakes long journeys.
Reader, with your leave, I will here introduce one of them.

Good luck brought us into acquaintance with Mr. Gillies, whom we
happened to meet in the course of our travels, as he was returning from
an exploring tour. About the first of August he formed a party of
sixteen persons, each carrying a knapsack and an axe. Their provis-
ions consisted of 250 lbs. of pilot bread. 150 lbs. of salted pork, 4 lbs.
of tea, two large loaves of sugar, and some salt. They embarked in
light canoes, 12 miles north of Bangor, and followed the Penobscot as
far as Wassataquoik river, a branch leading to the northwest, until
they reached the Seboois Lakes, the principal of which lie in a line,
with short portages between them. Still proceeding northwest, they
navigated these lakes, and then turning west carried their canoes to
the great lake, thence north, then along a small stream to the upper
"Umsaskis Pond," when they reached the Alleguash river, which leads
into the St. ]olin's, in about latitude 47^ 3'. Many portions of that
country had not been visited before, even by the Indians, who assured
Mr. Gillies of this fact. They continued their travels down the St.
Johns to the Grand Falls, where they met with a portage of half a
mile, and, having reached Meduxmekeag creek, a little above Wood-
stock, the party walked to Houlton, having travelled 1,200 miles, and
described almost an oval over the country by the time they returned to
Oldtown on the Penobscot.

While anxiously looking for "lumber lands," they ascended the emi-
nences around, then climbed the tallest trees, and, by means of a great
telescope, inspected the pine-woods in the distance. And, such excel-
lent judges are these persons of the value of the timber which they
thus observe, when it is situated at a convenient distance from water,
that they never afterwards forgot the different spots at all worthy of
their attention. They had observed only a few birds and quadrupeds,
the latter principally porcupines. The borders of the lakes and rivers
afforded them fruits of various sorts and abundance of cranberries,
while the uplands yield plenty of wild white onions and a species of
black plum.

Some of the party continued their journey in canoes down the St.
John's, ascended Eel river and the lake of the same name to Matta-
wamkeag river, due southwest of the St. John's, and, after a few por-
tages, fell into the Penobscot. I had made arrangements to accom-
pany Mr. Gillies on a journey of this kind, when I judged it would be
more interesting, as well as useful to me, to visit the distant country of
Labrador.

The road which we followed from Oldtown to Bangor was literally
covered with Penobscot Indians returning from market. On reaching
the latter beautiful town, we found very comfortable lodgings in an ex-
cellent hotel, and next day proceeded by the mail to Boston.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

CHAPTER II.

THE PENOBSCOT INDIANS.

The Eastern Tribes — The Race-slock — The Abenakis — The Etche-
mins — The Tarralines — Early History of the Tarratines — Wars and
Incidents — More of the Wars — The Three-years' War — An Interest-
ing N'arrative — Gyless Captivity Among the Henobscots — A Modem
Affair — The Tarratine Chiefs : The Bashaba — Later Tarratine Chiefs
and Governors — Orono — John Atteon — The Penobscot "in Politics"
— The Indian Lands and Treaties — The Indian Trust Fund — The
Old Indian Villages — The Indian Census — The Penoljscot Reserva-
tion — The Community of Sisters of Mercy.

THE EASTERN TRIBES.

Tlie Indians of Maine have received comparatively
little attention from the writers upon the aborigine.s,
whose regards have been principally given to the red
men of the Middle States, the South, and the Far West.
Gookin, in his enumeration of the New England tribes,
does not mention the Eastern Indians at all, but speaks
only of five " nations," the Pequots, the Narragansetts,
the Pawkunawkutts, the Massachusetts, and the Paw-
tuckets, the last-named of whom "had under them sev-
eral smaller sagamores, as the Pentacooks, the Agawams,
the Naumkeeks, Piscataways, Accomentas, and others."
It may be that the uncommonly peaceful and friendly
disposition of the savages upon the Maine, making them
less the subjects of history than their brethren of Massa-
chusetts and New York, has contributed to keep them
in the background of the aboriginal picture. Neverthe-
less their ethnological place, their numbers and charac-
teristics, and the wars in which they finally engaged,
possess sufficient interest to demand place in this work.

THE R.ACE-STOCK.

In the great divisions of the North American tribes,
the Eastern Indians belonged to the Algonquins. The
Lenni-Lenape- or "original people,"as their name implies
— more commonly known as the Delawares, early ex-
tended their hunting-grounds along the Susquehanna,
the Potomac, Delaware, and Hudson. \Vhen an exodus
was made by a portion of this great tribe across the Hud-
son, it took from them the name Mahicannituck ; and
this, shortened and corrupted in the English mouth, was
transferred to them as the Mahicans or Mohicans, and
in New England the Mohegans. Here they scattered
themselves, as they increased, over all the present States
east of the Hudson, and in time became divided into
several leading tribes, with many subdivisions or tribal
bands. Their affinity with the Indians further to the
southward is conclusively proved by the reseinblance of
language. So long ago as when Charlevoix wrote, this
fact was observed. After mentioning the wide dissem-
ination of the Algonquin speech (over a circuit of one
thousand two hundred leagues), he says: "It is pretended
that the natives of New England spoke dialects of the
same language." This is confirmed by the statement of
Heckewelder, a later and better authority upon Indian
topics. He affirms that when the Europeans came, the
Mohegans held the entire Atlantic coast, from Roanoke
to the northernmost parts of Nova Scotia, and that their
language and the tongue of the Algonquins were but
but dialects of the same original speech. La Hontan, a

writer of the time of Charlevoix, making his remarks
more specific to the Indians of Eastern Maine, says that
the dialect of the Etchemins differed but little from that
spoken by the Algonquins. The friendship between the
Algonquins, so called, and the Eastern Indians, was so
warm and cordial as to imply at least the tradition of
relationship. Champlain makes record of a great feast
prepared by the former in 1603, to which the "Moun-
taineers" and the Etchemins were invited. Charlevoix
also says in effect that many of the Algonquins joined
their brethren of Maine, when the latter were induced
by the French to emigrate to St. Francois and Becan-
cour, in Canada. Dr. Dwight says in his Travels:

The Indians of Penobscot, as I have been since informed by the Hon.
Timothy Edwards, were proved to be Mohekaneews by the following
incident ; Several men of this tribe, during the Revolutionary war, came
to Boston to solicit of the Government a stipend, which had been
formerly granted to the tribe by the Legislature of Massachusetts Bay.
The business was referred by the council of safety to Mr. Edwards,
then a member of their body, as being versed in the affairs and ac-
quainted with the character of Indians. Mr. Edwards employed Hen-
drick Awpaumut, a Stockbridge Indian accidentally in Boston at that
time, to confer with the petitioners and learn the nature of their expecta-
tions. Hendrick found himself able to converse with them, so far as
to understand their wishes satisfactorily ; and observed to Mr. Edwards
that their language was radically Mohekancew, and differed only as a
dialect. This fact I have from Mr. Edwards. 1 have mentioned it
here, because the contrary seems to have been universally adopted.

It may be added here that the plural tbrm of the word
Muhhekaneew, according to Dr. Edwards, is Muhhcka-
neok, whence Mohican and Mohegan. Besides the
generic application of the term, it is also a specific name
for a tribe that dwell in the present Windham county,
Connecticut, and thence north to the State line. It was
a powerful organization, putting in the field three thou-
sand warriois, and having at one time the celebrated
Uncas for chief

THE AUENAKIS.

A general name lias been given by many writers — the
older, as well as later — to all the Indians east of the
Piscataqua, to the country of the Mickmacks, in Nova
Scotia. They were called the Wapanchkie (men of the
east), or Wabenakies (east-land men), which became in
the French Abenaques, and in the English more com-
monly Abenakis or Abnakis. McKenney & Halls great
History of the Indian Tribes of North America says that
the New England Tribes were formerly known by their
red brethren west of the Hudson under the generic ap-
pellation of Wabenauki, or Men of the East. Their
languages were branches of the Algonquin stock, cog-
nate dialects, bearing a distinct resemblance one to the
other. All these tribes had undoubtedly a common In-
dian origin, and it is equally certain that their separation
into distinct communities occurred no very long time
before they were visited by the English voyagers and
colonists. Hutchinson, in his History of Massachusetts,
gives .\benaques and Tarrantines as equivalent terms; in
which he is certainly mistaken. The .\benakis are un-
doubtedly closely allied in blood to the Tarratines, or
Penobscot Indians ; but are well known to have been a
separate tribe, with a separate habitat. The statement of
Charlevoix is in the later statement as well — that the
"Abenaques live in a country from Pentagoet [Pen-

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

obscot] to New England." They inhabited the vast
forests that covered the tract west of the Penobscot, even
into New Hampshire, and north to Canada, in some
part of which the reminant of them now dwell. They
were a numerous people, until at least the period of the
first Indian war, and were mainly in four tribes — the
Sokokis or Sockhigones, the Indians of the Saco; the
Anasagunticooks, or Abenakis of the Androsscoggin and
the west of the Sagadahoc; the Canibas or Norridge-
wocks of the Kennebec — "great numbers of them," says
Hubbard, "when the river was first discovered;" and
the Wawenocks, between the St. George and Sagadahoc
waters. To these many writers now add the Tarratines
or Penobscots, the immediate subjects of the Bashaba,
or chief sagamore. The permanent villages of the Abena-
kis were five in number — two in Canada, and one each on
the Saco, the Androscoggin, and the Kennebec. The
French missionaries described these centres of population
as enclosed with strong, high palisades, surrounding clus-
ters of wigwams built of bark supported by bent poles.
The natives' dress was "ornamented with a great variety of
rings, necklaces, bracelets, belts, etc., made out of shells
and stones, worked with great skill. They praacticed
also agriculture. Their fields of skamgnar [corn] were
very luxuriant. As soon as the snows had disappeared,
they prepared the land with great care, and at the com-
mencement of June they planted the corn, by making
holes with fingers or with a stick, and, having dropped
eight or nine grains of corn, they covered them with
earth. "Their harvest was at the end of August." Their
chief characteristics were bravery, preserverance and te-
nacity of purpose, amiability and sociability, indisposed
to war, but suspicious, and uncompromising in their
hostility and pursuit of the war-path when once aroused,
fidelity to their engagements, and hospitality. "Their
attachment to their family, " says an historian of the East-
ern Indians, " was such as we do not read of in other
tribes of the Algic people." The French missionaries,
traders, and military commanders had great influence
over these Indians, and did much to provoke savage
aggressions upon the English settlement. They showed,
says Bryant & Gay's Popular History of the United
States, "the tact and adaptibility which distinguish that
nation."

This History says further:

The French studied in every way to ;i]3propriate the habits of tlie In-
dians, to hunt, travel, eat, sleep and dress in the native fashion. They
were apt learners of the different dialects; the lists of words and the
dictionaries compiled by their missionaries can be relied upon. And
these devoted men drew savage admiration by their constancy, calm-
ness in peril, assiduous efforts to teach and civilize, and their skill in
healing, as well as by the impressive solemnity of those novel services
of religion, with cross, cup, bell and candle, under the groined arches
of the primitive cathedral. But the English possessed over the French
one manifest advantage, and that has since been styled " manifest des-
tiny," for the current of history undermines and carries away the
adroitest policies of the nicest arts of accommotlation."

THE ETCHEMINS. ^

This has been taken as a general name for the tribes
that dwell along the banks and about the headwaters of
the Penobscot and St. John's rivers, thence eastwardly,
according to Hermon Moll's old map of the English

Empire in .America, to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and
southwardly to the Bay of Fundy. The order of the
king of France to D'Aulnay, in 1638, to confine his ju-
risdiction to the coast of the Etchemins seems, however,
to imply that the extent of it was included between the
St. John's and the Bay of Fundy. But it is certain that
it comprised the Penobscot region. Indeed, Chailevoix
would make this their chief district, as it may have been.
He says: "The Abenaques, or Canabas, have for their
nearest neighbors the Etchemins, or Marechites, about
Pentagoet and its environs; and more at the east are the
Mickmacks, or Souriquois, the proper inhabitants of
Acadia." His name Marechites, as a title for the whole
nation, is considerably used by other wTiters. The name
Etchemin is still preserved in a river, and also a town of
Canada.

Mr. Williamson adds some interesting facts concerning
this people:

Among the Etecheniins, marriages are negotiated by the fathers, and
solemnized, in modern times, by a Catholic priest. Captain Francis
says: "If an Indian is charmed with a squaw, he tells his parents and
they talk with hers; and, if all are pleased, he sends her a string of
wampum, perhaps i,ooo beads, and presents her with a wedding suit.
All meet at the wigwam of her parents; the young couple sit together
till married; they and the guests then feast and dance all that night and
the next; and then the married pair retire." Early wedlock is encour-
aged; and a couple in a fit of matrimonial union will, for the purpose
of finding a priest, traverse the woods to Canada. In later times poly-
gamy is not known among them, and divorces, which are never very
frequent, are by mutual consent.

Captain Francis says, before white people came here, sometimes
" Indians have four wives. " A sanup [husband] has unlimited control
over his wife, having been known to take her life with impunity. A
case of this kind occurred in 1785, when one in a paro.xysm of rage slew
his squaw and hid her body imder the ice of the Penobscot, without
being, according to report, so much as questioned for his conduct.

The religious notions of the natives are rude and full of superstition.
They believe in a Great Spirit, whom the .'^benaques called Tanto or
Tantum, and the Etechemins, Sazoos; also in the immortality of the
soul and in a paradise far in the west, where he dwells, and where all
good men go when they die. To the wicked they suppose he will say,
when they knock at the heavenly gates, "Go wander in endless misery;
you never shall live here." For plenty, victory, or any other great
good, they celebrated feasts with songs and dances to his praise.

They had strong faith in an evil spirit, whose Satanic Majesty they
called Mojahondo, supposing he possessed the attributes in general re-
vealed of that being in the Scriptures. They believed also in tutelar
spirits, or good angels, whom they denominated Mannitou, and they
entertained great veneration for their Powows. These, uniting in one
person the two offices of priest and physician, were supposed to possess
almost miraculous powers.

Their dead were generally buried in a sitting posture. In Pittston,
upon the Kennebeck, are two old burying grounds, where skeletons
are found in a posture half erect, the head bending over the feet.
Relics of human bodies have been discovered in a tumulus near Ossipee
pond, which were originally buried with the face downward. In these
two places, and in others upon the Kenduskeag and elsewhere, there
have been discovered instruments, paints, and ornaments interred — the
requisites to help the departed spirits to the "country of souls." The
modern manner of burial is borrowed from the Catholics. The corpse,
enclosed in a rough coffin, is followed by an irregular procession to the
burying-ground; and when interred, a little wooden crucifi.x is placed
at the head of the grave, which is sprinkled with consecrated water and
perfumed with flowers or herbs. If a Tarratine dies abro.ad, he must,
if possible, be borne to Oldtown and buried in the common grave-
yard.

The female lamentations for the dead are great, and sometimes ex-
cessive. The death of a young child, swept away from the arms of its
mother, as the two lay sleeping in a summer's day between high and
low w.ater mark upon the Penobscot be.ach, affords a striking instance
of savage grief. She burst into loud and excessive lamentations, and

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

mingled her cries with inarticulate jabber, an hour scarcely closing this
scene of shrieking and tears.

The three Etecheniin tribes have, severally and immeinorially, se-
lected. their sagamores and sachems, or subordinate officers, in form of
a general election.* But the candidate, when chosen, is not inducted
into his office without the presence and assistance of a delegation from
each of the other tribes. This was the case when Francis Joseph
Neptune, at Passama<|Uoddy, and John Aitteon, at Penobscot, were
m.ade chiefs of their respociive tribes; and the most intelligent credible
Indians agree in saying thai such is the practice among the Marechites,
and has always been the usage among all three of the tril)es.

THE T.ARR.\TINF.S.

The Etchemins, according to the historian Williamson,
were in three tribes — the Marechites proper, or Armon-
chiquois, the Indians of the St. John's; the Openango,
or Quoddy Indians, of the Passamaquoddy, and the
Tarratines, or aborigines of the Penobscot, with whom
we have mainly to deal. Mr. Parkman, however, and
with him, probably, all the later writers, assign these
Indians to the Abenaki confederation or stock.

There can be no doubt as to the habitat of the Tar-
ratines. All the older, as well as later, writers are one in
the view that they dwelt upon the Penobscot river and
bay, and the present remnant of Penobscot Indians are
undoubtedly descended lineally from the Tarratines.
They also claimed dominion over the tracts adjacent to
the river, from its sources to the sea. Captain Smith, in
his narrative, relates that the Penobscot mountains, or
Camden hills, formed a natural fortress, separating the
Tarratines from their neighbors, the other Abenaki tribes.
'I"he two peoples long lived in amity, although the
farmer cherished an hereditary enmity to the Abergin-
eans, or Northern Indians, especially in Massachusetts
and New Hampshire, which led finally, in 16 15-16, to
the terrible war between the Tarratines and the rest of
the Abenakis, in which the latter was almost extermina-
ted, and the Bashaba was slain.

Mr. Williamson says of the Tarratines:

They were a numerous, powerful, and warlike people, more hardy
and brave than their western enemies, whom they often plundered and
killed, and, accordmg to Hubbard and Price, kept the Sycamores
between the Piscataijua and the Mystic in perpetual fear. .After the
conquests and glory achieved in tlieir battles with the Bashaba and his
allies, they were not, like their enemies, wasted by disease and famine.
They retained their valor, animated by success and strengthened by
an early use and supply of firearms, with which they were fvirnished by
the French, t Less disturbed than the western tribes in the enjoyment
of their possessions, and also more discreet, they were always reluctant
to plunge into hostilities against the English.

The Tarratines ever manifested the greatest satisfaction in their
intercourse with the French. No fortifications upon the peninsula of
Major-biguyduce, or buildings in the vicinity, e.xcited either fear or
jealousy in them; for no rising plantations of the French threatened
Ihem with a loss of their lands or privileges. A barter of their furs
for guns, ammunition, and trinkets, was managed with a frtfedom and
adroitness which won and secured their attachment. Indeed, no for-
eigners could vie with Frenchmen, for their religious creeds and rites,
to which the natives were superstitiously devoted, their companionable
manners and volatile turn, all made the bonds strong and lasting. . .

The Tarratines have probalily at different periods shifted the situa-
tion of their principal village; at the mouth of the Kenduskeag they
had a common resting-place, when the white people first settled in the
vicinity — a place to which they were, from habit, strongly attached.
Here the mouldering relics of human bodies, also flint spears, stone

' Mr. Williamson's foot-note : "They are in modem times called governor,
lieutenant-governor, and captains, names borrowed from the English.

tWilliamson's foot-note: The Tarratines, for instance, cut out a shallop
from Dorchester, with live men in it, whom they killed.

implements of labor, and Indian paint dust have been accidentally dis-
interred, after a burial for an unknown period of time.

The Tarratines were neutrals in the war of the Revolution. In
return Massachusetts protected them and prohibited all trespasses upon
their lands, six miles in width on each side of the Penobscot, from the
head of the tide upwards. She has since, at different times, made
large purchases of their lands, and they are left [1832 J the owners of
only four townships, a few acres on the east side of the Penobscot,
opposite to the mouth of the Kenduskeag, and the islands between
Oldtown and Passadumkeag, 28 in number, containing 2,670 acres.
About 40 acres, in 1820, were under cultivation, and the
Indians that season raised 410 bushels of corn and 50 bushels of beans,
besides potatoes.

.\ccounts of the former seat of these Indians, three
miles above the mouth of the Kenduskeag, and of their
later residence at Oldtown, will appear further along in
this chapter.

The following useful description of the Penobscot In-
dians, as found by the French u|)on their advent in this
region, is from the Novus Aibis of John De Laet, pub-
lished in 1633. It will be observed that De Laet, who
doubtless refers to Penobscot bay, is sadly astray in his
definition of distance from the Kennebec, which is
nearer fourteen than four leagues :

Four leagues north from Kennebec, following the direction of the
coast, there is a bay containing in its bosom a large number of islands,
and near its entrance one of them is called by the French navigators
the island of Bacchus, from the great abundance of vines found grow-
ing there. The barbarians that inhabit here, are in some respects un-
like the other aborigines of New France, differing somewhat from
them both in language and manners. They shave their heads from
the foreh&td to the crown, but suffer their hair to grow on the back
side, confining it in knots, interweaving feathers of various plumage.
They paint their faces red or black, are well formed, and arm them-
selves with spears, clubs, bows and arrows, which, for want of iron
they point with the tail of a cruslaceous creature called signoc. They
cultivate the soil in a different manner from the savages that live east
of them, planting maize and beans together, so that the stalks of the
former answer the purpose of poles for the vines to run upon. They
plant in May and harvest in September. Walnut trees grow here, but
inferior ones. Vines are abundant, and it is said by the French that
the grapes gathered in July make good wine. The natives also raise
pumpkins and tobacco. They have ]5ermanent places of abode; their
cabins are covered with oak bark, and are defended by palisadoes.

According to Judge Godfrey's essay on the Baron de
St. Castine, the Tarratines were a clan of the great Aben-
aki community, receiving the name from the English
colonists; perhajis in honor of a brave Huron chief,
called Taratouan, upon whom the Jesuit missionaries
had relied for jjrotection. The Rev. P'ather Vetromile,
however, in his excellent paper on the .Abenakis, in the
sixth volume of the Maine Historical Collections, pre-
sumes the designation to have been derived from "Ati-
ronta," another Indian who rendered much service to the
pioneers of France in the New World. By some writers,
as by Mr. Gallatin, in his work on the Indian tribes, the
Tarratines and the .Xbenakis were substantially identi-
fied. Mr. Parkman, in his Jesuits in North .Vinerica,
says: "The Tarratines of New England writers were
the Abenakis, or a portion of them." Mr. Palfrey, the
historian of New England, quoting the old writer Hutch-
inson, considers the Tarratines as Abenakis. The Rev.
Father John G. Shea, in his voluminous work on The
Catholic Church in the United States, refers to the con-
version to that faith of "the powerful tribe of the Aben-
akis, or Tarenteens, as the early English settlers called
them." Gorges, however, in a passage concerning the

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

enemies of the Bashaba, says the savages called the
tribe Tarrantines. Mr. Williamson, making a rapid sum-
mary of the old authors, says they "agree that the gener-
al name of the natives upon the Penobscot was Tarra-
tines." Wood, in New England's Prospect, includes
some interesting notices of them. He says:

The country as it is in relation to tlie Intlians. is divided as it were
into shires, every severall division l>eing swayde by a severall l<ing, the
Indians^io the east and nortlieast liearing the names of Churchers or
Tarrenleencs. . . . Tal<e these Indians in their own

trimnie and naturall disposition, and tliey Ije reported to be wise, lofty-
.spirited, constant in friendship to one anotlier, true in their promises,
and more industrious than many other, (and so on, until] some of our
English, who to uncloathe them of their beaver coates, clad them with
the infection of swearing and drinking, which was never in fashion with
them before, it being contrary to their nature to guzzell downe stronge
drinke, until our bestial example and dishonest incitation hath brought
them to it; and from overflowing cups there hath been a proceeding to
revenge, murther, and overflowing of blood.

Governor Sullivan, in his History of the District of
Maine, furnishes an important contribution to the histo-
ry and philosophy of religion, concerning a somewhat
controverted point, in the following :

The fanciful historians have said much respecting the savage's hope
of felicity in fine fields beyond the g.ates of death, when he should
meet his ancestors and be happy in a state of immortality.
But from any conversations had with the Indians here, or from anything
which can be gathered from those who have been most with them,
there is no reason to Ijelieve that the Northern savages ever had ideas
of that nature.

E,\RLY HISTORY OF THE TARRATINES.

When they first becauie known to Euro|ieans, the Tar-
ratines dwelt on both sides of the Penobscot, and, with
their Abenaki brethren, roamed the region westward to
the Saco, if not to the Piscataquis. About one-third of
the New England Indians (sup])osed to number fifty thou-
sand in all) were on the soil of Maine. They came pres-
ently to be distinguished as Maine Indians; the rest were
called the New England Indians, some difference of dia-
lect further dividing the two. Samoset, the friendly savage
who came suddenly u\nm the Plymouth colony one warm
morning in February, 1621, with the assuring words, in
their own tongue, "welcome. Englishmen," is believed
to have been a Tarratine, from the island of Monhegan.
He was certainly a Maine Indian, and a chief The Tar-
ratines became first known in our histoiical literature,
however, as a tribe at war with the Wawenocks, their
next neighbors on the west, whom they practically exter-
minated. In 1 63 1 an expedition of one hundred of
them took the war-path against the Massachusetts In-
dians who were so afraid of the Eastern savages that they
declared they never camped or slept twice together in the
same place. In i66g the dreaded Mohawks — who had
doubtless waged frequent war with them through the
ages their parties coming down the Penobscot from the
great Canadian woods and waters — completely overcame
the Tarratines, plundered, burnt, and devastated their
villages. To this day the Penobscots detest and burn
with indignation at the very name of Mohawk.

The tribe was not exterminated, however, nor carried
into cainivity by their conquerors. They remained upon
and near the Penobscot in sufficient force to form an im-
iiortant eleirient in the history of early colonization in

the Northeast. The Tarratine and Passamaquoddy In-
dians were among the earliest converts made by the
Roman Catholic missionaries east of the Mississippi.
Before the advent of the Jesuits, says an old writer,
"they dyed patiently, both men and women, not knowing
of a hell to scare them nor a conscience to terrifie them."
They were at first very friendly to the whites, except as
they manifested natural indignation at the outrages perpe-
trated upon them by Weymouth and other explorers.
The Rev. Mr. Hubbard's Narrative of the Indian Wars
in New England, written in 1775, says:

Ever since the first settling of any English plantation in those parts
about Kennebeck, for the space of about 50 years, the Indians always
carried it fair, and held good correspondence with the English, until
the news came of Phillip's rebellion and rising against the inhabitants
of Plimouth colony in the end of June, 1675, after which time it was
appreliended by such as had the examination of the Indians about Ken-
nebeck that there was a general surmise amongst them that they would
be required to assist the said Philip, although they would not own that
they were at all engaged in the quarrel.

When the war with the French ended, in 1699, the
Maine Indians, with those of New Hampshire, made
a treaty with the English colonies, their sachems ac-
knowledging for them allegiance to the English crown.

\V.\RS .AND INCIDENTS.

There was no doubt an honest intention, especially at
first, on the part of many of the whites in New England,
to deal justly with the Indians, and avoid occasions of
war with them. The charter of Massachusetts enjoined
upon the colonists tliat they should endeavor lo win the
natives to the knowledge and obedience of the only
true God and Saviour, and of the Christian faith, "by
force of moral example and religious efforts and instruc-
tion." Laws were [)assed that strong liquors, and even
cider and beer, were not to be sold to them. Orders
were given that any trading-house among the Indians,
erected without the license of the General Court, should
be destroyed. If the corn-fields and crops of the na-
tives were injured by the cattle of the settlers, even by
reason of poor fencing, the town to which the owner of
the cattle belonged was to be compelled to make good
the loss, unless the authorities collected the amount of
damage from the owner. The Government undertook
the charge of all trade with the Indians in furs, peltry,
boats, or other water-craft, and commissioners were ap-
pointed by the authorities to determine all matters of
controversy among them, even those which a single
officer might decide in a case arising between English-
men. On the other hand, the sale of fire-arms to the
savages was strictly forbidden by royal proclamation as
early as 1622. They were, however, abundantly sup-
plied by the French, who allied the red man the more
strongly to them by the liberal sale or gift of guns and
gunpowder.

Friendly relations did not long subsist between the
whites and the Indians. Notwithstanding official and
legal guards, outrages were occasionally perpetrated by
the former upon the latter, even at the outset of their
intercourse, when a judicious policy, to say nothing of
justice, would have dictated a different course. Five of
the Indians of the Penobscot, for example, one of them

J^e^^e4-€:i-'(--^^gi.''^n^€4^e€ \^e€t.^ce .

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

a sagamore, were seized and carried away by the ex-
plorer Weymouth in 1605, and long kept in captivity.
The Indians soon began reprisals, and resistance to the
encroachments of the colonists. One Master Patterson,
of the Sagadahoc colony, the earliest upon the soil of
Maine, was killed by the Tarratines, almost at once up-
on his settlement. This is but one of the many exam-
])les that might be adduced.

In the summer of 1631 or 1632, the Tarratines pre-
pared for an attack upon Agawam (Ipswich), where the
sagamores, having treacherously mas.sacred a number of
Tarratine families, were believed to be sheltering them-
selves under the wing of the English. Forty canoe-
loads of Indians went thither; but their plot was be-
trayed to an English youth, who fired an alarm-gun and
beat a drum furiously, whereupon they put to sea again
without making an attack. The 'J'arratines, however,
afterwards killed some of the Agawam Indians, .\hout
one hundred made a midnight attack ui)on the lodge of
a sagamore near that place, and carried off his wife a
l)risoner to Penobscot.

According to tradition, the Tarratines took part in the
war between the New England Indians and the fierce
Mohawks, which raged for si,K or seven years; and, after
the decisive battle in 1669, in which the former were de-
feated, the Tarratine allies were followed even to the
Penobscot by their terrible enemies, who burned their
villages, and otherwise did them great harm. Following
this came the small-pox and other destructive diseases,
which caused the death of many of the Eastern and
Canadian Indians, and greatly interrupted the trade in
furs. Ky these successive calamities the Tarratines were
reduced to a mere handful. So early as November,
1726, Captain John Gyles, who professed to make an '
enumeration of the savages in this region, could find
but one hundred and thirty, "or there about," of the Pe-
nobscot Indians, above the age of sixteen years, and but
three hundred and eighty-nine natives of adult age in all
Maine. The trustworthiness of his census, however, is
very much to be doubted.

In 1675, the year of the opening of King Philip's
war, an attempt was made to involve the I^tchemin and
.•\benaki tribes also, which was happily frustrated. The
Canibas Indians had a fort at Teconnet Falls, on the
Sagodahoc, to which they had retired with their families,
and remained quiet there until after the burning of Scar-
borough. The people then became greatly excited
against the Indians, both friendly and hostile, and the
settlers on Monhegan island went so far as to offer a
bounty of five pounds upon every Indian head brought
in. The natives at Teconnet were naturally aroused
and fearful ; and to quiet their fears, as well as to remove
the contents of the trading-house, CajJtain Davis, who
was in charge of an establishment some miles distant,
near .Xrrowsick, sent a messenger with a promise that, if
the Indians would remove to his settlement, they should
have every needed supply at the fairest prices. The
messenger proved treacherous, and told them instead
that, "if they did not go down and give up their arm.s,
the Englishmen would come and kill them." This fur-

ther awakened their fears, and they abandoned the fort,
but, instead of going to Davis, they fled to Penobscot
and sent a runner to the Eastern tribes with a summons
to a council of war at the residence of Castine, who very
likely prompted the Indians to this step. Before the
council could be brought about, however, Abraham
Shute, of Pemaquid, chief magistrate, and a citizen of
uncommon sense and usefulness, succeeded in getting a
meeting of the alarmed sagamores at that place, where a
truce was agreed to, and the Indians promised "to live
in peace with the English, and prevent, if possible, the
Anasagunticooks from committing any more depreda-
tions, either upon the settlers or traders."

MORE OF THE \V.\RS.

It may be noted here that Iberville, with two shi])s
and two companies of soldiers, made his expedition in
1694, to effect the reduction of Fort William Henry, at
Pemaijuid. He took on board Vilkbon with fifty
Mickmacks at St. John's, and Castine with two hundred
Indians in canoes joined him at Penobscot. They ap-
peared before the fort July 14th, and the next day intim-
idated the commander of the garrison into a surrender.
The fort was then plundered, demolislied, and aban-
doned.

The next month Major Church reappeared in the Pe-
nobscot waters, and was informed by his pilot, John
York, whom he took on board when abreast of the Ma-
thebestuck Hills (Camden Heights), that the Indians
had told him of a fort they had built upon a little island
at the falls fifty or sixty miles up the stream — supposed
to have been the Island Lett, now (probably) Oldtown —
and that near by they "planted a great ijuantity of corn."
Church pushed up the river in his boats to "the Bend"
(Eddington), and there took to the west shore on foot
for two or three miles. He passed several places where
the Indians had once dwelt, killed several of the natives,
and took another prisoner, who told him that the men
of his tribe had gone to Canada. Church then returned,
observing on his way more abandoned habitations, with
corn-fields and turnip-patches and jjumpkins, especially
in the Isle of Penobscot, now Orphan Island. Below
this he took to his ships agam, and sailed for the Bay of
Fundy.

October 14, 1698, after the peace of Ryswick had
been concluded between F^ngland, F'rance, and other
nations involved with them in the war, the commission-
ers of Massachusetts met six of the eastern saga-
mores at Penobscot, with a great body of Indians, and
arranged preliminaries of a treaty which was fully con-
cluded at Mare Point the following January, ratifying
the convention of August ii, 1693, with additional
articles. The sagamores of Penobscot were not ex-
pressed, but yet were included, in the new jjacification.

THE THREE-VE.\RS' (OR I.OVEWELL's) WAR.

This was the fourth Indian war waged in New Eng-
land, and lasted from 1722 to 1725. It takes one of
its names from Captain John Lovewell, or Lovell, of
Dunstable, Massachusetts, hero of^ the famous fight
near Pegwacket, at the water since called from

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

him Lovewell's pond. The inhabitants, white and
red, of Maine, New Hampshire, and. Nova Scotia,
were mainly involved in it, the French in Canada not
takina; part, through fear of breaking the peace then ex-
isting between England and France. Their intrigues
and secret incitement of the Indians to make war were
not wanting, however; and in June, 1722, hostilities be-
gan by a war-party of the Canibas and Anasagunticook
tribes seizing nine white families settled on Merrymeet-
ing bay.

We give only such incidents of the war as pertain to
Penobscot county. All the Maine tribes were involved
in the outbreak ; and on the twenty-fifth of July the
governor and council solemnly passed a resolution that
"the Eastern Indians are traitors and robbers," and de-
clared war upon them and their confederates as enemies
of the king. The General Court met on the eighth of
August, confirmed the declaration of war, and proceeded
to make provision for the fight. Among other prep-
arations for the fight, "a large scout of three hundred
was appointed to destroy the Indians' strongholds and
habitations at Penobscot, and a body of four hundred to
range perpetually, by land or water, through the Eastern
country, especially upon and between the rivers Kenne-
bec and Penobscot." The ferocious and vindictive
character of the warfare proposed may be seen from the
offer of a bounty of fifteen pounds for every scalp taken
from a male Indian of twelve or more years, and eight
pounds for every woman or child captured.

Early in February, 1723, the Penobscot expedition
was set on foot, under Colonel Thomas Westbrook, com-
mander of the Eastern forces. On the eleventh he left
Kennebec with two hundred and thirty men, in whale-
boats and small sailing vessels, and scoured the coast to
Mount Desert, proceeding thence up Penobscot bay and
river, anchoring, it is thought, in Marsh bay, March 4th.

Disembarking his men, they marched five days through
the forest, but apparently near the river, when they
arrived at the supjjosed site of the Indian fort they
sought, upon one of the sevetal islands opposite them.
The Colonel further reports ;

Being obliged here to make four canoes to ferry from island to is-
land, I dispatched filty men upon discovery, who sent me word on the
9th that they had found the fort and waited my arrival. I left a guard
of 100 men with the provisions and tents, and proceeded with the rest
to join the scouting party. On ferrying over, the Indian fort appeared
in full view, yet we could not come to it by reason of a swift river, and
because the ice at the head of the islands would not permit the canoes
to come around; therefore, we were obliged to make two more, with
which we ferried over. We left a guard of 40 men on the west side of
the river, to facilitate our return, ond arrived at the fort, bv 6 of the
clock in the evening. It happened to have been deserted in the autumn
preceding, when the enemy carried away every article and thing except
a tew papers. The fort was 70 yards in length and 50 in breadth, walled
with stockades 14 feet in height, and enclosed 23 ■ ' well-finished wig-
wams," or, as another calls them, "houses built regular." On the
south side was their chapel, in compass 60 feet by 30, handsomely and
well finished, both within and on the outside. A little farther south
was the dwelling-house of the priest, which was very commodious. We
set fire to them all, and by sunrise next morning they were in ashes.
We then returned to our nearest guards, thence to our tents; and on
our arrival at our transports, we concluded we must have ascended the
river abont 32 miles. We reached the fort at St. George on the 20th,
with the loss of only fou*men. Rev. Benjamin Gibson and three others,
whose bodies after our arrival here we interred in usual form.

Mr. Williamson inquires, as to the point where Colo-
nel Westbrook halted: "Was not this place the lower
Stillwater, in Orono, six miles above Kenduskeag?" and,
in a subsequent foot-note, discussing the question of the
site of this important fortress and village, he says:

Some suppose it might have been the ancient Negas, a village on
Fort Hill, situate a league above the mouth of Kenduskeag stream;
for when could that have been destroyed unless at this time ? Yet Col.
Church makes no mention of the latter when he and his troops, in .'\u-
gust, 1696, scoured the river, nor Maj. Livingston, who traveled up the
river in November, 1710, on his way to Canada. It luust have been
built after the latter date, and before or during the present war. It
could not have been very ancient, because the plough has turned out,
since the .American Revolution, many articles of iron, steel, and lead,
of modern form and structure; yet, if it were quite modern, there
would be some tradition of it. All that we can learn is that it was
called by the first settlers in Bangor "the old French and Indian set-
tlement" on Fort Hill. This could not be thought 32 miles from the
place of Westbrook's anchorage, short as seamen's miles are over wild
lands. Nor are there islands here corresponding with those he men-
tions. The alrernative then is, the site must have been Oldtown, or
the ancient Lett mentioned by Livingston. That is situated on a
beautiful island, and below it are falls and a small island. Lieut. Gov.
Dummer (speech, May, 1723) says: "We have demohshed the fort and
all the buildings at Penobscot." The village at Fort Hill was proba-
bly destroyed by Capt. Heath [in 1725].

In October of this year (1723), the Indians stirprised
and captured Captain Cogswell and the crew of his ves-
sel, as they landed upon the shore of Mount Desert.
After this the theatre of war was chiefly upon the St.
George's and further to the southwest. In the fall of
1724, Colonel Westbrook led a new regiment of three
hundred men upon a scouting expedition from the Ken-
nebeck to the Penobscot, which got entangled in the
wilderness and had to return with its object but partly
accomplished. Captain Heath and his company reached
the latter river the same autumn; but effected nothing
of account.

The next year, however, the scene of action returned
to the beautiful valley of the Penobscot. Mr. William-
son will tell the principal story of the year:

After Colonel Westbrook and his party had destroyed the principal
Indian village at Penobscot, between two and three years since, the
French and natives had, with a diligence unusual for them, established
and built another, three leagues below, on the westerly bank of the
same river. It was a pleasant, elevated, and well-chosen site, a
few rods from the water, and easily fortified by stockades. It was
easier of access from the salt water than the former, and was a league
above the mouth of the Kenduskeag stream, which an enemy could
ford with convenience only in time of drought. Hearing of this vil-
lage, reputed to consist of six or seven cottages which had cellars and
chimneys, a chapel, and between forty and fifty wigwams, Captain
Joseph , Heath, coiumanding at Fort Richmond, proceeded with his
company in May, from Kennebeck across the country to Penobscot
fell upon the deserted village of about fifty Indian houses, and com-
mitted them to the flames. The Tarratines, who were a wary people,
probably had some intimation of the expedition, for the party saw
none of the native inhabitants. It was a bold enterprize ; but it be-
ing ascertained on their return to the garrison at St. George's river
that a conference had been proposed by the Indians, the particulars
were never made topics of any considerable remark. The village de-
stroyed, situate on Fort iiill, as the English have always called it, is
supposed to have been the ancient Negas. It was never repaired, the
Indians afterwards returning and reseating themselves at Oldtown.

This place, as is generally known, was within the
present limits of Bangor township. Mr. Williamson
says in a foot note:

Being so near the head of the tide and bend of the river, above
which is quick water, it was a resting-place and resort of the Indians
before the village were built. The appearances of Indian cornfields in

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

tlie vicinity was apparent, «hen tlie place was first settled by soitie of
the oldest present settlers.

Tbe sole remaining incident of the war, relating to the
Penobscot county or any of its residents, is thus related
by the same author :

Castine the younger was in a small bark, at anchor near Naskeag
Point, (viz., the southeast point of Sedgwick), and had with him on
board an Indian boy, perhaps his own son, and an linglish l.ad, by the
name ot Samuel Trask, belonging to Salem, whom he had redeemed
from the Indians. Though he w.as thoughtless of evil, the moment
the crew of an approaching English sloop were near enough, they fired
upon him. and obliged him and the boys to quit the bark and flee into
the woods for the safety of their lives. The master of the sloop, now
changing his conduct and hoisting a white flag, called unto him loudly
to return, offered him a safe conduct in writing, and declared he only
desired to have a free trade and mtercourse with him. Yet, shortly
after he had ventured to go with the lads on board of the sloop, the
master first threw him a bag of biscuit, and then took from him the
young captive, exclaiming: "Yoitr bark and all it contains arc in fact
lawful prize, and yourself might be made a prisoner ; so you may now
think yourself favored to go without molestation or further loss." This
insult, which was duly felt, w.as presently aggravated by one of the
crew, who, after going with them ashore, suddenly seized the Indian
boy and held him fast. Castine, perceiving the clinch to be violent
and unprovoked, shot the sailor dead, and escaped with the boy into
the woods. The conduct of these mariners was a great reproach to
them, and in every respect the height of impolicy; for the Indians
were now entertaining thoughts of peace, and Castine, who still pos-
sessed great influence among them, had more than once attested his
magnanimity by instances of friendship and a forbearing spirit towards
the English.

The following incident succeeding one of the wars is
also related by Mr. Williamson :

But the most memorable engagement of any hitherto since the war
happened. May ist, at the St. George river. It being an inviting
morning, April 30th, Captain Josiah Winslow, commander of the fort,
selected si.xteen of the ablest men belonging to the garrison, and in
a couple of staunch whale-boats preceded down the river, and
thence to the Green Islands in Penobscot bay, which at this season of
the year were frecjuented by the Indians for fowling. Though Winslow
and his companions made no discovery, their movements were watched
by the wary enemy; and on their return the ne.xt day, as they were as-
cending the river, they fell into a fatal ambush of the Indians, cower-
ing under each of its banks. They permuted Winslow to pass, and
then fired into the other boat, w-hich was commanded by Harvey, a
sergeant, and was nearer the shore. Harvey fell. A brisk discharge
of musquelry was returned upon the assailants, when Winslow, ob-
serving the imminent exposure of his companions, though he was
himself out of danger, hastened back to their assistance. In an in-
stant he found himself surrounded by thirty canoes and threefold that
number of armed savages, who raised a hideous whoop and fell upon
the two boat-crews with desperate fury. The skirmish was severe and
bloody; when Winslow and his men, perceiving inevitable death to be
the only alternative, resolved to sell their lives at the dearest rate.
They made a most determined and gallant defence ; and, after nearly
all of them were .dead or mortally wounded, himself ha\ing his thigh
fractured and being extremely exhausted, his shattered bark was set to
the shore. Here being waylaid, he fought a savage hand to hand
with the greatest personal courage, beat off the foe, and then, resting
on his knee, shot one ere they could dispatch him. Thus fell the in-
trepid Winslow and every one of his brave company, except three
friendly Indians, who were suffered to escape and communicate particu-
lars to the garrison. The Tarratines, who were rather a valiant than a
cruel people, composed the Indian parly ; and their loss, though never
known, is supposed to have doubled ours. In this action, inconsider-
able as were the numbers engaged, there was a remarkable display on
both sides of boldness and good conduct. 1'he death of Captain
Winslow was severely felt and lamented. He was a young ofiicer of
military talents and great worth, a late graduate of Harvard college,
and a descendant of one of the best families in the province.

ANOTHER INTERESTING NARR.VnVE,

somewhat related to the Penobscot country, but dating
back more than two hundred years, to the fall of 1C76, is
also derived from Williamson's History :

The story of Thomas Cobbet, one of the captives taken the last au-
tumn at Richmond Island, who returned home with Captam Moore, is
worthy of particular mention. His father was the minister of Ipswich.
After being wounded by a musket-shot, his hands were fast tied, and in
the division of the captives it was his most unfortunate lot to be as_
signed to an Indian of the worst character. Young Cobbet's first duty
was to manage the captured ketch of Fryer, in saihng to Sheepscot. and
from that place to paddle a canoe, carrying his master and himself, to
Penob.scot, and thence to their hunting ground at Mount Desert. He
suffered the extremes of cold, fatigue, and famine; and because he
could not understand the Indian dialect, the savage often drevii his knife
upon him, threatening him with instant death. In hunting on a day of
severe cold, he fell down in the snow, benumbed, famished, and sense-
less. Here he must have perished, had not tlie more humane hunters
conveyed him to a wigwam and restored him. At another time his sav-
age master w-as drunk five successive days, in which he was fearfully
raving like a wild beast. To such an alarming degree did he beat and
abuse his own squaws, that Cobbel, who knew himself to be much more
obnoxious than they to his fury, fled into the woods to save his life;
where he made a fire, formed a slender covert, and the squaws fed him.

At the end of nine weeks the Indians had a great powwow, and his
master sent him to Mons. Castine for ammunition to kill moose and
deer. He arrived at a most opportune hour, just before Mugg's de-
parture to Teconnet, who readily called him by name. "Ah," said
Mugg, " I saw your father when I went to Boston, and I told him his
son should return. He must be released according to treaty." "Yes,"
replied Madockawando, " but the captain must give me the fine coat he
has in the vessel; for his father is a great preach-man, or chief speaker,
among Englishmen." This request was granted, and young Cobbet
saw his demoniac master no more.

GVLES'S CAPTIVITY AMONG THE PENOBSCOTS.

In the early part of August, 1689, an attack was made
by a war-party from Penobscot upon the fort at Pema-
quid, which was captured. Judge Thomas Gyles, chief
justice of the district, was seized upon his farm, three
miles from Jamestown, and tomahawked, while most of
his family were carried off into captivity. One of the
sons, taken into the Penobscot country, left a narrative of
the massacre and his subsequent adventures, from which
Mr. Rufus King Sewall has made an abridgment in his
Ancient Dominions of Maine. We extract the following:

-At Mattawamkeag, up the Penobscot, they encountered a lodge of
dancing women. Young Gyles was flung into the midst of the circle.
An old squaw led him into the ring, when some seized him by the hair
of the head and others by his hands and feet, with great violence and
menaces of evil. At this moment his master entered and bought the
child off from the horrors of the gauntlet dance, by flinging down a
pledge.

Gyles, the second year of his captivity, was sent toward the sea, with
other natives, to plant com near the fort.

On reaching the village of wigwams, he was greeted by three or four
Indians, who dragged him to the great wigwam, where, with savage
yells and dances, the warriors were leaping about a James Alexander,
recently captured at Falmouth. Two families of Sable Indians, whose
friends had been lost by the attacks of English fishermen, had reached
this point, on a scout westward, to avenge the blood of their slaugh-
tered friends. These savages were thirsting for the blood of an Eng-
i^lishman. They rushed upon Gyles and tossed him into the ring. He
was then dragged out by the hair of his head, his body bent forward by
the same painful process, when he was cruelly beaten over his head and
shoulders. Others, putting a tomahawk into his hands, bid him "sing
and dance Indian." The Sable Indians .again rushed upon him in great
rage, crying, " ' Shall we who have lost relatives by the English suffer an
English voice to be heard among us?" He was beaten with an axe.
No one showed a spark of humanity save a Frenchman, whose cheeks
were wet with tears of pity at the sorrows of the captive white man.

The trials of this scene lasted a whole day. Another dance was pro-
jected. Gyles had been sent out to dress a skin for the manufacture of
leather. A friendly Indian sought him at his place of labor, and
warned him that his friend Alexander had fallen into the hands of his
enemies again, and they were searching for him. His master and mis-
tress bade him fly and hide himself till they both should come and call

HISTORY OF PENOliSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

him. which Ihey would do when the peril was ended. Gyles retired
and sought concealment in the fastnesses of a neighboring swamp, and
had scarcely attained his refuge when deafening whooi)s, mingled with
threats and flatteries, told him that the savages were on his track-
They sought him till evening, and then called — "Chon, Chon !' But
Chen would not trust them. Thus he escaped till the company had
dispersed ; when he went forth from his covert, assured of his safely by
the appearance of his master and mistress.

Onerous and servile duties were required of captives. One of these^
in the case of Gyles and Alexander, was that of ' 'toting" water from a
cool and- distant spring to the village lodge.

Wearied with toil, in the language of Gyles, "being almost dead,
James and I continued to relieve our toil by frightening the Indians."

At this period the Mohawks were a great source of alarm tu tlic
Eastern tribes, the rumor of whose alliance with the English had uuu
generally obtained. The traditions of this race were a commentary of
deeds of daring and success, handed down from remote periods in the
history of the aborigines of the American coast.

The two prisoners adroitly turned this infirnuty of their savage
masters to good account, on a dark night.

Alexander having been sent out for water, set his kettle on the brow
of the declivity, ran back to the lodges and told his master he feared
there were Mohawks lurking near the spring below, which, by the way,
was environed with stumps.

The braves of the tribe, with the master, accompanied the captive
Ale.xander on a reconnoisance. Approaching the brow of the hillside,
whereon the kettle sat, James, pointing to the stumps, gave it a kick
with his foot, by which his toe sent the iron vessel down the declivity
toward the spring; and every turn of the revolving bucket reared a
Mohawk on every stump, the clatter of whose arms was the signal of
preparation for battle; and he who could run fastest was the best fellow!
The result was a regular stampede of 30 or 40 warriors into the interior
forests, beyond the reach "of strange Indians."

Natural admiration is e.xcited in view of acts of personal courage
and physical prowess, and this would seem to be a spontaneous devel-
opment of the human mind.

At one time Gyles, during his captivity, encountered an ill-natured
savage. He had been cutting wood, which was bound up with thongs
and borne in bundles to the wigwam. While thus engaged, a stout,
ill-natured young fellow pushed him upon the ground backwards, sat
upon his breast, pulled out his knife and menaced him with death,
saying, "he never had jiet killed one of the English."

Gyles replied, "he might go to war, and that would be more manly
than to kill a poor captive who was doing their drudgery." But the
savage began to cut and stab him on the breast, in defiance of all
expostulation. Provoked to desperation. Gyles seized the Indian by
the hair of his head, and tumbling him off, followed up the movement
with his knees and fists, till copper-skin cried "enough." On feeling
the smart of his wounds, and seeing the blood which fell from his
bosom, "Gyles at him again," bade him get up and not lie there like
a dog; reproached him with his barbarities and cowardly cruelties to
other poor captives, and put him on his good behavior hereafter, on
the peril of a double dose of fist and boot cuffs.

Gyles was never after molested, and was commended by the tribe
for inflicting the merited chastisement.

Metallic vessels for culinary use were not required by the natives
among whom Gyles was a captive. A birchen bucket filled with water,
heated by the immersion of red-hot stones, would speedily boil the
toughest neck-pieces of beef.

The necessity of lucifer matches was forestalled by rapidly revolving
the sharpened point of an upright piece of wood in the socket or
cavity of a horizontal base, till a blaze was kindled.

The incantations of the powwow, among the unchristianized
natives, prevailed. For the dead great mourning was made. In the
shadowy and sombre stillness of evening twilight, a squaw breaks the
silence, wandering over the highest cliff-tops near her lodge, crying in
mournful and long drawn numbers, — "Oh, hawe-hawe!"

But, the season of mourning being ended, the relatives of the dead
end their sad memories in a feast, and the bereaved is permitted to
marry again. Purchased by a French trader, during the Eastern expe-
dition of Colonel Hawthorne, Gyles, after a servitude of nine years,
was restored to his home and surviving friends, and for many years
served his Government in the capacity of an Indian interpreter and in
the army. The elder brother of Gyles, after three years of captivity,
attempted to escape and was retaken. On the heights of Castine,
overlooking the waters of Penobscot bay, he was tortured by fire at
the stake; his nose and ears were cut off and forced into his mouth,

which he was compelled to cat; and then he was burnt as a diversion
to enliven the scene of a dance.

A MODERN AFFAIR.

The following incident, of comparatively recent date,
is given by Mr. Williamson, in the first volume of his
History of Maine:

Among the natives the law of retaliation is considered a dictate of
nature, always justifiable. The vile, they think, are deterred from the
commission of crimes through the perpetual fear of the avenger, if
they tran.sgress. An Indian was never known to ask redress through
the medium of our laws and courts, for an injury done him by one of
his tribe. Nor was there an instance, till quite lately, where a white
man ever sued an Indian in a civil action. But jjrosecutions have fre-
quently been instituted at law upon complaints, both of the English-
man and the Indian, for crimes committed by either against the other.

The trial and story of Peol Susup, so much in point, may be retold.
About sunset, June 28, 1816, this Indian's turbulence and noise, in the
tavern of William Knight, at Bangor, became intoleraljle , and the
inn-keeper thrust him out of the door, and endeavored to drive him
away. The Indian, instantly turning in a great rage, pursued him to
the steps with a drawn kmfe, and gave him a deep wound, just below
his shoulder-blade, of which he presently died.

On his arrest, Susup frankly said, "I have killed Knight, and I
ought to die; but I was in liquor and he abused me , or I never had
done it."

.■\fter an imprisonment till the June term of the Sujirenie Judicial
Court, at Castine, the subsequent year, he was arraigned on an indict-
ment for murder, to which he pleaded "not guilty." A day was con-
sumed in the trial, amidst a concourse which crow'ded the meeting-
house, and, according to the position urged by his counsel, the verdict
was "manslaughter."

The Court then said to him, "Susup, have you anything now to say
for yourself ?" — "John Neptune," said he, "will speak for me." That
Indian then stepped forward from the midst of his associates, towards
the judges, and deliberately addressed them in an impressive speech of
several minutes. He spake in broken English, yet every word was dis-
tinctly heard and easily understood. His questions were frequent and
forcible ; his manner solemn ; and a breathless silence pervaded the
whole assembly. He began ; "You know your people do my Indians
great deal of wrong. They abuse them very much ; yes, they murder
them ; then they walk right off— nobody touches them. This makes
my heart burn. Well, then, my Indians say, 'we'll go kill your very
bad and wicked men.' 'No,' I tell 'em, 'never do that thing ; we are
brothers.' Some time ago a very bad man about Boston shot an Indi-
an dead. Your people said, 'surely he should die ;' but not so. In the
great prison-house he eats and lives to this day ; certain he never dies
for killing Indian. My brothers say, 'let that bloody man go free ; —
Peol .Susup too. ' So we wish; hope fills the hearts of us all. Peace
is good. These, my Indians, love it well ; they smile under its shade. '
The white man and red man must be always friends; the Great Spirit
is our Father; I speak w'hat I feel."

Susup was sentenced to another year's imprisonment, and re(iuired
to find sureties for keeping the peace two years, in the penal sum of
five hundred dollars; when John Neptune and Squire Jo Merry Nep-
tune, of his own tribe. Captain Solmond, from Passamaquoddy, and
Captain Jo Tomer, from the river St. John, became his sureties in the
recognizance.

THE TARRATINE CHIEFS THE BASHABA.

Some mention of this chief potentate of the Eastern
Indians will fitly come in here. He is named very early
in the New England literature by Captain John Smith,
and it is not unlikely that the name is one of this ro-
mancer's [lure inventions, as it is strongly reminiscent of
"bashaw," a title with which he must have become suf-
ficiently familiar during his Turkish experience. The
counsellors or wise men of the tribes were the sachems;
the chief of these, or the chief magistrate, was the saga-
more; and the chief of the sagamores, or ruler over all
the tribes, was the Bashaba.

"We have no account," says Belknap, author of the
History of New Hampshire, "of any other Indian chief

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE,

in these Noithern parts whose authority was so extensive."

"He is a great governor," said Captain Francis, one
of th'e Tarratine cliiefs. "He had under him," wrote
Gorges, "many great sagamores, some of whom had a
thousand or fifteen hundred bowmen;" and in another
place: "He seemed to be of some eminence above the
rest in all that part of the continent."

Some writers, as Palfrey, affirm difference in rank be-
tween the sachems and the sagamores, saying that the
former were superior; others, as Gookin, say the titles
were equivalent or correspondent. Dudley, while re-
marking their equivalence, says the chiefs of the Northern
Indians were called sagamores; those further south were
sachems.

The dominion of the Bashaba was altogether in " Ma-
voshen," the present Maine. The Saco, says Purchas,
in the Pilgrims, "is the westernmost river of the domin-
ions of Bashebez;" and again: "To the easternmost of
Sagadahock, this is the Bashaba's dominion." Smith
rather doubtfully asserts, however, that, though the tribes
as far westward as Naumkeag (Salem) had their own
sachems, "they hold the Bashaba to be chief, and the
greatest among them." Gorges and other New England
writers are probably more nearly correct in representing
the Massachusetts Indians as allies rather than subjects
of the Bashaba, although somstimes they changed to
deadly enemies. Some writers, as Williamson, would
restrict his dominion on the eastward to St. George's;
but the strong probability, if not reasonable certainty, is
that it included the Penobscot country. Indeed, Bryant
& Gay, in their Popular History, plainly say that "this
great lord of the Penobscot country was called the Bash-
aba; but, although a good many names of local saga-
mores of distinction are mentioned in the early annals,
nobody ever had an interview with the veritable Bashaba.
It is probable that the term basliaba
merely indicated the sagamore who happened at differ-
ent times to enjoy the ascendency among the Penobscot
tribes. "

The Hon. Judge Godfrey, of Bangor, in a brief essay
on "Bashaba and the Tarratines," in the seventh volume
of the Maine Historical Collections, expresses the view
that Bashaba was not a title, but the individual name of
a chief, and supports his theory quite strongly. He
identifies "the Bashaba" with "Bessabes," mentioned by
Champlain simply as a captain or chief of the savages
who had led him to the "rapids of Norumbega," above
Bangor, the other chief who met him being "Cabahis."
The same dignitary, he thinks, is named in the Jesuit
Relation of i6i i as Betsabes, the "Sagamopf Kadesquit"
(Bangor), and one of the Indian captains, the others be-
ing Oguigueou and Asticon. He, says the Relation,
when the priests at Mt. Desert "made as though the
place did not please us, and that we should go to another
part," "himself came for us to allure us by a thousand
promises, having heard that we proposed to go there [to
Kadesquit] to dwell." According to Lescarbot, Bess-
abes or Bashaba was killed by the English, and Asticon
became his successor.

His capital, or place of residence, is scarcely less in dis-

cussion. Gorges says: "His chief abode was not far
from Pemaquid." Smith, Purchas, and others, suppose
that he lived towards or near the Penobscot Bay; and
\Villiamson, latest of the historians, avers that "his place
of immediate residence was probably between that river
[the Pemaquid] and Penobscot Bay." Mr. Folsoni, in
his historical discourse published in the Maine Histor-
ical Collections, says: "The place of his residence was
probably on the banks of the Penobscot ; and, as it was
also the seat of his government, the fabulous assertions
of a large city in that quarter may have arisen from an
exaggerated description of the humble capital of the Ba-
shaba's dominions." An old tradition fixed the aborig-
inal seat of power in "Norumbega," by which name the
Maine country was first known abroad and also early on
the old maps, in a town — some say great city — on the
east side of the Penobscot river, about opposite the site
of Bangor; and the Indians of that region, when first
met by the white men, also referred to a site of ancient
rule somewhere in the interior. Stachey says in one
place: "Early in the morninge the salvadges departed in
their canoas for the river of Pemaquid, promising Capt.
Gilbert to accompany him in their canoas to the river of
Penobscot, where the bassaba dwells." The indications
are that the Bashaba's capital, if anything more than an
ordinary Indian village, in the course of generations or
centuries had removed from the north to the coast about
or a little above the mouth of the Penobscot, and thence
gradually westward.

The Bashaba was not unlike more civilized princes, in
that he expected the courtesy of a call from other
potentates or from strangers who entered his realm. The
Bashaba expected, says Gorges, in his Description of
New England, "all strangers to have their address to him,
and not he to them." When the colony of Gorges and
Popham arrived at Sagadahoc, in 1607, it was cordially
received by the natives, and some of the sagamores of-
fered to accompany the English to the Bashaba, saying
that he was a mighty prince, ruling all the sachems from
Penobscot to Piscataqua, and that all visitors to his do-
mains were expected to pay him their respects. Popham,
President of the Colony Council, accordingly proceeded
some leagues along the coast toward Pemaquid, near
which the dignitary dwelt; but was driven back by head
winds and bad weather. The Bashaba, informed of this,
sent his own son to return the intended visit, and open
trade with the company in furs and peltry. The utmost
courtesy and kindness were shown the strangers, although
Weymouth had but a short time before forcibly seized
and carried away several natives from the coast. In Sep-
tember of the same year several Penobscot chiefs, com-
ing in canoes, were entertained by Popham at the Pema-
quid f(J^t. They, says the account, "besought Captain
Gilbert to accompany them in their canoes to the river
of Penobscot, where the Bashaba dwelt."

When Weymouth's expedition was on the coast, in
1 605, one party of Indians, pointing eastward, endeavored
to prompt him to a visit by signifying that "the Bashebe,
their king, had plenty of furs and much tobacco;" and
again, when Weymouth's pinnace was on its return to the

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

ship from the journey up the Penobscot, as is supposed,
three Indians came in a canoe from the eastern part of
the bay, one of whom, says the captain in his journal,
"we had before seen, and this coming was very earnestly
to importune us to let one of our men go with them to
the Bashebe, and then the next morning he could come
to our ship with furs and tobacco." Weymouth, how-
ever, was naturally suspicious of treachery, as he had
seized five of the Maine Indians, and had theni at that
moment in the hold. He therefore resisted all induce-
ments and invitations of the savages to visit their great
Mogul. Captain Smith, who tells the same story, with
considerable embellishment, in his History of New Eng-
land, also says that he was urged by the natives about St.
George's to visit and pay his respects to their prince.

The one now living (in 1608) must have been the last
of the Bashabas. A terrible war broke out about 1615,
between the Tarratines, or Penobscot Indians, and the
tribes to the westward, "on account," says Hubbard, "of
some treachery committed by the western tributaries of
the Bashaba, a great Indian prince, towards the Tarra-
tines." The latter began hostilities, it is believed, in the
early spring of 161 5, and carried the war into the ene-
my's country. I'^or two years it raged fiercely, and ended
only in the death of the Bashaba, whose sacred person
and capital were not exeuipt from attack, the laying waste
of his immediate domains, and the seizure and carrying
away of all his women and valuable effects. He had no
successor, and the power of the Abenakis was hopelessly
broken. Mr. Williamson says of this struggle :

This war. not only in its course, but consequences, was, we are told,
uncommonly destructive. The vanquished had been called from their
himting grounds, and prevented likewise from planting and fishing:
their habitations were destroyed, and famine and distress soon filled
the country with misery. Add to these the calamities of a ci\'il w'ar —
for the subordinate sachems, having no federal head or superior to
control and unite them, after the death of the Bashaba many of the
chief men fell into bloody feuds among themselves.

To these distresses succeeded a pestilence, which spread far and
wide, and was exceedingly fatal. It has been called the plague. It
raged in the years i6i7and 1618, and its wasting effects e.xtended from
the borders of the Tarratines, through the whole country, to the Nar-
ragansetts. The people died suddenly, and in great numbers, through
the whole intermediate coast. It is said some native tribes became
extinct, and their bones were seen years afterwards by the English
bleaching above ground, at and around the places of their former habi-
tations. The specific disease is not certainly known. Some have
thought it was probably the small-pox; others have believed it must have
been the yellow fever, from the circumstance that the surviving Indians
represented tlie bodies of the sick and dead to have assumed an appear-
ance resembling a yellow-colored garment.

LATER tarratinp: CHIEF.S.
After the Bashaba, whoever or whatever he may have
been, we have but few accounts of the chiefs or saga-
mores. One of the most famous in Maine at the time
of King IMiilip's war was Madockawando, adopted son
of a renowned chief and rei)Uted orator, Assiminasqua,
who was in his day sagamore of the Canibas, another
of the Abenaki tribes. Madockawando was father-in-
law of Baron Castine, if the latter ever really married his
daughter, who lived with the I'renclijnan upon the foot-
ing of a wife. He is said to have been a sagacious, seri-
ous man who, like Squando, the contemporaneous saga-
more of the Sokokies, claimed to have supernatural

visions and revelations. His first officer or ])rincipal ad-
viser was Mugg or Mogg, who is considered by Willianr-
son "the most cunning Indian of the age." Mugg derived
great advantage during the troubles between the English
and the Indians, from his former residence in English
families and his acquaintance with the English language
and habits. Shortly after the war with King Philip broke
out. Captain Fryer, of Portsmouth, was attacked with his
crew at Richmond island, where they were loading a
vessel with valuable property, to keep it from being plun-
dered by the savages. Fryer was wounded, and all were
taken prisoners. Mugg, after making an attack upon the
garrison at Wells, in which he killed two persons and did
considerable mischief, carried Fryer, then dying of his
wounds, to Piscataqua, and proposed on behalf of his
master to negotiate a peace. Madockawando had orig-
inally been opposed to the war, as he was untroubled by
the English, and his people were carrying on a profitable
trade with the French at Castine's post: it is probable,
therefore, that the offer of Mugg, so far, at least, as it
represented his superior's views, was sincere. Mugg was
sent on to Boston; and there, November 6, 1875, on be-
half of Madockawando and another chief named Che-
beirina, he did negotiate a treaty with the Governor and
Council, (jroviding, chiefly, that all acts of hostility should
cease, that all English captives, vessels, and goods should
be restored, and that the Penobscot sachems should take
arms against the Anasagunticooks and any other Eastern
Indians that should persist in the war. An English
officer was sent in a vessel with Mugg to Penobscot,
where Madockawando ratified the treaty and delivered
u[) such captives as were at hand. Only part of the
whole number, however, were returned; there was bad
faith otherwise on the part of the Indians; and hostilities
were renewed by the English in February at Mare Point,
Pemaquid, Arrowsick, and other places. After an attack
upon Wells, the garrison at Black Point was besieged,
May i6th, "with an uncommon boldness and pertinaci-
ty," says Williamson. A three-days' siege ensued, with
very sharp fighting, during which Mugg was killed. Wil-
liamson continues:

The loss of this leader so damped the courage of his companions
that they, in desp.air of victory, departed. Mogg had alternately
brightened and sh.aded his own character, until the most skilful pencil
would find it difficult so draw its just portrait. To the English this
remarkable native w.as friend or foe, and among his own people coun-
sellor, peacemaker, fighter, or emissary, just as self-interest or the par-
ticular occasion might dictate. His address was inspiring, and his
natural good sense and sagacity partially inclined Iiini to be an advo-
cate for peace.

The poet Whittier, in his versified legend of Mogg

Megone, giv(j(i this description of the equi])ment of the

famous lieutenant of Madockawando:

Megone hath his knife, and hatchet, and gun,
And his gaudy and tasselled blanket on;
His knife hath a handle with gold inlaid.
And magic words on its polished blade —
'Twas the gift of Castine to Mogg Megone,
For a scalp or twain from the Yengees torn;
His gun was the gift of the Tarratine,

And Madockawando's wives had strung
The brass and the beads which tinkle and shine
On the polished breech, and broad, bright line

Of beaded wampum around it hung.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

Madockawando himself has afterwards more promi-
nence in history, but not for some years. In 1689 he
led a party of several Indians, with an interpreter, from
Penobscot to Boston, to represent to the authorities that
Castine was greatly enraged with the English for plun-
dering his farm-house, and that there was reason to appre-
hend another terrible war. The sagamore was very
kindly received, laded with presents, and sent home in
the "colony sloo|i, with an apologetic letter to the irate
Frenchman. The previous year Madockawando had
given his voice at the outset against the outbreak which
resulted in King William's war, and agreed to negotiate
a treaty, in which it is thought the Eastern tribes would
have joined; but all were overruled by the influence of
Castine, and the war opened at North Yarmouth the next
August. In 1690 he again appears, as joint leader with
Castine of a force of natives going from the eastward to
reinforce the French and Indians being collected at
Casco Bay to attack Falmouth, which resulted in the
fall of the place, the capture of Fort Loyal, and the par-
tial massacre of the garrison, with many of the women
and children. Two years later the third Eastern expedi-
tion of Major Benjamin Church brought him into this
sagamore's country. He landed a party on the Seven
Hundred Acre Island, in Penobscot Bay, and was there
informed by some Frenchmen, who were living with their
families and Indian wives upon the island, that a great
number of the savages were on a neighboring (probably
Long) island, and that they hastened away in their
canoes as soon as they saw the ships of Church. They
could not be pursued past the peninsula without small
boats, which Church had not in sufficient number; so he
seized five Indians, with a lot of corn and beaver and
moose-skins, and set sail for Pemaquid. Madockawando,
with other chiefs, had become greatly exasperated by the
outrages committed on these expeditions, and in August
he visited Count Frontenac at Quebec, presented five
English prisoners, for which he received a reward, and
made an agreement that Frontenac should send two
ships of-war and two hundred Canadians to Penobscot,
while he joined them there with two to three hundred
Indians. The united force would then devastate the
coast below Penobscot, and destroy the new Fort Wil-
liam Henry at Pemaquid. Information of this plan was
sent to Boston by Nelson English, Governor of Nova
Scotia after its conquest by Phips, but now in captivity
at Quebec; and ste])s were taken to meet it. In the
late autumn the French ships and men, under Iberville,
arrived at Penobscot and were joined by Villebon and a
large force of Indians. All proceeded together to Fort
U'illiam Henry; but, finding it strongly built and de-
fended, and an English vessel at anchor under its guns,
the expedition returned without an attack, the savages, it
is said, fiercely stamping the ground in their disappoint-
ment. The next year, August 11, 1693, after a vigorous
campaign by the English under Major Converse, all the
Eastern tribes came into the new garrison at Pemaquid
by their representatives, and negotiated a treaty. Among
the thirteen sagamores signing this convention appear
the hieroglyphics of Madockawando and another chief

of the Tarratines, called Abenquid. War soon broke out
afresh, however, under the instigation of the Jesuit mis-
sionaries, inspired by Frontenac; and in July, 1694, Ma-
dockawando again comes to the front as one of three
subordinate leaders, under the Sieur de Villieu, now-
resident commander at Penobscot, of a force of two
hundred and fifty Indians, which attacked and destroyed
Dover, New Hampshire, plundered other settlements
farther away, returned to Maine and made a des[)erate
attack upon Kittery, where they killed eight persons, but
seem to have retired unsuccessful. With these exploits
Madockawando's career as a warrior probably ended. He
died soon after, as did "other sachems of the East," ac-
cording to Cotton Mather, "victims to the grievous un-
known disease, which consumed them [the Indians]
wonderfully."

At various times during the last century, in signatures
to treaties negotiated with the English, we meet with the
names of chiefs of the Tarratines — in these instruments
always called the Penobscot Indians. Thus, Wenemou-
ett appears as the chief sachem of the Penobscots in
August, 1726, signing Governor Duminer's treaty at Fal-
mouth, with Esj^egnect as second chief, whose signature
also appears under date June 17, 1727. The treaty of
October 16, 1749, was signed on behalf of the same
tribe by Eger Emmet, Nagamumba, Nictuirbouit, Efvar-
agoosaret, and Nemoon. Three jears later a single
head inan or chief, who rejoiced in the English or French
title of Colonel Louis, was the negotiator of a treaty as
representative of the Penobscots. This Colonel Lewis,
on this occasion of meeting the Massachusetts commis-
sioners at St. George's, said, among other things: "We
have have had great and long experience of Captain
Bradley's friend. The lieutenant is a good truck-master.
It would do your hearts good to see how kind he is to
us, and how justly he treats us." He asked for a shelter
by the mill, to provide for drunken Indians who lay out
over night, also for a bridge, and a causeway over Long
Meadow, on the road or trail to the mills. Orders were
given by the commissioners that the desired house and
bridge should be built by Cajnain Bradley. A black-
smith was asked for also, and the attention of the Gov-
ernment to the matter was promised. A belt of wam-
pum was given to Louis to lodge at Penobscot with a
copy of the treaty.

We are not aware that anything further is known of
these minor heroes of history. Of Joseph Orono, how-
ever, one of the later chiels, mucli moie is known.
From a sketch contributed by the historian Williamson
to the Massachusetts Historical Collections, many years
ago, we extract the following:

Juhcph Orono. the subject of tins sketch, was for a long time tlie
well-known chief of the Tarr.itine Indians, un the river Pciioliscot.
But. thougli he was only an Indian s.-igamore, his name, for the merits
of his character, is worthy of remembrance and respect. His ances-
try, as well as the exact number of his years, is involved in some
doubt. For there are no family names among the natives, by which
the lineage of any individual can be traced, as a son inherits no name
of his father.

There has been a story that he was a native of York, in this Slate,
born about the year 1688; that his paternal name was Donmel, and
that he was one of the captive children taken in the winter of 1692,

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

when that place was ravaged by the Indians. But this account is im-
proliahle; as the Northern Indians and those of the Merrimac and
Androscoggin made the attack, and soon afterwards sent liack to the
garrison-houses the elderly women and the children between the ages
of tliroe and seven years, in recompense to the Enghsh for previously
sparing the lives of several Indian females and children at Pejepscot.
At that time, moreover, the Donmel family was one of the most dis-
tinguished in the |)rovince, Samuel being tl)e same year one of the
council, and his brother a man of considerable note. So that, if a son
of either of them had been taken captive, it is |)robable lie was returned
or rccoveretl ; or. at least, there would have been some traditional ac-
count of his being carried away. But no such report, even in York,
has come down to this generation; and Capt. Joseph Munsell, of Ban-
gor, now in liis 88th year, says the story has no foimdation in fact, and
has been treated by the intelligi-nt Indians with derision.

Another account, e(|ually amusing, and more evident, is that Orono
was the descendant of Bason de Castine, a French nobleman who,
soon after the treaty of Breda, in 1667. located himself on the penin-
sula of the town which now bears his name, and married a daughter of
the celebrated Madockawando. a Tarratine chief of the age. It is true
that Castine resided many years at that place, and carried on a very
lucrative trade with the natives ; that he had three or four Tarratine
wives, one being that sagamore's daughter; and that of his several
children, one was "Castine the younger," a very worthy man, and
another, a very beautiful daughter, who married a Frenchman, and
was with her children, in 1704, taken captive. One of these, it has
been supposed, was Orono; yet this rests too much on mere probabil-
ity and conjecture to deserve entire belief

But, whatever may have been the lineage or extraction of Orono, it
is certain he was white in part, a half-breed or more — such being ap-
parent in his stature, features, and complexion. He himself told Cap-
tain Munsell his father was a Frenchman and his mother was Iialf French
and half Indian; but who they were by name i;e did not state. Orono
had not the copper colored countenance, the sparkling eyes, the high
cheek-bones, tawny features of a pristine native. On the contrary, his
eyes were of a bright blue shade, penetrating and full of intelligence
and Ijenignity, His hair, when young, was brown, perhaps approach-
ing to an auburn cast ; his face was large, broad, and well-formed, of a
sickly whiteness, susceptible of ready blushes, and remarkalily sedate.
In his person he was tall, straight, and perfectly proportioned ; and in
his gait there was a gracefulness which of itself evinced his superiority.
He did not incline his head forwaid, nor his feet inward, so much as
Indians usually do. But what principally gave him distinction was his
mind, his manners, and his disposition. For Orono was a man of good
sense and great discernment ;— in mood thoughtful, in conversation re-
served, in feelings benign. Hence he never allowed himself to speak
till he had considered what to say, always e.xpressing his thoughts in
short sentences, directly to the point. He had not much learning, be-
ing only able to read a little and write his name. But he could con-
verse freely in three languages— the Indian, F'rench, and English ; pei-
haps, also, understood some Latin phrases in the Romish litany. To
the Catholic religion he was strongly attached, and also to its forms of
worship. Hence the Rev. Daniel Little, of Kennebeck, a I'rotestant
missionary to the tribe after the Revolution, unable to shake his faith,
asked three times, before he could get an answer from the .sedate chief
thus; "In what language do you pray? " With a gravity much more
becoming than that of the missionary, he very reverently, raising his
eyes a little, leplied, '■ No matter what,— Great .Spirit knows all lan-
guages."

Orono's manners were both conciliating and commanding, and his
habits worthy of all imitation. For he was not only honest, chaste,
temperate, and industrious ; his word was sacred, and his friendship
unchanging. He was remarkable for his forethought and wisdom, for
his mild and equal disposition. Though he was not deficient in cour-
age or any of the marlial virtues, he was so fully aware how much wars
had wasted his tribe and entailed misery on the survivors, as to become,
from princi|)le, a uniform and jiersevering advocate of peace. He
knew, and always kibored to convince his people, that they flourished
best and enjoyed most under its refreshing shade.

At the commencement of the French and sixth Indi.an war, in 1754,
Tomasus (or Tainor) was at the head of the tribe, when he, Osson, O-
rono, and other chief men, so warmly espoused the policy of perpet-
uating peace, as to prevent the commisson of any mischief by their
people, till after the Casgill affair and the declaration of war against
them by the provincial government. The fact was that Captain James
Casgill, of Newcastle, commissioned to raise a company of volunteers,
enlisted and led them on an excursion into the woods towards Owl's

Head, in the vicinity of Penobscot Bay. Discovering a party of In-
dian hunters, Casgill and his company instantly fired upon them, shot
down twelve on the spot, and took their scalps , the rest fleeing for
their lives to the tribe, carried to it the tidings of the bloody and
wicked transaction. Casgill was generally and highly censured by the
white people, it being believed he must have known the unhappy hun-
ters belonged to the tribe of the friendly Tarratines.

Never were the feelings of the tribe put to severer trial. For the
provincial governor, perplexed at the nefarious affair, sent a message
to the sagamores, stating that it was impossible to distinguish between
their Indians and others, and that they must, within eight days, accord-
ing to the last treaty, send twenty men to join in the war against the
common enemy, or their tribe would be treated as belligerent foes.

"What! take arms in aid of men who had themselves broken the
treaty, — base men, whose hands are reeking with the blood of unoffend-
ing Indians? Aunt-ah, aunt-ah [no ! no!]," cried the chief speaker in
a council met on the occasion. "Send the H^ar-whoop ! Strike through
the false-hearted white men ! Burn to ashes their wives, —their wig-
wams, too ! Take blood for blood ! The spirits of our murdered broth-
ers call to us for revenge. The winds howl to us fionj the wilderness.
Sister widows cry, — orphans too. Do not Indians feel? Cut their
veins ; do they not bleed ? The moose bellows over wasted blood. The
bear licks the bleeding wounds of its cub. O Metunk-senah ! Metunk-
senah ! [Our Father, our Heavenly Father], pity our mourners.
Avenge ill-treated Indians. Our fathers told us. Englishmen came
here, a great many, many moons ago. They had no lands, no wig-
wams, — nothing. Then our good fathers say, "come, hunt in our
woods; come, fish in our rivers; come, warm by our fires. " So they
catch very great many salmon, — other fishes too. They stay among us
always. They call Indians good brothers. They smile in our faces.
They make wick-hegin [writingsl. to live here with us,— all one, the
same people. They signed them, as they call it, — our fathers, too.
Then Englishmen call the lands their own. Our fathers meant no
such thing. Certain, they never leave their children to starve. Eng-
lishman always smiles when he gets advantage. Then he loves us all
greatly. When he wants nothing of Indians, he don't love 'em so
much. Frenchmen never get away our lands. They sell us guns, —
powder too, — and great many things. They give us down weight, full
measure. They open our eyes to religion. They speak to us, in dark
days, good words of advice. Englishmen rob us. They kill our
brothers, when their hearts were warm with friendship,— when sweet
peace was melting on their lips. We give them homes. They put the
flaming cup to our mouths. They shed our blood. Did ever English-
men come to Indian's wigwam faint, and go away hungry ? Never.
Where shall Indians go? Here we were born. Here our fathers died.
Here their bodies rest. Here, too, we live. .^rise. Join Frenchmen.
Fight Englishmen. They shall die. They shall give place to Indi-
ans. This land, this river, is ours. Hunt Englishmen all off the
ground. Then shall Indians be free; then the ghosts of our fathers
bless their sons."

The voice of Orono, himself then more than sixty years of age, was
still for peace. "To kill the living will not bring the de.ad to life. The
crimes of few never sprinkle blood on all. .Strike the murderers. Let
the rest be quiet. Peace is a voice of the Great .Spirit. Every one is
blessed under its wings. Everything withers in war. Indians are
killed. Squaws starve. Nothing is gained , not plunder, not glory.
E^nglishmen are now too many. Let the hatchet lay buried. Smoke
the calumet once more. Strive for peace. Exact a recompense by
treaty for wrongs done us. None ! ay, then fight 'em."

But the young Indians panted for war, levenge and glory; and as
the Government soon proclaimed that hostilities actually existed
against the Tarratines, all hopes of any immediate pacification were
dissipated. At first the Indians made some violent attacks, killed
several people and burned a few houses. But they were neglected by
the French; time, war, and disease, they found, had greatly thinned
their ranks; in the course of three years they became discouraged, —
such a period being always long enough to satisfy Indian warriors; and
in 1759 the tribe was literally overawed by the establishment of Fort
Pownall, on the westerly banks of Penobscot Bay. Therefore, in .April
of the next year, they entered into a treaty with the provincial govern-
ment, and made war upon the colonists no more.

He, Osson, died about the beginning of the American Revolution.
During the preceding interval of peace, Orono, next to Osson in pol-
itical power, had, by his ability and prudence, acquired the confidence
of his people so entirely that they united and made him chief soon
after the other's death. Orono was a high liberty man, and from the
first a thoroughgoing Whig. He could not imagine how the mother

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

ounlry could possibly wish to enslave or plunder the colonies, which
were, as he thought, her distant children. Such were his views of
riches, religions, sovereignty, and even glory, that he could not see how
all of them combined could be any motive to so unnatural a warfare.
Liberty, next to peace, was the sweetest sound that could salute Or-
ono's ear. It was, to his experience, the gift and feeling of nature. In
conference with his people, he declared it to be an inborn disposition
of the heart and natural habit of life to strive against force and control,
as against death. He felt it. He knew it. The wild creatures that
rove through the woods he had seen happy, though hungry, because
they were under no ties that bound them. The brave little beaver
fights a duel with a hunter-boy for the chance of escape. What being
does not sigh and sicken in confinement? Does not even the spring-
bird then forget its song, — the ermine its sports? All nature flourishes
when free. The Great Spirit gives us freely all things. Our while
brothers tell us they came to Indian's country to enjoy liberty and life.
Their great Sagamore is coming to bind them in chains, to kill them.
We must fight him. We will stand on the same ground with them.
For should he bind them in bonds, next he will treat us as bears. In-
dians" liberties and lands his proud spirit will tear away from them.
Help his ill-treated sons; they will return good for good, and the law
of love runs through the hearts of their children and ours when we are
dead. Look down the stream of lime. Look up to the Great Spirit.
Be kind, be valiant, be fiee: — then are Indians the sons of glory.

Aroused and captivated by Orono's sentiments, his people generally
became decided Whigs. He had also great influence with the sachem
at Passamatjuoddy, and even at the river St. John, though in each of
the. tribes there were Indian Tories, and party spirit ran high; human
nature, whether cultivated or wild, exhibiting the same traits of char-
acter. At length Orono and three of his colleagues started to go and
tender their friendship and services to the government of Massachusetts,
attended by Andrew Gilman, who could speak their language as well
as his own. On their arrival at Portsmouth, money was liberally con-
tributed to bear their expenses, and a carriage procured to help them
on their journey. They met the Provincial Congress at Waterlown,
June 21, 1775, and entered into a treaty of amity with that body and
of engagements to afford assistance, afterwards proving themselves to
be among the most faithful allies of the American people. In return
for their pledges of good faith and immediate aid, Massachusetts for-
bade, under severe penalties, all trespasses on their lands, six miles in
width on each side of the Penobscot river from the head of the tide up-
wards. On the nineteenth of July, 1776, the three tribes mentioned all
acknowledged the independence of the United States, and engaged to
withhold all succor from the British enemy. In fact, there were sta-
tioned near the head of the tide, on the Penobscot, a company of thirty
(twenty white men and ten Indians), under the command of Andrew
Gilman, a lieutenant, and Joseph Munsell, an orderly sergeant, both
previously mentioned; and at Machias, where Munsell was afterwards
himself a lieutenant, there was a large company of one hundred In-
dians or more, commanded by Captain John Preble, all of whom had
rations, and most of them were under pay.

No man was more faithful to his engagements than Orono. From
1779, when the British took possession of the peninsula Biguyduce
(now Casline), and exercised an arbitrary command over all the settle-
ments on each side of the river, that active, vigilant chief communicated
with great dispatch to our officers and Government important and re-
peated intelligence, for which he once, if not more, received a tribute
of special thanks, and also a pecuniary reward. He was wise in coun-
sel, and his zeal to the last was inspiring to his tribe.

Orono was holden in equally high estimation after the war; and in
1785 and 1796 he entered into favorable treaties with Massachusetts,
by which he and his tribe, for valuable considerations, assigned to hei
large tracts of land, and also agreed with her upon the limits and ex-
lent of the territory retained. This celebrated chief, after a very long
life of usel'ulness and destruction, died at Oldtown, February 5. 1802,
reputed to have been one hundred and thirteen years old. But Captain
Munsell, who conversed with him in his last sickness, and asked him
his age, thinks, according to his best recollection, Orono told him he
was about one hundred and ten years of age at that time. He was ex-
ceedingly endeared to his tri jc, and highly respected by all his English
acquaintance. To a remarkable degree, he retained his mental faculties
and erect attitude till the last years of his life. As he was always
abstemious, and as his hair in his last years was of a milky whiteness,
he resembled in appearance a cloistered saint. His wife, who was a
full-blooded native, died several years after him. at an age supposed to
be greater than his own. Of his posterity it is only known that he
had two children, one a son, who was accidentally shot, about 1774. in

a hunting party, aged probably twenty-five; the other a daughter, who
married old Captain Nicholar. So desirous were his English friends
and neighbors to perpetuate his name and character that, when the
territory in the immediate vicinity of Oldtown was incorporated into a
town, March 12, 1806, it was called "Orono," in compliment to the
worthy chief.

His wife, commonly called "Madame Orono," died
at the very advanced age of one hundred and fifteen
years, in 1S09.

At the centennial celebration in Orono, March 3, 1874,
the following poem on "The Old Chiefs," bringing "the
bkie-eyed" ])rominently into notice, was sung by the as-
sembled company. It is from the pen of Rev. Henry
C. Leonard, long pastor of the Universalist church in
the village:

We sing the chiefs of auld lang syne:

Madockawando grave —
The Tarratine in Philip's lime;

Megone, the friend and knave;
Wenamuet with kingly face; —

All braves who bent the bow
In autumn's hunt or winter's chase;

But most, great Orono.

Madockawando's royal hand.

In nature's temple green.
His squaw-child gave in marriage bond

To lone and proud Castine.
But from the mountains to the sea.

Where gleams Penobscot's flow.
Best praised the white-born chief shall be.

The blue-eyed Orono.

In modern days of Atieon,

Or Neptune's later reign.
No tales are told of brave deeds done

Or sung in noble strain.
Our thoughts are turned to other days,

The days of strife and woe.
Relieved by calm, pacific ways

Of pale-faced Orono.

We sing the chief, the grand old chief,

The chief of auld lang syne.
Whose years of rule on mem'ry's leaf

Are years of bloodless line.
We sing the chief, the grand old chief,

The chief of long ago, —
The corn still sound in memory's sheaf, —

The high-browed Orono.

Nearly a century and a half from the disappearance of
Madockawando from history, we come to the chieftain-
ship of John Atteon over the Penobscot Indians. He
was rt- ported to be a descendant of the Baron de Cas-
tine and an Indian mother, but could not speak English
with facility, while Francis, one of the captains inducted
into office at the same time, and also supposed to be of
French blood in part, was a good English speaker, intel-
ligent and communicative. The sagamore or governor
had been chosen by general election of the tribe.

Mr. Williamson, the historian, was an eye-witness of
the ceremonies of induction or inauguration, and thus
describes them:

The parties in the Tarratine tribe were so sanguine and violent after
they lust their chief, that they could not for many months agree upon
a successor. Perplexed with the long controversy and deeply concerned
in effecting a union, the Catholic priest interposed his influence; when
they were induced to leave the rival candidates and select John Aitleon^
a reputed descendant of Baron de Castine, by an Indian wife.

On the i9lh of September, i8r6, at Oldtown village. Sagamore Ait-
loon. John Xi^ptune, next in grade and command, and two captains

HISTORN' OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

were inducted into office, with the customary ceremonies. To assist in
these, the chiefs and 15 or 20 other principal men from eacli of the
tribes at St. John's river and at Passamaquoddy had previously arrived,
appearing in neat and beconung dresses, all in the Indian fashion.

Early in the forenoon, the men of the Tarratine tribe, convening in
the great wigwam, called the camp, seated on the side pl.atform accord-
ing to seniority, Aitteon, Neptune, and the select captains at the head,
next the door; the former two being clad in coats of scarlet broad-
cloth and decorated with silver brooches, collars, armelasjis, jewels,
and other ornaments. Upon a spread before them, of blue cloth, an
ell scjuare, were e.\hibited four silver nied.ils, three of which were circu-
lar and twice the size of a dollar; the other was larger, in the form o,
a crescent. All these were emblematically inscribed with curious de_
vices, and suspended by parti-colored ribbons, a yard in length with
ends tied. Aware of gentlemen's wishes to be spectatois of the cere-
monials, they directed the Indian acting the part of marshal to invite
them into the camp. The admission of the female visitants was also
requested; but he replied, as directed by the chiefs, "Never our
squaws, nor yours, sit with us in coiuicil."

The spectators being seated below the tribe, upon the platform or
benches, covered with blankets, the Marechite delegation, preceded
by their chief, entered the camp in tnie Indian file and sat down, ac-
cording to individual rank, directly before the Tarratines. These now
tmcovered their heads and laid aside their hats and caps till the cere-
monies were closed.

Four belts of wampum, brought into the camp by a stately Mare-
chite, v\'ere unfolded and placed in the area upon a piece of broadcloth
which enclosed ihem; when his Sagamore, presently rising, took and
held one of them in his hands, and addressed Aitteon from five to ten
minutes in a courtly speech of pure vernacular, laying the belt at his
feet. Three others in rotation, and ne.\t in rank, of the same tribe,
addiessed, in a similar manner, the Tarratine candidates of compara-
tive grade; — all which were tokens of unchanging friendship and sane"
tions of perpetual union. The Sagamore then, taking the meda
nearest .Aitteon, addressed him and his tribe in another speech of the
same length as the former, in the course of which he came three o
four times to momentary pauses, when the Tarratines, collectively, ut.
tered deep guttural sounds like "aye." These were evident expres-
sions of their assent to have ."Aitteon, Neptune, Francis, and the other
their first and second Sagamores, and two senior captains. The
speaker, closing his remarks, advanced and placed the suspended
medal, as the badge of investiture, about .Aitteon's neck, the act by
which he was formally inducted into office and constituted Sagamore
for life. Neptune and the two captains, in their turns, after being
shortly addressed by the other Marechite actors, were invested by tl-.em
with the ensigns of office in the same way.

During these ceiemonies, the 'Quoddy Indians without stood around
a standard twenty feet in height, to and from the top of which they
alternately hoisted and lowered a flag, as each I'arraline was inducted
into office, at the same time and afterwards firing salutes from a well-
loaded swivel, near the same place.

Mr. Romaigne, the Catholic priest, attired in a white robe and long
scarf, having seated himself among the Tarratines before the ceremonies
were coinmenced, now, rising, read appropriate passages from the
Scriptures in Latin, and expounded them in the Indian dialect; and
next a psalm, which he and the Marechites chanted with considerable
harmony. In the midst of the sacred song, the whole of them moved
slowly out of the camp, preceded by the priest, leaving the Tarratines
seated, and, forming a circle in union with the 'Quoddy Indians, stood
and sang devoutly several minutes, and closed with a "Te Deum."
• The priest then departed to his house, and the Indians, entering the
camp, took their seats--the '(Juoddy Indians in a lower place, abreast
the sitting spectators, when they commenced their tangible salutations.
In this form of civility, each of the two delegations, rising in turn, liter-
ally embraced, cheek and lip, the four new-made officers, and shook
heartily by the hand all the others of the tribe.

The gentlemen, at the marshal's request, now withdrew, to be spec-
tators only about the doors and apertures; when the Tarratine females,
clad in their best dresses and fancifully ornamented, joined for the first
time the Indian assemblage, and the whole formed an elliptical circle
for dances. In close Indian file they moved forward m successive
order, with a kind of double shuffle, to their former places, animated
by the music of a light beat upon a drum, in the midst of the circus,
with the accompaniment of a vocal tune, (l-'ormeriy their chief instru-
ments were rattles, made of small gourds and pumpkin shells.) The
fem.ale dancers then retired; the Indians took their seats; and the spec-
tators were re-adniiiied.

To close the ceremonies, four chief men of the Marechites severally
rose in succession and sang short songs, somewhat entertaining, which
were dulv responded by others from the new-made officers; throughout
which the whole assemblage uttered, at almost every breath, a low-
toned, emphatic guttural sound, not unlike a hiccough, — the singular
way by which they expressed their plaudits and pleasures.

More than three hours were consumed in these ceremonies, which
were succeeded by a feast already preparing. Two fat oxen, slaugh-
tered and severed into pieces, were roasting; rice, beans, and garden
vegetables were boiling; and bread-loaves and crackers were abundant.
If the cooking, neatness, and order were unworthy of modern imita-
tion, the defects were counterbalanced by the hearty invitations and
welcomes with which all the visitants, equally with the natives, were
urged to become partakers, both of the repast and of the festive
scenes. The regularities of the day relaxed to rude dances and wild
sports in the evening, w hich \\ere by no means free from extravagance
and excess.

In 1838 Alteon and Neptune were deposed by the
tribe, and the resultant troubles were such that the legis-
lature of the State intervened, and passed an act that an
election should be held by the tribe every two years.
This law has been modified since, as will be seen here-
after. This Atteon died in May, 1S58, having had real
or nominal jurisdiction over the tribe from 1816 to that
time — forty-two years. 'I'he later i:hiefs or "governors"
were Tomer Socklexis, John Neptune, father of tlie
LieutenantGovernor of the same name; Joseph Lolon,
father of the well-known Captain Francis; John Atteon,
grandson of the former Sagamore John; and Joseph
Atteon, son of the last John. Some others have suc-
ceeded him for longer or shorter terms.

THE PENOBSCOT "IN POLITICS."

The Penobscots at Oldtown, having lost their sa-
chem, undertook the election of another in 181 6. It
was usual to elect proniptly a near relative of the deceased
Sagamore; Init in this case a delay of several months
occurred before a successor could be agreed upon; and
at length the factional spirit becoming unieasonably high
and intemperate their priest, a Roman Catholic, interposed
his authority, and virtually compelled them to abandon
the previous candidates and elect John Atteon, who was
reputed, as we have noticed, to be a descendant of the
Baron de St. Castine. The new chief was inducted into
office September 19, 1816, when John Neptune was
chosen his lieutenant, and two chief captains were con-
firmed, one of whom was Captain Francis. This is the
same Captain Francis, "a man of good understading,"
who gave the historian Willianison the information before
cited concerning the relationship of all the Indian tribes
of Maine.

A brief but interesting sketch of the "political his-
tory" of the tribe, such as it is, is thus given by Agent
Dillinghain, in his report for 1875:

I'rior to 1835, or thereabouts, as I am informed, no elections of dele-
gate to the Legislature were held in the tribe. The tjovernor and
Lieutenant-Governor had been chosen for life, and such delegates re-
ceived their appointment from the Governor of the tribe. John .Attian
and [ohn Neptune were holding the respective offices of Governor and
Lieutenant-Governor at that time, when, either by resignation,
impeachment, or from some cause, those offices were declared vacant,
and a meeting for a new election called; at which time Tomer Sock-
lexis and Attian Orson were chosen to fill the vacancies. The result
was not acquiesced in by a part of the tribe, who claimed that those
offices could not be vacated during the life of the occupants, and still
considered .Attian and Neptune their legally constituted officers. An-
other portion of the tribe hckl that the election was valid, and refused

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

longer to recognize Altian and Xeptune as officers. Since that time
the portion claiming Attian as Governor has been called the "Old
Party," and that portion claiming Sockle.vis as Governor, the "New
Parjy."

This state of affairs continued \mlil 1850. when an agreement was
entered into and signed by the officers and principal members of the
two parties, providing "that as John Atti.an and John Xeptune were
chosen according to the ancient usages of the tribe into their respec-
tive offices for life, that they should remain in said offices during the
remainder of their lives, and on the decrease ot one or both, the vacancy
should be filled by majority vote of the male members of the tribe of
twenty-one years of age and upwards, in meeting duly called by the
Agent. Said officers to continue for two years, and that an election
should be held every year to choose one member of the tribe to repre-
sent the tribe before the Legislature and the Governor and Council."
This agreement was not, as I learn, ver)' sacredly kept, or even much
regarded by either party, but each continued to claim and recognize
the same officers as before.

On the deceased of Governor John .\ttian, the old party immedialelv
declared his son, Joseph .^ttian, his successor, and he was duly inaugu-
rated by them, according to ancient custom, for life. Elections were
held annually for choice of delegate. Party spirit ran high, and there
e,\isted much ill-feeling, which manifested itself in individual quarrels
during the year, and usually at elections terminated in a general fight.
The question of term of office of Governor and Lieutenant Governor
continued an unsettled issue; discussions and quarrels interfered seri-
ously with their general avocations; for several weeks prior to the an-
nual election they wouli congregate at Oldtown from various distant
localities, consuming much time and money in addition to ordinary
travelling expenses.

Finally the Legislature, evidently considering it for the best interest
of the tribe, enacted a law in 1866, which provided "that the Penob-
scot Tribe of Indians be allowed hereafter to elect by ballot their
Governor, Lieutenant-Governor and Representative to the Legislature,
on the second Tuesday of September, annually, (changed in 1873 to
first Wednesday in November), and that the old and new party, so
called, shall be allowed to select from their respective parties, candi-
dates for said offices, alternately, commencing with the old party for
the year 1867; and the new party shall have no voice in the selection of
candidates for said offices, and shall not vole in their election in those
years when the old party is entitled to them; and the old party shall
have no voice in the selection of candidates for sard offices, and no
vote in their election, in those years when the new party is entitled to
them ; and it shall be the duty of the Agent to preside at such elec-
tions." Since which time their elections have been held in accordance
with that act, without objection being made thereto until lately. Each
party has now held fi\e elections of delegate, and at each have also
voted for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor, abandoning the old idea
of life term. Such elections have been perfectly quiet and orderly,
and, so far as I have been able to judge, satisfactory to those partici-
pating.

Within a few years about fifteen of the dissatisfied meinbers from
each of the two before named parties have united, calling Ihemsehes
"Third Party," or "Outsiders," and have claimed the same rights that
have been granted to the old and new parlies ; that is, among other
privileges, the right to hold elections one-third of the time. -At the
last election held by the old party (November, 1874), they having failed
to agree on the nominations made as usual in caucus, two sets of can-
didates were voted for; the defeated portion then joined the "third
party " in petitioning the Legislature the following winter for repeal of
the law of 1866, and to change the manner of conducting their elec-
tions, and to allow the tribe to vote together and the person having
the majority of votes to be declared elected, as was their former cus-
tom, as they claim. The old party had then held five elections under
the law of r866* the new party had held but four. These two parties
then united in presenting a remonstrance against any such proposed
change in the law affecting their elections. The peiuioners were, alter
hearing, granted leave to withdraw, without attempting to indicate
what may be a peaceful solution of this ve.xed question. I merely give
the above facts to be taken and used for what they are worth.

At the annual election of ths tribe, held on the first
Tuesday of October, 1880, Stephen Stanislaus was
chosen Governor, Samuel Neptune Lieutenant-Governor,
and Joseph Nicolar, Superintendent of Farming, was
elected Delegate of the tribe to the State Legislature.

■]HF. INDI.AN L.\NDS.

The first formal cession of their territory by the Tar-
ratine or Penobscot Indians seems to have been effected
at a conference and treaty of alliance held at the truck-
house near Mt. Hope, a little below the Penjejawock
stream, in Kenduskeag. now Bangor, in September, 1775.
There were present the chiefs of the Penobscot and St.
John's tribes, and on the part of the whites Generals Ben-
jamin Lincoln and Rufus Putnam, and Dr. Thomas
Rice. A treaty was here made and signed, by which the
red men relinquished a tract si.v miles wide on each side
of the river, and retained, as now, the islands in the river
above Oldtown, and in addition two islands in the Bay
and the land^ along the branches on the west side of the
Penobscot. This treaty the head-men of the tribe sub-
sequently repudiated, and new treaties had to be made.
The story is well told by the Hon. Lorenzo Sabine, a res-
ident of Bangor in his childhocd, in an elaborate article
on the Penobscots, in Volume XII. of the C/iris/ian
Examiner :

At the Revolution, the ungranted lands of Maine held by the Rrilish
crowii,as well as large tracts held by Loyalists, or Tories, became
vested in Massachusetts; and at the close of the struggle the attention
of gentlemen of that State, and of adventurers elsewhere, was directed to
them as a sure means to increase or acquire fortunes. The documents
of the time show indeed that, for ten or fifteen years after the peace,
the mania for " Eastern lands" was quite as intense as that which pre-
vailed within a very recent period. The pine forests and mill-sites of
the Penobscots were of great value, and were wanted by the "opera-
tors" of the day. Accordingly, in 1784, commissioners were ap-
pointed by Massachusetts to negotiate a cession. The result was the
purchase, in 1786, for 350 blankets and 200 pounds of powder, and a
quantity of shot and flints, of the country on the Penobscot River to
the Piscataquis stream on the one bank, and to the Metawamkeag on
the other, save the waters between the falls at Oldtown and the mouths
of these tributaries. This, as far as we have been able to discover, was
the first actual cession, and these paltry presents was the first pre-
tended eijuivalent. But the country below Bangor, on both banks of
the river and bay, had passed from their possession. On the westerly
side, the grant known in later times as the "Waldo Patent" embraced
the whole, while easterly, the colonial government had seized and ap-
propriated every acre of the mainland and all the islands, two of con-
siderable size only excepted. Thus the Penobscots had lost a large part
of their domam before the new masters they had offered to serve set
their covetous eyes on the territory above the head of the tide-waters.
There remained to the Indians, then, after the bargain in 1786 was con-
cluded, two islands near the sea, the islands just mentioned, and the
tract above Piscataquis and Metawamkeag, and northerly from them
without defined limits; and these were guaranteed in quiet possession,
as the chiefs supposed, forever. The words of the treaty are that all
the lands on the Penobscot River above the two streams named in the
tract, should lie as hunting-grounds for the Indians, and should not be
laid out or settled by the State or engrossed by individuals. But the
government of Massachusetts understood the matter diflferently. and
difficulties soon arose between the contracting parties, which, increasing
until r796, were adjusted, as then appeared, by a new treaty. In this
second convention the Penobscots ceded the mainland on both sides of
the river for a distance of thirty miles, commencing at a designated
rock in Eddington; but retained the river islands and the territory
above the thirty-mile line so drawn, northerly and indefinitely. The
consider.ition for the cession was 400 pounds of shot, too pounds of
powder, 100 bushels of corn, 13 bushels of salt, 36 hats, and a barrel of
rum, in hand, with an annuity of 300 bushels of corn, 50 pounds of
powder, 200 pounds of shot, and 75 yards of blue cloth. This annuity
is about equal to $600. This tract was surveyed into nine townships
and offered to purchasers in quarter-townships at a price the acre,
which, if received, placed in the treasury upwards of $180,000! Such
was the dealings of Christians with the helpless Indians in the year
1796.

In 1818, owing to various causes, the Penobscots had become poor;
and well do we remember their distress and sympathy of individuals in

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

behalf of their women and children. In the poverty of the tribe, sales
of pine timber svere ni.ide by their chiefs, on tlie lands which they re-
served in the last treaty, much to the displeasure of Massachusetts, on
the ground that the fee was in the State, and that the mere right to oc-
cupy, to fish, and to hunt was all that could be enjoyed by the Indians,
unless, indeed, they might embrace an agricultural life, of which there
could have been no ho[)e, for then the keenest .Anglo-Saxon eye saw
nothing in Maine east of the Kennebec but pine-trees and water-power
to saw them into marketable shapes.

In this position of affairs a commission was created to open a third
negotiation. Early in 1819, aconvention was ratified by which the Com-
monwealth obtained the whole of the remaining country, excepting four
townships of mainland, six miles square, and the islands so often men-
tioned in the Penobscot River. We have no room to record the various
articles which were to be delivered to the chiefs annually as payment for
this cession; but we state with pleasure that the quantities of food,
cloth, and ammunition were considerably more than in 1796, and that
provision was made for the repair of tlic Indian church and for the em-
ployment of a teacher in husbandry, while, beside, the women and
maidens were presented with several hundred yards of calico and rib-
bon. In fine, there is a spirit of liberality in this treaty which was
manifested on no other occasion.

But yet Massachusetts has little reason to plume herself on her
course toward the Penobscots, while they were under her guaidianship.
The Indian domain, though worth a million at the periods of cession,
and several millions now, cost her at most less than $35,000, as she
herself estimated, when, at the separation, an arrangement was sug-
gested by wliich Maine was to assume the payment of the annuities
stipulated in the treaties to which we have referred. Maine, on becom_
ing an independent State, in 1820, assumed the control of Indian af-
fairs within her borders; and, in 1833. appointed commissioners to dis-
pose of the four townships reserved by the Penobscots in the conven-
tion of 1819. The purchase-money, amounting to some $55,000, was
invested under the direction of the State, and remains entire. The in-
terest of this fund is divided annually in equal shares ; and m addition
the annuities under the treaties with Massachusetts are contmued, and
cannot be withheld, if good faith be observed, while the Penobscots
shall exist as a nation. These two sources of income, with the islands,
constitute now the only |)ublic or common property of the tribe. The
islands, to rely upon our own count in 1852, are twenty-seven or
twenty-eight in number. Some are low, small, and of little value; but
others are beautiful in surface and situation, and sufficient in size and
in richness of soil for the support of one hundred more families.

Some additional details concerning the arrangement

of 1795 are thus supplied by Mr. Wilhamson:

A serious controversy had lately arisen between the inhabitants upon
the Penobscot and the Tarratine Indians. By the treaty of 1785 the
Government supposed the tribe had nothing remaining but the islands
in the river; whereas, the chiefs insisted that the territory from the
head of the tide, six miles in width, on each side of the river upwards,
indefinitely, was theirs; and they determined not to relinquish it with- .
out being paid a consideration. To settle, therefore, the question of
controverted claims, three commissioners. William Shepherd of West-
field, Nathan Dane of Beverly, and Daniel Davis of Portland, met
the chiefs at Bangor, .'\ugust i, 1796, and concluded a treaty with
them, by which tbe Indians agreed to resign all their rights to lands
from Nichols's rock, in Eddington, thirty miles up the river, excepting
Oldtown Island, and those in the river above it. For this relinquish-
ment, the Government delivered to the tribe 150 yards of blue woolens,
— 400 pounds shot, — too pounds powder, — 100 bushels of corn, — 13
bushels salt, — 36 hats, — and a barrel of rum; and agreed to pay them,
so long as tliey should continue a tribe, a certain stipend every year, at
the mouth of the Kenduskeag. consisting of 300 bushels of Indian
corn, — 50 pounds of powder, — 200 pounds of shot, — and 75 yards of
blue woollen, fit for garments. The ratification of this treaty consisted
in its execution by the seals and signatures of the commissioners and
seven chiefs, and its acknowledgement betore Jonathan Eddy, esq. It
was supposed this tribe, once so numerous and powerful, was now
reduced to 350 souls. In 1803. the Government appointed an agent to
superintend their interests and take care of their lands.

The territory relinquished by the treaty was subsequently surveyed
into nine townships, and found to contain 189,426 acres. Already
there were thirty-two settlers, who were presently quieted upon their
lots; and in 1798 the residue was offered for sale in quarter-townships
at a dollar by the acre. Exclusive of this tract so relinejuished, is
Marsh island of five thousand acres and of an excellent soil, which the

Government, in a good mood, confirmed to John Marsh, the first settler,
for a small consideration, he exhibiting a pretended purchase from
the Indians.

THE TRUST FUND,

held in the State treasury for the benefit of the Indians
consists mainly of fifty thousand dollars paid by the State
in 1833, as jjart of the consideration for the four town-
ships of land purchased of the tribe. It was stipulated
that this sum should rest forever in the hands of the
State, but that a yearly interest thereon should be paid
to the Penobscots. Drafts were made on it, however,
from time to time, when over-expenditures were incurred
by the agents; but the sums taken were afterwards
restored from the interest fund. January i, 1864, the
fund amounted to fifty-two thousand four hundred and
thirty-eight dollars and forty-four cents, and additions
were made to it year by year from various sources, but
chiefly from rents derived from leasts ol the shores of
islands belonging to the reservation. In 1875 'he trust
fund had mounted to seventy-three thousand eight hun-
dred and twenty-eight dollars and forty-eight cents, and
the annual revenues from it constituted a very import-
ant part of the means for keejiing the members of the
tribe from want and discontent. For some years after
the act of February 11, 1873, the shore rents were not
added to the fund, but have been distributed directly to
the Indians — a plan which, said Agent Dillingham, in
his report of 1875, "has been very satisfactorily received,
and has been of very great advantage to the tribe, in
relieving their necessities and enabling them to live
through these hard times, when all, even the prudent
whites, find it so necessary lo carefully husband their
resources."

The amount derived from the Indian trust fund, for
each of the two years 1879-80, on interest account, was
four thousand four hundred and twenty-nine dollars and
seventy cents. The tribe also received an annuity of one
thousand four hundred dollars (formerly one thousand
eight hundred dollars), seven hundred dollars per an-
num for their agriculture, besides four hundred and fifty
dollars bounty on crops, and special appropriations for
schools and school-houses, repair of chapel, and salaries
of agent, superintendent of farming, priest (one hundred
dollars per year), governor (fifty dollars), and lieutenant
governor (thirty dollars). The total amounts in the two
years, respectively, were eight thousand and twenty-four
dollars and seventy cents, and eight thousand three hun-
dred and ninety-four dollars and seventy cents. The
shore rents added four thousand three hundred and
si.xty-one dollars and twenty-five cents to this in 1879,
and two thousand one hundred and fifty-four dol-
lars the ne.xt year, the decrease being caused by the
falling off of the lumber trade, the destruction of import-
ant mills, and other reasons.

It is thus seen that the tribe, considering its limited
numbers, is remarkably 'well provided for. The sums
paid to its members are expended under the direction of
the agent, mainly in supporting the very poor and infirm,
supplying medicine and medical attendance, paying
funeral expenses, and providing for a distribution in the

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

si)ring, to all ihe tribe, of corn, flour, pork, and molasses.
Wood is also inircliased, as needed by these people.
Schools for the Indian children are maintained on Old-
town, Mattanawcook, and Olamon islands, the latter two
in charge of the school committees of Greenbush and
Lincoln, respectively, and the first now taught by the
Sisters of Mercy, with great acceptability and success.
A new building was put up for ihis school, at the north
end of the village, in the summer of iS8o, at a cost of
about five hundred dollars.

THE INDIAN VILLAGES.

It is altogether orobable, from the number of arrow-
heads, axes, and other Indian antiquities found in places,
that the Tarratines had at least temporary camping
grounds on all the tributaries of the Penobscot. But
three sites in particular furnished them places of rendez-
vous — Mattawamkeag, Passadumkeag, and the Falls of
the Penobscot. At the latter two points it is believed
there were French forts, as well as Indian villages. One
of these was destroyed by Colonel Westbrook in 1723,
the inhabitants retiring up the river to Matlawamkeag.
The other was burned by Captain Heath about two years
afterwards. There is at this time no mention of a village
at Oldtown, but that undoubtedly became soon after-
w^ards the chief seat of the tribe, and has since retained
its pre-eminence. Mr. David Norton, author of Sketches
of Oldtown, believes that the present name corresponds
to an Indian name meaning the same, and given to the
same village — that is, the Indian settlement on the lower
part of Oldtown island.

Governor VVashburne says, in his address at the Orono

Centennial:

There was also a village on the tongue of land that extends eastward
from this hall [the Town Hall in Orono] to the Penobscot ri\'er at
Ayres' Falls, as they are now termed, bounded on the north by the
Stillwater river and on the south by the basin. The Indians called the
place Arumsumhmigtui. For many years after the settlement of the
town by the white men, the vestiges of cornfields and of habitations
were plain and unmistakable; and until comparatively a recent period,
stone weapons anil implements of agriculture were occasionally turned
up wherever the plough was driven, some of which I have seen in the
possession of the late John Bennoch, jr., esq., and Col. Eben Webster,
jr. I think it not improbable that the point of land at the confluence
of the Stillwater and Penobscot rivers, may have been the site of the
ancient "Lett" of the Indians.

The Governor remarked also the presence of an In.
dian village at Nicola's Island, near Passadumkeag, and
the probable fact that the fort and village destroyed by
Colonel Westbrook in 1723 was on this island. The In-
dians there, with some French families, settled, he says,
at Fort Hill, near the head of the tide, and built a vil-
lage of cottages and wigwams, with a Catholic chapel,
which was shortly deserted by its inhabitants, on the ap-
proach of Captain Heath with his invading force, who
gave the village to the flames. The Penobscots there-
after concentrated at Oldtown.

THE INDIAN CENSUS.

It is supposed that the Tarratines numbered about
two thousand four hundred when they first became
known to Europeans. They declined rapidly, however,
after King William's war. In 1736 the French reckoned

two hundred warriors on the Penobscot as available allies
to the Government of New France. In 1754 the tribe
counted about eight hundred, all told; but the ravages of
famine, disease, and other causes of decrease, left them
six years afterwards but seventy-three warriors and about
four hundred others. In 1764 the governor reported
that they could muster sixty fighting men ; but his esti-
mate is believed too small. Mr. Sabine thinks there
were then, probably, seven hundred persons in the tribe,
but that at the close of the century there were only half
as many, although the tribe had begun to increase some-
what, from the encouragement given to early marriages
by the Jesuit missionaries. The number of the Penob-
scot Indian families in 1811 was but fifty-seven, and of
individuals two hundred and forty-one. In 1820, all of
them being then clustered at Oldtown, they numbered
two hundred and seventy-seven souls, an increase as-
cribed by Dr. Jedediah Morse, in his report of 1820,
upon Indian affairs, to the Secretary of \\'ar, to "an
obligation imposed by the chiefs on the young peo-
ple to marry early." The St. Johns and Passamaquoddy
tribes are mentioned by Dr. Morse in connection with
the Penobscots, and he says further:

The three tribes above named live in great harmony and friendship
with each other. When either tribe elects and installs a chief, the chiefs
of the other two tribes are always present to assist in the ceremonies.

In religion these tribes are professedly Christians of the CatholicTaith^
have each a church, with a bell, aud priests to instruct them steadily or
occasionally. The priests who minister to the two latter tribes [the Pas-
saniaquoddies and the Penobscots] receive a stated stipend from the
treasury of the State. The State has lately engaged to provide and
support a farmer among the Penobscots to instruct them in agriculture.
We know not that any of these tribes have ever admitted schools to be
established among them.

The Penobscots, in government and internal regulations, are inde-
pendent. The legislative and e.vecutive authorities are vested in the
sachems, though the heads of all the families are invited to be present
at their public meetings, which are held in their house of worship and
conducted with order and decorum.

None of these tribes have other than incipient improvements in any-
thin" which pertains to civilized life. It is not probable, such is the
religious influence under which they act, combined w^ith their natural
attachment to their native places and to the sepulchers of their fathers,
that a proposal to remove and join a large community of Indians,
should It be made to them, would be accepted. It is probable they
will remove [remain?] in a sort of half-independent, half-civilized, and
evangelized state, gradually diminishing, as other tribes, once their pow-
erful neighbors, have done before them, till there shall be none re-
maining.

The census of the tribe, taken usually every year by
the superintending school committee of Oldtown,
showed a population of four hundred and forty-three in
August, 1855: of five hundred, in round numbers, in
1865; four hundred and forty-eight in 1876; four hun-
dred and forty-five in 1877; four hundred and fifty in
January, 1878; four hundred and forty-six in 1879; four
hundred and eighteen in 1880; and the same number in
1 88 1. The sum-total is reduced slightly some years by
emigration, as well as by death. The annual numbers
of births and deaths in the tribe are generally about
equal.

THE RESERVATION.

The islands belonging to the Penobscot reservation
number in all, says the agent, one hundred and forty-six,
with an aggregate of four thousand four hundred and

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

eighty-two acres, three-quarters of which have an arable
soil, among the most fertile and eligible for cultivation in
the State. In 1835 the value of the whole was calcula-
ted to be sixty-four thousand two hundred and forty-seven
dollars and sixty-four cents, mainly for the timber and
firewood growing upon them, which have now disap-
peared. The islands have still high value for farming
purposes, however, and some for hitching logs along the
shores, available in the form of rents, although this form
of value is reported as rapidly decreasing. Efforts are
being made to induce the Indians to scatter along
the islands and improve their fertile soil, instead of
concentrating at Oldtown, as has been the tendency
of late years. The agent says: "About all those Indi-
ans who live on their farms up river are self-reliant, and
have comfortable homes." In 1836 a considerable tract
on the west side of Orson Island was surveyed and re-
served for a public farm, suitable buildings were erected,
a foreman was employed, and other preparations made
to interest the tribe more thoroughly in the cultivation of
lots upon the farm. The arrangement was not very ben-
eficial, however, and in 1862 the whole farm was leased,
under an act of the legislature, for a trifling sum. More
recently, however, some of the Indians have began to
cultivate small tracts upon the place.

Many of the islands are leased for a small annual ren-
tal; others, principally those lowest down the river, are
occupied by the Indians themselves; and one. No. 133,
of the group known as Brown Islands, near Winn, is
reserved as their summer camping ground, and no trees
or wood is allowed to be cut from it.

THE PRESENT MISSION.

In the summer of 1878, at the instance of Father O'-
Brien, then priest to the tribe, and Bishop Healy, of
Portland, four members of the community of Sisters of
Mercy were sent from the mother-house at Manchester,
New Hampshire, and established upon the island. They
were at first in a hired house, but in 1880 a neat and
commodious convent and dormitory was erected for them
near the chapel, at a cost of one thousand two hun-
dred dollars, nearly two-thirds of which were contribu-
ted by Indians of the tribe. The Sisters are otherwise
supported by funds of their church, except that they re-
ceive the regular appropriation for schools on the island,
in consideration of their services as teachers. Sister M.
F. Borgia, of the Community, with one or more of her
associates, has had of late sole charge of the school at
Oldtown, and they also minister to the wants of the tribe
in attendance upon the sick and other personal visita-
tions, especially inculcating among the young women
principles of morality, industry, and economy, — the
need of which, indeed, prompted Father O'Brien, in
the first instance, to secure the presence of the sisters
here — and instructing them in sewing and other simple
and domestic art.s, of which they were before almost
wholly ignorant. Soon after going to the island, they
formed a class of women, both married and single, who
engaged in exercises of reading, singing, sewing, and
other useful employments. An evening school was also
established, with good success, for the young men of the

tribe who either could not or would not attend the day
schools. Their influence upon the island has been every
way good. Agent Bailey, in his report for 1880, says of
the Sisters:

These refined and accomplished women, having taken up theirabode
with the tribe on this island, are, with that utter self-abnegation which
characterizes the order, assiduously devoting themselves to the moral
and intellectual advancement of this remnant of a race which, while
living in the midst of our civilization, is not of it.

With the evidence of their devotion to the welfare of this people
daily accumulating, as would be expected, a great regard is recipro-
cally manifested for them, and no prejudice has been able to survive
their ministry of love. It may be premature to express any compara-
tive view of their labors, yet the opinion is ventured that upon the
home life of the tribe their influence will not be the least potent, as
they daily go from house to house, instructing the females in domes-
ticity, economy in expenditures, refinement of manners, and personal
purity.

CHAPTER III.

THE DISCOVERERS.

Tiiorfinn Karlsefne — Sabastian Cabot — John Varrazano — His .Account
of the Maine Country — ^John Rut — .Andre Thevet — First Description
of Penobscot Bay and Islands — Sir Humphrey Gilbert — Gosnold —
Natives in Foreign Garments, and with a Biscay Shallop — Martin
Pring — The Sieur De Monts and Samuel De Champlain — George
Weymouth — Was Weymouth in the Penobscot Waters? — Samuel
.Argall — The Jesuit Fathers — Captain John Smith — New England
First upon his Map — .Subsequent Voyages.

THORKINN KARLSEFNE.

To this daring Icelandic voyager may be accorded the
honor of conducting the first recorded voyage of civil-
ized men along the coast of Maine. Possibly Biarne the
first Norse explorer hitherward, in the winter of 990-91,
had caught a far glimpse of the bold headlands and
deep bays of this rock-bound shore, as he sailed the open
sea from Greenland to Cape Cod, and back from Cape
Cod to Nova Scotia and home. Leif, son of Erik the
Red, in the ship of Biarne nine years later, may also
have descried the coast from his lookouts, as he traversed
the watery way from his Marhland (Nova Scotia) to his
Vinland (probably Rhode Island). The battle of Thor-
vvald, another son of Erik, in 1004, with the Skraellings
(Indians) — the first known conflict of Euro[)eans and
aborigines upon the continent — doubtless came much
nearer the present confines of Maine, being fought, as
Dr. Kohl conjectures, on the shore not far from Boston
harbor. Two years later, came the next courageous
traversers of the Northern seas, Thorfinn and his com-
panions. Thorfinn had married the widow of Thor-
stein, a third son of Erik, and also an explorer, and
from her learned enough of Vinland to fire his imagina-
tion and tempt bim to emulate the deeds of his fellow-
countrymen. His wife and others fanned the flame, and
in the summer of 1007 he fitted out three ships, man-
ning them with one hundred and sixty sailors and in-
tending colonists, and also placing on board a variety of
live stock, for the colony to-be. The next spring they
sailed to Helluland (Leif's "stony land," or Newfound-
land), thence to Markland, and thence, instead of fol-

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

lowing their predecessors across the open sea through
the breadth of the Gulf of Maine, they coasted a long
way to the "southwest, having the land always on their
starboard" — that is, the picturesque land of Maine.
These happy, heroic eight-score were, then, the first of
European stock to look wonder-eyed into the beautiful
bays of Passamaquoddy, of Penobscot, and of Casco.
They left no record of their shoreward visits, if any they
made; but we know that they reached Cape Cod,
probably Buzzard's Bay, and also Narragansett Bay, on
the shores of which Thorfinn attempted settlement.
Here a son was born to him and Gudrida — Snorre, first
of European parentage born on the American continent.
One of Thorfinn's trusty mates, Thorhall the Hunter,
attempted another exploration along the coasts to the
northeast, but was caught by strong west winds and
driven across the ocean to the green shores of Ireland.
Thortinn himself afterwards sailed to the northward, and
came to "the country of the Onefoots," by which name
he may have designated the coasts of New Hampshire
and Maine, and in which country he saw "endless forests."
In the spring of loii, after three years' residence in the
south of Vinland, he sailed away to Greenland, whence
he never returned. It is not known what became of his
colony.

SEB.\ST1.\N CABOT.

After Thorfinn, many Northmen, it is believed, made
trading and ex[)loring voyages to Newfoundland and the
coasts of Maine; but very few and meagre notices of
them have been preserved, and none which relate strictly
to the Maine country. It is quite possible, also, that
one or both of the \'enetian adventurers, Nicolo and
Antonio Zeno, visited the old Icaria, Estotiland, and
Drogeo (Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and New Eng-
land?) laid down upon their map of 1400; but of this
nothing is certainly known. The mists clear away with
the advent of Columbus upon the shores of the New-
World; and from June 24, 1497, when John Cabot
touched the coasts of Labrador in latitude 56 or 58, as
Humboldt and others atifirm, the time, and place of dis-
coveries and explorations are rarely doubtful. The next
year Sebastian Cabot, second of the three sons of John,
sails along the coasts of Labrador and the Newfound-
land, and from the latter southerly, keeping the shores as
much as possible in view on his right. He was the first
Englishman to see the headlands of Maine, and there is
abundant reason to believe that he landed at some
points on his voyage, which was prosecuted to the neigh-
borhood of Cape Hatteras. Says Dr. Kohl :

The voyage of this gifted and enterprising youth along the entire
co;ast of the present United States — nay, along the whole extent of that
great continent in which now the English race and language prevail and
flourish, has always been considered as the true beginning, the founda-
tion and corner-stone of all the English claims and possessions in the
northern half of .America. English flags were Ihe first which were
planted along the shores, and English men were the first of modern
Europeans who with their own eyes surveyed the border of that great
assemblage of countries in which they were destined to become so prom-
inent, and were also the first to put their feet upon it. The history of
each one of that chain of States, stretching along the western shores of
the .Atlantic, begins with Sebastian Cabot and his expedition of 1498.
And this is especially true of the State of Maine and the other States

of New England, whose remarkable coasts were particularly observed
by him and clearly delineated on his chart.

It is thought possible that the Portuguese under Cor-
tereal, the Bretons and other French fishermen in the
early part of the sixteenth century, besides other adven-
turers in these northern waters, may have visited points
upon the shores of Maine; but if they did so, they have
not even left even the tradition of their visits.

JOHN VERR.\Z.\NO.

This voyager, commonly called Verrazaini, w\is a Flor-
entine adventurer, in the service of France. In the
spring of 1524, during his celebrated traverse of the .\t-
lantic shores from Cape Fear northward, he sailed, prob-
ably, along the entire coast of Maine. His account of
this part of the voyage, as translated from the Italian for
Ramusio's narrative in Hakluyt's Voyages, and repub-
lished in the first volume of the second series of the
Maine Historical Collections, is well worth transcription
here, as the first detailed description of this region given
by any European traveller. We retain the old English
of the translation :

Trending afterwards [after leaving Cape Cod] to the north, we found
another land high, full of Ihicke woods, the trees there of fitre, cipresse,
and such like as are wont to grow in cold countreys. The people dif-
fer much from the other, and looke how much the former seemed to be
curteous and gentle, so much were these full of rudenesse and ill man-
ners, and so barbarous that by no signes that ever we could make, could
we have any kind of traffike with them. Tbey cloth themselves with
Beares skinnes and Luzernes and Scales and other beastes skinnes.
Their food, as farre as we could perceive, repairing often to their dwell-
ings, we supposed to be by hunting and fishing, and of certaine fruits,
which are a kind of roots, which the earth yeeldeth of her own accord.
Th*^y have no graine, neither saw we any kind of signe of tillage, nei-
ther is the land, for the barrennesse thereof, apt to beare fruit or seed.
If at any time we desired by exchange to have anv of their commodi-
ties, they used to come to the seashore upon certain craggy rocks, and
we standing in our boats, they let down with a rope, crying continually
thai we should not approach to the land, demanding immediately the
exchange, taking nothing but knives, fishhooks, and tooles to cut
wilhall, neither did they make any account of our courtesie. .And
when we had nothing left to exchange with them, when we departed
from them, the people showed all signes of discourtesie and disdaine
as were possible for any creature to invent. We were in dispight of
them two or three leagues within the land, being in number twenty-five
armed men of us. -And when we went on shore they shot at us with
their bowes, making great outcries, and afterwards fled into the woods.

We found not in this land anything notable or of importance, saving
very great woods and certaine hills; they may have some mineral mat-
ter in them, because we saw many of them have headstones of copper
hanging at their eares. We departed from thence, keeping our course
northeast along the coast, which we found more pleasant champion
'champaign] and without woods, with high mountains within the land.
Continuing directly along the coast for the space of fifty leagues, we
disco\'ered thirty-two Islands, lying all neere the land, bein,g small and
pleasant to the view, high, and having many turnings and windings be-
Iwene them, making many fair harboroughs and chanels as they do in
the Gulfe of \'enice, in Sclavonia and Dalmatia. We had no knowl-
edge or acquaintance with the people : we suppose they are of the same
manners or nature as the others are. Sayling Northeast for the space
of one hundred and fiftie leagues, we discovered the land that in times
past was discovered by the Britons, which is in fiftie degrees.

JOHN RUT.

In 1527 Master John Rut, of the .Mary of Guilford, a
vessel dispatched by King Henry VIII. of England,
visited the coasts of "Arambec" or "Norumbega," as
Hakluyt mentions it, often, as the same relator tells,
"entering the ports of those regions, landing men, and
examining into the condition of the country," and again.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

she "oftentimes put her men on land to search the state
of these unknown regions." This is the first authentic
report giving clear information of the landing of English-
men u[)on these shores. It is quite probable that Master
Rut penetrated and explored the Penobscot, and visited
the people thereaway. Many maps of this period set
down Penobscot Bay as the great river of Norumbega,
and it was undoubtedly then the best-known water of
Maine. One writer thinks that Verrazano, who had re-
commended this expedition, was with it, and that he
perished at the hands of tlie savages on one of his ex-
cursions into the interior.

ANDRE THEVET.

This extensive traveller, a Frenchman and Franciscan
friar, took the coast of Maine in his voyage along the
Atlantic shore of both South and North America, in
1554-56. He has left in his Cosmography the first de-
tailed description of the Penobscot Bay and natives,
which is highly interesting, and deserves quoting in full,
as below:

Having left La Florida on the left hand, with all its islands, gulfs,
and capes, a river presents itself, which is one of the finest rivers in the
whole world, which we call Noriimbegue, and the aborigines .-^goncy,
and which is marked on some marine charts as the Grand River [mean-
ing Tenobscot Bay]. Several other beautiful rivers enter into it; and
upon its banks the French formerly erected a little fort about ten or
twelve leagues from its mouth, which was surrounded by fresh water,
and this place was named the Fort of Norumbegue.

.Some pilots would make me believe that this country (Norumbegue)
is the proper country of ('anada. But I told them that this was far
from the truth, since this country lies in 43° N., that of Canada in 50
or 52°. Before you enter the s.iid river appears an island [Fox Island],
surrounded by eight very small islets, which are near the country of
the green mountains [Camden Hills], and to the cape of the islets.
F'rom there you sail all along unto the mouth of the river, which is dan-
gerous from t'le great number of thick and high rocks ; and its entrance
is wonderfully large, .'^bout three leagues into the river an island pre-
sents itself to you that may have four leagues in circumference [Long
Island, now Islesboro']. inhabited only by some fishermen and birds of
different sorts, which island they called Aiayascou, because it has the
form of a man's arm, which they call so. Its greatest length is from
north to south. It wonld be very easy to plant on this island, and build
a fortress on it to keep in check the whole surrounding country. Hav-
ing landed and put our feet on the adjacent country, we perceived a
great mass of people coming down upon us from all sides in such num-
bers that you might have supposed them to have been a flight of star-
lings. Those who marched first were the men, wdiich they call tnjuchnns.
After them came the women, which they call pcrgruastas\ then the
adigcstas, being the children, and the last were the girls, called aiiiiis-
gestas. And all this people was clothed in skins of wild animals, which
they call rabalatz. Now, considering their aspect and manner of pro-
ceeding, we mistrusted them and went on board our vessel. But they,
perceiving our fear, lifted their hands into the air, making signs that
we should not mistrust them; and for making us still more sure, they
sent to our vessel some of their principal men, which brought us pro-
visions. In recompense of this, we gave them a few trinkets of a low
price, by which they were highly pleased. The ne.xt morning I, with
some others, was commissioned to meet them, to know whether they
would be inclined to assist us with more victuals, of which we were
very much in need. But having entered into the house, which they
call eattoquc, of a certain little king of theirs which called himself Per-
amich, we saw several killed animals hanging on the beams of the said
house, which he had prepared (as he assured us) to send to us. This
chief gave us a very hearty welcome, and, to show us his affection, he
ordered to kindle a fire, which they call azista, on which the meat was
to be put and fish to be roasted. Upon this some rogues came in to
bring to the king the heads of six men, which they had taken in war
and massacred, which terrified us, fearing that they might treat us in
the same way. But toward evening we secretly retired to our ship
without bidding good-bye to our host. .'\t this he was very much irri-

tated, and came lo us the next morning, accompanied by three of his
children, showing a mournful countenance, because he thought that we
had been dissatisfied with him; and he said in his language, "Let us
go, let us go on land, my friend and brother; come to drink and eat
what we have; we assure you upon oath by Heaven, earth, moon, and
stars, that you shall fare not worse than our own persons."

.Seeing the good affection and will of this old man, some twenty of
us went again on land, every one of us with his arms ; and then we
went to his lodgings, where we were treated and presented with what
he possessed. And meanwhile great numbers of people arrived, cares.s-
ing and offering themselves to give us pleasure, saying that they were
our friends. Late in the evening, when we were willing to retire and to
take leave of the company with actions of gratitude, they would not
give us leave. Men, women, children, all entreated us zealously to stay
with them, crying out these words, "My friends, do not start from here ;
you shall sleep this night with us." But they could not harangue so
well as to persuade us to sleep with them. And so we retired to our
vessel : and, having remained in this place five full days, we weighed
anchor, parting from them with a marvelous contentment of both
sides, and went out to the open sea.

GILBERT.

In 1583 Sir Humphrey Cilbert, arriving with his shi|js
at St. Johns, Newfoundland, read his commission from
Queen Elizabeth of England, and formally took posses-
sion of the place and the region within a radius of two
hundred leagues therefrom for the crown. He received a
sod and a twig in token of subjection, and set up a pillar
bearing a shield of lead, with the English arms engraved
upon it.

GOSNOLD.

Bartholomew Gosnold was the first English navigator
who sailed straight from Great Britain for the Anieiican
shores. 'J'his was in 1602. On the 4th of May he
sighted land at or about the forty-third degree of north
latitude. Mr. Williamson thinks this first land he saw
might have been Mount Desert or Agamenticus ; but
others, not relying upon Gosnold's reckoning, place it
further to the southward, in the neighborhood of Cape
Ann, if not the cape itself* Wherever it was, his ves-
sel was here boarded by a jjarty of Indians, who came in
"a shallop of European fabric," such as fisheinien use in
the Bay of Biscay, carrying sails as well as oars. They
had also an iron grapple and a kettle in their little ship.
The leader and one or two others were partly dressed in
foreign garmenLk.and as the old account in Putt has says,
"they spoke divers Christian words, and seemed to un-
derstand more than we, for want of langtiage, could
comprehend." This incident is highly interesting, as
showing that Biscayan fishermen had been driven across
the ocean, or that Frenchmen or Spaniards had visited
the coast of Maine (or Massachusetts, as the case may
be,) before the visit of Gosnold, and had there disap-
peared, leaving only these traces of their visit. •

M.\RT1N PRING

was one of Gosnold's companions. In the spring of the
next year he was provided by some merchants of Bristol
with two small vessels, with which he made, beyond all
doubt, a voyage along the coast of Maine, entering,
among other waters, and probably the first he entered on
this shore, the Bay of Penobscot. He found a "high
country full of great woods," with which the voyagers
were greatly pleased, as also with the fishing and harbor-

* See Bryant & Gay's Popular Hi.story of the Lfniled States, vol. i, p. 363.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

age; and, finding silver-grey foxes upon an island, they I
named the whole cluster the Fox Islands, which has
been. -retained, although the corporate name of the prin-
cipal ones, since ly^Sg, has been Vinalhaven. Gorges
relates that Pring made a perfect discovery of "all these
Eastern rivers and harbors, and brought the most exact
account of the coast that had ever come to hand."

DE MON'TS.

After the appointment by the French king of Pierre
du Guast, the Sieur de Monts, as Lieutenant-General of
Acadia, a vast country stretching from the fortieth to the
forty-sixth degree of north latitude, he sailed from Havre
de Grace in March, 1604; in about two months reached
Nova Scotia, and wintered at a fort he built upon an is-
land in the St. Croix River. With him was the restless
and daring navigator Samuel Champlain, and during the
winter the latter made a coasting voyage as far as Cape
Cod, concerning which little has been related. About
the middle of May, 1605, De Monts abandoned liis fort, 1
and himself sailed southward in search of a better loca- j
tion for his colony. He visited Mount Desert, entered
the Bay of Penobscot and viewed "Norumbegua," as
the adjacent country was then understood to be called;
entered the Kennebec also, and upon its banks erected
a cross and took possession for the French crown; also
penetrated the Casco and the Saco, sailed up Portland
Harbor, which he named Marchin, from an Indian chief
he met there; went on to Cape Cod, whence he returned
to St. Croix, unable to make a settlement through fear of
the natives, and finally went "to Port Royal with his
colony.

The voyage of this French explorer is forever linked
with the interesting story and beautiful scenery of Mount
Desert. Mrs. Clata Barnes Martin, in her interesting
guide book to this island, has the following:

From the voyages of this De Monts and of his associates and suc-
cessors, Mount Desert derives all tlie human interest of those early
years. Champlain first named it "Mons Deserle," from its wild and
savage solitudes, and the name " Frenchman's Bay," now applied only
to the water lying inmiediately northeast of this island, then belonged
to the whole expanse eastward to the Bay of Fundy. The name per-
petuates the memory of the sore strait to which came one Nicholas
D'.Aubri, a priest who accompanied De Monts in his first voyage. Be-
ing one of a party who left their boat to e.xplore the forest, he dropped
his sword by a brook where they stopped to drink. Returning to find
it, he soon lost his way; and his companions, after vain efforts to res-
cue him, were obliged to leave him to his fate. For sixteen days the
poor priest wandered along the shore nearly starved, till he was dis-
covered by a party who had returned to the spot in search of reputed
gold and silver, and was carried back to his companions, who received
him as one from the dead. This story, it may be added, is .given upon
the authority of one of the early historians of Maine. Remembering
what war of words has arisen concerning the planting of .settlements
but little farther west, these traditions are proffered, subject to such
amends as more able research may supply.

S.\MUEI. CHAMPL.AIN.

This famous French voyager appeared off the coasts of
Maine, which he called "Norumbegue," in September,
1604, with a small vessel sent from the St. Croix as an
expedition by the Sieur de Monts. He found and named
the isle "de Monts-deserts," and the Isle au Haut, at the
mouth of Penobscot Bay, which have retained their
names ever since; sailed up the Norumbegue or Penob-

scot River to the site of Bangor, where he is believed to

have moored his vessel at the foot of Newberry street,
just below the rocks in the stream ; had an interview
with the chiefs Bessabezand Cahabis; descended the river
safely, and went on coasting to the southwestward, prob-
ably to the St. George's River, whence he returned to the
St. Croix. He observed on the voyage the Camden Hills,
which he called the mountains of Bedabedec. The next
year he, with De Monts, was again in Penobscot Bay,
among the Fox Islands, but did not ascend the river.
Once more, in 1606, Champlain was in the bay, where
he stopped to repair his vessel.

GEORGE WEYMOUTH.

Dr. Belknap, in the second volume of his American
Biography, holds that the Penobscot Bay and River were
discovered by Captain Weymouth and his associates, in
June, 1605. He was sent out by the Earl of Southamp-
ton and others, in the English interest, to check the de-
signs of the French, whose claim to the Northeast coast
was denied. Ostensibly, Weymouth was sent to discover
the northwest passage ; but he sighted the American
coast instead, near Cape Cod, and ran northwardly to
the island of Monhegan (which he named St. George),
and there dropped anchor. He remained here nearly a
month, and made a beginning of agriculture on these
shores. His subsequent movements are much in discus-
sion. The following is an extract from the journal of the
voyage :

June 12 [1605]. — Our captain manned his shallop with seventeen
men and ran up the codde of the river, where we landed, leaving six to
keep the shallop. Ten of us, with our shot, and some armed, with a
boy to carry powder and match, marched up the country toward the
mountains, which we descried at our first falling in with the land, and
were continually in our view. To some of them the river brought us
so near, as we judged ourselves, when we landed, to be within a league
of them; but we found them not, having marched well-nigh four miles
and passed three great hills. Wherefore, because the weather was hot
and our men in their aimour, not able to travel far and return to their
pinnace at night, we resolved not to travel further.

We were no sooner come aboard our pinnace, returning do\\ii toward
our ship, but we espied a canoe coming from the further part of the
codde of the river, eastwaid. In it were three Indians, one of whom
we had before seen, and his coming was very earnestly to importune us
to let one of our men go with them to the Bashabe, and then the next
morning he would come to our ship with furs and tobacco.

June 13. — By 2 o'clock in the morning, taking advantage of the tide,
we went in our pinnace up to that part of the river which trendeth west
into the main, and we carried a cross to erect at that point [a thing
never omitted by any Christian travellers]. Into that river we rowed,
by estimation, twenty miles.

Whatever profit or pleasure is described in the former part of the
river is wholly doubled in this; for the breadth and depth is such that a
ship, drawing seventeen or eighteen feet of water, might have passed
as far as we went with our shallop, and much farther, because we left
it in so good a depth. From the place of our ship's riding in the har-
bor, at the entrance into the sound, to the furthest point we were in this
river, by an estimation, was not much less than three-score miles.

We were so pleased with this ruer, and so loth to forsake it, that we
would have continued there willingly for two days, having only bread
and cheese to eat. But the tide not suffering it, we came down with
the ebb. We conceived that the river ran very far into the land, for
we passed six or seven miles altogether fresh water (whereof we all
drank), forced up by a flowing of the salt water.

June 14. We warped our ship down to the river's mouth, and there
came to anchor.

15. Weighed anchor, and with a breeze from the land came to our
i watering-place in Penobscot Harbor, and filled our cask.

The last natned place has been reasonably conjee-

5°

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINI

tured to be the present George's Island Harbor ; the
"codde" or bay of the river, the Belfast Bay, in the
Penobscot waters ; and the canoe seen to have come
from Bagaducc, on the east side of Penobscot Bay. The
voyage with the shallop, or pinnace, is argued to have
been up the channel of the river. Weymouth is sup-
posed to have anchored his ship ofif the peninsula now
called Old Fort Point, and the mountains seen are iden-
tified as the Penobscot Hills. The reasoning to support
some of these conclusions will be found in the second
volume of Belknap's American Biography.

They are sharply controverted, however, by Mr. John
McKeen, in a paper contributed to the fifth volume of
the Maine Historical Collections, who is supported by
writers in a subsequent volume of this scries. He holds
that Weymouth, according to these entries in the Jour-
nal, entered Townsend Harbor, since called Booth Bay,
and thence explored the Sagadahoc River. The editor
of the Collections does not agree with his arguments,
but holds to the Penobscot theory, which ex-Covernor
Joshua L. Chamberlain, now President of Bowdoin
College, in his Centennial discourse on Maine: Her
Place in History, seems also to favor. Dr. Palfrey, in his
History of New England, suggests the Kennebec as the
river of Weymouth's exploration, and others say the St.
George's or Sagadahoc ; but it must be said, we think,
that the weight of authority is with the Penobscot. The
fact which seems to us conclusive, is the depth of water
the diarist mentions about three-score miles " from the
entrance into the sound," which is true of the Penobscot,
but not of any other of the rivers in discussion.

The adventurers were greatly delighted with the noble
river and the country it waters. The Journal says:
"Many who iiad been travellers in sundry countries
and in the most famous rivers, affirmed them not com-
parable with this — the most beautiful, rich, large, secure
harbouring that the world affordeth." One of the old
authors says Weymouth set up several crosses upon the
land. He made no settlement, however; but sailed
down the coast, carrying away five captive Indians, two
of whom afterwards appeared in the streets of London,
to wonder-eyed and gaping throngs.

SAMtiEf. .\r<;all.

This English adventurer, who three years afterwards
by strategy carried off Pocahontas from her father's cap-
ital to hold her a prisoner at Jamestown, visited the
coast of Maine in 1610, on a fishing voyage. He was
driven out of his course by a storm, and landed on a
rocky island off Penobscot Bay, where he found "great
store of seals," and so called it Seal Rock, a name still
appertainmg to it. About three years afterwards he re-
turned — Champlain says with sixty soldiers and fourteen
pieces of artillery — and learning from the natives of
the mission and settlement just beginning under the
French in this region, at St. Sauveur, he suddenly at-
tacked them, killing one of the missionaries, as else-
where related, and completely breaking up the settlement,
on the plea that it was within the patent of the Virginia

Company. He then sailed up the coast and completed
the reduction of the French settlements in Acadia.

THE JESUIT FATHERS.

It is worthy of note that the pious expedition set on
foot by Madame la Marquise de Guercheville, the
French lady to whom De Monts had ceded his Acadian
title, and which bore the Fathers Biard and Masse, Quen-
tun and Gilbert du Thet, was originally destined for Kad-
esquit, which occupied the site of Bangor. Biard, who
had preceded the latter two into the wilderness, had al-
ready selected this as a mission station; and when they
reached the harbor of St. Sauveur, on Mount Desert,
they eagerly inquired the way to Kadesquit. The na-
tives answered that their place was better, and, under
plea of a visit to their sagamore Asticon, who was sick,
they led the way to a beautiful site on the shore of
Some's Sound, so advantageous that the cross ivas there
planted, a slight entrenchment thrown up, and settlement
begun, to the utter abandonment of the Kadesquit
scheme. Had they gone up the Penobscot instead, they
might have escaped the overwhelming disaster which fell
upon them, as just above related.

CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH.

This celebrated explorer and soldier, of whom so
many romantic stories are told, including the story of
Pocahontas, was on the Maine coast in 16 14. He land-
ed at Monhegan the last of April, with two vessels from
London, and presently, in small boats, explored the
shores each way, from Penobscot to Cape Cod, making
a map of the coast as he went, which was prefixed to
his History. In the title of this first appears the name
New England, which some say Prince Charles gave;
others say more probalily, he only confirmed the name
which Smith suggested. The name is contained in
Smith's claim that he "broughte our newe England to the
subjection of the kingdom of Create Britain." In his
explorations the shrewd Captain picked up a valuable
cargo, which was sold abroad to great advantage. His
best trading was not in the Penobscot country, where, he
says, "our commodities were not so much esteemed," as
"the French traders bartered their articles on better
terms."

In 1615 Smith made another start upon a voyage to
reach New England, but was driven back by storms; and
a third venture was intercepted by French pirates, and
he was once more compelled to return. He was not
heard of again in the New World he had done so much
to discover, develop, and advertise.

SUBSEQUENT VOYAGES

to the coast of Maine have no special concern with this
history. The Penobscot waters were now well known to
the world, and scarcely ten years more elapsed before
the habitations of civilization began to rise upon their
picturesque shores.

'HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

CHAPTER IV.

GEOGRAPHICAL DESIGNATIONS.

Vinland— Skroellinge Land— Mavoshen—Drogeo— Terra de Baccalhaos
The Land of llie Bretons— The Country of Gomez— Norumbeg.a—
The Term m Literature— Acadia— North Virginia— New England-
Nova Scotia — The Waldo or Muscongiis Patent— The County of
Canada— The Territory of Sagadahock— The County of Cornwall —
The Dutch at Penobscot— New Ireland — The Province of Mayne—
The District of Maine— The State of Maine.

No SMALL part of the early history of this Northeastern
country is involved in the tlefinitions given by the ex-
plorers or early cartographers to the territory now occu-
pied by the State of Maine, or to larger tracts within
which that territory was included. As the process of
colonization went on, and the demands formore localized
government increased, we shall also find that the valley
of the Penobscot, or some part of it, was included in va-
rious successive county organizations, until at last Pe-
nobscot county, with its present limits and subdivisions,
stood full-formed.

VINI.AND.

Leif, son of Erik the Red, a Noiseman and the first
settler of Greenland, set out from the settlement at Erik's
Fiord in the year 1000, and sailed with a crew of thirty-five
men to the southwest, over a track [lursued ninj years
before by Biarne, whose ship Lief had bought. First
they reached the land seen by Biarne, Labrador or New-
foundland, which they called Helluland, or the Stone
Land. Sailing thence to the coast of Nova Scotia, they
called it Markland, or the Woodland. Reaching finally
Cape Cod, and, it is believed, the south shore of Rhode
Island, and finding there the marvel of vines and grapes,
they gave to this south country the name of Vinland,
which needs no interpretation, and which the Norsemen
subsequently applied to the whole coast between that re-
gion and Markland, or Nova Scotia. Vinland, then, was
the first country of European designation in which the
Penobscot territory, or any part of it, was included.

The "Promontorium Vinlandis," as a designation for
our Cape Cod, stands out conspicuously u|3on the chart
of the North .Atlantic, published by the Icelander Sigurd
Stephanius, in 1570. This point, however, because "it
was long to sail by," the daring voyagers themselves had
called Furdurstrands, or the \Vondei -strands.

In the year 11 12 Pope Paschal II. a]j[)ointed Erik
Upsi, a Norse ecclesiastic, as Bishop of Iceland, Green-
land, and Vinland ; and he is very doubtfully said to
have visited personally the last-named or North Ameri-
can division of his diocese, in 1121.

"SKR.ELLINGE LAND,"

or the country of the wretched dwarfs — that is, the sav-
ages, who were designated by the rude Northmen with
the contemptuous epithet of SkrasUings (chips, parings, or
mere fragments of humanity) — is the term applied upon
the map of Stephanius to the whole country between the
Promontorium Vinlandia; and "Marckland."

Mr. Gay, in his Popular History of the United States,
starts a very interesting inquiry as to these dwarfish
Skraellings. He says:

The assumption is that that these people of the Vinland vicinity were
Esquimau.x. If that be true, and the term was used merely for want of
any other to apply to copper-colored natives, then we are to conclude
that the Indians were later comers in that part of the country. Did the
first displace the Mound-building people, and then, in the course of
time, move upon and displace the Estiuimaux of the Atlantic coast?
Was it this race who were not smokers, and who made the shell-heaps
where no pipes are found?

MAVOSHF.N.

The aboriginal designation by which the territory now
embraced in the State of Maine was known, is that of
Mavoshn, Mavooshen or Mawooshen (Belknap) Mai-
vooshen (Purchas), or Moasham (Gorges). It was the
general name, apparently, given by the red-skinned na-
tives of the land. Mr. Belknap, in the second volume of
his American Biography, says it was a title for the whole
country of Maine and comprised nine or ten rivers,
whereof the westernmost was Shawakotock, known to the
French as Chouakoet, and to the English as Saco. The
easternmost was Quibequessen, somewhere east of the
PenobscoL The northern part of the same district, he
remaiks further, included the Penobscot bay and river,
which were also called Pemaquid, though the latter name
was afterwards approjjriated to the jjoint or reach of land
six leagues to the westward. Not far from here dwelt
the great chief, the Bashaba, who presumably ruled the
dominions of Mavoshen. Purchas' Pilgrimage describes
Mavoshen as "a country lying to the north and east of
Virginia, between the degrees of forty -three and forty-five.
It is forty leagues broad and fifty in length, lying in
breadth east and west and in length north and south. It
is bordered on the east side with a country, the people
whereof they call Tarrantines ; on the east with Ephistoma ;
on the north with a great wood, called Senaglecouna ; and
on the south with the main ocean, sea, and many islands.
In Mavooshen it seemeth there are nine rivers, the west-
ernmost of which is Shawacotoc. At the head of this
river, to the northwest, there is a small province which
they call Crokemago, wherein is one town. This is c<m-
jectured by the historian Williamson to have been" prob-
ably the Indian Pegwacket"

The present tract of Penobscot county was, then,
anciently a part of " Mavoshen." We shall in like man-
ner proceed briefly to indicate the several geographical
designations and civil jurisdictions including the region
of which this History is more immediately to treat.

UROGEO.

The sea-chart of the Venetian brothers, Nicolo and
Antonio Zeno, drawn about the year 1400, nearly a cen-
tury before the discovery by Columbus, published in
1558, and beautifully reduced and printed in fac-simile
by Dr. Kohl, in the first volume of the new series of the
Maine Historical Collections, exhibits three unknown
lands in the Western Hemisphere — Icaria, Estotiland, and
Drogeo. The first of these, an island, has been identified
with reasonable probability as Newfoundland; the second
as Nova Scotia; the third as the Norse Vinland, or New-
England, and upon the map of Lewelel, published at
Brussels in 1852, with his Geography of the Middle Ages,
it appears precisely in the locality of the present State of

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

Maine. It is blind work idenlifying the tracts, from the
meager indications presented ; but the conclusions reached
above seem the most probable of any. Drogeo, then,
is another pre-Columbian name for the country with
which this History deals.*

Drogeo was afterwards depicted upon the old charts as
an island, floating somewhere in mid-ocean.

TERRA DE BACC.M,H.\O.S.

Upon several of the Portuguese and other old maps,
the New England country is included in the vast tract
designated as Terra de Baccalhaos, a Portuguese term for
the Land of Codfish, said by some to have been discov-
ered by the father of the Cortereals before the time of
Columbus. The English sometimes called it "the Coun-
try of Bacallaos," and likewise " the Newfoundland,"
and " the New Isles." The Baccalhaos name designated
the island of Newfoundland for a long time.

THE LANli OK THE liRETONS.

Early in the sixteenth century, the hardy Bretons of
St. Malo, the Normans of Dieppe, and other Frenchmen,
began to apjiear in fishing voyages upon the coasts of
Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. The former gave the
title to the island of Cape Breton, which bears, as Dr.
Kohl remarks, the oldest F'rench name on the American
northeast coast. From them also was derived the desig-
nation Tcrre dts Bretons, or Land of the Bretons, which
appears upon maps of that time as applicable to a wide
extent of territory, including Nova Scotia and a large
part .of New England. It w-as also described by Ra-
musio as La Ter>-e Ncrroe (the New Land), extending
from forty degrees to sixty degrees north, and he says
many called it, particularly the southern part, La Terre
Fra/icais (the French Land).

THE COUNTRY OF GOMEZ.

On the old Spanish maps of North America, the tract
of which Maine is now a subdivision is laid down as
" La Tierra de Gomez," from Estevan (Stephen) Gomez,
a Portuguese in the service of Spain, who sailed in 1525
from Newfoundland, probably, to Florida. He may
have seen or touched the shores of Maine, but there is
no certain record of it, except, perhaps, a remark here-
after quoted from the beginning of Hakluyt's Discourse
concerning Western Planting. Dr. Kohl says, however :

Gomez probably entered this inlet [Penobscot Bay], and e.xplored it
more accurately than any other part of the coast; and in his report to
the king may probably have lavished his praises on its harbors, us
islands and its scenery.

We have already noted a fact which lends additional
probability to this statement, that the Penobscot river
was called the Rio de Gomez on the maps, and also by
another Spanish name, the Rio Grande. His voyage
adds one more to the nationalities that have claimed
jurisdiction or given a name to this region. After that
event the fishermen of Biscay, for more than a hundred
years, appeared in the waters about Newfoundland with

*The Rev. H. V. Da Costa, however, in his Critical E.\amination of
Dr. Kohl's work, thinks the learned German mistaken in his location of
" Drogeo," and that the appellation never belonged to any country so
far to the southward as Maine.

many vessels, amid the fishing fleets of the Bretons, Nor-
mans, and Basques, until they were forced away by rival
nations about the middle of the seventeenth century.

NORUMBEGA.

This — or Norombega (Purchas and Belknap), Nor-
umbegua (Sullivan), or Norimbagua (Champlain), etc.,
etc., — is more strictly a local designation, probably ap-
plied, rather than found, by the Europeans who earliest
visited the Penob.scot waters. Williamson says, however,
in treating of De Monts' expedition :

In ranging the coast weslwardly, they entered the bay of Penobscot,
which, with the neighboring country, some European adventurers had
previously understood by the natives, was called Norombegua.

L'Escarbot, in his History of De Monts' Voyages,
notes the name, in the same passage with " St. Croix,"
as that of a river in the country of the Etchetnins. Pur-
chas's note is " Pemptegoet [Penobscot] is that place so
famous under the name of Norombega." M. Denys, in
his Geographical and Historical Description of North
America, 1672, mentions "Norimbagua" as the previous
name of the first province in what he calls Canada —
that province extending " from Pentagoet [Penobscot]
to St. John." Belknap's remark seems to cover the
exact ground of the real information on the subject :

Norombega was a part of the same district comprehending Penobscot
bay and river, but its easleru and western limits are not described.

Finally, the following interesting discussion of the sub-
ject is embraced in Governor Sullivan's History of the
District of Maine :

The people of Xorumbega were supposed to be an ancient people
who lived on the river Penobscot, then called Pemptegeovett, near to
which, as it was imagined, a great city once stood, called by the name
of Norumbegua. Tlie bounds of New England was conceived to e.v-
tend to the river Pemaquid. and the country of Norumbegua to be
bounded west on that, and to run as far east as Penobscott, including
.Sheepscott river, then called Chavacovett. Some suppose it to be a
collection of Indian huts, and others an ancient town. In ogilby it ts
conjectured to be the ruins of an ancient town, which the natives called
Arambeck, and had deserted it. Some thought that the country had
been called by this name because a colony of Norwegians had anciently
been settled there.

The appellation of this part of the country, and of the several parts
which were supposed to be within the same, and of the rivers supposed
to be there, are not known in the Indian language, nor have the natives
any traditions of such towns or cities as are conjectured in the old
writers of the American history. On the whole, it may be safely con-
cluded that there never was an ancient country or city called Norum-
begua, but that the rage of the day for new discoveries, and the idle
tales of the voyagers, gave an imaginary existence to such a place.

The name Arambec, or Arambeag, sometimes found
instead of Norumbega, is believed to come nearer the
original word, as eag is a well-known termination in many
geographical names in the Northeast, meaning land or
place. A corruption of this, and the change into a Latin
ending, would easily give Norumbega. This designation
was generally used by the French, until supplanted by
Acadia. Norumbega first appears upon the old maps in
a chart of New France, prepared by the Italian Jacomo di
Gastaldi, about the year 1550. Here the "Terra de
Nvrvmbega," ornamented with neat drawings of trees
and mountains, and many figures of natives variously
engaged, with fishermen and sea animals off the shore,
corresponds closely to the later Nova Scotia. Its shore-

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

line is about 500 miles long. But a small stretch of the
coast of Maine is shown.

G,astaldi doubtless derived the information upon which
this map was made from Pierre Crignon, a French navi-
gator and writer, in 1537 or 1539, upon the French ex-
plorers, who was the first, so far as is known, to disclose
the aboriginal name "Norumbt'ga," by which he names
a vast extent of couiitr\'. including the tract now occu-
pied by Maine. (But Mr. DeCosta says Norumbega was
named by Peter Martyr, in 151 1. See his The Northmen
in Maine: A Critical E.\amination, etc.) According, how-
ever, to this writer's "Discourse of a great French sea-
captain of Dieppe [Jean Parmetier], on the navigations
made to the West Indies, called New France, from the
40° to the 47' N.," Norumbega reached even to Florida.
It was subsequently narrowed to New England, then to
the Maine country, and finally to the Penobscot region.
The preface to the first volume of the New Series of the
Maine Historical Collections remarks that " the ancient
Norumbega, embracing sometimes the whole of New-
England, has a conspicuous place on nearly all the early
maps, and retained its name far into the next century,
but over a narrower region.

Old Heylin, in his Cosmographie, printed at London
in 1652, attempts something like a boundary of tliis
country in the following :

Norombega hath on the N. E. Nova .Scotia, on the S. \V. Virginia.
Virginia, in the full latitude thereof, e.xtendeth
from the 34th degree, where it joins with Florida, unto the 44th degree,
where it quartereth on Xorombega.

Now we will let Monsieur Crignon speak for himself
in regard to this wonderful land. He says:

Going beyond the cape of the Bretons, there is a country contiguous
to this cape, the coast of which trends to the west a quarter southwest
to the country ^f Florida, and runs along for a good five hundred
leagues ; which coast was disco\'ered fifteen years ago by Master Gio-
vanni da Verrazano in the name of the King of France and of Madame
la Regente : and this country is called by many " La Francese, " and
even by the Portuguese themselves ; and its end is toward Florida under
18'' west and 38*^ north. The inhabitants of this country are a very
pleasant, tractable, and peaceful people. The country- is abounding
with all sorts of fruits. There grow oranges, almonds, wild grapes,
and many other fruits of odoriferous trees. The country is named by
the inhabitants, "Nurumbega;" and between it and Brazil is a great
gulf, in which are the islands of the West Indies, discovered by the
Spaniards.

But before this, in 1527, the English ship Mary of
Guilford, commanded by Master John Rut, had been in
North American w-aters, and "returned by the coasts of
Newfoundland, Cape Breton, and Norumbega," as Hak-
luyt says in his book of Voyages, Navigations, etc. But
Hakluyt's first edition w-as not published till 1589, and
Gastaldi must have relied upon Crignon. This old edi-
tion of Hakluyt's reads "coasts of Arambec," which prob-
ably means the same as Norumbega.

Upon the map of Girolamo Ruscelli, of date 1561,
this country appears as "Tierra de Nurumberg" (an evi-
dent confusion of "Norumbega" with a noted German
city), and is placed on the coast above "Larcadia," or
Acadia, which is something like getting the cart before
the horse.

Again, upon the map of Michael Lok, of 15S2, niade
after Verrazano's "olde excellent mappe," the country

appears as "Norombega," a long island, including every-
thing from Cape Breton to a large strait running from
north to south, and supposed by some to designate the
Hudson river. All the n-iaps of Lok's time are said by
Dr. Kohl to have the name conspicuous upon this part
of thern. Upon many subsequent maps it is displaced
by "Tiera de Bacalos" and other titles, but reappears on
Mercator's maps, in the latter part of the sixteenth cen-
tury, in the "Novus Atlas" of William and John Blaen,
1642, where it is printed as "Norembega," but previously,
in a map published by Hondius in 1607, as "Nurum-
bega."

In a great map of 1543, prepared by order of Henry
II., King of France, the name "Auotobagra" occurs
near Penobscot Bay, just where other maps have Norum-
bega, and runs up to a castle or cluster of houses in the
place where subsequent charts locate the city of Norum-
bega. "Auorobagra" is therefore reasonably conjectured
to be a misprint for the latter word.

On the map of the celebrated geographer and carto-
grapher, Gerard Mercator, 1568, repiesenting the east
coast of North America, we have the first location of a
large city or aboriginal capital of the country of Norum-
bega, on the east bank of the Penobscot, with the name
"Norumbega" attached. The existence of such a city
is also afifirnied by some of the old writers, as Pilot Jean
Alphonse, of Xaintonge, who says that Noronibega was a
city fifteen to twenty leagues from the sea, whose inhab-
itants were small and of a dark complexion. The fable
was repeated as late as 1607, in the Historie Universelle
des Indes Occidentales, and the name is honorably per-
petuated in "Norombega Hall" and otherwise. Yet it
must be said that the evidence supporting such belief is
very slight and unsatisfactory. Even the maps exhibit-
ing the locality place it upon the east side of the Penob-
scot ("on the Brewer flats," some writers say), and not
upon the site of Bangor.

The tradition of a large city called Norombega, situa-
ted upon the site of the city, seems, however, to have
passed into tacit acceptance in that place. But Judge
Godfrey and other well-inforn-ied local writers speak of it
as "the mythical great city," and the like. Champlain
says in his Voyages:

From the entrance [of Penobscot Bay] to where I was, which is
twenty-five leagues up the river, I saw no city nor village nor appear-
ance of there having been one ; but, indeed, one or two savage huts
where there was nobody.

And again, in the account of his voyage of 1605,

through Penobscot Bay and up the river, he says of the

rumored Norumbega:

They say also there is a great city well peopled with savages, adroit
and skillful, and used to the manufacture of cotton. I am sure that
most of those who speak of these things have never seen them, and de-
rive their authority from men who know no more than themselves.

All that Champlain reports of possible civilization in
the Penobscot wilderness was what he took to be an an-
cient and moss-covered cross somewhere in the woods.
He was undoubtedly mistaken, however, in his identifi-
cation of this object — unless, indeed, he in 1605 found
Weymouth's cross planted up some river the same spring,
which would hardly be as yet old and mossy.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

Says Heylin, in his Cosmographie:

Most have formerly agreed upon Norumbegua or Aranipec, as the
natives call it ; said to be a large, populous, and well-built town, and
to be situated on a fair and capacious river of the same name also.
But later observations tell us there is no such matter ; that the river
which the first relations did intend is Pemptegouet, neither larpe nor
pleasant [ ! ] : and that the place by them meant is called Agguncia,
so far from being a fair city, that there are only a few sheds or cal)ins,
covered with the barks of trees or the skins of beasts.

Upon the whole, it must be concluded that there was
nowhere ujjon the Penobscot, and at no time during the
aboriginal jicriod, anything more than the ordinary,
wretched Indian villages, at one of which the Pjashaba,
or chief, had his lodge and petty court.

The Penobscot is designated upon Mercator's map as
Rio Grande, or the "great river;" and it soon came to
be designated as the "Great River of Norumbega."
Thevet, in 1556, mentioning it also as the Grand River
on the charts, and called "Agoncy" by the natives, says,
"which we call Norumbegue," and eulogizes it as "one
of the finest rivers in the whole world." He mentions
also a little fort erected by the French ten or twelve
leagues from its mouth, and named the " Fort of Nor-
umbegue." The "(Ireat River of Norumbega," with the
mythical city on its eastern shore, makes a great figure
in many maps and charts of the sixteenth century.

The great gulf between Cape Cod and Nova Scotia,
not even yet receiving a specific geographical designa-
tion of general acceptance, but sometimes called the
Gulf of Maine, or of New England, was named by the
French fishermen of the earliest day as the Sea or Gulf
of Norumbega, from the country on the side of the
mainland.

Norumbega has made some figure in other literature
than that of travel or history. C)ne considerable work
of the old compiler and writer, Richard Hakluyt — the
Discourse concerning Western Planting, written in 1584,
but not printed until nearly three centuries afterwards,
when, in 1877, it first saw the light by the enterprise of
the Maine Historical Society — was apparently written
for the express pur[)ose of stimulating emigration to
Norumbega. In almost his opening sentence he men-
tions that "those [natives] whom Stephen Gomez
brought from the coaste of Maine in the year 1524
worshiijjjed the sonne, the moone, and the starres, and
used other idolatrie."

Milton, also, in the tenth book of the l\aradise Lost,
uses Norumbega fur the purposes of illustration. His
words are : —

Now from the North
Of Norombega and the .Samoed shore,
Bursting their brazen dungeons, armed with ice,
And snow and hail, and stormy gust and flaw,
Boreas and C'a;cias, and .^rgestes loud.
And Tlirascias rend the woods and rocks upturn.

The noblest poetical tribute, however, as yet paid to
Norumbega, is by the Quaker poet, John G. Whittier,
in a contribution to the Atlantic Monthly for June, 1S69.
We give it place here without abridgment, e.xcept to re-
move the historical foot-note: —

NOREMBEGA.

BY J. G. WHITTIER.

The winding way the serpent takes

The mystic water took.
From where, to count its beaded lakes,

The forest sped its brook.

A narrow space "twixt shore and shore.

For sun or stars to fall,
While evermore, behind, before.

Closed in the forest wall.

The dim wood hiding underneath

Wan flowers without a name ;
Life tangled with decay and death.

League after league the same.

Unbroken over swamp and hill

The rounding shadow lay.
Save where the river cut at will

A pathway to the day.

Beside that track of air and light.

Weak as a child unweaned.
At shut of day a Christian knight

Upon his henchman leaned.

The embers of the sunset's fires

Along the clouds on high ;
"I see," he said, "the domes and spires

Of Norembega town."

"Alack! the domes, O master mine.

Are golden clouds on high ;
Yon spire is but the branchless pine

That cuts the evening sky."

"O hush and hark! What sounds are these

But chants and holy hymns ?
"Thou hear'st the breeze that stirs the trees

Through all their leafy limbs."

" Is it a chapel bell that fills

The air with its low tone?"
"Thou hear'st the tinkle of the rills,

The insect's vesper drone." •

" The Christ be praised !— He sets for me

A blessed cross in sight I "
"Now, nay, 'tis but yon blasted tree

With two gaunt arms outright ! "

" Be it wind so sad or tree so stark.

It mattereth not, my knave ;
Methinks to funeral hymns I hark.

The cross is for my grave !

"My life is sped ; I shall not see

My home-set sails again ;
The sweetest eyes of Noimandie

Shall watch for me in vain.

"Yet onward still to ear and eye

The baffling marvel calls ;
1 fain would look before I die

On Norembega's walls.

"So, haply, it shall be thy part

At Christian feet to lay
The mystery of the desert's heart

My dead hand plucked away.

" Leave me an hour of rest ; go thou

And look from yonder heights ;
Perchance the valley even now

Is starred with city lights."

The henchman climbed the nearest hill.

He saw nor tower nor town.
But, through the drear woods, lone and still,

The river rolling down.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

He heard the stealthy feet of things

Whose shapes he could not see,
A flutter as of evil wings.

The fall of a dead tree.

The pines stood black against the moon.

A sword of tire beyond ;
He heard the wolf howl, and the lonii

Laugh from his reedy pond.

He turned him back : " O master dear,

We are but men misled ;
.\nd thou hast sought a city here

To find a grave instead."

"As God shall will ! what matter wliere

A true man's cross may stand.
So Heaven be o'er it here as there

In pleasant Norman land?

"These woods, perchance, no secret hide

Of lordly tower and hall ;
Yon river in its wanderings wide

Has washed no city wall ;

"Yet mirrored in the sullen stream

The holy stars are given ;
Is Norembega then a dream

Whose waking is in Heaven?

" No bnilded wonder of these lands

My weary eyes shall see ;
A city never made with hands

Alone awaiteth me —

■ ' ' Urds Syctn mysticd ' ; I see

Its mansions passing fair,
' Condi ta ca.lo' : let me be.

Dear Lord, a dweller there ! "

Above the dying e.xile hung

The vision of the bard.
.\s faltered on his failing tongue

The songs of good Bernard.

The henchman dug at dawn a grave

Beneath the hemlocks brown.
.And to the desert's keeping gave

The lord of fief and town.

Years after, when the Sieur Cliamplain

.Sailed up the mystic stream.
And Norembega proved again

A shadow and a dream.

He found the Norman's nameless grave

Within the hemlock's shade.
And, stretching wide its arms to save.

The sign tliat God had- made, —

The cross-boughed tree that marked the spot

.And made it holy ground :
He needs the earthly city not

Who hath the heavenly found I

ACADIA.

The next designation for the Maine and much oilier
country east of the Penobscot, and at one time, as we
shall see, for a tract west of that river also, was French,
originally Acadia, a corruption, some say, of Arcadia, the
classic name of the picturesque old tract in the middle
of the Peloponnesus (the modern Morea), the Switzer-
land of Greece, whose people believed themselves to be
the oldest tribe on the peninsula. This old-time deriva-
tion is n')t now generally accepteil, but the word is held
to be of unmixed Indian origin, .\ccording to Mr. Porter
C. Bliss, said to be very competent authority on Indian
words, Acadie is a pure Micmac word, with the significa-
tion of "place." The Eastern Indians still use it in

composition; and Passamaquoddy, or "the place of the
pollock," is derived from the Etchemin word pestum-
acadie. Its own derivation is from ahkt, "land," or
"place," and da^ an interjection denoting admiration,
the whole implying a fertile or abundant country excit-
ing pleasant surprise. The name first ap])ears in a map
of " Tierra Nueva," or the New Land, by Ruscelli, in
1561, as "Larcadia," designating an unlimited tract be-
tween "Tierra de Nurumberg" (Nurumbega) and "La
Florida." It was afterwards written and printed "L'Ar-
cadie," "L'Accadie," "la Cadie," " L' Acadie," "Lacadie,"
"Accady," and "Accadia," and even niore eccentric
shapes, but is commonly known, in speech and WTiting,
as Acadia. In this country, on the Nova Scotian side —

In the .Acadian land, on the shores of the basin of Minas,

where —

Distant, secluded, still, the little village of Grand Pre
Lay in the fruitful valley.

the thatch-roofed village, the home of .Acadian farmers.
Men whose lives glided on like rivers that water the woodlands,
Darkened by shadows of earth, but reilecting an image of heaven," —

here Mr. Longfellow has placed the opening scenes of
his poem "Evangeline."

It is not certainly known when or by whom the name
was first applied to this region. It appears to have been
already in use at the time (November 8, 1603) the first
royal grant of the country was made, by Henry IV. of
France and Navarre, to Pierre du Guast, otherwise the
Sieur de Monts. The words of the charter are, as ren-
dered into English : "We do appoint, ordain, make,
constitute, and establish you our Lieutenant General, to
represent our person in the country, territory, coasts, and
confines of Acadia, from the fortieth to the forty-sixth
degree ; and within this extent, or any part thereof, as
far inland as may be practicable, to establish, extend,
and make known our name, power, and authority, and
therewith subject, cause to submit and obey, all the
people of the said land and circumjacent country," etc.,
etc. This was the first civil jurisdiction proclaimed by
an enlightened government over Eastern Maine. It was
a vast tract thus assigned to the supremacy of De
Monts, extending from the latitude of Philadelphia to
the northern slopes of Mount Katahdin, including the
southern part of the present New Brunswick and nearly
the whole of Nova Scotia, and extending indefinitely
fr.jin the .Atlantic toward the Pacific.

De Monts sailed for his new possessions in two
well-equipped vessels, March 7, 1604, with a companion
of some note, M. de Pontrincourt, and a [lilot of mm h
greater fame, the renowned Samuel Champlain, the cour-
ageous exiilorer from whom the beautiful water between
New York and Vermont takes its name. Reaching the
coast off Nova Scotia, they presently explored the Bay of
Fundy, selected the site of Port Royal, later .Xnnapolis,
visited and named St. John's River, and reared a fortifica-
tion on the island they called St. Croix — from the brooks
about it, which came "crosswise to fall within this large
branch of the sea" (the Schoodic, which also came to be
known as the St. Croix). Here De Monts wintered ; here
was the first settlement, though not a permanent one, in
.■\cadia — the Settlement at Port Royal not beginning

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

until the next year; and here was in some sense the first
seat of government for the vast province of Acadia, in-
cluding all of the present Penobscot county, except a
parallelogram of about thirty miles, in length and bre;idth,
at the northern end.

De Mont's rule was soon broken, as to nearly the
whole of his mighty domain, by the establishment of
North and South Virginia, under English auspices; but
the I'Yench dominion in this (piarter was restored by the
treaty of St. (Jerniains, March 9, 1632, under the third
article of which "His Majesty of Great Britain promises
by his ambassador to give up and lestore to his most
Christian Majesty all the places occupied in New France,
Acadia, and Canada by the subjects of his Majesty of
Great Britain, causing the latter to retire from the said
places, and deliver to the commissaries of the most
Christian King in gt'od faith the power which he (the
ambassador) has from his Majesty of Great Britain, for
the restitution of said places." The English settlers
were, however, not wholly excluded from the country,
and many of them remained. New France, mentioned
in the article, was the general designation for all the vast
tracts in North America, not only at the East, but upon
the great waters of the West, supposed to be vested in
the crown of France, by the discoveries of her brave and
pious explorers. The name is said to have been given
first by John Verazzani, the Florentine voyager in the
French service, who sailed the entire coast from Florida
to Newfoundland in 1524, and took possession of the
Acadian country for France. He was killed (and eaten,
some say) by the Indians, somewhere upon its rock-bound
shores. In 1627 the title was legally recognized in the
grant of the domain to this body corporate of one hundred
and seven formed by Cardinal Richelieu, and called the
Company of New France. Of this immense region
Acadia, Canada, and Louisiana — each of which, espec-
ially the last, was in territorial extent and empire — were
component parts.

-Some years before the treaty of St. Gerniains, the
F'rench king had made a grant of land on the livcr St.
Johns to M. Claude St. Estienne de la Tour, a professed
Protestant, to whom was afterwards (February 11, 1631)
given a commission from Louis as Governor of Acadia.
The next year after the treaty, in 1633, Cardinal Riche-
lieu a|)pointed M. de Razilla, an officer in the army, to
take command in Acadia. La Tour, whose autliority
was now subordinate to that of Razilla, continued to re-
side upon the St. Johns, while the latter received an ex-
tensive grant west of La Tour's, including the bay and
river of St. Croix, and the islands "twelve leagues on the
sea." Razilla lived chiefly, however, in the fortress of
La Heve, east of Liver[)ool, on the south shore of Nova
Scotia, and there had the seat of his government. The
English from New I'lymouth, on the Massachusetts
coast, had already established a trading-house on the
eastern shore of Penobscot Bay, and remained tmdis-
turbed until early June, 1632, when a French vessel,
piloted, strange to say, by a recreant Scotchman, came
down upon it from the furl her parts of Acadia. Mr.
Williamson thus continues the story:

Her crew, conducting in tfie true character of freebooters, pretended
they had put into harbour in distress, and would esteem a permission to
repair leaks and refresh themselves as a great favor. Emboldened by
generous courtesies received, as well as by information of the master's
aljsence with most of his men on a tour westward for goods, they fiist
examined the forl-arms to ascertain if they were charged, then, seizing
swords and loaded muskets, ordered the three or four remaining keepers
of the truck-house to surrender, upon pain of instant death, and to de-
liver their goods and immediately put them on board. Having in this
shameful manner rifled the fort of its contents, to the amount of ;^5oo,
they bade the men this taunting and insulting farewell, "Tell your mas-
ter to rememljcrr the Isle of Re."

The last was an allusion to the crushing defeat sus-
tained by the English at an island, on the French coast
six years before. The traders at Penobscot, notwith-
standing this raid, restored and continued their post and
traffic there for three years longer, when they were com-
pelled to leave. They had meanwhile, in 1633, founded
another trading-house at Machias, with a valuable stock
and a small, but well-armed and trusty guard. This, too,
was plundered by La Tour the next year, who killed two
of the defenders in overcoming resistance and carried off
a large amount of property, with the survivors as prison-
ers. He afterwards, when taken to task by a New Ply-
mouth colonist for this transaction, boldly declared that
his authority was from the King of France, " who claiins
the coast from Cape Sable to Cape Cod," and that, if the
English attempted to trade to the east of Pemaquid, he
would sieze them. He then dismissed the Englishman
with his countrymen, the prisoners taken at Machias.

Many years afterwards, in 1654, La Tour was unpleas-
antly surprised by an English expedition with secret or-
ders from Cromwell to reduce the French possessions in
tliis quarter. The station at Penobscot was surrendered
without resistance ; La Tour, at St. John's, was wholly
unpre|)ared for battle, and his settlement was captured
without difificulty, as also Port Royal, La Heve, Cape
Sable, and every colony in the province. This was in
time of peace between France and England, and the
former power naturally complained of the invasion; hut
Crorawc-U, claiming under the t)lder title, refused restitu-
tiiin. The next year the contjuest was formally confirmed
to the iMiglish; but again, in 1667, it was returned to
France under the Treaty of Breda.

In the summer of 1635, M. I)'.\ulnay, who had
command, under Razilla, of the Acadian country w^est
of the St. Croix, made another descent upon the trading
house at Biguyduce, or Penobscot, and again plundered
it of goods. He did not leave the traders and their em-
plovees, as La Tour did, to revive the business upon their
departure; but sent them away altogether, with the
swelling injunction and threat, "(io now, and tell all the
])lantations southwartl to the twentieth degree that a fleet
of eight ships will be sent against them within a year, to
displace the whole of them; and know that my commis-
sion is from the King of F'rance." D'Aulney remained
upon the spot with eighteen followers, and fortified
against expected attack from the English. This soon
came at the hands of Captain Girling, in command of a
large vessel called the Hope, which had been engaged
for the purpose at Ipswich by the New Plymouth colon-
ists, with the pledge of two hundred pounds, if the

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

enterprise against D'Aulnay succeeded. The enemy
were too well entrenched, however, and, when Girling
had fired away all his ammunition, nothing remained but
to maintain a silent blockade in front of the fortress.
Meanwhile Massachusetts was making common cause
with New Plymouth for the expulsion of the French
from Biguyduce; and, under the advice of a captain of
much military experience, named Sellanova, was prepar-
ing a more extensive expedition against D'Aulnay, when
a tremendous storm did so much damage in the fields
and otherwise that provisions could not be had for it,
and it was abandoned. The French were presently
relieved of Girling's presence by the arrival of part of a
shipwrecked crew of Connecticut mariners, who had
been kindly treated by Razilla, and furnished with a
shallop for their voyage home. In some way difficult to
understand, these unfortunates fell into the hands of
D'Aulnay, rather than Girling: and the Frenchman
refused to let them go unless the obnoxious ship from
Ipswich should depart. The Hope was now probably
hopeless of success, and only too glad to get away. She
accordingly sailed for home, and D'Aulnay then allowed
his later visitors to leave, bearing a courteous letter to
the Governor of New Plymouth. He and I.a Tour both
made a solemn declaration afterwards that they would
never, unless expressly ordered to do so, claim any terri-
tory west of Pemaquid.

As to the extent of Acadia (or Nova Scotia), it is
usually held not to have reached further westward than
the line of the Penobscot. It is observable, however,
that during the English occupancy 1755-67, in the grant
to Sir Thomas Temple and the younger La Tour, the
Protector's charter describes their tract as "the territory
sometimes called L'Accadia, and that part of the country
called Nova Scotia, from Merliquash [later Lunenberg]
to Penobscot, the river St. George, and the Muscongus,
situated on the confines of New England" — which car-
ried the boundary far to the southwestward of Penobscot.
But Mr. Williamson avers that "it is certain, however,
that the French had at no time any territorial possessions
westward of Penobscot River and Bay waters, which
were for many years the divisional boundary between
them and the English."

The failure, in the treaty of St. Germains, to prescribe
definite limits to Acadia, led to endless controversies,
and the grant itself was furthermore always an unpopular
measure with the colonists in New England. The reces-
sion of the Acadian province to France by the treaty of
Breda, or rather in a subsequent article, was also greatly
lamented ; and it was a grave question concerning the
grant to Sir Thomas Temple, whether the Crown could
cede any other right over the territory than that of sov-
ereignty. Indeed, upon the pressure of his claims on
the English Government, he was nominally allowed the
total sum of ^16,200 for his purchase money and ex-
penses of fortifications and other improvements, though
he never received it. The article of cession in this
treaty made no prescription of boundaries, but men-
tioned by name, as included in the transfer, St. Johns,
Port Royal, I.a Heve, Ca|)e Sable, and Pentagoet or

Penobscot, which thus again became Gallic territory.
The French occupied all the coast from Cape Breton to
Penobscot, where they had a stockaded fort, as also at
Port Royal and St. Johns. According to Hutchinson's
History of Massachusetts, the French remained in pos-
session of Penobscot until about 1664.

M. de Bourg is reputed to have been the first French
(Jovernor of the restored province. M. Densy succeeded
to the rulership of .'\cadia, under the title of Lieutenant-
Governor, and remained in the province for thirty years.
In 1672, he published in Paris a short history of the
country. M. .Manival was subsequently Governor.

NORTH V1RGINI.\.

We now return to the English domination of the
Penobscot country. Following the discoveries of Captain
Weymouth, an association of Englishmen was formed, to
promote European colonization and the introduction of
Christianity among the savages on the shores of North
America. To these King James I. gave a patent, April
10, 1606, as two organizations under one general coun-
cil, — the former called the London Company, from the
residence of the corporators, or the First Colony of
Virginia; the other the Plymouth Company, or Second
Colony. The territory granted the two 'companies, and
claimed by the English crown, by virtue of the dis-
coveries of its subjects, stretched from the thirty-fourth
to the forty-fifth parallel, or from the latitude of Colum-
bia, South Carolina, to that of Passamaquoddy Bay and
Oldtown, in Penobscot county. The whole was known
by the general name of North and South Virginia ; but the
lower part of this county, below Oldtown, was included
in what was commonly known by the separate name of
North Virginia. The Second or Plymouth colony had
special jurisdiction here, being permitted to begin a
plantation anywhere above the thirty-eighth degree,
while the London Company might colonize anywhere
below the forty-first parallel, it being provided, however,
that the second settlement should not be made within
one hundred miles of that first planted. Each company
was ruled by a Subordinate Council of thirteen, nomi-
nated by the crown and resident with the colony; and
both were under the paramount jurisdiction of a General
Council of Virginia, also of thirteen and named by the
king, but resident in England. The colonies were fully
empowered by the patent to seize and expel intruders,
and had other important rights and privileges granted.

Under this charter the settlement at Jamestown, in
South Virginia, was made in April, 1607 ; and in August
of the same year, Popham and Gilbert, of the Plymouth
Company, formed the Sagadahock colony, at "the mouth
of a fair navigable river" on the coast of Maine, which
gave the name to the settlement. George Popham,
brother of the Lord Chief Justice of England and senior
captain of the voyage, was appointed president of the
colony; Raleigh Gilbert, nephew of Sir Walter Raleigh,
admiral; Edward Harlow, master of the militia; Ellis
Best, marshal; John Scammon, secretary of the colony;
James Dairs, commander of the fort ; and Gome Carew,
searcher, whatever that might be.

HISTORY OF TRNOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

The foundation for a great State, apjiarently, was thus
laid in the wilderness of the Northwest. Little account
was made of the French claims to the same territory,
and the courageous, enterprising Englishmen went on to
develop the land and hold it boldly for king and coun-
try. In 1613, under the auspices of Madame de Guerche-
ville, a devoted and enterprising Catholic Frenchwoman,
who had secured a transfer of De Monts' rights to her, a
colony and mission was established at St. Saviour, on
Mount Mansel, now Mount Desert Island. Captain
Argal, the voyager, on a fishing venture in these waters
was wrecked in Penobscot Bay, and there heard of the
French occupation so near that locality, and at once
advised the Virginian authorities of it.* They i)romptly
equipped a fleet of eleven fishing vessels with fourteen
cannon and si.xty men, with Argal in command, and sent
it to dispossess the French. The latter were taken com-
pletely by surprise, but made a faint resistance, during
which one of the Jesuit priests, Du Thet, was killed by a
musket-ball. The tort was captured, the Catholic cross
destroyed and another cross put up bearing the title of
the English king, in token of repossession of the place.
The fleet then sailed up the coast, destroying the rem-
nant of De Monts' settlement at St. Croi.x, and reduced
the fort and hamlet of Port Royal to ashes, after which
the expedition returned home. England and France
were at peace; but the former justified resistance to the
encroachments of the French upon the ground of the
original discovery by Cabot, the formal possession taken
by Gilbert, the North and South Virginia patent, and
the repeated visits of the English and the settlement of
the country. These claims appear to have been tacitly
admitted by France, since no resentment was expressed
at the ex])edition, nor reprisals attempted. A small
colony of the Frenchmen was permitted to remain at
Port Royal, with Biencourt, the former commander, still
at their head.

NEW ENGLAND.

After the explorations of Captain Smith along the
Maine coast, in 1&14, and the [ireparation of his famous
map and history. Prince Charles, to whom the docu-
ments were submitted, i)refixed to them the designation
New England, applying, it is supposed, to the whole
region between Manhattan, or New York, and Newfound-
land. Six years afterwards, November 3, 1620, a charter
was granted by King James to forty knights and gentle-
men of England, under the title of "The Council estab-
lished at Plymouth, in the County of Devon, for plantin",
ruling and governing New England in America." A more
extensive tract was granted them— and that, too, absol-
utely in fee simple— than either of the preceding com-
panies, English or French, had received. Its territory
was defined as between the 40th and 48th degrees of
northern latitude in breadth— that is, from the parallel
of Philadelphia to that of the Bay of Chaleurs and Trinity

*Palairet. in his description of the English and French Possessions
in North America, asserts that the French at this time had "a fort at
the mouth of the river Pentagoet or Penobscot, and Argal drove them
away." Ogilby, author of a Description of the New World, also says
that the Jesuits had become masters at Port Royal, and begun a fort at
Pentagoet. Neither statement is believed to be sufficiently supported.

Bay, Newfoundland, well to the north of the present
boundary of Maine, — and in length by the saine breadth
"throughout the mainland from sea to sea" — from the
Atlantic to the Pacific, which was a mighty stretch of
empire, regarded in either length or breadth. The privi-
leges previously granted in the Virginia charter were
continued in this, except that coinage of money was not
allowed. No Catholic, also, was to be allowed to settle
in the colony. Sir Ferdinando Gorges, a great and
venerable name in the history of Maine, who had become
President of North Virginia under the former patent, was
now most prominent in the new Council; and the next
in influence and authority to him was John Mason, the
virtual founder of New Hampshire. To Mason was
made the first territorial grant by the Plymouth Council,
being the lands between the Merrimac and Naumkeag
rivers, from their sources to the sea, with all islands
within three miles of the coast — a tract to which he gave
the name Mariana. The next grant was obtained by
Gorges from the Council, in order more effectually to
exclude the French from the northeastern part of New
FLngland, to Sir William Alexander, Secretary of State
for Scotland, under the name of

NOVA SCOTIA.

It was intended to designate the country simply as
New Scotland, in honor of Sir William's native land; but
the charter was written in Latin, and the name was trans-
lated accordingly into a form which it retains to this day.
The limits of the grant (which was confirmed September
10, 1621, by patent from the king) were from Passama-
quoddy Bay through the river St. Croix, to the farthest
source or spring which comes from the west; thence
north in a direct course overland to the first spring that
runs into the great river of Canada; thence northward
unto the river and along the shores of it eastward to
Claspe; and thence by the coast, exclusive of Newfound-
land and Cape Breton, around Cape Sable and across
the Bay of F'undy to the place of beginning, with the
islands and waters within six miles of the shore. This
was an unconditional grant in fee simple to Sir William,
without any provision for civil government in the jiatent.
The country was erected, says Mr. Williamson, "into a
royal palatinate, to be holden as a fief of the Scottish
crown, the proprietary being invested with the royal
rights and prerogatives of a count-palatine. The two
rights of soil and government being in this way originally
separated, were for a long period kept distinct, and some-
times in different hands. These territories must have
been considered the king's Scottish dominions; and even
then it will perplex the wisest civilian to discover the
justice or propriety of the tenure."

This remarkable grant has been noted by Governor
Joshua L. Chamberlain, in his Centennial Address on
The Place of Maine in History, as the only palatinate
ever established on the American continent.

It will be observed that no part of the Penobscot
county, and but little of any part of Eastern Maine, was
included in the grant to Sir William Alexander. After-
wards, however, the name Nova Scotia seems to have
been applied to much of the country southwestward of

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

the St. Croix, as we have already found that in 1656 the
Lord Protector's charter to Sir Thomas Temple, then
Governor of the Province, to La Tour, who had held
office there under the French, and William Crown,
granted "the territory sometimes called L' Accadia, and
that part of the country called Nova Scotia, from Merli-
quash to Penobscot, the river St. George and the Mus-
congus, situated on the confines of New England."
This unmistakably included the Penobscot country, and
we are thus justified in the introduction of Nova Scotia
as one of the geographical designations and civil juris-
dictions under which this country once existed. Mr.
Williamson says, however:

The phraseology and terms of Cromwell's patent to La Tour, Tem-
ple, and Crown, have proved to be the grounds or causes of endless
confusion and severe conflicts. Both Acadia and Nova Scotia are
mentioned, yet the limits and extent of them, as expressed, have long
perplexed the ablest statesmen; or, in other words, the language of
Cromwell's charter has been urged by opponents to show that Nova
Scotia must have embraced another and greater region than what is
contained in the charter to Sir William Alexander.

Under this grant Sir Thomas Temple, the chief pro-
prietor, in position and influence, at least, was made
governor. Young La Tour exhibited no title to lands
southwest of the Passamaquoddy ; and Captain Leverett,
then commander at Penobscot, received orders from the
Protector to surrender his powers and deliver the country
to Temple, who thus obtained personal jurisdiction over
the whole of Eastern Maine and even to St. George's —
perhaps, although concerning this there is a doubt, to the
Muscongus. Before leaving England to assume com-
mand of his province, Sir Thomas also bought all the La
Tour rights and titles in Nova Scotia or Acadia, taking a
regular assignment thereof. He arrived on the coast
in 1657, and remained Proprietary Governor ten years,
conducting at the same time a profitable trade with the
natives and colonists. He was, Mr. Williamson avers,
"a gentleman of humane and generous disposition, re-
markably free from the bigotry and religious prejudices
of the times. To cite an instance of his disinterestedness
— when the courts of Massachusetts were trying Quaker-
ism as a capital crime in 1660, he went and told them
that if they, according to their own declaration, "desired
the Quakers' lives absent, rather than their deaths pre-
sent," he would carry and provide for them at his own
expense. "Yet, and should any of them return," said he,
"I will again remove them."

After the Restoration, Sir Thomas was continued in
office, but as Provincial Governor, and for a time ap-
pears to have been regarded as the sole proprietor of the
entire province. His new commission was dated July 17,
1662, and expressly gave him jurisdiction from the east-
ern extremity of the great peninsula to "Muscongus, on
the confines of New England," with the exclusive priv-
ilege of trading with the natives in his province. But,
notwithstanding the favor with which he was treated, he
was soon to lose the entire portion of his domain lying
within the present limits of Maine, as will be related by
and by.

THE \V.\LDO I'.\TEN"T.

A part of the Penobscot country, in the south of it
and west of the bay and river, was included in the

Muscongus or Waldo Patent, granted March 2, 1630, by
the Plymouth council, to John Beauchamp, of Londoni
and Thomas Leverett, of Boston, England. The ter-
ritory conveyed lay between the Penobscot and Muscon-
gus waters, from the seaboard to an east and west line so
far north as would include a tract thirty miles square,
without trespassing upon the Kennebec or other patent.
This boundary, as since definitely settled, lies upon the
south line of Dixmont, Hampden, and Newburg town-
ships, in Penobscot county. As will be seen in our
sjjecial histories of the townships, some large tracts in
the southern part of this county were also included in
the Muscongus Patent, in order to eke out certain de-
ficiencies in the territory granted, in which Waldo county
is situated.

Nearly ninety years after the grant, the celebrated
Waldos became principally interested in it. From them
it took the name of the Waldo Patent, and is thus laid
down upon the map prefixed to Sullivan's History of the
District of Maine, and other old charts. The grant was
originally for the purpose of Indian traffic only, and a
trading-post was maintained by the owners upon St.
George's river until the outbreak of the first Indian war.

THE COUNTY OF CANADA.

In 163s, nearly three years after Charles the First, by
the Treaty of St. Germains, had surrendered to France
"all the places occupied by British subjects, in New
France, Acadia, and Canada," the Plymouth Council
nevertheless, being then about to dissolve, separated their
entire patent into twelve royal provinces. The first of
these, which included the Penobscot region, covered the
county between the St. Croix and Pemaquid rivers, from
the head of the latter by the shortest line to the Ken-
nebec, and from the point of junction upwards to its
source. This tract, extending north to the forty-eighth
degree, received the name of the County of Canada.
It was assigned to Sir William ."Mexander, Earl of Ster-
ling and grantee of Nova Scotia, which he had now lost
by the remarkable act of Charles in the convention of
St. Germains. It was provided that lots should be
drawn in the presence of the king for each of the royal
provinces, according to which the assignments were to
be made. On the ist of April the Council notified his
Majesty of their action, and prayed him to grant
patents to the assignees thus ascertained, with the powers
and privileges which had been granted in Maryland to
Lord Baltimore. The petition was granted, and new
patents were given to Lord Sterling, Sir Ferdinando
Gorges, John Mason, and others. The Plymouth Coun-
cil surrendered its constitution shortly after, and sub-
mitted to dissolution. It was succeeded by eleven of
the King's privy councillors, as Lords Commissioners of
of all his American Plantations, with Gorges as Gover-
nor-General of New England.

Notwithstanding the new patent and the English
claims, the French, under D'/\ulnay de Charnisy, who
has already come into our account of Acadia, established
themselves upon the peninsula on the eastern side of
Penobscot Bay, at a place now Castine, then called
Major-biguyduce, a corruption of the Indian name. He,

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

says Williamson, "constructed fortifications, not far from
a good harbor, which was well sheltered by islands, and
from which large ships might ascend the river forty
miles. He considered himself the immediate successor
of Razilla [late military commander of Acadia, or Nova
Scotia], and entitled to the paramount government of
the great peninsula, from Cape Sable to Canseau, espe-
cially at La Heve, where Razilla died; and Port Royal,
where D'Auln.iy himself sometimes resided; also at
Passamacjuoddy, where was the location of Razilla's own
patent; boldly claiming, moreover, by express commis-
sion from the latter, the right of command westward to
Penobscot, and as much farther as the French dominions
extended." He was expressly directed by the king, how-
ever, to confine his jurisdiction to the country of the
Etchemins, which, though somewhat indefinite, it was
hoped would keep him from infringing upon the territory
of his rival. La Tour.

We have before recorded the story of the fruitless at-
tack of the English vessel Hope, under Captain Girling,
upon D'Aulnay at Penobscot. He was much disliked
by the English settlers between that point and the Pis-
cataqua; and their sympathies, as well as those of the
authorities at Boston, now the seat of government for
New England, were generally with La Tour, who was a
Protestant, while D'Aulnay was a Catholic. Finally,
with the indirect aid of the English, he fitted up a small
fleet, with which he i)roceeded against D'Aulnay, who
had shortly before blockaded his fortress at St. Johns,
and forced him to flee to Boston. He found DWulnay
still at the mouth of St. Johns river, attacked his vessels
vigorously, and compelled him to quit the harbor, flee
down the coast to Penobscot, and there run his ships
aground, for the purpose of fortifying his trading-houses
more promptly and thoroughly. A few miles to the
northeast he had a mill, with some adjacent buildings;
and tliere the Massachusetts men had a brisk action with
the enemy, which resulted in some loss on each side.
The expedition then returned to Boston, with a vessel
captured from l)'x\ulnay, laden with valuable furs.

Soon afterwards, a party of prominent settlers from
the plantations below the Penobscot, on their way to the
St. Johns, to collect moneys due from La Tour, were
forcibly detained for some days by D'Aulnay ; in re-
venge for which one of them — Wannerton, of New
Hampshire — presently led a party against the French-
man's farm-house at Penobscot, captured and fired it,
and killed D'Aulnay's cattle, but lost his own life in the
transaction. D'Aulnay was now thoroughly enraged, and
issued commissions for the seizure of every colony vessel
found east of the Penobscot. He was soon obliged,
however, to acknowledge that he had been hasty, and
sent a commissioner to Boston to negotiate a treaty.
Several articles were adopted, October 8, 1644, and
temporary peace established. The next year he violated
both the treaty and his sovereign's instructions to main-
tain peace with the English, sailed for La Tour's strong-
nold at the St. Johns early in the spring, making prize
New England vessel on the way, and began a
Dombardment of the fort. This was now defended by

the wife of La Tour, a lady of great energy and cour-
age, under whose command so stout a resistance was
made that D'Aulnay was soon compelled to draw off,
with twenty of his force killed, thirteen wounded and
his ship so much disabled as to be in imminent danger
of going to the bottom. In 1646 another treaty was
made by D'Aulnay with the authorities at Boston; but
again, in April of the next year, attacked La Tour's
fort at St. John's, and was this time successful. His en-
emy's wife was made a prisoner; the rest of the garrison
massacred, it is said; and a large amount of plunder,
probably worth over ^10,000, carried to Penobscot.
Madame La Tour, borne also to D'Aulnay's capital, died
there within three weeks, of grief and the shame of de-
feat and imprisonment. The latter himself ended a
troubled career in 165 1, and, strange to say, the following
year the fortunes of the rival houses were united by the
marriage of La Tour and D'Aulnay's widow.

Mr. Williamson thus sums up the results of the an-
tagonism of La Tour and these belligerent Cauls, and of
the residence of D'Aulnay at Penobscot:

Twelve years' predatory warfare between two ambitious rivals, the
subjects of the same crown, produced effects highly injurious to the
settlements in the Province of Maine, and the plantations farther east-
ward. Sometimes they committed great wrongs, and even depreda-
tions ; their menaces frequently excited alarming apprehensions ; free
trade was interrupted ; and it was always difficult for the people so to
adjust their conduct by the maxims and rules of prudence as to keep
themselves out of the quairel.

The principles of D' Aulnay's great and boasted honor were uniform-
ly the servants of passion or interest. He furnished the natives
with fire-arms and amunition, and taught them the great power and
use of the gun. His priesthood, consisting wholly of firiars, made the
savages believe that Catholic rites and cereinonies were the essentials
of religion, and that the dictates of the missionaries were equivalent to
the precepts of divine authority ; whereas the orthodox Puritans careful-
ly withheld from the Indians the hunting-gun, so necessary among
them to obtain the supports of savage life, while their pious missiona-
ries very honestly instructed them that real religion consisted in regen-
erating the affections of the heart, in the immaculate purities
of life, and in the practices and dispositions towards others
which we would wish them to exhibit towards us. But these were
refinements which the untutored, unenlightened savages could not
understand. The usages of retaliation had acquired a kind of sanc-
tity among them which they believed Nature herself tolerated. Indul-
gences and superstitious forms, as allowed by the priests, were alto-
gether more accordant with their notions and habits then the self-deny-
ing doctrines of restraint and the rigid precepts of reform, as taught
by the Protestant missionaries. *

Since this region had been in the occupancy of the French, neither
the settlements at Penobscot, at Mount Desert, at Machias. at St.
Croix, nor the place eastward, had flourished. Most of the French
emigrants were ignorant, poor, and unenterprising ; the government
was of a despotic military character; and the commanders, as we have
seen, were perpetually contending. The social regulations were under
the direction of the ecclesiastics : rights and wrongs were not treated
nor regarded in a proper manner ; and no man of good sense and in-
telligence dwells contentedly where life and property are insecure. "

La Tour had now undivided sway over the County
of Canada. It was, however, simply a military com-
mand, without any civil powers or jurisdiction. It was,
says Williamson, "destitute of every property directly
promotive of settlement, for arms and civil liberties are
regulated by different laws." His dominion was regarded
with much distrust and jealousy by the English, and in
1653 the General Court of Massachusetts prohibited
the transportation of supplies either to the French or
the Dutch, with the latter of whom England was then at

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

war. A small cargo of flour and other necessaries was
presently allowed to La Tour, as his good-will and the
influence of the Catholic missionaries might yet be ser-
viceable to New England. The end came, however, the
next year, in the reduction of Nova Scotia, including the
capture of Penobscot, by Cromwell's ships, as previously
narrated. The following year, 1655, the whole Acadian
Province, with the County of Canada within it, was con-
firmed in English occupancy and sovereignty. La Tour,
who, shortly before, had apostalized from Protestantism
and become a Catholic, in consideration of the confirm-
ation of the province to him by the French Crown — a
man, says Williamson, "of equivocal character, either
Catholic or Protestant, as was most concomitant with in-
terest" — died soon after the capture of his domain, leav-
ing one son and an immense territorial estate, which was
made by Stephen D' La Tour, his son, the basis of
claims upon the English Government that were recogni-
zed by Cromwell in the grant to him, jointly with Sir
Thomas Temple and William Crown, Englishmen, of
"L'Accadia" and the country from Merliquash, or Lun-
enburg, to the Muscongus.

THE TERRITORV OF SAG.\D.\HOCK.

During the thirteen years' occupancy of Acadia, or
Nova Scotia, by the English, between the conquest
under Cromwell and the recession to the French by the
treaty of Breda, the province was mostly under the gov-
ernorship of Sir Thomas Temple, as has been related in
our closing paragraphs concerning Nova Scotia. In
1664, soon after the Restoration, Charles, having revived
the project of an American empire, with twelve royal
principalities or provinces, and the county of Canada
being now extinct, made an extensive grant to his brother
James, Duke of York and Albany, from whose title New
York and its capital derive their names. The patent
conveyed all the Dutch territories upon the Hudson,
with Long Island, and likewise " all that part of the
mainland in New England, next adjoining to New Eng-
land ; thence extending along the seacoast to a place
called Pemaquid, and up the river thereof to its farthest
head, as it tendeth northward ; thence at the nearest to
the river Kennebeck ; and so upwards, by the shortest
course to the river Canada, northward." This tract not
only cut a great tract out of the domain of Sir Thomas
Temple, but also encroached upon the Plymouth terri-
tories about the headwaters of the Sheepscot and the
Damariscotta, and included the whole of the Muscongus
(later Waldo) patent, before mentioned, w^ith a large part
of the Pemaquid patent and the Brown and Tappan
right, which had been granted from time to time by the
Plymouth Council, and the islands along the seaboard
above Pemaquid, of which some were now inhabited.
Nevertheless, the sweeping grant seems to have been
maintained in its integrity for about a quarter of a cen-
tury, or until the duke ascended the throne as James II.,
when it reverted to the crown. That part of it in the
Northeast was designated by different names. It was
popularly known as the Duke of York's Property or
Province, but by his agents was called New Castle, a
name also given to the southwestern part of the duke's

patent on the Delaware, where it is still preserved. They
further termed it the County of Cornwall. But the fittest
name for it is that by which it is best known in history —
the Territory of the Sagadahock. Long afterwards, un-
der William and Mary's charter of October 7, 1691 —
the famous " Provincial Charter " — the Province of Sag-
adahock was constituted between the river of that name
and the St. Croi.x, as will be more fully related hereafter.
The Duke of York became viceroy of the king over
his American possessions. Under him Colonel Richard
Nichols, after the subjugation by him of the Dutch at
Manhattan, became Deputy Governor of the Province,
including the Territory of Sagadahock. A royal com-
mission was appointed April 15, 1664, consisting of
Nichols, Sir Robert Carr, who was also a commander in
the expedition against the Dutch, George Cartwright, and
Samuel Maverick, " to settle the peace and security of
the country " — which meant mainly the recognition of
the Duke's authority and that of the Commission in
Massachusetts and Maine. After a rather troublous time
with the General Court at Boston and the exercise of
much despotic authority in the towns and plantations
between that place and Eastern Maine, they crossed into
the Territory of the Sagadahock and opened a court
September 5, 1865, at the dwelling of John Mason, on
the east bank of the Sheepscott. Here they summoned
the inhabitants of the several settlements to present them-
selves and formally submit themselves to His Majesty's
Government, within the duke's patent. Only twenty-
nine persons, whose names are given by Sullivan and Wil-
liamson, appeared in response to this summons. They
comprised, the latter thinks, but a minor part of the whole
number of settlers between the Sagadahock and the Pen-
obscot, and, we may add, none north or east of the latter
river. A -chief constable for the county was appointed,
also three magistrates or justices of the peace, and a re-
corder. No regular government was instituted, howerer,
— no legislation, trial by jury, or other element of an en-
lightened and thorough-going administraiion. Assur-
ances were given the people that their possessions and
rights should not be disturbed, although no sufificient
means were provided for the redress of wrongs, and the
policy was revived in all conveyances, whether by the
duke's agents or the planters, of incumbering them with
quit-rents. A treaty was negotiated with the Indians,
which contained judicious provisions for the settlement
of difficulties and the prevention of hostilities between
them and the whites. In early October the commis-
sioners went back to York, where their high-handed
measures, which we need not recapitulate, soon awakened
the most vivid and widespread indignation. The colon-
ists in the Northeast were not rid of them altogether
until the next year, when a new war between France and
England broke out. At the close of this, by the treaty
of Breda, Nova Scotia, including the Penobscot country,
was restored to the French, and passed under the gov-
ernment of De Bourg, who claimed jurisdiction over the
whole of the duke's Eastern patent, even as far as the
Kennebec river. This claim was not admitted by Massa-
chusetts, however, and a new survey of the north line of

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE

the Plymouth patent, made in 1672, carried it three miles
northward of the previous location, and brought it to
White Head island, in Penobscot Bay. The next year
the Dutch recaptured New York, and the Duke of York
was thus left with a very small jurisdiction within his
former vast patent. A new county, between the Sagada-
hock and St. George's rivers, the new north line, and the
seacoast, was erected by the General Court of Massa-
chusetts, and called Devonshire, with a full equipment
of officers. But the succeeding year, 1674, by another
turn of fortune's wheel, the province of New York was
restored to the English, and a new patent issued to the
duke, embracing all the territories described in the pat-
ent of ten years before. Sir Edmund Andros was ap-
pointed (Governor of New York and Sagadahock. No
disturbance was made, however, by either the duke's
officers or the French, of the new County of Devonshire,
in which the authority of the General Court remained
paramount, and the administration of justice went on
regularly and tranquilly. .-\ project was started at one
time to alienate to the crown the whole territory between
the Merrimac and the Penobscot, in order to create of it
a royal province for the Duke of Monmouth, natural son
of Charles II. The duke himself was fully bent upon
this scheme, from which he e.xpected to derive an annual
income of ^5,000, but it was never consummated.

In August, 1663, Colonel Thomas Dungan succeeded
Andros, by appointment of the duke, as Governor of
New York and Sagadahock. He appointed two com-
missioners, John Palmer and John West, to manage the
affairs of the county of Cornwall, who behaved very
badly, and attempted to exercise jurisdiction as far as to
the St. Croix. They seized a cargo of wines landed at
the French port at Penobscot, because duties had not
been paid at the Pemaquid custom-house, and were guilty
of many other high-handed acts. Their authority and
that of Dungan in the Sagadahock country, was suspend-
ed or nullified by the appointment of Andros in 1789,
as Governor of Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hamp-
shire, Maine, Plymouth, Pemaquid, and Narragansett (or
Rhode Island).

February 16, 1685, the viceroyalty of the Duke of
York in America was ended by his ascent of the throne
as Tames II., upon the death of his brother. 'We hear
Uttle more of his Territory of Sagadahock. The French
had generally undisputed possession east of the Penob-
scot, and established one of their forts upon the bay.
De Bourg was acting Governor; Jesuit missionaries,
traders, and settlers were at and about Penobscot in
considerable number, and a profitable trade with the
natives was carried on, while " the whole coast between
Penobscot and St. Croix remained untouched by the
arts of culture and improvement, and almost without
inhabitants."

THE COUNTY OF CORNWALL.

The facts relating to the erection of this county are
these: Upon the organization of the General Assembly
of the Province of New York in 1683, and the subdivis-
ion of the Province into counties, "Pemy Quid and all
Territories in those Parts, with the Islands adjoining,"

were ordered to constitute the county of Cornw^all, which
should be entitled to send one member to the Assembly.
Under this provision Gyles Goddard, of New Dartmouth,
represented the county for a time. He was also a jus-
tice of the county and lieutenant of "a foot company" in
the militia — also afterwards surveyor. It is said that
there was a re-enactment of the ordinance by the New-
York Assembly October i, 1691,* although the fort and
country about Pemaquid w-ere surrendered to Massachu-
setts by the royal order September 19, 1686.

THE DUTCH .\T PENOBSCOT.

In 1674 the Dutch, having concluded a treaty with
England, but being still at war with France and anxious,
as they had been for a long time, to share the fishing
and other advantages of the North American coasts
with the English and French, sent a vessel to sieze the
fort at Penobscot. It was captured without much loss,
but was soon voluntarily relinquished. Again, however,
in the spring of 1676, a Dutch man-ofwar appeared be-
fore the fort and compelled its surrender. It was the in-
tention now to maintain firm possession of the Penob-
scot country; but, as the fort was held to be within the
Duke of York's patent, and so in New England, a small
fleet was dispatched from Boston, which soon forced the
intruders to abandon the position. The singular part of
the transaction is that the English themselves did not re-
main as masters of the situation, but at once after the
reduction of the place abandoned it. As a consequence
of these events, however, it is said that Andros was in-
duced the next year to build a fort a Pemaquid and take
formal possession of the whole Eastern domain granted
to his superior, the Duke of York. It is one of the in-
teresting facts of Penobscot history that the country was
for a period, though a very short one, virtually under the
government of the Netherlands.

THE PROVINCE OF SAGAD.4H0CK.

William and Mary succeeded to the English throne
February 16, 1689, upon the abdication of James II.
The next year Nova Scotia was recaptured for England
by an expedition under Sir William Phips, a native of the
Province of Maine, born at Woolwich, upon the Sheeps-
cot. Out of the southwestern part of it was carved, Oc-
tober 7, 1 69 1, by the Provincial Charter of William and
Mary, a tract described by no specific name, but which
came to be known, probably from the Duke of York's
Eastern grant, as the Province of Sagadahock. It was
defined as "between the river Sagadahock [or Kenne-
beck] and Nova Scotia," extending "northward to the
river of Canada," and included the second of the Royal
Provinces of 1635, that between the Sagadahoc and Pe-
maquid, and the first, or county of Canada, stretching
thence to the St. Croix. The new province with Massa-
chusetts, Plymouth, and the Province of Maine unitedly
form the Royal Province of Massachusetts Bay. Acadia,
or Nova Scotia, was included in the charter, but exclu-

* Mr. Williamson (History of Maine, i., 421) avers that the King's
commissioners for settling (rather unsettling) the affairs of New Eng-
land, "erected the whole territory into a county, by the name of Corn-
wall, " upon their coming hither in 1665. We have taken the more cir-
cumstantial statement from a later and perhaps better authority.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

sive jurisdiction over it was eventually conceded by Mas-
sachusetts to the crown. "All islands and inlets lying
within ten leagues directly opposite the mainland with-
in the said bounds," were embraced in the charter, but
all English subjects were to have a common right of
fishery upon the coast or "in any arms of the sea or still-
water rivers." Sir William Phips was commissioned the
first Royal Governor. The events in the Penobscot
country during the terrible Indian war have been related
in our chapter upon the Indians. In 1693, as prejiara-
tions for another war were beginning, the fort at Penob-
scot was temporarily in the posession of the French, with
the Sieur de Villieu resident commander. It was at this
])lace, October 14, 1697, that the commissioners from
Massachusetts met the Indians and arranged prelimina-
ries of peace.

In 1697, both France and Massachusetts — the former
by the Treaty of Ryswick, as included in "Acadia," and
the latter by its charter — claimed the Sagadahock Prov-
ince. The next summer the English fishing-vessels were
warned off the coast and out of the Gulf of Maine.
No bloodshed resulted, however, until (^ueen Anne's
war with France, declared May 4, 1702. In the Treaty
of Utrecht, March 30, 17 13, the dispute was quieted by
the concession to the English of "all Nova Scotia, or
Acadia, with its ancient boundaries." From this time the
fee to the ungranted lands in the Province remained in
the Crown, while the civil jurisdiction was vested in
Massachusetts. In 1729, one Colonel David Dunbar
succeeded in getting the entire Province into his hands,
by royal proclamation, with instructions to settle, super-
intend, and govern it, and with scarcely any other condi-
tion than that he should preserve within it 300,000 acres
of the best pine and oak-timbered land, for the use of
the Crown. He made some considerable improvements
between the Sheepscot and Muscongus rivers, but his ar-
bitrary conduct soon caused discontent, which resulted
in his downfall in 1732. He retained his office, how-
ever, of Lieutenant (Governor of New Hampshire, until
his leturn to England in 1737.

In 1737, the white population of Sagadahock, embrac-
ing Georgetown, Sheepscot, Damariscotta, Townshend,
Harrington, Walpole, Broad Bay, and St. George's River,
was estimated at 1500. There were then within the
present limits of Maine about 7,000 people of civilized
stock. It will be observed that none of the localities
named was within the Penobscot valley; and the subse-
quent history of the Sagadahock Province has little con-
cern with the purpose of this History. It endured for a
number of years longer, and then was absorbed into
other geographical subdivisions.

"new IRELAND."

We anticipate the course of history, chronologically re-
garded, a little in the mention of this, in order to close
this chapter properly with an account of the erection
of the Province, and then of the State, of Maine. In
1780, a proposition was set on foot for the erection of a
British Province covering the territory between the Pe-
nobscot and the St. Croix, to be called "New Ireland,"
and to have Bagaduce, now Castine, for its capital. It

was expected that the loyalists or Tories from the Ameri-
can colonies, who had already settled along the coast in
considerable number, would colonize the province.
Thomas Oliver, a gradut;te of Harvard College and for-
merly Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts, was to be
its Governor, and the principal officers of the new state
were nominated. The British Ministry and the King
gave their approval to the scheme, and an attempt would
doubtless have been made to carry it into effect, had not
the Attorney-General delivered the opinion that the char-
tered rights of Massachusetts Bay did not end at the Pe-
nobscot, as held by the ministry, but extended to the
St. Croix, and would be infringed by the establishment
of "New Ireland." With this decision the project re-
ceived its quietus.

MAINE.

The charter granted by Charles the First to Sir Fer-
inando (lOrges, dated .April 3, 1639, erected the province
or county of Mayne. Some of the writers affirm that it
took its name from the province of Meyne, in France,
said to have been owned by the queen, Henrietta Maria;
but it has been demonstrably shown that this was no part
of her estate, and it is equally well settled that the an-
cient name for the mainland, as distinguished from the
islands off the shore, was taken for the new province.
It did not comprehend the whole of the present State of
Maine, nor any part of the Penobscot country. Its
boundaries, beginning at the mouth of the Piscataqua,
ran up that river and through Newichawannock and
Fall River northeastwardly one hundred and twenty
miles; from Piscataqua harbor along the coast to the
Sagadahoc; up that river and the Kennebec one hund-
red and twenty miles; and thence overland to the north
end of the line first defined. The charter included also
the islands and inlets within five leagues of the shore
between the Piscataqua and the Sagadahoc, the north
half of the Isles of Shoals, and the islands Capawock
and Nantican (supposed to be Martha's Vineyard and
Nantucket) near Cape Cod. Gorges, with his heirs and
assignees, were created absolute Lords Proprietors of
the [)rovince, reserving only to the crown su]jreme do-
minion, faith, and allegiance, and the right to exact a
yearly tribute of a quarter of wheat and one-fifth of
the avails of pearl fisheries and from gold or silver mines
— the revenue from which sources at that time must
have been small indeed. Thomas Gorges was appointed
deputy-governor; and Messrs. Richard Vines and Rich-
ard Bonythan, of Saco; Henry Joscelyn, of Black
Point; Francis Chamfernon and Edward Godfrey, of
Piscataqua, afterwards Kitlery; and William Hook, of
Agamenticus, were made councillors of the province.

It is not at all the purpose of this History to follow
the existence of the Province of Maine through its
troubled years. So much of its beginning has been in-
troduced here, in order to preface appropriately the story
of that great subdivision of New England, bearing the
same name in part, which came finally to include the
Penobscot region.

The Province of Maine (formally purchased by Mas-
sachusetts from Sir Ferdinando Gorges in 1677, for

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

^^1,250,) with its ancient boundaries, but separated into
the three counties of York, Cumberland and Lincoln,
endured until about half the period of the Revolution
war was spent, when the "District of Maine" was erected
by act of Congress. The immediate occasion for the
change resided in the appellate jurisdiction over all mari-
time causes, which the State of Massachusetts had con-
ceded to Congress, or the tribunals that might be created
by it, and had authorized an appeal from the State courts
in any case where the subject of a foreign power at
peace with the United States claimed a captured or lib-
elled vessel or cargo. The right of appeal could be
waived, however, and final trial had in the Superior
Court of Massachusetts. Congress accordingly, in 1778,
divided the State, for judicial purposes, into three dis-
tricts — the southern, middle and northern, whereof the
last constituted the District of Maine. Timothy Lang-
don, Esq., of Wiscasset, named by Mr. Williamson as "a
lawyer of considerable eminence," was ajjpointed judge
of the district ; and Mr. Nathaniel Thwing, of Wool-
wich, clerk.

Twelve years afterwards, when the census of 1790 ex-
hibited a population in Maine of 96,530, Maine was
"for many purposes," to quote Williamson's phrase, "re-
cognized by Federal authority as a district, and as if it
were a separate State." It was, says the historian, "more
expressly formed into a district, and jurisdiction assumed
over all its affairs belonging to the National Government.
Such, among many, were lighthouses — the single one in
Maine, at Portland Head, and the appurtenant lands, be-
ing ceded to the United States. All the coasts and ports
in Maine were classed into nine commercial districts, in
each of which there were appointed a collector and other
custom-house officers."

The collector appointed for the Penobscot district was
John Lee; for Frenchman's Bay, Melatiah Jordan. A
new District Court was created, with David Sewall judge;
William Lithgow, jr., of Hallowell, United States attor-
ney; Henry Dearborn, of Pittston, marshal; and Henry
Sewall, clerk.

Full jurisdiction over uhe District of Maine, except in
the matters delegated to the General Government, was
maintained by the commonwealth of Massachusetts, until
the State of Maine was formed, the latest-born of all
States of the Union upon the Atlantic seaboard, save
Florida. Agitation for the separation of Maine from
Massachusetts began almost at once upon the close of
the Revolutionary war. Mr. Williamson says:

The want of a distinct government had been often felt during the
late war, and was still recollected. As the State debt was large, there
must be heavy ta.fes through a series of years, which most men would
like to avoid. .Vn excessive thirst for superfluities was draining the
country of money, while thousands were poor and perplexed with
debts. These, and such as had everything to gain and nothing to lose,
were inclined to try an experiment. There were, however, advocates
of the measure among all classes— men of probity, wealth, and intelli-
gence, who believed a separate administration would be of essential
benefit to every portion and interest of the community. Some of the
greatest opponents were men in office, and all of them could present
plausible and correct pleas that the generous favors and provident care
which the people of Maine had at all times received from the State Gov-
ernment ought to silence complaint, and that Ijy a separation at the
present juncture, the vigor and force indispensable to the protection

and security of the district would be essentially weakened, if not alto-
gether paralyzed.

It is an incident of special interest that the first news-
[japer published in the State — the Falmouth Gazette,
started January i, 1785 — was established to concentrate
and promote the expression of public opinion in behalf
of separation. A preliminary convention was held at
Falmouth, October 5th, of the same year, at which an
address to the people of the district was voted, and a
call issued for a delegate convention, to meet January 4,
1786, to consider further the question of separation.

We need not follow the agitation and discussion
through the next third of a century. The fullness of
time for the rising Commonwealth of the Northeast ar-
rived in 1819. The Democratic newspajjers and poli-
ticians now generally advocated separation; the Federalists
as generally opposed it. Nevertheless towns in the dis-
trict petitioned the General Court, in May, for separation.
A law was a|jproved June 19th, submitting to the voters
of Maine the cjuestion: "Is it expedient that the Dis-
trict shall become a separate and independent State upon
the terms and conditions provided in 'an Act relating to
the separation of the District of Maine from Massachus-
etts proper, and forming the same into a separate and
independent State'?" On the fourth Monday of July
the people responded "yes" by a vote of 17,091 to
7,132. October nth, a convention assembled in Port-
land, and proceeded with the preparation of a constitution
for the new State. It was approved by popular vote in
town meetings on the first Monday in December, and
application was promptly made to Congress for admission
into the Federal Union. Many weeks of delay were
caused by the agitation in that body concerning the ex-
tension of slavery, arising from the contemporaneous
appeal of Missouri for admission, which resulted in the
famous Missouri compromise. All obstacles were cleared
by the 3d of March, 1820, when the act for the admis-
sion of Maine was passed, and on the 15th of that month
and year she became a sovereign State.

The intelligence was received in Bangor with great
satisfaction and general gratulation. On the day when
separation became finally an accomplished fact, a salute
of three guns was fired at daylight, another of thirteen at
sunrise, and eleven more at noon.

We reserve for another chapter some account of the
county organizations affecting the Penobscot country.

ttiSTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

GOVERNOR PLAISTED.

General Harris M. Plaisted, of Bangor, Governor of
the State, was born in leffcrson, New Hampshire, No-
vember 2, tSzS, son of Deacon WilHam and Nancy
(Merrill) Plaisted. His parents possessed little of this
world's Roods beyond the resources of a rocky farm with-
in the shadow of the \\'hite Mountains, but to their chil-
dren they left a rich inheritance in their exemplary lives
of industry unremitting, and of piety most pure and sin-
cere. For nearly forty years they were members and pil-
lars of the Baptist Church in Jefferson. The father died
in 1854, and the mother two years later. Noticing his
death the local paper (Coos Democrat) said of him:

He was a good man, and true in all his relations of life; a good
husband and father; a good citizen and an honest man. Scarcely have
we ever known one whose character was 50 positive, and whose life
was so earnest, so universally respected and beloved by all who knew
hitn. We never heard a word spoken, we never heard of a word
spoken, to his dispraise— not even one of those little qualifying words,
" but" or "if," so often used to cloud commendations that can but be
rendered.

General Plaisted was one of a family of nine children,
six sons and three daughters — three of whom, besides
himself, made their homes in Maine — Hon. William
Plaisted, of Lincoln, who has been a member of the State
Senate from this county; Dr. Plaisted, late of Farming-
ton, a graduate of Jefferson Medical College, Philadel-
phia, and surgeon of a Maine regiment during the war ;
Mrs! Church, deceased wife of Cyrus P. Church, Esq., of
Bradford. One son, Charles, is now living in Lancaster,
New Hampshire, who has represented his town in the
New Hampshire Legislature.

General Plaisted comes of good le.?al as well as fight
ing stock. His giandfather, the Hon. Samuel Plaisted,
was for several years Judge of the New Hampshire Court
of Common Pleas, and a native of Berwick, in this State;
was descended from Colonel John Plaisted, of Ports-
mouth, who was a member of the New Hampshire As-
sembly from 1693 to 1727; Speaker in 1697, 1717, and
1727; a member of the Royal Council from 1702 to
1716; a Judge of the Supreme Court from 1699 to 1719,
and Chief Justice in 1716-19. The father of Colonel
John was Captan Roger Plaisted, a distinguished officer
in the Indian wars that make so dark a chapter in the
early history of New England. Roger came to Berwick
about 1650, and was killed in battle with the Indians
October 17, 1675. The savages, about one hundred and
fifty, made an attack on the settlement, and were stoutly
resisted by Captain Plaisted in command of the two up-
per garrisons. At the first alarm he sent a messenger to
Major Waldron, at Dover, New Hampshire, importunate-
ly beseeching aid; "for," said he, "we are all in great
danger of being slain unless our God doth wonderfully
appear for us," and, in the true spirit of the age, added :
"They that cannot fight let them pray." No assistance
came to him, but in the fight the next day his desperate
resistance saved the settlement, though at terrible cost.

" Being greatly over matched," says the historian, "some
of his men sought safety in flight, but he, disdaining to
fly or yield, though urged again and again to surrender,
fought with desperate courage until literally hewed down
by the enemy's hatchets. Two of his sons, unwilling to
leave the intrepid man, sought their retreat too late and
were slain. Such bemg the fate of this Spartan family,
whose intrepidity deserves a monument more durable
than marble. The father had represented Kittery four
years in the General Court, and was highly respected for
his uncommon valor, worth, and piety. He and his sons
were buried on his own land near the battle-ground, full
in view from the highway leading through Berwick;
whose lettered tombstone tells succeeding ages: 'Near
this place lies buried the body of Roger Plaisted, who
was killed by the Indians October 17, 1675; ^g^^ forty-
eight years.' " *

Among the descendants of the brave old Indian fighter
are Governor Goodwin, of New Hampshire, and Gov-
ernor Fairfield, of this State, also Judge Peters, of the
Supreme Court of Maine.

General Plaisted is the eighth in descent from Roger
Plaisted. Until the age of seventeen he remained at
home in New Hampshire, working on his father's farm
and attending the district school. During the next three
years, spring and fall he attended the academy at Lan-
caster, St. Johnsbury, or at New Hampton, paying his
way by " doing chores " for his board, and " ringing
the bell " for his tuition ; teaching school winters and
working on the farm summers.

In 1S49 he entered college at Waterville, Maine, (Colby
university) where he graduated in 1853. During his col-
lege course he taught the village school in Waterville
three winters, and was principal of the Waterville Liberal
institute three terms. He was also superintendent of
schools, elected by the town, for three years.

In 1855 he graduated from the law school of the Uni-
versity of .'\lbany with the highest honors of the institu-
tion, winning the first prize, the gold medal, for the best
essay on equity jurisprudence. After pursuing his studies
one year in the office of Hon. A. W. Paine, of Bangor,
he was admitted to the Bar in 1856, and in October, the
same year, opened an ofifice in that city, where he has
since made his home. He was for three years — 1857-60
— a member of the staff of Governor Lot M. Morrill.
His first vote was cast for Hon. A. P. Morrill, Temper-
ance candidate for Governor in 1853.

In 1861 he entered the army as lieutenant-colonel of
the Eleventh Maine infantry, and was soon after pro-
moted to colonel. He entered active service in March,
1862, and commanded his regiment through the Penin-
sular campaign of General McClellan, participating in
most of the great battles of that memorable campaign
from the Siege of Yorktown to Malvern Hill. He
commanded a brigade in the Siege of Charleston under
General Gillmore in 1863. In April, 1864, he was trans-
ferred, with his brigade, to Virginia, and commanded
his brigade in General Grant's great campaign against Rich,
mond in 1864-65, which resulted in the overthrow of the

* Williamson's Historv of Maine.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

Confederacy. During this campaign his command was
engaged with the enemy and liad men killed and wound-
ed on fifty-nine different days — losing in the aggregate
one thousand three hundred and eighty-five out of two
thousand six hundred and ninety eight, and his command
never moved to the front without him while he was in the
service. He was twice promoted by the President "for
g:;llant and meritorious conduct in the field," to brigadier-
general, and major-general by brevet.

Durmg the war he was at home — once on sick leave,
and recruited over three hundred men — once for the
purpose of filling up his regiment, which had been more
than decimated in battle, and recruited three full com-
panies. Directly and indirectly, he succeeded in keep-
ing his regiment full and in the service to the close of the
war. The recruiting fees allowed him, as well as any one
who recruited for the army, amounted to over eighteen
hundred dollars — all of which he turned over to his sol-
diers. For this generous and patriotic act he received,
in the spring of 1864, through the Portland Press, the
felicitations of Mayor McLellan.

On taking leave of his old brigade General Plaisted
made to it the following farewell address, full of sensi-
bility and pathos, such as can animate only the citizen
soldier "whose bayonet thinks" — from every line of which
shines out the spirit of the true soldier and patriot:

To the officers and soldiers of the Third brigade— Eleventh Maine,
Tenth Connecticut, Twenty-fourth Massachusetts, One Hundredth
New York, Two Hundred and Sixth Pennsylvania.

At last, soldiers, it becomes my duty to say farewell ! That word
may sometimes be spoken and not carry with it the heart's regret, but
not by him who has, for years, shared tlie pleasant companionship of
soldiers.

Th.it companionship with you I have shared in a campaign which
will be celebrated even in the' world's history, celebrated for the brave
deeds and manly virtues of a patriot army contending for government,
freedom and empire; yes, soldiers, with you 1 I will not rehearse your
historv in that campaign. Suffice it to say. the record shows you en-
gaged your country's loes and had killed and wounded some of your
number on hlty-nine different days! that your losses in the aggieg.ate
were one thousand three hundred and eighty-tive out of two thousand
six hundred and ninety-eight. Your name and fame are as familier as
household words in the camps of this army corps and among your fel-
low-citizens at home. Your iron will and hrmness have won lor your-
selves the proud title of "The Iron Clads." That cowardly cry, "weare
n, inked," has never been heard in yourr.inks. When other troops have
given way on your right or your left you have shown to your enemy
that >ou'had no ilani<s, no'iear; that the Third brigade was all front,
and that, too, of steel. How well that front has been maintained the
long list of vour casualties sadly but gloriously attest. Your brave
deeds will be remembered in your country's history and be the proud
boast of your descendants.

When reviewed by the Lieutenant General and the Secretary of 'War,
not long since, your soldierly bearing won from those high officials the
stiongest expre'ision of their approbation and delight. What would
they nave thought had they seen >ou imght!

Be proud of your record, veterans; you have a right to be.

The respect and confidence of such troops after such service is honor
enough. It is sufficient reward for the best efforts, the best endeavors
of a lifetime. I am indebted to you, comrades. Your conduct has
afforded me the keenest pleasure of my life, and while life shall last
memory will constanUy recur to the conduct of the "Iron Brigade"
with as much pride and gratitude as the heart is capable of.

May the day come <|uickly when you can return to your homes to re-
sume your peaceful iJuisuits' and to receive the honois which belong
to our country's defenders. Then will you in your civil life vindicate
the high character of the army by aiding to restore and preseivc the pub-
lic nior.ils, and by proving to your lellow-citizens that in learning to be-
come good soldiers you have 'become the best of citizens.

In conclusion, 1 desire to repeat for your encouragement the language
of Washington to his brave troops, who had won for us the cause we
are now contending to niainlain: "Let me remind you," said he, "you,
the private soldiers, of the dignified part you have performed in the
great struggle. For hnppy — thrice happy — will he be accounted here-
after, who has contributed, though in the least degree, to the establish-
ment ol this gigantic Republic on the broad basis of human freedom
and empire." Immorial honors will belong to you as mivkwcj of the
Republic, no less than to our fathers as founders of it. Karewell!

To the Eleventh Maine, my old companions, farewell !

H. M. Pl.msted.

The military career of General Plaisted from the com-
mencement of the war in iS6i, when as a private citizen
he raised a company of volunteers and took the field in
the cause of his country, to the victorious close of the
great struggle in 1865, when, as l^revet Major General of
volunteers, he returned to his home in Bangor, forms
one of the brightest pages in the history of Maine troops,
and links that history with the most brilliant achieve-
ments of the Union army. It is fitting that, to a record
so brightly told, we add the expressed recognition of his
merits by his superior officers and conirades in arms.

During the Peninsular campaign in 1862, he served
under General Naglee. The latter having been promot:d
to the command of a division, was desirous that Colonel
Plaisted should cotiimand his (Naglee's) old brigade,
and wrote to the Vice President, Mr. Hamlin, as follows:

At my instigation our mutual friend. Colonel Harris M. Plaisted, is
an applicant for promotion that he may command my old brigade. I
can assure you it cannot fall into better hands. He has been well tried
on the Chickahominy, at I-'air Oaks, While Oak Swamp, and other
battlefields of the Peninsula, and snstained himself and regiment in
such a manner that his State will refer to the history of the war and the
conduct of the Eleventh Maine with pride and extreme satisfaction.
Let me ask of you as an especial fa\'or, that you will use your influence
with the President and secure the "star" lor Colonel Plaisted.

In 1863 General Plaisted commanded a brigade under
General Gilmore in the siege of Charleston, and was
warmly recommended for promotion.

In October, 1864, he was again reconimended for pro-
motion by Major Generals Terry, Ames, and Foster, his
corps and division commanders. Major General Terry,
the hero of Fort Fisher, wTOte as follows:

Colonel Plaisted is a brave, patriotic, and loyal man, and h:ts faith-
fully served the country since eaily in the war. Mis regiment is not
only one of the best in the Tenth Army Corps, but one of the best
which I have ever seen.

He is more than ordinarily attentive and zealous in the performance
of his duty, and equally careful for the comfort and welfare of his
men. In the battle of the 7th instant (New Miirket Road) he handled
his brig.ide with marked skill and ability, and it was as much due to
his eftorts as to the efforts of any one else that our flank was not turned
and the battle not lost.

General Foster wrote:

The discipline of his brigade (the Third of the First Division) is of
the highest order, and its lighting qualities unsurpassed by any in this
army. Colonel Plaisted having commanded it since its organization
at Hilton Head, is, in my judgment, entitled to the greater share of
the credit for the remarkable efficiency which it has attained. Colonel
Plaisted is an officer of unbounded zeal and energy, and his loyalty
and patriotism knows no bounds.

General Ames (from Maine) wrote:

The credit for the excellence of his regiment undoubtedly falls to
him. I have been connected with this corps for months, ami it is my
opinion, as well,as that of the officers of the higher gr.ades in the corps,
that the Eleventh Maine Volunteers is far superior to any Maine regiment
in the .Army of the James, in fact that it is unsurpassed by any regiment
from other States. '1 he conduct of the Eleventh Maine in every battle
it has participated in has called forth the highest praise from all, and I
must acknowledge it causes me the strongest feelings of State pride in
Maine troops.

The following tribute from the officers of One of the
regiments of his brigade was forwarded to General
Plaisted after his return home:

At a meeting held the 30th day of May, t865, by the commissioned
officers of the Tenth Connecticut Volunteer Infantry, at camp near
Richmond, Virginia, Colonel E. S. Greely being president, and Lieu-
tenant J. W. Hawxhurst secretary. Captain F. G. Hickerson, Captain
James H. Linsley, and Chaplain H. Clay Trumbull were appointed a
committee to draft resolutions expressing the feelings of the officers of
this regiment towards General Plaisted, their late late brigade com-
mander. The following piearnble and resolutions having been reported
by said committee, were unanimously adopted:

" WHIiREAS, General H. M. Plaisted, our brigadecommanderduring
long and arduous campaigns, has been forced, in consequence of fail-
ing health, to lea\e the military service he loved and adorned, and has

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

now retired to private and civil life, that be may ha\'e formal assurance
of what, from his long association with us, he must fully understand
are the true and hearty personal sentiments and opinions of the officers
of (he Tenth Connecticut —

"Resolved, That while our commander. General Plaisted, had our
sincere esteem for his genial social qualities .ind his ever kindly and
courteous personal bearing, our respect for his high integrity and
marked attainments in scholarship and military science, and our con-
fidence in his brave and experienced soldierly lead, he merited our es-
pecial admiration for his moral courage, in choosing, on more occasions
than one, to risk his own advancement rather than to risk in foolhardy
assaults the lives of the brave men he commanded, while his presence
with them when they were most exposed showed that he never held
them back from unwillingness to share all dangers to which they were
properly called of duty.

"That the unvarying and remarkable successes of his command are
the best evidences of General Plaisted's faithfulness and ability as a
soldier, and that no higher tribute of praise can be paid to his skill and
bravery than that he was a worthy commander of tiie 'Iron Brigade.'
That until the memory of the events in which we bore a part with him and
under him have passed from our minds, we shall ever cherish pleasing
recollections of General Plaisted as an able commander, a gallant
soldier, and an estimable Christian gentleman.

"Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be transmitted by our
president and secretary to General Plaisted, with assurance of our in-
dividual respect and regard.

" E. S. Greely, President,
Colonel Tenth Connecticut Volunteers.

"Lieutenant [. W. HAW.Xll'JR.ST, Secretary."

That Getieral Phisted possesses the highest moral as
well as physical courage is evidenced by the tollowing
order issued by him prohibiiing "whiskey rations" to the
officers under his command:

Hereafter requisitions for whiskey — the one gallon per month — by
commissioned ofticers of this brigade will not be approved at these
headquarters.

The colonel commanding tiie brigade believes that a scheine could
not be devised better calculated to ruin the young men holding commis-
sions in our army and to impair the discipline of the service than this
"one gallon a month " whiskey allowance; for such an habitual use of
into.^icating diink cannot fail to engender habits which, if not in the
service, must in after years prove ruinous to those who indulge in it.

But this gallon of whiskey — this jug of rum a month — is degrading
to the high character of an officer in the United States army, both in
his own estimation and in the estimation of his men. It destroys t!ie
respect which is due him as an officer and gentleman, and thus saps the
very foundation of military discipline.

Whiskey, as a beverage, it must be admitted, is a useless indulgence
at the best, and one which the officer must deny to liis men. The Col-
onel commanding is free to say that no officer possesses the true spirit
of a soldier who is not willing to practice that self-denial which it is his
duty to enforce upon the men of his command. It is believed by him
that the officers of his command have a proper appreciation of them-
selves and of the service, and, therefore, will readily discountenance a
practice which tends to the greatest evils, and which can be only a use-
less indulgence.

In May, 1865, after leaving the service, General Plais-
ted returned to Bangor to resume the practice of his pro-
fession, worn down by fever and ague from the effects of
which he has never fully recovered.

In 1867 he was elected Representative from Hangor
to the State Legislature, and re-elected in i868." He
was delegate, from the State at large, to the Republican
National Convention at Chicago in 1868, wliich nomi-
nated General Grant for the presidency. He was elected
Attorney General of the State by the Legislature in 1873
after a severe contest, and re-elected in 1874 and 1875.
It fell to his lot as Attorney General to conduct, in be-
halt of the State, during his three years of office, four-
teen capital cases, among which were the celebrated trials
of Wagner, Gordon, Lowell, Reed, Benner, Robbins,

the "Annie B." murderer, and Carson, twenty-two days
on tiiil.

So carefully and skilfully were these cases prepared and
managed no verdict was set aside by the full bench on law.
Some of these cases called for advocacy of the highest
order. He was always equal to the occasion. The cele-
brated Wagner case was the first which called forth all
his powers. This lifted him in reputation as advocate to
a high rank in his profession. In a column of editorial
comments the Boston Daily .Advertiser, of June 20,
1873, characterized his argument in this case as a
"model for such speeches," and as a " piece of masterly
rhetoric."

He was a member of the LXIVih Congress from the
Fourth District, serving on the Committee of Public Build-
ings and E.xpenditures of the Treasury Department. He
was also member of special committees on ventilation of
the Representative Hall, and Proctor Knott's committee
to investigate the " Whiskey Frauds," so-called. For the
whole of the long session, up to the middle of August,
1876, General Plaisted was taken from the floor of the
House by the labors of these committees. He also
served for several weeks a member of the sub-committee
appointed from the Committee on the Treasury Expendi-
tures. General Plaisted was not a candidate for a second
term, on account of a vote of the convention of 1875,
which gave the succession to Aroostook county.

Immediately on his return from Washington General
Plaisted resumed work in his office. In 1877 he en-
gaged with F. H. Appicton, Esq., m the preparation of
"Plaisted and Appleton's Digest," a digest of the sixty-
eight volumes of the Maine Reports— a work of four-
teen hundred pages, which was coinpleted the day he
was nominated for Governor. He had previously pub-
lished two other works, "The Lowell Trial," and "The
Wagner Trial." He has also jjrepared for future pub-
lication the history of the Plaisted family.

June T, 1 880, General Plaisted received the unanimous
nomination for Governor of two conventions — the Green-
back convention of one thousand five hundred and fifty
delegates, and the Democratic convention of seven hun-
dred and fifty delegates. He was elected in September
following, after the most hotly contested election per-
haps ever known in the State, receiving 73,770 votes to
73.554 cast for Hon. Daniel F. Davis. January 13, 188 r,
he was inaugurated Governor of the State for two years.
The Legislature elected at the same time is Republican.
Among the public acts of Governor Plaisted, which ex-
cited general discussion, were his inaugural address, his
vetoes of thirty-one bills for the re-charter of State banks
of issue, and his veto of the bill to apportion the State
for Senators and Representatives.

Governor Plaisted cast his last vote for the Republican
ticket in 1878. He had previously taken his stand pub-
licly in favor of Government currency as against bank
currency. He is opposed to all banks of issue and in
favor of Government issues to constitute, with gold and
silver, the entire circulating medium of the country. The
following extract from his inaugural address to the Legis-
lature presents the issues upon which he was elected:

History of pEKOBscot county, Maine.

Debt, public and private ; debt and taxation are slowly but surely
undermining our free institutions. Government bonds not only escape
taxation themselves, but they furnish a cover for all other kinds of evi-
dences of debt that are tax.ible. This double iniquity must l>e borne so
long as United States bonds are endured. It would seem that the prop-
osition to refund the seven or eight hundred millions of United States
bonds now maturing, could meet with but liitle favor by the mass of
the people in this State; that their interests demanded that these bonds
should be paid, not refunded to remain a burden for a generation at
least, and perhaps for generations. Then that other proposition be-
fore the American Congress, to retire and destroy the 346,000,000 legal
tender notes, — burn them, so that out ot their ashes may arise a like
amount of interest-bearing bonds to further tax the labor and industry
of the country ! V\'ould it not be more in accordance with the interest
of the toiling masses in this country, to require the National banks to
retire their cuirency, some over three hundred millions, and replace it
with United Slates legal tenders, and thereby pay off a like amount of
United States bonds, burn them up and thus relieve the people of so
much burden of interest, and above all, from the baneful influence of
these bonds upon the currency and business of the country ?

The Treasurer of the United States in his last report says: "In-
stead of the volume of the circulation being regulated by the business
needs of the country, it is governed by the price of United States
bonds !" The power that controls the volume of the people's money is
certain to control the people's destinies.

This cjueslion of the currency is one about which honest men may
honestly differ. It is an important question. Its decision will be of
far reaching consequence. If the bank currency win the wole field of
circulation, then we shall have a never ending national debt, mam-
tained by the banks as the basis of their existence; yes, fostered by
them as ''a national blessing" — to the banks, ever increasing in num-
ber and power as the country increases in wealth and population, and
certain to become, if not so already, a poluical machine, hostile to free
government, mingling in the elections and legislation of the counir\-,
corrupting the press and exerting its influence in the only way known
to the money power — by corruption.

But it is claimed that this bond policy is demanded in the interest of
idle capit.al; that it is necessary to furnish "an opportunity for the snfe
investment of idle capital." These safe investments for idle capital
are destructive, not only of the industries, but of the morals of the
people. As they render the trade of the money lender the most profit-
able business, they tend to create a race of idlers, misers, and cowards
who will never take any chances with labor in the productive industries
while this opportunity lor safe investment and exemption from tax-
ation is open to them. They take no risks. The Vanderbilts, with
tens of millions of United States bonds, spending the interest in Eu-
rope, and the tens of thousands of lesser bondholders, who produce
nothing and do nothing except clip coupons, what are they to this
country and its industries but a class of gilded paupers supported by
the labor of the country?

We have in this country five thousand persons who own and possess
five millions of property, mostly accumulated within the last fifteen
years, and that, too, through unequal laws. Twenty years ago a mil-
lionaire in this country was as rare as a prince, and so was a tramp.

According to Poor's Manual on Railroads, the number of miles of
railroads in operation in this country increased from 9,000 in 1851 to
86,500 miles in 1879; and the gross earnings from $36,000,000 in 1851
to $529,000,000 in 1879. These facts serve to illustrate the most start-
ling development of the age — the development of corporate power.

The presidents of the great trunk lines in this country control prop-
erty, three of them, valued at $1,818,000,000: and three others prop-
erty valued at $943,000,000.

These great trunk lines have been in the habit of combining, and
raising and lowering rates,^not according to business principles, but ac-
cording to their selfish interests. It is notorious that the change of these
rates in a single week recently added $5,000,000 per week to the burdens
of the people, and put many times that amount into the hands of
Eastern holders of grain, some of whom were railroad directors.

How, then, can any reflecting mind, any patriot, contemplate with-
out anxious concern, the tendency of the legislation of this country to
create such rapid accumulation of property in the hands of the few at
the expense of the many ?

"The freest government," says Webster, "cannot long endure.
where the tendency of the law is to create a rapid accumulation of
property in a few hands, and to render the masses of the people
poor and dependent."

Universal sufl'rage and great landed estates cannot long exist together,
for eitlier the owners of the estates must restrict the right of suffrage,
or that right of suffrage will in the end divide their estates.

Is it not time we paused in our career, and reviewed our principles ?

Our institutions were founded upon equality, or rather, grew out of
equality — that condition of comparative equality as to property that
characterized the early settlers of New England. They brought with
them no great capital, and, fortunately for humanity, there was noth-
ing here productive, to tempt investments. If one miUionaire had
come over in the Mayflower, he would have blasted the prospects of a
continent; for ours, then, would have been a government not to pro-
tect labor but capital. Capital would have shaped it. Our ancestors
came here all upon an equality as to property, or rather as to poverty.
But the lands were all open and free to them. They entered into
possession and established the town system, the hundred acre lot sys-
tem, the district school system, and upon this foundation they builded
their free and Christian Rej>ublic. All were tillers of the soil, farmers
—not tenant farmers, but freeholders, having absolute dominion over
their acres, recognizing no man as lord or master, no power between
them and the God ihey worshipped. They were lords and sovereigns
themselves, and if we are a nation of sovereigns to-day it is only so
far as we are a nation of freeholders. When these sovereigns got to-
gether to form a government what kind of a government could they
form ? Only that under which all were equals, all were sovereigns.
They could not have formed any other if they had tried. It was this
necessary act of parceling out the land into small freeholds, "that
fixed the future frame and form of their government."

Our New England ancestors not only began their system of govern-
ment under a condition of comparative equality as to property, but all
their laws were of a nature to favor and perpetuate that equality. This
is undoubtedly the true principle of legislation. .Any system of legisla-
tion, therefore, that tends to destroy this happy equality, wipe out the
small free-holds and centralize the ownership of land in the hands of the
few, not only destroys the prosperity and independence of the people,
but strikes at the very foundation of our republic. There is nothing in
this country so sacred as the free-hold. It was the inmiediate parent of
our free-school system and constitutes the essential condition of its exis-
tence, for in a country of great landed estates the district school system
is as impossible as it is unknown.

.At the foundation of our free system, therefore, lies the principle of
equality, and it is only upon that principle it can be preserved ; for it
can rest in the love of all only as it rests in the interests of all. Move it
from this basis of ecjuality and our temple of liberty falls, and then who
shall raise up its shapely columns again? It is only by a happy concur-
rence of the most fortunate circumstances our Constitution was framed
and adopted. No other people, no other country, no other age was
equal to the work. How far above the powers of the American people
to-day is such an achievement? We should know, since we are not
able to supply its one little defect, in relation to counting the electoral
votes. The wisdom and patriotism of Congress is unequal to the task,
though urged to it by every consideration of public safety. No, if our
experiment of free government shall fail from the earth, it will be the
knell of popular liberty the world over and for all time.

Cicero, in one of his orations, is led off into a panegyric upon the
Roman Constitution. How apt are his words, when applied to our im-
maculate charter, the crowning glory of the Revolution. — that master-
piece of human invention, at once the wonder and hope of the world. —
the Constitution under which we live! for. says the great orator. "O
wonderful system and discipline of government which we have received
from our fathers !—I,ET us PRIiSERVE IT."

General Plaisted married, September 21, 1858, Sarah
J., daughter of Chase P. and Mary J. (Clough) Mason,
of Waterville. They had three sons — Harold Mason, a
recent graduate of the State College, and now messenger
to the Governor and Council; Frederick William, a pupil
in the Bangor high school, and Ralph Parker, also in the
public schools of this city. Mrs. Plaisted died October
25, 1875, ^"d on the 27th of September, 1881, the Gov-
ernor was again married, this time to Mabel True,
daughter of Hon. Francis W. and Sarah A. (True) Hill,
of E.\eter, in this county, and grand-daughter of Colonel
Francis Hill.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

CHAPTER V.

COLONIZATION AND SETTLEMENT.

The Seventeeiuh Century — First White Settlements in Maine — A
Possible French Fort on the Penobscot in the Si.vteentli Century—
The Plymouth Pilgrims at Cistine— The Earthquake of 1638— Re-
ports and Statistics of Growth— Castine Village— The Old Fort-
Baron de St. Castine — Other Inhabitants of Pentagoet— Castine the
Younger — First English Settlers on the Penobscot.

THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.

The first permanent settlements upon the present soil
of Maine were made upon Arrowsick Island and the
mainland about the Sagadahoc river, and at Sheepscot,
Damariscotta, Pemaquid, and the St. George's river, as
early as 1613. A permanent settlement was begun
about this time at the mouth of the Saco. Monhegan,
says Williamson, "was permanently peopled about the
year 1622." But Bryant & Gay's History holds Bidde-
ford and Saco, planted by Richard Vines and John Old-
ham in 1630, to be the most decided beginnings of set-
tlements in Maine. Four years previously, the New
Plymouth colonists had followed their trading ventures
up and at the mouth of the Kennebec with the erection
of a "truck house'' at Penobscot, where they began trade
with the Tarratine Indians. It was the first English
trading-house in the Penobscot waters.

Governor Sullivan, in his History of the District of
Maine, says there were at this time eighty-four families,
besides fishermen, about Sheepscot, Pemaquid, and St.
George's. Reasoning from this datum, Mr. Williamson
thinks that in 1636 the whole number of whites between
Piscataqua and Penobscot must have exceeded 1,400,
and might possibly have reached 100 more.

In 1653, from the data supplied by the submission
made by the five towns of Maine te Massachusetts, the
same writer estimates : " If there were 250 families in
the five towns, and fifty farms on the Isles of Shoals, at
seven in a family, the whole number of persons would
be 2,100."

Eleven years after this, or in the year 1664, when
the Geographical and Historical Description of North
America was published by Monsieur Denys, he said:
"The French have a fort on the east side of the Penob-
scot Bay; and on the other hand the English are set-
tled in great numbers, and have a large country cleared
and under imi)rovement." The next year, when the
Royal Commissioners are said to have erected the 1 )uke
of York's Sagadahoc Territory into the County of Corn-
wall, the settlements along the coast are believed by Wil-
liamson to have comprised "probably 300 families;"
though Sullivan finds but 145 in 1673. In the later jear
a census of "Acadia" was taken by the French authori-
ties ; but we get from it no statistics as to the territory
now occupied by Maine, except of the Baron de Cas-
tine's settlement on Penobscot Bay, which had thirty-one
white persons, including the soldiers of the garrison.

The next year the outbreak of King Philip's War led
to an enrollment of the militia, which appears rather to
have been estimated than exactly ascertained, if one
may judge by the "round numbers" in which returns
were made. From these, however, it may be ascer-

tained, with reasonable certainty, that the white popu-
lation between the Piscataqua and the Penobscot
numbered 5,000 to 6,000. Leaving out, however, " Dev-
onshire" and the settlements west of the Sagadahoc,
the "residue of the Duke's patent" was returned as con-
taining but fifty men capable of bearing arms. The
statement of Captain Sylvanus Davis, however, then a
resident agent on the Sagadahoc and extensively ac-
quainted with the settlers, is that there were this year
(1675) 158 families east of that river. But there was
not yet, nor until eighty-five years thereafter, a single
permanent white settler on the bank of the Penobscot.
The next year the total population of Massachusetts and
New Hampshire, the Maine and Sagadahoc Provinces, was
but 150,000 souls. This is the statement of Mr. Wil-
liamson, who cites some older authorities. Mr. Palfrey
(History of New England) scouts this estimate as alto-
gether too large, and thinks there were probably in New
England at this time, leaving Maine altogether out of
the account, 40,000 to 45,000 people of English stock.
Hubbard, in his Narrative of the Troubles with the
Indians in New England, published in 1677, gives the
following account of the beginnings of settlement in
Maine: ,

The first place that was ever possessed by the English, in the hope of
making a plantation in those parts, was a tract of land on the west side
of the river of Kennebeck, then called Sagatohocke, since Saga-de-
hocke; other places adjoining were soon after seized, and improved for
trading and fishmg. The more remote and furthest northward at the
time belonging to the English (Penobscot forty years since being sur-
prised by the French and by them held at this day) is called Pemma-
quid, distant seven or eight leagues from Kennebeck, and is the utmost
boundary of Xew England, being about forty leagues distant from the
mouth of Pascataqua river. That Pemmaquid is a very commodious
haven for ships, and hath been found very advantageous to such as use
to come upon these coasts to make fishing voyages; southwest, or
southeast, from whence, about six or seven leagues, lies an island called
Monhiggon, of much use on the same account for fishing, it lying three or
four leagues into the sea from Damaril's Cove (a place of hkc advantage
for the stages of fishermen in former times). There have been for a
long time seven or eight considerable dwellings about Pemmaquid.
wnich is well accommodated with pasture-land about the haven for
feeding cattle, and some fields also for tiU.ige; all the land improvable
for such uses being already taken uj) by such a number of inhabitants
as is already mentioned.

A I'OSSIliLF- FRENCH FORT.

The old French navigator and writer, Andre Thevet,
who wrote of the Penobscot waters, or the "river of
Norumbegue," in 1556, makes the first mention of any-
thing like civilized settlement upon its banks or the
shores of the bay. He speaks of a small fort erected by
the French some ten or twelve leagues up the river,
which was called "the Fort of Norumbeque." He sup-
plies, however, no fnrther facts concerning it; and, as
nothing more is known of it and no vestiges of it have
ever been discovered, it seems probable that no such fort
existed in fact, and that Thevet transmogrified in his
relation the older story of an aborignal capital on the
Penobscot, which was itself named "Norumbega."

THE LANDING OF THE PILGRIMS.

Early in 1626, or perhaps the next year, — at all events,
but a very few years after the landing at Plymouth, —
the Pil