In Those Days The Point Where The Canal Leaves The
City Was Guarded By A Water-Gate, Which Has Long Since Been Removed, As
Have Also The Town Walls, The Only Remaining Portions Of Which Are The
Morsch-Gate And The Zylgate.
So, gliding along the quiet waters of the
Vliet, past the Water-gate, and looking up at the frowning turrets of the
Cow-gate, 'they left that goodly and pleasant city which had been their
resting-place near twelve years.' .
. . Nine miles from Leyden a
branch canal connects the Vliet with the Hague, and immediately beyond
their junction a sharp turn is made to the left, as the canal passes
beneath the Hoom-bridge; from this point, for the remaining five miles,
the high road from the Hague to Delft, lined with noble trees, runs side
by side with the canal. In our time the canal-boats make a circuit of
the town to the right, but in those days the traffic went by canal
through the heart of the city . . . . Passing out of the gates of
Delft and leaving the town behind, they had still a good ten miles of
canal journey before them ere they reached their vessel and came to the
final parting, for, as Mr. Van Pelt has clearly shown, it is a mistake to
confound Delft with Delfshaven, as the point of embarkation in the
SPEEDWELL. Below Delft the canal, which from Leyden thither is the
Vliet, then becomes the Schie, and at the village of Overschie the
travellers entered the Delfshaven Canal, which between perfectly straight
dykes flows at a considerable height above the surrounding pastures.
Then finally passing through one set of sluice gates after another, the
Pilgrims were lifted from the canal into a broad receptacle for vessels,
then into the outer haven, and so to the side of the SPEEDWELL as she lay
at the quay awaiting their arrival."
Dr. Holmes has prettily pictured the "Departure" in his "Robinson of
Leyden," even if not altogether correctly, geographically.
"He spake; with lingering, long embrace,
With tears of love and partings fond,
They floated down the creeping Maas,
Along the isle of Ysselmond.
"They passed the frowning towers of Briel,
The 'Hook of Holland's' shelf of sand,
And grated soon with lifting keel
The sullen shores of Fatherland.
"No home for these! too well they knew
The mitred king behind the throne;
The sails were set, the pennons flew,
And westward ho! for worlds unknown."
Winslow informs us that they of the Leyden congregation who volunteered
for the American enterprise were rather the smaller fraction of the whole
body, though he adds, as noted "that the difference was not great."
A careful analysis of the approximate list of the Leyden colonists,
- including, of course, Carver, and Cushman and his family, - whose total
number seems to have been seventy-two, indicates that of this number,
forty-two, or considerably more than half (the rest being children,
seamen, or servants), were probably members of the Leyden church. Of
these, thirty, probably, were males and twelve females. The exact
proportion this number bore to the numerical strength of Robinson's
church at that time cannot be determined, because while something less
than half as we know, gave their votes for the American undertaking, it
cannot be known whether or not the women of church had a vote in the
matter. Presumably they did not, the primitive church gave good heed to
the words of Paul (i Corinthians xiv. 34), "Let your women keep silence
in the churches." Neither can it be known - if they had a voice - whether
the wives and daughters of some of the embarking Pilgrims, who did not go
themselves at this time, voted with their husbands and fathers for the
removal. The total number, seventy-two, coincides very nearly with the
estimate made by Goodwin, who says: "Only eighty or ninety could go in
this party from Leyden," and again: "Not more than eighty of the
MAY-FLOWER company were from Leyden. Allowing for [i.e. leaving out]
the younger children and servants, it is evident that not half the
company can have been from Robinson's congregation." As the total
number of passengers on the MAYFLOWER was one hundred and two when she
took her final departure from England, it is clear that Goodwin's
estimate is substantially correct, and that the number representing the
Leyden church as given above, viz., forty-two, is very close to the
fact.
"When they came to the place" [Delfshaven], says Bradford, "they found
the ship and all things ready; and such of their friends as could not
come with them [from Leyden] followed after them; and sundry also came
from Amsterdam (about fifty miles) to see them shipped, and to take their
leave of them."
Saturday, July 22/Aug. 1, 1620, the Pilgrim company took their farewells,
and Winslow records: "We only going aboard, the ship lying to the key
[quay] and ready to sail; the wind being fair, we gave them [their
friends] a volley of small shot [musketry] and three pieces of ordnance
and so lifting up our hands to each other and our hearts for each other
to the Lord our God, we departed."
Goodwin says of the parting: "The hull was wrapped in smoke, through
which was seen at the stern the white flag of England doubly bisected by
the great red cross of St. George, a token that the emigrants had at last
resumed their dearly-loved nationality. Far above them at the main was
seen the Union Jack of new device."
And so after more than eleven years of banishment for conscience' sake
from their native shores, this little band of English exiles, as true to
their mother-land - despite persecutions - as to their God, raised the
flag of England, above their own little vessel, and under its folds set
sail to plant themselves for a larger life in a New World.
And thus opens the "Log" of the SPEEDWELL, and the "Westward-Ho" of the
Pilgrim Fathers.
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