d it Maine.

The settlements were weak and their growth tardy. In 1641 New Hampshire
placed itself under the protection of Massachusetts, but the king
separated them in 1679, and made New Hampshire a royal colony. In 1688
it again joined Massachusetts, and three years later was set off once
more by the king, after which it remained a royal colony until the
Revolution.

THE CONNECTICUT COLONY.

The Connecticut colony included all of the present State of Connecticut,
excepting a few townships on the shore of Long Island Sound. It came
into the possession of the Earl of Warwick in 1630, and the following
year he transferred it to Lords Say, Brooke, and others. The Dutch
claimed the territory and erected a fort on the Connecticut River to
keep out the English. The latter, however, paid no attention to them,
and a number of Massachusetts traders settled at Windsor in 1633.
Saybrook, at the mouth of the Connecticut, was settled in 1635. A great
many emigrants came from Massachusetts in 1636, the principal leader
being Thomas Hooker. They founded Weathersfield, Windsor, and Hartford,
and in 1639 adopted the name of the Connecticut colony and drew up a
written constitution, the first ever framed by a body of men for their
own government. Other settlements were made and Saybrook united with
them.

The most eventful incident in the history of Connecticut was the war
with the Pequot Indians, who were a powerful tribe in the eastern part
of the State. They tried to persuade the Narragansetts to join them, but
Roger Williams, who lived among them, persuaded Canonicus, their chief,
to refuse. Then the Pequots committed the fatal mistake of going to war
alone. The settlers, fully roused to their danger, assailed the Pequot
stronghold with fury, one summer morning in 1637, and killed all their
enemies, sparing neither women nor children. Thus a leading tribe of
Indians were blotted out in one day.

THE NEW HAVEN COLONY.

The New Haven colony comprised the townships already referred to as
lying on Long Island Sound. It was settled in 1638 by a company of
English immigrants, who were sufficiently wise and just to buy the lands
of the Indians. Other towns were settled, and in 1639 the group took the
name of the New Haven colony. Neither of the colonies had a charter, and
there was much rivalry in the efforts to absorb the towns as they were
settled. The majority preferred to join the Connecticut colony, for the
other, like Mas