e. Within a few years from the time of the building of "The
Desire," there were quite a number of Negro slaves in Massachusetts.
"John Josselyn, Gen't" in his "Two Voyages to New England," made in
"1638, 1663," and printed for the first time in 1674,[267] gives an
account of an attempt to breed slaves in Massachusetts.

"The Second of _October_, (1639) about 9 of the clock in the
morning, Mr. _Maverick's_ Negro woman came to my chamber
window, and in her own Countrey language and tune sang very
loud and shril, going out to her, she used a great deal of
respect towards me, and willingly would have expressed her
grief in _English_; but I apprehended it by her countenance
and deportment, whereupon I repaired to my host, to learn of
him the cause, and resolved to entreat him in her behalf,
for that I understood before, that she had been a Queen in
her own Countrey, and observed a very humble and dutiful
garb used towards her by another Negro who was her maid. Mr.
_Maverick_ was desirous to have a breed of Negroes, and
therefore seeing she would not yield by persuasions to
company with a Negro young man he had in his house; he
commanded him will'd she nill'd she to go to bed to her,
which was no sooner done but she kickt him out again, this
she took in high disdain beyond her slavery, and this was
the cause of her grief."[268]

It would appear, at first blush, that slavery was an individual
speculation in the colony; but the voyage of the ship "Desire" was
evidently made with a view of securing Negro slaves for sale. Josselyn
says, in 1627, that the English colony on the Island of Barbados had
"in a short time increased to twenty thousand, besides Negroes."[269]
And in 1637 he says that the New Englanders "sent the male children of
Pequets to the Bermudus."[270] It is quite likely that many
individuals of large means and estates had a few Negro slaves quite
early,--perhaps earlier than we have any record; but as a public
enterprise in which the colony was interested, slavery began as early
as 1638. "It will be observed," says Dr. Moore, "that this first
entrance into the slave-trade was not a private, individual
speculation. It was the enterprise of the authorities of the colony.
And on the 13th of March, 1639, it was ordered by the General Court
"that 3_l_ 8_s_ should be paid Lieftenant Davenport for the present,
for charge disburse