d to the congregation. Robinson remained at
Leyden, and never came to America. After a brief stop at Southampton,
where they met the Mayflower with friends from London, the Pilgrims
again set sail in the two ships. The Speedwell sprang a leak, and they
stopped at Dartmouth for repairs. Again they started, and had put three
hundred miles of salt water between themselves and Land's End, when the
Speedwell leaked so badly that they were forced to return. When they
dropped anchor at Plymouth in Devonshire, about twenty were left on
shore, and the remainder, exactly one hundred in number, crowded into
the Mayflower and on the 6th of September started once more to cross the
Atlantic. The capacity of the little ship was 180 tons, and her strength
was but slight. In a fierce storm in mid-ocean a mainbeam amidships was
wrenched and cracked, and but for a huge iron screw which one of the
passengers had brought from Delft, they might have gone to the bottom.
The foul weather prevented any accurate calculation of latitude and
longitude, and they were so far out in their reckoning that when they
caught sight of land on the 9th of November, it was to Cape Cod that
they had come. Their patent gave them no authority to settle here, as
it was beyond the jurisdiction of the London Company. They turned their
prow southward, but encountering perilous shoals and a stiff headwind
they desisted and sought shelter in Cape Cod bay. On the 11th they
decided to find some place of abode in this neighbourhood, anticipating
no difficulty in getting a patent from the Plymouth Company, which was
anxious to obtain settlers. For five weeks they stayed in the ship while
little parties were exploring the coast and deciding upon the best site
for a town. It was purely a coincidence that the spot which they chose
had already received from John Smith the name of Plymouth, the beautiful
port in Devonshire from which the Mayflower had sailed. [Sidenote:
Founding of Plymouth]

There was not much to remind them of home in the snow-covered coast on
which they landed. They had hoped to get their rude houses built before
the winter should set in, but the many delays and mishaps had served to
bring them ashore in the coldest season. When the long winter came to
an end, fifty-one of the hundred Pilgrims had died,--a mortality even
greater than that before which the Popham colony had succumbed. But
Brewster spoke truth when he said, "It is not with us as with men whom