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All these advantages, however, were not satisfactory.
The disappointment and uneasiness found vent in words.
One memorable example is preserved: “At the court of assistants,” says Winthrop, Nov. 3, 1635, “John Pratt of Newtown was questioned about the letter he wrote into England, wherein he affirmed divers things, which were untrue and of ill repute, for the state of the country, as that here was nothing but rocks, and sands, and salt marshes, etc. He desired respite for his answer to the next morning; then he gave it in writing, in which, by making his own interpretation of some passages and acknowledging his error in others, he gave satisfaction.”
1 This letter, probably written in the previous year, is not known to exist; but the “answer,” which sufficiently indicates its nature, is on record:—
The answer of me, John Pratt, to such things as I hear and perceive objected against me, as offensive in my letter.
First, generally, whatsoever I writ of the improbability or impossibility of subsistence for ourselves or our posterity without tempting God, or without extraordinary means, it was with these two regards: first, I did not mean that which I said in respect of the whole country, or our whole patent in general, but only of that compass of ground wherein these towns are so thick set together; and secondly, I supposed that they intended so to remain, because (upon conference with divers) I found that men did think it unreasonable that they or any should remove or disperse into other parts of the country; and upon this ground I thought I could not subsist myself, nor the plantation, nor posterity.
But I do acknowledge that since my letter there have been sundry places newly found out, as Neweberry, Concord, and others (and that within this patent), which will afford good means of subsistence for men and beasts, in which and other such like new plantations,
