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stones, and many people spent all their substance in wandering about over the wilderness country seeking a fortune in this way. There was one old man, who, she remembered, did roam about seeking for hidden treasures, until he lost his wits, and might be seen filling a bag with bright stones and shining sand, muttering and laughing to himself.
He was at last missed for some little time, when he was found lying dead in the woods, still holding fast in his hands his bag of pebbles.
On my querying whether any did find treasures hereabout, my aunt laughed, and said she never heard of but one man who did so, and that was old Peter Preble of Saco, who, growing rich faster than his neighbors, was thought to owe his fortune to the finding of a gold or silver mine. When he was asked about it, he did by no means deny it, but confessed he had found treasures in the sea as well as on the land; and, pointing to his loaded fish-flakes and his great cornfields, said, ‘Here are my mines.’ So that afterwards, when any one prospered greatly in his estate, it was said of him by his neighbors, ‘He has been working Peter Preble's mine.’
October 8.
Mr. Van Valken, the Dutchman, had before Mr. Rishworth, one of the Commissioners of the Province, charged with being a Papist and a Jesuit.
He bore himself, I am told, haughtily enough, denying the right to call him in question, and threatening the interference of his friend and ruler, Sir Edmund, on account of the wrong done him.
