spring-time it puts forth leaves on its shrivelling branches, and in the autumn wears its coronal of richest hue. A red cedar, without question as

ancient as this "Old Oak," and showing but a hint of its former beauty in its top, fashioned now somewhat like a crow's nest, leans landward over a wall, near Hoop Pole Cove, seeming to say: "I have braved and resisted the tempests of three centuries, of more years than the white men have been familiar with my surroundings; yet now I must die and give place to the group of hardy children at my side. May not their life be shortened as mine has been by the axe and knife of irreverent and careless hands." On high ground, overlooking this tree and Hoop Pole Cove, the villager sees a thousand objects on land and ocean, instructive to his thought, striking to his wonder, and pleasing to his fancy; but none of these objects touch his heart more certainly, as with a human voice of grave and tender tone, than the

"Old Cedar," the age and endurance of which have been the subject of fireside converse through generation after generation of his kindred before him.

ORIGIN OF THE NAME CAPE ANN.

In "Hubbard's Narrative," as given in "Young's Chronicles," Cape Ann and the Three Islands near its head are alluded to as having easily set aside the Turkish names which from 1614 they had borne. "Neither of them glorying in these Mahometan titles," says the narrator, Rev. William Hubbard, of Ipswich, "the promontory willingly exchanged its name for that of Cape Anne, imposed, as is said, by Captain Mason, and which it retaineth to this day, in honor of our famous Queen Anne, the royal consort of King James; and the three islands are now known by other names." As to the relation of the origin of the new name, Dr. Young says: "This is a mistake. The name was altered by Prince Charles, in honor of his mother, Anne of Denmark. See Mass. Hist. Coll., xxvi. 97, 99, and xxiii. 20." Mr. Hubbard died in Ipswich, Sept. 14, 1704, aged eighty-three.

B

SANDY BAY.

The part of the ocean at the end of the Cape lying between Gap Head and Straitsmouth Island on the south, and Andrews' Point on the north, in the first chapter of this book alluded to as Sandy Bay, has borne this name since the day of the first settlers around it. It is a semi-circular bay, bordered by a shore notched with little indentations called Coves. The seaward granite borders of these coves have been massively and solidly built upon with stone to a great height, so that safe harbors for stone-sloops, coasters, and fishing-craft have been made. The harbor at Rockport, on the south side of Sandy Bay, is a double one with two entrances. The harbor at Pigeon Cove, on the north side, is a single basin with one entrance, and that is close to the shore, approached from the south. Two or three smaller harbors between these two are occupied exclusively by stone vessels. Between the harbor of Rockport and the harbor of the Granite Company, the latter, halfway to Pigeon Cove, there are three beaches, separated from each other by narrow, jagged necks and points of granite. From these beaches arose the name borne by the Bay.

Across Sandy Bay, from Andrews' Point to Gap Head and Straitsmouth Island, the distance is

about four miles. From Rockport or from Pigeon Cove eastward to the Salvages, or the Savage Rocks, it is three miles. The Salvages unfold their harsh and cruel character when vessels are tossed upon them by the storm, or when they encounter them in thick, bewildering fog.

FIRST SETTLERS OF SANDY BAY.

Prior to 1700, the inhabitants around Sandy Bay were few. There remains to day on Gap Head the cellar of a house which was probably occupied by John Babson in 1695. The land which he held at that point was granted to him to use as a fishingstation. The wildness of his surroundings may be imagined from the circumstance that one day he encountered a bear, which he killed with a knife, since he had no other weapon with which to deal a deadly blow, and so free himself from the fierce animal. Taking off the skin of the bear, and spreading it upon a rock to dry, at the end of the neck which is the middle ground between the two parts of the harbor at Rockport, he gave occasion to the Chebacco or Ipswich fishermen, passing in their boats and catching sight of the bloody thing, to call the neck the name it is known by to-day,· "Bearskin Neck."

Babson did not permanently fix himself at his fishing-station. In 1721 he sold the property and moved away.

Richard Tarr was the first permanent settler near Sandy Bay. It is nearly certain that he located on the south side of Davison's Run before Babson began his fishing enterprise on Gap Head.

John Poole soon followed Tarr, and built a house on the north side of Davison's Run.

Several years rolled by before other settlers joined these two.

FIRST SETTLERS OF PIGEON COVE.

In the beginning of the seventeenth century a few persons took up their abode near Halibut Point, Andrews' Point, and Pigeon Cove; namely, Samuel Gott, William Andrews, Joshua Norwood, Jethro Wheeler, Jethro Wheeler, Jr., and Thomas Harris. These, and two or three others who settled near Pebble Stone Beach, were the only and not very near neighbors of Tarr and Poole.