SOURCE: Cairns, William B. “The New England Colonies. First Period, 1620-1676.” In A History of American Literature, pp. 21-55. New York: Oxford University Press, 1916.

In the following excerpt,which originally appeared in 1912, Cairns offers a broad outline of Morton's life in New England, finds him to be an irresponsible and ultimately unworthy person, and judges the account in New English Canaan to be inaccurate, carelessly written, and merely superficially humorous.

The exact facts regarding [Morton's] life are somewhat in doubt, for his own story and that of the Puritans do not agree, and probably neither is entirely trustworthy. It is known, however, that he was a Cavalier and a member of the Church of England, who in the early years of the Plymouth settlement held a plantation and trading post at Mount Wollaston, or Merry Mount. Here, with a few companions of the same sort, he traded with...