Some of the early forms of British and Dutch calendars, “annuals,” and agricultural “hand-books,” it is certain were brought over by several families, and were doubtless much consulted and well-thumbed “guides, counsellors, and friends” in the households of their possessors.  The great preponderance of reading matter brought by the little colony was, however, unquestionably of the religious controversial order, which had been so much a part of their lives, and its sum total was considerable.  There are intimations, in the inventories of the Fathers, of a few works of historical cast, but of these not many had yet been printed.  “Caesar’s Commentaries,” a “History of the World,” and a “History of Turkey” on Standish’s shelves, with the two Dictionaries and “Peter Martyr on Rome” on Dr. Fuller’s, were as likely to have come in the first ship, and to have afforded as much satisfaction to the hungry readers of the little community as any of the books we find named in the lists of their little stock.  It is pathetic to note, in these days of utmost prodigality in juvenile literature, that for the Pilgrim children, aside from the “Bible stories,” some of the wonderful and mirth-provoking metrical renderings of the “Psalme booke,” and the “horne booke,” or primer (the alphabet and certain elementary contributions in verse or prose, placed between thin covers of transparent horn for protection), there was almost absolutely nothing in the meagre book-freight of the Pilgrim ark.  “Milk for Babes,” whether as physical or mental pabulum, was in poor supply aboard the may-Flower.

The most that can be claimed with confidence, for particular objects of alleged may-Flower relation, is that there is logical and moral certainty that there was a supply of just such things on board, because they were indispensable, and because every known circumstance and condition indicates their presence in the hands to which they are assigned, while tradition and collateral evidence confirm the inference and sometimes go very far to establish their alleged identity, and their presence with their respective owners upon the ship.  A few other articles besides those enumerated in possession of the Pilgrim Society, and of other societies and individuals, present almost equally strong claims with those named, to be counted as “of may-Flower belonging,” but in no case is the connection entirely beyond question.  Where so competent, interested, and conscientious students of Pilgrim history as Hon. William T. Davis, of Plymouth, and the late Dr. Thomas B. Drew, so long the curator of the Pilgrim Society, cannot find warrant for a positive claim in behalf of any article as having come, beyond a doubt, “in the may Flower,” others may well hesitate to insist upon that which, however probable and desirable, is not susceptible of conclusive proof.