The scene opens in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the year 1668, where in one of the college buildings a contest between two rival printers had been waged for some years. Marmaduke Johnson, a trained and experienced printer, to whose ability the Indian Bible is largely due, had ceased to be the printer of the corporation, or Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England, but still had a press and, what was better, a fresh outfit of type, sent over by the corporation and entrusted to the keeping of John Eliot, the Apostle. Samuel Green had become a printer, though without previous training, and was at this time printer to the college, a position of vantage against a rival, because it must have carried with it countenance from the authorities in Boston, and public printing then as now constituted an item to a press of some income and some perquisites. By seeking to marry Green's daughter before his English wife had ceased to be, Johnson had created a prejudice, public as well as private, against himself.{1}

Each wished to set up a press in Boston itself, but the General Court, probably for police reasons, had ordered that there should be no printing but at Cambridge, and that what was printed there should be approved by any two of four gentlemen appointed by the Court. It thus appeared that each printer possessed a certain superiority over his rival. In the matter of types Johnson was favored, as he had new types and was a trained printer; but these advantages were partially neutralized by indolence and by Green's better standing before the magistrates.{1}

In England the excesses of the printing-press during the civil war and commonwealth led to a somewhat strict though erratically applied censorship under the restoration. A publication must be licensed, and the Company of Stationers still sought, for reasons of profit, to control printers by regulating their production. The licensing agent in chief was a character of picturesque uncertainty and spasmodic action, Roger L'Estrange, half fanatic, half politician, half hack writer, in fact half in many respects and whole only in the resulting contradictions of purpose and performance. On one point he was strong—a desire to suppress unlicensed printing. So when in 1668 warrant was given to him to make search for unauthorized printing, he entered into the hunt with the zeal of a Loyola and the wishes of a Torquemada, harrying and rushing his prey and breathing threats of extreme rigor of fine, prison, pillory, and stake against the unfortunates who had neglected, in most cases because of the cost, to obtain the stamp of the licenser.{2}

New England was at this time England in little, with troubles of its own; but, having imitated the mother country in introducing supervision of the press, it also started in to investigate the printers of the colony, two in number, seeking to win a smile of approval from the foolish man on the throne. With due solemnity the inquisition was made. Green could show that all then passing through his press had been properly licensed.

Johnson, less fortunate, was caught with one unlicensed piece—"The Isle of Pines." A fine of five pounds was imposed upon him, as effectual in suppressing him as though it had been one of five thousand pounds. He could now turn with relish to two books then on his press, "Meditations on Death and Eternity" and the "Righteous Man's Evidence for Heaven;" for Massachusetts Bay, with its then powerful rule of divinity without religion, or religion without mercy, held out small hope of his meeting such a fine within the expedition of his natural life. But he made his submission, petitioned the General Court in properly repentant language, acknowledged his fault, his crime, and promised amendment{1} The fine was not collected, and the principal result of the incident was to further the very natural union of Johnson and Green, but with Johnson as the lesser member in importance.

No copy of Marmaduke Johnson's issue of the "Isle of Pines" has come to light in a period of 248 years. It might well be supposed that the authorities caught him before the tract had gone to press, and so snuffed it out completely. Our sapient bibliographers have dismissed the matter in rounded phrase: "'The Isle of Pines' was a small pamphlet of the Baron Munchausen order, which in its day passed through several editions in England and on the Continent,"{2} a description which would fit a hundred titles of the period. In July, 1917, Sotheby announced the sale of a portion of the Americana collected by "Bishop White Kennett (1660-1728) and given by him to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts."

Lot No. 113 was described as follows:

[Neville (Henry)] The Isle of Pines, or a late Discovery of a fourth Island in Terra Australis, Incognita, being a True Relation of certain English persons who in the dayes of Queen Elizabeth, making a Voyage to the East Indies, were cast away and wracked upon the Island, wanting the frontispiece, head-line of title and some pagination cut into, Bishop Kenneths signature on title. sm. 4to S. G. for Allen Banks, 1668.

The pamphlet was sold, I am told, for fourteen shillings,{1} and resold shortly after to a New York bookseller for fifty-five dollars. He was attracted by the imprint, which read in full, "London, by S. G. for Allen Banks and Charles Harper at the Flower-Deluice near Cripplegate Church." The general appearance of the pamphlet was unlike even the moderately good issues of the English press, and the "by S. G." not only did not answer to any London printer of the day, except Sarah Griffin, "a printer in the Old Bailey,"{2} but was in form and usage exactly what could be found on a number of the issues of the press of Samuel Green, of Cambridge, Massachusetts.

On comparing the first page of the text of his purchase with the same page of an acknowledged London issue of the "Isle of Pines" in the John Carter Brown Library,{1} the bookseller concluded that the two were entirely different publications.

An expert cataloguer connected with one of the large auction firms of New York then took up the subject. After a study of the tract he became assured that it could only have been printed by Samuel Green, of Cambridge, and he brought forward facts and comparisons which seemed conclusive and for which he deserves much credit. It was a clever bit of bibliographical work. With such an endorsement as to rarity and quality the pamphlet was again put to the test of the auction room. The cataloguer stated his case in sufficient fulness of detail and the first page of the text was reproduced.{2} Naturally the discovery sent a little thrill through the mad-house of bibliography. The tract was knocked down for $400 to a bookseller from Hartford, Connecticut, presumably for some local collection. The incident would have passed from memory had it not been for one of those accidents to which even the amateur bibliographer is liable.

In the bitter days of the winter of 1917-18 the working force of the Massachusetts Historical Society was contracted into one room—the Dowse Library—where was at least a semblance of warmth in the open fireplace.