A similar fortune at a later date overtook the townships to the north of the Piscataqua.  The origin of the name “Maine,” applied to the regions of these settlements, has never been satisfactorily explained.  Possibly it was a compliment to Henrietta Maria, the French wife of Charles I.; more probably the fishermen used it to distinguish the continent from the islands.  The term “Maine” first occurs in the grant to Gorges and Mason, August 22, 1622, which embraced all the land between the Merrimac and the Sagadahoc, or Kennebec.  By Mason’s patent in 1629 the country west of the Piscataqua was called New Hampshire, and after that Maine was a name applied to the region between the Piscataqua and Kennebec.  In more modern times it was extended to the country beyond, as far as the St. Croix River.

Under Gorges’ influence Christopher Levett made a settlement in 1623 on an island in Saco Bay which has been called “the first regular settlement in Maine."[18] The same year some Plymouth merchants planted a colony upon Monhegan Island, which had been long a place of general resort for fishermen.[19] And about the same time Gorges made a settlement on the “maine” at Saco,[20] under the management of Richard Vines.  By two patents, both dated February 12, 1630, this settlement was divided into two parts—­one to Vines and Oldham, one to Lewis and Bonighton—­each extending four miles along by the sea-shore and eight miles along the river-banks.  These two tracts formed the township of Saco, a part of which now bears the name of Biddeford.  In 1625 the settlement of Pemaquid is known to have occurred, but it was not patented till February 14, 1631, by the Bristol merchants Aldsworth and Elbridge.  Next in order of settlement was probably the trading-post of the Plymouth colony at Kennebec, for which a patent was obtained in 1628.

Many other patents were issued by the Council for New England.  Thus, March 13, 1630, John Beauchamp and Thomas Leverett obtained a grant of ten leagues square, between Muscongus and Penobscot Bay upon which they set up a factory for trading with the Indians; while the modern city of Scarboro, on Casco Bay, occupies a tract which was made the subject of two conflicting grants, one to Richard Bradshaw, November 4, and the other to Robert Trelawney and Moses Goodyear, December 1, 1631.[21]

Three other patents issued by the Council for New England, and having an important connection with subsequent history, remain to be mentioned.  The first, December, 1631, granted twenty-four thousand acres ten miles distant from Piscataqua to Ferdinando Gorges (son and heir of John Gorges), Samuel Maverick, and several others.  Many settlers came over, and the first manager was Colonel Norton, but in a short time he appeared to have been superseded by William Gorges, nephew of Sir Ferdinando Gorges.[22]