Colonial dames and good wives (2024)

WRITTEN BY
ALICE MORSE EARLE

BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & COMPANY
THE RIVERSIDE PRESS CAMBRIDGE

Copyright, 1895,
By ALICE MORSE EARLE.

All rights reserved.

CONTENTS

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In the early days of the colony of MassachusettsBay, careful lists were sentback to old England by the magistrates, tellingwhat “to provide to send to New England”in order to ensure the successfulplanting and tender nourishing of the newsettlement. The earliest list includes suchhomely items as “benes and pese,” tameturkeys, copper kettles, all kinds of usefulapparel and wholesome food; but the list isheaded with a most significant, a typicallyPuritan item, Ministers. The list sent tothe Emigration Society by the Virginiancolonists might equally well have beenheaded, to show their most crying need,with the word Wives.

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The settlement of Virginia bore an entirelydifferent aspect from that of New England.It was a community of men who plantedJamestown. There were few women amongthe early Virginians. In 1608 one MistressForrest came over with a maid, Anne Burraws,who speedily married John Laydon, thefirst marriage of English folk in the newworld. But wives were few, save squaw-wives,therefore the colony did not thrive. SirEdwin Sandys, at a meeting of the EmigrationSociety in London, in November, 1619,said that “though the colonists are seatedthere in their persons some four years, theyare not settled in their minds to make ittheir place of rest and continuance.” Theyall longed to gather gold and to return toEngland as speedily as possible, to leavethat state of “solitary uncouthness,” as oneplanter called it. Sandys and that delightfulgentleman, the friend and patron ofShakespeare, the Earl of Southampton,planned, as an anchor in the new land, tosend out a cargo of wives for these planters,that the plantation might “grow in generationsand not be pieced out from without.”In 1620 the Jonathan and the London Merchant[Pg 3]brought ninety maids to Virginia on aventure, and a most successful venture itproved.

There are some scenes in colonial lifewhich stand out of the past with much clearnessof outline, which seem, though nodetails survive, to present to us a vivid picture.One is this landing of ninety possiblewives—ninety homesick, seasick buttimidly inquisitive English girls—on Jamestownbeach, where pressed forward, eagerlyand amorously waiting, about four hundredlonely emigrant bachelors—bronzed, sturdymen, in leather doublets and breeches andcavalier hats, with glittering swords andbandoleers and fowling-pieces, without doubtin their finest holiday array, to choose andsecure one of these fair maids as a wife.Oh, what a glorious and all-abounding courting,a mating-time, was straightway begunon the Virginian shore on that happy day inMay. A man needed a quick eye, a readytongue, a manly presence, if he were tosucceed against such odds in supply anddemand, and obtain a fair one, or indeedany one, from this bridal array. But whosoeverhe won was indeed a prize, for all were[Pg 4]asserted to be “young, handsome, honestlyeducated maids, of honest life and carriage”—whatmore could any man desire? Gladlydid the husband pay to the EmigrationCompany the one hundred and twentypounds of leaf tobacco, which formed, in onesense, the purchase money for the wife.This was then valued at about eighty dollars:certainly a man in that matrimonialmarket got his money’s worth; and thecomplaining colonial chronicler who assertedthat ministers and milk were the only cheapthings in New England, might have added—andwives the only cheap things inVirginia.

It was said by old writers that some ofthese maids were seized by fraud, weretrapanned in England, that unprincipledspirits “took up rich yeomans’ daughters toserve his Majesty as breeders in Virginiaunless they paid money for their release.”This trapanning was one of the cryingabuses of the day, but in this case it seemsscarcely present. For the girls appear tohave been given a perfectly fair showing inall this barter. They were allowed to marryno irresponsible men, to go nowhere as servants,[Pg 5]and, indeed, were not pressed to marryat all if against their wills. They were tobe “housed lodged and provided for of diet”until they decided to accept a husband.Naturally nearly all did marry, and from theunions with these young, handsome andgodly-carriaged maids sprang many of ourrespected Virginian families.

No coquetry was allowed in this mating.A girl could not promise to marry two men,under pain of fine or punishment; and atleast one presumptuous and grasping manwas whipped for promising marriage to twogirls at the same time—as he deserved tobe when wives were so scarce.

Other ship-loads of maids followed, andwith the establishment of these Virginianfamilies was dealt, as is everywhere elsethat the family exists, a fatal blow at a communityof property and interests, but thecolony flourished, and the civilization of thenew world was begun. For the unit ofsociety may be the individual, but the moleculeof civilization is the family. Whenmen had wives and homes and children they“sett down satysfied” and no longer sighedfor England. Others followed quickly and[Pg 6]eagerly; in three years thirty-five hundredemigrants had gone from England to Virginia,a marked contrast to the previousyears of uncertainty and dissatisfaction.

Virginia was not the only colony to importwives for its colonists. In 1706 His MajestyLouis XIV. sent a company of twenty younggirls to the Governor of Louisiana, Sieur deBienville, in order to consolidate his colony.They were to be given good homes, and tobe well married, and it was thought theywould soon teach the Indian squaws manyuseful domestic employments. These younggirls were of unspotted reputation, and uprightlives, but they did not love their newhomes; a dispatch of the Governor says:—

The men in the colony begin through habit touse corn as an article of food, but the women,who are mostly Parisians, have for this kind offood a dogged aversion which has not been subdued.Hence they inveigh bitterly against hisGrace the Bishop of Quebec who they say hasenticed them away from home under pretext ofsending them to enjoy the milk and honey of theland of promise.

I don’t know how this venture succeeded,but I cannot fancy anything more like the[Pg 7]personification of incompatibility, of inevitablefailure, than to place these young Parisianwomen (who had certainly known of themanner of living of the court of Louis XIV.)in a wild frontier settlement, and to expectthem to teach Western squaws any domesticor civilized employment, and then tomake them eat Indian corn, which theyloathed as do the Irish peasants. Indeed,they were to be pitied. They rebelled andthreatened to run away—whither I cannotguess, nor what they would eat save Indiancorn if they did run away—and they stirredup such a dissatisfaction that the imbrogliowas known as the Petticoat Rebellion, andthe governor was much jeered at for his unsuccessfulwardship and his attempted matrimonialagency.

In 1721 eighty young girls were landedin Louisiana as wives, but these were notgodly-carriaged young maids; they had beentaken from Houses of Correction, especiallyfrom Paris. In 1728 came another companyknown as filles à la cassette, or casket girls,for each was given by the French governmenta casket of clothing to carry to the newhome; and in later years it became a matter[Pg 8]of much pride to Louisianians that theirdescent was from the casket-girls, ratherthan from the correction-girls.

Another wife-market for the poorer classof wifeless colonists was afforded throughthe white bond-servants who came in suchnumbers to the colonies. They were ofthree classes; convicts, free-willers or redemptioners,and “kids” who had beenstolen and sent to the new world, and soldoften for a ten years’ term of service.

Maryland, under the Baltimores, was thesole colony that not only admitted convicts,but welcomed them. The labor of thebranded hand of the malefactor, the educationand accomplishments of the social outcast,the acquirements and skill of the intemperateor over-competed tradesman, all werewelcome to the Maryland tobacco-planters;and the possibilities of rehabilitation of fortune,health, reputation, or reëstablishmentof rectitude, made the custom not unwelcometo the convict or to the redemptioner.Were the undoubted servant no rogue, butan honest tradesman, crimped in Englishcoast-towns and haled off to Chesapeaketobacco fields, he did not travel or sojourn,[Pg 9]perforce, in low company. He might findhimself in as choice companionship, withladies and gentlemen of as high quality,albeit of the same character, as graced thoseother English harbors of ne’er-do-weels,Newgate or the Fleet Prison. Convictscame to other colonies, but not so openlynor with so much welcome as to Maryland.

All the convicts who came to the colonieswere not rogues, though they might be condemnedpersons. The first record in TalbotCounty, Maryland, of the sale of a convict,was in September, 1716, “in the third Yeareof the Reign of our Sovereign Lord KingGeorge.” And it was for rebellion and treasonagainst his Majesty that this convict,Alexander MacQueen, was taken in Lancashireand transported to America, and soldto Mr. Daniel Sherwood for seven years ofservice. With him were transported twoshiploads of fellow-culprits, Jacobites, on theFriendship and Goodspeed. The LondonPublic Record Office (on American and WestIndia matters, No. 27) records this transportationand says the men were “Scotts Rebells.”Earlier still, many of the rebels ofMonmouth’s rebellion had been sold for[Pg 10]transportation, and the ladies of the courtof James had eagerly snatched at the profitsof the sale. Even William Penn begged fortwenty of these rebels for the Philadelphiamarket. Perhaps he was shrewd enough tosee in them good stock for successful citizens.Were the convict a condemned criminal,it did not necessarily follow that he orshe was thoroughly vicious. One Englishhusband is found petitioning on behalf ofhis wife, sentenced to death for stealing butthree shillings and sixpence, that her sentencebe changed to transportation to Virginia.

The redemptioners were willing immigrants,who contracted to serve for a periodof time to pay the cost of their passage,which usually had been prepaid to the masterof the ship on which they came across-seas.At first the state of these free-willerswas not unbearable. Alsop, who was a redemptioner,has left on record that the workrequired was not excessive:—

Five dayes and a halfe in the summer is theallotted time that they worke, and for two months,when the Sun is predominate in the highest pitchof his heat, they claim an antient and customary[Pg 11]Priviledge to repose themselves three hours inthe day within the house. In Winter they dolittle but hunt and build fires.

and he adds, “the four years I served therewere not to me so slavish as a two-year’sservitude of a handicraft apprenticeship inLondon.”

Many examples can be given where theseredemptioners rose to respected social positions.In 1654, in the Virginia Assemblywere two members and one Burgess who hadbeen bond-servants. Many women-servantsmarried into the family of their employers.Alsop said it was the rule for them to marrywell. The niece of Daniel Defoe ran awayto escape a marriage entanglement in England,sold herself on board ship as a redemptionerwhen but eighteen years old, wasbought by a Mr. Job of Cecil County, Maryland,and soon married her employer’s son.Defoe himself said that so many good maid-servantswere sold to America that there wasa lack for domestic service in England.

Through the stealing of children andyouths to sell in the plantations, it canplainly be seen that many a wife of respectablebirth was furnished to the colonists.[Pg 12]This trade, by which, as Lionel Gatfordwrote in 1657, young people were “cheatinglyduckoyed by Poestigeous Plagiaries,”grew to a vast extent, and in it, emulatingthe noble ladies of the court, women oflower rank sought a degrading profit.

In 1655, in Middlesex, England, one ChristianSacrett was called to answer the complaintof Dorothy Perkins:—

She accuseth her for a spirit, one that takesupp men women and children, and sells thema-shipp to be conveyed beyond the sea, havinginticed and inveigled one Edward Furnifall andAnna his wife with her infant to the waterside,and putt them aboard the ship called the Planterto be conveied to Virginia.

Sarah Sharp was also asserted to be a“common taker of children and setter toBetray young men and maydens to be conveyedto ships.”

The life of that famous rogue, Bamfylde-MooreCarew, shows the method by whichservants were sold in the plantations. Thecaptain, with his cargo of trapanned Englishmen,among whom was Carew, cast anchorat Miles River in Talbot County, Maryland,ordered a gun to be fired, and a hogshead[Pg 13]of rum sent on board. On the day of thesale the men prisoners were all shaved, thewomen dressed in their best garments, theirneatest caps, and brought on deck. Eachprisoner, when put up for sale, told histrade. Carew said he was a good rat-catcher,beggar, and dog-trader, “upon which theCaptain hearing takes the planter aside, andtells him he did but jest, being a man ofhumour, and would make an excellent schoolmaster.”Carew escaped before being sold,was captured, whipped, and had a heavyiron collar, “called in Maryland a pot-hook,”riveted about his neck; but he again fledto the Indians, and returned to England.Kidnapped in Bristol a second time, he wasnearly sold on Kent Island to Mr. Dulaney,but again escaped. He stole from a house“jolly cake, powell, a sort of Indian cornbread, and good omani, which is kidney beansground with Indian corn, sifted, put into apot to boil, and eaten with molasses.” Jollycake was doubtless johnny cake; omani,hominy; but powell is a puzzle. He madehis way by begging to Boston, and shippedto England, from whence he was again trapanned.

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In the Sot-Weed Factor are found somevery coarse but graphic pictures of the womenemigrants of the day. When the factorasks the name of “one who passed for chambermaid”in one planter’s house in “Mary-Land,”she answered with an affected blushand simper:—

Another time, being disturbed in his sleep,the factor finds that in an adjoining room,—

Soon quarreling over their cards, the planters’wives fall into abuse, and one says scornfullyto the other:—

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The other makes, in turn, still more bitteraccusations. It can plainly be seen that suchsocial and domestic relations might readilyproduce similar scenes, and afford opportunityfor “crimination and recrimination.”

Still we must not give the Sot-WeedFactor as sole or indeed as entirely unbiasedauthority. The testimony to the housewifelyvirtues of the Maryland women byother writers is almost universal. In theLondon Magazine of 1745 a traveler writes,and his word is similar to that of manyothers:—

Wives were just as eagerly desired in NewEngland as in Virginia, and a married estatewas just as essential to a man of dignity. Asa rule, emigration thereto was in families,but when New England men came to theNew World, leaving their families behindthem until they had prepared a suitablehome for their reception, the husbands weremost impatient to send speedily for theirconsorts. Letters such as this, of Mr. Eyrefrom England to Mr. Gibb in Piscataquay,in 1631, show the sentiment of the settlersin the matter:—

I hope by this both your wives are with youaccording to your desire. I wish all your wiveswere with you, and that so many of you as desirewives had such as they desire. Your wife, Roger[Pg 17]Knight’s wife, and one wife more we have alreadysent you and more you shall have as you wishfor them.

This sentence, though apparently polygamousin sentiment, does not indicate an intentto establish a Mormon settlement inNew Hampshire, but is simply somewhatshaky in grammatical construction, and erraticin rhetorical expression.

Occasionally, though rarely, there wasfound a wife who did not long for a NewEngland home. Governor Winthrop wroteto England on July 4, 1632:—

I have much difficultye to keepe John Gallopeheere by reason his wife will not come. Imarvayle at her womans weaknesse, that she willlive myserably with her children there when shemight live comfortably with her husband here.I pray perswade and further her coming by allmeans. If she will come let her have the remainderof his wages, if not let it be bestowed tobring over his children for soe he desires.

Even the ministers’ wives did not all sighfor the New World. The removal of Rev.Mr. Wilson to New England “was rendereddifficult by the indisposition of his dearest[Pg 18]consort thereto.” He very shrewdly interpreteda dream to her in favor of emigration,with but scant and fleeting influence uponher, and he sent over to her from Americaencouraging accounts of the new home, andhe finally returned to England for her, andafter much fasting and prayer she consentedto “accompany him over an ocean to awilderness.”

Margaret Winthrop, that undaunted yetgentle woman, wrote of her at this date (andit gives us a glimpse of a latent element ofMadam Winthrop’s character), “Mr. Wilsoncannot yet persuade his wife to go, for all hehath taken this pains to come and fetch her.I marvel what mettle she is made of. Sureshe will yield at last.” She did yield, andshe did not go uncomforted. Cotton Matherwrote:—

Mrs. Wilson being thus perswaded over intothe difficulties of an American desart, her kinsmanOld Mr. Dod, for her consolation underthose difficulties did send her a present with anadvice which had in it something of curiosity.He sent her a brass counter, a silver crown, anda gold jacobus, all severally wrapped up; withthis instruction unto the gentleman who carried[Pg 19]it; that he should first of all deliver only thecounter, and if she received it with any shew ofdiscontent, he should then take no notice of her;but if she gratefully resented that small thing forthe sake of the hand it came from, he shouldthen go on to deliver the silver and so the gold,but withal assure her that such would be the dispensationsto her and the good people of NewEngland. If they would be content and thankfulwith such little things as God at first bestowedupon them, they should, in time, have silver andgold enough. Mrs. Wilson accordingly by hercheerful entertainment of the least remembrancefrom good old Mr. Dod, gave the gentlemanoccasion to go through with his whole presentand the annexed advice.

We could not feel surprised if poor homesick,heartsick, terrified Mrs. Wilson had“gratefully resented” Mr. Dod’s apparentlymean gift to her on the eve of exile in ourmodern sense of resentment; but the meaningof resent in those days was to perceivewith a lively sense of pleasure. I do notknow whether this old Mr. Dod was the poetwhose book entitled A Posie from Old Mr.Dod’s Garden was one of the first rare booksof poetry printed in New England in colonialdays.

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We truly cannot from our point of view“marvayle” that these consorts did not longto come to the strange, sad, foreign shore,but wonder that they were any of them everwilling to come; for to the loneliness of anunknown world was added the dread horrorof encounter with a new and almost mysteriousrace, the blood-thirsty Indians, and ifthe poor dames turned from the woods tothe shore, they were menaced by “murtheringpyrates.”

Gurdon Saltonstall, in a letter to JohnWinthrop of Connecticut, as late as 1690,tells in a few spirited and racy sentences ofthe life the women lead in an unprotectedcoast town. It was sad and terrifying inreality, but there is a certain quaintness ofexpression and metaphor in the narrative,and a sly and demure thrusting at Mr. James,that give it an element of humor. It waswritten of the approach of a foe “whoseentrance was as formidable and swaggeringas their exit was sneaking and shamefull.”Saltonstall says:—

My Wife & family was posted at your Honʳˢa considerable while, it being thought to be yemost convenient place for ye feminine Rendezvous.[Pg 21]Mr James who Commands in Chiefeamong them, upon ye coast alarum given, facethto ye Mill, gathers like a Snow ball as he goes,makes a Generall Muster at yor Honʳˢ, and soposts away with ye greatest speed, to take advantageof ye neighboring rocky hills, craggy, inaccessiblemountains; so that Wᵗᵉᵛᵉʳ els is lostMr James and yᵉ Women are safe.

All women did not run at the approachof the foe. A marked trait of the settlers’wives was their courage; and, indeed, opportunitieswere plentiful for them to show theirdaring, their fortitude, and their ready ingenuity.Hannah Bradley, of Haverhill,Mass., killed one Indian by throwing boilingsoap upon him. This same domestic weaponwas also used by some Swedish women nearPhiladelphia to telling, indeed to killingadvantage. A young girl in the MinotHouse in Dorchester, Mass., shovelled livecoals on an Indian invader, and drove himoff. A girl, almost a child, in Maine, shut adoor, barred, and held it while thirteen womenand children escaped to a neighboring block-housebefore the door and its brave defenderwere chopped down. Anthony Bracket andhis wife, captured by savages, escaped through[Pg 22]the wife’s skill with the needle. She literallysewed together a broken birch-bark canoewhich they found, and in which they gotsafely away. Most famous and fierce of allwomen fighters was Hannah Dustin, who, in1697, with another woman and a boy, killedten Indians at midnight, and started forhome; but, calling to mind a thought thatno one at home, without corroborative evidence,would believe this extraordinary tale,they returned, scalped their victims, andbrought home the bloody trophies safely toHaverhill.

Some Englishwomen were forced to marrytheir captors, forced by torture or dire distress.Some, when captured in childhood,learned to love their savage husbands.Eunice Williams, daughter of the Deerfieldminister, a Puritan who hated the Indiansand the church of Rome worse than he hatedSatan, came home to her Puritan kinsfolkwearing two abhorred symbols, a blanketand crucifix, and after a short visit, not likinga civilized life, returned to her Indianbrave, her wigwam, and her priest.

I have always been glad that it was myfar-away grandfather, John Hoar, who left[Pg 23]his Concord home, and risked his life asambassador to the Indians to rescue one ofthese poor “captivated” English wives, Mrs.Mary Rowlandson, after her many and heart-rending“savage removes.” I am proud ofhis “very forward spirit” which made himdare attempt this bold rescue, as I am proudof his humanity and his intelligent desire totreat the red men as human beings, furnishingabout sixty of them with a home anddecent civilizing employment. I picture him“stoutly not afraid,” as he entered the camp,and met the poor captive, and treated successfullywith her savage and avariciousmaster, and then I see him tenderly leadingher, ragged, half-starved, and exhausted,through the lonely forests home—home tothe “doleful solemn sight” of despoiledLancaster. And I am proud, too, of thenoble “Boston gentlewomen” who raisedtwenty pounds as a ransom for Mary Rowlandson,“the price of her redemption,” andtenderly welcomed her to their homes andhearts, so warmly that she could write ofthem as “pitiful, tender-hearted, and compassionateChristians,” whose love was sobountiful that she could not declare it. If[Pg 24]any one to-day marvels that English wivesdid not “much desire the new and dolefulland,” let them read this graphic and thrillingstory of the Captivity, Removes, and Restaurationof Mary Rowlandson, and he willmarvel that the ships were not crowdedwith disheartened settlers returning to their“faire English homes.”

A very exciting and singular experiencebefell four dignified Virginian wives in Bacon’sRebellion, not through the Indiansbut at the hands of their erstwhile friends.It is evident that the women of that colonywere universally and deeply stirred by theromance of this insurrection and war. Wehear of their dramatic protests against thetyranny of the government. Sarah Drummondvowed she feared the power of Englandno more than a broken straw, andcontemptuously broke a stick of wood toillustrate her words. Major Chriesman’swife, “the honor of her sex,” when her husbandwas about to be put to death as arebel, begged Governor Berkeley to kill herinstead, as he had joined Bacon wholly at hersolicitation. One Ann Cotton was movedby the war to drop into literary composition,[Pg 25]an extraordinary ebullition for a woman inher day, and to write an account of theRebellion, as she deemed “too wordishly,”but which does not read now very wordishlyto us. But for these four dames, the wivesof men prominent in the army under GovernorBerkeley—prime men, Ann Cotton callsthem—was decreed a more stirring participationin the excitements of war. The brilliantand erratic young rebel, Bacon, pressedthem into active service. He sent outcompanies of horsem*n and tore the gentlewomenfrom their homes, though they remonstratedwith much simplicity that theywere “indisposed” to leave; and he broughtthem to the scene of battle, and heartlesslyplaced them—with still further and moreacute indisposition—on the “fore-front”of the breastworks as a shield against theattacks of the four distracted husbands withtheir soldiers. We read that “the poor Gentlewomenwere mightily astonished at thisproject; neather were their husbands void ofamazements at this subtill invention.” Thefour dames were “exhibited to the view oftheir husbands and ffriends in the towneupon the top of the smalle worke he had[Pg 26]cast up in the night where he caused themto tarey till he had finished his defenceagainst the enemy’s shott.” There stoodthese four innocent and harmless wives,—“guardianangells—the white gardes of theDivell,” shivering through the chill Septembernight till the glimmering dawn saw completedthe rampart of earth and logs, or theleaguer, as it was called by the writers withthat exactness and absolute fitness of expressionwhich, in these old chronicles, givessuch delight to the lover of good old English.One dame was also sent to her husband’scamp as a “white-aproned hostage”to parley with the Governor. And this hidingof soldiers behind women was done bythe order of one who was called the mostaccomplished gentleman in Virginia, butwhom we might dub otherwise if we wished,to quote the contemporary account, to “opposehim further with pertinances and violentperstringes.”

I wish I could truthfully say that onemost odious and degrading eighteenth centuryEnglish custom was wholly unknownin America—the custom of wife-trading, theselling by a husband of his wife to another[Pg 27]man. I found, for a long time, no traces orhints of the existence of such a custom inthe colonies, save in two doubtful cases. Idid not wholly like the aspect of GovernorWinthrop’s note of the suggestion of somemembers of the church in Providence, thatif Goodman Verin would not give his wifefull liberty to go to meeting on Sundayand weekly lectures as often as she wished,“the church should dispose her to someother man who would use her better.” Iregarded this suggestion of the ProvidenceChristians with shocked suspicion, but calmedmyself with the decision that it merely indicatedthe disposition of Goodwife Verin asa servant. And again, in the records of the“Pticuler Court” of Hartford, Conn., in1645, I discovered this entry: “BaggettEgleston for bequething his wyfe to a youngman is fyned 20 shillings.” Now, any readercan draw his conclusions as to exactly whatthis “bequething” was, and I cannot see thatany of us can know positively. So, thoughI was aware that Baggett was not a very reputablefellow, I chose to try to persuademyself that this exceedingly low-priced bequeathingdid not really mean wife-selling.[Pg 28]But just as I was “setting down satysfyed”at the superiority in social ethics and moralityof our New England ancestors, I chanced,while searching in the Boston Evening Postof March 15, 1736, for the advertisem*nt ofa sermon on the virtues of our forbears, entitledNew England Tears and Fears of EnglandsDolours and Horrours, to find instead,by a malicious and contrary fate, this bit ofunwelcome and mortifying news not aboutold England but about New England’s “doloursand horrours.”

Boston. The beginning of last Week a prettyodd and uncommon Adventure happened in thisTown, between 2 Men about a certain woman,each one claiming her as his Wife, but so it was,that one of them had actually disposed of hisRight in her to the other for Fifteen Shillingsthis Currency, who had only paid ten of it inpart, and refus’d to pay the other Five, incliningrather to quit the Woman and lose his Earnest;but two Gentlemen happening to be present,who were Friends to Peace, charitably gave himhalf a Crown a piece, to enable him to fulfil hisAgreement, which the Creditor readily took, andgave the Woman a modest Salute, wishing herwell, and his Brother Sterling much Joy of hisBargain.

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The meagre sale-money, fifteen shillings,was the usual sum which changed hands inEngland at similar transactions, though onedame of high degree was sold for a hundredguineas. In 1858 the Stamford Mercurygave an account of a contemporary wife-salein England, which was announced throughthe town by a bellman. The wife was led tothe sale with a halter round her neck, andwas “to be taken with all her faults.” I amglad to say that this base British husbandwas sharply punished for his misdemeanor.

It seems scarcely credible that the customstill exists in England, but in 1882 a husbandsold his wife in Alfreton, Derbyshire;and as late as the 13th July, 1887, AbrahamBoothroyd, may his name be Anathema maranatha,sold his wife Clara at Sheffield, England,for five shillings.

A most marked feature of social life incolonial times was the belleship of widows.They were literally the queens of society.Fair maids had so little chance against them,swains were so plentiful for widows, that Ioften wonder whence came the willing menwho married the girls the first time, thusoffering themselves as the sacrifice at the[Pg 30]matrimonial altar through which the girlscould attain the exalted state of widowhood.Men sighed sometimes in their callow daysfor the girl friends of their own age, but assoon as their regards were cast upon a widow,the girls at once disappear from history, andthe triumphant widow wins the prize.

Another marked aspect of this conditionof society was the vast number of widows inearly days. In the South this was accountedfor by one of their own historians as beingthrough the universally intemperate habitsof the husbands, and consequently their frequentearly death. In all the colonies lifewas hard, exposure was great to carry on anyactive business, and the excessive drinkingof intoxicating liquors was not peculiar tothe Southern husbands any more than werewidows. In 1698 Boston was said to be“full of widows and orphans, and many ofthem very helpless creatures.” It wascounted that one sixth of the communicantsof Cotton Mather’s church were widows. Itis easy for us to believe this when we readof the array of relicts among which thataged but actively amorous gentleman, JudgeSewall, found so much difficulty in choosing[Pg 31]a marriage partner, whose personal andfinancial charms he recounted with so muchpleasurable minuteness in his diary.

A glowing tribute to one of these Bostonwidows was paid by that gossiping traveller,John Dunton, with so much evidence of deepinterest, and even sentiment, that I fancyMadam Dunton could not have been whollypleased with the writing and the printingthereof. He called this Widow Breck the“flower of Boston,” the “Chosen exemplarof what a Widow is.” He extols her highcharacter, beauty, and resignation, and thenbridles with satisfaction while he says,“Some have been pleas’d to say That were Iin a single state they do believe she wou’dnot be displeas’d with my addresses.” Herode on horseback on a long journey withhis fair widow on a pillion behind him, andif his conversation on “Platonicks and theblisses of Matrimony” was half as tediousas his recounting of it, the road must indeedhave seemed long. He says her love forher dead husband is as strong as death, butWidow Breck proved the strength of herconstancy by speedily marrying a secondhusband, Michael Perry.

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As an instance of the complicated familyrelations which might arise in marryingwidows, let me cite the familiar case of therich merchant, Peter Sergeant, the builderof the famous Province House in Boston. Iwill use Mr. Shurtleff’s explanation of thisbewildering gallimaufrey of widows andwidowers:—

He was as remarkable in his marriages as hiswealth; for he had three wives, the second havingbeen a widow twice before her third venture;and his third also a widow, and even becominghis widow, and lastly the widow of her thirdhusband.

To this I may add that this last husband,Simon Stoddart, also had three wives, thathis father had four, of whom the last threewere widows,—but all this goes beyond themodern brain to comprehend, and remindsus most unpleasantly of the wife of Bath.

These frequent and speedy marriages werenot wholly owing to the exigencies of coloniallife, but were the custom of the times inEurope as well. I read in the diary of thePuritan John Rous, in January, 1638, of thissomewhat hasty wooing:—

[Pg 33]

A gentleman carried his wife to London lastweek and died about eight o’clock at night, leavingher five hundred pounds a year in land. Thenext day before twelve she was married to thejourneyman woolen-draper that came to sellmourning to her.

I do not believe John Rous made specialnote of this marriage simply because it wasso speedy, but because it was unsuitable; asa landed widow was, in social standing, farabove a journeyman draper.

As we approach Revolutionary days, thereign of widows is still absolute.

Washington loved at fifteen a fair unknown,supposed to be Lucy Grimes, afterwardmother of Gen. Henry Lee. To herhe wrote sentimental poems, from which wegather (as might be expected at that age)that he was too bashful to reveal his love.A year later he writes:—

I might, was my heart disengaged, pass mytime very pleasantly as there’s a very agreeableYoung Lady Lives in the same house; but asthats only adding fuel to the fire it makes memore uneasy; for by often and unavoidably beingin Company with her revives my former Passionfor your Lowland Beauty; whereas was I to livemore retired from young women, I might in some[Pg 34]measure eliviate my sorrows by burying thatchast and troublesome passion in the grave ofoblivion or eternal forgetfulness.

The amorous boy of sixteen managed to“bury this chast and troublesome passion,”to find the “Young Lady in the house”worth looking at, and when he was twentyyears old, to write to William Fantleroy thusof his daughter, Miss Bettie Fantleroy:—

I purpose as soon as I recover my strength(from the pleurisy) to wait on Miss Bettie inhopes of a reconsideration of the former cruelsentence, and to see if I cannot obtain a decisionin my favor. I enclose a letter to her.

Later he fell in love with Mary Phillipse,who, though beautiful, spirited, and rich, didnot win him. This love affair is somewhatshadowy in outline. Washington Irvingthinks that the spirit of the alert soldierovercame the passion of the lover, and thatWashington left the lists of love for thoseof battle, leaving the field to his successfulrival, Colonel Morris. The inevitable widowin the shape of Madam Custis, with twopretty children and a fortune of fifteen thousandpounds sterling, became at last what he[Pg 35]called his “agreeable partner for life,” andIrving thinks she was wooed with much despatchon account of the reverses in the Phillipseepisode.

Thomas Jefferson was another example ofa President who outlived his love-affair witha young girl, and married in serenity a moreexperienced dame. In his early correspondencehe reveals his really tumultuous passionfor one Miss Becca Burwell. He sighs likea furnace, and bemoans his stammeringwords of love, but fair Widow Martha Skeltonmade him eloquent. Many lovers sighedat her feet; two of them lingered in herdrawing-room one evening to hear her sing athrilling love-song to the accompaniment ofJefferson’s violin. The love-song and musicwere so expressive that the two disconsolateswains plainly read the story of their fate,and left the house in defeat.

James Madison, supposed to be an irreclaimableold bachelor, succumbed at firstsight to the charms of fair Widow DorothyTodd, twenty years his junior, wooed herwith warmth, and made her, as Dolly Madison,another Mrs. President. BenjaminFranklin also married a widow.

[Pg 36]

The characteristic glamour which hunground every widow encircled Widow SarahSyms, and Colonel Byrd gives a spiritedsketch of her in 1732:—

In the evening Tinsley conducted me toWidow Syms’ house where I intended to take upmy quarters. This lady at first suspecting I wassome lover put on a gravity that becomes a weed,but as soon as she learned who I was brightenedup with an unusual cheerfulness and serenity.She was a portly handsome dame, of thefamily of Esau, and seemed not to pine toomuch for the death of her husband. This widowis a person of lively and cheerful conversationwith much less reserve than most of her countrywomen. It becomes her very well and setsoff her other agreeable qualities to advantage.We tossed off a bottle of honest port whichwe relished with a broiled chicken. At nineI retired to my devotions, and then slept sosound that fancy itself was stupefied, else Ishould have dreamed of my most obliging land-lady.

This “weed” who did not pine too muchfor her husband, soon married again, and becamethe mother of Patrick Henry; and thetestimony of Colonel Byrd as to her lively[Pg 37]and cheerful conversation shows the heredityof Patrick Henry’s “gift of tongues.”

was a famous Maryland belle, to whomcame a-courting two friends, young lawyers,named Dallam and Winston. It was a dayof much masculine finery and the two impecuniousbut amicable friends possessedbut one ruffled shirt between them, whicheach wore on courting-day. Such amiabilitydeserved the reward it obtained, for,strange to say, both suitors won BettyMartin. Dallam was the first husband,—thesacrifice,—and left her a widow withthree sons and a daughter. Winston didlikewise, even to the exact number ofchildren. Daughter Dallam’s son was RichardCaswell, governor of South Carolina,and member of Congress. Daughter Winston’sson was William Paca, governor ofMaryland, and member of the ContinentalCongress. Both grandsons on their wayto and from Congress always visitedtheir spirited old grandmother, who livedto be some say one hundred and twentyyears old.

[Pg 38]

There must have been afforded a certainsatisfaction to a dying husband—of colonialtimes—through the confidence that, byunwavering rule, his widow would soon becared for and cherished by another. Therewas no uncertainty as to her ultimate settlementin life, and even should she be unfortunateenough to lose her second partner,he still had every reason to believe that athird would speedily present himself. TheReverend Jonathan Burr when almost moribund,piously expressed himself to “thatvertuous gentlewoman his wife with confidence”that she would soon be well providedfor; and she was, for “she was veryshortly after very honourably and comfortablymarried unto a gentleman of goodestate,” a magistrate, Richard Dummer, andlived with him nearly forty years. Provisionswere always made by a man in hiswill in case his wife married again; scarcelyever to remove the property from her, butsimply to re-adjust the division or conditions.And men often signed ante-nuptialcontracts promising not to “meddle” withtheir wives’ property. One curious lawshould be noted in Pennsylvania, in 1690,[Pg 39]that a widow could not marry till a yearafter her husband’s death.

There seem to have been many advantagesin marrying a widow—she mightprove a valuable inheritance. The secondhusband appeared to take a real pride in demandingand receiving all that was due tothe defunct partner. As an example letme give this extract from a court record.On May 31st, 1692, the governor and councilof Maryland were thus petitioned:—

James Brown of St Marys who married thewidow and relict of Thomas Pew deceased, byhis petition humbly prays allowance for TwoYears Sallary due to his Predecessor as PublickPost employed by the Courts, as also for the useof a Horse, and the loss of a Servant wholly,by the said Pew deputed in his sickness to Officiate;and ran clear away with his Horse, someClothes &c., and for several months after notheard of.

Now we must not be over-critical, norhasty in judgment of the manners and motivesof two centuries ago, but those daysare held up to us as days of vast submissivenessand modesty, of patient long-suffering,[Pg 40]of ignorance of extortion; yet I think wewould search far, in these degenerate days,for a man who, having married a relict, would,two years after his “Predecessor’s” death,have the colossal effrontery to demand ofthe government not only the back salary ofsaid “Predecessor,” but pay for the use of ahorse stolen by the Predecessor’s own servant—nay,more, for the value of the saidservant who elected to run away. TrulyJames Brown builded well when he chose awife whose departing partner had, like areceding wave, deposited much lucrative silton the matrimonial shore, to be thriftilygathered in and utilized as a bridal dower byhis not-too-sensitive successor.

In fact it may plainly be seen that widowswere life-saving stations in colonial socialeconomy; one colonist expressed his attitudetowards widows and their Providentialfunction as economic aids, thus:—

Our uncle is not at present able to pay youor any other he owes money to. If he was ableto pay he would; they must have patience tillGod enable him. As his wife died in mercynear twelve months since, it may be he may lightof some rich widow that may make him capable[Pg 41]to pay; except God in this way raise him he cannotpay you or any one else.

It certainly must have been some satisfactionto every woman to feel within herselfthe possibility of becoming such a celestialagent of material salvation.

I wish to state, in passing, that it is sometimesdifficult to judge as to the maritalestate of some dames, to know whether theywere widows at the time of the second marriageor not, for the prefixed Mrs. was usedindifferently for married and single women,and even for young girls. Cotton Matherwrote of “Mrs. Sarah Gerrish, a very beautifuland ingenious damsel seven years ofa*ge.” Rev. Mr. Tompson wrote a funeraltribute to a little girl of six, which is entitledand begins thus:—

[Pg 42]

The pious old minister did not really meanby this tribute to the old-school doctors,that Mrs. Rebecka would have achievedearthly immortality. He modestly ends hispoetic tribute thus:—

These consorts and relicts are now butshadows of the past:—

The honest and kindly gentlemen who weretheir husbands, sounded their virtues indiaries and letters; godly ministers preachedtheir piety in labored and dry-as-dust sermons.Their charms were sung by colonialpoets in elegies, anagrams, epicediums, acrostics,threnodies, and other decorous verse.It was reserved for a man of war, and not avery godly man of war either, to pæan theirgood sense. Cervantes says that “womanscounsel is not worth much, yet he who despisesit is no wiser than he should be.”With John Underhill’s more gallant tributeto the counsel of a consort, we may fitly endthis chapter.

[Pg 43]

Myself received an arrow through my coatsleeve, a second against my helmet on the forehead;so as if God in his Providence had notmoved the heart of my wife to persuade me tocarry it along with me (which I was unwilling todo) I had been slain. Give me leave to observetwo things from hence; first when the hour ofdeath is not yet come, you see God useth weakmeans to keep his purpose unviolated; secondlylet no man despise advice and counsel of hiswife though she be a woman. It were strange tonature to think a man should be bound to fulfilthe humour of a woman, what arms he shouldcarry; but you see God will have it so, that awoman should overcome a man. What withDelilahs flattery, and with her mournful tears,they must and will have their desire, when thehand of God goes along in the matter, and thisto accomplish his own will. Therefore let theclamor be quenched that I hear daily in my ears,that New England men usurp over their wivesand keep them in servile subjection. The countryis wronged in this matter as in many thingselse. Let this precedent satisfy the doubtful,for that comes from the example of a rude soldier.If they be so courteous to their wives asto take their advice in warlike matters, howmuch more kind is the tender affectionate husbandto honor his wife as the weaker vessel.[Pg 44]Yet mistake not. I say not they are bound tocall their wives in council, though they are boundto take their private advice (so far as theysee it make for their advantageand good). InstanceAbraham.

The early history of Maryland seemssingularly peaceful when contrastedwith that of other colonies. There were fewIndian horrors, few bitter quarrels, comparativelyfew petty offences. In spite of theinflux of convicts, there was a notable absenceof the shocking crimes and equallyshocking punishments which appear on thecourt records of other provinces; it is alsotrue that there were few schools andchurches, and but scanty intellectual activity.Against that comparatively peaceful backgroundstands out one of the most remarkablefigures of early colonial life in America—MargaretBrent; a woman who seemedmore fitted for our day than her own. Shewas the first woman in America to demandsuffrage, a vote, and representation.

She came to the province in 1638 with hersister Mary (another shrewd and capable[Pg 46]woman), her two brothers, and nine othercolonists. The sisters at once took up land,built manorhouses, and shortly brought overmore colonists; soon the court-baron andcourt-leet were held at Mary Brent’s home,St. Gabriel’s Manor, on old Kent Island.We at once hear of the sisters as active inbusiness affairs, registering cattle marks,buying and selling property, attending withsuccess to important matters for their brothers;and Margaret soon signed herself“Attorney for my brother, &c., &c.,” andwas allowed the right so to act. The Brentswere friends and probably kinsfolk of LordBaltimore, and intimate friends, also, of thegovernor of Maryland, Leonard Calvert.When the latter died in 1647, he appointed bynuncupation one Thomas Greene as his successoras governor, and Margaret Brent ashis sole executrix, with the laconic instructionto “Take all and Pay all,” and to giveone Mistress Temperance Pypott a marecolt. His estate was small, and if he hadmade Greene executor, and Mistress Margaretgovernor, he would have done a muchmore sensible thing; for Greene was vacillatingand weak, and when an emergency[Pg 47]arose, he had to come to Margaret Brent forhelp. The soldiers, who had assisted thegovernment in recent troubles, were still unpaid,and Governor Calvert had pledged hisofficial word and the property of Lord Baltimorethat they should be paid in full. Afterhis death an insurrection in the army seemedrising, when Mistress Brent calmly steppedin, sold cattle belonging to the Proprietary,and paid off the small but angry army. Thiswas not the only time she quelled an incipientmutiny. Her kinsman, Lord Baltimore,was inclined to find bitter fault, and wrote“tartly” when the news of her prompt actionand attendant expenditure reached his ears;but the Assembly sent him a letter, gallantlyupholding Mistress Brent in her “meddling,”saying with inadvertent humour, that hisestate fared better in her hands than “anyman elses.”

Her astonishing stand for woman’s rightswas made on January 21, 1647-48, two centuriesand a half ago, and was thus recorded:—

Came Mrs Margaret Brent and requested tohave vote in the House for herself and voyceallsoe, for that on the last Court 3rd January it[Pg 48]was ordered that the said Mrs Brent was to belooked upon and received as his Ldp’s Attorney.The Governor deny’d that the s’d Mrs Brentshould have any vote in the house. And the s’dMrs Brent protested against all proceedings inthis present Assembly unlesse she may be presentand have vote as afores’d.

With this protest for representation, anddemand for her full rights, this remarkablewoman does not disappear from our ken.We hear of her in 1651 as an offender, havingbeen accused of killing wild cattle andselling the beef. She asserted with vigorand dignity that the cattle were her own, anddemanded a trial by jury.

And in 1658 she makes her last curtseybefore the Assembly and ourselves, a livingproof of the fallacy of the statement thatmen do not like strong-minded women. Forat that date, at the fully ripened age of fifty-seven,she appeared as heir of an estate bequeathedto her by a Maryland gentleman asa token of his love and affection, and of hisconstant wish to marry her. She thus vanishesout of history, in a thoroughly femininerôle, that of a mourning sweetheart; yetstanding signally out of colonial days as the[Pg 49]most clear-cut, unusual, and forceful figureof the seventeenth century in Maryland.

Another Maryland woman of force andfearlessness was Verlinda Stone. A letterfrom her to Lord Baltimore is still in theMaryland archives, demanding an investigationof a fight in Anne Arundel County, inwhich her husband was wounded. The letteris businesslike enough, but ends in afiery postscript in which she uses some prettystrong terms. Such women as these werenot to be trifled with; as Alsop wrote:—

All Complemental Courtships drest up in criticalRarities are meer Strangers to them. Plainwit comes nearest to their Genius, so that hethat intends to Court a Maryland girle, musthave something more than the tautologies of along-winded speech to carry on his design.

Elizabeth Haddon was another remarkablewoman; she founded Haddonfield, New Jersey.Her father had become possessed of atract of land in the New World, and shevolunteered to come alone to the colony, andsettle upon the land. She did so in 1701when she was but nineteen years old, andconducted herself and her business with[Pg 50]judgment, discretion, and success, and socontinued throughout her long life. Shemarried a young Quaker named Esthaugh,who may have been one of the attractions ofthe New World. Her idealized story hasbeen told by L. Maria Child in her bookThe Youthful Emigrant.

John Clayton, writing as early as 1688 of“Observables” in Virginia, tells of several“acute ingenious gentlewomen” who carriedon thriving tobacco-plantations, drainingswamps and raising cattle and buying slaves.One near Jamestown was a fig-raiser.

In all the Southern colonies we find theseacute gentlewomen taking up tracts of land,clearing them, and cultivating their holdings.In the settlement of Pennsylvania,Mary Tewee took two thousand five hundredacres in what is now Lancaster County. Shewas the widow of a French Huguenot gentleman,the friend of William Penn, and hadbeen presented at the court of Queen Anne.

New England magistrates did not encouragesuch independence. In the early daysof Salem, “maid-lotts” were granted to singlewomen, but stern Endicott wrote that itwas best to abandon the custom, and “avoid[Pg 51]all presedents & evil events of granting lottsvnto single maidens not disposed of.” Thetown of Taunton, Mass., had an “ancientmaid” of forty-eight years for its founder,one Elizabeth Poole; and Winthrop says sheendured much hardship. Her gravestonesays she was a “native of old England ofgood family, friends and prospects, all ofwhich she left in the prime of her life to enjoythe religion of her conscience in this distantwilderness. A great proprietor of thetownship of Taunton, a chief promoter ofits settlement in 1639. Having employedthe opportunity of her virgin state in piety,liberality and sanctity of manners, she diedaged 65.”

Lady Deborah Moody did not receive fromthe Massachusetts magistrates an over-cordialor very long-lived welcome. She is describedas a “harassed and lonely widow voluntarilyexiling herself for conscience’ sake.” Perhapsher running in debt for her Swampscottland and her cattle had quite as much to dowith her unpopularity as her “error of denyinginfant baptism.” But as she paid ninehundred or some say eleven hundred poundsfor that wild land, it is no wonder she was[Pg 52]“almost undone.” She was dealt with bythe elders, and admonished by the church,but she “persisted” and finally removed tothe Dutch, against the advice of all herfriends. Endicott called her a dangerouswoman, but Winthrop termed her a “wiseand anciently religious woman.” Amongthe Dutch she found a congenial home, and,unmolested, she planned on her Gravesendfarm a well-laid-out city, but did not live tocarry out her project. A descendant of oneof her Dutch neighbors writes of her:—

Tradition says she was buried in the north-westcorner of the Gravesend church yard. Uponthe headstone of those who sleep beside her weread the inscription In der Heere entslapen—theysleep in the Lord. We may say the same of thisbrave true woman, she sleeps in the Lord. Herrest has been undisturbed in this quiet spotwhich she hoped to make a great city.

It seems to be plain that the charge of theaffairs of Governor John Winthrop, Jr., inNew Haven was wholly in the hands of Mrs.Davenport, the wife of the minister, Rev.John Davenport. Many sentences in herhusband’s letters show her cares for herfriends’ welfare, the variety of her business[Pg 53]duties, and her performance of them. Hewrote thus to the Governor in 1658:—

For your ground; my wife speedily, even thesame day she received your letter, spake withsundry about it, and received this answer, thatthere is no Indian corne to be planted in thatquarter this yeare. Brother Boykin was willingto have taken it, but saith it is overrun with wildsorrell and it will require time to subdue it, andput it into tillage, being at present unfit to be improved.Goodman Finch was in our harbourwhen your letter came, & my wife went promptlydowne, and met with yong Mr Lamberton towhom she delivered your letter. He offeredsome so bad beaver that my wife would not takeit. My wife spake twise to him herself. Mywife desireth to add that she received for you ofMr Goodenhouse 30s worth of beaver & 4s inwampum. She purposeth to send your beaver tothe Baye when the best time is, to sell it for youradvantage and afterwards to give you an accountwhat it comes to. Your letter to Sarjiunt Baldwinmy wife purposeth to carry to him by the 1stopportunity. Sister Hobbadge has paid my wifein part of her debt to you a bushel of winterwheate.

The letters also reveal much loving-kindness,much eagerness to be of assistance,[Pg 54]equal readiness to welcome new-comers, andto smooth the rough difficulties in pioneerhousekeeping. Rev. Mr. Davenport wrotein August, 1655, from New Haven to Gov.Winthrop at Pequot:—

Madam Davenport also furnished therooms with tables and “chayres,” and “tookcare of yor apples that they may be keptsafe from the frost that Mrs. Winthrop mayhave the benefit of them,” and arrangedto send horses to meet them; so it is notstrange to learn in a postscript that thehospitable kindly soul, who thus cheerfullyworked to “redd the house,” had a “painein the soles of her feet, especially in theevening;” and a little later on to know shewas “valetudinarious, faint, thirsty, of littleappetite yet cheerful.”

All these examples, and many others helpto correct one very popular mistake. Itseems to be universally believed that the“business woman” is wholly a product of thenineteenth century. Most emphatically mayit be affirmed that such is not the case. I[Pg 56]have seen advertisem*nts dating from 1720 to1800, chiefly in New England newspapers, ofwomen teachers, embroiderers, jelly-makers,cooks, wax-workers, japanners, mantua-makers,—alltruly feminine employments; andalso of women dealers in crockery, musicalinstruments, hardware, farm products, groceries,drugs, wines, and spirits, while Hawthornenoted one colonial dame who carriedon a blacksmith-shop. Peter Faneuil’s accountbooks show that he had accounts insmall English wares with many Bostontradeswomen, some of whom bought manythousand pounds’ worth of imported goodsin a year. Alice Quick had fifteen hundredpounds in three months; and I am glad tosay that the women were very prompt inpayment, as well as active in business. ByStamp Act times, the names of five womenmerchants appear on the Salem list of traderswho banded together to oppose taxation.

It is claimed by many that the “newspaper-woman”is a growth of modern times.I give examples to prove the fallacy of thisstatement. Newspapers of colonial timescan scarcely be said to have been edited, theywere simply printed or published, and all that[Pg 57]men did as newspaper-publishers, women didalso, and did well. It cannot be asserted thatthese women often voluntarily or primarilystarted a newspaper; they usually assumedthe care after the death of an editor husband,or brother, or son, or sometimes to assistwhile a male relative, through sickness ormultiplicity of affairs, could not attend to hiseditorial or publishing work.

Perhaps the most remarkable examples ofwomen-publishers may be found in the Goddardfamily of Rhode Island. Mrs. SarahGoddard was the daughter of Ludowick Updike,of one of the oldest and most respectedfamilies in that State. She received an excellenteducation “in both useful and politelearning,” and married Dr. Giles Goddard, aprominent physician and postmaster of NewLondon. After becoming a widow, she wentinto the printing business in Providenceabout the year 1765, with her son, who waspostmaster of that town. They published theProvidence Gazette and Country Journal, theonly newspaper printed in Providence before1775. William Goddard was dissatisfiedwith his pecuniary profit, and he went toNew York, leaving the business wholly with[Pg 58]his mother; she conducted it with much abilityand success under the name Sarah Goddard& Company. I wish to note that shecarried on this business not under her son’sname, but openly in her own behalf; andwhen she assumed the charge of the paper,she printed it with her own motto as theheading, Vox Populi Vox Dei.

William Goddard drifted to Philadelphia,where he published the Pennsylvania Chroniclefor a short season, and in 1773 he removedto Baltimore and established himselfin the newspaper business anew, with only,he relates, “the small capital of a single solitaryguinea.” He found another energeticbusiness woman, the widow Mrs. NicholasHasselbaugh, carrying on the printing-businessbequeathed to her by her husband;and he bought her stock in trade and establishedThe Maryland Journal and BaltimoreAdvertiser. It was the third newspaper publishedin Maryland, was issued weekly at tenshillings per annum, and was a well-printedsheet. But William Goddard had anotherbee in his bonnet. A plan was formed justbefore the Revolutionary War to abolish thegeneral public post-office and to establish in[Pg 59]its place a complete private system of post-ridersfrom Georgia to New Hampshire.This system was to be supported by privatesubscription; a large sum was already subscribed,and the scheme well under way,when the war ended all the plans. Goddardhad this much to heart, and had travelledextensively through the colonies exploitingit. While he was away on these trips heleft the newspaper and printing-house solelyunder the charge of his sister Mary KatharineGoddard, the worthy daughter ofher energetic mother. From 1775 to 1784,through the trying times of the Revolution,and in a most active scene of military andpolitical troubles, this really brilliant womancontinued to print successfully and continuouslyher newspaper. The Journal andevery other work issued from her printing-presseswere printed and published in hername, and it is believed chiefly on her ownaccount. She was a woman of much intelligenceand was also practical, being an expertcompositor of types, and fully conversantwith every detail of the mechanicalwork of a printing-office. During this busytime she was also postmistress of Baltimore,[Pg 60]and kept a bookshop. Her brother William,through his futile services in this postalscheme, had been led to believe he would receiveunder Benjamin Franklin and the newgovernment of the United States, the appointmentof Secretary and Comptroller ofthe Post Office; but Franklin gave it to hisown son-in-law, Richard Bache. Goddard,sorely disappointed but pressed in moneymatters, felt forced to accept the position ofSurveyor of Post Roads. When Franklinwent to France in 1776, and Bache becamePostmaster-General, and Goddard again wasnot appointed Comptroller, his chagrin causedhim to resign his office, and naturally tochange his political principles.

He retired to Baltimore, and soon thereappeared in the Journal an ironical piece(written by a member of Congress) signedTom Tell Truth. From this arose a vastpolitical storm. The Whig Club of Baltimore,a powerful body, came to Miss Goddardand demanded the name of the author;she referred them to her brother. On hisrefusal to give the author’s name, he wasseized, carried to the clubhouse, bullied, andfinally warned out of town and county. He[Pg 61]at once went to the Assembly at Annapolisand demanded protection, which was givenhim. He ventilated his wrongs in a pamphlet,and was again mobbed and insulted.In 1779, Anna Goddard printed anonymouslyin her paper Queries Political andMilitary, written really by General CharlesLee, the enemy and at one time presumptiverival of Washington. This paper alsoraised a tremendous storm through whichthe Goddards passed triumphantly. Leeremained always a close friend of WilliamGoddard, and bequeathed to him his valuableand interesting papers, with the intentof posthumous publication; but, unfortunately,they were sent to England to beprinted in handsome style, and were insteadimperfectly and incompletely issued, andWilliam Goddard received no benefit orprofit from their sale. But Lee left himalso, by will, a large and valuable estate inBerkeley County, Virginia, so he retiredfrom public life and ended his days on aRhode Island farm. Anna Katharine Goddardlived to great old age. The story ofthis acquaintance with General Lee, and ofMiss Goddard’s connection therewith, forms[Pg 62]one of the interesting minor episodes of theWar.

Just previous to the Revolution, it wasnothing very novel or unusual to Baltimoreansto see a woman edit a newspaper. TheMaryland Gazette suspended on account ofthe Stamp Act in 1765, and the printer issueda paper called The Apparition of theMaryland Gazette which is not Dead butSleepeth; and instead of a Stamp it bore adeath’s head with the motto, “The Timesare Dismal, Doleful, Dolorous, Dollarless.”Almost immediately after it resumed publication,the publisher died, and from 1767to 1775 it was carried on by his widow,Anne Katharine Green, sometimes assistedby her son, but for five years alone. Thefirm name was Anne Katharine Green &Son: and she also did the printing for theColony. She was about thirty-six years oldwhen she assumed the business, and wasthen the mother of six sons and eight daughters.Her husband was the fourth generationfrom Samuel Green, the first printer inNew England, from whom descended aboutthirty ante-Revolutionary printers. Untilthe Revolution there was always a Printer[Pg 63]Green in Boston. Mr. Green’s partner, WilliamRind, removed to Williamsburg andprinted there the Virginia Gazette. At hisdeath, widow Clementina Rind, not to beoutdone by Widow Green and Mother andSister Goddard, proved that what womanhas done woman can do, by carrying on thebusiness and printing the Gazette till herown death in 1775.

It is indeed a curious circ*mstance that,on the eve of the Revolution, so manysouthern newspapers should be conducted bywomen. Long ere that, from 1738 to 1740,Elizabeth Timothy, a Charleston woman,widow of Louis Timothy, the first librarianof the Philadelphia Library company, andpublisher of the South Carolina Gazette,carried on that paper after her husband’sdeath; and her son, Peter Timothy, succeededher. In 1780 his paper was suspended,through his capture by the British.He was exchanged, and was lost at sea withtwo daughters and a grandchild, while onhis way to Antigua to obtain funds. Hehad a varied and interesting life, was a friendof Parson Whitefield, and was tried withhim on a charge of libel against the South[Pg 64]Carolina ministers. In 1782 his widow,Anne Timothy, revived the Gazette, as hadher mother-in-law before her, and publishedit successfully twice a week for ten yearstill her death in 1792. She had a largeprinting-house, corner of Broad and KingStreets, Charleston, and was printer to theState; truly a remarkable woman.

Peter Timothy’s sister Mary marriedCharles Crouch, who also was drowned whenon a vessel bound to New York. He was asound Whig and set up a paper in oppositionto the Stamp Act, called The SouthCarolina Gazette and Country Journal.This was one of the four papers which wereall entitled Gazettes in order to secure certainadvertisem*nts that were all directedby law “to be inserted in the South CarolinaGazette.” Mary Timothy Crouch continuedthe paper for a short time after herhusband’s death; and in 1780 shortly beforethe surrender of the city to the British, wentwith her printing-press and types to Salem,where for a few months she printed TheSalem Gazette and General Advertiser. Ihave dwelt at some length on the activityand enterprise of these Southern women,[Pg 65]because it is another popular but unstablenotion that the women of the North werefar more energetic and capable than theirSouthern sisters; which is certainly not thecase in this line of business affairs.

Benjamin and James Franklin were notthe only members of the Franklin familywho were capable newspaper-folk. JamesFranklin died in Newport in 1735, and hiswidow Anne successfully carried on the businessfor many years. She had efficient aidin her two daughters, who were quick andcapable practical workers at the compositor’scase, having been taught by their father,whom they assisted in his lifetime. IsaiahThomas says of them:—

A gentleman who was acquainted with AnneFranklin and her family, informed me that hehad often seen her daughters at work in theprinting house, and that they were sensible andamiable women.

We can well believe that, since they hadFranklin and Anne Franklin blood in them.This competent and industrious trio of womennot only published the Newport Mercury,but were printers for the colony, supplying[Pg 66]blanks for public offices, publishing pamphlets,etc. In 1745 they printed for the Governmentan edition of the laws of the colonyof 340 pages, folio. Still further, they carriedon a business of “printing linens, calicoes,silks, &c., in figures, very lively anddurable colors, and without the offensivesmell which commonly attends linen-printing.”Surely there was no lack of businessability on the distaff side of the Franklinhouse.

Boston women gave much assistance totheir printer-husbands. Ezekiel Russel, theeditor of that purely political publication,The Censor, was in addition a printer ofchap-books and ballads which were sold fromhis stand near the Liberty Tree on BostonCommon. His wife not only helped him inprinting these, but she and another youngwoman of his household, having ready pensand a biddable muse, wrote with celeritypopular and seasonable ballads on passingevents, especially of tragic or funereal cast;and when these ballads were printed with anice border of woodcuts of coffins and death’sheads, they often had a long and profitablerun of popularity. After his death, Widow[Pg 67]Russel still continued ballad making andmonging.

It was given to a woman, Widow MargaretDraper, to publish the only newspaper whichwas issued in Boston during the siege, theMassachusetts Gazette and Boston NewsLetter. And a miserable little sheet it was,vari-colored, vari-typed, vari-sized; of suchpoor print that it is scarcely readable. Whenthe British left Boston, Margaret Draper leftalso, and resided in England, where she receiveda pension from the British government.

The first newspaper in Pennsylvania wasentitled The American Weekly Mercury. Itwas “imprinted by Andrew Bradford” in1719. He was a son of the first newspaperprinter in New York, William Bradford,Franklin’s “cunning old fox,” who lived tobe ninety-two years old, and whose quainttombstone may be seen in Trinity Churchyard.At Andrew’s death in 1742, the paperappeared in mourning, and it was announcedthat it would be published by “the widowBradford.” She took in a partner, but speedilydropped him, and carried it on in her ownname till 1746. During the time that Cornelia[Pg 68]Bradford printed this paper it was remarkablefor its good type and neatness.

The Connecticut Courant and The Centinelwere both of them published for some yearsby the widows of former proprietors.

The story of John Peter Zenger, the publisherof The New York Weekly Journal,is one of the most interesting episodes inour progress to free speech and liberty, butcannot be dwelt on here. The feminine portionof his family was of assistance to him.His daughter was mistress of a famous NewYork tavern that saw many remarkable visitors,and heard much of the remarkable talkof Zenger’s friends. After his death in 1746,his newspaper was carried on by his widowfor two years. Her imprint was, “NewYork; Printed by the Widow CathrineZenger at the Printing-Office in StoneStreet; Where Advertisem*nts are takenin, and all Persons may be supplied with thisPaper.”

The whole number of newspapers printedbefore the Revolution was not very large;and when we see how readily and successfullythis considerable number of womenassumed the cares of publishing, we know[Pg 69]that the “newspaper woman” of that daywas no rare or presumptuous creature, anymore than is the “newspaper-woman” ofour own day, albeit she was of very differentilk; but the spirit of independent self-reliance,when it became necessary to exhibitself-reliance, was as prompt and as stable inthe feminine breast a century and a half agoas now. Then, as to-day, there were doubtlessscores of good wives and daughters whomaterially assisted their husbands in theirprinting-shops, and whose work will never beknown.

There is no doubt that our great-grandmotherspossessed wonderful ability to managetheir own affairs, when it became necessaryto do so, even in extended commercialoperations. It is easy to trace in the NewEngland coast towns one influence whichtended to interest them, and make them capableof business transactions. They constantlyheard on all sides the discussion offoreign trade, and were even encouraged toenter into the discussion and the traffic.They heard the Windward Islands, the Isleof France, and Amsterdam, and Canton, andthe coast of Africa described by old travelled[Pg 70]mariners, by active young shipmasters, in away that put them far more in touch withthese far-away foreign shores, gave themmore knowledge of details of life in thoselands, than women of to-day have. Andwomen were encouraged, even urged, to takean active share in foreign trade, in commercialspeculation, by sending out a “venture”whenever a vessel put out to sea, and wheneverthe small accumulation of money earnedby braiding straw, knitting stockings, sellingeggs or butter, or by spinning and weaving,was large enough to be worth thus investing;and it needed not to be a very large sum tobe deemed proper for investment. When aship sailed out to China with cargo of ginseng,the ship’s owner did not own all thesolid specie in the hold—the specie that wasto be invested in the rich and luxurious productsof far Cathay. Complicated must havebeen the accounts of these transactions, formany were the parties in the speculation.There were no giant monopolies in thosedays. The kindly ship-owner permitted evenhis humblest neighbor to share his profits.And the profits often were large. Thestories of some of the voyages, the adventures[Pg 71]of the business contracts, read like afairy tale of commerce. In old letters maybe found reference to many of the venturessent by women. One young woman wrotein 1759:—

Inclos’d is a pair of Earrings. Pleas askCaptin Oliver to carry them a Ventur fer me ifhe Thinks they will fetch anything to the Vallyof them; tell him he may bring the effects inanything he thinks will answer best.

One of the “effects” brought to thisyoung woman, and to hundreds of others,was a certain acquaintance with businesstransactions, a familiarity with the methodsof trade. When the father or husband died,the woman could, if necessary, carry on hisbusiness to a successful winding-up, or continueit in the future. Of the latter enterprisemany illustrations might be given. Inthe autumn of 1744 a large number of prominentbusiness men in Newport went into astorehouse on a wharf to examine the outfitof a large privateer. A terrible explosion ofgunpowder took place, which killed nine ofthem. One of the wounded was SuetonGrant, a Scotchman, who had come to America[Pg 72]in 1725. His wife, on hearing of the accident,ran at once to the dock, took in at aglance the shocking scene and its demandsfor assistance, and cutting into strips herlinen apron with the housewife’s scissors shewore at her side, calmly bound up the woundsof her dying husband. Mr. Grant was at thistime engaged in active business; he hadagencies in Europe, and many privateersafloat. Mrs. Grant took upon her shouldersthese great responsibilities, and successfullycarried them on for many years, while she educatedher children, and cared for her home.

A good example of her force of characterwas once shown in a court of law. She hadan important litigation on hand and largeinterests at stake, when she discovered theduplicity of her counsel, and her consequentdanger. She went at once to the court-roomwhere the case was being tried; whenher lawyer promptly but vainly urged her toretire. The judge, disturbed by the interruption,asked for an explanation, and Mrs.Grant at once unfolded the knavery of hercounsel and asked permission to argue herown case. Her dignity, force, and lucidityso moved the judge that he permitted her to[Pg 73]address the jury, which she did in so convincinga manner as to cause them topromptly render a verdict favorable to her.She passed through some trying scenes atthe time of the Revolution with wonderfuldecision and ability, and received from everyone the respect and deference due to athorough business man, though she was awoman.

In New York the feminine Dutch bloodshowed equal capacity in business matters;and it is said that the management of considerableestates and affairs often was assumedby widows in New Amsterdam. Twonoted examples are Widow De Vries andWidow Provoost. The former was marriedin 1659, to Rudolphus De Vries, and afterhis death she carried on his Dutch trade—notonly buying and selling foreign goods,but going repeatedly to Holland in the positionof supercargo on her own ships. Shemarried Frederick Phillipse, and it wasthrough her keenness and thrift and her profitablebusiness, as well as through his ownsuccess, that Phillipse became the richestman in the colony and acquired the largestWest Indian trade.

[Pg 74]

Widow Maria Provoost was equally successfulat the beginning of the eighteenthcentury, and had a vast Dutch business correspondence.Scarce a ship from Spain,the Mediterranean, or the West Indies, butbrought her large consignments of goods.She too married a second time, and asMadam James Alexander filled a most dignifiedposition in New York, being the onlyperson besides the Governor to own a two-horsecoach. Her house was the finest intown, and such descriptions of its variousapartments as “the great drawing-room, thelesser drawing-room, the blue and goldleather room, the green and gold leatherroom, the chintz room, the great tapestryroom, the little front parlour, the back parlour,”show its size and pretensions.

Madam Martha Smith, widow of ColonelWilliam Smith of St. George’s Manor, LongIsland, was a woman of affairs in anotherfield. In an interesting memorandum leftby her we read:—

Jan ye 16, 1707. My company killed a yearlingwhale made 27 barrels. Feb ye 4, IndianHarry with his boat struck a whale and calledfor my boat to help him. I had but a third which[Pg 75]was 4 barrels. Feb 22, my two boats & my sonsand Floyds boats killed a yearling whale of whichI had half—made 36 barrels, my share 18 barrels.Feb 24 my company killed a school whalewhich made 35 barrels. March 13, my companykilled a small yearling made 30 barrels. March17, my company killed two yearlings in one day;one made 27, the other 14 barrels.

We find her paying to Lord Cornbury fifteenpounds, a duty on “ye 20th part of hereyle.” And she apparently succeeded in herenterprises.

In early Philadelphia directories may befound the name of “Margaret Duncan,Merchant, No. 1 S. Water St.” This capablewoman had been shipwrecked on herway to the new world. In the direst hourof that extremity, when forced to draw lotsfor the scant supply of food, she vowed tobuild a church in her new home if her lifeshould be spared. The “Vow Church” inPhiladelphia, on Thirteenth Street near MarketStreet, for many years proved her fulfilmentof this vow, and also bore tribute tothe prosperity of this pious Scotch Presbyterianin her adopted home.

Southern women were not outstripped by[Pg 76]the business women of the north. No morepractical woman ever lived in America thanEliza Lucas Pinckney. When a young girlshe resided on a plantation at Wappoo,South Carolina, owned by her father, GeorgeLucas. He was Governor of Antigua, andobserving her fondness for and knowledgeof botany, and her intelligent power of applicationof her knowledge, he sent to hermany tropical seeds and plants for heramusem*nt and experiment in her garden.Among the seeds were some of indigo, whichshe became convinced could be profitablygrown in South Carolina. She at once determinedto experiment, and planted indigoseed in March, 1741. The young plantsstarted finely, but were cut down by an unusualfrost. She planted seed a secondtime, in April, and these young indigo-plantswere destroyed by worms. Notwithstandingthese discouragements, she tried a thirdtime, and with success. Her father wasdelighted with her enterprise and persistence,and when he learned that the indigohad seeded and ripened, sent an Englishmannamed Cromwell—an experienced indigo-worker—fromMontserrat to teach his[Pg 77]daughter Eliza the whole process of extractingthe dye from the weed. Vats were builton Wappoo Creek, in which was made thefirst indigo formed in Carolina. It was ofindifferent quality, for Cromwell feared thesuccessful establishment of the industry inAmerica would injure the indigo trade inhis own colony, so he made a mystery of theprocess, and put too much lime in the vats,doubtless thinking he could impose upon awoman. But Miss Lucas watched him carefully,and in spite of his duplicity, anddoubtless with considerable womanly powerof guessing, finally obtained a successfulknowledge and application of the complexand annoying methods of extracting indigo,—methodswhich required the untiring attentionof sleepless nights, and more “judgment”than intricate culinary triumphs.After the indigo was thoroughly formed bysteeping, beating, and washing, and takenfrom the vats, the trials of the maker werenot over. It must be exposed to the sun, butif exposed too much it would be burnt, iftoo little it would rot. Myriads of flies collectedaround it and if unmolested wouldquickly ruin it. If packed too soon it would[Pg 78]sweat and disintegrate. So, from the firstmoment the tender plant appeared aboveground, when the vast clouds of destroyinggrasshoppers had to be annihilated by flocksof hungry chickens, or carefully dislodgedby watchful human care, indigo culture andmanufacture was a distressing worry, andwas made still more unalluring to a feminineexperimenter by the fact that during theweary weeks it laid in the “steepers” and“beaters” it gave forth a most villainouslyoffensive smell.

Soon after Eliza Lucas’ hard-earned successshe married Charles Pinckney, and it ispleasant to know that her father gave her,as part of her wedding gift, all the indigo onthe plantation. She saved the whole cropfor seed,—and it takes about a bushel ofindigo seed to plant four acres,—and sheplanted the Pinckney plantation at Ashepoo,and gave to her friends and neighbors smallquantities of seed for individual experiment;all of which proved successful. The cultureof indigo at once became universal, the newspaperswere full of instructions upon thesubject, and the dye was exported to Englandby 1747, in such quantity that merchants[Pg 79]trading in Carolina petitioned Parliament fora bounty on Carolina indigo. An act ofParliament was passed allowing a bounty ofsixpence a pound on indigo raised in theBritish-American plantations and importeddirectly to Great Britain. Spurred on bythis wise act, the planters applied with redoubledvigor to the production of the article,and soon received vast profits as the rewardsof their labor and care. It is said that justprevious to the Revolution more childrenwere sent from South Carolina to Englandto receive educations, than from all the othercolonies,—and this through the profits ofindigo and rice. Many indigo plantersdoubled their capital every three or fouryears, and at last not only England was suppliedwith indigo from South Carolina, butthe Americans undersold the French inmany European markets. It exceeded allother southern industries in importance, andbecame a general medium of exchange.When General Marion’s young nephew wassent to school at Philadelphia, he started offwith a wagon-load of indigo to pay his expenses.The annual dues of the WinyahIndigo Society of Georgetown were paid in[Pg 80]the dye, and the society had grown sowealthy in 1753, that it established a largecharity school and valuable library.

Ramsay, the historian of South Carolina,wrote in 1808, that the indigo trade provedmore beneficial to Carolina than the mines ofMexico or Peru to old or new Spain. Bythe year of his writing, however, indigo(without waiting for extermination throughits modern though less reliable rivals, theaniline dyes) had been driven out of Southernplantations by its more useful and profitablefield neighbor, King Cotton, that hadbeen set on a throne by the invention of aYankee schoolmaster. The time of greatestproduction and export of indigo was justprevious to the Revolution, and at one timeit was worth four or five dollars a pound.And to-day only the scanty records of theindigo trade, a few rotting cypress boards ofthe steeping-vats, and the blue-green leavesof the wild wayside indigo, remain of allthis prosperity to show the great industryfounded by this remarkable and intelligentwoman.

The rearing of indigo was not this younggirl’s only industry. I will quote from various[Pg 81]letters written by her in 1741 and 1742before her marriage, to show her manyduties, her intelligence, her versatility:—

I think this record of important work couldscarce be equalled by any young girl in a[Pg 83]comparative station of life nowadays. Andwhen we consider the trying circ*mstances,the difficult conditions, in which these variedenterprises were carried on, we can well beamazed at the story.

Indigo was not the only important staplewhich attracted Mrs. Pinckney’s attention,and the manufacture of which she made asuccess. In 1755 she carried with her toEngland enough rich silk fabric, which shehad raised and spun and woven herself inthe vicinity of Charleston, to make three finesilk gowns, one of which was presented tothe Princess Dowager of Wales, and anotherto Lord Chesterfield. This silk was said tobe equal in beauty to any silk ever imported.

This was not the first American silk thathad graced the person of English royalty.In 1734 the first windings of Georgia silkhad been taken from the filature to England,and the queen wore a dress made thereof atthe king’s next birthday. Still earlier in thefield Virginia had sent its silken tribute toroyalty. In the college library at Williamsburg,Va., may be seen a letter signed“Charles R.”—his most Gracious MajestyCharles the Second. It was written by his[Pg 84]Majesty’s private secretary, and addressed toGovernor Berkeley for the king’s loyal subjectsin Virginia. It reads thus:—

Trusty and Well beloved, We Greet you Well.Wee have received wᵗʰ much content ye dutifullrespects of Our Colony in ye present lately madeus by you & ye councill there, of ye first productof ye new Manufacture of Silke, which as a markeof Our Princely acceptation of yoʳ duteys & foryoʳ particular encouragement, etc. Wee have beencommanded to be wrought up for ye use of OurOwne Person.

And earliest of all is the tradition, dear tothe hearts of Virginians, that Charles I. wascrowned in 1625 in a robe woven of Virginiasilk. The Queen of George III. was the lastEnglish royalty to be similarly honored, forthe next attack of the silk fever produceda suit for an American ruler, George Washington.

The culture of silk in America was an industrycalculated to attract the attention ofwomen, and indeed was suited to them, butmen were not exempt from the fever; andthe history of the manifold and undauntedefforts of governor’s councils, parliaments,noblemen, philosophers, and kings to force[Pg 85]silk culture in America forms one of themost curious examples extant of persistentand futile efforts to run counter to positiveeconomic conditions, for certainly physicalconditions are fairly favorable.

South Carolina women devoted themselveswith much success to agricultural experiments.Henry Laurens brought from Italyand naturalized the olive-tree, and his daughter,Martha Laurens Ramsay, experimentedwith the preservation of the fruit until herproductions equalled the imported olives.Catharine Laurens Ramsay manufacturedopium of the first quality. In 1755 HenryLaurens’ garden in Ansonborough was enrichedwith every curious vegetable productfrom remote quarters of the world that hisextensive mercantile connections enabled himto procure, and the soil and climate of SouthCarolina to cherish. He introduced besidesolives, capers, limes, ginger, guinea grass,Alpine strawberries (bearing nine months inthe year), and many choice varieties of fruits.This garden was superintended by his wife,Mrs. Elinor Laurens.

Mrs. Martha Logan was a famous botanistand florist. She was born in 1702, and was[Pg 86]the daughter of Robert Daniel, one of thelast proprietary governors of South Carolina.When fourteen years old, she married GeorgeLogan, and all her life treasured a beautifuland remarkable garden. When seventy yearsold, she compiled from her knowledge andexperience a regular treatise on gardening,which was published after her death, withthe title The Garden’s Kalendar. It wasfor many years the standard work on gardeningin that locality.

Mrs. Hopton and Mrs. Lamboll were earlyand assiduous flower-raisers and experimentersin the eighteenth century, and MissMaria Drayton, of Drayton Hall, a skilledbotanist.

The most distinguished female botanist ofcolonial days was Jane Colden, the daughterof Governor Cadwallader Colden, of NewYork. Her love of the science was inheritedfrom her father, the friend and correspondentof Linnæus, Collinson, and other botanists.She learned a method of taking leaf-impressionsin printers’ ink, and sent careful impressionsof American plants and leaves tothe European collectors. John Ellis wroteof her to Linnæus in April, 1758:—

[Pg 87]

This young lady merits your esteem, and doeshonor to your system. She has drawn and describedfour hundred plants in your method. Herfather has a plant called after her Coldenia. Supposeyou should call this new genus Coldenellaor any other name which might distinguish her.

Peter Collinson said also that she was thefirst lady to study the Linnæan system, anddeserved to be celebrated. Another tributeto her may be found in a letter of WalterRutherford’s:—

The homely virtue of being a good cheese-makerwas truly a saving clause topalliate and excuse so muchfeminine scientificknowledge.

I am much impressed in reading the courtrecords of those early days, to note thevast care taken in all the colonies to preventlying, slandering, gossiping, backbiting, andidle babbling, or, as they termed it, “brabling;”to punish “common sowers and movers”—ofdissensions, I suppose.

The loving neighborliness which provedas strong and as indispensable a foundationfor a successful colony as did godliness,made the settlers resent deeply any violations,though petty, of the laws of socialkindness. They felt that what they termed“opprobrious schandalls tending to defamaçonand disparagment” could not be endured.

One old author declares that “blabbing,babbling, tale-telling, and discovering thefaults and frailities of others is a most Commonand evill practice.” He asserts that a[Pg 89]woman should be a “main store house ofsecresie, a Maggazine of taciturnitie, thecloset of connivence, the mumbudget of silence,the cloake bagge of rouncell, the capcase,fardel, or pack of friendly toleration;”which, as a whole, seems to be a good dealto ask. Men were, as appears by the records,more frequently brought up for these offencesof the tongue, but women were not sparedeither in indictment or punishment. InWindsor, Conn., one woman was whippedfor “wounding” a neighbor, not in the flesh,but in the sensibilities.

In 1652 Joane Barnes, of Plymouth, Mass.,was indicted for “slandering,” and sentenced“to sitt in the stockes during the Courtspleasure, and a paper whereon her facte writtenin Capitall letters to be made faste vntoher hatt or neare vnto her all the tyme ofher sitting there.” In 1654 another Joanein Northampton County, Va., suffered a peculiarlydegrading punishment for slander.She was “drawen ouer the Kings Creeke atthe starne of a boate or Canoux, also thenext Saboth day in the tyme of diuine seruis”was obliged to present herself beforethe minister and congregation, and acknowledge[Pg 90]her fault, and ask forgiveness. Thiswas an old Scotch custom. The same yearone Charlton called the parson, Mr. Cotton,a “black cotted rascal,” and was punishedtherefor in the same way. Richard Buckland,for writing a slanderous song about AnnSmith, was similarly pilloried, bearing a paperon his hat inscribed Inimicus Libellus, andsince possibly all the church attendants didnot know Latin, to publicly beg Ann’s forgivenessin English for his libellous poesy.The punishment of offenders by exposingthem, wrapped in sheets, or attired in foulclothing, on the stool of repentance in themeeting-house in time of divine service, hasalways seemed to me specially bitter, unseemly,and unbearable.

It should be noted that these suits forslander were between persons in every stationof life. When Anneke Jans Bogardus(wife of Dominie Bogardus, the second establishedclergyman in New Netherlands), wouldnot remain in the house with one Grietje vanSalee, a woman of doubtful reputation, thelatter told throughout the neighborhood thatAnneke had lifted her petticoats when crossingthe street, and exposed her ankles in unseemly[Pg 91]fashion; and she also said that theDominie had sworn a false oath. Action forslander was promptly begun, and witnessesproduced to show that Anneke had flourishedher petticoats no more than was seemlyand tidy to escape the mud. Judgment waspronounced against Grietje and her husband.She had to make public declarationin the Fort that she had lied, and to paythree guilders. The husband had to paya fine, and swear to the good character ofthe Dominie and good carriage of the Dominie’swife, and he was not permitted tocarry weapons in town,—a galling punishment.

Dominie Bogardus was in turn sued severaltimes for slander,—once by ThomasHall, the tobacco planter, simply for sayingthat Thomas’ tobacco was bad; and again,wonderful to relate, by one of his deacons—DeaconVan Cortlandt.

Special punishment was provided forwomen. Old Dr. Johnson said gruffly to alady friend: “Madam, there are differentways of restraining evil; stocks for men, aducking-stool for women, pounds for beasts.”The old English instrument of punishment,—as[Pg 92]old as the Doomsday survey,—thecucking-stool or ducking-stool, was in voguehere, was insultingly termed a “publiqueconvenience,” and was used in the Southernand Central colonies for the correction ofcommon scolds. We read in Blackstone’sCommentaries, “A common scold may beindicted and if convicted shall be sentencedto be placed in a certain engine of correctioncalled the trebucket, castigatory, or cucking-stool.”Still another name for this “engine”was a “gum-stool.” The brank, or scold’sbridle,—a cruel and degrading means ofpunishment employed in England for “curstqueans” as lately as 1824,—was unknownin America. A brank may be seen at theGuildhall in Worcester, England. One atWalton-on-Thames bears the date 1633. Onthe Isle of Man, when the brank was removed,the wearer had to say thrice, in public,“Tongue, thou hast lied.” I do not findthat women ever had to “run the gauntelope”as did male offenders in 1685 in Boston,and, though under another name, inseveral of the provinces.

Women in Maine were punished by beinggagged; in Plymouth, Mass., and in Easthampton,[Pg 93]L. I., they had cleft sticks placedon their tongues in public; in the latterplace because the dame said her husband“had brought her to a place where there wasneither gospel nor magistracy.” In Salem“one Oliver—his wife” had a cleft stickplaced on her tongue for half an hour in public“for reproaching the elders.” It was ahigh offence to speak “discornfully” of theelders and magistrates.

The first volume of the American HistoricalRecord gives a letter said to have beenwritten to Governor Endicott, of Massachusetts,in 1634 by one Thomas Hartleyfrom Hungar’s Parish, Virginia. It gives agraphic description of a ducking-stool, and anaccount of a ducking in Virginia. I quotefrom it:—

The day afore yesterday at two of ye clock inye afternoon I saw this punishment given to oneBetsey wife of John Tucker, who by ye violenceof her tongue had made his house and ye neighborhooduncomfortable. She was taken to yepond where I am sojourning by ye officer whowas joyned by ye magistrate and ye Minister Mr.Cotton, who had frequently admonished her and alarge number of People. They had a machine for[Pg 94]ye purpose yᵗ belongs to ye Parish, and which Iwas so told had been so used three times thisSummer. It is a platform with 4 small rollers orwheels and two upright posts between whichworks a Lever by a Rope fastened to its shorteror heavier end. At the end of ye longer arm isfixed a stool upon which sᵈ Betsey was fastenedby cords, her gown tied fast around her feete.The Machine was then moved up to ye edge ofye pond, ye Rope was slackened by ye officer andye woman was allowed to go down under ye waterfor ye space of half a minute. Betsey had a stoutstomach, and would not yield until she hadallowed herself to be ducked 5 severall times.At length she cried piteously Let me go Let mego, by Gods help I’ll sin no more. Then theydrew back ye machine, untied ye Ropes and lether walk home in her wetted clothes a hopefullypenitent woman.

I have seen an old chap-book print of aducking-stool with a “light huswife of thebanck-side” in it. It was rigged much likean old-fashioned well-sweep, the woman andchair occupying the relative place of thebucket. The base of the upright supportwas on a low-wheeled platform.

Bishop Meade, in his Old Churches, Ministers,and Families of Virginia, tells of one[Pg 95]“scolding quean” who was ordered to beducked three times from a vessel lying inJames River. Places for ducking were preparednear the Court Houses. The marshal’sfee for ducking was only two pounds of tobacco.The ducking-stools were not kept inchurch porches, as in England. In 1634 twowomen were sentenced to be either drawnfrom King’s Creek “from one Cowpen to anotherat the starn of a boat or kanew,” or topresent themselves before the congregation,and ask forgiveness of each other and God.In 1633 it was ordered that a ducking-stoolbe built in every county in Maryland. At acourt-baron at St. Clements, the county wasprosecuted for not having one of these “publicconveniences.” In February, 1775, aducking-stool was ordered to be placed at theconfluence of the Ohio and MonongahelaRivers, and was doubtless used. As late as1819 Georgia women were ducked in theOconee River for scolding. And in 1824, atthe court of Quarter Sessions, a Philadelphiawoman was sentenced to be ducked, but thepunishment was not inflicted, as it wasdeemed obsolete and contrary to the spiritof the times. In 1803 the ducking-stool was[Pg 96]still used in Liverpool, England, and in 1809in Leominster, England.

One of the last indictments for duckingin our own country was that of Mrs. AnneRoyall in Washington, almost in our ownday. She was a hated lobbyist, whom Mr.Forney called an itinerant virago, and whobecame so abusive to congressmen that shewas indicted as a common scold before JudgeWilliam Cranch, and was sentenced by himto be ducked in the Potomac. She was,however, released with a fine.

Women curst with a shrewish tongue wereoften punished in Puritan colonies. In 1647it was ordered that “common scoulds” bepunished in Rhode Island by ducking, butI find no records of the punishment beinggiven. In 1649 several women were prosecutedin Salem, Mass., for scolding; andon May 15, 1672, the General Court of Massachusettsordered that scolds and railersshould be gagged or “set in a ducking-stooland dipped over head and ears three times,”but I do not believe that this law was everexecuted in Massachusetts. Nor was it inMaine, though in 1664 a dozen towns werefined forty shillings each for having no[Pg 97]“coucking-stool.” Equally severe punishmentswere inflicted for other crimes. KatharineAinis, of Plymouth, was publiclywhipped on training day, and ordered towear a large B cut in red cloth “sewed toher vper garment.” In 1637 Dorothy Talbye,a Salem dame, for beating her husband wasordered to be bound and chained to a post.At a later date she was whipped, and thenwas hanged for killing her child, who borethe strange name of Difficulty. No one buta Puritan magistrate could doubt, from Winthrop’saccount of her, that she was insane.Another “audatious” Plymouth shrew, forvarious “vncivill carriages” to her husband,was sentenced to the pillory; and if half thatwas told of her was true, she richly deservedher sentence; but, as she displayed “greatepensiveness and sorrow” before the simplePilgrim magistrates, she escaped temporarily,to be punished at a later date for a greatersin. The magistrates firmly asserted incourt and out that “meekness is ye chojsestorniment for a woman.”

Joane Andrews sold in York, Maine, in1676, two stones in a firkin of butter. Forthis cheatery she “stood in towne meeting[Pg 98]at York and at towne meeting at Kitterytill 2 hours bee expended, with her offensewritten upon a paper in capitall letters onher forehead.” The court record of onewoman delinquent in Plymouth, in 1683, isgrimly comic. It seems that Mary Rosseexercised what was called by the “painful”court chronicler in a triumph of orthographicaland nomenclatory art, an “inthewsiastickallpower” over one Shingleterry, a marriedman, who cringingly pleaded, as did ourfirst father Adam, that “hee must doo whatshee bade him”—or, in modern phrase, thatshe hypnotized him. Mary Rosse and heruncanny power did not receive the considerationthat similar witches and works do nowadays.She was publicly whipped and senthome to her mother, while her hypnotic subjectwas also whipped, and I presume senthome to his wife.

It should be noted that in Virginia, underthe laws proclaimed by Argall, women werein some ways tenderly regarded. They werenot punished for absenting themselves fromchurch on Sundays or holidays; while menfor one offence of this nature had “to lieneck and heels that night, and be a slave to[Pg 99]the colony for the following week; for thesecond offence to be a slave for a month; forthe third, for a year and a day.”

It is curious to see how long and how constantly,in spite of their severe and manifoldlaws, the pious settlers could suffer throughcertain ill company which they had been unluckyenough to bring over, provided thesaid offenders did not violate the religiousrules of the community. We might note asignoble instances, Will Fancie and his wife,of New Haven, and John Dandy and hiswife, of Maryland. Their names constantlyappear for years in the court records, asoffenders and as the cause of offences. JohnDandy at one time swore in court that allhis “controversies from the beginning ofthe World to this day” had ceased; but itwould have been more to the purpose had healso added till the end of the world, for hisviolence soon brought him to the gallows.Will Fancie’s wife seemed capable of anyand every offence, from “stealing pinnes”to stealing the affections of nearly every manwith whom she chanced to be thrown; andthe magistrates of New Haven were evidentlysorely puzzled how to deal with her.

[Pg 100]

I have noted in the court or church recordsof all witch-ridden communities, save inthe records of poor crazed and bewilderedSalem, where the flame was blown into aroaring blaze by “the foolish breath of CottonMather,” that there always appear on thepages some plain hints, and usually somedefinite statements, which account for theaccusation of witchcraft against individuals.And these hints indicate a hated personalityof the witch. To illustrate my meaning, letme take the case of Goody Garlick, ofEasthampton, Long Island. In reading theearly court records of that town, I was impressedwith the constant meddlesome interferenceof this woman in all social and townmatters. Every page reeked of Garlick. Shewas an ever-ready witness in trespass, boundary,and slander suits, for she was apparentlyon hand everywhere. She was present whena young man made ugly faces at the wife ofLion Gardiner, because she scolded him foreating up her “pomkin porage;” and shewas listening when Mistress Edwards wascalled a base liar, because she asserted shehad in her chest a new petticoat that she hadbrought from England some years before, and[Pg 101]had never worn (and of course no womancould believe that). In short, Goody Garlickwas a constant tale-bearer and barrator.Hence it was not surprising to me to find,when Mistress Arthur Howell, Lion Gardiner’sdaughter, fell suddenly and strangelyill, and cried out that “a double-tonguednaughty woman was tormenting her, a womanwho had a black cat,” that the wise neighborsat once remembered that Goody Garlick wasdouble-tongued and naughty, and had a blackcat. She was speedily indicted for witchcraft,and the gravamen appeared to be herconstant tale-bearing.

In 1706 a Virginian goody with a prettiername, Grace Sherwood, was tried as a witch;and with all the superstition of the day, andthe added superstition of the surroundingand rapidly increasing negro population, therewere but three Virginian witch-trials. GraceSherwood’s name was also of constant recurrencein court annals, from the year 1690, onthe court records of Princess Anne County,especially in slander cases. She was examined,after her indictment, for “witchesmarks” by a jury of twelve matrons, eachof whom testified that Grace was “not like[Pg 102]yur.” The magistrates seem to have beensomewhat disconcerted at the convictingtestimony of this jury, and at a loss how toproceed, but the witch asserted her willingnessto endure trial by water. A day wasset for the ducking, but it rained, andthe tenderly considerate court thought theweather unfavorable for the trial on accountof the danger to Grace’s health, and postponedthe ducking. At last, on a sunnyJuly day, when she could not take cold, thewitch was securely pinioned and thrown intoLyn Haven Bay, with directions from themagistrates to “but her into the debth.”Into the “debth” of the water she shouldhave contentedly and innocently sunk, but“contrary to the Judgments of all the spectators”she persisted in swimming, and atlast was fished out and again examined to seewhether the “witches marks” were washedoff. One of the examiners was certainly farfrom being prepossessed in Grace’s favor.She was a dame who eight years before hadtestified that “Grace came to her one night,and rid her, and went out of the key hole orcrack in the door like a black cat.” GraceSherwood was not executed, and she did not[Pg 103]die of the ducking, but it cooled her quarrelsometemper. She lived till 1740. Thepoint where she was butted into the depth isto this day called Witches Duck.

Grace Sherwood was not the only poorsoul that passed through the “water-test”or “the fleeting on the water” for witchcraft.In September, 1692, in Fairfield,Conn., the accused witches “Mercy Disburrowand Elizabeth Clauson were bound handand foot and put into the water, and theyswam like cork, and one labored to pressthem into the water, and they buoyed uplike cork.” Many cruel scenes were enactedin Connecticut, none more so than the persistentinquisition of Goodwife Knapp aftershe was condemned to death for witchcraft.She was constantly tormented by her oldfriends and neighbors to confess and toaccuse one Goody Staples as an accomplice;but the poor woman repeated that she mustnot wrong any one nor say anything untrue.She added:—

The truth is you would have me say that goodwifeStaples is a witch but I have sins enough toanswer for already, I know nothing against goodwifeStaples and I hope she is an honest woman.[Pg 104]You know not what I know. I have been fishedwithall in private more than you are aware of. Iapprehend that goodwife Staples hath done mewrong in her testimony but I must not returnevil for evil.

Being still urged and threatened with eternaldamnation, she finally burst into bittertears, and begged her persecutors to cease,saying in words that must have lingered longin their memory, and that still make theheart ache, “Never, never was poor creaturetempted as I am tempted! oh pray! pray forme!”

The last scene in this New Englandtragedy was when her poor dead body wascut down from the gallows, and laid upon thegreen turf beside her grave; and her oldneighbors, excited with superstition, andblinded to all sense of shame or unwomanliness,crowded about examining eagerly for“witch signs;” while in the foregroundGoodwife Staples, whose lying words hadhanged her friend, kneeled by the poor insultedcorpse, weeping and wringing herhands, calling upon God, and asserting theinnocence of the murdered woman.

It is a curious fact that, in an era which[Pg 105]did not much encourage the public speechor public appearance of women, they shouldhave served on juries; yet they occasionallydid, not only in witchcraft cases such asGrace Sherwood’s and Alice Cartwright’s,—anotherVirginia witch,—but in murdercases, as in Kent County, Maryland; thesejuries were not usually to render the finaldecision, but to decide upon certain points,generally purely personal, by which theirwise husbands could afterwards be guided.I don’t know that these female juries shineas exemplars of wisdom and judgment. In1693 a jury of twelve women in Newbury,Mass., rendered this decision, which certainlymust have been final:—

Wee judge according to our best lights andcontients that the Death of said Elizabeth wasnot by any violens or wrong done to her by anyparson or thing but by some soden stoping of hirBreath.

In Revolutionary days a jury of “twelvediscreet matrons” of Worcester, Mass., gavea decision in the case of Bathsheba Spooner,which was found after her execution to be awrong judgment. She was the last womanhanged by law in Massachusetts, and her[Pg 106]cruel fate may have proved a vicarious sufferingand means of exemption for otherwomen criminals.

Women, as well as men, when suspectedmurderers, had to go through the cruel andshocking “blood-ordeal.” This belief, supportedby the assertions of that learned fool,King James, in his Demonologie, lingeredlong in the minds of many,—indeed doesto this day in poor superstitious folk. Theroyal author says:—

In a secret murther, if the dead carkas be atany time thereafter handled by the murtherer, itwill gush out of blood.

Sometimes a great number of persons weremade to touch in turn the dead body, hopingthus to discover the murderer.

It has been said that few women weretaught to write in colonial days, and thatthose few wrote so ill their letters couldscarce be read. I have seen a goodly numberof letters written by women in thosetimes, and the handwriting is comparativelyas good as that of their husbands and brothers.Margaret Winthrop wrote with precisionand elegance. A letter of Anne[Pg 107]Winthrop’s dated 1737 is clear, regular, andbeautiful. Mary Higginson’s writing is fair,and Elizabeth Cushing’s irregular and uncertain,as if of infrequent occurrence. ElizabethCorwin’s is clear, though irregular;Mehitable Parkman’s more careless andwavering; all are easily read. But the mostbeautiful old writing I have ever seen,—elegant,regular, wonderfully clear and well-proportioned,was written by the hand ofa woman,—a criminal, a condemned murderer,Elizabeth Attwood, who was executedin 1720 for the murder of her infant child.The letter was written from “Ipswitch Golein Bonds” to Cotton Mather, and is a mostpathetic and intelligent appeal for his interferenceto save her life. The beauty andsimplicity of her language, the force anddirectness of her expressions, her firm denialof the crime, her calm religious assurance,are most touching to read, even after thelapse of centuries, and make one wonder thatany one—magistrate or priest,—even CottonMather—could doubt her innocence.But she was hanged before a vast concourseof eager people, and was declared most impenitentand bold in her denial of her guilt;[Pg 108]and it was brought up against her, as a mosthardened brazenry, that to cheat the hangman(who always took as handsel of his victimthe garments in which she was “turnedoff”), she appeared in her worst attire, andannounced that he would get but a sorrysuit from her. I do not know theestate in life of Elizabeth Attwood,but it could not havebeen mean, for her lettershows greatrefinement.

Accounts of isolated figures are oftenmore interesting than chapters of generalhistory, and biographies more attractivethan state records, because more petty detailsof vivid human interest can be learned; so,in order to present clearly a picture of thesocial life of women in the earliest days ofNew England, I give a description of a groupof women, contiguous in residence, and contemporaryin life, rather than an account ofsome special dame of dignity or note; and Icall this group Boston Neighbors.

If the setting of this picture would add toits interest, it is easy to portray the littlesettlement. The peninsula, but half as largeas the Boston of to-day, was fringed with sea-marshes,and was crowned with three conicalhills, surmounted respectively with the windmill,the fort, and the beacon. The champaignwas simply an extended pasture with[Pg 110]few trees, but fine springs of water. Windingfootpaths—most interesting of roadways—connectedthe detached dwellings, andtheir irregular outlines still show in our Bostonstreets. The thatched clay houses werebeing replaced by better and more substantialdwellings. William Coddington had builtthe first brick house.

On the main street, now WashingtonStreet, just east of where the Old SouthChurch now stands, lived the dame of highestdegree, and perhaps the most beautifulpersonality, in this little group—MargaretTyndal Winthrop, the “loving faythfull yoke-fellow”of Governor John Winthrop. Shewas his third wife, though he was but thirtywhen he married her. He had been firstmarried when but seventeen years old. Hewrites that he was conceived by his parentsto be at that age a man in stature and understanding.This wife brought to him, and leftto him, “a large portion of outward estate,”and four little children. Of the second wifehe writes, “For her carriage towards myselfe,it was so amiable and observant as I am notable to expresse; it had only this inconvenience,that it made me delight in hir too much[Pg 111]to enjoy hir long,”—and she lived with himbut a year and a day. He married Margaretin 1618, and when she had borne five children,he left her in 1630, and sailed to NewEngland. She came also the following year,and was received “with great joy” and aday of Thanksgiving. For the remainingsixteen years of her life she had but briefseparations from her husband, and she died,as he wrote, “especially beloved of all thecountry.” Her gentle love-letters to herhusband, and the simple testimony of contemporaryletters of her relatives and friends,show her to have been truly “a sweet graciouswoman” who endured the hardships ofher new home, the Governor’s loss of fortune,and his trying political experiences, withunvarying patience and “singular virtue,modesty and piety.”

There lived at this time in Boston a womanwho must have been well known personallyby Madam Winthrop, for she was a nearneighbor, living within stone’s throw of theGovernor’s house, on the spot where nowstands “The Old Corner Bookstore.” Thiswoman was Anne Hutchinson. She camewith Rev. John Cotton from Boston, England,[Pg 112]to Boston, New England, well respectedand well beloved. She went an outcast,hated and feared by many she left behindher in Boston. For years her name was onevery tongue, while she was under repeatedtrials and examinations for heresy. In thecontroversy over her and her doctrines, magistrates,ministers, women, soldiers, the commonmultitude of Boston, all took part, andtook sides; through the pursuance of thecontroversy the government of the colonywas changed. Her special offences againstdoctrines were those two antiquated “heresies,”Antinomianism and Familism, which Icould hardly define if I would. Accordingto Winthrop they were “those two dangerouserrors that the person of the Holy Ghostdwells in a justified person, and that nosanctification can help to evidence to us ourjustification.” Her special offences againstsocial and religious routines were thus relatedby Cotton Mather:—

So disturbed was the synod of ministerswhich was held early in the controversy, thatthis question was at once resolved:—

That though women might meet (some few together)to pray and edify one another, yet such aset assembly (as was then the practice in Boston)where sixty or more did meet every week, andone woman (in a prophetical way by resolvingquestions of doctrines and expounding scripture)[Pg 114]took upon her the whole exercise, was agreed tobe disorderly and without rule.

As I read the meagre evidences of herbelief, I see that Anne Hutchinson had ahigh supernatural faith which, though mysticalat its roots, aimed at being practical inits fruits; but she was critical, tactless, andover-inquisitive, and doubtless censorious,and worst of all she “vented her revelations,”which made her seem to many of thePuritans the very essence of fanaticism; soshe was promptly placed on trial for heresyfor “twenty-nine cursed opinions and fallinginto fearful lying, with an impudent Foreheadin the public assembly.” The end of it allin that theocracy could not be uncertain.One woman, even though her followers includedGovernor Sir Henry Vane, and ahundred of the most influential men of thecommunity, could not stop the powerful machineryof the Puritan Church and Commonwealth,the calm, well-planned opposition ofWinthrop; and after a succession of mortifyingindignities, and unlimited petty hectoringand annoying, she was banished. “The courtput an end to her vapouring talk, and findingno hope of reclaiming her from her scandalous,[Pg 115]dangerous, and enchanting extravagancies,ordered her out of the colony.”

In reading of her life, her trials, it is difficultto judge whether—to borrow Howel’sexpression—the crosier or the distaff weremost to blame in all this sad business;the preachers certainly took an over-activepart.

Of the personal appearance of this “erroneousgentlewoman” we know nothing. Ido not think, in spite of the presumptive evidenceof the marked personal beauty of herdescendants, that she was a handsome woman,else it would certainly be so stated. Theauthor of the Short Story of the Rise Reigneand Ruine of the Antinomians, Familists, andLibertines that infected the Churches of NewEngland calls her “a woman of a haughtyand fierce carriage, of a nimble wit and activespirit, and a very voluble tongue, more boldthan a man, though in understanding andjudgment inferior to many women.” Healso termed her “the American Jezebel,”and so did the traveller Josselyn in his Accountof Two Voyages to New England;while Minister Hooker styled her “awretched woman.” Johnson, in his Wonder-Working[Pg 116]Providence, calls her the “masterpieceof woman’s wit.” Governor Winthropsaid she was “a woman of ready wit and boldspirit.” Cotton Mather called her a virago,cunning, canting, and proud, but he did notknow her.

We to-day can scarcely comprehend whatthese “double weekly lectures” must havebeen to these Boston women, with their extremeconscientiousness, their sombre religiousbelief, and their timid superstition, intheir hard and perhaps homesick life. Thematerials for mental occupation and excitementwere meagre; hence the spiritualexcitement caused by Anne Hutchinson’sprophesyings must have been to them a fascinatingreligious dissipation. Many wereexalted with a supreme assurance of theirsalvation. Others, bewildered with spiritualdoubts, fell into deep gloom and depression;and one woman in utter desperation attemptedto commit a crime, and foundtherein a natural source of relief, saying“now she was sure she should be damned.”Into all this doubt and depression the wives—touse Cotton Mather’s phrase—“hookedin their husbands.” So; perhaps, after all it[Pg 117]was well to banish the fomenter of all thesetroubles and bewilderments.

Still, I wonder whether Anne Hutchinson’sold neighbors and gossips did notregret these interesting meetings, these excitingprophesyings, when they were sternlyended. I hope they grieved for her whenthey heard of her cruel death by Indian massacre;and I know they remembered her unstinted,kindly offices in time of sickness andaffliction; and I trust they honored “herever sober and profitable carriage,” and Isuspect some of them in their inmost heartsdeplored the Protestant Inquisition of theirfathers and husbands, that caused her exileand consequent murder by the savages.

Samuel Johnson says, “As the faculty ofwriting is chiefly a masculine endowment,the reproach of making the world miserablehas always been thrown upon women.” Asthe faculty of literary composition at thatday was wholly a masculine endowment, weshall never know what the Puritan womenreally thought of Anne Hutchinson, andwhether they threw upon her any reproach.

We gain a slight knowledge of what MargaretWinthrop thought of all this religious[Pg 118]ecstasy, this bitter quarrelling, from a letterwritten by her, and dated “Sad-Boston.”She says:—

Sad thoughts possess my sperits, and I cannotrepulce them; wch makes me unfit for anythinge,wondringe what the Lord meanes by all thesetroubles among us. Shure I am that all shallworke to the best to them that love God, or ratherare loved of hime, I know he will bring light outof obcurity and make his rituusnesse shine forthas clere as the nounday; yet I find in myselfan aferce spiret, and a tremblinge hart, not sowilling to submit to the will of God as I desyre.There is a time to plant, and a time to pull upthat which is planted, which I could desyre mightnot be yet.

And so it would seem to us to-day that itwas indeed a doubtful beginning to tear upwith such violence even flaunting weeds, lestthe tender and scattered grain, whose rootsscarce held in the unfamiliar soil, might alsobe uprooted and wither and die. But thecolony endured these trials, and flourished,as it did other trials, and still prospered.

Though written expression of their feelingsis lacking, we know that the Bostonneighbors gave to Anne Hutchinson that[Pg 119]sincerest flattery—imitation. Perhaps herfellow-prophets should not be called imitators,but simply kindred religious spirits.The elements of society in colonial Bostonwere such as plentifully to produce and stimulate“disordered and heady persons.”

Among them was Mary Dyer, thus describedby Winthrop:—

The wife of William Dyer, a milliner in theNew Exchange, a very proper and fair woman,notoriously infected with Mrs Hutchinsons errors,and very censorious and troublesome. Shebeing of a very proud spirit and much addictedto revelations.

Another author called her “a comelygrave woman, of a goodly personage, and ofgood report.”

Some of these Boston neighbors lived tosee two sad sights. Fair comely Mary Dyer,after a decade of unmolested and peacefulrevelations in Rhode Island, returned to herearly home, and persistently preached to herold friends, and then walked through Bostonstreets hand in hand with two young Quakerfriends, condemned felons, to the sound ofthe drums of the train band, glorying in hercompanionship; and then she was set on a[Pg 120]gallows with a halter round her neck, whileher two friends were hanged before hereyes; this was witnessed by such a multitudethat the drawbridge broke under theweight of the returning North-enders. Andsix months later this very proper and fairwoman herself was hanged in Boston, to ridthe commonwealth of an intolerable plague.

A letter still exists, written by WilliamDyer to the Boston magistrates to “begaffectionately the life of my deare wife.” Itis most touching, most heart-rending; itends thus, “Yourselves have been husbandsof wife or wives, and so am I, yea to onemost dearlye beloved. Oh do not you depriveme of her, but I pray you give me herout againe. Pitye me—I beg it with teares.”

The tears still stain this poor sorrowful,appealing letter,—a missive so gentle, sotimid, so full of affection, of grief, that Icannot now read it unmoved and I do indeed“pitye” thee. William Dyer’s tears havenot been the only ones to fall on his beautiful,tender words.

Another interesting neighbor living whereWashington Street crossed Brattle Street wasthe bride, young Madam Bellingham, whose[Pg 121]marriage had caused such a scandal in goodsociety in Boston. Winthrop’s account ofthis affair is the best that could be given:—

The governour Mr Bellingham was married.The young gentlewoman was ready to be contractedto a friend of his who lodged in hishouse, and by his consent had proceeded so farwith her, when on a sudden the governour treatedwith her, and obtained her for himself. Heexcused it by the strength of his affection, andthat she was not absolutely promised to theother gentleman. Two errors more he committedupon it. 1. That he would not have hiscontract published where he dwelt, contrary tothe order of court. 2. That he married himselfcontrary to the constant practice of the country.The great inquest prosecuted him for breach ofthe order of the court, and at the court followingin the fourth month, the secretary called him toanswer the prosecution. But he not going offthe bench, as the manner was, and but few of themagistrates present, he put it off to another time,intending to speak with him privately, and withthe rest of the magistrates about the case, andaccordingly he told him the reason why he didnot proceed, viz., that being unwilling to commandhim publicly to go off the bench, and yetnot thinking it fit he should sit as a judge, when[Pg 122]he was by law to answer as an offender. Thishe took ill, and said he would not go off thebench except he were commanded.

I think the young English girl, PenelopePelham, must have been sadly bewilderedby the strange abrupt ways of the new land,by her dictatorial elderly lover, by his autocraticand singular marriage with her, bythe attempted action of the governmentagainst him. She had a long life thereafter,for he lived to be eighty years old, and shesurvived him thirty years.

A very querulous and turbulent neighborwho lived on Milk Street was Mistress AnnHibbins, the wife of one of Boston’s honoredcitizens. Her husband had been unsuccessfulin business matters, and this “so discomposedhis wife’s spirit that she wasscarce ever well settled in her mind afterwards,”and at last was put out of the churchand by her strange carriage gave occasionto her superstitious neighbors to charge herwith being a witch. She was brought totrial for witchcraft, convicted, sentenced,and hung upon a Thursday lecture day, inspite of her social position, and the fact thather brother was Governor Bellingham. She[Pg 123]had other friends, high in authority, as herwill shows, and she had the belongings of acolonial dame, “a diamond ring, a taffetycloke, silk gown and kirtle, pinck-colored petticoat,and money in the deske.” MinisterBeach wrote to Increase Mather in 1684:—

I have sometimes told you your famous MrNorton once said at his own table before MrWilson, Elder Penn and myself and wife whohad the honour to be his guests—that the wifeof one of your magistrates, I remember, washanged for a witch only for having more witthan her neighbors. It was his very expression;she having as he explained it, unhappily guessedthat two of her prosecutors, whom she saw talkingin the street were talking about her—whichcost her her life, notwithstanding all he could doto the contrary.

It would naturally be thought, from theaffectionate and intense devotion of thecolonists to the school which had just become“Harvard-Colledge,” that Mr. NathanielEaton, the head-master of the freshlyestablished seat of learning, would be a citizenof much esteem, and his wife a dame ofas dignified carriage and honored station asany of her Boston and Cambridge neighbors.[Pg 124]Let us see whether such was the case. Mr.Eaton had had much encouragement to continueat the head of the college for life; hehad been offered a tract of five hundredacres of land, and liberal support had beenoffered by the government, and he “hadmany scholars, the sons of gentlemen andof others of best note in the country.” Yetwhen he fell out with one of his ushers onvery slight occasion, he struck the usherand caused two more to hold the poor fellowwhile he beat him two hundred stripes witha heavy walnut cudgel; and when poor UsherBriscoe fell a-praying, in fear of dying, MasterEaton beat him further for taking thename of God in vain. When all this crueltywas laid to him in open court “his answerswere full of pride and disdain,” and he saidhe had this unvarying rule, “that he wouldnot give over correcting till he had subduedthe party to his will.” And upon beingquestioned about other malpractices, especiallythe ill and scant diet provided by himfor the students, though good board hadbeen paid by them, he, Adam-like, “put itoff to his wife.”

Her confession of her connection with the[Pg 125]matter is still in existence, and proves heraccomplishments as a generous and tidyhousewife about equal to his dignity andlenity as head of the college. It is a mostcurious and minute document, showingwhat her duties were, and the way she performedthem, and also giving an interestingglimpse of college life in those days. Itreads thus:—

Truly a pitiful tale of shiftless stinginess,of attempted extortion, of ill-regulated service,and of overworked housewifery as well.

The Reverend Mr. Eaton did not escapepunishment for his sins. After much obstinacyhe “made a very solid, wise, eloquent,and serious confession, condemning himselfin all particulars.” The court, with Winthropat the head, bore lightly upon him afterthis confession, and yet when sentence of banishmentfrom the college, and restriction fromteaching within the jurisdiction, was passed,and he was fined £30, he did not give gloryto God as was expected, but turned awaywith a discontented look. Then the churchtook the matter up to discipline him, and theschoolmaster promptly ran away, leavingdebts of a thousand pounds.

[Pg 129]

The last scene in the life of Mrs. Eatonmay be given in Winthrop’s words:—

Mr. Nathaniel Eaton being come to Virginia,took upon him to be a minister there, but wasgiven up to extreme pride and sensuality, beingusually drunken, as the custom is there. He sentfor his wife and children. Her friends here persuadedher to stay awhile, but she went, notwithstanding,and the vessel was never heard ofafter.

So you see she had friends and neighborswho wished her to remain in New Englandwith them, and who may have loved her inspite of the sour bread, and scant beer, andbad fish, that she doled out to the collegestudents.

There was one visitor who flashed uponthis chill New England scene like a brillianttropical bird; with all the subtle fascinationof a foreigner; speaking a strange language;believing a wicked Popish faith; and englamouredwith the romance of past adventure,with the excitement of incipient war.This was Madam La Tour, the young wifeof one of the rival French governors of Acadia.The relations of Massachusetts, of Bostontown, to the quarrels of these two ambitious[Pg 130]and unscrupulous Frenchmen, La Tourand D’Aulnay, form one of the most curiousand interesting episodes in the history of thecolony.

Many unpleasant and harassing complicationsand annoyances had arisen between theFrench and English colonists, in the morenorthern plantations, when, in 1643, in June,Governor La Tour surprised his Englishneighbors by landing in Boston “with twofriars and two women sent to wait upon LaTour His Lady”—and strange sights theytruly were in Boston. He came ashore atGovernor Winthrop’s garden (now Fort Winthrop),and his arrival was heralded by afrightened woman, one Mrs. Gibbons, whochanced to be sailing in the bay, and saw theapproach of the French boat, and hastenedto warn the Governor. Perhaps Mrs. Gibbonshad a premonitory warning of thetwenty-five hundred pounds her husbandwas to lose at a later date through his confidencein the persuasive Frenchman. Governorand Madam Winthrop and their twosons and a daughter-in-law were sitting inthe Governor’s garden in the summer sunshine,and though thoroughly surprised, they[Pg 131]greeted the unexpected visitor, La Tour,with civilities, and escorted him to Bostontown, not without some internal tremors andmuch deep mortification of the Governorwhen he thought of the weakness and povertyof Boston, with Castle Island deserted,as was plainly shown to the foreigner by thelack of any response to his salute of guns;and the inference was quick to come that theFrenchman “might have spoiled Boston.”

But La Tour’s visit was most friendly; allhe wished was free mercature and the coöperationof the English colony. And he desiredto land his men for a short time, that theymight refresh themselves after their longvoyage; “so they landed in small companiesthat our women might not be affrighted withthem.” And the Governor dined the Frenchofficers, and the New England warriors ofthe train-band entertained the visiting Gallicsoldiers, and they exercised and trained beforeeach other, all in true Boston hospitablefashion, as is the custom to this day. Andthe Governor bourgeoned with as much of anair of importance as possible, “being regularlyattended with a good guard of halbertsand musketeers;” and thus tried to live down[Pg 132]the undignified heralding of a fellow-governorby a badly scared woman neighbor. And thecunning Frenchman, as did another of hisrace, “with sugared words sought to addulceall matters.” He flattered the sober Bostonmagistrates, and praised everything aboutthe Boston army, and “showed much admirationprofessing he could not have believed it,if he had not seen it.” And the foreignerswere so well treated (though Winthrop wasblamed afterwards by stern Endicott and theRome-hating ministers) that they came againthe following summer, when La Tour askedmaterial assistance. He received it, and helingered till autumn, and barely eight daysafter he left, Madam La Tour landed in Bostonfrom London; and strange and sad mustthe little town have seemed to her after herpast life. She was in a state of much anger,and at once brought suit against the masterof the ship for not carrying her and her belongingsto the promised harbor in Acadia;for trading on the way until she nearly fellinto the hands of her husband’s enemy,D’Aulnay. The merchants of Charlestownand Salem sided with the ship’s captain.The solid men of Boston gallantly upheld[Pg 133]and assisted the lady. The jury awarded hertwo thousand pounds damages, and bitterlydid one of the jury—Governor Winthrop’sson—suffer for it, for he was afterwardsarrested in London, and had to give bondfor four thousand pounds to answer to a suitin the Court of Admiralty about the Bostondecision in favor of the Lady La Tour.

In the mean time ambassadors from therival Acadian governor, D’Aulnay, arrivedin New England, and were treated withmuch honor and consideration by the diplomaticBoston magistrates. I think I canread between the lines that the Bostoniansreally liked La Tour, who must have hadmuch personal attraction and magnetism;but they feared D’Aulnay, who had broughtagainst the Massachusetts government aclaim of eight thousand pounds damages.The Governor sent to D’Aulnay a propitiatorygift of “a very fair new sedan chair (ofno use to us),” and I should fancy scarcelyof much more use in Acadia; and whichproved a very cheap way of staving off payingthe eight thousand pounds.

Madam La Tour sailed off at last withthree laden ships to her husband, in spite[Pg 134]of D’Aulnay’s dictum that “she was knownto be the cause of all her husband’s contemptand rebellion, and therefore theycould not let her go to him.” La Tour’sstronghold was captured shortly after “byassault and scalado” when he was absent,and his jewels, plate, and furniture to theamount of ten thousand pounds were seized,and his wife too; and she died in threeweeks, of a broken heart, and “her littlechild and gentlewomen were sent to France.”

I think these Boston neighbors were entitledto a little harmless though excitinggossip two or three years later, when theylearned that after D’Aulnay’s death thefascinating widower La Tour had promptlymarried Widow D’Aulnay, thus regaininghis jewels and plate, and both hadsettled down to a long andpeaceful life in NovaScotia.

In the autumn and winter of the year1704, Madam Sarah Knight, a residentof Boston, made a journey on horsebackfrom Boston to New York, and returned inthe same manner. It was a journey difficultand perilous, “full of buggbears to a fearfullfemale travailler,” and which “startled amasculine courage,” but which was performedby this woman with the companyand protection only of hired guides, the“Western Post,” or whatever chance travellershe might find journeying her way, ata time when brave men feared to travelthrough New England, and asked for publicprayers in church before starting on a journeyof twenty miles. She was probably thefirst woman who made such a journey, insuch a manner, in this country.

Madam Knight was the daughter of CaptainKemble, of Boston, who was in 1656 set[Pg 136]two hours in the public stocks as a punishmentfor his “lewd and unseemly behavior,”which consisted in his kissing his wife “publicquely”on the Sabbath Day, upon thedoorstep of his house, when he had justreturned from a voyage and absence of threeyears.

The diary which Madam kept on thiseventful trip contains the names of no personsof great historical interest, thoughmany of historical mention; but it is such avivacious and sprightly picture of the customsof the time, and such a valuable descriptionof localities as they then appeared,that it has an historical interest of its own,and is a welcome addition to the few diariesand records of the times which we possess.

Everything was not all serene and pleasantin the years 1704 and 1705 in NewEngland. Events had occurred which couldnot have been cheerful for Madam Knightto think of when riding through the lonelyNarragansett woods and along the shores ofthe Sound. News of the frightful Indianmassacre at Deerfield had chilled the veryhearts of the colonists. At Northamptonshocking and most unexpected cruelties had[Pg 137]been perpetrated by the red men. At Lancaster,not any too far from Boston, the Indianshad been most obstreperous. We canimagine Madam Knight had no very pleasantthoughts of these horrors when shewrote her description of the red men whomshe saw in such numbers in Connecticut.Bears and wolves, too, abounded in the lonelywoods of Massachusetts and Connecticut.The howls of wolves were heard every night,and rewards were paid by New Englandtowns for the heads of wolves that werekilled, provided the heads were brought intotown and nailed to the side of the meeting-house.Twenty-one years later than MadamKnight’s journey, in 1725, twenty bears werekilled in one week in September, within twomiles of Boston, so says the History of Roxbury;and all through the eighteenth centurybears were hunted and killed in upperNarragansett. Hence “buggbears” werenot the only bears to be dreaded on thelonely journey.

The year 1704 was memorable also becauseit gave birth to the first newspaper in thecolonies, the Boston News-Letter. Only afew copies were printed each week, and each[Pg 138]copy contained but four or five square feetof print, and the first number contained butone advertisem*nt—that of the man whoprinted it.

When Madam Knight’s journal was publishedin New York by Mr. Theodore Dwight,in 1825, the editor knew nothing of the diarist,not even her family name; hence itwas confidently believed by many that thejournal was merely a clever and entertainingfiction. In 1852, however, Miss Caulkinspublished her history of the town of NewLondon, and contradicted that belief, for shegave an account of the last days of MadamKnight, which were spent in Norwich andNew London. Madam Knight’s daughtermarried the Colonel Livingston who is mentionedin the journal, and left no children.From a descendant of Mrs. Livingston’sadministratrix, Mrs. Christopher, the manuscriptof the journal was obtained for publicationin 1825, it having been carefullypreserved all those years. In Blackwood’sMagazine for the same year an article appeared,entitled Travelling in America, whichreprinted nearly all of Madam Knight’s journal,and which showed a high appreciation[Pg 139]of its literary and historical merits. In 1858it was again printed by request in Littell’sLiving Age, with some notes of MadamKnight’s life, chiefly compiled from MissCaulkins’ History of New London, and againprovoked much inquiry and discussion. Recentlya large portion of the journal hasbeen reprinted in the Library of AmericanLiterature, with many alterations, however,in the spelling, use of capitals, and punctuation,thus detracting much from the interestand quaintness of the work; and most unnecessarily,since it is perfectly easy to readand understand it as first printed, when,as the editor said, “the original orthographywas carefully preserved for fear of introducingany unwarrantable modernism.”

The first edition is now seldom seen forsale, and being rare is consequently high-priced.The little shabby, salmon-coloredcopy of the book which I saw was made interestingby two manuscript accounts ofSarah Knight, which were inserted at theend of the book, and which are very valuable,since they give positive proof of thereality of the fair traveller, as well as additionalfacts of her life.

[Pg 140]

The first account was in a fine old-fashioned,unpunctuated handwriting, on yellow,time-stained paper, and read thus:—

Underneath this account was written inthe clear, distinct chirography of IsaiahThomas, the veteran printer, this endorsem*nt:—

The above was written by Mrs. HannabellCrocker, of Boston, granddaughter of the Rev.Cotton Mather, and presented to me by thatlady.—Isaiah Thomas.

The other manuscript account is substantiallythe same, though in a different handwriting;it tells of the pane of glass with therhymed inscription being “preserved as acuriosity by an antiquicrity” (which is a[Pg 142]delightful and useful old word-concoction),“until the British set fire to the town,” inRevolutionary times, and “Poor MadamKnight’s poetrys, with other curiosities, wereconsumed.” It says, “She obtained thehonorable title of Madam by being a famousschoolmistress in her day. She taught Dr.Franklin to write. She was highly respectedby Dr. Cotton Mather as a woman of goodwit & pleasant humour.”

Sarah Knight was born in 1666, and thuswas about thirty-eight years old when shemade her “perilous journey.” She startedOctober 2d, and did not reach New Yorkuntil December 6th. Of course much ofthis time was spent visiting friends andkinsfolk in New London and New Haven,and often, too, she had to wait to obtaincompanion travellers. She rode upon thefirst night of her journey until very late inorder to “overtake the post,” and this is theaccount of her reception at her first lodging-place:—

My guide dismounted and very complasentlyand shewed the door signing to me with his handto Go in, which I Gladly did. But had not gonemany steps into the room ere I was interrogated[Pg 143]by a young Lady I understood afterwards wasthe Eldest daughter of the family, with these,or words to this purpose, (viz) Law for mee—whatin the world brings you here at this time-a-night?I never see a woman on the Rode soDreadfull late in all my Varsall Life. Who areYou? Where are you going? I’m scar’d out ofmy witts—with much now of the same KindI stood aghast Prepareing no reply—when income my Guide—to him Madam turn’d roreingout: Lawfull heart John is it You? how de do?Where in the world are you going with this woman?Who is She? John made no Ans’r butsat down in the corner, fumbled out his blackJunk, and saluted that instead of Debb. Shethen turned agen to mee and fell anew into hersilly questions without asking mee to sit down.I told her she treated mee very Rudely and I didnot think it my duty to answer her unmannerlyQuestions. But to gett ridd of them I told herI come there to have the Posts company withme to-morrow on my Journey &c. Miss staredawhile, drew a chair bid me sitt And then runupstairs and putts on two or three Rings (or elseI had not seen them before) and returning settherself just before me shewing the way to Reding,that I might see her Ornaments.

It appears from this account that human[Pg 144]nature, or rather feminine love of display,was the same in colonial times as in thepresent day.

Very vivid are her descriptions of the variousbeds upon which she reposed. This isher entry in her diary after the first night ofher journey:—

I pray’d Miss to shew me where I must Lodg.Shee conducted me to a parlour in a little backLento, which was almost filled with the bedstead,which was so high that I was forced to climbon a chair to gitt up to ye wretched bed thatlay on it, on which having Strecht my tiredLimbs, and lay’d my head on a Sad-colour’dpillow, I began to think on the transactions ofye past day.

We can imagine her (if such an intrusivefancy is not impertinent after one hundredand eighty years), attired in her night-hoodand her “flowered calico night-rayle withhigh collared neck,” climbing wearily upona chair and thence to the mountainous bedwith its dingy pillow. The fashion of wearing“immoderate great rayles” had beenprohibited by law in Massachusetts in 1634,but the garment mentioned must have beensome kind of a loose gown worn in the day-time,[Pg 145]for we cannot fancy that even the meddlesomeinterference and aspiring ambitionfor omnipotence of those Puritan magistrateswould make them dare to attempt to controlwhat kind of a nightgown a womanshould wear.

Here is another vivid description of anight’s lodging, where her room was shared,as was the country custom of that time (andindeed for many years later), by the menwho had journeyed with her:—

Arriving at my apartment found it to be alittle Lento Chamber furnished amongst otherRubbish with a High Bedd and a Low one, aLong Table, a Bench and a Bottomless chair.Little Miss went to scratch up my Kennellwhich Russelled as if shee’d bin in the Barnamongst the Husks, and supose such was thecontents of the tickin—nevertheless being exceedingweary-down I laid my poor Carkes(never more tired) and found my Covering asscanty as my Bed was hard. Anon I heard anotherRusselling noise in Ye Room—called toknow the matter—Little Miss said shee wasmaking a bed for the men; who, when they werein Bed complained their leggs lay out of it byreason of its shortness—my poor bones complainedbitterly not being used to such Lodgings,[Pg 146]and so did the man who was with us; and poorI made but one Grone, which was from the timeI went to bed to the time I Riss, which wasabout three in the morning, Setting up by theFire till Light.

The word “lento,” or “lean to,” was sometimescalled “linter,” and you will still hearold-fashioned or aged country-people use theword. The “lean-to” was the rear portionof a form of house peculiar to New England,which was two stories high in front, with aroof which sloped down from a steep gableto a very low single story at the rear.

Madam Sarah speaks with some surprisethroughout her travels of the height of thebeds, so it is evident that very towering bedswere not in high fashion in Boston in 1704,in spite of the exceeding tall four-postersthat have descended to us from our ancestors,and which surely no one could mount in modern dayswithout a chair as an accessory.Even a chair was not always a sufficientstepping-block by the bedsides that MadamSarah found, for she thus writes: “He invitedus to his house, and shewed me twopair of stairs, viz, one up the loft, and totherup the Bedd, which was as hard as it was[Pg 147]high, and warmed with a hott stone at thefoot.”

After the good old Puritan custom of contumeliousreviling, in which clergymen, laymen,and legal lights alike joined, MadamKnight could show a rare choice of epithetsand great fluency of uncomplimentary descriptionwhen angered. Having expectedto lodge at the house of a Mr. DeVille inNarragansett, and being refused, she writesthus of the DeVilles:—

I questioned whether we ought to go to theDevil to be helpt out of the affliction. However,like the Rest of Deluded souls that post to yeInfernall denn, Wee made all possible speed tothis Devil’s Habitation; where alliting, in fullassurance of good accommodation, wee were goingin. But meeting his two daughters, as I suposedtwins, they so neerly resembled each otherboth in features and habit and look’t as oldas the Divel himself, and quite as Ugly. Wedesired entertainment, but could hardly get aword out of ’um, till with our Importunity tellingthem our necessity &c they call’d the oldSophister, who was as sparing of his words ashis daughters had bin, and no or none, was thereply’s he made us to our demands. Hee differed[Pg 148]only in this from the old fellow in totherCountry, hee let us depart. However I thoughtit proper to warn poor Travaillers to endeavourto Avoid falling into circ*mstances like ours,which at our next Stage I sat down and did asfolloweth:—

Madam Knight had a habit of “droppinginto poetry” very readily and upon almostany subject. Upon the moon, upon poverty,even upon the noise of drunken topers in thenext room to her own. The night-scene thatbrought forth the rhymes upon rum wasgraced by a conversation upon the derivationof the word Narragansett, and her report ofit is of much interest, and is always placedamong the many and various authorities for,and suggestions about, the meaning of theword:—

[Pg 149]

[Pg 150]

And I know not but my wishes took effect forthe dispute soon ended with tother Dram.

To one who, unused to venturing abroadin boats on stormy waters, has trusted herbodily safety to one of those ticklish Indianvehicles, a canoe, this vivid account of thesensations of an early female colonist in asimilar situation may prove of interest; nordo I think, after the lapse of centuries, couldthe description be improved by the addedwords of our newer and more profuse vocabulary:—

The Cannoo was very small & shallow so thatwhen we were in she seemd redy to take in waterwhich greatly terrify’d me, and caused me to bevery circ*mspect, sitting with my hands fast oneach side, my eyes stedy, not daring so much asto lodge my tongue a hairs breadth more on oneside of my mouth than tother, nor so much asthink on Lotts wife, for a very thought wouldhave oversett our wherey.

[Pg 151]

We are so accustomed to hearing of thegreat veneration and respect always shownin olden times by children toward their parents,and the dignified reserve and absoluteauthority of parents towards children, thatthe following scene rather shocks our establishednotions:—

Thursday about 3 in the afternoon I set forwardwith neighbour Polly & Jemima a girl about18 years old, who her father said he had been tofetch out of the Narragansetts and said they hadrode thirty miles that day on a sorry lean Jadewith only a Bagg under her for a pillion whichthe poor Girl often complain’d was very uneasy.Wee made Good speed along wch made poorJemima make many a sowr face the mare beinga very hard trotter, and after many a hearty& bitter Oh she at length low’d out: LawfulHeart father! this bare mare hurts mee Dingeely.I’m direfull sore I vow, with many words to thatpurpose. Poor Child—sais Gaffer—she us’t toserve your mother so. I dont care how motherust to do, quoth Jemima in a passionate tone.At which the old man Laught and kikt his Jadeo’ the side, which made her Jolt ten times harder.About seven that evening we came to New LondonFerry here by reason of a very high wind,we mett with great difficulty in getting over. The[Pg 152]boat tost exceedingly and our Horses capperedat a very Surprising rate and set us all in a frightespecially poor Jemima who desired father to saySo Jack! to the Jade to make her stand. Butthe careless parent, taking no notice of herrepeated desires, She Rored out in a Pasionatemanner Pray Suth father Are you deaf? Say SoJack to the Jade I tell you. The Dutiful Parentobeyed saying So Jack So Jack as gravely as ifhe had bin saying Chatchise after young Misswho with her fright look’t all the Colours of yeRainbow.

It is very evident from entries in her Journalthat Madam Knight thought much ofgratifying her appetite, for the food she obtainedat her different resting-places is oftendescribed. She says:—

Landlady told us shee had some mutton whichshee would broil. In a little time she bro’t it inbut it being pickled and my Guide said it smeltstrong of head-sause we left it and paid six penceapiece for our dinners which was only smell.

Again, she thus describes a meal:—

Having call’d for something to eat the womanbro’t in a Twisted thing like a cable, but somethingwhiter, laying it on the bord, tugg’d forlife to bring it into a capacity to spread; which[Pg 153]having with great pains accomplished shee serveda dish of Pork and Cabage I supose the remainsof Dinner. The sause was of a deep purplewhich I tho’t was boiled in her dye Kettle; thebread was Indian and everything on the Tableservice agreeable to these. I being hungry gotta little down, but my stomach was soon cloy’dand what cabage I swallowed served me for aCudd the whole day after.

The early colonists never turned very readilyto Indian meal and pumpkins—pumpionsas they called them in the “times whereinold Pompion was a saint;” and Johnson,in his Wonder-Working Providence, reprovedthem for making a jest of pumpkins, sincethey were so good a food. Madam Knighthad them offered to her very often, “pumpkinsause” and “pumpkin bred.” “Wewould have eat a morsell ourselves But thePumpkin and Indian-mixt Bread had such anaspect, and the Bare-legg’d Punch so awkerdor rather Awfull a sound that we left both.”

She gives a glimpse of rather awkwardtable-manners when she complains that inConnecticut masters permitted their slavesto sit and eat with them, “and into the dishgoes the black Hoof as freely as the white[Pg 154]hand.” Doubtless in those comparativelyforkless days fingers were very freely usedat the table.

She tells many curious facts about Connecticut.Divorces were plentiful in thatState, as they are at the present day. Shewrites:—

These uncomely Standaways are too much inVogue among the English in this Indulgent Colonyas their Records plentifully prove, and thaton very trivial matters of which some have beentold me, but are not Proper to be Related by aFemale Pen.

She says they will not allow harmless kissingamong the young people, and she tells ofa curious custom at weddings, where thebridegroom ran away and had to be chasedand dragged back by force to the bride.

Her descriptions of the city of NewYork; of the public vendues “where theygive drinks;” of the Dutch houses andwomen; of the “sley-riding” where she“mett fifty or sixty sleys,” are all very entertaining.There were few sleighs in Bostonat that date. Everything is comparedwith “ours in Boston,” or said to be “notlike Boston,” after a fashion still somewhat[Pg 155]followed by the Boston “Female Pen” ofthe present day. As New York then wasonly a small town of five thousand inhabitants,while Big Boston possessed ten thousandinhabitants, such comparisons werecertainly justifiable.

We must give her vivid and vivaciouspicture of a country “lubber” in a merchant’sshop:—

In comes a tall country fellow with his Alfogeosfull of Tobaco. He advanced to the middleof the room, makes an awkward nodd and spittinga large deal of Aromatic Tincture, he gavea scrape with his shovel-like shoo, leaving a smallshovel-full of dirt on the floor, made a full stop,hugging his own pretty body with his handsunder his arms, Stood Staring round him like aCatt let out of a Baskett. At last like the creatureBalaam rode on he opened his mouth andsaid Have you any Ribinen for Hat bands to sell Ipray? The Questions and answers about thepay being past the Ribin is bro’t and opened.Bumpkin simpers, cryes, Its confounded Gay Ivow; and beckoning to the door in comes JoanTawdry, dropping about 50 curtsies, and standsby him. He shews her the Ribin. Law You,sais shee, its right Gent, do you take it, its dreadfulpretty. Then she enquires: Have you any[Pg 156]hood silk I pray? which being brought andbought. Have you any Thred silk to sew it with?says shee, which being accomodated with theydeparted.

Though Madam Knight left no accountof the costume which she wore on her“perilous journey,” we know very well whatthe fashions of the time were and of whather dress consisted. She wore a woollenround-gown, perhaps of camlet, perhaps ofcalimanco, of which the puffed sleeves cameto the elbow and were finished with knotsof ribbons and ruffles. Riding-habits werethen never worn. I am sure she did notwear a neck-ruff on this journey, but a scarfor neck-kerchief or “cross cloth” instead.Long gloves of leather or kid protected herfair hands, and came to the elbow, and werefirmly secured at the top by “glove-tightens”made of braided black horsehair. A pointedbeaver or beaverette hat covered her head;the hat and peruke had not then reached theexcessive size which made them for a lady’s“riding equipage” so bitterly and openlycondemned in 1737 as an exceeding andabominable affectation. She doubtless woreinstead of the fine, stately peruke, a cap, a[Pg 157]“round cap,” which did not cover the ears,or a “strap cap,” which came under the chin;or perhaps a “quoif” or a “ciffer”—NewEngland French for coiffure. During hercold winter ride home she surely donned ahood. One is described at that date thus:“A woman’s worsted camlet riding-hood ofgrayish color faced with crimson coulour’dPersian.” Over her shoulders she wore aheavy woollen short cloak, or a scarlet “whittle,”and doubtless also added a “drugget-petticoat”for warmth, or a “safeguard” forprotection against mud. High-heeled pointedshoes of leather, with knots of green ribbonor silver buckles, completed Madam Sarah’spicturesque and comfortable attire. Oneother useful article of dress, or rather ofprotection, she surely as a lady of high gentilitycarried and wore: a riding-mask madeof black velvet with a silver mouthpiece, orwith two little strings with a silver bead atthe end, which she placed in either cornerof her mouth, to hold her mask firmly inplace.

The “nagg” upon which Madam rode waswithout doubt a pacer, as were all good saddle-horsesat that date. No one making any[Pg 158]pretension to fashion or good style wouldride upon a trotting-horse, nor indeed untilRevolutionary times was a trotter regardedas of any account or worth.

I do not think Madam Knight had a Narragansettpacer, for as soon as they wereraised in any numbers they were sent at onceto the West Indies for the use of the wivesand daughters of the wealthy sugar-planters,and few New England people could afford toown them. The “horse furniture” of whichshe speaks included, of course, her side-saddleand saddle-bag, which held her travelling-wardrobeand her precious journal.

Madam Sarah Knight did not end herdays in Boston. She removed to Norwich,Conn., and in 1717 it is recorded that shegave a silver cup for the communion-serviceof the church there. The town in gratitude,by vote, gave her liberty to “sitt in the puewhere she was used to sitt in ye meetinghouse.” She also kept an inn on the LivingstonFarm near New London, and Idoubt not a woman of her large experiencekept a good ordinary. No rustling beds, nosad-colored pillow-bears, no saucy maids, nonoisy midnight topers, no doubtful fricassees,[Pg 159]no pumpkin-bread, and, above all, no bare-leggedpunch in her house.

It is painful to record, however, that in1718 the teacher of Benjamin Franklin andfriend of Cotton Mather was indicted andfined for “selling strong liquor to Indians.”

Altogether, Madam Knight was far aheadof the time in which she lived. She was awoman of great energy and talent. She kepta school when a woman-teacher was almostunheard of. She ran a tavern, a shop. Shewrote poetry and a diary. She cultivated afarm, and owned mills, and speculated largelyin Indian lands, and was altogether a sharpbusiness-woman; and she must havebeen counted an extraordinarycharacter in those earlydays.

A “strange true story of Louisiana”so furnished with every attractiveelement of romance, so calculated to satisfyevery exaction of literary art, that it seemsmarvellous it has not been eagerly seizedupon and frequently utilized by dramatistsand novelists, is that of a Louisiana princess—orpretender—whose death in a Parisianconvent in 1771 furnished a fruitful topic ofspeculation and conversation in the courtsof France, Austria, Russia, and Prussia.This Louisiana princess (were she no pretender)was the daughter-in-law of Peter theGreat of Russia, wife of the Grand DukeAlexis, and mother of Peter II. of Russia.The story, as gathered from a few Europeanauthorities and some old French chroniclesand histories of Louisiana, is this.

The Princess Christine, daughter of a Germanprinceling and wife of the Grand Duke[Pg 161]Alexis, is said by Russian official and historicalrecords to have died in 1716 after a shortand most unhappy married life with a brutalroyal profligate, and to have been buriedwith proper court honors and attendance.But there is another statement, half-history,half-romance, which denies that she died atthat time, and asserts that her death andburial were but a carefully planned deception,to permit her to escape her intolerablelife in Russia, and only concealed her successfulflight from St. Petersburg and thepower of the Russian throne. Aided by thefamous Countess Königsmark, the princess,after some delay and frightened hiding inFrance, sailed from the port of L’Orient,accompanied by an old devoted court retainernamed Walter. Of course there mustalways be a lover to form a true romance,and a young officer named D’Aubant successfullyfills that rôle. He had often seenChristine in the Russian court, and hadrescued her from danger when she was huntingin the Hartz Mountains, and had cherishedfor her a deep though hopeless love. Whenthe news of her death came to the knowledgeof Chevalier D’Aubant, he sadly left[Pg 162]the Czar’s service and went to France.Soon after he chanced to see at the cathedralin Poitiers a woman who raised her veil,glanced at him with a look of recognition,and apparently a face like that of his lovedChristine. After long search for the unknown,he found her temporary home, onlyto learn that she, with her father Mons.De L’Ecluse (who was of course Walter),had just sailed for the New World. But thewoman of the house gave him a slip of paperwhich the fair one had left for him in casehe called and asked concerning her. On itwas written this enigmatical lure:—

Now, he would not have been an ideal court-lover,nor indeed but a sorry hero, if, aftersuch a message, he had not promply sailedafter the possible Christine. He learnedthat the vessel which bore her was to landat Biloxi, Louisiana. He sailed for the sameport with his fortune in his pockets. Buton arriving in Louisiana, Walter (or Mons.De L’Ecluse) had taken the disguising nameof Walter Holden, and Christine posed ashis daughter, Augustine Holden; so her[Pg 163]knight-errant thus lost trace of her. Christine-Augustineand her father settled in theColonie Roland on the Red River. D’Aubant,with sixty colonists, founded a settlementbut fifty miles away, which he namedthe Valley of Christine. Of course in duetime the lovers met, and disguise was impossibleand futile, and Augustine confessedher identity with the Crown Princess. Asher husband Alexis had by this time convenientlydied in prison, in Moscow, wherehe had been tried and condemned to death(and probably been privately executed), therewas no reason, save the memory of her pastexalted position, why she should not becomethe wife of an honest planter. They weremarried by a Spanish priest, and lived fortwenty happy years in the Valley of Christine.

But D’Aubant’s health failed, and hesought physicians in Paris. One day whenChristine was walking in the garden of theTuileries, with her two daughters, the childrenof D’Aubant, the German conversationof the mother attracted the attention of MarshalSaxe, who was the son of the veryCountess Königsmark who had aided Christine’s[Pg 164]escape. The marshal recognized theprincess at once, in spite of the lapse ofyears, and through his influence with LouisXV. obtained for D’Aubant a commission asmajor of troops, and the office of governorof the Isle of Bourbon. The King alsoinformed the Empress of Austria, who wasa niece of Christine, that her aunt was alive;and an invitation was sent from the Empressfor the D’Aubant family to become residentsof the Austrian Court. They remained,however, at the Isle of Bourbon until thedeath of D’Aubant and the two daughters,when Christine came to Brunswick and wasgranted a pension for life by the Empress.Her death in a convent, and her burial, tookplace over half a century after her pretendedlegal demise.

This is the Christine of romance, of courtgossip, of court credulity, but there is anotheraspect of her story. Judge Martinhas written a standard history of Louisiana.In it he says:—

Two hundred German settlers of Law’s grantwere landed in the month of March 1721 at Biloxiout of the twelve hundred who had beenrecruited. There came among the German new-comers[Pg 165]a female adventurer. She had been attachedto the wardrobe of the wife of the CzarowitzAlexis Petrovitz, the only son of Peter theGreat. She imposed on the credulity of manypersons, particularly on that of an officer of thegarrison of Mobile (called by Bossu, the ChevalierD’Aubant, and by the King of Prussia, Waldeck),who, having seen the princess at St. Petersburgimagined he recognized her features inthose of her former servant, and gave credit tothe report that she was the Duke of Wolfenbuttel’sdaughter, and the officer married her.

Grimm and Voltaire in their letters, Levesquein his History, all unite in pronouncingher an impostor. But you can chooseyour own estimate of this creature of highromance; if you elect to deem her a princess,you find yourself in the goodly companyof the King of France, the Empress ofAustria, Marshal Saxe, and a vast numberof other folk of rank and intelligence.

In the year 1771 there was sent to thiscountry from England a woman convict,who had in her enforced home a most extraordinaryand romantic career of successfulfraud.

The first account which I have seen of[Pg 166]her was printed in the Gentleman’s Magazinein 1771, and told simply of her startlingintrusion into the Queen’s apartmentsin London; but Dr. Doran’s Lives of theQueens of England of the House of Hanovergives this account of this interesting bitof Anglo-American romance.

Sarah Wilson, yielding to a strong temptationin the year 1771, filched one or two of theQueen’s jewels, and was condemned to be executed.It was considered almost a violation ofjustice that the thief should be saved from thehalter and be transported instead of hanged.She was sent to America, where she was allottedas slave, or servant, to a Mr. Dwale, Bud Creek,Frederick County. Queen Charlotte would havethought nothing more of her, had her majestynot heard with some surprise, that her sisterSusannah Caroline Matilda was keeping hercourt in the plantations. Never was surprisemore genuine than the Queen’s; it was exceededonly by her hilarity when it was discovered thatthe Princess Susannah was simply Sarah Wilson,at large. That somewhat clever girl havingstolen a Queen’s jewels, thought nothing, afterescaping from the penal service to which shewas condemned, of passing herself off as aQueen’s sister. The Americans were not so[Pg 167]acute as their descendants; so in love weresome of them with the greatness they affected todespise, that they paid royal honors to the cleverimpostor. She passed the most joyous of seasonsbefore she was consigned again to increaseof penalty for daring to pretend relationship withthe consort of King George. The story of thepresuming girl, whose escapades, however, werenot fully known in England at that time, served,as far as knowledge of them had reached thecourt, to amuse the gossips who had assembledabout the cradle of the young Elizabeth.

In this account of Dr. Doran’s there aresome errors. The real story of the crimeof Sarah Wilson and her subsequent careerwas this. In August, 1770, a strange womanfound her way by means of a private staircaseto the apartments of Queen Charlotte.She entered a room where the Queen andthe duch*ess of Ancaster were sitting, totheir alarm. While she was taking a leisurelysurvey of the contents of the room,a page was summoned, who expelled the intruder,but did not succeed in arresting her.Shortly after, the Queen’s apartments werebroken into by a thief, who stole valuablejewels and a miniature of the Queen. The[Pg 168]thief proved to be a woman named SarahWilson, who had been maid of the HonorableMiss Vernon, and this thief was asserted tobe the inquisitive intruder whose visit hadso alarmed the Queen.

Sarah Wilson was arrested, tried as a felon,and sentenced to death; but by the exertionsand influence of her former mistress thesentence was commuted to transportation tothe American colonies for a seven years’term of servitude. This leniency causedconsiderable stir in London and some dissatisfaction.

In 1771, after passage in a convict ship,Sarah Wilson was sold to a Mr. WilliamDuvall, of Bush Creek, Frederick County,Maryland, for seven years’ servitude. Aftera short time, in which she apparently developedher plans of fraud, she escaped fromher master, and went to Virginia and theCarolinas, where she assumed the title ofPrincess Susannah Caroline Matilda, and assertedshe was the sister of the Queen ofEngland. She still owned the miniature ofthe Queen, and some rich jewels, which gaveapparent proof of her assertion, and it issaid some rich clothing. It is indeed mysterious[Pg 169]that a transported convict couldretain in her possession, through all herreverses, the very jewels for whose theft shewas punished; yet the story can scarcely bedoubted.

She travelled through the South fromplantation to plantation, with plentiful promisesof future English offices and courtfavors to all who assisted her progress; andliberal sums of money were placed at herdisposal, to be repaid by Queen Charlotte;and she seems to have been universally welcomedand feasted.

But the fame of the royal visitor spreadafar and found its way to Bush Creek, to theears of Mr. Duvall, and he promptly suspectedthat he had found trace of his ingeniousrunaway servant. As was the customof the day, he advertised for her and a rewardfor her capture. The notice reads thus:—

Beauty readily inspires confidence, and dignitycommands it. But a woman with suchscant personal charms, with a blemish in hereye and stooping shoulders, must have beenmost persuasive in conversation to have surmountedsuch obstacles. It is said that shewas most gracious, yet commanding.

To elude Michael Dalton’s authorizedsearch from Philadelphia to Charleston,Sarah Wilson fled from her scenes of success,but also of too familiar and extensiveacquaintance, to New York. But New Yorkproved still too near to Maryland, so she tookpassage for Newport. Here her fame precededher, for in the Newport Mercury ofNovember 29, 1773, is this notice:—

Last Tuesday arrived here from New Yorkthe lady who has passed through several of thesouthern colonies under the name and character[Pg 171]of Caroline Matilda, Marchioness de Waldgrave,etc., etc.

I do not know the steps that led to hercapture and removal, but at the end of theyear the Marchioness was back on WilliamDuvall’s plantation, and bound to serve aredoubled term of years. It seems to beprobable that she also suffered more ignoblepunishment, for Judge Martin says in hisHistory of Louisiana:—

A female driven for her misconduct from theservice of a maid of honor of Princess Matilda,sister of George III., was convicted at the OldBailey and transported to Maryland. She effectedher escape before the expiration of hertime, and travelled through Virginia and boththe Carolinas personating the Princess, and levyingcontributions on the credulity of the plantersand merchants and even some of the king’s officers.She was at last arrested in Charleston,prosecuted and whipped.

I often wonder what became of the Brummagemprincess, with her jewels and herpersonal blemishes; and I often fancy thatI find traces of her career, still masquerading,still imposing on simple folk. For instance,[Pg 172]Rev. Manasseh Cutler wrote, at his home inIpswich Hamlet, Mass., on January 25, 1775:

A lady came to our house who had made agreat noise in the country, and has been madethe occasion of various conjectures. She callsherself Caroline Augusta Harriet, duch*ess ofBrownstonburges. Says she has resided in theCourt of England for several years, that sheeloped from the palace of St. James. She appearsto be a person of an extraordinary education,and well acquainted with things at Court,but she is generally supposed to be an impostor.

Three days later he writes that he “conveyedthe extraordinary visitor to town in achaise.” With this glimpse of Sarah—ifSarah she were—visiting in a little NewEngland town in a sober Puritan family, andriding off to Boston in a chaise with thepious Puritan preacher, she vanishes fromour ken, to be obscured in the smoke ofbattle and the din of war, and forcedto learn that to American patriotsit was no endearing trait topose as an Englishprincess.

Sir Thomas Browne says that “allheresies, how gross soever, have founda welcome with the people.” Certainly theyhave with the people, and specially theyhave with the Rhode Island people. Theeighty-two pestilent heresies so sadly deploredby the Puritan divines found a homein Rhode Island and the Providence Plantations.It was not strange, therefore, thatfrom the heart of Narragansett should springone of the most remarkable and successfulreligious woman-fanatics the world hasever known. Jemima Wilkinson was bornin the town of Cumberland, R. I., in 1758.Though her father was a poor farmer, shecame of no mean stock. She was a descendantof English kings—of King Edward I.—andlater of Lieutenant Wilkinson, ofCromwell’s army, and she was a second cousin[Pg 174]of Governor Stephen Hopkins and CommodoreHopkins.

When she was eight years old her motherdied, leaving her to the care of older sisters,whom she soon completely dominated. Shewas handsome, fond of ease and dress, vain,and eager for attention. She was romanticand impressionable, and when a new sect ofreligious zealots, called Separatists, appearedin her neighborhood—a sect who rejectedchurch organization and insisted upon directguidance from heaven—she became one ofthe most regular attendants at their meetings.

She soon betook herself to solitude andstudy of the Bible, and seemed in deep reflection,and at last kept wholly to her room,and then went to bed. She was at that timebut eighteen years old, and it scarcely seemspossible that she deliberately planned out hersystem of life-long deception which provedso successful; but soon she began to seevisions, which she described to her sistersand visitors, and interpreted to them.

Finally she fell in a deep trance, whichlasted thirty-six hours, during which shescarcely breathed. About the middle of[Pg 175]the second day, when surrounded by anxiouswatchers (who proved valuable witnesses inher later career), she rose up majestically,called for clothing, dressed herself, andwalked about fully restored and calm, thoughpale. But she announced that Jemima Wilkinsonhad died, and that her body was nowinhabited by a spirit whose mission was todeliver the oracles of God to mankind, andwho was to be known henceforth by thename of the Universal Friend. It ought tobe noted here that this girl of eighteen notonly maintained these absurd claims of resurrectionof the body and reincarnation, atthat time, in the face of the expostulationand arguments of her relatives and friends,but also with unshaken firmness, and beforeall hearers, till the day of her death at theage of sixty-one.

On the first Sunday after her trance, theUniversal Friend preached in the open airnear her home to a large and excited gatheringof people; and she electrified her audienceby her eloquence, her brilliant imagination,her extraordinary familiarity withthe Scriptures, and her facility and force ofapplication and quotation from them. Her[Pg 176]success in obtaining converts was mostmarked from the first, as was her successin obtaining temporal comforts and benefitsfrom these converts. In this she resembledthe English religious adventuress, JohannaSouthcote. For six years she lived at thehouse of Judge William Potter, in SouthKingstown, R. I. This handsome housewas known as the Abbey. He enlarged itby building a splendid suite of rooms for hisbeloved spiritual leader, on whom he lavishedhis large fortune.

Her success as a miracle-worker was notso great. She announced that on a certaindate she would walk upon the water, butwhen, in the face of a large multitude, shereached the water’s edge, she denounced thelack of faith of her followers, and refused togratify their curiosity by trying the experiment.Nor did she succeed in her attemptto raise from the dead one Mistress SusannaPotter, the daughter of Judge Potter, whodied during Jemima’s residence at the Abbey.She managed, however, to satisfy fully herfollowers by foretelling events, interpretingdreams, and penetrating secrets, which she[Pg 177]worded by ingeniously mystic and easily applicableterms.

Her meetings and her converts were notconfined to Rhode Island. In southernMassachusetts and Connecticut many joinedher band. In New Milford, Conn., her convertserected a meeting-house. In 1782 shestarted out upon a new mission. With asmall band of her disciples she went toPhiladelphia, where she was cordially receivedand entertained by the Quakers. InWorcester, Pa., her reception was enthusiastic.Scarce a diary of those times butcontains some allusion to her or her career.In the journal of Jacob Hiltzeheimer, ofPhiladelphia, I read:—

The manuscript diary of the ReverendJohn Pitman, of Providence, R. I., says:“Saw that poor deluded creature JemimaWilkerson and a number of her dull followersstanding staring at the cross-roads.”

In the days of reaction after the excitementof the Revolution, many aspirationsfor a better social state prompted settlementsin outlying portions of the Central States.Communities were founded, Utopias wereplanned, and soon the united body of peopleknown as the Friend’s followers decided toseek in the depths of the wilderness a newhome. It was a bold undertaking, but theband had a bold commander, and above all,they were absolute in their confidence in her.[Pg 179]In no way was that confidence shown so remarkablyas in the fact that the settlementwas made for her but without her. Thethree delegates sent to find a place suitablefor their purpose reported in favor of theregion at the foot of Seneca Lake in theState of New York. In 1788 the settlementwas made on the west shore of the lake bytwenty-five persons, on the primitive highwayof the region, about a mile south ofDresden, and it was named Jerusalem.

For over two years a band of determinedbelievers labored in this wilderness to preparea home for their leader, who was comfortablycarrying on her triumphant andflattering progress in the large cities. Surroundedby Indians, and menaced by wildbeasts, they cleared the forests, and plantedwheat, and lived on scant food. During thefirst year one family for six weeks had onlyboiled nettles and bohea tea for nourishment.When the cornfields yielded the second summer,a small grist-mill was built with incrediblelabor. When the well-fed and not at allover-worked Friend arrived, she found anorderly, industrious community of two hundredand sixty persons, who had built for[Pg 180]her a home and a meeting-house, and sheat once settled down in comparative comfortin the midst of her flock.

The house which was occupied by theFriend was a log-house of humble pretensions;to this two or three houses wereadded, then upper stories were placed overall, and framed in. It stood in a fine garden,and by its side was a long building used as aworkshop for the women of the settlement,where spinning, weaving, and sewing wereconstantly carried on. Near by stood thesugar grove, a most lucrative possession ofthe society. From this home the Friendand her steadfast followers would ride inimposing cavalcade, two by two, to meetingat the early settlement. With their handsome,broad-brimmed hats, substantial clothes,and excellent horses, they made a most notableand impressive appearance. Her secondhouse was more pretentious and comparativelyluxurious; in it she lived till the timeof her death.

Jemima Wilkinson’s followers were of nopoor or ordinary stock. Many brought toher community considerable wealth. Intothe wilderness went with her from Kingstown,[Pg 181]R. I., Judge William Potter and hisdaughters; a family of wealthy Hazards;Captain James Parker (brother of Sir PeterParker); four Reynolds sisters from a familyof dignity; Elizabeth Luther and seven children;members of the Card, Hunt, Sherman,and Briggs families. From New Milford,Conn., emigrated a number of Stones andBotsfords, and from New Bedford many membersof the influential Hathaway and Lawrencefamilies. From Stonington and NewLondon went a large number of Barnesesand Browns and Davises; from Philadelphiathe entire family of Malins and the Supplees;from Worcester, Pa., came a most importantrecruit, Daniel Wagener, with hissister, and Jonathan Davis, and other well-to-doand influential persons.

The most important converts to belief inher doctrines, and pioneers for her, weredoubtless Judge Potter and Captain Parker,both men of large wealth and unstinted liberalityto their leader. The former had beentreasurer of the State of Rhode Island; thelatter had been also a magistrate for twentyyears in the same State. They were thelargest contributors to the fund for the purchase[Pg 182]of the tract of land in New York.These men sacrificed home and friends tocome to the New Jerusalem with their adoredpriestess; but they quickly escaped from hersway, and became in later years her mostpowerful enemies. They even issued a complaintagainst her for blasphemy. The officerwho tried to serve the warrant upon herwas unable to seize the Friend, who was anaccomplished rider and well mounted, and,when he went to her house, was roughlytreated and driven away. John Lawrence,whose wife was Anna Hathaway, was a nearrelative of Commodore Lawrence; he was ashipbuilder at New Bedford, and, though hefollowed Jemima Wilkinson to Seneca Lake,never joined her society. Many of her believersnever lived in her settlement, but visitedher there; and many bequeathed to herliberally by will, and made valuable gifts toher during their life.

In the main, the influence of this remarkablewoman continued unabated with a largenumber of her followers throughout her life,and even after her death. This power survivedagainst the adverse conditions of frequentlitigations, personal asperities, constant[Pg 183]injurious reports, and the dislike ofmany to the strictness of her faith and austerityof life required by her from her followers.This allegiance could hardly have beenfounded solely on religious credulity, butmust have depended largely in her attractivepersonal traits, her humanity, and doubtlessalso to her attractive expositions of her livelyimagination. To the last she persisted incalling herself by the sole name of the UniversalFriend. Even her will was signedthus: “I, the person once called JemimaWilkinson, but in and ever since the year1777 known as and called the Public UniversalFriend, hereunto set my name and seal;Public Universal Friend.” But she cannilyappended a sub-signature over a cross-markof the name of her youth.

A remarkable feature of the UniversalFriend’s Society, perhaps the most remarkableeffect of her teachings, was the largenumber of excellent women who, as persistentcelibates, adhered to her teachingsthroughout their lives. Some lived in herhouse, and all were consistent representativesof her doctrines, and many lived togreat old age. Nor can I doubt from the[Pg 184]accounts of their lives that they were exceedinglyhappy in their celibacy and intheir unwavering belief in Jemima Wilkinson.Carlyle says, “Man’s gullibility is nothis worst blessing.” I may paraphrase hisassertion thus—woman’s gullibility is oneof her most comforting traits. Her persistentbelief, her unswerving devotion, often towholly unworthy objects, brings its own rewardin a lasting, though unreasoning satisfaction.

Jemima’s male adherents were nearly allmarried. It was her intention that her property,which was considerable, should be heldfor the benefit of her followers who survivedher, but it was gradually transferred andwasted till the last aged members of theband were forced to depend upon the charityof neighbors and the public.

One of the best accounts of the personalityof Jemima Wilkinson was given by theDuke de la Rochefoucault Liancourt, whovisited her in 1796. He says:—

We saw Jemima and attended her meeting,which is held in her own house. Jemima stoodat the door of her bed chamber on a carpet, withan armchair behind her. She had on a white[Pg 185]morning gown and a waistcoat such as men wearand a petticoat of the same color. Her blackhair was cut short, carefully combed and dividedbehind into three ringlets; she wore a stock anda white silk cravat, which was tied about her neckwith affected negligence. In point of deliveryshe preached with more ease than any otherQuaker I have ever heard, but the subject matterof her discourse was an eternal repetition of thesame subjects—death, sin and repentance. Sheis said to be about forty years of age but didnot appear more than thirty. She is of middlestature, well made, of florid countenance, andhas fine teeth and beautiful eyes. Her action isstudied. She aims at simplicity but is pedanticin her manner. Her hypocrisy may be traced inall her discourse, actions and conduct and evenin the very manner which she manages her countenance.

He speaks with much asperity of her pretenceof condemning earthly enjoyment whileher whole manner of living showed much personalluxury and gratification.

This description of her was given by onewho saw her:—

She was higher than a middle stature, of fineform, fair complexion with florid cheeks, darkand brilliant eyes, and beautiful white teeth.[Pg 186]Her hair dark auburn or black, combed from theseam of the head and fell on her shoulders inthree full ringlets. In her public addresses shewould rise up and stand perfectly still for a minuteor more, than proceed with a slow and distinctenunciation. She spoke with great easeand increased fluency; her voice clear and harmonious,and manner persuasive and emphatic.Her dress rich but plain and in a style entirelyher own; a broad brimmed beaver hat with alow crown, and the sides when she rode turneddown and tied under her chin; a full light drabcloak or mantle and a unique underdress; and acravat round the neck with square ends that felldown to the waist forward.

The square cravat or band gave her a semi-clericallook. The rich glossy smoothnessand simplicity of dressing her hair is commentedon by nearly all who left accounts ofher personal appearance; and was doubtlessmore marked in her day because the feminineheaddress of that time was elaborateto a degree that was even fantastic, and wasat the opposite extreme from simple curls.

Many scurrilous and absurd stories aretold of her, especially in a biography of herwhich was written and printed soon after[Pg 187]her death. Many of the anecdotes in thisbiography are too petty and too improbableto be given any credence. I am convincedthat she was a woman of most sober anddiscreet life; importunate of respect andgreedy of absolute power; personally luxuriousin her tastes, and of vast ambition, butalways of dignified carriage. And throughher dignity, sobriety, and reserve she had alasting hold upon her followers. Perhapsshe told her alleged belief, her tale of hermission, until she half believed it herself.One story of her is worthy repetition, and Ithink of credence.

It tells of her repulse when she endeavoredto secure among her followers the Indiansof Canandaigua. She spoke to them atCanandaigua and again at Seneca Lake, evidentlyrealizing fully the advantage thatmight be gained from them through land-grantsand personal support. Many of theOneida Indians had been converted by missionariesto Christianity, and as they held aSunday service she entered and made athrilling and impressive address, assuringthem she was their Saviour Jesus Christ.They listened to her with marked attention,[Pg 188]and one of their number arose and delivereda short and animated speech to his companionsin the Oneida tongue. When heceased speaking, Jemima turned to the interpreterand asked an explanation of thespeaker’s words, which was given her. TheIndian speaker sat by her side with a sardonicexpression on his grim face, and whenthe interpretation was finished, said significantlyand coldly, “You no Jesus Christ—heknow all poor Indian say as well as whatwhite man say,” and turned contemptuouslyfrom her. It is said that the cunning Indiandetective was the great chief RedJacket, and from what we knowof his shrewd and diplomaticcharacter it canreadily be believed.

Nothing can more plainly show theregard in which women were held inVirginia in the middle of the eighteenthcentury than the entries in the accounts ofColonel William Byrd of his visits to Virginiahomes. He was an accomplished andcultivated gentleman, who wrote with muchintelligence and power when relating hisinterviews with men, or discussing whatmight be termed masculine subjects, butwho revealed his opinion of the mental capacityof the fair sex by such side glimpsesas these: “We supped about nine and thenprattled with the ladies.” “Our conversationwith the ladies was like whip-syllabub,very pretty but nothing in it.” He alsomakes rather coarse jokes about Miss Thekkyand her maiden state, which was of coursemost deplorable in his and every one else’seyes; and he alludes disparagingly to Mrs.[Pg 190]Chiswell as “one of those absolute rarities,a very good old woman.” The Virginia womenare said by other authors of that day tohave been “bounteous in size and manner.”M. Droz wrote of them:—

Most of the women are quite pretty and insinuatingin their manner if they find you so.When you ask them if they would like to havehusbands they reply with a good grace that it isjust what they desire.

For many years an epidemic of sentimentalityand mawkishness seemed to everywhereprevail in America, and indeed everywhereamong English-speaking peoples, and seemedalso to be universally admired. The womenin America were, as Doctor Shippen wrote,“languishingly sweet.” This insipidity pervadedthe letters of the times, it showed inall the diaries and journals that record conversations.Long and vapid discourses onlove and matrimony and “Platonicks” wereheld even between comparative strangers.Even so sprightly and intelligent a journalistas Sally Wister records her exceedinglyflippant conversation with young officers ofnew acquaintance, who, within a few hours of[Pg 191]introduction, suggested matrimony and loveand kisses, and punctuated their remarkswith profanity, which they “declared wastheir favorite vice.”

William Black, a most observant traveller,wrote of Philadelphia girls in 1744:—

One of the ladies began a discourse on lovewherein she pull’d the other Sex to pieces. Settingforth the Constancy of their Sex and theUnstability of ours. Every one of the youngladies put in an Oar and helped her Out; at lastbeing quite tired of the Subject and at a Losswhat more to say the Lady that begun it turnedfrom it artfull enough to Criticizing on Plays andtheir Authors, Addison, Otway, Prior, Congreve,Dryden, Pope, Shakespere &c were named oftenin Question; the words Genius and no Genius,Invention, Poetry, Fine things, bad Language,no Style, Charming writing, Imagary and Diction,with many more Expressions which swim on thesurface of Criticism seemed to have been caughtby the Female Fishers for the Reputation of Wit.

Though William Black was willing to talkof “Love and Platonicks,” and with warmapproval, he was bitter in his rebuke of this“Fine Lady Mrs Talkative” who dared tospeak of books and authors.

[Pg 192]

It is well to note the books read by theseyoung ladies in high life, and their criticalopinion of them. A much-liked book wasnamed The Generous Inconstant. It hasvanished from our modern view. I shouldreally like to see the book that rejoiced insuch a title. We can also learn of the booksread by Lucinda the “Young lady of Virginia”and her friend Polly Brent. Lucinda’sjournal was written during a visit to theLees, Washingtons, Grymes, Spotswoods,and other first families of Virginia, and hasbeen preserved till our own day. She thusrecords:—

Sally Wister, a girl of fifteen, had broughtto her what she called “a charming collectionof books,”—Caroline Melmoth, someLadys Magazines, Juliet Grenville and “JoeAndrews”—this, Fielding’s Joseph Andrews,I suppose.

[Pg 194]

The sensible and intelligent Eliza Lucaswrote in 1742, when she was about twenty-oneyears old, with much critical discriminationon what she read:—

I send by the bearer the last volume of Pamela.She is a good girl and as such I love her dearly,but I must think her very defective, and evenblush for her while she allows herself that disgustingliberty of praising herself, or what is verylike it, repeating all the fine speeches made to herby others,—when a person distinguished for modestyin every other respect should have chosenrather to conceal them, or at least let them comefrom some other hand; especially as she mighthave considered those high compliments mighthave proceeded from the partiality of her friends,or with a view to encourage her and make heraspire after those qualifications which are ascribedto her, which I know experimentally to be oftenthe case. But then you answer, she was a youngcountry girl, had seen nothing of life, and it wasnatural for her to be pleased with praise, and shehad not art enough to conceal it. True, beforeshe was Mrs. B. it was excusable when only wroteto her father and mother, but after she had theadvantage of Mr B’s conversation, and others ofsense and distinction, I must be of another opinion.But here arises a difficulty—we are to be[Pg 195]made acquainted by the author of all particulars;how then is it to be done? I think by MissDurnford or some other lady very intimate withMrs B. How you smile at my presumption forinstructing one so far above my own level as theauthor of Pamela (whom I esteem much for theregard he pays to virtue and religion) but contractyour smile into a mortified look for I acquitthe author. He designed to paint no more thana woman, and he certainly designed it as a reflectionupon the vanity of our sex that a characterso complete in every other instance should be sodefective in this. Defective indeed when shesometimes mentions that poor creature Mr H’sapplauses it puts me in mind of the observationin Don Quixote, how grateful is praise even froma madman.

A most popular form of literary intercourseand amusem*nt was everywherefound in stilted sentimental correspondence,conducted often under assumed and high-soundingnames, usually classical. For instance,this young lady of Virginia writes toher friend, plain Polly, when separated for ashort time:—

Oh my Marcia how hard is our fate! that weshould be deprived of your dear company, whenit would compleat our Felecity—but such is the[Pg 196]fate of Mortals! We are never permitted to beperfectly happy. I suppose it is all right, elsethe Supreme Disposer of all things would havenot permitted it, we should perhaps have beenmore neglectful than we are of our duty.

She frequently forgets to use the pompousname of Marcia, especially when writingon any subject that really interestsher:—

You may depend upon it Polly this said Matrimonyalters us mightily. I am afraid it alienatesus from every one else. It is I fear the ban ofFemale Friendship. Let it not be with oursPolly if we should ever Marry. Farewell mylove, may Heaven shower blessings on your headprays your Lucinda. (I always forget to makeuse of our other name.)

Even so sensible and intelligent a womanas Abigail Adams corresponded under thenames Diana or Portia, while her friendsmasqueraded as Calliope, Myra, Aspasia, andAurelia. Wives wrote to their husbands,giving them fanciful or classical names.This of course was no new fashion. Didnot Shakespeare write:—

[Pg 197]

It is evident that in spite of all the outwarddignity shown in these pompous formsof address, and in a most ceremonial and reservedbearing in public, there existed inprivate life much rudeness of demeanor andmuch freedom in manner. Let me quoteagain from the vivacious pages of the younglady of Virginia:—

Now, these were no folk of low degree.The lively and osculatory Mr. Washingtonwas Corbin Washington. He married Hannah,daughter of Richard Henry Lee. Theirgrandson, John A. Washington, was the lastof the family to occupy Mount Vernon. Mr.Pinkard also had a delicate habit of “boltingin upon us, and overhearing part of our conveasationin our rooms, which hily delightedhim,” trying to seize the girls’ letters, dressingin women’s clothes, and other manly andgentlemanly pleasantries.

Sarah Eve records in her journal anequally affectionate state of manners in Philadelphiansociety in 1722. She writes:—

In the morning Dr Shippen came to see us.What a pity it is that the Doctor is so fond ofkissing. He really would be much more agreeableif he were less fond. One hates to bealways kissed, especially as it is attended withso many inconveniences. It decomposes theeconomy of ones handkerchief, it disorders oneshigh roll, and it ruffles the serenity of ones countenance.

[Pg 200]

Though there was great talk made of gallantand chivalric bearing toward the ladies,it is evident that occasional rudeness of mannerstill existed. A writer in the RoyalGazette of August 16, 1780, thus complainsof New York swains:—

As the Mall seems to be the chief resort forcompany of an evening I am surprized that thereis no more politeness and decorum observ’d bythe masculine gender. In short there is seldoma seat in that agreeable walk that is not takenup by the gentlemen. This must be very disagreeableto the fair sex in general whose tenderdelicate limbs may be tired with the fatiguesof walking, and bend, denied a seat to restthem.

I cannot discover that anything of thenature of our modern chaperonage wasknown in colonial days. We find the earlytravellers such as Dunton taking many along ride with a fair maid a-pillion back behindthem. In 1750 Captain Francis Goeletmade a trip through New England. He consortedonly with the fashionable folk of theday, and he appeared to find in them a verygenial and even countrified simplicity ofmanners. He tells of riding to “Turtle[Pg 201]Frolicks” and country dances with youngladies of refinement and good station in life.To one of the finer routs at Cambridge herode with Miss Betty Wendell in a chaise.There were twenty couples in all who wentto this Frolick, all, he says complacently, the“Best Fashion in Boston.” Young menescorted young girls to dancing-parties, andalso accompanied them home after the dancewas finished.

Weddings were everywhere, throughoutthe middle and southern colonies, scenes ofgreat festivity.

I have been much interested and amusedin reading the Diary of Jacob Hiltzheimer,of Philadelphia (which has recently been published),to note his references to the deepdrinking at the weddings of the day. Oneentry, on February 14, 1767, runs thus:“At noon went to William Jones to drinkpunch, met several of my friends and gotdecently drunk. The groom could not beaccused of the same fault.” This cheerfulfrankness reminds us of Sir Walter Raleigh’ssimilar ingenuous expression: “Some of ourcaptains garoused of wine till they were reasonablepleasant.”

[Pg 202]

This William Jones was married eighteenyears later to a third wife, and again keptopen house, and once more friend Jacobcalled on the bride and ate the wedding-cakeand drank the wedding-punch. Nay, more,he called four days in succession, and at theend “rode all the afternoon to wear off theeffects of the punch and clear my head.”At one bride’s house, Mrs. Robert Erwin’s,record was kept that for two days after thewedding, between three and four hundredgentlemen had called, drank punch, and probablykissed the bride.

It was the universal Philadelphia customfor the groom’s friends to call thus for twodays at his house and drink punch, and everyevening for a week large tea-parties weregiven by the bride, the bridesmaids andgroomsmen always in attendance. Sometimesa coaching trip was taken by the entirebridal party out on the Lancaster pike,for a wedding breakfast.

Similar customs prevailed in New York.In a letter written by Hannah Thompson Iread of bridal festivities in that town.

The Gentlemans Parents keep Open housejust in the same manner as the Brides Parents.[Pg 203]The Gentlemen go from the Bridegroom houseto drink punch with and give Joy to his Father.The Brides visitors go in the same manner fromthe Brides to her mothers to pay their complimentsto her. There is so much driving aboutat these times that in our narrow streets thereis some danger. The Wedding house resemblesa beehive. Company perpetually flying in andout.

In a new country, with novel methods ofliving, and unusual social relations, therewere some wild and furious wooings. Nonewere more coarsely extraordinary than thecourting of young Mistress Burwell by theGovernor of the colony of Virginia, an intemperate,blustering English ruffian namedNicholson. He demanded her hand in anOrientally autocratic manner, and when neithershe nor her parents regarded him withfavor, his rage and determination knew nobounds. He threatened the lives of herfather and mother “with mad furious distractedspeech.” When Parson Fouacecame, meekly riding to visit poor Mr. Burwell,his parishioner, who was sick (naturallyenough), the Governor set upon him withwords of abuse, pulled the clerical hat off,[Pg 204]drew his sword, and threatened the clericallife, until the parson fled in dismay. Fancyingthat the brother of Commissary Blair,the President of the Virginia College, was awould-be suitor to his desired fair one, heassailed the President with insane jealousy,saying, “Sir, your brother is a villain and youhave betrayed me,” and he swore revengeon the entire family. To annoy further thegood President, he lent his pistols to thewicked college boys that they might thuskeep the President out of the college buildings.He vowed if Mistress Burwell marriedany one but himself he would cut thethroat of bridegroom, minister, and justicewho issued the marriage license. The noiseof his abuse reached England, and friendswrote from thence protesting letters to him.At last the Council united and succeeded inprocuring his removal. Poor President Blairdid not fare well under other governors, andboth College and President were fiercelyhated by Governor Andros; and “a sparkishyoung gentleman,” the grandfather of MarthaWashington’s first husband, to show hiszeal for his gubernatorial friend, went intochurch and “with great fury and violence”[Pg 205]pulled Mrs. Blair out of her pew in the faceof the minister and the whole congregation—andthis in the stately old cavalier days.

One very curious duty devolved on younggirls at that day. They often served aspall-bearers. At the funeral of Mrs. DanielPhœnix the pall-bearers were women, andwhen Mrs. John Morgan, sister of FrancisHopkinson, died in Philadelphia, her brotherwrote of her funeral:—

The morning was snowy and severely cold,and the walking very dangerous and slippery,never the less a number of respectable citizensattended the funeral and the pall was borne bythe first ladies of the place.

Sarah Eve, in her diary, writes in 1772, ina somewhat flippant manner: “R. Rush, P.Dunn, K. Vaughan, and myself carried Mr.Ash’s child to be buried; foolish custom forgirls to prance it through the streets withouthats or bonnets!” At the funeral of FannyDurdin in 1812, the girl pall-bearerswere dressed in white, andwore long whiteveils.

Of amusem*nts for women in the firstcentury of colonial life, we can almostsay there were none. There was in NewEngland no card-playing, no theatre-going,no dancing. The solemn Thursday lecturewas the sole mid-week gathering. Occasionallythere was the excitement of TrainingDay. In the South the distances were toogreat from plantation to plantation for frequentfriendly meetings. As time went on,coöperation in gathering and storing thevarious food-harvests afforded opportunitiesfor social intercourse. Apple-parings andcorn-huskings were autumnal delights, butwhen these were over, the chafing youthfound no recreations through the long, snowymonths in country homes, and but scant opportunityfor amusem*nt in town. No wonderthat they turned eagerly to the singing-school,and found in that innocent gathering[Pg 207]a safety-valve for the pent-up longing fordiversion which burned in young souls thenas now. We can but wonder how, ere thesinging-school became a force, young NewEnglanders became acquainted enough witheach other to think of marriage; and wecan almost regard the establishment of thestudy of fugue and psalm singing as thepreservation of the commonwealth.

In Virginia the different elements of lifedeveloped characteristic pastimes, and by thefirst quarter of the eighteenth century therewere opportunities of diversion offered forwomen.

We have preserved to us an exact accountof the sports which were enjoyed byboth Virginian men and women. It may befound in the Virginia Gazette for October,1737:—

There is a certain rough and noisy heartinessin this rollicking Racing Day in oldVirginia that speaks of boisterous cheer akinto the days of “merrie England,” and whichseems far from disagreeable when contrastedwith the dull yearly round of sober days inNew England. Virginia and Maryland menhad many social clubs “to promote innocentmirth and ingenious humour,” but of coursewithin these clubs their consorts and daughterswere not guests. A ball or a countrydance were the chief amusem*nts of Southernwomen, and very smart functions someof these balls were, though they did begin inbroad daylight.

[Pg 210]

An early account was given by a travellingVirginian, William Black, of a GovernmentBall in the Council Room at Annapolisin 1744.

The Ladies of Note made a Splendant Appearance.In a Room Back from where theyDanc’d was Several Sorts of Wines, Punch andSweetmeats. In this Room those that was notengaged in any Dancing Match might betteremploy themselves at Cards, Dice, Backgammon,or with a cheerful Glass. The Ladies were sovery agreeable and seem’d so intent on Dancingthat one might have Imagin’d they had someDesign on the Virginians, either Designing tomake Tryal of their Strength and Vigour, or toconvince them of their Activity and Sprightliness.After several smart engagements in whichno advantage on either side was Observable, witha mutual Consent about 1 of the Clock in theMorning it was agreed to break up, every Gentlemanwaiting on his Partner home.

The method in which a ball was conductedsomewhat more than a century agoin Louisville was thus told by Maj. SamuelS. Forman, who visited that town as a youngman.

[Pg 211]

After the managers had organized the Companyby drawing numbers and appointing theopening with a Minuet, Uncle was called on andintroduc’d to a Lady for the opening scene. TheManagers who distributed the numbers calledGentⁿ No. 1, he takes his stand—Lady No. 1,she rises from her seat, the Manager leads herto the floor and introduces Gentⁿ No. 1, & so ontill the floor is full. After all the Company havebeen thus call’d out then the Gentⁿ are free toseek his Partner but no monopoly. Lady at thehead chooses the figure, but it is considered outof order for one Lady to head a figure twice unlessall have been at the head. If there happento be some ladies to whom from mistake or otherwisehave been passed the Managers duty is tosee to it. And another Custom was for a Gentⁿto call on a Lady & inform her of an intendedball & ask permission to see her to the place &see her safe home again. If the Gentⁿ does notdraw such Lady for the first Contra Dance hegenerally engages her for the first Volunteer.At the Refreshments the Gentⁿ will by instinctwithout Chesterfieldian monition see that hisbetterhalf (for the time being) has a quantumsufficit and that without cramming his jaws fulluntil he has reconducted her to the ball-room,then he is at liberty to absent himself for a while.There were two young gentlemen there from[Pg 212]New York who were much attached to eachother. They promised to let each other knowwhen a ball was on foot. At one time one cameto the other and told him to prepare his pumpsagainst such an evening. The answer was—Pumpsout of order, must decline. No Sir thatwill not do. Then Sir you have been buyingSeveral pair of handsome Mocassons for NewYork Ladies. If you will lend me one pair &you will put on one pair (it wont hurt them) Iwill go. Snaps his fingers—the very thing. Thenext ball after this Moccasons became very fashionable.So many fashions have their originsfrom Necessity.

A traveller named Bennet gives us anaccount of the amusem*nts of Boston womenin the middle of the century, whendancing was slowly becoming fashionable.

For their domestic amusem*nts every afternoonafter drinking tea, the gentlemen and ladieswalk the Mall, and from there adjourn to oneanothers house to spend the evening, those thatare not disposed to attend the evening lecturewhich they may do if they please six nights in theseven the year round. What they call the Mallis a walk on a fine green Common adjoining tothe south east side of the town. The Government[Pg 213]being in the hands of dissenters they dontadmit of plays or music houses; but of late theyhave sent up an assembly to which some of theladies resort. But they are looked upon to benone of the nicest, in regard to their reputation,and it is thought it will be soon suppressed for itis much taken notice of and exploded by thereligious and sober part of the people. Butnotwithstanding plays and such like diversionsdo not obtain here, they dont be dispirited ormoped for the want of them; for both the ladiesand gentlemen dress and appear as gay in commonas courtiers in England on a coronation orbirthday. And the ladies visit here, drink tea,indulge in every little piece of gentility to theheight of the mode, and neglect the affairs ofthe family with as good a grace as the finestladies in London.

The Marquis de Chastellux writes of thePhiladelphia assembly in 1780:—

The assembly or subscription ball, of which Imust give an account may here be introduced.At Philadelphia, there are places appropriatedfor the young people to dance in and wherethose whom that amusem*nt does not suit mayplay at different games of cards, but at Philadelphiagames of commerce are alone allowed. Amanager or Master of Ceremonies presides at[Pg 214]the methodical amusem*nts; he presents to thegentlemen and lady dancers, billets folded upcontaining each a number; thus fate decides themale or female partner for the whole evening.All the dances are previously arranged and thedancers are called in their turns. These dances,like the toasts we drink at table, have some relationto politics; one is called The SuccessfulCampaign, another Bourgoynes Defeat, a thirdClintons Retreat. The managers are generallychosen from among the most distinguished officersof the army. Colonel Mitchell, a little fatsquat man, was formerly the manager, but whenI saw him he had descended from the magistracyand danced like a common citizen. He is saidto have exercised his office with great severity,and it is told of him, that a young lady who wasfiguring in a country dance, having forgot herturn through conversing with a friend, he cameup to her and called out aloud, “Give over, Miss,take care what you are about. Do you thinkyou come here for your pleasure?”

The dance, A Successful Campaign, wasthe one selected by diplomatic Miss PeggyChamplin to open the ball, when she dancedin Newport with General Washington, to thepiping of De Rochambeau and his fellowofficers. This was “the figure” of A Successful[Pg 215]Campaign. “Lead down two coupleson the outside and up the middle; secondcouple do the same, turn contrary partners,cast off, right hand and left.” It was simple,was it not—but I doubt not it was dignifiedand of sedate importance when Washingtonfooted it.

Stony Point was another favorite of Revolutionarydays—for did not General Waynesuccessfully storm the place? This dancewas more difficult; the directions were somewhatbewildering. “First couple three handsround with the second lady—allemand.Three hands round with the second gentleman—allemandagain. Lead down twocouples, up again, cast off one couple, handsround with the third, right and left.” Iscarcely know what the figure “allemand”was. The German allemande was then anold style of waltz, slower than the modernwaltz, but I can scarcely think that Washingtonor any of those serious, dignified officerswaltzed, even to slow time.

Another obsolete term is “foot it.”

[Pg 216]

seems to refer to some definite step in dancing.Sheridan in The Rivals thus uses theterm in regard to dances:—

I’d foot it with e’er a captain in the county,but these outlandish heathen allemandes andcotillions are quite beyond me.

But “footing it” and “outlandish heathenallemandes” are not so misty as anotherterm, “to haze.” In the Innocent Maidthey “hazed.” “First three couples haze,then lead down the middle and back again,close with the right hand and left.” In dancingthe Corsino they figured thus: “Threecouples foot it and change sides; foot itagain and once more change sides; threecouples allemand, and the first fall in themiddle then right hand and left.”

Dancing-masters’ advertisem*nts of thosedays often give us the list of modish dances:“Allemandes Vally’s, De la Cours, DevonshireMinuets and Jiggs.”

Burnaby in 1759 wrote of a special pleasureof the Quaker maids of Philadelphia: offishing-parties.

The women are exceedingly handsome andpolite. They are naturally sprightly and fond of[Pg 217]pleasure and upon the whole are much moreagreeable and accomplished than the men. Sincetheir intercourse with the English officers theyare greatly improved, and without flattery, manyof them would not make bad figures even in thefirst assemblies in Europe. Their amusem*ntsare chiefly dancing in the winter, and in thesummer forming parties of pleasure upon theSchuilkill, and in the country. There is a societyof sixteen ladies and as many gentlemencalled The fishing company, who meet once afortnight upon the Schuilkill. They have a verypleasant room erected in a romantic situationupon the banks of that river where they generallydine and drink tea. There are severalpretty walks about it, and some wild and ruggedrocks which together with the water and finegroves that adorn the banks, form a most beautifuland picturesque scene. There are boats andfishing tackle of all sorts, and the companydivert themselves with walking, fishing, going upthe water, dancing, singing, conversing, or justas they please. The ladies wear an uniform andappear with great ease and advantage from theneatness and simplicity of it. The first andmost distinguished people of the colony are ofthis society; and it is very advantageous to astranger to be introduced to it, as he hereby getsacquainted with the best and most respectable[Pg 218]company in Philadelphia. In the winter whenthere is snow upon the ground it is usual tomake what they call sleighing parties.

He says of New York society:—

The women are handsome and agreeablethough rather more reserved than the Philadelphianladies. Their amusem*nts are much thesame as in Pensylvania; viz balls and sleighingexpeditions in the winter, and in the summergoing in parties upon the water and fishing; ormaking excursions into the country. There areseveral houses pleasantly situated upon EastRiver near New York where it is common tohave turtle feasts; these happen once or twicein a week. Thirty or forty gentlemen and ladiesmeet and dine together, drink tea in the afternoon,fish and amuse themselves till evening andthen return home in Italian chaises, a gentlemanand lady in each chaise. In the way there is abridge, about three miles distant from New Yorkwhich you always pass over as you return, calledthe Kissing Bridge where it is a part of the etiquetteto salute the lady who has put herselfunder your protection.

It is evident from these quotations andfrom the testimony of other contemporaryauthors that one of the chief winter amusem*nts[Pg 219]in New York and Philadelphia andneighboring towns was through sleighing-parties.Madam Knights, of Boston, writingin 1704 of her visit to New York, said:—

Their diversion in winter is riding sleighsabout three or four miles out of town where theyhave houses of entertainment at a place calledthe Bowery, and some go to friends houses, whohandsomely treat them. Mr. Burroughs carriedhis spouse and daughter and myself out to oneMadam Dowes a gentlewoman that lived at afarmhouse who gave us a handsome entertainmentof five or six dishes and choice beer andmetheglin, etc, all which she said was the produceof her farm. I believe we met fifty or sixtysleighs that day; they fly with great swiftnessand some are so furious that they will turn outof the path for none except a loaded cart.

There were few sleighs at that date in Boston.

Sixty-four years later, in 1768, a youngEnglish officer, Alexander Macraby, wrotethus to his brother of the pleasures of sleighing:—

You can never have had a party in a sleigh orsledge I had a very clever one a few days ago.[Pg 220]Seven sleighs with two ladies and two men ineach proceeded by fiddlers on horseback set outtogether upon a snow of about a foot deep onthe roads to a public house, a few miles from townwhere we danced, sung, romped and eat anddrank and kicked away care from morning tillnight, and finished our frolic in two or threeside-boxes at the play. You can have no ideaof the state of the pulse seated with pretty womenmid-deep in straw, your body armed with fursand flannels, clear air, bright sunshine, spotlesssky, horses galloping, every feeling turned to joyand jollity.

That older members of society then, asnow, did not find sleighing parties altogetheralluring, we learn from this sentencein a letter of Hannah Thompson written toJohn Mifflin in 1786:—

This Slaying match Mr Houston of HoustonSt gave his Daughters, Dear Papa, Dear Papa,do give us a slaying—he at last consented, toldthem to get ready and dress themselves warm,which they accordingly did and came running.We are ready papa. He ordered the Servants tohave some burnt wine against they came back.He desir’d them to step upstairs with him beforethey went. As soon as they got in an Attick[Pg 221]chamber, he threw up all the windows andseated them in two old Arm Chairs and beganto whip and Chirrup with all the Spirit of aSlaying party. And after he kept them longenough to be sufficiently cold he took them downand call’d for the Mulled Wine and they werevery glad to set close to the Fire and leave Slayingfor those who were too warm.

This I quote to execrate the memory ofMr. Houston and express my sympathy forhis daughters.

There were no entertainments more popular,from the middle of the past centuryto the early years of this one, than “turtlefrolics,” what Burnaby called turtle-feasts.Every sea-captain who sailed to the WestIndies intended and was expected to bringhome a turtle on the return voyage; and ifhe were only to touch at the West Indiesand thence pass on to more distant shores,he still tried, if possible, to secure a turtleand send it home by some returning vessel.In no seaport town did the turtle frolic cometo a higher state of perfection than in Newport.Scores of turtles were borne to thatwelcoming shore. In 1752 George Bresett,a Newport gentleman, sailed to the West[Pg 222]Indies, and promptly did a neighborly andcivic duty by sending home to his friendSamuel Freebody, a gallant turtle and agenerous keg of limes. Lime juice was thefashionable and favorite “souring” of theday, to combine with arrack and Barbadoesrum into a glorious punch. The turtle arrivedin prime condition, and Freebodyhanded the prize over to a slave-body namedCuffy co*ckroach. He was a Guinea Coastnegro, of a race who were (as I have notedbefore) the most intelligent of all the Africansbrought as slaves to these shores. Anynegro who acquired a position of dignity ortrust or skill in this country, in colonial days,was sure to be a Guinea-boy. Cuffy co*ckroachfollowed the rule, by filling a positionof much dignity and trust and skill—asturtle-cook. He was a slave of Jaheel Brenton,but he cooked turtle for the entiretown. The frolic was held at Fort George,on Goat Island, on December 23. Theguests, fifty ladies and gentlemen, sailedover in a sloop, and were welcomed withhoisted flag and salute of cannon. The dinnerwas served at two, tea at five, and thendancing begun. Pea Straw, Faithful Shepherd,[Pg 223]Arcadian Nuptials, were allemandedand footed, and the keg of limes and its fellow-ingredientskept pace with the turtle.The moon was at the full when the partylanded at the Newport wharf at eleven, butthe frolic was not ended. For instead ofthe jolly crowd separating, they went therounds, leaving one member of the party ata time at his own door, and then serenadinghim or her, till the whole company had beenhonored in succession. When Sammy wroteto Mr. Bresett he said:—

Upon the whole the entertainment had thepreference over all turtle frolics before it, and MrGeorge Bresetts health with “Honest George”was freely drank in a cheerful glass by every person;and at the request of the company I returnyou their compliments for the foundation of soagreeable an entertainment.

We find even so staid and dignified a ministerand legislator as Manasseh Cutler writingthus in Providence in 1787:—

This morning I received a polite invitationfrom Govenor Bowen in the name of a large companyto join them in a Turtle Frolic about sixmiles out of town. Mr Hitchco*ck and otherclergymen of the town were of the party but[Pg 224]much against my inclination I was obliged toexcuse myself.

The traveller who drives through the by-roadsof New England to-day is almost readyto assert that there is no dwelling too pooror too lonely to contain a piano, or at thevery least a melodeon or parlor organ. Thesounds of Czerny’s exercises issue from everyfarmhouse. There may be no new farm implements,no sewing-machine, but there willsurely be a piano. This love of music hasever existed on those rock-bound shores,though in early days it found a stunted andsad expression in hymn tunes only, and theperformance of music could scarce be calleda colonial accomplishment. The first musicalinstruments were martial, drums and fifesand hautboys. I have never seen, in anypersonal inventory, the notice of a “gitterne”as in similar Virginian lists.

But in the early years of the eighteenthcentury a few spinets must have been exportedto Boston and Philadelphia, and perhapsto Virginia. In 1712 an advertisem*ntwas placed in the Boston News-Letter thatthe Spinet would be taught, and on April 23,1716, appeared in the same paper:—

[Pg 225]

Note that any Persons may have all Instrumentsof Music mended or Virginalls or SpinnetsStrung & Tun’d, at a Reasonable Rate & likewisemay be taught to play on any of the Instrumentsabove mentioned.

In August, 1740, a “Good Spinnet” wasoffered for sale, and soon after a second-hand“Spinnet,” and in January, 1750, “Spinnetwire.”

On September 18, 1769, this notice appearedin the Boston Gazette and CountryJournal:—

It is with pleasure that we inform the Publicthat a few days since was ship’d for Newport avery Curious Spinnet being the first ever madein America, the performance of the ingeniousMr. John Harris of Boston (son of the late Mr.Jos. Harris of London, Harpsichord and SpinnetMaker deceased) and in every respect does honorto that Artist who now carries on the Businessat his house a few doors Northward of Dr.Clarkes, North End of Boston.

This first American spinet is said to bestill in existence in a house in Newport onthe corner of Thames and Gidley streets.It has one set of jacks and strings. Thehammers have crow-quills which press on[Pg 226]brass strings. It has ancient neighbors. InBristol, R. I., is a triangular spinet four feetlong, which is more than a century older thanthe town which is now its home. It bearsthis maker’s mark,—“Johann Hitchco*ckfecit London 1520.” If this date is correct,it is the oldest spinet known, the one ofItalian manufacture in the British Museumbeing dated 1521.

At the rooms of the Essex Institute inSalem, Mass., is an old spinet made by Dr.Samuel Blyth in that town. Henry M.Brooks, Esq., author of Olden Time Music,has in his possession a bill for one of theseAmerican spinets that shows that the pricein 1786 was £18. In the Memorial Hall atDeerfield, Mass., may be seen another dilapidatedone, made by Stephanus & Keene.This belonged once to Mrs. Sukey Barker, ofHingham.

In the Newport Mercury of May 17, 1773,is advertised, “To be sold a Spinnet of aproper size for a little miss, and a most agreeabletone—plays extremely easy on the keys.Inquire of the Printer.” Advertisem*nt ofthe sale of spinets and of instruction on thespinet do not disappear from the newspapers[Pg 227]in this country even after formidable rivalsand successors, the harpsichord and forte-piano,had begun to be imported in comparativelylarge numbers.

The tone of a spinet has been characterizedconcisely by Holmes in his poem, TheOpening of the Piano,—the “spinet with itsthin metallic thrills.” I know of nothingmore truly the “relic of things that havepassed away,” more completely the voice ofthe past, than the tinkling thrill of a spinet.It is like seeing a ghost to touch the keys,and bring forth once more that obsoletesound. There is no sound born in the nineteenthcentury that at all resembles it. Like“loggerheads” in the coals and “lug-poles”in the chimney, like church lotteries and tithingmen,the spinet—even its very voice—isextinct.

Since in the News-Letter first quoted inthis chapter virginals are named, I think themusical instrument of Queen Elizabeth musthave been tolerably familiar to Bostonians.Judge Sewall, who “had a passion for music,”writes in 1690 of fetching his wife’s “virginalls.”I cannot conceive what tunesMadam Sewall played on her virginals, no[Pg 228]tawdry ballads and roundelays, no minuetsand corams; she may have known half adozen long-metre psalm tunes such as theJudge set for so many years in meeting.

“Forte-pianers” were imported to America,as were other musical instruments. Itis said the first one brought to New Englandwas in 1785 by John Brown for his daughterSarah, afterwards Mrs. Herreshoff. It isstill possessed by Miss Herreshoff, of Bristol,R. I. The first brought to “the Cape” wasa Clementi of the date 1790, and found formany years a home in Falmouth. It is inperfect preservation, a dainty little inlaid boxlying upon a slender low table, with tinyshelves for the music books, and a tiny littlepainted rack to hold the music sheets, and apedal fit for the foot of a doll. It is nowowned by Miss Frances Morse, of Worcester,Mass. An old Broadwood piano, once ownedby the venerable Dr. Sweetser, may be seenat the rooms of the Worcester Society ofAntiquity; and still another, a Clementi, atthe Essex Institute in Salem.

By the beginning of this century piano-playingbecame a more common accomplishment,especially in the large towns, though[Pg 229]General Oliver said that in 1810, among thesix thousand families in Boston, there werenot fifty pianos. Rev. Manasseh Cutlerwrites in 1801, from Washington, of a youngfriend:—

She has been educated at the best schools inBaltimore and Alexandria. She does not conversemuch, but is very modest and agreeable.She plays with great skill on the Forte Pianowhich she always accompanies with the mostdelightful voice, and is frequently joined in thevocal part by her mother. Mr. King has an excellentForte-Piano which is connected with anorgan placed under it, which she plays and fillswith her feet, while her fingers are employed uponthe Forte-Piano. On Sunday evenings she constantlyplays Psalm music. Miss Anna playsDenmark remarkably well. But the most of thepsalm tunes our gentlemen prefer are the oldones such as Old Hundred, Canterbury, whichyou would be delighted to hear on the Forte-Pianoassisted by the Organ. Miss Anna gaveus some good music this evening, particularly theWayworn Traveller, Ma Chere Amie, The Tea,The Twins of Latma (somewhat similar to IndianChief) Eliza, Lucy or Selims Complaint. Theseare among my favourites.

[Pg 230]

In February, 1800, Eliza Southgate Bownewrote thus in Boston:—

In the morning I am going to look at someInstruments; however we got one picked out thatI imagine we shall take, 150 dollars, a charmingtoned one and not made in this country.

In June she said enthusiastically of her“Instrument:”—

I am learning my 12th tune Oh Octavia, Ialmost worship my Instrument,—it reciprocatesmy joys and sorrows, and is my bosom companion.How I long to have you return! I havehardly attempted to sing since you went away.I am sure I shall not dare to when you return.I must enjoy my triumph while you are absent;my musical talents will be dim when comparedwith the lustre of yours.

The most universal accomplishment ofcolonial women was the making of samplers,if, indeed, anything could be termed an accomplishmentwhich was so rigidly and prosaicallypart of their education. I can wellimagine the disgrace it would have been toany little miss in her teens a century ago notto be able to show a carefully designed andwrought sampler. On these samplers weredisplayed the alphabet, sometimes in various[Pg 231]shaped letters—thus did she learn to markneatly her household linen; bands of conventionaldesigns, of flowers, of geometrical patterns—thuswas she taught to embroidermuslin caps and kerchiefs; and there weregorgeous flowers and strange buildings, anddomestic scenes, and pastoral views, birdsthat perched as large as cows, and roses thatwere larger than either; and last and best ofall (and often of much satisfaction to thegenealogist), there was her name and her age,and sometimes her place of birth, and withala pious verse as a motto for this housewifelyshield. Of all the relics of old-time lifewhich have come to us, none are more interestingthan the samplers. Happily, many ofthem have come to us; worked with wiryenduring crewels and silk on strong linencanvas, they speak down through the centuryof the little, useful, willing hands thatworked them; of the tidy sempstresses andhousewives of those simple domestic days.We know little of the daughters of the Pilgrims,but Lora Standish has sent to us aprim little message of her piety, and a fadedtestimony of her skill, that makes her seemdear to us:—

[Pg 232]

A more ambitious kind of needlework tookthe form of what were known as mourningpieces. These were regarded with deepestaffection, for were they not a token of lovingremembrance? They bore stiff presentmentsof funeral urns, with drooping willows,or a monument with a bowed and weepingfigure. Often the names of dead membersof the family were worked upon the monument.A still more ambitious sampler borea design known as The Tree of Life. Astiffly branched tree was sparingly hung withapples labelled with the names of the virtuesof humanity, such as Love, Honor, Truth,Modesty, Silence. A white-winged angel onone side of this tree watered the roots witha very realistic watering-pot, and was balancedwith exactness, as were evenly adjustedall good embroidery designs of that day, byan inky-black Satan who bore a pitchfork ofcolossal proportions and a tail as long as akite’s, and so heavy that he could scarce have[Pg 233]dragged it along the ground—much less withit have flown.

For many years a favorite and muchpraised accomplishment was the cutting ofpaper in ornamental designs. This art wasambitiously called Papyrotamia, and it was ofspecial usefulness in its application to watch-papers,a favorite lover’s token of the day.The watch proper at that time was separateand removable from its case, which was ofgold, silver, shagreen, or lacquer. Of coursethe watch did not fit closely into the case,and watch-papers were placed within to serveas a cushion to prevent jar and wear; sometimesthe case would hold several. Artisticand grotesque taste could be used in themanufacture of these tokens of regard. Ihave seen them cut in various open-work designsfrom gilt and silver paper, embroideredin hair, painted in water colors. One I havehas two turtle-doves billing over two hearts,and surrounded by a tiny wreath; another,embroidered on net, has the words “God isLove;” another has a moss rose and thewords “Rejoice and blossom as a rose.” Anotherbears a funeral urn, and is evidently inmemoriam. Still another, a heart and arrows,[Pg 234]and the sentimental legend “Kill me for I dieof love.” Jefferson, writing as a young man,bitterly deplores his inadvertent tearing ofwatch-papers which had been cut for him byhis beloved Belinda. Watch and watch-papershad been accidentally soaked in water,and when he attempted to remove the papers,he says, “My cursed fingers gave themsuch a rent as I fear I shall never get over.I would have cried bitterly, but that Ithought it beneath the dignity of a man.”And he trusts the fair Becca will give himanother paper of her cutting, which, thoughbut a plain round one, he will esteem morethan the nicest in the world cut by otherhands.

Nothing can be more pathetic than thethoughtful survey of the crude and oftencumbersome and ludicrous attempts at decorativeart, through which the stunted andcramped love of the beautiful found expression,until our own day, in country homes.The dreary succession of hair-work, feather-work,wax flowers, shell-work, the crystallizationwith various domestic minerals and gumsof dried leaves and grasses, vied with yarnand worsted monstrosities, and bewildering[Pg 235]patchwork. Occasionally some bold femininespirit, made inventive through artisticlonging, gave birth to a novel, though toooften grotesque form of decoration.

A most interesting symbol of exquisiteneatness, unbounded patience, and blindgroping for artistic expression was RhodaBaker’s “Leather-Works.” Rhoda Bakerlived in a small Rhode Island village, whichwas dull at its birth and slow of growth andprogress. She had a nature so timid, sorepelling, and so wholly introspective, that,after nearly fifty years of shy and even unwilling“keeping company” with a preachingelder of the time,—a saint, almost amystic,—she died without ever having givento the quaint, thin, pleasant-faced, awkwardman, one word of encouragement to his equallytimid, his hinting and halting love-making.During those patient years of warm hopes,but most scanty fruition, he had built ahouse on an island which he owned in NarragansettBay, with a window where his belovedRhoda could sit sewing when she becamehis wife, and watch him happily rowingacross the Bay to her; but great lilac bushesgrew up unchecked, and shaded and finally[Pg 236]hid the window at which Rhoda never sat towelcome her husband-lover. After her deaththe Elder so grieved that he had naught toremind him and speak to him of his beloved,that he boldly decided to name his boat forher; but as he could not conscientiously sayshe had ever encouraged him by word orlook in his incipient love-making, and hemust be strictly honest and chivalrously respectfulto her memory, he painted uponthe boat in black letters this truthful yetdimly consoling legend, “Rhoda Wouldnt.”Poor Elder! Many a time had he ventureda-courting, and slowly entering, after his unansweredassault upon the door-knocker, hadfound the kitchen of this elusive Rhoda vacant,—buther rocking-chair was slowly rocking,—sohe sadly left the deserted room, theunwelcoming house.

He sacrificed his life to his affection forhis dead love. He had all his days a fear,a premonition, that he should lose his lifethrough a horse, so he never rode or drove,but walked, rowed, or sailed, and lived on anisland to escape his dreaded doom. WhenRhoda’s brother died in a distant town, theElder was bidden to the funeral, and he[Pg 237]honored his Rhoda’s memory by his attendance,and he had to ride there. As he leftthe house of mourning, a fractious youngcolt ran away with him, threw him out of thewagon, and broke his neck.

His sweetheart’s “Leather-Works” stillexist, to keep fresh this New Englandromance. I saw them last summer in theattic of the Town Hall. Rhoda left them inher will to her church, and they are now theproperty of the village church-guild. Theguild is vigorous and young, so can bear thisancient maiden’s bequest with cheerful carriageand undaunted spirits. The leather-worksare many and ponderous. One isa vast trellis (which may have been originallytwo clothes-horses), hung with elaboratelytwisted and tendrilled vines, bearingminutely veined leaves and various counterfeitand imaginary fruits. The bunches ofgrapes are made of home-cast leaden bullets,or round stones, covered dexterouslyand with unparalleled neatness and imperceptiblestitches with pieces of old kid glovesor thin leather; and to each a common dress-hookis attached. The stem of the bunchhas corresponding eyes, to each of which a[Pg 238]grape is hung. By this ingenious meansthe bunches of grapes could be neatly dustedeach week, and kept in repair, as well as easilyshaped. On this trellis hung also Rosesof Sharon, a mystic flower which Rhoda’ssister Eunice invented, and which had adeep spiritual signification, as well as extraordinaryoutline and intricate composition.Every leaf, every grape, every monstrousfruit, every flower of these Leather-Works,speaks of the æsthetic longing, the vaguemysticism, the stifled repression, of RhodaBaker’s life; and they speak equally of theElder’s love. It was he who moulded thebullets, and searched on the shore for carefullyrounded stones; and he who hauntedthe country saddlers and repair-shops forwaste strips of leather, which he often depositedin the silent kitchen by the rocking-chair,sure of grateful though unspokenthanks. Many a pair of his old boot-topsfigures as glorious vine leaves; and heeven tanned and dressed skins to supplyswiftly the artist’s materials when geniusburned. It was he who tenderly unhookedthe grapes and pears, the fruits of Eden andthe Roses of Sharon, when the trellis was[Pg 239]transported to the Town Hall, and he reverentlyplaced the trophies of his true love’sskill and genius in place in their new home.I always rather resent the fact that Rhodadid not bequeath the Leather-Works to him,when I think of the vast and almost sacredpleasure he would have had in them; as wellas when I remember the share he had in thepreparations for their manufacture. And theLeather-Works speak still another lesson,as do many of the household grotesqueriesseen in New England, a lesson of sympathy,almost of beauty, to those who “readbetween the lines, the finergrace of unfulfilleddesigns.”

We are constantly hearing the statementreiterated, that the Society of theDaughters of the American Revolution wasthe first association of women ever formedfor patriotic purpose. This assertion showsa lamentable ignorance of Revolutionary history;for a century and a quarter ago, beforethe War of the Revolution, patrioticsocieties of women were formed all over thecountry, and called Daughters of Liberty.Our modern bands should be distinguishedby being called the first patriotic-hereditarysocieties of women.

As we approach Revolutionary days, it isevident that the women of all the colonieswere as deeply stirred as were the men atthe constant injustice and growing tyrannyof the British government, and they werenot slow in openly averring their abhorrenceand revolt against this injustice. Their individual[Pg 241]action consisted in the wearing onlyof garments of homespun manufacture; theirconcerted exertions in gathering in patrioticbands to spin, and the signing of compactsto drink no more of the taxed tea, that significantemblem of British injustice andAmerican revolt.

The earliest definite notice of any gatheringof Daughters of Liberty was in Providencein 1766, when seventeen young ladiesmet at the house of Deacon Ephraim Bowenand spun all day long for the public benefit,and assumed the name Daughters of Liberty.The next meeting the little band hadso increased in numbers that it had to meetin the Court House. At about the sametime another band of daughters gathered atNewport, and an old list of the members hasbeen preserved. It comprised all the beautifuland brilliant young girls for which Newportwas at that time so celebrated. As oneresult of this patriotic interest, the Presidentand the first graduating class of Brown University,then called Rhode Island College,were clothed, at Commencement in 1769, infabrics of American homespun manufacture.[Pg 242]The senior class of the previous year atHarvard had been similarly dressed.

These little bands of patriotic womengathered far and wide throughout New England.At one meeting seventy linen wheelswere employed. In Newbury, Beverly, Rowley,Ipswich, spinning matches were held.Let me show how the day was spent. Iquote from the Boston News-Letter:—

Rowley. A number of thirty-three respectableladies of the town met at sunrise [this was inJuly] with their wheels to spend the day at thehouse of the Rev’d Jedidiah Jewell in the laudabledesign of a spinning match. At an hour beforesunset, the ladies then appearing neatlydressed, principally in homespun, a polite andgenerous repast of American production was setfor their entertainment, after which being presentmany spectators of both sexes, Mr. Jewelldelivered a profitable discourse from Romansxii. 2: Not slothful in business, fervent in spirit,serving the Lord.

You will never find matters of church andpatriotism very far apart in New England;so I learn that when they met in Ipswichthe Daughters of Liberty were also entertainedwith a sermon. The Newbury patriots[Pg 243]drank Liberty Tea, and listened to asermon on the text Proverbs xxxi. 19. Anothertext used at one of these gatheringswas from Exodus xxxv. 25: “And all thewomen that were wise-hearted did spin withtheir hands.”

The women of Virginia were early in thepatriotic impulses, yet few proofs of theiraction or determination remain. In a Northernpaper, the Boston Evening Post of January31, 1770, we read this Toast to theSoutherners:—

NEW TOASTS.

This is pretty plain language, but it couldnot be strange to the public ear, for ere thisBoston women had been appealed to in thepress upon this same subject.

In the Massachusetts Gazette, as early asNovember 9, 1767, these lines show the indignantand revolutionary spirit of the time:

Soon these frequent appeals, and the influenceof the public and earnest revolt ofthe Sons of Liberty, resulted in a public[Pg 245]compact of Boston women. It is thus recordedin the Boston press:—

Massachusetts Gazette, and the BostonWeekly News-Letter:—

It was natural that, in that hotbed of rebellion,young girls should not be behindtheir brothers, fathers, and their mothers inopen avowal of their revolt. Soon the youngladies published this declaration:—

[Pg 247]

We, the daughters of those patriots who haveand do now appear for the public interest, andin that principally regard their posterity—assuch, do with pleasure engage with them in denyingourselves the drinking of foreign tea in hopesto frustrate a plan which tends to deprive thewhole community of all that is valuable as life.

One dame thus declared her principles andmotives in blank verse:—

When little Anna Green Winslow boughta hat in February, 1771, she bought one of“white holland with the feathers sewed onin a most curious manner, white and unsulleyedas the falling snow. As I am as wesay a daughter of Liberty I chuse to wearas much of our own manufactory as posible.”

[Pg 248]

Mercy Warren wrote to John Winthrop, infine satire upon this determination of Americanwomen to give up all imports from GreatBritain except the necessaries of life, a listof the articles a woman would deem it imperativeto retain:—

After the war had really begun, Mrs. JohnAdams, writing July 31, 1777, tells of anastonishing action of Boston women, plainlythe result of all these revolutionary tea-notions:—

There is a great scarcity of sugar and coffee,articles which the female part of the State is veryloath to give up, especially whilst they considerthe scarcity occasioned by the merchants havingsecreted a large quantity. There had been muchrout and noise in the town for several weeks.Some stores had been opened by a number ofpeople, and the coffee and sugar carried into themarket and dealt out by pounds. It was rumoredthat an eminent stingy wealthy merchant (who isa bachelor) had a hogshead of coffee in his store[Pg 250]which he refused to sell the committee under sixshillings per pound. A number of females, somesay a hundred, some say more, assembled with acart and trunks, marched down to the warehouseand demanded the keys which he refused to deliver.Upon which one of them seized him byhis neck and tossed him into the cart. Uponhis finding no quarter, he delivered the keyswhen they tipped up the cart and dischargedhim; then opened the warehouse, hoisted outthe coffee themselves, put into the trunks, anddrove off. It was reported that he had personalchastisem*nts among them, but this I believewas not true. A large concourse of men stoodamazed, silent spectators of the whole transaction.

I suppose these Boston dames thoughtthey might have coffee since they could nothave tea; and, indeed, the relative use ofthese two articles in America was muchchanged by the Revolution. To this daymuch more coffee is drunk in America, proportionately,than in England. We are nota tea-drinking nation.

I don’t know that there were Daughtersof Liberty in Philadelphia, but Philadelphiawomen were just as patriotic as those of other[Pg 251]towns. One wrote to a British officer asfollows:—

I have retrenched every superfluous expensein my table and family. Tea I have not drunksince last Christmas, nor have I bought a cap orgown since your defeat at Lexington. I havelearned to knit and am now making stockingsof wool for my servants. In this way do I nowthrow in my mite for public good. I know this,that as free I can die but once, but as a slave Ishall not be worthy of life. I have the pleasureto assure you that these are the sentiments of mysister Americans.

The women of the South were fired withpatriotism; in Mecklenburgh and Rowancounties, North Carolina, Daughters of Libertyfound another method of spurring patriotism.Young ladies of the most respectablefamilies banded together, and pledgedthemselves not to receive addresses from anyrecreant suitors who had not obeyed the country’scall for military service.

There was an historic tea-party also in thattown of so much importance in those days—Edenton,N. C. On October 25, 1774, fifty-onespirited dames assembled at the residenceof Mrs. Elizabeth King, and passed[Pg 252]resolutions commending the action of theProvincial Congress, and declared also thatthey would not conform to “that PerniciousCustom of Drinking Tea or that the aforesaidLadys would not promote ye wear of anymanufacture from England,” until the taxwas repealed.

The notice of the association is containedin the American Archives, and runs thus:—

Association Signed by Ladies of Edenton,North Carolina, Oct. 25, 1774. As we cannot beindifferent on any occasion that appears to affectthe peace and happiness of our country, and asit has been thought necessary for the publickgood to enter into several particular resolves, bymeeting of Members of Deputies from the wholeProvince, it is a duty that we owe not only to ournear and dear relations and connections, but toourselves who are essentially interested in theirwelfare, to do everything as far as lies in ourpower to testify our sincere adherence to thesame, and we do therefore accordingly subscribethis paper as a witness of our fixed intentions andsolemn determination to do so. Signed by fiftyone ladies.

It is a good example of the strange notionswhich some historians have of the slight[Pg 253]value of circ*mstantial evidence in history,that the names of these fifty-one ladies havenot been preserved. A few, however, areknown. The president was Mrs. PenelopeBarker, who was thrice a widow, of husbandsHodgson, Crumm, and Barker. She washigh-spirited, and from her varied matrimonialexperiences knew that it was needlessto be afraid of any man; so when Britishsoldiers invaded her stables to seize her carriagehorses, she snatched the sword of oneof her husbands from the wall, with a singleblow severed the reins in the British officer’shands, and drove her horses back into thestables, and kept them too.

The fame of this Southern tea-partyreached England, for Arthur Iredell wrote(with the usual masculine jocularity uponfeminine enterprises) thus, on January 31,1775, from London to his patriot brother,James Iredell:—

I see by the newspapers the Edenton ladieshave signalized themselves by their protestagainst tea-drinking. The name of Johnston Isee among others; are any of my sister’s relationspatriotic heroines? Is there a female Congressat Edenton too? I hope not, for we Englishmen[Pg 254]are afraid of the male Congress, but ifthe ladies who have ever, since the Amazonianera, been esteemed the most formidable enemies,if they, I say, should attack us, the most fatalconsequence is to be dreaded. So dextrous inthe handling of a dart, each wound they give ismortal; whilst we, so unhappily formed by Nature,the more we strive to conquer them the moreare conquered! The Edenton ladies, consciousI suppose of this superiority on their side, byformer experience, are willing, I imagine, to crushus into atoms by their omnipotency; the onlysecurity on our side to prevent the impendingruin that I can perceive is the probability thatthere are few places in America which possessso much female artillery as in Edenton.

Another indication of the fame of theEdenton tea-party is adduced by Dr. RichardDillard in his interesting magazine paperthereon. It was rendered more public by acaricature, printed in London, a mezzotint,entitled “A Society of Patriotic Ladies atEdenton in North Carolina.” One lady witha gavel is evidently a man in woman’s clothing,and is probably intended for the hatedLord North; other figures are pouring thetea out of caddies, others are writing. This[Pg 255]caricature may have been brought forth inderision of an interesting tea-party picturewhich still exists, and is in North Carolina,after some strange vicissitudes in a foreignland. It is painted on glass, and the variousfigures are doubtless portraits of the Edentonladies.

It is difficult to-day to be wholly sensibleof all that these Liberty Bands meantto the women of the day. There were not,at that time, the associations of women forconcerted charitable and philanthropic workwhich are so universal now. There werefew established and organized assemblies ofwomen for church work (there had been somepraying-meetings in Whitefield’s day), andthe very thought of a woman’s society forany other than religious purposes must havebeen in itself revolutionary. And we scarcelyappreciate all it meant for them to abandonthe use of tea; for tea-drinking in that daymeant far more to women than it does now.Substitutes for the taxed and abandoned exoticherb were eagerly sought and speedilyoffered. Liberty Tea, Labrador Tea, andYeopon were the most universally accepted,though seventeen different herbs and beans[Pg 256]were named by one author; and patrioticprophecies were made that their use wouldwholly outlive that of the Oriental drink,even could the latter be freely obtained.A century has proved the value of theseprophecies.

Liberty Tea was the most popular of theseRevolutionary substitutes. It sold for sixpencea pound. It was made from the four-leavedloose-strife, a common-growing herb.It was pulled up whole like flax, its stalkswere stripped of the leaves and then boiled.The leaves were put in a kettle with theliquor from the stalks and again boiled.Then the leaves were dried in an oven.Sage and rib-wort, strawberry leaves andcurrant leaves, made a shift to serve as tea.Hyperion or Labrador Tea, much vaunted,was only raspberry leaves, but was not sucha wholly odious beverage. It was loudlypraised in the patriotic public press:—

The use of Hyperion or Labrador tea is everyday coming into vogue among people of all ranks.The virtues of the plant or shrub from whichthis delicate Tea is gathered were first discoveredby the Aborigines, and from them the Canadianslearned them. Before the cession of Canada to[Pg 257]Great Britain we knew little or nothing of thismost excellent herb, but since we have beentaught to find it growing all over hill and dalebetween the Lat. 40 and 60. It is found all overNew England in great plenty and thatof best quality, particularly on thebanks of the Penobscot, Kennebec,Nichewannock andMerrimac.

We do not need to make a compositepicture of the housewife of Revolutionarydays, for a very distinct account hasbeen preserved of one in the quaint pages ofthe Remembrancer or diary of ChristopherMarshall, a well-to-do Quaker of Philadelphia,who was one of the Committee of Observationof that city during the RevolutionaryWar. After many entries through theyear 1778, which incidentally show the manycares of his faithful wife, and her fulfilmentof these cares, the fortunate husband thusbursts forth in her praise:—

As I have in this memorandum taken scarcelyany notice of my wife’s employments, it mightappear as if her engagements were very trifling;the which is not the case but the reverse. Andto do her justice which her services deserved, byentering them minutely, would take up most ofmy time, for this genuine reason, how that from[Pg 259]early in the morning till late at night she is constantlyemployed in the affairs of the family,which for four months has been very large; forbesides the addition to our family in the house,it is a constant resort of comers and goers whichseldom go away with dry lips and hungry bellies.This calls for her constant attendance, not onlyto provide, but also to attend at getting preparedin the kitchen, baking our bread and pies, meat&c. and also the table. Her cleanliness aboutthe house, her attendance in the orchard, cuttingand drying apples of which several bushels havebeen procured; add to which her making ofcider without tools, for the constant drink of thefamily, her seeing all our washing done, and herfine clothes and my shirts, the which are allsmoothed by her; add to this, her making oftwenty large cheeses, and that from one cow,and daily using with milk and cream, besidesher sewing, knitting &c. Thus she looketh wellto the ways of her household, and eateth not thebread of idleness; yea she also stretcheth outher hand, and she reacheth forth her hand toher needy friends and neighbors. I think shehas not been above four times since her residencehere to visit her neighbors; nor throughmercy has she been sick for any time, but has atall times been ready in any affliction to me or my[Pg 260]family as a faithful nurse and attendant bothday and night.

Such laudatory references to the goodwifeas these abound through the Remembrancer.

It seems that so generous and noble a womanshould have had a reward in this world,as well as the next, for, besides her kitchenduties, she was a “nonsuch gardner, workingbravely in her garden,” and a first classbutter-maker, who constantly supplied herpoor neighbors with milk, and yet alwayshad cream to spare for her dairy.

[Pg 261]

Far be it from me to cast even the slightestreflection, to express the vaguest doubt,as to the industry, energy, and application ofso pious, so estimable an old gentleman asMr. Marshall, but he was, as he says, “easilytired”—“the little I do tires and fatiguesme”—“the grasshopper seems a burden.”So, even to our prosaic and somewhat emancipatednineteenth century notions as towomen’s rights and their assumption ofmen’s duties, it does appear that so patient,industrious, and overworked a consort mighthave been spared some of the burdensomeduties which devolved upon her, and whichare popularly supposed not to belong to thedistaff side of the house. An elderly milk-manmight have occasionally milked thecow for that elderly weary milkmaid. Andit does seem just a little strange that ahearty old fellow, who could eat gammonsand drink punch at every occasion of soberenjoyment and innocent revelry to which hewas invited, should let his aged spouse riseat daybreak and go to the wharves to buyloads of wood from the bargemen; and alsocomplacently record that the horse wouldhave died had not the ever-energetic wife[Pg 262]gone out and by dint of hard work and goodmanagement succeeded in buying in thebarren city a load of hay for provender.However, he never fails to do her justice incommendatory words in the pages of hisRemembrancer, thus proving himself morethoughtful than that Yankee husband whosaid to a neighbor that his wife was such agood worker and a good cook, and so pleasantand kept everything so neat and nicearound the house, that sometimes it seemedas if he couldn’t help telling her so.

One of the important housewifely cares ofPhiladelphia women was their marketing,and Madam Marshall was faithful in thisduty also. We find her attending market asearly as four o’clock upon a winter’s morning.In 1690, there were two market days weeklyin Philadelphia, and nearly all the early writersnote the attendance thereat of the ladiesresiding in the town. In 1744, these marketswere held on Tuesday and Friday. WilliamBlack, a travelling Virginian, wrote that yearwith admiration of this custom:—

I got to the market by 7, and had no smallSatisfaction in seeing the pretty Creatures, the[Pg 263]Young Ladies, traversing the place from Stall toStall where they could make the best Market,some with their maid behind them with a Basketto carry home the Purchase, others that weredesign’d to buy but trifles, as a little fresh Butter,a Dish of Green Peas or the like, had GoodNature & Humility enough to be their own Porters.I have so much regard for the fair Sexthat I imagin’d like the Woman of the HolyWrit some charm in touching even the Hem oftheir Garments. After I made my Market, whichwas one pennyworth of Whey and a Nosegay, Idisengag’d myself.

It would appear also that a simple andappropriate garment was donned for thishomely occupation. We find Sarah Eve andothers writing of wearing a “market cloke.”

It is with a keen thrill of sympathy thatwe read of all the torment that MistressMarshall, that household saint, had to endurein the domestic service rendered to her—orperhaps I should say through the lack ofservice in her home. A special thorn in theflesh was one Poll, a bound girl. On September13, 1775, Mr. Marshall wrote:—

As the years went on, Poll kept takingwhat he called “cruises,” “driving strokesof impudence,” visiting friends, strolling[Pg 265]around the streets, faring up and down thecountry, and he patiently writes:—

It is with a feeling of malicious satisfactionthat we read at last of the jaded, harassed,and conscientious wife going away for avisit, and know that the man of the house[Pg 266]will have to encounter and adjust domesticproblems as best he may. No sooner hadthe mistress gone than Poll promptly departedalso on a vacation. As scores oftimes before, Mr. Marshall searched for her,and retrieved her (when she was ready tocome), and she behaved exceeding well for aday, only, when rested, to again make a flitting.He writes on the 23d:—

I roused Charles up at daylight. Found MissPoll in the straw house. She came into thekitchen and talked away that she could not goout at night but she must be locked out. If that’sthe case she told them she would pack up herclothes and go quite away; that she would not beso served as her Mistress did not hinder her stayingout when she pleased, and the kitchen doorto be opened for her when she came home andknocked. The negro woman told me as well asshe could what she said. I then went and pickedup her clothes that I could find. I asked herhow she could behave so to me when I had conductedmyself so easy towards her even so as tosuffer her to sit at table and eat with me. Thishad no effect upon her. She rather inclined tothink that she had not offended and had donenothing but what her mistress indulged her in.I told her before Betty that it was not worth my[Pg 267]while to lick her though she really deserved it forher present impudence; but to remember I hadtaken all her clothes I could find except what shehad on, which I intended to keep; that if shewent away Charles with the horse should followher and bring her back and that I would senda bellman around the borough of Lancaster tocry her as a runaway servant, wicked girl, witha reward for apprehending her.

The fatuous simplicity of Quaker Marshall’sreproofs, the futility of his threats, theabsurd failure of his masculine methods, receivedimmediate illustration—as might beexpected, by Miss Poll promptly runningaway that very night. Again he writes:—

With what joy did the masculine housekeeperand steward greet the return of hiscapable wife, and resign his position as turnkey!Poll, upon liberation from restraint,flew swiftly away like any other bird fromits cage.

Notwithstanding such heavy weather overheadand exceeding dirty under foot our Poll afterbreakfast went to see the soldiers that came asprisoners belonging to Burgoynes army. Ourtrull returned this morning. Her mistress gaveher a good sound whipping. This latter was avariety.

And so the unequal fight went on; Pollcalmly breaking down a portion of the fencethat she might decamp more promptly, andreturn unheralded. She does not seem tohave been vicious, but simply triumphantlylawless and fond of gadding. I cannotalways blame her. I am sure I should havewanted to go to see the soldier-prisoners ofBurgoyne’s army brought into town. Thelast glimpse of her we have is with “herhead dressed in tiptop fashion,” rolling off in[Pg 269]a coach to Yorktown with Sam Morris’s son,and not even saying good-by to her vanquishedmaster.

Mr. Marshall was not the only Philadelphianto be thus afflicted; we find one of hisneighbors, Jacob Hiltzheimer, dealing a moresummary way with a refractory maid-servant.Shortly after noting in the pages of his diarythat “our maid Rosina was impertinent toher mistress,” we find this good citizen takingthe saucy young redemptioner before thesquire, who summarily ordered her to theworkhouse. After remaining a month inthat confinement, Rosina boldly answeredno, when asked if she would go back to hermaster and behave as she ought, and shewas promptly remanded. But she soonrepented, and was released. Her masterpaid for her board and lodging while underdetention, and quickly sold her for £20 forher remaining term of service.

With the flight of the Marshalls’ sorryPoll, the sorrows and trials of this goodQuaker household with regard to what Raleighcalls “domesticals” were not at an end.As the “creatures” and the orchard and gardenneeded such constant attention, a man-servant[Pg 270]was engaged—one Antony—acharacter worthy of Shakespeare’s comedies.Soon we find the master writing:—

I arose past seven and had our gentleman tocall down stairs. I spoke to him about his notserving the cows. He at once began about hisway being all right, &c. I set about servingour family and let him, as in common, do as hepleases. I think I have hired a plague to myspirit. Yet he is still the same Antony—hesays—complaisant, careful, cheerful, industrious.

Then Antony grew noisy and talkative, soabusive at last that he had to be put outin the yard, where he railed and talked tillmidnight, to the annoyance of the neighborsand the mortification of his mistress;for he protested incessantly and noisily thatall he wished was to leave in peace andquiet, which he was not permitted to do.Then, and repeatedly, his master told himto leave, but the servant had no other home,and might starve in the war-desolated town;so after half-promises he was allowed bythese tender folk to stay on. Soon hehad another “tantrum,” and the astoundedQuaker writes:—

[Pg 271]

He rages terribly uttering the most out of theway wicked expressions yet not down-right swearing.Mamma says it is cursing in the Popishway....

What this Popish swearing could havebeen arouses my curiosity; I suspect it wasa kind of “dog-latin.” Antony constantlyindulged in it, to the horror and sorrow ofthe pious Marshalls. And the amusing, thefairly comic side of all this is that Antonywas a preacher, a prophet in the land, andconstantly held forth in meeting to sinnersaround him. We read of him:—

I don’t know when to pity poor DameMarshall the most, with Antony railing inthe yard and disturbing the peace of theneighbors; or Antony cursing in a Popishmanner through the house; or Antony shammingsick and moaning by the fireside; orAntony violently preaching when she hadgone to the quiet Quaker meeting for anhour of peace and rest.

This “runnagate rascal” was as elusive,as tricky, as malicious as a gnome; wheneverhe was reproved, he always contrivedto invent a new method of annoyance inrevenge. When chidden for not feeding thehorse, he at once stripped the leaves off thegrowing cabbages, cut off the carrot heads,and pulled up the potatoes, and pretendedand protested he did it all solely to benefitthem, and thus do good to his master.When asked to milk the cow, he promptlyleft the Marshall domicile for a whole day.

Sent Antony in the orchard to watch the boys.As I was doubtful sometime whether if any came[Pg 273]for apples Antony would prevent, I took a walkto the back fence, made a noise by pounding asif I would break the fence, with other noise.This convinced me Antony sat in his chair. Hetook no notice till my wife and old Rachel cameto him, roused him, and scolded him for hisneglect. His answer was that he thought it hisduty to be still and not disturb them, as by sodoing he should have peace in heaven and ablessing would ever attend him.

This was certainly the most sanctimoniousexcuse for laziness that was ever invented;and on the following day Antony supplementedhis tergiversation by giving away allMr. Marshall’s ripe apples through the fenceto passers-by—neighbors, boys, soldiers, andprisoners. There may have been method inthis orchard madness, for Antony loathedapple-pie, a frequent comestible in the Marshalldomicile, and often refused to drinkcider, and grumbling made toast-tea instead.In a triumph of euphuistic indignation, Mr.Marshall thus records the dietetic vagariesof the “most lazy impertinent talking lyingfellow any family was ever troubled with:”

When we have no fresh broth he wants some;when we have it he cant sup it. When we have[Pg 274]lean of bacon he wants the fat; when the fat hecant eat it without spreading salt over it as withoutit its too heavy for his stomach. If newmilk he cant eat it till its sour, it curdles on hisstomach; when sour or bonnyclabber it giveshim the stomach-ache. Give him tea he doesn’tlike such slop, its not fit for working men; if hehasn’t it when he asks for it he’s not well used.Give him apple pie above once for some days,its not suitable for him it makes him sick. Ifthe negro woman makes his bed, she dont makeit right; if she dont make it she’s a lazy blackjade, &c.

In revenge upon the negro woman Dinahfor not making his bed to suit his notion, hepretended to have had a dream about her,which he interpreted to such telling effectthat she thought Satan was on his swift wayto secure her, and fled the house in superstitiousfright, in petticoat and shift, andwas captured three miles out of town. Onher return, Antony outdid himself with “allthe vile ribaldry, papist swearing, incoherentscurrilous language, that imperious pride,vanity, and folly could invent or express”—andthen went off to meeting to preach andpray. Well might the Quaker say with Juvenal,[Pg 275]“The tongue is the worst part of a badservant.” At last, exasperated beyond measure,his patient master vowed, “Antony, Iwill give thee a good whipping,” and he coulddo it, for he had “pacified himself with sundrystripes of the cowskin” on Dinah, the negro,when she, in emulation of Antony, was impertinentto her mistress.

The threat of a whipping brought on Antonya “fit of stillness” which descendedlike a blessing on the exhausted house. But“the devil is sooner raised than laid;” anonAntony was in his old lunes again, and thepeace was broken by a fresh outburst of laziness,indifference, and abuse, in which wemust leave this afflicted household, for atthat date the Remembrancer abruptly closes.

The only truly good service rendered tothose much tried souls was by a negro woman,Dinah, who, too good for this earth,died; and in her death involved themin fresh trouble, for in thatwar-swept town they couldscarce procure herburial.

Around the great glowing fireplace inan old New England kitchen centredthe homeliness and picturesqueness of an old-timehome. The walls and floor were bare;the furniture was often meagre, plain, andcomfortless; the windows were small and ill-fitting;the whole house was draughty andcold; but in the kitchen glowed a beneficentheart that spread warmth and cheer andwelcome, and beauty also when

The settlers builded great chimneys withample open hearths, and to those hearthsthe vast forests supplied plentiful fuel; butas the forests disappeared in the vicinity ofthe towns, the fireplaces also shrank in size,so that in Franklin’s day he could write ofthe big chimneys as “the fireplaces of ourfathers;” and his inventions for economizing[Pg 277]fuel had begun to be regarded as necessities.

The kitchen was the housewife’s domain,the chimney-seat her throne; but the furnitureof that throne and the sceptre werefar different from the kitchen furnishings ofto-day.

We often see fireplaces with hangingcranes in pictures illustrating earliest colonialtimes, but the crane was unknown inthose days. When the seventeenth-centurychimney was built, ledges were left on eitherside, and on them rested the ends of a longheavy pole of green wood, called a lug-poleor back bar. The derivation of the wordlug-pole is often given as meaning from lugto lug, as the chimney-side was often calledthe lug. Whittier wrote:—

Others give it from the old English wordlug, to carry; for it was indeed the carrying-pole.It was placed high up in the yawningchimney, with the thought and intent of itsbeing out of reach of the devouring flames,and from it hung a motley collection ofhooks of various lengths and weights, sometimes[Pg 278]with long rods, sometimes with chains,and rejoicing in various names. Pot-hooks,pot-hangers, pot-hangles, pot-claws, pot-cleps,were one and the same; so also weretrammels and crooks. Gib and gibcrokewere other titles. Hake was of course theold English for hook:—

A twi-crook was a double hook.

Other terms were gallow-balke, for thelug-pole, and gallow-crookes for pot-hooks.These were Yorkshire words, used alike inthat county by common folk and gentry.They appear in the inventory of the goodsof Sir Timothy Hutton, and in the farming-bookof Henry Best, both dating to the timeof settlement of New England. A reconwas another Yorkshire name for a chain withpot-hooks. They were heard but rarely inNew England.

The “eetch-hooke” named by ThomasAngell, of Providence, in 1694, with his“tramils and pot hookes” is an unknownand undescribable form of trammel to me,possibly an H-hook.

[Pg 279]

By these vari-named hooks were suspendedat various heights over the flames pots, kettles,and other bailed cooking utensils.

The lug-pole, though made of green wood,often became brittle or charred through toolong and careless use over the hot fire, andwas left in the chimney till it broke underits weighty burden of food and metal. Andas within the chimney corner was a favoriteseat for both old and young of the household,not only were precious cooking utensilsendangered and food lost, but human life aswell, as told in Judge Sewall’s diary, and inother diaries and letters of the times. So,when the iron crane was hung in the fireplace,it not only added grace and convenienceto the family hearth, but safety as well.On it still were hung the pot-hooks andtrammels, but with shortened arms or hangers.

The mantel was sometimes called by theold English name, clavy or clavel-piece. Inone of John Wynter’s letters, written in1634, he describes his new home in Maine:

The chimney is large, with an oven in eachend of him: he is so large that we can place ourCyttle within the Clavell-piece. We can brew[Pg 280]and bake and boyl our Cyttle all at once inhim.

The change in methods of cooking isplainly evinced in many of our commonkitchen utensils. In olden times the potsand kettles always stood on legs, and allskillets and frying-pans and saucepans stoodon slender legs, that, if desired, they mightbe placed with their contents over smallbeds of coals raked to one side of the hearth.A further convenience to assist this standingover coals was a little trivet, a tripod orthree-footed stand, usually but a simple skeletonframe on which the skillet could beplaced. In the corner of a fireplace wouldbe seen trivets with legs of various lengths,through which the desired amount of heatcould be obtained. We read in Eden’s FirstBooks on America:—

He shulde fynde in one place a fryingpan, inanother chauldron, here a tryvet, there a spytte,and these in kynde in every pore mans house:—

Of somewhat later date was the toast rack,also standing on its little spindling legs.

No better list can be given of the kitchenutensils of earliest colonial days in America[Pg 281]than those found in the inventories of theestates of the dead immigrants. These inventoriesare, in some cases, still preservedin the Colonial Court Records. We findthat Madam Olmstead, of Hartford, Conn.,had, in 1640, in her kitchen:—

This was certainly a very good outfit. Theutensils for the manufacture and storage ofbeer did not probably stand in the kitchen,[Pg 282]but in the lean-to or brew-house. A “cowl”was a large tub with ears; in it liquids couldbe carried by two persons, who bore theends of a pole thrust through the ears orhandles. Often with the cowl was specifieda pail with iron bail. William Harris, ofPawtuxet, R. I., had, in 1681, “two Paylesand one jron Bayle” worth three shillings.This naming of the pail-bail marked thechange in the form of pail handles; originally,pails were carried by sticks thrustthrough ears on either side of the vessel.

The jacks were waxed leather jugs ordrinking horns, much used in English alehousesin the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries,whose use gave rise to the singularnotion of the French that Englishmen dranktheir ale out of their boots. Governor Winthrophad jacks and leather bottles; butboth names disappear from inventories bythe year 1700, in New England.

These leather bottles were in universaluse in England “among shepherds and harvest-peoplein the countrey.” They werealso called bombards. Their praises weresung in a very spirited ballad, of which Igive a few lines:—

[Pg 283]

Latten-ware was a kind of brass. It maybe noted that no tin appears on this list, norin many of the inventories of these earlyConnecticut colonists. Thomas Hooker hadseveral “tynnen covers.”

Brass utensils were far from cheap. Handsomebrass mortars were expensive. Brasskettles were worth three pounds apiece. Nowonder the Indians wished their brass kettlesburied with them as their most preciouspossessions. The brass utensils of WilliamWhiting, of Hartford, in 1649, were worthtwenty pounds; Thomas Hooker’s, about fifteenpounds. Among other utensils namedin the inventories of some neighbors of[Pg 284]Mr. Hooker were an “iron to make Wafercakes,” “dyitt vessels,” “shredin knife,”“flesh fork.” Robert Day had a “brasschaffin dish, 3s, lether bottle 2s, brass posnet4s, brass pott 6s, brass kettle 2. 10s.” Achafing-dish in olden times was an open boxof wire into which coals were thrust.

Dame Huit, of Windsor, Conn., had thesearticles, among others:—

The “two Brandii” were brand-irons orbrond-yrons, a kind of trivet or support toset on the andirons. Sometimes they heldbrands or logs in place, or upon them dishescould be placed. Toasting-irons and broiling-ironsare named. “Scieufes,” or sieves,were worth a shilling apiece.

[Pg 285]

Eleazer Lusher, of Dedham, Mass., in1672, owned cob-irons, trammels, firepans,gridirons, toasting-fork, salt pan, brand pan,mortar, pestle, box iron heaters, kettles, skillets,spits, frying-pan, ladles, skimmers, chafing-dishes,pots, pot-hooks, and creepers.

The name creeper brings to our considerationone of the homeliest charms of the fireplace—theandirons. Creepers were thelower and smaller andirons placed betweenthe great firedogs. The word is also appliedto a low cooking spider, which could bepushed in among the embers. Cob-ironswere the simplest form of andirons, and usuallywere used merely to support the spit;sometimes they had hooks to hold a dripping-panunder the spit. Sometimes a fireplaceshowed three pairs of andirons, on whichlogs could be laid at various heights. Sometimesa single pair of andirons had threesets of hooks or branches for the same purpose.They were made of iron, copper, steel,or brass, often cast in a handsome design.The andirons played an important part inthe construction and preservation of a fire.

And the construction of one of these greatfires was no light or careless matter. Whittier,[Pg 286]in his Snow-Bound, thus tells of themaking of the fire in his home:—

Often the great backlog had to be rolledin with handspikes, sometimes drawn in bya chain and yoke of oxen. The making ofthe fire and its preservation from day to daywere of equal importance. The covering ofthe brands at night was one of the domesticduties, whose non-fulfillment in those matchlessdays often rendered necessary a journeywith fire shovel to the house of the nearestneighbor to obtain glowing coals to startagain the kitchen fire.

A domestic luxury seen in well-to-do homeswas a tin kitchen, a box-like arrangementopen on one side, which was set next theblaze. It stood on four legs. In it breadwas baked or roasted. Through the kitchenpassed a spit, which could be turned by an[Pg 287]external handle; on it meat was spitted tobe roasted.

The brick oven was not used so frequently,usually but once a week. This wasa permanent furnishing. When the greatchimney was built, a solid heap of stoneswas placed for its foundation, and a vast andmassive structure was reared upon it. Onone side of the kitchen fireplace, but reallya part of the chimney whole, was an ovenwhich opened at one side into the chimney,and below an ash pit with swinging irondoors with a damper. To heat this oven agreat fire of dry wood was kindled within it,and kept burning fiercely for some hours.Then the coal and ashes were removed, thechimney draught and damper were closed,and the food to be cooked was placed in theheated oven. Great pans of brown bread,pots of pork and beans, an Indian pudding,a dozen pies, all went into the fiery furnacetogether.

On Thanksgiving week the great oven washeated night and morning for several days.To place edibles at the rear of the glowingoven, it is plain some kind of a shovel mustbe used; and an abnormally long-handled[Pg 288]one was universally found by the oven-side.It was called a slice or peel, or fire-peel orbread-peel. Such an emblem was it of domesticutility and unity that a peel and astrong pair of tongs were a universal andluck-bearing gift to a bride. A good ironpeel and tongs cost about a dollar and a half.The name occurs constantly in old willsamong kitchen properties. We read of “theoven, the mawkin, the bavin, the peel.”Sometimes, when the oven was heated, thepeel was besprinkled with meal, and greatheaps of rye and Indian dough were placedthereon, and by a dextrous and indescribabletwist thrown upon cabbage leaves on theoven-bottom, and thus baked in a hayco*ckshape.

“Shepherd Tom” Hazard, in his inimitableJonny Cake Papers, thus speaks of theold-time methods of baking:—

Rhineinjun bread, vulgarly called nowadaysrye and Indian bread, in the olden time was alwaysmade of one quart of unbolted Rhode Islandrye meal to two quarts of the coarser grainedparts of Ambrosia (Narragansett corn meal) wellkneaded and made into large round loaves of the[Pg 289]size of a half-peck measure. There are two waysof baking it. One way was to fill two large ironbasins with the kneaded dough and, late in theevening, when the logs were well burned down,to clear a place in the middle of the fire andplace the two basins of bread, one on top of theother, so as to inclose their contents and pressthem into one loaf. The whole was then carefullycovered with hot ashes, with coals on top,and left until morning. Another way was toplace a number of loaves in iron basins in along-heated and well-tempered brick oven—stonewould not answer as the heat is too brittle—intowhich a cup of water was also placed to makethe crust soft. The difference between brownbread baked in this way, with its thick, soft,sweet crust, from that baked in the oven of aniron stove I leave to abler pens than mine toportray.

In friendly chimney corners there stood ajovial companion of the peel and tongs,the flip iron, or loggerhead, or flip-dog, orhottle. Lowell wrote:—

[Pg 290]

Flip was a drink of vast popularity, and Ibelieve of potent benefit in those days whenfierce winters and cold houses made hotdrinks more necessary to the preservation ofhealth than nowadays. I have drunk flip,but, like many a much-vaunted luxury of theolden time, I prefer to read of it. It is indescribablyburnt and bitter in flavor.

It may be noted in nearly all old inventoriesthat a warming-pan is a part of thekitchen furnishing. Wood wrote in 1634 ofexportation to the New England colony,“Warming pannes & stewing pannes are ofnecessary use and very good traffick there.”One was invoiced in 1642 at 3s. 6d., anotherin 1654 at 5s. A warming-pan was a shallowpan of metal, usually brass or iron, about afoot in diameter and three or four inchesdeep, with a pierced brass or copper cover.It was fitted with a long wooden handle.When used, it was filled with coals, and whenthoroughly heated, was thrust between theicy sheets of the bed, and moved up anddown to give warmth to every corner. Itsfireside neighbor was the footstove, a box ofperforated metal in a wooden frame, withinwhich hot coals could be placed to warm the[Pg 291]feet of the goodwife during a long winter’sdrive, or to render endurable the arctic atmosphereof the unheated churches. Often alantern of pierced metal hung near the warming-pan.The old-time lanterns, still occasionallyfound in New England kitchens orbarns, form a most interesting study for theantiquary, and a much neglected fad for thecollector. I have one of Elizabethan shape,to which, when I found it, fragments of thinsheets of horn still clung—the remains ofthe horn slides which originally were enclosedin the metal frame.

High up on the heavy beam over the fireplacestood usually a candlestick, an old lamp,perhaps a sausage stuffer, or a spice-mill, ora candle mold, a couple of wooden noggins,sometimes a pipe-tongs. By the side of thefireplace hung the soot-blackened, smoke-driedalmanac, and near it often hung abetty-lamp, whose ill-smelling flame couldsupply for conning the pages a closer thoughscarce brighter light than the flickeringhearth flame.

By the hearth, sometimes in the chimneycorner, stood the high-backed settle, a sheltered[Pg 292]seat, while the family dye-pot often wasused by the children as a chimney bench.

Many household utensils once in commonuse in New England are now nearly obsolete.In many cases the old-time names are disusedand forgotten, while the object itself maystill be found with some modern appellation.In reading old wills, inventories, and enrollments,and the advertisem*nts in old newspapers,I have made many notes of theseold names, and have sometimes succeeded,though with difficulty, in identifying theutensils thus designated. Of course thedifferent English shire dialects supply a varietyof local names. In some cases goodold English words have been retained inconstant use in New England, while whollyarchaic in the fatherland.

In every thrifty New England home therestood a tub containing a pickle for saltingmeat. It was called a powdering-tub, orpowdering-trough. This use of the word“powder” for salt dates even before Shakespeare’sday.

Grains is an obsolete word for tines orprongs. Winthrop wrote in 1643 that asnake crawled in the Assembly room, and[Pg 293]a parson “held it with his foot and staff witha small pair of grains and killed it.”

Spenser used the word “flasket” thus:“In which to gather flowers to fill their flasket.”It was a basket, or hamper, made ofwoven wicker. John Hull, writing in 1675,asks that “Wikker Flasketts” be brought tohim on the Sea Flower.

A skeel was a small, shallow wooden tub,principally used for holding milk to standfor cream. It sometimes had one handle.The word is now used in Yorkshire. Akinto it is the word keeler, a small wooden tub,which is still constantly heard in New England,especially in application to a tub inwhich dishes are washed. Originally, cedarkeelers were made to hold milk, and a lossetwas also a large flat wooden dish used forthe same purpose. A skippet was a vesselmuch like a dipper, small and round, withlong handle, and used for ladling liquids.

A quarn was a hand-mill for grinding meal,and sometimes it stood in a room by itself.It was a step in domestic progress beyondpounding grain with a pestle in a mortar,and was of earlier date than the windmill orwater-mill. In Wiclif’s translation we read[Pg 294]in Matthew xxiv: “Two wymmen schalen begryndynge in quern,” etc. This word is alsoused by Shakespeare in Midsummer Night’sDream. In early New England wills theword is found, as in one of 1671: “1 paireQuarnes and Lumber in the quarne house,10s.” It was sometimes spelled “cairn,” asin a Windham will, and also “quern” and“quirn.”

Sometimes a most puzzling term will befound in one of these old inventories, onewhich appears absolutely incomprehensible.Here is one which seems like a riddle ofwhich the answer is irrevocably lost: “OneBilly bassha Pan.” It is found in the kitchenlist of the rich possessions of Madam DePeyster, in 1774, which inventory is preservedin the family archives at the VanCortlandt Manor House, at Croton-on-Hudson.You can give any answer you pleaseto the riddle; but my answer is this, inslightly altered verse. I think that MadamDe Peyster’s cook used that dish to serve:—

The early settlers were largely indebted tovarious forest trees for cheap, available, andutilizable material for the manufacture ofboth kitchen utensils and tableware. Wood-turningwas for many years a recognizedtrade; dish-turner a business title. We findLion Gardiner writing to John Winthrop,Jr., in 1652, “My wyfe desireth MistressLake to get her a dozen of trays for sheehearith that there is a good tray-maker withyou.”

Governor Bradford found the Indians usingwooden bowls, trays, and dishes, and the “Indianbowls,” made from the knots of maple-trees,were much sought after by housekeeperstill this century. A fine specimen ofthese bowls is now in the MassachusettsHistorical Society. It was originally takenfrom the wigwam of King Philip. Woodennoggins (low bowls with handles) are constantlynamed in early inventories, and MaryRing, of Plymouth, thought, in 1633, that a“wodden cupp” was valuable enough toleave by will as a token of friendship.[Pg 296]Wooden trenchers, also made by hand, wereused on the table for more than a century,and were universally bequeathed by will,as by that of Miles Standish. White poplarwood made specially handsome dishes.Wooden pans were made in which to setmilk. Wooden bread troughs were used inevery home. These were oblong, trencher-shapedbowls, about a foot and a half inlength, hollowed and shaped by hand from alog of wood. Across the trough ran lengthwisea stick or rod, on which the flour wassifted in a temse, or searce, or sieve. Thesaying, “set the Thames on fire,” is said tohave been originally “set the temse onfire,” meaning that hard labor would, by thefriction of constant turning, set the woodentemse, or sieve, on fire.

It was not necessary to apply to the wood-turnerto manufacture these simply shapeddishes. Every winter the men and boys ofthe household manufactured every kind ofdomestic utensils and portions of farm implementsthat could be whittled or made fromwood with simple tools. By the cheerfulkitchen fireside much of this work was done.Indeed, the winter picture of the fireside[Pg 297]should always show the figure of a whittlingboy. They made butter paddles of redcherry, salt mortars, pig troughs, pokes, sledneaps, ax helves, which were sawn, whittled,and carefully scraped with glass; box trapsand “figure 4” traps, noggins, keelers, rundlets,flails, cheese-hoops, cheese-ladders, stanchions,handles for all kinds of farm implements,and niddy-noddys. Strange to say,the latter word is not found in any of ourdictionaries, though the word is as wellknown in country vernacular as the articleitself—a hand-reel—or as the old riddle:—

There were still other wooden vessels. Inhis Philocothonista, or The Drunkard Opened,Dissected and Anatomized (1635), ThomasHeywood, gives for “carouseing-bowles ofwood” these names: “mazers, noggins, whiskins,piggins, cruizes, wassel-bowles, ale-bowles,court-dishes, tankards, kannes.”

There were many ways of usefully employingthe winter evening hours. Somethrifty folk a hundred years ago occupiedspare time in sticking card-teeth in wool-cards.[Pg 298]The strips of pierced leather and thewire teeth bent in proper shape were suppliedto them by the card manufacturer.The long leather strips and boxes filled withthe bent wire teeth might be seen standingin many a country home, and many an eveningby the light of the blazing fire,—for thework required little eyesight or dexterity,—satthe children on dye-pot, crickets, andlogs of wood, earning a scant sum to add totheir “broom-money.”

By the side of the chimney, in New Englandcountry houses, always hung a broomor besom of peeled birch. These birchbrooms were a characteristic New Englandproduction. To make one a straight birch-treefrom three to four inches in diameterwas chosen, and about five feet of the trunkwas cut off. Ten inches from the larger enda notch was cut around the stick, and the barkpeeled off from thence to the end. Thenwith a sharp knife the bared end was carefullysplit up to the notch in slender slivers,which were held back by the broom-maker’sleft hand until they became too many and toobulky to restrain, when they were tied backwith a string. As the tendency of the slivers[Pg 299]or splints was to grow slightly thinnertoward the notch, there was left in the heartof the growing broom a short core, which hadto be whittled off. When this was done thesplints were all turned back to their firstand natural position, a second notch was cutan inch above the first one, leaving a stripof bark an inch in diameter; the bark waspeeled off from what was destined to bethe broom handle, and a series of splintswas shaved down toward the second notch.Enough of the stick was left to form thehandle; this was carefully whittled until aninch or so in diameter, was smoothed, andfurnished with a hole in the end in whichto place a string or a strip of leather for suspension.The second series of splints fromthe handle end was firmly turned down andtied with hempen twine over the whollysplintered end, and all the splints cut offthe same length. The inch of bark whichremained of the original tree helped to holdthe broom-splints firmly in place.

When these brooms were partly worn, therestraining string could be removed, and theflaring splints formed an ideal oven-besom,spreading and cleaning the ashes from every[Pg 300]corner and crevice. Corn brooms were unknownin these country neighborhoods untilabout the middle of the present century.

A century, and even as late as half a centuryago, many a farmer’s son (and daughtertoo) throughout New England earned his orher first spending-money by making birchbrooms for the country stores, from whencethey were sent to the large cities, especiallyBoston, where there was a constant demandfor them. In Northampton, about 1790, oneshopkeeper kept as many as seven or eighthundred of these brooms on hand at onetime.

The boys and girls did not grow rich veryfast at broom-making. Throughout Vermont,fifty years ago, the uniform price paidto the maker for these brooms was but sixcents apiece, and as he had to work at leastthree evenings to make one broom,—to saynothing of the time spent in selecting andcutting the birch-tree,—it was not so profitablean industry as gathering beech-nutsat a dollar a bushel. Major Robert Randolphtold in fashionable London circles, thatabout the year 1750, he carried many aload of these birch brooms on his back ten[Pg 301]miles to Concord, that he might thus earn afew shillings. Such brooms were known bydifferent names in different localities: birchbrooms, splinter brooms, and Indian brooms.The Indians were very proficient in makingthem, and it is said invented them. Thiscan readily be believed, for like birch-barkcanoes and snowshoes, they are examples ofperfection in utility and in the employmentof native materials. Squaws wandered overcertain portions of the country bearingbrooms on their backs, peddling them fromhouse to house for ninepence apiece and adrink of cider. In 1806, one minister ofHaverhill, New Hampshire, had two of thesebrooms given to him as a marriage fee.When a Hadley man planted broom corn in1797, and made corn brooms to sell, he wasscornfully met with the remark that broom-makingwas work for Indians and boys. Itwas long ere his industry crowded out thesturdy birch brooms.

There were many domestic duties whichdid not waft sweet “odors of Araby;” theannual spring manufacture of soft soap forhome consumption was one of them, andalso one of the most important and most[Pg 302]trying of all the household industries. Therefuse grease from the family cooking wasstowed away in tubs and barrels through thecool winter months in unsavory masses, andthe wood-ashes from the great fireplaceswere also thriftily stored until the carefullychosen time arrived. The day was selectedwith much deliberation, after close consultationwith that family counselor, thealmanac, for the moon must be in the rightquarter, and the tide at the flood, if the soapwere to “come right.” Then the leachwas set outside the kitchen door. Somefamilies owned a strongly made leach-tub,some used a barrel, others cut a section froma great birch-tree, and removed the bark toform a tub, which was placed loosely in acircular groove in a base made of wood or,preferably, of stone. This was not set horizontally,but was slightly inclined. The tubwas filled with ashes, and water was scantilypoured in until the lye trickled or leachedout of an outlet cut in the groove at thebase. The “first run” of lye was not strongenough to be of use, and was poured againupon the ashes. The wasted ashes were replenishedagain and again, and water poured[Pg 303]in small quantities on them, and the lyeaccumulated in a receptacle placed for it. Itwas a universal test that when the lye wasstrong enough to hold up an egg, it was alsostrong enough to use for the soap boiling.In the largest iron pot the grease and lyewere boiled together, often over a great firebuilt in the open air. The leached asheswere not deemed refuse and waste; theywere used by the farmer as a fertilizer.Soap made in this way, while rank andstrong, is so pure and clean that it seemsalmost like a jelly, and shows no trace ofthe vile grease that helped to form it.

The dancing firelight shone out on nobusier scene than on the grand candle-dipping.It had taken weeks to prepare for thisdomestic industry, which was the greathousehold event of the late autumn, as soap-makingwas of the spring. Tallow had beencarefully saved from the domestic animalskilled on the farm, the honeyed store ofthe patient bee had been robbed of wax tofurnish materials, and there was still anothersource of supply.

The summer air of the coast of New Englandstill is sweet with one of the freshest,[Pg 304]purest plant-perfumes in the world—thescent of bayberry. These dense woodyshrubs bear profusely a tiny, spicy, wax-coatedberry; and the earliest colonistsquickly learned that from this plentiful berrycould be obtained an inflammable wax, whichwould replace and supplement any lack oftallow. The name so universally applied tothe plant—candleberry—commemorates itsemployment for this purpose. I never passthe clumps of bayberry bushes in the earlyautumn without eagerly picking and crushingthe perfumed leaves and berries; andthe clean, fresh scent seems to awaken adim recollection,—a hereditary memory,—andI see, as in a vision, the sober little childrenof the Puritans standing in the clearglowing sunlight, and faithfully strippingfrom the gnarled bushes the waxy candleberries;not only affording through this occupationmaterial assistance to the householdsupplies, but finding therein health, and Iam sure happiness, if they loved the bayberriesas I, their descendant, do.

The method of preparing this wax wassimple; it still exists in a few PlymouthCounty households. The berries are simply[Pg 305]boiled with hot water in a kettle, and theresolved wax skimmed off the top, refined,and permitted to harden into cakes or candles.The references in old-time recordsto this bayberry wax are too numerous to berecounted. A Virginian governor, RobertBeverley (for the bayberry and its wax wasknown also in the South as myrtleberrywax), gave, perhaps, the clearest descriptionof it:—

A pale green brittle wax of a curious greencolor, which by refining becomes almost transparent.Of this they made candles which arenever greasy to the touch nor melt with lying inthe hottest weather; neither does the snuff ofthese ever offend the smell, like that of a tallowcandle; but instead of being disagreeable, if anaccident puts a candle out, it yields a pleasantfragrancy to all that are in the room; insomuchthat nice people often put them out on purposeto have the incense of the expiring snuff.

It is true that the balmy breath of thebayberry is exhaled even on its funeral pyre.A bayberry candle burns like incense; andI always think of its perfume as truly theincense to the household hearth-gods of anold New England home.

[Pg 306]

Bayberry wax was a standard farm-product,a staple article of traffic, till this century, andit was constantly advertised in the newspapers.As early as 1712, Thomas Lechmerewrote to John Winthrop, Jr.:—

I am now to beg one favour of you, that yousecure for me all the bayberry wax you can possiblylay yor hands on. What charge you shallbe at securing it shall be thankfully paid you.You must take a care that they do not putt toomuch tallow among it, being a custome andcheate they have gott.

When the candle-dipping began, a fiercefire was built in the fireplace, and over it washung the largest house kettle, half filled withwater and melted tallow, or wax. Candle-rodswere brought down from the attic, orpulled out from under the edge of beams,and placed about a foot and a half apart,reaching from chair to chair.

Boards were placed underneath to savethe spotless floor from greasy drippings.Across these rods were laid, like the roundsof a ladder, shorter sticks or reeds to whichthe wicks were attached at intervals of a fewinches. The wicks of loosely spun cotton ortow were dipped time and time again into the[Pg 307]melted tallow, and left to harden betweeneach dipping. Of course, if the end of thekitchen (where stood the rods and hung thewicks) were very cold, the candles grewquickly, since they hardened quickly; butthey were then more apt to crack. Whenthey were of proper size, they were cut off,spread in a sunny place in the garret tobleach, and finally stored away in candle-boxes.Sometimes the tallow was pouredinto molds; when, of course, comparativelyfew candles could be made in a day. In somecommunities itinerant candle-makers carriedmolds from house to house, and assisted inthe candle manufacture.

These candles were placed in candlesticks,or in large rooms were set in rudechandeliers of strips of metal with sockets,called candle-beams. Handsome rooms hadsconces, and the kitchen often had a slidingstand by which the candle could be adjustedat a desired height. Snuffers were as indispensableas candlesticks, and were sometimescalled snuffing-iron, or snit—a wordnot in the Century Dictionary—from the oldEnglish verb, “snyten,” to blow out. Thesnuffers lay in a little tray called a snuffer-tray,[Pg 308]snuffer-dish, snuffer-boat, snuffer-slice,or snuffer-pan. Save-alls, a little wire frameto hold up the last burning end of candle,were another contrivance of our frugal ancestors.

In no way was a thrifty housewife betterknown than through her abundant stock ofsymmetrical candles; and nowhere was askilful and dextrous hand more needed thanin shaping them. Still, candles were notvery costly if the careless housewife choseto purchase them. The Boston EveningPost of October 5, 1767, has this advertisem*nt:“Dip’d Tallow Candles Half a Pistareenthe single Pound & Cheaper by Cwt.”

In many a country household some old-timefrugalities linger, but the bounteousoil-wells of Pennsylvania have rendered candlesnot only obsolete, but too costly forcountry use, and by a turn of fashion theyhave become comparatively an article ofluxury, but still seem to throw an old-timerefinement wherever their soft rays shine.

An account of housewifely duties in mygreat-grandmother’s home was thus written,in halting rhyme, by one of her sons whenhe too was old:—

[Pg 309]

The manufacture of the farm-reared woolwas not so burdensome and tedious a processas that of flax, but it was far frompleasant. The fleeces of wool had to beopened out and cleaned of all sticks, burrs,leaves, feltings, tar-marks, and the dirt whichalways remained after months’ wear by thesheep; then it had to be sorted out fordyeing, which latter was a most unpleasantprocess. Layers of the various colors ofwools after being dyed were rolled togetherand carded on coarse wool-cards, again andagain, then slightly greased by a disagreeableand tiresome method, then run intorolls. The wool was spun on the great wheel[Pg 310]which stood in the kitchen with the reel andswifts, and often by the glowing firelightthe mother spun. A tender and beautifulpicture of this domestic scene has beendrawn by Dr. Gurdon Russell, of Hartford,in his Up Neck in 1825.

My mother was spinning with the great wheel,the white rolls of wool lay upon the platform,and as they were spun upon the spindle, sheturning the wheel with one hand, and with extendedarm and delicate fingers holding the rollin the other, stepping backwards and forwardslightly till it was spun into yarn, it formed apicture to me, sitting upon a low stool, whichcan never be forgotten. Her movements wereevery grace, her form all of beauty to me whoopposite sat and was watching her dextrousfingers.

The manufacture of flax into linen materialwas ever felt to be of vast importance,and was encouraged by legislation from earliestcolonial days, but it received a freshimpulse in New England through the immigrationof about one hundred Irish familiesfrom Londonderry. They settled inNew Hampshire on the Merrimac about1719. They spun and wove by hand, but[Pg 311]with far more skill than prevailed amongthose English settlers who had already becomeAmericans. They established a manufactoryaccording to Irish methods, and attemptsat a similar establishment were madein Boston. There was much public excitementover spinning. Women, rich as wellas poor, appeared on Boston Common withtheir wheels, thus making spinning a popularholiday recreation. A brick buildingwas erected as a spinning-school, and atax was placed in 1737 to support it. Butthis was not an industrial success, the excitementdied out, the public spinning-schoollost its ephemeral popularity, and the wheelbecame again simply a domestic duty andpride.

For many years after this, housewives hadeverywhere flax and hemp to spin and weavein their homes, and the preparation of thesestaples seems to us to-day a monumentallabor. On almost every farm might be seena patch of the pretty flax, ripening for thehard work of pulling, rippling, rotting, breaking,swingling, and combing, which all had tobe done before it came to the women’s handsfor spinning. The seed was sown broad-cast,[Pg 312]and allowed to grow till the bobs orbolls were ripe. The flax was then pulledand spread neatly in rows to dry. Thiswork could be done by boys. Then menwhipped or threshed or rippled out all theseed to use for meal; afterwards the flaxstalks were allowed to lie for some time inwater until the shives were thoroughly rotten,when they were cleaned and once morethoroughly dried and tied in bundles. Thencame work for strong men, to break the flaxon the ponderous flaxbreak, to get out thehard “hexe” or “bun,” and to swingle itwith a swingle knife, which was somewhatlike a wooden dagger. Active men couldswingle forty pounds a day on the swingling-board.It was then hetchelled or combedor hackled by the housewife, and thus therough tow was gotten out, when it wasstraightened and made ready for the sprucedistaff, round which it was finally wrapped.The hatchelling was tedious work and irritatingto the lungs, for the air was filledwith the fluffy particles which penetratedeverywhere. The thread was then spun ona “little wheel.” It was thought that tospin two double skeins of linen, or four[Pg 313]double skeins of tow, or to weave six yardsof linen, was a good day’s work. For aweek’s work a girl received fifty cents and“her keep.” She thus got less than a centand a half a yard for weaving. The skeinsof linen thread went through many tediousprocesses of washing and bleaching beforebeing ready for weaving; and after the clothwas woven it was “bucked” in a stronglye, time and time again, and washed outan equal number of times. Then it was“belted” with a maple beetle on a smooth,flat stone; then washed and spread out tobleach in the pure sunlight. Sometimes thethread, after being spun and woven, had beenwashed and belted a score of times ere itwas deemed white and soft enough to use.The little girls could spin the “swinglingtow” into coarse twine, and the older onesmake “all tow” and “tow and linen” and“harden” stuffs to sell.

To show the various duties attending themanufacture of these domestic textiles by aBoston woman of intelligence and socialstanding, as late as 1788, let me quote a fewentries from the diary of the wife of Col.John May:—

[Pg 314]

The wringing out of this linen yarn wasmost exhausting, and the rinsing in variouswaters was no simple matter in those days,for the water did not conveniently run intothe houses through pipes and conduits, buthad to be laboriously carried in pailfuls froma pump, or more frequently raised in abucket from a well.

I am always touched, when handling thehomespun linens of olden times, with a sensethat the vitality and strength of those enduringwomen, through the many tedious andexhausting processes which they had bestowed,were woven into the warp and woofwith the flax, and gave to the old webs oflinen their permanence and their beautifultexture. How firm they are, and how lustrous!And how exquisitely quaint and fine[Pg 315]are their designs; sometimes even Scripturaldesigns and lessons are woven into them.They are, indeed, a beautiful expression ofold-time home and farm life. With theirclose-woven, honest threads runs this finerbeauty, which may be impalpable and imperceptibleto a stranger, but which to me isreal and ever-present, and puts me truly intouch with the life of my forbears. But,alas, it is through intuition we must learn ofthis old-time home life, for it has vanishedfrom our sight, and much that is beautifuland good has vanished with it.

The associations of the kitchen firesidethat linger in the hearts of those who arenow old can find no counterpart in ourdomestic surroundings to-day. The welcomecheer of the open fire, which graced andbeautified even the humblest room, is lostforever with the close gatherings of thefamily, the household occupations, the homespunindustries which formed and imprintedin the mind of everychild the picture ofa home.