 Chapter 4 of Colonial Folkways by Charles McLean Andrews This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Abiliments and Habits In matters of dress, as well as in those of house-building and furnishing, the eighteenth century was an era of greatly increased expenditure and costly display of taste for luxuries and elaborate adornment which not only involved the wealthier classes and extravagance beyond their resources but also ended far too often in heavy indebtedness and even in bankruptcy. Henry Vassel of Cambridge and William Byrd III of Virginia are examples of men who lived beyond their means and became, in the end, financially embarrassed. The years from 1740 to 1765 representing the history of this country the highest point reached in richness of costume, variety of color, peculiarities of decoration and excess of frills and furblows on the part of both sexes. The richer classes affected no republican simplicity in the days before the revolution and while their standards did not prevail beyond town and tide water there were few who did not feel in some way for good or for ill this increasing complexity of the conditions of colonial life. To deal systematically with the subject of dress and colonial times we should trace its changes from the beginning, study the various forms it assumed according to the needs of climate and environment and describe the clothing worn by all classes from the negro to the governor and by all members of the family from the infant to the octogenarian. But a less formal account of colonial clothing will suffice to give one a fairly complete idea of what our ancestors wore as they went about their daily occupations and what they put on for such special occasions as weddings, funerals, assemblies and social entertainments. It is also interesting to note the peculiar garb of such men as ministers, judges, sea captains and soldiers for the judge on the bench wore his robe of scarlet the lawyer his suit of black velvet and officials in office and representatives in the assembly down the habiliment suited to the occasion. The royal governors were often gloriously bedecked their counselors bewigged and befriiled and masons in procession to their lodges wore their clothes as one observer put it. These however were not the everyday costumes of our forefathers the majority of the colonists except Negroes and indentured servants wore clothing which was relatively heavy and coarse throughout New England and to a lesser extent elsewhere men women and children wore home spun with linen shirts, toe cloths, skirts and breeches and woolen stockings. When they bought materials they selected heavy stuff such as bustin, cursey, sagathly, chaloon, duffel, drug it and surge. By the middle of the century however farmers of the better class were wearing a finer quality of shop goods such as gamblet, alamode, cala, manco and blue broad cloth. Perhaps the most widely used imported cloth was asenbrigg, a tough coarse linen, woven and asenabrook, West Bailey which they made up into nearly everything from breeches and entire suits to sheets, table covers and carpet bags. The village person wore broad cloth when performing the duties of his office and two suits of this material every six years was a fair average. For every day he wore the home spun of his parish nurse, buckskin and lambskin breeches were common and dear skin of which much of the clothing of our early ancestors was made was later used for coats by those who were exposed to wind and weather. Stockings which generally came over the knee were blue, black or grey and might be of worsted cotton or cloth. Shoes often of the course as kind, double sold and made of cow hide were made either at home or by village shoemakers who were also cobblers or after the middle of the century at such towns as Lynn. A great many of the farming people however went barefoot in summer. The New Englander usually possessed three suits of clothes, the durable and practical suit which he wore for working, a second vest which he put on for going to market or for doing errands in town and his vest which he reserved for the Sabbath day and preserved with utmost care. In both town and country clothing was made at home by the women and help what was cut out after the local fashion by the village tailor or seamstress who brought shears and goose with them to the house while the family provided material, thread and board. Suits rarely fitted the wearer, alterations were common and the same cloth was used for one member of the family after another until it was completely worn out, patching and turning were evidences of thrift and economy. Apprentices and dentures, servants and negroes in the north dressed in much the same way as did their bedders but enclosed their poor quality and cut, often made over from the discarded garments of their masters. In the south what were called planes were imported in large quantities for the negroes, those in the house wearing blue jacket and breeches and those in the field generally white. Frequently the negroes worked with almost nothing on and Josiah Quincy narrates how he was rode over Hobcaw, Berry in South Carolina by six negroes, four of whom had nothing on, but their kind of breeches scare sufficient for covering. When a servant or a negro ran away he put on everything that he had or could steal and such a fugitive must have been a grotesque sight. One runaway servant is described as wearing a gray rabbit skin hat with a clasp to it, a periwig of bright brown hair, a closed surge coat, breeches of brownish color, worsted stockings and wooden heeled shoes. One apprentice ran away wearing an all-brown drug it coat and a pair of leather breeches and carrying in addition two ozenbrig shirts and two pairs of trousers of the same material. An escaped negro was advertised as dressed in shirt, jacket and breeches, well in stockings, old shoes and an old hat and wearing a silver jewel in one of his ears, earrings or bobs in one or both ears were frequent negro adornments. The steady advance toward more ornate and picturesque dress which began to be evident in colonial life was due to closer contact with the West Indies and the Old World. The Puritans had began as early as 1675 to protest against the follies of dress. Roger Wolcott of Connecticut in his memoir written in 1759 speaks with regret of early times in the colony and bewails the loss of the simplicity and honesty which the people had when he was a boy. Toward the end of the 17th century he says the buildings were good to what they had been but mean to what they are now. Their dress and diet mean in course to what it is now and they regard for the Sabbath and reverence for the Magistrates far greater than in his day. To the Quaker also the growing world in us of the times was a cause of depression and lament. Peck over writing of his travels in 1742 though proud that the Quakers in the neighborhood of Annapolis were counted pretty topping people in the world, nevertheless regretted that they took so much liberty in launching into finery and believed that some of the children went in apparel much finer and more untruth-like than most I ever saw in England. The richer planters and merchants not only wore foreign fabrics but deliberately copied foreign fashions. Edis writing from Annapolis in 1771 was of the opinion that a new fashion was adopted in America even earlier than in England and he saw very little difference in the manner of a wealthy colonist and a wealthy Britain. A thousand and one articles from the great manufacturing towns of England, London, Bristol, Birmingham, Sheffield, Nottingham, Liverpool, Manchester, Torrington and other centers were brought in almost every ship that set sail for America. Scarcely a letter went from a Virginia planter or a Boston, New York or Philadelphia merchant which did not contain a personal order for articles of clothing for himself or his family and scarcely a captain's sail for England who did not carry commissions of one kind or another. The very names of the fabrics which the colonists bought show the extent of this early trade, Holland, Lawn, Lennon, Duck and Blankets, German Surge, Osnaburg Lennon, Mecklenburg Silk, Marsilona Silk, Handkerchiefs, Plander's Thread, Spanish Poplin, Russian Lawn and Cheating, Hungarian Stuff, Romal or Bombay Handkerchiefs, Scottish Tartons and Cross and Irish Lennon. Colonel Thomas Jones in 1726 sent in one order for four pairs of stag breeches, one fine Geneva Surge suit, one fine cloth suit lined with scarlet, one fine drab cloth coat and breeches, one gray cloth suit, a drug it coat and breeches, a freeze coat and several pairs of Kalamanko breeches and cloth breeches with silver holes. William Beverly at different times ordered a plain suit, a very fine cloth, a summer suit of some other stuff and silk with stocks to match, a winter riding suit, a suit of super fine and mixed broad cloth, a pair of riding breeches with silk stockings, a great riding coat, three Holland Wastecoats with pockets, round toed pumps, a pair of half jack boots, a beaver hat without stiffening, a light colored bob wig, knit hose to wear under others and many pairs of kid and buckskin gloves. Later he sent back the hose damnnified in the voyage to be dyed black in another pair that were too large in the calf, a having but a slender body as you know by my measure. He also found fault with the boots remarking I'm but slender and my leg is not short. For his wife, Beverly ordered a suit of loot string appropriate for a woman of 40 years, a whale bone coat, a hoop coat, a sarsenit quilted coat of any color but yellow, white tabby stays a suit of dressed, night clothes or a mob, ruffles and handkerchief, pairs of Kalamanko shoes, flowered stuff, damask shoes and silk shoes with silk heels, colored kid gloves and mittens, straw hats thread, worsted and pearl colored silk hose, pad with soy, ribbons and cruels for embroidering suit patterns. For his daughter, he wished a whole holland frock, a plain loot string coat, a gentile suit of flowered silk cloth or whatever is fashionable, a quilted petticoat, a cheap plain writing habit, a headdress but if headdresses were longer fashionable than a mobcap with ribbons, for other children he wanted Kalamanko or silk shoes in considerable variety, sometimes ordering fine thin black calf skins or skins of white leather to be made up into children's shoes on the plantation, hats with silver laces, colored hose and colored glove. Even members of the fair sex tried their own hand at foreign purchase who we are told that Sarah, full pinch of Boston sent five pounds sterling in silver and one pound 17 shillings to pay for purchases in London by a captain who was to buy the goods himself or to send the order to some London merchant. Such an account of purchases could easily be extended but enough has been said to show the general character of the orders and the dependence of the colonial planter and his family on the captain or the English merchant for fit, style and color. The suits which were made as a rule in London by a special tailor or dressmaker who had the measures could never be tried beforehand nor could their suitability in the matter of color and style be determined with any degree of satisfaction. The English correspondents in their letters interspersed their comments on trade with frequent suggestions regarding dress and fashions and one remark for example that the French heads are little war most the English the hoops very small upper petticoats of but four yards the gowns unlined. These old country correspondents and the obliging captains must at times have indulged in some puzzling shopping expeditions in London. Orders for a hat gentile but not very gay and for hats and shoes for children of certain ages but with the material and shape unspecified would call for the exercise of considerable discretion on a man's part and one is not surprised that complaints usually followed the receipt of the goods in America. Stockings were said to be too large boots too small hats too stiff or too soft or wrongly trim leather rotten and quality colors and patterns different from what was wanted only to those who frequented the colonial stores where pattern books sent from England were to be found was satisfaction guaranteed goods were often damaged on the voyage and Beverly once wrote goods received last spring damnified and to cap the climax have filled my house with cockroaches. The colors worn by the men were often varied and bright Kyler of New York ordered a suit of superfine scarlet plush with chaloon and all trimmings a coat and vest of light blue hair plush with all trimmings and fine chaloon suitable for each one merchant wanted a cleric colored duffel another gay broadcloth coat vest and breeches and still another two pieces of colored gingham for a summer suit all clothes even those which were fairly simple and worn by people of moderate means were adorned with buttons made of brass and other metals pearl or cloth covered in addition to damask and silk stuffs the women war collico and gingham printed in checks patterns and figures dots shells or diamonds which on one occasion Stephen Collins complained were too large and flaunting to suit the Philadelphia market sometimes a pattern was stamped on the cloth in London and was worked with cruel or floss in the colonies women's hats were made of silk or straw their hoods of velvet or silk and their stockings of silk thread cotton worsted and even plush shoes were often very elaborate with lepers of silk or damask and those for girls were made of leather calfskin kid or Morocco with silver laces and heels of wood covered with silk gloves which were worn from infancy to old age partly for reasons of fashion and partly to preserve the whiteness of the skin were sometimes imported and sometimes made by the local tailor who like the blacksmith was a craftsman of many accomplishments as for minor adornments the ladies carried fans and wore girdles with buckles but as a rule they possessed little jewelry except bracelets and a variety of finger rings either of plain gold or set with diamonds or rubies and an occasional thumb ring the men also wore rings commonly bearing a seal of carnelian cut with the wearer's arms or some other device many of the morning rings were realistically made with death's heads as can be seen from the advertisements of the jewelers the wearing of jewelry became much more common after 1750 earrings appeared and even knee buckles and shoe buckles tended to become more common in the modern day underwear and lingerie in the modern sense were almost unknown and though night gowns aren't mentioned it is uncertain whether they were designed for sleeping purposes whereas it's more likely for dressing gowns or my ladies toilet for outside wear for the men there were great coats and for the women coats and mantillas often scarlet and blue and for children older folk and soldiers there were splatter dashes a legging made of black glaze linen and royal cloth capes when traveling in the rain and the women put on a protective petticoat sometimes called a weather skirt and wore clogs or patterns against the mud umbrellas are mentioned early in the century but they were probably only carriage tops awnings or sunshades parasols were used by a few but sunbonnets collages were customary on sunny days wigs were worn by men of all ranks even by servants and wig and peruch makers were to be found in all the large wig blocks frequently appear among the invoices and before the queue came in many of the fashionable folk used bags for the hair last for making shoes liquid blacking and shoe brushes as well as hairbrushes were usually imported in traveling men carried clean shirts waistcoats and caps and most interesting of all clean sheets but only occasionally clean stockings and handkerchiefs soap was frequently included in invoices much of it made in New England all southern plantations soap houses with large copper vessels and other utensils in which soap was made for laundry purposes wash balls were imported possibly for domestic use but they were also an important part of the barber's outfit men had their own razors and hones and shave themselves but those of the richer classes either went to the barber at so much a quarter or had the barber come to their houses of indoor bathing it is difficult to find any trace there were bathing pools on some of the southern plantations and swimming holes abounded then as now but probably bathtubs were entirely unknown and washing was as far as the colonists ablutions went the toothbrush had not yet been invented but toothbrushes and tooth powders were in use as early as 1718 we read for instance of the Essence of Pearl guaranteed to do everything for the teeth of the dentium conservator and of another preparation of which the name is not given but which was to be rubbed on with a cloth once a day with the injunction however that if you preserve their beauty used it only twice a week salt and water was the commonest dentifers that these prophylactics were not very successful is evident from the prevalent toothache and decay which necessitated frequent pulling and an early resort to false teeth there were many individuals in the colonies who made such teeth and fastened them in their dentistry was as yet hardly a vocation by itself the apothecaries the doctors and even the barbers pulled teeth and some of them posed as dentists the goldsmiths advertised false teeth for sale spectacles or spectacles as one writer spells them were ordinarily used when necessary and ear trumpets were occasionally resorted to by the death interesting and picturesquas are these manifold details of household equipment and personal use in the old colonial days it is the color and energy of the daily life of the people of that time which make a deeper appeal to the reader of the 20th century among the poorer colonists who composed nine tenths of the colonial population life was a hundred round of activities on the farm and in the shop in the houses of the rich women concern themselves with their household duties dress and embroider of all kinds in some instances they manage the estate engaged in business and even took part in politics in the towns many of the retail stores were conducted by women Ruth Richardson of Talbot County, Maryland carried on her husband's affairs after his death and Martha Custis before her marriage with George Washington continued the correspondence and administer the plantation of her first husband who died in 1757 Madame Smith wife of the second land grave was another famous manager in 1732 Mrs. Andrew Galbraith of Donego, Pennsylvania took part in her husband's political campaign mounted her favorite mayor Nellie and with her spur at her heel and her red cloak flying in the wind scoured the country from one end to the other needless to say Andrew was elected colonial marriages took place that even so early in ages 14 and the number of men and women who were married two three and four times was large instances of a thrice widower marrying a twice or thrice widow are not uncommon girls thus became the mothers of children before they were out of their teens married Dr. John Rutledge when she was 14 and was the mother of seven children before she was 25 Ursula Bird who married Robert Beverly had a son and died before she was 17 Sarah Breck was only 16 or 17 when she married Dr. Benjamin Gott Sarah Peer Pot was 17 when she married Jonathan Edwards and Hannah Gardner was of the same age when she married Dr. McSparron large families even of 26 children of a single mother recorded but infant mortality was very great John Coleman and Judith Hobby had 14 children of whom five died at birth and only four grew up and married one took the well known Dr. Thomas Bullfinch of Boston though Sarah Hext lived to be 68 many mothers died early and often in childbirth an instance is given of a bearing ground near Bath, Maine in which there were the graves of ten married women eight of whom had died between the ages of 22 and 30 probably as the result of families and overwork. Second marriages were the rule though probably few were as sudden as that of the San Dominion Isaac Winslow who proposed to Ben Davis' daughter on the eve of the day he married his wife and married her within a week. The marriage ceremony generally took place at home instead of in the church and in many of the colonies was followed by a bountiful supper, cards and dancing there were often bridesmaids, diamond wedding rings and elaborate hospitality in New England the festivities lasted two or three days in a visitor's state a week in the south one proposing to marry had to give bond that the marriage would not result in a charge on the community and usually the bands were read three times a meeting and a license was obtained and recorded in Virginia where the county clerks granted licenses children under age could not marry without the consent of their parents and indentured servants could not marry during their servitude in Connecticut the bands were published but once and protests against the marriage were affixed to the signpost or the church door blanks for licenses were distributed by the governor and could be obtained of the local authorities a curious custom was that of bundling sometimes also called tarrying though the practices seem to have been different which Burnaby describes as putting the courting couple into bed with garments on to prevent scandal when if the parties agree it is all very well the bands are published and the two are married without delay a curious custom which prevailed from New England to South Carolina made the second husband responsible for the deaths of the first unless the bride were married in her chemise in the King's Highway in one instance the lady stood in a closet and extended her hand through the door and in another well authenticated both chemise and closet were dispensed with divorces were rare the Anglican church refused to sanction them and the crown for bad colonial legislatures to pass bills granting them the matter was therefore left to courts as New England courts refused to break a will so as a rule they refused to grant a divorce though there are a number of exceptions for divorces were allowed in both Massachusetts and Connecticut in the case of unhappy marriages separation by mutual agreement was occasionally resorted to sometimes the lady ran away and indeed advertisements for runaway wives seem almost as common in southern newspapers as those for runaway servants marriages between colonial women and officials missionaries of the society for the propagation of the gospel and even occasional visitors from abroad were not infrequent so William Draper Knight of the Bath who made an American tour in 1770 who'd and one during his journey Susanna daughter of Oliver the Lancy of New York family life in the colonies was full of affection though the expression of feeling was usually restrained and formal Colonel Thomas Jones for example addressed his fiance Elizabeth cock a widow and a niece of Mark Catesby the naturalist as madam or dearest madam during their engagement though after their marriage his greeting was my dearest life one of his wife's letters the gallant and devoted Jones read over about 20 times and his correspondence with her contains such gems of solicitude as this in my heart could take a flight from the imprisonment of a worthless carcass little better than dirt it should whisper to you in your slumbers the truth of my soul that you may be agreeably surprised with the luster of celestial vision surrounding you on every side with presence of joy and comfort in one continue sleep to the sparkling rays of the sun puts you in mind with him to bless the earth with your presence Richard Stockton writing to his wife Amelia from London in 1760 said that he had been running to every American coffee house to see if any vessels are bound to your side of the water and added I see not an obliging tender wife but the image of my dear Amelia is full and view I see not a hearty imperious and ignorant being but I rejoice that the partner of my life is so much the opposite affection for children was not often openly expressed in New England though ample testimony shows that it existed children were repressed in mind as well as embody and their natural and youthful spirits were generally ascribed to original sin toward their parents their attitude was decorous in the extreme Deborah Jeffery's address to father as honored sir and wrote I was much pleased to hear my letters were agreeable to you and mama I shall always do my endeavor to please such kind and tender parents education and punishment in colonial days went frequently hand in hand and servants and children were often treated with extreme harshness whipping was the universal remedy for misbehavior and was resorted to on all occasions in the case of children in their early years of servants throughout the period of their indenture and am rigorous during their whole lives yet one cannot read Colonel Jones says reference to these two dear pledges of your love in a letter to his wife or William Beverly's lament for his son who died as he thought for lack of care went away from home without realizing the depth of parental love in colonial times sickness death and the frailties of human life were perennial subjects of conversation and correspondence and few family letters of those days were free from illusions to them from infancy to old age death took ample toll so great was the colonial disregard for the laws of sanitation so little the attention paid to drainage and disinfection the human system was dosed in physics until it could hold no more governor ogle of Maryland said of his predecessor that he took more physics than anyone he had ever known in his life and Maria Bird was accustomed to swallow an abundance of finite whatever that was every home had its medicine chest either made up in England at apothecaries hall or supplied by some nearby druggist who furnished the necessary chemical and galenical medicines Joseph Cuthbert of Savannah for example fitted a box of medicines with directions for use on the plantation medicinal herbs were dispensed by Indian doctors and popular concoctions were taking enlarged doses by credulous people madam Smith wrote that the juice of the Jerusalem Oak had cured all the Negro children on the plantation of a distemper and that several Negroes had drunk as much as half a pint of it at a time nostrums quack remedies and proprietary medicines made by a secret formula were very common we read of wards and a dine pearls to be worn as necklaces by children at teething time of the bees or stone for curing serpent bites of Seneca snake root Bateman spectral drops trilling 10s original balsam Duffy's Alexa counters can's powder Anderson's pills for Haven's chemical tincture and other specifics to be given in a lot of pathway doses Jesuits Bart salt warmwood sweet basil iron treacle calamel flows unwind sell volatile salt and rhubarb were on the family lists and here and there were resorts where people drank medicinal waters or used them for bathing the prominent place which death occupied in colonial thought and experience gave to funerals the character of social functions and public events they were objects of general interest and were usually attended by crowds of people children were allowed to attend often as paul bearers that they might be impressed with the significance of death as the inevitable end of a life of trial and probation everywhere before the reaction of the sixties funerals were occasions of expense and extravagant display it was unusual to find Robert Hume of Charleston declaring in his will that his funeral should not cost over 10 pounds that the coffin should be plain and not covered by paul and that none of his relatives should wear at morning occasionally a colonist expressed the wish to be buried without pomp or funeral sermon but such a preference was rare the living of gloves rings and scarves was provided for in nearly every will and it is easy to believe the report that some of the clergy accumulated these articles by the hundred drinking even to the point of intoxication at funerals became such a scandal that ministers in England funded at the practice from the pulpit and Edmund Watson Virginia was moved to declare in his will that no strong Greek be provided or spent when he was buried but the custom was too deep seated to be easily eradicated the dead were buried in the burying ground or church yard though private burial places were customary on the plantations and in many parts of northern New York and New England at Annapolis a lot in the church yard was leased at a nominal rent but interment within the church was allowed for a consideration which was possible only to people of wealth and which went to the rector a potter's field seems hardly to have been known in colonial times for we are told that the poorer classes and there goes in Baltimore buried their deceased relations and acquaintances in several streets and alleys of the town and that not until 1792 was a special section set apart for their use a suicide was entered at a crossroads day and a stake was driven through the body usually except among the Quakers stones table monuments and head pieces were erected over the dead and often bore elaborate and curious inscriptions and carvings more or less crude the commonest materials free stone cyanide and slate were usually quarried in the colonies though Marvel was always brought from England Martha Custis procured in London a Marvel tune for our first husband and William Beverly directed that a stone of this material be imported for his father's grave vaults were constructed by those who could afford them and were widely used in the north in the 18th century End of chapter 4 Chapter 5 of colonial folk ways by Charles McLean Andrews this LibriVox recording is in the public domain everyday needs and diversions there was no want of food in colonial households and little scarcity or threatened famine in the land of our forefathers though the southern and west Indian colonists paid but little attention to the raising of the more important food staples they were able to obtain an adequate supply through channels of distribution that remained almost unchanged throughout the colonial period the provisions of New England and the flour, beef, pork and peas of New York and Pennsylvania were carried wherever they were wanted and satisfied the demands of those who were otherwise absorbed in the cultivation of tobacco, rice, indigo and sugar the greatest difficulty lay in the preservation of perishable foods for the colonists had as yet no adequate means of keeping fresh their meats and provisions in the outlying districts where supplies were irregular many a family lived on smoked, salted and pickled foods and during the winter were entirely without the fresh meats and green vegetables which were available in the summer and autumn seasons this need was partly satisfied by the plentiful supply of venison obtained from the forests for the colonists were great hunters fouling pieces, powder flasks shot bags, worms and ramrods were a part of every country householder's equipment though deer and wild birds were less plentiful in the 18th and in the 17th century their number was still large and wild turkeys geese, pigeons, hares and squirrels were always to be found fish abounded in the rivers, lobsters were nibble off the shores in considerable numbers clams were always plentiful and oysters were eaten not only along the sea coast from Maine to Georgia even in the back country as far as the Shenandoah wither they were sent packed in old barrels and flower casks lest the wagoners get foul of them turtles caught in the neighborhood or sent from the West Indies were frequently served up on the tables with the richer families and all the colonies even buffalo steaks were eaten for John Rowe records a dinner in 1768 of which venison, buffalo steaks, perch, trout and salmon were placed before the guests nearly all the meats, vegetables and fruits familiar to housekeepers of today were known to the colonial Danes in the better houses, beef, mutton lamb, pork, ham, bacon and smoked and dried fish were eaten as well as sausages cheese and butter which were usually homemade in New England though in the middle colonies on the south cheese was frequently imported from Rhode Island it is related that once when Beekman of New York could not sell some Rhode Island cheese that was loosing in weight and spoiling with maggots he proposed to have it hogged about the town by a cart man as for vegetables, the New Englander was familiar with cabbages radishes, lettuce, turnips green, corn, carrots parsnips, spinach, onions beets, parsley, savory, mustard pepper, grass, celery, cauliflower squashes, pumpkins, beans peas and asparagus but only the more prosperous householders pretended to cultivate even a majority of these in their gardens in the rural districts only cabbages beans, pumpkins and other vegetables of the coarser varieties were grown potatoes were not introduced until after the advent of the Scotch Irish in 1720 and they did not for some time become a common vegetable Dr. McSparin of Rhode Island made a record in his diary in 1743 that potatoes were being dug and Burkitt speaks of them as being plantedly produced by the year 1750 tomatoes were hardly yet deemed edible and only an occasional mention of cucumbers can be found in the south sweet potatoes early became popular and watermelons and muskmelons were raised in large quantities though they were grown in the north also to some extent every southern plantation notably in Virginia had its vegetable and flower garden and familiar items in the lists of articles ordered from England are the seeds and roots which the planter wanted fruit was abundant everywhere apples, pears, peaches apricots, damsons, plums, quinces, cherries and crab apples were all raised in the orchards north and south while oranges probably small and very sour were grown in South Carolina and on governor grants plantation in east Florida English and Italian gardeners were employed by certain of the wealthier planters and often exhibited superior skill in matters of propagating plants and shrubs at first graphs were obtained from England and the continent but as early as 1735 Paul Amades started his Georgian nursery in South Carolina and later William Prince established in the north a large fruit nursery at Flushing Long Island where he said that he had 15,000 trees fit to remove all inoculated and grafted from varying trees Christian LeMond began a similar business in South Pennsylvania of the smaller fruits strawberries, blackberries and gooseberries were cultivated and highly prized while strawberries and huckleberries were as well known as they are now and grapes were found in enormous quantities in a wild state though efforts to grow vineyards for the purpose of making wine were never very successful in preparing vegetables and fruits for preserving both for the winter supply at home and the southern and west markets the new England housewives proved themselves eminently resourceful and skillful they pickled Indian corn and other vegetables nuts and oysters they dried apples or else made them into sauce and butter and they preserved fruits not in cans with sealed jars but in huge crocs covered with paper and so sealed that the fruit would keep for a long time without fermenting for spices and condiments however all the colonists had to depend on outside sources capers English walnuts, anchovies, nutmegs pepper, maize, cloves, cinnamon ginger, olive, salad oil, almonds, raisins and dried currants were commonly ordered from England lemons which in 1763 were declared to have become almost a necessity for the health and comfort of the inhabitants of North America were obtained from the Mediterranean and the West Indies coffee, tea, hyacinth, bohia, congo and green and cocoa nuts came from England usually though much of the East Indian cocoa was smuggled in from Amsterdam or the foreign West Indies from the latter came also sweetmeats, tamarinds, preserved ginger, citrons and limes which were often brought by the sea captains as presents from West India merchants to whom hams, turkeys, geese and the like were sent in return spices and coffee were ground at home and cocoa nuts were made into chocolate either at home or at a neighboring mill Beverly ordered a stone and roller pairing chocolate on his plantation in a new England there were several chocolate mills where the beans were crushed either for the housewife at her request or for sale in the country households of the north nearly everything for the table was obtained from the farm and only salt, sugar and spices were bought even sugar was a luxury maple sugar honey and brown muscovado sugar were sometimes used but the common sweetening was molasses though this was rejected in the south for table use the food though ample in quantity was lacking in variety and was heavier and less appetizing than in the cities the commonest dishes were pork smoked salmon, red herring cod mackerel, Indian meal in many forms vegetables including the familiar sacretage, pies and puddings but in the northern cities the variety was greater and equal that of the south Philadelphia had scores of families whose elaborate table seemed a sinful waste to John Adams who has recorded in his diary the luxury of the Quaker households in Massachusetts the extravagance of hospitality was nonetheless marked Henry Vassel's expense book mentions oysters, herrings, mackerel, salmon sausages, cheese, almonds, biscuit ducks, chickens, turkeys fowls, quails, teals pigeons, beef, calves, head rabbit, lamb, biel, venison and quantities of vegetables and fruit as well as honey, chocolate and lemons in Virginia breakfast at least was a less elaborate meal than in New England, Harrow word tells us that at Belvedere it consists of tea, coffee or chocolate warm bread, butter and cold meat Edis mentions a Maryland breakfast of tea, coffee and the usual accompaniments ham, dried venison beef and other relishing articles dinner which was always served at noon consisted at Belvedere of smoked bacon or what we call pork ham either warm or cold when warm we have also either warm roast pig lamb, ducks or chicken green peas or anything else they fancy as these colonists also had plenty of roast and boiled and good strong beer it is perhaps not to be wondered at that they but seldom eat any supper fifthian speaks of a winter plan at nominee hall with coffee just at evening and supper between 8 and 9 o'clock Quincy gives an account of his entertainment which is full of interest, table decent but not inelegant provisions in different but well-dressed good wines and festivity and again on other occasions a prodigious fine pudding made of what they call rice flour knick-knacks brought on table after removal of meats a most genteel supper a solid plentiful good table what most impressed him were the superior quality of the wines the frequent exchange of toasts and the presence of musicians Adam Gordon said of Charleston that beef and mutton middling and the fish very rare and expensive all the poor he added and many of the rich eat rice for bread and give it even a preference they use it in their cakes called journey cakes and boiled or else boiled Indian corn which they call hominy it is a well-known fact that the colonists were heavy drinkers and that they consumed liquors of every variety in enormous quantities on all important occasions baptisms weddings funerals barn raisings church raisings house raisings ship launchings ordinations perambulations or beating the bounds at meetings of commissions and committees and in taverns clubs and private houses in new england a new officer was expected on training day to wet his commission bountifully among the new england farmers beer cider cider brandy and rum were the ordinary beverages cider however gradually supplanted beer and the thrifty farmers sometimes laid in for the winter a supply from ten to thirty barrels a keg or a punch of rum would usually lie alongside the barrels of cider in the cellar they would be left to ripen with age with the assistance of about five dozen apples peeled and cut in pieces which were added to improve the flavor beer was brooded home by the wives or in breweries in some of the towns even Charleston experimented in brewing with malt from Philadelphia ale and small beer in bottles were imported from england and spruce beer was used as a drink and sometimes as a remedy against scurvy rum was distilled in all the leading new england towns notably at Boston and Newport not only was it drunk at home and served out as a regular allowance to artisans and workmen but it was also used in trade with the Indians in dealings with the fishermen off Nova Scotia and Newfoundland in exchange with the southern colonies for grain and naval stores in the purchase of slaves in Africa rum from the West Indies was always more highly prized than that in England and brought a higher price in the market though in all the colonies rum was a common drink in Iraq was consumed also to some extent on southern tables the colonists in the north were more addicted to both these drinks than were the southerners and the colonists in New England more than those in New York and Pennsylvania where beer drinking predominated among the Dutch and the Germans on southern plantations the large number of distilleries which existed in the presence of still houses and sweat worms indicate a wider activity than merely the distilling of rum from molasses quantities of apple and peach brandy cherry fling and cherry rum were made in Virginia and South Carolina and we know that on one occasion Van Courtland of New York squared a single Virginia account by accepting 600 gallons of peach brandy instead of cash to a certain extent fruit brandies were made in the north also but the famous Applejack of New Jersey does not appear to have been introduced until just before the revolution it has been truly said that fruit growing in America had its beginning and for almost 200 years its whole sustenance in the demand for strong drink of imported wines those most frequently in demand were Madeira Claret, Canary, Vedonia, Burgundy and other French wines poured in brandy a sort of homemade claret was prepared from wild grapes by the Huguenots at Mannequin town but it always remained an experiment Claret was a table drink in New England but Gerard Beekman wrote in 1753 that it was in no demand in New York and that French wines were not in favor though it was imported in considerable quantities brandy never became a popular colonial drink and in Charleston when the price was high it was used chiefly for medicinal purposes in the same city Canary, Vedonia was considered much inferior to Madeira and was not usually liked because it was too sweet Burkitt however said that it was a common drink among people of fortune in New England though it was harsh in taste and inclined to look thick as a rule the colonists did not like sweet wines and for this reason the aromatic momsy never pleased the colonial palate Quincy who found the Charleston wines by odds the richest he had ever tasted thought them superior to those served by John Hancock of Boston and Henry Basil of Cambridge his account of the customary protracted toasting and drinking at Charleston tables the story Hamilton has said to have related of Washington general age told it says London in his diary that general Washington not withstanding his perfect regularity and love of decorum could bear to drink more wine than most people he loved to make a procrastinated dinner made it a rule to drink a glass of wine with every one at table and yet always drank three to four or more glasses of wine after dinner according to his company and every night took a pint of cream and an excellent idea of the customary drinks of these colonial times can be gained from a list issued in 1744 by the County Court of Chihuahua, North Carolina mentioning Madeira canary Bedonia Carolina cider northern cider strong malt beer of American make flip with half a pint of rum in it porter from Great Britain punched with low sugar lime juice and half a pint of rum pretty shale or beer bottled and wired in Great Britain flip was made in different ways but a common variety was a mixture of rum, pumpkin beer and brown sugar into which a red hot poker had been plunged for lighter drinks there were lemonade, citron water, distillations of anise, seed, oranges, cloves treacle, rotifia, peppermint and angelica and other homemade quarters and liqueurs taverns usually poor in appearance and service were to be found everywhere from Maine to Georgia in the towns on the traveled roads and at the ferry landings they not only offered accommodations for man and beast but frequently served also for council and assembly meetings social gatherings merchants associations preaching the acting of plays and their balconies proved convenient for the making of public speeches and announcements the taverns which also provided resorts where it was possible for gentlemen to enjoy their bowl and bottled with satisfaction were the scenes of a vast amount of hard drinking and quarreling he was for instance in a corner parlor of Hathaway's tavern in Charleston in 1770 that Delancey was mortally wounded by Hadley in a dual fought with pistols in the dark men met at the taverns and clubs to play billiards and cards to drink and to gamble and the following record shows the sort of score that they ran out punch and game of billiards one pack of cards to flip at whisk, whisk to punch at hombre, ditto at all fours, to liquor at billiards all night, to sangory and wine to sack, punch and beer club to brandy punch, to to sangories at billiards to punchy cards club afterwards many of the taverns had skittle alleys and shuffleboards but neither of these games nor billiards and bowling were confined to public resorts billiard tables would be found in private houses and bowling was often played in alleys especially built for the purpose and we are told that councilman Carter had a bowling green near nominee hall card playing was a common diversion the number of packs of cards must have come in with the first Virginia and Maryland settlers for card tables are known to have been in use on Cant Island as early as 1658 the number of packs of cards imported was prodigious one ship from London brought to the Cape Fear Colony toward the end of this period 144 packs another 576 and another 888 a Boston invoice shows 1584 packs a single Pennsylvania importation was valued for pounds sterling we know that cards were distributed and sold in stores from Portsmouth and Albany to Charleston and as far back as the Shenandoah Valley where Daniel Morgan later a major general under Washington spent his hilarious youth drinking rum playing cards and running up gambling debts from these packs we can appreciate what Peter DuBois meant when he wrote of his days at Wilmington I live very much retired for one of our social set who will drink claret and smoked tobacco in the morning the gentlemen of this town might be so if they please but an intolerable itch for gaming for veils in all companies this I conceive is the bane of society and therefore I shun the devotees to cards and pass my hours chiefly at home with my pipe and some agreeable author Henry Lawrence a merchant mentions the case of a young man in his counting house who had given his note to a card shopper and was with difficulty rescue from the gaping pickpockets who had followed him like a shatter and the stakes was a well-known failing of the vassal family and because of his love for reckless play Henry undoubtedly hastened his bankruptcy but this vice was not confined to the quality for niggers and street boys from Salem to Charleston gambled in the streets at Paw-Paw and Dice and Huzzle-Cat or pitching pennies was so common as to call for protests and grand jury presentments in an effort to abate what was justly deemed a public nuisance the use of tobacco was generally in every class and in every locality even women of the lower classes smoked for there is a reference to one who had a fit dropped a coal from her pipe and was burned to death for smoking and chewing tobacco was either cut and dried or else was made up into pigtails as the small twisted ropes or braids were called though paper tobacco put up in paper packages was coming into favor tobacco was smoked only in pipes either the fine long glazed pipes of clay imported from England and commonly called church wardens or in Indian pipes of red pipe stone often beautifully carved probably the Dutch and Germans continued to use in America their old country porcelain pipes with Benjala stems and it is more than likely that wooden and cob pipes were in fashion in the rural districts cigars were not known in America until after 1800 though in early advertisements snuff was recommended as medicinal the taking of snuff came to be as much a matter of social customers to the rich merchant and planter the snuff box was an article of decoration and it's proper use no matter of etiquette snuff was usually imported in canisters and bladders and occasionally in bottles but there were snuff factories in Philadelphia and New York and the father of Gilbert Stewart was a snuff maker in Rhode Island in addition to the diversion to be obtained from drinking smoking and gambling which may be called the representative colonial vices there were plenty of amusements and sports which absorbed the attention of the colonists north and south the woods and waters offered endless opportunity in summer for fishing and in winter for such time honored pursuits as hunting fouling trapping and fishing through the ice John Roe of Boston was a famous and untiring fisherman thousands of other enthusiasts played the part of colonial Isaac Waltons and there was a fishing club on the Skookle as early as 1732 fishing rods, lines, sinkers and hooks were commonly imported from England the woods were full of such big gamers elk moose, black bears, deer, lynxes pumas or panthers sometimes called tigers, gray wolves and wildcats and there was an abundance of such smaller animals as foxes, beavers, martens or fishers otters, weasels, minks, raccoons and musk rats or musk washes as they are still called in rural New England these animals were killed without regard for the future of the species sometimes the settlers even resorted to the wasteful an unsportsman like method of burning the forest so that the larger animals began to disappear from the eastern regions buffaloes for instance were formerly found in North Carolina as far east as Craven County but in the up country of South Carolina it was said that three or four men with dogs could kill twenty of these animals in a day in the same state the last elk had been killed as early as 1781 there was the case otherwise with the smaller gamon fowl wooden decoys and camouflage boats aided in the destruction of the ducks aged pigeons were used to attract the wilder members of the species which were shot in large numbers particularly in New England and so unlicensed had the destruction of the heath and become in New York that in 1708 the province determined to protect its game by providing for a closed season thus early did the movement for conservation began in America the sport of hunting led to the improvement of firearms and to the introduction of the English customer fox hunting guns which had formerly been clumsy and unreliable were now perfected to such a degree that we find references to a gun which would repeat six times a chamber gun a double barrel gun and a neat birding piece mounted with brass rifles which were common were used for target practice as well as for hunting rifle matches were arranged in Virginia on mustard days and in Connecticut shooting at a mark for a money prize was a favorite diversion on training days both the Virginians and the New Yorkers were called fox hunters and very fond of riding to hounds for which they imported their foxes from England in the south the two leading sports were horse racing and cock fighting though the format was an absorbing passion in all the colonies cock fighting so well illustrated in Hogarth's famous engraving which may well have been on many a colonial wall after 1760 was a sport which had been brought to America from England and which had lost none of its brutality in the transfer and the local rivalry was intense we read for example that a main of Cox was fought between the gentlemen of Gloucester and those of James River in which 20 pairs were matched and fought for five guineas the battle and 50 guineas the odd when Gloucester won James River challenge again and this time came out ahead and so the contest went on matches were frequently advertised in the Annapolis Williamsburg and Charleston papers stating in each case so many Cox so many battles so much each and so much the odd in guineas pounds and pistolies champion Cox like horses were known by name and were pitted against all comers Quincy saw five battles on his way from Williamsburg to Point Royal and mentions having met in Maryland two persons of the middling rank in life who had spent three successive days in cock fighting and as many nights in riot and debauchery horse racing was even more engrossing than cock fighting what is perhaps the earliest recorded race took place in York County, Virginia in 1774 when a tailor and a physician had a brush with their horses in consequence of which the tailor was fined by the county court because it was contrary to the law for a laborer to make a race being a sport only for gentlemen racing in Virginia was thus enjoyed as an occasional pastime at a very early date though it did not become a regular practice until after 1730 when the first blooded stallion was imported apparently the earliest race outside of Virginia occurred in 1694 when Sam Jennings was charged with being drunk when riding a horse race with Jay Slocum it may be noted in passing that horse racing gambling and possessing a billiard table were forbidden by law in Connecticut and that all such pursuits were discouraged though not forbidden in Massachusetts and Rhode Island races were run on greens at New Market in New Hampshire at Hampstead Flatland Plains and around Beaverpond online island on John Vanderbilt's field on Staten Island at Paula's Town Jersey City at Morris Town and Perth Amboy in New Jersey at center course near Philadelphia and at Lancaster in the same colony at the race course near Annapolis at Alexandria Fredericksburg and many other places in Virginia races were also run on dozens of race paths in North and South Carolina where large plantations have their own courses as well as on such public tracks as the round course at Monks Corner York course at the Old Quarter House and Thomas Butler's race ground neck. The number of blooded stallions and mayors in the colonies before the revolution must have been very large Massachusetts was the home of many blooded horses Rhode Island was famous for its narrow gans at Pacers and even Connecticut had stallions obtained from England for breeding purposes Virginia alone beginning her importation with bully rock in 1730 has record of 50 stallions and 30 mayors bred from stock introduced from England and the services of breeding horses were frequently advertised the horses used for racing were of course runners and Pacers as the trotting horse had not yet been introduced in the time which they made is recorded as low as two minutes the fast colts of Governor Sharp of Maryland were well known and Governor Ogil had a famous imported horse named spark the narrow gans at Pacers as they were called were the most distinctive colonial breed and horsemen from the southern colonies visited Rhode Island purchased stock and advertised the merits of their animals some of the colonial horse breeders preferred to buy their stock in England and it is interesting to note as an indication of the value of horses in those days that Charles Carroll contemplated buying a stallion for 100 pounds sterling and brewed mayors for 50 pounds each is perhaps equally interesting to know that he was dissuaded from his purchase by an in better colonial distrust of the ways of the mother country horse races were of all kinds for scrubs and thoroughbreds three or four year olds colts and fillies the heats were generally the best two out of three and the distance was from one to five miles with entrance fees and double at the post and prizes in the former purses silver punch bowls pint pots and tankards saddles bridles boots jockey caps and the like there were such prizes too as the jockey club plate the town purse and the free mason's plate there was a jockey club in Virginia before the revolution but that in Maryland was not recognized until 1783 crowds were large the side betting was heavy and pickpockets were always on hand the jockeys black or white who rode the horses were sometimes thrown and seriously injured or killed on at least one course a ladies gallery or grandstand was erected and there were doubtless others elsewhere so great was the popularity of these races that the quaker peck over had to wait until a Virginia race was over before he could hold a meeting it was at New England racing was one of the most conspicuous incidents these fairs were held in all the colonies outside of New England and even there they were occasionally held except in Connecticut whereas the very racist Samuel Peter says dancing fishing hunting skating and slaying on the ice were the only amusements allowed though the fairs were in most cases ordained by law they were sometimes purely private undertakings as that held it right New Hampshire which was promoted at Williamsburg in 1739 which found its support in a fund raised by a group of gentlemen the object of the fair was to bring people together to encourage trade and to provide a general commerce or traffic among persons that want to buy or sell either the product or manufacturer of the country or any other sorts of goods or merchandise and some colonies the fairs which usually lasted for three days were held but once a year in the autumn but in others twice a year in May and in December or October on these occasions horses oxen cow sheep hogs and sundry sorts of goods were exposed for sale the people indulged in such varieties of sport as a slow horse race with a silver watch to the high most a foot race at Williamsburg from the college to the capital a race for women on Long Island with a Holland smock and a gents gown for prizes a race by men in bags and an obstacle race for boys there were cuddling bouts bear baiting a notoriously cruel sport and catching a goose at full speed or a pig with a grease tail there were also such other amusing entertainments as grinning contests by half a dozen men or women for a roll of tobacco or a plum pudding and whistling contests for a guinea in which the participants were to whistle selected tunes as clearly as possible without laughing the people enjoy puppet shows rope walking and fortune telling and the ubiquitous medicine hawker sold his wares from a stage about rangs the odd tricks of his merry Andrew and the surprising feats of his little boy always attracted a crowd the fairs were also utilized in Virginia as an occasion for paying debts trading horses buying land and obtaining bills of exchange prominent among more aristocratic colonial diversions were the balls and assemblies given in private and public houses where dancing was the order of the evening dancing though not strictly forbidden in New England was not encouraged particularly if it were promiscuous or mixed yet so frequent were the occasions for dancing that many dancing schools were conducted in the larger towns one of the most noted was that of Charles Pelham in Boston where in 1754 lessons were given three afternoons a week state balls governor's assemblies and private gatherings were marked by lavish display formal etiquette and prolonged dancing drinking and card playing the quality who arrived in coaches wore their most respondent costumes went through the steps of the stately menu and also joined in the jigs reels marches country dances and horn pipes which were all in bogey at that time music which was a popular colonial accomplishment was taught as an important subject in a number of schools and many of daughter was kept at her scales until she cried from sheer exhaustion in the south the colonists were familiar with such musical instruments as the spinet harpsichord piano forte vial violin bill on cello guitar german flute french horn and jew's harp jefferson was vastly pleased with jenny talia ferro's playing on the spinet and singing benjamin carter son of councilman carter of nominee hall had a guitar a harpsichord piano forte a harmonica a violin a german flute and an organ he also had a good ear for music and as vithian tells us was indefatigable in practice captain gallant went to a consort in bolstein where the performance playing on four small violins one bass violin a german flute and an indifference small organ did as well as could be expected joseph quincey attended a meeting of the saint sesilla society and charleston in a large and elegant building where the performers were all at one end of the hall and the music he thought was good playing on the bass viols and french horns being grand but that on the harpsichord badly done though the performance of a recently arrived french violinist was incomparable the capitol defective this concert he said was want of an organ interest in the drama in these early days was much less general than the love of music going to the rare opportunities which the people had foreseen plays while they may have been private performances given by amateurs in the 17th century the earliest of which we have any record where those given before governor spotswood and williamsburg probably in the theater erected in 1716 that in the playhouse in new york before 1733 and that in the courtroom in charleston in 1735 taverns courtrooms and warehouses were used for much of the early acting and the first theaters in williamsburg new york charleston philadelphia and anapolis were crude affairs rough unadorned buildings very much like warehouses or tobacco barns in appearance there were no professional companies until 1750 when murray king louis hallon and david douglas began the history of the theater in america and aroused a great deal of interest in plays and play going from new york to savannah nearly all the plays both tragedies of these days were of english origin some of these early dramas were the recruiting officer the orphan the spanish fire or the double discovery the jealous wife the adosius or the morning bride the distressed mother loved in a village the provoked husband the school for lovers and a few of shakespeare's plays such as the tempest king lear hamlet and romeo and juliae the earlier plays had been written in america but not acted there was performed at philadelphia in 1767 the first american tragedy the prince of partheia by thomas godfrey son of the wea godfrey with whom franklin boarded for a time and who shares with hadley the honor of inventing the quadrant though there was no theater in new england until later in 1732 the new england weekly journal of boston in defiance of puritan prejudice printed in its columns a play the london merchant though the quaker opposition was not overcome until 1754 in philadelphia when hallam went there with his company the first permanent theater in america the south work was built in that city in 1766 and it was there a year later that godfrey's tragedy was performed during the 20 years preceding the revolution theater going was a constant aversion among the better class in the middle and southern colonies the mrs. manna galt of charleston tells us in her diary that she went five times in a week carnal jones wrote from williamsburg in 1736 she may tell betty pratt his step daughter there has been but two plays acted since she went which is catered by the young gentleman of the college as they call themselves and the busy body by the company on wednesday night last and i believe there will be another tonight they've been at a great loss for a fine lady who i think is called rinda but that difficulty is overcome by finding her which was to be the greatest secret and as such to be mrs. anderson that came to town with mrs. carter william allison writing from faulmouth virginia in 1771 said the best set of players that ever performed in america are to open the theater in fred ricksburg on wednesday next and continue for some weeks quincey saw hallam in the padlock and that gamester in new york in 1773 and thought him indifferent in tragedy but better in comedy while some of his company acted superlatively occasional amusements of a less formal or permanent nature existed in great variety itinerant performers passed up and down the colonies dougie an artist on the slack wire began his exhibitions in 1732 at van der berg's garden in new york mrs. elner harvey made quite a sensation as a fortune teller shortly before the revolution exhibitions of dwarfs electrical devices and displays musical clocks and punch and judy shows were common in most of the cities in larger towns wax works were also very popular and of these the most famous were those of mrs. right with the figures of whitefield and john dickinson and groups illustrating the return of the prodigal son the beginnings of a menagerie in circus may be seen in the exhibition of a lion in the mrs. new york and connecticut in 1729 the horses that did tricks in the dogs that rode sitting up in the saddle and the shows that occasionally came to new england towns on important occasions fireworks rockets wheels and candles were set off michelle gives an entertaining account of a display at williamsburg in 1702 which a number of mishaps occurred the show began with a reverse rocket which was to pass along a string to an arbor where prominent ladies were seated but it got stuck halfway and exploded two stars wheels were to revolve through the fireworks but they succeeded no better than with the rockets in short nothing was successful the rockets also refused to fly up but fell down arch like so that it was not worthwhile seeing most of the people however had never seen such things and praise them highly the color and the days of st. andrew st patrick st david and st george were celebrated in the south with drinking and speechmaking and st tamini day was observed in philadelphia with music and feasting christmas week was a period of merry making not only in the south but also among the anglicans in the north where christmas service was always held in kings chapel in boston in both sections of the country the occasion was marked by presence to members of the family and to friends about boxes that turned familiar to the southerners and still in use in england to the servants and tradesmen it was customary to observe gunpowder day the 5th of november in northern cities where it was called pope day and was celebrated by boys from the procession effigies of the pope the devil and anyone else who was for the moment in popular disfavor the day however was accompanied by so much routiness and disturbance of the peace and portsmouth new hampshire that its continuance was forbidden in 1768 by order of the assembly thanksgiving day that time honored new england institution which originated with the pilgrim fathers in 1621 had become in the 18th century an annual november observance proclaimed by the governor during this holiday was performed the people gathered at church and feasted at their homes surrounded by their kin from far and near engaging occasionally in harmless enjoyment but without hilarity or unseemly indulgence in the north especially quartz football ball and bat not baseball which was a 19th century introduction stew ball the forerunner of cricket with the wicket originally a stool cricket and wicket were common sports bowling billiards and shuffle board have already been mentioned for younger people there were plenty of reg tops and other gains so admirably described by mrs. Earl inner child life and colonial dates to whose list may be added pitching pennies button button break the pope's neck little children have their toys and dolls often imported in large quantities from england and dolls of colonial make in indian costumes one of these clad in a dress with a flap or belly cloud stockings muckinsons shells for the neck and with cap of wampum an indian basket and a bow and arrows we embed the third scent as a present to england end of chapter five chapter six of colonial folk ways by Charles McLean Andrews this LibriVox recording is in the public domain the intellectual life in all the colonies interest in intellectual things was limited and the standards reached by the generality were probably no higher than those of the people at large in england in the 18th century in proportion to the population but few persons were highly educated for a majority of the commonest either had no book learning at all or had no more than the rudiments of reading writing and accounting the back country and the frontier had very few schools of any kind and such popular education as was in vogue was confined almost entirely to the older settled regions along the coast and there what is now known as the education of the masses has scarcely yet been thought of even as an ideal to the colonial's popular education in the modern sense was as foreign as were democratic ideas in government the nearest approach to a plan of education for everyone was made in New England at least in Massachusetts and Connecticut including former colonies of Plymouth and New Haven here the colonists recognize the obligation of teaching all children something and imposed on the parents or the towns the duty of providing local schools for the benefit of the community this obligation was so well understood that in laying out new towns particularly the main tracks were frequently set aside for schools not only in Connecticut and Massachusetts but also in New Hampshire, Maine and the Connecticut settlement in the Wyoming valley the higher education necessary for preparing boys for college was furnished partly by the grammar schools and partly perhaps to a larger extent in the earlier period than afterwards by ministers who conducted schools in their directories in order to eke out their modest salaries the subjects taught in the log or clapboarded school houses were reading writing arithmetic and the catechism spelling was introduced early with little effect however as far as uniformity was concerned but English grammar was not cultivated in the schools even in the larger centers until about 1760 the first age to learning were the horn book the ABC book and the primer Dilworth Speller was in general use if we may judge from its frequent appearance in the lists of books imported Governor Wolcott of Connecticut tells us that he never went to school a day in his life but was taught by his mother at home and that he did not learn to read and write until he was 11 years old and his case was no means exceptional men in their wills often made provision for the education of their children but in most cases they desired nothing more than reading and good penmanship and an apprentice who had been taught to write a legible joining hand plane to be read was deemed properly treated by his master grammar schools where Latin and Greek were taught were rare grammar schools in Hartford and New Haven and the Boston Latin school are noteworthy examples of higher education in New England but even these schools did not reach a very high level outside of New England Maryland was the only colony which had a rudimentary system of public education for under the free school act of 1694 a series of schools supported by the counties was planned to be free for all or at least a number of the people's attending such schools were started sometimes by persons of wealth who would subscribe what was needed sometimes they were endowed by a single benefactor who would give money for this purpose during his lifetime or by will at his death the original purpose of the free school was to provide an education for those who were unable to pay tuition even in New England and the rest of the town schools particularly of Massachusetts during the 17th century and the first quarter of the 18th after this time however the maintenance of schools by general taxation became more frequent how many schools were established in Maryland it is difficult to say though an effort was made in 1696 to erect a school under the terms of the free school act nothing was accomplished at the time as late as 1707 Governor Seymour could say that not one step had been taken for the encouragement of learning in Maryland the fact however that the school founded at Annapolis was called King Williams school confirms the belief that a building was erected in 1701 before the King's death though it is not unlikely that little or no progress was made during the first few years of its existence to this school which was destined in time to grow into St. John's College Benjamin Leonard Calvert left a legacy in 1733 and from that date under the impetus of masters and ushers obtained from England its career was prosperous and continuous on the other side of the bay in Queen Anne County a second school was established in 1723 from the records which are still extant we learned that the subjects taught were reading, writing, arithmetic English, surveying, navigation and geography and that the school possessed a fine assortment of globes, maps and charts it offered an extensive course in mathematics in which it made use of a quadrant scales, encompasses and many English text books for a colonial school its collection of Latin and Greek text, treatises and lexicons was unusually complete but despite its equipment and the fact that in plan and outfit it was manifestly ahead of its time the school had a checkered career and a hard struggle for existence among both the Quakers and the Germans education was intimately bound up with religion and church organization the Friends Public School founded at Philadelphia in 1689 and destined to become the Penn Charter School of Today was not characteristic of the educational life of Pennsylvania wherever they lived the Quakers and Germans tried to establish schools which were more or less under the supervision of their churches and hence they outside the movement which led to the founding of the public school system in America though there were in Pennsylvania many private schools it cannot be said that this colony was a breast educationally of either New England or Virginia the Dutch and New York likewise established a system of parochial schools of which there were two in the period from 1751 to 1762 in the city itself but by far the most elaborate effort to build up schools in the interest of a particular form of doctrine and worship was that made by the society for the propagation of the gospel in foreign parts which after its foundation in 1701 entered upon a vast scheme of evangelization in all the colonies including the West Indies the establishment of libraries and schools formed the most important part of this undertaking in New York alone where the plan found its most complete application between five and ten elementary schools were started a single charity or free school in the city which pay pupils also attended was inaugurated in 1710 and under such deserving school masters the Huddleston's and Joseph Hildreth ran a continuous course until the revolution the other subjects taught were mainly the three Rs the Psalms, Catechism, Bible and Church doctrine it has been justly said that the patronage of schools in America by this society formed the foremost philanthropic movement in education during the colonial period in the colonies of New Jersey Virginia, North and South Carolina and Georgia and to some extent Maryland and New York also the system of education in both was a combination of private tutors small paid schools and an occasional endowed free school or academy the tutorial method and the sending of children to England for their education were possible only among the wealthier families and as free schools were not numerous in these colonies it follows that public education there was not furnished to the children at large Perth Amboy for instance seems to have had no school at all until 1773 and though the society for the propagation of the gospel sent school masters to Burlington the results were meager and New Jersey remained during colonial times without an educational system apart from the usual catechizing in the churches in Virginia education was largely a private business for though the Sims and Eaton free schools the oldest institutions of the kind in the colonies continued to exist they did not grow either in wealth or in efficiency this state had many private schools such as that at St. Mary's in Caroline County kept by Jonathan Boucher who in addition to his duties as rector took boys at 20 pounds for board and education or that of William Prentice and Williamsburg who though a clerk at the time and afterwards a merchant had a school where he taught Latin and Greek and took tuition fees Prentice's pupils David, Cato, Quintus, courteous parents, Justin Fidris Virgil and Caesar and used a gratis, a pantheon a vocabulary, a Greek grammar and two dictionaries sometimes the parents would advertise for any sober diligent person qualified to keep a country school guaranteeing a certain number of pupils that the results were not always satisfactory even among the best families is a parent from Nathaniel Burwell's unfraternal characterization of his brother Louis as one who could neither read spell nor cipher correctly and was in no ways capable of managing his own affairs or fit for any gentleman's conversation prominent planters obtained tutors from England, Scotland and the northern colonies and the accounts given by some of these teachers Benjamin Harrowwer at Captain Danger Fields Philip Fithian at Councilman Carter's Jonathan Boucher at Captain Dixon's throw light on the conditions attending the education of a planter's children the conditions thus described were probably more agreeable than was elsewhere the case for in other instances not only were tutors indentured servants but frequently were treated as such and made to feel the inferiority of their position one John Warden refused to accept the post of tutor in a Virginia family unless the planter and his wife and children were gentlemen the following letter from a Virginia to Macaulay, Perry of London in 1741 must be similar to many dispatch for a like purpose if possible I desire you will send me by Wilcox a school master to teach my children to read and write and cipher the children were two girls 16 and 12 and a boy at five years old I would willingly have such a person as Mr. Locke describes but can't expect such wages as I can afford but I desire he may be a modest, sober discreet person his wages I leave to your discretion the usual wages here for a lot master from Scotland is 20 pounds a year but they commonly teach the children the Scotch dialect which they never can wear off in addition to his employer's children the tutor was generally allowed to take other pupils for whom he could charge tuition Edward did this but had considerable trouble collecting the fees John Portres kept to school on Gibbons's plantation in Georgia where he taught the neighboring children writing grammar and practical mathematics in some instances the tutor acted also as a general fact totem for the plan to even serving as Overseer or steward James Ellerton the English tutor on Madame Smith's estate in South Carolina had as much to do with corn pigs and fences as he did with reading and the rule of three a great many New York, Maryland, Virginia and South Carolina boys of the more wealthy families were sent abroad for their education the sons of Oliver Delancey of New York went to England those of William Byrd the third were at cynics in Kent in 1767 Alexander and John Spots would remain at Eaton four years and Samuel Swan of North Carolina studied in England in 1758 Keith William Pratt Thomas Jones's stepson at the age of 14 was that doctor L. Harondale school in Chelsea learning French Latin Greek writing arithmetic drawing and fencing as far as it is thought necessary for a gentleman his sister Betty age nine wrote him from Virginia when he was eight years old you are God as far as the rule of three in arithmetic but I can't cast up some in addition cleverly but I'm striving to do better every day I can perform a great many dances and I'm now learning the symbol and I speak a word of French despite their English education few Southern boys were as precocious as Jonathan Edwards who began Latin at six was reading Locke on the human understanding when the other boys were lost in Robinson Crusoe and was ready for college at 13 or as Samuel Johnson later president of Kings College who was ambitious to learn Hebrew at six complained of his tutor as such a wretched poor scholar at 10 entered Yale and kept the climax of a long and erudite career by publishing a Hebrew and English grammar at the age of 71 few could quote classical writers or show such wide reading and extensive knowledge of books as did Cotton Mather or Thomas Hutchinson but few in the south were surpassed by the boys in the north in versatility and knowledge of the world many southern lads went to the northern colleges at Philadelphia Princeton and New Haven and a few northern schools to study some such special subject as navigation in the Carolinas there were fewer tutors than in Virginia a large number of private schools however it was maintained in Wilmington Charleston and Savannah there was a provincial free school in Charleston and another at Childsbury in the same colony but the free school founded by Colonel James Innes for the benefit of the youth of North Carolina was not started in Wilmington until 1783 south of Williamsburg there was no seminary for academic studies as Whitefield who tried to turn his orphan house in Savannah into a college in 1764 the private schools which predominated were promoted by private persons who advertised their wares and offered a varied assortment of educational attractions such as arithmetic algebra geometry trigonometry surveying dialing navigation gauging and fortification but there is no reason to believe that the results which they obtained did not justify the claims of the school masters some from motives in which desire for a living was probably a larger factor than zeal for education announced that they weren't ready to go out to receive day pupils or to take borders in the mercantile centers the desire for a practical education was always strong as early as 1713 in New York a demand arose for courses and navigation for the young men's men's education, astronomy and merchants accounts in 1755 a master by the name of James Bragg offered to teach navigation to gentlemen sailors and others in a short time and reasonable in Charleston George Austin Henry Lawrence's partner voiced a general feeling and forecast a modern controversy when he deemed training and business more to his son's advantage than to pour over latin and greek authors of little mercantile career here and there throughout the colonies there were evening schools as in New York Charleston and Savannah French schools as in New York and New Rochelle besides schools for dancing music and fencing and at least one school for teaching the art of manly defense whether shorthand was anywhere taught as doubtful and highly improbable yet from Henry Wolcott Jr of Windsor and Roger Williams Rhode Island to Jonathan Boucher Virginia Mellon there were those who were familiar with it and occasional references to writings and characters were point in the same direction as far as girls were concerned the opportunities for education were limited as a rule they were not admitted to the public schools of New England and coeducation prevailed apparently only on some of the private schools the Venable Society's Charity School in New York and in Pennsylvania particularly among the Germans in 1730 the Charity School had 68 pupils 20 of whom the Moravian Girls School at Bethlehem Pennsylvania and Salem North Carolina were unique of their kind day schools for young ladies were subsequently opened by men and women everywhere for the teaching of reading, writing, flourishing cyphering, French, English and literature and for instruction and embroidery the making of coats of arms painting resin cat-gut and all sorts of colored work and various other feminine accomplishments of the day deemed necessary as one prospectus puts it persons of fortune who have taste a boarding school for girls was opened at Norfolk, Virginia and another in Charleston to the latter of which Lauren sent his eldest daughter but boarding schools though not uncommon for boys particularly after 1750 were rare for colonial maidens some of whom from the south were sent abroad while many others were taught at home manuals on home training were known and used one of which the mother's advice to her daughters described as a small treatise for the education of ladies was imported into New England in 1766 many efforts were made to instruct and Christianize both Indians and Negroes among the best known of these are the labors of Jonathan Edwards among the Indians at Stockbridge of David and John Brainerd among those of New York New Jersey and Pennsylvania and of Eleazar Wheelock and his missionaries among the explorers and at the Indian school in Lebanon there was also an Indian school connected with William & Mary College in Massachusetts in 1751 proposed to start two schools for the instruction of Negro boys and girls to be boarded and taught at the expense of the colony the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel made this work a very important part of its program and instructed its missionaries and school masters to be ready as they have opportunity to teach and instruct the Indians from their children. As a consequence schools for this purpose were opened in many colonial towns and parishes the pioneer Dr. McSparin gave much of his time to catechizing and teaching both Indians and Negroes and there must have been others of the clergy doing the same unselfish work. Even Harrowwer the Virginia Tutor already mentioned read and taught the catechism to a small congregation of Negroes on Captain Dangerfield's Plantation one of the most famous efforts of the elementary education was that of commissary garden of South Carolina who started a Negro school in Charleston in 1744 to which all the Negro and Indian children of the parish were to go for instruction without any charge to their masters funds were collected a building was erected and the school continued for 22 years with from 30 to 70 children who were taught reading, spelling and the chief principles of the Christian religion. In the realm of the higher education colleges Harvard, William and Mary and Yale were already prominent colonial institutions but Princeton in 1753 was still our little infant college of New Jersey and the College of Rhode Island now Brown University and Dartmouth the outgrowth of Wheelock's work at Lebanon were hardly as yet fairly on their feet Kings College now Columbia University and the College and Academy of Philadelphia now University of Pennsylvania organized to promote more liberal and practical studies were just entering on their great careers the degrees granted by the colleges were Bachelor of Arts and Honorary Master of Arts to which in some instances Bachelor of Arts of other colleges were admitted higher degrees such as Dr. Divinity Dr. of Laws and Dr. of Civil Law were not conferred by American colleges but were granted to many a columnist chiefly among the clergy by Oxford Cambridge Aberdeen Glasgow and highest and repeat by Edinburgh occasionally a columnist received a degree from a continental university such as Padua or Utrecht though the cost of a degree in those days ran as high as 25 pounds there was considerable competition among the new England clergy to obtain this distinction and not a little wire pulling was involved in the process for professional training in medicine, surgery, law and art many columnists went abroad to England Scotland and the continent where they studied anatomy, surgery, medicine, pharmacy and chemistry red law and one or other of the ends of court in London were travelled as did Benjamin Weston, John Singleton Copley to see the leading galleries of Europe. One of the first to study surgery abroad was Thomas Bullfinch of Boston who was in Paris in 1720 studying obstetrics he declared in his letters that few surgeons in America knew much of the business that there was no place in the world like Paris I'm studying he writes with the greatest life in Paris and I might say in the universe for that business in 1751 his son Thomas also went over to study pharmacy and boarded in London at the chemists where drugs and medicines were prepared for the hospitals later he turned to surgery, Rose at 7 as he wrote his father walked to Great Marlborough street 3 miles away from his lodgings in Friday street St. Paul's where I am busy in dissection of dead bodies 2.4 in the afternoon sometimes don't allow myself time to dine at 6 I go to Mr. Hunter's lecture in Anatomy where I am kept till 9 he tells us that he did chemical experiments in his chamber and averted himself by seeing Garrick act but the majority of colonial doctors who studied abroad went to Edinburgh Dr. Walter Jones of Virginia one of the most distinguished of them took his degree there in 1769 and has left us in his letters a delightful account of his sojourn in that city the colonists spoke a variety of languages there are thousands who could not write or speak English particularly among those who like the Germans came from foreign lands and not only retained but taught their native tongue in America the Celtic Highlanders who settled at Cross Creek wrote and spoke Gaelic and specimens of their letters and accounts still survive Dutch continued to be spoken in New York and in Albany and his neighborhood it was the prevailing tongue in colonial times and even long after the colonial period had come to an end many of the New York merchants were bilingualist and some of them Robert Sanders for example wrote readily in English, Dutch and French the Huguenots adapted themselves to the use of English more easily than did the Germans and Dutch though many of them in New York and South Carolina continued to use French with the result that even their Negroes acquired a kind of French lingo the advantage of knowing French was generally recognized and among those who regretted their inability to speak the language was Kyler of New York a knowledge of French was desired partly as an accomplishment and partly as a business asset for those who like Charles Carroll had been educated in France thus had a distinct advantage over their fellows other languages were less generally understood Moses Lendo the indigo inspector of Charleston was one of those who spoke Spanish and many of the Jewish merchants and some of the foreign indentured servants were familiar with Spanish and Portuguese there must have been interpreters of Spanish in Connecticut in 1752 when there was some trouble over a Spanish ship at New London much of the evidence is in Spanish and Governor Wolcott who knew nothing of the language had the documents translated for him to a greater extent even than today the exigencies of commerce demanded of those trading with France, Holland, Spain, Portugal and the West Indies the knowledge of the languages used in those countries many colonists who went as merchants or factors to Amsterdam Bordeaux Lisbon or the towns of the foreign West Indies became proficient in one or more tongues in all the colonies there were agents and missionaries who were familiar with Indian speech in addition to such professionals as Conrad Weiser Daniel Klaus, Peter Raxall and Wilox missionaries there were others who though less regularly employed acquired in one way or another a knowledge of Indian speech and were able to act as interpreters many of the slaves were African niggers who spoke no English at all were only what was called black English and for that reason among others the niggers born in America always commanded a higher price in the market among the indentured servants were large numbers of Welsh who spoke only Gaelic of English who spoke only their Cornish, Somershire, Lancashire or Yorkshire dialect and the virus who spoke with the brogue very much on their tongues not only were there thousands of men and women in the colonies who could hardly read and who could only make their mark but there were also thousands who had little or no interest in reading or in collecting books the smaller farmers and planters, artisans and laborers can find their reading to the Bible or New Testament the Psalter or Himbock and an occasional religious work such as the practice of piety or pilgrims progress printed sermons also were popular particularly after 1740 the Whitefield began to be circulated among the volumes with which the colonial reader was familiar were the Almanacs, the Farmer's Almanac of Whitmore or Nathaniel Ames in Massachusetts, Wells's Register and Almanac the Hochdeutsch, Amerikan Nikscher calendar Tobler, South Carolina and Georgia Almanac and scores of others from these the colonists obtained all the scientific knowledge they possessed of sun, moon, tides and oceans as well as a great variety of religious, political and miscellaneous information a diverting assortment of jokes, puzzles and charades for idle hours and tables of exchanges interest and money values for the man of business except the Bible probably no book was held in greater esteem or was more widely read in the colonies in the 18th century than the Almanac in various forms and from the hands of many publishers it circulated from coast to back country and from Maine to Georgia to make them of knowledge. It was even more popular than the newspaper which though issued at this time in all the colonies except New Jersey was expensive, difficult to distribute and very limited in circulation. Collections of books other than those on the shelves of the libraries and in the stocks of the booksellers were largely confined to the houses of ministers, lawyers, doctors, wealthy merchants and planters, early libraries such as those of John Goodburn in Virginia 1635 William Brewster in Plymouth 1644 and Samuel Eaton in New Haven 1656 were brought from England and consisted chiefly of theological works with a sprinkling of classical authors and a few books on mathematics and geography none of these collections contained works of fiction. William Brewster had a volume or two of poetry and history the library of William Fitzhugh of Virginia 1671 included books on history, law, medicine, physics and morals but nothing of literature, essays, poetry or romance. The law library of Arthur Spicer of Virginia 1701 was remarkable for its scope and variety and the briefs of his contemporaries William Pitkin and Richard Edwards of Connecticut show that they too must have had the use of the leading law books of the day. Count Mathers library began when the owner was 19 with 96 volumes of which 81 were theological and the remainder works on history, philosophy and philology. The 17th century both in England and America was manifestly an age of heavy literature. With the reigns of Anne and the Georgia's a new literary activity began to make itself felt. Localities occupied by Quakers, Moravians, Westliens and Covenanters disclose large numbers of books of denomination or piety many of them in Dutch, German and Gaelic. Among those in English were Elwood's life pens no cross no crown, Eliza Hook's spirits of martyrs history, Barclay's Apology Fox's Journal and Boston's Fourfold State. The increased interest in agriculture, commerce, law, government and housekeeping that the columnists read books of practical nature such as The Art of Cooking, The Complete Housewife, Miller's Gardener's Dictionary, Longley's Book of Gardening, Burrow's Navigation Book, Led Better's Dialing, Wright's Negotiator, Matthew's Concerning Computation of Time, Mayor's Bookkeeping and other brochures relating to commerce as well as many books to numerous to be cited here on law, local government, the practice of medicine, anatomy, surgery, surveying and navigation. There were also many additions of the British statutes, law reports, proceedings of Parliament and treatises on Admiralty and Marine Matters, all of which were imported. Many of the leading men, particularly in the south, subscribe regularly to The London Magazine, The Gentleman's Magazine, Writers Almanac, Eckerd's Gazetteer, The Court Calendar and other British Periodical Publications. There was a close literary relation maintained between England and the colonies and newspapers, books and magazines were constantly sent by merchants across the Atlantic to their correspondence in America. An ever-widening interest in public affairs was bringing in a steadily increasing number of histories, biographies, voyages and travels such as the histories of Rapaz, Robertson, Malsheim, Raleigh, Clarendon, Burnett, Hume, Voltaire and Salmon, the lives of Julius Caesar, Oliver Cromwell, Louis XII, Marlborough and Eugene of Savoy and the voyages of Churchill and Anson. As time went on and improving taste on the part of the colonies for poetry, essays and fiction and translations from the classics and foreign languages began to show itself. Among the chief poets were Chaucer, Milton, Dryden and Poe, as well as such minor men as Gower, Butler, Dunn, Waller, Herbert, Collie, Congreve and Pryor. Among the essays popular in the colonies were those of Montaigne, Bacon, Swift and Ballingbrook, as well as the contributions of Steele and Addison to the Tatler and the Spectator and of Johnson to the Rambler. In fiction we find the writings of Richardson, Fielding, Stern, Goldsmith and Afrobain and the Romances, the Turkey Spy, the London Spy and the Jewish Spy and in drama the works of Ben Johnson, Shakespeare and Dryden. The translations from other languages were the Ili and the Odyssey, Cervantes, Don Quixote, Lasages, Gioblas and the Diabla, Boitot, Montesquieu, Latra, Poisson and the Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz which was amazingly popular. For young people there were Oliver's travels, Robinson Crusoe, The Arabian Knights and the great abundance of fables, gift books and short histories. As an indication of the range and variety of collections of books it is interesting to note that here and there were to be found such works as Horrell's games, Memoirs of Gamesters, Maddox on the Exchequer, Harrington's Oceana and even More's Utopia. As for law books Robert Bell the publisher of Philadelphia imported in 1771 a thousand sets of the English edition of Blackstone's Commentaries and himself issued a thousand sets more in four Royal Octavo volumes which he saw by subscription. Henceforth we begin to find for the first time copies of Blackstone appearing in colonial libraries and inventories. Many of the private libraries were works in French but rarely in other languages except among the Germans. Gray Elliott and English official in Savannah was apparently an exception for he had 200 volumes in several languages but what these languages were we do not know. In all libraries were to be found works issued from the various presses in America, the books of Calciman Carter of Nominee Hall numbered 1,503 volumes and those of William Bird the third of which there were more than 4,000 in many languages constituted what was probably at that time the largest private library in America. The practice of lending books was bound to be common in a country where they were rare and expensive and where neighborliness was a virtue. A number of lists which are in existence show the prevalence of the custom the catalog of the library of Godfrey Poe of Virginia 1716 containing 115 titles shows that about 30 books were out online and that several others have been lent and returned. In colonial correspondence we come upon such notes as this from a Dr. Farquharison of Charleston to Peter at Manigault in 1756 in which he says that he is sending back the books and magazines and would be obliged for reading Mr. Poe's works. From lending books as a personal favor it was but a short step to the establishment of private circulating libraries particularly as the beginning of the 18th century the Reverend Thomas Bray Commissary of Maryland had begun his series of lending libraries in the market towns for any of the clergy to have recourse to or to borrow books out of as there shall be occasion. How many such lending libraries were actually established it is difficult to say but there was one at Bath, North Carolina and another at Annapolis. There appeared to have been particularly in the south other collections quasi public and character such as the private library of Edward Mosley of Edenton which was thrown open for public use. These libraries differ from the circulating libraries of such booksellers as Garrett Noelle of New York and John Mine of Boston for example in that no charge was made for the privilege of borrowing. Perhaps the first library that may in a sense be called public was that owned by the town of Boston and kept in the library room of the townhouse it was started in 1656 and came to an untimely end in the fire of 1747 while it may have been accessible to readers it was in no sense a lending library for its massive folios and their equally ponderous contents must have made little appeal to any but the clergy. Much more important as an aid to the spread of good literature were the subscription libraries which came into existence as soon as books were made less bulky and more interesting and entertaining. Before the middle of the 18th century associations began to be formed for the buying and lending of books. The most famous was the library association of Philadelphia founded in 1731 by a group of 50 persons headed by Franklin which 10 years later published his first real catalog the Palmford association of Connecticut was established in 1740 that of Charleston in 1748 and that of Lancaster in 1759 to the last name Governor Hamilton and many leading Pennsylvanians gave money, globes and astronomical apparatus. Other instances of the spread of this movement were the larger library started in 1763 and the social library at Salem, Massachusetts established some time before the revolution. But there was at that time in the colonies no library supported by public funds and similar to the free public libraries of today. The bookseller was an important colonial character though many of the colonists imported their own books directly from England by far the larger number obtained what they wanted from those who made bookselling a trade. Merchants from large towns and along the Maryland and Virginia rivers carried in stock books which they obtained from England and Scotland. The inventories and invoices of these dealers are always interesting as showing their estimate of the popular taste. Though John Usher of Boston and Portsmouth was merchant and bookseller combined, few of the merchants did more than carry a small stock of books for sale while on the other hand scarcely any of the booksellers concerned themselves with trade. They imported and sold books published books and pamphlets, bound books printing of all kinds including blank forms for bonds, certificates, mortgages and chartered parties. They also made up an issue the newspapers of the day served generally as public printers for their colonies, acted as postmasters in many towns, kept in great bureaus and intelligence offices for their localities and were a local source of information. They also sold pens, ink, stationery and all sorts of school necessities. The scope of their activities was perhaps less varied in the north than in the south but everywhere they were indispensable in the life of their neighborhood. So important did these men become in colonial life that when Boston suffered heavily by the great fire of 1711 her most serious loss was the destruction of nearly all her bookselling establishments. End of chapter 6