time were unknown, the houses being heated by huge fire places. The same simplicity of manner prevailed for a long period under the English.

In Pennsylvania and Delaware the population was divided into the intelligent, progressive, sober and neat inhabitants of the long-settled regions, and the rude turbulent western borderers, whose economic and sanitary conditions were wretched. The farmers of the eastern section were as a rule prosperous, and among the tradesmen there was a keen sense of business honesty. The majority of the farmers owned the land which they cultivated and the houses in which they dwelt. There were many indented white servants, consisting for the most part of Irish and German

66

redemptioners "who bound themselves out to temporary servitude to defray the cost of the voyage from home. In the Eighteenth century probably more of these redemptioners came to Pennsylvania than to any of the colonies. The negro slaves in Pennsylvania were used chiefly for household service, seldom as fieldhands, but the Quakers were not long in deciding that slavery was morally wrong, and in 1688 we find a memorial being drawn up by the German Friends of Germantown protesting against "the buying and keeping of negroes." In 1758 the yearly meeting enjoined all Friends to set their slaves free, but though many complied it was not until 1776 that it was de

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cided to exclude all Friends from membership who refused to comply.* In New Jersey the conditions were fairly prosperous, but the general appearance of the towns and villages was insignificant and untidy.

In New Amsterdam the Dutch in the first half of the Seventeenth century were mostly engrossed in their trading enterprises, but still they found time for social amenities. Entertainments were generally family festivals, and as in the other colonies the funerals were notable events with much feasting and drinking. At the taverns the men met in clubs to smoke, drink and talk local politics, and there also the young people assembled to dance. Common divertisements were

66

going on pleasure parties in boat, car or wagon,' "fishing, fowling, and roving in search of nuts and strawberries." Dice, Dice, cards, bowls, shuffle-board and tennis were played, and on the turf, golf and a game of balls and hoops. New Years Day was celebrated with firing guns, beating drums and much drinking, and on May Day there was dancing around. May poles, and rough sport called pulling or riding the goose.

Music was a passion with the New Yorkers of the Eighteenth century. To play or to sing were imperative fashionable accomplishments. Popular instruments were the harpsicord, spinnet, violin, flute, pianoforte, organ, bassoon, and clarinet. There

were many glee clubs and musical associations. Numerous concerts, mostly by talented amateurs, were common; also subscription concerts or recitals and benefit concerts, vocal and instrumental. Dancing was still the popular diversion. Nearly every concert ended with a ball and every anniversary celebration, as the king's birthday, the queen's birthday and the gatherings of the many political, benevolent and patriotic societies and clubs. On the occasion of the celebration of the King's birthday in 1748, the ball opened at 6 o'clock, supper was served at 10 o'clock, and the last dance was at 5 o'clock the next morning.

In all respects, New York was an amusement-loving place in this period, and there was considerable variety in its pleasures; singing, dancing, feasting, shooting, skating, horse-racing and sleighing. In the winter-time sleighing out to the Bowery, there to partake of refreshments at some popular farm-house, was fashionable. Turtle-feasts or "frolics " as they were called, were notable events. The turtles were brought from the West Indies and were generally served at the country home of the fortunate gentleman who had received them. A big company was invited. Dinner was served at 2 o'clock and tea at 5 o'clock and dancing followed. Similar affairs were known to Newport and Providence, R. I., and other seaports.

The taverns of New York City, which were many in number, played a

large part in the social life of the metropolis. They were well furnished with billiard tables, truck tables, shuffle-boards, dice and cards and they were the scenes of much drinking and gambling. All of them had large rooms for entertainments, and public and private dinners and dances were held in them. Tea gardens were in different parts of the city and in these there were always refreshments, fireworks, and evening illuminations, and music. Marionette shows came in the early part of the century and various puppet shows, tumblers, acrobats, panoramas, and illustrated lectures. There were theatres in 1733.

Out-door social life included shooting, boating, fishing, bowling, golf, tennis, cricket, cock-fighting, bullbaiting and horse-racing. Large land owners had game preserves and deer parks. Pleasure boating on the rivers, and picnics in the woods were common in summer and these in general were the divertisements in other places, as Albany and Philadelphia. In fact, the social life of smaller cities and towns followed closely that of New York. There was a race track on Long Island as early as 1666, and from then until the Revolution horseracing was a regular sporting event of every year. Some notable races were run during this time, several on Long Island tracks. There was also good thoroughbred racing in Philadelphia in 1767. Even in Puritan New England there was a popular interest in horse-racing, so much so

The fact that education and religion received more attention in the North than in the Southern and Middle colonies, may account in a measure for the fact that the commissions of crime appear to have been less frequent. Undoubtedly also, the severe punishments meted out to criminals had a deterring effect, the instruments of punishment taking the forms of gibbets, stocks, ducking-stools, pillories and whipping-posts. Criminals were also branded, mutilated, or compelled to wear colored letters sewed to their garments indicating the nature of the crime committed. The

negroes were more harshly treated, in several instances being burned at the stake, for murder or arson.

The criminal classes were severely repressed in the Middle colonies, the

*Further details of the social life in the colonies may be obtained in the following: Esther Singleton, Social New York Under the Georges (New York, 1902); George Cary Eggleston, Life in the Eighteenth Century (New York, 1905), and Our First Century (New York, 1904); Madam Sarah K. Knight, and Rev. Mr. Buckingham, Journals from the Original Manuscripts (New York, 1825); Alice Morse Earle, Colonial Days and Good Wives (New York, 1900), and Child Life in Colonial Days (New York, 1899); P. A. Bruce, Social Life of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century (Richmond, 1907); Mrs. John King Van Rensselaer, The Goede Vrouw of Mana-ha-ta (New York, 1898); William Roote Bliss, Side Glimpses from the Colonial Meeting-House (Boston, 1894); C. C. Coffin, Old Times in the Colonies (New York, 1881); J. A. Doyle, The American Colonies Previous to the Declaration of Independence (London, 1869) and The English in America (3 vols., London, 1882-87).

most lenient in their treatment of them until 1718, when laws similar to those of the other colonies were adopted. The list of capital offences grew to fourteen, including counterfeiting, highway robbery and horsestealing; larceny, fornication and assault were punished by the pillory and the whipping-post; and smaller misdemeanors were punished by the presentation of the offenders in public. Paupers were not frequently seen, the majority of such cases being in Pennsylvania. The Quakers also established at Philadelphia the first hospital on the continent, devoted to treatment of the insane. The Phila

delphia prisons were regarded as most excellent; there was a good reform school and an excellent hospital. "In 1762 a charitable organization in that colony [South Carolina] was founded for the purpose of providing an infirmary for the reception of lunatics and other distempered persons.' The Revolutionary struggle, however, seems to have prevented this body of philanthropists from carrying out these purposes. Nevertheless it is recorded that in 1776 there was a 'madhouse' in 'Charlestown.' This was probably the poorhouse and asylum' which dates back to 1712, or possibly earlier." +

*

Watson, Annals of Philadelphia, vol. i., pp.

308-309.

†The South in the Building of the Nation, vol. X., pp. 598-599.

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The importance of education was recognized by the first settlers as soon as they arrived as well as by those in authority in the home country. The earliest effort to establish an educational institution in the New World was made under the auspices of King James I. by contributions of members of the Church of England from 1618 to 1623. Funds were collected for building a college in Virginia and land was set apart for its support. A free school was projected and partly

endowed in 1622, located at Charles City and called the "East India School." In 1660 an In 1660 an attempt was made to found a college for the purpose of supplying the colony with educated clergymen. Education did. not, however, take a firm hold in this colony. The settlers were widely scattered on their big plantations, and on the whole did not so generally come from the cultured class of England as did the settlers in Massachusetts. In 1692 a royal charter was

obtained for William and Mary College, which was located in Williamsburgh and which had its first commencement in 1700. Scattered through the colony were schools in connection with the churches, both Presbyterian and Episcopal. In many families private teachers were employed, the sons of wealthy families being generally sent to England to complete their education. This latter custom

extended to the other Southern colonies, and was more common in this section of the country than it was in the North. No general school law was established in Virginia until after the Revolution. Thomas Jefferson in 1779 drew up such a law, which, however, was not then adopted. This recognized three degrees of public instruction-elementary schools for all children; colleges for instruction suitable for the common needs of life; a university for higher culture on the basis of that at Williamsburgh.

Though there were no free schools in Virginia founded by the Assembly, many private individuals had founded such schools as the Symmes school, founded in 1636, Captain Moore's (1655), Richard Russell's (1667), Mr. King's (1669), the Eaton school (about 1689) and Edward Moseley's (1721).* There was also a considerable amount of compulsory primary education after 1649+ and in the Eighteenth century the people began to see to it that the colored people received a certain amount of education.‡ The isolation of homesteads reached its maximum in North Carolina, where there were no schools until shortly before the Revolution.|| In South Carolina the conditions were not quite so poor and from the first decade of the Eighteenth century the people exhibited a strong interest in popular education. There were several private schools, the first being established in Charleston in 1712.§ A free school system was started in South Carolina in 1710, and in Georgia in 1740 by Reverend George Whitefield. But the tendency was to neglect the education of the young, particularly the young men, who were trained more for commercial and agricultural

*William and Mary College Quarterly, vol. v., p. 113; Virginia Magazine, vol. i., pp. 326, 348. Hening's Statutes, vol. i., p. 336.

‡ William and Mary College Quarterly, vol. v., p. 219.

Fiske, Old Virginia, vol. ii., p. 315.

§ For details see Ramage, Local Government and Free Schools in South Carolina, in Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science, series i., no. xii.

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pursuits or in political affairs for governmental purposes.

Some time was found for reading, but as a rule the libraries were of little worth, though here and there were to be found some that were valuable. The library of Ralph Wormeley, a trustee of William and Mary College, contained about 400 titles.* That of William Byrd, of Westover, 3,625 volumes,† and that of Richard Lee, who died in 1715, about 300 titles. The majority of the libraries contained a few English classics, with perhaps Gil Blas or Don

Quixote and

Quixote and a few miscellaneous works on divinity, or helps in farming, etc.

In the charters to the Dutch West India Company there was a special provision that the Company should "maintain good and fit preachers, schoolmasters and comforters of the sick." In the later charters of the patroons there was the same provision. A school was established in New Amsterdam as early as 1633, and a plan was made also for a school in the settlement of New Amstel on the Delaware projected by the Dutch of New Netherland in 1655. Under the mastership of the Rev. Aegidius Luyck in 1662, the school of New

*For the list of which see William and Mary College Quarterly, vol. iii., pp. 170-174.

Lyman Draper in Virginia Historical Register, vol. iv., pp. 87-90.

William and Mary College Quarterly, vol. iii., pp. 247-249. See also Wiley's article on Southern Libraries in vol. x. of the South in the Building of the Nation.