Chapter XII: The Child in Earlier United States (5)

As the cities grew, the people would strive to get out for a time in the country, so that inns and gardens grew up in the suburbs and were much frequented. These gardens were sometimes small and of a private nature and again they were large and not only furnished the guests with food and drink but also with concerts and other entertainments. Clubs were quite numerous in those days, usually consisting of a number of men who had a weekly meeting at a tavern. These clubs often consisted of people of the same nationality, as, the Irish Club, the French Club, and so on. They had their patron saints on whose birthdays they would hold great festivals, the English having St. George, the Welsh St. David, the Irish St. Patrick, and the young Americans of New York, not to be outdone, "canonized, by their own authority, King Tammany, a Delaware chief long dead, and celebrated his feast on the old English May-day, which they ushered in with bell-ringings, as though it were a veritable saint's day."[327] There grew up in the cities gatherings of men and women, called "Assemblies," for the purpose of dancing, card-playing, and other social amusements. These were brilliant affairs, wherein both men and women were richly dressed, and where there was eating and drinking, great quantities of wine often being consumed.

The colonists were very fond of dancing. "From the most eastern forest settlements of Maine to the southern frontier of Georgia, people in town, village, and country were everywhere indefatigably fond of dancing ... the launching of a ship, the raising of a house, the assembling of a county court, and the ordination of a minister were good occasions for dancing."[328] They usually danced to the tune of a fiddle but if there was no fiddle that would not keep them from it as they would dance to some one's humming the tune. Dancing-schools arose and although they were forbidden in New England the young people learned to dance anyway. Dances sometimes began at six o'clock in the evening and lasted till three in the morning. "President Washington and Mrs. General Greene 'danced upwards of three hours without once sitting down,' and General Greene called this diversion of the august Father of His Country, 'a pretty little frisk.'"[329] This may be accounted for from the fact that the lady was usually assigned to her partner for the entire evening, with whom she did the greater part of her dancing.

Music was loved by the colonists throughout the entire colonial period. Yet in early New England there was really little that could properly be called music, for in the church there was only the droning out of the Psalms and often these were not sung by all the congregation in the same tune at the same time, making a most inharmonious medley. The first music-book appeared in 1712. The early instruments for accompanying the voice were the spinet and the harpsichord, the first organ in Boston was about 1711.

Mrs. Earle states that though after 1760 concerts were frequent yet the earliest advertisement she had found of a concert was in the _New England Weekly Journal_ of December 15, 1732:

"This is to inform the Publick That there will be a Consort of Music Perform'd by Sundry Instruments at the Court Room in Wings Lane near the Town Dock on the 28th of this Instant December; Tickets will be deliver'd at the Place of Performance at Five Shillings each Ticket. N. B. No Person will be admitted after Six."[330]

Because of the need of better music, there arose the "singing-school," a most happy form of amusement for the young people of the colonial days in New England where there was often but little chance for such. The singing-school teacher was a great man and when he made his appearance that other notable, the village school-master, had to take a back-seat for the time being, for this man was a "professional," who was to be paid and who paid his own bills and did not have to "board round." The singing-school gave agreeable occasion for the young people to spend a few of the long winter evenings together and for sleighing-parties to be made up to go to them, and where every girl, no matter how she got there, was sure of an escort home.

Card-playing and gambling were almost universal. Ladies gambled as well as gentlemen. Stakes often were high, sometimes large estates were lost in a short time by reckless betting at cards. "The ladies of New York were considered virtuous above many others of their sex because of the moderation of their gambling."[331] Although the New Englanders were very much opposed to cards and tried to stop their sale and use, yet they highly approved another form of gambling, the lottery. For a half century and longer the lottery was the greatest amusement of New England, it was sanctioned and participated in by all, the most esteemed citizens bought and sold tickets, and it was used as a scheme for raising funds for every purpose--colleges increased their endowments, towns and states raised money to pay their debts, and churches had lotteries "for promoting public worship and the advancement of religion." Not only were lotteries used to raise funds for public affairs but there were also private lotteries in great number and all kinds of prizes given, among such being furniture, clothing, real estate, jewelry, and books. "New England clergymen seemed specially to delight in this gambling excitement."[332]

As there was an abundance of wild game and fish, hunting and fishing were great sports among the colonists.

Deer were hunted in various ways. Sometimes the hunter, as learned from the Indians, covered himself in a deer skin and was thus enabled to get near the deer to shoot them; again a tree was felled and the hunter hid in the branches and shot the deer while browsing upon the twigs; at night the deer was approached by some one bearing a lighted torch and the hunter would shoot the dazed animal looking into the light, or the hunter would have a blazing fire in his canoe and float toward the deer and shoot it; also deer were run down by dogs and men on horseback. Wolves were caught on mackerel hooks bound together in a bunch and dipped in tallow; they were caught in iron traps; and they were caught in pits in the earth hidden by light coverings to let them fall through. Bears were caught in traps and pits and also hunted with dogs trained for the purpose. There was fox-chasing on horseback; sometimes on a moonlight night a sledge-load of cod-fish heads was left by a fence or wall where the moon shone brightly on it, and the foxes were shot as they came up to get the heads of the fishes. Squirrels were killed for sport and also because they consumed so much of the grain; sometimes two groups of hunters matched one another and then counted squirrel-scalps at night to see which party had killed the most squirrels during the day. Wild turkeys were trapped and killed with guns; sometimes fires would be built near their roosting-places and then they could be shot while bewildered from the light. Wild pigeons were taken in nets, by shooting with guns, and while on their roosts at night, they were knocked off with clubs, being so thickly together and thus unable to get away. Also other wild game was hunted, as, geese, ducks, grouse, partridges, and others.

One way of taking wild game was by a "drive." A ring of men would encircle a large tract of country and draw inward toward a center, and thus drive in deer, bears, wolves, turkeys, and other game, and as the animals made effort to escape the men would shoot them. Another way of hunting was by a fire-ring. A body of men would encircle a tract of land and then set fire to the leaves, which would burn in toward the center and then the men would shoot the animals as they would try to break through the fire-ring and would thus be brought to view.

Fishing was carried on in various ways. One of the most common ways was with nets, which were of various kinds. Weirs were also used, probably learned from the Indians and improved upon by the colonists. Long lines were staked out in a river and on it were placed short lines with hooks for catching the fish. Fish were speared with a harping-iron or gig. Where the fish were very plentiful men could ride into the water at night and spear the fish with gigs by torch light. They also went to the falls of the rivers and caught the shad and salmon as they were ascending the river to spawn. Fish also were caught with hook and line, but in the earlier times when they were so abundant this was considered too slow a process.

In winter the favorite amusement in New York was riding in sleighs and this was true also in Philadelphia. In the bitter climate of New England sleighing as a pastime was not entered into by the colonists in the early days. The Dutch in New York also indulged a great deal in skating, the ponds, marshes, and watered meadows on Manhattan Island offering plenty of ice for the sport. Sometimes provisions were carried into New York on the back of marketmen on skates.

In a new country full of wild animals and wild men, it becomes necessary for the settler to learn to use the gun as a means of livelihood and of defense and so the settlers became fine marksmen. Because of their learning to shoot well there arose contests in marksmanship. This consisted often in shooting at a mark for a prize, a silk handkerchief or such like. Also there were matches where a turkey was put up as a prize to be shot at, it might be a holiday was spent in a shooting-match. Sometimes a beef was divided among competitors, when a target would be put up and the one hitting the center or nearest to the center would receive the best cut of the beef and it would thus be distributed according to the shots ranging from the center.

A leading amusement of the colonists was horse-racing. It is possible that horse-racing began in Virginia as soon as there were horses in the colony to race. In 1665 the Governor of New York announced a horse-race to encourage the bettering of the breed of horses. The sport came late into New England and yet there were races and notices of challenges to race horses. The main centers of horse-racing were in the vicinity of New York, Annapolis, Williamsburg, and Charleston, and, later, at Philadelphia, also. There were two kinds of races. The first was a great, formal affair, drawing a large crowd, where the horses ran on a circular mile track, four rounds to a heat, best two out of three to win. This race required great endurance of the horses. The second kind of race was a more informal affair, where the race was for a quarter of a mile, for which race horses were bred to run for a short distance at a very high rate of speed. Before the expiration of the colonial period, there, too, arose the special forms of the trotting-match and the pacing-match.

Cock-fighting was another sport of the colonists, which was most popular in New York and the colonies south of it, its chief centers being in Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina. Men would go fifty miles to see a main, and choice gamecocks were imported from England. There was, too, bull-baiting and sometimes wolves and bears were captured alive and used for baiting with dogs. Sometimes a live wolf was tied to a horse's tail and dragged to death.

There were contests in running, leaping, wrestling, cudgeling, stool-ball, nine-pins, quoits, fencing, and back-sword or single-stick.

The people of the colonies did not have great opportunities for amusement in the way of shows and so they turned readily to any kind of exhibit and it did not require much display to attract them. This being true, there came to be displays of various kinds in plenty.

There were sleight-of-hand performances, acrobatic and contortionistic displays, tight and slack rope performances, and a kind of sword-dancing. Museums were founded in which there were shown wax figures and other curiosities; a mermaid was put on display; there were exhibits at various times of a solar microscope, camera obscuras, moving pictures showing windmills and water-mills in motion and ships sailing, electrical machines, a musical clock, puppets representing Joseph's dream, and prospects of London and of royal palaces. Among animals displayed, there were a lion drawn about on a cart by four oxen, a wonderful creature called a Sea Lion, a leopard "strongly chayned," a moose, a white sea bear, a camel, a cassowary "five feet high that swallows stones as large as an egg," and even a rabbit was advertised among "curious wild beasts." There was a big hog on display for four pence a person, and a cat with "one head, eight legs, and two tails."

The most remarkable animal of all exhibited must have been the one described in an advertisement in the Boston Gazette of April 20, 1741:

"To be seen at the Greyhound Tavern in Roxbury a wild creature which was caught in the woods about 80 miles to the Westward of this place called a Cattamount. It has a tail like a Lyon, its legs are like Bears, its Claws like an Eagle, its Eyes like a Tyger. He is exceedingly ravenous and devours all sorts of Creatures that he can come near. Its agility is surprising. It will leap 30 feet at one jump notwithstanding it is but 3 months old. Whoever wishes to see this creature may come to the place aforesaid paying one shilling each shall be welcome for their money."[333]

"Salem had the pleasure of viewing a 'Sapient Dog' who could light lamps, spell, read print or writing, tell the time of day, or day of the month. He could distinguish colors, was a good arithmetician, could discharge a loaded cannon, tell a hidden card in a pack, and jump through a hoop. About the same time was exhibited in the same town a 'Pig of Knowledge' who had precisely the same accomplishments."[334]

The first approach toward a theatrical entertainment seems to have been at Philadelphia in 1724, where was given acrobatic displays, rope-walking feats, and the like, which ended up with a half-acrobatic, half-dramatic performance of a comical character. Such entertainments must have followed in other cities. There was a theatrical troupe, a sorry lot, in Philadelphia in 1749, which went to New York in 1750, and probably was the same that produced a play in a Boston coffee-house that caused such a stir as to bring about legislation that kept the drama out of Boston for the remainder of the colonial period. Although at this time there may not have been any dramatic plays given, there was a custom in Virginia at country houses to have the reading aloud of plays, romances, and operas on rainy days, Sunday afternoons, and when there might not have been dancing of an evening because no fiddler could be secured for the music, and, later, after the introduction of the drama into the colonies amateur companies were organized to give plays.

The first real theatrical company in the colonies was in 1752, which troupe, twelve in number, came over from England. Their opening play was given at Williamsburg, at that time the capital of Virginia. This place was probably chosen for the beginning of the theatrical work in the colonies "because the inhabitants of Virginia were known to be rich, leisurely, and society-loving people, with enough of refinement to enjoy plays, and with few religious scruples against anything that tended to make life pleasant to the upper classes."[335]

"Twenty-four plays had been selected and cast before Lewis Hallam and his company left London on the 'Charming Sally,' no doubt a tobacco-ship returning light for a cargo. On her unsteady deck, day after day, during the long voyage, the actors diligently rehearsed the plays with which they proposed to cheer the hearts of people in the New World. Williamsburg must have proved a disappointment to them. There were not more than a thousand people, white and black, in the village. The buildings, except the capitol, the college, and the so-called 'palace' of the governor, were insignificant, and there were only about a dozen 'gentlemen's' families resident in the place. In the outskirts of the town a warehouse was fitted up for a theater. The woods were all about it, and the actors could shoot squirrels from the windows. When the time arrived for the opening of the theater, the company were much disheartened. It seemed during the long still hours of the day that they had come on a fool's errand to act dramas in the woods. But as evening drew on, the whole scene changed like a work of magic. The roads leading into Williamsburg were thronged with out-of-date vehicles of every sort, driven by negroes and filled with gayly dressed ladies, whose gallants rode on horseback alongside. The treasury was replenished, the theater was crowded, and Shakspere was acted on the continent probably for the first time by a trained and competent company. The 'Merchant of Venice' and Garrick's farce of 'Lethe' were played; and at the close the actors found themselves surrounded by groups of planters congratulating them, and after the Virginia fashion offering them the hospitality of their houses."[336]

This troupe finished the season at Williamsburg and then went to Annapolis and throughout Maryland and reached New York in 1753 and later went to Philadelphia. They made a trip to the West Indies and on their return to New York in 1758 they had difficulty in getting permission to play as a great religious wave had swept over the country and there was a strong feeling against such amusements. The troupe managed to overcome this opposition and continued in the colonies till the Revolutionary troubles arose. In 1774 the Continental Congress voiced the sentiment of the people in asking that there be a discontinuance of such sports and entertainments as would tend to distract thought and feeling from the getting ready of the colonies to defend their rights, and when the head of the American company, as the troupe was called, received this resolution from the president of the Congress, the work of the company was stopped and the actors sailed for the West Indies and that ended the drama in the colonies.

At the opening play by the English company at Williamsburg in 1752, the music was that of the harpsichord and furnished by the local music-master, and when they reached New York they procured a violinist. The theaters built at this time were little more than enclosed sheds and they were usually painted red. The scenery was quite indifferent. The seats were classified into boxes, pit, and gallery. The people in the pit were allowed to use liquors and smoking was permitted anywhere in the theater. Plays began at six o'clock in the evening and servants and slaves were sent early beforetimes to hold seats for their masters and mistresses. "Gentlemen made free to go behind the scenes, and to loiter in full view on the stage, showing their gallantry by disturbing attentions to the actresses."[337] which "proved so deleterious to any good representation of the play, that the manager advertised in 'Gaines' Mercury,' in 1762, that no spectators would be permitted to stand or sit on the stage during the performance. And also a reproof was printed to 'the person so very rude as to throw Eggs from the Gallery upon the stage, to the injury of Cloaths.'"[338]

=Games and Sports of Children and Young People.= Children played games and engaged in sports during the colonial times in the United States and many of these games were the same as were played in the home countries from whence their ancestors came and they are played today by their descendants. They were tormented, too, in their play, just as children always are, by adults in power, as shown by the following order issued in New York in 1673. "If any children be caught on the street playing, racing, and shouting previous to the termination of the last preaching, the officers of justice may take their hat or upper garment, which shall not be restored to the parents until they have paid a fine of two guilders."[339] The Puritan boys, too, had laws passed against one of their games that cannot be played without somebody getting hurt and hence the foolishness of such a law as was made in Boston in 1657. "Forasmuch as sundry complaints are made that several persons have received hurt by boys and young men playing at football in the streets, these therefore are to enjoin that none be found at that game in any of the streets, lanes or enclosures of this town under the penalty of twenty shillings for every such offence."[340]

But such laws as given above did not altogether crush the spirits of the boys for, as stated before, one man whose duties were to patrol New Amsterdam at night found they were active enough, for he complained that the boys set dogs on him, hid behind trees and fences and shouted out as he came by "Indians!" and played other tricks on him. Even as much as the Puritans tried to depress the spirits of their children, yet we find one of them noting in his diary of his grandson: "In the morning I dehorted Sam Hirst and Grindall Rawson from playing Idle tricks because 'twas first of April: They were the greatest fools that did so."[341] And this same boy was so wrought up with play when he was six years older as to cause his grandfather to write: "Sam Hirst got up betime in the morning, and took Ben Swett with him and went into the Comon to play Wicket. Went before anybody was up, left the door open: Sam came not to prayer at which I was much displeased."[342]

These children played the old historic game of cat's-cradle and passed it on to the children of today, a game that is found in many lands and among both civilized and uncivilized peoples.[343] They played hop scotch and tag of various kinds and London Bridge and honey-pots, and many, many others, as given in the paragraph below. They enjoyed singing games, of which they had quite a number.

"In a quaint little book called _The Pretty Little Pocket Book_, published in America at Revolutionary times, is a list of boys' games with dingy pictures showing how the games were played; the names given were chuck-farthing; kite-flying; dancing round May-pole; marbles; hoop and hide; thread the needle; fishing; blindman's buff; shuttlecock; king and I; peg-farthing; knock out and span; hop, skip, and jump; boys and girls come out to play; I sent a letter to my love; cricket; stool-ball; base-ball; trap-ball; swimming; tip-cat; train-banding; fives; leap-frog; bird-nesting; hop-hat; shooting; hop-scotch; squares; riding; rosemary tree. The descriptions of the games are given in rhyme, and to each attached a moral lesson in verse."[344] The following is a good illustration:

"MARBLES
"Knuckle down to your Taw.
Aim well, shoot away.
Keep out of the Ring,
You'll soon learn to Play.

"MORAL
"Time rolls like a Marble,
And drives every State.
Then improve each Moment,
Before its too late."[345]

A lady writing of a custom that prevailed at Albany about the middle of the eighteenth century, during her childhood there, writes as follows:

"The children of the town were divided into companies, as they called them, from five to six years of age, until they became marriageable. How those companies first originated, or what were their exact regulations, I cannot say; though I, belonging to none, occasionally mixed with several, yet always as a stranger, notwithstanding that I spoke their current language fluently. Every company contained as many boys as girls. But I do not know that there was any limited number; only this I recollect, that a boy and girl of each company, who were older, cleverer, or had some other pre-eminence among the rest, were called heads of the company, and as such were obeyed by the others.... Children of different ages in the same family belonged to different companies. Each company at a certain time of the year went in a body to gather a particular kind of berries to the hill. It was a sort of annual festival attended with religious punctuality. Every company had a uniform for this purpose; that is to say, very pretty light baskets made by the Indians, with lids and handles, which hung over one arm, and were adorned with various colors. Every child was permitted to entertain the whole company on its birthday, and once besides, during winter and spring. The master and mistress of the family always were bound to go from home on these occasions, while some old domestic was left to attend and watch over them, with an ample provision of tea, chocolate, preserved and dried fruits, nuts and cakes of various kinds, to which was added cider or a syllabub; for these young friends met at four and amused themselves with the utmost gayety and freedom in any way their fancy dictated."[346]

"In spring, eight or ten of the young people of one company, or related to each other, young men and maidens, would set out together in a canoe on a kind of rural excursion, of which amusement was the object. Yet so fixed were their habits of industry that they never failed to carry their work-baskets with them, not as a form, but as an ingredient necessarily mixed with their pleasures. They had no attendants, and steered a devious course of four, five, or perhaps more miles, till they arrived at some of the beautiful islands with which this fine river abounded, or at some sequestered spot on its banks, where delicious wild fruits, or particular conveniences for fishing afforded some attraction. There they generally arrived by nine or ten o'clock, having set out in the cool and early hour of sunrise.... A basket with tea, sugar, and the other usual provisions for breakfast, with the apparatus for cooking it; a little rum and fruit for making cool weak punch, the usual beverage in the middle of the day, and now and then some cold pastry, was the sole provision; for the great affair was to depend on the sole exertions of the boys in procuring fish, wild ducks, etc., for the dinner. They were all, like Indians, ready and dexterous with the axe, gun, etc. Whenever they arrived at their destination, they sought out a dry and beautiful spot opposite to the river, and in an instant with their axes cleared so much superfluous shade or shrubbery as left a semi-circular opening, above which they bent and twined the boughs, so as to form a pleasant bower, while the girls gathered dried branches, to which one of the youths soon set fire with gunpowder, and the breakfast, a very regular and cheerful one, occupied an hour or two. The young men then set out to fish, or perhaps to shoot birds, and the maidens sat busily down to their work. After the sultry hours had been thus employed, the boys brought their tribute from the river or the wood, and found a rural meal prepared by their fair companions, among whom were generally their sisters and the chosen of their hearts. After dinner they all set out together to gather wild strawberries, or whatever other fruit was in season; for it was accounted a reflection to come home empty-handed. When wearied of this amusement, they either drank tea in their bower, or, returning, landed at some friend's on the way, to partake of that refreshment."[347]

When we come to water sports there is found more hectoring of the boys by the lawmakers. The Puritan lawgivers passed laws against swimming and each tithing-man had ten families under his charge to keep the boys from swimming in the water, but it is guessed that the boys swam all the same. Strange to say the boys were not debarred from the opposite winter sport--that of skating, nevertheless there were many deaths from breaking through the ice and drowning.

"Skating is an ancient pastime. As early as the thirteenth century Fitzstephen tells of young Londoners fastening the leg-bones of animals to the soles of the feet, and then pushing themselves on the ice by means of poles shod with sharp iron points.... Wooden skates shod with iron runners were invented in the Low Countries. Dutch children in New Netherlands all skated, just as their grandfathers had in old Batavia. The first skates that William Livingstone (born in 1723) had on the frozen Hudson were made of beef bones, as were those of medieval children."[348]

There might be some excuse made for the Puritans trying to keep their boys from swimming because of their great fear of the use of water, both internally and externally, but how can the legislators of Albany be excused for the following cruel law!

"Whereas y^e children of y^e s^d city do very unorderly to y^e shame and scandall of their parents ryde down y^e hills in y^e streets of the s^d city with small and great slees on the Lord day and in the week by which many accidents may come, now for pventing y^e same it is hereby published and declared y^e shall be and may be lawful for any Constable in this City or any other person or persons to take any slee or slees from all and every such boys and girls rydeing or offering to ryde down any hill within y^e s^d city and breake any slee or slees in pieces. Given under our hands and seals in Albany y^e 22th of December in 12th year of Her Maj's reign Anno Domini 1713."[349]

By 1765 it would seem that legislation in Albany against coasting had been abandoned or else the coasting was done at night-time when travel had ceased. This passage below is by the same woman, writing of about the year 1765, who is quoted above in regard to the companies of children and young people of Albany.

"In town all the boys were extravagantly fond of a diversion that to us would appear a very odd and childish one. The great street of the town sloped down from the hill on which the fort stood, towards the river; between the buildings was an unpaved carriage-road, the foot-path beside the houses being the only part of the street which was paved. In winter the sloping descent, continued for more than a quarter of a mile, acquired firmness from the frost, and became very slippery. Then the amusement commenced. Every boy and youth in town, from eight to eighteen, had a little low sledge, made with a rope like a bridle to the front, by which it could be dragged after one by the hand. On this one or two at most could sit, and this sloping descent being made as smooth as a looking-glass, by sliders' sledges, etc., perhaps a hundred at once set out from the top of this street, each seated in his little sledge with the rope in his hand, which, drawn to the right or left, served to guide him. He pushed it off with a little stick, as one would launch a boat; and then, with the most astonishing velocity, precipitated by the weight of the owner, the little machine glided past, and was at the lower end of the street in an instant. What could be so delightful in this rapid and smooth descent I could never discover; though in a more retired place, and on a smaller scale, I have tried the amusement; but to a young Albanian, sleighing, as he called it, was one of the first joys of life, though attended by the drawback of walking to the top of the declivity, dragging his sledge every time he renewed his flight, for such it might well be called. In the managing this little machine some dexterity was necessary; an unskilful Phaeton was sure to fall. The conveyance was so low that a fall was attended with little danger, yet with much disgrace, for an universal laugh from all sides assailed the fallen charioteer. This laugh was from a very full chorus, for the constant and rapid succession of this procession, where every one had a brother, lover, or kinsman, brought all the young people in town to the porticos, where they used to sit wrapt in furs till ten or eleven at night, engrossed by this delectable spectacle. I have known an Albanian, after residing some years in Britain, and becoming a polished fine gentleman, join the sport and slide down with the rest."[350]

=Children's Toys and Story Books.= Toys must have been quite scarce in the earlier colonial days, probably very few beyond what the children or parents made, and rather crude. Even as late as 1695 a man in Massachusetts wrote to his brother in England that if toys in small quantities were sent to the colonies they would sell. Some years later toys increased in number and toy-shops arose, there being one in Boston in 1743. It is certainly hard to understand why marbles should not have been advertised for sale at an earlier time than the date given in the following: "Not until October, 1771, on the lists of the Boston shopkeepers, who seemed to advertise and to sell every known article of dry goods, hardware, house furnishing, ornament, dress, and food, came that single but pleasure-filled item 'Boys Marbles.'"[351]

There were not a great variety of toys used in the colonies. Tin toys were quite scarce as tin was not much in use at that time for such purposes. There were kites, hoops, balls, battledore and shuttles, tops, marbles, skates and sleds. There were home-made hobby-horses, coaches, and chariots. The boys had jack-knives and knew how to use them in making pop-guns, whistles, windmills, water-wheels, traps, and the like. Boys also made their own weapons, as, clubs, slings, bows, and arrows. The girls had dolls, of course, but they were home-made affairs for the greater part. The only dolls advertised in the colonial papers were those told about under dress, which were the models that were dressed in Europe and sent over to mantua-makers to give the styles. It is true that after serving this purpose the dolls were sold for children's use and thought much of by them. The furniture was much of it home-made, birch bark being especially adaptable for the purpose. Wicker cradles and chaises were made for the dolls, copied from those of infants.

It would seem that there were absolutely no books specially written for the pleasure of the children in the early years of the colonial times, nor for that matter were there any such written in England during the same period. There were, however, to teach some truths, three books written that were taken up by the children and who greatly loved to read them, which were _The Pilgrim's Progress_ in 1688, _Robinson Crusoe_ in 1714, and _Gulliver's Travels_ in 1726. The beginning of story books for children in England and America was in 1744, when John Newberry began publishing such books in London. His books were at once exported to America and advertisements of them are found in the colonial newspapers. One of these books, probably published in 1744, was "The Pretty Little Pocket Book," one story in which was "Jack the Giant Killer." Another book published by Newberry about 1760 was "Mother Goose's Melodies." After the Revolution, story books for children became more common and they have kept increasing through the years to the present.

=Holidays and Festivals.= The old English festivals were not greatly observed by the colonists. In Puritan New England there were few set times and days for pleasure. The holy days of the English Church were not only disregarded by the Puritans, but even laws were made forbidding their public celebration, for while in England they had turned away from the state church and they had learned to hate the excesses of the festivals. In the other colonies the demands of the early years and the getting away from religious influences may have brought about the decline of the celebration of the church festivals, for even in Virginia, which clung to the old church, the clergy complained that the people only observed Christmas and Good Friday as they did not want to stop work for other holidays.

Although Christmas was observed in the colonies outside of New England, it was not with the old English fervor and never with the great excesses, as stated by one of the old Puritan divines as spent throughout England in "revelling, dicing, carding, masking, mumming, consumed in compotations, in interludes, in excess of wine, in mad mirth."[352]

New Year's Day was a great day for the Dutch in New York and its observance was continued by the English when they came into control. The Dutch inaugurated the custom of New Year's calling, wherein the ladies kept open house and were called upon by their gentleman friends. Food and drink were served in generous quantities and before the end of the day the gentlemen would often get quite hilarious. The streets of the city would be filled with vehicles loaded with callers going from house to house, a general gala occasion. In the country towns of New York colony the New Year was often ushered in by men with fire-arms going from house to house and firing salutes. This was kept up until a crowd was collected and then they would end the day by firing at a mark.

If the Dutch of New York originated New Year's callings the Puritans of New England originated Thanksgiving Day. Just when each custom first began cannot be determined for each must have arisen gradually and continued till the practice became fixed. The thanksgiving days were not always at first for giving thanks for God's beneficence, but for various reasons, as, political events, the success of the Protestant cause, victories over Indians, the safe arrival of ships with friends and provisions, and so on. Nor were they set for any special season or day, probably Thursday became fixed because of its being the lecture day and autumn because of the time of harvests thus making the days of thanksgiving come more often at this season.

The first Thanksgiving was not a religious event nor a single day, but a time of recreation as shown from the following written by one of the Puritans in Plymouth on December 11, 1621:

"Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruits of our labors. They four killed as much fowl as with a little help beside served the company about a week. At which times among other recreations we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoyt with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer which they brought and bestow'd on our governor, and upon the captains and others."[353]

The first public thanksgiving was held in Boston in 1630 to express thanks for the safe arrival of ships bringing friends and food. From this on there were public thanksgivings, but not every year, until it became a fixed annual affair, but at just what time this occurred it would be impossible to state. As it became a fixed custom, there grew into it many of the features of the old English Christmas, notwithstanding the attitude of the Puritans toward that day, and it became a day of family reunions and of feasting on turkey and Indian pudding and pumpkin pie.

"But Thanksgiving Day was not the chief New England holiday. Ward, writing in 1699, does not name it, saying of New Englanders: 'Election, Commencement, and Training Days are their only Holy Days.'"[354]

Election Day was a kind of holiday and indeed sometimes the whole week was included in the holiday. As was stated before, Training Day was a day of coming together of the people at which there was not only military drill but also amusements of various kinds and sometimes the occasion for a display of public punishment. Commencement Day at the college was a proud day for the people whose sons graduated and a kind of general holiday for all. There was a dinner and plenty of wine. It would seem that this was an occasion for which more than a day would be used, as after 1730 Commencement Day was usually set for Friday as there would not be so much of the week left for jollifying.

Shrove Tuesday was observed in New York by the middle of the eighteenth century as a holiday given over to cocking-mains, as it was in England. Saint Valentine's Day was observed by the Dutch in New Amsterdam as Women's Day and it was celebrated by the young women, each of whom armed herself with a heavy cord having a knot on the end with which she struck every young man whom she would meet. Guy Fawkes' Day was celebrated at least in New England and New York, being the occasion for bonfires and fantastic parades and burning an effigy of Guy Fawkes, which often was only a straw carried by each one to cast into the fire. In some of the colonies, May Day was celebrated and a May-pole erected and some attempts were made to celebrate it in New England but it did not get much encouragement and it was but a feeble holiday there. Pinkster Day, the name being derived from the Dutch word for Pentecost, was a great holiday in New York for the negro slaves. They gathered in great numbers on that day and had singing and dancing and feasting and drinking--a general good time. The spring sheep-shearing and the autumnal corn-husking were a time of great gatherings and merry-makings, and there were also apple-bees, maple-sugar stirrings, and log-rollings.

=Public Punishments.= Another subject that could have well been placed under amusements is that of public punishments, for such did afford a means of amusement in the form of ridiculing and reviling the ones exposed and of throwing things at them, and, too, exposure was often on a holiday, thus affording more time and opportunity for the people to amuse themselves. Not only was the offender or criminal exposed to the public view but this was made all the worse by placing him in some kind of instrument that would cause him to be in an attitude that would emphasize the grotesqueness of the exposure and make the punishment all the more insulting and painful. This public form of punishment was not confined wholly to men for women, too, were sometimes placed thus before the public.

The exposure of the culprit was not enough for the people of those days and particularly in New England for the parson must be given a chance to display his powers and so the offender was often set in a public place in the church that he might be prayed and preached over and which were too often in the form of objurgations, and, further, this sermon was sometimes printed and sold for it was among the parson's greatest efforts.

This was a time of cruelty toward all living creatures whether beasts or men both in the old country and the new, probably somewhat the effect of the heavy and habitual indulgence in alcoholic drinks by all the people, thus deadening to an extent the higher sensibilities. These public displays must have hardened the people and in particular to have accustomed the young to such and to view crime as meriting open punishment without regard to the feelings of the one exposed. Yet some of the young people must have been affected in an opposite manner for there was a growing away from this form of punishment and of cruelty and which has continued down to the present time where the welfare and individuality of the offender is being more and more considered.

These people of the olden times very greatly feared ridicule, especially of being called names, and hence the ways of punishment were so devised as to place the culprit in a ridiculous position and so that he could not resist the insults inflicted upon him by his fellow-men. The colonists were forever resisting insults by bringing suits in petty slander and libel cases. Men in public positions were in particular jealous of their power and official honor and resented and punished affronts against themselves or their offices or their public doings. Although all classes of people were greatly affected by ridicule and slander, it would seem that schoolmasters and parsons were the most active against such, as is shown from the old court records.

One of the earliest of these instruments of punishment was the bilboes. This consisted of shackles attached to a heavy iron bolt or bar into which shackles the legs were thrust and then locked in with a padlock. Sometimes there was a chain on the end of the bar which was fastened to the floor or it might have been to the wall or a post so that the offender's legs were pulled up high to make his position the more ridiculous and painful. The bilboes were not greatly in use in the colonies and they were soon superseded by the stocks and the pillory. The stocks were made of two heavy timbers, one coming down on the other, with circular openings in them for holding the legs of the culprit, and sometimes also smaller openings for the arms. The upper timber was raised, the legs of the culprit placed in the openings and then kept tight by closing down the upper piece and fastening it. The one in the stocks usually sat on a low bench. The pillory consisted of two pieces of timbers as with the stocks and attached to two upright pieces at either end at about the height of a man's shoulders. There were three circular openings in the timbers, one for the neck and two small ones for the wrists. The neck and arms were placed in these openings and confined as the legs were in the stocks, leaving the head and hands hanging out exposed, the culprit standing.

The ducking stool was specially designed for scolding women, though also used for other offenses. There were different forms. The following description of one of these instruments and its use is said to be from a letter giving an account of a ducking in Virginia in 1634:

"The day afore yesterday at two of ye clock in ye afternoon I saw this punishment given to one Betsy wife of John Tucker who by ye violence of her tongue has made his house and ye neighborhood uncomfortable. She was taken to ye pond near where I am sojourning by ye officer who was joined by ye Magistrate and ye Minister Mr. Cotton who had frequently admonished her and a large number of People. They had a machine for ye purpose yt belongs to ye parish, and which I was so told had been so used three times this Summer. It is a platform with 4 small rollers or wheels and two upright posts between which works a Lever by a Rope fastened to its shorter or heavier end. At ye end of ye longer arm is fixed a stool upon which sd Betsey was fastened by cords, her gown tied fast around her feete. The Machine was then moved up to ye edge of ye pond, ye Rope was slackened by ye officer and ye woman was allowed to go down under ye water for ye space of half a minute. Betsey had a stout stomach, and would not yield until she had allowed herself to be ducked 5 several times. At length she cried piteously, Let me go Let me go, by God's help I'll sin no more. Then they drew back ye Machine, untied ye Ropes and let her walk home in her wetted clothes a hopefully penitent woman."[355]

The pillory itself was not sufficient punishment, for too often the ears of the offender were nailed back to the wood by his head and when the head was removed from the pillory sometimes the nails were not pulled and the ears thus released but the ears were split out of the nails. The cutting off the ears of the offender was of rather frequent occurrence. The brank or scold's bridle, a kind of head-piece with a spiked plate or flat tongue of iron to be placed in the mouth, was a cruel instrument that seems not to have been used in the colonies, as they used a cleft stick into which the tongue was inserted. Another form of punishment was the placing of a letter or inscription on the offender, sometimes the letter was of a conspicuous color and sewed on to the garment in a conspicuous place. The ears were not the only part to be maimed, for the nostrils were slit and the cheeks and forehead were gashed and the tongue was bored through with an awl, or even with a hot iron. Branding with a hot iron was a common enough form of punishment and to make it the more striking it was often done on the forehead or the cheek or on the hands.

Whipping became a common and frequent punishment and it was used for a number of different kinds of offenses. In New York in the time of Dutch control two of the most common causes for whipping was drunkenness and theft. In New England whipping was used as a punishment for lying, swearing, taking false toll, perjury, selling rum to the Indians, drunkenness, slander, name-calling, making false love to a young woman in which a pretense of marriage was used, and for other crimes. One of the greatest crimes in New England was idleness and "transients" as they were called, people who would not settle down and keep at steady work, were often whipped from town to town, for they were not allowed to remain anywhere very long. "So common were whippings in the southern colonies at the date of settlement of the country, that in Virginia even 'launderers and launderesses' who 'dare to wash any uncleane Linen, drive bucks, or throw out the open water or suds of fowle clothes in the open streetes,' or who took pay for washing for a soldier or laborer, or who gave old torn linen for good linen, were severely whipped. Many other offenses were punished by whipping in Virginia, such as slitting the ears of hogs, or cutting off the ends of hog's ears--thereby removing ear-marks and destroying claim to perambulatory property--stealing tobacco, running away from home, drunkenness, destruction of land-marks."[356]

Sometimes the offender was tied to the tail of a cart and whipped through the streets, sometimes he was whipped at the pillory, but most often the whipping-post was used. "There was a whipping-post on Queen Street in Boston, another on the Common, another on State Street, and they were constantly in use in Boston in Revolutionary times. Samuel Breck wrote of the year 1771:

"'The large whipping-post painted red stood conspicuously and prominently in the most public street in the town. It was placed in State Street directly under the window of a great writing school which I frequented, and from there the scholars were indulged in the spectacle of all kinds of punishment suited to harden their hearts and brutalize their feelings.'"[357]

Women as well as men were whipped. Sometimes the whipping was done in the jail-yard, sometimes at the whipping-post, and sometimes even at the tail of a cart, this last was a common enough form used on the Quaker women in Massachusetts. The following would imply that sex did not greatly appeal to the colonists. "In the 'Pticuler' Court of Connecticut this entry appears: May 12, 1668.... Mary Wilton, the wife of Nicholas Wilton, for contemptuous and reproachful terms by her put on one of the Assistants are adjudged she to be whipt 6 stripes upon the naked body next training day at Windsor."[358] "From a New York newspaper, dated 1712, I learn that one woman at the whipping-post 'created much amusement by her resistance.'"[359] Quoting further from Samuel Breck about the whipping-post in Boston in 1771: "Here women were taken in a huge cage in which they were dragged on wheels from prison, and tied to the post with bare backs on which thirty or forty lashes were bestowed among the screams of the culprit and the uproar of the mob."[360] "In Virginia in 1664 Major Robbins brought suit against one Mary Powell for 'scandalous speaches' against Rev. Mr. Teackle, for which she was ordered to receive twenty lashes on her bare shoulders and to be banished the country."[361]