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EVERY DAY LIFE 
 
 IN THE 
 
 COLONIES 
 
 BY 
 
 GERTRUDE L. STONE 
 
 AND 
 
 M. GRACE FICKETT 
 
 BOSTON, U. S. A. 
 
 D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS 
 
 1905 
 
LIBRARY of CONGflt>S 
 Two Coutes rt<iC«ivtiU 
 
 JUL 12 iyu5 
 
 COPY tt. 
 
 Copyright, 1905, 
 By D. C. Heath & Co. 
 
Preface 
 
 Each faculty should receive its training at the time 
 of its greatest natural activity. The imagination is 
 most in evidence in cliildhood. It is charged that 
 chiklhood is disappearing in this country. Students 
 of childlife warn us that the zest, joys, and imagin- 
 ings natural to children find but small place in the 
 lives of our young people and that too many of them 
 are old before they have had time to be young. The 
 tired look seen in the eyes, the weary and wrinkled 
 appearance of the face, the nervous and erratic move- 
 ments of the limbs indicate an unnatural condition in 
 many of our young people. The school is not respon- 
 sible for all these unfortunate results. The home, the 
 church, and the school should seek a remedy for the 
 evils. 
 
 It will be a sad day for the chiklren when they no 
 longer find great delight in learning what the boys 
 and girls of former days thought, felt, and did. 
 Something is wrong when little people cease to have 
 the keenest interest in the pastimes, occupations, ap- 
 parel, and homes of the cliihlren of long ago and in 
 
 iii 
 
iv PREFACE 
 
 all the details which made up their daily life. One of 
 the most efficient agencies in winning children to 
 simple and wholesome living may be the book that 
 records the story of childlife in earlier days in a way 
 to enlist the sympathy of the reader. 
 
 The present candidate for favor in this field of 
 service should receive a cordial welcome. It tells 
 graphically and in attractive form how the children of 
 New England spent their Christmas and with what 
 ceremonies they marked the occasion. These pages 
 help our boys and girls to see how this festival has 
 been extended and in what ways it has been elabo- 
 rated. 
 
 No child of average intelligence can read the ac- 
 count of the dame school without being able to close 
 his eyes and see the face and figure of the mistress, 
 the quaint appearance of the children, to make a pic- 
 ture of the room in which the school assembled and 
 listen to the routine work of the day. 
 
 Our children will learn some new lessons as they 
 study the old-time observance of the Sabbath. It 
 will be encouraging if the contrasts and comparisons 
 induce in them somewhat of the spirit of reverence 
 and devotion that was manifest in colonial days. The 
 restraints of the olden time were too severe ; the 
 license of the present has its fruits in unwarranted ex- 
 
PREFACE V 
 
 cesses. A study of the two periods should make pos- 
 sible better conduct on the part of our coming citizens. 
 
 Every normal child will be delighted with the 
 sketches which are giv^en of soap and candle-making, 
 will be glad to know how the colonists told time with- 
 out a clock, how children wrote their letters in the 
 long ago, and with what anxiety travelers prepared 
 for journeys. The fate of the poor debtor's children 
 will make little readers sorry for suffering, and thank- 
 ful that cruel laws do not permit such injustice in 
 these days. The story of the Indian attack on Saco 
 will give a new beauty and significance to Whittier's 
 famous poem. 
 
 The book will also develop that sympathy and in- 
 terest which are the true basis of all historical study. 
 It is fortunate that children like incidents, stories, 
 sketches, descriptions of life ; that they are eager to 
 know how people looked and lived and worked, and 
 that they are concerned about the joys and sorrows, 
 hopes and fears of their ancestors when they too were 
 3^oung. A¥hen the time comes for the formal study of 
 history, the children w4io have read this book will find 
 themselves traveling over familiar ground and will in- 
 terpret w4mt they read in the light of what they know. 
 
 It is with heartiest approval that this volume is pre- 
 sented to school officials, teachers, and parents for the 
 
vi PREFACE 
 
 children of this country. May it be as helpful to them 
 as it has proved interesting to, at least, one reader. 
 The word pictures are vivid and suggestive, the illus- 
 trations are well wrought out, and the lessons are 
 stimulating and clearly taught. It is a piece of work 
 of which the profession should feel proud. 
 
 W. W. Stetson. 
 
Authors' Note 
 
 Believing that the subject matter of this book is 
 such as lends itself readily to reproduction, either oral 
 or written, the authors have prepared a series of lan- 
 guage exercises which are printed as an appendix. It 
 is hoped that teachers who wish to correlate the work 
 in reading and language may find these outlines not 
 only practical but suggestive. 
 
 G. L. S. 
 
 M. G. F. 
 
 Gorham Normal Schoolj Maine, 3Iay, 1905. 
 
 vn 
 
Contents 
 
 The First New England Christmas (1620) 
 
 Dorothy's Hornbook . 
 
 A Puritan Sabbath (About 1668) 
 
 Soap- Making at the Rowlands' 
 
 When the Indians Fell on Saco 
 
 Candle-Making at the Coolidges' 
 
 Telling Time Without a Clock . 
 
 Two Letters of Long Ago (1743) 
 
 A May Day Journey (1727) . 
 
 The Poor Debtor's Children (1733) 
 
 Appendix 
 
 PAGE 
 1 
 
 13 
 
 27 
 36 
 42 
 61 
 69 
 79 
 94 
 103 
 115 
 
 IX 
 
Illustrations 
 
 On the Deck of the '^ Mayflower" . 
 Dorothy's Hornbook .... 
 ^N'athaniel and the Man in the Stocks 
 When the Indians fell on Saco 
 Patience Sees the Candles Made 
 Telling Time with the Sundial 
 Christina Writing Her Letter 
 The Maypole Dance .... 
 John and Julia Leaving London 
 
 Facing page 
 . 10 
 
 18 
 24 
 46 
 
 66 
 
 74 
 
 98 
 108 
 
 XI 
 
Life in the Colonies 
 
 THE FIRST NEW ENGLAND CHRISTMAS 
 
 It was a warm and pleasant Saturday — that 
 twenty-third of December, 1620. The winter 
 wind had blown itself away in the storm of the 
 day before, and the air was clear and balmy. 
 
 The people on board the Mcmifloiuer were glad 
 of the pleasant day. It was three long months 
 since they had started from Plymouth, in Eng- 
 land, to seek a home across the ocean. Now 
 they had come into a harbor that they named 
 New Plymouth, in the country of New England. 
 
 Other people called these voyagers Pilgrims, 
 which means wanderers. A long while before, 
 the Pilgrims had lived in England ; later they 
 made their home with the Dutch in Holland ; 
 finally they had said good-bye to their friends 
 in Holland and in England, and had sailed away 
 to America. 
 
 1 
 
2 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 There were only one hundred and two of the 
 Pilgrims on the Mayjlower ; but they were brave 
 and strong and full of hope. Now the May- 
 floiver was the only home they had ; yet if this 
 weather lasted they might soon have warm log- 
 cabins to live in. This very afternoon the men 
 had gone ashore to cut down the large trees. 
 
 The women of the Mayfloiver were busy, too. 
 Some were spinning, some knitting, some sew- 
 ing. It was so bright and pleasant that Mistress 
 Rose Standish had taken her knitting and had 
 gone to sit a little while on deck. She was too 
 weak to face rough weather, and she wanted to 
 enjoy the warm sunshine and the clear salt air. 
 By her side was Mistress Brewster, the minister's 
 wife. Everybody loved Mistress Standish and 
 Mistress Brewster, for neither of them ever 
 spoke unkindly. 
 
 The air on deck would have been warm even 
 on a colder day, for in one corner a bright fire 
 was burning. It would seem strange now, would 
 it not, to see a fire on the deck of a vessel ? But 
 in those days, when the weather was pleasant, 
 people on shipboard did their cooking on deck. 
 
 The Pilgrims had no stoves, and Mistress 
 Carver's maid had built this fire on a large 
 hearth covered with sand. She had hung a 
 
THE FIRST CHRISTMAS 3 
 
 great kettle on the crane over the fire, where 
 the onion soup for supper was now simmering 
 slowly. 
 
 Near the fire sat a little girl, husily playing 
 and singing to herself. Little Remember Aller- 
 ton was only six years old, but she liked to be 
 with Hannah, Mistress Carver's maid. This 
 afternoon Remember had been watching Han- 
 nah build the fire and make the soup. Now 
 the little girl was playing with the Indian 
 arrowheads her father had brought her the 
 night before. She was singing the words of the 
 old psalm : — 
 
 ''Shout to Jeliovab, all the earth. 
 Serve ye Jehovah with gladness ; before 
 him bow with singing mirth." 
 
 '' Ah, child, methinks the children of Old 
 England are singing different words from those 
 to-day," spoke Hannah at length, with a far- 
 away look in her eyes. 
 
 '' Why, Hannah ? What songs are the little 
 English children singing now ? " questioned 
 Remember in surprise. 
 
 *' It lacks but two days of Christmas, child, 
 and in my old home everybody is singing 
 merry Christmas songs." 
 
4 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 " Bat thou hast not told me what is Christ- 
 mas? " persisted the child. 
 
 " Ah, me ! Thou dost not know, 'tis true. 
 Christmas, Remember, is the birthday of the 
 Christ-child, of Jesus whom thou hast learned 
 to love," Hannah answered softly. 
 
 " But what makes the English children so 
 happy then ? And we are English, thou hast 
 told me, Hannah. Why don't we keep Christ- 
 mas, too? " 
 
 '^ In sooth we are English, child. But the 
 reason why we do not sing the Christmas carols 
 or play the Christmas games makes a long, long 
 story, Remember. Hannah cannot tell it so that 
 little children will understand. Thou must ask 
 some other, child." 
 
 Hannah and the little girl were just then near 
 the two women on the deck, and Remember said, 
 
 '* Mistress Brewster, Hannah sayeth she know- 
 eth not how to tell w^hy Love and Wrestling and 
 Constance and the others do not sing the Christ- 
 mas songs or play the Christmas games. But 
 thou wilt tell me, wilt thou not?" she added 
 coaxingly. 
 
 A sad look came into Mistress Brewster's eyes, 
 and Mistress Standi sh looked grave, too. No 
 one spoke for a few seconds, until Hannah said 
 
THE FIRST CHRISTMAS 5 
 
 almost sharply, " Why could we not burn a 
 Yule log Monday, and make some meal into little 
 cakes for the children ? " 
 
 " Nay, Hannah," answered the gentle voice of 
 Mistress Brewster. '' Such are but vain shows 
 and not for those of us who believe in holier 
 things. But," she added, with a kind glance at 
 little Remember, '' wouldst thou like to know 
 why we have left old England and do not keep 
 the Christmas Day? Thou canst not under- 
 stand it all, child, and yet it may do thee no 
 harm to hear the story. It may help thee to be 
 a brave and happy little girl in the midst of our 
 hard life." 
 
 '' Surely it can do no harm, Mistress Brew- 
 ster," spoke Rose Standish, gently. '* Remem- 
 ber is a little Pilgrim now, and she ought, me- 
 thinks, to know something of the reason for our 
 wandering. Come here, child, and sit by me, 
 while good Mistress Brewster tells thee how 
 cruel men have made us suffer. Then will I 
 sing thee one of the Christmas carols." 
 
 With these words she held out her hands to 
 little Remember, who ran quickly to the side of 
 Mistress Standish, and eagerly waited for the 
 story to begin. 
 
LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 II 
 
 '' We have not always lived in Holland, Re- 
 member. Most of us were born in England, 
 and England is the best country in the world. 
 'Tis a land to be proud of, Remember, though 
 some of its rulers have been wicked and cruel. 
 
 " Long before you were born, when your 
 mother was a little girl, the English king said 
 that everybody in the land ought to think as he 
 thought, and go to a church like his. He said 
 he would send us away from England if we did 
 not do as he ordered. Now we could not 
 think as he did on holy matters, and it seemed 
 wrong to us to obey him. So we decided to 
 go to a country where we might worship as we 
 pleased." 
 
 *' What became of that cruel king. Mistress 
 Brewster?" 
 
 " He ruleth England now. But tliou must 
 not think too hardly of him. He doth not un- 
 derstand, perhaps. Right will win some day, 
 Remember, though there may be bloody war be- 
 fore peace cometh. And I thank God that we, 
 at least, shall not be called on to live in the 
 midst of the strife," she went on, speaking more 
 to herself than to the little girl. 
 
THE FIRST CHRISTMAS 7 
 
 *' We decided to go to Holland, out of the 
 reach of the king. We were not sure whether it 
 was best to move or not, but our hearts were set 
 on God's ways. We trusted Him in whom we 
 believed. Yes," she went on, '' and shall we not 
 keep on trusting Him ? " 
 
 And Rose Standish, remembering the little 
 stock of food that was nearly gone, the disease 
 that had come upon many of their number, and 
 the five who had died that month, answered 
 firmly : " Yes. He who has led us thus far 
 will not leave us now." 
 
 They were all silent a few seconds. Presently 
 Remember said, '' Then did ye go to Holland, 
 Mistress Brewster? " 
 
 " Yes," she said. '^ Our people all Avent over 
 to Holland, where the Dutch folk live and tlie 
 little Dutch children clatter about with their 
 wooden shoes. There thou wast born, Remem- 
 ber, and my own children, and there we lived in 
 love and peace. 
 
 " And yet, we were not wholly happy. We 
 could not talk well with the Dutch, and so Ave 
 could not set right what was wrong among 
 them. 'Twas so hard to earn money that many 
 had to go back to England. And worst of all. 
 Remember, we were afraid that you and little 
 
8 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 Bartholomew and Mary and Love and Wrest- 
 ling and all the rest would not grow to be good 
 girls and boys. And so we have come to this 
 new country to teach our children to be pure 
 and noble." 
 
 After another silence Remember spoke again : 
 ^' I thank thee, Mistress Brewster. And I Avill 
 try to be a good girl. But thou didst not tell 
 me about Christmas, after all." 
 
 " Nay, child, but now I will. There are long 
 services on that day in every church where the 
 king's friends go. But there are parts of these 
 services which we cannot approve ; and so we 
 think it best not to follow the other customs that 
 the king's friends observe on Christmas. 
 
 ^' They trim their houses with mistletoe and 
 holly so that everything looks gay and cheerful. 
 Their other name for the Christmas time is the 
 Yule-tide, and the big log that is burned then 
 is called the Yule log. The children like to 
 sit around the hearth in front of the great, 
 blazing Yule log, and listen to stories of long, 
 long ago. 
 
 '' At Christmas there are great feasts in Eng- 
 land, too. No one is allowed to go hungry, for 
 the rich people on that day always send meat 
 and cakes to the poor folk round about. 
 
THE FIRST CHRISTMAS 
 
 '' But we like to make all our days Christmas 
 days, Remember. We try never to forget God's 
 gifts to us, and they remind us always to be good 
 to other people." 
 
 Ill 
 
 '' And the Christmas carols, Mistress Standish ? 
 What are they ? " 
 
 '' On Christmas eve and early on Christmas 
 morning," Rose Standish answered, '' little chil- 
 dren go about from house to house, singing 
 Christmas songs. Tis what I like best in all 
 the Christmas cheer. And I promised to sing 
 thee one, did I not? " 
 
 Then Mistress Standish sang in her clear, 
 sweet voice the quaint old English words : — 
 
 As Joseph was a-walking, 
 He heard an angel sing : — 
 "This night shall be the birth -time 
 Of Christ, the heavenly King. 
 
 ''He neither shall be born 
 In housen nor in hall, 
 Nor in the place of Paradise, 
 But in an ox's stall. 
 
10 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 "He neither shall be clothed 
 In purple nor in i)all, 
 But in the fair white linen 
 That usen babies all. 
 
 " He neither shall be rocked 
 In silver nor in gold, 
 But in a wooden manger 
 That resteth in the mould." 
 
 As Joseph was a- walking 
 There did an angel sing, 
 
 And Mary's child at midnight 
 Was born to be our King. 
 
 Then be ye glad, good people, 
 This night of all the year. 
 
 And light ye up your candk^s. 
 For His star it shineth clear. 
 
 Before the song was over, Hannah had come 
 on deck again, and was listening eagerly. " I 
 thank thee, Mistress Standish," she said, the 
 tears filling her blue eyes. *' 'Tis long indeed 
 since I have heard that song." 
 
 '' Would it be wrong for me to learn to sing 
 those words, Mistress Standish ? " gently ques- 
 tioned the little girl. 
 
 '' Nay, Remember, I trow not. The song 
 shall be thy Christmas gift." 
 
On the peck of the " Mayflower." 
 
THE FIRST CHRISTMAS 11 
 
 Then Mistress Standish taught the little girl 
 one verse after another of the sweet old carol, 
 and it was not long before Remember could say 
 it all. 
 
 The next day was dull and cold, and on Mon- 
 day, the twenty-fifth, the sky was still overcast. 
 There was no bright Yule log in the Mayflower, 
 and no holly trimmed the little cabin. 
 
 The Pilgrims were true to the faith they loved. 
 They held no special service. They made no 
 gifts. Instead, they went again to the work of 
 cutting the trees, and no one murmured at his 
 hard lot. 
 
 '^ We went on shore," one man wrote in his 
 diary, '' some to fell timber, some to saw, some 
 to rive, and some to carry ; so no man rested all 
 that day." 
 
 As for little Remember, she spent the day on 
 board the Mayflower. She heard no one speak 
 of England or sigh for the Englisli home across 
 the sea. But she did not forget Mistress Brew- 
 ster's story ; and more than once that day, as she 
 was playing by herself, she fancied that she was 
 in front of some English home, helping the 
 English children sing their Christmas songs. 
 
 And both Mistress Allerton and Mistress 
 Standish, whom God was soon to call away from 
 
12 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 their earthly home, felt happier and stronger as 
 they heard the little girl singing : — 
 
 ''He neither shall be born 
 In housen nor in hall, 
 Nor in the place of Paradise, 
 But in an ox's stall." 
 
 Learn : — 
 
 God wills it : here our rest shall be, 
 
 Our years of wandering o'er, 
 For us the Mayfloicer of the sea 
 
 Shall spread her sails no more. 
 
 — John Greenleaf Whitfier. 
 
DOROTHY'S HORNBOOK 
 
 Dorothy Parker began to go to school the 
 day she was four years old. Her birthday came 
 in May, and it was a bright spring morning 
 when she started with her sister Faith to walk 
 to the dame's school a mile away. This odd 
 name — a dame's school — meant that the school 
 was taught by a woman, and that it was kept 
 for the little children and the older girls. 
 
 Dorothy's brother Jonathan went to a master, 
 but Jonathan was learning Latin, because he 
 was to go to Harvard College. Nothing was 
 taught in the dame's school but reading, writ- 
 ing, and casting accounts, — no music, no draw- 
 ing, no nature study. The minister's daughter 
 taught the school in a room in the parsonage ; 
 and all the little children that Dorothy knew 
 went to this school. 
 
 Dorothy enjoyed the walk. Part of the way 
 the path lay through the woods and was marked 
 by notches cut in the trees, just as the Indians 
 
 13 
 
14 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 blazed their paths through the deeper forests. 
 Overhead the song sparrows, bluebirds, and cat- 
 birds were flying to and fro with straws and 
 threads for their nests. A catbird whistled to 
 Dorothy in such a sociable manner that she 
 thought he might be saying, " Such a little, 
 little girl to go to school, school, school 1 " 
 
 Dorothy felt quite grown-up by the time she 
 reached the parsonage, though her feet dragged 
 rather heavily and her dinner-pail seemed to 
 have more dinner in it than when she left 
 home. She took off" her hat and the school- 
 mistress gave her a seat. Now she would learn 
 to read ! 
 
 School began, and the teacher was soon busy 
 with the other pupils. She seemed to have for- 
 gotten Dorothy. The little girl watched and 
 waited patiently, but at last the schoolmistress 
 seemed a long way ofl" and her voice was so far 
 away that it could hardly be heard. Dorothy's 
 head nodded to the right, then to the left, and 
 then she was fast asleep. 
 
 When she awoke, it was the noon hour and 
 Faith had the dinner-pail in her hand. 
 
 " Come out of doors," she said, and Dorothy 
 gladly followed. 
 
 In the afternoon Dorothy stood on the floor 
 
DOROTHY'S HORNBOOK 15 
 
 with a class of little children, but as she did 
 not know what they had already learned in 
 school, she could not recite. On the whole, it 
 was such a very disappointing day that Dorothy 
 could hardly keep back the tears when she told 
 her mother that she had not learned to read. 
 
 Her mother smiled. " Rome was not built in 
 a day," she said soothingly, and then, turning 
 to Faith, she added, '' Dorothy must have the 
 hornbook to-morrow." 
 
 Dorothy understood both remarks. She knew 
 that the first meant she must not be in too much 
 of a hurry. How many times she had heard 
 that before ! She knew also that her mother 
 had really promised that to-morrow she should 
 have the precious hornbook dangling from her 
 neck just as Faith had worn it when she first 
 went to school. 
 
 II 
 
 Think of wearing your primer on a cord 
 around your neck ! That was what Dorothy 
 was so proud to do. Think of calling that 
 primer a book, when it was not a book at all, 
 but just a single page ! 
 
 The hornbook was the only kind of primer 
 
16 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 the school children had in those days. When 
 the strange primer was hung around Dorothy's 
 neck, in order that she might carry it safely to 
 school, it really looked more like a toy than 
 anything else. There was only one printed 
 page. A thin piece of wood was put behind 
 the sheet of paper to keep it smooth, and over 
 the printing was spread a sheet of horn so thin 
 that the letters could be seen through it. 
 
 Printing cost so much in those days that the 
 little sheet must be kept safe from wet or dirty 
 fingers. But glass was costly, too, and so the 
 thin covering of horn was used. A frame of 
 brass was put around the whole, and the wooden 
 back had a handle at the bottom. The horn- 
 book looked like a little hand mirror. A very 
 odd primer ! 
 
 Dorothy wore her hornbook to school the 
 second day. A new cord had been put through 
 the hole in the end of the little wooden handle, 
 and the hornbook hung like a very large locket 
 around Dorothy's fat little neck. 
 
 The string was so long that Dorothy could 
 hold her primer in her hand and study it with- 
 out taking off the cord. 
 
 The one little printed page that made Doro- 
 thy's whole primer was scarcely more than half 
 
DOROTHY'S HORNBOOK 17 
 
 as large as a page of our books. Yet it seemed 
 to her that there was a great deal on it to learn. 
 There was not a single thing she could tell ex- 
 cept the crosses in the two upper corners. 
 
 This second morning the teacher called Doro- 
 thy to her side. The little girl went eagerly. 
 She had been holding tight the handle of the 
 hornbook and waiting since school began, to find 
 out how to read. 
 
 '^ What can you read in your ' Criss Cross 
 Row'?" asked the teacher, using the name often 
 given to the hornbook page because of the two 
 crosses in the upper corners. 
 
 '' Nothing," faltered Dorothy, '' except the 
 crosses." 
 
 '' That is not reading," severely replied the 
 teacher. '' To learn to read you must learn your 
 letters first." 
 
 Using a knitting needle for a pointer, she 
 began at the top of the page where the alphabet 
 was printed in both capitals and small letters. 
 She taught Dorothy big A and little a for her 
 first lesson. Learning to read was not at all like 
 what Dorothy had expected. She wanted to 
 cry, but she was too proud. 
 
18 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 III 
 
 If Dorothy had gone to school when her own 
 daughter's daughter went, she would have had 
 a real book with pictures. Perhaps there would 
 have been a picture of an acorn and a picture of 
 a boy and the rhyme : — 
 
 " A is au Acorn that grew on an oak, 
 B is a Boy who delights in his book." 
 
 This surely would have given some help in 
 learning A and B. 
 
 It would have been easier still if Dorothy had 
 learned to read in these days, for nobody would 
 have troubled her with the letters at all. She 
 would have begun at once with little stories, 
 just as she expected to do. 
 
 It seemed very stupid to keep saying the 
 alphabet. Round O and curly S, to be sure, 
 were easy, but how could any one ever tell which 
 was little b and which was little d f 
 
 There were days when Dorothy wished she 
 lived where little girls had no hornbooks. At 
 last she knew that the hump was on the right 
 side of b and on the left side of d ; and she knew 
 also the sounds of the easy syllables in the next 
 line, a-b, ab^ o-b, ob, and all the others. 
 
Dorothy's Hok^book. 
 
DOROTHY'S HORNBOOK 19 
 
 There were more lines on the hornbook page, 
 and they took a long time to learn, because one 
 was a line that held all the figures, and the lower 
 part of the page contained the Lord's Prayer. 
 
 The day she was five years old Dorothy read 
 to her grandfather everything on the hornbook 
 from the cross in the upper left hand corner to 
 the Amen at the end of the prayer. 
 
 '' Grandfather is proud of his little grand- 
 daughter," said the old man with delight when 
 the child had finished. '' She has called every 
 word as it is on the page." 
 
 *' Perhaps," said Dorothy a little doubtfully, 
 '' I couldn't have read all the Prayer if I had 
 not heard you say it so many times." 
 
 Her grandfather smiled. *' By another birth- 
 day you will feel sure of every word, I think, 
 and then you must have a book of your very 
 own." 
 
 Doroth}'' said very little about her book, but 
 she kept hoping that it would be a book of the 
 Psalms like the copy Faith had, even to the 
 black cover with a gilt cross. 
 
 She was an earnest little pupil, and when her 
 next birthday came, she did know every word, 
 even when it was outside the prayer, — as her 
 grandfather had prophesied. She could also 
 
20 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 read some easy stories in a book the school- 
 mistress lent her. 
 
 One May morning her grandfather called 
 her to him and said, '' This is yours, Dorothy." 
 
 Dorothy, of course, looked at the object he 
 held in his hand, and her eyes shone as she saw 
 there a little black Psalm book. 
 
 '' You must do your reading in this now," 
 grandfather said smilingly, '' for Solace must 
 have the hornbook this spring when he begins 
 to go to school." 
 
 Learn : — 
 
 Nor let them fall under Discouragement, 
 
 Who at their Hornbook stick, and time hath spent, 
 
 Upon that A B C, while others do 
 
 Into their Primer or their Psalter go. 
 
 — John Bunyan (1686). 
 
A PURITAN SABBATH 
 
 '* Is that grandmother at the corner, Na- 
 thaniel?" asked Mistress Mather one pleasant 
 morning in June. 
 
 *^ Yes, mother, and she is turning this way. 
 May I go to meet her? " 
 
 Of course Mistress Mather said yes, and Na- 
 thaniel ran as fast as he could towards the 
 corner. In a few moments back he came, hold- 
 ing to his grandmother's hand. But grand- 
 mother could not spend the day ; she had come 
 on an errand, she said. 
 
 Pretty soon Nathaniel heard grandmother 
 say, '' Art thou willing, daughter Maria, that 
 Nathaniel should stay w^ith me two or three 
 days ? Perhaps 'twill help him to grow stronger, 
 and surely 'twill keep me from lonely thoughts." 
 
 '' Methinks 'twould do the child no harm," 
 answered Mistress Mather. '' Wouldst thou 
 like to spend the Sabbath with grandmother, 
 Nathaniel ? " 
 
 21 
 
22 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 "May I, mother?" asked the boy, with an 
 eagerness that made his mother glad. 
 
 For Nathaniel had never been strong and 
 active like other children. That year, all 
 through April and May, he had been too ill even 
 to sit up. Though he was much better, his 
 cheeks were still pale, and he looked frail and 
 thin. 
 
 Just then Nathaniel's father came in. He 
 was a man about whom you will read more 
 some time, for he was a famous minister of 
 Boston. 
 
 He had a name that sounds odd to us now — 
 Increase Mather. Names meant more in those 
 early days than they do now. Mr. Increase 
 Mather had named his oldest son, Nathaniel's 
 brother. Cotton ; but that was because Grand- 
 mother Mather was once Mistress Cotton. 
 
 One of Nathaniel's uncles was born on board 
 the ship that brought grandmother and Mr. 
 Cotton to America ; so they called him Seaborn. 
 Perhaps you have heard of Oceanus Hopkins 
 and Peregrine White. I wonder if you know 
 what those names mean. And I trust you 
 have not forgotten Remember Allerton and 
 Love and Wrestling Brewster. 
 
 It was Saturday, and a busy day for Mr. 
 
A PURITAN SABBATH 23 
 
 Mather. He stayed only long enough to say, 
 ^' Be a good boy, Nathaniel, and do as grand- 
 mother bids thee. ' Remember the Sabbath day 
 to keep it holy.' " 
 
 If you had seen the little five-year-old boy 
 trudging along North street with his grand- 
 mother, you would have wondered, '' Is it a girl 
 or a boy ? " For Nathaniel was not dressed like 
 little boys of to-day. 
 
 He wore a skirt that came to his ankles, and 
 his waist had long, loose sleeves. He did not 
 wear a hat. Instead, he had a cap tied with 
 strings under his chin. His shoes, too, were not 
 like yours. His mother had made them, and 
 they were more like the soft moccasins that 
 your baby brother wears. They would seem 
 clumsy to you, but I dare say Nathaniel thought, 
 if he thought anything about it, that they were 
 very pretty shoes indeed. 
 
 Nor was grandmother Mather dressed a bit 
 like your grandmother. Folded across her 
 breast was a large, white kerchief. But the 
 strangest thing about her was her hat. It was 
 called steeple-crowned, for its tall, pointed 
 crown looked a little like a steeple. 
 
 '' See, Nathaniel ! " said grandmother sud- 
 denly. '' There is a man in the stocks." 
 
24 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 As Nathaniel looked, he saw what no one of 
 you has ever seen. Two boards were fastened 
 together so that they looked like a piece of board 
 fence. Behind these boards a man was sitting, 
 but how uncomfortable he looked ! His feet 
 and hands were sticking out through holes in 
 the boards, and he could not move if he wanted 
 to. 
 
 Being placed in the stocks was a common 
 punishment in those days, and it hurt more than 
 you would think. Try some time to hold an 
 arm or a leg in the same position for a few min- 
 utes, and then think how uncomfortable you 
 would be if you had to sit that way a day at a 
 time. 
 
 '' Who is the wicked man ? And what wrong 
 hath he done, grandmother ? " asked Nathaniel. 
 
 '' I know not his name, child. But his home 
 is by the water-front, and last Sabbath he forgot 
 God's command and profaned the holy day. 
 He sat in his doorway and went not to the meet- 
 ing-house." 
 
 '^ I am sorry for him. But perhaps he will be 
 a better man now, grandmother. How tired and 
 ashamed he looks ! " 
 
 '' 'Tis not easy to sit in the stocks, child, nor 
 to bear the looks of all the passers-by." 
 
Nathaniet. and the Man 
 IN THE Stocks. 
 
A PURITAN SABBATH 25 
 
 '^ I hope I shall never have to sit in the 
 stocks," Nathaniel said, looking very solemn. 
 
 And grandmother smiled at the loving and 
 obedient little boy as she answered, '' 1 have 
 no fear of that, Nathaniel." 
 
 II 
 
 The old lady and the little boy walked on 
 slowly up the hill till they came to what is now 
 Pemberton square. In this neighborhood, and 
 not far back from Tremont street. Grandmother 
 Mather lived. 
 
 Stretching back up the hill from the house 
 was a large yard filled with rose bushes and 
 apple trees. After dinner grandmother and 
 Nathaniel walked about in the garden, stopping 
 now and then to smell the roses or to watch the 
 butterflies and humming birds. 
 
 The little boy grew tired before long, and they 
 both sat down on the soft green grass. There 
 Nathaniel could watch the sea and the sky as he 
 listened to stories about his Uncle Seaborn which 
 grandmother liked so much to tell. 
 
 By and by Deborah, who had lived many 
 years with grandmother, came to call them to 
 supper. By this time the town had grown very 
 
26 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 quiet. Scarcely a sound could be heard except 
 the twittering of the birds overhead, or the soft 
 murmur of the wind in the apple trees. 
 
 For as Nathaniel was sitting in the garden 
 the Sabbath had come to many people, and work 
 had stopped for the week. It would come for 
 everybody at sunset, but at three o'clock most 
 people put their w^ork aside and began to get 
 themselves and their children ready for the 
 Lord's Day. 
 
 After Nathaniel had eaten his supper, he went 
 out to bid good-night, he said, to the sky and the 
 sea and the flow^ers. But just as the sun w^as 
 setting, grandmother called him in again. 
 
 Into the best room they went, and with them 
 the two servants, Deborah and old John. Then 
 the first part of the Sabbath worship began. 
 
 Grandmother made a long prayer, but not 
 so long, Nathaniel thought, as his father's or 
 those his Grandfather Mather used to make. 
 Then they all sang a psalm, and the little boy's 
 clear, sweet treble sounded above the other 
 voices in the well-known w^ords : — 
 
 ^^The Lord is both my health and light ; 
 Shall men make me dismayed ! 
 Sith God doth give me strength and might, 
 Why should I be afraid 1 " 
 
A PURITAN SABBATH 27 
 
 Next came the time when every one was to 
 sit by himself a little while and think over the 
 sins of the past week. Nothing could be heard 
 but the crickets chirping in the garden ; and 
 they seemed to say to little Nathaniel, '' What — 
 have — you — done ? What — have — you — done ? " 
 
 The little boy tried so hard to think of a time 
 when he had been naughty or unkind that he 
 fell fast asleep in his big chair. He did not 
 wake even when John carried him upstairs, and 
 grandmother undressed him and tucked him 
 into bed. 
 
 The next morning the sky and sea were as 
 beautiful as they had been the day before, but 
 '' stillness was in the little town." It w^as the 
 morning of the Sabbath and no one was stirring. 
 ^' There was no footfall, no sound of voices in 
 the streets." 
 
 Deborah had made everything ready for 
 breakfast the night before, so that with few and 
 noiseless steps she soon placed the meal upon 
 the table. Nathaniel tiptoed downstairs, and 
 climbed into his chair with only a bow for good- 
 morning. 
 
 The breakfast was a very quiet meal. After 
 grandmother's long prayer at the beginning, she 
 did not speak again except to ask Deborah for 
 
28 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 more milk for Nathaniel. So of course nobody 
 else spoke. 
 
 After breakfast, Deborah cleared the table and 
 grandmother and Nathaniel went into the best 
 room. Then grandmother took from the shelf 
 a book of questions and answers about the Bible, 
 called the catechism. Nathaniel knew that 
 book, for he had seen one like it every Sunday 
 since he could remember. 
 
 Every child had to study the catechism and 
 learn it by heart. Nathaniel could say a large 
 number of the answers, even though the words 
 were long and he could not understand them 
 very well. 
 
 '' Thou wilt understand them better by and by, 
 Nathaniel," grandmother said, consolingly. 
 
 Right in the midst of a long answer, Nathaniel 
 heard a bell ring. 
 
 '' We will stop now," said grandmother. " It 
 is half past eight, and time to go to meeting. 
 Find John and Deborah, Nathaniel, and we will 
 start." 
 
 Ill 
 
 Before long, they were all walking down the . 
 hill to the church in North street, where Na- ji 
 
A PURITAN SABBATH 29 
 
 thaniel's father preachedo They did not call it a 
 church, but a meeting-house, for there, they said, 
 God met together with the people. 
 
 It was no new thing for Nathaniel, young as 
 he was, to go to meeting. His mother used to 
 take him when he was only a baby ; and for two 
 years now he had tried his best to understand 
 the long sermon in the morning and the second 
 long one in the afternoon. 
 
 Nathaniel could not sit with grandmother in 
 the meeting-house, nor even with his mother. 
 His place was with his brother Cotton and the 
 other boys on the pulpit stairs. 
 
 He stood quietly through his father's long 
 prayer, and then, sitting down, he listened to 
 every word in the Bible chapter that the other 
 minister read and explained. But he was glad 
 when it came time for everybody to sing with 
 the leader : — 
 
 "Likewise the lieaveus he down-bow' d 
 aud he descended: also there 
 Was at his feet a gloomy cloud 
 
 and he on cherubs rode apace." 
 
 Then came the sermon. Nathaniel listened 
 Avith all his might, for he knew well that both 
 his father and grandmother would ask what he 
 
30 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 remembered about it. Besides, he was much 
 afraid of Goodman Merry, the ti thing-man. 
 
 Every meeting-house in those days had its 
 tithing-man. It was his business to see that no- 
 body went to sleep and that everybody behaved 
 welL 
 
 He carried a long pole, with which he struck 
 any person on the head who was not doing as 
 he ought. One end of the pole was tipped with 
 fur from a rabbit's tail. This was the end that 
 Goodman Merry used when he wanted to wake 
 a tired mother or a sleepy little girl. But if he 
 saw a boy laughing or dozing, he struck the lit- 
 tle fellow sharply with the other end. That 
 was hard, for it was tipped w^ith the rabbit's foot. 
 
 This very Sunday a boy laughed aloud. 
 Down came the tithing rod with a hard thump 
 on his head. Nathaniel looked at the unhappy 
 boy, and thought : *' How could he have 
 laughed ! And how I hope I shall not go to 
 sleep and be hit with the hard rod ! " 
 
 When Mr. Mather began to talk, he used to 
 turn the hour-glass so that the lower part was 
 empty. When the sand had all run down, the 
 children would say to themselves, '' Now he is 
 half through." Then the minister would turn 
 the glass over again, and when the sand had run 
 
A PURITAN SABBATH 31 
 
 out for the second time the sermon would be 
 finished. 
 
 It was pretty hard for a little boy of five to 
 sit still two hours on a bright Sunday in June, 
 without once nodding. But Nathaniel did keep 
 awake, for he remembered Goodman Merry and 
 the tithing rod. 
 
 When he grew too sleepy to listen any longer 
 to the sermon, he tried all manner of ways to 
 make time pass quickly. He could count to 
 ten ; so he counted all the groups of ten people 
 that he could make. First he counted the men 
 with dark hair, then the men with light hair. 
 Then he counted the little girls he knew, then 
 those he didn't know, until finally the last grain 
 of sand had run out for the last time. 
 
 Now that the sermon w^as finished, the meet- 
 ing was almost over. After one more prayer 
 and a hymn, it was time for the benediction. 
 How every little boy and girl rejoiced to leave 
 those hard seats and get some fresh air again ! 
 
 Nathaniel was not strong enough to walk up 
 the hill before the afternoon service at two 
 o'clock, and grandmother took him to his own 
 home, not far from the church. 
 
 Mistress Mather was glad to find that her lit- 
 tle boy had passed such a pleasant night with 
 
32 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 his grandmother, but she knew that the long 
 service must have made him tired and sleepy. 
 So, after the cold dinner, she let little Nathaniel 
 sleep for an hour, before it was time to go again 
 to the meeting-house. His brother Cotton, 
 however, was not allowed a nap. He went 
 instead into his father's study to learn his 
 catechism to recite that evening. 
 
 At two o'clock they all went again to hear an- 
 other long sermon. This time Mr. Mather read 
 the chapter and the other minister preached. 
 Nathaniel was rather glad of this change, for, 
 dearly as he loved his fatlier, he could keep 
 awake better when he listened to a strange voice. 
 
 IV 
 
 When the afternoon meeting was over, Na- 
 thaniel went back with his grandmother to the 
 house on the hill. He went in at once, because 
 people thought it was wrong to sit out of doors 
 on a Sabbath afternoon or to wander among the 
 trees in the garden. " To Avalk in that way," 
 they said, " is walking profanely on the Sab- 
 bath." 
 
 So Nathaniel quietly followed grandmother 
 into the best room. First they talked about the 
 
 1 
 
 I 
 
A PURITAN SABBATH 33 
 
 sermons they had heard that day ; then grand- 
 mother read to him from a book for children 
 that Grandfather Cotton had written. Tlie 
 title had one rather hard word in it, but if 
 Nathaniel could understand it, you ought to. 
 It was called '' Spiritual Milk for Boston Babes 
 in Either England." It was not a story — only 
 questions and answers much like those in the 
 catechism that the little boy had recited in the 
 morning. 
 
 Nathaniel could sa}^ many of the answers in 
 this book, too, and to-night grandmother read to 
 him from a part he had not studied. 
 
 The new answers were not all easy for him 
 to understand, and though he meant to listen, 
 he found himself more than once thinking of 
 that kind old grandfather whom he had never 
 seen, but about Avhom grandmother had so often 
 talked to him. So thinking, he went to sleep, 
 and dreamed that he saw red-cheeked, blue- 
 eyed Grandfather Cotton holding out to him 
 a large cup of milk, and saying, ^' Drink it, 
 Nathaniel. It will make thee well and strong." 
 
 When Monday morning came, Boston was a 
 different town. Nathaniel woke early, and was 
 glad enough to hear the rumble of carts and the 
 sound of voices. He knew that he might spend 
 
34 LIFE IX THE COLONIES 
 
 the whole day out of doors and wander as he 
 pleased among the rose bushes. 
 
 All of a sudden it occurred to him that he 
 might have to go home that day. But grand- 
 mother had said '' two or three days," and 
 grandmother never forgot. "So I shall stay 
 here to-day and maybe to-morrow," concluded 
 Nathaniel. '' But even then it will not be much 
 longer, for Monday and Tuesday together are 
 shorter than Sunday." And so it proved. 
 
 That morning John had an errand over in 
 Dorchester and he took the little fellow in the 
 saddle with him. Grandmother was afraid it 
 would be a rather hard ride for a little sick boy, 
 but the little sick boy bore it better than she 
 feared. Of course, Prince couldn't help jolting 
 them ; but that wasn't bad when Nathaniel got 
 used to it, and John held him so tightly that he 
 could not have fallen off if he had tried. 
 
 Tuesday he fully expected to go home ; and 
 once, when grandmother brought him his cap, 
 he Avas sure his visit had come to an end. But 
 no, he was wrong ; for grandmother only took 
 him down on Milk street to call on a woman 
 who had been ill longer than he had. 
 
 Finally, when Wednesday afternoon came, 
 the visit was really over. Grandmother once 
 
A PURITAN SABBATH 35 
 
 more put on her steeple hat and tied Nathaniel's 
 cap strings under his chin. Then, hand-in- 
 hand, the old lady and the little boy walked 
 down the hill to the Mather home in North 
 street. 
 
 Learn : — 
 
 Q. Which is the fourth commandment % 
 A. The fourth commandment is, Eemember the Sab- 
 bath-day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor 
 and do all thy work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath 
 of the Lord thy God : in it thou shalt not do any work ; 
 thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, 
 nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger 
 that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made 
 heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and 
 rested the seventh day ; wherefore the Lord blessed the 
 Sabbath-day and hallowed it. — FromNathanieV s Catechism. 
 
SOAP-MAKING AT THE HOWLANDS' 
 
 The snowdrifts were disappearing fast. Each 
 day the sun drank up a great many little ones 
 and devoured huge pieces of the larger ones. 
 Great patches of brown earth were uncovered 
 in every direction, and the " caw, caw " of the 
 crows could be heard each morning. 
 
 '' Spring has really come, and we must make 
 the soap at once," sighed Goodwife Howland. 
 '' The grease will be softening and the meat 
 scraps are thawing. We shall not want to have 
 them about the house any longer. Jonathan, 
 you and William may as well make the lye 
 to-morrow." 
 
 ''Make the lye!" Little Richard heard it 
 with a start. He was only five and he knew of 
 just one kind of lie, — and that kind, he had 
 been taught, people ought not to make. 
 
 '' You will need to use two barrels," added 
 Goodwife Howland. 
 
 '' What can she mean ? " puzzled Richard, be- 
 36 
 
S^AP-MAKING 37 
 
 ginniDg to watch very carefully to see what his 
 big brothers would do. 
 
 They did nothing about the soap-making that 
 day, for they were busy chopping wood to burn 
 in the great fireplace the coming winter ; but 
 the next day they started the soap-making as 
 their mother had suggested. 
 
 It was all new to Richard. He had been sick 
 with measles at soap-making time the year 
 before. And before that, — well, he could not 
 remember. But they must have made soap, 
 because people had always been telling him to 
 wash his hands. 
 
 As children were taught in those days that 
 they should be seen and not heard, Richard 
 kept his bright blue eyes wade open, but asked 
 very few questions. 
 
 When Jonathan and William were ready to 
 make the lye, Jonathan rolled out two barrels, 
 each with a hole bored in the bottom. Into 
 each barrel he put a layer of clean, fresh straw, 
 and with William's help filled each with wood 
 ashes. Then they lifted the barrels to a high 
 bench that stood by the shed door, taking care 
 that the holes were just above two large empty 
 buckets. 
 
 *' The ashes cannot get into the buckets on 
 
38 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 account of the straw," thought Richard. Still 
 he asked no cjuestions. 
 
 When the barrels and buckets were in place, 
 Jonathan brought two pails of water. These 
 and many more he and William poured over 
 the ashes, until at last the water began to drip 
 into the buckets below. 
 
 '' Pretty dirty looking stuff! " thought Rich- 
 ard, as he stepped up to have a better view of 
 the water in the buckets. 
 
 " Look out, child ! " called Jonathan. " Do 
 not touch the lye unless you want to lose the 
 skin from your fingers." 
 
 So it was lye which the buckets held ! 
 Nothing but water that had run through wood 
 ashes ! Well, he was glad to learn. 
 
 " Surely you do not think it is strong enough 
 yet to eat the skin," said William. 
 
 '' Very likely it is," replied Jonathan. ''As 
 soon as it is through dripping we will test it ; I 
 hope it will not be necessary to pour it through 
 again." 
 
 '' Will Jonathan test it by dipping in his fin- 
 ger?" Richard asked himself. He did not like 
 to think of the result if the lye was strong. 
 But he need not have troubled himself about 
 Jonathan's finger ; for late in the afternoon 
 
SOAP-MAKING 39 
 
 Jonathan brought out a hen's egg and placed it 
 in one of the buckets. Wonder of wonders ! It 
 did not sink. He put the egg in the other 
 bucket : it floated there also. 
 
 '' Good ! both buckets of lye are all ready for 
 use," he said, with relief. '' We will have the 
 soap-making out of the way soon." 
 
 II 
 
 Nothing more was done about the soap until 
 the next morning. Then Jonathan began the 
 work by building a fire under the huge set ket- 
 tle in the back kitchen and by pouring the lye 
 into the kettle. 
 
 His mother brought the frozen meat scraps 
 and the waste grease that had been saved during 
 the winter. These she put into the lye. 
 
 Such a dirty kettleful as it was ! Richard 
 fairly laughed to himself. That make soap ? 
 The idea ! Why, he would not have to use any 
 soap all next year for scrubbing his hands ! 
 
 Much as he disliked to bother about clean 
 hands, he was almost sorry that he would not be 
 able to get clean if he should want to. 
 
 *' The skimmer, Richard," directed his mother, 
 in the midst of his worriment. The kettleful of 
 
40 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 lye and grease was bubbling briskly. When 
 Richard brought the skimmer, Goodwife How- 
 land began to take off all the refuse which rose 
 to the top. Out came bones, skin, and pieces of 
 candle wicking. 
 
 After a time, when all the waste had been 
 skimmed, the liquid grew thick as molasses. 
 Richard thought, as he watched it boil, that 
 perhaps after all he would have to wash his 
 hands. The thick ropy mixture was coming to 
 look very much like the soap he had used all 
 the last year. 
 
 PffI j)ff! pff! Blob I blob! It boiled as you 
 have seen molasses candy boil when it is almost 
 ready to take off the stove. At last his mother 
 said, '' The soap is made ! " 
 
 When Jonathan and William came in for din- 
 ner they ladled the hot soap into pails, and 
 carried it down cellar to fill the soap barrel. 
 Most people to-day keep their soap in boxes, but 
 the Howland family always kept theirs in a bar- 
 rel ; and when they needed more soap upstairs 
 they brought it up in a bowl. 
 
 When the soap was cold it was still a thick 
 brown jelly, but that was just what Goodwife 
 Howland expected, for the only kind of soap 
 she ever made for her famil}^ was what is called 
 
 1 
 
SOAP-MAKING 41 
 
 soft soap. It was not a bit like the hard white 
 soap you like to use when you wash your hands, 
 but it was very good soap ; and Richard How- 
 land could get his busy little hands just as clean 
 as if he had used the prettiest, sweetest-smelling 
 cake of hard soap that ever was made. 
 
 Learn : — 
 
 CleaDliness is next to Godliness. 
 
 — John Wesley. 
 
WHEN THE INDIANS FELL ON SACO 
 
 It was a cold winter night on the Maine coast. 
 Goodwife Garvin had carried away the candle, 
 leaving her little daughter Mary alone in the 
 small bedroom next the kitchen. Mary had 
 taken a slight cold that day. Her mother had 
 put her to bed earlier than usual and had made 
 her some ginger-tea that would be good at any 
 time, Mary thought. To-night it tasted very 
 good indeed. 
 
 "Thank you, mother," Mary had said, drink- 
 ing the last drop. As the little ten-year-old 
 girl settled comfortably back upon the pillow, 
 she forgot all about her cold. The ginger-tea 
 had been a rare treat, and she was to stay all 
 night in the warm bedroom instead of going up- 
 stairs as usual. On the wall she could watch 
 the reflection of the cheerful fire in the kitchen. 
 
 It was too dark to see out of doors, but Mary 
 could hear the white flakes of snow piling them- 
 selves softly against the windoAV. *' How pleas- 
 ant it is here in bed ! " she said to herself, and 
 
 42 
 
INDIANS FELL ON SACO 43 
 
 that was the last she really thought that night. 
 The sound of voices from the kitchen became 
 fainter and fainter ; the light on the wall danced 
 less and less ; and before very long, Mary was 
 fast asleep. 
 
 The voices in the kitchen went with her, how- 
 ever ; and in her dreams they changed to the 
 tinkle of the little brook by which she played 
 in the summer. The flickering light on the 
 wall became the dancing shadow of the willow 
 tree that grew by the edge of the brook. Mary 
 had pleasant dreams that night ; and when her 
 mother gently kissed her good-night, she was 
 smiling in her sleep. 
 
 Suddenly Mary woke. It was the gray twi- 
 light of the winter morning and she could not 
 see distinctly. But what Avas that tall, straight, 
 ugly form by the bed ? She gave one frightened 
 look, then tried to scream ; but a hard, dark 
 hand was on her lips, and a grufl" voice said, 
 " No scream ! Me kill ! " 
 
 In an instant Mary understood. The Indians 
 — the savage, murdering Indians — had fallen 
 upon Saco. They would kill or carry off every 
 one they could find. Had they killed her father 
 and mother, she wondered ? 
 
 As she lay there, not daring to move, she 
 
44 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 heard a loud shot, then another, and another. 
 There were noises everywhere. She heard quick 
 footsteps in the kitchen and upstairs, and voices 
 that she could not understand rang through the 
 house. 
 
 The Indian, meantime, was pointing to her 
 clothes that were lying near the bed, and Mary 
 knew he meant that slie was to dress quickly. 
 She put on her clothes, but her hands shook so 
 that it was slow work. Then the Indian, still 
 keeping his hand on her mouth, lifted her to 
 his shoulder and hurried from the house. 
 
 Mai-y tried to look about. She saw the form 
 of their next door neighbor lying on his back in 
 the yard. Suddenly her captor, picking up a 
 blanket, threw it over Mary's head, and she 
 could not see, or hear, and could hardly breathe. 
 
 The Indian carried Mary a long, long time, 
 and he walked very fast indeed. The little girl 
 was growing more and more frightened every 
 moment. What had become of her father and 
 mother she could not tell. She knew only that 
 she was a prisoner, and she thought the Indian 
 was carrying her to far-off Canada. 
 
 She tried not to remember the stories she had 
 heard of the children that the Indians had 
 stolen ; but she could not put the horrible tales 
 
i:NrDIANS FELL ON SACO 45 
 
 out of her mind. Some dreadful thing might 
 happen to her, and she trembled all over when 
 the Indian put her roughly down and beckoned 
 her to follow him. 
 
 It had stopped snowing and the sun was 
 shining. Walking was a difficult matter, never- 
 theless, for the snow was soft and deep, and 
 Mary could not go so fast as the Indian wanted 
 her to. 
 
 By and by the sun was almost over their 
 heads, and Mary knew that it was noon. Then 
 Whirling Wind (for that was the Indian's name) 
 stopped, munched a piece of dried deer-meat 
 that he had with him, and at last gave another 
 piece to Mary, making motions for her to eat, 
 too. She did not feel like eating, but she dared 
 not disobey ; so she chewed the deer-meat, and, 
 to her surprise, it did not taste so bad, after all. 
 
 Then Whirling Wind made some snowshoes 
 for Mary and showed her how to use them. It 
 was hard work at first and she grew very tired. 
 She was so tired she cried, but Whirling Wind 
 did not seem to care. He grunted and said, 
 '' No cry ! Hurry ! " and the frightened child 
 dared not cry again. Every step she took hurt 
 so that it seemed as if she could not take 
 another ; but she walked till the sun had set. 
 
46 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 Then they stopped again ; Mary had some 
 more meat and a drink of water ; and Whirling 
 Wind began to make a bed out of some fir 
 boughs. Then he threw her the blanket that 
 he had put over her head in the morning, and 
 she knew that she was at last to have a chance 
 to rest. 
 
 Strange to say, she had not thought till then 
 about her cold of the day before. Bedtime 
 brought it all back — her mother and father, the 
 warm house, the happy home. She cried again, 
 but Whirling Wind, who was never very far 
 away, stood over her ; and, touching his toma- 
 hawk, he said, '' No cry ! This kill ! " 
 
 After a while, miserable though she was, Mary 
 fell asleep and slept soundly all night. The 
 next morning, she found a great change in the 
 camp. Lying not far from her, on beds of fir, 
 were some children about her own age and two 
 young men. She knew them all, for she had 
 seen them often at the meeting-house. There 
 were the three Dyer children, John, Daniel and 
 Hannah, and William and Rufus Johnson. 
 With the prisoners were three more Indians and 
 two Frenchmen. All five seemed ever so much 
 more fierce and cruel than Mary's captor had 
 been. 
 
When thk Indians 
 
 FELL. ON SACO. 
 
INDIANS FELL ON SACO 47 
 
 It would be hard to tell how much better 
 Mary felt on seeing some of her friends again, 
 and she was even happy when she found from 
 the young men that Farmer Garvin and his wife 
 had escaped in safety to the garrison. '' Per- 
 haps I shall see them again, after all," she 
 thought. 
 
 That hope helped her through the long, hard 
 day, for the Indians were cruel indeed. One of 
 them walked behind the party and whipped the 
 children when they did not walk fast enough. 
 Mary was stronger than Hannah or Daniel and 
 could walk faster ; but she felt worse when they 
 were whipped than when she was struck herself. 
 
 The dreadful day came to an end at last ; the 
 evening, however, brought even worse things. 
 The Dyer children had told Mary that their 
 mother and their older sister had started with 
 the others, but the long walk had made them 
 both so sick that the}^ could not keep on. The 
 children had not seen their mother or sister 
 since the night before, and supposed that the 
 Indians had killed them. They were sure of it 
 this evening and Mary was, too ; for they all 
 knew only too well the scalps on which the 
 Indians were working. 
 
 So the fearful journey went on. When they 
 
48 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 had been tramping for almost a month, the In- 
 dians gave them another fright. Each prisoner 
 was taken in charge by an Indian, and made to 
 sit perfectly still. '' Now they are going to 
 scalp us," thought Mary, and she almost fainted 
 as an Indian walked up to her. But the Indian 
 only combed her hair out straight, and then 
 painted it black. He painted her face, too, with 
 daubs of red, so that I doubt whether her own 
 mother would have known her at first glance. 
 
 All the other prisoners were painted, too, and 
 the solemn little people who had not smiled for 
 a month could hardly help laughing to see 
 what good Indians they made. 
 
 When they left camp the next morning, their 
 way was no longer through the thick woods. 
 They went across fields instead, and soon, far off 
 upon a hill, they saw a farmhouse — the first 
 house of any kind that they had seen for a 
 month. 
 
 '^ I wonder whether French or English people 
 live there," said Rufus. 
 
 ''Oh, French, I suppose," his brother an- 
 swered. " We must be pretty far north by this 
 time, and in Canada somewhere. I don't be- 
 lieve we are to go much farther." 
 
 '' What do you suppose they will do with us 
 
INDIANS FELL ON SACO 49 
 
 now? Must we be Indians always?" asked 
 Mary. 
 
 " No, I think they mean to sell us to the 
 French, if they can. That will be better than 
 living in wigwams, anyway." 
 
 '* Perhaps so," answered Mary doubtfully, 
 '' but it will be more lonesome than ever if we 
 have to live in different places." 
 
 " Of course it will at first, but I think we 
 shall get back to Saco before very long." 
 
 II 
 
 William was partly right. The Indians did 
 sell them that very afternoon, just as soon as 
 they came to a little French village. Fright- 
 ened as Mary was when she knew she must 
 leave her companions, she could not help being 
 interested to kno^v how much Whirling Wind 
 would receive for her. She knew that the In- 
 dians did not care very much for white men's 
 money, but she was much surprised when she 
 saw a man give Whirling Wind only three 
 spools, a red blanket, and a hatchet with a very 
 bright blade. 
 
 '' My father would give ever so much more to 
 buy me back," she thought, bitterly. But she 
 
50 lifp: in the colonies 
 
 had no more time just then for thinking. 
 Whirling Wind grunted, " Ugh ! ugh ! " as if he 
 was much pleased at his bargain, and gave her a 
 little push towards the man who had handed 
 him the trinkets. 
 
 Then for the first time Mary looked her new 
 master in the face. It did not take her long to 
 know that he was a kind man, even though she 
 could not understand a word he was speaking, 
 for his eyes said, *' How weary you look, little 
 girl ! " All at once he took her up in his arms 
 and carried her across the road to a comfortable 
 looking sledge. He put her gently down on a 
 buffalo robe in the bottom, and after rolling her 
 up warm, he gave the patient oxen the word to 
 start. 
 
 Mary had not seen what had become of the 
 other children, but somehow she felt sure that 
 they were warm and contented like herself. 
 She was so glad to leave the gruff and cruel In- 
 dians and to feel the Frenchman's kindness, that, 
 though she did not know who he was or where 
 he was going, she forgot her troubles for a little 
 while and slept all the rest of the way. 
 
 When the sledge stopped, she woke with a 
 start. She was in front of a large farmhouse 
 that in some way looked familiar. '' Haven't 
 
INDIANS FELL ON SACO 51 
 
 I been here before?" she asked herself in 
 surprise. Then she remembered. It was the 
 same farmhouse they had seen and talked about 
 in the morning, and without knowing exactly 
 why, Mary felt that she was glad to be there. 
 
 Again she was lifted in the kind man's arms 
 and carried this time to the house. Two chil- 
 dren, a boy and girl about Mary's age, ran to 
 open the door for their father, and they both 
 looked in great surprise at their little visitor. 
 The father spoke kindly to them, and Mary 
 thought he was saying something about her. 
 When the children's mother came in, she seemed 
 to understand at once. Going up to Mary, she 
 took the forlorn little stranger in her arms and 
 kissed her tenderly. 
 
 Such a welcome was too much for the little 
 captive girl and she began to cry. To be in a 
 house again, to see father and mother and chil- 
 dren, — she could not have helped crying even if 
 Whirling Wind had stood by with his tomahawk 
 and said, '' No cry ! This kill ! " 
 
 No one in the French family could speak 
 English, but Mary did not need words to know 
 that she had fallen among friends. The next 
 morning, however, Mr. Le Blanc came into the 
 kitchen with a neighbor who could speak Eng- 
 
52 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 lish fairly well. Then Mary had a chance to 
 tell all about herself and her cruel capture. 
 
 '' The poor, poor child ! " thought the French 
 father and mother, and the neighbor said very 
 kindly, '' When the war is over, you shall go 
 home again. Meantime, you must be happy 
 here." 
 
 And she was happy. Jean and Elise were the 
 most delightful companions she had ever known, 
 and in a little while she had learned to speak 
 their language and to play their games. 
 
 She found, too, that not all the northern In- 
 dians were like the wicked man who had stolen 
 her from her father and mother. There were 
 kind-hearted Indians in Canada, as there had 
 been in New England, and some of them she 
 saw very often. There was one tall, handsome 
 Indian who came often to the house and whom 
 the children were always glad to see. His name 
 pleased them, too. In English it means *' Keeps- 
 the-Spotted-Ponies." 
 
 Keeps-the-Spotted-Ponies had once lived far- 
 ther west and he knew a great many wonder- 
 ful stories that his old grandmother had told 
 him. Every day that winter, when it w^as snow- 
 ing and bloAving hard, the children would won- 
 der whether Keeps-the-Spotted-Ponies would not 
 
INDIANS FELL ON SACO 53 
 
 come before night. They were not often disap- 
 pointed, for in such weather the lonely Indian 
 did not like his cheerless wigwam. He would 
 rather sit in front of the crackling fire in the 
 farmhouse, and tell stories of things that had 
 happened so far in the past that nobody had any 
 idea how long ago it was. 
 
 The children liked best of all the story of the 
 arbutus, and I have decided to tell it to you 
 here. Only I must write it in English, for you 
 could not understand it as Keeps-the-Spotted- 
 Ponies told it to Mary and Jean and Elise. 
 
 Ill 
 
 THE LEGEND OF THE ARBUTUS 
 
 There was once an old, old man Avith long 
 white locks. His wife and children were all 
 dead, and he lived alone in his wigwam. Now 
 the season of ice and snow had come, and it Avas 
 growing colder every day. Usually he delighted 
 in the cold, and never before had the days been 
 too sharp or bitter. But now even his thick 
 wolfskin could not keep him warm, and no- 
 where could he find fagots for a fire. 
 
 " Shall the Great Manito die?" he Avondered 
 sadly, and in despair he prayed the Great Spirit 
 that he might not perish. 
 
54 LIFE IN THE COLOXIES 
 
 But the cold grew still more bitter. Manito 
 shivered as the icy wind blew back his bearskin 
 door. Now, however, the strangest thing hap- 
 pened that could be imagined. Into the wig- 
 wam walked a lovely maiden, lovelier than the 
 fairest of Manito's daughters had been ; and as 
 she stepped inside, the air of the wigwam grew 
 mild and fragrant. 
 
 For a minute Manito could not speak ; he 
 could only look and wonder. " Her hair is 
 black as a crow's wing," he thought ; and, as she 
 walked slowly towards him, he saw that it was 
 so long that it swept the ground behind. " How 
 pink her cheeks are ! " he said to himself 
 " They are the color of the wild roses. And her 
 eyes ! A fawn's at night could not be brighter." 
 
 But where did the delicious odor come from? 
 He had seen the crown of flowers on the 
 maiden's head, and the willow buds in her hand. 
 Now he looked more closely, and found that her 
 dress was woven of sweet grass and that instead 
 of moccasins she had white lilies on her feet. 
 
 At last he found his voice. " Thou art wel- 
 come, lovely maiden," said the old man ; and 
 then he forgot his trouble and began to tell the 
 stranger what a mighty chief he was. 
 
 " When I walk abroad," he said, '' the brooks 
 and the rivers stand still to listen." 
 
INDIANS FELL ON SACO 55 
 
 " But I have only to smile," the maiden an- 
 swered, '' and flowers cover the cold earth and 
 lift up their little heads to smile back at me." 
 
 '' I shake my locks," said the chief, '' and the 
 wind knows that I am angry. It shrieks to the 
 squirrel and to the blind little mole to hide 
 themselves in the earth. It tells the robin and 
 the bluebird to fly far away to the south where 
 great Manito will not find them." 
 
 ''Great is Manito," spoke the maiden, "but 
 he is cruel. I am great, too, but gentler." 
 
 In an instant the proud chieftain's power was 
 gone. His eyes closed and he could feel him- 
 self grow smaller. In a little while he lay fast 
 asleep on the wigwam floor, not much larger 
 than the ordinary Indian. Streams of warm 
 water came out of his mouth, and his fur gar- 
 ments turned to bright green leaves. 
 
 Then the maiden put her hand into the folds 
 of her dress and drew out some beautiful rose- 
 white flowers. Kneeling down, she tenderly 
 hid the pink blossoms beneath the thick green 
 leaves ; and when she had finished, the wigwam 
 was full of a new fragrance, though not a flower 
 peeped out from its green bed. Still they could 
 hear the maiden when she whispered softly, 
 ''Be good, little flowers. You shall tell the 
 
56 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 world that the long, cold winter is past and that 
 the breath of summer is in the breeze." 
 
 Then the maiden walked away ; and as she 
 walked, myriads of the rose-white flowers sprang 
 up out of the ground and nestled softly among 
 the leaves. And to-day we know exactly where 
 she stepped ; for there, and nowhere else, the 
 arbutus blooms. 
 
 So the winter melted into the spring, and the 
 spring warmed into the summer. Then came 
 the clear, crisp days and sharp nights of the 
 autumn, and by the time the long, cold winter 
 had fairly come again, Mary had forgotten a 
 good deal of her English and had ceased to 
 think so much about her father and mother. 
 
 One year followed another, and still the cruel 
 war went on. There was no chance for Mary 
 to get home for eleven long years, and by that 
 time she cared much less about going back. 
 For she had grown into a beautiful Avoman, and 
 had married Jean, the little boy who had opened 
 the door for her that winter night. When the 
 war was ended, she had a lovely little girl, who 
 looked like her and was named for her. Only 
 the name was spelled M-a-r-i-e to show that it 
 was French. 
 
INDIANS FELL ON SACO 57 
 
 IV 
 
 From the fort near Saco the evening gun had 
 sounded. It was a damp and gusty night ; the 
 wind was blowing strong from the east, and in 
 the darkness the river Saco roared more loudly 
 and fiercely than ever. 
 
 " Ou the hearth of Farmer Garvin, blazed the crackling 
 walnut log ; 
 Eight and left sat dame and goodman, and between 
 them lay the dog, 
 
 Head on paws, and tail slow wagging, and beside him 
 
 on her mat, 
 Sitting drowsy in the firelight, winked and purred the 
 
 mottled cat. 
 
 * Twenty years ! ' said Goodman Garvin, speaking sadly, 
 
 under breath, 
 And his gray head slowly shaking, as one who speaks 
 of death. 
 
 The goodwife dropped her needles : ' It is twenty 
 
 years to-day, 
 Since the Indians fell on Saco, and stole our child 
 
 away.' " 
 
 They did not speak again for some time, but 
 each knew what the other was thinking about. 
 
1 
 
 58 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 Suddenly there came a loud knock ; and when 
 Goodman Garvin had opened the door, he saw 
 two strangers, a man and a young girl. 
 
 "Does Elkanah Garvin live here?" the man 
 asked politely. 
 
 '' I am Elkanah Garvin," answered the farmer ; 
 and without stopping to ask the names of the 
 travelers, he invited them cordially to come in. 
 Then Good wife Garvin, remembering the rain 
 and wind outside, drew up the settle, and urged 
 them to sit down in front of the fire. They 
 did so gladly, and began to unfasten their wet 
 clothes. As the maiden unclasped the hood of 
 her cloak, the fire for the first time lighted up 
 her features. 
 
 ^'Dame Garvin looked upon her : 'It is Mary's self I 
 see ! 
 Dear heart ! ' she cried, ' now tell me, has my child 
 come back to me 1 ' 
 
 'My name indeed is Mary,' said the stranger, sob- 
 bing wild ; 
 
 * Will you be to me a mother ? I am Mary Garvin's 
 child ! 
 
 ' She sleeps by wooded Simcoe, but on her dying day 
 She bade my father take me to her kinsfolk far I 
 
 away. ' 
 
INDIANS FELL ON SACO 59 
 
 ' And when the priest besought her to do me no such 
 wrong, 
 She said, ' ' May God forgive me ! I have closed my 
 heart too long. 
 
 ' ' When I hid me from mj^ father, and shut out my 
 mother's call, 
 I sinned against those dear ones, and the Father of us 
 alL'" 
 
 ' God be praised ! ' said Goodwife Garvin, ' He taketh 
 and He gives 5 
 He woundeth, but He healeth ; in her child our 
 daughter lives ! ' 
 
 ' Amen ! ' the old man answered, as he brushed a tear 
 
 away. 
 And, kneeling by his hearthstone, said, with rever- 
 ence, ' Let us pray. ' ' ' 
 
 But it seemed to the Garvin s that they ought 
 to thank God in public for the happiness He 
 had sent them in their old age ; so, when the 
 horn sounded on the next Sabbath morning, 
 Goodman and Goodwife Garvin took Marie to 
 the meeting-house, where every one could see 
 her and be glad with them. 
 
 "From the pulpit read the preacher, 'Goodman Garvin 
 and his wife 
 Fain would thank the Lord, whose kindness has fol- 
 lowed them through life, 
 
60 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 ' For the great and crowning mercy, that their daugh- 
 ter, from the wild, 
 Where she rests (they hope in God' s peace), has sent to 
 them her child ; 
 
 ' And the prayers of all God's people they ask, that 
 
 they may prove 
 Not unworthy, through their weakness, of such special 
 proof of love. ' ' 
 
 Learn : — 
 
 What the Sun told the Indians 
 
 O my children, 
 Love is sunshine, hate is shadow, 
 Life is checkered shade and sunshine, 
 
 Rule by love, O Hiawatha ! 
 
 — Henry Wadsworth Longfelloic. 
 
CANDLE-MAKING AT THE COOLIDGES' 
 
 Not since the Coolidge family came to New 
 England had Mistress Coolidge been able to 
 make any candles. The colonists had owned so 
 few cattle and sheep during the first few years 
 after they came to their new home that, even 
 w^ith the deer fat and the bear grease, there had 
 not been enough material for candle-making. 
 
 One day during the fall when Patience Cool- 
 idge was seven years old, her mother said, 
 '' There will be tallow enough for candles this 
 year. Our home shall be lighted in the same 
 way as Governor Winthrop's, though methinks 
 not so brightly." 
 
 The little girl's face broke into a radiant 
 smile. Once upon a time, when she went to town, 
 she had seen the beautiful candlesticks at the 
 Governor's house with snowy white candles in 
 them ; but she had never seen any candles 
 lighted. To think of being like the great Gov- 
 ernor Winthrop ! 
 
 61 
 
62 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 Patience tilted her dimpled chin a trifle 
 higher, bat she dared not say anything. Only 
 the Sabbath before, when she said that her shoes 
 were not so pretty as Anne Howland's, her grand- 
 mother had replied very severely, '' Pride goeth 
 before destruction ; and a haughty spirit before 
 a fall." 
 
 All the light that Patience had ever seen after 
 sunset in the great square room which served as 
 the Coolidges' kitchen and dining-room and 
 living-room, came from the burning of a big, 
 sticky pine knot. This knot, called candle-wood, 
 was placed on a flat stone in a corner of the fire- 
 place. It was really necessary to tuck it away 
 in such a fashion, because the smoke must go 
 up the chimney, and because the dirty, pitchy 
 droppings, — which were really tar, — must run 
 where they would be burned up and do no harm 
 in the clean room. 
 
 The burning knot made the room bright and 
 cheery ; but it did not give light enough to 
 make reading easy. Patience, too, very much 
 regretted that the candle-wood could not be 
 carried to another room. But then she was 
 small and was still a little afraid of dark halls 
 and black places behind doors. 
 
 It was a clear, cold night in November when 
 
CANDLE-MAKING 63 
 
 Mistress Coolidge said, '' To-morrow I must dip 
 the candles." 
 
 Patience had been hoping for a week that the 
 next day was to be the great day of the candle- 
 making. When her mother spoke, she closed 
 her eyes and tried to imagine how the room 
 would seem with a lighted candle on the table. 
 Would there be enough light so that across the 
 room she could see the face on her grand- 
 mother's large cameo breastpin ? 
 
 Patience did not have to wait until morning 
 to see the candle-making begin. That evening 
 her mother made the wicks ready. She stuck 
 an old iron fork upright in the kitchen table 
 about eight inches from the edge, and threw 
 around it half a dozen loops of the soft tow- 
 string, which she called wicking. By cutting 
 these loops at the edge of the table, she made 
 six wicks of the same length. 
 
 ^' Six, twelve, eighteen," she counted, until at 
 last she had laid out twenty-five dozen. '' That 
 is all we may have for this year's supply," she 
 said with regret. But Patience thought it could 
 not be that Governor Winthrop had many more. 
 
 After Patience had gone to bed, Mistress 
 Coolidge continued to work. She took the 
 wicks one at a time from the basket into wdiich 
 
64 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 she had tossed them, twisted each tightly, 
 doubled it, and slipped through the loop a 
 candle rod, — a stick not much thicker than a 
 lead pencil but about three times as long. The 
 twisted ends, as soon as Mistress Coolidge released 
 her hold upon them, untwisted a little and rolled 
 themselves together in a good firm wick. 
 
 When six wicks dangled by their looped ends 
 from one candle rod, she began on another rod 
 and so made each one ready for the dipping. 
 When Patience saw the limp little wicks in the 
 morning she thought they looked like stockings 
 on a clothes-line. 
 
 That morning, as soon as breakfast was over, 
 Mistress Coolidge said to her two tall sons, 
 '' Now a brisk fire, boys, and the two big iron 
 kettles from the shed. You will find the tallow 
 in them." 
 
 When the kettles were swung on heavy iron 
 hooks in the fireplace, the boys brought in a 
 pair of long poles. Mistress Coolidge tipped 
 down two straight-backed chairs and directed 
 the boys to place the poles across them, forming 
 something like a ladder without any rounds. 
 
 '^ The candle rods next, boys," she directed, 
 and then she added, as Jonathan brought these 
 out and she began to place them like rounds 
 
 1 
 
CANDLE-MAKING 65 
 
 across the sides of the ladder, '' It was well to 
 make these ready last night. The candle-dip- 
 ping will take all the morning." 
 
 II 
 
 The candle rods were soon in place. Then 
 the boys laid boards beneath the rods to keep 
 any greasy drippings from the floor ; and at last 
 they took one of the big kettles half full of 
 melted tallow from the fire and set it on the 
 broad hearth. 
 
 '' Now she is going to begin to dip," thought 
 Patience ; but, no, her mother took a pail and 
 poured boiling water into the kettle until it was 
 full. 
 
 " Oh, the tallow is spoiled ! " cried the little 
 girl in real distress. 
 
 Her mother did not seem troubled. ^' Ask 
 thy grandmother, she will tell thee. I cannot 
 stop now," she said briefly. 
 
 '' Where was the fat of the soup we had yes- 
 terday ? " asked Patience's grandmother when 
 the little girl had crossed the room to her. 
 
 '' On top," said Patience, and a smile broke 
 over her face. 
 
 " And that is where the tallow is ; where thy 
 
66 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 mother needs it that the wicks may reach it 
 easily. Is not the fat on the top of the water 
 deeper than the wicks are long? Do not be 
 troubled ; by and by she must pour in more 
 water to keep the tallow ever at the top of the 
 kettle." 
 
 All ready at last? No, not even yet. The 
 kitchen had to be cooled so that the candles 
 might harden well. Then at last everything 
 was really ready, and Mistress Coolidge took up 
 the first candle rod and skilfully dipped the six 
 Avicks into the hot tallow. 
 
 When they came out, Patience had another 
 disappointment. There were six greasy strings 
 hanging on the rod, not in the least like the 
 beautiful round w^hite candles she had seen in 
 the Governor's mansion. 
 
 Her mother straightened some of the wicks, 
 then dipped another rod and then another, until 
 they all had been dipped once. Then she took 
 up the first rod once more. 
 
 " There goes the first round of the ladder 
 again ! " thought Patience. 
 
 A little more tallow stuck this time and Pa- 
 tience gave a small sigh of satisfaction ; but she 
 could not keep from asking her grandmother, 
 " Will they ever be candles? " 
 
Patience seks the Candles made. 
 
CANDLE-MAKING 67 
 
 ^' Let patience have her perfect work," quoted 
 her grandmother, as she had a hundred times 
 before. 
 
 It took a long time to dip all the rods and 
 come back again to the first, but after a while 
 the first had been dipped and dipped until it 
 had grown to be as large as a lead pencil. 
 
 '' Why does she not keep them in the tallow 
 longer, that they may grow faster?" Patience 
 quietly asked her grandmother, for her mother 
 was working too busily to be interrupted. 
 
 '* Why should she melt off all the tallow that 
 is on the wicks?" her grandmother asked in 
 return. " That is what would surely happen if 
 she were to hold the wicks long in that hot ket- 
 tle. The hot tallow will stick to the cool candle 
 like cream to thy finger ; but the little candles 
 would become tow strings again if they re- 
 mained long in so hot a place." 
 
 After a time the second kettle was taken from 
 its hook in the fireplace and the first was hung 
 up with fresh tallow to melt. So the kettles 
 were used in turn until at last the candles were 
 done. Patience had well deserved her name be- 
 fore the twenty-five dozen completed candles 
 hung and swung on the rods across the long 
 poles. 
 
68 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 '' Now they will all be ready to carry to the 
 garret to bleach as soon as they are hard and 
 cold," said Mistress Coolidge with relief. 
 
 '' O mother, not all ! " cried Patience. " One, 
 you know, you said we would light to-night." 
 
 '' You are right, little daughter. Choose your 
 candle and make ready your grandmother's 
 brass candlestick. Polish it bright and bring 
 out the snuffer tray and snuffers. To-night you 
 shall see what candle-light is like." 
 
 What a delight it was to rub the old candle- 
 stick until it shone, and to fit the new candle into 
 the socket so carefully that it would stand just 
 straight. In the evening, when the candle was 
 lighted, Patience could not see the face on the 
 cameo pin as she had expected, but what of 
 that ! All she had to do was to carry the can- 
 dle across the room and hold it in front of her 
 grandmother in order to see every line of the 
 beautiful carved face. Best of all, however, she 
 had the candle when she went to bed, so that 
 she knew positively there was not a single creepy 
 thing behind the door. 
 
 Learn :- 
 How far that little candle throws his beams ! 
 So shiues a good deed iu a naughty world. 
 
 — Shakespeare. 
 
TELLING TIME WITHOUT A CLOCK 
 
 '' Now we are ready to start ! " said Mistress 
 Biddle cheerily, as her husband led the horse to 
 the horse block on which she stood. '' But let 
 us know first what time in the morning it is." 
 
 Mr. Biddle did not take out his watch nor 
 did William or Edward, who were waiting to 
 see their father and mother depart, go to look at 
 a clock. The fact is, there was not a watch or a 
 clock to be found on the great Biddle estate. 
 Instead, William went to look at the top of a 
 square stone post and came back to say that it 
 was nearly six o'clock. 
 
 '' When the chores are done, you may both 
 play until noon," said Mistress Biddle, with a 
 smile. " Be good boys. Do just as Hannah bids 
 you. We shall be back by dinner time day 
 after to-morrow." 
 
 Then she stepped from the block to her place 
 on the sleek black horse, and turned to say 
 good-bye as the impatient animal cantered away 
 with his double burden. 
 
 69 
 
70 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 There was not a train or an electric car, not 
 even a stage-coach, to take Mr. and Mistress Bid- 
 die to Philadelphia. They must go in their 
 own carriage or on horseback ; and as the roads 
 were very poor two hundred years ago, people 
 usually chose to go on horseback. 
 
 This morning, because the other horses were 
 needed for the farm work, both Mr. and Mis- 
 tress Biddle rode on the same horse. 
 
 Strange as it w^ould seem to-day, it was not 
 strange to William and Edward to see their 
 father in the saddle and their mother on the 
 pillion, or cushion, placed behind the saddle. 
 Women rode that way so often that it seemed as 
 natural as it does to-day to see a little girl riding 
 a bicycle. 
 
 The little boys watched until the travelers 
 were out of sight, then started for the barn to 
 finish the chores. On their way they peeped 
 into the kitchen to make sure that Hannah was 
 there, — for when their mother was away it was 
 not so lonesome if they knew just where Han- 
 nah could be found. Hannah was ironing and 
 happened to be standing on some of the noon 
 marks. William noticed this and it suggested a 
 delightful plan to him. 
 
 " Edward ! " he exclaimed, '\why not make 
 
TELLING TIME 71 
 
 some noon marks on the barn floor ? Then we 
 should know when it is dinner time, and Han- 
 nah would not have to blow the horn." 
 
 Edward agreed. He was only six and he 
 found most of William's plans very attractive. 
 
 '' When the chores are done, we'll make the 
 marks," said William eagerly. 
 
 Accordingly, when their promised play-time 
 came, they set to work on the marks. They 
 opened wide the big barn doors so that the sun 
 shone in almost half-way across the barn floor. 
 
 ''Shall we make a mark there?" asked Ed- 
 ward, pointing to the spot where the sunlight 
 stopped. 
 
 " Oh, no, it is not much after eight. We want 
 our mark just where the sun reaches at noon. 
 Do you see ? " 
 
 Edward understood, but it was plain that he 
 did not think it great fun to wait until noon 
 and then cut a single mark in the barn floor. 
 He was turning away to find some other play, 
 when William said coaxingly, " I'll tell you 
 what we can do. We'll measure the marks on 
 the kitchen floor and make them just the same 
 down here ; then as soon as that is done we'll 
 play Indians ! " 
 
 This plan pleased Edward and they ran to 
 
72 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 the house. Hannah was busy cooking in the 
 buttery, and so did not see the little boys toiling 
 over the measurements. She might have saved 
 them some play-time if she had known what 
 they were about. 
 
 When the boys returned to the barn, they 
 very carefully measured straight back from the 
 door-sill and made a mark at just the same dis- 
 tance from the sill as was the mark in the 
 kitchen. This was the midsummer mark, for 
 the sun is so high at noon in midsummer that 
 it can shine in only a little way. The next 
 mark was a little farther from the door, and 
 the next a little farther still, until the mid- 
 winter mark was made the farthest back of all, 
 because, in midwinter, the sun is so low at noon 
 that it can shine into a building for some 
 distance. 
 
 At last the boys finished the marks and could 
 begin to play Indians. It seemed as if they 
 had been playing about five minutes Avhen the 
 dinner horn sounded. In surprise they looked 
 at the noon mark. It was not noon according 
 to that ; but as it would not do to risk losing 
 dinner, they scampered to the house. It was just 
 noon by the kitchen mark ! What could be the 
 matter with the marks in the barn? 
 
TELLING TIME 73 
 
 The boys told Hannah of their perplexity, 
 for Hannah was too kindly ever to laugh at a 
 boy's questions. 
 
 '* I think I know what the trouble is," she 
 said. " The barn door is higher than the 
 kitchen door, so that the sunshine can reach in 
 farther at the same time of day." 
 
 William understood. " I shall have to make 
 a whole new set," he said thoughtfully. 
 
 '' Yes, you will," replied Hannah, '' but it 
 won't be hard. You can make one mark a day, 
 just at noontime by the sundial." 
 
 That was like Hannah ; she always helped 
 when she could. William saw that he should 
 only have to watch the sundial, and when it 
 was noon, to run as fast as he could to mark 
 that spot on the floor which the sun reached. 
 
 " To-morrow is midsummer's day," said Han- 
 nah, '' a good day to make your first mark." 
 
 It did not prove, however, to be a good day, 
 for it rained from the time the boys got up until 
 they went to bed. The sundial was of no use 
 without the sun ; and the noon marks on the 
 kitchen floor were no better. So there was 
 nothing by which to tell time except the hour- 
 glass. The boys turned that several times to 
 help the day go faster, and they made some 
 
74 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 wooden knives to use in the Indian attack they 
 would have the next day if it should be pleas- 
 ant ; but it was a long, dreary day and they 
 were not sorry when bedtime came. 
 
 II 
 
 The day on which Mr. and Mistress Biddle 
 were to come home was warm and sunny. The 
 boys did their chores early and had an exciting 
 Indian game. Then, as they knew William 
 was to have some new Ozenbridge trousers and 
 Edward a new waistcoat — and as there might be 
 some surprise from Grandmother Biddle — the 
 two boys began to feel impatient to see their 
 father and mother riding up the long, straight 
 road that stretched toward Philadelphia. 
 
 ^' There will not be a spear of grass left be- 
 tween the kitchen door and the sundial ! " 
 laughed Hannah, as the boys ran for the fifth 
 or sixth time in an hour to see what time it 
 was. 
 
 '' You would better stay next time long 
 enough to teach Edward how to tell the time of 
 day, and then you can take turns running to 
 look at the dial." 
 
 " Come ! " cried William, and off they raced 
 to the dial. 
 
Telling Time with the Sundial. 
 
TELLING TIME 75 
 
 Edward looked very wise while William told 
 the time, declaring it almost eleven. 
 
 '' Almost eleven," repeated Edward. '^ How 
 do you know ? " 
 
 William was very ready to tell. '' I will show 
 you," he said. 
 
 Edward looked hard at the metal plate about 
 a foot square, which he knew was called the 
 dial-plate. This was fastened firmly to the top 
 of a stone post, about four feet high, b}^ which 
 the boys were standing. The figures which Ed- 
 ward saw along the edges of the plate were 
 like the figures on the face of a clock, but they 
 formed a square instead of a circle as they do 
 on clocks and watches. Edward could not see 
 anything to tell him it was eleven o'clock. 
 
 '' You look and see where the shadow falls, 
 and that tells you what time it is," said William, 
 impressively. 
 
 That was not much help to poor little Ed- 
 ward. '' What shadow ? " he puzzled. 
 
 '' Why, this one," answered William, pointing 
 to a shadow formed by a piece of metal that 
 stood up almost in the middle of the plate. 
 
 Edward had often wondered why that piece 
 of iron was standing on the dial ; but if there 
 must be a shadow, why, it might as well come 
 
76 LIFE IX THE COLONIES 
 
 from that ugly old right triangle as from any- 
 thing else. 
 
 *' See, the shadow from the down-hill side of 
 the triangle lies close to the line that runs from 
 the bottom of the hill to the figure XI." 
 
 Edward nodded. 
 
 ''That says it is eleven o'clock," continued 
 the older brother. 
 
 Edward nodded more solemnly. 
 
 " And when the shadow from that same side 
 of the gnomon " 
 
 *' The what? " interrupted Edward. 
 
 '' The gnomon, the triangle," answered Will- 
 iam. '' When the shadow lies close to the line 
 that runs out to XII, why, then it is noon. Do 
 you see? " 
 
 Edward was sure that he did. 
 
 '' If the shadow is half-way between the two 
 lines, it is half-past eleven, you see," went on 
 William. 
 
 Edward agreed, but his eyes were fixed on an 
 object moving far down the road. '' They are 
 coming ! " he shouted. 
 
 True enough, they were coming — almost an 
 hour before Mistress Biddle had said they would 
 arrive. 
 
 Soon the boys were eagerly eyeing the pack- 
 
TELLING TIME 77 
 
 ages that were taken from the saddle-bags. 
 There was a soft bundle that might contain the 
 trousers and the waistcoat, and there was a hard 
 one that might hold a surprise. The boys were 
 wrong, however ; the soft bundle contained the 
 surprises. There was a lace collar for each boy, 
 a present from his grandmother. 
 
 ''I saw one thing at your grandmother's,'' 
 said Mistress Biddle, as she put away her pur- 
 chases, ''that pleased me greatly. Indeed, I 
 hope we may have one here before very long. 
 It is a machine for telling time,— a clock, they 
 call it. Your grandmother has just had one 
 brought over from England. It stands in the 
 corner of the room and is taller than William. 
 Think of it, William, the clock tells time both 
 day and night ! " 
 
 His mother's story reminded William to tell 
 about the noon marks he was planning to make 
 on the barn floor. Edward was also reminded 
 of what he had learned, and the little lad 
 proudly explained to his mother that he could 
 tell time by the sundial. 
 
 '' I am glad to hear both pieces of news," she 
 said, smiling at the boys. '' Wliat time is it 
 now, Edward ? " 
 
 Edward quickly ran out to the sundial. It 
 
78 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 was not eleven ; it was not half-past eleven. 
 What time was it? 
 
 He went back ruefully. '^ It is almost ex- 
 actly some time, but it is not eleven and " 
 
 William laughed. '' I forgot to teach him 
 the figures. We did not have time before you 
 came." 
 
 " That gives you something to do in play- 
 time to-morrow," said his mother. " If you 
 know those figures it will be easy for you to 
 tell time by your grandmother's clock when 
 you go to Philadelphia, as your father and I 
 are planning that you both shall do before the 
 summer is over ; but now it must be time for 
 William to run to the barn to cut his first noon 
 mark." 
 
 Learn : — 
 
 My days are as a shadow, and there is noue abidiog. 
 
 — On the sundial in the yard of a Friends' Meeting 
 Mouse, Gennantotvnj Pennsylvania. 
 
TWO LETTERS OF LONG AGO 
 
 Many years ago two little sisters, Mary and 
 Christina Grafton, lived in the town of Wil- 
 mington, in Delaware. Their grandparents had 
 come from Sweden a long time before, and Mary 
 and Christina liked to think of the land across 
 the sea about which they had heard so much. 
 They liked sometimes to remember that they 
 had the blue eyes and the flaxen hair of little 
 Swede girls, but still better they liked to think 
 they were Americans. 
 
 Even in those early days, the children of the 
 colonies had learned to love their own country 
 best of all. They had not so much to be proud 
 of as we have, perhaps. They had not so much 
 to make life easy, either. There Avere no rail- 
 roads, no trolley-cars, no telegraphs or tele- 
 phones. No one knew very much about what 
 was happening to those friends who lived at a 
 distance. 
 
 People could write letters, to be sure, but it 
 took a number of weeks sometimes for the mail- 
 
 79 
 
80 LIFE m THE COLONIES 
 
 carrier to ride on horseback from one colony to 
 another. Yet, although people did not know 
 much about the rest of the world, they were 
 just as good, just as brave, just as honest, as men 
 and women are now. So Mary and Christina 
 were very happy little girls. 
 
 But there was one reason why these children 
 did not have the good times that the boys and 
 girls of the northern colonies enjoyed. There 
 were few schools in Delaware, and there were 
 none like those to which Dorothy and Richard 
 and Nathaniel used to go. Many people in the 
 south did not care whether their children 
 learned anything or not ; but Mr. and Mrs. 
 Grafton were anxious to have their little girls 
 grow into wise and useful women. 
 
 So, by the time Mary was twelve, her mother 
 had taught her to read and write pretty well. 
 Christina, however, could read and write only 
 the easiest words. But then, Christina was four 
 years younger than Mary. 
 
 About this time Mr. Grafton went up to Phila- 
 delphia on a visit to his sister, the children's 
 Aunt Sally. After he came home, Mary and 
 Christina kept hearing bits of talk that they 
 could not understand at all. Something was 
 going to happen, they felt sure. 
 
 I 
 
LETTERS OF LONG AGO 81 
 
 " It's about us, I know," whispered Christina 
 after they had gone to bed one night. *' I heard 
 mother say to-day, ' It may be best for Mary, 
 but Christina is too small.' What do you sup- 
 pose she meant ? " 
 
 '' I'm sure I can't guess," Mary whispered 
 back, " but I think Aunt Sally has something to 
 do with it." 
 
 Sure enough. Aunt Sally had something to do 
 with it. The next day the children understood. 
 
 '' Mary," asked her father at breakfast, ''how 
 much can you read ? " 
 
 " I can read everything in the New England 
 Primer, sir," answered Mary, a little proudly. 
 
 " And can you cipher? " 
 
 ''No, sir, not at all." 
 
 " Your Aunt Sally has a plan, Mary, that we 
 like very much. She is to have a little school 
 at her house, and she has asked you to live with 
 her for a while and study with her girls and 
 boys. The teacher is to be a young man from 
 Harvard College, and you will learn much more 
 from him than your mother or I could teach 
 you. Of course we do not like to send you 
 from home, but we have agreed to Aunt Sally's 
 plan." 
 
 Mary hardly knew how to reply. " I am to 
 
82 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 go to Philadelphia — alone — and to school ? " she 
 said at last. 
 
 '' Yes, child," said her mother. '' Shall you 
 like it, do you think ? " 
 
 " Why, mother, I don't know," answered 
 Mary, soberly. '' I like to stud}^, and I shall 
 like to be with Aunt Sally and my cousins, but 
 I don't want to go away." 
 
 Christina was sure that she did not like the 
 plan. '' We need Mary here," she said. 
 
 '' Yes, we do," replied Mrs. Grafton. '' But I 
 shall have more time to teach you after Maiy 
 goes. If you work hard, perhaps you can write 
 Avell enough to send Mary a letter pretty soon." 
 
 '' Oh, I shall like that, Christina! " said Mary. 
 '' It will be almost like seeing you." 
 
 Christina was pleased, too, for she had not 
 thought of such a thing. Now those of you 
 who are eight years old have probably written 
 more than one letter to your father or mother 
 or teacher long before this, but you must not 
 forget how few letters were written, even by the 
 grown people, in those days. Postage cost so 
 much that most children could not send letters 
 when they wanted to, even if they knew how to 
 write. 
 
LETTERS OF LONG AGO 83 
 
 II 
 
 ''How soon am I to go, mother?" was the 
 next question. 
 
 '' Just as soon as your clothes are ready, 
 Mary." 
 
 Mrs. Grafton did not say next, " I shall go to 
 the store to-day to buy the cloth for your 
 dresses." Instead, she said to her husband, 
 '' Will you get some wool for me this morning, 
 so that I can begin to card it ? " 
 
 Mary well knew what " carding " was. Her 
 mother intended to get the wool ready to spin 
 into woolen yarn on the big spinning-wheel. 
 Then she would weave the yarn, and the cloth 
 would be all ready for cutting and sewing. 
 
 After two gray homespun dresses had been 
 finished, Mrs. Grafton made all the linen cloth- 
 ing that Mary would need. This time she used 
 the small spinning-wheel, because, for this 
 thread, she spun flax instead of wool. Then 
 there were stockings to be knit, and so many 
 other things to do besides, that it was several 
 weeks before the haircloth trunk could be 
 packed and strapped. 
 
 Finally, one bright spring morning, when the 
 grass was green and the trees pink and white 
 
84 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 with blossoms, Mary started for Aunt Sally's. 
 Her new homespun dress was very long and full, 
 and she wore so large a bonnet that one could 
 hardly see the little face within. 
 
 '^ What a funny little old woman ! " we might 
 say to-day ; but the captain of the little packet 
 that was to carry Mary up to Philadelphia said 
 to himself, " That's the prettiest little passenger 
 I've had for many a day." 
 
 When Christina could no longer see Mary's 
 handkerchief fluttering a good-bye, she turned 
 to her mother a very sober little face, and asked, 
 '' When shall we have a letter from Mary, do 
 you think ? " 
 
 " By the next post, I am sure. That will be 
 here in a few days. We ought to be very thank- 
 ful, Christina, that we are so near Philadelphia. 
 If we lived out in a mountain town of Pennsyl- 
 vania, or back on a Virginia plantation, or as far 
 south as the Carolinas, it might be a month or 
 more before Ave should hear from Mary." 
 
 Christina was not quite so thankful as her 
 mother, perhaps ; for she said, '' But if we lived 
 so far as that from Philadelphia, Mary couldn't 
 have gone at all, could she, mother? " 
 
 " No, Christina, it would not have been safe 
 to send her on so long a journey. But both you 
 
LETTERS OF LONG AGO 85 
 
 and she will be glad some time that she had this 
 chance to go to school." 
 
 Ill 
 
 The days after Mary went away were strange 
 ones for Christina, but she was such a busy lit- 
 tle girl that she did not have time to be lonely. 
 Every morning she was up early, and after 
 breakfast she would help her mother wash the 
 dishes and smooth the great, fluffy feather beds. 
 Then, when her housework was done, and while 
 her mother swept or cooked, Christina did her 
 ^' stent " : that is, her mother gave her just so 
 much sewing to do every day, and she was not 
 allowed to stop until she had finished the set 
 task. 
 
 In the afternoon, when the dinner dishes were 
 done, and Mrs. Grafton was sewing or spinning, 
 Christina read her lessons from the New Eng- 
 land Primer and wrote the copies that her 
 mother had set. 
 
 One morning, almost a week after Mary went 
 away, Mr. Grafton came, in, saying, '' Come, 
 Christina, get your bonnet on. The post has 
 just come from Philadelphia, and perhaps there 
 is something for us." It was not long before 
 
86 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 Christina and her father were walking towards 
 neighbor Anderson's inn, where all the town 
 mail was left. 
 
 " Yes," said Mr. Anderson in answer to Mr. 
 Grafton's question, " here is a letter. Per- 
 chance," he added knowingly, '' it is from thy 
 daughter Mary, for it hath come from Philadel- 
 phia." Letters came so seldom in^those days 
 that every one was interested in them. 
 
 '' Yes, this is surely from Mary," said Mr. 
 Grafton, speaking, however, to Christina rather 
 than to Mr. Anderson. " Let us go home to 
 read it." 
 
 It seemed a long time to Christina before she 
 saw that letter. She said not a word as she 
 w^aited for her mother to read it carefully and 
 then pass it to Mr. Grafton. She was a well-be- 
 haved child, and never teased, no matter how 
 eager she was. 
 
 At last her father said, " Now% little girl, it is 
 your turn. You may read Mary's letter aloud." 
 It was hard for Christina to make out some of 
 the w^ords. It wall be harder for you, because 
 little girls then did not speak just as they do 
 now. Would you like to read Mary's letter ? 
 
 Here it is : — 
 
LETTERS OF LONG AGO 87 
 
 Philadelphia, May 1, 1743. 
 Honoured Father & Mother : 
 
 I take my pen in hand to let you know 
 that I came safely three days ago to Philadelphia. 
 Aunt Sally and Uncle William were at the 
 wharf, for they thought that Captain Gerry 
 would leave Wilmington that morning. When 
 we came into the house, all my cousins were 
 waiting in the hall. The girls courtesied & the 
 boys bowed & they all said they were glad to see 
 me. Aunt Sally has made a schoolroom out of a 
 large front-chamber, & every morning at 8 o'clock 
 we all go up there to study. Benjamin has be- 
 gun Greek, & Harriet & I had a lesson in History 
 to-day. I am to learn to cipher, & I shall have 
 a lesson in Reading & Spelling every day. Aunt 
 Sally is kind to me, & I try to obey her in all 
 things. She teaches us all to sing, & is to give 
 the girls lessons in sewing. I miss you all, but 
 I am not lonesome. I am trying to be polite to 
 ever3^body & to learn how to conduct myself in 
 company. I have not so many dresses as my 
 cousins & at first I was cross about it. But 
 Aunt Sally has made me see how much better 
 it is to be kind and courteous than to be finely 
 dressed, & I am glad to write that I have no 
 more vain thoughts. Believe, my dear parents, 
 that I shall try to be an honour & a pride to you. 
 
 Very respectfully, 
 Mary Grafton. 
 
88 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 IV 
 
 At last the day came when Mrs. Grafton said, 
 " Suppose, Christina, that you write to Mary this 
 afternoon. I have not written to her for three 
 w^eeks, and besides, Mr. Wilson is going to Phila- 
 delphia to-morrow and he will take the letter for 
 us. It would be a pity not to have some- 
 thing read}^ for we must save postage when we 
 can." 
 
 Christina had been waiting for this permis- 
 sion. She answered, '' I am all ready, mother. 
 May I sit at the secretary? " 
 
 '' That will be easiest for you, I think. Let 
 me put a box on the chair first." 
 
 Then Christina climbed into her seat. ^' May 
 I have a sheet of this foolscap, mother? " 
 
 '' Not right away, Christina. You must make 
 your first draft on something that does not cost 
 so much. This will do, I think," and her 
 mother gave her a leaf from an old account 
 book. 
 
 Then Christina was all ready to begin. One 
 corner of the desk-lid held a bottle of ink which 
 Mrs. Grafton had made from oat galls and vine- 
 gar, and near by were two or three goose quills. 
 Can you guess what the goose quills were for ? 
 
Chkistina writing hek Letter. 
 
I 
 
LETTERS OF LONG AGO 89 
 
 The steel pens we have to-day were not known 
 so long ago. The hard part of a goose's quill 
 was sharpened and used for a pen. Some people 
 who like old-fashioned things write with goose 
 quills now. 
 
 Mrs. Grafton told Christina how the place and 
 date should be written, and showed her the 
 heading of Mary's letter. Then Christina was 
 puzzled. '^ Now, mother," she said, " how shall 
 I begin it ? Mary wrote ' I take my pen in 
 hand.' " 
 
 " Yes, that is one way," answered Mrs. Graf- 
 ton. " Here is another : ' I now sit down to 
 answer your welcome letter.' " 
 
 *' That will be just right," said Christina, " for 
 it is an answer, you know." 
 
 Now neither of these beginnings is much like 
 a letter of to-day, but if the old-fashioned letters 
 sound a little prim to us, our letters might seem 
 almost rude to the old-time writers. 
 
 Christina needed help more than once before 
 all the sentences were finished ; but when the 
 letter was finally copied on the large, clean 
 foolscap, not one word was spelled wrong, and 
 there was not a blot on the paper. 
 
 '' I could not make it look neater myself," 
 said Mrs. Grafton kindly, as she passed it back. 
 
90 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 . Christina's eyes beamed with pleasure, but she 
 said simply, " The ink is not yet quite dry, is it, 
 mother? I suppose I must not fold it yet." 
 
 '' No, Christina, you need not wait. I will 
 make the ink dry. Just get the sand-box." 
 
 Christina had often seen her father shake 
 sand over his paper, and now she remembered 
 that once he told her the sand would make the 
 ink dry. So she ran for the little tin box and 
 watched her mother shake the clean, fine sand 
 carefully over the w^et ink. 
 
 '' Now is it ready to fold, mother? " 
 
 '' Yes, child, it is all ready now." 
 
 Then Mrs. Grafton showed Christina how to 
 fold and seal her letter. As envelopes had not 
 come into use, the folding had to be done very 
 carefully, and the sealing, too. 
 
 Christina brought some red sealing wax, 
 which Mrs. Grafton softened by the heat of the 
 fire. Then she let some fall upon the letter so 
 that the edge of paper that had been folded over 
 was fastened like the flap of an envelope, and 
 while the wax was still warm, she pressed the 
 end of her thimble upon it, to make it look 
 pretty. After the folding and sealing, Christina 
 wrote the address : — 
 
 1 
 
LETTERS OF LONG AGO 
 
 91 
 
 Miss Mary Grafton 
 
 Philadelphia 
 
 Pennsylvania 
 
 In care of 
 Mr. William Morton 
 
 And here is the letter that came to Mary 
 after she had been away from home almost two 
 months : — 
 
 Wilmingtoiij Delcmare, 
 June 18, 174-3. 
 INIy beloved Sister, 
 
 I now sit down to answer your wel- 
 come letter. We are all well, & hope you are 
 the same. I miss you very much, so I study a 
 great deal. I have learned many things since 
 you went away. Mother says I have improved 
 most in writing. She sets me copies every day. 
 Yesterday I wrote : Fine feathers do not make 
 fine birds. Mother said that I might copy it 
 in this letter. I read from my Primer every 
 day. Part of my lessons I can say without the 
 book. I have learned all the verses about the 
 alphabet. I like the C verse best, but perhaps 
 that is because I like cats so much. Do you 
 remember it ? It says : 
 
92 lifp: in the colonies 
 
 The cat doth play 
 And after slay. 
 
 My sampler is nearly done. The letters and 
 the date are finished, and I have begun a verse. 
 Mother found it for me. I will write it here : — 
 
 Delightful task ! to watch with curious eyes 
 Soft forms of thought on infant bosoms rise. 
 
 Our parents wish me to say they have been 
 pleased with your letters. They hope that you 
 will advance a great deal. I am taking good 
 care of all your pets. Peter has grown to be a 
 big kitten. I feed the chickens every day. I 
 hope that you will come home soon. 
 
 Your affectionate sister, 
 
 Christina Grafton. 
 
 P. S. Our father & mother beg you to assure 
 Aunt Sally & Uncle William of their kind 
 re2;ards.' 
 
 C. G. 
 
 This was indeed a welcome letter to Mary. 
 She always kept it, and her great-great-grand- 
 children have it now. They like to look at the 
 pretty, old-fashioned writing and think what 
 a sweet little girl their great-great-great-aunt 
 Christina must have been. 
 
 1 
 
LETTERS OF LONG AGO 93 
 
 Learn: — 
 
 Be unto others kind and true, 
 As you'd have others be to you ; 
 And neither do nor say to men 
 Whate'er you would not take again. 
 
 — The Golden Eule, as Cknsthia read it in 
 the New England Primer. 
 
A MAY DAY JOURNEY 
 
 On May Day morning in the year 1727 every 
 Gary, large and small, was out of bed early. 
 Were they not all going to Jamestown to the 
 festival ? There was sure to be a May Queen — 
 the prettiest of the young girls, — and if there 
 was a Queen, of course there would be a May- 
 pole. 
 
 Nobody ever heard of having a May Queen 
 without having also a dance around a Maypole. 
 And probably there would be music and foot- 
 races and wrestling matches and perhaps a horse- 
 race. It would be a grand day, something like 
 Fourth of July, we should think, though all this 
 happened fifty years before the Fourth was 
 thought of. 
 
 When Clarice Gary slid out of her high canopy 
 bed and ran to the window, she found that it was 
 just the brightest morning of the whole spring- 
 time. The sun was shining on the river, mak- 
 ing the water look like glass ; and the blossoms 
 of the dogwood and apple trees made the whole 
 plantation one great garden. 
 
 94 
 
A MAY DAY JOURNEY 95 
 
 But Clarice could not wait to admire the 
 beauty of the view from her window : she must 
 tie her shoestrings and fasten her tucker more 
 quickly than ever before, for as soon as break- 
 fast was over, all the family were to start from 
 the little wharf close by the tobacco house and 
 sail in their own sloop to Jamestown. 
 
 It was a perfect morning for a sail : the breeze 
 was soft and fragrant, the robins and bluebirds 
 and thrushes were holding a festival of their 
 own, and a rare flower carpet stretched back 
 from each bank of the river. The occupants of 
 the boat, however, paid little heed to the beauty 
 of sight and sound all around them, for they 
 were either thinking of the sports of the day or 
 looking ahead for a glimpse of the bend which 
 would bring them in sight of the old town. 
 
 It appeared at last ! There was the old church ; 
 there were the few houses left standing, and the 
 ruins of others that had been burned by Bacon's 
 soldiers; and there were ivy-covered piles which 
 marked the site of still other houses which had 
 belonged to people who had been killed by the 
 Indians. 
 
 Clarice took little notice of the ivy and the 
 ruins, for in a meadow a little to one side of the 
 town she could actually see the Maypole with 
 
96 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 its gay-colored ribbons. That was what she had 
 come to see ! Her eyes danced. 
 
 '* Perhaps some time," she thought, '' if I grow 
 to look like Katherine " — for Clarice thought 
 her oldest sister the most beautiful girl in the 
 world — '' I may be chosen the Queen of the 
 May." With this thought in mind she stepped 
 on shore as daintily as any queen and went with 
 the others to the meadow. 
 
 There they found many friends of the family. 
 A few people had come even from Williams- 
 burgh, which was the largest town in Virginia, 
 but most of them came from the plantations 
 along the river. Some had come in chariots, or 
 coaches, some in chaises, some on horseback, and 
 others in what we should call rowboats. 
 
 It was not nine o'clock when the Gary family 
 reached the meadow, and there was time for Mr. 
 and Mrs. Gary to greet many of their neighbors 
 before the trumpet should sound and the May 
 Queen and her train should come from one of 
 the fine old mansions near the field. Glarice 
 stood by her mother's side and courtesied to all 
 to whom her mother spoke. She found the 
 period of waiting rather stupid, but it did not 
 last long. 
 
 Soon the trumpet sounded and the May Queen 
 
A MAY DAY JOURNEY 97 
 
 appeared. She was very beautiful ; but not so 
 beautiful — thought the loyal little sister — as 
 Katherine would be with flowers in her hair and 
 around her neck and on her gown. 
 
 After the trumpet had sounded a second time, 
 the sports began. First there was a wrestling 
 match between two traders who lived some dis- 
 tance up the river. One of them sometimes 
 came to the Gary plantation and had given the 
 children a few Indian trinkets. Clarice, how- 
 ever, cared very little for this contest and spent 
 most of her time looking at the pretty May 
 Queen, with the flower wreath for a crown ; but 
 Clarice's brother John did not take his eyes off" 
 the wrestlers until his friend had won. 
 
 When the trumpet next sounded, four fid- 
 dlers took their seats for their contest. Each 
 in turn played his prettiest tune. Clarice could 
 hardly keep her feet still ; she wanted so much 
 to dance. Oh ! how she did Avant to dance ! 
 But nobody mistrusted that the quiet little girl 
 on the grass by her mother's side was holding 
 one foot in her hand to keep it from running 
 away with her. Clarice was sorry when the 
 music was done and the musicians marched ofl*, 
 all playing their diflerent tunes at the same 
 time. 
 
98 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 Next there came a foot race between two In- 
 dians. John liked that better than Chirice did : 
 the music was still in her head and she felt a 
 bit dreamy. 
 
 After the Indians had finished, six young 
 girls ran a race around the Maypole. That 
 was fun. One of the runners was smaller than 
 the others but very pretty. Clarice hoped that 
 she would win ; but, no, a very unattractive girl 
 with a disagreeable smile crossed the line first. 
 Clarice said it seemed too bad because the little 
 one was so pretty ; but Katherine said it was 
 only fair because the other w^as so plain. 
 
 When this race was over, the May Queen, 
 with a graceful little speech, distributed the 
 prizes. Clarice thought that there was to be 
 nothing more before luncheon, and she w^as 
 sorry. John thought so, too, and he said to her 
 ruefully, '' The day is half gone ; and you know 
 the last half of anything always goes faster than 
 the first." 
 
 But they need not have been so mournful, 
 for in a moment the companions of the May 
 Queen took their places around the Maypole 
 and began the pretty Maypole dance. It w^as 
 the best part of the day, so Clarice thought, 
 and she hardly breathed as the bright ribbons 
 
A MAY DAY JOURNEY 99 
 
 were braided and unbraided and braided again. 
 Oh, it was the prettiest sight she had ever seen ! 
 
 This proved to be really the last part of the 
 entertainment before luncheon. In the after- 
 noon there was a race between two famous Vir- 
 ginia horses, and then, alas ! — it was time to go 
 home. 
 
 '' The little maid might ride home with us," 
 said Mrs. Burke, Clarice's godmother, as the 
 people were leaving the beautiful green meadow. 
 " There is plenty of room in the coach ; and Ave 
 shall pass your plantation before the child's bed- 
 time, I trow." 
 
 Mrs. Gary was willing that Clarice should go, 
 and another joy was added to a day already 
 crowded with pleasure. 
 
 The Burke's coach was the most splendid 
 carriage Clarice had ever seen : the body was 
 yellow with vermilion trimmings ; the cushions 
 were blue velvet, and on the doors there was 
 painted the coat-of-arms of the Burke family. 
 On all great days it was drawn by four black 
 horses ; and with a negro coachman and a negro 
 footman, it was by far the shoAviest turn-out at 
 the May-day festival. 
 
 Again Clarice stepped like a queen when Mr. 
 Burke assisted her into the big coach as formally 
 I OFC. 
 
100 LIFE IX THE COLONIES 
 
 as he had handed in Mrs. Burke and his sister. 
 This time she thought of a story she had heard 
 of Queen Elizabeth and of a royal journey 
 through London. Why was not this just as 
 good ? She would play that the tall pines and 
 cypresses along the road were the houses of the 
 great city. 
 
 It was warm in the coach and in time Clarice 
 began to feel sleepy. She did not want to go to 
 sleep and lose a part of the ride, so she straight- 
 ened up and wriggled first one foot and then 
 the other ; one hand and then the other ; then 
 she wriggled each finger on the right hand. 
 Just as she began w^ith the fingers of the left, 
 Mr. Burke asked her if she was going ''proces- 
 sioning " the next day. 
 
 '' Oh, no, sir ! " she gasped, '' only the men 
 and boys are going." 
 
 Perhaps Mr. Burke knew that and asked the 
 question only to wake her up, for he laughed 
 too heartily over such a simple answer, Clarice 
 thought. 
 
 '* Why did he ask me that ? " wondered 
 Clarice. *' ' Processioning ' is fun for John, but 
 I shall have to stay at home." 
 
 She knew that John was even then looking 
 forward to going with the men and boys from 
 
 
A MAY DAY JOURNEY 101 
 
 the neighboring plantations to examine the 
 boundaries. Barbed wire had not been thought 
 of in those days, and as the plantations were 
 large and the country was new, there had not 
 been time to build many fences of stone or rails. 
 Blazed trees w^ere used a great deal to show the 
 boundary lines. Often a corner was marked by 
 a pile of stones ; and sometimes a whole line of 
 trees was planted for a fence. Once a year the 
 men and boys went around to see if new trees 
 must be blazed, fresh piles of stones made, or 
 more trees planted. It meant an all-day picnic, 
 Clarice had heard John say. 
 
 '^ Speaking of 'processioning,' I am going to 
 set out five new pear trees to mark the line more 
 plainly between my north meadow and neighbor 
 Gary's land," Mr. Burke said to his wife. 
 
 As pear trees were interesting to Clarice only 
 in the fall when the fruit ^vas ripe, she shut her 
 eyes to see just how the May Queen looked 
 when she gave the flower-trimmed fiddle to the 
 musician who won that prize. It was a mistake 
 to shut them, for they would not open again— 
 to stay open — until the next morning. 
 
 The great coach jolted on and Clarice went 
 more and more soundly to sleep. The only 
 thing that she saw clearly when she reached 
 
102 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 home and was carried upstairs was the bright 
 yellow turban on old Chloe's head. 
 
 ''Is she a queen with a golden crown?" 
 thought Clarice sleepily. '' She must be, — but 
 — but — queen — queen — queen — of — of " 
 
 She really could not answer her own question, 
 and though she wanted to think it out, her 
 heavy eyelids shut in spite of herself. 
 
 Learn : — 
 
 You must wake and call me early, call me early, mother 
 
 dear ; 
 To-morrow '11 be the happiest time of all the glad New 
 
 Year ; 
 Of all the glad New Year, mother, the maddest, merriest 
 
 day; 
 For I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to be Queen 
 
 o' the May. 
 
 — Alfred Tennyson. 
 
THE POOR DEBTOR'S CHILDREN 
 
 *' I, FOR one, shall be glad to go," said John's 
 father. And John's mother answered quickly, 
 " 'Tis indeed better than I had dared to hope." 
 
 John and his sister Julia were playing quietly 
 in one corner of the room. They both looked 
 up as their parents spoke, and both saw the joy 
 in the eyes of father and mother. That was a 
 glad sight for the children, for theirs was usually 
 a sad home. 
 
 John and Julia Dexter lived a long time ago 
 in England, when the country was so badly gov- 
 erned that people were punished severely for 
 trifling misdeeds. A man who cut down a 
 cherry tree might be killed as a penalty. Even 
 an honest man, if he was too poor to pay all his 
 debts, could be sent to prison ; and, sad to tell, 
 such a man often had to stay there all his life. 
 What a useless punishment that must have 
 been ! And how unwise it was to send an hon- 
 est man to jail, rather than help him make a 
 
 living ! 
 
 103 
 
104 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 Mr. Dexter had been a merchant, but he had 
 met with ill fortune, and his creditors had said 
 that he must go to jail. For six years he had 
 lived in the tall, dark, brick prison, and had 
 never once been outside the high gate. Mrs. 
 Dexter and the children lived in the jail, too, 
 for they had no other home. Besides, they 
 wanted to be with the father, for they loved him 
 dearly, and they knew it was not his fault that 
 he was poor. They might go outside the high 
 gate if they wished, but they did not go very 
 often. London was so large and so wicked a 
 city that it was not safe for children to play in 
 the streets by themselves ; and Mrs. Dexter, who 
 tried to earn a little money by sewing, had no 
 time to go with them. 
 
 John could just remember the large house 
 where he used to live, but Julia had never been 
 in any house but the jail. She was born there 
 five years before this story begins. 
 
 But this day joyful news had come to the 
 gloomy prison. There was a man in England 
 who wanted to make people better and happier. 
 His name was James Oglethorpe. He had heard 
 about Mr. Dexter and about hundreds of other 
 men suffering in the same way. Good General 
 Oglethorpe said to himself: ''There is land in 
 
THE POOR DEBTOR'S CHILDREN 105 
 
 America — acres of it — that our king owns. 
 Will he not send these honest men across the 
 sea and let them begin life over again ? " 
 
 Sure enough, the king was willing, and now 
 news had come to the little room in the London 
 jail that Mr. Dexter might sail over the ocean 
 and be a free man again. 
 
 Do you wonder that the poor prisoner was 
 glad to go, or that the tears stood in his eyes as 
 he thanked God for noble General Oglethorpe? 
 Do you wonder that Mrs. Dexter cried for joy, 
 and that, when the children heard the plans, 
 they were happier than they had ever been be- 
 fore? 
 
 II 
 
 That same afternoon John and Julia heard 
 all about the plans. A great ship was to sail 
 out into the blue ocean, and carry them and 
 their father and mother far away to the west- 
 ward. They were going to a land where it Avas 
 warm and sunny most of the time, and where 
 the fields were green all the year round. 
 
 ''What are the fields like?" inquired little 
 Julia eagerly. 
 
 '' I cannot make you understand very well, 
 dear, but they are most like the great green vel- 
 
106 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 vet carpets in rich people's houses," her mother 
 answered. " And they are as soft and sweet as 
 they can be." 
 
 '' Does anybody lock them at night, mother? " 
 continued the little girl. 
 
 " No, my child. The country is open for 
 everybody to enjoy. It is only in the jails that 
 gates are closed every night." 
 
 •'Did you ever see the fields, father?" was 
 Julia's next question. 
 
 ''Yes, Julia. When I was a boy, I lived in 
 the country and I have played many a day in 
 the fields and under the trees." 
 
 " What is the name of the new country, 
 father?" asked John. 
 
 "They have named it Georgia, for our king." 
 
 " Does anybody live there now? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, my son. Two years ago General 
 Oglethorpe sailed away to Georgia with a good 
 many people. They have built a towai there, 
 and they are all happy and well." 
 
 "The other day the turnkey told me that 
 America was full of Indians and wasn't fit to 
 live in. What did he mean, father? " 
 
 " True, John, it is full of Indians, and I sup- 
 pose they are ugly neighbors. They are tall, 
 straight people, with reddish skin and black 
 
THE POOR DEBTOR'S CHILDREN 107 
 
 hair. No one knows how long they have lived 
 in America, but it is a long, long time." 
 
 *^ Are they bad people, father?" asked Julia 
 anxiously. 
 
 " They are not very good, I am afraid," was the 
 father's answer. " They do not like the white 
 men very well, and in the northern colonies 
 they have tried to burn the towns and to mur- 
 der the settlers." 
 
 " Oh, father ! " cried Julia, '' shall we see the 
 Indians?" 
 
 '' I fear we shall, little girl. There are a good 
 many of them in Georgia. But I don't believe 
 they will trouble us, for they have given Gen- 
 eral Oglethorpe the land he wanted and have 
 promised not to harm the English." 
 
 *' Doesn't the land belong to King George, 
 anyway ? " asked John in surprise. 
 
 *' The English claim it because they helped to 
 find it, but the Indians were living there when 
 the English came, and so they claim it, too. 
 Still, America is large enough for us all." 
 
 ''Then there is another reason for not being 
 afraid," went on Mr. Dexter, looking at Julia. 
 '' The chief of the Georgia Indians, Tomo-chi- 
 chi, came to visit England with General Ogle- 
 thorpe. He is a very good man, everybody says, 
 
108 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 though he might frighten Julia if she should see 
 him. He paints his face with daubs of red, as 
 the Indians like to do, and wears clothes of scar- 
 let and gold." 
 
 '' Oh, father," interrupted John, '' shall we see 
 him?" 
 
 '' Not before we get to Georgia, for he went 
 back last winter. But I am sure that we shall 
 see him by and by, for he will want to help the 
 new colony." 
 
 " Oh, I wish he had waited to go back with 
 us ! I hope he will come the first day after we 
 get there." And John's eyes danced to think of 
 it. '' How soon shall we start, father ? " 
 
 '' In two weeks, my boy. The time will go 
 quickly enough." 
 
 But, instead, the time dragged. Each day 
 seemed longer than the longest day John or 
 Julia could remember, and it was just as long 
 for the patient father and mother as for the eager 
 boy and girl. 
 
 At last, one October morning, the great prison- 
 gate shut behind them, and they went out across 
 the London streets on the first part of their way 
 to freedom. On the ship Symond they found 
 others of the little company already gathered. 
 There were hopeful looking men and women. 
 
John axd Julia leaving London. 
 

THE POOR DEBTOR'S CHILDREN 109 
 
 and children, too, with bright faces and wonder- 
 ing eyes. 
 
 Getting under way promised to take a long 
 time. '' I thought we should start as soon as we 
 came on board," said Julia in a rather disap- 
 pointed tone. 
 
 '' So did I," said John. '' Why don't we start, 
 father?" 
 
 '' We must wait for the other ship, The London 
 Merchant, to come down the river. Then you 
 must not be surprised if bad weather and high 
 winds keep us some time afterwards." 
 
 Mr. Dexter was right. It was several weeks 
 before they could sail many miles ; but at last 
 the Syinond and The London Merchant were 
 fairly on their way. It seemed to the children 
 as if they should never tire of watching the two 
 great ships cut merrily through the waves ; but 
 long before their usual bedtime the salt air and 
 the bright water had made their eyelids shut 
 tight, and before they knew it the great ship had 
 rocked them to sleep. 
 
 Ill 
 
 God's watchful care be o'er ye, 
 His breezes blow before ye, 
 To health and strength restore ye, 
 Upon the deep blue sea. 
 
no LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 With sorrows all behind ye, 
 No more shall hot tears bliud ye, 
 But hapi)iness shall find 3 e, 
 Across the deep blue sea. 
 
 There fertile lands entreat ye, 
 There sunny homes await ye. 
 And Fortune's joys shall greet ye — 
 Beyond the deep blue sea. 
 
 There none shall dare oppress ye. 
 There all shall free confess ye. 
 And children's children bless ye — 
 Far o'er the deep blue sea. 
 
 IV 
 
 It had been December when the ships had 
 finally started, and England had been cold, 
 dark, and dreary. Now early in February the 
 weather was as clear and warm as on a summer 
 day in England. Off in the distance, rising 
 from the blue sea, was a long line of green. 
 What could that be, the children wondered. 
 
 '' Those must be the pine groves along the 
 shore," some one answered. 
 
 Julia looked up quickly. It was her new 
 friend, Mr. John Wesley, Avho had spoken to 
 her. Mr. Wesley was a young minister, who, 
 with his brother Charles, had been willing to 
 
THE POOR DEBTOR'S CHILDREN 111 
 
 sail with the prisoners in order to help build up 
 the colony and to preach to the Indians. 
 
 Almost every day after morning service, he 
 had some kind word of greeting for the children. 
 After he went back to England, he became one 
 of the greatest preachers in the world, and John 
 and Julia were always glad that they had once 
 known him. This morning he stayed with 
 them a few minutes, and they all watched the 
 shore as it seemed to come nearer and nearer. 
 
 " I think the trees must be glad to see us, Mr. 
 Wesley," said Julia after a while. 
 
 " What makes you think so, Julia?" the min- 
 ister asked. 
 
 '' Why, they are bowing to us now, just as if 
 they said, ' Won't you come on shore with us ? ' " 
 
 " But trees can't talk, Julia," said her brother 
 quickly. 
 
 " I think they are glad to see us, anyway," re- 
 peated Julia, and nobody disputed her. 
 
 The colonists could not land at once. It was 
 almost a month before they stepped on the 
 island that was to be their home. Waiting was 
 hard, but they were used to it by that time ; and 
 meanwhile something happened that John, at 
 least, would gladly have waited another month 
 to see. 
 
112 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 " Look, Julia, look ! " he exclaimed one day. 
 '' There is Tomo-chi-chi in that little boat ! See 
 the feathers in his hair ! And his face is 
 painted ! See the two Indians with him ! Oh, 
 I hope he is coming on the ship ! " 
 
 It was really Tomo-chi-chi in his war-paint 
 and feathers and in his gold and scarlet dress. 
 His wife and nephew were with him and they 
 all came on board the Sijmond. 
 
 '' Let us go where we can see better," said 
 John. 
 
 But Julia hung back. '' I am afraid of them," 
 she said. 
 
 '' Why, they won't hurt you, Julia. They have 
 brought us some presents, I think. Don't you 
 see those two big jars ? " 
 
 Tomo-chi-chi had come to welcome the Eng- 
 lish, and, most of all, to see Mr. Wesley and his 
 brother. ''I am glad you are come. My people 
 need you," he told them. 
 
 His wife, too, seemed pleased. She went up 
 to the Wesleys, holding out to them the two jars 
 that John had noticed. The children could see 
 that one jar was full of milk, but they did not 
 know what the thick, yellow liquid in the other 
 could be. They found out afterwards that it 
 was honey. 
 
THE POOR DEBTOR'S CHILDREN 113 
 
 A few days after Tomo-clii-chi's visit, the 
 colonists went to tlie island where they were to 
 live. It stood at the mouth of a large river, and 
 seemed to be all ready for them. There was a 
 cleared place for their houses, and around the 
 opening were the sweet-smelling forests with a 
 thick growth of oak and pine and bay and 
 sassafras. The colonists named their little vil- 
 lage Frederica, and John and Julia were not the 
 only ones who thought it the prettiest place they 
 had ever seen. 
 
 Soon the work of settling began in earnest. 
 How long do you suppose it took to build the 
 Dexter house ? It was begun one morning early, 
 and at night everything was finished. For the 
 home was not built of wood or brick or stone. 
 It was March then and warm in Georgia. The 
 family needed only some sort of shelter from 
 the rain and the sun. 
 
 Mr. Dexter, with some of his friends, began 
 to cut forks and poles for a framework. Others, 
 all this time, were gathering the smooth, hand- 
 some palmetto leaves, and still others used these 
 leaves in thatching the roof. This house was 
 called a '' bower," and any child would like 
 to live in such a dwelling a little while, at 
 least. Afterwards, Mr. Dexter built a better 
 
114 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 and stronger home, but John and Julia alwa^^s 
 liked their " tree-house " best. 
 
 After the bower was built, the children helped 
 in the planting. The seed must be sown at once, 
 for the colonists were to raise all their food. Do 
 you wonder what they lived on while the crops 
 were growing ? Good Mr. Oglethorpe had looked 
 after that matter, and had given each person 
 food enough to last until the harvest-time. 
 
 How anxious the children were to see the 
 first green shoots ! They could hardly believe 
 that little seeds, covered up tight in the earth, 
 could push their w^ay out and grow into large 
 green plants. They had not long to wait, how- 
 ever ; and one morning their sharp eyes saw the 
 tiny blades growing ^vhere lately the grains of 
 barley had been hidden. 
 
 So the spring and summer passed swiftly by. 
 The crops grew, the mocking bird and the red- 
 bird and the bobolink sang their cheerful songs, 
 and the children saw new wonders every day. 
 It was the beginning of a healthy and happy 
 life for the little boy and girl of the London 
 jail. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 The following exercises are inserted in the hope that they will prove 
 suggestive to those teachers who wish to make the stories the basis of 
 oral and written language work. 
 
 The First New England Christmas 
 
 Write in your own words : — 
 
 (1) Why the Pilgrims went to Holland. 
 
 (2) Why the Pilgrims came to America. 
 
 Dorothy's Hornbook 
 
 How old was Dorothy when she went to school ? 
 
 What was her primer called ? 
 
 How did she wear it ? 
 
 Draw a picture of Dorothy's hornbook. Notice that 
 some of the old-fashioned letters are not just like ours. 
 
 Ask your teacher what books Dorothy read when she 
 grew older. 
 
 A Puritan Sabbath 
 Fill in the blanks : — 
 
 Nathaniel Mather was born in — 
 His father's name was 
 
 His brother's name was . 
 
 The Sabbath began at on Saturday. 
 
 115 
 
116 lifp: in the colonies 
 
 Everybody had to go to meeting iu the and 
 
 in the . 
 
 The little boys sat on the . 
 
 The punished them if they were 
 
 naughty. 
 
 Nathaniel had to study the every Sabbath. 
 
 See whether you can find out something about Cotton 
 Mather. 
 
 Soap- Ma KING at the Rowlands' 
 [Supply : liej lay, lye, laid.'] 
 
 The egg on top of the when William 
 
 it on the liquid. 
 
 An egg will on the top of all strong 
 
 A is a falsehood ; but is water that has 
 
 run through wood ashes. 
 
 Why did Goodwife Howland choose spring-time for 
 the soap-making? 
 
 How many years could Richard remember ? 
 
 Write a story of something that hapj)ened as long ago 
 as you can remember. 
 
 When the Indians Fell on Saco 
 See whether you can find out : — 
 
 (1) Who wrote the poetry in the story. 
 
 (2) What other stanza in this book he wrote. 
 
 (3) What story he wrote about an Indian that 
 
 lived on Cape Cod. Massachusetts. 
 Find and copy the stanza in this book in which Marie 
 tells who she is. 
 
 I 
 
APPENDIX 117 
 
 Find aud copy the stauza that tells what Goodwife 
 Garvin answered. 
 
 Who governs Canada now ? 
 
 What nation do you think governed Canada when Mary 
 Garvin lived there ? 
 
 See whether you can find out what made the change. 
 
 Candle-Making at the Coolidges' 
 
 Where have you seen candles used ? 
 
 Write a letter to a little girl who lived two hundred 
 years ago, telling her w^hy kerosene lamps are better than 
 candles. 
 
 Tell something interesting about electric lights. 
 
 Telling Time Without a Clock 
 
 Draw a picture of an hourglass. Sliow^ that half an 
 hour has passed since it was turned. 
 
 What other story in this book tells about an hour- 
 glass ? What happened when it was turned the second 
 time ! 
 
 What good place to make noon -marks do you know '? 
 How would you make them ? 
 
 What two days in the year should you select on which 
 to make the marks ? See whether you can find out how 
 many times a year and on what days the sun would 
 shine exactly half-way between the marks. 
 
 How did the sundial look ? 
 
 (1) What marked the time of day ? 
 
 (2) Where was the shadow at half-past three 1 
 When was the sundial of no use ? 
 
118 LIFE IN THE COLONIES 
 
 Here is another sundial motto for you to copy 
 I mark only sunny hours. 
 
 Two Letters of Long Ago 
 Write a letter to Mary Grafton, telling her : — 
 
 (1) How one would go now from Wilmington to 
 
 Philadelphia. 
 
 (2) About your last ride on the cars. 
 
 (3) Why you would rather live now than in her 
 
 time. 
 Write a letter to Christina Grafton, telling about : — 
 
 (1) The first letter you ever wrote : why you wrote 
 
 it, to whom, on what, and with what, and 
 how much it cost to send it. 
 
 (2) Your school : how many i^upils there are, what 
 
 you study, and what you have to read fi'om. 
 
 A May-Day Joueney 
 Supply the correct words for the blanks : — 
 
 John. — You ought to have gone with us, 
 
 Clarice. 
 
 Claeice. — Did you have to x^lant and make 
 
 of stones ? 
 
 John. — Yes, and we the trees, too. 
 
 Claeice. — I would rather go to to the May- 
 day festival. 
 
 John. — What did you like best there? 
 
 Claeice. — Oh, the dance around the , 
 
 didn't you? 
 
 John. — No, indeed, I'd rather see with paint 
 
 and feathers any time. 
 
APPENDIX 119 
 
 See whether you cau find out : — 
 
 (1) When Jamestown was settled. 
 
 (2) How it got its name. 
 
 (3) Who was Bacon and why did his soldiers des- 
 
 troy the town ? 
 
 The Poor Debtor's Children 
 Fill in the blanks : — 
 
 In people who could not pay their were 
 
 sent to . General sailed away with many 
 
 of these poor and founded the of . 
 
 Two good and famous men, and his brother 
 
 came to with . These colo- 
 nists built houses that they called . The children 
 
 called them . The colonists named their 
 
 town . 
 
 Tell from the story :— 
 
 Who was the king of England at this time? 
 In what direction is Georgia from England ? 
 How long did the voyage take"? 
 See whether you can find out :— 
 W^hen Georgia was first settled ? 
 What large city was settled before Frederica? 
 
ADVERTISEMENTS. 
 
AN ELEMENTARY HISTORY OF 
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THE HEATH READERS 
 
 A new series, that excels in its 
 
 1. Interesting and well graded lessons. 
 
 2. Masterpieces of English and American literature. 
 
 3. Beautiful and appropriate illustrations. 
 
 4. Clear and legible printing. 
 
 5. Durable and handsome binding. 
 
 6. Adaptation to the needs of modern schools. 
 
 The Heath Readers enable teachers, whether they 
 have much or little knowledge of the art, to teach children to 
 read intelligently and to read aloud intelligibly. They do this 
 without waste of time or effort, and at the same time that the 
 books aid pupils in acquiring skill in reading, they present 
 material which is in itself worth reading. 
 
 The purpose of the Heath Readers is, first^ to enable 
 beginners to master the mechanical difficulties of reading 
 successfully and in the shortest time ; secotid^ to develop the 
 imagination and cultivate a taste for the best literature ; 
 thirds to appeal to those motives that lead to right conduct, 
 industry, courage, patriotism, and loyalty to duty. The larger 
 purpose is, briefly, to aid in developing an appreciation of 
 that which is of most worth in life and literature. 
 
 The series contains seven books, as follows 
 
 Primer, 128 pages, 25 cents. 
 First Reader, 130 pages, 25 cents. 
 Second Reader, 176 pages, 35 cents. 
 Third Reader, 256 pages, 40 cents. 
 
 Fourth Reader, 320 pages, 45 cents. 
 Fifth Reader, 352 pages, 50 cents. 
 Sixth Reader, 352 pages, 50 cents. 
 
 Descriptive circulars sent free on rtquest. 
 
 D. C. HEATH & CO., Publishers, Boston, NewYork, Chicago 
 
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