Manners and Customs
When the first considerable emigration ceased about the year 1640, of the 25,000 settlers then living in the Colony, probably ninety-five per cent were small farmers or workmen engaged in the manual trades, together with many indentured servants who had come over under the terms of a contract whereby they were bonded to serve their masters for a term of years—usually five or seven. The remaining five per cent of the population was composed of those governing the colony—the stockholders in the Company, so to speak; ministers enough to supply the spiritual needs of each town and settlement, however small; a few of social position and comparative wealth; one lawyer; and a sprinkling of shopkeepers and small merchants living in the seaport towns. Here and there a physician or chirurgeon might be found, but the physical welfare of the smaller towns was usually cared for by some ancient housewife with a knowledge of herbs and simples. Sometimes it was the minister who practiced two professions and cared for the bodies as well as the souls of his congregation.
The founders of the colony in the Massachusetts Bay, and most of those who immediately followed them, were men who did not conform to the ritual and government of the Established Church in England. They were followers of John Calvin whose Geneva Bible was widely read in England and whose teachings had profoundly influenced English thought and manners. Calvin taught a great simplicity of life and a personal application of the teachings found in the Bible. In the Commonwealth that he set up in Geneva, the daily life and actions of its citizens were as closely guarded as if in a nursery for children. All frivolous amusements were forbidden; a curfew was established; and all were constrained to save souls and to labor for material development. There was a minute supervision of dress and personal conduct, and a literal construction of Bible mandates was carried so far that children were actually put to death for striking their parents.
Calvin's theology was based on the belief that all men were born sinners and since Adam's fall, by the will of God, predestined from birth to hell and everlasting torment, unless, happily, one of the elect and so foreordained to be saved. In this belief the Puritans found life endurable because they considered themselves of the elect; and in cases of doubt, the individual found comfortable assurance in the belief that although certain of his neighbors were going to hell he was one of the elect. It naturally followed that the imagination of the Puritans was concentrated on questions of religion.
The teachings of Calvin spread rapidly in England and among his followers there came about an austerity of religious life and a great simplicity in dress and manners.
It is true that most of the settlers of Massachusetts were poor in purse and with many of them mere existence was a struggle for a long time. But the growth of wealth in the Colony, although it brought with it more luxury in living and better dwellings, did not add much to the refinement of the people. It was the influence and example of the royal governors and a more frequent commercial intercourse with England and the Continental peoples that brought about a desire for a richer dress and an introduction of some of the refinements of life. This by no means met the approval of the Puritan ministers who frequently inveighed against "Professors of Religion who fashion themselves according to the World." The Rev. Cotton Mather, the leading minister in Boston and the industrious author of over four hundred published sermons and similar works, again and again exhorted against stage plays and infamous games of cards and dice. "It is a matter of Lamentation that even such things as these should be heard of in New England," he exclaimed. "And others spend their time in reading vain Romances," he continued. "It is meer loss of time."
With such a background and burdened with such a far-reaching antagonism toward the finer things of life, that help to lighten the burden of existence and beautify the way, it is small wonder that the esthetics found little fertile soil in New England; and much of this prejudice and state of mind lingered among the old families in the more remote and orthodox communities, until recent times.
The New England Puritans only allowed themselves one full holiday in the course of the year and that was Thanksgiving Day, a time for feasting. To be sure, there was Fast Day, in the spring, which gave freedom from work; but that was a day for a sermon at the meetinghouse, for long faces and a supposed bit of self denial—somewhere. The celebration of Christmas was not observed by the true New England Puritan until the middle of the nineteenth century.
A number of sermons preached by Rev. Samuel Moodey, an eccentric minister at York, Maine, for nearly half a century, were printed and among them: "The Doleful State of the Damned, especially such as go to hell from under the Gospel." This sermon was followed by its antidote, entitled: "The Gospel Way of Escaping the Doleful State of the Damned." Another of his sermons was upon "Judas the Traitor, Hung up in Chains." Parson Moodey's son, Joseph, followed him in the pulpit at York. He was known as "Handkerchief Moodey," as he fell into a melancholy; thought he had sinned greatly; and after a time wore a handkerchief over his face whenever he appeared in public. In the pulpit he would turn his back to the congregation and read the sermon, but whenever he faced his people it would be with handkerchief-covered features. Think what must have been the influence of two such men on the life and opinions of a town covering a period of two generations!
During the late seventeenth century and well into the eighteenth, the books usually found in the average New England family were the Bible, the Psalm Book, an almanac, the New England Primer, a sermon or two and perhaps a copy of Michael Wigglesworth's terrific poem—"The Day of Doom." The latter was first printed in 1662 in an edition of 1800 copies not one of which has survived. Every copy was read and re-read until nothing remained but fragments of leaves. Seven editions of this poem were printed between 1662 and 1715 and few copies of any edition now exist. The book expressed the quintesscence of Calvinism. Here is stanza 205, expressing the terror of those doomed to hell:
"They wring their hands, their caitiff-hands,
and gnash their teeth for terrour:
They cry, they roar, for anguish sore
and gnaw their tongues for horrour.
But get away without delay,
Christ pities not your cry:
Depart to Hell, there may you yell,
and roar Eternally."
Pastor Higginson of Salem wrote enthusiastically of the natural abundance of the grass that "groweth verie wildly with a great stalke" as high as a man's face and as for Indian corn—the planting of thirteen gallons of seed had produced an increase of fifty-two hogsheads or three hundred and fifty bushels, London measure, to be sold or trusted to the Indians in exchange for beaver worth above £300. Who would not share the hardships and dangers of the frontier colony for opportunity of such rich gain?
But the housewives in the far-away English homes were more interested in the growth of the vegetable gardens in the virgin soil, and of these he wrote: "Our turnips, parsnips and carrots are here both bigger and sweeter than is ordinary to be found in England. Here are stores of pumpions, cucumbers, and other things of that nature I know not. Plentie of strawberries in their time, and pennyroyall, winter saverie, carvell and water-cresses, also leeks and onions are ordinary." Great lobsters abounded weighing from sixteen to twenty-five pounds and much store of bass, herring, sturgeon, haddock, eels, and oysters. In the forests were several kinds of deer; also partridges, turkeys, and great flocks of pigeons, with wild geese, ducks, and other sea fowl in such abundance "that a great part of the Planters have eaten nothing but roast-meate of divers Fowles which they have killed."
These were some of the attractive natural features of the new colony in the Massachusetts Bay, as recounted by the Salem minister. Of the hardships he makes small mention, for his aim was to induce emigration. There was much sickness, however, and many deaths. Higginson himself lived only a year after reaching Salem. The breaking up of virgin soil always brings on malaria and fever. Dudley wrote "that there is not an house where there is not one dead, and in some houses many. The naturall causes seem to bee in the want of warm lodgings, and good dyet to which Englishmen are habittuated, at home; and in the suddain increase of heate which they endure that are landed here in somer ... those of Plymouth who landed in winter dyed of the Scirvy, as did our poorer sort whose howses and bedding kept them not sufficiently warm, nor their dyet sufficient in heart." Thomas Dudley wrote this in March, 1631. He explained that he was writing upon his knee by the fireside in the living-room, having as yet no table nor other room in which to write during the sharp winter. In this room his family must resort "though they break good manners, and make mee many times forget what I would say, and say what I would not."
But these hardships and inconveniences of living which the New England colonists met and overcame differ but little from those experienced in every new settlement. They have been paralleled again and again wherever Englishmen or Americans have wandered. In a few years after the coming of the ships much of the rawness and discomfort must have disappeared, certainly in the early settlements, and comparative comfort must have existed in most homes. If we could now lift the roof of the average seventeenth-century house in New England it is certain that we should find disclosed not only comfortable conditions of living but in many instances a degree of luxury with fine furnishings that is appreciated by few at the present time.
Of the early days following the settlement Roger Clap, who lived at Dorchester, afterwards wrote as follows:
"It was not accounted a strange thing in those days to drink water, and to eat Samp or Homine without Butter or Milk. Indeed it would have been a strang thing to see a piece of Roast Beef, Mutton or Veal; though it was not long before there was Roast Goat. After the first Winter, we were very Healthy: though some of us had no great Store of Corn. The Indians did sometimes bring Corn, and Trade with us for Clothing and Knives; and once I had a Peck of Corn, or there abouts, for a little Puppy-Dog. Frostfish, Muscles and Clams were a Relief to Many."
When Governor Winthrop landed at Salem in June, 1630, he supped on a good venison pasty and good beer, while most of those who came with him went ashore on Cape Anne side (now Beverly) and gathered strawberries. That was a fine beginning, but when winter set in many of them were "forced to cut their bread thin for a long season" and then it was that they fully realized that "the Ditch betweene England and their now place of abode was so wide.... Those that were sent over servants, having itching desires for novelties, found a reddier way to make an end of their Master's provision, then they could finde means to get more; They that came over their own men had but little left to feed on, and most began to repent when their strong Beere and full cups ran as small as water in a large Land.... They made shift [however] to rub out the Winter's cold by the Fireside, having fuell enough growing at their very doores, turning down many a drop from the Bottell, and burning Tobacco with all the ease they could."[38]
Lacking bread they lived on fish, mussels and clams. The rivers supplied bass, shad, alewives, frost fish and smelts in their season, also salmon, and corn meal could be bartered for with the Indians and shortly raised from seed.
"Let no man make a jest at Pumpkins, for with this fruit the Lord was pleased to feed his people to their good content, till Corne and Cattell were increased," wrote Johnson. Later (by 1650) the goodwives served "apples, pears and quince tarts instead of their former Pumpkin Pies," and by that time wheat bread was no dainty.
Society in the Massachusetts Bay in the seventeenth century was divided into several groups. First came the merchant class which also included the ministers and those possessed of wealth. Edward Randolph reported to the Lords of Trade in 1676, that in Massachusetts there were about thirty merchants worth from £10,000. to £20,000. "Most have considerable estates and a very great trade." Next came the freemen and the skilled mechanics. This class furnished the town officials and constituted the backbone of the colony. Then came the unskilled laborer and a step lower was the indentured servant. The merchant lived well and wore fine clothing forbidden to his more humble neighbors. The status of the servant may well be shown by the deposition presented in Court at Salem in 1657 by an apprentice to a stone-mason in the town of Newbury, Massachusetts, who testified that it was a long while before "he could eate his master's food, viz. meate and milk, or drink beer, saying that he did not know that it was good, because he was not used to eat such victualls, but to eate bread and water porridge and to drink water."[39]
It has been stated frequently that in the olden times in New England every one was obliged to go to church. The size of the meetinghouses, the isolated locations of many of the houses, the necessary care of the numerous young children, and the interesting side-lights on the manners of the time which may be found in the court papers, all go to show that the statement must not be taken literally. Absence from meeting, breaking the Sabbath, carrying a burden on the Lord's Day, condemning the church, condemning the ministry, scandalous falling out on the Lord's Day, slandering the church, and other misdemeanors of a similar character were frequent.
Drunkenness was very common in the old days. "We observed it a common fault in our young people that they gave themselves to drink hot waters immoderately," wrote Edward Johnson. Every family kept on hand a supply of liquor and wine, and cider was considered a necessity of daily living in the country, where it was served with each meal and also carried into the fields by the workers. It was stored in barrels in the cellar and the task of drawing the cider and putting on the table usually fell to the younger members of the family. A man would often provide in his will for the comfort of his loving wife by setting aside for occupancy during her life, one half of his house, with a carefully specified number of bushels of rye, potatoes, turnips and other vegetables; the use of a horse with which to ride to meeting or elsewhere; and lastly, the direction that annually she be provided with a certain number of barrels of cider—sometimes as many as eight.
Rev. Edward Holyoke, the President of Harvard College, was in the habit of laying in each year thirty or more barrels of cider as he had to provide for much entertaining. Late in the winter he would draw off part of his stock and into each barrel he would pour a bottle of spirit and a month later some of this blend would be bottled for use on special occasions.
What was their conduct not only in their homes but in their relations with their neighbors? Did they live peaceably and work together in building up the settlements? Did they set up in the wilderness domestic relations exactly like those they had abandoned overseas? It was a raw frontier country to which they came and it is apparent that at the outset they felt themselves to be transplanted Englishmen. So far as possible they lived the lives to which they had been accustomed and they engrafted in their new homes the manners and customs of the generations behind them. Most of them fully recognized, however, that they were not to return; that they had cut loose from the old home ties and it was not long before the necessities and limitations of frontier life brought about changed conditions in every direction. Politically, religiously and socially, they were in a different relation than formerly in the English parish life. Many of them, especially those somewhat removed from the immediate supervision of magistrate and minister, before long seem to have shown a tendency to follow the natural bent of the frontiersman toward independent thought and action. Their political leaders made laws restricting daily life and action and their religious leaders laid down rules for belief and conduct, that soon were repellent to many. Civil and clerical records are filled with instances showing an evasion of and even contempt for the laws and rules laid down by the leaders of their own choosing. Some of it doubtless was in the blood of the men who had come in search of a certain individual freedom of action, but much of it may be attributed to frontier conditions and primitive living. There were many indentured servants, and rough fishermen and sailors have always been unruly. Simple houses of but few rooms accommodating large families are not conducive to gentle speech or modesty of manner nor to a strict morality. The craving for landholding and the poorly defined and easily removed bounds naturally led to ill feeling, assault, defamation, and slander.