The favorite winter amusement in New York, as in Philadelphia, was riding in sleighs, a fashion which the Dutch brought from Holland. The English colonists in New England were slower to adopt sleighs for carriages, and never in early days found sleighing a sport. The bitter New England weather did not attract sleighers.
Madam Knights, a Boston visitor to New York, wrote in 1704:—
“Their diversion in winter is riding in sleighs about three miles out of town, where they have houses of entertainment at a place called the Bowery; and some go to friends’ houses, who handsomely treat them. I believe we mett fifty or sixty sleighs one day; they fly with great swiftness, and some are so furious that they turn out for none except a loaded cart.”
An English parson, one Burnaby, visiting New York in 1759, wrote of their delightful sleighing-parties; and Mrs. Anne Grant thus adds her testimony of similar pleasures in Albany:—
“In winter the river, frozen to a great depth, formed the principal road through the country, and was the scene of all those amusements of skating and sledge races, common to the north of Europe. They used in great parties to visit their friends at a distance, and having an excellent and hardy breed of horses, flew from place to place over the snow or ice in these sledges with incredible rapidity, stopping a little while at every house they came to, and always well received whether acquainted with the owners or not. The night never impeded these travellers, for the atmosphere was so pure and serene, and the snow so reflected the moon and star-light, that the nights exceeded the days in beauty.”
William Livingstone, when he was twenty-one years old, wrote in 1744 of a “waffle-frolic,” which was an amusement then in vogue:—
“We had the wafel-frolic at Miss Walton’s talked of before your departure. The feast as usual was preceded by cards, and the company so numerous that they filled two tables; after a few games, a magnificent supper appeared in grand order and decorum, but for my own part I was not a little grieved that so luxurious a feast should come under the name of a wafel-frolic, because if this be the case I must expect but a few wafel-frolics for the future; the frolic was closed up with ten sunburnt virgins lately come from Columbus’s Newfoundland, besides a play of my own invention which I have not room enough to describe at present. How’ever, kissing constitutes a great part of its entertainment.”
Kissing seemed to constitute a great part of the entertainment at evening parties everywhere at that time.
As soon as the English obtained control of New York, they established English sports and pastimes, among them fox-hunting. Long Island afforded good sport. During the autumn three days’ hunting was permitted at Flatbush; in other towns the chase was stolen fun. A woman-satirist, with a spirited pen, had her fling in rhyme at fox-hunting. Here are a few of her lines:—
“A fox is killed by twenty men,