The little English children were generally happy. The country around them was beautiful, the birds sang sweet songs in the trees near by, and there were flowers and fruits in plenty. When Christmas came they watched the Yule log burn in the big fireplace, and gathered around tables loaded with roasted turkeys, venison and other good things to eat.
Years passed by, and other settlers came to America. Most of them were from England, but there were some from Holland and Sweden and other countries of Europe.
Among the newcomers were the Quakers under William Penn, who called their new home in America Pennsylvania, meaning, Penn’s woods. They were gentle and peaceful and had little trouble with their Indian neighbors.
Then there were the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth in New England one bleak November day. They were quiet and sober-faced. They left their old home to seek one in which they would be free to worship God in the way they thought best. As it happened, they chose for themselves the coldest corner of the United States in which to settle and they had before them years of struggle and hard work.
They found the winters in New England colder than those they had known in England and the sharp winds crept in between the cracks in the walls of their rough log houses, chilling their backs even when they were gathered around the blazing logs in the big fireplaces. The crops of corn and beans were often scanty, because the soil was poor, and around them not far away were the Indians, some of whom scowled and muttered ugly words when they spoke of the white settlers who were hunting the game in the forests, and planting gardens on the land to which they thought they alone had the right.
The children of the Pilgrims were taught to be very quiet and sober in their ways. They loved to listen to the squirrels chattering in the trees, and to watch the rabbits scamper across the paths. They gathered blueberries and blackberries in summer and chestnuts and hickory nuts in the autumn. The boys dragged their sisters on rough sleds over the snow in winter and waded with them in the brooks as the days grew warmer, and at such times they laughed and chattered like all happy children. But when they reached home their faces became sober and their voices low, for they were taught that among older folks children should be seen and not heard.
When evening came they sat in straight chairs in the big kitchen which was the “living room” as well, while the men talked over the day’s work, and the women knit socks for the family.
Sometimes as the little Pilgrims settled themselves for the night’s sleep they were roused by the howling of wolves outside. They shuddered as they thought, “Suppose that had been the war whoop of the Indians coming to attack our village.”
On Sunday when the Pilgrims went to church the men led the way armed with muskets which might be needed at any moment in defending their families.
After the Pilgrims, the Puritans came to New England. They were even more sober and strict in their ways than the Pilgrims, and they, too, had trouble with their Indian neighbors.