1690. The first permanent newspaper, the Boston News Letter, began in
1704, and it had a Boston and a Philadelphia rival in 1719. The Maryland
Gazette was started at Annapolis in 1727, a weekly at Williamsburg, Va.,
in 1736. In 1740 there were eleven newspapers in all in the colonies;
one each in New York, South Carolina, and Virginia (from 1736), three in
Pennsylvania, one of them German, and five in Boston. The Connecticut
Gazette was started at New Haven in 1755; The Summary, at New London in
1758. The Rhode Island Gazette was begun by James Franklin, September
27, 1732, but was not permanent. The Providence Gazette and Country
Journal put forth its first issue October 20, 1762. In 1775, Salem,
Newburyport, and Portsmouth had each its newspaper. The first daily in
the country, the Pennsylvania Packet, began in 1784.
James Logan.
Other literature of American origin flourished in New England nearly
alone. It consisted of sermons, social and political tracts, poetry,
history, and memoirs. The clergy were the chief but not the sole
authors. Of readers, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston had many.
Much reading matter came from England. Charleston enjoyed a public
library from 1700. About 1750 there were several others. That left to
Philadelphia in 1751, by James Logan, comprised 4,000 volumes.
William and Mary had established a postal system for America, placing
Thomas Neale, Esquire, at its head. The service hardly became a system
till 1738. In ordinary weather a post-rider would receive the
Philadelphia mail at the Susquehannah River on Saturday evening, be at
Annapolis on Monday, reach the Potomac Tuesday night, on Wednesday
arrive at New Post, near Fredericksburg, and by Saturday evening at
Williamsburg, whence, once a month, the mail went still farther south,
to Edenton, N. C. Thus a letter was just a week in transit between
Philadelphia and the capital of Virginia. In New England, from here to
New York, and between New York and Philadelphia, despatch was much
better.
King William.
Queen Mary.
The learned professions also were best patronized and had the ablest
personnel in New England, where all three, but particularly the clergy,
were strong and honored. Outside of New England, till 1750, lawyers and
physicians, especially in the country parts, were poorly educated and
little respected. Each formidable disease had the people at its mercy.
Diphtheria, then known as the throat disease, swept through the land
once in about thirty years. Smallpox was another frequent scourge. In
1721 it attacked nearly six thousand persons in Boston, about half the
population, killing some nine hundred. The clergy, almost to a man,
decried vaccination when first vented, proclaiming it an effort to
thwart God's will. Clergymen, except perhaps in Carolina and Virginia,
were somewhat better educated, yet those in New England led all others
in this respect.
Colonial America boasted many great intellectual lights. President
Edwards won European reputation as a thinker, and so did Franklin as a
statesman and as a scientist. Linnaeus named our Bartram, a Quaker
farmer of Pennsylvania, the greatest natural botanist then living.
Increase Mather read and wrote both Greek and Hebrew, and spoke Latin.
He and his son Cotton were veritable wonders in literary attainment. The
one was the author of ninety-two books, the other of three hundred and
eighty-three. The younger Winthrop was a member of the Royal Society.
Copley, Stuart, and West became distinguished painters.
Except for mails, there were in the colonies no public conveyances by
land till just before the Revolution. After stage lines were introduced,
to go from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh required seven days; from
Philadelphia to New York, at first three, later two. The earliest coach
to attain the last-named speed was advertised as "the flying machine,"
From Boston one would be four days travelling to New York, two to
Portsmouth. Packet-boats between the main points on the coast were as
regular and speedy as wind allowed. Stage-drivers, inn-keepers, and
ship-captains were the honored and accredited purveyors of news.
Everywhere was great prosperity, little luxury. Paucity of money gave
rise to that habit of barter and dicker in trade which was a mannerism
of our fathers. Agriculture formed the basal industry, especially in the
Southern colonies; yet in New England and Pennsylvania both manufactures
and commerce thrived. Pennsylvania's yearly foreign commerce exceeded
1,000,000 pounds sterling, requiring 500 vessels and more than 7,000
seamen. From Pennsylvania, in 1750, 3,000 tons of pig-iron were
exported. The annual production of iron in Maryland just before the
Revolution reached 25,000 tons of pig, 500 of bar. The business of
marine insurance began in this country at Philadelphia in 1721, fire
insurance at Boston in 1724. New England produced timber, ships, rum,
paper, hats, leather, and linen and woollen cloths, the first three for
export.
In country places houses were poor save on the great estates, south, but
in the cities there were many fine mansions before 1700. From this year
stoves began to be used. Glass windows and paper hangings were first
seen not far from 1750.
The colonists ate much flesh, and nearly all used tobacco and liquor
freely. Finest ladies snuffed, sometimes smoked. Little coffee was
drunk, and no tea till about 1700. Urban life was social and gay. In the
country the games of fox and geese, three and twelve men morris, husking
bees and quilting bees were the chief sports. Tableware was mostly of
wood, though many had pewter, and the rich much silver. The people's
ordinary dress was of homemade cloth, but not a few country people still
wore deerskin. The clothing of the rich was imported, and often gaudy
with tasteless ornament. Wigs were common in the eighteenth century, and
all head-dress stupidly elaborate.
William Lang, of Boston, advertises in 1767 to provide all who wish with
wigs "in the most genteel and polite taste," assuring judges, divines,
lawyers, and physicians, "because of the importance of their heads, that
he can assort his wigs to suit their respective occupations and
inclinations." He tells the ladies that he can furnish anyone of them
with "a nice, easy, genteel, and polite construction of rolls, such as
may tend to raise their heads to any pitch they desire."
"Everybody wore wigs in 1750, except convicts and slaves. Boys wore
them, servants wore them, Quakers wore them, paupers wore them. The
making of wigs was an important branch of industry in Great Britain.
Wigs were of many styles and prices. Some dangled with curls; and they
were designated by a great variety of names, such as tyes, bobs, majors,
spencers, foxtails, twists, tetes, scratches, full-bottomed dress bobs,
cues, and perukes. The people of Philadelphia dressed as the actors of
our theatres now dress in old English comedy. They walked the streets in
bright-colored and highly decorated coats, three-cornered hats, ruffled
shirts and wristbands, knee-breeches, silk stockings, low shoes, and
silver buckles." [footnote: Mrs. M. J. Lamb, in Magazine of Am. History,
August. 1888.] Lord Stirling, one of Washington's generals, had a
clothing inventory like a king: a "pompidou" cloth coat and vest,
breeches with gold lace, a crimson and figured velvet coat, seven
scarlet vests, et cetera, et cetera.
The wigs encountered the zealous hostility of many, among these Judge
Samuel Sewall. His highest eulogy on a departed worthy was: "The welfare
of the poor was much upon his spirit, and he abominated periwigs." A
member of the church at Newbury, Mass., refused to attend communion
because the pastor wore a wig, believing that all who were guilty of
this practice would be damned if they did not repent. A meeting of
Massachusetts Quakers solemnly expressed the conviction that the wearing
of extravagant and superfluous wigs was wholly contrary to the truth.
Chief Justice Sewall.
There was an aristocracy, of its kind, in all the colonies, but it was
far the strongest in the South. Social lines were sharply drawn, an
"Esquire" not liking to be accosted as "Mr.," and each looking down
somewhat upon a simple "Goodman." These gradations stood forth in
college catalogues and in the location of pews in churches. The Yale
triennial catalogue until 1767 and the Harvard triennial till 1772
arrange students' names not alphabetically or according to attainments,
but so as to indicate the social rank of their families. Memoranda of
President Clap, of Yale, against the names of youth when admitted to
college, such as "Justice of the Peace," "Deacon," "of middling estate
much impoverished," reveal how hard it sometimes was properly to grade
students socially. At the South, regular mechanics, like all free
laborers, were few and despised. The indentured servants, very numerous
in several colonies, differed little from slaves. David Jamieson,
attorney-general of New York in 1710, had been banished from Scotland as
a Covenanter and sold in New Jersey as a four years' redemptioner to pay
transportation expanses. Such servants were continually running away,
which may have aided in abolishing the system. Paupers and criminals
were fewest in New England. All the colonies imprisoned insolvent
criminals, though dirt and damp made each prison a hell. All felonies
were awarded capital punishment, and many minor crimes incurred
barbarous penalties. Whipping-post, pillory, and stocks were in frequent
use. So late as 1760 women were publicly whipped. At Hartford, in 1761,
David Campbell and Alexander Pettigrew, for the burglary of two watches,
received each fifteen stripes, the loss of the right ear, and the
brand-mark "B" on the forehead. Pettigrew came near losing his life from
the profuse bleeding which ensued. A husband killing his wife was
hanged. A wife killing her husband was burned, as were slaves who slew
their masters.
The Pillory.
In care for the unfortunate and in the study and in all applications of
social science, Philadelphia led. The Pennsylvania Hospital, the first
institution of the kind in America, was founded in 1751. The
Philadelphia streets were the first to be lighted; those of New York
next; those of Boston not till 1773. Before the end of the period now
before us Philadelphia and New York also had night patrols.
Signature of Jolliet (old spelling).
CHAPTER VIII.
ENGLAND AND FRANCE IN AMERICA
Totem of the Sioux.
[1659-1672]
Working upward from the mouth of the St. Lawrence to the source of this
and of the Mississippi, and then down the latter river, Franciscans and
Jesuits their pioneers, braving dreadful hardships and dangers in
efforts, more courageous than successful, to convert the Indians, the
French had come to control that great continental highway and boldly to
claim for France the entire heart of North America.
A Sioux Chief.
In 1659, Groseilliers and Radisson penetrated beyond Lake Superior, and
dwelt for a time among the Sioux, who knew of the Mississippi River.
Next year Groseilliers went thither again, accompanied by the Jesuit
Menard and his servant, Guerin. In 1661 Menard and Guerin pushed into
what is now Wisconsin, and may have seen the Mississippi. These
explorations made the French familiar with the copper mines of Lake
Superior, and awakened the utmost zeal to see the Great River of which
the Indians spoke. La Salle probably discovered the Ohio in 1670, and
traced it down to the falls at Louisville. His main eulogist holds that
he even reached the Mississippi at that time, some three years earlier
than Joliet, but this is not substantiated. We also reject the belief
that he reached the stream by way of the Chicago portage in 1671.
Totem of the Illinois.
[1676]
In 1672 Count Frontenac, Governor of New France, despatched Louis Joliet
to discover the Great River. He reached the Strait of Mackinaw in
December, and there Pere Marquette joined him. In May, next year, they
paddled their canoes up the Fox River and tugged them across the portage
into the Wisconsin, which they descended, entering the Father of Waters
June 17, 1673. They floated down to the mouth of the Arkansas and then
returned, their journey back being up the Illinois and Desplaines
Rivers. Joliet gave his name to the peak on the latter stream which the
city of Joliet, Ill., near by, still retains. Joliet arrived at Quebec
in August, 1674, having in four months journeyed over twenty-five
hundred miles.
It thus became known how close the upper waters of the great rivers, St.
Lawrence and Mississippi, were to each other, and that the latter
emptied into the Gulf of Mexico instead of the South Sea (Pacific); yet,
as the Rocky Mountains had not then been discovered, it was for long
believed that some of the western tributaries of the Great River led to
that western ocean.
The Reception of Joliet and Marquette by the Illinois.
[1682]
In 1676 Raudin, and three years later, Du Lhut, visited the Ojibwas and
Sioux west of Lake Superior. Du Lhut reached the upper waters of the
Mississippi at Sandy Lake. He went there again in 1680. In 1682 La Salle
crossed the Chicago portage and explored the lower Mississippi all the
way to the Gulf, taking possession of the entire valley in the name of
France and naming it Louisiana. Nicholas Perrot travelled by way of the
Fox and Wisconsin Rivers to the upper Mississippi in 1685, and again in
1688. It is in his writings that the word "Chicago" first appears in
literature.
There were thus between the two great valleys, 1, the Superior route; 2,
the Wisconsin and Fox route; 3, the Illinois River route, whether by the
Kankakee, La Salle's way, or by the south branch of the Chicago River,
Joliet's way; and 4, the route by the Wabash and Ohio. The Wabash, too,
could be approached either from Lake Erie or from Lake Michigan, through
St. Joseph's River. At high water, canoes often passed from Lake
Michigan into the Mississippi without portage.
A Part of the Map Published in Paris by Thevenot as
"Marquette's Map." It shows the route taken by Joliet across Wisconsin
from the Baie des Puans (now Green Bay) to the Mississippi River, also
part of the return journey, that is, from the present site of Chicago,
northward along lake Michigan.
[1685-1690]
Louis XIV.
La Salle had the ambition to get to the South Sea from the Mississippi.
Governor De la Barre, who followed Frontenac, opposing him, he repaired
to France, where he succeeded in winning Louis XIV. to his plan. At the
head of a well-equipped fleet he sailed for the mouth of the
Mississippi, reaching land near Matagorda Bay on the first day of the
year 1685. Not finding the Mississippi, La Salle's officers mutinied.
The expedition broke up into parties, wandering here and there,
distressed by Indian attacks and by treachery among themselves. La Salle
was shot by his own men. Nearly all his followers perished, but a small
party at last discovered the river and ascended it to Fort St. Louis on
the Illinois, reaching France via Quebec. In this expedition France
took possession of Texas, nor did she ever relinquish the claim till, in
1763, the whole of Louisiana west of the Mississippi was ceded to Spain,
La Salle's ill-starred attempt led later to the planting of French
colonies by D'Iberville at Biloxi Island, in Mobile Bay, soon abandoned,
and at Poverty Point, on the Mississippi; and still later to the
settlement of New Orleans and vicinity. Growth in these parts was slow,
however. So late as 1713 there were not over three hundred whites in the
entire Mississippi Valley.
Coins Struck In France for the Colonies.
Assassination of La Salle.
New Orleans in 1719.
By this time French traders had set foot on every shore of the great
lakes and explored nearly every stream tributary thereto. The English,
pushing westward more and more, were trying to divide with them the
lucrative business of fur-trading, and each nation sought to win to
itself all the Indians it could. The Mohawks and their confederates of
the Five Nations, now equipped and acquainted with fire-arms, spite of
alternate overtures and threats from the French, remained firm friends
to the English, who more and more invaded those vast and fertile western
ranges. It grew to be the great question of the age this side the
Atlantic, whether England or France should control the continent. King
William's war, declared in 1689, was therefore certain to rage in
America as well as in Europe.
Signature of D'Iberville.
One sees by a glance at the map what advantage France had in this
struggle. It possessed the best fishing grounds and fur-producing
districts, and fish and furs were at first the only exports of value
from the north of America. The French, too, held all the water-ways to
the heart of the continent. Coming up Lake Champlain they could threaten
New York and New England from the rear. The colonies farther south they
shut in almost as straitly, French bullets whistling about any
Englishman's ears the instant he appeared beyond the mountains.
In other respects England had the advantage. In population English
America had become as superior as French America was territorially,
having 1,116,000 white inhabitants in 1750, to about 80,000 French. The
English colonies were also more convenient to the mother-country, and
the better situated for commerce both coastwise and across the ocean.
Among the English, temper for mere speculation and adventure decayed
very early, giving way to the conviction that successful planting
depended wholly upon persistent, energetic toil.
A piece of fortune more important yet was their relatively free
religious and political system. Toleration in religion was large.
Self-government was nearly complete internally, and indeed externally,
till the navigation acts. Canada, on the other hand, was oppressed by a
feudal constitution in the state, settlers being denied the fee simple
of their lands, and by Jesuits in Church. "New France could not grow,"
says Parkman, "with a priest on guard at the gate to let in none but
such as pleased him. In making Canada a citadel of the state religion,
the clerical monitors of the Crown robbed their country of a
transatlantic empire." Thus the Huguenots, France's best emigrants to
America, did not come to New France, but to New England and the other
Protestant colonies.