Child Life In Colonial Days

Text extracted from opening pages of book: 1926 All rights reserved STVL1TK8' OF' COPYRIGHT, 1899, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up and electrotyped November, 1899. Norwood Press . S. Cusbing 6f Co. Berwick & Smith Norwood, Mass., THIS BOOK HAS BEEN WRITTEN IN TENDER MEMORY OF A DEARLY LOVED AND LOVING CHILD HENRY EARLE, JUNIOR MDCCCLXXX-MDCCCXCH M-PUB1 -' c LIBRARY Foreword When we regard the large share which child study has in the interest of the reader and thinker of to-day, it is indeed curious to see how little is told of child life in history. The ancients made no record of the life of young children; classic Rome furnishes no data for child study; the Greeks left no child forms in art. The student of original sources of history learns little about children in his searches; few in number and comparatively meagre in quality are the-literary re mains that even refer to them. We know little of the childhood days of our forbears, and have scant opportunity to make comparisons or note progress. The child of colonial days was emphatically to be seen, not to be heard nor was he even to be much in evidence to the eye. He was of as little importance in domestic, social, or ethical relations as his childish successor is of great importance to-day; it was deemed neither courteous, decorous, nor wise to make him appear of value or note in bis own eyes or in the eyes of his seniors. Hence there was none of that exhaustive study of the motives, thoughts, and acts of a child which is now rife. vii The viii Foreword The accounts of oldtime child life gathered for this book are wholly unconscious and full of honesty and simplicity, not only from the attitude of the child, but from that of hisparents, guardians, and friends. The records have been made from affectionate interest, not from scientific interest; no profound search has been made for motives or significance, but the proof they give of tenderness and affection in the family are beautiful to read and to know. The quotations from manuscript letters, records, diaries, and accounts which are here given could only have been acquired by precisely the method which has been followed, a constant and distinct search for many years, combined with an alert watchfulness for items or even hints relating to the subject, during as many years of extended historical reading. Many pri vate collections and many single-treasured relics have been freely offered for use, and nearly all the sentences and pages selected from these sources now appear in print for the first time. The portraits of children form a group as rare as it is beautiful. They are specially valuable as a study of costume. Nearly all of these also are as true emblems of the generous friend ship of the present owners as they are of the life of the past. The rich stores of our many historical associa tions, of the Essex Institute, the American Antiquarian Society, the Long Island Historical Society, the Deer field Foreword Ix field Memorial Hall, the Lenox Library, have been generously opened, carefully gleaned, and freely used. The expression of gratitude so often tendered to these helpful kinsfolk and friends and to these bountiful societies and libraries can scarcely be emphasized by any public thanks, yet it would seem that for such assistance thanks could never be offered too frequently, nor too publicly. Nor have I, in gathering for this, as for my other books, failed to exercise what Emerson calls the catlike love of garrets, presses, and cornchambers, and of the conveniences of long housekeeping. Many long kept homes have I searched, many an old garret and press has yielded conveniences for this book. Though this is a record of the life of children in the American colonies, I have freely compared the con ditions in this country with similar ones in England at the same date, both for the sake of fuller elucidation, and also to attempt to put on a proper basis the civili zation which the colonists left behind them. Many s