Part 3

When Mr. Schuyler returned from England, about the year 1709, his niece Catalina, the subject of this narrative, was about seven years old; he had a daughter and sons, yet this child was early distinguished above the rest for docility, a great desire of knowledge, and an even and pleasing temper; this her uncle early observed. It was at that time very difficult to procure the means of instruction in those inland districts; female education of consequence was conducted on a very limited scale; girls learnt needle-work (in which they were indeed both skilful and ingenious) from their mothers and aunts; they were taught too at that period to read, in Dutch, the Bible and a few Calvinistic tracts of the devotional kind. But in the infancy of the settlement few girls read English; when they did, they were thought accomplished; they generally spoke it, however imperfectly, and few were taught writing. This confined education precluded elegance; yet, though there was no polish, there was no vulgarity. The dregs of the people, who subside to the bottom of the mass, are not only degraded by abject poverty, but so utterly shut out from intercourse with the more enlightened, and so rankling with envy at feeling themselves so, that a sense of their condition gradually debases their minds; and this degradation communicates to their manners, the vulgarity of which we complain. This more particularly applies to the lower class in towns; for mere simplicity, or even a rustic bluntness, I would by no means call vulgarity. At the same time these unembellished females had more comprehension of mind, more variety of ideas, more in short of what may be called original thinking, than could easily be imagined. Their thoughts were not like those of other illiterate women, occupied by the ordinary details of the day, and the gossiping tattle of the neighbourhood. The life of new settlers, in a situation like this, where the very foundations of society were to be laid, was a life of exigencies. Every individual took an interest in the general welfare, and contributed their respective shares of intelligence and sagacity to aid plans that embraced important objects relative to the common good. Every day called forth some new expedient, in which the _comfort_ or _advantage_ of the whole was implicated; for there were no degrees but those assigned to worth and intellect. This singular community seemed to have a common stock, not only of sufferings and enjoyments, but of information and ideas; some pre-eminence, in point of knowledge and abilities, there certainly was, yet those who possessed it seemed scarcely conscious of their superiority; the daily occasions which called forth the exertions of mind, sharpened sagacity and strengthened character; avarice and vanity were there confined to very narrow limits; of money there was little; and dress was, though in some instances valuable, very plain, and not subject to the caprice of fashion. The wolves, the bears, and the enraged or intoxicated savages, that always hung threatening on their boundaries, made them more and more endeared to each other. In this calm infancy of society, the rigour of the law slept, because the fury of turbulent passions had not awakened it. Fashion, that capricious tyrant over adult communities, had not erected her standard; that standard, to which the looks, the language, the very opinions of her subjects must be adjusted. Yet no person appeared uncouth, or ill bred, because there was no accomplished standard of comparison. They viewed no superior with fear or envy; and treated no inferior with contempt or cruelty; servility and insolence were thus equally unknown; perhaps they were less solicitous either to please or to shine than the members of more polished societies; because, in the first place, they had no motive either to dazzle or deceive; and in the next, had they attempted it, they felt there was no assuming a character with success, where their native one was so well known. Their manners, if not elegant and polished, were at least easy and independent; the constant efforts necessary to extend their commercial and agricultural possessions, prevented indolence; and industry was the certain path to plenty. Surrounded on all sides by those whom the least instance of fraud, insolence, or grasping meanness, would have rendered irreconcilable enemies, they were at first obliged to “assume a virtue if they had it not;” and every circumstance that renders virtue habitual, may be accounted a happy one. I may be told that the virtues I describe were chiefly those of situation. I acknowledge it. It is no more to be expected that this equality, simplicity, and moderation, should continue in a more advanced state of society, than that the sublime tranquillity and dewy freshness which add a nameless charm to the face of nature, in the dawn of a summer morning, should continue all day. Before increased wealth and extended territory, these “wassel days” quickly receded; yet it is pleasing to indulge the remembrance of a spot, where peace and felicity, the result of moral excellence, dwelt undisturbed, alas! hardly for a century.

CHAP. V.

State of Religion among the Settlers—Instruction of Children devolved on Females—to whom the Charge of Gardening, &c. was also committed—Sketch of the State of the Society at New-York.

I MUST finish this general outline, by saying something of that religion which gave stability and effect to the virtues of this infant society. Their religion, then, like their original national character, had in it little of fervour or enthusiasm; their manner of performing religious duties was regular and decent, but calm, and to more ardent imaginations might appear mechanical. None ever doubted of the great truths of revelation, yet few seemed to dwell on the result with that lively delight which devotion produces in minds of keener sensibility. If their piety, however, was without enthusiasm, it was also without bigotry; they wished others to think as they did, without showing rancour or contempt towards those who did not. In many individuals, whose lives seemed governed by the principles of religion, the spirit of devotion seemed to be quiescent in the heart, and to break forth in exigencies; yet that monster in nature, an impious woman, was never heard of among them.

Indeed it was on the females that the task of religious instruction generally devolved; and in all cases where the heart is interested, who ever teaches, at the same time learns.

Before I quit this subject, I must observe a singular coincidence; not only the training of children, but of plants, such as needed peculiar care or skill to rear them, was the female province. Every one in town or country had a garden; but all the more hardy plants grew in the field, in rows, amidst the hills, as they were called, of Indian corn. These lofty plants sheltered them from the sun, while the same hoeing served for both; their cabbages, potatoes, and other esculent roots, with variety of gourds, grew to a great size, and were of an excellent quality. Kidney-beans, asparagus, celery, great variety of salads and sweet herbs, cucumbers, &c., were only admitted into the garden, into which no foot of man intruded, after it was dug in spring. Here were no trees, those grew in the orchard in high perfection. Strawberries and many high flavoured wild fruits of the shrub kind abounded so much in the woods, that they did not think of cultivating them in their gardens, which were extremely neat, but small, and not by any means calculated for walking in. I think I yet see what I have so often beheld both in town and country, a respectable mistress of a family going out to her garden, in an April morning, with her great calash, her little painted basket of seeds, and her rake over her shoulder, to her garden labours. These were by no means figurative,

“From morn till noon, from noon till dewy eve.”

A woman, in very easy circumstances, and abundantly gentle in form and manners, would sow, and plant, and rake, incessantly. These fair gardeners too were great florists; their emulation and solicitude in this pleasing employment, did indeed produce “flowers worthy of Paradise.” These, though not set in “curious knots,” were arranged in beds, the varieties of each kind by themselves; this, if not varied and elegant, was at least rich and gay. To the Schuylers this description did not apply; they had gardeners, and their gardens were laid out in the European manner.

Perhaps I should reserve my description of the manner of living in that country for that period, when by the exertions of a few humane and enlightened individuals it assumed a more regular and determinate form. Yet as the same outline was preserved through all the stages of its progression, I know not but that it may be best to sketch it entirely, before I go further; that the few and simple facts which my narrative affords may not be clogged by explanations relative to the customs, or any other peculiarities which can only be understood by a previous acquaintance with the nature of the country, its political relations, and the manners of the people; my recollection all this while has been merely confined to Albany, and its precincts. At New-York there was always a governor, a few troops, and a kind of little court kept; there too was a mixed, and in some degree, polished society. To this the accession of many families of French Huguenots, rather above the middling rank, contributed not a little; those conscientious exiles had more knowledge and piety than any other class of the inhabitants; their religion seemed indeed endeared to them, by what they had suffered for adhering to it. Their number and wealth was such, as enabled them to build not only a street, but a very respectable church in the new city. In this place of worship service continued to be celebrated in the French language within my recollection, though the original congregation was by that time much blended in the mass of general society. It was the custom of the inhabitants of the upper settlement, who had any pretensions to superior culture or polish, among which number Mr. Schuyler stood foremost, to go once in a year to New-York, where all the law-courts were held, and all the important business of the province transacted; here too they sent their children occasionally to reside with their relations, and to learn the more polished manners and language of the capital. The inhabitants of that city, on the other hand, delighted in a summer excursion to Albany. The beautiful, and in some places highly singular banks of the river, rendering a voyage to its source both amusing and interesting, while the primitive manners of the inhabitants diverted the gay and idle, and pleased the thoughtful and speculative.

Let me now be indulged in drawing a picture of the abode of my childhood just as, at this time, it presents itself to my mind.

CHAP. VI.

Description of Albany—Manner of living there—Hermitage, &c.

THE city of Albany was stretched along the banks of the Hudson; one very wide and long street lay parallel to the river, the intermediate space between it and the shore being occupied by gardens. A small, but steep hill rose above the centre of the town, on which stood a fort, intended (but very ill adapted) for the defence of the place, and of the neighbouring country. From the foot of this hill, another street was built, sloping pretty rapidly down till it joined the one before mentioned that ran along the river. This street was still wider than the other; it was only paved on each side, the middle being occupied by public edifices. These consisted of a market-place, or guard-house, a town hall, and the English and Dutch churches. The English church, belonging to the Episcopal persuasion, and in the diocese of the bishop of London, stood at the foot of the hill, at the upper end of the street. The Dutch church was situated at the bottom of the descent where the street terminated; two irregular streets, not so broad, but equally long, ran parallel to those, and a few even ones open between them. The town, in proportion to its population, occupied a great space of ground. This city, in short, was a kind of semi-rural establishment; every house had its garden, well, and a little green behind; before every door a tree was planted, rendered interesting by being coeval with some beloved member of the family; many of their trees were of a prodigious size and extraordinary beauty, but without regularity, every one planting the kind that best pleased him, or which he thought would afford the most agreeable shade to the open portico at his door, which was surrounded by seats, and ascended by a few steps. It was in these that each domestic group was seated in summer evenings to enjoy the balmy twilight, or serenely clear moonlight. Each family had a cow, fed in a common pasture at the end of the town. In the evening they returned all together, of their own accord, with their tinkling bells hung at their necks, along the wide and grassy street, to their wonted sheltering trees, to be milked at their master’s doors. Nothing could be more pleasing to a simple and benevolent mind than to see thus, at one view, all the inhabitants of a town, which contained not one very rich or very poor, very knowing or very ignorant, very rude or very polished individual; to see all these children of nature enjoying in easy indolence, or social intercourse,

“The cool, the fragrant, and the _dusky_ hour,”

clothed in the plainest habits, and with minds as undisguised and artless. These primitive beings were dispersed in porches grouped according to similarity of years and inclinations. At one door young matrons, at another the elders of the people, at a third the youths and maidens, gaily chatting or singing together, while the children played round the trees, or waited near the cows, for the chief ingredient of their frugal supper, which they generally ate sitting on the steps in the open air. This picture, so familiar to my imagination, has led me away from my purpose, which was to describe the rural economy, and modes of living in this patriarchal city. At one end of the town, as I observed before, was a common pasture where all the cattle belonging to the inhabitants grazed together. A never-failing instinct guided each home to her master’s door in the evening, where, being treated with a few vegetables and a little salt, which is indispensably necessary for cattle in this country, they patiently waited the night; and after being milked in the morning, they went off in slow and regular procession to their pasture. At the other end of the town was a fertile plain along the river, three miles in length, and near a mile broad. This was all divided into lots, where every inhabitant raised Indian corn sufficient for the food of two or three slaves, (the greatest number that each family ever possessed,) and for his horses, pigs, and poultry: their flour and other grain they purchased from farmers in the vicinity. Above the town, a long stretch to the westward was occupied first by sandy hills, on which grew bilberries of uncommon size and flavour in prodigious quantities; beyond, rise heights of a poor hungry soil, thinly covered with stunted pines, or dwarf oak. Yet in this comparatively barren tract, there were several wild and picturesque spots, where small brooks, running in deep and rich bottoms, nourished on their banks every vegetable beauty; there, some of the most industrious early settlers had cleared the luxuriant wood from these charming little glens, and built neat cottages for their slaves, surrounded with little gardens and orchards, sheltered from every blast, wildly picturesque, and richly productive. Those small sequestered vales had an attraction that I know not how to describe, and which probably resulted from the air of deep repose that reigned there, and the strong contrast which they exhibited to the surrounding sterility. One of these was in my time inhabited by a hermit. He was a Frenchman, and did not seem to inspire much veneration among the Albanians. They imagined, or had heard, that he retired to that solitude in remorse for some fatal duel in which he had been engaged: and considered him as an idolator because he had an image of the Virgin in this hut. I think he retired to Canada at last; but I remember being ready to worship him for the sanctity with which my imagination invested him, and being cruelly disappointed because I was not permitted to visit him. These cottages were in summer occupied by some of the negroes who cultivated the grounds about them, and served as a place of joyful liberty to the children of the family on holidays, and a nursery for the young negroes, whom it was the custom to rear very tenderly, and instruct very carefully.

CHAP. VII.

Gentle treatment of slaves among the Albanians—Consequent attachment of domestics—Reflections on servitude.

In the society I am describing, even the dark aspect of slavery was softened into a smile. And I must, in justice to the best possible masters, say, that a great deal of that tranquillity and comfort, to call them by no higher names, which distinguish this society from all others, was owing to the relation between master and servant being better understood here than in any other place. Let me not be detested as an advocate for slavery, when I say that I think I have never seen people so happy in servitude as the domestics of the Albanians. One reason was, (for I do not now speak of the virtues of their masters,) that each family had few of them, and that there were no field negroes. They would remind one of Abraham’s servants, who were all born in the house, which was exactly their case. They were baptised too, and shared the same religious instruction with the children of the family; and, for the first years, there was little or no difference with regard to food or clothing between their children and those of their masters.

When a negro-woman’s child attained the age of three years, the first New-Year’s day after, it was solemnly presented to a son or daughter, or other young relative of the family, who was of the same sex with the child so presented. The child to whom the young negro was given, immediately presented it with some piece of money and a pair of shoes; and from that day the strongest attachment subsisted between the domestic and the destined owner. I have no where met with instances of friendship more tender and generous, than that which here subsisted between the slaves and their masters and mistresses. Extraordinary proofs of them have been often given in the course of hunting or Indian trading, when a young man and his slave have gone to the trackless woods together, in the cases of fits of the ague, loss of a canoe, and other casualties happening near hostile Indians. The slave has been known, at the imminent risk of his life, to carry his disabled master through trackless woods with labour and fidelity scarce credible; and the master has been equally tender on similar occasions of the humble friend who stuck closer than a brother; who was baptised with the same baptism, nurtured under the same roof, and often rocked in the same cradle with himself. These gifts of domestics to the younger members of the family were not irrevocable; yet they were very rarely withdrawn. If the kitchen family did not increase in proportion to that of the master, young children were purchased from some family where they abounded, to furnish those attached servants to the rising progeny. They were never sold without consulting their mother, who, if expert and sagacious, had a great deal to say in the family, and would not allow her child to go into any family with whose domestics she was not acquainted. These negro-women piqued themselves on teaching their children to be excellent servants, well knowing servitude to be their lot for life, and that it could only be sweetened by making themselves particularly useful, and excelling in their department. If they did their work well, it is astonishing, when I recollect it, what liberty of speech was allowed to those active and prudent mothers. They would chide, reprove, and expostulate in a manner that we would not endure from our hired servants; and sometimes exert fully as much authority over the children of the family as the parents, conscious that they were entirely in their power. They did not crush freedom of speech and opinion in those by whom they knew they were beloved, and who watched with incessant care over their interest and comfort. Affectionate and faithful as these home-bred servants were in general, there were some instances (but very few) of those who, through levity of mind, or a love of liquor or finery, betrayed their trust, or habitually neglected their duty. In these cases, after every means had been used to reform them, no severe punishments were inflicted at home. But the terrible sentence, which they dreaded worse than death, was passed—they were sold to Jamaica. The necessity of doing this was bewailed by the whole family as a most dreadful calamity, and the culprit was carefully watched on his way to New-York, lest he should evade the sentence by self-destruction.

One must have lived among those placid and humane people to be sensible that servitude—hopeless, endless servitude—could exist with so little servility and fear on the one side, and so little harshness or even sternness of authority in the other. In Europe, the footing on which service is placed in consequence of the corruptions of society, hardens the heart, destroys confidence, and embitters life. The deceit and venality of servants not absolutely dishonest, puts it out of one’s power to love or trust them. And if in hopes of having people attached to us, who will neither betray our confidence, nor corrupt our children, we are at pains to rear them from childhood, and give them a religious and moral education; after all our labour, others of their own class seduce them away to those who can afford to pay higher for their services. This is not the case in a few remote districts, where surrounding mountains seeming to exclude the contagion of the world, some traces of fidelity and affection among domestics still remain. But it must be remarked that, in those very districts, it is usual to treat inferiors with courtesy and kindness, and to consider those domestics who marry out of the family as holding a kind of relation to it, and still claiming protection. In short, the corruption of that class of people is, doubtless, to be attributed to the example of their superiors. But how severely are those superiors punished? Why this general indifference about home; why are the household gods, why is the sacred hearth so wantonly abandoned? Alas! the charm of home is destroyed, since our children, educated in distant seminaries, are strangers in the paternal mansion; and our servants, like mere machines, move on their mercenary track, without feeling or exciting one kind or generous sentiment. Home, thus despoiled of all its charms, is no longer the scene of any enjoyments but such as wealth can purchase. At the same time we feel there, a nameless, cold privation, and conscious that money can coin the same enjoyments with more variety elsewhere. We substitute these futile and evanescent pleasures for that perennial spring of calm satisfaction, “without o’erflowing full,” which is fed by the exercise of the kindly affections, and soon indeed must those stagnate where there are not proper objects to excite them. I have been forced into this painful digression by unavoidable comparisons. To return:—