Back Aa

Child Life in Colonial Days

<h2>CHAPTER IX</h2> <h3>CHILDISH PRECOCITY</h3> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Where babies, much to their surprise, Were born astonishingly wise; With every Science on their lips, And Latin at their finger-tips. </div> <div class="stanza"> —<cite>Bab Ballads. W. S. Gilbert, 1877.</cite> </div> </div> The seventeenth century was in Europe a period of eager development and hasty harvesting; English boys were made serious-minded by the conditions they saw around them, as well as by a forcing-house system of education, begun at very early years. This early ageing is reflected in the writings of the times. The <cite>Religio Medici</cite>, apparently the composition of a man of the large experience and serene contemplation of extreme age, was written by Sir Thomas Browne when he was but thirty. <div class="figcenter bord" style="width: 441px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/i060.jpg" width-obs="441" height-obs="600" alt="Torrey" /> <div class="caption">Samuel Torrey, Twelve Years Old, 1770 </div> </div> There are many records of the precocity of children, preserved for us many times, alas! through the sad recounting of early deaths. One of the[177] most pathetic records of a father's blasted hopes may be found in the pages of the diary of John Evelyn. In December, 1658, died his little son, Richard, five years and three days old. He was a prodigy of wit and learning, as beautiful as an angel, and of rare mental endowment. His father's account of his acquirements runs thus:— <blockquote> "He had learned all his catechism at two years and a half old; he could perfectly read any of the English, Latin, French, or Gothic letters, pronouncing the first three languages exactly. He had, before the fifth year, or in that year, not only skill to read most written hands, but to decline all the nouns, conjugate the verbs regular, and most of the irregular; learned out Puerelis, got by heart almost the entire vocabulary of Latin and French primitives and words, could make congruous syntax, turn English into Latin, and vice versa, construe and prove what he read, and did the government and use of relatives, verbs, substantives, ellipses and many figures and tropes, and made a considerable progress in Comenius' Janua; begun himself to write legibly and had a strong passion for Greek. The number of verses he could recite was prodigious, and what he remembered of the parts of plays which he would also act; and, when seeing a Plautus in one's hand, he asked what book it was, and being told it was comedy and too difficult for him, he wept for sorrow. Strange was his apt and ingenious application of fables and morals, for he had read Æsop; he had a wonderful disposition to mathematics,[178] having by heart divers propositions of Euclid that were read to him in play, and he would make lines and demonstrate them. He had learned by heart divers sentences in Latin and Greek which on occasion he would produce even to wonder. He was all life, all prettiness, far from morose, sullen, or childish in any thing he said or did." </blockquote> Of course this is not given as an ordinary education of an every-day child. It is an extraordinary record of a very unusual child, but it shows what an intelligent child could be permitted to do. Evelyn was a man of great good sense; not the sort of man who would force a child; indeed he averred that he abhorred precocity. But in truth it was a time in England's history when such a child could easily be overstimulated, when public events, the course of history, was so exciting that every child of keen wit must have felt the effects. The crowding of young minds did not end with the seventeenth century. A striking example of the desire to press education is found in the letters of Lord Chesterfield to his son, beginning in 1738, when the boy was not six years old. The language and subjects would be deemed to-day suited only to mature minds. In 1741 the father wrote:— <blockquote> "This is the last letter I shall write to you as a little boy, for to-morrow you will attain your ninth year; so that[179] for the future, I shall treat you as a youth. You must now commence a different course of life, a different course of studies. No more levity. Childish toys and playthings must be thrown aside, and your mind directed to serious objects. What was not unbecoming to a child would be disgraceful to a youth" etc. </blockquote> Letter after letter continued in this tone. For years was the process carried on. The result was a striking proof of the futility of such methods. The son died when but little past his youth, a failure in everything the father had most fondly desired and striven for. The crowded brain ever stumbled and hesitated when put to any important test. It was inevitable that New England parents, with their fairly passionate intensity of zeal for the education of their children, should in many cases overstimulate and force the infant minds in their charge. It seems somewhat anomalous with the almost universal distrust and hindrance of female education that one of the most precocious flowers of Puritanism should have been a girl, the "pious and ingenious Mrs. Jane Turell," who was born in Boston in 1708. Before her second year was finished she could speak distinctly, knew her letters, and "could relate many stories out of the Scriptures to the satisfaction and pleasure of the most judicious." Governor Dudley and other "wise and polite"[180] New England gentlemen were among those entitled "judicious," who placed her on a table to show off her acquirements. When she was three years old she could recite the greater part of the <cite>Assembly's Catechism</cite>, many of the psalms, many lines of poetry, and read distinctly; at the age of four she "asked many astonishing questions about divine mysteries." As her father was President of Harvard College, it may be inferred she had an extended reading course; but in a catalogue of Harvard College library printed a year or two later there is not a title in it of any of the works of Addison, or any of the poems of Pope, nothing of Dryden, Steele, Young, or Prior. In 1722, when Jane Turell was twenty years old, the works of Shakespeare were first advertised for sale in Boston. <div class="figcenter bord" style="width: 550px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/i061.jpg" width-obs="550" height-obs="428" alt="Copley" /> <div class="caption">The Copley Family </div> </div> In many families of extreme Puritanical thought, the children developed at an early age a comprehension of religious matters which would seem abnormal to-day, but was natural then. A striking instance of this youthful development (as he was of highly sensitive thought of every description) was Jonathan Edwards. A letter of his written when he was twelve years old is certainly precocious in its depth, though there is a certain hint of humor in it. Some one had stated the belief that the soul was material[181] and remained in the body until after the resurrection. Young Edwards wrote:— <blockquote> "I am informed yt you have advanced a notion yt the soul is material and keeps wth ye body till ye resurrection. As I am a profest lover of novelty you must alow me to be much entertained by this discovery. 1st. I wd know whether this material soul keeps wth in ye Coffin, and if so whether it might not be convenient to build a repository for it in order wch I wd know wt shape it is of whether round, triangular or foresquare or whether it is a number of long fine strings reaching from ye head to ye foot, and whether it does not live a very discontented life. I am afraid when ye Coffin gives way ye Earth will fall in and crush it, but if it should chuse to live above Ground and hover above ye Grave how big it is, whether it covers all ye body, or is assined to ye Head or Breast, wt it does when another Body is laid upon it. Souls are not so big but yt 10 or a dozen of ym may be about one body whether yy will not quarrill for ye highest place." </blockquote> His paper on spiders, written when he was but twelve, has become famous as a bit of childish composition. It shows great habits of observance, care in note-taking, and logical reasoning; and bears no evidence of youth either in matter or manner. A typical example of the spirit of the times in regard to juvenile education is found in the letters of Mrs. Pinckney. She writes to a friend:— [182] <blockquote> "Shall I give you the trouble my dear Madam to buy my son a new toy (a description of which I inclose) to teach him according to Mr. Locke's method (which I have carefully studied) to play himself into learning. Mr. Pinckney (his father) himself has been contriving a sett of toys to teach him his letters by the time he can speak. You perceive we begin betimes for he is not yet four months old." </blockquote> This toy may have been what is known to-day as a set of alphabet blocks, a commonplace toy. Locke speaks of a game of dice with letters with which children could play a game like "royal-oak," and through which they would learn to spell. He was not the inventor of these "letter-dice," as is generally asserted. It was a stratagem of Sir Hugh Plat, fully explained and illustrated in his <cite>Jewel House of Art and Nature</cite>, printed in London in 1653, a portion of a page of which is shown here. The toy seems to have been a success, for the following year Mrs. Pinckney writes to her sister:— <blockquote> "Your little nephew not yet two and twenty months old prattles very intelligibly: he gives his duty to you and thanks for the toys, and desires me to tell his Aunt Polly that if she don't take a care and a great deal of pains in her learning, he will soon be the best scholar, for he can tell his letters in any book without hesitation, and begins to spell before he is two years old." </blockquote> [183] This precocious infant, afterward General Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of Revolutionary fame, declared in his later life that this early teaching was sad stuff, and that the haste to make him a very clever fellow nearly made him a very stupid one. <div class="figcenter bord" style="width: 200px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/i062.jpg" width-obs="200" height-obs="145" alt="ABC" /> <div class="caption"> A ready way for children to learn their A.B.C. Cauſe 4 large dice of bone or wood to be made, and upon every ſquare, one of the ſmal letters of the croſs row to be graven, but in ſome bigger ſhape, and the child uſing to play much with them, and being alwayes told what letter chanceth, will ſoon gain his Alphabet, as it were by the way of ſport or paſtime. I have heard of a pair of cards, whereon moſt of the principall Grammer rules have been printed, and the School-Maſter hath found good ſport thereat with his ſchollers. Facsimile from <cite>Jewel House of Art and Nature</cite> </div> </div> Little Martha Laurens, born in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1759, could, in her third year, "read any book"; and like many another child since her day learned to read holding the book upside down.[184] Joseph T. Buckingham declared that when he was four years old he knew by heart nearly all the reading lessons in the primer and much of the <cite>Westminster Catechism</cite>. Boys entered the Boston Latin School when as young as but six years and a half old. They began to study Latin frequently when much younger. Zealous and injudicious parents sometimes taught infants but three years old to read Latin words as soon as they could English ones. It redounds to the credit of the scholarship of one of my kinsmen, rather than to his good sense or good temper (albeit he was a minister of the Gospel) that each morning while he shaved, his little son, five years of age, stood by his dressing-table, on a footstool, and read Latin to his father, who had also a copy of the same book open before him, that he might note and correct the child's errors. And the child when grown to old age told his children and grandchildren that his father, angered at what he deemed slowness of progress, frequent errors of pronunciation, and poor attempts at translation, would throw the book at the child, and once felled him from the footstool to the floor. <div class="figcenter bord" style="width: 450px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/i063.jpg" width-obs="450" height-obs="574" alt="Flagg" /> <div class="caption">Polly Flagg, One Year Old, 1751 </div> </div> It is told of Timothy Dwight, President of Yale College, that he learned the alphabet at a single lesson, and could read the Bible before he was four[185] years old, and taught it to his comrades. At the age of six he was sent to the grammar school and importuned his father to let him study Latin. Being denied he studied through the Latin grammar twice without a teacher, borrowing a book of an older boy. He would have been prepared for college when but eight years old, had not the grammar school luckily discontinued and left him without a teacher. The curriculum at Harvard in olden times bore little resemblance to that of to-day. Sciences were unknown, and the requirements in mathematics were meagre. Still a boy needed even then to be clever to know enough Greek and Latin to enter at eleven. Paul Dudley did so in 1686. His father wrote to the president a quaint letter of introduction:— <blockquote> "I have humbly to offer you a little, sober, and well-disposed son, who, tho' very young, if he may have the favour of admittance, I hope his learning may be tollerable: and for him I will promise that by your care and my care, his own Industry, and the blessing of God, this mother the University shall not be ashamed to allow him the place of a son—Appoint a time when he may be examined." </blockquote> There were still younger college students. In 1799 there was graduated from Rhode Island College[186] (now Brown University) a boy named John Pitman, who was barely fourteen. There is no evidence that the early marriages, that is, marriages of children and very young lads and girls, which were far from rare in England during the first years of our colonial life, ever were permitted in the new world. Nor were they as common at that date in England as during the previous century, for there had been severe legislation against them, especially against the youthful marriages of poor folk. Many have known of the juvenile weddings of English princes and princesses and marriages by proxy for reasons of state; but few know of these unions being general among English people. An interesting and authoritative book on this subject was published in 1897 by the Early English Text Society. Dr. Furnivall made a careful study of the old court records of the town of Chester, England, and published this account of trials and law cases concerning child-marriages, divorces, ratifications, troth-plights, affiliations, clandestine marriages, and other kindred matters. It is, as the editor says, a "most light-giving" volume. It ranges over all classes, from people of wealth, the manor owners and squires, to ale-house keepers, farmers, cobblers, maids, and men. It tells of the[187] marriages of little children in their nurses' arms, some but two or three years old, so young that their baby tongues could not speak the words of matrimony. Various arrangements, chiefly relating to lands and maintenance, led to these marriages, also a desire to evade the Crown's guardianship of orphans. In one case, a "bigge damsell" of twelve "intysed with two apples" a younger boy to marry her. "The woman tempted me and I did eat." One little bridegroom of three was held up in the arms of an English clergyman, who coaxed him to repeat the words of the service. Before it was finished the child said he would learn no more of his lesson that day. The parson answered, "You must speak a little more and then go play yon." The child-marriage of the Earl and Countess of Essex in 1606, resulting in the poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury, and the Countess' marriage to the Earl of Somerset, is a well-known historical example of the unhappy result of such marriages. The Earl of Anglesey's grandson was married in 1673, when he was eight years old. Mary Hewitt of Danton Basset was wedded in 1669, when three years old. In 1672 John Evelyn was present "at the marriage of Lord Arlington's only daughter, a sweet child if there ever was any, aged five, to the Duke of Grafton." [188] I have given the dates of these later child-marriages to show that they were not unusual in England long after America was settled. As late as 1729 a little English girl of some wealth and but nine years old was taken from her boarding school by her guardian and married to his son. Very differently did the upright New Englander regard the duties of guardianship. A little girl named Rebecca Cooper was left an orphan in early colonial days at Salem, Massachusetts. She was "a verie good match," an "inheritrice," and the sharp eyes of Emanuel Downing and his wife were upon her to "make a motion of marriage" for their son. Both wrote to Governor Winthrop, Madam Downing's brother, to gain his intercession in the matter, though the maid had not been spoken to. Madam wrote:— <blockquote> "The disposition of the mayde and her education with Mrs. Endicott are hopefull, her person tollerable, the estate very convenient, and that is the state of the business." </blockquote> Governor Endicott was the guardian and his answering letter to Winthrop has a manly and honorable ring which might well have sounded in the ears of all English guardians. <div class="figcenter bord" style="width: 450px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/i064.jpg" width-obs="450" height-obs="577" alt="James" /> <div class="caption">James Flagg, Five Years Old, 1744 </div> </div> <blockquote> "I am told you are sollicited in a busniss concerninge the girle which was putt to my warde and trust. I have not[189] been made acquainted with it by you know whome, which, if there had been any such intendment, I think had been but reason. But to let that passe, I pray you advise not to stirre in it, for it will not be affected for reasons I shall show you.... "The Lord knows I have alwais resolved (and so hath my wife ever since the girl came to vs) to yielde her vp to be disposed by yourself to any of yours if ever the Lord should make her fitt and worthie. "Now for the other for whom you writt. I confesse I cannot freelie yeald thereunto for the present, for these grounds. ffirst: The girle desires not to mary as yet. 2ndlee: Shee confesseth (which is the truth) hereselfe to be altogether yett vnfitt for such a condition, shee beinge a verie girl and but 15 yeares of age. 3rdlie: Where the man was moved to her shee said shee could not like him. 4thlie: You know it would be of ill reporte that a girl because shee hath some estate should bee disposed of soe young, espetialie not having any parents to choose for her. ffifthlie: I have some good hopes of the child's coming on to the best thinges. And on the other side I fear—I will say no more. Other things I shall tell you when we meet. If this will not satisfy some, let the Court take her from mee and place with any other to dispose of her. I shall be content. Which I heare was plotted to accomplish this end; but I will further enquire about it, and you shall know if it be true, ffor I know there are many passages about this busniss which when you heare of you will not like." </blockquote> [190] It is pleasant to record that all this match-making and machination came to naught. It would not have been strange if Governor Winthrop had deemed this girl old enough to be married. He had been but seventeen years old himself when he was married, but he was, so he writes, "a man in stature and understanding." He evidently was of the opinion that a child of fourteen or fifteen was of mature years. When his son John was but fourteen the governor made a will making the boy the executor of it. These child-marriages were not abolished in America because maturity or majority was established at a greater age; for up to the Revolution boys reached man's estate at sixteen years of age, became tax-payers, and served in the militia. Early unions were controlled by restrictive laws, such as the one enacted in Massachusetts in 1646, that no female orphan during her minority should be given in marriage by any one except with the approbation of the majority of the selectmen of the town in which she resided. Another privilege of the girl orphan was that at fourteen she could choose her own guardian. Thus were children protected in the new world, and their rights conserved. <hr class="chap" /> [191] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

1 of 2

2 of 2

Update Required To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.