At this small house are maintained four female and two male servants,
yet the house is not half cleaned, and the garden is little else but
weeds; litter and dirt pervade the premises, while these Independents
will play for hours at ball, or loll {51} over a rail to rest
themselves. Behold a true picture-general! How _pleasing_ to the lover
of freedom to contemplate its blessed effects! Leisure, instead of
inducing habits of mental improvement, and cleanliness, leaves them, in
utter negligence of both, only to pass half their time in mere idleness
and dirt: but why do I speak of the lower order while those, who should
set these a better example, pass their days at taverns and other
boarding-houses in idle games of shuffleboard and ninepins; or, seated
for hours motionless under the shed which is universally attached to the
houses, seem to exist solely to inhale the fumes of tobacco. Truly
these people understand not liberty,--civilly, it is idleness and
licentiousness; religiously, a leaving them to their wildest fancies.