it was first found out by the _Indians_ many Ages agoe, and transferr’d
into Christendom by that great Discoverer of _America Columbus_. It’s
generally made by all the Inhabitants of this Province, and between the
months of _March_ and _April_ they sow the seed (which is much smaller
then Mustard-seed) in small beds and patches digg’d up and made so by
art, and about _May_ the Plants commonly appear green in those beds:
In _June_ they are transplanted from their beds, and set in little
hillocks in distant rowes, dug up for the same purpose; some twice or
thrice they are weeded, and succoured from their illegitimate Leaves
that would be peeping out from the body of the Stalk. They top the
several Plants as they find occasion in their predominating rankness:
About the middle of _September_ they cut the Tobacco down, and carry
it into houses, (made for that purpose) to bring it to its purity: And
after it has attained, by a convenient attendance upon time, to its
perfection, it is then tyed up in bundles, and packt into Hogs-heads,
and then laid by for the Trade.
Between _November_ and _January_ there arrives in this Province
Shipping to the number of twenty sail and upwards (see note No. 43),
all Merchant-men loaden with Commodities to Trafique and dispose of,
{68} trucking with the Planter for Silks, Hollands, Serges, and
Broad-clothes, with other necessary Goods, priz’d at such and such
rates as shall be judg’d on is fair and legal, for Tobacco at so much
the pound, and advantage on both sides considered; the Planter for his
work, and the Merchant for adventuring himself and his Commodity into
so far a Country: Thus is the Trade on both sides drove on with a fair
and honest _Decorum_.
The Inhabitants of this Province are seldom or never put to the
affrightment of being robb’d of their money, nor to dirty their Fingers
by telling of vast sums: They have more bags to carry Corn, then Coyn;
and though they want, but why should I call that a want which is only a
necessary miss? the very effects of the dirt of this Province affords
as great a profit to the general Inhabitant, as the Gold of _Peru_ doth
to the straight-breecht Commonalty of the _Spaniard_.
Our Shops and Exchanges of _Mary-Land_, are the Merchants Store-houses,
where with few words and protestations Goods are bought and delivered;
not like those Shop-keepers Boys in _London_, that continually cry,
_What do ye lack Sir? What d’ye buy?_ yelping with so wide a mouth, as
if some Apothecary had hired their mouths to stand open to catch Gnats
and Vagabond Flyes in.
Tobacco is the currant Coyn of _Mary-Land_, and will sooner purchase
Commodities from the Merchant, {69} then money. I must confess the
_New-England_ men that trade into this Province, had rather have fat
Pork for their Goods, than Tobacco or Furrs (see note No. 44), which I
conceive is, because their bodies being fast bound up with the cords
of restringent Zeal, they are fain to make use of the lineaments of
this _Non-Canaanite_ creature physically to loosen them; for a bit of a
pound upon a two-peny Rye loaf, according to the original Receipt, will
bring the costiv’st red-ear’d Zealot in some three hours time to a fine
stool, if methodically observed.
_Medera_-Wines, Sugars, Salt, Wickar-Chairs, and Tin Candlesticks, is
the most of the Commodities they bring in: They arrive in _Mary-Land_
about _September_, being most of them Ketches and Barkes, and such
small Vessels, and those dispersing themselves into several small
Creeks of this Province, to sell and dispose of their Commodities,
where they know the Market is most fit for their small Adventures.
_Barbadoes_ (see note No. 45), together with the several adjacent
Islands, has much Provision yearly from this Province: And though
these Sun-burnt _Phaetons_ think to outvye _Mary-Land_ in their Silks
and Puffs, daily speaking against her whom their necessities makes
them beholding to, and like so many _Don Diegos_ that becackt _Pauls_,
cock their Felts and look big upon’t; yet if a man could go down into
their infernals, and see how it fares with them there, I believe he
would hardly find any other Spirit to {70} buoy them up, then the
ill-visaged Ghost of want, that continually wanders from gut to gut to
feed upon the undigested rynes of Potatoes.
_Trafique is Earth’s great Atlas, that supports_
_The pay of Armies, and the height of Courts,_
_And makes Mechanicks live, that else would die_
_Meer starving Martyrs to their penury:_
_None but the Merchant of this thing can boast,_
_He, like the Bee, comes loaden from each Coast,_
_And to all Kingdoms, as within a Hive,_
_Stows up those Riches that doth make them thrive:_
_Be thrifty_, Mary-Land, _keep what thou hast in store,_
_And each years Trafique to thy self get more._
{71}
A Relation of the Customs, Manners, Absurdities, and Religion of the
SUSQUEHANOCK (see note No. 46) INDIANS in and near MARY-LAND.
As the diversities of Languages (since Babels confusion) has made the
distinction between people and people, in this Christendompart of the
world; so are they distinguished Nation from Nation, by the diversities
and confusion of their Speech and Languages (see note No. 47) here
in _America_: And as every Nation differs in their Laws, Manners and
Customs, in _Europe_, _Asia_ and _Africa_, so do they the very same
here; That it would be a most intricate and laborious trouble, to
run (with a description) through the several Nations of _Indians_
here in _America_, considering the innumerableness and diversities
of them that dwell on this vast and unmeasured Continent: But rather
then I’le be altogether silent, I shall do like the Painter in the
Comedy, who being to limne out the Pourtraiture of the Furies, as they
severally appeared, set himself behind a Pillar, and between fright and
amazement, drew them by guess. Those _Indians_ that I have convers’d
withall here in this Province of _Mary-Land_, and have had any occular
experimental view of either of their Customs, Manners, Religions, and
Absurdities, are called by the {72} name of _Susquehanocks_, being a
people lookt upon by the Christian Inhabitants, as the most Noble and
Heroick Nation of _Indians_ that dwell upon the confines of _America_;
also are so allowed and lookt upon by the rest of the _Indians_, by
a submissive and tributary acknowledgement; being a people cast into
the mould of a most large and Warlike deportment, the men being for
the most part seven foot high in latitude, and in magnitude and bulk
suitable to so high a pitch; their voyce large and hollow, as ascending
out of a Cave, their gate and behavior strait, stately and majestick,
treading on the Earth with as much pride, contempt, and disdain to so
sordid a Center, as can be imagined from a creature derived from the
same mould and Earth.
Their bodies are cloth’d with no other Armour to defend them from the
nipping frosts of a benumbing Winter, or the penetrating and scorching
influence of the Sun in a hot Summer, then what Nature gave them when
they parted with the dark receptacle of their mothers womb. They go
Men, Women and Children, all naked, only where shame leads them by a
natural instinct to be reservedly modest, there they become cover’d.
The formality of _Jezabels_ artificial Glory is much courted and
followed by these _Indians_, only in matter of colours (I conceive)
they differ.
The _Indians_ paint upon their faces one stroke of red, another of
green, another of white, and another of black, so that when they have
accomplished the {73} Equipage of their Countenance in this trim, they
are the only Hieroglyphicks and Representatives of the Furies. Their
skins are naturally white, but altered from their originals by the
several dyings of Roots and Barks, that they prepare and make useful
to metamorphize their hydes into a dark Cinamon brown. The hair of
their head is black, long and harsh, but where Nature hath appointed
the situation of it any where else, they divert it (by an antient
custom) from its growth, by pulling it up hair by hair by the root in
its primitive appearance. Several of them wear divers impressions on
their breasts and armes, as the picture of the Devil, Bears, Tigers,
and Panthers, which are imprinted on their several lineaments with much
difficulty and pain, with an irrevocable determination of its abiding
there: And this they count a badge of Heroick Valour, and the only
Ornament due to their _Heroes_. (See note No. 48).
These _Susquehanock Indians_ are for the most part great Warriours, and
seldom sleep one Summer in the quiet armes of a peaceable Rest, but
keep (by their present Power, as well as by their former Conquest) the
several Nations of _Indians_ round about them, in a forceable obedience
and subjection.
Their Government is wrapt up in so various and intricate a Laborynth,
that the speculativ’st Artist in the whole World, with his artificial
and natural Opticks, cannot see into the rule or sway of these
_Indians_, to distinguish what name of Government to {74} call them
by; though _Purchas_ (see note No. 49) in his _Peregrination_ between
_London_ and _Essex_, (which he calls the whole World) will undertake
(forsooth) to make a Monarchy of them, but if he had said Anarchy, his
word would have pass’d with a better belief. All that ever I could
observe in them as to this matter is, that he that is most cruelly
Valorous, is accounted the most Noble: Here is very seldom any creeping
from a Country Farm, into a Courtly Gallantry, by a sum of money; nor
feeing the Heralds to put Daggers and Pistols into their Armes, to make
the ignorant believe that they are lineally descended from the house of
the Wars and Conquests; he that fights best carries it here.
When they determine to go upon some Design that will and doth require a
Consideration, some six of them get into a corner, and sit in Juncto;
and if thought fit, their business is made popular, and immediately
put into action; if not, they make a full stop to it, and are silently
reserv’d.
The Warlike Equipage they put themselves in when they prepare for
_Belona’s_ March, is with their faces, armes, and breasts confusedly
painted, their hair greased with Bears oyl, and stuck thick with
Swans Feathers, with a wreath or Diadem of black and white Beads upon
their heads, a small Hatchet, instead of a Cymetre, stuck in their
girts behind them, and either with Guns, or Bows and Arrows. In this
posture and dress they march out from their Fort, or {75} dwelling,
to the number of Forty in a Troop, singing (or rather howling out) the
Decades or Warlike exploits of their Ancestors, ranging the wide Woods
untill their fury has met with an Enemy worthy of their Revenge. What
Prisoners fall into their hands by the destiny of War, they treat them
very civilly while they remain with them abroad, but when they once
return homewards, they then begin to dress them in the habit for death,
putting on their heads and armes wreaths of Beads, greazing their hair
with fat, some going before, and the rest behind, at equal distance
from their Prisoners, bellowing in a strange and confused manner, which
is a true presage and forerunner of destruction to their then conquered
Enemy. (See note No. 50).
In this manner of march they continue till they have brought them to
their Berken City (see note No. 51), where they deliver them up to
those that in cruelty will execute them, without either the legal
Judgement of a Council of War, or the benefit of their Clergy at the
Common Law. The common and usual deaths they put their Prisoners to,
is to bind them to stakes, making a fire some distance from them; then
one or other of them, whose Genius delights in the art of Paganish
dissection, with a sharp knife or flint cuts the Cutis or outermost
skin of the brow so deep, untill their nails, or rather Talons, can
fasten themselves firm and secure in, then (with a most rigid jerk)
disrobeth the head of skin and hair at one pull, leaving {76} the
skull almost as bare as those Monumental Skelitons at Chyrurgions-Hall;
but for fear they should get cold by leaving so warm and customary
a Cap off, they immediately apply to the skull a Cataplasm of hot
Embers to keep their Pericanium warm. While they are thus acting this
cruelty on their heads, several others are preparing pieces of Iron,
and barrels of old Guns, which they make red hot, to sear each part and
lineament of their bodies, which they perform and act in a most cruel
and barbarous manner: And while they are thus in the midst of their
torments and execrable usage, some tearing their skin and hair of their
head off by violence, others searing their bodies with hot irons, some
are cutting their flesh off, and eating it before their eyes raw while
they are alive; yet all this and much more never makes them lower the
Top-gallant sail of their Heroick courage, to beg with a submissive
Repentance any indulgent favour from their persecuting Enemies; but
with an undaunted contempt to their cruelty, eye it with so slight and
mean a respect, as if it were below them to value what they did, they
courageously (while breath doth libertize them) sing the summary of
their Warlike Atchievements.
Now after this cruelty has brought their tormented lives to a period,
they immediately fall to butchering of them into parts, distributing
the several pieces amongst the Sons of War, to intomb the ruines
of their deceased Conquest in no other Sepulchre then {77} their
unsanctified maws; which they with more appetite and desire do eat
and digest, then if the best of foods should court their stomachs to
participate of the most restorative Banquet. Yet though they now and
then feed upon the Carkesses of their Enemies, this is not a common
dyet, but only a particular dish for the better sort (see note No. 52);
for there is not a Beast that runs in the Woods of _America_, but if
they can by any means come at him, without any scruple of Conscience
they’le fall too (Without saying Grace) with a devouring greediness.
As for their Religion, together with their Rites and Ceremonies, they
are so absurd and ridiculous, that its almost a sin to name them. They
own no other Deity than the Devil, (solid or profound) but with a kind
of a wilde imaginary conjecture, they suppose from their groundless
conceits, that the World had a Maker, but where he is that made it,
or whether he be living to this day, they know not. The Devil, as I
said before, is all the God they own or worship; and that more out of
a slavish fear then any real Reverence to his Infernal or Diabolical
greatness, he forcing them to their Obedience by his rough and rigid
dealing with them, often appearing visibly among them to their terrour,
bastinadoing them (with cruel menaces) even unto death, and burning
their Fields of Corn and houses, that the relation thereof makes them
tremble themselves when they tell it. {78}
Once in four years they Sacrifice a Childe to him (see note No. 53),
in an acknowledgement of their firm obedience to all his Devillish
powers, and Hellish commands. The Priests to whom they apply themselves
in matters of importance and greatest distress, are like those that
attended upon the Oracle at _Delphos_, who by their Magic-spells could
command a _pro_ or _con_ from the Devil when they pleas’d. These
_Indians_ oft-times raise great Tempests when they have any weighty
matter or design in hand, and by blustering storms inquire of their
Infernal God (the Devil) _How matters shall go with them either in
publick or private._ (See note No. 54).
When any among them depart this life, they give him no other
intombment, then to set him upright upon his breech in a hole dug in
the Earth some five foot long, and three foot deep, covered over with
the Bark of Trees Arch-wise, with his face Du-West, only leaving a
hole half a foot square open. They dress him in the same Equipage and
Gallantry that he used to be trim’d in when he was alive, and so bury
him (if a Soldier) with his Bows, Arrows, and Target, together with all
the rest of his implements and weapons of War, with a Kettle of Broth,
and Corn standing before him, lest he should meet with bad quarters
in his way. (See note No. 55). His Kinred and Relations follow him to
the Grave, sheath’d in Bear skins for close mourning, with the tayl
droyling on the ground, in imitation of our _English_ Solemners, {79}
that think there’s nothing like a tayl a Degree in length, to follow
the dead Corpse to the Grave with. Here if that snuffling Prolocutor,
that waits upon the dead Monuments of the Tombs at _Westminster_, with
his white Rod were there, he might walk from Tomb to Tomb with his,
_Here lies the Duke of_ Ferrara _and his Dutchess_, and never find any
decaying vacation, unless it were in the moldering Consumption of his
own Lungs. They bury all within the wall or Pallisado’d impalement of
their City, or _Connadago_ (see note No. 56) as they call it. Their
houses are low and long, built with the Bark of Trees Arch-wise,
standing thick and confusedly together. They are situated a hundred and
odd miles distant from the Christian Plantations of _Mary-Land_, at the
head of a River that runs into the Bay of _Chæsapike_, called by their
own name _The Susquehanock River_, where they remain and inhabit most
part of the Summer time, and seldom remove far from it, unless it be to
subdue any Forreign Rebellion.
About _November_ the best Hunters draw off to several remote places of
the Woods, where they know the Deer, Bear, and Elke useth; there they
build them several Cottages, which they call their Winter-quarter,
where they remain for the space of three months, untill they have
killed up a sufficiency of Provisions to supply their Families with in
the Summer.
The Women are the Butchers, Cooks, and Tillers of the ground, the
Men think it below the honour of {80} a Masculine, to stoop to any
thing but that which their Gun, or Bow and Arrows can command. The Men
kill the several Beasts which they meet withall in the Woods, and the
Women are the Pack horses to fetch it in upon their backs, fleying
and dressing the hydes, (as well as the flesh for provision) to make
them fit for Trading, and which are brought down to the _English_ at
several seasons in the year, to truck and dispose of them for course
Blankets, Guns, Powder and lead, Beads, small Looking-glasses, Knives,
and Razors. (See note No. 57).
I never observed all the while I was amongst these naked _Indians_,
that ever the Women wore the Breeches, or dared either in look or
action predominate over the Men. They are very constant to their Wives;
and let this be spoken to their Heathenish praise, that did they not
alter their bodies by their dyings, paintings, and cutting themselves,
marring those Excellencies that Nature bestowed upon them in their
original conceptions and birth, there would be as amiable beauties
amongst them, as any _Alexandria_ could afford, when _Mark Anthony_
and _Cleopatra_ dwelt there together. Their Marriages are short and
authentique; for after ’tis resolv’d upon by both parties, the Woman
sends her intended Husband a Kettle of boyl’d Venison, or Bear; and he
returns in lieu thereof Beaver or Otters Skins, and so their Nuptial
Rites are concluded without other Ceremony. (See note No. 58). {81}
Before I bring my Heathenish Story to a period, I have one thing worthy
your observation: For as our Grammar Rules have it, _Non decet quenquam
me ire currentem aut mandantem_: It doth not become any man to piss
running or eating. These Pagan men naturally observe the same Rule;
for they are so far from running, that like a Hare, they squat to the
ground as low as they can, while the Women stand bolt upright with
their armes a Kimbo, performing the same action, in so confident and
obscene a posture (see note No. 59), as if they had taken their Degrees
of Entrance at _Venice_, and commenced Bawds of Art at _Legorne_.
{82}
A Collection of some Letters that were written by the same Author, most
of them in the time of his Servitude.
_To my much Honored Friend_ Mr. T. B.
SIR,
I have lived with sorrow to see the Anointed of the Lord tore from his
Throne by the hands of Paricides, and in contempt haled, in the view of
God, Angels and Men, upon a public Theatre, and there murthered. I have
seen the sacred Temple of the Almighty, in scorn by Schismatics made
the Receptacle of Theeves and Robbers; and those Religious Prayers,
that in devotion Evening and Morning were offered up as a Sacrifice to
our God, rent by Sacrilegious hands, and made no other use of, then
sold to Brothel-houses to light Tobacco with.
Who then can stay, or will, to see things of so great weight steer’d
by such barbarous Hounds as these: First, were there an _Egypt_ to
go down to, I would involve my Liberty to them, upon condition ne’er
more to see my Country. What? live in silence under the sway of such
base actions, is to give consent; and though the lowness of my present
Estate and Condition, with the hazard I put my future dayes upon, might
plead a just excuse for me to stay at home; but Heavens forbid: I’le
rather serve in {84} Chains, and draw the Plough with Animals, till
death shall stop and say, _It is enough_. Sir, if you stay behind, I
wish you well: I am bound for _Mary-Land_, this day I have made some
entrance into my intended voyage, and when I have done more, you shall
know of it. I have here inclosed what you of me desired, but truly
trouble, discontent and business, have so amazed my senses, that what
to write, or where to write, I conceive my self almost as uncapable
as he that never did write. What you’le find will be _Ex tempore_,
without the use of premeditation; and though there may want something
of a flourishing stile to dress them forth, yet I’m certain there wants
nothing of truth, will, and desire.
_Heavens bright Lamp, shine forth some of thy Light,_
_But just so long to paint this dismal Night;_
_Then draw thy beams, and hide thy glorious face,_
_From the dark sable actions of this place;_
_Leaving these lustful Sodomites groping still,_
_To satisfie each dark unsatiate will,_
_Untill at length the crimes that they commit,_
_May sink them down to Hells Infernal pit._
_Base and degenerate Earth, how dost thou lye,_
_That all that pass hiss, at thy Treachery?_
_Thou which couldst boast once of thy King and Crown,_
_By base Mechanicks now art tumbled down,_
Brewers _and_ Coblers, _that have scarce an Eye,_
_Walk hand in hand an thy Supremacy;_
_And all those Courts where Majesty did Throne,_
_Are now the Seats for Oliver and Ioan:_ {85}
_Persons of Honour, which did before inherit_
_Their glorious Titles from deserved merit,_
_Are all grown silent, and with wonder gaze,_
_To view such Slaves drest in their Courtly rayes;_
_To see a_ Drayman _that knows nought but Yeast,_
_Set in a Throne like_ Babylons _red Beast,_
_While heaps of Parasites do idolize_
_This red-nos’d_ Bell, _with fawning Sacrifice._
_What can we say? our King they’ve Murthered,_
_And those well born, are basely buried:_
_Nobles are slain, and Royalists in each street_
_Are scorn’d, and kick’d by most Men that they meet:_
_Religion’s banisht, and Heresie survives,_
_And none but Conventicks in this Age thrives._
_Oh could those_ Romans _from their Ashes rise,_
_That liv’d in_ Nero’s _time: Oh how their cries_
_Would our perfidious Island shake, nay rend,_
_With clamorous screaks unto the Heaven send:_
_Oh how they’d blush to see our Crimson crimes,_
_And know the Subjects Authors of these times:_
_When as the Peasant he shall take his King,_
_And without cause shall fall a murthering him;_
_And when that’s done, with Pride assume the Chair,_
_And_ Nimrod-_like, himself to heaven rear;_
_Command the People, make the Land Obey_
_His baser will, and swear to what he’l say._
_Sure, sure our God has not these evils sent_
_To please himself, but for mans punishment:_
_And when he shall from our dark sable Skies_
_Withdraw these Clouds, and let our Sun arise,_
_Our dayes will surely then in Glory shine,_
_Both in our Temporal, and our State divine:_ {86}
_May this come quickly, though I may never see_
_This glorious day, yet I would sympathie,_
_And feel a joy run through each vain of blood,_
_Though Vassalled on t’other side the Floud._
_Heavens protect his Sacred Majesty,_
_From secret Plots, & treacherous Villany._
_And that those Slaves that now predominate,_
_Hang’d and destroy’d may be their best of Fate;_
_And though Great_ Charles _be distant from his own,_
_Heaven I hope will seat him on his Throne._
Vale.
Yours what I may,
G. A.
From the Chimney Corner upon a
low cricket, where I writ this in
the noise of some six Women,
_Aug._ 19. _Anno_
_To my Honored Father at his House._
SIR,