thought and language, are visible in all our proceedings, public and private." This William Smith, son of the accomplished lawyer in the Zenger case, was himself one of the few literary men of the province, the author of a "History of New York to the Year 1732," which is sturdy and racy, but so full of partisan bitterness that Smith himself admits it "deserves not the name of a history." As literature, however, it has decided merits. The only other literary name which needs to be mentioned before the Stamp Act period is that of Cadwallader Colden, son of a Cadwallader He Colden. Scottish parson in Berwickshire. was born in 1687 and educated at the University of Edinburgh, after which he studied medicine and began the practice of it in Philadelphia. In 1718 Governor Hunter made him surveyor-general of the province of New York. The next year Colden bought a fine estate in Orange County, some 3000 acres, and built a house on it. There he lived for many years in rural quiet, devoting himself to the physical sciences and to history, and keeping up a correspondence with the most eminent scholars and philosophers of Europe. At the time of the Stamp Act he was lieutenant-governor of New York, acting as governor. The work by which he is best known is his "History of the Five Nations." No outline of the Knickerbocker social life can pass without mention the lower strata of society, the servile classes. These were the same in kind as in Virginia, indented white servants and negro 1 Smith's History of New York, i. 328, ii. 379. slaves. I have discussed them so elaborately in that connection that I need not here repeat myself. In New York, as in Virginia, the indented White servants. white servants were either, 1, convicts shipped from Great Britain, to get rid of them; 2, poor men and women kidnapped and sold into servitude; or, 3, redemptioners, who paid their passage by servile labour after arriving in this country. As the great landed estates of New York were mostly worked by free tenant farmers, the demand for servile labour was very much smaller than in any of the southern colonies, and the indented white servants were much less numer ous. Negro slaves. As for negro slavery in New York, it never seemed to be an economic necessity, as in the southern colonies. The interests of no great staple industry seemed inseparably bound up with it, as was the case in Virginia with tobacco, in South Carolina with rice and indigo. The abolition of slavery was therefore easily accomplished by the act of 1785, which declared that from that time forth all children born of slave parents should be born free.2 Negro slaves were brought to New Amsterdam as early as 1625; they were bought and sold during the entire colonial period at an average price, whether for men or for women, of from $150 to $250. They were employed in all kinds of service, 1 See Old Virginia and Her Neighbours, ii. 177–203. 2 See my Critical Period of American History, p. 74. The census of 1820 showed 10,088 slaves in a total population of 1,372,111; that of 1830 showed only 75 slaves; that of 1840 only 4. agricultural and domestic, as ploughmen and gardeners, or as cooks and porters and valets, but children were seldom consigned to their care, as with southern "mammies." Ladies might be seen carried about town in sedan chairs borne by coloured men, or in coaches with negro drivers and footmen. They served in almost every menial capacity. In the city they never, perhaps, formed so large a portion of the population as in 1746, when a census showed 2444 slaves in a total of 11,723. It appears that the slaves were generally not overworked or ill-treated. Mrs. Grant tells us that among the people of Albany "even the dark aspect of slavery was softened into a smile." 1 Manumission was not infrequent; the slave was often allowed to choose his home among the heirs of his deceased master; and it is said that "if a slave was dissatisfied with his master, it was very common for the master to give him a paper on which his age, his price, etc., were written, and allow him to go and look for some one with whom he would prefer to live, and who would be willing to pay the price stated."2 When the purchaser was found, the master would hand over the slave and take the money, and we may hope that Cuffee found no reason to regret the change. Even in these kindly circumstances, however, slaves now and then ran away. The statute-book, moreover, shows that they were regarded Dread of the with some fear by their masters. They were prohibited from gathering in groups of more 1 Memoirs of an American Lady, i. 51. slaves. than four, and they were forbidden to carry guns, swords, or clubs, under penalty of ten lashes at the whipping-post. One curious act provided that no slave could go about the streets after nightfall anywhere south of the Collect without a lighted lantern, "so as the light thereof may be plainly seen." 1 The negro In 1712, during Governor Hunter's administration, there was an attempt at a slave insurrection. A party of negroes, armed with guns, knives, and hatchets, assembled one evening, in an plot of 1712. orchard near Maiden Lane, and set fire to an outhouse. At sight of the flames people came running to the spot, and as fast as they came were shot or slashed. Nine had been killed and six wounded when a squad of soldiers came upon the scene and captured the murderers. Many negroes were arrested, and twenty-one were executed in ways intended to strike terror. One was broken on the wheel, and several were burned alive at the stake, while the rest were hanged.2 The recollection of this affair may have had something to do with the virulence of the panic that was brought on in 1741 by what has been called the "Great Negro Plot." This was a melancholy instance of panic and delusion, not wholly unmingled with fraud, and has often been The "Great of 1741. Negro Plot" likened to the witchcraft delusion at Salem Village in 1692. It might also be compared with Titus Oates's miserable" Popish Plot," inasmuch as it was a symptom of a wave of 1 Morgan, Slavery in New York, p. 13. 2 Colonial Documents, v. 341, 346, 356, 367, 371, 525. fierce anti-Catholic excitement. To the generally mild and tolerant policy of New York we have now and then had occasion to note some exceptions. At the close of the seventeenth century, when the Counter-reformation was still showing such formidable strength in the giant war between Louis XIV. and William III., the dread of Catholics showed itself again and again in the legislative acts of Protestant countries. For example, in 1700 it was enacted in New York that any Popish priest discovered within the province after the first day of November of that year should be seized and imprisoned for life; and for every such person who should escape and be found Catholic at large, the penalty should be the gallows. Any person convicted of aiding or concealing such priest should be set in the pillory for three days and give bonds at the discretion of the court.1 This act was really and avowedly called forth by the persistent intrigues of Jesuit missionaries with the Long House. Under such circumstances it was not strange that a Catholic priest should be deemed an "incendiary and disturber of the public peace." Considerations of a religious nature had very little to do with the matter. Dread of priests. In the year 1741 this act had not yet been repealed, and the feelings that prompted it were once more stimulated into activity by the war with Spain that had been going on for two years. In 1 Colonial Laws of New York, i. 428. About the same time the law was passed in Rhode Island, debarring Catholics from the franchise; see Arnold's History of Rhode Island, ii. 490-494. In Massachusetts a Romish priest was liable to imprisonment for life. VOL. II. |