Customs and Fashions in Old New England

								

bear--too strong a flavor of liquorice, too haunting a medicinal
suggestion to be loved by other children of the Puritans. As an
instance, on a large scale, of the retributive fate that always pursues
the candy-eating wight, I state that the good ship Ann and Hope brought
into Providence one hundred years ago, as part of her cargo, eight boxes
of sweetmeats and twenty tubs of sugar candy, and on the succeeding
voyage sternly fetched no sweets, but brought instead forty-eight boxes
of rhubarb.
The children doubtless had prunes, figs, "courance," and I know they had
"Raisins of the Sun" and "Bloom Raisins" galore. Advertisements of all
these fruits appear in the earliest newspapers. Though "China Oranges"
were frequently given to and by Judge Sewall, I have not found them
advertised for sale till Revolutionary times, and I fancy few children
had then tasted them. The native and domestic fruits were plentiful, but
many of them were poor. The apples and pears and Kentish cherries were
better than the peaches and grapes. The children gathered the summer
berries in season, and the autumn's plentiful and spicy store of
boxberries, checkerberries, teaberries or gingerbread berries with
October's brown nuts. There were gingerbread and "cacks" even in the
earliest days; but they were not sold in unlimited numbers. The
omnipotent hand of Puritan law laid its firm hold on their manufacture.
Judge Sewall often speaks, however, of Banbury cakes and Meers cakes;
Meer was a celebrated Boston baker and confectioner. The colonists had
also egg cakes and marchepanes and maccaroons.
There were children's books in those early days; not numerous, however,
nor varied was the assortment from which Puritan youth in New England
could choose. Here is the advertisement of one:



     "Small book in easey verse Very Suitable for children, entitled The

     Prodigal Daughter or the Disobedient Lady Reclaimed: adorned with

     curious cuts, Price Sixpence."
Somehow, from the suggestion of the title we should hardly fancy this to
be an edifying book for children. John Cotton supplied them with



     "Spiritual Milk for Boston Babes in Either England: Drawn out of

     the Breasts of both Testaments for their Souls Nourishment. But

     may be of like Use to Any Children."
Another book was published in many editions and sold in large numbers,
and much extolled by contemporary ministers. It was entitled:



     "A Token for Children. Being the exact account of the Conversion &

     Holy & Exemplary Lives of several Young Children by James Janeway."
To it was added by Cotton Mather:



     "Some examples of Children in whom the fear of God was remarkably

     Budding before they died; in several parts of New England."
Cotton Mather also wrote: "Good Lessons for Children, in Verse." Other
books were, "A Looking Glasse for Children," "The life of Elizabeth
Butcher, in the Early Piety series;" "The life of Mary Paddock, who died