her liberal table. This arrangement gave her the advantage of a longer forenoon to dispose of. After breakfast she gave orders for the family details of the day, which, without a scrupulous attention to those minutia which fell more properly under the notice of her young friends, she always regulated in the most judicious manner, so as to prevent all appearance of hurry and confusion. There was such a rivalry among domestics, whose sole ambition was her favor, and who had been trained up from infancy, each to their several duties, that excellence in each department was the result both of habit and emulation; while her young protégées were early taught the value and importance of good housewifery, and were sedulous in their attention to little matters of decoration and elegance, which her mind was too much engrossed to attend to; so that her household affairs, ever well regulated, went on in a mechanical kind of progress, that seemed to engage little of her attention, though her vigilant and overruling mind set every spring of action in motion.

Having thus easily and speedily arranged the details of the day, she retired to read in her closet, where she generally remained till about eleven; when, being unequal to distant walks, the colonel and she, and some of her elder guests, passed some of the hotter hours among those embowering shades of her garden, in which she took great pleasure. Here was their Lyceum; here questions in religion and morality, too weighty for table-talk, were leisurely and coolly discussed; and plans of policy and various utility arranged. From this retreat they sojourned to the portico; and while the colonel either retired to write, or went to give directions to his servants, she sat in this little tribunal, giving audience to new settlers, followers of the army left in hapless dependence, and others who wanted assistance or advice, or hoped she would intercede with the colonel for something more peculiarly in his way, he having great influence with the colonial government. At the usual hour her dinner-party assembled, which was generally a large one; and here I must digress from the detail of the day to observe, that, looking up as I always did to Madame with admiring veneration, and having always heard her mentioned with unqualified applause, I look often back to think what defects or faults she could possibly have to rank with the sons and daughters of imperfection, inhabiting this

transitory scene of existence, well knowing, from subsequent observation of life, that error is the unavoidable portion of humanity. Yet of this truism, to which every one will readily subscribe, I can recollect no proof in my friend's conduct, unless the luxury of her table might be produced to confirm it. Yet this, after all, was but comparative luxury. There was more choice and selection, and perhaps more abundance at her table, than at those of the other primitive inhabitants, yet how simple were her repasts compared with those which the luxury of the higher ranks in this country offer to provoke the sated appetite. Her dinner-party generally consisted of some of her intimate friends or near relations; her adopted children, who were inmates for the time being; and strangers, sometimes invited, merely as friendless travellers, on the score of hospitality, but often welcomed for some time as stationary visitors, on account of worth or talents, that gave value to their society; and, lastly, military guests, selected with some discrimination on account of the young friends, whom they wished not only to protect, but cultivate by an improving association. Conversation here was always rational, generally instructive, and often cheerful. The afternoon frequently brought with it a new set of guests. Tea was always drunk early here; and, as I have formerly observed, was attended with so many petty luxuries of pastry, confectionary, &c., that it might well be accounted a meal by those whose early and frugal dinners had so long gone by. In Albany it was customary, after the heat of the day was past, for the young people to go in parties of three or four, in open carriages, to drink tea at an hour or two's drive from home. The receiving and entertaining this sort of company generally was the province of the younger part of the family; and of those many came, in summer evenings, to the Flats, when tea, which was very early, was over. The young people, and those who were older, took their different walks while Madame sat in her portico, engaged in what might comparatively be called light reading-essays, biography, poetry, &c., till the younger party set out on their return home, and her domestic friends rejoined her in her portico, where, in warm evenings, a slight repast was sometimes brought; but they more frequently shared the last and most truly social meal within.

Winter made little difference in her mode of occupying her

time. She then always retired to her closet to read at stated periods.

In conversation she certainly took delight, and peculiarly excelled; yet did not in the least engross it, or seem to dictate. On the contrary, her thirst for knowledge was such, and she possessed such a peculiar talent for discovering the point of utility in all things, that from every one's discourse she extracted some information, on which the light of her mind was thrown in such a direction as made it turn to account. Whenever she laid down her book she took up her knitting, which neither occupied her eyes nor attention, while it kept her fingers engaged; thus setting an example of humble diligence to her young protégées. In this employment she had a kind of tender satisfaction, as little children, reared in the family, were the only objects of her care in this respect. For those, she constantly provided a supply of hosiery till they were seven years old; and, after that, transferred her attention to some younger favorite. In her earlier days, when her beloved colonel could share the gayeties of society, I have been told they both had a high relish for innocent mirth, and every species of humorous pleasantry; but in my time there was a chastened gravity in his discourse, which, however, did not repulse innocent cheerfulness, though it dashed all manner of levity, and that flippancy which great familiarity sometimes encourages among young people who live much together. Had madame, with the same good sense, the same high principle, and general benevolence towards young people, lived in society such as is to be met with in Britain, the principle upon which she acted would have led her to encourage in such society more gayety and freedom of manners. As the regulated forms of life in Britain set bounds to the ease that accompanies good breeding, and refinement, generally diffused, supplies the place of native delicacy, where that is wanting, a certain decent freedom is both safe and allowable. But, amid the simplicity of primitive manners, those bounds are not so well defined. Under these circumstances, mirth is a romp, and humor a buffoon; and both must be kept within strict limits.

CHAPTER XXXI.

Family Details.

THE hospitalities of this family were so far beyond their apparent income, that all strangers were astonished at them. To account for this, it must be observed that, in the first place, there was perhaps scarce an instance of a family possessing such uncommonly well-trained, active, and diligent slaves, as that which I describe. The set that were staid servants when they married, had some of them died off by the time I knew the family; but the principal roots from whence the many branches then flourishing, sprung, yet remained. These were two women, who had come originally from Africa while very young: they were most excellent servants, and the mothers or grandmothers of the whole set, except one white-woolled negro-man; who in my time sat by the chimney, and made shoes for all the rest.

The great pride and happiness of these sable matrons were, to bring up their children to dexterity, diligence, and obedience; Diana being determined that Maria's children should not excel hers in any quality, which was a recommendation to favor; and Maria equally resolved that her brood, in the race of excellence, should outstrip Diana's. Never was a more fervent competition. That of Phillis and Brunetta, in the Spectator, was a trifle to it: and it was extremely difficult to decide on their respective merits; for though Maria's son Prince cut down wood with more dexterity and dispatch than any one in the province, the mighty Cæsar, son of Diana, cut down wheat, and thrashed it, better than he. His sister Betty, who, to her misfortune, was a beauty of her kind, and possessed wit equal to her beauty, was the best seamstress and laundress, by far, I have ever known; and the plain unpretending Rachel, sister to Prince, wife to Titus, alias Tyte, and head cook, dressed dinners that might have pleased Apicius. I record my old humble friends by their real names, because they allowedly stood at the head of their own class; and distinction of every kind should be respected. Besides, when the curtain drops, or

indeed long before it falls, 'tis perhaps, more creditable to have excelled in the lowest parts, than to have fallen miserably short in the higher. Of the inferior personages, in this dark drama I have been characterizing, it would be tedious to tell: suffice it, that besides filling up all the lower departments of the household, and cultivating to the highest advantage a most extensive farm, there was a thoroughbred carpenter and shoemaker, and a universal genius who made canoes, nets, and paddles; shod horses, mended implements of husbandry, managed the fishing, in itself no small department, reared hemp and tobacco, and spun both; made cider, and tended wild horses, as they call them ; which it was his province to manage and to break. For every branch of the domestic economy there was a person allotted-educated for the purpose; and this society was kept immaculate, in the same way that the quakers preserve the rectitude of theirs; and, indeed, in the only way that any community can be preserved from corruption; when a member showed symptoms of degeneracy, he was immediately expelled, or in other words, more suitable to this case, sold. Among the domestics, there was such a rapid increase, in consequence of their marrying very early, and living comfortably without care, that if they had not been detached off with the young people brought up in the house, they would have swarmed like an over-stocked hive.

In

The prevention of crimes was so much attended to in this well-regulated family, that there was very little punishment necessary; none that I ever heard of, but such as Diana and Maria inflicted on their progeny, with a view to prevent the dreaded sentence of expulsion; notwithstanding the petty rivalry between the branches of the two original stocks. termarriages between the Montagues and Capulets of the kitchen, which frequently took place, and the habit of living together under the same mild, though regular government, produced a general cordiality and affection among all the members of the family, who were truly ruled by the law of love; and even those who occasionally differed about trifles, had an unconscious attachment to each other, which showed itself on all emergencies. Treated themselves with care and gentleness, they were careful and kind with regard to the only inferiors and dependents they had, the domestic an