imals. The superior personages in the family had always
some good property to mention, or good saying to repeat, of
those whom they cherished into attachment, and exalted into
intelligence; while they, in their turn, improved the sagacity
of their subject animals, by caressing and talking to them.
Let no one laugh at this; for whenever man is at ease and
unsophisticated, where his native humanity is not extinguish-
ed by want, or chilled by oppression, it overflows to inferior
beings; and improves their instincts, to a degree incredible
to those who have not witnessed it. In all mountainous
countries, where man is more free, more genuine, and more
divided into little societies, widely detached from others,
and much attached to each other, this cordiality of senti-
ment, this overflow of good-will takes place.
The poet
says-

"Humble love, and not proud reason,
Keeps the door of heaven."

This question must be left for divines to determine; but sure am I that humble love, and not proud reason, keeps the door of earthly happiness, as far as it is attainable. I am not going, like the admirable Crichton, to make an oration in praise of ignorance; but a very high degree of refinement certainly produces a quickness of discernment, a niggard approbation, and a fastidiousness of taste, that find a thousand repulsive and disgusting qualities mingled with those that excite our admiration, and would (were we less critical) produce affection. Alas! that the tree should so literally impart the knowledge of good and evil; much evil and little good. It is time to return from this excursion, to the point from which I set out.

The Princes and Cæsars of the Flats had as much to tell of the sagacity and attachments of the animals, as their mistress related of their own. Numberless anecdotes, that delighted me in the last century, I would recount, but fear I. should not find my audience of such easy belief as I was, nor so convinced of the integrity of my informers. One circumstance I must mention, because I well know it to be true. The colonel had a horse which he rode occasionally, but which oftener travelled with Mrs. Schuyler, in an open carriage. At particular times, when bringing home hay or corn,

they yoked Wolf, for so he was called, in a wagon; an indignity to which, for a while, he unwillingly submitted. At length, knowing resistance was in vain, he had recourse to stratagem; and whenever he saw Tyte marshalling his cavalry for service, he swam over to the island, the umbrageous and tangled border of which I formerly mentioned: there he fed with fearless impunity till he saw the boat approach; whenever that happened, he plunged into the thicket, and led his followers such a chase, that they were glad to give up the pursuit. When he saw, from his retreat, that the work was over, and the fields bare, he very coolly returned. Being by this time rather old, and a favorite, the colonel allowed him to be indulged in his dislike to drudgery. The mind which is at ease, neither stung by remorse, nor goaded by ambition or other turbulent passions, nor worn with anxiety for the supply of daily wants, nor sunk into languor by stupid idleness, forms attachments and amusements, to which those exalted by culture would not stoop, and those crushed by want and care could not rise. Of this nature was the attachment to the tame animals, which the domestics appropriated to themselves, and to the little fanciful gardens where they raised herbs or plants of difficult culture, to sell and give to their friends. Each negro was indulged with his raccoon, his gray squirrel, or muskrat; or perhaps his beaver, which he tamed and attached to himself, by daily feeding and caressing him in the farm-yard. One was sure about all such houses to find these animals, in which their masters took the highest pleasure. All these small features of human nature must not be despised for their minuteness. To a good mind they afford consolation.

Science, directed by virtue, is a godlike enlargement of the powers of human nature; and exalted rank is so necessary a finish to the fabric of society, and so invariable a result from its regular establishment, that in respecting those whom the divine wisdom has set above us, we perform a duty such as we expect from our own inferiors; this helps to support the general order of society. But so very few, in proportion to the whole, can be enlightened by science, or exalted by situation, that a good mind draws comfort from discovering even the petty enjoyments permitted to those in the state which we consider most abject and depressed.

CHAPTER XXXII.

Resource of Madame.-Provincial Customs.

The

Ir may appear extraordinary, with so moderate an income as could in those days be derived even from a considerable estate in that country, how madame found means to support that liberal hospitality which they constantly exercised. I know the utmost they could derive from their lands, and it was not much: some money they had, but nothing adequate to the dignity, simple as it was, of their style of living, and the very large family they always drew around them. But with regard to the plenty, one might almost call it luxury, of their table, it was supplied from a variety of sources, that rendered it less expensive than could be imagined. Indians, grateful for the numerous benefits they were daily receiving from them, were constantly bringing the smaller game, and, in winter and spring, loads of venison. Little money passed from one hand to another in the country; but there was constantly, as there always is in primitive abodes before the age of calculation begins, a kindly commerce of presents. people of New York and Rhode Island, several of whom were wont to pass a part of the summer with the colonel's family, were loaded with all the productions of the farm and river. When they went home, they again never failed, at the season, to send a large supply of oysters, and all other shellfish, which at New York abounded; besides great quantities of tropical fruit, which, from the short run between Jamaica and New York, were there almost as plenty and cheap as in their native soil. Their farm yielded them abundantly all that in general agriculture can supply; and the young relatives who grew up about the house were rarely a day without bringing some provision from the wood or the stream. The negroes, whose business lay frequently in the woods, never willingly went there or any where else without a gun, and rarely came back empty-handed. Presents of wine, then a very usual thing to send to friends to whom you wished to show a mark of gratitude, came very often, possibly from the friends of the young people who were reared

and instructed in that house of benediction; as there were no duties paid for the entrance of any commodity there, wine, rum, and sugar were cheaper than can easily be imagined; and in cider they abounded.

The negroes of the three truly united brothers, not having home employment in winter, after preparing fuel, used to cut down trees and carry them to an adjoining sawmill, where, in a very short time, they made great quantities of planks, staves, &c., which is usually styled lumber, for the West India market. And when a ship-load of their flour, lumber, and salted provisions was accumulated, some relative, for their behoof, freighted a vessel, and went out to the West Indies with it. In this Stygian schooner, the departure of which was always looked forward to with unspeakable horror, all the stubborn or otherwise unmanageable slaves were embarked, to be sold by way of punishment. This produced such salutary terror, that preparing the lading of this fatal vessel generally operated as a temporary reform at least. When its cargo was discharged in the West Indies, it took in a lading of wine, rum, sugar, coffee, chocolate, and all other West India productions, paying for whatever fell short of the value, and returning to Albany, sold the surplus to their friends, after reserving to themselves a most liberal supply of all the articles so imported. Thus they had not only a profusion of all the requisites for good housekeeping, but had it in their power to do what was not unusual there in wealthy families, though none carried it so far as these worthies.

In process of time, as people multiplied, when a man had eight or ten children to settle in life, and these marrying early, and all their families increasing fast, though they always were considered as equals, and each kept a neat house and decent outside, yet it might be that some of them were far less successful than others in their various efforts to support their families; but these deficiencies were supplied in a quiet and delicate way, by presents of every thing a family required, sent from all their connections and acquaintances; which, where there was a continual interchange of sausages, pigs, roasting-pieces, &c., from one house to another, excited little attention: but when aunt's West India cargo arrived, all the families of this description within her reach had an ample boon sent them of her new supply.

The same liberal spirit animated her sister, a very excellent person, married to Cornelius Cuyler, then mayor of Albany; who had been a most successful Indian trader in his youth, and had acquired large possessions, and carried on an extensive commercial intercourse with the traders of that day, bringing from Europe quantities of those goods that best suited them, and sending back their peltry in exchange; he was not only wealthy, but hospitable, intelligent, and liberal-minded, as appeared by his attachment to the army, which was in those days the distinguishing feature of those who in knowledge and candor were beyond others. His wife had the same considerate and prudent generosity which ever directed the humanity of her sister; though, having a large family, she could not carry it to so great an extent.

If this maternal friend of their mutual relatives could be said to have a preference among her own and her husband's relations, it was certainly to this family. The eldest son, Philip, who bore her husband's name, was on that and other accounts a particular favorite; and was, I think, as much with them in childhood, as his attention to his education, which was certainly the best the province could afford, would permit.

Having become distinguished through all the northern provinces, the common people, and the inferior class of the military, had learned from the Canadians who frequented her house, to call aunt, Madame Schuyler; but by one or other of these appellations she was universally known; and a kindly custom prevailed, for those who were received into any degree of intimacy in her family, to address her as their aunt, though not in the least related. This was done oftener to her than others, because she excited more respect and affection; but it had in some degree the sanction of custom. The Albanians were sure to call each other aunt or cousin, as far as the most strained construction would carry those relations. To strangers they were indeed very shy at first, but extremely kind; when they not only proved themselves estimable, but by a condescension to their customs and acquiring a smattering of their language, ceased to be strangers, then they were in a manner adopted: for the first seal of cordial intimacy among the young people was to call each other cousin; and thus, in an hour of playful or tender intimacy, I have known