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diff --git a/12885-0.txt b/12885-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fab0120 --- /dev/null +++ b/12885-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2657 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12885 *** + +BUNDLING; +Its Origin, Progress and Decline In America. + +BY HENRY REED STILES, M.D., +AUTHOR OF HISTORY OF BROOKLYN, HISTORY OF WINDSOR, CT., ETC. + + + "I find by all historians, whether ancient or modern, whom I + consulted in searching for this work, the fact well recorded, and + established beyond all controversy, that the Yankee nation are a + set of talking, guessing, swapping and _bundling_ sons of women." + + + _Grant Thorburn's Notes on Virginia_. + + +ALBANY: +KNICKERBOCKER PUBLISHING COMPANY. +1871. + +Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, +BY HENRY R. STILES, +In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. + + + + TO MY ESTEEMED FRIEND, + DEACON JABEZ H. HAYDEN, + OF WINDSOR LOCKS, CONNECTICUT, + + Whose jealous love of his native state, led him, in defense of her + good fame, to make some strictures upon a statement relative to + _bundling_, in my _History and Genealogies of Ancient Windsor, + Conn._, which strictures (made and taken in the kindest spirit of + personal friendship) set me upon the further investigation of this + interesting subject. + + This Essay, + + The result of that investigation, and the justification + (as I claim) of my original statement, is + MOST RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED + BY THE AUTHOR + + + + +PREFATORY. + + +In the _History and Genealogies of Ancient Windsor, Conn._, published in +1859, speaking of the influence of the old French wars upon the +religious, moral and social life of New England, I used this language: + +"Then came war, and young New England brought from the long Canadian +campaigns, stores of loose camp vices and recklessness, which soon +flooded the land with immorality and infidelity. The church was +neglected, drunkenness fearfully increased, and social life was sadly +corrupted. _Bundling_--that ridiculous and pernicious custom which +prevailed among the young to a degree which we can scarcely +credit--sapped the fountain of morality and tarnished the escutcheons of +thousands of families." + +Hereupon there came a buzzing around my ears. Divers good sons of +Connecticut winced under the soft impeachment of having a bundling +ancestry, and intimated that my sketch of society in the olden times was +somewhat overdrawn. In 1861, an esteemed antiquarian friend in +Connecticut wrote me as follows: "Some of your friends feel that, in +your _History of Windsor_, you showed too much inclination to malign, or +at least ridicule, Connecticut institutions, though I think none of them +accuse you of malice in the matter, and they fear that this subject of +bundling cannot be ventilated without endangering the fair fame of old +Connecticut." + +Upon that hint I speak. Although born in the city of New York, I am the +son of Connecticut parents, and proud to trace my descent through six +generations of honest, hard-working, God-fearing Connecticut yeomanry. +By the mere accident of birth I cannot feel myself absolved from that +allegiance to the Wooden Nutmeg State, which is imposed upon me by the +ties of ancestry, of relationship, of youthful associations, and last, +not least, by the deep interest which I have taken in the history of one +of its eldest-born towns. I am, indeed, at this day, to all intents and +purposes, as wholly and truly a Connecticut man as if born within her +borders; and as proud of her past, as hopeful of her future, and as +jealous of her reputation as any one could desire. I trust, therefore, +that I may be allowed to disclaim any "inclination to malign, or at +least ridicule Connecticut institutions," a task which, in my case, +would savor of ingratitude, and which I should consider unworthy of my +humble pen. + +I cannot but think, also, that those who have found, or think that they +have found, an inimical design in any pleasantries in which I may have +indulged while describing the customs and manners of by-gone days--have +betrayed a _thin-skinnedness_, and an ignorance of the true glory of +Connecticut history, when they imagine that her fair fame can be +seriously tarnished by the fly-specks of certain customs--at no time +without their vigorous opponents--and long since rendered obsolete by +the march of improvement. + +The fun of the thing, however, is, that the sentence which has thus +called forth the animadversions of the critics, will be found, with its +context, on closer examination, to have applied to the _New England +Colonies_, and not to Connecticut alone! In their haste to vindicate the +land of steady habits, they seem to have assumed more than their share +of the reproach involved in my simple historical statement. + +As for myself, I am no believer in the theory that the objectionable +portions of history should be kept in the background, and that only the +bright side should be turned towards the world. If, as one has happily +said, "history is experience teaching by example," we most surely need +to have both sides fairly presented to us before we can properly extract +therefrom the lesson of good or of evil which is therein taught. It is +unnecessary to pursue the argument further. Suffice it to say, that +perfection is as little to be expected in the history of a state or a +community, as in the life of an individual. As to our ancestors, we must +take them as history shows them to us--"men of like passions with +ourselves," and "in all respects tempted as we are," yet neither worse, +nor, again, very much purer or better than ourselves. + +In this spirit I have undertaken to trace, in the following pages, the +origin, progress and decline of the custom of bundling in America, +together with such facts as clearly prove that it was not confined to +this continent, but prevalent in various countries of the world. + +"HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE." + +H. R. S. + + + + +BUNDLING. + + + BUNDLING. "A man and a woman lying on the same bed with their + clothes on; an expedient practiced in America on a scarcity of + beds, where, on such occasions, husbands and parents frequently + permitted travellers to _bundle_ with their wives and + daughters."--_Grose, Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue_. + + BUNDLE, _v.i._ "To sleep on the same bed without undressing; + applied to the custom of a man and woman, especially lovers, thus + sleeping."--_Webster, 1864_. + + BUNDLE, _v.n._ "To sleep together with the clothes + on."--_Worcester, 1864_. + + +Bundling, as may be seen from the above quoted definitions, was +practiced in two forms: first, between _strangers_, as a simple domestic +make-shift arrangement, often arising from the necessities of a new +country, and by no means peculiar to America; and, secondly, between +_lovers_, who shared the same couch, with the mutual understanding that +innocent endearments should not be exceeded. It was, however, in either +case, a custom of convenience. + +We may notice, in this connection, that it is very common, even at the +present day, in New England, to speak of one as having "bundled in with +his clothes on," if he goes to bed without undressing; as, for instance, +if he came home drunk, or feeling slightly ill, lay down in the daytime, +or in a cold night found the blankets too scanty. + +The point which first claims our attention in the discussion of this +custom, is its probable _origin_, and its _antiquity_ in + + +THE BRITISH ISLES. + + +For, though British travelers have uniformly endeavored to fix the odium +of this custom upon us their transatlantic cousins, as being peculiarly +"An American institution," it is, nevertheless, an indisputable fact +that bundling has for centuries flourished within their own kingdom. For +what else, in fact, was that universal custom of promiscuous sleeping +together which prevailed among the ancient Britons at the time of the +Roman conquest, and which led Cæsar to consider them as polyandrous +polygamists, and other ancient writers to give them an unenviable +character for morality?[1] Bundling, of course! in its rudest aboriginal +form. + +As to its moral aspects, being more charitably inclined towards our +British friends than they oftentimes are to us, we are willing to accept +Logan's defense of their ancestors. "The custom," he says, "which +continued until lately in some parts, and yet exists among a few of the +rudest, who sleep altogether on straw or rushes, according to the +general ancient practice, there is reason to believe, led to the +aspersion cast on the British and Irish tribes. How natural it must have +been for a casual observer to suppose, from seeing men and women +reposing in the same place, that the marriage rites were not in force. +To judge of the ancient inhabitants by the rudest of the present +Highlanders and Irish, who often sleep in the same apartment, and are +sometimes exposed to each other in a state of semi-nudity, we should not +come to a conclusion unfavorable to their morality,[2] for this mode of +life is not productive of that conjugal infidelity which St. Jerome and +others insinuate as prevalent among the old Scots. * * * Nations that +are even in a savage state are sometimes found more sensitive on that +point of honor than nations more advanced in civilization; and all, +perhaps, that can be admitted is, that certain formalities may have been +practiced by the Britons, from which the _bundling_ of the Welsh, and +the _hand-fasting_ in some parts of Scotland, are derived. The +conversation which took place between the Empress Julia and the wife of +a Caledonian chief, as related by Xiphilin, certainly evinces a +grossness and indelicacy in the amours of the British ladies, if true; +but it appears to be a reply where wit and reproof were more aimed at +than truth. The case of the Empress Cartismandua shows the nice feeling +of the Britons as to the propriety of female conduct. The respect of the +Germans for their females, and the severity with which they visited a +deviation from virtue, have been described; and the further testimony of +Tacitus may be adduced, who says that but very few of the greatest +dignity chose to have more than one wife, and when they did it was +merely for the honor of alliance. It may be here stated that the Gaëls +have no word to express cuckold, and that prostitutes were, by Scots' +law, like that of the ancient Germans, thrown into deep wells; and a +woman was not permitted to complain of an assault if she allowed more +than one night to elapse before the accusation."--_Logan's Scottish +Gaël_, 5th Am. edition, p. 472.[5] + +Indeed, whatever may have been the real state of morality among the +ancient Scotch and Irish--and it is quite probable that it has been +unfairly depicted by casual and prejudiced observers--the ancient custom +of bundling, which has been handed down from earliest times, has not +greatly contaminated their descendants of the present day. For, whatever +their national vices, the Scotch and Irish of our day maintain a +character for chastity superior to that of many of their more fortunate +and more civilized neighbors. Bundling, as now practiced in these +kingdoms, is merely a matter arising from the ignorance, or the poverty +of the inhabitants; and, while not salutary in its moral or physical +influence, is, at all events, less abused than we might reasonably +expect. + +In regard to + + +WALES. + + +We learn from Woodward's admirable history of that kingdom, the +following facts concerning the domestic habits of its people in the +twelfth century: + +"At night a bed of rushes was laid down along one side of the room, +covered with a coarse kind of cloth, made in the country, called +_brychan_; and all the household lay down on this bed in common, without +changing their dresses. The fire was kept burning through the night, and +the sleepers maintained their warmth by lying closely; and when, by the +hardness of their couch, one side was wearied, they would get up and sit +by the fire awhile, and then lie down again on the other side. It is to +this custom of promiscuous sleeping, that some of the worst habits of +the Welsh at the present day may be ascribed; and from the same custom +which their forefathers, the ancient Britons, practiced, arose Cæsar's +supposition that they were polyandrous polygamists." + +These habits, which were a matter of necessity with the ancient Welsh, +have become converted, by the lapse of time, among their descendants of +the present day, into an amatory custom precisely similar to that +practiced formerly in New England.[6] + +A tourist through Wales, in the year 1797,[7] thus speaks of the Welsh +_bundling_: "And here, amongst the usages and customs, I must not omit +to inform you that what you have, perhaps, often heard, without +believing, respecting the _mode of courtship_ amongst the Welsh +peasants, is true. The lower order of people do actually carry on their +love affairs in bed, and what would extremely astonish more polished +lovers, they are carried on honorably, it being, at least, as usual for +the Pastoras of the mountains to go from the bed of courtship to the bed +of marriage as unpolluted and maidenly as the Chloes of fashion; and yet +you are not to conclude that this proceeds from their being less +susceptible of the _belle-passion_ than their betters; or that the cold +air which they breathe has 'froze the genial current of their souls.' By +no means; if they cannot boast the voluptuous languor of an Italian sky, +they glow with the bracing spirit of a more invigorating atmosphere. I +really took some pains to investigate this curious custom, and after +being assured, by many, of its veracity, had an opportunity of attesting +its existence with my own eyes. The servant maid of the family I visited +in Caernarvonshire, happened to be the object of a young peasant, who +walked eleven long miles every Sunday morning to favor his suit, and +regularly returned the same night through all weathers, to be ready for +Monday's employment in the fields, being simply a day laborer. He +usually arrived in time for morning service, which he constantly +attended, after which he escorted his Dulcinea home to the house of her +master, by whose permission they as constantly passed the succeeding +hour in bed, according to the custom of the country. These tender +sabbatical preliminaries continued without interruption near two years, +when the treaty of alliance was solemnized, and, so far from any breach +of articles happening in the meantime, it is most likely that it was +considered by both parties as a matter of course, without exciting any +other idea. On speaking to my friend on the subject, he observed that, +though it certainly appeared a dangerous mode of making love, he had +seen so few _living_ abuses of it, during six and thirty years' +residence in that country, where it nevertheless had always, more or +less, prevailed, he must conclude it was as innocent as any other. One +proof of its being _thought_ so by the parties, is the perfect ease and +freedom with which it is done; no awkwardness or confusion appearing on +either side; the most well-behaved and decent young woman going into it +without a blush, and they are by no means deficient in modesty. What is +pure in idea is always so in conduct, since bad actions are the common +consequence of bad thoughts; and though the better sort of people treat +this ceremony as a barbarism, it is very much to be doubted whether more +_faux pas_ have been committed by the Cambrian boors in this _free +access_ to the bed chambers of their mistresses, than by more +fashionable Strephons and their nymphs in groves and shady bowers. The +power of habit is perhaps stronger than the power of passion, or even of +the charms which inspire it; and it is sufficient, almost, to say a +thing is the _custom of a country_, to clear it from any reproach that +would attach to an innovation. Were it the practice of a few only, and +to be gratified by stealth, there would, from the strange construction +of human nature, be more cause of suspicion; but being ancient, general, +and carried on without difficulty, it is probably as little dangerous as +a _tête a tête_ in a drawing-room, or in any other full dress place +where young people meet to say soft things to each other." + +In an antiquarian tour by the Rev. W. Bingley, in 1804,[8] we also find +the following description of this custom: "The peasantry of part of +Caernarvonshire, Anglesea, and Merionethshire, adopt a mode of +_courtship_ which, till within the last few years, was scarcely even +heard of in England. It is the same that is common in many parts of +America, and termed by the inhabitants of that country, _bundling_. The +lover steals, under the shadow of the night, to the bed of the fair one, +into which (retaining an essential part of his dress) he is admitted +without any shyness or reserve. Saturday or Sunday nights are the +principal times when this courtship takes place, and on these nights the +men sometimes walk from a distance of ten miles or more to visit their +favorite damsels. This strange custom seems to have originated in the +scarcity of fuel, and in the unpleasantness of sitting together in the +colder part of the year without a fire. Much has been said of the +innocence with which these meetings are conducted, but it is a very +common thing for the consequence of the interview to make its appearance +in the world within two or three months after the marriage ceremony has +taken place. The subject excites no particular attention among the +neighbors, provided the marriage be made good before the living witness +is brought to light. Since this custom is entirely confined to the +laboring classes of the community, it is not so pregnant with danger as, +on a first supposition, it might seem. Both parties are so poor that +they are necessarily constrained to render their issue legitimate, in +order to secure their reputation, and with a mode of obtaining a +livelihood." + +Another traveller[9] also mentions "a singular custom that is said to +prevail in Wales, relating to their mode of courtship, which is declared +to be carried on in bed; and, what is more extraordinary, it is averred +that the moving tale of love is agitated in that situation without +endangering a breach in the preliminaries." Referring to Mr. Pratt's +account of the custom, before quoted, he proceeds to remark: "Our +companion, like every one else that we spoke with in Wales on the +subject, at once denied the existence of this custom: that maids in many +instances admitted male bed-fellows, he did not doubt; but that the +procedure was sanctioned by _tolerated custom_ he considered a gross +misrepresentation. Yet in Anglesea and some parts of North Wales, where +the original simplicity of manners and high sense of chastity of the +natives is retained, he admitted _something of the kind_ might appear. +In those thinly inhabited districts a peasant often has several miles to +walk after the hours of labor, to visit his mistress; those who have +reciprocally entertained the _belle passion_ will easily imagine that +before the lovers grow tired of each other's company the night will be +far enough advanced; nor is it surprising that a tender-hearted damsel +should be disinclined to turn her lover out over bogs and mountains +until the dawn of day. The fact is, that under such circumstances she +admits a _consors lecti_, but not in _nudatum corpus_. In a lonely Welsh +hut this bedding has not the alarm of ceremony; from sitting, or perhaps +lying, on the hearth, they have only to shift their quarters to a heap +of straw or fern covered with two or three blankets in a neighboring +corner. The practice only takes place with _this view of +accommodation_." + +Still another glimpse of this favorite Welsh custom is presented by a +tourist in 1807.[10] He says: + +"One evening, at an inn where we halted, we heard a considerable bustle +in the kitchen, and, upon enquiry, I was let into a secret worth +knowing. The landlord had been scolding one of his maids, a very pretty, +plump little girl, for not having done her work; and the reason which +she alleged for her idleness was, that her master having locked the +street door at night, had prevented her lover enjoying the rights and +delights of _bundling_, an amatory indulgence which, considering that it +is sanctioned by custom, may be regarded as somewhat singular, although +it is not exclusively of Welsh growth. The process is very simple; the +gay Lothario, when all is silent, steals to the chamber of his mistress, +who receives him in bed, but with the modest precaution of wearing her +under petticoat, which is always fastened at the bottom--not +unfrequently, I am told, by a sliding knot. It may astonish a London +gallant to be told that this extraordinary experiment often ends in +downright wedlock--the knot which cannot slide. A gentleman of +respectability also assured me that he was obliged to indulge his female +servants in these nocturnal interviews, and that too at all hours of the +night, otherwise his whole family would be thrown into disorder by their +neglect; the carpet would not be dusted, nor would the kettle boil. I +think this custom should share the fate of the northern Welsh goats. +* * * * Habit has so reconciled the mind to the comforts of _bundling_, +that a young lady who entered the coach soon after we left Shrewsbury, +about eighteen years of age, with a serene and modest countenance, +displayed considerable historical knowledge of the custom, without one +touch of bashfulness."[11] + +Thus much for Wales, where the custom seems to have been entirely +confined to the lower classes of society, and where we have reason to +think it still prevails to some extent to this day.[12] + +The same author whom we last quoted also speaks of a "courtship similar +to _bundling_, carried on in the islands of Vlie and Wieringen, + + +IN HOLLAND, + + +Under the name of _queesting_.[15] At night the lover has access to his +mistress after she is in bed; and, upon an application to be admitted +upon the bed, which of course is granted, he raises the quilt, or rug, +and in this state _queests_, or enjoys a harmless chit-chat with her, +and then retires. This custom meets with the perfect sanction of the +most circumspect parents, and the freedom is seldom abused. The author +traces its origin to the parsimony of the people, whose economy +considers fire and candles as superfluous luxuries in the long winter +evenings." + +The Hon. Henry C. Murphy of Brooklyn, N. Y., late United States minister +at the Hague, has furnished us with the following note in relation to +this Nederduitsche custom: "As to its being a Dutch custom, it was so to +a limited extent in Holland in former times, and may yet be, though I +did not hear of it when I was there. Sewell gives the word _queesten_, +or _kweesten_, in his dictionary, printed over a century ago. The word +is defined in the dictionary of Wieland, the principal lexicographer in +that country, as follows: '_Kweesten_. Upon the islands of Texel and +Vlieland[16] they use this word for a singular custom of wooing, by +which the doors and windows are left open, and the lover, lying or +sitting outside the covering, woos the girl who is underneath.' Sewell +confines the custom to certain islands or lands near the sea." + + +LOVE AND COURTSHIP IN THE 14TH CENTURY. + + +In feudal times, in the last part of the fourteenth century, it became +the practice for the vassals, or feudatories, to send their sons to be +educated in the family of the suzerain, while the daughters were +similarly placed with the lady of the castle. These formed a very +important part of the household, and were of gentle blood, claiming the +honorary title of _chambriéres_ or chamber-maidens. The demoiselles of +this period were very susceptible to the passion of love, which was the +ruling spirit of the inmates of the castle. Feudal society was, in +comparison to the previous times, polished and even brilliant, but it +was not, under the surface, pure. Many good maxims were taught, but they +were not all practiced. "There was an extreme intimacy between the two +sexes, who commonly visited each other in their chambers or bedrooms. +Thus in the poem of Guatier d'Aupias, the hero is represented as +visiting in her chamber the demoiselle of whom he is enamored. Numerous +similar examples might be quoted. At times, one of the parties is +described as being actually in bed, as is the case in the romance of +_Blonde of Oxford_, where Blonde visits Jehan in his chamber when he is +in bed, and stays all night with him, in perfect innocence as we are +told in the romance. We must remember that it was the custom in those +times for both sexes to go to bed perfectly naked."[17] + + +IN SWITZERLAND, + + +According to an English observer,[18] analogous modes of courtship still +exist. In speaking of the canton _Unterwald_ he says: "In the story of +the destruction of the castles, we read that the surprise was effected +by a young girl admitting her lover to her room by a ladder, and an +English guide-book remarks, that this is still the fashion of receiving +lovers in Switzerland. Reference is had to the manner of wooing, which +in some cantons is called _lichtgetren_, in others _dorfen_ and +_stubetegetren_, and answers to the old-fashioned _going-a-courting_ in +England. The customs connected with it vary in different cantons, but +exist in some form in all except two or three. + +In the canon _Lucerne_, the _kiltgang_ is the universal mode of wooing; +the lover visiting his betrothed in the evening, to be pelted on the way +by all mischievous urchins; or if he is seated quietly with her by the +winter fire, they are sure to be serenaded by all manner of _cat voices_ +under the window, which are continued till he issues forth, perhaps at +dawn in the morning; and however long may be a courtship, these +_cater-waulings_ are the invariable attendants, and not the most +lamentable consequences of these nightly visits, recognized, however, as +entirely respectable and conventional in every canton." + +And again in the canton _Vaud_, he says, "the _kiltgang_, or nightly +wooings, are the universal custom with the universal consequences, but +in general the wife is treated with marked respect, is made keeper of +the treasury, and consulted as the oracle of the family." + +Among the amatory customs of various + + +SAVAGE NATIONS + + +and tribes, there are certain which somewhat resemble _bundling_, except +in the greater degree of freedom allowed--a freedom which, in the eyes +of civilized nations, is absolute immorality. Of this description is the +manner of wooing described by La Hontan as prevalent among the Indians +of North America.[19] + +Yet, in many of these instances, if we were to carefully examine the +social system and customs of our savage friends, and were willing to +judge them rather by the results of our own observation, than by our +preconceived opinions, we should probably find that the absolute +_practical morality_ of these _untutored natives_, was quite equal, if +not superior, to that of the educated and civilized whites.[20] + +Among these _customs de amour_, however, to which we have alluded as +existing among different savage tribes, there are none which bear so +perfect a resemblance to _bundling_, as that described by Masson in his +_Journeys in Central Asia, Belochistan, Afghanistan,_ etc. (III, 287.) +He says: + +"Many of the Afghan tribes have a custom of wooing similar to what in +Wales is known as _bundling-up_, and which they term _namzat bezé_. The +lover presents himself at the house of his betrothed with a suitable +gift, and in return is allowed to pass the night with her, on the +understanding that innocent endearments are not to be exceeded." + +Spencer St. John tells us, in speaking of the piratical and ferocious +Sea Dayaks of Borneo, that "besides the ordinary attention which a young +man is able to pay to the girl he desires to make his wife--as helping +her in her farm work, and in carrying home her load of vegetables or +wood, as well as in making her little presents, as a ring or some brass +chain-work with which the women adorn their waists, or even a +petticoat--there is a very peculiar testimony of regard which is worthy +of note. About nine or ten at night, when the family is supposed to be +fast asleep within the musquito curtains in the private apartments, the +young man quietly slips back the bolt by which the door is fastened on +the inside, and enters the room on tiptoe. On hearing who it is, she +rises at once, and they sit conversing together and making arrangements +for the future, in the dark, over a plentiful supply of _sirih-leaf_ and +_batle-nut_, which it is the gentleman's duty to provide, for his suit +is in a fair way to prosper; but if, on the other hand, she rises and +says, 'be good enough to blow up the fire,' or 'light the lamp' (a +bamboo filled with resin), then his hopes are at an end, as that is the +usual form of dismissal. Of course, if this kind of nocturnal visit is +frequently repeated, the parents do not fail to discover it, although it +is a point of honor among them to take no notice of their visitor; and, +if they approve of him, matters then take their course, but if not, they +use their influence with their daughter to ensure the utterance of the +fatal 'please blow up the fire.'" + +And now, having discussed the custom of bundling as it formerly existed +in Great Britain, and having proved its identity with the _queesting_ of +Holland, and the _namzat bezé_ of Central Asia, we propose to follow our +investigations to the continent of America, and to trace, if we can, its +origin and progress in the + + +UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, + + +in doing which, it is quite likely that, we follow the identical line of +travel and colonization--viz: from Old to New England, and from +Netherlands (the father-land) to New Netherlands--by which the custom of +bundling was really transplanted to these western shores. For, although +the grave and (sometimes) veracious historian of New York, Diedrich +Knickerbocker, hath endeavored to fasten upon the Connecticut settlers +the odium of having introduced the custom into New Netherland,[21] to +the great offense of all properly disposed people; yet we may reasonably +doubt whether the young mynheers and frauliens of New Amsterdam, in that +day, were any more innocent of this lover's pastime, than their +vivacious Connecticut neighbors. Indeed, can it be for one moment +supposed that the good Hollanders--a most unchanging and conservative +race--should have been so far false to the traditions of their fathers, +and the honor of the fatherland, as to leave behind them, when they +crossed the seas, the good old custom of _queesting_, with its +time-honored associations and delights? Or can it be imagined that those +astute lawgivers and political economists, the early governors and +burgomasters, were so blind to the necessities and interests of a new +and sparsely populated country, as to forbid bundling within their +borders? Indeed, it would be but a sorry compliment to the wisdom of +that sagacious and far-sighted body of merchants comprised in the High +and Mighty West India Company, to believe that they were unwilling to +introduce under their benign auspices, a custom so intimately connected +with their own national social habits, and so promising to the +prospective interests and enlargement of their _new plantations_, as +this. And, truly, Diedrich himself, doth, in another part of his book, +inadvertently betray the fact that bundling was by no means a purely +Yankee trick, for he speaks of the redoubtable Anthony Van +Corlaer--purest of Dutchmen--as "passing through Hartford, and Pyquag, +and Middletown, and all the other border towns, twanging his trumpet +like a very devil, so that the sweet valleys and banks of the +Connecticut resounded with the warlike melody, and stopping occasionally +to eat pumpkin pies, dance at country frolics, and _bundle_ with the +beauteous lasses of those parts, whom he rejoiced exceedingly with his +soul-stirring instrument." Which passage, while it proves that the +practice of bundling prevailed in Connecticut, proves equally well that +Anthony the trumpeter was by no means inexperienced in its delights, nor +unwilling to enjoy its comforts, whether under the name of _bundling_ or +_queesting_. + +Indeed, we do most truly believe that the cunning Knickerbocker, in his +desire to vindicate, as he thought, the character of his race against +the accusation of immorality, hath by his denial not only committed a +grievous sin against "the truth of history," but hath greatly added +thereto, by attempting to foist off the opprobrium of the same on to the +shoulders of the Connecticut folks. But history will not remain forever +falsified, and the day has at length arrived when every historical tub +must "stand on its own bottom," and the world will henceforth know that +the New Netherlanders did not take bundling by inoculation from the +Yankees, but that they brought it with them to the New World, as an +ancestral heirloom. + +This point being thus satisfactorily settled, to the honor of the +Dutchman, and the extreme satisfaction of all future historians, we next +proceed to investigate the bundling prevalent in + + +THE NEW ENGLAND STATES, + + +Where, as we have already shown, it was, as with the Dutchmen, an +_inherited_ custom. Its comparatively innocent and harmless character +has, however, been fearfully distorted and maligned by irresponsible +satirists, and prejudiced historians. Take, for example, the following +passage from Knickerbocker's _History of New York_,[22] wherein he +pretends to describe "the curious device among these sturdy barbarians +[the Connecticut colonists], to keep up a harmony of interests, and +promote population. * * * * They multiplied to a degree which would be +incredible to any man unacquainted with the marvellous fecundity of this +growing country. This amazing increase may, indeed, be partly ascribed +to a singular custom prevalent among them, commonly known by the name of +_bundling_--a superstitious rite observed by the young people of both +sexes, with which they usually terminated their festivities, and which +was kept up with religious strictness by the more bigoted and vulgar +part of the community. This ceremony was likewise, in those primitive +times, considered as an indispensable preliminary to matrimony; their +courtships commencing where ours usually finish, by which means they +acquired, that intimate acquaintance with each other's good qualities +before marriage, which has been pronounced by philosophers the sure +basis of a happy union. Thus early did this cunning and ingenious people +display a shrewdness at making a bargain, which has ever since +distinguished them, and a strict adherence to the good old vulgar maxim +about 'buying a pig in a poke.' + +"To this sagacious custom, therefore, do I chiefly attribute the +unparalleled increase of the Yanokie or Yankee tribe; for it is a +certain fact, well authenticated by court records and parish registers, +that wherever the practice of bundling prevailed, there was an amazing +number of sturdy brats annually born unto the state, without the license +of the law, or the benefit of clergy. Neither did the irregularity of +their birth operate in the least to their disparagement. On the +contrary, they grew up a long-sided, raw-boned, hardy race of whoreson +whalers, wood cutters, fishermen, and peddlers; and strapping corn-fed +wenches, who by their united efforts tended marvellously towards +populating those notable tracts of country called Nantucket, Piscataway, +and Cape Cod." + +Hear, also, that learned, but audacious and unscrupulous divine, the +Rev. Samuel Peters, who thus discourseth at length upon the custom of +bundling in Connecticut, and other parts of New England. After admitting +that "the women of Connecticut are strictly virtuous, and to be compared +to the prude rather than the European polite lady," he says: + +"Notwithstanding the modesty of the females is such that it would be +accounted the greatest rudeness for a gentleman to speak before a lady +of a garter, knee, or leg, yet it is thought but a piece of civility to +ask her to _bundle_; a custom as old as the first settlement in 1634. It +is certainly innocent, virtuous and prudent, or the puritans would not +have permitted it to prevail among their offspring, for whom in general +they would suffer crucifixion. Children brought up with the chastest +ideas, with so much religion as to believe that the omniscient God sees +them in the dark, and that angels guard them when absent from their +parents, will not, nay, cannot, act a wicked thing. People who are +influenced more by lust, than a serious faith in God, who is too pure to +behold iniquity with approbation, ought never to _bundle_. If any man, +thus a stranger to the love of virtue, of God, and the Christian +religion, should _bundle_ with a young lady in New England, and behave +himself unseemly towards her, he must first melt her into passion, and +expel heaven, death, and hell, from her mind, or he will undergo the +chastisement of negroes turned mad--if he escape with life, it will be +owing to the parents flying from their bed to protect him. The Indians, +who had this method of courtship when the English arrived among them in +1634, are the most chaste set of people in the world. Concubinage and +fornication are vices none of them are addicted to, except such as +forsake the laws of Hobbamockow and turn Christians. The savages have +taken many female prisoners, carried them back three hundred miles into +their country, and kept them several years, and yet not a single +instance of their violating the laws of chastity has ever been known. +This cannot be said of the French, or of the English, whenever Indian or +other women have fallen into their hands. I am no advocate for +temptation; yet must say, that _bundling_ has prevailed 160 years in New +England, and, I verily believe, with ten times more chastity than the +sitting on a sofa. I had daughters, and speak from near forty years' +experience. _Bundling_ takes place only in cold seasons of the year--the +sofa in summer is more dangerous than the bed in winter. About the year +1756, Boston, Salem, Newport, and New York, resolving to be more polite +than their ancestors, forbade their daughters _bundling_ on the bed with +any young man whatever, and introduced a sofa to render courtship more +palatable and Turkish, whatever it was owing to, whether to the sofa, or +any uncommon excess of the _feu d'esprit_, there went abroad a report +that this _raffinage_ produced more _natural consequences_ then all the +_bundling_ among the boors with their _rurales pedantes_, through every +village in New England besides. + +"In 1776, a clergyman from one of the polite towns, went into the +country, and preached against the unchristian custom of young men and +maidens lying together on a bed. He was no sooner out of the church, +then attacked by a shoal of good old women, with, 'Sir, do you think we +and our daughters are naughty, because we allow _bundling_?' 'You lead +yourselves into temptation by it.' They all replied at once, 'Sir, have +you been told thus, or has experience taught it you?' The Levite began +to lift up his eyes, and to consider of his situation, and bowing, said, +'I have been told so.' The ladies, _una voce_, bawled out, 'Your +informants, sir, we conclude, are those city ladies who prefer a sofa to +a bed: we advise you to alter your sermon, by substituting the word +_sofa_ for _bundling_, and on your return home preach it to them, for +experience has told us that city folks send more children into the +country without fathers or mothers to own them, than are born among us; +therefore, you see, a sofa is more dangerous than a bed.' The poor +priest, seemingly convinced of his blunder, exclaimed, '_Nec vitia +nostra, neo remedia pati possumus_,' hoping thereby to get rid of his +guests; but an old matron pulled off her spectacles, and, looking the +priest in the face like a Roman heroine, said, '_Noli putare me hæc +auribus tuis dare_.' Others cried out to the priest to explain his +Latin. 'The English,' said he, 'is this: Wo is me that I sojourn in +Meseck, and dwell in the tents of Kedar!' One pertly retorted, '_Gladii +decussati sunt gemina presbyteri clavis_.' The priest confessed his +error, begged pardon, and promised never more to preach against +bundling, or to think amiss of the custom; the ladies generously forgave +him, and went away. + +"It may seem very strange to find this custom of bundling in bed +attended with so much innocence in New England, while in Europe it is +thought not safe or scarcely decent to permit a young man and maid to be +together in private anywhere. But in this quarter of the old world the +viciousness of the one, and the simplicity of the other, are the result +merely of education and habit. It seems to be a part of heroism, among +the polished nations of it, to sacrifice the virtuous fair one, whenever +an opportunity offers, and thence it is concluded that the same +principles actuate those of the new world. It is egregiously absurd to +judge all of all countries by one. In Spain, Portugal and Italy, +jealousy reigns; in France, England, and Holland, suspicion; in the West +and East Indies, lust; in New England, superstition. These four blind +deities govern Jews, Turks, Christians, infidels, and heathen. +Superstition is the most amiable. She sees no vice with approbation but +persecution, and self-preservation is the cause of her seeing that. My +insular readers will, I hope, believe me, when I tell them that I have +seen, in the West Indies, naked boys and girls, some fifteen or sixteen +years of age, waiting at table and at tea, even when twenty or thirty +virtuous English ladies were in the room; who were under no more +embarrassment at such an awful sight in the eyes of English people that +have not traveled abroad, than they would have been at the sight of so +many servants in livery. Shall we censure the ladies of the West Indies +as vicious above all their sex, on account of this local custom? By no +means; for long experience has taught the world that the West Indian +white ladies are virtuous prudes. Where superstition reigns, fanaticism +will be minister of state; and the people, under the taxation of zeal, +will shun what is commonly called vice, with ten times more care than +the polite and civilized Christians, who know what is right and what is +wrong from reason and revelation. Happy would it be for the world, if +reason and revelation were suffered to control the mind and passions of +the great and wise men of the earth, as superstition does that of the +simple and less polished! When America shall erect societies for the +promotion of chastity in Europe, in return for the establishment of +European arts in the American capitals, then Europe will discover that +there is more Christian philosophy in American bundling than can be +found in the customs of nations more polite. + +"I should not have said so much about bundling, had not a learned +divine[23] of the English church published his travels through some +parts of America, wherein this remarkable custom is represented in an +unfavorable light, and as prevailing among the _lower class_ of people. +The truth is, the custom prevails among all classes, to the great honor +of the country, its religion, and ladies. The virtuous may be tempted; +but the tempter is despised. Why it should be thought incredible for a +young man and young woman innocently and virtuously to lie down together +in a bed with a great part of their clothes on, I cannot conceive. Human +passions may be alike in every region; but religion, diversified as it +is, operates differently in different countries. Upon the whole, had I +daughters now, I would venture to let them _bundle_ on the bed, or even +on the sofa, after a proper education, sooner than adopt the Spanish +mode of forcing young people to prattle only before the lady's mother +the chitchat of artless lovers. Could the four quarters of the world +produce a more chaste, exemplary and beautiful company of wives and +daughters than are in Connecticut, I should not have remaining one +favorable sentiment for the province. But the soil, the rivers, the +ponds, the ten thousand landscapes, together with the virtuous and +lovely women which now adorn the ancient kingdoms of Connecticote, +Sassacus, and Quinnipiog, would tempt me into the highest wonder and +admiration of them, could they once be freed ofthe skunk, the +moping-owl, rattlesnake and fanatic Christian." + +Or, to take another example of the abuse heaped by our English cousins +upon this so-called "American custom of bundling." We extract the +following from an article entitled _British Abuse of American Manners_, +published in 1815.[24] It seems that it had long been a custom in the +Westminster school, in the city of London, for the senior students, who +were about to leave that seminary for the university, at the age of +sixteen to eighteen, to have an annual dramatic performance, which was +generally a play of Terence.[25] To this, as annually performed, there +was usually a Latin prologue, and also an epilogue composed for the +occasion and this epilogue turned, for the most part, on the manners of +the day that would bear the gentle correction of good humored satire, in +elegant Latinity. In the epilogue presented at one of these exhibitions, +about 1815, in connection with the performance of Terence's _Phormio_, +the following balderdash (with much else, as applied to American life +and manners) was introduced and spoken by these ingenuous and virtuous +British youth, before a large and enlightened audience: + + "Nec morum dicere promtum est, + Sit ratio simplex, sitne venusta magis. + Æthiopissa palam mensæ formulatur herili + In puris naturalibus, ut loquimur. + Vir braccis se bellus amat nudare décentér, + Strenuus ut choreas ex-que-peditus agat. + Quid quod ibi; quod congere ipsis conque moveri + Dicitur, incolumi nempe pudicitiâ, + Sponte suâ, sine fraude, torum sese audet in unum. + Condere cum casto casta puelle viro? + Quid noctes coenaque Deûm? quid amœna piorum. + Concilia?" + +Which being translated is as follows: + +"Nor is it easy to say whether the tenor of their manners is more to be +admired for simplicity or elegance; a negro wench, as we are told, will +wait on her master at table in native nudity; and a beau will strip +himself to the waist, that he may dance unincumbered, and with more +agility. There, too, we hear of the practice of _bundling_ without any +infraction of female modesty; and the chaste maiden, without any +deception, but with right good will, ventures to share the bed with her +chaste swain! Oh, what nights and banquets, worthy of the gods! What +delightful customs among these pious people?" + +But this spirit of misrepresentation and ridicule, so glaringly apparent +in the foregoing extracts, and which has so universally characterized +all those British travelers and authors who have attempted to describe +our social habits and manners, is fitly rebuked, even as long ago as +1815, by an anonymous writer, whose trenchant pen reminds our British +cousins of the old adage concerning "those who live in glass houses," +etc. + +"From the time of Jack Cade," says he, "to Lord George Gordon, and down +to the present day, neither your _grave_ or _gay_ authorities on the +subject of _bundling_ and _tarrying_ are worthy of criticism. There is a +littleness in noticing, in the _London Quarterly Review_, a work which +heretofore has been distinguished for its taste, chasteness and +celebrity, the observation of travelers who, if men of truth, could only +mean to mention customs (if they were customs) of the most vulgar and +ignorant, which at any rate are now as little known as are the operation +of the blue laws of Connecticut, or part of the penal code enacted to +keep in slavery and subjection the sister kingdom.[26] + +"Englishmen, examine your own cottages, particularly in the north, and +on the borders, and extend your view to the western extremity of your +island. Pray, what term will you give to that promiscuous bundling of +the father, mother, children, sons and daughters-in-law, cousins, and +inmates who call to _tarry_, and not unfrequently stretch themselves in +one common bed of straw on the hovel's floor?[27] + +"Nay, even, in some parts of your empire, the hogs and the cows join the +group, and form a most audible respiration from their noses, getting +vent through the hole in the roof intended for a chimney, or spreading +throughout the clay built edifice with odorific sweetness, though +perhaps not so fragrant and refreshing as was the precious oil poured on +the venerable head of Aaron, which Sternhold and Hopkins tell us filled +the room with pleasure. In the early settlement of this country there +might have been houses in the route of the inquisitive and insidious +European travelers, unprovided with a spare bed on which he might +stretch his limbs; but, now, should Mr. Canning[28] himself visit us, he +need not fear being _bundled_--he need not travel far in any part of the +United States without enjoying the luxury of a soft couch and clean +sheets, where he can ruminate on the injustice he attempts on our +national character." + +Badinage, ridicule and misrepresentation aside, however, there can be no +reasonable doubt that _bundling_ did prevail to a very great extent in +the New England colonies from a very early date. It is equally evident +that it was originally confined almost entirely to the lower classes of +the community, or to those whose limited means compelled them to +economize strictly in their expenditure of firewood and candlelight. +Many, perhaps the majority, of the dwellings of the early settlers, +consisted of but one room, in which the whole family lived and slept. +Yet their innocent and generous hospitality forbade that the stranger, +or the friend whom night overtook on their threshold, should be turned +shelterless and couchless away, so long as they could offer him even +half of a bed. As an example of this we may cite the case of Lieut. +Anbury, a British officer, who served in America during the +Revolutionary War, and whose letters preserve many sprightly and +interesting pictures of the manners and customs of that period. In a +letter dated at Cambridge, New England, November 20, 1777, he thus +speaks: + +"The night before we came to this town [Williamstown, Mass.], being +quartered at a small log hut, I was convinced in how innocent a view the +Americans look upon that indelicate custom they call _bundling_. Though +they have remarkable good feather beds, and are extremely neat and +clean, still I preferred my hard mattress, as being accustomed to it; +this evening, however, owing to the badness of the roads, and the +weakness of my mare, my servant had not arrived with my baggage at the +time for retiring to rest. There being only two beds in the house, I +inquired which I was to sleep in, when the old woman replied, 'Mr. +Ensign,' here I should observe to you, that the New England people are +very inquisitive as to the rank you have in the army; 'Mr. Ensign,' says +she, 'our Jonathan and I will sleep in this, and our Jemima and you +shall sleep in that.' I was much astonished at such a proposal, and +offered to sit up all night, when Jonathan immediately replied, 'Oh, la! +Mr. Ensign, you wont be the first man our Jemima has bundled with, will +it Jemima?' when little Jemima, who, by the bye, was a very pretty, +black-eyed girl, of about sixteen or seventeen, archly replied, 'No, +father, not by many, but it will be with the first Britainer' (the name +they give to Englishmen). In this dilemma what could I do? The smiling +invitation of pretty Jemima--the eye, the lip, the--Lord ha' mercy, +where am I going to? But wherever I may be going now, I did not go to +bundle with her--in the same room with her father and mother, my kind +_host_ and _hostess_ too! I thought of that--I thought of more +besides--to struggle with the passions of nature; to clasp Jemima in my +arms--to--do what? you'll ask--why, to do--nothing! for if amid all +these temptations, the lovely Jemima had melted into kindness, she had +been an outcast from the world--treated with contempt, abused by +violence, and left perhaps to perish! No, Jemima; I could have endured +all this to have been blest with you, but it was too vast a sacrifice, +when you was to be the victim! Suppose how great the test of virtue must +be, or how cold the American constitution, when this unaccountable +custom is in hospitable repute, and perpetual practice."[29] + +Again, in a subsequent letter, the Lieutenant, after describing a New +England sleighing frolic, says: "In England this would be esteemed +extremely imprudent, and attended with dangerous consequences; but, +after what I have related respecting _bundling_, I need not say, in how +innocent a view this is looked upon. Apropos, as to that custom, along +the sea coast, by a continual intercourse among Europeans, it is in some +measure abolished; but they still retain one something similar, which is +termed _tarrying_. When a young man is enamored of a woman, and wishes +to marry her, he proposes the affair to her parents (without whose +consent no marriage, in this colony, can take place); if they have no +objections, he is allowed to tarry with her one night, in order to make +his court. At the usual time the old couple retire to bed, leaving the +young ones to settle matters as they can, who having sat up as long as +they think proper, get into bed together also, but without putting off +their under garments; to prevent scandal. If the parties agree, it is +all very well, the banns are published, and they married without delay; +if not, they part, and possibly never see each other again, unless, +which is an accident that seldom happens, the forsaken fair proves +pregnant, in which case the man, unless he absconds, is obliged to marry +her, on pain of excommunication."[30] + +The word _tarry_, in the sense of _to stop_ or _to stay_, was more used +by our ancestors than by the present generation; yet we think that +Lieut. Anbury was mistaken in his idea that the _tarrying_ was but for a +single night. It is true that marriages were early, and probably the +courtships were short, but we all know enough of New England _sparking_ +to know that a single night was cutting it rather short; and yet it is +easy to see how Anbury should get his erroneous idea. True, if the lover +was so unlucky as to get his final dismissal the first night, there was +an end of the matter, and well might they fail to meet again; but, in +that case, it is not likely that the favors of which he could boast +would be such as to seriously affect the reputation of the girl with +whom he tarried. The fact that in the custom of _tarrying_, the parties +also _bundled_, does not authorize the synonymous use of the two words, +which have nothing in common. For, doubtless many young men _tarried_ +with their sweethearts, who did not _bundle_ with them. + +Again, when, on a sabbath night, the faithful swain arrived, having, +perhaps, walked ten or more weary miles, to enjoy the company of his +favorite lass, in the few brief hours which would elapse before the +morning light should call him again to his homeward walk and his week of +toil, was it not the dictate of humanity as well as of economy, which +prompted the _old folks_ to allow the approved and accepted suitor of +their daughter to pursue his wooing under the downy coverlid of a good +feather bed (oftentimes, too, in the very same room in which they +themselves slept), rather than to have them _sit up_ and _burn out +uselessly_ firewood and _candles_, to say nothing of the risk of +catching their _death a' cold_? Indeed, was not the sanction of bundling +in such cases a tacit admission, on the part of the parents, of their +perfect confidence in the young folks, which necessarily acted upon the +latter as, at once, a strong restraint from wrong, and a strong +incentive to right doing? The influence of early religious training, the +powerful control which the church had obtained upon the social and +domestic life of the people, and the superstitious aspect which, in +those days, the gospel was made to wear, must also be taken into the +account. And, moreover, is it not probable that the universality of the +custom, which certainly cleared it from anything like odium or reproach, +would naturally tend to preclude, in a degree, any improper ideas in the +minds of those who practiced it? Such, then, we consider the _status_ of +the custom in the earlier history of the colonies, and among the _first +generation_ of settlers. + +"But," if the reader will allow us to quote from a previous work, "the +emigration from a civilized to a new country,[31] is necessarily a step +backward into barbarism. The _second generation_ did not fill the place +of the fathers. Reared amid the trials and dangers of a new settlement, +they were in a great measure deprived of the advantages, both social and +educational, which their parents had enjoyed. Nearly all of the former +could write, which cannot be said of their children. Neither did the +latter possess that depth of religious feeling, or earnest practical +piety which distinguished the first comers. Religion was to them less a +matter of the heart than of social privilege, and in the _half way +covenant_ controversy we behold the gradual _letting down of bars_ +between a pure church and a grasping world. + +"The _third_ generation followed in the footsteps of their predecessors. +Then came war; and young New England brought from the long Canadian +campaigns, stores of loose camp vices, and recklessness, which soon +flooded the land with immorality and infidelity. The church was +neglected, drunkenness fearfully increased, and social life was sadly +corrupted."[32] + +It is not, therefore, a matter of surprise that bundling should, in the +increased laxity of public morals, become more frequently abused. Its +pernicious effects became constantly more apparent, and more decidedly +challenged the attention of the comparatively few godly men who +endeavored to stem and to control the rapidly widening current of +immorality which threatened to overwhelm the land.[33] The powerful +intellect of Jonathan Edwards thundered its anathemas upon it; pious +divines prayed against it in their closets, and wrestled with it in +their pulpits; while many attempted by a revision of their church +polity, by greater carefulness in the admission of members; by rules +more stringently framed and enforced, to preserve, as best they might, +the purity of the churches committed to their charge, and to make them, +if it were possible, beacon lights amid the surrounding darkness of the +times.[34] The task, however, was well nigh hopeless. The French wars +were succeeded by that of the American Revolution, and not before the +close of that struggle, may the custom of bundling be said to have +received its deathblow, and even then it _died hard_. + +Its final disuse was brought about by a variety of causes, among which +may be named the improved condition of the people after the Revolution, +enabling many to live in larger and better warmed houses, and in the +very few places where the ministers dared to touch the subject in the +pulpit, as in Dedham, already referred to, a decided effect was +produced, but it was confined to the neighborhood, having very little +effect on the general custom. Probably no single thing tended so much to +break up the practice as the publication of a song, or ballad, in an +almanac, about 1785. + +This ballad described in a free and easy style the various plans adopted +by those who bundled, and rather more than hinted at the results in +certain cases. Being published in an almanac, it had a much larger +circulation than could have been obtained for it in any other way (tract +societies not being then in vogue), and the descriptions were so _pat_, +that each one who saw them was disposed to apply them in a joking way to +any other who was known to practice bundling; and the result was, such a +general storm of banter and ridicule that no girl had the courage to +stand against it, and continue to admit her lovers to her bed. + +We have found many persons who distinctly remember the publication of +this song, and the effect which it had on the public mind, but all our +efforts to find the almanac containing it, have proved of no avail. + +We have, however, been favored with the use of a broadside copy of a +ballad, preserved among the treasures of the American Antiquarian +Society, at Worcester, Massachusetts, which several of our ancient +friends have recognized as identical with that in the almanac, one of +them proving it by repeating from memory several lines from the Almanac +version, which were precisely like that of the broadside, a copy of +which we give herewith. + + +A NEW BUNDLING SONG; + +_Or a reproof to those Young Country Women, who follow that reproachful +Practice, and to their Mothers for upholding them therein_. + +Since bundling very much abounds, +In many parts in country towns, +No doubt but some will spurn my song, +And say I'd better hold my tongue; +But none I'm sure will take offence, +Or deem my song impertinence, +But only those who guilty be, +And plainly here their pictures see. +Some maidens say, if through the nation, +Bundling should quite go out of fashion, +Courtship would lose its sweets; and they +Could have no fun till wedding day. +It shant be so, they rage and storm, +And country girls in clusters swarm, +And fly and buz, like angry bees, +And vow they'll bundle when they please. +Some mothers too, will plead their cause, +And give their daughters great applause, +And tell them, 'tis no sin nor shame, +For we, your mothers, did the same; +We hope the custom ne'er will alter, +But wish its enemies a halter. +Dissatisfaction great appear'd, +In several places where they've heard +Their preacher's bold, aloud disclaim +That bundling is a burning shame; +This too was cause of direful rout +And talk'd and told of, all about, +That ministers should disapprove +Sparks courting in a bed of love, +So justified the custom more, +Than e'er was heard or known before. +The pulpit then it seems must yield, +And female valor take the field, +In places where their custom long +Increasing strength has grown so strong; +When mothers herein bear a sway, +And daughters joyfully obey. +And young men highly pleased too, +Good Lord! what can't the devil do. +Can this vile practice ne'er be broke? +Is there no way to give a stroke, +To wound it or to strike it dead. +And girls with sparks not go to bed +'Twill strike them more than preacher's tongue, +To let the world know what they've done +And let it be in common fame, +Held up to view a noted shame. +Young miss if this your practice be, +I'll teach you now yourself to see: +You plead you're honest, modest too, +But such a plea will never do; +For how can modesty consist, +With shameful practice such as this? +I'll give your answer to the life: +"You don't undress, like man wife," +That is your plea, I'll freely own, +But whose your bondsmen when alone, +That further rules you will not break, +And marriage liberties partake? +Some really do, as I suppose, +Upon design keep on some clothes, +And yet in truth I'm not afraid +For to describe a bundling maid; +She'll sometimes say when she lies down, +She can't be cumber'd with a gown, +And that the weather is so warm, +To take it off can be no harm: +The girl it seems had been at strift; +For widest bosom to her shift, +She gownless, when the bed they're in, +The spark, nought feels but naked skin. +But she is modest, also chaste, +While only bare from neck to waist, +And he of boasted freedom sings, +Of all above her apron strings. +And where such freedoms great are shar'd +And further freedoms feebly bar'd, +I leave for others to relate, +How long she'll keep her virgin state. +Another pretty lass we'll scan, +That loves to bundle with a man, +For many different ways they take, +Through modest rules they all will break. +Some clothes I'll keep on, she will say, +For that has always been my way, +Nor would I be quite naked found, +With spark in bed, for thousand pound. +But petticoats, I've always said, +Were never made to wear in bed, +I'll take them off, keep on my gown, +And then I dare defy the town, +To charge me with immodesty, +While I so ever cautious be. +The spark was pleased with his maid, +Of apprehension quick he said, +Her witty scheme was keen he swore, +Lying in gown open before. +Another maid when in the dark, +Going to bed with her dear spark, +She'll tell him that 'tis rather shocking, +To bundle in with shoes and stockings. +Nor scrupling but she's quite discreet, +Lying with naked legs and feet, +With petticoat so thin and short, +That she is scarce the better for't; +But you will say that I'm unfair, +That some who bundle take more care, +For some we may with truth suppose, +Bundle in bed with all their clothes. +But bundler's clothes are no defence, +Unly[35] horses push the fence; +A certain fact I'll now relate, +That's true indeed without debate. +A bundling couple went to bed. +With all their clothes from foot to head, +That the defence might seem complete, +Each one was wrapped in a sheet. +But O! this bundling's such a witch +The man of her did catch the itch, +And so provoked was the wretch, +That she of him a bastard catch'd. +Ye bundle misses don't you blush, +You hang your heads and bid me hush. +If you wont tell me how you feel, +I'll ask your sparks, they best can tell. +But it is custom you will say, +And custom always bears the sway, +If I wont take my sparks to bed, +A laughing stock I shall be made; +A vulgar custom 'tis, I own, +Admir'd by many a slut and clown, +But 'tis a method of proceeding, +As much abhorr'd by those of breeding. +You're welcome to the lines I've penn'd, +For they were written by a friend, +Who'll think himself quite well rewarded, +If this vile practice is discarded. + + +The party in favor of bundling were able, too, to _keep a poet_, as is +shown by the following ballad, which we transcribe from a printed copy +preserved by the American Antiquarian Society. + + +A NEW SONG IN FAVOUR OF COURTING. + +Adam at first was form'd of dust, +As scripture doth record; +And did receive a wife call'd Eve, +From his Creator Lord. + +From Adam's side a crooked bride, +The Lord was pleas'd to form; +Ordain'd that they in bed might lay +to keep each other warm. + +To court indeed they had no need, +She was his wife at first, +And she was made to be his aid, +Whose origin was dust. + +This new made pair full happy were, +And happy might remain'd, +If his help mate had never ate, +The fruit that was restrain'd. + +Tho' Adam's wife destroy'd his life, +In manner that was awful; +Yet marriage now we all allow +To be both just and lawful. + +But women must be courted first, +Because it is the fashion, +And so at times commit great crimes, +Caus'd by a lustful passion. + +And now a days there are two ways, +Which of the two is right, +To lie between sheets sweet and clean, +Or sit up all the night; + +But some suppose bundling in clothes +Do heaven sorely vex; +Then let me know which way to go, +To court the female sex. + +Whether they must be hugg'd or kiss'd +When sitting by the fire +Or whether they in bed may lay, +Which doth the Lord require? + +But some pretend to recommend +The sitting up all night; +Courting in chairs as doth appear +To them to be most right. + +Nature's request is, grant me rest, +Our bodies seek repose; +Night is the time, and 'tis no crime +To bundle in your clothes, + +Since in a bed a man and maid, +May bundle and be chaste, +It does no good to burn out wood, +It is a needless waste. + +Let coats and gowns be laid aside, +And breeches take their flight, +An honest man and woman can +Lay quiet all the night. + +In Genesis no knowledge is +Of this thing to be got, +Whether young men did bundle then, +Or whether they did not. + +The sacred book says wives they took, +It don't say how they courted, +Whether that they in bed did lay, +Or by the fire sported. + +But some do hold in times of old, +That those about to wed, +Spent not the night, nor yet the light +By fire, or in the bed. + +They only meant to say they sent +A man to chuse a bride, +Isaac did so, but let me know +Of any one beside. + +Man don't pretend to trust a friend, +To choose him sheep and cows, +Much less a wife which all his life +He doth expect to house. + +Since it doth stand each man in hand, +To happify his life, +I would advise each to be wise, +And chuse a prudent wife. + +Since bundling is not the thing, +That judgments will procure, +Go on young men and bundle then, +But keep your bodies pure. + +(Printed and sold by Nathaniel Coverly, Jun. Boston.) + + +The foregoing version is evidently not complete, several verses having +been left out on account of their containing _more truth than poetry_, +but these may be supplied from a manuscript copy, evidently made from +memory, with considerable variations from the printed copy, which by no +means improve it, though the schoolmaster did his best, and probably +saved for us a very complete version of the ballad as it passed from +mouth to mouth before the printed copy was made. + +It was transcribed from a volume of manuscript ballads in the +handwriting of Israel Perkins, of Connecticut, written in 1786, when he +was eighteen years old, and teaching school. + + +THE WHORE ON THE SNOW CRUST. + +1. Adam at first was formed of dust, + As we find on record; + And did receive a wife cal'd Eve, + By a creative word. + +2. From Adam's side a crooked bride, + We find complete in form; + Ordained that they in bed might lay + And keep each other warm. + +3. To court indeed they had no need, + She was his wife at first, + And she was made to be his aid, + Whose origin was dust. + +4. This new made pair full happy were, + And happy might remained, + If his help meet had never eat + The fruit that was restrained. + +5. Tho' Adam's wife destroyed his life + In manner that is awfull; + Yet marriage now we all allow + [To] Be both just and lawfull. + +6. And now a days there is two ways, + Which of the two is write + To lie between sheets sweet and clean + Or sit up all the night. + +7. But some suppose bundling in clothes + The good and wise doth vex; + Then let me know which way to go + To court the fairer sex. + +8. Whether they must be hug'd and buss'd + When setting up all night; + Or whether [they] in bed may lay, + Which doth reason invite? + +9. Nature's request is, give me rest, + Our bodies seek repose; + Night is the time, and 'tis no crime + To bundle in our cloaths. + +10. Since in a bed, a man and maid + May bundle and be chaste: + It doth no good to burn up wood + It is a needless waste. + +11. Let coat and shift be turned adrift, + And breeches take their flight, + An honest man and virgin can + Lie quiet all the night. + +12. But if there be dishonesty + Implanted in the mind, + Breeches nor smocks, nor scarce padlocks + The rage of lust can bind. + +13. Cate, Nance and Sue proved just and true, + Tho' bundling did practise; + But Ruth beguil'd and proved with child, + Who bundling did despise. + +14. Whores will be whores, and on the floor + Where many has been laid, + To set and smoke and ashes poke, + Wont keep awake a maid. + +15. Bastards are not at all times got + In feather beds we know; + The strumpet's oath convinces both + Oft times it is not so. + +16. One whorish dame, I fear to name + Lest I should give offence, + But in this town she was took down + Not more than eight months sence. + +17. She was the first, that on snow crust, + I ever knew to gender + I'll hint no more about this whore + For fear I should offend her. + +18. 'Twas on the snow when Sol was low, + And was in Capricorn, + A child was got, and it will not + Be long ere it is born. + +19. Now unto those that do oppose + The bundling traid, I say + Perhaps there's more got on the floor, + Than any other way. + +20. In ancient books no knowledge is + Of these things to be got; + Whether young men did bundle then, + Or whether they did not. + +21. Sence ancient book says wife they took, + It dont say how they courted; + Whether young men did bundle then, + Or by the fire sported. + + [But some do hold in times of old, + That those about to wed, + Spent not the night, nor yet the light, + By fire, or in the bed.] + +22. They only meant to say they sent + A man to choose a bride; + Isaac was so, but let me know, + If any one beside. + +23. Men don't pretend to trust a friend + To choose him sheep or cows; + Much more a wife whom all his life + He does expect to house. + +24. Sence it doth stand each one in hand + To happyfy his life; + I would advise each to be wise, + And choose a prudent wife. + +25. Sence bundling is not a thing + That judgment will procure; + Go on young men and bundle then, + But keep your bodies pure. + + +Since this work went to press we have been favored, by one of our +antiquarian friends in Massachusetts, with a copy of another poetical +blast against the practice of bundling. It was written in the latter +part of the last, or the first decade of the present century, by a +learned and distinguished clergyman settled in Bristol county, +Massachusetts, who was a graduate of Harvard University, and a doctor of +divinity. The original manuscript from which our copy is made, is very +carefully written out, with corrections apparently of a later date, and +now undoubtedly appears for the first time in printed form. + + +A POEM AGAINST BUNDLING._Dedicated to ye Youth of both Sexes_. + +1. Hail giddy youth, inclined to mirth, + To guilty amours prone, + Come blush with me, to think and see + How shameless you are grown. + +2. 'Tis not amiss to court and kiss, + Nor friendship do we blame, + But bundling in, women with men, + Upon the bed of shame; + +3. And there to lay till break of day, + And think it is no sin, + Because a smock and petticoat + Have chance to lie between. + +4. Such rank disgrace and scandal base, + All modest youth will shun, + For 'twill infest, like plague or pest, + And you will be undone. + +5. Let boars and swine lie down and twine, + And grunt, and sleep, and snore, + But modest girls should not wear tails + Nor bristles any more. + +6. Let rams the sheep mount up and leap, + Without restraint or blame, + But will young men act just like them; + Oh, 'tis a burning shame! + +7. It is not strange that horses range + Unfettered to the last, + But youthful lusts in fetters must + Be chained to virtue fast. + +8. Dogs and bitches wear no breeches, + Clothing for man was made, + Yet men and women strip to their linen, + And tumble into bed. + +9. Yes, brutal youth, it is the truth, + Your modesty is gone, + And could you blush, you'd think as much, + And curse what you have done. + +10. To have done so some years ago, + Was counted more disgrace + Than 'tis of late to propagate + A spurious bastard race. + +11. Quit human kind and herd with swine, + Confess yourself an whore; + Go fill the stye, there live and die, + Or never bundle more. + +12. Shall gentlemen with ladies join + To practice like the brutes, + Then let them keep with cattle and sheep, + And fodder on their fruits. + +13. This cursed course is one great source + Of matches undesigned, + Quarrels and strife twixt man and wife, + And bastards of their kind. + +14. But in excuse of this abuse + It oftentimes is said, + Father and mother did no other + Than strip and go to bed. + +15. But grant some did as you have said, + Yet do they not repent, + And wish that you may never do + What they so much lament? + +16. A stupid ass can't be more base + Than are those guilty youth + Who fill with smart a parent's heart, + And turn it into mirth. + +17. Others do plead hard for the bed, + Their health and weariness, + So drunkards will drink down their swill, + And call it no excess. + +18. Under pretense of self defense, + Others will scold and say, + An honest maid is chaste abed + As any other way. + +19. But where's the man that fire can + Into his bosom take, + Or go through coals on his foot soles + And not a blister make? + +20. Temptation's way has led astray + The likeliest of you all, + And yet you'r found on slippery ground, + And think you cannot fall. + +21. A female meek, with blushing cheek, + Seized in some lover's arms, + Has oft grown weak with Cupid's heat + And lost her virgin charms. + +22. But last of all, up speaks romp Moll + And pleads to be excused, + For how can she e'er married be, + If bundling be refused? + +23. What strange mistake young women, + To hope for sparks this way! + Your fond bold acts can't lay a tax + That men will ever pay. + +24. So cheap and free some women be, + That men are cloyed with sweet, + As horse or cow starve at the mow + With fodder under feet. + +25. 'Tis therefore vain yourselves to screen, + The practice is accurst, + It is condemned by God and man, + The pious and the just. + +26. Should you go on, the day will come, + When Christ your Judge will say, + In _bundles_ bind each of this kind, + And cast them all away. + +27. Down deep in hell there let them dwell, + And bundle on that bed; + There burn and roll without control, + 'Till all their lusts are fed. + + +The evidence presented in the preceding pages, establishes, as we think, +the following facts: + +1st. That the custom, so far as it pertained to the American States, had +its origin as a matter of convenience and necessity. + +2d. That in all stages of its history it was chiefly confined to the +humbler classes of society. + +3d. That its prevalence may be said to have closed with the eighteenth +century. + +It is our opinion that it came nearest to being a universal custom from +1750 to 1780, and that it was, at all times, regarded by the better +classes as a serious evil, and was no more countenanced by them then the +frequenting of grog shops is by the better class of the present day. + +This opinion is corroborated by the remarks of several old persons whom +we have consulted as to their recollections of the custom. Among these, +Mr. B., of East Haddam, Ct., now in his 95th year, says that he well +remembers it; that it could not be called general, though frequent. It +was not practiced among the more intelligent, educated classes, nor +among those who lived in large, well warmed houses. He says it was not +the fashion to bundle with any chap who might call on a girl, but that +it was a special favor, granted only to a favorite lover, who might +consider it a proof of the high regard which the damsel had for him; in +short, it was _only accepted lovers_ who were thus admitted to the bed +of the fair one, and, as he expresses it, only after long continued +urging in most cases.[36] He thinks the fashion ceased about 1790 to +1800, and in consequence of education and refinement; and that _no more +mischief was done then than there is now-a-days_. + +In the same strain, also, spoke the genial Colonel H., a native of +Berlin, Ct., born in 1775. He was perfectly conversant with the custom, +had known the old ladies, in some cases, to go up stairs before +retiring, to see that the bundling couple were comfortable, _tuck 'em +up_, and put on more bedclothes! And stoutly asseverated his belief +"that there wasn't any more mischief done in those days than there is +now." + +Indeed, all the old people with whom we have conversed on the matter, +although in some cases a little unwilling to own that they had ever +practiced it themselves, were unanimous in their belief that the abuse +of chastity under the bundling regime was no more frequent than it is +now. One old gentleman of whom we have heard, in reply to the half +reproachful, half joking question of his grandson, whether he wasn't +ashamed, replied: "Why, no! What is the use of sitting up all night and +burning out fire and lights, when you could just as well get under kiver +and keep warm; and, when you get tired, take a nap and wake up fresh, +and go at it again? Why, d--n it, there wasn't half as many bastards +then as there are now!"[37] + +Even within the present century we have found traces of the continuance +of the practice of bundling, though the instances are perhaps few, and +in some measure exceptional. Until a very late day the custom (as a +matter of convenience) was prevalent among the Dutch settlers of +Pennsylvania, and it is not improbable that traces may still continue to +exist in some of the more remote counties of that state. An old +schoolmaster who flourished in Glastenbury, Ct., some twenty years ago, +when relating his experiences in teaching in southern Pennsylvania, and +speaking of _boarding around_, informed us that when for any reason he +did not choose to go to his boarding place for the time being, he was +accustomed to stop at a tavern kept by an honest old Dutchman. On one +occasion, having asked the landlord if he could stay over night, he was +told that he could; and after chatting with his host through the +evening, was shown to bed. The landlord set down the candle and had gone +out of the room, when our friend noticed the only bed in the room was +already occupied, and calling to the host, notified him of the fact; +when he cried back: "Oh! dat ish only mine taughter; she won't hurt +nopoty," and coolly went his way. And our friend affirmed that he found +the daughter not only harmless, but also quite competent to take care of +herself. + +In New England, we believe that Cape Cod has the dubious honor of +holding out the longest against the advance of civilization, bundling, +as we have it on good authority, having been practiced there as late as +1827.[38] In Greenwich, New Jersey, it was in vogue in 1816. In the +state of New York this custom came under judicial cognizance in the year +1804, when the supreme court held, that although bundling was admitted +to be the custom in some parts of the state, it being proven that the +parents of the girl, for whose seduction the suit was brought, +countenanced her practicing it, they had no right to complain, or ask +satisfaction for the consequences, which, the court say, "_naturally +followed it_!"[39] + + + + +APPENDIX I. + + +BUNDLING. + +[From _The Yankee_ of August 13, 1828, published at Portland, Maine, and +edited by John Neal.] + + +By Rochefoucault, in accounting for the populousness of Massachusetts, +the New Englanders are charged with bundling. + +By Chastelleux, whose book I am not able to refer to now, the charge is +repeated, and by half a score of other honest, good natured people, who +have made books about the New World. + +But, if you enquire into the business, you are pretty sure to be told, +inquire where you may, that bundling is not known _there_, but somewhere +further back in the woods, or further _down east_. Nay, while in every +part of the United States the multitude speak of bundling as the habit +of their neighbors, either east, west, north, or south, where the +witches of the country were _located_ about a century ago by the +grandfathers of this generation, I, myself, though I have taken trouble +enough to learn the truth, have never yet been able to meet with a case +of bundling--of bundling proper, I should say--in the United States, nor +with but one trustworthy individual who had ever met with so much as one +case, and he had met with _but_ one, for which he would give his word. +These things are trifles; but when they are told in books that are read +and trusted to throughout Europe; such books, too, as that of the +Marquis de Chastelleux, or that of De Rouchefoucault, it becomes a +matter of serious inquiry. The truth must be told, whatever it is, for +the truth cannot be so bad, whatever it may be, as the untruth which is +now repeated of us. + +The travels of Chastelleux are translated by an Englishman who had been +a long while in this country. The book was undoubtedly written with +great care, by a very honest, able man, who had very good opportunities +of knowing the truth; and is now set off by another very honest, able +man, who was, if anything, rather partial to America--enough to make one +wary of trusting the report of any traveler who does not say in so many +words, after establishing a character for himself--I saw this; I heard +this; I take nobody's word for what I now say, etc., etc. It would be +easy to enumerate a multitude of other stories which are now believed +in, about the people of the United States, not only by the people of +Europe, and of Great Britain particularly, but by the people of the +United States themselves. But a dry catalogue of such things would be of +little use. + +[Here he refers to the charge reported of New Englanders, that that they +_eat pork and molasses--pork and molasses_ TOGETHER, which is here +denied as a ridiculous story. H. R. S.] + +They bundle in Wales; bundling there is a serious matter. A lady--a +Welsh woman whose word is truth itself--assured me not long ago, that in +her country they do not think a bit the worse, of a girl for +anticipating her duties, in other words, for being a mother before she +has been a wife; they have discovered, perhaps, that cause and effect +may be convertible terms; that in such a serious matter, none but a fool +would buy a pig in the poke, and that, after all, maternity may lead to +marriage there, as marriage leads to maternity here. And why not? for +after the establishment of the lying-in hospitals of Russia, the +unmarried who bore _children to the state_ were proud of the duty, and +were looked upon, we are told, with great favor by the public. She +added, also, that she was once at a party made up of sixteen or eighteen +females, and females of good characters, all but one or two of whom were +mothers, or had been so, before they were married. By Chastelleux and +his English translator it would appear to have been very much the same +in America about the years 1780-1-2. It is not so now. To have had a +child before marriage would now be fatal to a woman here, whatever might +be her condition or beauty; fatal in every shape. No man would have +courage to marry her; no woman of character would associate with her. +Ask the first individual you meet, above the age of twelve or thirteen +here, and you may have the name and history of every poor girl in the +neighborhood who has been so unlucky as to have a child of her own +without leave, perhaps, within a period of six or eight years in a +populous neighborhood of twenty or thirty miles about. A widow with half +a score of children, forty years ago, if we may believe Dr. Franklin, +was an object for the fortune hunters of America. It is not so now. The +demand for widows, and for every sort of ready made family is beginning +to be over. + +That which is called bundling here, though bad enough, is not a +twentieth part so bad. Here it is only a mode of courtship. The parties +instead of sitting up together, go to bed together; but go to bed with +their clothes on. This would appear to be a perilous fashion; but I have +been assured by the individual above, that he had proof to the contrary; +for in the particular case alluded to, the only case I ever heard of on +good authority, although he was invited by the parents of a pretty girl +who stood near him, to bundle with her, and although he _did_ bundle +with her, he had every reason to believe, that if he had been very free, +or more free than he might have been at a country frolick after they had +invited him to escort her, to sit up with her, to dance with her, he +would have been treated as a traitor by all parties. He had a fair +opportunity of knowing the truth, and he spoke of the matter as if he +would prefer the etiquette of sitting up to the etiquette of going to +bed with a girl who had been so brought up. He complained of her as a +prude. The following communication appears, however, to be one that may +be depended on:[40] + + "MR. NEAL--If you wish to know the truth about bundling, I think + your correspondent V. could tell you all about it--it seems by his + confession that he has practiced it on a large scale. I never heard + of the thing till about three years ago; an acquaintance of mine had + gone to spend the summer with an aunt, who lived somewhere near + Sandy river.[41] The following is a copy of one of her letters while + there: + + "'I should have written sooner, so don't think me unkind, for I have + been waiting for something to write about. You requested me to give + you a faithful description of the country, the manners and customs + of the inhabitants, etc. I have not been here quite three months, + but I have been everywhere, seen everything, and got acquainted with + everybody. I shall certainly inform you of everything I have seen or + heard that is worth relating. + + "'You remember how you told me, before I left home, that I was so + well looking that if I went so far back in the country I should be + very much admired and flattered, and have as many lovers as I could + wish for. I find it all true. The people here are remarkably kind + and attentive to me; they seem to think that I must be something + more than common because I have always lived so near Portland. + + "'But I must tell you that since I have been here I have had a beau. + You must know that the young men, _in particular_, are very + attentive to me. Well, among these is _one_ who is considered the + finest young man in the place, and well he may be--he owns a good + farm, which has a large barn upon it, and a neat two story house, + all finished. These are the fruits of his own industry; besides he + is remarkably good looking, is very large but well-proportioned, and + has a good share of what I call real manly beauty. Soon after my + arrival here I was introduced to this man--no, not _introduced_ + neither, for they never think of such a thing here. They all know me + of course, because I am a _stranger_. Some days, three, four, or + half a dozen, call to see me, whom I never before saw or heard of; + they come and speak to me as if I were an old acquaintance, and I + converse with them as freely as if I had always known them from + childhood. In this kind of a way I got acquainted with my beau, that + _was_; he was very attentive to me from our first meeting. If we + happened to be going anywhere in company he was sure to offer me his + arm--no, I am wrong again, he never offered me his arm in his life. + If you go to walk with a young man here, instead of offering you his + arm as the young men do up our way, he either takes your hand in + his, or passes one arm around your waist; and this he does with such + a provoking, careless honesty, that you cannot for your life be + offended with him. Well, I had walked with my Jonathan several times + in this kind of style. I confess there was something in him I could + not but like--he does not lack for wit, and has a good share of + common sense; his language is never studied--he always seems to + speak from the heart. So when he asked what sort of a companion he + would make, I very candidly answered, that I thought he would make a + very agreeable one. "I think just so of you," said he, "and it shall + not be my fault," he continued, "if we are not companions for life." + "We shall surely make a bargain," said he, after sitting silent a + few moments, "so we'll _bundle_ to-night." "_Bundle_ what?" I asked. + "_We_ will bundle together," said he; "you surely know what I mean." + I know that our farmers bundle _wheat_, _cornstalks_ and _hay_; do + you mean that you want me to help you bundle any of these?" inquired + I. "I mean that I want you to stay with me to-night! It is the + custom in this place, when a man stays with a girl, if it is warm + weather, for them to throw themselves on the bed, outside the bed + clothes; if the weather is cold, they crawl under the clothes, then + if they have anything to _say_, they say it--when they get tired of + talking they go to sleep; this is what we call bundling--now what do + you call it in your part of the world?" "We have no such works," + answered I; "not amongst respectable people, nor do I think that any + people would, that either thought themselves respectable, or wished + to be thought so." + + "'Don't be too severe upon us, Miss ----, I have always observed + that those who _make believe_ so much modesty, have in reality but + little. I always act as I feel, and speak as I think. I wish you to + do the same, but have none of your make-believes with me--you + smile--you begin to think you have been a little too scrupulous--you + have no objection to bundling _now_, have you?" "Indeed I have." "I + am not to be trifled with; so, if you refuse, I have done with you + forever." "Then be done as quick as you please, for I'll not bundle + with you nor with any other man." "Then farewell, proud girl," said + he. "Farewell, honest man," said I, and off he went sure enough. + + "'I have since made inquiries about _bundling_, and find that it is + _really_ the custom here, and that they think no more harm of it, + than we do our way of a young couple sitting up together. I have + known an instance, since I have been here, of a girl's taking her + sweetheart to a neighbor's house and asking for a bed or two to + lodge in, or rather to _bundle_ in. They had company at her + father's, so that their beds were occupied; she thought no harm of + it. She and her family are respectable. + + "'Grandmother says bundling was a very common thing in our part of + the country, in old times; that most of the first settlers lived in + log houses, which seldom had more than one room with a fire place; + in this room the old people slept, so if one of their girls had a + sweetheart in the winter she must either sit with him in the room + where her father and mother slept, or take him into her sleeping + room. She would choose the latter for the sake of being alone with + him; but sometimes when the cold was very severe, rather than freeze + to death, they would crawl under the bed-clothes; and this, after a + while, became a habit, a custom, or a fashion. The man that I am + going to send this by, is just ready to start, so I cannot stop to + write more now. In my next I'll give you a more particular account + of the people here. Adieu.' + + "_Mr. Editor_, you may be sure that what is related in the foregoing + letter is the truth. I know that there is considerable _other_ + information in it, mixed up with _that_ about which you wished to be + informed, but I could not very well separate it." + +So after all that has been said of the practice of bundling in our +country, by foreign writers, travelers, and reviewers--after all the +reproach that has been heaped upon us, now that we are able to get at +the plain truth, it appears to be, though certainly a bad practice, not +half so bad as the junketing and sitting up courtships that are known +elsewhere. Nay, more. Though in the present state of society it is a +practice that should be utterly discountenanced everywhere, still it +would seem to have grown up out of the peculiar circumstances of our +first settlers; to be confined _now_ to remote and small districts (for +I have heard of only three instances, after all my inquiry); and to be +rapidly going out of practice. Yet more; there can be no bad intentions, +there can be no evil consequences, where respectable and modest women +are not ashamed to acknowledge that they bundle. I am anxious to know +the truth for the purpose of correcting both the _misrepresentations_ +that are abroad, and the _practices_ that prevail here. Bundling, +however, is known in other countries, where they have less excuse, and +in Wales where they do _not_ bundle, as I have said before, it is no +reproach for a woman to have had a child before marriage. It was so in +Russia after Catharine established her lying-in hospitals. + +In the next number of _The Yankee_ (August 20th) there is the following +editorial paragraph: + + + BUNDLING. + + There is a great outcry just now about the paper on bundling which + was in the last _Yankee_. Now this very outcry proves the want of + the very paper alluded to. The article is about bundling; and people + who imagine bundling to be what it is not, a highly improper and + unchaste familiarity, are offended with it; but the very purpose of + that paper is to show that bundling is not what it is believed to + be, that it is neither so common nor so bad, not a fiftieth part so + bad as people have imagined. + + + + +APPENDIX II. + + +That the customs of courtship in many parts of the United Kingdom at the +present day, are precisely what they were in some parts of New England, +New Jersey and Pennsylvania, fifty years ago, is evident from the +revelations of the _Royal Commission on the Marriage Laws_, in the year +1868. Dr. Strahan, a physician and surgeon, who for nearly forty years +has practiced in the Scottish county of Stirling, testifies before the +commission, that his attention was first drawn to the subject in +consequence of observing the very great extent of immorality among the +working classes, not only as evidenced by the large number of +illegitimate children, but also by the still larger number of marriages +after the woman was with child; and the number of children born within +eight months of wedlock. He found, to his astonishment, that among the +working classes (i.e., the agricultural laborers), nine out of ten +women, when married, either had had illegitimate children, or were +pregnant at the time of marriage. "I have," he says, "a large midwifery +practice, and I very rarely attend a woman with her first child, where +the child is not born within a few months of wedlock, or else she has +had an illegitimate child before." He believes it is very common for +women to allow themselves to be seduced in the hope of being married. +They go on until they are _enceinte_, and then, if the young man is at +all a decent fellow, the friends interfere and the marriage is hurried +on. The sketch which Dr. Strahan supplies of Scotch courtships, explains +all this part of his observation. Young men and women meet together at +night, and the ordinary time is the middle of the night, when every one +else is in bed. "It is universal," says Dr. Strahan to the commission, +"among the working classes, to have this manner of courtship of which I +speak; there is no other courtship, in any other form; the fathers and +mothers will not allow their daughters to meet a young man in the +day-time; the young man never visits the family, but the parents quite +allow this; they have done it themselves before, and there is no +objection to it. The young man comes, makes a noise at the window; the +young woman goes out, they go to some outhouse; or perhaps the young man +is admitted to the young woman's bedroom after all are in bed, and there +is an hour or two of what is called courtship, but which would more +properly be called flirtation, because it is not necessary that there +should be any engagement to marry in these cases." + +Lord Lyveden inquired: "Do these meetings take place at particular +periods, such as harvest time, or is it over the whole of the year?" + +_Answer_: "The whole of the year; very commonly the young man visits the +young woman once a week." + +Lord Chelmsford said: "In England that would be called _keeping +company_. It is a very extraordinary way of keeping company when the +parents allow their daughter to go out with the young man at midnight, +or the young man to come into her bedroom." + +_Answer_: "Yes; the parents know no other way of doing it. I have +reasoned with the parents often when attending a case of illegitimate +birth, pointing out to the parents how it is they have been led on, but +they cannot imagine any other way of doing it; their daughters must have +husbands, and there is no other way of courting." + +Mr. Justice O'Hagan asking--"Does it prevail generally in Scotland?" was +answered--"Universally among the agricultural laborers." + +In reply to an inquiry by Mr. Dunlop, whether these young men lived +under any kind of supervision and knowledge of their masters, or whether +they could go out and in as they pleased, Dr. Strahan stated that +"plowmen, for instance, very often live in _bothies_, or in the farm +house; they get out after all are in bed, out of the window; or, if they +live in a bothie, without any trouble. They go to the neighboring +farm-house, they knock at the window, the girl comes to the window, and, +if she know the young man--or, after a little parley, if she does not +know him--she either comes out and goes with him to an outhouse, or he +comes into her bedroom. You must remember that they have no other means +of intercourse." + +"That is the point you press so much?" + +"Yes; a young woman cannot see either a sweetheart or an acquaintance in +any other way. I believe if it was not for fear of being out at night, +the girls would visit one another in the same way; they have no other +means of visiting; the customs of the country are such that a young man +could not be seen going in day-light to visit his sweetheart." + +Mr. Justice O'Hagan: "If the father knew that the young man was coming +into the house, and knew that he was with his daughter, would he not +interfere?" + +"He would lie comfortably in his bed, knowing that his daughter was in +an out-house or barn with a young man, for perhaps two hours; shutting +his eyes to it in the same way that a person in the higher ranks would +shut his eyes to his daughter going out for a walk with a young man." + +Dr. Strahan said also: "When you come to the middle class a young man +would not marry a girl that had had a child to another man; and very +probably he would not marry a girl that had had a child to himself; but +in the lower classes it is not so; it is almost universal to marry a +woman that has had a child, or that is with child to himself; but it is +very frequent to marry a woman that has had a child to another man; the +only objection is the burden of the child; the burden of the child might +be an obstacle, but the disgrace would be none." + +"Is it supposed," asked a commissioner, "that the woman, by marrying +this other man, wipes off her disgrace with the former?" + +"Yes; but it is so common that the disgrace is not so much as to prevent +the young man marrying her." + +The attorney-general: "It is hardly within our inquiry, but still it is +interesting to know; can you tell me whether, in these cases, where the +woman marries a man who is not the father of her child, any confusion, +as to the parent of the previously born child, arises? Are they apt in +law, to pass as the children of the subsequent husband?" + +"No, I do not think so." + +"The distinction is always kept up?" + +"The distinction is always kept up; very often the illegitimate child +goes by his own father's name, even among the other children; and I do +not think there is apt to be any confusion of that kind." + +Still, it seems that, in severely Calvinistic Scotia, the church does +not wholly wink at this state of things. The sinning couple, after +marriage, have to go through a certain whitewashing at church before +they are admitted to what are called church privileges. They have to go +before a kirk session, consisting of the minister and perhaps half a +dozen elders, when they are _admonished_. If the parties are married, +they appear but once; if not married, generally three times. They tender +themselves for rebuke without invitation, as without it the child cannot +be baptized, or admission given to the sacrament. They apply to the +minister in private, and confess their fault, and he causes them to be +summoned before the church session. + + + + +INDEX. +African tribes, courtship among, 42 +America, English misrepresentation of, 62. +America, bundling in, 44 + inherits bundling from Holland, 45. + bundling not peculiar to, 13. + bundling universal in 1750, 106. + +Ballads against bundling, 81, 100. + in favor of bundling, 88, 93. +Brychan, a cloth, 23. +Bundling, antiquity of, 14. +Bundling, abuse of, in New England, 75. + ballads on, 81, 88, 93, 100. + ceased with eighteenth century, 106, + confined to the lower classes, 107. +Bundling, described by Lt. Anbury in 1777, 66. + definition of, 13. + decision of N. Y. Supreme Court on, 111. + effect of, 75. + in America, 44. + in British isles, 14, 22. + in Cape Cod, 110. + in Holland, 35. +Bundling in Maine about 1828, 117. + in New England States, 48. + in Wales, 23, 115. + introduced in America from Holland, 45. + mentioned by Rev. Sam'l Peters, 51. + mentioned by Washington Irving, 49. + mentioned by Dr. A. Burnaby, 1759, 58. + mentioned by Sir Walter Scott, 20. + not peculiar to America, 13. +Bundling originating in poverty in Scotland and Ireland, 23. + origin of, 14. + originally confined to the lower classes in America, 65. + practiced in Pennsylvania till late years, 109. + preached against, 54. + recollections of by old persons, 106. +Bundling regarded as a serious evil, 106. + sanctioned by parents, 69. + sermon against, 77. + two forms of, 13. + universal now in lower classes of Scotland, 130. + universal in America in 1750, 106. + -up, in Wales, 42. + +Cape Cod, bundling practiced there in 1827, 110. +Central Asia, courtship in, 42. +Confession in public necessary for baptism of children, 76. +Courtship, customs of, in Great Britain, 127. +Courtship among Welsh peasantry, 29. + in Central Asia, 42. + in the 14th century, 37. + among N. A. Indians, 40. + in Switzerland, 38. +Cuckold, no word in Gaelic for, 21. +Customs of courtship, different in the cantons of Switzerland, 39. + +Dayaks of Borneo, courtship of, 42. +Dorfen, in Switzerland, 39. + +Empress Cartismandua, 21. + Julia, 20. +Epilogue on bundling at Westminster school, 1815, 61. + +Free-bench, 22. +French war, demoralizing influence of, 74. + + +Germans, respect of, for women, 21. +Gordon, Sir Robert, 19. + Sir Adam, 19. +Great Britain, bundling common at the present day in, 126. +Great Britain, immorality of lower classes in, 127. +Gwent, a district in Wales, 34. +Gwentian Code of Wales, 34. + +Hand-fasting, a Scotch custom, 17, 19. + common among all classes, 20. +Highland law of marriage, 16. +Highlanders, curious custom of the, 17. +Holland, bundling in, 35, 36. + +Illegitimacy not considered a disgrace in Scotland, 131. + +Kiltgang in canton of Lucerne. 39. +Kweesten, a Dutch custom, 36. + +La Hontan, Indian custom described by, 41. +Lichtgetren, in Switzerland, 39. +Love and courtship in the 14th century, 37. + +Maine, bundling in, 1828, 118. +Marriage laws of Great Britain, royal commission on, 127. +Marriage, Welsh laws relating to, 24. + +Namzat bezé, an African custom, 42. +Natural children legitimatized in Scotland, 18. +New bundling song, a, 81. +New England, bundling in, 48. +New song in favor of courting, a, 88. +New York Supreme Court on bundling, 111. +N. Am. Indians, chastity of, 41-52. + courtship among, 41. + +Pennsylvania, bundling in, 109. +Poem against bundling, a, 100. +Polygamy among ancient nations, 15. + in Great Britain, 15. +Prostitutes, punishment of in Scotland and Germany, 21. +Public confession of unlawful cohabitation made in New England, 75. + records of, 75. + +Quest, definition of and origin, 35. +Queesting, 35. + +Royal commission on marriage laws of Great Britain, 127. + +Savage nations, amatory customs of, 40. +Scotland, courtship of, 128. + conjugal infidelity in, 17. + admonition by church of, 133. +Scotch and Irish moral character, 22. +Scott, Walter, mention of bundling by, 20. +Stubetegetren in Switzerland, 39. +Sutherland, son of a hand-fast marriage claims earldom of, 19. +Switzerland, courtship in, 38. + +Tarrying, common in England, 64. + in New England, 70. +Texel, bundling in the island of, 36. + +United States, bundling in the, 44. + +Vlie and Wieringen, bundling practiced in islands of, 35. + +Wales, bundling in, 23. + described by Bingley, 28; + by Barbor, 30; + by Carr, 32; + by Pratt, 25. + chastity in, 115. +Welsh laws relating to marriage, 24. +Whore on the snow crust, the, 93. +Wieringen, see Vlie. +Wynet-werth, a Welsh term, 35. + + + + +FOOTNOTES. + + +[1] _Cæsar_ says, that several brothers, or a father and his sons, would +have but one wife among them. _Solinus_, indeed, says that the women in +Thule were common, the king having a free choice; and _Dio_ says the +Caledonians had wives in common; yet these assertions may well be +disputed. _Strabo_ describes the Irish as extremely gross in this +matter; _O'Conner_ says polygamy was permitted; and _Derrick_ tells us +they exchanged wives once or twice a year; while _Campion_ says they +only married for a year and a day, sending their wives home again for +any slight offense.--_Logan's Scottish Gael_, 5th Am. ed., p. 472. + +[2] _A History of the Highlands, and of the Highland Clans_, etc. (Jas. +Browne, LL.D., Advocate, 4 vols. London, 1853), IV, 398. + +"The law of marriage observed in the Highlands has frequently been as +little understood as that of succession, and similar misconceptions have +prevailed regarding it. This was, perhaps, to be expected. In a country +where a bastard son was often found in undisturbed possession of the +chiefship or property of a clan, and where such bastard generally +received the support of the clansmen against the claims of the feudal +heir, it was natural to suppose that very loose notions of succession +were entertained by the people; that legitimacy conferred no exclusive +rights; and that the title founded on birth alone might be set aside in +favor of one having no other claim than that of election. But this, +although a plausible, would nevertheless be an erroneous supposition. +The person here considered as a bastard, and described as such, was by +no means viewed in the same light by the Highlanders, because, according +to their law of marriage, which was originally very different from the +feudal system in this matter, his claim to legitimacy was as undoubted +as that of the feudal heir afterward became. It is well known that the +notions of the Highlanders were peculiarly strict in regard to matters +of hereditary succession, and that no people on earth was less likely to +sanction any flagrant deviation from what they believed to be the right +and true line of descent. All their peculiar habits, feelings and +prejudices were in direct opposition to a practice which, had it been +really acted upon, must have introduced endless disorder and confusion, +and hence the natural explanation of this apparent anomaly seems to be, +what Mr. Skene has stated, namely, that a person who was feudally a +bastard might in their view be considered as legitimate, and therefore +entitled to be supported in accordance with their strict ideas of +hereditary right, and their habitual tenacity of whatever belonged to +their ancient usages. Nor is this mere conjecture or hypothesis. A +singular custom regarding marriage, retained till a late period amongst +the Highlanders, and clearly indicating that their law of marriage +originally differed in some essential points from that established under +the feudal system, seems to afford a simple and natural explanation of +the difficulty by which genealogists have been so much puzzled. + +"This custom was termed _hand-fasting_, and consisted in a species of +contract between two chiefs, by which it was agreed that the heir of one +should live with the daughter of the other as her husband for twelve +months and a day. If, in that time, the lady became a mother, or proved +to be with child the marriage became good in law, even although no +priest had performed the marriage ceremony in due form; but should there +not have occurred any appearance of issue, the contract was considered +at an end, and each party was at liberty to marry or hand-fast with any +other. It is manifest that the practice of so peculiar a species of +marriage must have been in terms of original law among the Highlanders, +otherwise it would be difficult to conceive how such a custom could have +originated, and it is in fact one which seems naturally to have arisen +from the form of their society, which rendered it a matter of such vital +importance to secure the lineal succession of their chiefs. It is +perhaps not improbable that it was this peculiar custom which gave rise +to the report handed down by the Roman and other historians, that the +ancient inhabitants of Great Britain had their wives in common, or that +it was the foundation of that law of Scotland by which natural children +became legitimatized by subsequent marriage.[3] And as this custom +remained in the Highlands until a very late period, the sanction of +ancient custom was sufficient to induce them to persist in regarding the +offspring of such marriages as legitimate."[4] + +It appears, indeed, that as late as the sixteenth century, the issue of +a hand-fast marriage claimed the earldom of Sutherland. The claimant, +according to Sir Robert Gordon, described himself as one lawfully +descended from his father, John, the third earl, because, as he alleged, +"his mother was _hand-fasted_ and fianced to his father;" and his claim +was bought off (which shows that it was not considered as altogether +incapable of being maintained) by Sir Adam Gordon, who had married the +heiress of Earl John. Such, then, was the nature of the peculiar and +temporary connection which gave rise to the apparent anomalies which we +have been considering. It was a custom which had for its object, not to +interrupt but to preserve the lineal succession of the chiefs, and to +obviate the very evil of which it is conceived to afford a glaring +example. But after the introduction of the feudal law, which, in this +respect, was directly opposed to the ancient Highland law, the lineal +and legitimate heir, according to Highland principles, came to be +regarded as a bastard by the government, which accordingly considered +him as thereby incapacitated for succeeding to the honors and property +of his race; and hence originated many of those disputes concerning +succession and chiefship, which embroiled families with one another, as +well as with the government, and were productive of incredible disorder, +mischief and bloodshed. No allowance was made for the ancient usages of +the people, which were probably but ill understood; and the rights of +rival claimants were decided according to the principles of a foreign +system of law, which was long resisted, and never admitted except from +necessity. It is to be observed, however, that the Highlanders +themselves drew a broad distinction between bastard sons and the issue +of the hand-fast unions above described. The former were rigorously +excluded from every sort of succession, but the latter were considered +as legitimate as the offspring of the most regularly solemnized +marriage. + +This practice obtained not only among chiefs, but common people. + +Walter Scott, in the XXV chapter of the _Monastery_, in a note, says: +"This custom of hand-fasting actually prevailed in the upland days. It +arose partly from the want of priests. While the convents subsisted, +monks were detached on regular circuits through the wilder districts, to +marry those who had lived in this species of connexion. A practice of +the same kind existed in the Isle of Portland." + +[3] This is a mistake in point of law. The principle of legitimation by +subsequent marriage, was first explicitly announced in an imperial +constitution of Constantine, and being wisely recognized by the church, +it was adopted by the canonists, through whom it passed into our law. +The attempt to introduce it into England failed, in consequence of the +attachment of the people to their ancient Saxon constitutions; and +hence, although it was recognized in the statutes of Merton, it was +subsequently discarded, and never afterwards found admission into the +municipal system of the neighboring kingdom. There can be no doubt +whatever that the principle is one which reason, morality and religion +must equally approve. + +[4] Skene's _Highlanders of Scotland_, vol. I, chap. vii, 166, 167. + +[5] In _Scottish Ballads and Songs_, by James Maidment, Edinburgh, +MDCCCLIX, under the title of _Luckidad's Garland_, p. 134, is a +remarkable picture of the old and new times in Scotland, eighty or +ninety years ago, three of the twenty-four verses of which the ballad is +composed, being descriptive of something akin to _bundling_. In a London +edition of _Hudibras_, also, published in 1811, is a note to line 913, +of Part I, Canto I. As both of these extracts, however, are somewhat too +_broad_ for our pages, we content ourselves with simply referring +thereto. In the same category, also, is the definition, in _Bailey's Old +English Dictionary_, of the term _free bench_, as prevailing in the +manors of East and West Embourn, Chaddleworth in the county of Berks, +Tor in Devonshire, and other places of the west. + +[6] _History of Wales_ (by B. B. Woodward, B.A., London, 1853), p. 320; +who adds, also, p. 186, the following: + +"The laws which treat of the violation of the marriage bond and those +which relate to chastity generally, recognize a degree of laxity +respecting female honor, and, yet more remarkably, an absence of +feminine delicacy, such as could scarcely be paralleled amongst the most +uncivilized people now. They are of such a nature, that though most +characteristic, they must be passed by with this general mention. The +distinction between the Celtic and Teutonic races is perhaps in no case +more plainly marked than in this: The Anglo-Saxon laws on this subject +(always excepting those of the _ecclesiastical_ authorities) are modesty +itself, notwithstanding their plain speaking, compared with those of the +Welsh legislators." + +[7] _Gleanings through Wales, Holland, and Westphalia_, etc. (3d +edition, by Mr. Pratt, London, 1797), I, pp. 105-107. + +[8] _North Wales, including its Scenery, Antiquities, Customs_, etc. (by +Rev. W. W. Bingley, A.M., 2 vols., 8vo, London, 1804), II, p. 282. + +[9] _A Tour throughout North Wales and Monmouthshire_, etc., etc. (by +J. T. Barbor, F.S.A., London, 1803), pp. 103-9. + +[10] _The Stranger in Ireland_, by John Carr. + +[11] "On his way to Ireland he passed through Wales, and gives us a +slight sketch of the character of that people and country. _It must +afford no small gratification to a New England man to learn that the +practice of_ BUNDLING _is not peculiar to us, but that this pleasing +though dangerous art was probably imported from abroad_."--A review of +_The Stranger in Ireland_, in _Connecticut Courant_ for November 19th, +1806. + +[12] In this connection we may give the following extract from _Ancient +Laws and Institutes of Wales_, etc., etc., printed by command of his +late Majesty King William IV, under the direction of the commissioners +on the Public Records of the Kingdom. MDCCCXLI. Folio. From page +369.--The Gwentian[13] Code. + +"A woman of full age who goes with a man clandestinely, and taken by him +to bush, or brake, or house, and after connection deserted; upon +complaint made by her to her kindred, and to the courts, is to receive, +for her chastity, a bull of three winters, having its tail well shaven +and greased and then thrust through the door-clate; and then let the +woman go into the house, the bull being outside, and let her plant her +foot on the threshold, and let her take his tail in her hand, and let a +man come on each side of the bull; and if she can hold the bull, let her +take it for her _wynet-werth_[14] and her chastity; and, if not, let her +take what grease may adhere to her hands." + +[13] _Gwent_, the appellation of the district in Wales inhabited by the +Silures, comprised the diocese of Landav. + +[14] This word means _face shame_ or _face worth_. + +[15] A good honest word, which although not exactly English, is at least +first cousin to our _quest_, and _quiz_, etc. + +Worcester gives the following: "†Quēse, _v. a._, to search after. +_Milton_." [obsolete ē long, s like z.] Quĕst, _v. n._, to join search. +_B. Jonson_. †Quĕster, _n._, a seeker. _Rowe_. + +Is it not allowable to derive from one of these words Quēsing, or +Quĕsting, pronounced Qweesting, and from the other Quĕsting [è short]? +So that he who went _queesting_ was simply _searching after_ a wife, +understood. + +[16] These are two very small islands at the opening of the Zuider zee. + +[17] From _The Student and Intellectual Observer_, London, November +number, 1868, p. 310, in article by Thomas Wright, F.S.A. Chapter +vii--_Womankind in all Ages of Western Europe_, etc. + +[18] _Cottages of the Alps_ (London, 1860), pages 77, 91, 132. + +[19] _New Voyage to North America, giving a full Account of the Customs, +Commerce, Religion and Strange Opinions of the Savages of that Country_, +etc., etc. Written by Baron Lahontan, Lord Lieutenant of the French +Colony at _Placentia_, in Newfoundland, now in England. London, 1703. + +In describing the amatory customs of the Indians of this country, the +author says (Vol. II, p. 37): + +"You must know further, that Two Hours after Sunset the Old +Supperannuated Persons, or Slaves (who never lie in their Masters' Huts) +take care to cover up the Fire before they go. 'Tis then that the Young +Savage comes well wrapt up to his Mistress's Hut, and lights a sort of a +Match at the Fire; after which he opens the Door of his Mistress's +Apartment and makes up to her bed: If she blows out the light, he lies +down by her; but if she pulls her Covering over her Face, he retires; +that being a Sign that she will not receive him." + +[20] Verily, Peters's sarcasm savors as much of truth as humor when, +speaking of bundling, he says: "The Indians who had this method of +courtship among them in 1634, are the most chaste set of people in the +world. Concubinage and fornication are vices none of them are addicted +to, except such as forsake the laws of Hobbamockon and turn Christians. +The savages have taken many female prisoners, carried them back three +hundred miles into their country, and kept them several years, and yet +not a single instance of their violating the laws of chastity has ever +been known. This cannot be said of the French, or of the English, +whenever Indian or other women have fallen into their hands." + +[21] "Great jealousy did they likewise stir up by their intermeddling +and successes among the divine sex; for being a race of brisk, likely, +pleasant tongued varlets, they soon seduced the light affections of the +simple lasses from their ponderous Dutch gallants. Among other hideous +customs, they attempted to introduce among them that of _bundling_, +which the Dutch lasses of the Nederlandts, with that eager passion for +novelty and foreign fashions natural to their sex, seemed very well +inclined to follow, but that their mothers, being more experienced in +the world, and better acquainted with men and things, strenuously +discountenanced all such outlandish innovations." + +[22] By Washington Irving, p. 211. 4th Am. edition. + +[23] Dr. Andrew Burnaby. _Travels through the Middle Settlements in +North America, in the years 1759 and '60_. London, 1775. + +[24] _The Portfolio_ (Philadelphia, May 1816), p. 397. + +[25] _Terences Plays_ were preferred to those of Plautus, for this +purpose, inasmuch as the latter were more obscure, and abounded in +obsoletisms, and therefore Terence was preferred in England as the +text-book for schools. + +[26] Ireland. + +[27] _The Reviewers Reviewed, or British Falsehoods detected by American +Truths_ (New York, published by R. McDermot and D. D. Arden, No. 1, City +Hotel, Broadway, 1815, 12mo, 72), pp. 34, 35. + +[28] The Right Honorable Sir George Canning, the editor of the _London +Quarterly Review_. + +[29] _Travels through the Interior Parts of America; in a Series of +Letters_ (by an officer; a new edition, London, 1781, 8vo), vol. II, pp. +37-40. + +[30] _Anbury's Travels_, pp. 87, 88. + +[31] _History and Genealogies of Ancient Windsor, Conn.,_ p. 495. + +[32] The Rev. Alonzo B. Chapin, in his _History of Ancient Glastenbury, +Conn._ (p. 80), says that the church records, during the pastorate of +the Rev. John Eels [1759-1791], "compel us to believe that the influence +of the French war had been as unfavorable to morals as destructive to +life; and that the absurd practice of _bundling_ prevalent in those +days, was not infrequently attended with the consequences that might +have been expected, and that both together, aided by a previous growing +laxity of morals, and accelerated by many concurrent causes, had rolled +a tide of immorality over the land, which not even the bulwark of the +church had been able to withstand. The church records of the first +society, from 1760 to 1790, raise presumptions of the strongest kind, +that then, as since, _incontinence_ and _intemperance_ were among the +sins of the people. What the condition of things in Eastbury [an +ecclesiastical society in the east part of Glastenbury] was, we have no +means of knowing, _as that portion of the church records which treats of +this point, was long ago_ carefully _removed_. [N.B. Italics are our +own.] There is no reason, however, to suppose that this state of thing's +was peculiar to Glastenbury, for there is too much evidence that it +prevailed throughout the country." + +Mr. Chapin's deductions from the revelations of the Glastenbury records, +will be fully justified by the experience and observation of every +antiquarian who has had occasion to _dig deep_ among the civil and +ecclesiastical records of almost any one of the older towns of New +England. We have before us, while writing, a copy, made some years +since, by ourselves, of the records of the first church of Woodstock, +Conn., covering the period from 1727 to 1777, in which are a large +number of entries, mostly the names of parties who made _confessions_ of +this sort before that church. These cases occur most frequently between +the years 1737 and 1770. Our own observation among the records of the +old churches in Windsor and East Windsor, is, in effect, the same, and +we have occasionally happened upon the original manuscript confessions +of individuals read to the church before they were formally admitted to +its communion. + +[33] _History of Dedham, Mass_, (by Erastus Worthington, 1827), page +108. Under ministry of Rev. Jason Haven, ordained February 6, 1756. + +"Revolutionary times having produced a disposition to investigate all +the former principles and opinions of men, in politics and church +government, Mr. Haven caused the mode of admission into the church to be +altered. This was done in 1793. The new method required the candidate to +be propounded to the congregation by the minister. If no objections +within fourteen days were made, he was then of course admitted. At the +same time the church covenant and creed was altered, and made very +general in its expressions. This creed had so few articles, that all +persons professing and calling themselves Christians, would assent to it +without any objections. The church had ever in this place required of +its members guilty of unlawful cohabitation before marriage, a public +confession of that crime before the whole congregation. The offending +female stood in the broad aisle beside the partner of her guilt. If they +had been married, the declaration of the man was silently assented to by +the woman. This had always been a delicate and difficult subject for +church discipline. The public confession, if it operated as a +corrective, likewise produced merriment with the profane. I have seen no +instance of a public confession for this fault, until the ministry of +Mr. Dexter [1724-1755], and then they were extremely rare. In 1781 the +church gave the confessing parties the privilege of making a private +confession to the church, in the room of a public confession. In Mr. +Havens ministry, the number of cases of unlawful cohabitation increased +to an alarming degree. For twenty-five years before 1781, twenty-five +cases had been publicly acknowledged before the congregation, and +fourteen cases within the last ten years. This brought out the minister +to preach on the subject from the pulpit. Mr. Haven, in a long and +memorable discourse, sought out the cause of the growing sin, and +suggested the proper remedy. He attributed the frequent recurrence of +the fault to the custom then prevalent, of females admitting young men +to their beds, who sought their company with intentions of marriage. And +he exhorted all to abandon that custom, and no longer expose themselves +to temptations which so many were found unable to resist. + +"The immediate effect of this discourse on the congregation has been +described to me, and was such as we must naturally suppose it would be. +A grave man, the beloved and revered pastor of the congregation, comes +out suddenly on his audience, and discusses a subject on which mirth and +merriment only had been heard, and denounces a favorite custom. The +females blushed and hung down their heads. The men, too, hung down their +heads, and now and then looked out from under their fallen eyebrows, to +observe how others supported the attack. If the outward appearance of +the assembly was somewhat composed, there was a violent internal +agitation in many minds. And now, when forty-five years have expired, +the persons who were present at the delivery of that sermon, express its +effects by saying: 'How queerly I felt!' 'What a time it was!' 'This was +close preaching indeed!' The custom was abandoned. The sexes learned to +cultivate the proper degree of delicacy in their intercourse, and +instances of unlawful cohabitation in this town since that time have +been extremely rare." + +[34] _Butler's History of Groton_ (Pepperell & Shirley), page 174. At a +church meeting, Feb. 29, 1739-40, the subject of compelling persons to +confess themselves guilty of an offense, of which they said, "if not +absolutely, yet next to impossible to convict them," was acted upon, and +some relaxation made in the rule before adopted; but a part of the +record is so worn as to be illegible. + +Page 177. June 1, 1761. "The church also at this meeting, voted in +relation to the confession necessary to be made by parents, to entitle +their children to the rite of baptism, who might be supposed to have +committed the offence of which, in Mr. Trowbridge's time, they supposed +that, 'if not absolutely, yet next to impossible to convict them,' not +materially varying from a _seven-months_ rule heretofore adopted. These +regulations were signed by the moderator, and assented to by the pastor +elect." + +Page 181. "During Mr. Dana's ministry [1761-1775] 124 persons (38 males, +86 females) were admitted to the church in full communion; 200 (77 +males, 123 females) owned the baptismal covenant. Of the first class, 14 +confessed having committed the offence aforementioned, and of the last +class, 66, a proportion not indicative of good customs and morals." + +[35] A typographical mistake for _unruly_. + +[36] But this was as late as 1785 to 1790, when the custom was very near +its end. + +[37] Another, when in his 96th year, in speaking of his knowledge of the +custom, after answering all inquiries, voluntarily mentioned his own +personal experience. "In my younger days," said he, and his voice +trembled, more from emotion then age, "I was on the bed with as many as +five or six young women, but I thank God, that in all my long life I +have never had carnal knowledge of any but my lawfully wedded wives." + +[38] A physician who kept school _on the Cape_ many years ago, says +(June, 1869): "It is forty years since I was engaged on the Cape in +teaching school, and a friend of mine then related to me some of his +experience in a long career of courtship which included _bundling_. The +family left the happy couple alone. After sitting up till nine or ten +o'clock, the lady secures the fire, takes a light and retires, saying, +you know the way up stairs, turn to the right, etc. At a proper time he +follows, finding her nicely snuggled under the bed clothes, having +previously put on a very appropriate and secure night dress, made +neither like a bloomer or mantilla, but something like a common dress, +excepting the lower part, which is furnished with legs, like drawers, +properly attached. The dress is drawn at the neck and waist with strings +tied with a very strong knot, and over this is put the ordinary +apparel." + +[39] _Caines' Cases_, II, 219; Seger _vs_. Slingerland. + +[40] In reply to a query addressed to Mr. Neal, who is still living at +Portland, Maine, as to whether this letter was a _bona fide_ +communication, that gentleman says: "It was an actual communication from +a correspondent. Who that correspondent was, I never knew, but I never +entertained a doubt, and, in fact, find such internal evidence of good +faith, that I should never question the facts set forth." + +[41] Sandy River is near Farmington, Franklin county, Maine. + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Bundling; Its Origin, Progress and +Decline in America, by Henry Reed Stiles + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12885 *** |