ADDRESS. 21 



corn and beans, after having dried tliem in the sun, and cov- 

 ered them up level with the surface of the earth. There they 

 were well preserved through the winter. These excavated 

 barns were concealed by the women from their lazy husbands, 

 lest they should eat up all they had ; yet however carefully 

 all this was done, the hogs of the colonists sometimes unhing- 

 ed their barn doors and helped themselves to the contents. 

 One of these Indian barns was discovered by the pilgrims, at 

 the tim€ their granary was reduced so low as to contain only 

 five kernels of corn to each individual. 



Another plan of providing for their winter supply, was by 

 making large boxes, shaped a little like barrels, of a kind of 

 wicker-work. These barrels were kept in the wigwam for 

 the more immediate use of the family. 



This brief sketch of the farming in the early days of the 

 colony, is sufficient to show it to have been rude in the ex- 

 treme, and attended by hardship and trial to which we are 

 happily strangers. 



We may vv'ell imagine the surprise of the simple children 

 of nature at the first sight of a plow. It was a mystery to 

 them. They wanted to see the instrument work. It tore up 

 more ground in a day, than all their clam-shells could scrape 

 up in a month, and looking at the coulter and share and see- 

 ing them to be of iron, they told the plowman, if he was not 

 the devil himself he was very much like him. 



The first sight of a ship, you will recollect, had previously 

 caused them even greater excitement. To them it was a 

 floating island ; its masts were nothing but trees ; its sails 

 were clouds ; its discharge of guns was thunder and lightning, 

 but, as soon as the thunder and lightning ceased, they pushed 

 off their canoes to go and pick strawberries on the island. 



Slowly but gradually the. little colony advanced, yet there 

 were but few intelligent cultivators like Endicott and Win- 

 throp, and for the most part agriculture was in a state of ex- 

 treme depression. No enterprise marked the people engaged 

 in it, no spirit of inquiry gave it the charm of interest, no active 

 minds were devoted to its elevation and improvement. The 



