MIDDLE STATES. 



221 



of (he matches on Long Island and in Dutchess county, have been attended by vast crowds of 

 people. Boat-races, also, are sometimes held in the calm waters about New York. Skating 

 is practised with great animation, and thousands of people collect on the Delaware, at Philadel- 

 phia, when the stream is frozen. An ox, on such occasions, has sometimes been roasted on thp 

 ice, near the ]Mariner's Hotel, which is the hull of a large vessel moored in the river.* 



18. Education, (^c. The means of education are not neglected in some of the Middle 

 States, but there is not so much knowledge generally difilised as in New England. It is noi 

 common, however, except among the foreigners and their children, to find a person who canno* 

 read and write. Though there are more books printed at New York and Philadelphia than ij 

 all the rest of the republic, there are more houses without books or newspapers in the Middl* 

 States than in New England. The newspapers, however, from New York and Philadelphia 

 are circulated over the whole country. 



19. Religion. The sects are more various than in the Eastern States, and the e is hardly a 

 creed in Europe, that has not a society in the Middle States. The Catholics are numerous. 

 The Sabbath is less strictly observed than in New England, yet in general it is not profaned ; 

 and in Philadelphia it is as much observed as in Boston. 



20. Laws. The peculiarities of the laws are less than in the other sections ol the country ; 

 as in general the laws are not made like those of the West, for new countries ; or have not de- 

 scended, as in New England, from puritanic legislatures ; or are not, as in the South, devised 

 to meet the exigencies of the system of slavery. 



21. Arts. In the cities there are several eminent artists, and a general taste for the arts, and 

 several collections of paintings open to the public. Some of the useful or mechanic arts are in 

 a higher state at Philadelphia, than in any other city in the Union. 



* The following extracts are from an account in the 

 American Farmer, describing some of the manners and 

 customs of Bedford county, Pennsylvania. Tlie first re- 

 lates to the clearing of land, after the forest trees have 

 been girdled ; the latter describes a custom which also 

 prevails in Now England. 



]n eight or ten years, the timber begins to fall rapidly. 

 When the ground is pretty well covered with old logs, the 

 farmer goes into nigger off. This is effected by laying 

 the broken limbs and smaller trees across the logs, and 

 putting fire to it. Boys or women follow to chunk up the 

 fires. In a day or two the logs are niggered off at the 

 length of twelve or fifteen feet; sometimes the entire Iree 

 is consumed. When the trees are thus reduced to lengths 

 that can be handled by men, the owner has a log rolling. 

 He gives the word to eighteen or twenty of his neighbors 

 the day before the frolic, and when they assemble they 

 generally divide the force into two companies. A captain 

 is chosen by acclamation for each company, and the cap- 

 tains choose their companies, each naming a man alter- 



nately. When the whole is formed, they set to work, 

 provided wit'li linndspikes, and each company exerts itself 

 to make more log-heaps tluin the other. Nothing is charg- 

 ed for the work, and the only thing exceptionable in these 

 frolics, is the too immoderate use of whisky. In general, 

 great hilarity prevails ; but these meetings, like all others 

 in this country, are sometimes disgraced by dreadful com- 

 bats between tlie persons composing them." 



■■ The corn-husking is done at nitrht. The neiijhbors 

 meet at dark ; the corn has been previously pulled, and 

 hauled in a pile near the crib. The hands join in, the 

 whisky bottle goes round, the slory, the laugh, and the 

 rude song is heard. Three or four hundred bushels are 

 husked by nine or ten o'clock, a plentiful supper is pro- 

 vided, and sometimes the frolic ends with a stag dance; 

 that is, men and boys, without females, dance like mad 

 devils, but in good humor, to the time of a neighbor's cat- 

 gut and horse-liair, not always drawn with the melody and 

 judgment of Guillaurae." 



