The history of matrimonial institutions in the middle colonies is on the whole less attractive than in New England. At any rate, it is less interesting in the sense of being less eventful. The original materials from which to construct it are less abundant. There is nothing equal to the _Diary_ of the inimitable Sewall from which it may be filled out and embellished. It is not quickened by the struggle to maintain or to introduce diverse forms of celebration resting upon opposing theories as to the nature of the nuptial contract. There is little answering to the Puritan thoroughness in regulating the conduct of domestic life, even among the Quakers. Hence the legislative and judicial records are relatively meager. In New York, notably, between 1684 and the Revolution the law-book is a complete blank. On the other hand, in Pennsylvania, after the establishment of the proprietary government, the predominance of Quaker sentiment enables the original usages and the early statutes regarding wedlock to run their even course for generations without essential change. Still the study of marriage in the middle section of the English colonies is not devoid of social interest. There, on account of mixed population and diverse religious sects, toleration in the main prevailed. The quaint records of the Dutch and the homely ceremonial of the Friends may even prove entertaining, while in this field, as in every other, the thought and experience of New York and Pennsylvania have done much to form and fix the types of law and administration now prevailing in the United States. _a_) _Law and custom in New Netherland._--Long before the first plantations were established on the Hudson, as already seen, optional civil marriage had been sanctioned in several of the Dutch states, and as early as 1656 it was extended to the United Netherlands. In Holland independents of both old and New England found encouragement and also a model in the effort to realize similar ideas born of their common Protestantism.