More significant than all else was the growth of the sentiment of unity among the different colonies. Although properly known as provincials, to distinguish them from the British, they now, instead of speaking of themselves as New Englanders or Virginians or Englishmen, often substituted the name "Americans." The different colonies were looked upon as members of the same great family, ready to make common cause against a danger threatening any one of them. Some of the bolder ones began to express the thought that it would be a fine thing if they were all independent of the mother country, though for years the sentiment assumed no importance. Now was the time for England to display wisdom, justice, and statesmanship toward her subjects in America. Had she treated them as she now treats Canada and Australia and her other colonies, there never would have been a Revolution. No doubt in time we should have separated from her, but the separation would have been peaceable. [Illustration: BIBLE BROUGHT OVER IN THE "MAYFLOWER" IN PILGRIM HALL, NEW PLYMOUTH.] But while Great Britain has always been immeasurably above Spain in her treatment of her American subjects, she was almost as foolish, because she chilled the loyalty that had been proven in too many instances to be doubted. The mother country was laboring under the weight of burdensome taxes, and, since the colonies had always been prompt in voting money and supplies as well as men to assist England, Parliament thought she saw a way of shouldering a large part of this burden upon the Americans. Her attempts to do so and the results therefrom properly belong to the succeeding chapter. HOME LIFE OF THE COLONISTS. A few facts will assist in understanding the events that follow. Slavery, as has been stated, was legal and existed in all the colonies, but climatic conditions caused it to flourish in the South and decline in the North. All the colonies were Protestant, though religious liberty was permitted everywhere. The laws were amazingly strict and would never be submitted to in these times. To illustrate: a watchman in Hartford rang a bell every morning as notice to all adults to rise from their beds. Massachusetts had fourteen and Virginia seventeen offenses that were punishable with death. Some of the minor punishments were unique. If a woman became a common scold, she was placed near her own door, with a gag fastened in her mouth, that all might see and beware of her example. For other offenses, a man was ducked in water or put in the stocks. A stock was a strong framework, through which the feet or both feet and hands were thrust and held fast, while the pillory was a framework through which the head and hands of a criminal were imprisoned. Besides the disgrace attending such punishment, it was very trying. The whipping-post was quite common long after the Revolution, and it is still occasionally used in Delaware.