Ships in the "Indian trade" brought to the colonies abundance of sugar, molasses, chocolate, ginger, and other dried fruits. These were apparently far more common here than in England; Mr. Ernst says these constant relays of sweets "produced the American sweet-tooth--a wonder." Candied eringo-root, candied lemon-peel, angelica candy, as well as caraway comfits and sugared coriander-seed and dried ginger, were advertised for sale in Boston, and show the taste of the day. In 1731 Widow Bonyet had a notice of her specialties in the _Boston News Letter_. It has quite the modern ring in its meat jellies for the sick, and home-made preserves, jellies, and sirups. She also made those ancient sweets, macaroons, marchpanes, and crisp almonds. These latter do not appear to be the glazed and burnt almonds of the confectioner, and may have been salted almonds. The only candy Sewall refers to is sugared almonds. He frequently speaks of gifts of oranges, figs, and "raisins of the sun." Raisins were brought into all the colonial ports in vast amounts, and were until this century regarded by children as a great dainty. Each large city seems to have had some special confectioner or baker who was renowned for special cakes. Boston had Meer's cakes. New York children probably had the greatest variety of cookies, crullers, and various small cakes, as these were distinctly Dutch, and the Dutch vrouws excelled in cake-making. Strings of rock-candy came from China, but were rivalled by a distinctly native sweet--maple sugar. Equally American appear to us those Salem sweets, namely, Black Jacks and Salem Gibraltars. Base imitations appeared elsewhere, but never equalled the original delights in Salem. Children who were fortunate enough to live in coast towns reaped the sweet fruits of their fathers' foreign ventures. When a ship came into port with eighty boxes of sugar candy on board and sixty tubs of rock-candy, poor indeed was the child who was not surfeited with sweets. There was a sequel, however, to the toothsome feast, a bitter dessert. The ship that brought eighty boxes of sugar candy also fetched a hundred boxes of rhubarb and ten of senna. CHAPTER II CHILDREN'S DRESS _Man's earthly Interests are all hooked and buttoned together and held up by Clothes._ --_Sartor Resartus. Thomas Carlyle, 1833._ Of the dress of infants of colonial times we can judge from the articles of clothing which have been preserved till this day. Perhaps I should say that we can judge of the better garments worn by babies, not their everyday dress; for it is not their simpler attire that has survived, but their christening robes, their finer shirts and petticoats and caps.