"Their houses are mats or barks of trees, set on poles in the
fashion of an English barn, but out of the power of the winds, for
they are hardly higher than a man. They lie on reeds or grass. In
travel they lodge in the woods about a great fire, with the mantle
of duffils" [a coarse woolen cloth] "they wear by day wrapt about
them, and a few boughs stuck round them.
"Their diet is maize or Indian corn divers ways prepared, sometimes
roasted in the ashes, sometimes beaten and boiled with water, which
they call homine. They also make cakes not unpleasant to eat. They
have likewise several sorts of beans and peas that are good
nourishment: and the woods and rivers are their larder....
"But in liberality they excel. Nothing is too good for their
friend. Give them a fine gun, coat, or other thing, it may pass
twenty hands before it sticks: light of heart, strong affections,
but soon spent: the most merry creatures that live: they feast and
dance perpetually; they never have much, nor want much. Wealth
circulateth like the blood. All parts partake; and though none
shall want what another hath, yet exact observers of property. Some
kings have sold, others presented, me with several parcels of land.
The pay or presents I made them were not hoarded by the particular
owners; but the neighboring kings and their clans being present
when the goods were brought out, the parties chiefly concerned
consulted what, and to whom, they should give them. To every king,
then, by the hands of a person for that work appointed, is a
proportion sent, so sorted and folded, and with that gravity which
is admirable. Then that king subdivided it in like manner among his
dependents, they hardly leaving themselves an equal share with one
of their subjects: and be it on such occasions as festivals, or at
their common meals, the kings distribute, and to themselves last.
They care for little, because they want but little: and the reason
is, a little contents them. In this they are sufficiently revenged
on us. If they are ignorant of our pleasures, they are also free
from our pains. They are not disquieted with bills of lading and
exchange, nor perplexed with Chancery suits and Exchequer
reckonings. We sweat and toil to live. Their pleasure feeds them; I
mean their hunting, fishing, and fowling, and this table is spread
everywhere."
It would have been fortunate for settlers in other colonies if they had
taken the same friendly view of the Indians that Penn did, and, finding
the natives a different race from themselves, had made allowances for
those differences.
As Penn was on good terms with the Indians so he was with the men of
other races who had settled near his province. He liked the Dutch and
the Swedes as well as the English. He wrote of those who had located in
his territory:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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