History of the United States | Page 6

religious toleration by the act of 1649, flourished under
the mild rule of proprietors until it became a state in the American
union. New Jersey, beginning its career under two proprietors,
Berkeley and Carteret, in 1664, passed under the direct government of
the crown in 1702. Pennsylvania was, in a very large measure, the
product of the generous spirit and tireless labors of its first proprietor,
the leader of the Friends, William Penn, to whom it was granted in
1681 and in whose family it remained until 1776. The two Carolinas
were first organized as one colony in 1663 under the government and
patronage of eight proprietors, including Lord Clarendon; but after
more than half a century both became royal provinces governed by the
king.
[Illustration: WILLIAM PENN, PROPRIETOR OF
PENNSYLVANIA]
THE COLONIAL PEOPLES
=The English.=--In leadership and origin the thirteen colonies, except
New York and Delaware, were English. During the early days of all,
save these two, the main, if not the sole, current of immigration was
from England. The colonists came from every walk of life. They were
men, women, and children of "all sorts and conditions." The major
portion were yeomen, or small land owners, farm laborers, and artisans.
With them were merchants and gentlemen who brought their stocks of
goods or their fortunes to the New World. Scholars came from Oxford
and Cambridge to preach the gospel or to teach. Now and then the son
of an English nobleman left his baronial hall behind and cast his lot
with America. The people represented every religious faith--members
of the Established Church of England; Puritans who had labored to

reform that church; Separatists, Baptists, and Friends, who had left it
altogether; and Catholics, who clung to the religion of their fathers.
New England was almost purely English. During the years between
1629 and 1640, the period of arbitrary Stuart government, about twenty
thousand Puritans emigrated to America, settling in the colonies of the
far North. Although minor additions were made from time to time, the
greater portion of the New England people sprang from this original
stock. Virginia, too, for a long time drew nearly all her immigrants
from England alone. Not until the eve of the Revolution did other
nationalities, mainly the Scotch-Irish and Germans, rival the English in
numbers.
The populations of later English colonies--the Carolinas, New York,
Pennsylvania, and Georgia--while receiving a steady stream of
immigration from England, were constantly augmented by wanderers
from the older settlements. New York was invaded by Puritans from
New England in such numbers as to cause the Anglican clergymen
there to lament that "free thinking spreads almost as fast as the
Church." North Carolina was first settled toward the northern border by
immigrants from Virginia. Some of the North Carolinians, particularly
the Quakers, came all the way from New England, tarrying in Virginia
only long enough to learn how little they were wanted in that Anglican
colony.
=The Scotch-Irish.=--Next to the English in numbers and influence
were the Scotch-Irish, Presbyterians in belief, English in tongue. Both
religious and economic reasons sent them across the sea. Their Scotch
ancestors, in the days of Cromwell, had settled in the north of Ireland
whence the native Irish had been driven by the conqueror's sword.
There the Scotch nourished for many years enjoying in peace their own
form of religion and growing prosperous in the manufacture of fine
linen and woolen cloth. Then the blow fell. Toward the end of the
seventeenth century their religious worship was put under the ban and
the export of their cloth was forbidden by the English Parliament.
Within two decades twenty thousand Scotch-Irish left Ulster alone, for
America; and all during the eighteenth century the migration continued

to be heavy. Although no exact record was kept, it is reckoned that the
Scotch-Irish and the Scotch who came directly from Scotland,
composed one-sixth of the entire American population on the eve of the
Revolution.
[Illustration: SETTLEMENTS OF GERMAN AND SCOTCH-IRISH
IMMIGRANTS]
These newcomers in America made their homes chiefly in New Jersey,
Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and the Carolinas. Coming late upon
the scene, they found much of the land immediately upon the seaboard
already taken up. For this reason most of them became frontier people
settling the interior and upland regions. There they cleared the land,
laid out their small farms, and worked as "sturdy yeomen on the soil,"
hardy, industrious, and independent in spirit, sharing neither the
luxuries of the rich planters nor the easy life of the leisurely merchants.
To their agriculture they added woolen and linen manufactures, which,
flourishing in the supple fingers of their tireless women, made heavy
inroads upon the trade of the English merchants in the colonies. Of
their labors a poet has sung:
"O, willing hands to toil; Strong natures tuned to the