The Sot-weed Factor

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to Maryland, by Ebenezer Cook
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Title: The Sot-weed Factor: or, A Voyage to Maryland
In which is Describ'd The Laws, Government, Courts and Constitutions
of the Country
Author: Ebenezer Cook
Release Date: May 7, 2007 [EBook #21346]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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FACTOR ***
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Transcribers Notes
. The original spellings of words have been retained.
. Typos or suspected typos have been noted by [_sic_.].
. The long "s", which appears as an "f" with the right part of the cross
missing, has been replaced with "s".
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to the modern convention of one opening double quote and one
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alphabetical from (a) to (oo) and have been grouped at the end of
the book.
_S H E A' S_
_EARLY SOUTHERN TRACTS._
_No. II._
THE
Sot-weed Factor:
Or, a Voyage to
MARYLAND.
A
SATYR.
In which is describ'd
The Laws, Government, Courts and Constitutions of the Country, and
also the Buildings, Feasts, Frolicks, Entertainments and Drunken
Humours of the Inhabitants of that Part of _America_.
In Burlesque Verse.
By _Eben. Cook_, Gent.
LONDON:
Printed and Sold by _D. Bragg_, at the _Raven_ in
_Pater-Noster-Row_. 1708. (Price 6d.)

We have no means of knowing the history of Master "Ebenezer Cook,
Gentleman," who, one hundred and forty-six years ago, produced the
Sot-Weed Factor's Voyage to Maryland. He wrote, printed, published,
and sold it in London for sixpence sterling, and then disappeared
forever. We do not know certainly that Mr. Cook himself was the
actual adventurer who suffered the ills described by him "in burlesque
verse." Indeed, "Eben: Cook, Gent." may be a myth--a _nom de plume_.
Yet, there is a certain personal poignancy and earnestness about the
whole Story that almost forbid the idea of a secondhand narrative. Nay,
I think it extremely probable that it was "Eben: Cook, Gent." or, some
other equally afflicted gentleman assuming that name, who--
"_Condemn'd by Fate to wayward Curse,
Of Friends unkind and
empty purse_,"--
fled from his native land to become a Sot-Weed factor in America.[1]
The adventures and manners described are ludicrous and certainly very
unpolished. Although Mr. Cook calls his poem "_A Satyr_," there is, in
his account of early habits in Maryland, so much resemblance to what
we observe in the rude society of all new settlements, that it is possible
the story is not so much a Satire as a hightened description of what an
unlucky traveler found in certain quarters of the colony, Anno Domini,
1700. When "Mr. Cook," with an anathema in his mouth, makes a final
bow to his readers, he expressly adds, in a note, on the last page, that
"the Author does not intend by this any of the _English_ Gentlemen
resident there;" still, excepting even all these select personages, he
doubtless found _un_-gentlefolk enough among the rough farmers and
fishermen of obscure "Piscato-way" and the adjacent country, to justify
his discontent. At all events, we may, I imagine, very reasonably
suppose "Eben: Cook" to have been a London "Gent:" rather decayed
by fast living, sent abroad to see the world and be tamed by it, who
very soon discovered that Lord Baltimore's Colony was not the court of
her Majesty Queen Anne, or its taverns frequented by Addison and the
wits; and whose disgust became supreme when he was "finished" on
the "Eastern-Shoar,"[2] by

"A pious, Concientious Rogue"
who, taking advantage of his incapacity for trade, cheated him out of
his cargo and sent him home without a leaf of the coveted "Sot-weed!"
This poem is, very likely, the result of that homeward voyage. With
proper allowance for breadth and burlesque, angry exaggeration and the
discomforts of such a "Gentleman" as we may fancy Master Cook to
have been, it is well worth preservation as hinting, if not photographing,
the manners and customs of the ruder classes in a British Province a
century and a half ago.
The "Sot-Weed Factor" was first printed in London, in 1708, in a folio