The Beginner's American History Part 10

Penn said, "We intend to sit down lovingly among the Indians." On that account, he held a great meeting with them under a wide-spreading elm. The tree stood in what is now a part of Philadelphia. Here Penn and the red men made a treaty or agreement by which they promised each other that they would live together as friends as long as the water should run in the rivers, or the sun s.h.i.+ne in the sky.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PENN MAKING THE TREATY WITH THE INDIANS.]

Nearly a hundred years later, while the Revolutionary War was going on, the British army took possession of the city. It was cold, winter weather, and the men wanted fire-wood; but the English general thought so much of William Penn that he set a guard of soldiers round the great elm, to prevent any one from chopping it down.

Not long after the great meeting under the elm, Penn visited some of the savages in their wigwams. They treated him to a dinner--or shall we say a lunch?--of roasted acorns. After their feast, some of the young savages began to run and leap about, to show the Englishman what they could do. When Penn was in college at Oxford he had been fond of doing such things himself. The sight of the Indian boys made him feel like a boy again; so he sprang up from the ground, and beat them all at hop, skip, and jump. This completely won the hearts of the red men.

[Ill.u.s.tration: STATUE OF WILLIAM PENN. (On the Tower of the new City Hall, Philadelphia.)]

From that time, for sixty years, the Pennsylvania settlers and the Indians were fast friends. The Indians said, "The Quakers are honest men; they do no harm; they are welcome to come here." In New England there had been, as we have seen,[8] a terrible war with the savages, but in Pennsylvania, no Indian ever shed a drop of Quaker blood.

[Footnote 5: Founds: begins to build.]

[Footnote 6: Treaty: an agreement; and see paragraph 69.]

[Footnote 7: See Rev. i. 11 and iii. 7.]

[Footnote 8: See paragraph 90.]

100. How Philadelphia grew; what was done there in the Revolution; William Penn's last years and death.--Philadelphia grew quite fast.

William Penn let the people have land very cheap, and he said to them, "You shall be governed by laws of your own making." Even after Philadelphia became quite a good-sized town, it had no poor-house, for none was needed; everybody seemed to be able to take care of himself.

When the Revolution began, the people of Pennsylvania and of the country north and south of it sent men to Philadelphia to decide what should be done. This meeting was called the Congress. It was held in the old State House, a building which is still standing, and in 1776 Congress declared the United States of America independent of England. In the war, the people of Delaware and New Jersey fought side by side with those of Pennsylvania.

William Penn spent a great deal of money in helping Philadelphia and other settlements. After he returned to England he was put in prison for debt by a rascally fellow he had employed. He did not owe the money, and proved that the man who said that he did was no better than a thief. Penn was released from prison; but his long confinement in jail had broken his health down. When he died, the Indians of Pennsylvania sent his widow some beautiful furs, in remembrance of their "Brother Penn," as they called him. They said that the furs were to make her a cloak, "to protect her while pa.s.sing through this th.o.r.n.y wilderness without her guide."

[Ill.u.s.tration: WILLIAM PENN'S GRAVE AT JORDANS'S MEETING-HOUSE, ENGLAND.]

About twenty-five miles west of London, on a country road within sight of the towers of Windsor Castle,[9] there stands a Friends'

meeting-house, or Quaker church. In the yard back of the meeting-house William Penn lies buried. For a hundred years or more there was no mark of any kind to show where he rests; but now a small stone bearing his name points out the grave of the founder of the great state of Pennsylvania.

[Footnote 9: Windsor Castle: see paragraph 77.]

101. Summary.--Charles the Second, king of England, owed William Penn, a young English Quaker, a large sum of money. In order to settle the debt, the king gave him a great piece of land in America, and named it Pennsylvania, or Penn's Woods. Penn wished to make a home for Quakers in America; and in 1682 he came over, and began building the city of Philadelphia. When the Revolution broke out, men were sent from all parts of the country to Philadelphia, to hold a meeting called the Congress. In 1776, Congress declared the United States independent.

To whom did King Charles the Second owe a large sum of money? How did he pay his debt? What did the king name the country? What does the name mean? What has been found there? What is said about the Friends or Quakers? What did Penn want the land here for? How were the Quakers then treated in England? What did Penn do in 1682? Tell what the king said to Penn and what Penn replied. What city did Penn begin to build here? What does Philadelphia mean? What did Penn and the Indians do? What did the English general do about the great elm in the Revolution? Tell about Penn's dinner with the Indians. Did the Indians trouble the Quakers? What is said of the growth of Philadelphia? What was done there in the Revolution? Tell what you can about Penn's last days. Where is he buried?

GENERAL JAMES OGLETHORPE[1]

(1696-1785).

102. The twelve English colonies in America; General Oglethorpe makes a settlement in Georgia.--We have seen[2] that the first real colony or settlement made in America by the English was in Virginia in 1607. By the beginning of 1733, or in about a hundred and twenty-five years, eleven more had been made, or twelve in all. They stretched along the seacoast, from the farthest coast of Maine to the northern boundary of Florida, which was then owned by the Spaniards.[3]

The two colonies farthest south were North Carolina and South Carolina. In 1733 James Oglethorpe, a brave English soldier, who afterward became General Oglethorpe, came over here to make a new settlement. This new one, which made just thirteen[4] in all, was called Georgia in honor of King George the Second, who gave a piece of land for it, on the seacoast, below South Carolina.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Map of Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina.]

[Footnote 1: Oglethorpe (O'gel-thorp).]

[Footnote 2: See paragraph 37.]

[Footnote 3: Because the Spaniards had settled it in 1565; see paragraph 30.]

[Footnote 4: These thirteen colonies or settlements were: First, the four New England colonies (New Hamps.h.i.+re, Ma.s.sachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode island; Maine was then part of Ma.s.sachusetts, and Vermont was claimed by both New Hamps.h.i.+re and New York). Secondly, four middle colonies (New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, with Delaware). Thirdly, five southern colonies (Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia).]

103. What it was that led General Oglethorpe to make this new settlement.--General Oglethorpe had a friend in England who was cast into prison for debt. There the unfortunate man was so cruelly treated that he fell sick and died, leaving his family in great distress.

The General felt the death of his friend so much that he set to work to find out how other poor debtors lived in the London prisons. He soon saw that great numbers of them suffered terribly. The prisons were crowded and filthy. The men shut up in them were ragged and dirty; some of them were fastened with heavy chains, and a good many actually died of starvation.

General Oglethorpe could not bear to see strong men killed off in this manner. He thought that if the best of them--those who were honest and willing to work--could have the chance given them of earning their living, that they would soon do as well as any men.

It was to help them that he persuaded the king to give the land of Georgia.

104. Building the city of Savannah; what the people of Charleston, South Carolina, did; a busy settlement; the alligators.--General Oglethorpe took over thirty-five families to America in 1733. They settled on a high bank of the Savannah[5] River, about twenty miles from the sea. The general laid out a town with broad, straight, handsome streets, and with many small squares or parks. He called the settlement Savannah from the Indian name of the river on which it stands.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SAVANNAH, AS GENERAL OGLETHORPE LAID IT OUT IN 1733.]

The people of Charleston, South Carolina, were glad to have some English neighbors south of them that would help them fight the Spaniards of Florida, who hated the English, and wanted to drive them out. They gave the newcomers a hundred head of cattle, a drove of hogs, and twenty barrels of rice.

The emigrants set to work with a will, cutting down the forest trees, building houses, and planting gardens. There were no idlers to be seen at Savannah: even the children found something to do that was helpful.

Nothing disturbed the people but the alligators. They climbed up the bank from the river to see what was going on. But the boys soon taught them not to be too curious. When one monster was found impudently prowling round the town, they thumped him with sticks till they fairly beat the life out of him. After that, the alligators paid no more visits to the settlers.

[Footnote 5: Savannah (Sa-van'ah).]

105. Arrival of some German emigrants; "Ebenezer";[6] "blazing"

trees.--After a time, some German Protestants, who had been cruelly driven out of their native land on account of their religion, came to Georgia. General Oglethorpe gave them a hearty welcome. He had bought land of the Indians, and so there was plenty of room for all.

The Germans went up the river, and then went back a number of miles into the woods; there they picked out a place for a town. They called their settlement by the Bible name of Ebenezer,[7] which means "The Lord hath helped us."

There were no roads through the forests, so the new settlers "blazed"

the trees; that is, they chopped a piece of bark off, so that they could find their way through the thick woods when they wanted to go to Savannah. Every tree so marked stood like a guide-post; it showed the traveller which way to go until he came in sight of the next one.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE "BLAZED" TREES.]

[Footnote 6: Ebenezer (Eb-e-ne'zer).]

[Footnote 7: See I Sam. vii. 12.]

106. Trying to make silk; the queen's American dress.--The settlers hoped to be able to get large quant.i.ties of silk to send to England, because the mulberry-tree grows wild in Georgia, and its leaves are the favorite food of the silkworm.[8] At first it seemed as if the plan would be successful, and General Oglethorpe took over some Georgia silk as a present to the queen of England. She had a handsome dress made of it for her birthday; it was the first American silk dress ever worn by an English queen. But after a while it was found that silk could not be produced in Georgia as well as it could in Italy and France, and so in time cotton came to be raised instead.