USA > Pennsylvania > Philadelphia County > Philadelphia > Annals of Philadelphia, and Pennsylvania in the olden time; being a collection of the memoirs, anecdotes, and incidents of the earliest settlements of the inland part of Pennsylvania, Vol. I > Part 25
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a Scythian, and wished his boots " hung in their own straps." I danced round the room upon one foot many times, and after several intervals for respiration and pious ejaculation, I succeeded in getting my toes into trouble, or I may say purgatory. Corns I had as many as the most fanatic pilgrim would desire for peas in his shoes, yet I walked through the crowd (who were probably admiring their own boots too much to bestow a thought upon mine,) as if I were a carpet knight pelonaising upon rose leaves. I was in torment, yet there was not a cloud upon my brow,
Spem vulta simulat, premit altum corde dolorem.
I could not have suffered for principle as I suffered for those me- morable boots.
The coat I wore, was such as fashion enjoined ; the skirts were long and narrow, like a swallow's tail, two-thirds at least of the whole length. The portion above the waist composed the other third. The waist was directly beneath the shoulders ; the collar was a huge roll reaching above the ears, and there were two lines of brilliant buttons in front. There were nineteen buttons in a row. The pantaloons, (over which I wore the boots,) were of non-elastic corduroy. It would be unjust to the tailor to say that they were fitted like my skin; for they sat a great deal closer. When I took them off, my legs were like fluted pillars, grooved with the cords of the panta- loons. The hat that surmounted this dress had three-quarters of an inch rim, and a low tapering crown. It was circled by a ribbon two inches wide.
There is no modern dress that does not deform the human shape and some national costumes render it more grotesque than any na- tural deformity. Dress, at present, seems as much worn to conceal the form, as language is used to hide and not to express the thoughts. In a fashionable costume, all are forms alike ; there is no difference between Antinous or Æsop; Hyperion or a Satyr."
We know nothing so revolting to the sense of grave people of both sexes as was the first use among us of ladies' pantalettes, which came into use slowly and cautiously about the year 1830. We well remember the first female who had the hardihood to appear abroad in their display ; she was a tall girl in her minority, always accom- panied by her mother, the wife of a British officer, come then to settle among us. Her pantalettes were courageously displayed among us, with a half length petticoat. Often we heard the remark in se- rious circles, that it was an abomination unto the Lord to wear men's apparel. The fashion, however, went first for children till it got familiar to the eyes, and then ladies, little by little, followed after, till in time they became pretty general as a " defence from cold in winter," and for-we know not what-in summer !
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FURNITURE AND EQUIPAGE.
" Dismiss a real elegance, a little used, For monstrous novelty and strange disguise."
THE tide of fashion which overwhelms every thing in its onward course, has almost effaced every trace of what our forefathers pos- sessed or used in the way of household furniture, or travelling equi- page. Since the year 1800 the introduction of foreign luxury, caused by the influx of wealth, has been yearly effecting successive changes in those articles, so much so, that the former simple articles, which contented, as they equally served the purposes of our fore- fathers, could hardly be conceived. Such as they were, they de- scended acceptably unchanged from father to son and son's son, and presenting at the era of our Independence, precisely the same family picture which had been seen in the earliest annals of the town.
Formerly there were no sideboards, and when they were first introduced after the Revolution, they were much smaller and less expensive than now. Formerly they had couches of worsted damask, and only in very affluent families, in lieu of what we now call sofas or lounges. Plain people used settees and settles-the latter had a bed concealed in the seat, and by folding the top of it outwards to the front, it exposed the bed and widened the place for the bed to be spread upon it. This, homely as it might now be regarded, was a common sitting room appendage, and was a proof of more attention to comfort than display. It had, as well as the settee, a very high back of plain boards, and the whole was of white pine, generally unpainted and whitened well with unsparing scrub- bing. Such was in the poet's eye, when pleading for his sofa,
" But restless was the seat, the back erect Distress'd the weary loins, that felt no ease."
They were a very common article in very good houses, and were generally the proper property of the oldest members of the family- unless occasionally used to stretch the weary length of tired boys. They were placed before the fireplaces in the winter to keep the back guarded from wind and cold. Formerly there were no wind- sor chairs, and fancy chairs are still more modern. Their chairs of the genteelest kind, were of mahogany or red walnut, (once a great substitute for mahogany in all kinds of furniture, tables, &c.) or else they were of rush bottoms, and made of maple posts and slats, with high backs and perpendicular. * Instead of japanned waiters as now, they had mahogany tea boards and round tea tables, which being
* When the first windsor chairs were introduced, they were universally green
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turned on an axle underneath the centre, stood upright, like an ex panded fan or palm leaf in the corner. Another corner was occu pied by a beaufet, which was a corner closet with a glass door, in which all the china of the family and the plate were intended to be displayed for ornament as well as use. A conspicuous article in the collection was always a great china punch bowl, which furnished a frequent and grateful beverage,-for wine drinking was then much less in vogue. China tea cups and saucers were about half their present size ; and china tea pots and coffee pots with silver nozles was a mark of superior finery. The sham of plated ware was not then known ; and all who showed a silver surface had the massive metal too. This occurred in the wealthy families in little coffee and tea pots, and a silver tankard for good sugared toddy, was above vulgar entertainment. Where we now use earthenware, they then used delfware imported from England, and instead of queensware (then unknown) pewter platters and porringers, made to shine along a " dresser," were universal. Some, and especially the country peo- ple, ate their meals from wooden trenchers. Gilded looking-glasses and picture frames of golden glare were unknown, and both, much smaller than now, were used. Small pictures painted on glass with black mouldings for frames, with a scanty touch of goldleaf in the corners, was the adornment of a parlour. The looking-glasses in two plates, if large, had either glass frames, figured with flowers en- graved thereon, or was of scalloped mahogany, or of Dutch wood scalloped-painted white or black, with here and there some touches of gold. Every householder in that day deemed it essential to his convenience and comfort to have an ample chest of drawers in his parlour or sitting room, in which the linen and clothes of the family were always of ready access. It was no sin to rummage them be- fore company! These drawers were sometimes nearly as high as the ceiling. At other times they had a writing desk about the centre with a falling lid to write upon when let down. A great high clockcase, reaching to the ceiling, occupied another corner, and a fourth corner was appropriated to the chimney place. They then had no carpets on their floors, and no paper on their walls. The silver sand on the floor was drawn into a variety of fanciful figures and twirls with the sweeping brush, and much skill and pride was displayed therein in the devices and arrangement. They had then no argand or other lamps in parlours,* but dipped candles, in brass or copper candlesticks, was usually good enough for common use ; and those who occasionally used mould candles, made them at home, in little tin frames, casting four to six candles in each. A glass lantern with square sides furnished the entry lights in the houses of the affluent. Bedsteads then were made, if fine, of carved mahogany, of slender dimensions ; but, for common purposes, or for the families
* The first which ever came to this country is in my possession-originally a present trom Thomas Jefferson to Charles Thomson.
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uf good tradesmen, they were of poplar and always painted green. It was a matter of universal concern to have them low enough to answer the purpose of repose for sick or dying persons-a provision so necessary for such possible events, now so little regarded by the modern practice of ascending to a bed by steps like clambering up to a hay mow.
A lady, giving me the reminiscences of her early life, thus speaks of things as they were before the war of Independence. Marble mantels and folding doors were not then known, and well enough we enjoyed ourselves without sofas, carpets, or girandoles. A white floor sprinkled with clean white sand, large tables and heavy high back chairs of walnut or mahogany, decorated a parlour gen- teelly enough for any body. Sometimes a carpet, not, however, covering the whole floor, was seen upon the dining room. This was a show-parlour up stairs, not used but upon gala occasions, and then not to dine in. Pewter plates and dishes were in general use. China on dinner tables was a great rarity. Plate, more or less, was seen in most families of easy circumstances, not indeed, in all the various shapes that have since been invented, but in mas- sive silver waiters, bowls, tankards, cans, &c. Glass tumblers were scarcely seen. Punch, the most common beverage, was drunk by the company from one large bowl of silver or china; and beer from a tankard of silver.
The rarity of carpets, now deemed so indispensable to comfort, may be judged of by the fact, that T. Matlack, Esq., when aged 95, told me he had a distinct recollection of meeting with the first carpet he had ever seen, about the year 1750, at the house of Owen Jones, at the corner of Spruce and Second streets. Mrs. S. Shoe- maker, an aged Friend of the same age, told me she had received as a rare present from England a Scotch carpet ; it was but twelve feet square, and was deemed quite a novelty then, say seventy years ago. When carpets afterwards came into general use they only covered the floor in front of the chairs and tables. The covering of the whole floor is a thing of modern use. Many are the anec- dotes which could be told of the carpets and the country bumpkins. There are many families who can remember that soon after their carpets were laid, they have been visited by clownish persons, who showed strong signs of distress at being obliged to walk over them ; and when urged to come in, have stole in close to the sides of the room tip-toed, instinctively, to avoid sullying them !
It was mentioned before that the papering of the walls of houses was not much introduced till after the year 1790. All the houses which I remember to have seen in my youth were whitewashed only ; there may have been some rare exceptions. As early as the year 1769, we see that Plunket Fleeson first manufactures American paper hangings at the corner of Fourth and Chestnut Streets, and also paper mache, or raised paper mouldings, in imitation of carving, either coloured or gilt. But, although there was thus an offer to
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paper rooms, their introduction must have been extremely rare. The uncle of the present Joseph P. Norris, Esq., had his library or office room papered, but his parlours were wainscotted with oak and red cedar, unpainted and polished with wax and robust rubbing. This was at his seat at Fairhill, built in 1717.
The use of stoves in families was not known in primitive times, neither in families, nor in churches. Their fireplaces were as large again as the present, with much plainer mantelpieces. In lieu of marble plates round the sides and top of the fireplaces, it was or- namented with china-dutch-tile pictured with sundry Scripture pieces. Dr. Franklin first invented the "open stove," called also " Franklin stove," after which, as fuel became scarce, came in the better economy of the " ten plate stove."
When china was first introduced among us in the form of tea sets, it was quite a business to take in broken china to mend. It was done by cement in most cases; but generally the larger articles, like punch bowls were done with silver rivets or wire. More than half the punch bowls you could see were so mended.
It is only of late years that the practice of veneering mahogany and other valuable wood has prevailed among us. All the old fur niture was solid.
Having got the possession of a copy of an original draft of a letter of Mrs. Benjamin Franklin, written in 1765, to her hus- band then in Europe, I am enabled to ascertain some facts of household economy which show a state of imported luxuries in the higher classes, at an earlier period than might be inferred, from the facts told in these pages. It is her letter of minute description of their new house, just then erected in the Doctor's absence, in Franklin Court. I give it as a picture of domestic doings then. She says, "In the room down stairs is the sideboard, which is very handsome and plain, with two tables made to suit it and a dozen of chairs also. The chairs are plain horse hair, and look as well as Paduasoy, and are admired by all. The little south room I have papered, as the walls were much soiled. In this room is a carpet I bought cheap for its goodness, and nearly new. The large carpet is in the blue room. In the parlour is a Scotch carpet which has had much fault found with it. Your time- piece stands in one corner, which is, as I am told, all wrong-but I say, we shall have all these as they should be, when you come home. If you could meet with a Turkey carpet, I should like it ; but if not, I shall be very easy, for as to these things, I have become quite indifferent at this time. In the north room where we sit, we have a small Scotch carpet,-the small bookcase,-brother John's picture, and one of the King and Queen. In the room for our friends, we have the Earl of Bute hung up, and a glass. May I desire you to remember drinking glasses, and a large table cloth or two; also a pair of silver canisters. The closet doors in your room have been framed for glasses, unknown to me ; I shall send you an account of
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the panes required. I shall also send the measures of the fireplaces, and the pier of glass. The chimneys do well, and I have baked in the oven, and found it is good. The room we call yours, has in it a desk,-the harmonica made like a desk,-a large chest with all the writings,-the boxes of glasses for music, and for the electricity, and all your clothes. The pictures are not put up, as I do not like to drive nails, lest they should not be right. The Blue room, has the harmonica and the harpsicord, the gilt sconce, a card-table, a set of tea china, the worked chairs, and screen,-a very handsome stand for the tea kettle to stand on, and the ornamental china. The paper of this room has lost much of its bloom by pasting up. The curtains are not yet made. The south room is my sleeping room with my Susannah,-where we have a bed without curtains,-a chest of drawers, a table, a glass, and old black walnut chairs, and some of our family pictures. I have taken all the dead letters, [meaning those he had as Post Master General,] and the papers, that were in the garret, with the books not taken by Billy, [his son W. Franklin, at Burlington,] and had them boxed and barreled up, and put in the south garret to await your return. Sally has the south room up two pair of stairs, having therein a bed, bureau, table, glass, and the picture-a trunk and books-but these you can't have any notion of !"
She finally concludes familiarly and pathetically-"O my child ! there is a great odds between a man's being at home and abroad :- as every body is afraid they shall do wrong,-so, every thing is left undone!"
Family Equipage .- There is scarcely any thing in Philadel- phia which has undergone so great a change as the increased style and number of our travelling vehicles and equipage. I have seen aged persons who could name the few proprietors of every coach used in the whole province of Pennsylvania-a less number than are now enrolled on the books of some individual establishments among us for the mere hiring of coaches! Even since our war of Indepen- dence there were not more than ten or twelve in the city, and, rare ns they were, every man's coach was known at sight by every body A hack had not been heard of. Our progenitors did not deem a carriage a necessary appendage of wealth or respectability. Mer- chants and professional gentlemen were quite content to keep a one horsechair ; these had none of the present trappings of silver plate, nor were the chair bodies varnished ; plain paint alone adorned them, and brass rings and buckles were all the ornaments found on the harness; the chairs were without springs, on leather bands- such as could now be made for fifty dollars.
James Reed, Esq., an aged gentleman who died in the fever of 1793, said he could remember when there were only eight four- wheeled carriages kept in all the province! As he enumerated them, they were set down in the commonplace book of my friend Mrs. D. L., to wit : Coaches-the Governor's, (Gordon) Jonathan
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Dickinson's, Isaac Norris's, Andrew Hamilton's, Anthony Palmer's Fourwheeled chairs, drawn by two horses: James Logan's, Sten- ton ; David Lloyd's, Chester; Lawrence Growden's, Bucks.
At the earliest period of the city some two or three coaches are incidentally known. Thus William Penn, the founder, in his note to James Logan of 1700, says, "Let John (his black) have the coach, and horses put in it, for Pennsbury, from the city." In another he speaks of his " calash." He also requests the Justices may place bridges over the Pennepack and other waters, for his car riage to pass.
I have preserved, on page 172 of my MS. Annals in the City Library, the general list, with the names of the several owners of every kind of carriage used in Philadelphia in the year 1761 William Allen the Chief Justice, the Widow Lawrence, and Widow Martin, were the only owners of coaches. William Peters and Thomas Willing, owned the only two landaus. There were eighteen chariots enumerated, of which the Proprietor and the Governor had each of them one. Fifteen chairs concluded the whole enu- meration, making a total of thirty-eight vehicles.
In the MS. of Dusimitiere he has preserved an enumeration of the year 1772, making a total of eighty-four carriages.
The rapid progress in this article of luxury and often of conve- nience, is still further shown by the list of duties imposed on plea- sure carriages, showing, that in the year 1794, they were stated thus, to wit : thirty three coaches, one hundred and fifty-seven coachees, thirty-five chariots, twenty-two phætons, eighty light wagons, and five hundred and twenty chairs and sulkies.
The aged T. Matlack, Esq., before named, told me the first coach he remembered to have seen was that of Judge Wil- liam Allen's who lived in Water street, on the corner of the first alley below High street. His coachman, as a great whip, was im- ported from England. He drove a kind of landau with four black horses. To show his skill as a driver he gave the Judge a whirl round the shambles, which then stood where Jersey market is since built, and turned with such dashing science as to put the Judge and the spectators in great concern ! The tops of this carriage fell down front and back, and thus made an open carriage if required.
Mrs. Shoemaker, as aged as 95, told me that pleasure carriages were very rare in her youth. She remembered that her grandfather had one, and that he used to say he was almost ashamed to ap- pear abroad in it, although it was only a one horsechair, lest he should be thought effeminate and proud. She remembered old Richard Wistar had one also. When she was about twenty Mr. Charles Willing, merchant, brought a calash coach with him from England. This and Judge William Allen's were the only ones she had ever seen! This Charles Willing was the father of the late aged Thomas Willing, Esq., President of the first Bank of the United States.
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In the year 1728, I perceive by the Gazette, that one Thomas Skelton advertises that he has got "a fourwheeled chaise, in Chestnut street, to be hired. His prices are thus appointed : "For four persons to Germin-town, 12 shillings and 6 pence; to Frank- ford, 10 shillings ; and to Gray's Ferry, 7 shillings and 6 pence to 10 shillings."
In the year 1746, Mr. Abram Carpenter, a cooper, in Dock street, near the Golden Fleece, makes his advertisement, to hire two chairs and some saddle horses, to this effect, to wit :
" Two handsome chairs, With very good geers, With horses, or without, To carry friends about.
Likewise, saddle horses, if gentlemen please, To carry them handsomely, much at their ease, Is to be hired by Abram Carpenter, cooper Well known as a very good cask-hooper."
In October, 1751, a MS. letter of Doctor William Shippen, to John Godman, in London, wrote to discourage him from sending out two chairs or chaises for sale here, saying, they are dull sale.
The most splendid looking carriage ever in Philadelphia, at that time, was that used by General Washington, while President. There was in it, at least to my young mind, a greater air of stately grandeur than I have ever seen since. It was very large, so much so, as to make four horses an indispensable appendage. It had been previously imported for Governor Richard Penn. It was of a cream colour, with much more of gilded carvings in the frame than is since used. Its strongest attractions were the relief ornaments on the pannels, they being painted medallion pictures of playing cupids or naked children. That carriage I afterwards saw, in 1804-5, in my store yard at New Orleans, where it lay an outcast in the weather !- the result of a bad speculation in a certain Doc- tor Young, who had bought it at public sale, took it out to Orleans for sale, and could find none to buy it, where all were content with plain volantes ! A far better speculation would have been to have taken it to the Marquis of Lansdown, or other admirers of Washington in England .*
Even the character of the steeds used and preferred for riding and carriages, have undergone the change of fashion too. In old time, the horses most valued were pacers-now so odious deemed ! To this end, the breed was propagated with care, and pace races were held in preference! The Narraganset racers of Rhode Island were in such repute that they were sent for, at much trouble and expense, by some few who were choice in their selections. It may amuse the present generation to peruse the history of one such
* It became in time a kind of outhouse, in which fowls roosted ; and in the great battle of New Orleans it stood between the combatants, and was greatly shot-ridden ! Its gooseneck crane, has been laid aside for me.
VOL I .- 2 B
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horse, spoken of in the letter of Rip Van Dam, of New York, of the year 1711, to Jonathan Dickinson of Philadelphia. It states the fact of the trouble he had taken to procure him a horse. He was shipped from Rhode Island in a sloop, from which he jumped overboard and swam ashore to his former home! He arrived at New York in fourteen days passage much reduced in flesh and spirit. He cost 32£. and his freight 50 shillings. From New York he was sent inland to Philadelphia "by the next post," i. e., postman. He shows therein, that the same postrider rode through the whole route from city to city ! He says of the pacer, he is no beauty although "so high priced," save in his legs; says "he always plays and acts; will never stand still ; will take a glass of wine, beer, or cider, and probably would drink a dram in a cold morn- ing!" This writer, Rip Van Dam, was a great personage, he having been President of the Council in 1731, and, on the death of Governor Montgomery, that year was ex-officio Governor of New York. His mural monument is in St. Paul's church in that city.
A letter of Doctor William Shippen, of 1745, which I have seen, thus writes to George Barney, (celebrated for procuring good horses,) saying, " I want a genteel carriage horse of about fifteen hands high, round bodied, full of courage, close ribbed, dark chesnut, not a swift pacer, if that must much enhance his price. I much liked the pacer you procured for James Logan."
Formerly, livery stables and hacks (things of modern introduc- tion,) were not in use. Those who kept horses and vehicles were much restricted to those only whose establishments embraced their own stables. The few who kept their horses without such ap- pendages placed them at the taverns. They who depended upon hire were accustomed to procure them of such persons as had fre- quent uses for a horse to labour in their business, who, to diminish their expense, occasionally hired them in the circle of their ac- quaintance. In this way, many who were merchants (the ances- tors of those who have now a horse and gig for almost every son,) were fain to get their draymen to exempt a horse from his usual drudgery for the benefit of his employers for a country airing. A drayman who kept two or three such horses for porterage, usually kept a plain chair to meet such occasions. If the vehicles were homelier than now, they were sure to be drawn by better horses. and looked in all respects more like the suitable equipments of substantial livers than the hired and glaring fripperies of the livery-fineries of the present sumptuous days. Then ladies took long walks to the miry grounds of the South street Theatre, with- out the chance of calling for hacks for their conveyance. There is a slight recollection of a solitary hack which used to stand be- fore the Conestoga Inn, in High street-an unproductive concern, which could only obtain an occasional call from the strangers visit- ing the inn, for a ride out of town. To have rode in town would have been regarded as gross affectation,-practically reasoning
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