Page:Anne Bradstreet and her time.djvu/230

214 or £4; and yet many cattle were every year brought out of England, and some from Virginia." At last the new arrivals revolted, and one order ruled for all, the rate of profit charged, being long fixed at four pence in the shilling. Andover adopted this scale, being from the beginning of a thrifty turn of mind, which is exemplified in one of the first ordinances passed. Many boys and girls had been employed by the owners of cattle to watch and keep them within bounds, countless troubles arising from their roaming over the unfenced lands. To prevent the forming of idle habits the Court at once, did "hereupon order and decree that in every towne the chosen men are to take care of such as are sett to keep cattle, that they be sett to some other employment withall, as spinning upon the rock, knitting & weaving tape, &c., that boyes and girls be not suffered to converse together."

Such conversations as did take place had a double zest from the fact that the sharp-eyed herdsman was outwitted, but as a rule the small Puritans obeyed orders and the spinners and knitters in the sun, helped to fill the family chests which did duty as bureaus, and three varieties of which are still to be seen in old houses on the Cape, as well as in the Museum at Plymouth. The plain sea-chest, like the sailor's chest of to-day, was the property of all alike, and usually of solid oak. A grade above this, came another form, with turned and applied ornaments and two drawers at the bottom, a fine specimen of which is still in the old Phillips house at North Andover, opposite the Bradstreet house. The last variety had more drawers, but still retained the lid on top, which