Page:The Rise of American Civilization (Volume 1).djvu/148

 tans, emphasizing the civil character of marriage rather than religious sanctions, were equally sagacious in effecting jointures; the custom of seeking "good providers" and daughters and widows "well placed" was as firmly fixed in Massachusetts as the common law itself. Among accounts of the high and the low, amusing illustrations of the practice appeared—in Judge Sewall's diary, in advertisements, in Franklin's lampoons, for example. Whenever a lucky bargain was struck, the newspapers caught up the glad refrain. On one occasion a colonial editor announced that a happy groom had wed "a most amiable young lady with £10,000 to her fortune," filling in the details for the public.

The integrity of the family institution was generally protected by laws against carnality. Teachings of the church fathers on the wickedness of human nature, consecrated by centuries of Catholic propaganda and taken literally by Puritan and Anglican, were made, like due process, the law of the land in their new home. Fines, public confessions, brands, or lashings were usually prescribed for the incontinent and the records seem to indicate that, as a rule, it was the woman, not the man, who got the heavier punishment—a practice defended on the ground that her offenses might corrupt the family strain. Originally Connecticut and Massachusetts made adultery a capital crime, but in 1673 the former colony substituted branding for the death penalty and about twenty years afterward the latter adopted in its place a law requiring guilty persons to wear the scarlet letter—a milder rule borrowed from Plymouth. Respecting all the cardinal points of waywardness and all lapses from reputability, the canons of Virginia were as savage as those of Massachusetts.

As is generally the case, the eye of the law was everywhere quickest in discovering the shortcomings of the lowly. The lot of the indentured girl, for instance, was especially hard; if she fell from community grace and brought a child into the world out of wedlock, she was given an extra year