Note 254 — NEW ENGLISH CANAAN OR NEW CANAAN.

The observations of Roger Williams led him to a different conclusion: “Their affections, especially to their children, are very strong.... This extreme affection, together with want of learning, makes their children saucie, bold and undutifull. I once came into a house, and requested some water to drink; the father bid his sonne (of some 8 yeeres of age) to fetch some water: the boy refused, and would not stir; I told the father, that I would correct my child, if he should so disobey me &c. Upon this the father took up a sticke, the boy another, and flew at his father: upon my persuasion, the poore father made him smart a little, throw down his stick, and run for water, and the father confessed the benefits of correction, and the evill of their too indulgent affections.” (Key, ch. v.)

To the same effect Champlain wrote (Voyages, vol. iii. p. 170): “The children have great freedom among these tribes. The fathers and mothers indulge them too much, and never punish them. Accordingly they are so bad and of so vicious a nature, that they often strike their mothers and others. The most vicious, when they have acquired the strength and power, strike their fathers. They do this whenever the father or mother does anything that does not please them. This is a sort of curse that God inflicts upon them.” Winslow, on the other hand, in his Good News, lends some support to Morton’s statement in the text. He says: “The younger sort reverence the elder, and do all mean offices, whilst they are together, although they be strangers.” (Young’s Chron. of Pilg., p. 363.)