Francis Daniel Pastorius’s Description of Pennsylvania

Francis Daniel Pastorius’s Description of Pennsylvania
of the 1690s
in Circumstantial Geographical Description of the Lately Discovered Province of Pennsylvania, Situated in the Farthest Limits of America,
* in the Western World, 1700
EXCERPTS

CH. XI. Concerning the Inhabitants of this Province.
Of these, three sorts may be found:
1. The natives, the so-called savages.
2. The Christians who have come here from Europe, the so-called Old Settlers.
3. The newly-arrived Associations and Companies.
So far as concerns the first, the savages, they are, in general, strong, agile, and supple people, with blackish bodies; they went about naked at first and wore only a cloth about the loins. Now they are beginning to wear shirts. They have, usually, coal-black hair, shave the head, smear the same with grease, and allow a long lock to grow on the right side. They also besmear the children with grease and let them creep about in the heat of the sun, so that they become the colour of a nut, although they were at first white enough by Nature.
National Humanities Centre 4
They strive after a sincere honesty, hold strictly to their promises, cheat and injure no one. They willingly give shelter to others and are both useful and loyal to their guests.
Their huts are made of young trees, twined or bent together, which they know how to roof over with bark. They use neither table nor bench, nor any other household stuff, unless perchance a single pot in which they boil their food.
I once saw four of them take a meal together in hearty contentment and eat a pumpkin cooked in clear water without butter and spice. Their table and bench was the bare earth, their spoons were mussel-shells, with which they dipped up the warm water, their plates were the leaves of the nearest tree, which they do not need to wash with painstaking after the meal, nor to keep with care of future use. I thought to myself, these savages have never in their lives heard the teaching of Jesus concerning temperance and contentment, yet they far excel the Christians in carrying it out.
They are, furthermore, serious and of few words, and are amazed when they perceive so much unnecessary chatter, as well as other foolish behaviour, on the part of the Christians.
Each man has his own wife, and they detest harlotry, kissing, and lying. They know of no idols, but they worship a single all-powerful and merciful God who limits the power of the Devil. They also believe in the immortality of the soul, which, after the course of life is finished, has a suitable recompense from the all-powerful hand of God awaiting it.
They accompany their own worship of God with songs, during which they make strange gestures and motions with the hands and feet, and when they recall the death of their parents and friends, they begin to wail and weep most pitifully.
They listen very willingly, and not without perceptible emotion, to discourse concerning the Creator of Heaven and earth and His divine Light, which enlightens all men who have come into the world and who are yet to be born, and concerning the wisdom and love of God, because of which he gave his only-begotten and most dearly-beloved Son to die for us. It is only to be regretted that we can not yet speak their language readily and therefore cannot set forth to them the thoughts and intent of our own hearts, namely, how great a power and salvation lies concealed in Christ Jesus. They are very quiet and thoughtful in our gatherings, so that I fully believe that in the future, at the great Day of Judgment, they will come forth with those of Tyre and Sidon and put to shame many thousands of false nominal and canting Christians.
As for their economy and housekeeping, the men attend to their hunting and fishing. The women bring up their children honestly, under careful oversight and dissuade them from sin. They plant Indian corn and beans round about their huts, but they take no thought for any more extensive farming and cattle-raising; they are rather astonished that we Christians take so much trouble and thought concerning eating and drinking and also for comfortable clothing and dwellings, as if we doubted that God were able to care for and nourish us.
Their native language is very dignified, and in its pronunciation much resembles the Italian, although the words are entirely different and strange. They are accustomed to paint their faces with colours; both men and women use tobacco with pleasure; they divert themselves with fifes, or trumpets, in unbroken idleness.