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Boston and the Quakers of Philadelphia. In general the
early
colonists brought no paintings in their baggage and little thought
of them in their minds. Whatever their aspirations, whether for
freedom of conscience or for gold mines, the settlers passed their
first years in misery and squalor. They lived in hovels dug in the
sides of the hills, and the rude log hut was a luxury. A greater
degree of comfort soon came in, but even the towns were long
unpaved and poor, although the accounts vary greatly according to
the reporter. Thus, in the middle of the seventeenth century, John-
son describes Boston as "a city-like Towne crowded on the Sea,
banked and wharfed out with great industry and cost, the buildings
beautifull and large ; some fancily set forth with Brick, Tile, Stone
and Slate, and orderly placed with comeley Streets." The less par-
tial eyes of the Old World Royal Commissioners saw it a few years
later. " The houses generally wooden, their streets crooked, with
little decency and no uniformity." There was a steady improvement
with time. Brick came into general use after the beginning of the
eighteenth century, and " what is now known as colonial architecture
gradually developed, some of its best examples dating from about
1720.
This was written particularly of Boston, but it applies
equally
well to the other cities of the colonies. Both in New England and
Pennsylvania religious prejudice was opposed to most forms of art,
and New York kept to its traditions as a trading post rather than
an intellectual centre. Some of the patroons on the Hudson may
have brought with them an ampler culture, at least it was so of the
De Peysters, and there still remain portraits of Colonel Abraham
and his wife which must have been painted in Europe about 1700.
Mrs. Brown of Laggan, who was at the homestead about 1 760, re-
ports it well supplied with canvases. " The best bedroom was hung
with family portraits, some of which were admirably executed ; and in
the eating room which, by the bye, was rarely used for that purpose,
were some fine scriptural paintings; that which made the greatest
impression on my imagination and seemed to be universally admired,
was one of Esau coming to demand the anticipated blessing; the noble
manly figure, and the anguish expressed on his comely though strong
featured countenance, I shall never forget." Even the lesser people
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