investigations to the continent of America, and to trace, if we can, its
origin and progress in the


UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,


in doing which, it is quite likely that, we follow the identical line of
travel and colonization--viz: from Old to New England, and from
Netherlands (the father-land) to New Netherlands--by which the custom of
bundling was really transplanted to these western shores. For, although
the grave and (sometimes) veracious historian of New York, Diedrich
Knickerbocker, hath endeavored to fasten upon the Connecticut settlers
the odium of having introduced the custom into New Netherland,[21] to
the great offense of all properly disposed people; yet we may reasonably
doubt whether the young mynheers and frauliens of New Amsterdam, in that
day, were any more innocent of this lover's pastime, than their
vivacious Connecticut neighbors. Indeed, can it be for one moment
supposed that the good Hollanders--a most unchanging and conservative
race--should have been so far false to the traditions of their fathers,
and the honor of the fatherland, as to leave behind them, when they
crossed the seas, the good old custom of _queesting_, with its
time-honored associations and delights? Or can it be imagined that those
astute lawgivers and political economists, the early governors and
burgomasters, were so blind to the necessities and interests of a new
and sparsely populated country, as to forbid bundling within their
borders? Indeed, it would be but a sorry compliment to the wisdom of
that sagacious and far-sighted body of merchants comprised in the High
and Mighty West India Company, to believe that they were unwilling to
introduce under their benign auspices, a custom so intimately connected