The population of 1,370,000 people occupied a space which in 1890
furnished homes for more than 25,000,000. The settlements as yet rested
upon, or radiated from, the sea-coast and the watercourses; eight-tenths
of the American people lived within easy reach of streams navigable to the
sea. Settlements had crept up the Mohawk and Susquehanna valleys, but they
were still in the midst of the wilderness. Within each colony the people
had a feeling of common interest and brotherhood. Distant, outlying, and
rebellious counties were infrequent. The Americans of 1750 were in
character very like the frontiersmen of to-day, they were accustomed to
hard work, but equally accustomed to abundance of food and to a rude
comfort; they were tenacious of their rights, as became offshoots of the
Anglo-Saxon race. In dealing with their Indian neighbors and their slaves
they were masterful and relentless. In their relations with each other
they were accustomed to observe the limitations of the law. In deference
to the representatives of authority, in respect for precedent and for the
observances of unwritten custom, they went beyond their descendants on the
frontier. Circumstances in America have greatly changed in a century and a
half: the type of American character has changed less. The quieter,
longer-settled communities of that day are still fairly represented by
such islands of undisturbed American life as Cape Cod and Cape Charles.
The industrious and thriving built good houses, raised good crops, sent
their surplus abroad and bought English goods with it, went to church, and
discussed politics. In education, in refinement, in literature and art,
most of the colonists had made about the same advance as the present
farmers of Utah. The rude, restless energy of modern America was not yet
awakened.


4. INHERITED INSTITUTIONS.