In Pittsfield, as early as the year 1765, the pews were sold by "vandoo"
to the highest bidder, in order to stop the unceasing quarrels over
the seating. In Windham, Connecticut, in 1762, the adoption of this
pacificatory measure only increased the dissension when it was discovered
that some miserable "bachelors who never paid for more than one head and
a horse" had bid in several of the best pews in the meeting-house. In New
London, two women, sisters-in-law, were seated side by side. Each claimed
the upper or more dignified seat, and they quarrelled so fiercely over the
occupation of it that they had to be brought before the town meeting.

In no way could honor and respect be shown more satisfactorily in the
community than by the seat assigned in meeting. When Judge Sewall married
his second wife, he writes with much pride: "Mr. Oliver in the names of the
Overseers invites my Wife to sit in the foreseat. I thought to have brought
her into my pue. I thankt him and the Overseers." His wife died in a few
months, and he reproached himself for his pride in this honor, and left the
seat which he had in the men's foreseat. "God in his holy Sovereignty put
my wife out of the Fore Seat. I apprehended I had Cause to be ashamed of my
Sin and loath myself for it, and retired into my Pue," which was of course
less dignified than the foreseat.

Often, in thriving communities, the "pues" and benches did not afford
seating room enough for the large number who wished to attend public
worship, and complaints were frequent that many were "obliged to sit
squeased on the stairs." Persons were allowed to bring chairs and stools
into the meeting-house, and place them in the "alleys." These extra seats
became often such encumbering nuisances that in many towns laws were passed
abolishing and excluding them, or, as in Hadley, ordering them "back of the
women's seats." In 1759 it was ordered in that town to "clear the Alleys of