All of which are such
matters of course to-day that we can scarcely realize how revolutionary
they were two centuries ago.
To all who should come to his colony, Penn offered land at the rate of
forty shillings for a hundred acres, and the experiment, denounced at
first as visionary and certain of failure, was so successful that within
a year, more than three thousand persons had sailed to settle along the
Delaware. In the summer of 1682, Penn himself sailed for the New World,
and late in the following autumn, at a spot just above the junction of
the Schuylkill and Delaware, laid out a city as square and level as a
checker-board, and named it Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love.
Before taking possession of the land, he concluded a treaty with the
Delaware Indians, to whom it belonged, "the only treaty," as Voltaire
says, "between savages and Christians that was never sworn to and never
broken." Penn's stately and distinguished bearing, his affability and
kindness of heart, made a deep impression upon the Indians; they always
remembered him with trust and affection; and seventy years elapsed
before Pennsylvania tasted the horrors of Indian warfare.
The growth of the new city was phenomenal. Settlers came so fast that
cabins could not be built for them, and many of them lived for a time in
caves along the river.
Pages:
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70