nce in the preservation of such a theocracy as was New England,
since few of them returned to England, but after serving out their time
became freemen with homes and land and votes of their own; and the
commonwealth could not live as a religious organization unless it
thrived through the religious spirit of its citizens.

One other form of domestic service existed until this century. A limited
amount of assistance was given in some households by those unhappy
wights, the town-poor. These wretched paupers were sold to the lowest
bidder. Sometimes the buyer received but a few shillings a year from the
town for the "keep" of one of these helpless souls. We may be sure that
he got some work out of the pauper to pay for his board. We read of one
old Dimbledee, of Widow Bump and Widow Bumpus, degenerate successors in
name as well as in estate of the Pilgrim Bompasse, who were sold from
year to year from one farm to another and given a grudged existence,
till at last we find the town paying for their welcome coffins and
winding sheets. Two curious facts are to be noted in the poor accounts:
that the women paupers were almost invariably "very comfortable on it
for clothes," as were other women of that dress-loving day; and that
liquor was frequently supplied to both male and female paupers by the
town. Sometimes ten gallons apiece, a very consoling amount, was given
in a year. I have also noted the frequent presence on the poor-list of
what are termed "French Neuterls." These were Acadians--the neighbors
and compatriots of Evangeline--feeble folk, who, void of romance,
succumbed in despair to exile and home-sickness, a new language and a
new manner of living, and yielded weakly to work as servants when they
had no courage to maintain homes. New England paupers lived to a good
old age. I have been told that the unhappy fate of one of these
town-poor--an Acadian--was traced for over thirty years in the town
records of her sale. In 1767 there were twenty-one paupers in Danvers,
Mass., and their average age was eighty-four years, thus apparently
offering proof of good rum and good usage from the town. There was also
an hereditary pauperism. In Salem a certain family always had some of
its members on the list of town-poor from the year 1721 to 1848; and
perhaps they found better homes through "living around" than in trying
to support themselves.

Criminals were also sold into service to work out their sentences. Thus
did the practi