as to sell
boards to Gloucester men at "one shilling per hundred better cheape than
to strangers"--and was to receive pay "raised in the towne." Saco and
Biddeford, in Maine, ordered that fellow-townsmen should have preference
in every employment. Other towns ordered certain persons to buy
provisions "of the towns-men in preference." Reading would not sell any
of its felled timber out of the town. Thus the social compact called a
town extended itself also into all the small doings of daily life, and
the mutual helpfulness made mutual interests that proved no small
element of the force which bound all together in 1776 in a successful
struggle for independence.

In outlying settlements and districts this feeling of mutual dependence
and assistance was strong enough to give a name which sometimes lingered
long. "The Loomis Neighborhood," "The Mason Neighborhood," "The Robinson
Neighborhood" were names distinctive for half a century, and far more
distinguishing and individual than the Greenville, Masontown, and
Longwood that succeeded them.

There was one curious and contradictory aspect of this neighborliness,
this kindliness, this thought for mutual welfare, and that was its
narrowness, especially in New England, as regards the limitations of
space and locality. It is impossible to judge what caused this restraint
of vision, but it is certain that in generality and almost in
universality, just as soon as any group of settlers could call
themselves a town, these colonists' notions of kindliness and
thoughtfulness for others became distinctly and rigidly limited to their
own townspeople. The town was their whole world. Without doubt this was
partly the result of the lack of travelling facilities and ample
communication, which made townships far more separated and remote from
each other than states are to-day, and made difficult the possibility of
speedy or full knowledge of strangers.

This caused a constant suspicion of all newcomers, especially those who
chanced to enter with scant introduction, and made universal a custom of
"warning out" all strangers who arrived in any town. This formality was
gone through with by the sheriff or tithing-man. Thereafter should the
warned ones prove incapable or unsuccessful or vicious, they could not
become a charge upon the town, but could be returned whence they came
with despatch and violence if necessary. By this means, and by various
attempts to restrict the powers of citizens t