sent from home, left children in their care. The
Indians, on their part, were known to have helped white families with
food in winter time. Penn, on his first visit to the colony, made a long
journey unarmed among the Indians as far as the Susquehanna, saw the
great herds of elk on that river, lived in Indian wigwams, and learned
much of the language and customs of the natives. There need never be any
trouble with them, he said. They were the easiest people in the world to
get on with if the white men would simply be just. Penn's fair treatment
of the Indians kept Pennsylvania at peace with them for about seventy
years--in fact, from 1682 until the outbreak of the French and Indian
Wars, in 1755. In its critical period of growth, Pennsylvania was
therefore not at all harassed or checked by those Indian hostilities
which were such a serious impediment in other colonies.

The two years of Penn's first visit were probably the happiest of his
life. Always fond of the country, he built himself a fine seat on
the Delaware near Bristol, and it would have been better for him, and
probably also for the colony, if he had remained there. But he thought
he had duties in England: his family needed him; he must defend
his people from the religious oppression still prevailing; and Lord
Baltimore had gone to England to resist him in the boundary dispute. One
of the more narrow-minded of his faith wrote to Penn from England that
he was enjoying himself too much in his colony and seeking his own
selfish interest. Influenced by all these considerations, he returned
in August, 1684, and it was long before he saw Pennsylvania again--not,
indeed, until October, 1699, and then for only two years.

Chapter III. Life In Philadelphia

The rapid increase of population and the growing prosperity in
Pennsylvania during the life of its founder present a striking contrast
to the slower and more troubled growth of the other British colonies
in America. The settlers in Pennsylvania engaged at once in profitable
agriculture. The loam, clay, and limestone soils on the Pennsylvania
tide of the Delaware produced heavy crops of grain, as well as pasture
for cattle and valuable lumber from its forests. The Pennsylvania
settlers were of a class particularly skilled in dealing with the soil.
They apparently encountered none of the difficulties, due probably to
incompetent farming, which beset the settlers of Delaware, whose land
was as good as that of th