consciences. The governor answered that he would spare them until they
were better informed. But returning at mid-day and finding them playing
pitch-the-bar and stool-ball in the streets, he told them that it was
against _his_ conscience that they should play and others work, and so
made them cease their games.

By 1659 the Puritans had grown to hate Christmas more and more; it was,
to use Shakespeare's words, "the bug that feared them all." The very
name smacked to them of incense, stole, and monkish jargon; any person
who observed it as a holiday by forbearing of labor, feasting, or any
other way was to pay five shillings fine, so desirous were they to
"beate down every sprout of Episcopacie." Judge Sewall watched jealously
the feeling of the people with regard to Christmas, and noted with
pleasure on each succeeding year the continuance of common traffic
throughout the day. Such entries as this show his attitude: "Dec. 25,
1685. Carts come to town and shops open as usual. Some somehow observe
the day, but are vexed I believe that the Body of people profane it, and
blessed be God no authority yet to compel them to keep it." When the
Church of England established Christmas services in Boston a few years
later, we find the Judge waging hopeless war against Governor Belcher
over it, and hear him praising his son for not going with other boy
friends to hear the novel and attractive services. He says: "I dehort
mine from Christmas keeping and charge them to forbear."

Christmas could not be regarded till this century as a New England
holiday, though in certain localities, such as old Narragansett--an
opulent community which was settled by Episcopalians--two weeks of
Christmas visiting and feasting were entered into with zest by both
planters and slaves for many years previous to the Revolution.

Thanksgiving, commonly regarded as being from its earliest beginning a
distinctive New England festival, and an equally characteristic Puritan
holiday, was originally neither.

The first New England Thanksgiving was not observed by either Plymouth
Pilgrim or Boston Puritan. "Gyving God thanks" for safe arrival and many
other liberal blessings was first heard on New England shores from the
lips of the Popham colonists at Monhegan, in the Thanksgiving service of
the Church of England.

Days set apart for thanksgiving were known in Europe before the
Reformation, and were in frequent use by Protestants afterward,
especially in the