my
without.

The communities of this period are often referred to as pure
democracies, where each man was ranked equal to every other. This is far
from the fact. There were real aristocratic distinctions in every town,
nowhere more apparent than in meetings for religious worship. The truth
appears to be that the settlers were still bound by the fetters of habit
and custom brought from the mother-land. Emancipation from its
aristocratic practices and social distinctions came only with the slow
growth of democratic ideas and the overthrow of kingly rule.

DWELLINGS.

The first houses of the settlers were doubtless of logs, one story high,
"daubed" with clay. A common form was eighteen feet square, with seven
feet stud, stone fireplaces, with catted chimney, and a hip-roof covered
with thatch. These structures generally gave way in a few years to large
frame houses, covered with "clo'boards" and shingles, having fireplace
and chimney of brick, which was laid in clay mortar, except the part
above the roof, where lime was used. Of these houses, two styles
prevailed; one represented by the "Old Indian House," the other, less
elaborate, by the house now standing on the Smead lot. This house is
thirty feet square, two stories, with pitch roof, facing the street
westerly. It is covered with cloveboards, apparently the original, with
no signs of paint. It has four windows in front, and five at each end.
The front door, a little south of the centre, opens directly into the
south front room, which is sixteen by eighteen feet. On the north of
this, is a huge chimney which rises through the ridge, and the north
front room, twelve by thirteen feet. North of the chimney is a large,
dark closet. East of it is the kitchen, eleven by twenty feet, south of
which is the buttery. Stairs to cellar and chambers occupy the southeast
corner. The space over the kitchen is unfinished. The southwest chamber
is fifteen by fifteen, the northwest twelve by thirteen. Each story is
seven and a half feet stud. The frame is of hewn timber, generally nine
by fourteen inches. The plates are nine by sixteen; those at the ends in
the upper story project twelve inches over the walls, supported by the
side plates, and studs on the inner edge. The rafters are sawed, four by
four inches, and supported by purlins which are framed into heavy beam
rafters at the middle and each end of the roof. The whole building is of
pine. There was no lath and plaster; the w