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&ct." and also as "any kind of business to be done at Farming," which is even more inclusive. It was this business, which is the foundation of the wealth of a country, that engaged the labors of College Tom. Hampered as they were by the evils of the currency, the produce of the land yet supported a prosperous people, until the final crash came, brought on by the political as well as financial difficulties, and the fine farms once so flourishing and productive were left to revert to their primeval condition. The people as well as the land became impoverished, till in due time from the wrecks of a purely agricultural community manufactures took their rise.

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CHAPTER VIII.

The Feminine Portion of the Household. College Tom's Sisters. Women's Work. New Light Meeting. Sempstry and Housewifery. Mrs. Hazard. Her Friends, Mrs. Helme, Mrs. Torrey, and Mrs. Robinson. "Affair against Mother Robinson." The Kitchen. Mrs. Hazard's Grandchildren.

THE record of the life of the feminine part of College Tom's household is far less full than that of the men. Some of the great houses are still standing in which the mistress of the last century lived, and ruled her small kingdom. Many a house was built with a fine gambrel roof, giving good attic room, into which the slaves were locked at night. The house often had two chimneys, built quite near together in the middle, taking up what in modern times would be used for a hall. One of these chimneys was the kitchen chimney, with its great open fireplace and brick oven built into the side of it. College Tom's house had only one main chimney, but that was twenty-three feet wide at its base.1 Pewter dishes, brass and iron pots,

1 Narragansett Hist. Register, p. 293.

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and "pot hooks and trammels" by which the pots for boiling were hung, were valuable enough to be bequeathed by will. Robert Hazard, the father of College Tom, mentions twenty-one silver spoons in his will; "the largest silver spoons," silver" salt spoons," and "other silver spoons," he calls them. Sarah, his daughter, who afterward married Job Watson, has half "of all my Pewter Brass Iron and Wooden vessels left her, "two feather beds with furniture," with one half of the tables and chairs, and also of "Cupboard, Desk and Chests." She is to have the privilege of living in the mansion house with her mother until her marriage. Isabel and Phoebe, two slaves, are given her, and a thousand pounds old tenor, within a year of her father's death. The married daughter, Mary Champlin, having probably had a wedding portion, has only silver spoons, and five hundred pounds.1 Ten years later Stephen Champlin, her husband, died, and there seems to have been some trouble over the will, which Thomas Hazard settled. A farm was left to a younger son, Robert Champlin, which had still two years' lease to run. Stephen Champ1 South Kingstown Records.

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