Need someone who knows about History of the Modern Western World 4 essays 1pg each (350) words College Level

James Burney, on contact with the Maori of New Zealand (From the Internet Modern History Sourcebook)

Captain James Cook (1728-1779) of Yorkshire was without a doubt the greatest seafarer of the 18th century, circumnavigating the globe and opening the Pacific regions to the knowledge of the outside world. All too often, this eventually worked to the detriment of the native cultures of the islands. One of the most resilient nations of Oceania, however, was the Maori of New Zealand, first encountered during Cook's 1772-73 voyage. James Burney (1750-1821), a seaman with Cook who later became an admiral, left these impressions in his journals. Source: Beverly Hooper, ed., James Burney: With Captain James Cook in the Pacific (Canberra, Australia: National Library of Australia), pp. 67-68, 72-74.

These Islands have been described in so satisfactory a manner, that there is no room left for me to hold forth without making frequent repetitions of what has before been said never the less I will venture a word or two & attempt to draw their characters according to my own opinions -

I must confess I was a little disappointed on my first coming here as I expected to find People nearly as white as Europeans. Some of the better sort are tolerably white, more so than a Spaniard or Portugueze, but the generality are of a dark olive Colour. The men are something larger than the common run in England -

The Similitude of Customs & Language scarce admits any doubt of these Islanders being sprung from the same stock as the Zealanders though from the difference of climate & country they are as opposite in their characters as the enervated, luxurious Italians & the rude unpolished Northern Nations of Europe - the Heavoh & Tattow are common to both though practised in different manners - the Islanders have I think, the Advantage of the Zealanders, in their persons, they are likewise very cleanly, washing both before & after every meal, & take a great deal of Pride in their Dress - any thing showy or Ornamental is much more esteemed here than at Zealand - especially by the girls who have almost as much Vanity as the Women of Europe - Hospitality & a love of Society reigns through all these Islands; I never in any of my Rambles met with an unwelcome reception - In short they are a friendly humane people, superior to the Zealanders in many aspects - I mean the men as to the women, they must not be mentiond together unless by way of contrast - they are reckon'd smaller here than the English Women & not in proportion to the men, but take away our high heads & high heels, the difference of size would not be perceptible - there are much handsomer women in England & many, more ordinary. I mean as to the face - but for fine turned Limbs & well made persons I think they cannot be excelled - I only speak from my own notions, which are not infallible, for I have not the least pretence to set up for a Judge in this case - the Children are in general exceeding beautifull - as they grow up they lose it for want of that care which in Europe is taken to preserve Beauty, they are not in the least afraid "The Winds of the Heavens Should visit their faces too roughly" - were they brought up in the delicate manner European Women are, there would be a great many very fine women amongst these Islands - Colour, in my opinion, has very little to do with beauty provided it be a healthy one it is a handsome one whether fair, brown or black - I question if they have any Idea of Chastity being a virtue - you may see young Girls not more than 12 years old with bellies they can scarce carry - after Marriage they confine themselves to the Husband - if they are caught slipping the Husband commonly sends them home to their Relations, but the Gallant does not escape so well, his life often paying the forfeit of his incontinence. The independent men, or Aree's are allowed to have 2 wives - If a women after 6 or 7 months cohabitation with her Husband does not prove with Child, their Union, if they please, may be dissolved & each party at liberty to choose another mate. The women always mess by themselves & are seldom allowed to eat flesh - if a girl becomes pregnant the man cannot be forced to marry her. When a man courts any girl for a wife, after having got her relations consent, he sleeps 3 nights at their house - if the bride is a Virgin he is allowed to take no liberties till the 3d Night, though he lyes with her each Night - the 3d Day he makes the Relations a present & the 4th takes the Bride home - they give no portions with the girls unless the Bride's father has no Male children or other Male Relations to bestow his property on. A case which must be very rare in these Islands... ...

Opune - has but one child (a Girl) living; he has 2 Wives & 3 Concubines - Tereroa's Sister was formerly one of his wives - She has been dead some time his Daughter if She survives him will inherit his Dominions - for he is not likely to have any more Children, being now a very old man but is Still greatly loved by his own Subjects & feared by the other Islands - Opune, in spite of old age & Blindness, (his Eyes being very bad) nevertheless retains all the Chearfullness & Merriment of a Young Man, nor are his people ever happier than when in his Company - he is a great encourager of their Games & Revels (their Heavah of which I shall Speak presently) & has invented many new ones himself - I have given this Character of him from what Omy says, who stiles him a fighting man & a man of Laughter. - I never saw him -

Of these people's Character, I have as yet shewn you only the fair Side - My partiality towards them shall not induce me to Stop here - As I set down nought in Malice, so will I nothing extenuate.

In their dealings with us they are great thieves, our Goods being of such Value to them, that very few can withstand the temptation of a fair opportunity - nevertheless I have slept all Night in their houses 8 miles up the Country, without any attempt being made on me - theft amongst themselves is punished with Death -

They have some very barbarous customs, the worst of which is, when a man has as many children as he is able to maintain, all that come after are smothered: women will sometimes bargain with her husband on her first marrying him, for the Number of Children that shall be kept. They never keep any Children that are any ways deformed - every fifth Child if suffered to live is Seldom allowed to rank higher than a Towtow - yet notwithstanding all this, these Islands are exceeding populous - even the Smallest being full of inhabitants & perhaps were it not for the Custom just mentioned, these would be more than the Islands could well maintain -

Every Island has a high priest, some two, with inferior priests - of this latter Class was Omy - the Being whom they worship they call Mo-wee & sometime offer human sacrifices to him - this is not done at any particular sett times but when Mo-wee requires it - he appears to none but the high priests, who frequently pretend to see him flying - this gives the high priest great power & if he is a man of a vindictive temper, whoever offends him must feel it - Mo-wee always names the person & as soon as his desires are known to the high priest he sends his attendants to dispatch the destined victim who knows nothing of his fate till the minute of his death - having killed him, he is carried to the high Priest, who takes out his Eyes, which Mo-wee eats, & the body is buried -

Before they venture on any extraordinary Expedition, Mo-wee is consulted: if the priest brings bad News it is either laid aside or deferred till better success is promised. Temperance or Chastity is not in the least essential to the high priest's Character, he being at liberty to take any woman he chooses to honour so far, married or unmarried, for as long as he pleases. The great power of the high priest would be very inconvenient for the Chief Aree were it not that they most commonly exercise this office themselves. - The Kingsfisher is one of their inferior deities - & the high priest understands what they say...

Thomas Gage, Writings on Chocolate (From the Internet Modern History Sourcebook)

Thomas Gage (1603-1656 CE) was an English traveler and Dominican friar. Gage traveled to Spain, where he joined the Dominican order and subsequently undertook missionary work in Mexico and Guatemala from 1625 to 1637. Disillusioned by his experiences, he renounced Roman Catholicism and returned to England, becoming an Anglican clergyman. Gage published works on the European presence in America that criticized the atrocities committed against native peoples in those lands. His writings popularized Native American culture, such as the use of chocolate, and stimulated English interest in America. Source: E.S. Thompson, ed., Thomas Gage's Travels in the New World (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1958) pp. 151-159.

12. CONCERNING TWO DAILY AND COMMON DRINKS OR POTIONS MUCH USED IN THE INDIAS, CALLED CHOCOLATE AND ATOLE

CHOCOLATE being this day used not only over all the West Indias, but also in Spain, Italy, and Flanders, with approbation of many learned doctors in physic, among whom Antonio Colmenero of Ledesma, who lived once in the Indias, hath composed a learned and curious treatise concerning the nature and quality of this drink, I thought fit to insert here also somewhat of it concerning my own experience for the space of twelve years.43 This name chocolate is an Indian name, and is compounded from atte, as some say, or as others, atle, which in the Mexican language signifieth "water," and from the sound which the water, wherein is put the chocolate, makes, as choco choco choco, when it is stirred in a cup by an instrument called a molinet, or molinillo, until it bubble and rise unto a froth. And as there it is a name compounded, so in English we may well call it a compounded or a confectioned drink wherein are found many and several ingredients, according to the different disposition of the bodies of them that use it. But the chief ingredient, without which it cannot be made, is called cacao, a kind of nut or kernel bigger than a great almond which grows upon a tree called the tree of cacao, and ripens in a great husk, wherein sometimes are found more, sometimes less cacaos, sometimes twenty, sometimes thirty, nay, forty and above. This cacao, though as every simple, it contains the quality of the four elements, yet in the common opinion of most physicians, it is held to be cold and dry a praedominio. It is also in the substance that rules these two qualities, restringent and obstructive, of the nature of the element of the earth. And as it is thus a mixed, and not a simple element, it hath parts correspondent to the rest of the elements; and particularly it partakes of those which correspond with the element of air, that is heat and moisture, which are governed by unctious parts, there being drawn out of the cacao much butter, which in the Indias I have seen drawn out of it by the Creole women for to oint their faces. And let not this seem impossible to believe that this grain or nut of cacao should be said to be first cold and dry, and then hot and moist, for though experience be a thousand witnesses, yet instances will further clear this truth. First in the rhubarb which hath in it hot and soluble parts, and parts which are binding, cold, and dry, which have a virtue to strengthen, bind, and stop the looseness of the belly. Secondly, we see this clearly in the steel which having so much of the nature of the earth, as being heavy, thick, cold, and dry, should be thought unproper for the curing of oppilations [obstructions], but rather to be apt to increase them, and yet it is given as a proper remedy against them.

Every element, be it never so simple, begets and produceth in the liver four humours, not only differing in temper but also in substance; and begets more or less of that humour, according as the element hath more or fewer parts corresponding to the substance of that humour which is most engendered. From which example we may gather that when the cacao is ground and stirred, the divers parts which nature hath given it do artificially and intimately mix themselves one with another. And so, the unctious warm and moist parts mingled with the earthy represseth, and leaveth them not so binding as they were before, but rather with a mediocrity, more in-dining to the warm and moist temper of the air than to the cold and dry of the earth, as it doth appear when it is made fit to drink, that scarce two turns are given with the molinet, when there arises a fatty scum by which is seen how much it partaketh of the oily part.

From all that hath been said, the error of those is well discovered who, speaking of this drink of chocolate, say that it causeth oppilations, because cacao is astringent, as if that astriction were not corrected and modified by the intimate mixing of one part with another, by means of the grinding, as is said before. Besides it having so many ingredients which are naturally hot, it must of necessity have this effect, that is to say, to open, attenuate, not to bind. And laying aside more reasons, this truth is evidently seen in the cacao itself, which if it be not stirred, grinded, and compounded to make the chocolate, but be eaten as it is in the fruit (as many Creole and Indian women eat it), it doth notably obstruct and cause stop-pings, and make them look of a broken, pale, and earthy color, as do those that eat earthenware, as pots or pieces of lime walls (which is much used among the Spanish women thinking that a pale and earthy color, though with obstructions and stoppings, well becomes them). And for this certainly in the cacao thus eaten there is no other reason but that the divers substances which it contains are not perfectly mingled by the mastication only, but require the artificial mixture which we have spoken of before.

The tree which doth bear this fruit is so delicate, and the earth where it groweth so extreme hot, that to keep the tree from being consumed by the sun, they first plant other trees which they call las madres del cacao, "mothers of the cacao," and when these are grown up to a good height fit to shade the cacao trees, then they plant the cacauatales or the trees [orchards] of cacaos, that when they first show themselves above the ground, those trees which are already grown may shelter them, and, as mothers, nourish, defend, and shadow them from the sun. The fruit doth not grow naked, but many of them, as I have said, are in one great husk or cod, and therein besides, every grain is closed up in a white juicy skin which the women also love to suck off from the cacao, finding it cool, and in the mouth dissolving into water. There are two sorts of cacao. The one is common, which is of a dark color inclining toward red, being round and picked at the ends; the other is broader and bigger and flatter and not so round, which they call patlaxti [Theobroma bicolor, wild cacao], and this is white and more drying, and is sold a great deal cheaper than the former. And this especially more than the other causes watchfulness and driveth away sleep, and therefore is not so useful as the ordinary, and is chiefly spent by the ordinary and meaner sort of people. As for the rest of the ingredients which make this chocolatical confection, there is notable variety. Some put into it black pepper, which is not well approved of by the physicians because it is so hot and dry, but only for one who hath a very cold liver, but commonly instead of this pepper, they put into it a long red pepper called chile which, though it be hot in the mouth, yet it is cool and moist in the operation. It is further compounded with white sugar, cinnamon, cloves, aniseed, almonds, hazel nuts, orejuela [Cymbopetalum penduliflorum Baill., the Aztec xochinacaztli of the anona family], vanilla, zapoyal, [ground seeds of the mamey, Calocarpum mammosum], orange flower water, some musk, and as much of achiote as will make it look of the color of a red brick. But how much of each of these may be applied to such a quantity of cacao, the several dispositions of men's bodies must be their rule. The ordinary receipt of Antonio Colmenero was this: to every hundred cacaos, two cods of chile, called long red pepper, one handful of aniseed and orejuelas, and two of the flowers called mecaxochitl [Piper amalago], or vanilla, or instead of this fix roses of Alexandria, beat to powder, two drams of cinnamon, of almonds and hazel nuts of each one dozen, of white sugar half a pound, of achiote enough to give it the color. This author thought neither clove nor musk nor any sweet water fit, but in the Indias they are much used. Others use to put in maize or panizo [panic grass, probably Italian millet here], which is very windy, but such do it only for their profit by increasing the quantity of the chocolate because every fanega, or measure of maize containing about a bushel and a half, is sold for eight shillings, and they that sell chocolate sell it for four shillings a pound, which is the ordinary price. The cinnamon is held one of the best ingredients and denied by none, for that it is hot and dry in the third degree, it provokes urine and helps the kidneys and reins of those who are troubled with cold diseases.

The achiote [annatto] hath a piercing, attenuating quality, as appeareth by the common practice of the physicians of the Indias, experienced daily in the effects of it, who do give it to their patients to cut and attenuate the gross humours which do cause shortness of breath and stopping of urine, and so it is used for any kind of oppilations, and is given for the stoppings which are in the breast or in the region of the belly or any other part of the body. This achiote also groweth upon a tree [Bixa orellana] in round husks, which are full of red grains, from whence the achiote is taken, and first made into a paste, and then being dried up, is fashioned either into round balls or cakes, or into the form of little bricks, and so is sold. As concerns the long red pepper, there are four sorts of it: one is called chilchote; the other is very little, which they call chiltipiquin, and these two kinds are very quick and biting. The other two are called tonalchiles, and these are but moderately hot, for they are eaten with bread [tortillas] by the Indians, as they eat other fruits. But that which is usually put into chocolate, called chilpaelagua, which hath a broad husk and is not so biting as the first nor so gentle as the last. The mecaxochitl or vanilla hath a purgative quality. [The Vanilla fragrant was called tlilxochitl, "black flower," and is distinct from mecaxochitl, "rope flower," Piper amalago, but both were used for flavoring chocolate.] All these ingredients are usually put into the chocolate, and by some more, according to their fancies. But the meaner sort of people, as Blackamoors and Indians, commonly put nothing into it but cacao, achiote, maize, and a few chiles with a little aniseed. And though the cacao is mingled with all these ingredients which are hot, yet there is to be a greater quantity of cacao than of all the rest of the ingredients, which serve to temper the coldness of the cacao. From whence it follows that this chocolatical confection is not so cold as the cacao, nor so hot as the rest of the ingredients, but there results from the action and reaction of these ingredients a moderate temper which may be good for both the cold and the hot stomachs, being taken moderately.

Now for the making or compounding of this drink, I shall set down here the method. The cacao and the other ingredients must be beaten in a mortar of stone or, as the Indians use, ground upon a broad stone which they call metate, and is only made for that use. But first the ingredients are all to be dried, except the achiote, with care that they may be beaten to powder, keeping them still in stirring, that they be not burned or become black, for if they be over-dried, they will be bitter and lose their virtue. The cinnamon and the long red pepper are to be first beaten with the aniseed, and then the cacao, which must be beaten by little and little, till all be powdered, and in the beating it must be turned round that it may mix the better. Everyone of these ingredients must be beaten by itself, and then all be put into the vessel where the cacao is, which you must stir together with a spoon, and then take out that paste, and put it into the mortar, under which there must be a little fire, after the Confection is made. If more fire be put under than will only warm it, then the unctious part will dry away. The achiote also must be put in at the beating that it may the better take the color. All the ingredients must be searced [sifted through a sieve], save only the cacao, and if from the cacao the dry shell be taken, it will be the better. When it is well beaten and incorporated - which will be known by the shortness of it - then with a spoon (so in the Indias is used) is taken up some of the paste, which will be almost liquid, and made into tablets, or else without a spoon put into boxes, and when it is cold it will be hard. Those that make it into tablets, put a spoonful of the paste upon a piece of paper (the Indians put it upon the leaf of a plantain) where, being put in the shade - for in the sun it melts and dissolves, it grows hard. And then, bowing the paper or leaf, the tablet falls off by reason of the fatness of the paste, but if it be put into anything of earth or wood, it sticks fast and will not come off, but with scraping or breaking. The manner of drinking it is divers. The one most used in Mexico is to take it hot with atole, dissolving a tablet in hot water, and then stirring and beating it in the cup where it is to be drunk with a molinet, and when it is well stirred to a scum or froth, then to fill the cup with hot atole, and so drink it sup by sup. Another way is that the chocolate being dissolved with cold water and stirred with the molinet, and the scum taken off and put into another vessel, the remainder be set upon the fire with as much sugar as will sweeten it, and when it is warm, then to pour it upon the scum which was taken off before, and so to drink it.

The most ordinary way is to warm the water very hot and then to pour out half the cup full that you mean to drink, and to put into it a tablet or two, or as much as will thicken reasonably the water, and then grind it well with the molinet, and when it is well ground and risen to a scum, to fill the cup with hot water, and so drink it by sups, having sweetened it with sugar, and to eat it with a little conserve or maple bread steeped into the chocolate. There is another way which is much used in the island of Santo Domingo which is to put the chocolate into a pipkin [small earthenware pot] with a little water and to let it boil well till it be dissolved, and then to put in sufficient sugar and water according to the quantity of the chocolate, and then to boil it again until there comes an oily scum upon it, and then to drink it. There is another way yet to drink chocolate, which is cold which the Indians use at feasts to refresh themselves, and it is made after this manner. The chocolate, which is made with none or very few ingredients, being dissolved in cold water with the molinet, they take off the scum or crassy [dense] part which riseth in great quantity especially when the cacao is older and more putrified. The scum they lay aside in a little dish by itself, and then put sugar into that part whence was taken the scum, and then pour it from on high into the scum, and so drink it cold. And this drink is so cold that it agreeth not with all men's stomachs, for by experience it hath been found that it doth hurt by causing pains in the stomach, especially to women.

The third way of taking it is the most used, and thus certainly it doth no hurt, neither know I why it may not be used as well in England as in other parts, both hot and cold. For where it is so much used, as well in the Indias as in Spain, Italy, and Flanders, which is a cold country, find that it agreeth well with them. True it is used more in the Indias than in the European parts because there the stomachs are more apt to faint than here, and a cup of chocolate well confectioned comforts and strengthens the stomach. For myself I must say I used it twelve years constantly, drinking one cup in the morning, another yet before dinner between nine or ten of the clock, another within an hour or after dinner, and another between four and five in the afternoon, and when I was purposed to sit up late to study, I would take another cup about seven or eight at night, which would keep me waking till about midnight. And if by chance I did neglect any of these accustomed hours, I presently found my stomach fainty. And with this custom I lived twelve years in those parts healthy, without any obstructions or oppilations, not knowing what either ague or fever was. Yet will I not dare to regulate by mine own the bodies of others, nor take upon me the skill of a physician to appoint and decide at what time and by what persons this drink may be used. Only I say that I have known some that have been the worse for it, either for drinking it with too much sugar, which hath relaxed their stomachs, or for drinking it too often.

I have heard physicians of the Indias say of it, and I have seen it by experience in others, though never I could find it in myself, that those that use this chocolate much grow fat and corpulent by it. Which, indeed, may seem hard to believe, for considering that all the ingredients except the cacao do rather extenuate than make fat because they are hot and dry in the third degree. How then might this cacao with the other Indian ingredients be had in England? Even by trading in Spain for it, as we do for other commodities, or not slighting it so much as we and the Hollanders have often done upon the Indian seas. I have heard the Spaniards say that when we have taken a good prize, a ship laden with cacao, in anger and wrath we have hurled overboard this good commodity, not regarding the worth and goodness of it, but calling it in bad Spain cagarruta de carnero or sheep dung in good English. It is one of the necessariest commodities in the Indias, and nothing enricheth Chiapa in particular more than it, whither are brought from Mexico and other parts the rich bags of patacons only for this cagarruta de carnero.

The other drink which is much used in the Indias is called atole, of which I will say but a little because I know it cannot be used here. This was the drink of the ancient Indians, and is a thick pap made of the flour of maize, taking off the husks from it, which is windy and melancholy. This is commonly carried by the Indian woman to the market hot in pots, and there is sold in cups. The Creole students, as we go to a tavern to drink a cup of wine, so they go in company to the public markets, and as publicly buy and drink by measure of this atole which sometimes is seasoned with a little chile or long pepper, and then it pleaseth them best. But the nuns and gentlewomen have got a trick of confectioning it with cinnamon, sweet waters, amber, or musk, and store of sugar, and thus it is held to be a most strong and nourishing drink, which the physicians do prescribe unto a weak body as we do here our almond milk. But of what England never knew or tasted I will say no more, but hasten my pen to Guatemala, which hath been my second patria.

43 In this chapter only, Gage's original sentence construction and grammar, as found in the first (1648) edition, are retained. This policy of conscious archaism is partly to give the reader an idea of Gage's rather involved style - he hangs sentences one from another till he achieves a sort of literary mobile - which is fairly typical of all but the best writers of this period, but partly because Gage's dicussion of "hot and cold" and the "humour or chocolate and other products" is so typical of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and so out of place in the twentieth that modernization of prose seems almost to cast Gage's ideas - intelligent enough in the light of seventeenth-century thinking - into the realm of canting rubbish. It would be somewhat like supplying the bowmen of Agincourt with mine detectors to stuff in their quivers. Readers who find the first two pages difficult will find greater clarity in the later pages. If we of the twentieth century could define humour in seventeenth-century usage, it would simplify matters, but as Corporal Nym so often said, that's the humour of it.

Richard Frethorne, "Letter to Father and Mother"  (From the Internet Modern History Sourcebook

The European settlements were often multicultural communities with societies that evolved differently from those in Europe, allowing more class mobility for Europeans who came and became permanent settlers. Nevertheless, class and economic differences persisted, even in the colonies. One way to fund the costly voyage from Europe to the New World colonies was to sign on as an indentured servant. Under the terms of such contracts, workers agreed to several years of service, usually about seven, in return for the payment of their passage to North America. The work done by indentured servants varied according to their skills and gender. Some, especially women, served as domestic servants while men usually worked in the fields, or if they had skills, as artisans. This letter, written by Richard Frethorne to his parents, provides a first hand account of what conditions were like for indentured servants in the early English colony of Jamestown, in Virginia.

Source: Richard Frethorne, "Letter to his father and mother, March 20, April 2 and 3, 1623" in The Records of the Virginia Company of London, ed. by Susan Kingsbury (Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1935), 4: 58-62.

LOVING AND KIND FATHER AND MOTHER:

My most humble duty remembered to you, hoping in god of your good health, as I myself am at the making hereof. This is to let you understand that I you child am in a most heavy case by reason of the country, [which] is such that it causeth much sic kness, [such] as the sccurvy and the bloody flux and diverse other diseases, which maketh the body very poor and weak. And when we are sick there is nothing to comfort us; for since I came out of the ship I never ate anything but peas, and loblollie (that is, water gruel). As for deer or venison I never saw any since I came into this land. There is indeed some fowl, but we are not allowed to go and get it, but must work hard both early and late for a mess of water gruel and a mouthful of bread and beef. A mouthful of bread for a penny loaf must serve for four men which is most pitiful. [You would be grieved] if you did know as much as I [do], when people cry out day and night - Oh! That they were in England without their limbs - and would not care to lose any limb to be in England again, yea, though they beg from door to door. For we live in fear of the enemy every hour, yet we have had a combat with them... and we took two alive and made slaves of them. But it was by policy, for we are in great danger; for our plantation is very weak by reason of the death and sickness of our company. For we came but twenty for the merchants, and they are half dead just; and we look every hour when two more should go. Yet there came some four other men yet to live with us, of which there is but one alive; and our Lieutenant is dead, and [also] his father and his brother. And there was some five or six of the last year's twenty, of which there is but three left, so that we are fain to get other men to plant with us; and yet we are but 32 to fight against 3000 if they should come. And the nighest help that we have is ten mile of us, and when the rogues overcame this place [the] last [time] they slew 80 persons. How then shall we do, for we lie even in their teeth? They may easily take us, but [for the fact] that God is merciful and can save with few as well as with many, as he showed to Gilead. And like Gilead's soldiers, if they lapped water, we drink water which is but weak.

And I have nothing to comfort me, nor is there nothing to be gotten here but sickness and death, except [in the event] that one had money to lay out in some things for profit. But I have nothing at all - no, not a shirt to my back but two rags (2), nor clothes but one poor suit, nor but one pair of shoes, but one pair of stockings, but one cap, [and] but two bands [collars]. My cloak is stolen by one of my fellows, and to his dying hour [he] sould not tell me what he did with it; but some of my fellows saw him have butter and beef out of a ship, which my cloak, I doubt [not], paid for. So that I have not a penny, nor a penny worth, to help me too either spice or sugar or strong waters, without the which one cannot live here. For as strong beer in England doth fatten and strengthen them, so water here doth wash and weaken these here [and] only keeps [their] life and soul together. But I am not half [of] a quarter so strong as I was in England, and all is for want of victuals; for I do protest unto you that I have eaten more in [one] day at home than I have allowed me here for a week. You have given more than my day's allowance to a beggar at the door; and if Mr. Jackson had not relieved me, I should be in a poor case. But he like a father and she like a loving mother doth still help me.

For when we go to Jamestown (that is 10 miles of us) there lie all the ships that come to land, and there they must deliver their goods. And when we went up to town [we would go], as it may be, on Monday at noon, and come there by night, [and] then load the next day by noon, and go home in the afternoon, and unload, and then away again in the night, and [we would] be up about midnight. Then if it rained or blowed never so hard, we must lie in the boat on the water and have nothing but a little bread. For when we go into the boat we [would] have a loaf allowed to two men, and it is all [we would get] if we stayed there two days, which is hard; and [we] must lie all that while in the boat. But that Goodman Jackson pitied me and made me a cabin to lie in always when I [would] come up, and he would give me some poor jacks [fish] [to take] home with me, which comforted me more than peas or water gruel. Oh, they be very godly folks, and love me very well, and will do anything for me. And he much marvelled that you would send me a servant to the Company; he saith I had been better knocked on the head. And indeed so I find it now, to my great grief and misery; and [I] saith that if you love me you will redeem me suddenly, for which I do entreat and beg. And if you cannot get the merchants to redeem me for some little money, then for God's sake get a gathering or entreat some good folks to lay out some little sum of money in meal and cheese and butter and beef. Any eating meat will yield great profit. Oil and vinegar is very good; but, father, there is great loss in leaking. But for God's sake send beef and cheese and butter, or the more of one sort and none of another. But if you send cheese, it must be very old cheese; and at the cheesemonger's you may buy very food cheese for twopence farthing or halfpenny, that will be liked very well. But if you send cheese, you must have a care how you pack it in barrels; and you must put cooper's chips between every cheese, or else the heat of the hold will rot them. And look whatsoever you send me - be in never so much - look, what[ever] I make of it, I will deal truly with you. I will send it over and beg the profit to redeem me; and if I die before it come, I have entreated Goodman Jackson to send you the worth of it, who hath promised he will. If you send, you must direct your letters to Goodman Jackson, at Jamestown, a gunsmith. (You must set down his freight, because there be more of his name there.) Good father, do not forget me, but have mercy and pity my miserable case. I know if you did but see me, you would weep to see me; for I have but one suit. (But [though] it is a strange one, it is very well guarded.) Wherefore, for God's sake, pity me. I pray you to remember my love to all my friends and kindred. I hope all my brothers and sisters are in good health, and as for my part I have set down my resolution that certainly will be; that is, that the answer of this letter will be life or death to me. Therefore, good father, send as soon as you can; and if you send me any thing let this be the mark.

La Respuesta (1695) Sor Juana Inéz de la Cruz (From the Internet Modern History Sourcebook