She would choose the latter for the sake of being alone with
him; but sometimes when the cold was very severe, rather than freeze
to death, they would crawl under the bed-clothes; and this, after a
while, became a habit, a custom, or a fashion. The man that I am
going to send this by, is just ready to start, so I cannot stop to
write more now. In my next I'll give you a more particular account
of the people here. Adieu.'
"_Mr. Editor_, you may be sure that what is related in the foregoing
letter is the truth. I know that there is considerable _other_
information in it, mixed up with _that_ about which you wished to be
informed, but I could not very well separate it."
So after all that has been said of the practice of bundling in our
country, by foreign writers, travelers, and reviewers--after all the
reproach that has been heaped upon us, now that we are able to get at
the plain truth, it appears to be, though certainly a bad practice, not
half so bad as the junketing and sitting up courtships that are known
elsewhere. Nay, more. Though in the present state of society it is a
practice that should be utterly discountenanced everywhere, still it
would seem to have grown up out of the peculiar circumstances of our
first settlers; to be confined _now_ to remote and small districts (for
I have heard of only three instances, after all my inquiry); and to be
rapidly going out of practice.
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