ship of England or Holland in that day but made great dependence upon them.  Bacon was, of course, a main staple at sea.  In its half-cooked state as it came from the smoke-house it was much relished with their biscuit by seamen and others wishing strong food, and when fried it became a desirable article of food to all except the sick.  Mention is made of it by several of the early Pilgrim writers.  Carlyle, as quoted, speaks of it as a diet-staple on the may-Flower.  Salt ("corned”) beef has always been a main article of food with seamen everywhere.  Wood’ states that the “beef” of the Pilgrims was “tainted.”  In some way it was made the basis of a reputedly palatable preparation called “spiced beef,” mentioned as prepared by one of the sailors for a shipmate dying on the may-Flower in Plymouth harbor.  It must have been a very different article from that we now find so acceptable under that name in England.  Winthrop’ gives the price of his beef at “19 shillings per cwt.”  Winslow advises his friend Morton, in the letter so often quoted, not to have his beef “dry-salted,” saying, “none can do it better than the sailors,” which is a suggestion not readily understood.  “Smoked” beef was practically the same as that known as “jerked,” “smoked,” or “dried” beef in America.  A “dried neat’s-tongue” is named as a contribution of the Pilgrims to the dinner for Captain Jones and his men on February 21, 1621, when they had helped to draw up and mount the cannon upon the platform on the hill at Plymouth.  Winthrop paid “14d. a piece” for his “neats’ tongues.”  The pork of the Pilgrims is also said by Wood’ to have been “tainted.”  Winthrop states that his pork cost “20 pence the stone” (14 lbs.).

Hams seem to have been then, as now, a highly-prized article of diet.  Goodwin mentions that the salt used by the Pilgrims was (evaporated) “sea-salt” and very “impure.”  Winthrop mentions among his supplies, “White, Spanish, and Bay salt.”

The beans of the Pilgrims were probably of the variety then known as “Spanish beans.”  The cabbages were apparently boiled with meat, as nowadays, and also used considerably for “sour-krout” and for pickling, with which the Leyden people had doubtless become familiar during their residence among the Dutch.  As anti-scorbutics they were of much value.  The same was true of onions, whether pickled, salted, raw, or boiled.  Turnips and parsnips find frequent mention in the early literature of the first settlers, and were among their stock vegetables.  Pease were evidently staple articles of food with the Plymouth people, and are frequently named.  They probably were chiefly used for porridge and puddings, and were used in large quantities, both afloat and ashore.