Achenwall's Observations on North America

A contemporary report compiles verbal information about the colonies along North America's eastern seaboard, describing climate and sandy coasts, staple crops such as maize, beans, and tobacco, and indigenous peoples' languages, customs, and subsistence practices. It characterizes Native American political confederacies, warfare customs, and demographic decline from disease and trade goods. The account assesses colonial population growth, patterns of frontier settlement, land-purchase arrangements and small-rent tenure, and contrasts slower temperate-colony expansion with rapid development in sugar-producing islands. Observations combine natural history, economy, and social practices as recorded by European visitors.