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OLD NEW ENGLAND TRAITS
EDITED BY
GEORGE LUNT
... this story's actually true.
If any person doubt it, I appeal
To history, tradition, and to facts,
To newspapers, whose truth all know and feel.
BYRON
NEW YORK
PUBLISHED BY HURD AND HOUGHTON
Cambridge: the Riverside Press
1873
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by
GEORGE LUNT,
in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE:
STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY
_H. O. HOUGHTON AND COMPANY_.
INTRODUCTION.
The Editor of this little volume does not deem it incumbent upon him to
explain in what way the author's manuscript came into his possession. He
hopes it may be enough for him to say, that the writer believed himself
to be the only person whose memory retained most of the incidents and
anecdotes herein recorded; and a long and familiar acquaintance with his
character enables the Editor to state, that entire credence is due to his
narrative of facts, written down as occurring within his own knowledge
and to his relation of whatever he alleges himself to have derived from
others. A slight veil of mystery seems to have been originally thrown
over the story; especially in regard to the names of persons; but, as all
who are familiar with the locality will at once recognize its general
features, the Editor has thought it best, for the benefit of others not
so well informed, to make all proper explanations on this point in the
Index.
Sometimes, New England has been spoken of as devoid of the elements of
romance; but perhaps this idea may be owing to the fact, that the means
of presenting a different aspect of the case have not been sufficiently
investigated. A similar impression has prevailed in respect to Roman
history and literature, whether fabulous or otherwise; and the fathers of
New England, at least, have been thought to have exhibited some of the
traits, especially the simplicity and severity of character, which
distinguished those more ancient worthies, whose names and deeds have
been so long famous. But without making other citations, I may remark,
that I am scarcely acquainted with a poem more thoroughly romantic in
conception and sentiment, than "Gallus," the tenth eclogue of Virgil;
and Macaulay, in his "Lays of Ancient Rome," has turned some of its
legends to fine poetical account. Where can be found, for instance, a
prettier, or more suggestive picture, than the passage in his "Virginia,"
which some inspired painter might make immortal upon canvas, as it is in
verse:--
"With her small tablets in her hand, and her satchel on
her arm,
Home she went bounding from the school, nor dreamed
of shame or harm."
Perhaps, the solemnities of the colonial history of New England may have
overshadowed much of whatever poetical interest might be discovered in
its private annals. It depends upon the reader, whether the present
narrative may be thought in some measure to qualify the imputation in
question.
G. L.
OLD NEW ENGLAND TRAITS.
CHAPTER I.
It was the winter of 18--, between fifty and sixty years ago. Certainly
the winters of New England began earlier and were more severe than they
have seemed at a later period. After the fervid heat of summer has become
subdued by the progressive changes of the season, no atmosphere could be
clearer, purer, more exhilarating than the prevailing tone of our October
days, and this kindly influence, as if by way of preparing the human
frame for the gradual approach of winter, generally extends, with
occasional stormy intermissions, through November, and often very far
into the frosty domain of December itself. And such snow-storms as we
once endured! It may be alleged, that distance of time forbids accuracy
of comparison, and that masses of snow, which appeared vast to a child,
would not seem so immense to a full-grown man, and were really no more
huge than some of those with which winter nowadays envelopes the ground.
But facts within my memory do not admit of such an explanation, for I
distinctly recollect the driving storm which continued for days and piled
its accumulating heaps against the front of our dwelling-place, so as
entirely to cover the windows of the lower story of the house, and to
rise above the main door which was of ordinary height, and that at length
we were released from this imprisonment by means of an archway to that
entrance, dug through the drift by the friendly efforts of an opposite
neighbor.[1]
Our deliverer was a superannuated seaman; inspired partly, no doubt, by
the good-heartedness formerly, at least, thought to be characteristic of
that class of men, and, partly, by respect for the memory of my father,
who had been dead for some years, in the early prime of life, leaving
behind him the best of reputations as a shipmaster and a man. Perhaps Tom
Trudge had, at some time, sailed under him. I well remember the
triumphant air with which this ancient mariner introduced himself into
the kitchen, where all the family was assembled, doffing his tarpaulin,
flourishing his shovel, and cutting one or two capers, in token of his
hilarity at the accomplishment of his somewhat arduous job. Of course,
there were profuse thanks and congratulations on the occasion; but I
recollect only, that, after the second glass of grog furnished by my
mother,--a refreshment to which Tom was only too partial,--he executed
another spring from the floor, snapped his fingers and cried, "Tired,
ma'am!--not a bit of it! For all I've done to-day, by the blessed
binnacle I should think nothing at all of jumping over a meetin-us,--yes,
a meetin-us, ma'am!" to the amazement, at the idea of such a feat, of
certainly all the younger fry who were present at the ceremony.
The town in which we lived was one of the very oldest of the New England
settlements. Its situation is uncommonly beautiful, upon a slope
descending from a moderately elevated ridge towards the bank of a noble
river, which of late years has furnished more motive power to various
manufacturing establishments in the towns and villages, which have sprung
up on its borders, than any other stream in the world. At the time of
which I write, there was not a mill throughout its whole extent. It is
told, that Louis Philippe, when a fugitive in this country, in his youth,
passing up the road which leads mostly along the margin of the river to a
point where the first falls interrupt the navigation, pronounced the
scenery the most beautiful he had ever seen. The river was then chiefly
famous for the rafts of admirable timber which it sent down from the
primeval forests above, for the construction of the unsurpassed ships
built near the town, and for the commerce flourishing upon its bosom and
extending to every quarter of the globe. It was idle enough, in
comparison, at a later period.
Early in the present century, and for a long series of years in the past,
no town on the American coast surpassed it in commercial enterprise and
activity. The habits and traditions of the place were well calculated to
nurse a hardy race of seamen, and their reputation for skill and courage
was well known throughout the maritime world. Persons are very apt to
look at some direct circumstance, nearest at hand, for the cause of
events, which may after all result from much more remote contingencies.
So, at first, in the days of the declining trade of the town, they said
the obstruction to its commerce was owing to the sand-bar at the mouth of
the river. But the bar had been there from time immemorial; and though it
is true that modern-built vessels, with their cargoes, could not pass
that barrier, as ships of lesser tonnage were formerly accustomed to do,
yet the main cause for this decay of business was to be found in the
growth of the capital of the State, and the greater facilities for the
transaction of business which exist in larger than in smaller places.
But the bar itself was always of very dangerous passage in boisterous
weather, and often the daring pilots of the station, than whom none upon
the coast were more competent and courageous, were exposed to extreme
peril, in their small craft, in returning to the river, when they had
been on the look-out for inward-bound vessels in the bay.
It so happened that a schooner in which I was a passenger, when a
youngster, was detained outside the bar, and was likely to be detained
for several hours, waiting for the tide to make. A young pilot,
accompanied by his still younger brother, came alongside in their
whale-boat, and having some acquaintance with me invited me to sail with
them to town; and, having been some time absent from home, I gladly
accepted their offer. Their boat was under a single low sail. The breeze
was fresh and the day fair, though I could not but be aware, as we bowled
along towards the bar, that a retreating storm had left some indications
of its past presence in the tossing foam that sprang upwards as the waves
dashed upon that treacherous heap of shifting sand. The pilot sat in the
stern-sheets of the dancing boat, steering steadily with an oar. His
brother tended the sail, and I was crouched amidships. As we approached
nearer the scene of commotion, our younger companion assumed a station
in the bow of the boat and began to sound with an oar. This looked a
little formidable to a landsman; and soon turning his head in the
interval of hastily pushing his implement into the water, the bowsman
called out to his brother, "Joe, are you going to try it?" Joe made no
sign, but steered steadily on. Again and again the sounding oar went
rapidly down, and I suppose at last to the bottom, and again the young
man cried out with renewed energy, "Joe, are you going to try it?" Joe
uttered no word, but chewing his quid, looked steadfastly forward. In a
moment a heavy wave struck the boat, drenching us plentifully, but not
filling her, and bounding up, staggering a little, she dashed on, and
with another like slap or two, we were over and in fairly smooth water.
Had the boat struck bottom, she would have been instantly dashed to
pieces and we should have met the sad fate of others who, before and
since, have been drowned and lost to sight forever in that seething
tide.
In a conversation with a very eminent English novelist, of profounder
skill and more permanent fame, in my opinion, than any other since Scott,
he expressed his surprise at the solid aspect of the city of Boston, in
which we had met, on the day after his arrival in this country, upon his
first lecturing tour. He had enjoyed the best opportunities of viewing
"men and cities," not only in Europe, but in various parts of the farther
East. I took the liberty of replying that Boston had been growing nearly
two centuries and a half, and inquired if he expected to see wigwams, or
even those slighter fabrics which betoken the earlier stages of advancing
colonization. He said, "No, of course not; but it had quite as
substantial an appearance as an English city." But it is to be remembered
that the persons who came to this country, at first, and from time to
time, afterwards, were already civilized, and brought with them and
transmitted to their descendants much of the knowledge and many of the
habits, peculiarities, and even the traditions of their ancestors "at
home." Our town, too, looked old; though far from being so substantially
built as Boston.
In fact, while reading the fragment of Scott's autobiography of his
earlier days, and Dean Ramsay's "Reminiscences," one might almost think
that their descriptions of character and manners, in so ancient a city as
Edinburgh, were in many respects but a recapitulation of popular ways and
even of personal oddities in our own respectable American town.
Especially, the great novelist's vivid narrative of the desperate street
conflicts between the lads of the several quarters of the "auld town,"
revives many boyish recollections. In my youth, the division was into
Northenders and Southenders; but as our own residence was in the central
part of the town, we stood, as it were, between two fires. The conflicts
usually took place in the winter, when the snow was on the ground, and
though heartily engaged in, and sometimes quite too rough for play, were
generally good-natured enough to avoid any very serious danger to life or
limb. In the higher schools, the lads were drawn from every quarter of
the town; but upon dismissal for the day, or upon the afternoons of
Wednesday and Saturday, when no school was kept, the partisans of the
several sections offered combat which was seldom refused. The usual
weapons were snow-balls, which were sometimes, I regret to say, dipped in
water and frozen over night, and kept in some secure place to await the
expected battle, and occasionally a pebble, the missile commonly used by
the Scottish combatants, was inserted,--a practice which was almost
universally condemned. Very seldom did we come to a hand-fight, for a
spirited "rush," when either party felt strong enough for it, was almost
always followed by a rapid retreat on the other side. But woe to the
luckless stripling whose headlong courage carried him far in advance of
his companions; for upon a sudden turn of affairs he was a captive, and
down in an instant, and mercilessly "scrubbed" with snow by a dozen ready
hands, until the rallying host of his compatriots advanced vigorously to
the rescue. The normal alliance of us middle-men was with the
Southenders, though a good deal rougher than ourselves; and in times of
truce a solitary boy would walk a little gingerly through their quarter,
as errands or family occasions led him that way. But the principal
commercial interests centered in those parts of the town, and if, upon
the breaking out of determined warfare, we could secure, in the capacity
of leader, the services of some lubberly boy who had made a voyage, even
a mere coasting trip, to sea, though I remember that these were
sometimes far less adventurous in the field than those who had no
experience of the perilous deep, the issue of the contest was not for a
moment doubtful. The forces of our adversaries melted away, like the snow
with which they fought, at the very presence of a champion supposed to be
of such redoubted prowess. The dependence of those adverse combatants was
rather upon some of the younger hangers-on at the ship-yards, in their
territory, for such a casual auxiliary. Sometimes, the elements of
military skill would be displayed. While the two forces were closely
engaged, a flanking party would make a sudden rush up some short
by-street, and then the complete demoralization and panic-flight of the
warriors thus newly assailed was something truly disastrous to behold.
Of course, we enjoyed the ordinary boyish sports of boating, swimming,
and skating in the season for it; or, of a pleasant afternoon, would roam
away "over the hills," as the phrase ran, huckleberrying, perhaps, or
gathering penny-royal and other wild herbs for the old folks at home; to
be dried and reserved for future occasions. For, in those days, a garret
would hardly be considered complete, without bunches of these simples
hanging from the beams by strings, or stored away in paper-bags. In the
fall of the year, we had another resource, long since interdicted by the
owners of farms in the neighborhood of populous towns. This was the
pleasure of nutting; for the urchins of those days regarded these kinds
of fruit, growing on trees in the fields, as a sort of _feræ natura_ and
free to every passer-by; though the more surly proprietors, even then,
took much pains to circumvent and capture the lads, as they returned with
their poles for beating the branches and with their loaded bags, borne by
two or three of them, hanging by the middle across those implements.
Sometimes, predatory bands proceeded in force and defied the farmer on
his own ground. The story was told of one luckless individual who went
nutting alone and was caught and imprisoned, for a time, in the cellar of
the farm-house, but mischievously contrived to set all the taps of the
cider-barrels running, before he was released. These excursions led us
often to the Devil's Den, an excavation in an abandoned ledge of
limestone, in a solitary situation at some distance from the town, and
guarded, now as then, by three rather spectral-looking Lombardy poplars,
which to us boys had a sort of mystic and undefined significance. Here we
procured bits of serpentine, interspersed with veins of _rag-stone_, as
we denominated asbestos, which, strangely enough, we used to chew. I
suppose that no boy ever went to that place alone, and a sort of solemn
ceremony attended his first visit with his older playmates, to a scene
bearing an appellation ominous enough to call up every vague dread of his
youthful heart. The approach on these occasions was rather circuitous,
through the pastures, until an elevated mass of stone, standing quite
solitary, was reached, designated as "Pulpit Rock." To the summit of
this, the neophyte was required to climb, and there to repeat some
accustomed formula, I fear not very reverent, by way of initiation, and
supposed to be of power to avert any malign influences to which the
unprepared intruder upon the premises of the nominal lord of the domain
might otherwise be subjected. For these youngsters the ordinary means of
education were abundantly supplied, and the girls, too, had their Academy
for those who aspired to something beyond the common range; and when, at
a later period, I became conversant with their circle, I must say that I
have never known young ladies of better manners or more cultivated minds.
As an evidence of more expansive benevolence than usual, and of
profounder interest in the affairs of the great world abroad, I remember
that when the class of students in Goldsmith's Ancient History came to
recitation, one young lady burst into a torrent of tears. The astonished
teacher anxiously inquired into the cause of her emotion. In the midst of
her sobs she ejaculated, "Oh, that good man, Socrates! To think they
should have treated him so!" She was finally soothed; but considering
that the incident in question was of a rather remote date, this
ebullition of feeling evinced a generous sympathy with a victim of past
injustice, truly worthy of a philanthropic mind.
It is still a town of stately mansions upon its principal street, and one
more beautiful can scarcely be imagined. The magnificent elms, of the
graceful American kind, which line its borders, have always been reckoned
a feature of extraordinary beauty. Of late years, special means for
supplying and preserving this elegant and useful kind of embellishment of
the streets have been provided by the liberal bequest, for this purpose,
of Mr. John Bromfield, a native of the town, but long a respected
merchant at the capital of the State. A conspicuous house standing upon a
gentle elevation, at some distance from the street, with pleasant grounds
in its front and rear, was appropriately named by its original proprietor
"Mount Rural," though not, perhaps, with the most exact observance of the
requirements of grammatical construction. Still, it has some authority
for being considered idiomatic, for does not "Pilgrim's Progress" tell us
of the "Palace Beautiful?" And doubtless many other instances might be
cited of the substitution of an adjective for a noun. At all events, the
worthy owner, who built his house in the most approved style of former
New England architecture, spacious, square, and with projecting windows
in the roof, made some pretensions to classical allusion; for cultivating
extensive gardens in the rear of his dwelling, he placed for an
inscription on his front wall,--
"Miraturque novas frondes, et non sua poma,"--
a citation which, it is to be feared, would be taken rather as
encouragement to mischievous urchins, if any of them understood it,
rather than as a warning to abstain from the fruit.
Near the extremity of the opposite quarter of the town still stands an
ancient edifice of solid stone, with a couple of stories of porch of the
same material, approached by a lane, bordered with trees, leading some
distance from the highway, and constituting, with some modern additions,
the dwelling-place of a considerable farm. It boasts an age of more than
two centuries, as appears by the figures above its entrance, and was
apparently built for defence, when precautions against Indian incursions
were thought necessary, though afterwards used as a powder-house; and
tradition has it that, on one occasion, an explosion took place by
night, which blew away a part of the side wall, lifted the bed on which a
negro woman, the slave of the occupant, was asleep, bore her safely
across the road, and planted her, bed and all, upon the spreading
branches of an apple-tree, without injury. An early owner of the place
was the ancestor of one of the recent Presidents of the United States,
and it was known, until quite a modern period, as the PIERCE Farm.
Not many years ago, there still remained at the corner of a street,
between the points just designated, one of those ancient houses not
common in this country, the second story resting on heavy beams, which
showed themselves in the outside walls, and the walls of the long, low
dwelling filled in with a coat of dark plaster braced by wooden
cross-pieces, like those of Shakespeare's birthplace at Stratford. The
handsome houses before alluded to were the residences chiefly of
merchants, or sea-captains, who had retired from their maritime or
commercial occupations with a competence, or of prosperous professional
persons.[2] But a competence in those frugal days was an insignificant
sum in comparison with the fortunes of our own time, scarcely approaching
the annual income of the shoddy-masters, who now regulate the avenues of
social and so-called aristocratic life. Indeed, I was once informed by an
old inhabitant, that the richest person in the town, near the close of
the last century, was assessed upon only ten thousand dollars' worth of
personal property. But I think there must be some mistake in this
statement, unless the rate of taxation was exceedingly low; for this same
prosperous merchant devoted twenty times as much as that reputed capital
to certain pious uses, during his protracted life-time, and still left
forty times as much at his decease. Doubtless in those better days, the
inevitable "rates" ("death and rates," they used to say, "were certain")
were so small as to press but lightly upon the incomes of individuals in
moderate circumstances, and the means of getting at the exact measure of
a man's worldly "worth," had not reached their present degree of
perfection. Indeed I may state, upon unquestionable authority, that, late
in the first quarter of the present century, a highly respected trader of
the town, who lived genteelly and was taxed upon a supposed capital of
eighteen thousand dollars, waited upon the assessors and blandly told
them, "Gentlemen, I have been more than usually prosperous the last
year, and am willing you should tax me upon an additional thousand."
Such combined integrity and disinterestedness was the theme of universal
commendation; but when the old gentleman went to another reckoning a few
years afterwards, his heirs had the benefit of an estate nearer one
hundred thousand dollars in value, than the limited capital which had
contributed its quota to the public burdens. In a word, I have heard my
Aunt Judith say, that in her youth it was usual for respectable young
women to take service with more thriving neighbors or friends, for the
annual allowance of their board and a single calico gown, at four and
sixpence a yard,--as the price was before mills were established on our
own ground.
I cannot help referring more particularly to some of the families of the
town, who imparted to it a well-founded reputation, not surpassed, if
equaled, by that of any town or city in the land; for instance, there
were the Lowells, who gave name, afterwards, to that wonderful city of
spindles, which enjoys as world-wide a standing in the annals of
manufacturing enterprise as the old-world Manchester of a long-anterior
date, and one of whom, amid the desolate ruins of Luxor, struck by the
hand of fatal disease, conceived the idea of establishing that noble
Institute which bears his name, and will convey it to future grateful
generations; a name, too, which has so resounded in the popular
literature of the day. Then, there were the Jacksons, famous in mechanics
and in two of the learned professions; Charles Jackson, the erudite and
upright judge, and James Jackson, one of those skillful and truly
benevolent physicians, whose memory is still in the hearts of many
surviving patients. The Tyngs, too, resided there, long honorably
connected with colonial history and still represented by descendants of
national repute. Amongst other remarkable individuals was Jacob Perkins,
the famous inventor, who at an advanced age ended his useful career with
no little foreign celebrity in the great city of the world. I have read
lately of his successful exhibition of his wonderful steam-gun, in the
presence of the Duke of Wellington and other competent judges of the
experiment, and know not what national prejudice, perhaps, or other
casual reason, prevented its adoption.[3] In science, too, we had
Master Nicholas Pike, an ancient magistrate, whose arithmetic held its
ground throughout the country, until it was superseded by that of Master
Michael Walsh, which received the high commendation of so capital a
judge, in matters of calculation, as the old land-surveyor and finally
head of the nation, Washington. Master Walsh was an Irishman by birth,
though "caught young," as Dr. Johnson remarked, to account for any
distinction acquired by natives of Scotland; and he displayed much of
that impulsive temperament imputed to the people of Erin's Green Isle. He
dressed in the old style, his gray hair gathered into a queue, and
wearing top-boots to the last. He was an excellent classical scholar, as
well as mathematician. The pupils he prepared for college did justice to
his instructions, and some have acquired great eminence in the several
professions and in the conduct of important national affairs. As an
instance of his patriotic attachment to his adopted country, upon
casually meeting, late in life, a certain writer of the town, after a
cordial salutation, he added with a slight dash of the brogue, "I thank
ye for the Red and the Blue!" The young person was a little taken aback,
not remembering the allusion, for a moment, when the old gentleman
repeated emphatically,--"The Red and the Blue, ye know--Tom Campbell." It
was in reference to a couple of stanzas, addressed to the United States
by that great lyric poet, scarcely equaled in his day, namely:--
"United States! your banner wears
Two emblems: one of fame;
Alas! the other that it bears
Reminds us of your shame!
"The white man's liberty in types
Stands blazoned by your stars:
But what's the meaning of your stripes?
They mean your negroes' scars."
To this the American had retorted:--
"TO THE ENGLISH FLAG.
"England! whence came each glowing hue,
That tints yon flag of 'meteor' light,[4]--
The streaming red, the deeper blue,
Crossed with the moonbeam's pearly white?
"The blood and bruise,--the _blue_ and _red_,--
Let Asia's groaning millions speak!
The _white_,--it tells the color fled
From starving Erin's pallid cheek!"
The verses were at first circulated as above set down. Campbell
afterwards altered the two first lines of the second stanza into:--
"Your standard's constellation types
White freedom by its stars," etc.,--
impairing it, as some will think, both in force and in whatever poetical
expression it may have originally had. Poets are apt to make similar
mistakes, frittering away the first glow of thought and language, in
revision. Has not Tennyson thus injured "The ride of the six hundred?"
and did not Campbell himself half spoil "Hohenlinden," by taming its
phraseology down into a supposed superfluous accuracy? For example, he
first wrote,--
"'Tis morn, but scarce yon lurid sun
Can pierce the war-clouds, rolling dun," etc.
It occurred to him, or some "stop-watch critic" suggested, that the sun
itself was not actually "lurid," on that celebrated occasion, and he
accordingly changed the expression to "level," thus signifying a mere
natural phenomenon; and, besides the sacrifice of a fine poetical
expression, forgetting that the sun must have appeared actually "lurid"
through the interposition of "the war-clouds, rolling dun." Nor is this
the only instance of misapplied fastidiousness in that splendid and
stirring piece.
Then, there was the Rev. Dr. Spring, father of that celebrated clergyman,
Dr. Gardiner Spring, of New York. He had been a chaplain in the army of
the Revolution; and when I, as a boy, pulled off my cap to him in the
street, I fancied there was something a little military in his polite
salute in return. The good Doctor held to what were called Hopkinsian
tenets, a special form of strict orthodoxy; and it was alleged that,
differing from the ordinary practice of religious people in the town,
and construing literally the record of the Creation, "The evening and the
morning were the first day,"--the Saturday evening was observed with
primitive strictness in the family, while on Sunday evening, after
sunset, the excellent matron assumed her knitting-work, or attended to
whatever secular occupation she chose. I have often thought, and it seems
likely, that the name of Swett--that of one of the most eminent and
excellent physicians of his day, in our community, and who in fact fell a
sacrifice to the faithful discharge of his professional duty--was the
same as Schwedt, borne by the Prince de Schwedt, well known at the court
of Frederick of Prussia (so called) the Great. The good Doctor examined
the throat of a yellow fever patient, in a vessel lying at quarantine
ground in the river, and inhaling his infectious breath, went home
declaring he had taken the disease, of which he shortly died. The efforts
and liberality of his son, the late Colonel Samuel Swett, in promoting
the establishment of the Public Library of the town, though himself long
a resident in the capital of the State, will forever endear his memory to
the inhabitants. The daughter of another distinguished physician, Dr.
Sawyer, was Mrs. George Lee, who gained no little reputation by her
"Lives of the Ancient Painters," and especially by a book which attained
great popularity under the title of "Three Experiments of Living." I
should do great injustice to a list of noted personages--to some of whom
allusion is made elsewhere in these pages, and which might be extended,
if consistent with the objects of this work, were I to omit mention of a
lady, Miss Hannah F. Gould, whose poetical productions gained her
well-deserved applause and many friends, and some of whose highly
pleasing verses still retain their hold upon public esteem. Reflectively,
too, we might claim some share in the distinction of the most popular
American poet of our own day; for the direct ancestors of Longfellow
were natives of our immediate vicinage. I had no intention, certainly, of
offering any tribute to the living in these memorials of the past; but
one name inevitably suggests itself, better known on 'Change, in London,
than in the place of his birth. I speak of William Wheelwright, a lad, at
the period to which these sketches refer, long resident abroad, though
occasionally brought home by the obligations and affections of family
ties, to whose enterprise, and arduous, untiring pursuit of his object
are owing steam navigation and railway lines in the southern part of this
Continent, and to whose praise the whole South American coast will
respond.
There were others and many, of high personal character and local
reputation, and not a few of strongly marked characteristics, whose
names, perhaps, would scarcely sound familiar to modern ears; but I
cannot pass over one wealthy merchant, distinguished for his strong
common sense and decided individuality, as well as for a success in
business scarcely equaled in this country, in his day,--the well-known
William Bartlett, to whose judicious bounty the chief theological
seminary of the State and its principal Academy for the instruction of
youth owe so much toward the assurance of their permanent foundation.
Nor should the memory of Oliver Putnam fail of a record, who, long absent
from his native town, provided by his will for a generous bequest, upon
which a Free School of the highest character has been long established.
Nor should due tribute be forgotten in honor of George Peabody, who,
remembering those days of his youth which were passed in acquiring habits
of business in the place, distinguished its Public Library by a
munificent gift.
There had been many other men of marked character and great local
influence: Tracys, Daltons, Greenleafs, Davenports, Hoopers, Bradburys,
Johnsons, Coffins, Bromfields, Crosses; and many more, doubtless, might
be thought worthy of mention. Among those named above, Nathaniel Tracy
was one of the wealthiest merchants of his day, elsewhere referred to in
this narrative as suffering immense losses by his advances to the
government, when its needs were great and its credit was low, and in
other ways. Tristram Dalton was a Senator of the United States from
Massachusetts, in the First Congress under the Constitution; and
Theophilus Bradbury, afterwards appointed to the bench of the supreme
court of the State, was a member of the Federal House of Representatives
during a part of Washington's administration. Indeed, from some of the
early inhabitants of the town are descended not a few of the principal
families in the capital of the State; and its representatives, by some
tie of original or later connection, are scattered throughout the whole
country.
I linger somewhat longer and lovingly upon this preliminary part of
whatever story I may have to tell, because I am aware of nothing in the
literature of New England which furnishes precisely similar
reminiscences, and because pictures of past manners, if truthfully
portrayed, can hardly fail to be both interesting and useful. We heard
plentiful stories, in our youth, of a higher style of living in colonial
days, of coaches kept by the upper class of citizens; of their slaves,
whom we knew in their emancipated condition as gardeners and waiters in
general; of the cocked hats, the gold-embroidered garments, the laced
ruffles of the gentlemen, and the highly ornamented, but rather stiff
garniture in which the ladies with their powdered heads saw fit to array
themselves, as they now present themselves to us on the living canvas of
Copley. It was in the handsome residence of Mr. Dalton, long after his
decease, that I saw hangings of gilded morocco leather on the walls of
the principal room,--a substitute for the wall-paper in common use, and
which I have never seen or heard of in any other instance, in the United
States.
Our collector of the customs was peculiarly one of this class of
gentlemen of the old school. He was a person of very warm temperament and
of remarkable characteristics; an ardent Democrat, who, upon the
accession of President Jefferson, had succeeded Colonel W----, the first
collector of the port, appointed by Washington, under whom he had served
with distinction in the Revolutionary War. The residence of the latter,
and the office of customs itself, in those simpler days, were in the
house which was afterwards the birthplace of the writer of these
sketches. To that war the successor of the old soldier principally owed a
large fortune, which he had accumulated as the result of his privateering
adventures; and it is said that the prizes came in so plentifully, that
once he lifted up his hand and declared, "O Lord, it is enough!" However
this may be, it is certain that not long afterwards his riches gradually
vanished, and he was compelled to seek and obtained the office upon which
he supported his declining days. Though "aristocratic" enough in his own
personal character and demeanor, he was not naturally in much favor with
the grandees of the old Federal town; but they stood in awe of him,
nevertheless; for he had been very rich, and in his less prosperous days
was still a person of the most impulsive and resolute spirit. His
appearance in public was very marked. His person was manly and his
countenance singularly striking. He dressed in black, his small-clothes
terminating in white cotton stockings down to his gouty foot. On his
white head, decorated with a queue, was his three-cornered hat. He seemed
to take a pride in walking up the principal business street of the town,
at the time of high "'Change," and paying attention to no one, to utter
his not always very conciliatory thoughts aloud, in regard to his
contemporaries and matters in general, as he threw out sideways the gouty
foot aforesaid, on his way to the one o'clock dinner, which was the
fashion of the time.
But the Revolutionary War exhausted the fortunes of many prosperous men
of the day; and the story is told of one very rich merchant, who could
drive in his own carriage several days' journey--when such a journey over
difficult roads was hardly so much as could be accomplished by "the
hollow, pampered jades of Asia,"--and sleep in his own house every night.
He lent immense sums, for the time, to the Revolutionary government,
received what he could recover in depreciated currency, and failed. At
the period of my narrative, the country was suffering from the
consequences of another war, and the once active commerce of the old town
was reduced to the lowest ebb. It was then that active emigration began
from the sterile soil of New England--since rendered so much more
productive by intelligent cultivation--to the fertile region known as
"The Ohio;" just as, not much more than half a century ago, people talked
of "The Coos country" in New Hampshire, and within a few years we spoke
of the "Far West," brought at length within the compass of ordinary
travel and civilization.
As a picture of the rigors and extremities, I fear only too common, of
early New England life, among its hardy agricultural population, I
present extracts of a letter received from a venerable friend, a few
years ago, who from the depths of poverty, having emigrated in his youth
to wild lands not very far West, had risen to comparative wealth, which
he devoted to useful purposes. In fact, the son of an extremely poor
Vermont farmer became, by his own energy and integrity, the possessor of
a competent fortune, which enabled him, with views far surpassing the
immediate claims of this transitory world, to build a church and to
establish a flourishing educational institution, destined long, I trust,
to dispense infinite blessings to future generations. Thus, after some
preliminary matter, he proceeds to say, under date of March 16, 1866:--
"My father was one of the poor men of Vermont. When I was a small
boy I have pealed many a birch broom for a sixpence.[5] My Father
could get one shilling for what he made, take them on his back,
carry them four or five miles, sell them, bring home a little meal,
or a little bread, sometimes a half bushel Potatoes. My mother
would go two or three miles, and do a washing, bring home at night
a loaf of wry bread, and a small peace was all we had for supper
and a smaller Piece in the morning. Sometimes we was allowed one
Potato roasted in the ashes--no Hearth in the old log-House. My
mother has stirred butter in a tea-cup with the point of a knife,
to keep her little children from starving. My Father had about half
acre of oats--poor fence--the old cow got in the oats and died.
Then came the pinch--we as little children had to flee to the woods
to get something to sustain life--no schools, no meetings--nothing
but hunger and despair. I lived with my Father until I was
twenty-one years old. After I was sixteen my Father improved a
little in living. When I was a little over twenty-one I got me a
wife--we was both Poor--three knifes, three forks, three teacups,
three chairs, a poor bed--hardly could we keep house. But our
courage was good--my wife always standing by me, through all my
trouble and trials--shoulder to shoulder--heart & hand, from the
day of our marriage until the day of her Death. No man never had a
better wife than I had--always kind to the Poor and to all her
relations. She is now in the Grave Yard, and my judgment is, she is
well prepared for the next world--and for the good feeling I have
had for her for over fifty-six years, I have Erected a monument
over her grave weighing 7 tons, and twenty-one feet high--it is a
splendid monument--cost me over $600.00.
"On the Eighth day of last July the Bishop confirmed 28 in our
Church at the ---- everything in good order--the singing was
complete--my Voice is still heard above all the singers and I still
stand at the head of the choir--I am only 77.--On the 16th day of
last October, Previous notice being given, the wardens and Vestry
met at my house--one minister was also present, a Lawyer being
called to do the business. At 2 o'clock, P. M. I commenced handing
over Deeds of land, Buildings, Bonds, mortgages, money & furniture,
to the amount of nineteen thousand and five hundred Dollars, the
use and interest only to be used for the Church and the ----
Institute; but in case there should be a failure of the Church &
school, for seven years, at any one time, then the Property to go
back to my Heirs.
"I have been schooling from 7 to 11 Poor children, yearly--I am now
not schooling as many--my school is doing well--we have a good
minister and he is a good Preacher. The Church is doing well. I am
now commencing one more building, 60 feet long, 30 feet wide, and
three stories high, for the convenience of more room for Boarders
in the ---- Institute.
"I wrung more Bells at the fall of Richmond than any man in the
United States, which they was all purchased with one man's money--7
was the number, 4 large ones & 3 small ones--it is true I was a
little opposed to the War--but no matter. The Brick Church and the
Buildings I built for the ---- Institute now with Interest cost me
now over $43.000. They are all Paid for and I am out of Debt. I
have furnished every stick of wood for the Church, and have carried
the most of it in since it was built. I still wring the Bells on
all occasions." etc. etc.
There is, perhaps, a touch of the garrulity of age in this good man's
recital; but I consider his record of his early life, slight as it is,
yet too strikingly suggestive to be left to chances which might await a
private letter. Indeed, the character thus displayed is surely equal to
that of the best of the old Romans, in the middling class of life,
enlightened too by a living faith of which they had no conception; and
the sketch gives fair warrant for the conclusion, that, in point of manly
simplicity and integrity, the traits and the trials of those elder
worthies who helped to settle our republican institutions have not been
overdrawn.
-----
[1] As I set down these reminiscences I observe the
following paragraph in a Boston daily paper of November
27, 1872:--
"NOVEMBER SNOW. Fifty-two years ago to-day there were
twenty-eight inches of snow on a level in the vicinity
of Portsmouth, N. H."
[2] The late Mr. George Wood, of Washington, a native of our
town, in some highly interesting _Memorabilia_, formerly
published, says: "The aristocracy were not on High
Street, as now, but on Water Street, and more at the
South than the North end, as the old houses give
evidence to this day. The Johnsons, Jacksons,
Davenports, Coffins, Greenleafs, Bartletts, Pierces,
Hoopers, Tappans, Todds, Carters, Lunts, Marquands, and
others of wealth, were on Water Street or near it. There
were their grand houses and fine gardens, and it was not
till they thought of retiring from business that they
removed to the West-end or up-town, as gradually as they
always do in all places."
[3] After resigning his office of judge, which he had held
for only a few years, but administered with
extraordinary ability and integrity, Judge Jackson went
abroad for relaxation, and a letter from a gentleman in
London to a friend on this side the water says,--"Two of
your townsmen, Judge Jackson and Jacob Perkins, now fill
the public eye of England, and are the subjects of
public and private conversation."
[4] "The meteor flag of England," etc. Campbell. "Ye
mariners of England."
[5] These brooms are made by peeling strips from the stump,
which are fastened below.