I should scarcely deem it expedient to enter at much detail into the
eccentricities of our good townspeople, though it seems to me that in our
own street I could recall enough to make a pretty sizable volume.
But one feature of the times deserves a passing notice. I refer to the
inconsiderable number of insane persons, compared with the sad increase
of that unfortunate class in our own day, and the manner in which they
were treated. Of course, a more widely extended population multiplies the
sum of every description of disease. Besides, our ancestors were a
hardier race than their descendants, more inured to the regular routine
of physical toil, less given than the men and women of the present day to
hurtful indulgence, and far less exposed to the disturbing excitements of
business and pleasure. So far as I know, there were but two really
insane persons in our population of some seven or eight thousand, though
doubtless certain others were more or less "light-headed." One of those
two was sullenly crazy, and accounted dangerous, and therefore subjected
to physical restraint; the other, generally harmless, roamed through the
town at his own will, calling occasionally upon the acquaintance of his
better days, and making magnificent promises of the benefits he intended
to bestow, "when his ship came in." If I had inherited only a moderate
dividend of the proceeds of the successive ships and their cargoes, which
he promised my mother, on the above favorable contingency, usually
calling her out from dinner to whisper to her these magnificent promises,
more to her alarm than satisfaction, though being a woman of spirit she
put a brave face upon it--I should look down upon a Rothschild, an Astor,
or a Vanderbilt with natural contempt. Sometimes, incarceration was
thought necessary, also, in his case; and I have a vivid recollection of
the place of confinement allotted to each patient.
This was in the yard of the almshouse, for state and county asylums had
not then been thought of, and the strong wooden building in which they
were placed consisted of two apartments, perhaps twelve feet square, one
above and the other beneath the surface of the ground; the latter, in
fact, a dungeon with one barred window on a level with the yard. Here
they passed their gloomy hours as they might, in solitude and darkness,
scarcely relieved by light from without, with nothing to alleviate the
horrors of their condition, and probably considered in a state too
hopeless to admit of any remedy. The tenant of the upper cell was
comparatively lively, on the occasion of resort to his window for
conversation, or out of curiosity, which was freely permitted; but his
neighbor in the dungeon was dangerous; and I can never forget the terror
inspired by a sudden and vicious attempt made by him to seize the legs of
us children through the bars, as we stood conversing with the inmate of
the room above. Science and humanity have done very much, in modern
times, toward the restoration of such unhappy beings, who are in a
majority of cases susceptible of cure, or of improvement enough to
warrant their return to domestic life. But it is to be feared we are yet
far behind, in this country, the more enlightened and effectual methods
pursued for this purpose in some other civilized nations.
On one side of the street above alluded to lived for a long time, in my
boyhood, an ancient shoemaker entirely alone; and as he guarded his
residence with great secrecy and sold none of his wares, curious people
were puzzled to understand how he supported existence. He was known to be
partially deranged. Mischievous boys, sometimes, gathered in numbers,
would often assail his door with stones, standing ready for a start. But
if they were on the watch, so was Pettengill, from previous experience,
waiting behind his door with a heavy wooden bar in his hand, and giving
instant chase to the flying urchins, would send the bar rattling at their
heels. One day, after a season of unusual quiet, one of our lads anxious
to penetrate his mystery, ventured to knock gently at the barred portal,
was admitted, and expressed his wish to purchase a pair of shoes. The old
man opened several chests containing the articles sought for, and finally
selected a pair which proved a fit; but upon his visitor's making known
his readiness to buy, the maker deliberately returned them to their
receptacle, locked it fast and gravely declared, that he did "not like to
part with them, for fear of spoiling his assortment."
The next building was occupied by a respectable English couple as a
dwelling-place, with a small grocer's shop in front. They had no
children, except one strapping son of the old lady by a former husband,
grown to man's estate, and whose business seemed to be to lounge about
the premises in drab small-clothes; for I never saw him do anything. The
old lady might be seen of a morning, with iron pattens on her feet and
her clothes tucked up, mopping the floor of the shop; but in the
afternoon much more genteelly attired in silks of an ancient fashion. Mr.
Brown was a very quiet, inoffensive person, the wife a little
high-strung. It is certain that they had occasional domestic bickerings,
perhaps about the young man in the knee-breeches; for on one occasion it
is alleged that the old matron was overheard to address her spouse, with
a slightly Hibernian accentuation,--"Brune, Brune, ye case-knife looking
son of a gun! I married ye neither for love, nor for money, but the pure
convanience of the shop!" As these worthy people have long ago passed
away, there seems no scandal in detailing this little family incident.
Directly opposite these premises was a large old-fashioned house, still
standing, and, a century before, the residence of the minister of the
First Church. It was long afterwards occupied by a noted magistrate for
the trial of small actions, who served many years as town-clerk, and was
an energetic orator at town-meetings and in parish affairs. A culprit was
once brought before him for stealing a gentleman's set of new shirts. The
fact was stiffly denied. "A pretty story," said the accused party, "that
I should take his shirts!" An official scrutiny, however, soon exhibited
him standing with the half dozen articles of attire, one over another,
upon his person. "What a villain!" said the astonished justice. "Why
didn't you tell me you was a villain and save the time of the court, of
the witnesses, and the spectators, by owning up you were a villain, in
the first place?"
The citizens of the old town were pretty thorough Puritans, by
inheritance and inclination, at the middle of the last century. But the
minister of the First Church was, in his day, a gentleman noted for his
liberal tastes and accomplishments. He had a picture painted on a broad
panel over the fire-place of his library, representing himself and
several others of the cloth sitting around a table, in the full
canonicals of wig, gown, and band, before each a foaming mug of ale, and
each supplied with a tobacco pipe from which rolled volumes of narcotic
fumes. At the top of the painting was a legend in the Latin language, of
which the following is, I believe, a correct copy,--
"In essentialibus unitas, in non-essentialibus libertas, in omnibus
charitas."
They appeared to be having a jolly time, and evidently considered the
slight indulgences to which they were addicted among the moral
non-essentials, however necessary to their physical comfort. In this
picture, which is still extant, the rules of perspective were not
rigorously obeyed. In fact, the table is considerably tipped, whether
supposed to result from some sudden hilarious movement on the part of the
reverend compotators or owing to want of skill in the artist, I am not
able to testify. Indeed, the manners of the times had not then attained
their present professed strictness in regard to the use of exhilarating
liquors, and I have inspected a tavern-bill rendered to the principal
citizens, for articles of this sort consumed on some joyful public
occasion, at a much later period, the amount of which in quantity, though
not in price, would astonish a modern city council.
At the corner of the street stood an ancient tavern, the principal
establishment of the kind in the place, at which in staging times all the
stage-coaches from Boston and the eastward hauled up to change horses.
It was kept by the father of the popular host of one of the best known of
the long-established New York hotels. I well remember seeing a
considerable body of British sailors halted there for refreshment, under
guard, on their way to some prison in the interior, during the War of
1812. They were true British tars of the traditional type, with immense
clubs of hair, tied up with eel-skins and hanging short and thick down
their necks. They seemed in no wise depressed by their condition and in
fact were treated extremely well, for the general feeling of the town was
decidedly adverse to the war. I also remember a gathering in front of the
tavern, when the evening coach was expected, with the idea of mobbing an
unpopular general officer who was to pass through by that conveyance. But
a better sentiment was inculcated by the more orderly portion of the
assembly, and the obnoxious warrior was not molested, otherwise than by
expressions of dislike, either upon alighting, or when taking his place
to resume his journey. Politics ran very high at the time, almost to the
entire suspension of social relations between the differing parties,--the
Federalists, who opposed the war, and were accused of unpatriotic
sympathy with the cause of the enemy, and the Republicans, often
stigmatized as Jacobins, who were charged with the principles and designs
which had given impulse to the great French Revolution. Doubtless these
parties shared, on the one side and the other, in the hereditary enmity,
long since allayed if not altogether extinguished, between England and
France. But whatever might be the general turn of political sentiment,
both sides felt a patriotic pride in the success of the American arms.
Hence, it is probable, the temper of the crowd assembled to do dishonor
to the unlucky general. While the Republicans were indignant at a
supposed needless national disaster, the Federalists could scarcely
rejoice at it; and thus the moderation of the latter tended to restrain
the former from the display of any actually violent demonstration. At the
same period, there was formed, among the older administration men of the
day, a veteran military organization, of those beyond the ordinary age of
military service, well-known locally under the significant appellation of
the "Silver Greys." The corps was composed of elderly merchants and
traders and retired sea-captains, and their drills manifested at least
the ambition of military prowess. Their opponents alleged that their
company was formed for merely political purposes, and to overawe the
town; but their own doubtless more just solution of the matter was, that
their object was to aid in repelling invasion, in the unlikely case that
the British troops should land upon their own borders. They gave more
promise, certainly, of efficient service, should danger arise, than
could be expected of the superannuated Trojans chief of Priam's court, as
their catalogue is translated by Pope from the living record of Homer:--
"Here sat the seniors of the Trojan race,
Old Priam's chiefs and most in Priam's grace;
The king the first, Thymoetes at his side,
Lampus and Clitias, long in council tried,
Panthus and Hicetaon, once the strong,
And next, the wisest of the reverend throng,
Antenor grave and sage Ucalegon,
Leaned on the walls and basked before the sun;
Chiefs who no more in bloody fights engage,
But wise through time and narrative with age,
In summer days like grasshoppers rejoice,
A bloodless race, that send a feeble voice," etc.
The town had suffered everything from the war and the interdiction of
commerce in which it had been most actively engaged, preceding the event.
Multitudes were absolutely ruined, and the gaunt wolf stood grinning at
almost every other threshold. Among the memorials of that great struggle,
it may be as well to mention the rusted cannon planted for posts at the
corners of certain of the streets, the breech sunk in the ground and a
bomb-shell fastened in the muzzle. At such a time, it is not strange that
force occasionally took the place of law.
I could recall not a few instances in which, under the impulse of
political resentment, passion got the better of judgment. One day, the
marshal of the United States, in his cocked hat and with other official
insignia, entered the tavern I have mentioned, in quest of a fugitive
from justice. He inquired of a person whom he met in the public
apartment, if he had lately seen one Captain E----, who, it seems, on
some supposed provocation, had only thrown a custom-house officer into
the dock in one of our eastern harbors. The person addressed by the
marshal said that Captain E---- had just passed down the street, and when
the marshal turned to pursue the culprit, that individual, who was no
other than the one just addressed, slipped out of another door, ran by
the stable in the rear of the tavern and called upon Jem Knox, the
hostler, to harness a chaise with all speed and to follow him forthwith
in his flight. It appears, that the story of the captain's adventure was
already pretty well known in the public places of the town, and as a
visit of the marshal from Boston was a very extraordinary event in a
place usually so quiet, a prying character who was upon the spot asked
him if he was not looking for Captain E----. Upon receiving an
affirmative reply,--"That's the man," said he, "you have just spoken to."
The marshal started in pursuit and the captain had called out to such
persons of his acquaintance as saw him running, that he was chased by a
United States' officer. Half way through the street, one Clement Starr, a
stalwart Englishman, who lived at the spot and whose sympathies,
political and otherwise, were with the weaker party, seized the marshal
by the collar and insisted upon knowing what was the cause of the
considerable tumult which the outcry--"Stop him!" had raised. Escaping
this obstacle, the poor marshal was soon afterwards clasped in the
vigorous embrace of a spirited matron, who stood on her door-step as he
passed, and, besides being an acquaintance of the captain, was of the
same political proclivities as those of the retreating mariner.
While tearing himself away from this lively lady, Knox drove furiously
by, pulled up as he overtook the fugitive, who, as a witness of the
affair told me, tumbled into the chaise, and was soon out of the reach of
the threatening danger. Whether he was ever taken afterwards, or what
became of the prosecution, I have never heard.
Not far from us lived a worthy widow, with a family of children, and on
one occasion she was heard to mingle rather curiously an office of
devotion with a somewhat severe threat of domestic discipline. It was a
day in summer, and the windows being open, a passer-by heard her
objurgation. It seems the family had assembled at the dinner-table, and
her oldest son began by making premature demonstrations toward the
provisions, when his mother emphatically addressed him: "You Bob Barker,
if you stick your fork into that meat before I've asked a blessing, I'll
be the death of ye!"
There was a worthy shipmaster, also, who used to trade to Hayti, when
that stalwart colored person, Christophe, was the Emperor, who used to
say, "Put a bag of coffee in the mouth of h----, and a Yankee will be
sure to go after it." On one occasion, so the story ran, Captain H----
complained of some insult from one of Christophe's ragged soldiery. The
fact reached the ears of that potentate, who desired to stand well with
Americans, and our townsman was summoned before him. He found in the
presence of the monarch the whole body of the scanty force on duty in
the town. "Can you pick out the man who insulted you?" asked the sable
autocrat. Captain H---- pointed him out; but beginning to fear the
infliction of some punishment too severe, attempted to extenuate the
offence. "Stop!" cried Christophe, and called the soldier near him. "Do
you say this was the man of whom you have told me?" "Yes, sir, it is,"
replied the alarmed captain; "but"--In an instant Christophe had drawn
his sword, and with one blow struck off the head of the unlucky culprit.
The terror of the accusing party, at such a sudden and bloody
consummation, may be partly imagined. He procured his clearance as soon
as possible, and I believe made his future voyages to waters under a less
summarily sanguinary domination.
We had also a _soi-disant_ nobleman, of really the humblest extraction,
and ignorant to a singular degree, but known by his eccentricities far
and wide, who, on the score of a little money accidentally amassed,
proclaimed himself, by an inscription beneath a wooden statue of himself,
in front of his residence,--"LORD OF THE EAST, LORD OF THE WEST, AND THE
GREATEST PHILOSOPHER IN THE WESTERN WORLD." He decorated his court-yard
with an extraordinary amount of lumber of this sort, in the shape of
human beings, and dumb creatures of many sorts, each statue standing upon
its separate pillar, to the intense admiration of the gaping rustics who
visited the town to inspect it; and he fairly beat the Scottish Earl of
Buchan, who was infected with a similar mania. Upon an arch directly
opposite his front door, he had placed Washington, Adams, and Jefferson.
Adams, on the right, was bareheaded, and upon an inquiry by some one why
this distinction was made, since Jefferson's chapeau was in its place,
the great "lord" replied: "Do you suppose I would have anybody stand at
the right hand of Washington, with his hat on?" He was said, also, upon
certain hilarious occasions, celebrated in a tomb which he had
constructed under a summer-house in his garden, to have indulged in the
mastication of bank-bills between slices of bread and butter, doubtless
to the envy of his boon companions; not, as might be inferred, of the
better or richer classes, though, considering all things, it is perhaps
needless to hope that these current symbols of value were a little
cleaner than most of those of modern date. All this statuary rubbish,
however, was long ago removed; and the house and grounds, by the taste of
the present owner, have since ranked among the most pleasing objects of
inspection in the town.
This notably low and singularly eccentric character, as I have remarked,
fairly beat that other oddity,--in a different class of life and
contemporary with him,--the Scottish Earl of Buchan, elder half-brother
of Lord Chancellor Erskine. That nobleman was possessed with a passion
for the busts of persons, eminent or otherwise, not dissimilar to that of
our New England "lord" for wooden statuary, and perhaps was actuated by
equal vanity, though a person of real literary accomplishment, and in no
sense, except as mentioned, to be put in comparison with the other. He
displayed to his visitors a large and most incongruous collection of
these objects of art in a sort of grotto excavated in his garden, thus
reversing, however, the more conspicuous procedure of his brother
connoisseur, who exhibited his assemblage of rarities in his front yard.
The Scottish Earl, certainly, had some literary pretensions, while the
"lord" Timothy, who could neither read nor write with ordinary
expertness, honored the Muses, also, by affording countenance to a poet.
Whether this patronage extended to much material sustenance may be
considered doubtful, since this son of Apollo generally stood in the
market-place, when not wandering away to other parts, for the disposal
of his wares, dressed in semi-clerical habiliments, himself being of a
singularly grave aspect, and retailed frightful ballads of his own
composition, and small wares of various kinds from a basket on his arm.
It is questionable whether any of these literary productions survive to
the present day; and I fear that not one of them had any spark of that
vitality, potent to influence popular sentiment, which Fletcher of
Saltoun attributed to the songs of the people.
In the centre of this market-place--a space inclosed on all sides by
various shops or stores, and for some unaccountable reason styled "Market
Square," since its irregular outline much more resembled a truncated
triangle--stood the town pump, on the spot originally occupied by the
meeting-house of the First Church, already mentioned. On two sides of the
pump were set the wonted hand-carts of two superannuated individuals,
whose gingerbread, candies, and apples were the delight of such urchins
as were lucky enough to have coppers to buy with; for those convenient
mediums of exchange were not too plentiful among boys in 18--, and
frequently not with their parents either. These old men were the
undisturbed possessors of the ground, wheeling their vehicles to the spot
at early morning, and standing by them all day, though they never seemed
to me to be driving a very thriving business.
But the glory of the Square was during the week before
Thanksgiving,--then, as now, appointed for a day late in November, when
it was often difficult to make one's way through the throng of teams,
and especially sleighs, loaded with poultry fattened for the occasion,
and sometimes venison and abundance of other commodities for domestic use.
The mention of sleighs leads me to recur to a former remark upon the
earlier approach of winter in those times; for the employment of sleighs
implies the presence of snow upon the ground; and the farmers had
frequently driven from a great distance, "up country," from parts of
New Hampshire and Vermont, even from the borders of Canada, perhaps a
hundred and fifty or two hundred miles and more away, to attend the market
in our town; sometimes as many as a hundred loaded country sleighs, or on
other occasions as many wagons, in a single day. The construction of the
Middlesex Canal, connecting the waters of the Merrimack with those of
the Charles, diverted the main part of this traffic to Boston; and
railways finally conveyed to the capital most of the remainder which
came from any considerable distance. Wistful eyes, in the presence of
these heaping dainties, were sometimes averted, no doubt, from a
consciousness of empty pockets; yet there were always generous hearts
and bounteous hands to meet the exigencies of every neighborhood; and
we may be sure that no householder of decent repute, however poor or
unlucky, and probably few others, even if a little tarnished in the
moral world's esteem, lacked some kind friend who saw to it, that the
accustomed turkey or chickens smoked on the board before the eyes of
his hungry children on that day, at least, of all the year.
But, unless respectable legends are to be peremptorily discredited, an
incident once took place in this Market Square, of which I doubt if any
other New England town can show the parallel. I am about to relate a
statement made to me, not many years ago, by an elderly gentleman of
excellent character and standing, a justice of the peace and of the
quorum, and a devout member of the Orthodox Church. The story was told
with all gravity and implicit confidence in its truth; and some may think
it exhibits in a striking light the extent of human credulity and the
imperfection of human testimony: "My father," said this worthy person,
"has often told me of being in Market Square when a man, a woman, and a
little dog appeared, and soon collected quite a crowd by the exhibition
of feats of jugglery. At length, after a due collection of tribute from
the standers-by, the man produced a ball of cord from his pocket, threw
it into the air, and began to ascend it, hand over hand. The woman
followed, and after her the little dog. While the crowd was gaping, in
expectation of the return of this mysterious trio, some one drove into
the market-place and inquired the occasion of this unusual congregation.
Upon being informed, he said, that he had just met such a party on the
road, about a mile from the town." I had read the most extraordinary
accounts, by British officers and others, of exhibitions like this, which
they alleged they had often witnessed in India. I remembered one, in
particular, where tigers and other unwelcome guests, and even the
somewhat unwieldy bulk of an elephant, had seemingly been brought down,
before their eyes, upon a cable fastened by some mysterious agency far
aloft; for I suppose it behooved to be made fast in some inconceivable
region of the upper air. But that a similar demonstration could have been
made in a sober New England town, at noonday, could scarcely fail to "put
me from my faith." It impressed me, however, as at least an extraordinary
relation, coming from such a source; and happening to meet another
ancient and equally reputable friend on the same day, one, too, who had
been much about the world in the capacity of a navigator to foreign
climes, I took occasion to relate to him the strange narrative which I
had just heard. "Oh," said he, "there is no doubt about it; my mother has
often told me she was present and saw the whole transaction." "In the
mouth of two or three witnesses," says the Scripture, "shall every word
be established." In this case, it will be observed, the witnesses were
two, but both at second-hand. I shall not vouch, therefore, for anything
except that, as Scott says, "I tell the tale as 'twas told to me,"--and
it may be set down as one of these veritable legends which all persons
are at liberty to reject or accept, as they please. I expect to try the
faith of the reader still further before I have finished this historical
sketch. People often tell us, nowadays, that vulgar superstitions are
altogether things of the past. This may be so in public; but I imagine
that in private there is a lurking tinge of it in every human bosom.