story of the old house. The west end of the main structure was built
first; of this there is evidence in the material, the workmanship, the
age of the woodwork, and in indirect, but convincing written evidence.
The main beams of the frame--the posts, sills, girders, joists,
rafters, etc.--in this wing are of American larch or tamarack, a soft
wood, which, however, has shown astonishing durability in every part
except where it has been exposed to moisture. The east part of the
main structure, the second chapter, was possibly added in the time of
the affluent and pious Captain John Whipple, the second of that name,
who, in 1683, was estimated to be “worth” $16,570. In this part of the
house the main beams are of oak, and the posts and girders are carved
with some attempt at elegance of finish. Later a lean-to was added,
the rafters on the north (rear) side of the roof being supplemented
by a new set of rafters at an easier angle, carrying the roof at one
point almost to the ground. Whether the lean-to was entirely built at
one time, or in two sections, is unknown and is not of importance. The
lean-to is a relatively modern part, and the original profile of the
exterior must have been very angular and high-shouldered in proportion
to its ground area.
Now, here are the more interesting dimensions of the building, as
it stands. Length, on the ground, fifty feet; width, thirty-six
feet. Great east room, ground floor, twenty-four by seventeen and
one-half feet; height seven feet. Fireplace in this room, seven feet
and three inches wide; two feet, nine inches deep. Dimensions of
oak girders, fourteen by fourteen inches. Windows, diamond panes,
and hung on hinges, five feet, three inches wide, and two feet, six
inches high; three sashes each; should be leaded glass. East chamber,
same measurements as east room below. Fireplace in this room, six
feet, two inches wide, and two feet, two inches deep. These figures
may mean but little to the layman, but they are full of significance
to the architect, the builder, and the antiquarian. The exterior of
the Whipple house has nothing in its aspect that would serve to draw
especial attention to it; but the interior possesses these two distinct
points of architectural merit, remarkable massiveness of construction,
and fine, dignified proportions. The two main rooms on the ground
floor are in fact superb for their simplicity, size and solidity. The
beautiful rich brown tone of the old oak posts, girders and joists
gives the key of colour. There is a white plastered ceiling between
the joists, the plaster being put directly on the floor-boards of the
second story....
One thing is evident, to any visitor who stands in the great east room,
and contemplates the stately proportions of the interior; that is,
that the Whipples must have been great swells in their day, to possess
such a mansion. Indeed, no further proof of their status, so far as
means are concerned, is needed than is furnished by the entertaining
inventory of Captain John Whipple’s estate in 1683, with its painful
particularity, itemizing each separate article of household use,
apparel, tools, edibles, beverages, and even “Lawrence ye Indian,”
who was valued at four pounds, a sum which seems inexpensive, even
where the supply of Indians exceeded the demand. It is enough to make
collectors’ mouths water to run over this list of old furniture,
silverware, pewter, china, arms, andirons, brasses, coppers, gallipots,
buckles and buttons, “kittles,” warming-pans, trenchers, candlesticks,
“tin lanthorns,” beakers, flagons, “basons,” piggins, “sully bub” pots,
spinning wheels, and a score of other things, more or less phonetically
spelled, after the excellent fashion of the epoch, when, as George
Eliot remarks, spelling was mostly a matter of taste.
The first John Whipple, whose estate was inventoried in 1669, was not
nearly so well off as his son afterwards became, though he had a farm
of about 360 acres of land, worth $750, and houses and lands in the
town, worth $1,250, with $45 worth of “apparell,” $35 worth of “feather
beds,” $6.75 worth of “chayres,” and $12 worth of “bookes.”
Speaking of books, the Ipswich Historical Society has in its custody,
in the west room of the old house, the most unmitigatedly pious lot
of old books I ever saw. They come from the Religious Society in
Ipswich, and the visitor may while away long hours in reading such
light literature as Jonathan Edwards’ “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry
God” (Salem, 1786), Increase Mather’s “Angelagraphia” (Boston, 1696),
or “The Loving Invitation of Christ to the Aged, Middle-Aged, Youth
and Children, from the mouth of Elizabeth Osborn, only Three Years and
Nine Months Old.” The collection of books, manuscripts, autographs,
etc., displayed in this room embraces a copy of the Breeches Bible
(1615); an autograph letter from John Winthrop, Jr., founder of Ipswich
(1634); an inventory of the household goods in Winthrop’s house in
Ipswich; several old petitions, deeds, wills, and other Colonial and
Revolutionary documents of interest. On rainy days, when the outside
world is dark and dismal, and the time hangs heavy on one’s hands,
it will be consoling for the people who like that sort of thing to
sit down and run through Owen’s work on “Indwelling Sin,” Baxter’s
“Call to the Unconverted,” Woodward’s “Fair Warning,” Crawford’s
“Dying Shots,” the account of “Count Struensee’s Conversion,” Cooper
on “Predestination,” Edwards on “Original Sin,” Shepard’s “Sound
Believer,” Langdon on “The Revelation,” Coleman’s “Parable of the Ten
Virgins,” Webb’s “Direction for Conversion,” Bellamy’s “Glory of the
Gospel,” Ditton on “The Resurrection,” Doddridge on “Regeneration,”
or Stoddard’s “Safety of Appearing in ye Righteousness of Christ.”
But, though the theology of these stalwart Calvinists may seem a bit
inflexible and unlovely to modern eyes, what they did not know about
setting up a title-page was not worth knowing. As religionists they
were of their day, took their creeds straight and hot, and their rum
ditto; but they were first-rate printers!
The house is a veritable museum of Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century
relics and curios. There is a buffet full of old china in the west room
which contains some very rare and choice pieces. The andirons in this
room are cast-iron figures of Hessians, in grenadier caps, picked out
with gilt. The iron fire-back is dated 1693. The andirons in the east
room are dated 1596. The great east room is fitted up as a kitchen.
The fire burns on the hearth as of yore, and the spacious fireplace is
fully equipped with ancient cooking utensils. Huge pewter platters and
obsolete fire-arms adorn the walls. The spinning-wheels, cheese-press
and churns are in their places. Here we find the yarn reels, the great
winnowing fan, the old cradle, foot-stove, candle-mould, candlesticks,
nice pieces of old needlework, samplers, old lamps, pewter porringers,
tinder-boxes, trivets, lanthorns, trammels, tin kitchens with spits,
etc., and a highly interesting collection of old furniture. In the
west room are the cabinet of old china, sundry heirlooms, an ancient
piano, antique chairs and pictures. The paintings comprise a smoky old
panel depicting the harbour of Ipswich, in which the vessels fly the
British flag, showing that it was painted prior to the Revolution, and
a life-size bust portrait of Whitefield, anonymous, and somewhat queer
about the eyes. Whitefield preached in Ipswich, and he did so to such
good effect that Satan fled through the meeting-house window, leaving
on the window-ledge the print of his cloven hoof. Mr. Waters may not
believe this, but it is just as true as some other local traditions.
“The old mansion,” says President Waters, in a passage of retrospect
which shows how sympathetic is his vein of fancy, “is a constant
reminder of all the glorious names which hallow and illumine the early
years of our town life,--Saltonstall and Winthrop, Symonds and Denison,
Ward and Norton and Hubbard and all the rest. They were all friends
of the Elder. Every one of them may have crossed our threshold. As we
sit here in the flickering firelight we seem to see them sitting, as
of old, and conversing on the great themes.... The old pavement in the
dooryard rings again with the hoof-beats of Captain Whipple’s horse
hurrying to lead his troopers on a swift ride to Andover to repel an
Indian assault. John Appleton and Thomas French are talking in this
very room of their imprisonment and trial for advocating resistance to
the royal governor’s edict and demanding representation before they
would submit to taxation. Colonel Hodgkins and Colonel Wade and Major
Burnham smoke and sip their steaming cups and chat of Bunker Hill and
Yorktown, of Burgoyne and Cornwallis, Washington and Lafayette.” And he
evokes a vision of the ancient life, its feasts, weddings, funerals,
departures and home-comings, its daily toil, and all the lights and
shadows of the remote Puritan home life, that revives the far-off days
with a singular and touching reality.
FORT MARION, ST. AUGUSTINE
IZA DUFFUS HARDY
From Jacksonville to St. Augustine is like a going back from the
Nineteenth Century into the Sixteenth. This, the oldest city in the
United States--with its history that should be printed in red letters,
being one volume of war and siege and bloodshed--is to all appearance
the old Spanish settlement still. The world seems to have gone on and
left it behind; the march of modern improvement has passed it by; the
tourist has found it out, and the hotel-keeper, of course, keeps him
company; but they have failed to spoil, or modernize and mar the quaint
old town. Step outside your hotel, and you at once step into a bygone
age. The old Spanish city lies wrapt in a dreamy peace; it seems asleep
in the sunshine. Narrow, unpaved, sandy streets; quaint wooden houses
breaking out into balconies and piazzas; untidy yards with ragged
banana-trees and palms and oleanders and climbing roses; “coquina”
houses, relics of old days, massive of wall and scant of window, built
of the curious material “coquina,” found only hereabouts (formed of
masses of crushed shell dug out of Anastasia Island, just across the
river)--this is St. Augustine at a first glance!
The oldest inhabitant is sitting at his door under his own vine and
figtree, smoking the pipe of peace in his shirt sleeves. He bids us
good evening; we stop and chat awhile with the old man, who is like
a picture, his snow-white hair and beard framing a rugged brown face.
He is a Spaniard, he tells us, born here, and nearly grown to manhood
when the Spanish flag was hauled down to give place to the Stars and
Stripes. He points out one of the oldest Spanish houses, a pink house,
built of “coquina,” and plastered over with a delicious soft pink like
the flush of sunset. Its little lattice windows are broken, so that
we can see the thickness of its massive “coquina” walls; it is empty
and falling rapidly to ruin. Down the narrow, sunny, sandy, almost
deserted street comes a riderless horse, trotting at a brisk pace. He
knows his home, and turns in under his own archway smartly. Next comes
a solitary cow, and presently a mare, also unencumbered by rider or
saddle, followed by a pretty little foal. They are all returning to
their respective homes in a quiet, business-like way.
We walk on to the Plaza, the central spot in which the sluggish
currents of life in St. Augustine seem to meet and eddy and make a
little stir in the sleepy old place. Facing on the Plaza is the old
Catholic church, with its high quaint belfry, to which the guide-books
and residents invariably call the attention of the tourist. Here is
the old market, under whose arched roof, men, women and children were
bought and sold once upon a time, and not so long ago, before the slave
traffic (which brought its curse with it, and pulled down the pillars
of the temple, and drew ruin, at least for a season, on these fair
lands of the South), gave place to the innocent bargaining for fish,
flesh, fowl and fruit, which is all these old walls look down upon
to-day.
[Illustration: FORT MARION, ST. AUGUSTINE, FLORIDA]
Beyond the Plaza we come upon the “sea-wall,” which our little
guide-book has led us to anticipate as a “promenade.” When we behold
it, however, our dreams of promenading vanish. It runs along the shore,
from the modern barracks at one end of the town to the ancient fort at
the other. It is simply a low, massive stone wall, the top of which,
unprotected by any rail or parapet, is described as the favourite
“Lover’s Walk”; but, if it is so, St. Augustine lovers must be slender
as well as affectionate. We find it quite enough to walk singly upon
it with a steady head. The tourist is “promenading himself” there,
of course, with his wife in her palmetto-hat; and we perceive, on
observation of the various couples, that lovers, when young and slim,
_may_ walk double, though more frequently _he_ walks behind _her_. A
soft, fresh breeze blows up from the unseen Atlantic, which is shut
from our view by the long slip of Anastasia Island, running parallel
with the sea-wall, between the ocean, whose salt fragrance floats
faintly to us, and the river lapping the base of the wall. The sea-wall
walk leads us to the old Fort Marion, which is, perhaps _the_ sight to
be seen here.
The first stone was laid in 1592, the last, as the inscription over
the gateway tells us, in 1756. The great fortress is in excellent
preservation. Its massive “coquina” walls stand almost untouched by
time or siege, though the wild grass waves under our feet in the
barbican and blue flowers blossom from the chinks in the “coquina”
blocks. A grim silence broods over the ancient walls, as we explore
turret and drawbridge, casement and bastion. There is an old sergeant
whose mission is to show visitors over the place, but he is apparently
off duty, for we seek and find him not. A fellow-tourist, however,
gives us all the information we require. We sit on damp blocks of
stone on a mud floor under a vaulted roof, while he tells us of the
“locked dungeon,” into which admission can only be gained through the
absent sergeant. He pioneers us into the “bakehouse,” a huge, dimly-lit
stone room, also with mud floor and vaulted roof, with a recess which
served as oven, and one aperture which combined the offices of chimney
and window. It was here that, during the siege of St. Augustine, all
the townsfolk collected for shelter; and a wretched community they
must have been! From this bakehouse a gloomy archway leads into a
pitch-dark dungeon. Our escort lights matches, which only serve to
make the darkness visible. By their feeble glimmer we can see neither
roof nor walls, nothing but the thick blackness which closes round us
like a pall. We are told, however, that the obscurity here is nothing
to the inky darkness of the “locked dungeon,” wherein, the story
goes, skeletons were found in iron cages,--but this is, by the best
authorities, denied.
We next inspect a comparatively light and airy cell, with a narrow
grating high up, to our eyes unattainable and impassable, but through
which the Indian chief, “Wild Cat,” is said to have effected his
escape. The great Osceola, his companion in obscurity, nobly refused
to avail himself of the same means. It strikes me as possible that
the “Cat” was the slenderer and more agile of the two. From the fort
we cross a rough and pathless stretch of sand and turf to another
relic of the past--to the old city gates. They are built of “coquina,”
of course. We inspect the barred and grated sentinel-boxes, the high
towers flanking the gateway and dutifully resist the temptation to chip
off a piece of “coquina” as a souvenir.
The next day is Easter Sunday; the quaint old streets are crowded
with gaily-dressed people; the Plaza is swarming with happy pairs.
This is truly the “Land of Flowers.” As we saunter in the shade of
the great trees that make King Street rather a forest-glade than a
street, and linger to gaze into the groves and gardens which surround
almost every residence, we drink in the fragrant breeze, heavy with
perfumes of myriad blossoms, and revel in the luxuriance of tropical
bloom and foliage all around us. Here is the lance-leaved palmetto, and
here the beautiful feathery date-palm; here the oleanders droop their
pink and pearl, starred and scented boughs high out of reach above
our heads; here climbing roses straggle up to the housetops; here are
great forest-like trees covered with the sweet yellow flowers of the
apoppinac; here the giant magnolia, tall as a poplar and sturdy as an
oak, is opening the great white petals of its mammoth flower. Now and
then we come upon the bridal blossoms of the orange and again upon
branches weighed down under their globes of ruddy gold.
We take a farewell stroll down St. George’s Street--where the oldest
inhabitant still sits smoking under his figtree, and the ragged
bananas and spiky palms in the gardens stand out against the deepening
glow in the west--as evening draws on. We wander down to the sea-wall,
which is nearly deserted now. There are one or two wild-looking men
on horseback, their saddles mere mats of crimson or blue embroidered
cloth, their feet thrust into the unsightly bags known as Mexican
stirrups. There are several dogs, one large yellow mastiff taking his
siesta on the sea-wall, occupying the entire width of the “promenade”;
a canine friend, coming to interview him, stands on his hind legs, with
his fore-paws on the top of the wall. This somehow makes the “Lover’s
Walk” look a very small affair. One of the riders spurs his horse up on
to the wall, and, like the successful admirer of “the Lady Kunigonde of
the Kynast,” he “rides along the battlemented parapet,” breaking up the
canine _tête-à-tête_. Fortunately, there are no lovers on the wall
to be startled from off their own particular domain, only the yellow
mastiff scuttles down in a hurry as horse and rider gallop by.
The sun is setting behind the town, and the eastern sky before us
catches a tender reflected blush just on the horizon. Beyond the
sea-wall lies a stretch of water, blue as heaven and calm as a dream;
it scarcely laps against the old stones; the little boats on its
surface “float double” boat and shadow; an indescribable softness, like
a sleep, broods over its waveless tide. Beyond this entranced water
lies the long dark shade of Anastasia Island; beyond that, the pale
reflected rose of the eastern sky fades slowly with the dying day. The
one or two stragglers on the sea-wall stand out in vivid silhouette
against the blue water and blushing sky; the clatter of the horse’s
hoofs, as the equestrian Blondin dashes along the top of the wall,
seems to shatter the silence like the breaking of a spell.
ST. ANNE DE BEAUPRÉ, QUEBEC[19]
ANNA T. SADLIER
Long ago, in some far away time too distant for actual history to have
recorded the fact, a few Breton sailors, coming up the great river were
surprised by a terrific storm. In all the terror of the moment, the
blackness of the night, the howling of the winds and the rushing of the
waters, their hearts went back to distant Brittany. In childhood and in
youth they had been taught to have recourse to the beloved patroness
of their _chère Bretagne_. Never had St. Anne d’Auray failed to
hear a simple and heartfelt prayer. They registered a vow: if the good
saint brought them once more to land, there where their feet touched
they would build her a shrine. A morning came blue and cloudless.
These brave men were ashore and where? They looked about them. To the
northward rose the Laurentian hills, to the southward the wide-rolling
St. Lawrence, to the eastward a little stream, now the St. Anne,
dividing the settlement from the neighbouring parish of St. Joachim.
In such surroundings they built a simple wooden chapel and laid the
foundation of a shrine now famous throughout America.
[Illustration: ST. ANNE DE BEAUPRÉ, QUEBEC, CANADA]
The years went on; these hardy _voyageurs_ passed on their way and
were heard of no more in the village they had founded. But habitations
soon grew up, and the settlement of Petit-Cap began to be known
by the little temple which stood in its very heart. Meanwhile in the
passing years, the springtime floods and the winter storms, and even
the hand of time itself, began to tell upon the sturdy wooden frame
of the good saint’s shrine. The project of rebuilding it was first
seriously entertained somewhere about 1660. A prosperous farmer of
the village, named Etienne Lessard, made a generous donation of land
sufficient for the erection of a church, provided only that the work
was begun at once. A discussion now arose as to the propriety of
changing the site; but the matter was finally decided and M. Vignal, a
priest from Quebec, went down to Petit-Cap to bless the foundations.
He was accompanied by M. d’Aillebout, Governor of New France, who went
thither expressly to lay the corner-stone.
This second church, which remained in use till 1876, was built of stone
and stood just at the foot of the hill, where the present chapel for
processions now is. During the years following its erection multitudes
of pilgrims flocked thither.
Amongst those whose interest in the welfare of the church and the
propagation of the devotion have woven a halo round this village shrine
is that immortal Bishop of Quebec--he who coming of the ancient and
knightly race, the Barons Montmorenci de Laval, forsook the splendours
of a luxurious court and the softness of a southern climate to devote
his wonderful intellect to the service of the primitive Canadian Church.
Rich gifts began to pour in and the attention of royalty itself
was drawn to the spot; for a gleam from the magnificence of that
traditionally splendid court of Louis le Grand fell upon that humble
sanctuary hard by the blue stream, which still bore the Indian
_voyageur_ upon his way. It is part of the romance which antiquity
has lent to the place, this offering made by the queen-mother of Louis
XIV. Anne of Austria’s own royal hands worked a handsome chasuble as
a gift to the good St. Anne. The ornaments upon it are red, white and
black arrows and the whole is richly wrought in gold and silver. Now,
though that splendid pageant of a dream, that gorgeous phantom of a
dead royalty, has passed into tradition, the vestment worked by the
royal mother’s hands is still seen at the altar of St. Anne’s upon
great occasions.
A costly silver reliquary adorned with precious stones and two pictures
painted by the Franciscan friar, Luc Lafrançois, are the gifts of Mgr.
de Laval; while there is a crucifix of solid silver presented by the
hero of Iberville in 1706 in return for favours obtained. So does the
past intermingle everywhere with the present, and such tokens speak
like the voices of the dead, giving testimony of answered prayers.
Kneeling there before that beloved mother of the Mother of Christ,
we can see in fancy, as humble suppliants by our side, the great and
good prelate whose name shines out from the early Canadian annals with
an unsurpassed lustre, or the valiant soldiers, proud and warlike
viceroys, gay and gallant barons of France, who have bent the knee
here, humble, believing, hopeful as the poor fisher whose boat rocked
the while upon the surging waters without. In 1875, a magnificent
banner, seven feet and a half high by four and a half broad, was
presented to the Curé by his Excellency Lieutenant-Governor Caron, of
Quebec. On one side of it is St. Anne teaching the Blessed Virgin, the
two figures encircled by a silver shower. Above and below is inscribed:
“St. Anne, Consolation of the Afflicted, pray for us.” The reverse
of the banner represents St. Joachim as a pilgrim, proceeding to the
temple with his simple gift of two white doves. The work thereupon was
done by the Sisters of Charity.
The walls and sanctuary are fairly covered with crutches, hearts of
gold and silver, and the like, each one telling of a belief in some
cure obtained, or petition heard.
The year of 1876, the year of the building of the new church was
crowned by a rescript of His Holiness Pius IX., bearing date the 7th of
May, by which he declared St. Anne patroness of the Province of Quebec,
as long ago St. Joseph had been declared patron of all Canada.