Love of the Country—Communion with Nature—Farming at
Salisbury—Lenox—Matteawan—The Peekskill Farm.
Like the fabled Antæus of old, Mr. Beecher found strength by contact
with old Mother Earth; not only that, but rest, health, and inspiration;
while from the study of natural processes, in which he delighted, he
gained a deep insight into the beautiful and, to so many eyes, hidden
mysteries of nature, which was a never-failing source of comfort and
pleasure to him through all his life—a rich treasury, from which he drew
so much of that illustrative imagery which illuminated and beautified
his writings and speeches. If Earth was the mother, Nature was the
grandmother, equally beloved and loving. Nothing that came from her
hands was uninteresting; each and every of her children found a true and
faithful brother in Mr. Beecher, to whom in turn they showed that trust
and confidence that opened up to him such glorious visions, such
secrets, full of exquisite beauty, vouchsafed to but few among mankind.
Of course he was fond of fishing and hunting. Not that he ever shot or
caught anything: he was generally innocent of any such charge. He loved
to tramp the woods, and stroll along the brookside, ostensibly hunting
or fishing, but really communing with nature. The gun and rod were only
for pretext. We take his own confessions:
“But, aside from the pleasure which arises in connection with seeking or
taking one’s prey, we suspect that the collateral enjoyments amount,
often, to a greater sum than all the rest: the early rising, the
freshness of those morning hours preceding the sun, which few
anti-piscatory critics know anything about; that wondrous early-morning
singing of birds, compared to which all after-day songs are mere
ejaculations—for such is the tumult and superabundance of sweet noise,
soon after four o’clock in summer, that one would think that if every
dewdrop were a musical note, and the bird shad drank them all, they
could not have been more multitudinous or delicious. Then there is that
incomparable sense of freedom which one has in remote fields, in
forests, and along the streams. His heart, trained in life to play with
jets, like an artificial fountain, seems, as he wanders along the
streams, to resume its own liberty, and, like a meadow-brook, to wind
and turn, amid flowers and fringing shrubs, at its own unmolested
pleasure.
“Care and trouble, in ordinary life, and especially in cities, disturb
the fountains of feeling, as rubbish fallen into the fountains of ruined
cities in the East chokes them, or splits and scatters their streams
through all secret channels.
“One who believes God to have made the world, and to have expressed His
own tastes and thoughts in the making, cannot express what feelings
those are which speak music through his heart. A little plant growing in
silent simplicity in some covert spot, or looking down upon him from out
of a rift in some rock uplifted high above his reach or climbing—what
has it said to him, that he stops and gazes as if he saw more than
material forms? What is that rush of feeling in his heart, and that
strange opening up of thoughts, as if a revelation had been made to him?
Who that has a literal eye could see anything but that solitary flower
casting a linear shadow on the side of the gray rock—a shadow that loves
to quiver, and nod, and dance to every step which the wind-blown flower
takes? But this floral preacher up in that pulpit has many a time
preached tears into my eyes, and told me more than I was ever able to
tell again.
“Indeed, in many and many a tramp the best sporting was done on my back.
Flat under a tree we lay, a vast Brobdingnag, upon whom grasshoppers
mounted, and glossy crickets crept, harmless, with evident speculation
of what such a phenomenon could portend. Along the stems creep aspiring
ants, searching with fiery zeal for no one can even tell what. The
bluejay is in the tree above you. The woodpecker screws round and round
the trunk, hammering at every place like an auscult doctor sounding a
patient’s lungs. Little birds fly in and about, gibbering to each other
in sweet little detached sentences, confidentially talking over their
family secrets, and expressing those delicate sentiments which one never
speaks above a whisper in twilight. When you rise, the birds flutter and
fly, and clouds of insects fly off from you like sparks from a fire when
a log rolls over. The brook that gurgled past the tree, feeding its
roots, and taking its pay in summer shadows, varied every hour, receives
a portion of out-jumping fry. Far off their coming shines. But before
they had even touched the water, that bold trout sprung sparkling from
the surface and sunk as soon, leaving only a few bubbles to float down.
There! if the trout has a right to his grasshopper, have I not a right
to the trout? I’ll have him! After several throws I find that it takes
two to make a bargain.
“At length one must go home. I never turn from the silence of the
underbrush, or the solitude of the fields, or the rustlings of the
forest, without a certain sadness as if I were going away from friends.”
Flowers and birds were his delight. Every spring he watched almost
impatiently for the first arbutus, anemone, bloodroot, and violet, and
enjoyed their short stay with an intensity that years increased rather
than abated. The first song of the robin, the first plaintive note of
the bluebird, and the sweet lay of the song-sparrow were each year
listened for, and eagerly announced to the family with all the
enthusiasm of early boyhood. Through the summer he watched and cared,
with tender solicitude, for the roses, lilies, dahlias, and
chrysanthemum, with the many, many other of the flower-world which he
always had about him. And as each in its turn lived out its short span,
faded, and fell, he watched the scattering petals almost mournfully,
finding consolation only in the certainty of their return another year.
Each season with its many changing moods was a living allegory to him.
Spring was the young child just born, full of smiles, of tears, and
winsome ways—the beginnings of life. Summer was early maturity, in which
the first promises of fruitage were beginning to be fulfilled. Steadier
and more sober, with increasing responsibilities. Fall perfected
maturity with its full fruitage. Early winter, extreme old age,
lingering at the threshold of the grave. Midwinter, nature’s death,
which, like the soul’s, ends not in destruction, but only rests awhile
to awaken into a more glorious resurrection.
Nature was to him God’s book wide open, each leaf free and unbound,
filled with that which comforted his soul and confirmed his faith.
Not even in evolution, that bugbear of so many of his clerical brethren,
did he find anything to disturb his trust in God, his faith in the Lord
Jesus Christ, or his confidence in the Bible, as life’s guide-book; but
quite the contrary. He found his trust, his faith and confidence,
strengthened and enlightened thereby. Many rough places were smoothed,
many dark spots enlightened.
In it he saw the highest proof of God’s wonderful wisdom. A mind that
could conceive, perfect, and put into operation so wonderful, so simple
and yet effective a natural law, could only be divine.
It is not strange that, with his tastes and feelings, a plot of land to
cultivate became early a necessity. While not exactly “brought up” on a
farm, he was brought into intimate relation with most forms of
farm-labor. The small plot of land around his father’s house furnished
the field for quite a little practical farming. For in New England every
one was expected to raise the greater part of his own vegetables, and
the boys, as soon as they were big enough to run around, were expected
to contribute their little quota towards the common good.
It was not until he was settled in Indianapolis that Mr. Beecher owned a
plot of his own large enough for flowers, fruit, and vegetables. There
he worked daily, finding rest from his head-work, fresh air, and
healthful exercise, which would alone have more than repaid him for all
expense or trouble. Rising before five in the summer, he was out in his
garden when most of his neighbors were enjoying the sweet
unconsciousness of their morning naps. Aside from the big dividend of
increased health and vigor, he was further rewarded by unusual success
in raising small fruits and flowers. His roses were a revelation to the
community, and lent their fragrance to many an humble home or sick room.
For fruit and flowers did pastoral duty, cheering the sick, brightening
the dark side of life in many a poverty-cramped family; while the
impulse along the line of taste and love for the beautiful, and the
feeling of the dignity of honest labor, which he gave to the whole
community, we are told is still felt, and will long be remembered as a
souvenir of his pastorate in Indianapolis.
His contributions to the theory of gardening and farming in the Indiana
_Farmer and Gardener_ we have already referred to in an earlier chapter.
During the first few years of his Brooklyn pastorate he does not seem to
have had the time to look about for any place in which to practise his
favorite avocation.
Of course the crowded condition of city life precluded the possibility
of having either farm or garden near his home. He was accustomed then to
visit among friends a part of the time, spending the bulk of the summer
in some picturesque place.
The earliest bit of country that lies within our memory was Salisbury,
in Connecticut, where Mr. Beecher spent the summers of 1852 and 1853.
We remember well how, with the semi-savagery of early boyhood, we, with
our misguided playmates, lay in wait for some frisky guinea-pigs,
playing harmlessly in their little pen, and, after capturing a number,
transported them to an upper veranda, and, in imitation of the ancient
heathen’s treatment of captives, dashed them upon the stones below; and
how retribution, in the form of a very indignant father, seized upon our
youthful person, and, with the dexterity born of some little practice,
gave us a long-abiding illustration of how dreadful a thing was cruelty.
There also we obtained our first practical insight into a hornet’s
disposition and activity.
Salisbury, doubtless, was a lovely spot, but its memories to us are not
cheering, and we pass on.
In 1853 Mr. Beecher purchased his first farm in the East, a plot of
ninety-six acres, situated in the town of Lenox, up among the Berkshire
hills of Massachusetts. This was known as the “Blossom Farm.” It was
justly celebrated for its fine fruit, especially apples. But it did not
altogether suit Mr. Beecher, nor tempt him into any great agricultural
outlay. It was too far from the city. He could not run up for a day, and
back again. He could not be there in spring and seed time, owing to his
pastoral duties. Six weeks’ vacation time in midsummer, with an
occasional visit of two or three days, was about the limit of his time
there. He had to run the farm by proxy, which was about as enjoyable, to
him, as employing some one to eat his meals.
Having a chance, in 1857, to sell the place, he did so, and then hired
another farm at Matteawan, just back of Fishkill Landing, on the Hudson
River. This promised to be a more satisfactory place; but a little over
two hours from New York, he could run up and back the same day, and
spend many a halfday at work in his garden, from which he was debarred
by distance at Lenox. This, doubtless, would have been his
country-place, had not some happy chance led him a little further down
the river, to Peekskill-on-the-Hudson, just at the entrance to the
Highlands. There he found his ideal summer home, on the east side of the
river, facing the sunset, but about forty miles from New York; the land
rising by a succession of easy hills, terrace-like, six hundred feet
above the river level, until one reached the farm a little over a mile
and a half from the depot. Although when he first saw it the place was
rough, but little cultivated, with gnarled and half-dead apple-trees
scattered here and there over it, yet the possibilities were such that
on the first inspection he decided to buy. So it came about that in the
fall of 1859 he gave up his Matteawan place and bought the hillside at
Peekskill, which he named “Boscobel.”
[Illustration: The Cottage at Peekskill.]
At the foot of his lawn the turnpike runs along a level stretch for
nearly a quarter of a mile; from the road the land rises on the north by
a gradual, easy grade in graceful lines up to a comparatively level
plateau, on which the cottage and the old barns were located, in true
old-fashioned style, in happy disregard of either convenience or scenic
effect. Taking a fresh start, the grade rose upward again for three or
four hundred yards, forming a third level space on top, and then plunged
steeply down into the valley of Peeks-kill. From the turnpike the
private approach ran up between a double row of stately maples to the
very doorstep. This hill was one of the spurs that ran back from the
river at right angles to its course—a detached foot-hill of the
Highlands.
With the exception of a few acres on the crest of the hill, the farm lay
along the south slope, sheltered by its own crest from the north winds,
its face to the southern sun. In this Mr. Beecher saw peculiar
advantages for early fruit and vegetables, while the view in every
direction delighted his eye. From the house, looking west, lay the
river, visible only for a mile or so, and lying like a beautiful Swiss
lake encircled by protecting mountains. To the south and southeast the
landscape was varied and charming—low hills, woodland and green fields,
making up a beautiful picture. Whilst from the hill-top, reputed to be
the highest point in Westchester County, the country lay out like one
great panorama on all sides, the view to the north and west being
especially grand; another glimpse of the Hudson being visible just
before it is swallowed up by the grim mountains of the Highlands. Over
all in the distance rise, blue and faint, the Catskills, whilst to the
east the country rolls in graceful, broken stretches for miles.
Such were the general features of the farm when Mr. Beecher bought it.
The house was a low, two-story, wooden farm-house of pre-Revolutionary
origin, where, as the legend goes, that sturdy old warrior, Israel
Putnam, had his headquarters at one time—a legend strongly corroborated
by the silent testimony of cannon-balls, bayonets, and various military
trappings from time to time unearthed by the inquisitive and grubbing
plough. In the spring of 1860 Mr. Beecher took possession of his new
farm of thirty-six acres, and began at once the work of reformation and
improvement.
At first the low, scrubby bushes that, under the pretence of bearing
edible fruit, had long been allowed to outlive their usefulness, were
grubbed up and made into fagots for kindling. Then one by one the trees
in the ancient apple-orchard, which Putnam’s patriots had, doubtless,
many a time assaulted and carried by storm well-nigh a hundred years
before, and which in turn took a sharp and colicky revenge upon their
assailants—unless the quality of their fruit had greatly deteriorated in
modern times—yielded to the axe, and in the generous open fireplace, the
glory of the old-fashioned farm-house, paid their last tribute to their
master, man.
[Illustration: The Old Apple-Tree.]
The last to fall a victim to axe and fire, and then only when extreme
old age and decay had ended its apple-bearing life, and made it a
standing menace of danger to all who passed under its rotted branches,
was one entitled to special notice. Mr. Beecher wrote of it:
“I have a tree on my place at Peekskill that cannot be less than two
hundred years old. Two ladies, one about eighty years old, called upon
us several years ago, saying that they had been brought up on the farm,
and inquiring if the old apple-tree yet lived. They said that in their
childhood it was called ‘_the old apple-tree_,’ and was then a
patriarch. It must now be a Methuselah, and is probably the largest
_recorded_ apple-tree in the world. I read in no work of any apple-tree
whose circumference exceeds twelve or thirteen feet. This morning I
measured the Peekskill apple-tree, and found that, at four feet from the
ground, where the limbs begin to spring, it was fourteen feet and ten
inches in circumference, and at six feet from the ground fourteen feet
and six inches. I am sorry to add that the long-suffering old tree gives
unmistakable signs of yielding to the infirmities of old age.” Where the
enormous limbs branched out, so great was the space, a summer-house was
built, in which the children played keeping house.
Then the old ramshackle barns were taken in hand, with their successive
additions hitched on, as more space might be required—architectural
after-thoughts, regardless of everything except capacity. Some were torn
down, others removed to more convenient and less obtrusive
localities—the smaller buildings doing duty for carriages and chickens;
the larger ones, with a little ingenuity and the aid of a carpenter or
two, being consolidated into one commodious building.
Of course this was the work of several years, and required no little
planning and arranging, furnishing that restful change of occupation,
from the continuous and intense mental strain, which Mr. Beecher so much
needed.
The surface cleared, then began the more serious work of subsoiling,
draining, and clearing up of stones. Every inch of the thirty-six acres,
save only where trees and buildings stood, was turned over to the
subsoil. The deep subsoil plough, with four sturdy oxen to give it
force, drove its steel nose twenty inches down into the earth, taking
different parts of the farm in successive seasons, each then being
seeded down to grass, grain, or vegetables, as the case might be. The
loose stones, having first been carefully gathered from the upturned
surface, were then utilized in laying gutters by the roadside, in
building foundations for barns, sheds, etc., or in making drains—for he
found that the live springs that filled the hillside, unless regulated,
might make his lawn too damp. So deep drains were sunk across the lower
half of the hill in different directions, which carried off the surplus
moisture; while under house, barn, and cattle-sheds wells were sunk from
eight to ten feet, furnishing a supply of cool, sparkling water, never
failing in the dryest summer. With these later improvements began his
real gardening and farming; every form of flower, fruit, and vegetable
that the latitude would permit was planted and raised. Pears, apples,
and grapes, among the fruit, might be said to have been his specialty;
between two and three thousand trees and vines were planted, carefully
watched, trimmed, and pruned year by year until they came into full
bearing, while the smaller fruit, vines, and bushes became well-nigh
innumerable. Though he kept the place always well stocked with what
might be called the standard crops, he was very fond of taking up, for a
year or two, several specialties, devoting his principal attention and
study to these until he had pretty thoroughly mastered their habits,
peculiarities, and capacities, then for the next year or two take up
something else, and so on, gradually in time making a special study of
every flower, fruit, and vegetable that could be grown in that latitude.
When strawberries were in hand he tried every variety, early and late,
large and small, sweet and tart, and in such numbers that several
hundred quarts were often picked in one day. The same was true of pears,
apples, plums, peaches, cherries, grapes, raspberries, blackberries, as
well as peas, corn, potatoes, cabbages, etc.
After one class of fruit or vegetable had had its turn, it was not
neglected, but one or two of the varieties found best adapted to the
locality were retained (except in the large fruit-trees, of which a
large assortment was always kept), and only sufficient planted to supply
the family with about four times as much as could possibly be used; for,
unless there was enough of everything, so that each person in the family
at the time might, if so inclined, make a meal of any one thing, he
would not touch it. “Skimpy messes,” as he used to call them, were his
utter abomination. But the thing that gave him the greatest pleasure was
to beat his neighbors in early crops. Across the turnpike, at the foot
of the lane, for many years lived a very dear friend, Mr. George Dayton,
a gentleman of means, well skilled in every phase of scientific farming;
and between the two was carried on, so long as Mr. Dayton lived, a most
earnest rivalry on the subject of farming. Nothing delighted Mr. Beecher
more than to gather a basket of peas, a large dish of strawberries, or a
dozen ears of corn, the first of the season, that had ripened just a day
or two ahead of Mr. Dayton’s, and bringing them down to his friend’s,
deliver them to him, as, with an air of mock sympathy, he condoled with
him over his inability to raise early vegetables or fruit; then, with a
hearty laugh, invite him up on to the hillside to learn how a farm
should be run. The natural advantages of his location, sheltered from
the north and open to the first warm breezes from the south, generally
gave him these pleasant triumphs by two or three days; though once in a
while the tables would be turned, and he had to take his turn at being
bantered and receiving his friend’s so-called charity.
We confess we used to prefer these infrequent reverses, for our youthful
eyes watched regretfully the dishful of great, luscious strawberries
going in triumphal procession to Mr. Dayton’s. We used to think that the
first fruits, like charity, should be tried at home, and had to find
such guilty consolation as we could in a surreptitious visit to the
strawberry-bed. This was not altogether satisfactory, for aside from the
attendant risks, the remaining berries would only be half-ripe.
At the same time he bought the place it was his good fortune to meet an
English gardener, Mr. Thomas J. Turner, and to secure his services as
superintendent, or “boss,” as he was known to the men—one of those
simple-minded, faithful, hard-working men, who never spared himself, nor
his subordinates. His devoted attachment to the family and the
place—“_Our_ farm” he used to call it—made him an invaluable helper.
For flowers and ornamental shrubs Turner had at first but little taste;
his great ambition was to make the farm “pay,” and the contest for
supremacy between master and man caused much amusement to all parties.
Turner was always trying to extend the borders of his pea and potato
patches, encroaching on the hollyhocks and dahlias, while Mr. Beecher
would crowd the corn and lima beans to make more room for roses and
pinks.
How Mr. Beecher outwitted his opponent we will let him narrate:
“I am as set and determined to have flowers as my farmer, Mr. Turner, is
to have vegetables; and there is a friendly quarrel in hand all the
season, a kind of border warfare, between flowers and vegetables—which
shall have this spot, and which shall secure that nook; whether in this
southern slope it shall be onions or gladioluses; whether a row of
lettuce shall edge that patch, or of asters. I think, on a calm review,
that I have rather gained on Mr. Turner. The fact is, I found that he
had me at a disadvantage, being always on the place and having the whole
spring to himself. So I shrewdly tampered with the man himself, and
before he knew what he was about, I had infected him with the flower
mania (and this is a malady that I have never known cured), so that I
had an ally in the very enemy’s camp. Indeed, I begin to fear that my
manager will get ahead of me yet in skill and love of flowers!”
[Illustration: Mr. Beecher on His Farm.]
In the years when corn, cabbage, or potatoes were being specialized
Turner was happy. With a proud and beaming face he would drive down to
the local market, load after load of choice vegetables. His cup of
happiness would overflow when he returned and announced that “_our_
vegetables” brought the best price of any in the market.
But, alas! like many a man before him, his pride became, figuratively
speaking, his ruin; for after a while the fact was discovered that
Turner was selecting the largest and fairest for the market, and that
the home table had to be content with second and third rates, too poor
to sell with credit. That ended all further farming for profit. From
that time on nothing further was raised for the market.
As full of interest as every process connected with farming and fruit
culture was, Mr. Beecher’s greatest pleasure was in the cultivation of
flowers and ornamental shrubs. Their ever-varying form, their delicate
perfume, and, above all, their abounding wealth of color, furnished him
a bouquet of which he never tired. Roses were perhaps his standard
favorites, and, whatever other specialty he might be studying, they were
kept up always. Of these he wrote:
“All rosedom is out in holiday attire, and roses white and black, green
and pink, scarlet, crimson, and yellow, striped and mottled, double and
single, in clusters and solitary, moss-roses, damask roses, Noisette,
Perpetual, Bourbon, China, tea, musk, and all other tribes and names,
hang in exuberant beauty. The air is full of their fragrance. The eye
can turn nowhere that it is not attracted to a glowing bush of roses.
What would not people shut up in cities give to see such luxuriance of
beauty!... The wonder is that every other man is not an enthusiast, and
in the month of June a gentle fanatic. Floral insanity is one of the
most charming inflictions to which man is heir. The garden is
infectious. Flowers are ‘catching,’ or the love of them is. Men begin
with one or two. In a few years they are struck through with floral
zeal. And one finds, after the heat, and strife, and toil of his
ambitious life, that there is more pure satisfaction in his garden than
in all the other pursuits that promise so much of pleasure and yield so
little.”
In different years he tested every variety of form and color which could
be found in the single and double hollyhocks, single and double dahlias,
phlox, geraniums, pansies, lilies, fuchsias, and chrysanthemum,
sometimes massed in great banks of color, sometimes scattered in
different beds and along borders, or in little beds hidden amid the
shrubbery. From early May till frost came, “Boscobel” was always ablaze
with the glories of flowers in their different seasons.
It is given to few to understand, and fewer still to experience, the
wonderful effect which flowers had upon him. Fagged with hard work,
vexed with cares, with nerves strained and irritated, a few hours among
his flowers rested his brain, soothed his nerves, and refitted him for
days of hard work. Doubtless change of occupation, open air, and the
slight physical exertion required in tending his pets, did something
towards rest and recreation; but there was a subtle power in many colors
that worked upon his nerves in a strangely mysterious way, that gave him
more relief from nerve excitement in an hour than any drug ever
compounded. Flowers and colored gems—which he called unfading
flowers—possessed this soothing power above everything else.
In his younger days his farming and gardening experiences were
intimately associated with hard physical work. But after he had settled
at “Boscobel” the number and pressure of his regular engagements made
farm labor, except by proxy, impossible. He worked some, it is true, but
principally for exercise; the real use and benefit of the farm being its
sweet and soothing restfulness.
His description of his “work” and the unalloyed pleasure he found in
“farming” needs no enlarging:
“The light is just coming. I do not care for that, as I do not propose
to get up at such an hour. But the birds _do_ care. They evidently wind
up their singing apparatus over-night, for when the first bird breaks
the silence, in an instant the rest go off as if a spring had been
touched which moved them all. There are robins without count,
wood-thrushes, orioles, sparrows, bobolinks, meadow-larks, bluebirds,
yellowbirds, wrens, warblers, catbirds (as the Northern mocking-bird is
called), martins, twittering swallows. Think of the noise made by mixing
all these bird-notes together; add a rooster and a solemn old crow to
carry the base; then consider that of each kind there are scores, and of
some hundreds, within ear-reach, and you will have some faint conception
of the opening chant of the day. You may not think that I wake so early,
but I do; or, having awakened, I again go to sleep, but I solemnly do. I
don’t think of getting up before six.
“After breakfast there are so many things to be done first that I
neglect them all. The morning is so fine, the young leaves are so
beautiful, the bloom on the orchard is so gorgeous, the sounds and
sights are so many and so winning, that I am apt to sit down on the
veranda for just a moment, and for just another, and for a series of
them, until an hour goes by. Do not blame me! Do not laugh at such
farming and such a farmer.
“The soil overhead bears larger and better crops, for a sensible man,
than does the soil under-feet. There are blossoms in the clouds. There
is fruit upon invisible trees, to those who know how to pluck it.
“But then sky-gazing and this dallying with the landscape will not do.
What crowds of things require the eye and hand! Flowers must be
transplanted. Flower-seeds must be sown; shrubs and trees pruned; vines
looked after; a walk taken over the hill to see after some evergreens,
with many pauses to gaze upon the landscape, and many birds watched as
they are confidentially exhibiting their domestic traits before you. The
kittens, too, at the barn must be visited, the calf, and the new cow.
Then every gardener knows how much time is consumed in watching the new
plants. For instance, I have eight new kinds of strawberries that need
looking after, each one purporting to be a world’s wonder. I am quite
anxious about eight or ten new kinds of clematis, two new species of
honeysuckle, eight or ten new and rare evergreens, and ever so many
other things, shrubs and flowers.
“But what shall I say of the new peas, new beans, rare cucumbers, early
melons, extraordinary potatoes? Do you not see that it is impossible for
me, amid such incessant and weighty cares, to write? The air is white
with apple-blossoms; the trees are all singing; the steaming ground
beseeches me to grant it a portion of flower-seeds; by night the
whippoorwill, and by day the wood-thrush and mocking-bird, fill my
imagination with all sorts of fancies, and how can I write?”
After a number of years Mr. Beecher began to think that he would like to
build a house that should embody his ideal of what a home should be—a
real homestead whose hospitable largeness could readily accommodate all
the children and the children’s children, and which in design, in finish
and decoration, should be an education for his children. Several years
were spent in talking over plans and examining designs proposed by
architects before the final plan was adopted. Then the Tilton conspiracy
broke out, and for a short time deferred the proposed building. But the
need of some diverting occupation, something that should change the
entire current of his thoughts, became so decided that in self-defence
he began building the new house. On that peaceful hillside, amid the
busy workmen, he found a grateful asylum and refuge from the tempest
with which his enemies had sought to destroy him.
It has never been doubted in his family, that the relief which he found
in the pure air, the beautiful scenery, the sweet communion with flowers
and birds, at Peekskill, with his engrossing interest in “_the_ house,”
saved his life during those years when the burden was the heaviest.
He has often said that he never spent money more profitably than in
building his new house and in laying out his grounds.
Stone by stone and brick by brick he watched the foundations and the
lower stories rise. Each floor-beam, joist, and girder received his
zealous scrutiny. The reasons for this, and the causes for that, he must
know all about; until, long before the house was finished, he was,
barring the manual dexterity, as good a mason or carpenter as the best
of those at work. Every day, and often a dozen times a day, he climbed
from cellar to ridge-pole, studying, investigating, making suggestions,
or proposing alterations—these latter the terror of his architect; for,
though often decided improvements on the first plans, they sometimes
involved a serious modification of the work in hand. Every gentleman who
visited him must make the tour clear to the ridge-pole, for there the
view was finest. Once, when a young man was his visitor and victim, he
insisted that they should mount the lofty but unfinished chimney to get
a little more extended outlook, setting the example himself; but his
companion, who was hugging a firmly-secured cross-tie, in momentary fear
of losing his balance and falling, declared that he drew the line at the
chimney, and would aspire no higher.
When finally the house was up came the internal finishing and
decoration. Nothing was omitted that, in his opinion, would increase
comfort or convenience; while, in the decorative and ornamental finish,
he aimed at results which should educate the eye and tastes of his
children.
“Boscobel” was to be the family home, and ultimately his permanent
residence, for then he used to say that when he reached seventy, he
proposed to retire from the public and devote his closing years to
literary work.
Here children and grandchildren were together each summer, pilgrims to
this domestic Mecca. The house must be large enough to hold them all,
and friends besides, without crowding; and it was, twenty and
twenty-five being no unusual number gathered within its walls. And on
one occasion, when a clerical union was invited to meet at “Boscobel,”
thirty were, with a little ingenious packing, entertained over-night.
It was not until the summer of 1878 that the workmen were finally
dispossessed and the family entered into the new house. What a sense of
expansion we all experienced! We looked back upon the humble little
cottage, hallowed by so many years full of enjoyment, and wondered how
it could ever have held us all—something as a butterfly, with broad,
expanded wings, might contemplate its empty chrysalis, surprised that it
had lived so long, cramped within so small a compass.
The richness of the wall-paper and the delicacy of the frescoing would
not permit the hanging of pictures, while Mr. Beecher’s love of the
beautiful would not permit him to rest quiet until he had found some way
of further decoration appropriate to his walls. This led him to the
study of the various ornamental ceramics. China, Japan, England and
France, Germany and America, were each laid under contribution for its
characteristic productions. Fortunately he had made his mantel-pieces
broad and high, with many little shelves and brackets, convenient
resting-places for vases, cups, and bowls. Once the house was complete
came the final work of improvement—the landscape, grading, planting
ornamental shrubs, and laying out of his lawn, whose ten acres spread
out before the new house. The trimming of trees and shrubs into
fantastic or mathematical figures, and strict regularity of path and
plot, he detested. Landscape-gardening should be only an assistant to
nature, not a remodeller.
On this theory he laid out his place. In the changing of grades,
grouping of shrubs, planting of tangled copses, he sought to give to
everything the appearance of natural growth and formation.
[Illustration: The House at Peekskill.]
Having taken up ornamental trees and plants, with his usual thoroughness
he exhausted the subject. Every tree and shrub that with reasonable care
could be made to grow on that favored place was planted. And so
skilfully and naturally have they been grouped that, though there are
over sixteen hundred of the ornamental varieties growing within the
limits of those thirty-six acres, they are not crowded, and nearly
twenty acres are free for grass, vegetables, and fruit.
It was stated by an experienced landscape-gardener, in 1884, that, with
the exception of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, no collection
similar in extent and variety could then be found in America.
Of course this building, improving, and planting called for a constant
and heavy outlay of money. It was in part to meet this that he projected
and carried out the series of lecture-tours that ran through the last
ten years of his life.
In the commercial sense of the word his farming was not profitable. He
spent upon his place many thousands of dollars that never came back to
him in coin or currency. His receipts were of the kind not to be found
in the open market, not affected by the flurries in “The Street”;
neither defaulting cashier nor stock-jobbing speculator could depreciate
or lessen them.
If money be valued at the amount of comfort and happiness it affords,
then the thousands lavished on his beloved home were well spent, for
seldom has the same amount given so much of real, healthful happiness,
and to so many.
None outside of the family will ever know to how many “Boscobel” was a
veritable tower of refuge in dark days and troublous times; how many
found inspiration there for greater work, and increased courage for
burden-bearing; whilst to Mr. Beecher it was an investment that repaid
him, in dividends of life-lengthening rest, reinvigoration, and
happiness, many hundred per cent. No wonder that he loved every spear of
grass, every budding leaf and perfumed flower, upon that hillside. They
were his children, at least by adoption. No wonder that the birds, and
even the very insects, his uninvited summer guests, were dear to him;
and that each fall, as he turned his back upon the summer and the
hillside, to enter again into the harassing turmoils of city life, his
thoughts ran back in gratitude to the many friends that had contributed
so much to his happiness:
[Illustration: Hall in New House at Peekskill.]
“Neither can a sensitive nature forget his summer companions, or stint
them in their meed of praise and gratitude. Worms whose metamorphosis we
have watched; spiders whose webs glitter along the grass at morning and
at evening, or mark out geometric figures among the trees—spiders red,
brown, black, green, gray, yellow, and speckled; soft-winged moths;
gorgeous butterflies, steel-colored and shining black crickets, locusts
and grasshoppers, and all the rabble of creaking, singing, fiddling
fellows besides, which swarm in air and earth—we bid you all a hearty
good-by. Sooth to say, we part from some of you without regret. But for
the million we feel a true yearning, so much have we watched your ways,
so many hours has our soul been fed by you through our eyes. Ye are a
part of the great Father’s family.
“Oh! how goodly a book is that which God has opened in this world! Every
day is a separate leaf—nay, not leaf, but volume, with text, and note,
and picture, with every dainty quip and quirk of graceful art, with
stores of knowledge illimitable, if one will only humble himself to
receive it! One should not willingly be ungrateful, even to the smallest
creatures or to inanimate objects that have served his pleasure.
“And so, to reed and grass, bush and tree, stone and hill, brook and
lake, all creeping things and all things that fly, to early birds and
late-chirping locusts, we wave our hand in grateful thanks!
“But to that Providence over all, source of their joy and mine, what
words can express what every manly heart must feel?
“Only the life itself can give thanks for life.”
While house, flowers, and plants occupied the greater part of his
farming time, they by no means monopolized it. He took a very deep
interest in his chickens. White Leghorns, Buff Cochins, and Brown
Brahmas, out of the many kinds that he tried, were the final favorites,
and repaid him well in eggs—the universal hen currency—for his pains and
care. Of these he wrote:
“It is a day for the country; the city palls on the jaded nerve. I long
to hear the hens cackle. There are lively times now in barn and
barn-yard, I’ll warrant you.... The Leghorn, of true blood, leads the
race of fowls for continuous eggs, in season and out of season—eggs
large enough, of fine quality, and sprung from hens that never think of
chickens. For a true Leghorn seldom wants to sit. They believe in
division of labor. If they provide the eggs, others must hatch them....
The Brahmas and Cochins have good qualities. They are large, even huge.
They are peaceable. And the Cochins do not _scratch_—an important fact
to all who have gardens.... But a more ungainly thing than Buff Cochins
the eye never saw. A flock of Leghorns is a delight to the eye; their
forms are symmetrical, and every motion graceful. But the fat, podgy
Cochins waddle before you like over-fat buffoons. They are grotesque,
good-natured, clumsy, useful creatures, with a great love of sitting. We
keep Cochin hens to sit on Leghorn eggs.”
So long as he raised chickens in the good old-fashioned, orthodox way he
was very successful; but when, one unlucky day, he fell into the hands
of the agent of some patent chicken-breeding process, his sorrows began.
The hatcher and brooder appeared in due time, with trays, tin pans,
heater, self-regulating thermometer, and enough other paraphernalia to
hatch out an ostrich. _Three hundred_ selected eggs were taken for the
first experiment, carefully stowed in the trays, the heat turned on, the
regulating thermometer put in gear; then we all stood back and gazed in
wondering admiration upon the machine which was to grind out chickens
like a mill. Our impatience could hardly be restrained to await the
eventful day when the shells should crack, and the downy occupants come
tumbling out of the trays; while visions of tender broiled chickens,
chickens roasted, stewed, and fricasseed without limit, danced through
our exultant minds. _Three hundred_ spring chickens! Phew! And the
process could be repeated indefinitely.
At last the long-expected day arrived when, according to the
regulations, all well-behaved eggs should hatch.
_Mons laboravit et_—no, not a mouse, but one solitary little chicken
came forth. Two hundred and ninety-nine good eggs had gone wrong!
The second trial resulted better: one in every ten responded at the
roll-call. But even these found this cold world uncongenial, and, what
with the pips, gapes, and other maladies incident to chicken babyhood,
their little band rapidly diminished to zero. But these discouragements
only stimulated Mr. Beecher to greater effort, determined that, if the
machine could be made to work, _he would make_ it. It would be hard to
say what the upshot might have been, had not the machine, one fine
night, started off on an original plan of its own, with a view to
forcing the eggs, which resulted in burning the hatcher, chicken-house,
part of a barn, and nearly cleaning out the entire general
establishment. After that the hens had a monopoly of the hatching
business.
With his cattle he was uniformly successful, no one having invented any
calf-hatching machine. For many years he raised nothing but
Ayrshires—very handsome cows and very generous milkers—but finally he
began to try the Jerseys, and never after changed from them. Their
beautiful deer-like heads, small, graceful limbs, and kindly
dispositions made them universal favorites; while their milk, scant in
quantity but wonderfully rich in cream, made berry-time a marked season
of the year. As he never cared to keep more than six or eight cows, he
had each year to sell several heifers; these, thanks to the kindness of
Mr. Kittredge, his next-door neighbor, having been registered in the
Jersey stock-book, sold for large prices.
No farm so well stocked with flowers should be without its bees; so
about eight years ago he purchased four hives of Italian bees, had a
proper shed erected, and the bees duly installed.
After a few preliminary experiments he delegated the care and culture of
bees to our hands. The necessity of appearing in his pulpit at regular
stated times, with a face reasonably free from distortion, compelled him
to forego the pleasure and exercise of caring for and dodging bees. But
if he found it prudent to turn the bees over to others, he none the less
enjoyed watching his proxy, making humorous suggestions—from a
convenient distance. Though he did not himself handle them, he kept
himself fully posted respecting their habits. All that the text-books
could teach he learned, and then would question us as to our actual
experience. Whenever a hive swarmed he was on hand, if at the farm, and
none were more interested in capturing the swarm than he.
As we have intimated, his bees sometimes showed a want of respect for
“the cloth,” and an inappreciation of his friendly interest. At these
times he joined as heartily as the less interested spectators in the
laugh raised at his expense; for there seems to be something
irresistibly comical in the sight of a full-grown man waging a hopeless
war with a mere mite of a bee. His relish for the humorous could not be
stayed even by the smart of a bee’s sting, while a little patience was
sure to afford him a chance to return the laugh with interest.
On one occasion an enormous swarm had settled on the lower limbs of a
cherry-tree, just over the place where an unconscious calf was tethered
and peacefully browsed. By some strange freak the swarm dropped from the
limb upon the unsuspecting calf. Fortunately, while swarming, bees are
not apt to be aggressive. The calf, terrified at this crawling mass so
suddenly enveloping it, began to bleat and rush frantically around as
far as its chain would permit. The bees, at last annoyed at the shaking
up they received, began to remonstrate in a very pointed manner. Matters
were momentarily growing more and more serious for the calf, when one of
the farm-hands, happening by, rushed in, with more zeal than discretion,
trying to free the calf; before he could unfasten the chain the calf
succeeded in entangling him, finally tripping him up and falling with
him to the ground, a confused mass of calf, bees, and Irishman.
Fortunately another man ran in, and, pulling up the spike to which the
chain was fastened, released them all. Happily no one was seriously
hurt, but the final rescuer, with face and hands still smarting, meeting
Mr. Beecher, burst out, in somewhat incoherent excitement: “Those domded
bees have murthered the calf, an’ Kelly’s kilt and gone to _h——— the
other way_.”
Mr. Beecher was never able to get any satisfactory explanation as to
what the “other way” was.
Between the Jerseys and the bees, Boscobel soon became a land veritably
flowing with milk and honey.
No account of the Peekskill home would be complete without some mention
of the dogs. Like all true lovers of nature, Mr. Beecher was very fond
of dogs, and generally had a fairly large family on hand.
From Bruno and Jack, two canine giants—one a St. Bernard and the other
half Russian bloodhound and half mastiff—to the little, wiggling mite of
a diminutive black-and-tan, all bark and wiggle, through all the
intervening grades of size and kind—mastiff, colly, Esquimaux, and
terrier—one thing only was insisted upon invariably: the dog must be
kind and gentle to children. He might be ever so homely, ever so
useless, and he would be petted and loved; but if he once snapped at the
little ones who tumbled over him, pulling tail and ears, the fiat went
forth, as irrevocable as the laws of the Medes and Persians—banishment
or death. He loved to watch them frolicking among themselves or with the
children, chasing and being chased. With them he would take long walks,
and often sit upon the bank and talk to the companion who, with ears
pricked up and wagging tail, seemed almost to understand him. Of one he
once wrote:
“I have a four-legged heathen on my place—‘Tommy.’ He is a most
intelligent and a most discriminating little dog; he is a gentleman in
disguise, and I am really sorry for him that he cannot talk. If ever
there was a dog that was distressed to think that he could not talk,
that dog is. I sit by him on the bank, of a summer evening, and I say,
‘Tommy, I am sorry for you’; and he whines, as much as to say, ‘So am
I.’ I say, ‘Tommy, I should like to tell you a great many things that
you are worthy of knowing’; and I do not know which is the most puzzled,
he or I—I to get any idea into his head, or he to get any out of mine;
but there it is: I know what he thinks, and he knows not what I think.
He knows that there is something above a dog, and he manifests his
canine uneasiness by whining, and in other ways. His aspiration shows
itself from his ears to his tail. He longs to be something more and
better; he yearns to occupy a larger sphere; but, after all, he does
not, and he cannot.”
To the children “Boscobel” was a beautiful home, filled with everything
that could educate the eye and taste, and cultivate the love of the
beautiful in nature; made doubly dear by the daily association with our
father in his happiest and brightest moods.
To the friends for whom its doors were ever open it was a delightful, to
its owner a veritable _haven of rest_.
From its commanding height he looked out upon the country lying below
and beyond, with the eye of ownership; for he used to say: “I own all I
can see. I enjoy all that there is of beauty and peacefulness in my
neighbor’s lands as much as they, without the responsibility or the
taxes.” This, he declared, was the most profitable kind of land-owning.