recorded his hairbreadth escapes and daring adventures, for those who
witnessed them never told the tale, nor would Doctor Howe willingly speak
of them himself. He was of too active a temperament to be much of a
scholar in his youth, although in after life he went through with
whatever he undertook in a thorough and conscientious manner. He went to
Brown University, and appears to have lived much the same kind of life
there which Lowell did at Harvard,--full of good spirits, admired by his
classmates, as well as by the young ladies of Providence, and
exceptionally fond of practical jokes; always getting into small
difficulties and getting out of them again with equal facility. He was so
amiable and warm-hearted that nobody could help loving him; and so it
continued to the end of his life.
He could not himself explain exactly why he joined the Greek Revolution.
He had suffered himself while at school from the tyranny of older boys,
and this strengthened the sense of right and justice that had been
implanted in his nature. He had not the romantic disposition of Byron;
neither could he have gone from a desire to win the laurels of Miltiades,
for he never indicated the least desire for celebrity. It seems more
likely that his adventurous disposition urged him to it, as one man takes
to science and another to art.
It was certainly a daring adventure to enlist as a volunteer against the
Turks. Byron might expect that whatever advantage wealth and reputation
can obtain for an individual he could always count upon; but what chances
would young Howe have in disaster or defeat? I never heard that Byron did
much fighting, though he spent his fortune freely in the cause; and
Doctor Howe, as it happened, was not called upon to fight in line of
battle, though he was engaged in some pretty hot skirmishes and risked
himself freely.
He went to Greece in the summer of 1824 and remained till after the
battle of Navarino in 1827. Greece was saved, but the land was a desert
and its people starving. Doctor Howe returned to America to raise funds
and beg provisions for liberated Hellas, in which he was remarkably
successful; but we find also that he published a history of the Greek
Revolution, the second edition of which is dated 1828. For this he must
have collected the materials before leaving Greece; but as it contains an
account of the sea-fight of Navarino, it must have been finished after
his return to America. The book was hastily written, and hastily
published. To judge from appearances it was hurried through the press
without being revised either by its author or a competent proofreader;
but it is a vigorous, spirited narrative, and the best chronicle of that
period in English. Would there were more such histories, even if the
writing be not always grammatical. Doctor Howe does not sentimentalize
over the ruins of Sparta or Plato's Academy, but he describes Greece as
he found it, and its inhabitants as he knew them. He possesses what so
many historians lack, and that is the graphic faculty. He writes in a
better style than either Motley or Bancroft. His book ought to be revised
and reprinted.
We quote from it this clearsighted description of the preparation for a
Graeco-Turkish sea-fight:
"Soon the proud fleet of the Capitan Pashaw was seen coming down
toward Samos, and the Greek vessels advanced to meet it. And here
one cannot but pause a moment to compare the two parties, and
wonder at the contrast between them. On one side bore down a long line
of lofty ships whose very size and weight seemed to give them
a slow and stately motion; completely furnished at every point for
war; their decks crowded with splendidly armed soldiers, and their
sides chequered with double and triple-rows of huge cannon that it
seemed could belch forth a mass of iron which nothing could resist.
On the other side came flying along the waves a squadron of light
brigs and schooners, beautifully modelled, with sails of snowy white,
and with fancifully painted sides, showing but a single row of
tiny cannon. There seemed no possibility of a contest; one fleet
had only to sail upon the other, and by its very weight, bear the
vessels under water without firing a gun.
"But the feelings which animated them were very different. The Turks
were clumsy sailors; they felt ill at ease and as if in a new
element; but above all, they felt a dread of Greek fire-ships,
which made them imagine every vessel that approached them to be
one. The Greeks were at home on the waves,--active and fearless
mariners, they knew that they could run around a Turkish frigate
and not be injured; they knew the dread their enemies had of
fire-ships, and they had their favorite, the daring Kanaris, with
them."
* * * * *
The heroic deeds of the modern Greeks fully equalled those of the
ancients; and the death of Marco Bozzaris was celebrated in all the
languages of western Europe. William Muller, the German poet, composed a
volume of fine lyrics upon the incidents of the Greek Revolution; so that
after his death the Greek Government sent a shipload of marble to Germany
for the construction of his monument.
One day Doctor Howe, with a small party of followers, was anchored in a
yawl off the Corinthian coast, when a Turk crept down to the shore and
commenced firing at them from behind a large tree. After he had done this
twice, the doctor calculated where he would appear the third time, and
firing at the right moment brought him down with his face to the earth.
Doctor Howe often fired at Turks in action, but this was the only one
that he felt sure of having killed; and he does not appear to have even
communicated the fact to his own family.
After Doctor Howe's triumphant return to Greece with a cargo of
provisions in 1828 he was appointed surgeon-general of the Greek navy,
and finally, as a reward for all his services, he received a present of
Byron's cavalry helmet,--certainly a rare trophy. [Footnote: This helmet
hung for many years on the hat tree at Dr. Howe's house in South Boston.]
Doctor Howe's mysterious imprisonment in Berlin in 1832 is the more
enigmatical since Berlin has generally been the refuge of the oppressed
from other European countries. The Huguenots, expelled by Louis XIV.,
went to Berlin in such numbers that they are supposed by Menzel to have
modified the character of its inhabitants. The Salzburg refugees were
welcomed in Prussia by Frederick William I., who had an official hanged
for embezzling funds that were intended for their benefit. In 1770
Frederick the Great gave asylum to the Jesuits who had been expelled from
every Catholic capital in Europe; and when the brothers Grimm and other
professors were banished from Cassel for their liberalism, they were
received and given positions by Frederick William IV. Why then should the
Prussian government have interfered with Doctor Howe, after he had
completed his philanthropic mission to the Polish refugees? Why was he
not arrested in the Polish camp when he first arrived there?
The futile and tyrannical character of this proceeding points directly to
Metternich, who at that time might fairly be styled the Tiberias of
Germany. The Greek Revolution was hateful to Metternich, and he did what
he could to prevent its success. His intrigues in England certainly
delayed the independence of Greece for two years and more. He foresaw
clearly enough that its independence would be a constant annoyance to the
Austrian government,--and so it has proved down to the present time.
Metternich imagined intrigues and revolution in every direction; and
besides, there can be no doubt of the vindictiveness of his nature. The
cunning of the fox is not often combined with the supposed magnanimity of
the lion.
The account of his arrest, which Doctor Howe gave George L. Stearns,
differs very slightly from that in Sanborn's biography. According to the
former he persuaded the Prussian police, on the ground of decency, to
remain outside his door until he could dress himself. In this way he
gained time to secrete his letters. He tore one up and divided the small
pieces in various places. While he was doing this he noticed a bust of
some king of Prussia on top of the high porcelain stove which forms a
part of the furniture of every large room in Berlin. Concluding it must
be hollow he tipped it on edge and inserted the rest of his letters
within. The police never discovered this stratagem, but they searched his
room in the most painstaking manner, collecting all the pieces of the
letter he had torn up, so that they read every word of it. Whether his
letters were really of a compromising character, or he was only afraid
that they might be considered so, has never been explained.
The day after his arrest he was brought before a tribunal and asked a
multitude of questions, which he appears to have answered willingly
enough; and a week or more later the same examiners made a different set
of inquiries of him, all calculated to throw light upon his former
answers. Doctor Howe admitted afterwards that if he had attempted to
deceive them they would certainly have discovered the fact. He was in
prison five weeks, for which the Prussian government had the impudence to
charge him board; and why President Jackson did not demand an apology and
reparation for this outrage on a United States citizen is not the least
mysterious part of the affair.
A good Samaritan does not always find a good Samaritan. After his return
to Paris Doctor Howe went to England, but was taken so severely ill on
the way that he did not know what might have become of him but for an
English passenger with whom he had become acquainted and who carried him
to his own house and cared for him until he was fully recovered. This
excellent man, name now forgotten, had a charming daughter who materially
assisted in Howe's convalescence, and he said afterwards that if he had
not been strongly opposed to matrimony at that time she would probably
have become his wife. He was not married until ten years later; but he
always remembered this incident as one of the pleasantest in his life.
The true hero never rests on his laurels. Doctor Howe had no sooner
returned from Europe than he set himself to work on a design he had
conceived in Paris for the instruction of the blind. Next to Doctor
Morton's discovery of etherization, there has been no undertaking equal
to this for the amelioration of human misery. He brought the best methods
from Europe, and improved upon them. Beginning at first in a small way,
and with such means as he could obtain from the merchants of Boston, he
went on to great achievements. He had the most difficulty in dealing with
legislative appropriations and enactments, for as he was not acquainted
with the ruling class in Massachusetts, they consequently looked upon him
with suspicion. He not only made the plan, but he carried it out; he
organized the institution at South Boston and set the machinery in
motion.
The story of Laura Bridgman is a tale told in many languages. The deaf
and blind girl whom Doctor Howe taught to read and to _think_ soon
became as celebrated as Franklin or Webster. She was between seven and
eight years old when he first discovered her near Hanover, N. H., and for
five years and a half she had neither seen nor heard. It is possible that
she could remember the external world in a dim kind of way, and she must
have learned to speak a few words before she lost her hearing. Doctor
Howe taught her the names of different objects by pasting them in raised
letters on the objects about her, and he taught her to spell by means of
separate blocks with the letters upon them. She then was taught to read
after the usual method of instructing the blind, and communicated with
her fingers after the manner of deaf mutes. Doctor Howe said in his
report of the case:
"Hitherto, the process had been mechanical, and the success about as
great as teaching a very knowing dog a variety of tricks. The poor child
had sat in mute amazement and patiently imitated everything her teacher
did; but now the truth began to flash upon her; her intellect began to
work; she perceived that here was a way by which she could herself make
up a sign of anything that was in her own mind, and show it to another
mind, and at once her countenance lighted up with a human expression; it
was no longer a dog or parrot,--it was an immortal spirit, eagerly
seizing upon a new link of union with other spirits!"
Finally she was educated in the meaning of the simplest abstract terms
like right and wrong, happy and sad, crooked and straight, and in this
she evinced great intelligence, for she described being alone as _all
one_, and being together _all two_,--the original meaning of
alone and altogether, which few persons think of. In trying to express
herself where she found some difficulty she made use of agglutinative
forms of speech. [Footnote: Like the Aztecs, Kanackers and other
primitive races.]
The education of Laura has rare value as a psychological study; for it
proves incontestably that mind is a thing in itself, and not merely a
combination of material forces, as the philosophers of our time would
have us believe. Laura Bridgman's mind was there, though wholly unable to
express itself, and so soon as the magic key was turned, she developed as
rapidly and intelligently as other girls of her age. She soon became much
more intelligent than the best trained dog who has all his senses in an
acute condition; and she developed a sensibility toward those about her
such as Indian or Hottentot girls of the same age would not have done at
all. She soon began to indicate that sense of order which is the first
step on the stairway of civilization. If these qualities had not been in
her they never could have come out.
Why is it that so many superior women remain unmarried, and why do men of
superior intellect and exceptional character so often mate themselves
with weak or narrow-minded women? That a diffident man, with a taste for
playing on the flute, should be captured by a virago, is not so
remarkable,--that is his natural weakness; but it is also true that the
worthiest man often chooses indifferently. This thing they call matrimony
is in fact like diving for pearls: you bring up the oyster, but what it
contains does not appear until afterward. A friend of Sumner, who
imagined his wife had a beautiful nature because she was fond of wild-
flowers, discovered too late that she cared more for botany than for her
husband.
Chevalier Howe met with better fortune. He waited long and to good
purpose. It was fitting that such a man should marry a poetess; and he
found her, not in her rose-garden or some romantic sylvan retreat, but in
the city of New York. Miss Julia Ward was the daughter, as she once
styled herself, of the Bank of Commerce, but her mind was not bent on
money or a fashionable life. She was graceful, witty and charming in the
drawing-room; but there was also a serious vein in her nature which could
only be satisfied by earnest thought and study. She went from one book to
another through the whole range of critical scholarship, disdaining
everything that was not of the best quality. She soon knew so much that
the young men became afraid of her, but she cared less for their
admiration than for her favorite authors. Above all, the deep religious
vein in her nature, which never left her, served as a balance to her
romantic disposition. Her first admirer is said to have been an eloquent
preacher who came to New York while Miss Ward was in her teens.
Another man might have crossed Julia Ward's path and only have remembered
her as a Sumner friend. Doctor Howe recognized the opportunity, and had
no intention of letting it slip. His reputation and exceptional character
attracted her; and he wooed and won her with the same courage that he
fought the Greeks. Her sister married Crawford, the best sculptor of his
time, whom Sumner helped to fame and fortune.
Doctor Howe's wedding journey, which included a complete tour of Europe,
seems to have been the first rest that he had taken in twenty years. Such
wedding journeys are frequent enough now, but it is a rare bride that
finds the doors of distinguished houses opened to her husband from
Edinburgh to Athens. Was it not a sufficient reward for any man's service
to humanity?
For that matter Doctor Howe's lifelong work received comparatively slight
recognition or reward. A few medals were sent to him from Europe,--a gold
one from the King of Prussia,--and he was always looked upon in Boston
as a distinguished citizen; but his vocation at the Blind Asylum withdrew
him from the public eye, and the public soon forgets what happened
yesterday. What a blaze of enthusiasm there was for Admiral Dewey in
1899, and how coldly his name was received as a presidential candidate
one year later!
Doctor Howe was once nominated for Congress as a forlorn hope, and his
name was thrice urged unavailingly for foreign appointments. He certainly
deserved to be made Minister to Greece, but President Johnson looked upon
him as a very "ultra man",--the real objection being no doubt that he was
a friend of Sumner, and the second attempt made by Sumner himself was
defeated by Hamilton Fish. Doctor Howe was fully qualified at any time to
be Minister to France, and as well qualified as James Russell Lowell for
the English Mission; but the appointment of such men as Lowell and Howe
has proved to be a happy accident rather than according to the natural
order of events. What reward did Doctor Morton ever obtain, until twenty-
five years after his death his name was emblazoned in memorial hall of
Boston State House! It is an old story.
Yet Doctor Howe may well be considered one of the most fortunate
Americans of his time. Lack of public appreciation is the least evil that
can befall a man of truly great spirit,--unless indeed it impairs the
usefulness of his work, and Edward Everett, who had sympathized so
cordially with Doctor Howe's efforts in behalf of the Greeks, could also
have told him sympathetically that domestic happiness was fully as
valuable as public honor. Fortunate is the man who has wandered much over
the earth and seen great sights, only the better to appreciate the quiet
and repose of his own hearth-stone! The storm and stress period of Doctor
Howe's life was over, and henceforth it was to be all blue sky and smooth
sailing.
Sumner expressed a kind of regret at Doctor Howe's marriage,--a regret
for his own loneliness; but he found afterwards that instead of losing
one friend he had made another. His visits to South Boston were as
frequent as ever, and he often brought distinguished guests with him,--
English, French, and German. There was no lady in Boston whom he liked to
converse with so well as Mrs. Howe; and if he met her on the street he
would almost invariably stop to speak with her a few minutes. He
sometimes suffered from the keen sallies of her wit, but he accepted this
as part of the entertainment, and once informed her that if she were
president of the Senate it would be much better for the procedure of the
public business.
George Sumner also came; like his brother, a man much above the average
in general ability, and considered quite equal to the Delivery of a
Fourth of July oration. He was the more entertaining talker of the two,
and in other respects very much like Tom Appleton,--better known on the
Paris boulevards than in his native country. Instead of being witty like
Appleton he was brilliantly encyclopaedic; and they both carried their
statements to the verge of credibility.
Doctor Howe organized the blind asylum so that it almost ran itself
without his oversight, and as always happens in such cases he was
idolized by those who were under his direction. There was something
exceedingly kind in his tone of voice,--a voice accustomed to command and
yet much subdued. His manner towards children was particularly charming
and attractive. He exemplified the lines in Emerson's "Wood-notes":
"Grave, chaste, contented though retired,
And of all other men desired,"
applied to Doctor Howe more completely than to the person for whom they
were originally intended; for Thoreau's bachelor habits and isolated mode
of life prevented him from being an attractive person to the generality
of mankind.
It was said of James G. Blaine that he left every man he met with
the impression that he was his best friend. This may have been well
intended, but it has the effect of insincerity, for the thing is
practically impossible. The true gentleman has always a kind manner, but
he does not treat the man whom he has just been introduced to as a
friend; he waits for that until he shall know him better. It is said of
Americans generally that they are generous and philanthropic, but that
they do not make good friends,--that their idea of friendship depends too
much on association and the influence of mutual interests, instead of the
underlying sense of spiritual relationship. When they cease to have
mutual interests the friendship is at an end, or only continues to exist
on paper. Doctor Howe was as warm-hearted as he was firm-hearted, but he
never gave his full confidence to any one until he had read him through
to the backbone. His friends were so fond of him that they would go any
distance to see him. His idea of friendship seemed to be like that of the
friends in the sacred band of Thebes, whose motto was either to avenge
their comrades on the field of battle or to die with them.
He did not like a hypocritical morality, which he said too often resulted
in the hypocritical sort. He complained of this in Emerson's teaching,
which he thought led his readers to scrutinize themselves too closely as
well as to be too censorious of others; and he respected Emerson more for
his manly attitude on the Kansas question than for anything he wrote.
He always continued to be the chevalier. He was like Hawthorne's gray-
haired champion, who always came to the front in a public emergency, and
then disappeared, no one knew whither. When the Bond Street riot took
place in 1837, there was Doctor Howe succoring the oppressed; in 1844 he
joined the Conscience Whigs and was one of the foremost among them; he
helped materially toward the election of Sumner in 1851, and for years
afterwards was a leader in the vigilance committee organized to resist
the Fugitive Slave law. He stood shoulder to shoulder with George L.
Stearns in organizing resistance to the invasions of Kansas by the
Missourians; and again in 1862 when Harvard University made its last
desperate political effort in opposition to Lincoln's Emancipation
Proclamation; but when his friends and his party came into power Howe
neither asked nor hinted at any reward for his brilliant services.
Edward L. Pierce, the biographer of Sumner, was not above exhibiting his
prejudices as to certain members of the Bird Club, both by what he has
written and what he neglected to write. He says of the Chevalier: "Dr.
Howe, who had a passion for revolutions and civil disturbances of all
kinds, and had no respect for the restrictions of international law or
comity, was vexed with Sumner for not promoting the intervention of the
United States in behalf of the insurgent Cubans."
This reminds one of Boswell's treatment of Doctor Johnson's friends. Like
John Adams and Hampden, Doctor Howe was a revolutionary character,--and
so were Sumner and Lincoln,--but he was a man in all matters prudent,
discreet and practical. He was as much opposed to inflammatory harangues
and French socialistic notions as he was to the hide-bound conservatism
against which he had battled all his life. Like Hampden and Adams his
revolutionary strokes were well timed and right to the point. Experience
has proved them to be effective and salutary. It was the essential merit
of Sumner and his friends that they recognized the true character of the
times in which they lived and adapted themselves to it. Thousands of
well-educated men lived through the anti-slavery and civil war period
without being aware that they were taking part in one of the great
revolutionary epochs of history. That Doctor Howe and Senator Sumner
differed in regard to the Cuban rebellion is a matter of small moment.
Howe considered the interests of the Cubans; Sumner the interests of
republicanism in Spain and in Europe generally. Both were right from
their respective standpoints.