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THE BAY STATE MONTHLY
A New England Magazine
OF
HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, LITERATURE
AND
STATE PROGRESS
* * * * *
VOLUME III
* * * * *
BOSTON
BAY STATE MONTHLY COMPANY
No. 43 MILK STREET
1885
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1885, by the BAY STATE
MONTHLY COMPANY, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at
Washington. All rights reserved.
CONTENTS OF VOLUME III.
Adams, Samuel, The Patriot, Edward P. Guild 401
(4 Illustrations)
Amesbury, The Home of Whittier, Frances C. Sparhawk 418
(3 Illustrations)
Andrew, John Albion, 141
(2 Illustrations)
Among the Books 136, 218, 306,
388, 469
Assessment Insurance G.A. Litchfield 317
Assessment Life Insurance Sheppard Homans 411
Authoritative Literature of George Lowell Austin 313, 408
the Civil War
Boston Latin School, The 74
Christopher Gault.--A Story Edward P. Guild 278
City of Worcester, The Fanny Bullock Workman 147
(18 Illustrations)
Clarke, Colonel John B., 9
Sketch of the Life of
Civil War, Authoritative 313, 408
Literature of the
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty _vs._ George W. Hobbs 17
Monroe Doctrine
Coffin, Charles Carleton, 1
Sketch of the life of
Concord Men and Memories, Geo. B. Bartlett 224
(6 Illustrations)
Concord, N.H., Impression Prof. Emile Pingault 16
D'un Français
Conspiracy of 1860-61, The Geo. Lowell Austin 233
Crapo, Hon. William Wallace, Edward P. Guild 309
Biographical sketch
David, Barnabas Brodt Rev. J.G. Davis D.D. 69
Divorce Legislation of Chester F. Sanger 27
Massachusetts
Drowne, Shem, and his Handiwork Elbridge H. Goss 33
Early English Poetry Prof. Edwin H. Sanborn LL.D. 125
Editor's Table 139, 215, 300,
384, 463
Elizabeth, A Romance of Frances C. Sparhawk 48, 107, 202,
Colonial Days 289, 384, 447
First New England Witch Willard H. Morse M.D. 270
Fort Shirley Prof. A.L. Perry 341
Grimke Sisters, The George Lowell Austin 183
Hero of Lake Erie, The Hon. William P. Sheffield 321
(1 Illustration)
Hingham, (3 Illustrations) Francis H. Lincoln 258
Historical Record 303, 386, 465
Hollis Street Church 47
Home of Whittier, Amesbury The Frances C. Sparhawk 418
(3 Illustrations)
House of Ticknor, The Barry Lyndon 266
(4 Illustrations)
Insurance, Assessment G.A. Litchfield 317
Insurance, Assessment Life Sheppard Homans 411
Jackson, Helen Hunt 256
Kate Field's New Departure Edward Increase Mather 429
(1 Illustration)
Lake Erie, The Hero of Hon. William P. Sheffield 321
(1 Illustration)
Lincoln, Abraham George Lowell Austin 165
Long, John D., A Brief Biography 221
Marblehead in 1861, The Response of Samuel Roads Jr. 378
March of the 6th Regiment, The Rev. Charles Babbidge 374
Marsh, Sylvester, Sketch of Chas. Carleton Coffin 65
the life of
Massachusetts, The Present H.K.M. 439
Resources of
Massachusetts, Divorce Legislation Chester F. Sanger 27
Massachusetts Hills, Rambles Among Atherton P. Mason M.D. 101
Memoranda for the Month 220
Model Industrial City, A Fanny M. Johnson 328
(11 Illustrations)
Mormon Church, The Victoria Reed 348
Nantasket Beach Edward P. Guild 179
Nantucket, Ten days in Elizabeth Porter Gould 190
(2 Illustrations)
National Banks--Surplus Funds George H. Wood 14
and Net Profits
Nurse, Rebecca, Homestead of Elizabeth Porter Gould 436
O'Brien Hugh Col. Chas. H. Taylor 253
Old Dorchester, Historical Charles M. Barrows 39
Paine, Hon. Henry W. Prof. William Mathews, LL.D. 391
Past and Future of Silver, The David M. Balfour 97
Patriot, Samuel Adams, Edward P. Guild 401
The (4 Illustrations)
Pickett's Charge, Portrait and Charles A. Patch 397
diagram
Precious Metals, The David M. Balfour 415
Publisher's Department 64, 308, 390, 472
Phillips, John, with Portrait 249
Rambles Among Massachusetts Hills Atherton P. Mason M.D. 101
Resources of Massachusetts, H.K.M. 439
The Present
Response of Marblehead in 1861, Samuel Roads, Jr. 378
The
Silver, Past and Future of David M. Balfour 97
Sixth Regiment, The March of The Rev. Charles Babbidge 374
Ten Days In Nantucket Elizabeth Porter Gould 190
(2 Illustrations)
Thompson, Denman, Sketch of the Life of 12
Ticknor, The House of Barry Lyndon 266
(4 Illustrations)
Tommy Taft, A Story of Boston Town A.L.G. 244
Two Days with The A.M.C. Helen M. Winslow 367
Two Reform Mayors of Boston 249
Webster, Col. Fletcher, A reminiscence of 38
Webster, Daniel, The Last Portrait of 340
Wedding in Ye Days Lang Syne Rev. Anson Titus 36
White and Franconia Mountains,
The (24 Illustrations) Fred Myron Colby 76
Witch, The first New England Willard H. Morse M.D. 270
Worcester, The City of Fanny Bullock Workman 147
(18 Illustrations)
POEMS.
By The Sea Teresa Herrick 377
Equinoctial Sidney Maxwell 383
Growing Old 299
In Ember Days Adelaide G. Waldron 277
Memory's Pictures Charles Carleton Coffin (1846) 124
The Muse of History Elizabeth Porter Gould 248
Room At The Top 366
The Old State House Sidney Maxwell 414
Idleness Sidney Harrison 183
A Birthday Sonnet George W. Bungay 201
STEEL ENGRAVINGS.
Charles Carleton Coffin Facing 1
John B. Clarke 9
Sylvester Marsh 65
John Albion Andrew 141
John D. Long 221
Hugh O'Brien 253
William Wallace Crapo 309
Henry W. Paine 391
[Illustration: Charles Carleton Coffin]
THE BAY STATE MONTHLY.
_A Massachusetts Magazine_
VOL. III. APRIL, 1885. NO. I.
* * * * *
CHARLES CARLETON COFFIN.
Among the emigrants from England to the western world in the great
Puritan exodus was Joanna Thember Coffin, widow, and her son Tristram,
and her two daughters, Mary and Eunice. Their home was in Brixton, two
miles from Plymouth, in Devonshire. Tristram was entering manhood's
prime--thirty-three years of age. He had a family of five children.
Quite likely the political troubles between the King and Parliament, the
rising war cloud, was the impelling motive that induced the family to
leave country, home, friends, and all dear old things, and become
emigrants to the New World. Quite likely Tristram, when a youth, in
1620, may have seen the Mayflower spread her white sails to the breeze
and fade away in the western horizon, for the departure of that company
of pilgrims must have been the theme of conversation in and around
Plymouth. Without doubt it set the young man to thinking of the
unexplored continent beyond the stormy Atlantic. In 1632 his neighbors
and friends began to leave, and in 1642 he, too, bade farewell to dear
old England, to become a citizen of Massachusetts Bay.
He landed at Newbury, settled first in Salisbury, and ferried people
across the Merrimack between Salisbury and Newbury. His wife, Dionis,
brewed beer for thirsty travellers. The Sheriff had her up before the
courts for charging more per mug than the price fixed by law, but she
went scot free on proving that she put in an extra amount of malt. We
may think of the grave and reverend Justices ordering the beer into
court and settling the question by personal examination of the foaming
mugs,--smacking their lips satisfactorily, quite likely testing it a
second time.
Tristram Coffin became a citizen of Newbury and built a house, which is
still standing. In 1660 he removed with a portion of his family to
Nantucket, dying there in 1681, leaving two sons, from whom have
descended all the Coffins of the country--a numerous and widespread
family.
One of Tristram's decendants, Peter, moved from Newbury to Boscawen, New
Hampshire, in 1766, building a large two-storied house. He became a
prominent citizen of the town--a Captain of the militia company, was
quick and prompt in all his actions. The news of the affair at Lexington
and Concord April 19,1775, reached Boscawen on the afternoon of the next
day. On the twenty-first Peter Coffin was in Exeter answering the roll
call in the Provincial assembly--to take measures for the public safety.
His wife, Rebecca Hazelton Coffin, was as energetic and patriotic
as he. In August, 1777, everybody, old and young, turned out to defeat
Burgoyne. One soldier could not go, because he had no shirt. It was this
energetic woman, with a babe but three weeks old, who cut a web from the
loom and sat up all night to make a shirt for the soldier. August came,
the wheat was ripe for the sickle. Her husband was gone, the neighbors
also. Six miles away was a family where she thought it possible she
might obtain a harvest hand. Mounting the mare, taking the babe in her
arms, she rode through the forest only to find that all the able-bodied
young men had gone to the war. The only help to be had was a barefoot,
hatless, coatless boy of fourteen.
"He can go but he has no coat," said the mother of the boy.
"I can make him a coat," was the reply.
The boy leaped upon the pillion, rode home with the woman--went out with
his sickle to reap the bearded grain, while the house wife, taking a
meal bag for want of other material, cutting a hole in the bottom, two
holes in the sides, sewing a pair of her own stockings on for sleeves,
fulfilled her promise of providing a coat, then laid her babe beneath
the shade of a tree and bound the sheaves.
It is a picture of the trials, hardships and patriotism of the people in
the most trying hour of the revolutionary struggle.
The babe was Thomas Coffin--father of the subject of this sketch,
Charles Carleton Coffin, who was born on the old homestead in Boscawen,
July 26, 1823,--the youngest of nine children, three of whom died in
infancy.
The boyhood of the future journalist, correspondent and author was one
of toil rather than recreation. The maxims of Benjamin Franklin in
regard to idleness, thrift and prosperity were household words.
"He who would thrive must rise at five."
In most farm-houses the fire was kindled on the old stone hearth before
that hour. The cows were to be milked and driven to the pasture to crop
the green grass before the sun dispatched the beaded drops of dew. They
must be brought home at night.
In the planting season, corn and potatoes must be put in the hill. The
youngest boy must ride the horse in furrowing, spread the new-mown
grass, stow away the hay high up under the roof of the barn, gather
stones in heaps after the wheat was reaped, or pick the apples in the
orchard. Each member of the family must commit to memory the verses of
Dr. Watts:
"Then what my hands shall find to do
Let me with all my might pursue,
For no device nor work is found
Beneath the surface of the ground."
The great end of life was to do something. There was a gospel of work,
thrift and economy continually preached. To be idle was to serve the
devil.
"The devil finds some mischief still for idle hands to do."
Such teaching had its legitimate effect, and the subject of this sketch
in common with the boys and girls of his generation made work a duty.
What was accepted as duty became pleasure.
Aside from the district school he attended Boscawen Academy a few terms.
The teaching could not be called first-class instruction. The
instructors were students just out of college, who taught for the
stipend received rather than with any high ideal of teaching as a
profession. A term at Pembroke Academy in 1843 completed his acquisition
of knowledge, so far as obtained in the schools.
The future journalist was an omnivorous reader. Everything was fish that
came to the dragnet of this New Hampshire boy--from "Sinbad" to
"Milton's Paradise Lost," which was read before he was eleven years old.
The household to which he belonged had ever a goodly supply of weekly
papers, the _New Hampshire Statesman_, the _Herald of Freedom_, the _New
Hampshire Observer_, all published at Concord; the first political, the
second devoted to anti-slavery, the third a religious weekly. In the
westerly part of the town was a circulating library of some one hundred
and fifty volumes, gathered about 1816--the books were dog-eared, soiled
and torn. Among them was the "History of the Expedition of Lewis and
Clark up the Missouri and down the Columbia to the Pacific Ocean," which
was read and re-read by the future correspondent, till every scene and
incident was impressed upon his memory as distinctly as that of the die
upon the coin. Another volume was a historical novel entitled "A Peep at
the Pilgrims," which awakened a love for historical literature. Books of
the Indian Wars, Stories of the Revolution, were read and re-read with
increasing delight. Even the _Federalist_, that series of papers
elucidating the principles of Republican government, was read before he
was fourteen. There was no pleasure to be compared with that of visiting
Concord, and looking at the books in the store of Marsh, Capen and Lyon,
who kept a bookstore in that, then, town of four thousand
inhabitants--the only one in central New Hampshire.
Without doubt the love for historical literature was quickened by the
kind patronage of John Farmer, the genial historian, who was a visitor
at the Boscawen farm-house, and who had delightful stories to tell of
the exploits of Robert Rogers and John Stark during the French and
Indian wars.
Soldiers of the Revolution were living in 1830. Eliphalet Kilburn, the
grandfather of Charles Carleton Coffin on the maternal side, was in the
thick of battle at Saratoga and Rhode Island, and there was no greater
pleasure to the old blind pensioner than to narrate the stories of the
Revolution to his listening grandchild. Near neighbors to the Coffin
homestead were Eliakim Walker, Nathaniel Atkinson and David Flanders,
all of whom were at Bunker Hill--Walker in the redoubt under Prescott;
Atkinson and Flanders in Captain Abbott's company, under Stark, by the
rail fence, confronting the Welch fusileers.
The vivid description of that battle which Mr. Coffin has given in the
"Boys of '76," is doubtless due in a great measure to the stories of
these pensioners, who often sat by the old fire-place in that farm-house
and fought their battles over again to the intense delight of their
white-haired auditor.
Ill health, inability for prolonged mental application, shut out the
future correspondent, to his great grief, from all thoughts of
attempting a collegiate course. While incapacitated from mental or
physical labor he obtained a surveyor's compass, and more for pastime
than any thought of becoming a surveyor, he studied the elements of
surveying.
There were fewer civil engineers in the country in 1845 than now. It was
a period when engineers were wanted--when the demand was greater than
the supply, and anyone who had a smattering of engineering could find
employment. Mr. Coffin accepted a position in the engineering corps of
the Northern Railroad, and was subsequently employed on the Concord and
Portsmouth, and Concord and Claremont Railroad.
In 1846 he was married to Sallie R. Farmer of Boscawen. Not wishing to
make civil engineering a profession for life he purchased a farm in his
native town; but health gave way and he was forced to seek other
pursuits.
He early began to write articles for the Concord newspapers, and some of
his fugitive political contributions were re-published in _Littell's
Living Age_.
Mr. Coffin's studies in engineering led him towards scientific culture.
In 1849 he constructed the telegraph line between Harvard Observatory
and Boston, by which uniform time was first given to the railroads
leading from Boston. He had charge of the construction of the
Telegraphic Fire Alarm in Boston, under the direction of Professor Moses
G. Farmer, his brother-in-law, and gave the first alarm ever given by
that system April 29, 1852.
Mr. Coffin's tastes led him toward journalism. From 1850 to 1854 he was
a constant contributor to the press, sending articles to the
_Transcript_, the Boston _Journal, Congregationalist_, and New
York _Tribune_. He was also a contributor to the _Student and
Schoolmate_, a small magazine then conducted by Mr. Adams (Oliver
Optic).
He was for a short time assistant editor of the _Practical Farmer_,
an agricultural and literary weekly newspaper. In 1854 he was employed
on the Boston _Journal_. Many of the editorials upon the
Kansas-Nebraska struggle were from his pen. His style of composition was
developed during these years when great events were agitating the public
mind. It was a period which demanded clear, comprehensive, concise,
statements, and words that meant something. His articles upon the
questions of the hour were able and trenchant. One of the leading
newspapers of Boston down to 1856 was the _Atlas_--the organ of the
anti-slavery wing of the Whig party, of the men who laid the foundation
of the Republican party. Its chief editorial writer was the brilliant
Charles T. Congdon, with whom Mr. Coffin was associated as assistant
editor till the paper was merged into the _Atlas and Bee_.
During the year 1858 he became again assistant on the _Journal_. He
wrote a series of letters from Canada in connection with the visit of
the Prince of Wales. He was deputed, as correspondent, to attend the
opening of several of the great western railroads, which were attended
by many men in public life. He was present at the Baltimore Convention
which nominated Bell and Everett as candidates for the Presidency and
Vice Presidency in 1860. He travelled west through Pennsylvania, Ohio,
and Indiana, before the assembling of the Republican Convention at
Chicago, conversing with public men, and in a private letter predicted
the nomination of Abraham Lincoln, who, up to the assembling of the
convention, had hardly been regarded as a possible candidate.
He accompanied the committee appointed to apprise Mr. Lincoln of his
nomination to Springfield, spent several weeks in the vicinity--making
Mr. Lincoln's acquaintance, and obtaining information in regard to him,
which was turned to proper advantage during the campaign.
In the winter of 1860-61, Mr. Coffin held the position of night editor
of the _Journal_. The Southern States were then seceding. It was
the most exciting period in the history of the republic. There was
turmoil in Congress. Public affairs were drifting with no arm at the
helm. There was no leadership in Congress or out of it. The position
occupied by Mr. Coffin was one requiring discrimination and judgment.
The Peace Congress was in session. During the long nights while waiting
for despatches, which often did not arrive till well toward morning, he
had time to study the situation of public affairs, and saw, what all men
did not see, that a conflict of arms was approaching. He was at that
time residing in Maiden, and on the morning after the surrender of
Sumter took measures for the calling of a public meeting of the citizens
of that town to sustain the government. It was one of the first--if not
the first of the many, held throughout the country.
Upon the breaking out of the war in 1861 Mr. Coffin left the editorial
department of the _Journal_ and became a correspondent in the field,
writing his first letter from Baltimore, June 15, over the signature of
"_Carleton_"--selecting his middle name for a _nom de plume_.
He accompanied the right wing under General Tyler, which had the advance
in the movement to Bull Run, and witnessed the first encounter at
Blackburn's Ford, July 18. He returned to Washington the next morning
with the account, and was back again on the succeeding morning in season
to witness the battle of Bull Run, narrowly escaping capture when the
Confederate cavalry dashed upon the panic-stricken Union troops. He
reached Washington during the night, and sent a full account of the
action the following morning.
During the autumn he made frequent trips from the army around Washington
to Eastern Maryland, and the upper Potomac, making long rides upon the
least sign of action. Becoming convinced, in December, that the Army of
the Potomac was doomed to inaction during the winter, the correspondent,
furnished with letters of introduction to Generals Grant and Buell from
the Secretary of War, proceeded west. Arriving at Louisville he found
that General Buell had expelled all correspondents from the army. The
letter from the Secretary of War vouching for the loyalty and integrity
of the correspondent was read and tossed aside with the remark that
correspondents could not be permitted in an army which he had the honor
to command.
Mr. Coffin proceeded to St. Louis, took a look at the army then at
Rolla, in Central Missouri, but discovering no signs of action in that
direction made his way to Cairo where General Grant was in command.
General Grant's headquarters were in the second story of a tumble-down
building.
No sentinel paced before the door. Ascending the stairs and knocking,
Mr. Coffin heard the answer, "Come in." Entering, he saw a man in a blue
blouse sitting upon a nail-keg at a rude desk smoking a cigar.
"Is General Grant in?" he asked.
"Yes, sir."
Supposing the man on the nail keg with no straps upon his shoulder to be
only a clerk or orderly, he presented his letter from the Secretary of
War, with the remark, "Will you please present this to General Grant?"
whereupon the supposed clerk glanced over the lines, rose, extended his
hand and said, "I am right glad to see you. Please take a nail keg!"
There were several empty nail kegs in the apartment, but not a chair.
The contrast to what he had experienced with General Buell was so great
that the correspondent could hardly realize that he was in the presence
of General Grant, who at once gave him the needed facilities for
attaining information.
The rapidity of the correspondent's movements--the quickness with which
he took in the military situation, may be inferred from the dates of his
letters. On January 6, 1862, he wrote a letter detailing affairs at St.
Louis. On the eighth, he described affairs at Rolla in Central Missouri.
On the eleventh, he was writing from Cairo. The gunboats under Commodore
Foot were at Cairo, and the correspondent was received with the utmost
hospitality, not only by the Commodore, but by all the officers.
Upon the movement of General Zolicoffer into Kentucky, Mr. Coffin
hastened to Louisville, Lexington, and Central Kentucky, but finding
affairs had settled down, hastened down the Ohio River on a steamboat,
reaching the mouth of the Tennessee just as the fleet under Commodore
Foot was entering the Ohio after capturing Fort Henry. Commodore Foot
narrated the events of the engagement, and Mr. Coffin, learning that no
correspondent had returned from Fort Henry, stimulated by the thought of
giving the Boston _Journal_ the first information, jumped on board
the cars, wrote his account on the train, and had the satisfaction of
knowing that it was the first one published.
Returning to Cairo by the next train, he proceeded to Fort Donelson and
was present in the cabin of the steamer "Uncle Sam" when General Buckner
turned over the Fort, the Artillery, and 15,000 prisoners to General
Grant. He hastened to Cairo, wrote his account on the cars, riding
eastward, till it was complete, then returning, and arriving in season
to jump on board the gunboat Boston for a reconnoissanceof Columbus.
Mr. Coffin continued with the fleet during the operation at Island No.
10. His knowledge of civil engineering enabled him to assist Captain
Maynadier of the engineers in directing the mortar firing. On one
occasion while mounted on a corn crib near a farm-house to note the
direction of the bombs, the Confederate artillerists sent a shell which
demolished a pig-pen but a few feet distant.
While at Island No. 10, the battle of Pittsburg Landing was fought.
Leaving the fleet he hastened thither, accompanied the army in its slow
advance upon Corinth, was present at the battle of Farmington and the
occupation of Corinth.
General Halleck, smarting under the criticism of the press, ordered all
correspondents to leave, and Mr. Coffin once more joined the fleet,
descending the Mississippi. During the engagement with the Confederate
fleet at Memphis, he stood upon the deck of the Admiral's despatch boat
with note-book and watch in hand--noting every movement. He was fully
exposed, aided in hauling down the flag of the Confederate ship, "Little
Rebel," and assisted in rescuing some of the wounded Confederates from
the sinking vessels.
He accepted an invitation from Captain Phelps of the Benton to accompany
him on shore when the city was surrendered, and saw the stars and strips
go up upon the flag-staff in the public square and over the Court House.
The Army of the Potamac was in front of Richmond, and he returned east
in season to chronicle the seven day's engagement on the Peninsular. The
constant exposure to malaria brought on sickness, which prevented his
being with the army in the engagement at the second Bull Run, but he was
on the field of Antietam throughout the entire contest, and wrote an
account which was published in the Baltimore _American_, of which
an enormous edition was disposed of in the army--and was commended for
its accuracy.
In October Mr. Coffin was once more in Kentucky, but did not reach the
army in season to see the battle of Perrysville. Comprehending the
situation of affairs there, that there could be no movement until the
entire army was re-organized under a new commander, he returned to
Virginia, accompanying the army in its march from the Potomac to
Fredericksburg, and witnessed that disastrous battle. A month later he
was with the fleet off Charleston and saw the attack on Sumter by the
Monitor, and the bombardment of Fort McAllister.
In April he was once more with the Army of the Potomac, arriving just as
the troops were getting back to their quarters after Chancellorsville to
hear the stories and collect an account of that battle.
When the Confederate army began the Gettysburg Campaign Mr. Coffin
watched every movement. He was with the cavalry during the first day's
struggle on that field, but was an eyewitness of the second and third
days' engagement. His account was re-published in nearly every one of
the large cities, was translated and re-published in France and Germany.
While the armies east and west were preparing for the campaign of 1864
Mr. Coffin made an extended tour through the border states--Maryland,
West Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri, Kansas, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio,
to ascertain what changes had taken place in public opinion. In May he
was once more with the Army of the Potomac under its great leader,
Lieutenant General Grant, and saw all the conflicts of the Wilderness,
Spottsylvania, North Anna, around Hanover, Cold Harbor, the struggles in
front of Petersburg through '64. Upon the occupation of Savannah by
General Sherman he hastened south, having an ardent desire to enter
Charleston, whenever it should be occupied by Union troops. He was
successful in carrying out his desires, and with James Redpath of the
New York _Tribune_ leaped on shore from the deck of General
Gilmore's steamer when he steamed up to take possession of the city.
Mr. Coffin's despatch announcing the evacuation and occupation of
Sumter, owing to his indefatigable energy, was published in Boston,
telegraphed to Washington, and read in the House of Representatives
before any other account appeared, causing a great sensation.
Thus read the opening sentence:
"Off Charleston, February 18, 2 P.M. The old flag waves over Sumter and
Moultrie, and the city of Charleston. I can see its crimson stripes and
fadeless stars waving in the warm sunlight of this glorious day. Thanks
be to God who giveth us the victory."
In March the correspondent was again with the Army of the Potomac,
witnessing the last battles--Fort Steadman--Hatcher's Run--and the last
grand sweep at Five Forks. He entered Petersburg in the morning--rode
alone at a breakneck pace to Richmond, entering it while the city was a
sea of flame, entered the Spottsville hotel while the fire was raging on
three sides--wrote his name large on the register--the first to succeed
a long line of Confederate Generals and Colonels. When President Lincoln
arrived to enter the city, he had the good fortune to be down by the
river bank, and to him was accorded the honor of escorting the party to
General Weitzel's headquarters in the mansion from which Jefferson Davis
had fled without standing upon the order of departure.
With the fall of Richmond, and the surrender of Appomattox, Mr. Coffin's
occupation as an army correspondent ended. During these long years he
found time to write three volumes for juveniles--"Days and Nights on the
Battle Field," "Following the Flag," and "Winning his Way."
On July 25, 1866, Mr. Coffin sailed from New York for Europe,
accompanied by Mrs. Coffin, as correspondent of the Boston _Journal_.
War had broken out between Austria on the one side and Italy and
Germany on the other. It was of short duration; there was the battle
of Custozza in Italy and Konnigratz in Germany, followed by the
retirement of Austria from Italy, and the ascendency of Bismarck over
Baron Von Beust in the diplomacy of Europe. It was a favorable period
for a correspondent and Mr. Coffin's letters were regularly looked for
by the public. The agitation for the extension of the franchise was
beginning in England. Bearing personal letters from Senator Sumner,
Chief Justice Chase, General Grant, and other public men, the
correspondent had no difficulty in making the accquaintance of the men
prominent in the management of affairs on the other side of the water.
Through the courtesy of John Bright, who at once extended to Mr. Coffin
every hospitality, he occupied a chair in the speaker's gallery of the
House of Commons on the grand field night when Disraelli, then Prime
Minister, brought in the suffrage bill. While in Great Britain Mr.
Coffin made the acquaintance not only of men in public life, but many of
the scientists,--Huxley, Tyndal, Lyell, Sir William Thompson. At the
social Science Congress held in Belfast, Ireland, presided over by Lord
Dufferin, he gave an address upon American Common Schools which was
warmly commended by the London _Times_.
An introduction to the literary clubs of London gave him an opportunity
to make the acquaintance of the literary guild. He was present at the
dinner given to Charles Dickens before the departure of that author to
the United States, at which nearly every notable author was a guest.
Hastening to Italy, he had the good fortune to see the Austrians take
their departure from Verona and Venice and the Italians assume
possession of those cities. Upon the entrance of Victor Emanuel to
Venice he enjoyed exceptional facilities for witnessing the festivities.
He was present at the coronation of the Emperor and Empress of Austria,
as King and Queen of Hungary. Through the courtesy of Mr. Motley, then
Minister to Austria, he received from the Prime Minister of the empire
every facility for witnessing the ceremonies.
At Pesth he made the acquaintance of Francis Deak, the celebrated
statesman--the John Bright of Hungary; also, of Arminius Vambrey, the
celebrated Oriental traveller.
At Berlin he had the good fortune to see the Emperor William, the Crown
Prince, Bismarck, Van Moltke, the former and the present Czar of Russia,
and Gortschakoff, the great diplomatist of Russia, in one group. The
letters written from Europe were upon the great events of the hour,
together with graphic descriptions of the life of the common people.
After spending a year and a half in Europe, Mr. Coffin visited Greece,
Turkey, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, sailing thence down the Red sea to
Bombay, travelled across India to the valley of the Ganges, before the
completion of the railroad, visiting Allahabad, Benares, Calcutta,
sailing thence to Singapore, Hong Kong, Canton, Shanghai. Ascending the
Yang-tse six hundred miles to Wuchang; the governor of the province
invited him to a dinner. From Shanghai he sailed to Japan, experiencing
a fearful typhoon upon the passage. Civil war in Japan prevented his
travelling in that country, and he sailed for San Francisco, visiting
points of interest in California, and in November made his way across
the country seven hundred miles--riding five consecutive days and nights
between the terminus of the Central Pacific road at Wadsworth and Salt
Lake, arriving in Boston, January, 1869, after an absence of two and a
half years. During that period the Boston _Journal_ contained every
week a letter from his pen.
For one who had seen so much there was an opening in the lecture field
and for several years he was one of the popular lecturers before
lyceums. In 1869 he published _Our New Way Round the World_, followed by
the _Seat of Empire_, _Caleb Crinkle_ (a story) _Boys of 76_, _Story of
Liberty_, _Old Times in the Colonies_, _Building the Nation_, _Life of
Garfield_, besides a history of his native town. His volumes have been
received with marked favor. No less than fifty copies of the _Boys of
'76_ are in the Boston Public Library and all in constant use.
Mr. Coffin has given many addresses before teacher's associations, and a
course of lectures before the Lowell Institute. During the winter of
1878-9 a movement was made by the Western grangers to bring about a
radical change in the patent laws. Mr. Coffin appeared before the
Committee of Congress and presented an address so convincing, that the
Committee ordered its publication. It has been frequently quoted upon
the floor of Congress and highly commended by the present Secretary of
the Interior, Mr. Lamar. Mr. Coffin also appeared before the Committee
on Labor, and made an argument on the "Forces of Nature as Affecting
Society," which won high encomiums from the committee, and which was
ordered to be printed. The honorary degree of A. M. was conferred upon
Mr. Coffin in 1870, by Amherst College. He is a member of the New
England Historical and Genealogical Society, and he gave the address
upon the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the settlement of his
native town. He is a resident of Boston, and was a member of the
Legislature for 1884, member of the Committee on Education, and reported
the bill for free textbooks. He was also member of the Committee on
Civil Service, and was active in his efforts to secure the passage of
the bill. He is a member of the present Legislature, Chairman of the
Committee on the Liquor Law, and of the special committee for a
Metropolitan Police for the city of Boston. Mr. Coffin's pen is never
idle. He is giving his present time to a study of the late war, and is
preparing a history of that mighty struggle for the preservation of the
government of the people.
* * * * *
[Illustration: John B. Clarke]
COLONEL JOHN B. CLARKE.
Editor and Proprietor of the Manchester [N.H.] Mirror.
Among the business enterprises in which the men of to-day seek fortune
and reputation, there is scarcely another which, when firmly established
upon a sound basis, sends its roots so deep and wide, and is so certain
to endure and prosper, bearing testimony to the ability of its creators,
as the family newspaper. Indeed, a daily or weekly paper which has
gained by legitimate methods an immense circulation and a profitable
advertising patronage is immortal. It may change owners and names, and
character even, but it never dies, and if, as is usually the case, it
owes its early reputation and success to one man, it not only reflects
him while he is associated with it, but pays a constant tribute to his
memory after he has passed away.
But, while the rewards of eminent success in the newspaper profession
are great and substantial, the road to them is one which only the
strong, sagacious, and active can travel, and this is especially true
when he who strives for them assumes the duties of both publisher and
editor. It requires great ability to make a great paper every day, and
even greater to sell it extensively and profitably, and to do both is
not a possible task for the weak. To do both in an inland city, where
the competition of metropolitan journals must be met and discounted,
without any of their advantages, requires a man of grip, grit and
genius.
In 1852 the Manchester MIRROR was one of the smallest and weakest papers
in the country. Its weekly edition had a circulation of about six
hundred, that of its daily was less than five hundred, and its
advertising receipts were extremely small. Altogether, it was a load
which its owner could not carry, and the whole establishment, including
subscription lists, good will, press, type and material, was sold at
auction for less than a thousand dollars.
In 1885 the WEEKLY MIRROR AND FARMER has a circulation of more than
twenty-three thousand and every subscriber on its books has paid for it
in advance. The DAILY MIRROR AND AMERICAN has a correspondingly large
and reliable constituency, and neither paper lacks advertising
patronage. The office in which they are printed is one of the most
extensive and best equipped in the Eastern States out of Boston. In
every sense of the word the MIRROR is successful, strong and solid.
The building up of this great and substantial enterprise from so small a
beginning has been the work of John B. Clarke, who bought the papers, as
stated above, in 1852, has ever since been their owner, manager, and
controlling spirit, and, in spite of sharp rivalry at home and from
abroad and the lack of opportunieies which such an undertaking must
contend with in a small city, has kept the MIRROR, in hard times as in
good times, steadily growing, enlarging its scope and influence, and
gaining strength with which to make and maintain new advances; and at
the same time has made it yield every year a handsome income. Only a man
of pluck, push and perseverance, of courage, sagacity and industry,
could have done this; and he who has accomplished it need point to no
other achievement to establish his title to a place among the strong men
of his time.
Mr. Clarke is a native of Atkinson, where he was born January 30, 1820.
His parents were intelligent and successful farmers, and from them he
inherited the robust constitution, the genial disposition, and the
capacity for brain-work, which have carried him to the head of his
profession in New Hampshire. They also furnished him with the small
amount of money necessary to give a boy an education in those days, and
in due course he graduated with high honors at Dartmouth College in the
class of 1843. Then he became principal of the Meredith Bridge Academy,
which position he held three years, reading law meanwhile in an office
near by. In 1848 he was admitted to the Hillsborough county bar from the
office of his brother, at Manchester, the late Honorable William C.
Clarke, Attorney General of New Hampshire, and the next year went to
California. From 1849 until 1851 he was practicing his profession,
roughing it in the mines, and prospecting for a permanent business and
location in California, Central America, and Mexico.
In 1851 he returned to Manchester and established himself as a lawyer,
gaining in a few months a practice which gave him a living; but in
October of the next year the sale of the MIRROR afforded an opening more
suited to his talents and ambition, and having bought the property he
thenceforth devoted himself to its development.
He had no experience, no capital, but he had confidence in himself,
energy, good judgment, and a willingness to work for the success he was
determined to gain. For months and years he was editor, reporter,
business manager, accountant, and collector. In these capacities he did
an amount of work that would have killed an ordinary man, and did it in
a way that told; for everymonth added to the number of his patrons; and
slowly but steadily his business increased in volume and his papers in
influence.
He early made it a rule to condense everything that appeared in the
columns of the MIRROR into the smallest possible space, to make what he
printed readable as well as reliable, to make the paper better every
year than it was the preceding year, and to furnish the weekly edition
at a price which would give it an immense circulation without the help
of travelling agents or the credit system: and to this policy he has
adhered. Besides this, he spared no expense which he judged would add to
the value of his publications, and his judgment has always set the
bounds far off on the very verge of extravagance. Whatever machine
promised to keep his office abreast of the times, and increase the
capacity for good work, he has dared buy. Whatever man he has thought
would brighten and strengthen his staff of assistants, he has gone for,
and if possible got, and whatever new departure has seemed to him likely
to win new friends for the MIRROR he has made.
In this way he has gone from the bottom of the ladder to the top. From
time to time rival sheets have sprung up beside him, but only to
maintain an existence for a brief period, or to be consolidated with the
MIRROR. All the time there has been sharp competition from publishers
elsewhere, but this has only stimulated him to make a better paper and
push it succesfully in fields which they have regarded as their own.
In connection with the MIRROR a great job printing establishment has
grown up, which turns out a large amount of work in all departments, and
where the state printing has been done six years. Mr. Clarke has also
published several books, including "Sanborn's History of New Hampshire,"
"Clarke's History of Manchester," "Successful New Hampshire Men,"
"Manchester Directory," and other works. Within a few years a book
bindery has been added to the establishment.
Mr. Clarke still devotes himself closely to his business six hours each
day, but limits himself to this period, having been warned by an
enforced rest and voyage to Europe in 1872 to recover from the strain of
overwork, that even his magnificent physique could not sustain too great
a burden, and he now maintains robust and vigorous health by a
systematic and regular mode of life, by long rides of fifteen to
twenty-five miles daily, and an annual summer vacation.
In making the MIRROR its owner has made a great deal of money. If he had
saved it as some others have done, he would have more to-day than any
other in Manchester who has done business the same length of time on the
same capital. But if he has gathered like a man born to be a
millionaire, he has scattered like one who would spend a millionaire's
fortune. He has been a good liver and a free giver. All his tastes
incline him to large expenditures. His home abounds in all the comforts
that money will buy. His farm is a place where costly experiments are
tried. He is passionately fond of fine horses, and his stables are
always full of those that are highly bred, fleet, and valuable. He loves
an intelligent dog, and a good gun, and is known far and near as an
enthusiastic sportsman.
He believes in being good to himself and generous to others; values
money only for what it will buy, and every day illustrates the fact that
it is easier for him to earn ten dollars than to save one by being
"close."
A business that will enable a man of such tastes and impulses to gratify
all his wants and still accumulate a competency for his children is a
good one, and that is what the business of the MIRROR counting-room has
done.
Nor is this all, nor the most, for the MIRROR has made the name of John
B. Clarke a household word in nearly every school district in Northern
New England and in thousands of families in other sections. It has given
him a great influence in the politics, the agriculture, and the social
life of his time, has made him a power in shaping the policy of his city
and state, and one of the forces that have kept the wheels of progress
moving in both for more than thirty years.
In a word, what one man can do for and with a newspaper in New Hampshire
John B. Clarke has done for and with the MIRROR, and what a great
newspaper can do for a man the MIRROR has done for John B. Clarke.
* * * * *
DENMAN THOMPSON.
Throughout the United States where-ever the name of New England is held
in respect there is the name of Denman Thompson a household word. His
genius has embodied in a drama the finer yet homlier characteristics of
New England life, its simplicity, its rugged honesty, its simple piety,
its benevolence, partially hid beneath a rough and uncouth exterior. His
drama is an epic--a prose poem--arousing a loyal and patriotic love for
the land of the Pilgrims in the hearts of her sons, whether at home, on
the rolling prairies of the West, in the sunny South, amid the grand
scenes of the Sierras, or on the Pacific slope.
That Denman Thompson was not a native of New Hampshire was rather the
result of chance. His parents were natives of Swanzey, where they are
still living at a ripe old age, and where they have always lived, save
for a few years preceeding and following the birth of their children. In
1831 the parents moved to Girard, Erie County, Pennsylvania, when,
October 15, 1833, was born their gifted son. The boy was blessed with
one brother and two sisters, and death has yet to strike its first blow
in the family.
At the age of thirteen years Denman accompanied his family to the old
home in Swanzey, where for several years he received the advantages of
the education afforded by the district school. For his higher education
he was indebted to the excellent scholastic opportunities afforded by
the Mount Cæsar Seminary in Swanzey.
At the age of nineteen he entered the employ of his uncle in Lowell,
Massachusetts, serving as book-keeper in a wholesale store, and in that
city he made his _debut_ as Orasman in the military drama of the FRENCH
SPY.
In 1854, at the age of twenty-one years, he was engaged by John
Nickerson, the veteran actor and manager, as a member of the stock
company of the Royal Lyceum, Toronto. From the first his success was
assured, for aside from his natural adaptation to his profession he
possesses indomitable perseverance, a quality as necessary to the rise
of an artist as genius. On the provincial boards of Toronto he studied
and acted for the next few years, perfecting himself in his calling and
preparing for wider fields. Then he acted the rollicking Irishman to
perfection; the real live Yankee, with his genuine mannerisms and
dialect, with proper spirit and without ridiculous exaggeration, and the
Negro, so open to burlesque. The special charm of his acting in those
characters was his artistic execution. He never stooped to vulgarities,
his humor was quaint and spontaneous, and the entire absence of apparent
effort in his performance gave his audience a most favorable impression
of power in reserve. His favorite characters were Salem Scudder in THE
OCTOROON, and Myles Na Coppaleen in COLLEEN BAWN.
In April, 1862, Mr. Thompson started for the mother country, and there
his reception was worthy a returning son who had achieved a well-earned
reputation. His opening night in London was a perfect ovation, and
during his engagement the theatre was crowded in every part. He met with
flattering success during his brief tour, performing at Edinburg and
Glasgow before his return to Toronto the following fall.
From that time must be dated the career of Mr. Thompson as a _star_
or leading actor and manager, at first in low comedy, so called, or
eccentric drama, and later, in what he has made a classic New England
drama.
Mr. Thompson is the author of several very pleasing and successful
comedies, but the play JOSHUA WHITCOMB is the best known and most
popular. The leading character is said to have been drawn from Captain
Otis Whitcomb, who died in Swanzey in 1882, at the age of eighty-six. Cy
Prime, who "could have proved it had Bill Jones been alive," died in
that town, a few years since, while Len Holbrook still lives there.
General James Wilson, the veteran, who passed away a short time since,
was well known to the older generation of today. The last scene of the
drama is laid in Swanzey and the scenery is drawn from nature very
artistically. Mr. Thompson is the actor as well as creator of the
leading character in the play. The good old man is drawn from the quiet
and comforts of his rural home to the perplexities of city life in
Boston. There his strong character and good sense offset his simplicity
and ignorance. He acts as a kind of Providence in guiding the lives of
others. To say that the play is pure is not enough--it is ennobling.
The success of the play has been wonderful. Year after year it draws
crowded houses--and it will, long after the genius of Mr. Thompson's
acting becomes a tradition.
Mr. Thompson is a gentleman of wide culture and extensive reading and
information. Not only with the public but with his professional brethren
he is very popular on account of his amiable character. Naturally he is
of a quiet and benevolent disposition, and has the good word of everyone
to whom he is known.
As one of a stock company he never disappointed the manager--as a
manager he never disappointed the public.
In private life he has been very happy in his marital relations, having
married Miss Maria Bolton in July, 1860. Three children--two daughters
and one son, have blessed their union.
A book could well be written on the adventures and incidents that have
attended the presentation of the great play since its inception. Nowhere
is it more popular than in the neighborhood of Mr. Thompsons's summer
home. When a performance is had in Keene the good people of Swanzey
demand a special matinee for their benefit, from which the citizens of
Keene are supposed to be excluded.
In Colorado a Methodist camp-meeting was adjourned and its members
attended the play _en masse_. Such is the charm of the play that it
never loses its attraction.
Mr. Thompson is in the prime of life, about fifty years old. His home is
in New Hampshire; his birthplace was in Pennsylvania. He made his
_debut_ in Massachusetts, and received his professional training in
Canada; he is a citizen of the United States, and is always honored
where genius is recognized.
Like the favorite character, Joshua Whitcomb, in his favorite play, Mr.
Thompson is personally sensitive, kind-hearted, self-sacrificing; he
never speaks ill of any one, delights in doing good, and enjoys hearing
and telling a good story; he is quiet, yet full of fun; generous to a
fault. His company has become much attached to him.
In the village of Swansey is Mr. Thompson's summer home; a beautiful
mansion, surrounded by grounds where art and nature combine to please.
The hospitality of the house is proverbial, but its chief attraction is
its well-stocked library.
* * * * *
NATIONAL BANKS.
THE SURPLUS FUND AND NET PROFITS.
By George H. Wood.
In the elimination of an unusually large amount of dead assets under the
requirements of the National Bank law, previous to extension of the
corporate existence of a bank, the very interesting question is brought
to notice, of what is the proper construction of the law in regard to
reducing and restoring the surplus fund.
Does the law forbid the payment of a dividend by a National Bank when
the effect of such payment will be to reduce the surplus fund of the
bank below an amount equal to one-tenth of its net profits since its
organization as a National Bank; and if so, upon what ground? It does,
and for the following reasons. The power to declare dividends is granted
by section 5199 of the Revised Statutes of the United States in the
following language: "The Directors of any association (National Bank)
may semi-annually declare a dividend of so much of the _net
profits_ of the association as they shall judge expedient; but each
association shall, before the declaration of a dividend, carry one-tenth
of its net profits of the preceding half year to its surplus fund until
the same shall amount to twenty per cent, of its capital stock."
The question at once arises, what are the net profits from which
dividends may be declared, and do they include the surplus fund? It is
held that the net profits are the earnings left on hand after charging
off expenses, taxes and losses, if any, and carrying to surplus fund the
amount required by the law, and that the surplus fund is not to be
considered as net profits available for dividends, for, if it were, the
Directors of a bank could at any time divide the surplus among the
shareholders. It would only be necessary to go through the form of
carrying one-tenth of the net profits to surplus, whereupon, if the
surplus be net profits available for the purpose of a dividend, the
amount so carried can be withdrawn and paid away at once, thereby
defeating the obvious purpose of the law in requiring a portion of each
six month's earnings to be carried to the surplus fund, that purpose
being to provide that a surplus fund equal to twenty per cent, of the
bank's capital shall be accumulated.
The law is to be so construed as to give effect to all its parts, and
any construction that does not do so is manifestly unsound. Therefore a
construction which would render inoperative the requirement for the
accumulation of a surplus fund cannot be correct, and the net profits
available for dividends must be determined by the amount of earnings on
hand other than the surplus fund when that fund does not exceed a sum
equal to one-tenth of the earnings of the bank since its organization.
Having shown what the net profits available for dividends are, the only
other question that can arise is: Can losses and bad debts be charged to
the surplus fund and the other earnings used for paying dividends, or
must all losses and bad debts be first charged against earnings other
than the surplus fund, so far as such earnings will admit of it, and the
surplus, or a portion of it, used only when other earnings shall be
exhausted?
This question is virtually answered above, for if the object of the law
in requiring the creation of a surplus fund may not be defeated by one
means it may not by another; if it may not be defeated by paying away
the amounts carried to surplus in dividends, neither may it be by
charging losses to the surplus and at the same time using the other
earnings for dividends.
Moreover, section 5204 of the Revised Statutes of the United States
provides as follows: "If losses have at any time been sustained by any
such association, equal to or exceeding its undivided profits then on
hand, no dividend shall be made; and no dividend shall ever be made by
any association, while it continues its banking operations, to an amount
greater than its net profits then on hand, deducting therefrom its
losses and bad debts."
This language fixes the extent to which dividends may be made at the
amount of the "net profits" on hand after deducting therefrom losses and
bad debts, and as it has been shown above that the surplus fund cannot
be considered "net profits," available for dividends within the meaning
of the law, it follows that in order to determine the amount of net
earnings available for dividends the losses must first be deducted from
the earnings other than surplus.
It is to be observed also that section 5204 specifies that if losses
have at any time been sustained by a bank equal to or exceeding its
"_undivided_ profits" on hand no dividends shall be made.
Now the surplus fund is not undivided profits, except in so far as it is
earnings not divided among the shareholders. It is made upon a division
of the profits--so much to the stockholders and so much to the surplus
fund. If the law had intended that losses might be charged to surplus
fund in order to leave the other earnings available for dividends it is
to be presumed that care would not have been taken to use the words
"undivided profits," in the connection in which they are used, as stated
above.
Furthermore, if losses may be charged to surplus when at the same time
the other earnings are used for dividends to shareholders, a bank may go
on declaring dividends, and never accumulate any surplus fund whatever
if losses be sustained, as they are in the history of nearly every bank.
A construction of the law which would render inoperative the requirement
for the creation of a surplus cannot be sound; and as the only way to
insure that a surplus shall be accumulated and maintained is to charge
losses against other earnings as far as may be before trenching upon the
surplus; it must be that the law intended that the "undivided profits"
which are not in the surplus fund shall first be used to meet losses.
To a full understanding of the subject it is proper to say that after
using all other earnings on hand at the usual time for declaring a
dividend to meet losses the whole or any part of the surplus may be used
if the losses exceed the amount of the earnings other than surplus, and
then at the end of another six months a dividend may be made if the
earnings will admit of it, one-tenth of the earnings being first carried
to surplus and the re-accumulation of the fund thus begun.
This is because the law has been complied with by charging the losses
against the "undivided profits," as far as they will go, and it is
impossible to do more, or require more to be done, for the
re-establishment of the state of things that existed prior to losses
having been sustained than to do what the law requires shall be done to
originally establish that state of things.
* * * * *
CONCORD, N.H.
* * * * *
IMPRESSIONS D'UN FRANÇAIS.
* * * * *
Par le Professeur Emile Pingault.
Quand les Français, les Français de France, comme disent leurs cousins
canadiens, parlent de l'Amérique ou pensent à cette reine des
républiques, ils n'ont en vue que les grandes villes. New-York, Boston,
Philadelphie, Chicago, la Nouvelle Orléans etc. ... forment seuls, pour
eux, l'immense continent découvert par Christophe Colomb.
Je voudrais essayer de réagir contre l'idée générale qu'on a, que la
lumiére, l'intelligence, la prospérité ne se trouvent que dans les
grands centres.
La Providence a voulu que je vinsse établir ma tente dans une ville qui,
bien qu'étant la capitale du New-Hampshire, paraît comme un point
microscopique auprès des villes que j'ai citées plus haut. Eh bien, sans
flatterie aucune, si l'on a pu appeler Boston l'Athène de l'Améríque, je
ne vois pas pourquoi on n'appellerait pas Concord un petit
_Rambouillet_, toute proportion gardée.
Je ne vous dirái pas que Concord est une petite ville située sur la
Merrimac, de 14,000 à 15,000 habitants, mais ce que je puis vous dire
c'est qu'il faudrait aller bien loin pour trouver une ville plus
intelligente et plus éclairée, je dirais même plus patriarcale. Tout le
monde s'y connaît et s'estime l'un l'autre. Il y a dans cette ville une
émulation pour le bien et pour l'instruction qui ne peut être surpassée.
Outre les écoles publiques telles que la Haute École (High School), les
écoles de grammaire, les écoles particulières, on y voit encore des
professeurs de langues modernes, des professeurs de dessin et de
peinture, et parmi ces derniers un jeune artiste qui fera vraiment la
gloire de l'Etat de Granit si la rlasse éclairée sait l'attacher
permanemment à la capitale. La musique a une place privilégiée dans
cette ville, les concerts de l'orchestre Blaisdelle sont suivis comme le
seraient les premières de Booth et d'Irving. Il y a la plus que du
sentiment, il y a véritablement de l'art, et un enfant de Concord, mort
il y a deux ans, âge de vingt ans à peine, était une preuve manifeste
que l'art est compris ici à un degré supérieure.
La littérature est cultivée avec le plus grand soin. Outre trois clubs,
composés chacun d'une quinzaine de membres, qui étudient et admirent
Shakspeare; une dame qui manie la parole comme le grand dramatiste
maniait la pensée donne des conférences sur l'auteur d'_Hamlet_
devant un auditoire aussi intelligent que nombreux.
Cet amour de s'instruire et d'étudier perce jusque dans les enfants les
plus jeunes. Deux _Kindergarten_ sont établis en cette ville; là,
outre les choses aimables et utiles qu'on enseigne aux petits garçons et
petites filles de cinq à six ans, on leur apprend aussi le français.
Qu'il est beau de voir ces jeunes intelligences se développer an son de
la belle langue de Bossuet, de Fénelon, de Lamartine et de Victor Hugo.
Vous verrez à Concord un spectacle peut-être unique dans les Etats-Unis:
une douzaine de petits Américains et Américaines chantant la
_Marsellaise_ et dansant des rondes de Bretagne et de Vendée avec
une voix aussi douce et un accent aussi pur que s'ils étaient nés sur
les bords de la Seine.
Ajoutez à ce tableau bien court et nullement exagéré que l'union et la
paix régne entre tous les habitants de la ville, que la police y est
heureuse et fort peu occupée, et vous aurez l'idée de la tranquillité
dont on jouit dans cet endroit privilégié.
J'avouerai franchement, pour finir, que si toutes les villes et villages
ressemblaient à Concord, l'Amérique serait le premier de tous les mondes
connus.
* * * * *
CLAYTON-BULWER TREATY VS. MONROE DOCTRINE.
By George W. Hobbs.
In every conflict of European with American interests on the two
continents, comprising North and South America, our countrymen always
make their appeal to the "Monroe Doctrine" as the supreme, indisputable,
and irrevocable judgment of our national Union. It is said to indicate
the only established idea of foreign policy which has a permanent
influence upon our national administration, whether it be Republican or
Democratic, politically. A President of the United States, justly
appealing to this doctrine, in emergency arouses the heart and courage
of the patriotic citizen, even in the presence of impending war.
In view of this powerful sentiment swaying a great people, as well as
their government, it is not surprising that Congress is often called
upon to apply its principles; and it therefore becomes more and more
important that it should be well understood by _people_, as well as
Congress, in respect to its origin and purpose.
In the message of President Monroe to Congress, at the commencement of
the session of 1823-24, the following passages occur:
"In the wars of the European powers, in matters relating to themselves,
we have never taken any part, nor does it comport with our policy to do
so. It is only when our rights are invaded, or seriously menaced, that
we resent injuries, or make preparations for defence. With the movements
in this hemisphere we are of necessity more immediately connected, and
by causes which must be obvious to all enlightened and impartial
observers. The political system of the allied powers is essentially
different in this respect from that of America. This difference proceeds
from that which exists in their respective governments; and to the
defence of our own, which has been achieved by the loss of so much blood
and treasure, and matured by the wisdom of their most enlightened
citizens, and under which we have enjoyed such unexampled felicity, this
whole nation is devoted.
"We owe it, therefore, to candor, and to the amicable relations existing
between the United States and those powers to declare--_that we should
consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion
of this hemisphere, as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the
existing colonies or dependencies of any European power, we have not
interfered and shall not interfere; but with the governments who have
declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we
have on great consideration, and on just principles acknowledged, we
could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them or
controlling in any other manner their destiny, in any other light, than
as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition towards the United
States_."
"It is impossible that the allied powers should extend their political
sytem to any portion of either continent, without endangering our peace
and happiness.
"It is equally impossible, that we should behold such interposition in
any form with indifference."
Lest there may be some misapprehension, as to the political
circumstances, which called for the promulgation of this "Monroe
Doctrine," let us for a moment review the events which gave color and
importance to the political environments of that date which elicited
from President Monroe this now famous declaration.
In the year 1822 the allied sovereigns held their Congress at Verona.
The great subject of consideration was the condition of Spain; that
country being then under the Cortes or representatives of the
Revolutionists. The question was, whether or not Ferdinand should be
re-instated in all his authority by the intervention of foreign powers.
Russia, Prussia, France, and Austria, were inclined to that measure;
England dissented and protested, but the course was agreed upon; and
France, with the consent of these other continental powers, took the
conduct of the operation into her own hands. In the spring of 1823, a
French army was sent into Spain. Its success was complete; the popular
government was overthrown, and Ferdinand was re-instated and
re-established in all his power. This invasion was determined on and
undertaken precisely on the doctrines which the allied monarchs had
proclaimed the year before at Laybach; that is, that they had the right
to interfere in the concerns of another State, and reform its
government, "in order to prevent the effect of its bad example" (this
bad example, be it remembered, always being the example of free
government by the people). Now having put down the example of the
Cortes, in Spain, it was natural to inquire, with what eyes they should
look on the Colonies of Spain, that were following still worse examples.
Would King Ferdinand and his allies be content with what had been done
in Spain itself, or would he solicit their aid and would they grant it,
to subdue his rebellious American colonies?
Having "reformed" Spain herself to the true standard of a proud
monarchy, it was more than probable that they might see fit to attempt
the "reformation" and re-organization of the Central and South American
Colonies, which were following the "pernicious example of the United
States," and declaring themselves "free and independent," it being an
historical fact, that as soon as the Spanish King was completely
reestablished he invited the co-operation of his allies in regard to his
provinces in South America, to "assist him to readjust the affairs in
such manner as should retain the sovereignty of Spain over them." The
proposed meeting of the allies for that purpose, however, did not take
place. England had already taken a decided course, and stated
distinctly, and expressly, that "she should consider any foreign
interference by force or by menace, in the dispute between Spain and the
Colonies, as a motive for recognizing the latter without delay."
The sentiment of the liberty-loving people of the American Union was
strongly in favor of the independence of the Colonies, which our
government had already recognized; and it was at this crisis, just as
the attitude of England was made known, that President Monroe's noble
and patriotic declaration was made. Its effect was grand; it disarmed
all organized attempts on the part of Spain and her allies to
re-organize her "rebellious colonies"--now our sister republics in the
western hemisphere--and shook the political systems of the world to
their centres.
"The force of President Monroe's declaration," said Daniel Webster,
"was felt everywhere by all those who could understand its object, and
foresee its effect." Lord Brougham said in Parliament that "no event
had ever created greater joy, exaltation, and gratitude, among all the
freemen in Europe;" that he felt "proud in being connected by blood
and language with the people of the United States;" that "the policy
disclosed by the message became a great, a free, an independent nation."
Daniel Webster again said of it, "I look on the message of December,
1823, as forming a bright page in our history. I will neither help to
erase it nor tear it out; nor shall it be by any act of mine blurred or
blotted. It did honor to the sagacity of the government, and I will not
diminish that honor. It elevated the hopes and gratified the patriotism
of the people over these hopes. I will not bring a mildew, nor will I
put that gratified patriotism to shame."
The effect of this declaration in Europe was all that could have been
desired by the patriotic statesmen who contributed their counsel to its
adoption. The message arrived in England on December 24,
1823--twenty-two days after Mr. Monroe delivered it to Congress. On the
second of January. Mr. Camming, the British Minister of foreign affairs,
told the American Minister that the principles declared in the message,
that the American continents were not to be considered as subject to
future colonization by any of the powers of Europe, greatly embarassed
the instructions he was about to send to the British Ambassador at St.
Petersburg, touching the Northwestern boundary; and that he believed
Great Britain would combat this declaration of the President with
animation.
Its effect upon the then pending negotiations with Russia was so
favorable, that the convention of 1824 was concluded in the Spring of
that year, by the withdrawal on the part of the Emperor of his
pretentious to exclusive trade on the Northwest coast, and by fixing the
parallel of 54" 40' as the line between the permissible establishments
of the respective countries.
This in brief is the history of the celebrated "Monroe Doctrine." It has
never been affirmatively adopted by Congress, by any recorded vote, as
the fixed and unalterable policy of this Republic; but its patriotic
sentiment is so deeply bedded in the hearts of the American people of
every political opinion, that Congress ought not and dare not ignore it.
But did not the United States Senate, when it ratified the
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty in 1850, practically ignore the "Monroe Doctrine"
and open the door for future trouble? Let us examine this treaty, which,
in the light of present Congressional action, has become an important
element in American politics, and see if it is not antagonistic to the
American policy, and more than the _bete noir_ of partizan dreams.
In order for a complete understanding of the terms, and bearing of this
treaty, I deem it important to give a full synopsis, rather than a brief
reference to its salient points:
THE CLAYTON-BULWER TREATY.
"A convention between the United States of America and her Britannic
Majesty.
PREAMBLE.
"The United States and her Britannic Majesty, being desirous of
consolidating the relations of amity, which so happily subsist between
them, by setting forth and fixing in a convention their views and
intentions with reference to any means of communication by ship canal,
which may be constructed between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, by way
of the river San Juan de Nicaragua and either or both the lakes of
Nicaragua or Manaqua, to any port or place on the Pacific ocean, the
President of the United States has conferred full powers on John M.
Clayton, Secretary of State of the United States, and her Britannic
Majesty on the Right Honorable Sir Henry Lytton Bulwer, a member of her
Majesty's most honorable Privy Council, Knight Commander of the most
honorable order of Bath, and Envoy Extraordinary and Minister
Plenipotentiary of her Britannic Majesty to the United States for the
aforesaid purpose; and the said plenipotentiaries, having exchanged
their full powers, which were found to be in proper form, have agreed to
the following articles, _viz_:
Article 1. The governments of the United States and Great Britain hereby
declare that neither the one nor the other will ever obtain, or maintain
for itself, any exclusive control over the said ship canal; agreeing
that neither will ever erect or maintain, any fortifications commanding
the same, or in the vicinity thereof: or occupy, or fortify, or
colonize, or assume or exercise any dominion over Nicaragua, Costa Rica,
the Mosquito Coast, or any part of Central America. Nor will either make
use of any protection which either affords, or may afford, or any
alliance which either has or may have, to or with, any state or people
for the purpose of erecting or maintaining any such fortifications, or
of occupying, fortifying, or colonizing Nicaragua, Costa Rica, the
Mosquito Coast, or any part of Central America, or of assuming, or
exercising dominion over the same; nor will the United States or Great
Britain take advantage of any intimacy, or use any alliance, connection,
or influence, that either may possess, with any state or government,
through whose territory the said canal may pass, for the purpose of
acquiring or holding, directly or indirectly, for the citizens or
subjects of the one, any rights or advantages in regard to commerce, or
navigation through the said canal, which shall not be offered on the
same terms to the citizens or subjects of the other.
Art. 2. Vessels of the United States or Great Britain traversing the
said canal shall, in case of war between the contracting parties, be
exempted from blockade, detention, or capture by either of the
beligerents, and this provision shall extend to such a distance from the
two ends of the said canal, as may hereafter be found expedient to
establish.
Art. 3. The persons and property engaged in building the said canal
shall be protected by the contracting parties from all unjust detention,
confiscation and violence.
Art. 4. Both governments will facilitate the construction of said canal
and establish two free ports, one at each end of said canal.
Art 5. Both governments will guaranty and protect the neutrality of said
canal; provided, however, that said protection and guaranty may be
withdrawn by both, or either governments, if both or either should deem
that the persons building or managing the same adopt or establish
regulations concerning traffic therein, as are contrary to the spirit
and intention of this convention, either by unfair discrimination, in
favor of the commerce of one contracting party over the other, or by
imposing oppressive exactions or unreasonable tolls upon passengers,
vessels, goods, wares, merchandise, or other articles,--neither party to
withdraw such protection and guaranty without first giving six months
notice to the other.
Art 6. Treaty stipulations maybe made with the Central American States,
and states with which either or both parties have friendly intercourse;
and settle all differences arising as to the rights of property in the
canal, etc.
Art. 7. Contract to be entered into without delay, and the party first
commencing labor, etc., in the construction of said canal, is to have
priority of claim to construct the same, and will be protected therein
by the parties to this treaty.
Art. 8. Both governments agree that protection shall be extended by
treaty stipulations, hereafter to be made and entered into, to other
communications or ways across said isthmus.
Art. 9. Treaty to be ratified by both governments and ratifications
exchanged at Washington within six months."
This treaty bears date April 19, 1850, and is still in force in all its
provisions.
Is there anything in the terms, conditions, or effect of this treaty,
which in any way tends to militate or conflict with the declarations of
the "Monroe Doctrine?"
To answer this question satisfactorily, and give a careful analysis of
the treaty, in all its details, would take more time and space than I am
at liberty to use; but I may be pardoned if I trespass a little and give
a few reasons why I am come to the conclusion that the effect of the
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty is to abrogate and annul to a great extent the
cardinal principle of the "Monroe Doctrine."
In the first place the "Monroe Doctrine" was the accepted policy of this
government as to all foreign intervention from 1823 to 1850, and with
some of the leading minds of the country it has never ceased to be the
paramount creed in the national catechism. During these twenty-seven
years the project of building an inter-oceanic canal had been
considerably agitated, in Congress and out, and had enlisted to some
extent the sympathies of foreign powers who desired a shorter passage to
the Pacific Ocean, the East Indies, and the markets of Cathay, than the
stormy ones around the southern capes of either hemisphere.
This agitation finally culminated in diplomatic correspondence between
the representatives of Great Britain and the United States relative to
the construction of such a means of communication and the rights of the
two nations to the same, resulting in the treaty. In April, 1850, the
Senate of the United States, by a very large vote, ratified and
confirmed this treaty, notwithstanding it was vigorously opposed by such
men as Stephen A. Douglas and Lewis Cass, then in the zenith of their
fame.
It appears in the Congressional record of 1850, and subsequently, that
the treaty was ratified without a very clear understanding of its
meaning; and it was even hinted, in rather plain language, that the
representative of Great Britain had been too sharp, too diplomatic for
his American brother, and had overreached him. It further appeared that
the honorable Senate was sadly deficient in knowledge of geography, and
national boundaries; for it is matter of record, that many Senators
voted for the ratification under the impression that British Honduras
was included in the territory of Guatamala, and that the British
settlements were in that republic; while, as a fact, Balize or British
Honduras was on the easterly side of the Isthmus, never had been a part
of that republic, and the British settlements were, and always had been,
in Yucatan. They further understood the treaty to say, that neither
government should occupy, fortify, or colonize Nicaragua, Costa Rica,
the Mosquito Coast, or any part of Central America; but it is a fact,
that at the very date of the treaty, at the date of the ratification,
and since, Great Britain occupied and colonized the Mosquito coast, or
that part which joins British Honduras on the northerly side of South
Honduras; and Mr. Douglas, in 1857, in a debate in Congress upon a
"resolution of inquiry as to the present status of the treaty," said:
"I voted against the treaty, Mr. President, for the reason that I am
unwilling to enter into any stipulations with any European power, that
we would not do on this continent whatever we might think it our duty to
do, whenever a case should arise. I voted against it because by clause
1 of that treaty we are debarred from doing what it might be our duty to
do; but as it has been entered into, I desire to see it enforced. I am
not yet aware that that clause of the treaty has been carried into
effect. I have yet to learn that the British Government have withdrawn
their protectorate from the Mosquito Coast; I have yet to learn that
they have abandoned the possession of that territory which they held
under the Mosquito King."
From the day that treaty was ratified to the present, it has been a
fertile source of discord and misunderstanding between the two
governments; and from 1850 to 1858 its provisions were thrice made the
basis of a proposal to arbitrate as to their meaning: their modification
and abrogation have been alike contingently considered, and their
imperfect and vexatious character have been repeatedly recognized on
both sides. Even the present administration is laboring with the
difficulty, and seeking some honorable way to free the treaty from its
embarrassing features, or entirely abrogate it. President Buchanan, in
1858, characterized and denounced the treaty as "one which had been
fraught with misunderstanding and mischief from the beginning;" and the
leading statesmen of the country have felt that it was entirely
inadequate to reconcile the opposite views of Great Britain and the
United States towards Central America.
The Honorable James G. Blaine, late Secretary of State under the
lamented Garfield, in his diplomatic correspondence with Lord Granville,
in 1881, in summing up his review of the negotiations concerning this
treaty, says: "It was frankly admitted on both sides that the
engagements of the treaty were misunderstandingly entered into,
improperly comprehended, contradictorily interpreted, and mutually
vexatious."
An examination of the diplomatic correspondence and the Congressional
Records of the years 1852-3-4 reveals what may perhaps be unknown
history to many of my readers; that Great Britain within one year after
she signed and ratified the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, and agreed therein
NOT "to colonize, fortify, or exercise control over, any part of Central
America," did seize upon, colonize and partially fortify and exercise
control over the five islands in the Bay of Honduras, called the Bay
Islands; and that she did this in derogation of the declarations of the
"Monroe Doctrine," and in direct violation and contempt of the Treaty,
which she had so recently entered into; that this same national
cormorant immediately surveyed and made a new geographical plan of
Central America, in which she extended her province of Balize from the
river Hondo, on the north, to the river Sarstoon on the south, and from
the coast of the bay westward to the falls of Garbutts on the river
Balize; or five times its original size; and then modestly claimed that
her possessions were not in Central America, and therefore not within
the provisions of the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty; that she has to this day
continued her protectorate, as she calls it, of the Mosquito Coast, and
that within six days after the Treaty of California, which secured to us
that "pearl of the occident," she seized San Juan and occasioned a brief
naval excitement at Greytown, the port of the San Juan river. This last
kick by Great Britain at the treaty she had so solemnly promised to
abide by was the most barefaced and impudent of all; for it was at that
time supposed by every body who had considered the question of an
inter-oceanic canal, that if built at all it would be by way of the San
Juan river, Lake Nicaragua, and across Nicaragua to the Pacific; thus
making Greytown the important port of said canal, and the key to the
control of the entire commerce thereon.
The diplomatic correspondence which followed this high-handed outrage,
like all the diplomatic (?) correspondence concerning Central America,
while firm and bold on the part of this government, yet lacked that
moral force, national importance, and perfect fearlessness, which the
fetters imposed by the treaty prevented us from using or exhibiting.
With the treaty out of the way, and the principles of the "Monroe
Doctrine" imprinted as a legend upon our banners, we should have stood
on unassailable ground; have exhibited a national importance and
vitality--an uncompromising firmness, courage and dignity that would
have carried conviction, achieved immediate and honorable success, and
commanded the respect of the civilized world. But fettered, tantalized,
and weakened, by the ambiguities and inconsistencies of this
co-partnership treaty, the United States government was compelled to
temporize, argue, and explain, and finally compromise with her
co-partner, and graciously allow the disgraceful fetters to remain.
Did Great Britain withdraw her protectorate? No. Did she withdraw her
colonies from the Bay Islands? No. Did she give up her new geography of
Central America, and restore Balize to its original territory? No. Did
she yield a single point in the controversy, except to give up and
repudiate as unauthorized the seizure of San Juan? No. Not in a single
instance when the territory of Central America was at stake, and the
provisions of the treaty were concerned, did she yield a single point;
but she has even claimed and argued, that under the proper
interpretation of the terms of that treaty she may hold all that she
then enjoyed, and all that she can seize or buy, which is more than five
statute miles from the coast line of any part of Central America;
because, as she says, the treaty means the political, not the
geographical Central America, and the political Central America is that
part only of the continent which is contained within the limits of the
five Central American republics; while the geographical Central America
comprises all the territory and adjacent waters which lie between the
republic of Mexico and South America; and that as Balize, Yucatan, and
the Bay Islands, were not within the limits of the five Central American
republics, they are no part of the Central America designated and
intended in the treaty, and are not included in the term "other
territory" used in said treaty.
The United States on the other hand claimed that the express language of
the treaty, to wit: "that neither will occupy, or fortify, or colonize,
or assume, or exercise any dominion over Nicaragua, Costa Rica, the
Mosquito Coast, or any part of Central America," means the geographical
Central America, including all that is not specifically enumerated from
Mexico on the north, to New Grenada or the United States of Columbia on
the south; that the claim of Great Britain was not a tenable or
reasonable one, and that the understanding was, that neither government
should thereafterwards acquire, or assume any control over, any part of
the territory lying between Mexico and South America.
In the year 1853, during the discussion in the Senate upon the
resolution of inquiry presented by Mr. Douglas, Mr. Clayton, then
Senator from Delaware, admitted that the ambiguity of the treaty is so
great, that on some future occasion a conventional article, clearly
stating what are the limits of the Central America named in the treaty,
might become advisable.
This admission, from the lips of the very man who so diplomatically (?)
represented the United States in the making of this vexatious treaty, is
rather significant, and aids us of this generation in coming to the
conclusion that the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty is a disgrace to this
republic, and ought to be at once abrogated.
Another historical fact, with which few are familiar, and which shows
the animus of this treaty, is this: In 1849 Mr. Hise, our minister at
Nicaragua, reported to the Honorable Secretary of State that Nicaragua
had offered to the United States, through him, "the exclusive right to
build, maintain, and forever control an inter-oceanic canal across that
republic; and offered to enter into treaty stipulations to that effect."
Mr. Hise strongly urged the acceptance of this offer, and prepared and
forwarded to the State Department a treaty, accepted by the government
of Nicargagua, which confirmed in specified terms the offer of full and
complete control and government of said canal. For reasons best known to
the Department of State, this treaty, called the Hise treaty, was never
accepted or presented to the Senate for ratification and adoption, but
was somehow quietly smothered, and the Clayton-Bulwer co-partnership
treaty reported and adopted in its stead.
It will be seen at a glance, by even the most careless political tyro,
that the Hise treaty was directly in line and accord with the express
principles of the "Munroe Doctrine;" and that it would have given to
this country the exclusive rights, which under the treaty adopted it
must share with its co-partner, Great Britain. Had the United States
accepted the offer made by Nicaragua, and thus obtained the exclusive
privilege of opening and controlling the canal, we could have opened it
to the commerce of the world, on such terms and conditions as we should
deem wise, just, and politic; and it would have been more creditable to
us as a nation to have acquired it ourselves, and opened it freely to
the use of all nations, rather than to have entered into a
co-partnership by which we not only have no control in prescribing the
terms upon which it shall be opened, but lose the right of future
acquisition and control of Central American territory. Had we accepted
it (or should we accept the recent offer of Nicaragua to the same
general effect) we should have held in our possession a right, and a
might, which would have been ample security for every nation under
heaven to have kept the peace with the United States.
Honorable Stephen A. Douglas, in commenting upon the conduct of the
State Department of 1849 and 1850, said: "When we surrendered this
exclusive right we surrendered a great element of power, which in our
hands would have been wielded in the cause of justice for the benefit of
all mankind."
"But suppose," said Senator Clayton in reply, "that Great Britain and
other European powers would not have consented to our exclusive control
of a canal, in which they, as commercial nations, had as much, and more
interest, that we had?"
"Well, then," in the language of Senator Douglas, "if Nicaragua desired
to confer the privilege, as it appears she did, and we were willing to
accept, it was purely an American question with which England or any
other foreign power had no right to interfere, or claim to be consulted,
no more than we could claim to be consulted when the Holy Alliance
sought to establish the equilibrium of Europe. We were not consulted
then, and in matters purely continental we have no occasion to consult
them; and if England, or any other foreign power, should attempt to
interfere, the sympathies of the rest of the civilized world would be
with us."
The policy of England has always been an aggressive one. While for
nearly seventy years she has professed a friendship and national harmony
with the United States, she has not ceased to plant her colonies and
establish sentry boxes on every sea-girt island, that she could control,
within a short voyage of our coast; while she has Gibraltar to command
the entrance to the Mediterranean, a garrison at the Cape of Good Hope
to control the passage to the Indies, she also maintains on the Bahamas
and the Bermudas, in her well-equipped garrisons, vigilant sentinels
whose eyes are ever watching the western continent in obedience to the
royal behest; and in the magnificent island of Jamaica she has
established, and maintained at enormous expense, a fortified and
well-garrisoned naval station, which practically controls the Caribbean
sea, the Gulf of Mexico, Central America, and even the contemplated
canal itself; and yet not content with all this readiness and armament
for aggressive war, she creeps still nearer the coveted prize and on the
Bay Islands, almost in sight of the proposed canal, she plants her royal
banner, and holds the key as the mistress of the situation; so that in
case of war between the two countries she is well prepared for a quick
and vigorous blow at the life of this republic.
She may have no occasion for many years to strike such a blow, but she
will wait in readiness; and woe be to that national simplicity which
puts its faith in princes, and takes no heed for the future.
What, then, is the duty of this republic in regard to the Central
American problem? Shall we abrogate the patriotic principles contained
in the declarations of the Monroe doctrine, and confess that we have no
definite American policy? Shall we withdraw from the honorable and
patriotic position of defender and upholder of republicanism on this
continent, and permit the royal wolves of devastation to run wild over
our sister republics, because, forsooth, in an evil hour, we were led
into an alliance which, under the name of a treaty, has embarrassed our
action, clouded our judgment, and involved our self-respect? Shall the
great American Nation, with its untold resources, its magnificent
capabilities, and its sublime faith in the manifest destiny of this
republic, calmly submit to the errors, mistakes, aye, blunders of its
aforetime rulers, and under a mistaken sense of honor continue to be
bound hand and foot by the terms of that pernicious treaty which might
well be called the covenant of national disgrace?
I maintain that it is an utter impossibility for a treaty-making power
to impose a permanent disability on the government for all coming time,
which, in the very nature and necessity of the case, may not be outgrown
and set aside by the laws of national progression, which all unaided
will render nugatory and vain all the plans and intentions of men. In
the language of Honorable Edward Everett, in his famous diplomatic
correspondence with the Compte De Sartiges in relation to the Island of
Cuba, in 1852, when asked to join England and France in a tripartite
treaty, in which a clause was embodied forbidding the United States from
ever acquiring or annexing that Island to this republic, "It may well be
doubted, whether the Constitution of the United States would allow the
treaty making power to impose a permanent disability on the American
government for all coming time, and prevent it under any future change
of circumstances from doing what has so often been done in the past. In
1803 the United States purchased Louisiana of France, and in 1819 they
purchased Florida of Spain. It is not within the competence of the
treaty-making power in 1852 effectually to bind the government in all
its branches, and for all coming time, not to make a similar purchase of
Cuba. There is an irresistible tide of affairs in a new country which
makes such a disposition of its future rights nugatory and vain.
America, but lately a waste, is filling up with intense rapidity, and is
adjusting on natural principles those territorial relations which, on
the first discovery of the continent, were, in a good degree,
fortuitous. It is impossible to mistake the law of American progress and
growth, or think it can be ultimately arrested by a treaty, which shall
attempt to prevent by agreement the future growth of this great
republic."
The good faith of this nation demands that we should live up to all our
treaties and agreements, so far as it is possible to do so; but when in
the course of events, and by reason of the fixed decrees of growth, we
are not able to do so, then it becomes us, in honor and fairness to
others, as well as to ourselves, to take immediate measures to modify,
and if necessary entirely rescind them, let the consequences be what
they may.
The genius of America is progressive, and the pluck and activity of the
average American is unsurpassed. Who shall say, then, that Central
America shall never become part of this Republic, which now increases
its population over a million each year? What statesman shall now in the
light of experience seek to bind this nation within the limits of a
treaty, that these United States will not annex, occupy, or colonize any
new territory? If the Nicaragua Canal shall ever be constructed, will
not American citizens settle along its line, and Yankee enterprise
colonize, and build Yankee towns, and convert that whole section into an
American state? Will not American principles and American institutions
be firmly planted there? And how long will it be before the laws of
progress shall require us to extend our jurisdiction and laws over our
citizens in Central America--even as we were obliged to do in Texas?
Perhaps not in our day and generation, but in the words of the lamented
Douglas, "So certain as this republic exists, so certain as we remain a
united people, so certain as the laws of progress, which have raised us
from a mere handful to a mighty nation, shall continue to govern our
action, just so certain are these events to be worked out, and you will
be compelled to extend your protection-in that direction. You may make
as many treaties as you please, to fetter the limits of this great
republic, and she will burst them all from her, and her course will be
onward to a limit which I will not venture to prescribe. Having met with
the barrier of the ocean in our western course, we may yet be compelled
to turn to the North and to the South for an outlet."
With a distinctly American policy, such as the Father of his Country
foreshadowed and advised, when in his farewell address he warned us
against "entangling alliances with foreign powers;" such as President
Monroe bequeathed to us in the declarations of the "Monroe Doctrine," we
shall be more likely to achieve honor and renown; national prosperity
and universal respect, than can ever be ours, while fettered and bound,
by the galling chains of an entangling, unwise, and unfair treaty.
* * * * *
THE DIVORCE LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
By Chester F. Sanger.
There evidently exists just at the present time a great and increasing
interest in the old and much debated subjects of divorce, and divorce
legislation; an interest which is intensified as the population of our
younger states with their widely varying laws governing this matter
increases and the dangers and opportunities for fraud grow more
apparent. Naturally enough, therefore, public attention is invited to
these different laws of the several states of our Union, some allowing
divorce for one cause, others refusing it upon the same ground, and one
state, at least, refusing to grant a divorce for any cause whatever. The
remedy for this seems to many to be a national divorce law, establishing
in all the states a uniform mode of procedure and a uniform basis upon
which all petitions for divorce must be grounded; it must also fix the
status of the parties in every state and prescribe the several property
rights of each after the entry of the judicial decree which separates
them from a union, not of God, as some would try to teach, but often
from fetters, the weight and horror of which are known to the parties
alone, or to those, who, unlike our theoretical reformers, have had some
practical experience in the actual operation of our divorce courts.
While it is a fact, overlooked by the enthusiasts on this subject, that
no such national law can be passed without an amendment to the
constitution, since the passage of such an act would be an invasion of
the rights reserved to the several states; yet in view of this
widespread interest in the question, the development and present
condition of the laws regulating divorce in our own Commonwealth becomes
an interesting matter of inquiry. While such a discussion has little or
nothing to do directly with the moral aspects of the subject, it is well
to note in passing that the doctrine of the indissolubility of the
marriage relation was not made a tenet of the church until as late as
1653. The Mosaic Law made the husband the sole judge of the cause for
which the woman might lawfully be "put away," and many Bibical scholars
of great attainments have maintained that when rightly interpreted the
words of Christ do not restrict divorce to the single cause of actual
adultery, while elsewhere in the New Testament divorce for desertion is
expressly sanctioned.
The Roman Catholic Church, while it pronounced the marriage tie
indissoluble, at the same time reserved to the Pope the right to grant
absolute divorce, a right which was often exercised for reward, while
her Ecclesiastical Courts in the meantime declared many marriages null
and void upon so-called impediments established solely upon the
confession of one or the other of the parties seeking divorce. This
course is hard to explain satisfactorily if we admit a sincere belief in
the justice of her own dogma. It was from this practice of the Church
that came the custom of granting partial divorce, or, as it was termed,
divorce from bed and board--a divorce which was one only in name, and
made a bad matter worse, surrounding both parties with temptations, and
being, as it has been said, an insult to any man of ordinary feelings
and understanding. It was, to be sure, an attempt to comply with the
established doctrine of the Church, but it was a compromise with
common-sense. To this same source may be traced the curious procedure in
England, known as a suit for the restoration of conjugal rights, wherein
a husband or wife, who, being unable to obtain a a genuine divorce, had
separated from his or her partner for cause, might be compelled by the
power of the law to return to the "bliss too lightly-esteemed."
There is one state in our Union in which, as one of her Judges puts it,
"to her unfading honor," not a single divorce has been granted for any
cause since the Revolution. But the fact remains, not so much to her
unfading honor, perhaps, that she has found it necessary to regulate by
statute the proportion of his property which a married man may bestow
upon his concubine, while at the same time adultery is not an indictable
offence. Another of her Judges has said from the bench, "We often see
men of excellent characters unfortunate in their marriages, and virtuous
women abandoned or driven away houseless by their husbands, who would be
doomed to celibacy and solitude if they did not form connections which
the law does not allow, and who make excellent husbands and wives
still."
This judicial utterance makes an excellent basis for the statement that
it is better to adapt the law to facts as we find them, than to proceed
on the principle that as there is no redress called for save where there
is a wrong, if we do not allow the redress, there will, of course, be no
wrong. There is no escape from the conclusion that divorce or irregular
connections will prevail in every community; why not agree with Milton
that honest liberty is the greatest foe to dishonest license?
When the founders of the new Commonwealth came to these shores they
brought with them of necessity the laws of the mother country, and so we
shall find that the divorce laws of England, as they existed at that
time, were the early laws of the colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts
Bay. The Ecclesiastical courts of England were invested with full
jurisdiction of all matters of divorce, but from about the year 1601
they had steadily refused to grant an absolute divorce for any cause
whatever, although they as constantly granted divorce from bed and
board, allusion to which has already been made; that is, they decreed a
judicial separation of man and wife, which freed the parties from the
society of each other, but at the same time left upon them all the
obligations of the marriage vow as to third parties. Finally, when
divorce was sought for cause of adultery, resort was had to parliament,
and in 1669 an absolute divorce for that cause was granted by that body
for the first time. This mode of procedure was, of course, a most
expensive one, and during the seventeenth century but three decrees
absolute were granted, the parties in each belonging to the peerage and
the cause being the same.
In cases arising in the early history of the colonies we should
therefore expect to find the law as I have briefly sketched it as
existing in England, and as there were then no courts exercising the
functions of the Ecclesiastical Courts we might safely look for the
exercise of these powers by the Court of Deputies, or General Court,
which was at that time not simply a deliberative body, but also a court
of most extensive and varied jurisdiction, in matters both civil and
criminal. This was precisely the fact; the records show that in 1652
Mrs. Dorothy Pester presented to the General Court her petition for
leave to marry again, giving as her reason the fact that her husband had
sailed for England some ten years before, and had not been heard from
since. The court decreed that liberty be granted her to marry, "when God
in his providence shall afford her the opportunity." In 1667 the same
court refused to grant a like petition, for the reason that they were
not satisfied by the evidence that the husband had not been heard from
for three years.
One year prior to this appears the first record of a divorce in the
Plymouth colony, which, taken in connection with the two cases just
referred to, throws a bright light on the unwritten laws then regulating
this matter. Elizabeth, wife of John Williams, appeared with a petition
asking for a divorce, and complaining of her husband because of his
great abuse of, and "unaturall carryages towards her, in that by word
and deed he had defamed her character and had refused to perform his
duty towards her according to what the laws of God and man requireth."
Her husband appeared and demanded trial of the issue by jury, who found
the complaint to be just and true. Thereupon the deputies "proseeded to
pase centance" against him as follows: "that it is not safe or
convenient for her to live with him and we doe give her liberty att
present to depart from him unto her friends untill the court shall
otherwise order or he shall behave himself in such a way that she may be
better satisfyed to returne to him againe." He must also "apparell her
suitably at present and provide her with a bed and bedding and allow her
ten pounds yearly to maintaine her while she shall bee thus absent from
him," and to ensure the faithful performance of the decree of the court
he must "put in cecurities" or one third of his estate must be secured
to her comfort. As he has also defamed his wife and otherwise abused
her, it is further decreed that he must stand in the market place near
the post, with an inscription in large letters over his head which shall
declare to all the world his unworthy behavior towards his wife. And as
though the poor man was not yet sufficiently punished they go on to say
that "Inasmuch as these his wicked carriages have been contrary to the
lawes of God and man, and very disturbing and expensive to this
government, we doe amerce him to pay a fine of twenty pounds to the use
of the Colonie." One is inclined to think upon reading this rather
severe "centance" that if the law of our day was somewhat similar the
divorce docket would not be so long as at present.
I have cited this case at considerable length for the reason that it
shows that the divorces then granted, even in aggravated cases, were
from bed and board, and that the right of the wife to a certain portion
of the property of her husband was recognized and enforced. The other
cases show that cruel and abusive treatment and absence unexplained for
the term of three years were then as now considered good grounds on
which to seek separation.
The first legislation in our state bearing directly on our subject
appears to have been in 1692, when it it was provided that all
controversies concerning marriage and divorce should be heard and
determined by the Governor and Council, thus changing simply the
tribunal without affecting the existing laws. Curiously enough, although
the tribunal which should determine the controversies was thus fixed,
there was no provision made for enforcing its decrees, and it was thus
left practically powerless for sixty-two years, or until 1754, when this
defect in the law was remedied by a provision that refusal or neglect to
obey the decrees of the Governor and Council might be punished like
contempt of courts of law and equity by imprisonment.
In 1693 were passed the first statutes regulating the subject of
marriage in the colony, the preamble to which was as follows: "Although
this court doth not take in hand to determine what is the whole bredth
of the divine commandment respecting marriage, yet, for preventing the
abominable dishonesty and confusion which might otherwise happen,"
certain marriages are declared to be unlawful and the issue thereof
illegitimate, and severe and degrading punishments are provided for all
offenders, even although innocent of any wrong intent.
As the population of the colony increased and spread over the country at
a distance from Boston, the fact that the only court having jurisdiction
of matters of divorce and marriage was held only in that town was the
cause of ever-increasing inconvenience, and accordingly it was enacted
in 1786 that "whereas, it is a great expense to the people of this state
to be obliged to attend at Boston upon all questions of divorce, when
the same might be done within the counties where the parties live, and
where the truth might be better discovered by having the parties in
court," jurisdiction in all matters of divorce should be vested in the
Supreme Judicial Court, where it has ever since remained in spite of
efforts made at various times to give to other courts concurrent or even
exclusive jurisdiction. As the Supreme Judicial Court is now overworked,
and as it is not deemed advisable, for various reasons, to increase its
numbers, it is more than probable, in view of the increase in the number
of libels annually filed, that some modification of our laws will soon
be made which shall give the entire jurisdiction of this matter either
to the Superior Court or to the Judges of Probate in the several
counties. Governor Robinson called the attention of the Legislature to
the importance of some change in this direction in his last message, and
urged speedy action.
The act of 1786, above alluded to, fixed the causes of divorce at
two--adultery or impotency of either of the parties, but allowed a
divorce from bed and board for extreme cruelty. To this was added in
1810 the further cause of desertion, or refusal to furnish proper
support to the wife. To the two causes above named the Legislature of
1836 added a third, namely, the imprisonment of either party for the
term of seven years or more at hard labor.
In 1698 it had been provided that in case of three years' absence at
sea, when the voyage set out upon was not usually of more than three
months' duration, the man or woman whose relation was in this way parted
from him might be considered single and unmarried. In 1838 wilful
desertion for five years was added to the then existing causes for
absolute divorce, in favor of the innocent party, and in 1850 yet
another cause was added by providing that if either party separated from
the other and for three years remained united with any religious sect or
society believing or professing to believe that the relation of husband
and wife is void and unlawful, a full divorce might be granted to the
other.
The law remained thus for ten years, or until the adoption of the
General Statutes in 1860, when desertion for five years was made ground
for granting a divorce to the deserting party also, provided it could be
shown that such desertion was due to the cruelty of the other, or in
case of the wife, to the failure of the husband to properly provide for
her. Divorce from bed and board was also authorized for extreme cruelty,
complete desertion, gross and confirmed habits of intoxication, if
contracted after the marriage, and neglect of the husband to provide for
his wife. Such limited divorces might be made absolute after five years'
separation, on petition of the party to whom the divorce was granted,
and after ten years on that of the guilty party. There was no change in
these laws until 1870, when limited divorce, a relic of churchly
superstition, was done away with entirely in this State, the grounds
upon which it had been granted being at the same time made cause for
absolute divorce, with the condition, however, that all such divorces
should be in the first instance _nisi_, that is, conditional, to be
made absolute after three years in the discretion of the court, and
after five years as of right. Prior to this time, in 1867, it had been
enacted that all decrees of divorce should be first entered _nisi_,
to be made absolute in six months in the discretion of the court, and
this act of 1870 therefore left nine causes for absolute divorce; but in
all cases for cruelty, desertion, intoxication, or neglect or refusal to
support, the decree must remain conditional for at least three years.
Since that date there have been many changes in the statutes, but all in
the direction of regulating the entry of the decree, without affecting
the causes therefor, except that in 1873, habits of intoxication, even
if contracted before marriage, were made good grounds for a decree.
The law of 1841, which remained in force until 1853, forbad the marriage
of the party for whose fault divorce was granted during the lifetime of
the innocent partner; but in the latter year the court was authorized to
allow the guilty party, except in cases of adultery, to remarry; and in
1864 it was provided that even in such cases the guilty one might marry
after three years, unless actually tried and convicted of the crime. In
1873 even this restriction of three years was removed, and the law
remained so until 1881, when it was enacted that the guilty party in all
cases might marry after two years without the formality of applying to
the court for leave so to do.
From this brief review of the history of our law there is but one
conclusion to be drawn, that slowly but surely the doors to divorce have
been opened until it has become a comparatively easy matter to obtain
that relief which for so many years was absolutely refused. A few
statistics will illustrate this: In the year 1863 there were in the
state 10,873 marriages and 207 divorces; in 1882 there were 17,684
marriages and 515 divorces, or an increase in the former of 62.6 per
cent., and of the latter of 147.6 per cent., while the population of the
state increased in the same time 53.4 per cent. Since the legislation of
1870, which, as we have seen above, made divorce obtainable on nine
grounds, the increase in the number of decrees granted has been 36 per
cent., while in the same period marriages have increased but 20 per
cent.
During this twenty years 79 per cent. of all divorces granted were for
adultery and desertion, and of those granted for the first-mentioned
cause only a trifle over one-half were for the fault of the man; while,
contrary to a widely-prevalent belief, the record shows that of the
decrees entered for that cause the proportion is greater in the country
districts than in our cities. In the same period the highest ratio of
divorce to marriage has been one to twenty-three, and the lowest one to
thirty-three, the average for the whole time being one to thirty-one;
but in Suffolk County, comprising the cities of Boston and Chelsea and
the towns of Winthrop and Revere, the average has been only one to
forty-one and nine-tenths. These statistics are indeed startling, and
may be easily used as a foundation for an argument that our laws
governing the matter are far too lenient, since the number of divorces
is so apparently excessive.
But on the other hand is it not as fair an inference from all the facts,
that beyond and deeper than any provisions of the law there is something
wrong in society itself; that we must look for the real root of the
trouble in the influences which are operating upon our social life as a
people? Our Judges who administer the law are learned, of great
experience in the matter of weighing evidence, careful and
conscientious. The laws are carefully framed to prevent collusion
between the parties, and especially to render it difficult to obtain a
divorce for the groundless desertion of the party seeking the
separation; in fact they are far in advance of the laws of many of our
sister states, and it has been truly said that the divorce laws of this
Commonwealth have kept pace with the improved understanding of the
condition of the people, and have been wisely framed to meet the many
causes which exist in modern life to break up the domestic relations.
There is not one of our statutory causes for divorce which could be
stricken out without a certainty of inflicting legal cruelty in the
future. Of all our divorces nearly seventy per cent, are upon petition
of the wife; and it can be safely said that nearly all will agree that
to compel a woman to submit to the cruelty and brutalities of a drunken
or profligate husband, is not only inflicting upon her legal cruelty,
but has an influence which extends beyond the individual and is powerful
for evil upon those who are to come after us.
Strangely enough as our educational advantages have increased, as more
avenues of self support have been opened to women, so has the ratio of
divorce to marriage also grown larger, thus apparently furnishing
conclusive proof that it is not legislative reform that is now needed.
It is not necessary to argue that no legislation can operate in any way
to strengthen those family ties which have their foundation in the
social and domestic affections. On the other hand, any thing in the
direction of education of the young tending to strengthen love of home
and domestic life, and to do away with the prevalent tendency to what
has been termed individualism, will be a step in the right path and will
aid in lessening the evils which so many wrongly ascribe to faulty
legislation. If any further proof of this fact is needed it is found in
the knowledge that by far the larger part of the seekers for relief come
from our native population, while none but those who have some practical
experience in the realities of the divorce court room can know how
intolerable are the burdens from which this relief is sought.
* * * * *
SHEM DROWNE AND HIS HANDIWORK.
By Elbridge H. Goss.
The weird imaginings and romantic theories of our great story-teller,
Hawthorne, must not be taken as veritable and indisputable history.
Some of the Boston newspapers have recently run riot in this respect.
Hawthorne, in his "Drowne's Wooden Image," in "Mosses from an Old
Manse," says the figure of "Admiral Vernon," which has stood on the
corner of State and Broad streets, Boston, for over a century, was the
handiwork of one Shem Browne, "a cunning carver of wood." Upon this
statement of the romancer, for there is no authentic history to warrant
it, one paper, in an article entitled "A Funny Old Man," says: "Deacon
Shem Drowne, the Carver. Concerning the origin of the carved figure of
Admiral Vernon there can be no doubt. History, ancient records, and
fiction all record the presence in Boston of one Deacon Shem Drowne,
whose business it was to supply the tradesmen and tavern-keepers of the
day with similar carved images to indicate their calling, or by which to
identify their places of business."[1]
Another, discoursing of this same image, as "Our Oldest Inhabitant,"
after attributing it to the same man's workmanship, states: "Deacon Shem
Drowne, whose name suggests pious and patriarchal, if not nautical
associations, carved the grasshopper which still holds its place over
Faneuil Hall, and also the gilded Indian,[2] who, with his bow bent and
arrow on the string, so long kept watch and ward over the Province
House, the stately residence of the royal Governors of Massachusetts."[3]
This writer repeatedly spells the name wrong. His name was Drowne, not
Droune.[4] In "Drowne's Wooden Image," Hawthorne makes his Shem Drowne a
wood-carver, plain and simple: "He became noted for carving ornamental
pump heads, and wooden urns for gate posts, and decorations, more
grotesque than fanciful, for mantle pieces." "He followed his business
industriously for many years, acquired a competence, and in the latter
part of his life attained to a dignified station in the church, being
remembered in records and traditions as Deacon Drowne, the carver," and
he connects him with the real Shem Drowne of history, only by speaking
of him this once as "Deacon Drowne," and saying: "One of his
productions, an Indian Chief, gilded all over, stood during the better
part of a century on the cupola of the Province House, bedazzling the
eyes of those who looked upward, like an angel of the sun;" plainly
indicating that he thought the Indian was carved from wood, instead of
being made, as it was, of hammered copper.
The real Shem Drowne was not a wood-carver; no authority for such a
statement can be found. His trade is given as that of a "tin plate
worker,"[5] and a "cunning artificer" in metal;[6] nowhere as a
wood-carver. He was born in Kittery, Maine, in 1683. His father was
Leonard Drowne, who came from the west of England to Kittery, where he
carried on the ship building business until 1692, when, on account of
the French and Indian wars, he removed his family to Boston, where he
died, a few years after, and his grave is in the old Copp's Hill Burying
Ground.[7] At Boston Shem Browne established himself in his trade. He
was elected a deacon of the First Baptist Church, in 1721. He was "often
employed in Town affairs, especially in the management of
Fortifications."[8]
He married Catherine Clark, one of the heirs of Nicholas Bavison, of
Charlestown, who was a purchaser in the "Pemaquid Patent," or grant of
the Plymouth Company, of some twelve thousand acres, to Messrs.
Aldsworth and Elbridge of Bristol, England, made in 1631. Becoming
interested in the claim of his wife, as one of the heirs, in 1735, he
was appointed agent and attorney of the "Pemaquid Proprietors," in which
capacity he acted for many years. It was sometimes called the "Drowne
Claim." In 1747 he had the whole tract of land surveyed, and was
instrumental in causing forty or more families to settle in that region.
That he became blind, or nearly so, as early as 1762, is attested by a
deed of land at Broad Cove (Bristol, Maine), made in that year to Thomas
Johnston; a note in the margin of which states that it was "distinctly
read to him on account of his sight;"[9] but the signature is written in
a large, plain hand. He died January 13, 1774, aged ninety-one years. He
had a daughter, Sarah, who, in 1757, was married to Rev. Jeremiah Condy,
who, from 1739 to 1764, was pastor of the First Baptist Church, of which
church Mr. Drowne was a deacon. As a metal worker he made the
grasshopper, Indian, and other vanes; but that he ever carved a pump
head, urn, gate-post, "Admiral Vernon," or any other wooden image, there
is not a scintilla of evidence; nothing but the figment of a romancer's
brain.
The following letter to his nephew, Honorable Solomon Drowne of
Providence, Rhode Island, is here printed by the kindness of Henry T.
Drowne, Esq., of New York, who has many of the old papers of the Drowne
families. It was written soon after his nephew's marriage, and is an
interesting document; full of a sympathetic and kindly spirit; showing
that the customs of his church, the Baptist, of that day, were very
similar to those of the Evangelical churches of to-day; and gives an
instance of "Catholic Christian Spirit" worthy of note. The use of the
colon instead of the period is also noticeable:
BOSTON [Massachusetts],
August y'e 18, 1732.
LOVING KINSMAN:
Yours I received and have considered the Contents, and pray that your
spouse may be directed and assisted by the grace and holy spirit of
God to live in all good conscience before Him and this being the
indispensable Duty of everyone when come to the use of Reason, with
all seriousness to search the Scriptures, from thence to learn our
Duty; and, then with Humility to devote ourselves to God, which is our
reasonable Service; and, this being the awfulest solemnity that poor
mortal man ever transacts in, whilst in this world: being to enter into
Covenant with the Most High God. In the Concernment of a precious soul
for a vast Eternity, ought to be entered upon with earnest prayer to
God for his grace, that it may be sufficient for us, and that His
strength might be made perfect in weakness: As for the order in which
our Church admits Members into Communion: the Person who desires to
joyn to the Church stands propounded a fortnight, in which time inquiry
is made concerning their Life and Conversation: then they appear before
the Church, make _Confession_, with their mouth, of their Repentance
toward God, and their faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ: and, if
nothing appears by information contrary to their _Confession_, then
they are approved of by a vote of the Church, with all readiness; and
so partake of the Holy ordinances--Baptism and the Lord's Supper.
Our breaking-bread day is always on the first Sabbath in every month,
and, always on the Friday before it, we have a Church Meeting, which is
carried on by prayer, in order to prepare for our approach to the Lord's
table: at which Meetings _those_ are sometimes heard and sometimes
on the Sabbath, as circumstances best serve--so that any Person at a
Distance may send to our minister to propound them to the Church timely,
and order their coming, so as to partake of both ordinances on the same
day: The Reverend Mr. Cotton of Newton, on occasion of a man of his
Parish desiring to join in Communion with our Church, gave him a Letter
of Recommendation, not as a member with him, but as of one in Judgment
of Charity qualified by the grace of God to be received amongst us:
which the Church received as a mark of his Catholic Christian Spirit.
That you and your spouse may be directed to do what may be most for
the glory of God: and for your own Peace and Comfort, both for time
and Eternity: that you may both walk in all the commands and ordinances
of the Lord blameless is the Prayer and Desire of your loving uncle.
SHEM DROWNE.
Two of the three best known weather vanes made by Drowne, are still on
duty; and one, the Indian chief, which for so many years decked the
Province House, is now the property of the Massachusetts Historical
Society, in one of the rooms of which it is to be seen, still swinging
on its original pivot. From the sole of his foot to the top of his
plume, it is four feet, six inches; and from his elbow to tip of arrow,
four feet; weight forty-eight pounds.
The old grasshopper on Fanueil Hall[10] was made in 1742, and has veered
with the winds and been beaten by the storms of one hundred and forty
odd years. It was last repaired in 1852, when there was found within it
a much-defaced paper, only a part of which could be read:
SHEM DROWNE MADE ITT
May 25, 1742
To my Brethren and Fellow Grasshoppers
Fell in y'e year 1755 Nov 15th day from y'e Market by a great Earthquake
... sing ... sett a ... by my old Master above.
Again Like to have Met with my Utter Ruin by Fire, but hopping Timely
from my Publick Situation came of with Broken bones, and much Bruised,
Cured and again fixed....
Old Master's Son Thomas Drowne June 28th, 1763. And Although I now
promise to Play ... Discharge my Office, yet I shall vary as ye
wind.[11]
The other one still in use is the old "Cockerel" of Hanover Street
Church fame. This was made for the New Brick Church in 1721, and is the
oldest of the three. It held its position on this church and its
successors, one of which was long known as the "Cockerel Church," for
one hundred and forty-eight years, when it was raised on the Shepard
Memorial Church of Cambridge, where it now is. "It measures five feet
four inches from bill to tip of tail, and stands five feet five inches
from the foot of the socket to the top of comb, and weighs one hundred
and seventy-two pounds."[12]
Possibly some other specimens of the handiwork of this good Deacon Shem
Drowne are still in existence. Who knows?
[Footnote 1: Boston Globe, October 18, 1884.]
[Footnote 2: Neither of these were carved; they were both of metal.]
[Footnote 3: Boston Evening Record, January 10, 1885.]
[Footnote 4: Fac-similes of his signature are given in "Memorial History
of Boston," vol. II, p. 110, written in 1733, and in John Johnston's
"History of Bristol, Bremen and the Pemaquid Plantation," p. 466,
written in 1762.]
[Footnote 5: Johnston's "Bristol and Bremen."]
[Footnote 6: Samuel Adams Drake's "Old Landmarks of Boston," p. 135.]
[Footnote 7: Mss. letter of Henry T. Drowne, Esq., of New York.]
[Footnote 8: Samuel G. Drake's "History of Boston."]
[Footnote 9: History of "Bristol and Bremen."]
[Footnote 10: Drake in "Old Landmarks," says: "the grasshopper was long
thought to be the crest of the Faneuils."]
[Footnote 11: Boston Daily Advertiser, December 3, 1852.]
[Footnote 12: Historical and Genealogical Register, vol. XXVII, p. 422.]
* * * * *
THE WEDDING IN YE DAYS LANG SYNE.
By Rev. Anson Titus.
The story of courtship and marriage is ever fascinating. It is new and
fresh to the hearts of the youthful and aged. A few words upon the
marriage day in the early New England will not be without interest.
September 9, 1639, the General Court of Massachusetts Bay Colony passed
a law ordering intentions of marriage to be published fourteen days at
the public lecture, or in towns where there was no lecture the
"intention" was to be posted "vpon some poast standinge in publique
viewe." On this same day it was ordered that the clerks of the several
towns record all marriages, births and deaths. This was a wise
provision. It at once taught the people of the beginning and of the
designed stability of the new-founded government.
The course of true love did not run smooth in these early days any more
than to-day. Parents were desirous of having sons and daughters
intermarry with families of like social standing and respectability. But
the youth and maid often desired to exercise their own freedom and
choice. On May 7, 1651, the General Court ordered a fine and punishment
against those who "seeke to draw away y'e affections of yong maydens." In
the time of Louis XV, of France, the following decree was made: "Whoever
by means of red or white paint, perfumes, essences, artificial teeth,
false hair, cotton, wool, iron corsets, hoops, shoes, with high heels,
or false tips, shall seek to entice into the bonds of marriage any male
subject of his majesty, shall be prosecuted for witchcraft, and declared
incapable of matrimony." The fathers of New England may have made
foolish laws, but this one in France at a later time goes beyond them.
The seductive charms of the sexes they deemed could not be trusted.
Wonderment often comes to us of the thoughts and manners of the sage
law-makers when their youthful hearts were reaching out after another's
love.
The marriage day was celebrated with decorum. The entire community were
conversant of the proposed marriage, for the same had been read in
meeting and posted in "publique viewe." The earliest lawmakers of the
Colony were pillars in the church, and though they did not regard
marriage an ordinance over which the church had chief to say, yet they
desired an attending solemnity. In 1651 it was ordered that "there shall
be no dancinge vpon such occasions," meaning the festivities, which
usually followed the marriage, at the "ordinary" or village inn.
The marriage of widows made special laws needful. Property was held in
the name of the husband. The wife owned nothing, though it came from the
meagre dowry of her own father. When the husband died the widow had
certain rights as long as she "remained his widow." These rights were
small at best, though the estate may have been accumulated through years
of their mutual toil and hardships. We have notes of a number of cases,
but give only a few. We omit the names of the contracting parties.
"T---- C---- of A---- and H---- B---- of S----, widow were married
together, September y'e 28th, 1748, before O---- B---- J.P. And at ye
same time y'e s'd H---- solemnly declared as in y'e presence of Almighty
God & before many witnesses, that she was in no way in possession of her
former husband's estate of whatever kind soever neither possession or
reversion." An excellent Deacon married an elderly matron, Dorothea
----, and before the Justice of Peace "Y'e s'd Dorothea declared she
was free from using any of her former husband's estate, and so y'e
s'd Nathaniel [the Deacon] received her." The following declarations
are not without interest. "Y'e s'd John B---- declared before marriage
that he took y'e s'd Hannah naked and had clothed her & that he took
her then in his own clothes separate from any interest of her former
husbands." Again a groom declares: "And he takes her as naked and
destitute, not having nor in no ways holding any part of her former
husband's estate whatever." We have also the declaration of a widower on
marrying a widow in 1702, who had property in her own name, probably
gained by will, "that he did renounce meddling with her estate." These
declarations evidence that the widow relinquished, and that the groom
received her without the least design upon the estate. It has been
intimated that in a few instances these declarations became a "sign,"
but we can hardly credit it. The "rich" widow was taken out of the
matrimonial problem.
The following affidavit is spread on the town records of Amesbury:
"Whereas Thomas Challis of Amesbury in y'e County of Essex in y'e
Province of y'e Massachsetts Bay in New England, and Sarah Weed,
daughter of George Weed in y'e same Town, County and Province, have
declared their intention of taking each other in marriage before
several public meetings of y'e people called Quakers in Hampton and
Amesbury, and according to y't good order used amongst them whose
proceeding therein after a deliberate consideration thereof with
regard to y'e righteous law of God and example of his people recorded
in y'e holy Scriptures of truth in that case, and by enquiry they
appeared clear of all others relating to marriage and having consent
of parties and relations concerned were approved by said meeting.
Now these certify whom it may concern y't for y'e full accomplishment
of their intention, this twenty-second day of September being y'e year
according to our account 1727, then they the s'd Thom's Challis and
Sarah Weed appeared in a public assembly of y'e afores'd people and
others met together for that purpose at their public meeting-house
in Amesbury afores'd and then and there he y'e s'd Thom's Challis
standing up in y'e s'd assembly taking y'e s'd Sarah Weed by y'e hand
did solemnly declare as followeth:
Friends in y'e fear of God and in y'e presence of this assembly whom I
declare to bear witness, that I take this my Friend Sarah Weed to be my
wife promising by y'e Lord's assistance to be unto her a kind and loving
husband till death, or to this effect; and then and there in y'e s'd
assembly she y'e said Sarah Weed did in like manner declare as follweth:
Friends in y'e fear of God and presence of this assembly whom I declare
to bear witness that I take this my Friend Thom's Challis to be my
husband promising to be unto him a faithful and loving wife till death
separate us, or words of y'e same effect. And y'e s'd Thom's Challis
and Sarah Weed, as a further confirmation thereof did then and there to
these presents set their hands, she assuming y'e name of her husband. And
we whose names are hereto subscribed being present amongst others at
their solemnizing Subscription in manner afores'd have hereto set our
names as witness."
Then follow the names of groom and bride, relatives on either side, and
then the names of members in the assembly, first the "menfolks," then
the "womenfolks." The names all told are forty-one. Among them is that
of Joseph Whittier, which name with those of Challis and Weed have long
been honored names in Amesbury.
The marriage gift to the husband on the part of his parents was usually
a farm, a part of the homestead; the dowry to the young bride from her
parents was a cow, a year's supply of wool, or something needful in
setting up house-keeping. If the homestead farm was not large the young
couple were brave enough to encounter the labors and toils of frontier
life, and begin for themselves on virgin soil and amid new scenes. It
required bravery on the part of the young bride. But there were noble
maidens in those days. The cares and duties of motherhood soon followed,
but the house-cares and the maternal obligations were performed to the
admiration of later generations. The fathers and mothers of New England
were strong and hardy. Their praises come down to us. Witnesses new and
ancient testify of their worth and royalty of character.
* * * * *
A REMINISCENCE OF COL. FLETCHER WEBSTER.
In a private conversation with the writer not long since General
Marston, of New Hampshire, related the following story:
"On the morning of the thirtieth of August, 1862, before sunrise, I was
lying under a fence rolled up in a blanket on the Bull Run battle-field.
It was the second day of the Bull Run battle. My own regiment, the
Second New Hampshire Volunteers, had been in the fight the day before
and had lost one-third of the entire regiment in killed and wounded.
"While so lying by the fence some one shook me and said, 'Get up here.'
In answer I said, without throwing the blanket from over my head, 'Who
in thunder are you?' The answer was made, 'Get up here and see the
Colonel of the Massachusetts Twelfth.'
"The speaker then partly pulled the blanket off my head and I saw that
it was Colonel Fletcher Webster; whereupon I arose, and we sat down
together and I sent my orderly for coffee.
"We sat there drinking the coffee and talking about his father, Daniel
Webster, and he told me about his father going up to Franklin every year
and always using the same expression about going. He would say
'Fletcher, my son, let us go up to Franklin to-morrow; let us have a
good time and leave the old lady at home. Let us have a good old New
Hampshire dinner--fried apples and onions and pork.' At about that time
the Adjutant of Colonel Webster's regiment came along and told him that
the General commanding his brigade wanted to see him. Colonel Webster
replied that he would be there shortly.
"As he sat there on the blanket with me he took hold of his left leg
just below the knee with both hands and said: 'There, I will agree to
have my leg taken off right there for my share of the casualties of this
day.' I replied: 'I would as soon be killed as lose a leg; and the
chances are a hundred to one that you won't be hit at all.' 'Well,' said
he as he gave me his hand, 'I hope to see you again; goodbye.' I never
saw him again. He was killed that day. His extreme sadness, his
depression, was perhaps indicative of a conviction or presentiment of
some impending misfortune."
* * * * *
OLD DORCHESTER.
By Charles M. Barrows.
The quaint old Puritan annalist, James Blake, wrote as a preface to his
book of records:
"When many most Godly and Religious People that Dissented from y'e way
of worship then Established by Law in y'e Realm of England, in y'e Reign
of King Charles y'e first, being denied y'e free exercise of Religion
after y'e manner they professed according to y'e light of God's Word and
their own consciences, did under y'e Incouragment of a Charter Granted
by y'e S'd King, Charles, in y'e Fourth Year of his Reign, A.D. 1628,
Remoue themselues & their Families into y'e Colony of y'e Massachusetts
Bay in New England, that they might Worship God according to y'e light
of their own Consciences, without any burthensome Impositions, which was
y'e very motive & cause of their coming; Then it was, that the First
Inhabitants of Dorchester came ouer, and were y'e first Company or
Church Society that arriued here, next y'e Town of Salem who was one
year before them."
Nonconformity, then, was the "very motive and cause" which settled
Dorchester, the oldest town but one in Puritan New England, and planted
there a sturdy yeomanry to whom freedom of conscience was more than home
and dearer than life. Nor was this "vast extent of wilderness" to which
they succeeded by right of purchase from the heirs of Chickatabat any
such narrow area as that of the same name, recently annexed to the city
of Boston. It extended from what is now the northern limit of South
Boston to within a hundred and sixty rods of the Rhode Island line, thus
giving the township a length of about thirty-five miles "as y'e road
goethe." The late Ellis Ames, of Canton, a competent authority, says the
town "was formerly bounded by Boston, Roxbury, Dedham, Wrentham,
Taunton, Bridgewater and Braintree," so that its history is the history
of a large part of the towns in Norfolk county and a portion of Bristol.
The manner in which the original territory has been gradually reduced is
thus told by Mr. Ames: "Milton was set off in 1662; part of Wrentham, in
1724: Stoughton, in 1726; Sharon, in 1765; Foxborough, in 1778; Canton,
in 1797; strips were also set off to Dedham, probably, in 1739; and
before the whole was annexed, portions of the northern part of the town
were set off to Boston, at two several times: in 1804 and in 1855."
Since that date another portion has been severed to make the northern
quarter of Hyde Park. Honorable John Daggett, the historian of
Attleborough, which was then a part of the Rehoboth North Purchase, says
there was a dispute concerning the boundary between Dorchester and that
town, which was finally settled by a conference of delegates, held at
the house of one of his ancestors.
Why those "most Godly and Religious People" chose to settle where they
did rather than on the Charles river, as at first intended, Mr. Blake
proceeds to tell us in his annals. He says they made the voyage from
England to New England in a vessel of four hundred tons, commanded by
Captain Squeb, and that they had "preaching or expounding of the
Scriptures every day of their passage, performed by Ministers." Contrary
to their desires, the ship discharged them and their goods at Nantasket,
but they procured a boat in which part of the company rowed into Boston
harbor and up the Charles river, "until it became narrow and shallow,"
when they went ashore at a point in the present village of Watertown.
But after exploring the open lands about Boston, they finally made
choice of a neck of land "joyning to a place called by y'e Indians
Mattapan," because it formed a natural inclosure for the cattle they had
brought with them, and which, if turned into the open land, would be
liable to stray and be lost. This little circumstance fixed the original
settlement on the marsh now known as Dorchester Neck.
The honor of the name Dorchester appears to belong to Rev. John White,
minister of a town of the same name in the mother country, who planned
and encouraged the exodus to America. But the hardy little band of
exiles who received the title from old Cutshumaquin, the successor of
Chickatabat, little knew what their wild territory was destined to
become in the course of a hundred years. They were loyal subjects of the
English throne, building their log cabins and rude meeting-house on
Allen's Plain under protection of a charter from King Charles; there
they hoped to found a permanent town, where the worship of God should be
maintained in accordance with the dictates of the Puritan conscience,
without interference of churchman, Roman Catholic, Baptist, or Quaker.
There was room in the unexplored forests to the south for pasturage and
for the overflow, whenever, as Cotton Mather said when the whole state
contained less than six thousand white inhabitants, "Massachusetts
should be like a hive overstocked with bees."
The first meeting-house in Dorchester, a very unpretentious structure of
logs and thatch, was completed in 1631, and no free-holder was allowed
to plant his domicile farther than the distance of half a mile from it,
without special permission of the fathers of the town. It stood near the
intersection of the present Pleasant and Cottage streets, and that
portion of the former highway between Cottage and Stoughton streets is
supposed to have been the first road laid out in the early settlement.
Shortly after, this road was extended to Five Corners in one direction,
and to the marsh, then called the Calf Pasture, in the other. The
present names of these extensions are Pond street and Crescent avenue.
From Five Corners a road was subsequently laid out running, north-east
to a point a little below the Captain William Clapp place, where there
was a gate which closed the entrance to Dorchester Neck, where the
cattle were pastured. It was on this street that Rev. Richard Mather,
the first minister of the town, Roger Williams, of Rhode Island fame,
and other distinguished citizens resided. The next undertaking in the
way of public improvements was the building of two important roads, one
leading to Penny Ferry, thus opening a highway of communication with the
sister Colony at Plymouth; the other leading to Roxbury, Brookline and
Cambridge.
In Josselyn's description of the town soon after its settlement may be
read:
"Six myles from Braintree lyeth Dorchester, a frontire Town, pleasantly
situated and of large extent into the maine land, well watered with two
small rivers, her body and wings filled somewhat thick with houses, ...
accounted the greatest town heretofore in New England, but now giving
way to Boston."
Through what hardships and privations this infant freehold was
maintained can be understood by those only, who have read the records of
the colonial struggle against a sterile soil, a rigorous climate, grim
famine, hostile Indians, and a total lack of all the appliances and
comforts of civilization. The years 1631 and 1632 were a period of great
distress to the Dorchester farmers, on account of the failure of their
crops and supplies of provision, and Captain Clapp wrote concerning it:
"Oh! y'e Hunger that many suffered and saw no hope in an Eye of Reason
to be Supplied, only by Clams & Muscles, and Fish; and _Bread_ was
very Scarce, that sometimes y'e very Crusts of my Fathers Table would
have been very sweete vnto me; And when I could have _Meal & Water &
Salt_, boyled together, it was so good, who could wish better. And it
was not accounted a strange thing in those Days to Drink Water, and to
eat _Samp_ or _Homine_ without Butter or Milk. Indeed it would
have been a very strange thing to see a piece of Roast Beef, Mutton, or
Veal, tho' it was not long before there was Roast _Goat_."
In 1740, the same year that Whitefield visited New England, on his
evangelistic mission, the crops were again cut off by untimely frosts,
and Mr. Blake wrote in his annual entry-book: "There was this year an
early frost that much Damnified y'e Indian Corn in y'e Field, and after
it was Gathered a long Series of wett weather & a very hard frost vpon
it, that damnified a great deal more."
It is not unfair to suppose that the habits of rigid economy learned in
this school of adversity influenced the passage of the celebrated law
against wearing superfluities, quite as much as their austere prejudice
against display. Be that as it may, the attention of the court was
called to the dangerous increase of lace and other ornaments in female
attire, and, after mature deliberation, it seemed wise to them to pass
the following wholesome law:
"Whereas there is much complaint of the wearing of lace and other
superflueties tending to little use, or benefit, but to the nourishing
of pride, and exhausting men's estates, and also of evil example to
others; it is therefore ordered that henceforth no person whatsoever
shall prsume to buy or sell within this jurisdiction any manner of lace
to bee worne ore used within o'r limits.
"And no taylor or any other person, whatsoever shall hereafter set any
lace or points vpon any garments, either linnen, woolen, or any other
wearing cloathes whatsoever, and that no p'son hereafter shall be
imployed in making any manner of lace, but such as they shall sell to
such persons but such as shall and will transport the same out of this
jurisdiction, who in such a case shall have liberty to buy and sell; and
that hereafter no garment shall be made w'th short sleeves, whereby the
nakedness of the arm may be discovered in the bareing thereof, and such
as have garments already made w'th short sleeves shall not hereafter
wear the same, unless they cover their armes with linnen or otherwise;
and that hereafter no person whatsoever shall make any garment for
women, or any of their sex, w'th sleeves more than halfe an elle wide in
y'e widest place thereof, and so proportionable for bigger or smaller
persons; and for the p'r sent alleviation of immoderate great sleeves
and some other superfluities, w'ch may easily bee redressed w'th out
much pr udice, or y'e spoile of garments, as immoderate great briches,
knots of ribban, broad shoulder bands and rayles, silk lases, double
ruffes and caffes, &c."
But the court did not confine itself to prescribing the size of a lady's
sleeves, or the trimming she might wear on her dress: it passed other
timely laws to restrain the idle and vicious and preserve good order
throughout the community. It was ordered in 1632 "that y'e remainder
of Mr. (John) Allen's strong water, being estimated about two gallandes,
shall be deliuered into y'e hands of y'e Deacons of Dorchester for
the benefit of y'e poore there, for his selling of it dyvers tymes to
such as were drunke by it, knowing thereof."
In 1638 the court passed a curious law regulating the use of tobacco,
which runs as follows:
"The Court finding since y'e repealing of y'e former laws against
tobacco y'e law is more abused than before, it hath therefore ordered
that no man shall take any tobacco in y'e field except in his iourney,
or meale times, vpon pain of 12'd for every offence, nor shall take any
tobacco in (or near) any dwelling house, barne, Corn or Haye, as may be
likely to endanger y'e fireing thereof, vpon paine of 2's for every
offence, nor shall take any tobacco in any Inne or common victualling
house; except in a private room there; so as neither the master of the
same house nor any other gueste there shall take offence thereat; w'ch
if they doo, then such p son is forth w'th to forebeare, vpon paine of
2's 6'd for every offence."
One office created by the court of that early period it might not be a
bad idea for the authorities of the present day to revive. Wardens were
appointed annually to "take care of and manage y'e affairs of y'e
School; they shall see that both y'e Master & Schollar, perform, their
duty, and Judge of and End any difference that may arrise between Master
& Schollar, or their Parents, according to Sundry Rules & Directions,"
set down for their guidance.
In all matters coming within the province and jurisdiction of the
colonial church the law was even more exacting than in merely civil
affairs; and singularly enough, the town authorities took it upon
themselves to seat all persons who attended divine service in the
meeting-house where it seemed to them most proper. With the full
approbation of the selectmen, responsible persons were sometimes allowed
to construct pews or seats for themselves and their families in the
meeting-house; but it appears on one occasion that three citizens
undertook to "make a seat in y'e meeting-house," without first getting
the full permission and consent of the town fathers, an act deemed
exceedingly sinful, and for which they were arraigned before the town at
a special meeting and publicly censured. After duly considering the case
it was decided to allow the seat to remain, provided it should not be
disposed of to any person but such as the town should approve of, and
that the offending parties acknowledge their "too much forwardness," in
writing, which they did in the following manner:
"We whose names are underwritten, do acknowledge that it was our
weakness that we were so inconsiderate as to make a small seat in the
meeting-house without more clear and full approbation of the town and
selectmen thereof, though we thought upon the conference we had with
some of the selectmen apart, and elders, we had satisfying ground for
our proceeding therein; w'ch we now see was not sufficent; therefore we
do desire that our failing therein may be passed by; and if the town
will grant our seat that we have been at so much cost in setting up, we
thankfully acknowledge your love unto us therein, and we do hereupon
further engage ourselves that we will not give up nor sell any of our
places in that seat to any person or persons but whom the elders shall
approve of, or such as shall have power to place men in seats in the
assembly.
[Signed]. INCREASE ATHERTON,
SAMUEL PROCTOR,
THOMAS BIRD.
At another time one Joseph Leeds, a member of the church, was accused of
maltreating his wife; the charge was sustained, and after the case had
been considered at several special meetings, it was settled by his
confessing and promising "to carry it more lovingly to her for time to
come." But Jonathan Blackman, another erring brother, was charged with
misdemeanors that could not be so easily overlooked; he was accused of
lying and also of stealing. He had been whipped for these offences, but
refused to come before the church for wholesome discipline, and ran away
out of the jurisdiction. Accordingly he was "disowned from his church
relation and excommunicated, though not deliuered up to Satan, as those
in full communion, but yet to be looked at as a Heathen and a Publican
unto his relations natural and civil, that he might be ashamed."
Another class of statutes--laws that have a queer sound in
nineteenth-century Massachusetts--were designed for the encouragement of
special public service. Here are examples of some of them:
"1638. For the better encouragement of any that shall destroy wolves,
it is ordered that for every wolf any man shall take in Dorchester
plantation, he shall have 20's by the town, for the first wolf, 15's
for the second, and for every wolf afterwards, 10's besides the
Country's pay."
"1736. Voted, that whosoever shall kill brown rats, so much grown as
to have their hair on them, within y'e town of Dochester, y'e year
ensuing, until our meeting in May next, and bring in their scalps
with y'e ears on unto y'e town treasurer, shall be paid by y'e town
treasurer Fourpence for every rat's scalp."
The same year the town offered a bounty for the destroying of striped
squirrels.
Now that the recent death of Wendell Phillips brings freshly to mind the
bitter opposition with which the early champions of abolution were
treated in Boston and vicinity, it is pleasant to find in the musty
records of the Dochester Plantation emphatic evidence that they not only
recognized slavery as an evil, and the slave-trade as a heinous crime,
but that they set their faces like a flint against it. The traffic in
slaves began among the colonists in the winter of 1645-6, and in the
following November the court placed on record this outspoken
denunciation of the practice:
"The Gen'all Co'te conceiving themselves bound by y'e first opertunity
to bear Witness against y'e haynos & crying sin of man stealing, as also
to prscribe such timely redresse for what is past, and such a law for
y'e future as may sufficiently deter all others belonging to us to have
to do in such vile and odious courses, iustly abhored of all good and
iust men, do order y't y'e negro interpreter w'th others unlawfully
taken, be y'e first opertunity (at y'e charge of y'e country for psent),
sent to his native country in Ginny, & a letter w'th him of y'e
indignation of y'e Corte thereabout, and iustice hereof, desiring o'r
hono'red Gov'rnr would please put this order in execution."
How men so clear in their convictions of the rights of Africans could be
guilty of the most heartless injustice to Quakers and their friends, it
is not easy to explain; and yet they mercilessly persecuted one of their
own fellow-citizens, Nicholas Upsall, and made him an exile from his
home, for no greater crime than that of countenancing and befriending
members of the Society of Friends. He kept the Dorchester hostelry, and
was wont to entertain Quakers as he did any other decent people; but for
this he was apprehended and tried by the court, and sentenced to pay a
fine of £20 and be thrown into prison. Finally, finding it impossible to
entirely prevent his friends from holding intercourse with him, he was
banished from the settlement for the remainder of his life. That curious
book, "Persecutors Maul'd with their own Weapons," contains the
following account of the case:
"Nicholas Upsall, an old man full of years, seeing their (the
authorities) cruelty to the harmless Quakers that they had condemned
some of them to die, both he and elder Wisewell, or otherwise Deacon
Wisewell, members of the church in Boston, bore their testimonies in
public against their brethren's horrid cruelty to the said Quakers. And
the said Upsall declared that he did look at it as a sad forerunner of
some heavy judgment to follow upon the country; which they took so ill
at his hands, that they fined him twenty pounds and three pounds more at
another meeting of the court, for not coming to their meeting, and would
not abate him one grote, but imprisoned him and then banished him on
pain of death, which was done in a time of such extreme bitter weather
for frost, snow and cold, that had not the heathen Indians in the
wilderness woods taken compassion on his misery, for the winter season,
he in all likelihood had perished, though he had then a good estate in
houses and lands, goods and money, also a wife and children."
One of the officials who for a time had charge of poor Upsall during the
period of his imprisonment was John Capen, of whom the old chroniclers
have left a pleasanter record, namely, a transcript of several of his
youthful love-letters. The following will serve as sample:
"SWEETE-HARTE,
"My kind loue and affection to you remembered; hauinge not a convenient
opertunety to see and speake w'th you soe oft as I could desier, I
therefore make bold to take opertunety as occassione offers it selfe to
vissit you w'th my letter, desiering y't it may find acceptance w'th
you, as a token of my loue to you; as I can assuer you y't yours have
found from me; for as I came home from you y'e other day, by y'e way I
reseaued your letter from your faithfull messenger w'ch was welcom
vnto me, and for w'ch I kindly thanke you, and do desier y't as it is
y'e first: so y't may not be y'e last, but y't it may be as a seed
w'ch will bring forth more frute: and for your good counsell and
aduise in your letter specified, I doe accept, and do desier y't we may
still command y'e casse to god for direction and cleering vp of your way
as I hope wee haue hitherto done; and y't our long considerations may at
y'e next time bring forth firme concessions, I meane verbally though not
formally. Sweete-harte I have given you a large ensample of patience, I
hope you will learn this instruction from y'e same, namely, to show y'e
like toward me if euer occassion be offered for futuer time, and for
y'e present condesendency vnto my request; thus w'ch my kind loue
remembered to yo'r father and mother and Brothers and sisters w'th
thanks for all their kindness w'ch haue been vndeseruing in me I rest,
leauing both them and vs vnto y'e protection and wise direction of y'e
almighty.
"My mother remembers her love vnto y'or father and mother; as also
vnto your selfe though as it vnknown.
"Yo'rs to command in anything I pleas.
"JOHN CAPEN."
In this connection may very properly be given another letter written at
about the same date. Punkapoag, the summer residence of Thomas Bailey
Aldrich, the poet editor of the Atlantic, was a part of colonial
Dorchester and one of the points where the famous John Eliot began his
missionary labors among the Indians. In the interest of the natives at
that station he wrote the following letter to his friend, Major
Atherton, in 1657:
"Much Honored and Beloved in the Lord:
"Though our poore Indians are molested in most places in their meetings
in way of civilities, yet the Lord hath put it into your hearts to
suffer us to meet quietly at Ponkipog, for w'ch I thank God, and
am thankful to yourselfe and all the good people of Dorchester. And
now that our meetings may be the more comfortable and p varable, my
request is, y't you would further these two motions: first, y't you
would please to make an order in your towne and record it in your towne
record, that you approve and allow y'e Indians of Ponkipog there to sit
downe and make a towne, and to inioy such accommodations as may be
competent to maintain God's ordinances among them another day. My second
request is, y't you would appoint fitting men, who may in a fitt season
bound and lay out the same, and record y't alsoe. And thus commending
you to the Lord, I rest,
"Yours to serve in the service of Jesus Christ,
"JOHN ELIOT."
Following this missive a letter on quite a different subject, dictated
by the redoubtable Indian chief, King Philip, may be interesting. It
bears date of 1672, and is addressed to Captain Hopestill Foster of
Dorchester:
"S'r you may please to remember that when I last saw You att Walling
river You promised me six pounds in goods; now my request is that you
would send me by this Indian five yards of White light collered serge to
make me a coat and a good Holland shirt redy made; and a p'r of good
Indian briches all of which I have present need of, therefoer I pray S'r
faile not to send them by my Indian and with them the severall prices of
them; and silke & buttens & 7 yards Gallownes for trimming; not else att
present to trouble you w'th onley the subscription of
"KING PHILIP,
"his Majesty P.P."
One of the best commentaries on the lives and characters of the chief
actors in the history of the Dorchester Plantation may be read on the
tombstones that mark the places where their precious dust was deposited.
From Rev. Richard Mather, the most noted pastor of the church of that
period, to the humblest contemporary of his who enjoyed the rights and
priveleges of a free-holder, none was so mean or obscure that a
characteristic, if not fitting, epitaph did not mark the place of his
sepulture. From the many well worth perusing, the following are singled
and transcribed for the readers of this sketch.
Epitaph of James Humfrey, "one of y'e ruling elders of Dorchester," in
the form of an acrostic:
"I nclos'd within this shrine is precious dust.
A nd only waits ye rising of ye just.
M ost usefull while he liu'd, adorn'd his Station,
E uen to old age he Seur'd his Generation.
H ow great a Blessing this Ruling Elder be
U nto the Church & Town: & Pastors Three.
M ather he first did by him help Receiue;
F lynt did he next his burden much Relieue;
R enouned Danforth he did assist with Skill:
E steemed high by all; Bear fruit Untill,
Y eilding to Death his Glorious seat did fill."
When Elder Hopestill Clapp died his pastor, Rev. John Danforth, composed
the following verses for his grave stone:
"His Dust waits till ye Jubile,
Shall then Shine brighter than ye Skie;
Shall meet and join to part no more,
His soul that Glorify'd before.
Pastors and Churches happy be,
With Ruling Elders such as he;
Present useful, Absent Wanted,
Liv'd Desired, Died Lamented."
William Pole, an eccentric citizen of the village, before his demise,
composed an epitaph to be chiseled on his monument, "Y't so being dead
he might warn posterity; or, a resemblance of a dead man bespeaking y'e
reader;" so under a death's head and cross-bones it stands thus:
"Ho passenger 'tis worth your paines to stay
& take a dead man's lesson by ye way.
I was what now thou art & thou shall be
What I am now what odds twixt me and thee
Now go thy way but stay take one word more
Thy staff for ought thou knowest stands next ye door
Death is ye dore yea dore of heaven or hell
Be warned, Be armed, Believe, Repent, Fairewell."
The virtues of one who was "downright for business, one of cheerful
spirit and entire for the country" are recorded in this fashion:
"Here lyes ovr Captaine, & Major of Suffolk was withall:
A Goodley Magistrate was he, and Major Generall,
Two Troops of Hors with him here came, svch worth his loue did crave;
Ten Companyes of Foot also movrning marcht to his grave.
Let all that Read be sure to Keep the Faith as he has don.
With Christ his liues now, crowned, his name was Hvmfrey Atherton."
The following was written on the death of John Foster, who is mentioned
in the old annals as a "mathematician and printer":
"Thy body which no activeness did lack,
Now's laid aside like an old Almanack;
But for the present only's out of date,
'Twill have at length a far more active state.
Yes, tho' with dust thy body soiled be.
Yet at the resurrection we shall see
A fair EDITION, and of matchless worth.
Free from ERRATAS, new in Heaven set forth.
'Tis but a word from God the great Creator,
It shall be done when he saith Imprimator."
The clerk of the old Dorchester Church seems also to have been a maker
of elegiac verse; for after the decease of Rev. Richard Mather, the
pastor, and one of the ablest divines of colonial New England, the
church records contain the two complimentary stanzas quoted below, the
first being an evident attempt at anagram:
"Third in New England's Dorchester,
Was this ordained minister.
Second to none for faithfulness,
Abilities and usefulness.
Divine his charms, years seven times seven,
Wise to win souls from earth to heaven.
Prophet's reward his gains above,
But great's our loss by his remove."
Sacred to God his servant Richard Mather,
Sons like him, good and great, did call him father.
Hard to discern a difference in degree,
'Twixt his bright learning and his piety.
Short time his sleeping dust lies covered down,
So can't his soul or his deserved renown.
From 's birth six lustres and a jubilee
To his repose: but labored hard in thee,
O, Dorchester! four more than thirty years
His sacred dust with thee thine honour rears."
This couplet to three brothers named Clarke must suffice for epitaphs:
"Here lie three Clarkes, their accounts are even,
Entered on earth, carried up to Heaven."
Before taking leave of these fascinating old records, so rich in facts
and the stuff that fiction is made of, it will be interesting to have an
estimate of the growth of the Dorchester Plantation; for this purpose
the valuation of the town is given, a century from the date of its
settlement:
Houses, 117
Mills, 6
Acres of orchard, 250 1-2
Acres of mowing, 1834 1-4
Acres of pasture, 2873 1-2
Acres of tillage, 518 1-2
Male slaves, 10
Female slaves, 1
Oxen, 157
Cows, 661
Horses, 207
Sheep and goats, 661
Swine, 251
Value of feeding stock, etc., £431
Decked vessels, tons, 64
Open vessels, tons 68
====
132
Ratable polls, 252
Not ratable, 24
====
276
The tax for that year, assessed on real estate, was £72 16s 6d; on
personal estate, £9 14s 11d.
When all who took up the original claims on Allen's Plain had passed
through the vicissitudes of their troubled lives and been numbered with
the silent majority in the field of epitaphs, already alluded to, and
their descendents were on the eve of the great struggle which was
destined to sever them from the mother country, and the hearts of
patriotic men began to feel the premonitory throbs of that spirit of
independence soon to fire the first shot at Lexington, the Union and
Association of Sons of Liberty in the province held a grand celebration
in Boston, on the fourteenth of August, 1769. From John Adams's famous
diary we learn that this jovial company, including the leading spirits
of the time, first assembled at Liberty Tree, in Boston, where they
drank fourteen toasts, and then adjourned to Liberty Tree Tavern, which
was none other than Robinson's Tavern in Dorchester. There under a
mammoth tent in an adjacent field long tables were spread, and over
three hundred persons sat down to a sumptuous dinner. "Three large pigs
were barbecued," and "forty-five toasts were given on the occasion," the
last of which was, "Strong halters, firm blocks and sharp axes to all
such as deserve them." The toasts were varied with songs of liberty and
patriotism by a noted colonial mimic named Balch, and another song
composed and sung by Dr. Church. "At five o'clock," says Mr. Adams,
"the Boston people started home, led by Mr. Hancock in his chariot, and
to the honour of the Sons, I did not see one person intoxicated."
* * * * *
HOLLIS STREET CHURCH.
The demolition of Hollis Street Church in this city destroys another old
historic land-mark, which, like King's Chapel, the old State House, and
other venerable structures, have a record that endears them to the
popular heart. A brief sketch of the three buildings which have
successively occupied the site, which is so soon to be left vacant, is
worthy of preservation.
The name of the church and the street on which it stood was bestowed in
honor of Thomas Hollis, of London, noted for his liberal benefactions;
and his nephew of the same name devoted a bell for the edifice, in 1734.
The land on which the original structure was erected, was presented for
that purpose by Governor Belcher, in 1731; and in April of the same
year, by permission of the selectmen of Tri-Mountain, or Boston, a
wooden building, sixty feet long and forty feet wide, was began, which
was finished and dedicated in midsummer of the following year.
In the great South End fire, on the twentieth of April, 1787, and in
response to an imperative demand, a second, and larger wooden house, was
erected on the site of the first, and made ready for occupancy in the
course of the following year. This building was planned by Charles
Bulfinch, and in its architecture resembled St. Paul's Church, now
standing on Tremont street.
Within a year the Hollis Street Society has removed to an elegant new
edifice on the Back Bay, and the brick building they left behind must
now disappear in the march of improvement. It was erected in 1811, in
order to accommodate the prosperous and rapidly-growing society for whom
it stood as a place of worship. To make room for it, the wooden
meeting-house already referred to was taken down in sections and removed
to the town of Braintree.
The several clergymen who have been the honored pastors of Hollis Street
Church are worthy of mention in this connection. The first was Rev.
Mather Byles, a lineal descendant of John Cotton and Richard Mather, who
was ordained pastor, December 20, 1732. He was dismissed August 14,
1776, on account of his strong Tory proclivities. His immediate
successor was Rev. Ebenezer Wright, a young divine from Dedham and a
graduate of Harvard, who remained the pastor until the new meeting-house
was finished, in 1788, when he was dismissed at his own request, on
account of ill-health.
The next pastor was a man in middle life, who made himself an
acknowledged power among the Boston clergy, Rev. Samuel West, of
Needham. He died in 1808, and was succeeded by Rev. Horace Holley, from
Connecticut, who was installed in March, 1809, and remained till 1818.
Rev. John Pierpont, who resigned in 1845, made way for Rev. David
Fosdick, who preached there two years, when Rev. Starr King was settled
in 1845, and remained till 1861, Rev. George L. Chaney then took the
place till 1877, and was succeeded by Rev. H. Bernard Carpenter, the
present pastor.
* * * * *
ELIZABETH.[13]
A ROMANCE OF COLONIAL DAYS.
By Frances C. Sparhawk, Author of "A Lazy Man's Work."
CHAPTER XIII.--_Continued_.
Half an hour later Edmonson marched into his friend's room. His face was
flushed, and his eyes had a triumphant glitter. It was an expression
that heightened most the kind of beauty he had.
"You are booked for a visit, Bulchester," he began, seating himself in
the chair opposite the other. "I have accepted for you; knew you would
be glad to go with me."
"That is cool!" And Bulchester's light blue eyes glowed with anger for a
moment. His moods of resentment against his companion's domination,
though few and far between, were very real.
"Not at all. In fact it is a delightful place, and I don't know to what
good fortune we are indebted for an invitation. Neither of us has much
acquaintance with Archdale."
"Archdale? Stephen Archdale?"
"Yes. You look amazed, man. We are asked to meet Sir Temple and Lady
Dacre. I don't exactly see how it came about, but I do see that it is
the very thing I want in order to go on with the search. Another city,
other families."
"But--." Bulchester stopped.
"But what?"
"Why, the possible Mistress Archdale,--Elizabeth. Of course I am happy
to go, if you enjoy the situation."
A dangerous look rayed out from Edmonson's eyes.
"I can stand it, if Archdale can," he answered. "How fate works to bring
us together," he mused.
"I don't understand," cried the other. "What has fate to do with this
invitation?" Edmonson, who had spoken, forgetting that he was not alone,
looked at his companion with sudden suspicion. But Bulchester went on in
the same tone. "If it is to carry out your purpose though, little you
will care for having been a suitor of Mistress Archdale."
"On the contrary, it will add piquancy to the visit." Then he added,
"Don't you see, Bulchester, that I dare not throw away an opportunity?
Ship 'Number One' has foundered. 'Number Two' must come to land. That is
the amount of it."
"Yes," returned Bulchester with so much assurance that the other's
scrutiny relaxed.
"I suppose it is settled," said his lordship after a pause.
"Certainly," answered Edmonson; and he smiled.
Lady Dacre and train, having fairly started on their two day's journey,
she settled herself luxuriously and again began her observations. But as
they were not especially striking, no chronicle of them can be found,
except that she called Brattle Street an alley, begged pardon for it
with a mixture of contrition and amusement, and generally patronized the
country a little. Sir Temple enjoyed it greatly, and Archdale was glad
of any diversion. When they had stopped for the night, as they sat by
the open windows of the inn and looked out into the garden which was too
much a tangle for anything but moonlight and June to give it beauty,
Lady Dacre sprang up, interrupting her husband in one of his remarks,
and declaring it a shame to stay indoors such a night.
"Give me your arm," she said to Archdale, "and let us take a turn out
here. We don't want you, Temple; we want to talk."
Sir Temple, serenely sure of hearing, before he slept, the purport of
any conversation that his wife might have had, took up a book which he
had brought with him. He was an excellent traveler in regard to one kind
of luggage; the same book lasted him a good while.
Lady Dacre moved off with Stephen. They went out of the house and down
the walk. She commented on the neglected appearance of things until
Stephen asked her if weeds were peculiar to the American soil. In answer
she struck him lightly with her fan and walked on laughing. But when
they reached the end of the garden, she turned upon him suddenly.
"Now tell me," she said.
"Tell you what?"
"Tell me what, indeed! What a speech for a lover, a young husband. Has
the light of your honeymoon faded so quickly? Mine has not yet. Tell me
about her, of course, your charming bride."
Stephen came to a dead halt, and stood looking into the smiling eyes
gazing up into his.
"Lady Dacre," he said, "the Mistress Archdale you will find at Seascape
is my mother." Then he gave the history of his intended marriage, and of
that other marriage which might prove real. His listener was more moved
than she liked to show.
"It will all be right," she said tearfully. "But it is dreadful for you,
and for the young ladies, both of them."
"Yes," he answered, "for both of them."
"You know," she began eagerly, "that I am the----?" then she stopped.
Stephen waited courteously for the end of the sentence that was never to
be finished. He felt no curiosity at her sudden breaking off; it seemed
to him that curiosity and interest, except on one subject, were over for
him forever.
When Lady Dacre repeated this story to her husband she finished by
saying: "Why do you suppose it is, Temple, that my heart goes out to the
married one?"
"Natural perversity, my dear."
"Then you think she _is_ married?"
"Don't know; it is very probable."
"Poor Archdale!"
Sir Temple burst into a laugh. "Is he poor, Archdale, because you think
he has made the best bargain?"
"No, you heartless man, but because he does not see it. Besides, I
cannot even tell if it is so. I believe I pity everybody."
"That's a good way," responded her husband. "Then you will be sure to
hit right somewhere."
"I will remember that," returned Lady Dacre between vexation and
laughing, "and lay it up against you, too. But, poor fellow, he is so in
love with his pretty cousin, and she with him."
"Poor cousin! Is she like a certain lady I know who chose to be married
in a dowdy dress and a poke bonnet for fear of losing her husband
altogether?"
But Lady Dacre did not hear a word. She was listening to a mouse behind
the wainscotting, and spying out a nail-hole which she was sure was big
enough for it to come out of, and she insisted that her husband should
ring and have the place stopped up.
When the party reached Seascape the summer clouds that floated over the
ocean were beginning to glow with the warmth of coming sunset. The sea
lay so tranquil that the flash of the waves on the pebbly shore sounded
like the rythmic accompaniment to the beautiful vision of earth and sky,
and the boom of the water against the cliffs beyond came now and then,
accentuating this like the beat of a heavy drum muffled or distant. The
mansion at Seascape with its forty rooms, although new, was so
substantial and stately that as they drove up the avenue Lady Dacre,
accustomed to grandeur, ran her quick eye over its ample dimensions, its
gambrel roof, its immense chimneys, its generous hall door, and turning
to Archdale, without her condescension, she asked him how he had
contrived to combine newness and dignity.
"One sees it in nature sometimes," he answered. "Dignity and youth are a
fascinating combination."
In the hall stood a lady whom Archdale looked at with pride. He was fond
of his mother without recognizing a certain likeness between them. She
was dressed elegantly, although without ostentation, and she came
towards her guests with an ease as delightful as their own. Stephen
going to meet her, led her forward and introduced her. Lady Dacre looked
at her scrutinizingly, and gave a little nod of satisfaction.
"I am pleased to come to see you Madam Archdale," she said in answer to
the other's greeting. There was a touch of sadness in her face and the
clasp of her hand had a silent sympathy in it. It was as if the two
women already made moan over the desolation of the man in whom they both
were interested, though in so different degrees. But the tact of both
saved awkwardness in their meeting.
Archdale stood a little apart, silent for a moment, struggling against
the overwhelming suggestions of the situation. Even his mother did not
belong here; she had her own home. Perhaps it would be found that no
woman for whom he cared could ever have a right in this lovely house.
When these guests had gone he would shut up the place forever,
unless----. But possibilities of delight seemed very vague to Stephen as
he stood there in his home unlighted by Katie's presence. All at once he
felt a long keen ray from Sir Temple's eyes upon his face. That
gentleman had a fondness for making out his own narratives of people and
things; he preferred Mss. to print, that is, the Mss. of the histories
he found written on the faces of those about him, which, although
sometimes difficult to decipher, had the charm of novelty, and often
that of not being decipherable by the multitude. Stephen immediately
turned his glance upon Sir Temple.
"You are tired," he said with decision, "and Lady Dacre must be quite
exhausted, animated as she looks. But I see that my mother is already
leading her away. Let me show you your rooms."
Sir Temple's eyes had fallen, and with a bow and a half smile upon his
lips, he walked beside his host in silence.