My natal soil is Chester county. My father had a small farm, on which he
has been able, by industry, to maintain himself and a numerous family.
He has had many children, but some defect in the constitution of our
mother has been fatal to all of them but me. They died successively as
they attained the age of nineteen or twenty, and, since I have not yet
reached that age, I may reasonably look for the same premature fate. In
the spring of last year my mother followed her fifth child to the grave,
and three months afterwards died herself.
My constitution has always been frail, and, till the death of my mother,
I enjoyed unlimited indulgence. I cheerfully sustained my portion of
labour, for that necessity prescribed; but the intervals were always at
my own disposal, and, in whatever manner I thought proper to employ
them, my plans were encouraged and assisted. Fond appellations, tones of
mildness, solicitous attendance when I was sick, deference to my
opinions, and veneration for my talents, compose the image which I still
retain of my mother. I had the thoughtlessness and presumption of youth,
and, now that she is gone, my compunction is awakened by a thousand
recollections of my treatment of her. I was indeed guilty of no flagrant
acts of contempt or rebellion. Perhaps her deportment was inevitably
calculated to instil into me a froward and refractory spirit. My faults,
however, were speedily followed by repentance, and, in the midst of
impatience and passion, a look of tender upbraiding from her was always
sufficient to melt me into tears and make me ductile to her will. If
sorrow for her loss be an atonement for the offences which I committed
during her life, ample atonement has been made.
My father is a man of slender capacity, but of a temper easy and
flexible. He was sober and industrious by habit. He was content to be
guided by the superior intelligence of his wife. Under this guidance he
prospered; but, when that was withdrawn, his affairs soon began to
betray marks of unskilfulness and negligence. My understanding, perhaps,
qualified me to counsel and assist my father, but I was wholly
unaccustomed to the task of superintendence. Besides, gentleness and
fortitude did not descend to me from my mother, and these were
indispensable attributes in a boy who desires to dictate to his
gray-headed parent. Time, perhaps, might have conferred dexterity on me,
or prudence on him, had not a most unexpected event given a different
direction to my views.
Betty Lawrence was a wild girl from the pine-forests of New Jersey. At
the age of ten years she became a bound servant in this city, and, after
the expiration of her time, came into my father's neighbourhood in
search of employment. She was hired in our family as milkmaid and
market-woman. Her features were coarse, her frame robust, her mind
totally unlettered, and her morals defective in that point in which
female excellence is supposed chiefly to consist. She possessed
super-abundant health and good-humour, and was quite a supportable
companion in the hay-field or the barnyard.
On the death of my mother, she was exalted to a somewhat higher station.
The same tasks fell to her lot; but the time and manner of performing
them were, in some degree, submitted to her own choice. The cows and the
dairy were still her province; but in this no one interfered with her or
pretended to prescribe her measures. For this province she seemed not
unqualified, and, as long as my father was pleased with her management,
I had nothing to object.
This state of things continued, without material variation, for several
months. There were appearances in my father's deportment to Betty, which
excited my reflections, but not my fears. The deference which was
occasionally paid to the advice or the claims of this girl was accounted
for by that feebleness of mind which degraded my father, in whatever
scene he should be placed, to be the tool of others. I had no conception
that her claims extended beyond a temporary or superficial
gratification.
At length, however, a visible change took place in her manners. A
scornful affectation and awkward dignity began to be assumed. A greater
attention was paid to dress, which was of gayer hues and more
fashionable texture. I rallied her on these tokens of a sweetheart, and
amused myself with expatiating to her on the qualifications of her
lover. A clownish fellow was frequently her visitant. His attentions did
not appear to be discouraged. He therefore was readily supposed to be
the man. When pointed out as the favourite, great resentment was
expressed, and obscure insinuations were made that her aim was not quite
so low as that. These denials I supposed to be customary on such
occasions, and considered the continuance of his visits as a sufficient
confutation of them.
I frequently spoke of Betty, her newly-acquired dignity, and of the
probable cause of her change of manners, to my father. When this theme
was started, a certain coldness and reserve overspread his features. He
dealt in monosyllables, and either laboured to change the subject or
made some excuse for leaving me. This behaviour, though it occasioned
surprise, was never very deeply reflected on. My father was old, and the
mournful impressions which were made upon him by the death of his wife,
the lapse of almost half a year seemed scarcely to have weakened. Betty
had chosen her partner, and I was in daily expectation of receiving a
summons to the wedding.
One afternoon this girl dressed herself in the gayest manner and seemed
making preparations for some momentous ceremony. My father had directed
me to put the horse to the chaise. On my inquiring whither he was going,
he answered me, in general terms, that he had some business at a few
miles' distance. I offered to go in his stead, but he said that was
impossible. I was proceeding to ascertain the possibility of this when
he left me to go to a field where his workmen were busy, directing me to
inform him when the chaise was ready, to supply his place, while
absent, in overlooking the workmen.
This office was performed; but before I called him from the field I
exchanged a few words with the milkmaid, who sat on a bench, in all the
primness of expectation, and decked with the most gaudy plumage. I rated
her imaginary lover for his tardiness, and vowed eternal hatred to them
both for not making me a bride's attendant. She listened to me with an
air in which embarrassment was mingled sometimes with exultation and
sometimes with malice. I left her at length, and returned to the house
not till a late hour. As soon as I entered, my father presented Betty to
me as his wife, and desired she might receive that treatment from me
which was due to a mother.
It was not till after repeated and solemn declarations from both of them
that I was prevailed upon to credit this event. Its effect upon my
feelings may be easily conceived. I knew the woman to be rude, ignorant,
and licentious. Had I suspected this event, I might have fortified my
father's weakness and enabled him to shun the gulf to which he was
tending; but my presumption had been careless of the danger. To think
that such a one should take the place of my revered mother was
intolerable.
To treat her in any way not squaring with her real merits; to hinder
anger and scorn from rising at the sight of her in her new condition,
was not in my power. To be degraded to the rank of her servant, to
become the sport of her malice and her artifices, was not to be endured.
I had no independent provision; but I was the only child of my father,
and had reasonably hoped to succeed to his patrimony. On this hope I had
built a thousand agreeable visions. I had meditated innumerable projects
which the possession of this estate would enable me to execute. I had no
wish beyond the trade of agriculture, and beyond the opulence which a
hundred acres would give.
These visions were now at an end. No doubt her own interest would be, to
this woman, the supreme law, and this would be considered as
irreconcilably hostile to mine. My father would easily be moulded to
her purpose, and that act easily extorted from him which should reduce
me to beggary. She had a gross and perverse taste. She had a numerous
kindred, indigent and hungry. On these his substance would speedily be
lavished. Me she hated, because she was conscious of having injured me,
because she knew that I held her in contempt, and because I had detected
her in an illicit intercourse with the son of a neighbour.
The house in which I lived was no longer my own, nor even my father's.
Hitherto I had thought and acted in it with the freedom of a master; but
now I was become, in my own conceptions, an alien and an enemy to the
roof under which I was born. Every tie which had bound me to it was
dissolved or converted into something which repelled me to a distance
from it. I was a guest whose presence was borne with anger and
impatience.
I was fully impressed with the necessity of removal, but I knew not
whither to go, or what kind of subsistence to seek. My father had been a
Scottish emigrant, and had no kindred on this side of the ocean. My
mother's family lived in New Hampshire, and long separation had
extinguished all the rights of relationship in her offspring. Tilling
the earth was my only profession, and, to profit by my skill in it, it
would be necessary to become a day-labourer in the service of strangers;
but this was a destiny to which I, who had so long enjoyed the pleasures
of independence and command, could not suddenly reconcile myself. It
occurred to me that the city might afford me an asylum. A short day's
journey would transport me into it. I had been there twice or thrice in
my life, but only for a few hours each time. I knew not a human face,
and was a stranger to its modes and dangers. I was qualified for no
employment, compatible with a town life, but that of the pen. This,
indeed, had ever been a favourite tool with me; and, though it may
appear somewhat strange, it is no less true that I had had nearly as
much practice at the quill as at the mattock. But the sum of my skill
lay in tracing distinct characters. I had used it merely to transcribe
what others had written, or to give form to my own conceptions. Whether
the city would afford me employment, as a mere copyist, sufficiently
lucrative, was a point on which I possessed no means of information.
My determination was hastened by the conduct of my new mother. My
conjectures as to the course she would pursue with regard to me had not
been erroneous. My father's deportment, in a short time, grew sullen and
austere. Directions were given in a magisterial tone, and any remissness
in the execution of his orders was rebuked with an air of authority. At
length these rebukes were followed by certain intimations that I was now
old enough to provide for myself; that it was time to think of some
employment by which I might secure a livelihood; that it was a shame for
me to spend my youth in idleness; that what he had gained was by his own
labour; and I must be indebted for my living to the same source.
These hints were easily understood. At first, they excited indignation
and grief. I knew the source whence they sprung, and was merely able to
suppress the utterance of my feelings in her presence. My looks,
however, were abundantly significant, and my company became hourly more
insupportable. Abstracted from these considerations, my father's
remonstrances were not destitute of weight. He gave me being, but
sustenance ought surely to be my own gift. In the use of that for which
he had been indebted to his own exertions, he might reasonably consult
his own choice. He assumed no control over me; he merely did what he
would with his own, and, so far from fettering my liberty, he exhorted
me to use it for my own benefit, and to make provision for myself.
I now reflected that there were other manual occupations besides that of
the plough. Among these none had fewer disadvantages than that of
carpenter or cabinet-maker. I had no knowledge of this art; but neither
custom, nor law, nor the impenetrableness of the mystery, required me to
serve a seven years' apprenticeship to it. A master in this trade might
possibly be persuaded to take me under his tuition; two or three years
would suffice to give me the requisite skill. Meanwhile my father would,
perhaps, consent to bear the cost of my maintenance. Nobody could live
upon less than I was willing to do.
I mentioned these ideas to my father; but he merely commended my
intentions without offering to assist me in the execution of them. He
had full employment, he said, for all the profits of his ground. No
doubt, if I would bind myself to serve four or five years, my master
would be at the expense of my subsistence. Be that as it would, I must
look for nothing from him. I had shown very little regard for his
happiness; I had refused all marks of respect to a woman who was
entitled to it from her relation to him. He did not see why he should
treat as a son one who refused what was due to him as a father. He
thought it right that I should henceforth maintain myself. He did not
want my services on the farm, and the sooner I quitted his house the
better.
I retired from this conference with a resolution to follow the advice
that was given. I saw that henceforth I must be my own protector, and
wondered at the folly that detained me so long under his roof. To leave
it was now become indispensable, and there could be no reason for
delaying my departure for a single hour. I determined to bend my course
to the city. The scheme foremost in my mind was to apprentice myself to
some mechanical trade. I did not overlook the evils of constraint and
the dubiousness as to the character of the master I should choose. I was
not without hopes that accident would suggest a different expedient, and
enable me to procure an immediate subsistence without forfeiting my
liberty.
I determined to commence my journey the next morning. No wonder the
prospect of so considerable a change in my condition should deprive me
of sleep. I spent the night ruminating on the future, and in painting to
my fancy the adventures which I should be likely to meet. The foresight
of man is in proportion to his knowledge. No wonder that, in my state of
profound ignorance, not the faintest preconception should be formed of
the events that really befell me. My temper was inquisitive, but there
was nothing in the scene to which I was going from which my curiosity
expected to derive gratification. Discords and evil smells, unsavoury
food, unwholesome labour, and irksome companions, were, in my opinion,
the unavoidable attendants of a city.
My best clothes were of the homeliest texture and shape. My whole stock
of linen consisted of three check shirts. Part of my winter evenings'
employment, since the death of my mother, consisted in knitting my own
stockings. Of these I had three pair, one of which I put on, and the
rest I formed, together with two shirts, into a bundle. Three
quarter-dollar pieces composed my whole fortune in money.