"I tell thee, Jack Cade, the clothier means to dress the
commonwealth, and turn it, and put a new nap upon it."--_King
Henry VI._
As I knew Mary must have communicated to her father my real name, I did
not hesitate, as I ought to have done in my actual dress and in my
assumed character, about following them, in order to inquire if I could
be of any service. I never saw distress more strongly painted in any
man's countenance than it was in that of Mr. Warren, when I approached.
So very obvious, indeed, was his emotion, that I did not venture to
obtrude myself on him, but followed in silence; and he and Mary slowly
walked, side by side, across the street to the stoop of a house, of
which all the usual inmates had probably gone in the other direction.
Here Mr. Warren took a seat, Mary still at his side, while I drew near,
standing before him.
"I thank you, Mr. Littlepage," the divine at length said, with a smile
so painful it was almost haggard, "for, so Mary tells me you should be
called--I thank you for this attention, sir--but, it will be over in
another minute--I feel better now, and shall be able to command myself."
No more was then said, concerning the reason of this distress; but Mary
has since explained to me its cause. When her father went into the
meeting-house, he had not the smallest idea that anything like a
religious service would be dragged into the ceremonies of such a day.
The two ministers on the stage first gave him the alarm; when a most
painful struggle occurred in his mind, whether or not he should remain,
and be a party to the mockery of addressing God in prayer, in an
assembly collected to set at naught one of the plainest of his
laws--nay, with banded felons drawn up around the building, as principal
actors in the whole mummery. The alternative was for him, a minister of
the altar, to seem to quit those who were about to join in prayer, and
to do this moreover under circumstances which might appear to others as
if he rejected all worship but that which was in accordance with his own
views of right, a notion that would be certain to spread far and near,
greatly to the prejudice of his own people. But the first, as he viewed
the matter, involved a species of blasphemy; and yielding to his
feelings, he took the decided step he had, intending to remain out of
the building, until the more regular business of the day commenced.
It is certain Mr. Warren, who acted under the best impulse of Christian
feeling, a reverence for God, and a profound wish not to be a party in
offending him with the mockery of worship under such circumstances, has
lost much influence, and made many enemies, by the step he then took.
The very same feeling which has raised the cry of aristocracy against
every gentleman who dwells in sufficiently near contact with the masses
to distinguish his habits from those around him; which induces the
eastern emigrant, who comes from a state of society where there are no
landlords, to fancy those he finds here ought to be pulled down, because
he is not a landlord himself; which enables the legislator to stand up
in his place, and unblushingly talk about feudal usages, at the very
instant he is demonstrating that equal rights are denied to those he
would fain stigmatize as feudal lords, has extended to religion, and the
Church of which Mr. Warren was a minister, is very generally accused of
being aristocratic, too! This charge is brought because it has claims
which other Churches affect to renounce and reject as forming no part of
the faith; but the last cannot remain easy under their own decision; and
while they shout, and sing that they have found "a Church without a
bishop," they hate the Church that has a bishop, because it has
something they do not possess themselves, instead of pitying its deluded
members, if they believe them wrong. This will not be admitted
generally, but it is nevertheless true; and betrays itself in a hundred
ways. It is seen in the attempt to _call_ their own priests bishops, in
the feeling so manifest whenever a cry can be raised against their
existence, and in the _general_ character of these theological rallies,
whenever they do occur.
For one, I see a close analogy between my own Church, as it exists in
this country, and comparing it with that from which it sprung, and to
those which surround it, and the true political circumstances of the two
hemispheres. In discarding a vast amount of surplusage, in reducing the
orders of the ministry, in practice as well as in theory, to their
primitive number, three, and in rejecting all connection with the state,
the American branch of the Episcopal Church has assumed the position it
was desirous to fill; restoring, as near as may be, the simplicity of
the apostolical ages, while it does not disregard the precepts and
practices of the apostles themselves. It has not set itself above
antiquity and authority, but merely endeavored to sustain them, without
the encumbrances of more modern abuses. Thus, too, has it been in
political things. No attempt has been made to create new organic social
distinctions in this country, but solely to disencumber those that are
inseparable from the existence of all civilized society, of the clumsy
machinery with which the expedients of military oppressors had invested
them. The real sages of this country, in founding its institutions, no
more thought of getting rid of the landlords of the country, than the
Church thought of getting rid of its bishops. The first knew that the
gradations of property were an inevitable incident of civilization; that
it would not be wise, if it were possible, to prevent the affluent from
making large investments in the soil; and that this could not be done in
practice, without leaving the relation of landlord and tenant. Because
landlords, in other parts of the world, possessed privileges that were
not necessary to the natural or simple existence of the character, was
no reason for destroying the character itself; any more than the fact
that the bishops of England possess an authority the apostles knew
nothing of, rendered it proper for the American branch of the Church to
do away with an office that came from the apostles. But envy and
jealousy do not pause to reflect on such things; it is enough for
_them_, in the one case, that you and yours have estates and occupy
social positions, that I and mine do not, and cannot easily, occupy and
possess; _therefore_ I will oppose you, and join my voice to the cry of
those who wish to get their farms for nothing; and in the other, that
you have bishops when we can have none, without abandoning our present
organization and doctrines.
I dwell on these points at some little length, because the movement of
Mr. Warren and myself, at that moment, had a direct influence on the
circumstances that will soon be related. It is probable that fully
one-half of those collected in the Little Nest meeting-house, that
morning, as they stood up, and lent a sort of one-sided and listless
attention to the prayer, were thinking of the scandalous and
aristocratical conduct of Mr. Warren, in "goin' out o' meetin' just as
meetin' went to prayers!" Few, indeed, were they who would be likely to
ascribe any charitable motive for the act; and probably not one of those
present thought of the true and conscientious feeling that had induced
it. So the world wags! It is certain that a malignant and bitter feeling
was got up against the worthy rector on that occasion, and for that act,
which has not yet abated, and which will not abate in many hundreds,
until the near approach of death shall lay bare to them the true
character of so many of their own feelings.
It was some minutes before Mr. Warren entirely regained his composure.
At length he spoke to me, in his usual benevolent and mild way, saying a
few words that were complimentary, on the subject of my return, while he
expressed his fears that my uncle Ro and myself had been imprudent in
thus placing ourselves, as it might be, in the lion's jaws.
"You have certainly made your disguises so complete," he added, smiling,
"as to have escaped wonderfully well so far. That you should deceive
Mary and myself is no great matter, since neither of us ever saw you
before; but, the manner in which your nearest relatives have been
misled, is surprising. Nevertheless, you have every inducement to be
cautious, for hatred and jealousy have a penetration that does not
belong even to love."
"We think we are safe, sir," I answered, "for we are certainly within
the statute. We are too well aware of our miserable aristocratical
condition to place ourselves within the grasp of the law, for such are
our eminent privileges as a landed nobility, that we are morally certain
either of us would not only be sent to the State's prison were he to be
guilty of the felony those Injins are committing, and will commit, with
a perfect impunity, but that he would be kept there, as long as a single
tear of anguish could be wrung from one of those who are classed with
the aristocracy. Democracy alone finds any sympathy in the ordinary
administration of American justice."
"I am afraid that your irony has only too much truth in it. But the
movement around the building would seem to say that the real business of
the day is about to commence, and we had better return to the church."
"Those men in disguise are watching us, in a most unpleasant and
alarming manner," said Mary Warren, delighting me far more by the
vigilance she thus manifested in my behalf, than alarming me by the
fact.
That we were watched, however, became obviously apparent, as we walked
toward the building, by the actions of some of the Injins. They had left
the side of the church where they had posted themselves during the
prayer, and head was going to head, among those nearest to us; or, it
would be nearer to appearances, were I to say bunch of calico was going
to bunch of calico, for nothing in the form of a head was visible among
them. Nothing was said to Mr. Warren and Mary, however, who were
permitted to go into the meeting-house, unmolested; but two of these
disguised gentry placed themselves before me, laying their rifles across
my path, and completely intercepting my advance.
"Who you?" abruptly demanded one of the two;--"where go--where come
from?"
The answer was ready, and I trust was sufficiently steady.
"I coomes from Charmany, und I goes into der kerch, as dey say in mine
coontry; what might be callet a meetin'-'us, here."
What might have followed, it is not easy to say, had not the loud,
declamatory voice of the lecturer just then been heard, as he commenced
his address. This appeared to be a signal for the tribe to make some
movement, for the two fellows who had stopped me, walked silently away,
though bag of calico went to bag of calico, as they trotted off
together, seemingly communicating to each other their suspicions. I took
advantage of the opening, and passed into the church, where I worked my
way through the throng, and got a seat at my uncle's side.
I have neither time, room, nor inclination to give anything like an
analysis of the lecture. The speaker was fluent, inflated, and anything
but logical. Not only did he contradict himself, but he contradicted the
laws of nature. The intelligent reader will not require to be reminded
of the general character of a speech that was addressed to the passions
and interests of such an audience, rather than to their reason. He
commented, at first, on the particular covenants of the leases on the
old estates of the colony, alluding to the quarter-sales, chickens,
days' work, and durable tenures, in the customary way. The reservation
of the mines, too, was mentioned as a tyrannical covenant, precisely as
if a landlord were obliged to convey any more of the rights that were
vested in him, than he saw fit; or the tenant could justly claim more
than he had hired! This man treated all these branches of the subject,
as if the tenants had acquired certain mysterious interests by time and
occupation, overlooking the fact that the one party got just as good a
title as the other by this process; the lease being the instrument
between them, that was getting to be venerable. If one party grew old as
a tenant, so did the other as a landlord. I thought that this lecturer
would have been glad to confine himself to the Manor leases, that being
the particular branch of the subject he had been accustomed to treat;
but, such was not the precise nature of the job he was now employed to
execute. At Ravensnest, he could not flourish the feudal grievance of
the quarter-sales, the "four fat fowls," the "days' works," and the
_length_ of the leases. Here it was clearly his cue to say nothing of
the three first, and to complain of the _shortness_ of the leases, as
mine were about to fall in, in considerable numbers. Finding it was
necessary to take new ground, he determined it should be bold ground,
and such as would give him the least trouble to get along with.
As soon as the lecturer had got through with his general heads, and felt
the necessity of coming down to particulars, he opened upon the family
of Littlepage, in a very declamatory way. What had _they_ ever done for
the country, he demanded, that they should be lords in the land? By some
process known to himself, he had converted landlords into lords in the
land, and was now aiming to make the tenants occupy the latter
station--nay, both stations. Of course, some services of a public
character, of which the Littlepages might boast, were not touched upon
at all, everything of that nature being compressed into what the
lecturer and his audience deemed serving the people, by helping to
indulge them in all their desires, however rapacious or wicked. As
everybody who knows anything of the actual state of matters among us,
must be aware how rarely the "people" hear the truth, when their own
power and interests are in question, it is not surprising that a very
shallow reasoner was enabled to draw wool over the eyes of the audience
of Ravensnest on that particular subject.
But my interest was most awakened when this man came to speak of myself.
It is not often that a man enjoys the same opportunity as that I then
possessed to hear his own character delineated, and his most private
motives analyzed. In the first place, the audience were told that this
"young Hugh Littlepage had never done anything for the land that he
proudly, and like a great European noble, calls his 'estate.' Most of
you, fellow-citizens, can show your hard hands, and recall the burning
suns under which you have opened the swath, through those then lovely
meadows yonder, as _your_ titles to these farms. But Hugh Littlepage
never did a day's work in his life"--ten minutes before he had been
complaining of the "days' work" in the Manor leases as indignities that
a freeman ought not to submit to--"no, fellow-citizens, he never had
that honor, and never will have it, until by a just division of his
property, or what he now _calls_ his property, you reduce him to the
necessity of laboring to raise the crops he wants to consume."
"Where is this Hugh Littlepage at this very moment? In Paris,
squandering _your_ hard earnings in riotous living, according to the
best standards of aristocracy. He lives in the midst of abundance,
dresses richly and fares richly, while _you_ and _yours_ are eating the
sweat of your brows. He is no man for a pewter spoon and two-pronged
fork! No, my countrymen! He must have a _gold_ spoon for some of his
dishes, and you will find it hard to believe--plain, unpretending,
republican farmers as you are, but it is not the less true--he must have
forks of _silver_! Fellow-citizens, Hugh Littlepage would not put his
knife into his mouth, as you and I do, in eating--as all plain,
unpretending republicans do--for the world. It would choke him; no, he
keeps _silver_ forks to touch his anointed lips!" Here there was an
attempt to get up something like applause, but it totally failed. The
men of Ravensnest had been accustomed all their lives to see the
Littlepages in the social station they occupied; and, after all, it did
not seem so very extraordinary that we should have silver forks, any
more than that others should have silver spoons. The lecturer had the
tact to see that he had failed on this point and he turned to another.
The next onset was made against our title. Whence did it come? demanded
the lecturer. From the King of England; and the people had conquered the
country from that sovereign, and put themselves in his place. Now, is it
not a good principle in politics, that to the victors belong the spoils?
He believed it was; and that in conquering America, he was of opinion
that the people of America had conquered the land, and that they had a
right to take the land, and to keep it. Titles from kings he did not
respect much; and he believed the American people, generally, did not
think much of them. If Hugh Littlepage wished an "estate," as he called
it, let him come to the people and "starve _them_" and see what sort of
an estate _they_ would give him.
But there was one portion of his speech which was so remarkable, that I
must attempt to give it as it was uttered. It was while the lecturer was
expatiating on this subject of titles, that he broke out in the
following language:--"Don't talk to me," he bellowed--for by this
time his voice had risen to the pitch of a Methodist's in a
camp-meeting--"Don't talk to me of antiquity, and time, and length of
possession, as things to be respected. They're nawthin'--jest nawthin'
at all. Possession's good in law, I'll admit; and I contind that's jest
what the tenants has. They've got the lawful possession of this very
property, that layeth (not eggs, but) up and down, far and near, and all
around; a rich and goodly heritage, when divided up among hard-working
and honest folks; but too much, by tens of thousands of acres, for a
young chap, who is wasting his substance in foreign lands, to hold. I
contind that the tenants has this very precise, lawful possession, at
this blessed moment, only the law won't let 'em enj'y it. It's all owing
to that accursed law, that the tenant can't set up a title ag'in his
landlord. You see by this one fact, fellow-citizens, that they are a
privileged class, and ought to be brought down to the level of gin'ral
humanity. You can set up title ag'in anybody else, but you shan't set up
title ag'in a landlord. I know what is said in the primisis," shaking
his head, in derision of any arguments on the other side of this
particular point; "I know that circumstances alter cases. I can see the
hardship of one neighbor's coming to another, and asking to borrow or
hire his horse for a day, and then pretendin' to hold him on some other
ketch. But horses isn't land; you must all allow _that_. No, if horses
_was_ land, the case would be altered. Land is an element, and so is
fire, and so is water, and so is air. Now who will say that a freeman
hasn't a right to air, hasn't a right to water, and, on the same
process, hasn't a right to land? He _has_, fellow-citizens--he _has_.
These are what are called in philosophy elementary rights; which is the
same thing as a right to the elements, of which land is one, and a
principal one. I say a principal one; for, if there was no land to stand
on, we should drop away from air, and couldn't enj'y _that_; we should
lose all our water in vapor, and couldn't put it to millin' and
manafacterin' purposes; and where could we build our fires? No; land is
the _first_ elementary right, and connected with it comes the first and
most sacred right to the elements.
"I do not altogether disregard antiquity, neither. No; I respect and
revere pre-emption rights; for they fortify and sustain the right to the
elements. Now I do not condemn squattin' as some does. It's actin'
accordin' to natur', and natur' is right. I respect and venerate a
squatter's possession; for it's held under the sacred principle of
usefulness. It says, 'Go and make the wilderness blossom as the rose,'
and means 'progress.' That's an antiquity I respect. I respect the
antiquity of your possessions here, _as tenants_; for it is a
hard-working and useful antiquity--an antiquity that increases and
multiplies. If it be said that Hugh Littlepage's ancestors--your noble
has his 'ancestors,' while us 'common folks' are satisfied with
forefathers"--[this hit took with a great many present, raising a very
general laugh]--"but if this Hugh's ancestors did pay anything for the
land, if I was you, fellow-citizens, I'd be gin'rous, and let him have
it back ag'in. Perhaps his forefathers gave a cent an acre to the
king--may be two; or say sixpence, if you will. I'd let him have his
sixpence an acre back again, by way of shutting his mouth. No; I'm for
nawthin' that's ungin'rous.
"Fellow-citizens, I profess to be what is called a democrat. I know that
many of you be what is called whigs; but I apprehend there isn't much
difference between us on the subject of this system of leasing land. We
are all republicans, and leasing farms is anti-republican. Then, I wish
to be liberal even to them I commonly oppose at elections, and I will
freely admit, then, on the whull, the whigs have rather outdone us
democrats, on the subject of this anti-rentism. I am sorry to be obliged
to own in it, but it must be confessed that, while in the way of
governors there hasn't been much difference--yes, put 'em in a bag, and
shake 'em up, and you'd hardly know which would come out first--which
has done himself the most immortal honor, which has shown himself the
most comprehensive, profound, and safe statesman; I know that some of
our people complain of the governors for ordering out troops ag'in the
Injins, but they could not _help_ that--they wouldn't have done it, in
my judgment, had there been any way of getting round it; but the law was
too strong for them, so they druv' in the Injins, and now they join us
in putting down aristocracy, and in raising up gin'ral humanity. No; I
don't go ag'in the governors, though many does.
"But I profess to be a democrat, and I'll give an outline of my
principles, that all may see why they can't, and don't, and never will
agree with aristocracy or nobility, in any form or shape. I believe one
man is as good as another in all things. Neither birth, nor law, nor
edication, nor riches, nor poverty, nor anything else, can ever make any
difference in this principle, which is sacred and fundamental, and is
the chief stone of the corner in true democracy. One man is as good as
another, I say, and has just the same right to the enj'yment of 'arth
and its privileges, as any other man. I think the majority ought to rule
in all things, and that it is the duty of the minority to submit. Now
I've had this here sentiment thrown back upon me, in some places where I
have spoken, and been asked, 'how is this--the majority must rule, and
the minority must submit--in that case, the minority isn't as good as
the majority in practice, and hasn't the same right. They are made to
own what they think ought not to be done?' The answer to this is so
plain, I wonder a sensible man can ask the question, for all the
minority has to do, is to join the majority, to have things as they want
'em. The road is free, and it is this open road that makes true liberty.
Any man can fall in with the majority, and sensible folks commonly do,
when they can find it, and that makes a person not only a man, as the
saying is, but a FREEMAN, a still more honorable title.
"Fellow-citizens, a great movement is in progress. 'Go ahead!' is the
cry, and the march is onward; our thoughts already fly about on the
wings of the lightning, and our bodies move but little slower, on the
vapor of steam--soon our principles will rush ahead of all, and let in
the radiance of a glorious day of universal reform, and loveliness, and
virtue and charity, when the odious sound of _rent_ will never be heard,
when every man will sit down under his own apple, or cherry tree, if not
under his own fig-tree.
"I am a democrat--yes, a democrat. Glorious appellation! I delight in
it! It is my pride, my boast, my very virtue. Let but the people truly
rule, and all must come well. The people has no temptation to do wrong.
If they hurt the State, they hurt themselves, for they are the State. Is
a man likely to hurt himself? Equality is my axiom. Nor, by equality, do
I mean your narrow pitiful equality before the law, as it is sometimes
tarmed, for that may be no equality at all; but I mean an equality that
is substantial, and which must be restored, when the working of the law
has deranged it. Fellow-citizens, do you know what leap-year means? I
dare say some of you don't, the ladies in partic'lar not giving much
attention to astronomy. Well, I have inquired, and it is this: The 'arth
revolves around the sun in a year, as we all know. And we count three
hundred and sixty-five days in a year, we all know. But the 'arth is a
few hours longer than three hundred and sixty-five days in making its
circuit--nearly six hours longer. Now everybody knows that four times
six makes twenty-four, and so a twenty-ninth day is put into February,
every fourth year, to restore the lost time; another change being to be
made a long distance ahead to settle the fractions. Thus will it be with
democracy. Human natur' can't devise laws yet, that will keep all things
on an exactly equal footing, and political leap-years must be introduced
into the political calendar, to restore the equilibrium. In astronomy we
must divide up anew the hours and minutes; in humanity, we must, from
time to time, divide up the land."
But I cannot follow this inflated fool any longer; for he was quite as
much of fool as of knave, though partaking largely of the latter
character. It was plain that he carried many of his notions much further
than a good portion of his audience carried theirs; though, whenever he
touched upon anti-rentism, he hit a chord that vibrated through the
whole assembly. That the tenants ought to own their farms, and pay no
more rents, AND POCKET ALL THE BENEFITS OF THEIR OWN PREVIOUS LABORS,
THOUGH THESE LABORS HAD BEEN CONSIDERED IN THE EARLIER RENTS, AND WERE,
INDEED, STILL CONSIDERED IN THE LOW RATES AT WHICH THE LANDS WERE LET,
was a doctrine all could understand; and few were they, I am sorry to
say, who did not betray how much self-love and self-interest had
obscured the sense of right.
The lecture, such as it was, lasted more than two hours; and when it was
done, an individual rose, in the character of a chairman--when did three
Americans ever get together to discuss anything, that they had not a
chairman and secretary, and all the parliamentary forms?--and invited
any one present, who might entertain views different from the speaker,
to give his opinion. Never before did I feel so tempted to speak in
public. My first impulse was to throw away the wig, and come out in my
own person, and expose the shallow trash that had just been uttered. I
believe even I, unaccustomed as I was to public speaking, could easily
have done this, and I whispered as much to my uncle, who was actually on
his feet, to perform the office for me, when the sound of "Mr.
Chairman," from a different part of the church, anticipated him. Looking
round, I recognized at once the face of the intelligent mechanic, named
Hall, whom we had met at Mooseridge, on our way to the Nest. I took my
seat at once, perfectly satisfied that the subject was in good hands.
This speaker commenced with great moderation, both of manner and tone,
and, indeed, he preserved them throughout. His utterance, accent, and
language, of course, were all tinctured by his habits and associations;
but his good sense and his good principles were equally gifts from
above. More of the "true image of his Maker" was to be found in that one
individual than existed in fifty common men. He saw clearly, spoke
clearly, and demonstrated effectively. As he was well known in that
vicinity and generally respected, he was listened to with profound
attention, and spoke like a man who stood in no dread of tar and
feathers. Had the same sentiments been delivered by one in a fine coat,
and a stranger, or even by myself, who had so much at stake, very many
of them would have been incontinently set down as aristocratic, and not
to be tolerated, the most sublimated lover of equality occasionally
falling into these little contradictions.
Hall commenced by reminding the audience that they all knew him, and
knew he was no landlord. He was a mechanic, and a laboring man, like
most of themselves, and had no interest that could be separated from the
general good of society. This opening was a little homage to prejudice,
since reason is reason, and right right, let them come whence they will.
"I, too, am a democrat," he went on to say, "but I do not understand
democracy to mean anything like that which has been described by the
last speaker. I tell that gentleman plainly, that if he is a democrat, I
am none, and if I am a democrat, he is none. By democracy I understand a
government in which the sovereign power resides in the body of the
nation; and not in a few, or in one. But this principle no more gives
the body of the people authority to act wrong, than in a monarchy, in
which the sovereign power resides in one man, that one man has a right
to act wrong. By equality, I do not understand anything more than
equality before the law--now if the law had said that when the late
Malbone Littlepage died, his farms should go not to his next of kin, or
to his devisee, but to his neighbors, then that would have been the law
to be obeyed, although it would be a law destructive of civilization,
since men would never accumulate property to go to the public. Something
nearer home is necessary to make men work, and deny themselves what they
like.
"The gentleman has told us of a sort of a political leap-year that is to
regulate the social calendar. I understand him to mean that when
property has got to be unequal, it must be divided up, in order that men
may make a new start. I fear he will have to dispense with leap-years,
and come to leap-months, or leap-weeks, ay, or even to leap-days; for,
was the property of this township divided up this very morning, and in
this meetin'-'us, it would get to be unequal before night. Some folks
can't keep money when they have it; and others can't keep their hands
off it.
"Then, again, if Hugh Littlepage's property is to be divided, the
property of all of Hugh Littlepage's neighbors ought to be divided too,
to make even an _appearance_ of equality; though it would be but an
_appearance_ of equality, admitting that were done, since Hugh
Littlepage has more than all the rest of the town put together. Yes,
fellow-citizens, Hugh Littlepage pays, at this moment, one-twentieth of
the taxes of this whole county. That is about the proportion of
Ravensnest; and that tax, in reality, comes out of his pockets, as much
as the greater part of the taxes of Rensselaer and Albany Counties, if
you will except the cities they contain, are paid by the Rensselaers. It
wun't do to tell me the tenants pay the taxes, for I know better. We all
know that the probable amount of the taxes is estimated in the original
bargain, and is so much deducted from the rent, and comes out of the
landlord if it comes out of anybody. There is a good reason why the
tenant should pay it, and a reason that is altogether in his interest;
because the law would make his oxen, and horses, and carts liable for
the taxes, should the landlord neglect to pay the taxes. The collector
always sells personals for a tax if he can find them on the property;
and by deducting it from the rent, and paying it himself, the tenant
makes himself secure against that loss. To say that a tenant don't take
any account of the taxes he will be likely to pay, in making his
bargain, is as if one should say he is _non com._, and not fit to be
trusted with his own affairs. There are men in this community, I am
sorry to say, who wish a law passed to tax the rents on durable leases,
or on all leases, in order to choke the landlords off from their claims,
but such men are true friends to neither justice nor their country. Such
a law would be a tax on the incomes of a particular class of society,
and on no other. It is a law that would justify the aggrieved parties in
taking up arms to resist it, unless the law would give 'em relief, as I
rather think it would. By removing into another State, however, they
would escape the tax completely, laugh at those who framed it, who would
incur the odium of doing an impotent wrong, and get laughed at as well
as despised, besides injuring the State by drawing away its money to be
spent out of its limits. Think, for one moment, of the impression that
would be made of New York justice, if a hundred citizens of note and
standing were to be found living in Philadelphia or Paris, and
circulating to the world the report that they were exiles to escape a
special taxation! The more the matter was inquired into, the worse it
must appear; for men may say what they please, to be ready ag'in
election time, as there is but one piece or parcel of property to tax,
it is an income tax, and nothing else. What makes the matter still worse
is, that every man of sense will know that it is taxing the same person
twice, substantially for the same thing, since the landlord has the
direct land-tax deducted from the rent in the original bargain.
"As for all this cry about aristocracy, I don't understand it. Hugh
Littlepage has just as good a right to his ways as I have to mine. The
gentleman says he needs gold spoons and silver forks to eat with. Well,
what of that? I dare say the gentleman himself finds a steel knife and
fork useful, and has no objection to silver, or, at least, to a pewter
spoon. Now, there are folks that use wooden forks, or no forks, and who
are glad to get horn spoons; and _they_ might call that gentleman
himself an aristocrat. This setting of ourselves up as the standard in
all things is anything but liberty. If I don't like to eat my dinner
with a man who uses a silver fork, no man in this country can compel me.
On the other hand, if young Mr. Littlepage don't like a companion who
chews tobacco, as I do, he ought to be left to follow his own
inclination.
"Then, this doctrine that one man's as good as another has got two sides
to it. One man ought to have the same general rights as another, I am
ready to allow; but if one man is as _good_ as another, why do we have
the trouble and cost of elections? We might draw lots, as we do for
jurors, and save a good deal of time and money. We all know there is
ch'ice in men, and I think that so long as the people have their ch'ice
in sayin' who shall and who shall not be their agents, they've got all
they have any right to. So long as this is done, the rest of the world
may be left to follow their own ways, provided they obey the laws.
"Then, I am no great admirer of them that are always telling the people
they're parfect. I know this county pretty well, as well as most in it;
and if there be a parfect man in Washington County, I have not yet
fallen in with him. Ten millions of imparfect men won't make one parfect
man, and so I don't look for parfection in the people any more than I do
in princes. All I look for in democracy is to keep the reins in so many
hands as to prevent a few from turning everything to their own account;
still, we must'nt forget that when a great many do go wrong, it is much
worse than when a few go wrong.
"If my son didn't inherit the property of Malbone Littlepage, neither
will Malbone Littlepage's son inherit mine. We are on a footing in that
respect. As to paying rent, which some persons think so hard, what would
they do if they had no house to live in, or farm to work? If folks wish
to purchase houses and farms, no one can prevent them if they have money
to do it with; and if they have not, is it expected other people have to
provide them with such things out of their own----"
Here the speaker was interrupted by a sudden whooping, and the Injins
came pressing into the house, in a way to drive all in the aisles before
them. Men, women and children leaped from the windows, the distance
being trifling, while others made their escape by the two side-doors,
the Injins coming in only by the main entrance. In less time than it
takes to record the fact, the audience had nearly all dispersed.