few could find any Fault with what Dame Nature had done for her....
When I view’d her I thought all the Statues I ever beheld, was so much
inferior to her in Beauty that she was more capable of Converting
a man into a Statue, than of being Imitated by the Greatest Master
of that Art, & I surely had as much delight in Surveying her as the
Organs of Sight are capable of conveying to the Soul.”
Few names were better known in the old-time social life than that of
Franks. David Franks was a brother of Phila Franks, afterwards Mrs.
Oliver De Lancey, and father of Rebecca Franks, who was a reigning
belle during the British occupation of Philadelphia, when General Howe
was in the habit of tying his horse before David Franks’s house and
going in to have a chat with the ladies, and probably to enjoy a laugh
at some of Miss Rebecca’s spirited sallies. Although the beautiful
Jewess shared the honors of belledom with fair Willings and Shippens,
no person seems to have disputed her title to be considered the wit
of the day among womankind. Abigail Franks, who became Mrs. Andrew
Hamilton, was another daughter of David Franks. It was to this sister
in Philadelphia that Miss Rebecca wrote a long gossipy letter from New
York in 1781, in which she contrasted the manners of the belles of that
city and her own very much to the advantage of those of the latter
place, always excepting the Van Hornes, with whom she is staying,
and whom she describes as most attractive, Miss Kitty Van Horne much
resembling the greatly admired Mrs. Galloway.
“By the way,” she writes, “few New York ladies know how to entertain
company in their own houses, unless they introduce the card-table.
Except this family, who are remarkable for their good sense and ease,
I don’t know a woman or girl that can chat above half an hour, and
that on the form of a cap, the color of a ribbon, or the set of a
hoop, stay, or jupon. I will do our ladies, that is in Philadelphia,
the justice to say they have more cleverness in the turn of an eye
than the New York girls have in their whole composition. With what
ease have I seen a Chew, a Penn, Oswald, Allen, and a thousand
others entertain a large circle of both sexes, and the conversation,
without the aid of cards, not flag or seem in the least strained or
stupid.”[40]
In Mr. Joseph Shippen’s “Lines Written in an Assembly Room” we
find a graceful picture of the beauties of the ante-Revolutionary
period. “Fair, charming Swift,” the eldest daughter of John Swift,
who afterwards became Mrs. Livingston; “lovely White,” a sister of
Bishop White, who, as Mrs. Robert Morris, was the chosen friend of
Mrs. Washington while in Philadelphia; “sweet, smiling, fair M’Call;”
Katharine Inglis; Polly Franks, an elder daughter of David Franks;
Sally Coxe, who married Andrew Allen, the loyalist; and Chews so fair
that Mr. Shippen cannot decide which is the fairer. Two of these
bewildering sisters, Mary and Elizabeth Chew, married respectively
Alexander Wilcocks and Edward Tilghman. Another poet, of a period a
little later than this, happening to pick up a knot of ribbon dropped
by Miss Chew on the ball-room floor, thus descants upon her charms:
“If I mistake not--’tis the accomplish’d Chew,
To whom this ornamental bow is due;
Its taste like hers, so neat, so void of art--
Just as her mind and gentle as her heart.
I haste to send it--to resume its place,
For beaux should sorrow o’er a bow’s disgrace.”
It does not appear to have taken great inspirations to set the muse
to rhyming in those days. Mr. John Swanwick seems always to have
found his prompt to obey his call, and whether he is disappointed in
a walk with Miss Markoe, or whether he takes such a walk; whether it
is Miss Meredith’s canary-bird that dies or the great astronomer David
Rittenhouse, all alike give wings to his Pegasus. He lends Miss Abby
Willing his Biographical Dictionary, and with it encloses a dozen
verses or more on those inscribed in this “splendid roll of fame.”
Another occasion of poetic inspiration is when tears are observed to
stream down a young lady’s cheek on listening to a sermon from the Rev.
William White. Must it not have been delightful to possess such a fancy?
As early as 1765 some of the good old Quaker names are to be found
on the Assembly lists, as Mifflin, Fishbourne, Dickinson, Galloway,
Nixon, Powell, and Cadwalader, the latter family being, like the
Ingersolls, Montgomerys, Sergeants, Tilghmans, Wisters, and Markoes,
among later arrivals in Philadelphia from other States or from abroad.
Margaret Cadwalader married Samuel Meredith, first Treasurer of the
United States, while her elder sister Polly became the wife of Philemon
Dickinson, from Crosia-doré, Maryland, a brother of John Dickinson,
himself distinguished as a soldier and statesman, while General John
Cadwalader carried off one of the Meschianza belles, Miss Williamina
Bond.[41] Among names upon other Assembly lists, early and late, are
those of Clymer, Hazlehurst, Evans, Burd, Lewis, McMurtrie, McPherson,
Sims, Ross, Watmough, Biddle, Wharton, Meade, etc., while in that
of 1765 there is a curious record of “Miss Allen, alias Governess,”
which evidently refers to Ann Allen, who married Governor John Penn, a
grandson of the Proprietary. Of this fair lady the ever-ready Swanwick
sings,--
“When youthful Allen of majestic mien
Seems as she moves of every beauty queen--
And by refinements of a polish’d mind,
To decorate a throne design’d.”
The regular Assembly balls seem to have been discontinued during the
War of the Revolution, although most of this time there was no lack
of gayety in Philadelphia, especially in Tory circles, as is shown by
contemporaneous letters. Miss Franks writes to Mrs. William Paca[42] in
1778, while the British were in possession of the city,--
“You can have no idea of the life of continued amusement I live in. I
can scarce have a moment to myself. I have stole this while everybody
is retired to dress for dinner. I am but just come from under Mr. J.
Black’s hands and most elegantly am I dressed for a ball this evening
at Smith’s where we have one every Thursday. You would not Know the
room ’tis so much improv’d.
“I wish to Heaven you were going with us this evening to judge for
yourself. I spent Tuesday evening at Sir Wᵐ Howes where we had a
concert and Dance. I asked his leave to send you a Handkerchief to
show the fashions. He very politely gave me leave to send anything you
wanted, tho’ I told him you were a Delegate’s Lady....
“The Dress is more ridiculous and pretty than any thing I ever
saw--great quantity of different colored feathers on the head at a
time besides a thousand other things. The Hair dress’d very high in
the shape Miss Vining’s was the night we returned from Smiths--the Hat
we found in your Mother’s Closet wou’d be of a proper size. I have
an afternoon cap with one wing--tho’ I assure you I go less in the
fashion than most of the Ladies--no being dress’d without a hoop. B.
Bond makes her first appearance tonight at the rooms.”
In B. Bond we recognize one of the Meschianza belles, while the Miss
Vining to whom Miss Franks refers was a Wilmington girl, whose beauty,
grace, and fluency in speaking their language made her a great favorite
with the French officers in America, who wrote home so enthusiastically
of her charms that her name became known at the court of France,
the queen herself expressing a desire to meet the famous American
beauty.[43]
“No loss for partners,” the lively lady continues, “even I am engaged
to seven different gentlemen for you must know ’tis a fix’d rule
never to dance but two dances at a time with the same person. Oh how
I wish Mr. P. wou’d let you come in for a week or two--tell him I’ll
answer for your being let to return. I know you are as fond of a gay
life as myself--you’d have an opportunity of rakeing as much as you
choose either at Plays, Balls, Concerts or Assemblys. I’ve been but
3 evenings alone since we mov’d to town. I begin now to be almost
tired.”[44]
It is probably to the revival of the hoop about 1778, of which Miss
Franks speaks, that some humorous verses refer, in which the hoop and
anti-hoop factions are described as arraying themselves for battle
upon the floor of the Assembly room. The anti-hoop party was under the
leadership of Narcissa, who with her followers declared that it was
their opinion
“That unless
They had it in their Power to dress
As they thought proper, nought would be
At last left to their Option free,
And so concluded, one and all,
Hoopless to go to the next Ball.”
The hoop party was conducted by Fribeto, the Nash of the time, a
miniature beau, who suggests to the mind Pope’s _dramatis personæ_ in
the “Rape of the Lock:”
“A gayly brilliant thing
That sparkled in the shining ring.
* * * * *
This same Fribeto once was chose
Director of the Belles and Beaux,
When’er in full Assembly they
Should meet to dance an hour away.”
Indeed, the scheme and treatment of this rhymed _Bataille de Dames_
are evidently borrowed from Pope’s brilliant satire, and some verses
seem not unworthy the pen of Francis Hopkinson, as, for instance, a
description of the two factions upon the Assembly night:
“Here walks a Fair, from Head to toe
As straight as ever she can go;
And here a Dame with wings so wide,
Three Yards at least from side to side.
“Hoops and no Hoops dividing stand
In dread array on either Hand,
Resolved to try th’ important Cause
By that Assembly’s fixed Laws.”
In the conflict which ensues, Fribeto is worsted by the slim damsels,
and takes refuge under Melisinda’s ample wing, from whose pocket he
surveys the field of battle. Enraged by the impertinent popping up of
the dandy’s head from Melisinda’s pocket, Narcissa aims a blow at him,
which glances aside and falls upon the bosom of his protectress, who
starts up with a cry of pain and makes her escape, leaving Fribeto
prone upon the ball-room floor, a pitiable object.
“One peal of laughter fills the place.
The Hoops their Hero now despise,
And view him with disdainful Eyes,
And with one Voice at once agree
To cry aloud for Liberty”--
declaring
“That Women still
In dress at least should have their will.”
Upon which the humiliated Fribeto announces,--
“My office and my Right
To govern, I resign this Night,
Nor will I meddle should you come
In greasy night Caps to this Room,
Or sit in Rows in yonder Benches,
As black with Dirt as Cynder-wenches.”
This important battle probably occurred after the British evacuation
of the city, as Philadelphia gayety did not cease with the departure
of the red-coats, an article of apparel that General Knox declared
the American girls loved too well. Arnold’s advent as Commandant, we
know, was inaugurated by a series of festivities from which the Tory
belles were not excluded. Indeed, when such a measure was contemplated
in connection with a grand ball to be given to the French and American
officers, it was found impossible to make up the company without
them, consequently they appeared in full feather, at this and other
entertainments, it being alleged by more than one authority that far
from being slighted these loyalist ladies were given the preference
over Whig belles. Among leading Tory women were Miss Polly Riché, her
friend Miss Christian Amiel, the Bards, Bonds, Odells, Oswalds, and
Cliftons. It has been whispered that Miss Amiel was the fair lady to
whom General Arnold was engaged in writing amatory epistles before
Miss Shippen’s charms conquered the hero of many battles. A note from
the Commandant to Miss Riché is still extant, in which he thanks her
for a picture conveyed to him, in language so guarded that no reading
between the lines serves to reveal the original of the miniature,
although there are those who shrewdly suspect that it was a picture of
General Arnold, which, for reasons best known to herself, Miss Amiel
returned to him through Miss Riché. Miss Amiel afterwards married
Colonel Richard Armstrong who was in America with Major Simcoe’s
British Foot, while her friend Miss Riché became the wife of Charles
Swift. It is evidently to her approaching marriage that Miss White
refers in a letter written in 1785, in which she relates the disasters
that have befallen the wardrobes of several mutual friends, among them
Miss B. Lawrence, who has lost “three elegant lisk robes, and seventy
yards of Lace, beside the rest of her Cloaths. There is,” she adds,
“no dependence on these stage boats, pray be careful how you send
your wedding Cloaths up when you come to Town for it must be horribly
mortifying to lose them.”
It is evident that the Assembly Balls were revived soon after peace
was declared, and held occasionally, if not regularly, as Mrs. John
Adams speaks of attending an Assembly while in Philadelphia during the
administration of President Washington. The dancing she pronounces
“very good and the company of the best kind,” adding that the ladies
are more beautiful than those she has seen at foreign courts. Mrs.
Adams must have been subject to variable moods at this time, as she
writes to her daughter one week of the dazzling brilliancy of Mrs.
Washington’s drawing-room, concluding that Mrs. Bingham had given
laws to the Philadelphia women in fashion and elegance, while in
another letter she says of an Assembly Ball, “the room despicable; the
etiquette,--it was difficult to say where it was to be found. Indeed,
it was not New York; but you must not report this from me.” This was
probably written after one of their long drives to town over muddy
roads, which made Bush Hill seem so undesirable a residence to the
Vice-President and his wife. Mrs. Adams writes in more amiable mood
upon another occasion, and is pleased to find “Mrs. Powell of all the
ladies she has met the best informed, beside which she is friendly,
affable, good, sprightly, and full of conversation.” This lady who
combines so many charms is Mrs. Samuel Powel, born Elizabeth Willing,
the aunt of Mrs. Bingham, who also came in for a large share of the
New England lady’s admiration, being included in her “constellation of
beauties,” with her sister Elizabeth, soon to become the wife of Major
William Jackson, whose portrait represents one of the handsomest men
of the time. The Chews of whom Mrs. Adams speaks are younger sisters
of the Meschianza belles, little Sophia, Juliana, and Maria, grown up
to take their sisters’ places. Old Chief Justice Benjamin Chew had a
host of pretty daughters, and in the gay world of society, as in court
circles, there is always a laudable disposition to hail the rising
sun. Instead of Mrs. Benedict Arnold, her sisters, the Redmans, the
Bonds, and Miss Wilhelmina Smith, who has gone off to Maryland with her
husband Charles Goldsborough, we find a new bevy of beauties, Sally
McKean, who afterwards married the Marquis de Yrujo, and whose languid
beauty seemed made for a Southern court, Mrs. Walter Stewart, born
Deborah McClenachan, Mrs. Henry Clymer, Mrs. Theodore Sedgwick, from
Massachusetts, and Miss Wolcott, from Connecticut, whom New England
gentlemen were wont to boast equal in beauty and grace to Mrs. Bingham.
Mrs. Adams comments upon the gayety and prodigality of Philadelphia
living at this period, as General Greene had done a little earlier, the
latter having declared the luxury of Boston “an infant babe” to that
of the Quaker City. Much of the extravagance which prevailed for some
years in Philadelphia was an outcome of the speculation and the pursuit
of private gain induced by the enormous inflation of the Continental
currency. “Wealth thus easily acquired was as freely squandered,” says
Mr. F. D. Stone in his admirable paper on Philadelphia society during
the period of the new tender, “and while luxuries were being enjoyed by
one class of citizens, the expenses and burdens of others were greatly
increased.” In the diary of the moderate and abstemious Washington we
read of a number of entertainments and numerous dinners attended by him
at the Ingersolls’, Morrises’, Chews’, Rosses’, Willings’, Hamiltons’,
and Binghams’; at the latter place “I dined in great splendor,” writes
the President, who was well content with one dish of meat and one or
two glasses of wine at his own table. Again, in a letter written from
Philadelphia to General Wayne by a brother officer we read,--
“Permit me to say a little of the dress, manners, and customs of
the town’s people. In respect to the first, great alterations have
taken place since I was last here. It is all gayety, and from what I
can observe, every lady and gentleman endeavors to outdo the other
in splendor and show.... The manner of entertaining in this place
has likewise undergone its change. You cannot conceive anything more
elegant than the present taste. You can hardly dine at a table but
they present you with three courses, and each of them in the most
elegant manner.”
Miss Sally McKean, in writing to a friend in New York of Mrs.
Washington’s first levee, says,--
“You never could have such a drawing-room; it was brilliant beyond
anything you can imagine; and though there was a great deal of
extravagance, there was so much of Philadelphia taste in everything
that it must be confessed the most delightful occasion of the kind
ever known in this country.”
Some of the old names run down the Assembly list through all the years
to our own time, as Chew, Shippen, M’Call, Hopkinson, McIlvaine,
White, Barclay, Cadwalader, Coxe, Lardner, and many more, while others
have quite disappeared from Philadelphia society. There are no more
Hamiltons, Oswalds, Cliftons, Plumsteds, Allens, Swifts, Inglises, or
Francises to be found on the lists of to-day. Some of these families
are no longer represented in the male line, while others have married
and settled abroad, notably the Binghams, Allens, Hamiltons, and
Elliots. Into the social circles where they once held sway have come
such Southern names as Randolph, Byrd, Page, Robinson, Carter, Hunter,
and Neilson from Virginia, and Tilghman, Cheston, Murray, and many
other well-known names from that Eastern Shore of Maryland famed for
its good cheer, and for its hospitable Colonial mansions presided over
by beautiful matrons.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
FOOTNOTES:
[35] Evidently intended for Mrs. Mayoress, as Charles Willing was
elected Mayor of Philadelphia in 1748.
[36] Mr. Richard Penn Lardner, a descendant of this Lynford Lardner,
in 1878, owned the original list of the subscribers to the Assembly
of 1749, and the manner in which this list and the rules for its
government came into the possession of the Historical Society of
Pennsylvania is in itself an interesting bit of local history. The
rules were the property of Mr. Charles Riché Hildeburn, a direct
descendant of John Swift. He offered to give them to the society if
the old list should also be forthcoming. Mr. Lardner signified his
willingness to donate the list, and the formal presentation was made
by the late President of the Historical Society, the Hon. John William
Wallace. Thus, after a separation of one hundred and thirty years, the
old documents came together through the agency of descendants of three
of the managers of the very Assembly to which they pertained.
[37] Chronicles of the Plumsted Family, by Eugene Devereux.
[38] Some of these old playing-cards, with invitations to the Assembly
printed on the backs, are still in the possession of a descendant of
the first Edward Shippen.
[39] This Mrs. Bingham was the mother of William Bingham, who married a
daughter of Thomas Willing, whose wife, Anne McCall, may well be spoken
of as “the beautiful mother of a beautiful race.”
[40] From manuscript letter in possession of the Historical Society of
Pennsylvania.
[41] The name Williamina was inherited from a beautiful grandmother,
Williamina Wemyss Moore.
[42] This letter was forwarded by Edward Tilghman, who was “out on his
parole,” with the gauze handkerchiefs, ribbons, etc, to Mrs. Paca,
born Anne Harrison, the second wife of William Paca, of Wye Island,
Maryland, who was a delegate to Congress. (Pennsylvania Magazine, vol.
xvi. p. 216.)
[43] This story, on the authority of Thomas Jefferson, is related by
Miss Elizabeth Montgomery in her “Reminiscences of Wilmington.”
[44] Pennsylvania Magazine, vol. xvi. pp. 216, 217.
INDEX.
A.
Abercrombie, Dr. James, 119.
Adams, John, 11, 66, 88, 130, 148, 192.
Adams, Mrs. John, 13, 16, 65, 191, 224.
Adams, John Quincy, 70, 125, 167.
Agassiz, Louis, 145.
Agassiz, Mrs. Louis, 140.
Alexander, General William, 70.
Allen, Andrew, 214.
Allen, Ann, 216.
Allinson, Edward P., 154.
Alsop, Mary, 85. (Mrs. Rufus King.)
American Philosophical Society, 97-147.
Amiel, Christian, 223.
André, Major John, 26, 33, 44, 52, 84.
Armand, Colonel, 210.
Armstrong, Colonel Richard, 223.
Arnold, General Benedict, 63, 194, 223.
Arnold, Mrs. Benedict, 44. (Peggy Shippen.)
Atlee, Dr. W. F., 68.
Aubrey, William, 184.
Auchmuty, Miss, 38, 42.
Auchmuty, Rev. Samuel, 56.
B.
Bache, Dr. Franklin, 174.
Bache, Mrs. Richard, 12, 17, 85.
Barclay, 200, 228.
Bard, 223.
Barton, Dr. Benjamin S., 132.
Bartram, John, 103, 104.
Bartram, William, 104.
Bayard, The Misses, 88.
Beasley, Dr. Frederick, 167.
Beckwith, Colonel, 168.
Beekman, Colonel Henry, 85.
Beekman, Mrs. James, 84.
Biddle, Clement C., 167.
Biddle, Nicholas, 117, 152.
Bingham, William, 211.
Bingham, William, United States Senator, 211 (note).
Bingham, Mrs. William, 89, 92, 224, 226.
Binney, Horace, 173.
Black, William, 199, 210.
Bleecker, 82.
Blended Rose, Ladies of the, 33, 42.
Bonaparte, Charles Lucien, 139.
Bonaparte, Joseph, 164.
Bond, Becky, 43, 218.
Bond, Dr. Phineas, 103.
Bond, Williamina, 42, 216.
Boudinot, Elias, 74.
Bowers, Mrs. John M., 8.
Breck, Samuel, 66, 152.
Bunker’s Hotel, 67.
Burd, 200, 216.
Burgoyne, General, 34.
Burning Mountain, Ladies of the, 43.
Burr, Aaron, 66, 131.
Bush Hill, 225.
Byrd, 229.
C.
Cadwalader, General John, 216.
Cadwalader, Margaret, 216.
Cadwalader, Polly, 216.
Cadwalader, Dr. Thomas, 111.
Calder, Sir Henry, 28, 49.
Callowhill, Hannah, 178. (Hannah Penn.)
Canino, Prince de, 164, 168.
Carey, Henry C., 123, 167.
Carey, Mathew, 167.
Carey Vespers, 123.
Carter, 229.
Cathcart, Lady, 18, 19, 205.
Cathcart, Lord, 42.
Chapman, Dr. Nathaniel, 117, 153.
Chastellux, Marquis de, 84, 148.
Cheston, 229.
Cheves, Langdon, 173.
Chew, Elizabeth, 214.
Chew, Mary, 214.
Chew, Peggy, 42, 49, 58.
Chew, Sally, 43.
Clarkson, 82.
Clifton, Eleanor, 28, 29.
Clinton, Governor George, 81.
Clinton, Mrs. George, 92.
Clinton, Sir Henry, 38, 61.
Clymer, George, 155.
Clymer, Mrs. Henry, 226.
Coffin, Eleanor, 20.
Colden, Dr. Cadwallader, 104, 105.
Collins, Zacheus, 162.
Conyngham, 200.
Coxe, Sally, 214.
Craig, Janet, 42, 56.
D.
Daschkof, Princess, 140, 142.
Deane, Silas, 148.
De Lancey, Mrs. Oliver, 212.
De Peyster, 82.
Dickinson, John, 103, 205, 216.
Digby, Admiral Robert, 73.
Draper, Sir William, 30.
Drayton, Colonel, of South Carolina, 125.
Drinker, Elizabeth, 18.
Duane, Mrs. James, 83, 88.
Duer, Colonel William, 70.
Duer, Lady Kitty, 69, 70, 83.
Dulany, Daniel, 103.
Du Ponceau, Peter S., 121-129, 155, 162.
E.
Elliot, Governor Andrew, 73, 204, 205.
Elliot, Elizabeth, 205.
Emlen, 200.
Evans, 216.
Evans, Governor John, 184.
Eve, Sarah, 18, 199.
F.
Fishbourne, 215.
Fisher, 200, 203.
Fisher, Joshua Francis, 173.
Foulke, Liddy, 10.
Francis, Anne, 134.
Francis, Dr. John W., 152.
Francis, Sir Philip, 134-136.
Francis’s Hotel, 207.
Franklin, Benjamin, 12, 17, 106, 112, 114, 120, 140;
founder of Philosophical Society, 97-102.
Franklin, Samuel, 70.
Franklin, Sarah, 71. (Mrs. Richard Bache.)
Franklin, Walter, house of, New York residence of General Washington,
67-70.
Franks, Abigail, 212.
Franks, David, 212.
Franks, Phila, 212.
Franks, Polly, 214.
Franks, Rebecca, 14, 38, 43, 59-61, 213, 219.
Fraser, Caroline, 164.
Furness, Dr. William H., 124.
G.
Gallatin, Albert, 125.
Galloway, Mrs., 213.
Gerry, Elbridge, 91.
Gerry, Mrs. Elbridge, 86.
Gliddon, George Robins, 125.
Goldsborough, Charles, 57, 226.
Greene, General Nathaniel, 8, 226.
Griffin, Lady Christiana, 85.
Griffin, Cyrus, 85, 90.
Griffitts, Hannah, 54.
Griffitts, Dr. Samuel Powel, 154.
Grouchy, Marquis de, 164.
H.