reunion: "Let me thank thee for the picture thee so kindly left with
me. The sweet, lovely girl face takes me back to the dear old days, as
I look at it. I wish I could give thee something half as valuable in
return." The portrait of Mrs. Downey at the age of eighty, here given,
is from a photograph she contributed to an album presented to Whittier
by his schoolmates of 1827, after the reunion of 1885. Rev. Dr. S. F.
Smith attended this reunion in place of his wife, who was then an
invalid, and he wrote to his wife this account of the appearance of her
old schoolmate at that meeting: "She looked, O so _distingue_, in black
silk, with a white muslin veil, reaching over the silver head and down
below the shoulders. Just as if she were a Romish Madonna, who had
stepped out from an old church painting to hold an hour's communion
with earth."
I was in correspondence with Mrs. Downey during the last years of her
life, but she would not give me permission to call upon her, and the
reason given was that I had seen the miniature, and she preferred to be
remembered by that. She was very shy about telling of her early
acquaintance with Whittier, and whatever I could learn was by
indirection. For instance, I obtained the Marblehead story by her
sending me a copy of Whittier's poems which he had given her, and she
had drawn a line around the stanzas quoted above. No word accompanied
the book. Of course I guessed what she meant, and asked if my guess was
correct. She replied "Yes," and no more. Whittier said he had the
Captain Ireson story from a schoolmate who came from Marblehead. I
asked her if she, as the only Marblehead schoolmate, was the person
referred to, and received an emphatic "No." To an intimate friend she
once said that during her early acquaintance with Whittier it seemed as
if the devil kept whispering to her, "He is only a shoemaker!"
The apartment now used as a reception room was the kitchen of the
original cottage, and has the large fireplace and brick oven that were
universal in houses built a century ago. A small kitchen was later
built as an ell, and this central room became the dining room,
remaining so as long as Mr. Whittier lived. In the reception room is a
large bookcase filled with a part of the poet's library, exactly as
when he was living here. His books overrun all the rooms in the house,
and many are packed in closets. The large engraving of Lincoln over the
mantel is an artist's proof, and was placed there by Whittier forty
years ago. An ancient mirror in this room, surmounted by a gilt eagle,
was broken by a lightning stroke in September, 1872. The track of the
electrical current may still be seen in the blackening of a gilt
moulding in the upper left corner. The broken glass fell over a member
of the family sitting under it, and Whittier himself, who was standing
near the door of the "garden room," was thrown to the floor. All in the
house were stunned and remained deafened for several minutes, but no
one was seriously injured. Up to that time the house had been protected
by lightning rods; but Mr. Whittier now had them removed, and refused
to have them replaced, though much solicited by agents. In revenge, one
of the persistent brotherhood issued a circular having a picture of
this house with a thunderbolt descending upon it, as an awful warning
against neglect! He had the impudence to emphasize his fulmination by
printing a portrait of the poet, who, it was intimated, would yet be
punished for defying the elements.
The old parlor, the principal room of the original cottage, has
suffered no change in the several remodelings of the house. The beams
in the corners show a frame of the olden style--for the cottage had
been built many years when the Whittiers came here. The clear pine
boards in the dado are two feet in width. In this room are placed many
memorials of the poet of interest to visitors. What to him was the most
precious thing in the house is the portrait of his mother over the
mantel--a work of art that holds the attention of the most casual
visitor. The likeness to her distinguished son is remarked by all. One
sees strength of character in the beautiful face, and a dignity that is
softened by sweetness and serenity of spirit. The plain lace cap, white
kerchief, drab shawl, and folded hands typify all the Quaker virtues
that were preeminently hers.
On the opposite wall is the crayon likeness of Elizabeth, the dearly
loved sister, so tenderly apostrophized in "Snow-Bound:"--
"I cannot feel that thou art far,
Since near at need the angels are;
And when the sunset gates unbar,
Shall I not see thee waiting stand,
And, white against the evening star,
The welcome of thy beckoning hand?"
When she died, in 1864, her friend, Lucy Larcom, had this excellent
portrait made and presented it to the bereaved brother, and it has hung
on this wall nearly forty years. All the other members of the
"Snow-Bound" family are here represented by portraits, except the
father and uncle Moses, of whom no likenesses exist, save as found in
the poet's lines. The Hoit portrait of Whittier, painted when he was
about forty years of age, was kept out of sight in a seldom-used
chamber, while the poet was living, for he allowed no picture of
himself to be prominently displayed. The portrait of his brother was
painted when he was about forty years of age. A small photograph of his
older sister, Mary Caldwell, is shown, and a silhouette of aunt Mercy;
also a portrait of his brother's daughter, Elizabeth (Mrs. Pickard),
who was a member of his household for twenty years, and to whom he left
this house and its contents by his will. Her son Greenleaf, to whom
when four years of age his granduncle inscribed the poem "A Name," now
resides here.
[Illustration: MRS. PICKARD]
In this parlor is the desk on which "Snow-Bound" was written, also "The
Tent on the Beach" and other poems of this period. The success of
these poems enabled him to buy a somewhat better desk, now to be seen
in the "garden room," where this desk formerly stood. In this desk are
presentation copies of many books, with the autographs of their
authors--Harriet Beecher Stowe, Lydia Maria Child, Miss Mitford, Julia
Ward Howe, John Hay, T. B. Aldrich, and others. Here also is the diary
kept by Elizabeth Whittier, in the years 1835-37, covering the period
of the removal from Haverhill to Amesbury. Of antiquarian interest is
an account-book of the Whittier family, from 1786 to 1800, going into
minute details of household expenses, and containing many times
repeated the autographs of Whittier's grandfather, his father, and his
uncles Moses and Obadiah, who recorded their annual settlements of
accounts in this book. Near the desk are bound volumes of papers
edited by Whittier--the "New England Review" of 1830, the "Pennsylvania
Freeman" of 1840, and the "National Era" of 1847-50. These contain much
of his prose and verse never collected. The Rogers group of statuary
representing Whittier, Beecher, and Garrison listening to the story of
a fugitive slave girl, who holds an infant in her arms, is in the
corner of the room, where it has been for about thirty years. The
garden, in the care of which Mr. Whittier took much pleasure, comprises
about one half acre of land. He had peach, apple, and pear trees--but
the peaches gave out and were not renewed. He also raised grapes,
quinces, and small fruit in abundance. The rosebush he prized as his
mother's favorite is still flourishing, as are also the fine magnolia,
laburnum, and cut-leaved birch of his planting. The ash tree in front
of the house was planted by his mother.
While gathering grapes in an arbor in this garden, in 1847, Mr.
Whittier received a bullet wound in the cheek. Two boys were firing at
a mark on the grounds of a neighbor, and this mark was near where
Whittier stood, but on account of a high fence they did not see him.
When the bullet struck him, he was so concerned lest his mother should
be alarmed by the accident that he said nothing, not even notifying the
boys. He bound up his bleeding face in a handkerchief and called on Dr.
Sparhawk, who lived near. As soon as the wound was dressed, he came
home and gave his family their first notice of the accident. The boys
had not then learned the result of their carelessness. The lad who
fired the gun was named Philip Butler, and he has since acquired a high
reputation as an artist. The painting representing the Haverhill
homestead which is to be seen at the birthplace was executed by this
artist. He tells of the kindness with which Whittier received his
tearful confession. It was during the first days of the Mexican war,
and some of the papers humorously commented upon it as a singular fact
that the first blood drawn was from the veins of a Quaker who had so
actively opposed entering upon that war.
[Illustration: SCENE IN GARDEN, AT WHITTIER'S FUNERAL]
Once while his guest at Amesbury, I went with him to town meeting. He
was one of the first men in the town to vote that morning, and after
voting spent an hour talking politics with his townsmen. General C.,
his candidate for Congress, had been intemperate, and the temperance
men were making that excuse for voting in favor of Colonel F., who,
Whittier said, always drank twice as much as C., but was harder headed
and stood it better. Other candidates were being scratched for reasons
as flimsy, and our Grand Old Man was getting disgusted with the Grand
Old Party, as represented at that meeting. He said to a friend he met,
"The Republicans are scratching like wild cats." In the evening an old
friend and neighbor called on him, and was complaining of Blaine and
other party leaders. At last Mr. Whittier said, "Friend Turner, has
thee met many angels and saints in thy dealings with either of the
parties? Thy experience should teach thee not to expect too much of
human nature." On the same evening he told of a call Mr. Blaine made
upon him some time previously. The charm of his manner, he said,
recalled that of Henry Clay, as he remembered him. On that occasion
Blaine made a suggestion for the improvement of a verse in the poem
"Among the Hills," which Whittier adopted. The verse is descriptive of
a country maiden, who was said to be
"Not beautiful in curve and line."
Blaine suggested as an amendment,--
"Not _fair alone_ in curve and line;"
and this is the reading in the latest editions.
[Illustration: THE FERRY, SALISBURY POINT
Mouth of Powow in foreground at the right hidden by its own banks in
this picture. Hawkswood in distance at extreme right.]
Thomas Wentworth Higginson, during his residence in Newburyport, was
often a guest at the Amesbury home, and he has this to say of each
member of the family: "The three members of the family formed a perfect
combination of wholly varying temperaments. Mrs. Whittier was placid,
strong, sensible, an exquisite housekeeper and 'provider;' it seems to
me that I have since seen no whiteness to be compared to the snow of
her table-cloths and napkins. But her soul was of the same hue; and all
worldly conditions and all the fame of her children--for Elizabeth
Whittier then shared the fame--were to her wholly subordinate things,
to be taken as the Lord gave. On one point only this blameless soul
seemed to have a shadow of solicitude, this being the new wonder of
Spiritualism, just dawning on the world. I never went to the house that
there did not come from the gentle lady, very soon, a placid inquiry
from behind her knitting-needles, 'Has thee any farther information to
give in regard to the spiritual communications, as they call them?' But
if I attempted to treat seriously a matter which then, as now, puzzled
most inquirers by its perplexing details, there would come some keen
thrust from Elizabeth Whittier which would throw all serious solution
further off than ever. She was indeed a brilliant person, unsurpassed
in my memory for the light cavalry charges of wit; as unlike her mother
and brother as if she had been born into a different race. Instead of
his regular features she had a wild, bird-like look, with prominent
nose and large liquid dark eyes, whose expression vibrated every
instant between melting softness and impetuous wit; there was nothing
about her that was not sweet and kindly, but you were constantly taxed
to keep up with her sallies and hold your own; while her graver brother
listened with delighted admiration, and rubbed his hands over bits of
merry sarcasm which were utterly alien to his own vein."
[Illustration: POWOW RIVER AND PO HILL]
The village of Amesbury enjoyed a sense of proprietorship in Whittier
which it never lost, even when Danvers claimed him for a part of each
year. He did not give up the old house, consecrated by memories of his
mother and sister, but returned to it oftener and oftener in his last
years, and he hoped that he might spend his last days on earth where
his mother and sister died. The feeling of the people of Amesbury was
expressed in a poem written by a neighbor, and published in the village
paper, under the title of "Ours," some stanzas of which are here
given:--
"I say it softly to myself,
I whisper to the swaying flowers.
When he goes by, ring all your bells
Of perfume, ring, for he is ours.
"Ours is the resolute, firm step,
Ours the dark lightning of the eye,
The rare sweet smile, and all the joy
Of ownership, when he goes by.
. . . . .
"I know above our simple spheres
His fame has flown, his genius towers;
These are for glory and the world.
But he himself is only ours."
[Illustration: FRIENDS' MEETING-HOUSE AT AMESBURY]
The Friends' meeting-house, in 1836, was nearly opposite the Whittier
cottage, on the site of the present French Catholic church. Two
centuries ago there had been an earlier meeting-house of the Society,
also on Friend Street, and the name of the street was given on this
account. The present meeting-house, on the same street, was built in
1851, upon plans made by Mr. Whittier, who was chairman of the
committee having it in charge. He once told me that some conservative
Friends were worried lest he make the house too ornate. To satisfy
them, he employed three venerable carpenters, one of them a Quaker
minister and the other two elders of the Society, and the result was
this perfectly plain, neat structure, comfortable in all its
appointments. Visitors like to find the seat usually occupied by
Whittier. It is now marked by a silver plate. I have accompanied him to
a First Day service here, in which for a half hour no one was moved to
say a word. And this was the kind of service he much preferred to one
in which the time was "fully occupied." The meeting was dismissed
without a spoken word, the signal being the shaking of hands by two of
the elders on the "facing seats." Then each worshiper shook the hand of
the person next him. There was no sudden separation. The company formed
itself into groups for a pleasant social reunion. In the group that
surrounded Whittier were ten or twelve octogenarians, whom he told me
he had met in this way almost every week since his boyhood; for even
when living in Haverhill, this was the meeting his family attended. It
was delightful to see the warmth and tenderness of the greetings of
these venerable life-long friends. I once accompanied him to a
devotional meeting, where many of the leading Friends of the Society
were present, and as the papers had announced the names of several
speakers from distant States, he expressed the fear that there would be
no opportunity to get "into the quiet." As the speakers followed each
other in rapid succession, he asked me if I had a bit of paper and a
pencil with me. Then he appeared to be taking notes of the proceedings.
I fancied some of the speakers noticed his pencil, and were spurred by
it to an enlargement of utterance. When we were at home, I asked what
he had written. He smiled and handed me his "notes," which are before
me as I write. "Man spoke," "Woman sang," "Man prayed," and so on for
no less than fourteen items. Being slightly deaf, he had heard scarcely
anything, and had been noting the number and variety of the
performances. It was his protest against much speaking. At dinner the
same day, his cousin, Joseph Cartland, commented upon the inarticulate
sounds that accompanied the remarks of one or two of the speakers. "Let
us shame them out of it," he said, "let's call it grunting." "Oh, no,
Joseph," said Whittier, "don't thee do that--take away the grunt, and
nothing is left!"
[Illustration: INTERIOR OF FRIENDS' MEETING-HOUSE
Whittier's usual seat marked, on left side, near "facing seats."]
Mr. Whittier had many wonderful stories illustrating the guidance of
the spirit to which members of the Society of Friends submitted in the
daily intercourse of life. One was of an aged Friend, who never failed
to attend meeting on First Day. But one morning he told his wife that
he was impelled to take a walk instead of going to meeting, and he knew
not whither he should go. He went into the country some distance and
came to a lane which led to a house. He was impressed to take this
lane, and soon reached a house where a funeral service was in progress.
At the close of the service he arose, and said that he knew nothing of
the circumstances connected with the death of the young woman lying in
the casket, but he was impelled to say that she had been accused of
something of which she was not guilty, and the false accusation had
hastened her death. Then he added that there was a person in the room
who knew she was not guilty, and called upon this person, whoever it
might be, to vindicate the character of the deceased. After a solemn
pause, a woman arose and confessed she had slandered the dead girl. In
telling such stories as this, Mr. Whittier did not usually express full
and unreserved belief in their truth, but he maintained the attitude of
readiness to believe anything of this kind which was well
authenticated, and he approved of the methods of work adopted by the
Society for Psychical Research in England and in this country.
[Illustration: CAPTAIN'S WELL]
The hills encircling the lovely valley of the short and busy Powow
River, beginning with the southwestern extremity of the amphitheatre,
are: Bailey's, on the declivity of which, overlooking the Merrimac, is
the site of Goody Martin's cottage, the scene of the poem of "Mabel
Martin;" next is the ridge on which is the Union Cemetery where
Whittier is buried; then Whittier Hill, named not for the poet but for
his first American ancestor who settled here, and locally called
"Whitcher Hill"--showing the ancient pronunciation of the name; then,
across the Powow, are Po, Mundy, Brown's, and Rocky hills. On a lower
terrace of the Union Cemetery ridge, and near the cemetery, is the Macy
house, built before 1654 by Thomas Macy, first town clerk of Amesbury
(and ancestor of Edwin M. Stanton, the great war secretary), who was
driven from the town for harboring a proscribed Quaker in 1659, as told
in the poem "The Exiles;"[6] also, the birthplace of Josiah Bartlett,
first signer of the Declaration of Independence after Hancock, whose
statue, given by Jacob R. Huntington, a public-spirited citizen of
Amesbury, stands in Huntington Square; and near by is "The Captain's
Well," dug by Valentine Bagley in pursuance of a vow, as told in
Whittier's poem; also the Home for Aged Women, for which Whittier left
by his will nearly $10,000. It is to a view of Newburyport as seen from
Whittier Hill, a distance of five miles, that the opening lines of "The
Preacher" refer:--
"Far down the vale, my friend and I
Beheld the old and quiet town;
The ghostly sails that out at sea
Flapped their white wings of mystery;
The beaches glimmering in the sun,
And the low wooded capes that run
Into the sea-mist north and south;
The sand-bluffs at the river's mouth;
The swinging chain-bridge, and, afar,
The foam line of the harbor-bar."
The cemetery in which Whittier is buried can be reached by either the
electric line from Merrimac, or the one from Newburyport--the latter
approaching nearest the part in which is the Whittier lot. This lot is
in the section reserved for the Society of Friends, and is surrounded
by a well-kept hedge of arbor vitae. Here is buried each member of the
family commemorated in the poem "Snow-Bound," and also the niece of the
poet, who was for twenty years a member of his household. There is a
row of nine plain marble tablets, much alike, with Whittier's slightly
the largest. At the corner where his brother is buried is a tall cedar,
and at the foot of his own grave is another symmetrical tree of the
same kind. Between him and his brother lie their father and mother,
their two sisters, their uncle Moses and aunt Mercy. His niece,
daughter of his brother, has a place by his side. Inclosed by the same
hedge is the burial lot of his dearly-loved cousin, Joseph Cartland.
For those who take note of dates it may be said that his father died in
1830, and not, as stated on his headstone, one year later.
[Illustration: WHITTIER LOT, UNION CEMETERY, AMESBURY]
Po Hill, originally called Powow, because of the tradition that the
Indians used to hold their powwows upon its summit, is three hundred
and thirty-two feet high, and commands a view so extended that many
visitors make the ascent. One of Whittier's early prose legends is of a
bewitched Yankee whose runaway horse took him to the top of this hill
into a midnight powwow of Indian ghosts. In describing the hill he
says: "It is a landmark to the skippers of the coasting craft that sail
up Newburyport harbor, and strikes the eye by its abrupt elevation and
orbicular shape, the outlines being as regular as if struck off by the
sweep of a compass." From it in a clear day may be seen Mount
Washington, ninety-eight miles away; the Ossipee range; Passaconaway;
Whiteface; Kearsarge in Warner; Monadnock; Wachusett; Agamenticus and
Bonny Beag in Maine; the Isles of Shoals with White Island light; Boon
Island in Maine; and nearer at hand Newburyport with its harbor and
bay; Plum Island; Cape Ann; Salisbury and Hampton beaches; Boar's Head
and Little Boar's Head; Crane Neck and many other of the beautiful
hills of Newbury, Rowley, Ipswich, and Danvers. The view of Cape Ann as
seen from Po Hill is referred to by Whittier at the opening of the poem
"The Garrison of Cape Ann:"--
"From the hills of home forth looking, far beneath the tent-like span
Of the sky, I see the white gleam of the headland of Cape Ann."
Down the south side of the Po flows the Powow River in a series of
cascades, the finest of which are now hidden by the mills, or arched
over by the main street of the village of Amesbury. The hill is
celebrated in several of Whittier's poems, including "Abram Morrison,"
"Miriam," and "Cobbler Keezar's Vision." The Powow, a little way above
its plunge over the rocks where it gives power for the mills, flows in
front of the Whittier home, and but the width of a block distant. The
surface of its swift current is but a few feet below the level of
Friend Street. Po Hill rises steeply from its left bank. The Powow is
mentioned in the poem "The Fountain:"--
"Where the birch canoe had glided
Down the swift Powow,
Dark and gloomy bridges strided
Those clear waters now;
And where once the beaver swam,
Jarred the wheel and frowned the dam."
[Illustration: THE FOUNTAIN, ON MUNDY HILL]
"The Fountain" is a spring that may be found on the western side of
Mundy Hill. The oak mentioned in this poem is gone, and a willow takes
its place. The Rocky Hill meeting-house is well worth the attention of
visitors, as a well-preserved specimen of the meeting-houses of the
olden time. Its pulpit, pews, and galleries retain their original form
as when built in 1785. It is situated on the easternmost of the fine
circlet of hills that incloses the valley of the Powow. This hill is
well named, for here the melting glaciers left their most abundant
deposit of boulders. A trolley line from Amesbury to Salisbury Beach
passes this venerable edifice.
[Illustration: ROCKY HILL CHURCH, BUILT IN 1785]