_Northampton, Mass. July 24, 1834._
And you will positively "excommunicate" me if I do not send you "some
_first impressions_" of Yankee-land? Have at you then; though, really,
my time has been so filled with seeing and hearing, that hardly a scrap
remains to write down a hundredth part of the curious or striking
things that meet my eyes and ears.
Unusual opportunity has been afforded me for seeing various lights and
shades of Yankee character. In stage and steamboat, in jersey wagon and
on foot, on highways and by-ways, in farm houses and city palaces, I
have seen and chatted with all sorts of people, from the ---- of the
---- down to the tavern porter and the country laborer. Five days I
have spent in a pedestrian stroll, calling often at the country houses
to get a draught of water, rest myself, and talk with the farmer or his
wife. These gossipings, you may well suppose commonly produced
amusement and frequently solid information, at least solid materials
for reflection; and, considering that it is only a little more than
three weeks since my entry into New England, methinks I have a pretty
exact measure of Jonathan's foot. Yet for all this preface, do not
expect any very astounding revelations. From the thousand incidents
that, unitedly, make my tour extremely interesting to myself, it is not
certain that any one, or any dozen can be selected, which will
materially interest another person.
In the _visible_ face of Massachusetts and Connecticut, the features
which, by their novelty or beauty, most strike a Virginian eye, are the
small farms, usually of from fifty to two hundred acres; the small
fields in proportion, there being sometimes fifteen or twenty in one
farm; the stone fences, rendered necessary and numerous in many places
by scarcity of timber, and by the troublesome superabundance of stone;
the universality of _hay_ crops, on hills as well as in meadows; the
almost entire absence of wheat, (the only grains generally cultivated
being corn, rye and oats,) the clustering of habitations together in
villages, instead of having them dispersed at intervals of a mile over
the country; the white painted village churches, all with stately
spires, visible for miles around, having gilt vanes, and clocks of
hands so large and stroke so loud, that I have repeatedly seen and
heard the hour half a mile off.--The country is more hilly, or
_rolling_, as our farmers would say, than the lower half of Virginia;
and the hills have, generally, a smaller base and a more gracefully
swelling, dome-like top, than our hills. These rotundities, with their
concomitant hollows, traversed by numberless stone fences, with here
and there patches of woodland and detached white farm houses, half
imbosomed in elms and fruit trees; while, perhaps, two or three
villages, with steeples piercing the sky, are at once within the view,
exhibit everywhere landscapes of a beauty unknown to eastern, or
indeed, to western Virginia. Here is not a hundredth part of the
appearance of abject, squalid poverty, that our state presents. I have
not seen a log house in New England; and nine-tenths of the ordinary
farm houses are painted. Brick and stone buildings are not common,
except in the cities. This village, the most lovely to the eye in all
the north, and Worcester, (take care to call it _Wooster_) having
respectively, 3000 and 4 or 5000 inhabitants, contain, both together,
hardly more than one hundred and fifty brick and stone houses.
But the _morale_ of New England, the character of her people, their
tone of thought and feeling upon some important subjects, their social
and political institutions, regulations, and usages, have interested me
far more than her physical lineaments.
Would that time and space were mine to explain the road, pauper, and
school systems of Massachusetts and Connecticut. (They and Rhode Island
are the only states of New England which I have visited.) But that
would require too much detail. Their felicitous organization may be
inferred from their effects.
The common roads are all, or nearly all, _ridged up_, turnpike fashion,
and fully as good as our turnpikes. I do not mean such as a certain one
not far from ----, which the traveller knows to be a turnpike only by
the tolls and the jolts, but those in the valley, and near Richmond.
There is probably not a beggar by trade (except solicitors for pious
charities and subscriptions) in New England. The needy are sent to a
poor house, having a farm attached to it, on which they work for the
parish, or are let to the lowest bidder for their maintenance, as the
people of each township choose. In different townships (or _towns_, as
the provincial dialect hath it,) the number of paupers greatly varies.
I have been told of five, ten, twenty, and even thirty, or more, upon
the list; and, as there are many "towns" in a county, perhaps the
number of such pensioners here, equals ours. But mark! the expense here
is next to nothing--sometimes absolutely nothing: nay, some "towns"
actually derive a revenue from the labors of their parish poor. Salem
has thus gained several thousand dollars in a year. All who are able
render a fair equivalent, sometimes more, for the relief they receive.
Every person in this state, above four years of age, is entitled to
instruction, at the charge of the "town," in the useful common branches
of knowledge; and a man or woman who cannot read, is here a
prodigy.--Nine-tenths, at least, of the whole population take, or read
newspapers. (In Virginia not more than half the white population does
so.) Here seems to be not a fourth of the tippling that we have;
gambling is even far more rare: there is not a race course in New
England; and, considering the density of the population, (eighty to the
square mile, ours is only nineteen,) I do not believe there is a fourth
so much vice and crime as with us. In moral science, and not least in
that branch of it which investigates the texture of a people's
character, it is hard to ascertain causes and effects with
precision.--What was _effect_, by a sort of reaction frequently becomes
_cause_; they give each other reciprocal impulses, like the mutual aid
of parent and offspring; sometimes various causes mingle their
operations, in unseen, perhaps invisible degrees,--and there is no
laboratory, no apparatus for resolving the inscrutable compound into
its elements. The moral chemist should, therefore, diffidently ascribe
the order, industry, sobriety, thriftiness, and intelligence, which
characterise these people, to any one cause, or to any set of causes.
But general consent, and the reason of the case, leave little doubt
that much, if not most of these virtues, must be attributed to the
system of COMMON SCHOOLS. Yet it may be questioned if, in producing
social good, the school system has not in these states a
_co-efficient_, of equal or superior influence. The road and poor
systems--nay, the school system itself, it seems to me, owe nearly all
their virtues to the TOWNSHIP SYSTEM.
Each county is subdivided into districts, of no uniform shape or size,
though usually four, five, or six miles long and broad. By an
impropriety, too fast rooted ever to be eradicated, these are called
_towns_; which word is never understood here in its English sense, as
opposed to _country_, and meaning an assemblage of houses, but always
as signifying one of the _districts_ I have mentioned. Protesting
against its lawfulness, I shall yet use it now in the New England
sense. Each town is a sort of republic. Its people, in full town
meeting, elect a representative, or representatives, in the
legislature, _selectmen_, (nearly equivalent to common-council-men)
assessor, and collector; decide how the poor shall be kept, schools
organized, or roads altered or repaired, and what amount shall be
raised by taxes for these and other purposes. A town meeting is held
statedly, in the spring, for elections; and two or three others,
whenever ten voters request it of the selectmen, in writing. At
deliberative meetings, a chairman (here called "Moderator,") is chosen
by the assembly; great decorum prevails, and earnest debates arise. The
town, as a corporate person, is liable for any damage sustained through
neglect to keep a road in repair; and damages have frequently been
recovered. It is obliged by law, to support schools enough to educate
all its children in the manner prescribed. It is bound to maintain its
own poor. And the near interest, the direct agency which every citizen
has in the performance of these duties, cause them to be attended to
with an exactness and an efficacy which a government less _local_,
never would attain. This is the very system which it was the leading
wish of Mr. Jefferson's life to see established in Virginia.[1] No one
can see its admirable effects without owning that wish to have been one
of the wisest which his wise and patriotic mind ever cherished. Such an
organization is not only a nursery of statesmen,--it diffuses among the
multitude habits of reflection and of action about public
affairs,--makes them feel often and sensibly, the dignity of
self-government,--and fits them better and better for the exalted task.
It is, morally, what a _well disciplined_ militia would be physically.
Not the wretched militia that, by our own disgraceful neglect, has now
become our own scorn, but that which our forefathers recommended to us
as a main "bulwark of our liberties," and "the best defence of a free
state."
[Footnote 1: See his letters to Kercheval, in 1816.]
_All the direct taxes in this state are laid by the towns._ The state
government is maintained entirely by the interest on some accumulated
funds, and by a tax of half of one per cent. on the capital of the
state banks. By the by, there are at least one hundred of these in
Massachusetts, having a capital altogether, as is computed, of about
thirty millions! And this for a state of 7,800 square miles, and
640,000 people. Verily "_incedit per ignes suppositos cineri doloso:_"
or, in English, "she _sits_ upon a mine of gunpowder." Perhaps sailing
through the air in a car buoyed by bubbles, might be as apt an
illustration.
The _common_ schools (so those supported by taxation are called) are
not the only ones, for even elementary instruction. Many wealthy
persons, unfortunately for the public weal, prefer sending their
children to teachers of their own employing: and thus numerous private
schools of various grades, and some of these of great merit, are
planted over the state. _Unfortunately_ I say, because such persons are
often those whose _interested_ countenance and supervision are most
essential to the good management of the _common_ schools,--which,
deprived of them, lose half their usefulness. Female education is well
attended to. Good schools for females, (reputedly so, I have not
entered one of them) seem much more numerous than with us, allowing
duly for population. And a judgment of the trees by their fruits, would
confirm that belief; for in my casual and diversified intercourse, I
have met, I think, with a larger proportion of well taught women than
would occur in a similar range through our own society. Yet such a
comparison is very fallacious, and perhaps not worth making. Of one
thing I am satisfied, by personal observation; that the additional work
rendered necessary to ladies in New England, by the imperfect and
unservant-like "help" which they hire, is not at all incompatible with
refined delicacy of mind, manners, and person. That it _is_ so,
however, is a leading argument with some of our _philosophers_ for
slavery. If memory served me, I would quote for their benefit, a
caustic passage from the "Three Wise Men of Gotham," to the effect that
"a _genuine philosopher_ is never at a loss for _facts_ to support any
theory, however absurd or ridiculous. Having constructed _that_
according to the most approved principles, and upon the most ingenious
plan, he goes to work, and either _makes_ all the facts needful to
uphold it, or distorts actual facts to suit his purpose."
It has been my good fortune to meet with some admirable female minds in
New England. Since the spells of romance were shaken from me, I have
never hoped to see more happily exemplified, that trait of a capital
heroine of our favorite Miss Edgeworth: "you could discover that the
stream of literature had passed over her mind, only by the verdure and
fertility you saw there." (I mar the quotation, doubtless, but that is
its substance.) No pedantic harping upon books, and authors, and
sciences; some cross-examination would be requisite, to find out that
she knew their names. But let a subject be tabled, calling for ideas,
or for exertions of intellect, to which a conversancy with books,
authors and sciences was indispensable--and you might see that she knew
them well. Then too she knew much that they--but for fear you should
think I am about to fall in love, (which however is impossible,) I will
suppress the rest of my encomium.
_Abolition_, if not dead here, is in a state too desperately feeble to
give us an hour's uneasiness. Of the many intelligent men with whom I
have conversed on this subject in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and
Connecticut, there is but a single one who does not reprobate the views
of Messrs. Tappan, Cox, Garrison and Co. as suggestions of the wildest,
most pernicious fanaticism. Tappan has two brothers in Boston, both
ardent colonizationists, and decidedly opposed to his mad notions. Not
only do the persons I have talked with, themselves reprobate
interference with that painfully delicate and peculiar concern of the
south: they testify to the almost entire unanimity of their
acquaintance, in the same sentiment. And such multiplied and decisive
proofs have I, of the sound state of the public mind on that subject,
as leave me not a doubt, that nine-tenths of the votes, and ninety-nine
hundredths of the intellect of the country, are for _letting us wholly
alone_. You have little idea of the contempt in which Garrison, and his
will-o'-the-wisp, the _Liberator_, are held here. I have heard him
spoken of as a "miserable fanatic," and "a contemptible poor creature,"
in companies so numerous and mixed, as to demonstrate--none gainsaying
it--that the speakers but expressed the public thought. "There is in
this, as in other communities," said a Cambridge Professor to me,
"always afloat a certain quantity of moral _virus_, or noxious _gas_,
ever and anon imbodying itself in some such form as this, of
abolitionism. Not long ago, it was anti-masonry. In two years,
abolitionism will be as prostrate as anti-masonry is now. It may,
meanwhile, spread fast and boldly: it may create disturbances and
alarms: it may prevail so far, in some districts, as to have
representatives in Congress, who will there bring forward some scheme
of emancipation: but triumph finally, or even extensively, in the
north, _it never can_." And all that I saw, or heard, convinced me that
Mr. G---- was not widely mistaken.
At Worcester, last year, an apostle of abolition from "some where away
down east," delivered a lecture, in the Baptist Church, against
slavery; depicting its wrongs and evils, and insisting upon its
extirpation. He was heard patiently; but when he closed, the pastor of
the church arose, and, to the satisfaction of a numerous audience,
completely answered every argument; vindicated the southern
slaveholders from all wilful injustice in being such; shewed the
impracticability of any but the most cautiously gradual emancipation,
and the madness of attempting even that, by officious intermeddling
from the non-slaveholding states. Our apostle wanted to lecture again
the next day; but the excitement against his doctrine had grown so
strong, that he was refused a further hearing, and admonished, by some
of the leading citizens, that if he remained longer, he was in danger
of tar and feathers. Among the warmest of his reprobators, were the
late and the present governors; both residing there. He wisely
decamped; and has had no successor in Worcester. The manner in which
the New York riots have been spoken of in New England, strikingly shews
the bad odor of abolition here. Instead of the leaning towards that
side, which I feared would result from sympathy and indignation at its
being made the object of a mob's fury, the abolitionists seem to be
regarded by the majority as most chargeable themselves, with all the
mischief that has been done. It is the common sentiment, that they
deserved the treatment they received; and the censure thrown upon the
mob is very _gentle roaring_ indeed. I find almost every New Englander
readily assenting to the positions,--That two millions of slaves could
never be turned loose amongst us and live, while _we_ lived: that the
existence of the two _castes_ in the same country, in a state of
freedom and equality, is morally impossible: that emancipation, without
removal, therefore, is utterly chimerical: that, unjustifiable as
slavery is in the abstract, rights of property in slaves have been
acquired, which, sanctioned as they are by the constitution, and by a
claim prior and paramount to the constitution, cannot be violated
without an outrage, destructive at once of our social compact: that,
let slavery be ever so wrong, abolition ever so just and easy, it is a
matter which concerns _us alone_; and as to which, we are so
sensitively jealous of extraneous interposition, that every agitation
of the subject in other states is calculated to weaken our attachment
to them, and bind faster the chains of slavery.
In a word, the south may be assured, that on this point, New England is
sound: at least the three states which I have visited. Colonization is
popular here--with those, I mean, who know or reflect at all about it.
The majority (like the majority with us,) are without either knowledge
or thought on the subject. The abolitionists find fault with
colonization, because, say they, its aim is to postpone or prevent
emancipation. Our southern _illuminati_ oppose it, on the ground that
it _favors_ emancipation! Do not these inconsistent objections
neutralize each other, like opposite quantities in Algebra, or opposite
simples in Chemistry?