IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 7 // C5^/ :/. f/i ^n ^ 1.0 I.I 1.23 f iiM Ilia '■^^» IM |||22 ^ *« IIIIM LA. 11 1.6 Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, NY. 14580 (716) 872-4503 4% iV ^. o .V ^ci\^ ^\ Wk\ 'f.V % V "^"1^<> &9 Wr ^ CrHM/ICMH Microfiche Series. CIHM/ICMH Collection de microfiches. Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductlons Institut Canadian de microreproductions historiques 1980 Technical and Bibliographic Notes/Notes techniques et bibliographiques The Institute has attempted ;o obtain the best original copy available for filming. Features of this copy which mav be bibliographically unique, which may alter any of the images in the reproduction, or which may significantly change the usual method of filTiing, are checked below. D D D n D Coloured covers/ Couverture de couleur I I Covers damaged/ Couverture endommagde Coves-s restored and/or laminated/ Couverture restaurea et/ou peliicul^e I I Cover title missing/ Le titre de couverture manque Coloured maps/ Cartes gdographiques en couleur □ Coloured ink (i.e. other than blue or black)/ Encre de couleur (i.e. autre que bleue ou noire) I I Coloured plates and/or illustrations/ D Planches et/ou illustrations en couleur Boun^^ with other material/ Reli6 avec d'autres documents Tight binding may cause shadows or distortion along interior margin/ La reliure serr^e peut causer de I'ombre ou de la distortion le long de la marge intdrieure Blank leaves added during restoration may appear within the text. Whenever possible, these have been omitted from filming/ II se peut que certaines pages blanches ajoutdes lors d'une restauration apparaissent dans le texte, mais, lorsque cela dtait possible, ces pages n'ont pas 6t6 filmdes. Additional comments:/ Commentaires suppl^mentaires: L'Institut. a microfilm^ lo meilleur exemplaire qu'il lui a 6t6 possible de se procurer. Les details de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-dtre uniques du point de vue bibliographique, qui peuvent modifier un9 image reproduite, ou qui peuvent exiger une modification dans la mdthode normale de filmage sont indiquds ci-dessous. I I Coloured pages/ D Pages de couleur Pages damaged/ Pages endommagees Pages restored and/oi Pages restaur^es et/ou pellicul^es Pages discoloured, stained or foxei Pages ddcolor^es, tachetdes ou piqudes Pages deteched/ Pages d^tachdes Showthrough/ Transparence Quality of prir Qualitd in^gale de I'impression Includes supplementary materie Comprend du materiel supplementaire Only edition available/ Seule Edition disponible I I Pages damaged/ I I Pages restored and/or laminated/ I I Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ I I Pages deteched/ I I Showthrough/ I I Quality of print varies/ I I Includes supplementary material/ I I Only edition available/ Pages wholly or partially obscured by errata slips, tissues, etc., hcve been refilmed to ensure the best possible image/ Les pages totalement ou partiellement obscurcies par un feuillet d'errata, une pelure, etc., ont 6t6 filmdes d nouveau de fagon d obtenir la meilleure image possible. y 10X This item is filmed at the reduction ratio chocked below/ Ce document est filmd au taux de reduction indiqu6 ci-dessous. 14X 18X 22X 26X SOX s/ 12X 16X 20X 24X 28X n 32X The copy filmed here has been reproduced thanks to the generosity of: Harold Campbell Vaughan Memorial Library Acadia University L'exemplaire fiim6 fut reproduit gr^ce d la g6n6rosit6 de: Harold Campbell Vaughan Memorial Library Acadia University The images appearing here are the best quality possible considerfng the condition and legibility of the original copy and in keeping with the filming contract specifications. Les images suivantes ont 6t6 reproduites avec le plus grand soin, compte tenu de la condition et de la nettetd de Tcxemplaire film6, et en conformity avec les conditions du contrat de filmage. Or'/ginal copies in printed paper covers are filmed beginning with the front cover and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impres- sion, or the back cover when appropriate. All other original copies are filmed beginning on the first page with a printed or illustrated impres- sion, and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impression. Les exemplaires originaux dont la couverture en papier est imprimde sont filmds en commenpant par le premier plat et en terminant soit par la dernidre page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration, soit par le second plat, selon le cas. Tous les autres exemplaires originaux sont film6s or. commenpant par la premier) page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration et en terminant par la dernidre page qui comporte une telle empreinte. The last .^ .o'ded frame or: each microfiche shail contain ^h- symbol —►(meaning "CON- TINUED"), or the symbol V (ineaning "END"), whichever applies. Un des symboles suivants apparaitra sur la dernidre image de ch?que microfiche, selon le cas: le symbole --♦■ sign.fie "A SUiVRE", le symbole V signifie "FIN". Maps, plates, charts, etc., may be filmec* at differertt reduction ratios. Thuse too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper left hand corner, left to right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following diagrams illustrate the method: Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre film6s d des taux de reduction diffdrents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seul cliche, il est film6 d partir de Tangle sup6r>9u; uauche, de gauche d droite, et de hF\:t en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images n^cessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mdthode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. 332 t^t Same Sluthor. Abbotfs Paragraph Histories, THE UNITED STATES from the Discovery of the Continent to the Present Time. THE AMERICAN REVOLU- TION. Boston : Roberts Brothers. 1876. REVOLUTIONARY TIMES: SKETCHES OF OUR COUNTRY, ITS PEOPLE, AND THEIR WAYS, ©lit Jl^unlrrrt ¥^atrs ^go. By EDWARD ABBOTT. BOSTON: ROBERTS BROTHERS. i8;6. r Copyright, 1876, By Edward AerjOTT. t\ e \(^ :^ Cambridge : Press of John Wilson y hereafter contra6l, fome of which things md the reft inhumane and cruel. Therefore, the inhabit. -. in .vn-nieeting aflem- bled, unanimoufly voted their * ntire difapprobation, and contempt of the proceediigs of faid M'Neil, CHARACTER AND LIFE. 65 t refpefling his wife, and beg leave to inform the public of the true ftate and circuniftances of the cafe. Mrs. M'Neil, before fhe married her prefent hufband, was a widow, and had under her care the eftate of her chil- dren ; and Mr. M'Neil was a man of very litde intereft, and as little inclined to labour. He had three lots of land given him, in faid town, for fettling (each lot con- tained 50 acres) except a very trifle, which he i.»aid for three cottages, which the proprietors built on faid lots. The value of the land was then but trifling, for there were then but three families in the town. Before marriage, Mr. M'Neil borrowed money of Mrs. M'- Neil, which belonged to her children, to pay his debts, which he was then involved in ; and alfo gave him the very fliirt that he was married in ; and direcfcly after marriage, was obliged to fell even the very curtains, from her bed, to pay for his board, which he alfo owed before marriage ; and the firfl; fummer after they were married, flie tarried in Chefter (where fhe formerly lived) and by her own frugality, prudence and induflry, and by felling her brafs kettle (which was hers alfo before marriage) flie provided herfelf, her hufband, and two boys, with provifions of all forts for that fum- mer (and the three lafl were at New-Boflon, at the diftance of better than 30 miles from^ her.) And fince fhe removed to New-Bofton, which is better than 20 years, fhe has reared a family of fmall children ; and by her continual affiduity, has brought his eftate to what it now is ; which is not inconfiderable ; and he himfelf has been abfent almoft the whole of the time \l 66 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES:. (except in the winter, there was little or nothing to be done ;) fo that it appears in fa6l, that fhe has main- tained him, herfelf, and family, almoft entirely fince they were unhappily joined. And now, inrtead of her forfaking him, he has forfaken her, and his family, and let out the farm to a ftranger (upon terms which he denied their own fon) and feems to requeft her to remove to a place (where all things confidered) every body muft judge unreafonable, as well as unjuft, and cruel, which to avoid all refle6lions that we poffibly can, and do the innocent juftice we fhall omit ; and to make her cafe as deplorable, as poffible, threatens to take from her all the necelTaries of life, and requires her to do that, which (without breach of charity) we think we can afTert, he himfelf in no wife wifheth and refufeth to leave to indifferent perfons, to fettle honour- ably that, which, by the tenor of his actions, he does not wifh to be done honeftly. And now having de- clared the truth, we fubmit it to the public, to judge his reafons for advertifing his wife. By order of the town. WM. CLARK, Town-Clerk. New-Bojlon^ March 26, 1776. There was a severity in public punishments which we of this day would hardly endure. The stocks, the pillory, and the whipping- post are too fai.iiliar to need detailed men- tion. One document in point we must niake ft ) CHARACTER AND LIFE, 67 room for, even though its date places it a Httle outside of the field we are especially view- ing * Strong Licker to Exses. at a Cort holclen at Farmine;ton In hartforcl County Janerary the 13: 1762 presant Jared Lee Just peace for sd County vvliearas David Culver of Farmington In sd County was atached and brought befouer Jared Lee Just-peace to answer unto one sertin Complaint Giv- enin In the Name and behalf of our Lord the King by obadiah Andrus Constabel to the sd Jared Lee Just peace the Complainant saith that the sd Culver was In the hous of Jonathan Root In Southington on the 20 of October Last past and Did ther Drink Strong licker to Exses that he was Found Drunk In the Lane near Aaron websters and at his one plaes of abode being bereaved of the cues of his Reason and under- standing and Urns the sd David Culver pleads Gilty In Cort theirfouer Find that the sd Culver shal pay as a fine to the town tresuar of this town the sum of o — 8 — o Lawfull mony as Fine and Coast alowed £0 — 3 — 6 mony whear of Execution Remains to be don ;^o — 8 — o Fine Febuary the 6 1762 then Execution Granted on the o — 3 — 6 Cost the above judgment Feb 22: 1762 then Execution Returned satisfied obadiah Andrus Constabel of Farmington * Sketches of Southington, p. 410. 68 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. Slavery, it should be borne in mind, existed generally throughout the States, though the agitation of emancipation had a place in the counsels which attended the foundation of the government. How strange it is to read to-day of the buying and selling of slaves in New England a hundred years ago, and to find in the Boston papers of that time adver- tisements of runaway negroes. The follow- ing document is probably one of the last of its kind : — i« to all men to home these Presents come — greeting know yeae that I Josiah Campe of Milford in the County of Nevvhaven in the State of Connecticut for the consideration of Sixty Pounds LawfuU money Do Sell make over and conforme unto Abraham Clark of Milford in s'd county and state afores'd as my one Proper Estate on negro Boy named Handow Coggs thirteen yearse and During s'd negroo naturall Life and if said negroo Is set free within six yeare from this Date by the Laws of this state then I Josiah Camp Do bind my Self my heirs Executor or adminis- trator to Pay back to s'd Clark so much of s'd sum as shall l)e judged that s'd negroo hase not earnt and I Josiah Campe Do bind my Self my heirs executor or administrator formerly by these Presents to warrent and Defend s'd Clark from all Clame from aney Per- \ CHARACTER AND LIFE. 69 son or Persons what so ever for s'd negroo whereunto I have Set my hand and sell this 30th Day of January Ad 1784. JOSIAH CAMP. In presents of witnesses Michael Pike, Nathaniel Tibbals. Fashions changed a hundred years ago as they do now, and perhaps it would be impos- sible to give an exact picture of the costumes of different classes at any one given time. But, in general, it may be said that gentlemen wore small-clothes, knee-buckles, and buckled shoes ; coats broad-skirted, wide-cuffed, and lace-ruffled, and of brown, gray, claret, or other color ; long waistcoats with broad flaps over the pockets, cocked hats, and in many cases wigs and powdered hair. The small sword was a common article of full dress, while scarlet cloth and gold and silver lace, with showy buttons, were resorted to by patri- cians on important occasions. The ladies made up their silks and satins and brocades into sacques and petticoats, hooped and trailed, set off with ruffles, and variously pat- terned and bedecked, according to the style ^i mil 70 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, of the hour. They spent much time upon their hair, and the arrangement of the head- dress for the great party or the grand ball was a very complicated operation. One of these grand wardrobes — one that actually figured at some of Martha Washington's re- ceptions — has been thus recently described in public print, by a lady evidently fully capa- ble of appreciating its beauties and peculiari- ties :-^ The satin slip, as it was then called, or, as we should say, under-skirt, was white, but it is now of a rich cream color at night ; in day-time it shows the discoloration of age. This slip is so narrow that it is a wonder how any woman ever walked with ease in it. Around the bottom is a simple row of very costly lace, of the kind known as Honiton. The over-dress is an India satin, Turkey red, as our ancestors had it. It is cut close to the form with a few gathers at the back, — - a modern tie-back is nothing to it ; the queer old waist terminates just below the bust. It is rather diamond-shaped than square in the neck, with a fall of white lace, with which also the skirt of the "Turkey" is trir ned. The shoes are most singular. It seems as if no woman ever could have walked in them, but the soles show that they have been worn. They are of white satin, with the toe part sharpened almost to a CHARACTER AND LIFE, 71 point, while the heel is placed in the centre of the slipper ; the heel is about two inches high, and at the end resembles the stem of an inverted clay-pipe. These, and like these, were of course the fashions of the fashionable people of the cit- ies and of wealthy circles. The plain folks dressed in soberer styles. The soldiers of the Revolutionary army knew little of the splendors, or even of the neatness and com- fort, of uniforms ; and it is one of the humors of our own time to say that the original ulster overcoat was invented at Valley Forge, con- sisting of a bed-blanket with holes to put the arms through, and a mule-halter for a belt. Let it not be forgotten in this connection, that the Revolutionary soldier's musket was a fire-lock, and that he carried not cartridges, but powder in a horn hung by his side. The tinder-box had not yet been superseded by the match-box, and flint and steel did exclu- sive service in kindling spark and flame. As for other marks of the stage which society had reached, we refer the reader to three items from Mr. Trumbull's " new edition " of " the Pilgrim's Progress," as follows : — ■ , , \. '^ 72 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, I"* 1770 Buys a home-made Wooden Clock. 1774 Lights Boston streets with oil lamps; 1780 Buys an Umbrillo for Sundays ; and when- ever he shows it is laughed at for his effeminacy. Of amusements there was little variety in the olden time. Some of the domestic in- dustries were turned to good account for pur- poses of pastime ; and the husking-match, the quilting-bee, and the apple-paring gave the young people ample opportunity for the play of pleasant feeling. The " raising " was made a half-holiday for the men of all the neighbor- hood. Fencing was a manly accomplishment, and had its teachers in the cities and large towns. The ladies gave coffee-parties of an afternoon ; and a dinner-party of the elect was a very grand affair. An occasional con- cert enlivened the monotony of life, as thus:* At Concert Hall, on Thurfday the 22nd Inflant, will be a grand CONCERT of VOCAL and IN- STRUMENTAL MUSIC. Firft Violin by Mr. Mor- gan, Harpfichord by Mr. Propert. The firft Atl will conclude with the celebrated Highland Ladie Con- certo ; and by p:irticular Defire will be Sung, the Favorite Song of Mongo, out of the Padlock. * Boston Gazette, Monday, April 12, 1773. CHARACTER AND LIFE. 73 Tickets to be had of the Printers, at the Britifh Coffee Houfe, and at Mr. Propert's Lodgings, at Haifa Dollar each. To begin at Seven o'clock. No Money to be taken at the Door. The first attempt at theatricals in Boston was made somewhere about 1750. It called out a law forbidding such amusements, and the town allowed no regular theatre until nearly the close of the century. That which the British maintained in Faneuil Hall in 1775 was, of course, a forced exception to the rule. In New York, the case was different, where, at the opening of the Revolution, the little theatre on John Street had been minis- tering to tlie public want since 1767. Of a performance on the 25th of j<.!iuary, 1777, Gaine's " Mercury" gives this account : — January 26. — Lafl evening, the little theatre in John Street, in New York, was opened, wi*h the cele- brated burlefque entertainment of Tom Thumb, writ- ten by the late Mr. Fn-'lding to ridicule the bathos of feveral dramatic pieces that at his time, to the dif- grace of the Britifh ftage, had engroffed both the Lon- don theatres. The characters were performed by gentlemen of the navy and army. The fpirit with which this favorite piece was fupported by the per- 74 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, formers, proves their tafte and ftrong conception ^^ the humor. The performance convinces us that a good education and knowledge of polite life, are effen- tially neceflary to conftitute a good a6lor. The play was introduced by a prologue written and fpoken by Captain Stanley. We have great pleafure in applaud- ing this firfl; effort of his infant mufe, as replete with true poetic genius. The fcenes painted by Captain De Lancey, have great merit, and would not difgrace a theatre, though under the management of a Garrick. The houfe was crowded with company, and the ladies made a brilliant appearance. The John Street Theatre was an unsightly building, painted red, standing some dis- tance back from the street, and approached from the sidewalk by a covered way. During the occupation of the city by the British, the theatrical company was stocked by inferior officers of the army and navy, who were glad to share the profits accruing from their per- formances, for the replenishment of their easily wasted purses. The objections which the theatre still en- counters in the minds of a considerable por- tion of the community were in the strongest possible force then. CHARACTER AND LIFE. 75 Josiah Qiiincy, Jr., wrote of himself, on one occasion, as having been " much amused M by a performance which he witnessed at this John Street Theatre in 1773, but adds: "As a citizen and friend to the morals and happi- ness of society, I should strive hard against the admission, and much more the establish- ment, of a theatre in any State of which I was a member." Another curious instance of the public sen- timent of the time respecting the theatre, and not only that, but of the degree to which leg- islation undertook to regulate the conscience, is found in a vote of Congress passed on the 1 6th of October, 1778, as follows : — Whereas frequenting play-houses and theatrical en- tertainments has a fatal tendency to divert the minds of the people from a due attention to the means nec- essary for the defence of their country and preserva- tion of their liberties, Resolved^ That any person holding an office under the United States, who shall act, promote, encourage, or attend such play, shall be deemed unworthy to hold such office, and shall be accordingly dismissed. In connection with the record of this vote, 'je REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, in its issue of Nov. 2, 1778, the "New York Journal " relates the following pleasant in- cident : — The theatre being open laft evening, the Marquis de La Fayette being in company with his Excellency the Prefident of Congrefs, afked him to accompany him to the play. The Prelident politely excufmg him- felf, the marquis prefled him to go. The Prefident then informed the marquis that Congrefs having that day pafled a refolution, recommending to the feveral States to ena6l laws for the fuppreffion of theatrical amufements, he could not poffibly do himself the honor of waiting upon him to the play. " Ah ! " replied the marqui'", " have Congrefs pafled fuch a refolution ? then I will hot go to the play." The social dance and the public ball seem, after all, to have been the popular diversion. The dancing-master had employment even in staid and proper Boston. Thus:* — Dancing Academy. 'T^HOMAS TURNER, begs leave to acquaint the -*■ Public, he has open'd a School oppofite William Vaflall's, Efq : to teach the elegant Art of Dancing in the moll improved Tafte, viz. Minuets, Cotillions, Hornpipes and Englifli Country Dances. — Thofe * The Boston Gazette, Monday, March 20, 1775. CHARACTER AND LIFE, 77 Parents to whom it may be agreeable, to confer on him the Tutorage of their Children, may depend on fuch Care and AfTiduity, as ihall prove greatly to their Advantage. — Any Gentleman or Lady not inclining to attend the publick School, ihall be waited on with Pleafure and Attention. The public ball, with the graceful minuet and the stately contra-dance, seems to have been the favorite form of demonstration in honor of festive anniversary and distinguished guest. When on one occasion La Fayette was in Baltimore, on his way to the "front" at the South, a ball was tendered to him. " Why so gloomy at a ball } " asked some belle of the evening, who had been struck with the soberness of the young French nobleman. " I cannot enjoy the gayety of the scene," was his reply, " while so many of the poor soldiers are without shirts and other neces- saries." " We will supply them," was the impulsive reply of the assembled ladies, who met next day to make up clothing for their suffering defenders. In this and other ways, the mere 7^ REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, pleasure-seeking spirit of even those troublous times often met a just rebuke and was turned into wiser channels. Many stories have come down, pleasantly illustrative of the patriotic sentiments that pre- vailed. Nothing was commoner than for chil- dren to be named after Washington, Hancock, the Adamses, and other of the Revolutionary leaders. On a Sunday in July, 1776, the Rev\ Mr. Perry, of East Windsor, Conn., had the distinguishing privilege of baptizing a child by the name of " Independence," — not proba- bly a solitary experience. But when about the same time a minister of Norwalk was called to baptize the child of a Mr. Edwards by the name of Thomas Gage, the neighbor- hood was aroused ; and " one hundred and feventy young ladies formed themfelves into a battalion, and with folemn ceremoi;iy ap- pointed a general and other officers to lead them on. This petticoat army then marched in the greatcft good order to pay their com- pliments to Thomas Gage, and prefent his mother with a fuit of tar and feathers ; " * and * New England Gazette, May 30, 1776. CHARACTER AND LIFE. 79 only the courage and valor of the innocent baby's sire seem to have thwarted the pur- pose of the expedition. Mr. Jacob Vredenburgh, barber, of New York, received the formal thanks of the New York Sons of Liberty, " for his firm, spirited, diVid patriotic conduct in refusing to complete an operation vulgarly called shaving, which he had begun on the face of Captain John Croser, Commander of the ' Empress of Russia,' one of his Majesty's transports now lying m the river ; but most fortunately and providen- tially was informed of the identity of the gentleman's person, when he had about half- finished the job." •! f ji 8o REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. V. DOMESTIC CONCERNS. It must be remembered that life a hundred years ago was generally marked by great iso- lation. Outside of the few cities and leading towns, the population was never dense, and often just the opposite ; so that the house and home of the avera VI ^: % c^y <$> Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) b72-4S03 s V iV ^ :\ \ €^, V\<^^' a^ ^^" '^^ ^,/^ ♦\ ,.<^ 5^ #? .^";.% fA I !^ 1 92 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, So much for the division of the wardrobe among the three sons. Now for the similar division of the household furniture between the three daughters : . Bathsheba Bedstead £^ 5 • Chest 6 wig box • . . . . 6 Candle stick 6 •» »,....* 2^ Bed Tick 12 Blanket 5 Coverlid 6 1 sheet 68 2 pillow cases 2 I Spoon 3j I Knife & fork 8 chair Banister 3 cash in Will 12 « ' ■ ■ Hannah I Bed £^\, I o Great Chair . • d Sp( 3i iu 8 Hi DOMESTIC CONCERNS, 93 Rebecka Bed cord £o 28 fire shovel & tongs .' 3 Hand Irons '6 ij Bellows 18 2 Dillows 6 I Bolster 16 I Sheat 6 8 I pr. r^';n'v cases 2 3 pint Base • 2 I Knive & fork 8 a spoon 3} /2 2 7i Acct. of articles not divided. a pair of knee buckels. a pair of Garters. a book The Hosannahs of Children. a Funeral Sermon. People " lived well " a hundred years ago, their generally simple tastes being capable of easy and abundant satisfaction. Succotash was a favorite common food ; and the bill of fare of a gentleman's dinner in Falmouth in 1774, recorded by John Adams, included these items : ** Salt-fish and all its apparatus, roast chickens, bacon, pease, as fine a salad as F= iw II I 94 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, \ \ ever was made, and a rich meat pie. Tarts and custards, etc., good wine and as good punch as ever you made." There were times and places, it is true, when and where a scarcity of good provisions v^ras felt ; and there was an especial pinch in the commodity of tea, of which mar y patriotic people denied themselves altogether, and others bought only sparingly at large prices. " We are all learn- ing economy," wrote Franklin from Philadel- phia in 1775. "Instead of half-a-dozen courses to dinner, gentlemen content them- selves with two." Prices generally felt the pressure of the times ; and their attempted regulation by authority was only partially successful. An item suggestive on this point is the following from the " Essex Gazette " of April 25 — May 3, 1775: — ASSIZE OF BREAD IN SALEM, March i, 1775. 2-3ds, of a Penny white loaf . . . olb. /^ 02. \o d. a Penny white Loaf o 6 15 a Two-penny ditto o 13 14 A Four-penny ditto i II 12 DOMESTIC CONCERNS. 95 In the town records of Farmington, Conn., under date of Jan. 30, 1775, appears this minute of a Committee of Inspection previ- ously appointed : * — Voted \}c\'3X Mr. James Persaville, Merchant of this Town, having bought and sold Goods higher tlian usual hy his own Confession, has been guilty of a vio- lation of ye Association. That this Committee do upon a Confession made, and promise of Amendment by said Percival for his Fault in purchasing and selling sundry articles of Eng- lish Goods at higher prices than is consistent with ye true sense of ye Association, and upon his promising as far as he can to deposit ye surplussage of ye money over and above what they would have amounted to if sold at his usual Prices into ye Hands of such Person or Persons as shall by this Committee be appointed to receive ye same to be appropriated to ye use of ye Poor of ye Town of Boston, and upon such Confes- sion and Retraction being made public restore sd Percival to full and compleat Charity. That if it has aheady or in time to come may hap- pen that any Person or Persons, Inhabitants of any of ye neighbouring Towns have refused or shall refuse to acceed to or in any Way or Manner violate ye do- ings of ye Continental Congress, it shall be ye duty of ye Inhabitants of this Town to withdraw all kinds of * History of Southington, p. 525. f' 96 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. \ connexion from such Person or Persons, and as Mem- bers of this Committee we will use our best Endeav- ours that ye Inhabitants punctually adhere to this vote and practice accordingly. That it is highly important that all Venders of Goods and Merchandize they have either disposed of since ye ist day of December 1773, OJ" ^^^^e now on hand, with their Number or other marks whereby said articles or any of them have been usually rank'd or distinguished, together with ye Prices they have sold them at for ready Pay and their usual Advance for Credit since ist day of December 1773, or do now sell them, and also ye Names of ye Persons any of such Goods or -Merchandize have been purchased of since ye first day of December, 1774, to ye Intent they may be in the most effectual Manner prevented sell- ing such Goods or Merchandize hereafter at higher Prices than they have been accustomed to since ye above mentioned ist day of December 1773 Contrary to ye Association of ye Continental Congress, or if they should that they may be detected and brought to condign Punishment. That all Venders of Goods or Merchandize within this Town shall hereafter each for himself render a particular Account to three or more of this Committee being present to take such Account of every article of such Goods or Merchandize as shall be purchased by them and brought into this Town with their numbers or other Marks of Distinction, and likewise of ye Place where and ye Persons of whose said Goods or DOMESTIC CONCERNS. 97 Merchandize were purchased before any of ye Pack- ?ge3 thereof are broken, and it is expected ye Pur- chaser upon ye Receipt of any such Goods or Mer- chandii'e will notify three or more as aforesaid of this Committee to be present to take such account of ye true Intent and Meaning of this Vote. In Boston, under date of April 14, 1777, the Selectmen and Committee of Correspond- ence of the town, acting under legislative authority, published the following schedule of prices : * — COD Fifli and Haddock, guts and gills in, One Penny-out, Two Pence per Pound. Tom Cod and Flounders, One Penny half-penny per Pound. Hallaboat T'iree Pence per lb. Eels (kin'd and gutted. Three Pence per Pound. Carting Wood from Wharves to the Buyer's Houfe, including every expence but the Firfl Coll, in confid- eration of the Wharfingers retailing in fmall Quantities, Five Shillings per Cord. Irucking a fmgle Hogflieads, Two Shillings. Tierces in proportion. Trucking Barrels, a Load, 3 to a Load, Four Shillings. Carting or Trucking Merchandize, not included in Cafks, Four Shillings per Ton, and in proportion for a Quarter of a Ton. * The New England Chronicle. 7 s-;u ff 98 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, II Men's beft made Calf-fkin Shoes not to exceed Twelve Shillings a Pair. Boy's ditto in a jufl proportion. Women's Leather Shoes, Six Shillings per Pair. Women's Cloth Shoes, Eight Shillings per Pair. Men's beft Beaver Hats, F'orty-eight Shillings a Piece. Soap, good Merchantable, deliver'd at the Houfe of the Purchafer, Twenty Shillings per Barrel and one Penny three Farthings per fingle Pound. Tallow dip'd Candles, Nine Pence per the Box and Ten Pence a fmgle Pound. Salt and Meadow Hay, Two Shillings per Hundred. Rice, Thirty Shillings per Hundred, Eight and Six Pence per Quarter, and Four Pence per Pound. Loaf Sugar, One Shilling and Six Pence per the Quantity or fingle Loaf. Vinegar, One Shilling per Gallon. Onions, Eight Pence per Half Peck, Fourteen Pence per Peck, Two Shillings per Half Bufhel, and Four Shillings per Bufhel. Carrots, Four Pence per Half Peck, Seven Pence per Peck, One Shilling per Half Buftiel, and Two Shillings per Bufhel. Parfnips, Eight Pence per Half Peck, Fourteen Pence per Peck, Two Shillings per Half Bufhel, and Four Shillings per Bufliel. Turnips, Three Pence per Half Peck, Five Pence per Peck, Nine Pence per Half Bufhel, and One Shil- ling and Six Pence per Bufhel. ^p DOMESTIC CONCERNS. 99 m the 'teen and 'ence I Two 'teen and [ence Shil- Potatoes, Four Pence per Half Peck, Seven Pence per Peck, One Sliilling per Half Bufhel, and Two Shillin<;s per Bufhel. Eggs, Nine Pence per Dozen. Merchantable Hogfhead Hoops to be furveyM, Fourteen Foot long, at Twelve Shillings per Hundred. Ditto fhorter than Eleven Foot, Nine Shillings ; Twelve Foot, Ten Shillings. Ditto Barrel Hoops to be furvey'd, Nine Foot long, Six Shillings per Hundred. Ditto Ihorter than Nine Foot in proportion. Red Oak Hogfhead Staves, Three Pounds per Thoufand. White Oak Ditto, Six Pounds per Thoufand. Red Oak Barrel Staves, One Pound Eight Shil- ngs per Thouflind. Clear Try'd Hogs Fat, Six Pence for any Quantity and Eight Pence by the fingle Pound. Merchantable Boards by Retail, Three Pounds per Thoufand. Clear feafon'd Boards, Three Pounds Twelve Shil- lings per Thoufand. Good Cyder clear drawn from the Lees, with the Barrel, Twenty Shillings, and without Seventeen Shillings. All Cord Wood from the Country, befides Oak and Walnut, to the Buyer Home, Twenty-fix Shillings per Cord. In Philadelphia, in August of the same year, ft 100 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. I IM I prices were thus reported by John Adams in one of his letters to his wife : * — *• Prices current, Four pounds a week for board, besides finding your own washing, shaving, candles, liquois, pipes, tobacco, wood, etc. Thirty shillings a week for a servant. It ought to be thirty shillings for a gentleman ard four pounds for the servant, be- cause he generally eats twice as much and makes twice as much trouible. Shoes, five dollars a pair. Salt, twenty-seven dollars a bushel. Butter, ten shillings a pound. Punch, twenty shillings a bowl." The money system of the country, it should be remembered, was in a mixed condition. Not only was the English currency in use, but the colonies, and, later, the Continental Congress, had issued their paper notes of divers sorts. Fractional parts of a dollar were in circulation then as now. To a con- siderable extent all this paper money was counterfeited by the enemy, with the object of helping forward the work of subjugation, and it further suffered constant and enormous depreciation ; how great may appear from the following notice in the " New York Gazette, of October 2Z : — >» * Familiar Letters, p. 301. DOMESTIC CONCERNS. lOI Wanted by a gentleman fond of curiofities, who is fhortly going- to England, a parcel of Congrefs Notes, with which he intends to paper fome rooms. Thofe who wifh to make fomething of their ftock in that commodity, (hall, if they are clean and fit for the pur- pofe, receive at the rate of one guinea per thoufand for all they can bring before the expiration of the pref- ent month. Inquire of the printer. N. B. — It is expected they will be much lower. n 102 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. VI. EDUCATION. At hardly any point does the America of 1776 present a stronger contrast to the America of 1876, than in respect to schools and education. There were colleges then, it is true ; but only nine of them, and only five that could be said to be in established and successful operation. The academies and higher seminaries with which the land is now so thickly studded were then al- most absolutely unknown. The necessity for schools preparatory to the college course had not begun to be felt, and of professional schools there was a corresponding scarcity. There was, however, a medical school in successful operation in Philadelphia, the eminent Dr. Benjamin Rush being one of its three pro- fessors. For the higher education of women almost no facilities existed. There was even EDUCATION, 103 a prejudice against it, which had yet to be dispelled. The nine colleges above alluded to, with the dates of their foundation, were as fol- lows : — Harvard, Cambridge, Mass 1638 William and Mary, Williamsburg, Va. . . . 1693 Yale, New Haven, Conn 1700 College of New Jersey, Princeton 1748 Columbia, New York 1754 Brown University, Providence, R.I 1765 Dartmouth, Hanover, N.H 1770 Rutgers, New Brunswick, N.J 1771 Hampden Sidney, Hampden Sidney, Va. . . 1775 Of these nine, the only five that were at this time really worthy of their name, as be- ing contributive to the intellerlULd life of the people, were Harvard, William and Mary, Yale, Princeton, and Columbia. The foun- dations of Dartmouth had just been laid in the midst of the woods, and amongst a pioneer population ; with log houses for its first build- ings, and four miles of desolate travel to the nearest human habitation. Yet in 1773 Dart- mouth counted its six graduates, and conferred 'ffK^ 104 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, M Ill >^ nineteen honorary degrees ! A graphic pict- ure of what college life meant and cost under these circumstances is supplied in the follow- ing paragraph of reminiscence, the reader merely needing to know in explanation that the mill referred to was one of the neces- sary appurtenances of this "college" in the woods:* — The mill man, Osborn, wrote to Joseph Vaill, a young man of Litchfield, to come up to Hanover "to obtain a college education, by helping him tend the mills ; " and Mr. Vaill tells us how he answered the call. He says he "started September 28, T772, with three others, with packs on their backs, with an axe and one horse, to find their way, as best they might, 180 miles to the colleoje saw-mill. We found the mills down in the woods, where the howling of wild beasts and the plaintive notes of the owl added to the gloomi- ness of the night season. We made ourselves bunks and filled them with straw, did our own cooking and washing," and, if you can believe it, they took in a boarder ! The price paid for sawing and sticking boards was one dollar a thousand, and half the toll for grinding. Upon this income we were ourselves to live and offset the board of Sophomore Osborn, one of the brothers, who became our teacher to fit us for college, and whose compensation was cancelled by his * The First Half Century of Dartmouth College, pp. 31, 32. |i EDUCATION. 105 \ boarding with us. We were two years fitting. One of our number died and another returned home ; but two others came on and filled their places, "so that the mill work, the boarding-house, and Sophomore Osborn's support should not fail. Mr. Vaill entered college, and says he studied in his cold home with pine knots for light, walked four miles a day to his recitations, facing a north-west wind, and often break- ing his own path in the new snows. It is marvellous I did not freeze, as I was thinly clad." Humorous as is the thought of a shower of honorary degrees bursting upon such a land- scape, there appears, perhaps by contrast, a singular stateliness and propriety in a corre- sponding act of " old " Harvard, then entitled to that epithet by reason of its already honor- able age of nearly one hundred and forty years ; which college, on the third day of April, 1776, promulgated in sonorous Latin the decree of its Corporation, whereby General George Washington, on the very day before his departure from Cambridge to New York, was invested with its " highest honor ; " namely, the degree of Doctor of Laws. The document was published in full, both in Latin and in English, in the leading columns of the " New ,i t' io6 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. England Chronicle," of April 25, following; from a stained and musty copy of which it is here reproduced to the eye of the curious and reverent reader : — THE CORPORATION of HARVARD COLLEGE in Cambridge, in New England, to all the Faithful in Chrift, to whom thefe Prefents fhall come, GREETING. TTSTHEREAS Academical Degrees were originally ' ' inftituted for this Purpofe That Men, eminent for Knowledge, Wifdom and Virtue, who have highly merited of the Republick of Letters and the Common- Wealth, fhould be rewarded with the Honor of thefe Laurels ; there is the greateft Propriety in Conferring fuch Honor on that very illuflrious Gentleman, GEORGE WASHINGTON, Efq ; the accomplifhed General of the Confederated Colonies in America; whofe Knowledge and patriotic Ardor are manifeft to all : Who, for his diftinguifhed Virtue, both Civil and Military, in the firft Place, being ele6led by the Suf- frages of the Virginians, one of their Delegates, exerted himfelf with Fidelity and fingular Wifdom in the cele- brated Congrefs of America^ for the Defence of Liberty, when in the utmoft Danger of being for ever loft, and for the Salvation of his Country ; and then, at the earneft Requeft of that Grand Council of Patriots, without Hefitation, left all the Pleafures of EDUCA TION. 107 his delightful Seat in Virginia, and the Affairs of his own Eftate, that through all the Fatigues and Dangers of a Camp, without accepting any Reward, he might deliver New England from the unjuft and cruel Arms of Britain, and defend the other Colonies ; and Who, by the moft fignal Smiles of Divine Providence on his Military Operations, drove the F'leet and Troops of the Enemy with difgraceful Precipitation from the Town of Bofton, which for eleven Months had been fhut up, fortified, and defended by a Garrifon of above feven Thoufand Regulars ; fo that the Inhabitants, who fuffered a great Variety of Hardfnips and Cruel- ties while under the Power of their Oppreffors, now rejoice in their Deliverance, the neighbouring Towns are freed from the Tumults of Arms, and our Univer- fity has the agreeable Profpe6t of being reflored to its antient Seat. Know ye therefore, that We, the Prefident and Fellows of Harvard College in Cambridge, (with the Confent or the Honoured and Reverend Overfeers of our Academy) have conftituted and created the afore- faid Gentleman, GEORGE WASHINGTON, who merits the higheft HONOR, DOCTOR of LAWS, the Law of Nature and Nations, and the Civil Law ; and have given and granted him at the fame Time all Rights, Privileges, and Honors to the faid Degree pertaining. In Teftimony whereof. We have affixed the com- mon Seal of our Univerfity to thefe Letters, and fub- fcribed them with our Hand writing this Third Day of ii \ io8 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, April in the Year of our Lord one Thoufand feven Hundred Seventy-fix. pSitrillum "I .] Socii. LCommune SAMUEL LANGDON, S.T.D. Praefes. NATHANIEL APPLETON, S.T.D. JOHANNES WINTHROP, Mat. et Phil P ANDREAS ELIOT, S.T.D. (Hoi. L L.D. [ SAME. COOPER, S.T.D. J JOHANNES WADSWORTH, Log. et Eth. Pre. The- faurius. All the colleges suffered more or less during the Revolution. Harvard was turned out of its quarters in Cambridge in 1775, and obliged to adjourn temporarily to Concord. Yale met with corresponding interruptions, and held no public commencements from 1777 to 1 78 1. Columbia's solitary building was appropriated by the British as a military- hospital ; and the small but valuable library was dispersed, and in part destroyed, but few of the books ever finding their way back. There were no graduates from 1776 to 1784. Princeton suffered as much as either of the others, not alone in the loss of her resources, but in the interruption of academical exer- EDUCA TION. 109 cises ; the buildings having been used as barracks by the British. In the Battle of Princeton, Nassau Hall was occupied and de- fended by them until they were driven out by the Americans. The College of William and Mary was the wealthiest of the sisterhood up to the time of the Revolution ; but its resources were then greatly crippled. Here, in 1775, originated the fraternity of the Phi Beta Kappa ; and hence was derived the chapter at Harvard. The old records are still in existence. An examination of the Continental Con- gress, composed as it was of leading men of all the Colonies, affords some light upon the topic of popular education at that period. The Congress, whose sessions extended through some ten years, comprised in all some three hundred and fifty members, of whom about one-third were graduates of col- leges. A recent writer in one of the most intelligent and accurate of American jour- nals * has taken pains to collect and array a paragraph of important statistics upon this ♦ New York Evening Post, January, 1876. m^^. ^ no REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. subject, which we take leave to insert here, though without verification, that, however, be- ing hardly necessary for our present purpose : There were in the Continental Congress during its existence 350 members; of these 118, or about one- third of the whole, were graduates from colleges. Of these, twenty-eight were graduated from the College of New Jersey in Princeton, twenty-three from Har- vard, twenty-three from Yale, eleven from William and Mary, eight from the University of Pennsylvania, four from Columbia College, one from Brown Uni- versity, and one from Rutgers College, and twenty- one were educated in foreign universities. These 118 graduates were distributed in the Colonies as follows : New Hampshire had four college graduates among her delegates, three of whom were graduated from Harvard, and one from Princeton ; Massachusetts had seven- teen, sixteen of whom were from Harvard and one from Yale; Rhode Island had four graduates, — two from Princeton, one from Harvard, and one from Brown University; Connecticut had eighteen grad- uates, — thirteen from Yale, three from Princeton, and two from Harvard. New York, out of her large dele- gation, had but eight graduates, — four from Columbia, and four from Yale. New Jersey had eleven grad- uates, — eight from Princeton, one from Yale, and one from Rutgers. Pennsylvania had thirteen graduates, — four from Princeton, four from the University of Penn- EDUCATION. Ill sylvania, one from Yale, and four educated in foreign parts. Delaware had two graduates, both from Prince- ton. Maryland had seven, — three from Princeton, two from the University of Pennsylvania, one from Wil- liam and Mary, and one educated in foreign parts. Virginia had nineteen graduates, — ten from William and Mary, two from Princeton, and eight educated in foreign parts. North Carolina had four graduates, — two from the University of Pennsylvania, one from Harvard, and one educated in foreign parts. South Carolina had seven graduates, — two from Prince- ton, and five educated in foreign parts. Georgia had five graduates, — three from Yale, one from Prince- ton, and one educated in foreign parts. Thus it ap- pears that Princeton had representatives from ten of the Colonies ; Yale, from six ; Harvard, from five ; the University of Pennsylvania, from three ; William and Mary, from two ; and Columbia, Brown, and Rutgers, from one each. Fifty-six delegates signed the Decla- ration of Independence. Of these twenty-eight, or just one-half, were college graduates. If it may be said that the Continental Con- gress was as fairly a representative body in respect to intelligence and culture as the forty-fourth Congress, then it must be owned that the people of 1776 were a very intelligent and cultivated people, and turned such school and college advantages as they enjoyed to good account. 112 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. Professional schools, as has before been said, were almost unknown. The candidate for the honors of the law, the dignities of the ministry, and, generally speaking, for the toils of medical practice, was obliged to pursue his studies under private teachers. The the- ological seminaries of the time were simply families of students grouped in the house- holds of famous and popular divines. One of the most celebrated of these came to be that of Rev. Dr. Emmons, of Franklin, which how- ever had only made its beginning in one of the years of the Revolution. As to schools of the common grade, the New England Colonies were in obvious ad- vance of the others ; but the system at its best was such that occasion offered for such pub- lic notices as this, for example : * — A Morning school. 'X/'OUNG Ladies, or young Gentlemen, who have a ■*• Mind to be acquainted with the French Language ; to be perfe(51;ed in reading, fpeaking or writing the Eng- lifh ; — to be introduced to, or Compleated in their Im- provements, in Arithmetic, Penmanfhip, or Epiftolary * New England Chronicle, July i8, 1776. EDUCATION. 113 Writing, may be properly affifted in purfuing either of thefe Attainments, from 5 to 7 o'Clock in the Morn- ing, at the School on Court Square, oppofite the Eaft Door of the State Houfe ; where Conftant Attendance *vill be given, and the mofl ufeful Branches of Com- mon Education taught in the bed approved Manner. " On Morning Wings^ how active fprings the MindP"* 8 114 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. VII. LITERATURE. The period of the Revolution was not greatly productive in literature, except of that special sort to which such a conflict and the peculiar experiences attendant upon it would naturally give rise. Patriotism held the pen, and politics and the incidents of the war fur- nished the themes. The people found their solid reading in such works of previous gen- erations and other lands as were at hand, and the times witnessed little more than the seed- sowing of future har\'ests. And yet there is a distinct literary tint in the many-colored picture of our country a hundred years ago. In the first place, many of the distinguished men who figure on other accounts in the scenes before us deserve honorable mention for their services in literature: Washington and Jefferson, by their letters ; the Adamses, LITER A TURE. 115 n a d le n n s. Otis, and Dickinson, by their pamphlets and poHticai essays ; Drs. Withcrspoon, Stiles, and Mayhew, by their published sermons and ad- dresses ; and, notably, Rev. Dr. Emmons, by his "more than 7,ocx) copies of nearly 200 sermons." The state papers of the period, especially of the years immediately preceding actual hostilities, have never been surpassed before or since, and can never cease to chal- lenge admiration. Francis Hopkinson of Philadelphia, who was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, has also this title to fame, that he was the author of " The Battle of the Kegs," a humorous bal- lad descriptive of an actual incident, and one of the best-known literary fruits of the Revo- lution. He distinguished himself by other writings, chiefly of a politico-satirical charac- ter, and achieved great popularity in his day. Hopkinson was brother-in-law to Rev. Jacob Duche, the patriotic chaplain to the Congress, who himself published some sermons, pam- phlets, and other small works. E ;han Allen was author as well as soldier, having written a telling account of his captivity in Canada. I, ,; li; ii6 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, Charles Thompson, for many years the sec- retary of the Continental Congress, was a man of literary tastes and some literary achieve- ments ; the chief of the latter being a trans- lation of the whole Bible, which, however, did not appear until after the clos3 of the war. Mr. Thompson had for a private pupil Wil- liam Bartram, a son of John Bartram, and now a young man of about twenty-five, destined to do some useful work as a botanical inves- tigator and author. While the war was in progress, he was in the South, gathering the materials for a volume on the natural features of that part of the country, which appeared in 1 79 1. John Bartram, the father, was the author of " A Description of East Florida '* (1766), but was just laying aside his pen at a good old age. A pretentious work on much the same subject, which appeared at New York in 1775, was the first volume of a " Nat- ural History of East and West Florida," by one Bernard Romans. It was illustrated with copperplates and maps. The author followed it three years later with the first vol- ume of a work on the Netherlands, translated LITER A TURE. 117 from Dutch historians and dedicated to Jona- than Trumbull. But in neither case did he go further than a first volume. The ballad literature of the Revolution formed a distinct school, and was the most original product of the mind and circum- stances of the period. These ballads found their way in great numbers to the public press, generally from anonymous writers, and were almost universally pointed with a polit- ical purpose. Every important event was celebrated in this way, and notable char- acters were applauded or satirized as they deserved. The collections of Du Simiticre and Freneau preserve the most characteristic of these extemporaneous effusions, and throw no little light upon the times. Freneau was himself one of the openly avowed and most meritorious of these Revolutionary singers. He was a young New-Yorker, of Huguenot descent ; and of his writings, both in prose and verse, several collections were published. Du Simitiere, who was also of French extrac- tion, but living in Philadelphia, was one of the antiquaries of his day, and exercised his lit- I ii8 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, erary tastes by commencing as early as 1776 a collection of materials for a history of the war, carefully cutting from the newspapers all news and other items relating to the prog- ress of events, and pasting them upon sheets of paper, under a proper system of classifi- cation. Freneau was born in 1752, which was also the birth-year of a number of other men who, in 1776, were beginning to make a mark in literature. Among these were Alexander Graydon, who carefully stored up his remi- niscences of the Revolution for a volume of "Memoirs," which he published in 181 1; Gouverneur Morris, author of the essays by ** An American," published in the " Pennsyl- vania Packet," in 1 780 ; Rev. William LinUj of New York, who published several volumes of eloquent discourses ; Mrs. Ann Eliza Bleecker, whose name is borne by a number of poems and tales ; and Rev. Timothy Dwight, who became the president of Yale College, and was the author of the well- known hymn, ** I love thy kingdom, Lord." The name of Dwight, who now, at a little LITER A TURE. 119 past the age of twenty, was just finishing his poem, "The Conquest of Canaan," suggests another interesting coincidence, and brings to view another circle of iUustriou? writers. Dwight was a fellow, at Yale College, of David Humphreys, Joel Barlow, and John Trumbull, the four being friends and working much together. Humphreys came to wield a ready pen, which he turned to good ac« count, first in patriotic pleasantries, and later in the writing of a " Life of General Put- nam," which was one of the earliest of essays in American biography. Barlow had the honor of seeing his Commencement poem, " The Prophet of Peace," printed the same year of its delivery, when he was but twenty- three ; but the greater and better part of his literary work, chiefly poetry, belongs to a later period. Trumbull's intellectual life and literary his- tory are exceptionally interesting ; his poem, " MTingal," being perhaps the most strik- ing of the literary remains of the Revolution. Trumbull, who was born in Watertown, Conn., in 1750, passed his examination for admission 1 N 120 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. -*' \ to Yale before he was eight years old, sitting on that occasion for the purpose in the lap of Dr. Emmons ; but happily he did not begin his course till six years later, which brought him into the notable company above men- tioned. After leaving Yale, he studied law with John Adams in Boston, and before he was twenty-five had written a political poem of some sixty or seventy stanzas, called " An Elegy on the Times." His " M'Fingal," which was begun in 1774 and finished in 1782, Vi^as undertaken at the instance of some of his political friends, as a piece of public service ; a-.d, to take his own description of it, aimed to give a '* general account of the American contest, with a particular description of the character and manners of the times, inter- spersed with anecdotes, which no history could probably record or display ; and, with as much impartiality as possible, satirize the follies and extravagances of my [his] country- men as well as of their enemies." The poem had a great run, as such a burlesque would at such a period. More than thirty editions of it were printed, in all possible forms ; and it went everywhere. LITERATURE, 121 In 1775-76 there was published in Phila- delphia, by one Robert Aitkin, a Scotchman, a monthly periodical, called " The Pennsyl- vania Magazine, or American Monthly Mu- seum." Thomas Paine was its editor, on a salary of X25 a year ; and among its contribu- tors were President Witherspoon and Francis Hopkinson. It was Paine's success at this post which drew from Dr. Benjamin Rush suggestions that led to his celebrated pamph- let, " Common Sense." Paine was the author not only of " Common Sense," probably the most famous and influential pamphlet in American history, but of a series of political tracts, under the general title of " The Crisis," eighteen of which appeared between 1776 and 1783. Philadelphia had also a " United States Magazine," of which Hugh Henry Bracken- ridge wa's editor. Brackenridge was a graduate of Princeton in the class of 1771 ; and his com- mencement poem, on " The Rising Glory of America," achieved the distinction of print the year following its delivery. He also wrote a drama, entitled " Bunker's Hill," which was published in 1776. 1 122 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. To the Revolutionary period belong the familiar lines — " No pent-up Utica contracts your pow'rs, But the whole boundless continent is yours ! " which occur in the epilogue to a tragedy, "Cato," written in 1778 by Jonathan M. Sewall, a lawyer of Portsmouth, N.H. At Dover, N.H., Dr. Jeremy Belknap was in the midst of his twenty years' pastorate, col- lecting, we may suppose, the materials for his invaluable History of New Hampshire, the first volume of which was published at Phila- delphia in 1784. Noah Webster had just en- tered Yale ; and, before the Revolution ended, had begun those labors which were to yield spelling-book and dictionary as their lasting fruit. Then, of other writers, there were Nathaniel Evans, of New Jersey, a collection of whose poems was posthumously published in 1772; Theodoric and Richard Bland, both Virginians, the former an occasional versifier, the latter a pamphleteer ; Dr. Benjamin Church, who impaired his growing fame as a spirited poet LITER A TURE, 123 ir by treasonable correspondence with the enemy, and was compelled to leave the country, the ship in which he sailed from Boston for the West Indies never being heard from ; Hannah Adams, who, though but twenty years old, was laying the foundations of learning and taste for her subsequent industrious and honorable literary career ; and finally Mercy Warren, one of the most truly and effectively patriotic women of the Revolution, author of several poems and tragedies, and in after years of a history of the war. The year 1775 saw the first number of Isaiah Thomas's New England Almanack. The first dramatic work written in America was now about a dozen years old, having ap- peared in 1763. This was ''The Prince of Parthia," a tragedy of considerable but un- even merit, its author being Thomas Godfrey, a native of Philadelphia. Perhaps the most curious chapter in the volume of Revolutionary literature was that furnished by the career of Phillis Wheatley, the " prodigy " of her times, and such not only by reason of her youth, but of her race and 124 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, condition. She was a native African, had been brought to this country in 1761, was pur- chased in the slave-mart of Boston by the family whose name she bore, and was now only about twenty years of age. She mani- fested great intelligence, and acquired learning and accomplishments with astonishing rapidity and ease. Her poems, wbich were numerous, and extremely creditable considering her his- tory, were collected and published in a volume. One of them, addressed to Washington, read in connection with the correspondence which attended it, will give the reader a good idea of her powers, and of the place she held in the public esteem : — Sir: Phi His Wheatley to Gen, Washington. I have taken the freedom to address your Ex- cellency in tlie enclosed Poem, and entreat your acceptance, though I am not insensible of its inaccu- racies. Your being appointed by the Grand Conti- nental Congress to be Generalissimo of the Armies of North America, together with the fame of your virtues, excite sensations not easy to suppress. Your gene- rosity, therefore, I presume, will pardon the attempt. Wishing your Excellency all possible success in the LITER A TURK. 125 great cause you are so generously engaged in, I am Your Excellency's most obedient humble servant, Phillis Wheatley. Providence, Oct. 26, 1775. His Excellency Gen. Washington. Celestial choir ! enthron'd in realms of light, Columbia's scenes of glorious toils I write. While freedom's cause her anxious breast alarms. She flashes dreadful in refulgent arms. See mother earth her offspring's fate bemoan, And nations gaze at scenes before unknown ! See the bright beams of heaven's revolving light Involved in sorrows and the veil of night ! The goddess comes, she moves divinely fair, Olive and laurel binds her golden hair : Wherever shines this native of the skies, Unnumbered charms and recent graces rise. Muse ! bow propitious while my pen relates How p6ur her armies through a thousand gates, As when Eolus heaven's face deforms, Enwrapp'd in tempest and a night of storms ; Astonish'd ocean feels the wild uproar. The refluent surges beat the sounding shore ; Or thick as leaves in Autumn's golden reign, Such, and so many, moves the warrior's train. In bright array they seek the work of war, When high unfurl'd the ensign waves in air. ';• N I 4" i 126 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, Shall I to Washington their praise recite ? Enough thou know'st them in the fields of fight. Thee, first in place and honours, — we demand The grace and glory of thy martial band. Fam'd for thy valour, for thy virtues more, Hear every tongue thy guardian aid implore ! One century scarce perform'd its destined round, When Gallic powers Columbia's fury found ; And so may you, whoever dares disgrace The land of freedom's heaven-defended race ! Fix'd are the eyes of nations on the scales, For in their hopes Columbia's arm prevails. Anon Britannia droops the pensive head, While round increase the rising hills of dead. Ah ! cruel blindness to Columbia's state ! Lament thy thirst of boundless powers too late. Proceed, great chief, with virtue on thy side. Thy ev'ry action let the goddess guide. A crown, a mansion, and a throne that shine. With gold unfading, Washington ! be thine. Washington's reply to this offering was as follows : — Cambridge^ February id^ 1776. Miss Phillis : Your favor of the 26th October did not reach my hands till the middle of December. Time enough, you will say, to have given an answer ere this. Granted. But a variety of important occurrences continually interposing to distract the mind and withdraw the LITERATURE. 127 attention, I hope will apologize for the delay, and plead my excuse for the seeming but not real neglect. I thank you most sincerely for your polite notice of me, in the elegant lines you enclosed ; and however undeserving I may be of such encomium and pane- gyric, the style and manner exhibit a striking proof of your poetical talents ; in honour of which, and as a tribute justly due to you, I would have published the poem, had I not been apprehensive that, while I only meant to give the world this new instance of your genius, I mig'lit have incurred the imputation of vanity. This, and nothing else, determined me not. to give it place in the public prints. If you should ever come to Cambridge, or near head-quarters, I shall be happy to see a person §0 favoured by the Muses, and to whom Nature has been so liberal and beneficent in her dispensations. I am, with great respect, your obedient humble servant, George Washington. The system of public libraries in the United States belongs exclusively to the present century ; and almost wholly to the third quarter of it, which is just now closed. A hundred years ago the only libraries that could properly fall under this designation, apart from the comparatively small collec- tions of the colleges, were the Society Library 128 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, in New York, and the Library Company's in Philadelphia. The collection of books belong- ing to the latter was not a large or valuable one, though it enjoyed the patronage of Franklin. It was housed in Carpenters' Hall, and was open daily from 2 to 7 p.m. The librarian's salary was ;^6o. The free use of the books was tendered to the mem- bers of the Congress. The Redwood Library was in existence at Newport ; and there was a Library Society in Charleston, S.C, now about thirty years old, which had accumu- lated a fund of a hundred thousand dollars, and at one time had a collection of from five to six thousand volumes. Most of the books were destroyed by fire in 1771. Private libraries there were, some of them large and valuable ; larger and more valuable in pro- portion, probably, than those of the present day. The parish library held a place of im- portance, which it has long since lost, and was often administered upon the circulating prin- ciple. Its contents were scarcely miscellane- ous in even the slightest degree, but almost wholly theological; comprising the works of LITER A TURK, 129 English theologians, memoirs, standard his- tories, and volumes of sermons and religious essays. Conspicuous among these parish li- braries was that left with the Old South Church, Boston, by its then lately deceased pastor, Rev. Thomas Prince, and designated by him as the " New England Library." Books were loaned with generous freedom from hand to hand, and in this way did wide and persis- tent service. In the large towns, circulating libraries upon the familiar plan attempted to meet the popular want for a lighter litera- ture. One such had been established in Boston, by John Main, as early as 1764. In 1773, Mr. James Foster Condy, adver- tising in the " Boston Gazette " of July 8th a recent importation '* of the mofb efteemed Books," to be found on sale '*at his Book- Store in Union Street, directly oppofite the Cornfield," specifies : Aflbrtment . a very large in Law — Phyfick — Hiflory — Divinity — Clafllck — Navigation Hufbandry — Agriculture, «Scc. '30 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. ALSO A large Colleflion of Plays, Children's and Chap- man's Books, Bibles of every fize and Quality, Pfalters, Primers, Spelling Books, and Pfalm-Books — Grove on the Sacrament, Doddridge's Family Religion, a Poem entitled the Grave — Recovery from Sicknefs, Smith's Eflay, Diflenting Gentleman's Anfwer, Town and Country, &c, &c. That mysterious " collection of books be- longing to a gentleman deceased," the pathetic announcement of whose sale draws tears from our eyes and money from our pockets so fre- quently in these later days, seems to be an old collection, for we find it advertised in the "Boston Gazette," of May 3, 1773. The American author was often his own publisher, and publishing was far from being the science into which it has since been developed. The following prospectus relat- ing to the publication of young Dwight's poem (see p. 119) indicates with what throes even poetic thought sometimes found deliver- ance into the printed page : * — ♦ The New England Chronicle, March 14, 1776. LITER A TURE. 131 lat- Lt'S )es rer- Proposals for Printing by Subscription. The CONQUEST of CANAAN, A POEM, in nine books. I. This work will be Contained in twelve fheets, making upwards of 350 pages 12 mo. II. It will be printed with an elegant type, upon fine writing paper ; will be contained in one volume, delivered to the fubfcribers neatly bound, gilt ant let- tered, at the price of one dollar. III. Thofe who fubfcribe for twelve, fliall hav > 1 thirteenth gratis. Subscriptions for the Poem, are taken in by J. Dunlap in Philadelphia, Mr. J. Holt, New York, Mr. W. C. Houfton, in Princeton, Mr. F. Barber, in Eliza- bethtown, Mr. J. Davenport, in Fairfield, Meflirs,Greens, in New Haven, Mr. F. Watfon, in Hartford, Mr. H. Hill, in Norwich, Mr. 'G. Olny, in Providence, the Printer of this paper, in Cambridge, Do(Stor J. Brackett, in Portfmouth, and by various other gentlemen in the principal towns on the Continent ; with all of whom are lodged papers. Containing a general account of the work. ... A further difcription, and fome fpecimens of it, will foon be publilhed in the Penn/yivania Magazine. But we must pass from books to another appliance of the intellectual life of the time. 1^2 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. VIII. THE PRESS. There were no daily newspapers in the time of the Revolution. Of some fifty papers which were born, and lived, or died, between 1748 and 1783, all were weeklies or semi- weeklies. There were forty-three such in ex- istence at the end of the war. They were poor affairs, viewed in the light of the jour- nalism of to-day ; but, measured by their times, displayed considerable enterprise, and exerted an immense influence. It was their characteristic that they aimed not so much to print the news of the locality in which they were published as to bring to that locality news from distant parts of the country and of the world. In fact, the newspapers of the Revolution had compara- tively little to do with news of any kind. The gathering of it had not been reduced to a system. The publisher was his own editor THE PRESS. 133 and reporter. There were no telegraph tolls to pay ; and, had there been, there would have been no money with which to have paid them. News travelled to the paper by private con- veyance. It was two months coming from Great Britain, and six months from Constan- tinople. That useful and widely known indi- vidual, " a gentleman of undoubted veracity," lived, however, in the country at that time, and rendered valuable services. The papers were filled with political sayings, satires, and lampoons. By many of them, the largest liberty of discussion was allowed ; and there were noticeable tendencies to the freest sort of speculation. Of journalism in the modern sense of the term, elaborated, enterprising, competitive, lavish in outlay, and presenting a field for the highest attainments and most carefully acquired professional skill, there was absolutely nothing. And yet we must accord to the journals of the Revolution, small, irreg- ular, struggling sheets that they were, the credit of a generally heroic spirit, and a very noble achievement in shaping the patriotic temper of the times. 134 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. A number of newspapers were published in and about Boston, all but one of which, however, were suspended wholly or in part during the siege. This one survivor of the disturbances of 1775-76 was the "Massachu- setts Gazette and Weekly News-Letter," the organ of the Tories. The " Massachusetts Spy," . now four years old, had been founded by Isaiah Thomas as a neutral sheet, but had become committed to the Revolutionary party. The prospectus which announced its appear- ance in July, 1770, gives so graphic a picture of a newspaper enterprise of the time, that we copy it in full, as quoted by Mr. Hudson : * — To THE Public It has always been cuflomary for Printers and Publlfliers of new periodical Publications, to introduce them to the World with an Account of the Nature and End of their Defign. We, therefore, beg Leave to obferve, Thit this fmall Paper, under the name of THE MASSACHUSETTS SPY, is calculated on an entire New Plan. If it meets with a favorable Reception, it will be regularly publiflied Three Times every Week, viz, Tue/iiays, Thurfdays and Saturdays (on two of which Days no News-Paper is publiflied *• Journalism in the United S'^ates, p. 127. THE PRESS, 135 in this Town) by which Means, thofe who favour this Undertaking with tlieir Subfcription, will always have the mod material of the News, which may from Time to Time arive from Europe and from the other Parts of this Continent, on the Day of its Arrival, or the next Day following, (Sundays excepted) which will be fooner through this Channel than any other. Great Care will be taken in colle6lins: and infertinc: the frcih- elt and choiceft: Intelligence from Europe, and the ma- terial Tranfad;ions of this Town and Province; Twice every Week will be given a Lill of the Arrival and Departure of Ships and other Veflels, alfo a Lift of Marriages and Deaths, &c. and occafionally will be inferted felect Pieces in Profe and Verfe, curious Inven- tions and new Difcoveries in Nature and Science. Thofe who Choofe to advtrtife herein, may depend on having their Advertisements inferted in a neat and Confpicuous Manner, at the moft reafonable Rates. When there happens to be a larger Quantity of News and a greater Number of Advertifements than can well be contained in one Number, at its ufual Bigncfs, it will be enlarged to double its Size at fuch Times, in order that our Readers may not be difappointed of Intelligence. This is a brief Sketch of the Plan on which we pro- pofe to publifli this Paper, and we readily flatter our- felves the Public will honour it with that Regard the Execution of it may deferve ; and doubt not, it will be executed with fuch Judgment and Accuracy as to merit a favourable Reception. ■ '.! t u 136 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. Then there vas the " New England Chron- icle," published by Povvars and Willis, at one time in Boston, at another time in Cambridge, and then again in Boston ; besides sustaining the rather intimate relation of both conse- quent of, and antecedent to, the " Essex Ga- zette," of Salem ; and further appearing at one time under the name of the *' Indepen- dent Chronicle-." There \/as also the " Inde- pendent Ledger and American Advertiser," founded in 1778; the ''Continental Journal and Weekly Advertiser," first issued in May, 1776; and the " Boston Gazette," which lat- ter, dating back as far as 1766, was the chief organ of the Revolutionary Party. To all of these patriot papers Samuel Adams, John Adamsj James Otis, Joseph Warren, and otliers of the republican leaders in Boston, were constant contributors. Let us look over a copy of one of these old papers ; and, for the value of the associations of the date, let it be " The New England Chronicle," of July 4, 1776. It is " Vol. VIII. Numb. 411," and bears the imprint : "BOS- TON : Printed by POWARS and WILLIS, ' \ THE PRESS. 137 ' at their Office oppofite the new Court House, Queen-Street." It is a four-page sheet, about ten inches by fifteen, three col- umns to a page. There are no rules between the columns. The first column of the first page contains a proclamation of General Washington, offering a bounty of lands to soldiers and officers of the army ; the second, a brief resolution of the Congress, and short extracts from letters from Lewistown, Balti- more,, and New York ; the third, a communi- cation from some anonymous correspondent relating to Dr. Price's new work on Civil Lib- erty. Following this, upon the second page, come advices from Williamsburg, Philadel- phia, New York, Hartford, Providence, and Watertown, with half a column of advertise- ments. Two columns of the third page are occupied by further advices from New York and other points relating to the progress of the war, and the third column is divided between more advertisements and a legal notice signed " Tim. Pickering, Jun." One- half of the fourth page is again given up to advertisements, and the other to despatches I (ii ! Hi 138 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. from London reporting the proceedings of Parliament. There is no editorial matter ; and, it may be added, no telegraph " specials " from Philadelphia, foretelling the Declaration ! Outside of Boston, the New England papers of the time were " The New Hampshire Ga- zette," which was founded at Portsmouth in 1756, and has continued to the present day without interruption or change of name ; a " New Hampshire Gazette," started in 1775 ; the "Norwich Packet" (1773); the "Hart- ford Courant " (1764) ; the " Connecticut Jour- nal and New Haven Post Boy" (1767); the "Connecticut Gazette" (1773), successor to the " New London Gazette" (1758) ; and the "Newport Mercury" (1758), of which James P^anklin was the publisher. Vermont's paper, the " Vermont Gazette, or Green Mountain Boy," was not started till 1781. New York being occupied by the British during the greater part of the year, only four papers were continued through the period, three weeklies and one semi-weekly ; the publication being so arranged that there was a paper every day in the week except Sunday . 1 THE PRESS. 139 and Tuesday. The semi-weekly was " Riv- ington's Royal Gazette," and it was the lead- ing one of the four. All had the sanction of the British authorities, and were in the hands of the Tories. " Rivington's Gazette " was very outspoken in its opposition to the patri- ots, and expressed its sympathies for the royal cause in the strongest terms. It is said that several hundred copies of each issue were regularly sent to Boston in 1775, to be distributed in General Gage's army. The " Ga- zette's " three companions were " Gaine's Mer- cury, the " Royal American Gazette," and the " New York Mercury." The patriot papers were driven out of the city by the entrance of the British, The " New York Journal, or General Advertiser," (1767), removed to Peughkeepsie, and the " New York Packet and American Advertiser" (1776) to Fishkill. Albany had a " Post-Boy." In New Jersey there was a " New Jersey Gazette" (1777) and a *' New Jersey Journal" (1778), the latter published at Chatham. In addition to the " Pennsylvania Chroni- cle and Universal Advertiser," which had 1:1 i • %■ \\\ . » it '4 1 1\ r 1 140 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, been published in Philadelphia since 1767, no less than five other papers were started in that city during the very first year of the Revolution, one of them a German sheet. Further south was the " Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser," whose first num- ber, under date of Aug. 20, 1773, contained an advertisement of George Washington's, offering for lease twenty thousand acres of land on the Ohio and Kanawha Rivers. Two ** Virginia Gazettes " were published in Wil- liamsburg, Va., with one of which Jefferson had much to do. In this it is said that the Declaration of Independence was first pub- lished on the 26th of July. Still further south there were the " North Carolina Ga- zette " at Newbern, the " South Carolina and American General Gazette " of Charleston, and the " Georgia Gazette " in Savannah. It is impossible at this distance to realize the difificulties which attended newspaper publication a hundred years ago. The great- est of them grew out of the scarcity of paper occasioned by the war. Not only was paper scarce, but rags were scarce ; and the only ' ■ d THE PRESS. 141 paper-mill in New England in 1769 had to appeal to the people to save every scrap, after this fashion : — Advertisement. The Bell Cart will go through Bofton before the end of next month, to collect Rags for tlie Paper- Mill at Milton, when all people that will encourage the Paper Manufactory, may difpofe of them. They are taken in at Mr. Caleb Davis's fliop, at the Fortifica- tion ; Mr. Andrew Gillefpie's, near Dr. Clark's ; Mr. Andras Randall's, near Phillips's Wharf; and Mr. John Boies's in Long Lane ; Mr. Frothingham's in Charleftown ; Mr. Williams's in Marblehead ; Mr. Edfon's in Salem; Mr. John Harris's in Newbury; Mr. Daniel Fowle's in Portfmouth ; and at the Paper- Mill in Milton.* This difBculty seems to have been no less ten years later, when the " Massachusetts Spy " again, as quoted by Mr. Hudson, f con- tained the following touching and irresistible appeal : — Cash Given for Linen and Cotton and Linen Rags, at the Printing Office. It is earneftly requefted that the fair Daughters of Liberty in this extenfive Country would not neglect to * News-Letter, March 6, 1769, as quoted in "Journal- ism in the United States," p. 114. t lb. p. 115. 1 '\ ~tr. i , 142 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. ^ ferve their Country, by faving for the Paper- Mill, all Linen and Cotton and Linen Rags, be they ever fo fmall, as they are equally good for the purpofe of mak- ing paper, as thofe that are larger. A bag hung up in one corner of a room, would be the means of faving many which would be otherwife loft. If the Ladies fhould not make a fortune by this piece of economy they will at leaft have the fatisfa6lion of knowing they are doing an eflential fervice to the Community, which with Ten Shillings per pound, the price now given for clean white rags, they muft 'be fenfible will be a fufficient reward. Isaiah Thomas. The subscription price of the " New Eng- land Chronicle " was six shillings and eight pence per annum. Happy the printer who received his pay in money and with prompt- ness. The following advertisement from the "New York Journal," in August, 1777, bears on this point : — The printer being unable to carry on his bufinefs without the neceflaries of life, is obliged to affix the following prices to his work, viz. : Yox a quarter of news, 12 lbs. of beef, pork, veal, or mutton, or 4 lbs. of butter, or 7 lbs. of cheefe, or 18 lbs. of fine flour, or half a bufhel of wheat, or one bufliel of Indian corn, or half a cord of wood, or 300 wt. of hay, or \ THE PRESS, 143 other articles of country produce as he (hall want them, in like proportions, or as much money as will purchafe them at the time ; for other articles of print- ing work, the prices to be in proportion to that of the newfpaper. All his cuftomers, who have to fpare any of the above, or other articles of country produce, he hopes will let him know it, and afford him tiie necef- fary fupplies, without which his bufinefs here muft very foon be difcontinued. There is something suggestive in the very names which many of these old papers bore, names which hold a meaning strikingly illus- trative of the methods of communication in use. Now we call our papers Telegraphs, Expresses, and Mails ; then they were Nevvs- Letters, Packets, and Post-Boys. The newspaper was not the only instru- ment for influencing public opinion. The pamphlet held a place midway between the cumbersome book and the transient journal ; and this light artillery of the political ord- nance of the war was in constant use and did invaluable service. Such a pamphlet was Thomas Paine's "Common Sense," already referred to, which was published early in 1776, attained an enormous circulation, and : I I ; IS 144 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, exerted a powerful influence in shaping the public mind in favor of independence and con- federation. The hand-bill, too, and the broad- side, as well as the ballad, ^re favorite weapons of thought, and gavv^ a swift and easy currency to the invectives and satires which would hardly have found expression in more formal ways. CHURCHES AND CLERGY. 145 IX. THE CHURCHES AND THE CLERGY. The American people at birti were em- phatically a religious people. All sects of the Christian Church had a foothold in the coun- try, though their relative importance, meas- ured by the number of congregations and value of property, was very different from now. Not only all the States, but all the leading o immunities, were distinctively Protestant. Tt'" Methodists and Roman Catholics, which, in numbers and wealth, substantially lead all the other denominations to-day, were then at the other extreme of the list, the formal organization of neither having taken place until after the Revolution. The order com- plete was as follows : Congregationalist, Bap- tist, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Lutheran, German Reformed, Dutch Reformed, and Roman Catholic. As a whole, the Congrega- tionalists, the Baptists, and the Presbyterians 10 ■1 : , 1 >■■ I ■-SI, 146 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. were warmly on the side of independence ; the Episcopalians, as generally, in sympathy with the mother country. Exceptions of course there were on both sides. In shaping the views of the conflict and moulding the character which wrought them out so suc- cessfully, the patriot pulpit wielded a power- ful influence. The political sermons of the New England clergy were printed in pam-. phlet form and scattered far and wide ; and the Church, carefully dissevered from the State, was yet both brain and heart thereto, at the time when the condition of the latter was a question of life and death. The Meth- odists and Roman Catholics were too few and feeble to play any distinctive part in the contest. The Congregational ists were strong- est in New England, of whose broad and firm institutions they had laid the foundations more than a century before. The Episco- palians were similarly strong in New York, and the Presbyterians in New Jersey and Philadelphia ; the Baptists were feeling their way down into Virginia, and planting there the seeds of the thick growth that has since CHURCHES AND CLERGY. H7 f sprung up through all the South. John Mur- ray, the father of Universalism, was just beginning his American ministry in New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts. The Quakers were in force in Philadelphia. The eccentric sect of the Sandemanians was establishing itself obscurely in some of the inland towns of Connecticut. The only Epis- copal clergyman who remained in Philadelphia after its evacuation by the British was Dr. William White, who had continued to pray for the King up to the time of the Declaration, and then with a good grace submitted to the new order. He it was who was afterward consecrated first Episcopal bishop of Penn- sylvania. Throughout the entire country the minister was largely charged with the general dissem- ination of intellectual influence. His min- istry was not restricted, as it is now, to the mere preaching of sermons and pastoral care. There was much more for him to do then. More was expected of him. He did more. How much is well set forth in the words that follow : — :;ii f I I 148 REVOTMTIONARY TIMES. 1^1 mi The clergyman not only sanctified and cemented the parish, but he founded the State. It was his instruc- tion which moulded the soldier and the statesman. Liv- ing among agriculturists, remote from towns, where language and literature would naturally be neglected and corrupted, in advance of the school-master and the school, he was the future college in embryo. When we see men like Marshall graduating at his right hand, with no other courses than the simple man of God who had left the refinements of civilization for the wilder- ness taught, and with no other diploma but his bene- diction, we may indeed stop to honor their labors. Let the name of the American missionary of the colo- nial and revolutionary age suggest something more to the student of our history than the limited notion of a combatant with heathenism and vice. He was also the companion and guide to genius and virtue. When the memorials of those days are written, let his name be recorded, in no insignificant or feeble letters, on the page with the great men of the State whom his talents and presence inspired.* The ranks of the clergy of the Revolution included many stalwart and noble characters, as well as some that were amusingly eccentric. There was President John Witherspoon of Princeton College, where he was the succes- * Duyckinck's Cyclopedia of American Literature, vol. i. p. 421. CHURCHES AND CLERGY. 149 \ sor of Jonathan Edwards, a lineal descendant of John Knox, and now about fifty years of age ; Dr. Dufficld, ten years younger, and since 1771 the pastor of Old Pine Street Church in Philadelphia, where he made him- self so conspicuous for devotion to the patriot cause, that a price was put upon his head ; Mr. Duche, the worthy and patriotic Episco- palian of Philadelphia, who, by offering extem- pore prayer in his capacity as chaplain to the Continental Congress, verified Samuel Adams's assurance that he was no bigot, and astonished those delegates who were "dissenters;" Dr. Auchmuty, who ended his twenty-nine years ministry over Trinity Church in New York in 1777, and by his loyalty to both the Church and State of Eng- land earned the degree of Doctor of Divinity from the University of Oxford ; and Dr. Sea- bury, also of New York, loyalist, and after the Revolution consecrated the first Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States. At Elizabethtown, N.J., was the Rev. James Caldwell, a Presbyterian, of Huguenot de- scent, who, in the attack by the British upon sm ' fl!'* ^r 5"^ ISO REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. Springfield, supplied the patriot soldiers with hymn-books from the church for wadding, ex- claiming, " Now, boys, give them Watts ! " He it was whose wife was so cruelly murdered by the British, while surrounded by her nine chil- dren. At New Haven, Dr. Ezra Stiles had just succeeded to the presidency of Yale Col- lege. At Cambridge, Dr. Langdon presided over Harvard. In Boston, Dr. Charles Chauncy was drawing to the close of his sixty years ministry over the First Church, and the First Baptist Church at the North End had for its pastor Rev. Dr. Stillman. Dr. Samuel Cooper, pastor of the Brattle Street Church, was pre-eminently the leading Boston clergyman of the day. He, too, was a political writer, and an active associate of the Adamses. The odd genius of the Boston pulpit, or one such, was Mather Byles, who was the first pastor of the Hollis Street Church, and one of the few clergymen of New England who adhered to the Crown during the Revo- lution. There is almost no end to the stories illustrating his wit, which was of a sort that CHURCHES AND CLERGY. 151 \ chiefly expressed itself in quips and puns. Thus, when one day he descried a couple of the Selectmen with their chaise mired in the unkempt street before his house, he said to them, *' Well, gentlemen, I am glad to see you stirring in this matter at last." In character and career, Rev. Dr. Emmons, of Franklin, Mass., was one of the most marked men of his times ; yet his life was in good measure a representative one, and the story of it lets us well into a view of the New England interior of the time. He was a man of methodical habits, as most all the fathers were. He divided his days by inflexible rule, rising, eating, working, exercising, and retir- ing at fixed hours, which changed not. In those ordinarily placid days, there were few of the interruptions which now make a regular routine so difficult, if not impossible. For more than half a century he sat in the same chair in his study, and to look about the room was to see at once the spot where his feet in- variably rested. The wood must be laid on his fire just sOy the vvood-box be replenished at such a time, the visitor must enter and depart I > !. mi 4 ■ i '1' 152 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, by a time-table, and every peg had its ap- pointed duty. Stern as was the faith, and rigid as was the practice, of these old divines, there was much humor in their composit^ion, and on occasion they could crack a joke with anybody. Dr. Mather Byles was not the only punster of his times. It was a formidable matter then, when pas- torates often lasted a lifetime, to "call" a minister. The church, quite likely, took an entire day for its action, making the important occasion a season of special fasting and prayer. It was not an uncommon thing for an ordina- tion service to be held, weather permitting, in the open air, meeting-houses not always being large enough to accommodate the curious and reverent throngs which would assemble thereto from all the regions roundabout. The com- mon range of a minister's salary in the inland towns of New England was from ^250 to $400 a year. This was pieced out by a gift at set- tlement, and occasional donations afterward, and sometimes supplemented by grants of cord-wood or other produce from the farms of '*at ■' ■ ! Il*j CHURCHES AND CLERGY. 153 his parishioners. Happy was he who received his stipend promptly and in substantial money ! The meeting-houses of both town and coun- try suffered greatly during the war. Such as fell into the hands of the British were dese- crated without scruple, and some of them were plundered or even altogether destroyed. Those which were spared by war have been wasted by time, and few specimens of the class remain. The old representative meeting-house was a huge ungainly block, cubical, or nearly so, two stories in height, furnished within with galleries, and without with a stunted tower. The pulpit was lofty, reserved, and imposing, befitting the position of him who occupied it. In front was " the deacons* seat," where re- posed these worthies in visible emblem of ecclesiastical order and authority. Over the pulpit was the sounding-board, so suspended as to reflect the preacher's voice and send it forth the better to his hearers. The pews were large square boxes, or pens, close-doored, high-walled, and railed around the top. Here- in the families of the congregation gathered, f i t t <4 1" \ ,^ I W i; ■j Pi > ^X i if 'mrb 11 if 154 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. 'ih 11 each by itself, half of each group obliged, of course, to sit with back to the preacher. The allotment of pews was often a matter not of individual choice, but of parish arrangement ; and the "seating committee" under the latter had a difficult and delicate work to perform. No common heat was provided in winter, the individual foot-stove being the only source of warmth. Cushions and carpets were " vanity." The Sabbath services were long and tedious, the two of morning and afternoon coming close together, with only a brief intermission between, which there was no Sabbath school to occupy. The scarcity of paper often com- pelled the minister to preach from a manu- script so closely written that the use of a magnifying glass, to decipher it as he read, was necessary. There was no public read- ing of the Scriptures. Church music deserves here a paragraph by itself. There had been little or no popular instruction in the art of song, and there was a very limited knowledge of sacred tunes. Watts's " Psalms and Hyms," '* Tate and Brady's Collection," and the now famous " Bay CHURCHES AND CLERGY. 155 Psalm Book," were the only hymn-books in cammon use ; and the word "common" must here be used in a very restricted sense. The hymns were usually "lined" out by one of the deacons, and the introduction of books into church use was effected only after violent opposition. The printing of sacred music had but just begun. Billings's singing-book, which appeared in 1770, was the first original publication of its kind in the country ; and, de- fective though it was, it led to a revolution in the methods of public praise. Armed with this weapon, the church choir rose into a rec- ognized position ; and the " lining " deacon, tenacious of his privileges to the last, was compelled to subside. The new system was however long looked upon with suspicion ; and instruments, even the sedate bass-viol and the docile fiddle, had to fight their way to respectability. The curious pitchpipe was depended on to start the tune ; and as for the noble organ, that was looked upon in some quarters as " an instrument of the devil for the entrapping of men's souls," and as such was for a long time excluded from good eccle- siastical society. 156 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. An important and interesting adjunct of the meeting-house, in some parts of the coun- try, was the " Sabba'-Day House." Comfort, being carefully shut out of the meeting-house itself, was only thus rudely provided for in such subordinate structures. The Sabba'- Day House was a family affair, generally com- prising but a single apartment, perhaps fifteen feet square, with windows and a fire-place. It was very plainly and sparsely furnished. Chairs for the old people and benches for the children stood round the walls, and a table in the centre might hold the Bible and a few religious books and pamphlets ; while at one side shelves contained dishes for cooking and eating. Sometimes the Sabba'-Day House was mounted above a shed, within which the horse could be sheltered. A group of such cabins standing about the meeting-house added not a little to the picturesqueness of the spot, and their use conduced greatly to the convenience and comfort of Sabbath worship, especially in winter. The family able to keep a Sabba'- Day House drove directly thither on Sabbath mornings, warmed themselves up by a hot \-^ CHURCHES AND CLERGY, 157 1 ^ fire without, and quite likely by a hot drink within ; and here spent the intermission, with further wholesome regard for the wants of the inner man. The better class of these Sabba*- Day Houses were whitewashed, some of them were double, and to the truth of history it must be said that between Sabbaths they oc- casionally furnished the wild young men of the parish with secure haunts for unseemly carousals. . Thanksgiving and Fast were the chief public religious days. A feature of the religious life of Boston was the Thursday Lecture, which on one occasion of Washington's attendance was followed by an "elegant dinner at the Bunch of Grapes Tavern, Provided at the Public Expenfe, when Joy and gratitude fat on every countenance and fmilcd in every eye." Washington, it should be said, though a com- municant of the Church of England, displayed a spirit of the truest catholicity in relig- ious matters. When in Morristown, NJ., learning that the sacrament was to be ob- served in the Presbyterian Church upon the following Sabbath, he called upon its pastor, "!1 158 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. Rev. Dr. Jones, and asked whether communi- cants of another denomination would be per- mitted to join. " Most certainly," was the reply : " ours is not the Presbyterian table, General, but the Lord's ; and hence we give the Lord's invita- tion to all his followers, of whatever name." " I am glad of it," said Washington : " that is as it ought to be ; but, as I was not sure of the fact, I thought I would ascertain it from yourself, as I propose to join with you on that occasion. Though a member of the Church of England, I have no exclusive partialities." Some of the most picturesque and truly historic churches of the country were those of its central and southern portions. Here, for instance, was the Dutch church of Flat- bush, Long Island ; a stone edifice in the form of a parallelogram, sixty-five feet by fifty, square-roofed, and holding a bell in its small steeple. The gallery across its eastern end was divided into two s, one set apart for the slaves, ^^^ .u oor whites and strangers. Its ,ndo\ were of small stained glass, set in lead ; a d under the build- I, i J1 I I CHURCHES AND CLERGY. 159 ing were vaults for the burial of the dead. In Virginia, seven miles south-west from Mount VcM'non, stood Pohick Church, to us now of special sacredness as having been the place of Washington's attendance. Its recent sore dilapidations have been repaired, and the hon- ored edifice is in a measure restored to its old condition. In its prime, it was a plain but stately house, unecclesiastical in its appear- ance, but dignified by an elaborate pulpit, and fitted with the square pews of the time with seats upon their three sides. In South Carolina, in the village of Dor- chester, the home of the Massachusetts colo- nists, was the Old White Meeting-House, long since abandoned ; and in the same town St. George's Church, a pretentious, cruciform building of brick, with Gothic windows, to which the ladies drove of a Sunday morning in their chaises, convoyed by gentlemen on horse-back, with swords hanging by their sides. There are many of these ruined churches of a hundred years ago now scattered through the South, and it were well if present impulse VI 1 I T-T" i6o REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. should lead to their recovery and preserva- tion. The clergy of Revolutionary times, it should be remarked again, as we take leave of them and of their churches, were men of great in- telligence and unsurpassed influence ; and much more distinctly a class by themselves than now. They were regarded with a rever- ence, not to say awe, wholly foreign to the mind at this present day. The meeting- houses in which they preached were the true cradles of national liberty and virtue ; and their own figures are among the noblest and most striking in all the group of worthies now passing in review. I '!' PROFESSIONS AND TRADES. l6l X. PROFESSIONS AND TRADES. ' J.! The industrial interests of the country were chiefly apjricultural. Manufactures had only just begun to f^el the impulse of the troubles with the mother country, and, with the im- mense mechanical developments of the pres- ent century yet far in the future, were in their earliest infancy. The New England farm and the Southern plantation were the representative investments of the people in the tillage of the soil. A recently published letter of General Rich- ard Montgomery, of Revolutionary fame, gives an interesting account of his farm in West- chester, N.Y., as it stood in 1773. It was doubtless, in the general, a fair sample of pos- sessions of this description. It consisted of about seventy acres, with fresh and salt meadow in uncommon proportion, and a good orchard. The seven acres of salt meadow II T i .'H A ■M 162 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. were mostly covered with black grass, con- sidered "a very great source of improvement to the farmer." The nearly nine acres of fresh meadow once constituted a rich black swamp, which had been drained at consider- able expense. The woodland, embracing about the same area as the meadow, was swampy, and susceptible of being as easily transferred into meadow. The advantages of excellent fish and oysters to be had near by were esteemed cm important consideration. The dwelling-house (which had just been new- roofed) was on the '* eastern road," and con- veniently situated for an inn or a store, either of which enterprises was much ** wanted in that part of the country ; " while the prem- ises further afforded "a very fine situation for a gentleman to build upon," the neighbor- hood being *' desirable," and but fifteen miles from New York. For this property the owner asked the price of ;£o50, though he inti- mated that his " bottom price " would be ;£6oo. The thrifty farmer in these times had the benefit of neither agricultural newspaper nor PROFESSIONS AND TRADES. 1 63 agricultural society. He thought out his own theories, if he ventured into theories at all. If he were of independent and courageous habit, he was just beginning to experiment with artificial fertilizers. If he had been pros- perous, and had acquired lands and stock in abundance, he would let out portions of the former on shares, and some of the latter by the six months or the year, receiving hire for his cows in cheese and butter. He usually kept two or three hired men all the year round, and sufficient "extra" hands durin;^ the sum- mer, receiving them to his table, and treating them in all respects as members of his family. Twenty pounds was a price in 1776 for a six months' term of labor ; a price that expressed in part the increase of the demand over th.e supply, and, in part, the depreciation of the currency. Dr. Wheelock, breaking ground for Dartmouth College in the New Hampshire wilderness, paid his men three or four shilHngs a day ; and the kitchen girl received about the same amount a week. The necessities of the war created some rude manufactures of saltpetre, powder, and II ^1 m '.A ill 164 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. % weapons small and great ; but for the most part trades were confined to the production of small-wares for domestic use, — tin, wooden, and of similar description. In the " New England Chronicle," of June i, 1775, Mr. John Clarke " Begs leave to inform the Pub- lic, that he is removed from the Manufactory in Bofton to Concord, about a Quarter of a Mile Eaf t of the Mecting-Houfe, on the great Road to Bofton, where he carries on the But- ton-making Bufinefs as ufual, and hopes the Favour of his Former and other Cuftomers. Good ftrong Buttons with iron Eyes and Bot- toms for Six Shillings O. T. per Dozen with the following Motto, — Union and Liberty in all America. N.B. Said Clarke makes any Quantity of Buttons on timely Notice, as cheap and as good as thofe in London." The lady-reader may like to take^ a peep into a shop of the period, as depicted in the following advertisement in the " New England Chronicle," for Aug. 24, 1775 : — • BROADCLOTHS. There is for Sale, at BICKER'S Shop, in Cam- bridge, near the Houfe formerly improved by Mr Bradifli, as a Tavern, PROFESSIONS AND TRADES. 165 A Fine AfTortment of blue, 3nd other coloured Broad Cloths, with Trimmings to match, with a good AfTort- ment of Checks, Linens ; filk, cotton and linen Hand- kerchiefs, Bed-Ticks, Corduroys, striped Hollands, Velvit and Velverets, Ratteens, Serges, Diapers, Cam- bricks, Lawns, worfted Hose. Breeches Patterns of rnoft Colours, Cambleteens, Sewing Silks, Twifl, Threads, Buckrams, Quality Binding, Crewels, Tapes, Needles, Pen and Jack Knives, Shoe and Knee Buc- kles, Felt Hats, Loaf Sugar by hundred or less, Lynn Shoes, Ribbons Nonefopretties, gold and silver Lace, gold Buttons and Loops, fuitable for Hats, with a vari- ety of other Articles. IS fP le Ir The legal profession shared the eminence of the ministerial, and was then as now a path to fame and fortune. Judges held court in circuits, and the lawyers travelled with them. *' The country," wrote John Adams, from York, Me., in 1774, "is the situation to make estates by the law." And in proof of the affirmation he cites the case of John Sullivan, of Durham, N.H., "who began with nothing, but is now said to be worth ten thousand pounds lawful money, his brother James al- lows five or six, or perhaps seven, thousand pounds, consisting in houses and lands, notes, ffp 1 66 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, Jfl bonds, and mortgages. He has a fine stream of water, with an excellent corn-mill, saw- mill, fulling-mill, scythe-mill, and others, in all six mills, which are both his delight and his profit." It certainly could not have been by his proper professional fees alone that the lawyer of that time grew rich. Eight dollars was a common fee in an important case, five for a jury argument, and smaller sums for smaller services. In North Carolina, the legal fee for drawing a deed was one dollar; to charge five, as some of the leeches of the pro- fession did, was an outrageous extortion. An interesting feature of legal life in New York was a club of lawyers, known as " The Moot." Its regular meetings were devoted to the discussion of professional questions purely. Its first president was William Liv- ingston ; and its first secretary, Samuel Jones, was succeeded by Mr. Jay. The elder mem- bers of the bar participated with the younger in the proceedings of " The Moot," and a feel- ing of entire fraternity prevailed among all. No one was allowed to introduce political topics of the province, and to persist in such PROFESSIONS AND TRADES. 167 an offence was to invite expulsion. Great weight was attached to the opinions enounced in the meetings, so great as to constitute it ahnost " a court of last resort." This glance at the professional occupations of the people would be imperfect without a tribute to the painters of the period, the list of which includes names that must remain forever pre-eminent in the history of Amer- ican art. The skilled engravers of the coun- try could be counted on the fingers of one hand with two fingers to spare, the famous Paul Revere beins: chief amon^: them. He it was who engraved the plates in 1775 for the paper money ordered by the Provincial Con- gress, and afterwards for th'. 6rst issue of Continental money directed by the general Congress. The circle of painters was more numerous, and the works which they have left are among our most highly prized memo- rials of Revolutionnry times. Portraiture was the favorite field of achievement, with an occasional attempt at historic groups and scenes. Easily at the head of American artists at T^- i63 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. \ the time immediately precedin<2^ the Revolu- tion was John S. Copley. Copley lived in Boston, where he was born ; his estate on Beacon Street, now marked by the Somerset Club House, being one of the largest and finest in the town. He is described as a handsome man, of showy tastes ; and his striking portraits were eagerly sought for by all the old families. He had few early advan- tages and little training, and his successes were purely the fruits of real genius. As the war came on, greatly to the interruption of his work, he removed to England ; but he left behind him the productions of many busy vears, which are scattered " from Maine to Georgia." To own a family Copley is almost a patent of American nobility. His portraits were usually large, painted with considerable regard to drapery and costume, and, if open to criticism as inclining to stiffness, were remarkable for their coloring. Charles W. Peale, the father of Rembrandt Peale, a Marylander, was returning from Eng- land, where he had spent several years in study, at just about the time that Copley was PROFESSIONS AND TRADES. 169 going thither ; and, having first served briefly in the American army, settled in Philadel- phia, and in a measure succeeded to Copley's place and fame. He had been a pupil of Copley's before going abroad. John Adans, visiting his studio in 1776, found therein a large variety of portraits and sketches. Peale painted no less than fourteen portraits of Washington, and had for sitters so large a number of the public men of the time as to suggest to him the formation of a national gallery. His residence in Philadelphia was greatly promotive of the taste for the fine arts in that city. Then there were John Trumbull, who also studied with Copley, and who had for his studio in Boston the very room which Smi- bert, a still earlier artist of considerable fame, had consecrated by his brush ; the eccentric Gilbert Stuart, who was with Trumbull a pupil of Benjamin West in London, and like Trumbull was at only the beginning of his artistic life a hundred years ago ; and Ben- jamin West himself, who though an Amer- ican, and belonging to this period, lived so m 1 70 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. long abroad that he hardly belongs to this group of American painters. And of minor artists there were not a few, many of whose portraits still hang in the old houses of the land. ■ I h! NOTABLE MEN AND WOMEN. 171 XL THE MEN AND WOMEN OF THE REV- OLUTION. Our survey of Revolutionary times would be incomplete without a rapid glance at some of the prominent people who adorned them, and who helped to make them what they were. We have mapped out the country, enumerated the important cities and towns, and travelled about among them. It remains to ask : Who distinguished those interesting localities bv their residence } Who beside the clergy vv^ere the men of public influence } Who were attending the old churches and reading the old newspapers .'' There are two groups of notabilities who stand projected against the scenes and events of 1776, one military, the other civilian ; and, as it is a time of war, we will take the former first. ./ i 1/2 REVOLUTrONARY TIMES, \ The pre-eminent military personage of i yjS was of course General George Washington. Washington was now forty-four years of age. He exceeded six feet in height, and his com- manding physical presence was paralleled by a noble and dignified mien. His face was pitted with the small-pox, but exhibited strong features and a florid complexion. His eyes were blue, and his hair was brown. Bodily, mental, and moral qualities, each of the high- est excellence, blended in him in striking harmony and symmetry. He possessed im- mense physical strength, an indomitable cour- age, and a moral sense of singular purity. His power of self-control was remarkable, when it is considered how deep and powerful were the passions of his nature. His per- sonal habits were irreproachable ; a judicious temperance giving tone to his whole life. His military uniform was a blue coat with buff facings, buff waistcoat and breeches, rich epaulets, and a handsome small sword. He also carried a pair of pistols, and sometimes wore across his breast, between his coat and waistcoat, a light blue ribbon. His personal NOTABLE MEN AND WOMEN 1 73 tastes were simple and unostentatious ; but he nevertheless ordered his official life and com- posed his military household with consider- able form and etiquette. A prominent, if not the foremost, place by the side of Washington belonged to General Nathaniel Greene, now but thirty-six years old ; a man rather above the common size, with a tendency to corpulency in his figure ; of fair and florid complexion ; of gentle dis- position and serene in manner. Then th^re were General Artemas Ward, whose connec- tion with the army closed this year, he being at the age of forty-nine ; General John Stark, the hero of the Battle of Bennington, aged forty-eight ; General Israel Putnam, forty- eight ; General Horatio Gates, forty-eight ; General Cftarles Lee, the eccentric English- man, forty-five ; General Philip Schuyler, forty- three ; General John Sullivan, thirty-six ; and General Henry Knox, one of the most brilliant as he was one of the youngest of the Revolu- tionary officers, twenty-six. A no less dis- tinguished place in this group belonged to Montgomery, who had fallen at Quebec in II ;-i ::,( i 11 l'« v^:\ \l 174 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, December, 1775 ; had he lived, he would now have reached his thirty-eighth year. The foreign officers were a set by them- selves. Lafayette, now but nineteen years of age, was accounted one of the handsome men of the army. His forehead receded, his features were small and delicate, and a promi- nent feature was his deep red hair. The Baron Steuben was a much older man, being forty-five. So was De Kalb, who was about forty-four. Pulaski was thirty-nine, while Kosciuszko was but thirty. Looked at together, the striking character- istic of all these Revolutionary officers is their youthfulness, their average age being a trifle under forty. Turning row to the civilians, the eye first re^jts perhaps upon Benjamin Franklin, the oldest as he was the greatest of them all ; a man of strong and well-knit frame, in stature an inch or two short of six feet, of light com- plexion and gray eyes, and with hair hanging thickly upon his shoulders. At his right hand we may place the short, stout, and sturdy John Adams, only forty-one, of prominent NOTABLE MEN AND WOMEN 1/5 -dy forehead, benignant eye, firm mouth, and ear- nest expression ; and at his left the magnetic Jefferson, who when he penned the immortal Declaration was but thirty-three years of age, tall, graceful, red-haired, and blue-eyed. The famous Samuel Adams was older than these last associates, having reached the age of fifty- four; a man of common size, but of muscu- lar form, erect, fair, and serious in manner. Alexander Hamilton, again, was the youth among the statesmen, being not twenty years old when his public debates and powerful pamphlets began to give him an influential place among the Revolutionary leaders. Hamilton was under rather than above the middle size, spare in figure, graceful in move- ment, and courtly in manner ; his general air one of uncommon delicacy and refinement. John Hancock, President of the Continental Congress, whose signature first subscribes tne Declaration, was but thirty-nine, a man of fine presence and polished address. Then there were stern Roger Sherman, one of the elders, fifty-five, and Oliver W'olcott, fifty, both of Connecticut ; the elegant rhilip Livingston, REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. of New York, sixty ; Robert Morris, of Penn- sylvania, forty-three ; Ceesar Rodney, of Del- aware, forty-six ; Samuel Chase, thirty-five, and Charles Carroll, thirty-nine, both of Mary- land ; Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, forty- four ; Edward Rutlcdge, of South Carolina, twenty-seven ; and Button Gwinnett, of Geor- gia, forty-four. All of these last-named were signers of the Declaration of Independ- ence. Dr. Witherspoon, of New Jersey, an- other impcHlant member of the Continental Congress, was a man of impressive personal appearance ; and his strong Scotch accent and ardent manner gave great charm to his public utterance. Charles Thompson, the notable secretary of the body, was a tall and well-pro- portioned man, but spare in countenance, and crowned with erect white hair. Associated with the foregoing in the Congress, but by intention not a signer of the Declaration, was John Dickinson of Pennsylvania, better kuown as ''Tie Farmer," under which soubriquet he wrote much and influentially in favor of the war. He was now forty-four years old. And there were other men of power and mark NOTABLE MEN AND WOMEN. 177 not included with the distinguished represen- tatives who met at Philadelphia : such as the pre-eminent Patrick Henry, of Virginia, most powerful of all the orators of the Revolution, now forty years of age, a tall, spare, awk- ward-looking man, whose presence, when in- flamed with ti- fire of his genius, yet became majestic and imposing; Jonathan Trumbull, of Connecticut, now sixty-six, the great "war governor " of his time, on whom Washington relied as " one of his main pillars of support ; " * Christopher Gadsden, of South Carolina, one of the most zealous of the patriots, now fifty- two ; Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, of the same State as Gadsden, a captain in the regi- ment of which Gadsden was colonel, like him a man of lofty character and elegant tastes, and now just thirty years of age ; and David Rittenhouse, of Philadelphia, a man of a sci- entific turn, whose Revolutionary services were of a peaceful and philosophic character, now forty-four. ♦ It is said that the designation " Brother Jonathan," as applied to the personified American people, grev/ out of Washington's frequent remark concerning Governor Trum- bull : " Let us hear what brother Jonathan says." 12 \\ ^^ ^ 178 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. Last of all there was that group upon whom the shadows rest: including Benedict Arnold, who was only thirty-six at the time of which we speak ; and Aaron Burr, who was then but twenty, and only four years out of Princeton College. With a few exceptions, the women of the Revolution are to be spoken of more conven- iently in the mass than as individuals. Mrs. Mercy Warren, whose name has already had mention upon the literary page, was foremost among the intellectual representatives of her sex ; and her scholarship, patriotism, and strength of character gave her really a com- manding position. Her correspondence was extensive, and her counsel was frequently sought in private by the statesmen in conduct of affairs. Mrs. General Knox, who was a daughter of Thomas Flucker, a royal secretary of Massachusetts, was a conspicuous figure, no less for her vigor and independence of mind and originality of habit, than for her imposing personal appearance and dignified address. She was a recognized leader in society, and turned her admitted ascendency NOTABLE MEN AND WOMEN. 1/9 to good account ; but regretted, it is said, in after years her engrossment with public af- fairs, declaring that, if she could live her life over again, she "would be more of a wife, more of a mother, more of a woman." Mrs. General Greene, who was Catherine Little- field, of Block Island, like Mrs. Knox shared with her husband the perils and hardships of campaign life. Mr brilliant qualities earned for her high di? -.tion and wide influence ; and she is specially remembered from the fact that it was at her house in Georgia, and under her encouragement, that Eli Whitney produced his famous cotton-gin. With pecu- liar admiration one looks back to such a wo- man as Mrs. Mary Draper of Dedham, in Massachusetts, who was a whole " relief com- mittee " in herself, and converted her own premises into a perfect "soldiers' rest." At the outbreak of the war, when the patriots of New England were hastening to arms, she organized her household into a bakery, put her huge ovens in full blast, spread a long table by the road-side, and kept it bounteously supplied with pans of bread and cheese and J i8o REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. ■■[ < 7 tubs of cider ; so, day after day, supplying the needs of hungry men, as they marched by on the way to Boston. There is one woman of the Revolutionary times whose name we hold in most reverent remembrance : this was the mother of Wash- ington. No portrait of her is in existence ; and her only memoir is that by G. W. P. Cus- tis, which Mrs. Ellet has effectively epito- mized. Her moral nature was predominant, but her intellectual strength gave her the right to rule in her world, while simplicity and sweetness unfailing characterized her manner and her spirit. Her tastes were domestic, her habits were industrious and exact, and her piety consecrated a secluded spot among the rocks and trees near her house as her place of prayer. To the women of the Revolution, as a class, sentiment and custom did not allow the posi- tions of public service which in a measure they now enjoy ; but no patriotism could be more ardent, no courage firmer, no spirit of sacri- fice heartier than was theirs. They were the heroines of many serious frolics, the accounts iilii NOTABLE MEN AND WOMEN. l8l of which are important contributions to the inner history of the times. Thus, once at a quilting-bee at Kinderhook, N.Y., the only young man in the company ventured some aspi sions upon the Congress, in session at the time in Philadelphia, and continued the offence until the girls could brook it no longer. Laying hold of him with one consent, they stripped him to the waist, coated him with molasses in lieu of tar, flecked him with flag-down in lieu of feathers, and then let him go. And one of these girls was a parson's daughter ! The young ladies of Amelia County, Virginia, moved by the emergency of their country, entered into a compact " not to receive the addresses of any person, be his circumstances or situation in life what they will, unless he has served in the American armies long enough to prove by his valor that he is deserving of their love." The patriotic fervor of a daughter of the Revolutionary period is well illustrated by a letter which is printed in the " Continental Journal," of Sept. 25, 1777. It was written by a young lady of sixteen to her brother l82 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. \ at Fort Washington, and, falling into the hands of an officer, so pleased him by its noble tenor that he gave out copies of it for publication. It is as follows : — Bq/ion, 23^ Sept., ^Jl^- Dear Billy, — What news ? would be the firft queftion you'd afk could I fee you. I anfvver by way of letter, none at all. The next is, how do you do ? I anfvver very well ; how do you do ? Metliinks I hear your comparatively feeble voice famed for the noife of battle ; Betfy, I am well, happy accents they are — I fancy I indulge a pleafing reverie that you are now ftaking the foe ; how happy Ihould I be, to hear that my brother was the firft who ruflied on to defperate battle. Never let the name of raife a blulh on his fitter's cheek ; re- member from me that I am your fifter, that my hap- pinefs depends on your good behaviour. Return vidlorious, or return no more. Rather than hear that you was a coward, or a timid aflerter of the rights of your Country ; I had rather hear that leaden death had difmantled your fpirited foul, and fent it murmuring to the fkies. I had rather be obliged to ftalk the mangled heaps with the firmnefs of a grieved daughter of liberty, in fearch of the crimfon'd corps of my brother, to wafh his wounds with my tears, confcious that he was fighting for me, for himfelf, for his country — I'd call the wondering fpectators, and fliew your corps, ii ! NOTABLE MEN AND WOMEN. 1 83 and tell them with aboafling fmile this was my brother. But flop, I 11 j;o no further — I hope you will fight and have an opportunity of feeing the ruin of your Britifh foes : your hands flained with blood of Engliih tyrants, fliall procure you a lauriel — that time Ihall never brurti from your temples. / a>n, dr'c. Often a like spirit with the foregoing showed itself in more practical ways, as in the case of Emily Geiger, a young South Car- olinian maiden, not more than eighteen years of age, who under perilous circumstances vol- unteered to carry a letter from General Greene to General Sumter. Greene, fearing that the girl might lose the letter, first communicated its contents to her, and she then set forth upon her expedition, mounted on a fleet horse. On the second day, she was intercepted by the enemy's scouts, suspected, taken to a neighboring house, and a woman sent for to search her person. While the woman was coming, she ate up her letter piece by piece ; and the search, of course, was fruitless. She was released, and proceeding on her way reached her destination in safety, and commu- nicated her errand. ( r"^> r; 1 84 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. XII. ODDS AND ENDS. I It only remains, to complete the design of these pages, to set down here by themselves a few items of interest which have not found an orderly admission in an earlier place. As the eye passes from the illustrious in- dividuals of Revolutionary times, it may well rest for a moment upon some of the distin- guished families whose broad estates embel- lished the landscape, and whose successive generations have played so important parts in the national history. Taking the country through, the aristocratic idea was far more dominant then than now. Many scions of old English households had been transplanted to the American soil, in the hope of finding room for freer and fuller growth ; and the immense domains to be had almost for the asking tempted an ambition and encouraged ODDS AND ENDS. 185 a taste which found satisfaction in a life laid out only on the most elaborate scale. The inequalities of the old society have been evened up in these latter days, and we look almost in vain for those great and proud fami- lies whose names a hundred years ago gave distinction to the Colonics they had helped to settle and develop. These old and honorable names were especially prominent at the South. Among them were the Izards and Draytons of South Carolina, the eminent and influential William Henry Drayton being the foremost representative of the latter, though at the time of his death, in 1779, he had attained the age of but thirty-seven years. Drayton Hall, the family seat, was an imposing man- sion in the English style, fronting on the Ashley River, built some thirty years before the Revolution at a cost of $90,000. It was of brick, much of its material having been imported from England, and was largely fin- ished within in panel and wainscot of solid mahogany. Another representative family of this class is found in the Fairfaxes, who traced their I*. e> '^ IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) y k{o {./ .< :/ 5r ^. 1.0 I.I 1.25 f IIM IIIIIM 1^ 1.4 IIM 1.6 vQ ' ^ J \ \ .^N^ ^\^^ fi> '<^> 'n. ^^ *^ 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, NY. 14580 (716) 872-4503 tf W\? -, ///// ^^ 6^ ■ ^ • Mi! 1 86 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. descent through a long Hne of English lords, back to the times before the Conquest. Their vast estates were in Virginia ; their seat, on the banks of the Potomac, a few miles below Mount Vernon, was named "Bel voir;" and Lord Thomas Fairfax was the friend anc' early patron of Washington. Through all the fabric of Revolutionary events there ran the thread of a peculiar misery in the prevalence of the small-pox, which dread malady had not yet found its match in the treatment of vaccination. Not only the ranks of the army, but the homes of the people, were invaded by this loathsome visitor, and its devastations were terrible. Its victims were counted by thousands, and the gloomy fears of pestilence intensified the ordinary h -errors of war. Nevertheless, the superstitions which prevailed, and the straits to which the sufferers were driven, gave oc- casion for some humorous situations. Thus, a traveller to the southward mentions that at one place he found a woman sitting wrapped in blankets, by a roaring fire, and making a ODDS AND ENDS, 187 night of it in that fashion ; her intent being "- to sweat out the small-pox." A far funnier thing than this must have been a " small-pox party," a glimpse of which is given in this extract of a letter from one Joseph Barrell, quoted by Mr. Drake from Brewster's History of Portsmouth : * — Mr. Storer has invited Mr. Martin to take the small-pox at his house : '^ vf^s. Wentvvorth desires to get rid of her pears in the san,3 way, we will accommo- date her in the best way we can. I've several friends that I've invited, and none of them will be more wel- come than Mrs. W. Duelling, though prohibited by law, was sustained tu a considerable degree by public sentiment ; and several notable instances of the now detested practice were afforded dur- ing the Revolution. General Charles Lee was wounded in a duel with Colonel John Laurens, of Washington's staff, who gave the challenge because of some aspersions which he had cast upon the Commander-in-chief. General Con- way, the instigator of the conspiracy against Washington, known as the " Conway Cabal," * Old Landmarks, p. 389. i88 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, v/as wounded in a duel with General Cadwal- ader, on the 4th of July, 1778. And a year earlier Button Gwinnett, one of the signers of the Declaration, was killed in a duel with General Mcintosh. Revolutionary times were without an " Old Probabilities," but could well have kept him in occupation if he had been on the ground, provided with the necessary instruments for gathering his reports and despatching them. The winter of 1772-73 was a very mild one. In Falmouth, Me., January 27th was set down as a summer day, and no snow fell there until well into February. The winter of 1774-75 was equally remarkable for its mildness, the weather being so warm at New York in February that boys went into the river to swim. For such deficiencies in cold, however, the winter of 1779-80 made full amends. This was long remembered for its severity, and earned the name of " the hard winter." The country was buried beneath a mass of snow that at times rendered the roads utterly impassable, and Long Island Sound ODDS AND ENDS. 189 was almost entirely frozen over. Persons crossed from Long Island to the Connecticut shore on the ice, and wood was brought from the same quarter to New York in sleighs. What the clerk of the weather would have thought of the " Dark Day," the 19th of May in the same year, 1780, it is difficult to say. The phenomenon was a most astonishing one. It must hc.ve been really appalling. The day was a Friday, too ! For several days previous the air had been uncommonly obscured, so that the sun and moon were given a reddish hue. Early on this Friday morning, clouds began to gather in a way to portend rain, and at eleven o'clock the darkness had become so intense as to excite remark and prompt spe- cial observation. We will let a writer in the "Country Journal," of May 20, finish the story : — At half-paft eleven, in a room with three windows, twenty-four panes each, all opened toward the fouth-eaft and fouth, large print could not be read by perfons of good eyes. About twelve o'clock, the windows being ilill open, a candle caft a (hade fo well defined on the s. i. IQO REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. \ wall, as that profiles were taken with as much eafe as they could have been in the night. About one o'clock, a glimpfe of light, which had continued till this time in the eaft, ihut in, and the darknefs was greater than it had been for any time before. Between one and two o'clock, the wind at the weft frefhened a little, and a glimpfe of light appeared in that quarter. We dined about two, the windows all open, and two candles burning on the table. In this time of the greateft darknefs, the dunghill fowls went to their rooft ; cocks crowed in anfwer to each otiier, as they commonly do in the night; wood-cocks, which are night birds, whif- tled as they do only in the dark ; frogs peeped ; in fhort, there was the appearance of midnight at noon- day. About three o'clock the light in the weft in- creafed, the motion of the clouds more thick, their color higher and more braffy than at any time before ; there appeared to be quick flafhes or corufcations, not unlike the aurora borealis. Between three and four o'clock we were out and perceived a ftrong, footy fmell ; fome of the company were confident a chimney in the neighbourhood muft be burning ; others con- jedlured the fmell was more like that of burned leaves. About half-paft four, our company, which had paffed an unexpected night very cheerfully together, broke up. I will now give you what I noticed afterwards. I found the people at the tavern near by much agitated. Among other things which gave them much furprife, they mentioned the ftrange appearance and fmell of the rain water, which they had faved in tubs. Upon ODDS AND ENDS, 191 examining the water, I found a flight fcum over it, which, rubbing between my tliumb and finger, I found to be nothing but the black aflies of burnt leaves. . . . The vaft body of fmoke from the woods, which had been burning for nany days, mixing with the common exhalations from tl.e earth and water, and condenfed by the a<5lion of winds from oppofite points, may, perhaps, be fufficient caufes to produce the furprifing darknefs. The wind in the evening pafled round fur- ther norths where a black cloud lay, and gave us reafon to expe6l a fudden guft from that quarter. The wind brought that body of fmoke and vapour over us, in the evening, (at Salem, Maffachufetts,) and perhaps it never was darker fince the Children of Ifrael left the houfe of bondage. This grofs darknefs held till about one o'clock, although the moon had fulled but the day before. Between one and two the wind frefhened up at north-eaft, and drove the fmoke and clouds away, which had given diftrefs to thoufands, and alarmed the brute creation. And now let us in imagination transport ourselves back to that Fourth of July, 1776, which is the supreme point ot the period we have been surveying, and, turning the eye forward to that future which has become our past, pick out one by one some successive events of a familiar kind which have con- tributed to the century's progress ; so the 'I ■it 192 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. better to realize the remoteness of these Revolutionary times. July 4th, 1776: it is yet eight days before Captain Cook is to set sail from Plymouth, England, on that voyage of exploration, one achievement of which is to be the discovery, two years later, of the Sandwich Islands. A month and more of life the historian Hume has before him. Rousseau, Linna:ius, and Garrick have nearly two years more ; Sir William Blackstone, nearly four ; and Samuel Johnson, eight. Napoleon Bonaparte is a boy of seven : thirty-nine years of varied discipline, adventure, and achievement await him before his career shall terminate at Waterloo. Walter Scott, who is to be Napoleon's biographer, is two years his junior ; but Irving, who forty years later is to visit Scott at Abbots- ford, is not yet born, nor will he be these seven years. It is eighteen years yet to the birth of Bryant, twenty-seven to that of Emerson, thirty-one to Longfellow's, thirty- three to Abraham Lincoln's. Only by slow steps are new States of America to join themselves to the original of inal ODDS AND ENDS. 193 thirteen. Vermont, the first, will not present herself yet for fifteen years ; Kentucky, only after sixteen ; Tennessee, in twenty ; Ohio, in twenty-six ; Louisiana, in thirty-six ; Indiana, in forty ; Mississippi, in forty-one ; Illinois, in forty-two; Alabama, in forty-three ; Maine, in forty-four; Missouri, in forty-five; Arkansas, in sixty ; Michigan, in sixty-one ; Florida and Texas, sixty-seven; Iowa, seventy; Wisconsin, seventy-two; California, seventy-four; Minne- sota, eighty-two ; Oregon, eighty-three ; Kan- sas, eighty-five; West Virginia, eighty-seven; Nevada, eisfh^y-eight ; Nebraska, ninety-one. Equally ti,,. in the future are many of the colleges which by 1876 are to constitute so conspicuous a part of the furnishing of the Jand. It is seventeen years to the founding of Williams ; twenty-two to that of Bowdoin ; forty-five to that of Amherst ; forty-seven to that of Trinity ; fifty-seven to that of Oberlin ; sixty-five to that of the University of Michi- gan ; ninety-two to that of Cornell University. In the world of useful arts, the steam-engine is a new invention, and has not yet passed out of the experimental stage. Steam navigation, 13 w \i 194 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, to the popular mind, is a chimera, and seven years must elapse before Fitch will first move his vessel by this new motive power on the Delaware ; thirty-one, before Fulton will es- tablish " The Clermont " as a regular steam packet between New York and Albany ; forty- three, before " The Savannah " is to earn the distinction of being the first steamship to cross the great and wide sea. George Ste- phenson, who, thirty-eight years hence, is to construct in England his first locomotive engine, is not yet born ; and America has to wait yet half a century before it can witness the operation of its first railroad, that from the granite quarries at Quincy to tide-water. A longer time still by several years must the people continue to strike their flint and steel, < before lighting their fires with " lucifer " matches. The cotton-gin is seventeen years in the future ; illuminating gas, forty-six; steel pens, the same ; india rubber over-shoes, fifty ; the daguerreotype, sixty-four ; the telegraph, sixty- eight ; and the sewing-machine, seventy. Gentlemen will wear short clothes twenty ODDS AND ENDS. 195 even nove I the I es- team orty- 1 the p to Ste- is to otive as to tness from vater. it the steel, < :ifer " n the pens, ; ihe sixty- • wenty years longer, before putting on trousers ; and eat with steel forks for fifty, before exchang- ing them for forks of silver. Not for twenty years yet is Jenner to be- gin his struggle for the introduction of vacci- nation ; and it must be ten years more before this his beneficent theory shall have won its triumph over the combined forces of super- stition and bigotry. For sixty years longer must the surgeon's patient suffer under the operating-knife, before the inhalation of ether can be resorted to for the deadening of his sensibilities. It will be thirty-six years before the experimenting American will succeed in getting anthracite coal to burn, sixty before he will arm himself with a revolver, and sixty- one before he will see a steam-vessel pro- pelled by a screw. Not for fifty years will an " iron-clad " afloat demonstrate the possi- bility of a revolution in naval architecture ; not for seventy-five will petroleum freely supersede sperm oil and candles. For forty years longer the American printer is to work with a hand-press, though in some- thing less than that time he will adopt the 196 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. process of stereotyping ; but it will be seventy- five years before he will make the improve- ment of electrotyping, and eighty or more before he will apply the new method to the printing of newspapers. After the lapse of about this same time, he will amuse himself with machines for setting up and distributing type, and just a little later will pause with in- terest before a shop window to see a young lady operate a " type-writer." But in less . than fifty years he will have received from Europe the art of lithography. Nearly ninety years must pass before the travelling American can take his seat amid the luxuries of a Pullman car, and more than ninety before he can enter upon his comfort- able journey in it, with meals by day and sleep by night, across the continent ; while, in the street cars of the cities, only the closing years of the century will resound to the mel- low ring with which the conductor of uncer- tain integrity signifies his obedience to the direction to " Punch in the presence of the passenjare." Finally, to the best of this present writer's ODDS AND ENDS. 197 knowledge and belief, the very last year of all the busy and eventful one hundred must com'^ before an inquiring reader can find in any such snug compass as that in which this little book has attempted to present it, a bird's- eye view of the things that were at the be- ginning. APPENDIX. The materials of this book have been derived mainly from the following sources : — Bancroft's History of the United States. Lossing's Pictorial Field Book of the Revolution. Moore's Diary of the Elevolution. Hudson's Journalism in the United States. Familiar Letters of John Adams and his Wife. Drake's Old Landmarks of Boston. Memoir of Josiah Quincy, Jr. Breed's Presbyterians and the Revolution. Patterson's Historical Sketch of the Synod of Phila- delphia. Mrs. Ellet's The Women of the American Revolution. Timlow's Sketches of Southington, Conn. Boston Gazette, 1773-1775. New England Chronicle, 1775- 1776. Continental Journal, 17/7. Crosby's First Half-Century of Dartmouth College. Stevens's Address on Old New York before the New York Historical Society. Duycki nek's Cyclopedia of American Literature. Manuscripts and private memorials. MMaiMAaMMM 200 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. Those who desire to go further in this explora- tion of Revolutionary times will find important helps among the works grouped below. Any thing like completeness in such a list is of course out of the question here; and the reader should be frankly warned that many of the books named are scarce, and some excessively rare ; while comparatively few are to be found in public libraries. The titles are in most cases abbreviated, and the names of authors are in italics. Natural and Civil History of the French Dominions in North and South America. London: 1760. Account of North America. London: 1775. Historical, Geographical, Commercial, and Philosophi- cal View of United States. Winterbotham, New York : 1 796. Topographical Description of the Western Territory of North America. Imlay. New York: 1793. Present Political State of Massachusetts Bay and Town of Boston. New York : 1 775. History of New Hampshire Churches. Lawrence, Claremont: 1857. Thirty Days in New Jersey Ninety Years Ago. (1776-77). Haven. Trenton: 1867. Papers Relating to the [Episcopal] Church in Virginia. Perry, Privately printed. 1870. Old Churches, Ministers, and Families of Virginia. Meade. Philadelphia: 1857. APPENDIX. 20 1 Carolina in the Olden Time. By the author of "Our Forefathers." Narrative of Col. David Fanning of Adventures in North Carolina, from 1775 to 1783, Richmond, Va. : 1 86 1. Revolutionary History of North Carolina. Hawks, Swain, and Graham. Raleigh: 1853. Memoirs of the Revolution as relating to South Caro- lina. Drayton. Charleston, S.C. : 1821. Memoirs of the Early Settlers of Ohio, with Incidents and Occurrences in 1775. Hildreth. Cincinnati: 1852. History of Philadelphia. Wesicott. Annals of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania in the Olden Time. Watson. Philadelphia : 1845. History of Independence Hall, with Biographies of the Signers, Historical Sketches, etc. Belisle. Phil- adelphia: 1859. New York City during the Revolution. Privately printed. New York: 1851. Boston in the Colonial Times (Sir C. H. Frankland). Nason. Albany : 1865. West Cambridge on the 19th of April, 1775. StnitK Boston: 1864. Richmond in By-gone Days. Richmond, Va. : 1856. Letters of Eliza Wilkinson during the Invasion and Possession of Charleston, S.C, by the British. Gilman. New York : 1839. 202 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. Law's Colonial History of Vincennes. Vincennes : 1858. Annals of San Francisco. Souli and others. New York: 1855. New Travels in the United States in 1788. J, P. De IV, BrissoL London : 1 794. Travels through the Interior Parts of North America in 1766-68. Carver, London: 1778, Travels in the Interior inhabited Parts of North America in 1791-92. Campbell. Edinburgh : 1793. Travels through the Middle Settlements in North America in 1759-60. Burnaby. London: 1775. Adventures of Capt. Matthew Phelps in Two Voyages from Connecticut to the River Mississippi, 1773- 1780. HaswelL Bennington : 1802. Travels and Adventures in Canada and the Indian Territories • between 1760-76. Henry. New York: 1809. Travels through the United States in 1796, '97. Roch- foucatdd. London: 1799. Tour in United States of, America. Smyth. Lon- don : 1784. Travel through the States of North America. Weld. London : 1799. Travels in North America in 1780-82. Chastellux, London: 1787. APPENDIX. 203 Letters from an American Farmer describing certain Provincial Situations, Manners, and Customs. St, John. London: 1783. A Journal of Two Visits to Indiana, West of the River Ohio, in 1772-73. Jones. New York : 1875. Military Journal during the American Revolutionary War, 1775-83. Thacher. Boston: 1823. Memoirs of am American Lady. Mrs, Grant. Lon- don : 1809. Letters from America, Historical and Descriptive. Eddis. London: 1792. Letters and Memoirs. Mad. Riedesel. New York : 1827. Private Journal kept during a Portion of the Revolu- tionary War. Philadelphia: 1836. Baptists and the American Revolution. Cathcart, Richmond : 1876. The Pulpit of the American Revolution. Thornton, Boston: i860. ' Chaplains and Clergy of the Revolution. Headley, History of Music in New England. Hood. Boston : 1846. History of Printing in America. Thomas. Worcester : 1810. Songs and Ballads of the Revolution. Moore, New York: 1856. Domestic History of the American Revolution. Ellet, 204 REVOLUTIONARY TIMES, Biographical Sketches of Loyalists. Sabine. Boston : 1864. The Youth of Jefferson ; or, A Chronicle of College Scraps at Williamsburg in Virginia, 1794. New York: 1854. Sketch of John S. Copley. Perkins. Cambridge: 1873. Life and Times of Washington. Sshroeder. Old New England Traits. Liint. Boston : Our Forefathers : Their Homes and Churches. By the author of " Carolina in the Olden Time." Charleston : i860. Anecdotes of the Revolutionary War in America, with Sketches of Character, etc., etc. Garden, Charles- ton, S.C. : 1822-28. Brooklyn: 1865. Anecdotes of the American Revolution. New York : 1844. Reminiscences of the Revolution. Albany : 1833. Principles and Acts of the Revolution in America. Niles. Bal ti more : 1822. Local histories in great number. Collections of the several Historical Societies. American Military Pocket Atlas of the British Col- onies. London: 1776. The American Geography. Morse, Boston : 1 789. INDEX. -♦o^ Adams, Hannah, 123. Adams, John, 22, 25, 60, 63, 93, 114, 120, 165, 169, 174. Adams, Samuel, 22, 114, 149, 175. Aitkin, Robert, 121. Albany, N.Y., 27, 28, 51. Allen, Ethan, 115. Amboy, N.J., 13. Amusements. 72-77. Annapolis, Md., 13, 14, 41. Apthorps, The, 31. Architecture, 37, 82. Arnold, Benedict, 178. Auchmuty, Dr., 149. Augusta, Ga., 14, 43. Balls, 76-78. Baltimore, Md., 14, 20, 41, 42, 52, 82. Baptists, 145, 146. Barlow, Joel, iig. Bartram, John, 16, 116. Bartram, William, 116. Bath, N.C.. 47. "Banle of the Kegs," 115. B.iyards, The, 31. Beaufort, S.C, 50. Belknap, Dr. Jeremy, 122. Bethlehem, Pa., 25, 46. Bland, Richard, 122. Bland, Theodoric, 122. Bleecker, Mrs. Ann Eliza, ii8. Book-store, An old, 128. Boone, Daniel, 15. Boston, Mass., 13, 19, 28, 33-40, 51, 52, 53, 54» 5S> 62, 73, 80, 120, 136, 150, 167. Boston Gazette, 52, 72, 88, 129, 130. Brackenridge, Ilugh Henry, 121. Burr, Aaron, 178. Byles, Mather, 150. Burgoyne's surrender, Tidings of, 48. Cadwalader, Gen., i?8. Caldwell, Rev. James, 149. Cambridge, Mass., 14, 41, ij;o, 164. Carpenters' Hail, Philadelphia, 21. Carroll, Charles, 42, 176. Charleston, S.C, 13, 14, 20, 42, 45, 4«, 53, 55- Chase, Samuel, 42, 176. Chauncy, Dr. Charles, 150. Children, Habits of, 85. Church, Dr. Benj.imin, 122. Churches, 25, 29, 36, 37, 145-160. Cities, The five prominent, 19. Civilians of eminence, 174-178. Clergy, The, 147-152. Coffee-houses, 30, 31. Colleges, 25, 29, 41, 102-1 1 1, 148, 150, 163. Colonies, The thirteen original, 13. "Common Sense," 121, 143. Concert, Programme of a, 72. Concord, Mass., 164. Congregationalists, 145. Congress, 22, 23, 109-in, 149, 175, 176, Connecticut, 13, 16, 46, 147. Continental Journal, 56, i8r. Conway, Gen., 187. Cooper, Rev. Dr. Samuel, 150. Copley, John S., 42, 168, 169. Corn wal lis, 20. Country Journal, 189. Courtship of Matthew Griawold, 86. 2o6 INDEX, "Dark Day" of 1780, 189-191. Declaration of Independence, 17, 23, 42, i75> '76, 188. De Xalb, 174. De Lanceys, The, 31. Delaware, 13. Delaware River, 51. Detroit, 12, 17. Dickinson, John, 115, 176. Dorchester, Mass., 16. Dorchester, S.C. 16, 159. Draper, Mrs. Mary, 179. Draytons, The, 185. Dress, 69-71. Duche, Rev. Jacob, 115, 149. Duellinp, 187. Diiffield, Dr., 149. Du Simitiere, 117. Dutch Reformed, The, 145. Dutch, The, 27, 46, 158 Dwight, Rev. Timothy, 118, 119, 130. Easton, Pa., 27. East Windsor, Conn., 78. Edenton, N.C., 47. Emmons, Rev. Dr., 87, 112, 115, 120, 151. Enpravers, 167. Episcopalians, 145, 146, 147, 149, ^'57- Essex Gazette, 94. Euphrates, Pa.j 47. Evans, Nathaniel, 122. Exeter, N.H., 13, 40. Fairfaxes, The, 185, 186. Falmouth, Me., 14, 40, 53, 93, 185, Families of distinction, 3t, 184-186. Farm, A model. 161, 162. Farmer's life, The, 162, 163. Farinington, Conn., 95. Florida, 16. Flucker, Thomas, 176. " Flying machine," 52. Fourth of July, 1776, prospect from, 191-197, Franklin, Renjamin, 94, 174. Franklin, William, 54, 55. Freneau, 117, ii8. Funeral customs, 89. Future, view of from 4th of July, 1776, 191-197. Gadsden, Christopher, 22, 177. Gaine's Mercury, 73. Gates, Gen._ Horatio, 173. Geiger, Emily, 183. Germantown, Pa., 25, 46. Georgetown, Md., 41. Georgia, 13, 16, 49, 179. German Refo»'med, 145. Germans, The, 46. Godfrey, Thomas, 123. Governments, Forms of, 18. Graydon, Alexander, 118. Greene, Gen. Nathaniel, 173, 183. Greene, Mrs. Gen., 179. Griswold, Matthew, Courtship of, 86. Gwinnett, Button, 176, 187. Hamilton, Alexander, 175. Hancock House, The 38-40. Hancock, John, 87, 175. Hartford, Conn., 13, 14, 41, 46, 51. Henry, Patrick, 22, 177. Hopkinson, Francif., 115, 121. House, Interior of, 83. Hudson River, 82. Humphreys, David, 119. Independenck Hall, 23. Indiana, 16. Indian tribes, 12, 17. Industrial interests, 161. Inventory in a New Hampshire family, 98. Isles 01 Shoals, 14. Izards, The, 185. Jay, John, 22, 166. Jefferson, Thomas, 114, 174. Johnston's Hall, 82. Johnstown, N.Y.j 82. Jones, Samuel, 166. Journalism, 132-143. KrNDERHOOK, N.Y., 187, Kitchen, Scene in, 84. Knox, Gen. Henry, 173. Knox, Mrs. Gen., 178. Kosciuszko, 174. INDEX. 207 Lafaybttb, 76, 77, 174. Lake George, 51. Lancaster, Fa., 26, 46, 47. Langdnn, Dr., 150. Laurens, Col. John, fSj. Lawyers, 165-167. Lee, Gen. Charles, 173, 187. Lee, Richard Henry, 176. Libraries, 127-129. Ljnn, Rev. William, 118. Litflefield, Catherine Mrs. Gen. (ireene), 17c). Livingstons, The, 31, 166, 175. Louisiana, 16. Lutherans, 27, 145. Mmi.s, 54-57- Maine, 12, 14, 40, 53, Manufactures, 164. Marblehead, Mass., 40. Maryland, 13, 15, 16, 41, 47. Marriage notices, 87, 88. Massachusetts, 12, 13, 15, 16, 53, '47; I7«- Meeting-houses, 153. Men of the Revolution, 171-178. Methodists, 145, 146. "M;Fingal," 119. Minister, call and settlement of, 152. Mississippi River and Valley, 12, 44. Mohawk Valley, The, 15, 51. Money system, 100. Montjromery, Gen., i6r, 173. Morality, 63. Morris, Gouverneur, 118. Morris, Robert, 176. Morrises, I'he, 31. Morristown, N. J., 46, 157. Music in the churches, 154. Newark, N.J., 27. Newbern. N.C., 13, 14, 48. Newburyport, ^L^ss., 52. Newcastle, Del., 13, 14. New England Chronicle, 64, 130, 164. New England life and traita, 60, 61, 81, 146, 161, 179. New Hampshire, 12, 13, 14, 15, 51, New Haven, Conn., 13, 41, 46, 51, - »5o. [147. New Jersey, 13, 14, 15, 16, 51, 82, New Orleans, 44. Newport, R.L, 13, 41. Newspapers, 132-143. New York, City of, 13, 27, 33, 51, ^52, 53. 54. 5S»62, 73, 80, 136, 188. New York Gazette, 87, 100. New York, State of, 12, 13, 15, 8a. Norfolk. Va , 14. North Carolina, 13, 15, i6, 47, 61, 82, 166. Ofrcers of the Revolution, 171- 174. Ohio, 16. Otis, James, 115. Paca, William, 42. Paine, Thomas, 121. Painters, 167-170. Peale, Charles W., 16S. Peale, Rembrandt, 168. Pennsylvania, 13, 16, 21, 61, 147. Pennsylvania Gazette, 55. Pennsylvania Magazine, 121. Pennsylvania, University of, 25. Philadelphin, Pa., 13, 20-25,26, 27, 4'^> S'» 52, 5S> 80, 94, 102, 117, 121, 147, 166, 169, 177. Piercy, Rev. Mr., 44. Pinckney, Charles Cotesworth, 177. Pittsburg, Pa., 12, 27. Plymouth, Mass., 14. Political parties, 6, , Population in 1776, 59. Portsmouth, N. H., "14, 40, 187. Post-office. The, 57. Presbyterians, 16, 145, 146, 158. Prices, 95-100. Princeton, N.J., 29, 148. Products of the several States, 16. Providence, R.L, 13, 14, 41, 45, 51. Pulaski, 174. Putnam, Gen. Israel, 173. Quakers in Philadelphia, ai. Quincy, Josiah, Jr., 53, 75. Rags, Scarcity of, 140, 141. Reading, P'^nn., 14, 46. Reamstown, Pa., 46. Revere, Paul, 107. Rhode Island, 13, 15, 45, 147. •y,jL ' M' 208 INDEX. Kichmnnd, Va., 51. Rittenhouse. David, 177. Roads, 51. Rodney, Cassar, 176. Roman Catholics, 17, 145, 146. Romans, Bernard, 116. Rush, Dr. Henjamin, 102, 121. Riitledfie, Edward, 22, 176. Rutledge, John, 22. Sabba'-Day Houses. 156. San Francisco, Mission of, 17. Siilem, Mass., 40, 94. Savannah. Ga., 13, 14, 43. Schools, Professional, 112. School, A mornine:, 112. Schuyler, Gen. Philip, 173. Seabury, Dr., 14'). Sectional contrasts, qo~6i. Sewall, Jonathan M., 122. Sherman. Roger, 175. Sicjners of the Declaration, 42, 115. Slavery, 68. Small-pox, 1S6, 187. Smibert, 169. South Carolina, 13, 14, 15, 16, 61, 159, 1555. Southern traits, 61. Spanish, The, 44. Sprinpfield, Mass., 41, 51. Stape-coacli, 52, 53. Stark, Gen. John, 173. States, Governments of, iS. States, Products of, 16. Steuben. Baron, 174. Stiles, Dr., 115, 150. Stillman, Dr., ii;o. St. Lawrence River, 54. St. Louis, Mo., 16. Stone, Thomas, 42. Store. Interior of a, 164. Stuart, Gilbert. 169. Stuyvesants, The, 31. Sumter, Gen., 183. Sullivan, Gen. John, 173. Taverns, 30. Theatre, 73, 76. Thomas, Isaiah, 123. Thompson. Charles, iifi, 176. Thursday Lci ture in Boston, 157. Tories and Whigs, 62. Travel, 45-54- Trumbull, John, the painter, 169. Trumbull, John, the poet, 119. Trumbull, Jonathan, 117, 177. United States Magazine, 121. Universalists, 147. Vaughan, John, 23. Vermont, 12. Vincennes, Ind., i6. Virginia, 13, 14, 15, i6, 47, 51, 61, 82, i'i9, 181, 186. Vredenburg, Jacob, 79. Wagrs, 163. Waltham, Va., sr. Warren, Mercy, 123, 178. Ward, Gen. Artemas, 173. Washington, George, 22, 105-107, 114, 124-127, 157, 159, 169, 172, i7.3«. >87- Washington, The mother of, 180. Watcrtown, Mass., 41. Watson, Elkanah, 45-50. Wattses, The, 31. Wealth, 62. Weather in 1772-80, 188. Webster, Noah, 123. West, Benjamiuj 169. West, Colonization of the, 16. Westcheater. N.Y., 161. Wheatley, Phillis. 123-127. Whigs and Tories, 62. Whitefield, Rev. George, 40, 43. Williamsburg, Va., 13 47. Wilmington, N.C., 48. Witherspoon, Dr., 115, 121, 148, i/fi. Wolcott, Oliver. 175. Wolcott, Ursula, and Matthew Griswold, 86. Women of the Revolution, 178-183. Wyoming, Valley of, 15, York, Me., 165. Yorktown, Pa., 27.