GIFT OF 
 
 75 3 V 
 
LITERARY 
 
 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 JOHN G. WHITTIER, 
 
 AUTHOR OF "MARGARET SMITH S JOURNAL," 
 " OLD PORTRAITS," ETC. 
 
 "There are those who would never have an author speak of things of which others 
 have spoken ; and if he does, they accuse him of saying nothing new. But, if the 
 subjects are not new, the disposing of them may be ; as in pjaying at tennis both play 
 with the same ball, but differently ." Blaiae Pascal. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 TICKNOR AND FIELDS. 
 
 M DCCC LIV. 
 
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by 
 
 JOHN G. WHITTIER, 
 In the Clerk s Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 
 
 7? fa 9 
 
 STEREOTYPED AT THE 
 BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUHDBY, 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 MOST of the pieces which make up this volume 
 were originally written for newspapers with which 
 the author has been editorially or otherwise con 
 nected. Penned at widely different periods, in 
 every variety of mood and circumstance, alike 
 under the depressing influences of illness and the 
 stimulus of popular excitement, any thing like 
 consecutive arrangement or unity has been out of 
 the question. Indeed, their selection from a large 
 amount of similar matter, destined, in all human 
 probability, to that capacious wallet 
 
 " Which Time hath ever at his back, 
 Wherein he puts alms to oblivion," 
 
 has been owing quite as much to the fact that they 
 
 (3) 
 
4 PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 lay nearest at hand as to any estimate of their rel 
 ative fitness or merit. If any apology is needed 
 for the light and playful tone of some of them, 
 it must be found in the fact that they were written 
 at times when any more serious effort would have 
 been irksome and painful, and that they afforded 
 the necessary episodical relief of an intense and 
 over-earnest life. There are other papers bearing 
 directly or remotely upon questions which still 
 divide popular feeling and opinion, the entire omis 
 sion of which would have done injustice to the 
 author s convictions and been a poor compliment 
 to the reader s liberality. 
 
 It may be as well for the author to frankly 
 own that, in giving these hasty and ill-assorted 
 papers to his publishers, he has had some fear 
 that he was making an unnecessary experiment 
 upon the patience and kindness of the reading 
 public, to which he is already a good deal in 
 debted. Apart, however, from a little solicitude 
 as respects the interests of his good-natured pub 
 lishers, he resigns his book to its fate with a 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 5 
 
 comfortable degree of unconcern, satisfied that it 
 will at least find favor in the quarter where favor 
 will be most grateful and desirable the hearts 
 of his personal friends. 
 
 AMESBURY, fifth month, 1854. 
 
 THE 
 

 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGK 
 
 UTOPIAN SCHEMES AND POLITICAL THEORISTS, . . 9 
 PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS, ... 20 
 THOMAS CARLYLE ON THE SLAVE QUESTION, ... 34 
 
 ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART, 47 
 
 THE TWO PROCESSIONS, 69 
 
 EVANGELINE, 74 
 
 A CHAPTER OP HISTORY, 84 
 
 FAME AND GLORY, 98 
 
 FANATICISM, 107 
 
 THE BORDER WAR OF 1708, 113 
 
 THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT, 126 
 
 LORD ASHLEY AND THE THIEVES, 136 
 
 MIRTH AND MEDICINE, ^. .143 
 
 POPE NIGHT, " .... 154 
 
 THE BETTER LAND, 161 
 
 THE POETRY OF THE NORTH, 165 
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES, 179 
 
 (7) 
 
8 CONTENTS. 
 
 THE BLACK MEN IN THE DEVOLUTION AND WAR OF 1812, 184 
 
 MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY, 196 
 
 CHARMS AND FAIRY FAITH, 257 
 
 MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK 273 
 
 THE AGENCY OF EVIL, 283 
 
 THE LITTLE IRON SOLDIER, 308 
 
 THE CITY OF A DAY, 31G 
 
 PATUCKET FALLS, 326 
 
 HAMLET AMONG THE GRAVES, 335 
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES, 343 
 
 THE WORLD S END, 34 
 
 SWEDENBORG, . 374 
 
 FIRST DAY IN LOWELL, 381 
 
 TAKING COMFORT, 3M 
 
 THE BEAUTIFUL, 395 
 
 THE LIGHTING UP, .. ... 403 
 
 THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS, 409 
 
 THE TRAINING, 425 
 
LITERARY 
 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES, 
 
 UTOPIAN SCHEMES AND POLITICAL 
 THEORISTS. 
 
 THERE is a large class of men, not in Europe alone, 
 but in this country also, whose constitutional conservatism 
 inclines them to regard any organic change in the gov 
 ernment of a state or the social condition of its people 
 with suspicion and distrust. They admit, perhaps, the 
 evils of the old state of things ; but they hold them to be 
 inevitable, the alloy necessarily mingled with all which 
 pertains to fallible humanity. Themselves generally 
 enjoying whatever of good belongs to the political or 
 social system in which their lot is cast, they are disposed 
 to look with philosophic indifference upon the evil which 
 
 (9) 
 
10 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 only afflicts their neighbors. They wonder why people 
 are not contented with their allotments ; they see no rea 
 son for change ; they ask for quiet and peace in their 
 day ; being quite well satisfied with that social condition 
 which an old poet has quaintly described : 
 
 " The citizens like pounded pikes ; 
 
 The lesser feed the great; 
 The rich for food seek stomachs, 
 And the poor for stomachs meat." 
 
 This class of our fellow-citizens have an especial dislike 
 of theorists, reformers, uneasy spirits, speculators upon 
 the possibilities of the world s future, constitution builders, 
 and believers in progress. They are satisfied ; the world 
 at least goes well enough with them ; they sit as comfort 
 ably in it as Lafontaine s rat in the cheese; and why 
 should those who would turn it upside down come hither 
 also ? Why not let well enough alone ? Why tinker 
 creeds, constitutions, and laws, and disturb the good old- 
 fashioned order of things in church and state ? The idea 
 of making the world better and happier is to them an 
 absurdity. He who entertains it is a dreamer and a vis 
 ionary, destitute of common sense and practical wisdom. 
 His project, whatever it may be, is at once pronounced to 
 be impracticable folly, or, as they are pleased to term 
 it, Utopian. 
 
UTOPIAN SCHEMES. 11 
 
 The romance of Sir Thomas More, which has long 
 afforded to the conservatives of church and state a term 
 of contempt applicable to all reformatory schemes and 
 innovations, is one of a series of fabulous writings, in 
 which the authors, living in evil times and unable to 
 actualize their plans for the well being of society, have 
 resorted to fiction as a safe means of conveying forbidden 
 truths to the popular mind. Plato s Timoeus, the first 
 of the series, was written after the death of Socrates and 
 the enslavement of the author s country. In this are 
 described the institutions of the Island of Atlantis the 
 writer s ideal of a perfect commonwealth. Xenophon, in 
 his Cyropedia, has also depicted an imaginary political 
 society by overlaying with fiction historical traditions. 
 At a later period we have the New Atlantis of Lord 
 Bacon and that dream of the City of the Sun with which 
 Campanella solaced himself in his long imprisonment. 
 
 The Utopia of More is perhaps the best of its class. 
 It is the work of a profound thinker the suggestive 
 speculations and theories of one who could 
 
 "Forerun his age and race, and let 
 His feet millenniums hence be set 
 In midst of knowledge dreamed not yet." 
 
 Much of what he wrote as fiction is now fact, a part 
 of the framework of European governments, and the 
 
12 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 political truths of his imaginary state are now practically 
 recognized in our own democratic system. As might be 
 expected, in view of the times in which the author wrote, 
 and the exceedingly limited amount of materials which he 
 found ready to his hands for the construction of his social 
 and political edifice, there is a want of proportion and 
 symmetry in the structure. Many of his theories are no 
 doubt impracticable and unsound. But, as a whole, the 
 work is an admirable one striding in advance of the 
 author s age, and prefiguring a government of religious 
 toleration and political freedom. The following extract 
 from it was doubtless regarded in his day as something 
 worse than folly or the dream of a visionary enthusiast : 
 
 " He judged it wrong to lay down any thing rashly, and 
 seemed to doubt whether these different forms of religion 
 might not all come from God, who might inspire men in a 
 different manner, and be pleased with the variety. Pie 
 therefore thought it to be indecent and foolish for any man 
 to threaten and terrify another, to make him believe what 
 did not strike him as true." 
 
 Passing by the Telemachus of Fenelon, we come to 
 the political romance of Harrington, written in the time of 
 Cromwell. Oceana is the name by which the author 
 represents England ; and the republican plan of govern 
 ment which he describes with much minuteness is such as 
 he would have recommended for adoption in case a free 
 
UTOPIAN SCHEMES. 13 
 
 \ 
 
 commonweal tli had been established. It deals somewhat 
 severely with Cromwell s usurpation ; yet the author did 
 not hesitate to dedicate it to that remarkable man, who, 
 after carefully reading it, gave it back to his daughter, 
 Lady Claypole, with the remark, full of characteristic 
 bluntness, that "the gentleman need not think to cheat 
 him of his power and authority ; for what he had won 
 with the sword he would never suffer himself to be scrib 
 bled out of." 
 
 Notwithstanding the liberality and freedom of his spec 
 ulations upon government and religion in his Utopia, it 
 must be confessed that Sir Thomas More, in afterlife, fell 
 into the very practices of intolerance and bigotry which 
 he condemned. "When in the possession of the great seal, 
 under that scandal of kingship Henry VIII., he gave his 
 countenance to the persecution of heretics. Bishop Bur- 
 net says of him, that he caused a gentleman of the Temple 
 to be whipped and put to the rack in his presence, in 
 order to compel him to discover those who favored heret 
 ical opinions. In his Utopia he assailed the profession 
 of the law with merciless satire ; yet the satirist himself 
 finally sat upon the chancellor s woolsack ; and, as has 
 been well remarked by Horace Smith, " if, from this ele 
 vated seat, he ever cast his eyes back upon his past life,, he 
 must have smiled at the fond conceit which could imagine 
 a permanent Utopia, when he himself, certainly more 
 
14 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 learned, honest, and conscientious than the mass of men 
 has ever been, could in the course of one short life fall 
 into such glaring and frightful rebellion against his own 
 doctrines." 
 
 Harrington, on the other hand, as became the friend of 
 Milton and Marvell, held fast, through good and evil 
 report, his republican faith. He published his work after 
 the restoration, and defended it boldly and ably from the 
 numerous attacks made upon it. Regarded as too danger 
 ous an enthusiast to be left at liberty, he was imprisoned 
 at the instance of Lord Chancellor Hyde, first in the 
 Tower, and afterwards on the Island of St. Nicholas, 
 where disease and imprudent remedies brought on a par 
 tial derangement, from which he never recovered. 
 
 Bernardin St. Pierre, whose pathetic tale of Paul and 
 Virginia has found admirers in every language of the civil 
 ized world, in a fragment, entitled Arcadia, attempted 
 to depict an ideal republic, without priest, noble, or slave, 
 where all are so religious that each man is the pontiff of 
 his family, where each man is prepared to defend his 
 country, and where all are in such a state of equality that 
 there are no such persons as servants. The plan of it 
 was suggested by his friend Rousseau during their pleasant 
 walking excursions about the environs of Paris, in which 
 the two enthusiastic philosophers, baffled by the evil 
 passions and intractable materials of human nature as 
 
UTOPIAN SCHEMES. 15 
 
 manifested in existing society, comforted themselves by 
 appealing from the actual to the possible, from the real to 
 the imaginary. Under the chestnut trees of the Bois de 
 Boulogne, through long summer days, the two friends, sick 
 of the noisy world about them, yet yearning to become its 
 benefactors, gladly escaping from it, yet busy with 
 schemes for its regeneration and happiness, at once 
 misanthropes and philanthropists, amused and solaced 
 themselves by imagining a perfect and simple state of 
 society, in which the lessons of emulation and selfish am 
 bition were never to be taught ; where, on the contrary, 
 the young were to obey their parents, and to prefer father, 
 mother, brother, sister, wife, and friend to themselves. 
 They drew beautiful pictures of a country blessed with 
 peace, industry, and love, covered with no disgusting 
 monuments of violence, and pride, and luxury, without 
 columns, triumphal arches, hospitals, prisons, or gibbets; 
 but presenting to view bridges over torrents, wells on the 
 arid plain, groves of fruit trees, and houses of shelter for 
 the traveller in desert places, attesting every where the 
 sentiment of humanity. Religion was to speak to all 
 hearts in the eternal language of Nature. Death was no 
 longer to be feareci ; perspectives of holy consolation were 
 to open through the cypress shadows of the tomb ; to live 
 or to die was to be equally an object of desire. 
 
 The plan of the Arcadia of St. Pierre is simply this : 
 
16 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 A learned young Egyptian, educated at Thebes by the 
 priests of Osiris, desirous of benefiting humanity, under 
 takes a voyage to Gaul for the purpose of carrying thither 
 the arts and religion of Egypt. He is shipwrecked on 
 his return in the Gulf of Messina, and lands upon the 
 coast, where he is entertained by an Arcadian, to whom 
 he relates his adventures, and from whom he receives in 
 turn an account of the simple happiness and peace of 
 Arcadia, the virtues and felicity of whose inhabitants are 
 beautifully exemplified in the lives and conversation of 
 the shepherd and his daughter. This pleasant little prose 
 poem closes somewhat abruptly. Although inferior in 
 artistic skill to Paul and Virginia or the Indian Cot 
 tage, there is not a little to admire in the simple beauty 
 of its pastoral descriptions. The closing paragraph re 
 minds one of Bunyan s upper chamber, where the weary 
 pilgrim s windows opened to the sunrising and the singing 
 of birds: 
 
 " Tyrteus conducted his guests to an adjoining chamber. 
 It had a window, shut by a curtain of rushes, through the 
 crevices of which the islands of the Alpheus might be 
 seen in the light of the moon. There were in this cham 
 ber two excellent beds, with coverlets of warm and light 
 wool. 
 
 " Now, as soon as Amasis was left alone with Cephas, 
 he spoke with joy of the delight and tranquillity of the 
 
UTOPIAN SCHEMES. 17 
 
 valley, of the goodness of the shepherd, and of the grace 
 of his young daughter, to whom he had seen none worthy 
 to be compared, and of the pleasure which he promised 
 himself the next day, at the festival on Mount Lyceum, 
 of beholding a whole people as happy as this sequestered 
 family. Converse so delightful might have charmed 
 away the night without the aid of sleep, had they not been 
 invited to repose by the mild light of the moon shining 
 through the window, the murmuring wind in the leaves 
 of the poplars, and the distant noise of the Achelous which 
 falls roaring from the summit of Mount Lyceum." 
 
 The young patrician wits of Athens doubtless laughed 
 over Plato s ideal republic. Campanella s City of the 
 Sun was looked upon, no doubt, as the distempered vision 
 of a crazy state prisoner. Bacon s college, in his New 
 Atlantis, moved the risibles of fat-witted Oxford. More s 
 Utopia, as we know, gave to our language a new word, 
 expressive of the vagaries and dreams of fanatics and 
 lunatics. The merciless wits, clerical and profane, of the 
 Court of Charles II. regarded Harrington s romance as 
 a perfect godsend to their vocation of ridicule. The gay 
 dames and carpet knights of Versailles made themselves 
 merry with the prose pastoral of St. Pierre ; and the poor 
 old enthusiast went down to his grave without finding an 
 auditory for his lectures upon natural society. 
 
 The world had its laugh over these romances. When. 
 
18 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 unable to refute their theories, it could sneer at the authors, 
 and answer them to the satisfaction of the generation in 
 which they lived, at least by a general charge of lunacy. 
 Some of their notions were no doubt as absurd as those of 
 the astronomer in Rasselas, who tells Imlac that he has 
 for five years possessed the regulation of the weather, and 
 has got the secret of making to the different nations an 
 equal and impartial dividend of rain and sunshine. But 
 truth, even when ushered into the world through the 
 medium of a dull romance and in connection with, a vast 
 progeny of errors, however ridiculed and despised at first, 
 never fails in the end of finding a lodging-place in the 
 popular mind. The speculations of the political theorists 
 we have noticed have not all proved to be of 
 
 such stuff 
 
 As dreams are made of, and their little life 
 Rounded with sleep." 
 
 They have entered into and become parts of the social 
 and political fabrics of Europe and America. The proph 
 ecies of imagination have been fulfilled; the dreams of 
 romance have become familiar realities. 
 
 What is the moral suggested by this record ? Is it not 
 that we should look with charity and tolerance upon the 
 schemes and speculations of the political and social theo 
 rists of our day ; that, if unprepared to venture upon new 
 
UTOPIAN SCHEMES. 19 
 
 experiments and radical changes, we should at least con 
 sider that what was folly to our ancestors is our wisdom, 
 and that another generation may successfully put in prac 
 tice the very theories which now seem to us absurd and 
 impossible ? Many of the evils of society have been meas 
 urably removed or ameliorated ; yet now, as in the days 
 of the apostle, " the creation groaneth and travaileth with 
 pain ; " and although quackery and empiricism abound, is 
 it not possible that a proper application of some of the 
 remedies proposed might ameliorate the general suffering ? 
 Rejecting, as we must, whatever is inconsistent with or 
 hostile to the doctrines of Christianity, on which alone 
 rests our hope for humanity, it becomes us to look kindly 
 upon all attempts to apply those doctrines to the details 
 of human life, to the social, political, and industrial rela 
 tions of the race. If it is not permitted us to believe all 
 things, we can at least hope them. Despair is infidelity 
 and death. Temporally and spiritually, the declaration 
 of inspiration holds good " We are saved by hope." 
 
PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHU 
 SETTS. 
 
 BERNARDIN ST. PIERRE, in his Wishes of a Solitary, 
 asks for his country neither wealth, nor military glory, 
 nor magnificent palaces and monuments, nor splendor of 
 court nobility, nor clerical pomp. "Rather," he says, 
 " O France, may no beggar tread thy plains, no sick or 
 suffering man ask in vain for relief ; in all thy hamlets 
 may every young woman find a lover and every lover a 
 true wife ; may the young be trained arightly and guarded 
 from evil; may the old close their days in the tranquil 
 hope of those who love God and their fellow-men." 
 
 We are reminded of the amiable wish of the French 
 essayist a wish even yet very far from realization, we 
 fear, in the empire of Napoleon II. by the perusal of 
 two documents recently submitted to the legislature of 
 the State of Massachusetts. They indicate, in our view, 
 the real glory of a state, and foreshadow the coming of 
 that time when Milton s definition of a true common 
 wealth shall be no longer a prophecy, but the description 
 
 (20) 
 
PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 21 
 
 of an existing fact "a huge Christian personage, a 
 mighty growth and stature of an honest, man, moved by 
 the purpose of a love of God and of mankind." 
 
 Some years ago, the legislature of Massachusetts, at 
 the suggestion of several benevolent gentlemen whose 
 attention had been turned to the subject, appointed a 
 commission to inquire into the condition of the idiots of 
 the commonwealth, to ascertain their numbers, and 
 whether any thing could be done in their behalf. 
 
 The commissioners were Dr. Samuel G. Howe, so well 
 and honorably known for his long and arduous labors in 
 behalf of the blind, Judge Byington, and Dr. Gilman Kim- 
 ball. The burden of the labor fell upon the chairman, 
 who entered upon it with the enthusiasm, perseverance, 
 and practical adaptation of means to ends which have 
 made him so efficient in his varied schemes of benevo 
 lence. On the 26th of the second month, 1848, a full re 
 port of the results of this labor was made to the governor, 
 accompanied by statistical tables and minute details. One 
 hundred towns had been visited by the chairman or his 
 reliable agent, in which Jive hundred and seventy-Jive per 
 sons in a state of idiocy were discovered. These were 
 examined carefully in respect to their physical as well as 
 mental condition, no inquiry being omitted which was 
 calculated to throw light upon the remote or immediate 
 causes of this mournful imperfection in the creation of 
 
22 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 God. The proximate causes Dr. Howe mentions are to be 
 found in the state of the bodily organization, deranged 
 and disproportioned by some violation of natural law on 
 the part of the parents or remoter ancestors of the suffer- 
 ers. Out of 420 cases of idiocy, he had obtained informa 
 tion respecting the condition of the progenitors of 359 ; 
 and in all but four of these cases he found that one or the 
 other, or both, of their immediate progenitors had in some 
 way departed widely from the condition of health : they 
 were scrofulous, or predisposed to affections of the brain, 
 and insanity, or had intermarried with blood relations, or 
 had been intemperate, or guilty of sensual excesses. 
 
 Of the 575 cases, 420 were those of idiocy from birth, 
 and 155 of idiocy afterwards. Of the born idiots, 187 
 were under twenty -five years of age, and all but 13 seemed 
 capable of improvement. Of those above twenty-five 
 years of age, 73 appeared incapable of improvement in 
 their mental condition, being helpless as children at seven 
 years of age ; 43 out of the 420 seemed as helpless as 
 children at two years of age ; 33 were in the condition of 
 mere infants ; and 220 were supported at the public charge 
 in almshouses. A large proportion of them were found to 
 be given over to filthy and loathsome habits, gluttony, and 
 lust, and constantly sinking lower towards the condition 
 of absolute brutishness. 
 
 Those in private houses were found, if possible, in a 
 
PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 23 
 
 still more deplorable state. Their parents were generally 
 poor, feeble in mind and body, and often of very intemper 
 ate habits. Many of them seemed scarcely able to take 
 care of themselves, and totally unfit for the training of 
 ordinary children. It was the blind leading the blind, 
 imbecility teaching imbecility. Some instances of the 
 experiments of parental ignorance upon idiotic offspring, 
 which fell under the observation of Dr. Howe, are related 
 in his report. Idiotic children were found with their 
 heads covered over with cold poultices of oak bark, which 
 the foolish parents supposed would tan the brain and 
 harden it as the tanner does his ox hides, and so make it 
 capable of retaining impressions and remembering lessons. 
 In other cases, finding that the child could not be made to 
 comprehend any thing, the sagacious heads of the house 
 hold, on the supposition that its brain was too hard, tor 
 tured it with hot poultices of bread and milk to soften it. 
 Others plastered over their children s heads with tar. 
 Some administered strong doses of mercury, to " solder up 
 the openings " in the head and make it tight and strong. 
 Others encouraged the savage gluttony of their children, 
 stimulating their unnatural and bestial appetites, on the 
 ground that " the poor creatures had nothing else to enjoy 
 but their food, and they should have enough of that ! " 
 
 In consequence of this report, the legislature, in the 
 spring of 1848, made an annual appropriation of twenty- 
 
24 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 five hundred dollars, for three years, for the purpose of 
 training and teaching ten idiot children, to be selected by 
 the governor and council. The trustees of the Asylum for 
 the Blind, under the charge of Dr. Howe, made arrange 
 ments for receiving these pupils. The school was opened 
 in the autumn of 1848 ; and its first annual report, ad 
 dressed to the governor and printed by order of the senate, 
 is now before us. 
 
 Of the ten pupils, it appears that not one had the usual 
 command of muscular motion the languid body obeyed 
 not the service of the imbecile will. Some could walk 
 and use their limbs and hands in simple motions ; others 
 could only make slight use of their muscles ; and two were 
 without any power of locomotion. 
 
 One of these last, a boy six years of age, who had been 
 stupefied on the day of his birth by the application of hot 
 rum to his head, could scarcely see or notice objects, and 
 was almost destitute of the sense of touch. He could 
 neither stand nor sit upright, nor even creep, but would 
 lie on the floor in whatever position he was placed. He 
 could not feed himself nor chew solid food, and had no 
 more sense of decency than an infant. His intellect was 
 a blank ; he had no knowledge, no desires, no affections. 
 A more hopeless object for experiment could scarcely 
 have been selected. 
 
 A year of patient endeavor has nevertheless wrought a 
 
PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 25 
 
 wonderful change in the condition of this miserable being. 
 Cold bathing, rubbing of the limbs, exercise of the muscles, 
 exposure to the air, and other appliances have enabled 
 him to stand upright, to sit at table and feed himself, and 
 chew his food, and to walk about with slight assistance. 
 His habits are no longer those of a brute ; he observes 
 decency ; his eye is brighter ; his cheeks glow with health ; 
 his countenance is more expressive of thought. He has 
 learned many words, and constructs simple sentences; 
 his affections begin to develop ; and there is every pros 
 pect that he will be so far renovated as to be able to 
 provide for himself in manhood. 
 
 In the case of another boy, aged twelve years, the im 
 provement has been equally remarkable. The gentleman 
 who first called attention to him, in a recent note to Dr. 
 Howe, published in the report, thus speaks of his present 
 condition : " When I remember his former wild and 
 almost frantic demeanor when approached by any one, 
 and the apparent impossibility of communicating with him, 
 and now see him standing in his class, playing with his 
 fellows, and willingly and familiarly approaching me, 
 examining what I gave him, and when I see him already 
 selecting articles named by his teacher, and even cor 
 rectly pronouncing words printed on cards, improvement 
 does not convey the idea presented to my mind ; it is 
 creation; it is making him anew." 
 
26 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 All the pupils have more or less advanced. Their 
 health and habits have improved ; and there is no reason 
 to doubt that the experiment, at the close of its three years, 
 will be found to have been quite as successful as its most 
 sanguine projectors could have anticipated. Dr. Howe 
 has been ably seconded by an accomplished teacher, 
 James B. Richards, who has devoted his whole time to 
 the pupils. Of the nature and magnitude of their task, 
 an idea may be formed only by considering the utter list- 
 lessness of idiocy, the incapability of the poor pupil to 
 fix his attention upon any thing, and his general want of 
 susceptibility to impressions. All his senses are dulled 
 and perverted. Touch, hearing, sight, smell are all more 
 or less defective. His gluttony is unaccompanied with 
 the gratification of taste the most savory viands and the 
 offal which he shares with the pigs equally satisfy him. 
 His mental state is still worse than his physical. Thought 
 is painful and irksome to him. His teacher can only 
 engage his attention by strenuous efforts, loud, earnest 
 tones, gesticulations and signs, and a constant presenta 
 tion of some visible object of bright color and striking 
 form. The eye wanders, and the spark of consciousness 
 and intelligence which has been fanned into momentary 
 brightness darkens at the slightest relaxation of the 
 teacher s exertions. The names of objects presented to 
 him must sometimes be repeated hundreds of times before 
 
PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 27 
 
 he can learn them. Yet the patience and enthusiasm of 
 the teacher are rewarded by a progress, slow and unequal, 
 but still marked and manifest. Step by step, often com 
 pelled to turn back and go over the inch of ground he 
 had gained, the idiot is still creeping forward ; and by 
 almost imperceptible degrees his sick, cramped, and pris 
 oned spirit casts off the burden of its body of death, 
 breath as from the Almighty is breathed into him, and 
 he becomes a living soul. 
 
 After the senses of the idiot are trained to take note 
 of their appropriate objects, the various perceptive facul 
 ties are next to be exercised. The greatest possible 
 number of facts are to be gathered up through the 
 medium of these faculties into the storehouse of memory, 
 from whence eventually the higher faculties of mind may 
 draw the material of general ideas. It has been found 
 difficult, if not impossible, to teach the idiot to read by 
 the letters first, as in the ordinary method ; but while the 
 varied powers of the three letters, h, a, , could not be 
 understood by him, he could be made to comprehend 
 the complex sign of the word hat, made by uniting the 
 three. 
 
 The moral nature of the idiot needs training and de 
 velopment as well as his physical and mental. All that 
 can be said of him is, that he has the latent capacity for 
 moral development and culture. Uninstructed and left 
 
28 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 to himself, he has no ideas of regulated appetites and pro 
 pensities, of decency and delicacy of affection and social 
 relations. The germs of these ideas, which constitute the 
 glory and beauty of humanity, undoubtedly exist in him ; 
 but there can be no growth without patient and perse 
 vering culture. Where this is afforded, to use the lan 
 guage of the report, " the idiot may learn what love is, 
 though he may not know the word which expresses it ; he 
 may feel kindly affections while unable to understand the 
 simplest virtuous principle ; and he may begin to live ac 
 ceptably to God before he has learned the name by which 
 men call him." 
 
 In the facts and statistics presented in the report, light 
 is shed upon some of the dark pages of God s providence, 
 and it is seen that the suffering and shame of idiocy are 
 the result of sin, of a violation of the merciful laws of 
 God and of the harmonies of His benign order. The 
 penalties which are ordained for the violators of natural 
 laws are inexorable and certain. For the transgressor 
 of the laws of life there is, as in the case of Esau, " no 
 place for repentance, though he seek it earnestly and 
 with tears." The curse cleaves to him and his children. 
 In this view, how important becomes the subject of the 
 hereditary transmission of moral and physical disease and 
 debility ! and how necessary it is that there should be a 
 clearer understanding of, and a willing obedience, at any 
 
PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 29 
 
 cost, to, the eternal law which makes the parent the bless 
 ing or the curse of the child, giving strength and beauty, 
 and the capacity to know and do the will of God, or be 
 queathing loathsomeness, deformity, and animal appetite, 
 incapable of the restraints of the moral faculties ! Even 
 if the labors of Dr. Howe and his benevolent associates do 
 not materially lessen the amount of present actual evil 
 and suffering in this respect, they will not be put forth in 
 vain if they have the effect of calling public attention to 
 the great laws of our being, the violation of which has 
 made this goodly earth a vast lazar house of pain and 
 sorrow. 
 
 The late annual message of the governor of Massachu 
 setts invites our attention to a kindred institution of chari 
 ty. The chief magistrate congratulates the legislature, in 
 language creditable to his mind and heart, on the opening 
 of the Reform School for Juvenile Criminals, established 
 by an act of a previous legislature. The act provides 
 that, when any boy under sixteen years of age shall be 
 convicted of crime punishable by imprisonment other 
 than such an offence as is punished by imprisonment for 
 life, he may be, at the discretion of the court or justice, 
 sent to the State Reform School, or sentenced to such im 
 prisonment as the law now provides for his offence. The 
 school is placed under the care of trustees, who may either 
 refuse to receive a boy thus sent there, or, after he has 
 
30 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 been received, for reasons set forth in the act, may order 
 him to be committed to prison under the previous penal 
 law of the state. They are also authorized to apprentice 
 the boys, at their discretion, to inhabitants of the common 
 wealth. And whenever any boy shall be discharged, 
 either as reformed or as having reached the age of 
 twenty-one years, his discharge is a full release from his 
 sentence. 
 
 It is made the duty of the trustees to cause the boys to 
 be instructed in piety and morality, and in branches of 
 useful knowledge, in some regular course of labor, me 
 chanical, agricultural, or horticultural, and such other 
 trades and arts as may be best adapted to secure the 
 amendment, reformation, and future benefit of the boys. 
 
 The class of offenders for whom this act provides are 
 generally the offspring of parents depraved by crime or 
 suffering from poverty and want, the victims often of 
 circumstances of evil which almost constitute a necessity, 
 issuing from homes polluted and miserable, from the sight 
 and hearing of loathsome impurities and hideous discords, 
 to avenge upon society the ignorance, and destitution, and 
 neglect with which it is too often justly chargeable. In 
 1846 three hundred of these youthful violators of law 
 were sentenced to jails and other places of punishment in 
 Massachusetts, where they incurred the fearful liability 
 of being still more thoroughly corrupted by contact with 
 
PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 31 
 
 older criminals, familiar with atrocity, and rolling their 
 loathsome vices "as a sweet morsel under the tongue." 
 In view of this state of things the Reform School has 
 been established, twenty-two thousand dollars having been 
 contributed to the state for that purpose by an unknown 
 benefactor of his race. The school is located in "West- 
 boro , on a fine farm of two hundred acres. The 
 buildings are in the form of a square, with a court in the 
 centre, three stories in front, with wings. They are con 
 structed with a good degree of architectural taste, and 
 their site is happily chosen a gentle eminence, overlook 
 ing one of the loveliest of the small lakes which form a 
 pleasing feature in New England scenery. From this 
 place the atmosphere and associations of the prison are 
 excluded. The discipline is strict, as a matter of course ; 
 but it is that of a well-regulated home or school room 
 order, neatness, and harmony within doors ; and without, 
 the beautiful sights, and sounds, and healthful influences of 
 Nature. One would almost suppose that the poetical 
 dream of Coleridge, in his tragedy of Remorse, had found 
 its realization in the "Westboro School, and that, weary 
 of the hopelessness and cruelty of the old penal system, 
 our legislators had imbodied in their statutes the idea 
 of the poet : 
 
 " With other ministrations thou, Nature, 
 Healest thy wandering and distempered child : 
 
32 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Thou pourest on him thy soft influences, 
 
 Thy sunny hues, fair forms, and breathing sweets, 
 
 Thy melodies of woods, and winds, and waters, 
 
 Till he relent, and can no more endure 
 
 To be a jarring and a dissonant thing 
 
 Amidst this general dance and minstrelsy." 
 
 Thus it is that the Christian idea of reformation, rather 
 than revenge, is slowly but surely incorporating itself in 
 our statute books. "We have only to look back but a 
 single century to be able to appreciate the immense gain 
 for humanity in the treatment of criminals which has 
 been secured in that space of time. Then the use of 
 torture was common throughout Europe. Inability to 
 comprehend and believe certain religious dogmas was a 
 crime to be expiated by death, or confiscation of estate, or 
 lingering imprisonment. Petty offences against property 
 furnished subjects for the hangman. The stocks and the 
 whipping post stood by the side of the meeting house. 
 Tongues were bored with redhot irons and ears shorn 
 off. The jails were loathsome dungeons, swarming with 
 vermin, unventilated, unwarmed. A century and a half 
 ago the populace of Massachusetts were convulsed with 
 grim merriment at the writhings of a miserable woman 
 scourged at the cart tail or strangling in the ducking 
 stool ; crowds hastened to enjoy the spectacle of an old 
 man enduring the unutterable torment of the peine forte 
 
PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 33 
 
 et dure pressed slowly to death under planks for 
 refusing to plead to an indictment for witchcraft. What 
 a change from all this to the opening of the State Reform 
 School, to the humane regulations of prisons and peniten 
 tiaries, to keeneyed benevolence watching over the ad 
 ministration of justice, which, in securing society from 
 lawless aggression, is not suffered to overlook the true 
 interest and reformation of the criminal, nor to forget that 
 the magistrate, in the words of the apostle, is to be indeed 
 " the minister of God to man for good " ! 
 
THOMAS CARLYLE ON THE SLAVE 
 QUESTION. 
 
 A LATE number of Eraser s Magazine contains an ar 
 ticle bearing the unmistakable impress of the Anglo- 
 German peculiarities of Thomas Carlyle, entitled "An 
 Occasional Discourse on the Negro Question," which 
 would be interesting as a literary curiosity were it not 
 in spirit and tendency so unspeakably wicked as to excite 
 in every rightminded reader a feeling of amazement and 
 disgust. With a hard, brutal audacity, a blasphemous 
 irreverence^ and a sneering mockery which would do 
 honor to the devil of Faust, it takes issue with the moral 
 sense of mankind and the precepts of Christianity. Hav 
 ing ascertained that the exports of sugar and spices from 
 the West Indies have diminished since emancipation, 
 and that the negroes, having worked, as they believed, 
 quite long enough without wages, now refuse to work for 
 the planters without higher pay than the latter, with the 
 thriftless and evil habits of slavery still clinging to them, 
 can afford to give, the author considers himself justi- 
 
 (34) 
 
THOMAS CARLYLE OX THE SLAVE QUESTION. 35 
 
 fied in denouncing negro emancipation as one of the 
 " shams " which he was specially sent into this world to 
 belabor. Had he confined himself to simple abuse and 
 caricature of the self-denying and Christian abolitionists 
 of England " the broad-brimmed philanthropists of 
 Exeter Hall" there would have been small occasion 
 for noticing his splenetic and discreditable production. 
 Doubtless there is a cant of philanthropy the alloy 
 of human frailty and folly in the most righteous re 
 forms, which is a fair subject for the indignant sarcasm 
 of a professed hater of shows and falsities. Whatever is 
 hollow and hypocritical in politics, morals, or religion 
 comes very properly within the scope of his mockery, and 
 we bid him God speed in applying his satirical lash 
 upon it. Impostures and frauds of all kinds deserve 
 nothing better than detection and exposure. Let him 
 blow them up to his heart s content, as Daniel did the 
 image of Bell and the Dragon. 
 
 But our author, in this matter of negro slavery, has 
 undertaken to apply his explosive pitch and rosin, not to 
 the affectation of humanity, but to humanity itself. He 
 mocks at pity, scoffs at all who seek to lessen the amount 
 of pain and suffering, sneers at and denies the most sacred 
 rights, and mercilessly consigns an entire class of the 
 children of his heavenly Father to the doom of compul 
 sory servitude. He vituperates the poor black man with 
 
36 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 a coarse brutality which would do credit to a Mississippi 
 slave driver, or a renegade Yankee dealer in human 
 cattle on the banks of the Potomac. His rhetoric has 
 a flavor of the slave pen and auction block vulgar, 
 unmanly, indecent a scandalous outrage upon good 
 taste and refined feeling which at once degrades the 
 author and insults his readers. 
 
 He assumes (for he is one of those sublimated philoso 
 phers who reject the Baconian system of induction and 
 depend upon intuition without recourse to facts and fig 
 ures) that the emancipated class in the West India islands 
 are universally idle, improvident, and unfit for freedom ; 
 that God created them to be the servants and slaves of 
 their " born lords," the white men, and designed them to 
 grow sugar, coffee, and spices for their masters, instead 
 of raising pumpkins and yams for themselves ; and that, 
 if they will not do this, " the beneficent whip " should be 
 again employed to compel them. He adopts, in speaking 
 of the black class, the lowest slang of vulgar prejudice. 
 " Black Quashee," sneers the gentlemanly philosopher, 
 " black Quashee, if he will not help in bringing out the 
 spices, will get himself made a slave again, (which state 
 will be a little less ugly than his present one,) and with 
 beneficent whip, since other methods avail not, will be 
 compelled to work." 
 
 It is difficult to treat sentiments so atrocious and 
 
THOMAS CARLYLE OX THE SLAVE QUESTION. 37 
 
 couched in such offensive language with any thing like 
 respect. Common sense and unperverted conscience re 
 volt instinctively against them. The doctrine they incul 
 cate is that which underlies all tyranny and wrong of 
 man towards man. It is that under which " the creation 
 groaneth and travaileth unto this day." It is as old as 
 Bin ; the perpetual argument of strength against weak 
 ness, of power against right ; that of the Greek philoso 
 pher, that the barbarians, being of an inferior race, were 
 born to be slaves to the Greeks ; and of the infidel 
 Hobbes, that every man, being by nature at war with 
 every other man, has a perpetual right to reduce him to 
 servitude if he has the power. It is the cardinal doctrine 
 of what John Quincy Adams has very properly styled 
 " the Satanic school of philosophy " the ethics of an 
 old Norse sea robber or an Arab plunderer of caravans. 
 It is as widely removed from the " sweet humanities " and 
 unselfish benevolence of Christianity as the faith and 
 practice of the East India Thug or the New Zealand 
 cannibal. 
 
 Our author does not, however, take us altogether by 
 surprise. He has before given no uncertain intimations 
 of the point towards which his philosophy was tending. 
 In his brilliant essay upon Francia of Paraguay, for in 
 stance, we find him entering with manifest satisfaction 
 and admiration into the details of his hero s tyranny. In 
 
REQREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 his Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell in half 
 a dozen pages of savage and almost diabolical sarcasm 
 directed against the growing humanity of the age, the 
 "rose-pink sentimentalisms," and squeamishness which 
 shudders at the sight of blood and infliction of pain he 
 prepares the way for a justification of the massacre of 
 Drogheda. More recently he has intimated that the ex 
 termination of the Celtic race is the best way of settling 
 the Irish question ; and that the enslavement and forcible 
 transportation of her poor, to labor under armed task 
 masters in the colonies, is the only rightful and proper 
 remedy for the political and social evils of England. In 
 the Discourse on Negro Slavery we see this devilish 
 philosophy in full bloom. The gods, he tells us, are with 
 the strong. Might has a divine right to rule blessed 
 are the crafty of brain and strong of hand ! Weakness 
 is crime. " VCB victis ! " as Brennus said when he threw 
 his sword into the scale Woe to the conquered! The 
 negro is weaker in intellect than his "born lord," the 
 white man, and has no right to choose his own vocation. 
 Let the latter do it for him, and, if need be, return to the 
 " beneficent whip." " On the side of the oppressor there 
 is power ; " let him use it without mercy, and hold flesh 
 and blood to the grindstone with unrelenting rigor. Hu 
 manity is squeamishness ; pity for the suffering, mere 
 " rose-pink sentimentalism," maudlin and unmanly. The 
 
THOMAS CARLYLE OX THE SLAVE QUESTION. 39 
 
 gods (the old Norse gods doubtless) laugh to scorn alike 
 the complaints of the miserable, and the weak compas 
 sions and " philanthropisms " of those who would relieve 
 them. This is the substance of Thomas Carlyle s advice ; 
 this is the matured fruit of his philosophic husbandry 
 the grand result for which he has been all his life sound 
 ing " unfathomable abysses " or beating about in the thin 
 air of Transcendentalism. Such is the .substitute which 
 he offers us for the Sermon on the Mount. 
 
 He tells us that the blacks have no right to use the 
 islands of the West Indies for growing pumpkins and 
 garden stuffs for their own use and behoof, because, but 
 for the wisdom and skill of the whites, these islands 
 would have been productive only of "jungle, savagery, 
 and swamp malaria." The negro alone could never have 
 improved the islands or civilized himself ; and therefore 
 their and his " born lord," the white man, has a right 
 to the benefits of his own betterments of land and " two- 
 legged cattle " ! " Black Quashee " has no right to dis 
 pose of himself and his labor, because he owes his partial 
 civilization to others ! And pray how has it been with 
 the white race, for whom our philosopher claims the di 
 vine prerogative of enslaving ? Some twenty and odd 
 centuries ago, a pair of half-naked savages, daubed with 
 paint, might have been seen roaming among the hills and 
 woods of the northern part of the British island, subsist- 
 
40 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 ing on acorns and the flesh of wild animals, with an 
 occasional relish of the smoked hams and pickled fingers 
 of some unfortunate stranger caught on the wrong side 
 of the Tweed. This interesting couple reared, as they 
 best could, a family of children, who, in turn, became the 
 heads of families ; and some time about the beginning 
 of the present century one of their descendants in the 
 borough of Ecclefechan rejoiced over the birth of a man 
 child now somewhat famous as " Thomas Carlyle, a maker 
 of books." Does it become such a one to rave against the 
 West India negro s incapacity for self-civilization ? Un 
 aided by the arts, sciences, and refinements of the Ro 
 mans, he might have been, at this very day, squatted on 
 his naked haunches in the woods of Ecclefechan, painting 
 his weather-hardened epidermis in the sun like his Pict 
 ancestors. Where, in fact, can we look for unaided self- 
 improvement and spontaneous internal development, to 
 any considerable extent, on the part of any nation or 
 people ? From people to people the original God-given 
 impulse towards civilization and perfection has been 
 transmitted, as from Egypt to Greece, and thence to the 
 Roman world. 
 
 But the blacks, we are told, are indolent and insensible 
 to the duty of raising sugar and coffee and spice for the 
 whites, being mainly careful to provide for their own 
 household and till their own gardens for domestic com- 
 
THOMAS CARLYLE ON THE SLAVE QUESTION. 41 
 
 forts and necessaries. The exports have fallen off some 
 what. And what does this prove ? Only that the negro is 
 now a consumer of products, of which, under the rule of the 
 whip, he was a producer merely. As to indolence, under 
 the proper stimulus of fair wages we have reason to be 
 lieve that the charge is not sustained. If unthrifty habits 
 and lack of prudence on the pa^rt of the owners of estates, 
 combined with the repeal of duties on foreign sugars by 
 the British government, have placed it out of their power 
 to pay just and reasonable wages for labor, who can 
 blame the blacks if they prefer to cultivate their own 
 garden plots rather than raise sugar and spice for their 
 late masters upon terms little better than those of their 
 old condition, the " beneficent whip " always excepted ? 
 The despatches of the colonial governors agree in admit 
 ting that the blacks have had great cause for complaint 
 and dissatisfaction, owing to the delay or non-payment 
 of their wages. Sir C. E. Gray, writing from Jamaica, 
 says that " in a good many instances the payment of the 
 wages they have earned has been either very irregularly 
 made or not at all, probably on account of the inability 
 of the employers." He says, moreover, 
 
 " The negroes appear to me to be generally as free 
 from rebellious tendencies or turbulent feelings and ma 
 licious thoughts as any race of laborers I ever saw or 
 heard of. My impression is, indeed, that under a system 
 
42 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of perfectly fair dealing and of real justice they will come 
 to be an admirable peasantry and yeomanry ; ablebodied, 
 industrious, and hard working, frank, and well disposed." 
 It must indeed be admitted that, judging by their 
 diminished exports and the growing complaints of the 
 owners of estates, that the condition of the islands, in a 
 financial point of view, is by no means favorable. An 
 immediate cause of this, however, must be found in the 
 unfortunate sugar act of 1846. The more remote, but for 
 the most part powerful, cause of the present depression is 
 to be traced to the vicious and unnatural system of slavery, 
 which has been gradually but surely preparing the way 
 for ruin, bankruptcy, and demoralization. Never yet, by 
 a community or an individual, have the righteous laws of 
 God been violated with impunity. Sooner or later comes 
 the penalty which the infinite Justice has affixed to sin. 
 Partial and temporary evils and inconveniences have un 
 doubtedly resulted from the emancipation of the laborers ; 
 and many years must elapse before the relations of the 
 two heretofore antagonistic classes can be perfectly ad 
 justed and their interests brought into entire harmony. 
 But that freedom is not to be held mainly accountable for 
 the depression of the British colonies, is obvious from the 
 fact that Dutch Surinam, where the old system of slavery 
 remains in its original rigor, is in an equally depressed 
 condition. The Paramaribo Neuws en Advertentie Blad, 
 
THOMAS CARLYLE OX THE SLAVE QUESTION. 43 
 
 quoted in the Jamaica Gazette, says, under date of Jan 
 uary 2, 1850, "Around us we hear nothing but com 
 plaints. People seek and find matter in every thing to 
 picture to themselves the lot of the place in which they 
 live as bitterer than that of any other country. Of a 
 large number of flourishing plantations, few remain that 
 can now be called such. So deteriorated has property 
 become within the last few years, that many of these 
 estates have not been able to defray their weekly ex 
 penses. The colony stands on the brink of a yawning 
 abyss, into which it must inevitably plunge unless some 
 new and better system is speedily adopted. It is impossi 
 ble that our agriculture can any longer proceed on its old 
 footing ; our laboring force is dying away, and the social 
 position they held must undergo a revolution." 
 
 The paper from which we have quoted, the official 
 journal of the colony, thinks the condition of the emanci 
 pated British colonies decidedly preferable to that of 
 Surinam, where the old slave system has continued in 
 force, and insists that the Dutch government must follow 
 the example of Great Britain. The actual condition of 
 the British colonies since emancipation is perfectly well 
 known in Surinam : three of them, Essequibo, Demerara, 
 and Berbice, being its immediate neighbors, whatever evils 
 and inconveniences have resulted from emancipation must 
 be well understood by the Dutch slaveholders ; yet we 
 
44 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 find them looking towards emancipation as the only pros 
 pect of remedy for the greater evils of their own system. 
 This fact is of itself a sufficient answer to the assumption 
 of Carlyle and others, that what they call " the ruin of the 
 colonies " has been produced by the emancipation acts of 
 1833 and 1838. 
 
 We have no fears whatever of the effect of this literary 
 monstrosity which we have been considering upon the 
 British colonies. Quashee, black and ignorant as he may 
 be, will not " get himself made a slave again." The mis 
 sion of the "beneficent whip" is there pretty well over; 
 and it may now find its place in museums and cabinets of 
 ghastly curiosities, with the racks, pillories, thumbscrews, 
 and branding irons of old days. What we have feared, 
 however, is, that the advocates and defenders of slave- 
 holding in this country might find in this Discourse matter 
 of encouragement, and that our anti-Christian prejudices 
 against the colored man might be strengthened and con 
 firmed by its malignant vituperation and sarcasm. On 
 this point we have sympathized with the forebodings of an 
 eloquent writer in the London Enquirer : 
 
 " We cannot imagine a more deadly moral poison for 
 the American people than his last composition. Every 
 cruel practice of social exclusion will derive from it new 
 sharpness and venom. The slaveholder, of course, will 
 exult to find himself, not apologized for, but enthusiast!- 
 
THOMAS CAKLYLE ON THE SLAVE QUESTION. 45 
 
 cally cheered, upheld, and glorified, by a writer of Eu 
 ropean celebrity. But it is not merely the slave who will 
 feel Mr. Carlyle s hand in the torture of his flesh, the riv 
 eting of his fetters, and the denial of light to his mind. 
 The free black will feel him too in the more contemptuous 
 and abhorrent scowl of his brother man, who will easily 
 derive from this unfortunate essay the belief that his in 
 human feelings are of divine ordination. It is a true work 
 of the devil, the fostering of a tyrannical prejudice. Far 
 and wide over space, and long into the future, the winged 
 words of evil counsel will go. In the market-place, in the 
 house, in the theatre, and in the church by land and by 
 sea, in all the haunts of men their influence will be 
 felt in a perennial growth of hate and scorn, and suffering 
 and resentment. Amongst the sufferers will be many to 
 whom education has given every refined susceptibility that 
 makes contempt and exclusion bitter. Men and women, 
 faithful and diligent, loving and worthy to be loved, and 
 bearing, it may be, no more than an almost imperceptible 
 trace of African descent, will continue yet longer to be 
 banished from the social meal of the white man, and to be 
 spurned from his presence in the house of God, because a 
 writer of genius has lent the weight of his authority and 
 his fame, if not of his power, to the perpetuation of a pre 
 judice which Christianity was undermining." 
 A more recent production, Latter Day Pamphlets, in 
 
46 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 which man s capability of self-government is more than 
 doubted, democracy somewhat contemptuously sneered at, 
 and the "model republic" itself stigmatized as a "nation 
 of bores," may have a salutary effect in restraining our 
 admiration and in lessening our respect for the defender 
 and eulogist of slavery. The sweeping impartiality with 
 which in this latter production he applies the principle of 
 our " peculiar institution " to the laboring poor man, irre 
 spective of color, recognizing as his only inalienable right 
 " the right of being set to labor " for his " born lords," 
 will, we imagine, go far to neutralize the mischief of his 
 Discourse upon Negro Slavery. It is a sad thing to find 
 so much intellectual power as Carlyle really possesses so 
 little under the control of the moral sentiments. In some 
 of his earlier writings as, for instance, his beautiful 
 tribute to the Corn Law rhymer we thought we saw 
 evidence of a warm and generous sympathy with the poor 
 and the wronged, a desire to ameliorate human suffering, 
 which would have done credit to the " philanthropisms of 
 Exeter Hall " and the " Abolition of Pain Society." Lat 
 terly, however, like Moliere s quack, he has " changed all 
 that ; " his heart has got upon the wrong side ; or rather, 
 he seems to us very much in the condition of the coal 
 burner in the German tale who had swapped his heart of 
 flesh for a cobble stone. 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART.* 
 
 IN accordance with the labor-saving spirit of the age, 
 we have in these volumes an admirable example of his 
 tory made easy. Had .they been published in his time, 
 they might have found favor in the eyes of the poet Gray, 
 who declared that his ideal of happiness was "to lie on a 
 sofa and read eternal new romances." 
 
 The style is that which lends such a charm to the 
 author s essays brilliant, epigrammatic, vigorous. In 
 deed, herein lies the fault of the work, when viewed as a 
 mere detail of historical facts. Its sparkling rhetoric is 
 not the safest medium of truth to the simple-minded in 
 quirer. A discriminating and able critic has done the 
 author no injustice in saying that, in attempting to give 
 effect and vividness to his thoughts and diction, he is often 
 overstrained and extravagant, and that his epigrammatic 
 style seems better fitted for the glitter of paradox than the 
 
 * History of England from the accession of James II. By T. B- 
 Macaulay. Vols. I. and II. 
 
 (47) 
 
48 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 sober guise of truth. The intelligent and well-informed 
 reader of the volume before us will find himself at times 
 compelled to reverse the decisions of the author, and 
 deliver some unfortunate personage, sect, or class from 
 the pillory of his rhetoric and the merciless pelting of his 
 ridicule. There is a want of the repose and quiet which 
 we look for in a narrative of events long passed away : 
 we rise from the perusal of the book pleased and excited, 
 but with not so clear a conception of the actual realities 
 of which it treats as would be desirable. We cannot help 
 feeling that the author has been somewhat over-scrupu 
 lous in avoiding the dulness of plain detail, and the dry- 
 ness of dates, names, and statistics. The freedom, flowing 
 diction, and sweeping generality of the reviewer and 
 essayist are maintained throughout; and, with one re 
 markable exception, the History of England might be 
 divided into papers of magazine length, and published, 
 without any violence to propriety, as a continuation of 
 the author s labors in that department of literature in 
 which he confessedly stands without a rival historical 
 review. 
 
 That exception is, however, no unimportant one. In 
 our view, it is the crowning excellence of the first volume 
 its distinctive feature and principal attraction. We 
 refer to the third chapter of the volume, from pp. 260 to 
 398 the description of the condition of England at the 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. 49 
 
 period of the accession of James II. We know of nothing 
 like it in the entire range of historical literature. The 
 veil is lifted up from the England of a century and a half 
 ago; its geographical, industrial, social, and moral con 
 dition is revealed ; and, as the panorama passes before us 
 of lonely heaths, fortified farm houses, bands of robbers, 
 rude country squires doling out the odds and ends of their 
 coarse fare to clerical dependants, rough roads, servicea 
 ble only for horseback travelling, towns with unlighted 
 streets, reeking with filth and offal, and prisons damp y 
 loathsome, infected with disease, and swarming with ver 
 min, we are filled with wonder at the contrast which it 
 presents to the England of our day. We no longer sigh 
 for " the good old days." The most confirmed grumbler 
 is compelled to admit that, bad as things now are, they 
 were far worse a few generations back. Macaulay, in 
 this elaborate and carefully-prepared chapter, has done a 
 good service to humanity, in disabusing well-intentioned 
 ignorance of the melancholy notion that the world is 
 growing worse, and in putting to silence the cant of blind, 
 unreasoning conservatism. 
 
 In 1685 the entire population of England our author 
 estimates at from five millions to five millions five hundred 
 thousand. Of the eight hundred thousand families at that 
 period, one half had animal food twice a week. The other 
 half ate it not at all, or at most not oftener than once a 
 4 
 
50 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 week. "VVheaten loaves were only seen at the tables of 
 the comparatively wealthy. Rye, barley, and oats were 
 the food of the vast majority. The average wages of 
 working men was at least one half less than is paid in 
 England for the same service at the present day. One 
 fifth of the people were paupers, or recipients of parish 
 relief. Clothing and bedding were scarce and dear. 
 Education was almost unknown to the vast majority. The 
 houses and shops were not numbered in the cities ; for 
 porters, coachmen, and errand runners could not read. 
 The shopkeeper distinguished his place of business by 
 painted signs and graven images. Oxford and Cambridge 
 Universities were little better than a modern grammar and 
 Latin school in a provincial village. The country magis 
 trate used on the bench language too coarse, brutal, and 
 vulgar for a modern tap room. Fine gentlemen in London 
 vied with each other in the lowest ribaldry and the grossest 
 profanity. The poets of the time, from Dryden to Dur- 
 fey, ministered to the popular licentiousness. The most 
 shameless indecency polluted their pages. The theatre 
 and the brothel were in strict unison. The church winked 
 at the vice which Opposed itself to the austere morality or 
 hypocrisy of Puritanism. The superior clergy, with a 
 few noble exceptions, were self-seekers and courtiers ; the 
 inferior were idle, ignorant hangers-on upon blaspheming 
 squires and knights of the shire. The domestic chaplain, 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. 51 
 
 of all men living, held the most unenviable position. " If 
 he was permitted to dine with the family, he was ex 
 pected to content himself with the plainest fare. He 
 might fill himself with the corn beef and carrots ; but 
 as soon as the tarts and cheese cakes made their appear 
 ance he quitted his seat, and stood aloof till he was sum 
 moned to return thanks for the repast, from a great part 
 of which he had been excluded." 
 
 Beyond the Trent the country seems at this period to 
 have been ju a state of barbarism. The parishes kept 
 bloodhounds for the purpose of hunting freebooters. The 
 farm houses were fortified and guarded. So dangerous 
 was the country that persons about travelling thither 
 made their wills. Judges and lawyers only ventured 
 therein, escorted by a strong guard of armed men. 
 
 The term of human life throughout the kingdom was 
 much shorter than it is at the present time. The year 
 1685 was not a sickly year; yet one in twenty-three 
 of the entire population of London died. The present 
 annual mortality of London is only one in forty. Filth 
 was allowed to accumulate in the streets of the capital 
 to a degree which would be intolerable to modern sensi 
 tiveness. The dwelh ngs of the peasantry were loathsome 
 as sties. Personal cleanliness was little attended to. 
 Foul infectious diseases, now almost unknown, were com 
 mon. Fleas and other detestable vermin abounded. The 
 
52 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 sense of misery was stupefied by enormous draughts of 
 beer, almost the only article of consumption which was 
 cheaper than at present. 
 
 Sectarian bigotry and persecution, for opinions on mat 
 ters about which often neither persecutor nor persecuted 
 could be certain, added to the evils of the times. Neigh 
 bor acted as spy upon neighbor ; swearing and drunken 
 Cavaliers avenged the persecution and plunder of their 
 fathers in Cromwell s time by packing the jails with the 
 inheritors of the faith and names of the old Puritan zeal 
 ots. When the corpse of some Independent preacher 
 or Anabaptist interpreter of prophecies was brought out 
 from the jail where heresy expiated its offences, the rabble 
 followed it with scoffing and derision, encouraged thereto 
 by magistrates and clergy. The temper of the time 
 was hard and cruel. Macaulay has two or three pages 
 crowded with terrible facts touching this point. The 
 gospel of humanity seems neither to have been preached 
 nor felt. 
 
 The natural resources of the island were undeveloped. 
 The tin mines of Cornwall, which two thousand years 
 before attracted the ships of the merchant princes of 
 Tyre beyond the Pillars of Hercules, were indeed worked 
 to a considerable extent; but the copper mines, which 
 now yield annually fifteen thousand tons, were entirely 
 neglected. Rock salt was known to exist, but was not 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. 53 
 
 used to any considerable extent j und only a partial supply 
 of salt by evaporation was obtained. The coal and iron 
 of England are at this time the stable foundations of her 
 industrial and commercial greatness. But in 1685 the 
 great part of the iron used was imported. Only about 
 ten thousand tons were annually cast. Now eight hun 
 dred thousand is the average annual production. Equally 
 great has been the increase in coal mining. " Coal," says 
 Macaulay, " though very little used in any species of 
 manufacture, was already the ordinary fuel in some dis 
 tricts which were fortunate enough to possess large beds, 
 and in the capital, which could easily be supplied by water 
 carriage. It seems reasonable to believe that at least 
 one half of the quantity then extracted from the pits was 
 consumed in London. The consumption of London 
 seemed to the writers of that age enormous, and was 
 often mentioned by them as a proof of the greatness of 
 the imperial city. They scarcely hoped to be believed 
 when they affirmed that two hundred and eighty thousand 
 chaldrons that is to say, about three hundred and fifty 
 thousand tons were, in the last year of the reign of 
 Charles II., brought to the Thames. At present near 
 three millions and a half of tons are required yearly by 
 the metropolis ; and the whole annual produce cannot, 
 on the most moderate computation, be estimated at less 
 than twenty millions of tons." 
 
54 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 After thus passing in survey the England of our an 
 cestors five or six generations back, the author closes his 
 chapter with some eloquent remarks upon the progress 
 of society. Contrasting the hardness and coarseness of 
 the age of which he treats with the softer and more 
 humane features of our own, he says, " Nowhere could be 
 found that sensitive and restless compassion which has 
 in our time extended powerful protection to the factory 
 child, the Hindoo widow, to the negro slave ; which pries 
 into the stores and water casks of every emigrant ship ; 
 which winces at every lash laid on the back of a drunken 
 soldier; which will not suffer the thief in the hulks to 
 be ill fed or overworked ; and which has repeatedly en 
 deavored to save the life even of the murderer. The 
 more we study the annals of the past, the more shall we 
 rejoice that we live in a merciful age, in an age in which 
 cruelty is abhorred, and in which pain, even when de 
 served, is inflicted reluctantly and from a sense of duty. 
 Every class, doubtless, has gained largely by this great 
 moral change ; but the class which has gained most is 
 the poorest, the most dependent, and the most defence 
 less." 
 
 The history itself properly commences at the close of 
 this chapter. Opening with the death scene of the dis 
 solute Charles II., it presents a series of brilliant pictures 
 of the events succeeding. The miserable fate of Gates 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. OO 
 
 and Dangerfield, the perjured inventors of the Popish 
 plot ; the trial of Baxter by the infamous Jeffreys ; the 
 ill-starred attempt of the Duke of Monmoutli ; the battle 
 of Sedgemoor, and the dreadful atrocities of the king s 
 soldiers, and the horrible perversion of justice by the 
 king s chief judge in the " Bloody Assizes ; " the bar 
 barous hunting of the Scotch dissenters by Claverhouse ; 
 the melancholy fate of the brave and noble Duke of Ar- 
 gyle, are described with a graphic power unknown to 
 Smollet or Hume. Personal portraits are sketched with 
 a bold freedom which at times startles us. The "old 
 familiar faces," as we have seen them through the dust 
 of a century and a half, start before us with lifelike dis 
 tinctness of outline and coloring. Some of them disappoint 
 us ; like the ghost of Hamlet s father, they come in a 
 " questionable shape." Thus, for instance, in his sketch 
 of William Penn, the historian takes issue with the world 
 on his character, and labors through many pages of dis 
 ingenuous inuendoes and distortion of facts to transform 
 the saint of history into a pliant courtier. 
 
 The second volume details the follies and misfortunes, 
 the decline and fall, of the last of the Stuarts. All 
 the art of the author s splendid rhetoric is employed in 
 awakening, by turns, the indignation and contempt of the 
 reader in contemplating the character of the wrong- 
 headed king. In portraying that character, he has brought 
 
56 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 into exercise all those powers of invective and merciless 
 ridicule which give such a savage relish to his delineation 
 of Barrere. To preserve the consistency of this charac 
 ter, he denies the king any credit for whatever was really 
 beneficent and praiseworthy in his government. He 
 holds up the royal delinquent in only two lights : the one 
 representing him as a tyrant towards his people ; the 
 other as the abject slave of foreign priests a man at 
 once hateful and ludicrous, of whom it is difficult to speak 
 without an execration or a sneer. 
 
 The events which preceded the revolution of 1688 ; 
 the undisguised adherence of the king to the church of 
 Rome ; the partial toleration of the despised Quakers 
 and Anabaptists ; the gradual relaxation of the severity 
 of the penal laws against Papists and dissenters, pre 
 paring the way for the royal proclamation of entire liberty 
 of conscience throughout the British realm, allowing the 
 crop-eared Puritan and the Papist priest to build con 
 venticles and mass houses under the very eaves of the 
 palaces of Oxford and Canterbury ; the mining and 
 countermining of Jesuits and prelates, are detailed 
 with impartial minuteness. The secret springs of the 
 great movements of the time are laid bare ; the mean 
 and paltry instrumentalities are seen at work in the 
 under world of corruption, prejudice, and falsehood. No 
 one, save a blind, unreasoning partisan of Catholicism or 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. O7 
 
 Episcopacy, can contemplate this chapter in English his 
 tory without a feeling of disgust. However it may have 
 been overruled for good by that Providence which takes 
 the wise in their own craftiness, the revolution of 1G88, 
 in itself considered, affords just as little cause for self- 
 congratulation on the part of Protestants as the substitu 
 tion of the supremacy of the crowned Bluebeard, Henry 
 VIIL, for that of the pope, in the English church. It had 
 little in common with the revolution of 1642. The field 
 of its action was the closet of selfish intrigue the stalls 
 of discontented prelates the chambers of the wanton 
 and adulteress the confessional of a weak prince, whose 
 mind, originally narrow, had been cramped closer still 
 by the strait jacket of religious bigotry and superstition. 
 The age of nobility and heroism had well nigh passed 
 away. The pious fervor, the self-denial, and the strict 
 morality of the Puritanism of the days of Cromwell, and 
 the blunt honesty and chivalrous loyalty of the Cavaliers, 
 had both measurably given place to the corrupting influ 
 ences of the licentious and infidel court of Charles II. ; 
 and to the arrogance, intolerance, and shameless self-seek 
 ing of a prelacy which, in its day of triumph and revenge, 
 had more than justified the terrible denunciations and 
 scathing gibes of Milton. 
 
 Both Catholic and Protestant writers have misrepre 
 sented James II. He deserves neither the execrations 
 
58 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of the one nor the eulogies of the other. The candid 
 historian must admit that he was, after all, a better man 
 than his brother Charles IL He was a sincere and 
 bigoted Catholic, and was undoubtedly honest in the dec 
 laration, which he made in that unlucky letter which 
 Burnet ferreted out on the continent, that he was pre 
 pared to make large steps to build up the Catholic church 
 in England, and, if necessary, to become a martyr in her 
 cause. He was proud, austere, and self-willed. In the 
 treatment of his enemies he partook of the cruel temper 
 of his time. He was at once ascetic and sensual, alter 
 nating between the hair shirt of penance and the em 
 braces of Catharine Sedley. His situation was one of 
 the most difficult and embarrassing which can be con 
 ceived of. He was at once a bigoted Papist and a 
 Protestant pope. He hated the French domination to 
 which his brother had submitted ; yet his pride as sover 
 eign was subordinated to his allegiance to Rome and a 
 superstitious veneration for the wily priests with which 
 Louis XIV. surrounded him. As the head of Anglican 
 heretics, he was compelled to submit to conditions galling 
 alike to the sovereign and the man. He found, on his 
 accession, the terrible penal laws against the Papists 
 in full force ; the hangman s knife was yet warm with 
 its ghastly butcher work of quartering and disembowel 
 ling suspected Jesuits and victims of the lie of Titus 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. 59 
 
 Gates ; the Tower of London had scarcely ceased to 
 echo the groans of Catholic confessors stretched on the 
 rack by Protestant inquisitors. He was torn by conflict 
 ing interests and spiritual and political contradictions. 
 The prelates of the established church must share the 
 responsibility of many of the worst acts of the early part 
 of his reign. Oxford sent up its lawned deputations to 
 mingle the voice of adulation with the groans of tortured 
 Covenanters, and fawning ecclesiastics burned the in 
 cense of irreverent flattery under the nostrils of the 
 Lord s anointed, while the blessed air of England was 
 tainted by the carcasses of the ill-fated followers of Mon- 
 mouth, rotting on a thousand gibbets. While Jeffreys 
 was threatening Baxter and his Presbyterian friends 
 with the pillory and whipping post; while Quakers and 
 Baptists were only spared from extermination as game 
 preserves for the sport of clerical hunters ; while the 
 prisons were thronged with the heads of some fifteen 
 thousand beggared families, and dissenters of every name 
 and degree were chased from one hiding-place to another, 
 like David among the cliffs of Ziph and the rocks of the 
 wild goats, the thanksgivings and congratulations of 
 prelacy arose in an unbroken strain of laudation from 
 all the Episcopal palaces of England. "What mattered 
 it to men, in whose hearts, to use the language of John 
 Milton, " the sour leaven of human traditions, mixed with 
 
60 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 the poisonous dregs of hyprocrisy, lay basking in the 
 sunny warmth of wealth and promotion, hatching Anti 
 christ," that the privileges of Englishmen and the 
 rights secured by the great charter were violated and 
 trodden under foot, so long as usurpation enured to their 
 own benefit ? But when King James issued his Decla 
 ration of Indulgence, and stretched his prerogative on the 
 side of tolerance and charity, the zeal of the prelates for 
 preserving the integrity of the British constitution and 
 the limiting of the royal power flamed up into rebellion. 
 They forswore themselves without scruple : the disciples 
 of Laud, the asserters of kingly infallibility and divine 
 right, talked of usurped power and English rights in the 
 strain of the very schismatics whom they had persecuted 
 to the death. There is no reason to believe that James 
 supposed that, in issuing his declaration suspending the 
 penal laws, he had transcended the rightful prerogative 
 of his throne. The power which he exercised had been 
 used by his predecessors for far less worthy purposes 
 and with the approbation of many of the very men who 
 now opposed him. His ostensible object, expressed in 
 language which even those who condemn his policy cannot 
 but admire, was a laudable and noble one. " We trust," 
 said he, " that it will not be vain that we have resolved 
 to use our utmost endeavors to establish liberty of con 
 science on such just and equal foundations as will ren- 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. Gl 
 
 der it unalterable, and secure to all people the free 
 exercise of their religion, by which future ages may reap 
 the benefit of what is so undoubtedly the general good 
 of the whole kingdom." Whatever may have been the 
 motive of this declaration, even admitting the sus 
 picions of his enemies to have been true, that he advo 
 cated universal toleration as the only means of restoring 
 Roman Catholics to all the rights and privileges of which 
 the penal laws deprived them, it would seem that there 
 could have been no very serious . objection on the part 
 of real friends of religious toleration to the taking of 
 him at his word and placing Englishmen of every sect 
 on an equality before the law. The Catholics were in a 
 very small minority, scarcely at that time as numerous as 
 the Quakers and Anabaptists. The army, the navy, and 
 nine tenths of the people of England were Protestants. 
 Real danger, therefore, from a simple act of justice to 
 wards their Catholic fellow-citizens the people of Eng 
 land had no ground for apprehension. But the great 
 truth, which is even now but imperfectly recognized 
 throughout Christendom, that religious opinions rest be 
 tween man and his Maker, and not between man and 
 the magistrate, and that the domain of conscience is 
 sacred, was almost unknown to the statesmen and school 
 men of the seventeenth century. Milton ultra liberal 
 as he was excepted the Catholics from his plan of 
 
62 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 toleration. Locke, yielding to the prejudices of the time, 
 took the same ground. The enlightened latitudinarian 
 ministers of the established church men whose talents 
 and Christian charity redeem in some measure the char 
 acter of that church in the day of its greatest power and 
 basest apostasy stopped short of universal toleration. 
 The Presbyterians excluded Quakers, Baptists, and Pa 
 pists from the pale of their charity. With the single 
 exception of the sect of which William Penn was a con 
 spicuous member, the idea of complete and impartial 
 toleration was novel and unwelcome to all sects and 
 classes of the English people. Hence it was that the 
 very men whose liberties and estates had been secured 
 by the declaration, and who were thereby permitted to 
 hold their meetings in peace and quietness, used their 
 newly-acquired freedom in denouncing the king, because 
 the same key which had opened their prison doors had 
 also liberated the Papists and the Quakers. Baxter s 
 severe and painful spirit could not rejoice in an act which 
 had, indeed, restored him to personal freedom, but which 
 had, in his view, also offended Heaven, and strengthened 
 the powers of Antichrist by extending the same favor 
 to Jesuits and Ranters. Bunyan disliked the Quakers 
 next to the Papists ; and it greatly lessened his satisfac 
 tion at his release from Bedford jail that it had been 
 brought about by the influence of the former at the court 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. 63 
 
 of a Catholic prince. Dissenters forgot the wrongs and 
 persecutions which they had experienced at the hands 
 of the prelacy, and joined the bishops in opposition to 
 the declaration. They almost magnified into Christian 
 confessors the prelates who remonstrated against the 
 indulgence, and actually plotted .against the king for 
 restoring them to liberty of person and conscience. The 
 nightmare fear of Popery overcame their love of religious 
 liberty ; and they meekly offered their necks to the yoke 
 of prelacy as the only security against the heavier one 
 of Papist supremacy. In a far different manner the 
 cleareyed and plainspoken John Milton met the claims 
 and demands of the hierarchy in his time. " They en 
 treat us," said he, " that we be not weary of the insup 
 portable grievances that our shoulders have hitherto 
 cracked under ; they beseech us that we think them fit 
 to be our justices of peace, our lords, our highest officers 
 of state. They pray us that it would please us to let 
 them still haul us and wrong us with their bandogs and 
 pursuivants ; and that it would please the Parliament 
 that they may yet have the whipping, fleecing, and flay 
 ing of us in their diabolical courts, to tear the flesh from 
 our bones, and into our wide wounds, instead of balm, to 
 pour in the oil of tartar, vitriol, and mercury. Surely 
 a right, reasonable, innocent, and softhearted petition ! 
 O the relenting bowels of the fathers ! " 
 
64 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Considering the prominent part acted by William Penn 
 in the reign of James II., and his active and influential 
 support of the obnoxious declaration which precipitated 
 the revolution of 1688, it could hardly have been other 
 wise than that his character should suffer from the un 
 worthy suspicions and prejudices of his contemporaries. 
 His views of religious toleration were too far in advance 
 of the age to be received with favor. They were, of 
 necessity, misunderstood and misrepresented. All his 
 life he had been urging them with the earnestness of 
 one whose convictions were the result, not so much of 
 human reason as of what he regarded as divine illumi 
 nation. What the council of James yielded upon grounds 
 of state policy he defended on those of religious obliga 
 tion. He had suffered in person and estate for the exer 
 cise of his religion. He had travelled over Holland and 
 Germany, pleading with those in authority for universal 
 toleration and charity. On a sudden, on the accession 
 of James, the friend of himself and his family, he found 
 himself the most influential untitled citizen in the British 
 realm. He had free access to the royal ear. Asking 
 nothing for himself or his relatives, he demanded only 
 that the good people of England should be no longer 
 despoiled of liberty and estate for their religious opinions. 
 James, as a Catholic, had in some sort a common interest 
 with his dissenting subjects, and the declaration was for 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST -STUART. 65 
 
 their common relief. Penn, conscious of the rectitude 
 of his own motives and thoroughly convinced of the 
 Christian duty of toleration, welcomed that declaration 
 as the precursor of the golden age of liberty and love 
 and good will to men. He was not the man to distrust 
 the motives of an act so fully in accordance with his life 
 long aspirations and prayers. He was charitable to a 
 fault : his faith in his fellow-men was often stronger than 
 a clearer insight of their characters would have justified. 
 He saw the errors of the king, and deplored them ; he 
 denounced Jeffreys as a butcher who had been let loose 
 by the priests ; and pitied the king, who was, he thought, 
 swayed by evil counsels. He remonstrated against the 
 interference of the king with Magdalen College ; and re 
 proved and rebuked the hopes and aims of the more 
 zealous and hotheaded Catholics, advising them to be 
 content with simple toleration. But the constitution of 
 his mind fitted him rather for the commendation of the 
 good than the denunciation of the bad. He had little in 
 common with the bold and austere spirit of the Puritan 
 reformers. He disliked their violence and harshness ; 
 while, on the other hand, he was attracted and pleased by 
 the gentle disposition and mild counsels of Locke, and 
 Tillotson, and the latitudinarians of the English church. 
 He was the intimate personal and political friend of Al 
 gernon Sydney ; sympathized with his republican the- 
 5 
 
66 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 cries; and shared his abhorrence of tyranny, civil and 
 ecclesiastical. He found in him a man after his o>v:n 
 heart genial, generous, and loving ; faithful to duty and 
 the instincts of humanity a true Christian gentleman. 
 His sense of gratitude was strong, and his personal .friend 
 ships sometimes clouded his judgment. In giving his 
 support to the measures of James in behalf of liberty of 
 conscience, it must be admitted that he acted in consist 
 ency with his principles and professions. To have taken 
 ground against them, he must have given the lie to his 
 declarations from his youth upward. He could not dis 
 own and deny his own favorite doctrine because it came 
 from the lips of a Catholic king and his Jesuit advisers ; 
 and in thus rising above the prejudices of his time, and 
 appealing to the reason and humanity of the people of 
 England in favor of a cordial indorsement on the part 
 of Parliament of the principles of the declaration, he be 
 lieved that he was subserving the best interests of his 
 obeloved country and fulfilling the solemn obligations of 
 religious duty. The downfall of James exposed Penn 
 to peril and obloquy. Perjured informers endeavored to 
 swear away his life; and, although nothing could be 
 proved against him beyond the fact that he had steadily 
 supported the great measure of toleration, he was com 
 pelled to live secluded in his private lodgings in London 
 for two or three years, with a proclamation for his arrest 
 
ENGLAND UNDER THE LAST STUART. 67 
 
 hanging over his head. At length, the principal informer 
 against him having been found guilty of perjury, the 
 government warrant was withdrawn ; and Lords Sidney, 
 Rochester, and Somers, and the Duke of Buckingham 
 publicly bore testimony that nothing had been urged 
 against him save by impostors, and that "they had 
 known him, some of them for thirty years, and had never 
 known him to do an ill thing, but many good offices." It 
 is a matter of regret that one professing to hold the impar 
 tial pen of history should have given the sanction of his 
 authority to the slanderous and false imputations of such 
 a man as Burnet, who has never been regarded as an 
 authentic chronicler.* The pantheon of history should 
 
 * Gilbert Burnet, in liberality as a politician and tolerance as a 
 churchman, was far in advance of his order and time. It is true that 
 he shut out the Catholics from the pale of his charity and barely tol 
 erated the dissenters. The idea of entire religious liberty and equality 
 shocked even his moderate degree of sensitiveness. He m*t Penn at 
 the court of the Prince of Orange, and, after a long and fruitless effort 
 to convince the dissenter that the penal laws against the Catholics 
 should be enforced, and allegiance to the established church continue 
 the condition of qualification for offices of trust and honor, and that 
 he and his friends should rest contented with simple toleration, he 
 became irritated by the inflexible adherence of Penn to the principle 
 of entire religious freedom. One of the most worthy sons of the Epis 
 copal church, Thomas Clarkson, alluding to this discussion, says, 
 "Burnet never mentioned him (Penn) afterwards but coldly or sneer- 
 ingly, or in a way to lower him in the estimation of the reader, when- 
 
68 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 not be lightly disturbed. A good man s character is the 
 world s common legacy ; and humanity is not so rich in 
 models of purity and goodness as to be able to sacrifice 
 such a reputation as that of William Penn to the point 
 of an antithesis or the effect of a paradox. 
 
 ever he had occasion to speak of him in his History of his Own 
 Times." 
 
 He was a man of strong prejudices ; he lived in the midst of revo 
 lutions, plots, and intrigues ; he saw much of the worst side of human 
 nature ; and he candidly admits, in the preface to his great work, 
 that he was inclined to think generally the worst of men and parties, 
 and that the reader should make allowance for this inclination, al 
 though he had honestly tried to give the truth. Dr. King, of Oxford, 
 in his Anecdotes of his Own Times, p. 185, says, " I knew Burnet : 
 he was a furious party man, and easily imposed upon by any lying 
 spirit of his faction ; but he was a better pastor than any man who 
 is now seated on the bishops bench." The tory writers Swift, 
 Pope, Arbuthnot, and others have undoubtedly exaggerated the 
 defects of Burnet s narrative ; while, on the other hand, his whig 
 commentators have excused them on the ground of his avowed and 
 fierce partisanship. Dr. Johnson, in his blunt way, says, " I do not 
 belieye Burnet intentionally lied ; but he was so much prejudiced that 
 he took no pains to find out the truth." On the contrary, Sir James 
 Mackintosh, in the Edinburgh Review, speaks of the bishop as an 
 honest writer, seldom substantially erroneous, though often inaccu 
 rate in points of detail; and Macaulay, who has quite too closely 
 followed him in his history, defends him as at least quite as accurate 
 as his contemporary writers, and says that, " in his moral character, 
 as in his intellectual, great blemishes were more than compensated 
 by great excellences." 
 
THE TWO PROCESSIONS. 
 
 " Look upon this picture, and on this." Hamlet. 
 
 CONSIDERING that we have a slave population of nearly 
 three millions, and that in one half of the states of the 
 republic it is as hazardous to act upon the presumption 
 that " all men are created free and equal " as it would be 
 in Austria or Russia, the lavish expression of sympathy 
 and extravagant jubilation with which, as a people, we are 
 accustomed to greet movements in favor of freedom abroad, 
 are not a little remarkable. We almost went into ecsta 
 sies over the first French revolution ; we filled our papers 
 with the speeches of orator Hunt and the English radi 
 cals ; we fraternized with the United Irishmen ; we hailed 
 as brothers in the cause of freedom the very Mexicans 
 whom we have since wasted with fire and sword ; our ora 
 tors, north and south, grew eloquent and classic over the 
 Greek and Polish revolutions. In short, long ere this, 
 if the walls of kingcraft and despotism had been, like those 
 of Jericho, destined to be overthrown by sound, our Fourth 
 
 (69) 
 
70 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of July cannon shootings and bell ringings, together with 
 our fierce, grandiloquent speech-makings in and out of 
 Congress, on the occasions referred to, would have left no 
 stone upon another. 
 
 It is true that an exception must be made in the case 
 of Hayti. We fired no guns, drank no toasts, made no 
 speeches in favor of the establishment of that new re 
 public in our neighborhood. The very mention of the 
 possibility that Haytien delegates might ask admittance 
 to the congress of the free republics of the new world 
 at Panama " frightened from their propriety " the eager 
 propagandists of republicanism in the senate, and gave a 
 deathblow to their philanthropic projects. But as Hayti 
 is a republic of blacks, who, having revolted from their 
 masters as well as from the mother country, have placed 
 themselves entirely without the pale of Anglo-Saxon sym 
 pathy by their impertinent interference with the monopoly 
 of white liberty, this exception by no means disproves the 
 general fact, that, in the matter of powder burning, bell 
 jangling, speech-making, toast-drinking admiration of 
 freedom afar off and in the abstract, we have no rivals. 
 The caricature of our " general sympathizers " in Martin 
 Chuzzlewit is by no means a fancy sketch. 
 
 The news of the revolution of the three days in Paris, 
 and the triumph of the French people over Charles X. 
 and his ministers, as a matter of course acted with great 
 
THE TWO PROCESSIONS. 71 
 
 effect upon our national susceptibility. We all threw up 
 our hats in excessive joy at the spectacle of a king dashed 
 down headlong from his throne and chased out of his 
 kingdom by his long-suffering and oppressed subjects. 
 We took half the credit of the performance to ourselves, 
 inasmuch as Lafayette was a principal actor in it. Our 
 editors, from Passamaquoddy to the Sabine, indited para 
 graphs for a thousand and one newspapers, congratulating 
 the Parisian patriots, and prophesying all manner of evil 
 to holy alliances, kings, and aristocracies. The Na 
 tional Intelligencer of September 27, 1830,- contains a full 
 account of the public rejoicings of the good people of 
 Washington on the occasion. Bells were rung in all the 
 steeples, guns were fired, and a grand procession was 
 formed, including the President of the United States, the 
 heads of departments, and other public functionaries. 
 Decorated with tricolored ribbons, and with tricolored 
 flags mingling with the stripes and stars over their heads, 
 and gazed down upon by bright eyes from window and 
 balcony, the " general sympathizers" moved slowly and 
 majestically through the broad avenue towards the Capi 
 tol, to celebrate the revival of French liberty in a manner 
 becoming the chosen rulers of a free people. 
 
 What a spectacle was this for the representatives of 
 European kingcraft at our seat of government! How 
 the titled agents of Metternich and Nicholas must have 
 
72 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 trembled, in view of this imposing demonstration, for the 
 safety of their " peculiar institutions " ! 
 
 Unluckily, however, the moral effect of this grand 
 spectacle was marred somewhat by the appearance of 
 another procession, moving in a contrary direction. It 
 was a gang of slaves ! Handcuffed in pairs, with the 
 sullen sadness of despair in their faces, they marched 
 wearily onward to the music of the driver s whip and the 
 clanking iron on their limbs. Think of it ! Shouts of 
 triumph, rejoicing bells, gay banners, and glittering cav 
 alcades, in honor of Liberty, in immediate contrast with 
 men and women chained and driven like cattle to market ! 
 The editor of the American Spectator, a paper published 
 at Washington at that time, speaking of this black pro 
 cession of slavery, describes it as " driven along by what 
 had the appearance of a man on horseback." The miser 
 able wretches who composed it were doubtless consigned 
 to a slave jail to await their purchase and transportation 
 to the south or south-west; and perhaps formed a part 
 of that drove of human beings which the same editor states 
 that he saw on the Saturday following, " males and females 
 chained in couples, starting from Robey s tavern, on foot, 
 for Alexandria, to embark on board a slave ship." 
 
 At a Virginia camp meeting, many years ago, one of the 
 brethren, attempting an exhortation, stammered, faltered, 
 and finally came to a dead stand. " Sit down, brother," 
 
THE TWO PROCESSIONS. 73 
 
 said old Father Kyle, the one-eyed abolition preacher ; 
 * it s no use to try ; you can t preach with twenty negroes 
 sticking in your throat ! " It strikes us that our country 
 is very much in the condition of the poor confused 
 preacher at the camp meeting. Slavery sticks in its 
 throat, and spoils its finest performances, political and 
 ecclesiastical; confuses the tongues of its evangelical 
 alliances ; makes a farce of its Fourth of July celebra 
 tions ; and, as in the case of the grand Washington pro 
 cession of 1830, sadly mars the effect of its rejoicings in 
 view of the progress of liberty abroad. There is a stam 
 mer in all our exhortations ; our moral and political 
 homilies are sure to run into confusions and contradic 
 tions; and the response which comes to us from the 
 nations is not unlike that of Father Kyle to the planter s 
 attempt at sermonizing: "It s no use, brother Jonathan ; 
 you can t preach liberty with three millions of slaves in 
 your throat ! " 
 
EVANGELINE* 
 
 EUREKA ! Here, then, we have it at last an Ameri 
 can poem, with the lack of which British reviewers have 
 so long reproached us. Selecting the subject of all others 
 best calculated for his purpose, the expulsion of the 
 French settlers of Acadie from their quiet and pleasant 
 homes around the Basin of Minas, one of the most sadly 
 romantic passages in the history of the colonies of the 
 north, he has succeeded in presenting a series of ex 
 quisite pictures of tne striking and peculiar features of 
 life and nature in the new world. The range of these 
 delineations extends from Nova Scotia on the north-east 
 to the spurs of the Rocky Mountains on the west and the 
 Gulf of Mexico on the south. Nothing can be added to 
 his pictures of quiet farm life in Acadie, the Indian sum 
 mer of our northern latitudes, the scenery of the Ohio and 
 Mississippi Rivers, the bayous and cypress forests of the 
 south, the mocking bird, the prairie, the Ozark hills, the 
 
 * Evangeline, a Tale of Acadie. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 
 
 (74) 
 
EVANGELINE. 75 
 
 Catholic missions, and the wild Arabs of the west, roam 
 ing with the buffalo along the banks of the Nebraska. 
 The hexameter measure he has chosen has the advantage 
 of a prosaic freedom of expression, exceedingly well 
 adapted to a descriptive and narrative poem ; yet we are 
 constrained to think that the story of Evangeline would 
 have been quite as acceptable to the public taste had 
 it been told in the poetic prose of the author s Hy 
 perion. 
 
 In reading it and admiring its strange melody we were 
 not without fears that the success of Professor Longfellow 
 in this novel experiment might prove the occasion of call 
 ing out a host of awkward imitators, leading us over weary 
 wastes of hexameters, enlivened neither by dew, rain, nor 
 fields of offering. 
 
 Apart from its Americanism, the poem has merits of a 
 higher and universal character. It is not merely a work 
 of art ; the pulse of humanity throbs warmly through it 
 The portraits of Basil the blacksmith, the old notary, 
 Benedict Bellefontaine and good Father Felician, fairly 
 glow with life. The beautiful Evangeline, loving and 
 faithful unto death, is a heroine worthy of any poet of the 
 present century. 
 
 The editor of the Boston Chronotype, in the course of 
 an appreciative review of this poem, urges with some 
 force a single objection, which we are induced to notice, 
 
76 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 as it is one not unlikely to present itself to the minds of 
 other readers : 
 
 " We think Mr. Longfellow ought to have expressed a 
 much deeper indignation at the base, knavish, and heart 
 less conduct of the English and colonial persecutors than 
 he has done. He should have put far bolder and deeper 
 tints in the picture of suffering. One great, if not the 
 greatest, end of poetry is rhadaman thine justice. The 
 poet should mete out their deserts to all his heroes ; honor 
 to whom honor, and infamy to whom infamy, is due. 
 
 " It is true that the wrong in this case is in a great 
 degree fathered upon our own Massachusetts ; and it may 
 be said that it is a foul bird that pollutes its own nest. 
 We deny the applicability of the rather musty proverb. 
 All the worse. Of not a more contemptible vice is what 
 is called American literature guilty than this of unmiti 
 gated self-laudation. If we persevere in it, the stock will 
 become altogether too small for the business. It seems 
 that no period of our history has been exempt from 
 materials for patriotic humiliation and national self- 
 reproach; and surely the present epoch is laying in a 
 large store of that sort. Had our poets always told us the 
 truth of ourselves, perhaps it would now be otherwise. 
 National self-flattery and concealment of faults must of 
 course have their natural results." 
 
 We must confess that we read the first part of Evan- 
 
EVANGELINE. 77 
 
 geline with something of the feeling so forcibly expressed 
 by Professor Wright. The natural and honest indigna 
 tion with which, many years ago, we read for the first 
 time that dark page of our colonial history, the expul 
 sion of the French neutrals, was reawakened by the 
 simple pathos of the poem ; and we longed to find an ade 
 quate expression of it in the burning language of the poet. 
 We marvelled that he who could so touch the heart by his 
 description of the sad suffering of the Acadian peasants 
 should have permitted the authors of that suffering to 
 escape without censure. The outburst of the stout Basil, 
 in the Church of Grand Pre, was, we are fain to acknowl 
 edge, a great relief to us. But, before reaching the close 
 of the volume, we were quite reconciled to the author s 
 forbearance. The design of the poem is manifestly in 
 compatible with stern " rhadamanthine justice " and indig 
 nant denunciation of wrong. It is a simple story of quiet 
 pastoral happiness, of great sorrow and painful bereave 
 ment, and of the evidence of a love which, hoping and 
 seeking always, winders evermore up and down the wil 
 derness of the world, baffled at every turn, yet still retain 
 ing faith in God and in the object of its lifelong quest. 
 It was no part of the writer s object to investigate the 
 merits of the question at issue between the poor Acadians 
 and their Puritan neighbors. Looking at the materials 
 before him with the eye of an artist simply, he has 
 
78 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 arranged them to suit his idea of the beautiful and pa 
 thetic, leaving to some future historian the duty of sitting 
 in judgment upon the actors in the atrocious outrage which 
 furnished them. With this we are content. The poem 
 now has a unity and sweetness which might have been 
 destroyed by attempting to avenge the wrongs it so vividly 
 depicts. It is a psalm of love and forgiveness : the gen 
 tleness and peace of Christian meekness and forbearance 
 breathes through it. Not a word of censure is directly 
 applied to the marauding workers of the mighty sorrow 
 which it describes just as it would a calamity from the 
 elements a visitation of God. The reader, however, 
 cannot fail to award justice to the wrong doers. The 
 unresisting acquiescence of the Acadians only deepens his 
 detestation of the cupidity and religious bigotry of their 
 spoilers. Even in the language of the good Father Fe- 
 lician, beseeching his flock to submit to the strong hand 
 which had been laid upon them, we see and feel the mag 
 nitude of the crime to be forgiven : 
 
 " Lo, where the crucified Christ from his cross is gazing upon you ! 
 See in those sorrowful eyes what meekness and holy compassion ! 
 Hark ! how those lips still repeat the prayer, Father, forgive 
 
 them! 
 
 Let us repeat that prayer in the hour when the wicked assail us ; 
 Let us repeat it now, and say, Father, forgive them! " 
 
 How does this simple prayer of the Acadians contrast 
 with the "deep damnation of their taking off" ! 
 
EVAXGELINE. 79 
 
 The true history of the Puritans of New England is 
 yet to be written. Somewhere midway between the 
 caricatures of the Church party and the self-laudations 
 of their own writers the point may doubtless be found 
 from whence an impartial estimate of their character may 
 be formed. They had noble qualities : the firmness and 
 energy which they displayed in the colonization of New 
 England must always command admiration. TVe would 
 not rob them, were it in our power to do so, of one jot or 
 tittle of their rightful honor. But, with all the lights 
 which we at present possess, we cannot allow their claim 
 of saintship without some degree of qualification. How 
 they seemed to their Dutch neighbors at New Nether 
 lands, and their French ones at Nova Scotia, and to the 
 poor Indians, hunted from their fisheries and game 
 grounds, we can very well conjecture. It may be safely 
 taken for granted that their gospel claim to the inherit 
 ance of the earth was not a little questionable to the 
 Catholic fleeing for his life from their jurisdiction, to the 
 banished Baptist shaking off the dust of his feet against 
 them, and to the martyred Quaker denouncing woe and 
 judgment upon them from the steps of the gallows. Most 
 of them were, beyond a doubt, pious and sincere ; but we 
 are constrained to believe that among them were those 
 who wore "the livery of heaven" from purely selfish 
 motives, in a community where church membership was 
 
80 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 an indispensable requisite, the only "ope?i sesame" before 
 which the doors of honor and distinction swung wide to 
 needy or ambitious aspirants. Mere adventurers, men of 
 desperate fortunes, bankrupts in character and purse con 
 trived to " make gain of godliness " under the church and 
 state government of New England, put on the austere exte 
 rior of sanctity, quoted Scripture, anathematized heretics, 
 whipped Quakers, exterminated Indians, "burned and 
 spoiled the villages of their Catholic neighbors, and hewed 
 down their graven images " and " houses of Riminon." It 
 is curious to observe how a fierce religious zeal against 
 heathens and idolaters went hand and hand with the old 
 Anglo-Saxon love of land and plunder. Every crusade 
 undertaken against the Papists of the French colonies 
 had its Puritan Peter the Hermit to summon the saints 
 to the wars of the Lord. At the siege of Louisburg, ten 
 years before the onslaught upon the Acadian settlers, one 
 minister marched with the colonial troops, axe in hand, 
 to hew down the images in the French churches ; while 
 another officiated in the double capacity of drummer and 
 chaplain a "drum ecclesiastic," as Hudibras has it. 
 
 At the late celebration of the landing of the Pilgrims in 
 New York, the orator of the day labored at great length 
 to show that the charge of intolerance, as urged against 
 the colonists of New England, is unfounded in fact. The 
 banishment of the Catholics was very sagaciously passed 
 
EVANGELINE. 81 
 
 over in silence, inasmuch as the Catholic Bishop of New 
 York was one of the invited guests, and (hear it, shade of 
 Cotton Mather !) one of the regular toasts was a compli 
 ment to the pope. The expulsion of Roger Williams was 
 excused and partially justified ; while the whipping, ear 
 cropping, tongue boring, and hanging of the Quakers was 
 defended, as the only effectual method of dealing with 
 such " devil-driven heretics," as Mather calls them. The 
 orator, in the new-born zeal of his amateur Puritanism, 
 stigmatizes the persecuted class as " fanatics and ranters, 
 foaming forth their mad opinions ; " compares them to the 
 Mormons and the crazy followers of Mathias ; and cites 
 an instance of a poor enthusiast, named Eccles, who, far 
 gone in the u tailor s melancholy," took it into his head 
 that he must enter into a steeple-house pulpit and stitch 
 breeches " in singing time " a circumstance, by the way, 
 which took place in Old England as a justification of 
 the atrocious laws of the Massachusetts colony. We have 
 not the slightest disposition to deny the fanaticism and 
 folly of some few professed Quakers in that day ; and had 
 the Puritans treated them as the pope did one of their 
 number whom he found crazily holding forth in the Church 
 of St. Peter, and consigned them to the care of physicians 
 as religious monomaniacs, no sane man could have blamed 
 them. Every sect, in its origin, and especially in its time 
 of persecution, has had its fanatics. The early Christians, 
 6 
 
82 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 if we may credit the admissions of their own writers or 
 attach the slightest credence to the statements of pagan 
 authors, were by no means exempt from reproach and 
 scandal in this respect. Were the Puritans themselves 
 the men to cast stones at the Quakers and Baptists ? Had 
 they not, in the view at least of the established church, 
 turned all England upside down with their fanaticisms and 
 extravagances of doctrine and conduct ? How look they 
 as depicted in the sermons of Dr. South, in the sarcastic 
 pages of Hudibras, and the coarse caricatures of the cleri 
 cal wits of the times of the second Charles? With their 
 own backs scored and their ears cropped for the crime of 
 denying the divine authority of church and state in Eng 
 land, were they the men to whip Baptists and hang 
 Quakers for doing the same thing in Massachusetts ? 
 
 Of all that is noble and true in the Puritan character 
 we are sincere admirers. The generous and self-denying 
 apostleship of Eliot is, of itself, a beautiful page in their 
 history. The physical daring and hardihood with which, 
 amidst the times of savage warfare, they laid the founda 
 tions of mighty states, and subdued the rugged soil, and 
 made the wilderness blossom; their steadfast adherence 
 to their religious principles, even when the restoration 
 had made apostasy easy and profitable ; and the vigilance 
 and firmness with which, under all circumstances, they 
 held fast their chartered liberties and extorted new rights 
 
EVANGELINE. 83 
 
 and privileges from the reluctant home government, 
 justly entitle them to the grateful remembrance of a gen 
 eration now reaping the fruits of their toils and sacrifices. 
 But, in expressing our gratitude to the founders of INew 
 England, we should not forget what is due to truth and 
 justice; nor, for the sake of vindicating them from the 
 charge of that religious intolerance which, at the time, 
 they shared with nearly all Christendom, undertake to 
 defend, in the light of the nineteenth century, opinions 
 and practices hostile to the benignant spirit of the gos 
 pel and subversive of the inherent rights of man. 
 
 OF TH* 
 
 VERSITY 
 
A CHAPTER OF HISTORY. 
 
 THE theory which a grave and learned northern 
 senator has recently announced in Congress, that slavery, 
 like the cotton plant, is confined by natural laws to cer 
 tain parallels of latitude, beyond which it can by no pos 
 sibility exist, however it may have satisfied its author 
 and his auditors, has unfortunately no verification in the 
 facts of the case. Slavery is singularly cosmopolitan in 
 its habits. The offspring of pride, and lust, and avarice, 
 it is indigenous to the world. Rooted in the human 
 heart, it defies the rigors of winter in the steppes of Tar- 
 tary and the fierce sun of the tropics. It has the univer 
 sal acclimation of sin. 
 
 The first account we have of negro slaves in New 
 England is from the pen of John Josselyn. Nineteen 
 years after the landing at Plymouth, this interesting 
 traveller was for some time the guest of Samuel Maver 
 ick, who then dwelt, like a feudal baron, in his fortalice 
 on Noddle s Island, surrounded by retainers and servants, 
 bidding defiance to his Indian neighbors behind his strong 
 
 (84) 
 
A CHAPTER OF HISTORY. 85 
 
 walls, with " four great guns " mounted thereon, and " giv 
 ing entertainment to all new comers gratis." 
 
 "On the 2d of October, 1639, about nine o clock in 
 the morning, Mr. Maverick s negro woman" says Josse- 
 lyn, " came to my chamber, and in her own country lan 
 guage and tune sang very loud and shrill. Going out to 
 her, she used a great deal of respect towards me, and 
 would willingly have expressed her grief in English had 
 she been able to speak the language ; but I apprehended 
 it by her countenance and deportment. Whereupon I 
 repaired to my host to learn of him the cause, and re 
 solved to entreat him in her behalf ; for I had understood 
 that she was a queen in her own country, and observed 
 a very dutiful and humble garb used towards her by an 
 other negro, who was her maid. Mr. Maverick was de 
 sirous to have a breed of negroes ; and therefore, seeing 
 she would not yield by persuasions to company with a 
 negro young man he had in his house, he commanded 
 him, willed she, nilled she, to go to her bed, which was 
 no sooner done than she thrust him out again. This she 
 took in high disdain beyond her slavery ; and this was 
 the cause of her grief." 
 
 That the peculiar domestic arrangements and unfas- 
 tidious economy of this slave-breeding settler were not 
 countenanced by the Puritans of that early time, we have 
 sufficient evidence. It is but fair to suppose, from the 
 
86 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 silence of all other writers of the time with respect to 
 negroes and slaves, that this case was a marked exception 
 to the general habits and usage of the colonists. At an 
 early period a traffic was commenced between the New 
 England colonies and that of Barbadoes ; and it is not 
 improbable that slaves were brought to Boston from that 
 island. The laws, however, discouraged their introduc 
 tion and purchase, giving freedom to all held to service 
 at the close of seven years. 
 
 In 1641, two years after Josselyn s adventure on Nod 
 dle s Island, the code of laws known by the name of the 
 Body of Liberties was adopted by the colony. It was 
 drawn up by Nathaniel Ward,- the learned and ingenious 
 author of the Simple Cobbler of Agawam, the earliest 
 poetical satire of New England. One of its provisions 
 was as follows : 
 
 " There shall be never any bond slaverie, villianage, 
 or captivitie amongst us, unles it be lawfull captives taken 
 in just warres and such strangers as willingly sell them 
 selves or are sold to us. And these shall have all the 
 liberties and Christian usages which the law of God es 
 tablished in Israel doth morally require." 
 
 In 1646 Captain Smith, a Boston church member, in 
 connection with one Keeser, brought home two negroes 
 whom he obtained by the surprise and burning of a 
 negro village in Africa and the massacre of many of its 
 
A CHAPTER OF HISTORY. 87 
 
 inhabitants. Sir Richard Saltonstall, one of the assist 
 ants, presented a petition to the general court, stating 
 the outrage thereby committed as threefold in its nature 
 viz., murder, man stealing, and Sabbath breaking ; inas 
 much as the offence of "chasing the negers, as afore- 
 sayde, upon the Sabbath day, (being a servile work, and 
 such as cannot be considered under any other head,) is 
 expressly capital by the law of God ; " for which reason 
 he prays that the offenders may be brought to justice, 
 " soe that the sin they have committed may be upon their 
 own heads and not upon ourselves." 
 
 Upon this petition the general court passed the fol 
 lowing order, eminently worthy of men professing to rule 
 in the fear and according to the law of God a terror 
 to evil doers, and a praise to them that do well : 
 
 " The general court, conceiving themselves bound by 
 the first opportunity to bear witness against the heinous 
 and crying sin of man stealing, as also to prescribe such 
 timely redress for what has passed, and such a law for 
 the future as may sufficiently deter all others belonging 
 to us to have to do in such vile and odious courses, justly 
 abhorred of all good and just men, do order that the negro 
 interpreter and others unlawfully taken be by the first 
 opportunity, at the charge of the country for the present, 
 sent to his native country, Guinea, and a letter with him 
 of the indignation of the court thereabout and justice 
 
88 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 thereof, desiring our honored governor would please put 
 this order in execution." 
 
 There is, so far as we know, no historical Tecord of 
 the actual return of these stolen men to their home. A 
 letter is extant, however, addressed in behalf of the gen 
 eral court to a Mr. Williams on the Piscataqua, by 
 whom one of the negroes had been purchased, requesting 
 him to send the man forthwith to Boston, that he may 
 be sent home, " which this court do resolve to send back 
 without delay." 
 
 Three years after, in 1649, the following law was 
 placed upon the statute book of the Massachusetts col 
 ony : 
 
 " If any man stealeth a man, or mankind, he shall 
 surely be put to death." 
 
 It will thus be seen that these early attempts to introduce 
 slavery into New England were opposed by severe laws 
 and by that strong popular sentiment in favor of human 
 liberty which characterized the Christian radicals who 
 laid the foundations of the colonies. It was not the rigor 
 of her northern winter, nor the unkindly soil of Massa 
 chusetts, which discouraged the introduction of slavery 
 in the first half century of her existence as a colony. It 
 was the Puritan s recognition of the brotherhood of man 
 in sin, suffering, and redemption, his estimate of the 
 awful responsibilities and eternal destinies of humanity, 
 
A CHAPTER OF HISTORY. 80 
 
 his hatred of wrong and tyranny, and his stern sense of 
 justice, which led him to impose upon the African slave 
 trader the terrible penalty of the Mosaic code. 
 
 But that brave old generation passed away. The civil 
 contentions in the mother country drove across the seas 
 multitudes of restless adventurers and speculators. The 
 Indian wars unsettled and demoralized the people. Hab 
 its of luxury and the greed of gain took the place of the 
 severe self-denial and rigid virtues of the fathers. Hence 
 we are not surprised to find that Josselyn, in his second 
 visit to New England, some twenty-five years after his 
 first, speaks of the great increase of servants and negroes. 
 In 1680 Governor Bradstreet, in answer to the inquiries 
 of his majesty s privy council, states that, two years be 
 fore, a vessel from " Madagasca " brought into the colony 
 betwixt forty and fifty negroes, mostly women and chil 
 dren, who were sold at a loss to the owner of the vessel. 
 " Now and then," he continues, " two or three negroes 
 are brought from Barbadoes and other of his majesty s 
 plantations and sold for twenty pounds apiece; so that 
 there may be within the government about one hundred 
 or one hundred and twenty, and it may be as many 
 Scots, brought hither and sold for servants in the time 
 of the war with Scotland, and about half as many 
 Irish." 
 
 The owning of a black or white slave, or servant, at this 
 
90 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 period was regarded as an evidence of dignity and respect 
 ability ; and hence magistrates and clergymen winked at 
 the violation of the law by the mercenary traders, and 
 supplied themselves without scruple. Indian slaves were 
 common, and are named in old wills, deeds, and invento 
 ries, with horses, cows, and household furniture. As early 
 as the year 1649 we find "William Hilton, of Newbury, 
 sells to George Carr, " for one quarter part of a vessel, 
 James, my Indian, with all the interest I have in him, to 
 be his servant forever." Some were taken in the Narra- 
 gansett war and other Indian wars ; others were brought 
 from South Carolina and the Spanish Main. It is an in 
 structive fact, as illustrating the retributive dealings of 
 Providence, that the direst affliction of the Massachusetts 
 colony the witchcraft terror of 1692 originated with 
 the Indian Tituba, a slave in the family of the minister 
 of Danvers. 
 
 In the year 1690 the inhabitants of Newbury were 
 greatly excited by the arrest of a Jerseyman who had been 
 engaged in enticing Indians and negroes to leave their 
 masters. He was charged before the court with saying 
 that " the English should be cut off and the negroes set 
 free." James, a negro slave, and Joseph, an Indian, were 
 arrested with him. Their design was reported to be, to 
 seize a vessel in the port and escape to Canada and join 
 the French, and return and lay waste and plunder their 
 
A CHAPTER OF HISTORY. 91 
 
 masters. They were to come back with five hundred 
 Indians and three hundred Canadians ; and the place of 
 crossing the Merrimack River, and of the first encampment 
 on the other side, were even said to be fixed upon. ^Yhen 
 we consider that there could not have been more than a 
 score of slaves in the settlement, the excitement into which 
 the inhabitants were thrown by this absurd rumor of 
 conspiracy seems not very unlike that of a convocation of 
 small planters in a backwoods settlement in South Caro 
 lina on finding an antislavery newspaper in their weekly 
 mail bag. 
 
 In 1709 Colonel Saltonstall, of Haverhill, had several 
 negroes, and among them a high-spirited girl, who, for 
 some alleged misdemeanor, was severely chastised. The 
 slave resolved upon revenge for her injury, and soon found 
 the means of obtaining it. The colonel had on hand, for 
 service in the Indian war then raging, a considerable store 
 of gunpowder. This she placed under the room in which 
 her master and mistress slept, laid a long train, and 
 dropped a coal on it. She had barely time to escape to 
 the farm house before the explosion took place, shattering 
 the stately mansion into fragments. Saltonstall and his 
 wife were carried on their bed a considerable distance, 
 happily escaping serious injury. Some soldiers stationed 
 in the house were scattered in all directions ; but no lives 
 were lost. The colonel, on recovering from the effects 
 
92 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of his sudden overturn, hastened to the farm house and 
 found his servants all up save the author of the mischief, 
 who was snug in bed and apparently in a quiet sleep. 
 
 In 1701 an attempt was made in the general court of 
 Massachusetts to prevent the increase of slaves. Judge 
 Sewall soon after published a pamphlet against slavery, 
 but, it seems with little effect. Boston merchants and ship 
 owners became to a considerable extent involved in the 
 slave trade. Distilleries established in that place and in 
 Rhode Island furnished rum for the African market. The 
 slaves were usually taken to the West Indies ; although 
 occasionally part of a cargo found its way to New Eng 
 land, where the wholesome old laws against man stealing 
 had become a dead letter on the statute book. 
 
 In 1767 a bill was brought before the legislature of 
 Massachusetts to prevent " the unwarrantable and unr 
 natural custom of enslaving mankind." The council of 
 Governor Bernard sent it back to the house greatly 
 changed and curtailed, and it was lost by the disagree 
 ment of the two branches. Governor Bernard threw his 
 influence on the side of slavery. In 1774 a bill pro 
 hibiting the traffic in slaves passed both houses ; but Gov 
 ernor Hutchinson withheld his assent and dismissed the 
 legislature. The colored men sent a deputation of their 
 own to the governor to solicit his consent to the bill ; but 
 he told them his instructions forbade him. A similar 
 
A CHAPTER OF HISTORY. 93 
 
 committee waiting upon General Gage received the same 
 answer. 
 
 In the year 1770 a servant of Richard Lechmere, of 
 Cambridge, stimulated by the general discussion of the 
 slavery question and by the advice of some of the zealous 
 advocates of emancipation, brought an action against his 
 master for detaining him in bondage. The suit was 
 decided in his favor two years before the similar decision 
 in the case of Somerset in England. The funds necessary 
 for carrying on this suit were raised among the blacks 
 themselves. Other suits followed in various parts of the 
 province ; and the result was, in every instance, the freedom 
 of the plaintiff. In 1773 Ca?sar Hendrick sued his mas 
 ter, one Greenleaf, of Newburyport, for damages, laid at 
 fifty pounds, for holding him as a slave. The jury 
 awarded him his freedom and eighteen pounds. 
 
 According to Dr. Belknap, whose answer to the queries 
 on the subject, propounded by Judge Tucker, of Virginia, 
 have furnished us with many of the facts above stated, the 
 principal grounds upon which the counsel of the masters 
 depended wer.e, that the negroes were purchased in open 
 market, and included in the bills of sale like other prop 
 erty ; that slavery was sanctioned by usage ; and, finally, 
 that the laws of the province recognized its existence by 
 making masters liable for the maintenance of their slaves, 
 or servants. 
 
94 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 On the part of the blacks, the law and usage of the 
 mother country, confirmed by the great charter, that no 
 man can be deprived of his liberty but by the judgment 
 of his peers, were effectually pleaded. The early laws of 
 the province prohibited slavery, and no subsequent legis 
 lation had sanctioned it ; for, although the laws did recog 
 nize its existence, they did so only to mitigate and modify 
 an admitted evil. 
 
 The present state constitution was established in 1780. 
 The first article of the Bill of Rights prohibited slavery 
 by affirming the foundation truth of our republic, that " all 
 men are born free and equal." The supreme court de 
 cided in 1783 that no man could hold another as property 
 without a direct violation of that article. 
 
 In 1788 three free black citizens of Boston were kid 
 napped and sold into slavery in one of the French islands. 
 An intense excitement followed. Governor Hancock took 
 efficient measures for reclaiming the unfortunate men. 
 The clergy of Boston petitioned the legislature for a total 
 prohibition of the foreign slave trade. The society of 
 Friends, and the blacks generally, presented similar pe 
 titions ; and the same year an act was passed prohibiting 
 the slave trade and granting relief to persons kidnapped 
 or decoyed out of the commonwealth. The fear of a 
 burden to the state from the influx of negroes from abroad 
 led the legislature, in connection with this law, to prevent 
 
A CHAPTER OF HISTORY. 95 
 
 those who were not citizens of the state or of other states 
 from gaining a residence. 
 
 The first case of the arrest of a fugitive slave in 
 Massachusetts under the law of 1793 took place in 
 Boston soon after the passage of the law. It is the case 
 to which President Quincy alludes in his late letter 
 against the fugitive slave law. The populace at the 
 trial aided the slave to escape, and nothing further was 
 done about it, 
 
 The arrest of George Latimer as a slave in Boston, and 
 his illegal confinement in jail, in 1842, led to the passage 
 of the law of 1843 for the "protection of personal lib 
 erty," prohibiting state officers from arresting or detain 
 ing persons claimed as slaves, and the use of the jails of 
 the commonwealth for their confinement. This law was 
 strictly in accordance with the decision of the supreme 
 judiciary in the case of Prigg vs. The State of Pennsyl 
 vania, that the reclaiming of fugitives was a matter exclu 
 sively belonging to the general government ; yet that the 
 state officials might, if they saw fit, carry into effect the 
 law of Congress on the subject, "unless prohibited by 
 state legislation." 
 
 It will be seen by the facts we have adduced that 
 slavery in Massachusetts never had a legal existence. 
 The ermine of the judiciary of the Puritan state has never 
 been sullied by the admission of its detestable claims. It 
 
96 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 crept into the commonwealth like other evils and vices, 
 but never succeeded in clothing itself with the sanction 
 and authority of law. It stood only upon its own execra 
 ble foundation of robbery and wrong. 
 
 With a history like this to look back upon, is it strange 
 that the people of Massachusetts at the present day are 
 unwilling to see their time-honored defences of personal 
 freedom, the good old safeguards of Saxon liberty, over 
 ridden and swept away after the summary fashion of " the 
 fugitive slave bill ; " that they should loathe and scorn 
 the task which that bill imposes upon them of aiding 
 professional slave hunters in seizing, fettering, and con 
 signing to bondage men and women accused only of that 
 which commends them to esteem and sympathy, love 
 of liberty and hatred of slavery ; that they cannot at 
 once adjust themselves to "constitutional duties" which 
 in South Carolina and Georgia are reserved for trained 
 bloodhounds ? Surely, in view of what Massachusetts 
 has been, and her strong bias in favor of human freedom, 
 derived from her greathearted founders, it is to be hoped 
 that the executive and cabinet at Washington will grant 
 her some little respite, some space for turning, some 
 opportunity for conquering her prejudices before letting 
 loose the dogs of war upon her. Let them give her 
 time, and treat with forbearance her hesitation, qualms of 
 conscience, and wounded pride. Her people, indeed, are 
 
A CHAPTER OF HISTORY. 97 
 
 awkward in the work of slave catching, and, it would 
 seem, rendered but indifferent service in a late hunt in 
 Boston. Whether they would do better under the sur 
 veillance of the army and navy of the United States, 
 is a question which we leave with the president and his 
 secretary of state. General Putnam once undertook to 
 drill a company of Quakers, and instruct them, by force 
 of arms, in the art and mystery of fighting ; but not a 
 single pair of drab-colored breeches moved at his "for 
 ward march ; " not a broad beaver wheeled at his word 
 of command; no hand unclosed to receive a proffered 
 musket. Patriotic appeal, hard swearing, and prick, of 
 bayonet had no effect upon these impracticable raw re 
 cruits; and the stout general gave them up in despair. 
 We are inclined to believe that any attempt on, the part 
 of the Commander-in-chief of our army and navy to con 
 vert the good people of Massachusetts into expert slave 
 catchers, under the discipline of West Point and Norfolk, 
 would prove as idle an experiment as that of Genera! 
 Putnam upon the Quakers. 
 7 
 
FAME AND GLORY.* 
 
 THE learned and eloquent author of the pamphlet lying 
 before us with the above title belongs to a class, happily 
 on the increase in our country, who venture to do homage 
 to unpopular truths in defiance of the social and politi 
 cal tyranny of opinion which has made so many of our 
 statesmen, orators, and divines the mere playthings and 
 shuttlecocks of popular impulses for evil far oftener than 
 for good. His first production, the True Grandeur of 
 Nations, written for the anniversary of American inde 
 pendence, was not more remarkable for its evidences of a 
 highly cultivated taste and wide historical research than 
 for its inculcation of a high morality the demand for 
 practical Christianity in nations as well as individuals. 
 It burned no incense under the nostrils of an already in 
 flated and vain people. It gratified them by no rhetorical 
 falsehoods about " the land of the free and the home of 
 the brave." It did not apostrophize military heroes, nor 
 
 * An address before the Literary Society of Amherst College, by 
 
 Charles Sumner. 
 
 (98) 
 

 
 FAME AND GLORY. 99 
 
 strut " red wat shod " over the plains of battle, nor call 
 up, like another Ezekiel, from the valley of vision the 
 dry bones thereof. It uttered none of the precious 
 scoundrel cant, so much in vogue after the annexation of 
 Texas was determined upon, about the destiny of the 
 United States to enter in and possess the lands of all 
 whose destiny it is to live next us, and to plant every 
 where the " peculiar institutions " of a peculiarly Chris 
 tian and chosen people, the land-stealing propensity of 
 whose progressive republicanism is declared to be in ac 
 cordance with the will and by the grace of God, and 
 who, like the Scotch freebooter, 
 
 " Pattering an Ave Mary 
 "When he rode on a border forray," 
 
 while trampling on the rights of a sister republic, and re 
 creating slavery where that republic had abolished it, talk 
 piously of " the designs of Providence " and the Anglo- 
 Saxon instrumentalities thereof in "extending the area 
 of freedom." On the contrary, the author portrayed the 
 evils of war and proved its incompatibility with Christian 
 ity contrasting with its ghastly triumphs the mild victo 
 ries of peace and love. Our true mission, he taught, was 
 not to act over in the new world the barbarous game which 
 has desolated the old ; but to offer to the nations of the 
 earth warring and discordant, oppressed and oppress- 
 
100 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 ing the beautiful example of a free and happy people 
 studying the things which make for peace democracy 
 and Christianity walking hand in hand, blessing and being 
 blessed. 
 
 His next public effort an address before the Literary 
 Society of his alma mater was in the same vein. He 
 improved the occasion of the recent death of four distin 
 guished members of that fraternity to delineate his beauti 
 ful ideal of the jurist, the scholar, the artist, and the phi 
 lanthropist, aided by the models furnished by the lives of 
 such men as Pickering, Story, Allston, and Channing. 
 Here, also, he makes greatness to consist of goodness : 
 war and slavery and all their offspring of evil are sur 
 veyed in the light of the morality of the New Testament. 
 He looks hopefully forward to the coming of that day when 
 the sword shall devour no longer, when labor shall grind 
 no longer in the prison house, and the peace and freedom 
 of a realized and acted-out Christianity shall overspread 
 the earth, and the golden age predicted by the seers and 
 poets alike of paganism and Christianity shall become a 
 reality. 
 
 The address now before us, with the same general 
 object in view, is more direct and practical. We can 
 scarcely conceive of a discourse better adapted to prepare 
 the young American, just issuing from his collegiate re 
 tirement, for the duties and responsibilities of citizenship. 
 
FAME AND GLORY. 101 
 
 It treats the desire of fame and honor as one native to 
 the human heart, felt to a certain extent by all as a part 
 of our common being a motive, although by no means 
 the most exalted, of human conduct ; and the lesson it 
 would inculcate is, that no true and permanent fame can 
 be founded except in labors which promote the happiness 
 of mankind. To use the language of Dr. South, " God 
 is the fountain of honor ; the conduit by which he con 
 veys it to the sons of men are virtuous and generous 
 practices." The author presents the beautiful examples 
 of St. Pierre, Milton, Howard, and Clarkson -men whose 
 fame rests on the firm foundation of goodness for the 
 study and imitation of the young candidate for that true 
 glory which belongs to those who live, not for themselves, 
 but for their race. " Neither present fame, nor war, nor 
 power, nor wealth, nor knowledge alone shall secure an 
 entrance to the true and noble Valhalla. There shall be 
 gathered only those who have toiled each in his vocation 
 for the welfare of others." " Justice and benevolence are 
 higher than knowledge and power. It is by his goodness 
 that God is most truly known ; so also is the great man. 
 When Moses said to the Lord, Show me thy glory, the 
 the Lord said, I will make all my goodness pass before 
 thee." 
 
 "We copy the closing paragraph of the address, the 
 inspiring sentiment of which will find a response in all 
 generous and hopeful hearts : 
 
102 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 " Let us reverse the very poles of the worship of past 
 ages. Men have thus far bowed down before stocks, 
 stones, insects, crocodiles, golden calves graven images, 
 often of cunning workmanship, wrought with Phidian 
 skill, of ivory, of ebony, of marble, but all false gods. 
 Let them worship in future the true God, our Father, 
 as he is in heaven and in the beneficent labors of his 
 children on earth. Then farewell to the siren song 
 of a worldly ambition ! Farewell to the vain desire of 
 mere literary success or oratorical display ! Farewell to 
 the distempered longings for office ! Farewell to the dis 
 mal, bloodred phantom of martial renown ! Fame and 
 glory may then continue, as in times past, the reflection 
 of public opinion ; but of an opinion sure and steadfast, 
 without change or fickleness, enlightened by those two 
 suns of Christian truth love to God and love to man. 
 From the serene illumination of these duties all the forms 
 of selfishness shall retreat like evil spirits at the dawn 
 of day. Then shall the happiness of the poor and lowly 
 and the education of the ignorant have uncounted friends. 
 The cause of those who are in prison shall find fresh 
 voices ; the majesty of peace other vindicators ; the suf 
 ferings of the slave new and gushing floods of sympathy. 
 Then, at last, shall the brotherhood of mankind stand con 
 fessed ; ever filling the souls of all with a more generous 
 life ; ever prompting to deeds of beneficence ; conquer- 
 
FAME AND GLORY. 103 
 
 ing the heathen prejudices of country, color, and race ; 
 guiding the judgment of the historian ; animating the 
 verse of the poet and the eloquence of the orator ; enno 
 bling human thought and conduct ; and inspiring those 
 good works by which alone we may attain to the heights 
 of true glory. Good works ! Such even now is the 
 heavenly ladder on which angels are ascending and de 
 scending, while weary humanity, on pillows of stone, 
 slumbers heavily at its feet." 
 
 "We know how easy it is to sneer at such anticipations 
 of a better future as baseless and visionary. The shrewd 
 but narrow-eyed man of the world laughs at the sugges 
 tion that there can be any stronger motive than selfish 
 ness, any higher morality than that of the broker s 
 board. The man who relies for salvation from the con 
 sequences of an evil and selfish life upon the verbal or 
 thodoxy of a creed, presents the depravity and weakness 
 of human nature as insuperable obstacles in the way of 
 the general amelioration of the condition of a world lying 
 in wickedness. He counts it heretical and dangerous to 
 act upon the supposition that the same human nature 
 which, in his own case and that of his associates, can con 
 front all perils, overcome all obstacles, and outstrip the 
 whirlwind in the pursuit of gain, which makes the 
 strong elements its servants, taming and subjugating the 
 very lightnings of heaven to work out its own purposes 
 
104 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of self-aggrandizement, must necessarily and by an or 
 dination of Providence become weak as water when en 
 gaged in works of love and good will, looking for the 
 coming of a better day for humanity, with faith in the 
 promises of the gospel, and relying upon Him, who in call 
 ing man to the great task field of duty, has not mocked 
 him with the mournful necessity of laboring in vain. 
 We have been pained more than words can express to 
 see young, generous hearts, yearning with strong desires 
 to consecrate themselves to the cause of their fellow-men, 
 checked and chilled by the ridicule of worldly-wise con 
 servatism and the solemn rebukes of practical infidelity 
 in the guise of a piety which professes to love the unseen 
 Father while disregarding the claims of his visible chil 
 dren. Visionary ! Were not the good St. Pierre, and 
 Fenelon, and Howard, and Clarkson visionaries also ? 
 
 What was John Woolman, to the wise and prudent of 
 his day, but an amiable enthusiast ? What to those of 
 our own is such an angel of mercy as Dorothea Dix ? 
 Who will not, in view of the labors of such philanthro 
 pists, adopt the language of Jonathan Edwards : " If these 
 things be enthusiasms and the fruits of a distempered 
 brain, let my brain be evermore possessed with this happy 
 distemper " ? 
 
 It must, however, be confessed that there is a cant of 
 philanthrophy too general and abstract for any practical 
 
FAME AND GLORY. 105 
 
 purpose, a morbid sentimentalism, which contents it 
 self with whining over real or imaginary present evil and 
 predicting a better state somewhere in the future, but 
 really doing nothing to remove the one or hasten the 
 coming of the other. To its view the present condition 
 of things is all wrong; no green hillock or twig rises 
 over the waste deluge ; the heaven above is utterly dark 
 and starless : yet somehow out of this darkness which 
 may be felt the light is to burst forth miraculously ; 
 wrong, sin, pain, and sorrow are to be banished from the 
 renovated world, and earth become a vast epicurean gar 
 den or Mahometan heaven. 
 
 " The land, unploughed, shall yield her crop ; 
 Pure honey from the oak shall drop ; 
 
 The fountain shall run milk ; 
 The thistle shall the lily bear ; 
 And every bramble roses wear, 
 
 And every worm make silk." * 
 
 There are, in short, perfectionist reformers as well as 
 religionists, who wait to see the salvation which it is the 
 task of humanity itself to work out, and who look down 
 from a region of ineffable self-complacence on their dusty 
 and toiling brethren who are resolutely doing whatsoever 
 their hands find to do for the removal of the evils around 
 them. 
 
 * Ben Jonson s Golden Age Restored. 
 
106 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 The emblem of practical Christianity is the Samaritan 
 stooping over the wounded Jew. No fastidious hand can 
 lift from the dust fallen humanity and bind up its unsight 
 ly gashes. Sentimental lamentation over evil and suf 
 fering may be indulged in until it becomes a. sort of mel 
 ancholy luxury, like the "weeping for Thammuz" by the 
 apostate daughters of Jerusalem. Our faith in a better 
 day for the race is strong ; but we feel quite sure it will 
 come in spite of such abstract reformers, and not by reason 
 of them. The evils which possess humanity are of a kind 
 which go not out by their delicate appliances. 
 
 The author of the address under consideration is not of 
 this class. He has boldly, and at no small cost, grappled 
 with the great social and political wrong of our country 
 chattel slavery. Looking, as we have seen, hopefully to 
 the future, he is nevertheless one of those who can re 
 spond to the words of a true poet and true man : 
 
 " He is a coward who would borrow 
 
 A charm against the present sorrow 
 From the vague future s promise of delight ; 
 As life s alarums nearer roll, 
 The ancestral buckler calls, 
 Self-clanging, from the walls 
 In the high temple of the soul ! " * 
 
 * Russell Lowell. 
 
FANATICISM. 
 
 THERE are occasionally deeds committed almost too 
 horrible and revolting for publication. The tongue falters 
 in giving them utterance ; the pen trembles that records 
 them. Such is the ghastly horror of a late tragedy in 
 Edgecomb, in the State of Maine. A respectable and 
 thriving citizen and his wife had been for some years 
 very unprofitably engaged in brooding over the mysteries 
 of the Apocalypse and in speculations upon the personal 
 coming of Christ and the temporal reign of the saints 
 on earth a sort of Mahometan paradise, which has as 
 little warrant in Scripture as in reason. Their minds of 
 necessity became unsettled ; they meditated self-destruc 
 tion ; and, as it appears by a paper left behind in the 
 handwriting of both, came to an agreement that the hus 
 band should first kill his wife and their four children and 
 then put an end to his own existence. This was literally 
 executed the miserable man striking off the heads of his 
 wife and children with his axe and then cutting his own 
 throat. 
 
 (107) 
 
108 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Alas for man when he turns from the light of reason 
 and from the simple and clearly defined duties of the 
 present life and undertakes to pry into the mysteries of 
 the future, bewildering himself with uncertain and vague 
 prophecies, Oriental imagery and obscure Hebrew texts ! 
 Simple, cheerful faith in God as our great and good 
 Father, and love of his children as our own brethren, acted 
 out in all relations and duties, is certainly best for this 
 world, and we believe also the best preparation for that to 
 come. Once possessed by the falsity that God s design 
 is that man should be wretched and gloomy here in order 
 to obtain rest and happiness hereafter; that the mental 
 agonies and bodily tortures of his creatures are pleasant 
 to him; that, after bestowing upon us reason for our 
 guidance, he makes it of no avail by interposing contra 
 dictory revelations and arbitrary commands, there is 
 nothing to prevent one of a melancholic and excitable 
 temperament from excesses so horrible as almost to jus 
 tify the old belief in demoniac obsession. 
 
 Charles Brockden Brown a writer whose merits have 
 not yet been sufficiently acknowledged has given a 
 powerful and philosophical analysis of this morbid state 
 of mind this diseased conscientiousness, obeying the 
 mad suggestions of a disordered brain as the injunctions 
 of divinity in his remarkable story of Wieland. The 
 hero of this strange and solemn romance, inheriting a 
 
FANATICISM. 109 
 
 melancholy and superstitious mental constitution, becomes 
 in middle age the victim of a deep, and tranquil because 
 deep, fanaticism. A demon in human form, perceiving 
 his state of mind, wantonly experiments upon it, deepen 
 ing and intensating it by a fearful series of illusions of 
 sight and sound. Tricks of jugglery and ventriloquism 
 seem to his feverish fancies miracles and omens the 
 eye and the voice of the Almighty piercing the atmos 
 phere of supernatural mystery in which he has long 
 dwelt. He believes that he is called upon to sacrifice the 
 beloved wife of his bosom as a testimony of the entire 
 subjugation of his carnal reason and earthly affections to 
 the divine will. In the entire range of English literature 
 there is no more thrilling passage than that which describes 
 the execution of this baleful suggestion. The coloring of 
 the picture is an intermingling of the lights of heaven and 
 hell soft shades of tenderest pity and warm tints of 
 unextinguishable love contrasting with the terrible out 
 lines of an insane and cruel purpose, traced with the 
 blood of murder. The masters of the old Greek tragedy 
 have scarcely exceeded the sublime horror of this scene 
 from the American novelist. The murderer confronted 
 with his gentle and loving victim in her chamber; her 
 anxious solicitude for his health and quiet ; her affec 
 tionate caress of welcome ; his own relentings and natu 
 ral shrinking from his dreadful purpose ; and the terrible 
 
110 RECREATIONS AND 3IISCELLANIES. 
 
 strength which he supposes is lent him of Heaven, by 
 which he puts down the promptings and yearnings of his 
 human heart and is enabled to execute the mandate of 
 an inexorable Being, are described with an intensity 
 which almost stops the heart of the reader. When the 
 deed is done a frightful conflict of passions takes place, 
 which can only be told in the words of the author : 
 
 " I lifted the corpse in my arms and laid it on the bed. 
 I gazed upon it with delight. Such was my elation that 
 I even broke out into laughter. I clapped my hands and 
 exclaimed, It is done ! My sacred duty is fulfilled ! To 
 that I have sacrificed, God, thy last and best gift, 
 my wife ! 
 
 " For a while I thus soared above frailty. I imagined 
 I had set myself forever beyond the reach of selfishness. 
 But my imaginations were false. This rapture quickly 
 subsided. I looked again at my wife. My joyous ebulli 
 tions vanished. I asked myself who it was whom I saw. 
 Methought it could not be my Catharine ; it could not be 
 the woman who had lodged for years in my heart ; who 
 had slept nightly in my bosom ; who had borne in her 
 womb and fostered at her breast the beings who called 
 me father ; whom I had watched over with delight and 
 cherished with a fondness ever new and perpetually grow 
 ing. It could not be the same ! 
 
 " The breath of heaven that sustained me was with- 
 
FANATICISM. Ill 
 
 drawn, and I sunk into mere man. I leaped from the 
 floor ; I dashed my head against the wall ; I uttered 
 screams of horror; I panted after torment and pain. 
 Eternal fire and the bickerings of hell, compared with 
 what I felt, were music and a bed of roses. 
 
 " I thank my God that this was transient ; that he 
 designed once more to raise me aloft. I thought upon 
 what I had done as a sacrifice to duty, and was calm. My 
 wife was dead ; but I reflected that, although this source 
 of human consolation was closed, others were still open. 
 If the transports of the husband were no more, the feel 
 ings of the father had still scope for exercise. When 
 remembrance of their mother should excite too keen a 
 pang, I would look upon my children and be comforted. 
 
 " While I revolved these things new warmth flowed in 
 upon my heart. I was wrong. These feelings were the 
 growth of selfishness. Of this I was not aware ; and, to 
 dispel the mist that obscured my perceptions, a new light 
 and a new mandate were necessary. 
 
 " From these thoughts I was recalled by a ray which 
 was shot into the room. A voice spoke like that I had 
 before heard, * Thou hast done well ; but all is not done 
 the sacrifice is incomplete thy children must be 
 offered they must perish with their mother ! : 
 
 The misguided man obeys the voice ; his children are 
 destroyed in their bloom and innocent beauty. He is 
 
112 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 arrested, tried for murder, and acquitted as insane. The 
 light breaks in upon him at last; he discovers the im 
 posture which has controlled him ; and, made desperate 
 by the full consciousness of his folly and crime, ends the 
 terrible drama by suicide. 
 
 Wieland is not a pleasant book. In one respect it 
 resembles the modern tale of Wuthering .Heights; it has 
 great strength and power, but no beauty. Unlike that, 
 however, it has an important and salutary moral. It is a 
 warning to all who tamper with the mind and rashly 
 experiment upon its religious element. As such, its 
 perusal by the sectarian zealots of all classes would 
 perhaps be quite as profitable as much of their present 
 studies. 
 
THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. 
 
 THE picturesque site of the now large village of Ha- 
 verhill, on the Merrimac River, was occupied a century 
 and a half ago by some thirty dwellings, scattered at un 
 equal distances along the two principal roads, one of 
 which, running parallel with the river, intersected the 
 other, which ascended the hill northwardly and lost itself 
 in the -dark woods. The log huts of the first settlers had 
 at that time given place to comparatively spacious and 
 commodious habitations, framed and covered with sawed 
 boards, and cloven clapboards, or shingles. They were, 
 many of them, two stories in front, with the roof sloping 
 off behind to a single one ; the windows few and small, 
 and frequently so fitted as to be opened with difficulty, 
 and affording but a scanty supply of light and air. Two 
 or three of the best constructed were occupied as garri 
 sons, where, in addition to the family, small companies of 
 soldiers were quartered. On the high grounds rising 
 from the river stood the mansions of the well-defined 
 aristocracy of the little settlement larger and more im- 
 8 
 
114 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 posing, with projecting upper stories and carved cornices. 
 On the front of one of these, over the elaborately wrought 
 entablature of the doorway, might be seen the armorial 
 bearings of the honored family of Saltonstall. Its hos 
 pitable door was now closed; no guests filled its spacious 
 hall or partook of the rich delicacies of its ample larder. 
 Death had been there ; its venerable and respected occu 
 pant had just been borne by his peers in rank and station 
 to the neighboring graveyard. Learned, affable, intrepid, 
 a sturdy asserter of the rights and liberties of the prov 
 ince, and so far in advance of his time as to refuse to 
 yield to the terrible witchcraft delusion, vacating his 
 seat on the bench and openly expressing his disapproba 
 tion of the violent and sanguinary proceedings .of the 
 court, wise in council and prompt in action, not his 
 own townsmen alone, but the people of the entire prov 
 ince, had reason to mourn the loss of Nathaniel Sal 
 tonstall. 
 
 Four years before the events of which we are about to 
 speak the Indian allies of the French in Canada suddenly 
 made their appearance in the westerly part of the settle 
 ment. At the close of a midwinter day six savages 
 rushed into the open gate of a garrison house owned by 
 one Bradley, who appears to have been absent at the 
 time. A sentinel stationed in the house discharged his 
 musket, killing the foremost Indian, and was himself 
 
THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. 115 
 
 instantly shot down. The mistress of the house, a spirited 
 young woman, was making soap in a large kettle over 
 the fire. She seized her ladle and dashed the boiling 
 liquid in the faces of the assailants, scalding one of them 
 severely, and was only captured after such a resistance as 
 can scarcely be conceived of by the delicately framed and 
 tenderly nurtured occupants of the places of our great- 
 grandmothers. After plundering the house, the Indians 
 started on their long winter march for Canada. Tradition 
 says that some thirteen persons, probably women and 
 children, were killed outright at the garrison. Goodwife 
 Bradley and four others were spared as prisoners. The 
 ground was covered with deep snow, and the captives 
 were compelled to carry heavy burdens of their plundered 
 household stuffs ; while for many days in succession they 
 had no other sustenance than bits of hide, ground nuts, 
 the bark of trees, and the roots of wild onions and lilies. 
 In this situation, in the cold, wintry forest, and unattended, 
 the unhappy young woman gave birth to a child. Its 
 cries irritated the savages, who cruelly treated it and 
 threatened its life. To the entreaties of the mother they 
 replied, that they would spare it on the condition that it 
 should be baptized after their fashion. She gave the 
 little innocent into their hands, when with mock solemnity 
 they made the sign of the cross upon its forehead by 
 gashing it with their knives, and afterwards barbarously 
 
116 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 put it to death before the eyes of its mother, seeming to 
 regard the whole matter as an excellent piece of sport. 
 Kothing so strongly excited the risibilities of these grim 
 barbarians as the tears and cries of their victims extorted 
 by physical or mental agony. Capricious alike in their 
 cruelties and their kindnesses, they treated some of their 
 captives with forbearance and consideration and tor 
 mented others apparently without cause. One man on 
 his way to Canada was killed because they did not like 
 his looks, "he ivas so sour;" another because he was 
 " old and good for nothing." One of their own number, 
 who was suffering greatly from the effects of the scalding 
 soap, was derided and mocked as a " fool who had let a 
 squaw whip him ; " while on the other hand the energy 
 and spirit manifested by Goodwife Bradley in her defence 
 was a constant theme of admiration, and gained her so 
 much respect among her captors as to protect her from 
 personal injury or insult. On her arrival in Canada she 
 was sold to a French farmer, by whom she was kindly 
 treated. 
 
 In the mean time her husband made every exertion in 
 his power to ascertain her fate, and early in the next year 
 learned that she was a slave in Canada. He immediately 
 set off through the wilderness on foot, accompanied only 
 by his dog, who drew a small sled, upon which he carried 
 some provisions for his sustenance, and a bag of snuff , 
 
THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. 117 
 
 which the governor of the province gave him as a present" 
 to the governor of Canada. After encountering almost 
 incredible hardships and dangers with a perseverance 
 which shows how well he appreciated the good qualities 
 of his stolen helpmate, he reached Montreal and betook 
 himself to the governor s residence. Travel-worn, ragged, 
 and wasted with cold and hunger, he was ushered into the 
 presence of M. Vaudreuil. The courtly Frenchman civ 
 illy received the gift of the bag of snuff, listened to the 
 poor fellow s story, and put him in a way to redeem his 
 wife without difficulty. The joy of the latter on seeing 
 her husband in the strange land of her captivity may 
 well be imagined. They returned by water, landing at 
 Boston early in the summer. 
 
 There is a tradition that this was not the goodwife s 
 first experience of Indian captivity. The late Dr. Abiel 
 Abbott, in his manuscript of Judith Whiting s Recollec 
 tions of the Indian Wars, states that she had previously 
 been a prisoner, probably before her marriage. After 
 her return she lived quietly at the garrison house until 
 the summer of the next year. One bright moonlit night 
 a party of Indians were seen silently and cautiously 
 approaching. The only occupants of the garrison at that 
 time were Bradley, his wife and children, and a servant. 
 The three adults armed themselves with muskets . and 
 prepared to defend themselves. Goodwife Bradley, sup- 
 
118 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 posing the Indians had come with the intention of again 
 capturing her, encouraged her husband to fight to the last, 
 declaring that she had rather die on her own hearth than 
 fall into their hands. The Indians rushed upon the gar 
 rison, and assailed the thick oaken door, which they forced 
 partly open, when a well-aimed shot from Goodwife Brad 
 ley laid the foremost dead on the threshold. The loss of 
 their leader so disheartened them that they made a hasty 
 retreat. 
 
 The year 1707 passed away without any attack upon 
 the exposed frontier settlement. A feeling of compara 
 tive security succeeded to the almost sleepless anxiety 
 and terror of its inhabitants ; and they were beginning 
 to congratulate each other upon the termination of their 
 long and bitter trials. But the end was not yet. 
 
 Early in the spring of 1708 the principal tribes of 
 Indians in alliance with the French held a great council 
 and agreed to furnish three hundred warriors for an expe 
 dition to the English frontier. They were joined by one 
 hundred French Canadians and several volunteers, con 
 sisting of officers of the French army, and younger sons 
 of the nobility, adventurous and unscrupulous. The Sieur 
 de Chaillons, and Hertel de Rouville, distinguished as a 
 partisan in former expeditions, cruel and unsparing as his 
 Indian allies, commanded the French troops ; the Indians, 
 marshalled under their several chiefs, obeyed the general 
 
THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. 119 
 
 orders of La Perriere. A Catholic priest accompanied 
 them. De Rouville, with the French troops and a portion 
 of the Indians, took the route by the River St. Fra^ois 
 about the middle of summer. La Perriere, with the 
 French Mohawks, crossed Lake Champlain. The place 
 of rendezvous was Lake Nickisipigue. On the way a 
 Huron accidentally killed one of his companions; where 
 upon the tribe insisted on halting and holding a council. 
 It was gravely decided that this accident was an evil 
 omen and that the expedition would prove disastrous ; 
 and, in spite of the endeavors of the French officers, the 
 whole band deserted. Next the Mohawks became dis 
 satisfied and refused to proceed. To the entreaties and 
 promises of their French allies they replied that an 
 infectious disease had broken out among them, and that, 
 if they remained, it would spread through the whole 
 army. The French partisans were not deceived by a 
 falsehood so transparent ; but they were in no condition 
 to enforce obedience ; and, with bitter execrations and 
 reproaches, they saw the Mohawks turn back on their 
 war path. The diminished army pressed on to Nick 
 isipigue, in the expectation of meeting, agreeably to their 
 promise, the Norridgewock and Penobscot Indians. They 
 found the place deserted, and, after waiting for some days, 
 were forced to the conclusion that the eastern tribes had 
 broken their pledge of cooperation Under these circum- 
 
120 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 stances a council was held ; and the original design of the 
 expedition, viz., the destruction of the whole line of 
 frontier towns, beginning with Portsmouth, was aban 
 doned. They had still a sufficient force for the surprise 
 of a single settlement ; and Haverhill, on the Merrimac, 
 was selected for conquest. 
 
 In the mean time intelligence of the expedition, greatly 
 exaggerated in point of numbers and object, had reached 
 Boston, and Governor Dudley had despatched troops to 
 the more exposed outposts of the provinces of Massa 
 chusetts and New Hampshire. Forty men, under the 
 command of Major Turner and Captains Price and Gard 
 ner, were stationed at Haverhill in the different garrison 
 houses. At first a good degree of vigilance was mani 
 fested ; but, as days and weeks passed without any alarm, 
 the inhabitants relapsed into their old habits ; and some 
 even began to believe that the rumored descent of the 
 Indians was only a pretext for quartering upon them two 
 score of lazy, rollicking soldiers, who certainly seemed 
 more expert in making love to their daughters and drink 
 ing their best ale and cider than in patrolling the woods 
 or putting the garrisons into a defensible state. The 
 grain and hay harvest ended without disturbance ; the 
 men worked in their fields, and the women pursued their 
 household avocations, without any very serious appre 
 hension of danger. 
 
THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. 121 
 
 Among the inhabitants of the village was an eccentric, 
 ne er-do-well fellow, named Keezar, who led a wandering, 
 unsettled life, oscillating, like a crazy pendulum, between 
 Haverhill and Amesbury. He had a smattering of a 
 variety of trades, was a famous wrestler, and for a mug 
 of ale would leap over an ox cart with the unspilled 
 beverage in his hand. On one occasion, when at supper, 
 his wife complained that she had no tin dishes ; and, as 
 there were none to be obtained nearer than Boston, he 
 started on foot in the evening, travelled through the 
 woods to the city, and returned with his ware by sunrise 
 the next morning, passing over a distance of between 
 sixty and seventy miles. The tradition of his strange 
 habits, feats of strength, and wicked practical jokes is 
 still common in his native town. On the morning of the 
 29th of the eighth month he was engaged in taking home 
 his horse, which, according to his custom, he had turned 
 into his neighbor s rich clover field the evening previous. 
 By the gray light of dawn he saw a long file of men 
 marching silently towards the town. He hurried back to 
 the village and gave the alarm by firing a gun. Pre 
 vious to this, however, a young man belonging to a neigh 
 boring town, who had been spending the night with a 
 young woman of the village, had met the advance of the 
 war party, and, turning back in extreme terror and con 
 fusion, .thought only of the safety of his betrothed, and 
 
122 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 passed silently through a considerable part of the village 
 to her dwelling. After he had effectually concealed her 
 he ran out to give the alarm. But it was too late. 
 Keezar s gun was answered by the terrific yells, whistling, 
 and whooping of the Indians. House after house was 
 assailed and captured. Men, women, and children were 
 massacred. The minister of the town was killed by a 
 shot through his door. Two of his children were saved 
 by the courage and sagacity of his negro slave Hagar. 
 She carried them into the cellar and covered them with 
 tubs, and then crouched behind a barrel of meal just in 
 time to escape the vigilant eyes of the enemy, who 
 entered the cellar and plundered it. She saw them pass 
 and repass the tubs under which the children lay and 
 take meat from the very barrel which concealed herself. 
 Three soldiers were quartered in the house ; but they 
 made no defence, and were killed while begging for 
 quarter. 
 
 The wife of Thomas Hartshorne, after her husband 
 and three sons had fallen, took her younger children into 
 the cellar, leaving an infant on a bed in the garret, fear 
 ful that its cries would betray her place of concealment 
 if she took it with her. The Indians entered the garret 
 and tossed the child out of the window upon a pile of 
 clapboards, where it was afterwards found stunned and 
 insensible. It recovered, nevertheless, and became a man 
 
THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. 123 
 
 of remarkable strength and stature ; and it used to be a 
 standing joke with his friends that he had been stinted 
 by the Indians when they threw him out of the window. 
 Goodwife Swan, armed with a long spit, successfully 
 defended her door against two Indians. While the mas 
 sacre went on, the priest who accompanied the expedition, 
 with some of the French officers, went into the meeting 
 house, the walls of which were afterwards found written 
 over with chalk. At sunrise, Major Turner, with a por 
 tion of his soldiers, entered the village ; and the enemy 
 made a rapid retreat, carrying with them seventeen pris 
 oners. They were pursued and overtaken just as they 
 were entering the woods ; and a severe skirmish took 
 place, in which the rescue of some of the prisoners was 
 effected. Thirty of the enemy were left dead on the field, 
 including the infamous Hertel de Rouville. On the part 
 of the villagers, Captains Ayer and Wainwright and 
 Lieutenant Johnson, with thirteen others, were killed. 
 The intense heat of the weather made it necessary to 
 bury the dead on the same day. They were laid side by 
 side in a long trench in the burial ground. The body of 
 the venerated and lamented minister, with those of his 
 wife and child, sleep in another part of the burial ground, 
 where may still be seen a rude monument with its almost 
 illegible inscription : 
 
 " Clauditur hoc tumulo corpus Reverendi pii doctique 
 
]24 EECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 viri D. Benjamin Rolfe, ecclesice Christi quce est in 
 Haverhill pastoris fidelissimi ; qui domi suce ab hostibus 
 barbare trucidatus. A laboribus suis requievit mane did 
 sacrce quietis, Aug. XXIX, anno Dom. MD CO VIII. 
 jEtatis suce XL VI" 
 
 Of the prisoners taken, some escaped during the skir 
 mish, and two or three were sent back by the French 
 officers, with a message to the English soldiers, that, if 
 they pursued the party on their retreat to Canada, the 
 other prisoners should be put to death. One of them, a 
 soldier stationed in Captain Wainwright s garrison, on his 
 return four years after, published an account of his cap 
 tivity. He was compelled to carry a heavy pack, and 
 was led by an Indian by a cord, round his neck. The 
 whole party suffered terribly from hunger. On reaching 
 Canada the Indians shaved one side of his head, and 
 greased the other, and painted his face. At a fort nine 
 miles from Montreal a council was held in order to decide 
 his fate ; and he had the unenviable privilege of listening 
 to a protracted discussion upon the expediency of burning 
 him. The fire was already kindled, and the poor fellow 
 was preparing to meet his doom with firmness, when it 
 was announced to him that his life was spared. This 
 result of the council by no means satisfied the women and 
 boys, who had anticipated rare sport in the roasting of a 
 white man and a heretic. One squaw assailed him with 
 
THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. 125 
 
 a knife and cut off one of his fingers; another beat him 
 with a pole. The Indians spent the night in dancing and 
 singing, compelling their prisoner to go round the ring 
 with them. In the morning one of their orators made a 
 long speech to him, and formally delivered him over to an 
 old squaw, who took him to her wigwam and treated him 
 kindly. Two or three of the young women who were 
 carried away captive married Frenchmen in Canada and 
 never returned. Instances of this kind were by no means 
 rare during the Indian wars. The simple manners, gayety, 
 and social habits of the French colonists among whom 
 the captives were dispersed seem to have been peculiarly 
 fascinating to the daughters of the grave and severe 
 Puritans. 
 
 At the beginning of the present century, Judith Whi 
 ting was the solitary survivor of all who witnessed the 
 inroad of the French and Indians in 1708. She was 
 eight years of age at the time of the attack, and her 
 memory of it to the last was distinct and vivid. Upon 
 her old brain, from whence a great portion of the records 
 of the intervening years had been obliterated, that ter 
 rible picture, traced with fire and blood, retained its sharp 
 outlines and baleful colors. 
 
THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. 
 
 " The Frere into the dark gazed forth ; 
 The sounds went onward towards the north ; 
 The murmur of tongues, the tramp and tread 
 Of a mighty army to battle led." * 
 
 LIFE S tragedy and comedy are never far apart. The 
 ludicrous and the sublime, the grotesque and the pa 
 thetic, jostle each other on the stage ; the jester, with 
 his cap and bells, struts alongside of the hero ; the lord 
 mayor s pageant loses itself in the mob around Punch 
 and Judy; the pomp and circumstance of war become 
 mirth-provoking in a militia muster ; and the majesty of 
 the law is ridiculous in the mock dignity of a justice s 
 court. The laughing philosopher of old looked on one 
 side of life and his weeping contemporary on the other ; 
 but he who has an eye to both must often experience that 
 contrariety of feeling which Sterne compares to u the con 
 test in the moist eyelids of an April morning, whether to 
 laugh or cry." 
 
 * Ballad of the Cid. 
 
* THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. 127 
 
 The circumstance we are about to relate may serve as 
 an illustration of the way in which the woof of comedy 
 interweaves with the warp of tragedy. It occurred in 
 the early stages of the American revolution, and is part 
 and parcel of its history in the north-eastern section of 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 About midway between Salem and the ancient town 
 of Newburyport, the traveller on the Eastern Railroad 
 sees on the right, between him and the sea, a tall church 
 spire, rising above a semicircle of brown roofs and vener 
 able elms ; to which a long scolloping range of hills, sweep 
 ing off to the seaside, forms a green background. This 
 is Ispwich the ancient Agawam ; one of those steady, 
 conservative villages of which a few are still left in New 
 England, wherein a contemporary of Cotton Mather and 
 Governor Endicott, were he permitted to revisit the 
 scenes of his painful probation, would scarcely feel him 
 self a stranger. Law and gospel, imbodied in an ortho 
 dox steeple and a court house, occupy the steep, rocky 
 eminence in its midst ; below runs the small river under 
 its picturesque stone bridge ; and beyond is the famous 
 female seminary, where Andover theological students are 
 wont to take unto themselves wives of the daughters of 
 the Puritans. An air of comfort and quiet broods over 
 the whole town. Yellow moss clings to the seaward 
 sides of the roofs : one s eyes are not endangered by the 
 
128 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 intense glare of painted shingles and clapboards. The 
 smoke of hospitable kitchens curls up through the 
 overshadowing elms from huge-throated chimneys whose 
 hearthstones have been worn by the feet of many gener 
 ations. The tavern was once renowned throughout New 
 England, and it is still a creditable hostelry. During 
 court time it is crowded with jocose lawyers, anxious cli 
 ents, sleepy jurors, and miscellaneous hangers on dis 
 interested gentlemen, who have no particular business of 
 their own in court, but who regularly attend its sessions, 
 weighing evidence, deciding upon the merits of a lawyer s 
 plea or a judge s charge, getting up extempore trials upon 
 the piazza or in the bar room of cases still involved in the 
 glorious uncertainty of the law in the court house, prof 
 fering gratuitous legal advice to irascible plaintiffs and 
 desponding defendants, and in various other ways seeing 
 that the commonwealth receives no detriment. In the 
 autumn old sportsmen make the tavern their head quar 
 ters while scouring the marshes for sea birds ; and slim 
 young gentlemen from the city return thither with empty 
 game bags, as guiltless in respect to the snipes and wag 
 tails as Winkle was in the matter of the rooks after his 
 shooting excursion at Dingle Dell. Twice,snay, three 
 times, a year since third parties have been in fashion, 
 the delegates of the political churches assemble in Ipswich 
 to pass patriotic resolutions, and designate the candidates 
 
THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. 129 
 
 whom the good people of Essex county, with implicit faith 
 in the wisdom of the selection, are expected to vote for. 
 For the rest there are pleasant walks and drives around 
 the picturesque village. The people are noted for their 
 hospitality ; in summer the sea wind blows cool over its 
 healthy hills ; and, take it for all in all, there is not a 
 better-preserved or pleasanter specimen of a Puritan 
 town remaining in the ancient commonwealth. 
 
 The 21st of April, 1775, witnessed an awful commotion 
 in the little village of Ipswich. Old men, and boys, (the 
 middle aged had marched to Lexington some days before,) 
 and all the women in the place who were not bedridden 
 or sick came rushing as with one accord to the green in 
 front of the meeting house. A rumor, which no one at 
 tempted to trace or authenticate, spread from lip to lip 
 that the British regulars had landed on the coast and 
 were marching upon the town. A scene of indescribable 
 terror and confusion followed. Defence was out of the 
 question, as the young and ablebodied men of the entire 
 region round about had marched to Cambridge and Lex 
 ington. The news of the battle at the latter place, exag 
 gerated in all its details, had been just received ; terrible 
 stories of the atrocities committed by the dreaded " regu 
 lars " had been related ; and it was believed that nothing 
 short of a general extermination of the patriots men, 
 women, and children was contemplated by the British 
 9 
 
130 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 commander. Almost simultaneously the people of Bever 
 ly, a village a few miles distant, were smitten with the 
 same terror. How the rumor was communicated no one 
 could tell. It was there believed that the enemy had 
 fallen upon Ipswich and massacred the inhabitants with 
 out regard to age or sex. 
 
 It was about the middle of the afternoon of this day 
 that the people of Newbury, ten miles farther north, as 
 sembled in an informal meeting at the town house to hear 
 accounts from the Lexington fight and to consider what 
 action was necessary in consequence of that event. Par 
 son Carey was about opening the meeting with prayer 
 when hurried hoofbeats sounded up the street, and a 
 messenger, loosehaired and panting for breath, rushed up 
 the staircase. " Turn out, turn out, for God s sake," 
 he cried, " or you will all be killed ! The regulars are 
 marching on us ; they are at Ipswich now, cutting and 
 slashing all before them ! " Universal consternation was 
 the immediate result of this fearful announcement ; Par 
 son Caret s prayer died on his lips ; the congregation 
 dispersed over the town, carrying to every house the 
 tidings that the regulars had come. Men on horseback 
 went galloping up and down the streets shouting the 
 alarm. Women and children echoed it from every 
 corner. The panic became irresistible, uncontrollable. 
 Cries were heard that the dreaded invaders had reached 
 
THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. 131 
 
 Oldtown Bridge, a little distance from the village, and that 
 they were killing all whom they encountered. Flight was 
 resolved upon. All the horses and vehicles in the town 
 were put in requisition ; men, women, and children hur 
 ried as for life towards the north. Some threw their 
 silver and pewter ware and other valuables into wells. 
 Large numbers crossed the Merrimac and spent the 
 night in the deserted houses of Salisbury, whose inhabit 
 ants, stricken by the strange terror, had fled into New 
 Hampshire to take up their lodgings in dwellings also 
 abandoned by their owners. A few individuals refused 
 to fly with the multitude : some, unable to move by reason 
 of sickness, were left behind by their relatives. One old 
 gentleman, whose excessive corpulence rendered retreat 
 on his part impossible, made a virtue of necessity ; and, 
 seating himself in his doorway with his loaded king s 
 arm, upbraided his more nimble neighbors, advising them 
 to do as he did, and " stop and shoot the devils." Many 
 ludicrous instances of the intensity of the terror might be 
 related. One man got his family into a boat to go to 
 Ram Island for safety. He imagined he was pursued by 
 the enemy through the dusk of the evening, and was an 
 noyed by the crying of an infant in the after part of the 
 boat. " Do throw that squalling brat overboard," he 
 called to his wife, "or we shall be all discovered and 
 killed." A poor woman ran four or five miles up the 
 
132 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 river arid stopped to take breath and nurse her child, 
 when she found to her great horror that she had brought 
 off the cat instead of the baby ! 
 
 All through that memorable night the terror swept on 
 ward towards the north with a speed which seems almost 
 miraculous, producing every where the same results. At 
 midnight a horseman clad only in shirt and breeches 
 dashed by our grandfather s door, in Haverhill, twenty 
 miles up the river. " Turn out ! Get a musket ! Turn 
 out ! " he shouted ; " the regulars are landing on Plum 
 Island ! " " I m glad of it," responded the old gentleman 
 from his chamber window ; " I wish they were all there, 
 and obliged to stay there." When it is understood that 
 Plum Island is little more than a naked sand ridge, the 
 benevolence of this wish can be readily appreciated. 
 
 All the boats on the river were constantly employed for 
 several hours in conveying across the terrified fugitives. 
 Through " the dead waste and middle of the night " they 
 fled over the border into New Hampshire. Some feared 
 to take the frequented roads, and wandered over wooded 
 hills and through swamps where the snows of the late 
 winter had scarcely melted. They heard the tramp and 
 outcry of those behind them, and fancied that the sounds 
 were made by pursuing enemies. Fast as they fled, the 
 terror, by some unaccountable means, outstripped them. 
 They found houses deserted and streets strewn with house- 
 
THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. 133 
 
 hold stuffs abandoned in the hurry of escape. Towards 
 morning, however, the tide partially turned. Grown men 
 began to feel ashamed of their fears. The old Anglo- 
 Saxon hardihood paused and looked the terror in its face. 
 Single or in small parties, armed with such weapons as 
 they found at hand, among which long poles, sharpened 
 and charred at the end, were conspicuous, they began to 
 retrace their steps. In the mean time such of the good 
 people of Ipswich as were unable or unwilling to leave their 
 homes became convinced that the terrible rumor which 
 had nearly depopulated their settlement was unfounded. 
 
 Among those who had there awaited the onslaught of 
 the regulars was a young man from Exeter, New Hamp 
 shire. Becoming satisfied that the whole matter was a 
 delusion, he mounted his horse and followed after the re 
 treating multitude, undeceiving all whom he overtook. 
 Late at night he reached Newburyport, greatly to the 
 relief of its sleepless inhabitants, and hurried across the 
 river, proclaiming as he rode the welcome tidings. The 
 sun rose upon haggard and jaded fugitives, worn with 
 excitement and fatigue, slowly returning homeward, their 
 satisfaction at the absence of danger somewhat moderated 
 by an unpleasant consciousness of the ludicrous scenes 
 of their premature night flitting. 
 
 Any inference which might be drawn from the fore 
 going narrative derogatory to the character of the people 
 
134 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of New England at that day, on the score of courage, 
 would be essentially erroneous. It is true, they were not 
 the men to court danger or rashly throw away their lives 
 for the mere glory of the sacrifice. They had always a 
 prudent and wholesome regard to their own comfort and 
 safety ; they justly looked upon sound heads and limbs as 
 better than broken ones ; life was to them too serious and 
 important, and their hardgained property too valuable, 
 to be lightly hazarded. They never attempted to cheat 
 themselves by underestimating the difficulty to be en 
 countered or shutting their eyes to its probable conse 
 quences. Cautious, wary, schooled in the subtle strategy 
 of Indian warfare, where self-preservation is by no means 
 a secondary object, they had little in common with the 
 reckless enthusiasm of their French allies or the stolid 
 indifference of the fighting machines of the British regular 
 army. When danger could no longer be avoided they 
 met it with firmness and iron endurance, but with a very 
 vivid appreciation of its magnitude. Indeed, it must be 
 admitted by all who are familiar with the history of our 
 fathers that the element of fear held an important place 
 among their characteristics. It exaggerated all the dan 
 gers of their earthly pilgrimage and peopled the future 
 with shapes of evil. Their fear of Satan invested him 
 with some of the attributes of Omnipotence and almost 
 reached the point of reverence. The slightest shock of 
 
THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. 135 
 
 an earthquake filled all hearts with terror. Stout men 
 trembled by their hearths with dread of some paralytic 
 old woman supposed to be a witch. And when they be 
 lieved themselves called upon to grapple with these ter 
 rors and endure the afflictions of their allotment, they 
 brought to the trial a capability of suffering undiminished 
 by the chloroform of modern philosophy. They were 
 heroic in endurance. Panics like the one we have de 
 scribed might bow and sway them like reeds in the wind ; 
 but they stood up like the oaks of their own forests 
 beneath the thunder and the hail of actual calamity. 
 
 It was certainly lucky for the good people of Essex 
 county that no wicked wag of a tory undertook to im 
 mortalize in rhyme their ridiculous hegira, as Judge 
 Hopkinson did the famous Battle of the Kegs in Phila 
 delphia. Like the more recent Madawaska war in 
 Maine, the great Chepatchet demonstration in Rhode 
 Island, and the " Sauk fuss " of Wisconsin, it remains to 
 this day " unsyllabled, unsung ;" and the fast-fading mem 
 ory of age alone preserves the unwritten history of the 
 great Ipswich fright. 
 
LORD ASHLEY AND THE THIEVES. 
 
 " THEY that be whole need not a physician, but they 
 that are sick," was the significant answer of our Lord to 
 the self-righteous Pharisees who took offence at his com 
 panions the poor, the degraded, the weak, and the sinful. 
 " Go ye and learn what that meaneth. I will have 
 mercy, and not sacrifice ; for I am come not to call the 
 righteous, but sinners, to repentance." 
 
 The great lesson of duty inculcated by this answer of 
 the divine Teacher has been too long overlooked by 
 individuals and communities professedly governed by his 
 maxims. The phylacteries of our modern Pharisees are 
 as broad as those of the old Jewish saints. The respect 
 able Christian detests his vicious and ill-conditioned 
 neighbors as heartily as the Israelite did the publicans and 
 sinners of his day. He folds his robe of self-righteous 
 ness closely about him, and denounces as little better than 
 sinful weakness all commiseration for the guilty ; and all 
 attempts to restore and reclaim the erring violators of 
 human law otherwise than by pains and penalties as 
 
 (136) 
 
LORD ASHLEY AND THE THIEVES. 137 
 
 wicked collusion with crime, dangerous to the stability 
 and safety of society and offensive in the sight of God. 
 And yet nothing is more certain than that, just in pro 
 portion as the example of our Lord has been followed in 
 respect to the outcast and criminal, the effect has been to 
 reform and elevate to snatch as brands from the burn 
 ing souls not yet wholly given over to the service of evil. 
 The wonderful influence for good exerted over the most 
 degraded and reckless criminals of London by the excel 
 lent and self-denying Elizabeth Fry, the happy results of 
 the establishment of houses of refuge and reformation 
 and Magdalen asylums, all illustrate the wisdom of Him 
 who went about doing good, in pointing out the morally 
 diseased as the appropriate subjects of the benevolent 
 labors of his disciples. Xo one is to be despaired of. 
 We have no warrant to pass by any of our fellow-crea 
 tures as beyond the reach of God s grace and mercy ; 
 for, beneath the most repulsive and hateful outward man 
 ifestation, there is always a consciousness of the beauty 
 of goodness and purity, and of the loathsomeness of sin 
 one chamber of the heart as yet not wholly profaned, 
 whence at times arises the prayer of a burdened and 
 miserable spirit for deliverance. Deep down under the 
 squalid exterior, unparticipative in the hideous merriment 
 and recklessness of the criminal, there is another self, a 
 chained and suffering inner man, crying out, in the 
 
138 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 intervals of intoxication and brutal excesses, like Jonah 
 from the bosom of hell. To this lingering consciousness the 
 sympathy and kindness of benevolent and humane spirits 
 seldom appeal in vain ; for, whatever may be outward 
 appearances, it remains true that the way of the trans 
 gressor is hard, and that sin and suffering are inseparable. 
 Crime is seldom loved or persevered in for its own sake; 
 but, when once the evil path is entered upon, a return 
 is in reality extremely difficult to the unhappy wanderer, 
 and often seems well nigh impossible. The laws of social 
 life rise up like insurmountable barriers between him and 
 escape. As he turns towards the society whose rights he 
 has outraged its frown settles upon him; the penalties 
 of the laws he has violated await him ; and he falls back 
 despairing,, and suffers the fetters of the evil habit to 
 whose power he has yielded himself to be fastened closer 
 and heavier upon him. for some good angel, in the 
 form of a brother-man and touched with a feeling of his 
 sins and infirmities, to reassure his better nature and to 
 point out a way of escape from its body of death ! 
 
 We have been led into these remarks by an account, 
 given in the London Weekly Chronicle, of a most re 
 markable interview between the professional thieves of 
 London and Lord Ashley a gentleman whose best 
 patent of nobility is to be found in his generous and 
 untiring devotion to the interests of his fellow-men. It 
 
LORD ASHLET AXD THE THIEVES. 133 
 
 appears that a philanthropic gentleman in London had 
 been applied to by two young thieves who had relin 
 quished their evil practices and were obtaining a pre 
 carious but honest livelihood by picking up bones and 
 rags in the streets their loss of character closing against 
 them all other employments. He had just been reading 
 an address of Lord Ashley s in favor of colonial emigra 
 tion, and he was led to ask one of the young men how he 
 would like to emigrate. " I should jump at the chance ! " 
 was the reply. Not long after the gentleman was sent 
 for to visit one of those obscure and ruinous courts of the 
 great metropolis where crime and poverty lie down to 
 gether localities which Dickens has pictured with such 
 painful distinctness. Here, to his surprise, he met a 
 number of thieves and outlaws, who declared themselves 
 extremely anxious to know whether any hope could be 
 held out to them of obtaining an honest living, however 
 humble, in the colonies, as their only reason for continu 
 ing in their criminal course was the impossibility of 
 extricating themselves. He gave them such advice and 
 encouragement as he was able, and invited them to 
 assemble again, with such of their companions as they 
 could persuade to do so, at the room of the Irish Free 
 School, for the purpose of meeting Lord Ashley. On the 
 27th of the seventh month last the meeting took place. 
 At the hour appointed, Lord Ashley and five or six other 
 
140 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 benevolent gentlemen interested in emigration as a means 
 of relief and reformation to the criminal poor entered the 
 room, which was already well nigh filled. Two hundred 
 and seven professed thieves were present. " Several of 
 the most experienced thieves were stationed at the door to 
 prevent the admission of any but thieves. Some four or 
 five individuals, who were not at first known, were sub 
 jected to examination, and only allowed to remain on 
 stating that they were, and being recognized as members 
 of the dishonest fraternity ; and before the proceedings 
 of the evening commenced the question was very care 
 fully put, and repeated several times, whether any one 
 was in the room of whom others entertained doubts as to 
 who he was. The object of this care was, as so many of 
 them were in danger of getting into trouble, or, in other 
 words, of being taken up for their crimes, to ascertain if 
 any who might betray them were present ; and another 
 intention of this scrutiny was, to give those assembled, 
 who naturally would feel considerable fear, a fuller con 
 fidence in opening their minds." 
 
 What a novel conference between the extremes of 
 modern society ! All that is beautiful in refinement and 
 education, moral symmetry and Christian grace, con 
 trasting with the squalor, the ignorance, the lifelong 
 depravity of men living " without God in the world " 
 the pariahs of civilization the moral lepers, at the 
 
LORD ASHLEY AND THE THIEVES. 141 
 
 sight of whom decency covers its face, and cries out, 
 U f7ndean/ n After a prayer had been offered Lord 
 Ashley spoke at considerable length, making a profound 
 impression on his strange auditory as they listened to his 
 plans of emigration, which offered them an opportunity 
 to escape from their miserable condition and enter upon a 
 respectable course of life. The hard heart melted and 
 the cold and cruel eye moistened. With one ayccord the 
 wretched felons responded to the language of Christian 
 love and good will and declared their readiness to follow 
 the advice of their true friend. They looked up to him 
 as to an angel of mercy, and felt the malignant spirits 
 which had so long tormented them disarmed of all power 
 of evil in the presence of simple goodness. He stood in 
 that felon audience like Spenser s Una amidst the satyrs ; 
 unassailable and secure in the " unresistible might of 
 meekness," and panoplied in that 
 
 noble grace which dashed brute violence 
 
 "With sudden adoration and mute awe." 
 
 Twenty years ago, when Elizabeth Fry ventured to 
 visit those " spirits in prison," the female tenants of 
 Newgate, her temerity was regarded with astonishment, 
 and her hope of effecting a reformation in the miserable 
 objects of her sympathy was held to be wholly visionary. 
 Her personal safety and the blessed fruits of her labors, 
 
142 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 nevertheless, confirmed the language of her divine Master 
 to his disciples when he sent them forth as lambs among 
 wolves : " Behold, I give unto you power over all the 
 power of the enemy." The still more unpromising ex 
 periment of Lord Ashley, thus far, has been equally suc 
 cessful ; and we hail it as the introduction of a new and 
 more humane method of dealing with the victims of sin 
 and ignorance and the temptations growing out of the 
 inequalities and vices of civilization. 
 
MIRTH AND MEDICINE * 
 
 IP any of our readers (and at times we fear it is the 
 case with all) need amusement and the wholesome alter 
 ative of a hearty laugh, we commend them, not to Dr. 
 Holmes the physician, but to Dr. Holmes the scholar, 
 the wit, and the humorist; not to the scientific medical 
 professor s barbarous Latin, but to his poetical prescrip 
 tions, given in choice old Saxon. We have tried them, 
 and are ready to give the doctor certificates of their 
 efficacy. 
 
 Looking at the matter from the point of theory only, 
 we should say that a physician could not be otherwise 
 than melancholy. A merry doctor ! Why, one might as 
 well talk of a laughing death s head the cachinnation of 
 a monk s memento mori. This life of ours is sorrowful 
 enough at its best estate; the brightest phase of it is 
 "sicklied o er with the pale cast" of the future or the 
 past. But it is the special vocation of the doctor to look 
 
 Poems by Oliver Wendell Holmes. 
 
 (143) 
 
144 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 only upon the shadow ; to turn away from the house of 
 feasting and go down to that of mourning; to breathe 
 day after day the atmosphere of wretchedness ; to grow 
 familiar with suffering ; to look upon humanity disrobed 
 of its pride .and glory, robbed of all its fictitious orna 
 ments, weak, helpless, naked, and undergoing the last 
 fearful metempsychosis from its erect and godlike image, 
 the living temple of an enshrined divinity, to the loath 
 some clod and the inanimate dust. Of what ghastly- 
 secrets of moral and physical disease is he the depositary ! 
 There is woe before him and behind him ; he is hand and 
 glove with misery by prescription the ex officio gauger 
 of the ills that flesh is heir to. He has no home, unless 
 it be at the bedside of the querulous, the splenetic, the 
 sick, and the dying. He sits down to carve his turkey, 
 and is summoned off to a post mortem examination of 
 another sort. All the diseases which Milton s imagina 
 tion jmbodied in the lazar house dog his footsteps and 
 pluck at his door bell. Hurrying from one place to 
 another at their beck, he knows nothing of the quiet com 
 fort of the " sleek-headed men who sleep o nights." His 
 wife, if he has one, has an undoubted right to advertise 
 him as a deserter of "bed and board." His ideas of 
 beauty, the imaginations of his brain, and the affections 
 of his heart are regulated and modified by the irre 
 pressible associations of his luckless profession.. Woman 
 
MIRTH AND MEDICINE. 145 
 
 as well as man is to him of the earth, earthy. He sees 
 incipient disease where the uninitiated see only delicacy. 
 A smile reminds him of his dental operations ; a blushing 
 cheek of his hectic patients ; pensive melancholy is dys 
 pepsia ; sentimentalism, nervousness. Tell him of love 
 lorn hearts, of the " worm i the bud," of the mental im 
 palement upon Cupid s arrow, like that of a giaour upon 
 the spear of a janizary, and he can only think of lack of 
 exercise, of tight lacing, and slippers in winter. Sheridan 
 seems to have understood all this, if we may judge from 
 the lament of his Doctor, in St. Patrick s Day, over his 
 deceased helpmate. " Poor dear Dolly ! " says he. "I 
 shall never see her like again ; such an arm for a band 
 age ! veins that seemed to invite the lancet ! Then her 
 skin smooth and white as a gallipot ; her mouth as 
 round and not larger than that of a penny vial ; and 
 her teeth, none of your sturdy fixtures, ache as they 
 would, it was only a small pull, and out they came. I 
 believe I have drawn half a score of her dear pearls. 
 [ Weeps. ] But what avails her beauty ? She has gone, 
 and left no little babe to hang like a label on papa s 
 neck!" 
 
 So much for speculation and theory. In practice it is 
 
 not so bad after all. The grave digger in Hamlet has his 
 
 jokes and grim jests. We have known many a jovial 
 
 sexton ; and we have heard clergymen laugh heartily at 
 
 10 
 
146 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 small provocation close on the heel of a cool calculation 
 that the great majority of their fellow-creatures were 
 certain of going straight to perdition. "Why, then, should 
 not even the doctor have his fun ? Nay, is it not his duty 
 to be merry, by main force if necessary ? Solomon, who, 
 from his great knowledge of herbs, must have been no 
 mean practitioner for his day, tells us that " a merry heart 
 doeth good like a medicine ; " and universal experience has 
 confirmed the truth of his maxim. Hence it is, doubtless, 
 that we have so many anecdotes of facetious doctors, dis 
 tributing their pills and jokes together, shaking at the 
 same time the contents of their vials and the sides of 
 their patients. It is merely professional, a trick of the 
 practice, unquestionably, in most cases ; but sometimes it 
 is a " natural gift," like that of the " bonesetters," and 
 " scrofula strokers," and " cancer curers," who carry on 
 a sort of guerilla war with human maladies. Such we 
 know to be the case with Dr. Holmes. He was born for 
 the " laughter cure," as certainly as Preisnitz was for the 
 " water cure," and has been quite as successful in his way, 
 while his prescriptions are infinitely more agreeable. 
 
 The volume now before us gives, in addition to the 
 poems and lyrics contained in the two previous editions, 
 some hundred or more pages of the later productions of 
 the author, in the sprightly vein and marked by the bril 
 liant fancy and felicitous diction for which the former 
 
MIRTH AND MEDICINE. 147 
 
 were note worthy. His longest and most elaborate poem, 
 Urania, is perhaps the best specimen of his powers. Its 
 general tone is playful and humorous ; but there are pas 
 sages of great tenderness and pathos. Witness the fol 
 lowing, from a description of the city churchgoers. The 
 whole compass of our literature has few passages to 
 equal its melody and beauty. 
 
 " Down the chill street, which winds in gloomiest shade, 
 What marks betray yon solitary maid ? 
 The cheek s red rose, that speaks of balmier air, 
 The Celtic blackness of her braided hair ; 
 The gilded missal in her kerchief tied ; 
 Poor Nora, exile from Killarney s side ! 
 Sister in toil, though born of colder skies, 
 That left their azure in her downcast eyes, 
 See pallid Margaret, Labor s patient child, 
 Scarce weaned from home, a nursling of the wild, 
 Where white Katahdin o er the horizon shines, 
 And broad Penobscot dashes through the pines : 
 Still as she hastes her careful fingers hold 
 The unfailing hymn book in its cambric fold : 
 Six days at Drudgery s heavy wheel she stands, 
 The seventh siceet morning folds her weary hands. 
 Yes, child of suffering, thou mayst well be sure 
 He who ordained the Sabbath loved the poor." 
 
 This is but one of many passages, showing that the 
 author is capable of moving the heart as well as of tic 
 kling the fancy. There is no straining for effect ; simple, 
 
148 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 natural thoughts are expressed in simple and perfectly 
 transparent language. 
 
 Terpsichore, read at an annual dinner of the Phi Beta 
 Kappa Society at Cambridge, sparkles throughout with 
 keen wit, quaint conceits, and satire so good-natured that 
 the subjects of it can enjoy it as heartily as their neigh 
 bors. Witness this thrust at our German-English wri 
 ters : 
 
 " Essays so dark, Champollion might despair 
 To guess what mummy of a thought was there, 
 Where our poor English, striped with foreign phrase, 
 Looks like a zebra in a parson s chaise" 
 
 Or this at our transcendental friends: 
 
 " Deluded infants ! will they never know 
 Some doubts must darken o er the world below 
 Though all the Platos of the nursery trail 
 Their clouds of glory at the gocart s tail ? " 
 
 The Lines on Lending an old Silver Punch Bowl are 
 highly characteristic. Nobody but Holmes could have 
 conjured up so many rare fancies in connection with such. 
 a matter. Hear him : 
 
 " This ancient silver bowl of mine, it tells of good old times, 
 Of joyous days, and jolly nights, and merry Christmas chimes : 
 They were a free and jovial race, but honest, brave, and true, 
 That dipped their ladle in the punch when the old bowl was new. 
 
MIRTH AND MEDICINE. 149 
 
 A Spanish galleon brought the bar, so runs the ancient tale, 
 Twas hammered by an Antwerp smith, whose arm was like a flail ; 
 And now and then between the strokes, for fear his strength should 
 
 fail, 
 He wiped his brow and quaffed a cup of good old Flemish ale. 
 
 Twas purchased by an English squire to please his loving dame, 
 Who saw the cherubs and conceived a longing for the same ; 
 And oft as on the ancient stock another twig was found, 
 Twas filled with caudle spiced and hot and handed smoking round. 
 
 But changing hands it reached at length a Puritan divine, 
 
 Who used to follow Timothy and take a little wine, 
 
 But hated punch and prelacy ; and so it was, perhaps, 
 
 He went to Leyden, where he found conventicles and schnaps. 
 
 And then, of course, you know what s next it left the Dutchman s 
 
 shore 
 "With those that in the Mayflower came, a hundred souls and 
 
 more, 
 
 Along with all the furniture to fill their new abodes 
 To judge by what is still on hand, at least a hundred loads. 
 
 Twas on a dreary winter s eve, the night was closing dim, 
 When old Miles Standish took the bowl and filled it to the brim. 
 The little captain stood and stirred the posset with his sword, 
 And all his sturdy men at arms were ranged about the board. 
 
 He poured the fiery Hollands in the man that never feared; 
 He took a long and solemn draught and wiped his yellow beard ; 
 And one by one the musketeers, the men that fought and prayed, 
 All drank as twere their mother s milk, and not a man afraid ! 
 
150 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 That night affrighted from his nest the screaming eagle flew ; 
 He heard the Pequot s ringing whoop, the soldier s wild halloo : 
 And there the sachem learned the rule he taught to kith and kin, 
 Run from the white man when you find he smells of Hollands 
 gin. " 
 
 In his Nux Postc&natica he gives us his reflections on 
 being invited to a dinner party, where he was expected 
 to " set the table in a roar " by reading funny verses. He 
 submits it to the judgment and common sense of the im 
 portunate bearer of the invitation, that this dinner-going, 
 ballad-making, mirth : provoking habit is not likely to ben 
 efit his reputation as a medical professor. 
 
 " Besides, my prospects. Don t you know that people won t employ 
 A man that wrongs his manliness by laughing like a boy, 
 And suspect the azure blossom that unfolds upon a shoot, 
 As if Wisdom s old potato could not flourish at its root ? 
 
 It s a very fine reflection, when you re etching out a smile 
 
 On a copperplate of faces that would stretch into a mile, 
 
 That, what with sneers from enemies and cheapening shrugs from 
 
 friends, 
 It will cost you all the earnings that a month of labor lends." 
 
 There are, as might be expected, some commonplace 
 pieces in the volume a few failures in the line of 
 humor. The Spectre Pig, the Dorchester Giant, the 
 Height of the Ridiculous, and one or two others might be 
 omitted in the next edition without detriment. They 
 
MIRTH AND MEDICINE. 151 
 
 would do well enough for an amateur humorist, but are 
 scarcely worthy of one who stands at the head of the pro 
 fession. 
 
 It was said of James Smith, of the Rejected Addresses, 
 that " if he had not been a witty man, he would have 
 been a great man." Hood s humor and drollery kept in the 
 background the pathos and beauty of his soberer produc 
 tions ; and Dr. Holmes, we suspect, might have ranked 
 higher among a large class of readers than he now does 
 had he never written his Ballad of the Oysterman, his 
 Comet, and his September Gale. Such lyrics as La Gri- 
 sette, the Puritan s Vision, and that unique compound of 
 humor and pathos, the Last Leaf, show that he possesses 
 the power of touching the deeper chords of the heart and 
 of calling forth tears as well as smiles. Who does not 
 feel the power of this simple picture of the old man in the 
 last-mentioned poem? 
 
 " But now he walks the streets, 
 And he looks at all he meets, 
 
 Sad and wan ; 
 
 And he shakes his feeble head, 
 That it seems as if he said, 
 
 They are gone. 
 
 The mossy marbles rest 
 On the lips that he has pressed 
 In their bloom ; 
 
152 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 And the names he loved to hear 
 Have been carved for many a year 
 On the tomb." 
 
 Dr. Holmes has been likened to Thomas Hood ; but 
 there is little in common between them save the power of 
 combining fancy and sentiment with grotesque drollery and 
 humor. Hood, under all his whims and oddities, conceals 
 the vehement intensity of a reformer. The iron of the 
 world s wrongs had entered into his soul ; there is an 
 undertone of sorrow in his lyrics ; his sarcasm, directed 
 against oppression and bigotry, at times betrays the ear 
 nestness of one whose own withers have been wrung. 
 Holmes writes simply for the amusement of himself and 
 his readers ; he deals only with the vanity, the foibles, 
 and the minor faults of mankind, good naturedly and 
 almost sympathizingly suggesting excuses for the folly 
 which he tosses about on the horns of his ridicule. In 
 this respect he differs widely from his fellow-townsman 
 Russell Lowell, whose keen wit and scathing sarcasm, in 
 the famous Biglow Papers and the notes of Parson Wil 
 bur, strike at the great evils of society and deal with the 
 rank offences of church and state. Hosea Biglow, in 
 his way, is as earnest a preacher as Habakkuk Muckle- 
 wrath or Obadiah Bind-their-kings-in-chains-and-their- 
 nobles-in-fetters-of-iron. His verse smacks of the old 
 Puritan flavor. Holmes has a gentler mission. His 
 
MIRTH AXD MEDICINE. 153 
 
 careless, genial humor reminds us of James Smith in his 
 Rejected Addresses and Horace in London. Long may 
 he live to make broader the face of our care-ridden gen 
 eration, and to realize for himself the truth of the wise 
 man s declaration that a "merry heart is a continual 
 feast." 
 
POPE NIGHT. 
 
 " Lay up the fagots neat and trim ; 
 Pile em up higher; 
 Set em afire ! 
 The pope roasts us, and we ll roast him ! " 
 
 Old Song. 
 
 THE recent attempt of the Romish church to reestab 
 lish its hierarchy in Great Britain, with the new cardinal, 
 Dr. Wiseman, at its head, seems to have revived an old 
 popular custom, a grim piece of Protestant sport, which, 
 since the days of Lord George Gordon and the "no 
 Popery" mob, had very generally fallen into disuse. On 
 the 5th of the eleventh month of this present year all 
 England was traversed by processions, and lighted up 
 with bonfires, in commemoration of the detection of the 
 "gunpowder pfot" of Guy Fawkes and the Papists in 
 1605. Popes, bishops, and cardinals, in straw and paste 
 board, were paraded through the streets and burned amid 
 the shouts of the populace, a great portion of whom would 
 have doubtless been quite as ready to do the same pleas- 
 
 (154) 
 
POPE NIGHT. 155 
 
 ant little office for Henry of Exeter, or his grace of Can 
 terbury, if they could have carted about and burned in 
 effigy a Protestant hierarchy as safely as a Catholic one. 
 
 In this country where every sect takes its own way, 
 undisturbed by legal restrictions, each ecclesiastical tub 
 balancing itself, as it best may, on its own bottom, and 
 where bishops Catholic and bishops Episcopal, bishops 
 Methodist and bishops Mormon, jostle each other in our 
 thoroughfares it is not to be expected that we should 
 trouble ourselves with the matter at issue between the 
 rival hierarchies on the other side of the water. It is a 
 very pretty quarrel, however, and good must come out of 
 it, as it cannot fail to attract popular attention to the 
 shallowness of the spiritual pretensions of both parties, 
 and lead to the conclusion that a hierarchy of any sort 
 has very little in common with the fishermen and tent- 
 makers of the New Testament. 
 
 Pope Night the anniversary of the discovery of the 
 Papal incendiary Guy Fawkes, booted and spurred, ready 
 to touch fire to his powder train under the Parliament 
 House was celebrated by the early settlers of New 
 England, and doubtless afforded a good deal of relief to 
 the younger plants of grace in the Puritan vineyard. In 
 those solemn old days, the recurrence of the powder plot 
 anniversary, with its processions, hideous images of the 
 pope and Guy Fawkes, its liberal potations of strong 
 
156 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 waters, and its blazing bonfires reddening the wild No 
 vember hills, must have been looked forward to with no 
 slight degree of pleasure. For one night at least, the 
 cramped and smothered fun and mischief of the younger 
 generation were permitted to revel in the wild extrava 
 gance of a Roman saturnalia or the Christmas holidays 
 of a slave plantation. Bigotry frowning upon the May 
 pole, with its flower wreaths and sportive revellers, and 
 counting the steps of the dancers as so many steps towards 
 perdition recognized in the grim farce of Guy Fawkes s 
 anniversary something of its own lineaments, smiled com 
 placently upon the riotous young actors, and opened its 
 close purse to furnish tar barrels to roast the pope, and 
 strong water to moisten the throats of his noisy judges 
 and executioners. 
 
 Up to the time of the revolution the powder plot was 
 duly commemorated throughout New England. At that 
 period the celebration of it was discountenanced, and in 
 many places prohibited, on the ground that it was insulting 
 to our Catholic allies from France. In Coffin s History of 
 Newbury it is stated that, in 1774, the town authorities 
 of Newburyport ordered " that no effigies be carried about 
 or exhibited only in the daytime." The last public cele 
 bration in that town was in the following year. Long 
 before the close of the last century the exhibitions of 
 Pope Night had entirely ceased throughout the country, 
 
POPE NIGHT. 157 
 
 with, as far as we can learn, a solitary exception. The 
 stranger who chances to be travelling on the road be 
 tween Newburyport and Haverhill, on the night of the 
 5th of November, may well fancy that an invasion is 
 threatened from the sea, or that an insurrection is going 
 on inland ; for from all the high hills overlooking the 
 river tall fires are seen blazing redly against the cold, 
 dark, autumnal sky, surrounded by groups of young 
 men and boys busily engaged in urging them with fresh 
 fuel into intenser activity. To feed these bonfires, every 
 thing combustible which could be begged or stolen from 
 the neighboring villages, farm houses, and fences is 
 put in requisition. Old tar tubs, purloined from the 
 ship builders of the river side, and flour and lard bar 
 rels from the village traders, are stored away for days, 
 and perhaps weeks, in the woods or in the rain gullies 
 of the hills, in preparation for Pope Night. From the 
 earliest settlement of the two towns the night of the 
 powder plot has been thus celebrated, with unbroken 
 regularity, down to the present time. The event which 
 it once commemorated is probably now unknown to 
 most of the juvenile actors. The symbol lives on from 
 generation to generation after the significance is lost; and 
 we have seen the children of our Catholic neighbors as 
 busy as their Protestant playmates in collecting, by " hook 
 or by crook," the materials for Pope Night bonfires. "We 
 
158 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 remember, on one occasion, walking out with a gifted and 
 learned Catholic friend to witness the fine effect of the 
 illumination on the hills, and his hearty appreciation of 
 its picturesque and wild beauty the busy groups in the 
 strong relief of the fires, and the play and corruscation of 
 the changeful lights on the bare, brown hills, naked trees, 
 and autumn clouds. 
 
 In addition to the bonfires on the hills, there was 
 formerly a procession in the streets, bearing grotesque 
 images of the pope, his cardinals and friars ; and behind 
 them Satan himself, a monster with huge ox horns on his 
 head, and a long tail, brandishing his pitchfork and 
 goading them onward. The pope was generally furnished 
 with a movable head, which could be turned round, 
 thrown back, or made to bow, like that of a china ware 
 mandarin. An aged inhabitant of the neighborhood has 
 furnished us with some fragments of the songs sung on 
 such occasions, probably the same which our British 
 ancestors trolled forth around their bonfires two cen 
 turies ago: 
 
 " The 5th of November, 
 As you well remember, 
 
 Was gunpowder treason and plot ; 
 And where is the reason 
 That gunpowder treason 
 
 Should ever be forgot ? " 
 
POPE NIGHT. 159 
 
 " When James the First the sceptre swayed 
 This hellish powder plot was laid ; 
 They placed the powder down below, 
 All for Old England s overthrow. 
 Lucky the man, and happy the day, 
 That caught Guy Fawkes in the middle of his play ! " 
 
 " Hark ! our bell goes jink, jink, jink ; 
 Pray, madam, pray, sir, give us something to drink ; 
 Pray, madam, pray, sir, if you ll something give, 
 We ll burn the dog, and not let him live. 
 We ll burn the dog without his head, 
 And then you ll say the dog is dead." 
 
 " Look here ! from Rome 
 The pope has come, 
 
 That fiery serpent dire; 
 Here s the pope that we have got, 
 The old promoter of the plot ; 
 We ll stick a pitchfork in his back, 
 
 And throw him in the fire ! " 
 
 There is a slight savor of a Smithfield roasting about 
 these lines, such as regaled the senses of the virgin 
 Queen or "bloody Mary," which entirely reconciles us 
 to their disuse at the present time. It should be the 
 fervent prayer of all good men that the evil spirit of 
 religious hatred and intolerance, which on the one hand 
 prompted the gunpowder plot, and which on the other has 
 ever since made it the occasion of reproach and persecu- 
 
160 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 tion of an entire sect of professing Christians, may be no 
 longer perpetuated. In the matter of exclusiveness and 
 intolerance, none of the older sects can safely reproach 
 each other ; and it becomes all to hope and labor for the 
 coming of that day when the hymns of Cowper and the 
 Confessions of Augustine, the humane philosophy of Chan- 
 ning and the devout meditations of Thomas a Kempis, the 
 simple essays of Woolman and the glowing periods of 
 Bossuet, shall be regarded as the offspring of one spirit 
 and one faith lights of a common altar, and precious 
 stones in the temple of the one universal church. 
 
THE BETTER LAND. 
 
 "THE shapings of our heavens are the modifications 
 of our constitution," said Charles Lamb, in his reply to 
 Southey s attack upon him in the Quarterly Review. 
 
 He who is infinite in love as well as wisdom has 
 revealed to us the fact of a future life, and the fearfully 
 important relation in which the present stands to it. 
 The actual nature and conditions of that life he has hidden 
 from us no chart of the ocean of eternity is given us 
 no celestial guide book or geography defines, localizes, 
 and prepares us for the wonders of the spiritual world. 
 Hence imagination has a wide field for its speculations, 
 which, so long as they do not positively contradict the 
 revelation of the Scriptures, cannot be disproved. 
 
 We naturally enough transfer to our idea of heaven 
 whatever we love and reverence on earth. Thither the 
 Catholic carries in his fancy the imposing rites and time- 
 honored solemnities of his worship. There the Methodist 
 sees his love feasts and camp meetings in the groves and 
 by the still waters and green pastures of the blessed 
 11 (161) 
 
162 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 abodes. The Quaker, in the stillness of his self-commun 
 ing, remembers that there was " silence in heaven." The 
 Churchman, listening to the solemn chant of vocal music 
 or the deep tones of the organ, thinks of the song of the 
 elders and the golden harps of the New Jerusalem. 
 
 The heaven of the northern nations of Europe was a 
 gross and sensual reflection of the earthly life of a bar 
 barous and brutal people. 
 
 The Indians of North America had a vague notion of 
 a sunset land, a beautiful paradise far in the west, moun 
 tains and forests filled with deer and buffalo, lakes and 
 streams swarming with fishes the happy hunting ground 
 of souls. In a late letter from a devoted missionary 
 among the western Indians (Paul Blohm, a converted 
 Jew) we have noticed a beautiful illustration of this be 
 lief. Near the Omahaw mission house, on a high bluff, 
 was a solitary Indian grave. " One evening," says the 
 missionary, "having come home with some cattle which I 
 had been seeking, I heard some one wailing ; and, looking 
 in the direction from whence it proceeded, I found it to be 
 from the grave near our house. In a moment after a 
 mourner rose up from a kneeling or lying posture, and, 
 turning to the setting sun, stretched forth his arms in 
 prayer and supplication with an intensity and earnestness 
 as though he would detain the splendid luminary from 
 running his course. With his body leaning forward and 
 
THE BETTER LAND. 163 
 
 his arms stretched towards the sun, he presented a most 
 striking figure of sorrow and petition. It was solemnly 
 awful. He seemed to me to be one of the ancients come 
 forth to teach me how to pray." 
 
 A venerable and worthy New England clergyman, on 
 his death bed, just before the close of his life, declared that 
 he was only conscious of an awfully solemn and intense 
 curiosity to know the great secret of death and eternity. 
 
 The excellent Dr. Nelson, of Missouri, was one who, 
 while on earth, seemed to live another and higher life in 
 the contemplation of infinite purity and happiness. A 
 friend once related an incident concerning him which 
 made a deep impression upon my mind. They had been 
 travelling through a summer s forenoon in the prairie, and 
 had laid down to rest beneath a solitary tree. The doctor 
 lay for a long time, silently looking upwards through the 
 openings of the boughs into the still heavens, when he 
 repeated the following lines, in a low tone, as if commun 
 ing with himself in view of the wonders he described : 
 
 " the joys that are there mortal eye hath not seen ! 
 the songs they sing there, with hosannas between ! 
 O the thrice-blessed song of the Lamb and of Moses ! 
 O brightness on brightness ! the pearl gate uncloses ! 
 white wings of angels ! fields white with roses ! 
 white tents of peace, where the rapt soul reposes ! 
 the waters so still, and the pastures so green ! " 
 
164 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 The brief hints afforded us by the sacred writings 
 concerning the better land are inspiring and beautiful. 
 Eye hath not seen, nor the ear heard, neither hath it 
 entered into the heart of man to conceive of the good in 
 store for the righteous. Heaven is described as a quiet 
 habitation a rest remaining for the people of God. 
 Tears shall be wiped away from all eyes ; there shall be 
 no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall 
 there be any more pain. To how many death beds have 
 these words spoken peace ! How many failing hearts 
 have gathered strength from them to pass through the 
 dark valley of shadows ! 
 
 Yet we should not forget that " the kingdom of heaven 
 is within ; " that it is the state and affections of the soul, 
 the answer of a good conscience, the sense of harmony 
 with God, a condition of time as well as of eternity. 
 What is really momentous and all-important with us is 
 the present, by which the future is shaped and colored. 
 A mere change of locality cannot alter the actual and 
 intrinsic qualities of the soul. Guilt and remorse would 
 make the golden streets of paradise intolerable as the 
 burning marl of the infernal abodes; while purity and 
 innocence would transform hell itself into heaven. 
 
THE POETRY OF THE NORTH. 
 
 THE Democratic Review not long since contained a 
 singularly wild and spirited poem, entitled the Norse 
 man s Ride, in which the writer appears to have very 
 happily blended the boldness and sublimity of the heathen 
 saga with the grace and artistic skill of the literature of 
 civilization. The poetry of the Northmen, like their lives, 
 was bold, defiant, and full of a rude, untamed energy. 
 It was inspired by exhibitions of power rather than of 
 beauty. Its heroes were beastly revellers or cruel and 
 ferocious plunderers ; its heroines unsexed hoidens, play 
 ing the ugliest tricks with their lovers, and repaying 
 slights with bloody revenge very dangerous and un 
 satisfactory companions for any other than the fire-eating 
 Viking?, and red-handed, unwashed Berserkars. Signifi 
 cant of a religion which reverenced the strong rather 
 than the good, and which regarded as meritorious the un 
 restrained indulgence of the passions, it delighted to sing 
 the praises of some coarse debauch or pitiless slaughter. 
 The voice of its scalds was often but the scream of the 
 
 (165) 
 
166 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 carrion bird, or the howl of the wolf, scenting human 
 blood : 
 
 " Unlike to human sounds it came ; 
 
 Unmixed, unmelodized with breath ; 
 But grinding through some scrannel frame, 
 Creaked from the bony lungs of Death." 
 
 Its gods were brutal giant forces, patrons of war, rob 
 bery, and drunken revelry ; its heaven a vast cloud-built 
 alehouse, where ghostly warriors drank from the skulls 
 of their victims ; its hell a frozen horror of desolation and 
 darkness, all that the gloomy northern imagination could 
 superadd to the repulsive and frightful features of arctic 
 scenery, volcanoes spouting fire through craters rimmed 
 with perpetual frost, boiling caldrons flinging their fierce 
 jets high into the air, and huge jokuls, or ice mountains, 
 loosened and upheaved by volcanic agencies, crawling 
 slowly seaward, like misshapen monsters endowed with 
 life a region of misery unutterable, to be avoided only 
 by diligence in robbery and courage in murder. 
 
 What a work had Christianity to perform upon such a 
 people as the Icelanders, for instance, of the tenth cen 
 tury to substitute in rude, savage minds the idea of 
 its benign and gentle Founder for that of the Thor and 
 Woden of Norse mythology ; the forgiveness, charity, and 
 humility of the gospel for the revenge, hatred, and pride 
 inculcated by the eddas. And is it not one of the 
 
THE POETRY OF THE NORTH. 167 
 
 strongest proofs of the divine life and power of that gos 
 pel, that, under its influence, the hard and cruel Norse 
 heart has been so softened and humanized that at this 
 moment one of the best illustrations of the peaceful and 
 gentle virtues which it inculcates is afforded by the 
 descendants of the sea kings and robbers of the middle 
 centuries? No one can read the accounts which such 
 travellers as Sir George Mackenzie and Dr. Henderson 
 have given us of the peaceful disposition, social equality, 
 hospitality, industry, intellectual cultivation, morality, and 
 habitual piety of the Icelanders, without a grateful sense 
 of the adaptation of Christianity to the wants of our race, 
 and of its ability to purify, elevate, and transform the 
 worst elements of human character. In Iceland Christi 
 anity has performed its work of civilization, unobstructed 
 by that commercial cupidity which has caused nations 
 more favored in respect to soil and climate to lapse into 
 an idolatry scarcely less debasing and cruel than that 
 which preceded the introduction of the gospel. Trial by 
 combat was abolished in 1001, and the penalty of the 
 imaginary crime of witchcraft was blotted from the statutes 
 of the island nearly half a century before it ceased to dis 
 grace those of Great Britain. So entire has been the 
 change wrought in the sanguinary and cruel Norse char 
 acter that at the present day no Icelander can be found, 
 who, for any reward, will undertake the office of execu- 
 
168 RECREATIONS AffD MISCELLANIES. 
 
 tioner. The scalds, who went forth to battle, cleaving 
 the skulls of their enemies with the same skilful hands 
 which struck the harp at the feast, have given place to 
 Christian bards and teachers, who, like Thorlakson, whom 
 Dr. Henderson found toiling cheerfully with his beloved 
 parishioners in the hay harvest of the brief arctic sum 
 mer, combine with the vigorous diction and robust thought 
 of their predecessors the warm and genial humanity of a 
 religion of love and the graces and amenities of a high 
 civilization. 
 
 But we have wandered somewhat aside from our pur 
 pose, which was simply to introduce the following poem, 
 which, in the boldness of its tone and vigor of language, 
 reminds us of the Sword Chant, the Wooing Song, and 
 other rhymed sagas of Motherwell : 
 
 THE NORSEMAN S RIDE. 
 
 BY BAYARD TAYLOR. 
 
 The frosty fires of northern starlight 
 
 Gleamed on the glittering snow, 
 And through the forest s frozen branches 
 
 The shrieking winds did blow ; 
 A floor of blue and icy marble 
 
 Kept Ocean s pulses still, 
 When, in the depths of dreary midnight, 
 
 Opened the burial hill. 
 
THE POETRY OF THE NORTH. 169 
 
 Then, while the low and creeping shudder 
 
 Thrilled upward through the ground, 
 The Norseman came, as armed for battle, 
 
 In silence from his mound 
 He who was mourned in solemn sorrow 
 
 By many a swordsman bold, 
 And harps that wailed along the ocean, 
 
 Struck by the scalds of old. 
 
 Sudden a swift and silver shadow 
 
 Came up from out the gloom 
 A charger that, with hoof impatient, 
 
 Stamped noiseless by the tomb. 
 " Ha ! Surtur,* let me hear thy tramping, 
 
 My fiery northern steed, 
 That, sounding through the stormy forest, 
 
 Bade the bold Viking heed ! " 
 
 He mounted ; like a northlight streaking 
 
 The sky with flaming bars, 
 They, on the winds so wildly shrieking, 
 
 Shot up before the stars. 
 " Is this thy mane, my fearless Surtur, 
 
 That streams against my breast ? 
 Is this thy neck, that curve of moonlight 
 
 Which Helva s hand caressed ? , 
 
 " Xo misty breathing strains thy nostril ; 
 Thine eye shines blue and cold ; 
 
 * The name of the Scandinavian god of fire. 
 
170 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Yet mounting up our airy pathway 
 
 I see thy hoofs of gold. 
 Not lighter o er the springing rainbow 
 
 Walhalla s gods repair 
 Than we in sweeping journey over 
 
 The bending bridge of air. 
 
 " Far, far around star-gleams are sparkling 
 
 Amid the twilight space ; 
 And Earth, that lay so cold and darkling, 
 
 Has veiled her dusky face. 
 Are those the Nornes that beckon onward 
 
 As if to Odin s bo ard, 
 Where by the hands of warriors nightly 
 
 The sparkling mead is poured ? 
 
 " Tis Skuld : * her star-eye speaks the glory 
 
 That wraps the mighty soul, 
 When on its hinge of music opens 
 
 The gateway of the pole ; 
 When Odin s warder leads the hero 
 
 To banquets never o er, 
 And Freya s f glances fill the bosom 
 
 With sweetness evermore. 
 
 " On ! on ! the northern lights are streaming 
 In brightness like the morn, 
 
 * The Nome of the future. 
 
 t Freya, the northern goddess of lore. 
 
THE POETRY OF THE NORTH. 171 
 
 And pealing far amid the vastness 
 
 I hear the gyallarhorn.* 
 The heart of starry space is throbbing 
 
 "With songs of minstrels old ; 
 And now on high Walhalla s portal 
 
 Gleam Surtur s hoofs of gold." 
 
 * The horn blown by the watchers on the rainbow, the bridge oyer 
 which the gods pass in northern mythology. 
 
THE BOY CAPTIVES. 
 
 AN INCIDENT OF THE INDIAN WAR OF 1695. 
 
 THE township of Haverhill, even as late as the close 
 of the seventeenth century, was a frontier settlement, oc 
 cupying an advanced position in the great wilderness, 
 which, unbroken by the clearing of a white man, extend 
 ed from the Merrimac River to the French villages on 
 the St. Franfois. A tract of twelve miles on the river 
 and three or four northwardly was occupied by scattered 
 settlers, while in the centre of the town a compact village 
 had grown up. In the immediate vicinity there were but 
 few Indians, and these generally peaceful and inoffensive. 
 On the breaking out of the Narragansett war, the inhab 
 itants had erected fortifications and taken other measures 
 for defence ; but, with the possible exception of one man 
 who was found slain in the woods in 1676, none of the 
 inhabitants were molested ; and it was not until about the 
 year 1689 that the safety of the settlement was seriously 
 threatened. Three persons were killed in that year. In 
 
 (172) 
 
THE BOY CAPTIVES. 173 
 
 1690 six garrisons were established in different parts of 
 the town, with a small company of soldiers attached to each. 
 Two of these houses are still standing. They were built 
 of brick, two stories high, with a single outside door, so 
 small and narrow that but one person could enter at a 
 time ; the windows few, and only about two and a half 
 feet long by eighteen inches wide, with thick diamond 
 glass secured with lead, and crossed inside with bars of 
 iron. The basement had but two rooms, and the cham 
 ber was entered by a ladder instead of stairs ; so that 
 the inmates, if driven thither, could cut off communica 
 tion with the rooms below. Many private houses were 
 strengthened and fortified. We remember one familiar 
 to our boyhood a venerable old building of wood, with 
 brick between the weather boards and ceiling, with a mas 
 sive balustrade over the door, constructed of oak timber 
 and plank, with holes through the latter for firing upon 
 assailants. The door opened upon a stone-paved hall, or 
 entry, leading into the huge single room of the basement, 
 which was lighted by two small windows, the ceiling 
 black with the smoke of a century and a half; a huge 
 fireplace, calculated for eight-feet wood, occupying one 
 entire side ; while, overhead, suspended from the timbers 
 or on shelves fastened to them, were household stores, 
 farming utensils, fishing rods, guns, bunches of herbs 
 gathered perhaps a century ago, strings of dried apples 
 
174 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 and pumpkins, links of mottled sausages, spareribs, and 
 flitches of bacon ; the firelight of an evening dimly re 
 vealing the checked woollen coverlet of the bed in one 
 far-off corner, while in another 
 
 " the pewter plates on the dresser 
 
 Caught and reflected the flame as shields of armies the sunshine." 
 
 Tradition has preserved many incidents of life in the 
 garrisons. In times of unusual peril the settlers generally 
 resorted at night to the fortified houses, taking thither 
 their flocks and herds and such household valuables as 
 were most likely to strike the fancy or minister to 
 the comfort or vanity of the heathen marauders. False 
 alarms were frequent. The smoke of a distant fire, the 
 bark of a dog in the deep woods, a stump or bush taking 
 in the uncertain light of stars and moon the appear 
 ance of a man, were sufficient to spread alarm through 
 the entire settlement and to cause the armed men of the 
 garrison to pass whole nights in sleepless watching. It 
 is said that at Haselton s garrison house the sentinel on 
 duty saw, as he thought, an Indian inside of the paling 
 which surrounded the building, and apparently seeking to 
 gain an entrance. He promptly raised his musket and 
 fired at the intruder, alarming thereby the entire garrison. 
 The women and children left their beds, and the men 
 seized their guns and commenced firing on the suspicious 
 
THE BOY CAPTIVES. 175 
 
 object ; but it seemed to bear a charmed life and remained 
 unharmed. As the morning dawned, however, the mys 
 tery was solved by the discovery of a black quilted petti 
 coat hanging on the clothes line, completely riddled with 
 balls. 
 
 As a matter of course, under circumstances of perpetual 
 alarm and frequent peril, the duty of cultivating their 
 fields, and gathering their harvests, and working at their 
 mechanical avocations was dangerous and difficult to the 
 settlers. One instance will serve as an illustration. At 
 the garrison house of Thomas Dustin, the husband of the 
 far-famed Mary Dustin, (who, while a captive of the In 
 dians, and maddened by the murder of her infant child, 
 killed and scalped, with the assistance of a young boy, the 
 entire band of her captors, ten in number,) the business of 
 brickmaking was carried on. The pits where the clay was 
 found were only a few rods from the house ; yet no man 
 ventured to bring the clay to the yard within the enclo 
 sure without the attendance of a file of soldiers. An anec 
 dote relating to this garrison has been handed down to 
 the present time. Among its inmates were two young 
 cousins, Joseph and Mary Whittaker ; the latter a merry, 
 handsome girl, relieving the tedium of garrison duty with 
 her lighthearted mirthfulness and 
 
 " Making a sunshine in that shady place." 
 
176 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Joseph, in the intervals of his labors in the double ca 
 pacity of brickmaker and man at arras, was assiduous ia 
 his attentions to his fair cousin, who was not inclined to 
 encourage him. Growing desperate, he threatened one 
 evening to throw himself into the garrison well. His 
 threat only called forth the laughter of his mistress ; and, 
 bidding her farewell, he proceeded to put it in execu 
 tion. On reaching the well he stumbled over a log ; 
 whereupon, animated by a happy idea, he dropped the 
 wood into the water instead of himself, and, hiding be 
 hind the curb, awaited the result. Mary, who had been 
 listening at the door, and who had not believed her 
 lover capable of so rash an act, heard the sudden plunge 
 of the wooden Joseph. She ran to the well, and, lean 
 ing over the curb and peering down the dark opening, 
 cried out, in tones of anguish and remorse, " Joseph, if 
 you re in the land of the living, I ll have you ! " " I ll 
 take ye at your word," answered Joseph, springing up 
 from his hiding-place and avenging himself for her coy 
 ness and coldness by a hearty embrace. 
 
 Our own paternal ancestor, owing to religious scruples 
 in the matter of taking arms even for defence of life and 
 property, refused to leave his undefended house and en 
 ter the garrison. The Indians frequently came to his 
 house ; and the family more than once in the night heard 
 them whispering under the windows, and saw them put 
 
THE BOY CAPTIVES. 177 
 
 their copper faces to the glass to take a view of the apart 
 ments. Strange as it may seem, they never offered any 
 injury or insult to the inmates. 
 
 In 1695 the township was many times molested by 
 Indians and several persons were killed and wounded. 
 Early in the fall a small party made their appearance in 
 the northerly part of the town, where, finding two boys at 
 work in an open field, they managed to surprise and cap 
 ture them, and, without committing further violence, re 
 treated through the woods to their homes on the shore 
 of Lake "Wmnipiseogee. Isaac Bradley, aged fifteen, was 
 a small but active and vigorous boy ; his companion in 
 captivity, Joseph Whittaker, was only eleven, yet quite as 
 large in size, and heavier in his movements. After a 
 hard and painful journey they arrived at the lake, and 
 were placed in an Indian family, consisting of a man and 
 squaw and two or three children. Here they soon ac 
 quired a sufficient knowledge of the Indian tongue to en 
 able them to learn from the conversation carried on in 
 their presence that it was designed to take them to Can 
 ada in the spring. This discovery was a painful one. 
 Canada, the land of Papist priests and bloody Indians, 
 was the especial terror of the New England settlers, and 
 the anathema maranatha of Puritan pulpits. Thither the 
 Indians usually hurried their captives, where they com 
 pelled them to work in their villages or sold them to the 
 12 
 
178 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 French planters. Escape from thence through a deep 
 wilderness, and across lakes, and mountains, and almost 
 impassable rivers, without food or guide, was regarded as 
 an impossibility. The poor boys, terrified by the pros 
 pect of being carried still farther from their home and 
 friends, began to dream of escaping from their masters 
 before they started for Canada. It was now winter ; it 
 would have been little short of madness to have chosen 
 for flight that season of bitter cold and deep snows. Ow 
 ing to exposure and want of proper food and clothing, 
 Isaac, the eldest of the boys, was seized with a violent 
 fever, from which he slowly recovered in the course of 
 the winter. His Indian mistress was as kind to him as 
 her circumstances permitted procuring medicinal herbs 
 and roots for her patient, and tenderly watching over him 
 in the long winter nights. Spring came at length ; the 
 snows melted ; and the ice was broken up on the lake. 
 The Indians began to make preparations for journeying 
 to Canada ; and Isaac, who had during his sickness de 
 vised a plan of escape, saw that the time of putting it in 
 execution had come. On the evening before he was 
 to make the attempt he for the first time informed his 
 younger companion of his design, and told him, if he in 
 tended to accompany him, he must be awake at the time 
 appointed. The boys laid down as usual in the wigwam 
 in the midst of the family. Joseph soon fell asleep ; but 
 
THE BOY CAPTIVES. 179 
 
 Isaac, fully sensible of the danger and difficulty of the 
 enterprise before him, lay awake, watchful for his oppor 
 tunity. About midnight he rose, cautiously stepping over 
 the sleeping forms of the family, and securing, as he went, 
 his Indian master s flint, steel, and tinder, and a small 
 quantity of dry moose meat and corn bread. He then 
 carefully awakened his companion, who, starting up, for 
 getful of the cause of his disturbance, asked aloud, " What 
 do you want ? " The savages began to stir ; and Isaac, 
 trembling with fear of detection, laid down again and pre 
 tended to be asleep. After waiting a while he again 
 rose, satisfied, from the heavy breathing of the Indians, 
 that they were all sleeping ; and fearing to awaken Jo 
 seph a second time, lest he should again hazard all by his 
 thoughtlessness, he crept softly out of the wigwam. He 
 had proceeded but a few rods when he heard footsteps 
 behind him; and, supposing himself pursued, he hurried 
 into the woods, casting a glance backward. What was 
 his joy to see his young companion running after him ! 
 They hastened on in a southerly direction as nearly as 
 they could determine, hoping to reach their distant home. 
 When daylight appeared they found a large hollow log, 
 into which -they crept for concealment, wisely judging 
 that they would be hotly pursued by their Indian cap 
 tors. 
 
 Their sagacity was by no means at fault. The Indians, 
 
180 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 missing their prisoners in the morning, started off in pur 
 suit with their dogs. As the young boys lay in the log 
 they could hear the whistle of the Indians and the barking 
 of dogs upon their track. It was a trying moment ; and 
 even the stout heart of the elder boy sank within him as 
 the dogs came up to the log and set up a loud bark of 
 discovery.^ But his presence of mind saved him. He 
 spoke in a low tone to the dogs, who, recognizing his fa 
 miliar voice, wagged their tails with delight and ceased 
 barking. He then threw to them the morsel of moose 
 meat he had taken from the wigwam. While the dogs 
 were thus diverted the Indians made their appearance. 
 The boys heard the light, stealthy sound of their mocca- 
 sons on the leaves. They passed close to the log ; and 
 the dogs, having devoured their moose meat, trotted after 
 their masters. Through a crevice in the log the boys 
 looked after them and saw them disappear in the thick 
 woods. They remained in their covert until night, when 
 they started again on their long journey, taking a new 
 route to avoid the Indians. At daybreak they again con 
 cealed themselves, but travelled the next night and day 
 without resting. By this time they had consumed all the 
 bread which they had taken, and were fajnting from 
 hunger and weariness^. Just at the close of the third day 
 they were providentially enabled to kill a pigeon and a 
 small tortoise, a part of which they ate raw, not daring 
 
THE BOY CAPTIVES. 181 
 
 to make a fire, which might attract the watchful eyes of 
 savages. On the sixth day they struck upon an old In 
 dian path, and, following it until night, came suddenly 
 upon a camp of the enemy. Deep in the heart of the 
 forest, under the shelter of a ridge of land heavily tim 
 bered, a great fire of logs and brushwood was burning ; 
 and around it the Indians sat, eating their moose meat 
 and smoking their pipes. 
 
 The poor fugitives, starving, weary, and chilled by the 
 cold spring blasts, gazed down upon the ample fire, and 
 the savory meats which the squaws were cooking by it, 
 but felt no temptation to purchase warmth and food by 
 surrendering themselves to captivity. Death in the forest 
 seemed preferable. They turned and fled back upon their 
 track, expecting every moment to hear the yells of pur 
 suers. The morning found them seated on the bank of a 
 small stream, their feet torn and bleeding and their bodies 
 emaciated. The elder, as a last effort, made search for 
 roots, and fortunately discovered a few ground nuts, 
 (glicine apios,) which served to refresh in some degree 
 himself and his still weaker companion. As they stood 
 together by the stream, hesitating and almost despairing, 
 it occurred to Isaac that the rivulet might lead to a larger 
 stream of water, and that to the sea and the white settle 
 ments near it; and he resolved to follow it. They again Jf: 
 began their painful march ; the day passed, and the % night 
 
182 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 once more overtook them. When the eighth morning 
 dawned the younger of the boys found himself unable to 
 rise from his bed of leaves. Isaac endeavored to encour 
 age him, dug roots and procured water for him ; but the 
 poor lad was utterly exhausted. He had no longer heart 
 or hope. The elder boy laid him on leaves and dry ;rass 
 at the foot of a tree, and with a heavy heart bade him 
 farewell. Alone he slowly and painfully proceeded down 
 the stream, now greatly increased in size by tributary 
 rivulets. On the top of a hill he climbed with difficulty 
 into a tree, and saw in the distance what seemed to be a 
 clearing and a newly-raised frame building. Hopeful and 
 rejoicing, he turned back to his young companion, told 
 him what he had seen, and, after chafing his limbs a while, 
 got him upon his feet. Sometimes supporting him, and 
 at others carrying him on his back, the heroic boy stag 
 gered towards the clearing. On reaching it he found it 
 deserted, and was obliged to continue his journey. To 
 wards night signs of civilization began to appear the 
 heavy, continuous roar of water was heard; and, presently 
 emerging from the forest, he saw a great river dashing 
 in white foam down precipitous rocks, and on its bank the 
 gray walls of a huge stone building, with flankers, pali 
 sades, and moat, over which the British flag was flying. 
 This was the famous Saco Fort, built by Governor Phips 
 two years before, just below the falls of the Saco River. 
 
THE EOT CAPTIVES. 183 
 
 The soldiers of the garrison gave the poor fellows a kindly 
 welcome. Joseph, who was scarcely alive, lay for a long 
 time sick in the fort ; but Isaac soon regained his strength 
 and set out for his home in Haverhill, which he had the 
 good fortune to arrive at in safety. 
 
 Amidst the stirring excitements of the present day, 
 when every thrill of the electric wire conveys a new 
 subject for thought or action to a generation as eager as 
 the ancient Athenians for some new thing, simple legends 
 of the past like that which we have transcribed have 
 undoubtedly lost in a great degree their interest. The 
 lore of the fireside is becoming obsolete, and with the 
 octogenarian few who still linger among us will perish the 
 unwritten history of border life in New England. 
 
THE BLACK MEN IN THE REVOLUTION 
 AND WAR OF 1812. 
 
 THE return of the festival of our national independ 
 ence has called our attention to a matter which has been 
 very carefully kept out of sight by orators and toast 
 drinkers. We allude to the participation of colored men 
 in the great struggle for American freedom. It is not in 
 accordance with our taste or our principles to eulogize the 
 shedders of blood even in a cause of acknowledged justice ; 
 but when we see a whole nation doing honor to the 
 memories of one class of its defenders to the total neglect 
 of another class, who had the misfortune to be of darker 
 complexion, we cannot forego the satisfaction of inviting 
 notice to certain historical facts which for the last half 
 century have been quietly elbowed aside, as no more 
 deserving of a place in patriotic recollection than the 
 descendants of the men to whom the facts in question re 
 late have to a place in a Fourth of July procession. 
 
 Of the services and sufferings of the colored soldiers 
 of the revolution no attempt has, to our knowledge, been 
 
 (184) 
 
THE BLACK MEN IN THE REVOLUTION. 185 
 
 made to preserve a record. They have had no historian. 
 With here and there an exception, they have all passed 
 away ; and only some faint tradition of their campaigns 
 under Washington, and Greene, and Lafayette, and of 
 their cruisings under Decatur and Barry, lingers among 
 their descendants. Yet enough is known to show that the 
 free colored men of the United States bore their full 
 proportion of the sacrifices and trials of the revolutionary 
 war. 
 
 The late Governor Eustis, of Massachusetts, the pride 
 and boast of the democracy of the east, himself an active 
 participant in the war, and therefore a most competent 
 witness, Governor Merrill, of Xew Hampshire, Judge 
 Hemphill, of Pennsylvania, and other members of Con 
 gress, in the debate on the question of admitting 1 Missouri 
 as a slave state into the Union, bore emphatic testimony 
 to the efficiency and heroism of the black troops. Hon. 
 Calvin Goddard, of Connecticut, states that in the little 
 circle of his residence he was instrumental in securing, 
 under the act of 1818, the pensions of nineteen colored 
 soldiers. " I cannot," he says, " refrain from mentioning 
 one aged black man, Primus Babcock, who proudly pre 
 sented to me an honorable discharge from service during 
 the war, dated at the close of it, wholly in the hand 
 writing of George Washington ; nor can I forget the 
 expression of his feelings when informed, after his dis- 
 
186 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 charge had been sent to the war department, that it 
 could not be returned. At his request it was written for, 
 as he seemed inclined to spurn the pension and reclaim 
 the discharge. There is a touching anecdote related of 
 Baron Steuben on the occasion of the disbandment of the 
 American army. A black soldier, with his wounds un- 
 healed, utterly destitute, stood on the wharf just as a 
 vessel bound for his distant home was getting under weigh. 
 The poor fellow gazed at the vessel with tears in his 
 eyes, and gave himself up to despair. The warmhearted 
 foreigner witnessed his emotion, and, inquiring into the 
 cause of it, took his last dollar from his purse and gave it 
 to him, with tears of sympathy trickling down his cheeks. 
 Overwhelmed with gratitude, the poor wounded soldier 
 hailed the sloop and was received on board. As it moved 
 out from the wharf, he cried back to his noble friend on 
 shore, " God Almighty bless you, master Baron ! " 
 
 " In Rhode Island," says Governor Eustis in his able 
 Speech against slavery in Missouri, 12th of twelfth month, 
 1820, " the blacks formed an entire regiment, and they 
 discharged their duty with zeal and fidelity. The gallant 
 defence of Red Bank, in which the black regiment bore a 
 part, is among the proofs of their valor." In this contest 
 it will be recollected that four hundred men met and 
 repulsed, after a terrible and sanguinary struggle, fifteen 
 hundred Hessian troops, headed by Count Donop. The 
 
THE BLACK MEN IX THE REVOLUTION. 187 
 
 glory of the defence of Red Bank, which has been pro 
 nounced one of the most heroic actions of the war, belongs 
 in reality to black men ; yet who now hears them spoker 
 of in connection with it ? Among the traits which dis 
 tinguished the black regiment was devotion to their 
 officers. In the attack made upon the American lines 
 near Croton River on the 13th of the fifth month, 1781, 
 Colonel Greene, the commander of the regiment, was cut 
 down and mortally wounded; but the sabres of the enemy 
 only reached him through the bodies of his faithful guard 
 of blacks, who hovered over him to protect him, every one 
 of whom was killed. The late Dr. Harris, of Dunbarton, 
 New Hampshire, a revolutionary veteran, stated, in a 
 speech at Francestown, New Hampshire, some years ago, 
 that on one occasion the regiment to which he was attached 
 was commanded to defend an important position, which 
 the enemy thrice assailed, and from which they were as 
 often repulsed. " There was," said the venerable speaker, 
 " a regiment of blacks in the same situation, a regiment 
 of negroes fighting for our liberty and independence, not a 
 white man among them but the officers, in the same 
 dangerous and responsible position. Had they been un 
 faithful or given way before the enemy, all would have 
 been lost. Three times in succession were they attacked 
 with most desperate fury by well-disciplined and veteran 
 troops ; and three times did they successfully repel the 
 
188 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 assault, and thus preserve an army. They fought thus 
 through the war. They were brave and hardy troops." 
 
 In the debate in the New York convention of 1821 for 
 amending the constitution of the state, on the question of 
 extending the right of suffrage to the blacks, Dr. Clarke, 
 the delegate from Delaware county, and other members, 
 made honorable mention of the services of the colored 
 troops in the revolutionary army. 
 
 The late James Forten, of Philadelphia, well known as 
 a colored man of wealth, intelligence, and philanthropy, 
 enlisted in the American navy under Captain Decatur, 
 of the Royal Louis, was taken prisoner during his second 
 cruise, and, with nineteen other colored men, confined on 
 board the horrible Jersey prison ship. All the vessels in 
 the American service at that period were partly manned 
 by blacks. The old citizens of Philadelphia to this day 
 remember the fact, that, when the troops of the north 
 marched through the city, one or more colored companies 
 were attached to nearly all the regiments. 
 
 Governor Eustis, in the speech before quoted, states 
 that the free colored soldiers entered the ranks with the 
 whites. The time of those who were slaves was pur 
 chased of their masters, and they were induced to enter 
 the service in consequence of a law of Congress by which, 
 on condition of their serving in the ranks during the war, 
 they were made freemen. This hope of liberty inspired 
 
THE BLACK MEN IX THE REVOLUTION. 189 
 
 them with courage to oppose their breasts to the Hessian 
 bayonet at Red Bank, and enabled them to endure with 
 fortitude the cold and famine of Valley Forge. The 
 anecdote of the slave of General Sullivan, of New Hamp 
 shire, is well known. When his master told him that 
 they were on the point of starting for the army, to fight 
 for liberty, he shrewdly suggested that it would be a great 
 satisfaction to know that he was indeed going to fight for 
 his liberty. Struck with the reasonableness and justice 
 of this suggestion, General S. at once gave him his 
 freedom. 
 
 The late Tristam.Burges, of Rhode Island, in a speech 
 in Congress, first month, 1828, said, " At the commence 
 ment of the revolutionary war, Rhode Island had a num 
 ber of slaves. A regiment of them were enlisted into the 
 continental service, and no braver men met the enemy in 
 battle ; but not one of them was permitted to be a soldier 
 until he had first been made a freeman." 
 
 The celebrated Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, 
 in his speech on the Missouri question and in defence of 
 the slave representation of the south, made the following 
 admissions : 
 
 "They (the colored people) were in numerous in 
 stances the pioneers, and in all the laborers, of our armies. 
 To their hands were owing the greatest part of the forti 
 fications raised for the protection of the country. Fort 
 
190 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Moultrie gave, at an early period of the inexperienced and 
 untried valor of our citizens, immortality to the American 
 arms ; and in the Northern States numerous bodies of 
 them were enrolled, and .fought side by side with the 
 whites at the battles of the revolution." 
 
 Let us now look forward thirty or forty years, to the 
 last war with Great Britain, and see whether the whites 
 enjoyed a monopoly of patriotism at that time. 
 
 Martindale, of New York, in Congress, 22d of first 
 month, 1828, said, " Slaves, or negroes who had been 
 slaves, were enlisted as soldiers in the war of the revolu 
 tion ; and I myself saw a battalion of them, as fine martial- 
 looking men as I ever saw, attached to the northern 
 army in the last war, on its march from Plattsburg to 
 Sackett s Harbor." 
 
 Hon. Charles Miner, of Pennsylvania, in Congress, 
 second month 7th, 1828, said, " The African race make 
 excellent soldiers. Large numbers of them were with 
 Perry, and helped to gain the brilliant victory of Lake 
 Erie. A whole battalion of them were distinguished for 
 their orderly appearance." 
 
 Dr. Clarke, in the convention which revised the con 
 stitution of New York in 1821, speaking of the colored 
 inhabitants of the state, said, 
 
 " In your late war they contributed largely towards 
 some of your most splendid victories. On Lakes Erie 
 
THE BLACK MEN IX THE REVOLUTION. 191 
 
 and Champlain, where your fleets triumphed over a foe 
 superior in numbers and engines of death, they were 
 manned in a large proportion with men of color. And in 
 this very house, in the fall of 1814, a bill passed, receiv 
 ing the approbation of all the branches of your govern 
 ment, authorizing the governor to accept the services of a 
 corps of two thousand free people of color. Sir, these 
 were times which tried men s souls. In these times it 
 was no sporting matter to bear arms. These were times 
 when a man who shouldered his musket did not know but 
 he bared his bosom to receive a death wound from the 
 enemy ere he laid it aside ; and in these times these 
 people were found as ready and as willing to volunteer 
 in your service as any other. They were not compelled 
 to go ; they were not drafted. No ; your pride had 
 placed them beyond your compulsory power. But there 
 was no necessity for its exercise ; they were volunteers ; 
 yes, sir, volunteers to defend that very country from the 
 inroads and ravages of a ruthless and vindictive foe 
 which had treated them with insult, degradation, and 
 slavery." 
 
 On the capture of Washington by the British forces, it 
 was judged expedient to fortify, without delay, the prin 
 cipal towns and cities exposed to similar attacks. The 
 vigilance committee of Philadelphia waited upon three of 
 the principal colored citizens, viz., James Forten, Bishop 
 
192 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Allen, and Absalom Jones, soliciting the aid of the people 
 of color in erecting suitable defences for the city. Ac 
 cordingly, twenty-five hundred colored men assembled 
 in the state-house yard, and from thence marched to 
 Gray s Ferry, where they labored for two days almost 
 without intermission. Their labors were so faithful and 
 efficient that a vote of thanks was tendered them by the 
 committee. A battalion of colored troops was at the 
 same time organized in the city under an officer of the 
 United States army; and they were on the point of 
 marching to the frontier when peace was proclaimed. 
 
 General Jackson s proclamations to the free colored 
 inhabitants of Louisiana are well known. In his first, 
 inviting them to take up arms, he said, 
 
 " As sons of freedom, you are now called on to defend 
 our most inestimable blessings. As Americans, your 
 country looks with confidence to her adopted children for 
 a valorous support. As fathers, husbands, and brothers, 
 you are summoned to rally round the standard of the 
 eagle, to defend all which is dear in existence." 
 
 The second proclamation is one of the highest compli 
 ments ever paid by a military chief to his soldiers : 
 
 "TO THE FREE PEOPLE OF COLOR. 
 
 " Soldiers ! when on the banks of the Mobile I 
 called you to take up arms, inviting you to partake the 
 
THE BLACK MEN IN THE REVOLUTION. 193 
 
 perils and glory of your white fellow -citizens, I expected 
 much from you ; for I was not ignorant that you possessed 
 qualities most formidable to an invading enemy. I knew 
 with what fortitude you could endure hunger, and thirst, 
 and all the fatigues of a campaign. I knew well how you 
 loved your native country, and that you, as well as our 
 selves, had to defend what man holds most dear his 
 parents, wife, children, and property. You have done 
 more than I expected. In addition to the previous quali 
 ties I before knew you to possess, I found among you a 
 noble enthusiasm, which leads to the performance of 
 great things. 
 
 "Soldiers! the President of the United States shall 
 hear how praiseworthy was your conduct in the hour of 
 danger, and the representatives of the American people 
 will give you the praise your exploits entitle you to. Your 
 general anticipates them in applauding your noble ardor." 
 
 It will thus be seen that whatever honor belongs to the 
 " heroes of the -revolution " and the volunteers in " the 
 second war for independence " is to be divided between 
 the white and the colored man. We have dwelt upon 
 this subject at length, not because it accords with our 
 principles or feelings, for it is scarcely necessary for us to 
 say that we are one of those who hold that 
 
 "Peace hath her victories 
 No less renowned than war," 
 
 13 
 
194 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 and certainly far more desirable and useful ; but because, 
 in popular estimation, the patriotism which dares and does 
 on the battle field takes a higher place than the quiet 
 exercise of the duties of peaceful citizenship ; and we are 
 willing that colored soldiers, with their descendants, should 
 have the benefit, if possible, of a public sentiment which 
 has so extravagantly lauded their white companions in 
 arms. If pulpits must be desecrated by eulogies of the 
 patriotism of bloodshed, we see no reason why black de 
 fenders of their country in the war for liberty should not 
 receive honorable mention as well as white invaders of a 
 neighboring republic who have volunteered in a war for 
 plunder and slavery extension. For the latter class of 
 " heroes " we have very little respect. The patriotism 
 of too many of them forcibly reminds us of Dr. Johnson s 
 definition of that much-abused term : " Patriotism, sir ! 
 Tis the last refuge of a scoundrel." 
 
 " What right, I demand," said an American orator some 
 years ago, " have the children of Africa to a homestead in 
 the white man s country ? " The answer will in part be 
 found in the facts which we have presented. Their right, 
 like that of their white fellow-citizens, dates back to the 
 dread arbitrament of battle. Their bones whiten every 
 stricken field of the revolution ; their feet tracked with 
 blood the snows of Jersey ; their toil built up every forti 
 fication south of the Potomac ; they shared the famine and 
 
THE BLACK. MEN IX THE REVOLUTION. 195 
 
 nakedness of Valley Forge and the pestilential horrors of 
 the old Jersey prison ship. Have they, then, no claim to an 
 equal participation in the blessings which have grown out 
 of the national independence for which they fought? Is 
 it just, is it magnanimous, is it safe even, to starve the 
 patriotism of such a people, to cast their hearts out of 
 the treasury of the republic, and to convert them, by 
 political disfranchisement and social oppression, into 
 enemies ? 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 DR. SINGLETART is dead ! 
 
 Well, what of it ? All who live die sooner or later ; 
 and pray who was Dr. Singletary, that his case should 
 claim particular attention ? 
 
 Why, in the first place, Dr. Singletary, as a man, born 
 to our common inheritance of joy and sorrow, earthly in 
 stincts and heavenward aspirations, our brother in sin 
 and suffering, wisdom and folly, love, and pride, and van 
 ity, has a claim upon the universal sympathy. Besides, 
 whatever the living man may have been, death has now 
 invested him with its great solemnity. He is with the 
 immortals. For him the dark curtain has been lifted. 
 The weaknesses, the follies, and the repulsive mental and 
 personal idiosyncrasies which may have kept him without 
 the sphere of our respect and sympathy have now fallen 
 
 (196) 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 197 
 
 off, and he stands radiant with the transfiguration of eter 
 nity, God s child, our recognized and acknowledged brother. 
 
 Dr. Singletary is dead. He was an old man, and sel 
 dom, of latter years, ventured beyond the precincts of his 
 neighborhood. He was a single man, and his departure 
 has broken no circle of family affection. He was little 
 known to the public, and is now little missed. The vil 
 lage newspaper simply appended to its announcement 
 of his decease the customary post mortem compliment, 
 " Greatly respected by all who knew him ; " and in the 
 annual catalogue of his alma mater an asterisk has been 
 added to his name, over which perchance some gray- 
 haired survivor of his class may breathe a sigh as he calls 
 up the image of the freshfaced, brighteyed boy, who, as 
 piring, hopeful, vigorous, started with him on the journey 
 of life a sigh rather for himself than for its unconscious 
 awakener. 
 
 But a few years have passed since he left us ; yet al 
 ready well nigh all the outward manifestations, landmarks, 
 and memorials of the living man have passed away or 
 been removed. His house, with its broad, mossy roof 
 sloping down on one side almost to the rose bushes and 
 lilacs, and with its comfortable little porch in front, where 
 he used to sit of a pleasant summer afternoon, has passed 
 into new hands and has been sadly disfigured by a glaring 
 coat of white paint ; and in the place of the good doctor s 
 
198 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 name, hardly legible on the Corner board, may now be 
 seen, in staring letters of black and gold, " VALENTINE 
 ORSON STUBBS, M. D., Indian doctor and dealer in 
 roots and herbs." The good doctor s old horse, as well 
 known as its owner to every man, woman, and child in 
 the village, has fallen into the new comer s hands, who 
 (being prepared to make the most of him, from the fact 
 that he commenced the practice of the healing art in the 
 stable, rising from thence to the parlor) has rubbed him 
 into comparative sleekness, cleaned his mane and tail of 
 the accumulated burrs of many autumns, and made quite a 
 gay nag of him. The wagon, too, in which at least two 
 generations of boys and girls have ridden in noisy hilarity 
 whenever they encountered it on their way to school, has 
 been so smartly painted and varnished, that, if its former 
 owner could look down from the hill slope where he lies, 
 he would scarcely know his once familiar vehicle as it 
 whirls glittering along the main road to the village. For 
 the rest, all things go on as usual ; the miller grinds, the 
 blacksmith strikes and blows, the cobbler and tailor stitch 
 and mend, old men sit in the autumn sun, old gossips stir 
 tea and scandal, revival meetings alternate with apple bees 
 and huskings, toil, pleasure, family jars, petty neighbor 
 hood quarrels, courtship, and marriage, all which make 
 up the daily life of a country village, continue as before. 
 The little chasm which his death has made in the hearts 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 199 
 
 of the people where he lived and labored seems nearly 
 closed up. There is only one more grave in the burying 
 ground that is all. 
 
 Let nobody infer from what I have said that the good 
 man died unlamented ; for, indeed, it was a sad day with 
 his neighbors when the news, long expected, ran at last 
 from house to house and from workshop to workshop, 
 " Dr. Singletary is dead ! " He had not any enemy left 
 among them; in one way or another he had been the 
 friend and benefactor of all. Some owed to his skill 
 their recovery from sickness ; others remembered how he 
 had watched with anxious solicitude by the bedside of 
 their dying relatives, soothing them, when all human aid 
 was vain, with the sweet consolations of that Christian 
 hope which alone pierces the great shadow of the grave 
 and shows the safe stepping stones above the dark waters. 
 The old missed a cheerful companion and friend, who 
 had taught them much without wounding their pride by 
 an offensive display of his superiority, and who, while 
 making a jest of his own trials and infirmities, could still 
 listen with real sympathy to the querulous and impor 
 tunate complaints of others. For one day at least, even 
 the sunny faces of childhood were marked with unwonted 
 thoughtfulness ; the shadow of the common bereavement 
 fell over the play ground and nursery. The little girl re 
 membered, with tears, how her broken-limbed doll had 
 
200 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 taxed the surgical ingenuity of her genial old friend ; and 
 the boy showed sorrowfully to his playmates the top 
 which the good doctor had given him. If there were few, 
 among the many who stood beside his grave, capable of 
 rightly measuring and appreciating the high intellectual 
 and spiritual nature which formed the background of his 
 simple social life, all could feel that no common loss had 
 been sustained, and that the kindly and generous spirit 
 which had passed away from them had not lived to him 
 self alone. 
 
 As you follow the windings of one of the loveliest rivers 
 of New England, a few miles above the sea mart, at its 
 mouth, you can see on a hill, whose grassy slope is check 
 ered with the graceful foliage of the locust, and whose top 
 stands relieved against a still higher elevation, dark with 
 oaks and walnuts, the white stones of the burying-place. 
 It is a quiet spot, but without gloom, as befits " God s 
 Acre." Below is the village, with its sloops and fishing 
 boats at the wharves, and its crescent of white houses mir 
 rored in the water. Eastward is the misty line of the 
 great sea. Blue peaks of distant mountains roughen the 
 horizon of the north. Westward the broad, clear river 
 winds away into a maze of jutting bluffs and picturesque 
 wooded headlands. The tall, white stone on the west 
 erly slope of the hill bears the name of " Nicholas Sin- 
 gletary, M. D.," and marks the spot which he selected 
 
MY SUMMER TVITH DR. SINGLETART. 201 
 
 many years before his death. When I visited it last 
 spring the air about it was fragrant with the bloom of 
 sweet brier and blackberry and the balsamic aroma of the 
 sweet fern ; birds were singing in the birch trees by the 
 wall ; and two little, brown-locked, merry-faced girls were 
 making wreaths of the dandelions and grasses which grew 
 upon the old man s grave. The sun was setting behind 
 the western river bluffs, flooding the valley with soft light, 
 glorifying every object and fusing all into harmony and 
 beauty. I saw and felt nothing to depress or sadden me. 
 I could have joined in the laugh of the children. The 
 light whistle of a young teamster, driving merrily home 
 ward, did not jar upon my ear ; for from the transfigured 
 landscape, and from the singing birds, and from sportive 
 childhood, and from blossoming sweet brier, and from the 
 grassy mound before me I heard the whisper of one word 
 only, and that word was PEACE. 
 
 CHAPTER H. 
 
 SOME ACCOUNT OF PEEWATVKIN, ON THE TOCKETUCK. 
 
 "Well and truly said the wise man of old, " Much 
 study is a weariness to the flesh." Hard and close 
 
202 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 application through the winter had left me ill prepared to 
 resist the baleful influences of a New England spring. I 
 shrank alike from the storms of March, the capricious 
 changes of April, and the sudden alternations of May, 
 from the blandest of south-west breezes to the terrible and 
 icy eastern blasts which sweep our seaboard like the fa 
 bled sanser, or wind of death. The buoyancy and vigor, 
 the freshness and beauty, of life seemed leaving me. The 
 flesh and the spirit were no longer harmonious. I was 
 tormented by a nightmare feeling of the necessity of ex 
 ertion, coupled with a sense of utter inability. A thou 
 sand plans for my own benefit, or the welfare of those 
 dear to me, or of my fellow-men at large, passed before me ; 
 but I had no strength to lay hold of the good angels and 
 detain them until they left their blessing. The trumpet 
 sounded in my ears for the tournament of life ; but I could 
 not bear the weight of my armor. In the midst of duties 
 and responsibilities which I clearly comprehended I found 
 myself yielding to the absorbing egotism of sickness. I 
 could work only when the sharp rowels of necessity were 
 in my sides. 
 
 It needed not the ominous warnings of my acquaint 
 ance to convince me that some decisive change was 
 necessary. But what was to be done ? A voyage to 
 Europe was suggested by my friends ; but unhappily I 
 reckoned among them no one who was ready, like the 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SIXGLETARY. 203 
 
 honest laird of Dumbedikes, to inquire, purse in hand, 
 " Will siller do it ? " In casting about for some other ex 
 pedient, I remembered the pleasant old-fashioned village 
 of Peewawkin, on the Tocketuck River. A few weeks 
 of leisure, country air, and exercise, I thought, might be 
 of essential service to me. So I turned my key upon my 
 cares and studies, and my back to the city, and one fine 
 evening of early June the mail coach rumbled over Tocke 
 tuck Bridge and left me at the house of Dr. Singletary, 
 where I had been fortunate enough to secure bed and 
 board. 
 
 The little village of Peewawkin at this period was a 
 well-preserved specimen of the old, quiet, cozy hamlets 
 of New England. No huge factory threw its evil shadow 
 over it; no smoking demon of an engine dragged its long 
 train through the streets ; no steamboat puffed at its 
 wharves, or ploughed up the river, like the enchanted 
 ship of the Ancient Mariner, 
 
 " Against the wind, against the tide, 
 Steadied with upright keel." 
 
 The march of mind had not overtaken it. It had neither 
 printing press nor lyceum. As the fathers had done 
 before them, so did its inhabitants at the time of my visit. 
 There was little or no competition in their business ; there 
 were*no rich men, and none that seemed over-anxious to 
 
204 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 become so. Two or three small vessels were annually 
 launched from the carpenters yards on the river. There 
 was a blacksmith s shop, with its clang of iron and roar 
 of bellows ; a pottery, garnished with its coarse earthen 
 ware ; a store, where molasses, sugar, and spices were 
 sold on one side, and calicoes, tape, and ribbons on the 
 other. Three or four small schooners annually left the 
 wharves for the St. George s and Labrador fisheries. 
 Just back of the village a bright, noisy stream, gushing 
 out, like a merry laugh, from the walnut and oak woods 
 which stretched back far to the north through a narrow 
 break in the hills, turned the great wheel of a gristmill, 
 and went frolicking away, like a wicked Undine, under 
 the very windows of the brown, lilac-shaded house of 
 Deacon Warner, the miller, as if to tempt the good man s 
 handsome daughters to take lessons in dancing. At one 
 end of the little crescent-shaped village, at the corner of 
 the main road and the green lane to Deacon Warner s 
 mill, stood the school house, a small, ill-used, Spanish- 
 brown building, its patched windows bearing unmis 
 takable evidence of the mischievous character of its in 
 mates. At the other end, farther up the river, on a rocky 
 knoll open to all the winds, stood the meeting house, 
 old, two story, and full of windows, its gilded weather 
 cock glistening in the sun. The bell in its belfry had 
 been brought from France by Skipper Evans in the -latter 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. INGLETART. 205 
 
 part of the last century. Solemnly baptized and conse 
 crated to some holy saint, it had called to prayer the 
 veiled sisters of a convent and tolled heavily in the mass 
 es for the dead. At first some of the church felt misgiv 
 ings as to the propriety of hanging a Popish bell in a 
 Puritan steeple house ; but their objections were overruled 
 by the minister, who wisely maintained, that, if Moses 
 could use the borrowed jewels and ornaments of the 
 Egyptians to adorn and beautify the ark of the Lord, it 
 could not be amiss to make a Catholic bell do service in 
 an Orthodox belfry. The space between the school and 
 the meeting house was occupied by some fifteen or twenty 
 dwellings, many colored and diverse in age and appear 
 ance. Each one had its green yard in front, its rose 
 bushes and lilacs. Great elms, planted a century ago, 
 stretched and interlocked their heavy arms across the 
 street. The mill stream, which found its way into the 
 Tocketuck near the centre of the village, was spanned by 
 a rickety wooden bridge, rendered picturesque by a ven 
 erable and gnarled white oak which hung over it, with its 
 great roots half bared by the water and twisted among 
 the mossy stones of the crumbling abutment. 
 
 The house of Dr. Singletary was situated somewhat 
 apart from the main street, just on the slope of Blueberry 
 Hill a great, green swell of land, stretching far down 
 from the north, and terminating in a steep bluff at the 
 
206 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 river side. It overlooked the village and the river a long 
 way up and down. It was a brown -looking, antiquated 
 mansion, built by the doctor s grandfather in the earlier 
 days of the settlement. The rooms were large and low, 
 with great beams, scaly with whitewash, running across 
 them, scarcely above the reach of a tall man s head. 
 Great-throated fireplaces, filled with pine boughs and flower 
 pots, gave promise of winter fires, roaring and crackling 
 in boisterous hilarity, as if laughing to scorn the folly and 
 discomfort of our modern stoves. In the porch at the 
 front door were two seats, where the doctor was accus 
 tomed to sit in fine weather with his pipe and his book, 
 or with such friends as might call to spend a half hour 
 with him. The lawn in front had scarcely any other or 
 nament than its green grass, cropped short by the doctor s 
 horse. A stone wall separated it from the lane, half over 
 run with wild hop, or clematis, and two noble rock maples 
 arched over with their dense foliage the little red gate. 
 Dark belts of woodland, smooth hill pasture, green, broad 
 meadows, and fields of corn and rye, the homesteads of 
 the villagers, were seen on one hand; while on the 
 other was the bright, clear river, with here and there a 
 white sail, relieved against bold, wooded banks, jutting 
 rocks, or tiny islands, dark with dwarf evergreens. It 
 was a quiet, rural picture, a happy and peaceful contrast 
 to all I had looked upon for weary, miserable months. It 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SIXGLETARY. 207 
 
 soothed the nervous excitement of pain and suffering. I 
 forgot myself in the pleasing interest which it awakened. 
 Nature s healing ministrations came to me through all my 
 senses. I felt the medicinal virtues of her sights, and 
 sounds, and aromal breezes. From the green turf of her 
 hills and the mossy carpets of her woodlands my lan 
 guid steps derived new vigor and elasticity. I felt, day 
 by day, the transfusion of her strong life. 
 
 The doctor s domestic establishment consisted of widow 
 Matson, his housekeeper, and an idle slip of a boy^ who, 
 when he was- not paddling across the river, or hunting in 
 the swamps, or playing ball on the " Meetin us Hill," 
 used to run of errands, milk the cow, and saddle the 
 horse. Widow Matson was a notable shrill-ton gued 
 woman, from whom two long-suffering husbands had ob 
 tained what might, under the circumstances, be well 
 called a comfortable release. She was neat and tidy 
 almost to a fault, thrifty and industrious, and, barring her 
 scolding propensity, was a pattern housekeeper. For the 
 doctor she entertained so high a regard that nothing could 
 exceed her indignation when any one save herself pre 
 sumed to find fault with him. Her bark was worse than 
 her bite ; she had a warm, woman s heart, capable of soft 
 relentings ; and this the roguish errand boy so well under 
 stood that he bore the daily infliction of her tongue with 
 a good-natured unconcern which would have been greatly 
 
208 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 to his credit had it not resulted from his confident expec 
 tation that an extra slice of cake or segment of pie would 
 ere long tickle his palate in atonement for the tingling 
 of his ears. 
 
 It must be confessed that the doctor had certain little 
 peculiarities and ways of his own which might have 
 ruffled the down of a smoother temper than that of the 
 widow Matson. He was careless and absent minded. 
 In spite of her labors and complaints, he scattered his 
 superfluous clothing, books, and papers over his rooms 
 in " much-admired disorder." He gave the freedom of 
 his house to the boys and girls of his neighborhood, who, 
 presuming upon his good nature, laughed at her remon 
 strances and threats as they chased each other up and 
 down the nicely-polished stairway. Worse than all, he 
 was proof against the vituperations and reproaches with 
 which she indirectly assailed him from the recesses of her 
 kitchen. He smoked his pipe and dozed over his news 
 paper as complacently as ever while his sins of omission 
 and commission were arrayed against him. 
 
 Peewawkin had always the reputation of a healthy 
 town ; and if it had been otherwise, Doctor Singletary 
 was the last man in the world to transmute the aches and 
 ails of its inhabitants into gold for his own pocket. So, 
 at the age of sixty, he was little better off, in point of 
 worldly substance, than when he came into possession of 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 209 
 
 the small homestead of his father. He cultivated with 
 his own hands his cornfield and potato patch, and trimmed 
 his apple and pear trees, as well satisfied with his 
 patrimony as Horace was with his rustic Sabine villa. 
 In addition to the care of his homestead and his profes 
 sional duties, he had long been one of the overseers of the 
 poor and a member of the school committee in his town ; 
 and he was a sort of -standing reference in all disputes 
 about wages, boundaries, and cattle trespasses in his 
 neighborhood. He had, nevertheless, a good deal of 
 leisure for reading, errands of charity, and social visits. 
 He loved to talk wi,th his friends, Elder Staples, the min 
 ister, Deacon Warner, and Skipper Evans. He was an 
 expert angler, and knew all the haunts of pickerel and 
 trout for many miles around. His favorite place of resort 
 was the hill back of his house, which afforded a view of 
 the long valley of the Tocketuck and the great sea. Here 
 he would sit, enjoying the calm beauty of the landscape, 
 pointing out to me localities interesting from their his 
 torical or traditional associations, or connected in some 
 way with humorous or pathetic passages of his own life 
 experience. Some of these autobiographical fragments 
 affected me deeply. In narrating them he invested famil 
 iar and commonplace facts with something of the fascina 
 tion of romance. "Human life," he would say, "is the 
 same every where. If we could but get at the truth, we 
 14 
 
210 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 should find that all the tragedy and comedy of Shak- 
 speare have been reproduced in this little village. God 
 has made all of one blood ; what is true of one man is in 
 some sort true of another ; manifestations may differ, but 
 the essential elements and spring of action are the same. 
 On the surface, every thing about us just now looks pro 
 saic and mechanical ; you see only a sort of barkmill 
 grinding over of the same dull, monotonous grist of daily 
 trifles. But underneath all this there is an earnest life, 
 rich and beautiful with love and hope, or dark with hatred, 
 and sorrow, and remorse. That fisherman by the river 
 side, or that woman at the stream below, with her wash 
 tub, who knows what lights and shadows checker their 
 memories, or what present thoughts of theirs, born of 
 heaven or hell, the future shall ripen into deeds of good 
 or evil ? Ah, what have I not seen and heard ? My 
 profession has been to me, in some sort, like the vial 
 genie of the Salamanca student; it has unroofed these 
 houses, and opened deep, dark chambers to the hearts of 
 their tenants, which no eye save that of God had ever 
 looked upon. "Where I least expected them, I have 
 encountered shapes of evil ; while, on the other hand, I 
 have found beautiful, heroic love and self-denial in those 
 who had seemed to me frivolous and selfish." 
 
 So would Dr. Singletary discourse as we strolled over 
 Blueberry Hill or drove along the narrow willow-shaded 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SIXGLETARY. 211 
 
 road which follows the windings of the river. He had 
 read and thought much in his retired, solitary life, and 
 was evidently well satisfied to find in me a gratified lis 
 tener. He talked well and fluently, with little regard to 
 logical sequence, and with something of the dogmatism 
 natural to one whose opinions had seldom been subjected 
 to scrutiny. He seemed equally at home in the most 
 abstruse questions of theology and metaphysics, and in 
 the more practical matters of mackerel fishing, corn grow 
 ing, and cattle raising. It was manifest that to his book 
 lore he had added that patient and close observation of 
 the processes of Nature which often places the unlettered 
 ploughman and mechanic on a higher level of available 
 intelligence than that occupied by professors and school 
 men. To him nothing which had its root in the eternal 
 verities of Nature was " common or unclean." The black 
 smith, subjecting to his will the swart genii of the mines 
 of coal and iron; the potter, with his "power over the 
 clay ; " the skipper, who had tossed in his frail fishing 
 smack among the icebergs of Labrador; the farmer, who 
 had won from Nature the occult secrets of her woods and 
 fields ; and even the vagabond hunter and angler, famil 
 iar with the habits of animals anjl the migration of birds 
 and fishes, had been his instructors ; and he was not 
 ashamed to acknowledge that they had taught him more 
 than college or library. 
 
212 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 THE DOCTOR S MATCHMAKING. 
 
 " Good morning, Mrs. Barnet," cried the doctor, as 
 we drew near a neat farm house during one of our 
 morning drives. 
 
 A tall, healthful young woman, in the bloom of ma 
 tronly beauty, was feeding chickens at the door. She 
 uttered an exclamation of delight and hurried towards 
 us. Perceiving a stranger in the wagon she paused, 
 with a look of embarrassment. 
 
 c 
 
 " My friend, who is spending a few weeks with me," 
 explained the doctor. 
 
 She greeted me civilly and pressed the doctor s hand 
 warmly. 
 
 " 0, it is so long since you have called on us that we 
 have been talking of going up to the village to see you 
 as soon as Robert can get away from his cornfield. You 
 don t know how little Lucy has grown. You must stop 
 and see her." 
 
 " She s coming to see me herself," replied the doctor, 
 beckoning to a sweet blue-eyed child in the doorway. 
 
 The delighted mother caught up her darling and held 
 her before the doctor. 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 213 
 
 " Doesn t she look like Robert ?" she inquired. "His 
 very eyes and forehead ! Bless me ! here he is now." 
 
 A stout, hale young farmer, in a coarse checked frock 
 and broad straw hat, came up from the adjoining field. 
 
 " Well, Robert," said the doctor, " how do matters now 
 stand with you ? Well, I hope." 
 
 " All right, doctor. We ve paid off the last cent of the 
 mortgage, and the farm is all free and clear. Julia and I 
 have worked hard ; but we re none the worse for it." 
 
 " You look well and happy, I am sure," said the doctor. 
 " I don t think you are sorry you took the advice of the old 
 doctor, after all." 
 
 The young wife s head drooped until her lips touched 
 those of her child. 
 
 " Sorry ! " exclaimed her husband. " Not we ! If there s 
 any body happier than we are within ten miles of us, I 
 don t know them. Doctor, I ll tell you what I said to 
 Julia the night I brought home that mortgage. * Well, 
 said I, that debt s paid; but there s one debt we can 
 never pay as long as we live. * I know it, says she ; 
 but Dr. Singletary wants no better reward for his kind 
 ness than to see us live happily together and do for 
 others what he has done for us. " 
 
 " Pshaw ! " said the doctor, catching up his reins and 
 whip. " You owe me nothing. But I must not forget 
 my errand. Poor old widow Osborne needs a watcher 
 
214 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 to-night ; and she insists upon having Julia Barnet, and 
 nobody else. What shall I tell her?" 
 
 "I ll go, certainly. I can leave Lucy now as well as 
 not." 
 
 " Good by, neighbors." 
 
 " Good by, doctor." 
 
 As we drove off I saw the doctor draw his hand hastily 
 across his eyes, and he said nothing for some minutes. 
 
 " Public opinion," said he at length, as if pursuing his 
 meditations aloud, " public opinion is, in nine cases out 
 of ten, public folly and impertinence. We are slaves 
 to one another. We dare not take counsel of our con 
 sciences and affections, but must needs suffer popular 
 prejudice and custom to decide for us, and at their bidding 
 are sacrificed love and friendship and all the best hopes 
 of our lives. We do not ask, What is right and best for 
 us ? but, What will folks say of it ? We have no individu 
 ality, no self-poised strength, no sense of freedom. We 
 are conscious always of the gaze of the many-eyed tyrant. 
 We propitiate him with precious offerings ; we burn in 
 cense perpetually to Moloch, and pass through his fire the 
 sacred first born of our hearts. How few dare to seek 
 their own happiness by the lights which God has given them, 
 or have strength to defy the false pride and the prejudice 
 of the world and stand fast in the liberty of Christians ! 
 Can any thing be more pitiable than the sight of so many, 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 215 
 
 who should be the choosers and creators under God of 
 their own spheres of utility and happiness, self-degraded 
 into mere slaves of propriety and custom, their true 
 natures undeveloped, their hearts cramped and shut up, 
 each afraid of his neighbor and his neighbor of him, living 
 a life of unreality, deceiving and being deceived, and for 
 ever walking in a vain show? Here, now, we have just 
 left a married couple who are happy because they have 
 taken counsel of their honest affections rather than of the 
 opinions of the multitude, and have dared to be true to 
 themselves in defiance of impertinent gossip." 
 
 "You speak of the young farmer Barnet and his wife, 
 I suppose ? " said I. 
 
 "Yes. I will give their case as an illustration. Julia 
 
 * 
 
 Atkins was the daughter of Ensign Atkins, who lived on 
 the mill road, just above Deacon "Warner s. When she 
 was ten years old her mother died ; and in a few months 
 afterwards her father married Polly Wiggin, the tailoress, 
 a shrewd, selfish, managing woman. Julia, poor girl ! had 
 a sorry time of it ; for the ensign, although a kind and 
 affectionate man naturally, was too weak and yielding to 
 interpose between her and his strong-minded, sharp- 
 tongued wife. She had one friend, however, who was 
 always ready to sympathize with her. Robert Barnet 
 was the son of her next-door neighbor, about two years 
 older than herself; they had grown up together as school 
 
216 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 companions and playmates ; and often in my drives I used 
 to meet them coming home hand in hand from school, or 
 from the woods with berries and nuts, talking and laugh 
 ing as if there were no scolding step-mothers in the 
 world. 
 
 " It so fell out that when Julia was in her sixteenth year 
 there came a famous writing master to Peewawkin. He 
 was a showy, dashing fellow, with a fashionable dress, a 
 wicked eye, and a tongue like the old serpent s when he 
 tempted our great-grandmother. Julia was one of his 
 scholars, and perhaps the prettiest of them all. The ras 
 cal singled her out from the first ; and, the better to ac 
 complish his purpose, he left the tavern and took lodgings 
 at the ensign s. He goon saw how matters stood in the 
 family, and governed himself accordingly, taking special 
 pains to conciliate the ruling authority. The ensign s 
 wife hated young Barnet, and wished to get rid of her 
 daughter-in-law. The writing master, therefore, had a 
 fair field. He flattered the poor young girl by his atten 
 tions and praised her beauty. Her moral training had 
 not fitted her to withstand this seductive influence ; no 
 mother s love, with its quick, instinctive sense of danger 
 threatening its object, interposed between her and the 
 tempter. Her old friend and playmate he who could 
 alone have saved her had been rudely repulsed from 
 the house by her mother-in-law ; and, indignant and 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SIXGLETARY. 217 
 
 disgusted, he had retired from all competition with his for 
 midable rival. Thus abandoned to her own undisciplined 
 imagination, with the inexperience of a child and the pas 
 sions of a woman, she was deceived by false promises, be 
 wildered, fascinated, and beguiled into sin. 
 
 " It is the same old story of woman s confidence and 
 man s duplicity. The rascally writing master, under pre 
 tence of visiting a neighboring town, left his lodgings and 
 never returned. The last I heard of him, he was the 
 tenant of a western penitentiary. Poor Julia, driven in 
 disgrace from her father s house, found a refuge in the 
 humble dwelling of an old woman of no very creditable 
 character. There I was called to visit her ; and, although 
 not unused to scenes of suffering and sorrow, I had never 
 before witnessed such an utter abandonment to grief, 
 shame, and remorse. Alas ! what sorrow was like unto 
 her sorrow ? The birth hour of her infant was also that 
 of its death. 
 
 " The agony of her spirit seemed greater than she could 
 bear. Her eyes were opened, and she looked upon her 
 self with loathing and horror. She would admit of no 
 hope, no consolation ; she would listen to no palliation or 
 excuse of her guilt. I could only direct her to that 
 Source of pardon and peace to which the broken and con 
 trite heart never appeals in vain. 
 
 " In the mean time Robert Barnet shipped on board a 
 
218 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Labrador vessel. The night before he left he called on 
 me and put in my hand a sum of money, small indeed, 
 but all he could then command. 
 
 " You will see her often, he said. Do not let her 
 suffer ; for she is more to be pitied than blamed. 
 
 " I answered him that I would do all in my power for 
 her ; and added, that I thought far better of her, contrite 
 and penitent as she was, than of some who were busy in 
 holding her up to shame and censure. 
 
 " God bless you for these words ! he said, grasping my 
 hand. I shall think of them often. They will be a com 
 fort to me. 
 
 "As for Julia, God was more merciful to her than man. 
 She rose from her sick bed thoughtful and humbled, but 
 with hopes that transcended the world of her suffering 
 and shame. She no longer murmured against her sor 
 rowful allotment, but accepted it with quiet and almost 
 cheerful resignation as the fitting penalty of God s broken 
 laws and the needed discipline of her spirit. She could 
 say with the Psalmist, The judgments of the Lord are 
 true, justified in themselves. Thou art just, O Lord, and 
 thy judgment is right. Through my exertions she ob 
 tained employment in a respectable family, to whom she 
 endeared herself by her faithfulness, cheerful obedience, 
 and unaffected piety. 
 
 " Her trials had made her heart tender with sympathy 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 219 
 
 for all in affliction. She seemed inevitably drawn towards 
 the sick and suffering. In their presence the burden of 
 her own sorrow seemed to fall off. She was the most 
 cheerful and sunny-faced nurse I ever knew ; and I always 
 felt sure that my own efforts would be well seconded when 
 I found her by the bedside of a patient. Beautiful it was 
 to see this poor young girl, whom the world still looked 
 upon with scorn and unkindness, cheering the desponding, 
 and imparting, as it were, her own strong, healthful life to 
 the weak and faint ; supporting upon her bosom, through 
 weary nights, the heads of those who, in health, would 
 have deemed her touch pollution ; or to hear her singing 
 for the ear of the dying some sweet hymn of pious hope 
 or resignation, or calling to mind the consolations of the 
 gospel and the great love of Christ." 
 
 " I trust," said I, " that the feelings of the community 
 were softened towards her." 
 
 " You know what human nature is." returned the doc 
 tor, " and with what hearty satisfaction we abhor and 
 censure sin and folly in others. It is a luxury which we 
 cannot easily forego, although our own experience tells us 
 that the consequences of vice and error are evil and bitter 
 enough without the aggravation of ridicule and reproach 
 from without. So you need not be surprised to learn 
 that, in poor Julia s case, the charity of sinners like her 
 self .did not keep pace with the mercy and forgiveness 
 
220 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of Him who is infinite in purity. Nevertheless, I will do 
 our people the justice to say that her blameless and self- 
 sacrificing life was not without its proper effect upon 
 them." 
 
 " What became of Robert Barnet ? " I inquired. 
 
 "He came back after an absence of several months, 
 and called on me before he had even seen his father and 
 mother. He did not mention Julia ; but I saw that his 
 errand with me concerned her. I spoke of her excel 
 lent deportment and her useful life, dwelt upon the ex 
 tenuating circumstances of her error and of her sincere 
 and hearty repentance. 
 
 Doctor, said he, at length, with a hesitating and em 
 barrassed manner, f what should you think if I should 
 tell you that, after all that has passed, I have half made 
 up my mind to ask her to become my wife ? 
 
 " I should think better of it if you had wholly made up 
 your mind, said I ; i and if you were my own son, I 
 wouldn t ask for you a better wife than Julia Atkins. 
 Don t hesitate, Robert, on account of what some ill-natured 
 people may say. Consult your own heart first of all. 
 
 " I don t care for the talk of all the busybodies in 
 town, said he ; but I wish father and mother could feel 
 as you do about her. 
 
 " Leave that to me/ said I. * They are kindhearted 
 and reasonable, and I dare say will be disposed to make 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLET ART. 221 
 
 the best of the matter when they find you are decided in 
 your purpose. 
 
 " I did not see him again ; but a few days after I 
 learned from his parents that he had gone on another 
 voyage. It was now autumn, and the most sickly season 
 I had ever known in Peewawkin. Ensign Atkins and 
 his wife both fell sick ; and Julia embraced with alacrity 
 this providential opportunity to return to her father s 
 house and fulfil the duties of a daughter. Under her 
 careful nursing the ensign soon got upon his feet ; but 
 his wife, whose constitution was weaker, sunk under the 
 fever. She died better than she had lived penitent 
 and loving, asking forgiveness of Julia for her neglect and 
 unkindness, and invoking blessings on her head. Julia 
 had now, for the first time since the death of her mother, 
 a comfortable home and a father s love and protection. 
 Her sweetness of temper, patient endurance, and forget- 
 fulness of herself in her labors for others gradually over 
 came the scruples and hard feelings of her neighbors. 
 They began to question whether, after all, it was meri 
 torious in them to treat one like her as a sinner beyond 
 forgiveness. Elder Staples and Deacon Warner were 
 her fast friends. The deacon s daughters the tall, blue- 
 eyed, brown-locked girls you noticed in meeting the 
 other day set the example among the young people of 
 treating her as their equal and companion. The dear 
 
222 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 good girls ! They reminded me of the maidens of Naxos 
 cheering and comforting the unhappy Ariadne. 
 
 " One midwinter evening I took Julia with me to a poor 
 sick patient of mine, who was suffering for lack of attend 
 ance. The house where she lived was in a lonely and 
 desolate place, some two or three miles below us, on a 
 sandy level, just elevated above the great salt marshes, 
 stretching far away to the sea. The night set in dark 
 and stormy ; a fierce north-easterly wind swept over the 
 level waste, driving thick snow clouds before it, shaking 
 the doors and windows of the old house, and roaring in 
 its vast chimney. The woman was dying when we ar 
 rived, and her drunken husband was sitting in stupid 
 unconcern in the corner of the fire place. A little after 
 midnight she breathed her last. 
 
 " In the mean time the storm had grown more violent ; 
 there was a blinding snowfall in the air ; and we could 
 feel the jar of the great waves as they broke upon the 
 beach. 
 
 " It is a terrible night for sailors on the coast, I said, 
 breaking our long silence with the dead. God grant 
 them sea room! 
 
 " Julia shuddered as I spoke, and by the dim-flashing 
 firelight I saw she was weeping. Her thoughts, I knew, 
 were with her old friend and playmate on the wild 
 waters. 
 
MY SUMMER "WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 223 
 
 " Julia, said I, i do you know that Robert Barnet loves 
 you with all the strength of an honest and true heart ? 
 
 " She trembled, and her voice faltered as she confessed 
 that when Robert was at home he had asked her to be 
 come his wife. 
 
 " And, like a fool, you refused him, I suppose ? the 
 brave, generous fellow ! 
 
 " * doctor ! she exclaimed. How can you talk so ? 
 It is just because Robert is so good, and noble, and gen 
 erous that I dared not take him at his word. You your 
 self, doctor, would have despised me if I had taken 
 advantage of his pity or his kind remembrance of the old 
 days when we were children together. I have already 
 brought too much disgrace upon those dear to me. 
 
 " I was endeavoring to convince her, in reply, that she 
 was doing injustice to herself and wronging her best 
 friend, whose happiness depended in a great measure upon 
 her, when, borne on the strong blast, we both heard a faint 
 cry as of a human being in distress. I threw up the win 
 dow which opened seaward, and we leaned out into the 
 wild night, listening breathlessly for a repetition of the 
 sound. 
 
 "Once more, and once only, we heard it a low, 
 smothered, despairing cry. 
 
 " Some one is lost, and perishing in the snow, said 
 Julia. * The sound comes in the direction of the beach 
 
224 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 plum bushes on the side of the marsh. Let us go at 
 once. 
 
 " She snatched up her hood and shawl and was already 
 at the door. I found and lighted a lantern and soon 
 overtook her. The snow was already deep and badly 
 drifted, and it was with extreme difficulty that we could 
 force our way against the storm. We stopped often to 
 take breath and listen ; but the roaring of the wind and 
 waves was alone audible. At last we reached a slightly 
 elevated spot, overgrown with dwarf plum trees, whose 
 branches were dimly visible above the snow. 
 
 " ( Here, bring the lantern here ! cried Julia, who had 
 strayed a few yards from me. I hastened to her, and 
 found her lifting up the body of a man who was appar 
 ently insensible. The rays of the lantern fell full upon 
 his face, and we both, at the same instant, recognized 
 Robert Barnet. Julia did not shriek nor faint; but, 
 kneeling in the snow and still supporting the body, she 
 turned towards me a look of earnest and fearful inquiry. 
 
 " Courage ! said I. * He still lives. He is only over 
 come with fatigue and cold. 
 
 "With much difficulty partly carrying and partly 
 dragging him through the snow we succeeded in getting 
 him to the house, where, in a short time, he so far recovered 
 as to be able to speak. Julia, who had been my prompt and 
 efficient assistant in his restoration, retired into the shadow 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 225 
 
 of the room as soon as he began to rouse himself and look 
 about him. He asked where he was and who was with 
 me, saying that his head was so confused that he thought 
 he saw Julia Atkins by the bedside. You were not 
 mistaken, said I ; * Julia is here, and you owe your life 
 to her/ He started up and gazed round the room. I 
 beckoned Julia to the bedside ; and I shall never forget 
 the grateful earnestness with which he grasped her hand 
 and called upon God to bless her. Some folks think me 
 a toughhearted old fellow, and so I am ; but that scene 
 was more than I could bear without shedding tears. 
 
 " Robert told us that his vessel had been thrown upon 
 the beach a mile or two below, and that he feared all the 
 crew had perished save himself. Assured of his safety, I 
 went out once more, in the faint hope of hearing the voice 
 of some survivor of the disaster ; but I listened only to 
 the heavy thunder of the surf rolling along the horizon of 
 the east. The storm had in a great measure ceased ; the 
 gray light of dawn was just visible ; and I was gratified 
 to see two of the nearest neighbors approaching the house. 
 On being informed of the wreck they immediately started 
 for the beach, where several dead bodies, half buried in 
 snow, confirmed the fears of the solitary survivor. 
 
 " The result of all this you can easily conjecture. Robert 
 Barnet abandoned the sea, and, with the aid of some of 
 his friends, purchased the farm where he now lives, and 
 15 
 
226 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 the anniversary of his shipwreck found him the husband 
 of Julia. I can assure you I have had every reason to 
 congratulate myself on my share in the matchmaking. 
 Nobody ventured to find fault with it except two or three 
 sour old busybodies, who, as Elder Staples well says, 
 would have cursed her whom Christ had forgiven, and 
 spurned the weeping Magdalen from the feet of her 
 Lord. " 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE HILLSIDE. 
 
 It was one of the very brightest and breeziest of sum 
 mer mornings that the doctor and myself walked home 
 ward from the town poorhouse, where he had always one 
 or more patients, and where his coming was always wel 
 comed by the poor, diseased, and age-stricken inmates. 
 Dark, miserable faces of lonely and unreverenced age, 
 written over with the grim records of sorrow and sin, 
 seemed to brighten at his approach as with an inward 
 light, as if the good man s presence had power to call the 
 better natures of the poor unfortunates into temporary 
 ascendency. Weary, fretful women happy mothers in 
 happy homes, perchance, half a century before felt their 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SIXGLETARY. 227 
 
 hearts warm and expand under the influence of his kind 
 salutations and the ever-patient good nature with which 
 he listened to their reiterated complaints of real or im 
 aginary suffering. However it might be with others, he 
 never forgot the man or the woman in the pauper. There 
 was nothing like condescension or consciousness in his 
 charitable ministrations ; for he was one of the few men I 
 have ever known in whom the milk of human kindness 
 was never soured by contempt for humanity in whatever 
 form it presented itself. Thus it was that his faithful 
 performance of the duties of his profession, however re 
 pulsive and disagreeable, had the effect of Murillo s pic 
 ture of St. Isabel of Hungary binding up the ulcered 
 limbs of the beggars. The moral beauty transcended the 
 loathsomeness of physical evil and deformity. 
 
 Our nearest route home lay across the pastures and 
 over Blueberry Hill, just at the foot of which we en 
 countered Elder Staples and Skipper Evans, who had 
 been driving their cows to pasture, and were now leisurely 
 strolling back to the village. We toiled together up the 
 hill in the hot sunshine, and, just on its eastern declivity, 
 were glad to find a white-oak tree, leaning heavily over a 
 little ravine, from the bottom of which a clear spring of 
 water bubbled up and fed a small rivulet, whose track of 
 darker green might be traced far down the hill to the 
 meadow at its foot. 
 
228 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 A broad shelf of rock by the side of the spring, cush 
 ioned with mosses, afforded us a comfortable resting- 
 place. Parson Staples, in his faded black coat and white 
 neckcloth, leaned his quiet, contemplative head on his 
 silver-mounted cane : right opposite him sat the doctor, 
 with his sturdy, rotund figure, and broad, seamed face, 
 surmounted by a coarse stubble of iron-gray hair, the 
 sharp and almost severe expression of his keen gray eyes 
 flashing under their dark penthouse, happily relieved by 
 the softer lines of his mouth, indicative of his really genial 
 and generous nature. A small, sinewy figure, half doubled 
 up, with his chin resting on his rough palms, Skipper 
 Evans sat on a lower projection of the rock just beneath 
 him, in an attentive attitude, as at the feet of Gamaliel. 
 Dark and dry as one of his own dunfish on a Labrador 
 flake, or a sealskin in an Esquimaux hut, he seemed 
 entirely exempt from one of the great trinity of tempta 
 tions ; and, granting him a safe deliverance from the world 
 and the devil, he had very little to fear from the flesh. 
 
 We were now in the doctor s favorite place of resort, 
 green, cool, quiet, and sightly withal. The keen light 
 revealed every object in the long valley below us ; the 
 fresh west wind fluttered the oak leaves * above ; and the 
 low voice of the water, coaxing or scolding its w r ay over 
 bare roots or mossy stones, was just audible. 
 
 " Doctor," said I, " this spring, with the oak hanging 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SIXGLETARY. 229 
 
 over it, is, I suppose, your Fountain of Bandusia. You 
 remember what Horace says of his spring, which yielded 
 such cool refreshment when the dogstar had set the day 
 on fire. What a fine picture he gives us of this charming 
 feature of his little farm ! " 
 
 The doctor s eye kindled. " I m glad to see you like 
 Horace; not merely as a clever satirist and writer of 
 amatory odes, but as a true lover of Nature. How pleas 
 ant are his simple and beautiful descriptions of his yellow, 
 flowing Tiber, the herds arid herdsmen, the harvesters, 
 the grape vintage, the varied aspects of his Sabine retreat 
 in the fierce summer heats, or when the snowy forehead 
 of Soracte purpled in winter sunsets ! Scattered through 
 his odes and the occasional poems jvhich he addresses to 
 his city friends, you find these graceful and inimitable 
 touches of rural beauty, each a picture in itself." 
 
 " It is long since I have looked at my old school-day 
 companions the classics," said Elder Staples ; " but I re 
 member Horace only as a light, witty, careless epicu 
 rean, famous for his lyrics in praise of Falernian wine and 
 questionable women." 
 
 " Somewhat too much of that, doubtless," said the 
 doctor; "but to me Horace is serious, and profoundly 
 suggestive, nevertheless. Had I laid him aside on quit 
 ting college, as you did, I should perhaps have only 
 remembered such of his epicurean lyrics as recommended 
 
230 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 themselves to the warm fancy of boyhood. Ah, Elder 
 Staples, there was a time when the Lyces and Glyceras 
 of the poet were no fiction to us. They played blind- 
 man s buff with us in the farmer s kitchen, sang with us in 
 the meeting house, and romped and laughed with us at 
 huskings and quilting parties. Grandmothers and sober 
 spinsters as they now are, the change in us is perhaps 
 greater than in them." 
 
 " Too true," replied the elder, the smile which had just 
 played over his pale face fading into something sadder 
 than its habitual melancholy. " The living companions 
 of our youth, whom we daily meet, are more strange to us 
 than the dead in yonder graveyard. They alone remain 
 unchanged ! " 
 
 " Speaking of Horace," continued the doctor, in a voice 
 slightly husky with feeling, " he gives us glowing descrip 
 tions of his winter circles of friends, where mirth and 
 wine, music and beauty, charm away the hours, and of 
 summer-day recreations beneath the vine-wedded elms of 
 the Tiber or on the breezy slopes of Soracte ; yet I sel 
 dom read them without a feeling of sadness. A low wail 
 of inappeasable sorrow, an undertone of dirges, mingles 
 with his gay melodies. His immediate horizon is bright 
 with sunshine ; but beyond is a land of darkness, the 
 light whereof is darkness. It is walled about by the ever 
 lasting night. The skeleton sits at his table ; a shadow 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. S1NGLETARY. 231 
 
 of the inevitable terror rests upon all his pleasant pic 
 tures. He was without God in the world ; he had no 
 clear abiding hope of a life beyond that which was has 
 tening to a close. Eat and drink, he tells us ; enjoy pres 
 ent health and competence ; alleviate present evils, or for 
 get them, in social intercourse, in wine, music, and sen 
 sual indulgence ; for to-morrow we must die. Death was 
 
 i 
 in his view no mere change of condition and relation ; it 
 
 was the black end of all. It is evident that he placed 
 no reliance on the mythology of his time, and that he re 
 garded the fables of the Elysian Fields and their dim and 
 wandering ghosts simply in the light of convenient poetic 
 fictions for illustration and imagery. Nothing can, in my 
 view, be sadder than his attempts at consolation for 
 the loss of friends. Witness his Ode to Virgil on the 
 death of Quintilius. He tells his illustrious friend sim 
 ply that his calamity is without hope, irretrievable, and 
 eternal ; that it is idle to implore the gods to restore the 
 dead ; and that, although his lyre may be more sweet 
 than that of Orpheus, he cannot reanimate the shadow of 
 his friend nor persuade the ghost-compelling god* to 
 unbar the gates of death. He urges patience as the sole 
 resource. He alludes not unfrequently to his own death 
 in the same despairing tone. In the Ode to Torquatus 
 one of the most beautiful and touching of all he has 
 written he sets before his friend, in melancholy con- 
 
232 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 trast, the return of the seasons, and of the moon renewed 
 in brightness, with the end of man, who sinks into the 
 endless dark, leaving nothing save ashes and shadows. 
 He then, in the true spirit of his philosophy, urges Tor- 
 quatus to give his present hour and wealth to pleasures 
 and delights, as he had no assurance of to-morrow." 
 
 " In something of the same strain," said I, " Moschus 
 moralizes on the death of Bion : 
 
 1 Our trees and plants revive ; the rose 
 In annual youth of beauty glows ; 
 But when the pride of Nature dies, 
 
 Man, who alone is great and wise, 
 No more he rises into light, 
 The wakeless sleeper of eternal night. " 
 
 " It reminds me," said Elder Staples, " of the sad bur 
 den of Ecclesiastes, the mournfulest book of Scripture ; 
 because, while the preacher dwells with earnestness upon 
 the vanity and uncertainty of the things of time and 
 sense, he has no apparent hope of immortality to re 
 lieve the dark picture. Like Horace, he sees nothing 
 better than to eat his bread with joy and drink his wine 
 with a merry heart. It seems to me the wise man might 
 have gone farther in his enumeration of the folly and 
 emptiness of life, and pronounced his own prescription 
 for the evil vanity also. What is it but plucking flowers 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 233 
 
 on the banks of the stream which hurries us over the 
 cataract, or feasting on the thin crust of a volcano upon 
 delicate meats prepared over the fires which are soon to 
 ingulf us ? O, what a glorious contrast to this is the 
 gospel of Him who brought to light life and immortality ! 
 The transition from the Koheleth to the epistles of Paul 
 is like passing from a cavern, where the artificial light 
 falls indeed upon gems and crystals, but is every where 
 circumscribed and overshadowed by unknown and unex 
 plored darkness, into the warm light and free atmosphere 
 of day." 
 
 " Yet," I asked, " are there not times when we all wish 
 for some clearer evidence of immortal life than has been 
 afforded us ; when we even turn away unsatisfied from the 
 pages of the holy book, with all the mysterious prob 
 lems of life pressing about us and clamoring for solution, 
 till, perplexed and darkened, we look up to the still 
 heavens, as if we sought thence an answer, visible or 
 audible, to their questionings ? We want something be 
 yond the bare announcement of the momentous fact of a 
 future life ; w T e long for a miracle to confirm our weak 
 faith and silence forever the doubts which torment us." 
 
 " And what would a miracle avail us at such times of 
 darkness and strong temptation ? " said the elder. " Have 
 we not been told that they whom Moses and the prophets 
 have failed to convince would not believe although one 
 
234 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 rose from the dead ? That God has revealed no more to 
 us, is to my mind sufficient evidence that he has revealed 
 enough." 
 
 " May it not be," queried the doctor, " that Infinite 
 Wisdom sees that a clearer and fuller revelation of the 
 future life would render us less willing or able to perform 
 our appropriate duties in the present condition ? En 
 chanted by a clear view of the heavenly hills, and of our 
 loved ones beckoning us from the pearl gates of the city 
 of God, could we patiently work out our life task here, 
 or make the necessary exertions to provide for the wants 
 of these bodies whose encumbrance alone can prevent us 
 from rising to a higher plane of existence ? " 
 
 " I reckon," said the skipper, who had been an atten 
 tive, although at times evidently a puzzled, listener, " that 
 it would be with us pretty much as it was with a crew of 
 French sailors that I once shipped at the Isle of France 
 for the port of Marseilles. I never had better hands 
 until we hove in sight of their native country, which they 
 hadn t seen for years. The first look of the land set em 
 all crazy ; they danced, laughed, shouted, put on their 
 best clothes ; and I had to get new hands to help me 
 bring the vessel to her moorings." 
 
 " Your story is quite to the point, skipper," said the* 
 doctor. " If things had been ordered differently, we 
 should all, I fear, be disposed to quit work and fall into 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 235 
 
 
 
 absurdities like your French sailors, and so fail of bring 
 ing the world fairly into port." 
 
 " God s ways are best," said the elder ; " and I don t 
 see as we can do better than to submit with reverence to 
 the very small part of them which he has made known to 
 us, and to trust him like loving and dutiful children for 
 the rest." 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE HILLSIDE. 
 
 The pause which naturally followed the observation 
 of the elder was broken abruptly by the skipper. 
 
 " Hillo ! " he cried, pointing with the glazed hat with 
 which he had been fanning himself. " Here away in the 
 north-east. Going down the coast for better fishing, I 
 guess." 
 
 " An eagle, as I live ! " exclaimed the doctor, following 
 with his cane the direction of the skipper s hat. "Just 
 see how royally he wheels upward and onward, his sail- 
 broad wings stretched motionless, save an occasional flap 
 to keep up his impetus ! Look ! the circle in which he 
 moves grows narrower ; he is a gray cloud in the sky, a 
 point, a mere speck or dust mote. And now he is 
 
236 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 * 
 
 clean swallowed up in the distance. The wise man of 
 old did well to confess his ignorance of the way of an 
 eagle in the air. " 
 
 " The eagle," said Elder Staples, " seems to have been 
 a favorite illustration of the sacred penman. They 
 that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength ; they 
 shall mount upward as on the wings of an eagle. " 
 
 "What think you of this passage?" said the doctor. 
 " * As when a bird hath flown through the air, there is no 
 token of her way to be found ; but the light air, beaten 
 with the stroke of her wings and parted by the violent 
 noise and motion thereof, is passed through, and therein 
 afterward no sign of her path can be found. " 
 
 " I don t remember the passage," said the elder. 
 
 " I dare say not," quoth the doctor. " You clergymen 
 take it for granted that no good thing can come from 
 the Nazareth of the Apocrypha. But where will you 
 find any thing more beautiful and cheering than these 
 verses in connection with that which I just cited ? The 
 hope of the ungodly is like dust that is blown away 
 by the wind;, like the thin foam which is driven by 
 the storm ; like the smoke which is scattered here and 
 there by the whirlwind : it passeth away like the remem 
 brance of a guest that tarrieth but a day. But the 
 righteous live forevermore ; their reward also is with 
 the Lord, and the care of them with the Most High. 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 237 
 
 Therefore shall they receive a glorious kingdom and 
 a beautiful crown from the Lord s hand; for with his 
 right hand shall he cover them, and with his arm shall 
 he protect them. " 
 
 " That, if I mistake not, is from the "Wisdom of Solo 
 mon," said the elder. " It is a striking passage ; and 
 there are many such in the uncanonical books." 
 
 " Canonical or not," answered the doctor, " it is God s 
 truth, and stands in no need of the indorsement of a set 
 of well-meaning but purblind bigots and pedants, who 
 presumed to set metes and bounds to divine inspiration, 
 and decide by vote what is God s truth and what is the 
 devil s falsehood. But, speaking of eagles, I never see 
 one of these spiteful old sea robbers without fancying that 
 he may be the soul of a mad Viking of the middle cen 
 turies. Depend upon it, that Italian philosopher was not 
 far out of the way in his ingenious speculations upon the 
 affinities and sympathies existing between certain men 
 and certain animals, and in fancying that he saw feline 
 or canine traits and similitudes in the countenances of 
 his acquaintance." 
 
 " Swedenborg tells us," said I, " that lost human souls 
 in the spiritual world, as seen by the angels, frequently 
 wear the outward shapes of the lower animals, for in 
 stance, the gross and sensual look like swine, and the 
 cruel and obscene like foul birds of prey, such as hawks 
 
238 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 and vultures, and that they are entirely unconscious of 
 the metamorphosis, imagining themselves marvellous 
 proper men/ and are quite well satisfied with their com 
 pany and condition." 
 
 " Swedenborg," said the elder, " was an insane man, 
 or worse." 
 
 " Perhaps so," said the doctor ; " but there is a great 
 deal of method in his madness/ and plain common sense 
 too. There is one grand and beautiful idea underlying 
 all his revelations or speculations about the future life. 
 It is this: that each spirit chooses its own society, and 
 naturally finds its fitting place and sphere of action, fol 
 lowing in the new life, as in the present, the leading of 
 its prevailing loves and desires, and that hence none 
 are arbitrarily compelled to be good or evil, happy or 
 miserable. A great law of attraction and gravitation 
 governs the spiritual as well as the material universe ; 
 but, in obeying it, the spirit retains in the new life what 
 ever freedom of will it possessed in its first stage of being. 
 But I see the elder shakes his head, as much as to say, I 
 am wise above what is written/ or, at any rate, meddling 
 with matters beyond my comprehension. Our young 
 friend here," he continued, turning to me, " has the appear 
 ance of a listener ; but I suspect he is busy with his own 
 reveries, or enjoying the fresh sights and sounds of this 
 fine morning. I doubt whether our discourse has edified 
 him." 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETART. 239 
 
 " Pardon me," said I ; " I was, indeed, listening to an 
 other and older oracle." 
 
 " Well, tell us what you hear," said the doctor. 
 
 " A faint, low murmur, rising and falling on the wind. 
 Now it comes rolling in upon me wave after wave of 
 sweet, solemn music. There was a grand organ swell ; 
 and now it dies away as into the infinite distance ; but I 
 still hear it, whether with ear or spirit I know not, 
 the very ghost of sound." 
 
 "Ah, yes," said the doctor ; " I understand it ; it is the 
 voice of the pines yonder a sort of morning song of 
 praise to the Giver of life and Maker of beauty. My ear 
 is dull now and I cannot hear it ; but I know it is sound 
 ing on as it did when I first climbed up here in the bright 
 June mornings of boyhood, and it will sound on just the 
 same when the deafness of the grave shall settle upon my 
 failing senses. Did it never occur to you that this deaf 
 ness and blindness to accustomed beauty and harmony is 
 one of the saddest thoughts connected with the great 
 change which awaits us ? Have you not felt at times 
 that our ordinary conceptions of heaven itself, derived 
 from the vague hints and Oriental imagery of the Scrip 
 tures, are sadly inadequate to our human wants and 
 hopes ? How gladly would we forego the golden streets 
 and gates of pearl, the thrones, temples, and harps, for the 
 sunset lights of our native valleys ; the woodpaths, whose 
 
240 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 moss carpets are woven with violets and wild flowers; 
 the songs of birds, the low of cattle, the hum of bees in 
 the apple blossom the sweet, familiar voices of human 
 life and nature ! In the place of strange splendors and 
 unknown music, should we not welcome rather whatever 
 reminded us of the common sights and sounds of our old 
 home?" 
 
 " You touch a sad chord, doctor," said I. " Would that 
 we could feel assured of the eternity of all we love ! " 
 
 "And have I not an assurance of it at this very 
 moment ? " returned the doctor. " My outward ear 
 fails me ; yet I seem to hear as formerly the sound of 
 the wind in the pines. I close my eyes; and the picture 
 of my home is still before me. I see the green hill 
 slope and meadows ; the white shaft of the village 
 steeple springing up from the midst of maples .and elms ; 
 the river all afire with sunshine; the broad, dark belt 
 of woodland; and, away beyond, all the blue level of 
 the ocean. And now,* by a single effort of will, I can 
 call before me a winter picture of the same scene. It 
 is morning as now ; but how different ! All night has the 
 white meteor fallen in broad flake or minutest crystal, the 
 sport and plaything of winds that have wrought it into a 
 thousand shapes of wild beauty. Hill and valley, tree 
 and fence, wood sled and well sweep, barn and pigsty, 
 fishing smacks frozen up at the wharf, ribbed monsters of 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SIXGLETARY. 241 
 
 dismantled hulks scattered along the river side, all lie 
 transfigured in the white glory and sunshine. The eye, 
 wherever it turns, aches with the cold brilliance, unre 
 lieved save where the blue smoke of morning fires curl 
 lazily up from the Parian roofs, or where the main chan 
 nel of the river, as yet unfrozen, shows its long winding 
 line of dark water glistening like a snake in the sun. 
 Thus you perceive that the spirit sees and hears without 
 the aid of bodily organs ; and why may it not be so here 
 after ? Grant but memory to us, and we can lose nothing 
 by death. The scenes now passing before us will live in 
 eternal reproduction, created anew at will. We assuredly 
 shall not love heaven the less that it is separated by no 
 impassable gulf from this fair and goodly earth, and that 
 the pleasant pictures of time linger like sunset clouds 
 along the horizon of eternity. When I was younger, I 
 used to be greatly troubled by the insecure tenure by 
 which my senses held the beauty and harmony of the 
 outward world. When I looked at the moonlight on the 
 water, or the cloud shadows on the hills, or the sunset sky, 
 with the tall, black tree boles and waving foilage relieved 
 against it, or when I heard a mellow gush of music from 
 the brown-breasted fife bird in the summer woods, or the 
 merry quaver of the bobolink in the corn land, the thought 
 of an eternal loss of these familiar sights and sounds would 
 sometimes thrill through me with a sharp and bitter pain. 
 16 
 
242 RECREATIONS AXU MISCELLANIES. 
 
 I have reason to thank God that this fear no longer 
 troubles me. Nothing that is really valuable and neces 
 sary for us can ever be lost. The present will live here 
 after; memory will bridge over the gulf between the two 
 worlds; for only on the condition of their intimate union 
 can we preserve our identity and personal consciousness. 
 Blot out the memory of this world, and what would heaven 
 or hell be to us ? Nothing whatever. Death would be 
 simple annihilation of our actual selves, and the substitu 
 tion therefor of a new creation, in which we should have 
 no more interest than in an inhabitant of Jupiter or the 
 fixed stars." 
 
 The elder, who had listened silently thus far, not 
 without an occasional and apparently involuntary man 
 ifestation of dissent, here interposed. 
 
 "Pardon me, my dear friend," said he; "but I must 
 needs say that I look upon speculations of this kind, how 
 ever ingenious or plausible, as unprofitable, and well nigh 
 presumptuous. For myself, I only know that I am a 
 weak, sinful man, accountable to and cared for by a just 
 and merciful God. What he has in reserve for me here 
 after I know not, nor have I any warrant to pry into his 
 secrets. I do not know what it is to pass from one life to 
 another ; but I humbly hope that, when I am sinking in 
 the dark waters, I may hear his voice of compassion and 
 encouragement, It is I ; be not afraid. " 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 243 
 
 " Amen," said the skipper, solemnly. 
 
 " I dare say the parson is right, in the main," said the 
 doctor. " Poor creatures at the best, it is safer for us 
 to trust, like children, in the goodness of our heavenly 
 Father, than to speculate too curiously in respect to the 
 things of a future life ; and, notwithstanding all I have 
 said, I quite agree with good old Bishop Hall : It is 
 enough for me to rest in the hope that I shall one day see 
 them ; in the mean time, let me be learnedly ignorant and 
 incuriously devout, silently blessing the power and wis 
 dom of my infinite Creator, who knows how to honor 
 himself by all those unrevealed and glorious subordi 
 nations. " 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 THE SKIPPER S STORY. 
 
 " Well, what s the news below ? " asked the doctor of 
 his housekeeper, as she came home from a gossiping 
 visit to the landing one afternoon. " What new piece 
 of scandal is afloat now ? " 
 
 "Nothing, except what concerns yourself," answered 
 widow Matson, tartly. " Mrs. Nugeon says that you ve 
 been to see her neighbor Wait s girl she that s sick 
 
244 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 with the measles half a dozen times, and never so much 
 as left a spoonful of medicine; and she should like to 
 know what a doctor s good for without physic. Besides, 
 she says Lieutenant Brown would have got well if you d 
 minded her, and let him have plenty of thoroughwort 
 tea, and put a split fowl at the pit of his stomach." 
 
 "A split stick on her own tongue would be better," 
 said the doctor, with a wicked grimace. " The Jezebel ! 
 Let her look out for herself the next time she gets the 
 rheumatism; I ll blister her from head to heel. But 
 what else is going ? " 
 
 " The schooner Polly Pike is at the landing." 
 
 " What, from Labrador ? The one Tom Osborne went 
 in?" 
 
 " I suppose so ; I met Tom down street." 
 
 " Good ! " said the doctor, with emphasis. " Poor 
 widow Osborne s prayers are answered, and she will see 
 her son before she dies." 
 
 "And precious little good will it do her," said the 
 housekeeper. " There s not a more drunken, swearing 
 rakeshame in town than Tom Osborne." 
 
 " It s too true," responded the doctor ; " but he s her 
 only son ; and you know, Mrs. Matson, the heart of a 
 mother." 
 
 The widow s hard face softened; a tender shadow 
 passed over it ; the memory of some old bereavement 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 245 
 
 melted her ; and as she passed into the house I saw her 
 put her checked apron to her eyes. 
 
 By this time Skipper Evans, who had been slowly 
 working his way up street for some minutes, had reached 
 the gate. 
 
 " Look here ! " said he. " Here s a letter that I ve got 
 by the Polly Pike from one of your old patients that you 
 gave over for a dead man long ago." 
 
 " From the other world of course," said the doctor. 
 
 " No, not exactly ; though it s from Labrador, which 
 is about the last place the Lord made, I reckon." 
 
 " What, from Dick Wilson ? " 
 
 " Sartain," said the skipper. 
 
 And how is he ? " 
 
 " Alive and hearty. I tell you what, doctor, physick 
 ing and blistering are all well enough, may be ; but if 
 you want to set a fellow up when he s kinder run down, 
 there s nothing like a fishing. trip to Labrador, specially 
 if he s been bothering himself with studying, and writing, 
 and such like. There s nothing like fish chowders, hard 
 bunks, and sea fog to take that nonsense out of him. 
 Now, this chap," (the skipper here gave me a thrust in 
 the ribs by way of designation,) " if I could have him 
 down with me beyond sunset for two or three months, 
 would come back as hearty as a Bay o Fundy porpoise." 
 
 Assuring him that I would like to try the experiment, 
 
246 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 with him as skipper, I begged to know the history of the 
 case he had spoken of. 
 
 The old fisherman smiled complacently, hitched up his 
 pantaloons, took a seat beside us, and, after extracting a 
 jackknife from one pocket, and a hand of tobacco from 
 the other, and deliberately supplying himself with a fresh 
 quid, he mentioned, apologetically, that he supposed the 
 doctor had heard it all before. 
 
 " Yes, twenty times," said the doctor ; " but never 
 mind ; it s a good story yet. Go ahead, skipper." 
 
 " Well, you see," said the skipper, " this young Wilson 
 comes down here from Hanover College, in the spring, as 
 lean as a shad in dog days. He had studied himself half 
 blind, and all his blood had got into brains. So the doc 
 tor tried to help him with his poticary stuff, and the 
 women with their herbs ; but all did no good. At last 
 somebody advised him to try a fishing cruise down east ; 
 and so he persuaded me to take him aboard my schooner. 
 I knew he d be right in the way, and poor company at 
 the best, for all his Greek and Latin ; for, as a general 
 thing, I ve noticed that your college chaps swop away their 
 common sense for their laming, and make a mighty poor 
 bargain of it. Well, he brought his books with him, and 
 stuck to them so close that I was afraid we should have 
 to slide him off the plank before we got half way to Lab 
 rador. So I just told him plainly that it wouldn t do, 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 247 
 
 and that if he d a mind to kill himself ashore I d no ob 
 jection, but he shouldn t do it aboard my schooner. * I m 
 e en just a mind, says I, to pitch your books overboard. 
 A fishing vessel s no place for em ; they ll spoil all our 
 luck. Don t go to making a Jonah of yourself down here 
 in your bunk, but get upon deck, and let your books alone, 
 and go to watching the sea, and the clouds, and the isl 
 ands, and the fog banks, and the fishes, and the birds ; 
 for Natur, says I, don t lie nor give hearsays, but is 
 always as true as the gospels. 
 
 " But twas no use talking. There he d lay in his 
 bunk with his books about him, and I had e en a most to 
 drag him on deck to snuff the sea air. Howsomever, one 
 day it was the hottest of the whole season after we 
 left the Magdalenes, and were running down the Gut of 
 Canso, we hove in sight of the Gannet Rocks. Thinks I 
 to myself, I ll show him something now that he can t find 
 in his books. So I goes right down after him ; and when 
 we got on deck he looked towards the north-east, and, if 
 ever I saw a chap wonder struck, he was. Right ahead 
 of us was a bold, rocky island, with what looked like a 
 great snow bank on its southern slope ; while the air was 
 full overhead, and all about, of what seemed a heavy fall 
 of snow. The day was blazing hot, and there wasn t a 
 cloud to be seen. 
 
 " What in the world, skipper, does this mean ? says 
 
248 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 he. * We re sailing right into a snow storm in dog days 
 and in a clear sky. 
 
 " By this time we had got near enough to hear a great 
 rushing noise in the air, every moment growing louder 
 and louder. 
 
 " It s only a storm of gannets, says I. 
 
 " Sure enough ! says he ; * but I wouldn t have be 
 lieved it possible. 
 
 " When we got fairly off against the island I fired a 
 gun at it ; and such a fluttering and screaming you can t 
 imagine. The great snow banks shook, trembled, loos 
 ened, and became all alive, whirling away into the air 
 like drifts in a nor -wester. Millions of birds went up, 
 wheeling and zigzagging about, their white bodies and 
 black-tipped wings crossing and recrossing and mixing 
 together into a thick grayish-white haze above us. 
 
 " * You re right, skipper, says Wilson to me ; Nature 
 is better than books. 
 
 " And from that time he was on deck as much as his 
 health would allow of, and took a deal of notice of every 
 thing new and uncommon. But, for all that, the poor fel 
 low was so sick, and pale, and peaking that we all thought 
 we should have to heave him overboard some day or 
 bury him in Labrador moss." 
 
 " But he didn t die after all, did he ? " said I. 
 
 " Die ? No ! " cried the skipper ; " not he ! " 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 249 
 
 " And so your fishing voyage really cured him ? " 
 
 " I can t say as it did, exactly," returned the skipper, 
 shifting his quid from one cheek to the other, with a sly 
 wink at the doctor. " The fact is, after the doctors and 
 the old herb women had given him up at home, he got 
 cured by a little blackeyed French girl on the Labrador 
 coast." 
 
 " A very agreeable prescription, no doubt," quoth the 
 doctor, turning to me. " How do you think it would suit 
 your case ? " 
 
 " It doesn t become the patient to choose his own nos 
 trums," said I, laughing. " But I wonder, doctor, that 
 you haven t long ago tested the value of this by an ex 
 periment upon yourself." 
 
 " Physicians are proverbially shy of their own med 
 icines," said he. 
 
 " "Well, you see," continued the skipper, " we had a 
 rough run down the Labrador shore ; rain storms and fogs 
 so thick you could cut em up into junks with your jack- 
 knife. At last we reached a small fishing station away 
 down where the sun doesn t sleep in summer, but just 
 takes a bit of a nap at midnight. Here Wilson went 
 ashore, more dead than alive, and found comfortable lodg 
 ings with a little, dingy French oil merchant, who had a 
 snug, warm house, and a garden patch, where he raised 
 a few potatoes and turnips in the short summers, and a 
 
250 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 tolerable field of grass, which kept his two cows alive 
 through the winter. The country all about was dismal 
 enough ; as far as you could see there was nothing but 
 moss, and rocks, and bare hills, and ponds of shallow 
 water, with now and then a patch of stunted firs. But 
 it doubtless looked pleasant to our poor sick passenger, 
 who for some days had been longing for land. The 
 Frenchman gave him a neat little room looking out on 
 the harbor, all alive with fishermen and Indians hunting 
 seals ; and to my notion no place is very dull where you 
 can see the salt water and the ships at anchor on it, or 
 scudding over it with sails set in a stiff breeze, and where 
 you can watch its changes of lights and colors in fair and 
 foul weather, morning and night. The family was made 
 up of the Frenchman, his wife, and his daughter a little 
 witch of a girl, with bright black eyes lighting up her 
 brown, good-natured face like lamps in a binnacle. They 
 all took a mighty liking to young Wilson, and were ready 
 to do any thing for him. He was soon able to walk 
 about ; and we used to see him with the Frenchman s 
 daughter strolling along the shore and among the mosses, 
 talking with her in her own language. Many and many 
 a time, as we sat in our boats under the rocks, we could 
 hear her merry laugh ringing down to us. 
 
 " We staid at the station about three weeks ; and when 
 we got ready to sail I called at the Frenchman s to let 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETARY. 251 
 
 Wilson know when to corae aboard. He really seemed 
 sorry to leave ; for the two old people urged him to re 
 main with them, and poor little Lucille wouldn t hear a 
 word of his going. She said he would be sick and die on 
 board the vessel, but that if he staid with them he would 
 soon be well and strong ; that they should have plenty 
 of milk and eggs for him the winter ; and he should ride 
 in the dog sledge with her, and she Would take care of 
 him as if he was her brother. She hid his cap and great 
 coat ; and what with crying, and scolding, and coaxing, 
 she fairly carried her point. 
 
 " You see Fm a prisoner, says he ; l they won t let 
 me go. 
 
 " "Well, 5 says I, you don t seem to be troubled about 
 it. I tell you what, young man, says I, it s mighty 
 pretty now to stroll round here, and pick mosses, and 
 hunt birds eggs with that gal ; but wait till November 
 corses, and every thing freezes up stiff and dead except 
 white bears and Ingens, and there s no daylight left to 
 speak of, and you ll be sick enough of your choice. You 
 won t live the winter out ; and it s an awful place to die 
 in, where the ground freezes so hard that they can t bury 
 you. 
 
 " ; Lucille says, says he, that God is as near us in 
 the winter as in the summer. The fact is, skipper, I ve no 
 nearer relative left in the States than a married brother, 
 
252 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 who thinks more of his family and business than of me ; 
 and if it is God s will that I shall die, I may as well 
 wait his call here as any where. I have found kind friends 
 here ; they will do all they can for me ; and for the rest 
 I trust Providence.* 
 
 " Lucille begged that I would let him stay ; for she said 
 God would hear her prayers, and he would get well. I 
 told her I wouldn t urge him any more ; for if I was as 
 young as he was, and had such a pretty nurse to take 
 care of me, I should be willing to winter at the north 
 pole. "Wilson gave me a letter for his brother ; and we 
 shook hands, and I left him. When we were getting 
 under weigh he and Lucille stood on the landing-place, 
 and I hailed him for the last time, and made signs of 
 sending the boat for him. The little French girl under 
 stood me ; she shook her head, and pointed to her father s 
 house; and then they both turned back, now and then 
 stopping to wave their handkerchiefs to us. I felt sorry 
 to leave him there; but for the life of me I couldn t 
 blame him." 
 
 " I m sure / don t," said the doctor. 
 
 " "Well, next year I was at Nitisquam Harbor ; and, 
 although I was doing pretty well in the way of fishing, I 
 couldn t feel easy without running away north to Brador 
 to see what had become of my sick passenger. It was 
 rather early in the season, and there was ice still in the 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DK. SINGLETAEY. 253 
 
 harbor ; but we managed to work in at last ; when who 
 should I see on shore but young Wilson, so stout and 
 hearty that I should scarcely have known him. He took 
 me up to his lodgings and told me that he had never spent 
 a happier winter ; that he was well and strong, and could 
 fish and hunt like a native ; that he was now a partner 
 with the Frenchman in trade, and only waited the coming 
 of the priest from the Magdalenes, on his yearly visit to 
 the settlements, to marry his daughter. Lucille was as 
 pretty, merry, and happy as ever ; and the old Frenchman 
 and his wife seemed to love Wilson as if he was their 
 son. I ve never seen him since ; but he now writes me 
 that he is married, and has prospered in health and 
 property, and thinks Labrador would be the finest country 
 in the world if it only had heavy timber trees." 
 
 " One cannot but admire," said the doctor, " that wise 
 and beneficent ordination of Providence whereby the 
 spirit of man asserts its power over circumstances, mould 
 ing the rough forms of matter to its fine ideal, bringing 
 harmony out of discord coloring, warming, and lighting 
 up every thing within the circle of its horizon. A loving 
 heart carries with it, under every parallel of latitude, the 
 warmth and light of the tropics, It plants its Eden in the 
 wilderness and solitary place, and sows with flowers the 
 gray desolation of rocks and mosses. Wherever love 
 goes, there springs the true heart s ease, rooting itself even 
 
254 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 in the polar ices. To the young invalid of the skipper s 
 story, the dreary waste of what Moore calls, as you 
 
 remember, 
 
 the dismal shore 
 
 Of cold and pitiless Labrador, 
 
 looked beautiful and inviting ; for he saw it softened and 
 irradiated in an atmosphere of love. Its bare hills, bleak 
 rocks, and misty sky were but the setting and background 
 of the sweetest picture in the gallery of life. Apart from 
 this, however, in Labrador, as in every conceivable lo 
 cality, the evils of soil and climate have their compensa 
 tions and alleviations. The long nights of winter are 
 brilliant with moonlight, and the changing colors of the 
 northern lights are reflected on the snow. The summer 
 of Labrador has a beauty of its own, far unlike that of 
 more genial climates, but which its inhabitants would not 
 forego for the warm life and lavish luxuriance of tropical 
 landscapes. The dwarf fir trees throw from the ends of 
 their branches yellow tufts of stamina, like small lamps 
 decorating green pyramids for the festival of spring ; and 
 if green grass is in a great measure wanting, its place is 
 supplied by delicate mosses of the most brilliant colors. 
 The truth is, every season and climate has its peculiar 
 beauties and comforts ; the footprints of the good and 
 merciful God are found every where ; and we should be 
 willing thankfully to own that he has made all things 
 
MY SUMMER WITH DR. SINGLETART. 255 
 
 beautiful in their time if we were not a race of envious, 
 selfish, ungrateful grumblers." 
 
 " Doctor ! doctor ! " cried a ragged, dirty-faced boy, 
 running breathless into the yard. 
 
 ""What s the matter, my lad ?" said the doctor. 
 
 " Mother wants you to come right over to our house. 
 Father s tumbled off the hay cart ; and when they got him 
 up he didn t know nothing ; but they gin him some rum, 
 and that kinder brought him to." 
 
 " No doubt, no doubt," said the doctor, rising to go. 
 "Sunitia similibus curantur. Nothing like hair of the 
 dog that bites you." 
 
 " The doctor talks well," said the skipper, who had 
 listened rather dubiously to his friend s commentaries on 
 his story; "but he carries too much sail for me some 
 times, and I can t exactly keep alongside of him. I told 
 Elder Staples once that I didn t see but that the doctor 
 could beat him at preaching. Very likely, says the 
 elder, says he; for you know, skipper, I must stick to 
 my text; but the doctor s Bible is all creation. " 
 
 " Yes," said the elder, who had joined us a few moments 
 before, " the doctor takes a wide range, or, as the farmers 
 say, carries a wide swath, and has some notions of things 
 which in my view have as little foundation in true phi 
 losophy as they have warrant in Scripture ; but, if he 
 sometimes speculates falsely, he lives truly, which is by 
 
25 G RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 far the most important matter. The mere dead letter of 
 a creed, however carefully preserved and reverently 
 cherished, may be of no more spiritual or moral efficacy 
 than an African fetish or an Indian medicine bag. What 
 we want is, orthodoxy in practice the dry bones clothed 
 with warm, generous, holy life. It is one thing to hold 
 fast the robust faith of our fathers, the creed of the 
 freedom-loving Puritan and Huguenot, and quite an 
 other to set up the five points of Calvinism, like so many 
 thunder rods, over a bad life, in the insane hope of 
 averting the divine displeasure from sin." 
 
CHARMS AND FAIRY FAITH. 
 
 "Up the airy mountain, 
 
 Down the rushy glen, 
 We darn t go a-hunting 
 
 For fear of little men. 
 Wee folk, good folk, 
 
 Trooping all together; 
 Green jacket, red cap, 
 
 Gray cock s feather." Attingham. 
 
 IT was from a profound knowledge of human nature 
 that Lord Bacon, in discoursing upon truth, remarked 
 that a mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure. " Doth 
 any man doubt," he asks, " that if there were taken out of 
 men s minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, 
 and imaginations, but it would leave the minds of a number 
 of men poor, shrunken things, full of melancholy and indis 
 position, and unpleasing to themselves ? " This admitted 
 tendency of our nature this love of the pleasing intoxi 
 cation of unveracity, exaggeration, and imagination 
 may perhaps account for the high relish which children 
 17 (257) 
 
258 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 and nations yet in the childhood of civilization find in 
 fabulous legends and tales of wonder. The Arab at the 
 present day listens with eager interest to the same tales 
 of genii and afrits, sorcerers and enchanted princesses, 
 which delighted his ancestors in the times of Haroun al 
 Raschid. The gentle, churchgoing Icelander of our 
 time beguiles the long night of his winter with the very 
 sagas and runes which thrilled with not unpleasing horror 
 the hearts of the old Norse sea robbers. What child, 
 although Anglo-Saxon born, escapes a temporary sojourn 
 in fairyland ? Who of us does not remember the intense 
 satisfaction of throwing aside primer and spelling book 
 for stolen ethnographical studies of dwarfs and giants? 
 Even in our own country and time old superstitions and 
 credulities still cling to life with feline tenacity. Here 
 and there oftenest in our fixed, valley-sheltered, inland 
 villages slumberous Rip Van Winkles, unprogressive 
 and seldom visited may be found the same old beliefs in 
 omens, warnings, witchcraft, and supernatural charms 
 which our ancestors brought with them two centuries 
 ago from Europe. 
 
 cThe practice of charms, or what is popularly called 
 "trying projects," is still, to some extent, continued in 
 New England. The inimitable description which Burns 
 gives of similar practices in his Halloween may not in 
 all respects apply to these domestic conjurations ; but the 
 
CHARMS AND FAIRY FAITH. 259 
 
 following needs only the substitution of apple seeds for 
 nuts : 
 
 " The auld gude wife s weel-hoordet nits 
 
 Are round an round divided ; 
 An mony lads and lassies* fates 
 
 Are there that night decided. 
 Some kindle couthie side by side 
 
 An burn thegither trimly : 
 Some start awa wi saucy pride 
 
 And jump out owre the chimlie." 
 
 One of the most common of these "projects" is as 
 follows : A young woman goes down into the cellar, or 
 into a dark room, with a mirror in her hand, and, look 
 ing in it, sees the face of her future husband peering 
 at her through the darkness the mirror being, for the 
 time, as potent as the famous Cambuscan glass of which 
 Chaucer discourses. A neighbor of mine, in speaking of 
 this conjuration, adduces a case in point. One of her 
 schoolmates made the experiment and saw the face of a 
 strange man in the glass ; and many years afterwards she 
 saw the very man pass her father s door. He proved to 
 be an English emigrant just landed, and in due time 
 became her husband. Burns alludes to something like 
 the spell above described: 
 
 " Wee Jenny to her grannie says, 
 
 "Will ye go wi me, grannie, 
 To eat an apple at the glass 
 I got from uncle Johnnie ? 
 
260 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 She fufFt her pipe wi sic a lunt, 
 
 In wrath she Avas so vaporin , 
 She noticed na an azle brunt 
 
 Her bran new worset apron. 
 
 Ye little skelpan-limmer s face, 
 
 How dare ye try sic sportin , 
 An seek the foul thief ony place 
 
 For him to try your fortune ? 
 Nae doubt but ye may get a sight ; 
 
 Great cause ye hae to fear it ; 
 For mony a one has gotten a fright, 
 
 An lived and died deleerit." 
 
 It is not to be denied, and for truth s sake not to be 
 regretted, that this amusing juvenile glammary has seen 
 its best days in New England. The schoolmaster has 
 been abroad to some purpose. Not without results have 
 our lyceum lecturers and travels of Peter Parley brought 
 every thing in heaven above and in the earth below 
 to the level of childhood s capacities. In our cities and 
 large towns children nowadays pass through the opening 
 acts of life s marvellous drama with as little manifes 
 tation of wonder and surprise as the Indian does through 
 the streets of a civilized city which he has entered for the 
 first time. Yet Nature, sooner or later, vindicates her 
 mysteries ;, voices from the unseen penetrate the din of 
 civilization. The child philosopher and materialist often 
 
CHARMS AND FAIRY FAITH. 261 
 
 becomes the visionary of riper years, running into illumin- 
 ism, magnetism, and transcendentalism, with its inspired 
 priests and priestesses, its revelations and oracular re 
 sponses. 
 
 But in many a green valley of rural New England 
 there are children yet; boys and girls are still to be 
 found not quite overtaken by the march of mind. There, 
 too, are huskings, and apple bees, and quilting parties, 
 and huge old-fashioned fireplaces piled with crackling 
 walnut, flinging its rosy light over happy countenances 
 of youth and scarcely less happy age. If it be true 
 that, according to Cornelius Agrippa, " a wood fire doth 
 drive away dark spirits," it is, nevertheless, also true that 
 around it the simple superstitions of our ancestors still 
 love to linger ; and there the half-sportful, half-serious 
 charms of which I have spoken are oftenest resorted to. 
 It would be altogether out of place to think of them by 
 our black, unsightly stoves, or in the dull and dark monot 
 ony of our furnace-heated rooms. Within the circle of 
 the light of the open fire safely might the young conjurers 
 question destiny ; for none but kindly and gentle messen 
 gers from wonderland could venture among them. And 
 who of us, looking back to those long autumnal evenings 
 of childhood when the glow of the kitchen fire rested on 
 the beloved faces .of home, does not feel that there is truth 
 and beauty in what the quaint old author just quoted 
 
262 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 affirms ? " As the spirits of darkness grow stronger in the 
 dark, so good spirits, which are angels of light, are multi 
 plied and strengthened, not only by the* divine light of the 
 sun and stars, but also by the light of our common wood 
 fires." Even Lord Bacon, in condemning the super 
 stitious beliefs of his day, admits that they might serve 
 for winter talk around the fireside. 
 
 Fairy faith is, we may safely say, now dead every 
 where, buried, indeed, for the mad painter Blake 
 saw the funeral of the last of the little people, and ail 
 irreverent English bishop has sung their requiem. It 
 never had much hold upon the Yankee mind, our super 
 stitions being mostly of a sterner and less poetical kind. 
 The Irish Presbyterians who settled in New Hampshire 
 about the year 1720 brought indeed with them, among 
 other strange matters, potatoes and fairies ; but while the 
 former took root and flourished among us, the latter died 
 out, after lingering a few years in a very melancholy and 
 disconsolate way, looking regretfully back to their green 
 turf dances, moonlight revels, and cheerful nestling around 
 the shealing fires of Ireland. The last that has been heard 
 of them was some forty or fifty years ago in a tavern 
 
 house in S , New Hampshire. The landlord was a 
 
 spiteful little man, whose sour, pinched look was a stand 
 ing libel upon the state of his larder. He made his house 
 so uncomfortable by his moroseness that travellers even 
 
CHAKMS AND FAIRY FAITH. 263 
 
 at nightfall pushed by his door and drove to the next 
 town. Teamsters and drovers, who in those days were 
 apt to be very thirsty, learned, even before temperance 
 societies were thought of, to practise total abstinence on 
 that road, and cracked their whips and goaded on their 
 teams in full view of a most tempting army of bottles 
 and glasses, from behind which the surly little landlord 
 glared out upon them with a look which seemed expres 
 sive of all sorts of evil wishes, broken legs, overturned 
 carriages, spavined horses, sprained oxen, unsavory poul 
 try, damaged butter, and bad markets. And if, as a mat 
 ter of necessity, to " keep the cold out of his stomach," 
 occasionally a wayfarer stopped his team and vent.ured to 
 call for " somethin w T armin ," the testy publican stirred 
 up the beverage in such a spiteful way, that, on receiving 
 it foaming from his hand, the poor customer was half 
 afraid to open his mouth, lest the redhot flip iron should 
 be plunged down his gullet. 
 
 As a matter of course, poverty came upon the house 
 and its tenants like an armed man. Loose clapboards rat 
 tled in the wind ; rags fluttered from the broken windows ; 
 within doors were tattered children and scanty fare. The 
 landlord s wife was a stout, buxom woman, of Irish lin 
 eage, and, what with scolding her husband and liberally 
 patronizing his bar in his absence, managed to keep, as 
 she said, her " own heart whole," although the same could 
 
264 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 scarcely be said of her children s trousers and her own 
 frock of homespun. She confidently predicted that "a 
 betther day was coming," being, in fact, the only thing 
 hopeful about the premises. And it did come sure 
 enough. Not only all the regular travellers on the road 
 made a point of stopping at the tavern, but guests from 
 all the adjacent towns filled its long-deserted rooms - the 
 secret of which was, that it had somehow got abroad that 
 a company of fairies had taken up their abode in the 
 hostelry and daily held conversation with each other in 
 the capacious parlor. I have heard those who at the time 
 visited the tavern say that it was literally thronged for 
 several weeks. Small, squeaking voices spoke in a sort 
 of Yankee-Irish dialect, in the haunted room, to the as 
 tonishment and admiration of hundreds. The inn, of 
 course, was blessed by this fairy visitation ; the clap 
 boards ceased their racket, clear panes took the place of 
 rags in the sashes, and the little till under the bar grew 
 daily heavy with coin. The magical influence extended 
 even farther ; for it was observable that the landlord wore 
 a good-natured face, and that the landlady s visits to the 
 gin bottle were less and less frequent. But the thing 
 could not, in the nature of the case, continue long. It 
 was too late in the day and on the wrong side of the 
 water. As the novelty wore off, people began to doubt 
 and reason about it. Had the place been traversed by a 
 
CHARMS AND FAIRY FAITH. 265 
 
 ghost or disturbed by a witch they could have acquiesced 
 in it very quietly; but this outlandish belief in fairies 
 was altogether an overtask for Yankee credulity. As 
 might have been expected, the little strangers, unable to 
 breathe in an atmosphere of doubt and suspicion, soon 
 took their leave, shaking off the dust of their elfin feet as 
 a testimony against an unbelieving generation. It was, 
 indeed, said that certain rude fellows from the Bay State 
 pulled away a board from the ceiling and disclosed to 
 view the fairies in the shape of the landlady s three slat 
 ternly daughters. But the reader who has any degree 
 of that charity which thinks no evil will rather credit the 
 statement of the fairies themselves, as reported by the 
 mistress of the house, " that they were tired of the new 
 country, and had no pace of their lives among the Yan 
 kees, and were going back to ould Ireland." 
 
 It is a curious fact that the Indians had some notion 
 of a race of beings corresponding in many respects to the 
 English fairies. Schoolcraft describes them as small 
 creatures in human shape, inhabiting rocks, crags, and 
 romantic dells, and delighting especially in points of land 
 jutting into lakes and rivers and which were covered with 
 pine trees. They were called Puckweedjinees little 
 vanishers. 
 
 In a poetical point of view it is to be regretted that 
 our ancestors did not think it worth their while to hand 
 
266 KECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 down to us more of the simple and beautiful traditions 
 and beliefs of the "heathen round about" them. Some 
 hints of them we glean from the writings of the mission 
 ary May hew and the curious little book of Roger Wil 
 liams. Especially would one like to know more of that 
 domestic demon, Wetuomanit, who presided over house 
 hold affairs, assisted the young squaw in her first essay 
 at wigwam keeping, gave timely note of danger, and 
 kept evil spirits at a distance a kind of new world 
 brownie, gentle and useful. 
 
 Very suggestive, too, is the story of Pumoolah a 
 mighty spirit, whose home is on the great Katahdin 
 Mountain, sitting there with his earthly bride, (a beautiful 
 daughter of the Penobscots transformed into an immortal 
 by her love,) in serenest sunshine, above the storm which 
 crouches and growls at his feet. None but the perfectly 
 pure and good can reach his abode. Many have from 
 time to time attempted it in vain ; some, after almost 
 reaching the summit, have been driven back by thunder 
 bolts or sleety whirlwinds. 
 
 Not far from my place of residence are the ruins of a 
 mill in a narrow ravine fringed with trees. Some forty 
 years ago the mill was supposed to be haunted ; and horse 
 shoes, in consequence, were nailed over its doors. One 
 worthy man, whose business lay beyond the mill, was 
 afraid to pass it alone ; and his wife, who was less fearful 
 
CHARMS AND FAIRY FAITH. 267 
 
 of supernatural annoyance, used to accompany him. The 
 little old white-coated miller, who there ground corn and 
 wheat for his neighbors, whenever he made a particularly 
 early visit to his mill used to hear it in full operation 
 the water wheel dashing bravely, and the old rickety 
 building clattering to the jar of the stones. Yet the 
 moment his hand touched the latch or his foot the thresh 
 old all was hushed save the melancholy drip of water 
 from the dam or the low gurgle of the small stream eddy 
 ing amidst willow roots and mossy stones in the ravine 
 below. 
 
 This haunted mill has always reminded me of that 
 most beautiful of Scottish ballads, the Song of the Elfin 
 Miller, in which fairies are represented as grinding the 
 poor man s grist without toll : 
 
 "Full merrily rings the millstone round; 
 
 Full merrily rings the wheel ; 
 Full merrily gushes out the grist : 
 
 Come, taste my fragrant meal. 
 The miller he s a warldly man, 
 
 And maun hae double fee ; 
 So draw the sluice in the churl s dam 
 
 And let the stream gae free ! " 
 
 Brainerd, who truly deserves the name of an American 
 poet, has left behind him a ballad on the Indian legend 
 of the black fox which haunted Salmon River, a tributary 
 
268 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of the Connecticut. Its wild and picturesque beauty 
 causes us to regret that more of the still lingering tra 
 ditions of the red men have not been made the themes 
 of his verse: 
 
 THE BLACK FOX. 
 
 How cold, how beautiful, how bright 
 The cloudless heaven above us shines ! 
 
 But tis a howling winter s night; 
 Twould freeze the very forest pines. 
 
 The winds are up while mortals sleep ; 
 
 The stars look forth while eyes are shut ; 
 The bolted snow lies drifted deep 
 
 Around our poor and lonely hut. 
 
 With silent step and listening ear, 
 
 With bow and arrow, dog and gun, 
 . We ll mark his track his prowl we hear : 
 Now is our time ! Come on ! come on ! 
 
 O er many a fence, through many a wood, 
 Following the dog s bewildered scent, 
 
 In anxious haste and earnest mood, 
 The white man and the Indian went. 
 
 The gun is cocked ; the bow is bent ; 
 
 The dog stands with uplifted paw; 
 And ball and arrow both are sent, 
 
 Aimed at the prowler s very jaw. 
 
CHARMS AND FAIRY FAITH. 269 
 
 The ball to kill that fox is run 
 
 Not in a mould by mortals made ; 
 The arrow which that fox should shun 
 
 Was never shaped, from earthly reed. 
 
 The Indian Druids of the wood 
 
 Know where the fatal arrows grow ; 
 They spring not by the summer flood ; 
 
 They pierce not through the winter s snow. 
 
 Why cowers the dog, whose snuffing nose 
 
 Was never once deceived till now ? 
 And why amid!st the chilling snows 
 
 Does either hunter wipe his brow ? 
 
 For once they see his fearful den ; 
 
 Tis a dark cloud that slowly moves 
 By night around the homes of men, 
 
 By day along the stream it loves. 
 
 Again the dog is on the track, 
 
 The hunters chase o er dale and hill ; 
 They may not, though they would, look back ; 
 
 They must go forward, forward still. 
 
 Onward they go, and never turn, 
 
 Amidst a night which knows no day ; 
 For nevermore shall morning sun 
 
 Light them upon their endless way. 
 
 The hut is desolate ; and there 
 The famished dog alone returns ; 
 
270 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 On the cold steps he makes his lair ; 
 By the shut door he lays his bones. 
 
 Now the tired sportsman leans his gun 
 Against the ruins on its site, 
 
 And ponders on the hunting done 
 By the lost wanderers of the night. 
 
 And there the little country girls 
 
 Will stop to whisper, listen, and look, 
 
 And tell, while dressing their sunny curls, 
 Of the Black Fox of Salmon Brook. 
 
 The same writer has happily versified a pleasant super 
 stition of the valley of the Connecticut. It is supposed 
 that shad are led from the Gulf of Mexico to the Con 
 necticut by a kind of Yankee bogle in the shape of a bird. 
 
 THE SHAD SPIRIT. 
 
 Now drop the bolt, and securely nail 
 
 The horseshoe over the door ; 
 Tis a wise precaution ; and, if it should fail, 
 
 It never failed before. 
 
 Know ye the shepherd that gathers his flock 
 Where the gales of the equinox blow 
 
 From each unknown reef and sunken rock 
 In the Gulf of Mexico, 
 
CHARMS AND FAIRY FAITH. 271 
 
 While the monsoons growl, and the trade winds bark, 
 
 And the watchdogs of the surge 
 Pursue through the wild waves the ravenous shark 
 
 That prowls around their charge ? 
 
 To fair Connecticut s northernmost source, 
 
 O er sand*bars, rapids, and falls, 
 The Shad Spirit holds his onward course 
 
 With the flocks which his whistle calls. 
 
 0, how shall he know where he went before ? 
 
 Will he wander around forever ? 
 The last year s shad heads shall shine on the shore, 
 
 To light him up the river. 
 
 And well can he tell the very time 
 
 To undertake his task : 
 When the pork barrel s low he sits on the chine 
 
 And drums on the empty cask. 
 
 The wind is light, and the wave is white % 
 
 With the fleece of the flock that s near ; 
 Like the breath of the breeze he comes over the seas 
 
 And faithfully leads them here. 
 
 And now he s passed the bolted door 
 
 Where the rusted horseshoe clings ; 
 So carry the nets to the nearest shore, 
 
 And take what the Shad Spirit brings. 
 
272 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 The comparatively innocent nature and simple poetic 
 beauty of this class of superstitions have doubtless often 
 induced the moralist to hesitate in exposing their ab 
 surdity, and, like Burns in view of his national thistle, to 
 
 " Turn the weeding hook aside , 
 And spare the symbol dear." 
 
 But the age has fairly outgrown them, and they are 
 falling away by a natural process of exfoliation. The 
 wonderland of childhood must henceforth be sought with 
 in the domains of truth. The strange facts of natural 
 history, and the sweet mysteries of flowers and forests, 
 and hills and waters, will profitably take the place of the 
 fairy lore of the past, and poetry and romance still hold 
 their accustomed seats in the circle of home, without 
 bringing with them the evil spirits of credulity and un 
 truth. Truth should be the first lesson of the child and 
 the last aspiration of manhood ; for it has been well said 
 that the inquiry of truth, which is the lovemaking of it, 
 the knowledge of truth, which is the presence of it, and 
 the belief of truth, which is the enjoying of it, is the sov 
 ereign good of human nature. 
 
MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK. 
 
 "FASCINATION," saith Henry Cornelius Agrippa, in 
 the fiftieth chapter of his first book on Occult Philoso 
 phy, " is a binding which comes of the spirit of the witch 
 through the eyes of him that is bewitched, entering to his 
 heart; for the eye being opened and intent upon any 
 one with a strong imagination doth dart its beams, which 
 are the vehiculum of the spirit, into the eyes of him that 
 is opposite to her, which tender spirit strikes his eyes, 
 stirs up and wounds his heart, and infects his spirit. 
 Whence Apuleius saith, Thy eyes, sliding down through 
 my eyes into my inmost heart, stirreth up a most vehe 
 ment burning. And when eyes are reciprocally intent 
 upon each other, and when rays are joined to rays, and 
 lights to lights, then the spirit of the one is joined to that 
 of the other ; so are strong ligations made and vehement 
 loves inflamed." Taking this definition of witchcraft, we 
 sadly fear it is still practised to a very great extent among 
 us. The best we can say of it is, that the business seems 
 latterly to have fallen into younger hands ; its victims do 
 18 (273) 
 
274 KECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 not appear to regard themselves as especial objects of 
 compassion ; and neither church nor state seems inclined 
 to interfere with it. 
 
 As might be expected in a shrewd community like ours, 
 attempts are not unfrequently made to speculate in the 
 supernatural to "make gain of soothsaying." In the 
 autumn of last year a "wise woman" dreamed, or som- 
 nambulized, that a large sum of money, in gold and silver 
 coin, lay buried in the centre of the great swamp in Poplin, 
 New Hampshire; whereupon an immediate search was 
 made for the precious metal. Under the bleak sky of 
 November, in biting frost and sleet rain, some twenty or 
 more grown men, graduates of our common schools, and 
 liable, every mother s son of them, to be made deacons, 
 squires, and general court jnembers, and such other drill 
 officers as may be requisite in the march of mind, might 
 be seen delving in grim earnest, breaking the frozen earth, 
 uprooting swamp maples and hemlocks, and waking, with 
 sledge and crowbar, unwonted echoes in a solitude which 
 had heretofore only answered to the woodman s axe or the 
 scream of the wild fowl. The snows of December put an 
 end to their labors ; but the yawning excavation still 
 remains, a silent but somewhat expressive commentary 
 upon the age of progress. 
 
 Still later, in one of our Atlantic cities, an attempt was 
 made, partially, at least, successful, to form a company 
 
MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK. 275 
 
 for the purpose of digging for money in one of the deso 
 late sandkeys of the West Indies. It appears that some 
 mesmerized " subject," in the course of one of those som- 
 nambulic voyages of discovery in which the traveller, 
 like Satan in chaos, 
 
 " O er bog, o er steep, through straight, rough, dense, or rare, 
 With head, hands, wings, or feet, pursues his way, 
 And swims, or sinks, or wades, or creeps, or flies," 
 
 while peering curiously into the earth s mysteries, chanced 
 to have his eyes gladdened by the sight of a huge chest 
 packed with Spanish coins, the spoil, doubtless, of some 
 rich-freighted argosy, or Carthagena galleon, in the rare 
 days of Queen Elizabeth s Christian buccaneers. 
 
 During the last quarter of a century, a colored woman 
 in one of the villages on the southern border of New 
 Hampshire has been consulted by hundreds of anxious 
 inquirers into the future. Long experience in her pro 
 fession has given her something of that ready estimate of 
 character, that quick and keen appreciation of the capacity, 
 habits, and wishes of her visitors, which so remarkably 
 distinguished the late famous Madame Le Normand, of 
 Paris ; and if that old squalid sorceress, in her cramped 
 Parisian attic, redolent of garlic and bestrewn with the 
 greasy implements of sorry housewifery, was, as has been 
 affirmed, consulted by such personages as the fair Jose- 
 
276 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 phine Beauharnois, and the " man of destiny," Napoleon 
 himself, is it strange that the desire to lift the veil of the 
 great mystery before us should overcome in some degree 
 our peculiar and most republican prejudice against color, 
 and reconcile us to the disagreeable necessity of looking 
 at futurity through a black medium ? 
 
 Some forty years ago, on the banks of the pleasant little 
 creek separating Berwick, in Maine, from Somersworth, in 
 New Hampshire, within sight of my mother s home, dwelt 
 a plain, sedate member of the society of Friends, named 
 Bantum. He passed throughout a circle of several miles 
 as a conjurer and skilful adept in the art of magic. To 
 him resorted farmers who had lost their cattle, matrons 
 whose household gear, silver spoons, and table linen had 
 been stolen, or young maidens whose lovers were absent ; 
 and the quiet, meek-spirited old man received them all 
 kindly, put on his huge iron-rimmed spectacles, opened 
 his " conjuring book," which my mother describes as a 
 large clasped volume in strange language and black-letter 
 type, and after due reflection and consideration gave the 
 required answers without money and without price. 
 The curious old volume is still in the possession of the 
 conjurer s family. Apparently inconsistent as was this 
 practice of the black art with the simplicity and truthful 
 ness of his religious profession, I have not been able to 
 learn that he was ever subjected to censure on account of 
 
MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK. 277 
 
 it. It may be that our modern conjurer defended him 
 self on grounds similar to those assumed by the celebrated 
 knight of Nettesheim, in the preface to his first Book of 
 Magic : " Some," says he, " may crie oute that I teach 
 forbidden arts, sow the seed of heresies, offend pious ears, 
 and scandalize excellent wits ; that I am a sorcerer, super 
 stitious and devilish, who indeed am a magician. To 
 whom I answer, that a magician doth not among learned 
 men signifie a sorcerer or one that is superstitious or 
 devilish, but a wise man, a priest, a prophet, and that 
 the sibyls prophesied most clearly of Christ; that ma 
 gicians, as wise men, by the wonderful secrets of the 
 world, knew Christ to be born, and came to worship him, 
 first of all ; and that the name of magicke is received by 
 philosophers, commended by divines, and not unacceptable 
 to the gospel." 
 
 The study of astrology and occult philosophy, to 
 which many of the finest minds of the middle ages de 
 voted themselves without molestation from the church, 
 was never practised with impunity after the reformation. 
 The Puritans and Presbyterians, taking the Bible for 
 their rule, " suffered not a witch to live ; " and, not con 
 tent with burning the books of those who " used curious 
 arts " after the manner of the Ephesians, they sacrificed 
 the students themselves on the same pile. Hence we 
 hear little of learned and scientific wizards in New 
 
278 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 England. One remarkable character of this kind seems, 
 however, to have escaped the vigilance of our modern 
 doctors of the Mosaic law. Dr. Robert Child came to 
 this country about the year 1644 and took up his resi 
 dence in the Massachusetts colony. He was a man of 
 wealth, and owned plantations at Nashaway, now Lan 
 caster, and at Saco, in Maine. He was skilful in min 
 eralogy and metallurgy, and seems to have spent a good 
 deal of money in searching for mines. He is well known 
 as the author of the first decided movement for liberty of 
 conscience in Massachusetts, his name standing at the 
 head of the famous petition of 1646 for a modification of 
 the laws in respect to religious worship, and complaining 
 in strong terms of the disfranchisement of persons not 
 members of the church. A tremendous excitement was 
 produced by this remonstrance; clergy and magistrates 
 joined in denouncing it; Dr. Child and his associates 
 were arrested, tried for contempt of government, and 
 heavily fined. The court, in passing sentence, assured 
 the doctor that his crime was only equalled by that of 
 Korah and his troop, who rebelled against Moses and 
 Aaron. He resolved to appeal to the Parliament of Eng 
 land, and made arrangements for his departure, but was 
 arrested, and ordered to be kept a prisoner in his own 
 house until the vessel in which he was to sail had left 
 Boston. He was afterwards imprisoned for a considerable 
 
MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK. 279 
 
 length of time, and on his release found means to return 
 to England. The doctor s trunks were searched by the 
 Puritan authorities while he was in prison ; but it does 
 not appear that they detected the occult studies to which 
 he.was addicted, to which lucky circumstance it is doubt 
 less owing that the first champion of religious liberty in 
 the new world was not hung for a wizard. 
 
 Dr. C. was a graduate of the renowned University of 
 Padua, and had travelled extensively in the old world, 
 Probably, like Michael Scott, he had 
 
 " Learned the art of glatnmarye 
 In Padua, beyond the sea ; " 
 
 for I find in the dedication of an English translation of a 
 continental work on astrology and magic, printed in 1651 
 " at the sign of the Three Bibles," that his " sublime her- 
 meticall and theomagicall lore" is compared to that of 
 Hermes and Agrippa. He is complimented as a master 
 of the mysteries of Rome and Germany, and as one who 
 had pursued his investigations among the philosophers of 
 the old world and the Indians of the new, " leaving no 
 stone unturned the turning whereof might conduce to the 
 discovery of what is occult." 
 
 There was still another member of the Friends so 
 ciety in Vermont, of the name of Austin, who, in answer, 
 as he supposed, to prayer and a long-cherished desire to 
 
280 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 benefit his afflicted fellow-creatures, received, as he be* 
 lieved, a special gift of healing. For several years appli 
 cants from nearly all parts of New England visited him 
 with the story of their sufferings and praying for a re 
 lief, which, it is averred, was in many instances really 
 obtained. Letters from the sick who were unable to 
 visit him, describing their diseases, were sent him ; and 
 many are yet living who believe that they were restored 
 miraculously at the precise period of time when Austin 
 was engaged in reading their letters. One of my uncles 
 was commissioned to convey to him a large number of 
 letters from sick persons in his neighborhood. He found 
 the old man sitting in his plain parlor in the simplest 
 garb of his sect grave, thoughtful, venerable a drab- 
 coated Prince Hohenlohe. He received the letters in 
 silence, read them slowly, casting them one after another 
 upon a large pile of similar epistles in a corner of the 
 apartment. 
 
 Half a century ago nearly every neighborhood in New 
 England was favored with one or more reputed dealers 
 in magic. Twenty years later there were two poor old 
 sisters who used to frighten school urchins and " children 
 of a larger growth " as they rode down from New Hamp 
 shire on their gaunt skeleton horses, strung over with 
 baskets for the Newburyport market. They were aware 
 of the popular notion concerning them, and not unfre- 
 
MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK. 281 
 
 quently took advantage of it to levy a sort of black mail 
 upon their credulous neighbors. An attendant at the 
 funeral of one of these sisters, who when living was about 
 as unsubstantial as Ossian s ghost, through which the stars 
 were visible, told me that her coffin was so heavy that 
 four stout men could barely lift it. 
 
 One of my earliest recollections is that of an old woman, 
 residing about two miles from the place of my nativity, 
 who for many years had borne the unenviable reputation 
 of a witch. She certainly had the look of one a com 
 bination of form, voice, and features which would have 
 made the fortune of an English witch finder in the days 
 of Matthew Paris or the Sir John Podgers of Dickens, 
 and insured her speedy conviction in King James s High 
 Court of Justiciary. She was accused of divers ill doings, 
 such as preventing the cream in her neighbor s churn 
 from becoming butter, and snuffing out candles at husk- 
 ings and quilting parties. 
 
 " She roamed the country far and near, 
 
 Bewitched the children of the peasants, 
 Dried up the cows, and lamed the deer, 
 And sucked the eggs, and killed the pheasants." 
 
 The poor old woman was at length so sadly annoyed by 
 her unfortunate reputation that she took the trouble to 
 go before a justice of the peace, and made solemn oath 
 that she was a Christian woman, and no witch. 
 
282 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Not many years since a sad-visaged, middle-aged man 
 might be seen in the streets of one of our seaboard 
 towns at times suddenly arrested in the midst of a brisk 
 walk and fixed motionless for some minutes in the busy 
 thoroughfare. No effort could induce him to stir until, 
 in his opinion, the spell was removed and his invisible 
 tormentor suffered him to proceed. Pie explained his 
 singular detention as the act of a whole family of witches 
 whom he had unfortunately offended during a visit down 
 east. It was rumored that the offence consisted in break 
 ing off a matrimonial engagement with the youngest mem 
 ber of the family a sorceress, perhaps, in more than 
 one sense of the word, like that "winsome wench and 
 walie" in Tarn O Shanter s witch dance at Kirk Alloway. 
 His only hope was that he should outlive his persecutors ; 
 and it is said that at the very hour in which the event 
 took place he exultingly assured his friends that the spell 
 was forever broken, and that the last of the family of 
 his, tormentors was no more. 
 
 When a boy, I occasionally met at the house of a rela 
 tive in an adjoining town a stout, red-nosed old farmer of 
 the neighborhood. A fine tableau he made of a winter s 
 evening, in the red light of a birch log fire, as he sat for 
 hours watching its progress, with sleepy, half-shut eyes, 
 changing his position only to reach the cider mug on the 
 shelf near him. Although he seldom opened his lips save 
 
MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK. 283 
 
 to assent to some remark of his host or to answer a direct 
 question, yet at times, when the cider mug got the better 
 of his taciturnity, he would amuse us with interesting 
 details of his early experiences in " the Ohio country." 
 
 There was, however, one chapter in these experiences 
 which he usually held in reserve, and with which " the 
 stranger intermeddled not." He was not willing to run 
 the risk of hearing that which to him was a frightful 
 reality turned into ridicule by scoffers and unbelievers. 
 The substance of it, as I received it from one of his 
 neighbors, forms as clever a tale of witchcraft as modern 
 times have produced. 
 
 It seems that when quite a young man he left, the 
 homestead, and, strolling westward, worked his way from 
 place to place until he found himself in one of the old 
 French settlements on the Ohio River. Here he procured 
 employment on the farm of a widow ; and being a smart, 
 active fellow, and proving highly serviceable in his de 
 partment, he rapidly gained favor in the eyes of his 
 employer. Ere long, contrary to the advice of the 
 neighbors, and in spite of somewhat discouraging hints 
 touching certain matrimonial infelicities experienced by 
 the late husband, he resolutely stepped into the dead 
 man s shoes : the mistress became the wife, and the ser 
 vant was legally promoted to the head of the household. 
 
 For a time matters went on cosily and comfortably 
 
284 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 enough. He was now lord of the soil ; and, as he laid 
 in his crops of corn and potatoes, salted down his pork, 
 and piled up his wood for winter s use, he naturally 
 enough congratulated himself upon his good fortune and 
 laughed at the sinister forebodings of his neighbors. But 
 with the long winter months came a change over his 
 " love s young dream." An evil and mysterious influence 
 seemed to be at work in his affairs. Whatever he did 
 after consulting his wife or at her suggestion resulted 
 favorably enough ; but all his own schemes and projects 
 were unaccountably marred and defeated. If he bought a 
 horse, it was sure to prove spavined or wind-broken. His 
 cows either refused to give down their milk, or, giving it, 
 perversely kicked it over. A fine sow which he had bar 
 gained for repaid his partiality by devouring, like Saturn, 
 her own children. By degrees a dark thought forced its 
 way into his mind. Comparing his repeated mischances 
 with the ante-nuptial warnings of his neighbors, he at last 
 came to the melancholy conclusion that his wife was a 
 witch. The victim in Mother well s ballad of the Demon 
 Lady, or the poor fellow in the Arabian tale who discov 
 ered that he had married a ghoul in the guise of a young 
 and blooming princess, was scarcely in a more sorrowful 
 predicament. He grew nervous and fretful. Old dismal 
 nursery stories and all the witch lore of boyhood came 
 back to his memory; and he crept to his bed like a 
 
MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK. 285 
 
 criminal to the gallows, half afraid to fall asleep lest his 
 mysterious companion should take a fancy to transform 
 him into a horse, get him shod at the smithy, and ride him 
 to a witch meeting. And, as if to make the matter worse, 
 his wife s affection seemed to increase just in proportion 
 as his troubles thickened upon him. She aggravated him. 
 with all manner of caresses and endearments. This was 
 the drop too much. The poor husband recoiled from her 
 as from a waking nightmare. His thoughts turned to 
 New England ; he longed to see once more the old home 
 stead, with its tall wellsweep and butternut trees by the 
 roadside ; and he sighed amidst the rich bottom lands 
 of his new home for his father s rocky pasture, with its 
 crop of stinted mulleins. So one cold November day, 
 finding himself out of sight and hearing of his wife, he 
 summoned courage to attempt an escape, and, resolutely 
 turning his back on the west, plunged into the wilderness 
 towards the sunrise. After a long and hard journey he 
 reached his birthplace and was kindly welcomed by his 
 old friends. Keeping a close mouth with respect to his 
 unlucky adventure in Ohio, he soon after married one of 
 his schoolmates, and, by dint of persevering industry 
 and economy, in a few years found himself in possession 
 of a comfortable home. 
 
 But his evil star still lingered above the horizon. One 
 summer evening, on returning from the hay field, who 
 
286 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 should meet him but his witch wife from Ohio! She 
 came riding up the street on her old white horse, with a 
 pillion behind the saddle. Accosting him in a kindly 
 tone, yet not without something of gentle reproach for 
 his unhandsome desertion of her, she informed him that 
 she had come all the way from Ohio to take him back 
 again. 
 
 It was in vain that he pleaded his later engagements ; 
 it was in vain that his new wife raised her shrillest re 
 monstrances, not unmingled with expressions of vehement 
 indignation at the revelation of her husband s real po 
 sition ; the witch wife was inexorable ; go he must, and 
 that speedily. Fully impressed with a belief in her 
 supernatural power of compelling obedience, and perhaps 
 dreading more than witchcraft itself the effects of the 
 unlucky disclosure on the temper of his New England 
 helpmate, he made a virtue of the necessity of the case, 
 bade farewell to the latter amidst a perfect hurricane of 
 reproaches, and mounted the white horse, with his old 
 wife on the pillion behind him. Of that ride Burger 
 might have written a counterpart to his ballad: 
 
 " Tramp, tramp, along the shore they ride, 
 Splash, splash, along the sea." 
 
 Two or three years had passed away, bringing no tidings 
 of the unfortunate husband, when he once more made his 
 
MAGICIANS AND WITCH FOLK. 287 
 
 appearance in his native village. He was not disposed 
 to be very communicative ; but for one thing, at least, he 
 seemed willing to express his gratitude. His Ohio wife, 
 having no spell against intermittent fever, had paid the 
 debt of nature and had left him free ; in view of which, 
 his surviving wife, after manifesting a due degree of re 
 sentment, consented to take him back to her bed and 
 board ; and I could never learn that she had cause to 
 regret her clemency. 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL.* 
 
 IN this life of ours, so full of mystery, so hung about 
 with wonders, so written over with dark riddles, where 
 even the lights held by prophets and inspired ones only 
 serve to disclose the solemn portals of a future *state of 
 being, leaving all beyond in shadow, perhaps the dark 
 est and most difficult problem which presents itself is that 
 of the origin of evil the source whence flow the black 
 and bitter waters of sin, and suffering, and discord the 
 wrong which all men see in others and feel in themselves 
 the unmistakable facts of human depravity and mis 
 ery. A superficial philosophy may attempt to refer all 
 these dark phenomena of man s existence to his own 
 passions, circumstances, and will ; but the thoughtful ob 
 server cannot rest satisfied with secondary causes. The 
 grossest materialism, at times, reveals something of that 
 latent dread of an invisible and spiritual influence which 
 is inseparable from our nature. Like Eliphaz the Teman- 
 
 * From the " Supernaturalism of New England," in the Democratic 
 
 Review. 
 
 (288) 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 289 
 
 ite, it is conscious of a spirit passing before its face, the 
 form whereof is not discerned. It is indeed true that 
 our modern divines and theologians, as if to atone for the 
 too easy credulity of their order formerly, have uncere 
 moniously consigned the old beliefs of satanic agency, 
 demoniacal possession, and witchcraft to Milton s recepta 
 cle of exploded follies and detected impostures, 
 
 " Over the backside of the world far off, 
 Into a limbo broad and large, and called 
 The paradise of fools," 
 
 that indeed, out of their peculiar province, and apart 
 from the routine of their vocation, they have become the 
 most thorough sceptics and unbelievers among us. Yet 
 it must be owned that, if they have not the marvellous 
 themselves, they are the cause of it in others. In certain 
 states of mind, the very sight of a clergyman in his sombre 
 professional garb is sufficient to awaken all the wonder 
 ful within us. Imagination goes wandering back to the 
 subtle priesthood of mysterious Egypt. We think of 
 Jannes and Jambres; of the Persian magi; dim oak 
 groves, with Druid altars, and priests, and victims, rise 
 before us. For what is the priest even of our Xew Eng 
 land but a living testimony to the truth of the supernatu 
 ral and the reality of the unseen a man of mystery, 
 walking in the shadow of the ideal world by profession 
 19 
 
290 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 an expounder of spiritual wonders ? Laugh he may at 
 the old tales of astrology and witchcraft and demoniacal 
 possession ; but does he not believe and bear testimony to 
 his faith in the reality of that dark essence which Scrip 
 ture more than hints at, which has modified more or less 
 all the religious systems and speculations of the heathen 
 world the Ahriman of the Parsee, the Typhon of the 
 Egyptian, the Pluto of the Roman mythology, the Devil 
 of Jew, Christian, and Mussulman, the Machinito of the 
 Indian evil in the universe of goodness, darkness in the 
 light of divine intelligence in itself the great and crown 
 ing mystery from which by no unnatural process of 
 imagination may be deduced every thing which our fore 
 fathers believed of the spiritual world and supernatural 
 agency? That fearful being with his tributaries and 
 agents, " the devil and his angels," how awfully he 
 rises before us in the brief outline limning of the sacred 
 writers ! How he glooms, " in shape and gesture proudly 
 eminent," on the immortal canvas of Milton and Dante ! 
 What a note of horror does his name throw into the sweet 
 Sabbath psalmody of our churches ! What strange, dark 
 fancies are connected with the very language of com 
 mon-law indictments, when grand juries find under oath 
 that the offence complained of has been committed "at 
 the instigation of the devil " ! 
 
 How hardly effaced are the impressions of childhood ! 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 291 
 
 Even at this day, at the mention of the evil angel, 
 an image rises before me like that with which I used 
 especially to horrify myself in an old copy of Pilgrim s 
 Progress. Horned, hoofed, scaly, and fire-breathing, his 
 caudal extremity twisted tight with rage, I remember 
 him, illustrating the tremendous encounter of Christian 
 in the valley where " Apollyon straddled over the whole 
 breadth of the way." There was another print of the 
 enemy which made no slight impression upon me. It 
 was the frontispiece of an old, smoked, snuffstained 
 pamphlet, the property of an elderly lady, (who had a 
 fine collection of similar wonders, wherewith she was kind 
 enough to edify her young visitors,) containing a solemn 
 account of the fate of a wicked dancing party in New 
 Jersey, whose irreverent declaration, that they would have 
 a fiddler if they had to send to the lower regions after him, 
 called up the fiend himself, who forthwith commenced 
 playing, while the company danced to the music inces 
 santly, without the power to suspend their exercise, until 
 their feet and legs were worn off to the knees ! The rude 
 woodcut represented the demon fiddler and his agonized 
 companions literally stumping it up and down in "cotil 
 lons, jigs, strathspeys, and reels." He would have 
 answered very well to the description of the infernal 
 piper in Tarn O Shanter. 
 
292 KECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 To this popular notion of the impersonation of the 
 principle of evil we are doubtless indebted for the whole 
 dark legacy of witchcraft and possession. Failing in our 
 efforts to solve the problem of the origin of evil, we fall 
 back upon the idea of a malignant being the antagonism 
 of good. Of this mysterious and dreadful personification 
 we find ourselves constrained to speak with a degree of 
 that awe and reverence which are always associated with 
 undefined power and the ability to harm. " The devil," 
 says an old writer, " is a dignity, though his glory be 
 somewhat faded and wan, and is to be spoken of accord 
 ingly." 
 
 The evil principle of Zoroaster was from eternity 
 self-created and existent, and some of the early Christian 
 sects held the same opinion. The gospel, however, affords 
 no countenance to this notion of a divided sovereignty of 
 the universe. The divine Teacher, it is true, in dis 
 coursing of evil, made use of the language prevalent in 
 his time, and which was adapted to the gross conceptions 
 of his Jewish hearers ; but he nowhere presents the im- 
 bodiment of sin as an antagonism to the absolute power 
 and perfect goodness of God, of whom, and through whom, 
 and to whom are all things. Pure himself, he can create 
 nothing impure. Evil, therefore, has no eternity in the 
 past. The fact of its present actual existence is indeed 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 293 
 
 strongly stated ; and it is not given us to understand the 
 secret of that divine alchemy whereby pain, and sin, and 
 discord become the means to beneficent ends worthy of the 
 revealed attributes of the infinite Parent. Unsolved by 
 human reason or philosophy, the dark mystery remains 
 to baffle the generations of men ; and only to the eye of 
 humble and childlike faith can it ever be reconciled to the 
 purity, justice, and mercy of Him who is " light, and in 
 whom is no darkness at all." 
 
 " Do you not believe in the devil ? " some one once 
 asked the nonconformist Robinson. " I believe in God," 
 was the reply ; " don t you ? " 
 
 Henry of Nettesheim says " that it is unanimously 
 maintained that devils do wander up and down in the 
 earth ; but what they are, or how they are, ecclesiasticals 
 have not clearly expounded." Origen, in his Platonic 
 speculations on this subject, supposed them to be spirits 
 who, by repentance, might be restored, that in the 
 end all knees might be bowed to the Father of spirits, 
 and he become all in all. Justin Martyr was of the 
 opinion that many of them still hoped for their sal 
 vation; and the Cabalists held that this hope of theirs 
 was well founded. One is irresistibly reminded here 
 of the closing verse of the Address to the Deil, by 
 Burns : 
 
294 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 " But fare ye weel, Auld Nickie ben ! 
 Gin ye -wad take a thought and mend, 
 Ye aiblins might I dinna ken 
 
 Still hae a stake : 
 I m wae to think upon yon den 
 
 E en for your sake." 
 
 The old schoolmen and fathers seem" to agree that the 
 devil and his ministers have bodies in some sort material, 
 subject to passions and liable to injury and pain. Origen 
 has a curious notion that any evil spirit who, in a contest 
 with a human being, is defeated, loses from thenceforth all 
 his power of mischief, and may be compared to a wasp 
 who has lost his sting. 
 
 " The devil," said Samson Occum, the famous Indian 
 preacher, in a discourse on temperance, " is a gentleman, 
 and never drinks." Nevertheless it is a remarkable fact, 
 and worthy of the serious consideration of all who " tarry 
 long at the wine," that, in that state of the drunkard s 
 malady known as delirium tremens, the adversary, in some 
 shape or other, is generally visible to the sufferers, or 
 at least, as Winslow says of the Powahs, " he appeareth 
 more familiarly to them than to others." I recollect a 
 statement made to me by a gentleman who has had bitter 
 experience of the evils of intemperance, and who is at this 
 time devoting his fine talents to the cause of philanthropy 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 295 
 
 and mercy, as the editor of one of our best temperance 
 journals, which left a most vivid impression on my mind. 
 He had just returned from a sea voyage; and, for the 
 sake of enjoying a debauch unmolested by his friends, took 
 up his abode in a rumselling tavern in a somewhat lonely 
 location on the seaboard. Here he drank for many days 
 without stint, keeping himself the whole time in a state of 
 semi-intoxication. One night he stood leaning against a 
 tree, looking listlessly and vacantly out upon the ocean ; 
 the waves breaking on the beach, and the white sails of 
 passing vessels vaguely impressing him like the pictures 
 of a dream. He was startled by a voice whispering 
 hoarsely in his ear, " You have murdered a man; the 
 officers of justice are after you; you must fly for your 
 life ! " Every syllable was pronounced slowly and sepa 
 rately ; and there was something in the hoarse, gasping 
 sound of the whisper which was indescribably dreadful. 
 He looked around him, and, seeing nothing but the clear 
 moonlight on the grass, became partially sensible that he 
 was the victim of illusion, and a sudden fear of insanity 
 thrilled him with a momentary horror. Rallying him 
 self, he returned to the tavern, drank another glass of 
 brandy, and retired to his chamber. He had scarcely 
 lain his head on the pillow when he heard that hoarse, 
 low, but terribly distinct whisper, repeating the same 
 words. He describes his sensations at this time as incon- 
 
296 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 ceivably fearful. Reason was struggling with insanity; 
 but amidst the confusion and mad disorder one terrible 
 thought evolved itself. Had he not, in a moment of mad 
 frenzy of which his memory made no record, actually 
 murdered some one ? And was not this a warning from 
 Heaven ? Leaving his bed and opening his door, he 
 heard the words again repeated, with the addition, in a 
 tone of intense earnestness, " Follow me I " He walked 
 forward in the direction of the sound, through a long 
 entry, to the head of the staircase, where he paused for 
 a moment, when again he heard the whisper, half way 
 down the stairs, " Follow me ! " 
 
 Trembling with terror, he passed down two flights of 
 stairs, and found himself treading on the cold brick floor 
 of a large room in the basement, or cellar, where he had 
 never been before. The voice still beckoned him on 
 ward ; and, groping after it, his hand touched an upright 
 post, against which he leaned for a moment. He heard 
 it again apparently only two or three yards in front of 
 him : " You have murdered a man ; the officers are 
 close behind you ; follow me ! " Putting one foot for 
 ward while his hand still grasped the post, it fell upon 
 empty air, and he with difficulty recovered himself. 
 Stooping down and feeling with his hands, he found him 
 self on the very edge of a large uncovered cistern, or 
 tank, filled nearly to the top with water. The sudden 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 297 
 
 shock of this discovery broke the horrible enchantment. 
 The whisperer was silent. He believed, at the time, that 
 he had been the subject, and well nigh the victim, of a 
 diabolical delusion ; and he states that, even now, with 
 the recollection of that strange whisper is always associ 
 ated a thought of the universal tempter. 
 
 Our worthy ancestors were, in their own view of the 
 matter, the advance guard and forlorn hope of Christen 
 dom in its contest with the bad angel. The new world, 
 into which they had so valiantly pushed the outposts of 
 the church militant, was to them, not God s world, but the 
 devil s. They stood there on their little patch of sancti 
 fied territory like the gamekeeper of Der Freischutz in 
 the charmed circle ; within were prayer and fasting, un- 
 melodious psalmody and solemn hewing of heretics " be 
 fore the Lord in Gilgal ; " without were " dogs and 
 sorcerers," red children of perdition, Powah wizards, and 
 " the foul fiend." In their grand old wilderness, broken by 
 fair, broad rivers, and dotted with loveliest lakes, hang 
 ing with festoons of leaf, and vine, and flower, the steep 
 sides of mountains whose naked tops rose over the sur 
 rounding verdure like altars of a giant world, with its 
 early summer greenness and the many-colored wonder 
 of its autumn, all glowing as if the rainbows of a summer 
 shower had fallen upon it, under the clear, rich light 
 of a sun to which the misty day of their cold island was 
 
298 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 as moonlight, they saw no beauty, they recognized no 
 holy revelation. It was to them terrible as the forest 
 which Dante traversed on his way to the world of pain. 
 Every advance step they made was upon the enemy s terri 
 tory. And one has only to read the writings of the two 
 Mathers to perceive that that enemy was to them no 
 metaphysical abstraction, no scholastic definition, no fig 
 ment of a poetical fancy, but a living, active reality, 
 alternating between the sublimest possibilities of evil and 
 the lowest details of mean mischief; now a "tricksy 
 spirit," disturbing the good wife s platters or soiling her 
 new-washed linen, and anon riding the storm cloud and 
 pointing its thunderbolts ; for, as the elder Mather perti 
 nently inquires, " how else is it that our meeting houses are 
 burned by the lightning ? " What was it, for instance, but 
 his subtlety, which, speaking through the lips of Madame 
 Hutchinson, confuted the "judges of Israel "and put to 
 their wits end the godly ministers of the Puritan Zion ? 
 Was not his evil finger manifested in the contumacious 
 heresy of Roger Williams ? Who else gave the Jesuit 
 missionaries locusts from the pit as they were such 
 a hold on the affections of those very savages who would 
 not have scrupled to hang the scalp of pious Father Wil 
 son himself from their girdles ? To the vigilant eye of 
 Puritanism was he not alike discernible in the light wan 
 tonness of the May-pole revellers, beating time with the 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 299 
 
 cloven foot to the vain music of obscene dances, and in 
 the silent, hat-canopied gatherings of the Quakers, " the 
 most melancholy of the sects," as Dr. Moore calls them ? 
 Perilous and glorious was it under these circumstances 
 for such men as Mather and Stoughton to gird up their 
 stout loins and do battle with the unmeasured, all-sur 
 rounding terror. Let no man lightly estimate their 
 spiritual knight errantry. The heroes of old romance 
 who went about smiting dragons, lopping giants heads, 
 and otherwise pleasantly diverting themselves, scarcely 
 deserve mention in comparison . with our New England 
 champions, who, trusting not to carnal sword and lance, 
 in a contest with principalities and powers, 
 
 " spirits that live throughout, 
 
 Vital in every part, not as frail man," 
 
 encountered their enemies with weapons forged by the 
 stern spiritual armorer of Geneva. The life of Cotton 
 Mather is as full of romance as the legends of Ariosto or 
 the tales of Beltenebros and Florisando in Amadis de 
 Gaul. All about him was enchanted ground ; devils 
 glared on him in his " closet wrestlings ; " portents blazed 
 in the heavens above him ; while he, commissioned and 
 set apart as the watcher, and warder, and spiritual cham 
 pion of " the chosen people," stood ever ready for battle, 
 with open eye and quick ear for the detection of the 
 
300 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 subtle approaches of the enemy. No wonder is it that 
 the spirits of evil combined against him ; that they beset 
 him as they did of old St. Anthony ; that they shut up 
 the bowels of the general court against his long-cher 
 ished hope of the presidency of Old Harvard ; that they 
 even had the audacity to lay hands on his anti-diabolical 
 manuscripts, or that " ye divil that was in ye girl flewe 
 at and tore" his grand sermon against witches. How 
 edifying is his account of the young bewitched maiden 
 whom he kept in his house for the purpose of making 
 experiments which should satisfy all " obstinate Saddu- 
 cees " ! How satisfactory to orthodoxy and confounding 
 to heresy is the nice discrimination of " ye divil in ye 
 girl," who was choked in attempting to read the cate 
 chism, yet found no trouble with a pestilent Quaker 
 pamphlet ; * who was quiet and good humored when the 
 
 * The Quakers appear to have, at a comparatively early period, 
 emancipated themselves in a great degree from the grosser super 
 stitions of their times. William Penn, indeed, had a law in his colony 
 against witchcraft ; but the first trial of a person suspected of this 
 offence seems to have opened his eyes to its absurdity. George Fox, 
 judging from one or two passages in his journal, appears to have held 
 the common opinions of the day on the subject ; yet when confined 
 in Doomsdale dungeon, on being told that the place was haunted 
 and that the spirits of those who had died there still walked at night 
 in his room, he replied, " that if all the spirits and devils in hell were 
 there he was over them in the power of God, and feared no such 
 thing." 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 301 
 
 worthy doctor was idle, but went into paroxysms of rage 
 when he sat down to indite his diatribes against witches 
 and familiar spirits ! 
 
 All this is pleasant enough now ; we can laugh at the 
 doctor and his demons ; but little matter of laughter was 
 it to the victims on Salem Hill ; to the prisoners in the 
 
 The enemies of the Quakers, in order to account for the power and 
 influence of their first preachers, accused them of magic and sorcery. 
 " The Priest of Wakefield," says George Fox, (one trusts he does 
 not allude to our old friend the Ticar,) " raised many wicked slanders 
 upon me, as that I carried bottles with me and made people drink, 
 and that made them follow me ; that I rode upon a great black horse, 
 and was seen in one county upon my black horse in one hour, and in 
 the same hour in another county fourscore miles off." In his ac 
 count of the mob which beset him at Walney Island, he says, " When 
 I came to myself I saw James Lancaster s wife throwing stones at 
 my face, and her husband lying over me to keep off the blows and 
 stones ; for the people had persuaded her that I had bewitched her 
 husband." 
 
 Cotton Mather attributes the plague of witchcraft in New England 
 in about an equal degree to the Quakers and Indians. The first of the 
 sect who visited Boston, Ann Austin and Mary Fisher, the latter a 
 young girl, were seized upon by Deputy Governor Bellingham, in 
 the absence of Governor Endicott, and shamefully stripped naked for 
 the purpose of ascertaining whether they were witches with the devil s 
 mark on them. In 1662 Elizabeth Horton and Joan Broksop, two 
 venerable preachers of the sect, were arrested in Boston, charged 
 by Governor Endicott with being witches, and carried two days 
 journey into the woods, and left to the tender mercies of Indians 
 and wolves. 
 
302 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 jails ; to poor Giles Corey, tortured with planks upon his 
 breast, which forced the tongue from his mouth and his 
 life from his old, palsied body ; to bereaved and quaking 
 families ; to a whole community priestridden and spec 
 tre-smitten, gasping in the sick dream of a spiritual night 
 mare and given over to believe a lie. "VVe may laugh, 
 for the grotesque is blended with the horrible ; but we 
 must also pity and shudder. The clearsighted men who 
 confronted that delusion in its own age, disenchanting, 
 with strong, good sense and sharp ridicule, their spell 
 bound generation, the German "VVierus, the Italian 
 D Apone, the Epglish Scot, and the New England Calef, 
 deserve high honors as the benefactors of their race. 
 It is true they were branded through life as infidels and 
 " damnable Sadducees ; " but the truth which they uttered 
 lived after them, and wrought out its appointed work, for 
 it had a divine commission and God speed. 
 
 " The oracles are dumb ; 
 
 No voice nor hidious hum 
 Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving ; 
 
 Apollo from his shrine 
 
 Can now no more divine, 
 With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving." 
 
 Dimmer and dimmer, as the generations pass away, 
 this tremendous terror, this all-pervading espionage of 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 303 
 
 evil, this active incarnation of motiveless malignity, 
 presents itself to the imagination. The once imposing 
 and solemn rite of exorcism has become obsolete in the 
 church. Men are no longer in any quarter of the world 
 racked or pressed under planks to extort a confession of 
 diabolical alliance. The heretic now laughs to scorn the 
 solemn farce of the church which, in the name of the All- 
 Merciful, formally delivers him over to Satan. And 
 for the sake of abused and long-cheated humanity let 
 us rejoice that it is so, when we consider how for long, 
 weary centuries the millions of professed Christendom 
 stooped, awestricken, under the yoke of spiritual and 
 temporal despotism, grinding on from generation to gen 
 eration in a despair which had passed complaining, be 
 cause superstition, in alliance with tyranny, had filled 
 their upward pathway to freedom with shapes of terror 
 the spectres of God s wrath to the uttermost, the fiend, 
 and that torment the smoke of which rises forever. 
 Through fear of a Satan of the future, a sort of ban 
 dog of priestcraft held in its leash and ready to be let 
 loose upon the disputers of its authority, our toiling 
 brothers of past ages have permitted their human task 
 masters to convert God s beautiful world, so adorned and 
 fitted for the peace and happiness of all, into a great 
 prison house of suffering, filled with the actual terrors 
 which the imagination of the old poets gave to the realm 
 
304 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of Rhadamanthus. And hence, while I would not weaken 
 in the slightest degree the influence of that doctrine of fu 
 ture retribution, the accountability of the spirit for the 
 deeds done in the body, the truth of which reason, reve 
 lation, and conscience unite in attesting as the necessary 
 result of the preservation in another state of existence of 
 the soul s individuality and identity, I must, nevertheless, 
 rejoice that the many are no longer willing to permit the 
 few, for their especial benefit, to convert our common 
 Father s heritage into a present hell, where, in return 
 for undeserved suffering and toil uncompensated, they can 
 have gracious and comfortable assurance of release from 
 a future one. Better is the fear of the Lord than the 
 fear of the devil ; holier and more acceptable the 
 obedience of love and reverence than the submission of 
 slavish terror. The heart which has felt the " beauty of 
 holiness," which has been in some measure attuned to the 
 divine harmony, which now, as of old in the angel hymn 
 of the advent, breathes of " glory to God, peace on earth, 
 and good will to men," in the serene atmosphere of that 
 " perfect love which casteth out fear," smiles at the ter 
 rors which throng the sick dreams of the sensual, which 
 draw aside the night curtains of guilt, and startle with 
 whispers of revenge the oppressor of the poor. 
 
 There is a beautiful moral in one of Fouque s miniature 
 romances Die Kohlerfamilie. The fierce spectre, which 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 305 
 
 rose giant-like, in its blood-red mantle, before the selfish 
 and mercenary merchant, ever increasing in size and 
 terror with the growth of evil and impure thought in the 
 mind of the latter, subdued by prayer, and penitence, and 
 patient watchfulness over the heart s purity, became a 
 loving and gentle visitation of soft light and meekest mel 
 ody "a beautiful radiance, at times hovering and flow 
 ing on before the traveller, illuminating the bushes and 
 foliage of the mountain forest a lustre strange and love 
 ly, such as the soul may conceive, but no words express. 
 He felt its power in the depths of his being felt it like 
 the mystic breathing of the Spirit of God." 
 
 The excellent Baxter and other pious men of his day 
 deprecated in all sincerity and earnestness the growing 
 disbelief in witchcraft and diabolical agency, fearing that 
 mankind, losing faith in a visible Satan and in the super 
 natural powers of certain paralytic old women, would 
 diverge into universal scepticism. It is one of the sad 
 dest of sights to see these good men standing sentry at 
 the horn gate of dreams ; attempting against most dis 
 couraging odds to defend their poor fallacies from pro 
 fane and irreverent investigation ; painfully pleading 
 doubtful Scripture and still more doubtful tradition in 
 behalf of detected and convicted superstitions tossed on 
 the sharp horns of ridicule, stretched on the rack of phi 
 losophy, or perishing under the exhausted receiver of 
 20 
 
306 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 science. A clearer knowledge of the aspirations, capaci 
 ties, and necessities of the human soul, and of the revela 
 tions which the infinite Spirit makes to it, not only 
 through the senses by the phenomena of outward nature, 
 but by that inward and direct communion which, under 
 different names, has been recognized by the devout and 
 thoughtful of every religious sect and school of philoso 
 phy, would have saved them much anxious labor and a 
 good deal of reproach withal in their hopeless champion 
 ship of error. The witches of Baxter and " the black 
 man " of Mather have vanished ; belief in them is no 
 longer possible on the part of sane men. But this mys 
 terious universe, through which, half Veiled in its own 
 shadow, our dim little planet is wheeling, with its star 
 worlds and thought-wearying spaces, remains. Nature s 
 mighty miracle is still over and around us; and hence 
 awe, wonder, and reverence remain to be the inheritance 
 of humanity: still are there beautiful repentances and 
 holy death beds ; and still over the soul s darkness and 
 confusion rises, starlike, the great idea of duty. By 
 higher and better influences than the poor spectres of 
 superstition man must henceforth be taught to reverence 
 the Invisible, and, in the consciousness of his own weak 
 ness, and sin, and sorrow, to lean with childlike trust on 
 the wisdom and mercy of an overruling Providence 
 walking by faith through the shadow and mystery, and 
 
THE AGENCY OF EVIL. 307 
 
 cheered by the remembrance that, whatever may be his 
 apparent allotment, 
 
 " God s greatness flows around our incompleteness ; 
 Round our restlessness his rest." 
 
 It is a sad spectacle to find the glad tidings of the 
 Christian faith and its " reasonable service " of devotion 
 transformed by fanaticism and credulity into superstitious 
 terror and wild extravagance ; but, if possible, there is 
 one still sadder. It is that of men in our own time re 
 garding with satisfaction such evidences of human weak 
 ness and professing to find in them new proofs of their 
 miserable theory of a godless universe, and new occasion 
 for sneering at sincere devotion as cant, and humble rev 
 erence as fanaticism. Alas ! in comparison with such, 
 the religious enthusiast, who in the midst of his delusion 
 still feels that he is indeed a living soul and an heir of 
 immortality, to whom God speaks from the immensities 
 of his universe, is a sane man. Better is it in a life 
 like ours to be even a howling dervis or a dancing Shaker, 
 confronting imaginary demons with Thalaba s talisman 
 of FAITH, than to lose the consciousness of our own 
 spiritual nature and look upon ourselves as mere brute 
 masses of animal organization barnacles on a dead uni 
 verse ; looking into the dull grave with no hope beyond it ; 
 earth gazing into earth, and saying to corruption, " Thou 
 art my father ; " and to the worm, " Thou art my sister." 
 
THE LITTLE IRON SOLDIER; 
 
 O H , 
 
 WHAT AMINADAB IVISON DREAMED ABOUT. 
 
 AMINADAB IVISON started up in his bed. The great 
 clock at the head of the staircase, an old and respected 
 heirloom of the family, struck one. 
 
 "Ah," said he, heaving up a great sigh from the 
 depths of his inner man, " I ve had a tried time of it." 
 
 " And so have I," said the wife. " Thee s been kicking 
 and threshing about all night. I do wonder what ails 
 thee." 
 
 And well she might; for her husband, a well-to-do, 
 portly, middle-aged gentleman, being blessed with an easy 
 conscience, a genial temper, and a comfortable digestion, 
 was able to bear a great deal of sleep, and seldom varied 
 a note in the gamut of his snore from one year s end to 
 another. 
 
 " A very remarkable exercise," soliloquized Aminadab ; 
 "very." 
 
 (308) 
 
THE LITTLE IRON SOLDIER. 309 
 
 " Dear me ! what was it ? " inquired his wife. 
 
 " It must have been a dream," said Aminadab. 
 
 "O, is that all?" returned the good woman. "I m 
 glad it s nothing worse. But what has thee been dream 
 ing about ? " 
 
 " It s the strangest thing, Hannah, that thee ever heard 
 of," said Aminadab, settling himself slowly back into his 
 bed. " Thee recollects Jones sent me yesterday a sample 
 of castings from the foundry. Well, I thought I opened 
 the box and found in it a little iron man, in regimentals, 
 with his sword by his side and a cocked hat on, looking 
 very much like the picture in the transparency over 
 neighbor O Neal s oyster cellar across the way. I thought 
 it rather out of place for Jones to furnish me with such a 
 sample, as I should not feel easy to show it to my cus 
 tomers, on account of its warlike appearance. However, 
 as the work was well done, I took the little image and set 
 him up on the table, against the wall ; and, sitting down 
 opposite, I began to think over my business concerns, 
 calculating how much they would increase in profit in case 
 a tariff man should be chosen our ruler for the next four 
 years. Thee knows I am not in favor of choosing men 
 of blood and strife to bear rule in the land : but it never 
 theless seems proper to consider all the circumstances in 
 this case, and, as one or the other of the candidates of the 
 two great parties must be chosen, to take the least of two 
 
310 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 evils. All at once I heard a smart, quick tapping on the 
 table ; and, looking up, there stood the little iron man close 
 at my elbow, winking and chuckling. That s right, 
 Aminadab ! said he, clapping his little metal hands to 
 gether till he rang all over like a bell, take the least of 
 two evils. His voice had a sharp, clear, jingling sound, 
 like that of silver dollars falling into a till. It startled me so 
 that I woke up, but, finding it only a dream, presently fell 
 asleep again. Then I thought I was down in the Ex 
 change, talking with neighbor Simpkins about the election 
 and the tariff. I want a change in the administration, 
 but I can t vote for a military chieftain/ said neighbor 
 Simpkins, as I look upon it unbecoming a Christian 
 people to elect men of blood for their rulers/ I don t 
 know, said I, what objection thee can have to a fighting 
 man; for thee s no Friend, and hasn t any conscientious 
 scruples against military matters. For my own part, I 
 do not take much interest in politics, and never attended 
 a caucus in my life, believing it best to keep very much 
 in the quiet, and avoid, as far as possible, all letting and 
 hindering things ; but there may be cases where a mili 
 tary man may be voted for as a choice of evils, and as a 
 means of promoting the prosperity of the country in busi 
 ness matters. l What ! said neighbor Simpkins, * are 
 you going to vote for a man whose whole life has been 
 spent in killing people ? This vexed me a little, and I 
 
THE LITTLE IRON SOLDIER. . 311 
 
 told him there was such a thing as carrying a good prin 
 ciple too far, and that he might live to be sorry that he 
 had thrown away his vote, instead of using it discreetly. 
 Why, there s the iron business/ said I ; but just then I 
 heard a clatter beside me ; and, looking round, there was 
 the little iron soldier clapping his hands in great glee. 
 That s it, Aminadab ! said he ; business first, conscience 
 afterwards ! Keep up the price of iron with peace if you 
 can, but keep it up at any rate. This waked me again 
 in a good deal of trouble ; but, remembering that it is said 
 that dreams come of the multitude of business, I once 
 more composed myself to sleep." 
 
 " Well, what happened next ? " asked his wife. 
 
 " Why, I thought I was in the meeting house, sitting 
 on the facing seat as usual. I tried hard to settle my 
 mind down into a quiet and humble state ; but somehow 
 the cares of the world got uppermost, and, before I was 
 well aware of it, I was far gone in a calculation of the 
 chances of the election, and the probable rise in the price 
 of iron in the event of the choice of a president favorable 
 to a high tariff. Rap, tap, went something on the floor. 
 I opened my eyes, and there was the little image, redhot, 
 as if just out of the furnace, dancing, and chuckling, and 
 clapping his hands. That s right, Aminadab ! said he ; 
 go on as you have begun ; take care of yourself in this 
 world, and I ll promise you you ll be taken care of in the 
 
312 KECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 next. Peace and poverty, or war and money. It s a 
 choice of evils at best; and here s Scripture to decide 
 the matter : " Be not righteous overmuch." Then the 
 wicked-looking little image twisted his hot lips, and leered 
 at me with his blazing eyes, and chuckled and laughed 
 with a noise exactly as if a bag of dollars had been poured 
 out upon the meeting-house floor. This waked me just 
 now in such a fright. I wish thee would tell me, Han 
 nah, what thee can make of these three dreams?" 
 
 " It don t need a Daniel to interpret them," answered 
 Hannah. " Thee s been thinking of voting to-morrow for 
 a wicked old soldier, because thee cares more for thy iron 
 business than for thy testimony against wars and fightings. 
 I don t a bit wonder at thy seeing the iron soldier thee 
 tells of; and if thee votes to-morrow for a man of blood, it 
 wouldn t be strange if he should haunt thee all thy life." 
 
 Aminadab Ivison was silent, for his conscience spoke in 
 the words of his wife. He slept no more that night, and 
 rose up in the morning a wiser and better man. 
 
 When he went forth to his place of business he saw the 
 crowds hurrying to and fro; there were banners flying 
 across the streets, huge placards were on the walls, and 
 he heard all about him the bustle of the great election. 
 
 " Friend Ivison," said a redfaced lawyer, almost breath 
 less with his hurry, " more money is needed in the 
 second ward; our committees are doing a great work 
 
THE LITTLE IRON SOLDIER. 313 
 
 there. What shall I put you down for ? Fifty dollars ? 
 If we carry the election, your property will rise twenty 
 per cent. Let me see ; you are in the iron business, 
 I think?" 
 
 Aminadab thought of the little iron soldier of his dream, 
 and excused himself. Presently a bank director came 
 tearing into his office, 
 
 "Have you voted yet, Mr. Ivison? It s time to get 
 your vote in. I wonder you should be in your office 
 now. No business has so much at stake in this election 
 as yours." 
 
 "I don t think I should feel entirely easy to vote for 
 the candidate," said Aminadab. 
 
 " Mr. Ivison," said the bank director, " I always took 
 you to be a shrewd, sensible man, taking men and things 
 as they are. The candidate may not be all you could wish 
 for ; but when the question is between him and a worse 
 man, the best you can do is, to choose the least of the 
 two evils." 
 
 "Just so the little iron man said," thought Aminadab. 
 " * Get thee behind me, Satan ! No, neighbor Dis 
 count," said he, " I ve made up my mind. I see no war 
 rant for choosing evil at all. I can t vote for that man." 
 "Very well," said the director, starting to leave the 
 room ; " you can do as you please ; but if we are defeated 
 through the ill-timed scruples of yourself and others, and 
 
314 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 your business pinches in consequence, you needn t expect 
 us to help men who won t help themselves. Good day, 
 sir." 
 
 Aminadab sighed heavily, and his heart sank within 
 him ; but he thought of his dream, and remained steadfast. 
 Presently he heard heavy steps and the tapping of a 
 cane on the stairs ; and as the door opened he saw the 
 drab surtout of the worthy and much-esteemed friend who 
 sat beside him at the head of the meeting. 
 
 "How s thee do, Aminadab?" said he. "Thee s 
 voted, I suppose." 
 
 " No, Jacob," said he ; "I don t like the candidate. I 
 can t see my way clear to vote for a warrior." 
 
 " Well, but thee doesn t vote for him because he is a 
 warrior, Aminadab," argued the other ; " thee votes for 
 him as a tariff man and an encourager of home industry. 
 I don t like his wars and fightings better than thee does ; 
 but I m told he s an honest man, and that he disapproves 
 of war in the abstract, although he has been brought up to 
 the business. If thee feels tender about the matter, I 
 don t like to urge thee ; but it really seems to me thee 
 had better vote. Times have been rather hard, thou 
 knows; and if by voting at this election we can make 
 business matters easier, I don t see how we can justify 
 ourselves in staying at home. Thou knows we have a 
 command to be diligent in business as well as fervent in 
 
THE LITTLE IRON SOLDIER. 315 
 
 spirit, and that the apostle accounted him who provided 
 not for his own household worse than an infidel. I think 
 it important to maintain on all proper occasions our gospel 
 testimony against wars and fightings ; but there is such a 
 thing as going to extremes, thou knows, and becoming 
 over-scrupulous, as I think thou art in this case. It is 
 said, thou knows, in Ecclesiastes, t Be not righteous over 
 much : why shouldst thou destroy thyself ? " 
 
 "Ah," said Aminadab to himself, "that s what the 
 little iron soldier said in meeting." So he was strength 
 ened in his resolution, and the persuasions of his friend 
 were lost upon him. 
 
 At night Aminadab sat by his parlor fire, comfortable 
 alike in his inner and his outer man. " Well, Hannah," 
 said he, "I ve taken thy advice. I didn t vote for the 
 great fighter to-day." 
 
 " I m glad of it," said the good woman, " and I dare 
 say thee feels the better for it." 
 
 Aminadab Ivison slept soundly that night, and saw no 
 more of the little iron soldier. 
 
THE CITY OF A DAY.* 
 
 THIS, then, is Lowell a city springing up, like the 
 enchanted palaces of the Arabian tales, as it were in a 
 single night, stretching far and wide its chaos of brick 
 masonry and painted shingles, filling the angle of the 
 confluence of the Concord and the Merrimac with the 
 sights and sounds of trade and industry. Marvellously 
 here has art and labor wrought their modern miracles. 
 I can scarcely realize the fact that a few years ago these 
 rivers, now famed and subdued to the purposes of man 
 and charmed into slavish subjection to the wizard of 
 mechanism, rolled unchecked towards the ocean the 
 waters of the Winnipiseogee and the rock-rimmed 
 springs of the "White Mountains, and rippled down their 
 falls in the wild freedom of Nature. A stranger, in view 
 of all this wonderful change, feels himself, as it were, 
 thrust forward into a new century ; he seems treading 
 on the outer circle of the millennium of steam engines 
 
 * This paper and several which follow it are from " The Stranger in 
 
 Lowell." written in 1843. 
 
 (316) 
 
THE CITY OF A DAY. 317 
 
 and cotton mills. W ORK is here the patron saint. Every 
 thing bears his image and superscription. Here is no 
 place for that respectable class of citizens called gentle 
 men, and their much vilified brethren familiarly known 
 as loafers. Over the gateways of this new- world Man 
 chester glares the inscription, " WORK, OR DIE ! " Here 
 
 " Every worm beneath the moon 
 Draws different threads, and late or soon 
 Spins, toiling out his own cocoon." 
 
 The founders of this city probably never dreamed of 
 the theory of Charles Lamb in respect to the origin of 
 labor : 
 
 " Who first invented work, and thereby bound 
 
 The holiday rejoicing spirit down 
 To the never-ceasing importunity 
 
 Of business in the green fields and the town ? 
 Sabbathless Satan he who his unglad 
 
 Task ever plies midst rotatory burnings ; 
 For wrath divine has made him like a wheel 
 
 In that red realm from whence are no returnings." 
 
 Rather, of course, would they adopt Carlyle s apostrophe 
 of " Divine labor, noble, ever fruitful the grand, sole 
 miracle of man ; " for this is indeed a city consecrated to 
 thrift dedicated, every square rod of it, to the divinity 
 of work ; the gospel of industry preached daily and hour 
 ly from some thirty temples, each huger than the Milan 
 
318 EECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Cathedral or the temple of Jeddo, the Mosque of St. 
 Sophia or the Chinese pagoda of a hundred bells ; its 
 mighty sermons uttered by steam and water power; its 
 music the everlasting jar of mechanism and the organ 
 swell of many waters ; scattering the cotton and woollen 
 leaves of its evangel from the wings of steamboats and 
 rail cars throughout the land ; its thousand priests and its 
 thousands of priestesses ministering around their spin 
 ning-jenny and power-loom altars, or thronging the long, 
 unshaded streets in the level light of sunset. After all, 
 it may well be questioned whether this gospel, according 
 to Poor Richard s Almanac, is precisely calculated for 
 the redemption of humanity. Labor, graduated to man s 
 simple wants, necessities, and unperverted tastes, is doubt 
 less well ; but all beyond this is weariness to flesh and 
 spirit. Every web which falls from these restless looms 
 has a history more or less connected with sin and suffer 
 ing, beginning with slavery and ending with overwork 
 and premature death. 
 
 A few years ago, while travelling in Pennsylvania, I 
 encountered a small, dusky-browed German of the name 
 of Etzler. He was possessed by a belief that the 
 world was to be restored to its paradisiacal state by the 
 sole agency of mechanics, and that he had himself dis 
 covered the means of bringing about this very desirable 
 consummation. His whole mental atmosphere was 
 
THE CITY OF A DAY. 319 
 
 thronged with spectral enginery ; wheel within wheel ; 
 plans of hugest mechanism; Brobdignagian steam en 
 gines ; Niagaras of water power ; windmills with " sail- 
 broad vans " like those of Satan in chaos, by the proper 
 application of which every valley was to be exalted and 
 every hill laid low ; old forests seized by their shaggy 
 taps and uprooted ; old morasses drained ; the tropics 
 made cool; the eternal ices melted around the poles; 
 the ocean itself covered with artificial islands blossom 
 ing gardens of the blessed, rocking gently on the bosom 
 of the deep. Give him " three hundred thousand dollars 
 and ten years time," and he would undertake to do the 
 work. Wrong, pain, and sin, being in his view but the 
 results of our physical necessities, ill-gratified desires, 
 and natural yearnings for a better state, were to vanish 
 before the millennium of mechanism. " It would be," 
 said he, " as ridiculous then to dispute and quarrel about 
 the means of life as it would be now about water to 
 drink by the side of mighty rivers or about permission 
 to breathe the common air." To his mind the great 
 forces of Nature took the shape of mighty and benig 
 nant spirits, sent hitherward to be the servants of man in 
 restoring to him his lost paradise; waiting only for his 
 word of command to apply their giant energies to the 
 task, but as yet struggling blindly and aimlessly, giv 
 ing ever and anon gentle hints, in the way of earthquake, 
 
320 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 fire, and flood, that they are weary of idleness, and would 
 fain be set at work. Looking down, as I now do, upon 
 these huge brick workshops, I have thought of poor 
 Etzler, and wondered whether he would admit, were he 
 with me, that his mechanical forces have here found their 
 proper employment of millennium making. Grinding on, 
 each in his iron harness, invisible, yet shaking by his 
 regulated and repressed power his huge prison house 
 from basement to capstone, is it true that the genii of 
 mechanism are really at work here, raising us, by wheel 
 and pulley, steam and water power, slowly up that in 
 clined plane from whose top stretches the broad table 
 land of promise ? 
 
 Many of the streets of Lowell present a lively and 
 neat aspect, and are adorned with handsome public and 
 private buildings ; but they lack one pleasant feature of 
 older towns broad, spreading shade trees. One feels 
 disposed to quarrel with the characteristic utilitarianism 
 of the first settlers, which swept so entirely away the 
 green beauty of Nature. For the last few days it has 
 been as hot here as Nebuchadnezzar s furnace or Mon 
 sieur Chabert s oven, the sun glaring down from a copper 
 sky upon these naked, treeless streets, in traversing which 
 one is tempted to adopt the language of a warm-weather 
 poet : 
 
 " The lean, like walking skeletons, go stalking pale and gloomy ; 
 The fat, like redhot warming pans, send hotter fancies through me ; 
 
THE CITY OF A DAY. 321 
 
 I wake from dreams of polar ice, on which I ve been a slider, 
 Like fishes dreaming of the sea and waking in the spider." 
 
 How unlike the elm-lined avenues of New Haven, upon 
 whose cool and graceful panorama the stranger looks 
 down from the Judge s Cave, or the vine-hung pinnacles of 
 West Rock, its tall spires rising white and clear above 
 the level greenness ! or the breezy leafiness of Port 
 land, with its wooded islands in the distance, and itself 
 overhung with verdant beauty, rippling and waving in 
 the same cool breeze which stirs the waters of the beauti 
 ful Bay of Casco ! But time will remedy all this ; and, 
 when Lowell shall have numbered half the years of her 
 sister cities, her newly-planted elms and maples, which 
 now only cause us to contrast their shadeless stems with 
 the leafy glory of their parents of the forest, will stretch 
 out to the future visitor arms of welcome and repose. 
 
 There is one beautiful grove in Lowell, that on 
 Chapel Hill, where a cluster of fine old oaks lift their 
 sturdy stems and green branches, in close proximity to 
 the crowded city, blending the cool rustle of their leaves 
 with the din of machinery. As I look at them in this 
 gray twilight they seem lonely and isolated, as if wonder 
 ing what has become of their old forest companions, and 
 vainly endeavoring to recognize in the thronged and 
 dusty streets before them those old, graceful colonnades of 
 21 
 
322 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 maple and thick-shaded oaken vistas, stretching from 
 river to river, carpeted with the flowers and grasses of 
 spring, or ankle deep with leaves of autumn, through 
 whose leafy canopy the sunlight melted in upon wild 
 birds, shy deer, and red Indians. Long may these 
 oaks remain to remind us that, if there be utility in the 
 new, there was beauty in the old, leafy Puseyites of Na 
 ture, calling us back to the past, but, like their Oxford 
 brethren, calling in vain ; for neither in polemics nor in 
 art can we go backward in an age whose motto is ever 
 
 "ONWARD." 
 
 The population of Lowell is constituted mainly of New 
 Englanders ; but there are representatives here of almost 
 every part of the civilized world. The good-humored 
 face of the Milesian meets one at almost every turn ; 
 the shrewdly solemn Scotchman, the transatlantic Yan 
 kee, blending the crafty thrift of Bryce Snailsfoot with 
 the stern religious heroism of Cameron ; the blue-eyed, 
 fair-haired German from the towered hills which -over 
 look the Rhine slow, heavy, and unpromising in his 
 exterior, yet of the same mould and mettle of the men 
 who rallied for "fatherland" at the Tyrtean call of 
 Korner and beat back the chivalry of France from the 
 banks of the Katzback the countrymen of Richter, and 
 Goethe, and our own Follen. Here, too, are peddlers 
 from Hamburg, and Bavaria, and Poland, with their 
 

 THE CITY OF A DAY. 323 
 
 sharp Jewish faces, and black, keen eyes. At this mo 
 ment beneath my window are two sturdy, sunbrowned 
 Swiss maidens grinding music for a livelihood, rehears 
 ing in a strange Yankee land the simple songs of their 
 old mountain home, reminding me, by their foreign garb 
 and language, of 
 
 " Lauterbrunnen s peasant girl." 
 
 Poor wanderers ! I cannot say that I love their music ; 
 but now, as the notes die away, and, to use the words 
 of Dr. Holmes, "silence comes like a poultice to heal the 
 wounded ear," I feel grateful for their visitation. Away 
 from crowded thoroughfares, from brick walls and dusty 
 avenues, at the sight of these poor peasants I have gone 
 in thought to the vale of Chamouny, and seen, with 
 Coleridge, the morning star pausing on the " bald, awful 
 head of sovereign Blanc," and the sun rise and set upon 
 snowy-crested mountains, down in whose valleys the night 
 still lingers ; and, following in the track of Byron and 
 Rousseau, have watched the lengthening shadows of the 
 hills on the beautiful waters of the Genevan lake. Bless 
 ings, then, upon these young wayfarers, for they have 
 <; blessed me unawares." In an hour of sickness and las 
 situde they have wrought for me the miracle of Loretto s 
 Chapel, and borne me away from the scenes around me 
 and the sense of personal suffering to thafr wonderful land 
 
324 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 where Nature seems still uttering, from lake and valley, 
 and from mountains whose eternal snows lean on the hard, 
 blue heaven, the echoes of that mighty hymn of a new- 
 created world when " the morning stars sang together, 
 and all the sons of God shouted for joy." 
 
 But of all classes of foreigners the Irish are by far the 
 most numerous. Lighthearted, wrongheaded, impul 
 sive, uncalculating, with an Oriental love of hyperbole, 
 and too often a common dislike of cold water and of that 
 gem which the fable tells us rests at the bottom of the 
 well, the Celtic elements of their character do not readily 
 accommodate themselves to those of the hard, cool, self- 
 relying Anglo-Saxon. I am free to confess to a very 
 thorough dislike of their religions intolerance and bigotry, 
 but am content to wait for the change that time and the 
 attrition of new circumstances and ideas must necessarily 
 make in this respect. Meanwhile I would strive to rev 
 erence man as man, irrespective of his birthplace. A 
 stranger in a strange land is always to me an object of 
 sympathy and interest. Amidst all his apparent gayety 
 of heart and national drollery and wit, the poor Irish emi 
 grant has sad thoughts of the "ould mother of him," 
 sitting lonely in her solitary cabin by the bogside ; recol 
 lections of a father s blessing and a sister s farewell are 
 haunting him ; a grave mound in a distant churchyard 
 far beyond the " wide wathers " has an eternal greenness 
 
THE CITY OF A DAY. 32") 
 
 in his memory ; for there, perhaps, lies a " darlint child " 
 or a "swate crather" who once loved him. The new 
 world is forgotten for the moment ; blue Killarney and the 
 Liny sparkle before him, and Glendalough stretches be 
 neath him its dark, still mirror ; he sees the same even 
 ing sunshine rest upon and hallow alike with Nature s 
 blessing the ruins of the Seven Churches of Ireland s 
 apostolic age, the broken mound of the Druids, and the 
 round towers of the Phoenician sun worshippers ; pleasant 
 and mournful recollections of his home waken within him ; 
 and the rough and seemingly careless and lighthearted 
 laborer melts into tears. It is no light thing to abandon 
 one s own country and household gods. Touching and 
 beautiful was the injunction of the prophet of the He 
 brews : "Ye shall not oppress the stranger; for ye know 
 the heart of the stranger, seeing that ye were strangers in 
 the land of Egypt." 
 
PATUCKET FALLS. 
 
 MANY years ago I read, in some old chronicle of the 
 early history of New England, a paragraph which has 
 ever since haunted my memory, calling up romantic 
 associations of wild Nature and wilder man : 
 
 " THE SACHEM WONOLANSET, WHO LIVED BY THE 
 GREAT FALLS OF PATUCKET, ON THE MERRIMAC." 
 
 It was with this passage in my mind that I visited for 
 the first time the Rapids of the Merrimac, above Lowell. 
 
 Passing up the street by the Hospital, a large and 
 elegant mansion, surrounded by trees, and shrubbery, and 
 climbing vines, I found myself, after walking a few rods 
 farther, in full view of the Merrimac. A deep and rocky 
 channel stretched between me and the Dracut shore, along 
 which rushed the shallow water a feeble, broken, and 
 tortuous current, winding its way among splintered rocks, 
 rising sharp and jagged in all directions. Drained above 
 the falls by the canal, it resembled some mountain stream 
 let of old Spain, or some Arabian wady, exhausted by a 
 year s drought. Higher up the arches of the bridge 
 
 (326) 
 
PATUCKET FALLS. 327 
 
 spanned the quick, troubled water ; and, higher still, the 
 dam, so irregular in its outline as to seem less a work of 
 Art than of Nature, crossed the bed of the river a lake- 
 like placidity above contrasting with the foam and mur 
 mur of the falls below. And this was all which modern 
 improvements had left of " the great Patucket Falls " of 
 the olden time. The wild river had been tamed ; the 
 spirit of the falls, whose hoarse voice the Indian once 
 heard in the dashing of the great water down the rocks, 
 had become the slave of the arch conjurer, Art ; and, like 
 a shorn and blinded giant, was grinding in the prison 
 house of his taskmaster. 
 
 One would like to know how this spot must have 
 seemed to the " twenty goodlie persons from Concord and 
 Woburn" who first visited it in 1652, as, worn with 
 fatigue, and wet from the passage of the sluggish Con 
 cord, " where ford there was none," they wound their slow 
 way through the forest, following the growing murmur of 
 the falls, until at length the broad, swift river stretched 
 before them, its white spray flashing in the sun. What 
 cared these sturdy old Puritans for the wild beauty of the 
 landscape thus revealed before them ? I think I see them 
 standing there in the golden light of a closing October 
 day, with their sombre brown doublets and slouched hats, 
 and tlieir heavy matchlocks such men as Ireton fronted 
 death with on the battle field of Naseby, or those who 
 
328 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 stalked with Cromwell over the broken wall of Drogheda, 
 smiting, " in the name of the Lord," old and young, "both 
 maid, and little children." Methinks I see the sunset 
 light flooding the river valley, the western hills stretching 
 to the horizon, overhung with trees gorgeous and glowing 
 with the tints of autumn a mighty flower garden, 
 blossoming under the spell of the enchanter, Frost; the 
 rushing river, with its graceful water curves and white 
 foam ; and a steady murmur, low, deep voices of water, 
 the softest, sweetest sound of Nature, blends with the sigh 
 of the south wind in the pine tops. But these hard- 
 featured saints of the New Canaan "care for none of 
 these things." The stout hearts which beat under their 
 leathern doublets are proof against the sweet influences of 
 Nature. They see only " a great and howling wilderness, 
 where be many Indians, but where fish may be taken, and 
 where be meadows for ye subsistence of cattle," and 
 which, on the whole, " is a comfortable place to accom 
 modate a company of God s people upon, who may, with 
 God s blessing, do good in that place for both church and 
 state." (Vide petition to the general court, 1653.) 
 
 In reading the journals and narratives of the early 
 settlers of New England, nothing is more remarkable 
 than the entire silence of the worthy writers in respect 
 to the natural beauty or grandeur of the scenery amid 
 which their lot was cast. They designated the grand and 
 
PATUCKET FALLS. 329 
 
 glorious forest, broken by lakes and crossed by great 
 rivers, intersected by a thousand streams more beautiful 
 than those which the old world has given to song and 
 romance, as " a desert and frightful wilderness." The 
 wildly picturesque Indian, darting his birch canoe down 
 the Falls of the Amoskeag or gliding in the deer track of 
 the forest, was, in their view, nothing but a " dirty tawnie," 
 a " salvage heathen," and " devil s imp." Many of them 
 were well educated men of varied and profound erudi 
 tion, and familiar with the best specimens of Greek and 
 Roman literature ; yet they seem to have been utterly 
 devoid of that poetic feeling or fancy whose subtle alchemy 
 detects the beautiful in the familiar. Their very hymns 
 and spiritual songs seem to have been expressly calcu 
 lated, like "the music grinders" of Holmes, 
 
 "To pluck the eyes of sentiment, 
 
 And dock the tail of rhyme, 
 To crack the voice of melody, 
 And break the legs of time." 
 
 They were sworn enemies of the Muses ; haters of 
 stage-play literature, profane songs, and wanton sonnets; 
 of every thing, in brief, which reminded them of the days 
 of the roistering cavaliers and bedizened beauties of 
 the court of "the man Charles," whose head had. fallen 
 beneath the sword of Puritan justice. Hard, harsh, 
 
330 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 unlovely, yet with many virtues and noble points of char 
 acter, they were fitted doubtless for their work of pioneers 
 in the wilderness. Sternly faithful to duty, in peril, and 
 suffering, and self-denial, they wrought out the noblest of 
 historical epics on the rough soil of New England. They 
 lived a truer poetry than Homer or Virgil wrote. 
 
 The Patuckets, once a powerful native tribe, had their 
 principal settlement around the falls at the time of the 
 visit of the white men of Concord and Woburn in 1652. 
 Gookin, the Indian historian, states that this tribe was 
 almost wholly destroyed by the great pestilence of 1C12. 
 In 1674 they had but two hundred and fifty males in the 
 whole tribe. Their chief sachem lived opposite the falls ; 
 and it was in his wigwam that the historian, in company 
 with John Eliot, the Indian missionary, held a " meeting 
 for worshippe on ye 5th of May, 1676," where Mr. Eliot 
 preached from " ye twenty-second of Matthew." 
 
 The white visitants from Concord and Woburn, pleased 
 with the appearance of the place and the prospect it 
 afforded for planting and fishing, petitioned the general 
 court for a grant of the entire tract of *land now embraced 
 in the limits of Lowell and Chelmsford. They made no 
 account whatever of the rights of the poor Patuckets ; 
 but, considering it " a comfortable place to accommodate 
 God s people upon," were doubtless prepared to deal with 
 the heathen inhabitants as Joshua the son of Nun did with 
 
PATUCKET FALLS. 331 
 
 the Jebusites and Perizzites, the Hivites and the Hittites, 
 of old. The Indians, however, found a friend in the 
 apostle Eliot, who presented a petition in their behalf that 
 the lands lying around the Patucket and Wamesit Falls 
 should be appropriated exclusively for their benefit and 
 use. The court granted the petition of the whites, with 
 the exception of the tract in the angle of the two rivers 
 on which the Patuckets were settled. The Indian title to 
 this tract was not finally extinguished until 1726, when 
 the beautiful name of Wamesit was lost in that of Chelms- 
 ford, and the last of the Patuckets turned his back upon 
 the graves of his fathers and sought a new home among 
 the strange Indians of the north. 
 
 But what has all this to do with the falls ? When 
 the rail cars came thundering through his lake country, 
 Wordsworth attempted to exorcise them by a sonnet ; and, 
 were I not a very decided Yankee, I might possibly fol 
 low his example, and utter in this connection my protest 
 against the desecration of Patucket Falls, and battle with 
 objurgatory stanzas these dams and mills, as Balma- 
 whapple shot off his horse pistol at Sterling Castle. Rocks 
 and trees, rapids, cascades, and other waterworks are doubt 
 less all very well ; but on the whole, considering our seven 
 months of frost, are not cotton shirts and woollen coats 
 still better? As for the spirits of the river, the Merri- 
 mac Naiads, or whatever may be their name in Indian 
 
332 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 vocabulary, they have no good reason for complaint ; inas 
 much as Nature, in marking and scooping out the channel 
 of their stream, seems to have had an eye to the useful 
 rather than the picturesque. After a few preliminary 
 antics and youthful vagaries up among the White Hills, 
 the Merrimac comes down to the seaboard, a clear, cheer 
 ful, hardworking Yankee river. Its numerous falls and 
 rapids are such as seem to invite the engineer s level 
 rather than the pencil of the tourist ; and the mason who 
 piles up the huge brick fabrics at their feet is seldom, I 
 suspect, troubled with sentimental remorse or poetical 
 misgivings. Staid and matter of fact as the Merrimac is, 
 it has, nevertheless, certain capricious and eccentric tribu 
 taries ; the Powwow, for instance, with its eighty feet fall 
 in a few rods, and that wild, Indian-haunted spickct, taking 
 its well nigh perpendicular leap of thirty feet, within sight 
 of the village meeting house, kicking up its pagan heels, 
 Sundays and all, in sheer contempt of Puritan tithing men. 
 This latter waterfall is now somewhat modified by the 
 hand of art, but is still, as Professor Hitchcock s Sceno- 
 graphical Geology says of it, " an object of no little inter 
 est." My friend T.. favorably known as the translator of 
 Undine and as a writer of fine and delicate imagination, 
 visited Spicket Falls before the sound of a hammer or 
 the click of a trowel had been heard beside them. His 
 journal of A Day on the Merrimac gives a pleasing and 
 
PATUCKET FALLS. 333 
 
 vivid description of their original appearance as viewed 
 through the telescope of a poetic fancy. The readers of 
 Undine will thank me for a passage or two from this 
 sketch : 
 
 " The sound of the waters swells more deeply. Some 
 thing supernatural in their confused murmur; it makes 
 me better understand and sympathize with the writer of 
 the Apocalypse when he speaks of the voice of many 
 waters, heaping image upon image, to impart the vigor of 
 his conception. 
 
 " Through yonder elm branches I catch a few snowy 
 glimpses of foam in the air. See that spray and vapor 
 rolling up the evergreen on my left ! The two side pre 
 cipices, one hundred feet apart and excluding objects of 
 inferior moment, darken and concentrate the view. The 
 waters between pour over the right-hand and left-hand 
 summit, rushing down and uniting among the craggiest 
 and abruptest of rocks. for a whole mountain side of 
 that living foam ! The sun impresses q, faint prismatic 
 hue. These falls, compared with those of the Missouri, 
 are nothing nothing but the merest miniature ; and yet 
 they assist me in forming some conception of that glorious 
 expanse. 
 
 " A fragment of an oak, struck off by lightning, strug 
 gles with the current midway down ; while the shattered 
 trunk frowns above the desolation, majestic in ruin. This 
 
334 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 is near the southern cliff. Farther north a crag rises out 
 of the stream, its upper surface covered with green clover 
 of the most vivid freshness. Not only all night, but all 
 day, has the dew lain upon its purity. 
 
 " With my eye attaining the uppermost margin, where 
 the waters shoot over, I look away into the western sky, 
 and discern there (what you least expect) a cow chewing 
 her cud with admirable composure, and higher up several 
 sheep and lambs browsing celestial buds. They stand on 
 the eminence that forms the background of my present 
 view. The illusion is extremely picturesque such as 
 Allston himself would despair of producing. l Who can 
 paint like Nature ? " 
 
HAMLET AMONG THE GRAVES. 
 
 AN amiable enthusiast, immortal in his beautiful little 
 romance of Paul and Virginia, has given us in his Mis 
 cellanies a chapter on the Pleasures of Tombs a title 
 singular enough, yet not inappropriate ; for the meek- 
 spirited and sentimental author has given, in his own 
 flowing and eloquent language, its vindication. " There 
 is," says he, " a voluptuous melancholy arising from the 
 contemplation of tombs ; the result, like every other at 
 tractive sensation, of the harmony of two opposite prin 
 ciples from the sentiment of our fleeting life and that 
 of our immortality, which unite in view of the last habi 
 tation of mankind. A tomb is a monument erected on 
 the confines of two worlds. It first presents to us the 
 end of the vain disquietudes of life and the image of 
 everlasting repose ; it afterwards awakens in us the con 
 fused sentiment of a blessed immortality, the probabilities 
 of which grow stronger and stronger in proportion as 
 the person whose memory is recalled was a virtuous 
 character. 
 
 (335) 
 
336 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 " It is from this intellectual instinct, therefore, in favor 
 of virtue, that the tombs of great men inspire us with a 
 veneration so affecting. From the same sentiment, too, it 
 is that those which contain objects that have been lovely 
 excite so much pleasing regret ; for the attractions of love 
 arise entirely out of the appearances of virtue. Hence 
 it is that we are moved at the sight of the small hillock 
 which covers the ashes of an infant, from the recollection 
 of its innocence ; hence it is that we are melted into ten 
 derness on contemplating the tomb in which is laid to 
 repose a young female, the delight and the hope of her 
 family by reason of her virtues. In order to give interest 
 to such monuments, there is no need of bronzes, marbles, 
 and gildings. The more simple they are, the more en 
 ergy they communicate to the sentiment of melancholy. 
 They produce a more powerful effect when poor rather 
 than rich, antique rather than modern, with details of 
 misfortune rather than titles of honor, with the attributes 
 of virtue rather than with those of power. It is in the 
 country principally that their impression makes itself felt 
 in a very lively manner. A simple, unornamented grave 
 there causes more tears to flow than the gaudy splendor 
 of a cathedral interment. There it is that grief assumes 
 sublimity ; it ascends with the aged yews in the church 
 yard ; it extends with the surrounding hills and plains ; 
 it allies itself with all the effects of Nature with the 
 
HAMLET AMONG THE GRAVES. 337 
 
 dawning of the morning, with the murmuring of the 
 winds, with the setting of the sun, and with the darkness 
 of the night." 
 
 Not long since I took occasion to visit the cemetery 
 near this city. It is a beautiful location for a " city of 
 the dead " a tract of some forty or fifty acres on the 
 eastern bank of the Concord, gently undulating, and cov 
 ered with a heavy growth of forest trees, among which 
 the white o ak is conspicuous. The ground beneath has 
 been cleared of undergrowth, and is marked here and 
 there with monuments and railings enclosing "family 
 lots." It is a quiet, peaceful spot ; the city, with its 
 crowded mills, its busy streets and teeming life, is hidden 
 from view ; not even a solitary farm house attracts the 
 eye. All is still and solemn, as befits the place where 
 man and nature lie down together ; where leaves of the 
 great life tree, shaken down by death, mingle and moulder 
 with the frosted foliage of the autumnal forest. 
 
 Yet the contrast of busy life is not wanting. The 
 Lowell and Boston Railroad crosses the river within view 
 of the cemetery ; and, standing there in the silence and 
 shadow, one can see the long trains rushing along their 
 iron pathway, thronged with living, breathing humanity, 
 the young, the beautiful, the gay, busy, wealth- 
 seeking manhood of middle years, the child at its moth 
 er s knee, the old man with whitened hairs, hurrying 
 22 
 
338 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 on, on, car after car, like the generations of man 
 sweeping over the track of time to their last still resting- 
 place. 
 
 It is not the aged and the sad of heart who make this 
 a place of favorite resort. The young, the buoyant, the 
 lighthearted come and linger among these flower-sown 
 graves, watching the sunshine falling in broken light upon 
 these cold, white marbles, and listening to the songs of 
 birds in these leafy recesses. Beautiful and sweet to the 
 young heart is the gentle shadow of melancholy which 
 here falls upon it, soothing, yet sad a sentiment mid 
 way between joy and sorrow. How true is it, that, in 
 the language of Wordsworth, 
 
 " In youth we love the darkling lawn, 
 
 Brushed by the owlet s wing ; 
 Then evening is preferred to dawn, 
 
 And autumn to the spring. 
 Sad fancies do we then affect, 
 In luxury of disrespect 
 To our own prodigal excess 
 Of too familiar happiness." 
 
 The Chinese, from the remotest antiquity, have adorned 
 and decorated their grave grounds with shrubs and sweet 
 flowers as places of popular resort. The Turks have their 
 graveyards planted with trees, through which the sun 
 looks in upon the turban stones of the faithful, and 
 
HAMLET AMONG THE GRAVES. 339 
 
 beneath which the relatives of the dead sit in cheerful 
 converse through the long days of summer in all the lux 
 urious quiet and happy indifference of the indolent East. 
 Most of the visitors whom I met at the Lowell cemetery 
 wore cheerful faces; some sauntered laughingly along, 
 apparently unaffected by the associations of the place ; 
 too full, perhaps, of life, and energy, and high hope to 
 apply to themselves the stern and solemn lesson which is 
 taught even by these flower-garlanded mounds. But, for 
 myself, I confess that I am always awed by the presence 
 of the dead. I cannot jest above the gravestone. My 
 spirit is silenced and rebuked before the tremendous 
 mystery of which the grave reminds me, and involuntarily 
 
 pays 
 
 "The deep reverence taught of old, 
 
 The homage of man s heart to death." 
 
 Even Nature s cheerful air, and sun, and bird voices only 
 serve to remind me that there are those beneath who 
 have looked on the same green leaves and sunshine, felt 
 the same soft breeze upon their cheeks, and listened to 
 the same wild music of the woods for the last time. 
 Then, too, comes the saddening reflection, to which so 
 many have given expression, that these trees will put 
 forth their leaves, the slant sunshine still fall upon green 
 meadows and banks of flowers, and the song of the birds 
 and the ripple of waters still be heard after our eyes 
 
340 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 and ears have closed forever. It is hard for us to realize 
 this. "We are so accustomed to look upon these things 
 as a part of our life environment that it seems strange 
 that they should survive us. Tennyson, in his exquisite 
 metaphysical poem of the Two Voices, has given utter 
 ance to this sentiment : 
 
 " Alas ! though I should die, I know 
 That all about the thorn will blow 
 In tufts of rosy-tinted snow. 
 
 Not less the bee will range her cells, 
 The furzy prickle fire the dells, 
 The foxglove cluster dappled bells." 
 
 " THE PLEASURES OF THE TOMBS ! " Undoubtedly, 
 in the language of the Idumean seer, there are many who 
 " rejoice exceedingly and are glad when they can find the 
 grave," who long for it " as the servant earnestly desireth 
 the shadow." Rest, rest to the sick heart and the weary 
 brain, to the long afflicted and the hopeless rest on the 
 calm bosom of our common mother. Welcome to the 
 tired ear, stunned and confused with life s jarring dis 
 cords, the everlasting silence ; grateful to the weary eyes 
 which "have seen evil, and not good," the everlasting 
 shadow. 
 
 Yet over all hangs the curtain of a deep mystery a 
 curtain lifted only on one side by the hands of those who 
 
HAMLET AMONG THE GRAVES. 341 
 
 are passing under its solemn shadow. No voice speaks 
 to us from beyond it, telling of the unknown state ; no 
 hand from within puts aside the dark drapery to reveal 
 the mysteries towards which we are all moving. " Man 
 giveth up the ghost ; and where is he ? " 
 
 Thanks to our heavenly Father, he has not left us 
 altogether without an answer to this momentous ques 
 tion. Over the blackness of darkness a light is shining. 
 The valley of the shadow of death is no longer " a land 
 of darkness and where the light is as darkness." The 
 presence of a serene and holy life pervades it. Above its 
 pale tombs and crowded burial-places, above the wail of 
 despairing humanity, the voice of Him who awakened 
 life and beauty beneath the graveclothes of the tomb at 
 Bethany is heard proclaiming, " I AM THE RESURREC 
 TION AND THE LIFE." We know not, it is true, the 
 conditions of our future life ; we know not what it is to 
 pass from this state of being to another ; but before us 
 in that dark passage has gone the Man of Nazareth, and 
 the light of his footsteps lingers in the path. Where he, 
 our Brother in his humanity, our Redeemer in his divine 
 nature, has gone, let us not fear to follow. He who or- 
 dereth all aright will uphold with his own great arm the 
 frail spirit when its incarnation is ended ; and it may be, 
 that, in language which I have elsewhere used, 
 
342 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 when Time s veil shall fall asunder, 
 
 The soul may know 
 No fearful change nor sudden wonder, 
 Nor sink the weight of mystery under, 
 But with the upward rise and with the vastness grow. 
 
 And all we shrink from now may seem 
 
 No new revealing ; 
 Familiar as our childhood s stream, 
 Or pleasant memory of a dream, 
 The loved and cherished past upon the new life stealing. 
 
 Serene and mild the untried light 
 
 May have its dawning ; 
 As meet in summer s northern night 
 The evening gray and dawning white, 
 The sunset hues of Time blend with the soul s new morning. 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 
 
 " Here s to budgets, packs, and wallets ; 
 Here s to all the wandering train." Burns. 
 
 I CONFESS it, I am keenly sensitive to "skyey influ 
 ences." I profess no indifference to the movements of 
 that capricious old gentleman known as the clerk of the 
 weather. I cannot conceal my interest in the behavior 
 of that patriarchal bird whose wooden similitude gyrates 
 on the church spire. Winter proper is well enough. 
 Let the thermometer go to zero if it will ; so much the 
 better, if thereby the very winds are frozen and unable 
 to flap their stiff wings. Sounds of bells in the keen air, 
 clear, musical, heart-inspiring ; quick tripping of fair 
 moccasoned feet on glittering ice pavements ; bright eyes 
 glancing above the uplifted muff like a sultana s behind 
 the folds of her yashmack ; schoolboys coasting down 
 street like mad Greenlanders ; the cold brilliance of 
 oblique sunbeams flashing back from wide surfaces of glit 
 tering snow or blazing upon ice jewelry of tree and roof. 
 There is nothing in all this to complain of. A storm of 
 
 (343) 
 
344 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 summer has its redeeming sublimities its slow, up 
 heaving mountains of cloud glooming in the western 
 horizon like new-created volcanoes, veined with fire, shat 
 tered by exploding thunders. Even the wild gales of 
 the equinox have their varieties sounds of wind-shaken 
 woods and waters, creak and clatter of sign and casement, 
 hurricane puffs and down-rushing rainspouts. But this 
 dull, dark autumn day of thaw and rain, when the very 
 clouds seem too spiritless and languid to storm outright 
 or take themselves out of the way of fair weather ; wet 
 beneath and above, reminding one of that rayless atmos 
 phere of Dante s Third Circle, where the infernal Pries- 
 nitz administers his hydropathic torment 
 
 "A heavy, cursed, and relentless drench 
 The land it soaks is putrid ; " 
 
 or rather, as every thing, animate and inanimate, is seeth 
 ing in warm mist, suggesting the idea that Nature, grown 
 old and rheumatic, is trying the efficacy of a Thompsonian 
 steam box on a grand scale ; no sounds save the heavy 
 plash of muddy feet on the pavements ; the monotonous, 
 melancholy drip from trees and roofs; the distressful 
 gurgling of water ducts, swallowing the dirty amalgam of 
 the gutters ; a dim, leaden-colored horizon of only a few 
 yards in diameter, shutting down about one, beyond which 
 nothing is visible save in faint line or dark projection ; the 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 34J 
 
 ghost of a church spire or the eidolon of a chimney pot. 
 He who can extract pleasurable emotions from the alem 
 bic of such a day has a trick of alchemy with which I 
 am wholly unacquainted. 
 
 Hark ! a rap at niy door. Welcome any body just 
 now. One gains nothing by attempting to shut out the 
 sprites of the weather. They come in at the keyhole ; 
 they peer through the dripping panes; they insinuate 
 themselves through the crevices of the casement, or plump 
 down chimney astride of the raindrops. 
 
 I rise and throw open the door. A tall, shambling, 
 loose-jointed figure ; a pinched, shrewd face, sunbrown 
 and wind dried ; small, quick-winking black eyes. There 
 he stands, the water dripping from his pulpy hat and 
 ragged elbows. 
 
 I speak to him ; but he returns no answer. With a 
 dumb show of misery quite touching he hands me a 
 soiled piece of parchment, whereon I read what purports 
 to be a melancholy account of shipwreck and disaster, to 
 the particular detriment, loss, and damnification of one 
 Pietro Frugoni, who is, in consequence, sorely in want 
 of the alms of all charitable Christian persons, and who 
 is, in short, the bearer of this veracious document, duly 
 certified and indorsed by an Italian consul in one of our 
 Atlantic cities, of a high-sounding, but to Yankee organs 
 unpronounceable, name. * 
 
346 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Here commences a struggle. Every man, the Ma 
 hometans tell us, has two attendant angels the good one 
 on his right shoulder, the bad on his left. " Give/ says 
 Benevolence, as with some difficulty I fish up a small 
 coin from the depths of my pocket. " Not a cent," says 
 selfish Prudence ; and I drop it from my fingers. " Think," 
 says the good angel, " of the poor" stranger in a strange 
 land, just escaped from the terrors of the sea storm, in 
 which his little property has perished, thrown half naked 
 and helpless on our shores, ignorant of our language, and 
 unable to find employment suited to his capacity." "A 
 vile impostor ! " replies the left-hand sentinel. " His paper, 
 purchased from one of those ready writers in New York 
 who manufacture beggar credentials at the low price of 
 one dollar per copy, with earthquakes, fires, or ship 
 wrecks, to suit customers." 
 
 Amidst this confusion of tongues I take another survey 
 of my visitant. Ha! a light dawns upon me. That 
 shrewd, old face, with its sharp, winking eyes, is no 
 stranger to me. Pietro Frugoni, I have seen thee be 
 fore. Si, signer, that face of thine has looked at me 
 over a dirty white neckcloth, with the corners of that 
 cunning mouth drawn downwards, and those small eyes 
 turned up in sanctimonious gravity, while thou wast offer 
 ing to a crowd of half-grown boys an extemporaneous 
 exhortation in the capacity of a travelling preacher. 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 347 
 
 Have I not seen it peering out from under a blanket, as 
 that of a poor Penobscot Indian, who had lost the use of 
 his hands while trapping on the Madawaska? Is it not 
 the face of the forlorn father of six small children, whom 
 the "marcury doctors" had "pisened" and crippled? 
 Did it not belong to that down-east unfortunate who had 
 been out to the " Genesee country " and got the " fevern- 
 nager," and whose hand shook so pitifully when held out 
 to receive my poor gift ? The sarne ; under all disguises 
 Stephen Leathers, of Barrington him, and none 
 other! Let me conjure him into his own likeness: 
 " Well, Stephen, what news from old Barrington ? " 
 "O, well I thought I knew ye," he answers, not the 
 least disconcerted. " How do you do ? and how s your 
 folks ? All well, I hope. I took this ere paper, you see, 
 to help a poor furriner, who couldn t make himself under 
 stood any more than a wild goose. I thought I d just 
 start him for ard a little. It seemed a marcy to do it." 
 
 Well and shiftily answered, thou ragged Proteus. One 
 cannot be angry with such a fellow. I will just inquire 
 into the present state of his gospel mission and about the 
 condition of his tribe on the Penobscot ; and it may be 
 not amiss to congratulate him on the success of the steam 
 doctors in sweating the " pisen " of the regular faculty out 
 of him. But he evidently has no wish to enter into idle 
 conversation. Intent upon his benevolent errand, he is 
 
348 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 already clattering down stairs. Involuntarily I glance out 
 of the window just in season to catch a single glimpse of 
 him ere he is swallowed up in the mist. 
 
 He has gone ; and, knave as he is, I can hardly help 
 exclaiming, " Luck go with him ! " He has broken in 
 upon the sombre train of my thoughts and called up be 
 fore me pleasant and grateful recollections. The old 
 farm house nestling in its valley; hills stretching off to 
 the south and green meadows to the east; the small 
 stream which came noisily down its ravine, washing the 
 old garden wall and softly lapping on fallen stones and 
 mossy roots of beeches and hemlocks ; the tall sentinel 
 poplars at the gateway; the oak forest, sweeping un 
 broken to the northern horizon ; the grass grown car 
 riage path, with its rude and crazy bridge, the dear 
 old landscape of my boyhood lies outstretched before me 
 like a daguerreotype from that picture within which I 
 have borne with me in all my wanderings. I am a boy 
 again, once more conscious of the feeling, half terror, 
 half exultation, with which I used to announce the ap 
 proach of this very vagabond and his " kindred after 
 the flesh." 
 
 The advent of wandering beggars, or " old stragglers," 
 as we were wont to call them, was an event of no ordinary 
 interest in the generally monotonous quietude of our farm 
 life. Many of them were well known ; they had their 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 349 
 
 periodical revolutions and transits ; we could calculate 
 them like eclipses or new moons. Some were sturdy 
 knaves, fat and saucy ; and, whenever they ascertained 
 that the "men folks" were absent, would order provisions 
 and cider like men who expected to pay for it, seating 
 themselves at the hearth or table with the air of Falstaff 
 " Shall I not take mine ease in mine own inn ? " Others, 
 poor, pale, patient, like Sterne s monk, came creeping up 
 to the door, hat in hand, standing there in their gray 
 wretchedness with a look of heartbreak and forlornness 
 which was never without its effect on our juvenile sen 
 sibilities. At times, however, we experienced a slight 
 revulsion of feeling when even these humblest children 
 of sorrow somewhat petulantly rejected our proffered 
 bread and cheese, and demanded instead a glass of cider. 
 Whatever the temperance society might in such cases 
 have done, it was not in our hearts to refuse the poor 
 creatures a draught of their favorite beverage ; and wasn t 
 it a satisfaction to see their sad, melancholy faces light 
 up as we handed them the full pitcher, and, on receiving 
 it back empty from their brown, wrinkled hands, to hear 
 them, half breathless from their long, delicious draught, 
 thanking us for the favor, as " dear, good children " ! Not 
 unfrequently these wandering tests of our benevolence 
 made their appearance in interesting groups of man, wo 
 man, and child, picturesque in their squalidness, and man- 
 
350 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 ifesting a maudlin affection which would have done honor 
 to the revellers at Poosie-Nansie s, immortal in the can 
 tata of Burns. I remember some who were evidently 
 the victims of monomania haunted and hunted by some 
 dark thought possessed by a fixed idea. One, a black- 
 eyed, wild-haired woman, with a whole tragedy of sin, 
 shame., and suffering written in her countenance, used 
 often to visit us, warm herself by our winter fire, and 
 supply herself with a stock of cakes and cold meat; but 
 was never known to answer a question or to ask one. 
 She never smiled ; the cold, stony look of her eye never 
 changed ; a silent, impassive face, frozen rigid by some 
 great wrong or sin. We used to look with awe upon the 
 "still woman," and think of the demoniac of Scripture 
 who had a "dumb spirit." 
 
 One I think I see him now, grim, gaunt, and 
 ghastly, working his slow way up to our door used to 
 gather herbs by the wayside and call himself doctor. 
 He was bearded like a he goat and used to counterfeit 
 lameness, yet, when he supposed himself alone, would 
 travel on lustily as if walking for a wager. At length, as 
 if in punishment of his deceit, he met with an accident in 
 his rambles and became lame in earnest, hobbling ever 
 after with difficulty on his gnarled crutches. Another 
 used to go stooping, like Bunyan s pilgrim, under a pack 
 made of an old bed sacking, stuffed out into most plethoric 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 351 
 
 dimensions, tottering on a pair of small, meagre legs, and 
 peering out with his wild, hairy face from under his 
 burden like a big-bodied spider. That "man with the 
 pack" always inspired me with awe and reverence. 
 Huge, almost sublime, in its tense rotundity, the father 
 of all packs, never laid aside and never opened, what 
 might there not be within it? With what flesh-creeping 
 curiosity I used to walk round about it at a safe distance, 
 half expecting to see its striped covering stirred by the 
 motions of a mysterious life, or that some evil monster 
 would leap out of it, like robbers from Ali Baba s jars or 
 armed men from the Trojan horse ! 
 
 There was another class of peripatetic philosophers 
 half peddler, half mendicant who were in the habit of 
 visiting us. One we recollect, a lame, unshaven, sinister- 
 eyed, unwholesome fellow, with his basket of old news 
 papers and pamphlets, and his tattered blue umbrella, 
 serving rather as a walking staff than as a protection from 
 the rain. He told us on one occasion, in answer to our 
 inquiring into the cause of his lameness, that when a young 
 man he was employed on the farm of the chief magistrate 
 of a neighboring state ; where, as his ill luck would have it, 
 the governor s handsome daughter fell in love with him. 
 He was caught one day in the young lady s room by her 
 father; whereupon the irascible old gentleman pitched him 
 unceremoniously out of the window, laming him for life, on 
 
352 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 the brick pavement below, like Vulcan on the rocks of 
 Lemnos. As for the lady, he assured us " she took on 
 dreadfully about it." " Did she die ? " we inquired anx 
 iously. There was a cumiing twinkle in the old rogue s 
 eye as he responded, " Well, no, she didn t. She got 
 married." 
 
 Twice a year, usually in the spring and autumn, we 
 were honored with a call from Jonathan Plummer, maker 
 of verses, peddler and poet, physician and parson, a Yan 
 kee troubadour, first and last minstrel of the valley of 
 the Merrimac, encircled, to my wondering young eyes, 
 with the very nimbus of immortality. He brought with 
 him pins, needles, tape, and cotton thread for my mother ; 
 jackknives, razors, and soap for my father ; and verses of 
 his own composing, coarsely printed and illustrated with 
 rude woodcuts, for the delectation of the younger branches 
 of the family. No lovesick youth could drown himself, 
 no deserted maiden bewail the moon, no rogue mount the 
 gallows without fitting memorial in Plummer s verses. 
 Earthquakes, fires, fevers, and shipwrecks he regarded as 
 personal favors from Providence, furnishing the raw ma 
 terial of song and ballad. Welcome to us in our country 
 seclusion as Autolycus to the clown in Winter s Tale, we 
 listened with infinite satisfaction to his readings of his own 
 verses, or to his ready improvisation upon some domestic 
 incident or topic suggested by his auditors. When once 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 353 
 
 fairly over the difficulties at the outset of a new subject 
 his rhymes flowed freely, " as if he had eaten ballads and 
 all men s ears grew to his tunes." His productions an 
 swered, as nearly as I can remember, to Shakspeare s 
 description of a proper ballad " doleful matter merrily 
 set down, or a very pleasant theme sung lamentably. * 
 He was scrupulously conscientious, devout, inclined to 
 theological disquisitions, and withal mighty in Scripture. 
 He was thoroughly independent ; flattered nobody, cared 
 for nobody, trusted nobody. When invited to sit down 
 at our dinner table, he invariably took the precaution to 
 place his basket of valuables between his legs for safe 
 keeping. " Never mind thy basket, Jonathan," said my 
 father ; " we sha n t steal thy verses." " I m not sure 
 of that," returned the suspicious guest. "It is written, 
 Trust ye not in any brother. " 
 
 Thou too, Parson B., with thy pale student s brow 
 and rubicund nose, with thy rusty and tattered black 
 coat overswept by white, flowing locks, with thy profes 
 sional white neckcloth scrupulously preserved when even 
 a shirt to thy back was problematical, art by no means 
 to be overlooked in the muster roll of vagrant gentlemen 
 possessing the entree of our farm house. Well do we re 
 member with what grave and dignified courtesy he used 
 to step over its threshold, saluting its inmates with the 
 same air of gracious condescension, and patronage with 
 23 
 
354 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 which in better days he had delighted the hearts of his 
 parishioners. Poor old man ! He had once been the 
 admired and almost worshipped minister of the largest 
 Church in the town where he afterwards found support in 
 the winter season as a pauper. He had early fallen into 
 intemperate habits ; and at the age of threescore and ten, 
 when I remember him, he was only sober when he lacked 
 the means of being otherwise. Drunk or sober, however, 
 Le never altogether forgot the proprieties of his profes 
 sion ; he was always grave, decorous, and gentlemanly ; 
 he held fast the form of sound words, and the weakness 
 of the flesh abated nothing of the rigor of his stringent 
 theology. He had been a favorite pupil of the learned 
 and astute Emmons, and was to the last a sturdy defender 
 of the peculiar dogmas of his school. The last time we 
 saw him he was holding a meeting in our district school 
 house, with a vagabond peddler for deacon and travelling 
 companion. The tie which united the ill-assorted couple 
 was doubtless the same which endeared Tarn O Shanter 
 to the souter : 
 
 " They had been fou for weeks thegither." 
 
 He took for his text the first seven verses of the con 
 cluding chapter of Ecclesiastes, furnishing in himself 
 its fitting illustration. The evil days had come ; the 
 keepers of the house trembled ; the windows of life were 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 355 
 
 darkened. A few months later the silver cord was loo 
 sened, the golden bowl was broken, and between the poor 
 old man and the temptations which beset him fell the 
 thick curtains of the grave. 
 
 One day we had a call from a " pawky auld carle " of 
 a wandering Scotchman. To him I owe my first intro 
 duction to the songs of Burns. After eating his bread 
 and cheese and drinking his mug of cider he gave us 
 Bonnie Doon, Highland Mary, and Auld Lang Syne. 
 He had a rich, full voice, and entered heartily into the 
 spirit of his lyrics. I have since listened to the same 
 melodies from the lips of Dempster, (than whom the 
 Scottish bard has had no sweeter or truer interpreter ;) 
 but the skilful performance of the artist lacked the novel 
 charm of the gaberlunzie s singing in the old farm-house 
 kitchen. Another wanderer made us acquainted with the 
 humorous old ballad of "Our gude man cam hame at. 
 e en." He applied for supper and lodging, and the next 
 morning was set at work splitting stones in the pas 
 ture. While thus engaged the village doctor came riding 
 along the highway on his fine, spirited horse, and stopped 
 to talk with my father. The fellow eyed the animal at 
 tentively, as if familiar with all his good points, and 
 hummed over a stanza of the old poem : 
 
 " Our gude man cam hame at e en. 
 And hame cam he ; 
 
356 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 And there he saw a saddle horse 
 
 Where nae horse should be. 
 How cam this horse here ? 
 
 How can it be ? 
 How cam this horse here 
 
 Without the leave of me ? 
 1 A horse ? quo she. 
 Ay, a horse, quo he. 
 Ye auld fool, ye blind fool, 
 
 And blinder might ye be, 
 Tis naething but a milking cow 
 
 My mamma sent to me. 
 A milch cow ? quo he. 
 * Ay, a milch cow, quo she. 
 Weel, far hae I ridden, 
 
 And muckle hae I seen ; 
 But milking cows wi* saddles on 
 
 Saw I never nane. " 
 
 That very night the rascal decamped, taking with 
 him the doctor s horse, and was never after heard of. 
 
 Often, in the gray of the morning, we used to see one 
 or more " gaberlunzie men," pack on shoulder and staff 
 in hand, emerging from the barn or other out buildings 
 where they had passed the night. I was once sent to the 
 barn to fodder the cattle late in the evening, and, climb 
 ing into the mow to pitch down hay for that purpose, I 
 was startled by the sudden apparition of a man rising up 
 before me, just discernible in the dim moonlight streaming 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 357 
 
 through the seams of the boards. I made a rapid re 
 treat down the ladder ; and was only reassured by hear 
 ing the object of my terror calling after me, and recog 
 nizing his voice as that of a harmless old pilgrim whom 
 I had known before. Our farm house was situated in a 
 lonely valley, half surrounded with woods, with no neigh 
 bors in sight. One dark, cloudy night, when our parents 
 chanced to be absent, we were sitting with our aged 
 grandmother in the fading light of the kitchen fire, work 
 ing ourselves into a very satisfactory state of excitement 
 and terror by recounting to each other all the dismal 
 stories we could remember of ghosts, witches, haunted 
 houses, and robbers, when we were suddenly startled by 
 a loud rap at the door. A stripling of fourteen, I was 
 very naturally regarded as the head of the household ; so, 
 with many misgivings, I advanced to the door, which I 
 slowly opened, holding the candle tremulously above my 
 head and peering out into the darkness. The feeble glim 
 mer played upon the apparition of a gigantic horseman, 
 mounted on a steed of a size worthy of such a rider 
 colossal, motionless, like images cut out of the solid night. 
 The strange visitant gruffly saluted me ; and, after making 
 several ineffectual efforts to urge his horse in at the door, 
 dismounted and followed me into the room, evidently en 
 joying the terror which his huge presence excited. An 
 nouncing himself as the great Indian doctor, he drew 
 
358 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 himself up before the fire, stretched his arms, clinched 
 his fists, struck his broad chest, and invited our attention 
 to what he called his " mortal frame." He demanded in 
 succession all kinds of intoxicating liquors ; and, on being 
 assured that we had none to give him, he grew angry, 
 threatened to swallow my younger brother alive, and, 
 seizing me by the hair of my head as the angel did the 
 prophet at Babylon, led me about from room to room. 
 After an ineffectual search, in the course of which he mis 
 took a jug of oil for one of brandy, and, contrary to my 
 explanations and remonstrances, insisted upon swallowing 
 a portion of its contents, he released me, fell to crying and 
 sobbing, and confessed that he was so drunk already that 
 his horse was ashamed of him. After bemoaning and 
 pitying himself to his satisfaction he wiped his eyes, and sat 
 down by the side of my grandmother, giving her to under 
 stand that he was very much pleased with her appearance ; 
 adding, that, if agreeable to her, he should like the privi 
 lege of paying his addresses to her. While vainly en 
 deavoring to make the excellent old lady comprehend his 
 very flattering proposition he was interrupted by the 
 return of my father, who, at once understanding the mat 
 ter, turned him out of doors without ceremony. 
 
 On one occasion, a few years ago, on my return from 
 the field at evening, I was told that a foreigner had asked 
 for lodgings during the night, but that, influenced by his 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 359 
 
 dark, repulsive appearance, my mother had very reluc 
 tantly refused his request. I found her by no means 
 satisfied with her decision. " What if a son of mine was 
 in a strange land ? " she inquired, self-reproachfully. 
 Greatly to her relief, I volunteered to go in pursuit of the 
 wanderer, and, taking a crosspath over the fields, soon 
 overtook him. He had just been rejected at the house of 
 our nearest neighbor, and was standing in a state of 
 dubious perplexity in the street. His looks quite justified 
 my mother s suspicions. He was an olive-complexioned, 
 black-bearded Italian, with an eye like a live coal, such 
 a face as perchance looks out on the traveller in the 
 passes of the Abruzzi one of those bandit visages which 
 Salvator has painted. With some difficulty I gave him 
 to understand my errand, when he overwhelmed me with 
 thanks and joyfully followed me back. He took his seat 
 with us at the supper table ; and, when we were all gath 
 ered around the hearth that cold autumnal evening, he 
 told us, partly by words and partly by gestures, the story 
 of his life and misfortunes, amused us with descriptions of 
 the grape gatherings and festivals of his sunny clime, 
 edified my mother with a recipe for making bread of 
 chestnuts ; and in the morning, when, after breakfast, his 
 dark, sullen face lighted up and his fierce eye moistened 
 with grateful emotion as in his own silvery Tuscan accent 
 he poured out his thanks, we marvelled at the fears which 
 
360 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 had so nearly closed our door against him ; and, as he 
 departed, we all felt that he had left with us the blessing 
 of the poor. 
 
 It was not often that, as in the above instance, my 
 mother s prudence got the better of her charity. The 
 regular "old stragglers" regarded her as an unfailing 
 friend; and the sight of her plain cap was to them an 
 assurance of forthcoming creature comforts. There was 
 indeed a tribe of lazy strollers, having their place of 
 rendezvous in the town of Barrington, New Hampshire, 
 whose low vices had placed them beyond even the pale of 
 her benevolence. They were not unconscious of their evil 
 reputation ; and experience had taught them the necessity 
 of concealing, under well-contrived disguises, their true 
 character. They came to us in all shapes and with all 
 appearances save the true one, with most miserable stories 
 of mishap and sickness and all "the ills which flesh is 
 heir to." It was particularly vexatious to discover, when 
 too late, that our sympathies and charities had been 
 expended upon such graceless vagabonds as the " Bar 
 rington beggars." An old withered hag, known by the 
 appellation of Hopping Pat, the wise woman of her 
 tribe, was in the habit of visiting us, with her hopeful 
 grandson, who had " a gift for preaching " as well as for 
 many other things not exactly compatible with holy 
 orders. He sometimes brought with him a tame crow, a 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 361 
 
 shrewd, knavish-looking bird, who, when in the humor for 
 it, could talk like Barnaby Rudge s raven. He used to 
 say he could " do nothin at exhortin without a white 
 handkercher on his neck and money in his pocket " a 
 fact going far to confirm the opinions of the Bishop of 
 Exeter and the Puseyites generally, that there can be no 
 priest without tithes and surplice. 
 
 These people have for several generations lived dis 
 tinct from the great mass of the community, like the 
 gypsies of Europe, whom in many respects they closely 
 resemble. They have the same settled aversion to labor 
 and the same disposition to avail themselves of the fruits 
 of the industry of others. They love a wild, out-of-door 
 life, sing songs, tell fortunes, and have an instinctive 
 hatred of "missionaries and cold water." It has been 
 said I know not upon what grounds that their an 
 cestors were indeed a veritable importation of English 
 gypsyhood ; but if so, they have undoubtedly lost a good 
 deal of the picturesque charm of its unhoused and free 
 condition. I very much fear that my friend Mary Rus 
 sell Mitford, sweetest of England s rural painters, 
 who has a poet s eye for the fine points in gypsy char 
 acter, would scarcely allow their claims to fraternity with 
 her own vagrant friends, whose camp fires welcomed her 
 to her new home at Swallowfield. 
 
 " The proper study of mankind is man ; " and, accord- 
 
3G2 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 ing to my view, no phase of our common humanity is 
 altogether unworthy of investigation. Acting upon this 
 belief two or three summers ago, when making, in com 
 pany with my sister, a little excursion into the hill country 
 of New Hampshire, I turned my horse s head towards 
 Barrington for the purpose of seeing these semi-civilized 
 strollers in their own home, and returning, once for all, 
 their numerous visits. Taking leave of our hospitable- 
 cousins in old Lee with about as much solemnity as we 
 may suppose Major Laing parted with his friends when 
 he set out in search of desert-girdled Timbuctoo, we drove 
 several miles over a rough road, passed the Devil s 
 Den unmolested, crossed a fretful little streamlet noisily 
 working its way into a valley, where it turned a lonely, 
 half-ruinous mill, and climbing a steep hill beyond, saw 
 before us a wide sandy level, skirted on the west and north 
 by low, scraggy hills, and dotted here and there with 
 dwarf pitch pines. In the centre of this desolate region 
 were some twenty or thirty small dwellings, grouped to 
 gether as irregularly as a Hottentot kraal. Unfenced, 
 unguarded, open to all comers and goers, stood that city 
 of the beggars no wall or paling between the ragged 
 cabins to remind one of the jealous distinctions of prop 
 erty. The great idea of its founders seemed visible in its 
 unappropriated freedom. Was not the whole round world 
 their own ? and should they haggle about boundaries and 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 363 
 
 title deeds ? For them, on distant plains, ripened golden 
 harvests ; for them, in far-off workshops, busy hands were 
 toiling ; for them, if they had but the grace to note it, the 
 broad earth put on her garniture of beauty, and over 
 them hung the silent mystery of heaven and its stars. 
 That comfortable philosophy which modern transcen 
 dentalism has but dimly shadowed forth that poetic 
 agrarianism, which gives all to each and each to all is 
 the real life of this city of unwork. To each of its dingy 
 dwellers might be not unaptly applied the language of 
 one who, I trust, will pardon me for quoting her beautiful 
 poem in this connection : 
 
 " Other hands may grasp the field or forest, 
 Proud proprietors in pomp may shine ; 
 Thou art wealthier all the world is thine." 
 
 But look ! the clouds are breaking. " Fair weather 
 cometh out of the north." The wind has blown away the 
 mists ; on the gilded spire of John Street glimmers a beam 
 of sunshine ; and there is the sky again, hard, blue, and 
 cold in its eternal purity, not a whit the worse for the 
 storm. In the beautiful present the past is no longer 
 needed. Reverently and gratefully let its volume be laid 
 aside ; and when again the shadows of the outward world 
 fall upon the spirit, may I not lack a good angel to remind 
 me of its solace, even if he comes in the shape of a Bar- 
 rington beggar. 
 
THE WORLD S END. 
 
 " Our Father Time is weak and gray, 
 Awaiting for the better day ; 
 See how idiot-like he stands, 
 Fumbling his old palsied hands ! " 
 
 Shelley s Masque of Anarchy. 
 
 " STAGE ready, gentlemen ! Stage for camp ground, 
 Deny ! Second Advent camp meeting ! " 
 
 Accustomed as I begin to feel to the ordinary sights 
 and sounds of this busy city, I was, I confess, somewhat 
 startled by this business-like annunciation from the driver 
 of a stage, who stood beside his horses swinging his whip 
 with some degree of impatience : " Seventy-five cents to 
 the Second Advent camp ground !" 
 
 The stage was soon filled ; the driver cracked his whip 
 and went rattling down the street. 
 
 The Second Advent the coming of our Lord in 
 person upon this earth, with signs, and wonders, and 
 terrible judgments the heavens rolling together as a 
 scroll, the elements melting with fervent heat ! The 
 
 (364) 
 
THE AVORLD S END. 365 
 
 mighty consummation of all things at hand, with its 
 destruction and its triumphs, sad waitings of the lost and 
 rejoicing songs of the glorified ! From this over-swarm 
 ing hive of industry from these crowded treadmills of 
 gain here were men and women going out in solemn 
 earnestness to prepare for the dread moment which they 
 verily suppose is only a few months distant to lift up 
 their warning voices in the midst of scoffers and doubters, 
 and to cry aloud to blind priests and careless churches, 
 " BEHOLD, THE BRIDEGROOM COMETH ! " 
 
 It was one of the most lovely mornings of this loveliest 
 season of the year ; a warm, soft atmosphere ; clear 
 sunshine falling on the city spires and roofs; the hills 
 of Dracut quiet and green in the distance, with their 
 white farm houses and scattered trees; around me the 
 continual tread of footsteps hurrying to the toils of the 
 day; merchants spreading out their wares for the eyes 
 of purchasers ; sounds of hammers, the sljarp clink of 
 trowels, the murmur of the great manufactories subdued 
 by distance. How was it possible, in the midst of so 
 much life, in that sunrise light, and in view of all abound 
 ing beauty, that the idea of the death of Nature the 
 baptism of the world in fire could take such a practical 
 shape as this ? Yet here were sober, intelligent men, 
 gentle and pious women, who, verily believing the end to 
 be close at hand, had left their counting rooms, and work- 
 
366 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 shops, and household cares to publish the great tidings, 
 and to startle, if possible, a careless and unbelieving gen 
 eration into preparation for the day of the Lord and for 
 that blessed millennium the restored paradise when, 
 renovated and renewed by its fire purgation, the earth 
 shall become as of old the garden of the Lord, and the 
 saints alone shall inherit it. 
 
 Very serious and impressive is the fact that this idea 
 of a radical change in our planet is not only predicted in 
 the Scriptures, but that the Earth herself, in her primitive 
 rocks and varying formations, on which are lithographed 
 the history of successive convulsions, darkly prophesies of 
 others to come. The old poet prophets, all the world 
 over, have sung of a renovated world. A vision of it 
 haunted the contemplations of Plato. It is seen in the 
 half-inspired speculations of the old Indian mystics. The 
 Cumcean sibyl saw it in her trances. The apostles and 
 martyrs of our faith looked for it anxiously and hopefully. 
 Gray anchorites in the deserts, worn pilgrims to the holy 
 places of Jewish and Christian tradition, prayed for its 
 coming. It inspired the gorgeous visions of the early 
 fathers. In every age since the Christian era, from the 
 caves, and forests, and secluded " upper chambers " of the 
 times of the first missionaries of the cross, from the Gothic 
 temples of the middle ages, from the bleak mountain 
 gorges of the Alps, where the haunted heretics put up 
 
THE TVORLD S END. 367 
 
 their expostulation, "How long, Lord, how long?" 
 down to the present time, and from this Deny camp 
 ground, have been uttered the prophecy and the prayer 
 for its fulfilment. 
 
 How this great idea manifests itself in the lives of the 
 enthusiasts of the days of Cromwell ! Think of Sir 
 Henry Vane, cool, sagacious statesman as he was, waiting 
 with eagerness for the foreshadowings of the millennium, 
 and listening, even in the very council hall, for the blast 
 of the last trumpet ! Think of the Fifth Monarchy I 
 weary with waiting for the long-desired consummati 
 rushing out with drawn swords and loaded matchlocks 
 into the streets of London to establish at once the rule of 
 King Jesus ! Think of the wild enthusiasts at Munster, 
 verily imagining that the millennial reign had commenced 
 in their city ! Still later, think of Granville Sharpe, dili 
 gently laboring in his vocation of philanthropy, laying 
 plans for the slow but beneficent amelioration of the con 
 dition of his country and the world, and at the same time 
 maintaining, with the zeal of Father Miller himself, that 
 the earth was just on the point of combustion, and that 
 the millennium would render all his benevolent schemes 
 of no sort of consequence ! 
 
 And, after all, is the idea itself a vain one ? Shall 
 to-morrow be as to-day? Shall the antagonism of good 
 and evil continue as heretofore forever? Is there no 
 
368 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 hope that this world-wide prophecy of the human soul, 
 uttered in all climes, in all times, shall yet be fulfilled ? 
 Who shall say it may not be true ? Nay, is not its truth 
 proved by its universality ? The hope of all earnest souls 
 must be realized. That which, through a distorted and 
 doubtful medium, shone even upon the martyr enthusiasts 
 of the French revolution, soft gleams of heaven s light 
 rising over the hell of man s passions and crimes, the 
 glorious ideal of Shelley, who, atheist as he was through 
 
 arly prejudice and defective education, saw the horizon 
 f the world s future kindling with the light of a better 
 day that hope and that faith which constitute, as it 
 were, the world s life, and without which it would be dark 
 and dead, cannot be in vain. 
 
 I do not, I confess, sympathize with my Second Advent 
 friends in their lamentable depreciation of Mother Earth 
 even in her present state. I find it extremely difficult to 
 comprehend how it is that this goodly, green, sunlit home 
 of ours is resting under a curse. It really does not seem 
 to me to be altogether like the roll which the angel bore 
 in the prophet s vision, " written within and without with 
 mourning, lamentation, and woe." September sunsets, 
 changing forests, moonrise and cloud, sun and rain, I, 
 for one, am contented with them. They fill my heart 
 with a sense of beauty. I see in them the perfect work 
 of infinite love as well as wisdom. It may be that our 
 
THE WORLD S END. 369 
 
 Advent friends, however, coincide with the opinions of an 
 old writer on the prophecies, who considered the hills and 
 valleys of the earth s surface and its changes of seasons 
 as so many visible manifestations of God s curse, and 
 that in the millennium, as in the days of Adam s inno 
 cence, all these picturesque inequalities would be levelled 
 nicely away, and the flat surface laid handsomely down 
 to grass ! 
 
 As might be expected, the effect of this belief in the 
 speedy destruction of the world and the personal coming 
 of the Messiah, acting upon a class of uncultivated, and, 
 in some cases, gross minds, is not always in keeping with 
 the enlightened Christian s ideal of the better day. One 
 is shocked in reading some of the "hymns" of these 
 believers. Sensual images semi-Mahometan descrip 
 tions of the condition of the " saints " exultations over 
 the destruction of the " sinners " mingle with the beau 
 tiful and soothing promises of the prophets. There are 
 indeed occasionally to be found among the believers men 
 of refined and exalted spiritualism, who in their lives and 
 conversation remind one of Tennyson s Christian knight 
 errant in his yearning towards the hope set before 
 
 him : 
 
 " to me is given 
 
 Such hope I may not fear ; 
 I long to breathe the airs of heaven, 
 Which sometimes meet me here. 
 24 
 
370 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES.* 
 
 I muse on joys which cannot cease, 
 Pure spaces filled with living beams, 
 
 White lilies of eternal peace, 
 Whose odors haunt my dreams." 
 
 One of the most ludicrous examples of the sensual 
 phase of Millerism, the incongruous blending of the 
 sublime with the ridiculous, was mentioned to me not long 
 since. A fashionable young woman in the western part 
 of this state became an enthusiastic believer in the doc 
 trine. On the day which had been designated as the 
 closing one of time she packed all her fine dresses and 
 toilet valuables in a large trunk, with long straps attached 
 to it, and, seating herself upon it, buckled the straps over 
 her shoulders, patiently awaiting the crisis shrewdly 
 calculating that, as she must herself go upwards, her 
 goods and chattels would of necessity follow. 
 
 Three or four years ago, on my way eastward, I spent 
 an hour or two at a camp ground of the Second Advent 
 in East Kingston. The spot was well chosen. A tall 
 growth of pine and hemlock threw its melancholy shadow 
 over the multitude, who were arranged upon rough seats 
 of boards and logs. Several hundred perhaps a thou 
 sand people were present, and more were rapidly 
 coming. Drawn about in a circle, forming a background 
 of snowy whiteness to the dark masses of men and foli 
 age, were the white tents, and back of them the provision 
 
THE WORLD S END. 371 
 
 stalls and cookshops. When I reached the ground, a 
 hymn, the words of which I could not distinguish, was 
 pealing through the dim aisles of the forest. I could 
 readily perceive that it had its effect upon the multitude 
 before me, kindling to higher intensity their already 
 excited enthusiasm. The preachers were placed in a 
 rude pulpit of rough boards, carpeted only by the dead 
 forest leaves and flowers, and tasselled, not with silk and 
 velvet, but with the green boughs of the sombre hemlocks 
 around it. One of them followed the music in an earnest 
 exhortation on the duty of preparing for the great event. 
 Occasionally he was really eloquent, and his description 
 of the lasfc day had the ghastly distinctness .of Anelli s 
 painting of the End of the World. ! ?ajj * 
 
 Suspended from the front of the rude pulpit Tvere two 
 broad sheets of canvas, upon one of which was the figure 
 of a man, the head of gold, the breast and arms of silver, 
 the belly of brass, the legs of iron, aad feet of clay the 
 dream of Nebuchadnezzar. On the other were depicted 
 the wonders of the Apocalyptic vision the beasts, the 
 dragons, the scarlet woman seen by the seer of Patmos, 
 Oriental types, figures, and mystic symbols, translated 
 into staring Yankee realities, and exhibited like the 
 beasts of a travelling menagerie. One horrible image, 
 with its hideous heads and scaly caudal extremity, re- 
 
372 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 minded me of the tremendous line of Milton, who, in 
 speaking of the same evil dragon, describes him as 
 
 " Swindging the scaly horrors of his folded tail." 
 
 To an imaginative mind the scene was full of novel 
 interest. The white circle of tents ; the dim wood 
 arches ; the upturned, earnest faces ; the loud voices of 
 the speakers, burdened with the awful symbolic language 
 of the Bible; the smoke from the fires rising like 
 incense, carried me back to those days of primitive 
 worship which tradition faintly whispers of, when on hill 
 tops and in the shade of old woods Religion had her first 
 altars, with every man for her priest and the whole uni 
 verse for her temple. 
 
 Wisely and truthfully has Dr. C banning spoken of 
 this doctrine of the Second Advent in his memorable 
 discourse in Berkshire a little before his death: 
 
 "There are some among us at the present moment 
 who are waiting for the speedy coming of Christ. They 
 expect, before another year closes, to see him in the 
 clouds, to hear his voice, to stand before his judgment 
 seat. These illusions spring from misinterpretation of 
 Scripture language. Christ, in the New Testament is said 
 to come whenever his religion breaks out in new glory 
 or gains new triumphs. He came in the Holy Spirit in 
 
THE WORLD S END. 373 
 
 the day of Pentecost. He came in the destruction of 
 Jerusalem, which, by subverting the old ritual law and 
 breaking the power of the worst enemies of his religion, 
 insured to it new victories. He came in the reformation 
 of the church. He came on this day four years ago, 
 when, through his religion, eight hundred thousand men 
 were raised from the lowest degradation to the rights, 
 and dignity, and fellowship of men. Christ s outward 
 appearance is of little moment compared with the brighter 
 manifestation of his spirit. The Christian, whose inward 
 eyes and ears are touched by God, discerns the coming 
 of Christ, hears the sound of his chariot wheels and the 
 voice of his trumpet, when no other perceives them. He 
 discerns the Savior s advent in the dawning of higher 
 truth on the world, in new aspirations of the church after 
 perfection, in the prostration of prejudice and error, in 
 brighter expressions of Christian love, in more enlightened 
 and intense consecration of the Christian to the cause of 
 humanity, freedom, and religion. Christ comes in the 
 conversion, the regeneration, the emancipation of the 
 world." 
 
 OF THK 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
SWEDENBOKG. 
 
 THERE are times when, looking only on the surface of 
 things, one is almost ready to regard Lowell as a sort of 
 sacred city of Mammon the Benares of gain ; its huge 
 mills, temples; its crowded dwellings, lodging-places of 
 disciples and "proselytes within the gate;" its ware 
 houses, stalls for the sale of relics. A very mean idol 
 -worship too, unrelieved by awe and reverence a selfish, 
 earthward-looking devotion to the " least-erected spirit 
 that fell from paradise." I grow weary of seeing man 
 and mechanism reduced to a common level, moved by the 
 same impulse, answering to the same bell call. A night 
 mare of materialism broods over all. I long at times to 
 hear a voice crying through the streets like that of one 
 of the old prophets proclaiming the great first truth that 
 the Lord alone is God. 
 
 Yet is there not another side to the picture? High 
 over sounding workshops spires glisten in the sun silent 
 fingers pointing heavenward. The workshops themselves 
 are instinct with other and subtler processes than cotton 
 
 (374) 
 
STVEDENBORG. 375 
 
 spinning or carpet weaving. Each human being who 
 watches beside jack or power loom feels more or less in 
 tensely that it is a solemn thing to live. Here are sin 
 and sorrow, yearnings for lost peace, outgushing gratitude 
 of forgiven spirits, hopes and fears, which stretch be 
 yond the horizon of time into eternity. Death is here. 
 The graveyard utters its warning. Over all bends the 
 eternal heaven in its silence and mystery. Nature, even 
 here, is mightier than Art, and God is above all. Under 
 neath the din of labor and the sounds of traffic, a voice, 
 felt rather than heard, reaches the heart, prompting the 
 same fearful questions which stirred the soul of the world s 
 oldest poet : "If a man die, shall he live again? " "Man 
 giveth up the ghost, and where is he?" Out of the 
 depths of burdened and weary hearts comes up the ago 
 nizing inquiry, " What shall I do to be saved ? " " Who 
 shall deliver me from the body of this death?" 
 
 As a matter of course, in a city like this, composed of 
 all classes of our many-sided population, a great variety 
 of religious sects have their representatives in Lowell. 
 The young city is dotted over with "steeple houses," 
 most of them of the Yankee order of architecture. The 
 Episcopalians have a house of worship on Merrimac 
 Street a pile of dark stone, with low Gothic doors and 
 arched windows. A plat of grass lies between it and the 
 dusty street ; and near it stands the dwelling house in- 
 
376 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 tended for the minister, built of the same material as the 
 church and surrounded by trees and shrubbery. The 
 attention of the stranger is also attracted by another con 
 secrated building on the hill slope of Belvidere one of 
 Irving s "shingle palaces," painted in imitation of stone 
 a great wooden sham, " whelked and horned " with pine 
 spires and turrets a sort of whittled representation of 
 the many-headed beast of the Apocalypse. 
 
 In addition to the established sects which have reared 
 their visible altars in the City of Spindles, there are many 
 who have not yet marked the boundaries or set up the 
 pillars and stretched out the curtains of their sectarian 
 tabernacles ; who, in halls and " upper chambers " and in 
 the solitude of their own homes, keep alive the spirit of 
 devotion, and, wrapping closely around them the mantles 
 of their order, maintain the integrity of its peculiarities in 
 the midst of an unbelieving generation. 
 
 Not long since, in company with a friend who is a regu 
 lar attendant, I visited the little meeting of the disciples 
 of Emanuel Swedenborg. Passing over Chapel Hill and 
 leaving the city behind us, we reached the stream which 
 winds through the beautiful woodlands at the Powder 
 Mills and mingles its waters with the Concord. The hall 
 in which the followers of the Gothland seer meet is small 
 and plain, with unpainted seats, like those of " the people 
 called Quakers," and looks out upon the still woods and 
 
SWEDENBORG. 377 
 
 that ts willowy stream which turns a mill." An organ of 
 small size, yet, as it seemed to me, vastly out of proportion 
 with the room, filled the place usually occupied by the 
 pulpit, which was here only a plain desk, placed modestly 
 by the side of it. The congregation have no regular 
 preacher; but the exercises of reading the Scriptures, 
 prayers, and selections from the Book of Worship were 
 conducted by one of the lay members. A manuscript 
 sermon, by a clergyman of the order in Boston, was read, 
 and apparently listened to with much interest. It was 
 well written and deeply imbued with the doctrines of the 
 church. I was impressed by the gravity and serious 
 earnestness of the little audience. There were here no 
 circumstances calculated to excite enthusiasm, nothing 
 of the pomp of religious rites and ceremonies ; only a 
 settled conviction of the truth of the doctrines of their 
 faith could have thus brought them together. I could 
 scarcely make the fact a reality, as I sat among them, that 
 here, in the midst of our bare and hard utilities, in the 
 very centre and heart of our mechanical civilization, were 
 devoted and undoubting believers in the mysterious and 
 wonderful revelations of the Swedish prophet revelations 
 which look through all external and outward manifesta 
 tions to inward realities ; which regard all objects in the 
 world of sense only as the types and symbols of the world 
 
378 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of spirit ; literally unmasking the universe and laying bare" 
 the profoundest mysteries of life. 
 
 The character and writings of Emanuel Swedenborg 
 constitute one of the puzzles and marvels of metaphysics 
 and psychology. A man remarkable for his practical 
 activities, an ardent scholar of the exact sciences, versed 
 in all the arcana of physics, a skilful and inventive mech 
 anician, he has evolved from the hard and gross mate 
 rialism of his studies a system of transcendent spiritualism. 
 From his aggregation of cold and apparently lifeless 
 practical facts beautiful and wonderful abstractions start 
 forth like blossoms on the rod of the Levite. A politician 
 and a courtier, a man of the world, a mathematician en 
 gaged in the soberest details of the science, he has given 
 to the world, in the simplest and most natural language, a 
 series of speculations upon the great mystery of being; 
 detailed, matter-of-fact narratives of revelations from the 
 spiritual world, which at once appall us by their bold 
 ness, and excite our wonder at their extraordinary method, 
 logical accuracy, and perfect consistency. These remark 
 able speculations the workings of a mind in which a 
 powerful imagination allied itself with superior reasoning 
 faculties, the marvellous current of whose thought ran 
 only in the diked and guarded channels of mathematical 
 demonstration he uniformly speaks of as " facts." His 
 
SWEDENBORG. 379 
 
 perceptions of abstractions were so intense that they seem 
 to have reached that point where thought became sensible 
 to sight as well as feeling. What he thought, that he 
 saw. 
 
 He relates his visions of the spiritual world as he 
 would the incidents of a walk round his own city of 
 Stockholm. One can almost see him in his "brown coat 
 and velvet breeches," lifting his " cocked hat " to an 
 angel, or keeping an unsavory spirit at arm s length with 
 that " goldheaded cane " which his London host describes 
 as his inseparable companion in walking. His graphic 
 descriptions have always an air of naturalness and proba 
 bility ; yet there is a minuteness of detail at times almost 
 bordering on the ludicrous. In his Memorable Relations 
 he manifests nothing of the imagination of Milton, over 
 looking the closed gates of paradise or following the 
 " pained fiend " in his flight through chaos ; nothing of 
 Dante s terrible imagery appalls us ; we are led on from 
 heaven to heaven very much as Defoe leads us after 
 his shipwrecked Crusoe. We can scarcely credit the fact 
 that we are not traversing our lower planet ; and the 
 angels seem vastly like our common acquaintances. We 
 seem to recognize the t; John Smiths," and " Mr. Browns," 
 and " the old familiar faces " of our mundane habitation. 
 The evil principle in Swedenborg s picture is, not the 
 colossal and massive horror of the Inferno, nor that stern 
 
380 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 wrestler with fate who darkens "the canvas of Paradise 
 Lost, but an aggregation of poor, confused spirits, seek 
 ing rest and finding none save in the unsavory atmosphere 
 of the "falses." These small fry of devils remind us 
 only of certain unfortunate fellows whom we have known, 
 who seem incapable of living in good and wholesome 
 society, and who are manifestly given over to believe a 
 lie. Thus it is, that the very "heavens " and " hells " of 
 the Swedish mystic seem to be "of the earth, earthy. 5 
 He brings the spiritual world into close analogy with the 
 material one. 
 
 In this hurried paper I have neither space nor leisure 
 to attempt an analysis of the great doctrines which under 
 lie the " revelations " of Swedenborg. His remarkably 
 suggestive books are becoming familiar to the reading and 
 reflecting portion of the community. They are not un 
 worthy of study ; but, in the language of another, I would 
 say, "Emulate Swedenborg in his exemplary life, his 
 learning, his virtues, his independent thought, his desire 
 for wisdom, his love of the good and true ; aim to be 
 his equal, his superior, in these things ; but call no man 
 your master." 
 
FIRST DAY IN LOWELL. 
 
 To a population like that of Lowell, the weekly respite 
 from monotonous in-door toil afforded by the first day of 
 the week is particularly grateful. Sabbath comes to the 
 weary and overworked operative emphatically as a day 
 of rest. It opens upon him somewhat as it did upon 
 George Herbert, as he describes it in his exquisite little 
 
 poem : 
 
 " Sweet day, so pure, so cool, and bright, 
 
 The bridal of the earth and sky ! " 
 
 Apart from its soothing religious associations, it brings 
 with it the assurance of physical comfort and freedom. 
 It is something to be able to doze out the morning from 
 daybreak to breakfast in that luxurious state between 
 sleeping and waking in which the mind eddies slowly and 
 peacefully round and round instead of rushing onward 
 the future a blank, the past annihilated, the present but 
 a dim consciousness of pleasurable existence. Then, too, 
 the satisfaction is by no means inconsiderable of throw 
 ing aside the worn and soiled habiliments of labor and 
 
 (381) 
 
382 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 appearing in neat and comfortable attire. The moral in 
 fluence of dress has not been overrated even by Carlyle s 
 professor in his Sartor Resartus. William Penn says that 
 cleanliness is akin to godliness. A well-dressed man, all 
 other things being equal, is not half as likely to compro 
 mise his character as one who approximates to shabbi- 
 ness. Lawrence Sterne used to say that when he felt 
 himself giving way to low spirits and a sense of depres 
 sion and worthlessness a sort of predisposition for all 
 sorts of little meannesses he forthwith shaved himself, 
 brushed his wig, donned his best dress and his gold 
 rings, and thus put to flight the azure demons of his un 
 fortunate temperament. There is somehow a close affin 
 ity between moral purity and clean linen ; and the sprites 
 of our daily temptation, who seem to find easy access to 
 us through a broken hat or a rent in the elbow, are mani 
 festly baffled by the " complete mail " of a clean and decent 
 dress. I recollect on one occasion hearing my mother 
 tell our family physician that a woman in the neighbor 
 hood not remarkable for her tidiness had become a 
 church member. " Humph ! " said the doctor, in his 
 quick, sarcastic way, " what of that ? Don t you know 
 that no unclean thing can enter the kingdom of heaven ? " 
 " If you would see " Lowell " aright," as Walter Scott 
 says of Melrose Abbey, one must be here of a pleasant 
 first day at the close of what is called the " afternoon 
 
FIRST DAT IX LOWELL. 383 
 
 service." The streets are then blossoming like a peripa 
 tetic flower garden ; as if the tulips, and lilies, and roses 
 of my friend W. s nursery, in the vale of Nonantum, 
 should take it into their heads to promenade for exercise. 
 Thousands swarm forth who during weekdays are confined 
 to the mills. Gay colors alternate with snowy white 
 ness ; extremest fashion elbows the plain demureness of 
 old-fashioned Methodism. Fair pale faces catch a warmer 
 tint from the free sunshine and fresh air. The languid 
 step becomes elastic with that " springy motion of the 
 gait " which Charles Lamb admired. Yet the general 
 appearance of the city is that of quietude ; the youthful 
 multitude passes on calmly, its voices subdued to a lower 
 and softened tone, as if fearful of breaking the repose of 
 the day of rest. A stranger fresh from the gayly-spent 
 Sabbaths of the continent of Europe would be undoubt 
 edly amazed at the decorum and sobriety of these crowd- 
 ed streets. 
 
 I am not over-precise in outward observances ; but I 
 nevertheless welcome with joy unfeigned this first day 
 of the week sweetest pause in our hard life march, 
 greenest resting-place in the hot desert we are treading. 
 The errors of those who mistake its benignant rest for the 
 iron rule of the Jewish Sabbath, and who consequently 
 hedge it about with penalties and bow down before it in 
 slavish terror, should not render us less grateful for the 
 
384 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 real blessing it brings us. As a day wrested in some de 
 gree from the god of this world, as an opportunity afford 
 ed for thoughtful self-communing, let us receive it as a 
 good gift of our heavenly Parent in love rather than 
 fear. 
 
 In passing along Central Street this morning, my at 
 tention was directed by the friend who accompanied me 
 to a group of laborers, with coats off and sleeves rolled 
 up, heaving at levers, smiting with sledge hammers, in 
 full view of the street, on the margin of the canal, just 
 above Central Street Bridge. I rubbed my eyes, half 
 expecting that I was the subject of mere optical illusion ; 
 but a second look only confirmed the first. Around me 
 were solemn, go-to-meeting faces smileless and awful ; 
 and close at hand were the delving, toiling, mud-be 
 grimed laborers. Nobody seemed surprised at it ; no 
 body noticed it as a thing out of the common course of 
 events. And this, too, in a city where the Sabbath pro 
 prieties are sternly insisted upon ; where some twenty 
 pulpits deal out anathemas upon all who " desecrate 
 the Lord s day ; " where simple notices of meetings for 
 moral purposes even can scarcely be read ; where many 
 count it wrong to speak on that day for the slave, who 
 knows no Sabbath of rest, or for the drunkard, who, im- 
 bruted by his appetites, cannot enjoy it. Verily there 
 are strange contradictions in our conventional morality. 
 
FIRST DAY IN LOWELL. 385 
 
 Eyes which, looking across the Atlantic on the gay 
 Sabbath dances of French peasants, are turned up 
 ward with horror, are somehow blind to matters close at 
 home. What would be sin past repentance in an indi 
 vidual becomes quite proper in a corporation. True, the 
 Sabbath is holy ; but the canals must be repaired. Ev 
 ery body ought to go to meeting ; but the dividends must 
 not be diminished, Church indulgences are not, after all, 
 confined to Rome. 
 
 To a close observer of human nature there is nothing 
 surprising in the fact that a class of persons, who wink at 
 this sacrifice of Sabbath sanctities to the demon of gain, 
 look at the same time with stern disapprobation upon 
 every thing partaking of the character of amusement, how 
 ever innocent and healthful, on this day. But for my 
 self, looking down through the light of a golden evening 
 upon these quietly passing groups, I cannot find it in my 
 heart to condemn them for seeking on this their sole day 
 of leisure the needful influences of social enjoyment, un 
 restrained exercise, and fresh air. I cannot think any 
 essential service to religion or humanity would result 
 from the conversion of their day of rest into a Jewish 
 Sabbath, and their consequent confinement, like so many 
 pining prisoners, in close and crowded boarding houses. 
 Is not cheerfulness a duty, a better expression of our 
 gratitude for God s blessings than mere words ? And 
 25 
 
386 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 even under the old law of rituals, what answer had the 
 Pharisees to the question, " Is it not lawful to do good on 
 the Sabbath day ? " 
 
 I am naturally of a sober temperament, and am, besides, 
 a member of that sect which Dr. More has called, mis- 
 takingly indeed, " the most melancholy of all ; " but I 
 confess a special dislike of disfigured faces, ostentatious 
 displays of piety, pride aping humility. Asceticism, mo- 
 roseness, self-torture, ingratitude in view of down-shower 
 ing blessings, and painful restraint of the better feelings 
 of our nature may befit a Hindoo fakir, or a Mandan 
 medicine man with buffalo skulls strung to his lacerated 
 muscles ; but they look to me sadly out of place in a be 
 liever of the glad evangel of the New Testament. The 
 life of the divine Teacher affords no countenance to this 
 sullen and gloomy saintliness, shutting up the heart 
 against the sweet influences of human sympathy and the 
 blessed ministrations of Nature. To the horror and 
 clothesrending astonishment of blind Pharisees he ut 
 tered the significant truth, that " the Sabbath was made 
 for man, and not man for the Sabbath." From the close 
 air of crowded cities, from thronged temples and syna 
 gogues, where priest and Levite kept up a show of 
 worship, drumming upon hollow ceremonials the more 
 loudly for their emptiness of life, as the husk rustles the 
 more when the grain is gone, he led his disciples out 
 
FIRST DAY IX LOWELL. 387 
 
 into the country stillness, under clear Eastern heavens, on 
 the breezy tops of mountains, in the shade of fruit trees, 
 by the side of fountains, and through yellow harvest fields, 
 enforcing the lessons of his divine morality by compari 
 sons and parables suggested by the objects around him 
 or the cheerful incidents of social humanity the vine 
 yard, the field lily, the sparrow in the air, the sower in 
 the seed field, the feast and the marriage. Thus gen 
 tly, thus sweetly kind and cheerful, fell from his lips the 
 GOSPEL OF HUMANITY ; love the fulfilling of every law ; 
 our love for one another measuring and manifesting our 
 love of him. The baptism wherewith he was baptized 
 was that of divine fulness in the wants of our humanity ; 
 the deep waters of our sorrows went over him ; ineffable 
 purity sounding for our sakes the dark abysm of sin ; yet 
 how like a river of light runs that serene and beautiful 
 life through the narratives of the evangelists ! He broke 
 bread with the poor despised publican ; he sat down with 
 the fishermen by the Sea of Galilee ; he spoke compas 
 sionate words to sinsick Magdalen ; he sanctified by 
 his presence the social enjoyments of home and friendship 
 in the family of Bethany ; he laid his hand of blessing 
 on the sunny brows of children ; he had regard even to 
 the merely animal wants of the multitude in the wilder 
 ness ; he frowned upon none of life s simple and natural 
 pleasures. The burden of his gospel was love; and in 
 
388 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 life and word he taught evermore the divided and scat 
 tered children of one great family that only as they drew 
 near each other could they approach Him who was their 
 common centre ; and that, while no ostentation of prayer 
 nor rigid observance of ceremonies could elevate man to 
 heaven, the simple exercise of love, in thought and ac 
 tion, could bring heaven -down to man. To weary and 
 restless spirits he taught the great truth, that happiness 
 consists in making others happy. No cloister for idle 
 genuflections and bead counting, no haircloth for the 
 loins nor scourge for the limbs, but works of love and 
 usefulness under the cheerful sunshine, making the waste 
 places of humanity glad and causing the heart s desert 
 to blossom. "Why, then, should we go searching after the 
 cast-off sackcloth of the Pharisee? Are we Jews, or 
 Christians? Must even our gratitude for "glad tidings 
 of great joy " be desponding ? Must the hymn of our 
 thanksgiving for countless mercies and the unspeakable 
 gift of His life have evermore an undertone of funeral 
 wailing ? What ! shall we go murmuring and lamenting, 
 looking coldly on one another, seeing no beauty, nor light, 
 nor gladness in this good world, wherein we have the 
 glorious privilege of laboring in God s harvest field, with 
 angels for our task companions, blessed and being blessed ? 
 To him who, neglecting the revelations of immediate 
 duty, looks regretfully behind and fearfully before him, 
 
FIRST DAY IX LOWELL. 389 
 
 life may well seem a solemn mystery, for, whichever way 
 he turns, a wall of darkness rises before him ; but down 
 upon the present, as through a skylight between the shad 
 ows, falls a clear, still radiance, like beams from an eye 
 of blessing ; and, within the circle of that divine illumina 
 tion, beauty and goodness, truth and love, purity and 
 cheerfulness blend like primal colors into the clear har 
 mony of light. The author of Proverbial Philosophy 
 has a passage not unworthy of note in this connection, 
 when he speaks of the train which attends the just in 
 heaven : 
 
 " Also in the lengthening troop see I some clad in robes of triumph, 
 Whose fair and sunny faces I have known and loved on earth. 
 Welcome, ye glorified Loves, Graces, Sciences, and Muses, 
 That, like Sisters of Charity, tended in this world s hospital ; 
 Welcome, for verily I knew ye could not but be children of the 
 
 light; 
 
 Welcome, chiefly welcome, for I find I have friends in heaven, 
 And some I have scarcely looked for ; as thou, lighthearted Mirth ; 
 Thou, also, star-robed Urania ; and thou with the curious glass, 
 That rejoicest in tracking beauty where the eye was too dull to 
 
 note it. 
 
 And art thou, too, among the blessed, mild, much-injured Poetry ? 
 That quickenest with light and beauty the leaden face of matter, 
 That not unheard, though silent, fillest earth s gardens with music, 
 And not unseen, though a spirit, dost look down upon us from the 
 stars." 
 
TAKING COMFORT. 
 
 FOR the last few days the fine weather has lured me 
 away from books and papers and the close air of dwell 
 ings into the open fields, and under the soft, warm sun 
 shine, and the softer light of a full moon. The loveliest 
 season of the whole year that transient but delightful 
 interval between the storms of the " wild equinox, with 
 all their wet," and the dark, short, dismal days which 
 precede the rigor of winter is now with us. The sun 
 rises through a soft and hazy atmosphere ; the light mist 
 clouds melt gradually away before him ; and his noontide 
 light rests warm and clear on still woods, tranquil waters, 
 and grasses green with the late autumnal rains. The 
 rough-wooded slopes of Dracut, overlooking the foils of 
 the river ; Fort Hill, across the Concord, where the red 
 man made his last stand, and where may still be seen the 
 trench which he dug around his rude fortress ; the beau 
 tiful woodlands on the Lowell and Tewksbury shores of 
 the Concord ; the cemetery ; the Patucket Falls, all 
 
 (390) 
 
TAKING COMFORT. 391 
 
 within the reach of a moderate walk, offer at this season 
 their latest and loveliest attractions. 
 
 One fine morning, not long ago, I strolled down the 
 Merrimac, on the Tewksbury shore. I know of no walk 
 in the vicinity of Lowell so inviting as that along the 
 margin of the river for nearly a mile from the village of 
 Belvidere. The path winds, green and flower skirted, 
 among beeches and oaks, through whose boughs you 
 catch glimpses of waters sparkling and dashing below. 
 Rocks, huge and picturesque, jut out into the stream, 
 affording beautiful views of the river and the distant city. 
 
 Half fatigued with my walk, I threw myself down upon 
 the rocky slope of the bank, where the panorama of earth, 
 sky, and water lay clear and distinct about me. Far 
 above, silent and dim as a picture, was the city, with its 
 huge mill masonry, confused chimney tops, and church 
 spires ; nearer rose the height of Belvidere, with its 
 deserted burial-place and neglected gravestones sharply 
 defined on its bleak, bare summit against the sky ; before 
 me the river went dashing down its rugged channel, send 
 ing up its everlasting murmur ; above me the birch tree 
 hung its tassels ; and the last wild flowers of autumn pro 
 fusely fringed the rocky rim of the water. Right opposite, 
 the Dracut woods stretched upwards from the shore, 
 beautiful with the hues of frost, glowing with tints richer 
 and deeper than those which Claude or Poussin mingled, 
 
392 TCECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 as if the rainbows of a summer shower had fallen among 
 them. At a little distance to the right a group of cattle 
 stood mid-leg deep in the river; and a troop of children, 
 brighteyed and mirthful, were casting pebbles at them 
 from a projecting shelf of rock. Over all a warm but 
 softened sunshine melted down from a slumberous au 
 tumnal sky. 
 
 My revery was disagreeably broken. A low, grunting 
 sound, half bestial, half human, attracted my attention. 
 I was not alone. Close beside me, half hidden by a tuft 
 of bushes, lay a human being, stretched out at full length, 
 with his face literally rooted into the gravel. A little 
 boy, five or six years of age, clean and healthful, with 
 his fair brown locks and blue eyes, stood on the bank 
 above, gazing down upon him with an expression of child 
 hood s simple and unaffected pity. 
 
 "What ails you?" asked the boy at length. "What 
 makes you lie there ? " 
 
 The prostrate groveller struggled half way up, ex 
 hibiting the bloated and filthy countenance of a drunkard. 
 He made two or three efforts to get upon his feet, lost his 
 balance, and tumbled forward upon his face. 
 
 " What are you doing there ? " inquired the boy. 
 
 " Tm taking comfort, he muttered, with his mouth in 
 the dirt. 
 
 Taking his comfort ! There he lay, squalid and 
 
TAKING COMFORT. 393 
 
 loathsome under the bright heaven, an imbruted man. 
 The holy harmonies of Nature, the sounds of gushing 
 waters, the rustle of the leaves above him, the wild 
 flowers, the frost bloom of the woods, what were they 
 to him ? Insensible, deaf, and blind, in the stupor of a 
 living death, he lay there, literally realizing that most 
 bitterly significant Eastern malediction " May you eat 
 dirt!" 
 
 In contrasting the exceeding beauty and harmony of 
 inanimate Nature with the human degradation and de 
 formity before me, I felt, as I confess I had never done 
 before, the truth of a remark of a rare thinker, thai 
 " Nature is loved as the city of God, although, or rather 
 because, it has no citizen. The beauty of Nature must 
 ever be universal and mocking until the landscape has 
 human figures as good as itself. Man is fallen ; Nature 
 is erect." * As I turned once more to the calm blue sky, 
 the hazy autumnal hills, and the slumberous water, dream 
 tinted by the foliage of its shores, it seemed as if a shadow 
 of shame and sorrow fell over the pleasant picture ; and 
 even the west wind which stirred the tree tops above me 
 had a mournful murmur, as if Nature felt the desecration 
 of her sanctities and the discord of sin and folly which 
 marred her sweet harmonies. 
 
 God bless the temperance movement ! And he will 
 
 * Emerson. 
 
394 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 bless it; for it is his work. It is one of the great miracles 
 of our times. Not Father Mathew in Ireland, nor 
 Hawkins and his little band in Baltimore, but He whose 
 care is over all the works of his hand, and who in his 
 divine love and compassion "turneth the hearts of men 
 as the rivers of waters are turned," hath done it. To 
 him be all the glory. 
 
THE BEAUTIFUL. 
 
 A beautiful form is better than a beautiful face ; a beautiful be 
 havior is better than a beautiful form ; it gives a higher pleasure than 
 statues or pictures ; it is the finest of the fine arts." 
 
 Em& son s Essays, Second Series, iv., p. 162. 
 
 A FEW days since I was walking with a friend, who, 
 unfortunately for himself, seldom meets with any thing in 
 the world of realities worthy of comparison with the ideal 
 of his fancy, which, like the bird in the Arabian tale, 
 glides perpetually before him, always near, yet never 
 overtaken. He was half humorously, half seriously, com 
 plaining of the lack of beauty in the faces and forms that 
 passed us on the crowded sidewalk. Some defect was 
 noticeable in all : one was too heavy, another too angular ; 
 here a nose was at fault, there a mouth put a set of 
 otherwise fine features out of countenance ; the fair com 
 plexions had red hair, and glossy black locks were wasted 
 upon dingy ones. In one way or another all fell below 
 his impossible standard. 
 
 The beauty which my friend seemed in search of was 
 
 (395) 
 
396 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 that of proportion and coloring ; mechanical exactness ; a 
 due combination of soft curves and obtuse angles, of warm 
 carnation and marble purity. Such a man, for aught I 
 can see, might love a graven image like the girl of Flor 
 ence, who pined into a shadow for the Apollo Belvidere. 
 looking coldly on her with stony eyes from his niche in 
 the Vatican. One thing is certain he will never find his 
 faultless piece of artistical perfection by searching for it 
 amidst flesh-and-blood realities. Nature does not, as far 
 as I can perceive, work with square and compass, or lay 
 on her colors by the rules of royal artists or the dunces 
 of the academies. She eschews regular outlines. She 
 does not shape her forms by a common model. Not one 
 of Eve s numerous progeny in all respects resembles 
 her who first culled the flowers of Eden. To the infi 
 nite variety and picturesque inequality of Nature we 
 owe the great charm of her uncloying beauty. Look at 
 her primitive woods ; scattered trees, with moist sward 
 and bright mosses at their roots ; great clumps of green 
 shadow, where limb intwists with limb and the rustle of 
 one leaf stirs a hundred others stretching up steep hill 
 sides, flooding with green beauty the valleys, or arching 
 over with leaves the sharp ravines, every tree and shrub 
 unlike its neighbor in size and proportion the old and 
 storm broken leaning on the young and vigorous intricate 
 and confused, without order or method. Who would 
 
THE BEAUTIFUL. 397 
 
 exchange this for artificial French gardens, where every 
 tree stands stiff and regular, clipped and trimmed into 
 unvarying conformity like so many grenadiers under 
 review ? Who wants eternal sunshine or shadow ? "Who 
 would fix forever the loveliest cloudwork of an autumn 
 sunset, or hang over him an everlasting moonlight ? If 
 the stream had no quiet eddying place, could we so admire 
 its cascade over the rocks ? Were there no clouds, could 
 we so hail the sky shining through them in its still, calm 
 purity? Who shall venture to ask our kind Mother 
 Nature to remove from our sight any one of her forms or 
 colors ? Who shall decide which is beautiful, or other 
 wise, in itself considered ? 
 
 There are too many, like my fastidious friend, who go 
 through the world " from Dan to Beersheba, finding all 
 barren " who have always some fault or other to find 
 with Nature and Providence, seeming to consider them 
 selves especially ill used because the one does not always 
 coincide with their taste, nor the other with their narrow 
 notions of personal convenience. In one of his early 
 poems, Coleridge has well expressed a truth, which is not 
 the less important because it is not generally admitted. 
 The idea is briefly this : that the mind gives to all things 
 their coloring, their gloom, or gladness ; that the pleasure 
 we derive from external nature is primarily from our 
 selves : 
 
393 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 " from the mind itself must issue forth 
 
 A light, a glory, a fair luminous mist, 
 Enveloping the earth." 
 
 The real difficulty of these lifelong hunters after the 
 beautiful exists in their own spirits. They set up certain 
 models of perfection in their imaginations, and then go 
 about the world in the vain expectation of finding them 
 actually wrought out according to pattern ; very unreason 
 ably calculating that Nature will suspend her everlasting 
 laws for the purpose of creating faultless prodigies for 
 their especial gratification. 
 
 The authors of Gayeties and Gravities give it as their 
 opinion that no object of sight is regarded by us as a 
 simple, disconnected form, but that an instantaneous reflec 
 tion as to its history, purpose, or associations converts it 
 into a concrete one a process, they shrewdly remark, 
 which no thinking being can prevent, and which can only 
 be avoided by the unmeaning and stolid stare of " a goose 
 on the common or a cow on the green." The senses and 
 the faculties of the understanding are so blended with 
 and dependent upon each other that not one of them can 
 exercise its office alone and without the modification of 
 some extrinsic interference or suggestion. Grateful or 
 unpleasant associations cluster around all which sense 
 takes cognizance of; the beauty which we discern in an ex 
 ternal object is often but the reflection of our own minds. 
 
THE BEAUTIFUL. 399 
 
 What is beauty, after all ? Ask the lover who kneels 
 in homage to one who has no attractions for others. The 
 cold onlooker wonders that he can call that unclassic 
 combination of features and that awkward form beautiful. 
 Yet so it is. He sees, like Desdemona, her " visage in 
 her mind," or her affections. A light from within shines 
 through the external uncomeliness softens, irradiates, 
 and glorifies it. That which to others seems common 
 place and unworthy of note, is to him, in the words of 
 Spenser, 
 
 " A sweet, attractive kind of grace ; 
 
 A full assurance given by looks ; 
 Continual comfort in a face ; 
 The lineaments of gospel books." 
 
 "Handsome is that handsome does hold up your 
 heads, girls ! " was the language of Primrose in the play 
 when addressing her daughters. The worthy matron 
 was right. Would that all my female readers who are 
 sorrowing foolishly because they are not in all respects 
 like Dubufe s Eve, or that statue of the Venus " which 
 enchants the world," could be persuaded to listen to her. 
 What is good looking, as Horace Smith remarks, but 
 looking good ? Be good, be womanly, be gentle gen 
 erous in your sympathies, heedful of the well being of all 
 around you ; and, my word for it, you will not lack kind 
 words of admiration. Loving and pleasant associations 
 
400 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 will gather about you. Never mind the ugly reflection 
 which your glass may give you. That mirror has no 
 heart. But quite another picture is yours on the retina 
 of human sympathy. There the beauty of holiness, of 
 purity, of that inward grace " which passeth show," rests 
 over it, softening and mellowing its features just as the 
 full, calm moonlight melts those of a rough landscape into 
 harmonious loveliness. " Hold up your heads, girls ! " 
 I repeat after Primrose. Why should you not ? Every 
 mother s daughter of you can be beautiful. You can 
 envelop yourselves in an atmosphere of moral and intel 
 lectual beauty, through which your otherwise plain faces 
 will look forth like those of angels. Beautiful to Led- 
 yard, stiffening in the cold of a northern winter, seemed 
 the diminutive, smoke-stained women of Lapland, who 
 wrapped him in their furs and ministered to his neces 
 sities with kindness and gentle words of compassion. 
 Lovely to the homesick heart of Park seemed the dark 
 maids of Sego, as they sung their low and simple song of 
 welcome beside his bed, and sought to comfort the white 
 stranger, who had " no mother to bring him milk and no 
 wife to grind him corn." 0, talk as we may of beauty as 
 a thing to be chiselled from marble or wrought out on 
 canvas, speculate as we may upon its colors arid outlines, 
 what is it but an intellectual abstraction, after all ? The 
 heart feels a beauty of another kind ; looking through the 
 
THE BEAUTIFUL. 401 
 
 outward environment, it discovers a deeper and more real 
 loveliness. 
 
 This was well understood by the old painters. In their 
 pictures of Mary, the virgin mother, the beauty which 
 melts and subdues the gazer is that of the soul and the 
 affections, uniting the awe and mystery of that mother s 
 miraculous allotment with the irrepressible love, the 
 unutterable tenderness, of young maternity Heaven s 
 crowning miracle with Nature s holiest and sweetest in 
 stinct. And their pale Magdalens, holy with the look of 
 sins forgiven, how the divine beauty of their penitence 
 sinks into the heart ? Do we not feel that the only real 
 deformity is sin, and that goodness evermore hallows and 
 sanctifies its dwelling-place? When the soul is at rest, 
 when the passions and desires are all attuned to the 
 divine harmony, 
 
 " Spirits moving musically 
 To a lute s well-ordered law," * 
 
 do we not read the placid significance thereof in the human 
 countenance ? "I have seen," said Charles Lamb, "faces 
 upon which the dove of peace sat brooding." In that 
 simple and beautiful record of a holy life, the Journal of 
 John Woolman, there is a passage of which I have been 
 
 * The Haunted Palace, by Edgar A. Poe. 
 26 
 
402 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 more than once reminded in my intercourse with my 
 fellow-beings : " Some glances of real beauty may be seen 
 in their faces who dwell in true meekness. There is a 
 harmony in the sound of that voice to which divine love 
 gives utterance." 
 
 Quite the ugliest face I ever saw was that of a woman 
 whom the world calls beautiful. Through its "silver 
 veil" the evil and ungentle passions looked out hideous 
 and hateful. On the other hand, there are faces which 
 the multitude at the first glance pronounce homely, un 
 attractive, and such as " Nature fashions by the gross," 
 which I always recognize with a warm heart thrill ; not 
 for the world would I have one feature changed ; they 
 please me as they are ; they are hallowed by kind memo 
 ries ; they are beautiful through their associations ; nor 
 are they any the less welcome that with my admiration 
 of them " the stranger intermeddleth not." 
 
THE LIGHTING UP. 
 
 " He spak to the spynnsters to spynnen it oute." 
 
 Piers Ploughman. 
 
 THIS evening, the 20th of the ninth month, is the time 
 fixed upon for lighting the mills for night labor ; and I 
 have just returned from witnessing for the first time the 
 effect of the new illumination. 
 
 Passing over the bridge, nearly to the Dracut shore, I 
 had a fine view of the long line of mills, the city beyond, 
 and the broad sweep of the river from the falls. The 
 light of a tranquil and gorgeous sunset was slowly fading 
 from river and sky, and the shadows of the trees on the 
 Dracut slopes were blending in dusky indistinctness with 
 the great shadow of night. Suddenly gleams of light 
 broke from the black masses of masonry on the Lowell 
 bank, at first feeble and scattered, flitting from window 
 to window, appearing and disappearing, like will-o -wisps 
 in a forest or fireflies in a summer s night. Anon tier 
 after tier of windows became radiant, until the whole vast 
 
 (403) 
 
404 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 wall, stretching far up the river, from basement to roof, 
 became checkered with light reflected with the starbeams 
 from the still water beneath. With a little effort of fancy, 
 one could readily transform the huge mills, thus illumi 
 nated, into palaces lighted up for festival occasions, and 
 the figures of the workers, passing to and fro before the 
 windows, into forms of beauty and fashion, moving in 
 graceful dances. 
 
 Alas ! this music of the shuttle and the daylong dance 
 to it are not altogether of the kind which Milton speaks 
 of when he invokes the " soft Lydian airs " of voluptuous 
 leisure. From this time henceforward for half a weary 
 year, from the bell call of morning twilight to half past 
 seven in the evening, with brief intermissions for two 
 hasty meals, the operatives will be confined to their tasks. 
 The proverbial facility of the Yankees in despatching their 
 dinners in the least possible time seems to have been 
 taken advantage of and reduced to a system on the Lowell 
 corporations. Strange as it may seem to the uninitiated, 
 the working men and women here contrive to repair to 
 their lodgings, make the necessary preliminary ablutions, 
 devour their beef and pudding, and hurry back to their 
 looms and jacks in the brief space of half an hour. In 
 this way the working day in Lowell is eked out to an 
 average throughout the year of twelve and a half hours. 
 This is a serious evil, demanding the earnest consideration 
 
THE LIGHTING UP. 405 
 
 of the humane and philanthropic. Both classes the 
 employer and the employed would in the end be greatly 
 benefited by the general adoption of the " ten-hour sys 
 tem," although the one might suffer a slight diminution in 
 daily wages and the other in yearly profits. Yet it is 
 difficult to see how this most desirable change is to be 
 effected. The stronger and healthier portion of the oper 
 atives might themselves object to it as strenuously as the 
 distant stockholder who looks only to his semi-annual 
 dividends. Health is too often a matter of secondary 
 consideration. Gain is the great, all-absorbing object. 
 Very few, comparatively, regard Lowell as their " con 
 tinuing city." They look longingly back to green valleys 
 of Vermont, to quiet farm houses on the head waters of 
 the Connecticut and Merrimac, and to old familiar homes 
 along the breezy sea board of New England, whence they 
 have been urged by the knowledge that here they can 
 earn a larger amount of money in a given time than in 
 any other place or employment. They come here for 
 gain, not for pleasure ; for high wages, not for the com 
 forts that cluster about home. Here are poor widows 
 toiling to educate their children ; daughters hoarding their 
 wages to redeem mortgaged paternal homesteads or to 
 defray the expenses of sick and infirm parents ; young 
 betrothed girls, about to add their savings to those of their 
 country lovers. Others there are, of maturer age, lonely 
 
40G RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 and poor, impelled hither by a proud unwillingness to te?t 
 to its extent the charity of friends and relatives, and a 
 strong yearning for the " glorious privilege of being inde 
 pendent." All honor to them ! Whatever may have 
 closed against them the gates of matrimony, whether their 
 own obduracy or the faithlessness or indifference of others, 
 instead of shutting themselves up in a nunnery or taxing 
 the good nature of their friends by perpetual demands for 
 sympathy and support, like weak vines, putting out their 
 feelers in every direction for something to twine upon, 
 is it not better and wiser for them to go quietly at work, 
 to show that woman has a self-sustaining power ; that she 
 is something in and of herself; that she, too, has a part 
 to bear in life, and, in common with the self-elected " lords 
 of creation," has a direct relation to absolute being? To 
 such the factory presents the opportunity of taking the 
 first and essential step of securing, within a reasonable 
 space of time, a comfortable competency. 
 
 There are undoubtedly many evils connected with the 
 working of these mills ; yet they are partly compensated 
 by the fact that here, more than in any other mechanical 
 employment, the labor of woman is placed essentially upon 
 an equality with that of man. Here, at least, one of the 
 many social disabilities under which woman as a distinct 
 individual, unconnected with the other sex, has labored in 
 all time, is removed ; the work of her hands is adequately 
 
THE LIGHTING UP. 407 
 
 rewarded ; and she goes to her daily task with the con 
 sciousness that she is not "spending her strength for 
 nought." 
 
 The Lowell Offering, which has been for the last four 
 years published monthly in this city, consisting entirely 
 of articles written by females employed in the mills, has 
 attracted much attention and obtained a wide circulation. 
 This may be in part owing to the novel circumstances of 
 its publication ; but it is something more and better than 
 a mere novelty. In its volumes may be found sprightly 
 delineations of home scenes and characters, highly-wrought 
 imaginative pieces, tales of genuine pathos and humor, and 
 pleasing fairy stories and fables. The Offering originated 
 in a reading society of the mill girls, which, under the 
 name of the Improvement Circle, was convened once in a 
 month. At its meetings, pieces, written by its members 
 and dropped secretly into a sort of " lion s mouth," pro 
 vided for the purpose of insuring the authors from detec 
 tion, were read for the amusement and criticism of the 
 company. This circle is still in existence ; and I owe to 
 my introduction to it some of the most pleasant hours I 
 have passed in Lowell. 
 
 The manner in which the Offering has been generally 
 noticed in this country has not, to my thinking, been 
 altogether in accordance with good taste or self-respect. 
 It is hardly excusable for men, who, whatever may be their 
 
408 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 present position, have, in common with all of us, brothers, 
 sisters, or other relations busy in workshop and dairy, and 
 who have scarcely washed from their own professional 
 hands the soil of labor, to make very marked demonstra 
 tions of astonishment at the appearance of a magazine 
 whose papers are written by factory girls. As if the com 
 patibility of mental cultivation with bodily labor and the 
 equality and brotherhood of the human family were still 
 open questions, depending for their decision very much on 
 the production of positive proof that essays may be written 
 and. carpets woven by the same set of fingers ! 
 
 The truth is, our democracy lacks calmness and 
 solidity, the repose and self-reliance which come of 
 long habitude and settled conviction. We have not yet 
 learned to wear its simple truths with the graceful ease 
 and quiet air of unsolicitous assurance with which the 
 titled European does his social fictions. As a people, 
 we do not feel and live out pur great Declaration. We 
 lack faith in man confidence in simple humanity, apart 
 from its environments. 
 
 " The age shows, to my thinking, more infidels to Adam, 
 Than directly, by profession, simple infidels to God." * 
 
 * Elizabeth B. Browning. 
 
THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. 
 
 " The mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small ; 
 Though with patience he stands waiting, with exactness grinds he 
 all." Frederick von Logau. 
 
 THE great impulse of the French revolution was not 
 confined by geographical boundaries. Flashing hope into 
 the dark places of the earth, far down among the poor 
 and* long oppressed, or startling the oppressor in his 
 guarded chambers like that mountain of fire which fell 
 into the sea at the sound of the apocalyptic trumpet, it 
 agitated the world. 
 
 The arguments of Condorcet, the battle words of Mira- 
 beau, the fierce zeal of St. Just, the iron energy of Danton, 
 the caustic wit of Camille Desmoulins, and the sweet 
 eloquence of Vergniaud found echoes in all lands, and no 
 where more readily than in Great Britain, the ancient foe 
 and rival of France. The celebrated Dr. Price, of Lon 
 don, and the still more distinguished Priestley, of Birming 
 ham, spoke out boldly in defence of the great principles 
 
 (409) 
 
410 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 of the revolution. A London club of reformers, reckoning 
 among its members such men as Sir William Jones, Earl 
 Grey, Samuel Whitbread, and Sir James Mackintosh, was 
 established for the purpose of disseminating liberal appeals 
 and arguments throughout the United Kingdom. 
 
 In Scotland an auxiliary society was formed, under the 
 name of Friends of the People. Thomas Muir, young 
 in years, yet an elder in the Scottish kirk, a successful 
 advocate at the bar, talented, affable, eloquent, and dis 
 tinguished for the purity of his life and his enthusiasm in 
 the cause of Freedom, was its principal originator. In 
 the twelfth month of 1792 a convention of reformers was 
 held at Edinburgh. The government became alarmed, 
 and a warrant was issued for the arrest of Muir. He 
 escaped to France ; but soon after, venturing to return to 
 his native land, was recognized and imprisoned. He was 
 tried upon the charge of lending books of republican 
 tendency and reading an address from Theobald Wolf 
 Tone and the United Irishmen before the society of which 
 he was a member. He defended himself in a long and 
 eloquent address, which concluded in the following manly 
 strain : 
 
 " What, then, has been my crime ? Not the lending to 
 a relation a copy of Thomas Paine s works not the 
 giving away to another a few numbers of an innocent and 
 constitutional publication; but my crime is, for having 
 
THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. 411 
 
 dared to be, according to the measure of my feeble abili 
 ties, a strenuous and an active advocate for an equal 
 representation of the people in the house of the people 
 for having dared to accomplish a measure by legal means 
 which was to diminish the weight of their taxes and to 
 put an end to the profusion of their blood. Gentlemen, 
 from my infancy to tin s moment I have devoted myself 
 to the cause of the people. It is a good cause it will 
 ultimately prevail it will finally triumph." 
 
 He was sentenced to transportation for fourteen years, 
 and was removed to the Edinburgh jail, from thence to the 
 hulks, and lastly to the transport ship, containing eighty- 
 three convicts, which conveyed him to Botany Bay. 
 
 The next victim was Palmer, a learned and highly 
 accomplished Unitarian minister in Dundee. He was 
 greatly beloved and respected as a polished gentleman 
 and sincere friend of the people. He was charged with 
 circulating a republican tract, and was sentenced to seven 
 years transportation. 
 
 But the friends of the people were not quelled by this 
 summary punishment of two of their devoted leaders. In 
 the tenth month, 1793, delegates were called together 
 from various towns in Scotland, as well as from Birming 
 ham, Sheffield, and other places in England. Gerrald 
 and Margaret were sen! up by the London society. After 
 a brief sitting, the convention was dispersed by the public 
 
412 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 authorities. Its sessions were opened and closed with 
 prayer, and the speeches of its members manifested the 
 pious enthusiasm of the old Cameronians and Parliament 
 men of the times of Cromwell. Many of the dissenting 
 clergy were present. William Skirving, the most deter 
 mined of the band, had been educated for the ministry, 
 and was a sincerely religious man. Joseph Gerrald was 
 a young man of brilliant talents and exemplary character. 
 When the sheriff entered the hall to disperse the friends of 
 liberty, Gerrald knelt in prayer. His remarkable words 
 were taken down by a reporter on the spot. There is 
 nothing in modern history to compare with this supplica 
 tion, unless it be that of Sir Henry Vane, a kindred 
 martyr, at the foot of the scaffold, just before his execu 
 tion. It is the prayer of universal humanity, which God 
 will yet hear and answer. 
 
 " thou Governor of the universe, we rejoice that, at 
 all times and in all circumstances, we have liberty to 
 approach thy throne, and that we are assured that no 
 sacrifice is more acceptable to thee than that which is 
 made for the relief of the oppressed. In this moment of 
 trial and persecution we pray that thou wouldst be our 
 defender, our counsellor, and our guide. O, be thou a pillar 
 of fire to us, as thou wast to our fathers of old, to enlighten 
 and direct us; and to our enemies a pillar of cloud, and 
 darkness, and confusion. 
 
THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. 413 
 
 Thou art thyself the great Patron of liberty. Thy 
 service is perfect freedom. Prosper, we beseech thee, 
 every endeavor which we make to promote thy cause ; for 
 we consider the cause of truth, or every cause which tends 
 to promote the happiness of thy creatures, as thy cause. 
 
 " thou merciful Father of mankind, enable us, for thy 
 name s sake, to endure persecution with fortitude; and 
 may we believe that all trials and tribulations of life 
 which vv r e endure shall work together for good to them 
 that love thee ; and grant that the greater the evil, and 
 the longer it may be continued, the greater good, in thy 
 holy and adorable providence, may be produced there 
 from. And this we beg, not for our own merits, but 
 through the merits of Him who is hereafter to judge the 
 world in righteousness and mercy." 
 
 He ceased, and the sheriff, who had been temporarily 
 overawed by the extraordinary scene, enforced the war 
 rant, and the meeting was broken up. The delegates 
 descended to the street in silence, Arthur s Seat and 
 Salisbury crags glooming in the distance and night, an 
 immense and agitated multitude waiting, around, over 
 which tossed the flaring flambeaux of the sheriff s train. 
 Gerrald, who was already under arrest, as he descended 
 spoke aloud, " Behold the funeral torches of Liberty ! " 
 
 Skirving and several others were immediately arrested. 
 They were tried in the first month, 1794, and sentenced, 
 
414 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 as Muir and Palmer had previously been, to transporta 
 tion. Their conduct throughout was worthy of their great 
 and holy cause. Gerrald s defence was that of Freedom 
 rather than his own. Forgetting himself, he spoke out 
 manfully and earnestly for the poor, the oppressed, the 
 overtaxed, and starving millions of his countrymen. That 
 some idea may be formed of this noble plea for liberty, I 
 give an extract from the concluding paragraphs : 
 
 "True religion, like all free governments, appeals to 
 the understanding for its support, and not to the sword. 
 All systems, whether civil or moral, can only be durable 
 in proportion as they are founded on truth and calculated 
 to promote the good of mankind. This will account to 
 us why governments suited to the great energies of man 
 have always outlived the perishable things which despot 
 ism has erected. Yes, this will account to us why the 
 stream of Time, which is continually washing away the 
 dissoluble fabrics of superstitions and impostures, passes 
 without injury by the adamant of Christianity. 
 
 " Those who are versed in the history of their country, 
 in the history of the human race, must know that rigorous 
 state prosecutions have always preceded the era of con 
 vulsion ; and this era, I fear, will be accelerated by the 
 folly and madness of our rulers. If the people are discon 
 tented, the proper mode of quieting their discontent is, not 
 by instituting rigorous and sanguinary prosecutions, but 
 
THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. 415 
 
 by redressing their wrongs and conciliating their affec 
 tions. Courts of justice, indeed, may be called in to the 
 aid of ministerial vengeance ; but, if once the purity of 
 their proceedings is suspected, they will cease to be objects 
 of reverence to the nation; they will degenerate into 
 empty and expensive pageantry, and become the partial 
 instruments of vexatious oppression. Whatever may be 
 come of me, my principles will last forever. Individuals 
 may perish; but truth is eternal. The rude blasts of 
 tyranny may blow from every quarter; but freedom is 
 that hardy plant which will survive the tempest and strike 
 an everlasting root into the most unfavorable soil. 
 
 " Gentlemen, I am in your hands. About my life I 
 feel not the slightest anxiety : if it would promote the 
 cause, I would cheerfully make the sacrifice ; for, if I 
 perish on an occasion like the present, out of my ashes 
 will arise a flame to consume the tyrants and oppressors 
 of my country." 
 
 Years have passed, and the generation which knew the 
 persecuted reformers has given place to another. And 
 now, half a century after William Skirving, as he rose to 
 receive his sentence, declared to his judges, " You may 
 condemn us as felons, but your sentence shall yet be reversed 
 by the people" the names of these men are once more 
 familiar to British lips. The sentence has been reversed; 
 the prophecy of Skirving has become history. On the 
 
41 G RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 21st of the eighth month, 1853, the corner stone of a 
 monument to the memory of the Scottish martyrs for 
 which subscriptions had been received from such men as 
 Lord Holland, the Dukes of Bedford and Norfolk, and the 
 Earls of Essex and Leicester was laid with imposing 
 ceremonies in the beautiful burial-place of Calton Hill, 
 Edinburgh, by the veteran T-eformer and tribune of the 
 people, Joseph Hume, M. P. After delivering an appro 
 priate address, the aged radical closed the impressive 
 scene by reading the prayer of Joseph Gerrald. At the 
 banquet which afterwards took place, and which was pre 
 sided over by John Dunlop, Esq., addresses were made 
 by the president, and Dr. Ritchie, and by William Skir- 
 ving, of Kirkaldy, son of the martyr. The Complete 
 Suffrage Association of Edinburgh, to the number of five 
 hundred, walked in procession to Calton Hill, and in the 
 open air proclaimed unmolested the very principles for 
 which the martyrs of the past century had suffered. 
 
 The account of this tribute to the memory of departed 
 worth cannot fail to awaken in generous hearts emotions 
 of gratitude towards Him who has thus signally vindicated 
 his truth, showing that the triumph of the oppressor is but 
 for a season, and that even in this world a lie cannot live 
 forever. Well and truly did George Fox say in his last 
 days, " The truth is above all" 
 
 Will it be said, however, that this tribute comes too 
 
THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. 417 
 
 late ? that it cannot solace those brave hearts which, 
 slowly broken by the long agony of colonial servitude, 
 are now cold in strange graves ? It is, indeed, a striking 
 illustration of the truth that he who would benefit his 
 fellow-man must " walk by faith," sowing his seed in the 
 morning, and in the evening withholding not his hand; 
 knowing only this, that in God s good time the harvest 
 shall spring up and ripen, if not for himself, yet for others, 
 who, as they bind the full sheaves and gather in the heavy 
 clusters, may perchance remember him with gratitude and 
 set up stones of memorial on the fields of his toil and 
 sacrifices. We may regret that, in this stage of the 
 spirit s life, the sincere and self-denying worker is not 
 always permitted to partake of the fruits of his toil or 
 receive the honors of a benefactor. We hear his good 
 evil spoken of and his noblest sacrifices counted as nought; 
 we see him not only assailed by the wicked, but dis 
 countenanced and shunned by the timidly good, followed 
 on his hot and dusty pathway by the execrations of the 
 hounding mob and the contemptuous pity of the worldly 
 wise and prudent; and when at last the horizon of Time 
 shuts down between him and ourselves, and the places 
 which have known him know him no more forever, we 
 are almost ready to say with the regal voluptuary of old, 
 " This also is vanity and a great evil ; for what hath a 
 man of all his labor and of the vexation of his heart 
 27 
 
418 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 wherein he hath labored under the sun?" But is this 
 the end ? Has God s universe no wider limits than the 
 circle of the blue wall which shuts in our nestling-place ? 
 Has life s infancy only been provided for, and beyond this 
 poor nursery chamber of Time is there no play ground for 
 the soul s youth, no broad fields for its manhood ? Per 
 chance, could we but lift the curtains of the narrow pin 
 fold wherein we dwell, we might see that our poor friend 
 and brother whose fate we have thus deplored has by no 
 means lost the reward of his labors, but that in new fields 
 of duty he is cheered even by the tardy recognition of the 
 value of his services in the old. The continuity of life is 
 never broken ; the river flows onward and is lost to our 
 sight ; but under its new horizon it carries the same waters 
 which it gathered under ours, and its unseen valleys are 
 made glad by the offerings which are borne down to them 
 from the past flowers, perchance, the germs of which 
 its own waves had planted on the banks of Time. Who 
 shall say that the mournful and repentant love with which 
 the benefactors of our race are at length regarded may 
 not be to them, in their new condition of being, sweet and 
 grateful as the perfume of long-forgotten flowers, or that 
 our harvest hymns of rejoicing may not reach the ears of 
 those who in weakness and suffering scattered the seeds 
 of blessing? 
 
 The history of the Edinburgh reformers is no new 
 
THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. 419 
 
 one; it is that of all who seek to benefit their age by 
 rebuking its popular crimes and exposing its cherished 
 errors. The truths which they told were not believed, 
 and for that very reason were the more needed ; for it is 
 evermore the case that the right word, when first uttered, 
 is an unpopular and denied one. Hence he who under 
 takes to tread the thorny pathway of reform who, smitten 
 with the love of truth and justice, or, indignant in view of 
 wrong and insolent oppression, is rashly inclined to throw 
 himself at once into that great conflict which the Persian 
 seer not untruly represented as a war between light and 
 darkness would do well to count the cost in the outset. 
 If he can live for Truth alone, and, cut off from the gen 
 eral sympathy, regard her service as its " own exceeding 
 great reward ; " if he can bear to be counted a fanatic and 
 crazy visionary ; if, in all good nature, he is ready to receive 
 from the very objects of his solicitude abuse and obloquy 
 in return for disinterested and self-sacrificing efforts for 
 their welfare ; if, with his purest motives misunderstood 
 and his best actions perverted and distorted into crimes, he 
 can still hold on his way and patiently abide the hour when 
 "the whirligig of Time shall bring about its revenges ;" 
 if, on the whole, he is prepared to be looked upon as a sort 
 of moral outlaw or social heretic, under good society s 
 interdict of food and fire ; and if he is well assured that 
 he can, through all this, preserve his cheerfulness and 
 
420 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 faith in man, let him gird up his loins and go forward 
 in God s name. He is fitted for his vocation; lie has 
 watched all night by his armor. Whatever his trial may 
 be, he is prepared ; he may even be happily disappointed 
 in respect to it; flowers of unexpected refreshing may 
 overhang the hedges of his strait and narrow way ; but it 
 remains to be true that he who serves his contemporaries 
 in faithfulness and sincerity must expect no wages from 
 their gratitude ; for, as has been well said, there is, after 
 all, but one way of doing the world good, and unhappily 
 that way the world does not like ; for it consists in telling 
 it the very thing which it does not wish to hear. 
 
 Unhappily, in the case of the reformer, his most danger 
 ous foes are those of his own household. True, the 
 world s garden has become a desert and needs renova 
 tion ; but is his own little nook weedless ? Sin abounds 
 without ; but is his own heart pure ? While smiting down 
 the giants and dragons which beset the outward world, 
 are there no evil guests sitting by his own hearthstone ? 
 Ambition, envy, self-righteousness, impatience, dogmatism, 
 and pride of opinion stand at his doorway, ready to enter 
 whenever he leaves it unguarded. Then, too, there is no 
 small danger of failing to discriminate between a rational 
 philanthropy, with its adaptation of means to ends, and that 
 spiritual knight errantry which undertakes the champion 
 ship of every novel project of reform, scouring the world 
 
THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. 421 
 
 in search of distressed schemes held in durance by com 
 mon sense and vagaries happily spellbound by ridicule. 
 He must learn that, although the most needful truth may 
 be unpopular, it does not follow that unpopularity is a 
 proof of the truth of his doctrines or the expediency of his 
 measures. He must have the liberality to admit that it is 
 barely possible for the public, on some points, to be right 
 and himself wrong, and that the blessing invoked upon 
 those who suffer for righteousness is not available to such 
 as court persecution and invite contempt; for folly has 
 its martyrs as well as wisdom ; and he who has nothing 
 better to show of himself than the scars and bruises which 
 the popular foot has left upon him is not even sure of 
 winning the honors of martyrdom as some compensation 
 for the loss of dignity and self-respect involved in the 
 exhibition of its pains. To the reformer, in an especial 
 manner, comes home the truth that whoso ruleth his own 
 spirit is greater than he who taketh a city. Patience, 
 hope, charity, watchfulness unto prayer, how needful 
 are all these to his success ! Without them he is in 
 danger of ingloriously giving up his contest with error and 
 prejudice at the first repulse ; or, with that spiteful phi 
 lanthropy which we sometimes witness, taking a sick 
 world by the nose, like a spoiled child, and endeavoring 
 to force down its throat the long-rejected nostrums pre 
 pared for its relief. 
 
422 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 What then ? Shall we, in view of these things, call 
 back young, generous spirits just entering upon the peril 
 ous pathway ? God forbid ! Welcome, thrice welcome, 
 rather. Let them go forward, not unwarned of the dan 
 gers nor unreminded of the pleasures which belong to the 
 service of humanity. Great is the consciousness of right. 
 Sweet is the answer of a good conscience. He who pays 
 his wholehearted homage to truth and duty who swears 
 his lifelong fealty on their altars, and rises up a Nazarite 
 consecrated to their holy service is not without his solace 
 and enjoyment when to the eyes of others he seems the 
 most lonely and miserable. He breathes an atmosphere 
 which the multitude know not of; "a serene heaven 
 which they cannot discern rests over him, glorious in its 
 purity and stillness." Nor is he altogether without kindly 
 human sympathies. All generous and earnest hearts 
 which are brought in contact with his own beat evenly 
 with it. All that is good, and truthful, and lovely in man, 
 whenever and wherever it truly recognizes him, must 
 sooner or later acknowledge his claim to love and rever 
 ence. His faith overcomes all things. The future unrolls 
 itself before him, with its waving harvest fields springing 
 up from the seed he is scattering ; and he looks forward 
 to the close of life with the calm confidence of one who 
 feels that he has not lived idle and useless, but with 
 hopeful heart and strong arm has labored with God and 
 Nature for the best. 
 
THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. 423 
 
 And not in vain. In the economy of God, no effort, 
 however small, put forth for the right cause, fails of its 
 effect. No voice, however feeble, lifted up for truth, ever 
 dies amidst the confused noises of time. Through dis 
 cords of sin and sorrow, pain and wrong, it rises a death 
 less melody, whose notes of wailing are hereafter to be 
 changed to those of triumph as they blend with the great 
 harmony of a reconciled universe. The language of a 
 transatlantic reformer to his friends is then as true as it is 
 hopeful and cheering; " Triumph is certain. We have 
 espoused no losing cause. In the body we may not join 
 our shout with the victors; but in spirit we may even 
 now. There is but an interval of time between us and 
 the success at which we aim. In all other respects the 
 links of the chain are complete. Identifying ourselves 
 with immortal and immutable principles, we share both 
 their immortality and immutability. The vow which 
 unites us with truth makes futurity present with us. Our 
 being resolves itself into an everlasting now. It is not so 
 correct to say that we shall be victorious as that we are 
 so. When we will in unison with the supreme Mind, the 
 characteristics of his will become, in some sort, those of 
 ours. What he has willed is virtually done. It may 
 take ages to unfold itself; but the germ of its whole history 
 is wrapped up in his determination. When we make his 
 will ours, which we do when we aim at truth, that upon 
 
424 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 which we are resolved is done, decided, born. Life is 
 in it. It is ; and the future is but the development of its 
 being. Ours, therefore, is a perpetual triumph. Our 
 deeds are, all of them, component elements of success." * 
 
 * Miall s Essays ; Nonconformist, vol. iv. 
 
THE TRAINING, 
 
 * Send for the mUingtary." 
 
 Cfaypoie, in Wivw TVtrt. 
 
 WHAT S now in the wind? Sounds of distant music 
 tloat in at my window on this still October air. Hurrying 
 drum beat, shrill fite tones, wailing bugle notes, and, by 
 way of accompaniment, hurrahs from the urchins on the 
 crowded sidewalks. Hero come the citizen soldiers, each 
 martial foot beating up the mud of yesterday s sionn with 
 the slow, regular, up-and-down movement of an old-fash 
 ioned churn dasher. Keeping time with the feet below, 
 some threescore of plumed heads bob solemnly beneath 
 me. Slant sunshine glitters on polished gun barrels and 
 tinselled uniform. Gravely and soberly they pass on, as 
 if duly impressed with a sense of the deep responsibility 
 of their position as self-constituted defenders of the 
 world s last hope the United States of America, and 
 possibly Texas. They look out with honest, citizen faces 
 under their leathern visors, (their ferocity being mostly 
 
 (123) 
 
426 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 the work of the tailor and tinker,) and, I doubt not, are at 
 this moment as innocent of bloodthirstiness as yonder 
 worthy tiller of the Tewksbury hills who sits quietly in 
 his wagon dispensing apples and turnips without so much 
 as giving a glance at the procession. Probably there is 
 not one of them who would hesitate to divide his last 
 tobacco quid with his worst enemy. Social, kindhearted, 
 psalm-singing, sermon-hearing, Sabbath-keeping Chris 
 tians ; and yet, if we look at the fact of the matter, these 
 very men have been out the whole afternoon of this 
 beautiful day, under God s holy sunshine, as busily at 
 work as Satan himself could wish in learning how to 
 butcher their fellow-creatures and acquire the true scien 
 tific method of impaling a forlorn Mexican on a bayonet, 
 or of sinking a leaden missile in the brain of some un 
 fortunate Briton, urged within its range by the double 
 incentive of sixpence per day in his pocket and the cat- 
 o -nine-tails on his back ! 
 
 Without intending any disparagement of my peaceable 
 ancestry for many generations, I have still strong sus 
 picions that somewhat of the old Norman blood, some 
 thing of the grim Berserker spirit, has been bequeathed 
 to me. How else can I account for the intense childish 
 eagerness with which I listened to the stories of old cam 
 paigners who sometimes fought their battles over again 
 in my hearing ? Why did I, in my young fancy, go up 
 
THE TRAINING. 427 
 
 with Jonathan, the son of Saul, to smite the garrisoned 
 Philistines of Michmash, or with the fierce son of Nun 
 against the cities of Canaan ? "Why was Mr. Greatheart, 
 in Pilgrim s Progress, my favorite character? "What 
 gave such fascination to the narrative of the grand Ho 
 meric encounter between Christian and Apollyon in the 
 valley ? Why did I follow Ossian over Morven s battle 
 fields, exulting in the vulture screams of the blind scald 
 over his fallen enemies ? Still later, why did the news 
 papers furnish me with subjects for hero worship in the 
 half-demented Sir Gregor McGregor, and Ypsilanti at 
 the head of his knavish Greeks ? I can account for it 
 only on the supposition that the mischief was inherited 
 an heirloom from the old sea kings of the ninth century. 
 
 Education and reflection, have indeed, since wrought a 
 change in my feelings. The trumpet of the Cid, or Ziska s 
 drum even, could not now waken that old martial spirit. 
 The bulldog ferocity of a half-intoxicated Anglo-Saxon, 
 pushing his blind way against the converging cannon fire 
 from the shattered walls of Ciudad Rodrigo, commends 
 itself neither to my reason nor my fancy. I now regard 
 the accounts of the bloody passage of the Bridge of Lodi, 
 and of French cuirassiers madly transfixing themselves 
 upon the bayonets of Wellington s squares, with very 
 much the same feeling of horror and loathing which is 
 excited by a detail of the exploits of an Indian Thug, or 
 
428 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 those of a mad Malay running a muck, creese in Land, 
 through the streets of PuloPenang. Your "Waterloo, and 
 battles of the Nile and Baltic, what are they, in sober 
 fact, but gladiatorial murder games on a great scale 
 human imitations of bull fights, at which Satan sits as 
 grand alguazil and master of ceremonies ? It is only 
 when a great thought incarnates itself in action, desper 
 ately striving to find utterance even in sabre clash and 
 gun fire, or when Truth and Freedom, in their mistaken 
 zeal and distrustful of their own powers, put on battle 
 harness, that I can feel any sympathy with merely phys 
 ical daring. The brawny butcher work of men whose 
 wits, like those of Ajax, lie in their sinews, and who are 
 "yoked like draught oxen and made to plough up the 
 wars," is no realization of my ideal of true courage. 
 
 Yet I am not conscious of having lost in any degree 
 my early admiration of heroic achievement. The feeling 
 remains ; but it has found new and better objects. I have 
 learned to appreciate what Milton calls the martyr s " un- 
 resistible might of meekness" the calm, uncomplaining 
 endurance of those who can bear up against persecution 
 uncheered by sympathy or applause, and, with a full and 
 keen appreciation of the value of all which they are called 
 to sacrifice, confront danger and death in unselfish devo 
 tion to duty. Fox, preaching through his prison grates 
 or rebuking Oliver Cromwell in the midst of his soldier 
 
THE TRAINING. 429 
 
 court ; Henry Vane beneath the axe of the headsman ; 
 Mary Dyer on the scaffold at Boston ; Luther closing his 
 speech at Worms with the sublime emphasis of his " Here 
 stand I ; I cannot otherwise ; God help me ;" William Penn 
 defending the rights of Englishmen from the bale dock of 
 the Fleet prison ; Clarkson climbing the decks of Liver 
 pool slave ships ; Howard penetrating to infected dungeons ; 
 meek Sisters of Charity breathing contagion in thronged 
 hospitals, all these, and such as these, now help me to 
 form the loftier ideal of Christian heroism. 
 
 Blind Milton approaches nearly to my conception of a 
 true hero. What a picture have we of that sublime old 
 man, as, sick, poor, blind, and abandoned of friends, 
 he still held fast his heroic integrity, rebuking with his 
 unbending republicanism the treachery, cowardice, and 
 servility of his old associates ! He had outlived the hopes 
 and beatific visions of his youth ; he had seen the loud 
 mouthed advocates of liberty throwing down a nation s 
 freedom at the feet of the shameless, debauched, and per 
 jured Charles II., crouching to the harlot-thronged court 
 of the tyrant, and forswearing at once their religion and 
 their republicanism. The executioner s axe had been 
 busy among his friends. Vane and Hampden slept in 
 their bloody graves. Cromwell s ashes had been dragged 
 from their resting-place ; for even in death the effeminate 
 monarch hated and feared the conquerer of Naseby and 
 
430 RECREATIONS AND MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Marston Moor. He was left alone, in age, and penury, 
 and blindness, oppressed with the knowledge that all 
 which his free soul abhorred had returned upon his 
 beloved country. Yet the spirit of the stern old repub 
 lican remained to the last unbroken, realizing the truth 
 of the language of his own Samson Agonistes : 
 
 patience is the exercise 
 
 Of saints ; the trial of their fortitude 
 Making them each their own deliverer 
 And victor over all 
 That tyranny or fortune can inflict." 
 
 The curse of religious and political apostasy lay heavy 
 on the land. Harlotry and atheism sat in the high places ; 
 and the "caresses of wantons and the jests of buffoons 
 regulated the measures of a government which had just 
 ability enough to deceive, just religion enough to perse 
 cute." But, while Milton mourned over this disastrous 
 change, no self-reproach mingled with his sorrow. To 
 the last he had striven against the oppressor ; and when 
 confined to his narrow alley, a prisoner in his own mean 
 dwelling, like another Prometheus on his rock, he still 
 turned upon him an eye of unsubdued defiance. Who, 
 that has read his powerful appeal to his countrymen when 
 they were on the eve of welcoming back the tyranny and 
 misrule which, at the expense of so much blood and 
 
THE TRAINING. 431 
 
 treasure, had been thrown off, can ever forget it ? How 
 nobly does Liberty speak through him ! " If," said he, 
 "ye welcome back a monarchy, it will be the triumph of 
 all tyrants hereafter over any people who shall resist 
 oppression ; and their song shall then be to others, How 
 sped the rebellious English? but to our posterity, How 
 sped the rebels, your fathers ? " How solemn and awful 
 is his closing paragraph! "What I have spoken is the 
 language of that which is not called amiss the good old 
 cause. If it seem strange to any, it will not, I hope, 
 seem more strange than convincing to backsliders. This 
 much I should have said though I were sure I should 
 have spoken only to trees and stones, and had none to 
 cry to but with the prophet, earth, earth, earth ! to 
 tell the very soil itself what its perverse inhabitants are 
 deaf to ; nay, though what I have spoken should prove 
 (which Thou suffer not, who didst make mankind free : 
 nor Thou next, who didst redeem us from being servants 
 of sin) to be the last words of our expiring liberties." 
 
I/7&W73C 
 
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 LOAN DEPT 
 
 
 
 n General Library 
 Diversity of Calif orn, ; 
 Berkeley 
 
 
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY