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THE

NEW ENGLAND MAGAZINE

AND

BAY STATE MONTHLY.

    OLD SERIES            MARCH, 1886.      NEW SERIES
    VOL. IV. NO. 3                          VOL. I. NO. 3.

Copyright, 1886, by Bay State Monthly Company. All rights reserved.

Transcriber's Note: Minor typos have been corrected and footnotes moved
to the end of the article.




Along the Kennebec

BY HENRY S. BICKNELL

[Illustration]

The first glimpse of the Kennebec, on approaching it from the sea,
presents to the stranger a barren and uninviting picture. Hemmed in on
either side by low, rocky isles, studded with scraggy pines that have
long defied old Atlantic's blasts, it must have been a dreary and
disappointing sight, indeed, to the little band of voyagers who were
seeking a home in the new world over two centuries ago. Many treacherous
sand-bars reach out to the circuitous channel that extends seaward a
mile or more, and numerous wrecks along shore bear evidence of their
hidden dangers. Before the age of skilful pilots and steam fog-whistles,
the mariner must have had a busy time with his lead in threading this
watery pathway, unaided by a single sign or sound from shore. A few
days' sojourn among the charming bays and inlets dispels all feelings of
lonesomeness, and unfolds a scene of continued interest and keen
enjoyment. On a pleasant morning, from the summit of any hilltop the
view is delightful. Scores of crafts, from the saucy mackerel-catcher
to the huge three-master, are leaving their anchorage under the shadows
of Sequin, and the lofty white shaft of the lighthouse above looms clear
and grand against the sky. At the weirs along the river fishermen are
pulling in their nets, which glimmer with their night's catch. The
bustling little tugs, with half a dozen "icers" in tow, are struggling
nobly against the tide. The merry shouts of bathers on Popham beach
mingle with the roar and rush of the incoming tide. The dark pine-clad
hills trending northward form a fitting background to the scene. A fine
government light on Pond Island guards the entrance to the river. The
cliffs on the ocean side are quite precipitous, and rise to a height of
sixty feet, over which the spray is dashed in severe storms. Why it was
named Pond Island has always been a mystery, for the drinking-water even
is caught from the showers that fall upon the light-keeper's roof. From
the summit the island slopes to the western shore, where a small cove
affords the only landing-place, and in rough weather great skill is
required in embarking safely. We were informed that the island furnished
pasturage sufficient for one cow, but, from a close observation, it was
evident that she must be content with two meals a day, or get an
occasional donation from the meadows on the mainland. Twice a year the
district inspector makes his rounds, and, during the week previous to
his visit, the entire family devote all their energy in scouring and
polishing, until everything about the place, from the doorknob to the
lenses, fairly sparkles with brilliancy. On these occasions, the
light-keeper is seen in his best mood, and is the perfection of
politeness and urbanity, for then a hope of reappointment is betrayed in
every movement. Across the channel, Stage and Salter's Islands, and the
Georgetown shore, forms the eastern boundary of the river, and is the
home of numerous camping and fishing parties during the summer. Here the
artist may find many rare bits of picturesque scenery that are almost
unknown. Further up the river, on the left, Hunnewell's Point with its
magnificent beach stretches away for miles to the west. At its northern
extremity stands Fort Popham, named after the first English explorer who
visited the coast. It was erected some years ago, but has never been
completed, and, as proven, the government saved money by neglecting it.
Imposing and impregnable as it might have been then, it would now offer
but a feeble resistance to the onslaught of modern naval warfare.
Numerous pyramids of cannon balls are scattered about within the
enclosure, and many old-fashioned guns have been rusting away in peace
for the past decade. The interior of the fortress is grass-grown, and
two lonesome sentinels in faded regalia guard this useless property, and
draw their regular wages from generous Uncle Sam. They are very
important in their manner, and allow no intruders on the premises. A few
years ago two Harvard students ventured within the sacred walls, and one
of them was fatally shot by the over-zealous officer. Popham Beach has
become a favorite summer resort within the past few years, and boasts
two hotels, and daily mails, and steamers to the outside world.

[Illustration: Pond Island Light.]

[Illustration]

[Illustration: FORT POPHAM.]

[Illustration: THE STORE, FORT POPHAM.]

Fishing forms the chief industry among the natives, although, in years
past, when the shipping of ice became extensive on the river, and
brought immense numbers of vessels here, piloting at once became a great
source of profit. In those days bright visions of wealth suddenly
dazzled their eyes, but the bonanza soon faded, for the advent of the
tugboats dispelled their dream, and ruined their financial calculations.
The fishing-smacks then tossed idly at their moorings for weeks at a
time, and the straggling garden patches among the rocks passed
unnoticed, while the owners were rowing seaward in search for incoming
vessels. Oftentimes they embarked in their wherries soon after midnight,
and early morn found them five or six miles from shore. Everybody
suddenly developed into an experienced navigator, and curious schemes
were originated in the endeavor to outwit each other. This vocation is
no longer profitable, and the natives have relapsed into their former
monotony. So far away from the sound of a church-bell, it would be no
easy matter to tell when the Sabbath morn arrives, were it not for the
radical change that comes over these hardy longshoremen. The clatter and
jingle of the ponderous family razor, as it flies back and forth on the
time-worn strap suspended from the kitchen mantlepiece, is the first
signal that ushers in the day. The change is an outward one at least,
for then the "biled" shirt with high dickey, the long-tailed black coat,
and ancient "stovepipe" take the place of the familiar reefer and
sou'wester. The low hum of hymns is heard, and refrains from "I want to
be a Daniel" float out on the air. Gradually increasing in volume and
earnestness, the voices swell into a quaint and weird melody. From all
directions small boats are crossing river and bay to the little red
school-house at Popham. Moved, we confess, more by curiosity than by any
thirst for religious consolation, we joined the procession. Gathered
within the cheerless room, unadorned, save here and there by
wretchedly-executed prints of early patriots who would scarcely be
recognized by their own friends, old and young alike presented a
distressed and penitent appearance.

[Illustration]

All thoughts of the beautiful world outside were overshadowed by the
feelings of doubt and fear within. In the absence of a regular preacher,
each one, beginning with the eldest and grayest of the flock, poured out
a pitiful story of sins, and prayed for strength to guide their
uncertain steps. The lamentations grew louder and stronger, and the
tears flowed fast and free, and the little ones shook with fear at the
dismal picture unfolded to their already terrified minds. Finally,
overcome by their highly-wrought excitement, they subsided into a
prolonged and painful silence, broken only by sobs and moans. Passing
out from the dismal service to the green meadows that stretch away to
the sea, our little party gave a sigh of relief, and the air seemed
purer, and the sky brighter than ever. On our return we passed one of
the worst self-accused sinners busily hauling in the cast catch from his
weir along the shore. Tears still stood upon his furrowed cheeks, while
religiously apologizing for his seeming wickedness. His excuses were
lavish with regret, but we could but feel that his sincerity was less
than his love of the mighty dollar.

A few years ago the natives were thrown into a state of the greatest
excitement by the discovery of valuable deposits of feldspar on one of
their rocky farms. The news spread quickly along the river, and the
presence of capitalists in their midst lent additional interest to the
prospective bonanza. The fishing business again came to a standstill,
and the old settlers looked upon each other as bloated bond-holders.
Such a drilling and blasting was never seen before in these parts, and
soon the whole territory was dotted with huge mounds of imaginary ore.
Farms that could scarcely be given away suddenly possessed enormous
values in the minds of their lucky owners. Some of the mines were
developed extensively, and shipments began which have continued at
intervals, but only a few of them furnished the best quality. The spar
is shipped to the mills in New Jersey, where it is used for glazing
crockery. Rare specimens of beryl are often found by curiosity-seekers
among the quartz.

[Illustration: ACROSS THE MARSH, INDIAN POINT.]

[Illustration: HARRINGTON'S LANDING.]

About two miles above Popham the river widens into a considerable bay,
which offers safe and spacious anchorage for vessels of all sizes. It
bears the unpretentious name of Parker's Flats, but when a fleet of
half a hundred unfurl their sails to the morning breeze, the bay becomes
a stirring and imposing scene. Upon the left bank is Harrington's
Landing, one of the noted landmarks in this region and the point of
departure to the outside world. The elder Harrington has been something
of an autocrat among the natives, and is one of the famous characters on
the river. He was once elected a member of the legislature, but after
taking his seat his importance seemed to be unappreciated by his
associates, and he obtained leave of absence and quickly returned to
this more genial spot. He was short but very portly, and his voice
contained many of the elements of a fog-horn. It is related that years
ago, while piloting a schooner out to sea, he fell over the stern into
the river. His boys put off in a skiff to the rescue, but being so
ponderous it was impossible to pull him in without upsetting the boat,
so putting a rope around his body they towed him ashore, not much the
worse off for his sudden bath. This colony has always been a prolific
field for the census collector, and it is doubtful if any authentic
figures as to the number of little Harringtons were ever obtained. They
swarmed about the place like so many bees. One of them whom we had
formerly noticed seemed to be missing, and on inquiring of the old man
he appeared bewildered. After reflecting a few moments he exclaimed,
"Oh! it seems to me he got 'schronched' last spring 'tween the wharf and
schooner!"

[Illustration: Fiddlers Reach.]

A cold nor'easter compelled us to pass the night here, and a long
wretched night it was. We encamped in a fireless, cheerless room, and
fought a small army of insects and mice, till the first streaks of dawn
enabled us to vacate our quarters. The tumult and squabble overhead
continued at intervals through the night and rose above the howling of
the storm without. Descending the creaky stairway, we found the old lady
stripping fish for our breakfast. A number of pigs and fowl were
rummaging about the kitchen at will. Piles of garments were stacked up
in the four corners of the room, where they were sorted over and over
again, as each one of the boys emerged from above. Not wishing to spoil
our appetite we kept out of sight till breakfast was ready, and the
ceremony of eating was performed as rapidly as possible. We were very
hungry, and ate with our eyes nearly closed, and conversation was
anything but hilarious. For years the huge flat-bottomed scow plied back
and forth to the steamers, and the skipper enjoyed a monopoly of the
business, and ruled his motley crew with an iron hand. Gradually old age
began to weaken his power, and the sons overthrew his authority and
pushed him aside. All hands became captain and crew at once, and amid a
medley of commands and crash of baggage, embarking got to be both
exciting and perilous.

The river was discovered by the French, under Du Mont, in 1604, and
possession taken in the name of the king of France. They had already
planted a colony at Quebec, and were led to believe, from meagre
accounts of the Indians, which were strengthened by the magnitude of the
river and the great force of its current, that they had found another
route to their Canadian possessions. They made no extended explorations
at this time, on account of the hostilities of the Indians, and resigned
all attempt to maintain their claims to a region rich in furs and
fisheries. Three years later the English, commanded by Capt. Geo.
Popham, landed on this shore and made some attempts to form a
settlement, but the extreme severity of the following winter discouraged
their ambitions and caused abandonment of the project. The English,
however, renewed their efforts in 1614, and sent the celebrated Capt.
John Smith, with two ships, to establish a permanent colony here. He
made a map of the territory and gave it the name of New England. The
trade with the natives became at once of considerable value, and
friendly relations were established for some time, which enabled the
colonists to obtain a better knowledge of the value of their new
discoveries. The powerful tribe of Canibas Indians occupied the lands on
both sides of the river for a long distance. It is sometimes spelled
Kennebis, from which the stream derives its name. At a point a short
distance below the city of Bath, the river makes a sudden turn, which
discloses the entrance to the Valley of the Kennebec. At once the
scenery changes from the barren and rocky shores to one of broad and
fertile acres.

This sharp bend of the river has always been known as "Fiddler's Reach."
Tradition says that in early days a band of explorers, who were
searching along the river, passed through the "Reach," and came upon the
broad valley so unexpectedly that their joy and surprise were unbounded.
One of the sailors climbed out upon the bowsprit and began to fiddle a
tune in honor of the discovery. Either by the flapping of a sail or by
his own carelessness he was knocked overboard and drowned. The oldest
inhabitants place implicit confidence in the legend, and the title will
always cling to the spot. Now and then a little neglected graveyard
comes into view, and the moss-covered shafts bear quaint inscriptions.
With considerable difficulty we deciphered the following lines:--

    Brothers and sisters, as you pass by:
    As you are now so once was I.
    As I am now so you will be.
    Prepare to die and follow me.

The facts were as cold as the stone on which the words were chiselled,
and startling as well; so we turn to pleasanter scenes.

Several little streams flow into the lower Kennebec, on which are
situated sleepy fishing villages, that once were the scenes of activity
and prosperity. Upon the shores of these winding streams many a noble
vessel was reared, and the light of the forge reflected the hopes and
ambitions of a busy people. When the ship-building industry received its
death-blow, a sudden change took place, and silence has reigned supreme
to this day. The event seemed to blast the energies of the population,
and a Rip Van Winkle stillness settled down upon these once stirring
scenes. Scarred and weather-bronzed sailors idly dream away the passing
hours, waiting in vain for a revival of the once happy days.

      The light of the forge has died away,
    The anvil's ringing voice is still,
    And the bell in the church upon the hill
      Mournfully tolls for a by-gone day.

Where once numerous fleets discharged their cargoes from the Indies, now
only an occasional "smack" is seen. Warehouses and piers alike have gone
to decay, and the streets are grass-grown with neglect. As suddenly as
this lamentable event occurred, another change was rapidly wrought, when
the ice business received such a wonderful start, some fifteen years
ago.

Although ice had been shipped abroad to a limited extent years
previously, the possibilities of untold wealth had never before dazzled
the vision. Rude storehouses began to rise on every hand, which have
since given place to extensive and even handsome structures. A perfect
furor was created along the river by the brilliant prospect of a
gigantic bonanza. Hundreds of storehouses of immense proportions were
erected during the summer months, and for several successive winters the
river and adjacent streams were the scene of a feverish excitement.
Every dollar that could be obtained was invested in a claim, and some
farmers upon the shores mortgaged their possessions in the desire to
embark in the enterprise. The ice-crop had sustained such a total
failure upon the Hudson, for one or two seasons, that the Kennebec
furnished the only extensive field for this product. In many cases later
on, however, the greed for gain overbalanced prudence in holding the
harvest for fancy prices; and as other sections again furnished their
share of the article, many small fortunes dwindled away as rapidly as
they came. The business has since fallen into the control of large
companies, who own their fleets of vessels and tugboats, but reap only a
moderate profit on their investment. The scenes are yet lively and
picturesque, and add much to the charms of the locality.

Sufficient capital, combined with the highest skill and the widest
experience, and the Kennebec would soon become a worthy rival of the
famous Clyde. Ship-building has not been altogether abandoned, but it is
only a shadow of its former greatness. The river at this point attains
its greatest width. The opposite shore is the western boundary of the
town of Woolwich, which has always remained under the quiet rule of
agriculture, and made no attempts to enter the field of commerce.
Capital has been sparingly invested in manufactures; and although her
people have the prestige of wealth and brains, Bath will undoubtedly
continue for years to come as she is to-day. She is the natural head of
the lower Kennebec, which embraces so many charming nooks and corners
in its winding way to the sea. The remaining beauties and spots of
interest of the river will be treated in a future article, on "The Upper
Kennebec."

From the western extremity of Fiddler's Reach the city of Bath stretches
northward for several miles, fringing the waterfront with its scores of
docks and ship-yards. Years ago nearly the entire city was hidden from
view by the lofty frames and hulls of vessels upon the stocks. The air
was freighted with the merry music of countless hammers, and

    Covering many a rood of ground
    Lay the timber piled around:
    Timber of chestnut and elm and oak,
    And scattered here and there with these
    The knarred and crooked cedar-trees,
    Brought from regions far away.

Not a port or sea is there in any clime but the tall and stately ships
of Bath have entered. Her name and reputation are worldwide. The onward
march of steam has, however, supplanted the slower power of sails, and
this, together with the growing industry of iron ship-building, has
prostrated the life of the city. The representatives of Maine in the
halls of Congress have striven vigorously and persistently in the
endeavor to evoke national aid in securing such legislation as will
enable these idle yards to compete with other more favored places.

[Illustration: ADIEU SEGUIN]




MAPLE-SUGAR MAKING IN VERMONT.

BY J. M. FRENCH, M.D.


The poet Saxe has written of his native State, that Vermont is noted for
four staple products; oxen, maple-sugar, girls, and horses:--

    "The first are strong, the last are fleet,
    The second and third exceedingly sweet,
    And all uncommon hard to beat."

Whatever changes may have taken place in other respects, in maple-sugar,
at least, Vermont retains her preëminence, producing each year from
eight to ten million pounds, or more than any other single State, and
nearly one-third of the entire amount manufactured in the United States.

[Illustration: CATCHING SAP.]

To the farmer's boy among the Green Mountains the springtime is the
sweetest and most welcome of all the seasons. And however far he may
wander in later years from the scenes of his boyhood, yet often, in
quiet hours or when busied with the cares of life, his thoughts return
to the old homestead; and, as he walks again in the old paths, recalls
the old memories, and watches the old-time pictures come and go before
his mental vision, he enjoys again, and with a freshness ever new, the
pleasures of the maple-sugar season.

Midwinter is past. The "January thaw" has come and gone, leaving a
smooth, hard crust, just right for coasting. The heavy storms of
February have piled the drifts mountain high over road and fence and
wall; and the roaring winds of early March have driven the snow in
blinding clouds along the hill-sides, through the forests, and down into
the valleys. But now the coldest days are over, and the sun, in his
returning course, begins to send down-rays of pleasant warmth. The
nights are still sharp, and the March winds have not yet ceased to blow;
but for a week, the snow has been melting at noon-day on the southern
slope of the hills.

[Illustration: THE YOKE.]

One afternoon, when the sun seems a little warmer than usual, the farmer
comes in to the house, on his return from a trip to the wood-lot,
saying, "Boys, this is good weather for sap. We must get the buckets
out, and be ready to tap the trees to-morrow."

The buckets are stored in the loft over the shed, or at the barn or in
the sugar-house, where they were carefully laid away after last year's
season was over. Now they must be washed and scalded, repaired if
necessary, and carried around to the trees.

Twenty-five years ago nearly all the buckets were made of pine or cedar,
had wooden hoops, and were without covers. At present many of them are
made of tin, and are provided with covers.

By night, with all hands at work, the buckets are washed and
distributed. They are left in sets of half-a-dozen at convenient
distances through the orchard, or else are turned bottom-upwards on the
snow, one at the foot of each tree.

Sometimes it happens at this stage of the proceedings that a storm
comes up unexpectedly, a cold spell follows, and operations are delayed
accordingly. But, if the weather continues fine, the next day the trees
are tapped.

[Illustration: GATHERING THE SAP.]

Armed each with a bit-stock and one-half or three-quarter-inch bit, the
farmer and his older boys go from tree to tree, and, selecting a
favorable spot a few feet from the ground, break off any rough pieces of
outer bark, and bore a hole into the tree to the depth of one or two
inches. Formerly a larger bit was used, and the bore was rarely more
than an inch in depth; but experience has shown that the smaller and
deeper bore injures the tree less and secures a larger quantity of sap.

Next the younger boys, acting as assistants, come forward with spouts
and nails and buckets. The old style of spout consists of a wooden tube
some five or six inches in length, tapered slightly at one end to fit
the auger-hole, and with the upper half of the cylinder cut away down to
an Inch from the point where it enters the tree. The new style, now
largely used, is made of galvanized iron, is of smaller size, and has
attached to it a hook on which to hang the bucket. Sometimes, also,
spouts of tin are used, being driven into the bark just beneath the
auger-hole.

After the spouts have been driven in, the buckets must be put in place
and fastened there. If iron spouts are used they are already provided
with hooks. If wooden or tin ones are used, instead, the common practice
is to drive into the tree, a few inches below the spout, a nail made of
wrought-iron, with a tapering point and thin head, and upon this to hang
the bucket by means of its upper hoop; or, if the ground is level and
the snow nearly gone, it is sometimes set upon the ground.

[Illustration: BOILING SAP--THE OLD WAY.]

At length the trees are tapped, the spouts and nails are driven, the
buckets are set, and all is ready for the sap.

I remember once to have seen in an illustrated magazine a picture, one
of a series intended to represent the process of sugar-making, in which
the spouts were several feet in length, and the sap poured out in a
rushing stream, as though each spout were a hose-pipe, and every tree a
water-main. To carry out the idea, it would have required a man to
stand at every tree and empty the rapidly filling buckets into a monster
hogshead.

Not thus lavishly is this nectar of the gods poured out on our New
England hills; but slowly, filtered through the closely wrought fibres
of the _acer saccharinum_, absorbing new sweetness, and gaining a more
delicate flavor at each step of its progress, until at last it falls
drop by drop into the bucket. This is rarely filled in less than
twenty-four hours, while three or four bucketfuls is an average yield
for a season, and six a large one.

[Illustration: BOILING DOWN.]

Next the sugar-house is put in order, the arch is mended, the kettle or
pan washed out, and all necessary preparations are made for boiling. The
earliest method of boiling sap of which I have any recollection was in a
huge caldron kettle suspended from a heavy pole, which was supported at
each end by the limb of a tree or on top of a post. Then a huge log was
rolled up to each side of the kettle, and the fire was built between
them. This was known simply as the "boiling-place," and could be changed
as often as convenient. The kettle which contained the sap was also open
for the reception of the dust, and smoke, and falling leaves, and forms
of dirt innumerable.

The first advance on this primitive method was made by building a rough
arch of stone around the kettle to retain the heat and economize fuel.
Next a rectangular pan of sheet-iron was substituted for the kettle, and
a shed or rude house was built around the arch. The process of
improvement has continued, until to-day in most of the larger orchards
can be found neat and convenient sugar-houses, with closely-built arches
of brick; while in place of the ancient caldron kettle, or the still
much-used sap-pan, it is common to find the modern evaporator.

There are several patterns of evaporators in use. The most common one
consists of a pan of from twelve to sixteen feet in length and four or
five in width, divided into compartments by a series of partitions which
run nearly across the pan, at intervals of six or eight inches, but at
alternate ends stop three or four inches short of the side. Thus all the
compartments are connected with each other in such a manner as to form
one winding passage-way.

Back of the arch, and at one corner, stands a large hogshead containing
sap, with a faucet at the bottom, and a small tube opening into the rear
compartment of the evaporator. This tube has a self-acting valve, which
closes when the sap has reached the proper height in the pan, and opens
again when it has been lowered by boiling.

When the sap is first turned on it at once runs through the entire
passage-way, and covers the bottom of the pan. Thenceforward it enters
slowly, and is heated gradually in the rear compartments, while the
boiling is confined to the front portion of the pan.

The density of this boiling portion of the liquid is constantly
increased by evaporation; and the fresh sap, instead of mixing
intimately with the boiling mass, acts as a pressure in the rear,
forcing it steadily towards the front. Soon the different compartments
of the evaporator present the saccharine fluid in all its phases, from
fresh, cool sap, through warm, hot, and boiling, then partially
concentrated, then thin syrup, then thicker, and, if the process be long
enough continued, even down to sugar. It is customary, however, to draw
it off through another faucet in front when it has reached the
consistency of syrup.

In the smaller orchards, the sap is usually gathered in pails and
brought directly to the central reservoir. For this purpose a sap-yoke
is borne on the shoulders, with a large pail suspended from each end. In
larger orchards, where the ground is not too rough, a barrel or hogshead
is fastened upon a sled and drawn through the sugar-place by a yoke of
oxen; or, if the ground slopes regularly, a system of spouts or pipes is
sometimes arranged to bring the sap from convenient stations to the
boiling-place.

It is roughly estimated that four gallons of sap will make one pound of
sugar. But the sap varies greatly in sweetness, not only in different
seasons, but in different parts of the same season, and in different
trees at the same time. As a general rule, large and widely-branching
trees produce sweeter sap than small and gnarled ones, as well as a much
larger quantity. The first sap of the season is always the sweetest, and
of the most delicate flavor, while late runs are of poorer quality, and
have a "buddy" and bitter taste.

A drink from the buckets is considered a great treat at first, and,
though it soon loses the charm of novelty, is always healthy and
refreshing, and is the common drink of the sugar-camp during the entire
season.

Sometimes, when the buckets are nearly full, there comes a cold snap,
and the sap is turned to ice. But, however hard it may have frozen,
there is always a central portion, small if the ice is thick, larger if
thin, which is liquid still. This is pure, concentrated sweetness, maple
honey unalloyed, though it never finds its way into the market.

So far all has been hard work, but now comes the boiling, and here the
poetry of sugar-making begins.

In those old days,--the halcyon days of youth,--after the sap was
gathered, and the fuel piled high beside the arch, then it was that we
sat down by the blazing fire and watched it burn; heaped on the logs,
filled up the kettle, and again sat down to muse, or talk, or read. If
the wind whistled afar, the boiling-place was in a sheltered nook; if
the rain poured down, or the snow-flakes fell without, we were protected
by the sugar-house or shed; if the day was cold the fire was warm; _and
the heart of a youth is never cold_.

When the weather was fine, and the sap running fast, it was often
necessary to spend a good part of the night in boiling sap. Instead of
feeling this a burden, here we found our pleasures but intensified. How
the bright blaze chased the dim shadows far back into the woods, and the
black smoke rolled up in great clouds to the sky! How sweet and warm and
refreshing was the sap as it grew more and more concentrated! And how
welcome were the neighbors' boys when they came to share with us the
midnight watch! There was many a thrilling story told, many a sprightly
joke was cracked, or lively game of euchre played. And when the
war-cloud gathered in the Southern horizon, it was there we talked of
the latest news, and registered our patriotic vows.

When pans are used for boiling, the last thing before the work of the
day is done is "syruping down." When the sap is all boiled in, and the
product has attained a sufficient degree of concentration,--nearly equal
to that of the "maple syrup" of the markets,--the fire is suffered to go
down, the pan is drawn off, the syrup dipped out and strained through a
flannel cloth, and stored away in pails or tin cans to await the final
process of "sugaring off."

This event takes place after a few days of boiling, when the syrup has
accumulated in sufficient quantities; and, as it presents the first
fruits of the harvest, is usually made the occasion of a sugar-party.
Now, the maple sugar-party is a New England institution, and the great
feast of the season. The young people invite their friends, the
neighbors' boys and girls, and sometimes a select party of school-mates
from the village. The young folks go out through the woods in glee, the
boys drawing the girls on sleds over the crust, the young men and
maidens walking together,--a merry throng full of life and glee. The
older folks are also there, at least sometimes; but their presence is no
damper on the spirits of the young.

First, the pan is half filled with syrup, and a gentle fire is started.
As the temperature rises, a thick scum appears on the surface,
consisting of such impurities as may have passed through the meshes of
the strainer. If proper care has been taken to keep out all forms of
dirt in gathering and boiling, and if, after being strained, the syrup
was allowed to stand and settle for two or three days, until all the
nitre,--or "sand," as it is called,--and other heavy impurities, were
deposited on the bottom of the pail, then the liquid which is poured off
is clear and light-colored. But if these precautions have not been
taken, if dust, and leaves, and cinders have been allowed free access,
then the liquid is dirty and dark-colored, and the scum is thick and
muddy. In such cases it is customary to make use of some device for the
purpose of "purifying" it, such as stirring a cup of milk or a beaten
egg into the slowly heating mass. These things are supposed to have an
affinity for the dirt, and to increase the volume of impurities which
rise to the surface. Their real utility is questionable.

When the liquid begins to simmer slightly, and just before it fairly
boils, all the scum is removed by means of a long-handled skimmer, and
is emptied into the pan with the "settlings," and both these are
afterwards utilized in the manufacture of vinegar.

After boiling for a while, the syrup begins to thicken, and the bubbles
to rise higher and higher in the pan, like boiling soap. Thenceforward
it must be watched with care, to prevent its boiling over, or burning on
the bottom of the pan.

As soon as the sugar begins to show signs of graining, all hands pass up
their saucers to be filled; and they are refilled an unlimited number of
times, until all are thoroughly sweetened. For though sugar is the
product of hard labor, and has a cash value, yet in all the sugar-camps
it is as free almost as water throughout the season,--until it is
grained and in the tubs, when it becomes property, and is held sacred.

Not many, however, can eat more than one, or at most two, saucerfuls of
warm sugar. So, when the appetite is sated with this, and the sugar is
done a little harder, merry voices call for pans of snow, or if a clean
snow-bank is at hand, betake themselves to this instead, and, after
having partially cooled the liquid by stirring it in the saucer, pour it
slowly out upon the smooth snow-crust, where it quickly hardens and
becomes brittle, making a most luscious and toothsome substitute for
molasses candy.

If the sugar is to be made into cakes it requires to be boiled longer
than if intended for graining in tubs, as is the more common form.

Finally, when frequent trials show that the proper degree of
concentration has been reached, the master of the ceremonies pronounces
it "done," pulls off the fagots, and lets the fire go down, or else
draws the pan off the arch and lets it cool. Then the sugar is stirred
vigorously with a huge wooden paddle until it begins to grain, when it
is poured out into the tubs, or dipped into tins, if intended for cakes.

But though the sugar is eaten, the party is not over for the young
folks. There is still time for an hour or two of coasting--an
old-fashioned tournament of "sliding down hill." And so the livelong day
is a time for sweet things said and done as well as eaten, of romping
and frolicking, of mirth and laughter, of youthful courtships begun and
carried on, of joy and gladness everywhere.




EDITORIAL NOTE ON DANIEL WEBSTER.


The extraordinary public services of Daniel Webster, as one of the most
eminent statesmen of this or of any other country, cannot be adequately
estimated. Hence, whatever illustrates his public life, and especially
his private character, will never cease to be invested with a degree of
interest which attaches to few other public men. So much of disparaging
statements in reference to Mr. Webster has been unjustly and, perhaps,
thoughtlessly put in circulation, that we deem it a privilege to publish
elsewhere an article presenting trustworthy evidence tending to correct
whatever false impressions may still exist. At the Webster Centennial
Dinner in Boston, in January, 1882, under the auspices of the Dartmouth
College Alumni Association, among other able addresses, one by Hon.
Edward S. Tobey was especially remarkable for the evidence produced as
to Mr. Webster's religious opinions, which, unsought, had come to his
knowledge during a period of forty years. Mr. Tobey, upon request, used
the material facts of this address in the preparation of an article for
this Magazine. In this connection it is of interest to recall the fact
that Mr. Tobey united with President Smith, during the administration of
the latter, in efforts for the founding of a Webster Professorship at
Dartmouth College, and was the first donor to the fund, contributing
$5,000. In the year just ended (1885) the endowment reached the sum of
$50,000, and the professorship was established.




THE BOSTON UNIVERSITY LAW SCHOOL.

BY BENJAMIN R. CURTIS.


A distinguished member of the Boston Bar was recently asked by a younger
professional brother what he considered the most valuable acquirement a
young man could possess for the successful practice of the law. He at
once replied, "To be able to tell your clients what _to do_." This was
the purpose for which the Boston University Law School was founded; this
has been the constant aim of its teachings; and the selection of
practitioners for instructors, coming fresh from consultations with
their clients, and from sharp contests in the court-rooms, has been made
from the first with the endeavor to set before the students live men,
who could tell them what to do and how to do it.

If students could be more frequently brought face to face with the
living heroes of the law, the zeal for careful work and laborious study
would be fanned almost into enthusiasm. To follow the complex details of
a difficult branch of law, from the lips of an eminent counsellor who
has but lately exhausted the subject in an important case at the bar, is
a rare and precious pleasure. At our medical schools the students sit at
the feet of the leading physicians and surgeons of the day. Why are
young lawyers sent forth to practise, acquainted only with the old
masters of the law, and ignorant, often, of the very names of the
eminent ones of their day and generation? Chief-Justice Shaw said, "A
man may be a laborious student, have an inquiring and discriminating
mind, and have all the advantage which a library of the best books can
afford; and yet, without actual attendance on courts, and the means and
facilities which practice affords, he would be little prepared either to
try questions of fact or argue questions of law." "I was once asked,"
said a high legal authority, "to inspect the examination-books of a
graduating class in a law school. The student whose work I was shown was
the son of a distinguished man, a faithful scholar, and a young man of
excellent ability. The subject he had written upon was Equity
Jurisprudence,--one of the most difficult branches of the law. He had,
indeed, studied his English models carefully, and his book showed the
extreme theoretical form of instruction pursued at the school. Among
other things, in describing the course of equity procedure in England,
he fully and elaborately explained each minute step; to what _building
in London_ certain papers were to be taken on a certain day, and at a
precise time, and in what _room_ filed; _and I certainly expected to be
told in what pigeon-hole_."

The Boston School of Law was opened, in 1872, under the supervision of
the Boston University, of which it is a department. The first
instruction was given at No. 18 Beacon street, where the school remained
for two years. The school opened with sixty-five students. The late Hon.
George S. Hillard was the Dean. The lecturers comprised such well-known
names as Edmund H. Bennett, Henry W. Paine, Judge Benjamin F. Thomas,
Dr. Francis Wharton, Judge Dwight Foster, Charles T. Russell, Judge
Benjamin R. Curtis, William Beach Lawrence, Judge Otis P. Lord, Dr. John
Ordronaux, Nicholas St. John Greene, Melville M. Bigelow, and Edward L.
Pierce. It is safe to say that no other Law School of that date,
anywhere in the country, could have offered to its students a better
list of instructors than this. A remarkably varied judicial and
professional experience among the corps of lecturers, from first to
last, is here set forth. Truly, the law could be learned here from its
fountain-heads.

The fall of 1873 saw ninety students on the roll. The corps of lecturers
remained about the same as before, while the course of instruction was
somewhat enlarged. It was evident that the students had come to work;
the list was largely composed of young men who had selected the law for
their profession after careful consideration, who understood that they
would be obliged to rely upon it for their support in life, and who were
therefore determined to make the most of the rich instruction which the
distinguished body of lecturers was ready to impart. The students wished
to be taught what to do, and they were eager to put their knowledge to
good use as soon as the occasion permitted.

The fall term of 1874 opened with one hundred and thirty-four students.
The good seed planted two years previously was thus already bearing its
fruit. A few changes had been made in the faculty and lecturers. Mr.
Nicholas St. John Greene was performing the duties of acting Dean, to
enable Mr. Hillard to seek that retirement which his health demanded.
Judge John Lowell offered a course of lectures on Bankruptcy, and the
well-known lawyers Charles B. Goodrich and Chauncey Smith, of Boston,
were prepared to meet the senior class with their specialties,
respectively, of Corporation and Patent law. With the opening of this
term a change of quarters was necessitated; the school was removed to
the Wesleyan building, 36 Bromfield street, which was then considered
very commodious. Here it remained till the fall of 1884. Each subsequent
year saw a continued increase in the number of pupils. In the fall of
1877 Judge Edmund H. Bennett was appointed Dean. A more fortunate
selection could not have been made. A long experience as Probate Judge
had given him a wide and practical knowledge of Probate law in all its
departments, and his varied legal writings in other departments of the
law showed how well qualified he was to undertake the general
administration of the school. With all his learning, moreover, Judge
Bennett possesses a remarkable power of imparting knowledge, a very
clear insight into human nature, and a certain gentle magnetism which
attracts and charms young men. The man and the occasion were thus well
suited to each other. If the important place of Dean had been filled at
that time by an ordinary man, the remarkable progress then made might
have gone for nought; but with Judge Bennett at its head, the Boston Law
School has continually justified the hopes and wishes of its founders.
This result could only have been brought about by the patient
supervision, watchful energy, and valuable experience, which are clearly
set forth in the rare character of its Dean.

In the fall of 1879 the corps of lecturers was increased by the name of
Truman H. Kimpton, lecturer on the Constitution of the United States;
and three special instructors were appointed to assist the
lecturers,--Messrs. Wayland E. Benjamin, George R. Swasey, and John E.
Wetherbee; and in 1880 the list of instructors was further increased by
Austin V. Fletcher. In 1881 Benjamin R. Curtis took his father's place
as lecturer on the Jurisdiction and Practice of the United States
Courts. John Lathrop came to lecture on Corporations, and Francis L.
Wellman was added to the corps of instructors. In 1883 Edward J. Phelps
began to lecture on Constitutional law, and continued his connection
with the school till his departure to England, as United States Minister
at the Court of St. James.

The year 1883 also marked the retirement from the school of Hon. Henry
W. Paine, who for eleven years had filled the chair of Lecturer on Real
Property. "So thoroughly was he master of his subject, difficult and
intricate as it confessedly is, that in not a single instance, except
during the lectures of the last year, did he take a note or scrap of
memoranda into the class-room."[A]

In 1884, owing to the receipt of several large legacies, the University
was enabled to provide new quarters for the Law School. A large and
well-built house, No. 10 Ashburton place, was purchased by the
corporation, and was at once remodelled in accordance with a careful
plan which one of the best architects in the city had devised. This
house was formerly the residence of the late Mr. Augustus H. Fiske, the
well-known lawyer, who died many years ago. Mr. Fiske was a remarkable
man. His practice was very extensive throughout Suffolk and Middlesex
counties, and he is said to have been in the habit of entering more
cases at the terms of the courts than any other lawyer of his day. He
made it a point to reach his office before seven o'clock in the morning,
and he generally remained there till late in the evening. The
consequence was that he broke down rather early in life, and died in his
prime. His early death, however, was not expected by the Bar. A short
time before his last sickness he appeared as a witness in a certain case
in Suffolk County, and at the conclusion of a long cross-examination at
the hands of Henry W. Paine, Mr. Fiske inquired if Mr. Paine had any
further questions to ask. "No, Brother Fiske," said Mr. Paine, "I think
not,--but stay; you have just told us when you began practice; now, what
your brethren of the Bar are more concerned in, is, when are you going
to leave off?"--"Not till the last nail is driven in my coffin," was the
answer. Soon after this Mr. Fiske fell sick, and Mr. Paine called on him
at his house. Mr. Fiske was sitting up in bed taking a deposition in his
night-gown, with the parties gathered about him. The next day he died.

The alterations at No. 10 Ashburton place were made under the
supervision of Mr. William G. Preston, the architect. The front of the
basement, about twenty feet square, is a pleasant room, well lighted,
and is used by the students, for study, conversation, and general
social purposes. Directly back of this is a dressing-room, 25 × 19,
containing about one hundred lockers, for the use of the students.
Ascending to the first floor, one is struck with the spaciousness of the
hall-way, which extends from the entrance to the door of the
lecture-hall. It is finished in light wood, and the design of the
staircase is particularly tasteful, while the stairs themselves are very
easy of ascent. To the left of the entrance is the Dean's room, 19 × 19,
finished in cherry; and next on the left is a part of the library, which
is finished in white-wood. In the rear is the lecture-hall, where
everything has been done to combine light and air with comfort. The hall
is something over fifty-two feet long, twenty-six feet wide, and
seventeen feet in height. Almost the entire roof, which is in the shape
of an immense skylight, is made of glass. The walls are light in color,
while the general effect is one of light and airiness. In the
lecture-hall, as elsewhere, special regard has been paid to the
ventilation. The atmosphere is changed continually, without any
perceptible draughts. The seating capacity of the lecture-hall is about
two hundred. The second story is devoted wholly to the library, which,
with the room on the first floor, affords space for the University's
valuable collection of books. Leading from one of the large rooms on
this floor is a small one for the librarians, which is fitted up with
open fireplace, desks, and other suitable furnishings. The whole floor
is finished in white-wood. On the third floor are two recitation rooms,
with a seating capacity of eighty and fifty, respectively. Above are
three club-rooms, devoted to the use of the several law clubs in the
school. With such accommodations the school will receive a new impetus.

The cause of legal education has advanced greatly within the memory of
lawyers who are even now hardly of middle age. Twenty years ago law
schools in this country were few in number and most of them poor in
equipment. No examination, and but little study, was required as a
condition for the degree of Bachelor of Laws; one of the oldest schools
conferred the degree upon all students registered therein for a certain
length of time,--one year. To-day, in most of the schools, students are
required to study at least two years, and to pass examinations in some
ten or twelve branches of the law before a degree is given. Some schools
require three years' study, and of these this school is one. Indeed, it
was the first to establish such a course, the trustees including it in
the statutes of organization in 1871. Transition from the earlier
standards to the present one has been gradual but steady, and to-day the
degree is conferred (save in exceptional cases) only upon those who have
studied law at least three years.

One or two features of the course of instruction deserve especial
mention. The first of these is the prominence given to the system of
recitations, and their separation from the lectures. These latter are
given by the elder members of the profession; the lecturer himself
occupies most of the hour in laying down and explaining propositions of
law and citing authorities in support. The lecturer's work is
supplemented by the instructors, who conduct recitations upon the topics
already reviewed by their elders; in these exercises the students are
expected and required to occupy most of the time in asking or answering
questions, and in the discussion and argument of points raised or
suggested in the previous lecture.

The freedom of debate and liberty of criticism given at the recitations,
larger than it is practicable to obtain at the lectures, is found to be
a most useful method of fixing principles or correcting errors.

The Moot Courts are another prominent feature of the instruction. These
are held regularly every Saturday. Some question of law is argued by
students who have been previously assigned as counsel; a member of the
faculty sits as Chief-Justice, two students being associated with him as
Justices. Upon the decision of the question written opinions are
prepared by each of the Associate Justices and read by them at a
subsequent session of the court. These opinions are afterwards printed
and bound under the title of "Boston University Reports."

In October last (1885) the school opened with one hundred and
seventy-one students, and with the following list of lecturers and their
topics: Brooks Adams, _Chartered Rights_; Edmund H. Bennet, _Agency,
Contracts, Criminal Law, Partnership, Wills_; Melville M. Bigelow,
_Bills and Notes, Insurance, Torts_; Uriel H. Crocker, _Massachusetts
Conveyancing_; Samuel S. Curry, _Elocution and Oratory_; Benjamin R.
Curtis, _Jurisdiction and Practice of the United States Courts_; William
G. Hammond, _History of the Common Law_; John Lathrop, _Corporations_;
James K. Maynadier, _Patent Law_; Elias Merwin (who succeeded the late
Judge Dwight Foster in 1884), _Equity Jurisprudence, Equity Pleading_;
John Ordronaux, _Medical Jurisprudence_; John E. Wetherbee, _Real
Property_; Edward J. Phelps, _Constitutional Law_; Charles T. Russell,
_Admiralty and Shipping, Evidence, Parliamentary Law, Pleading and
Practice_; Charles T. Russell, Jr., _Law of Elections_; James Schouler,
_Bailments, Domestic Relations_; George R. Swasey, _Sales_; Francis
Wharton, _Conflict of Laws_.

In this current school year there are one hundred and seventy-five
undergraduate students, among them men from Maine, California, and
Florida; while during the fourteen years of its existence the school has
had among its members students from nearly every State in the Union, the
Territories, and District of Columbia, as well as several from the
Empire of Japan.

The graduates now number about six hundred and fifty, and the school is
to be congratulated on the success which many of them have attained in
professional and public life. In this Commonwealth, during the year just
closed, the alumni counted among them members of the Governor's Council,
State Senators, Mayors, District Attorneys, Registers of Probate,
Representatives, and Clerks of Courts; while in some of the Western
States graduates, though still young, wear judicial honors.

The many friends of the school suffered a great loss in the recent
sudden death of Mr. John E. Wetherbee. At thirty years of age he had
already earned for himself a substantial practice, and his constant
application to the study of law, together with an easy and impressive
delivery, gave his instruction at the school peculiar power. Some burden
too heavy for him to bear brought his work to a sudden close. Those who
were accustomed to meet him, and look for him, and listen to him, will
find it hard to realize that they will see him no more. His work at the
school is now in the hands of Mr. Albers, Mr. Smith, Mr. Jenney, and Mr.
J. G. Thorp, Dr.

A course of lectures on Railroad Law is now being given, for the first
time, by J. H. Benton, Jr., the counsel for the Old Colony Railroad
Company; and the course on Real Property, which was but partially
completed by Mr. Wetherbee, has been taken up by Christopher G.
Tiedeman, now Professor of Law in the University of Missouri.

It is safe to say that everything that means, intelligence, experience,
and hard work can suggest, to continue the school at its present high
grade of excellence, will be afforded by those who are, and who will be,
intrusted with the charge; and it is proper to add that the school has
benefited greatly by the untiring efforts of Mr. Samuel C. Bennett (son
of Judge Bennett), who is now Assistant Dean, and also one of the
regular instructors, and who faithfully seconds the work of his father
in the general direction of affairs.

The school already has a large and valuable library, and an annual
appropriation is made by the University for its care and increase. The
State Library, Boston Public Library, and Social Law Library, all of
which are in the immediate neighborhood of the school, afford every
possible facility for extra investigation.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] Prof. Wm. Mathews, LL.D., in Bay State Monthly, November, 1885.




HON. EDMUND HATCH BENNETT.


From among the hills of Vermont and New Hampshire have sprung many
renowned citizens, whose talents, industry, moral worth, and practical
wisdom have been by no means unimportant factors in the prosperity and
progress of the nation, and in the due discharge of its legislative,
administrative, and judicial functions. The subject of this brief
sketch, Hon. Edmund Hatch Bennett, was born in Manchester, Vt., April 6,
1824. He was educated in his native State,--first in the Manchester and
Burlington academies, and then in the University of Vermont, at
Burlington, where he graduated in the class of 1843. In 1873 his _alma
mater_ bestowed upon him the well-merited degree of Doctor of Laws. The
profession of the law, in which, by his industry, capacity, and
character, he has been so successful, was not adopted without mature
consideration. For some short time after graduation he taught a private
school in Virginia; but, probably finding, subsequently, that his
tastes, quite as much as his talents, might have fuller and fitter scope
for their gratification and development in legal than in academical
pursuits, he ultimately decided to enter upon a course of legal studies
with a view to preparing himself for the discharge of forensic and
judicial duties. His first practical knowledge of the law was acquired
in the office of his father at Burlington, Vt., his father being at the
time, and for many years previous, an Associate Justice of the Supreme
Court of Vermont. He became a member of the Vermont bar in 1847; but
early in 1848 he removed to Taunton, where he resided until 1884; and to
whose social, educational, and religious advancement he has contributed
in no small degree. In June, 1853, he married Sally, the second daughter
of Hon. Samuel Crocker, of Taunton.

When the city was incorporated, in 1865, his fellow-citizens showed
their high appreciation of his personal character and public spirit in a
very pronounced manner by unanimously electing him the first chief
magistrate of the newly incorporated community. To this honorable and
influential post he was twice elected subsequently, viz., in 1866 and
1867.

Judge Bennett has put much hard and honest work into his profession; in
this he is an example to younger men, which it would not be amiss for
them to imitate. His first law connection in Taunton was with the late
Nathaniel Morton, a brother of the present Chief-Justice of
Massachusetts. Subsequently he formed a partnership with Hon. Henry
Williams, and afterwards with Henry J. Fuller, Esq., of Taunton.

At the bar of his own county he took almost from the first a prominent
place, and he has been able to turn the accumulated and well-digested
results of his study and practice to good account in the instruction of
others. During the years of 1870, 1871, and 1872 he occupied the
position of lecturer at the Dane Law School of Harvard University,
Cambridge. With the Law School of Boston University he has stood
connected from its commencement in 1872, receiving at that time the
honor of being selected as its Dean. He was not at the time able to
serve in that capacity, but was a regular lecturer, and in 1876, on
being again elected to the position, he accepted it. This relation to
the school he sustains at present, having, during the decade which has
passed since his assumption of the office, contributed in no small
measure to the present efficient organization and very gratifying
prosperity of the school. In May, 1858, he was appointed Judge of
Probate and Insolvency for Bristol county, holding the office
twenty-five years, and resigning in 1883.

In other directions, and by other methods than that of communicating
oral instruction, Judge Bennett has exerted himself to develop the
science and advance the practice of his profession. His legal
works--written and edited alone, or in company with others--number more
than a hundred volumes, the chief of which are: "English Law and Equity
Reports;" an edition of Mr. Justice Story's works; "Leading Criminal
Cases;" "Fire Insurance Cases;" "Digest of Massachusetts Reports;"
American editions of the recent English works of "Goddard on Easements;"
"Benjamin on Sales;" "Indermann on the Common Law;" and many others. For
some considerable time he has been editorially connected with the
_American Law Register_ of Philadelphia. His lecture on "Farm Law,"
delivered at Hingham in December, 1878, before the State Board of
Agriculture, attracted very general attention at the time, and was
republished in agricultural journals all over New England, as well as in
the West.

In religious sympathy and work Judge Bennett is allied with the
Protestant Episcopal Church. For some years he acted either in the
capacity of warden or vestry-man of St. Thomas parish, Taunton, and
several times as delegate represented the parish in the Diocesan
Convention. In 1874, 1877, 1880, and 1883 he was appointed delegate from
his diocese to the General Triennial Convention of the Protestant
Episcopal Church in this country. He is now senior warden of St. Paul's
Episcopal Church, of Boston.




THE LIFE AND CHARACTER OF DANIEL WEBSTER.

BY HON. EDWARD S. TOBEY.


I might well shrink from writing on a topic which has already engaged
the pen and thought of the most able of Mr. Webster's contemporaries and
biographers, were it not that, by opportunities wholly unsought, so much
of reliable testimony, not previously published, has come to me tending
to correct false opinions and impressions as to his private character,
that a sense of justice which I could not conscientiously resist, led me
on the occasion of the centennial anniversary of Mr. Webster's birthday,
which was observed in this city (Boston) in 1882, under the auspices of
the Alumni of Dartmouth College, to present, substantially, the facts
and views which are now by request repeated. I may add, that I realized
more fully an obligation and an interest to give currency to them from
the fact of my former connection with Mr. Webster's Alma Mater, as one
of its Board of Trustees, and also from having made the first
contribution to the Webster professorship in that institution, which,
through the liberality of others, has since been fully endowed.

While I would not enlarge on the subject of Mr. Webster's public
services and extraordinary statesmanship already so well known
throughout this and other countries, I may briefly refer to one
especially eloquent speech of the many made by him to which it was my
privilege to listen. After the death of President Harrison, and the
accession to office of Vice-President John Tyler, all the members of the
Cabinet, except Mr. Webster, resigned. He remained as Secretary of
State, for the purpose of bringing to a successful conclusion a
perplexing controversy between Great Britain and the United States as to
the trial and release of Alexander McLeod, a British subject, then held
as a prisoner in the State of New York for participating in an attack on
the steamer "Caroline" within the waters of the United States. The
British Government avowed the act as authorized, and imperatively
demanded McLeod's release. It tasked to the utmost the extraordinary
ability of Mr. Webster, as a mutual friend informed me, to find
sufficient ground on which to comply with England's demand, and yet
maintain the dignity of the Government of the United States,
consistently with the relations between the Federal Government and that
of the State of New York. The question seemed at one time to threaten
the peaceful relations between England and America, of which the public
were not aware. Under Mr. Webster's construction of the duty and
obligations of our Government, McLeod was surrendered, and soon after
Mr. Webster resigned. Having been unjustly criticised by certain
political leaders, and his motives impugned for remaining so long in the
Cabinet, he at once sought vindication in a speech delivered in Faneuil
Hall, defining his position, in which he poured out a torrent of
eloquence seldom equalled, and in which he clearly indicated the chagrin
that even a great man may feel when he is made the subject of unjust
suspicion and criticism.

While I have no claim whatever to be regarded as one of the great
statesman's associates, I was favored with a very limited and casual
acquaintance in the latter part of his life, and an opportunity to know
something of his private life and his religious character, through his
particular friends, of whom a few were also my personal friends. I may
perhaps, therefore, properly speak of unquestionable facts which have,
by force of circumstances, come to my knowledge at different times
through a period of about forty years, tending to disprove the base
rumor and slanders which have found an astonishing currency.

To these I never thought it proper to refer publicly, until the pages of
one of our most respectable periodicals[B] reproduced the rumors, which
were subsequently publicly refuted in the Boston _Herald_, by Mr.
Webster's able biographer, George Ticknor Curtis. The friends of Mr.
Webster would have been false to his memory and their own moral
obligation had they failed to put forward the evidence in their
possession to disprove the charges on which such rumors were fabricated,
and which, until a few years ago, had not found a place, so far as I
know, in any respectable publication.

The late Dr. John Jeffries, who was the physician of Mr. Webster, was
also my family physician for twenty years. Not long after the close of
the late civil war, an Episcopal clergyman of Charleston, S.C., became
my guest. He being in need of medical advice, I introduced him to Dr.
Jeffries. After his case had been disposed of he inquired of Dr.
Jeffries: "Pray, sir, were the stories which we hear at the South
concerning Mr. Webster's private character true?" The doctor replied:
"Do you refer to his alleged drinking habits?"--"Yes, sir," said the
clergyman. "No, sir," answered Dr. Jeffries; "they were not true." He
added: "I was his physician for many years, and made the _post-mortem_
examination. He died from no such cause." To illustrate to what extent
Mr. Webster was misunderstood and consequently maligned, the doctor
related the following fact: "On a certain occasion when Mr. Webster was
engaged to speak in Faneuil Hall, he had been for several days much
reduced by medical treatment. Late in the afternoon I suggested that, in
his reduced condition, a glass of wine would be useful. He replied: 'No,
doctor, I prefer a plate of soup; and when His Honor the Mayor calls for
me, perhaps you will accompany me.' I assented, and did accompany him.
That evening, before Mr. Webster had closed his speech, a certain
political rival left the hall and was met by a friend, who inquired, 'Is
the meeting over?' The envious politician answered, 'No; I have come
away disgusted. Webster is intoxicated.'" Who was the most reliable
witness in this case,--his honest physician, an eye-witness, who spoke
from knowledge, or the political rival, who spoke from false inference?
This is but one of several similar instances of misapprehension and
consequent cruel injustice which I might relate, did the time and
occasion permit.

There is now living in this city a gentleman of the highest
respectability, personally well-known to me for thirty-five years, who
was for about twenty-five years intimately connected with Mr. Webster,
at Marshfield, as the manager of his affairs, and consequently with him
under all circumstances during his summer residence there. Mr. Webster
regarded him with the affection of a father for a son. This gentleman
has said to me more than once, with emotion and evident feelings of
indignation: "No one has ever seen Mr. Webster at Marshfield unduly
under the influence of stimulants." He adds: "I was with him on festive
occasions here and in New Hampshire, when others were indulging in the
customary habit of drinking; but I have never seen Mr. Webster, on those
occasions, use stimulants to excess."

The late Judge Peleg Sprague, whom from family relationship it was my
privilege to know intimately until the very last year of his life, a
short time before his death, in conversation with me, refuted the
charges of Mr. Webster's alleged excessive drinking habits in
Washington. Judge Sprague was ten years in Congress, and was associated
with Mr. Webster, under various circumstances, in public and social
life.

I have thus offered the evidence of three witnesses, whose opportunity
of knowledge and whose credibility, it cannot be denied, are to be
accepted against rumors so easily put in circulation by reckless as well
as by mistaken men, but which have beyond question been believed by very
many good men who had not the opportunity, or perhaps the sense of
obligation, to investigate the origin of them.

As to Mr. Webster's religious character and habits of mind, I can hardly
express the great satisfaction afforded me by the testimony of his
intimate friend, the Rev. Dr. Lothrop, who has in eloquent and
unqualified language confirmed, and, indeed, more than confirmed, all
that others have known of it.[C] Dr. Lothrop repeated his criticism on a
prayer once offered by the chaplain of the United States Senate, in
which Mr. Webster concurred, expressing at the same time his view of the
nature and true object of prayer. This reminds me of the fact that the
last sermon which Mr. Webster ever heard was on the subject of prayer,
from the lips of the late Rev. Dr. Kirk, preached in the little
Methodist church at Duxbury, about four miles from Marshfield. This was
about six weeks before Mr. Webster's death. He was accompanied by Sir
John Crampton, the British Minister, who at that time was at Marshfield
negotiating a treaty on the fishery question, Mr. Webster then being
Secretary of State. Through the mutual friendly relations of my esteemed
friend and partner, the Hon. Seth Sprague, I had the privilege, with him
and the Rev. Dr. Kirk, of dining with Mr. Webster the next day. It
afforded an opportunity to listen to his entertaining and instructive
anecdotes, of which I will relate one only. He said: "On a certain
occasion, when President Kirkland, of Harvard University, was called
upon by one of his familiar friends, a clergyman, he inquired as to the
state of affairs in his parish; to which the clergyman replied, 'We are
troubled by a good deal of controversy.'--'Ah! and pray what may the
subject be?' inquired Dr. Kirkland. 'It is the doctrine of the final
perseverance of the saints which agitates the minds of my people,' said
the clergyman. 'Well,' said President Kirkland, 'I, too, have a
controversy among my people; but the topic is of a very different
nature. What troubles me and them most is, the final perseverance of
sinners.'"

I am sure, however, that his own statement of his Confession of Faith,
written in 1807, and published in the Boston _Courier_ about twenty-two
years since, taken together with his extraordinary plea in the famous
Girard case, and his address at Plymouth in 1820, on the subject of its
settlement by the Pilgrim fathers will be specially appreciated. The
confession is as follows:--

     I believe in the existence of Almighty God, who created and
     governs the whole world. I am taught this by the works of
     Nature and the word of Revelation.

     I believe that God exists in three persons: this I learn from
     Revelation alone. Nor is it any objection to this belief that I
     cannot comprehend how _one_ can be _three_, or _three_ _one_. I
     hold it my duty to believe, not what I can comprehend or
     account for, but what my Maker teaches me.

     I believe the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be
     the will and word of God.

     I believe Jesus Christ to be the Son of God. The miracles which
     He wrought establish in my mind His personal authority, and
     render it proper for me to believe whatever He asserts; I
     believe, therefore, all His declarations, as well when He
     declares Himself the Son of God as when He declares any other
     proposition. And I believe there is no other way of salvation
     than through the merits of His atonement.

     I believe that things past, present, and to come are all
     equally present in the mind of the Deity; that with Him there
     is no succession of time nor of ideas; that, therefore, the
     relative terms past, present, and future, as used among men,
     cannot, with strict propriety, be applied to Deity. I believe
     in the doctrines of foreknowledge and predestination, as thus
     expounded. I do not believe in those doctrines as imposing any
     fatality or necessity on men's actions, or any way infringing
     free agency.

     I believe in the utter inability of any human being to work out
     his own salvation without the constant aids of the Spirit of
     all grace.

     I believe in those great peculiarities of the Christian
     religion,--a resurrection from the dead and a day of judgment.

     I believe in the universal providence of God; and leave to
     Epicurus, and his more unreasonable followers in modern times,
     the inconsistency of believing that God made a world which He
     does not take the trouble of governing.

     Although I have great respect for some other forms of worship,
     I believe the Congregational mode, on the whole, to be
     preferable to any other.

     I believe religion to be a matter not of demonstration, but of
     faith. God requires us to give credit to the truths which He
     reveals, not because we can prove them, but because He declares
     them. When the mind is reasonably convinced that the Bible is
     the word of God, the only remaining duty is to receive its
     doctrines with full confidence of their truth, and practise
     them with a pure heart.

     I believe that the Bible is to be understood and received in
     the plain and obvious meaning of its passages, since I cannot
     persuade myself that a book intended for the instruction and
     conversion of the whole world should cover its true meaning in
     such mystery and doubt that none but critics and philosophers
     can discover it.

     I believe that the experiments and subtleties of human wisdom
     are more likely to obscure than to enlighten the revealed will
     of God, and that he is the most accomplished Christian scholar
     who has been educated at the feet of Jesus and in the College
     of Fishermen.

     I believe that all true religion consists in the heart and the
     affections, and that therefore all creeds and confessions are
     fallible and uncertain evidences of Evangelical piety.

These views he held at twenty-five, and in the main retained them in his
later years, as is shown by his remarks before the Supreme Court of
Massachusetts on the occasion of the death of his intimate associate,
Jeremiah Mason, of which the following is an extract:--

     But, sir, political eminence and professional fame fade away
     and die with all things earthly. Nothing of character is really
     permanent but virtue and personal worth. These remain. Whatever
     of excellence is wrought into the soul itself belongs to both
     worlds. Real goodness does not attach itself merely to this
     life: it points to another world. Political or professional
     reputation cannot last forever, but a conscience void of
     offence before God and man is an inheritance for eternity.
     Religion, therefore, is a necessary and indispensable element
     in any great human character; there is no living without it.
     Religion is the tie that connects man with his Creator, and
     holds him to His throne. If that tie be all sundered, all
     broken, he floats away,--a worthless atom in the universe; its
     proper attraction all gone, its destiny thwarted, and its whole
     future nothing but darkness, desolation, and death. A man with
     no sense of religious duty is he whom the Scriptures describe
     in such terse but terrific language, "Without God in the
     world." Such a man is out of his proper being, out of the
     circle of all his duties, out of the circle of all his
     happiness, and away, far, far away, from the purposes of his
     creation. A mind like Mr. Mason's, active, thoughtful,
     penetrating, could not but meditate deeply on the condition of
     man below, and feel its responsibilities. He could not look on
     this mighty  system,--

     "This universal frame, thus wondrous fair,"--

     without feeling that it was created and upheld by an
     Intelligence to which all other intelligences must be
     responsible. I am bound to say, that in the course of my life I
     never met with an individual, in any profession or condition of
     life, who always spoke and always thought with such awful
     reverence of the power and presence of God. No irreverence, no
     lightness, even no too familiar allusion to God and His
     attributes, ever escaped his lips. The very motion of a Supreme
     Being was, with him, made up of awe and solemnity, and filled
     the whole of his great mind with the strongest emotions. A man
     like him, with all his proper sentiments and sensibilities
     alive in him, must in this state of existence have something to
     believe, and something to hope for; or else, as life is
     advancing to its close and parting, all is heart-sinking and
     oppression Depend upon it, whatever may be the mind of an old
     man, old age is only really happy when, on feeling the
     enjoyments of this world pass away, it begins to lay a stronger
     hold on those of another.

Mr. Webster then quotes, on the authority of another, the grounds of Mr.
Mason's religious faith, thus:--

     Mr. Mason was fully aware that his end was near; and in answer
     to the question, "Can you now rest with firm faith upon the
     merits of your Divine Redeemer?" he said, "I trust I do. Upon
     what else can I rest?" At another time, in reply to a similar
     question, he said, "_Of course_; I have no other ground of
     hope."

Mr. Webster adds:--

     Such, Mr. Chief-Justice, was the life and such the death of
     Jeremiah Mason. For one I could pour out my heart like water at
     the recollection of his virtues and his friendship, and in the
     feeling of his loss. I would embalm his memory in my best
     affections.

Again, in the following extract from a letter to his teacher, Mr. James
Tappan, about two years before Mr. Webster's death, he writes:--

     You have, indeed, lived a checkered life. I hope you have been
     able to bear prosperity with meekness, and adversity with
     patience. These things are all ordered for us far better than
     we could order them for ourselves. We may pray for our daily
     bread; we may pray for forgiveness of sins; we may pray to be
     kept from temptation, and that the kingdom of God may come in
     us, and in all men, and His will everywhere be done. Beyond
     this we hardly know for what good to supplicate the Divine
     Mercy. Our Heavenly Father knoweth what we have need of better
     than we know ourselves, and we are assured that His eye and His
     loving kindness are upon us and around us every moment.

How entirely in harmony are these religious views of Mr. Webster with
similar utterances on several public occasions, to which allusion has
already been made; and especially with that extraordinary dramatic
scene so vividly described by his biographer, Mr. Harvey, who was an
eye-witness and participator in it, when, in the solitary farm-house of
John Colby,[D] in New Hampshire, Mr. Webster, at the request of Mr.
Colby, led in prayer. Whatever else of unfriendly criticism has been
made on the character of Mr. Webster, he has never been charged with
hypocrisy, or of parading his religious opinions; least of all in that
remote hamlet of John Colby, whither he had gone to visit him for the
first time in twenty-five years, because he had heard of Mr. Colby's
remarkable conversion late in life. Can there be the remotest suspicion
that other than the most pure and noble of all motives could have
governed him, as he then sought communion with God in prayer? And, as
Mr. Harvey remarked to the writer, "It was indeed a prayer."

About one year before the death of Mr. Webster I casually met Professor
Stuart, of Andover, on his return from a visit to Mr. Webster, at
Marshfield, when, in the course of conversation relating to his
religious habits, the professor remarked, "Mr. Webster has arrived at
that period in life when he feels more than ever his moral
accountability;" and added, "He has resumed family worship." I inquired,
"What evidence have you of this?" He answered, "Clergymen who have
recently visited in his family have so informed me." This, of course,
implied that family worship had once been his custom, but that it had
been temporarily suspended,--perhaps attributable to unusual pressure on
his time by reason of his always arduous public duties.

I am glad to have the opportunity, in these columns, of repeating such
testimony as I am able to offer, and to which much more might be added,
as to the worth and private character of America's greatest statesman,
whose record of distinguished public service will adorn the pages of his
country's history with unfading lustre long after the unjust aspersions
on his character shall have passed into oblivion forever.

FOOTNOTES:

[B] The _Atlantic Monthly_.

[C] Speech at Dartmouth Webster Centennial Dinner, Boston, 1882.

[D] John Colby was the husband of Mr. Webster's eldest sister, who died
many years before the visit here referred to. He was known as a great
sceptic in religious matters in early life, and hence Mr. Webster's
earnest desire to visit him soon after he heard of Mr. Colby's
conversion.




FORTY YEARS OF FRONTIER LIFE IN THE POCOMTUCK VALLEY.

BY HON. GEORGE SHELDON.


One result of John Eliot's attempt to civilize the Massachusetts Indians
was, that in 1663 the General Court granted to the town of Dedham eight
thousand acres of wilderness, as compensation for the territory taken by
the apostle for his settlement at Natick. After an examination of
various localities, Dedham selected a tract upon the far away lands of
the Pocomtucks, bought out the rights of the Indians who claimed it, and
in 1665 laid out the grant there. This land was divided into five
hundred and twenty-three shares, or rights, called "cow-commons," and
held by each freeholder of Dedham, according to his interest in the
undivided land in the old township; and it was paid for by a general
town tax. Fractions of a cow-common were called sheep-commons, five of
which equalled a cow-common. These shares were offered for sale to such
men as Dedham should approve. The required standard of character does
not appear, but this regulation was no dead letter, as the town records
testify; and picked men only were allowed a foothold on this new
possession. We may therefore suppose that it was a goodly body of men
which gathered, about 1671-5, on the virgin soil in the lower valley of
the Pocomtuck River. Here were the headquarters of the Pocomtuck
Indians, whose chieftains were at the head of the confederate clans in
the Connecticut valley. In 1663, the date of the grant, the Pocomtucks
were engaged in a successful campaign against the powerful Mohawks; but,
before the compass and chain of the surveyor had been called into
requisition to lay out the bounds of the grant, the majority of this
tribe had been swept off by a retaliatory invasion of their western
enemies. This was doubtless considered a special interposition of
Providence in behalf the projected settlement, and a manifestation of
Divine indignation against the heathen, who were popularly considered
subjects of the devil, seeking to establish his kingdom "in these
uttermost parts of the earth." However this may be, the first English
settlers here found the power of native rule broken, and a remnant of
the Pocomtucks gathered for protection near the centre of a triangle
formed by the settlements at Hadley, Hatfield, and Northampton.

The early comers had no fear of the natives, and danger there was none.
They were welcomed by the crushed tribe as another bulwark against the
Mohawks. There is no hint of any hostile feeling on the part of the red
men, or of any anticipation of it on the part of the whites, until the
breaking out of Philip's War. The primal cause of this outbreak is not
far to seek. Whenever and wherever, on our shifting frontier, our
so-called civilization has come in contact with the barbarism of the
aborigines, similar results have followed. And nowhere was this effect
more certain than when our Puritan ancestors, with their inflexible
ideas of duty, confronted the New England savage in his native wilds.

It should have been early apparent to our rulers that these two races,
essentially so different, could not live side by side in fellowship and
harmony, and subject to the same rules and regulations. Eliot realized
this, and planned the isolated community at Natick, which, as we have
seen, resulted in the English settlement at Pocomtuck.

The policy of the whites was, by fair means or foul, to induce the
natives, as soon as possible, to acknowledge allegiance to the English;
this being accomplished, the laws of the Puritans were strictly enforced
upon these free children of the forest, and their violation punished by
fine, imprisonment, and stripes. It does not appear that any particular
effort was made in the Connecticut Valley to teach the savages the
precepts of Christ, but they were held accountable to the laws of Moses,
as interpreted by the rulers, even to being punished for travelling on
Sunday.

Such oppressive acts by narrow-minded good men were supplemented by the
knavery of unscrupulous bad men. The Indian trader, in accordance with
the teachings of the times, not only looked upon the savages as the
offspring of Satan, but also as fair objects of spoil; consequently, the
simplicity, moral honesty, and ignorance if these Canaanites and
Amalekites were made the most of financially. Ignorant of the benefits
of wise restraint, and unused to such wiles as were practised upon them
by the traders, the unsophisticated natives had a hard time indeed
between the two.

Demoralized by the white man's fire-water, they were cheated while under
its influence. Though the sale of rum to the Indians was forbidden by
law, and illicit traders were prosecuted, "conviction in liquor cases"
was no easier then than now. The word of a heathen had small weight
against the oath of a Christian, and fear of the traders often prevented
the victims from pressing their complaints.

Before the advent of the whites the natives seem to have been thrifty
and provident, laying up stores for contingencies. With English
implements and weapons, their facilities for planting and hunting were
greatly increased, and their products should have been correspondingly
larger. The unlimited demand for furs should have stimulated the chase,
and their sale should have added to their comforts in food and shelter.
By their contact with the whites, their lives should have been changed
for the better. Was this the effect? The contrary is notoriously true.
The increased income was squandered in liquors. Like thousands to-day,
they would give their most costly possessions to gratify their appetite
for strong drink. When the corn crop was short, and gave out in the
spring, or had been squandered for rum, they borrowed of the traders,
paying two hundred per cent for it at harvest. They became poor,
shiftless, and dependent. They even pledged their children as security,
to be held as slaves in default of contract. They knew they were
debased, and despised by the superior race, and felt their degradation.
To this condition had come the remnant of the Pocomtucks; a power which
within a generation had humbled the fierce Mohawks, and scattered in
battle the armies of Uncas the Mohegan.

To the natives, the English fur-trader was the representative of his
race; and as they gradually found themselves no match for his methods or
his morals, their simple faith in the white man's honesty, their
debasing fear of his prowess, their reverence for him as a superhuman
being, little by little died out. They saw themselves wronged,
despoiled, and abused, with less and less power to assert their rights
and maintain their independence; and their hearts became more and more
filled with a sullen desire for revenge. In the ethics of the North
American Indian, there was but one mode of gratifying this feeling.
Nothing would suffice but the blood of the offender. This fearful code,
with all its horrors, was felt alike by the innocent and the guilty,
when Philip and the hour came.

Meanwhile the plantation at Pocomtuck was increasing in strength and
prosperity. The rich soil of the meadows yielded an abundance of Indian
corn, wheat, rye, barley, beans, and flax. Game of every kind was plenty
and easily secured. Flocks of turkeys, pigeons, geese, and ducks were
all about them in the woods and waters. The forest also furnished
condiments, in the form of sugar from the sap of the maple tree, and
honey from the heart of the "bee tree." The rivers teemed with choice
fish; herds of deer were so common as to impress the name of "Deerfield"
permanently upon the settlement. Peace and plenty smiled on all, and the
foundations of the little community seemed firmly established. The
planters had come to stay. In 1673, a minister had been secured in the
person of Samuel Mather, a Harvard graduate of 1671. In 1675, they had
already "a little house for a meeting-house, yt they meete in," and were
building a dwelling for the minister. None dreamed that the horrors of
an Indian war were so soon to overwhelm them and change the whole aspect
of nature and of human affairs in this quiet valley. The news of the
outbreak at far-off Plymouth, in June, 1675, raised no fears in them.
The attack on Brookfield, August 2, opened their eyes, and preparations
for defence were pushed with vigor. The swamp fight under the shadow of
Wequamps brought the war to their very doors; and, on the first of
September, the settlers were called upon to defend their homes against
the attack of those who had hitherto been considered trusty friends.

The days of peace and plenty were over for this unhappy people. On the
slaughter of Lothrop and the "Flower of Essex," at Bloody Brook,
September 18, this chosen land was deserted and given back to the
wilderness.

After seven years of wandering, such of the survivors as had courage
enough returned to the desolate scene of their former prosperity; but
the progress of resettlement was slow and painful. Fortifications were
built, old and young trained for soldiers, watch and ward kept night and
day, scouts ranged the surrounding forests, and all were constantly on
the alert. All hunting or fishing, all labor in forest or field, all
journeying, was at the imminent risk of life or liberty. From the
nearest swamp or thicket, from behind some fence, stump, or clump of
brake, at any moment might appear the flash of the musket or gleam of
the scalping-knife. Never ending toil under these conditions, and
unceasing vigilance, were the price of existence, and the stern
realities of life closed in upon them on every side. Labor they must,
or starvation was at the door; for their sustenance must be drawn from
their own acres. They could not look back for aid, as the towns below
were in the same condition. Women and children were not exempt from
laborious toil. Of relaxation there was little, and recreation was
unthought of. Even parental love was constrained and formal. Children
were born into a cold and cheerless atmosphere, and it is not to be
wondered at that they grew up hard and austere men and women, whose
chief or only solace was the hope of an eternity of rest and
psalm-singing, in a heaven earned by the endurance of trials with piety,
patience, and faith that all their sufferings would in some way redound
to the glory of God.

There was little desire or opportunity for cultivating the mind. A dense
ignorance of letters was the rule. Hardly a woman born of the generation
preceding Queen Anne's War could write her name, and many of the most
active and useful men could do no better. The people lived wholly off
the land. Their clothing and bedding were either from flax, raised,
pulled, rotted, broken, and swingled by the men; and hatchelled, carded,
spun, and woven into cloth, and cut, and made up by the women; or else
of wool sheared from the flocks, carded and spun by hand, and knit into
stockings, or woven into blankets or rugs, or into flannel, to be fulled
for men's wear; or into linsey-woolsey, for the women and children. To
the material for men's garments must be added buckskin for breeches and
leggins. Shoes were often made of untanned hide, moccasin fashion, a
method borrowed from the Indians. Thorns took the place of pins in
woman's gear, and thongs did duty for buttons, with men. If the maiden
did have "genuine bear's oil" for her hair, for lack of a mirror her
head must be dressed by the pool or placid spring.

The imports were the metals for the smith, guns, swords, lead, powder,
rum, salt, sickles, razors, jack-knives, scissors, needles. There was
seen occasionally, in the most forehanded families, a show of red shag
cotton, calico, or Manchester. Very rarely some ambitious woman would
appear with a silk wimple, scarf, or ribbon. In such extreme cases, be
she dame or maiden, the stern hand of the law fell heavily upon the
culprit, and certainly with more weight if she wore the unseemly and
offending article "in a flaunting manner."

They had neither tea nor coffee. Their drink beside water was cider or
malt beer. Spirituous liquors were a luxury, used principally in
sickness, at weddings, funerals, or other special occasions. Indian corn
and wheat were staple articles of diet; the former eaten as hulled corn,
or beaten in a mortar into samp or hominy; and probably wheat was
prepared in the same manner. Their dishes were of wood or pewter;
gourd-shells answered for dippers and vessels of various use; and
clam-shells made acceptable spoons. The household utensils were largely
home-made.

Artisans were few. The wood-work of their carts, ploughs, yokes, and
other farm implements, was generally made at home. The cart-irons,
ploughshares, chains, axes, billhooks, scythes, and other cutting
instruments, were hammered out on the anvil of the village blacksmith;
and the work turned out by them is unequalled by any of the craft
to-day.

With all their hardships and poverty, with all their distress and
danger, the people were strict in the observance of all the established
rites of their faith. The meeting-house burned in Philip's War was at
once replaced on the second settlement. Within a score of years this had
been outgrown, and a third edifice erected. It was two stories, square,
with the roof rising from each of the sides to the turret in the centre.
Of the interior finish a little is known. There were no pews; the
worshippers were "seated" in fixed places, according to rules
established in town-meeting, where the "dignity" of each rude bench was
formally discussed and declared by vote. The women sat on the right of
the minister, and the men on the left. The boys and girls were stored
away somewhere in nooks and corners, under the eye of the tythingmen. On
each side of the entrance places were reserved where, on entering, the
men could deposit their loaded guns under the care of an appointed
guard. While the faithful pastor was warning his devout hearers against
the wiles of the tempter within, the sentinel, stationed in the turret
above, watched all approaches, to guard against surprisal by an enemy
without.

The communities of this period are often referred to as pure
democracies, where each man was ranked equal to every other. This is far
from the fact. There were real aristocratic distinctions in every town,
nowhere more apparent than in meetings for religious worship. The truth
appears to be that the settlers were still bound by the fetters of habit
and custom brought from the mother-land. Emancipation from its
aristocratic practices and social distinctions came only with the slow
growth of democratic ideas and the overthrow of kingly rule.


DWELLINGS.

The first houses of the settlers were doubtless of logs, one story high,
"daubed" with clay. A common form was eighteen feet square, with seven
feet stud, stone fireplaces, with catted chimney, and a hip-roof covered
with thatch. These structures generally gave way in a few years to large
frame houses, covered with "clo'boards" and shingles, having fireplace
and chimney of brick, which was laid in clay mortar, except the part
above the roof, where lime was used. Of these houses, two styles
prevailed; one represented by the "Old Indian House," the other, less
elaborate, by the house now standing on the Smead lot. This house is
thirty feet square, two stories, with pitch roof, facing the street
westerly. It is covered with cloveboards, apparently the original, with
no signs of paint. It has four windows in front, and five at each end.
The front door, a little south of the centre, opens directly into the
south front room, which is sixteen by eighteen feet. On the north of
this, is a huge chimney which rises through the ridge, and the north
front room, twelve by thirteen feet. North of the chimney is a large,
dark closet. East of it is the kitchen, eleven by twenty feet, south of
which is the buttery. Stairs to cellar and chambers occupy the southeast
corner. The space over the kitchen is unfinished. The southwest chamber
is fifteen by fifteen, the northwest twelve by thirteen. Each story is
seven and a half feet stud. The frame is of hewn timber, generally nine
by fourteen inches. The plates are nine by sixteen; those at the ends in
the upper story project twelve inches over the walls, supported by the
side plates, and studs on the inner edge. The rafters are sawed, four by
four inches, and supported by purlins which are framed into heavy beam
rafters at the middle and each end of the roof. The whole building is of
pine. There was no lath and plaster; the walls were made of matched
boards. The ceiling was finished by the joists and underside of the
floor above being planed; the floors were double or of matched boards.

The "Old Indian House," built by John Sheldon, about 1698, stood at the
north end of the training-field, facing the south. Its frame was
largely of oak. It was twenty-one by forty-two feet, two stories, with a
steep pitch roof. In front, the second story projected about two feet,
the ends of the cross-beams being supported by ornamental oak brackets,
two of which are preserved in Memorial Hall. A lean-to thirteen and
a-half feet wide ran the whole length of the north side, its roof being
a continuation of that on the main building.

The ground floor was thus thirty-four and a-half by forty-two feet. From
the centre rose the chimney, about ten feet square at the base, with
fireplaces on the sides and rear. South of it was the front entry,
which, including the stairway, was eight by twelve feet. The lower floor
was laid under the sill, which, projecting beyond the wall, formed a
ledge around the bottom of the rooms wide enough for the children to sit
upon. Stepping over the sill into the front entry, doors are seen on
either hand opening into the front rooms; stairs on the right, lead, by
two square landings and two turns to the left, to a passage over the
entry, from which, at the right and left, doors lead to the chambers. In
the rear of the chimney is a small, dark room, with stairs to the
garret. Including the garret, there were five rooms in the main
structure, each of them lighted by two windows with diamond panes set in
lead.

In the centre of the lean-to was the kitchen, with windows in the rear;
east of this was a bedroom, and west, the buttery and back entry. The
fireplace was a deep cavern, the jambs and back at right angles to each
other and the floor.

At the sides, hanging on spikes driven into pieces of wood built into
the structure for the purpose, were the long-handled frying-pan, the
pot-hook, the boring iron, the branding iron, the long iron peel, the
roasting hook, the fire-pan, the scoop-shaped fire-shovel, with a trivet
or two. The stout slice and tongs lean against the jambs in front.

In one end was the oven, its mouth flush with the back of the fireplace.
In this nook, when the oven was not in use, stood a wooden bench on
which the children could sit and study the catechism and spelling-book
by firelight, or watch the stars through the square tower above their
heads, the view interrupted only by the black, shiny lug-pole, and its
great trammels; or in the season, its burden of hams and flitches of
pork or venison, hanging to be cured in the smoke. The mantle-tree was a
huge beam of oak, protected from the blaze only by the current of cold
air constantly ascending. The preparation of fuel was no light task, and
"building a fire" was no misnomer. The foundation was a "back-log," two
or three feet in diameter; in front of this the "fore-stick,"
considerably smaller, both lying on the ashes; on them lay the
"top-stick," half as big as the back-log. All these were usually of
green wood. In front of this pile was a stack of split wood, branches,
chips, and cobs, or, if cob-irons were present, the smaller wood was
laid horizontally across these. The logs would last several days, and be
renewed when necessary, but the fire was not allowed to go out. Should
this happen, the fire-pan was sent to a neighbor for coals, or the tin
lantern with a candle for a light. In default of neighbors, the
tinder-box, or flint-lock musket with a wad of tow were used to evoke a
spark. "Tending fire" meant renewing the lighter parts of the fuel; for
this purpose, there was, in prudent families, a generous pile of dry
cord-wood in the kitchen. With these appliances, considerable warmth was
felt in the room; the larger part of the heat, however, was lost up the
huge chimney. Fresh air rushed in at every crack and cranny to supply
this great draft; and, although the windows were small, and the walls
lined with brick, there was no lack of ventilation. In this condition of
things, the high-backed settle in front of the blazing fire was a cozy
seat. It was the place of honor for the heads of the family and
distinguished guests. Sometimes the settle was placed permanently on one
side of the fireplace, the seat hung on leather hinges, under which was
the "pot-hole," where smaller pots, spiders, skillets, and kettles were
stored.

The fireplaces in the front rooms were of the same pattern, but smaller
than that in the kitchen. Fires were seldom built there except at
weddings, funerals, or on state occasions. The furniture, for the most
part home-made, rude and unpainted, was scanty--a few stools, benches,
and split-bottomed chairs; a table or two, plain chests, rude, low
bedsteads, with home-made ticks filled with straw or pine needles. The
best room may have had a carved oak chest, brought from England, a tent
or field bedstead, with green baize, or white dimity curtains, and
generous feather bed. The stout tick for this, the snow-white sheets,
the warm flannel blankets, and heavy woollen rugs, woven in checks of
black, or red, and white, or the lighter harperlet, were all the
products of domestic wheel and loom. There were no carpets. The floors
were sprinkled with fine, white sand, which, on particular occasions,
was brushed into fanciful patterns with a birch broom, or bundle of
twigs. The style of painting floors called "marbling," hardly yet
extinct, was a survival of this custom.

The finishing of the "Indian House" was more elaborate than that of the
Smead house; but there was no lath and plaster, the ceiling being the
same. The partitions and walls were of wainscot-work, with mouldings
about the doors and windows. These mouldings were all cut by hand from
solid wood. In some cases the oak summer-tree was smoothed and left
bare, with a capital cut on the supporting posts; generally, hereabouts,
it was covered with plain boards,--it may be, in the best room, with
panels. No finer lumber is found than that with which these old houses
were finished.

Their massive frames, each stout tenon fitted to its shapely mortise by
the try rule, whose foundations were laid by our sires so long ago that
the unsubdued savage still roamed in the forest where its timbers were
hewn, stand as firmly as when the master-builder dismissed the tired
neighbors, who had heaved up the huge beams, and pinned the last rafter
to its mate (for there were no ridgepoles) at the raising.


AN EVENING AT HOME.

The ample kitchen was the centre of family life, social and industrial.
Here around the rough table, seated on rude stools or benches, all
partook of the plain and often stinted fare. A glance at the family
gathered here after nightfall of a winter's day may prove of interest.
After a supper of bean-porridge, or hominy and milk, which all partake
in common from a great pewter basin, or wooden bowl, with spoons of
wood, horn, or pewter; after a reverent reading of the Bible, and
fervent supplication to the Most High for care and guidance; after the
watch was set on the tall mount, and the vigilant sentinel began pacing
his lonely beat, the shutters were closed and barred, and with a sense
of security the occupations of the long winter evening began. Here was a
picture of industry, enjoined alike by the law of the land and the stern
necessities of the settlers. All were busy. Idleness was a crime. On the
settle, or a low arm-chair, in the most sheltered nook, sat the revered
grandam--as a term of endearment called granny--in red woollen gown, and
white linen cap; her gray hair and wrinkled face reflecting the bright
firelight; the long stocking growing under her busy needles, while she
watched the youngling of the flock, in the cradle by her side. The
goodwife, in linsey-woolsey short gown and red petticoat, steps lightly
back and forth in calf pumps beside the great wheel, or poises
gracefully to give a final twist to the long-drawn thread of wool or
tow. The continuous buzz of the flax wheels, harmonizing with the
spasmodic hum of the big wheel, shows that the girls are preparing a
stock of linen against their wedding day. Less active, and more fitful,
rattles the quill-wheel, where the younger children are filling quills
for the morrow's weaving. Craftsmen are still scarce, and the yeoman
must depend largely on his own skill and resources. The grandsire, and
the goodman, his son, in blue woollen frocks, buckskin breeches, long
stockings, and clouted brogans with pewter buckles, and the older boys,
in shirts of brown tow, waistcoat and breeches of butternut-colored
woollen homespun, surrounded by piles of white hickory shavings, are
whittling out with keen Barlow jack-knives, implements for home
use,--ox-bows and bow-pins, axe-helves, rakestales, forkstales, handles
for spades and billhooks, wooden shovels, flail-staff and swingle,
swingling knives, pokes and hog-yokes for unruly cattle and swine. The
more ingenious, perhaps, are fashioning buckets, or powdering tubs, or
weaving skepes, baskets, or snow-shoes. Some, it may be, sit astride the
wooden shovel, shelling corn on its iron-shod edge, while others are
pounding it into samp or hominy in the great wooden mortar.

There are no lamps or candles, but the red light from the burning pine
knots on the hearth glows over all, repeating, in fantastic pantomime on
the brown walls and closed shutters, the varied activities around it.
These are occasionally brought into a higher relief by the white
flashes, as the boys throw handfuls of hickory shavings on to the
fore-stick, or punch the back-log with the long iron peel, while wishing
they had "as many shillings as sparks go up chimney." Then, the
smoke-stained joists and boards of the ceiling, with the twisted rings
of pumpkin, strings of crimson peppers, and festoons of apple, drying on
poles hung beneath; the men's hats, the crook-necked squashes, the
skeins of thread and yarn hanging in bunches on the wainscot; the sheen
of the pewter plates and basins, standing in rows on the shelves of the
dresser; the trusty firelock, with powder-horn, bandolier, and
bullet-pouch, hanging on the summer-tree, and the bright brass
warming-pan behind the bedroom door--all stand more clearly revealed for
an instant, showing the provident care for the comfort and safety of the
household. Dimly seen in the corners of the room are baskets in which
are packed hands of flax from the barn, where, under the flax-brake, the
swingling-knife and coarse hackle, the shives and swingling tow have
been removed by the men; to-morrow the more deft manipulations of the
women will prepare these bunches of fibre for the little wheel, and
granny will card the tow into bats, to be spun into tow yarn on the big
wheel. All quaff the sparkling cider or foaming beer, from the
briskly-circulating pewter mug, which the last out of bed in the morning
must replenish from the barrel in the cellar. But over all a grave
earnestness prevails; there is little laughter or mirth, and no song to
cheer the tired workers. If stories are told they are of Indian horrors,
of ghosts, or of the fearful pranks of witchcraft.

This was the age of superstition. Women were hung for witches in Salem,
and witchcraft believed in everywhere. Every untoward event was imputed
to supernatural causes. Did the butter or soap delay its coming, the
churn and the kettle were bewitched. Did the chimney refuse to draw,
witches were blowing down the smoke. Did the loaded cart get stuck in
the mud, invisible hands were holding it. Did the cow's milk grow scant,
the imps had been sucking her. Did the sick child cry, search was made
for the witches' pins. Were its sufferings relieved by death, glances
were cast around to discover the malignant eye that doomed it. Tales of
events like these, so fascinating and so fearful, sent the adults, as
well as children to bed with blood chilled, every sense alert with fear,
ready to see a ghost in every slip of moonshine, and trace to malign
origin every sound breaking the stillness--the rattle of a shutter, the
creak of a door, the moan of the winds or the cries of the birds and
beasts of the night. For more than a century later, the belief in
witchcraft kept a strong hold on the popular mind and had a marked
influence on the character of the people.

For two or three evenings previous to Feb. 29, 1704, a new topic of
supernatural interest has been added to the usual stock. Ominous sounds
have been heard in the night, and, says Rev. Solomon Stoddard, "the
people were strangely amazed by a trampling noise round the fort, as if
it were beset by Indians." The older men recalled similar omens before
the outbreak of Philip's War, when from the clear sky came the sound of
trampling horses, the roar of artillery, the rattle of small arms, and
the beating of drums to the charge. As these tales of fear, coupled with
their own warning, were in everybody's mouth, what wonder if the hearts
of the thoughtful sank within them; that they cowered with undefinable
dread, as under the shadow of impending disaster; and asked each other
with fear and trembling the meaning of this new and dire portent. They
had not long to wait the answer.

Even then, only just beyond the northern horizon an avalanche was
sweeping down to overwhelm the settlement. A horde of Frenchmen turned
half Indian, and savages armed with civilized powers of destruction,
under Hertel de Rouville, a French officer of the line, were hurrying
towards our doomed frontier, over the dreary waste of snow which
stretched away for three hundred miles to the St. Lawrence. In the dark
shade of some secluded glen, or deep ravine, a day's march nearer our
border, each night their camp was pitched and kettles hung. Their fires
lighted up the mossy trunks and overhanging branches of the giant
hemlock and the towering pine, throwing their summits into a deeper
gloom, and building up a wall of pitchy darkness which enclosed the camp
on every side.

A frugal supper, and quiet soon reigned within this circle; around each
camp-fire the tired forms of the invaders were soon stretched on beds of
evergreens--great dark blotches, with luminous centres, on the crystal
snow--a sound sleep undisturbed by the relief of sentinels, or
replenishment of fires--up at dawn, a hasty breakfast, and onward. The
nearer and nearer prospect of blood and plunder added new strength to
their limbs, and sent new gleams of ferocity across their swart faces.
Dogs with sledges aided to transport the equipage of the camp, and the
march was swift.

The errand of this horde was to murder the inhabitants and burn the
dwellings of an unprotected town; its ultimate purpose was to please the
Abenaki Indians of Maine. These Indians had complained to the governor
of Canada about some fancied or real wrong done them by the English, and
begged for redress. The prayer of the savages, and the policy of the
French, were in full accord, and this expedition was sent out to prove
to the Indians that the French were their friends and avengers. Its
object was accomplished.

Leaving the dogs, sledges, and such baggage as suited his purpose, at
the mouth of West River, under the shadow of Wantastiquet, De Rouville,
with scouts well advanced, pushed forward his eager army on its last
day's march with caution and celerity, and reached the bluff overlooking
our valley on the night of Feb. 28, 1703-4. Here, behind a low ridge,
the packs were unstrapped, the war-paint put on, and final preparations
made. Not long before dawn, at the darkest hour of the night, the attack
was made on the sleeping town with fire and sword.

Many attempts have been made to depict the shocking tragedies of this
dreadful morning, but no pen or pencil ever has succeeded in fitly
portraying the terrible reality, the ghastly horrors of this crowning
event in the life of a frontier town.




TRUST.

BY J. B. M. WRIGHT.

    There's a lesson ever hiding
        Deep within the floweret's cell,
    Of an endless trust abiding
        Safe with Him who guideth well.

    As the flowers are ever gazing
        To the land above the stars,
    We, our earnest life upraising,
        Look beyond life's sunset bars,

    With our eager footsteps wending,
        Strive to reach the summits grand,
    Where, the past and future blending,
        His own guardian angels stand.




ELIZABETH.[E]

A ROMANCE OF COLONIAL DAYS.

BY FRANCES C. SPARHAWK, Author of "A Lazy Man's Work."


CHAPTER XXXII.

THE CAPITULATION.

It was the fifteenth of June. The expected ships had joined Commodore
Warren, and his fleet of eleven men-of-war bore into the harbor. Signals
had been agreed upon between the two commanders. The brush was piled
upon Green Hill ready to send its columns of flame into the air when the
Dutch flag at the mast-head of Warren's ship should announce that he was
ready.

Under the inspiring promise of this flag, and in the blaze of the
answering signals, the troops, with drums beating and colors flying,
were to rush to the assault. Archdale's opinion, that heavy guns at the
lighthouse would be disastrous to their old enemy the Island Battery,
had been confirmed by two Swiss deserters, and that place was now almost
untenable under a galling fire. The Circular Battery, built to protect
the entrance to the city, was little better than a mass of ruins, while
the fire that morning from Pepperell's fascine batteries was so hot that
the enemy could not stand to their guns. Land and sea trembled with the
shock of the cannonade. In the midst of all this Warren came ashore. The
troops were drawn up as if for parade, and the Commodore addressed them
in a few spirited words which stirred their devotion to the flag under
which they were fighting. Then Pepperell stepped forward and swept his
keen eyes along the ranks of the men. He had a knowledge of them and an
interest in them that Warren could not even understand. To the
Englishman they were so many soldiers eager to uphold the honor of the
British nation, and he was proud of them. But Pepperell saw the forests
to be hewn, the fields to be reclaimed from the wilderness, the cities
yet unbuilded. He saw the life, great, though half its greatness was not
dreamed of, that was to pour in through this gate which to-day's work
was to open. For, not only that fear and hatred of Popery which marked
his age, but, already, that American love of liberty, to which
priestcraft is so inimical, burned within him. A touch of Winkelried's
fervor kindled his eye. If into his breast, and into the breasts of his
comrades, the bayonets of the enemy were to be planted, yet should a way
be made for his countrymen.

"Soldiers," he said, "some of you fellow-citizens, and all of you
fellow-workers in a great cause, I have no fear of you. I have good
reason to know your persistence, and your undaunted courage. Our mother
England needs us to-day. She has not demanded this work of us, for she
has thought of us as children. Shall she find us grown to brawny
manhood?" A deafening cheer rolled from rank to rank to answer him.
"Foes assail her, and the enemy's hand is at her throat. Have we the
glorious privilege of striking it down? Yes! To-day." Again cheer on
cheer burst from the ranks, and rose above the roar of the cannon.
"Then, let us spring to our work with nerves of steel, and arms of iron,
and hearts of oak, like our ships that outride the storm, like our trees
that laugh at the gale. But, look! it is we who command the gale, for it
is our cannon that thunder. The enemy's--they are faint and fainter in
reply. Their gates are broken down; their walls are broken down; their
hearts quake within them, for all their gallant front. My brave
soldiers, remember your comrades who lie here in their graves, and carry
home to their sorrowing families the news that they have not died in
vain; and carry home to your rejoicing families the assurance that you
have not lived in vain. For more than that homes shall be peaceful, more
than that hearts shall be happy, is it that religion shall be free. But
one thing let us remember: strong hearts are not boastful; not in our
own might do we go forth to this battle. '_Christo duec_,'--'with Christ
for our leader,'--this is our courage. Our flag, whose motto ends with
this, may well begin, '_Nil desperandum_--'Never despair.' We never have
despaired; we have known only hope, and now hope is to become a
certainty. On you rests the glory of making it so. On you. The enemy is
ours _to-day_! Louisburg is ours TO-DAY! When you look toward the fleet
and see the red flag at the mast-head of the 'Superbe;' when you look
toward the hill and see the three columns of smoke rise up--then in your
might, in the might of Christ, your Leader, march on! Fight! Conquer!
And draw breath only within the walls of Louisburg!"

In the tumult of applause that followed this appeal the commanders
turned toward one another. Warren was about to go back to his ship and
give the final orders for bringing the fleet into action at once; for
the lengthening shadows gave warning that the day was waning, and that
it was time for plan and speech to ripen into action. With a word of
parting, they clasped hands briefly, and the Commodore had already
turned to enter his boat, when, with his face toward the city, he
suddenly stopped.

"Look!" he said to Pepperell. "Who is that?"

"A white flag, as I live!" cried the General, watching the captain in
command of the advance battery, who was going forward to receive the
French officer. "Yes," he continued, as Duchambou's letter was handed to
him. "See! he asks time to consider terms of capitulation."

After a few hasty orders, by which truce succeeded war, the commanders
were seated in Pepperell's tent, their voices seeming to themselves to
ring out strangely in the silence about them. The soldiers, flushed with
desire for victory, rested upon their arms in an impatient acquiescence,
and Pepperell himself, who, as a commander, rejoiced in the thought that
bloodshed might be prevented, yet turned martial eyes upon his companion
for a moment, and said, stifling a sigh:--

"They'd have gone at it splendidly!"

"Yes," answered the Commodore; "but this is better. Only we must not
give those ships time to come up, or Duchambou may change his mind, and
we may have our fight on worse terms."

"I agree with you perfectly," answered Pepperell. "We will be no
sticklers for trifles."

Another boat beside the Commodore's had lain rocking on the tide in the
shallow water while the General was speaking to his men. At the end of
his address the oars were plied vigorously, and the boat shot out from
the shore. Suddenly, by tacit consent, every oar hung poised on the
boat's edge, and the stalwart rowers, bending forward with upturned
faces, remained motionless, their eyes fastened upon some object on
shore.

"Yes, it's a white flag!" said one of them at last. "Truce? Aint we
going to have a chance at the '_parley-vous_?'"

A murmur of disappointment answered him.

"I do believe they've struck," said another. And the oars began to be
moved again, as if the sooner their work was over the sooner the pliers
would learn what they were anxious to know.

"What are you saying?" cried Mr. Royal. "What's that about truce?" he
added to the man next him.

"Don't know, sir," the man answered.

"Don't you see the officer with the white flag going up to the General?"
volunteered another.

"Stop!" cried Mr. Royal, decidedly. "Wait a moment. If there's a truce,
I'm not going to Canso yet." The boat was almost at the side of the
waiting vessel, and the men exchanged looks of impatience, although they
complied at once.

"There's Col. Vaughan," said Nancy. "See! he's there beside the General,
and he looks as cross as can be."

"Then you may be sure the engagement is put off," returned Elizabeth.

"I shall not leave yet. I will go back to shore," said her father, glad
to return to a place which only consideration for his daughter's safety
had induced him to leave at that time.

They had just stepped upon the beach again when the General came up,
accompanied by Commodore Warren.

"They're going to surrender," said Pepperell to Elizabeth, as the two
commanders bowed, and passed on hastily.

So Elizabeth did not go to Canso, where the hospitals had been removed.
In the light of after events she felt sometimes that it might have been
better if she had gone.

Two days later Pepperell marched into Louisburg, at the head of his
troops. The French, who were to depart with the honors of war and to
sail for France, were drawn up, as if on parade, to receive the
victorious army. The colonial volunteers looked at the battered
defences, which were still strong enough to have resisted them longer if
a combined attack had not been threatened, and they said to one
another:--

"It takes our General to capture a Gibraltar. We should all have been in
our graves if we had obeyed Governor Shirley, and begun by assault."

From the window of a house overlooking the square, Elizabeth and her
faithful attendant watched the whole ceremony of giving and taking
formal possession of the city, the exchange of salutations between the
French troops and their conquerors, and the departure of the former,
with drums beating and colors flying, to embark for France under a
twelve months' parole. When all was over, and she still sat there, her
eyes full of proud tears at the glory of her country, a voice behind her
said:--

"Do you remember the agreement we made?"

She turned, surprised, her lashes still wet.

"I didn't hear you coming," she answered. "You mean when I said I should
like to be invited to walk through Louisburg?"

"Yes."

"I should be glad, by and by, if you have leisure; although I suppose
that everybody will have that now."

He smiled. "If you saw Pepperell's tasks, you wouldn't think so."

"Then, I suppose that you are busy, too, and everybody else?"

"Yes. Shall I come for you at sunset?"

The words seemed to sound over and over again in Elizabeth's
ears,--words, in themselves, almost ungracious, but which his tone had
made to mean, "No business ranks your pleasure." Already they had
returned to the courtesies of peace. She could not answer in a different
spirit; she must abide by the idle words he had remembered, and go. Her
work here was over. Many of her patients had been sent home, and all
were well cared for now.

Sunset in the middle of June, and in that latitude, was only the
burnished gate-way to a beautiful twilight that lingered as if loath to
leave the land it loved. The city lay as tranquil as if no bombshell had
ever burst over it, or no alien force now held possession of it.
Soldiers were everywhere; but order reigned. Voices were heard, and
laughter; but not even rudeness assailed the inhabitants, who, while
waiting for transportation, had received a promise of protection in
their shattered homes. These ventured out now, in the new immunity from
cannon-balls, to examine the ruins of their city.

"We've done a good deal of damage in six weeks to a fortress that it
took thirty years to build," said Archdale to Elizabeth. "There are only
three whole houses left in the city." As he spoke they were passing by
gaping walls and shattered gun-carriages. They walked through entire
streets where the buildings, all more or less demolished, showed at
every point the cruelties of war. At one place they heard voices coming
from a roofless dwelling, which proved that its inmates still called it
home, and clung to the poor shelter that it gave.

"Take care!" cried Stephen, drawing her back suddenly. And as he spoke,
a stone from the high wall lost the balance it had precariously kept,
and fell almost at her feet. "We will walk in the middle of the street,"
he said, and they went on again, she leaning lightly on the arm he
offered her through the ways rough and often obstructed. It all seemed
like nothing else that had ever been with them, or ever would be with
them again. The city, wrecked by the storm that had raged against it,
lay in the stillness of hopelessness, and the moon that rose before the
twilight had begun to fade made the calmness appear deeper in sight of
the destruction that had brought death. It seemed to Elizabeth like
Archdale's own life.

"Do you know where Mr. Royal is?" he asked.

"I am not anxious about him," she answered, with a smile. "He is well
provided for in every way at General Pepperell's banquet." She stopped
suddenly, and turned to Stephen. "That is where you ought to be, too,"
she said; "and you are here on account of my thoughtless speech."

"Not so at all," he answered, with decision. "To be walking here with
you is what I like best."

She understood that her knowledge of his suffering and her sympathy made
this very natural. That evening for the first time they spoke of Katie.
He said that it seemed strange to him that the thought of her had so
little power over him.

"It will all come back with the old life," she answered; "that seems
broken now, but we shall take it up again."

"Where we left it?" he asked.

"I think so," she answered him.

He said nothing, for he did not himself understand what it was that
moved him so, and why he should be so eager to deny what must be true.
Only one thing was clear to him: that nothing must break the peace of
this evening. This was real in the midst of so much that seemed unreal,
and beautiful in the midst of confusion. They went on for a time in a
mood that Archdale dreaded to break in upon. But there was something
that he must tell her, lest she should learn it in a still harder way.

"I have news," he began at last, reluctantly.

"News?" she cried. "From home? About any one there? Not bad?"

"Yes, bad, but not from home at all. News that I wish you need never
hear; but this cannot be helped; and I know all that can be known about
the matter. Shall I tell you?"

"Yes," she answered, faintly.

"It is about Edmonson."

"I thought so."

"And Harwin."

"Yes. They"--

"They fought," he finished,--"yes. I don't know how they managed it, nor
how Harwin could leave the fleet, but in some way he did." The speaker
paused.

"Well?" she said, tremulously, after a silence.

"Harwin was killed." Archdale felt her hand tighten its grasp. "And
Edmonson," he added. Suddenly she drew away from him, and looked at him
searchingly, her breath coming unevenly.

"What!" she gasped. "Both! Both of them! Two deaths! How could it be?
Tell me what you mean."

"That is what I mean. It is true. Edmonson, you remember, willed, at
last, to recover, and he did so rapidly, that is, he was well enough to
go about, though not to report for duty. How he and Harwin arranged
matters, or met in the lonely spot in which they were found, I can't
explain,--nobody can. Evidently, it was a duel, and it appears to have
been without seconds, to make the matter more secret. Each must have
given the other his death, for they were found--But I need not tell you
all this."

"Yes, tell me how you are sure that they both--died in the duel."

"Edmonson must have given the death-wound first, for it seemed as if
Harwin, in an expiring agony, had sprung upon him and stabbed him to the
heart, as he fell himself." Elizabeth stood motionless, her face turned
away and one hand over her eyes. "The news was brought to the General
yesterday morning, and he sent me over to investigate," added Archdale
after a pause, in which he had studied her with the utmost attention.

Suddenly she turned quite away from him with a low moan. "It is
terrible, terrible!" she said under her breath. "And I--I--Oh, take me
back to the house!"

As Archdale obeyed, they went on without speaking, she no longer holding
his arm, but shrinking into herself as if she would have liked to be
invisible altogether.

"I think," she said at last, slowly, "that I ought to have been willing
to go to Canso. Perhaps I could have prevented the meeting by having
them watched, or in some way. Of course I can't tell. But I ought not to
have been selfish, and ask to stay here."

She had almost reached the house as she said this.

"You, selfish!" he cried.

But he fancied that she did not hear him, for she only repeated: "I
ought not to have been so selfish," and after a moment, as she stepped
upon the threshold, added, "Thank you; but I should not have gone if I
had known. Good-night."

He was alone in the moonlight; in a mood greatly at variance with the
tranquil sky that he stood looking into vaguely. Was Elizabeth suffering
only because she was connected, though so innocently, with this dreadful
thing? Was this all? It must be. And yet,--and yet people could love
where they despised,--there was Katie.

Then he saw that not only sympathy for Elizabeth had made him speak, but
the desire to see how Edmonson's death affected her. Well, after all, he
had not seen anything clearly, and he was neither proud of himself, nor
happy, as he walked away.


CHAPTER XXXIII.

COMPENSATION.

"Yes, Boston has gone wild," asserted Colonel Archdale a week after the
news of the capture of Louisburg. He was in his brother's house, with
Mr. Archdale, his wife, and Katie, as eager listeners. "And not only
Boston," he went on, "but New York and Philadelphia, too. As to Boston,
there has never been anything like it since the place was founded.
Captain Bennett got in with the news about one o'clock the morning of
the third. But they didn't fire the salvos until daylight. Then the
bells rang--oh! how they rang!--and the streets filled like magic. The
cannon fired, the people shouted and wept for pride and joy. All day
long crowds kept pouring in from the towns round about, and at night
there was not a house in the city or near it that was not illuminated.
Pepperell's official report was very interesting. Part of it was read to
the people; but I saw the document. He speaks handsomely of Commodore
Warren, which was to be expected of him; and he says that he believes
there never were such rains seen before, 'which,' he adds, 'is not
perhaps to be wondered at, for we gave the town about nine thousand
cannon-balls and six hundred bombs before it surrendered;' and he said,
too, that 'the day of the flag of truce the fire from Island Battery
made some of the gunners run into the sea for shelter.'"

"Has Elizabeth returned?" asked Katie, after further details of the
surrender had been given.

"Yes; she came home with her father in Captain Bennett's ship. I saw her
that same day."

"How is she?"

"Very well; she looks worn, however; she must have worked hard. She is a
strange young lady,--very charming, though."

"Yes, indeed; as good as gold," assented Katie, wondering if Elizabeth's
fatigue had seriously injured her good looks. She wondered, also, if
Stephen were any more reconciled to his fate. But she did not ask this.

"I suppose Stephen has not come home yet," said her mother at the
moment.

"He will not be here at present. He wrote me that Pepperell needed him
there."

New England was full of the elation that a youth feels at having given
evidence of manly prowess. For the idea of the expedition had been born
in the colonial brain, and the enterprise had been carried through by
colonial nerve, muscle, and endurance. The very sinews of war had come
from New England. Days of thanksgiving were appointed. The soldiers who
returned broken down by wounds or illness found welcome and aid, and the
families of those who had died in the service were considered by some as
opportunities for proving the gratitude they felt for victory. Europe
was amazed at the exploit, and England had good reason to remember a
conquest which counterbalanced the disasters that she had met with on
the Continent, and was the best achievement of the war of 1744. News
soon came that Warren had been made Admiral, and their own soldier,
Pepperell, created a Baronet.

One perfect afternoon in September Katie set out through the fields to
her uncle's house. The walk was not too long when one went across lots.
She would perhaps stay to tea, and then the Colonel would send her home.
She felt that it was very nice in all the family not to resent her
change of mind in regard to Stephen. That day she went on in happy mood.

At last she crossed the little bridge over the creek, and walked slowly
up to the house, wondering that she had found neither of her cousins on
the river this beautiful day. They would have taken her across the
stream, and saved her the distance down the bank to the bridge, and up
the long avenue on the other side. But it was cool under the arching
trees. She sauntered on. Exercise had brightened her color a little, but
it was still as delicate as the petal of a rose; her eyes, too, were
full of brightness; her mouth, with its beautiful curves, was
bewitching. Altogether, a more graceful figure, in its white dress, and
a more perfect face, had seldom made their way through a vista of summer
foliage. Was it her fault if too critical an observer missed in the face
those shadowy lines that nothing but thought can draw, and in the eyes
that peculiar clear depth of shining that comes only when fires of pain
have burned into the soul, and purified it, and made it luminous? The
shadows of the great trees above her flickered over her face, and did
their best to make up the defect, and her long lashes threw a beautiful
shade around the bright brown eyes. A young life that suffering has
never touched has a wonderful charm in its exemption. It is only when
suffering fails in its work that something is missed in the face it has
passed over.

As she came near the house she saw that the hall door stood open. She
thought that her uncle, or one of the girls, was there. With a smile of
greeting she ran the few more steps up the avenue, and standing on the
threshold, called merrily:--

"Here am I! Where are you, somebody? Uncle Walter? Faith?" Then she gave
a cry of surprise, and, holding out her hand without any embarrassment,
said:--

"Stephen! you at home? I hadn't heard of it. When did you come?"

Archdale stood a moment motionless, looking at her fixedly. Then he came
forward mechanically and took her hand, still staring at her, in what
seemed to her a kind of bewilderment, until she again asked when he had
returned, and hoped that he had escaped wounds and illness in the siege.

"Yes," he said, at last, in what seemed to her an unnatural way, "I am
quite well, thank you." After a pause he added, "I was coming this
evening to see you all. I reached here only to-day."

"Come back with me," she answered, "and"--she hesitated a moment, then,
feeling that it was better for poor Stephen to have the encounter over
at once, since he must bear the pain of it, she busied herself with
looking through the open door of the drawing-room, and added,--"You will
meet Lord Bulchester there; he is coming this evening." In spite of
herself she turned pale, and her eyelids drooped.

But Stephen held out his hand with a coolness that she told herself was
admirably assumed.

"I congratulate you," he said. "He is a much better match than I am. He
is a good fellow, too, else I shouldn't be glad, my dear cousin." He had
not called her cousin for years, not since their betrothal, and Katie
looked up at him. Their eyes met.

After her return that evening, and after Stephen had left his uncle's
house, she sat talking listlessly with Lord Bulchester. She was thinking
over the account of the death of Harwin and of Edmonson. She had learned
the details that afternoon. They were dreadful, she thought.

She perceived something of the truth as to this duel. She knew now, as
she had told her mother before, that Harwin was not a man to love to his
death; it was Elizabeth's suitor who had done that. And Katie, at the
moment lightly touched by the crime and the horror, sat lost in
contemplation of something that did move her deeply.

"Yes," she said to herself, "it was she, not I, who had the power. And
now? Yes, now, is it still not I? How very strange!"


CHAPTER XXXIV.

IN THE STORM.

Drip! drip! fell the rain that day, two weeks after Stephen Archdale's
return from Louisburg. It was an easterly drizzle that, looked at from
the window, seemed to be merely time wasted, for the rain appeared to be
amounting to nothing; but if one tried it, he found it chilling,
penetrating, and gloomy enough. To Archdale, as he plodded through the
muddy streets, Boston had never looked so dismal; yet within the last
ten days he had tasted enough of its hospitality to have had the memory
of its smiling faces lighten his gloom. But another memory overshadowed
these. He had not been to see Mistress Royal during his stay in town. He
wondered if this neglect seemed strange to her, or if she had not even
noticed it. Of course, fêted and flattered as she was, the heroine of
the hour, though bearing her honors under protest, she had not wasted
her thoughts upon him. He was doing her injustice here, and he felt sure
of it; she had thought of his meetings with Katie. But her very sympathy
was what he wanted least of all; it was as strong a defence as the walls
of Louisburg.

What did he want? Why had he not been to see her? Why should he go? The
mist and dimness of the day were nothing to the obscurity in his own
mind. All that he was quite sure of was, that whenever he had received
an invitation, and the heroes of Louisburg had had lionizing enough, he
had thought, first of all that he should meet Elizabeth Royal; yet when
he had met her he had never talked much to her; but by stealth he had
watched her constantly.

That morning he was walking toward her home. Should he go in and ask for
her? He slackened his steps as he drew near. But what should he say to
her? Commonplaces? He went on.

Elizabeth happened to go to the window as Archdale was disappearing down
the street. Since his return an arrangement had been made to pay back
the money that she had put into the Archdale firm, and a part of this
had been already paid; the rest was to follow soon. It was no wonder
that Mr. Archdale wanted to be rid of all thought of her, since she had
made him lose what he valued most in the world. After a time she turned
back to the open fire again and took up her book; but she did not read
much. "Is it possible," she said to herself at last, "that it annoys me
because he does not treat me as the rest do, as if I had done something
wonderful? He knows better. And surely I have done him injury enough to
make him wish never to see me again." Again she sat with her book in her
lap and thinking. "There was a charm in that terrible life at Louisburg
that I cannot find here," she said to herself at last. "I suppose I am
not made for gayety. He was one of the figures in it, and he recalls it.
But all that life has gone, and he with it." Then she was shocked at a
disposition that could prefer bloodshed to peace. No; it certainly was
not this: it was because for once she had been a little useful. She felt
sure that Stephen Archdale had met Katie, and, as he went down the
street past the house that rainy morning, Elizabeth's thoughts followed
him with a pity all the more deep that it would be compelled to be
forever silent.

A week went by,--a week of weather that had all the sultriness of
August. Mrs. Eveleigh, more amazed at each added day of this, predicted
calamity, and urged Elizabeth to give up an excursion that she had
promised to take down the harbor with a party of friends. Sir Temple and
Lady Dacre, who had spent the summer in Canada, and had returned to
Boston, were among the guests; indeed, the party had been made for them,
and, as the dainty yacht sped out to sea, none were more pleased with
it, and with being in it, than Lady Dacre.

Archdale was nearer Mistress Royal than he had been since their walks
and talks together at Louisburg. But Sir Temple Dacre had seized upon
her almost at starting, and when the yacht ran ashore for the party to
stroll under the trees on the point and to lunch there, the conversation
was still going on. Sir Temple was asking Elizabeth about her late
experiences and observations; he found the first very interesting, and
the latter unusually keen.

As the company grouped themselves upon the beach, however, Elizabeth
found Archdale beside her.

"I want you to see the waves from that point," he said. "It puts me in
mind of one of the juttings of the shore up there."

She walked on with him, and two of her companions, who had heard the
remark, followed, desirous, as they said, to get a sight of anything
that could give them a hint of Louisburg. Elizabeth would not spoil
Archdale's satisfaction by saying that she saw no resemblance. She
listened while he answered the questions of the others, and by
suggestions and reminders she led him on to vivid descriptions of one of
the incidents of the siege. In talking he constantly referred to her.
"You remember," he said, sometimes; or at others, "You were not there;"
or, again, "It was on such a day," recalling some event with which she
was connected. It seemed to Archdale very soon when the summons came to
lunch.

"I haven't enjoyed myself so much for a long time. I hope we are not
going home yet," protested Lady Dacre, as the party went on board again.

"No, indeed!" cried Archdale. "Where should you like to go, Lady Dacre?"

Her ladyship pointed to a line of shore a few miles distant. "Is that
too far?"

"Not if the wind holds good," returned another of the party so promptly
that a sailor, who was about to speak, drew back again with a frown, and
contented himself with muttering something to his companions.

For a time the wind was fair; but when they had gone two-thirds of the
distance it failed them. The boat lay, rocking a little, but with no
onward progress, her sails hanging flabby and motionless. Gradually
laughter and jest ceased from the lips of the pleasure-seekers.

"A shower coming up," said Sir Temple Dacre, in a tone that he wished to
make unconcerned. But it was not a mere shower that threatened, but
something more awful in the brassy heavens, the stifling atmosphere, the
clouds that had gathered with a swiftness unprecedented in that region.
The air seemed to have receded behind the clouds to swell the fury of
the tempest that was coming. The stillness was full of horror; it seemed
like the uplifting of a weapon to strike. The reticence of the sailors
was ominous. This calm had fallen so suddenly that the boat had not been
able to reach land, or even water more sheltered. It must meet the full
fury of the tempest.

The lightning began to play incessantly. The thunder had a sound of
struggle, as if the giant of the skies were breaking his fetters.

At length the listeners heard a sullen roar more prolonged than the
tempest, and the wind was upon them. The little vessel shivered and flew
before it. It swept past the cove that the sailors had hoped to enter,
and bore down with terrible speed toward the rocky coast beyond. The
sails had been furled, but the wind and the water needed no aid. The
rain came, a blinding deluge; the forked bolts seemed to have set the
air on fire; the crash of the thunder and the roar of the wind and the
water all mingled together.

The company had scattered. Only a few had gone into the little cabin,
the rest preferring to take what small chance the freedom of the deck
might give them. With all conventionalities swept away, they were
themselves as their companions had never seen them before and never
would again. Some were crouched on the deck, with sobs and cries for
help; some knelt in silent prayer, and others sat with a stoicism of
bearing that their paleness and anxious eyes showed was superficial.

Elizabeth, with an unconquerable desire to meet death upon her feet,
stood clinging to the mast. She had thrust her arm through a rope about
it, and so could resist the wind which, as she stood, was somewhat
broken to her by the mast. Archdale, catching by one thing and another,
came toward her. Slipping one arm into the rope, he put the other about
her in a firm support.

She looked up at him. She remembered him as she had seen him during the
siege, imperturbable in a storm of shot. "You have faced death many
times before," she said.

"Never with you beside me. The dread of this is that I cannot save you."
And then, as he looked at her, all that he had come to understand, and
had meant to break to her so slowly, lest she should be startled away
from him, broke from him at once in impetuous speech. "But death with
you, Elizabeth," he cried, "is better to me than life without you. I
have known it for only a little time; I can't tell how long it has been
true. But, in face of death, you shall know it. Don't think me fickle.
You know better than any one else how I played out that game to the
bitter end,--no, the happy end,--for at this moment I would rather stand
here five minutes and speak out my heart to you, and feel that you love
me, and die in your love, Elizabeth, than spend a long life by Katie
Archdale's side. My darling, I am selfish. I would send you away to
safety if I could; but I must be glad to have you here beside me." For
she was clinging to him, and her head, that had from the first been bent
to avoid the wind, was almost upon his shoulder. A moment ago he had
thought that this would be enough to comfort him if she did not turn
from him; now it was not even the beginning, it was only a divine
possibility. He bent over her. "Before it is too late, my darling," he
said.

But she did not speak. Only, after a moment, she raised her head, and
their eyes met.

The wind shrieked in its fury, the water seethed and hissed, and the
boat rushed on toward the rocks. The two turned their eyes away to watch
the sea, and then back again upon each other.

"It is the water that unites us again," said Archdale, "and this time
forever. My wife, kiss me once here before eternity come."

"Have you no hope?" she asked him.

"It is cruel," he answered. "No, I have none. When we touch the rocks
the boat will go to pieces in an instant. And look at the sea." She
raised her lips to his as he bent over her; no color came into her face;
she was already at the gates of death. She spoke a few low words to
Archdale, and then they stood together in silence.

Through the blackness of the storm they saw the turrets of foam where
the water was raging over the hidden rocks. Elizabeth shivered. "My
father!" she said, brokenly. Stephen could speak no word of comfort. He
could only clasp her more closely as they waited for the fatal crash.
His eyes now rested upon hers, and now measured the distance between the
boat and the breakers.

"What does it mean?" he cried at last. "We are not going directly upon
them now! Can the wind have veered? O God! is there any chance? any of
life with you, Elizabeth? No, it cannot be." His voice had an
unsteadiness that his conviction of the destruction that they were
rushing upon had not given it.

The wind had veered, and in veering had fallen a very little. It no
longer rained in such torrents; but the rain had been a discomfort
unnoticed in the danger. The wind, still furious, and the rocks which
they were nearing, left no one in the boat, thought for the rain.

It grew a little lighter. The vessel gave herself a shake, not like the
straining of the moments before, and rushed on. Yet the wind had lost
something of its force, and it was not now driving directly against the
rocks, as Archdale had seen. It might veer and fall still more before
they should be reached. There was still terrible danger; but there was,
at least, one chance of escape.

So the minutes went by. The rocks grew plainer to the watchers until it
seemed to them probable that they were passing over the outermost ones.
But, if the boat could round the point before her without striking, it
would find a smoother shore beyond.

With the brightening of the prospect Elizabeth had drawn away from
Archdale, and they had joined the others who had revived a little in the
new hope. All were breathless with suspense, for the next few moments
were more full of instant peril than those that had gone before. At any
moment they might strike, and then--half a mile or more of foaming water
between them and the shore, while the two frail boats that they had to
make the passage in would not hold them all.

The storm on shore was remembered for years as something nearer a
tropical hurricane than had been known ever to have visited New England.

The boat swept on. Once there came a sound that made the listeners
shiver, but the keel grated and passed over, the point was rounded, and
they entered calmer water, wild enough, however, and found the wind
still falling and the place more sheltered.

But it was not for some time, and not without great danger in the
passage, that all the party stepped again upon land.

They were miles away from their homes, and must find present shelter,
and such conveyance as they could.

On the way to a farm-house that had opened its doors to them, Archdale,
who had been helping in getting the company on shore, joined Elizabeth.
He took the shawl that she was carrying and threw it over his arm,
making use of the opportunity to say a few words to her in an undertone.

He never forgot the expression with which she looked up at him.
Embarrassment and amusement threw a veil over her gratitude for their
safety, and over that new force in her that danger had revealed.

"You would not have had everything all your own way so readily," she
said, "if--if--I mean, I--I should not have"--She stopped.

A terrible fear seized upon Archdale.

"You regret what you said? You did not mean it, Elizabeth?" His lips
were dry. He spoke with difficulty. It had seemed to him too wonderful
for belief.

She gave him one swift glance that set his heart aglow. She slipped her
hand into his proffered arm, and went on demurely in the drenched
procession.

END.

FOOTNOTES:

[E] Copyright, 1884, by Frances C. Sparhawk.




THE ORIOLE.

BY CLINTON SCOLLARD.


    Oriole, sitting asway
    High on an emerald spray,
        Why that melodious zest,
        Bird of the beautiful breast,
    Bright as the dawn of the day?

    What are the words that you say?--
    "Sing and be merry with May,
        Since to be merry is best,"
              Oriole?

    Winter has wasted away;
    Gone are the skies that were gray:
        Hear the glad bird near its nest!
        Come let us join in its jest,--
    Join in the joy of the gay
              Oriole!




A TRIP AROUND CAPE ANN.

BY ELIZABETH PORTER GOULD.


Mr. and Mrs. Gordon allowed no summer to pass without going with their
family to some place noted for its beautiful or historical attractions.
Their ten days' stay in Nantucket, in July, 1883, as well as their
intelligent sojourn in Concord the following summer, had been to them a
fruitful source of many an hour's conversation and pleasure.

And now the summer of 1885 was approaching, and where should they go? To
be sure they could not have the delightful company of Miss Ray, the
young lady who had been with them for several seasons, for she had
married, and gone to reside in Colorado. But their daughter Bessie was
still with them, and also their son Tom. He was now a student in the
Institute of Technology. This constituted the Gordon family.

After a little discussion, it was decided to yield to Mrs. Gordon's
desire to visit the home of her childhood, Manchester, Mass., and take
what she had not taken for twenty years, a ride round the Cape. Bessie
and Tom had never taken this trip, and Manchester was a good place to
start from. These were two important considerations which finally
decided the matter.

As they finished talking, Mrs. Gordon, in her zeal for historical truth,
begged that whenever they thought of or wrote the name of the Cape, they
would spell it with an _e_. She could not imagine Queen Anne spelling
her name Ann.

"Indeed," she added, "your Uncle Tenney in his 'Coronation' spells it
with an _e_, and so does Smith's 'Narrative,' the first document which
tells of it. That should be authority, surely."

When the middle of July came, the Gordons started, as they had planned
to do, to go to the home of Mrs. Gordon's mother in Manchester (now so
well known as Manchester-by-the-Sea), on old High Street. The town had
changed the name of this street to Washington, but the old lady could
not be tempted to call it so, for she had always lived on High Street,
indeed was born there, and she didn't see "why it wasn't the same street
that it always was." The good-sized brick house in which she lived was
particularly dear to Mrs. Gordon, since in it she first saw the light
of this world, and in it some of her pleasantest child-days had been
spent. So when upon their arrival she saw Tom boyishly stop to swing on
the linked iron chains which marked the front entrance to the house, she
herself was swinging on them, as in the olden days.

Upon entering the house, she found herself spontaneously going, just as
she used to do, through the hall to the piazza on the back of the house,
to catch a glimpse of the fresh green garden, with its summer
houses--one of which enclosed the well--which to her youthful eye had
been so grand. How prettily the nasturtiums, growing over the wall,
adorned the time-honored lane by the house! No wonder that they had
caught the artistic eye of Enneking. For these nasturtiums, with the
dear old lane which had known her childish feet, the large elm tree, and
even a portion of the house itself, as caught by his genius, had greeted
her eye when a short time before she had been in New York city. Then the
house had another and peculiar interest, since it had been dedicated,
like a church. A relative of hers, a well-to-do sea-captain, had built
it some fifty years ago, and although he was no professor of religion,
yet he conceived this idea concerning it. Perhaps the size of the house
had suggested this to him, since it was a large one for those days.
Everybody thought it was so strange to have the minister come and hold a
regular dedication service. The house was full of people to witness it.
But when, many years afterward, the first services of a church which was
formed from the old one were held in the parlors of this very house,
many thought Captain Allen's act prophetic.

The morning after the arrival of the Gordon family at this interesting
brick house, familiar to all old frequenters of Manchester, Mr. Gordon
made arrangements for a ride around the town. Every year, he said, had
something new to show. They went first in the direction of Gale's Point.
The sight of the comfortable Smith farm, where Mrs. Gordon used to visit
when a girl, brought to her mind the fact that the whole of this Gale's
Point, where now there were no less than sixteen fine houses was then a
part of this farm known as Major's Smith's pasture land. It could have
been bought for a mere song. But now some of the land had brought over
six thousand dollars an acre. How she did wish that her father had been
far-seeing enough to have bought up all this shore when he could have
done so for a mere pittance!

They stopped every little while to enjoy the fine ocean-views which the
Point afforded. Mr. Gordon's business eye was noticing every
improvement.

"They'll miss it," he said, as they passed in sight of the observatory
on Doctor Bartol's place across the stream, "if they do not build a
bridge over to Tuck's Landing. People then could drive directly there
from Point Rocks here, instead of going way round through the town. It
must come in time. It will come."

He seemed thus to have settled the matter, as far as himself was
concerned; and then wondered why that little wooden building was being
erected on the landing owned by the town. He found out its use, however,
when, a few weeks later, he was an invited guest to one of the annual
picnics held by the "Elder Brethren." These gatherings, he learned, had
become quite an institution for the mingling of fish chowders and bright
speeches.

Continuing their drive, they soon paused in front of the Howe place, for
its fine sea-view, and, later on, by the Black residence, for the added
inland view. The sight of Lobster Cove brought to mind the many good
picnics once enjoyed there. Soon Gale's Point was behind them, and they
were driving past the Masconomo, the hotel which gives such a pretty
background of human interest to Old Neck beach. This Indian name
suggested Indian history to Mrs. Gordon. She was so surprised that her
children were ignorant of Masconomo, the sagamore of Agawam.

"Why, this town ought to have been named Masconomo," she added, after
having told them of his kind treatment of Governor Endicott's men, when
in 1630 they landed on these, his shores. "I am glad that Mr. Booth
remembered him when he built this hotel. I thanked him once for it."

As she finished speaking, she called attention to the quaint,
sloping-roof house perched upon a large, high rock, which they were then
passing. This was the one which Mr. James T. Fields had built and
occupied a number of summers before his death. The sight of it brought
to mind some pleasant little experiences of her friendship with him,
which she related as they continued their drive down the Old Neck road.
On this they passed the house, perhaps a hundred years old, now owned
and occupied by John Gilbert, the actor. A little further on they came
to the Towne place, which, through the courtesy of its owner, gave them
a good look at Eagle Head and the pretty houses which dot the
surrounding shore. Returning, they drove for a while on the singing
sands of Old Neck beach, before going back through the town towards West
Manchester to Doctor Bartol's observatory. On reaching that, through the
kindness of the venerable doctor, they were privileged to view from the
top its fine outlook.

"What a short distance to Gale's Point," exclaimed Tom pointing in that
direction, "but what a long ride round!"

"That's what I said," responded his father. "The bridge must come."

After driving through one or two of the neighboring places, and also
through the Higginson woods, where as yet there was but one house, they
drove back to the centre of the town. Before returning home they spent
some little time in Allen's favorite corner-store, where they indulged
with its genial owner--who was an old friend of Mrs. Gordon's--in
pleasant reminiscences. He told them much of the present condition of
the town, and of its projected changes. He said that the taxes, which
had been as high as thirteen or fourteen dollars a thousand, and as low
as four dollars and eighty cents, were just now six dollars and ten
cents a thousand. He greatly interested Bessie and Tom by telling
amusing and even thrilling anecdotes of some old ancestors of theirs who
had been prominent in town affairs. He told of one in particular, an old
sea-captain, who was captured by the British in the revolutionary war
for being an American; how he suffered everything while incarcerated in
Dartmoor prison, rather than deny his birthright. The originality of
this old "grandsir," as he was called, also interested them. He always
called the gentry, or the "upper ten," the "Qual." This was his name for
the quality, as others called them. Tom was specially pleased to hear
that the farm which he owned and lived on was still owned and occupied
by his descendants, having been in the same family name since 1640. What
is called "Leach Mountain" belongs to the estate.

As the Gordons were leaving the friend who had so entertained them, he
invited them to go in the afternoon to the Essex woods to see the
Agassiz rock, and the immense boulder near it. This invitation they were
happy to accept. Bessie was the only one of the party who had visited
the place. She had taken a trip there the summer before with a party of
scientific people, and had not wearied in speaking of its peculiar
characteristics. No wonder that Agassiz himself had come to see it, and
expressed his admiration for it. Then such an immense boulder resting
upon another boulder and bearing upon its summit a thrifty pine tree,
was certainly a wonder. And they all thought so too, when in the
afternoon they were climbing the rough ladder (manufactured by two
Manchester gentlemen for the purpose) to obtain the views over all the
trees of the town, and islands, with the ocean winding in and out. They
found it hard to believe that such boulders found in thick woods could
have been borne hither in ages gone by, by the force of the waters of
the sea. But Tom declared, with a student's air which did not escape his
father's attention, that since they all showed the marks of glacial
action, it must have been so. After visiting this novel freak of nature,
they drove up through the Essex woods. These woods of nearly four miles
in length were especially dear to Mrs. Gordon, since they were so
associated with good times of her youth. She silently thanked the
far-seeing people who, to preserve them from the hand of the wood-cutter
had secured a portion on each side of the road.

These drives around Manchester led her to reflect how the town was
improving under the influence of its summer residents. New roads had
been made, and one long since closed had been reopened. Bessie had told
of this the summer before, when she had driven over its several miles of
woods to the Chebacco lakes. The streets were now lighted and watered,
and even some of the fences had been removed. This she considered a
great improvement. Indeed, since her visit to Williamstown, and other
towns in the Berkshire hills, she could not be wholly satisfied with any
place seeking beauty as long as the houses were shut in by fences. She
looked upon these as relics of barbarism, necessary only to primitive or
disorderly regions. To be sure she did not see but four or five of the
eleven or twelve cabinet manufactories which she used to see, but she
saw a public library well patronized by the nearly two thousand
inhabitants.

The large cobble-stones in front of some of the houses so attracted
Tom's attention that they all decided to go the next day to Cobble-stone
Beach to see these "hard-boiled eggs of the sea" which the ocean for
ages had been rounding into perfect shape. This they did before they
went to Norman's Woe to enjoy, with a party of friends, an old-fashioned
picnic. While sitting on the rocks at Norman's Woe, Tom, at Bessie's
request, recited The Wreck of the Hesperus. She could never think of the
one without the other, the poet had so immortalized it.

They had several yacht sails, one day going as far as Marblehead Neck,
where they landed, and enjoyed the hospitality of the Club House. Their
swift return to Manchester in less than an hour's time was a great
pleasure. But the days were going, and they were yet to go round the
Cape. The day that was finally set for this purpose proved to be one of
the loveliest of the season. By nine o'clock they were driving through
the Manchester woods, where every now and then the sweet wild roses
greeted them by the roadside. As Mrs. Gordon looked in among the stately
pines she felt as never before the steady friendship of nature. The
thought rested her. These old trees were as true to her to-day as they
were years ago. She soon saw in the distance on Graves' Beach the house
which the poet Dana, as one of the first summer residents, had built
some forty years ago. This was still in the Dana name, and the one near
it was the summer-house of the poet's grandson and his wife, the
daughter of Longfellow.

Later they passed the Manchester poorhouse, with its good ocean-view,
and caught a glimpse of Baker's island. When they came to a small pond
by the roadside, separated from the salt water by only a narrow strip of
land, Mrs. Gordon recalled how, when it was owned by the town (it now
belonged to the Jefferson Coolidge estate), she and her brother used to
gather its pond-lilies with the pink-tinted leaves. They were thought to
be extra fine. Just before they reached the Crescent beach in Magnolia,
they saw among the trees on the right the summer home of James Freeman
Clarke. After pausing for a good look at Magnolia with its Hesperus, its
Sea-View hotels, and its pretty cottages in the distance, and passing
the boundary stone between Manchester and Gloucester, they found
themselves in the Gloucester woods. They drove leisurely along to enjoy
their fragrance. They passed the swamp where the magnolia plant grows,
away from its Virginia home. Bessie, the day before, had seen for the
first time in her life, in a garden in the village, its white fragrant
blossoms on a plant which had successfully thrived, after having been
transplanted from this swamp. Others had thrived as well, much to the
delight of their owners.

Upon nearing Gloucester, the rocks became more apparent. The beautiful
Hovey place on the right gave particular satisfaction to Mr. Gordon for
its combination of woods, ocean-view, and look of solid comfort.

Soon Gloucester harbor, with Eastern Point lighthouse in the distance,
came before them. Then they crossed the little narrow bridge under which
the Massachusetts and Ipswich Bays meet. Tom had curiosity enough to
notice that the Ipswich was then running into the Massachusetts.

After passing the Pavilion Hotel, and driving through Gloucester's main
street with its busy outlook, they came to the Rockport road, with its
quaint houses, resembling those of Marblehead. While on this road they
saw, off on the right, Bass Rock, where was the summer home of Elizabeth
Stuart Phelps.

Just before entering Rockport the rocks were so many and connected that,
if they had chosen, they could have walked to the highway on Ipswich Bay
on them alone. No wonder that such a place was called Rockport.

While in the town they went to the Cove to see something of the
extensive fish business carried on there. They walked on to the Point,
to see the old fort which, in the time of the revolutionary war,
contained enough plucky men to seize a barge with men and a cannon,
which a passing British man of War sent to besiege them. The men were
taken to Gloucester, but the cannon was left there where it remained
until it found a better place in the town-hall yard. There, all
renovated, it now stands as a precious relic of American pluck.

Mr. Gordon was interested to see where the breakwater was to be, for
which government had been petitioned. This he considered a necessity
sure to come.

From Rockport they went on to Pigeon Cove, passing on the way
thrifty-looking houses, the Rockport Granite Company quarries, and also
those of the Pigeon Cove Company.

After having done justice to the good dinner which the Pigeon Cove House
afforded, they continued their ride around the Cape. Driving on to
Phillips Avenue, they passed the Ocean View House, and later the summer
home of Sara Jewett, the actress. Next to this was the house of the late
Doctor Chapin, who was a pioneer in Pigeon Cove as a summer resident.
After passing other cottages, and some boarding-houses, they came to
Halibut Point, the extreme point of Cape Ann. Here they alighted, and
went down on the rocks, and spent some time, on this perfect summer day,
in enjoying the grand old ocean. They then retraced their steps, and
were soon driving past more pretty cottages nestling among the pine
trees, surrounded by wild roses and well-directed care, until they come
out to the main road again. They then drove through Folly Cove, a
fishing-place facing Ipswich Bay, and also Lanesville, where they saw
work going on in the Lanesville Granite Company quarries. At Bay View
they visited the Cape Ann quarries. Here they saw the model of the
Flying Mercury, which, cut in granite, had just been sent on to the new
post-office in Baltimore. They also saw some granite balusters being
made for the same place. All this reminded Mrs. Gordon of her visit here
some fourteen years before, when she had seen the workmen cutting the
eagle for the Boston post-office. The polishing of the granite attracted
their attention. They learned that it took three days of constant
rubbing of sand and water over the granite by machine to obtain the
polish required. They next visited the place of General B. F. Butler,
near there, and also the one adjoining it of Colonel Jonas French.
Thence they returned to Gloucester, through the pretty winding road by
the Squam river, leaving the village of Annisquam, connected by a
bridge, at the right. They arrived in Manchester in the early evening,
delighted with their all-day trip. Mrs. Gordon had enjoyed the striking
and many changes which the twenty years had brought; while Mr. Gordon
was more than ever convinced of the value of this shore to those seeking
the beauty and healing strength of woods. They lingered a day or two
longer in Manchester, in which they enjoyed a moonlight stroll on the
beach, as well as a long, interesting drive all over Beverly Farms.
While driving through Franklin Haven's beautiful grounds, which he so
generously opens to the public, they, with others who had gone before
them, gratefully appreciated this privilege of seeing such beauty away
from the public thoroughfare. "In a peculiar sense," mused Mrs. Gordon,
"such men are benefactors. They rest the tired eye, and calm the
troubled nature."

The Gordons returned to their suburban Boston home wiser than they left
it. And they are fully determined to take another trip next summer. (If
they do, the readers of the _New England Magazine_ shall hear of it.)




EDITOR'S TABLE.


_Socialism in America and Europe._ It is a spectacle quite too sad for
laughter, and yet too comical for tears, which was offered a few weeks
ago by the unemployed and hungry thousands who disturbed the quiet and
alarmed the fears of the people of London. That strange and unlooked-for
outbreak was probably only the first act in a drama the end of which we
have not yet seen. If "coming events cast their shadows before," what
has happened in England, and is constantly happening in other European
countries and in America, bodes ill for the stability of governments and
the peace of the world. Socialistic theories fill the air, disturb the
minds, and inflame the passions of men. Socialism, in one or other of
its forms, counts its disciples by tens of thousands on both sides of
the Atlantic. With the majority it is a dim and indistinct craving after
an ideal condition of society, without any intelligent conception as to
how it is to be reached and realized. The acknowledged lights and
leaders of the movement, however, teach it as a philosophy, preach it as
a gospel, advocate and practise it as a new style of social refinement,
or labor for its adoption and establishment as a desirable scheme of
social reform. There are philosophical socialists, and Christian
socialists, and æsthetic socialists, and socialists whose dream can only
be fulfilled by a general overturning of the existing order of things
with a view to a more just and equitable distribution of wealth, labor,
liberty, and happiness. They disagree in many things very radically, but
they are all captured by one ideal and animated by one ambition, and it
is a sublime and beautiful conception too, being nothing less than the
consummation of human happiness--so far as such a thing is possible--and
the creation of a heaven upon earth. Socialism contemplates a condition
of society in which not only all shall share equally in work, profit,
property, and enjoyment, but in which there will be no "capitalists, no
middle-men, no rent-taking, and no interest-drawing, and if there is any
wage-paying, only such wage as is a due and full equivalent for the
portion of work done, which shall be measured by the exigencies of the
community, and shall be so assessed and paid for as to leave no margin
of profit to any but _actual_ workers;" a state of society, in a word,
on which all kinds of toil, the lowest as well as the highest, will be
so pleasant and agreeable as to be no toil at all. With so high and
admirable an aim, it seems a pity that socialism can find no better way
to fulfil itself than by a resort to lawlessness and violence.
Notwithstanding all that has been said, sung, and written in its favor,
especially in the two great English-speaking countries, it may still be
described as "a thing with its head in the clouds and its feet in the
intolerable mud." However, our business with our fellow-beings, as
Spinoza said, is not to censure them, nor to deplore them, but simply to
understand them.

       *       *       *       *       *

_The Chinese Problem_ is one which is beset with so many
difficulties--moral, social, religious, industrial, economic,
international--that most thoughtful persons, probably, would prefer to
leave it alone if the indulgence of private feeling in the matter could
be made consistent with an adequate sense of public duty. As things have
been, and still continue to be, however, silence is impossible. The
question presses for solution, from many sides, with a painful
persistency, and the further shelving of it would scarcely be good
policy. Here in New England the problem may not confront us in that
sternly practical aspect which it every day wears to the citizens of the
Pacific Coast, and in other parts of the country, where considerable
Chinese populations affect the industrial interests of the local
communities. Nevertheless, its stable and satisfactory settlement is
quite as much our concern as theirs. Indeed, recent incidents in and
near Boston have made this perfectly plain. It is very true that the
perpetration of outrage and violence on harmless and unoffending
foreigners would not be tolerated for a moment by the public sentiment
and lawful authorities of the New England and other Eastern States; but,
in the judgment of other nations, not a section of the American people,
but the whole nation, however unjustly, will be made to bear the
responsibility of such lawless demonstrations of feeling as have
recently taken place in the West, and endure the discredit and reproach
of them.

Aside, therefore, altogether from the purely domestic bearing of this
painful subject, there are strong and sufficient reasons why some
immediate measures should be taken for the mitigation or removal of this
grave national trouble. It is certainly not easy to say what is best to
be done. Pride and prejudice of race is one of the most deep-seated and
ineradicable of human infirmities, and one of the most difficult to deal
with, especially when conjoined and complicated with other motives and
passions equally, if not more, powerful. But, while the recent message
of President Cleveland to Congress shows significantly enough how
difficult the problem appears to a high-souled, benevolent minded, and
practical statesman, it also contributes some valuable suggestions
towards its solution, in the carrying out of which it is to be earnestly
hoped he will be vigorously supported and assisted by congressional
action.

       *       *       *       *       *

_A Short History of Napoleon the First._[F] Naturally gifted with a fine
faculty for historical criticism, and possessing an uncommon breadth and
completeness of information in that department of historical research
which his professional duties have called him specially to cultivate,
Professor Seeley's historical judgments have acquired a weight and
authority quite their own. We were, therefore, prepared, before opening
this book, to find in its pages a careful and discriminating estimate of
the military career and character of the Child of the Revolution,--and
we have not been disappointed. The task Professor Seeley set himself was
one requiring as much courage as intelligence and critical skill; and he
has displayed all these qualities in a most admirable manner, with the
result that a great historical problem has been appreciably advanced
towards its true solution. Mr. Seeley is quite aware of the difficult
and delicate nature of his undertaking. This feeling betrays itself
constantly. "He lends himself readily to unmeasured panegyric or
invective," says the Professor, "but scarcely any historical person is
so difficult to measure." Again: "No one can question that he leaves far
behind him the Turennes, Marlboroughs, and Fredericks, but when we bring
up for comparison an Alexander, a Hannibal, a Cæsar, a Charles, we find
in the single point of marvellousness Napoleon surpassing them all.
Every one of those heroes was born to a position of exceptional
advantage. Two of them inherited thrones; Hannibal inherited a position
royal in all but the name; Cæsar inherited an eminent position in a
great empire. But Napoleon, who rose as high as any of them, began life
as an obscure provincial, almost as a man without a country. It is the
marvellousness which paralyzes our judgment. We seem to see at once a
genius beyond all estimate, a unique character and a fortune utterly
unaccountable."

But, while admitting that the personality and the fortune of Napoleon
were both alike surprising, Mr. Seeley contends that it is only the
accidental combination of both which has impressed and captivated the
imagination of mankind; and he believes that the separation of these
factors by a calm exercise of the judgment will greatly simplify the
problem and reduce the marvel of the great soldier's achievements. There
will, of course, be some divergence of opinion as to this, but it seems
to us that, on the whole, it is a judgment which subsequent historians
will be likely to accept without serious modifications. It can hardly be
called an absolutely impartial judgment. At no more than a distance of
seventy years from Waterloo, that was not in the nature of things
possible, if indeed it will ever be. The historian that would tell the
story of the French Revolution, and estimate the character and result
of Napoleon's military and political action, without bias or betrayal of
personal sympathy or antipathy, would be a most extraordinary person; he
could not be an Englishman; he could not be a Frenchman; he could not be
a German; he could scarcely be an American, for obvious reasons. Bearing
this in mind we cannot but think that Mr. Seeley has achieved
considerable success in the difficult task he has undertaken in the
later and more valuable portion of his book. Fully admitting, as he
does, Napoleon's extraordinary military talents, his astonishing
versatility and fruitfulness of resource, the promptitude, rapidity, and
unerring precision of his movements, Mr. Seeley maintains that what is
really marvellous is the remarkable combination of favorable
circumstances which at the outset furnished his field, and the equally
remarkable flow of good fortune which made him so successful in it.
Commenting on the brilliant victory of Marengo, which the professor
designates "his crowning victory," he says, "Genius is prodigally
displayed, and yet an immense margin is left for fortune." He points out
Napoleon's superstitious belief in his own unfailing good luck, and
shows how, by expecting results entirely unwarranted by the
probabilities, as at Leipsic, for instance, his strange hallucination
finally proved ruinous to himself and to France.

       *       *       *       *       *

The thanks of all lovers of literature are due to our enterprising
contemporary, the _Century_, for securing and presenting to the public
the opinions of leading American journalists, authors, and scholars on
the subject of international copyright. The truly laudable endeavor of
the _Century_ Company to obtain for the noble army of thinkers and
writers on both sides the Atlantic the protection they desire and
deserve will, it is hoped, not prove vain and futile. That any immediate
and satisfactory step will be taken in this direction is scarcely to be
expected. But the discussion of the question, in the form presented by
the _Century_, will, at least, do something to break up the supineness
and indifference of the reading public. That once done, some substantial
redress of an old-standing grievance will not be much longer delayed.

FOOTNOTES:

[F] Boston: Roberts Brothers.




EDUCATION.


In determining a nation's place and power in the great work of modern
civilization, it is not necessary to take into consideration the extent
of its territory, the number of its population, the richness of its
resources, the extent and prosperity of its commerce, the wealth of its
people, the sufficiency of its naval and military defences, or even the
form of its government and the character of its political institutions;
the decision must mainly turn on the thoroughness, completeness, and
comprehensiveness of its educational machinery and work. Judged by this
standard the United States may fairly claim to be assigned a foremost
place in the great community of enlightened and progressive modern
peoples. It is very true that the high schools, colleges, and
universities of the country cannot boast a great historic past; that
they can scarcely be said to be so completely equipped and munificently
endowed as many of the English and German seats of learning; but these
disadvantages of a young and growing nation will, in course of time,
diminish and disappear, while newer and happier educational methods,
employed in a freer and more favorable field, will be sure to produce
results not hitherto achieved in this most important department of human
enterprise and activity.

The attention of the American nation is being turned, as never before,
to the question of education; the wealth of the nation is being
literally poured forth upon a scale and with a munificence unprecedented
perhaps in the history of the world. "In the single decade, from 1870 to
1880," says Dr. Warren, President of the Boston University, in his
report for the year 1884-85, "private individuals in the United States
consecrated to educational purposes, by free gift and devise, more than
thirty millions of dollars." This fact, taken in conjunction with the
truly noble deed of "the Hon. Leland Stanford, who by one act set apart
for the founding and equipping of a new University in California the
magnificent endowment of twenty millions of dollars," speaks volumes.
The educational future of America was never so full of promise as
to-day.




HISTORICAL RECORD.


January 15.--Annual meeting of the American Statistical Society, at
Boston. Officers were elected as follows: President, Francis A. Walker;
vice-presidents, George C. Shattuck and Hamilton A. Hill; corresponding
secretary, Edward Atkinson; recording secretary, Carroll D. Wright;
treasurer, Lyman Mason; librarian, Julius L. Clarke; counsellors, J. R.
Chadwick, Benjamin F. Nourse, John Ward Dean; committee on publication,
R. W. Ward, Walter C. Wright, C. D. Bradlee; finance committee, Lyman
Mason, D. A. Gleason, Otis Clapp. Edward Atkinson read a paper in which
he discussed the question of the cost of living, and showed that the
tendency, recent and present, has been, and is, an ameliorating one.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 16.--The Salem Athenæum proprietors held a meeting to take
action on the proposed consolidation of its library with the several
other private collections, for the nucleus of a public library. The
proposition had already been accepted by the Essex Institute, and a
committee appointed to confer with other societies. There was some
discussion, and a committee, consisting of William Mack, the Rev. E. B.
Willson, John Robinson, T. Frank Hunt, and Charles Osgood, was chosen by
a vote of 41 to 10 to carry out the project of consolidation.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 18.--Annual meeting of the Webster Historical Society, at the
Old South Meeting-house, in Boston. Officers were elected as follows:--

President, the Hon. Joshua L. Chamberlain, of Maine.

Vice-Presidents.--The Hon. Alexander H. Rice, Massachusetts; the Hon.
George F. Edmunds, Vermont; the Rev. Noah Porter, Connecticut; the Hon.
Henry Howard, Rhode Island; the Hon. Austin F. Pike, New Hampshire; the
Hon. James G. Blaine, Maine; the Hon. Thomas F. Bayard, Delaware; the
Hon. William M. Evarts, New York; the Hon. J. Henry Stickney, Maryland;
the Hon. D. W. Manchester, Ohio; the Hon. John Wentworth, Illinois; the
Hon. Lucius F. Hubbard, Minnesota; the Hon. J. C. Welling, District of
Columbia; the Hon. George C. Ludlow, New Jersey; General William T.
Sherman, Missouri; Dr. Edward W. Jenks, Michigan; Capt. Clinton B.
Sears, Tennessee; the Hon. Joseph B. Young, Iowa; the Hon. Horace Noyes,
West Virginia; the Hon. James H. Campbell, Pennsylvania; the Hon.
William H. Baker, New Mexico, and the Rev. Charles M. Blake, California.

Executive Committee.--The Hon. Stephen M. Allen, Edward F. Thayer,
Nathaniel W. Ladd, the Hon. Edmund H. Bennett, and the Hon. Albert
Palmer.

Finance Committee.--The Hon. Nathaniel F. Safford, William B. Wood,
Henry P. Kidder, Edward F. Thayer, and the Hon. Alexander H. Rice.

Historiographers.--The Rev. William C. Winslow, the Rev. Edward J.
Young, and the Rev. Thomas A. Hyde.

Committee on Future Work.--The Hon. Nathaniel F. Safford, the Hon. E. S.
Tobey, Stillman B. Allen, the Hon. Mellen Chamberlain, and Thomas H.
Cummings, Esq.

Treasurer.--Francis M. Boutwell.

Recording Clerk.--Nathaniel W. Ladd.

Corresponding Secretary.--Thomas H. Cummings.

Actuary.--William H. Colcord.

The annual address, entitled "Daniel Webster as an Orator," was then
delivered by the Rev. Thomas Alexander Hyde.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 18.--At Lowell, Mass., the Joint Special Committee of the City
Council, appointed to consider the expediency of observing April 1, the
fiftieth anniversary of the city's incorporation, by a formal
celebration, decided that it was expedient. James Russel Lowell, who is
a nephew of Francis Cabot Lowell, the founder of the city, will probably
deliver the oration.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 28, 29.--A serious ice-storm did great havoc among trees in many
of the cities and towns of New England.

       *       *       *       *       *

February 11.--Meeting of the Mass. Historical Society, the Rev. Dr.
Ellis, the president, being in the chair. The death of Francis E.
Parker, who had been for twenty-three years a member of the society,
called forth earnest words from those who were intimately associated
with him.

Mr. Quincy presented to the cabinet of the society a piece of
Shakspere's mulberry-tree, which had been cut from a block that belonged
to David Garrick, and was sealed with his seal (a head of Shakspere), as
a witness of its authenticity. This block was presented to the
distinguished actor by the mayor, aldermen, and burgesses of Stratford,
at the famous jubilee of 1769. Mr. Quincy gave a short sketch of Robert
Balmanno, a Shaksperian scholar and collector, who possessed the
original block, with Garrick's seal upon it, and whose affidavit is
attached to the piece given to the society. The Hon. R. C. Winthrop
presented to the society a large framed photograph of Daniel Webster,
taken from an original crayon portrait which has been hanging on his own
walls for forty years. The latter was drawn by Eastman Johnson at Mr.
Winthrop's request, and at the very time that Healy was taking a
likeness in oil for the royal gallery at Versailles. The sittings, which
lasted about a week, were held in one of the old committee-rooms of
Congress, down in the crypts of the Capitol. The crayon, when finished,
elicited expressions of admiration from some of the most intimate
friends of Mr. Webster, and it was afterwards lithographed; but this
photograph is better, and is hardly less impressive than the original.
The president read a letter of sympathy prepared to be sent to Gov.
Hutchinson on his departure for England by some prominent citizens of
Milton. An indignant protest from other citizens compelled the
retraction of this letter before it was sent. These papers will appear
in a history of Milton now in preparation. Mr. Deane offered a
resolution from the Council that a committee be appointed to inquire
into the value and extent of the labors of Mr. B. F. Stevens in
publishing from the archives of the states of Europe the diplomatic
correspondence and other papers relating to the United States between
1772 and 1784, and to report whether or not it be desirable for this
society to take any action to encourage the work. Mr. Winsor and Dr.
Green were appointed members of this committee. Dr. Moore moved that a
letter once written by a committee of this society on the centennial
celebration of the settlement of Boston, which does not appear on its
records, be reproduced in the proceedings, since the action of this
society was the first step which led to that interesting celebration.

       *       *       *       *       *

February 13.--Meeting of the New England Historical Genealogical
Society, President Wilder in the chair. The historiographer announced
the decease of members, of which information had been received, viz.:
Ashael Woodward, M.D., at Franklin, Conn., December 30, 1885; Ariel Low,
at Boston, January 5, 1886; Nahum Capen, LL.D., at Dorchester, January
8; Francis Walker Bacon, at Boston, January 17; Edmund Batchelder
Dearborn, at Boston, January 22; Henry Perkins Kidder, at New York,
January 28. The corresponding secretary made a statement as to some of
the more valuable gifts of books for the month, the donation of chief
value being a full set of Force's "American Archives," from the Hon. M.
P. Wilder. The secretary, the Rev. Mr. Slafter, also made a statement
concerning the proposition recently made by Mr. Benjamin F. Stevens, an
antiquarian of local celebrity, formerly resident in Vermont, but now in
England. He has made a collection of titles of manuscripts relating to
American affairs during the period from 1772 to 1784, which manuscripts
are in the government archives of England, France, Holland, and Spain,
and number 80,000 or more. Many of them are of the first historical
importance, and have never been published. The proposition is that
Congress shall be induced to take some measures for the printing of
these indexes and the more important of the manuscripts. The society, on
Mr. Slafter's motion, adopted a resolution in favor of the project, and
appointed a committee to coöperate with other committees or societies in
urging the matter at Washington. Mr. Slafter declined being chairman of
the committee, and it was made up as follows: Abner C. Goodell, John
Ward Dean, Albert H. Hoyt, Edmund F. Slafter, and Charles L. Flint. The
historical essay of the session was read by Mr. S. Brainard Pratt, of
Boston, and its subject was "The Bible in New England." In referring to
the use of the Bible in the Sunday service, by reading of selections
therefrom, he said this was for a long time resisted. The first reading
of the kind was in the Brattle-street Church, in Boston, in 1699, and it
was regarded as an audacious innovation, as savoring of Presbyterianism,
and being but little better than Episcopalianism in disguise. The next
church to adopt the practice was that of South Reading, in 1645, and the
next was in 1669, when the Old South Church, in Boston, took up with it.
The progress of the movement was very slow, as is indicated by these
facts, and the fact that in the South Parish Church, of Ipswich, there
was no reading of Scripture, as a part of the service, until the year
1826. The essayist said there have been 326 versions, of varying
editions, of the New and Old Testaments, or both, published in New
England, namely: In Rhode Island, 1; Maine, 12; Vermont, 18; New
Hampshire, 25; Connecticut, 83; Massachusetts, 187. There yet remains
one in manuscript, of great interest, which the enterprise and wealth of
Boston have never yet given to the world in type. That is the version
prepared by Cotton Mather, and the manuscript of which is in the
possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society.

       *       *       *       *       *

February 13-16.--Floods did great damage in Boston and other places in
Eastern Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut.




NECROLOGY.


January 16.--Death of Henry W. Hudson, LL.D., at Cambridge, from
exhaustion following a slight surgical operation. He was one of the most
noted Shaksperian scholars in the world. He was born in Cornwall, Vt.,
January 28, 1814. His early life was, like that of so many other Green
Mountain boys, one of poverty, struggle for a livelihood and an
education, till finally he had gained his much-coveted collegiate
training, and began life as a teacher in the South. He became interested
in Shakspere, studying the plays with only the slight aids then within
his reach. Almost immediately he fell to work upon his critical analysis
of the dramatist, which he delivered in the form of lectures at
Huntsville, and afterwards at Mobile and Cincinnati. In the fall of 1844
he came to Boston, and was constantly engaged in delivering his
Shaksperian lectures, during the following winter, in Boston and the
chief neighboring cities. The succeeding year they were repeated in
Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington. George S. Hillard, Theodore
Parker, Dr. Chandler Robbins, and Mr. Emerson became deeply interested
in him. His lectures were first published in 1848, and were dedicated to
Richard H. Dana. Mr. Hudson was admitted to the diaconate in the
Episcopal Church by Bishop Whittingham, in Trinity Church, New York, in
1849. He was still more or less engaged in literary pursuits, and in
1852 became and continued for nearly three years the editor of the
_Churchman_, a weekly religious journal then published in New York.
Subsequently he originated the _Church Monthly_, which he edited a year
or two. His only parochial charge has been that of St. Michael's,
Litchfield, Conn., assumed in 1858 and retained until 1860. It was in
1851 that his first edition of "Shakspere's Plays" appeared, in eleven
volumes, after the form and style of the Chiswick edition of 1826. In
1852 he married Miss Emily S. Bright, daughter of Henry Bright, of
Northampton. In 1862 he became chaplain in the New York Volunteer
Engineers. From 1865 Mr. Hudson lived principally in Cambridge,
frequently officiating in parish churches on Sundays, but principally
devoting himself to the teaching of Shakspere and other English authors,
in Boston and the immediate neighborhood. He was for a long time a
lecturer on English literature at the Boston University. A few years ago
he received the degree of LL.D., from Middlebury College. For two years
he was the editor of the _Saturday Evening Gazette_. In 1870 Messrs.
Ginn & Heath became his publishers, and brought out his "School
Shakspere" in three volumes, containing seven plays each. In 1872 he put
into two volumes the substance of his earlier volumes on "Shakspere's
Characters," revising, condensing, rewriting his earlier work, parts of
which he had outgrown, and presenting his final opinions, under the
title of Shakspere's "Life, Art, and Characters," which he dedicated to
his friend, Mr. Joseph Burnett, of Southboro'. It is but a few years
since his "Harvard Shakspere" was brought out.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 17.--Death of the Hon. Hosea Doton, of Woodstock, Vt., aged
seventy-four. He was a man of wide reputation as a mathematician and
civil engineer, and had long been in correspondence with leading
scientists in different parts of the country. His work in determining
altitudes of Vermont mountains is accepted as authority. For
thirty-eight years he made astronomical calculations for the _Vermont
Register_, also many years for the _New Hampshire Register_, and had
long kept a meteorological record for the Smithsonian Institute.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 18.--Death of the Rev. Jacob Hood, at his residence in
Lynnfield. He passed his ninety-fourth birthday on Christmas-day last.
He was born in Lynnfield, December 25, 1791, and moved to Salem in 1820,
where he was master of the old East School in 1822, remaining until
1835, at a salary of $600 per year. He taught an old-fashioned
singing-school in Salem from 1835 to 1850, and hundreds of his old
pupils in Essex county delight to speak of him as "Master Hood." He
returned to Lynnfield in May, 1865, where he had quietly resided since,
respected and beloved by all around him.

       *       *       *       *       *

Sudden death, in Boston, of Francis Edward Parker. He was the only son
of the Rev. Dr. Nathan Parker, minister of the Unitarian Church at
Portsmouth, N.H., and was born in that city, July 23, 1821. He was
educated at Phillips Exeter Academy, and from thence came to Harvard
College, where he graduated in 1841 with the highest honors of his
class. He studied his profession in the law-school at Cambridge, and in
the office of the late Mr. Richard H. Dana, and on his admission to the
bar, about 1846, he formed a professional connection with that gentleman
which continued until Mr. Dana's appointment to the office of United
States District Attorney, in 1861. He early gained a good position as a
lawyer, but his tastes led him more to chamber practice and to the
management of trust estates than to the conflicts of the court-room,
although he never entirely gave up the latter. As a trust lawyer he
stood in the front rank of the profession, and no one was intrusted
with greater and more momentous interests, and no one's judgment was
relied on with more implicit confidence on difficult and delicate
questions. In 1865 he was a member of the State Senate. For many years
he was a member of the School Committee and an Overseer of the Poor, and
rendered efficient services in those positions. He was long an active
officer of the Boston Provident Association, and at the time of his
death had been for many years one of the most influential members of the
Board of Overseers of Harvard University.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 19.--Death, at Springfield, Mass., of Benjamin Weaver, one of
the founders of the _Springfield Union_. He was the most active and
influential Democrat in that city.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 21.--The Hon. Samuel Metcalf Wheeler, a prominent citizen of
Dover, N.H., died after a protracted illness. He was born in Newport,
N.H., May 11, 1823; educated in the seminary at Claremont, N.H., the
military academy at Windsor, Vt., and the Newbury Seminary; studied law;
was admitted to the bar in 1847; soon after moved to Dover, and became a
partner with ex-Congressman Hall. In 1858 the partnership was dissolved.
He represented Dover in the Legislature for five years; was a member of
the Constitutional Convention, Speaker of the House; was a candidate for
Congress in the Republican Convention in the First District, twice being
defeated by only one vote, and he received the honorary degree of M.A.
from Dartmouth. He was at one time president of the Dover National Bank.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 23.--Death at Chester, Vt., of Deacon A. B. Martin, well-known
and much respected through that region. He was aged sixty-three. He was
formerly a member of the State Legislature, and had held a number of
offices of trust.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 28.--Death in New York of Henry P. Kidder, the Boston banker. He
was born in Boston, in 1821. During his youth he received the
common-school education of those days, displaying in his studies much of
the keen sagacity and clearness of intellect which characterized his
future business career. Although never a college student, he was always
what may justly be termed a well-read man, and, indeed, a learned one.
At fifteen years of age he went a mere boy into the wholesale grocery
house of Coolidge & Haskell, a firm well-known to many of Boston's
older residents. In his capacity as clerk he displayed a marked ability,
and won for himself the commendation of his employers. In 1842 Charles
Head obtained for him a position in the banking-house of John E. Thayer
& Brother. In twelve years he became a partner, and so continued until
1865, when a new firm was started, under the present name of Kidder,
Peabody, & Co. Twenty years of unexampled prosperity have placed it in
the foremost rank of America's banking establishments.

Mr. Kidder always shrank from publicity, and led a thoroughly domestic
life. He, however, was a Republican delegate to the National Republican
Convention in Chicago in 1884. He was president of the American
Unitarian Association, Treasurer of the Museum of Fine Arts, State
Trustee of the Massachusetts General Hospital, President of the
Children's Mission, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Young Men's
Christian Union, and was also connected with most of the charitable
institutions and organizations of the city. He had been for many years
one of the leading members of the South Congregational Church, and one
of its committee, taking a most active part in the work of the society.

       *       *       *       *       *

January 31.--Death, at Marblehead, of Adoniram C. Orne, a well-known and
highly respected citizen of that town, at the age of 74. He was one of
the earliest shoe-manufacturers in Marblehead, and a public-spirited
citizen, many important local improvements having been suggested and
carried into effect by his persistent efforts. He was a consistent
advocate of temperance, and was the author of several statistical
pamphlets on the subject, some of which are recognized as authority, and
have a wide circulation.

       *       *       *       *       *

February 7.--Death, at Worcester, of Hon. Peter C. Bacon, of the law
firm of Bacon, Hopkins, & Bacon. He was born in Dudley, in 1804. He was
the son of Jeptha Bacon. He graduated from Brown University in 1827, and
later read law at the New Haven Law School, and in the office of Davis &
Allen, in Worcester. He was admitted to the bar in 1830, and commenced
to practise in his native place, but soon removed to Oxford, where he
went into partnership with Ira M. Barton, who subsequently became Judge
Barton. In 1845 Mr. Bacon came to Worcester, and had ever since been the
leading member of the bar. Since his admission to the bar, fifty-six
years ago, Mr. Bacon's office has been a training-school for the youth
of the profession, and among his old students are reckoned some of the
leading lawyers of the State. Nearly one-half the lawyers in Worcester
were formerly students under him, and there is scarcely a State in the
Union that has not some representatives from this great law-office.

       *       *       *       *       *

February 7.--Death, in Boston, of John G. Webster. He was born at
Portsmouth, N.H., on the 8th of April, 1811, and was, therefore, nearly
75 years of age. He was a distant kinsman of Daniel Webster. His
paternal grandmother was a kinsman of John Locke, the English
philosopher and metaphysician. His maternal ancestors, from whom he
received his middle name,--the Gerrisbes,--emigrated from England to
this country in 1640.

Mr. Webster's early education was in the schools of Portsmouth, N.H.,
and at a boarding-school of five hundred or six hundred boys, at South
Berwick, Me., which he was obliged to leave at the age of fourteen to
serve as clerk and book-keeper in a village store. In 1841 Mr. Webster
came to Boston and joined his brother, David Locke Webster, who had for
several years been engaged in the leather business, and they established
the firm of Webster & Co., with a joint capital of $12,000; the same
firm is still in existence, one of the oldest, if not the oldest in the
same line of business in the city of Boston. In 1845 the firm built a
tannery and leather manufactory in Malden, which covered about one acre
of ground. The same business now occupies an area of between twelve and
fifteen acres. Mr. Webster was in former years one of the most active
business men in this vicinity, engaged in many other enterprises outside
of his regular business. He was one of the incorporators of the Malden
Bank; was its president for several years; was one of the incorporators
of the Malden & Melrose Gas Company, and one of the Suffolk Horse
Railroad Company, since consolidated with the Metropolitan, of which he
was a director and the treasurer for some years. He was director and
treasurer of the Boston, Revere Beach, & Lynn Railroad from its
incorporation to the year 1880. He was a member of the City Council of
Boston in 1855 and 1856. He represented his ward in the Legislature of
Massachusetts in 1857, and again in 1880 and 1881.

Mr. Webster, when a young man, was in sympathy with the Whig party; but,
on the organization of the Free Soil party, became its earnest
supporter, and so continued until the formation of the Republican party,
of which he remained an ardent advocate until the day of his death.

His only son, Frederick G. Webster, in the year 1863, while yet a minor,
was tendered by Governor Andrew a commission as Lieutenant of the
Fifty-fourth Massachusetts,--Colonel Shaw's regiment,--one of the first
regiments of colored troops organized in the country. He accepted his
commission. Mr. Webster was too patriotic, too much devoted to the good
cause, to withhold his consent that his son should enter the army, and
the young man joined his regiment at Folly Island, South Carolina. In an
engagement which occurred soon after the captain of the company was
killed, and Lieutenant Webster took the place of his fallen superior,
and his comrades testify that he filled it with intrepid courage and
efficiency throughout the battle. Subsequently he fell sick with typhoid
fever, was taken to the hospital at Beaufort, S.C., and there died,
before his father could reach him. Mr. Webster leaves a widow and four
grown daughters, sorrow-stricken at his sudden and unexpected decease.

Any one who knew Mr. Webster in connection with charitable and
philanthropic work must testify to the gentle, loving kindness of his
nature and to his ready sympathy with the sorrows and misfortunes of his
fellow-creatures, and with every good work intended to ameliorate their
condition. He was one of the original members of the Citizens' Law and
Order League, was one of its first vice-presidents, and remained one of
its officers to the day of his death. He was the treasurer of the
National League, and the secretary bears testimony to his unfailing
interest in the good work, to his thorough sympathy and hearty
coöperation in all efforts to mitigate the evils of intemperance. No
member of the League devoted more earnest zeal and self-sacrificing
labor to promote the reforms initiated by the League. He was a member of
the Public School Association, and a postal-card invitation to a meeting
of that Association, on Saturday last, bore his name in connection with
that of the Rev. Edward Everett Hale and several other gentlemen.

On Wednesday last Mr. Webster was out. On that evening he was feeling a
little ill, and postponed engagements which he had made for Thursday. He
supposed his illness only temporary, and expected to be out on Friday
and again on Saturday. When his family retired Saturday night they bade
him good-night, and he told them that he felt better. At three o'clock
in the morning they were awakened, and, hurrying to his room, found that
he apparently had difficulty about breathing, and in a few minutes he
passed quietly away without speaking. Mr. Webster was a member of the
New or Swedenborgian Church, and held to that faith very strongly. He
was a believer that departed spirits still hover about their friends and
assist them in the good which they are endeavoring to accomplish. If
such be the case, many a good cause in Boston to-day is being helped by
his presence, although he is gone from us forever.




IN OLDEN TIMES.


In Wickford, Rhode Island, is what is claimed to be the oldest Episcopal
church in America. It was built in 1707, and was once stolen and
transported a distance of seven miles. It was originally built on what
was then called McSparren Hill, but in the course of seventy-five years
the population had changed so that most of the worshippers came from
Wickford, seven miles away. The proposition to remove the church was
first made at a vestry meeting, but was so bitterly opposed by the few
members who yet remained on McSparren Hill that the Wickford faction
resolved on a _coup d'état_. The road from where the church stood to
Wickford was all down hill. They mustered their forces one evening,
collected all the oxen in the vicinity, placed the house on wheels, and,
while the opposing faction were soundly sleeping in their beds, hauled
the holy edifice to the spot where it now stands, and where it has since
remained. As it was utterly impossible to move the house back up the
hill again, the surprised hill residents could only vent their rage in
unchurchly language. Although the old building is still standing, the
present society worship in a more modern edifice.

The house built by Elnathan Osborn, in 1696, still stands in Danbury,
Connecticut. One of the Osborns was six years old when General Tryon's
British troops visited the place. The lad came home from school to find
the house full of redcoats. They were making free with the contents of
the buttery. The boy attempted to back out, when one of the men called
to him, "Come in, lad, we won't hurt you." "Is there any cider in the
house?" asked the soldier. The boy took out a large wooden bowl, went
down cellar, and filled it several times with apple juice for the men.
When the British fired the village, a few hours later, there was no
torch applied to the home of Elnathan Osborn. The house still stands at
the foot of Main street. It is a low, hip-roofed house, studded with
enormous beams, and lighted with tiny diamond window-panes.

The oldest building in Boston is said to be the one which stands at the
corner of Moon and Sun Court streets. It was built in 1677, and conveyed
by Benjamin Rawlings to Ralph Barger, February 8, 1699, for £45, New
England currency, as per record in Registry of Deeds, lib. 19, fol. 270.

John Hollis, Braintree, who died in 1718, left, as is recorded in the
inventory of his estate, "one baptising suit."

Edwin D. Mead, of Boston, is to give a course of six lectures on "The
Pilgrim Fathers," before the students of Bates College at Lewiston, Me.
The lectures will begin March 1, and will be open to the public.

The New Haven Colony Historical Society has for its officers Simeon E.
Baldwin president, ex-Governor English vice president, Thomas R.
Trowbridge, Jr., secretary, Robert Peck treasurer, and a board of
twenty-five directors.

A lively discussion has been started as to which is the oldest church in
Connecticut. Stamford claims that its church that just celebrated its
two hundred and fiftieth anniversary was the first organized on
Connecticut soil. An old pastor of the First Church of Hartford writes
to claim that that church was organized in 1633, and that the two
hundred and fiftieth anniversary was celebrated in 1883. Stamford does
not deny that the Hartford Church may have been organized in 1633, but
says it was not in Connecticut at that time.

Hartford, Conn., has a public library of thirty-six thousand volumes,
but it costs anybody five dollars a year to get books out of it, and
there are only six hundred people in the whole city who care to pay that
price for its privileges.

       *       *       *       *       *

OLD MARRIAGE RECORDS.

The following authentic list of marriages, by the Rev. Thomas Skinner,
second pastor of the Congregational Church in Westchester parish, in the
town of Colchester, Conn., is furnished for use in the NEW ENGLAND
MAGAZINE, by Mr. Martin L. Roberts, of New Haven, Conn.:--

1755.--Sept. 1, Caleb Loomis, Jr., and Ann Strong; Ezra Bigelow and
Hannah Strong.--Sept. 24, John Carrier and Hannah Knowlton.

1756.--Nov. 5, Rev. Ephraim Little and Mrs. Abigail Bulkley.

1758.--Jan. 4, Policarphus Smith and Dorothy Skinner; John Mitchell and
Hepzibah Shepardson.--Jan. 24, Jacob Smith and Jemima Fuller.--April,
Joshua Bailey and Ann Foot.--April 27, Samuel Brown of East Hampton and
Elizabeth Brainerd.--May 4, William Chamberlain, Jr., and Mary Day;
Bezaleel Brainerd and Hannah Brainerd.

1759.--Paul Gates and Mehitable Rogers; ----, Jehiel Fuller and Sarah
Day; ----, Daniel Shipman and Elizabeth Hartman.--July 10, John Bigelow
and Hannah Douglas.--Nov. 8, John Murray and Desire Sawyer.--Dec. 6,
Noah Day and Ann Loomis.

1760.--David Bigelow and Patience Foote.--April, Roswell Knowlton and
Ann Dutton.--May 7, Thomas Chipman and Bethiah Fuller.--May 29, Levi
Gates and Lydia Crocker.--Dec. 9, Lazarus Watrous and Lois Loomis.--Dec.
24, Hezekiah Waterman and Joanna Isham.

1764.--Jan. 8, David Bigelow and Mary Brainerd; Benjamin Morgan and
Elizabeth Isham.

       *       *       *       *       *

AN EARLY BELL IN SALISBURY.--The town records of Salisbury, Mass.,
under date of 3, 1st mo. 1647: "it was ordered yt Richard North shall
have fivetie shillings for ringing the bell tow yeares & a half past &
twenty shillings to ring it one yeare more, beginning att Aprill next
ensueing." A year previous it was "voated to daube the meeting house."

A. T.

       *       *       *       *       *

THE BOUNDARY LINE BETWEEN MASSACHUSETTS AND NEW HAMPSHIRE.--A committee
appointed by the freemen of Salisbury, Mass., in 1658, to determine the
boundary between Salisbury and Hampton (between Massachusetts and New
Hampshire), reported, "the sayed line is very darke & doubtful to us."
The same can be said in 1886, two hundred and thirty-three years later.

A. T.

       *       *       *       *       *

The occasional revival of an old Indian name for an hotel, club, or
street should interest every American. Indeed, such names should be more
frequently revived than they are, to connect us in our history with the
Indian who preceded us. They also have an educational value. For it is a
fact that many, upon hearing, for the first time, of the _Mas'cono'mo_
and _Nan'nepash'emet_ hotels at Manchester-by-the-Sea and Marblehead
respectively, have been led to seek for the origin of the names, and in
this way have made their first acquaintance with the old Indian chiefs
who held full sway where the hotels now stand. It is possible that many
have been led to look up Indian history still farther since the new
_Algonquin_ Club was formed in Boston.

It is to be regretted that so many of the full-of-meaning, musical
Indian names ever should have been replaced by such commonplace English
ones as are now frequently met with. Who can say that _Chelsea_ is an
improvement on sweet _Win'nisim'met_? Or that the slight elevation which
joins that city to Everett, called _Mount Washington_ (how ludicrous
that must strike strangers who are familiar with _the_ Mount
Washington!), was not better as _Sagamore Hill_, the Indian name for it?
Some of its public-spirited inhabitants are going back to that; and they
dare to prophesy that, by the time Chelsea is a part of Boston as the
_Winnisimmet District_, it will have no other name.




LITERATURE AND ART.


The value of town histories is a subject which has been editorially
considered more than once in this magazine. Recognizing the importance
of these local histories in their relations to New England history in
general, it always gives us pleasure to note the additions which are
made from time to time to this department of historical literature. Such
an addition has recently been made in consequence of the centennial
anniversary of the town of Heath, Franklin county, Mass., which was
observed on the nineteenth of August last, the historical addresses with
other matter having been just published in a neat volume[G] of about one
hundred and sixty pages.

Heath, which was named from General William Heath, is a striking example
of the decadence of the New England hill towns, its population having
fallen from eleven hundred and ninety-nine in the year 1830, to five
hundred and sixty-eight at present. The site of old Fort Shirley is in
the township. Fifty years ago, the town afforded an unusual proportion
of its population to the professional ranks, and was noted for its
religious and educational influence and patronage. The two principal
addresses given in the book are by John H. Thompson, Esq., of Chicago,
and Rev. C. E. Dickinson, of Marietta, Ohio, and will be found valuable
to the general reader, as well as to the native of the town. Excepting
some typographical errors, the book is a model of such a work, and
reflects credit on the editor, Mr. E. P. Guild.

       *       *       *       *       *

_Leaves from a Lawyer's Life, Afloat and Ashore_, contains some very
interesting personal reminiscences of the War of the Rebellion, and aims
to supplement and correct the too meagre and often inaccurate accounts
of "the naval and military forces whose services, sufferings, and
sacrifices" are there passed in review. The theme is popular and
inspiring, and the story is vigorously and eloquently told. The author
adopts a style of narrative admirably adapted to preserve the "many
honorable recollections" he records, and rescue from oblivion a number
of interesting facts which he complains "are fast vanishing into gloom."
The opening chapter, written from fulness of knowledge, and with a clear
perception of the relative value and importance of facts, will repay
careful perusal, notwithstanding all that has recently appeared in
popular American serials on the subject of the Civil War. In the
account it gives of the blockade of the Atlantic and Gulf ports, after
the notification of Flag Officer Pendergast, at Hampton Roads, April 30,
1861, we have a splendid illustration of the manner in which, in a great
national crisis, a lack of resources is made up for by energy, bravery,
and businesslike despatch. The account of the chase of the gold-laden
steamer R. E. Lee, under the command of the daring Captain Wilkinson, by
the Federal steamer Iroquois, is very exciting; and the charm thus felt
at the outset is evenly distributed and remarkably well sustained
throughout the book. Mr. Cowley's work is valuable, as supplying a place
not filled by any of the larger and more pretentious histories of the
late war. Full of vivid description, spicy detail, felicitous citation,
and sparkling anecdote, _Leaves from a Lawyer's Life_ is sure to prove a
genuine source of pleasure to a wide circle of readers.

       *       *       *       *       *

_The Origin of Republican Form of Government._[H] This book discusses in
an historico-philosophical vein the genesis, growth, and development of
the constitution of the American Republic, and the exposition attempted
in its pages, if not exhaustive, is yet lucid, masterly, and suggestive.
While unable to admit the soundness of some of the author's premises, or
to acquiesce in all his conclusions, we are glad to recognize the high
value of his contribution to the literature of a profoundly interesting
subject, which hitherto can hardly be said to have monopolized the
attention and thought of American historians. The author is probably
wrong in thinking that in the pages of his interesting little book he is
pursuing an almost entirely untravelled path, but there can be no doubt
that considerable credit is due to him, for pointing out the exceeding
fruitfulness of a too much neglected field of historical inquiry. The
chapters on the political and religious causes of the Revolution are
worthy of a careful reading, and indeed we cordially commend the book as
a whole to all who wish to know the "record of their country's birth,"
and the constitutional guaranties of their personal "peace, liberty and
safety."

       *       *       *       *       *

_Battle of the Bush_,[I] by Robert B. Caverly, is a series of historical
dramas published in pamphlet form, to be subsequently consolidated,
according to the advertisement of the publisher, "into a neat volume of
about three hundred and fifty pages." To those in love with the curious
legends and romantic incidents of early colonial history this work in
its present attractive form will be especially welcome. The simplicity
as well as savagery of Indian life is here placed in conjunction and
contrast with the sober domestic manners and customs, high-toned
morality and religion of the early Pilgrim people. The various
relations between the two, incident to neighborhood, trade, and
intercourse,--relations sometimes of friendship and sometimes of
conflict,--are often strikingly exhibited, and the author succeeds in
awakening a genuine interest in those old-time affairs. The beautiful
illustrations which enrich the work give it an additional attraction and
value.

       *       *       *       *       *

_Railroad Transportation; its History and its Laws_,[J] by Arthur J.
Hadley, is worthy of careful study, and is likely to attract some
attention, discussing, as it does, questions of railroad history and
management which have become matters of public concern, and aiming to
present clearly the more important facts of American railroad business,
to explain the principles involved, and to compare the railroad
legislation of different countries and the results achieved. Mr.
Hadley's book admirably supplements the extant literature on the
subject, prominently presenting and ably discussing many hitherto
neglected features of importance. The book will prove valuable to
railroad stockholders, to statesmen desirous of a fuller understanding
of a question of great national interest, and to the American public
generally.

FOOTNOTES:

[G] Heath, Mass., Centennial, August 19th, 1885. Addresses, Speeches,
Letters, Statistics, etc. Edited by Edward P. Guild. Published for the
Committee.

[H] New York and London: G. P. Putnam & Sons.

[I] Boston: published by the author. For sale by B. P. Russell.

[J] G. P. Putnam & Sons: New York and London.




INDEX TO PERIODICAL LITERATURE.


     (First numeral refers to foot-note and name of periodical.
     Second number to page. Date of the periodical is that of month
     preceding this issue of the NEW ENGLAND MAGAZINE, unless
     otherwise stated.)


ACADEMIC AND EDUCATIONAL. Tufts College. _Rev. E. H. Capen. D.D._ 8,
99.--Abbot Academy. _Annie Sawyer Downs._ 8, 136.--Overwork in Schools.
_John D. Philbrick, LL.D._ 10, 330.--Education in Rome. _L. R. Klemm,
Ph.D._ 10, 335.--The Problem of Woman's Education. _Nicolo D'Alfonso._
_Translated by V. Chamberlin._ 10, 360.--The King's English at Home and
at School. _J. H. May_. 10, 369.--Our Insular Ignorance. _John Robert
Seeley._ 16, 199.--The Lady Teacher. _Margaret W. Sutherland._ 17,
55.--The Year's Work. _Elizabeth Taylor._ 17, 68.--How Shall we Teach
Writing in Primary Grades? 17, 77.

ANTHROPOLOGY. The Dance in Place Congo. _George W. Cable._ 7, 517.

ARCHÆOLOGY, PHILOLOGY, AND MYTHOLOGY. The Origin of the Alphabet. _A. H.
Sayce._ 16, 145.--Solar Myths. _F. M. Müller_. 16, 219.--In the
Catacombs of Italy. 18, 202.

ARCHITECTURE. Recent Architecture in America. _Mrs. Sckuyler Van
Renssalaer._ 7, 548.--A New England Home. _Lyman H. Weeks._ 19,
142.--The Architectural Exhibition. _M. G. H._. 19, 146.

ART. Antoine Louis Barye. _Henry Eckford._ 7, 483.--On Drapery and its
Interpretation. _Thomas Gordon Hale._ 16, 255.--Fresco Decoration. 19,
144.--The Decoration of City Houses. _Ralph A. Cram._ 19, 150.--New
Lamps and Old. 19, 148.--Some Designs in Umbrella Stands, etc. _F. B.
Brock._ 19, 157.

BIOGRAPHY. W. H. Brown. J. H. Kennedy. 3, 410.--Thomas Burham. David W.
Cross. Henry J. Seymour. 3, 427.--Anecdotes of McClellan's Bravery. Z.
7, 515.--Anthony Wayne. _Gen. John Watts De Peyster._ 2, 127.--Toombs.
_Charles F. Woodbury._ 14, 125.--Two Old-fashioned Love Matches. _Helen
Campbell._ 14, 157.--Auber. 16, 207.--Who was John Harvard? _Frank J.
Symes._ 14, 181.--Sketch of Dr. W. E. Carpenter. 5, 538.--Sketch of
James Eads. 5, 544.--Women in Astronomy. _G. Langrange._ 5, 534.--Daniel
Webster as a School-master, _Elizabeth Porter Gould._ 10,
323.--Relations of Biography with History. _Hon. Marshall P. Wilder._
10, 341.--General Grant. _Gen. L. F. Jennings._ 10, 347.--Lives and
Homes of American Actors. _Lisle Lester._ 18, 104.--Sherman's Opinion of
Grant. 13, 200.

HISTORY.--Two Famous London Churches, 1, 144.--The City of Albany. Two
Hundred Years of Progress. _Frederic G. Mather._ 2, 105.--The Charleston
Convention, 1788. _A. W. Clason._ 2, 153.--Historic Aspects of Sable
Island. _J. McDonald Oxley, LL.B., B.A._ 2, 162.--The New Mexican
Campaign of 1862. _A. A. Hayes._ 2, 171.--Army of the Potomac under
Hooker. _Major William H. Mills._ 2, 185.--The City of the Straits.
_Henry A. Griffin._ 3, 348.--S. S. Cox's Three Decades of Federal
Legislation. _J. F. Rhodes._ 3, 356.--Siege of Fort Pitt. _T. J.
Chapman._ 3. 387.--Chicago. _Consul W. Butterfield._ 3, 393.--Geography
and Early American History. _B. A. Hinsdale._ 3, 433.--Preparing for the
Wilderness Campaign. _U. S. Grant._ 7, 573.--Our March Against Pope.
_Gen. James Longstreet._ 7, 601.--With Jackson's "Foot Cavalry" at the
Second Manassas. _Allen C. Redwood._ 7, 614.--On Detached Service, _C.
A. Patch._ 8, 121.--The Campaign of Shiloh. _Gen. G. T. Beauregard._ 13,
159.--A Family Romance of the Time of Elizabeth. _A. T. Story._ 12,
491.--Lost Journals of a Pioneer. _C. E. Montgomery._ 14, 173.--The Old
Régime of San Francisco. _Bernard Moses._ 14, 195.--Town Government in
Rhode Island. _W. G. Foster._ 21, 5.--The Narragansett Planters. _Edward
Channing._ 21, 5.

INDUSTRY.--Pittsburgh Glass and Glass-makers. _J. H. Seymour_. 3,
367.--Beginning of Some Public Enterprises in Western Pennsylvania. _W.
S._ 3, 414.

LITERATURE.--Original New England Magazine. _Rev. Edgar Buckingham._ 8,
153.--Macbeth with Kelly's Music. _A. A. Wheeler._ 14, 185.--Recent
Verse. 14, 205.--Recent Fiction. 14, 210.--Poetry, Politics, and
Conservatism. _George N. Curzon._ 16, 154.--Superfine English. 16,
177.--On Love's Labor Lost. _Walter Pater._ 16, 234.

MEDICINE, HYGIENE, PHYSIOLOGY.--Instinct as a Guide to Health. _Felix L.
Oswald, M.D._ 5, 517.--Medical Practice in Damaraland. _G. G. Büttner._
5, 526.--Cause of Acquired Immunity from Infectious Diseases. _James
Law, F.R.C.V.S._ 15, 97.--Health of United States Army. _B. F. Pope,
M.D._ 15, 112.--Yellow Fever Prevention. _Joseph Holt, M.D._ 15,
118.--The Plumbers. President Allison's Circular. _A. N. Bell._ 15,
121.--Impure Air and Unhealthy Occupations, etc. _C. W. Chancellor,
M.D._ 15, 125.--State Boards of Health of the United States. _G. P.
Conn._ 15, 133.--Crime and Insanity. 16, 249.--Sanitary House
Furnishing. _Glenn Brown, A.A.I.A._ 19, 154.

MISCELLANEOUS.--Lessons of the America's Cup Races. _J. Heslop._ 12,
498.

MILITARY.--The Increasing Curse of European Militancy. _Alfred Russell
Wallace._ 5, 521--The Musket as a Social Force. _John McElroy._ 5,
485.--The Grand Army of the Republic in Massachusetts. _Past
Commander-in-Chief George S. Merrill._ 8, 113.

MUSIC.--Chinese Music, etc. 20, 33.--Handel's "Messiah." 20,
34.--Technical Drill. 20, 36.--Opera Sung by Americans. 20, 37.

NATURAL HISTORY.--Will the Land become a Desert? _Joseph Edgar
Chamberlain._ 7, 532.--Pine Trees of Florida. 12, 581.--Acclimatization.
_Professor Rudolph Virchow._ 5, 507.

POLITICS. ECONOMICS.--Need and Nature of Civil Service Reform. _Dorman
B. Eaton_. 4, 171.--Recent Experiments in State Taxation _H. J. Ten
Eyck._ 5, 460.--Discrimination in Railway Rates. _Gerrit L. Lansing._ 5,
494.--Influence of Inventions on Civilization. _C. Smith._ 5,
474.--Irish Home Rule Agitation: Its History and Issues. _Rev. H. O.
Hewitt._ 8, 157.--The Congo and the President's Message. _John A.
Kasson._ 13, 119.--Race and the Solid South. _Cassius M. Clay._ 13,
134.--America's Land Question. _A. J. Desmond._ 13, 153.--England and
Ireland. _Henry George._ 13, 185.--Disintegration of Canada. _Dr.
Prosper Bender._ 2, 144.--The Chinese Immigration Discussion. _Frances
E. Sheldon._ 14, 113.--Benefits of Chinese Immigration. _John S.
Hittell._ 14, 120.--German Expatriation Treaty. _A. A. Sargent._ 14,
148.--The Coming Contests of the World. 16, 164.--An Anglo-Saxon
Alliance. _J. Redpath Dougall._ 16, 190.

RECREATION AND AMUSEMENT.--Around the World on a Bicycle. _Thomas
Stevens._ 12, 506.--Croquet in Elyria. _W. F. Hurlbert._ 12,
526.--Cruise of the "Philoon." _James F. Jerome._ 12,
548.--Recollections of Mardi Gras. _M. R. Dodge._ 12, 566.

SCIENCE AND INVENTIONS.--Bishop's Ring around the Sun. _W. M. Davis._ 5,
466.--Acclimatization. _Prof. Rudolph Virchow._ 5, 507.--The Problem of
Photography in Color. _Prof. O. N. Rood._ 5, 531.--Improvement of East
River and Hell Gate. _Gen. John Newton._ 5, 433.--The Modern Ice-Yacht.
_C. L. Norton._ 12, 536.--Some Fallacies of Science. "_Ouida._" 13,
137.--Hygiene in Dwellings. _G. N. Bell._ 15, 151.

TRAVEL AND DESCRIPTION.--Hints from Japanese Homes. _C. R. D._ 12,
575.--A Vacation in the Tropics. 12, 581.

       *       *       *       *       *

1 _The Quiver._

2 _Magazine of Am. History._

3 _Magazine of Western History_ (Cleveland, O.).

4 _Lippincott's Magazine._

5 _Popular Science Monthly._

6 _Queries_ (Buffalo, N.Y.).

7 _The Century._

8 _New England Magazine._

9 _St. Nicholas._

10 _Education._

11 _Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political
Science._

12 _Outing._

13 _North American Review._

14 _Overland Monthly._

15 _The Sanitarian._

16 _The Eclectic._

17 _The Ohio Educational Monthly._

18 _The Brooklyn Magazine._

19 _The Decorator and Furnisher._

20 _The Musical Herald._

21 _Johns Hopkins University Studies._

       *       *       *       *       *

Several months ago the publishers of the NEW ENGLAND MAGAZINE began a
series of illustrated papers on the principal colleges, seminaries, and
other educational institutions of New England. In pursuance of this
plan, ably written and amply illustrated articles on Brown University,
Tufts College, Abbott Academy, have already appeared; also the Boston
University School of Law, with fine steel portrait of its dean; others
are in hand, or in process of preparation, and will appear in due
course, among them being Trinity College, Williams College, Bowdoin
College, Andover Theological Seminary, Phillips Academy, Andover, and
Phillips Academy, Exeter, etc., etc.

[Illustration: James Otis]