OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY, OR, "CHIVALRY" IN MODERN DAYS, A PERSONAL RECORD OF REFORM CHIEFLY LAND REFORM, THE: LAST BY THOS. AINGE DEVYR. " For the Land is Mine, saith the Lord, for ye are strangers and sojourners with Me." Leviticus, Chap, xxv., v. 23. "When he can hide the Sun with a blanket, and put the Moon in his pocket, I'll pay him Kent." SHAKESPEARE. " The Land belongs in usufruct to the Living" THOMAS JEFFERSON. " I do not endorse all the headlong opinions of Mr. Devyr. I believe that he has fallen into errors and made mistakes.* But he has labored so long in Land Reform, and so sincerely, that I accord to him the privilege of having letters addressed to him, at the Office of the Irish World, New York, Box 3,624. PATRICK FORD. * Right 1 Pope says : " Virtuous and vicious every man must be ; Few in the extreme, but all in the degree." See p. 2OO, Amc'n Sec. PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOK, 37 BECOME ST., GREENPOINT, NEW YORK. Copyright, \ TjipW,s Afnge evyr, 1882. DEDICATION. Whoever rejects the word " Monarchy/' and the Frauds, the Cruelties, the Human Idolatry that lie couched beneath it. Whoever accepts the word " Republic," and all the Justice and Brotherhood it implies, to that Man I dedicate this book. Whoever prides in the Grand Traditions of the Republic, and enshrines in her heart the Memories of those who loved it, labored for it, and died for it, to that Woman I dedicate this book. Thoughts addressed to every true and brave man : The Creator either made the land Or He did not. He made it for the dukes and lords, Or He did not. He made it for the people, Or He did not. To pay Rent to earth-lords, is it a DENIAL OF THE CREATOR? Or is it not ? Is it hard to know His will 1 Or is it not 3 If you know His will And do it not, Are ye brave and true men, Or are .ye not ? itttietttil? EVIDENCES. The American Section of this book will present proofs that : FIKST The Unbounded Power to Tax has filled all its govern- ments with public Spoilsmen instead of public Statesmen. SEI OND That bad laws and bad administrations are the natural and inevitable result. THIED That an Army and a Navy are a hotbed of aristocracy not only unnecessary to the Eepublic, but a great evil and an open insult. That the money they cost would, under wise guidance, educate all the youth of the Eepublic of both sexes and give them a fair start in life. FOURTH That our "Diplomacy," and all that hangs around it, is a mere importer of snobbery. " Entanglements " that complicate us with foreign lands, and may, assisted by the sailing-about Navy, fish up a foreign War for us any day. FIFTH That our Eepublic is opening its arms to the rack-renting rogues of Europe, and rearing within its own borders a breed of the same sort of villains, to establish here on soil, on mine and on waters the same Crime and Blasphemy that has for so far cursed the world. SIXTH That virtue has utterly fled the public councils since the days of Andrew Jackson. SEVENTH That the daily press, and nine-tenths of the press generally, are mere business firms that manufacture public opinion for those who can best pay them. That their news makes them welcome everywhere, and that they criminally abuse that welcome. That with the corporations, politicians, and monopolists generally they form a vast conspiracy against the liberties of the people and the life of the Eepublic. EIGHTH That small daily papers ought to be got up at every populous centre if not to boycott the daily instruments of the mon- opolists, at least to enable us to get the news, and so save ourselves from their evil influence. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. SUPPRESSION OF THOUGHT. It may be necessary to state or repeat here that publishing firms that call themselves "respectable" will not touch a thoroughly searching Reform Book. This book was offered to more than one such publisher, even of the most " liberal" hue. And even put into their hands with all costs paid, and with offer to make their own conditions in relation to profits ! They, "not to put too fine a point on it," c}id their part toward its suppression. I suppose the state- ment of this fact will rouse every true Reform paper and every true progressive man to defeat their purpose, and to give the book their countenance and support. True Reformers true men, and women too will, I think, be sure to push this book along. I expect, I ask, no aid from any other. I have mentioned elsewhere that time was when the proflt-monger- ing daily press could by their silence consign to oblivion, or by their vituperation poison and kill off any Book of Reform. That time has passed away. There are four hundred Reform papers now in the Republic to stand by and see fair play. And the Irwh World itself has opened a telegraph of Thought ten thousand lines, over which Thought can be flashed from, one Reform mind to another all over the world. THE LATEST. Professor White, of Cornell, says : "There seems among the young men of the present day to be a wide- spread belief that political life is a game of grasping and griping; that generous sentiments are the badges of fools ; that patriotism is an outworn lure of tricksters, and that honesty and honor are entirely banished from the public service. The cause of it is the spoils system." [And that exists by the Unbounded Power to Tax.] And General Townsend, of New York, and all t'ie Generals fueled from Washington, speak out in this strain : "Within the short period of twenty-five years the population of this country will have swollen probably to one hundred million of people; at which time, being morally no nearer the millennial condition as a people than at present, we shall sorely need a repressive force of some kind." Our present evils are to be continued, then ! People may not be content with them, and a force to sabre them down will be "sorely needed." Grenadiers, to the front ! [See page 187, American Section.] Somebody (Job, I believe) has written, "0! that mine enemy would write a book ! " A book extends over a surface so large embraces subjects so various that unless the author were what man never was it will contain points less or more weak less or more evil. I trust the reader will remember this, and judge my book by the whole tenor and drift of it not by isolated passages, plenty of which doubtless may be found objectionable. THE ODD BOOK OT THE NIJ?ETEENTH CENTURY J And above all, and beyond all, and in one light most important of all, is the example it presents of what American Civilization would be, were it not choked to death by the corrupt politicians.* A NATIONAL CONVENTION. NINTH That a Keforru Convention, elected from all the States and Territories, should sit en permanence in New York City. Take charge of, and debate daily and from day to day, all the interests of the Republic. In such Convention every proposed Reform would have full consideration, and thus would be realized the injunction of Scripture, "Prove all things, and hold fast that which is good." This Convention, and the Reform daily papers, and the weekly, systematic, imperative Collection of Funds, are an absolute necessity. In my inmost soul I believe that the fate of the Republic pivots on these three things. People generally do not realize the Great Battle that is approaching. The small rubbish brawls, burglaries, swindlings, etc., that fill the big sheets waste time and deprave the public taste. They should have no place in the new papers. To criticise public vil- lainies, and note and stimulate Public Progress, here and in Europe, is the work before them. The Ward I live in supports a spirited little daily. And once the NATIONAL CONVENTION is assembled, its proceedings will give a lift to all the Reform papers. In London Mr. Hollyoake compiles a weekly "Town Talk" of current events that is published in nearly all the country papers. I could, from the I. W. and Reform sources generally, publish a similar article weekly for the new papers, and I would do it for pay or without pav. The Powers of Darkness are at work. Bring out the Powers of Light. COLLECTING FUNDS. Every Land League Branch, every Benefit Society and every Reform Organization should establish a WEEKLY COLLECTION OP FUNDS. An average of five cents a week from those whose rights and liberties are at stake would yield more money than is requisite both to sustain Ireland and to commence the War of Ideas in this country. By envelopes! seems to be the best means. And finally, this book will show the sudden rise and rapid progress of the Great Movement that, uprising in Ireland, now vibrates over the world. *See page five, American Section. f Thus : The Officers of the Organization enclose a blank to each family in the School district, to b returned to them with the amount written therein of what they will pay wf-ekly. To receive these returns a close box might be left at a favorable house in the centre of the School district. These are only hints, and no doubt can be improved on. CONTENTS. THE IRISH AND ENGLISH SECTIONS. PRELIMINARY : Chapter on Facts Wendell Phillips Thoughts on Civiliza- tion _ Education Modes of Entering on. Life Political Economy, and criticism on Henry George Hints from Franklin The two British wars. INTRODUCTION : Ncc3ssity for " THE ODD BOOK." CHAPTER I : Early Thoughts on Landlords Their blighting influences. CHAPTER II : Little biographies and less scientific research The Immensi- ties _ Man His Inheritance Emerging from the darkness Great wealth a great error Testimony of Burns and Goldsmith An imaginary " good landlord." CHAPTER III : Indicting the British Oligarchy for their great crimes Scott, Lockhart and Miss Edgeworth on the witness stand. CHAPTER IV : Donegal Dawning life Parish schools An outwave of old books, among them Bomances of Chivalry Their influence. CHAPTER V: Sketches illustrative of aboriginal manufactures, trade, modes of life and thought among the wilder districts of Ireland and the people who inhabit them. CHAPTER VI : Voyage to Liverpool at sixteen in search of work and knowledge Strange incidents and stranger poetry Uses of adversity S^/ . / PRELIMINARY. VU THOUGHTS ON CIVILIZATION. THIS CHAPTER IS DEDICATED TO THE YOUNG PEOPLE JUST ENTERING ON LIFE. " You'll try the world soon, my lad, And, Andrew dear, believe me, You'll find mankind an unco squad, And mucklo they may grieve you. For care and trouble set your thought." So warned the Scottish ploughman in the Old World one hundred years ago. So might he send out the warning in the New World and in the present day. Why should this be so ? To open that inquiry this paper is inscribed to the young men and young women of the Republic, who are now coming out from school and from apprenticeship out to "try the world." EDUCATION OF YOUTH. A public school founded on, say, 500 acres of suitable land. Pupils of both sexes already up out of the parental prima- ries the first instruction should, for most vital reasons, always be given at home. In those public seminaries all the arts, sciences, and handicrafts taught; also, cultivation of the soil, to bring from it everything of use and of beauty from the field of wheat to the parterre of flowers. Factory buildings embellished and beautified of all required varieties. Machinery driven by one head of water (precluding the use of steam), which may also be the dwelling place of selected fishes. Everything useful taught under the most attractive and refining forms. Every trade and art RANKED AS A SCIENCE. All equally honored, because each in its way is useful to man. Eegulated by aptitude and inclination, all things should be taught from measuring the star spaces to making or mend- V PRELIMINARY. ing a shoe. The telescope to indicate the immensities; the microscope. to dive into the minute. Photographic views of all countries, seen through magnifying lenses, so arranged as to give all an idea of the world we live in. Everything in short that could instruct and exalt to find a place in that public seminary. And a thorough brotherhood and sister- hood understood, cherished, enforced and for the supreme reason that ALL are Children of the one DIVINE PARENT, Equal Inheritors of His Form and His Spirit, and of the Grand World He has prepared for their home. Yes! you are all Equal Inheritors of the unspeakably grand Estate which this fertile globe presents. Equally entitled to have that home awaiting you on the day your education or your apprenticeship is completed, and you go forth to give to the world an individual life and an individual exertion. A wise and just government would have this possession already prepared for you. Would have, in the various climates which your country presents, Townships, or tracts of land scientifically laid out. Its central village its park its fountains, its factories and public buildings all on a tasteful rural scale. Its roads, streets, bridges, fields and fruit-trees, all things already prepared for the new and welcome guests and visitors. Perhaps it is an old Township re-modeled, where friends already reside perhaps a new Township or tract, to which friends may remove to be near you. Those who prefer to go out and battle for life in the compet- ing world, of course at liberty so to do but with the condition so beautifully set forth in Scott's best production: " If on life's uncertain main Mishap shall mar thy sail, If faithful, wise, and brave in vain-, Woe, want, and exile thou sustain Beneath the fickle gale, Waste not a sigh on fortune changed, PRELIMINARY. IX On thankless crowds or friends estranged ; But come where kindred worth shall smile, To greet thee on the lonely isle," or in this peaceful retreat, among your old school-fellows, always ready and joyful to receive you. But now ! You must all enter this competing world. Enter it to find every avenue to a comfortable living blocked up by those who came before you. You may have formed the dearest friendships or the dearer loves. Your school part- ing-day may be a tearing asunder of the holiest tics. But part you must ! Very many never to meet again. The Gov- ernment, entrusted with all our vast resources, that should have prepared your home your Inheritance for you, pre- ferred to rob you of that home and Inheritance to part it between themselves inside of Congress and their associate criminals outside. They preferred to set aside the Divine Plan that ought to govern the earth casting you out to combat for life in a world in which no home retreat is provided for you. In which your share in fhe Creator's Bounty is not even spoken of at all. No ! the caucus-born politicians whose four months' dead- lock about the spoils of the Republic so recently stood forth the scorn of the world those are the culprits who send you forth DISINHERITED robbed of all the Creator has made for you. Those drive you forth, out to an anxious strife with a hard world out to a strife where there should be no strife, where tho Creator intended all should be harmony ! With a rational and virtuous government guiding the destinies of the nation, all that is here indicated, and as much more and better as time and experience would point out, would be yours. Educated as Republican men and women ought to bb, and your Inheritance prepared for you, you would never know one anxious thought of how to secure a living in accordance with your tastes and inclinations. X PKELIMINABY. But now ! How truly has one of yourselves written these beautiful and sorrowful lines: " When first life's journey I began The glittering prospect charmed my eyes ', I saw along the extended plain Joy after joy successive rise. But soon I found 'twas all a dream, And learned the fond pursuit to shun ; Where few can reach their purposed aim, And thousands daily are undone." "Why "undone! " There ought to be no "undoing" on this Divinely-fashioned Earth. And there would be none if virtuous statesmen controlled the nations, instead of base, sordid, political knaves. Some of you have bright prospects before you homes to return to : friends to sustain you. But, in the present unjust and criminal state of society, nothing is certain. Besides, among you whose prospects are brightest may be found gen- erous natures that will do even more to aid your less favored brothers and sisters in the public effort than they will do themselves. I, who speak thus to you, must soon quit the scene upon which you are just entering. My experiences of fifty years are laid before you in this book. And far more important, I lay before you a Character whose example points out to you the way to a humane, exalted, American Civilization founded upon the equal rights and equal dignity of every citizen modi- fied only by the aspiration, the culture, and the taste that will then be within the reach of all. May the Power that formed this grand world, and formed you His Children to inhabit it, inspire you to wrest your homes and your fate, and the fate of the dear ones that are to come after you, out of the hands of the criminals who are preparing for this nation all the horrors of British Civiliza- PRELIMINARY. XI tion. May Almighty God inspire and assist you to wrench* the Republic out of their felon, " dead-locking " hands ! MODE OF SETTLEMENT. Isolated farm life is to some extent rude and solitary. Can that condition be changed for the better ? Let us inquire. Here are two pictures taken from Nature the one an improvement on the other, and both an indication of how taste and science should fashion your new home. The fol- lowing picture of Indian life was furnished to me by F. W. JByrdsal, a deceased brother Reformer, who personally sketched it on the ground: " The dwelling houses -were of logs in good condition -with a lot of ground to each house, fenced in, and part under cultivation. The Council House was really a curiosity ; the walls, the roof, the floor, the door all were composed of split cane, interlaced with singular firmness and taste we tried the walls with our handa, and the floors with our feet. The landscape was beautiful, and nothing of human kind was visible. Animals were fat and sleek and very docile ; the houses without in- mates. The doors open, and all indicated peace and comfort. At length three Indian men presented themselves, shook hands with us all in turn, and one of them could speak a ftw words of English. The Chief and town folks were at work in the corn field. Under guidance we rode on to the field, ABOVE A MILE IN LENGTH, the majestic Apalachicola forming its eastern boundary. A shady covert, in which a swarm of papooses of different ages peep at us with great attention but no alarm. The Indians ot both sexes were at work, each with a hoe ; and at the leading row of corn was the oldest man, the Chief. Salutations exchanged, the Indians resumed their work ; an interpreter, a negro (probably a runaway), was the medium of com- munication. Howawkawpawchasse was then a grandfather, but had to hoe his row as well as any other. When a series of rows was hoed out, the old chief took the lead in another series, and it would be disgraceful for anyone not to follow his Chief. The large field of corn, sweet potatoes, pumpkins, and cow peas, was the common property of the town to feed the inhabitants ; also the cattle and hogs for subsistence during the year. But the lots of ground enclosed round the dwelling houses were private prop- erty, to raise produce, feed, stock and poultry, at the disposal of the individual * There is no difficulty in it. No Revolution to wade through. Nothing necessary only to !et the Representatives in Congress know that the work must be done no delay, no excuse, no off-put. If anj Member dares to plunder and disinherit you hold him to personal account, even in the extremest sense. On this principle, this pivot, turns the enduring fate of the Republic; and there must be no trifling about it. The gentlest means possible ought to be used. But, that failing, use the un- gentlest means that may be necessary. Xii PRELIMINARY. owner. Each Indian could cultivate, for his own purposes of luxury and trading as much ground as he pleased. In the general or public field, It was the custom to work no longer than mid-day, unless in cases of emergency." , Is not the principle here suggested by Mother Nature to the wild man the same as her suggestion, carried more perfectly out, in the Zoar Community? And which may be improved to the highest point in a truly Republican Civiliza- tion. The Zoar Community of Germans was established in Ohio in 1817. I condense the description of a recent visitor to the establishment: "It is a ' little city.' Three straight streets, running parallel to the river, are crossed at right angles by four shorter ones. k< The squares are divided into four lots, each -with its own dwelling, fenced in with neat railing, and laid out into vegetable and flower gardens, cultivated almost exclus- ively by the women. " The streets are marvellously clean, and like the fields, bordered by long rows of apple trees. "Trim walks run out at ei-her side of the street corners ; fountains of clear spring w^ter splash and sparkle in moss-covered stone basins. " In the centre of the village is a large public garden, neatly kept and geometrically laid out, and filled with all kinds of domestic and foreign exotics. " Ijarge hot houses are connected with it, and the sale of plants and shrubs forms an important item in the revenue of the community." After describing the houses and furniture, of the primi- tive cast, the writer proceeds: "At one side of the village stands the dairy stable, 50 by 210 feet, containing 104 stalls. It is built with two long rows of stalls divided by an asphaltum walk 15 feet In width, over which a tramway carries feed. Over 100 cows are kept, and are driven morning and evening to the stable to be milked. This is performed by a score or more of the village maidens, who carry the milk to the dairy-house, where it is emptied into an exaggerated tub, and dealt out to the families at required. A large quantity ot cheese is manufactured, and from its superior quality commands a ready market. On the opposite side of the village are the large stables for horses, and the granaries for the immense crops of cereals raised by the society, and in different parts of the hamlet are the shops for the various trades, cider presses, public bakery, etc. Down by the river are two large flouring mills, a machine shop, founiry, woolen mills and saw mills. "Though like other people taking & part in the Political Government, they have within it a Local Government of their own by trustees annually elected. Three meals and two luncheons are served daily. They have their own brewery, their own hotel- much frequented in the evening as a place of discussion and intercourse. They have also a large general store, containing all neccisary things that are brought from a distance dry goods, hard-ware, groceries, etc. all purchased at wholesale prices and supplied without profit. This is but a mere glance at what has been achieved by peo- ple inspired only by Nature, and aided only by their own industry*" PRELIMINARY. X1H Here, then, is no mere theory. Here are the teachings of Nature in two distinct stages the Primary and the Progress- ive. As much, nay more than the Zoar stage exceeds the savage stage, may the progress of enlightenment improve the high Rational Civilization that would be sure to come, if we were once clear of the murderous politicians. Those who prefer the isolated farm to be suited accord- ingly. And now, brothers and sisters, a word to you on that floundering, misleading thing called POLITICAL ECONOMY. Man is Disinherited ! In his Father's Household he is denied his place driven out to provide for his Natural Wants, without the means to provide for them. In that astounding Primal Wrong behold the germ of all the evils that affect, or that ever did affect, the Human Family. Alongside of that Disinheritance, Fraud, Cruelty and Baseness of Soul built up a Wages Workhouse, in which to receive the desolate man, and use and abuse him for their sordid purposes. In that Structure to apportion him work up to the limit of endurance, and wages down to the lowest verge of subsistence. The Structure is not a prison. Men can go out of it at any moment. But they must go out burthened with their remorseless wants, to STAND UPON NOTHING ! And this is what Political Economy essays to per- petuate. And the two Executioners Hunger and Nakedness stand outside await- ing them. So, if they would escape death at their hands, they must beg an escape back into the " Economy " Workhouse. The Godless, sordid Work- house, from which all human sympathy all Divine Justice is barred out, A code, formed and administered by the Frauds and Cruelties themselves, governs that house. They call it " Political Economy," and enforce it under penalty of death by Nakedness and Hunger, the Executioners, that forever stand on the outside. Within its walls are one moan of discontent and one snarl of contention' And to allay that discontent and harmonize that contention, ass-loads of books (that's the way to measure them) have been thrown out in vain. In vain ! in vain ! For those books accepted the great Wages Workhouse as a natural fact as if no other provision were made by God for that deso- XIV PRELIMINARY. late, Disinherited man. Accepted tho hideous Lie, and never looked at the beautiful and provident Truth the fertile soil that lay alongside of it. The Truth distinctly shown even in this example. Mr. Hoag, of Renss,-!- aerville, Albany County, N. Y., took an axe and a spade in his hand. He struck into the forest, cleared his Held, and reared his log cabin flrst. Then his house, his orchard, and his only son. Ho also carried the land Patroon on his back all the time. I saw him with his good house his son, a man of taste and culture his four-acre orchard of grafted fruit that netted him $300 a year his fertile fields and flourishing wood lot, with the stream running between both driving a saw-mill and furnishing a brook trout to his table his fifty bee-hives his single and double carriages and sleighs. Tho interior of his house replete with a plenty and purity and freshness that the city rarely or never knows lambs' wool and choice feathers combining; to fit up his dormitories. Those opened on tho summer vine or closed on. the wintry tempest. Sit down to his breakfast table, and you would hesitate to get up again. And even the clip of his sheep, sent to tho neighboring factory returned in handsome, durable cloth. And all this comes of tliQ/ree Capital offered by Nature, and the active Capital of intellect and force stored in his head and arm. There is not a commodity of use known to what is- called " Civilization," of which Mr. Hoag could not command his share. And he never paid Interest on a dollar in his life. Political Economy, Mr. George ! * Advise the "students to study Political Economy " ! No, no 1 Let the students turn their thoughts to the study of the Economy of Nature, and waste no thought on the big unnatural Work- house or its Political Economy. Restore to tho Disinherited ones what their Benevolent Creator made for them. That's the work to be done ! Let us further illustrate it. Once upon a time a farmer erected a dove-cote for pigeons. He loved to* see the pigeons fly over tho fields, pick up grains and enjoy themselves. Besides, if he wanted one or two for his use, ho expected to have them in good condition. But by-and-bye he found the birds in bedraggled plumage and wasted to skin and bone. In order to find out the cause he climbed up at the rear of the dove-cote, and, looking in, he saw the pigeons come in one after another and deposit their cropfuls on a big heap receiving a few pol- luted grains from the bottom of tho heap, to enable them to fly forth for * Of recent fame. Probably the only conscientious writer that ever took up the subject. [ See hi* book, " Progress and Poverty." ] PRELIMINARY. XV another cropful. He saw a big, bloated pigeon on the top of the heap, and a guard of pigeons perched round the sides of it, enforcing a " law " they had made. The " law " was to the effect that the bloated pigeon owned all the outside fields, and if any bird touched a grain on them without his permis- sion, and bringing in their cropfuls to him, the body-guard of pigeons would peck him to death. The farmer saw, too, a Smith pigeon, arid a Ricardo- pigeon, and a Mill pigeon, hard at work regulating how much or how little of each cropful should be given to the gatherers ; and lastly a George pigeon peeped in, trying to set them right, and dragging them up out of their well-earned obscurity. And this they called the science of " Production and Distribution." They had been philosophizing and " Economizing " at it for a hundred years and more, and made for so far not the least advance toward its settlement. As soon as the master of the dove-cote ascertained all this, he wrung the necks of the bose and his body-guard, anil was very near serving the skin-and-bono pigeons in the same way for submitting to such a stupid, obvious, egregious imposture. But, in pity for what they had suffered, he spared them and let them fly forth free to forage for themselves. And they soon became fat, and feathered, and active, and happy, and all that Nature intended pigeons to be. Mr. George perceives that Land Monopoly is the source of all our social disorders, and he exclaims, " I see the remedy, but it is so radical a remedy that I deemed it necessary to enquire whether there was any other remedy." And, accordingly, he proceeds to discuss "just" amounts of Rent, that he knows ought not to have an existence at all. A rather difficult task, when we look at the ten thousand or ten million fronts Bent puts on in claiming " its dues." Speaks of " the legitimate earnings of Capital," and how much of an acre's produce ought to go to the laborer, how much to the capitalist,, and how much to the land-owner. All this is beating about the bush, but it may be necessary. It may be necessary in the present depraved condition of the public mind to go into these considerations in order to get a hearing- at all. And, in that case, Mr. George's book may be a happy thought and a good, practical stepping-stone to the NATURAL ECONOMY that I hope to see supersede the Political Economy. The one being just as true and just and simple as Nature itself ; the other as tortuous, heartless and unjust as the Politics it is named after. I believe nay, I know that Mr. George's book has been studied by men who, had he presented the " radical remedy " which XVl PRELIMINARY. he sees, would not be likely to touch his book at all. Besides, Mr. George had to write a book ; and if he had taken Natural Economy for his subject, its elucidation had been so simple pud so short that there would be nothing to write a book about. The Township, with its arrangements, ruled over by such men as Mr. Hoag, aggregating into a county government, and those forming on a larger scale, answering to our State governments. Inheritance and Education, growing out of it, would leave as little room for crime as there is for weeds in a carefully cultivated field. Hardly any " law " would be required. None for the collection of debts. None except a Defining Record for the holding or transfer of possessions in land. No occasion for borrow- ing and therefore no Interest. In a State so constituted, a fixed limit to the possessory farm, say fifty acres now, and if necessary that lessened to forty, thirty, or twenty, more or less, in succeeding years. The less the farms the more thoroughly cultivated and the people living more closely together: This I take to be the Natural Economy. And before the advent of a true man into its ranks I felt inclined, I will just say to expectorate my contempt upon the white-washed wickedness called Political Economy. ME. GEOKGE'S EEMEDY is to make the occupier a "rent-paying tenant of the State," or "leave the ownership in the individual owner and appropriate the rent by taxation." I cannot accept this remedy. Because, first, there is or can be no " indi- vidual ownership " in that in which all have an indefeasible right. Second Because the "State" plan would require a horde of men to work it, every one of which was a fallible, perhaps vicious and dishonest man. Third Because, with the rents in his hands, the putative " owner " could employ a part of them to turn aside hostile legislation. Fourth Because, even if the "owner" slumbered till the law against him was enacted, he would bend all his energy and means to its repeal, with an effect we see every day exemplified. Fifth Because it would not mend the matter to leave to individual "land-owners" (poison fungi which Mr. George continues \o recognize) to collect the land rents and hand all but a per centage over to the State. Sixth Because the money, if so handed over which is not likely might not, indeed would not, be applied to the " common benefit." And this PRELIMINARY. XVll Because one tornado of taxation sweeps over the land, from tho petty thefts under a village charter up to the enormous villainies, smugglings and perjuries and briberies clustered into one heap in the Custom House. And how much of it goes to tho "common benefit"? And must wo wait for justice till wo re-create these political rogues? He very judiciously follows Carlyle's thought that the dehumanizing selfishness now holding such general sway has its deep root in the dread of poverty. In my brief way I have treated the same subject. "Give labor a free field and its full earnings," says Mr. George ;" take for the benefit of the whole community that fund which tho growth of the community creates, and want and the fear of want would be gone." Most true. And more than " gone." A vista of diffused splendor and boundless utility embracing all men, here rises to our view. The only doubt is whether the means proposed by Mr. George (just look at them ! ) are likely to achieve the end. I fear that Beform traveling on the road that he points out would be a long time on the way. He further speaks in this way : " Call it religion patriotism sympathy the enthusiasm for humanity, or the love of God give it whatever name you will there is yet a force that overcomes and drives out selfishness a force which is the electricity of the moral Universe a force beside which all others are weak." The picture is grand poetically and latent philosophically a reflex of his own heart. Practically it is a myth. It does not drive out selfishness. So far from being "the force before which all others are weak," it is almost might I not say entirely? silenced by the actual, active, all- pervading, all-dominant force of selfishness, now in full possession all over the world. I by no means believe in State landlordism and its machinery of rent- gatherers. I hold that every man has a right to as much land as he chooses to cultivate where land is abundant. Where it is not abundant a maximum must be agreed upon, up to which he may go and no farther. The State has no right to charge him money for what is the Divine Gift. For protec- tion he is liable to its cost, nothing more. Nor has the State any right to prescribe to him where he shall settle. It is his right to settle on any un- occupied land that may best suit him. Mr. George makes a place for 4t capital," and discusses fair amounts of its " earnings." I don't see any place for it in Nature's Economy. Neither did Mr. Hoag as already shown. He discusses, too, what of an acre's product should belong to the " land- XV111 PRELIMINARY. owner." In the Economy of Nature I find no place for a thing of that name. For me it is not necessary to consider his views of modern Civilization, and whether it tends to "equality"; and whether bishops did or did not "become by consecration the peers of the greatest nobles," or whether kings holding the stirrup of popes were or were not hopeful things. EFor in this book I have found it necessary to ignore, renounce, condemn nd execrate the robbing, enslaving, murdering thing that calls itself Civilization," wherever it is to be found all over the world. The splendid abilities of Mr. George, his extensive erudition, his clear conception of the Great Truth and his magnificent presentation of it, naturally lead to the thought that, as he knows so much, he must have a keen insight into everything our governing machinery for example, and how to turn it aright. Here would be a dangerous mistake. The mad, wicked men who govern us would rejoice feel safe, indeed if we brought no other means to bear on them, than the means suggested by Mr. George. One Foundation Truth only is the thing they may dread. And that is rapidly coming down on them. The Truth that all titles to land are of very necessity Frauds and Forgeries. That there never did never could exist a title save the possessory title of the Occupant who cultivates a fair-sized farm for the support of his family. That's the Truth to which the people in Ireland, and here, and everywhere must be roused up. And that SUBLIME TBUTH will sweep away the robbers' titles, whether from kings, Cromwells or Congresses one of which never owned never could have owned an inch of what they pretended to give away. His opinion that we should let Corporations grow to their full height and then abolish them by taxation is it not equally erroneous? He seems to forget that those Corporations control actually own the Legislatures, through which only he could lay a penny of tax upon them. The one way to reach them is first, last and always contained in three words, " SPBEAD THE LIGHT." Once men see the Great Truth, they will find means to enforce it. The simple Economy of Nature requires no abstruse study to perceive It, and nothing more than common sense and healthful labor to realize it. Natural Economy as opposed to Political Economy the one as superior to the other as the kindly care of Nature is superior to the skulking, swindling rapacity of Politics. PRELIMINARY. XIX Next in importance, and equally simple in its nature, is the question of FINANCE. Experience will soon discover how many dollars per capita is the necessary volume of a circulating medium. Kept do\vn, and also kept up, to that amount, shrinkage, fluctuations, panics, with their attendant evils, will be unknown. Then each nation can regulate for itself a thing impossible under a Metallic System. Conclusive evidence on this subject will bo found on other page?. Besides and this also touches you young people very nearly gold and silver were given to civilized man for use, not for a token of exchange. If confined to that use they would come down to their economical price probably not a fourth or a sixth of their present commercial value. In our watches, jewelry, etc., there need bo no lacquered imitations. On our tables no corroding, and oven poisoning mixtures of the baser metals. Gold was given for those uses ; so was silver. Now they are made the instruments of confusion, loss, robbery, murder, and oven suicides by the thousand, statis- tical evidences of which ,aro presented in this book. And throughout will bo presented the not general but universal corruption and absence of public virtue that pervades the Republic. In leaving to government the unbounded power to tax, we invited all the public vice in the country to rush in and govern us. That they did rush in, and "oar all our virtuous citizens out, it is a main business of this book to show. It will do more. It will suggest the means necessary to rescue the Repub- lic all the means, at least, that long experience and intense, anxious thought on the subject enables mo to present. "We, you and I, may bo the instru- ments of tho Higher Power in accomplishing the Great Work. That Power has given us tho Steam Slave and tho ten thousand ingenious machine fingers working by its force. Tho printing press, tho telegraph, and even an occult chemical force to equalize army force, and if driven to extremity, make the naked helpless ones a match for tho organized bands of Fraud and Cruelty. Let us implore and rely on that Aid from Above, and this world may bo changed, even in our own brief day, from the Hell that evil men have made of it, to tho Paradise which tho Creator evidently intended it to be. I have appealed to you young and untainted ones. Under the Divine Power, it is you will determine whether British Civilization, now raising XX PRELIMINARY. aloft its shiny, snaky head among us, shall bo suffered to rot out every Republican virtue, or whether a humane, virtuous Civilization indigenous to the Bepublic founded on its early virtues shall now bravely enter on the scene, and drive out the British spirit and example, as your fathers drove out the hordes sent over to enslave them, in two obstinate, malignant and murderous wars. In this, book I present to you an example of that " Indignous Civilization," as it blossomed apart from the political knaves. Just as I close I find in "Franklin's "Works," edited by Jared Sparke, (volume 8, page 416), the following most important suggestion: "Accounts upon oath have been taken in America by order of Congress of the British barbarity committed there. It is expected of me to make a school-book of them, and to have thirty-five prints designed here by good artists arid engraved, each expressing one or more of the different horrid facts, to be inserted in the book in order to impress the minds of children and posterity with a deep sense of England's bloody and insatiable malice and wickedness. Every fresh instance of her devilism makes me abominate the thought of a reunion with such a people." But the reunion now, at this day, is being rapidly pushed in on us. All that is superficial and all that is base in the Republic are plunging headlong into this detestable "re- union." It is not generally realized that the war of 1812 was a war of subjugation the sailor question a mere pre- text. Nor is the vandalism of that war borne in mind and the tens of thousands of the very flower of our young men young and old murdered in it by the revived "devil- ism." Then it was the devil at his full height touched by Ithuriel's spear. Now it is the same devil creeping into the Garden and breathing evil into the woman's ear. Whisper- ing that Civilization is a want of her life, and that she must want if she does not take it from England, and with it, all England's abominations. Must take them all instead of rejecting them all, and founding a Civilization indigenous to PRELIMINARY. Xxi America and " New to the "World. " Who will adopt Franklin's idea ? Who will organize a mental force to make head against this great evil? Who will take the Fathers of the Eepublic for their guide ? Who will help to cast out the devil and the "devilism" that Franklin speaks about? Who will take his model and even now force it "into our school books, to impress the minds of our children and posterity with a deep sense of England's [her government's] bloody and insatiable malice and wickedness"? OPINIONS OF THE PRESS.' Who was that old philosopher that exclaimed, "What evil have I done that these bad men should speak well of me?" Most books are now ushered forth with a long flourish of "Opin- ions of the press.'' As much as to say, "I am an honest book, a good book see my character vouched for by one or two hundred / rogues." Those rogues, riding on their newsbags, block up almost every avenue to the public mind. Flatter them, bribe them, propitiate them in some way, and they will give any ordinary book an onward lift. But not such a book as mine. Between them and this book is an antagonism instinctive and irrepressible, so decided and so natural, withal, that "the devil and holy water" is no more than a joke to it. A very few years ago those daily news-mongers could draw the pall of silence over any man or any book of Reform. Or, if they preferred that course, they could then stifle it under an avalanche of vituperation. There was no defense against them there was no escape from them there was no appeal. A voice raised against them fell dead in the utterance. Eight thousand "Pharisees " and their twenty thousand "Scribes" held supreme dominion over the public mind. A dominion, it is boasted, that "they could not abdicate if thev would." PRELIMINARY. But the fact that I write this, and that a very large public have an opportunity to read it, shows that a change impends over those self-crowned monarchs. An electricity of mind now connects Reformers all over the world. A thought thrown out by one reaches them all . Among the progressions of the age this is the most progressive. Do we owe it to the Irish World? to the Great, Vital Truth which inspires that journal? That Truth the Father- hood of God, and the Brotherhood of Man and all the grand rights that this relation implies. That is what gives a self-moving power to the Great Bef orm Paper. This carries it alike into the Cabin and the Castle. Alike necessary to both to all men who from hope or from fear strain to know what new thoughts and new actions are taking possession of the world. If I can launch my book on that great current of thought, a knowledge of it will reach four hundred similar currents, fringing along the mighty stream four hundred local Reform papers to every one of which I am prepared to send on application a copy for review. And so it may reach men of thought everywhere. No, not everywhere. Hid away in the great existing Darkness are some of the best minds in the country. Men who have never seen of Beforni a written sentence who have never heard of Reform an articulate voice. I trust that such men will yet hear and yet come to our help. I may well hope this, for without the help of just such men this book had never been written. As some authors write their own reviews, I write my own " OPINIONS OP THE PRESS." i Farewell! May heaven enlighten and arouse you to this redeeming work. And remember, he who now speaks to you has already outlived the time allotted to man; that he never sought public power or public favor; that he seeks nothing from you now but your help to rescue your Repub- lic, your rights, your homes the memories and the works of your fathers from the collective sordidness that threatens to submerge the Republic in the depths of that murderous villainy called "British Civilization." INTRODUCTION. " Truths would you teach, and save a sinking land; All fear, none aid you. and low understand." PoPBu " But the heart and the mind And the voice >f mankind Shall arise in communion, And who shall resist that proud union ?" BYRON. THERE is already a great profusion of books. The Scientific confined to its exact field. The Imaginative, flashing over an empire that knows no bounds ; and all between those wide ex- tremes, every Department of Knowledge Las its books each, it may be presumed, cleverly illustrating the subject to which it is devoted. On Society, Government, Political Economy, books have suo- ceeded each other borrowed and patched from each other and put forth quite a respectable wilderness of leaves. As for fruit, there is a great crop of it to be found in the garrets and cellars in the long hours of ill-requited labor, with ghastly intervals of no labor and no requital at all. Society, Nations, Men in all countries and in all ages have very sturdily held that whatever modes of life and opinion pre- vailed in any and each of those countries, at the then existing time, was the true opinion the true and proper mode of life. Never did two nations agree as to what was right and natuial, and yet each was quite sure that its own Institutions were right, perfect, not to be que c tioned. But change was at work on them all ; sometimes gently and imperceptibly, like the autumn breeze ; sometimes with the shock of a social earthquake. The murderous combats of even de- fenceless men against wild beasts in the arena of Rome, the Hindoo widow on her funeral pyre, the Juggernaut, the hangings and crucifixions and diabolical tortures all these, in their times, were held as sacred things in the countries where they existed, and to raise a voice against them was likely to have that voice silenced forever. There was not one of those Nations but was just as satisfied that it was right as we now are satisfied that we are right. They could see, just as we also see, only what existed close around them, and they accepted it for good, and defended it with great 2 INTRODUCTION. earnestness, and, indeed, with great injustice and cruelty. The prevailing Errors knew, at least, how to trench themselves rounci with terrors and with death. To lift a hand against any govern- ment, even at this day, is adjuged " High Treason," and incurs condemnation to the most revolting death. This is tne law alike in Monarchy and Republic, notwithstanding the testimony which the "Declaration of Independence" boars against it bears to the justifiable nature of all such discontents and rebellions. The Ptolemean philosophers made this mudcly little Earth of ours the centre of the Universe. From this erroneous stand- point they viewed all the orbital motions, and vainly tried to make them all fall into line with their Erroneous Scheme. This error held possession of all the seats of learning, and even of the Church, for fifteen hundred years. They learned better (and they were quite unwilling to learn) when a man arose and drove this world of ours into its proper place ; put the great Sun in the centre, and made our Earth one among the other little orbs that revolve around him. This done, the Ptolemean cycles and epicycles disappeared. There was no further use for them. Emblem of the problems of human society. Our thinkers and our writers on those problems have tried, and vainly tried, to solve . than a plea- sure. One of Burns' " Twa Dogs " made a very shrewd guesa at tbo condition of those lives : " They loiter, louneingr. lank, and lazy, Tho' dei! hae't ail-* them, yet uneasy. Their days insipid, dull, and tasteless. Tlieir nights unquiet. Jang, ami restlesa. And even their sports, their balls, and race* Their galloping thro' public places. There's such parade, such pomp and art; The joy can scarcely reach the heart." OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 21 Goldsmith strikes even a higher key on the same subject : ** In these, ere trifiers half their ends attain. The toiling pleasure sickens into pain. And even where fashion's brightest arts decoy The heart, distrusting, asks if this be joy." And one of themselves, almost the only honest man to be found among them, Lord Byron, condenses the truth into two lines: " Let this one toil for bread, that rack for rent. Who sleeps the best may be most content." Contrast this with the following picture drawn by thia hand and published in my first work ("Our Natural Eight*'") foity years ago. I spoke thus to the landlord in that far off time : " When we consider the diversity of the human character, it will appear somewhat strange that, of the whole number, there would not be found one Individual landlord to do his duty. Laying aside all the obligations which the divine and beautiful law of Chrisrianity lays upon us and. Oh! these should not be entirely disregarded ! what an honest tame could such a man acquire, what a glorious name could he transmit to posterity, by giving us the first practical example of the great change which must, ere long, inevitably take place. How simple and. to a benevolent mind, how de- lightful the task. Imagine his tenantry convened, and the good man ad- dressing them in language like this: 'MY FBIENDS It is acknowledged on all sides that the present system of society is productive of many evils and many are the plans and measures proposed for their removal. "Repeal of the Union," "Abolition of the State Church." " Poor Laws," " Public Works." and so forth, alternately in fashion. None of these can be effected without difficulty and delay, and if effected, they would, I fear, rather alleviate than remove the evils of society. * Amid all these proposed reforms and remedies, a thought has struck me, that it is in the power of every landlord to make his tenantry comfort- able, independently of legal enactments, and I intend to try the experi- ment forthwith. * I will reduce my rents to a fourth of their present standard, and grant perpetual leases of all my land to every tenant a lease of what he now occupies, except, where the farm may exceed twenty acres : in which case the overplus will be given to those whose holdings are least. I will reside among you, and it shall be my pleasure and my pri le to improve and re- fine you. But you shall not be permitted to sell your interest in the land, save under certain restrictions; neither shall you be allowed, in any case, to sub-let at a dearer rent than I charge. I shall also require you to fer- tilize your farms and improve your dwellings, and. in doing so. I shall bo happyto lend you all the assistance in my power. I have employed a skill- ful agriculturist, and his business shall be to give you whatever instruction you may require. Your fields must and will be fertile, and your cottages neat and comfortable. * You. my friends, nmy suppose that I am sacrificing my inclinations and convenience, in order to promote your good. I have no such merit it 22 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; is no sacrifice to quit the follies of fashion and the sensual gratification of luxury. My days were lost in pursuits unworthy an intellectual and useful being, and my nights sought an escape from apathy and discontent in the whirlpool of amusing folly. I saw my wealth wasted on the worthless, the profligate, and the vile, and I reflected that my conduct involved a virtuous and worthy people in penury and distress. From that moment I resolved to devote my energies to other and nobler pursuits, and I am now come among my people with a fixed determination to make them happy." What evil, my friends, could possibly result from a change like this ? On the contrary, what beautiful order would it not produce what an im- petus would it give to agriculture, what a vivifying spirit would it spread over the land ? Fondly does the mind picture to itself the beauty, the hap- piness that springs forth under the regenerating system. The renovated fertility of the field, the waving foliage of the hedge-row, the smiling gay- ety of the new-moddelled cottage its garden of vegetables, fruits, and flowers, its " bee-hives hum," its shadowing poplars that cottage no longer the receptacle of privation and misery, but the abode of requited industry and enviable content." Now, I put it to those landlords themselves, Would not a change to the life and the duties here indicated be not only a better but a happier life than their present life of riot and de- bauchery, and sin and shame, or whatever it may be ? Even if it be comparatively virtuous, still the life here pictured would be far preferable to anything that could be devised under the present system. In justice, therefore, to eveyrbody all round, and in espe- cial mercy to those wretched, misguided, and unnatural men who impiously call themselves " landlords," let us define rights and enforce duties natural rights and natural duties upon all. Try to make every man useful in society a brother and helper to his fellow man. This is easily said, has been said continuously, al- ways, by every man who takes the trouble to open his mouth on the subject. But first, the only broad, deep, lasting foundation for this mu- tual help and mutual brotherhood, is the recognition full and hearty, of the great Divine Truth that all men are One before the Creator. That to all men He gave the same erect form " after his own image." That all are alike subject to the same natural wants and necessities. That all are capable of, and entitled to a full share, not merely of the material resources created for our use, but also to their assured share in the Intellectual Estate that has been accorded to us from on high. The man who can not see these truths, what are we to say to him ? Nothing evil. The man who does see them, and will not accept them and act up to them, of him we will ask, what is he but a rebel to the Most High ? OK, THE SPIEIT OF CHIVALKY IN MODERN DATS. 23 What will be said to him when he comes up to the last great account ? But of one thing let all men make sure. Of this : That until this Divine Law is seen, accepted, and acted upon, there never will be either lasting happiness or lasting peace on this earth among the great One-family. No stability in any government that will not lay its foundation on this rock this sublime Dem- ocracy of Christianity. I might stop here as if nothing more could be said on the subject, it is so plain and so easily under- stood. But there is very much to say. Very many rocks to point out. Very many " Experiences " to be presented, very many details of the wrigglings and falsehoods that are practised in the governments the several governments even of a repub- lic, as well as of the idolatrous things called Monarchies. Very many of the instructive incidents that led, or attended, the writer of this book up from early boyhood to the present time. Time which, with him, cannot continue a great deal longer. And now, friend public. If you should condescend to amuse yourself with this book, for amusing this book will be, and if at any weak or wavering point you should think worth while to <5riticise it, I trust you will ciaas My faults even with your own which meaneth put A kind construction upon them and me; But that you wont, then don't I'm not less free," to remind you of the " eagerly waited for " " Drosera," and the exquisite fragments " about " Goody Two Shoes " and " Giles Gingerbread." You spread that " fly-trap " for me, and if you catch loss of time and money by it, it is just what you deserve. TJUU UDJJ JOOi: OS 1 THE JslNitiTK'ENTli CHAPTER III. A. PUBLIC ACCUSATION FACTS AND WITNKSSES. TO THE OLIGARCHY OF GREAT BRITAIN. I must commence this chapter with a reminder to you, the " landlords " of. Great Britain arid Ireland. Most oi 1 you that are now on the stage had no hand in the Famine of '47. But the luxuries that surrounded your cradle and your boyhood were bought with rents wrung from the people when they were left to die. Perhaps if you had been men you would not have starved a whole people to death as your fathers did. We must not impute a crime to you till you either commit or endorse it. You did not commit that great crime. Will you endorse it? Here's how it commenced : The potato crop failed, and that was all your fathers left the people to live upon. Now they must die if the grain and the provisions are to be sold and exported to satisfy their demand for rent. Some of your fathers gleaned twenty, lifty, one hundred pounds sterling a day off the people whom they thus left to die. The distress warrant, the threat of ejectment were brought down upon them. The crops must be sold to dis- charge this shall I call it Rent or Impiety ? Notices were put up at night in the seaports. They were answered in this way : " A troop of the 13th light dragoons have been ordered from Goit and two companies of the 3()th from Loughrea. to aid the garrison in putting down bread riots in Gal way. Her majesty's war steamer Strombol arrived last night and anchored in the roadstead." The meaning of this you can comprehend, "if you don't submit to be starved, you can take your choice and be shot." Your fathers endorsed this great crime, do you also endorse it? But before you answer, let us have a quiet lalk about your posi- tion in general as well as a few words upon this artificial famine, created by yourselves and your fathers. You believe in the Bible, don't you ? Well, the Bible talks after this fashion, and, take my friendly word for it, it will be far better for you if you recognize Its truth and bring it into the action of your lives : "The land shall not bo sold forever, for the land is MINE." salth th Lord. " for ye are strangers and sojourners with mo." LEV.. CHAP. 25. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 25 That rests on an authority that you profess to recognize in virtue of its Divine origin, and this other you did get into your heads by virtue of several hard knocks : " All legitimate government is derived from the consent of the gov- erned." DECLARATION OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. Those two mottoes comprehend the whole ground of contro- versey between you and me. The first we believe to be the voice of The Creator speaking to His servant Moses. The second is the voice of America speaking to everybody's common sense. I affirm these truths ; you solidly deny them. That is the issue. Now, let me proceed to ask you a few questions : Have you riot for long centuries usurped over the people of Ireland a government of FORCE? A force that delighted to dip its hands in the blood of every man who might be virtuous enough to deny its authority or resist its crimes? During the same dreary centuries, have you not by what right I cannot discover seized upon -all the soil, and all the mines, and all the waters and the water- falls of those islands? Have you not also formed the kindly Earth into an engine of oppres- sion? that Earth which the Father of us all ordained to furnish His children with food, and clothing, and homes and refinements? And have you not been guilty of a great blasphemy against the Almighty, and a great crime against your, equal brother man? IRELAND IN 184 r . Have you not taken away the products of the land, to satisfy the Fraud, the Impiety! which you call "Bent"? Have you not murdered by hunger, and consequent disease the millions who labored to rear up those products? Have not the strong men, and the gentle women, and the little prattling children had to die that your rioting might be fed? You aro "Noble" mon ! Are these the facts that ennoble you? You aro "Honorable" and "Right Honorable" men! Are these your "Honorable" and "Right Honorable" deeds? Those people died the most horrible of all human deaths. While hunger tore at the vitals of the strong man, he had but to look into the eyes of his poor partner to see the glare of famine where once was girlish joy, and brightness, and affection! And are those the lisping little ones crying: "Papa! mamma! as) THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CJfiNTUKY : we are dying ! can't you give us a little, little, little bit or dread V But let me close the door. Even imagination shrinks back ap- palled from that unspeakable horror. The night is closing upon* them and death will be there before the morning rises. Then we- may enter and see how near the murdered ones clung together in their last agony ! Inhuman men ! did you do these things ? ' Was this natural death, or what was it? Did the miserables; " put hand on their own lives ? " Did they die by the " visitation* of God ? " Or can it be possible that you, my lords, and dukes^ and " right honorable gentlemen" had anything to do with it? There is crime somewhere. What sort of crime is it? Is it manslaughter ? Alas ! the victims were unresisting were un able to resist their fate ! What ! could it be murder ? murder under circumstances the most foul and horrible that ever did or that ever could exist ?: Did it embrace many people ? Was it millions ? Or how many- did it embrace? The brain reels under the computation. How many, O ! how many ? And where are they the guilty ones? vvno are they? Will not Heaven or Earth find out who they are and where they are,. and give them up to justice ? Surely, they cannot be the great men of the land. Surely,, there cannot be such things in this world as " noble " guiltiness as "Honorable " and " Eight Honorable " crimes !* Wretched men ! come down out of your high places. You can- not bring the dead of hunger back to life. You cannot restore- the pyramids of wealth which you have snatched out of their famishing hands, for has not that wealth been melted on your sensual appetites ? You cannot blot out the hideous memories of the past. But there is one thing that you can do. It is ia- There was no natural famine, no failure of crops in Ireland in 18l5-'6. Nothing failed' bat the potato. But as all other produce had to be sold and shipped away to meet the rack- rents. As the landlord habitually left nothing to subsist the people but the potato, and' as the potato utterly rotted and disappeared, then nothing but death tor the people, if th other produce was to be shipped away. The men in the seaports saw that all men saw it the land robber saw it, if he only would look at it. But he wouldn't the latest spark of hu- man feeling was dead within him nearly dead, too, in Queen and " Consort," and Council., and when notices were put up at night in Galway notices that no more lood must b shipped away what heed was given to the approaching doom ? This: "Five companies ot the 14th Infautry are ordered from Gort and a squadron of the 4th Dragoon Guards are also ordered to Qalway, to keep down tne disorder which threatens that town." People ! Th+ Queeu, and Consort, and Council, give you a choice : " Bents must be paid t Tea tear to b* Uuved. You must take chance or if you prefer to be shot, we'll shoot you, 14 OR, THE SPIRIT O* CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 2t your power, even now, to cease from your crimes to fall down on your knees and beg of God and man for forgiveness. But will you do even this? It is not likely. Yours Is a chronic disease of very, very long standing ; an immortal crime that has descended to you from father to son, and from genera- tion to generation. Can we expect that you will obey the Divine Will and come down out of your crimes ? It is not likely. But whether voluntarily or otherwise, down you must come to the true level. I fear you will like Pharaoh "harden your hearts." But no ! that process will not be necessary. Those hearts of yours are quite ready for use. They require no more hardening. And If the people should arise and " go up " themselves " out of bondage," Pharaoh-like, will you gather your horsemen and your chariots to pursue them ? I suppose you will, even if your path, like his, should lie through the Red Sea ! But what would this earth do if that Bed Sea should arise and overwhelm you? You have so long been a great blessing to the world that the thought of losing you is insupportable. Well, you will at least leave us your picture in History. It will be some consolation to us when you are gone. A picture, a proof to the Future Ages that you were no myth ; - -that there really did exist once on this earth a class so mon- strously " noble," so detestably " honorable," so villainously * right honorable " as yourselves. And now that you are about to pass away, be it our care that your removal shall be accomplished as gently as possible. You iiave left us, to be sure, many examples of how "removals " may l>e effected. But common men by which I mean men of common humanity cannot be expected to emulate " Noble " and " Honor- able " and " Right Honorable " men like you. I will promise nothing of the kind for them. 1 believe they would not make good that promise. It would be entirely above their capacity to unroot the house over your heads, to throw down Its walls, to cover you with rags and drive you forth to hunger and without resource you, and your wife, and your little ones ! to the mer- cies of a wintry sky. No i The " common fellows " the fellows of common humanity 1 mean cannot reach a refinement like that. They will be ig-" noble " enough not to disturb your old bouse at all, until the new one is prepared to receive you. They 'Will naiia you down gently give you what help and guidance 28 TOE ODD BOOlv OF TTLR NINETEENTH CENTURY ; they can treat you, in short, every bit as well as themselves; that is, IL you take their kindness in good part. If you do not if you try to kick arid trample, and spurn them to do, in short, what you have been so accustomed to do, you vviil your- selves be responsible for what may befal you. But it will be better and safer for you not to do this. Better to take it all in good part. We will do what we can to make the change easy and agreeable, and even beneficial to you. in a way you cannot now understand. Of one pang, at least, you will ba saved the pang of envy. Having handed you carefully dow& from the " high places " in which you have committed ?o much sin, we will not allow any neighbor of yours to ascend those heights and set up the same Idolatry/ On the boundless plain below there will be beauty, and room, and employment enough for us all. Still, I cannot deny that " noble " men will become less "noble" when they turn their thoughts to honesty and their hands to use. But, then, how can we help that? God bless you! there is no unmixed good in this world, and when you remembei that you cannot be both useful and "noble" "Right Honor- able " and right honest at the same time, I trust you will take heart and be comforted ! For, if even I were there you might reckon on my good offices at all times, and on every reasonable occasion. 1 am a professed Christian ; and the Christian maxim, " love your enemies, do good to those who despitefully use you," binds me to your inter- est with an especial force. But there, are other maxims in the same book ; there is something about " measuring" and "met- ing," and " measuring to you again." I have forgotten the ex- act authority, and I trust that nothing will arise on your part to make us remember it. I refer you to the text, however. It may, perhaps, awaken in you that Christian forbearance which has lain asleep now, for how many ages ! Or if that indeed be hopeless, still the text may be of use. Jt may whisper to you not to " smite us on one cheek" till you are sure that we are ready to present to you the other ! But you are surrounded by foolish counsellors, and those may lead you Into Imprudences which even yourselves would be the first to deplore. That evangelist of yours, the London Times, OB, THB SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 29 lias been comforting you of late, soothing you into pleasant secu- rity, assuring you that England is at your back, " united as one man." You will be foolish if you believe all this. A gentleman may, it is true, calculate the whole mind of England merely by strutting into Printing-House Square and taking a goose quill in his fist. But then, you know, he may be mistaken * in his calcu- lation ! I think he is mistaken. And if you make careful inquiry about work and wages, and disfranchisement and poverty, and tne poorhouse you will find such facts, as will make you doubt that assurance given you by the soothing Times. I think those tacts will bring you over to my opinion and it is this : If you lean for support on the masses of England they will be pretty sure to slip from under you, and let you tumble, very nearly into the mud. LOCKHART, SCOTT AND EDGEWORTH. And don't you deserve to be tumbled into it ? Let me call in JSlr Waiter Scott to answer the question Scott a Tory of the most clean-cut stamp ; Scott who would have enforced even the old penal laws of Ireland ; Scott who organized his Galashiels and forest followers in 1819, to combat the men of Northumberland, who were moving for popular government. Let him and his son- in-law, Lockhart, and the Edgeworths, come up to the witness stand against you. Let us hear what they have to say about you you and your " Bight Honorable " deeds. " On the 1st of August," says Mr. Lockhart, " we proceeded from Dublin to Edgeworthstown. Here above all we had the opportunity of seeing in what universal respect and comfort a gentleman's family may live in that country, and in far from its most favored districts, provided only they live here habitually and do their duty as the friends and guardians of those among wbom Providence has appointed their proper place. Here we round neither mud hovels nor naked peasantry, but snug cottages and smiling faces ail about. There was a very large school in the village, of which masters and pupils were In nearly equal proportion Protestants and Catholics. The Protestant Squire enforcing discipline by his personal superin- tendence. How deeply he (Sir Walter) pitied and condemned tht He tas found oat his mistake. He now discovers thai " Landlord war (Ireland) vaa * ttovbleaome n p;Vainst the despoilers of man's Inheritance, of my Inheritance. They so impoverished the whole country I lived in, by carrying away the absentee black mail, that our humble business (a oakery) was paralyzed, all business was paralyzed, stunted, starved by the poverty those blind and inhuman "lords" left behind them. flHix* ' loL never yet has been revealed to them their great crime. My father was sober, honest, truthful, but singularly careless and improvident. Re nad what he called a "clean spirit" that is, that he would not take affront from any man. I heard him often say. " I am a poor man, but 1 never was poor enough to tell a lie." I am now on reflection led to believe that the right to tell a lie was a reserved right, to be used when necessary, to fasten the precarious hold men had on existence. My mother was guileless, retiring, and as industrious as my father was the reverse. Of a religious mind she would sing a low Methodist hymn while sewing or at the " spinning wneel." 1 the same low music she would hum over Goldsmith's "Turn gentle hermit of the dale." The word hermit probably investing it in her thought vitfc a semi-sacred character. I would not say one word on this subject of my parents only to impress my opinion in relation to Chivalry. The influence of such a singular pair on my dawning mind must have been marked strongly and distinctly, must have slightly bent the twig in its after direction. Good or bad, I would wish to give the merit to that "parent pair," rather than to two tattered old books. But I cannot do it. On the foundation laid by them only a narrow, selfish virtue ever could have grown up. It was the Inspiration descending through those old books that determined the future bent and action of my life. And now fifty years have sped away in varied life, and action and not'without suffering. Have I gleaned up any cool judg- ment? Has that " experience" that teacheth even fools taught me anything ? Perhaps not, for if I had a million of golden coins at my disposal I would spend them in pouring forth millions of OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 41 of those books of chivalry among the future men of America and of the world. The contempt of danger, the toils, tho vigilance, the honor of those brave men vindicating right and striking down wrong and oppression. Their sole reward woman's smile, and tho proud consciousness of deserved honor. Even if all imaginary, still that imagination would ennoble. Would lift men out of the rut of selfishness out, up, into a brighter, a happier, and a holier life. Blind aristocrats ! Shallow, stupid, ignoble men ! Insensible to truth and true nobility. Actually not knowing how base it is to riot in excess that is " Extracted from a fellow-creatiire's woe." The groat primal criminals of the earth, and yet not even know you are criminals ! How do you need a little of that redeeming spirit, at which, no doubt, you will have the dull audacity to sneer. But it is the misfortune of your birth and bringing up. If your fathers had, through a long descent, been manfully and honestly earning their bread, you, too, would be manly and honest. If you live by rapine if you criminally snatch from labor what it worked to earn if you stand with hired manslayers to kill that laboror if he resists your robbery if, in short, you are what we see you, all that it is possible to conceive of base and dishonorable and if you are so mentally blind that you do not see your c~ime that, too, is an inheritance that has come down to you with the stolen land. It is far more your misfortune than it is your fault. "Your misfortune!" For if the order of land robbers did not exist, the harmonies of Nature would exact just as much action from a man as the health of his being would require. As day follows night, as the seasons succeed each other so would action and health, harmony and happiness, go on together. Turning an artificial hell into a natural paradise. Removing the deep material degradation of one class, and casting out the deeper spiritual degra- dation of the other. 42 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; CHAPTER V. SKETCHES ILLUSTRATIVE OF ABORIGINAL MANUFACTURES, MODES OF LIFE AND THOUGHT AMONG THE WILDER DISTRICTS OF IRELAND AND THE PEOPLE WHO INHABITED THEM. CASTE. Is the spirit of caste inherent in human nature, or has it been crushed into it by external high pressure of the great Social Lie ? 'Certain it is that this stupid spirit is to be found digging down into the nethermost strata of social life. Let me classify its workings in my native village, down in the shadows where in- 'quiry has seldom reached. The shop-keeper knows his high position and he is always either scrambling or thinking to get up, never looking down to the mechanic order beneath him. In that order, too, the same unmanly feeling exists. The watchmaker comes first, or side by side with the saddler. The carpenter and mason come along to- gether, the first a little ahead. In the shoemaker and smith there is no essential difference, but the tailor stands by himself, a pitch above the weaver, who, excepting the day laborer, is the lowest down of all. I need not observe that the tailor there, as everywhere, is the butt of little wits, and that the laborer is held as low down as the furrow he digs in. The classification some- what follows the established order. The more useful the lower down in the scale. When it comes to actual test, the laborer, and I think the weaver too, is excluded from social intercourse. All the rest assemble and half forget their social distinctions at the " Tradesman's Ball," which comes annually. At the Servants' Ball, distinctions are not very marked, the day laborer would be admitted, but he hasn't the necessary money or clothes. Those servants who wait upon his " honor " or " his reverence " know very well that they are a few pegs higher up than those who serve the heads of a public house or of a grocery shop. Whether distinctions are inherent in our nature, or whether they are incident to our discordant "civilization," is now open for dispute. There stand my facts and make what you can of them. In one especial those gatherings, Trade and Servant, were dis- tinguished. They brought .generally conflicting lampoons, and OB, THE SPIRIT Of CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. <4S odes out at the heels of them. Those gave opportunity to eulo- gize or satirize the individual performers, as the rhymer might be swayed for or against. There was no libel law extant. If there had been, there would have been more rhyming inside than, outside of the jail. "What ! A jail in your remoteness? " Yes, it is an especial privilege, accessible always in any nook of the world. But my brightest spots lay out of doors, on water and on land. " Hillo ! Tom. Come over the hills, here's the gun and plenty of the explosive. You shall have one shot to niy two." This was the salute of a lad who lived in a big house had a good shot gun, ammunition, money, everything that 1 had not, but still an occasional companion of my own. " No," I replied. " Not on such conditions ; I must have shot about, and the first shot to begin with." H Pooh ! There's " Dan Sly " (we were all sliding on the ice pond) who will come without a shot at all merely for a share of what's here," pointing to his game bag. " Take him, ' I suggested, and away I went on the slide. I guessed what was coming on my return. " Well, no, I won't. He can't tell stories as you can. Come along," handing me the gun off his shoulder. We proceeded up the " Moor hill," where were outlying stacks of barley. No birds in view, level goes my gun and off, and down tumbles a rat. It had peered out at the top of one of the stacks to see what kind of weather it was. My companion was greatly amused, but wondered I would throw away my shot on such game. It was, indeed, an omen of my c^nai&g life of how I was to throw away many a shot at just such game (only public} and with an equal loss of the ammunition. Talk of the undefined happiness folded up in ten thousand pounds a year ! It does not truly exceed does it truly equal ? a rural village life, if uncursed with " lord "-made poverty, and! having the influence of taste, society, books, field, river and se* sports. Even the light labor to command, those would itself be a blessing. Often have I sat down to a wholesome dinner, cost- Ing not quite one penny sterling, with more profit and zest thao could be gathered round most of the club dinners of London. Nature is in all things a humane leveller in this as all the rest. 1 have forgotten so far to mention that it was a great discred- 44 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; it to be poor a disgrace, almost a crime. II, too, any misfor- tune, or error, had befallen any of your relations, you were held* in disgrace for it. In short there reigned a great mental oppres- sion over poor Poverty, as well as the material oppression that crushed it down. About this time (aetat 14) a retired Army surgeon offered to- furnish bocks and assist in my education for the Catholic priest- hood, I wonder, if I had accepted his offer, what change would' it have made in the tenor of my life. But I didn't accept it. I believed that a life of prayer and celibacy, or even the hypocrisy that would assume those virtues,- though it might accord many men's natures, would not at all accord with mine. I my friend so, and so ended the negotiation. Shortly after this I attended a Catholic meeting. Captain James Sinclair and all the liberal celebrities of the County Donegal were there. Whilst the eloquence flowed on. at every * hear, hear!" on the platform the other juveniles and myself would set up a most deafening cheer. Now, the "hear ! hear ! " was an ap- peal for close attention ; and this cheer of ours rendered that impossible, as it drowned the speaker's voice. Still, it was & " glorious blunder " in its way. That meeting was held in the rural "chapel : " and, on return- Ing to town, the same juveniles fell into another " glorious blun- der." We made a dash to unharness the horses, that ourselves might draw the orators into town in triumph. In the carriage which I helped to attack sat that corpulent old veteran. Captain? James Sinclair.* " Boys," said he, " these demonstrations are wrong-timed and improperly directed, but don't be ashamed of them. They evince that ardent enthusiasm which, under proper guidance, is an overmatch for the most fortified wrong. Enthusi- asm, rny boys, is the gunpowder loaded, rammed clown, and lev- eled against the foe " [with a piece of lead in front of it] . " Or it i& that same gunpowder exploded in the magazine to the destruc- tion of its owners. Boys, you have the work of men before you. Learn wisdom, and do that work well. Let the horses now do ' At>oat t.lts time savera: liberals vere imprisoned on a cnarge of maiming cattle sworn, against DV Informer*. Captain Sinclair sussectec t^.at these were perjurers. So by a ser- rant &t iaa t^ ;ail cuto3 or.eot ns own cows, and advertised a " Rewara." An Iniorm. r sresentea. a^ oflerei tc twe*r against one of th neighbors. I'hi* :ac: put an end; to tint OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. Af theirs." That was spoken nearly fifty years ago, and it lies sub- stantially bright and distinct in my memory still. CHAPTER VI. VOYAGE TO LIVERPOOL INCIDENTS, ADVENTURES, SEA SCENE, FAILURE, AND HKLTRN HOME. AT sixteen I adventured to Liverpool. Book?, lectures, the telescope, the microscope all of which I had got glimpses of in stray leaves I would find there in ful'. My father conveyed me to Derry, the place of embarkation. Near Convoy we passed the demesne of Squire Montgomery, brother of the hero-general who fell at Quebec. He was down among the trees, but seeing our cortege, he came briskly up, was soon in possession of our purpose, put his hand on my shoulder and wished me good luck. He was well-liked, notwithstanding his French principles, both in politics and social life, and quite vigorous in body and mind not- withstanding his eighty odd years. Eaphoe reposed near by un- der the wing of the Bishop's palace. The diocese has long since 1 een disestablished, its castle deserted and burnt to the ground, its lands and revenues sequestrated. It would not be easy to .find out who was the better for all this. Certainly the village oj Raphoe was a great deal the worse. On to Londonderry, and took pa c sage in the " Greyhound," Alexander Keay, master, from whom I received the first rebuff that was offered to me when entering on active life. Being only a deck passenger, I became a tresspasser when I intruded on the after deck. There two or three cabin passen- gers surrounded the captain and alternated among them the large perspective glass. Woody shores lay along the margin of Lough Foyle. Southward, in the distance, loomed up Ennish- owen Head, an obtrusive and grand promontory. By and by, away to the north, the Giant's Causeway lifted up its pillars. Not aware, at the time, of the distinction created by " deck " and 4< cabin," I attempted to join in the conversation, and desired greatly to get a look through the perspective glass. The Cap- tain, however, treateed me (a la Percy Shafton) " with a stare." 4nd the changeful shores and headlands danced alike througU 46 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY j the perspective glass and their conversation, in neither of whicft was I permitted to share. And so night fell down. Conrad says in that never-to-be-equalled " Corsair " : " Aye at set of Sun, The breeze will freshen when the day is done." Our breeze freshened into a gale. Over the deck the waves be- .gan to career, and down into the forehold were ordered the deck passengers ! The narrator of the horrors of the " Black Hole at Calcutta " observes : " If we had known the doom before us, we should have rushed on the bayonets of the Sepoys as a refuge from that more horrible death." So with us, but down we were, the hatch- way fastened, tarpaulined over, and we hermetically sealed down before we knew our danger, or thought of resistance. Then it was too late. Darkness, sea sickness, smothering for want of air, and fifteen human beings down in that narrow hold, largely filled with cargo, fastened down, live or die till morning. We piled up bales, trusses, everything that was moveable, shaping them like a pyramid, its apex pointing to the nailed-down hatch- way. I, the youngest and most alert, was assisted up and sus- tained on the top. Poised on my shoulders and neck, I kicked violently on the inside of the hatch. In vain, they did not heed, and I had to sink down exhausted, and all had to abide the issue live or die, till morning. Had thare been a few more of us, not one would have seen that morning alive. Some years later there were seventeen people so nailed down, in a Sligo and Liv- erpool steamer, every one of whom perished. We reached Liverpool, and I found myself a white slave look- ing for a master in vain. Day after day I rose before sunrise to seek a foothold on existence. In vain ! I even went out to the suburban brick-fields, but my immature years and unknit frame admonished employers, and they shook their heads. I waited about the Exchange looking for a job. Poor business. When an employer came looking for hands he brought the sun of Heaven along with him, carried a few men away with him, and left the rest darker than before. He never brought me with him. It was men he waDted, not a slender stripling lik myself. In the last week I had only half a day's work ; and as I called at the office, I wondered when the young gentleman in charge OB, THE SPIRIT O* CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 47 spoke very kindly to me, still more did I wonder when he paid me eighteen pence instead of fifteen. There was nothing for it now but a journey homeward ; my father was known to the Captain of the ' John." That was suffi- cient to provide me a passage back again to Derry; she was to Bail at daybreak ; I came to the " Old Dock " at the first peep of morning. She was gone. Through the dim twilight I could dis- cern the mainsheet, covered with a black anchor, far away down the river. She was burned and sunk the second night out, about ten miles off the Irish coast. Yes ! On that short, moonless night in June, the man on the look-out on the coast-guard station heard " The minute jrun at sea/' and now rising o'er the far dark waters, the forked flashing blaze of a ship on fire. If ever I return to the British Islands I will examine what record the newspapers kept of that sublime disas- ter. Yes 1 Sublime ! A vessel on fire on a far-off dark ocean I hope you may never see the sight But if you do, you will have seen at once the terrible and sublime. There was hospitality on shore for all that were saved from the conflagration of the " John ; " but men have not so much feeling for the wrecks of fortune as they have for the wrecks of ships. Wrecks of fortune ! Mine was a complete one. But Nature, for a purpose of her own, seems to take care ot young people. At any rate, I was taken care of. A fifty-ton eraft was about to sail for my native village, with a load of rock- salt, crockery, etc. The skipper and two sailors constituted the crew, and an old school-fellow of mine, older and more used to the world than myself, formed the passengers. We were entitled to no rations, and after two deys out our slender sea-store waa entirely gone. Whether the skipper and his crew knew of our extremity I can't say, but they did not offer us anything. At length my comrade made access to the ship's pantry, and offered me a share. This to me was a hard trial. I had formed my standard of honor on the principles of the old knights. How could I come down from that standard ? How could I partake of stolen goods? Some old philosopher has said, "If you would keep men honest, leave them something to eat." I had to illus- trate the truth of this philosophy. We were two or three days out when a sharp storm overtook IUK. Being sea sick below, I got up en the deck at grey daw |8 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; The waves were tumbling up short and jagged, as high ae they are permitted to pitch, which is, I believe, twenty-eight feet from hollow to crest. " The wind was down, but still the sea ran high." Not a breath of air, and the tide carrying us straight upon the * Maiden Kocks " at the the rate of five or six miles an hour. Twenty years after a lady visiting at our house requested me to write a description of this scene. Retired for the purpose, and without having thought of versification, and without making the least mental effort, I returned within an hour with the following iwcription ; THE MAIDEN ROCKS. The tempest night swung round the world, And calm bright morning o'er the sea, Would soothe, in vain, the waves that hurled On high their mountain energy. In the dim distance Fairhead mountain, Eobed in dark azure, raised his form. Bathing his feet the deep sea fountain, Lull'd on his breast the sleeping storm. Ill cloudy curls the smoke ascended From kelp fires 'round his rocky base. And up away in ether blended With sky-clouds, in their dwelling place. The cot emerges from their shadow. Sheening the unassisted eye. Through our perspective glass the meadow Waves welcome to the morning sky. Firm seated in repose and grandeur In that far mountain you may trace An imaged world around it, splendor The ocean underneath it space. It was sublime, that tumbling ocean. Chaffing on high its tameless wrath With not a breeze to urge its motion, Or whisper to it of its path. Yon white sail in the far off distance. Yon light-house on the far off eteep. Is that a vision of existence ? Is this a refuge from the deep? And both, far by that hazy shore A safety we must reach no more? Steady and wtrong; on, on, relentless; Dumb TIDE has bound us to his car ; Ol were yon ocean passage ventless, Or waged the waves less lofty war, Not thus would we be dashed into the arms W. the cold " Maidens " in their sea - OB, THE SPIEIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. Not thus their roused caress would leap to meet us, But gentler mood receive, aud calmer transports greet us. And we might, haply, from a few caresses, Escape on broken planks and swimming dresses. But now they bare their breasts before us. The veil of spray that clothes their brow Will soon play cloudy music o'er us. Will lovingly embrace us now. The doom is, doubtless, a sublime one. The sepulchre, no doubt, is grand ; Prompt and decisive is the time; one Hour hence ! Now, then, make a noble stand Oil this small soot of intervening deck. And meet with scorning nerve the coming wreck. One hour hence ? Kise the waves to overwhelm Our tiny skiff that breasts them like a duck. ^Our captain now himself has seized the helm, Sticks knife in mast, and whistles for good luck, 'Whistling at sea is danger, we allow. But peril save us ! or we perish now. I'orish ! for here they are ; the hour is gone, The six-mile distance has been quickly passed ; If I could lay my finger on a stone, That small round stone, how easily I'd cast Into the " Maidens' " lap ; but scraps of coal Fall short, as yet. of so sublime a gaol. Five minutes more ! But no, there is a breath Just born upon the wave-tops, and it floats Up to our sail, and grapples with our death, As vice and virtue grasp each others throats And yet its power to save us don't avail; Still on is our career : the infant gale Yet vainly puts its shoulder to the sail. II there be spirits hovering near me now, Prompting the thought that knits my gathering brow, Oh, tell me, prompt me, in that fated hour, * Was there, indeed, a spirit-wielded power That came embodied in that infant breeze? Its path upon the jabble of the seas. i" Jabble ? " pray what is jabble ?) Shake a.pitcher Until its liquid flies into your face ; Or fling a stone into this flooded ditch ; or, Dash ! drive your wagon through a slough, or placa. But that's enough ; in any such thing dabble, And you'll find out what sort of thing is " jabbie." Above the jabble, then, the breeze's wing Stretched its young effort to the flapping sail, J^hich. dull and dreamy, would do nought but swin (Perli sips 'twas searching for the absent gale,) 60 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBYJ From side to side, as up we climbed the wave. Or tumbled down it down as to a grave. A5d now the " Maidens " don their best attira. As near and nearer drifts the fated boat; Rises their drapery in ascending spire. And up along: with it their voices float. Hie out. young breeze, or start at once to vigor, Else useless, all, 'twill be your growing bigger. And. imperceptibly, it gathers strength. And grapples closer with the drifting timber, Blackens its speed, still slackens, till, at length, (As earth swings round in June and in December.) Our rock- ward motion stands, and by degrees. We slowly retrograde it o'er the seas. "Within our little cabin coffee-steams Exhale temptation ; now the danger's o'er. Outside, around the everlasting streams Of ocean-flood sweeps onward : and the shore IB hazy and sublime, amid the beams That fold it in their love, whose golden tie Enclasps the earth, the ocean, and the sky. But we are not all sunshine. Clay and spirit, Though quite sublime in many of their moodft Do several little weaknesses inherit. Among them is a leaning upon foods. A vulgar weakness 'tis, but more imperious Than higher things, from dreamy to delirious* And BO we snatch a moment from the sky. We leave the coast and mountain to themselves, Hor mark the six-knot tide still rushing by, But down among the tables and the shelves. And having spent some twenty minutes there. Emerge again into the upper air. Not as that sea-gull swooping on before us: Not as that porpoise light'ning through the wavej Not as the cloud, careering faster o'er us; As the wind voices pipe a higher stave. Not iust like one. and vet like all of these. Our path is onward in the dashing spray. Furrowing a green lane through the azure seas. And holding on our wing'd and eager way. Broad to our right (or starboard) the Atlantic; Close on our left (or larboard) the romantic. Bock-bound, and white sand-bedded shore is seen. Brown with dark heath, or bright with summer zreeik ****** -^ When tempest thunders on the shaking sea. And night and breakers close beneath our lee. And when the light-house rises on our sight. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 61 Taking your part against the closing night And allied tempest don't you gaze and love it. And deem it brighter than the star above it. Its tranqui! lustre peering from afar, Eisirig above the billows like that star: It comes, it comes across the billow's roar, A human sympathy from that dark shore. And so the high headlands, with their light-houses, and the lo\v, retiring shores, with their sheltered cottages, passed in re- view before .us during that long sunny Sabbath day of eihgteen hours. It was indeed a magmficent run of more than 150 miles. Apart from the grand variety which the passing coast present- ed, we had two incidents in the run. One, a revenue cutter's Heave to " shot, which we disregarded, and then her six-pound- ers sent dancing after us over the waves. The skipper, and in- deed all of us, enjoyed the excitement, and the nearer the balls struck to us, the louder rose our derisive cheer. As we neared the Island of Tory the chase gave us up. We were running down on that Island, and it became necessary to tack, for the iirst time that day, in order to come between the Island and the mainland. I was standing listlessly on the deck when, in coming round, the heavy gale struck our sails sideways, and threw us suddenly almost on our beam ends. I fell, or rather was flung, down from where I stood, and fell heavily upon the lee bulwark, which, fortunately, was just high enough to save me from tumb- ling violently and headlong into that boiling sea. Night closed as we rounded Arranmore Island, and sighted Cape Telling; the headland which sentinels on the north the great bay of Done- gal. I got home, and though tenderly attached to the people and the scenes, I felt no joy. I was lost in mortification at my great failure, I discovered, too, that turf-peat, though a vegetable de- posit, was largely charged with sulphur, and that I, some way, had become a man. An eccentric and liberal gentlemen in our village had institUj ted a fishing enterprise. I, with five or six other boys, became m hand aboard. Our pay was ten pence a day. Sometimes we kept on the waves all night, increasing our ten pence to twenty. On one of those nights we were driven to shore by a heavy snow storm. Bivouacked under a precipitous bank, lighted a fire and were about to realize the comforts of a nap with fronts scorching and backs coated with snow. But a country man, searching in 52 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J the storm for his sheep, came down to the blaze, and hallooing from the top of the bank, invited us to the shelter of his cabin. It consisted of one apartment some fourteen feet square. How buoyant is youth ! Our slumbers could not hold ground against practical jokes played on each other till morning. One of them I remember yet. Even then I attached a moral to it. A naked foot belonging to one of the sleepers lay in tempting proximity to the fire on the hearth*. A live coal was placed near it for the purpose of producing sport. The foot began to under- go sundry contortions which were quite amusing to look at. But at last the coal was put a little too near it nearer than the sleeper could bear. It awoke him. He jumped up and knocked down one or two actors or abettors of the wrong. They had put the coal a little too near. If they had been reasonable in their sport, the sleeper would have slept on, and the game might have continued till morning. But they were not reasonable, my fac- tory lords and lord dukes. They put it on a little heavier than nature could bear. They did exactly what you have been doing, my lords, and the natural consequence followed. Do you under- stand ? Probably not yet. But you may by and by. The more tempestuous the day the more awake and hungry are the fishes. And so, instead of rough weather keeping us on land, it had an effect exactly otherwise. On those rough days you could see four-fifths of a boat's keel out of water as she seemed to jump from one short high wave to another. On one occasion, with a lively wind and a good " take " at our hand-lines, light squalls arose at intervals from the north. You could easily see them approach, scudding on a dark grayish cloud. In proportion to the darkness and size of the (cloud would be the force and duration of the squall. Grand to look on, and rousing the fish, we enjoyed rather than feared them. But, by and by, one cloud showed up bigger and blacker than all the others combined. We were well out in the offing and headed with all our force to the land. In vain ! Before we got under shelter of the high coast the squall struck us with the greatest fury, blinding and battering us at the same time with a storm of hail. We were blown off the land across toward a des 9ft sand bar, called the " Back Strands." I had been affect- ed with sea sickness the best part of the day, but, as we ap- proached the " Back Strands," the swell rose so high, and thd OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 53 breakers for miles before us looked so horrible, that one of our hands ("Don Sly" we used to call him) fairly cowered and dropped the oar. My sickness was gone like a flash ; I seized the oar, made a footspur of Don Sly's back, and, all pulling steadily, we held our our own till the squall spent itself and then we shot out of the ground swell, and headed across the bay. The 'moment the danger was over my sea sickness returned and threw me down as before. Yield to danger and it will destroy you. Confront it manfully and you will overcome it. One time (I speak of it here, though this happened long after), I was pur- sued by a dozen men with bludgeons. I was making for my lodging-house in the hamlet of a wild mountain district. Ex- pecting this assault, I had a large horse pistol in my breast, and wheeling suddenly round, my pursuers caught the gleam of its bright brass butt in my grasp. This, with the suddenness of my wheel about, so disconcerted them, that a lane opened before me ; I passed through them in perfect safety, and they did not even renew the pursuit. The moral is, " Take hold of the danger, don't wait till the danger takes hold of you ! " At this adventurous work of fishing, I earned a small sum which enabled me to enter a rather humble field in the world of trade, but I succeeded tolerably well. My comrade, Prank Bay, is off, a hand on board the " Susau Jane," bound for Liverpool. I am conveying him down the bay. " That gun is left behind," said the Captain. "Your sister de- tained it, hid it away, that you yourself might return. I could not be rude to her, for she is a glorious girl, though she is your sister Frank." So spoke the Captain. And she was. I am looking at her now of a summer evening in a pearl white dress. Tall, straight, majestic. Face and fea- tures slightly petite compared with her commanding figure, but glowing, regular, surpassingly beautiful. Alas ! alas ! About half the time between this moment and that day she filled an early grave. Tempted into it by stimulating drinks. Why was man given thepower to create such a temptation ? " Have you any loose silver? " This by Frank to myself sotto voice. "A little." " Buy that fowling piece; you need it very much, and I don't like to put the Captain to loss. He'll give you an order for it, and I'll write a line to Anne." It is done, and ashore with Alick Henderson, the pilot 54 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBT ; Presented my credentials to Miss Anne. "No! she would not part with the fowling piece. She would keep it in revenge for the taking away of Frank." Too young and too fond of the chase to be sensible that I was doing a most ungallant thing, I summoned the young lady to the Petty Sessions. But Miss Anne took a walk up to the parson- age, where dwelt at once the regulator of legal morals and of re- ligious aspirations who could point with equal readiness the way up to Heaven or down to the " Black Hole." Is that the Peeler emerging from the home of Miss Bay? Is that my gun on his shoulder? The Reverend has untertaken to protect the gun. Looks ominous, but nil fasperandum. The day of trial is yet to come. And it did come and proceeded till late, and then adjourned, shut up shop. Not quite. " Is this not the return day of my suit us Miss Bay?" "Certainly," replies the Reverend Justice. " Why did you not answer when it was called? " "It was not called!" " It was called. Was it not, Mr. Clerk ? " Jack gave a gutter- al sound that seemed neither aye nor no. A mixture like of the one with the other. " It was not called, I have been here since the court opened." " Very well ; you shall have it called, as you are in such a hur- ry about it. What is your complaint ? " I stated the facts and presented my documents. " Have you any witness ? " " Yes. He is here, Mr. Henderson, the pilot." Alick told a straight story and to the point. Then this to myself from the bench. "What right have you to keep a gun ? " " What is your honor's objection to me ? Is it my character ? " " No. I know nothing against your character." " Is it my religion?" (A shade of irony seemed in this for I could not fairly shelter myself under either of the churches.) " No, in this country religions are equal before the law, but I find this gun floating around, and it is not registered." " How can the owner have a thing registered till he gets it in possession ? Give me my property, and take it from me again if I don't conform to the law." The bench pauses. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 65 ** Well, come to the Moor at ten o'clock to-morrow." I did, and he handed the gun to me. So far, good. With a gun either registered at 6e. or smuggled without charge you are, or were in those days, entitled to sport round the coast. But to cross a field in pursuit of hare or partridge was a sacri- lege. Nevertheless youth, in some of ite specimens, is headlong and unreflecting and I was one of those specimens. Starting a covey of partridge on adjoining grounds, I jump over the redoubt, and in on the forbidden fields of the Reverend Justice. The game had pitched in front of a hawthorn knoll. As I approached the Reverend's two sons emerged from behind the knoll just in time to shoot a brace of the covey. I " made myself scarce." I had broken the law ; I didn't think at the moment that they also had broken it. A uniformed Peeler favored me the same afternoon with a printed invitation to the Petty Sessions. There was nothing for it but to obey. The Eeverend father is on the bench, and the two hopeful sons are on the witness stand. Oaths and recitals on their part, and a frank admission on mine, followed. Sentence, " a twenty pound fine or three months." Half belongs to the (with emphasis) "in- formants," but the young gentlemen would remit that half. The other half must be paid. I am " neither able nor willing to pay it," and I frankly say so. " Is he a prisoner ? " say a couple of the Peelers I was already no favorite with them. "No," says his Reverence. "We know where to get him." With a nod, " you have a fortnight to make up the sum." My dissent is a shake of the head. And so I descend from the dock. I had been reading all the loose leaves that lay within my reach. Among them a small tattered " Instructions to Justices of the Peace." In it I found that sporting without a license kill- ing game, even on your own ground, incurred the penalty of twenty pounds. I found, too, that the License was to be obtained at the nearest Custom House, at Ballyshannon. Can it be possi- ble that the Reverend and his sons forgot to get the license ? To solve the doubt I make the journey to Ballyshannon U is only twelve miles off. 56 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; It is as I hoped. Books overhauled Connollys, Crawfords, Kellys, Treddenicks, but none so far down the alphabet as Welch. I feel considerably lighter as I return home. I never was, and never probably will be, of a reticent disposi- tion. It soon got abroad that I had been at Ballyshannon for a purpose. Ten days are past, and Jack Beard, the Clerk, hail* me. "What are you going to do about that fine? A short time only remains ; have you gathered up the money? " "No." " Now, be sensible. You are entering life. Beginning trade. It will injure you every way if you are sent to jail" " It will not injure me. It will do me good." " Do you good ! What do you mean by doing you good ?" Beflectively. "Let me see: I can't earn ten pounds a month outside of a jail, can I? " " Of course you can't. Why ask such a question ? " " Because I can earn that much inside." " Don't be talking foolishly. I want to be your friend." And he did. Jack was a good free-going Protestant, a smart fellow too, who had been Secretary to a company of United Men in '98 while he was yet a mere boy. " I know you are uneasy about what may happen to me. But don't. I'm only going to make money. I hold three gentlemen in my hand for twenty pounds each. Half of that will come to me." " Don't talk that way. You know how it will go in a tussle between you and a magistrate on the bench." " There will be no tussle with me. It will be between the law and the bench." " Don't think of it," and Jack left me. Next morning a very venerable gentleman, all the more vener- able for being very rich, demeaned himself by stopping at our cabin door. " Is Tom within ? " " Yes." And Tom goes out to him. " I have heard about that fine, and have spoken to the magis- trate about it." I give him thanks and an assurance that he need give himself no such trouble. OB, THE 8PIBXT OS CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 67 * Why not ? " I explain. " O ! that won't do. We must live good neighbors In this far off little home of ours." He had returned with a fortune from America. " I like good neighbors and a good neighborhood, if that were possible." " It is possible. Come along up with me to the Moor." We go. We enter the lawn, religion and law meet us and speaks. " Mr. McDonnell wishes to make things easy for you, and has called on me for that purpose." " I have already explained to Mr. McDonnell how, and how much, I thank him." " But I do not myself wish to hurt a neighbor (a shade of de- ceit here) and I have determined of my own free will to remit that fine, and I hope there shall be good neighborhood for the time to come." It is so settled, and I make good use of the " good neighbor- hood " by marching across his grounds next day with that litiga- ted gun on my shoulder, But that was not all ; 1 was to have still another encounter with him. It is late on a Sunday night. There is a wake, and a crowd of boys are assembled at the play of " watch the candle." A most hillarious and uncivilized play it is ; and the noise made falls unluckily upon the outside night and a couple of sancti- monious ears belonging to a 'Methodist class leader," who is, besides, a Church Warden. The Peelers have just made their appearance in the world, and one of them is along with the Church Warden. Thus strength- ened that official comes in to infuse his authority into us and put an end to the mirthful noise. To my surprise and disgust all my playmates fled to the garden. But my tutelary knights never thought of running away. Neither did I. So I was left to confront what was coming. " What noise is this by young vaga- bonds on the Sabbath evening ? " Thus the Church Warden. I did not appropriate the offered civility, and he followed it up with a hard look at my face, and " there's nobody here but idle ras- cals." 14 The number is increasing. One more since you came in." 68 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; " Take him prisoner." This to the loose, tall young fellow in the green uniform. It was probably the first duty he was ordered to, and he obeyed it right readily by laying violent hands on myself. My tutelary knights had brought me to this had made me stand whilst my companion? ran away They now came promptly to my aid. With suddeD hold and jerk, J tore down the two fronts of the green jacket, buttoned as it was, a la mili- taire, up to his throat. The sudden onset and surprise enabled me to swing him round and rush him out of the street door, I am afraid with an additional kick or two. Hearing the onset, its pre- liminaries and result, the crowd of boys returned, and their re- turning courage was brought to the test, when quickly marched up Sergeant Saunders with his whole force, twelve strong, to escort me down to prison. Bayonets screwed on were on one side, and grasped paving stones on the other. There might have been danger, indeed ; there was danger and I said : " Boys, if you throw a stone in a rescue, the first thing the guard does is to shoot the prisoner. Do you wish that I should be shot ? " " And besides," urged the Sergeant, " Tom will get no worse treatment than myself till morning no worse prison than my rooms." It was so settled, and with my body-guard I filed down to the barracks. In a village of rural size everybody knows everybody. Was it strange then that the Sergeant's handsome and really good daughter, then just a woman, knew myself, then just claiming to be a man. Truth is, all the young people found means of coming together without the older people showing them the way. So when I came to my lock-up, I found the tea kettle steaming, the tea things set, and a welcome for myself rarely indeed accorded to a king's prisoner by king's troops, and in durance for a crime committed against themselves, the king's forces. Nor was that all. There is a ring at the bell, and a lady enters with a paper in her hand. My gun-partridge prosecutor had been roused from his midnight sleep, and had written cabalistic ?ords on this paper in virtue of which I am free to return to the wake-house, as an escort to the lady who was niece to the de- ceased and had money to lend. Hence her Influence with the Rev. Justice, i.'he whole adventure was squeezed into little mow (ban the midnight hour OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. ) But next day came a piebald paper denouncing very ugly crimes dilapidation, violent assault, and so forth which I must justify at the approaching Quarter Sessions, or take a journey to Lifford and a recess in the county jail. I was a subscriber to the Catholic Bent. So I wrote to the Asso- ciation it was then in high feather in Dublin to ask their advice in my "difficulty." "Apply to some Attorney in your County who is a member of the Catholic Association. "EDWARD DWYER, Secretary." I did so apply to the only professional member the county contained. But no reply came back from Edward Murray, Attorney- at-law. Our old friend Jack Beard, the clerk, hailed me once more. "The Sessions are at hand," he says; "what are you going to do about officer Graham and his jacket? " "Stand trial, I suppose. What else? " "Well, there may be something else. I have been inquiring, and I think if you pay costs, including the tailor's bill, you will be let off." I must confess, at the present day, that I would listen to a similar offer in a similar case with more favor (such is the quieting effect of time) than I did then. As it was, a very resolved and distinct negative was my answer. The Quarter Sessions approached and things looked squally. My friend of the partridges sat beside the Assistant Barrister (Major), and literally "had his ear." That identical churchwarden who had got me into all the scrape was the first on the jury list to try my offense. I objected. "For what cause?" asked the Court. I stated the facts. " A very sufficient cause stand aside, Mr. Corscaden." My hero of the partridges winced spoke sub voce to the Bench suddenly rose and exit, a sure sign of what was to follow. On evidence of the policeman and churchwarden, them- selves, I was not only acquitted! but commended, and both those worthies sharply reprimanded told, in short, that if they had 1 >een worse used they deserved it. How different the result would have been had it been tried by the "Reverend Rector" himself! It was this adventure that made me the first "Young Irelander " on record. I was a subscriber to the Catholic Association, and I had written to that body for advice. They replied, as we have seen, and that reply led to my enlightenment, as we shall see. THK ODD BOOK OF THE NES2STEJEHXH CENTURY J OHAPTEB VH. ORANGEISM AJTD OTHER THINGS. THB anniversary of tho Boyne always brought bad feeling with it. It also brought a large procession of Orangmen into the village, armed, on foot and on horseback. They generally contented themselves with playing party tunes, and firing on th empty air. On the occasion of which I now write they did more, and one man of the opposite creed was struck down under a cart, and received seventeen sword cuts on the face and scalp. Neal Gallagher was quite a smart young fellow, and what was more to the purpose, a chief officer of the Ribbon organization, and held it in his grasp. He lived a mile out of the town, and along hi the month of June, hi walks towards his home, he and I projected a movement to settle the Orangemen. It is Sunday, the llth of July. I sometimes go to chapel to see the flounces and bonnets, but this time I have other busi- ness. Neal is there, and, as a matter of course, a crowd is there, We are all very demure, if not very devout, till Mass is over. Then outside there is a talk about pikes and muskets and mus- tering against the following day. The Tannawilly men, reinforced by the Killymard men, insist that they can do the work them- selves without sending down for the Inver men. Neal doesn't eay much till all have spoken. Then. " Boys, I like that voice. It has the clear ring in it. But we don't want any fighting if we can gain the day without it. Now, If the Inver men also come to the ground, we'll have such a force as the magistrates and their police will not face at all. This is Sunday, and we will best keep it holy by deciding that there shall be no blows ; there will be none when the Inver men show themselves." NeaPs word was law, as indeed it ought to be. But how apprise the Inver men ? They are at Mass now In " the Frosses chapel," eight or ten miles from here. They'll all be gone home ; we can't reach them in time. " We can. Those mountain congregations are late assembling, and they are not in haste to go back home without a little talk with their neighbors. I have a horse and saddle on the ground OR, THE SPIKIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 61 and an hour hence I can be there.' " I have another," said John McDonagh, a young man whose house had been threatened by the Orangemen. Neal off with his hat, and out with a sheet of paper on it. Pen and ink were mysteriously at hand, and in a twinkling we are armed with credentials to Jack McGlenachy, and a general invitation to a " Party at Thrushbank " by day- break next morning. The messengers are in the saddle, and don't pull up till we are at " the Frosses chapel." The devotions are over, but the crowd is not. Our message, didn't it create a stir ! The affair was arranged in ten minutes. Effectually, too, as the next morning light over Thrushbank fully proved. Now here let me make confession. I don't think, on the whole, that I deserved the praise which this action entailed on me for weeks thereafter. But, " as an open confession is good for the soul," let me make it here. Write down that I had an aiding mo- tive for this fast and furious ride. Winding along the river as it streamed seaward from the " chapel," there was a narrow, smooth road, almost a bridlepath, between the house of prayer, and the house of a young lady, who really was not, and could not be, half as beautiful, tall, majestic, goddess-like as I imagined her. But she was a good deal of all that ; very proud, too, and quite a toast with all the dashing young fellows in that region. Now let me confess it to my confusion but honestly confess it I expected that she would get a sight of me, and see that I could ride as good a horse, and was as much of a man as the very " biggest " and best of her admirers, I was not disappointed. She was emerging from the chapel gate as the douple gallop of two horses covered with foam reined up in front it. Though not one of the " recognized," she knew, " For quickly comes such knowledge," all about it, and did slightly return as I doffed my cap to her. She passed on, and as her form receded down the river pathway I am afraid, though I am not sure, that she could have bought me over from patriotism, Ireland, Freedom, all things most sa- cred in my thoughts, with one intonation of her voice. Talk of Heaven and golden harps, and hallelujahs ! Give me, in the long immortality that lies before us, the feelings of that day. And why should they not be given? The Supreme Intelli- gence gave them to us here. Why not continue them, continue them to us hereafter ? I at least trust He will 651 THE ODD BOOK O THB NINETEENTH CENTURY; " If Heaven one draught of Heavenly pleasure spar*, One cordial in this melancholr vale. 'Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair, In others' arms breathe lorth the tender tale. , Beneath the milk white thorn that scents the evening gale." Having written thus far, I remember that such men as Mira- beau, Barnave, and many another French patriot, and even Ed- mund Burke, were lured to the side of the court by the charms of the Queen and the court ladies. I fear that men, unapproach- able by all other temptation, may (but again a say I am not sure) yield to that. Next day word comes flashing into the village that Thrushbank is garrisoned by 3,000 men. But I antici- pate. It is still Sunday, but now it is Sunday night, and the word goes round that the Orangemen have sworn to burn McDon- agh's house before morning. Not a human being is asleep in the village ; all doors open ; all people out in the street. In front of McDonagh's we are assembled. Arms may be useful. Mclntyre keeps the second " head Inn ; " it is our place of re- Bort, and he has a musket and two horse pistols. Will he give them ? " No ; you will get yourselves into jail. No arms from me." " Stand aside !" Dash in, know their hiding place, and the captured arsenal is ours. We hold a council of war. It ia agreed that the people shall retire to their rest, and that, if in- vasion comes, Pat Cannon will summon to arms with his key bugle. It is twelve o'clock one two o'clock ; bright summer moonlight. Hark ! It is the gallop of horses, bare-backed, and the riders almost guiltless of overclothing. They had started out of bed. The Orangemen are on the march, they report, and would be here before now, only they stop to sharpen their swords on the grey rocks. Pat has the key bugle to his mouth to summon to arms the garrison. " Hold ! It may be a mistake. Mulreany and myself will cross tho Moor Hill, mark their ap- proach, and rush back and report it. Till then, wait." We cross the hill and the hill beyond it. All is as i^acef ul and silent as if a human passion did not wust La sJh* world. We return by Frank Ray's Grove. It is now in moonlight shadow. Not so thfc reverend JuKtioe at the head of ROOM* thirty or forty Peelers and revenue police. They are marching down the Chapel road to the town. From our thicket saniuaioa wo see two prisoners, our friend Neal and his uncle. They were " taken in the fact of OB, THE SPIRIT OK CHIVALRY IN MODERN DA VS. 63 an overt act "" running bullets of a Sunday morning." Along tbe shadowy hill we have a good start, outstrip the guard, and report what's approaching. All retire and shut up ; I to my sister's house, which is next door to the residence of my gentle friend , who had rescued me from Sergeant Sa u odors. " You must not stay here, she says [she was in along with my sister]. If search comes you'll be safer in my back parlor. You know I'm a Protestant, and loyal, and everything they wish." So said, so done. And sure enough the search did come through all the houses, and went thoroughly through that of my sister. No prize. My friend stood at her front door. She was in terror about "those Bibbonmeu," and glad in proportion to see his reverence vindicating the law. Myself, with my ear to the key- hole all the time, greatly amused listening to the loyal conver- sation. Next day about 3,000 men assembled, armed as they best could, principally with wool shears broken in .two, and each half forming quite a formidable pike blade of fifteen inches long, and with a point of very insinuating sharpness. The mountain and Piedmont are sheep-grazing countries, and in every cabin is a pair or two of wool shears every shears good at a pinch for two pike heads. But morning rises over the big blue mountains, and descends down over the lake and even down the river to Thrushbank Bridge. There they are with Captain Gibbons at their head. Wherever they come from they line a high stone fence that lies between them and a quiet rural bye road that leads down to and across the river. Their right flank rests on the bridge, and the stream easily fordable. The left wing is uncovered, or resting upon a front of pikes. John Hamilton, a J. P., and a good kind of a man hi his way; Brooke, of Lough Eske House, another J. P., not quite so good ; worse still, the Rev. Joe Welch, our old acquaintance. They are on horseback, leading on the rather fidgety and unreliable Peelers and the wholly resigned " whiskey police," who are in , quiet understanding with the rebels. These to fire over heads ; those to rush in and make them prisoners. All the hilltops are canopied with crowds, not very " sedate to think," but "watching each event." The troops block up the highroad with their march, and no one is suffered to pass before them toward the array of the insurgents, Birt C4 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CKNTUHY : the fields are too wide to be guarded. I pass on to the end of the hill (Drimlonagher) that overlooks the position within a quarter of a mile. I have a case of pistols only. If the row be- gins I must have a hand in. But a parley is sounded a con- ference a treaty. " Retire to homes " on one side. " No more Orange parades " on the other. Release and amnesty to the two prisoners. The first two conditions made good ; the last vio- lated wholly, I believe, by Welch and Brooke, to the disapproval and disgust of Mr. Hamilton. My friend Neal and his uncle are imprisoned twelve months for " conspiring to fight," and we were all conspirators. Sergeant Hammond had been at the wrong side of the Ameri- can war of 1812. He carried liberality home with him. I don't know what kind of a parish clerk he made ; but as a schoolmas- ter he stood alone. Never has the sun risen on a man who gave more liberty and less learning to his scholars than did Andy. On a far-back 12th of July I and a comrade wreathed our capa with green and marched away in front of the Orange procession on its way to Ballintra. Audacious ! A tall, fierce boy left the ranks in pursuit. Andy hadn't his eye playing the fife ; and just as young Corscaden seized us the tune ceased sounding, and Andy was there. He ordered that we should wear just what color we pleased, and it was so ordered. The schoolmaster has always a potential voice. Andy in particular. But that green affair was seven years before. I am now a a young man, setting out to Belfast for goods. Two businesses I have, and one of them is to get away from the charge of " con- spiracy." I am on foot to take the mountain road to Killeter the road that skirts into view of That lake whoso gloomy shore, Skylark never warbles o'er. * But just at the approach to the village on comes the Rev, Joseph at the head of his patrolling force, and with less or more " conspiring " prisoners. Andy is with them in the front. He steps out and briskly forward, takes hold of rny hand ; in short, identifies himself with me as his personal friend and pro- tege. Welch looks grimly on and marches on with his troop, leaving Andy literally taking care of me. The memory of that man is always a soothing resting spot when I see it far back In the distance. Eyen th puilentiftl Lough Derg. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 66 J proceed on my journey, and before entering the mountain road the last man I signal a recognition to is Jemmy Stewart, whose after wretched fate Is seen in this volume. I am at Castle- derg (named from the lough and river) and have time to stroll over its very, very narrow old bridge, and up to the ruins of what was once the parent and the pride of the village. Even In the far past times, there was youth, and trees, and flowers. Was there a purer and more golden light over those days than the light that descends on us now ? No, the light Is still young, but we are growing older ! A. CLOUDY SUNBEAM. I have spoken of the " bridle path," and the "seaward river," and the " receding form," and the " train of admirers," too, the elite of coast and mountain. Well, they were all on the retreat, carrying their damaged hearts home with them in silence. A reasonably high priced government official, and unreasonably low-sized government man, was about to carry off the prize. What else could be thought ? Position, ambition, public sensa- tion, and friends' persuasion are persuasive things, and they all conspired to cast the horoscope. I am in the "Young Men's Club," a "Chapman, Billie," signals. Sotto voce. "Won't you send a farewell to Miss before she enters the dreary waste of matrimony?" Is it so ? Certainly it is. This Is the last free chance. She'll be " pro- perty " before a week goes round. "Excuse me 1 This pen and ink." In a wink I am in the next room, and that pen rushing on in this fashion: Whilst ethers past the twilight hour No t that is not my present (hem*. In winding walk or leafy bower, That error, that fantastic dream ; Or roaming orer bank and scaur; Away with them, I can forget. Companioned with tht evening star. Or if they be remembered yet. Or watching beauty's kindling eyes Away with them 1 'Tis my design In smiles far brighter than the skies; To sketch thyselt and wee O'Bryan. Such smiles as thine were wont to be, " O I where has fled the towering taste But those are things I needn't mention : That once delighted in the Ullest, For smile of thine ne'er shone on me, And has it dwindled to tne least. Thy kindest gaze was inattention ; To the small small the very smallest, All that is past and let it go, Foor Tall ! I once thought it would do. That fleeting dream is gone, is orer : And many another thought so too; Yet 'tis to thee alone I owe But now your chance is like my own, That e'er my heart became a roTer ; And that's a good deal worse than none ; And such it is, I care not now Surveyor, too. But wherefore speak Were I this moment placed before that, Of one 'tis painful to remember. r meet thee with a changless brow. The recollection of whose cheek Fer I hare ceased to lore, adore thee. Brings to my memory bleak December: 9 66 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURI : Yet oft 63' Inver's verdant lide His moving billet met your eye. And oil relaxed your stoic pride To heave for him the pitying sigh; He had a servant to be sure. But breath that no one could endure; Another had a short thick neck, And his fine form was not unlike A small meal or potato sack; He was tar, they called him Jack; No, no 'twas Bill, for now I mind it; 1 think 'twas Bill; but just look back. And on his billetdeux you'll find it O ! bad I space to tune one lay, To .smart O'/ton 1 big Gillea ; To Jialingion along the shor, To Clarke, and to a hundred more; And EaVy.-iJiannon too ! but hold My nrnsc nor longer thus a-mi me, Or you ar.d I may get n scold; Butgtutlo lady, pray excuse me. And I'll not write another line But all about wee, wee O'Bryan.- ' "TSs said, but surely isn't true. What recommended !;im to you Was a email met about the pay; That weekly comes or every day. However that, be, this I know. That you liave ever more been prudent : Aud it would puzzle me to show A right good reason why you shouldn't; That you arc Jorftly nil agrees. And many a time I've choug'.it a pity That such a flower breathed not the breez* Among the ?ir.\)ns f a city; Where lords, arid xnusnti, and dukes ar most nobly does spell it." Terminating with some half remembered doggerel about "George's deep channel," and the "flowery O'Oonnell." In this way there was not a cabin in T reland but rang with the praises of this evil man. Nor was all this without cause. The Catholics were a subject caste had fallen for, and with, the vicious Stuarts. Arid once at least, on the 12th of July in every year, the banners and drums ot the Orangemen, renewed remembrance of the "Boyne and Aughrim. Protestant Dissenters disapproved of those irritating displays, joined the Catholic Association, and " Emancipation " so called was achieved in 1829. Immediately thereafter, the tory press demanded the BAL- ANCE SHEET of the " Catholic Bent." The merits of this demand is presented at page 67. Emancipation is gained and here is t^e first condition imposed by the Act : " I. A. B.. do sincerely promise and swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to his Majesty King George the Fourth, and will defend him to the utmost of my power against all conspiracies and attempts whatever which shall be made against his person, crown, or dignity; and I WILL DO MY UTMOST ENDEAVOR TO DISCLOSE AND HAKE KNOWN TO HIS MAJESTY, HIS HEJP.S, AND SUCCESSORS. ALju TREASONS AND TRAITOROUS CONSPIRACIES which may be formed against him or them." Thus every man taking office under it, becomes a sworn SPY of the government. Following this beginning are some twenty- seven sections of the Act, all penal and prohibitory. All in full accordance with what is here quoted. The disfranchisement of the Forty-shlllingers', a part of the bargain forms a distinct Act by itself. One trumpet note of triumph peals over the earth. The Catholic lawyers are in their new seats of honor. Those who elected Dan are driven out to destitution and death. 70 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; No man heeded them. Yes ! Henry Grattan Curran, son of the great orator, thus embalms them : " "With ruddy chocks around his hearth six laughing children stood, And kindly turned that old man's eye on his own flesh and blood ; His daily labor won for them a home, and clothes, and food And, as they broke their daily bread, he taught them Heaven was good, And bade them eat in thankfulness good man of the olden time ! " But when election time was come who then too rich or grand To crowd that humble peasant's floor, to seize his rugged hand, To ask his vote and interest, and swear like him to stand And peril life and liberty for faith and fatherland ! For he was " a real staunch Forty" the pride of the olden time. 11 But times were changed the fight was fought the struggle overpast^ And lost the power the Forties used so bravely to the last. Like broken swords these dauntless men aside were falsely cast ; That hearth was quenched ; that cabin's wall in ruin strewed the blast : And where is he the " Forty" the heart of the olden time? " The Reform Bill of '32 brought the Whigs into power, and along in '-M Dan made a splurge for " Repeal." But his motion met with such a hostile reception that he quailed knocked under and made the "Lichfield House compact" with the Whigs. This disfranchisement of the Forty-shilling Freeholders was a public- calamity, second only to the lord-made famine of '47. It affected the whole Island. It ruined all poor tenants, Protest- ant and Catholic alike. Discontent springs up, and there is need of a coercion law. The Tories were then in power, and the des- potic law would enable them to transport to a penal settlement any man in a "proclaimed district" who might be found outsido of his cabin after the sun went down. Dan shook both Hemi- spheres with his denunciations of this inhuman law. But such laws are asked only for a time, at the end of which time they "expire by limitation." When this law so expired the Tories were out, and the Whigs were in and demanded a renewal of this atrocious law. What did O'Connell do? As a part of his contract with the Whigs will he sustain them in this demand? He has forty * of his relatives and adherents in Whig places. Will he sustain them with his vote? Aye and with his speech, too. O'Connell spoke and voted for this atrocious law which five * I had this t';n-i troi Mr. Collins when he was J'rivat^ Secretary of Joseph Hume. M. P. OR, THE SPI1UT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS, 71 years before he had so vehemently and so righteously denounced, Those facts did not strike down the popularity of the man, and when I was in London in '36 and '37 Dan was invited to Demo- cratic meetings in that city. I was present at one of those, and, among other things, he used this figure of speech : " The sweat of your toil, my friends, streams over your brow, and you can. with soap and towel, wash it away ; but there remains behind a brand that you can't wipe away in this manner. It is the brand of slavery; and that can be wiped out only by the soap and towel of universal suffrage." To which there was a loud re- sponse of applause. Now it was remarkable that in all his pro- grammes and speeches to the Irish people the word " universal suffrage" did not ever pass his lips. By its use he kept the English Democracy on his side; but a night was approaching that would settle the account between him and the Beformers of England. That night saw the defeat of the Factory bill in- tended to relieve the factory children. Those little ones had been worked destructive hours and debarred from education. The friends of the children had introduced to Parliament a bill for their relief. This bill the Manufacturers resisted. The op- posing forces, for the bill and against it, assembled in the lobbies of the House of Commons on the night fixed for the debate. "Don't lose time with me," said Dan, to the children's lobbyists. " Look to those that are uncertain, me you are sure of. Not only are the children secure of my vote but my humble voice shall be raised in their behalf." He had yet to pass the Manu- facturers' lobbyists. They got hold of him, and, whatever con- siderations they urged upon him, he wheeled right round, and he not only voted but made a "sympathetic " speech against any change in the conditions of the lav/. He " had come down to the House," he said, " determined to vote for all that was claimed on the part of the children ; but he fortunately was shown that the parents of those children could not spare any deduction from the wages they earned, and so, in justice to those parents, h must vote to keep the children at their work as usual." Such was his explanation : but a more authentic explanation appeared the following week. The Manufacturers subscribed one thoue- and pounds sterling to the "O'Cormell Tribute.^ I should have previously stated that immediately after the Catholic rent had ceased was commenced the " O'Connell Tribute, 1 ' and it reached 72 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; some seventeen thousand pounds in a single year. This trans- action was denounced by the Reformers as the "Sale of the Factory children ; " and dimmed, but for a time only, the popu- larity of Dan, About this time the Duchess of Kent (Victoria's mother) couldn't live on 30,000 sterling a year and free palaces. So she ran in debt, and application is made to the Commons to relieve her distress. The Commons refused to do it. Dan exhausted his eloquence in vain, and then he said he would " raise a sub- scription in Ireland, and even his barefoot coutry-women would tush in from glen and mountain, and club their sixpences rather than see their queen's mother in embarassed circumstances ! " By and by the queen got married, and it was proposed in the Hon. House to grant Albert 20,000 a year. Dan leveled his indig- nation against the proposal. It was " a beggarly allowance," and he moved to amend ten thousand pounds to it. The House was again obstinate, and to Dan's disgust the poor prince had. to sit down with the " beggarly " twenty thousands pounds a year. Dan now discovered that the royal stables were not fit for the new-comer's horses. So he sustains a modest grant of 70,000 to build new ones. The eloquence of Dan failed once more, and f he prince had to put up with the existing stables. It is '37, and the Canadian Assembly has refused to pay the government officials, till certain grievances are redressed. Lord Tohn, then premier, won't redress them. On the contrary, he Brings in Resolutions to seize upon the Canadian strong-box, and pay the officials out of it. I was in the strangers' gallery that tight, and heard the debate. Dan spoke against the Resolutions, and voted against them told the minister that this would pro- duce bloodshed in the Colony, though the minister might think the prophecy " a fairy tale ! " The measure was passed however, and many a Canadian died in opposing it many a homestead was leveled by the flames and many a gallant American bor- derer was hanged to death for attempting to do for Canada what Lafayette did for his own Republic. Could Dan have prevented this ? Let us inquire ? Parties in the Commons were nearly balanced at the time. Dan, with his " tail of forty joints " held the balance. To affect thia Canadian question, be well knew that it was utter- ly useless for himself and all his followers to vote against it, for the whole Tory side was sure to vote with the government. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 7i< What then could Dan do ? Simply take Lord John aside and peak to him in this way : " You gave those poor waifs in Cana- da a Constitution, and now you are going to violate it because they ask a small matter of redress, which is not very unreason- able. Take my advice and give them the trifling boon, or if you don't ! " Lord John needn't ask the meaning of this " If you don't ! " He knows its meaning right well. Knows that Dan can oust him from office by voting with the Tories on the very next close division on the Malt Tax for example, or any other trial of strength. This word resolutely spoken by Dan would, as I believed on that night, and have ever since believed, have saved all the slaughter and sorrow that ensued in Canada, and its border. And this is the only inferential charge I bring against him. Judge whether it is reasonable. All the others are direct substantial facts. Then comes the burning of the American steamer " Caroline " on the Niagara river, and the murder of her watchman, Durfee, by a Scotch McLeod. Dan presents himself again. "Let New York touch a hair of McLeod's head," he exclaims, " and fire and sword will rouse her midnight homes." When the dispute about Oregon arose, Dan spoke to hia followers in the spring of 1845. Let her majesty do "Jus- tice to Ireland " (whatever that meant.) " Then Ireland would start forward with all her chivalrous and manly daring under the banners of Queen Victoria then would Irishmen show their devotion to the throne." This, too, from the man who would not purchase the " greatest revolution with one drop of blood," but, to shield the loyal criminal McLeod, he would spill any quan- tity that might be desirable. Yet hear him again, in the same breath. " We tell them (the English government) from this spot, that they can have us, that the throne of Victoria can be made per- fectly secure, the honor of the British Empire maintained, and the American Eagle in its highest pride brought down, and the British Lion put up in his place. Let them but conciliate us, and do us justice, and they will have us enlisted under the banner of Victoria, Oregon shall be theirs, and Texas shall be harmless." And now at the close of every session of Parliament he held a meeting to beg another year's trial for the Whigs. He organized the " Volunteers, " " the Precursors," or " pray curse us " as 74 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J they were facetiously designated. Every year a new name end a new organization. At every one of these the first and last cry was send in the money, and you shall "have justice next year or my head on a block." Next year came ; ifc brought neither justice nor the "head on the block;" but it brought many blockheads to sustain him for another year. At a meeting in Cork a poor fellow called out, "but what about Re- peal, Mr. O'Connell ? " Dan was equal to the emergency. " Is there nobody there to put a wisp in that calf's mouth ? " This was greeted with a roar of laughter and applause, and that " Ee- peal question was settled." "William Sharman Crawford was in Parliament in those days a . true-hearted man, whose principal object was to legalize "Tenant Right," as it practically existed in several northern counties. Dan was especially hostile to Mr. Crawford and this law ; and as the character of Mr. Crawford was invulnerable to attack, Dan put in buffoonery, and called him " Sharman Agrah I with the white waistcoat." Disgusted with this action, Father Kenyon, a Catholic priest, came out in an eloquent letter, recounting Dan's crimes and de- nouncing him. Dan was equal to this even. He made no re- ply, I ut he went to the new monastery of La Trappe, made his penitence, and presented it with 1,000. This brought the bish- op down on Father Kenyon, and he had to " subside." Thus it went for seven years. At last the Whigs are out, and have nothing to give. The Tories are in and will give nothing. So Dan raises his voice, and the long-proscribed "Repeal" echoes over the world. This was in '41 or '42. Fergus O'Connor sends in his adhesion and one pound ; Bronterre O'Brien sends his and one shilling. Both Irishmen and leaders in England. Dan throws the money back to them. He " will have nothing to do with Chartists physical-force disturbers of the Queen." At the same time Robert Emmett, of New York, resigned the Repeal treasurership in the following communication : "Since our 1,-ist meeting I have read the report of the National Repeal Association of Ireland, by the Earl of Charlemount. which was drawn up In a com mittee appointed for the purpose, and dated the 27th of December*, "In this document they have indiscriminately pronounced that the per- sons who were engaged in the struggle for liberty in Ireland in 1798 wore wicked miscreants whose crimes they detest and deprecate, and whom they would consign to the contempt and indignation of mankind. And OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 75 those sentiments appear to have been adopted by that body without even a murmur of disapprobation. " Now I should bo sorry that this attempt, from such a source and on such an occasion, to stigmatize the character of men. to whose purity of -motive even their political enemies have borne complete testimony, had not given pain to many bosoms besides my own ; and I am aware that it has already eli- cited the most decided and avowed reprobation tn>m many members of the Repeal Association in this city. But the peculiarity of my situation renders It lit that I should promptly free myself from the possibility of having it ever imputed to me that I had passively admitted that such language miht be justifiable on any grounds, under any circumstances, from any quarter. And I can perceive no mode of doing this decidedly, effectually, and con- sistently, except that which 1 now resort to." And then he resigns the Treasurership of the Repeal Associa- tion. Let me here fix attention. If Dan had helped Sharman Crawford at that time nothing could have defeated nor even de- ferred a thorough Tenant-Right law. With such a law in opera- tion the lives of the tillers of the soil would not depend upon that one solitary resource, the potato. If the potato failed for a season in America it would be felt only as an inconvenience. It would have been no more than an inconvenience in Ireland in the fatal year of '47 had Dan co-operated with Mr. Crawford. Mr. Crawford had Ulster with him. Dan could have roused the other three provinces. If he would not, and if a half million perished in consequence, then was somebody to blame. Who ? The two or three last movements of his life were in perfect keeping with all the rest. When the monster half million meetings of '46 swept over Ireland, till they came to Clontarf, the Lord Lieu- tenant " proclaimed " that the Clontarf meeting should not be held. With half a million of men, and all Dublin at his back, Dan knocked under in the most loyal manner. He was imprisoned, but the Whig law Peers let him out again. Great were the re- joicings in Dublin, and it encouraged him. to propose his last proposition. That was to form a " Preservative Society " to con- sist of 300 gentlemen who would prove their ability to take care of Ireland, by each paying down one hundred pounds sterling. This would have figured up 30,000. But the 300 gentlemen di J not make their appearance. Then came the last meeting or nearly the last he ever attended. "They say I am growing old," said Dan, " but I'll give them a good deal of trouble .yet before I die. My people keep their hair and teeth up till ninety." He then insured his life for ten thousand pounds, and transferred his heart to Rome immediately after. So the last haul he made off the Insurance Company. All my early thought and feel- 76 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; ings were with O'Connell. But so far as I can judge every should stand or fall not by our feelings but by his own acts. CHAPTEE IX. A VOYAGE ABCHBISHOP MCHALE PERSECUTIONS IN THE LAST CENTURY A FEUDAL COURT KILLYBEGS SEA AND MOUNTAIN SCENES KOBBER ADVENTUEES SPORT CAPITAL YARN MARKET. IT is Spring, 1834. I charter a small vessel to run across to Killala. The owner and one "hand " to navigate. I to supercargo. At the last moment the ' ' hand " refuses to adventure himself on board. So the owner had to be captain and myself the crew. It is grand to be alone on the desert waters in a very small craft, when all is silent eave the moaning of the waves, and all is dark save the pale star beam dancing over them. And then to see in the distance, stalking toward you, a tall ship holding on her way as lonely and as silent as yourself. Such a ship had left Sligo harbor, and was heading northward across the bay. By the nautical rules she ought to have yielded to us the right of way. Expecting that she would do so, we held on our course almost a little too long! But no ! She stalked from wave to wave, right onward, and we were just rushing across her bows when my captain put down the helm the crew (that was myself) handled the mainsail and we swung round just in time to graze our opponent's side. Three seconds later and the lofty ship would have commissioned us to the bottom how many fathoms ! There seems a fate in those things. The "hand " who shrank from venturing with us that night was drowned just a yeac after on the rocky coast of Mulloghmore, in the same bay. Out of that voyage grew a fact that bore fruit forty years after. L*et me briefly trace it here. My shipowner, who had charge of my freight, employed a watchman, under who.se care about three pounds' worth of my property disappeared. After breakfast, in Mrs. * * * boarding house, came settle- ment of his freight. I stopped the value of my lost property. High words ensued, but not many for, as reply to what I deemed an insult, I jumped across the table where he sat opposite, and bore both of us to the ground. We got up and (in deference to the lady and her daughter) deferred the "issue" till we should meet OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVAbRY IN MODKllN DAYS. 77 where his vessel lay. He retired to the appointment at once, and I " sedate by use," as Glenalvon says, sat down and wrote a long letter home, and carried it to the post office. Then walked leisurely down to the " trysting place." My opponent was well known to a number of young men who worked in a large factory fronting the dock. Those young men persuaded the combat off, as a thing of no use to either of us. He was dead in a short time after, and this peaceful turn saved me many an after re- gi?et. It is a lesson. Remember it. Returning by Ballina, I heard Bishop MacHale preach a sermon in the Irish language. It is difficult to believe, but the following is a true description written forty years after : " In the spring of 1834 I had occasion to visit Ballina on busi- ness. The new Cathedral (St. Patrick's) had been just roofed in and was ready for dedication. I was naturally desirous of seeing the man whose name had already became a household word in Ireland. 'Twas true, he was to speak in the Irish lan- guage, which I did not understand. But I did hear him, never- theless ; did stand (there were no seats), for it may have been two hours, enraptured with the oratory, one word of which I did not understand. The picture is still before me. The voice still vi- brates hi my spirit. Such a picture ! such a voice ! Now calm and colloquial, as if a brother, not a father, spoke to the assem- bled flock. Bat in the impassioned flow of his discourse, as he cast his eyes upward, and raised his right arm aloft, I saw a picture, I heard an eloquence, the like of which I never saw and never heard since that day. Now in his eighty-seventh year, with his mind and even his eye-sight doing the duty they did fifty years ago, surely everything about him must be of deep and even scientific interest. Was he a pure Celt ? Was the moun- tain that overhung his father's cabin high or low, coast or in- land? How near to it did the heather grow ? Was there a lake, a stream, a rock or spring adjoining it ? Who of his kin joined the invading French ; what did they do ; what suffer ? His rela- tives are, doubtless, still numerous in that region. I met several of them at that time. They were in the humbler ranks of life, 80 at least they remain in my memory. I had realized ten pounds on my venture. Connuaght hospi- tality kept me up that night till 2 o'clock A. M., and yet I was of? at six off on foot to save five shilling**, the coach i'aiv to Sligu, 16 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; a distance of thirty Irish miles. Though I had realized 10 on my venture, five shillings was just what a laborer would earn in a whole week, digging witli his spade. But the day was warm, and in not a house by the wayside would they confess to a cup of water because I didn't ask it in Irish. I was let into this secret by a man who traveled with me three or four miles. Then I asked not again, but walked up to the " dresser " wherte stood the pail or "piggin" and helped myself. Nor was this at all strange. Those people were descendants of families who had been driven out of the northern counties in the middle of the last century, by the cry an Orange cry- of " To Connaught or hell." That terrible time when a notice would be put on the cabin door, fixing a night in which the house would be thrown down and the occupants driven away, if they did not in the meantime take their departure. "Manor Court " existed at this time. A feudal institution, the Seneschal (judge) appointed by the " lord of the soil." I had stopped the value of my lost property out of Captain John's freight. He cited me to the Manor Court, and there got a decree against me. I appealed it to the assizes at Lifford. It is midnight dark, and the rain falling in torrents. I am on horseback, with 24 miles and Barnes mountains before me. To go alone through that storm and that mountain. Well "Loss of ease, though it might grieve me sore; Yet loss of pence, full well I knew, would trouble me much more." But it was not the loss or gain of pence that decided me. It was that a present pleasure is always dearly purchased with an after regret. So I went, employed a lawyer, who, whether designedly or not, was absent when the case was called. I took his brief and had the case won before he returned, to the no small amusement of the Judge and the audience. KILLYBEGS. The place is little known, though it seems destined In the Great Future to be the chief point of departure to and arrival from the New World, at least in the mail and passenger trade. It does not lie so far west as does Gal way, but lies so much farther north as to balance the western advantage of its rival, if rival it can be considered, that has no haven better than an open roadstead. Killybegs, on the contrary, has a harbor that will vie with, if it does not excel, any in the British Islands. It la entirely land-locked by high hills save at the narrow entrance* OB, -THE SPIRIT OB- CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 79 where high rocky precipices divide to form an inlet from the deep sea, the entrance itself as deep and invariable. There is no channel with its attendant sand bar, because no stream falls into it, save a small one, draining a short and narrow space of coun- try, and nearly dry in summer. The harbor is very spacious, .averaging nearly two miles long from the entrance inward, and over a mile wide. Nearly half of this area affords deep and all of it secure anchorage. In crossing from St. John's, Newfoundland, in a propeller, we made Cape Teeling, lying off Killybegs, early in the morning and wore away the long summer day before we and myself were within three miles of clearing the Glen of a Sunday night-fall We passed a shebeen house, the last house till we would reach " McGurk's," our stage for the night. Some half dozen fellows were around the shebeen house door, and my comrade advised quick motion. " If there be bad characters in a neigborhood they are sure to be at the shebeen ol a Sunday night." Quick motion it was then, and we had gained about a mile, when tramp, tramp, tramp, came rapidly and heavi- ly behind us. " I knew it," said, Owen " there they come." Now Owen, though a very droll and amusing fellow, was the most dis- tinguished coward in our " profession." " We are prepared," I said ; under cover here (it was a misty rain) is what'll "take a couple of pets out o' them." " So go ahead." We did at a fast run and lost sound of our pursuers in a turn of the road. But Owen stumbled and fell and before he was up again the tramp came " Nearer, clearer, deadlier than before." and Owen was off again, guarded behind and encouraged by the two pistols. The chase continued thus with little change in the distance between us, till we came to the end of McGurk's farm, about a quarter of a mile from the house. Here I wheeled round, and, heedless of my comrade's remonstrances, awaited the pursuit* pistols in hand. He said I was mad, but he would stand by me. Emerged from the mist, they perceived us awaiting them in the middle of the road. There were six of them, and, after brief counsel, four fell back into the mist, and two approach- ed us. I suppose their theory was this. If all came forward we would again betake ourselsves to our heels and make McGurk's good before they could reach us ; whereas, if we waited for two, 84 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; as was more likely, those could grapple with and detain us while the others rushed up. However that might be, the two, came running forward with " Why didn't you wait for company ? " "We choose our company," said Owen, I swinging round on their rear presenting the pistols. "You are prisoners or dead men" I said, " on with you, you'll rest in Derry jail to-morrow. Shout and it will be your last" And so they marched on in front of us a distance of some fifty or a hundred yards, begging all the while to be let go. Owen was of the same opinion ; " we could not spare time" he said, "it would damage our business ; better give them a few kicks and be done with them." I yielded, deputed the kicking duty to Owen, still presenting the pistols. He performed it in the most praiseworthy and ludicrous manner, and so dis- missed them back to their companions. Though quite successful in trade, it was impossible that I should grow rich ; for if I had twenty or thirty pounds lying un- used for a week or two, I conceived a most irrational contempt for it. My energy and endurance no, resistance to fatigue were very great. Walk fourteen Irish miles to a market, active on foot the whole day, without breakfast, till it came by candle- light ; then retrace the same fourteen Irish miles home again, not to go to bed, but to manufacture torches out of dry bog fir, and "burn the water," i. e. } spear salmon under the light, on the fords of our beautiful little" " river " (we used to call it, though it was only a stream easily waded through in ordinary times of the year) ; firing an odd pistol shot to keep the solitary water- keeper at bay, whilst we, I and Ward, my brother-in-law, pur- sued our sport. How careless of consequences is youth ! Not for gam, but for the mere sport of killing the salmon, how often have we put our necks within the compass of a halter. Let me relate one example of this kind. The following is a conversation between Ward, as he eat ehoemaking on his bench, and half-a-dozen mountain men in whose wild region he used to sport in times gone by : WARD "Have you much sport out there this season? " MOUNTAIN MEN" Sport ! No. There hasn't been a * splunk ' lighted on the Ainey (a mountain river) since the winter set in. H * How is that ? What has happened to you all ?" "Troth, plenty. Jemmy Burns, and a strong guard along with Him, patrols every night at Harrv Monaghan's Bridge, with fiat- OE, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVAU&Y IN MODERN DAYS. 85 Tula of loaded muskets. Ah ! begorra, they'd shoot us like mag- pies if we kindled the least light." " D'ye think it would be hard to break up their parade an* put things on the ould footing ?" " No ; it can't be done. Jemmy's as wicked as the devil. You know he was transported for 'levelling* seven years ago, and lias just come back from Botany Bay." " O ! I know all that ; but we'll settle him. Will ye meet u at the bridge o' Wednesday night ? I'll bring half-a-dozen along with me." " Yes ; we'll meet you with half-a-dozen more. But I don't see the good." This conversation took place between the aforementioned Ward, who was an irreclaimable sportsman, and one of the mountain men with whom he used to "poach" (they call it) in the wild districts referred to. So Wednesday night came, and saw eight of us on the march to the scene of action. We mustered six guns and made show of the other two by shouldering " quarter clefts " of ash. We stopped at a sod house ; the house of Owen the thatcher ; but let me describe : A " Turncoat " and an " Informer " were the two things most detested and the two names most dreaded as brands of disgrace. The first for changing your religion, diverging from the track your father had traveled before you. The second for giving informa- tion against illicit distillers. The latter, indeed, was base and criminal in the last degree. It was to brig destruction on the property and imprisonment on the person ; in one word, ruin on its victim. The abhorrence in which it was held was, indeed, an honor to the people. Owen, the thatcher, had been employed, I believe by Hector Magee, and the contact led him into the toils of the Rector. Owen immediately found himself more detested even than the Informers, and so he retreated into the trackless moor that lay near the mountain. As " Petersburgh rose like an exhalation from the Neva " so did Owen's sod castle rise in a few days an '* exhalation " on the face of the moor. Ward was too much of a sportsman and had seen too much of the world to hug in hia heart this prejudice against Owen. His love of freedom and field sports, his defiance of landlord temporal authority, extended to 86 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY? a semi- defiance of all authority, even to what claimed to bo spiritual. So he chose Owen's fortress as his " base of opera- tions " when invading the Ainey river. Thus it was when we ap- proached the "exhalation" on Wednesday night. It appeared in the dim light like a rugged, bulky, singular looking mound, rising abrubtly in the face of the moor. " This," said Ward, " is the place. We'll prepare things here.* The door of wicker, quilted inside with a straw mat, opened, and stooping we entered the " sod castle." It was sufficiently high to stand in, had an aperture in the wall sufficient for light and ventilation, and two or three panes of glass, a hole in the roof above the fire place gave egress to the smoke. The moor was all turf, and a blazing fire was on the hearth that lighted, warmed and dried the edifice, which might be fifteen feet square, and a month or two old. Here we prepared the torches and sped on to set at nought the temporal authority over the salmon, as Owen had set at nought the spiritual authority over the soul Ward, commander ; myself his henchman, and second in com- mand. Arrived at the bridge, our auxiliaries were nowhere to be seen. But "Jemmy," the redoubtable Jemmy, had his men mustered in a stone house three or four hundred yards below the bridge. Our commander crossed the stream, shot up the mountain in quest of the auxiliaries, and Jemmy, seeing the crowd, marched out to attack us. Myself was now in command. Advancing from the shadow of the battlements to a height on the road, " Ground arms ! " " Give your brass butts a tear along the rough stones to sound their metal as a warning." " Stand off! or you're dead men 1 " But Jemmy approached his forces along the height, eight in all, themselves and muskets relieved against the dull ky. "Stand off!" Jemmy now was within parley of us threatened law and extermination ; but only got this reply : " Stand to your guns, men ! " " Make ready ! * Click went that cocking of each piece. " Now fire when I pro- nounce 'Three!'" "Stand off!" "One! two!"- but before the "three" came, Jemmy and his men wheeled and sought once more the safety of their stone fortress. Surely this was providential. Jemmy was a brave man, had been a leveller, was selected to this charge for his headlong Courage. If he had approached us if he hadn't retreated, if he had merely stood his ground every gun in our party would OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRT IS MODERN DAYS. 87 nave been fire* at him ; and so sanguinary were the laws at that time, and indeed yet, that the act of firing would have brought every one of us under shadow of the gallows. By this time Ward was descending the opposite bank with his reinforcement of the mountain men. He knew their rendezvous, and found them at once. And now was held a council of war. So far I had been vic- torious, and had no especial appetite for any more "glory. 1 * But Ward gave a spring and an oath that he would never spend a night and mnroh so far without having a little sport for it. He had a "spunk" in his pocket, i. e., a live ember wrapped in a large wad of dry tow. Out he pulled it down on the margin of the stream and in a minute the bright flash of his torch shone over the waters. " Fire at the light ! " is the word of the water- keepers. "Jemmy" didn't forget it, and balls and slugs from his eight muskets flew over our heads. I suppose the bridge battlements prevented a lower aim. Crack and flame went the guns of our men, now stationed on both banks, and up rose a wild hurrah, " Tannawilly ! Tannawilly!" the meaning of which Jemmy well knew, and he rapidly sought the shelter of his stone fortress. Left to pursue our sport we had plenty of it, varied by incidents that, though very exciting to ourselves, I will not stop to relate here. I don't believe we comprehended the fact that if one of the water-keepers had been shot, the law would have adjudged us all guilty of murder. A "CAPITAL" SCENE. Neighboring the famous shrines of Lough Derg, and near the Barnes range in Donegal, the road runs through an extensive moorland without either rock or sudden acelevity for miles ex- tending on either side, the surface one continuous layer of in- tensely black and solid peat. But, unlike the ordinary bogs, which reach anywhere between five and fifteen feet deep, this peat averaged, perhaps, two feet in thickness a little less or a little more. Under it all along under it lay a dense bluish clay. The two mixed together formed a soil which vindicated our good opinion of it in a large, newly-fenced, newly-cultivated field, I believe, by a resident curate or rector of the dominant church. He had come ostensibly to do good things, but I BUS- 88 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; pect that the very best thing he did was the breaking in of that ten-acre field on the edge of this vast moor. Traveling along from thence over the moor afore-described 1 , 1 came to a nook, at the foot of the mountain, through which flowed a stream. Here was found a comparatively well built cottage and outhouse ; a garden, and two or three fields fenced in, on which had grown oats, potatoes, etc. Night fell heavy and dark, and I was glad to find hospitality at this remote home- stead. A porridge supper is held in higher repute than one that is founded on potatoes. Bnt there was no meal to make it, What then ? Why there was a sack or two of oats. A large pot was hung over the blazing fire, and a quantum sup of the oats put in and thus soon kiln- dried. Down came the quearns, or primitive hand mill, and all taking a twist at it, we quickly had a dish of new meal (always most delicious), and, with a liberal supply of milk proverbially good in mountain regions we had a supper that ought to lift a sick man into health again. Where this oats grew and this homestead stood was a lonely and un- productive waste four or five years before, as lonely as the " Wilds immeasurably spread " that I had passed over in approaching to it, every acre of wtiich could have been turned to the same account. Who does not see the lesson taught by what is here written ? And yet we are deafened and stunned with a continuous ory about capital " English capital ! " to develop the resources of Ireland. Here was the natural " capital " of the country at work. Here, on a primitive scale was the effect it could produce, if let loose over, the whole face of the country. But the impious " landlord " won't let it loose ; he has it in chains, and keeps the man and the moor alike uncultivated alike bare and hungry. Thus is the right arm of industry paralyzed. Thus is left in primeval barrenness the site of many a beautiful lanscape- and home of comfort and civilization, the thought of which calls up Fitzjames' imaginative picture of a similar scene in Scotland. Scotland ! also oppressed and depopulated by her " noble i ** " honorable," and " right honorable " criminals. And " What a scene were here," he cried. "For princely pomp, or churchman's pride, On this bold brow, a lordly tower; In that soft vale, a lady's bower ; On yonder meadow, far away. OB, THE SPIRIT OTf CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 8$ The turrets of a cloister gray. How blithely might the bugle-horn Chide on the lake, the lingering morn! Hew sweet, at eve, the lover's lute Chime, when the groves were still and mute, And, when the midnight moon should lave Her forehead in the silver wave, How solemn on the ear would come The holy matin's distant hum. While the deep peal's commanding tone Should wake, in yonder islet lone, A sainted hermit from his cell, To drop a bead with eYrjr knell." Suppose an aray of laborers and engineers and" architects should appear on this now wild waste surrounding Lough Derg. Suppose they came for the purpose of changing its barren dreariness into the picture here so beautifully described. And further, suppose Lord Leitrirn, or some other " lord," ap- proaching, coming up to them, ordering them off, telling them that God made all this wild land for him, and it must remain wild. Suppose all this, and haven't you supposed a " capital '* condition of things ? THE OLD YARN MABKET. I had up to this time been clerk to a yarn merchant My duty to sit on the wheel of a stationary cart ; enter quantities,, prices, and names as my principal purchased the yarn bunches. This trade has now passed away forever. I cannot portray the crowd clamoring and jostling, several voices at once calling out their names, and my employer pronouncing price and quantity the same action and noise going on at twenty other points around- me. The market was held in the forenoon, so that the sellers might have money and time wherewith to make purchases IIL the afternoon. It gave me a very sharp discipline, which was of great service to me in after life. I was paid for this service half-a-crown when I had become proficient, which was twice to three times as much as most other boys got for the same ser- vice. My father's reputation for honesty helped to this, for col- lusions had been detected between clerks and confederates; the one entering a false name and quantity, the other claiming and receiving the price. It is unnecessary to acid the yarns were spun on that neat and. tidy machine the " spinning wheel," which had, not long before^ 12 90 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; superseded the "rock and spindle" (distaff), till it was itself superseded by the comprehensive machinery of the mill. Mill- spun yarn, though spun a thousaid threals at once, is, strange to say, greatly superior to the best produced on the spinning wheel, though maoipulated by the most skillful hand, one thread at a time. The following paragraph is in " Our Natural Rights" : " Our raen easterly seek the most toilsome work at a remuneration of 6d. to 8d. a day. Ourw.>men are si ill more industrious ; if the price of linen yarn afford them anything above a penny for spinning a hank (3,240 yards}, an excessirely laborious day's work, the market id overstocked with that ar- ticle. What a change would these energies produce if properly called forth and directed ! " CHAPTER X. SKETCHES. FEUDAL "CUSTOM" AND FEUDAL COURTS MY FIRST OMEN REPRESSIVE LITERATURE A WILD PICTURE THE " LEV- ELERS" AND " CARDERS " TfiNPENNlES AND TlTHK FUQU- TIVE HISTORY BATTLE OF NEW Ross MRS. S. C. HALL GLEN- FIN A STORM AND A STIMULANT RECRUITING "OuR NATURAL RIGHTS " STANDING GUARD A FISH PHENOMENON NIGHT PIC- TURE OF '98 A STRANGE DANGER THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH MY COMRADE. Low notes as well as high have their place in a " March " of mu- sic. So with this book. It will strike some pretty high notes as it goes along, just as surely will it strike low notes when the on- ward "March " demands it. Rude some of those notes may be, but never one of them coarse or indelicate. Even of rude not many will be presented, and those only to glance in upon phases of humble life that may interest, or to convey a lesson that may be useful. Fiction even of Scott and Dickens descends into hiding places into which facts have no business to follow. SNAKES. This is illustrative of a barbarism that was practised, and is yet probably, by men who claimed to be intelligent and assumed the rank of gentlemen. All our fields were fenced in with high clay mound-walls, thrown up from trenches on either side. Those are soon covered with a luxuriant vegetation. On one of those fences Snakes were set and a notice of " Snakes here " to keep off intruders. Those snakes consisted of a steel prong, set in a short stake of wood, fastened upright and firmly into the ground. The prong might be six inches long, projecting up out of the wood, brought to a point with a barb on it, and as sharp as a lane.p. In pursuit of small wild peas, I crossed this mound- OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 01 like fence and slided down on my back on the inside. One ol those snakes caught me just behind the ankle and ran up as 1 descended to under the knee. Just opening through the skin, without sinking deeper, as if incised by the most skillful surgeon. I have ever thought this fact providential. The danger from such things was very great and their use throws light on opinion as it then existed and does probably still exist in that place. " CUSTOM." Major Nesbit, of Ardera, was the last to enforce this feudal extortion. Cattle sold or exchanged were charged six pence. The Custom matt stood at the entrance to the village fair with a book and a cudgel. Then pay six pence or swear there was no trade. It is worthy of notice that the country people who were not his tenants, and who numbered thousands, submitted to this extortion, and that the " Chapman Billies,** of whom I made one, resisted it. In ttie busiest time of the market the collector would come round and pronounce the word " custom." It was then "four pence or a fight." If you refused he caught the end of a piece of good* : then a pull of strength, a volley of expletives, coming to a conclusion or kicks and blows. The custom man was inspired only by some two shillings a day, and though standing the tug bravely lor ft year or two he finally yielded up the victory. This Major Nesbit was the landlord and employer of the men who car- ried gravel across the moor tor four pence a day (see " Our Natural Rights" elsewhere). He acted in this way, too, when entrusted with the distribution of a cargo of "eoaise oatmeal" donated from England in one of our periodical famines about this time: Roads, bridges, and beautifyings on his demesne were irade and the labor paid for by small allowances of the coarse oatmeal, a large portion of which became un- sound and went to the manure heap along in the autumn, though people perished for want of it during the summer. It had been pleasant to -Count over his ten or twelve silver pounds every fair night. This pleas- ure was no more; and, brooding over his los's, the Major hatched a measure of revenge on us. There existed au obsolete law, commanding the liege "billies " each to pay for a license. In the name of this law he sent the police down upon us, and seized every yard of dry goods ex- posed for sale, bundled them up, tied them on a cart, and left them un- der guard for the night preparatory to their consignment next morning to the Custom House in Bally shannon. It is late; the sergeant and his guard are watching the loaded cart at the barrack door. The Major was implacable ; nothing could move him. But sometimes " The best-laid scheme* o' mice and men gang aft aglcy," and so it befelkwith the Major. One of the " billies " was a crony and a creditor of the sergeant, and paid him a friendly visit on his monoton- ous watch. The " mountain dew " had a strong fascination in those re- gions and in those times perhaps has yet. At any rate a friendly bottle was produced. Attention could not be fixed at once on the bottle inside and the cart outside. Ropes are cutfibl a . and men, inclined to help themselves at least to their own goods, are quick of hand. The Major! " He counted them at close of day. But when the &un rose, where were they?" Nowhere that the major could find out. And so ended his clutch at the " Custom." AN OMEN OF MY LIFE. The first strife the world put upon me came In this way: Tom Gallagher sought help to gather his crop of gooseberries. I thought ii a lucky opening for a little praise; I had never earned any yet, and I thought it would be very pleasant. So I uoirowed Tom's old conical bat, D2 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J determined to carry off the championship. I sought a seclusion, lest others seeing how rapidly I worked might do the same and snatch from me the coveted honor. Son John came and urged me to come up to the company, which 1 firmly declined to do. Tom also tried per- suasion with me, but in vain. I never dreamed that they suspected I sought the seclusion that I might eat their gooseberries. They sus- pected it, however, and a day or two after they got a confirmation of their fence; and with cruelty, because I knew no better, designed to lime the poor birds. I met father and son returning to their cottage, and I lingered till they were out of sight. Then darted up the tree hid by the dense foliage, and set my sprig most wickedly across the bird's nest. John returned and ran along the road to discover if I had passed on. I had not. so he and his father sought through all the recesses of the orchard. They found nothing and returned to the house; and I de- scended from the tree and was just out on the road, leisurely walking down it, when they turned a corner and confronted me. I must have looked condemned, for I thought they suspected me, though for nothing worse than snaring birds on their tree. I was mistaken. Two or three days afterward I found I had the reputation of a prowler who made a trade of stealing Tom Gallagher's gooseberries. Those imputation^ how exactly did they foreshadow the succession of similar imputations that followed in their train a little in Ireland, none in England, a tor- rent of them in America. Those who accepted those imputations little knew the world of romance and chivalry I lived in, in those very imma- ture, boyish years. I spent all my waking hours out among the hilte and streams, and in close companionship with nature her sunshine, shadow, storm, brake and copse, summer flowers and winter snows. Theae laid within me what ? " The deep foundation of my future life." MISLEADING SCRAPS. There was a sprinkling of lie-low-and-be-contented literature scat- tered among us. " The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain," whose little rosy Molly picked wool off the briers in the sheep-walk. She was so happy at her dish of potatoes and salt made more so by the suggestion that other people had not even salt to their potatoes. Then came "Poor Eich- ard " with his beggarly talk, and " The Pleasant Art of Money-Catch- ing," telling you or the virtues of bread and water. The seduction of rfcyme, too, " Get what you can, and what you get, bold. 'Tis the stone that will tarn all your lead into gold. " And when you have got the philosopher's stone you needn't complain of the heavy taxes." And more insinuating. "If ceaseless thus the fowls of heaven He teed*, If o'er the fields such lucid robes He spreads, Will He not care for you, ye faithless say t Is He unwise, or are you less than they T" And then came another canting, hypocritical voice with : '* I was young and am now old, and never did I see the honest man ' an hungered,' nor the seed of the righteous man begging his bread." This was a comfort- able footing to put it upon ; it settled the whole dispute. Poverty was only a proof of wickedness in your parents or yourself, so there was no more to be said about it. A "WILD PICTURE. In the Bosses, an extensive mountain coast, county of Donegal ; nothing is manufactured but stockings, nothing spoken but the Irish language. The mode of knitting is here different from that in use elsewhere. The *' needles " are plied under the fingers by the sense of touch only. The OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 93 process is unseen by the eye; arid, strangely enough, the work accom- plished thus is about double as much as that which is operated above the fingers and assisted by the eye. Connemara, the other great stock- ing mart, resembles this one in all respects product, wildness, and the primitive tongue. At a great fair in the Bosses .my business was knocked in the head by a faction fight between the Campbells and the O'Donnells. Conspicuous in attempting to quell it were half-a-dozen gentlemen, among them a magistrate or two. The faction leaders and the magis- trates conferred on terms of more than equality, and, for the time, a lull took place. But it is to be succeeded by a hurricane of paving stones opened on both sides along the opposing lines. The gentlemen (including Mr. Foster the magistrate) were nowhere neither were the Campbells. The victorious O'Donnells slept the night over their victory, and next forenoon, under the leadership of a singularly powerful looking man, they assembled and marched out some two miles (it was on my return home path, and under safe conduct I was along with them) to where the cabins of the Campbells were, some quarter of a mile off the road down a de- clevity. They descended on them at a run. They were deserted, and I was shocked to see them smash in the doors and demolish as far as they could conveniently the houses, and I am afraid all they contained. This was within three or four miles of the ferry house, the picture of which is presented in " Our Natural Kights " contained in this volume. In pro- portion to the wildness of the country was the ferocity of the people. THE " LEVELERS." The chronic rebellion passes down through the horrors of '98 to my own time and the Levelers and Carders. Scarcity, if not actual want, is in every poor man's cabin, and I remember to hear with joy that the "Card- ers" hud made, by the application of a wool card to his back, Jemmy Scrupe reduce his meal six pence in the peck. To this was added the more humane action of the " Levelers." It is night; a heavy tramp is heard in the village street; a column of men in semi-military array march through to the eastward. They have done their work westerly, and all the cattle pounds down to Glen Head are in ruins. Lowing and bleat- ing prisoners have found their way home. But cui buono ? What good ? The landlord has his eye and his clutch on them still : and they had, too, the best of the poor " levelers." They had money, lesiure, troops, and courts at their backs. The " levelers " had nothing; no defence but to secrete themselves as long as they could, be caught at last and trans- ported by the law and the " landlords." I think Protestants had most to do in those things; farther North they had ail to do in them. Of our levelers 1 only knew two personally, one a Catholic, Jemmy Burns, the other a Protestant, Bob Henderson. His brother John, a very respect- able man in his way, kept a blacksmith's shop. Bob had a wild reputa- tion, was spoken of with disapproval and disrespect. And yet, who knows but he was a better, more manly, noble, truly estimable man than his brother John whom everybody respected ? The Levellers were Knights-errant in their way. TEN-PENNY TRADING AND TITHE. The day is fine, and the trees are budding out their leaves as I pass the gate house of Kev. Sandy Montgomery of Inver, a very good man In his way, probably a close connection of a far better man, distinguished In American history. The carriage drive is smooth, winding, and over- Shadowed with trees. Admiring the value and the beauty of what I saw, the thought, for the first time in my life, struck me that* all around was merely material every tree would rampeake" and perish by and by, and that time would prostrate the tall chimneys and fine house which now opened to my view. The house is quite hospitable. " No surly por- ter stands in guilty state," and I march under its roof, am surrounded by its inmates, and leave with rny pack a little lighter, and my purse of silver tenpennies a little heavier. Across to the fishing village of Inver, 94 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY J being some half-a-dozen of low, rather comfortable houses built just above high-water mark, with a hard, bright sand margin before them, and beyond the bay, Doorin Head, and the ocean. The fishermen own- Ing those houses deal with Nature, and as the " landlords " were not also the " sealords," those fishermen could and did live in tolerable comfort in reward of their adventurous toil. With them I had also a market, and I believe they were ignorant enough to be perfectly content in their way of living. The open season brought them work, and the winter " barred the doors on frosty winds." All the more bright and warm within contrasted with storms without. Pat Donlevy is collecting rents from one or two hundred tenants. He buys half-a-guinea's worth of my wares, calls for my bill in front of the crowd. " Here it is, 10s. 6d." " Irish or British currency ? " " British; the wholesale markets have been so those three months." He speaks to the crowd : "You see this is now the lawful money of the United King- dom. Pay or you'll get no receipt and you know what will follow." He thus made them pay twenty pence in the pound more than he was en- titled to, that amount being the difference in the two currencies. The landlords throughout Ireland had a similar chance offered to them ; and I knew one very large one who availed himself of it. Poverty keeps men ignorant, and ignorance keeps men poor. For many years the Tithe question had been discussed and denounced, and dangerous resistance made to it. Quakers have heroically suffered fine and imprisonment rather than yield to it. The great bulk of the Irish people were the reverse of Quakers, and they resisted in their own way, and a good sprinkling of blood was shed here and there about it. ' I don't begrudge to pay the landlord his rent," said a recusant farmer, " he gives me land for it. But the parson gives me nothing ; I don't go to his church, and I'll not pay him any tithe as long as I can help it." The man was acting up to the light within him ; he did not know that he was uttering an unconscious blasphemy ; didn't know that the land- lord and the parson stood exactly in the same boots. Just so much of heaven as the parson could give, exactly so much could the " landlord " give of the earth. FUGT7TTVE HISTOBY '98. I met with a sewed pamphlet, some seventy pages, nearly fifty years ago, which was confined exclusively to a description of the battle of New Ross its preliminaries and result. The author was a loyalist surgeon, who, under shelter of a cockade and a protection from General Johnson, was present at the battle. After the defeat at the "The Three Rocks,'* the flying Royalists took refuge in the walled town of New Boss, Bagenal Harvey, in command of the Republican forces, advanced and en- trenched his camp some two miles in front of the town. There was no investment of the place. The uprising people reinforced Harvey during the ensuing six weeks, and Johnson employed the same time in drawing in reinforcements from every available corner of the Island. At the end of that time he had a force superior in p6int of numbers to that of the United Men. My author, the surgeon, puts Johnson's force at twenty-six thousand, and that of Harvey about two thousand less. Baines, one of the British compilers, is now before me. He puts the forces of the United Men up to thirty thousand, and takes a nought from those under General Johnson leaving them at twenty-six hundred !* With these twenty-six hundred, if we can believe Baines, he marches out to storm the entrenched camp of the thirty thousand men ! Those com- prising the very men who at the battle of The Three Rocks chased the redcoats for " ten Irish miles on a run ! " This fact I had from Jemmy Gallagher, an itinerant tailor, who belonged to the Donegal militia, and was present at the battle. * The object of these falsehoods is to deter men trom revolting against their accursed way. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 95 11 It was not on the force of arms," says a French author, " that Eng- land relied for success. It was on gold to bribe, and corrupt literature to mislead." Baines is an example. And then my author describes the " ranks of war " marching to the at- tack. The repulse. Renewed attack ! Repulsed again! A third time! Driven back, and the Eepublicans dash after them across the trenches into the open plain. Johnson's cavalry are held in hand, to charge as soon as the melee gets clear of the trenches. It is a critical moment. There is a wooded ground or high hedges on their flank. Under cover of this a strong body of pikemen, most of them outlaws from the North, come down like a whirlwind on the cavalry's flank. It is another Oulart Hill. And there is nothing for it now but a rush for the sheltering walls of New Boss. Those who are left behind meet a sharp fate or join the Republi- cans. And then there is desparate fighting at the four gates of the town ; but especially at the " Throe-Bullet Gate " and adjoining wall. Three of the gates are forced. The United Men enter, and after some hard street fighting, the broken columns of Johnson are driven to the other side of the river. Instead of following him, the victors are content to "put a guard on the bridge " and sit down to enjoy themselves. Joviality, or anything to make them jovial, has been a stranger to them of late, and now when it comes, all other things are forgotten. Johnson understands this; returns and fires the town. Why dwell on the horrible sequel? On that day Ireland's battle was Won and Lost! Thousands of the disorganized Republicans perish in the flames or are slaughtered in the streets. The surgeon also relates this : " Next day, accompanied by a youug acquaintance, I wal&ed through the several streets watching the bodies of men falling from the burning houses. My companion said it was a deplorable sight those blackened corpses. A guard overheard him, and seizing him by th collar swung him round and shot him through the head with a pistol, and Singing him down exclaimed: Make, you, one more among them." "At mercy of the waves, wliusu mercies are Like human beings during civil war." No, Byron; you are unjust to the " waves." STIMULANTS. Glentin. was more wild than beautiful before Sir Charles Style took it in hand, and Mrs. S. C. Hall outlined its " rundale " agriculture. It nes- tles under the Barnes range, and owns a " decent " mountain lake in its highest recess. I explored it only once from Ballybofey to Glenties. It was in winter, in a snow storm, and I alone. The road lay across an open moor, untouched as it was created. There must have been furrows alongside of the road, but they were leveled up with the snow. I was yet some miles from the hostlery, beside the lough, of which they had told me. But just as I was perplexed by the immense white level, luck came along in the shape of one of the natives, comfortably on horseback in a "soogan" (straw saddle). An excellent pilot he was knew the turns and windings of the road and followed them. I could not keep up, but before the tracks he left behind were closed with the falling snow " smoke-flavored my memory . Here's a sample. I have a heavy wallet on my back. There is a rising road of miles before me. A glass of ale carries myself and my load comfortably over the upward way. But beware ! OUB NATURAL RIGHTS. With the manuscript in my breast I was returning from an unsuccess- ful effort to have it printed in Derry. I rode a very tali horse, and dark- 96 THE ODD BOOK OF THE. NINETEENTH CENTURY; ness had settled down as I urged him through the " gap " of Barnes. It is unsafe to urge a horse to his full speed down a hill. Mine foil headlong, flinging me what Christie of the Clinthill would call a " gads length out of the saddle." I was neither hurt nor stunned, and as I gathered up, putting my hand to my breast pocket I exclaimed, " here lies what saved me," and even yet I am not sure but I was right. However, I carried the manuscript to Belfast, when Tait, of High street, had just discontinued some publication, and wanting a job for his idle hands, undertook my business, 500 copies, 6d. the price, I takinsr 100, he taking chance with the rest. I advertised it in the extreme liberal " Newry Examiner," and began to fear it was not worth much, when the editors took no notice of the copy I left at their office for review. I knew little of the world or of editors at the time. In my native village any- body or everybody would take a copy for nothing, but no solitary six- pence did I receive except one the purchaser a " Still-hunting police- man," I suppose because his craft was mentioned in the text. But I had, years before, devoted my life to an unceasing war against Land Monopoly. Thus I said to my friends, " I have dragged up the long- forgotten truth, that the land is the property of the whole people that those few men who call themselves its owners, are not owners, but im- postors. The first Reform we need is a Land Beform. The first question to be solved is a question of Inheritance. The Inheritance of the whole people. A day is coming when I will lay my head on the death-pillow. Will a thought then come like this ? " Coward ! when you had youth and energy, you shrank from the great duty. Now your power is gone, a green sod will cover you your day of action has passed. A great truth was given to you you were not worthy of the mission, die and bo forgotten, a recreant as you have lived." Such a thought, I said, will not darken iny death bed. I will present this truth, as I best may, in that great turbulent centre of thought, London, I will try to win attention to it. I may succeed. If not, one success is certain, the consciousness of having done all I could do, STANDING GUARD. We rented a hungry barren field about an acre and a half. It gave us work, but no wages. Excepting some grass about the margins, we lost time and labor on it. Want of room to store our potatoes, put vis on the shift to " pit " them on the field in a pile covered with straw and clay. This was broken into at night, and a part of the contents stolon. Next night, my brother, myself, and another boy, concealed'ourselve.s near by, and as it grew late we saw a tall man approaching with an empty creel on his back. He crossed the fence, and throwing down the creel com- menced to open the " pit." We sprang upon him. My two companions soized him by the collar, I with my leveled gun covering him. So we proceeded down the declivity toward the gap or entrance to the field, on our way to town and the " black hole." When about h ilf way down, not- withstanding the leveled gun was at his back, he gave a wrench, and sprang clear of the hold, and ran at the top of his speed. I fired at him, but the charge was bird shot, and did him no injury. It gave us something to talk about, and that was something in those times and places. A FISH PHENOMENON. It was quite an honor for the very common people to be permitted in- tercourse with well-to-do genteel people. The Presbyterian mini Hewston, was rather democratic. At least he joined seven or eight of us (boys* on a row down the bay to fish with cod lines. Those aro of strong whip-cord. A long narrow lead sink has a hole in each ond. On one end you fasten the lino, on the other end the " snid," a fathom long with a large baited hook attached. The line is cast down till bottom is struck. Then you haul up a fathom so that the hook and bait Avill \ near the bottom. You then pull the line a foot or two up and down with OB, THE 8PIBI1 OF GHIVALKY IK MODERN DAYS. 97 a sawing motion on the gunwale. When tke fish strikes you feel the weight, and haul up rapidly with the prize. I speak of this because a singular phenomenon occurred on this occasion. The day was cairn and sultry, a bad day for " take." There were seven lines out, hooks, bait, " snid," all alike'. Suddenly a " take " came to my line, and as fast as I could bait and haul them up I caught seven fish. Not one of the other lines got a nibble excepting one. The eight fish were all we caught, and it just afforded one a piece to us. Who can tell what brought so many fisn to my hook? Why did they prefer it to all the other hooks equally as tempting? Had magnetic phenomena anything to do with it ? A NIGHT MAEOH, 1798. My father, as we have seen, was a carrier. He happened to be in Dublin when " the Rebels broke out at Kilcock, and in one night, by concert, dis- armed all the military outposts over a sweep of twenty or thirty miles." That was his account of it to me. It might have been five or six months later when the French landed at Killala, and opened the famous " chase " in that neighborhood. A general signal was made for all the government forces to con verge on that point. In the neighborhood of that grand and unique mountain pass, " Barnes Gap," was a wayside hostelrie; carts loaded with furniture are at its door, and the " thud " of a marching regiment is approaching. The cart-horses are quickly unstabled, and hurried into a woody recess be- hind an adjoining fence. The carts, however, betray the truth that horses can't be far off, and so when the songs, and curses, and clamor of the regiment gradually sank in the distance, the horses are sought, but are not to be found. There is nothing for it but follow the advancing troops. A Major in command of the rear-guard brings the owners and their com- plaint before the " head Colonel." " Loads of furniture for the Rev. sandy Montgomery and Rev. Mr. Ball of Drimholm." ' Very well, Ma- jor, see that the men have their horses." Good news for the horses, for each had two tired men on his back ; one was a teamster in civilian's dress. This irritated my father, so he closed with the offer of " I'll knock him oft' if you give me a shilling." A dig with the butt of the gun down came blue-coat, and the shilling was earned. Hats were off, and thanks bowed to the Major. " Stop," said he, " let the horses drink at this stream." Up comes half a dozen stragglers, and thus the Major : " Boys I knew you were fatigued, so I have procured these horses to help you along." " The Lord bless and be good to your honor ! " and jump, jump, in a moment the half a dozen are on horseback. But the Major enlight- ened them with a cut or two of the long cartwhip, restored the horses to their owners to the great amusement of all hands. Even the unhorsed went off " cursing and laughing." Returning down the road they meet another straggler running to regain his colors. " Luck at last," 'he ex- claims, jumping on one of the horses. He was instantly overmatched and hauled down again. But he had his revenge. " Lord love ye, boys, I wouldn't touch your horses, but if you don't hide them someway there's a dozen coming up, mostly drunk, and they'll be sure to seize upon them." The moor was level, and the wag had the satisfaction to see man and horse crossing it at right angles, through knolls and "slunks" to get out of view of the crowd that was not approaching. A STEANGE DANGEB. In the hollows of the mountains are " shaking quas," (quagmires) col- lections of water overgrown by vegetation. Enter, and if you don't sink through it, the whole surface undulates to your tread. It forms a trap not confined to Ireland and its unheeding cattle. In a similar trap near Newburg N. Y.. was discovered perhaps the most perfect specimen of the mastadon which we possess. It had gradually sunk, and was found undisturbed and undistorted, in a standing posture, as the mud quietly closed over it. The shaking qua is known and guarded against. But 13 98 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; there is a kindred danger vory little known, at least, that I had never even heard of, 'till it was on the point oi claiming me for its own. I am traveling alone. It is a breezy summer day, and I am on my way to Glenties. To go round by the road is a stretch of three or four miles. To cross straight over the mporland it is about half the distance. No path, no house, rocky acclevities and hollow swamps diversify the sur- face. But then there is variety in it, and so I shoot up the mountain side, and with an easy energy bound from one point to another of the ine- qualities. The heather, thick, and tough, and high enough to form almost my sole impediment. There's a smooth, hard looking spot, en- tirely free of heather. I bound upon it. No ! not upon it, into it. In, up to my middle at the first plunge. It is a thing of which I had never heard the existence. Of such a tough, paste-like consistence, that I am held fast in it, and I quickly realize the horrible fact that I am gradually sinking, and that any motion I might make to extricate myself only makes me sink the faster. Its bottom was probably fathoms deep. If I remained motionless it might be half an hour before I would be sunk over the head. Any attempt at motion would sink me in half that time. A slender twig of heather grew on its margin within reach. Its root just edging on the drowning mud promised little strength of hold. If it gives way death is inevitable, and all traces of it undiscoverable. I had to pull on that twig gently, and only to get such help as would inclince me a little from the perpendicular lean me forward on the mud a little at first, then a little more to the horizontal which lessened my sinking motion, for I was slowly and steadily settling down. But I had to in- crease the pulls, and the anchoring of that slender twig was all that could save me from a death the most horrible. It held till I got near enough to clutch with my other hand the ground beneath it. I was saved ! That twig of heather ! I remember its form distinctly. It was branch- less to near the top, and no thicker than the pen I write with. If it had given way another hour had not struck till the soft mass had closed over me, leaving no trace of my existence. Keep out of unfrequented places if you are alone. A youth known to me named Allen went to the " big woods " near New York a chestnutting. He fell from one of the high trees, so fractured his limbs that he could not move, and no one within sound of his voice, he lay there till he died. THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH. Cheerful amusements are conducive not only to bright, but also to long life. " Dan Crilly is the best company-keeper about all the Bridge End." It was a high encomium. With it came the couplets : " The Bridge End boys they are going lads, And search the whole town there's none such to be had; II the bridge had but teeth and a tongue tor to speak. It could tell that same night what was done at the wake. Derry down." Outlandish practical jokes were played outside of the wake-house. Dan was the son of a Bridge End blacksmith, and became heir to the nvil and sledge. Heir also to the "blacksmith's tithe." Whilst the sheaves were yet on the field, Dan and all such Dan's borrowed a horse, and went forth as a \v elcome tithe gatherer. He had mended the plough- ironswas ever ready to mend them, and the "tenants" around were just as ready to hand over as many odd sheaves of oats as made each of the Dan's such a " inelder " (see Tom O'Shanter) as carried them on till the corn grew again. Exercise and love of fun have kept Dan luring- and at work to this day a life now close upon eighty years. WATER KEEPING. John Gallagher was our most formidable Water-keeper. He would charge on us with an expletive that we abbreviated into " Hilt," by which name only we dealt with him. Four pounds a year couldn't keep him OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 99 always watching;, and when he didn't watch we did. A tributary flowing into the river forms an angle the favorite haunt of the fish. The initia- ted aware of this, met the fish on their own terms at this angle; hence probably the epithet "angler" at first designated a skillful fisher, but now degenerated into a common name. At any rate I am a very little boy at the point of the angle, and John is a very active man at the centre of the hypothenuse. If I run down the base line I am cut off and caught. If up the perpendicular I am a little more so. But worse than caught I can't be. So my fish are in the grass, and my tackle In the flood, and I off at a run expecting the big hand on my shoulder every moment. But it didn't corne, and looking round John was nowhere to be seen. Has the earth opened and swallowed him! Something of the kind. The ground is low holm intersected with narrow, almost bottomless drains to keep it dry. The late rains have prostrated a heavy growth of 9ats across the drains covering them up, and making pitfalls, out of which I see John emerging streaming with water, and covered with mud. I am safe, interrupt my tackle as it floats down, and in duo time return for my finny spoils. The fall and submer- gence had a cooling effect on John's ardor. I think he gave up the em- ployment, and didn't trouble us any more. I mention this trifle, to say never give up." and to show the absurdity as well as the roguery of a villainous " lord " standing between even the fcttle boys and their natural prey, and natural amusement. The dangef it, too, when boys grow up to be men as we have seen. A CONVIVIAL SKETCH. " Ho has arrived, and has brought along both Moore and Byrtjn. Won't we have a night of it ? " It was Campbell, the bookseller, who iiad just come along with his enormous wallet of wares on his back. And so night came, and the parlor of the haunted house browght us together just as the twopenny caudles chased out tke last gray glimmer- ing of the twilight. There was big George, the brother of the landlord, and Httle Daniel the second, as wo used to call him at once doctor and druggist, whose emporium of (what's this you call the Goddess of Health) lay next door. Then there was Lynch, the chapel shoolmaster, whose smooth and ready eloquence always brought him into the scrape of being elected chairman. Doctor M., no, the doctor was only a boy keeping store for his falser at this time the abilities and the follies that distinguished his afterlife were just budding out. J.B., afterward the J'amou* author otf "Shaa$y Maguire," a mere boy, had just returned from Lefwrkenny school, and was preparing for M^ynooth. On this night he made the first essay of those brilliant talent* that shone forth in ""Sfeandy Maguire." A work worthy of Scott or Burns. A boofc that gjvflS'yft once immortality to his own name, and to the beautiful libds toD that has the honor of his birth. Big George was a young man *l some fifty summers always welcome wherever he showed" his undesigning and good-natured face. " He was a merchant, a farmer, and a smuggler. And sometimes, when the friends around him were very select, he would throw off the picture of a broad blue sea, with the moonbeams jumping along the waves from one crest to another. The splash of oars the long narrow white coast-guard boat, shooting toward them the trumpet voice, ''Heave to," and then a flaw of wind. The man at the helm, he alvvavs maintained, couldn't help it. But, so it was, a sudden tack of the "Nancy of Flushing," fairly ran down nine bubbling men, and their gray, lead-color boat along with them. "Ah, well!" he would interject, "if I had known that my old school-fellow, Pat Kogers, was aboard of her, that flaw of wind never "would have struck our sails." It will be seen by this that George could converse and tell a story as "Well as another man. A fact he well knew, and presuming on it he got up "'o make a jpeech in honor of twelve empty tumblers that had been just 100 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; drained to the perpetuation of his " health, body and soul, here and' hereafter." But leaving the conversational, which he knew, he plunged into the ora- torical, which he did not know. He was not made aware of his rashness till he had got as far as " Gentlemen, gentlemen, gentlemen ! " three times. He was fast firmly stuck in the oratorical bog as ever any of us had been in the natural one. But he didn't stick long. Turning around to the Chairman, he ex- claimed : " D n it, Lynch ! why don't yon help me ? " To which em- phatic appeal the Chairman responded iri tins wise: " Gentlemen, our friend is so overpowered with his feelings that he can find no utterance for them. It is, gentlemen, because we do not feel as strongly as he does upon this memorable occasion (great cheers) that we are enabled to retain that coolness and self-possession which our friend has lost. To my mind, gentlemen, it adds, and should add, and will forever add, to the deserved popularity with which our friend is regarded by all classes of men and especially by the ladies." As George's tame in that direction was unrivalled, one loud shout of merriment interrupt- ed the speaker. " Well, gentlemen," after the explosion had died away, " I find you will not permit me to do justice to this great subject. There- fore I will close by proposing one other bumper, and nil it high to Mr. O'Flaherty's maiden speech ! " The applause and the glass jingle died way, as all things earthly must die away, but George came to life again and this time he didn't get on his legs. "I'm glad," said he, " to see you all so amused, and should be glad if you would show us what you can do yourselves in the plow traces. I move that every gentleman round this round table shall fol- low my example and show what literary stuff he's made of." This was agreed to. Every man did show his stuff, and poor stuff it was in all conscience. I remember only two brief snatches. One of them my own, and the other by the iar-famed author of "Shandy Maguire." His (re- markable coincidence with his early death) was a paraphrase on the " Wandering Boy," ending with these two lines : "My limbs all relaxed, In the cold grave shall lie The remains of a poor little wandering boy." Mine had nothing of dying in it. Heaven grant that it, too, may b* prophetic. Here it is : We want to shake vonr parting hand, John Ball, And to give to you a starting hand, John Bull. But when you j?o to KO, If we find that you are slow. We'll give you a touch o' th' toe. John Bull. We have tried what sort of stuff you are. And we find its very tough you are, John Bull. 3e you tender, be you tough, Be you smooth, or be you rouph, We have nursed you long enough, Johc Boll. 'Twas the devil brought you over here, John Bull, And you happened into clover here. John Bill I suppose you'll jump and rear. When we slart y< u Irom your lair. But hugaeth arvdhgrirl* ^^ ^^ "Itevrare'of the sharp, thing. OH, TilK Wi J IKIT OF CHIVALRY IN MCYDliRN ; TfcETOTAL. About 1830, Eev. Dr. Edgar of Belfast originated the first Total Absti- nence movement perhaps on record. Jonn Hamilton, of whom see " Thrushbank." and who yet survives, one of the best of his class, car- ried the thought into Donegal. Aided by Prof. Niblaek, a Presbyterian ctorgy man also one of the best of his classhe convened a meeting in the session house. Many of the young mon joined the movement, my- self among the rest. But old Mr. Early, the parish priest ho was very }d was persuaded that the whole thing was a lishing for proselytes. This was a mistake, but it was fatal to the movement. He denounced it from the altar, and all of his creed at once withdrew. I owed no allegi- ance to either church or king, and so strictly did I hold on to it, that Jor just twelve months, though living half my time in public houses, I ins ' that hung by their side, As far as we could we threw them in the tide; ' And the devil go with you,' says Arthur Me Bride, To buy you a check in the morning." Deserting bothered the service a little. And they attacked it in songg like the following, set to very lugubrious music : " My father reared me tenderly, I was his only son, H always knew I was inclined to follow the flte and drum, I courted a maid both tall and straight until she won my heart. She first advised me to enlist, and after to desert." Then the song scrapes him through thickets of misfortune till it leaves him in a strain like this : THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CTCNTURY t " Once r thought I never would be in this rejected state, A poor forlorn effigy, bound up to hardships great; It a bird but flutters on a tree, the terror strikes my heart, Each star J see alarms me, O ! why did T desert, ' My brother is a seaman bold. He knows that I am here, Aloud, aloud to him I cry, to bring the small boat near; Unt. the title forces her away, he cannot bring her to, And here in sorrow I remain, and know not what to do. " But to conclude and make an end of my deserting eons, I hope to shine in armor bright, and that before its long; My sergeant and my officers have clothes for me in store, If they would combine and pardon me, I would desert no more." So much for that make up. Indeed there has been far less said or sung about this same recruiting: than it deserves. One other light flashed in upon it is all I remember. A victim thus talks about it: " 'Twas on a certain Tuesday, to Armagh I did go, Meeting with some small offence, * that filled my heart, with woe; J met wilh Sergeant Arcuson in Market street jr-hi^ down. How would you like young man 'he says, 'to he a light dragoon.' " ' A soger's life, kind sir,' T said, ' with me would not agree, For I am light and airy, and at my liberty; I'll live as hppy as a prince, my mind does tell me so, Bo fare-ye-well, I'm going home my shuttle for to throw.' ' ' O ! are you in hurry? ' he this to me did say, Are you in a hurry, or are you goiug away ? Or is your dwelling nigh this place, as I would wish to know; Likewise your name young man,' he says, ' and tbat before you go.' ' I answered him, immediately, ' my dwelling's not *ar off, My place of habitation's within six miles of Armagh; Churles Higgins is my uamo, iroin Oaledon town I came, And I think I never done the crime, I should deny my name.' He says, ' my cousin Chales, I think you might do worse, Than to go see yonr country boys, and list in the light hors. And by his great persuasions, with him I did agree, To go and see my country boys, ^nd quit my liberty. " First we marched to Tullamore, where there 1 called to min*, Thinking of sweet Caledon town, and all 1 left behind} Farewell friends, and father, and mother also, Since I have quit my liberty, I am obliged to o." Goldsmith supposes a case, and says : 11 Tbe only art her griefs to cover. To hide her shame from every eye ; To bring repentence to her lover, And wring his bosom, is to die." On the very same principle the young: man does not " die," "to wring the bosom " of his mistress. But he enlists, which gives a " wring" near- ly as painful. So Charlie's mistress felt so she wrote to him so Charlie deserted. Back to Caledon, back through her back garden, to a mutual flood of love and sorrow at the cottage gate. A reward is placed on Charlie's head. It is placarded all round. " Your'e the man," says a * Thore la quite a romance attached to this sou. That "small offence wit* hit wwtb9.rt. And such "small omci"dW much fo7 the ^r^t OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IK MODERN DAY!. 106 big Peeler, meeting Charlie at the grey dawn one morning. ' Come with me." But under the load of his griefs Charlie is as strong as two of him, and hurls him to the kennell. The Peeler holds on, crying for " help, help!" and vengeance against some early laborers who will not help him. Charlie escapes, and stag hunts are out after him over the coun- try next day, and for several days. In vain. The people are on his side. Counsel, protection, money are furnished him, and the next thing we hear is a meeting between him and his affianced on board the brig " Dis- patch " from Derry quay, to the New World, taking another item from old Morld strength, and adding it to the new. What a villainous system ! What a bad, stupid aristocracy ! MY OOMEADB. He was a peacemaker, a "bet"-er on the bow oar a cicerone up the mountain. He was my buon comarado when I ventured down there. But one thing puzzled me. He loved solitude, and it was such a solitary suburban walk that shore pathway. Its only drawback, a tasteful two- story hermitage, embosomed in trees and flowers, fortified by an unget- overable white wall, and a gate through which you may look, but must not enter. That was all. I didn't like it. There was an esplanade in front of the hotel that attracted myself, and I began to suspect that there must be some kindred attraction lurking in that green hermitage, and I began to hum " Solitude where are the charms. That sages have seen in thy face." But it wouldn't be quite so bad " With one to whisper solitude is sweet,' " pointing significantly to the green hermitage. " Have yon seen her ? " he said. " No, but I have heard." " Are you curious ? " " Not much a your them there in that hermitage and if you get in its doubtful whether you'll ever get out again." "I'm not afraid." "Try." "But hold. If you succeed, you might suddenly recollect that a paper like this is an inconvenience in your side pocket ?" "Certainly. Is that all?" "Yes, that is all." And so I am at the festooned gate, with a tinkle at the ring-, and the paper in my pocket. Half back swings a Venetian, and half ap- pears such a face ! Up goes my cap, and down goes a rather quizzical, beseeching kind of a bow. Archly returned, as if to say : " I know, and I will," and a tripping foot is heard on .the stair-carpet, the gate opens, and I am standing in paradise, with Eve in her girlhood and a summer dress right before me. ' I know about it," she interjects ; " come in, you shall see." Such a little alcove, tapestry, flowers, pictures a wilderness, but all on the tiniest scale. I suddenly recollect. " This happened into my"- -"Yes I know it is the most harmless, amusing thing; do you ever write poetry?" "Never." "But let us see." She opens, reads, "Embalm." O! that is good " Moonlight, and roses, and wreaths of snow." "Do you think he stole those things?" "But look! 'power, bower, hour, flower, lower, shower, and turn ower.' Just you read." " Thank you." It is mine it is addressed to me. It is his heart he's talking about." " Emhalra it in the music of thy sighs, And sun it in the starlight of thine eyes; O'ershaclow it with that oright wavy hair. Repose it on thy brow, as moonlight lair; Caress it on thy cheek's transcendent glow, A moss rose bursting through a wreath of snow; And when you have it fairly in your power. Admit it for the moment to your bower: Sport with its leelings through the vacant hour, Breathe vernal airs around its budding flower; Nor let one cloud above it seem to hover, Tiien down upon it, like a thunder shower. , Turn owrl" 14 106 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; " Well, do you know that is not so very bad, but isn't it Scotch ? " **Nu indeed ! There isn't a word here but Irish." Listen " My heart went a jumping tip to her large eyes, For like stars they attract in proportion to size; And all of its danger was qui'.o unaware, Till it found itself spider-web'd up in her hair; Yes, her hair ! And, in troth, its a troublesome place toe As e'er summer fly of a heart run a race to; For once it is caught, it may flutter and bizz too, And write what it feels in the lines of its phiz too; But however it flutters, its little she cares, The owner of those pretty curl'd silken hairs; So let me get from them as fast as [ can. Or faith I'll be coming away a dead man; And what are those strange little things that appears, Justin under her hair ? 'Pon my conscience they're ears: Such curves, heights, and hollows ! Well, is it a wonder Such wonderful tbinjrs make a fellow knock under? There's a HOCK, too, so lovely, so smooth, and so white, And just the right roundness to make it all right; That neck! Why there is something so charming about it. Her all other charms would look nothing without H ; Then her shoulders so round. (No, they arn't 'round shoulders,*) That they strike with surprise the admiring beholders; And a waist! When set free from the toil? ol the toilet, Its symmetry rot even marrittge would spoil it; Skip we clown to the feet, and the ankles above them, Such feet! and such an&les, o:ie couldn't but low them; Then how graceful the gait: How enchanting the motion. Never talk of the undulous swell of the occ;iu ; Never talk of the musical moun of the tree*. When they bend to the kiss of the vagabond breeze ; But ' you will talk! ' Well, faith you'd have reason for talking. If you saw this fair dame in the hurnor ot walking; But talking of walking, reminds me to say, It is safest and best to be walking away. 1 ' I got through. And it was no easy task to keep a grave face on It, aad w, ; '-h the lights and shadows, the frowns arid the laughter, chasing e?.eh other over that child-like, queen-like face. But I did get over it quiotly, and she did not. One of the merriest and most musical peals founded oft the emotion. And rising she put that little fairy hand on my HiK-i'.lder. " Do you think he is rnad V " * Well, yes ! I do think he is imi'l in love with somebody." "You are going now. Tell him he must do ponanee for this at moonrise this very night. I'll teach him ! " Didn't I fall down from Heaven when I came back to that youth. It is moon- rise, and passing by, just by accident, I see through the branches that she is hanging her whole weight on his arm, and otherwise subjecting him to " capital punishment." Perhaps there is not one critical eye that may glance over this sketch more aware of its objectionable presence than I am myself. But I give it because it is FOUNDED ON FACT. A SKIRMISH. The human mind as well as the human body demands action. Men living in remote mountains, and wholly illiterate, have not much exer- ciftf; for the mind, and they are put to shifts to keep it from stagnation. Ono of the shifts, and a principal one, is to provoke quarrelling adven- tures. A stirring adventured this kind will furnish them with conver- sa' ion for months or years to come. To make this laudabie provision, a OB, THE SrilUT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATa \0l party of the adventurers attended the annual Regatta at Killybcgs. I am now keeping: store there, and some friends come to visit me and see the Regatta. Intending to return immediately, their jaunting- cars are at the door, but " Social mirth and glee sit down All joyous and unthinking," as poor Bob has it And though not at all " transmogrified," " We were all very merry after coming o'er the ferry, For all our men were drinking a little, and singing too, it must be confessed. Along came the adven- turers from the mountain. " Here's something to talk about, we'll take a ride on those jaunting cars." So the first thing we hear is an unlocked tor rattle of the cars, and out we rush to the rescue. The enemy is driv- en off, and the cars re-captured. But they have no thought of carrying home a defeat to talk about. They know whore to find reinforcements. They find them, and return to retrieve what Ossian would call "their fame." They arc young men, but a man of a thought born of forty sum- mers leads them. It did not suit my purpose at all to make enemies of the clans around where I lived, so I tried to persuade this man to " let us have peace." I did not make much progress, for he understood little English, and I understpod less Irish. We are negotiating in this way, when crack! crack! his party has attacked my friends some twenty yards distant. He had a heavy oak cudgel, and raising it fiercely with a r ' honimon dhoul! " made a rush to help his associates. With the sudden- ness that was iny habit, I dashed upon the cudgel, and swung it out of his hand just in time, for turning to the help of my friends. A bareloot fel- low (it was early morning, and he had been started out of bed) was rush- ing forward with two or three formidable stones on his arm, and one In his hand, which he was just letting fly. It was at the head of our biggest champion, who then was engaged with two or three assailants. I made a loud shout as well as a rush at the missile-man, which so discon- certed him that he threw three stones all wide of the mark before I got near him. Then turning he fled with great rapidity in his barefeet. I never excelled in running, .but this time I overtook him as he turned to go up a lane. He fell under a blow of the captured cudgel, and I rushed back to the help of my friends. They were already victors, for six strong, resolute men are an overmatch for three times their number, if less strong, and less resolute. But the trouble wasn't over. Their friends in th neigiiborhood were numerous, and we were comparative stangers. The street soon became crowded, and the jaunting cars, with my visitors, were at a stand still.. In my store were scythes for sale each a two handed sword. My wife's brother and myself rushed to the store, but before we had the scythes in hand, his sister had the store door locked, and the key secreted. We had no alternative but dash up stairs and, uscasing a window, make good our descent to the street. Fortunately the crowd gave way before the scythes, and let the jaunting cars with our friends pass on. When roused in this way men are men no longer, they are wild beasts. We escorted pur visitors to a safe distance, and the scythes brought us home again, safe and sound. But not for aye. Some weeks after, six of those men waylaid me in the ( *Nick of the Balloch," a .mountain pass, on my way to the yarn market of Ardera wounded me dangerously, and only for one generous young fellow in the gang who took n e under his protection, probably would have killed me outright. In tl ose encounters I found that the heaviest blow of a cudgel does not pr duo ) pain but, strange as it may be thought, a shock of warmth why snould I not add a. distinct pleasurable sensation for that is just the ic'.'iing. AS a literary scrap I don't like this sketch. I had no pleasure In writ- Ing it. The reader will have less in lookipg over it. But it shows .that the spirit and the deeds enshrined by Ossian stiH lives on. A natural result of isolation and ignorance. "OUR NATURAL RIGHTS." WHEN AND WHY IT WAS WRITTEN. FOB two or three years previous to 1836 my mind was deeply absorbed by the question of Man's true relation to the soil All political discussions that I came within the range of, and even all ordinary topics of conversation, were directed, if possible, into the foundation question of the ownership of the soil. This gov- ernment succeeded that Whig succeeded Tory, and Tory "Whig. Still no relief, no change, save that rags grew raggeder and dis- tress more intense. I had, however, advanced far beyond the standard that would refer the evil to the advent of a Eussell, and the exit of a Peel. I had ceased to wander so far abroad in search of the causes of the squalid misery I saw around me, and of which I was the victim myself. I saw that the earth, if vig- orously tilled, would yield plenty of the comforts of life. I saw that jthere was abundance of willing nerve and sinew. The ques- tion was too plain and single willing labor, and a fertile soil, would produce plenty to eat, drink, wear. That this plenty did not exist was sufficient proof that there was something wrong in the relation between that labor and that soil This train of thought once awakened, it was no easy matter to lull it to sleep again. Was a criminal executed, was a young girl seduced, did a merchant fail in business, were ten thousand men left on the battle-field, others might refer the causes to what they pleased, I regarded them as the effects sprung, either directly or remotely, from the absolute monopoly of the soil. My business required that I should travel pretty extensively. My intercourse with the farming and laboring population was . unbounded. I began to treasure up facts : What caused this man's hut to be wretched, and his farm to be neglected. Fami- lies driven out homeless on the highway, what brought the ruin upon them ? In brief, when I saw any evil standing out from among the common order of things, I traced that evil to mono- poly of the soil by a few, and exclusion from it o the many. OUli NATURAL BIGHTS. And so I wrote and published " Our Natural Rights "my first and I think my best work. Catholic Emancipation was now law. Its fruits, a score or two of Catholic lords and lawyers, thrown into Parliament One hundred thousand forty-shilling freeholders thrown out of their homes Thrown out ! all to suffer, mariy to die. For must not the landlord manufacture the new class of ten pound voters? Must he not keep up his power in what is face- tiously called the "House of Commons ? " What if the highways become darkened with these wretched men and their forlorn families? What if they die, as they did die by thousands? Cannot the landlord do what he likes with " his own?" But this brought people's thoughts back to the subject of Landlords and land. My own thoughts were still more forcibly arrested to the subject by the following circumstance : Adjoining my native town (Donegal) .lay certain fields " lord"- ed by the Earl of Arran, and "tenant-"ed by "Minister Craw- ford," a curate of the Established Church. The earl and the minister got to legal loggerheads about those fields. Pending two or three years' litigation, the fields became a practical com- mon, and the grass grew as heartily as if there was neither a lord nor a minister on the face of the earth. There were plenty of lean, hungry cows in the neighborhood. Those got in upon the grass they grew fat and sleek, and it was wonderful how much milk they gave. The Jubilee of the Israel- ites (see Leviticus) had come back at last, and every man " re- turned unto his possession." Well, if the twenty or thirty acres thus made free diffused around so much benefit, what would twenty thousand acres ac- complish ? I began to work the problem, and I found out that every hungry man would have far more than he would be able I- > eat, and every hungry horse and cow would have more than they could " roll in." And then I began to collect facts and arrange them together. The result was a pamphlet. The " contents of which the follow- Ls a copy : OUR NATURAL RIGHTS. "OUR NATUEAL BIGHTS." INTKODUCTION. CHA3*. 1. British Constitution. The People Utterly Powerleaa Under It. " Whose freedom is by sufferance, and at will Of a superior, he is never free." COWPEB. CHAP. 2. Great Practical Evils of the British System Mainly Founded on Monopoly of the Boil American Revolution French Revolution- British National Debt, a forgery on the People. Motto : " Truths that you will not read in the gazettes, But which 'tis time to teach the hireling tribe That fatten on their country's gore and debts." BYRON. CHAP. 8. The Way the British Taxes go. Rapacity and Meanness of the Aristoorao jc Motto : " 'Tis avarice all ; ambition is no more. See all our nobles begging to be slaves. See all our fools aspiring to be knaves." POPE. CHAP. 4. Glance at the Political History of Britain from the American Revolution Downward. Irish Volunteers. United Irishmen. Catholic As- sociation. West India Slave Question ; True Merits of all These. Motto : " Who can tread the memorable fields, Where freedom's battle has been lost and won, Nor feel thy mighty spirit. Independence. Great in his bosom." HETHERINGTON. CHAP. 5. Absolute Ownership of the Land the Foundation on which Rests the whole Superstructure of British Society. Reform Impossible so long as that Ownership Exists. Motto : " It's hardly in a body's power To keep, at times, from being sour, To see now things are shared." BURNS. CHAP. 6. Showing the mighty evils produced by Land Monopoly in Ireland. Reflections thereon. Motto : " Such dupes are men to custom, and so prone To reverence what is ancient, and can plead A course of long observance for its use, That even servitude, the worst of ills. Because transmitted down from sire to son. Is kept and guarded as a sacred thing." COWPEB, CHAP. 7. The Nature of Land Ownership Discussed on Philosophical. Historical, and Scriptural Grounds. Its Absurdity and Impiety. Motto: " Nature affords at least a glimmering light, The lines, though touched but faintly, are irawn right." POPE. CHAP. 8. Spontaneous Risings of the Irish People Against the Oppres- sions of tae Landlords. Interesting Facts, Proposed Reform and its Con- sequences. Motto: " As to a man's farming his own property it is a heavenly lifo: but devil take the lifo of reaping the fruit that another must eat." BURNS' T *:TTEB TO MRS. DUNLOP. CHAP. 9. Intention of God and Nature in making man Hungry, and Bid- ding tho Earth Produce. Solicitude of Nature to provide us with all our natural reijuiromonts. Tho "Divine Right" of Landlords a Ridiculous Hoax. Tfieir whole liven one Social, Moral, and Religious Crime, Motto: " Our noe.lful knowledge like our needful food, UnhG'ltfnil lios OPMII In the common field. Yon scorn what lios l>ofore you in the page Of Naturoand Experience moral truth. And Jlvo in sM"nc for distinguished namei. Sinking in virtuns you rise in lame; Yonr learning, like the lunar beam, affords t, but not heai." OUR NATURAL RIGHTS. A WARNING WORD TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. This I got printed in Deny, in large-sized hand bills. And? in the various towns where I did business I would fasten one up- near the market-place, and when a crowd came to read I would stand by with apparent unconcern, and listen to their comments. One tall, mechanic-looking young man read it aloud in Armagh, and discouraged and offended me greatly by exclaiming " It is a d d nervous production." I thougt nervous meant weak, as " nervous debility." I did not know that the word could mean at once both strong and weak. Such and so limited was my knowledge of language at the time. The Derry printers would not touch the work itself. But I did not lose faith. Commenced at a boyish age, and published over forty years ago, I think it dealt more thoroughly with the land questoin than anything written by me (and I have written what would fill vol- umes) on the subject since. Though the work of a very inex- perienced hand, in a remote unlettered neighborhood, it anti- cipated or went a little beyond the boldest thoughts that now stir up the public mind on this great subject. I may safely present it, therefore, as, at least, A L1TTEEABY CURIOSITY. OUR NATUBAL EIGHTS. (TiiT, High Slreet, Belfast. 1836.) To SKABMAN CRAWFORD, ESQ.. M. P. SIB: In availing myself e-f the honor you allow me. I regret that (hav- great principle I have asserted, but to be the first landlord that will set a practical example of the important change that must soon take place : and I am confirmed in this opinion by a review of the manly, disinterested, aye. and unfashionable part you have taken in the cause of our mueh- wronged peasantry. That every occupier of laad has an inalienable right in the soil he culti- vates is the essential principle, the soul and spirit, of this tract. I have tjndeavored to show that he has been unjustly deprived of that right, and inat it could revert to him without any' infringement on the right proper- ly BO called of property, or the slightest interruption of social tranquili- ty. In deeming that you, as a landlord, would countenance such a princi- ple, I supposed the existence ot a virtue rarely to be met with in these de- generate times. Disclaiming every private and individual motive, I dedicate this treatise to you on public grounds alone. You have fearlessly grappled with abso- lute ownership that monster which has long devastated society, and ren- dered it one scene of desolation and misery ; and I am proud that it is in my power, even by this slight testimony, to mark my deep sense of your well directed and uncalcu'atina patriotism. I have the honor to subscribe myself i'our most obedient, And most obliged servant, THE AUTHOR. CUB NATURAL RIGHTS. INTRODUCTION. The main object of the following work is to show that ownership of load cannot be absolute and unlimited, like that of other property, and that on this point, mankind have fallen into a destructive error an error which has produced, and, if not rectified, will virtually perpetuate the worst evils of society. I am aware that this question involves an ntire change in our social relations ; and I almost hesitate to bring a subject of such great importance before the public. We may reasonably presume that whatever accords with Justice has been ordained or permitted by God. Thus, if absolute, ownership nf !and accords with Justice, it bears the impress of the Most High, and b/> has given His sanction to criminal luxury on the one side, and gnawing fam- ine on the other. (Absolute ownership of land must ever produce these.) Dare we think God capable of acting thus ? We dare if we acknowledge the Right and Justice of " absolute ownership." This thought ought to put every reflecting man on inquiring into its merits, and a very sligh' inquiry will demonstrate that it is as unjust in its very nature as it is mon- strous in its effects ; that no earthly power could confer, nor earthly de- sert merit, absolute ownership of the land. "The land is mine, (saith the Lord,) for ye are strangers and sojourners with Me." The atrocity of the present system is, indeed, sufficiently obvious ; but the mistaken notion of its sacredness, and the groundless dread of a gen- eral scramble, have hitherto preserved it in its rampant growth. I have undertaken to show that the system is neither sacred nor just, and that, in avoiding the whirlpool of Anarchy, we need not dash ourselves against the rock of Despotism, whilst the safe and sunny course of Limitation lies between the ruinous extremes, equally distant from either. There is not an evil of society but has its root in absolute ownership of land. Correct this, and you destroy all our social evils. Limited owner- ship could not deprive the landlord of that moral influence which natur- ally belongs te a good man, but it would take from him the power of coercing his tenant's vote. Thus, " the Ballot," which, after all, is but a skulking expedient, would be rendered unnecessary. Limited ownership, by giving the occupier a perpetual property in the soil, by securing to him a large portion of the fruits of his industry, and by keeping him to his duty, would fertilize our lands, reclaim our wastes, and treole the agri- cultural products of the island. We then would require no Poor Laws. Limited ownership, by exacting a duty * of the landlord, would destroy the bad effects of Absenteeism, the worst perhaps the only bad effect of the " Union." Under Limited ownership, the Tithe Question could be settled to the benefit of the farmer now it cannot. Limited ownership would soon and easily deprive the Peers of their unnatural power. Its operation would civilize and relice the people, destroy intemperance and crime, root out misery trom the land, add to our strength and impor- tance as a nation, by keeping at homo the flower of our population, who now go to perish in the American wilds. In fine it would effect every social good and be unattended by one political evil. Let us rouse 9urselves to the moral strife, and we will find leaders among the enlightened and the Influential. It is impossible that an O'Connell, a Hume, or a Crawford could view the momentous struggle and not join heart and soul with the people; and even if they should de- sert us, leaders will start from our own broad ranks, and demonstrate that intellect does not depend on the quality of a dinner, the swing of a coach, or the jargon of a college. *The duty of the landlord nhould he well defined, and, like the merchant's, might b per* formed either by .himself or by ix.y. (112) OUR NATURAL BIGHTS. CHAPTER I.FOR THE LEARNED. Ot God above, or man below, What can we reason but from what we know T Por. There are data given us, In the search of Truth, a certain knowledge of some things on which to ground our inquiries in matters the truth of which is not so evident. If men took this knowledge for their data, and wrought the problem by the plain rule of reason, society would not be confused by the irreconcilable opinions which at present diversify and disgrace the human mind. But, instead of pursuing this certain and, indeed, obvious path to truth, men generally follow the path which edu- cation and prejudice point out to them, or take the opinions of per- sons for whom they entertain respect { and adopt those opinions for their own. Though this is, generally speaking, the fashion of the present day, yet, as I intend that my little work shall have, at least, the merit of sin- gularity (no easy matter neither, amidst the " Twice ten hundred thousand daily scribes. Whose volumes, pamphlets, newspapers illumine as,") I shall go on the principle of my motto, though I confess It is rather a stale and exploded one just now First, then, we know that labor and industry produce plenty and com- fort: hence, according to my principle, plenty and comfort were destined as the reward of industry and toil. Secondly, we know that the diyine gift of intellect has been dispensed by our Great Author to man, in every grade, promiscuously ; hence we must see that the way of education to wisdom should be aliue open to all. Thirdly, we know that virtue and tal- ents are the offspring of immortal part of man, the breath of God, and as such, infinitely superior to the gross adjuncts of property and wealth, the mere supports of our corruptible tenement ; hence our motto would lead us to conclude that esteem and reverence are alone due to talents and vir- tue, whilst wealth and property may fairly claim for their owners that respect which is due to a herd of cattle or bale of merchandise. Fourth- ly, we know that every man is, by nature, subject to the same wants and necessities ; hence we at once see that the supply of those wants should be pretty nearly equal, and perceive the enormity of the system which gives one individual the supply of thousands, and leaves those thousands in want of the support which nature demands. These are truths which reasoning from what we " know " points out. I admit that they are not incontrovertible to such of the learned as can prove black to be white ; who hold that the proper method of manuring a field is by arranging straight, well-built dung-hills in regular order who admire the rank and useless weeds those noisome mounds produce, and view with complacency the starved and stunted herbage which eve- rywhere surround them ; who, if you talk of spreading the manure over the barren waste, raise an outcry about "spoliation" and "anarchy," appeal to your feelings on the beautiful regularity and waving greenness of their dung-heaps, and, finally, stop your mouth by exclaiming " Order is Heaven's first law." Not caring to enter the arena with this class of logicians, I leave them, for the present, to the enjoyment of their enlightened and comprehensive views; and, in return, I must crave their forbearance whilst I honestly avow that, to me, few are the charms of such dung-hills, and that I would n >t feel much remorse at spreading abroad at least a portion of their putrid contents, nor would I be apprehensive of much evil follow- ing the change. But, as a portion of the learned (to whom this chapter is especially addressed) may here stop, and cry "Pshaw! we know all these, things already; and acting on our knowledge, we have achieved Emancipation, we have battled for Ket'orm, and we are steadily pursuing great objects, the attainment of which will make the people free and 15 (113) OUK NATURAL RIGHTS. happy. To us, therefore, there appears nothing new in your chapter."' I cry the patience of those personages, and beg- to tell them that part of the chapter is yet to come, and that they will mid in it something not only new but the novelty of which will astound them. A man, though endowed with a friendly, conciliatory disposition, may, without much mental pain, quarrel with those whom he regards as hy- pocritical saints or licensed robbers, but to be compelled to disagree, on many and important subjects, with fchose for whom he feels respect bor- dering on reverence, must, to such a mind, be painful in the extreme. In venturing to assume the name of author, I am forced into this dilemma, though I perceive that it will in some degree militate against my success. A considerable portion of the public think that the democratic leaders of the present day are driving society with lightning speed ctown the steeps of destruction. The great majority of the community think that they are aiming at neither more nor less than the equitable rights of mankind. And few, if any, think them too slow in their motions, or too moderate in their demands of improvement. This is, if I mistake not, a correct estimate of the public mind in its present state; and it is difficult, if not dangerous, to attempt steering my rude and untried skiff over such adverse waters; but if it go down let it go; many a nobler bark shared the same fate, though never a nobler cargo ! The singular opinions which I am about to submit to the public, in the following work, are not altogether the result of abstract reasoning, still less are they grounded on sentiments hackneyed and worn-out by the public ; of tnis they bear evidence, pernaps, too clear. They were, ifi fact, *thj:ust, as it were., upon my mind by a combination of circumstances. .The tales of oppression and innovation to which my childhood listened with horror, rooted in my mind an early and intense, though undefined, Jove of country, and hatred of oppression. Subsequently, witnessing tile- sufferings and privations of the peasantry of my own district; and, per- haps, more than all, a full participation in those sufferings, forced me to look sharply into the nature of the anamolies which I saw and felt iu our social system, and examine eagerly the plans proposed for their re- moval. In pursuing this inquiry I necessarily became acquainted with the great political questions of the day Keform, .Retrenchment, Aboli- tion of Tithes, etc. The value which these objects really possess, and the additional lustre with which they were clot&ed by the talent, patriot- ism, and genius of the age, for a time convinced me, in common with .others, that they were all-sufficient to remove the evils of society, I re- joiced in the great spirits whose superhuman power was paralyzing the tyrant's hand, and shaking from its unnerved grasp the plunder of ages. But the bright illusion quickly vamsned before the earnest thought which the fore-mentioned sufferings and privations compelled me to give the subject, and in its stead I beheld the fixed, the " cold real- ity." Namely, that not only all that has yet been achieved in the shape of freedom, but also all our prospective improvements, are a bubble on the sea compared to the vast change that must take place before wo caii. have a social system worthy of rational beings. A change which, ac- cording to the rate of our progression, cannot take place for centuries to come, and which does not appear to be even contemplated by our most sanguine patriots.* Of that change, its necessity and consequences, my opinions are contained in those pages throughout. * This was written, tbougli not published, before Mr. Crawford appeared in tbe public- councils. (114) OUR NUTURAL RIGHTS CHAPTER H. WHICH THE LEARNED MAY NOT READ. Whose freedom is by sufferance, and at will Of a superior, he is never free. COWPEB. Having addressed my introductory chapter to the learned and affluent , icrsons, with whom I have little community of purpose or feeling 1 , 1 pro- . cod to dedicate the remainder of the work to my brothers of industry and toil. And as I am aware that many of these do not rightly understand what sort of hotch-potch our social system is, farther than to know it i>ud by its effects, I shall commence by laying down an outline of its iorm; and first, of the constitution of our government King, House of Lords, and House of Commons. The kinglv office is hereditary. The principal powers vested in the Crown u re those : Choice of the ministry, which conducts the govern- ment; prerogative of convening, proroguing, and dissolving the House of Commons ; of creating new members of the House of Peers ; and any measure, though passed by both Houses of Parliament, cannot become a law without having received the Royal assent. The House of Lords is principally composed of the hereditary nobil- ity, the King seldom exercising the power of creating new Peers. It is the prerogative of this House to alter any measure which may have been passed by the House of Commons, (but so altered, it cannot becoome a law, without afterwards receiving the sanction of the Commons,) or to linally reject it, by which it is quashed for the Session then being, it' not brought forward in an altered shape. This House makes our Constitu- tion a negative oligarchy; but as it opposes itself to every kind of national improvement, it.- is likely to be new modeled, or entirely borne down, by the reforming spirit of the age. The House of Commons is electiye by registered voters. Of these nine-tenths are to be found in the middle and what is termed the lower classes of society; hence, we find, as its very name implies, that this House ought to belong to the common people. But the aristocracy have long usurped all power and authority there. This they formerly effected chiefly through means of the " Rotten Bor- oughs." And now that an Indignant people have prostrated those strongholds of the robber, they quietly effect the same purpose by the absolute ownership of the land. This gives to the landlord the power of driving to poverty and destitution any tenant who might dare to vote contrary to his directions. Effectually is this ruffian power exerted, and it is infinitely worse in its effects than the "Rotten Borough" sys- tem. That laid no sin to the unfortunate peasant, but this violates his conscience, takes from him his honesty, and leaves him " poor indeed." The House of Commons is composed of 105 Irish, 53 Scotch, and 500 Eng- lish Representatives, in all 658 members. To it belongs the power of imposing the taxes, and voting the amount to its several uses. In it most laws are formed, subject, as has been said, to revision or rejection by the House of Lords. I have observed that the House of Commons, of right, belongs to the common people. If any man deny this, it is plain that that man would allow the people no power at all in the State. The King, the principal gentleman in the realm, will, naturally, be favorable to his brothers of the aristocracy; and his power is very considerable. The House of Lords will, of course, have a tender feeling for themselves, and their power is absolute, inasmuch as no law can be enacted without their sanction. And if the people have no preponderance in the House of Com- mons, then they have no power at all in the State, but are completely at the mercy of the gentlefolks, and must obey whatever laws these same gentlefolks choose to enact. Whether the people have, or have not, that tins to bo examined. (115) OUR N AIT UAL lilUHTS. A very brief examination will load us to the truth of this matter. The House of Commons is divided into three partiesTories, Whigs, and Radicals. The Tories are for continuing 1 tithes, taxes, and every species of peculation that tends to aggrandize the rich and beggar the poor. This class holds the opinion (exemplified in the speech of Sir Kobert Peel, on the vote by Ballot, June, 1835,) that one man, possessing fifty thousand nnds, is equal to ./we hundred men, who may be possessed of only one dred pounds each. Money, the vile creation of man, according to the Tories, possesses all discrimination, and ought to possess supreme pow- er in guiding the affairs of the State. And man, the noblest work of the Almighty, ought, according to the same authority, to possess no power at all. By the way, Sir Kobert Peel is one of the most moderate, as he is unquestionably the most talented, of the Tories. The Whigs profess to be the friends and servants of the people, and certainly, they are better rulers* than the Tories ; but still they are aris- OUK NATf'KAL lilttliTS. rightfully belong to the landlords? This is a question of awful impor* tance; on it rests the freedom and happiness of the human race. The landlord answers: "I purchased it with money, or my ancestors bequeathed it to me as an inheritance." To this I roply, you could not purchase what no man has a right to sell nor could your ancestor be- queath to you what could not, and did not, belong to himself namely, unlimited ownership of the soil. Before we investigate the right of absolute ownership, let us examine how it actually works; for the good or for the evil of society. Alas, we need not stop long on this inquiry. The splendor of dress and equipage, the thousand luxuries, the ease and sloth, which this power basely kqeps to itself, and the shapeless dirty rags, the miserable shelter, the continuous toil,* and the wretched food which it ruffianly assigns to its victims, show us in a moment its villainous effects on society. Instead of land- lords being the promoters of improvement and civilisation, which, under just and proper restrictions they would be, they are now an effec- tual drag-chain upon agriculture, arid, consequently, on every other kind of improvement; instead of being the regulators, they are now, iu fact, the derangers and disturbers of society. As "Facts a-e cbiels that winna dinf And downa be disputed," 1 shall here mention one out of many such that came under my own ouservation. Not long since, purchasing hay of a small farmer, f and observing that his little meadow had produced a very bad and scanty crop, I was not a litt-e severe on him for his indolence, particularly as I saw that his farm aftowled many facilities of fertilizing the spot. " I have no lease," re- plied the poor man, " and why should I labor to improve when I know that my rent would be raised to the full value of my improvements. This is the true secret of our want and mh^ry this fhe great blight, which hanging over the land, keeps iu a state of nature our reclaimable wastes,! and blasts with comparative sterility our most fertile vales. Every shilling of capital, and every day of toil that the occupier may *3xpend on improvement is forfeited to the landlord; and should his condition approximate to decency, instead of approval or encourage- ment, he hears tha agfnt growl forth, " that fellow can li ve as well as myself." There is, then, a new valuation held, and a few pounds added to his rent reels him back to the level of wretchedness. And is this the tenure by which land must be held ; this the feeling under which it is to be cultivated ? And must barrenness and desolation spread over God's earth, and discontent and misery dwell with His peo- ple, that the landlord may indulge in his lust of unnatural power and in traveling over a mountainous district of Donegal, some years since. I observed a xmmber y change would be an improvement in the cloth- ing, food, and oilier domestic comforts of the people. Suppose every in.iiviinal in Ireland ould afford to expend two additional pounas annually on these necessaries; this by adding Afiqen additional millions to our home cons -caption, would ra se a very unusual stir aniCTiz our tradesmen and ehop-fceeners; and rurther, country people, comfortable and happy at home, would not be so reaay as they are now to rush into towns, sad starve the trade ot fhop-keepers and mech&a os. (125) OUR NATURAL RIGHTS. title is subject to at least the same limitations and restraints. In order to come at the real nature and extent of this title, we must commence our examination at its first rise in the patriarchal and pastoral times, and If it appears that the 9\vnership of land was not then absolute and un- limited, we must inquire when and how it became so. The first owner- ship of land was unquestionably that of the patriarch who settled with his family on a certain extent or un9ccupied soil. From the moment of his occupation, he naturally acquired a property in the land; and if another settler afterwards came to the same spot, he at once acknow- ledged the right of the first occupier, and withdrew to an unoccupied place. But mark, if the first settler should claim ownership of what he had not in occupation, the incomer, would, very naturally, refuse to recognize any such claim. These were the circumstances under which the first ownership of land was asserted and recognized, and occupation alone gave that ownership. In the lapse of time the family of the patriarch became numerous, his children and grandchildren grew up around him, and every branch of the family had the " go" of its flock and herd on. the common territory; the unnatural thought of giving the entire property to his eldest son, never entered the head of the good old man. Indeed, any attempt of the unnatural thought of giving the entire property to his eldest son, never entered the head of the good old man. Indeed, any attempt of the kind would only have produced anarchy and ruin in the little com- monwealth, as Nature would impel every member of the community to rise up against this unjust and unnatural decree. Well, then, we see the little state increasing in numbers and importance, their petty jealousies and disputes (if they had such,) referred to their parental magistrate; we see the person of their common father reverenced, and his word law; we see him " gathered to his fathers" and his eldest son, their second father, and of course the most experienced man in the community, called on to act in the magisterial capacity of his father, still having the " go " of his flocks on the common property, and nothing more, save the honor and respect due his station. In process of time, the family becoming more and more numerous, forms a clan, of which this magistrate or his successor is the chief. The labor and attention necessary to regulate the affairs of the mul- tiplying people, and dispense justice to all, is daily increasing, so that the chief in attending to it cannot pay the necessary attention to his flocks, herds, and other domestic concerns. Whilst his time was thua employed in the service of the community, it became equitable and necessary that the community should support him and his family. Then, probably, it was that each member of the clan first contributed a sheep or bullock towards the support of their chief, not as recognizing any right or property on his part, to the soil in which the cattle pas- tured, but as a just and indispensable return for his services in regulat- ing the affairs of the clan. It was, in fact, neither more nor less than wages for service done. Let us suppose for a moment that the chief refused to perform his duty, that ho removed himself and family to another country, and de~ to be sent to him for the clan to the vaga- country support you. For us, so far from contributing to your support, we alienate and ut- terly deny your blood, and you shall never more make one of our family." They would follow up this renouncement by electing a new chief, and giving to him the honor and emoluments-jjvhich the othe prof- ligate had abandoned. If such was the title of the ancient chief, and if such would have beea his treatment should he desert his post, let us inquire what has altered the case as regards his successor or the present day. In this inquiry, it is above all things necessary that we be cool and impartial. If there haft arisen or possibly could arise, any circumstance or event in the lapse of ages, that could fairly and honestly do away with the original right of the occupiers, and vest an absolute and unconditional right in the chief, (126* OUR NATUEAL RIGHTS, ^M him the unlimited ownership which he now assumes I sav that in thL rtstc* fj-id+- thn fn ~-f-v.u^vi ^fi*u vioowiniauu culu utJcitn i sun*> SSl Sftte 5SSV P q f h he la ^ d ' C uld ^ e 8eize it; in Opp^sitSn to tS /5!iiH fiS P PHu buc , h a se izure would be death-deserving robbery Oould the people themselves bestow it on him in reward of WserviSt ^r ltH 7\ Chap ' ** V ' * 23 '- MThe land 8ha11 not be ^W forever; for tbe land is Mine, salth tfoe Lord, for ye are strangers and sojourners with Me. ~ff n th ta i, aU , lhe laDd f y Ur P s8e8siou ' y a shall grant a redemption for the land .rotter be waxen poor, and hath sold away some ot his possession and if anr ot Ju. km come to redeem it. then shall he redeem that which his brother sold ST-Then'let him council n " e * * m "' &M hmSeU ** able tO redeem ** ' restore ay return unto his possession . , ay return uno s possession I! JV'i? 1 ' to re3t re " to bim ' then that wnich is 8old 8na " "main in th nt and h m .!h * * * antU * e year f the Jubilee - and * the J ^ilee it shall go is ^ to the absolute will of ner ' regulation it was impossible for an indi- Kefor^He^rffit l m *' m WWch W6 at present roan - "* M?- e " 8 flMdVhJ^ e r,rti nd H Is i,? IIn K' forye , are6tran S rers and sojourners with tte ?Sn of tr,,?h ' W H ^ Irt 5 aU y acknowledge that the landlord is r (127) OUtt NATURAL, RIGHTS. its rise in the barbarous middle ages of tho world, from villainous en* croachments, and the " stand and deliver " force of arms. Perish such authority ! Having digressed into an imaginary picture of great exploits and vir- tuous services, and shown that even these could by no means purchase absolute ownership of the soil, I now turn to the " cold reality," to the encroachment of the cheat, and the sword of the bravo. We le it the patriarchal chief performing the duties and receiving the wages of his mages terial office. So far all was perfectly fair and just; but as power begets ambition, and affluence generates indolence and profusion, he (or his successor) gradually increased his demand of contributions, and began to give wav to negligence arid caprice in the discharge of his duty. Any person that has observed the ideal superior- ity and ignorant pride of the strippling aristocrat, will easily perceive that the son of the chief, surrounded by attendants, and served with a greater share of respect than fell to the lot of his compeers, very natur- ally imbibed the seeds of pride and arrogance, grew up a worse iuaa than his father, and, of course, made further encroachments on the rights of his people. In the lapse of ages, and the absence of written documents, the origi- nal compact between the people and the chief became indistinctly re- membered or entirely forgotten. The annual sheep and bullock contin- ued to be paid, but whether for the magisterial service, of the chief, or his supposed right in the soil, does not appear in these dark times to be perfectly understood or much attended to. Then came domestic war or foreign invasion. In these commotions, some one chief, superior to the rest, obtained sway, and, on the return of peace became king. The neigh- boring chiefs who acted with, or were subdued by him, formed a union under him, and bound themselves to support his government with sup- plies and men. The new made king, in return, confirmed to them the possession of the land on which their respective clans dwelt, and it is probable that it was at this juncture that the chief first claimed " owner- ship " of the soil. But whether it was at this juncture, or before it, or a-lter it, the claim was alike unjust: his own dishonest encroachment could not give him such ownership, neither could the king give it; in fact what Tar the king only a chief swelled a little bigger than his fellows " A pagoti thing of sabre sway. With front ot brass and feet of clay.' And I cannot see that such a " thing " had any right whatever to deprive the occupier of his property, and bestow it on the chief. But, however the right may have been, we find the feudal chief in possession, not only of the soil, but of the very lives and limbs of his people. The remuner- ation for his services he fraudulently and impiously perverted into a pay- ment for the soil and the seasons; and the natural duty of every man to arm in defence of the community, he, by the most villainous encroach- ment, corrupted into a warlike service due to himself, when his ambi- tion or caprice chose to call on it. In fact, the history of the nobles, an- cient as well as modern, is one scene of wrongs and oppressions practiced on the people, and yet man, base, degenerate man! reverences the de- scendants of these worthies, themselves as worthy, merely because " Their blood Has crept through scoundrels ever since the flood.* 1 But man will yet break through his mental thraldom, and such worthtea will receive their due in the contempt and scorn of a regenerated people. Scrutinize the -i i^tion in all its bearings; turn it round and round, and examine it in very possible point of view, and we find that nothing could give unlimited ownership of land, except force or fraud, and the times are, I trust fast passing away in which these could give a suffi- cient title. (128) OUB NATURAL RIGHTS. CHAPTER IX, ' As to a man farming his own property, it is a heavenly life, bnt devil take the life reaping the fruits that another must eat." BURNS' LETTER TO MBS. DDNLOP. Before dismissing the subject, another question remains to be disposed of, namely, can any people be independent or happy under the system of absolute ownership ? It is useless to waste time in discussing a ques- tion, the merits of which are, indeed, self-evident. Independent they cannot by any means be, even though permitted to hold their land at a shilling an acre; and the happiness that exists only by the sufferenco of another, is, at best of a very doubtful quality. Tis true there are in Ireland some districts comparatively prosperous and independent, such are the Northern manufacturing counties. And are those districts prosperous and independent under the " absolute own- ership " of the landlords ? No such thing. The industry and skill of the people of these parts would be of little service to them, if the landlord were not checked in his career of extortion by the deep undergrowl of the people. Our hereditory despots may talk as they will of the insub- ordination of other districts of Ireland ; but in no place has their greed been so effectually resisted as in the North. Who has not heard of " Tommy Downshire." * The manner in which he enforces his right is not, perhaps, the most unexceptionable, but the principle he vindicates is the purest and best, and it ought to be contended for in a manner worthy of itself, morally and constitutionally, like any other great po- litical question. If a ly man doubt that things are managed thus in the "North," let him take the following fact as a sample of what is doing there : '* A gen- tleman resident in the county Donegal, some years ago, employee! an efficient agent on an estate which he possesses near Lurgan (county Ar- magh). This hireling, agreeably to his orders, set about raising rents and harassing the tenantry. Instead of patiently submitting to his " absolute " power, the tenantry assembled in thousands, at noon-day, breathing discontent and vengeance. Under the influence of bodily fear, the agent requests the presence of his master to allay the dangerous discontent. When the landlord arrives on the ground, he is presented with a memorial, in substance like this : ' The discontents of your ten- antry do not arise from any disinclination to pay a fair and equitable rent for the land, which themselves and their ancestors have occupied for centuries ; they beg to refer you to the rate of rents charged on the neighboring estates, and they will cheerfully pay as much as their neighbors.' The landlord replied that he did not wish to be considered an oppressor, that he would reduce from 40s. to 28s. an acre, but that he would sell the estate rather than make further reduction." These terms were agreed to. The tenantry pay 28s., whereas, had they quietly sub- mitted to the 40s. regimen, it is very likely that, in a country so rich and fertile, the regulation would ere now be 3. This principle is in general operation in the Northern counties. It effectually curbs absolute ownership : and so far they hold their prosper- ity by a direct departure from the settled state of things. They can now enjoy the fruits of their industry ; but who would enjoy those fruils if the landlord were permitted to fleece them as he pleased V The sturdy in- habitant of the North would, I doubt, in that case, be allowed the hunger .and persecution which now fall to the lot of his rugged brother of the * The name assumed by the agrarian regulators of Armacrti and Down, and other oortb m counties*. (.Physical force looking on to see lair play. 1877.J 17 (129) CUE NATURAL RIGHTS. As the principle of "Tommy Downshire" is a very natural one, springing- out of comm9p sense and common justice, it is no way strange that it has manifested itself in various parts of the country, but, like the good seed that " fell amongst thorns, it has, except in tha " North," been choked up by inefficient combination and isolated resist- ance. The people are already aware of the vast importance of this principle; let them direct their attention to its manifest justice, and there is a moral power abroad that will ensure its complete and speedy triumph. Indeed when we consider the diversity of human character it appears most strange that among the crowds of landlords, or blackmailers, who infest Ireland, there could be found only two or three examples that, even approach the teachings of justice and humanity. Laying aside all the obligations that the divine and beautiful law of Christianity imposes upon us and oh ! these should not be entirely disregarded what an honest fame could an individual landlord acquire, what a glorious name would he transmit to posterity, by being the first to come forward and do his duty, or what appears to him to be his duty the duty that he is so well paid for doing! How simple and, to a benevolent mind, how de- lighthil the task! Imagine the tenantry convened, and the good man addressing them in language like this : " MY FRIENDS It is acknowledged on all sides that the present system of society ia pro- ductive of many evils and many are the plans and measures proposed lor their removal. ' Kcpeal of the Union,' ' Abolition of the State Church,' " Poor Laws,' 'Public Works,' and no forth, are alternately in fashion. None of these can be effected without difficulty ami delay, and it effected, they would, I fear, rather alleviate than rtmovc the evils of society. " Amid all these proposed reforms and remedies, a thought has struck mo, that itis in the power of every landlord to make his tenantry comfortable, independently of legal enact- ments, and I intend to try the experiment forth with. " I will reduce my rents to a fourth of their present standard, and grant perpetual leases of all my land to every tenant a lease of what he now occupies, except where the farm may exceed twenty acres; in which case the overplus will be given to those whose holdings are least. I will reside amonx yon and it will be my pleasure and my pride to improve and refine you. But you shall not be permitted to sell your interest IL the land, save under cer tain restrictions: neither shall you be allowed, in any cast, to sub-let at a dearer rent than I charge. 1 shall also require you to fertilize your farms anjl improve your dwellings, anfl. in doing so, 1 shall be happy to lend you all the assi -tance in my power. I have employed a skillful agriculturist, and his business shall be to give you whatever instruction you my require. Your fields must and will be fertile, and your cottage neat and comfortable. . " You, my friends, may suppose that I am sacrificing my inclination and convenience, in order to promote your good. 1 have no such merit it is no sacrifice to quit the follies of fashion and the sensual gratification of luxury. My days were lost in pursuits unworthy an Intellectual and useful being, and my nights sought an escape from apathy and discontent in the whirlpool of amusing lolly. 1 saw mv wealth wasted on the worthless, the profli- gate, and the vile, and I reflected that my conduct involved a virtuous and worthy people in penury and distress. From that moment I resolved to devote my energies to other an:i coLler pursuits, aud I am now come among my people with a fixed determination to makv them happy." This speech appears in the early pages, but it is necessary here. It is worth repeating. If It be heeded, it may save a great deal of very great trouble. What evil could possibly result from a change like this? On the contrary, what beau- tiful order would it not produce; what an impetus would it give to agriculture; what a vivifying spirit would it spread over the land ? Fondly does the mind picture, to itself th be-iuty, the happiness that springs lorth under the regenerating gysvem. The renovated fertility or the fleld, the wuviug lolinge o; toe hedge-row, the smiiing gaiety of the new- modelled cottage, its garden of vegetables, fruits and flowers; it? ' l>ee hive's hum;' it* hadowing poplars: that cottage no longer the receptacle o< privation and misery, tut th bode of re.quitted industry ami enviable content. (130J OUB NUTURAL RIGHTS. And shall that picture be realized ? Shall joyous Independence bound over the land, bringing plenty and comfort to every fireside, or shai unnatural tyranny continue to shed its withering: blight over God's cre- ation, and dole out to dependent j man the wretched boon of rags and hunger ? OUBS is THE CHOICE ! What is the power of a bloated aristoc- racy when arrayed against the will of a great and intellectual people ? Let the public mind but rouse itself and send forth its written decree, and strong though tyranny may be, entrenched in the prejudice and plunder of a thousand years, it will sink beneath that decree, and right and jus- tice will again reign over all ! OHAPTEB X, CONCLUDING ADDRESSED TO THE WISE AND WEfcL-ENOUGH, Our needful knowledge, like our needful food, Unhedged lies open in the common field. And bids all welcome to the vital least; You scorn what lies belore you in the oago Ot nature imd experience, moral iruth. And dive in science lor distinguished names. Sinking in virtue as you rise in lame: Your learning, like the lunar beam, affords Light, but not heat YOUNG. Though the Inherent principles of our nature undoubtedly l^an to vir- tue and philanthropy, yet man, in the present incongruous state of so- ciety, will be found much wrapped up in self, and seldom lastingly affected by the contemplation of ills that cannot reach that darling ob- ject. Hence I anticipate the hostility of the well-enough portion of socie- ty to my views and opinions. But in the retreats of toiling indigence certain wants and necessities will second those viws and demonstrate the accuracy of those opinions. To those whose wisdom and wants, too. are satisfied with the present " order " of things, I leave the task 01 proving, first, that Nature, in yielding tbe necessaries of life only to the hand of industry, intended those necessaries for such as perform no in- dustry at ail; second, that in producing the supports of life in economi- t Th re is what is termed " du/y worfr." In the mornings of Spring and Autumn, you will meet droves of the ragged, wretched peasantry, e-.tcb. bearing the badge ot orii al sin ta spade) on his shoulder, hurrying to the demesnes ot our landlords and agents. Many of these unfortunates have to travel a journey ot sixteen to eighteen Irish miles, and, of course, the same distance in returning home, to perform a day's work that naves tnolr task-masters no more than (3d. or bd. I once had tbe curiosity to go to see these worse than alaves at "duty," on the ground ol an Absentee's aerent. It was m Mav; an immense cal- dron ot potatoes had been boiled for their breakfast: but as the buds germiuating shoots ?oiiie of them hali-a-yard long had been suffered to remain on them, it would take an irishman to tell whether they were potatoes or merely a mass of concreted weeds. These, with half-roasted salt-herrings (and no over-supply of them) was the breakfast of which all partoos eagerly, with the exceptipn ot one young man, who declined eating at all, and kept walking ahout the ground, no'tin the best possible humor, if could augur uzht from his knit brow and compressed lip. I could perceive that the domestic menials had better food alloted to them, and, in particular, a couple ot stout young telrows, whose business it was to lead on the serfs at the labor; and lest they might not " lead" well enough, there was an overseer apfo'nted to 1 ' drive" 1 them; not. indeed, with the ^art-whip, but with a- good national blackthorn. The meal over, all were on fieir sp.ides, straining and striving, and led O'i by the two stout domestics, the driver urging on the hindermost by threats and Mow* / u It's a great shame, Puddy, that you don't put the conceit out o' them fellows," said a middle-aged peasant, whose gaunt visage and bare l;ones sufficiently indicated why he did not, ensraee in tl;e contest himself. The athletic young man to whom this was ad- dressedand who. I perceived, hae I was on tiptoe to learn what plan he was about to adopt for the improvement ot the wretched horderer.-: but I soon touud that his excursion to this wnd region had a holier obiect. His WAS a plan for their spiritual welfare, by compelling them, at the head of a large body ot military, to pay tithes into his own apostolic pocket.- 1 Not long since, as I loitered in the shop of a medical gentlemen, in a remote village ke your breakfast ot porridge and milk." " Oh. flu -nol where would 1 get porri ige and milk ? There is not a peck ot meal withi i miles of wherft we live." " And what good diet d > you live uoon," asked she doctor. " Why. potatoes ana (hesitatingly,) sometimes a dr^o ot milk, like our neighbors," was the reply. After she vvafc gone, the Doctor into med me ihat vast numbers in the neighborhood were laboring uudef imilar diseases trotn the same cause. And yet 1 saw their scanty crop oi grain being *o a lor export, at 6d. to 7d. per stone (fourteen pounds), and a< that was insufficient to satisfy the landlord, their bliicit cauie sol I, so. ne ot them as cheap as eighteen shillings a head-* things, the use ot which nature absolutely required to maintain *J>em in health to the w_nt," of the thirty thousund-a-year boys ! (133) OUR NATURAL RIGHTS. tlngulshable hatred of tyranny, the defects of limited abilities and an Incomplete education. I have, it is true, proposed a great and serious change. What of that if it be as good as it is great, and as practicable as it is important 7 Many may think it too strong and sweeping a remedy for our social evils. Well, I call on them to point out any other remedy by which they can be radically cured. Some change of the kind must take place, or, monstrous as is the system now, it will, in the lapse of time, become ten times more monstrous. Why, estates in this neighborhood which, some thirty or forty years ago, were not worth seven thousand pounds annually, through the fertilizing improvements of the tenant, are now worth thirty thousand a year. And though our Honorables will not expend a penny in enhancing the value of the soil, yet, as soon as it is reclaimed, they honorably seize the whole benefit. The soil will go on improving, till in many districts it becomes live times more valuable than it is now ; this improvement .will be effected (in Ireland at least), as it ever more has been, by the labor and capital of the tenant; and if you leave absolute ownership unchecked, the minion who now receives thirty thousand a year will then have one hundred thousand extracted fraudulently from the toil and sweat of the people. Nay, they have actually invented a plan for compelling the tenant to improve the land for them under pain of utter starvation. The hellish plan is expressed in a familiar adage, eternally in the mouth of the landlord and his subordinates, " High rent is the best manure ever land got." Now, what is the plain English of this ? Here it is : " The present quality or condition of the soil does not afford us more than a certain portion of produce; now we will exact double the quantity of produce, and then the tenant must reclaim the land for us or starve with his family ! " I would never close this pamphlet if I waited to embody in it a tenth of the wrongs and oppressions which crowd into my mind. The Earl of Gosford, too, ' the best landlord in Armagh," as somebody styled him. (" You're a sorry set, when I'm the best of you.") the liberal Earl of Oosi'ord could stand up in his Farming Society meeting, some four or five years ago, and make a long speech, to show that the farmer ought to keep no horse to assist him in his labor, and concluded a patriotic ha- rangue by filling the goblet high " to spade labor, the poor man's best" and he might have added, last " resource." But Lord Gosford, or any other " Gos " among them, need not " lay the unction to his soul " that such will be the poor man's last resource ; they will find to their cost that he has other resources than stooping his shoulders to the horse's labor, and bending the image of God under a burden of dung ! As the present wretchedness and the growing intelligence of the peo- ple render a great and speedy change inevitable, what manner of change would be best, and what the best means of effecting it, becomes matter for the serious and instant consideration of the people. On the former question I have given my opinions at length ; if the people agree with these opinions, the latter is of easy solution. An English or Irish paper will cost only fourpence ; every to wnland in the empire should take at least one weekly paper, advocating the principle of limited ownership. This would give to such papers as would espouse the people's cause a circulation which would enable them to command the first-rate talent of the nation. Association on association would follow, and that same spirit whose waking start scared tyranny from the sin of intolerance and the filth of Rotten Borroughs. would spring into active and vigor- ous life, and establish and regulate the long trodden-down rights of mankind. This concludes the pamphlet, excepting " a warning word to the Americans," and here it is : The sole cause of American freedom is, that the energies of her people and her political influence are not under the dominion of landlords. So (134) UUK NATURAL KKiliTS. lory? as land can be easily purchased by the in-coming emigrant all shall go on well ; but when it comes to be wanted for the absolute owners, farewell to the plenty, and happiness, and freedom of the NEW WORLD, and welcome the rampant, tyranny, the slavery and wretchedness of the OLD. And will the men of America those free spirits who quitted indignantly and forever the lands of the tyrant will they tamely stand to see a similar tyranny established in the land of their adoption? Or will tho descendants of those heroes that fought, and bled, and died to save their country from ,' the pollution of the oppressor, permit a domestic oligarchy to grow up and gorge upon the vitals of the country? Why, to borrow a simile from their own great land, it would be destroy- ing a den of snakes at the peril and loss of life and limb ; and afterwards suffering a nest of these same reptiles to breed inside of the house, and sting to death themselves and their children ! The last paragraph is not finished. The conclusion of it is lost. It lies on my memory a sketch of the Imagination. The Republic polluted with knaves, and Washington and his great compatriots "bursting their cerements" throw- ing the light of their protection over their darkening land, and "waving the sword of avenging justice" over the heads of its growing Oligarchy. A picture, in short, that must be realized very soon though it may be by hands less worthy and possibly in a rougher way. With the exception of the closing lines, "OuR NATURAL BIGHTS " is here presented, word for word, as it was written almost fifty years ago. My resolve was now taken. I would devote my life to a war against Land Monopoly a war to the death till either one or the other should die. The best way I could commence the war was to go to London and open the campaign at thai great centre of Thought and action. (136) 186 THE ODD BOOK OF THF MNMTKKNTH CENTURY; CHAPTER XI. ONE of my rivals for the prizes of our village school, E. 0. dot- lias, disappeared for years, and returned with a treasure of Latin, Greek, and aristocratic longings. His purpose was to become a priest of the Catholic Church, was refused ordination, and made his way to London, where he found employment on the Foreign department of The Sun. This was a very substantial fact in favor of my design, which was to remove to London in order to carry on the war to which I had devoted my life. But first I reconnoitered. Went to London. Found Mr. Crawford, at his rooms in Cecil street, Strand. My brochure had been already in his hands. He was perhaps the best aristocrat in Ireland, but I found the superstition of caste slightly upon him, and he rather discouraged my thought of removing to London. One of my tutelary knights could not have been more sensitive to coldness or neglect, and I said : " Well, sir, if I can't be useful here useful to Ireland my path is straight to the United States. Good morning." He followed me on the stair. " Hold ! Don't go to America, Ireland cannot afford to lose such men as you." "Then Ireland shall not lose me. I will return to London, and enter on the war ; " and I returned home, broke up house, and returned to London with my family. In Liverpool we barely es- caped the loss of all the money we had in gold. Left it in an unlocked trunk out of which silver spoons were stolen, whilst the money providentially escaped. The gold symbol was too weighty to carry about my person. What bank notes I had were per- fectly secure. Take notice ! I reached London, and Mr. Collins instructed, encouraged, and introduced me. The threepenny stamp on newspapers had been brought down to one penny. And The Constitutional was started as a morning paper to inspirit and direct the democracy. To me, fresh from the mountain coast was given the "Irish de- partment " of that paper. Up to this time all the daily papers of London were divided between the two aristocratic parties, Tory and Whig. The Con- utitutional professed to come out on the broad ground of popu- lar rights. It was my duty to collate and comment npon the OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. current affairs and current news of Ireland. In doing so, the landlords, and the rackrents came in for a good deal of my at- tention. The evil news abounded, and I traced it all to its evil source the absolute ownership of land. The stamp of my opinions quickly showed itself in the Consti- tutional. And now let me relate a fact that has instruction in it. I was at Mr. Crawford's rooms, when Wm. Smith O'Brien came up stairs with a number of our paper in his hand; "Hillo! Crawford, we have got help. Have you seen The Constitutional. this morning? " "I have," replied Mr. Crawford, "and can pre- sent to you the person who says he is author of the article you refer to." A blended chagrin and disappointment came over O'Brien's face to think the voice had not come from a higher quarter. " Who says he is ! " It was an implied insult ; I could feel that, the first, and indeed the last, ever offered to me by men in their position. How could I resent it ? I believed them to be the best aristocrats in Ireland. I believe so still. My resentment found no voice. Better so. Far better. Ascerbities are better avoided. They leave less or more of their bitterness behind them in looking over our memories of the past. Without Intending it, I got measurably even with both of these gentle- men by and by, as shall be seen. I am now speaking to the Democracy of England on that vital subject which formed the object of my life. My first encounter was, audaciously enough, with The Times The Thunderer. It came this way. Lough Erne, in addition to being one of the largest and most beautiful lakes in Europe, is a fine fostering field for salmon. Its outlet to the ocean is at Ballyshannon, three miles down from the lake. At this point is what must be one of the most magnificent "salmon leaps" in. the world. Often have I " Leaned me down upon a bank," watching the feats of force, agility, anl perseverance of the salmon, as pitching from below, a height of (estimated) twelve to twenty feet, they would reach the brow of the cataract, and by sheer force of fin and tail fight against it, till they either won and went on their upward way, or were driven down again into " The hell of waters" that boiled below, but only to renew the combat, and give over only with victory. 18 138 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J The salmon fishery of those waters is, like everything else that God made for His people, seized upon by robber " landlords,'^ measured and valued in money. And very valuable it is. The particular landlord who claims it as his fief I don't know, but it was then leased to the widow of Doctor Sheil, a man very famous in his profession in his day. It is no discredit to Scotch- men to say that they are enterprising fellows, and they proved BO here, by planting stake nets outside the great sand bar which juts up against the ocean. Those nets intercepted the salmon. Bent had to be paid the relentless rent ! and there was noth- ing wherewith to pay it. Word went around that the widow was ruined, and one or two thousand men from coast and mountain descended on the stake nets and left " not a wreck behind." The event echoed itself into the Times office what event does not ? and elicited a loud peal of " thunder," indeed, levelled at the "agrarian rioters." Nor did it disdain to estimate the "destruction of property" as well as the destruction of his Majesty's " peace, law, and order." Now it so happened that my relatives lived within ten miles of the " riot ; " knew all about it, and had just written its whole history to myself. It was not a hard job to throw the subject into shape, and give it a place in The Constitutional. A few sarcasms about the new affiiliation of the Times with marauders who "devoured widows' houses" oame in naturally enough at the end of my statement. Sur- prised, and it may be a, little stunned, by such an unexpected attack, the Times took breath for the better part of a week, in- formed itself on the subject, and then came out ; made a frank amende to the Irish net-breakers, and to " one of our contempo- raries," for having discovered the truth. It was a conservative, preservative, and praiseworthy riot after all. But the Times did not name the "contemporary," for that would be adver- tising our new enterprise. The victory was with us, however. The fact gave me a lift in the estimate of my employers, and threw an especial brightness on my prospect of being usefuL The work I had to do was not work, it was a pleasure the pleasure I would have chosen if all earthly pleasures lay at my feet At this time a tax was on salt in Ireland, and it was remitted MB a premium on curing of fish. I had not seen, suffered, and risked much in the trade of fishing, but enough to put me out of OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 1B9 conceit with it. The first horror my childhood listened to was the " Drowning in Bruekless Bay," of the whole fishing fleet, I know not how many boat crews, in one night, of which not one escaped. Each succeeding year brought its average of drowned men and destituted families. To this was added a fact still more likely to weigh with the school of Politico economists. The pursuit of fishing gave an adventurous habit, that looked down with indifference, or contempt, on the plodding labor of -spade and scythe. Worse, it gave a spending habit, a contempt for small outlays as well as for small gains. On rare occasions there was not perhaps an experienced fisherman on the coast, who had not realized as much as a pound sterling by one night'a lucky fishing. This could only be when there was a' very large haul and a very high price,, and those two things so rarely met together as to resemble gambling. But the golden memory would remain, and it helped the public houses materially. There is intense friendliness in the Irish people, as well as intense fierce- ness. The readiest, most convincing way this friendliness can show itself is by " Come in boys, and let us have a drop." Con- scious of present inability to afford the cost, the next word would be "the company's health, they're wagging their tails (i. e. the herrings) will pay for this." And so the fishing, as a staple re- liance, did, with an uncertain amount of good, bring very certain amounts of evil. I published my views on the subject, in The Constitutional, I wrote to the Executive in Dublin, urging to change the premium on fishing to a premium on flax raising, and reclaiming the adjacent heather lands ; pointing out the al- tered homes and steadily increasing industry and gains that would follow. To every communication on the subject, I re- ceived a courteous, and somewhat hopeful, reply. Encourage- ment to fishing, I believe, was withdrawn, but no land improve- ment was substituted in its place. The "landlord," as he called himself, stood in the way. And was he not both the " landlord " and the law '? The Constitutional was a re-model of the Public Ledger, which was a continuation of the Public Advertiser, immortalized by the letters of Junius. It failed, partly because the five estab- lished papers would not admit it to the joint arrangement for ** expressing " continental news up from Dover. Telegraphs were not in those days, and even railroads had only made their 140 THE ODD BOCK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUKT ; ilrst footing between Liverpool and Manchester. The Constitu- tional employed a relay horse-express of its own, at a cost thftfc helped largely and suddenly to sink it. But a more potent cause of its failure came, I think, from an. other quarter. There was, at the time I am speaking of, a knot of very wise men, in their own estimation Hume, Eoebuck, Brougham, Col- Thomson, etc., who christened themseleves " Philosophical Radi- cals/' and took the field against the poor people, and in favor of the poor landlords. Between those quacks and The Constitutional it was agreed, OB the one hand, that the new paaer would do nothing to add to the odium in which the " Poor Law Amendment Act "so called was held by the -people of England. In return, the influence of the * Philosophical " was to be directed to the great benefit of the new enterprise. This fact blasted my own prospects, first, and, by and by, it blasted also the prospects of The Constitutional For (now 1836 or '7) the government brought forward its plan for a Poor Law in Irelanda counterpart to that already fastened on England ; the same in its prison workhouses locust host of officials ; imprisonment and starvation of the poor. The subject relating to Ireland fell into my department. I prepared an ar- ticle pointining out the evils of the proposed law every clause of it a distinct evil. I proceeded to set forth the millions of acres of idlo and easily reclaitnable land that abounded in Ireland, and presented the gaunt owners of a million of idle bands vainly asking for something to do. The remedy was simply to set the idle hands to work upon the idle land One or two arces, and help to build a cottage would fix any poor family in profitable employment for half of its time, leaving the other half to work for hire. I urged that this would bo a complete remedy the machinery alike simple and inexpensive. That article, though it never saw the light, brought upon me great personal adversity. The editorial " We " was, on The Constitutional at least, no misnomer. The editorial corps was four or five in number, and the contribution of each was, as it ought to be, submitted to the judgment of all. All were Radical Reformers and true mei\ and no difference in judgment or action had arisen till now. Now that my article " leveled a deadly thrust at the English Poor OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. Law through the side of that proposed for Ireland." " We will not defend the new law, neither can we attack it." These were the words of Laman Blanchard, editor-in-chief, aa he urged me to expunge four lines from my manuscript. I refused. " Those lines," I said, " are the soul ; without them the article would be a ' dead carcase/ I left my home," I con- tinued, " not simply to earn a living, but to diffuse truth as I saw it." And I urged that this understanding with the Koebuck fraternity would lead to a great misunderstanding with the Radical Reformers of England, and the people^at large. Impair the usefulness and peril the existence of the paper. Poor, good Blanchard ! He tried to persuade me that the article was very much to the purpose by merely showing my views of what was needed, that my reflections on the proposed law could be omitted without detriment to those views. But my keen, yet I will confess mistaken, sense of honor would not assent to his condition. I threw down my pen, walked out of the office, and carried that dark night a darker gloom into my little household. It was, indeed, a contrast. That very day I had been with my wife along the Serpentine river then quite rural searching for a desirable cottage near its banks. My income from the paper was more than sufficient for my wants ; it was earned by the per- formance of work that was to me a positive enjoyment, and I looked joyfully forward to a long and perhaps a bright career of usefulness. How was all this hope darkened in that dark night ! Looking back at it through the long memory, it seems an in- credible, but a very painful dream. For months I did nothing save instruct myself in language, and the art of a reporter. I was coming gradually to the last of my slender resources. My memories of London during this time would fill a volume, and not without instruction, but it would not be to my purpose to write all those memories here. From the eventful night in which I left the office of the Con- Mtitutional, I did not enter it during the time above indicated. At the end of that time I called in the publishing office. Mr. Dyer, who was in charge of that department, received me with a good will that stands bright in my memory. Beyond a nod of recognition as I passed through his office to the editorial rooms up stairs, we had known nothing of each other. I might well be surprised then, when he invited me into the back parlor f and .142 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J (having learned that I had been so long without employment) threw his purse of sovereigns on the table, and invited rne to borrow from him what I might require for the present. I suc- ceeded in assuring him that I had not yet come to my last guinea. He was, I found, familiar with the circumstances under which I left the office, and was pleased to say good things to me which I did not at all expect to hear. " Mr. Blanchard," he said " has often expressed regret that he could not find you out,'" and on his suggestion, I appointed to call on that gentleman on the following evening. " You were right," said he, as he took me by the hand. " Our tacit assent to the new Poor Law has done its work. We expire in four weeks from this time. Come, how- ever, and earn a guinea with us so long as we remain in exist- ence." "But you know my opinions," I replied, " and they ere not altered." "Do as you think right," he said, " it is all the same now." And at the end of the four weeks The Constitutional ceased to exist. And now I have to look back at a dreary effort to learn report- ing, to practise the phonetic alphabet, invent short signs to indi- cate long words and phrases, and to improve my knowledge of language. I tried penny-a-lining, gave tolerably good sketches of casual incidents and public meetings. Multiplied and dropped them into all the journal letter boxes. To see next morning vapid accounts of the same things published in them all, and mine neglected. I did not know even that the editors were not likely to insert anything I would send, not knowing whether it was, or was not, authentic. And thus I floundered on, not at all aware that I was ploughing the sand that hardly ever could, under the circumstances, yield me any return. One day I was in St. James' Park. William IV. was yet above ground, and a file of mounted life guards were drawn up in front of the palace. This indicated the coming out of the king, and so not much of a crowd gathered to see how royalty looked in its old days. On its appearance a tall young fellow threw up his hat and raised a solitary cheer. Not entirely solitary, for it was greeted with a derisive laugh all round the crowd. I trans- mitted a sketch of the picture to the Weekly Dispatch, headed " Royalty on the Wane," and had not the perception to go for the pay I was entitled to on its publication. The Dispatch was a professed Republican paper, and it ie likely mv extreme activity, OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS, 143 and my extreme views, and my extreme need, would have got me a place on it if I had tried. Bat I did not try for it. I was, indeed, very simple and very helpless. With the little money I had remaining I bought wares and sent them for sale to my brother in Donegal. And never was missive more looked for than the return of his slender remit- tance. But the capital was small, and the profits small, and as we had to live, every consignment, and remittance back, grew smaller and smaller, and finally disappeared. There were four of us. What had we to pawn? Almost nothing. My Irish notes entrusted to Mr. Crawford had been returned in English money and was all gone. I had written telling him that I had left The Constitutional, and why I left it. He did not answer my letter, but I did not write again to him, which I now think was strange, as I concluded that he surely had not recieved that which I had written. I thought of him, however, and hav- ing in my posession some of his corresspondence with me, I took it to Scotland Yard, to Col. Rowan, the Police Commissioner, and a relative, I believe, of Mr. Crawford. He ordered my name on the lists, and myself to the Medical Examiner. If the examiner had rejected me, what then ? Aye, what then ? It is an easy matter for political economists to write and talk. They never sank to know what then fell upon me. But he did not reject me, and day after day, I don't know for how many days, I journeyed to Scotland Yard, living, all of us living, the meanwhile half on hope, half on allowance. At length a vacancy, 81 of the N division, stationed at Hackney. There I reported, and I earned my first day's pay by stretching all night under the Inspector's eye on a wooden bench in the station house. Next morning I don the costume, and return home to effect a transit to my new field of work or glory. But there was sickness before me. A premature existence had escaped from a trial of the world, I had outstaid my time, and when I returned to duty the local authority bundled up my toggery, and sent myself and it before the Commissioner. It must have been that he took unusual interest in me as the correspondent of Mr. Crawford. He spoke very kindly to me, and as he did so the bitterness of my spirit came welling to my eyes. He spoke en- couragingly too. In short, his good, kindly nature showed itself 144 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; in such a way as brings, at this far off time, an emotion of regret and gratitude to my heart. He restored me to life, for I had no other means of existence, ssnt me back on the local command- ers. Quite an unusual thing, I understood, and half conveying a rebuke to them. The pay was 20 weekly shillings, of which four went for rent of rooms ; luckily the new regulation of only 12s. for recruits was not yet established. It was one other narrow escape. Luckily, too, it was summer, and my duty night patrol- ing in a neighborhood almost rural. But night waking and watching is a war against Nature. I supposed that this was my fate, my life, and I set to with my usual shallow simplicity to earn promotion by my active vigil- ance. I don't know, the length of the beat assigned to me, but it just took three- quarters of an hour to go round it. Every sinuosity of lane, stable, or out-house had to be inspected in every that length of time. Always just at twelve o'clock, as if the sun were shooting sleep through the earth, as in the zenith he flings waking down upon it, I could net keep my eyes open. But standing was not permitted, so I had to walk on, though dis- tinctly asleep for some time, and over some space that I cannot now fix exactly. But as soon as the " wierd hour " was passed I emerged into full life and wakefulness. Whether this was a peculiarity of my own organization, or whether it is a general law might be worth inquiry. I was not long in service till I made an enemy of Sergeant Jones, the petty officer in immediate command over me. It was in this way. Two men in the small hours emerged over a yard or garden fence out into the street. Of course it was my duty to confront them, I was paid for it; be- sides in that way lay promotion. Sergeant Jones happened to come up on his rounds, and I demanded that he should assist me. No ! those men, he knew them, and he ordered me to let them go. I refused, and someway we all got up to the station. My cap- tives once there I returned to my beat, and heard no more of them. Lucky for me, for instead of sleep, I would have had to attend court in the morning. I speak of this because it is a se- rious drawback on the policeman's immunities. This same Ser- geant Jones was, shortly after, transported for life, for robbing and attempting to murder his landlord by repeated blows on the head with a hammer. He had entered the landlord's office on the pretence of paying him rent. No doubt this bad man was *n OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. i45 league with my garden prisoners. I had just one other charac- teristic incident whilst on this really well ordered force. On line of my beat were some pretentious houses, inhabited either by the upper middle class or the lower upper class I could not determine which. It had rounded " the short hour," when screams of " murder, murder !" and a sash thrown up made a pull on my heart, and a pull out of my locust to interfere. The voice and person were those of a lady, a fact confirmed by the style of the house. ' What's the matter?" from myself, "Keep the peace, and keep quiet, or I'll be in to take a hand." Go to h , you Irish , or I'll be out with you to take a hand." This from a powerful looking gentlemanlike man just behind the lady on whom it was clear he had not expended all his wrath. " I want you to come out, I want you to the station house, " was my invitation. "Stop a moment, 1*11 station you," and vanishing from the window with heavy tramp he rapidly descended the stairs, and flung open the front door, to do, I did not know exactly what to myself. And I never learned. Promptitude, a thought of the old knights, was always my friend in such cases, and it was so now. I was already with my back leaned upright against the wall at the side of the door entrance. He opened, and before he got clear out I swung in on him with all my collected force, and threw him heavily down on his back on the hall floor, my club out and I on the top of him. The shock to him gave me great advantage. His writhing, pitching, and cursing were very vig- orous, and did not abate in the least when I swung the club and threatened to disable him. Faithful woman! The outraged wife came rushing down stairs, and begged my forbearance, as only a woman can beg. " But this ruffian," I called him ruffian, though the tout ensemble called him a gentleman, " this ruffian will murder you if I let him up, therefore it is far better he should be safe this night in the station house." "No! no ! he . won't, he's so good, only a little wild to night. Say you won't Robert dear, and come up stairs with me. I hope, I hope this good polceman won't take you away ! " I certainly was soft- ened by her distress, and he, too, must have softened, if not by it, by the fall. So he grunted a kind word to her, and a vow that he would have me extravasated by my superiors for draw- ing my club on him. And, indeed, to use the club, except in the lit THE OL>1 HOOK OF THK NINETEENTH CENTURY ; most extreme necessity, brings, and very properly, instant dis- missal from the London force. That w:is my second adventure. My third I would not relate only to honestly confess how far this life was sinking me. Our Superintendent, Molliheu, rode slowly past me one day. There was still a stalk of what Burns calls " carle hemp " in my nature, arid I did not touch my hat with the expected salute. He passed on but immediately wheeled and cama up with me. " Why did you pass without the usual salute ? " I felt like Percy Shafton, when he had not " determined what answer he might think it perfectly convenient to make." And like, Percy, I hesitated. "Oil see, you didn't know me, I am your Superintendent." I nodded an insincere and cowardly assent. I knew him well enough. But in our volume of " Instructions " (a very useful manual) this saluting duty had no place, and I should have manfully told him so. Those things teach me to soften my judgment of a man whom I may find acting meanly and falsely. Two or three times in my life I did both. But I now had been three months in the service, and I thought it was time to look for that promotion which I had been trying to earn, trying by petty and mean acts of which I am now vainly ashamed, and for which I offer the penitence of this con- fession. I had so far sank my manhood as to open and search little bundles belonging to people ; because the regulations I think, I am not sure, ordered it to be done. I had left home with aspirations and a purpose as noble as ever inspired a man, and just see what necessity and circumstances had drive me to. A very little encouragement, and I would have been an ignoble thief-catcher for life. And so I wrote to Colonel Kowan, intimating my wish, and re- counting my merits. In reply my Inspector ordered me to don my private clothes, and go before the Commissioner. As I departed I could not forecast the upshot, but the know- ing ones said "there goes the last of him." I was soon before the ColoneL " This is your writing." "Yes." " Why did you write this ? Did some one induce you to do 80?" " No. Whatever is there is my own thought." OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 147 " This is unusual. Take your things. Eeturn to duty/' That was all. I had no other earthly way to live, and I did not know the risk I ran, till I met the general surprise with which my re- turn to the N division was greeted. Outre I believe I hav been tn all things. It is not likely many such incidents are recorded in the annals of the " force." My situation now became intolerable. A crushing failure had fallen on my life. I entered London with the determination am i the hope to fix attention on the great principle which alone e:m give stability to nations and happiness to the human family. And now it had come to this ! A dull mechanical patrol for nine hours every night, and that for seven nights in every week. That was the condition of life now offered to me. My system refused the condition. The deepening gloom of my mind seized upon my digestion and threatened to close up the account. A thought fell heavily upon me how innocent I was, how unde- serving such a doom ! At last in the dead of night I had to re- port off duty sick. Our physician, a smart, intelligent young fellow put me on a regimen, " light pudding, hard crackers, no meat." I quote because I know it is good in such cases, and let. the reader bear in mind that I will lose no occasion to let what may be useful be at least seen. But regimen was of no avail. My system distinctly refused to accept the condition of life offered to it. What then? I wrote to Mr. Blanchard what was, and what was likely to come of it. My descriptive letter ended thus : " Every night, seven nights in every week, this is repeated. Brooding and bit- ter thought has taken hold of my stomach, and, in short, I am given notice quit ' either this work, or this existence." My memory does not hold, I suppose I never did know, the means by which Mr. Blanchard accomplished my rescue, but I found myself engaged to take charge of the Greenwich Gazette.'' That is certainly a creditable Institution, the Greenwich Hos- pital. Legless, armless, and generally stranded seamen find very tolerable refuge here. It also gives a refuge to the canvas likenesses of the groat naval commanders, and in a glass case the moth-devoured uniform worn by Nelson at Trafalgar, the hole, and even the earnest little French bullet that went through it. The Park is large and rural, the abode of a good many tame deer, and of the Observatory that gives longitudes to 148 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; the world ; also of certain precipitous declivities that give rolling^ down velocity to the light-hearted London visitors to the Green- wich fair. Blackheath, an extensive common (unfenced in the time I speak of, and I suppose so still) juts up to the interior end of the Park, and thence away a mile or more into the coun- try. This within five cents of London, where people are sunk down deep or piled up sky high in their habitations. Monarchy and aristocracy ! What a precious gift you are to this happy world ! An excellent school for the sailor boys is attached to the Hospital, of which Mr. Hartnall, proprietor of the Gazette, was Principal. At the late election the Gazette had hoisted the colors of the Tory candidate, and insisted that he was a true Whig. The young man was, I believe, a nephew of Thomas Atwood, of Bir- mingham, the famous Reformer. He was elected, and the in- dignation of the Whigs threatened to extinguish the Gazette. To avert this, Hartnall bargained with a model charlatan, who signed himself Christopher Irving, L.L.D., F.A.S. Of the condition of this bargain I knew notning, but Hartnall, a very shrewd fellow, Boon found that the " F. A. S." might honestly omit the F and add one S more to his signature. Of this dilemma Mr.Bkmchard became aware, and signaled myself to leave " the force " and the pleasant neighborhood of Hackney. My first article in The Gazette was a counterpart of that which sundered me from The Constitutional "We agree with Mr^ Sharman Crawford," so ran the article " that the best Poor Law for Ireland would be an absentee tax, or some law that would react upon the landlords, and compel them to remain on their estates, and do their whole duty to their tenantries," etc. I sent the paper to Mr. Crawford, at his residence near Bangor, county Down. He gave a quite hearty acknowledgment of its receipt. I had expressed in it doubts that he had not pushed his land bill in Parliament with sufficient energy. To which he. replied " The landlords and lawyers ON ALL SIDES of the House were op- posed to me." That when he gave " notice of motion for a certain night in the future," always on that night the government had business to do, before which all other business must give way^ Then lie could do nothing, but give " notice " for another night. That other night came and brought the same interference by the government. So that they " Obstructed " him from getting his OR, THE SPIRIT OB 1 CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 149 bill before the House at all. He then explained that he did not answer my letter (referred to page 167), becase he " did hot see what he could do " to aid me. This struck to my heart with re- gret and indignation. I had, in my trusting simplicity, concluded undoubtingly that he had not received my letter at all, or he would have replied to it. That illusion was now dissipated. I realized that Mr. Crawford was an aristocrat, and I took up the thought that he treated me with neglect because his position and his fourteen thousand a year entitled him to do so. In short, I concluded that he, too, assumed the superiority affected by his insolent class to men of my class. This I never could tolerate, and I wrote him my thought that " to public virtue and public usefulness I would yield everything, to mere wealth or station I would yield nothing. That if in the long hereafter we ever met or ever corresponded, it must be on terms of perfect equality." I never heard from Mr. Crawford again ; never met him, though I made quite a chatacteristic step in that direction twenty years thereafter, as we shall see. But to return. Weeks elapsed before I knew of the principal fact that led to my engagement on Tlie Gazette. Rumors floated around, but I did not helieve them. Hartnall was a clever, lib- eral fellow. I liked him. He gave me all I wanted of my own way. ^ut yet, " Fie upon but yet, Bur yet Is but a jailer, to brine: forth Some monstrous malefactor." Let us see. The constituents of Mr. Atwood gave him or he gave them a public dinner. Those public dinners are good, but the " after dinners " are better. When you have swallowed all you can of her majesty's health, and taken another gulp of the "royal family," you come to the earnest work of the even- ing, the " guest," and the " occasion," and the crowding proofs that Dolitics are not always a dry subject. At those dinners " A man's a' man for a that" if he is duly commissioned with pencil and note book to. arrest the passing scenes, fasten them on paper and ink, and present them next morning to the awaiting public. For the time being you are the Peer of the lirst Peer in the land. "Very conde- scending of the Peers " you will say. You are mistaken. It is not condescension. It is necessity. The poor Peers must sub- mit to it, either to it or to oblivion. They tried to side-table it 150 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUKY; once or twice I believe. A " strike," a closing up of notebooks?; those avenues to diurnal fame, and next morning the Hon. rob- bers found themselves so sunk down in oblivion that nobody knew where they had disappeared to. But to return to the dinner, or rather the " after dinner." To every toast a speech or two, with an interlayer of (by profession- als) the Briton's national songs, such as : *' Where'er fte goes, where'er he steers, In every clirae he sees. The fla helped strongly to scatter the Botten Boroughs. It now reor- ganized once more. Action present and vigorous was now ite word and its work. It was a groundswell of the tempest that very soon was coming. Early in the spring of 1838, John Mason, shoemaker; Edward Charlton, bricklayer ; Jamie Ayr, mason; Robert Lowrey, tailor ; Tom Horn, music dealer ; John Rucastle, druggist ; Richard Blackball, workman ; Thos. Gray, tobacco- nist ; Dr. Hume, surgeon, and Cokburn, a blind man, earnest and eloquent, gave life to our weekly meetings. Thos. Horn was our President, Wm. Thomasou our Recording Secretary, and my- self what is stated. Thomas Doubleday and Robert Blakey ! If clear heads, pure hearts, and moral and mental action could save a state, those two men would have saved England. They were now proprie- tors, and, as they signed their contributions, "Writers of the Liberator." The paper had been established by Augustus H. Beaumonta native of the United States a member of the Jamaica legisla- ture. He championed the cause of the (yet) enslaved negro, and fought more than one duel with men in the planter's interest. He came to Europe after Emancipation. He made his way to Paris, and joined in the " three days " that drove Charles X. from the throne. With his brother, Dr. Arthur Beaumont, h made entrance into Brussels, and fought in the battles that then drove the Holland troops out of Belgium. I had previously re- ported a speech by him at a meeting in the Crown and An- chor " in London. It was a meeting to sympathize with Poland. But his speech was a fierce Philippic against the Polish nobles, and their treatment of the serfs. He was, indeed, a true Demo- crat To such a man as this the conducting 500 emigrants to help the Canadian patriots was a work of far less difficulty than it would be to u man of less military experience and less dar- ing character. That was his object. So he sold the paper to Mr. Blakey, a prosperous furrier of Morpeth, who had large business relations over the whole kingdom. And yet he \vas as simple-minded oa hQ was single of heart and purpose. We shall sea 1(JQ THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; COMMENCING THE CHARTIST AGITATION. John Collins was a very plain, very sensible, very earnest, very eolloquial orator, with a magazine of facts in the shelves of his memory. He was selected to commence the agitation in Glas- gow. The workers crowded everywhere to hear the new evan- gel, and after stirring up the adjacent villages for a fortnight or three weeks, a demonstration was advertised on Glasgow Green. It was a success far beyond our expectation. The movement thus vigorously commenced, rolled southward. Sunderland, the two Shields, the collieries, were vigorously stirred up. As re- porter, I was present at most or all of them, till they culminated in a " Demonstration " at Newcastle on coronation day. Lon- don papers had just come to hand, printed in gold, as an emblem of royalty and loyalty. The workers met on the Town Moor, covered over by 500 suggestive banners, and intervaried with fourteen bands. Numbers estimated down to fifty thousand, and up to eighty thousand men. As the immense ranks filed past The Liberator office, I rushed to our upper windows, and replied to their deafening cheers with one or two vollies from an old musket. My employers hastened to put a stop to this proceeding thought it not only a great but a dangerous indiscretion, and I suppose they were right However, we all proceed to the platform prepared for us on the Town Moor. Fergus O'Connor is in full oratory, when out from the barracks, and across right toward us. came I don't know how many of, or all the garrison, Accoutred, armed, and in manuring order. It loomed like another " Manchester massacre." But no ! That was a yoemanry crime. The regular troops are seldom set to work of the kind. Those were only out to a fire a feudejoiein honor of the coronation. Why they crossed the moor and passed close to our meeting we could only guess'. This happened ! The commanding officer rode his horse up sideways close to the crowd, straining to hear what Fergus might be say- ing. One young fellow inconvenienced by the presure of the horse, wheeled round and, putting his hands to the horse's side, gave him such a push as staggered him down the declivity. The officer said not a word, but rode after his command. I thought OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MOUtURN DAYS. 161 then, and I think even now, that if this slight incident had taKen place, especially with a yoemanry commander, it .might have had a very ugly result. The agitation was now fairly commenced, and what the flunkies- called a " Political Methodism " seized upon the leaders. At six o'clock, throwing down their implements of toil, those true not mock noblemen would hasten home, lunch bread and cheese, and a glass of ale, and off on foot to a meeting, generally one or two, sometimes six or seven, miles off. The mode of agitation projected in Birmingham was admirable. There was little talk about Magna Charta, Bill of Rights, revolutionary right of the reigning dynasty. Our shot was of a solid kind ; no flashing blanks in it. Sugar, taxed up from 2|d. to 8d., coffee, from 5d. to 2s. 2d., tea in like proportion. The queen dowager in her palace, or her pleasure ship, with three hundred pounds a day. The worn out laborer in a bastile workouse, starved to death on 15d. worth of food in the week. A letter going ten miles, it might be to summon a mother to the sick bed of her son, could not be released without a fee of 10d., more than the day's wages of an Irish laborer. Breadstuffs so taxed by the Corn Laws that the price of wheat at Newcastle was 60s. a quarter ; across in the Baltic ports it was 80s. The common land belonging to the people fenced in and swallowed by the aristocracy ; the game law, the big demesnes of the oligarchy ; the garrets and cellars of the working people. The work, and the no work ; the big salaries, and the little salaries. The manhood of the people the dignity conferred by honest toil were they not contrasted with the voluptuous idleness of an insolent crew that rioted on the wealth toiled for by others, and that dared to exclude Eng- lishmen from all share in making the laws which they were com- pelled to obey. But the foundation wrong of all, monopoly of the soil, and of the mines of England that estate given freely by God to all His children our leaders wholly and against my earnest advice, put in abeyance. " That will surely be broken up with every other wrong as soon as we get a government by Universal Suffrage." So they said, but whether rightly or not we shall see by the lesson taught in America where universal suffrage exists. Here, then, was political education. Taught orally it took the "near-cut" of reading and writing, and tens of thousands of 1G2 THE ODD BOOK OF THE MlHifiTEJKJSTH CKSTUKY ; men in England, who could not read or write, were, by ittending half a dozen of those meetings, imbued with a clear, s ibstantial knowledge of the foul thing that their government wa3, and the fair thing that it ought to be. No occasion to begin the alpha- bet, and words of one syllable about it, to awaken the people to the enormity of their wrongs, to the irrational greed and in- justice of their Whig " liberal " rulers. Education is the way to taste, refinement, the truest and high- est development and enjoyment of life. There is no "royal road " to those attainments. But the rights and the duties of men, in rational, civilized communities, can be taught in a very short time, and in a few very short lessons. More surely, too, for written "instruction" very commonly bewilders or mis- leads " Pride often eruides the author's pen. Books, as affected, are as men ; But he who studies Nature's laws. From certain truth his maxims draws." The Five " points " of the Charter were Universal Suffrage, Vote by Ballot, Annual Parliaments. No property qualification, and Payment of Members ; afterward a sixth was added Equal Electoral Districts. We were now fairly in the very storm of agitation. Almost the entire working element was on our side, and almost the entire middle (we called them "profitmongering ") class was against us. Incensed at them for their servile attitude, we pro- jected a Joint-stock Company for the sale of weekly supplies needed in the families of the workers chiefly colliers. To this there was a very largo and rapid subscription. Nine directors were elected by vote of the shareholders, and again, owing doubtless to my centralized usefulness, I was named a director and placed at the head of the poll. I mention this to show the liberality which I have found to be a characteristic of the English Democrats. John Blake\-, clogger, and Richard Ayr, publican, went every Wednesday to Morpoth, and bought, as I understood, 500 worth of bee.f cattle. This was ready for sale, and was sold on the following Saturday. A man recommended by them was appointed manager. But I was so in the hey-day of the agitation that I knew little and suspected nothing of what might pos- sibly be going on in our trading venture, One thing I did know. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 109 On our first opening, all the traders in the Butchers bank had to shut up, and the grocers and cheesemongers down the Side might as well have followed their example. About two thousand pounds worth were sold every week. It ought to have left a good profit, as the customers, principally shareholders, cheerfully paid the highest prices. And yet before the winter was out the shares so depreciated that my own 5 worth realized I think 30a after iny departure in the ensuing January. The foreign policy of Lord Palmerston was at this time thought to be too yielding to the movements of Russia iri the East. Mr. Urquhart, the leader in this discontent, was invited to a public dinner in Newcastle. The five newspapers Chronicto % Journal, Courant, Mercury, and Gateshead Observer sent their reporters to photograph the proceedings ; I, too, was sent by Tlie Liberator. For those gentlemen of the " Fourth Estate" a din- ner table was set in an ante-room. This mark of inferiority I had never seen attempted at public dinners in London and its vicinity. Indeed, the slightest aggression of any kind made on the London reporters would produce a general " strike," and a march off, leaving the aggressors to the oblivion of next morn- ing. But those provincial reporters had no such pluck. They left me to resent alone the indignity. This I did v ith my boot heels sounding along the stone corridor, as loud as I could strike them, during the substantiate of the repast. With the wine, and dessert, and speeches, and so forth, came " equality." I made one, and in the lulls of duty passed the bottle on my own terms. My employers were at the dinner, and I think they were rather pleased with the spirit I had shown. More pleased still, when on Saturday morning my report was chosen as the best* an' 1 , several hundred copies of our paper purchased by the com- mittee for far-off circulation. As mere stenographers there were far better hands present than myself. But as this foreign policy was one of our charges against tho government, I under- stood the subject and they did not. Their facts, dates, amounts^ boundaries, et?., W3re not preserved with entire accuracy. I speak of the thing mainly because it led to a matter of far more significance. A week or two previously we had called a meeting for the purpose of sending an address and deputation to Ireland, inviting its people to join with our people in the con- teat for self-government. P so happened that this address waa 164 'i'Hisi ODD BOOK. OJB' THJbi KIMJiTEENTH CENTURY J printed in the same paper that contained Mr. Urquhart's speech in arraignment of Lord Palmerston's policy. The banqueters sent the paper to Mr. O'Connell, then in Dub- lin, and I may as well insert it here. ADDRESS OF THE NORTHERN POLITICAL UNION OF NEWCASTLE-TJPON-TYNB TO THEIR OPPRESSED BROTHERS IN IRELAND. Irishmen! Brothers! The outraged millions of England, Scotland, and Wales have arisen in their might and majesty to assert those rights which God and Nature intended every man should enjoy. We demand for every man of mature age and good Character the right of citizenship, as well for the honest peasant as for the lordiing or the middleman; for the operative, as well as for the ernploj'er; in shorfr for all men alike, without reference to creed, sect, or condition. The elective franchise is the right of every man that comes into the world stamped with the image of his Creator. The greatest men in your own land, both of the past and the present age, have again and again proclaimed the important truth, that " every man excluded from the elective franchise is necessarily a slave ! " Will Irishmen continue "slaves ? " Will the descendants of the Volunteers, the kindred of the brave men who gave freedom to America, shrink back in the contest for equal rigts ? Or will they join hoart and hand with their brothers of England, of Scotland aye, and of France, and swear by the spirit of their fathers that " slavery" shall exist no longer ? Brothers, we should not ask these questions. We should rely with con- fidence on vour unsolicited aid were it not for the artifices of designing men who, through the press and from the platform, distort our objects and belie our sentiments, in order to prevent you from joining us, and assisting us to put an end to those oppressions undar which we mutually groan. You are told we have joined the Tories. We fling back the charge with ineffable scorn; we fling it upon those vile instruments who have joined the Tories ; whose last effort was to fasten forever the incubus of the Tory Church upon the necks of the dissentient people. Who did this? Why, the Whig Government, the Government Press, and the Govern- ment Patriots; and yet, Irishmen, they dare to insult your understand- ing, by telling you that we, the Radical Reformers of Great Brittair\ have joined the Tories; we who have avowed that the rule of the profli- gate aristocracy both Whig and Tory shall speedily and forever conie to and end. Irishmen, in answering this vile calumny, we appeal to facts, and to your common sense. Did not the Tories resist all extension of the frua- chise even to a few great towns ? Did not they battle for the rotten BOP- OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN EAfS, 165 oughs to the very last ? And will these men join a movement that win make the franchise universal ? that will establish the power of the People, and prostrate in utter ruin the dominion of both factions of the Aristocracy ? Oh ! the imposition is too gross, too palpable, too insult' lag! You are told you have a humane Government in Ireland. Will its hu- manity protect you from the visits of the Tithe ruffian V Will it save you from the exterminating power of the Landlord, when he wants to manufacture a breed of voters who will "drive kindly " to the hustings ? But, Irishmen, there are certain facts connected with the conduct of your Chief Governor which have considerably shaken our faith in his humanity. We shall trouble you with one of these facts, if for no other purpose than to show you that Englishmen can take note of your suffer- ings, can cherish a remembrance of your wrongs. In June, 1836, the population of an immense district in the "Rosscss," county Donegal, were driven to subsist on sea-weed, and the green gar- bage of the fields. A subscription was got up to keep them from perish- ing. Earl Mulgrave was appealed to for some assistance, and this same Earl MuJgrave, this good and kind Lord Lieutenant, this paragon of hu- manity, could not afford a single penny to relieve the furnishers, though in the receipt of 20,000 a year of the public money, not to talk of his pri- vate fortune, and though two of his horses lost on the very same week several thousand pounds on the Curragh of Kildare. But you hear his praises rung forth by the press and the "liberal" public speakers. What, Irishmen, would you think if all those praises were shouted by fellows that are hunting for places under the Govern- ment ? The " marketable gentlemen " who " daily scribble for their daily bread " in the public press, and the brirtloss lawyers who spout at the public meeting, may possibly do in 1>! itter that which will please the man who has places and emoluiao ' >stow. We say that these things are just possible, and, if so, a new light is let in on the unaccount- able proceedings of these gentlemen for some time past. In a recent letter, the Iv.-v. Mr. Davern describes these worthies aa men whose " views are difficult indeed to be understood, unless we were really to class them among these corrupt place hunters, who, counted as they are by thousands, it may be truly said, swarm through every pettj town in the kingdom." Irishmen! beware of these place hunters. If you love your wives and children, if you would raise your lovely land into the scale of inde- pendent nations, if you would avoid political damnation, beware of these Infamous place hunters; and truly may it be said that their "name is legion." You have had Reforms, but they have not reached the industrious and long-suffering people; they have placed your leaders high in eminence; they have made them the denizens of palaces and courts, whilst tho sac- rificed and exterminated forty-shilling freeholder has. perished in the high way. Are you not famishing in the midst of fertility? Is not your labor 166 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; seeking a market in the farthest corner of the globe, whilst your own immeasurable wastes and green hills are lying unreclaimed and unpro- ductive? Your sublime waterfalls spending their force upon the naked rocks instead of the Engine of Manufactures; your noble bays arid ee- turies deserted, save by the sail that bears away from you the necessa- ries of life ? And what attempt have your rulers made to remedy these things ? Have they said to the landlord : " You must give the people " leave to reclaim the soil, and to live upon it when it is reclaimed ; you *' must establish manufactories, and thus give employment on the barika "of your beautiful rivers; you must invite the ship's path to the noble " bay, not as now to carry away the food, but the manufactures of the 41 people, and bring them in return the useful products of other lands; "you, landlords, must, in short, return from your gambling, your idle- * ness, and your extravagance, and do your duty to the people from " whose labor your wealth is derived ? " No, no, Irishmen, your rulsrs have done nothing like this; they will .aever do anything like it. They could only afford you Bastile prison reception for some 80,000 destitute poor, out of the famishing population of two millions. We assert that the resources of your country and the industry of its inhabitants are sufficient to maintain your people in plenty and happiness. \Ve charge these men to be unfit to govern you ; we arraign them before a jury of Irishmen as being either knavish or inca- pable, and fearlessly we leave the verdict in" your hands. You are told that if you had rights equal to Englishmen you would be well off; that you would then require no domestic Parliament. Brothers we beseech you, as you would avoid the wiles of Satan as you would profit by the experience which " teacheth even the wise," to listen to our plain statement, and then judge how far you ought to be content with the state of things now existing in England. At the close of the French war the Whig and Tory landlords eased themselves of 17,000,000 of land tax which pressed upon property; they threw the whole burden upon the people in the shape of soap tax, ale tax, tea tax, and a tax on every article used by the people. Not con- tent with this they established the Corn Laws, and doubled the price of food, both in Ireland and England, in order that they might obtain high rents. Then our manufactures came into competition With the manufac- tures of the continent, where workmen could get the necessaries of life at half the price paid by the English or Irish workmen. Our manufac- tures naturally fell off, our people were left without employment, and they fell unwillingly on the poor rates, thus visiting on their own heads the injustice and greed of the aristocracy. What did the Whigs do then? Why they repealed the poor law which gave every man in England a right to employment or support off the soil, and they established tlw bastile law, which separates even the aged husband and wife ; shuts them up in separate cells, and treats them every way worse than the common felon. This infernal enactment had the effect that was intended, and now the operative weaver of Carlisle, Glasgow, Manchester and London is fain to subsist on an average of 3s. or 3s. 6d. a week, Is. 6d. or 2s. of OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 167 which is taken from him by the Government in taxes, in order that the Queen Dowager may have 100,000 and the Queen herself 1,300,000 a year, and all the off-shoots of the accursed aristocracy allowances in the arne proportion for doing nothing. Irishmen ! will such a state of things content you ? Are horrors like these the object of your highest hopes and wishes ? Or dare you join with your Brothers of England and Scotland, and at once and forever release yourselves from the fangs of an aristocracy which has rendered your beautiful land a comparative desert, and sent your best and brav- est and loveliest to a premature grave in the land of the stranger ! Brothers ! having invited you to join with us in putting an end to this monstrous state of things by establishing the right of the people to make the laws, it remains for us to point out to you the means we have at our disposal, the agencies we intend to use, in achieving the regener- ation of our common country. First, then, every principle of justice, of Christianity, and of common humanity are on our side. We have used, are still using, these at all our public meetings, and through what is ours of the press. We have elect- ed a convention to sit in London in order to force those principles of justice, and humanity, and reason upon our rulers. God forgive those who tell you that we do not use argument and reason in our cause, but rely solely upon physical force for the accomplishment of our purpose. But, Irishmen and we are proud to say it we have spoken of physi- cal force in the last resort, and we will tell you, as we have a thousand times told our calumniators, what are our real sentiments on the mo- mentous question. The Constitution and ,the laws of England guarantee to Englishmen the right to have in their houses defensive arms. We are not subject to the spy system of registering these arms, as are the people of Ireland. The executive dare not come to our houses and seize upon them, as they do in your own oppressed country. The government dare not suspend the constitution in England as they have done in Ireland by their ac- cursed coercion bills. These rights we have entire, inviolate, undispu- ted. Now we want you to particularly mark our determination ; we are resolved to have arms. Not to use them unless the Government becomes the aggressors; unless they violate the Constitution, and break the laws, as they lately have done in Canada. In that case we are determined to preserve inviolate the laws and the Constitution, and put down, BY FORCE OF ARMS, any Algerine attempt on the part of the Govern- ment. Will Irishmen condemn us for this ? Will they not rather bid us Godspeed? And, Irishmen, we are able to repel aggression. Within a few years the populations of our manufacturing and commercial towns have trebled; intelligence has progressed in like proportion; and now Lan- cashire alone is able to turn out 300,000 resolute defenders of the Consti- *ion, a proportionate number will be found bustling about on the banka of the Tyne, and should the hour arrive that will call forth Englishmen, in their mighty and just wrath, not all the hordes that the combined des- 168 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY J pots of Europe could bring into the field would be able to withstand thorn for a single day. We are peaceable people, we demand our rights in peace; but we aro a resolute, a powerful, a prep; rod people, and the rights of citizens wo must have, whether a paltry, pelting aristocracy will it or no. Which of you does not look back upon the one bright spot in Irish his- tory, when your noble country " Sprang forth a goddess arraert and undented T " Which of you does not delight to dwell upon the glorious era of the Volunteers, when an army of unpaid Irishmen held the petition in one hand, und the sword to enforce it in the other ? The parasites of a trai- torous government may preach to cowards and contented slaves; but Irishmen, oh ! Irishmen, will never believe that, failing every other re- source, Englishmen have no right to vindicate their liberty with their d all these disasters, have exhibited incapacity and imbecility more ludicrous and at the same time disastrous than ever were exhib- ited by the ministers of any country ; to you who have reduced the finances of the country to a state of embarrassment and dis- tress, bordering on bankruptcy and insolvency ; to you who, without the knowledge and consent of Parliament, have spent money to the amount of four millions belonging to depositors in savings' banks, and added the amount to the national debt ; to you who, in spite even of this dishonesty, have, by your wicked extravagance, rendered actual loans in the time of peace neces- sary ; to you in fine who by your crimes, ignorance, tyranny, folly, infatuation and imbecility, have had showered upon you a more astounding inixture of curses, hatred, contempt, derision and laughter, than ever yet fell to the lot of mortal men ; to you whose villainies we detest, whose ignorance we ha\ 7 e ex posed, whose stupidity we have ridiculed ; to you we dedicate this book, hoping that it will efficiently help to swell the tMe of detestation, despite and scorn under which you are sinking, and under which you will finally sink never more to exist as a politi- cal party, but to be buried forever under the heavy abhorrence and disdain of the people of England, and of none more than of THE WRITERS OF THE NORTHERN LIBERATOR." On the third of May. 1839, is printed the following In The Northern Liberator: "At a late meeting in Meath, held by the Whig landlords and briefless place hunters of that county, lor the purpose of keeping the vampires (Whigs) in office, Mr. Sharman Crawford delivered himself after the fol- lowing fashion : " My lords and gentlemen, I felt myself especially called on to come forward on this occasion, in consequence of certain sentiments put forward by Mr. O'Connell, at a dinner given to that gentleman in Newry some few days ago. He then asked why would not Sharman Crawford come forward on the present momentous occasion, and assist his iellow coun- trymen ? Mr. O'Connell further said that he apprehended some harsh expressions made use of by him might be an impediment, and expressed a willingness that these expressions might be forgotten. Now, I most oordiaHy respond to this declaration. (Tremendous cheering among the 174 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; Whig landlords, which lasted several minutes.) Every expression sav- oring of political hostility should be forgotten (renewed cheering) and as long as the honorable and learned gentleman proceeds :n this course^ I promise him that nothing shall emanate from me to revive past differ- ences. (Great applause.) But at the same time whilst I state this, let it be understood that I will ma.ntain those public principles which I have ever maintain d, but I will endeavor to maintain them without offence to the honorable and learned gentleman, or to any other individual. ] can assure the meet ng that il required no submission from Mr. O'Gounll to' join in the national movement, when I could, in conformity with my own principles, join in it. I consider that any public man wtio, from a personal feeling, would hesitate to join in an effort for his country's iree- dom, is unworthy of the respect or confluence of the people. (Hear, hear."). The Whigs were at this time more uttrely detested by thfr operatives of England, than ever was party before or since. The indescribable horror of the starvation poor-laws, had fallen a social pestilence over the whole land. The Writer's of Th& Liberator were continually dragging out its sin and hideous- ness before people. The Whigs were then hard at work fasten- ing the same heartrending evils over Ireland. Then Mr. Craw- ford joined them. Was my reception of the news too savage? Here it is as published in The Libwator : " ' No doubt the Godless Whig factions will chuckle loudly over this- new conversion, and hold it up as a proof irrefragable of the justice, benevolence, and wisdom of th>ir own accursed sway both in Ireland and England. Doubtless it will be adduced as one other evidence of the unreasonableness and 'impracticability' of Englishmen's claims to citizenship. Even Sharman Crawford has deserted them; even that gentleman sees the >' national' necessity that exists for cherishing 'lib- eral' government in Irel-ind. Stiff-necked Radicals! some of you even denied the mildness and justice of our rule in Ireland ; what now can you say lor yourselves? Doos not Sharman Crawford know more about Irish affairs than you English, unwashed, malcontents can protend to know? Look at his testimony recorded above, and shrink back con- founded, or seek in your acknowledged ignorance an excuse for your wickedness and folly ! ' Such, no doubt,, will be the triumphant burst of virtu us Whig indignation; and we know not where to take refuge from it, save in the following letter, addressed to Mr. Devyr (of this journal) on the 6th of November, 1837. This letter was never before published, and the original, in Mr. Crawford's hand-writing, is in our possession at the present moment.' " After referring to private matters, it proceeds thus: " If ever a country was in a degraded position Ireland is that country. I really feel what I never thought i should Jeel, that it is an actual dis- credit for a man to avow himself an Irishman. There is no public mind Or opinion, there is no a-ting principle but the vile one of a spirit of per- sonal hostility to the Tory party. 1 say personal hostility alone, for if they have vengeance against the individuals of that party, by keeping them out of power, they oire not one straw about the rights or interests of the nation, and they become the degraded slaves, the lick-spittles (to use a common phrase) of one man, and through him of the Whig govern- ment. Look at the dissolution of that degraded body the National Asso- ciation, and the grounds for it ; they say they trust this government, and what cause have they ? Do thev not know the Corporation Bill which they brought forward, and the 'Tithe Bill, and above all, that which would be the greatest curse of Ireland, the abominable Poor Law Bill the Bat- OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 175 Kte Prison Bill; and with all those measures to be discussed for Ireland, this petty mock parliament of Ireland dissolves itself, and the people are not to say one word tor themselves, not even to express an opinion as to what they want or desire. And when I speak of the tithes, at this very moment the government is affording all the aid of the civil and military power of the state to illegal services. The Irish Liberals plume them- selves on returning such a body of what they call Liberal members ; and what are these Liberal members ? Men not pledged to a single princi- ple, except that of being the hacks of O'Gonnell and the Whig govern- ment. Was there ever such a degrading position for any nation to place itself in!" Now, this glorious humbuggcr is trying to humbug the English ation, and seems likely to succeed. Read his letters to the tradesmen London, and the people of Stockport, taking altogether a differnt tack, stimulating the people to act for themselves iti P^ngland, whilst ho la crushing the act ion of the people in Ireland ; and this on the idea that the Irish have already agitated, and are up to agitation.. And what ia the agitation they are up to? To be his humble slaves and tools, and when ho gets the English into the same position, he will be content with the agitation there also. And can the English forget his conduct all the last session of Parliament, and his conduct about the factory question ? to., etc., t-to. This man's powers of humbug are, to be sure, orb-emi- nent, when he can thus cajole even Englishmen and Scotchmen, by keep- ing up the cry against Toryism AND AT THE SAME TIME ACTUALLY SUPPORTING IN IRELAND TORY PRINCIPLES, UNDER THE SHAH OP WHIGGISM ! ! ! There, Englishmen ! " Look on this picture and on that." At Sharman Crawford then and now. Oh, ttie contrast ia disgusting and- .thank Providence that you have escaped from m>n, and grounded your sole Confidence and hop* > on those principles that will not or cannot deceive you. Well, may we exclaim with Cowper : "The aee ol virtuous politics is past, Aud we are deep in that of cold pretence." Thus we see the Inmate vice of a landed aristocracy, in eyen its best and mildest specimens. At the time Mr. Crawford wrote the above ('37) letter there was no sign of tempest in the politi- oul sky. " All seemed as peaceful and as still. As tha mists slumbering on yon hill." But now ('39) the voice of England was re-echoing from every city, and village, factory and farmhouse. The people were making common cause with the "order" proscribed by the aristocrats the order of labor and starvation. The aristocrats were also making common cause to stand by their " order "the order of idleness and plunder, and, true to the brotherhood, even Sharman Crawford is on their side. Pertinent to the subject, and just here, let me present a con- trast furnished by " The Writers of The Liberator" Men whose selves, or progenitors, never stole a foot of land, or clutched a ^billing earned by another man's toil. Had he not been edu- cated in a Lie and an inheritor of Stolen Goods, Mr. Crawford I7(i THK ulH> iiu>K OJf 'JHK NINKTJiENTH CKNTURY ; might have been a good man. A man nearly as good as <4 The Writers of The Liberator." Now look at the contrast. See iu the foregoing dedication bow they take Mr. Crawford by the political throat. What strikes one with utter astonishment is that those good men did not see that the Land llobbery of England the shut- ting of the people of England out from the soil of England, the Demesnes, Parks and Chases of England, driving the people into the hovels, cellars and garrets of England, with nothing to live upon. But above all, and overshadowing all the rest, the Land Bents, that those wise and good men did not see that here was an evil five times greater, more direct and criminal than even the blood-bought Rotten Borough Debt. But peace to their memory ! Never did truer men lift a voice or a pen in the sacred cause of Humanity. Of their trenchant ability let me give this highly instructive example : WHIG AND TOUT. JANUARY 20, 1838. A Whig has rather a lean, sallow, and impassioned appearance, HS if he had long been estranged from the pood things of onlcc, and been subjected to an astringent course of private and public economy ; he is a sort of political huckster, dealing in small wares such ts," the ors to sot up in his little establishment with every attention to stage effect; he spouts liberalism freely at elections and public dinners, but in the House of Commons he sings small, and rounds his periods with a Conservative prudence; he lays down all general principles with a saving portion of reservations, qualifications and conditions ; he is bold and warlke out of office, but tame and pusillanimous when in; pen- sions and grants are the staple commodities of his eloquent indignation when on the hustings, but in the House they become sacred and vested rights; he pretends to an intimate acquaintance of. and a deep venera- tion for, the great principles of constitutional freedom and liberty; but his sou! is a compound of narrow views, little spites, and shuflling expe- dients; in line, he makes a stepping stone of public confidence and credulity for his own selfish ends, and under the plea of promoting the national welfare, is only intent on consolidating his own power and in- fluence. A Tory is, in general, distinguished by a full, sleek, rotundity of out- line, as if he had long browsed at his ease in the rich pastures of political profusion ; like the rich man in the parable, he gives evident indications of having " fared sumptuously every day;" his mind (to use a material metaphor) is soft and spongy, or, as common language terms it, weak and silly, and if ever it arrives above mediocrii y, the man turns a knave; he entertains a morbid terror and hatred of all "Innovation" and always follows in the wake of that social and political blasphe- my Improvement with a sulky and growling step; he talks loudly o! the sacrcdness of the Church, while his life is one continued BOene of sensuality, and profanation; he eulogizes the Constitution, whilo lie knows as liUle of either its history, or nature, as it does ef hint; he day by day feeds his mind with the lowest intellectual OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 17 ' garbage; his nightly slumbers are broken and disturbed with spec- tral v.sions of massacres, murders, and gibbets; he shows a sneak- ing and fawning disposition to what he calls respectability, but whatever promotes his own interests is all ho has m view; he is never troubled with any lofty asp rations alter anything beyond tho mere raw material of human existence; he has no remembrance of past political events, save the simple fart that his hands are now in the pub- lic purse; in line, he is a social and political outcast, smarting under the Combined and mortifying feeling's or envy and disappointment. The movement had now continued for over a year, and no interference with it was attempted by the government. But early In August, 1838, the Birmingham magistrates applied to the government for a body of the London police to put down a series of daily meetings then being held in the " Bull Ring " of that town. This they accomplished by a sudden onslaught with their olubs, beating down a passage through the crowd and seizing upon the leaders on the platforms. This exasperated the Democracy all over the country. In the outraged town itself a riot shortly ensued that did a good deal of damage to iron railings, and held possession for I don't know how long, I think a night and most of two days. Then commenced the work of " preparation," and from that time till November we computed sixty thousand pikes made and shafted on the Tyne and .Wear. At this distance of time and place the number would seem to be exaggerated. But I was at the very center of the movement, not only as a principal officer of the Northern Political Union, but as the reporter and working editor of The Liberator. In the latter capacity I was always on hand to receive reports and deputations from all the surrounding districts, not only on the Tyne but on the Wear. And I was present in some part of nearly every Saturday at the pike market, to take sharp note of tho sales. The market was held in a long 'gar- ret room, over John Blakey's shop in the Side. In rows were benches of boards, supported on tressels, along, which the Winlaton and Swalwall chain and nail makers -brought in their interregnum of pikes, each a dozen or two, rolled up in the smtth's apron. The price for a . fin- ished and polished article was two shillings and sixpence. For the article in rougher shape, but equally "serviceable, the price was eighteenpence. I see it noted elsewhere that down in the Norfolk region the price was only half that amount, but at the figure I mention our hand-hammer manufacturers could not supply the demand. Instance. Enter three men to the Liberator V78 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; Office. One speaks : " This youth wants a pike, and they're all sold. You must let him have yours that you bought last week." " What am I to do myself ? I bought the implement only Because I wanted it, and friend M. has the shaft almost ready." * But you have a gun and a case of pistols, and with good use ^hose will keep you busy." "I have thought of all that, but a pike may be more useful in some contingencies. In short I want it myself." " Well, if you do, I'll engage to procure' one for you before the week's out," so turning round to his protegee, " out with that half crown, you can't go empty away." The ex- change was made, and the three departed, all of them furnished now. I cite this fact as throwing light on the condition of things. It is seen that the market was unusually good, the price unusually high, and the workmen all around unusually willing. At the time, as closely as we could calculate, we counted sixty thousand shafted pikes. The arming was not at all concealed. By the preceding ad- dress to the people of Ireland, it will be seen that it was openly avowed, and the right to do so distinctly and defiantly asserted. One man brought before the magistrates for some trifling offence was found to have two pikes concealed under his coat. He stated that he was afraid of his house being attacked, and purchased them to defend it. He was discharged, and went home, carrying his pikes with him, The onslaught on Birmingham set Newcastle aflame. Every night was a night of business, of public meeting, or of the coun- cil. At those the rioting at Birmingham was thus described : " On Thursday evening, the people were assembled in the Bull Bine as usuiU. ft workingman reading a newspaper, when police just arrived from London, with two magistrates at their head, marched on them three abreast, and clubbed right and left men women and children. The men rallied and attacked the police, who fled in all directions, seven danger- ously wounded. Dr. Taylor saved the lives of two policemen. The Mayor and Col. Ohatterton were soon on the ground, and. supported by the Rifles and *th Dragoons, read the Riot Act, cleared the streets and guarded their entrances. At half- past ten the people chanting "Fall Tyrants, Fall.' re- newed the combat, but having neither firearms nor pikes, bludgeons and stones were o! no avail. Marching to Hollo way head, they tore up the iron railings of a church, overturning their massive granite foundations. With tuoae they were again rushing to combat the military, when Dr. Tay- lor and McDowal. of the convention which was then sitting, came forward, and dis&uaded and drove back the people. Shortly after Dr. Taylor was arrested in his hotel. At nine o'clock next morning the convention reas- passed resolutions, the last one, ' that the people of Binning- OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 179 ham would judge of their right to meet, and of their power and resources to obtain justice.' The people were advised not to conflict with the mili- tary, but hold the Borough authorities responsible. Lord John Russell dare not enter a borough town with military to suppress discussion with- out a requisition from the local authorities." A meeting in Newcastle thus proceeded : Mr. Mason proposed the first resolution : " That the magistrates of Birmingham had committed high treason against the people, the Constitution, and the Queen, ' Protection,' he said, had been withdrawn, and the peole now stood absolved from their allegiance." Mr. Thomason seconded the resolution. Bather than see the present syystem of fraud and oppression continue, he would see every town, and village, and court, and castle one smoking ruin. Mr. Devyr moved the second resolution : " That if the government attempted to put down discussion In Newcas- tle, the people would meet their illegal act by Constitutional resistance." He adverted to the idle ruffians who rotted on 100,000 a year, and ordered the toiling people to starve on six shillings a week. He referred to the force of the clubbed muskets at Bunker Hill ; to the Circassians in arms against the Czar ; to the United Men of New Boss and Oulart Hill. The middle classes might talk of a physical revolution with horror. Not so the people ; even a recruiting sergeant urged the men of Birm- ingham to resist their tyrants to the death. Now the old help- less, infirm people die 100,000 every year of famine and a broken heart. Force to force must now be the motto. Mr. Cockburn (blind) seconded the resolution. "Never had people moved for right but tyrants met them with brute force. The Whig Reform Bill was carried by physical force." He urged a general arming. Now or never they must prepare for war. Next day the following placard was posted round the streets : " Julien Harney was arrested last night in Bedlington." "MEN OF DURHAM AND NORTHUMBERLAND. Your oppressors have Bet the majesty of the people at utter defiance. They have determined that you shall live a life of toil, and die a death of hunger when you can toil no more. If you do not submit to this, they will consign you to a bloody grave by the grand old argument the bayonet, the bullet, the halter." Then this comes from the other side : " Whereas, Certain ill-disposed persons are In the habit of meeting within the limits of this borough and using inflammatory and seditious J80 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUEYJ language, calculated to make Hor Majesty's subjects discontented with Iheir condition, and to produce terror in the minds of the population. " This, therefore, is to give notice that those tumultuous assemblages will not be longer suffered to take place within tho precincts ol this Borough. " JOHN FIFE. Mayor. " God save the Queen. In the name of the Corporation." Whereupon " The Council of the Northern Political Union " met immediately, and before the sun set the following counter f proclamation anorued the walls : " Wliereas, Certain men calling themselves the Corporation of New- castle-on-Tyne, have presumed to call in question the inalienable right of Englishmen to meet, discuss, and petition the Queen and Parliament lor a redress of their grievances ; and " Whereas. These men have presumed to forbid the exercise of a right founded in the Constitution, and have assumed the power which does not belong even to the Queen and the Parliament: "Now. therefore, we, the Council of the Northern Political Union, pro- olaim to the peopleof this Borough and surrounding neighborhood, that it is their duty to meet for the exercise of this Constitutional right, and ho\v to the Corporation of Newcastle-on-Tyne that this assumed power of theirs is held in utter contempt by all good Englishmen. * God save the People." " POSTSCRIPT. A meeting will b held in tho Forth every evening at half past six." Excitement rose high, and a company of 52 dragoons pa- trolled the streets. They were loudly cheered. A body of dra- goons were ordered to service in Bedlington. Notwithstanding their presence and that of two magistrates, a meeting of thou- sands was held on the green of that town. In response to our proclamation the Winlaton and Swalwall bands marched into town, flanked by thousands. Two table plat- forms were constructed on the Forth. Messrs. Hepburn, Ayr, Parkinson, Mason, Cockburn, liucastle and Byrne, spoke, and resolutions to keep the peace, but to resist illegal force were adopted. Fifteen to twenty thousand men were present. Formed ix or eight abreast, they marched through the principal streets when the meeting was over. A letter was read from Dr. Taylor, that "he was bailed, but his hair had been cut off during his brief confinement." A very foolish, because a very exasper- ating, thing for the magistrates to do. The letter was printed as a handbill and circulated in large numbers. Next day at 4 Vclock the Winlaton band came in, and multitudes (though they were requested to send only delegations) assembled in greater lumbers than the day before. Mr. Gumbleton, a collier, took OK, THE SPI10T OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 181 the chair. James Ayr arrived from Carlisle, where 10,000 were meeting every evening on the Sands. They projected a convention from all the large towns, and invited Newcastle to send a delegate. Mr. Mason came in from a meeting at Sneddin Hill, where the colliers could hardly be dissuaded from com- mencing the strike. He read from Birmingham that Mr. Lovett and John Collins had been arrested. On their examination, both bravely declared their opinion that it was the duty of the people to resist illegal force, brought against them by men who usurped the power of making laws without the consent of the people. The meeting passed a resolution extolling the lofty and straightforward conduct of Messrs Lovell and Collins, and spoke with contempt of the "picturesque politics" of Mr. Mutz, M. P. WEDNESDAY. A false rumor that the military had been called out in Glasgow, and that the people of Carlisle were besieging the castle, gave increased intensity to public excitement About one o'clock the Birmingham paper, arrived, and the news was Issued in a placard. The Convention sitting in Birmingham had issued an address, in which was the following : " Tradesmen of Birmingham. Englishmen! The laws of your country have been broken by blood-thirsty magistrates; and murderous police- men have spilled the blood of your people. A committee must be elected to guard over the public safety, each trade a delegate to represent itself. Decision and energy I or you will be driven back to the curfew of the Nor- man invader. Endorsed by the Newcastle council thus : ' There is a glorious example, follow it speedily. Let no time be lost." Before seven o'clock the lower part of the Side was occupied by a dense crowd, which made way for slowly passing carriages, the policemen not interfering to enforce the " Street Act." A large procession, with bands and banners, crossed the bridge to Gateshead, returned largely reinforced, and proceeded to th* Forth numbering many thousand more than any previous meet- ing. News from Birmingham announced immense crowds at a public meeting at Weighbury, the rifles patroling the streets, and the wounded policemen recovering, which elicited expres- sions of glad sympathy from the crowd. Mr. Devyr read a letter from James Williams, of Sunderland, describing a meeting o 20,000 on the Moor, which was joined by 1,000 which came down OE the railway from Thornly, Howell, etc. Never was such 182 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J hospitality shown in Sunderland as that night to those visitors. The men of the West were ready to stand by the Convention. Tho Council met in the evening. News from Shields, and the following subscriptions: Bensham, Os. Gd. ; Gosforth, 5s. 4d. ; Brondling Place, 3s. 3d. ; St. Lawrence, 10s. lOd. ; Cookson's Glass Works, 3s. ; Toward aid, 2s. ; Two gentlemen's servants, 2a. ; Gatoshead, 12s. ; Uxworth, 1, and 2, 8s. l#d. ; Leg Hill, 1, 4s-. d. ; Upworth and Ouston, 9s. 3d. ; J. Kent, Is ; Newcastle, 8, 10s, 8^d. ; Skinner's Burn Pottery, 4s. These sums are interesting aa an indication of the finance department. We had no scarcity of money for necessary use. THURSDAY. Excitement ; crowds ; news from Birmingham, and the following address, in handbill, was placarded over the town, .and neighborhood. It was also extensively circulated at a penny by a crier of first speech as, who went about shouting " A full and true account of the 'Middle Classes' of the Northern Political Union." This was the only sparkle of amusement imparted to the deep feeling almost anxiety that was expressed on every countenance. A downpour of rain only quickened the march to tho Forth, and packed all the denser tho convened thousands. Mr. Hepburn (collier), tho Chairman, announced that numbers of the idle classes were joining tho movement. More news frora Birm- ingham. Assaults on tho people, and meetings dispersed. Con- vention propose national organizations under officers. Mr. Burns, M. C. : " If the magistrates Peterloo us, wo will Moscow England." This is the address : TO THE MIDDLE CLASSES OF THE NOKTH OF ENGLAND. GENTLEMEN : Wo address you in tho language of brotherhood, prob- ably for tho last time. Up to tho very last moment you have shut your senses to reason; but now that the last moment for moral appeal has arrived, perhaps you will listen to this last appeal of tho people. With n folly that will bo the wonder of future r,ges, you have placed a blind confidence in the Whig Aristocracy ; you have surrendered into their hands your "right of thought," and any decree they please to send forth you look upon as if it were a decree from On High. And now let us ask you a few questions touching tho claims which this Aristocracy has upon your respect and confidence. Keflect upon, theaa questions, and answer them like rational men : Are you and your posterity mortgaged to pay tho boroughmongers' debt? Are you not compelled to pay on an average threo times tho valuo lor bread, meat, wino, spirits, teas and everything you consume, in order to support the Jew swindlers and a perfumed, insolent Aristocracy? Are you not shut out from tho manly sports and recreations which neo were tho health and pride of Englishmen ? If, after your six months' conflnooient in the ware or counting house, you wish for a day's OR, THE 61'lliIT OV CH1VALHY IN . MOUEKN DAYS. 18$ port- over the lake or mountain, arc you not toM that th-3 iiali, tae fowl, and the wild animal, all must be preserved lor my lord s usu awl amuse- ment, and it you petsifct to assert your natural right over them, are you not punished wit;i tine and imprisonment ? "WiU the Aristocracy associate w.th you will they endure an alliaaoe by marriage with what they Impudently denominate your base biood ? Do they not, in one word, de-pise and oppress you as much as they do the working men, the only diiference being that you are able, and would appear willing, to bear the yoke, whilst we are unable, aud, thank God, neither are wo willing to hear it V Is not the money piundervd from the people and spent in the debauch of the Court, or the profligacy of the Continent; is the money, we ask* not virtually abstracted from your trade and profits ? Would we carry away our money to squander it on the dancers, gamesters, and prosti- tutes of the continental cit.es, or would we lay it. out at home in food, elotuing, and other necessary articles, to the great beuelit of domestic trade and manufactures V We entreat you, not lor our sakes, but for your own, not for the soiree- of our families, but for the sake of your own wives and children, to take up these questions like men, and calmly and rationally discuss titeir truth or falsehood. Discussed tiiey now must be physically or morally one way or the other even if you are content to remain quiescent slaves, you will be permitted to remain so no longer. But then comes your bugbear, "If you, the working men had power in your hands, there would be no security for life and property." One fact, you will yourselves admit, is worth t n thousand arguments; if tuese facts do not convince you, to talk of reasoning any longer is- altogether out of the question. Look to America; in the mercantile States of that republic all power is in the hands of the people, their will is law; and Is the manufacturer less safe in his business, the trader less s -cure of his property, than in England ? Why, the very lault of American societs is the over en- eourarnagent and importance that is given to its trade. Look, t">o, to Switzerland, whose laws must receive the sanction of the whole male population, assembled in arms, from sixteen years of age upward. Where is the country on the face of the earth can boast of more security for life and property, more absence of crime, more posi- tive virtues than are to be found in the mountains, vaL s, and cities of Switzerland ? Look at the soothing tranquil >ty of these Democratic countries, and contrast them w.th the murderous anarchy that even at this moment desolates Aristocratic Spain. Dear are our families to us, dear our humble nornes; our feelings are as human as your own, and if compelled to take tn field in vindica- tion of our sacred rights, we shall do so with our hearts yearning for our helpless families, whom many of us must never see again ; to thig alternative we are driven by a dire and uncontrollable necessity; we are uot " men of blood." But blood is on the land; it falls without a record; hecatombs, up- wards of 100,000 souls, are yearly sacrificed to famine and a brokoa heart; the old, the helpless, the unresisting die, and no man writes their epitaph. If you be not as blind, as hardened of heart as ever Pharaoh was of old, you must perceive that a mighty, a thorough, a radical change must now very speedily take place in the constitution of society in these islands, a change which it is not in your power to avert, though it is in your power to give it a peaceful character. Do you call the courage of the people in question ? Why even the Tory Times acknowledges that contempt of death is natural to every errand-boy in England. But it is not a question of courage we are discussing now, it is a quee- 184 THK ODD BOOK OW THE NINETEENTH CENTUBT; tioB of necessity ;, watch your own child as with tears it implores for * morsel ; see the eye of your own wive and sister grow dim with famine? feel hunger tearing your own vitals ; then hear the shot-peal calling you to death or freedom ; opening to you a chance of escape from the hell you endure, and you will rush into the shock of battle with a joy bord- ering on madness. And what will be the result of that strife of blood which you alone eon avert ? If successful, the people will look on their fallen brothers, and apostrophize their mangled remains thus : " Well, you were sacri- ficed by the middle classes; they could have saved you, but they would not; they assisted and encouraged the Aristocracy to murder you ! Let desolation dwell in the homes that made your homes desolate ! " Mid- dle classes : vengeance, swift and terrible, will then overtake you. On the other hand, should the people of England be put down suppos- ing for a moment the impossibility what then ? Why, to use the word of more than one Whig journal, they will " DISPERSE IN A MILLION OF INCENDIARIES," your warehouses, your homes, will be given to the flames, and one black ruin overwhelm England ! Are you prepared tor this ? If you are contented to be trampled and spat upon by the Aristocarcy ; if you have no pity for your brothers and sisters in the humbler walks of life ; if you feel not for the myriads who annually perish of cold and hunger ; still ask yourselves, are you pre- pared to see your own homes in a blaze ; your property given to flames, and no insurance to redeem it ; yourselves, perhaps j^our wives and children shrieking to midnight outlaws for that mercy which in the day of your power you denied to them ? Praying that God, who endowed you with common sense and human feelings, will free your mind from the prejudice and dispose you to do your duty in this terrible crisis, We remain (if not you own faults) your sincere fiiends, THE COUNCIL OF THE NORTHERN POLITICAL UNION, This address created great consternation. The arrest of Mr. -John Bell, printer, and the owner of The, Liberator, Mr. Blakey, immediately followed. It was like the Irish address, written by myself but not signed by the President and Secretaries of the Council, Caution now became one of the virtues. CHAPTER XII. WE had now fairly joined issue with the Mayor and Magis- trates. In despite of their proclamation, the meetings on the Forth continued, with increasing numbers and added enthusiasm. Railroad or telegraph were not, and it took the better part of a week for instructions to come from Downing street. At the end of that time horse, foot and artillery, about 800 or 1,000 men, were ordered out of the barraks to bring the dispute to an end. No interference was made to prevent the meeting. It assembled f spoke from two platforms and through a tempest of disloyal speeches, adopted a loyal address to the Queen to dismiss her ministers, and do sundry other things which she was not likely to OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 185 do. All so .far was a triumph to us. We had vindicated the time-honored right, and stood on the same vantage ground for to-morrow's meeting, and to-morrow's the authorities compelled to look on or oppose the right which was held so sacred. But the impetuous would not listen to our reasoning. They would march, eight abreast, through the leading streets now guarded by horse, foot and artillery not to speak of the special constables who ran, and the municipal police who did not run. And so they marched on Westgate street, where the force* were drawn up to receive them, special constables in front, police second, military horse, foot and artilery third. The specials fled into an adjoining church-yard, behind the upright tombstones,. I was in front of the procession, doing all I could, in word and act, to persuade and push it back. The Mayor and his Squire, Mr. Brown, on horseback, were on the same mission from the time we left the Forth; and it was rumored and bell vert-that pistol was leveled at him and missed fire; I? so, the crowd escaped a great danger, for, with 800 men and two pieces of artillery drawn up in readiness, great destruction of life most probably would have followed. However, though the specials ran the police did not. They rushed on the crowd, seized the ban- ners, and laid round them with swords, wounding several, one man very dangerously. Our people had been well taught that it was not riot we wanted, but revolution. So not a stone was thrown. Fifteen or twenty prisoners were taken. But the police acted with cool judgment, not touching one of the leaders, who were in the front of the procession, expostulating and striving to drive it back. The streets were cleared by the dragoons, good natured fellows, who laughed heartily as the women and girls ran screaming out of their way. Not so the specials. Gathering from their hiding places when they found there was no danger, they formed an awkward squad, and scouring through the public houses turned out the stragglers. " Hangings they pricked and counters with their swords, And wounded several shutters and some boards." The circuit judges were then sitting in Newcastle, and the grand jury had found " true bills " against several of the leaders, myself among them. They doubtless meant this as a blow to the most forward of us, to demoralize the approaching meet- ing. Arraigned before their masquerading lordships in their 24 186 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CEKTUKI ? black gowns and white wigs, Lord Denman, who was a reminded us, in a rather quiet friendly way, that we were " com- mitting not only a crime but a folly, in assuming that the mass could govern instead of being governed. We were seeking/' he said, " to put society standing on its head instead of its feet to put the cart before the horse"- with other logic equally to the purpose. Unmoved by the terrors of the title and the warnings of the wig, fche writer asked permission to say a few words in reply to what had just fallen from his lordship. "Certainly! Freedom of speech is the glory of Englandthe privilege of Englishmen." PRISONER. In proof of which I and my fellow-prisoners stand here in the dock. DENMAN. Taken quite aback. -PRISONER. "It is a glorious "sunset streaming through that gothic window. Did your lordship ever hear of a great country lying away in iLs direction cf that Setting sun ? Did you hear that its people did assume to govern themselves ? Actually do the very thing that your lordship informs us cannot be done? Nor need your lordship's thought travel so far as that New World. Even in this old decaying world of ours, embosomed among the rocks and glaciers of the Alps, are institutions of the same kind, flourishing for the last six hundred years. And surely your lordship will not pronounce Englishmen less capable of governing themselves than the Americans or the Swiss ? Are your lordship's countrymen less intelligent, are they less trust- worthy than those denizens of the mountain and the forest?" It is not often, perhaps, that a judge is catechised by a prisoner. His lordship did not seem to have any reply conven- ient, that he might make to this unexpected attack, and so he made none ; but fixed amount of bail, and motioned that we might withdraw to prison. At that time the American Republic was a "pillar of fire" to inspirit the Democracies of Europe* What it is now shall be evolved as we proceed. And so, it is 10 o'clock at night, and at that hour Thoma- son Ayr, Dr. Hume and myself ?re inured in a large cell^ singing the " Marsellaise," "American Star "anything but "God save the Queen." When hark! It is tramp, tramp along the stone corridor, a pause, a turning of locks and hing.oa and in crowd Messrs. Blakey, Doubleday, Thomas Gray, Thomas, OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 187 Horn, John Blakey, Kichard Ayr, Sutherland and Nicholson. In short, they crowd in and crowd us out along with them. They had sought the magistrates and perfected the bail at that late hour, mainly through the. influence of my two employers, who were greatly respected, even by their political antagonists. Public meetings and their varied and impassioned proceedings were now deemed to be more impracticable than lectures, and so it is announced that a quiet moral force lecture is to be delivered on the nature of the National Debt, and the question of who ought to pay it ? In the absence of one more capable, I was myself appointed to deliver this lecture. It was necessary to keep cool and argumentative, for seated near were two police officers, an hideous as to throw at once into shocking arid melancholy con- trast the beautiful scene on which his gaze had so recently dwelt. It was a horrid pile, dark as midnight, windowless, and surrounded by a huge rude and \ofty wall. No ray of light seemed to be permitted to enter there; it required no strong imagination to fancy that under the horrid shadow of its enclosure toads and cold reptiles crawled ; that to its recesses joy wa^ a stranger, and a smilo a thing unknown, except to memory, if memory lingered there. " At its gates stood three beings, with hellish features, but withal so- cold that they seemed to be cast iron ; and with lean and bony hands, the bones of which seemed to be living steel as the hard fingers moved and- worked in their sockets. " Figure aftor figure, as m phantasmagoria, passed before these mo- tionless fiends : as they passed each he.'d out in his or her hand a scrap of that same paper-looking substance which the Chancellor had before seen. Some, However, failed to produce it; and on each failure the three figures pointed, with their steel fingers, to the gate of the horrid domain,' and tho shivering wretches, as if facinated by a snake, obeyed and en- tered in. At the further end of this building appeared to be a low door of exit, and as poor wretches shivered and entered at the front, strange' funerals seemed to issue from behind. No mourners were there; no en- siyns of woe; no ministering priest; but skeletons bore a bare shell upon their shoulders, and seemed to carry it, grinning as they went, .to a dishonored grave. 11 At tli:a appalling vision the honorable gentleman started back as if horror-struck. Gradually recovering himself, however, he seemed to 1 reflect, and mutt -red 'strange, strange!' wholesome test! wholesome test! Poor Law Bastiles! Poor Law Bastiles! The disorder of the Hon- orable Chancellor, however, bee tme so serious that after swallowing another tumbler of hock and Seltzer- water, it was deemed prudent to persevere no longer at that time." And now in the House of Lords, Lord Melbourn admitted 190 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; that houses had been burned in Birmingham ; regretted the in- temperate language uttered at the public meetings, " but he never knew a time when it would be so extremely inexpedient to resort to strong measures." The Duke of Wellington said thirty houses had been burned, their contents first taken out and burned in the street. Earl Fitzwilliam reminded the Duke that greater riots had taken place in Birmingham, in 1789 or 1790. The Marquis of Londonderry referred to the multitudes of colliers that were meeting around Sunderland and Newcastle. In the House of Commons, Thomas Atwood moved to take up the National Petition. In the course of his speech he de- nounced the existing currency system, and said that there were =no dangers that the people ought not to risk rather than sub- mit to their present miserable condition. He spoke of France. Arthur Young traveled 200 miles over it, and found all the cas- tles burnt to the ground. Louis was asleep till the Bastile fell about his ears. Lord John Russell said no government could secure contin- ued prosperity, especially in England, which depends so largely on manufactures and commerce. The petition before the House contained only 1,000,000 signatures, but Major Cartwright had petitions presented for Universal Suffrage aggregating 3,000,000 of names. The petitioners say " we are bound down under a load of taxes, which notwithstanding fall greatly short of the wants of our rulers. Our tradesmen are trembling on the edge of bank- ruptcy, our workmen are starving, capital brings no profit, and labor no remuneration. The home of the artificer is desolate, and the wareroom of the pawnbroker is full. The workhouse is crowded and the manufactory is deserted." He denied that this was so, and pointed to a million of deposits in savings banks within the year (deposited by the Middle Classes, the workers had not wherewith to keep them alive). Increase oi wages, or lessening the cost of living, alone could relieve the people. Would Universal Suffrage accomplish either? (Yes the taxes make the cost of living three times as high as it other- wise would be. Universal Suffrage would give us free trade and accomplish both objects.) He said the promoters of the peti- tion advised the people to withdraw their money from the sav- ings banks, change it to gold, abstain from exciseable articles, OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 191 practice exclusive dealings, insist upon the ancient constitu- tional right to bear arms. Those things, he said, would be fatal to the government and Constitution of England. (!!!) Mr. Dirsaeli concurred entirely in the principles on which the petition was founded. The ablest men in the country had pro- mulgated those principles. The petitioners stated that the energies of a mighty people had been wasted in building up the power of selfish and ignorant men ; that the few had governed for the interests of the few, and that the people had been tram- pled upon and basely deceived by the expectations formed on the Reform Act. Mr. O'Connell had opposed the Chartists outside of the House, and denounced their doctrine of physical force as high treason but in England only 19 out of a hundred adult men had a vote* In Ireland only 4 out of every hundred. (He did not dwell upon the fact that himself urged the disf ranch isement of the 40s. freeholders.) Mr. Wakely showed that Lord John Russell attempted to mislead the House when he said the people were putting large deposits in the savings banks. Workmen earning 6s. or 7s. a week had nothing to put into such banks. After which the motion to go into committee was lost by 235 to 46. In the next day's seession Mr. Disraeli denounced Lord Rus- 6elPs bill for an added force of 5,000 men to the army. It might, he said, be necessary to bring a force against their fellow-country- men, but they must know what was the necessity, and whether 5,000 men were a great deal too much or a great deal too little. Mr. Wakely said this 5,000 proposition would be favorably re- ceived in just two places, and those were the two Houses of Parliament. The bill was brought in, not forty members present The London papers now group together the demonstrations held throughout the North, at all populous centres. The Sun quotes from our " Address to the Middle Classes," and several other revolutionary proclamations, commenting on "a great .activity of the national intellect a Sampson-like striving that must be heeded by our rulers." Richard Carlisle, once an im- prisoned champion of the unstamped press, went round to oppose universal suffrage. Called meetings at some rich people's expense, but nobody would go to hear him. The subject of land ownership was ignored in our movement. But I got edged into The Liberator now and then such hints as the following : 192 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; " Immense tracts of land are lying barren in Ireland, and immense numbers of men willing to labor are going about unemployed. The blasphemous aristocracy will not let the people reclaim the soil except on the condition that all its enhanced value shall go into the accursed rent roll, leaving the people at the same level of rags and hunger. Sharman Crawford tried to bring in a bill to remedy this state of things, but it was frowned out of existence alike by the sham ' Liberal/ Whigs and the intolerant Tories. And now comes another horrible picture from Connemara," etc., etc. At Sunderland shipwrights, seamen and the trades meet, and three privates of the 98th meet along with them, and are loudly cheered. Proceedings against Williams and Bicns, at which their counsel, Mr. Thompso- , informed the bench that "the in- tentions of these gentlemen were peaceable, otherwise they could have brought to the ground 20,000 miners." A RIOT IN NEWCASTLE. Summer, especially July, is a revolutionary period ; and so a paving stone crowd took possession of Newcastle, late on Satur- day night and early on Sunday morning. It swept along Bailiff- gate, Castle street and Castle Garth, St. Nicholas square, Col- lingwood street, and untou.ching the Turf Hotel, entered Mosley, Grey and Dean streets, and all down the Side and Butcher Bank. On this range all the street lamps were broken, and there was, besides, a considerable shattering of window glass. It is true the Liberator office was loudiy cheered by an attendant crowd, but the actual rioters broke 20s. worth of glass in our windows. I quote a description from Mie Liberator, written by mvself as a looker on : "Excitement and curiosity was up on Sunday, whilst rumors, like a circular wave, widened tne disturbance as it receded to a distance. Many therefore caino in from the surrounding towns and country. Those moved round to trace the progress of the rioters, and all Sunday the streets pre- sented a crowded and animated appearance. It was amusing to hear knaves and fools of respectable exterior throwing the blame on the cause of the people. One could hardly help a feeling of indignation mixing with the contempt they excited, when you heard them swear between their teeth that they would "iang the unwashed ruffians up on the defaced lamp posts." A few arrests were made. At the examinations a mixture of OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 193 serious and coinic was evolved. Thus, Robert Farley had 1,100 pounds of gunpowder. Where did it come from ? The excuse was that it was intended for the Cramlington colliery, but on account of the " disturbed state of the country" the proprietors would not take it in. This seems to have been an " impromptu." It was condemned and sent to the barrack, and Farley fined 3s. for each pound, or jail in proportion. A half formed pik out of an immense file made its appearance, as also did Peter Flanmagan, who stated that he got dead drunk at the " Bell," and, boxing with a comrade boy, lost his cap and was taken prisoner by Kidley, the policeman. MAYOR. You have an excellent memory to be so drunk? PRISONER. In troth, and that's true enough. (Laughter.) RIDLEY. You were not drunk. ;FLANNAGAN. If I was not would I be all dirt as ye see me ? RIDLEY. You got that on falls with me. FLANNAGAN. An' if I wasn't drunk would I fall with the like* of you ? (Roars of laughter.) Fined 20s. or "a month." Mr. Gibson, of Dean street, heard one of a group of men say that the town could be easily fired, and that by cutting the em- bankment at the Westgate the engines would be useless, and that the policemen didn't know how to fight. Reference to the ji res in Birmingham were made by some of tke rioters. CHAPTER XIIL HENRY VINCENT was a very young man, a very eloquent speaker and equally clear and vigorous writer. He was among the first consigned to prison for making " her Majesty's subjects discon- tented with their condition." This was at Bristol, I think, where he published The Vindica- tor. The rising in South Wales, under John Frost, was precipi* tated by a sympathy for Vincent, and a determination to set him free. Mr. Frost was the first Reform Mayor of Newport ; had acquitted himself creditably as President of the Conven- tion (National) of Delegates, held in London (summer of 1838), and he had done still better in a published correspondence with Lord John Russell. But he wanted entirely the stern qualities 194 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; of a military chief. The rising had been concerted at a meeting up in the hills (Merthyr Tydvil), about a fortnight previous to the 3d of November. At that meeting the delegates of three sections of country arranged to advance on Newport, the near- est military station, on the night of the 3d. The country was aflame, and it was computed that each section would move ten thousand men. It is evident that they did not anticipate any check from the small detachment of regulars stationed in that town, for at the meeting referred to a resolution was passed, as we were advised, to " hang any of their own men who might de- stroy either life or property." Singularly enough a storm of wind and rain set in about the first, and continued incessantly for three days and nights, rend- ering the mountain country almost impassable. The fragment of one division only the nearest under Frost himself reached Newport at eight or nine o'clock on the morning of the 4th, in- stead of the dark 2 o'clock that was intended. The troops occupying the place took position in the Westgate Inn, a strong stone building. The van of the Insurgents had among them some three or four hundred pieces of firearms ; those were flint- locks, drenched with rain, and incapable of making much impres- sion in any case, and none at all on the stone walls from which volley after volley swept the streets. It was stated that the garrison had come to its last round, when, led on by " Jack the Fifer," the assailants burst open the door, and rushing into the hall were met by that last round, which poured on them with deadly effect. They recoiled, panic-stricken, leaving several of their men dead and wounded. Jack the Fifer, himself, whom I met afterward in America, was shot through the hand. Mr- Frost, and the leaders of the other divisions, Williams and Jones, were made prisoners, tried, and condemned to death, but their sentences were afterwards commuted, mainly through the influence of the Middle Classes, who signed almost unanimously a memorial to the crown for that object. The first news that we at Newcastle-on-Tyne had of the ris- ing was through the London Times. It announced, by special correspondent, that Frost, at the head of 30,000 men, was in possession of South Wales. A significant change on that instant appeared in Newcastle. For weeks previously not a group of three men would be suffered to stand together on the sidewalk. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 195 No political paper was suffered to appear on the walls. And from the windows of the Liberator office I have seen a man cru- elly knocked down and dragged to prison for presuming to question the order to " move on." As soon as the intelligence of Frost's movement reached us all this was reversed. The Eeformers met in exultant groups, and several copies of a painted placard (painted in our office with printer's ink) were pasted up like this : " The hour of British Freedom has struck ! John Frost is in possession of South Wales at the head of 30,000 men." Past these placards the policemen quietly walked. The fact will bear one explana- tion. In revolutions a large portion of the people are passive, and readily obey the stronger side, and our policemen, it seems, were among this number. UNWKITTEN HISTOEY. If I now enter upon unwritten history, I do so because it may be useful to both peoples and Governments in coming times, and at this distance of time cannot do harm to anybody. Intelli- gence of the rising swept over the neighborhood, and the fol- lowing night delegates from 65 armed districts were assembled in Newcastle waiting for the expected Proclamation by Frost. The leaders were from the numerous districts lying close around. The two Shields, Sunderland, and the more distant districts of Durham and Northumberland were not present, but they were nearly or wholly as well appointed and prepared to rise at the expected signal. My indignation, always fierce against the unjust and man- slaying aristocracy, was greatly intensified by what I saw that night. While in the upper large room were assembled the earnest and gloomy chiefs of the insurrection, in the lower rooms were numbers of unthinking, good natured men, singing and playing music, even with their wives and daughters among them, waiting for the signal. Those people ! Is it there they ought to be ? Or is it in their peaceful homes and quiet beds, reposing from the toils of the day, and recruiting their faculties for that toil which the morrow was sure to bring to them? But here they were, peaceful, Christian men and women, willing to labor honestly and well for the sustainment of their families 196 THE ODD BOOK OJf THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J and tho strength and greatness of the nation. Here, driven by a heartless, shall I not add, a brutal handful of selfish culprits,, who wouldn't even " live and let live," but who, through their starvation villainy, drove those solid, innocent, honest men honestly willing to work for a mere living drove them to this dire necessity ! Here they were in midnight muster, waiting the signal to grasp the pike and level the musket to give or re- ceive death driven to it by greedy and rapacious men, indcred- ible in their selfishness, unapproachable in their crimes. Thoso men who would be content with so little, and who would work so faithfully in return for that little. The thought roused in my heart an impulse, a passion, for vengeance that night. Venge- ance on the men whose outrageous selfishness brought condi- tions down to the scene before me ! But the more reflecting men are at the top of the house and I must go up to them. It was yet only midnight. We expected the gallop of a horse every instant. The proclamation was to radiate by horse express from the centre, Birmingham, all round. The night mail from London would be in by 2 o'clock, and The Times at least would throw some additional light upon the darkness. But there comes a rap to the door. An inquiry for me and a letter put in my hands. Our apartments were in the Liberate building, and my little household could not and would not be asleep at such a time. The letter had been expressed up from Sunderland by Williams and Binns. They had just received it from a young friend named Batchelor, who resided in Newport and was a spectator of the conflict. It outlined the facts and very distinctly stated the issue : " Three days' storm in tho hills ; only about 1,000 of the first division reach Newport, tired,, drenched, at 8 A. M., instead of 2. The soldiers under cover,, the rebels in the streets. The slaughter all the one side. Frost prisoner." The relations of mind and matter form a most interesting- and abstruse question. Therefore I feel it a duty to state here a distinct fact bearing upon the subject. Mental pain every man suffers now and then, and I did not pass through life with- out my share of it. I understood those mental sensations,. More or less intense, they were all of the same purely spirit- ual nature. But when I opened that letter and gathered re - OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 197 alized its contents, there struck a wholly different feeling dis- tinctly physical through the material structure of my heart. A combination of sharpness and coldness, as if a quick incision were made into it by an exceedingly sharp instrument made of ice. Very sensible am I that my feelings were of little conse- quence then or now, what they were or were not. I write the fact, as it is possible it may be suggestive as a mental phenome- non. A hushed attention while I read the letter, and then n sudden decision. There has been no " overt act." Every man to his home, as if this night and its resolve had never had an existence. Next day, when the intelligence came on in the newspapers, I was made painfully aware of what was, I suppose, a very natu- ral fact. An entire revulsion came over the public mind. Men seemed to be impressed with the thought that the Government was impregnable. All congratulated themselves that, whatever course on our part had been taken, the Government knew noth- ing and could do nothing about it. A meeting was immediately held to found a penny subscription for the defence of Frost. I present a sketch of it as amusing and instructive. A warrant is out for the second arrest of Dr. Taylor, and he is now to ad- dress this public meeting : " ' A number of police, in the disguise of honest men.' (I quote the Lib erator.) beset the entrance. They soon had the satisfaction to see the Dr. approach, enveloped in his broad blue cloak, overshadowing hat ttd muffler. The crowd was dense, and a voice cries out, ' Make room for tfca Doctor.' But there was no necessity for this intimation for the 'oflotar were sharp enough to know him at once by his coat and hat. even thxign his distinguishing whiskers were buried in the deep folds of a large hand- kerchief. ' Doctor. I want you,' ' Doctor I want a word with you,' ' Doctor I have a warrant for your apprehension.' echoed from a dozen pair of Bweetlips. and in another instant he was in safe keeping, marching sta- tion-ward in sullen silence. No ebullition of feeling broke from him save a hollow hem! hem! which swelling in his throat indicated the bootless indignation dwelling in the heart below. It mattered not ; on with him to the Westgate Station House. Arrived there. Mr. Inspector Little placed himself on one side of the culprit-stand and the prisoner on the other. The ' shocking bad hat ' must of course off. outside coats can no longer keep their places whilst muffle handkerchief must uncoil itself and give to view all of hair and whiskers that have escaped the scissors of justice in Warwick Gaol. Well, off all did 3ome. Ralph rubbed his eyes, and we aro credibly informed was about to drop down on his knees. He had often heard in his native wilds of kelpies, spunkies. and all that sort of thing, together with many a wonderful tale of illusions which the Devil delighta 198 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY : to work on his followers ; but here the Devil was at work in his own Sta- tion House, the Doctor had vanished, and in his stead stood one Wm. Byrne, calmly inquiring by what authority he had been brought there^ Ralph, when recovered from his horror, asked his myrmidons why they ' wakened the wrong man ? ' Bootless inquiry. The henchmen weren't there to reply. They had fled in terror, and Ralph is looking for an- answer from them up to the present time." Meanwhile the meeting was organized, Edward Charlton, brick- layer, (an energetic and true man, whom I love to remember), in- the chair. He " regretted the premature movement in Wales, but that should not prevent Englishmen from insisting on their rights. Piece by piece their freedom was disappearing, and when the Rural Constabulary should be formed they had seen the last of it." Mr. Harney said " John Frost had ever kept the- onward path of humanity. They had all seen the ability and dignity with which he had hurled his scorn at the Government, when it proposed to deprive him of the Commission of trie- Peace for attending the patriotic meetings. And in his second correspondence on the imprisonment of Mr. Vincent, with what dignity he had showered his contempt on John Russell, the scoundrelly little lord ! Though all Newport was out on that eventful morning, not one of his townsmen would identify Mr Frost, save a spy, and a boy of ten years old, who had never- seen him before. The English people were sacrificed to the corn laws, to the factories, to the bastiles, to a scantier and 'coarser food, in order to supply more luxuries to their in- human, idle, scoundrelly oppressors." James Ayr, mason, de- fied the "blues" present, and the Government who sent them. He was above their power. They might take his life if they pleased ; he had nothing to live for but unrequited toil through- dreary years, and an end to bis days in a starvation bastile.. Mr. Peddie said " The Whigs promised reform and we carried' them into power. How did they redeem their pledge? By giving the Queen Dowager 100,000 a year, in addition to large- domains and palaces. And to the dowager of the workingman they gave imprisonment ?nd starvation. To a Queen without. a family they had giv\ n a ' civil list " larger than tiie Tories. gave to the profligate G o rge IV. Thus were they cheated by that picture of a monkoy in a consumption, Lord John Russell. However the poor ir.i^ht go to bed hungry in the biistiles, the. Queen, with her 980.000 pounds a year, need not eat the tongs OR, THE SPIlilT OF CHIVALRY IN MODKRN DAYS. 199 jr a supper. The middle classes had no objection to physical force, but. it must be arrayed on the side of oppression. He be- lieved in physical force, too, but he dind't believe it should be all on the one side." He urged the penny subscription, and there were about 500 pennies laid down, many present not hav- ing the penny with them. All thought now went forth to tho condemnation of Frost and his compatriots, which we knew to be certain. Shall I say that some of us looked forward to it with a desperate hope that public affairs and public feeling might take such, a sudden wheel round as would enable us to at once snatch the prisoners from the scaffold and the people from slavery. This much I dis- tinctly remember, that after the slow murderous solemn, ordeal of the trial was finished by conviction and the old barbarous sentence, there were those on the sidewalk in front of our office who gave a bound of delight with " thank God ! The Govern- ment has just pronounced its own sentence. That on John Frost will never be excuted ! Frost was condemned to die. So also were Williams and Jones, the leaders of those two sections that did not reach Newport. The slow, majestic paraphernalia of terror that at- tend trials for High Treason in England are, I think, quite effec- tive and well judged. Not so the barbarous conditions of the sentence. The " hurdling," and the "hanging," and the "be- M-,ading," and " disemboweling," and other obsolete barbar- "iiiis might pass, but when it came to the " quartering," those quarters to be disposed of as " her Majesty (a girl of eighteen) should be pleased to direct," there was in it (to them) worse than a violation of humanity, there was a violation of taste. It was " worse than a crime ; it was a blunder." Outdoor public meetings were now prohibited, and indoor meetings so interfered with, that we took refuge in religious services and sermons. The scriptures afforded us no scarcity of Keform texts, and we improved them to the edification of the policemen, who always attended to take note of our proceed- ings. In proportion as we had to suppress expression of our feelings did those feelings gather strength and resolve. Along in De- cember, a meeting was held at Dewsbury of delegates from most Of the considerable towns in the North. It was there resolved 1:00 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; that a simultaneous rising should take place in those towns on the night of the 12th of January! The personal sympathy for Frost and his unfortunate associates precipitated this move- ment, as the sympathy i'or Vincent had precipitated the rising in South Wales. Men were now growing more desperate, the spirit of forbearance and humanity that actuated the former movement (under Frost) was disappearing. Respect for either life or property would no longer be permitted to stand in the way of success. Every town concerned took its own way to action. Ours (Newcastle) was this : Classes of twelve were formed, each with a leader chosen by themselves. The captains of each class, as they had to meet in consultation, were necessarily known to each other, but each knew nothing of the personnel of the other classes. Nothing except their numbers and state of prepared- ness. For the first time an oath was resorted to. Each mem- ber of the combination was, with a peculiarly impressive solemnity, sworn to impenetrable secrecyto obey orders to hold their lives of no account in the attainment of their object and to execute death upon any one who might be found to betray information of our action to the governing authorities. The men to thus take the initiative were, of course, among the most resolute of the people. They comprised a fierce and even vindictive element, but it was hold in check by the cool- ness and humanity of the leading spirits. For example, it was strongly urged that on the night of the " rising " all the corpora- tion police should be slain on their beats. Personal feelings are ever the most dangerous, and in this. desire I could detect that of revenge for the beating with their clubs and draggicg to prison of our friends a part those officials had to act in the discharge of their vocation. It was decided, however, that no injury should be inflicted on them. That the several station houses should be captured and used for the temporal impris- onment of the police, whilst the mayor, municipality and other officials in power should be confined in their own houses or elsewhere. The work of accomplishing this we regarded as nothing. That of vanquishing the troops, consisting of some 800 infantry, two companies of dragoons, and two of artillery, we well knew to be the main difficulty. And we purposed to meet it with every appliance within our OB, THJfi SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 201 reach. Thirteen-inch shells and four or five-inch grenades were to form a main part of our reliance. For the construction of these there was no lack of old metal everywhere lying around- The moulds to form and the workmen to cast them were fur- nished by Newcastle. Winlaton and Swalwell, villages three or four miles distant, engaged to construct the necessary furnaces and do the casting. The following sketch, which I find in a diary of that date, is both a mental and a material photograph : It is Sunday. A December noon is pouring its sunshine on the bright quiet snow that covers all the fields and mantles the trees and hedges. Even the Scotswood road sparkles in its frost pavement powdered with snow. How quiet ancl lovingly Heaven looks down on that scene. How ill in accord with the purpose that directs my steps. Can I not abandon myself to a quiet saunter up the Tyne ? No ! Quiet and recreation are afar from my thought. I think of the sordid and inhuman me j whose rapacity to the millions had turned all this brightness and beauty life itself into a darkness and a curse. " And here is one of those sordid men," I exclaimed, as Aid. Potter met me, astride on a saddle returning to town. We understand each other. He is one of the respectable, loyal, " law-and-order " starvation men. I am one of the turbulent and disloyal crowd. But he does not know that I am unthinking of the day arid its worship that my path is across that picturesque bridge to the iron villages beyond, or for what purpose ? does not know that before another Sabbath dawn he may hear ** The shot, the shout, the groan of war Keverberate along that vale, More suited to the shepherd's tale," or the keelman's song as he floats his cargo down those quiet waters, now darkly sleeping in the arms of the embracing snow. I thought why did the Creator afflict the world with such men? Why did He permit them to turn this beautiful world into a terrestrial hell? Immersing their own ignoble beings in a sea of selfishness so sunk that they cannot even see the misery of body and strife of soul that they have created around them. But I am nearing Scotswood bridge, on my way to Swalwal and Winlaton, and not at all on a message of peace. I reach the headquarters. Poor fellows ! They are quiet, or- 202 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUEY ; derly, unimpassioned. But they are men, and to assert thei** equal manhood they will peril their lives. Plans are unfolded. Maps of Newcastle and Sunderland barracks and Tynemouth castle spread out the various " quarters " of the various arms are accurately laid down. Their numbers, their nature, and on which the first blow shall fall. On this there was but one opinion. The officers hors du combat, the troops would join us. Such was our firm belief, and I think it was well founded. The infantry, I remember, were principally young Irishmen an in- flammable race, that had given quite assuring indications of their good will. The thought that countrymen of their own were leaders in the movement had some weight with them. Of pikes there was a supply that had denuded the plantations around of their straight saplings. Of firearms far less, but all that could be procured for money. Those two facts I knew of my own knowledge. Of powder used for blasting in the mines there was or could be no scarcity. Old cast iron cannon had recently been numerous lying around. Whether those or whether brass pieces were put in requisition and mounted for service I had affirmative report, but no per- sonal knowledge of their number or efficiency. Our chief, or I should say our first, reliance in the approaching conflict was on 13-inch shells and 4|-inch grenades, to be discharged by gradu- ated fuses. Here I think we very dangerously miscounted the results. A heavily loaded 13-inch shell would, we computed, blow down an ordinary brick wall or shatter a 2-inch wooden gate, if exploded up close against either. It strikes me with astonishment, now, that without actual demonstration we should arrive at a certain conclusion on the subject, which we certainly did the more so, as such grave consequences depended. The use of the grenades was more assured, for we didn't expect that very heavy work would be done by them. Well adjusted and thrown from ranks or roofs, or from windows, they were not likely to disappoint our expectation. Still, I think now that our ardor carried us into very dangerous and uncertain conclusions- It was agreed, however, now this Sabbath day at Winlaton, that Newcastle should have constructed models of both missiles and furnish skilled moulders to cast them. On the part of Win- laton and Swalwal, it was engaged that a blast furnace, or more than one if necessary, should be in readiness at a day as early OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 203 as possible before the end of the week. The mission ended, I returned to Newcastle, lighted by a crescent moon over the hushed landscape. Amid all the offered happiness that lay around me enfolded in that quiet of Heaven and earth, what wonder that I thus thought as I recrossed the bridge and gazed up and down the waters on my homeward return, " Wretched men ! little do you know the enormity of your crime ; little how base yourselves how grovelling your selfishness how much truer happiness an honest competence would bring to you com- pared with the excesses for which you now endanger alike your bodies and your souls. And now you enforce this conflict of blood upon the innocent men I have just parted from forced upon them this deadly conflict ! " The departed scenes of my early life rose up before me. The regrets of Burns were in my heart : " O ! enviable early days, When dancing thoughtless pleasure's maze, To care and guilt unknown ! How ill exchanged for riper times, To feel the follies or the crimes Of others or my own." The same base and ignoble men who had impoverished and em- bittered his life had also fastened upon mine and invited me to its one alternative mortal combat if I would not submit That combat was now grimly approaching. I got home well pleased with the full success of my mission, as I believed it be. Every feeling had now left me save resolve and solicitude that nothing should be left undone that could at all contribute to our success. All the trades nearly every man who worked were with us. We found no difficulty in having three molds made, one of 13 inch and two of 4| inch diameter. For this work we paid 1 and 10s. respectively. As little diffi- culty had we in procuring two skillful molders. Counting that the blast furnace was ready, those men were sent out to do the work on Tuesday. The " rising " was to take place in the early darkness of Sunday morning. But a deputation comes in from Winlaton with the discouraging intelligence that no furnace had been or could be erected. The " workies " had no ground on which to erect it, and the owners of the ground Whig middle - class men kept up a constant and suspicious watch. Always on hand at the Liberator office, I generally had the 20-1 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTLHT : first communication of every fact and circumstance affecting 1 the movement. If anything grave and doubtful presented, the ''Council " was at once called together. It was not on this oc- casion. Time was too pressing. All the difficulties connerted with the furnace were present -d to myself alone. They were, indeed, most formidable. But my reply was: "If you hav not contrivance, management, resources to surmount greater difficulties than this, how can we expect to dethrone the govern- ment? The reasons that you present are very substantial things, but they will be of no use when we come front to front with the soldiery. Just think of it ! As they pour in their vol- leys, think of us shaking our fist at them, and exclaiming : ' If we had the grenades and a dozen or two of shells to hurl from the housetops we would be a match for you.' No, no ! We must have the shells. Empty talk will do nothing for us." "And we sliall have them," replied the deputation. "Count upon them sure and certain." And leaving this assurance they returned home. I had rooms in the same building in which a lively manufac- ture of five-second small and half- mi mite, large fuses was going on. But it was a trade that we knew little about, and therefore had a singeing of fingers before we mastered it: suHicieutly. We succeeded, however, tolerably well. The length and caliber of the fuse and the packing in of the gunpowder governed tbe time of ignition, and this part of our armament was, I think, brought to a precision sufficiently practical for use. In car- tridge making four or five buckshot went into a companionship with every bullet. Bags of buckshot were as yet an article of commerce and were in demand. Thus time and act moved on toward the eventful Saturday night. Nothing practicable was left undone in Newcastle, arid we relied undoubtingly on the Winlaton men that the explosives would be forthcoming. But they were not. Nor was this all. On the night of move- ment there assembled not quite seventy men, out of the secret enrollment nearly ten times that number. Of course those who did assemble were the most daring and desperate spirits in the movement ; and, finding that they wore not in a condition for a stand up fight, it was strongly urged that the torch should be resorted to. It was urged that *.hip OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 205 step would cause a waking up and excitement, under the influ- ence of which every revolutionist would rush to arms. Others, and with better judgment, maintained that to break in upon the slumbers of peaceful families, destroy their scanty property and endanger their lives would be productive of no one good, and of evil unspeakable. The latter counsel prevailed. It was resolved to wait events, and in case our friends made a successful rising in any one of the various towns in which the rising was to take place, it was determined not to allow th .troops on the Tyne or Wear to march against them. We would 'throw up barricades and give them work to do at home. On proceeding to the rendezvous one thought of my family did not even cross my mind. But now that the affair had taken this peaceful turn, I thought of my wife's anxiety, and hastened home to tell her the result, describing hurriedly what had taken place. " Have they separated ? " she inquired. " They agreed -and were preparing to do so when I left" " Throw on your -cloak, and back as fast as ever you can. They will revert to their first opinion and use the torch. Those men are desperate enough to do anything." This seemed intuition, though the principal men were indeed .personally known to her. Her earnestness won upon what I thought my better judgment. I was instantly out. Rap- idly retracing my course to the suburban shvet, our ren- dezvous. I don't now remember the name of tho street, but through the long memory I know it was a new street, in the Sandgato direction, I think, but interior some dis- tance from the river. As I passed the several policemen on their beats, I could not but contrast the reigning quiet- ness with the strife and uproar that would have burst forth hod they known what was going on. Shall I confess it there was a feeling akin to pride in the consciousness of our ex- clusive knowledge, in the thought that I and my associates knew a fact so grave, ind of which they were wholly Ignorant. I reached the centre of action, and, to my dismay, found the men formed into four parties, just issuing forth on their most des- perate, and, indeed, mad mission. I had reached the large room door leading out to the head of the stairway. John Mason \vas foremost. "We have resolved to do it," said he, "we must rouse the people by some desperate action, and the torch is to 206 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; be the action " or words to that effect. " ~ou will pass over my dead body first," I retorted, " if you don't allow ine five minutes to speak." Not one minute ; your'e a traitor," shouted a voice, and Mason sprang upon a pistol leveled at me in the fel- low's hand, wrenching it from his grasp. " Who are you," he exclaimed, " whom we dida't know a week ago, that dares o con- front a man who has been acting vigorously with us from the first?" Then turning to me he urged me not to delay them even for the five minutes, but I was immovable, and he movou that the time should be allowed me. I spoke : Friends, brothers ! If my heart revolts at this terrible resolve, I. who so deeply sympathize with your wrongs, so resolve to right them, how will It be with the multitude, even of your own friends, \\heu dawn rises over the smoking ruins that once was Newcastle? Ho\v will the oeho of your desperate deed reverberate over all England ? How will all the crime and incendiarism, falsely charged against you. uow be real- ized ? What a change will that morning bring forth ! Magistrates. Milita- ry. Police. Middlemen, all sweeping through the streets, and you crouch- ing, hiding among i;he ruins in vain from their just vengeance. If you have no though 1 : for that mother rushing undressed out from the flamoa bringing, it maybe, only a part of her children along with her out under the skies of a January night. If you have no feeling for her and her fam- ily, have feeling for the women and children of your own house when such a day of horror has descended upon thorn through your great mis- taken crime. And, above all, have feeling for the holy cause we are en- gaged in. on which this madness will fix a stain never, never, to be cleansed out. You condemned this proceeding not an hour ago .and now you adopt it. How can you rely on your judgment, such a judgment as this ? This step would be utter, total, irretrievable ruin! Some one of our associiite towns will make a start to-night, then hurra for tho barricades! Broth- ers, if you agree in this view, give mo a show of hands ? They did unanimously, with the single exception of the man from whom Mason wrenched the pistol. This man was from Blaydon, and as I afterward learned by letters to America, was a traitor and a spy. But owing, I sup- pose, to the solemn oath taken by so many men, he was afraid to give public evidence against us. I now remained till I saw the meeting dispersed, every man to his home. But not before we sent scouts out to warn back such of our adherents as might be marching in from outer vil- lages, such as Blyth and Bedlington. John Mason acted man- fully that night. To his activity I probably owed my life. But the most desperate, among whom was Eobbert Peddle, a Scotchman, and like Tom Paine, a staymaker, were not at all re- OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 207 conciled to even a temporary inaction, and next evening I was informed that a party of them were assembled in a remote room in "the Side," preparing to enter upon the horrible work that had been prevented the night before. Under guid- ance, I hastened to the spot through dark, intricate passages, and up tumble-down stairs. To my expostulations they replied that I was " too late." " Already," they said, " was the work commenced, and they must go on with it, or abandon their friends who had gone forth to do it. Before midnight " they af- firmed " flame and combat would have full possession of New- castle ; I might join in that combat or I might not, but the fact I could not alter." I believed them, retired home, and spent such a night of anxiety and horror as stands far alone in the record of my life. I threw myself on the bed with my uniform blouse and arms on the table, and I now wonder at the mistaken sense of honor that made me prepare to join them on hearing the first shot. Day dawned in quietness, the most welcome I have ever seen. Let me here record a singular fact concerning this Peddle. Ordinarily, he was more of a rhapsodist than an orator. But as we neared this crisis, he made a speech at one of our meetings which, for electrical force of thought and language, I have never seen equalled. I did not publish the sublimity of this speech, but my memory presents a faint outline of it. It pictured a calm, bright landscape, waving with trees and blossoming with flowers. A darkening of the sky " gathering, gathering " of the tempest, a frightened multitude on the fields below. Crowns, and coronets, and coaches on a grand dark mountain above. It is a volcano. It shakes un der their feet, bursts asunder, and all that defied heaven and cursed the earth sinks howling into it. I mention the fact as a very singular mental phenomenon. It was indeed a remarkable inspiration of the crisis, similar to Meagher's apostrophe to the sword or his splitting eloquence in the dock of Clonmel. , Peddie was a man of all or of any work. Next day he threat- ened the scaffold to myself and Mr. Kucastle, because we would not furnish horse and carriage to convey him (and a few desper- erate followers) to Alnwick castle. It contained arms and treas- ure, he averred, and its pastures were filled with just such ra- tions as the revolutionary forces required. A young butcher followed in his train for several days to take charge in this de- partment. 208 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY I But those in chief control of the movement, held to their re- solve to await events in the other insurgent towns, and to be guided by them. For several days, I think four days, there was a lull. No intelligence 1 At last it came ; to the effect that several risings in Sheffield, Bradford and other towns had taken place ; all abortive, and several of the more prominent men en- gaged in them made prisoners. This, like the news of Frost's failure, produced such a revulsion in the public mind as showed that all chance of present action had again passed away. There* is, indeed, *' A tide in the affairs of men." We were not without friends even among the Government au- thorities. No one who observed our zeal, activity, and, let mo- add, intelligence, and the vast numbers arrayed on our side could fail to see that we were a most formidable power. As such a power, individuals sought our good will and assur- ance of protection in the event of a contest. They to return- similar good offices to us. Through this means we were ap- prized that the local magistrates had got possession of all the particulars of our " nightly muster," already mentioned. But it: was represented to. us that they had as yet no sworn evidence of the fact before them. This, we reasonably concluded, would not long be wanting. All hope of resistance on our part had departed for the present. Months must elapse before the tide of popular feeling would rise again. Meanwhile, we would be in the shelter of a prison, if not suspended between earth and Heaven, or luxuriating in the fields of Van Dieman's Land, whichever the Government pleased. * As we knew it was in full possession of our desperate design upon the barracks and the overt acts performed in furtherance of that design,! we Not a Reformer of note escaped the vengeance of the Government. Even Fergus O'Oon - nor, who took no part in either of the insurrectionary movements, was thrown into prison for eighteen months. Bronterre, equally innocent, shared the same vengeance. Holbery, of Sheffield, (taken at the rising in Sheffield.) was kept in prison till he died. + Four days alter our abortive meeting, Bell, the foreman of our printing office (who wa*- not in our secret councils), signaled me into a private room. " Mr. ." naming an offl cial, " sends yon word that the magistrates have information of two assemblings in arm , on Saturday night in street. The information is vague, not sworn to, and therefore no warrants issned. If it be true, and it you were present, he desires to warn you." ' Hoot ! it is not true I " was my response. " Well, then, let me have some copy." But ho had got his last "copy " from me. Consulted with Mr. Rucastle, who was by no means so deeply compromised as myself. The situation was just this. Assembling in arm,! though not k blow struck, was an act of High Treassn. No means to resist, and no thought of sbmission, I quitUd the field. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 20$ had little room to doubt what it would do. Twenty minutes before I started for America, I had not the remotest idea of ever crossing the Atlantic. Mr. Rucastle and myself cross- ed Tyne bridge to Gateshead, as if to take a customary walk up the river bank. But crossing the hills to Chesterle street, my companion cast his last longing look at that river. I think it i* ray mission to see it again. I was under two separate bonds on charges of sedition. My employers were securities on one, and John Blakey, dogger and T think Richard Ayr, publican, on the other. The latter two,, fearing to lose the amouat of recognizance, had us pursued to Liverpool, whence we narrowly and singularly got away.* The former retained an amount of my salary which they were, in- deed, entitled to retain to cover the risk. The Government did exact the penalty, but returned it again at the intercession of the then member for Gateshead. Contrasts are striking, and there is in human nature a tend- ency to make itself bright by darkening its neighbors. I think it not unlikely that individuals who never endured real fatigue,, or incurred real danger, or even made pecuniary sacrafice in the movement, whose co-operation was holiday sunshiny work, and even who made out of it large pecuniary gain, may have spoken of me after my departure in this darkening spirit. All I can say is that I avoided no fatigue, shrank from no danger, refused not to contribute far beyond the extent of my slender means toward the advancement of the common cause. At the rising under Frost very prominent men had a sudden call to Trance to be out of the way. At the later rising, now mentioned, there waa a still more general avoidance of danger in a similar way. In- deed, the number of distinguished leaders who took any part in the dangers of the work was very small. I do not remember one, only John Mason, Edward Charlton, a fine young fellow named Held, and I think Jemmy Ayr, celebrated for his declara- tion that he would agitate no more in the old way, that for the time to come he would " agitate the bricks and mortar." f John Rucastle and myself were proceeding to a shop to buy some necessaries lor th voyage, and stept in for a glass of ale. From behind a screen came the lamiliar Newcastle idiom. The incident led to our escape. t Jemmy was a mason by trade, and when arraigned tor this and other imputed sedition. lie got cleverly oat, by affirming that he meant simply that he would give up agitation, take to ail trade, and agitate the bricks and mortar for a living. 37 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; I was present, and took a man's part at all those proceedinga The movement was alike dear to me in its darkest as in its brightest hour. I left it when I saw myself without means of resisting the Government. I had no disposition to submit to its vengeance. And I am as proud of the resolution and energy with which I preserved my personal freedom, as I am of the un- ceasing labors I had given to the public cause. I had not means to defray the expense of my voyage. But luckily I had from time to time made small remittances to my mother, the last of which was untouched by her, when a letter apprising my relatives of my position reached her hand. She returned me the Bank of England note just as I sent it, and this enabled me to get away from Liverpool, leaving a stock in my hand of just fifteen pence sterling when I landed in New York. I had fixed to sail in a " transient ship," but happened by a singular chance to meet two refugees from the neigberhood of Newcastle, who had manufactured pikes during the past season. They informed me they were to sail next morning in the * Inde- pendence," a "liner." We, Mr. R. and myself, determined to sail with them, and at the moment commenced to get our luggage on board. Next morning when we came to embark, the vessel was falling out of the dock gate, and the dull sheet of water in the dock prevented us from getting near her. The watermen would take no less than a sovereign for pushing us across. I had only five shillings, which an old boatman accepted, not a mo- ment too soon, as we had scarcely Jumped aboard when she was through the gate, and every sail set, with a fair wind blowing her down the river, and on to the steam tug which had just towed her out of the dock, and now had to cast-loose in order to get out of her way. At that moment, the Government officials who were in close pursuit, reached the pier head. "Where is the 'Independ- ence ? ' " " Yonder, under a press of sail." " We want to hire a steamboat to pursue her, she has political prisoners on board." " There is no steamer on the Mercy can catch her. See the tug she employed is just casting loose to avoid being run over." As we were to sail so suddenly, I did not appre- hend that the pursuit would come so close on us, so I entered my true name at the shipping agent's. The pursuers discovered it, and would have succeeded, only they delayed to have their OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 211 warrants countersigned by the Liverpool magistrates, who did not come to their office till nine o'clock. THE sketch of a winter voyage in a sail ship would afford anything but pleasure, either to the writer or the reader. An overnight storm rattling down yards and rigging on the deck. When at day- break the "chief officer" treads through the wreckage to the fore- castle, where the crew chilled, tired, worn out have taken refuge ; when he commands, threatens, expostulates, to bring them out in vain the sceno is full of instruction as to the merits or demerits of the sea-faring life. It is not an infrequent or a pleasant incident when food and water for the last ten days give little to the crew and little or nothing to the passengers. If we log about in the Gulf stream for three or four weeks and if, going into the wheel-house at midnight, the man-at-the- wheel is asleep on his feet and the vessel heading in the wrong direction if lights below are forbidden and the order disobeyed and if smokers smoke themselves to sleep in their berths within arm's-length of the straw protruding from a wall of delf crates you may well rejoice when the "land clouds "rise before you, and be happier still when the low, white, sandy coast of Long Island rises over the waves. A Yankee pilot springs aboard your first connecting link with the New "World. And all teaches that there are ten or twenty times more traveling over the seas than is necessary that it is a school of tyranny in the cabin, and that it is a life of homeless, heartless degradation to the "men before the mast." The paging is irregular, owing to difficulties not worth describing here. Indeed, the book could not come out at all only for one fact that seems, or was, providential. None of the large houses will publish a book of searching Keform even if indemnified, secured from loss. A library edition, at a higher price, will be required, In which all these irregularities will disappear. " Youth, like the softened wax, with ease will take Those images that first impression make." There is a very general, passive, useless assent given to this Tery great truth. But its importance does not seem to be realized certainly is not acted upon. If it were, it would put another spirit into men and boys, and another face on the world. In this book is stated my own experience on this subject how one or two fragmentary, now obsolete, books gave bent and direction to my whole life. Let me add I read ihis somewhere " Stooping is characteristic of the clown; an erect figure, of the gentleman." Those two sentences took the worker's growing stoop out of me. Somewhere, too, I remember this printed line : " To excel in dancing, is to ex- >cel in trifles." I had no ambition to " excel in trifles ; " and so, and not very wisely, I turned my back on the ball-room forevermore. All men favor education look up to it as the great re- deeming power. But the education that teaches youth to read evil books and study evil models, whether is it a redeem- ing or a degrading power ? And yet those evil books are presented on every news-stand in the tempting form of clear type and brilliant engravings. A man who has to confine his son (who desired to " run away and turn pirate "), procures a list of eight " rival youth traps," with such titles as the follow- ing : "Black Adder, or the Pirates of the Channel ;" " The Two Kunaways, a Story of Mystery and Thrilling Incidents ;" 2 THE ODD BOOK OF THE OTNETEENTH CENTURY ; " Jack Dauntless, the Boy Privateer ;" " Dashing Dick, the King of the Highway ;" " Charlie, the Masher, or the Boss on Boilers ;" and so on, ad nauseam. " The illustrations are," pays this man, "literally murderous." In one story, the boy hero enters a thieving den, called " The Hole in the "Wall ;" and, while dividing the prey, a shout is raised, " Cheese it ! Cops are coming." Charlie the Masher is troubled because Bob's mother " puts too much awfully religious chilling between her and Bob." For a genteeler grade of boys we find another range. And a brave "American boy " is presented in a large engraving, blazing; his revolver in the faces of a young lady's carriage horses,, herself seated, terrified, with outstretched, imploring arms; Following this come, " How to Flirt," " How to Get BichJ* how to learn anything, everything, but the private or public virtues. Obscene books are suppressed, and their venders pun- ished. But all this rubbish has unchecked sway, and they are doing their deadly work, for "'Tis education forms the tender mind, Which way the twig is bent the tree's inclined." Never was truth more apparent never was truth more important never was truth more neglected especially in this boasted American Kepublic. This book sufficiently shows the things in Europe especial- ly in England that call themselves "Civilization." And it seems taken for granted that America must adopt civilization as it exists in Europe, or have no civilization at all. And this was inevitable. The civilization of England grew out of robbery and murder, accomplished by the sword.* And * It was lato in the eleventh century. William, called the Conqueror, was a natural son of the Duke of Normandy ; and, having no dominion to in- herit, ho determined to rob the English people of their country. For this purpose, ho gathered all the burglars that would join him, and sailed for England. It was a happy household in those days. The lands held in allo- OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. A the civilization now looming up in the United States is founding itself on robbery and murder, accomplished by all the skulking, cowardly vices.* Disinheriting the people, buying and selling votes in legislatures all the legislatures; and " decisions " in the courts all the courts. And having practically shut the people out from the soil, made them " free to starve," then hire what they want of them at star- vation wages, and let what they don't want beg, steal, or perish. Like to like. Civilizations founded on robbery are necessarily the same, irrespective of time or country. So, if the robbery be not checked here now, in the United States the wretched Past of Europe is the doomed Future of America. dial posessions, under the Head Landlord who Created them. But there is a landing of the Burglars and a gathering of the Household to resist them. A conflict. And did not Hastings present a pitiable sight on the evening of that day. The murdered Household lies covering the ground. Murdered by the burglarious "ancestors" of which British Civilization is now so proud. Then come scenes like this : " Hark 1 what sounds of mortal agony are these? Is that a white smoke ascending over the adjacent wood? Skirt the wood, cross that dell. There ! a glade opens before us a crowd, a, fire ! A man is hanging by the body from a rope fastened to two trees, and (does God reign !) is that a fire burning under him ? Is that a crowd of the noble Norman ancestors ' gathered around ?" " Where have you hid your treasure ?" they cry out to the tortured man. Alas / he has no treasure, no reply to make but the convulsions of his body and those miserable cries. The "ancestors" realize it at last. But he must not be taken down; it might affect their next experiment. So he is left to die. Those "experi- ments " are given up bye and bye, but not until they have ceased to be profit- able. (See Niebuhr, Hallam and others' Histories of the Middle Ages.) Then they turn to other work. What is that other work ? It is to rob the people of all their lands. In this robbery, Byron says, speaking of his ancestors : " Six and twenty manors Was their reward for following Billy's banners." Such was the foundation on which rose the sinful abomination called British Civilization. * The fact that corporations own the legislatures and the courts has for years been known to the public. Thus Jay Gould, on the witness stand, 4 THE 3DD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J " But could it be otherwise ?" " Is it not the nature of man ?" Such questions are asked, and are deemed unanswerable. But this bock will answer them. It will show, by proof and example, that such is only the nature of bad men. It will beforo tho Legislative Committee of New York, drags out the modus operandi, as published by tho New York Board of Trade : " I do not know how much I paid toward helping friendly men We had four States to look after, and \ye had to suit our politics to circumstances. In a Democratic dis- trict I was a Democrat ; in a Republ can district I was a Rep iblican . and in a doubtful district I was doubtful ; but in every district, and at all times, I have always been an Erie man ." And the State legislation procured in this way is law, is it? And the National legislation for the great Thief Railroads procured in this way is law , is it ? And tho decisions of politician (which means corrupt) Courts pro- cured in this way is law, is it ? And tho infamous Court in California that drova men out of their homes won from the wilderness, and gave those homes to the Thief Eailroad Co., was law, was it ? And when government (which means politician) officials killed seven of those settlers while robbing thorn of their homes, it was law, was it ? Or was it murder most foul ? Was it stripped of the infamous garment called " law " murder in the first degree? We are " law-abiding citizens F' It is the boast eternally ringing in our cars. And yet how can we be law-abiding citizens when even this big conservative Board of Trade informs us that we have NO LAW to abide by? Such is our promising Civilizing at home, and here's how it goes to im- provo itself abroad. Albert Rhodes, a gentleman well acquainted with the subject, writes: " Among the unrepublican ideas which a foreign residence furnishes to the handsome sex is that of marrying a title. This is the cause of wit (ridi- cule) at tho expense of American institutions. M. Le Comte states to the American family that he desires so much money for his name, settled with binding legal documents, before the ceremony, or paid down on the nail. And the republican father agrees to the proposition, and pays. " To any one connected with American legations in Europe, the extra- ordinary efforts made by some American women to get presented at Court is a familiar experience. The Head of the Legation is besieged in a variety of ways that this may be accomplished. He is invited to a dinner, and the demand is sprung on him at the dessert. A pretty woman natters him into peaceful satisfaction with himself and all the world, and suddenly over her fan asks tho dreaded question. Strategy and prayers are resorted to that they may bo the elect out of many applicants to stand up before royalty and exchange bows." There is just one power which, under the Divine Power, can save the Re- public from ruin and degradation, and that power reposes in the YOUNG MEN of America 1 OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 5 show what allures those bad men into all our various govern- ments, forming aggregations so impure that good and honor- able men will not even approach their contamination. I can throw a flood of light on this momentous fact by pre- senting a character which shows what civilization in the New World ought to be what it would be if evil men had not seized control of the nation and with God's Providence what it will be when the evil men are driven out. It is a character purely indigenous to the country, the nature of which, and the lesson it teaches, slowly unfolded to me through a close intercourse of thirty years. Those near where I write will recognize the character at once. May the honorable and manly lesson it teaches become known to the YOUNG MEN of the Republic inspire them with Ms spirit turn them aside from the vices of Europe, to emulate the virtues which founded and which alone can preserve the Republic. AN AMERICAN CHARACTER. He is a chivalrous young man just from school. He has not given his time and energies to the dead languages, nor so filled his mind with the thoughts of other men that it will hold nothing else. His thoughts are of his own times hia inspiration the traditions of his own country. His father is a principal manufacturer* whose house ia the *NOTE. The old gentleman ! I knew him well, tho' at a late period of his life. As reporter at our public meetings I was struck with the sound com- mon sense which he brought to bear on our local affairs his purse as ready as his advice. The Gas Light Company is dying out. He brings it to life again. The village is half bankrupt. He saves its credit at a sharp loss to himself. A local Bank. Tried in vain till he takes hold of it. A Sayings Bank. Nobody will deposit till he takes it in hand. And this in private matters. "Is Mr. * * * returned yet?" "No." "Anything wrong?" "Not much; the Insurance Company presses me for interest money." " Tell them to wait or send the document to me." His career of usefulness was prolonged up to nearly his eightieth year. At its outset he navigated his own sail ferryboat between what is now Bridge Street, Brooklyn, and New York a premonition of his usefulness for the next fifty or sixty years. I have seen him call the servant to brush his five year old winter coat at the time he was signing a church or a charity check for $500 at one time for $4,000. His brother, much his senior, was a Minute Man in the Revolu- tionary War and was slain (shot through the head) combatting the marauders THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J resort of all the refinement of the neighborhood. Cultivated men and women only one descent from the days, and the asso- ciations of Hamilton and Burr are guests at that large and hospitable house. Here was a tempting field for any young adventurer into life. A superintendence of his father's business lies before him, with just as little to do and as much for doing it as he may please to determine. But no ! The spirit of a true man of " Chivalry in Modern Days " is within him. Temp- tation ! He does not feel it. Opportunity ! He turns from it away. He will not rest even the foundation of his fortune on a dollar of his father's wealth. Works in his factory now with pen and now with muscle as the need presents. Intelligent, vigilant, and guardedly economical for he has a purpose to achieve, he has realized $1,000 and a reputation worth $50,000. He has now attained his majority and goes into business for himself, borrowing what money he needs from his relative on strictly business principles and at the legal rate of interest. But looking round, and resting on his capacity and repu- tation, he finds that he can borrow at a lower rate of interest.- And so he closes up the old account and opens the new. In the ever changing field of American enterprise frequent opportunity offers to a man of keen discernment and unlim- ited resource. He is master of both. And before the first ten years of his majority are over he is reaching up toward the millions. He has laid a foundation on which such a man could build a fortune high as the Stewarts or the Yanderbilts. But he has other ambitions. First it is his laudable pur- pose to enjoy life and PROMOTE CIVILIZATION. He has a stud of half a dozen horses, with carriages and sleighs to match. of Arnold in his native Connecticut. Captain Lawrence, whoso last words were " don't give up the ship," (see ante notice of Greenwich) was a relative of the family, and one of its recently deceased members was named after him. Such were the men who founded the Kepublic, and whose examples I trust will yet save and adorn it and .build it up. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 7 Manly exercise on horseback is taking its place, in the North at least, among the " lost arts." But he will not lose it he will hold on to it has its full outfit and, fashion or no fash- ion, he will do in this what he does in other things, and that is just what he pleases. He is by no means particular whether his associates are unreasonably rich or reasonably poor so that they are not vulgar and have a soul in their bodies that he can respect. Has a seat beside him in his phaeton and lets some of them know as they never knew be- fore, and never would have known if he hadn't shown them, how assuring, how refining and how pleasant are the atten- tions of a true gentleman. He has businesses now, more than one, operated by agents. They don't draw much on his personal attention, for he has other thoughts than to give his whole life to those exacting cares. He confides in no man at hap-hazard. Has known his agents well and for years, and holds systematic accounta- bility over them all. In merely business matters he is a strict business man. Some of those dealing with him aver that he leans rather to hardness in a bargain. But this may be born of an expected softness that it was disappointing not to find. Every need for business-help now gravitates to- ward him as naturally as the cold traveler to the warm fire- side. The large old homestead, a presence of the conven- iences and pretension of fifty or sixty years before, is now too old and must make way not for the palatial residence of modern fashion. No ! Around the old mansion is a spa- cious enclosure of forest trees. In that enclosure and under shadow of the trees rises a modest two-story cottage. Mod- ernized, it is true, yet far less in size and pretention than the old mansion. But there is a cellar in it as free to the invalid who.asks for a medicine of pure wine or brandy as it is to the guest at his hospitable board. That unpretentious cot- tage is replete with adornments gems of art, briefly every- thing requisite in a home of refinement and truly Republican 8 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J Civilization. A civilization that in its exclusiveness andt it must be exclusive of what is not of it does not at all forget the brotherhood of man. His fortune has been growing steadily, and he, as steadily,, has been keeping it down by a generous, helpful hand. In. the routine of business, he occasionally intermingles with the Wall Street people, and their contact Avould perhaps throw a tinge of frost over his genial nature that might take an hour of home influences to thaw away. But even "on change " were gentlemen, his associates, whose standard of honor was, as I learned from him, upon a level with his own. This in their personal affairs but I have no evidence that they participated in his public spirit. In that he stood alone> of all his class. TVTany of his class were good men in their way. As we shall see. General Crooke was a noble example of what I designate "Chivalry in Modern Days." Peter Cooper, too, has done good things in the work of edu- cation, and in one phase of national reform. But the gentle- man, whose character I here faintly essay to present, accepted, at first sight, the three great reforms which can alone save this Republic from falling into Anarchy, Monarchy, and Ruin. " A constitutional limit to the power of Taxing. A strict pre- servation of the lands, and the mines, and the waters of the nation, as the Heritage of the people forever. And a National Money issued by the National Government, regulated by the authority, and resting on the resources of the entire nation/" The first to keep the governments free from marauders: what we now call politicians. The second to make available a secure home to every man who is willing to work, for the support of his family. The third to keep the volume of money in the country always full, never overflowing. Freeing" the nation from the fluctuations in values, the panics, losses, distress, death, and suicides innumerable, that we have wit- nessed so often, and so intense during the last few years. Those great principles, notwithstanding his previous opin.- OE, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. V Ions, he adopted at first sight. When told that this latter would take away a large income from his bank, his reply was brief and emphatic : "I CARE NOT FOR MY BANK, I CARE FOR MY COUNTRY ?" Where was another banker in the whole country who acted or thought thus nobly ? Where one who did not even reverse it down to that other thought : " I care for my bank, I don't care for my country?" And this chivalrous man, and such men as this, were practically shut out from the government of the nation shut out by the aggregation of political rogues, with which no honorable man could associate. Addicted to field sports, he has several trained pointers, one of which is a favorite, and, ride or walk, is always in at- tendance on him. Associating with the officers of a near naval station, he is imbued with their nautical tastes, but not in the least with their hauteur and insolence. He built the first American yacht, named the "Peerless," from the character in Spenser's "Fairy Queen." I believe an appreciation of " The Fairy Queen " indicates a very high standard of literary taste, a standard I never could reach to. Here we find that standard reached up to by a lady friend, to whom he owed that romantic and, indeed, *' peerless " name given to the first American yacht. A literary taste indigenous to the Republic, though probably not attain- ed by one in ten of the ladies who flaunt their pretensions within Buckingham Palace and around Windsor Park. The refinements and elegancies to be traced around and inside of that two-story cottage realizes, rather than indicates, all, all, that American civilization need aspire to. It is 1850, and this truly American gentleman speaks to me : " See that worn-looking wooden house, perched on the acclivity on the other side of the Creek (Newtown). Many a pleasant re-union I have enjoyed in that house. The young men and young ladies of the adjoining village and farm-houses formed a company which, for frank-hearted simplicity and 10 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUEY J genuine taste, I neither hope nor wish to see excelled in this country." Whether his lady friend did or did not favor those re-umons with her presence, it would be useful to know, as throwing into view the most delicate lights and shades of Republican civilization.* That lady friend " Was to him a crystal-girded shrine," which no intrusive breeze was permitted to approach. In all my intercourse with him in his office, in his phaeton, in his yacht, in his festive parlor she was never present, and he never spoke her name with one exception. He said she was " pleased with something that appeared in ' The Post ' (my paper), recently." He believed "it was about flowers." I said "it must be something about flower culture that ap- peared with which, as a writer, I had nothing to do." But, on reflection, I thought it might be the f ollowing trifle. And, in the very uncertain hope that it was so, I preserved it. After the lapse of many, many years, it was referred to the lady for recognition. And she wrote upon it : " It is the very same ; I recognized it at once." I present it here, as even the admirer of " The Fairy Queen " could reach down to its simple beauties. BCRPS AND R.QWERS. There are many beautiful birds and wild flowers in Europe that have not been transplanted into this western clime and probably would not flourish hero if they were. Of wild flowers, perhaps, the primrose is that which the voluntary exile misses most. Of birds, perhaps, the cuckoo. Burns has immortalized the daisy in his affecting and philosophical lines to one which he had crushed with his plowshare ; but we don't remember any especial ode to the primrose. It is incidentally mentioned very frequently and very honorably. " The daisy pied, and all the sweets the dawn of nature yields The primrose pale, and violet blue, lay scattered o'er the fields," Is a couplet of one of the finest songs in the Irish and English languages for it is in both. And " Her modest looks the cottage might adorn, Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn," * Note by the lady. "She did not her friend must have been scarcely beyond boyhood at the time referred to." OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 11 Is one of ths most exquisite images in Goldsmith's exquisite poem of " The Deserted Village." But of birds the cuckoo comes up with all the vivid recollectons of leafy copses green, sunny glades and tinkling waterfalls our schoolboy days our truant wanderings, when the young spirit, fresh from its Maker, deemed the earth one boundless paradise. The following " Ode " has one fault. It is far, by far too short. We have not seen a reprint of it in this country, and had to fish it out of a collection printed in England : ODE TO THE CUCKOO. Hail ! beauteous stranger of the wood, Attendant on the spring ! Now heaven repairs thy vernal seat, And woods thy welcome sing. Soon as the daisy decks the green, Thy certain voice we hear ; Hast thou a star to guide thy path, Or mark the rolling year ? Delightful visitant ! with thee I hail the time of flowers, When heaven is filled with music sweet Of birds among the bowers. The schoolboy wandering in the wood, To pull the flowers so gay, Starts, thy curious voice to hear, And imitates thy lay. Boon as the pea puts on the bloom, Thou fly'st the vocal vale ; An annual guest in other lands, Another spring to hail. Sweet bird ! thy bower is ever green, Thy sky is ever clear ; Thou hast no sorrow in thy song, No winter in thy year. O ! could I fly, I'd fly with thee ; We'd make, with social wing, Our annual visit round the globe, Companions of the spring. Among my singularities was one that would not recognize the customs of society in their rigid exclusions. I spoke of this, one time to my friend, and was reminded " that the cus- tom was not at all unreasonable. That intercourse on purely business or public grounds was one thing. And social rela- 12 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTUEYJ tions were quite another thing." And so they are, and so they must be and ought to be, so long as great inequality exists in condition, culture, and taste. Is it not the mission of a Republic to level up that inequality ? The rigid exclu- sion of myself in this instance was justified, and helped per- haps, by what I am now going to relate. It was in the large hall of the old mansion. A plainly dressed lady was ascending the high, wide staircase. My idea of the mistress of that mansion of her external adorn- ments was very grand and very erroneous. It was the house of a millionaire, and I therefore mistook this lady for the housekeeper so neatly, so unpretentiously was she dressed. She paused for a moment to reply to an inquiry brusquely modulated on my habit of speech and my mistaken impres- sion. Nature, indeed, never did intend me for the drawing- room. She had rougher work for me to do through life. And now, as always, my rough mission was in my voice : The voice that replied was the most extraordinary voice I ever heard ! It has been truly said that never was, never will be, musical instrument made to approach that divine instrument the human voice. How did I feel that truth now, in contrast with my own discordant brusquerie ! May I to that contrast ascribe the fact that I never heard that voice again? An American lady requires no court teaching to inspire and protect her dignity. I relate this frankly, because I am not at all ashamed of it, or the slight to myself that it implies. " Honor and shame from no conditions rise ; Act well your part there all the honor lies." My " part " was to swing a heavy axe in a forest of trees that "brought forth evil fruit." I by no means regret the " part " thus assigned to nie, though I do regret the rough- ness it entailed upon me, and the consequent exclusion from the social refinements, which I trust, in the coming days, all men of worth and manhood will be permitted to enjoy. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 13 As illustrative of this subject, and showing how this same *' Society " tends to mistake tinsel for gold, I recall Mr. Col- lins, who so effectually aided me on entering public life. In rather "looped and windowed" garments, and unencumbered feet, we rivaled off the prizes in our parish school. With a .zeal and sacrifice that descended to pauper* depths, he achieved a classical education and a position on the London press. He had written himself into it by extreme denuncia- tions of his country and his countrymen. Ireland, with him Avas a grand appendage or Appanage of the British Crown. " It would be of great value if submerged for twenty-four hours under the ocean, to clear it of its existing inhabitants." His tastes, manners, habits, could not have been more refined if they had descended to him from the far back centuries. On his relatives he turned his back, bluntly and utterly. He had one brother and one sister. Their little paternal spot of ground had been taken from them by the all present, ever voracious " landlord." Out of his five weekly guineas he could have spared them one ; but he wanted all for his own selfish requirements. His sister had no means of life but domestic service her requital little more than one dollar per month ! "What became of her I never knew ; but his brother, a very simple and very good natured boy, grew to be a man, and shifting to get a job of labor work round the docks of Glas- gow, he fell into the water and was drowned. It was the nature of this man to take one extreme. It was mine to take the other. I have a thought that he was by no means a better mail than myself, and yet he would be accepted where all men of my own stamp would be excluded perhaps reason- ably excluded from "society." The inequalities of con- dition are full of discords. In a rational state of society, those inequalities will be greatly both lessened and smoothed * The " Poor'Scholar " was then, probably still is, a fixed institution in parts of Ireland. Aspiring to become a priest he gets education for nothing, and no family will turn him away from from its door. 14 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTTJBY J down. I quote this example as a protest against them, as they exist now, and must exist, in what we call "Civilization." "English Civilization ! " Where is the rack-renting " lord or lady " whose character or civilization will stand a moment's comparison with the indigenous American civilization here dimly outlined? The liveries, crowns, coronets, and coats of arms that ye are hankering after! What are they but the insignia of the ruffians who persisted in murdering your fathers through a seven years' war, to enslave them. I do not say that every one of you who shows a panel, or a cockade, or a livery button on the street, would have sided with the British had you lived in the days of the Eevolution ; but does not such base conduct lay you open to the imputation ? The gentleman, whose character I have essayed to out- line, is now beyond human blame or praise. Years before I interchanged a thought with him, this incident fastened my attention on him. Place, what is now Broadway and First Street; time, the summer of 1840. I am standing with the landlord of the Kings County Hotel. "Who," I ask, "is that noble-looking young man on the opposite sidewalk?" "That is * * *, the best Democrat in Long Island!'' "Democrat! I thought he was a Whig. I know the old gentleman, his father is, for I have met him at their public meetings." " You misapprehend me. The young gentleman is not a Democrat in the political sense of the word. On the contrary, he is a Whig in a slight way, but the path of poli- tics is a little too crooked for him. He is too honorable to have anything to do with them. He is content, in a private way, to help those who may be worthy of his help, and many a one who is not worthy of it. That is why I call him the best Democrat on Long Island. He is certainly the most generous and open-hearted gentleman within its borders." I left reflecting seriously on what I had heard. It was, indeed, matter for grave thought. Here is a cause that re- tires the best men in the country from the government of OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 15 the Republic. And can the Republic be well governed ex- cept by just such men ? It was indeed a solemn thought. It disclosed a deadly evil that must from its very nature apply everywhere. Politics, politicians, had established sway, not only in * * * *, but over the whole Republic, and their evil influences must necessarily pervade all its gov- ernments from the highest to the lowest. No man of true honor venturing near it to turn it aside. How little do we know of the good or the evil that lies before us ! How could I deem that this young man of such aristocratic presence, of such strange and exceptional char- acter, would at a future time understand, accept, sustain me, adopt every vital Reform that was presented to him and endeavor long and continuously to avert the wreck and the degradation which this, book will present, and which is briefly epitomized in the close of this chapter. To that now let us turn. OUR NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS. How well in the experience of forty years has the ominous truths enfolded in these lines been realized in this Republic. The young disease that must consume at length, Grows with its growth and strengthens with its strength, till we see that everything good is neglected and everything evil done or permitted. Why is this? Simply because there is no government in the United States. No Constitution no law. Nothing but bargain and sale and scramble. Public virtue never thought of the very name an obsolete word. What led to this state of things and what would remedy it ? is the business of this American section to disclose. Let us take a close view of the system and see how it WOEKS IN DETAIL. And first of City Govern- ment as it comes under my personal observation. A Police Justice is to be elected. Our Alderman is popular. He intro- duces an utter stranger. " Mr. So and So is my cousin. He is a good Democrat and will make a good Justice. " Sweeping round the District they go together especially to the public houses treating everybody. " Mr. So and So" is 16 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; 4 'caucused" and elected though few voting for him ever saw him before. He turns out to be a haunter of groggeries ; oftener with two black eyes than one. Fines are his daily harvest all returnable to the city treasury under oath, but never one of them returned. Example Has thirteen men and boys arrested for bathing outside of his jurisdiction. Two of them appeal to a jury trial and beat him in. his own court. Eleven he fines twenty shillings each and goes on several " drunks " with the proceeds. A street lamp is put up worth about $25. Its price is assessed at $72 on each side of the block (street), in all $144. The owner on one side pays. The other side owner refuses. His property is advertised, sold, and must be redeemed at a gross charge of $113 for one-half of the $25 lamp 1 Sewers cost $1 or $1.50 per foot. Assessed at $4 $2 on each side of the street. Pay that, or your pro- perty will be auctioned, and then pay more for permission to connect the house pipes with it than would build it in the new. Leased ground for site of stable. Manure " ordinanced " to be kept in a covered box. Stable owner neglects to close the lid and the man who leased the site is dragged four miles to court and fined $5. Asks why not pursue the stable owner? Answer. " The law authorizes us to take either, and we choose to take you" having a dislike to you. Lease a house for a term of years. The water pipes go wrong and you are summoned and fined al- though you had no power to enter the house at all save as a trespasser. That, too, for the same " dislike." There is a Board of Works and a Board of Health. The Board of Works wants to " raise the wind." Gives orders to cut connection between all yard hydrants and water closets. Penalty $50. A rush is made for thousands of permits at 75 cents each. If too late in responding you are favored by being let off by a fine of $5 or $10 instead of the " lawful" $50. Ensues a war between the two " Boards." The Health wins, and then another change on the hydrants and another expense. Across vacant lots is a near diagonal rural-like pathway. " Ordinanced" to fence up and let the walkers go round. If not done immediately vote- wallopers employed to do it, who cheat in work and material the charge assessed on the owners. New fences disappear for firewood. Again ordered rebuilt another small job for the vote-walloppers. Commence on your own ground to dig a cellar. Aro arrested, liable to fine ; must go miles under durance to get a permit fined or not at pleasure, and as you may or may not have political influence. Tenement houses are a perrenial harvest to the municipal rogues. Law formed like a net-work meshes to catch in every quarter. I am favored with seventeen summonses at once every one of them ominous of a $50 fine. General Crooke interposes and says : " I am this man's friend and will defend those suits." The General was a "power " the suits are withdrawn, and the haul missed of seventeen times $50. I speak of the city of Brooklyn, where I reside. In it are jails, arsenals, cells, court-rooms, etc. Everything but a public hall. Even the school- houses are shut against meetings and lectures. OE, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 17 An out-Ward " Improvement Association " is formed by the vultures in the City Hall. They call a " Champagne Supper " and discuss what way is best to go to plunder. They actually project a Sewer for miles across an open country of farm lands. Kush up to Albany and for a comparative trifle buy a lav/ authorizing them to construct it at a cost of 300,000 and levy the same off the miles of farm lands. No opposition few of those affected know about it. An offer to build it is already in at the $300,000, but $600- 000 would give more plunder, so they go to Albany to buy authority to that effect. Resistance is made, principally by myself. Public meetings, and remonstrances, but all only avail to reduce the $600,000 to $500,000. The swindlers return to Albany the next session and buy a law for an additional $125,000.- More of this hereafter. A boy makes a doggerel rhapsody on a Fire Company. By their means he- is elected County Su pervisor. A contract is made to build an armory, and this boy who never grew to mental manhood is made chairman of the Mili- tary Committee. He interpolates, forges, $10,000 extra into the written contract. General Crooke, twenty odd years a Supervisor, exposes the fraud, but finally gives way and suffers it, as the board is weightily against him. He had saved the county hundreds of thousands, but had to give way occa- sionally, as he informed me, otherwise he could do no good at all. Like our friend Johnson at X&maU i " He never ran away except when running, Was nothing but a valorous kind of cunning/* But the Brooklyn Bridge was the happiest thought of all. It is a perreniaP plunder. Where it will end it would be vain to conjecture. Our Police are by far the most conscientious men connected with our gov- ernment. As we proceed, it will bo seen that every man of them is clothed^ with the right (or impunity) to kill any man he may choose, and yet one in a- hundred of them does not exercise the privilege. Here followed names prominent in political fraud. But on reflection I omit them. I have no personal war with these wretched men. Victims of a mistaken system of a tempta- tion that knows no bounds they are far less guilty than they are unfortunate. If we take that temptation away we change the whole aspect of the Republic. If we fail to do that, by no power under Heaven can the Republic be saved. A Street Car Corporation gets an illegal grant from the Common Councir of five miles of street worth several millions of dollars. The bribe to each Councilman is $1,000, with $500 that he is to distribute among his friends. to " talk it up." The briber approaches the Councilman in this way : " I give you this $1,500 as a personal favor to yourself. We have already plenty of votes. It will go through the Board whether you take the money or not." 18 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; So he takes the money and the road goes into operation. One man, onr oldest and most influential citizen, resists it at law. Not one taxpayer in the city stands by him and he very properly lets go and lets the poltroons suffer. Large tax on this road left unpaid except, perhaps, a little hush money, A condition, too, is that it shall keep the cobble-stone pavement in repair. But big sugar-refinery trucks are wearing it up. " Rail " and " Sugar " join hands, and for an " unknown consideration" the city sovereigns give them a new unwearing pavement, costing $30 a running foot, assessed on the people who owned and had already paved the streets. Mistaken charges in tax accounts are a profitable thing. Up go notices that, under no circumstance, will money paid be returned. Illegal notices to be sure ; but they serve their purpose. Again, you pay a tax. By some hocus-pocus, it is not entered on the books. Years after, you sell the pro- perty. On search, the paid tax is found unrecorded. If you have preserved the receipt, in all your migrations, you are safe. If not, the tax is extorted again, before you can give' a title for what you have sold. Knowing they would be robbed, the people of Brooklyn voted three times against the introduction of water. But leading " Democrat," H. C. M., and leading "Whig," J. B. T., put their heads together and went to Albany. One had the " Democrats " at his back; the other, the "Whigs." So they forced the water on the city, the water tax furnishing a continual margin of place and plunder. A panic cry is raised, and a Reservoir pro- jected miles away. Money sunk in it by the million all unnecessary most of it stolen. A Collector, like all other officials, must be a politician. He embezzles, defaults, steals. Suits are entered against his sureties, who are also politi- cians. Not the slightest thought of recovering one dollar from them. But won't the Corporation lawyers make a penny ? And after years of sham litigation, a motion is made in the Common Council, suit discontinued and sureties discharged, being all brothers, all intertwisted political thieves. A Park is projected. Only go up to Albany, and get (for a " consideration ") boundless authority to buy the land, and the work, and the materials, and assess on local property, or on the city, to pay the cost. Then begins the harvest of plunder. I will buy your land at a fabulous value, to be agreed on between us, each to get a share of the spoils. Who shall trace how the ten millions went probably three-fourths a swindle. And now, yearly, a plunder crop of $100,000 for taking care of the park. All fines in the Police Courts belong to the city treasuiy. One justice pays in, the other three do not. The paying justice is thrown overboard by the caucus at the next election, just because he was an honest man because he did not keep the fines, and give round a part of them. Liquor sellers, kerosene sellers, cartmen, truckmen, all must pay licenses to a very large aggregate amount all goes into the vortex of roguery. An Arrears Clerk, is in the Collector's office. He makes out the arrear bills, and whistles three-fourths of his time. An Arrears Department is OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 19 instituted with a head, at $4,000, who does almost nothing and has a crowd of assistants to help him, each from $800 to $1,500 a year. In the City Courts, what justice can you expect, when each Judge, with his $10,000 a year, appoints a crowd of henchmen, at $4 a day, with little to do, and that little belonging to the overcrowded Police department. Juries, too, are a grim farce, as wo shall see. A Board of Assessors, each at $4,000 a year. Its business is to extort as much tax as possible. They go so close as to charge $12 a year for water on a rear shanty, where there is neither water nor inhabitant. The owner pays the fraud for years, then throws down the shanty to escape from it. The general tax has risen from $1 to $3.50 a year on all property, produc- tive or unproductive. But the aggregate of thieves ciy " more, more." So they add 25 per cent, to the valuations already far higher than tho average values in the State thus making the tax solidly 4) per cent. And tho ' 'appeal- ing to heaven," genius, who invented this roguery, is rewarded by a school superintendency, at $5,000 a year.* Above and apart from all those rogueries,. the piling up of debt went on steadily. The city is now in two districts. In '74 the debt of the Western district (containing 300,000 inhabitants) was $35,000,- 000, being about $110 per capita ; whilst the debt of London per capita, in the same year, was $7.93. And the worst symptom connected with all this is the sluggish, stultified apathy of the men who pay the taxes, and whose property is pledged for this debt. Efforts, from time to time, were made to stem this flood of cor- ruption ; but it will be seen, as we proceed, that there was only one man of means and property that ever lent aid to those efforts. Need I name that honorable man? STATE GOVEENMENT. Up till a late date, the pay of a New York legislator was $3 a day. It cost an average of $500 to secure his election. The loss of his work at home was equal to $2 a day. His expense, if he lived decently in Albany, was $3 to $4 a day. As public virtue is not even simulated, his presence in the capitol was conclusive evidence that he was a political rogue. And a promising market lay before him. On an average, more than a thousand bills come before the session. Few of them did not aim at plunder of some kind, and they had to buy their way into law. If the legislator did not remunerate himself for all his outlay, and go home with a little fortune, he was " behind the times." Thurlow Weed was quite a liberal broker in this business " How much did you get for that last vote ?" " Only so much !" " It was too * Those Assessors had each $4,000 a year beside what they could make by com- promising (colluding) with large property owners. They were sham Democrats. The sham Republicans naturally wanted to get their places. So up they go to Albany and jet a scratch from the sovereign thieves enthroned there legislating the present Board out and seven sham Republicans in. The outs to still retain their salaries till the end of their appointed term. Thus were all the patriots reconciled to their lot. 20 Tin: ODD BO-JK cr TEE NiNErEENTH CENTOI-LY; little, John. Take this $100, and it will make you well enough." John was a Willianisburgh man, and he made no secret of Thurlow's " fair dealiug.' r Thus stimulated, the thing called " legislation " has in New York State run up to more than a thousand Acts in every session. Patch upon patch. Thus (I transcribe). "An Act to amend, an Act entitled, an Act to amend the several Acts relating to the Board of Emigration." A turnpike or the bridge on Long Island is sure to have a steal in it, and it must have the consent of the honorable members from the interior county. He knows and cares nothing about it. But he has paid five hundred or a thousand for his election. He will take you in hand and the first inquiry is, " how much money's in it ?" Such an aspect is the chronic disease. But the cure is quite simple. A revision of the Constitution that will confine State Legis- lation to things affecting the whole State, and to be paid for out of the State tax. All local improvements remitted under Constitutional regulation to those who will have to pay for them. All corporations business and muni- cipal to form themselves under well defined constitutional conditions. Thus might come a legislative session of ten days and ten or a dozen Acts, instead of a hundred days and ten hundred Acts. But a far greater reform than that is imperative, which shall be shown as we proceed. New York City had grown famous (or infamous) in its robberies. Then existing was the New Court House and the Tweed dynasty. Brooklyn was, still more so, and why should not Albany go in for a share ? So the press is set to howl about the greatness of the State and the littleness of the State Capitol. And to work they go, and throw away ten millions on a building, the chief merit of which is that it is so badly constructed that it imperils the lives of the aggregated roguery. Byron must have been thinking of these villainies when he wrote : "All that the mind would shrink from of excesses, All that the body perpetrates of bad, All that wo see, hear, read, of man's distresses,. All that the devil would do if run stark mad. All that defies the worst that pen expresses, All with which hell is peopled or as bad, Is here let loose." STATE THIEVERY STATE CANALS. In the Constitution it is ordered that a certain portion of the tolls be laid aside annually to pay off their cost. Canal Commissioners succeed each other now sham Democrats now sham Republicans. Instead of so apply- ing the tolls, they steal $6,000,000 additional, and the degraded newspapers suggest that, as both parties had a hand in it, neither party is to blame. And instead of repudiating the securities forged and sold by the Commis- sioners, and putting the forgers in State Prison, the only question pre- sented to the paper-ridden people, is whether will we pay off the $6,000,000 by an added tax, or fund it at legal interest ? [A STRAY LEAF PUT IN PLACE.] THE GREAT ERROR. " What great events from trifling causes spring. " Before I proceed an inch further in this section I hold It a ;sacred duty to vindicate "The Republic." Not the Republic con- cealed and dishonored by rogues, as it now stands forth in the United States, but the pure, living principle of Republican Government as it was accorded to us from On High ! A principle that can no more be affected by the corruption of men or of a nation, of a day or of a century, than the sun is extinguished by a passing cloud that hides his effulgence temporarily from the earth. One omission, apparently the most trivial, made at the founding of the Republic, led to all the public evils that now exist in the United States. As I would hasten to justify a dear friend from evil imputation that might be falsely cast upon him, so do I hasten to the vindication of that Heaven-ordained principle, Republican Government. As standing half a point out of her course will plunge the ship into the breakers, so the omission of a half a dozen lines from the Con- stitution has brought the Republic of the United States to the over- hanging verge of ruin. Lines like these : "Federal Taxationshall be limited to 50 cents per capita of the pop~ ulation ; * local taxation to 50 cents per $100 on a standing valuation of the property taxed. No estate in land shall exceed 100 acres. Public Debt in any of its forms shall not be created." Instead of restraint like this, the Republic virtually made pro- clamation ' ' Hear ye ! Hear ye ! All shrewd, active, unprincipled men, ye are wanted to govern the new Republic ; but you must govern constitu- tionally. The privileges accorded to you, and the restraints imposed on you, are thus set forth in the Constitution of the Nation and of the several States to wit : " You shall have no power to take away from the citizen his vote, or his musket, or his freedom of speech, or of the press, or of petition, or of public meeting. But " You shall have power to create whatever offices you please, fill them as you please with yourselves and your friends perform their duties or leave them unperformed, as you please fix whatever * Indeed, tax would not bo wanted at all in a wisely governed country. The action of this nation's currency would furnish fifty millions a year, as shown toward the end of this book. [A STRAY LEAF PUT IN PLACE.] amount of salaries you please, and for whatever money you may re- quire you can draw on the public, and the public engage to pay it over to you, whatever the amount may be, but on this imperative condition that you shall CALL IT TAX ! ' ' You may take the liberty to deed away to yourselves or others the real estate of the nation, and to bond the people thereof and their children. But you must call the deeds ' Patents of the United States,' and you must register the bonds, and call it a bonded debt. You can sell these bonds, and do with the money whatever to you may seem good." This is the exact substance, the distinct and definite condition pro- claimed by the Eepublic at the commencement of its life. The Con- stitution did not proclaim it in those exact words, but this was its exact meaning, and the shrewd, unscrupulous -men were not long in finding it out. The power thus conferred made its attraction felt, less or more, in the very first elections that took place in the He- public. And it grew with every succeeding election, and the steal- ings, at first taken timidly, slender in amount and covered up in their mode, increased with a progression that outstripped the most wild estimates that were thought possible, of which this book will present the most astounding examples. And is this any proof of defect or evil in Republican Institutions ? No ! If men rob in the name of Religion, is that a proof of evil in Religion itself? Another crime of appalling nature and magnitude was an inevit- able concomitant of this great primary vice. From a conclave of such men, met to legislate, bad laws flowed forth as naturally as im- pure waters from a putrid fountain.* Inefficient and corrupt ad- ministration of the laws was another necessary Qutflow from the same impure source. But above all these crimes and impurities unapproached by their dishonor the soul of Republicanism has its home in the sky, ready to descend to us and protect and bless us the moment we show wisdom and courage. With stupidity and cowardice the Republic will never dwell. * In New York City the police arrest and imprison men and women for sitting on the benches of the Battery Park of a.sultry afternoon in August. Of a Sunday afternoon in October they swoop through a whole street, and arrest the men and women they find sitting on their stoops or standing on their sidewalk. The word of ti single politician policeman is sufficient proof that they are "all bad characters or idle persons," and the politician Bencher sends them to prison from two weeks to six months. No crime ia even imputed to them ! And is this law? "Aye, marry, is't? Crowner's quest law ! " OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 21 NATIONAL GOVERNMENT. From the central fountain at Washington corruption radiates over the whole land. Cabinet, Congress, Departments, Army, Navy, Diplomacy, Custom House, Patent Office all, in short, is corruption, and this is not the place to go into the endless details. From stealing hundreds of millions in lands and dollars, down to the pettiest theft,* nothing is too heavy to lift up, nothing too little to stoop down to. For at this centre are the Collective, picked and chosen Political Swindlers the upfloated scum of the whole corrupt, fermenting heap. Well might Judge Black defy the Senate to con- vict the place seller, Belknap. " If you do if his be a crime you convict every man in office President and all down." I will not here enter upon the judicial murders perpertrated by the Penn- sylvania Courts Pennsylvania, where it seems the worst and wickedest politicians are twisted together. Nor the unheard of tortures committed in our prisons everywhere, because without date and evidence no man would believe them. Those dates, incentives, and evidences will appear in due place as wo proceed. As will also the villainies committed gen- erally by the Courts and Legislatures. But here I may quote Mr. Windom, our Secretary of the Treasury, on the nature of our Associated Press. In speaking of Corporations here is what he says : " In order to lay deep and sure foundations for the maintenance of their power they have now seized upon the channels of thought. Look at it a moment. One man, who controls more miles of railroad than any other in the world, now also controls the telegraphic system of the United States and Canada, and is (as I learn) also the owner of three out of the seven news- papers which constitute the Associated Press, through the agency of which the news is distributed over the entire country. He may at any time secure * Another ;7ie other and myself applied for a parent of submarine propeller for steamships. Model, drawing and 20 for cavtat. Patent refused, because the principle was published in an untranslated French book. They cheated us out of the ten dollars, thalf price of the caveat , returnable to us by law. Applied again and again for it, and -were again and again met by lying excuses, but no money. Neither wa* it strange. Every mah in that office was a picked-out politician, and all politicians go into busi- ness to make what they can. About this time Nelson, M. C. from Brooklyn, brought up a bill to charge $500 for each patent. I sent a comment on this villainy to the Tri- bune. It suggested that at one point in every county, there should be an " Inventor's Room," attached to the shop of an intelligent carpenter who would furnish tools, ma- terials, and handicraft instructions to inventors. That at fixed periods competent judges should visit those invention traps, and see what they had caught. Horace so far approved of this as to give it Leader prominence. But the subject fell to the ground. Since that time I improved this submerged propeller, and invented a means of dis- charging coal barges in a few minutes avoiding the shoveling and hoisting now in use, and facilitating the coaling of steamships. I projected a means of saving life on Railroads of which as we proceed but I never approached the Patent Office again ^ partly through my natural repugnance, to hold intercourse with political thieves, and partly because I had no money to risk, where experience taught me I would be pretty SK-re to lose it. 22 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; the fourth paper, which will give him absolute control over the news which the people shall receive. What opportunity will there be then for a fair dis- cussion of these questions ? The daily news supplied to the myriads of newspapers must first pass under the supervision of one or two men who represent the Associated Press. They will have full authority, and doubtless will be required to suppress, add to, or color the information thus sent out ag may best serve the interest, the ambition, or the malice of the man to whom they owe their places. Hence the twenty millions of people who read their morning papers at their breakfast tables will daily receive just such impressions as this one man shall choose to give them." A gentleman lecturing in Chicago on " The Press," understands this sub- ject. He states that "eight thousand newspaper proprietors, with their twenty-thousand writers, possess a power over the destinies of the Repub- lic that they could not abdicate, even if they would." He hopes they will awaken to a sense of their responsibility. What is written here is a mere meagre indication of the actual condition the nature and the volume of corruption that is now submerging the Re- public. But thence let no man conclude that Republican government is a failure ; far from it. The discovery of those evils lead us up directly to THE CAUSE that produced them, and thus points out the way to their removal. That cause is the UNBOUNDED POWER TO TAX, left open in the Constitutions. The whole wealth of the nation left an unprotected prey, and " where the carcass is, there will the vultures be gathered together." Now if the young men of the nation don't see this, or if the young women don't box their ears and make them see it, there is no other power under the Almighty Power that can save the Republic. As we proceed, this book will show one solitary example of the extent to which individual virtue could and did resist the corruption. It will also show the more effectual though less trying example of one honorable man,keeping entirely away from it, and teaching, by his repeated and repeated efforts, a lesson without which this book had never been written. Those efforts, with the Great Truths they embraced, will be unfolded in the pages that lie before us. Again ; I pray may the Divine Power inspire the young men of the Re- public to take that lesson to heart, and emulate that chivalrous example ! We have seen the horrors born of British Civilization by the sword. We have seen a sample of American Civilization born of civic swindling. But the main object now is to indicate the true indigenous Civilization that has been vainly attempting to take its natural place in the Republic. Through a record of years will be shown the continuous effort thus made to drive out the vicious and false, and oring in the true and virtuous. So far, that endeavor has only realized the ominous lines " Truths would you teach, and save a sinking land, All fear, none aid you, and few understand." But the example is left, and unfolds a true Future to the Republic, Will the young untainted manhood of the country take hold of it ? Will it be OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 23 their high destiny to wrest the Republic from the clutch of the criminal pol- iticians ? Will they drive out the false and bring in the true? Will they be the medium of au inspiration from On High ? Let us hope so. " Hope springs eternal in the human breast." Turn we now to the serious work of this section. KETBOSPECT. The assumption by the British Parliament to tax the Col- onists the Stamp Act and its reception the discontents and resistances even to the burning of Revenue vessels the snowballing in Boston the orders to have those accused of treason sent over to be tried in the English Courts the Boston Tea Party the raid of Major Pitcairn on Lexington and Concord, and the commencement of the war are all promi- nent in the abridged Histories. But the earlier causes that led to the Revolution are not brought out prominently. The Colonists not only bore the brunt of the old French War, but they undertook to meet most of the debt which was a result of it. Up to that time it was not considered worth while to tax them. This gave a hint which the voracity of the British Boroughmongers took hold of. Long previous to this the Colonial governments had issued a much needed paper currency and loaned it on mortgage to individuals. It was based on the mortgage and the stamp of the government gave it currency. From this source the Colonial treasury was greatly benefited by the in- terest accruing on the mortgage bonds. But the British Parliament abrogated this right and compelled the with- drawal of the money, and that involved a foreclosure of the mortgages, and was both a public and a private wrong that caused discontent, growing into disloyalty. And records like the following well might also cause discontent. In 1718 the Indians, some twelve thousand strong, took attitude to defend their lands from " Patentees " who claimed them under grants from the Crown. The Governor marched on their great Camp with 1,200 muskets. There were no politician Post-traders in those days to furnish rifles and am- munition. So bows and tomahawks had to succumb. But not till a full third of the white men were killed or wounded. This was in the Carolinas. 24 TEE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUKY J The " Royal Patentees," though claiming the lands from which the Indians were thus expelled would pay no part of the debt resulting from the war. The legislature therefore sold the land. " The terms offered," says the Historian (How- ard Hinton) " were favorable, and five hundred Irish families came and planted themselves on the frontier." But the " Royal Patentees " deprived those settlers of their lands. Some perished from want. Others fled to Northern Colonies. " And thus," continues the Historian, " a strong barrier was removed and the country exposed to the incursions of the savages. Thus did the great curse that drove those people from their native land meet them and murder them on what they vainly hoped to be their adopted home." Half a point from her course will plunge a ship into the breakers. The spark from a tobacco pipe burnt Chicago to the ground. The omission of a few lines in the present Con- stitutions has brought this Republic to the very edge of ruin. How this half point was mistaken, and our Ship of State driven on the breakers, it is one object of this book to un- fold. One other object is to show how that ship may be rescued before she becomes a total wreck. The murderous war of the Revolution is over. John Adams succeeds Washington in the Presidency. He keeps what is called a "Republican Court," and already public parasites flock around him. He and they accomplished the "Alien and Sedition Laws," and most unfortunately by a bare majority of two votes, planted the germ of a Navy. Greedy profitmongers of America, following the example of England, sail over the world in 'pursuit of gain, instead of developing their vast home resources. To protect them in their outsailing greed, we get into a war with the Barbary pirates, in which large numbers of our most promising youth perish the moiiarchs of Europe looking on whilst we fought the battle which should be fought by themselves. Those profitmongers aiid this navy involved us, too, in a second murderous war with England. Tens of thousands of our people are slaughtered, and our cities burned in this war. All brought on us by the vagabondizing profitmongers who could have worked more profitably even for themselves at home. "An unnecessary and disgraceful war," (says Howard Hinton), and he adds, " the more detestable when contem- plated as a series of human sacrifices for the preservation of a OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 25 Commercial system" This same Navy, and for the same " de- testable " purpose, now costs us seventeen to twenty millions a year, and the (45th) Congress made good a stealing of six millions committed in its Department in Washington. A twin monster is the standing arm}?, the twins consuming between them far over a million a week, keeping 150,000 citi- zens working every day in the year to support them. The rnessroom a first-rate hotel the cabins redolent of ori- ental luxury the soldier and the sailor on coarse, meagre allowance and scanty pay. Cheated and even murdered by the officers with impunity. * Congressmen, that is to say corrupt politicians, name cadets to West Point for the army to An- apolis for the navy. " Common people " admissible only to the rank of " petty officers." Diplomatists to complicate us with foreign powers, deplete the Treasury, and import cargoes of Royalist snobbery themselves and their long tail of idle secretaries and attaches. The latest duty assigned to them, is to gather statistics of how little the European worker can make out to starve upon. And this to prepare the American workman to be assimilated to the same condi- tion. A custom house filling the land with smuggling and per- jury, levying probably three dollars from the people, andreturn- ing one to the government. Practically allowing our snob mil- lionaires to import what they please from Europe in their re- turn trunks. And by a recent order the securities of smug- gling merchants are suffered henceforth to go scot free. Land monopoly, Mine monopoly, Banks and Debts, imitating England in all her villainies, and exceeding her in not a few. MY FIRST EXPERIENCE. 1840. Landed. It is night, and I am returning from a hotel with refreshments to my wife, who is sick in the cabin of the vessel. A sheet of water lies between me and the ship, and I hail a professional boatman to push me across. He will "for a shilling." All I have is a sixpence, which I offer him. He refuses, not knowing it is English, and while negotiating a voice sings out, " Coine around this way and you can step aboard." I did. It w^is emblematic of what I should encounter in the country. Hardness from the pro- * Facts, figures and dates as we proved. 26 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J fessionals (politicians), help and kindness from the non-pro- fessionals the uncorrupted citizens. The country was staggering up out of the financial pros- tration of '36. There is more merchant business done now in one street or half a street than was then done in the whole city. Brooklyn had only 20,000 inhabitants. The materials for the City Hall lay around in fragments, and there was no habitable house outside of Pierrepont Street at Fulton. What is now the Eastern District, with its 200,000, had only 5,000 people. Aided by loans on some fragmentary silver and gold trinkets, I got rooms. Found employment from the agent of that able periodical, the Democratic Review, to canvass for subscribers. But the concern was so poor that Mr. Webster had to borrow from his grocer on Saturday night the little I had earned, and so the employment left me. I wish some of the misguided men who are now driving the Kepublic to ruin could have a little of my experience at that time. It was worse than my trials in Liverpool ten years before. Then I had only myself to take care of. Now I had a little family, and to return to them night after night from a vain search for employment (any employment I would have worked at, pick or spade, or anything), was a trial which words cannot describe. It is the middle of April, and a driving snow storm fills the street. Indian meal and molasses furnished our unvaried fare, and after breakfast " Surely you are not going out in that tempest," said my wife. " Surely I am," was the reply. " The employment-coach may drive up some day, and I'll always keep on the road side to catch it." On that day I got my first hold on existence in the New World. Win. H. Colyer was a relative of the Harpers a clever, adventurous man, a re-printer of books, and an active Dem- ocrat. He ambitioned position in the party, and Williams- burgh was a Democratic village with a Whig paper passing for neutral Mr. Colyer made a partnership with me on liberal terms. He furnished all printing materials and two printers, and a page weekly of Master Humphrey's Clock (Little Nell) which he was then reprinting. My duty was to keep the books, and report and write for the paper, and make myself useful to the party. He also furnished me $5 a week til the business would begin to pay. Evidence of partnership for a year was deposited in the hands of a very conscientious man, a friend of his, named Fitzgerald. Oil, THE BPIKIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 27 HARD CIDER CAMPAIGN. And so on the 6tli of June, 1840, the Williamsurgh Demo- crat came out and " astonished the natives," under the con- trol of a man supposed to know little of American affairs \ being only three months in the country. But the Hard Cider campaign had just commenced, and there was no time to stand upon trifles. I thought the Democrats the embodiment of public virtue, and I did not like the exhibition of stuffed owls, coon skins, toy cider barrels and miniature log cabins as political arguments. They were employed however at the instigation of Horace Greeley, and as I learned against the will of the moderate Whigs under the rule of Thurlow Weed and Governor Seward.* I attacked their programme, but in a strain of good-natured sarcasm like this : " It cannot be denied that the Whigs, our opponents, are by far the best Whigs in the whole Republic. Their Log Cabin especially leaves compari- son far behind. Here's an indication of its history : * Whigs carried the nation. The emblematic log cabins built everywhere, the owls and coons, living and dead, everywhere paraded and made a great many people believe that Harrison was a Democrat in his habits of ' life. Doggrel verses helped them, such as " Go it for the cooney boys, Cooney in a cage ; Go it with a rush boys, Go it in a rage." Horace Greeley was appointed to promulgate their national campaign sheet, the " Log Cabin," and it astonished me very much that he would dare to belie the most recent History in making out a case against his oppo- nents. There could be no better political engineer than Horace. Another help to the Whigs at this campaign was the cold-blooded apathy which Pre- sident Van Buren had manifested whilst the Canadian officials of Victor! i were hanging to death American citizens who had crossed the line to h^lp the Patriots. It was a prevailing and not unreasonable opinion that Martin could by a quiet friendly word or two have saved all those lives. A word or two like this : " Our citizens have formed opinions on this matter. They have read the history of Lafayette coming to help us. I, too, could have made the matter hard for you by just giving a friendly wink to those desir- ing to cross the border. I didn't. I saved you from that danger. And I will be greatly obliged to you if you oblige me in return." But Martin didn't do anything like this, and doubtless it cost him thousands of votes. He was. indeed, an unworthy and unlike successor of General Jackson. At any rate he had to step down and out. I give one or two extracts from McKen- zi Almanac* which throws light on the blood-thirsty things that were done in those days. 28 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; OEDEB FKOM HEAD-QUAKTEBS, Juno 9th, 1840. Sir : you are requested to meet at Daniel Woods house to-morrow morn- ing, the committee to build the log cabin to proceed to woods of G-eii. John- son for the purpose of cutting timber." The March. In obedience to the above signal, the "Tippeys" mustered with rope in hand and axe over shoulder, and marched, executioner-like, to the groaning groves of the gallant, generous General. " Hewers of Wood" 'Tis noon. Each succeeding bang of the axe sends forth a succeeding rush of ciderated perspiration. Empty bottles are scat- tered round in exhausted, useless, corkless confusion. The cider, like them- selves, is exhausted. So they divide into two corps. One remaining " hewers of wood" the other commencing " drawers of water." Dull and muddy was the standing pool. Soft, swampy, and singularly slimy were its approaches. On moved the devoted bands plash in went the bubbling bottles as Ossian would say, " the frogs retreated to the darkness of their caves." Evening. The sun rolls its westering course. A mellow light floats upon the forest, tinges the hill tops, and bathes the yoke of oxen with a big log at their tails. Magnificent Vesper has drawn her transparent veil over the shadowy scene. A silvery radiance lights up the embattled clouds, the queen of night looks frern her balcony in the sky and beholds a pile of logs in the neighbourhood of Grand street. The Curtain Falls. Bepose has settled down upon the world sleep seals the eyes of the actors in this noble achievement a gentle snore takes posses- sion of their nostrils ; soft, salutary and gently sounding be your slumbers, O ! worthy successors of revolutionary sires ! The Raising. Another morn of blushing brightness has dawned upon the patriotic scene. Again the venturous "forlorn hope" is astraddle on the growing pile. Again rings the ponderous axe quivers the echoing trunk heavenward speeds their progress they are already eight feet from the earth they raise aloft the monumental crown a barber's pole, with an empty cider barrel at the top, emblematical of the head of their old General." At tlie dedication of tliis edifice I attended as a Reporter. No doubt the " dedicators " were as surprised to see me there, as I was when they hustled me out ! And yet there were real good fellows among them, as we shall see, though I didn't know it at the time. The most noisy leader in our opposing host was an English lawyer named " Temple Fay, Esq." Ho was very dark visaged, and his loquacity was unbounded, and in. all discussions I affected to believe that Templefay was a village which sent forth confused noises. The following doggerel b-rought me a good many subscribers : OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 29 " Ye Summer small birds thou will be " Fall " birds, Ye bees that bumble o'er the flowery spray, Ye winds that rattle and ye waves that battle Up and down the Biver and all thro' the bay ; Ye trembling treeses ye bustling breezes, Ye calves that stagger, and ye lambs that play- Be hushed your noises, be dumb your voices, Till I sing the praises of Templefay. It's aspect clear as the skies of midnight, When stars and moonlight are far away, It's brightness beaming no bushel-hid light To guide the Locofoco* on his way. Sometimes its " moonshine" would pass for sunshine, As o'er the waters it loves to play, Sometimes it deares you anon relieves you As song or silence seizes Templefay. 1 hour delightful when close of nightfall Brings brute and broker from work and play How sweet to float o'er, in ferry-boat o'er, And hear the throat f roar of Templefay. Ye ghouls of Wall Street, ye grubs of all streets Come forth, come all meet, by close of day For speculation to save the nation Catch inspiration from Templefay." Here was my audacity before I was quite three months in the country. I insert it to show that editors even daily editors have individual powe&jf they only choose to exercise it. TAKIFF! TAKIFF! "Unshackled in our opinions independent in the use of our quill we have placed the names of MARTIN VAN BUBEN and BICHABD M. JOHNSON at the head of this article not because we believe them to be infallible in their whole line of policy not because we claim inpeccability for the men of their appointment to office, seeing that they have only poor human nature to select from but because we believe that they are right in defending the most extensive and unshackled exercise of the Elective Franchise right because they would have the Public Treasury unconnected with Banks *7. e. a "locofoco" traveller one who journeys on his own two political legs. When the hold-back hunkers turned off the gas at a public meeting, the progressive bought loco-foco matches and lighted up with candles hence the name. 30 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY ; right because they would purge the currency, and not have us lie down at night with a sheaf of " money " in our desk, and find in the morning it has undergone a wonderful transmutation right because they would entrust the nation's safety to the unbought gallantry of her free sons, and not to the evolutions of a mercenary army right because they would preserve in- violate, but under the Constitution, the legislative supremacy of each State in all its own internal matters right because they would save us from the eternal pestilence of a National Debt right because they would steadily re- sist unproductive improvements and encourage the wholesome progress of Agriculture. For those principles and others growing out of them or similar to them, we support the present Administration, even though disapproving of their policy on the Tariff question; which disapproval WE HEBE AVOW, and shall take another occasion to defend and justify." I did so, but the article is lost. It likened the principle to a man trying to rear up an orchard on a bank of the ocean which the sea blast would not permit to grow. A high tariff was a wall to keep from our young Factories the sea-blast of cheap labor productions coming in from Europe. That was the truth as I saw it, and there was too much of the old Knights-errant in me to even keep silent on the subject. The leaders remonstrated with me, but let me have my own way another very strange fact in political warfare. But as soon as I found that we had unbounded public lands, I saw that there lay the true " protection," and I abandoned the tariff doctrine forevermore. Turned my face to the mercies of Nature and my back on the mercies of the Cotton Lords. The election is over. General Harrison is chosen. Fresh from the Chartist agitation and believing that the Demo- cratic Party to be all that it appeared to be, I had so acquit- ted myself in the "canvass" that Judge A. D. Soper, our "Association" Chairman, said this to me : "the New York Com- mittee has been republishing your campaign articles in the Sun and Planet. They think you will be more useful in a wider field, New York or Washington." Of course I was at their service, eagerly desirous to be as useful as I could. But after the turmoil of the election I had leisure to look around me, and I soon discovered that the amassing of a large fortune was very generally considered to be the end and aim of existence. The young man entering life was pointed to some "distinguished person" who had commenced life very poor and ended it very rich. Against this doctrine I was hardy enough to publish the following protest : OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 3l [I do not know whether this article brought mo under the notice of my life-long sustainer Mr. * * * . But I do know that the tenor of his life accorded with its suggestions.] AMBITION. " O ! Happiness ! our being's end and aim ; Good, pleasure, ease, content whate'er thy name Thou something art that prompts the eternal sigh, For which we bear to live, nor dread to die." POPE. " Human Ambition is nothing else than a longing after a splendid and exalted ' Happiness.' Developing itself in various forms, the goal of its hopes and efforts is still the same- -some bright eminence where happiness may be enjoyed in its highest and most sublime character. The philosophic mind, whilst noting the career of distinguished men, even without looking into its own feelings for instruction, easily discovers that the approval and admiration of our fellow-citizens imparts to the cup of human bliss its highest and most etherial zest. The Indian with his tomahawk, and the cizilized savage of scientific war, go forth, alike, in the hope of being hailed with loud homage on their victorious return. The philosopher, as he unravels the secret principles of Nature the mariner, as he explores the unknown deeps even the patriot heart that goes forth to bleed in the cause of his country all, all look forward to the moment when their toils and dangers shall be rewarded with the general approval of their brothers of humanity. "And of all the beneficent laws of Nature, this law is, or rather was intended to be : the most beneficent to man. This, the highest happiness of which our mortality would seem to be capable, was to be purchased only by such actions as would c^ll forth the approval of our fellows naturally expected to be good and virtuous actions. ' But how turned aside and perverted has been this law ! How conducive to man's misery and destruction has it been made ! ' In the ages of early barbarism,, the Chief who first repelled an invading foe was received, and deservedly so, with paens of applause on returning to his protected people. By an imperceptible transition, the same applause was awarded to his success when, instead of being the victorious defender, he became the ruthless aggressor. A louder fnmo hns ben 71 awarded to u 32 THE otoD SooK or THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; Alexander or a Napoleon than that which encircles the nathe of a Washing- ton or a Jackson. "But there is another kind of 'glory" another species of ambition which bids fair, ' like Aaron's serpent,' to swallow up the rest, "We allude to the ' glory ' which wealth imparts, and to the bastard, degenerate ambition which prompts to its accumulation. " We shall not go back to trace the times and the countries of oppression^ in which mere wealth found means to command the homage of the enslaved multitude. It is enough for us to state that in despotic Europe ' wealth ' has become synonymous with ' honor,' and ' poverty ' with ' disgrace.' " Here, too, we are fast verging to the same irrational and dangerous mistake. Here even in this Republic wealth is beginning to command an homage which by no means belongs to it and here, too, the attainment of a large fortune is held up to our youth as the ne plus ultra of human ambition. " In vain the Sacred Volume warns us that we ' cannot serve God and Mammon.' It is in vain that the ' camel ' and the ' needle's eye ' arc brought into contact to illustrate the wickedness, as common sense illustrates tho folly, of giving up our days to the accumulation of riches. The old wiU teach, and the young will learn that, a large fortune achieved, the princi- pal end of our existence is fulfilled. " But it is an error, and a grevious one let who will teach, and let who will learn it. Shall we compare the wretches who purchased the Roman Empire with their sordid millions to him whose earthly possession was seven acres of land? When the names of our Washington and our Jackson go down to posterity gathering a halo as they descend into future agci where will be found the names of John Jacob Astor and men of his kind? "We exhort the masses to beware of how they render tho semblance of homage to mere wealth. To virtue, benevolence and public spirit let just homage be paid; but let all attempts of men to arrogate to themselves respect, merely because they are rich, be met and repelled by public con- tempt and scorn. "Ambition!" Go like the noble bard and hold com- with a skull ' Look: at its broken arch, its ruined wall, Its chambers desolate, its portals foul ! Yet this was once Ambition's airy hall The dome of thought the palaco of the soul ! ' OB, -THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAY*. 66 "Away with all ambition that has not for its object the welfare of tlie human race!" I followed these articles with another, (which is lost), sug- gesting principles the adoption of w T hich would tend to prevent large accumulations. No Land or Mine Monop- oly. No public debts. Railroads made and operated by the people. Nothing in which to invest large wealth save mer- chandise that "moth or dust might corrupt or thieves break in and steal." This stirred up the Hunker leaders and notification was sent to me that I must not publish such principles for the time to come. They were not "Democratic" they said, "because they were not adopted by the Party. I suggested that they were essentially Democratic, and that the Party should adopt them or change its present name. At any rate they would get no "monopolizing" Democracy from me. 80 they took away the Party advertising (Sheriff's and other) and gave it to the Whig Star, there being only the two papers in the county. They also refused to pay me for what advertising I had done for them. And when I sued them they declared they would appeal it up, up to the highest court. I was unable to follow in such a flight, so I had to let it go. This discouraged my partner. He had two young men working on the paper worth to him in his book office twenty dollars a week. He therefore proposed to pay me half that sum weekly for the unexpired six months of the partnership if I would consent to release him. I was surprised at the generosity of this offer and he was not less so when I re- plied that I would "take 110 money that I hud not earned," but would do what he required all the samo. He volun- teered to leave me the use of his printing materials for a few weeks to ascertain whether the advanced wing of the party would furnish me new materials. They did subscribe $300 of which Henry Meiggs, since famous in South American railroad enterprise and General Crooke w r ho has recently departed, subscribed one half. The General sustained the paper for the next six months by sending in his servant and 34 THE ODE BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; wagon twice a week with the choice products of his farm. I bought the press from Samuel Adams who was murdered by Colt, and I met at his ("Adams") office that marine mur- derer (as we shall see) Slidell Mackenzie where he was actu- ally having printed religious tracts of his own composition! But the best of the "Hunkers," Judge Lott, got -elected to the "Assembly," and vigorously advocated the principle of Universal suffrage in a village charter (Chittenango) where it was sought to restrict the voting to property-holders. I heartily approved his action in The Democrat. Now, the General and the Judge held different places in the same Party. The General marching vigorously in the front and the Judge cautiously bringing up the rear. Venality had already shown itself, and as much in the press as elsewhere. Little w r as known of me. * Might I not be tampering with Judge Lott?" Meeting the General he said to me: I "see you have been praising Judge Lott." Yes, I was glad to find him deserving praise. "Don't you know he is opposed to Progress, and that he and his friends did all they could to injure your paper?" "Yes, but if my worst enemy does public good I will give him credit for it, as I would denounce my best friend if he did public evil." "That's your choice. Mine is, if a man gives me one kick I'll give him three kicks in return." And so that friend, my first and my last in America, turned away from me in, I suppose, silent contempt. He had seen the paper that he above all men had cherished into existence turned to the exaltation of his political opponent, and he uttered no word of reproach. But he interchanged no thought or word with me for weary months, and I supposed he never would again. In 1842 the Whigs of England got out of power, and after a sordid silence of seven years, O'Connell raised the cry of "Eepeal." A Repeal Association was got up in Williamsburgh. I refused to join it denounced O'Connell as a sycophant of the British crown, and a deluder of the Irish people who wanted merely to transfer the tyranny from London to Dub- lin. This was the first causo of difference between my coun- OE, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALEY IN MODEBN DATS. 35 tryinen and myself though I offered to aid an invading force, and contribute to its outfit. At the same time they resolved to form an "Adopted Cit- izens Democratic Association," from which all native Demo- crats must be excluded. I am invited to address them, and I say: "This is an ill-advised, ungrateful and even absurd proceeding. What! proscribe men in their own country. The very men who opened their hearts and their doors to you!" But they carried out their purpose, and put nine adopted citizens forward as candidates for the Town election just approaching. Mr. Minturn, President of the village came into the meeting and said to me, " There is to be opposition to our Report on the school matter to-morrow night. Come up and help us." "Is it true," I asked, "that you propose to lease that under- ground cellar instead of building new school houses?'* "What could we do?" he replied; "money is so stringent that we dare not lay a tax." "Well," I rejoined "I cannot con- sent to put the children in that damp cellar for a lease of four years, and I must oppose you. Just then a buzz ran through the meeting, "Be up to-morrow night and oppose the d d * * * * " a ruse of the political leaders, for there was no religious issue at all in the matter. Next night brought a meeting in which there was more kicks and pushes than arguments. After a struggle of two or three hours the lease of the cellar was rejected, and a resolution carried for new primary school houses. In those days every local expenditure had to go through the ordeal of a public meeting. Against my most earnest protest, the Irish politicians put nine adopted citizens the whole ticket up for Town offices at the approaching election. I ridiculed the proceeding in the Democrat, and they only polled one-third of the party vote some 130 out of 400. Judge Soper, who was comparatively, even in politics, an honorable man, said to me: "The Whigs are now supreme. You should keep quiet, and the popularity you have gained at the school meeting will insure you a share of the Village printing, and that will preserve your paper. There was just one week between the Town and Vil- lage elections the former pertains to county, the latter to village affairs. "I want to do it," I replied. "I will print an 36 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; Extra, calling 'all hands to the rescue!' Help with all your influence, and we'll re-conquer next week." He did. The Extra went out, a meeting called, excitement stirred up, and we carried the Village election the body of the adopted citizens rallying to the standard. Their leaders only had caused the late dissension and defeat. And they continued their work. There existed thus early a party fued in New York on the question of sectarian school money. They had introduced it here, and lost us a Senator by it. They had endorsed John A. Cross, the Whig candi- date for Assembly, because he presided at a Repeal meeting, and gave $5 to the fund. They had electioneered a " black ticket, " from which every name was scratched off excepting Wm. Lake, one of themselves. General Crooke was at the time the most wakeful and watchful public man in the County. He saw all that was going on, and he came and said to me: "I did not understand you when we last met; I do now, and henceforth count upon me as a friend." That sin- gle assurance that coming back of a friend whom I thought forever lost outweighed all the difficulties that beset me. There was certainly a great deal of fight in me in those days. I believed the Democratic party to be what it pro- fessed to be, aud as I would defend liberty itself, I would de- fend it. I resented in my paper all this disloyalty to the party. Bat the "bolters" could still command the "Nom- inations" by rallying their followers. And the native Dem- ocrats were afraid to lose the nominations which was to lose all hope of place. So they sent to me an ultimatum that I must say nothing of the rebellion or the whole force of the party would be leveled against nie. I refused, and it was done. A public meeting was called to expel me. The at- tendance was large and the excitement high. It was a sin- gular meeting. One charge against me was that I was seen speaking to such and such gentlemen, who were Whigs. Another, that I had spoken disrespectfully of the Navy. Another, that I wanted to divide out the public lands among Individuals, instead of selling them as a resource of the gov- ernment's expenditures, and finally that I was fierce in de- nouncing those who ventured to differ with me. In reply I did not admit it was a crime to be on speakng terms with any fellow-citizens; maintained that the Navy was simply infamous. Henshaw, of Boston, the Secretary, retaining his OK, THE SPIKIT OP CHIVALBY IN MODERN DAYS. 37 own four thousand dollars a year, and reducing the laborers in the navy yards to a dollar a day. As for the land charge it was disposed of, when offered, by one general shout in my favor. And I was proud, I said, of all the fierceness I had shown against the continuous underhanded and ruinous plottings, all of which I recounted from first to last. A vote was called, and strange it was to see all iny countrymen whom I had attempted so much for not the lea it in my recent attempts to keep them right in their public action to see them all voting against me, and all the native Democrats for whom I had done or attempted very little voting in my favor, although I had refused their ultimatum. So close was the vote that the Chairman, Judge Soper, could not decide it, and called a division of the house. The crowd was so equal on both sides that two or three active bolters took hold of Peter Y. Eemsen and Denies Strong, pulling them to their side by main force. And thus fortified declared themselves the victors.* This producing no effect, another plan was resorted to. Edward Neville was our party treasurer. A clever, active young man, but who, like hundreds of thousands, was vitiated and ultimately ruined by politics. He instituted a libel suit against me for asking in my paper what had been done with money paid into the treasury for printing pur- poses. I had done the printing, and instead of my inquiry bringing me any money it brought a Sheriff's officer around with a writ to convey me to prison bail fixed at $4,000. A comparative stranger, I could not procure such exorbitant bail, and so I was escorted into the County Jail there prob- ably to remain till a trial would or would not release me. Money-resources I had none, and now my paper, the sole dependence of my family, must go down. Eeflection was not a pleasant companion, as I half undressed to throw myself on the prison pallet. It is midnight. A thundering at the prison gate is heard a creaking of the hinges a heavy tramping along the cor- ridor. Stop at my cell door. It opens, and five or six gentle- * I am well aware that these are very small matters, but I present them because they illustrate a very great matter. A mixture of religion and politics. A principle an element that Republics will require to very strictlj guard against. 38 THE ODD BOOK Oi 1 THE NINETEENTH CENTtfRYj men enter, with one of whom I had never exchanged a word, though I knew them all personally. They were all Whigs all my political opponents. They had been at a Fireman's Meeting heard what had been done took carriage drove to the Sheriff's house roused him up entered bail, and, to enable me to return home with them, brought the Sheriff along to insure my liberation. Though volunteer Firemen, they were among the most opulent men in the village. I have the names only of Barnet Boerum, John McBrair, Leonard T. Coles, Henry Ackerly, and I think Daniel Woods and one other. In our local politics perhaps not one of those gentlrinen had escaped a scratch of my pen, yet here they surrounded me, unasked and unexpected, prompted only by that natural love of justice and abhorrence of wrong which lies deep in the human heart, and which would show itself in all our affairs, if we lived in a natural state of Society. It was indeed a strange sight. To see those men for whom I had done nothing attempted nothing corning to rescue me from the persecution of men for whom I had attempted everything possible to me from the day of the war meeting at Thrush Bank (see ante), to my efforts recently made to keep them within the bounds of common sense. Your Irish politician is to the full as unprincipled as politician can be, He is as able, too, as the best of them and he is dangerous just in proportion to his ability. It was half a dozen sense- less, greedy politicians raised this persecution against me. And now, I repeat it, the strange sight is seen of Amer- icans, virtually strangers to me, coming at dead of night to rescue me out of their hands! If this was not "CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS," I don't know where to go to look for it. The gentleman with whose character this section opens was u member of this same Fire Company. What a prompt, generous, chivalrous spirit had governed the Republic, had not the worst men in the country everywhere rushed in and taken control of it effectually barring the best men out.* General Crooke, residing at a distance, did not hear of the * Monarchists and Oligarchs, and vicious men all over Europe, clutch at the thought that all honor of the Bepublic lies buried in the sea of selfish- ness, and fraud, and snobbery that covers the whole land. They little dream that, apart and unknown, keeping itself away from the contamination, there exists a manhood that may yet drivo out the politicians, and make the Re- public worthy of its founders a light and a hope to the prostrate nations. OK, THE ..iPIiilT OF OHIVALUY IX MODERN DAYS. 39 affair till the next day. Then I found him at my side with his characteristic promptitude. "Take care of your busi- ness," said he, "I'll take care of your defense." But the " defense " was not so easily taken care of as he supposed, as we shall see. He entered into an agreement with Egan, Neville's counsel, that no step should be taken without mutual notice. I expressed a doubt of their good faith, and he rebuked me for thinking such evil of them. But a month after he hailed me as I was crossing New York City Park. "This is fortunate," said he. "We have no time to spare," and he hurried me into the Court House. Those men had broken parole ! Secretly procured a Sheriff's Jury, and representing that I had no defense to make, got a verdict against me for $2,000. The General had just time to enter tho necessary appeal. And finally, with much labor to himself, he baffled their purpose. If he had not I had already built a house and they would have taken it from me for their Judgment of $2,000. The Coon Skin Log Cabin Campaign, a singular proof of public gullibility, had swept Harrison into the chair, and an overwhelming majority of Whigs into Congress. In the canvass they had disowned a National Bank policy, and yet an Extra Session was called and a National Bank, virtually $210,000,000 hurried through Congress by Henry Clay a very able, and I believe, a very dangerous man. But President Harrison died one month after his Inauguration, and John Tyler, now President, vetoed the bill. Mr. Tyler had been a life-long -anti-Bank man. To emphasize their denial of a Bank pol- icy (they had been three times defeated on that issue) the Whigs put Tyler on for the Vice-Presidency. When he vetoed their Bank they were in great wrath against him. And instead of sustaining him the Democratic leaders were scarcely less marked in their hostility than were the Whigs themselves. A striking instance of politicians' in- gratitude. I had been writing articles on the subject of "Preserving the Public^ Lands." Geo. H. Evans and John Windt came to my little printing office, and there w projected The National Reform Party to pre- serve the Public Lands- for actual settlers, called a public meeting, which issued a Report, of which I give extracts. After showing the progress that Machinery had made even then, (1844), the Report pro- ceeds : "This triumph of MACHINE LABOK, and ultimate prostration of HUMAN LABOR cannot be .averted. As well might we attempt to alter any of Na- 40 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUHY J ture's fixed laws, as to attempt to arrest the ouward march of science and machinery." " The question then recurs How shall we escape from an evil which it is impossible to avert? " " Nature is not unjust. The POWER who called forth those mechanical forces did not call them forth for our destruction. OUR REFUGE is UPON THE SOIL, in all its freshness and fertility OUR INHERITAGE is IN THE PUB- LIC DOMAIN in all its boundless wealth and infinite variety. This heritage once secured to us, the evil we complain of will become our greatest good. Machinery, from the formidable rival, will sink into the obedient instrument of our will." In Europe God's Inheritance to man is usurped by the Aristocracy. There the disinherited man has nothing to fall back upon. " If to the Common's fenceless limits strayed, He drives his flock, to pick the scanty blade. Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide, And even the bare worn Common is denied." " But in this Republic, all that the Greater designed for man's use is ours belongs not to an Aristocracy, but to the People. The deep and intermin- able forest; the fertile and boundless prairie; the rich and inexhaustible mine all all belong to the People are held by the Government, in trust for them. Here, indeed, is the natural and healthful field for man's labor. Let him apply to his MOTHER EARTH, and she will not refuse to give him employment neither will she withhold from him, in due season, the fulness of his reward." " Your Committee does not recognize THE AUTHORITY of Congress to shut out from, those lands such citizens as may not have money to pay ransom for them. Still less do we admit THEIR AUTHORITY to sell the Public Do- main, to men who require it only as an engine to lay our children under tribute to their children to all succeeding time. We regard the public lands as a CAPITAL STOCK, which belongs not to us only, but also to Posterity. The moment Congress or any other power proceeds to ALIENATE THE STOCK to speculators, that moment do they attempt a cruel and cowardly fraud upon posterity, against which, we here enter our most solemn PROTEST. Go to Europe. Mark the toil, the rags, the hunger, and the despair which is the sole inheritance of its countless millions, while a few thousands run into the opposite extreme of luxury, excess, and guilt unspeakable .' Look at this horrible state of things, and whilst you do so remember that the same fate awaits our own Eepublic, if we permit a landed aristocracy to grow up among us. " The first great object, then, is to ascertain and establish the right of the people to the soil ; to be used by them in their own day, and transmitted AN INALIENABLE HERITAGE to their Posterity. "That once effected, let an OUTLET Reformed by the Government that will carry off our superabundant labor to the salubrious and fertile West. In those regions thousands, and tens of thousands, who are now languishing OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 41 in hopeless poverty, will find a certain and a speedy independence. The labor market will be thus eased of the present distressing competition, and those who remain, as well as those who emigrate, will have the oppor- tunity of realizing ^comfortable living." Such is a brief synopsis of the Keport. On this basis we founded The National Keform Movement that eventually led to the Great Civil War. Every member of the Association had to pay and did pay weekly two or three cents, or whatever he could afford. Made platform of a wagon and held two or three meetings in the Streets and Square Corners every week, besides our weekly indoor meeting. New York had achieved the ten hour law, arid Massachusetts call- ed a convention on the subject in Boston. Evans, Mike Walsh, Bovay and myself were deputed to that Convention. Our consti- tuents gave us money to pay for the best of everything. But we thought it our duty to " rough it," as our constituents would have to do. Our doing so disclosed to us a most villainous proceeding on the part of the Corporation that owned the line. Not a seat, not an inch even of freight left so that you might sit on it during the night. The officers when they found Mike Walsh aboard offered him all hospitality. He rejected it denounced the owners, and with our- selves so exposed them when we returned to New York that by this or some other means an end was put to their inhumanity. Their vil- lainy was carried from the water to the land. The despised car that carried us from Providence to Boston was left in utter darkness, while the Select cars were bathed in a flood of light. This was Avithin a matter of two or three seconds of cos-ting me my life. Coming out from a five minutes' stop for refreshments, in the dark- ness and haste I grasped the iron guard in front of the platform and stepped out in front instead of upon it. Luckily I had hold of the iron when I fell, and just raised myself up as the train moved on. And those greedy and inhuman men did all this in order to force people to pay the high fares. Our novel agitation, and the downright worth and simplicity of the Keform itself, found such a response in the public mind that early in 1845 the New York Assembly endorsed our principle by the unusual vote of 103 to 5 dissenters. And next or second week Daniel Webster, then John Tyler's Secretary of State, pronounced formally in its favor. There had already been one raid into the Anti-Kent district (Cen- tral counties of New York), to enforce the claims of Patroon Van Kensselaer. Troops were now demanded from New York city. Whereupon the Reformers placarded New York, calling a public 42 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUKY; meeting to memorial the Governor against this use of the military and ask him to refer the whole subject to the Legislature for peace- ful arbitration. This set the New York dailies all in a blaze, and they called upon the lieges to be up attend the meeting and, once for all, squelch the ' ' Agrarians." Such was the villainy of that press even at this early day. We found the sidewalk crowded, our room packed full, and the Adjutant from the Arsenal in possession of our platform reading a string of resolutions that breathed fire and sword. What followed is honorably characteristic of American character. The crowd made way for us. I was pushed forward by John Windt as our spokesman. Appealing to their love of fair play the dense throng listened to me as commencing with the command : "Go forth and replenish the earth," I swept through the horrors that Land Monopoly had inflicted on the human Family in all the ages down to the present day now, when it was introducing distress and dissension even into our own Republic. At the close of which the meeting rejected the Adjutant's war resolutions, and carried our peaceful memorial by a majority nearly unanimous. And never afterward did the military appear in the Anti-Kent region. RETROSPECTIVE. In the winter of 1840 the farmers started the Heldeberg Advocate in a remote village. I saw their advertisement and wrote letters for it. Of the only one I have I give a sample : LETTER III. WLLLIAMSBUBGH, L. I., Feb'y 22, 1842. " For the land is mine saith the Lord, for ye are strangers and sojourners with me." Leviticus, Chap. XXV. To STEPHEN YAN HENSSELAEB : SIR That you are a "great" man everybody is agreed but some little difference of opinion may exist as to the particular class of great men to which you properly belong. The first class are those who give their labors, their wisdom, and their virtues to the establishment of happiness among the human race of this class was George Washington. The second class comprises all those whose investigating minds opened out new truths to human ken ; dragged latent agencies into the light, and made them subservient to our daily wants and purposes. Such was a New- ton and a Watts. The third class are those who, content to forego the dignity of man's nature are willing to live by preying upon the produce of others' toil. OE, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 4 These form a very numerous class, and they comprise, in their own estimation at least, the greatest men in the community. To this genus belong Dukes, Earls, aristocrats and Highwaymen." It is not necessary here to do more than thus indicate the tone of those letters. At the seventh letter, the printer, a "Party Democrat," would publish no more of my writings. The paper died and another named the Guardian of the Soil soon after followed it. I attended their cele- bration of the 4th of July, 18-12, in Rensselaerville, twenty miles above Albany. Ratified a treaty, they help me to free the Public Lands, to actual settlers only, I to aid them in their local war write at- tend their conventions, and made the condition that I should pay my own expenses which now I was able to do. The Know-Nothing movement, then in full career never reached me. Eesolutions of thanks and confidence met me at all the conventions. One of which, I preserved on account of its peculiar terseness and style : " Resolved That the Anti-Renters of Rensselaerville, in public meeting assembled, do present to our brethren throughout the county of Albany, THOMAS A. DEVYB as a proper and deserving man to receive their suffrages and ours for Member of Congress at the approaching Fall Election, any man labored in our cause ? He has labored more. Has any man sacri- ficed ? He has sacrificed more. Has any man produced results ? He has produced greater. For this, therefore, and the consideration of his eminent abilities to discharge the the duties of the station, we make this present- ment as our first choice. " This was in the winter of '45. In the following summer, the Whig and Hunker politicians wormed themselves into the move- ment. In every town of those central counties, as indeed in every town of the State and nation, the most live men were active politi- cians. As soon as the Anti-Bent movement could elect legislators and decide governors, all those township politicians under orders from their Headquarters set themselves to take control of the move- ment. How they tried to keep me out of the editorship of the Albany Freeholder and failing, how they tried to corrupt me to seize on its ownership, how they forcibly locked the farmers out of their property. How I started the Anti-Renter and sank in it my last resources in trying to make head against the double combina- tion of Whigs and Hunkers. How I attended most or all their con- ventions and public meetings I will not describe here often left by a farmer's wagon, miles from my hotel, in the dead of night. It was with the politicians of the Central Counties as it was with the politicians of Williamsburgh. But it went in the latter case even to 44 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY j ordering their band to strike up, at the last great meeting I attended, to drown my voice. That voice so broke down that for days after I could not speak louder than a whisper. I shall only preserve two or three records of all that lies written before me. And those be- cause they are not surcharged with confusion and gloom. Oct. 7, '42. I write from the house of a Revolutionary Soldier Francis Garvey, now in his 82d year. He entered the team service of the Republic in his 16th year, on the banks of the Hudson, and served three years afterward in the Regular Army. He describes General Washington as a large, portly man not very handsome, but of commanding appearance. He speaks of a Review at which ' Steuben put them through the manual exercise, by word of com- mand ; by roll of the drum ; by flourish of his (Steuben's) sword. This was at Stony Point 4,000 men present, and Generals "Washington, Steuben, Put- nam, and McDougal were highly satisfied with their state of discipline.' " " The old man's mental faculties are, with trifling abatement, remarkably sound and vigorous. He imitated to great perfection the broken English of Steuben, as he shouted to the men in line, 'Attention!' 'Holt up your heats !' (heads.) ' Look like the Tevil look like me 1' " " General McDougal he describes as a Scotchman, who was promoted for his natural talents and gallantry, although as the old man confidently avers, he could not write his own name, but had a man attending on him in the capacity of secretary. McDougal, he says, carried a quantity of snuff loose in his waistcoat pocket, into which he would dip a quill for the purpose of use. Washington he describes as mounted on a roan horse, and attended by a small mulatto servant." " He gives some anecdotes of him that were current at the time of the war. On one occasion a ball struck the pummel of his saddle and tore it up, leav- ing an unsightly breach which the general smoothed down with his hand, observing, ' the balls are a little careless this morning.' " " General Greene jested with him on what the British Government would do if they got hold of the Commander-in-chief. To which Washington re- plied, putting his hand to his cravat, i4 this neck was never made for a halter.' " " He remembers the capture of Andre well, and states that David Williams would have been seduced by the offered bribes only for the sterner virtue of Paulding and Van Wart. He affirms, too, that General Washington awarded to Williams the same reward that was decreed to the other two, but accompanied it with the remark that he did not deserve it." " Mrs. Garvey is now in her 82d year. Her brother was called upon to serve in the ' Continentals.' He furnished a substitute for a service of three years. For this he paid a bounty of ' thirty silver dollars, ten bushels of wheat, and a barrel of pork.' This, it appears, was appropriated to the use of his family, the substitute himself receiving the rations of a soldier." " Their covered wagons reached along the road for half a mile ranged on OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 45 one side, while their horses were tied to the wagons and fences, and pro- vided from her ' father's meadow,' " " The old man is very indignant as he well may be, at the treatment he has received from the Van Rensselaers. He says that neither Land Monoply nor Bank Monopoly was ever contemplated by the heroes of the Revolu- tion." Saw the tomb of David Williams in Livingstonville. Met a French peddler who had served in Louis Napoleon's army at Borne, against Garribaldi. The second draft of 30,000 men, he said, was divided into three brigades, each to take eight hours work, day and night, in the trenches. Those were cut zig-zag to prevent raking from the city. Each column when on du!;y had a quantity of wine in their haversack for copious refreshment, and so they slowly but surely approached, and I think the aid undermined the walls. At a sale of cattle in Delaware County for a distress of rent, a party of young men armed and disguised as Indians assembled. Deputy Sheriff Steele fired upon them. The fire was returned and both he and his horse fell dead. O'Connor, an Irishman, and Vansteenberg, an American, were tried for murder. The previous legislature had passed a law making it felony to disguise. This assumed felony made the shooting of Steele murder instead of man- slaughter. But the law was pronounced void as the legisla- ture had no authority to interfere with the dress of the people. Judge Parker charged the jury that their most important duty would be to fix the grade of the crime, and he designated Mitchel Sanford to defend the prisoners. Sani'ord admitted that the crime was murder, and this Judge Parker seized upon, and in summing up informed the jury that it was admitted that the killing of Steele was murder, and that all they had to determine was whether the prisoners were responsible reminding them that when a body of men were assembled to do an unlawful act the action of one was the action of all. The whole State was in a condition of excitement not to be described. A ver- dict of guilty was rendered and the young men sentenced to be hanged. I criticised both Parker and Sanford for their conduct on the trial, and also published two successive letters to Governor Wright recounting the case of Sally Bodine, in Staten Island, and Bolam, in Newcastle-on-Tyne, to show the wrong done to those young men by forcing on their trials at a time of great public ex- citement. The Governor sent for me to his residence and after a long interview I left with the joyful hope that he would commute 46 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; the sentences. He did. And in a year both were pardoned out by Mr. Wright's successor in office. It is 1846 and the morning of the Fourth of July. The politicians have entire control, and I am not invited to speak at the Celebration twelve miles from Albany. Hard driven to get the paper out. I am at work in the office when two or three smart young fellows enter. " Are you going to the celebration?" "Yes I'll start by nine o'clock!" " Don't trouble about a conveyance. We have carriages and will call for you if you say so." I agreed and worked on and waited in vain for them till I realized that they came only to de- ceive and keep me away from the meeting. But I started on foot and (regaling myself with wild strawberries along the near cuts, for by this time I knew the country well) reached the ground in good time. Though uninvited by the leaders, I was called on by the meet- ing, and I preserve the following speech as it shows the progress made by the movement up to that time. ME. PRESIDENT, LA.DIES AND GENTLEMEN : From the centre to the shores of thja vast Kepublic twenty millions of freemen are met this day to cele- bratejthe most sublime event that ever was written on the page of history?"] Anoyet, from the hills of Maine to the prairies of Texas from the Atlafl^ tic's wave to the shores of the Pacific there is not to-day assembled a meet- ing of such importance to the Kepublic, and to the cause of freedom over the whole earth, as that which is here assembled among these mountain hills. How ? Let us examine : When man was created, and went forth to people the earth he soon turned aside after evil. The thoughts of his heart were, in the emphatic language of the Scripture, " evil, and only evil, and that continually." So much so that the Almighty sent a deluge upon the earth, that destroyed the race, saving only Noah and his family. These went forth from the Ark, and again peopled the face of the land, and branched off into various nations and tongues and kindreds, and selfish- ness and vice again spread over the world. Why trace the long and painful history that succeeded the luxury and the crimes of the few the degradation, misery, and bondage of the many ? Kings and lords and chiefs, and mail-clad robbers parcelled out God's earth among them. But, like the LOST ONE of old, in assuming the power of Gods, they fell and became devils. Devils that tortured and starved and slew their fellow men with a fierceness and a ferocity which would bo wholly incredible were not the facts guaran- teed by what is passing at the present moment throughout the old world. Wickedness abounded enough to move the Creator to send another deluge on the earth, had not His promise been given His " bow hung in the clouds" as a pledge that he would not, again, destroy the world by a flood. The time, too, had, in the language of the new dispensation, come, " not OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 47 to destroy but to fulfil." So the All-wise upheaved from the silent depths a new, a vast, an unpolluted continent. The soil of Europe and of the East, had been too deeply polluted with crime and suffering. And a new, a stain- less, and untrodden world was called into existence. It was, as I iirmly believe, Mr. President and fellow-citizens, set apart for the earthly redemp- tion of the human family. And when great works are to be accomplished it is interesting to observe how they are brought about. Does the Euler of the World go to the palaces ,^of the great or the halls of learning to select the instrument of His Will ? No. The Republican fishermen of Gallilee wore chosen to the work of our spirit- ual Redemption, and, the Republican fisherman of Genoa was chosen to i open the path to this last refuge and resting place of Liberty on the earth. No sooner was the path made across the water, than the men of free spirit those who felt most impatient of insult and of. wrong embarked upon those waters and crossed the desert billows to the promised land. Then gleaned the axe, and followed the ploughshare, and curled aloft the cottage smoke. Not by force and rapine and bloody fields was their pro- gress marked. The men who landed on Plymouth Rock were pick men the adventurous, the daring, and the free came forth. Thus was it so order- ed that the very breed of men, destined to people this new continent, was the best that the old races could afford. In those deep solitudes, and in the kindly, but at the same time vigorous, strife with Nature, the germ of freedom expanded, and grew and struck deep and universal root among the rising people. France had grasped a neighboring country, and the strife and bloodshed of despots was transferred from Europe to the New World. This, though seemingly a great calamity, was destined in the All-wise plan to powerfully aid in working out our independence. The defence of Crown Point, the sanguinary defeat of Braddoek, at which Washington himself was present, taught the Father of his country, and the other noble men of the day, a les- son in the art of war, of which the oppressor was doomed to reap the con- sequences. At the close of this Border War the generous spirit of the settlers scorned to tax the Mother country with the expense. They not only furnished forces and supplies during the contest, but they undertook to pay off the responsibilities of the War. How did the Government, which means the Aristocracy, of England re- ward them? Why, by attempting to introduce that system of " Taxation without Representation" which has so long been doing its work in the British Isles. They concluded that if the Colonists had resources sufficient to maintain an arduous and expensive war, they surely must be worth a plucking, and so they set about taxing the Colonies against their consent. Lordly mouths had been multiplying, and in those late days one lordly mouth had learned to swallow more than would feed a score of them a cen- tury earlier. Out came the stamped parchment, and the Taxed Tea one 48 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; of them was met by the Sous of Liberty in New York, and the other was met by the Boston Indians, It would be superfluous, in me, to trace the progress of that glorious struggle to its glorious termination. Let us now draw from it a lesson, and an example, which ought to bind together the men of the East and the West of the city and the country the glorious movement for Land Reform which is now going abroad over the earth. If the Boston men had struggled for themselves only if their whole en- ergies had been confined to a repeal of the Boston Harbor Bill if they had been desirous of making their own peace regardless of the welfare of the country, who would have helped then\? And what could they have effected? Nothing. The power of England could have crushed that of Massachusetts in a day. But when the voice of patriotism went forth when it echoed over the middle States and into the Carolinas when the struggle ceased to be a local orie^ and became national the fate of despotism was decided. Then look at the men who assisted at the National Baptism, and attended at our presentation among the nations of the Earth. Where in history shall we parallel the fame of a Washington, a Franklin, a Jefferson, a Samuel Adams, and the other groat and good men of the He volution? The work to be accomplished was great, and the chosen men were worthy of its accom- plishment. See, too, the time selected for the founding of this great Nation. At a period when the lost arts were starting from their grave of ages. At a time when Modern Genius was about to subject the Mechanical forces, and even the very lightnings of Heaven, to our will. At the time when the steam Engine careered the Ocean ship ploughed up the Prairie wilderness en- tered the Factory and sat down patiently to spin and weave. At the time that the Printing cylinder could throw off ten thousand impressions of man's thought in an hour, whilst the Railway scatters them almost over the Republic in a day. At such a time, my friends, was this young and mighty Republic called forth from the nonentity of the past. Then contemplate the field chosen for the great Experiment. Look at its extent of surface its variety of clime the diversity and profusion of its productions. We are told of the fertility of Europe. I speak the language of experience when I say the British Islands in point of natural fertility fall far short of New York. And here you can gather into a quarter acre lot a greater variety of fruits than can be raised in the " three Kingdoms." Look at the natural highways which intersperse and and spread over the whole interior. Begin at our own Hudson trace its connexion, by Railway and Canal, with the great lakes, mark these, extending to within hailing distance of the vast southern outlets the Mississippi and its tributary streams. And, last and greatest, look at the institutions that preside over all, founded upon the eternal truth that men are created equal and that the legitimate source of all law and government is the people at large. Whoever, Mr. President and fellow-citizens, will contemplate these things can hardly fail to perceive, running through all of them, ONE GKEAT AND OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODfcRN DAYS. 49 UNIFORM DESIGN the earthly redemption of the human race first through- out this continent, ultimately throughout the world. That DESIGN would be frustrated. Progress, Liberty, IndependenceT would be impossible if Land Monopoly were allowed to fasten itself upon the Republic. And think ye that all this beautiful train of circumstances are to be broken all those bright hopes to be blasted in order to make way for the little, crouching, skulking cripple of Land Monopoly? No, my friends no ! That heartless and ferocious cripple is doomed he never was able to go alone, and henceforth no man will be found to carry him. He is doomed, and we, my friends WE are appointed to carry that doom into execution. Men of the Mountain Towns ! Let us perform the mission to which we are appointed. Let us this day, renew the pledge that you war, not only for the freedom of your own fields, but for the freedom of the wide field of the ichole Republic. Tell the world, that, at the bottom of this local struggle, lies a principle deep as the foundations of the earth, broad as the earth's surface enduring, in its application, as the earth itself. On a day like this will our sympathies not go forth to the oppressed, the houseless, and the degraded? Shall the cry of their distress go up from cellar and garret sJiall the poverty of our brotliers the rags of their wives the hunger of their chil- dren, find no answering sympathy from the men who first flung to the breeze the standard of man's earthly redemption? Shall our watch light go forth a beacon and a hope to all nations of the earth, or shall it smoke and nicker and perish where it arose, among the Helderberg Mountains? And now, my friends, having said so much on the general subject, let me come nearer home let us examine what we have been doing for the past few years, and measure the amount of work we have performed of progress we have made. Ten years ago, none of you were considered good enough to own a title in ' fee. Rents were flush cattle could not find room in the Patroon's yard, and his granaries were groaning under that " merchantable winter wheat." As for " fat fowls " they were a drug in the market. The Rent was as much as the Patroons could possibly squander, and more too. How, then, could you expect that he would sell you a title in fee. No no, they would not sell an acre, at any price. But hark ! a signal gun is fired in one of the deep glens of the Helderberg. It is answered by another, and another. The deepened rolls are blended with many voices. The Patroon pricks up his ears at the hojrid noise, and, mixed with a thunder cheer, that shook the skies, he hears a loud voice ex- claim, "DOWN WITH THE RENT 1" Hearing the thickening and deepening uproar, the Patroon thought it best to call an Auction on the lands. In ordinary cases it is usual for auctions to begin low and work up high. But being somewhat of a Dutchman himself, our Patroon thought it best to do business on the principle of a Dutch Auc- tion, that is, to begin high and come down low. Well, he set up sale price 50 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY j eight or ten dollars an acre. " Seven, six, five, going, going. Who bids? Who bids?" "Hurrah! Hurrah!" shouts the crowd " Down with the Kent ! " But when he came down to " four," and to " three " some few nibbled at him. To their own grief for now he is down to "two" to " one fifty," and since he (Mr. D.) came on the ground he had been informed that the selling price now is fifty cents ! Another jump or two and he would be d< nvn to the right figure. What followed from that day till I left the farmers to themselves four months later, I recall only as an incredible and painful dream. At every meeting and convention, and I attended all within reach, I was met by a storm of sordid politicians but let me shut up the page. It is November, and I am without resource though eight or nine hundred unpaid subscriptions are on my books, I am driven to an extremity that I will not write down here. But I remembered what a gentleman the gentleman had said to me when leaving Williarnsburgh for Albany. I had called to pay him a small sum I was indebted. "You have acted honorably," said he, " and wherever you may be if you want a friend write to me. I had previously built a house and it was about to be sold for mortgage on the lot, when he saved it by taking up the mortgage. I now wrote to him. " Farmers have not realized. I am out of money. Lend me $150." The conclusion related to their local organization. But within three months that organization was utterly broken and all lost. It came by return of mail. Four weeks after (it in now Decem- ber, 1846.) I write again : " Send me six hundred dollars, or live hundred, which you please, and take deed of that house now held in joint stock between us, in Williamsburgh." The answer came prompt as before but not exactly to the same purpose "Not a cent! What! Utterly ruin yourself in the service of men who will not furnish you even with rations and ammunition to keep tJieJield? Strike tents. Come down here. You have worlml for the pub- lic long enough. Now do something for your family. When here call on me. Tell tJiem not a word, and not a cent /" I obeyed this friendly and wise summons, not without regret. A mirage of great usefulness rose before me. If I could hold out for another year. But I had already held out so long that while it was difficult to go it was impossible to stay. Edward Lawson, once a Chartist schoolmaster in County Durham, England, had previously OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 51 recognized me at A public meeting in Albany. Of course we became close friends. I had a claim on the county for some $30 or $40. He gave me the money for it, and I got off down the river just as the ice was closing in. My reception from that true and wise man ! but it is facts not feelings must make up this record. " Take your note book," said he, "and go round the water front- age of New York and Brooklyn. Ascertain what property is to be sold the description, the owner and the price. Spend a whole week at it. Then come to me with your notes and diagrams." I did so. He put his fingers on one of the diagrams. "Secure that. Here's a check for the purpose. You want employment, too. Begin at once to improve it, and draw on me for means to carry on the work. Such property," he added, " will be wanted, by and by, and that which is even partially improved will have the first market." Wise foresight. It came out like a prophecy. I am now at work with men and horses turning tide water into land. The ten hour system had been achieved by the mechanics of New York, but the laborers had to work from "light to dark" wages 75 cents a day. Living was cheap, potatoes, meat, butter, tea, sugar, coffee, &c., &c., all about half what they cost now (bon- daged 1881). The anti-christian inhuman code of political economy would have given me laborers of 12 to 14 hours a day for 75 cents. I fixed the time at 10 hours and the pay at seven York shillings, 87 > cents. I had felt the monotony of long hours at work, so I broke it by a short rest and an allowance of ale in the forenoon and the same in the afternoon.* I had brought my printing materials from Albany, and my printing office in the rear of my Grand street house was let at $5 a week and from it was issued the " Morning Post," by Joseph Taylor, Geo. Bennett and T. Anderson Smith. *A man toiling for live hours ;it a stretch feels considerably fagged dur- ing the last hour. The thought that he has still a long time to work through will tell upon him from the beginning. On the contrary, let it be " hurrah boys ; four hours is the time !" and they will start \vith energy, continue with cheerfulness, do the work " with a will" and the result will not be a heavy loss to the employer. But, whether it does or not, it is just as useless for the employer to resist a reduction of hours as it would be for him to resist the progress of enlight- enment. With the immense and varied machinery, chemistry and the arts generally, man may have not even three or four hours per day to work. This, then , is the time the time intended by that Divine Power. As man became intellectual, those arts were given to him that he might have time to cultivate that intellect. 52 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J [This I wrote at the time, twenty years ago, before the Corpora- tion reign commenced. Under the reign of those monstrous tyrants justice falls prostrate and progress turns back. The new condition will be work all your waking hours for the smallest modicum that will keep you alive, to work on, or till enough of Chinamen comes over to take your place. ] Mitchel Sanford had instituted a libel suit against me for com- menting on his conduct at the trial of Van Steenberg. That libel suit came on now after my return to Williamsburgh. My comments had come as hard on Judge Parker himself as they did on Sanford. And yet that hardened politician managed to try the suit. Sanford begged the jury for a verdict, assuring them that he would not touch a penny belonging to the defendant. The Judge charged that though he understood a part of the jury was favorable to the defendant, still, as Mr. Sanford would not take any money he .(the Judge) thought it was their duty to agree on a verdict for the plain- tiff. Of course he knew such was not their duty, and he knew San- ford would take all he could get, but the jury took his advice to the amount of $500. Sanford agreed to discharge this on the spot for a sum of $60 of costs. Half of that sum I paid him down and the other half I sent him from Williamsburgh by next mail. After which he entered judgment against me (in Kings County where my prop- erty lay) to the amount of $700, including costs. COLONEL CEOOKE. The reader has soon in preceding pages how vigilantly this Amer- ican gentleman watched over and sustained me. He is now pro- ceeding with me to Albany to move for a now trial and protect me from this wrong. It is midwinter the steamer is cutting her way through the ice now forming on the Hudson. We are together in the saloon and he thus speaks : "Do you know why I come with you on this business?" I spoke of his general disposition to do good. "That disposition, if I have it, would not bring me so far and at such a season. No, let me frankly tell you why I am here. I have noted that your countrymen are very ingenious fellows most of them so ingenious that if you ask them a question they give such answer as may suit their purpose, whatever that purpose may be. Now, I have watched you narrowly, since you came among us, both in our personal intercourse and your writings, and if I had seen in OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 53 you the least tendency toward that kind of "ingenuity" I would not turn round to serve you." And this man was an American, who had labored through his long life to redeem from fraud the politics of his country. Arrived at Albany he saw Sanford and gave him a warning that I will not write here. It resulted in $600 of a saving to me, and in one other illustration of American character and " Chivalry in Mod- ern Days." THE GREAT FAMINE IN IRELAND. It was now 1847, and the great land robbers of Ireland who had always murdered on a scale of .some 70,000* a year were now to murder by the million. The potato was a mass of rottenness. Nothing else had for generations been left to sustain the people, and now that it was gone the land rob- bers insisted upon the Blasphemy called Rent for " their land " all the same. So all the other products, grain, cattle, even poultry and eggs,' were sold or seized upon to pay the Blasphemy. What are called Rockite Notices were put up in Galway and other ports, declaring an embargo on the ships that were carrying away the food. For answer horse, foot and artil- lery were drafted in to offer a choice between being shot or starved. A survivor of imprisonment in the black hole at Calcutta exclaims, " Had we known what was before us, we would have rushed on the bayonets of the Sepoys rather than be driven into that hole." The generous heart of America arose up far more gene- rally than it did in the recent famine. For the need, though great in '80, was far greater in '47. Every city and most towns rose, and spontaneously contributed with unparalelled generosity. In vain ! In vain ! And let us examine how and why it was in vain. How the half million dead would have been saved, and why they were lost. In "Williamsburgh a meeting was called, at which no less than six gentlemen, the elite of the place, made speeches from the heart besides calling on myself, a veteran of famines. I said I had " seen cargoes of oatmeal consigned to principal * See report of Government Commissioner adduced on O'Connell's trial, also pamphlet of Manchester physician, declaring that number, and adding that deaths rose or fell with the price of bread., 54 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUKY ; men in my neighborhood (Donegal), for distribution. It was grossly misapplied reached only comparatively few of those needing it. The Nesbit, before noticed in this book, had his demesne adorned with walks, plantings, and a stone bridge out of such a consignment, and half of it made its way to the compost heap heated and rotted, while people died for want of it. Mere almsgiving would always run a risk like that. Ample funds were now in the hands of the Relief Committees. The price of breadstuff's in New York was two to three cents a pound. The true way to meet the exigency was to enter the market, buy up and send over by the cargo to all the Irish ports sink the freight, and sell at the New York prices. This would drive all speculators out of the market. It would cheapen food not only in Ireland, but in England, Scotland, and even on the continent. Much domestic work was always to be done. Some public works were com- menced more would follow men would get work every- where at say a shilling a day. That would buy 12 Ibs. of In- dian meal or 8 Ibs. of wheat flour. In the cheapest of times in Ireland, oatmeal was never less than two to three cents a pound, and in cheap times no one died of hunger." The meeting applauded this view, and drew up a resolution em- bodying it, and instructing our committee to recommend it to the National Committee sitting in Wall Street. They did not object to this, but said it would do no harm to let it lie over for a week, when they would call another meeting and take final action on it. Alas ! alas ! They broke their prom- ise handed the money over to Wall Street, and called no other meeting ! Had that gentleman who gave the largest subscription ($225) been on that Committee that promise had never been broken. The absence of honor in the local and stupid obstinacy in the Wall street committee cost, I sincerely believe, half a million of lives. When this transpired, the whole ghastly scene that was to follow rose up before me. I left niy work in other charge, and went to the Committee in Wall Street. The Committee Avould not act without the President. I continued to call four days in succession before I found the President. Stated my purpose urged the facts known to me, and the endorse- ment of our public meeting. " No !" he would not interfere with THE LAWS OF TKADE. That was a thing that must not be thought of. " But," I rejoined, " there are a. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 55 million of lives at stake. THEY WILL BE LOST if you do not suspend those laws for this brief season. If you do suspend them, and adopt the plan approved by our public meeting, you will xave every life. If you do not, they will perish." He refused point blank to unsettle the " fixed prin- ciple* of that quack science called Political Economy" I re- tired. I stood stunned on the sidew r alk stunned with the weight and vastness of my defeat. I had fought for a mil- lion of human lives, and lost the battle defeated by that cast-iron fiend, begotten of Adam Smith. How truly was my forebodings realized. Misapplication, fraud and rottenness fell upon the almsgiving. In Mrs. Nicholson's "FAMINE IN IRELAND" (Scribner, New York, 1851) I find the following : " Let the policemen speak out if they will, and testify if many an injured ton of meal has not been flung into' the sea at night from ports in Ireland, which were sent to the poor, and by neglect spoiled, while the objects for whom it was intended died without relief." I also find this entry in my records : A ROYAL FARCE. " There is nothing new under the sun," said some sage of the olden time, but he hadn't seen a "gracious Queen" of England put herself and her household on short allowance of broad and even that of inferior quality ! Can it bo that this exhibit of benevolence on the part of her majesty is made for show, rather than for service. Really there are so many nooks and corners in the least of her majesty's palaces that the facilities for smug- gling bread enough for the " household " will be very great. When her ma- jesty's equerry in waiting, who is never less than a lord's cousin or son, has consumed his " pound of bread," the chances are that he will make up the difference in confectionary, or odd crumbs. It is melancholy to see a farce so exceedingly grave played in the face of a famishing nation. Her Majesty's receipts, a year, amount to between half a million and a million of dollars. Now, if she set apart five thousand dol- lars of this for her support, and informed her equerrys, and grooms of the stole, and ladies of honor, that they must board themselves for the nex^ three months. If she had done this and given the balance of her income to help to save the lives of her "subjects," there would have been some sub- stance in it. But her " gracious majesty " takes a cheaper path to charity. Perhaps the bare supposition that her majesty, and Albert, and the Lord Georges and the lady Janes, in waiting, will each get only a pound of coarse bread in the 24 hours that this supposition will be as good to the Irish peo- ple as if each of them got the daily allowance himself." The foregoing I find published at the time, but it is almost 56 THE ODD BOOK OV THE NINETEENTH CENTURA too horrible for belief. If this woman had called together her " faithful Commons " for a loan to save life as she is con- tinually doing for purposes of destroying it, life could have been saved by a dash of her pen. Was not the " pound of bread" affair too clumsy too insulting." The Morning Post was feebly conducted. The editor, I. A. Smith was retiring, and his partners, George Bennett and Joseph Taylor asked me to take hold or lose the rent of my office. I did. I thought I had no right to touch a penny of money advanced for the dock work, and the $5 paid my weekly expenses. I was wrong. My work was worth my expenses. But I didn't think of that took hold made partnership for a year. Compiled, reported, and wrote leaders for that small daily for the whole year, and overlooked and helped my men at the dock for ten hours every day of that time. That formed one oddity. In look- ing over that file I find another oddity an already ancient telegraph lying in ruin along our street thus celebrated TO THE LIGHTNING. " Child of the marshalled clouds, whose playful form I've watched careering through the skies of night, The storm illumed by thee, I deemed no storm, Thou wert so fitful, beautiful and bright. Free'r than monarch of the billowy main, Freer than eagle in his field of space, Or Indian on his undiscovered plain, Earth was thy sport, and Heaven thy dwelling place. Thy freaks were brilliant and thy voice was loud, Where cloud and counter cloud agreed to meet, Till a chain rose from earth and pierced thy shroud And brought thee trembling to the sage's feet. Thy limbs lay lock'd in steel for half an age, Fettered and valueless, until, at length, Arose in Franklin's land another sage Who gave commission to thy spirit's strength. And thou obedient as the carrier dove, Goest on thy errand o'er the hair-line path, Less frequently, alas ! the voice of love Than of contention, bitterness and wrath. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 67 Nations and men are rushing to thy shrine, Thy voice and fame are heard from sea to sea ! But here dismantled poles and shattered twine. Are all the homage that we pay to thee. Is Williamsburgh, alas 1 so dull and dead ? Is it so dumb, and lame, and deaf, and blind ? Peace, fool I It only goes so fast ahead, That it has left the Telegraph behind. That's it, Mr. Editor. How many inhabitants will AVO have by next year ? And what do you think will lots be worth ? LIGHTNING ROD." The following are also scintillations from the Pout: JUNE 12. "There is nothing presented in this Republic so. calcu- lated to give us pain as the vulgar, coarse and repulsive language and general demeanor of too many of our boys the future sovereigns of the Bepublic. The old Republics had their philosophers, who instructed the Youth taught them, in uubought lectures, love of country, reverence for her institutions, a sense of their own dignity and of the important and honorable duties they were destined to fulfil. But who teaches our youth? and how are they taught? "Many and many a time have we fallen into this painfully interest- ing train of thought, but we generally forbore giving expression to it. We did so under the sad conviction that to speak of any- thing of mere public interest and utility would be singing lullabys to the tempest." Every LIVE man was attached to one or other of the two parties. I did not know T , nor perhaps care, how many enemies I made by such articles as this: JUNE 18. "The infamous Slidell McKenzie, who hanged to death three American citizens in contempt of the most solemn laws of the Re- public, has been appointed to the command of another of our national vessels. The first time he is becalmed again, in need of a little pleasureable excitement, he has the same permission to hang up as many more for his amusement. And what are we to say to the government that thus rewards him for his heinous crimes, and puts him in a way to continue them ? " 'Here!' the politicians will exclaim, 'this is anti-neutral. You are finding fault with the Democratic government.' "Gentlemen, is it any comfort to you to hear that a Whig govern- ment was just as bad? When McKenzie came home with the blood 58 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURA ,' of those three men on his soul, the Whig government took him out of the hands of the civil authorities, and transferred him to the hands of co-criminals of his own kind, to screen him from justice. Fellows who had for long years smacked their champagne with all the more gusto that groans of tortured seamen still rang in their ears seamen, who are treated worse than wild beasts - who are fed out of a rice trough, while Oriental luxury reigns in the cabin. Public Opinion stepped in, however, and rebuked the government. McKenzie was kept at home, and, riding out on a spirited horse, at Tarrytown, he was thrown his foot hung in the stirrup, and the horse dashed along till he avenged the three innocent seamen." JUNE 20. ' ' Discover a fossil turned out by a stone-breaker. Advise geologists to print instructions for quarrymen." FOURTH OF JULY. "We have wisdom to plan, activity to urge, strength and skill to execute. Many a future city reposes in the unawakened resources of this great land. Genius will arise; the Arts be restored and pushed forward ; Science will tower to heights proportioned to the extent of our domain. But there is danger danger that all those resources will be directed too much to indi- vidual aggrandizement. On that single pivot hangs the fate of the Kepublic. Let us begin, then, individually, to lay the foundation for national virtue. If you can do good to anyone without loss or even with trifling loss do it. Better your axe should be blunted your umbrella lost your wheel-barrow broken than that you should contract that impenetrable selfishness which, when it be- comes general, destroys nations." YACHTING. AUGUST 16. " Once more upon the waters yet once more ; And the waves bound beneath me like a steed That knows his rider." "Unquestionably, usefulness you are a useful thing, and we could delight to see you going down into the deep future growing more perfect and powerful till at last you made the long latent forces of Nature do all the work and gave man every man one long and joyous holiday. But the quick and accelerating march of utility has a mortal and relentless tendency to crush out the beautiful itself from existence its worship from the human heart. The chivalry of ancient times is gone, and in its field stands modern conventionalism. The short, quick bang of the fowling piece has forever (or has it forever?) chased away tho primitive, OR, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 59 graceful and intensely interesting sport of "Hawking." The echoes of America have hardly ever been awakened by the ' ' Horn of Chase" nor has, that we know of, the deep baying of the "opening pack" ever loaded the breeze of a cis- Atlantic vale. The free saddle has given place to the parlor snuggery of the light wagon. Men fish now-a-days with a silver hook, and sail in steam tugs ! Utility ! stern, loveless, unpoetic power ! We welcome your sway universal drudge of a universal holiday. But why should you kill off all the beautiful things, and sear up the still more beautiful feelings of the past? What were the holiday you promise us, if those beautiful things and those delightful feelings are not to make a part of it? Well, it is one consolation to know that the iron of the times has not entered into all the souls among us that there are still a few (and their number increasing) who hold the philosophy that enjoy- ment, under guidance, is wealth the only wealth a man really possesses, and that all other merely slips through his fingers." In the absence of news I strove to give variety to the paper, and force it into usefulness. I mention this as a contrast to what follows. But at last the year had run round, and the partnership expired. The paper had paid every one connected with it a fair compensation. To make it day work for the printers, it had been changed to an evening paper. It was a complete success. But it was only an honest success, and to my aston- ishment the. partners declared off. Bennett was going to journey work, he said, and he wished me to remove the ob- ligation to take my materials at $500, which had been agreed upon. It would do me no good to hold it over him, and have it weigh on his mind wherever he might go to work. I believed his falsehood for truth, and gave him a formal quit- tance. That accomplished, out came the prospectus of the Williamsburgh Times. Behind it stood all the prospective thieves of both the political parties, .and the prospective harvest was so tempting as to seduce men naturally inclined to be honest. Incensed at this baseness, and foreseeing its object, I resolved to carry on the paper, and employed two brothers professed Land Reformers, and good printers to help me through. Of money I had all that was necessary. I changed it back to a morning paper. But the prospective thieves seduced those two men so effectually that they blew out the lights and left the office late in the night without a fiO THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; word of warning. I could not discharge my men at the dock, and cease their work. When my family got floating-about printers from New York, a chum would beckon them out, and, after brief conference, they would return for hat and coat, and disappear. The conspirators (for that the sequel proved them to be) had money and political preferment to offer, and several of the seduced got political places which they hold to this day. The tax-payers looked stupidly on, not realizing what was to come. I concluded that the taxes would be doubled perhaps trebled. But I had not the least apprehension of the audacity shown by those political thieves. First they went to their brother rogues in Albany, and got the public meetings abolished ,kat heretofore author- ized the public expenditure. They substituted an elected Board of Finance. But in its first year the rogues spent (stole) $30,000 above what the Finance Board prescribed. The next or second year, their brothers in Albany abolished the Finance Board, and let them loose at taxing (stealing) without restraint. In the seven years ending 1855, the population had doubled, and the taxes went up from $23,000 to $313,000, or over twelve dollars for one. An instructive phenomenon here presents itself. During the existence of the Post the activity of Thought was remark- able, if not unprecedented, in a population of 10,000 people. The Lyceum, the Land Reformers, the Liberty Party, the Workingmen's Library Association, were in full activity, with lectures, meetings and discussions. In the f oh 1 owing year, under the sordid reign of the thieves' organ, all this was reversed. Meetings, discussions, lectures all passed utterly away. There is a theory that it is not only the sophistry of dishonest writers that misleads, but that the virus of their corrupt minds flows into and vitiates the mind of the public. The going out of the Pout and the coming in of the Times furnished a very distinct evidence on this subject. And this: . A negro troupe advertised a week's performance in Lexing- ton Hall, of singing and stuff like this: Miss Lucy had a baby, And just when it was bo'n She dipped it in the batter pot, And called it Lucy Long." "Like to like," the Times gave them the full use of its Oil, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. columns, and bespoke for them a full success. The Post (it was yet in existence) denounced an exhibition so degrading to public taste, and after the first abortive night, it disap- peared. MEAGHER AND O'BRIEN. About this time ('52) Thomas Francis Meagher made his way from Australia to New York. His fame had long pre- ceded him, and the announcement of a lecture by him brought together some 5,000 people. I was present, and in relation to it addressed a letter to Mr. Meagher, which I abridge : "This letter is to convey to you my protest against the manner in Which you trifled with the time and attention of the thousands of ardent men who attended at your lecture. No human being who believed in your reputation could deem it possible that you would lecture on any other subject than the late disastrous events in Ireland her present position, and the condition of things in Europe and here, as those might bear upon and affect that position. Instead of that you gave us you gave that immense meeting a lecture on the twaddling inanities of Australian History. Australian History ! Well and truly did you tell us, at the outset, that her his- tory is "a white page." That she had no history. What were you afraid of, sir, that you would not approach the "imperfect light" that now hangs over Ireland, and endeavor to lessen that imperfection. Who were you afraid of, sir, that you would not approach her "defeat," for the purpose of preparing the way, that it might one day be turned into victory? "Our gracious little Queen," as Dan used to call her. "Her popu- larity it is that holds Republican ideas in check!" so you tell us. Ah, sir, that mind which could have the least reverence for such a piece of furniture is but poor soil for the growth of Kepublican prin- ciples. How many good women in England, and in Ireland, too, die yearly of famine and the diseases it induces? Is not every brilliant in that woman's hair every hair itself purchased with a human life? You mistake the field of your power, if you suppose it lies in paying court even to female crowned heads, or sly, gouty conserva- tives. Such field will lead you to nothing, sir, but ignoble sloth and obscurity. Once a true Republic shall be formed in this country and a true 62 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; Republic must guarantee to every one of its citizens the right to dig bread out of that Republican soil once this is done, and done I trust it soon will be, let us cast about for a wise disposition of the hearts and rifles that are ready for work . in this country. Such a disposition as will send forth from these sliores that redemption to Ireland, and to Eng- land, too, that those unhappy nations are not likely to soon achieve by their ow r n unaided exertions. I have the honor to remain, Your obedient servant, THOMAS AINGE DEVYR." For this a torrent of anonymous vituperation was dashed upon me in our local press, ending in this way: " ' Tis sweet for one's country to lie;' to die for it is trifling. This is the teaching of our second Daniel, and truly he ought to know. Practice is said to make perfect, and he must therefore be as near perfection in this matter as it is possible for man to attain." I was not very long out of London at the time, where those connected with the press must take the ten-pace risk if they are insulted. So I wrote to the editor: " Now, sir, this is not the fair thing. You know it isn't and I trust if any of your correspondents has anything personal to growl out for the future, you will let him growl it himself, not make you his mouth-piece. You and I, Mr. Editor, know the code in respect to these things ; your correspondent evident- ly does not. But probably he will bear teaching. I am likely to enter upon a work in which I must adopt the motto of Ossian's Fingal, 'Never seek the combat, nor shun it when it comes.' Now, sir, if things have gone to the devil in Europe, and if they are going to the devil here ; if the sword reigns supreme in the one, and if cheating and corruption and hypocrisy are beginning to reign supreme in the other ; and if I am little over forty years old, and have little else to do than amuse myself by making war on these things for twenty or thirty years to come and if I should determine so to do, it will be necessary, at the outset, for the conditions to be made known. These public things are the legitimate field of controversy. It is not necessary for men to turn aside from that field, for the purpose of slandering my private character. No man of honor and taste will do it ; and if others will, I can only defend myself as circum- stances may require. This is indeed a grave matter ; far, far too grave for buffoonery, though buffoons may not be aware of the fact. Liberty is openly struck down, and writhing from the White Sea to the Mediterranean, In Great Britain she is permitted to danee in her chains, to the tune of "Britons never will be slaves." In America, corruption is throned in our capitals, and stalking abroad over the land. Is there nothing to do for such men as Meagher in view of the ruin accomplished in Europe and impending here?" OR, THE SPIBIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 63 The editor actually tried to show that there was nothing in the foregoing paragraph to which I could take exception. And the libeler came out with the following denial of his pub- lished words. I quote it to show the depths to which vicious natures will descend: To THE EDITORS OF THE "INDEPENDENT PKESS:" Gentlemen You are quite right in the construction which you place upon the sentence in my last communication to which the great Devyr takes such signal exception. To assail the personal character of Mr. D , least of all in respect to his veracity, was never my thought. I have no knowledge upon which to base such an assault, and no cause to make it if I had. "When Mr. O'Brien touched these shores I enclosed to him these strictures on Mr. Meagher's debut. I told him of the degrading uses to which our unreflecting countrymen are put by their self-seeking leaders. I had been pre- sented to Mr. O'Brien, in London, so early as 1836, as a Land Reformer, in which good work he was then ardently engaged. But I waited for some days in vain for any response to my communication. Fearing to misinterpret him into a mere member of the Irish Gironde,* I again wrote to him, that there might be no mistake. The following is his reply : "WASHINGTON, March 9, 1859. Sir : I did not answer your ilrst letter because I was unwilling to say any- thing that would offend you ; but since you seem to interpret my silence as a want of respect, I think it right to say that the perusal of any publication disparaging to my friend, Mr. Meagher, can afford me no gratification, but, on the contrary, much pain. I have the honor to be Your obedient servant, WM. SMITH O'BRIEN. THOMA.S A. DEVYB, Esq. To this note I sent the following reply intended less for Mr. O'Brien himself than for the public: WILLIAMSBULG: T , March 16, 1859. Sir : I did not suppose my strictures on any of your compatriots of '48 would afford you "gratification." I did not intend to pay court to you in any such dishonorable way. How could you suppose I did? On the contrary, I believed it would give you " pain" to read, as it gave me pain to be compelled to write them. But what then? Can you not look a truth in the face because it may give you pain? Will you give no heed to facts bearing on the fate of the Irish *" Gironde" was the middleocracy of France, who would substitute their own power for that of the monarchy. 64 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; nation because they also bear on the conduct of one of your friends? Revers- ing the famous aphorism, do you indeed exclaim, "Not that I love Home less, but that I love Ccesar more ? " And yot Ireland looks up to you, and her children and friends in this country look up to you, with a vague hope. A hope that, perhaps, God has chastened you into a great deliverer. Tell them to dismiss that hope. And, above all, tell them that their own domestic oligarchs press upon them with a weight closer and heavier than the foreign chain ! "Where is enslaved man to turn his eyes for hope? Those who, like myself, had an early struggle with poverty who know what it is to stare actual famine in the face have they any power to make themselves felt? Alas ! no. Their sense of wrong may drive them to the shadowy hillside, and the night- echoes of their musket may ring tho knell of the individual oppressor. But they possess no other eloquence. " Knowledge to their eyes her ample page, Rich with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll ; Chill penury repressed their noble rage, Aud froze the genial current of the soul." Sir, if you realized the wrongs of these unhappy men if you were fit to be their deliverer you would bid "friendship" stand back. You would trample on politeness. You would thank God, who had spared your days and given you power to aid in righting them, and you would devote to the holy work every waking moment of your future life. But will you do this work? Do you oven comprehend it? Do you under- stand the right of that miserable man bending over his spade. His right to a sustaining spot on this earth as a child of our common Father? Do you realize this Great Truth: that as the "structure of his lungs gives him a man's right in the atmosphere," so does the " structure of his stomach " give him a man's right in the soil? No, sir, you do not realize those things. You are a gentleman an " esta- ted" gentleman yourself. It is two thousand years since the Gracchii perished. And their order has it produced one inheritor of their virtues up to the present day. "Ireland for the Irish." What does it mean, sir? Is it that a few Irish lawyers and Irish gentlemen shall "play at govern- ment" and TAXES without interference from British power? If so, a fig for it. I would not raise my linger to produce such a change. But if " Ireland for the Irish" means that the Irish land " belongs " to the Irish people ; that It ought to furnish them with " plentiful tables " and " happy homes ;" that the landlord or sheriff shall " not vex them " any more ; if it means that the government of Ireland shall be the collective will of her whole adult man- hood ; that its paramount duty shall be to regulate equitably the ownership of this Irish land then, sir, is he worthy the name of man who would not almost wade the Atlantic to strike for such a Revolution? I have the honor, &c., THOMAS AINGE DEVYJ$, OK, THE SPIBIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 65 KOSSUTH HUNGARY ENGLAND. I find the following in my printed records of 1851 : Men's opinions differ now and then. I suppose it is right. At any rate, it is our nature. In reference to the Hungarian affair, mine agreed with my fellow-citizens' up to the point where Kossutli so zealously endorsed the British Government. Now, that government is distinguished from the other despotisms of Europe only by its subtlety as the serpent in the garden was distinguished "from all tho other beasts of the field." When, therefore, Kossuth told the people of England that they were "not free because they were great and prosperous, but they were great and prosperous because they were free," I stopped short. When he told the English people that the bulwark of their freedom was their municipalities, it is no wonder I cried, " hold ! " For those very municipalities had put steel handcuffs upon me at the bidding of the government. In fact, the big tarantula has his den in Downing street (London), and all the municipaUties are so many of his \claws. ~~ I believed that these empty and lying boasts about British liberty were calculated to discourage the democratic element everywhere, so I published my views on the whole matter, and sent them on to Washington. They did good, and helped to kill off the impostor when he reached that capital. The following is an extract I wrote and published while Kossuth was yet in Eng- land, and before he reached this land, where the shrewd Yankees let him x - swindle them out of some seventy thousand dollars : Hopes are built upon it that, in the event of Hungary again raising the standard of Independence, England will join in aiding the new nationality. I have no evidence before me that England will do any such thing especially if the new nation aspires to the rank of a Republic resting on the sovereignty of the whole people. Let us briefly analyze the nature of England's institutions, social and political. All the land of the British Islands, and all the minerals, are in the hands of an aristocracy " the landed aristocracy." Nearly all the capital, the manufacturing machinery, and the commerce of the nation are in the hands of another aristocracy " the moneyed aristocracy." The Itglslation of the country is divided between them, and pretty equally divided. The laboring millions are excluded from all participa- tion in the controlling of public affairs. These two aristocracies issue their will, christened by the name of "law," and enforce obedience to it by the mediation of 50.- 000 bayonets, aided by an army hardly less numerous of rural police and municipal constables. Liberty perished alike beneath Augustus and * The thirty Mock tyrants when Rome's annals wax but dirty. 1 * The first typifies your Russian Czar, the second your British Oligarchy. The one is the iiend touched with Ithuriel's spear up in its natural proportions The other is the same fiend groveling on its bellv in the garden and breathing falsehoods into the xr< man's ear. Which of the vwo despotisms is the best or the w-rst in practice I will not undertake to say. The English Parliament the Reformed Parliament voted to Adelaide, dowager of William IV., half a million of dollars a year, and a seventy- four-gun ship to jaunt her up the Mediterranean for the benefit of her health. This 66 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; to the very woman who drove the country to the verge of civil war in 1832, by oppos. ing the Reform Bill. The workingman, or his wife or mother in poverty and old age were, by the vote of that same Parliament, consigned to a prison workhouse, starved upon fifteen pence worth of food in the week, and the very hair shaved off their heads, as an indignity added to their miserable condition ! This is a sample of government justice in England. Of government rapacity it is enough to say that it has the working millions formed into one vast gang of white slaves, toiling in the field, and in the mine, and in the factory, ior a subsistence far less adequate and assured than is given to the very horses that are yoked to the wagon and the plough. Two dollars and a half per week will more than average the reward of labor. "With five hundred dollars a week, an English aristocrat would con- sider himself a beggar. The one produces all England'* wealth ; the othtr docs nothing but debauch in London, or ride after his hounds. TAX-PAYEES' MOVEMENT. It is now 1855, and local taxes have so enormously increased that Directors of the City Bank and others subscribed three or four hun- dred dollars to start a weekly paper to combat and expose the rob- bery. At the suggestion of Mr. * * * they appoint me to take charge of it, with Field, Cashier of the Bank, to assist me. He showed me the list of subscribers names, and said he would collect the monies. Meanwhile I need not delay. I could borrow a sum from Mr. * * *, which I did. Purchased press and material. Founded the Tax-Payer's Association held weekly meetings for several months. About twenty reformers, all poor men, attended those meetings, and an opposing number of taxeaters also attended them. Not an owner of property came to help us. Not a subscriber to the press fund excepting that one man whom we all know by this time. He subscribed double and paid it. But I came out a loser of several hundred dollars and six months effort.* Floating-about printers are easily bribed, and the taxeaters had plenty of money to bribe them. So as soon as I employed one a visitor would come and ask him out to confer. He would return, put on his coat, and leave, just as it was done by the same political rogues in the affair of the Morning Post. Mr. Field went over bodily *It is believed that Tax Assessors connive with rich men. And if a formi- dable opposition presents itself lower the tax demands to get rid of the opposition. This was probably done in the present instance. I presented that thought to Mr. * * *. He gave me written authority to have the Bank taxes so examined as to either disprove or confirm the suspicion. Finding what my purpose was the Bank officials baffled it for weeks, and finally \vouUl not allow the books to be examined. OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DA^S. 67 to the taxeaters foil into ill health, and his brother had to take care of him till he died. I worked at case and the press myself, with my two little sons to help me, and finally fell dangerously sick, and the politicians were triumphant, and the taxpayers were and are just where they ought to be, Bobbed by taxation the highest, local Debt the largest, and government perhaps the very worst in the world. The programme of the Taxpayers' Party was thus set forth : " The object of the Party is to put down fraud, waste and oppression in our City and County government, and to rouse up into life its laziness and inefficiency. To restore the rate of taxation that prevailed ten years ago. A man who paid live dollars on his house and lot then, ought not to pay one cent more now, There have been as many improvements made since that time houses built, factories established, wharves and stores erected as are sufficient to bear the legitimate increase in the expense of government. Tax-payers ! Have your burdens rapidly increased from year to year till they are now insupportable? Have these burdens driven away New York capital to other places? Is not Williamsburgh left as poor as a church mouse? Does anything flourish but the office holders? Have the watch dogs of the Press leagued with the robbers? Have they remained silent? Have they taken their share of the spoils? Have they worried and bitten the good men among you who would dare to disturb the public thieves? Have they driven out all truth from their columns? Have they presented you, for years, with falsehood and carricatures? There are in every town and ward discreet and intelligent men who have not been much mixed up in politics. Let these men consult with each other, and fix upon a proper 'man say for the office of Alderman. Let a requisition be got up asking him to serve Let that requisition be carried round to every voter let all sign it who are determined to put an eTfid to this state of affairs. Primary meetings have become odious, and in our programme they are unnecessary. A gentleman nominated in this way can hardly fail of being elected . Ten years ago we used to meet in mass convention, men of all parties, and debate what reforms we wanted from the Legislature. We used to ad- journ from night to night until we agreed upon the necessary measures. Then we sent a deputation to Albany with those measures, and they came back to us enacted into law. Why is this not done now? " O ! the Bennetts, the Fields, the Sparks, the Comstocks, the Huntlys and their drummed up recruits, would not let us" do it." Ah well ! If that indeed, be so, let us 68 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J like the falling Csesar, cover our faces with our garment and decently resign ourselves to our fate." THE COKKUPT COKPOKATION PRESS. The main reason urged by me against feeding this foul press, was, not the fifty thousand dollars a year, and more, that it costs the city not the many thousands more that it sacks by the numerous Sheriff's sales brought upon us by the deplorable state of our affairs not the sums of blackmail which, to my cost, I know it is in the habit of levying : O ! no NOT these by any means. If George Bennett would take his sheep's head back to Cockneydom and keep it there ; and if the other men of types and lamp- black (who are less hurtfull, because they are less mendacious and veno- mous than he is), if they would all take themselves off, and guarantee us against another batch of the same sort I, for one, would vote them tJie fifty thousand dollars a year, during their natural lives rather than not get rid Of them. And never did a plundered city make as good a bargain before, as this would be for us. Why? Simply because the $1,800,000,* which are plun- dered off us yearly, is plundered off us by means of this corrupt and vil- lainous press. Their falsifications their concealments their slanders of our best public men who does not know these were the things which run the plunder up to an amount so enormous? Well did Madame de Sael say : " In the same way as regular troops are more formidable than militia to the independence of the people, so do hired writers deprave and mislead public opinion much more than could take place when men communed only by words, and formed their opinions by facts which fell under their own observation." We have now " hired writers" hired, paid, fed, by the men who literally " reel to bed " under the weight of our plunder. " The Flint, one day reproached the Steel, for striking it so hard in order to bring forth its fire. " It is no pleasure to me," said the steel. " This hard striking injures wears and cuts me up as much as it does you. But, though you are full of fire, when would you give sparks if I did not strike you hard?" " There may be some reason in that," returned the flint, "and is it possible this hard striking is disagreeable to you as well as to me? And does it happen only because I will not give fire without it? Let me reflect." The enemies of Reform will, of course, resort to every possible untruth. \ Among the rest I am too " impetuous too fiery." I am. Far too much so I for my own welfare and quiet. I am The Steel because they are The Flint. Here follow items and incidents connected with this effort: " Of our first number we printed 3,000 copies. The printer's bill amounted to just $27 paper, 15.50 placards, advertising. &c., brought up the total to It is now some eight or ten millions, with a debt approaching forty millions. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 69 over $77, leaving all the editorial work all the examination into public records. &c., to go " free, gratis, for nothing." Now, 3,000 copies, at three cents each, would come to ninety dollars, out of which the carriers receive $30 for their labor. Then there is the trouble and loss in collecting, which will bring down the receipts to $50, or less, for what cost $77, with editorial labor, office rent, &e., OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 71 could discharge him. But we couldn't discharge an Alderman and if you - talked of such a thing, he would raise h 11 with you. So badly were our . ptreets paved that a gentleman coming to one of them was requested to turn back as the Inspector was coming to view it, and if the horse trod on it some of the stones might sink in. (Great laughter and cheers.) Mr. Wall concluded by saying that there was sickness in his family that money could not purchase him to be present to-night ; but that he felt it was the sacred duty of all good men to come forward and put an end to those things. He retired amid a round of applause. Byron talks thus of first speeches : " I had forgotten but must not forget An orator, the latest of the session, Who had delivered well a very set, Smooth speech, his first and maidenly transgression, Upon debate the papers echoed yet, With his debut which made a strong impression, And ranked with what is every day displayed The best first speech that ever yet was made." There was nothing " set" or at all " smooth" in this first speech of Mr. Wall. It was the welling up of the honest feeling that lay at the bottom of his heart. If Mr. Wall had cherished and brought out those feelings that were natural to him he would have been a very useful and very distinguished man. But the base natures that surrounded him " Repressed his noble rage And froze the genial current of his soul." as those base natures did with many a naturally good man like Win. Wall. I give these details because they are sharply illustrative of American government and American character. POLICE. About this time I had not as good an opinion of our police force as I afterwards found it deserved. I had not, as yet, realized that my life, or the life of any citizen, was absolutely at their disposal. And when I found that not one in a hundred of them availed himself of his privilege, I could not but feel both kindly and grateful to them. Many a time since, I have taken off my mental hat and thanked them for not killing me as they passed me by. But the Tax-payers' Movement roused animosity, I think on both sides. Mine took this satirical shape : " Let others sing of battle steeds, Of rifles and of wars, And tell us of their gallant deeds Beneath the stripes and stars; 72 THE ODD BOeE QP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J Give me the star beneath whose beam You neither work nor beg The star below my shoulder seam, The stripe upon my leg. The Freedom's star, whose gallant show Waves to the breeze on high ; The stripe that joins that star a bow Of promise in the sky. Well, you look up to see them float You hoist them up a peg ; But I my star is on my coat, My stripe is on my leg. That stripe, you say, in better days Waved o'er young Freedom's Band That star shot down its virgin rays, To light a happy land ! Bosh ! Put this lager to your throat, And drink it to the dregs ; And toast the star upon my coat, The stripe upon my legs ! No more of stripe, by tempest driven Above its wall of oak Of star, that from the blue of Heaven Lights up the cannon's smoke ! Tobacco smoke is sweeter far, Among those brandy kegs. Hurrah ! then, tor the stripe and star On me and on my legs ! The following appears in one of the last numbers (VII.) of the Taxpayer : " Tte incessant thougl* and physical labor which have pressed upon me in this movement, have so utterly broken my health that I must travel. My own family pant this sheet. They are obtaining proficiency daily, and will, 1 think, keep up the weekly issue during my absence. But let -the citizens count nothing on me. If they are ready to free this distressed city they can easily do so. If they are not, they must suffer on, on." And they did and do suffer on to an extent which we shall see as we proceed. It was my purpose to record impunity given to crime by American Jurisprudence. But the early records preserved for this purpose were dwarfed out of existence by the examples almost in- credible that now, '81, force themselves on our attention every day. If a sailor drowned passengers in mid-ocean and got off with three f" OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 73 months imprisonment if a U. S. Commander murdered at the yard- arm three innocent men in contempt of the express law of the Ke- public and got off without censure if a counsel betrayed to the gallows the prisoner he was appointed to defend, later events far more atrocious crowded in so fast as by comparison to render such small mattefs not worth notice. Our absurd and wicked diplomacy began to attract attention at this time. It drew forth expositions like this : HOME MISSIONS AND FOKEIGN MISSIONS. " It is true another kind of diplomacy belongs to the Kepublic. A mission of our pioneer ambassadors into our royal back woods. This Home Missionary, after, felling and digging, and ploughing enough for his family's use, has a little extra time which he would fain apply to fencing, humanizing the precincts of his cabin, perhaps constructing a rude cradle in which to rock little Billy. But this would be quite unreasonable. He should rather employ this extra time to raise xtra corn or wheat, drive it ten or twelve miles to market, and turn it into money. One will bring fifty cents per bushel and the other fifteen. The price may be small. The labor to produce it may be ardu- ous. The very toil of carrying it to market may be worth half the amount that his sales will bring. But he has at least one thing to cheer him in his hard struggle. It is the reflection that when he has succeeded in scraping together $200, and when he has paid it into the National Treasury for his land, it will be patriotically applied to buy "Opera tickets " for the young gentlemen and ladies of our foreign Ambassador's suite. It is true, when returning from market, empty-handed to his lonely cabin in the woods when the barefooted little ones run to lisp their sire's return, And climb his knee the envied kiss to share," a thought may come over him a fierce and sorrowful thought that the money which he received for his wheat and corn would have bought many a little necessary bitterly wanted by his own wife and children. Well, they must put up with the privation. There is no cure. A patriotic government has decided that the backwoodsman should rather furnish the Ambassador's family with opera tickets than his own family with the necessaries of life, And if the backwoodsman should repine at this application of his money, he ought to remember that we could never get 74 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J along with those mighty and redoubtable monarchies of Europe and elsewhere if we did not send forth our ' ' Mission"-aries to feast and coax, and conciliate and cajole their Diplomatic corps. Our insti- tutions are so tottering and theirs so firm ! Our resources are so limited and theirs so vast! Our industry is so sluggish and theirs is so active ! Their mercenaries are so brave and our vol- unteers so pusillanimous ! Our Treasury is so empty and theirs is so full ! Our trade is so worthless to them and theirs is of such immense value to us ! And finally, and above all, their subjects are so happy and loyal and our citizens are so miserable and malcon- tent that some terrible thing might come of it, if we had not our " entertaining' corps to eat and drink European ambassadors into good humor with us, and thus, and by that means, obtain for this Republic their magnanimous forbearance. One fine day in June Victoria opened her first Parliament. Wasn't there a cavalcade of Ambassadors? and wasn't the importance of each nation written on the diplomatic coaches in letters of flaming gold? That plain American carriage of Andrew Stevenson what is it doing there? It is the statue of Brutus in the procession of Caesar. Really, it is very condescending in the other Ambassadors to suf- fer it among them at all. It speaks a whole volume of politics to the assembled thousands of workingmen who came to see the show. The thousands cheer it along St. James', down Whitehall, and all away to the Old Abbey. They cheer the American brown carriage, and some of them grin and jeer at the fine European tinsel and gold. The savages ! What a taste they must have. But we'll set the mat- ter right we'll get gilded carriages too." And all this diplomacy costing millions is not merely useless to us. It is both dishonoring and dangerous. A political parvenue goes out to a foreign Court with a train of paid "loblolly boys " at his heels. All on the watch to pick up "noble and royal" snobbery to astonish the native* when they return home again. If there be any Republicans, (not thief Republicans), in the country, they have a worthy job before them to regulate this villainy along with the rest. THE PANIC OF 1857. At this time the Banking law of New York State enjoined specie redemption of all bills issued by the Banks. For this purpose the banks retained what they called "a solid basis." But now the "basis" takes flight to Europe, and to avoid a breach of the law and consequent bankruptcy they cease to discount. Then there is no OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 75 money no manufacturing no employment. Everything is at a stand still. Mr. * * * explains to me the condition of his bank That it was only by drawing on the resources of all his friends he was enabled to redeem the torrent of inrushing bank bills. But by resolutely withholding discounts the storm must blow over. He could not sleep at night at the thought of the bare possibility of his father's name (as President) and his own as Director being dishon- ored, and owing to his resources and vigilance they were not. At his desire, and enlightened by his practical knowledge, I wrote "Currency Explosions, their Cause and Cure." From it I give ex- tracts : 1st Extract. " Gold is simply a commodity of use in the arts, but if the credit of a nation is broken down by anarchy or war, it will be found useful as a temporary medium of exchange." 2(Z " The permanent currency of any Nation ought to be based on the nation's resources and credit. If that credit is good, its currency will be convertible into all commodities including gold." 3d. " To base a currency on gold is to base a house upon moveable bricks that may be withdrawn at any time, especially by a foreign demand, leaving the structure to tumble into ruins." th Settlement Of Land "Nature intended man's relation to the soil to be very close and permanent. On the bosom of his great Nursing Mother he finds security from the collapses of trade. Health invigorates his frame and his position is the best for cultivating both the private and the public 5th Extract. FOREIGN EXCHANGE. 11 The foreign merchant sells his cargo of goods and gets paid for it in currency, but that won't do to take home with him. The banks are no lon- ger compelled to give him gold, and the premium on that metal is up to five per cent. He can't afford that ; it takes away all his profits. So he goes to an exporting firm and asks can they sell him an Exchange on Liver- pool. 'No.' The prices of grain and cotton here, with freight, &c., add- ed, are about equal to what they would bring in Liverpool. Therefore they are not shipping and have no exchange to sell. But,' replies the merchant, ' I'll give you three per cent premium for a bill.' ' Well,' returns the other, ' let me see. There is the ship Washington waiting for a freight. She car- ries 20,000 barrels of flour which at $5 amounts to $100,000 net, the sum you want. Your premium of 3 per cent amounts to $3,000. A very fair profit. Yes, we'll ship the flour, and give you a Bill of Exchange on the conditions you have mentioned.' " And thus the flour is sold only because the foreign merchant could not compel the bank to give him gold. He goes home and calculates for another adventure. But he finds that if he cannot sell his wares at three per cent or more advance on his last sales, it will not do to take them to America. This 76 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J checks our imports and by the double action the balance of trade is rapidly adjusted without in the least affecting our currency or our domestic trade. But under the "gold basis" system excessive importation could only be checked, not by screwing the foreign merchant who brings on the necessity, but by bringing down all prices to the European level contracting the whole currency of the nation producing confu- sion, loss, and ruin widespread as the whole continent and vibrating over the world. Thus compelled, all the banks in New York State held a Conven- tion in the city repudiated the "redemption" folly, issued their bills untrammelled with gold. Everybody was glad to get them. Trade revived. Gold would not command 50 cents premium on $100. Up till we were one year into the war it did not reach 2 per cent, and never would if the central government had not basely and criminally repudiated its own "lawful money," and become a bor- rower, when it could and should have been a lender, as will be seen by a Memorial forwarded to Congress in February 1863, by the same gentleman without whose influence this book had never been written. THAT MEMOKIAL. After showing that the State Banks had no legal existence and how to " retire " them, it proceeded thus : " The rubbish cleared away, let the Government issue a National Cur- rency to take its place. The Currency must be a large amount, probably two thousand millions of dollars in "1865.* " To this amount the nation will accept the bills of the Government. Will the nation redeem them ? Yes. At sight. In flour, beef, cloth, houses, lands, everything, in short, contained in the nation. Every man will be glad to get them. There will bo no other money in the country." " With this 2,000,000,000 of new National Currency the Government can extinguish its incipient debt and have a large surplus, which may be loaned to bankers or others on a deposit of State stocks at an interest of five or six per cent, an annual gain of twenty-five millions. (This was in February 1863, when the debt was small.) The casual destruction of the bills, especi- ally in war times, would on the above amount average 1^ to 2 per cent thirty to forty millions yearly. Increase of business and population would demand a steady increase of nearly an equal amount. Making in all well up to one hundred millions a year of legitimate resource to the Govern- ment." And yet the blocklieaded rogues went and borrowed money from the Shyloeks more rogue than the blockhead. The Memorial continued : "The bills of the National Currency must not be a "Promise to pay." "Strange coincidence. This turned out to be the exact volume in circulation in 1865. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 77 They are a draft by the Government on the people. An evidence of a debt due by the people to the bearer, and should bear that evidence on their face, thus : $10 TO THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES. CBEDIT THE BEAKER TEN DOLLARS AT SIGHT. VALUE RECEIVED BY THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. LEGAL TENDER. SIGNED, A. B. ATTEST, C. D. $10 ' ' The bill once issued, the nation takes it, and the Government has nothing further to do with it, save perhaps renew it when worn out." By the help of unfortunate Preston King, a naturally good man who sank under the sea of corruption he floated in, I had this Memorial laid on all the desks in Congress. The gentleman who inspired this, himself a banker and a millionaire, when reminded that it would take largely from the profits of his own bank, replied as we have seen " I CARE NOT FOR MY BANK, i CASE FOR MY COUNTRY ! " When I reached Washington with this Memorial I could not get access to Mr. Chase. His ante-room was filled with place beggars his deputy, Har- rington, thought, I suppose, that I was one of them, and spoke to me in such strain. I told him my business was not with him but with Mr. Chase, and he took care that I should not see Mr. Chase. To what follows let me ask especial attention. Edmund C. Stedman, a clever writer and somewhat of a Reformer, occu- pied a large office room in the Treasury Department. I told him my mis- sion. " You can accomplish nothing," said he. " Mr. Chase will borrow and will have National Banks." " But what will the people say," I ask, "when they see him avoid this Great Gain and embrace this great Annual Loss?" " The people !" he replied, " If we bid them put their heads in that cor- ner (pointing to it) till we put our foot on their necks they will do it." And he was just out from a long probation in Greeley's Tribune office, when he voiced this appalling sentiment. Here, just here, lies the great, the terrible danger of the Republic ! I returned home. O ! how discouraged ! It is midnight. A big dark cloud rises up in the sky. Flashes of sheet lightning play round its margins, and plant an immense tree of fire on its disk. It disappears returns seems to play hide and seek behind and before the cloud presents a nocturnal view of which the European skies can present no idea. It was a celestial landscape that I never saw equalled before or since. And I found myself asking, "Is there no Spirit making a part of this sublime scene that will come down and help us to save this glorious land?" The sublimities of Nature have a tendency to stir up those deep thoughts. "When Winter flung down its night shadows and howled its sleety breath through the trees an 78 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J impulse would coine over me to invoke even the spirit of the tem- pest to suggest some thought that might preserve the Eepublic. Through the vigil of many a night how indignantly have I thought that the property I had achieved by friendly aid and personal effort was being wrenched out of my hand confiscated to the use of banded politicians. The means of supporting and educating my children fast going or gone. At last the thought dawned on me of a Constitutional Limit to Taxation. Mr. * * * adopted it at once, and ordered several thou- sand copies of a Circular embodying it to be printed and circulated. Of the hundreds sent to them, not a newspaper noticed it only Mac- kenzie's* Messenger, published in Toronto. These are points of the Circular : " The Constitution of New York State declares that Municipal Governments must be restricted in their power of taxation, and it makes it the duty of the Legislature to restrict them and prevent the abuse of that power." "2d. The Legislatures HAVE NOT performed that duty. Apart from the immense sums expended on local improvements, New York City is taxed about $30,000f a day, besides the rents, licenses, and so forth, that come into the city treasury, and the fees and fines that are levied off the people." " Brooklyn is much more heavily burthened than New York, in proportion to her ability to pay. With her very slender resources, the tax extorted from her is over $6,000 a day, whilst the fees and fines levied by her officials, and largely applied to their own private use, make up a considerable aggre- gate in the year. The local improvements are a distinct tax, and a source of much waste and oppression. The water tax, in both cities, is apart from these estimates." " Judicious and liberal men believe that the above amounts are four or five times larger than an honest and efficient government ought to cost. And yet the governments of these cities are as little remarkable for efficiency as they are for economy." " Thus the constitutional guarantee above recited is set at nought. And while in seven years /rora 1848 to 185 5 the taxes in the four wards of old Williamsburfjh were increased from about $23,000 a year to $308,000, *Wm. Lyon Mackenzie was a Scotchman, a wonderful repository of facts. An able and a true man. He was a principal actor in the Canadian "outbreak" of '37. He and two of his confederates were out one night and met and captured one of their most dangerous enemies, but did not search and disarm him. So, falling back for a moment, he shot down one of his captors and made his escape. This I had from Mr. Mackenzie, and there is instruc- tion in tht fact. But though a gazeteer of knowledge it took a great deal of fact and argu- ment to enlist him against land monopoly. But, he did join in our movement by and by, and became one of our most efficient auxiliaries. '58. Now, '81, it is three times as great in both cities, OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 79 the Legislature did not interpose to "restrict" this enormous abuse of power." " Thus, then, stands the case. The Constitution guarantees that our pro- perty shall not be taken from us by unreasonable and unjust taxation. But it places the enforcement of that safeguard in the hands of the Legislature, which neither WILL nor CAN enforce it." " This right is a fundamental one. If it is not preserved inviolate, no man can call any property his own: and thus the strongest bond of the social compact is broken* and society itself tends to anarchy." ' The framers of the Constitution did not foresee that the vital principle, thus wisely proclaimed by them, would be set at naught by the guardians to whom they entrusted it. If they had foreseen this, it would have been an easy matter for them to have made this limiting a DISTINCT and definite provision in the Constitution. In this way ' Data of the legitimate cost of government lay everywhere within their reach.* And based on this data, they could have fixed a MAXIMUM TAX to be levied off the ASSESSED VALUEf of property in the various cities. Under this provision, the governing powers would be assured a fair com- pensation. The owners of property would be compelled to pay this "fair compensation." Beyond this legitimate tax, their property-rights would be inviolable. Increasing value in 'the taxable property would keep exact pace with the legitimate necessities of government : and thus would all cities be DULY TAXED and DULY PROTECTED. The same principle could be applied to the COUNTIES to the STATE governments : and, based upon population, even to the government of the UNITED STATES. But the present government of our cities has been thus described : "Gathering in corner groceries, and stimulated by the prospect of plun- der, the most worthless and ignorant of our populace, under guidance of *Some twenty-odd years ago taxation in New Jersey was limited by law to 75 cents on the $100 valuation. But only by " law." A legislature assem- bled one winter and repealed the law making it read as it reads in New York State, and all over, " steal as much as you please, only be sure to call it ' tax.' " And from that day to this it has been one succession of political thieving in Jersey, about equal in proportion to what has been going on in Brooklyn and New York. Jersey has not boen so able to bear up under the robberies as the other cities, that is all the difference. If the above-men- tioned limit had been studded into the Constitution of New Jersey she would not as now be prosecuting an interlaced government of thieves. The last culprits are Collector and four "Chosen Freeholders" in Somerset County, with " more coming," " coming." But after all, the question comes up, is even a Constitution of any avail? It is a fortress, to be sure, but of what use is a fortress, if garrisoned by the enemy? By order of Gran', Bradley and Strong turned the U. S. Consti- tution inside out in an hour'b time. fBut in taxing real estate this could not be done. The percentage fixed in the Constitution the valuation also fixed, the payer would know exactly what he had to pay, and he would not be likely to pay more than the law imposed on him. But "laws" to make up deficiencies, or contract debt, must bo Constitutionally forbidden. 80 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; political knaves, undertake to provide us with a government.. They mako a combined rush upon the polls they succeed and that success lays the entire property of the city, as ' SPOILS,' at their feet, to take what they please, to distribute it as they please." "This corruption of our city governments diffuses its evil in every direction." "It burthens the mechanic's house and lot (frequently mortgaged) with a tax sometimes equal to the rent and tax of a similar house in Europe." " It discourages improvements, and so renders real estate unsaleable." "It incites evil minded and incapable men to ' manage' themselves into municipal power not for the good they can do the public, but for the per- sonal gain they can make out of this unrestrained license to tax. " It thus excludes our virtuous citizens from the public councils. " It brings dishonor upon the Republican name, both at home and abroad. " It fills monarchists with joy and exultation ; and, finally, it lays the axe to the very root of our Republican Institutions." Hundreds of these were mailed to newspapers all around. It was indeed a discouraging indication when only one paper noticed it, and of the hundreds of people who read it, not one man gave us the slightest response. It is now January, 1860, and under the same auspices and aid * * * I addressed a Circular to the Southern Senators who were persistently resisting the Homestead bill. I give an outline of it: "A remarkable phenomenon has arisen in our history the Anti-Slavery feeling now aspires to control the country. In proportion to the rapid increase of this power has its adverse element in the South increased also ; and, as those hostile forces are rapidly ap- proaching each other, we cannot but recognize in them great danger to the peace of the country. How shall we avert that danger? This is the great problem of the day. A problem which partisans on either side, are far more likely to complicate than to solve. The writer of this has r.ever been identified with either of the great parties that divide the country. He has no prejudice not the slightest feeling on one side or the other. From 1848, when the contest as- sumed form under Mr. Van Burcn, he has watched it anxiously. He be- lieves that its most important element has to a groat extent been overlooked both in the North and South, and he further believes, that an examination of this element will show first, the GKEAT CAUSE that has called up these opposing forces ; secondly, the means by which that same cause can be made to bring about both lasting prosperity and lasting peace. But first, he must have it admitted that Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson were Democrats. Nay, that they did more to found and consoli- date that party than any other two men that ever belonged to it. Mr. Jefferson laid down the philosophic truth, that the " earth belongs in usufruct to the living." And Andrew Jackson, in his Message of 1832, re- OR, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 81 commended that our public lands be reserved for the free use of actual set- tlers only. It is because the " Democratic Party" of the present day have turned their backs upon this greatest principle of Democracy, that they find themselves in their present position. For this is the true source of the preponderance of the Republican power in the Northern States. Take away this source, and this preponderance will disappear. Its origin is in the Wilmot Proviso that slave labor should not cross the dividing line. Appeals made to sectional feeling on behalf of that doctrine produced some effect. But it could not form a party powerful enough to sway the nation, on the simple issue of whether a slave should work on this side or on that side of a geographical line. From early in 1844 the " Freedom of the public lands to actual settlers" had been earnestly discussed by the masses, in all the North-Eastern and Western States. A substantial principle it was, that afforded no ground for mystification. It gained general acceptance from men of all parties who lived by labor, and who had families .ooking to them for support. Defeated in 1852. the Whig leaders saw it was useless to come again be- fore the people with their present issues. Banks and Tariffs had gone down stream, and the movement for Land Reform had sunk " Distribu- tion " * to the bottom. The old issues were therefore put in abeyance, and the Whigs rallied to their aid every shade of opinion that believed no slave should work on the northerly side of a geographical line. But there was little soul in this issue, and still less substance. Little en- thusiasm could it create among white men, most of whom were, themselves, in anxious circumstances living precariously from hand to mouth. And so the Whigs, now Republicans, took up the "Freedom of the Public Lands," and spoke it kindly. Their principal organ, the New York Tribune, though a late convert, was now its foremost advocate; and Col. Fremont, in his letter of acceptance, put his adherence to it beyond a doubt. This great Democratic principle had been repeatedly rejected by the Democrats. It had been distinctly offered at the Cincinnati Convention, and was very distinctly treated with contempt. And so the Democratic Re- formers went Corward for Col. Fremont. The present position of our public affairs is a just retribution on the " Democratic party." To go against a landed Democracy to repudiate the principles of its OWN FOUNDERS was no common crime, and already it has the foretaste of no common retribution. But the retribution may still be averted by doing justice, even now " at the eleventh hour." This can only be done by the Democratic Party in the Senate taking up *0f the public lands to the States, or rather to the State stock jobbers, long a rallying cry of the Whigs. 2 'i"5Z ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY; the measure and passing it through by a vote that WILL SHOW THEY ABE IN EAKNEST. The passage of this law would be at once a just and a final compromise of the existing difficulties of the country. Honorable to all parties, it would place the Southern citizen on equality with other citizens in the eye of terri- torial law. Speculation would be at an end ; and with abundance of land to choose from, what temptation would the Northern settler have to crowd down on the regions of rice and cotton and sugar ? And as little tempta- tion would the planter have to crowd up on the merely grain growing land. Nature assigns to each his field of operation. She bids them live as neigh- bors ought to live apart, in peace. With the unchained enthusiasm of the Northern States for Free Homes, the vessel of State would rapidly swing round to her old moorings. There is not a Southern Senator but sees by the votes in either House that few statesmen north of the dividing line will venture to oppose this meas- ure. They see, too, the revolution it has effected in Minnesota. They see, in short, that it is building up the " Republican" power and striking down the " Democratic party " in all the Northern States. The imputation is out upon them that they despise the poor men of the North. Let them show that that imputation is unjust. Let them no longer stand between the Northern laborer and his undoubted right. If they do this, good will and gratitude will go forth to them, and that good will and gratitude will bring to them security and peace. But let it become clearly known that this right is withheld obstinately by combined Southern votes, and what will be the result ? Why, it will be a great weakening of the bonds of unio;i. So early as 1852 I addressed a letter to Gen. Shields, then U. S. Senator from Illinois, of which the following is a fragment : " Marmontel, though a courtier of Louis XIY, describes the Senators who slew the Gracchii, as ' mere senators whose motto was that the people were made only to obey and to suffer.' They consummated their crime, and its penalty overtook them not in their children but in themselves, in the ter- riblo proscriptions of Marius and Sylla ; in the wild beast fury of the ' Social War: ' As things are beginning to loom up now, this warning would seem a pro- phecy. " If the Homestead Bill now before the Senate be quietly passed into a law it will produce a change .n this world far greater than came over it when we presented ourselves a new nation among the nations of the earth. ' Help that change if you be a man if you be a Democrat. For a Com- : monwealth of Freeholders, look at your own happy State. For the ragged, starved, tattered tenant the idle, luxurious, inhuman landlord look back to the land you left behind you. It is greener now than when you last looked on it green with famine graves 1 " Do as you please. Do all of you as you please. I will not go down on OB, lila SPIBIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. my knees to you. I will not kiss the dust at your feet, and implore you to save, at once, this Republic from ruin, and your own names from etcrn.d reproach. But I will tell you, that when the wail of suffering and tho hov.i of strife shall hereafter arise in this land ion: STEIFE, too, will start up bo- fore this drama is ended there will bo names uttered with a hissing curso ; the names of those men who could have averted the destruction but who WOULD NOT," Hunter, Toombs, all the Southerners, all but Andrew Johnson. THOMAS AINGE DEVYR. WILLIAMSBUEGH, January 1, 1860. But those Southern Senators hardened their hearts as rash, arrogant men ever do ; and as such rash, arrogant men are doing now (1881). TRIP TO EUKOPE. 1860. The dead weight of gold redemption thrown off by the banks, they discounted freely, and work, wages, business of every kind improved. The question of "Tenant Eight" was up in Ireland, chiefly under the auspices of the Catholic Prelates, and I resolved to go and see what I could do to help it. I had not much money at my disposal, but I had Mr. * * * at my back. He it was who both encouraged and enabled me to go. After presenting me with liquors and wines from his cellar for the voyage, he gave my hand a part- ing clasp wished me a "good time," and said, "traveling's expensive, if you fall short of money drop me a line." Take passage in the screw steamer Brazil, for Galway, call- ing by St. John's Newfoundland. Custom House officers conveyed our officers of the ship down .the bay. They made a carouse of it. And the sailors, too, followed their example. So that only for half a dozen active passengers the Brazil would have been burnt (by the upsetting of a tall lamp- torch in the lower hold) before we reached Sandy Hook. In four days got into the fogs of Newfoundland, and our proxim- ity to the coast could only be estimated by the kind of mud brought up by the plummet. We overshot St. John's some miles, and by daybreak brought up in front of what looked like two diamond mountains, standing as close together as the pillars of an immense gate. They were anchored in forty fathom water, towering some 100 feet high. They formed picture, unequaled in grandeur, as they reflected the rays of the rising sun. But the sublimities of this world the chained laborer never sees i Lofty rock banks form the coast of Newfoundland through 84 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTUKYJ which breaks a narrow entrance to the harbor of St. John's. A fortification on the high summits on each side of the en- trance is garrisoned by soldiers from the " Condemned Regi- ment" stationed on the Island, and which is formed of the hardest characters taken from all the British regiments of the line. We had the two bishops of the Island, of the rival creeds, passengers so far. It was the 2d day of June, but not the promise of a bud could I discover in the most sheltered nooks of Governor Bannerman's grounds. The established bishop showed me the interior of his very handsome church. But his rival bishop showed me a sight still more remarkable. As he passed along the streets of St. John's people, one after another, knelt to him for a blessing, quite regardless of the mud. I remembered that in Dr. j.-'arnelTs "Hermit" when the angel discloses himself, he says: " For this commissioned I forsook the sky ; Nay, cease to roieel thy teiiow servant I." Not so thought our friend the bishop. He took the kneel- ing as a thing he was accustomed to. The scene lowered my estimate very much both of the bishop and the people.* The fisheries are the sole stay of Newfoundland, and seals and codfish rival each other in importance with also a heavy reserve of salmon. For many months the coast is em- braced with icefields, to which the fishermen fasten their boats, "land'' on them, and capture the young seals with the stroke of a bludgeon. Many Scotch adventurers are thus engaged, and also in the trade growing out of it. An active man, I was told, can here, in the season, realize a pound sterling a day, though in Ireland (1700 miles distant) the same man would have to work nearly a month for the same money. Next morning headed for Ireland through the fog and warm waters of the Gulf stream. Surprisingly few vessels hove in sight till we came abreast of the Irish coast, the headlands of Donegal, at daybreak of the 9th. f It was mid- *0n enquiry it was explained that the homage was not at all paid to him, but to the Power he represented on earth. fWe had two escapes from adding to the list, "Lost at sea." 1. Two boys are sent for liquors to the Jower hold. There is no light they have u lamp and matches. The bottles are packed in straw and the boys are in a skylarking mood. Lighting the lamp they threw the still burning OK, THE SPIEIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 85 night before we had warped through the rocks (which for miles out in the sea encircle the Connaught coast) and anchored in the Galway roadstead. We could have anchored in Killybegs by six A. M. Custom House officers ransank our luggage native boats are alongside and at 6d each convey us to land It is eight o'clock and the city is still asleep. Knocking Vainly at two hotels we succeeded in rousing a third to give us a breakfast. In the afternoon took train for Dublin. " What a fine fruit country," said an American gentleman, as he gazed on the " One boundless blush one white empurpled shower Of mingled blossoms " of hawthorn trees spreading around everywhere. When told of the "fruit," how utterly valueless he exclaimed, " What a stupid people : The ground occupied by those hawthorns would produce millions worth of grafted fruit." He did not think at the moment that evil men calling them- selves landlords, or landgods, stood in the way of all im- provement. At every Police station Notices are up forbidding foreign enlistment. The Pope is at war with Insurgents and hund- reds of young men are emigrating from Ireland to recruit his army. Met Catholic students in Dublin. Told them my purpose. "Di-timed," they said. Thought was now ab- sorbed in the emigration to aid the Pope. Spent some days in Dublin. Interviewed the Governor of the Bank of Ire- land and one of the city M. P's., urging them to invite Amer- ican visitors to the old homes, by opening free or very cheap railroad travel to them. Explored the Phoenix Park, with its forest cf centennial hawthorns. Its horseback in saddles and side-saddles, cantering around more pictur- match close to the straw where fortunately it died out. 2. Saturday is a fes- tive day on shipboard. The weather is fine, the sailors oddly costumed are improvising a drama on tho main deck the cabin passengers gyrating on the Quarter deck to the strains of a Galway fiddler captured from among the steerage passengers. Fortunately (in this case at least) I am always sick at sea. -Retiring from tho gay scene, 1 met the steward who told me he had left a light in my room. It was a sperm candle in a spring socket. Ho sup- posed he had fastened the spring but it was held only by the hard substance of the candle. As it burned down that holding melted, and as I entered, the blaming stump was projected by the spring into the berth and bed- clothes. This was in the lower tier and 1 was just in time. 86 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J esque, exciting and exercising than the wagons and " sulkies" of the United States. Northward to Enniskillen, rested on the Island which divides the upper and lower Lough Erne. A beautiful sheet of water dotted with innumerable islets. One of which a land-thief formed into "his estate," and built a grand house amid its embowering trees. Twenty-four years! I pass over the changes and the memories associated with the Donegal of my boyhood as in- teresting only to myself. It contains the grandest ruins I have seen in Ireland, the lofty stone-sashed castle of the O'Donnell's, and the classic Monastery in which was written centuries ago, "The Annals of the Four Masters." The lofty chain of Barnes mountain circles in the coast country five miles landward of the village. See ante. In this desert "gap" I found two sod hovels, and two wretched families huddled in them shut out, disinherited by the land rogues, and striving to dig starvation among the interstices of the rocks Beach Deny of " the Siege." An hour in the " Mayor's Court " was full of instruction. With a clerk and two officers he dispensed justice with promptness and ap- parent fairness. " I'll have you to the Mayor's office " is a sharp restraint on evil-doers. There ia no " Mayor's office" in New York or Brooklyn now, except for signing bills to de- plete the treasury or holding caucus with politician rogues. Alas ! for the virus of aristocratic pride ! Met two or three clever educated gentlemen in Derry whose father was known to my father when both were servant boys. When I spoke of this they shrank from the record as if their father were their disgrace that clever, energetic man who found- ed lor them the respectability which they were thus striv- ing to guard from the supposed contamination of his name ! I was thus far on my way to London, but took train for Belfast. Purpose to call on Sharman Crawford. Twenty- four changeful years had passed over since my public con- nection with him in London. I had then admonished him that any future intercourse between us must be on terms of exact equality. I had now totally forgotten his defection to O'Connell and the starve-pauper Whigs (in 1839) (see ante) and my sharp exposure of it in the Newcastle Liberator. Whether he now remembered it is doubtful, for now he was over eighty years of age. At any rate this happened : Landed at Bangor and thence to Crawfordsburn, a walk of two miles OR, THE SPIEIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 87 over a pleasant road and pleasant surroundings. The cot- tages white and neat, and though in June, not a little boy or girl barefooted. \ made inquiries, by which I found that the people under Mr. Crawford's influence were comfortable and contented a striking contrast to what I had hitherto noted in my tour. I wrote a note and sent it with his gate- keeper, informing him that I would remain at the hotel in Bangor for two or three hours, to which he might send a messenger if he desired to see me. It was my old monitors of chivalry that prompted me to this course. I paid his gate-keeper liberally and gave money to workmen employed outside of his gate. I'm afraid this liberality will not stand to my credit in the last Great Account as it was intended to show Mr. Crawford that I sought no favors from him that I was, in my way, as independent as himself. I stayed at the hotel, but the messenger did not come for me. Returned to Belfast embarked for Liverpool, and made observations which convince me that man (since the invention of steam) is armed with a power sufficient to MASTER THE OCEAN, and navigate in perfect security through its largest waves trampling them down in their most boisterous moods. To London. One commotion of volunteering to repel an ap- prehended Invasion urged by the French Colonels. Met of my old fellow-laborers only Bronterre O'Brien his fine in- tellect a good deal unbalanced, but leaning more fiercely than ever against the "Right Honorables" that have made Eng- land a hell. George Jacob Hollyoake put his rooms at my service, and 'here I met Col. Alsop, and one or two others who were regretting that certain efforts made by them had been unsuccessful in removing Louis Napoleon to a better (or a warmer) world. A grandson of Sir Henry Clinton, too, of our revolutionary times. He was horrified at my expres- sed opinion that if the French came, not a workingman in England ought to lift a hand for the protection of a country in whose lands, mines and governments they were not permit- ted to share. Bradlaugh was beginning to peep out from behind the name of the " Iconoclast." He has since learned to be a Malthusian to abolish population for you see there is not room for it because of the ducal hunting grounds. He proposes to go peacefully to work and abolish Royalty by Act of Parliament. He may be mistaken in both his pro- grammes, but he certainly is prudent. It is far easier to war 88 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; against tlie uncreated than to war against the ducal hunt- ing grounds while the duke stands over them with a sword in one hand and a musket in the other. And as for " Monarch or no, no, no monarch?" Parliament will argue the question with him till the " crack of doom " a good, round, sound encounter of eloquence that will hurt nobody. That was my thought of him twenty years ago. If he has changed since that time I hope it is for the better. Nothing in the shape of reform could be done in London, and I wrote to Mr. Doubleday, of Newcastle, and also to Joseph Cowen, then, as now, the leading Democrat of that region. Replies did not come direct, but a letter reached me from Glasgow which caused me to cross the Cumberland hills, to that stirring town. My purpose all through was to present man's INHERITANCE in the land and a FIXED LIMIT to the taxing power. But I got no efficient help. While in Glasgow a letter reached me via London from Mr. Doubleday. He was in " Moffat, (a watering place) at the house of his daughter, looking for health." A hearty friend- liness ran through his letter, and after wishing success to my aims concluded thus: "The British Constitution is good enough for me if ice only had it." Pure, clever and noble hearted man ! How my heart holds your memory ! I gave up the thought of going to Newcastle, and took up the thought of returning to New York. It. is true I remem- bered that a gentleman the gentleman in Williamsburgh, in wishing me ban voyage, said, "Traveling is expensive; if you fall short of the needful just drop me a line." But I now saw no prospect of use in remaining. A letter from Mr. Cowen was on the way heartily inviting me to Newcastle. But, and greatly to my regret, only came to hand after I reached New York. What a world it is? By sea or land injustice will confront you. Having examined the accommodations, I paid seventy dollars for second cabin passage in the Cunard steamer "Asia." Approach to our saloon and state rooms, the grand entrance. But when at sea, this was closed against us, and a forecastle kind of fixture opened, with a break-neck kind of ladder attached, in direct violation of our contract. Held council, and, half in fun half in fear, we signed, in a "round robin " of remonstrance, a circle of signatures, in which there is neither first nor last. The " despots of the deep " insisted on OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 89 knowing who was foremost in this mid-way meeting. " Well, then, if I am the man, what are you going to do about it ? " " You shall see." " Be quick then ; I am writing my experi- ence for the New York Tribune, and this proceeding will form an incident ! " The public press ! "Why, it carries its suprem- acy out to sea, and the grand entrance was re-opened to us. Watching the heave of the ship its rising and descending forces disclosed an immense " power," which, if it could be utilized, would do immense work. I think it could be, but under what conditions I will not present here. With a good deal of labor and some cost I made a model embodying iny thoughts ; but, partly owing to my antipathy to the Patent Office, and partly to my distrust of patent lawyers, etc., I turned away from the subject. I fell sick, too, and the brass of my model, I suppose, made its way to the junk shop. The following brief sketches taken on the ground, are all that I retain in my notes, written of this visit to England : CONDITION OF ENGLAND. " She holds what might have been tho noblest nation." BYBON. " A little rule, a little sway A sunbeam in a winter day- Is ^}1 the proud and mighty have Between the cradle and the grave." DTEK. I am on a hill looking down over a tranquil valley. There are groves and orchards, and pastures and corn-fields, and "jocund labor " at work over them all. That scene ! It has not the majestic grandeur of a mountain- coast. Bavine, precipice, and desert wold are not there. But the man who blends a little of the solid with the sentimental could not look upon a scene more beautiful. The very arch above it seems more a shelter than a sky. Some bard has written the following over it : " Fair plenty now begins her golden reign, The yellow fields thick wave with ripened grain ; Joyous the swains renew their sultry toils, And bear in triumph home the harvest's wealthy spoils." " This must be England," said I. "Happy, home-like England. How rich her pastures ! How over-flowing her fields ! " "Yes! This is England," said a venerable-looking man, who 90 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; stood by my side. "It is fruitful England still but, alas! it is happy England no longer. Come with ine." We stood beside a brook overshadowed with trees. A man in a smock frock sat upon its margin. In his hand was a crust of dark- colored bread, and with a small brown pitcher he took water from the eddies beside him. This was his dinner, and a hard green apple, plucked from some hedge, supplied the dessert. My guide said in a low voice, " Do you understand ?" "Yes, oh lyes, I do indeed understand. And, of all the teeming plenty around us, is this all that can be afforded to him? To him THE LABORER whose toils are rewarded with such abundant fruits?" " Dont you know, "said my guide, " this land the sun that warms, and the showers that nourish it are the property of my lord duke of Devonshire? That's what his Grace allows to the laborer. And can't he ' do what he likes with his own? ' " " I suppose, yes. But is the earth, and the sunshine, and the showers ' his own ! ' WHO GAVE THEM TO HIM? ' Did you ever expect to hear such a question, my lord dukes ! Yet men are beginning to ask it. Where will we get an answer to give them? THE COAL MINE. We are descending in darkness so rapidly descending that I can scarcely hold my breath. Dark, dark ! and down, down ! we are a half a mile below the surface. At last ! A light is before us, fitfully struggling with the dark- ness. We are in a coal pit, and have just touched bottom. Let us approach the light. Isn't this a rail-track? Do cars run here ? Yes, cars run here, and now a train of them comes along. Five or six strange-looking creatures are drawing them. I never saw such beasts of draught before. They are a new invention of the great lord who owns the mines. They approach, and through the blackness sticking over them we discover that they are women ! Finely-formed, well-developed women, of the true old Anglo-Saxon race. Straps are over their nude busts, for the place is suffocating, and they are drawing the train of cars to the mouth of the pit ! There is an inscription" These mines, granted to the Marquis of Londonderry by Charles II., A. D. 1675." "It should have read thus," said my guide, and he placed two written words on the in- scription. "That's ridiculous," said I. "It is time it was made so," said my guide and tTvus he left it; OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRT IN MODERN DAYS. 91 "These mines were CHEATED FOB the Marquis of Londonderry BY CHARLES II., A. D. 1675." Let it stand so. And doesn't it look sensible, my lord dukes? THE COAL MINER, We find ourselves on the river Tyne, in the home of a collier. Everything in it is surpassingly clean arid neat. The Bible is in a recess of the window, and The Northern Liberator, a Chartist news- paper, is lying on a table hard by. An elderly woman is rasping the crust off a brown loaf. That's the coffee. It is a new kind of coffee, invented by the lord of the mines. That sugar is very black, and milk is dear. Too dear for people who hew coal and draw trucks far down below the surface of the earth ! But a frying-pan is at work making a feeble noise. Just such a noise as six ounces of bacon can afford to make when drowning in a quart of Water. The man and his wife come in from their subterra- nean toil. Its covering of blackness is upon them, but they are hungry and cannot wait. The bread, and the bacon-soup, and a bowl of the new-fashioned coffee disappear. The toilers disappear, too, into an inner room. But they soon return in decent harmony with the clean furniture and the shining eight-day clock. They are going to a Chartist meeting.* My lord dukes, dare I call you great fools for suffering a school to be built in your land? "No, our design was to teach, 'Honor the king,' 'Render unto Caesar,' ' Obey the powers that be. 1 " I understand! You didn't know that the "windows of Heaven would be opened ! " But the collier arid his wife are gone to the Chartist meeting and we must go elsewhere. THE RECRUIT. i Away ! We are in a railway train. A crimp-sergeant is beside us, and a young recruit. " You think they will come? " said the crimp-sergeant. "All your comrades ! " "I am sure they will," said the recruit. "They have to work all their waking hours in field and barn, and have nothing for it but the * The text is a literal description of a scene to which I was an eye-witness in 1839. 9iJ THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTtJfcY ; morsel they eat, and such covering as this." He pointed to his fustian jacket, stiff with toil and clay, and his corduroys of the same fashion. That recruit 1 I am looking at him now. Finely-formed, and but little bent by his long drudgery. His face spoke of the quiet house- hold virtues save that a radiance broke through it, for he was now escaping into a twenty-three years' servitude more intense and equally ill-rewarded. He will never have a home ! The gentle ministerings of woman his can never be ! The voice of his children must lie silent in the unborn tomb ! Himself will lose those rural virtues that now beam forth so legibly in that open countenance. He will be brutalized in the camp, if death does not save him does not grant him an early discharge upon some bloody field ! And this is England under its lord dukes ! THE MAIDEN. But away, away! We are in London. In front of that grand entrance to Hyde Park the Marble Arch. Gorgeous liveries and superb barouches are there. Those gallantly- mounted young "noble fellows'' are chatting with that vulgar-look- ing dowager in the barouche.* No doubt she has (at her banker's) a solid attraction for the dashing young beaux. One of these wheels his horse suddenly round, and, waving to the dowager a graceful "good bye," comes back, riding close to us on the sidewalk. Won't the middle of the broad street do him. No, he has business at the sidewalk. For, promenading along itgoing and returning in short lengths is a young girl attended by an elderly woman, both of them clad in decent black. A most lovely girl, Just budding into womanhood. Hardly, yet quite, at her growth, she is about the middle size. And yet there is a majesty around her rare, almost wonderful, in one so young. It is the majesty of beauty " Like the night Of cloudless climes and starry skies, And all that's best of dark and light Meet in her aspect and her eyes." *Fact. I pledge my accuracy upon it. The most broad, twfyar-faced women I saw in England were those grand dowagers. I do not know the cause of this. Leading slothful, sensual and unnatural lives would, 1 sup- pose, produce the effect. At any rate, the effect was there, OR, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 93 A signal of intelligence passes between the "noble" fellow and the duenna. The latter conveys it to her protege, who returns a dis- sentient shrug of the shoulders and motion of the head. The ' ' noble' 1 fellow has to pass on for the present. Poor thing ! Can it be that she is putting off till the latest moment the accomplishment of her shame? "And that girl ought to have been the recruit's wife," said my guide.* It was enough. Imagination presented their festooned cottage their contented toil their beautiful and healthy children, playing with their rural companions, and growing up the stay the wealth and the ornament of the land ! Both will die childless. One in the sun-sodden climes of India. The other in a squalid cellar of one of the God-forsaken back lanes ! And this, my lords and dukes, is your administration of the af- fairs of England. This is the way you increase her prosperity, and add to her power. " How long ! how long ! O ! Lord !'" THE POOK HOUSE. The gay scene is gone and a gray scene is around us. There are high dead walls that imprison even the vision. It is the Yard of a London Workhouse. The inmates are seated around on long wooden benches. Oh, misery ! what a pitiful expression in that long line of ghastly faces ! There is no conversation. They are looking away into vacancy or it may be into the far past days. No voice no motion save as they move uneasily their skeleton bones on the hard bench, f "No, it is not sick they are," said my guide, in answer to my appealing look. "They are STARVING ! Starving on fifteen pence half -penny worth of taxed food in the week." "Oh, give me some- thing to relieve them, or take me away ! " 1 : Believe them ! There are a thousand hells like that in these Christian islands." And is this the England you have made it, my lords and dukes? THE FACTORY SLAVE. We are now wandering in the streets of Manchester. It is winter, * These Recruit and Maiden are presented here just as I saw them in England. fOf this scene I was an eye-witness. $4 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEE5JTH CENTURY ; and not yet day. There is a knocking at one of the doors, and a voice, "Jenny, Jenny, here's little Eddy." "I can't take him," re- plies a voice from within, "you did not give me the two pence last time." "Oh, do take him ! I'll pay you all on Saturday. You know I was sick last week, and little Susan and myself earned only four shillings." The door opens, the mother hands in her baby, and she and Susan (seven years old) wend their way to the factory. I don't know how far, but they reach it before it is day. Poor little Susan ! I hope your childish limbs will not sink under you during the next weary twelve or fourteen hours ! Can it be, my lords and dukes, that your stealing up all the lands of England has anything to do with the sorrows and the sufferings of that mother and child ! THE GALLOWS. We are in the centre of London now. In the front of Newgate prison. Shall we go in? No! IT will come out by-and-bye ; don't you see the crowd gathering? Day has not yet risen, and the peaceful moon looks down through the cloud-spangles of that tranquil sky down on the gathering crowd down on those sordid walls. Heaven contrasted with earth. How beautiful the one, how hideous the other ! But the day has risen now. It is looking at a sea of upturned faces. There is a shout, a cry, neither of joy, nor sorrow, nor triumph, nor fear. A cry not natural to the human soul ; but habitual made so by the scene before us. For there is a landing-place of wood or iron jutting out from the high wall. And there are several persons standing on it, strangely attired. Three of them have ropes round their necks. They are going to be killed. Yes ! I now comprehend it all. "One" stands forward. He stands beside eternity, and speaks to the earth for the last time. He was a little child once, he says, and a cabin, a garden, and a brook are his first memories. He was growing up, with his brothers and sisters ; manhood was coming and the garden was small. He had to go forth, and he had no place to go to. Every spot was taken up. The poor had small bits of land, too little for themselves. There were large tracts lying idle, but these were my lord's parks, and my lord's mountains. Nobody dared to approach them. He OB, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 95 Came to the city, and for many weeks sought to find a master.* In vain. He had coino unbidden on the earth. Nature's wants were his only heritage. Her bounties wcro not for him. "And so,' said he, "I had to eat, or I would die to find shelter, or I would perish. The laws of society ignored me. I ignored its laws. Had it given me a foothold, and such instructions as it could afford, would I be here this day ? I and my two wretched brothers ? Society is stronger than me. But whilst it c^o " The drop falls the rope breaks ! The word dies in the utterance. For the wretched man fails, stunned and bleeding, on the hard pavement thirty feet below. He is taken up, moaning piteously; and, half walked, half carried to the hos- pital to staunch his miserable wounds? Xo ! to the gallows once more that he may be killed effectually this time !f "Coming struggle!" Those words were written twenty- one years ago. And the struggle has come in earnest. Tiie writers in Paper and Pamphlet, and the orators in Pulpit and Platform, are standing bravely by the side of the ducal vil- lainy all agreeing that the world was made for the debauch- ing dukes. But the Will of the Creator is letting the light in on them. That Will is too plain to be mistaken, and too sacred to be disobeyed. The mortal hunger and nakedness of His children on the one side; the ducal debauchees on the other. Who can doubt for which of the two was this grand world formed ? And men are stupid enough to endorse the dukes, without even knowing that they are denying God at the same moment. They have been born and bred in the Impious Falsehood, and it will take time and effort to drag them up out of it. For it is not in a day or a month that you can make the Turk turn Christian. *I went through such an experience, as we have seen, when I was just entering manhood. I had a homo to return to. If I had not, whether must I die or take something to keep me alive? fThfs scene is a reality. Three brothers, Paddy, Jemmy, and Aliok Stuart were hanged in Lifford, county Donegal, about fifty years ago. I knew them personally, and the facts were just as I have related them- excepting the speech. Ignorance left them dumb they could raise no voice in their agony. Left them blind they could not see the lords and dukes at the bottom of their crimes and their fate. They were Protestants belonged to that very class, on whom the lord dukes rely to help them In their coming struggle. 96 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 5 HOEACE GEEELEY. I had now returned to New York, and at his request had furnished a description of my voyage to Mr. Greeley for pub- lication. He asked what would I do to help him in the election of Lincoln now close at hand. I replied ihat I must oppose him by reviewing the many errors he fell into since I came to the country that reminding him of those errors might make him pause in his present course. It was very simple, or stupid, of me to hope such a thing, but I actually did hope it. Apart from the light it throws on Greeley's true character, as a resume of public events not prominent in history the letter, is of value. Personally I felt most jdndly, and thus expressed what I felt: MB. GREELEY I write this letter from my heart to yours. You are the only public man in the country who has been uniformly kind to me. Would to God my voice might reach your better nature, and open your eyes to the dangerous course you are pursuing. ' Coming events cast their shadows before," and such events sometimes come suddenly, j In tracing the fate of the Eoman Republic, Marmontel compresses a grave lesson into one solid sentence. "The Eostrum and the Campus Martius, that had never before seen violence, were inundated with gore, and Eome became a slaughter house." On this particular subject history has but one warning lesson. You know that so long as I had the least hope that your party would act in good faith with us in relation to the Public Lands, I, as well as my brother Land Eeformers throughout the country, acted with you, honestly, zealously. I would not now interfere between you and your opponents, in your battle for the national spoils, did not another great question present itself. That question is whether we shall remain one strong and harmon- ious Eepublic, or wade through civil strife to disruption or future antagonism. Alas ! for yourself, Mr. Greeley, and doubly, alas ! for your country, that you " Born for the Universe, narrowed your mind, And to PAETY gave up what was meant for mankind." What a greatness you might have achieved for yourself what a salvation for your country had there been a little less of earth ifc your nature I OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DA7B, 97 Conducting the Log Cabin for the Whigs, you put whatever shape suited your purpose upon history even the most recent. With your consent and approval the streets were filled with processions, dead owls, living ccons, and mock log cabins as political arguments. You asked a "generous confidence." You got it, and used it "First To commence a National Debt in time of profound peace, A $12,000,000 loan. "Secondly To t&xsalt, sugar, tea, coffee, molasses, etc., and let gems, all manner of precious stones, in free. "Thirdly To alienate t he PUBLIC LANDS, as the 'Common Lands* have been alienated from the people of England. "Fourthly To establish at Washington a National Bank of two hundred and ten millions of dollars to begin with, and extending its controlling ramifications over the whole Republic." President Harrison was called to his fathers after one month's official life. John Tyler succeeded him, and twice vetoed the National Bank through and by which your party expected to sustain their other evil measures. The sequel is soon told. Out of twenty- six States and three Territories, you held the reins in no more than five after the next election, in 1842 ! Now, Mr. Greeley, as editor of the Log Cabin, you know that you did more to bring this great disgrace and this great danger on the Republic than ten thousand of the common men that shouted under your banners. You cannot but see for you believe in Providence that the country was saved from this Great Conspiracy, in which you acted so largo a part, by the removal of Gen. Harrison, and tiio stern virtue of John Tyler. But, as this is a subject you are not likely to see through clearly, let me illustrate : If you had been a pilot, say in 1840. If you had asked a "generous confidence" from the ship's crew, and they, believing your protesta- tions of skill and honesty, had put you in command of the vessel of State. If, in return for that "generous confidence," you, either through ignorance or design, headed the ship right into the breakers. If God, in his mercy to the gallant vessel, took your man at the wheel to Himself, and inspired the man who succeeded him to head her off the rocks. If the crew rallied against you, chased you from the quarter- deck, and locked you down under hatches for your attempted crime. If that were so then (1840), how could you now (18GO) present yourself and your associates as the right men, the reliable pilots, to take charge of the gallant ship? Yet this is exactly your present position. Cannot 98 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J you realize that it is? And do you not despise the man who would impose himself on the public for that which he is not? How is it, then? When you acted so foolishly or so wickedly in 1840 how are you sure that you are not acting as foolishly or as wickedly now? But it is possible you may think that you have gleaned up wisdom and added to your stock of public virtue since that time. Perhaps you think your success in life is a proof of this. And yet you know that the corrupt system which prevails in polit- ical cabals excludes the best men ice have from all participation in public affairs. You know that the sorrowful lines of the poet never applied more truly to his own unhappy land than they now apply to this unhappy country ; " Unprized arc her sons till they've learned to betray Undistinguished they live if they shame not their sires, And the torch that would light them through dignity's way Must be caught from tho pile where their country expires." Above all things, Mr. Greeley, distrust your success your great public success. A wiser man, I think, than either you or I has said: " When vico prevails and impious men bear sway, The post of honor is a private station." You know that the politicians of all parties, yours among the rest, are sneaking, self-seeking, corrupt men ; that people are beginning to regard the very name "politician" as synonymous with infamy. And yet your "post of honor" has not been "a private station." You have been always, and now are, the essential leader of one of those bands of politicians by trade. How could you glean up public virtue where it was not? How could you, indeed, maintain your superiority among them if you were not the Paul Clifford of the gang? Paul had genius, energy, generosity, and even a slender brilliant thread of honesty running through his character. And did not those qualities render him all the more valuable to the gang all the more formid- able to the country which he infested? But let us re-enter on your career, and step along from fact to KHODE ISLAND. The people of that State had been ruled under the exclusive and insulting charter of one of England's worst kings, Charles II. This charter had secured all power to the local aristocracy disfranchis- ing the people at large and they were white people too very much OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 99 as the negroes of the South are disfranchised. Did you not hail the new " Declaration of Independence" issued by the people of Rhode Island? Did you not support it with ardor in your paper? Did you not maintain that "all legitimate government" was indeed " derived from the consent of the governed "? This in the first week or two of the movement. How was it, then, that a new light fell upon you the week following ? How was it that you wheeled rapidly into the ranks of the "Algerines," and opened upon the republicans such a heavy and sustained fire as only you knew how to direct? MINE BOBBERY. When the government of James K. Polk undertook to deed away the immense copper regions of Lake Superior to its favorites, the National Reform Association protested against the robbery. I called upon you, and asked you to h elp us to oppose it. You wouldn't. On the contrary, you employed your Washington correspondent to abet this immense fraud. Some of the Reformers found a key to this strange conduct of yours in the fact that you were yourself a share- holder in those grants. I could not think so. I merely regarded you as r. By some confusion led That almost looked like want of head.' You accepted the doctrines of Fourier, that splendid dreamer. But, alas ! as soon as the politicians would have nothing to do with M. Fourier, you put him out in the cold, and would not allow his friend, M. Brisbane, to bring him into warm himself. Does not this little fact show what reformers may hope from you in the hour of their need. ' LAND REFORM. But you "have always done justice to my great measure, the Freedom of the Public Lands to Actual Settlers." Let us, Mr. Greeley, approach this question with reverence. It is, indeed, " holy ground. I need not remind you, sir, that you had been the right arm of that party which saw no better useior those lands than to DISTRIBUTE" them amonsr the several States which you know means the several politicians and money-lenders throughout the States. I need not re- mind youthatwhenagallant "forlornhope" of workingmen commenced a regular movement for the preservation and freedom of those lands that from the Spring of 1844 to the Fall of 1845, eighteen long months, you looked on at their patriotic efforts, and instead of giving them one word of cheer, kept hammering on at your scheme of " Distribution !' 100 THE ODD BOOK OF THB NINETEENTH CKNTTTBY ; 1 ' Distribution " of the lands among the States ! All this time the Phil- istines had you like a blind Sampson chained in their mill, grinding corn for them. And thus for eighteen long months you could not see the noble efforts of those great-hearted men. At last you saw them. Their efforts struck your "Distribution" scheme stone-dead; and then the Philistines unchained you, and let you look abroad and see what was going on in the world. And you found a new state of affairs you found that a Resolution in favor of Land Reform had passed the Assembly of New York by the instructive vote of one hundred and two affirmatives to Jive nega- tives. You found that the farmers of the central counties had joined issue with that British legacy to us Landlordism. And so you found "Distribution" dead killed by our labors in New York City, and that vote in tho Assembly of New York State. And from that moment you and your party abandoned the "Dis- tribution" scheme forevermore. And then you became a Land Reformer ! Then you turned from the selling to the rising sun ! j GENERAL JACKSON. In the Summer of 1845 the obsequies of General Jackson were cele- brated in New York City on a scale commensurate with the old hero's fame am! services. The Tribune carricatured the whole ceremonial with a bitterness which I thought in exceedingly bad taste. I criti- cized the Tribune for this bad taste, in tho Farmers' paper, then under my control ; and, being on the subject, expressed a thought like this : ' : For every true reformer, created by Nature, there come into this world ten thousand quacks. Mr. Greeley has not yet said a word against land monopoly; and ho is a puzzle to us whether to call him tho one true reformer, or to place him among the ten thousand quacks." Tho very next week I was gratified to see you come out with your first article on Land Reform. But 1 was then at Albany, publishing a paper in the interest of the \ farmers and the paper circulated among fifty thousand voters. Then you camo personally to my office and gave in your adherence. POLICE. Fernando Wood made our police system a political machine. You removed Fernando's creatures to make way for your own. Fernando hadn't armed his creatures with secret revolvers. You remedy this 03, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 101 defect. Fernando made us pay $600 to his creatures ; you order us to pay $800 to yours. And here is a sample of what they can do for the money : One of them (Cairns) arrests a citizen ILLEGALLY. The citizen (Hollis) very naturally, and very properly, too, resists, frees himself, and runs away. Your creature follows the man, (who, mind you, had violated no law) fires at him shot after shot, regardless of the crowded street Fulton. The ' ' FUGITIVE, " to save himself from being mur- dered, takes hold of an apple stand and stops, to give himself up. The cruel wretch comes forward and, while his victim is so standing, shoots him through the back, dead! A political grand jury is called. They absolve the murderer ; without even putting him on his trial, he is let loose again on the community, and his brother policemen make up a purse of gold (one hundred and seventy-five dollars) and present it to him as ' ' a slight mark of their approval. ' ' Now, I ask you solemnly, Mr. Greeley, if this murder had been committed on a "fugitive slave' in the streets of New York, wouldn't you have in- voked heaven and earth for justice upon his murderer? And yet, when your white brother is murdered, you are essentially dumb! Indeed, your teachings have so debauched the public mind that when I went to a public meeting of "Progressives, " in the Bowery, to call their attention to this outrage on liberty, they wouldn't enter- tain the subject at all. They had two negro orators, and were too busy (I state a literal fact) discussing the more important concern of "Whether the ancient Egyptians were black, white, or tawny" ! Even the temperance preachers who try of an evening to make converts along the docks are repeatedly thrown into prison by these police ; and, though repeatedly discharged by the Courts, are again thrown into prison by the police. The Tribune abets this outrage. "The police," it says, "are determined to enforce their authority." What authority have they, sir, to trample on law and right? I grant you that your political opponents are corrupt, mean, selfish and dishonorable. To finish the picture, 1 have only to add that your party is WORSE beyond all comparison. The one uses "rods," the other "scorpions." TAX-EATEKS. From 1848 to 1855 the journeymen politicians raised the taxes of Williamsburgh from $23,000 to $378>000. About the latter period 'I established the Tax-Payer, to expose and put a stop to this enormous fraud. I called personally on you. I implored your assistance in favor ol my effort. I put Into your hands the proofs (printed from 102 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CKNTUBY J the public records) of the open robbery that was practiced upon us. You would give me no help ! I was one day on a Staten Island ferry-boat. Sunday it was, and the immense crowd, many of them intoxicated, were admitted with- out stint. One or two fights were commenced, and if they had gone on nothing could have saved the careening boat from capsizing. I took notes of what I saw, intending to publish the facts in a New York paper. I had forgotten for a moment that the editor, whoever he might be, would cry out : Hillo! Mr. Guideall, how do we stand on Staten Island matters? Does the ferry line advertise with us? Has any of our friends real estate that might be affected by publishing an article on the unsafe ferries? " Why, yes sir, we advertise for them occasionally, and Mr. Paper- Share has also shares in the line." "Ah, well ! " (Chuck under the table.) As this image passed in review before me I put up my note-book. Within that very month a large number of people were killed or drowned on that same ferry bridge. PBOTECTION TO AMEKICAN LABOE. Can you propose nothing better for it than the choking dust, the unwholesome gases, the stupefying noises of a factory? Can you propose nothing better for it than having the gate slammed in its face, if a human thought or a human action keeps it a minute too late in answering the morning or the noon-tide bell? Toiling as if they were dead parts of the machinery stifling not developing their faculties obeying not thinking suffering not enjoying life. A band of white slaves, toiling out a life worse than death, to build up princely fortunes for heartless and may I not say inhuman? employers.* *The following is an official document presented to the Massachusetts Legislature in 1843, and late movements in that State show us that things are not improving since that time : " We, the undersigned, females, dependant upon the labor of our hands for subsistence, having left the employment of the Middlesex Manufacturing Company, on account of a violation on their part of the agreement existing between the undersigned and said Company, are now suffering persecution from said Company, and are hunted from place to place, that we may find no employment by which to earn a living. Not being able to contend against our rich persecutors by bringing a suit at law for satisfaction, we are compelled to seek redress or protection from the powers which created said Company. The ' Regulation Paper ' which accompanies this memorial reads as follows : 'All persons entering into the employment of the Company are considered as engaged for twelve months, and those who leave sooner OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 103 Now, Mr. Greeley, though you and I may be brother reformers in some things, we differ very much ir this. "Protection to American Labor!" The unglossed realities of yaw picture are before us. Permit me, beside it, to present mine. I would have a very large majority of the American people gentle- men farmers living on their estates, and raising solid, bountiful 'material, with which to feed and clothe their own nation and a reserve withal, sufficient to meet famine wherever it might appear in the world. I would have the needful arts follow them and found manufactures wherever the water-fall offered them its free force; growing up from little to large, and owned by their operators, just as the farmer would own his grounds. I would found this manufactur- ing life on men's free not constrained action. I would throw across it a'dash of sunshine, an opening to the sky, a prospect, and if need be a ramble over meadows and hills. I would associate it with the teeming, plenty, and the perennial purity of Nature. I would have a market spring up between it and the fanners around. I would develop, by those means, our brothers and sisters into dignified and complete men and women. And any manufactures that would not grow up spontaneously under circumstances like these, why I would leave them to the houseless disinhe.rited peoples of Europe ; and when those brought their products to our shores I would give them of the super- abundance of our soil in exchange. And so would you, too, Mr. Greeley, I have that faith in you still if the cotton-lord white-slave party would only let you. But they will not receive a regular discharge.' We did not imply, by agreeing to this, that our wages were to be subject to any reduction which the Company might see fit to make, and when they gave us official notice that they were going to cut our wages down twenty-five per cent, we considered it a viola- tion ot the agreement between us. We therefore quit working for said Company. Some of us went to work for other Companies, but these Com- panies soon received our names, and we were immediately turned off. Some of us applied for work where hands were wanted, but were informed that they could employ none 'of the turn outs from the Middlesex,' and many who labored with us have been obliged to leave Lowell, and seek their bread wo know not where, on account of the persecution carried on against them by the Middlesex Company. Our names are upon all the corporations in Lowell that we may find no employment. We therefore pray that you will, if consistent with your constitutional powers, stay the hand of our persecutors ; and if not, that some law may be enacted which will prevent our brothers, sisters, and friends suffering as we suffer, if ever they should resist injustice from Manufacturing Companies. " Buth Hancock, Mary J. Stowell, Caroline J. Sweetser, Debora Smith, Betsey Tenney, Lydia Or. Bates, Julia A. Taylor, Maria French, Mary W. Honey, Lucinda Keeler, Ennice G. Ilsley, Kebecca H. Flynn, Amy Little- field, Jane G, Morton, Mary A. Morgan." lAad this villainy continues to the present day.] 104 THE ODD BOOS OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J won't. It would not suit the Abbot Lawrence school of politicians. And yet it might suit them just as well as to be breaking their firms in the attempt to bribe Tariff Laws through Congress ! GBAND JURIES, in this neighborhood at least, are mere political machines, each member named by the supervisor of his district. I was named one time. We visited the wretched prisoners in King's County Jail, who, according to our "Young Men's Christian Association," are the most ' 'barbarously treated of any prisoners in the State. " I took note of the facts and submitted a presentment to my brother jurors. One of them a trading, and withal a most stupid politician said: "It would make a very good newspaper article, but he 'guessed' they would not adopt it." To this the other twenty politicians agreed, having an undefined dread of Devyr. I took the paper to the Tribune office, thinking that surely it would not turn its back on those brut- ally treated prisoners. Your locum tenens, Mr. Dana, said he "would take care of it ; " and so he did such good care that it never saw the light. The Sheriff was a Republican, it seems^and coming up for re-election ; my paper might possibly injure his prospects, and so the prisoners were left without a voice ! Tired with this uncertainty, I, once for all, wrote a private letter to you, enumerating ten subjects of reform that I proposed to discuss through your columns: First on the Patent Laws; secondly the evil of building houses and ships that will burn up ; thirdly Consti- tutional Limit to Taxation, and so forth. You tacitly agreed to my proposal, publishing my first article on reform of the Patent Laws. The second you would not publish, though if human life and prop- erty be of any worth it was the most valuable I had ever offered to you. It struck at the business of the Insurance Companies, and those companies advertise in the Tribune. Alas ! that reform must be clogged by such considerations. LAND REFORM. A notice appeared in the Tribune, inviting some one who knew the literature of land reform to come forward and publish a history of that reform that would enure to the benefit of the Republican party. I called at the Tribune office, and stated that I was willing to undertake this work, provided that it was no "make-believe," to catch votes. Mr. Dana referred me to the central committee at Washington. I sent to them specimens of the literature, and offered to do the work without reward. I added that I had seen much polit- OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 105 ical insincerity, and if any was to be practiced now they had better keep clear of me. Mr. Grow, the chairman, returned my specimens without a word of reply ! But it was hard for me to give up the hope that I had so long cher- ished the hope, namely, that your party would help us truly in this great Reform on the Public Lands. So I called on yourself, sir. Yov ^vere, naturally, the last man in whom my trust would die away. In reply to my offer, and its one condition, you said an article in the Tribune would serve the same purpose ! It was a discouragement, indeed, when you squeezed the whole work down to one article in the Tribune; so I said, "Well, even that is, perhaps, better than nothing ; but, compress it as I may, it will be a long article." You "did not think so," and you intimated that it would be best to confine myself to "half a column!" Mr. Greeley, you were my last hope. I looked through the political leaders opposed to you I saw only selfishness and hypocrisy; I looked at your own political associates they were equally selfish and hypocritical. To you, therefore, I clung, as would the sailor to his plank in a drowning ocean. But you would not let me write this history. That was certain. And yet, why not? The proposition came from yourself. It would help in the approaching election. I would work as I am used to work, without pay. I returned home mournfully thinking of those things. I turned to the papers I had written from time to time on this subject. Among them I found the following APPEAL TO THE WHIGS. "You demand that a slave shall not be permitted to work on the northerly side of a geographical line. You do not propose to lessen the number of slaves. You do not propose to ameliorate their con- dition. But you want to restrict slavery to its present limits. You want to preserve the Territories to free labor. ' ' Is that all ? ' Yes, that is all. ' "Well, now, if that be all, there is no need to dispute with the South about it. Will you not be obliged to me if I show you a plan by which you can accomplish that object certainly, effectually, and with no danger at all? A plan in which the whole masses of the North not a fraction of them will back you. A plan that will range at your side all the white proletarians the homeless men of the Southern States. A plan that will not leave to the slave-holder the shadow of an excuse to break the peace, or a shadow of power to carry out such a purpose. Would the freedom of the Public Lands to actual settlers forever limit' 106 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J ing the farm to 160 acres would this simple measure, or would it not, keep slavery out of the Territories? " Reflect upon this question, and give me a distinct answer to it. ' ' But you do not need to reflect. You know that such a law would fill the Territories with poor men from the South, and energetic men from the free States. You know that this law would not in terms, indeed, but in effect shut out the slave-holder. Could he pursue his vocation on 160 acres of land? Or, if he could, what inducement would he have to enter a Territory from which slavery would be sure to be driven as soon as it becomes a State? "Gerrit Smith loves the slave as well as you can pretend to love him, and he answers the question in these words : ' Land reform Is the mightiest and most thorough of all anti-slavery measures. Abolish slavery, and land monopoly will reproduce it. But abolish land monopoly, and make every man an acknowledged owner of the soil and there will be no room left for the return of slavery.' " But you make the matter worse when you tell us that New York City can furnish as many volunteers as will keep South Carolina in order, at a very small figure of pay. It is, indeed, deplorable that such shallow flippancy can show itself in discussing the life or death of this glorious Union. Mr. Douglas left his party in '52 and stood by you on the Nebraska bill. This severed him from the Buchanan Administration. In return you spoke out that he should be returned to the Senate. He was your ally, and devoted to political death by his own party. But the hungry office-seekers of Illinois would not suffer your generous purpose. Their base little party newspapers came along, day after day, howling at you for speaking of a generous return for the help Mr. Douglas had given you. Now that the whole Administration pack opposed his return to the Senate, there was a chance for the hungry office-seekers of Illinois. By this help, they would surely be able to turn Douglas out of a seat periled only by the aid he lent to themselves. You succumbed to those base and ungrateful men, and joined them in their bitter and ungrateful warfare. But you gained nothing by it. The sturdy men of Illinois saw the ingratitude, and they rebuked it as it deserved. And now you take the man (Lincoln) foremost in that ingratitude who stumped the State against Douglas and you use him to push aside Wm. H. Seward, a far abler man, whom you have so long personally and bitterly opposed. The letter concluded with this paragraph. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 107 With gratitude for tho personal kindness you have ever shown me, and in the liopo that you will, even yet, pause and have pity on your country, permit me to subscribe myself your friend, THOMAS AINGE DEVYK. Before it went to press I sent him a proof of it, offering to print any denials or explanations he might choose to make, reserving the privilege oi commenting on them. The follow- ing waj his reply : NEW YORK, Nov. 20, 1860. MR. T. A. DEVYR : The only favor I shall ever ask of you and I never asked one before is, that you procure and read Benedict Arnold's letter to his betrayed countrymen after he escaped from West Point to the British camp, and then take a steady look at your own face in a mirror. I loathe you too much, for your treason to the rights of man, to Lpeak of you : but for what you have said or may say about me I care nothing. I remain, glad that you have ceased personally to infest me, HORACE GEEELEY. To which I rejoined: Greeley, are you the "rights of man?" Are the political knaves associated with you the "patriots of the last century? " Is the man who denounces you both ' ' Benedict Arnold? " It is long since _ knew your vices ; but I never thought you were such an able and malig- nant scoundrel. THOMAS AINGE DEVYR. He had asked favors of me to edit the Land Reformer in favor of Fremont to write him letters from Europe; and I had written hundreds of dollars worth of correspondence for his paper, without ever mentioning the word "cent" in requital. Lincoln is elected, and Greeley, " Scared at the sound himself has made," publishes the following: Nov. 17, '60. "If the Cotton States are satisfied that they can do better out of the Union than in it, we insist on letting them go in peace. The right to secede may be a revolutionary one, but it exists, nevertheless. We must ever resist the right of any State to remain in the Union and nullify the laws thereof. To withdraw from the Union is quite another matter. Whenever a considerable section of our Union shall deliberately resolve to go out, we shall resist all coercive measures designed to keep them in. We hope never to live in a Republic whereof one section is pinned to the other by bayonets." 108 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J ON THE 20th. "If the Cotton States, unitedly and earnestly, wish to withdraw from the Union, we think they should and would be allowed to do so. Any attempt to compel them, by force, to remain would be contrary to the principles enunciated in the Declaration of Independence contrary to the fundamental idea on which human liberty is based." DECEMBER 7th. "If the Declaration of Independence justified the secession from the British Empire of three millions of Colonists in 1776, we do not see why it would not justify the secession of five millions of Southerners in 1860." We have seen how he battled for land reform when it had power. Now that his vicious party had poisoned it to death, I find this record in a rural paper, the Southport Telegraph : GREELEY ON LAND REFORM. Greeley thinks that all men have a natural God-given right to the earth; but then, he says that the public lands stand pledged in the most solemn manner for the pay- ment of the late war debt, and therefore he cannot go for freedom of the public lands. Let us examine this position a little. Man has a natural, God-given right to the land ? Yes. Well, what makes slaves ? Why, depriving them of their natural, God-given rights. Well, then, if the government had pledged the persons of our citizens and their children forever, for the payment of this debt, would not the pledge have been equally binding and sacred. The idea that one generation has a right to perpetrate an admitted fraud upon the succeeding one is certainly not worthy of Horace Greeley. Southport (N. Y.) Telegraph. A mistake of the Telegraph. It was pre-eminently "worthy of Horace Greeley." On December 5th, 1879, Wendell Phillips in a lecture says: "Mr. Greeley was most pretentious. The philosophy of his edit- ing was the most tyrannical, unjust, cruel and arbitrary that a decent man ever avowed. He said that he did not undertake to tell the truth ; that his only object was to tell the news, and if any man's character was offended or injured in the Tribune he was at liberty to set himself right. The doctrine was cruel, unjust, insolent, and hard-hearted, and has never been avowed by a respectable man. As if anybody had a right to make his living by printing a spicy lie about you, to make his paper more saleable, and then you were allowed to devote your days to hunting up evidence to disprove it, and arrange matter for the press, and send your carefully-prepared document, with your affidavit, to the Tributw all of which trouble he OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 109 had no right to subject you to and when you had done it, and when he printed your answer, it was to be riddled with insult, to be merci- lessly torn to pieces, you ridiculed to be treated as if you were a highway robber on trial, instead of a worthy citizen who had been used to get a penny into the pocket of a dishonest knave." There lives not a man, perhaps, who will impugn the purity of heart of Wendell Phillips, and he here draws even a worse picture of Greeley than the facts I was reviewing compelled me to draw. The foreman of the office in which my letter was printed was a creature of Greeley and a speaker at the Ward meet- ings. He so contrived as to spoil 1,500 out of 2,000 of the impressions for want of ink. He disappeared soon after from New York, charged with embezzling lecture noneys. Whether it was Greeley got between the paper and the ink I don't know. But I do know that the printer lost if some one other than myself didn't pay him. GENEKAL CBOOKE THE WAR. I had a conversation with him before hostilities commenced in Charleston harbor, to this effect: D. I fear we're on the edge of a Civil War. C. Civil War ! No : It will be essentially a foreign war. The seceding States must be dealt with as we would deal with a foreign enemy. There will be frontier lines contended for battles quarter and exchange of prisoners. D. But the Democratic Party its leaders at. the late Albany meeting declared common cause with the South ! If they act up to that declaration, the fighting will begin here, and you and I, General, may confront each other from opposite sides of a barricade. My fast friend of so many years was instantly transformed into one of the most fierce and hostile men I have ever encountered. "If you strike hands with those Albany dough-faces, and array yourself against the forces of the government, if you are captured within this district I'll hang you with my own hands." I treated this demonstration as one of his habitual jests, but observed that they "put on a terrible front this morning. " "It is no jest," said he, "I mean it seriously, and I mean it to be personally offensive to you. I regret that I ever interested myself 110 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; in a man who would stir up civil war in a State that received himself as a refugee so hospitably a State that did so much for him. " D. New York State did nothing for me. Individuals like yourself. General, did much. So did the natural resources of the country, But New York State left me without protection against plunderers and libelers like * * * * whilst it never knocked at my door but with a Tax-bill such as neither Czar nor Sovereign had ever ventured to present to their oppressed subjects. C. Be that as it may, you will not be permitted to commence civil war. The. militia, of which I have command, will act simply as a Police, to forward volunteers to the seat of war. That man must have a bad heart who would oppose us in this, and so bring war of the most remorseless kind to our own doors. And, he added, I mean this for you, personaly. D. Even language like this will not make me forget what you have been to mo. Are you just? Is it true that a man "must have a bad heart," if he dared to defend in the field a principle sustained by him at the ballot box? C. Then you are a Secessionist. D. I have no occasion. I will obey the laws of New York State so long as I remain within her boundaries. If I leave those bounda- ries, she has no right to follow me and bring me back by force. C. I don't believe she'd think you worth the trouble. D. There she'd be right. So I think of the South, she isn't "worth the trouble." C. These new Southern allies of yours are aristocrats insolent and avowed. You, a life-long and extreme democrat, to be found in the ranks of men who would not recognize your equality if you were among them ! D. Have we not aristocrats in the North, darkening their crimes under the cloak of hypocrisy? To the Southern aristocrats I would say "Go! a good riddance," even if I did not believe their "con- sent " necessary to their legitimate government. C. The very argument adduced an hour ago by our Hunker * * * a man who has ever been tied to the South by place and profit. D. Well, I at least have no such interest. Never had. Never favored them denounced them warned them of what their inso- lence would bring on them. But now that they ask permission to govern themselves from a proposition so just and so simple I cannot withhold my consent, even if I did not most heartily wish to get rid of them. OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. Ill C. They take permission ; they do not ask it. They capture our forces, seize our forts, plunder our Treasury at New Orleans with- out so much as saying "by your leave!" Would you not resent such deeds? or, has all resentment died within you? D. Appeals to the feelings are misleading things in discussing public questions. And when such appear I always think there is not much of fact to appeal to. The seceded States were partners in the Union. A part of the assets as well as of the liabilities belong to them. They naturally take that portion which is found within their own limits leaving to us all that lie within ours. They take Nor- folk Navy Yard and arsenal ; they leave Brooklyn and West Troy. They take half a million in the Sub-Treasury in New Orleans ; they leave five millions in the Sub-Treasury in New York. Must a man "have a bad heart " because he sees things in this light? C. Perhaps not. A man may bo mistaken and not have a bad heart. The truth is, I had just been goaded by the opposition of a notoriously corrupt man, and when I found you urging the same considerations that he urged, I transferred to you a portion of the resentment that had been roused by him. Saying this, he offered me his hand. He ' ' regretted having spoken so offensively to me ; " and I truly rejoiced that I had refused to take offence from a man who had done so much for me the goodness of whoso heart I had so often experienced. " When you have got a former friend for foe," many a bitter consequence might be avoided, if you would only call up the good and kind things that "former friend" had said and done to you. Surely it is more like a man to call up those grateful witnesses, than to give way to the mere animal instinct of re- sentment. The "war fever" was a moral epidemic. Men everywhere caught the contagion. Its intensity may be estimated from the effect it produced on the humane and noble hearted gentleman here re- 'erred to. The Southern Senators, and " chivalries " generally, were indeed insolent, inflated aristocrats. They re- quired a lesson which would teach them man's equality and they got it, and deserved it. At the same time the Northern slave-drivers of the factories, and of most other hired work, were even more detestable adding hypocrisy to inhumanity. So State after State seceded, and siezed upon all of the 112 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY} United States property that lay within their borders forts, arsenals, etc. declaring that the national assets and liabili- ties should be referred to a peaceful arbitration. All but Fort Sumpter in Charleston harbor. Judge Campbell was in Washington on the part of the South, in negotiation with Seward and Lincoln. A statu, quo was understood, and Char- leston furnished the garrison of Sumpter with an open market. Meanwhile Seward organized a fleet to "relieve" that fort. It was met by the shore batteries and driven back, and fire opened on the fort on its refusal to surrender. Lincoln issued a call for 75,000 men to bring the South to order. Indeed Greeley had previously declared that " New York city could furnish two or three regiments to establish order in Charleston at a small figure of pay." Such was the short- sighted shallowness of the two men. Congress, every member of which was the spawn of a cor- rupt political caucus, seized the opportunity (when men were watching the changing fortunes of the war) to plunder the nation of lands and money on a scale incredible in its vast- ness. Two hundred millions of acres and almost two hundred millions of dollars were plundered wlien the war was at the hottest, and nobody watching the plunderers divided by a great Conspiracy inside and outside of Congress. Of the issue of the war there could be little doubt. Southern incapacity encouraged blockade runners to bring in foreign goods and luxuries and bring away in payment the gold, on which their paper money rested each trip depreciating the Southern paper. Even the Northern paper money went down to 240. Both rested on a fugitive basis of gold ; the basis left for other parts, and down tumbled the paper. As for men's lives, they were of no account in the armies of the North. It had all Europe from which to recruit soldiers and workmen. We read of migratory swarms rushing into fires in volume suffic- ient to extinguish them. On the same principle Grant threw the Northern soldiers on death, knowing that if he destroyed one of the enemy for every four or five he lost victory would be his in the long run. I now turn to a man who was as politically pure as Greeley was politically villainous. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 113 GEKEIT SMITH. Strange phenomenon of the human mind! One of the most pronounced peace counsellors of the age was Gerrit Smith. At an anniversary of the Peace Society, held in Boston in '56, he was its chosen orator, and urged the doctrine, "if you are smitten on one cheek present the other." He pictured a nation refusing to lift its hand even for self- defense, and other nations rushing in to protect it in its obedience to the great Christian precept. And yet, in his canvassing tour for Governor of New York, two years after, he deliberately said within my own hearing that before he "would see injustice done to ono black baby he would see oceans of blood flow." And yet Gerrit Smith was a man of great ability alike as an orator and a writer, and of a purity of heart rarely paralleled.* r Though the home of Gerrit Smith was the abode of taste and refinement of the highest order, it was accessible on terms of perfect equality to any honest man, in whatever coat or of whatever color. Indeed, I suspect the colored man had the preference, just because he was ostracized. At the time I speak of (1858) he made the tour of the State, addressing crowded assemblages everywhere. His presence was most commanding his tall figure, classic features, and long, pro - fuse white beard his voice a silver trumpet his elocution keeping in modulated bounds the enthusiasm and the passion of his great heart. And yet it is my lon^-iixed judgment that few men ever did more, by a sin of omission, to substan- tially injure America than Gerrit Smith. lie had fully mastered the great foundation principle on which all govern- ments and enduring institutions must repose, and thus de- scribed it: "Land Reform is the greatest of all Anti-Slavery measures. Abolisii Slavery to-morrow, and Land Monopoly would pave the way to its re-establishment. But abolish Land Monopoly make every American citizen the owner of a faim adequate to his necessity and there will be no room for the return of Slavery." Founded on this declaration, I got out a " Broadside " in his favor, and armed with 10,000 copies of this " Broadside " * His heart overtaxed his brain, insomuch that he had once to be put temporarily under medical treatment in one of the public Institutions. 114 THS ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; I proceeded to the central counties. I came to Clarksville, twelve miles from Albany, at a time when the sham Demo- cratic leaders were assembled to make their nominations for local offices for that county. I walked up the street, dis- tributing my sheets at the houses and 'to the crowd; and, having done so, returned to the hotel. Immediately a crowd of " Democrats " rushed into the house after me, and robbed me by force of half the sheets I had remaining. Had not several ladies belonging to the hotel come to the rescue, I would have lost all the papers. Indeed, it was with great difficulty they were able to save me from great personal violence. They (those " Democratic " leaders) carried their prize out, and made a bonfire of them in the street. The loaded whips that came nearest my head in the melee were wielded by Irishmen, though it has been seen how much cause they had to abhor Parker. \ But how and whence was it ? An hour after this outrage I took my remaining Broadsides under my arm, and pro- ceeded through the crowd to search for some conveyance that would speed me on my way. I felt perfectly secure that no one would hurt me. And I did go safely through that undiminished crowd, and achieved my purpose of pro- ceeding along on a farmer's wagon. This robbery and burning of my property was accomplished in broad daylight, within twelve miles of the Governor's Executive Chamber. Next day I made affidavit of the facts before a Justice of the Peace, and forwarded it to Governor King. He found it compatible with his official duty to take no notice of it. So also with the great and good Horace Greeley, to whom I sent a transcript of the proceedings. Thurlow Weed's paper published the affair, but seemed to think nothing of it. I proceeded, and the remaining five thousand copies fell into good hands. Parker was so beaten that he never showed on a public ticket from that day to this. Mr. Smith was idolized in his own neighborhood. In it he was elected to Congress in opposition to both the polit- ical parties. But on this trial not more than five or six thousand votes were returned in his favor in the whole State. The reason for this was twofold. . First, his friends knew he had no chance against the regular nominees of the old parties, and, therefore, voted for Morgan, their second choice. OB, THE SPIBIT OP CHIVALBY IN MODERN DATS. 115 And secondly, half the votes he did receive were not counted to him. The district in which I resided gave him several votes to my own knowledge, yet the returns did not show that one vote had been cast for him. He paid the expense of my Broadside and the cost of my traveling connected therewith. Ole insisted upon paying for my time and labor. But to this I did not, indeed I could not, consent, as at my very outset in public life I resolved never to make profit by my efforts to put down Land Monopoly, and it was on that score alone I supported Mr. Smith. On the Negro Slave Question we differed, at least in the importance attached to it. He practically put it first and foremost in his efforts, though his theory, as we have seen, gave precedence to Land Reform. Evil indeed was it to his country that his theory went one way and his practice another. For Mr. Smith, in his Address already quoted, gave the most eloquent discussion to the first great want of the nation that, perhaps, ever was spoken or printed. With his undi- vided co-operation his resources, which were ample his character, so pure and uninipeached and his genius, so lofty, clear and demonstrative we could have knocked Land Monopoly on the . head. In fact the contest was virtually won when this Slavery Question carried the public thought away from it. On account of my work in this matter Mr. Smith made, on my suggestion, a charitable donation of $25. And yet this great thinker utterly deserted Land Eeform, and whilst he gave fifteen hundred dollars a month to sustain the border war in Missouri, waged by the heroic John Brown, he refused to give thirty or forty dollars a month to sustain that pure-hearted man, George H. Evans, in publishing his Land Ref orm paper in New York. Evans was literally starved back to his mortgaged spot of ground in New Jersey. Greeley held a mortgage on it for $200 had imperative need and must get the money he lent but would take no Interest. Mr. * * * , ever ready to do good, lent George half the sum without security and without Interest. Instead of cultivating the stony public mind George went to cultivate melons, and out of the first return from his crop he came and paid off this $100 loan of honor. The war is over; Mr. Smith's great object has been achieved; 116 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH in Air. erica an aristocracy such as has forever cursed the world. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 117 he will for ever want " more." He wants you to take another loaf from your children, that he may add another wine to his table. He is insane ! He is execrable ! You strike against him, do you? Alas! it is the strike of weakness against strength, of poverty against wealth, of hunger against plethora. You ha\ e given up your INHERITANCE your right to own, and use, and enjoy your own property. In that you have given up everything LIBERTY, SECURITY, KNOWLEDGE, REFINEMENT, CHEERFULNESS all that makes life true and dignified. You have accepted SERVITUDE, SUBJECTION, DEGRADATION, IGNORANCE. You have cast aside and turned your back upon all the God-like attributes of your nature. You are no longer the MAN you were created! You are the DRUDGE that is made of you by wicked men, and you are not even aware that you / are only a drudge. In writing the name of " Gerrit Smith," why did my thought start away and lose itself in the maze I have just traced? Why? How could it do otherwise when that name, "Man's Inheritance," flashes across the political gloom like lightning across a midnight sky. "Man's Inheritance ! " Can I forget that you, the ablest advocate you, the purity and devotion of whose life won for it a little of that consideration and respect which attaches to your own character you, oh, misery! alas for the coming ages! you, even you, adandoned that God-like effort, in the vain attempt to efface lines of black and white to annul a distinction fixed by the Creator of us all? THOMAS AINGE DEVYR. How relentless are Time and Fate ! Seventeen or eighteen years have rolled over. His great idea of Negro Emancipa- tion has been carried triumphantly through ponds of blood and over fields of dead bodies and broken hearts, and, in answer to the foregoing, I receive this last recognition from Gerrit Smith: PETERSBORO', December 18, 1874. THOMAS A. DEVYR: My Old and Dear Friend -Your highly esteemed letter finds me an old man (nearly 78) and in greatly impaired health. I have to answer it briefly, and by the hand of another. I scarcely wonder at your getting out of patience with me. so shrunken am I from what I was in my brighter and better 118 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J days, when you first knew me. But age and sickness must tell upon their sufferer. I can do no more in the sphere of political economy. May God preserve you to work in it many, many years. Our old Land Reform cause is still dear to me, though I may no longer have strength to serve it. My dear wife will be pleased to know that you still remem- ber her. She, too, is in broken health, and is in the hands of a physician in New York. With kind regards to all the members of your family, I am, as ever, your friend, T* V T? Q MTT, GBRRIT SMITH. JDY XL b. JMlLLEB. Very soon after this date that pure spirit left the sphere of its great exertions. Mrs. Smith, too, a glorious woman, an equal partner even for such a man followed him to his rest two or three months after. Never did a wedded pair leave a purer, brighter, loftier memory behind them. Of my sustained correspondence with Mr. Smith I find in my always carelessly kept records only the foregoing letters and one autograph, which I preserve as a foe-simile of his most singular handwriting: 122 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J THE FENIAN MOVEMENT. The chronic discontent which underlies and inspires the chronic war so long existing in Ireland became vigorously 've at the close of the Great American Civil "War, 1865-6. etings were held, speeches made, papers printed, but not a word written or spoken about the great foundation griev- ance of Ireland THE LAND GRIEVANCE. "The English op- pression of seven centuries " the contrasted figures of " Celt and Saxon" a sprinkling of "green fields," "blue moun- tains" and "pellucid waters," and "The long-faded glories they cover. " This was the burden of all that was said, sung or written ; in the midst of which the thief who dares to call himself a "lord" lay hid away, unseen and unheeded. The Irish People, Organ of John O'Mahoney and the Fenian Brother- hood, was two weeks old, and had got no farther than "Saxon" and "Sunburst," when I broke in upon them with a letter which I abridge : THE LAND QUESTION IN IKELAND. ' What art thou, Freedom? O ! could slaves Answer from their living graves This demand, tyrants would flee Like a dream's dim imagery. Thou art not as impostors say, A shadow soon to pass away A superstition and a name Echoing from the cave of Fame. For the laborer, thou art bread, And a comely table spread, From his daily labor come, In a neat and happy home." SHKLLEY. "An empty sack won't stand." Irish Proverb. The first grand step towards Freedom is Nationality. And yet Nationality per se is not Freedom. Europe is full of nationalities but where is its Freedom? Tumble the Swiss Alps cut of the map, and you will leave very little freedom behind. " But Ireland will establish universal suffrage, and surely from the adult manhood of Ireland will come forth a government commensurate with her wants." Such, doubtless, is the impression. Let us take care to have that impres- sion realized. France, whose advance step shakes Europe like an earthquake high- minded, chivalrous, intellectual France what is the amount of substantial freedom wrested out of her frequent and glorious revolutions? The conlis- Oix, THE bPittlT UF CH1VALKV IN MODERN UAVS. 123 cated lauds of the "emigrant nobles" form, now many a happy homestead for the people but only for a small portion of the people of France. And this breaking up of tho " emigrants' estates " was only an incident of the Revolution. Those " nobles " turned their backs on Franco to join her invaders. And then the Republic took their lands to redeem the national assignats. Those who had assignats got land. Those who had no assignats get no land. And those of tho nobles who tolerated the Republic. Have not they or their representatives a clutch on tho soil of Franco to tho present day ? A recent English traveler says that much of the lands of Southern France are in the hands of small proprietors, and he adds that in tho owner of one hundred acres (much of it in vines) he found the refined gentleman, sur- rounded by a train of assistants, cultivating his crops, and realizing just such a happy life as we rarely find except in tales of romance. But the artisans and laborers of the French cities and on the French soil, what do they realize? Can it be possible that an American workman will receive as ranch money for one day's toil of ten hours as the French work- man receives in return for his labor of a whole week? Can it be possible that the million:? of gallant Frenchmen alter all their victories rtill livo in i hr presence- of poverty? Behold, then, the contrast ! Reflect how things might have been if the French nation had resumed the French soil, and opened its bosom to the whole French people. And would it have been unjust to apportion to those "nobles/' each, a farm <;f reasonable s.;ze, and lot them work for their living like honestcr and better men? Well, France did not do so and is there no instruction in tho result? Are we Irishmen wiser and better than our brothers < >t' 1 'ranee? Y,'e are not. And now for a short Christian Catechism : Are the poorest men and women equal to the richest in the sight of their Creator? Are they made in His Image? Do they inherit His Spirit, as He "breathed it into the nostrils of Adam," tho first man? Has he given to all His Children the same wants and necessities? Has He created any means by which those common wants may be supplied? Are there such things as a fruitful soil, varied and inexhaustible mines infinite mechanical forces? Are those, with the condition of labor annexed to them, sufficient to supply all our wants first the material, then the moral and intellectual ! Who performs that condition of labor? Who should enjoy its fruits? Does your reason suggest no answer to those questions? Think those things over till you hear again from THE SON OF A UNITED IRISHMAN. 1*2 -1- THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; O'Mahoncy tlien commissioned mo to write tlio leaders of his paper, which I did up to the seventh number. The London Time* took the alarm declared we wanted to " establish the Jewish Theocracy of Land, " called on- the land- lords 1o "standby the government andn^ht for! heir estates," and had our paper shut out from the mails. The paper rose from 10,000 to 30,000 in circulation. At tho seventh number, Sullivan (the printer) -would publish nothing more from my pen. The first thing ho refused to publish was tho following critique upon an "Address to Southern Irishmen," by Judge O. A. Lochrane, of Georgia sucli a sample of literary rub- bish as rarely ever made its way into print. As a sharp etching of a puro demagogue, and for other reasons, I pre- serve it. "And Brutus is an honorable man." SEAKESPEAE::. To tlie ''Honorable" O! A ! Lochrane: Sir. " Honorable " is a grand prefix to a man's name. They use it ?r abuse it a good deal in the British Islands. But hero, it 13 not abused at all. Hero, every man who has the prefix must necessarily bo an honorable and an honest man. For lias he not first taken a plunge into tho pure fountain of Party Politics? Has he not been "cleansed" in that fountain, of all >crisy and double dealing? Has he not been "'sprinkled with the hyssop" of patriotism and public virtue, and come out "whiter than snow"? To bo sure ho has. You have been in the bath, and know all about it. I wish to remind tho Southern Irishmen of tho fact, so that they may givo you such respect as i.3 your due. For you have been addressing a letter to them recently, and that letter i.3 to mo a tempting invitation to sit down arid have a talk with you. Our purpose, you are told, is to "free Ireland from the British Government." A most atrocious purpose, to be sure 1 "To form an Irish Republic." How preposterous ! To make it one day an out- post "of the United States." Yv r orse and worse! How could you think wo would bo guilty of such wickedness? It ii true the oU monarchies have their anchoring grounds in all corners cf the globe. But what then! " Royal" men and "noble" men surely ought to have prerogatives above and beyond common fellows like us. Don't you judge so most honorable Judge? And you tell us that "a revolution commenced without sufficient OR, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IX MODERN DAYS. 125 resources to sustain it, is the highest crime against both God and man." O! A! is it indeed? Away, ye Folanders under Kosciusko ! we will revere your heroism no longer. Ye Circassians fighting for your mountain homes ! how dare you commit such a crime ! Resist the mi-hty Russian Empire, indeed. Oh, ye criminals ! Fathers of Seventy-six, too you little knew how near you ^tood to that '' moral '' precipice ! Had the tiJo not turned in the Delaware had the gallant French come to help your enemy instead of yourself I shudder to think of what " criminate " you would have been "before God and man." Heroes of Ninety-eight ! But you will be forgiven, I hope. Lochrane ha-1 not yet arisen to make you aware of your "great crime." And then you shako i:i our faces that "one hundred and fifty millions of inhabitants" which "England owns" in all quarters of the globe. Vrhat a smothering we will get when all this power comc.3 down upon us. AVe had been under the impression that much of England's power had to go away, away abroad to keep doicn those myriadicol inhabitants. Tv r o were foolish enough to regard them as our very practical allies. It was cruel of your "honor" to dispel this pleasing illusion. And that "thousand ships, and hundred thousand seamen," which you count up for England how many of them is a free gift of your own? It i.3 of importance to us to know this. "We were counting on no more than her own ships, and we remember the Briton's national song : " Where'er he goes where'er he steers In every clime he sees Tho fl .g that braved a thousand years, The battle and the breeze." And so we expected only a sprinkling of those flags along the Irish coast. One in every ten or twenty miles. It was very unfair and ill-" judge "-ed and un-"neutral"of you, Judge Lochrane, to make a present of five or six hundred ships to one of the belligerents, to the great damage of the other. Besides, if your paper ships will turn out to be as heavy metal as your paper bullets, they will send us every one to the bottom. And now, would you please stand up, till I put you through a short catechism? Do you know the extent of water front Ireland presents bays, headlands, creeks, inlets and all manner of indentations ? Can you 126 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; guess how many heavy ships it would take to watch it? How close must the cordon be? links of five miles, ten miles or twenty miles? The consequence of putting weak links in the chain such as vessels of less weight than fifty guns ? How many open coast landing places of a fine summer evening? How long it might take, with ready boats and launches, to throw a thousand men on shore? How they could bring with them say sixty rounds and a week's rations? Have you given your sage thoughts to the element of steam? How it has changed things since the days of Napoleon ? Can you guess how far off a ship may be descried even in daylight? How far off at night? How long a vessel would be in making the land after she hove in sight of it? Do you know the difference between a blockade runner forced to make a port, and an Invader jumping to get his foot on any point of the shore? If you fall in with a war vessel, do you know that her first shot must be a harmless ' ' Heave to " ? Her next, a boat with an officer to inspect your papers? Could you imagine us driven right aboard that war ship? Our grappling irons? A thousand men starting from under the shade of our bulwarks? Their boarding-pikes and six-shooters ! "Won't you pray "God have mercy" on the souls of your friends, if they resist now? You believe, doubtless, that nothing of this kind can be done. It is natural for you to believe so. But let me assure you that such things have been done a thousand times. Done, even, without the help of steam. Done, even, by mercenaries with no higher incentive than a love of fighting and a day's pay. Now, Judge, between you and me, I'm afraid you never troubled yourself about these things at all. I'm afraid you rushed forward to instruct the public before you took the least trouble to instruct yourself. "O ! A ! but I think you haven't the ships, or the army, or, may- be the men and the bravery to do this." Well, I'll leave you to guess at those things. But don't look into your own soul as a mirror of what we can, or cannot, do. You will find little belonging to us reflected there. What a delectable Judge you are, sure enough! You inform us that the power of England has "swept over Ireland" from sixteen- ninety to eighteen-forty-eight as indeed it has for a much longer period. And you assure us in the same breath that we have for all this time "borne along the highways of the world" a bright escutcheon, "blazoned all over with fame," and "wreathed all over with laurels ! " How that bright escutcheon could stand up while THE .si'JKiT or uuvAUtY is MODERN DAYS. 127 England thus "swept over" it! how those wreaths of laurel could grow on the brows of a "swept over" people you do not wait to inform us ! Out upon you, Lochrane ! Out upon all the shallow, selfish demagogues (and their name is legion) who could offer to the en- slaved people of Ireland this imaginary heritage in the Past, in lieu of the real living heritage their own land in the Present, and in the long Time to come ! See the Irishman in his empty cabin. The land-thief has been there and taken away the food. That infant has nothing to get now from its wretched mother. The fountain is dry and beginning to shrivel up. "Hush! baby! here is a cupfull of that 'glory' sent over by Judge Lochrane, of Georgia, in the United States." His favorite boy (five years old) cries through his choking sobs, "Papa, won't you give poor little Tommy something oh ! something to eat ! He is sick ! he will die !" " Yes, darling ! here is a morsel of 4 twined poetry ' which an ' Honorable ' Judge sent you from beyond the seas!" May Heaven forgive you, Judge Lochrane if it can! You don't feed your own wants on " vanquished laurels " and "trod- den down glory " ! But what ! though demagogues speak falsehood about our history ! What! though laurels do not enwreathe though glory does not over-shadow it ! Is that history less dear to us because dimmed by a flood of tears? Is the memory of our fathers less cherished by us because they fell and died (alas ! vainly died) in defense of their country and their homes? The aspiration was there. The devotion was there. The strong right hand was there. But the cool thought and wise foresight were not there. Impetuous valor swept them away. But not, I hope, forever ! The United Irishmen won the battle of New Boss on which turned the fate of Ireland. But what their impetuous valor gained was quickly lost again for want of that cool thought which ardent valor is unwilling to listen to. Fatal error ! How have you been atoned for ! with what a torrent of blood and tears ! But it leaves no stain on the manhood of Ireland. And neither does England's victory of '48, which you point to with such exulta- tion. Smith O'Brien, Dillon, Doheny and Stephens had their Head- quarters in a remote village of Tipperary. It was a Summer day. A captain of dragoons with his troop rides into the narrow street, 128 THE ODD BOOK O' THE MSETEENTH CENTURY J and they are brought up all standing by a barricade. The rifles behind it cover the gallant captain, who is so fascinated by the attention that he hasn't power to move. The insurgent leaders are in council hard by. They send a herald (John Dillon) to know if the gallant captain has indeed come out to make arrests, as is reported? But the captain (being himself under arrest just then) is glad to say, "No!" He is merely out taking a harmless ride. Oh ! very well ; if that is the case, open this barricade to the gallant captain. And so, he and his troop go on their way rejoicing, to the great disgust of the men who had shut them up in the coop. Michael Doheny gives the particulars in his " Felon's Track, " and adds: "Tnis WAS THE REVOLUTION, IF WE HAD ACCEPTED IT." Bnt they did not accept it. Judge Lochrane was there in spirit, and he would not let them. The Almighty hand seems to have preserved us so far from the "high commanding influence " which the London Times desires so much to see. Let us preserve ourselves from it for the time to come. I must now lump a lot of " honorable absurdities" together, and get rid of them in one batch. You speak of the " Komance of Revolution," with the ground you walk upon (consecrated in '76) staring you in the face! Of "compromise" between that bloated 1 ' landlord " and his perishing victim ! The ' blood of God is our anti- dote," you say. It has flowed before the tyrant's eyes for centuries, unheeded. You speak of bringing out the doomed ones to this land. How many could we bring out, and how many must remain to perish? You dwell on the "plunder, murder and massacre of war," but forget the 70,000 who die annually of famine. And isn't that a brilliant discovery of yours we are not " Irishmen " any longer, we are only "Fenians." O! A! Yes. The "Volunteers" of '82, and the " United men " of '98 ceased to be Irishmen the moment they took up their distinctive names. They didn't know it, to be sure, for Judge Lochrane wasn't on the ground to tell them. But the Southern Fenians haven't that excuse, and I trust they will deport themselves accordingly. But I am afraid they are stiff-necked fellows. I am afraid they will not hearken to " Honorable " wisdom, when it is offered gratis to them at their own doors. They have been through the war, too. No doubt they have suffered, Judge Lochrane, probably as much as you did yourself. Yet they don't seem to be shaking in their shoes OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 129 with fear. I suppose the slices they wear are not ' 'Honorable " shoes. Little Tommy's famishing voice is ringing in their ears. Can it be that they are preparing to bring him some other deliverance a little more substantial than your "wreathed laurels" and your twined poetry"? 0! A! "but they can't do it," you say. The American Govern- ment won't let them. You cite big names, and even quote Latin to prove this. But then again you disprove it all when you admit that there is no law "to prevent the citizen [from] emigrating." Well, that privilege is quite sufficient for us. We want no more, if we only make good use of it. But I cannot close until I give the Northern Fenians one undiluted ray of light, just as it shoots from your sunny intellect. Here's what you say : "The Revolution is not the people, but a woman fond of show and ornament, and given to dance and exhibition*." Now, I believe that such a revolution (or woman) would be a fit consort for Judge Lochrane himself; arid, taking off my hat and making my best bow, in that congenial company let me leave him. THE SON or A UNITED IRISHMAN. Sullivan was an active, able man in his way. He wrote "Desmond," quite a clever tale of the South of Ireland. But his position brought temptation to him, to which he appears to have yielded, greatly I think to his own loss. J.-Doran Killian, too, (called "the brain of the movement"), was a clever writer and speaker, but entirely unsuited to the leader- ship of a revolutionary movement. In both respects the same 'may be said of Wm. E. Robinson, who figured a good deal at the public meetings. The atmosphere of New York is not a pure place to breathe in. The rottenness of politics pervades it thoroughly, and the men I here speak of did not resist its contagion. Finding the paper in bad hands, I started the Fenian Brotherhood, and published, in its first number, this LETTER TO ARCHBISHOP M'CLOSKEY. RIGHT REVEREND SIR: I take the liberty of presenting to your notice two facts of history. Both of them are significant, and may at the present moment be studied by you with great profit. Lady Montague, an Englishwoman, draws the following picture of France in 1718 : 130 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J " I think nothing so terrible as objects of misery, and the country villages of France show nothing else. While the post horses are changed, the whole town comes out to bog, with such miserable, starved faces, and thin, tat- tered clothes, that they need no other eloquence to persuade one of the wretchedness of their condition. This is all the French magnificence you see till you come to Fontainbleau, where you are showed jifteen hundred apartments in the king's hunting palace." So much for the effect. Now for the cause : " Supposing," says high Tory Allison, " the produce of an cr ) worth 3 2s. 9d., the proportion that went to the king was 1 18s. -id. ; to tti-j 1 indlord 18s., and to the actual cultivator 5s. If the produce of an acre were divided into twelve parts, nearly seven and a half went to the king, three and a half to the proprietor, and ONE to the actual cultivator ! " That's the way they ordered things in France in those days. And there were three "orders" in France at this time, who kept the people in this deplorable condition. One was the "Royal" order the sensual and detestable Bourbons. Next came the ' Noble '' order the thieves wno had stolen all the lands of France from their true owners, the people. This "Noble" order not only excused itself from paying taxes, but was continually besetting the Court to get pensions, sinecures, all manner of plunder out of the national treasury out of the " seven and one-half parts" plundered by the king. Then there was a third order that of the bishops and clergy. This order was a political body, with legislative power equal to that of the nobles. They, too, excused themselves from all payment of taxes ; and all its high dignitaries vied with the highest nobles in the splendor and luxury of their lives ! This order, naturally enough, took part with the oppressors of France. I do not say that they were oppressors themselves-, but I ask you, Bight Reverend Sir, what do you think about them? And I ask you further, do you think they did right in siding with the oppressors of France? You will, of course, be guarded in answering this question, as it has a personal leaning toward your- self. And I would further ask you, what effect did this conduct of the French clergy produce upon the French people? Had it anything to do with making France a nation of Infidels? The founder of the Christian Religion was not an oppressor of the poor. He did not league himself with their oppressors. The people of France ought to have remembered that great truth. They ought to have held firmly to the Christian faith. They ought to have seen that the French political clergy were one thing, and the OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 131 Christian religion was quite another thing. But they didn't. They turned their backs and bccarr.e infidels. Do not follow the example of the French bishops. Bo not throw yourself or your clergy as a shield over the crimes of the English and Irish n,ri,;tocracy. Do not! No shield can save them Irom the indignation of an uprisen and virtuous people. The shield may get itself tarnished, but it cannot either screen or protect thorn ia their crimes. I have shown 3*011, sir, the witness borne by a woman against tho atrocious S3~otc:n in France a system of which your order was at once partaker and defender. Let me now place before you the witnessing of another woman an American woman Mrs. Nichol- son, who visited the land of green graves and ruined households iu 1847. Look ! "A former rector, named Wilson, died in tLp Sumraor of '17 leaving .a wife and four children on :i pivtty spot where they had resided for jxv.rs. Here I w;is invited to spend a few weeks, and with doep sorrow I saw. step by step, all taken for TAXES und KENT. Everything that had life out of doors was sold at auction--tlion. everything of furniture. Tho cottage was left desohi e tho moth :r w is put injii.'l, and is now looking through its gr.itod windo-.vs, whilst her children are scattered abroad, trying to got a morsel of bread." And this, a woman of refinement one of that class, too, which the foul government would fain enlist under their unholy standard. And Sir Richard O'Donnell (one of the old Celtic names) was the desolator of this poor lady's household. Well and truly does Mr. Q!Mahoney say in his Irish book that the " village tyrants, though some of them be of Gaelic name and blood, and a few of them even of the national faith, are now the only foreign enemy." But to return to the picture : "To see," says Mrs. Nicholson, '-the tumbled cabin, with the hopeless inmates lingering around it, and wailing in despair -scraping the rubbish for some little relic of mutual affection , the ragged, barefooted little ones clinging around them one on the back of the weeping mother, and the father looking on in despair! Then they take their way to some ditch to encamp, supperless, for the night- without covering for the head or foot, or a scrap of blanket to put over them - into whatever ditch they may crawl. Village upon village, and company after company have I seen. And a magistrate who was traveling informed me that., at nightfall the preceding day, he had found a company who had gathered a few sticks and fastened them into the ditch, and spread over what miserable rags they could collect 132 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J (for the rain was fast pouring), and under these more than two hundred men, women, and children were to crawl tor the night. He alighted from his car and counted them. They had that day been driven out, and there was not one pound of any kind of food in the encampment 1 " Now, Eight Keverend Sir, what do you say to those horrors? We are going, 1 trust, to put an end to them. You don't like our way of doing it? Well then, show us a better way, and we'll take it. We'll be very glad indeed if you point out a better way. If you don't do this if you don't show us a better way be assured that we will take our own ! For this hellish system shall not continue. Even your inertia defense of it will be unavailing. If people must die sacrificed to this Moloch of aristocracy the mode of sacrifice must be changed. Hunger will have to give place to the sword ! Hitherto the victims have been all on the one side. Wouldn't it be well now to let the other side have a turn? Oh, no ! That would be shocking. But scenes like the following are not shocking at all : 'The road was rough," says this good Mrs. Nicholson, "and we were constantly meeting with pale, meagre men on their way from the mountains, to break stones and pile them high for the compensation of one pound of meal a day ! Flocks of children went to school for the " bit of bread ' there supplied to them ; some crying with hunger, and some begging to get in without the penny required for their tuition. The poor little emaciated things went weeping away. We saw multitudes in the last stages of suffer- ing, yet not one through that day asked charity ! and in one case the common hospitality showed itself by offering us milk when we asked for water." At Kossford, in Erris, this picture : "A young lady lived back two miles upon the mountain. She was edu- cated in the popular genteel style, and her family had some of them died, and all broken down, she was staying in a thatched cottage, which had yet the remains of taste and struggling gentility. Two of the peasant women had seen Mr. Bourne and me going that way, and by a shorter path had hastened and given Miss notice, so that when we entered, the cottage was in trim and she in due order to receive us. That pitiful effort was painful to witness. She was suffering hunger, and had no possible way of escape. Yet she assumed a magnanimity of spirit, and complained not. She only expressed much pity for the poor tenants on the land about her, and begged us, it possible, to send relief. Her table was spread with those pretty little ornaments which adorn the drawing-rooms of the rich ; and she, with a light scarf hung carelessly about her shoulders, genteel in form and beauti- ful in features, was already looking from eyes that were putting on the- 'famine stare.' 'What can be done with that helpless, proud, interesting OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 13& girl? ' said Mr. Bourne, as we passed away. ' She must die in all her pride, if some relief is not speedily found. She would not go to the work-house, and there, on that desolate mountain, she will probably pine away and die unheeded." This was the famine when , directly and indirectly, millions perished. In ordinary time o.ily sevei.t, thousand die annually of hunger and its attendant diseases. Have we lost all manhood ? Must such crimes and such suffering endure forever? And this American lady this honest, true hearted woman does not throw a screen over the " Noble," and "Honorable," and " Right Honorable" criminals. No, indeed, she speaks to them in this way : " Ye miserable oppressors ! what will ye do when the day of God's wrath shall come? What 'rock and mountain' will ye call upon to screen your guilty heads? Ye lords! when the Lord of lords shall gird on His sword, then shall these poor be a swift witness against you. You who call your- selves lords, after the name of Him whose mission was mercy ! When look- ing at those exiles, my heart has said How much more woeful is the case of him who drove you into the storm ! Well might the apostle James say, ' Go to ! ye rich men, weep and howl 1 ' " But the good woman concludes with the prayer, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Offering up on your behalf the same prayer, and extending to you the same Christian spirit, permit me, Bight Reverend Sir, to take my leave. The feeling evoked, so far as I could judge, was a political instinctive feeling to strike down the domination of England, without much thought about the ownership of the land. Its intensity breathes in this article : TO SHIP! TO SHIP! "Come as the winds come, When forests are rended ; Come as the waves come, When navies are stranded^ Faster come 1 faster come 1 Thicker, and faster ! " SCOTT. Not to arms ! To arms ! But To ship ! To ship ! There is one spot still living on this earth. One spot in which Soul is up enthroned sovereign of thought and action. One spot where a divine enthusiasm carries men above the low sordid pursuits that are the disgrace of the age. One spot where deeds approach that will electrify the nations. That spot is Ireland. To the ship ! To the ship 1 Hurra ! for 134. THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ' A wet sheet and a flowing sail, A wind that follows fast." Hurra ! for the steam giant that works so bravely down in that deep hold. Hurra ! for the gallant vessel, crushing beneath her the subject waves, and bounding (like the Irish wolf dog) to the help of our brothers in the field to the rescue of our brothers in the dungeon. Back ! Back ! To the land of Palaces and Prisons. Back for a look at the riot of the Court, and the starvation of the Cottage. Hold the breath ! Set the teeth ! Bring up the memories ! Our brothers must soon MAY NOW be in the field. " Why stand we here loitering?" Crowd in the money. Make way for the crowding men. Emigration is free 1 Gunpowder an article of commerce. Hurra ! Hurra ! Bottom has been struck. The lowest depth has been sounded. That nation sunk deepest is the first to rebound. The pre-eminence is ours. This the turning point of earth's history. Ignorance darkened the Past enlightenment dawns over the Future. Mind is emancipated. Voice and pen unchained. Hurra ! Hurra ! Our brothers were poor. They must toil, toil, and forever toil, to keep themselves alive. What was to dread from them? They buy rifles, indeed ! Why ; they hadn't the price of caps. They forge pikes ! Why, they couldn't pay for a pound of steel. And so the tyrants were comforted. For they didn't know that America was here. They did not dream of the American dollar. They did not know that Irishmen had such a thing. That they would throw it out so freely. That workshops would clank. That foundries would spit fire. That powder and shot would roll them- selves up together by the magic of that American dollar. No ! Dead, them- selves, to every noble impulse consumed by their own base desires they did not know that there was anything nobler in this world than sordid riot- ing and sloth. They did not think of the American dollars ! Of the men and women who sent them along. But they are beginning to think of them now Hurra 1 Hurra I To think ! Aye, and to speak. " Oh, those bombs, and grenades, and rifle bullets ! They were good servants when we nad them all to ourselves. But they have divided forces half gone over to the mob. Alas 1 for those " sinews of war," sent on by the women and men, and girls and boys of America i That noble lords and ladies like us should ever see this day ! " But the day has come. In with the money ! Up with the sails, or " By Jove, we'll be too late for the first cut." Up and at them ! Hurra ! Hurra ! BARGAIN AND SALE. - "When the Irish Peojjle became formidable when it struck at that sensitive sore, the Land --when its circulation trebled, from 10,000 OH, THE SP1H1T OJb' CHIVALRY J\ MODEBN DAYS. 135 to 30,000 in five weeks then it became worth a buying. Whether it was bought or not by Mr. Archibald, the British Consul, I cannot say ;ueh things are done in a very close and dark market but the reader can judge from what follows. He forged, quoted this, sheer forgery, as if from the London Spectator : "England's war expenses have been increased three millions of dollars a day, or the expenses of the American government during the late war." " We are thus weakening and exhausting England without striking a blow and the ' longer we keep 011 this game ' the more powerless we are making her, and the more ' influential Fenianism is becoming.' " " England has now all the expense without the least prospect of recruit- ing her army. "We are crushing the vitals out of England by a moral phys- ical revolution alone, and every day we can safely protract the struggle is a gain to us, and a loss to her." On which my comment at the time was, "Get out, you scoundrel!" In one thing this Sullivan was honest honester t'lan most I do not say all of the leaders. He did not profess to be actuated by principle. "The excitement would die out by-and-bye," he said, "but it would leave an established newspaper in his hands." This to myself, personally. At the election of '68 he wheeled his paper round for Grant, and got a $1,000 check from "Wilkes, of the Spirit of the Times, for doi \g so. Enthusiasm was intense. The New York 'Longshoremen's Society presented $2,700. Headquarters the large and grand house in Union Square was crowded with similar busi- ness. A meeting was called in Williamsburgh (my own home.) I was standing uninvited in the crowd when Colonel Powers called me up to the platform. Mr. Wm. E. Kobinson was speaking with his usual fluency, and he kept speaking on till Mr. Killian arrived. Mr. K. asked me had I spoken yet. No, that pleasure was before me. He presented him- self. A fine presence and effective speaker, he kept the audi- ence interested till the lateness of the hour compelled an adjournment. In the course of his speech he said, " Much as had been said about contributions they had only reached half a million of dollars." The Civil War was over. Blockade runners could be bought cheap. More than 100,000 men who had breathed 136 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J gunpowder for years were straining to volunteer for the Invasion. Yet noiiiing was doi And it was fortunate that nothing was done. For the Fenian Movement had not the first idea of the Grand Truth that the world is the Creator's world, and that the people HE sent to it, every one of them, came with his title deed in his stomach and in the dependent wants clustered around it. All the wants material first, then moral and intellectual. It was a chivalrous inspiration for nationhood a transfer of tiie Government from London to Dublin. But the transfer of not an acre from the Thief to the Owner. I could do nothing with the leaders. They split into two factions. One would send, and did send, individuals over to organize the Irish people. Those were can- h', and impris- oned, and tried and brought Isaac Butt out a 5 their counsel. The oiner faction was headed by Mr. Roberts, a dry goods merchant of little public experience, and General Sweeny, a brave man who won a commission and lost an arm in thd Mexican war, and distinguished himself in the recent civil war. Those called for an invasion of Canada. Purpose to "make it a Republic, and found on it belligerent rights, with pri- vateers to sweep the seas of English commerce." But instead of making friends of the Canadians, the General proclaimed that "20,000 who fought under Grant would beat 60,000 Kanucks." To show the folly of this talk, and for another far more important purpose, I quote from Captain Preston's " Three Years in Canada," ending '39 : "The French-Canadian," says Captain Preston, "is disloyal to England. Ho argues thus : If you keep me down by force I must submit ; but if you relax that force it will be the signal for my rising against you." After describing the sullen apathy of the Canadian militia, and the serious apprehension that they would join the invad- ing force threatened from the United States, Preston thus continues: "But, fortunately, between the utterance of the Invasion and its execution a sufficient interval elapsed to admit of reflection, and when it was understood that an invasion of the Province concealed a OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODEPN DAYS. 137 war against life and property, despondency gave way to indigna- tion," etc., etc. "Well does the Marseillaise say tliat " Falsehood's dagger tyrant's wield." Never was concocted a more poisonous falsehood than this. And Preston discloses that it was spoken from every platform and echoed through, every newspaper, and preached by the French-Canadian priests, who had the especial ear of the people. And he illustrates the result by this picture : "One militia man rushed from the ranks, and singling out an antagonist, plunged his bayonet into him, exclaiming: ' You scoundrel, you wanted to rob mo of my farm. There ! take that instead.' " Never was a more unmixed lie. The gallant American borderers wanted none of tiieir land would not tone tne gift of it. But the Lie served a terrible purpose. I did not suit the Fenian leaders it seemed any more than I had suited the Political leaders, and alter publishing eight or nine numbers of my paper I came out of the tug a loser of much time and labor, and I don't know how many hundred dollars. I shall conclude my account of Fenianism with a letter, which. I abridge : To HON. AND LIBERAL MB. GLADSTONE, CHANGELLOB or THE BRITISH EXCHEQUER : SIK You a:ad your coadjutors are great " liberals " if we take your own word lor it. You put four horses to your carriage, and a burden of manure on the back of the small t Miant ho who cultivates the fields which you have the frontleas impudence to call yours. You put I don't know how many descriptions of wine on yoi:r table, and you leave not even a pint of butter- milk on the tablo of your brother man him whom you have robbed of his natural right on tii earth. You take a palace to yourselves and give a hove 1 , or the ditch side, to your cheated brother. You dispense rags to the robbed multitudes, and you take " purple and fine linen ' to yourselves. To them, e loct, and ignorance ; co yourselves, education and wisdom. To them, all earthly toil and suffering; to yourselves, all earthly idleness and enjoyment. v Tiberall" Faith you are liberal, nobody can deny that. Liberal to 138 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J yourselves ! Liberal of the stolen goods which you have stolen from your outraged brothers. And, Gladstone, you are a pet and a paragon of " liberality" and, may we not add, of candor also? For you have been talking about the Fenians the other day in Liverpool ; and you spoko of them as if they were enemies, not of you and your " liberal" government, but of the Canadian people. You innocently assume that the Canadian people are all full of loyalty to the " authority of her Majesty." You forget all about the butcheries committed by her Majesty, " aided and abetted" by such " liberal." men as you committed on those same Canadian people in '37, thirty years ago ! Huudi jds of patriots hung to death by Head, your commander, for which murders he received a message of thanks from your "liberal" predecessors, Melbourne and Russell. To you, sir, those barbarous murders, perpetrated in cold blood, on pris- oners taken in war, may appear all as matters of course. You think doubt- Jess that those murderers were doing ^od a service that the " divine right " of kings and queens gave them a right to murder their fellow-creatures. The Canadian people will probably think otherwise. Time may have dimmed their memory of those inhuman crimes committed by you. But we'll try to jog that memory of theirs. If we in the United States have only a little common sense we will send a snow-storm of documents into Canada during the warm weather that will create a light and a reflection all over that laud. Wo began wrong. That is admitted. Make your best of it. But mistakes lead the way to success. They form that experience which " teacheth even fools." When this paper reaches you, and I will send it on carefully, you and your " liberal " brothers will bo aware of the news of our confusion and incapacity ; that will reach you at the same time. But be not too quick in arriving at conclusions. This Kepublic one State of it, indeed has more men willing and able to demolish you and your govern- ment than would do the business in a week. Do you think that a little in- terruption or the incapacity of half a dozen half-leaders will alter the determination of those in on ? There never was a more helpless despotism than yours once the test is brought to it. The Irishman, the agricultural laborers of England, and the denizens of the factory-hells, if let fairly loose upon you, by a force that could marshal them for action, would break the egg-shell that you live in, and scatter all the chickens like yourself in a week's time. Even your soldiers and sailors you know all about what they are, or if you don't know, you may have the fortune to be instructed. You have youx* victory such as it is over those unresisting men that are shut down in your deep dungeons. But at what cost? Why, sir, you have reduced that government of yours to the most passive imbecility. . No matter what is going on in Europe you cannot appear in its councils as a National Power. Your representative at Valparaiso had his instruction OR. THE 8PIKTT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 139 and he went aside out of the way pf the Spanish shells. He couldn't you couldn't afford to incur the resentment of such a fourth-rate power as Spain. Soon will your situation be known to all men. Known that the Irish element everywhere are watching you, " For never yet was human power, That could escape, if unforgiven, The patient search and vigil long Of him who treasures up a wrong." Prepare yourself therefore. There is no uncertainty about the future save a trifling uncertainty in the matter of time. VOLUNTEER. If this letter did not make an impression on Mr. Gladstone, the rescue at Manchester, the blowing up of Clerkenwell, the attempt on Chester Castle did, and his well-meant but abor- tive land law was the result. ITEMS. I now present a number of Items, promiscuously, in which there is instruction: THE Sun informs us that the Land Leaguers of New York are " neither more nor less than English Chartists transported to this country." It is '46 5 and a Revolutionary veteran is refused a seat in the Troy and Albany Coach, because he is not respectably dressed. The old spirit is rapidly dying out. The stage manager knows little about Revolutions and cares less. Orestes A. Brownson, while yet a Freethinker, delivered a lecture ir New York City on the " Civilizing Effects of British Commerce." Most of the Social Reformers were of his way of thinking on religious matters, and I lost some friends among them by criticising Brownson's discourse. I cited the monopoly of food in the East Indies till the very rivers were sodden with the dead of hunger the poisoning with opium and slaughtering of the Chinese. I dealt with him in this manner to the especial displeasure of Mr. John Hecker then a smal' store baker since a millionaire, flour miller, and vender o printed paper bags Hecker went into ' The Churchman " business, and Brownson became famous in his Native American Catholic Review. 1 find the following in my papers : ' The Governor (Gilmer) of Virginia has resigned office. Some time since a slave-stealer retreated on New York State, and a requisition was made on Governor Seward to give him up. This Governor Seward refused to do 140 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J and very soon a culprit from New York took refuge in Virginia. A requisi- tion was made on Governor Gilmer, but the Virginian would not give up the offender till his claim on the New York Executive would bo complied with. His legislature expressed a different opinion, and so Gilmer resigned. This complication may lead to non-intercourse between the States or even worse." [ It did indeed lead to inconceivably worse. ] Faneuil Hall is sacred by its association with the earliest history of the Eevolution. It is an immense building the lower story of which presents four fronts, or blocks, occupied by stores. The upper stories are set apart for public use, such as armories for the military companies, etc. ; the middle story belongs to the public and can be had for the purposes of public meetings, on the requisition of 100 citizens. Its ample interior its plat- forms and galleries the fine paintings of Washington, Warren, Knox, the two Adams', Samuel and John Q a bust of the elder Adams, Commodore Freble and Tom Paine they are all finely executed, and seem as if they were listening, with the most profound attention, to every sound that echoes through the immense Hall. If Governments listened to the admonitions of Nature and Nature is the direct and unerring manifestation of God himself if they did that they would not be found conferring upon a man what they have no authority to confer, and that, too, which he, owing to the fragility of his nature, has not the capacity to receive namely, ownership of the Land. Social, as well as political salvation, depends upon finding out what Natural Eight is, and bravely adopting it. Before the Declaration of Independence, any man who contemplated separation from England was, so George Washington in- forms us, looked upon as a madman. Every Keformer that ever showed face in the world was regarded by the "wise men " of their day as "very rash " " very reprehensible," " very dangerous people." In Senate, January 26, 1828, pending the discussion of the bill granting " pre-emption to actual settlers," Mr. Clay of Kentucky said : " In no shape in which the bill could be placed, could he be brought to vote for it. The whole pre-emption system was a violation of all law, and an encourage- ment to persons to go on the public lands and take the choicest portions of them as suited their interests or inclinations." In Senate, January 27, 1833, Mr. Tipton said : " He understood that the Senator from Kentucky denounced the settlers on the lands as a lawless Danditti of land robbers, unjustly grasping at the public treasure." Here Mr. Clay rose and said : "lie would repeat what he did say on the occasion referred to by the honorable Senator from Indiana," as above. UK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 141 Prom measuring the velocity of light to the construction of a glass button, from the vast to the minute, tho march of Science and of Art strikes us with a consciousness that those things are not emanations of the human mind that they come from a great Superintending Benevolence that sees what wo want, and gives it to us with a profuse hand. All that Art and Science points out to us is received with welcome by all people. The truths of Astronomy the records of Geology the art of form- ing and fashioning cloth, of fusing and utilizing metals steam, electricity every improvement and discovery in material Science and material Art is accepted and put to use. They do not infringe upon the great established Social Wrongs. Indeed all those things go now to pamper those wrongs. To the great mass of toilers those progressions are as if they were not. Chained by their necessities to incessant toil, the world around them its use, Its grandeur, its boundless resource of all things is not for them. They are Disinherited ' In 1842 The Boss manufacturers of New England and Pittsburgh, and in- deed all round, made dividends of from 20 to 33 per cent annually. Having set forth this fact, the Mechanics' Association of Fall River proceeded thus : " 1. The system of labor to which we have alluded in our preamble, re- quiring of the Mechanic and Laborer of New England from twelve to fifteen hours labor per diem, is more than the physical constitution of men can bear. We have only to acquaint ourselves with the bills of mortality which are annually rendered through the public journals of the day, with the em- ployment of those who have died the nature of the disease which ter- minated their earthly existence, and we shall find that three-fifths of all the deaths which occurred among us are attributable to the system of labor by which wo are governed ; and yearly there are thousands who come down to a premature grave in consequence of a system of labor which levies such, a heavy tax upon the physical t-trenyth of man as to render him wholly unable to pay. But this is not all. The influence of that system of labor is such as must of necessity extinguish the intellectual fire which heaven desired should burn upon and in every soul of man." And yet they still hang on to that condition instead of turning their thoughts to the only thing that can rescue them THE LAND ! The Marquis of Lafayette, of an old noblesse family, did, in the ardor of his youth, fight and sacrifice heroically for the young American Republic. But, returning to France, he breasted the French Revolution in favor of the Monarchy till he had to fly across to the Austrian lines from the hostility of his own soldiers. But the old remembrances of what he had done in America brought him up and out in 1830 against the despotism of Charles X. Unfortunately, for it was almost entirely through his influence that the Revolution accepted Louis Phillipe under the deceiving title of " Citizen King." The sordid scheming and tyrannical reign of the " Citizen King '' cost France seventeen years of suffering, and no moderate waste of in several attempts to throw him off the throne. One of the most re- 142 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY \ markable of those attempts is portrayed in Hugo's Les Miserdbles em- bellished in fact, but not at all in spirit. The funeral of General La Marj'ie was well calculated to rouse the en- thusiasm of all the young and ardent Republicans in Paris. Those judging the public mind by their own threw up barricades, and how they fought behind them is master of undying History. But the excitement was partial, personal not national. Hence thoso gallant mon failed and perished. A lesson, mark it. One of my first controversies with our local authorities is thus described : BATHING. The men of the Republic ought to bo men accomplished in all the manly exercises shutout from no improvement that would make them :nore vigorous and efficient in all the necessities and emergencies of life. Bathing swimming, diving, and performing every practicable motion in the water is one of the manly and useful exorcises. Hardihood self- reliance health, and enlarged capacity to bo useful would result from sea bathing. In a little book, entitled "A. Picture of the Seasons," the following passage occurs, when it comos to describe the fervid heats of Summer: "Bathing too, is a delightful amusement, and h;ippy is tho swimmer who alone can enjoy in full zest this healthful exercise." We are persuaded that in the restriction* put upon this "healthful exer- cise " an injury is done, to the working classes especially a serious injury, and that, too, quite unnecessarily. AN INTERVIEW 1878. Monopolist Step in and take a seat. Glad to see you. Reformer Glad to hear it. I called to see if you wouldn't help us to direct this great upheaval of the people for financial Reform. Monopolist I know of no upheaval of the people. I hear of a clamor raised by idle, thriftless scalawags inclined to liquor and averse to work. Reformer Your picture is not a true one. There was no discontent no idlers no tramps seven years ago. Whatever men are now bad govern- ment has made them. Monopolist No. Idleness and drunkenness and turbulence have made them. And look at their leaders. Ben Butler, a thief; Denis Kearney, a vulgar, ignorant demagogue. Where will they lead them to? Reformer Of yourself, you know nothing of Ben Butler. Of Denis Kearney you know only that he has as much practical knowledge as has stirred up the whole hive of national plunderers. You don't like those leaders. But how have you and your class led the people? You have Dis- inherited them not yourself I admit, but your class stolen their Inherit- ance and given it to Railroad thieves their mines, everything that belonged OR, THE SPIRIT Of CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYB. 143 to them and to their posterity. Now you vituperate them. You daro to spea k as if you were thoir master. Fifteen years ago you endorsed this paper for reform.* You paid your part for sending it on to Congress. But a man (the * * * man) stood then at your shoulder, and infused public virtue into you. Ho is now gone, and you are what I see. Astonished that a representative of the ''lower class" would daro to board him in his offlco, the Monopolist flashed with rage. It was as fiercely returned by tho Kef of mo r, and a quasi acquaintance of thirty-five years ended with Denunciation on one side, Defiance on the other. Impressed with the ability of Mr. Boucicault and the evident force of his character, I wrote to him suggesting a theme that would bring out the man hood of tho American mechanic and tho ladylike dignity of the American girl who dared honorable work and became reined through tho innate ex- cellence of her nature. Unluckily he was in bad humor at tho time, and wrote me the following note. I say unluckily, for I hold that this was a better and everyway more profitable field than some ho so sedulously cultivated : DEAR SIB : In reply to yours of April the 4th I regret to say that it is my present intention to retire from my position before the American public at the conclusion of this season. Tho influence of the Press upon art and artists in this country is' so de- basing that, although tho public are both generous and appreciative, the associations of tho artist aro beneath contempt, and tho artists themselves become subservient to an association of men I mean the journalists un- paralleled in infamy and presumption. No public reward can compensate a gentleman for the degradation of being brought into contact with such persons, or having his name spelt by such pens. Your aspirations, sir, do you extreme credit; but, alas! they belong to another country and a different time. I am, vours truly, " DION BOUCICAULT. 39 E. 15th street, Now York, April li, 1860. Strange and wayward fate I With tho ability to powerfully assist the wronged, belied, half prostrate people, this man will go a little way down to- ward posterity as a mere amusement-maker for reward. Then be xitterly forgotten. ANTI- KENT 1842. Guarantee to tho people the position which their Creator intended for them guarantee to them the fruits of their honest toil. Do this, and they will guarantee to you the power the prosperity and the undecaying sta- bility of the Republic. But if, on the other hand, you insist upon propping up barbarous and * Memoii.U to Trragress (see ante). 144 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH OENTUKY selfish feudalism if you persist in domesticating in this Republic a system at war with Religion and Reason, with both the letter and spirit of our Insti- tutions a system from which has ilowed evils so vast, and so unmitigated a system from which no good ever did or can ever come. If you do this, gentlemen, you will find, when it is, perhaps, too late, that you arc plunging right into Anarchy first, and Monarchy afterward. By a strange obliquity of vision you are rushing upon the precipice. The old Rattlesnake, Land Monopoly, stands glaring upon you. Like squirrels, or small birds, you are preparing to dash into its devouring jaws. "SQUATTERS" 1844. I learn by the Common Council proceedings a few daye ago that a reso- lution passed the Board of Aldermen " in favor of taking measures to- collect rents from squatters on the public lands in the 12th and 16th Wards." Some poor people, anxious to get a living by honest labor rather than be- come paupers, have gone to the unsettled and unenclosed parts of this island (which, a " long time ago/' some Dutchmen, who had no right to buy it, pretended to buy off some Indians who had no right io sell it, for about twenty-eight dollars,) and have erected huts and shanties to live in on it. That's what our political Aldermen want rent for. Subsequently the .xdermen forged titles to this land, and give them now (1881) to success- ful profitmongers. Those come with their " crowbar brigades " and tear down the shanties, and throw out the people living in them. By what right f-sjlid the Aldermen first charge rent and then forge titles to those lands ? God's title must be vindicated m\ nil land or this Republic is lost. A M O B M O N S T A T E 8 M A N . Joseph Smith was the Mormon candidate for President in 1844. Thus he wrote: "As soon as the greater National evils could be remedied, so that slavery could not occupy one-half of the United States, for specula- tion, competition, prodigality, and fleshly capital, and so that enormous salaries, stipends, fees, perquisites, patronage, and the wages of spiritual wickedness in ' ermine and lace, ' could not swallow up forty or fifty millions of public revenue, I would use all honorable means to bring the wages of the mechanics and farmers iip and the salaries of public servants down; increase labor and money by a judicious tariff, and advise the People, who are the only sovereigns of the soil, to petition Congress to pass & uniform, land lair ! that UK; air, tho water, and the land of tho ' Asylum of the Oppressed,' might bo free to freemen ! With considerations of the highest regard for unadulterated freedom, I have the honor to be your obedient servant, JOSEPH SMITH." OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS, 145 THE A L P 8 A LESSON. When Hannibal, the Carthaginian General, succeeded in flghting his way over the Alps, " conquered not only the Alpine nations, but the Alps themselves," he found himself in Italy, and approached by the gathered armies of Rome. He then made a speech to his men that has been pre- served in History, in Vhich ho pictured the situation like this: "Before you is the Po, a river as broad and more rapid than the Rhone. Behind you are the Alps, over which, with your hopes high and resources undiminished, you could scarce force a passage. Here, then, you must conquer or die the moment you meet the enemy. Let this bo but firmly implanted in your minds, and once more. T say, you are victorious." And they were victorious. Now there is a very brief catechism which, if the Irish people- --the Ameri- can people ALL peoples, will only spend some minutes in learning, and then keep it present always present in mind, so surely as Hannibal's men won the battle of Ticiu, so surely will the outraged Human Family win iho battle of right and of true Freedom. We say true Fr oedom, for it is a.sham Freedom that leaves the people no Inheritance in the soil. Xo means to support tho wants of their nature. ILLUSTRATIVE. .^ James B. Taylor, a shrewd, selfish man, started as a Whig politician, ;md when the Brooklyn Water Works had been twice voted dowh by the people he and his "Whig" friends joined with H. C. Murphy and his -'Demo- cratic" backers, and got a law, through the " sr -ereign power" of corrupt politicians assembled in Albany, to build tho Water Works. ' ' Water bonds ' ' flew about into the hands of the politicians, and formed a particular and enormous " steal, " apart from the general stealing out of the general taxes of tho city. Taylor became, rich, and speculated in other ways. The City of Now York owned tho Washington Market, It had been built on ground filled in from tho Hudson River front. Taylor discovered that the State's title to this " land under water" had not been given to the city. He went and procured an Act giving thotitlo to himself , and commenced proceed- ings of ejectment against tho city. He was bought off, and made half a million in this way. Similar \vas his action on the " Gansevort property," at G3d street and the River, and a similar amount of plunder was th.-i result. But his great " success " ended, as is generally tho case, in a coffin, and great wrangling in tho courts and newspapers about his will. WEBSTER: HE WANTS A FOREIGN MISSION 1845. A large tract of land and water intrinsically of considerable value but doubly valuable from its geographical position is " negociated '' from us by Lord Ashburton, tho wily instrument of wily and dishonest 146 THE GDI) BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; employers. Ask who conducted the negociations that gave latitudes of Oregon to our must forward enemy ? The answer is DANIEL WEBSTEK ! Of diplomatic service such as Mr. Webster performs wo have had enough It would be worth some millions of dollars to this Eepublic if our Boundary question stood now, as it stootl when Mr. Webster took it under his diplo- matic wings twelve months ago. It is now brought -to light in the British House of Commons that Webster and Ashburton cozened us out of a large portion of our dominions. Ashburton's employers are aware of the cheat. He, himself, is aware of the cheat. We are tricked out of our prop- erty by a fraud, and when the fraud is brought to light when the maps are produced in the House of Commons Avhich settle the question which fix to a hair's breadth the ground belonging to each nation does any Honorable member get up in his place, and move that the fraud committed by Webster and Ashburton be set aside and justice set up in its place ? No such thing. Their standard of morals does not comprehend any other line of action than to pocket the fruits of the roguery. BIGHT OF MAN TO THE EABTH 1846. When men, or nations, commence wrong, they fall from blunder to blun- der, and nothing but difficulty besets them at every step. A Government ought never to part with the fee of a foot of land. In point of fact it has no authority to do so. The government of to-day does not set up an cibidiny control even over the laws that affect men's every day affairs ; and how much less have they a right to setup an abiding control over the Eternal Earth which will be green, and flowery, and fruitful full of springs and rivulets, and waving woods fresh, youthful and life-sustaining as it is now when the men who now exercise an unbounded authority over it will have betaken themselves to other spheres higher or lower as the r-ase may be and will have done, forever, with all earthly affairs. The true theory, then, is for the aggregate of the people represented by their existing government to *hold the fee of all lands at the same time securing each individual, his heirs or assigns, in the possession and use of all that reasonable share of which he may have become the rightful occu- pant. If this were done all minerals would, as a matter of course, vest in the State, and if an exceedingly rich mine turned up, it enured to the benefit of the Nation not to the building up of a particular fortune. This in 1844. And look at the condition now ! But our Government thinks that it is possessed of all wisdom in this and every other matter. So does every other government on the lace of the earth, from the Chinese to the British. Their opinion is not. however, any proof that such is the fact. Only one voice of sound wisdom in relation t > government has ever been heard in tin's world, ami that is the voice of Nature. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 147 PAY-MILEAGE CONGRESS. The growing rapacity among the politicians and the gradual decay of public spirit among the people is sharply illustrated by the history of the Pay and Mileage allowed to Members of Congress. Originally it was $3.00 per day, and the same amount for every twenty miles travel in going to and returning from the seat of Government. Bye and by this was changed to $8.00 a day, and the same amount for twenty miles travel. In 1816 another rise was accomplished, and so many of those who favored it were defeated at the polls that it was repealed at the next session. So it remained till 1856, when the salary was raised to $5,000 a year mileage as before, though now two hundred miles could be traveled for the price previously paid for twenty. Besides, though the railroads straightened the routes one-third, members computed the old distance, and got paid accordingly. Then came con- structive mileage. A session closes on Monday, an extra session opens on Tuesday, and Hon. Members vote themselves another Mileage forgoing and returning an imaginary journey to their homes on the intervening night* Follows an open Stationery Account, into which Hon. Members intro- duce not only paper and penknives, but fans, reticules and other adorn- ments for the females of their families. In its printing jobs the official newspaper made more money than the President of the United States then received for his four years' salary. After exposing and condemning all this fraud, Horace Greeley takes his share of the " Mileage swindle " on the plea that he ought to take it when every other member was doing the same thing. Ono member only declined to participate in the plunder, and he lived so near Washington that his share would have been nil THE INTERNATIONALS. In 1873 several of their men had been clubbed and imprisoned in New York for walking in procession. I was present at one of their meetings. A committee reported that they had consulted a lawyer who would not act against the police without a considerable fee. There was no money in the treasury could not be, with members' dues fixed at 25 cents a month. Motion carried to let the police escape, and so encourage them to further outrages! Ira B. Davis and myself protested each with a $5 bill. In vain ! Not a man would help us. Secretary half an hour reading bye-laws words words words. A meeting in Tompkin's Square ordered. I am one of Committee on Resolutions. Propose a path out to the Public Lands. My colleagues are surprised at me. Have. \ long since passed that old opinion. "Government must cultivate the lands, work the factories, and afford everything at cost price." I could not agree to this programme, and resigned from the Committee. Next week the ' public meeting came off in Tompkin's Square, and, singularly enough, in, speaking I had to recount the following rascalities which passed through Congress on the preceding day : 148 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; 1st " Unanimous consent was given to place on the Calendar a bill to pay back to all State officers the tax paid (during the war) on their salaries 2d " Bill to give away to the Southern Pacific Railroad all it as^ed of the Public Lands in Florida, 3d" A bill to pay claims for rent in States that were in rebellion when the rent accrued. 4th " Appropriation of $50,000 to favorite newspapers. 5th "An amendment which raised the salaries of all heads of bureaus to $4,000 a year. 6th "A bill to give half the Island of Yerba Buona, in the Bay of San Francisco, to a Railroad Company, sustained by a vote of 94 to 75. Passed. 7th "A subsidy to a Paciiic Steamship Company of $500,000. This to en- courage the brutalizing of our young men as ' common sailors.' " At this meeting I urged tho Land and Loan Bill that Congressmen voting against it must be held to personal account by hooting them in tho streets on their return from Washington ; and, if a row followed, be prepared to an- ticipate their shot. The other speeches and resolutions demanded Govern- ment to manufacture everything, cultivate the lands, and furnish all products at cost price. And this machinery asked by men both intelligent and honest ! COMMUNE. Ill omened word ! How many lives have been sacrificed to it 1 How much evil is it now doing how much has it yet to do ! From tho first dawn of electoral liberty in France the people communed personally, orally, with each other in inhabited sections about answering to our school dis- tricts. To communicate means intercourse of persons at a distance from each other by the intermediaries of letters, messages, etc. To commune is to meet face to face, and speak or commune with each other. Hence the small compact districts were very properly called " Communes." The Prin- ciple of Diffusion as opposed to Centralization was called " The Commune. " All this the assassins of liberty in Europe and here knew and know ex- cepting, indeed, tho vulgar hangers-on at their heels who do not know much of anything. "Whoever, therefore, confounds the word or the thing "Com- mune" with a community of gooda is and must be either a dangerous knave or an untaught blockhead. A sketch ot ! tho history and siege of tho " Commune " at the ignoble close of the Franco-Prussian war lies before me. It is written by an eye-witness the American Minister a man of aristocratic proclivities, which frequently burst out offensively to view. It commences March 3d, 1871, and with this picture : " The city was dull and lifeless. Walking to my hotel in the Rue Rivoli the few people I met. in their dark and lowering faces I eould read half starvation and discontent." There ! Behold the foundation of all the troubles I The German forces were marching out. of the city, and a Junta, at Bordeaux was plotting a n- OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 149 turn of the Bourbons. The writer tells us that " the honest sentiment of the moment was discontent, produced by long years of oppression." " They dreaded the return of Kings demanded the Constitutional Bepublic, with the Municipality governed by men elected by the inhabitants instead of the rulers proposed to bo imposed on them by the Thiers' government." That government, on tho capture of Napoleon, formed itself, and wan now sitting in Versailles. Thiers and that central Junta desired to rule France by holding the governments of the cities in their hands. This Paris repelled. Tho National Guards fraternized, drove out Palladine's regular army seized his cannon and fortified Montmartre. Here it was that Generals Thomas and Le Comte were detected as spies, with plans of the fortifications on their persons, tried and shot. This has been pronounced an " unnecessary act of cruelty. " Whether it was or not the case of Major Andre goes far to decide-. It would seem, however, that the Versailles government and its army showed no mercy to any of the Commune people that fell into their hands armed or unarmed. The besieged people imprisoned the Archbishop, Darboy, and others as hostages, proclaiming that they should be shot if the Versailles government continued those indiscriminate murders. The same condition was laid down by the Southern Confederates when some of their men were under sentence of death in the North. Man for man and grade for grade were selected (Colonel Corcoran was one of them) from Northern prison- ers, cast into condemned cells, and held for whatever fate tho North might in- flict on those condemned Southerners. Humanity prevailed at Washington. onl a jail delivery was the result. A thirst of blood prevailed at Versailles, and mutual murder was the result. I state the conditions. It. is for the reader to judge them. With a free soil, and really free people, we ought to have a com- merce as free as the winds that waft it. Why should our sugar cost us more than its natural price three to four cents a pound? Why should the Government levy $300,000,000, and the smugglers far more every year, from the consumers of our taxed goods ? Is it to give factory slave labor to our population ? We go for a free- hold soil labor for every man to be the monarch of his own two hands not worked like an automaton fourteen hours a day, for barely what will keep up the steam of his miserable existence. Let the factory lord make his own fortune. Let the laborer make his upon the land. Under a rational system, five millions a year, and less, too, would support our National Government. That ought to be raised off property the richest paying most the very poor paying nothing. Let us open our ports to the enslaved world. Let us show an example to the fallen nations of the earth, and they will thank- 160 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY J fully pour in their produce and manufactures and take in return the abundance of our Free Soil. This they would do with their own ships, if we didn't like to venture ours without a guard of honor at a cost of ten millions a year ; and which could not guard them after all. With a Free Commerce, where would be our need for a Navy ? With a Free Soil, where would be our need for an Army ? We could op- pose four millions of armed Freemen to all the mercenaries in the world. 1844. And things have been steadily steadily growing worse and worse. DEAD OF FAMINE. The Beport of your own Government Commissioners declares that seventy thousand human beings perish annually in Ireland from the effects of famine. Daniel 0' Gannett" s Speech on the State Trial. The extraordinary mortality in the manufacturing districts is induced by famine, filth and the absence of fresh air. Probably 100,000 die pre- maturely in England alone from diseases having their origin in these causes. Pamphlet by a Manchester Physician, published in 1842. Such is the fate that has descended on our brothers and sisters, who toil, and travail, and famish in the Old World. Twenty millions of the human race come into existence only to weep and to suffer, and die. To bear the burthen of life, perched upon NOTHING with- out permission to set their foot on that solid earth which would enable them to bear it with ease and comfort. And so they labor on for a brief season, till death puts a period to their sufferings. And then another twenty millions succeed them, more decrepid, miserable, and short lived than the last. And the United States of America is trying to plunge into the same condition, Men ! wake up, or you'll be murdered while you're sleeping. SINGULAR DEMAND MADE. "A Republic without a Name." So the Historical Society sets to work and fashions out "Alleghani." But out comes an out- sider, and suggests, " Dollarland." Then a sound comes over the hills very like Yankee-doodle-dum, and it dies into an echo of Disnmlswarnpism. This disgusts the " Historicals, " and they retire from the field, leaving the Republic "a deed without a name." LEGAL COLLECTION OF DEBTS. Whether credit does more good than evil to men in business is a subject not much inquired into. And yet it is a most important OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 151 subject. It is true, it seems to be a matter over which legislation has little legitimate control. If A desires to buy on credit, and B desires to sell to him, it looks like a private transaction with which the public have nothing to do. But has it not as little to do with the after payment that forms a part of the bargain? If A re- fuses to pay B for the goods he has sold to him, does it not also seem, that that is their own affair, the public having no more busi- ness to interfere with the last part of the bargain than with the first. The law to collect debts breeds a swarm of lawyers, and helps on the ruin of the Republic. GEORGE H. EVANS ON FOURIERISM. Now what does Fourierism propose to do? To restore Capital to Its rightful owners? No. To prevent its use to extort more Capital from the laborer? Oh, no. To give the laborer a right to get his own living on the soil of his birth, and to accumulate Capital for himself? Certainly not : the soil of his birth belongs to Capital. Well, then, at least, you will allow the laborer to go into the primae- val forest and begin a "Re-organization of Industry" based on Equal Rights? Decidedly not. The Landless shall unite with those who have got possession of their accumulated labor, that this Capi- tal shall have the power of re-production without the labor of the possessor, and, to all eternity, live without labor on the toil of the industrious. Such is Fourierism ! YOUNG IRELANDERS. From my National Reformer 1845 : We have not seen that " Nation"-al humbug, the Dublin Nation, for some time past. The cowardly impostors are afraid to exchange with us, because they know we have a knack of distinguishing between words and deeds between solid facts and windy declamation. They know, too, that wherever we alight upon dishonesty, we are sure to toss it up to public scorn. We have not, therefore, seen the Nation for a great while. But we see in the last number of the Irish Volunteer an ex- tract from it, sneering at the labors of the Times 1 Commissioner in searching out, and spreading before Europe, the horrid details of Irish hunger, nakedness, and utter degradation. Ah, ye most hypocrit- ical and base crew, that, Rodin-like, play upon the passions of our 162 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; unhappy countrymen ! The Times 1 Commissioner did more service to the cause of humanity, by his expose of the people's wretchedness, than the "Veiled Prophet "(Dan O'Connell) and his accomplices have done of harm during the last twelve months. And that is saying a good deal. "THE CITY GOVERNMENT AND THE NEWSPAPERS." Such is the caption in one of the New York newspapers. Now let us see how the New York plunderers are going to be exposed. Look ! "An attempted steal of four millions of dollars, and an accomplished steal of three millions." Well ! it is something to have newspapers to let in the light on those crimes. But what? Is it indeed the newspapers themselves that are making this steal? Is it for three years' advertising of the city government that they ask four millions and a half of dollars? Have they already received three millions, and demand half as much more? Was this the wages of their con- nivance or their defense of the public frauds. This ! though a city bulletin issued by authority once a week would do the municipal work ten times as well, and, sold at two cents a copy, would not cost the city one dollar ! This, then, is the ' butter horn" that silences the watch-dogs or inspires them with an approving growl. The New York Tunes assaulted this machinery, and damaged it a trifle that will be soon repaired, and for the suggestive reason that itself had asked a taste of the butter horn, value $30,000 and was refused. BEN BUTLER. In approaching Mr. * * * f s office one morning he put the paper into my hand, saying, " Butler has stolen your thunder and vollied it through Congress yesterday." I wrote to him encourag- ingly. In reply to my recognition Ben sent me a dozen copies of his speech, to which I responded, "Good so far, but a national movement should commence at once by an imposing meeting in New York City. Its reported speeches would make the subject known over the whole country as matter of news, and he was just the man to lead off in such a movement." I urged this on him again and again, but discovered that his zeal stopped short with the mere cir- culation of his speech. Mr. * * and myself had founded a hope on him. It was disappointed. I saw the opportunity that was lost, and expressed my regret that he could not see it and seize upon OB, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 153 it. Kegret that he was not big enough to commence this great Reform adding that " I did not blame him. He could make himself no bigger than God made him. " He replied that "some men make themselves lesser than God made them." I assented acknowledged that his "own life proved his position." So ended the corres- pondence, short and sharp. ON TEMPERANCE. I find this in my correspondence with Gerrit Smith: "There is a deep meaning in the thirst for exciting drinks. The human soul is not like the human body, a mere machine. To rise day after day to the monotonous routine of eating, working, and going to sleep again, does not satisfy its longings. It will not, at the bidding of an Inhuman Civilization, stagnate into a petrifaction. It realizes the burying-alive agony to which the philosophic bard has given an immortal voice : ' The keenest pangs the wretched find Are raptures to the dreary void The leafless desert of the mind The waste of feelings unemployed.' 44 You have found water sufficient for your wants. So have I. But throw back the immortal within us to rot in a mental dungeon, and how would we feel. Eot ! Oh, no ! IT will not rot. It will quaff the maddening draught it will burst the dungeon it will revel in Imaginations, first then in madness. If either you or I attempt to wrest the bowl from its hand it will exclaim : ' ' Give my soul its natural sphere, and it will trouble you for no maddening substitute. But beware how you break that bowl, the last resource of a madman." "If it were not Gerrit Smith that is identified with those things, they should provoke from me no criticism. The superficially and, as I hold them, stupidly benevolent men who surround and over- shadow you, might prepare their nostrums, and with them mock our mortal sickness. But they should have no attention from me. How often have I said that you do not belong to those men. But, alas ! alas ! spirit, like body, takes the hue of reflected light." If Gerrit Smith had done for the white man as much as he did for the negro, Land Monopoly would have been killed stone dead in this country. Now, as ages roll on, the future of Europe looms up dark before us. 154 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J ELECTIONS. They were originally managed in this way. Meeting to appoint delegates to nominate candidates. Meeting to ratify or reject those nominations which often did reject names and substitute others. This has disappeared, and primary balloting substituted, under an Inspector appointed at "Headquarters." The duty of the In- spector is to " count in " the nominee of Headquarbers. This is the pro- cess in both the Big Parties. The candidates so presented are both necessarily corrupt instruments of " Headquarters," and your sole privilege is to vote for one that is bad, to keep out one that is, if possible, worse. There is no secrecy in it. The opposing ballots are known by the printed endorsements on their backs. Some- times candidates are "stuffed in," in this way. Tickets thrown out on the table, for the purpose of assorting them. The In- spector or other "stuffer" gathers together 100 or 150 of the tickets he wants to defeat, counts them exactly so as to correspond in number with the " little jokers " he has up his sleeve. When all is ready he gives a signal, and two or three roughs commence a row. In the confusion quick as lightning the obnoxious tickets are swept off, and the "little jokers " take their place, and the "stuffed in" candidate comes out with the handle of an " Honorable" stuck to his name. Such is the treason of politics in the cities. In the virtuous rural districts they would scorn to go through such tor- tuous bye-paths. They march " honestly " up to the polls with their ballots in one hand and their roll of bills in the other to buy and sell the votes as they would any other commodity. And this Anarchy at the ballot box is the lawful child of the Great Anarchy in Washington. It is several years since I discovered this ; and when I said the farmers ought to be ashamed of themselves, the answer was, " Why should they? They don't pretend to be any better than Members of Congress or Honorables in Albany. Don't those sell their votes? What those are doing every day, on a large scale, and with little or no disguise, has not the farmer as good a right to do above board on a small scale, and only for one day in the year?"* MR. * * * A discussion in our local papers caused me to write an article from which I extract : * A correspondent of the New York World hud published a full description of those trafficings. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 156 "From the time (1847) this gentleman rescued me out of Albany (where the anti-rent fanners let me spend my last dollar in their cause), I was honored a good deal with his countenance and his con- fidence ; and I tell you, sir, that his principle was to do good himself with his money, rather than bequeath the good-doing to those who were to come after him. ' The less I die worth the more will it be to my honor,' was an accepted motto of his. No entries were made of his unceasing charities. I thought I knew something of them myself, but on the day of his interment I met an individual gentle- man who told me more of his charities than I had discovered in an acquaintance of thirty years. 44 With reference to the Public Library of which you speak, he held that far better use could be made of $50,000 than to give it to any such purpose. He held that there were more books in the Public School libraries than were made use of; and if not, the necessary additions could be easily and cheaply made that men of learning and research were generally men of leisure, who, if they wanted rare books, could afford to go and get them in the Astor Library. He also held that the old gentleman, his father, was unadvised when he signed a paper promising to the scheme three or four thousand dollars. And yet, when the old gentleman was deceased, and when other signers sought protection from the courts, though utterly disapproving it himself, he (like the honorable gentleman he was) paid over the $4,000 without a word of questioning. The $50,000 you speak of he did indeed bequeath to the poor of the District its interest a perpetual charity. " His settled purpose was to do far more for Williamsburgh, and far more wisely. But disease seized upon him eat into his mind distracted, weakened, dimmed it for one or, I think, two years before it took him away from us. It is not necessary to state here what his purposes were, and what he did to iorward them the less so because it is likely to come out in the movement for public parks in the District, which, I trust, is now approaching. 4 ' I write this in discharge of a duty which I owe to the memory of a man highly honored by all who knew him, and yet whose rarest worth, (I do not mean his charities), was not known to the public at all. THOMAS AINGE DEVYB." 156 THE ODD BOOK OP THE HJLNKl'KENlTH CENTUBY } THE GBEAT DIFFICULTY. It would undoubtedly be a difficult matter to construct a fortress that would be impregnable in itself, without a garrison to defend it, or with a garrison of sluggards and cowards. In like manner will constitutional protections be of little avail to a submissive, degene- rate people. It is seen that the Constitution of New York State affirms the principle of " Limited Taxation." In vain. It lies there a dead letter "abuse " has been pushed into robbery incred- ible in its audacity and vastness, and yet no resistance to it has appeared in any quarter. To refuse payment of a robbing tax bill bring it into the courts, and rest your defense on Art. 8, sec. 9, of the Constitution, would put the courts on their mettle, and it would arouse, if anything could arouse, the "two-legs" I don't call them men out of their stupid apathy. But no man in the whole State of New York has attempted anything of the kind. The "In" band of robbers are exposed and denounced in election times. But by whom ? By the " Out " band of robbers, who strive and scream to get power to themselves in order to commit the same crimes. Still, it seemed that if a definite limit were fixed to local taxation fixed in the Constitution that limit must be observed, because if a Collector presented a bill any higher than the limit, why, the Tax- payer would refuse to pay it, and his property could not be seized upon, and so the extortion would be baffled. Not at all. The Tax swindlers would have nothing to do but steal, steal, steal, and create "deficiencies" by the million. This they have been doing every year and putting the deficiency of this year into the Tax levy of the next. An aggravated example of this kind on a large scale has just been furnished by the Canal Board of New York State. This Board is constituted as follows : It consists of nine members, three Commissioners, chosen for six years one to go out every two years, at which period one is elected in hia place. Then the Lieut. -Governor is chairman, and the Secretary of State, Controller, Treasurer, Attorney-General and State Engi- neer make up the Board. Elected at various times, and of both political parties, it is claimed that neither party is responsible for their fraud, and this seems to be accepted, generally though it takes small discernment, indeed, to see that both parties are responsible. Well ! This precious Board, made up of picked and polished chiefs from both parties, has gone on for several years back "stealing," as even the Ring newspapers have to admit, until the " deficiency" OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 157 reaches six millions of dollars. Then steps in the Legislature, and proposes that the people shall take their choice by a general vote whether they will pay this forged paper, that the "Board" issued, now at once, or fund it as a permanent debt of the State. No- body talks of repudiating the swindle and prosecuting the thieves. Is it possible that any machinery of government any safeguards, however wisely instituted can save such a submissive people? And one Great Pacific Railroad presents, like "Hamlet, "a play within a play a swindle within a swindle. The gross Company, in- terwoven with and forming part of a corrupt Congress, seize upon Public Lands, empires of public lands, and screw out of us 65 mil- lions of U. S. Bonds. Then forms the inner Bing of the sharpest knaves of the Company. Those make what they call a " Credit Mobilier," based upon our Public Bonds, which sell at 10 or 12 per cent above par. The road is contracted out in the lump to a dummy contractor at $50,000 a mile $25,000 dollars being the outside value of constructing it. The "Mobilier" takes the job into its own hands, includes a large extent of the already finished road, and makes thirty or forty millions to themselves and such of their pals in the Congress as they have selected. An Inquiry is set on foot. Before whom ? "Who but a selection of members from that same thief Congress, which does not, perhaps, contain a man who has not in some shape participated either in the gross swindle of the big Company or the nett swindle of the condensed Mobilier? To secure its loan the Government had taken a first mortgage of the road and rolling stock. It is by Congress turned into a second mortgage, not worth a cont, and the swindle is complete. However, the road is there and the lands are there waiting for their true owners when the people come to their senses. GOVERNOR HOFFMAN. I write the following particulars because he was mixed up with bhe ignorance that cost the lives of fifty or sixty people shot in New York streets, and for other reasons : A Brooklyn Sewer over throo or four miles of open country, was concocted at a Champagne Supper by the City Hall thieves. Got an act through in Albany, authorizing an outlay of $300,000; amended it to $600,000. I had Governor Hoffman's letter that he would not sign the Act till he would give me an audience in opposition to it. Went to Albany for that purpose, but found that his signature had crossed mo on the way. He skulked from seeing me, and signed another bill tor $125,000 additional. I note 158 THE ODD BOOK OK THK NINETEENTH CENTURY; this complicity of Hoffman because he made himself notorious by sending Jim. Fisk's regiment (the 9th) to guard a procession of Orangemen in New York. Somebody throw an old shoe at the procession, and* the regiment opened fire along the sidewalks and shot fifty or sixty people.* Because, too, his block-headed example caused the stupid British Government to repeal the " Public Processions (Ireland) Act," and re-introduce the party feuds that had been for years well nigh got rid of. In this connection I wrote Hoffmann this letter : Nassau Avenue and Fourth Street, j Greenpoint, May XO, 1870. ' John T. Hoffman, Politici.iu-Governor of New Totk State : The time honored adag " Honor among thierts " is of two kindi. One eonfled to themselves, and relating to secrecy and a fair dirision of their spoils. Another, where the captain or a a individual of the gang may interpose protection to a victim who has had the misfortune to fall into their hands. I recal this as an illustration, merely. I could not, you know, apply it literally to the politicians of New York, and the can whom they " delight to honor." But, nevertheless, it was some such unwarranted expectation a* this that pointed my thought to Governor Hoffman the thought that he would not lend himself to a fraud so new in the history of cities as a half million sewer, te afflict the com fields of Bushwick and poison the three-mile-long narrow waters of Newtown Creek. As the pleasant romances of life stiver, one by one, into fragments of " cold reality," we feel uncomfortable, and get into, at least, momentary bad humor with ourselves and everybody else. So it was with mo when I found that Mr. Governor Hoffman had " shivered " the respectable ideal I had formed of him into the " cld reality" of what he is. But on reflection I found that I was unjnit in this that the ptr te Governor Hoff- man was not mu:h to blame. If Nature infused into him a little weakness, or even if it were baseness, could he help that ? He certainly could not. And if circum- stances threw him into a peculiar, and not very pure, moral atmosphere, was it any wonder that the natural weakness, " or even if it were baseness," of which I have spoken, should crop out into offensive size and vicious action t Can we censure the ptr te Hoffman for a result so natural ! He could not help it could he I And so I transferred my bad Lumor from that blameless gentleman to myself. I *When the Orangemen of New York proposed to commemorate the discord of the Boyue, in 1688 and the slaughter and torture of the gallant and United Irishmen, one hundred and ten years later 1 prepared a briei articlo, ahowiug their historical merits that their banner was stained wi'h the bloud of Emmet, Lord Edward Wolie Tone, Bagenal Harvey, William Orr, amd other thousands of Protestant Presbyterians who perished in that great struggle for republicanism. I went to the New York (Democratic) World with the lesson. "If you have news," aid the autocratic editor, " we will gladly receive it, but we advise the people ourselves." "And if you don't understand this subject," I replied, " and if I do ; if there is great danger approaching, will you not allow a warning voice to go forth that may avert that danger?" The reply was, "We take news, but not advice." And this was three dnyu before took place that wanton and uuprovoked massacre on the 12th of July. Now, if the gentlemen of the World had brought a masculine understand- ing to bear upon the (subject; if they had realized its nature and its danger ; if they had exerted themselves to see Governor Hoffman and instruct his ignorance, it is very probable tkat. an innocent man or woman would not have bean slaughtered on that uuhappy day. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY Ilf MODERH DAT*. 159 knew all about "birds of a feather," and their habits. Why did I expaet to find, in Governor Hoffman, a game bird companioned with carrion crows ? And, so, having reflected that Mr* Hoffman could not help being what he ia, and having forgiven myself (we are all sure to do that) for the error I had fallen into respecting him, I am all right again. Right, and prepared to estimate more truly the vote-sellers of Albany, and their eustomeis in Brooklyn and New York. And the vote-sellers are all right, too. They delivered the goods the spurious legislation and got their money. So far as they are concerned the account is closed. But it is not closed yet in favor of the buyers of this spurious legislation. It is just possible that they may not be able to pass the counterfeit article the bonds BO authorized for the genuine. If representative government has disappeared if bargain and sale has usuipcd its place and if the people should at last open their eyes and take note of this fact, you know the logical result that is likely to follow ; that not only the bonds, but the legal forgers of the bonds biggest of whom is John Hoffman will be repudiated by the people." (And he was. most effectually.) Bennett, of the Times, (see ante.) was a very active engineer of this Sewer Fraud. It was litigated, and facts like this came out in the referee's report: "The Board ($ewer Commissioners) gave Friel a contract at a fraud of $163,000. For draining that was not done, $150,000. The law required that the city maps should be used. They gave T. W. Field $35,000 for new ones. For engineering and inspecting $81,- 000 was charged. The detail entree showed only $28,000. They is- sued interest-bearing bonds before the money was wanted, causing a loss of $20,000 making direct frauds of over $300,000, which the indirect frauds ran up to over $400,000. For a solvent bid was in to do the whole work for $300,000, and there was $625,000 expended (or stolen) on it. In the meetings called to combat the swindle this Field kept " appealing to Heaven, and hoping his course would be graved on his tombstone " his villainous course ! He had carried through a rise in the Tax valuation of the city of 25 per cent, and was made Superintendent of Schools ($5,000 a year) as the reward of that public villainy. I lost a little money, and a great deal of time and effort, opposing this swindle thought something was gained when $100,000 was struck off the Act. But they quietly returned to the charge next year, and got $125,000 additional the odd $25,000 used pro- bably to bribe it through the Legislature. The sum only is uncertain, for no law could be procured without a bribe, and no law refused if a proper bribe was offered. And this is "law," and this is a Eepublic, and there is nothing better than this and the people, fanned by wings of the daily vampires, sleep on ! sleep on ! But not forever surely, not forever ! FINANCIAL SWINDLING. 1868. Walker, an Ex, and M'Culloch, an Existing, Secretary of the Treasury, published two letters to prepare the way for the Great Fraud of '69. Those letters, in one binding, hung together, as in- deed their authors should have done if merit were duly rewarded. 160 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J I spent a day in Cooper Institute searching newspaper files for those letters, but could not find them, to the great loss of this book and its readers. For never in the records of financial villainy was anything to compare with the glaring impossibilities presented as facts in those letters. A big, broad, undisguised insult offered by those swindlers to the understanding of the people. In " The Currency of the Future," published at that time, I find this about them : SAMPLES OF STATESMANSHIP. FBOM OUR Ex AND EXISTING SECRETAIRES. MoCulloch We are " afflicted with a redundancy of currency." Witness the " inactivity of trade" and scarcity of employment. Walker Pay the bondholder " 800 millions " extra. It will be a " gain in values." Added to the burdens of the Nation. McCulloch " Reckless and extravagant men are a public nuisance." They let their money fly into the channels of trade, and my own Custom House. Walker "My elaborate essay converted the 38th Congress to create the National Banks," and bestow on them thirty millions a year. Gain to them Loss to the Nation. McCulloch The " late contraction " " stimulated labor," " increased pro- duction," and made " incomes light " and " trade inactive." Walker I sold 250 millions of bonds to the Dutch bankers. Price 35 cents on the dollar. They have risen to 82 cents, but it is a " burning, blushing " shame il ive don't make it up to 100 in gold. McCulloch We have gone through a difficult war, and are "afflicted" with the agent that pulled us through it. Walker "To establish our gold oasis we must borrow 250 millions more from the Dutch for home circulation." Ono half to go back to them in premium on their present stocks, t'other half to pay off those stocks returnedto hansel our " specie payment." McCulloch " Contraction" must be enforced by Congress as a means to resumption because " nothing ^c ill be gained by forced resumption." When the country is ready it will resume as a matter of course, but a first thing necessary is etiforced contraction. Walker " With paper money we must go into the extremes of contraction and expansion." For why ! Congress is too stupid to fix a proper mean. McCulloch " Diminution " of the currency " increases the supply of it." A McCulloch truth. Walker Hates "national debts," and would commence to pay off the present 2,500 millions with " ONE million in a year." McCulloch A currency redeemable in lands, goods, chattels, everything that is for sale in the nation is not redeemable at all. Why? Because it is " IRREDEEMABLE." Walker " We will be twenty times richer twenty years hence than we are now." Walker's word for it. McCulloch " Our obligations " will be "dishonored" if we pay them- according to our agreement. Walker (becomes poetic) " 2,300 millions of currency is a grim monster" won't it hunt our people " into dismal caverns, the abodes of want and misery, where would wander in ngony and despair the wretched victims " of this terrible creation of Walker's brain. McCulloch" Money is wanted in the moving of crops, but is not wanted in their production." Labor is the grand element of production, but wno would think, that laborers want money? OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 161 Walker (Is again poetic)" If wo don't double our debt." and that very speedily, our " wealth and our labor will leave our shores " in one " vast exodus." For, the people will never, never, stand the oppression of light taxes. McCulloch If banks did not exist, " I'd none of them," but as they do exist, I'll punish them with a bonus of many millions a year. Walker" National currency is 11 forced loan." Because, don't you see, it is taken withpleasure and profit by the people. McCulloch If National Banks were not, Btate Banks must l>e. Because Congress has neither the power nor the brains to issue a currency of its own. Walker " Wo cannot carry on foreign trade if we nave a depreciated cur- rency," because there was 200 millions worth of foreign trade done by New York alone in the depreciated currency year just dosed. McCulloch " Credit is curtailed, and some say more money is wanted to do the business for cash. Wanted ! Nonsense. Those who have no money can draw checks on a bank." And so forth, and so on, to the end of the chapter. Freed from bewildering circumlocutions, these are a sample of the out- rageous and absurd propositions -which the two worthies dared to flaunt (n the face of the nation. History may record the fact, but will posterity be- lieve it, that two such men so superficial in understanding, irould have the audacity to attempt such an unheard-of crime against the nation, and get no other punishment than a drumming out ot the service, to the tune of the " Rogue's March "? A FALSE SYSTEM. The Ptolomaic system of the Universe made the whole heavens revolve diurnally round this muddy little earth of ours. The sun had to travel some 550 millions of miles every day, and the nearest fixed star could not come to time unless he stept out at tho rate of 2,500 millions of miles in a single second. This profound philosophy kept possession of the learned world for many, many centuries, and when assailed by one Copernicus, the learned Universities disowned him, and the Church tumbled him (or his disciple Galileo) down on his bare knees, to ask pardon for having doubted the orthodox philosophy. All this, however, did little practical harm to the world. The Universe went on in its old jog trot way" seed time and harvest " came, Avhatever the learned blockheads might say or do about it. But the case is far different under our Ftolomaic philosophy of finance. We make ail tho material wealth, the productive energies, the commercial activities, and even tho credits and the authorities of the nations revolve round one of the least and least useful metals that wo know. And wo have the results that might bo expected. Our " system " keeps toppling over our heads for a brief time, and then tumbles down, crash 1 on tho top of us. Even philosopher Walker has to record the fact, that we have had chaos come again in our ftnaiK" s, '' eight times in sixty-four years." But what cares Walker. A small per centage out of the Dutch bankers will bring him safe out of the storm away up into the fruitful regions of the National 162 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH OENTUBYJ Banks themselves there to bask in the perpetual sunshine ho has created and among the patriotic, prosperous progeny of his prolific pen.* It will be hard, too, if all the gas blown out by the honorable McCulloch does not inflate a balloon big enough to translate him into the same per- ennial skies ! There the kindred souls may serenely look down, as the thunders roll and the tempests break on the common crowd beneath them But Walker has got six feet by two, and a mocking devil has got a hold on McCulloch. NEW YOBK WOBLD. The New York World is a light of the old philosophy though its own nature and the blasts from without make it rather flickering and unsteady. It wants, by the sheer force of paper and lampblack, to make a creed for the Democratic party. It would be difficult to say what influence brings it to strike hands with Greeley and the Evening Post. Like them it yearns for the " gold standard" the " specie basis "the " true measure of value." Still, when it comes to a closer view, it gets afraid, and would put the con- summation off, and for the following very sufficient reasons : " If a European war should break out, or any great disaster should over- take that quarter of the world, causing large amounts of our bonds to be returned to this country for sale ; or if the exchanges from any other cause should be greatly against us (as they will almost necessarily be if we im- port much and export little) a great drain of gold would ensue, forcing the banks to suspend, cancelling their charters, compelling the Government to redeem their notes, and reducing it to insolvency by its inability to do so." And again, in the same article : " If the Greenbacks were withdrawn and the (pet) banks should (thus) break, the people would be without any other currency than gold and silver, which would produce guch stringency and distress as would bring universal ruin." And at what time, may we ask, would those reasons not exist? At what time would wars not be ready to spring into destructive action? But the writer forgets that even Greenbacks could afford him no protection under a return to the specie sham. Would not they, too, like the other paper credits, be reducible to gold? Would not the holders of them make a " rush " and " redeem " them in gold just as eagerly as would the holders of all other paper? Would not their "conversion" leave us naked to that gold " stringency, distress and universal ruin." so unwillingly sketched by the gentleman himself? GBEELEY AND GOLD. That vibrating philosopher, the New York Tribune, is now floundering in the Ptolomaic vortex, like all the other philosophers. So long as our cir- culating paper was in the hands of Bank monopolists and per centage shavers, Mr. Greeley blew the loudest kind of a trumpet in its praise. In 1858 he had no bondholders to back up in their rapacious demand for gold, But he did not stay up long. He was flaunting $25,000 gold bonda in Washing- ton when he unexpectedly tumbled into the grave. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 163 and so, taught by the recent great calamity of '57, he sent forth a votce like the following : ' Gold and silver are a real necessity as a measure of value in such times as the period of our own Revolution, and the great Revolution in France. When the omission of Government paper was such as to overwhelm the nation's credit, of course its value sunk to any indefinite fraction of its face ; when to this was superadded the Machiaveliau policy of England in forging alike our ' Continental paper ' and the French Assignats ; when the re- spective countries (America and Franco) were overrun with those forgeries, it became impossible for the genuine paper to be distinguished from the spurious, and then those securities ceased to have any value at all. But those times have passed away, and with them has passed all necessity for the use. of gold. * Somebody, about the time of the War ('63), I suppose he was an Irishman, sang all this in honor of Mr. Greeley : CHORUS. Oh, dear ! what can the matter be? Oh, dear I what can the scatter be? Dear me, what will the damage be? Greeley's undone by the war. Ye toul' us at first that the North wasn't right at all ; If South wish'd to go, she might go any night at all. Then ye foun' out that her men wouldn't fight at all And so, that there could be no war. That their bones were all " boase," and their sinews all vigorloss, Their swords hadn't blades, and their muskets were triggerlew j Nothin' to do only knock them down niggerless And put an end to the war. First out from the Union ye'd cut them and carve them out ; Next bullets and steel and gun-powder you'd sarve them out; And lastly you'd stap all their rations, and starve them out Famish them out of the war. For their land, you swore, wouldn't give praties or oats at all ; They couldn't get goold, and they hadn't bank notes at all. And how without brogans, or breeches, or coats at all- How could they go to the war? But Greeley, asthore ! this fair talk has been foul to us ; The good things ye promised the wise things ye toul' to us Where, all, are they now? Gone aglee, bi me s 1, to us Hammered aside by the war. You boozeled and foozeled our " Prince o' Wales Corcoran ; " * From the dock of Clonmel, too, ye hooked our friend Meagher in : First you sent both of their senses a shuugheriu- - Then you sent them to the war. *Bo distinguished for refusing to turn out the 69th Regiment to honor th Prince of Wales in New York. 164 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY J For you know when the two wero across-the-Atlantlo-men, Their love for " Repeal " was resolved and romantic then ; Now, *' Union by bayonets I " like any two frantio men Shouting, they rush to the war. And afther all this you won't be afther lavin' us In quateness to think how you have been desavin us ; But day afthar day you kape tellin' us, deavin' us, All what you think of the war. What you think, you ass ! I've been murdhered an kilt for yo I The best drap of blood that I had has been spilt for you ! Till you're in the " big house the county has built for you "' f We'll see no end to the war. Our tay once was tay but it's now like-cr dry turf moul' ; Our sugar was six-pence It's now twice as high, am toul ; And coffee was coffee it's now burnt rye dher-dioul ! Someway bewitched by the war. The cottin's so scarce, my last shirt is too nice a fit ; The treacle's got sour, and I can't get of rice a bit ; An' whiskey i Och, murdher ! you've trubbled the price of it ! Bad luck to yourself an' the war. " Bad luck *' Och, it's seldom I've leisure to pray at all ; And now it's so late I've no time to delay at all ; But my blessin' I'll leave you, before I go way at all Lave to yourself au' the war. Och, "the curse of the crows on ye," Greeley, ma augenarjh ! May the d 1 himself pound you up in his knockin' trough ! I'll meet you some darracht night, gu lean ire rudh imttacJi An' give you a touch of the war. Oh, dear J what can the matter be? Oh, dear! what can the scatter bo? Dear me I what will the damage be? Groeley's undone by the war. As a contrast to this rhapsody, and a compensation, let me present a picture of early life and heroism, THE WAR SONG OF THE VERMONTEBS ('76). Ho ! all to the borders? Vermonters, come down, With your breeches of deer-skin and jackets of brown ; With your red woolen caps and your mocassins, come, To the gathering summons of trumpet and drum. Come down with your rifles ! Let gray wolf and f ox Howl on in the shade of their primitive rocks ; Let the bear feed securely from pig-pen and stall Here's a two-legged game for your powder and ball. Ho I all to the rescue ! for Satan shall work No gain for the legions of Hampshire and York; They claim our possessions, the pitiful knaves, The tribute we pay shall be prisons and graves. "fJall. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 165 Let Clinton and Ten Broek with bribes in their hands Still seek to divide us and parcel our lands, We've coats for our traitors, whoever they are, The warp is of feathers, the filling of tar ! Does the ' ' Old Bay State " threaten ? Does Congress complain ? Bwarms Hampshire in arms on our borders again? Bark the war-dogs of Britain aloud on the lake? Let 'em come, what they can they are welcome to take. What seek they among us? The pride of our wealth IB comfort, contentment and labor and health, And lands which, as freemen, we only have trod, Independent of all save the mercies of God. Yes ! we owe no allegiance ; wo bow to no throne ; Our ruler is law, and the law is our own ; Our leaders themselves are our own fellowmen, Who can handle the sword, or the scythe, or the pen. Our wives are all true, and our daughters are fair, With their blue eyes of smiles, and their light flowing hair; All brisk at their wheels till the dark even-fall Then blithe at the sleigh-ride, the husking or ball. We've sheep on the hill-sides, we've cows on the plain, And gay-tasseled corn-fields, and rank growing grain ; There are deer on the mountains, and wood pigeons fly From the crack of our muskets like clouds in the sky. Like a sun-beam the pickerel glides through the pool ; And the spotted trout leaps where the waters are cool, Or darts from his shelter of rock and of root At the beaver's quick plunge or the angler's pursuit. And ours are the mountains which awfully riso Till they rest their green heads in the blue of the skies ; And ours are the forests unwasted, unshorn Save where the wild path of the tempest is torn. And, though savage and wild be this climate of ours, And brief be our season of fruits and of flowers, Far dearer the blast round our mountains which raves Than the soft summer zephyr that breathes over slave* I Hurrah for Vermont 1 for the land which we till Must have sons to defend her from valley and hill ; Leave the harvest to rot on the field where it grows, And the reaping of wheat for the reaping of foes. From far Michiscoui's wild valley to where Poosooinsuck steals down from his wood-circled lair, From Shockticook river to Lutterlock town, Ho 1 all to the rescue I Vermonters come down ! Come York or come Hampshire, come traitors and knaves, If ye rule o'er our land, ye shall rule o'er our graves ; Our vow is recorded, our banner unfurled In the name of Vermont we defy all the world ! In 1762 New York laid claim to 64 townships in Vermont under a grant from Charles II., and made an ineffectual attempt to dla. 166 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY; possess the settlers. Offered a reward for Ethen Allen and seven of his associates. Those in turn proclaimed that they would ' ' kill and destroy' 1 any force daring to approach them. New Hampshire laid claim to the whole of Vermont ; Massachusets to two-thirds of it. Britain, too, was hovering round its skirts, but the little State de- clared and maintained its independence for fifteen years, and was admitted to the Union 1791. The above War Song has, I believe, no place in the libraries. Is a fugitive, and was likely to be lost. The same is, I suppose, true of "The Poacher," written by Thomas Doubleday pure, high-minded patriotic Thomas Doubleday ! once my associate on the Northern Liberator of Newcastle-on-Tyne. Let me preserve it. THE POACHER. They feast and they snore, whilst we hunger and toll ; They rejoice in the title of " Lords of the Soil." Kay, as " Lords of the Soil," not content with their share, They resolve to be " Princes and Powers of the air 1" Not content with their reign o'er the wet and the dry, Their dominion would have all that run or that fly ; But their " High and Low " are no more than a name, And we swear there shall always be " Jack and the Game I" See the Pheasant rise stately, all glistening with gold I Bee the Covey, alarm'd, flash in fear from their hold ; See the Woodcock, alone, from the well-head take wing; From the grass-tangled bank see the Leveret spring. Who's the Rearer, the Tender, the Feeder of those? 'Tis the Woodman who plants, and the Ploughman who sows, For here " High and Low " are no more than a name, And afield there will always be " Jack and the Game." A " Poacher's " a title a " Lord ; ' is no more ; And both have been won by brave fellows of yore ! The Mitre's the Bishop's the Crown is the King's ; But who ever saw " goods and chattels " with wings? Then scour out your barrels, your powder keep dry; There can be no " Manorial Bights " in the sky, For there " High and Low " are no more than a name, And not half so well sounding as " Jack and the Game I " Do ye preach up " *he Peace?" do ye threaten If a cover we beat, or a trigger we draw? Bemember the time, in its ripeness may come, When your ears maybe stunn'd by the roll of the drum I To fight for your fields, shall it then be our will, Or to bleed for the birds we're forbidden to kill? Not while " High and Low " is made more than a name, And the lawyer dares stand betwixt " Jack and the Gam* OE, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 167 When ye've tied down the eagle with parchment and wax, And, by law, made the wild swan his pinion relax ! When the crane and the wild duck ye stop on their way, And set up a turnpike, the woodcock to stay When this ye have done, we shall yield, as we must, The heritage true and the privilege just ; But till then " High and Low" shall be only a name, And we swear there shall always be " Jack and the Game." ENGLISH CHARACTER GOOD ENGLISHMEN. Among the most remarkable men now in England are University Professor John Ruskin, and Joseph Co wen, M. P. for Newcastle-on- Tyne. Yet Mr. Ruskin dwells with prido on the great minds that English Colleges have sent forth to carry enlightenment into far-off lands Enlightenment ! written with the sword in tho blood of the far-off peoples. In China, India, Canada, as well as Ireland, Scotland, and the besavaged state of her own people, under her own eyes and her own procurement. And Mr. Cowen ! How and where shall I place him? As a Re- former standing alone in Parliament: And, owing partly to his posi- tion as an Englishman, distinguished above them all. Dragging forth into distinct and damning contrast the Bright and Glad- stone ' ' Out " and the Bright and Gladstone ' ' In." Brave, uncounting and unapproachable. And yet Mr. Cowen prided so much in England's foreign "possessions and power "that he went along with Disraeli, sustaining on the floor of Parliament his wildest villainies, mistaking them for an extension of England's greatness. Such is the dull prestige of birth, bringing up, and country even in men of such large heart, keen perception, bravo devotion to tho right and defiance t.> the wrong as John Ruskin and Joseph Cowen.* In close affinity with those is George Jacob Hollyoake, a natural, persistent, life-long Reformer yet he, too, with a remarkable peculiarity. It has been seen how he aided my purpose twenty years ago and later took a great deal of trouble in procuring papers necessary to the English Section of this book. I don't know but the sect of " Secularists " was originated by Mr. Hollyoake. He is at least one of its most active members. "Co-operation " is his forte, and prob- *Juat as I close, M~. Cowen h,.s made a speech at Newcastle-on-Tyne. Nothing could be more searching and scraping-up than he gave the surface of things. But all on the surface. He took no more notice of the Divine Truth than if it had no 168 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTTTRY \ ably he has done more to advance it than any other man living. He speaks as he writes calmly and lucidly ; and in his recent visit to the United States he commanded the attention and (outwardly at least) the respect of men who were at the moment worming their way toward the destruction of the Eepublic working to hand it over to the Destroying Corporations, and eventually to a "Crown." Mr. Hollyoake fills his place \voll as a local, practical, partial Reformer. Bnt to me it seems that his nature and abilities are worthy of a loftier and wider range. And I hope that he will, even yet, give them a higher range. Laying their foundation on the solid Land instead of the shifting Storehouse. I commend 1o his thought, and the thought of all thoughtful men, to study the Nature- inspired examples elsewhere presented by the "Indian Settlement" and the "Zoar Community." The high consideration in which all true men must hold Mr. Hollyoake has been expressed already in this book. And now* at this late hour, my heart goes forth to the writer of the following letter. I anxiously hope that a copy of " THE ODD BOOK " will find him in good health and usefulness. He is he must be an embodiment of the patriotism of New- castle in its past days. Otherwise, he never could have pre- served and cherished a memento of "The Writers" the pure, good, able, devoted " Writers of the Liberator" In the interim of four years I had lost reams of papers and letters (through my irregularity), and I regard it as providential that this of Mr. Longstaffe comes to my hand at the last moment: NORTON. Htoekton-on-Tees, October 1, 1877. DEAR SIR : I send you the little book referred to in Mr. Devyr's letter of Aug. 13 last which I return you, with thanks for its perusal. You can tell him I lend him ' The Northern Lights " on the terms of his letter with very great pleasure, as it .always affords mo satisfaction to assist others in elucidating the history of the " North Counterie," and I have no doubt Mr. Devyr's book will throw considerable light on an important epoch in our political organ- ization. Yours faithfully, SAMUEL FRANCIS LONGSTAFFE. F.ll.H.8. To G. J. HOLLYOAKE, Esq., 22 Essex St., London, W. C. POST SCRIPT. Mr. Devyr's letter would be interesting to Tyneside friends. I therefore beg to ask your permission to insert the enclosed communication in the columne of the "Notes and Queries "of the Weekly Chronicle, Newcastle. OR, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 169 If you consent, please send it either direct to the editor or return to me for that purpose and if you could add a note on Mr. Devyr's life and history, it would add to the interest of the letter. Yours truly, S. F. L. Much was done at the time much favorable notice con- ferred on me by those two gentlemen. I have lost the evidences of this, but I have not lost my sense of gratitude for it. I believe I am a younger man than Gladstone and, if things go favorable, iny voice will yet be heard in " Cannie Newcastle." The Constitution of New York State is called up for re- vision every twenty years. Delegates to revise it are elected in the same way, and unluckily by the same machinery, as Members of Assembly. It was the corruption and proflig- acy of those very men which made the revision necessary, and to elect such men to restrict their own plundering^ would be not a little absurd. I spoke of this to Mr. ***.... "The supreme want," said he, "is a Constitutional Limit to Taxation. But if all others stand still our moving will serve no purpose. You know our men of note and influence. Will you interview some of them oa the subject?" He gave me a memorandum, setting iurth tho vital and far-reaching import- ance of this Reform and his belief that I had zeal and ex- perience to aid in carrying it out. I took the paper (it is now mislaid), but on reflection I decided not to call on men who had acted so contemptibly in the Taxpayers' Movement. And I so reported. " Well, I'll try another plan." And he sent round notes to a number of those gentlemen to meet at Firemen's Hall and discuss the subject. He instructed the messenger to deliver the notes personally, and ascertain whether they would promise to attend. They all promised to meet, and not one of them fulfilled the promise. A note came from Mr. * * himself, expressing regret that he couldn't be present till nine o'clock. That hour came and he came, and no other came, and there was no meeting. But the politicians roused all over the State, and elected themselves by the old machinery, and so tinkered the Consti- tution so made it worse instead of better that it was re- jected when submitted to the popular vote, all but a lease of fourteen years to the judges round which all the lawyers rallied at the polls. 170 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; And so that effort also fell to the ground. It was about the last he was destined to make. And the scene closes as follows : I am slowly recovering from a sickness that kept me on life's extreme confines for almost a year. Mr. * * * is in Boston himself under medical treatment. My mind had been unbalanced for months, and I wrote some incoher- encies to him on matters of business. He replied, "Take no trouble about those matters. What you have to do is get well. An occasional drive out will help you, and I have given instructions that my coachman shall attend to this when required." Why do I relate those things? Why, but to show the strangely good and considerate nature of a man who at the moment was himself in the grasp of a fatal disease. He returned home only to leave us for a better world. I was indebted to him in every way as, indeed, almost everybody was who came near him. And now in his great last affliction I do not ask to attend on him, for would it not be imputed to me as a mean seeking of personal ad- vantage? I write to him, stating my bitter regret that I cannot be at his side. The following reply comes to me. One of the last he has ever written. The stamp of his waning powers is upon it as compared with the bold, vigorous im- press of his hand in the days gone bye. But the heart, the goodness, the kindness is still the same: OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 171 No shadow of regret or sorrow. The latest effort a ray a sunset ray of departing hope and brightness. His whole life a presence of "CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS." Surely an immortality lies before us. A higher and purer life where this world's inequality will not stand a barrier between soul and soul. In looking back at my varied career, I could not help thinking that it contained Thought and Experience that might form a chart, less or more useful to future voyagers on the same turbulent sea. To that end I had been gathering them up, with a vague, undetermined purpose of presenting them under the title of "MEMORIES OF A LOST LIFE." "Lost,"' I now thought, irretrievably, by the loss of its sole encourager and inspirer. As I proceeded in my task the full character of that gentleman gradually unfolded to me. How distinctly it brought out and emphasized the cause of our early decay! how it suggested an example to the nations! how, with "the modifications of time and country and existing habits of thought," it revived the Chivalry of ancient days. And, under whatever title and whatever circumstance, I determined to present that example to his countrymen, first then to mine, and to the world but still under the name and title of "A Lost Life " when this happened : FIKST CONNECTION WITH THE "IRISH WORLD." I had suffered so much fatigue, vexation, loss of health and loss of money in my effort to give direction to the Fenian Movement, and had given up in such utter despair, that the word "Irish," prefixed to any printed matter, made me recoil from the sight of it. General Crooke had put a number of the Irish World in my hand years before, but I would not look at it. So it might have been to the end, only this happened : Passing a news-stand I saw the name of Archbishop McHale on a newspaper (the Irish World) in large letters. It fronted the descrip- tion of a, fete given in celebration of his fiftieth year as a prelate. In that description men of note were eloquent in depicting his career. 172 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J But the thought struck mo that the incident of forty-five years before (see ante Irish section) enabled me to pay a higher tribute to his powers than had been, or indeed could be, offered to him by even the most eloquent of his eulogists. I embodied the fact in a communi- cation to the Irish World. I also had been skirmishing in a jocund way with our local metal-heads on the subject of finance, and en- closed the following ironical letter to Wendell Phillips : "Rag Money! ' Don't you know, Mr. Phillips that it is a vile thing? Who invented it ? How nearly did it aink us during the war ! How little has it done /or us since the advent of peace 1 We have been afflicted with it now for about 16 years We have ' flaunted in rags ' all that time, for what tailor would give good broadcloth for ' rag money ' ? And ia it strange if we have not broken our fust during the while fir why should butcher or baker give fresh beef or bread for mere * rag money ' ? How we have gone through sun and Btorma, without a roof to cover us ! for what landlord is such a fool as to take ' rag money ' for rent ? Debta, of course, have stood still, for what creditor would accept payment in 'rag money'? Why, the very creators of the vile thing disowned their own buby ; would not care it themselves, and had not the face to affront the foreign banker with the sight of it I Ah, Phillips, Phillips, Wend-ill Phillips 1 How could you wend your way into such a mud, and try to wend the whole world in along with you ! " 'Tis true, you saw that the bonds, the flx*d 6 per cents, were made of exactly the same 'rage,' created by exactly the same authority, resting exactly upon the sam banis you saw those Jlxed bond* some 10 per cent better thi\n gold, and that I suppose was the reason why you put the circulating bonds, the greenbacks ou the strne level as to assuredness. God bless you, there ig between them the greatest difference in the world. The one bears a big crop of gold every year, the other be trs nothing . It takes a great machinery to collect this gold crop together, and just see how many honest fellows in the Custom House, and all around, make a decent living, besides 'pickings,' as t crews in that machinery. Think, too, of the enterprising smugglers, what would become of them if this machinery were broken up ? And would not it all go to the dogs, if you only could persuade people to turn the Jixed bonds into circulating tonds ? But then, you know, there would be no gold crop for the bond- holders, everybody would take the circulating bonds, and glad to get hold of them, without asking interest on them from the government, which means from themselves, They would find uo for them all, too. If France uses $30 per capita, we require a far bigger amount, for is not everything here about twice as dear as it is in France ? Our fields, forests, and factories, too ; don't they require a far bigger outlay for their development f " But then , if you take a pen and combine these facts ek'llf ully, they would play the devil with the National Debt, the Custom House, the smugglers, and all those evang- elizing influences which now reign over the whole nation. Fse, Wtndell ! don't you see what you are driving at? What would result if your doctrine prevailed? But it won't prevail. We will meet it, and confound it, and upset you and it. We have nothing to do only shout * rag money/ ' rag money ' ! and the thing ia done." To my astonishment I found that the Irish World was as Green- backed as myself my two contributions coming out with strong OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 173 approval in its next number. I found, too, that it was earnest and far-seeing on the question of Land Ownership. I made several con- tributions to it ; from one of which, August, '76, 1 extract what seemed a prophecy : THE COAL MINER. " Working in constrained and unnatural positions, begrimed with dirt, he ia in all respects a blacker and less protected slave than ever was the negro. But ' hold on ' ! says Gowan. ' Half a million a month more will bring up the dividends, and secure our positions and our big pay. There are such a multitude of those miners that 10 per cent struck off their present wages will make up just the sum we want. Men who now receive $50 a month will si ill receive $45, and they ought to be thankful, lor when they look round they will see plenty of meu who can get NO WORK and MO WAGK8 at Ull.' "And so the miner at his long, unnatural, dangerous, dark and dirty toil, is docked a tenth of the pittance he had been earning, to add to the hoards of the foreign and domestic sha'ks. His little ones may want a bigger yard of cloth than they did last year ; a bigger dish of potatoes ; but what business has he with a wife or lictle ones ? That twenty millions of London gold vested in the mines is a very big fact. A paring of it would buy ns many spies as might be found necessary, as many and as good lawj em as ever proved black to be white, as many ink voices as ever howled through the column* of ihe press, and it is a melancholy thought that juries may be as leadily packed in one country as another. One or two resentful and desperate men may break through the law, may ' cover their tracks,' and make it h<*id to trace th m. Such men are not likely to be the leading, thinking men among the miners. But what matier! The thinking men are the modt obnoxious to the monopolists, because th y are the most formidable. Unable to trace and clutch the real reckless offendeis, it is just possible that they might take hold of the thinking, leading me a, and bring the machinery uf nired spies and paid lawyers, and even packed juriee, to bear down upon them. Such things have been done a thousand times, and never, perhaps, on an occasiou that looked more suspicious than toofcj the whole aspect of affairs as now presented in the Coal regions of Pennsylvania." All here spoken of, and far more and far worse, actually took place ten months after this. The dates and facts will be found in the Appendix. They are so horrible and so disgusting that, if it were at all compatible with my duty, I would exclude even an allusion to them from this book. ON THE STAFF. My coming on the staff of the Irish World was hardly less singular than my first correspondence with it. I had written a letter describing the overthrow of gold by the banks in '57 and notifying that I would write no more take no more trouble with a people that were so dull and apathetic. At the same time Mr. Ford had written inviting me to help 174 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY J him, and the two communications crossed each other on the way. Mr. Ford introduced me with this very flattering notice : " It is with pleasure we announce that we have added to the staff of the Irish World Mr. Thomas Ainge Devyr. His name is already known to the reader, and it is unnecessary to make any flourishes in this introduction. Mr. Devyr is a man of conscience and a man of ideas. He is a time- honored, but by no means a time-worn, reformer. His whole life has been devoted to the service of humanity ; and now, moving toward three-score and ten, his one absorbing thought is to spend the remaining days that God shall give him in the same noble work." And the very first work I had to do on the paper was a criticism on the writings in the press that led to the un- paralleled Judicial Murders that followed in Pennsylvania, and which are outlined in the Appendix to this book : RATTLESNAKES. "Where at each step the stranger fears to wake The rattling terrors of the vengeful snake." GOLDSMITH. The New York Sun is one of those snakes. It has got more rattles than most of the other snakes. A more venomous bite, too. It has sprung all its rattles this week, and makes a hideous noise in the train of one Gowen. The particular Gowen. The Gowen who took the coal fields of Pennsyl- vania across the Atlantic on his back, and pledged them for twenty millions to the London Jews. According to the rattles of this rattlesnake, one band of assassins peoples the entire coal regions. He calls them "cut-throats," who " stab in the dark," and, on slight provocation, " shoot from behind." The venom of the snake must be in gross quantity 'when it overboils in this way. Now, this same Gowen has given the miners not 'very " slight," but very great provocation, if seeking their lives and cutting down their pittance of wages be provocation. If that be a gage of war, this Gowen has thrown it in their faces. Isn't it strange, then, that men so numerous, so " lawless," so " stab-in-the-dark," so " shoot- from-behind," as this villainous writer describes them isn't it strange that they have not so much as turned a hair on this Go wen's head? Now, the wicked man who wrote this knew nothing what- ever of the men whom he murders in this way. (Yes, murders followed those atrocious writings.) But Gowen had come to New York and "instructed " him. And those writings brought on the OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 175 JUDICIAL MURDERS IN PENNSYLVANIA, which are faintly set forth in the Appendix. John Kehoe was a man of weight and intelligence. He had in- terested himself in behalf of men arrested by the Coal Thugs, which so exasperated them, it seems, that they determined to hang him- self. They had the wretches ready to swear the halters off their own convicted necks and on to that of John Kehoe. Summoning the Court of Pardons to meet him at Harrisburgh to review this Judicial Murder, the Attorney-General their own Attorney-General pro- ceeds to write down this paragraph a damning paragraph, that tells the whole story. He had previously told them that he had no hope they would alter their judgment, and he finishes in this way : " But I will be in Harrisburgh on the 17th, at eleven o'clock. My hands are washed of Kehoe's blood, and if others want to do the same, I will aid them." On which the infamous Miners' Journal comments in this way, " The concluding remarks had been better left unuttered." Yes ! The Judicial murderers might well wish those words of even their own Prosecuting Attorney " unuttered." Those words are a death sentence to the reputation of every official man engaged in compassing the death of John Kehoe. Right ! Attorney-General, you could have little hope, indeed, of the men who could see "no doubts in the case before." Such men had taken their stand, and were not to be driven from it. Strictly, there could be no " Pardon- ing " in the case. How could there be when the evidence was by condemned murderers swearing to save their own lives? Besides the Judicial Murders recorded in the Apendix there were more added sufficient to make up twenty-two or twenty-three in all. All on the evidence of real convicted murderers swearing to save their own forfeited and accurst lives. In the case of one of them, M 'Donald, the noose was three times slipped over his head, and his long beard as often lifted up on pretense of fixing the rope aright on his bare innocent neck. Will not those unspeakable crimes invoke a heavy cursoon the Republic? To reprint articles from an ordinary ephemeral newspaper in a book like this would be unpardonable. But a paper the authority of which was so repeatedly recognized in both Houses of the British Parliament is not an ordinary paper. 176 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J Recognized as the only publication that was a terror to them. There are few well-informed men in Europe who have not heard of the -Irish World in this connection. They, too, may be curious to see a sample of the artillery that shot its way through the two Honorable Houses. Even the two or three specimens I give will throw a suggestive light on the Great Movement a movement that now fixes the attention of the world. I offer them, therefore, with this explanation, and without further apology. Thus was rained the hot shot into the "Home Rulers" that drove them from their guns. First In tracing the progress of the movement comes this picture of THE HOME BULE D E LU S I N1877. Enter a village in Ireland. There is a meeting convened in the lower end of the street to consider the wrongs, and thier remedies, of Ireland. A man of plain speech and ragged exterior is telling them that they have a right to " life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness " in the land of their birth. He is telling them that it is a mortal sin to submit to plunder and slavery. He has got so far as to say, " Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." Hark I There comes a great noise of trumpets and cymbals and all brass instruments. On horseback and in chariots come on a great cav- alcade grotesquely attired, waving flags and shouting gibberish. The meeting at the lower end of the street breaks up, and comes rushing to see the bedizined mountebanks and watch their performances. It is a grand success for the mountebanks. They break up the down street meeting. The actors are so big, so various, and of such name and of such note. The brazen trumpets and tinseled costumes are so loud, and so bright, and so grotesque, withal, that the crowd is carried away, and loses siftht for the moment of the man in the ragged coat, and his sober speech about " life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." And then there is to be a great Conference held in Dublin. Mr. Butt wants admission to be very select ministers of the gospel and ministers of the government. Biggar, Parnell and Ferguson oppose this, and the meeting breaks up in confusion. On which the Irish World goes to prayers in this way : A foreshadowing, we trust, of the final break-up of the great Obstructing Home Rule party. That done, we'll have a chance to fall back upon the homely meeting at the foot of the street, and hear once more about " life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," with all the land of Ireland for a hunting ground. Second And this assault on OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 177 THE HOME RULE P H A N T M._ 1878. This Home Rule Conference may well look forward to the pleasant play in which they are to be the admired actors. " The liberals," " the friends of progress," " the people's champions," the admired of all beholders. There will be placards and processions to arouse the admiring public. The lead- ing patriots, in the full bloom of exuberent "liberalism," will march or be- driven to the lighted halls. The crowd will cheer them along the streets, and redouble the cheer when they mount the rostrum. There is a glow of warmth and a blaze of light around them. They have arisen from a delicious dinner and a glass or two of exhilarating champagne. The reporters are ranged before them, to catch their world - redeeming words from their eloquent mouths. The morrow's sun will rouse an admiring public to snatch the morning paper, and read with rapt wonder the elo- quence inspired by the good dinner and the ten-year-old wines and the reverberating magnetism of last night's crowd. Reconnoitering in front of the hotel and around the street corners, Curiosity will be poised on its tip- toes to catch a glimpse of the patriotic orator of last evening, and hurra ! his carriage drive to the station, whence he whirls away to gather fresh banquets and fresh laurels in the next admiring town. His lungs are sanitarially inflated, his appetite aroused, his bodily health is set firmly on its legs. His mental vigor is ever so far ahead of even his material exuber- ance. Wherever may be that man in the dilapidated frieze coat, bending over the spade after a hungry breakfast wherever he may be, the " liberal,'' "patriotic" Home Eule leaders are as well and as satisfied as heart can wish. But how is it with what is left of the frieze coat? We will suppose that he is the rack-rented tenant of six acres of land. It used to be only four acres, but they have got the "statute acre," the "English acre," and that bedeviled the four acres Irish up to six acres English, with a rent marching up to keep it company. He has been thinking if that spot of ground were his own, subject only to a national quit rent, there would soon be another face upon it. Many a time he has thought what a sheltering, sunny little orchard that half acre behind the cabin would make. That dale rising beyond and above the two-acre meadow, how the wintry streams from its potato and flax ridges might be led over that meadow and irrigate and improve its crop. In the adjoining hollow may be turf, and on the knoll beyond it limestone. Here, then, with a little care is plenty of -manure. The oats and barley and hay and straw that now must be carted into the big maw of the land rogue, how their essentials might again return to the ground and recruit its fertility. All this he has many and many a time pictured to himself, and with it the warm, secure home and its contented and comfortable inmates. But he has not anything like this ; he has not the least chance of anything like it. It must not be even spoken of until the Home Rule party getg another chance at the six hundred aliens another ciuurge at them, with Isaac Butt leading on the wordy war. Yes, that man 178 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J and his unimproved fields and his half-naked, half-starved family must wait till the eloquent sixty overthrow the pig-headed six hundred, and get leave to transfer their gymnastics from London to College Green. Well, if, at the end of fifty or five hundred years, this victory the victory of the sixty over the six hundred should be accomplished, then what then? Freed from imperial cares, the local lawyers and land thieves could direct all their attention to bamboozling the people. The great Land Blasphemy would not be approached by them, and if others approached it those others would be met with a howl about the " sacred rights of property." Press, platforms, pulpits would level their artillery against that man in the frieze coat, and if that didn't do they would level the artillery of lead and gunpowder upon him. If he said, " I, too, am a child of the Great Father, and give me this small four-acre modicum of my Father's estate? " the first work of the Home Eule Dubliners would be to choke him into silence, and if he would resist, then choke him into death. Among all the leading men now pursuing this fugitive, far-off Phantom of Home Rule, how many of them ever toiled a day in the field and sat down at night to a scanty supper? We look at the long list of M. Ps., and T. Cs., and M. Ds., and Q. Cs., and reverends and right reverends. They are all there, standing in one imposing group, and they force upon our unwilling thought that they are not of the class that needs to speak out and bo heard The Great Foundation class, on whose intelligence and industry depends the prosperity of the individual and the greatness of the land. We very much mistake that great sovereign class, if they are contented to remain in their rags to live in their dens and dig in their uncertainties whilst Mr. Murphy and Mr. Butt and Mr. Mitchell-Henry, and all the rest of the " half sirs," lead on another, or ten other, or fifty other annual assaults on the alien six hundred. Third And this on the same subject: TO THE MEN OF I R EL AN D. 1876. The United States have recently been a political battle-field from North to South and from one ocean to the other. We had to take a hand in, the more especially as the two great conflicting parties agreed between themselves to continue all our existing evils want of money, want of land everything. Their " sound and fury," and glaring torches, and banners, and bands, all trooped out to be- wilder and humbug the people. We couldn't stand by to look and listen ; we raised our voice against it. Our indignant voice against the Party Factions that are working to enslave this country to Mon- opolists and stock-gamblers. This gave a half direction to our OR, THE SPIRIT Of CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 179 thought turned it half away from the "noble" criminals that en- slave, and outrage, and slay, and starve the people of Ireland. If they had taken moderate rents, instead of starvation rents ; if they had done as the Edgeworth family did in Longford, and as Sharman Crawford did in the County Down ; it they had lived among contented and comfortable tenantries, leading in agriculture, arts, and refinements ; if they had been a little less selfish and inhuman, it would have been a little better for themselves, and a good deal worse for the people. "Worse!" for under a system like that a humane system men might have remained under the delusion that God's land did belong to liars who called themselves landlords. That those liars and plunderers were "noble," and that the multitudes of honest men were base "base born!' That to sport and spend and steal the product of other men's toil made them " honorable" and " right honorable.' The more they stole, the more the honor. Under the mild sway of the Edgeworths and the Sharman Crawfords the GKEAT 1 IE about land ownership might have remained unexposed, unquestioned even, for centuries. But now the light has broken out It is in the heavens it is edging with gold and silver every cloud it is raining its effulgence down on every field and forest tree it is curling round the blaze of every cottage fire, and gilding every ascending cottage smoke. This Glorious Truth, that the land is GOD'S LAND, that the people's are GOD'S CHILDREN, that the Land Thief is the great foundation criminal of the world. That he is the inflicter of all the poverty on the people of all the ignorance of all the crime. That no man sorrows or dies in hunger and in rags, but this Land Thief kills him. That no man languishes in a dungeon, or is forced out to die upon the scaffold, but the Great Land Thief Mas lured him there into that doom ! Men of Ireland 1 Make way for this Great Light. Open your hearts to it. Impart it to your brothers of your own and of the other lands. Let yours be a " voice in the wilderness ; prepare ye the way, make its path straight." So sure as every heart becomes the altar of this Truth, so sure as this divine Thought lifts a man up to a knowledge of himself of his true dignity of his true place on the earth, so sure will there arise within him a God-like strength that will, of itself, almost without the design or the consent of the man himself, rise up in its might and majesty, and hurl the GBEAT LIE from before it, down into the 180 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY} pit of scorn and forgetfulness, and hurl with it the High Priest of that Great Lie the blasphemous Landlord. Talk not of Revolution. Think not of the rifle or the pike till, first, the groat Truth of man's NATURAL RIGHTS is enthroned in all your hearts. Once in full possession of that Great Truth of man's Equal Birthright in his Father's Estate once every man of you knows he is an heir-at-law of a ten or twenty-acre field then prepare the artillery ! But not till then. Till then not a word about it. Fourth. The following article is especially valuable, as embodying a ruling of the "law lords" which kills off all the titles in Ireland. For, if Force is not in some titles, Fraud is in them all. MAN'S NATURAL RIGHTS. 1878 " On Lough Neagh's banks when the fisherman strays As the clear cold eve's declining, He sees the round towers of other daj In the waves beneath him shining." There is some poetry and no truth in those lines, but Lough Neagh is worthy of some notice and deep interest for all that. It has from the first claimed distinction in two grand essentials. Ireland is but a green dot on the map, and yet Lough Neagh happens to be one of the largest lakes of Europe. It possesses, also, the very singular quality of petrifying wood into stone. The holly is a solid, close-grained wood. Saw it into any size, and carve it into any figure you please, immersed in the lake for a time proportioned to its bulk, and it returns to you a stone of a smoothness and fineness of grain, and as free from grit as the wood you immersed six or seven years before. An old familiar cry in the northern fairs and markets was " Lough Neagh hones for the razors." . But another distinction has fallen on Lough Neagh a new dis- tinction that will take its place above the two old ones. Nature, it seems, had a sharp eye on Lough Neagh from the first knew from its bulk and depth and coolness and clearness that it would be a good large nursery for good large fish. Onq of those reprobates who shake the devil's club over Ireland twice or three times every year had an ancestor, as it appears, named Lord Donegal. This ancestor lived in the pure and pious precincts of the court of Charles II. of England. Well, by some parasitical process doesn't he coax this exemplary monarch into a belief that Lough Neagh, its waters and its fish, did belong to and were specially created for him, Charlee tL OB, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 181 " But," says he, " your Majesty has ' other fish to fry' than the fish of Lough Neagh ; and, for fear they would go to loss or to the fishermen along its banks, would it not comport more with your royal dignity to grant them to me and my heirs lifting the burden and the thought of them off you and your heirs forever?" " Well," responds His Majesty of the Mistresses, " yes; I don't see what business Nature had to create them for me. I wash my hands out of them, both the water and the fish. There's my sign manual. Take them along with you. As Nature gave them to me so do I give them to you, and not otherwise "/ So far so good. Tears rolled on, two hundred of them, and neither has Lord Done- gal nor his blessed heirs had time to attend to the fish at Lough Neagh. And the fish and the fishermen got along very well without them. At the end of that time a justice of the peace named Cromelin raised a war about the fish didn't see- why this latent " Donegal '' ownership should not bo brought up out of the depths again in his own favor. So away he goes to the present Donegal not the town or even the county, but the man buys his "royalty" of fish from him for a " good song " or two, and comes back with a voice issuing from the dead grave of Charles of the Mistresses, and tele- phoned through the live carcass of the Marquis of Donegal, ordering the fishermen to " hands off" and let Cromelin into his " royalty." Thefishermen heard the voice, but they heeded it not, and Cromelin disappears off the scene, leaving a group of trustees behind him to uproot the fishermen and scatter their nets. They cite the fisher- men, as thieves and robbers, before the nearest justice we believe before Cromelin himself, who very quickly denounces fine and im- prisonment, but is stopped short by an appeal to the court above. The one side pleads natural right and " immemorial iisage," the other interposes the not-to-be-questioned right of the defunct Charles to make disposition of the fish forever and ever. The two naked issues came up before Mr. Justice Lawson and a jury, at the Assizes of Belfast, and, as a good judge, learned in the stupidities of the law, he hooted at the disputation. The right of Charles to give and Donegal to receive and his heirs to transfer to Cromelin, and Crome- lin to transfer to the trustees (the staff and the dog and the kid and the bush of blackberries) were all affirmed by Mr. Justice Lawson, His Justiceship refusing to let it go to the jury at all. But up it went oh another appeal to the Courts in Dublin, and thence pro- gressed across the Channel to the House of Lords. 182 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH OENTUBY } Here, strange to say, a rebellion broke out among the "law lords" against the supremacy of the dead Charles, and this is the shape it took. Here's what they agreed upon : First Lawson had no right to abolish the trial by jury. Second A patent from Charles II. was not at all sufficient to settle the question of ownership. Third The Lord Chancellor observed that " no evidence was given how the Croim became possessed of the fishery" Fourth Lord Blackburno said that " on the evidence before them the jury would have been justified in finding a verdict for the defend- ants" that is, for the public. Fifth (and most important of all) Lord Cairns asks actually, and to the horror of all land thieves in the rack-rented islands asks this question: "How DID CHARLES II. GET THE FISHERY OF LOUGH NEAGH?" and adds : " If Charles II. got the fishery of Lough Noagh by VIOLENCE or FRA VD or by any ILLEGAL MEANS, he had no more right to give it to the Marquis of Donegal than he had to give him the fee-simple of the planet Neptune." " The fee-simple of the planet Neptune !" Here let us pause and take breath, abd assure ourselves that we are actually alive and awake, and that we are quoting the singular and sublime words of such a body as the law peers of England sublime for once, if they never were so before and never will be again. Powerful, indeed, must the truth be when it forces itself into the learned brains and out through the learned mouth of such a body. Let us now repose the Whole question, then, on a query or a conun- drum, or whatever you like to call it : If the man giving the title say William or Cromwell or James got his own title by " violence, or fraud" had he or had he not a right to give a title to anybody else? That's the conundrum. The Chancellor and the ' ' law lords," to our joyful surprise and astonishment, say "THEY HAD NOT." So the only question that remains is whether the land thieves or their ancestors did or did not come to their title by " fraud or violence." a question I leave the historic records to decide. About this time (1878) all the liberal papers and liberal platforms and liberal pulpits in Ireland rang out in favor of that open, palpable delusion, " Home Kule." All their clamor in its favor was re-echoed by the "liberal " armies on this side of the ocean. The Irish World stood alone exposing, oppos- OK, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 183 ing and ridiculing it. It was incepted by Isaac Butt, a born, bred and natural Tory. He called around him gentlemen, none but "gentlemen," of both political parties, and a first canon of their creed was protection of the vested robberies which they called "vested rights!" Didn't the Irish World attack it in this way? HOME BULE ITS DYING FLUKEY. 1878. "When the monster of the Northern deep feels the harpoon of the hunter he lashes the waters into a foam and spouts to any height and any distance. The dying Home Kule party that assemblage of hollow-hearted, picked-out, propertied aristocrats is in the condi- tion of the whale just now. The people had got tired and disgusted with its performances. Its out-branches were dying out or dead. Its machinery run down flat for want of the mainspring public sup- port. The first petty "flurry " they made of "Obstruction " having subsided down toward the quietude of death, the party gives one more dying heave to the waters. It takes the shape of a three days' Conference in Dublin, ending 23d October. Whether this splurge will attract much attention we shall see, and whether it should attract anything but contempt or execration let us now examine. It proposes a war against Mr. Butt. To what end? Is not Mr. Butt already a dead cock in the pit? " Ah ! well, but, you see, can't we make a noise crowing over him?" Gallant fellows, those Ob- structionists ! If they haven't gained a victory over the alien House they expect to have it over Isaac Butt. And isn't that something? And so with the flush of this great unachieved victory on their cheek, they boldly advance farther on their regenerating path. How advance? and to what end? Why, they will make a " tour through the entire Island " and rouse the people. House them to what? To the great question of " Obstruction!" They will rouse the constit- uencies; they will march candidates into the field pledged to "ob- struct" the alien House so as "to stop Parliamentary business. 1 ' Can they do this? Not at all not the least approach to it. But they will " force the Parliament to expel them " can they not effect that much? We say again, not at all not the least approach to it. For, by a simple change of the " rules of the House," in shortening debate, similar even to our "previous question," the alien Parlia- ment may spit upon their " obstruction " without expelling or im- prisoning, or even voting a censure on any one man engaged in it. And now Mr. ParneU and the other booted and spurred and 184 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBT J mounted horsemen of Home Oppression, which happens to be the true name of Home Eule the rule of the rack-renters will fly around the country offering to the people a clumsy, transparent false- hood as a truth. Offering, in short, a gross insult to the people, in addition to a murderous wrong. Daring to presume that the people of Ireland are so ignorant that they cannot even see through this insult of "expulsion," which the itinerant mountebanks who travel round the country offer to them. But what can they do those booted and spurred gentlemen? "Where do they get the boots and spurs? Do they not get them from the great land thefts, either directly or indirectly? At any rate, those land thefts are quite compatible with their enjoyment of boots and spurs. Abolish the land robberies to-morrow, and the boots of most of them, might change into brogans. Instead of cultivating Home Eule delusions, it is possible that they might legitimately come to cultivate a ten-acre patch for a living. No, no ! The Land Robbery must be kept in the background. Away, kept out of sight for if the [people are allowed to think of it there may be some slight change from boots to brogans. But the people will be allowed to think of it and roused up to think of it. What though one vast conspiracy to screen that Bobbery covers the whole land? What if the " patriot ' endorses it, the pul- pit consecrates it, the editorial army covers it with its guns? What if a thousand Home Bule screamers rush from post to pillar round the island, begging attention away from it away to their buffoonery ? What if they shut it down this Laud Bobbery and Blasphemy down into the caverns of their silence and lock the door of their mouth upon it? The Great Truth of man's Equal Inheritance in kin Fathers Estate will burst' through the buffoonery will crack open the cerements of their dead mouths and out it will come, placidly and peacefully or with a crash that will be neither placid nor peaceful out into the light even of the nineteenth century before its close. This buffoonery, this last gross insult offered to the people of Ire- land ! Are ye, indeed, so stupid, Messrs. Home Shammers, as to think it will keep out the light? keep the Irish people eternally working in the rattle and the weight of the land thief's chain? No, no ! That uncreated orchard on the hillside ; that undrained meadow; that quarter cultivated field; that cabin with the grcou water tracks trickling down its inside walls ; that man with the "windowed" garment and bent frame and asking stomach; that woman once so lovely in her girlhood, now with disheveled hair and OR, THE SPEMT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 185 care-worn countenance ; those barefoot little ones with the out-worn ; raggedness napping around them ; all this must be changed, good "Messrs. Home Shammer*. The orchard must bloom, the meadow flourish, the cottage smile; decent clothes, cheerful hearts and faces; no dread of the robber bailiff or exterminating sheriff; a thought of brightness and hope for the morrow, instead of a thought of darkness and despair. All, all this must come. And all this would be better for all parties, even for the rack-rent thieves. So look to it ! All this must come, or doom must come?" i Those teachings wero faithfully followed up. The famine that set in the necessity that called aloud for help called attention to the cause of the necessity. Mr. Parnell's visit to America intensified that attention, and the drift of events on both sides of the ocean gave strength and impetus to the Great Truth and the Great Necessity. Just at this juncture, too, Beaconsfield over-reached himself and dissolved Parlia- ment. The Great Truth was sufficiently in motion to force its way in some shape into all the turmoils of the Elections. For it or against it, it was introduced into them all. The impetus thus given to it who shall estimate? What is here stated aided also to give it both force and direction. It was snowing heavily when Mr. Parnell held his last levee in New York on his departure to take part in the elec- tions. Home Rule was a thing of the past, and he was ex- horted to substitute " Land " for " Home Rule," and let the latter drop out of the programme. He did so. " Land land as God gave it," became the rallying cry, and it carried all before it in Ireland. The Land League was formed, and at its first session demanded a two years' suspension of evictions, and actually proposed to buy out the Blasphemers at some twenty odd years' purchase. They were reminded that this was at least" premature that the matter should be referred to the judgment of the people at the numerous pub- lic meetings that were now to come. This was acceded to, and Gladstone sat down to incubate his bill. He had done something ten years before, and it was expected that the experience and reflection of the ten years would enlarge and strengthen him. Forster had been a pilgrim to the famine thirty odd years before, and John Bright had said brilliant and even ominous words on the subject at the close of the late session. Sir Cliarlea Dilke, too, a professed Republican, 186 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; selected by Gladstone roused expectation. But not a mem- ber either in House or in Cabinet had the least sense of the GREAT ISSUE now up for judgment. Not one of them realized that to clutch and huxter out what the Creator had given freely was an IMPIETY riding horseback on a LIE. And likely not a man among the double squad but would have made a most orthodox Turk had he been bred up in Constantinople. Discussions of the subject in Parliament could do good only so far as those discussions were re-discussed outside, not in the Isles alone, but on the continent, in America, every- where. It formed a grand opening to spread abroad the Divine Truth that had now come down. To tell the nations that the Creator made the land a free gift, not to the Liars and Rogues, but to the whole Human Family. But it seems the "Parliamenters" themselves did not want the Truth to be known. At least they did not attempt to make it known. Indeed it is to be questioned whether one of them, up till very recently, realized or accepted it at all. And 80 light skirmishing went on in Parliament and heavy skirmishing went on in the large and quickly succeeding meetings that now rang all over Ireland. Even at these the speakers and the writers kept almost dumb about the Great Truth. But the primitive strata did not keep dumb. Explosions burst forth everywhere. " No Rent!" "No Land Thieves!" "God made the Land for the People!" Weekly vollies from the Irish World boomed across the ocean, and aided at least aided the explosions, and gave them an echo far and wide. Dunraven and Orra- no-more did not mend the matter when they proclaimed in the House of Lords that the Irish newspapers did them (the peer-less thieves!) no harm. The harm "came from that organ of American Thought, the New York Irish World." Buckshot Forster denounced it in the Commons, and Gladstone, too, acknowledged its power by guarding the ports and. post offices against it. Vainly guarding. The paper got in about as effectually as before. Thus it stood when Gladstone brought in two bills which were indeed a direct challenge to physical conflict. I do not pretend to determine the reception the bills merited. But, like others, I am free to offer my opinion about it. It has been seen from the first that Mr. Parnell inherits OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALBY IN MODERN DATS. 18? the energy and pluck of his naval ancestor. Never reaching after the sublimities sedate, cool, imperturbable never off his guard, and never hesitating. No one doubts that he had decision and pluck sufficient to take up Gladstone's gauntlet and throw it back in his face, if he had only thought of doing so. Suppose he had thought of doing so. Suppose he had met the challenge in this way : "You, Mr. Gladstone, have MAN'S LAW at your back. You have a compact force of prepared mercenaries drilled in the art of killing people. You have the platform, the press, and the non-resisting pulpit sustaining you. To your money re- source there is no practical limit. As little bound is there to your skill in applying it. The inhuman ferocity with which you enter conflicts of this kind has left an undying stamp on the pages of '98 in Ireland and '37 in Canada. I know your nature, but am not afraid of it. You have un- just " laws," 50,000 mercenary forces, and the murderous traditions behind you. I have the LAW OF GOD and Nature to sustain me, and a million of men and well-grown boys be- hind it. They are "spoiling for a fight," too; and have a means in their hands that equalizes war. Hand grenades were at one time an arm of war hence the name grenadiers. They were superseded by the musket ball, only because the musket ball was more destructive. "Now a change has taken place a discovery made that makes the grenade more destructive than the musket ball. As an arm of war they are sure to return to the field. Their use by assassins developed their power not their true use. Assassinations, individual destructions, are not their true use. If even directed against man-enslavers and their guards the use is unwise. Their true field of action is the opon field, or the open street, or wherever you may array your mercenaries to enforce the robbings and murder- ings of what you call " law." In the evolution of things a Great Truth the Great Truth has come down to us, and with it has been sent down a Power that neutralizes all your perfected skill in the science of killing people. Its -use re- quires neither drill nor skill. So you may count whether my million of men and boys are, or are not, a match for the force behind you. " This understood, we may come to business. Your Arms Bill is to disarm my friends, is it ? Your Coercion 188 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ; Bill is to imprison my officers, is it? I don't propose to disarm your men or to imprison your officers, and I will by no means consent that you shall disarm or imprison mine. If I did there could be no negotiation between us nothing but dictation on your part and submission on mine. No! The odds aro now very, very largely in my favor, and this robbing and degrading and murdering of tho Irish people has gone on long enough."* Such, it seems to me, was the logical attitude into which Gladstone had forced him. And at the same moment affairs were transpiring in the little Transvaal that lent very de- termined countenance to that attitude. One county, one city in Ireland, had more resource both of men and material (and as much of resolve, too, I may venture to add) than the entire Transvaal. It was fortunate. It was providential that Mr. Parnell did not realize the position Gladstone had crowded him into. If he had realized that this was a direct challenge to him that it carried a gross personal insult to him and to his friends in dar- ing to disarm and imprison them, Parnell would have accepted the challenge as readily as he would an invitation to pistols and a ten-yard shot. It was providential that he did not realize it. It is not yet lime, and will not be till the most rugged, ragged and oppressed man in Ireland conies to know that no man EXISTS better than himself clothed more than himself with Manhood's BIGHTS and DIGNITY ! The men who have assumed the teaching of Ireland have thrown their dirty little exhalations between it and the sky. But the exhal- ations are not of a nature to remain there. It is from a flood of light from Heaven, not from a torrent of blood on the earth, that man's earthly redemption must come. That con- viction reconciles us to the illogical attitude of Mr. Parnell. For Gladstone would doubtless have been glad to take refuge from his moral nakedness even in the convulsions of war. To keep in hiding the Great Truth is now the greatest sin against man against the Creator. Heaven forbid that I should charge any man with a wilful, cowardly conceal- ment of the Great Truth. It is far more likely that *Tho Groat Convention showed that tho Light was diffused. And now Mr. Parnell's arrest shows that ho should havo met Gladstone at tho time and in tho way indicated. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 183 the Great Blasphemy has been so grounded into them from generation to "generation that it forms a part of their inherited life. But their amount of guilt or of inno- cence is of little consequence. If, in the fulness of time, the consuming, degrading, murdering LIE is to be overthrown, and the Divine Truth enthroned up in its stead if that time has now at last come, no earthly obstacle can prevent its ac- complishment. No new rent-charge yoke, no fixing of the fixities, no bargaining with Blasphemers. THE NEW LAND LAW. It lifts the personal odium of cruelty in all its forms rack- renting, seizing, selling out and evicting out entirely off the shoulders of the Blasphemers, and rests it upon that intangible and morally unapproachable thing called " Law." Thus now speaks the Blasphemer: "You are on the sidewalk, are you? you and your family ? Your cabin is leveled to the ground. But from the passage of the Land Bill into law I had no part in fixing your burthens or throwing down your house. It was the law did it. ' The law took its course.' I had neither the direction nor the control of it. So, 'thou canst not say I did it.' " And that "law," and the administration of that law in all its ramifications, are in the supreme hands of born and bred aristocrats. Commissions, Land Courts all in control of it all of one breed all empowered to do just what the Blasphemer himself had heretofore to take the odium and the risk of doing. A remarkable distinction of this bill, also, is that it enjoins not even an hour's duty nor a shilling's sacrifice of any kind on the Blasphemer. Leaves him nothing to do only go about where he pleases and do what he pleases with the collected Blasphemy, without even the condition of planting a fruit tree, to adorn the lands lie is authorized to desecrate. Persons who have not studied out the nature of this Great Criminal may think the name "Blasphemer" harsh and ill- timed. But, if it be true that the good God intended this earth for an unspeakably happy as well as unspeakably grand home for His Great Family and if this evil man mars the DIVINE PURPOSE robs, starves, desolates and kills, even by millions upon millions, his brother man and his sister woman 190 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTTTRTj the name of "Blasphemer "indicates only his crime against the Creator. His crimes against his fellow-creatures what name can describe? THE LAB O R E K. Singularly enough, the first voice in his favor was raised by himself at a meeting in Portadown, County Armagh. It was caught up and echoed in the Irixh World. At the meet- ing to receive Davitt in Jones' Wood, New York, a resolution on the subject was presented to the appointed committee, and it was embodied, after a feeble fashion of their own, in the regular proceedings. More than one missive was sent through the mail to Gladstone, asking him to secure at least an acre or two to every laborer, and a loan to build a cottage on it. Not only was he disinclined in this direction, but Forster, at a late period of the incubation, told a deputation on the subject that there would be no room for them in the coming law. He reversed his talk, however, a few days after. Such is governing shallowness. Grade, caste, land thievery, and all injustice, are so deep and so ramified in Ire- land that it would be wonderful if the "tenant farmers" escaped their contagion. And they didn't escape it. But time and events will teach them better. And now comes up a disposition to galvanize the dead carcass of Home Rule. It was well, therefore, to level at it once more the artillery that first vollied it off its legs. And now the same gentlemen are putting the same Phantom into the foreground. There is just one condition on which they should be recognized as true men, as reformers, as anything but shams and impostors. And that condition is a very short and a very simple one. After they have done homage to Home Rule after they have sacrificed to Home spinning and weaving let them whisper to their audience before it disperses one little sentence like this, " Remember, and carry home with you the Thought, that your Creator did not send you as a beggar or a slave to this earth; that the soil is His ESTATE, and that you are His EQUAL CHILDREN." If the gentlemen Instructors had done this constantly, persist- ently from the first, the thieves would now be on their knees before the people instead of riding on their necks. There is a little hope that they will do it, even yet but there is a bright hope that they will be unhorsed if they don't do it. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALBY IN MODERN DAYS. 191 I am hastening to a close of the book. This was adopted at a recent public meeting. It condenses the first great need : LAN D R E FOB Ml Three powerful forces are now settling down on the Republic. Corpora- tions have arisen within the memory of man. They are increasing with great rapidity. Already they have all the cotton mills, the railroads, the coal mines, gold and silver mines, shoe and leather manufactories ; nearly all the great industries are in their hands. They are usurping the PUBLIC LANDS by hundreds of millions of acres, cultivating them by machinery, from 15,000 to 20,000 acres of wheat in one field ; grazing ranches as large as counties. They control all the Legislatures, and the Courts are their obedient tools. That is one great force setting in upon us. Machinery is another force, illimitable in its power. The Empire of China contains 400,- 000,000 of people, and can send as many fifty-cent laborers over in one year aa would do all the work in this country. No disposition of the currency can save us from those forces ; no regulation of wages or hours of labor can save us. One thing only can save us THE PUBLIC LANDS, AND A FREE PATH TO THEM ! And a loan to begin the settlement. The following orders were sent on to Congress from a public meeting of Land Reformers in New York. City : WHEREAS There are large numbers of our people unemployed and in distressed circumstances ; and, WHEREAS There are large areas of fertile Public Lands lying untilled and unproductive ; therefore, Resolved That it is the instant and imperative DUTY of Congress to take up the LAND AND LOAN BILL, introduced by the Hon. Hendrick B. Wright, of Pennsylvania, and pass it into a law without delay. Eesoloed That the lands o( all nations are the Inalienable Inheritance of the peoples of those nations ; and that wo shall "hold as traitors and public enemies any men in authority who shall dare to shut out the people of this nation from the lauds of this nation. And no matter under what guise or pretense they may try to cover up this crime, we shall not submit to it. Better that the whole existing generation should perish than that our pos- terity should bo enslaved. Resolved That DISINHERITANCE is SLAVERY Wages Slavery which, in most of ita phases, is worse than Chattel Slavery ; more easily worked and more profitable to the slave-driver more crushing, and even exterminating, to the slave. Twenty thousand miners in Pennsylvania petitioned for this law, but it was thrown out In the last Congress by a vote of 212 to 22 ! Both political parties voted against it both alike enemies of the people. An aspiration to rise and become great in the world is a natural, and, under proper direction, it would be a laudable aspiration as all truly natural impulses are. But in the 192 THE ODD BOOK Of THE NUSETEENTH CENTURY \ United States this impulse is working incessantly for evil. There is no standard of Public Yirtue set up for emulation. Labor is greatly overtaxed and proportionately underpaid. As everything else is turned upside down, why should not work be slighted? assumed to be an evidence of inferior mind? Backing your brains, and cutting into your truth and manhood in law, in politics, or in profit-hunting are assumed to be pursuits more dignified than honest, down- right work. Work ! which is almost the only nurse of the virtues that remains among us. The lawyer stands high, as he can "make the worse appear the better reason." The same faculty (and it is a mean, ignoble faculty) is brought into action in the world of trade and the world of politics. If nothing can sustain a true Republic but truth and honor, then a]l those three work directly toward its destruction. Both law and commerce are embodied insincerities. Politics is gambling direct. The public spoils are the faro bank, the whole nation is a "hell," and every politician is a player. The professional gambler is not more sunken and lost than is the professional politician. And the unnatural pressure put upon the wage worker tends to undermine even his honest manhood. Tired to exhaustion, is it wonderful that he tries to evade a part of his heavy task, even by duplicity? To remedy all this turn your back on the examples set us by England. She has unbounded Monopoly of the Soil and DIS- INHERITANCE of the people. She has a metal currency that makes all trade tributary to money-lenders. She has un- stinted power to tax the people to any amount the " Collective " criminals choose to extort. She has a drilled army to compel their submission under pain of death. It is because we have forgotten the murders she committed upon our fathers; it is because we are untrue to the traditions of the Eepublic; it is because we have followed her accurst example that all our existing evils have fallen upon us. Civilization we must have. It is part of the SUPREME PLAN. Shall we accept British "Civilization," springing out of the ages of ignorance, rapine and murder? Or shall we adopt an American Civilization, founded on the teachings of Christ Jesus and the Bublime traditions of the Republic? British Civilization, indeed! British inhumanity British wallo wings in unearned luxury ! No, no ! Surely God has not forsaken us. OB, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 193 I have a thought that the death of President Garfield would have signaled the subversion of the Kepublic. That he was providentially saved, even for a time, is to me a promise that help from On High will come to us, and that the Republic will be rescued out of the sordid and insane hands that threaten its destruction.* The danger is now so great the destruction so nearly accomplished that I believe no earthly effort could save it. No power but the Power from On High. To enumerate all the watchful care which General Crooke held over me would be tiresome. But two or three things I must add before taking leave of him. A bogus In- surance Company would have swindled me out of the only really valuable possession I ever had some 30 acres of land. He said to me, "That land is rooted. It will not take wing and fly away, as this Insurance stock may do." As it did do a few months after. Its President gathered all of its assets he could scrape together and fled abroad with them. My possessions had gone with the rest only for Philip S. Crooke. The 1 Pennsylvania Coal Company notified that it would not make good an agreement for a dock lease it had made with me. They knew the General, and as soon as he notified them, they at once gave up their design, and it saved me a matter of $30,000 and more. All of which left me through the inhuman taxation of Brooklyn's political rogues and the destruction brought about by the Currency Screw of John Sherman. Before that screw descended my property paid its heavy taxes and interest on its debt, and left me $3,000 a year to live on. The screw came, and employment fell and wages fell, and the rent of my houses could not be paid, and I had to request my creditors (heirs of Mr. * * * ) to take all the property and make what they could of it. Though that *When the crime of Guiteau was consummated General Grant, in an, interview published iu all the papers, said, ' If this Nihilism is an outgrowth in our country, if the President dies / will proceed to Washington and hang the Nihilists and their followers." Here was a declared abrogation of all law. An ushering in of the Dictatorship. Bouse, men I Understand, at least, the volcano you are standing on. 194 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CJBNTUET $ friend was gone, enough of his spirit remained to decline this offer and leave the property in my hands in hopes I might one day redeem it. So it remains at this day managed by my son, and I believe it stands one lonely and honorable example amid all the desolations that the Contracted Cur- rency spread over the whole country. Just before I was compelled to take the above step General Crooke wrote me the following, which I preserve to his honor: And now when the poor or perplexed man comes to Brook- lyn for the one adviser that never failed him he searches and searches for his office. It is not there, he is told he has removed. "Oh! where? I must find him!" An Invisible Power takes him by the hand. The streets vanish. He is in a place of graves. " There he sleeps," whispers its voice. OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHTVAUIY IN MODERN DAYS. 195 "He has at last closed his last office?" "And what am I to do? Where seek the sure aid and the wise counsel?" "Aye! where? where?" repeats the voice! Surely the life of such a man is a proof of immortality. I once said to him, "Is not the hoped-for future existence a grand mystery ? " " That we live," said he, " is a grander mystery. That the life given should be continued to us is no mystery at all." THE GREAT FRENCH REVOLUTION. Before I left England Mr. Doubleday said to me, "Bronterre's Life of Robespierre 1 puts a new face upon the atrocities of the French Revolution." Up to that time all the writers ascribed all the guilt to the French people picturing the aristocrats as innocent lambs led to the slaughter. In the lull after '48 I got together all the available data and commenced to arrange it under the title of " Dug-up Facts of the Great French Revolution." In pursuing my task I found the most astounding falsehoods, suppressions and self- contradictions and deductions the direct reverse of what the facts authorized. Allison gave a list of four hundred authorities he derived from. Of these just two were Democrats, and he does not quote a line from either. Each writer he quotes from outdid those who went before him in truculent mendacity, to gain Court favor for himself and sale for his book. And as for Allison himself, he is the bravest falsifier of them all. On one page he tells us that "it was ths feudal nobles who laid the foundations of freedom," and in the next page he thus shows us a sample of the freedom they brought into the world : "The most important operations of agriculture were fettered or prevented by the game laws. "Wild boars and herds of deer were let loose, and did damage which, in four parishes only, amounted to nearly 8,000 a year. Hoeing and weeding restricted, lest the young partridges should be destroyed. Corn had to be ground at the landlord's mill, and bread baked at his oven. Permis- sion to grind barley between two stones had to bo purchased. And of twelve parts, the produce of an acre, the king got seven and one- half parts, the seigneur three and one-half, and the actual cultiva^r ONE." And this is but an indication of the self-contradictions and falsehoods that distinguish all the compilers, with the one single exception of Carlyle. I showed my plan to Dana of the Tribune he was then. He encouraged me to go on and he'd help to get me a 196 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NmETEENTH CENTURY J publisher. I disclosed my purpose to the Harpers, who then had Parson Abbot puffing up to the skies the usurper and purjurer Louis Napoleon. They, too, encouraged me to go through with it. But before I was half through out they came with a book on the subject by Abbot the first notice of which I saw was Dana making merry with its peurile absurdities ! So much for the honor and the enter- prise of the Harpers. When I had the work in a forward condition I called on the Appleton's and thought it good fortune to find Dana there before me, expecting he would aid me in accordance with his promise. He was working on their Cyclopedia at the time, and had very much the diffident air of a man that feared to be turned off. I suppose this was assumed to lessen in appearance the meanness of breaking his promise, which he did most effectually. The manuscript lies untouched to this day. One peculiarity I enforced in it. At the end of each fact stated, I ask the reader to pause and criticise, and form his own opinion of what it is worth urging him to carry the same critical judgment always into all he should read, whether in book or newspaper, so that he might not permit the ' ' His-story " makers to do all the thinking for him. Is not the mean selfishness that has taken among us such deep and "wide-spread possession is it not traceable to the one foundation, all -pervading sin of DISINHERIT- ANCE? Had Disinheritance not been, would not men have worked their condition up to its natural place and perfection centuries and centuries ago? Opportunity for development had been afforded to all minds, and the growth and greatness of mental wealth had been in proportion. Destitution had been unknown, and with it the distress, the deaths and the suicides resulting from it never, never had appeared. A sight of these terrible examples was to men like the sight of people crushed over to the edge of a precipice and the weakest falling down it to death. So long as the precipice existed so long as large numbers of people were crushed over it was it strange that the sight made men take every means, even the sordid and the base, to get away from it? Had the precipice never existed had the ample provision made by THE CREATOR been made available to all would this selfishness have such a deadly hold on men? Would it have. OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IX MODERN DATS. 197 any hold on them at all? Is not a restoration of man to his INHERITANCE the first work to be done ? Is it not the founda- tion on which alone you can regenerate society? Abdicate that Inheritance leave it in the hands of evil men and all the Reform you may build will be built on a quicksand. Holding in their hands the GRANARY OF EXISTENCE, those men could mould into any shape trample down into any depths the condition of all the peoples in all the nations. Establish the DIVINE LAW on the Soil! Throw down the corrupt laws of criminal kings, Cromwells and Congresses! Arouse, men! Look around ye. Comprehend the great, great work that is to be done. This great work, which, though commenced in Ireland, must be fought out on this side of the ocean it is fighting under Deadly disadvantages in Ireland. How many writers, how many speakers, how many preachers present in its full proportions the DIVINE LAW to the acceptance of the Irish people? "Whoever is not with the Great Truth is against it." . And has it not been proclaimed in the House of Lords that the Irish papers did them (the thieves) no harm? That the. Irish World of. New York was alone their great enemy? Under circumstances like these, would it be wise to risk the GREAT ISSUE its success, or its discomfiture, or even its delay on the conflict now going on in Ireland? In that conflict as it now stands, is that Great Issue brought squarely up at all? If its writers, speakers and preachers were equal to the Great Occasion if, instead of clouding it, they would flash in the Heaven-born LIGHT upon the people if they would directly and vigorously oppose the Divine Law to the Bobber Law we might help, and await their victory whilst prepar- ing to take the field for our own. But it is not so the very thieves, speaking out of their den, proclaim that the writers of Ireland do them no harm. Is not the issue, then, upon us? May we not, here now in the United States, exclaim with Bruce at Bannockburn? Now's the day and now the hour; See the front of battle lower 1 See approach the LAND THIEF'S power I Chains and slaverie ! "Approach," indeed ! That Thief is among us is welcomed among us by our governing traitors. He has " grants " filtered 198 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J through Spanish and Mexican marauders of the last century, who did not own an inch of the land. He has "grants" from kings and Holland Companies, that did not own an inch of the land. He has "grants " from corrupt and criminal stewards in Congress, that didn't own an inch of the land. He has "grants" from Farmer occupants, who did not own an inch of the land. And he thinks they think the foreign and domestic land thieves think that the one, for a few dollars in hand paid down, and the other, for no dollars paid will have nothing to do but rack-rent, degrade and murder the American citizen a citizen no longer through all future time! Yes ! Our atrocious " law " gives the Irish Land Thief a very encouraging slap on the shoulder and the struggling Irish people a very discouraging slap in the face. Is not the nature of those insane monopolists, and their brother traitors caucused into our government, clearly brought out in the Judicial Murders of innocent men in Pennsylvania? in the unheard-of crimes and cruelties and murders in our prisons? in the Consular scrapings among the oppressed workers of Europe, to find out how little wages they can contrive not to die upon? in the coalition of militia officers of the North with Beauregard and his unhanged brothers of the South, in their proposed army of 200,000 chosen scalawags, political scalawags, (700 picked out in each Congressional District) to be drilled, appointed and officered from that concentration of political traitors now usurping government in Washing- ton? in their street-firing drill, to slay our citizens should they rise against "Consular starvation"? The GREAT ISSUE is indeed upon us. Let us accept it at once. And whilst with one hand we throw help and encouragement over to our friends in Ireland, with the other hand let us take our own domestic traitors by the throat reprint the Mary- borough motto: "NO AIE-LOKDS! NO WATER-LORDS! NO LAND-LOKDS!" and scatter it broadcast over the country. Any public meet- ing that separates without proclaiming this Great Truth will not be a land meeting it will be a landlords' meeting. So, if it is not proclaimed from the platform, let some brave fellow proclaim it from the crowd. OH, THE SPIRIT OJf CHIVALRY IK MODERN DATS. 19$ PAKNELL IN BKOOKLYN. It is a great meeting. The Academy of Music is full. You pay your half dollar to a "rosette" politician outside. And every "rosette" you encounter inside insignias another politician. Parnell ia in front tall, erect, impassive as a steel statue. He is telling a plain story of desolation and ig-" noble" crime. But there is a stir, a buzz, and a " Hail to the chief! " A broad, burly bulk makes a lane through the crowd on the platform. "Who is it?" I ask. "Who? Don't you know Beecher?" "What I the 'bread and water* man?" and I begin to hiss with great vigor, not doubting that everybody would join in. Instead of that rosettes and policemen have me by the neck, and I can just twist round in their hands and stentor out, "Bread and water! Bread and water ! " before I am telegraphed safely out to the sidewalk. Beecher had just been a royal "birthdaying" in Montreal, and, surcharged with love and loyalty, who knows how much of it he would have scattered over the meeting, if he hadn't got that " bread and water " in the face? That helped to cool him off. And the land rogues and royalties will never cite the speech he made that evening. In a printed review of the meeting, one of the first if not the very first of the leaders in the movement thus characterized it: "There was only one man in the meet- ing, and that man was put out." "Tax !" There should be no such thing in any civilized nation the United States for example. Our 50,000,000 of people require $40 per capita. France has $30. Of this 2,000 million two per cent is lost annually in the circulation a gain to the Government of forty millions annually. Increase of population and trade would require an increase of one or two per cent in the currency to keep it up to the per capita standard making thirty or forty millions more. The standing Army is a great evil the sailing-about Navy is a great evil our diplomacies abroad are a great evil our Custom House is a great evil our office-holders in the General Government are a great evil our swarms of lawyers are a great evil. With our ports open free to all foreign nations all monopoly of lands and mines and waters abolished Townships settled on just and scientific principles and converging into simple State governments it is not clear that we would either have "foreign entanglements" or any need for a 200 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J "General Government." Few laws required. None for land, save a Record defining Boundaries, Possessors' Names, and Transfers. None for interfering with commerce by collecting debts. Our criminal law proportioned to our criminals, which would be steadily going down to nil There is no need of Tax, Mr. George ; and if there is no property in land, how can you tax it? I had occasion to examine the records of suicides in Brooklyn, and for two and one-half years of Contraction and distress I found seventy extra above the number recorded in the two and one-half years before Contraction. This would indicate an aggregate of 7 , extra in the whole country during those two and one-half years, as Brooklyn contains one hundredth part of the entire population. Two Germans, who lost their mortgaged houses and lost their work, went, one after the other, to a dilapidated house and hanged themselves. Two small traders in groceries broke down and resorted to the same remedy. And the owner of one of the prettiest houses and grounds in the same neighborhood lost it by foreclosure, and threw himself before a train and was killed. All these took place within a radius of one or two miles. The guilt of those political criminals in Washington never, never will be measured. Docs it not stand up side by side with the crimes and murders of the land thieves of Ireland? Men wondered when I stated at a public meeting that "if I were to be driven out of the world in this way (and I ran a close chance for it) I would step up to Washington and take on the journey a few companions along with me." Though still on the staff of the Irish World, uncertain health has estranged me a good deal of late from my principals. It is with deep regret that I look back upon the time when we were much together, engaged in the holiest work that can fall to the lot of man. I have preserved one evidence of their good will to me when I entered on the service of the paper. That was five years ago. Two years later their kindly feeling toward me surely over-tinted the following picture : " MB. DEVYP FOB CONGRESS. All through this campaign, and all the campaigns though admonishing the friends of Industrial Keform to exercise all diligence in making their nominations, we have ourselves refrained from OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 201 presenting any names. There were two reasons for our not doing so. In the first place, we had neither the time nor the disposition to canvass the personal merits of individuals. And, in the second place, we feared that any such suggestions might be thought to be a piece of impertinence on our part. There is one name, however, whose full significance we understand, and the presentation of which we feel to be an act of duty that name i s Thomas Ainge Devyr. When most of us- were in our cradles the man who bears that name was battling for the cause of humanity. To-day there is not in the forefront of Keform a soldier who fights more vigorously, more unselfishly or more zealously than he. Not one ! Mr. Devyr is now up for Congress. Greenback-Labor men of Greenpoint! honor yourselves by sending him to the National Legislature. Think not because Mr. Devyr is on the staff of the Irish World that we are anxious to see him chosen as your Bepresentative. Think not this, we say, for it was for this very reason because ofJds connection with this paper that we have kept his name out of our columns till this moment. No, no ! Did we take a narrow and selfish view of the matter, we should prefer rather to see him defeated in the nomi- nation. We should consult only the interests of this paper. But we are capable of rising to a holier conception of our duty. Serviceable as Mr. Devyr is to us, he can be of still greater service to the nation at Washington." Well, I can do no more than here and now bear testimony to the fact that the cause of Human Progress owes more to the Messrs. Ford than it owes to any other men now living. For have they not opened a communion of mind to Beformers all over the world, and which they never had before? And have they not inaugurated the Great Movement that now shakes the earth? They were and are the men ! Davitt, Parnell all the leaders of the movement were and are merely their disciples. As for Patrick Ford, as a literary swordsman a zealous, wary, fierce gladiator of Reform I would advise the hollow hearts to keep out of his way. A lecturer in Chicago informs us that "there are eight thousand, odd, newspapers in the United States, which wield a power over the public mind that they could not abdicate if they would," and, let me add, would not abdicate if they could. As soon would the most despotic monarch abdicate his crown. The lecturer, as well as the outspoken Chicago Times, admits that newspapers are enterprises to make money. The time is coming has come when Thought shall govern. The retailers of news were not slow to perceive this, 202 TEDS QDI> BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY j and they improved the opportunity. Their business gave them almost exclusive access to the public mind. How they used their "opportunity" is mirrored in the present condition of the country. They did not levy inhuman taxes. They did not Disinherit the people, steal the Public Lands, or "scramble" the public mines. They did not embody soulless Corporations to take possession of all our public resources and utilize them by the disinherited slavery of wages. It would be difficult to put your finger upon one wrong or robbery wrought directly by the daily newspapers. And yet, by indirection, ' 'by counsel, by concealment, by partaking, and by defense of the ill-done," they are guilty of them all. The measure of the country's distress and degradation is the measure of their guilt. But as the day rises and the light grows another change comes over the world. Men realize the Almighty Will, and we see in the distance the Great Land Movement in America getting under way. A NATIONAL CONVENTION of Delegates, one or more from each State and Territory, sitting en permanence in New York, and holding con- tinuous communion with their constituents. Their debates on the Land Robbery, and all other public robberies, published in their newspapers and read as news, enlightening the whole nation. A small daily at every centre of population, superseding the corrupt "enterprises " in the matter of news, wresting out of their hands their power over the public mind. Trades Unions could help this change. Such is the vision that rises up before us. It is yet in the distance. The only way to approach it and to realize it is to let in THE LIGHT to force the GKEAT TKUTH on public attention. In this let ail men help. And women and boys and girls. Small hand presses, with type and instructions, can bo had for little money. In an incredibly short time boys and girls would learn to use them. Select from Reform papers and books short articles, and print and scatter them around in the shape of tracts. The Iritth World file is a mine of Reform diamonds. Useful things will be found even in this book. Wherever found, print them and scatter them every tract surrounded by a tasteful border, which may be deftly colored with a toy brush in tiny little hands. The whole process would greatly improve the tastes and the knowledge of the young persons engaged in it. I have copper-plates of the "Deserted Village," with a preface and sketch of the author. And of Burns' "Twa Dogs," with a picture of Burns, and critique on his character. The whole containing thirty pages, including twelve illustrations. I will send twelve copies of it, post paid, for one dollar. It will form a patri- OR, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY US MODERN DATS. 203 otic souvenir, intrinsically' 'woT thra cart-load ^of. gift -books. The. two greatest blows ever struck at the aristocracy are the "Deserted Village" and the "Twa Dogs." The man who circulates if it is but one copy will be helping along. The work before US' is an immense work. It will take the resources of all our minds and all our means to accomplish it. 1 may err in my suggestions any of us may err. But as brothers let us judge each other kindly, and all pull together. Let me add " I've paced much this weary mortal round, And sage experience bids me this declare " that the lawyers and the politicians and, more dangerous than both, the daily newspapers now loom up the greatest danger ahead of us. Even among those are good and patriotic men. Let them throw their heart into this great redeeming work, and admonish their less worthy brothers to do the same thing. POLITICAL SCUM. "The hum Of cities that boil over with their scum." BTEON. If the "scum" of the city is bad, is not the scum of the "caucus " worse? All kinds of people, good and bad, go to make up the city. Only one kind of people go to make up the caucus a kind it is not necessary to re-describe here. The man who notes the sidewalks of New York who sees the DISINHERITED man and woman trying to snatch a precarious existence out of their sale of small wares, the whole stock not worth a dollar who sees their asking faces turned to every passer-by, in the "forlorn hope" of a pause and a purchase that man, if he has a heart in his body, will feel almost a curse rising within it against the inhuman, spoils-scrambling, dead-locking "Scum" that shut' those people out from the rural homes which the All-Wise created for them. The lordly Scum of Europe can plead- in mitigation of their crime that they were born to it. Our Scum have not even that excuse. They were not "born to it." By their own self-debasement they have come to it come to be the ignoble, criminal, execrable things that you see. EMIGRATION. Load with warlike stores. Take out papers for any foreign port. Charter or take the loan of steamers to transport emigrants, each having.a rifle in his baggage. Meet the. storeships on the ocean, at a point fixed upon. I accept the fact that our caucus government at Washington 204 TEE ODD BOOK. OX* THE jnOTOTCETOH CJESTTK"? \ will do all it can to protect the Thugs of England. But can it stop emigra- tion? The British Government in 1860 (see ante.) could not interpose when hundreds of young men from Ireland emigrated to Italy to aid the Pope. Three thousand men could "rough it" for ten days on one steamer, and three or four such steamers, manned by veterans of our late war, would soon settle the dispute. New York State alone could furnish a volunteer volunteer force that would settle the land thieves in quick time. Working girls "Mr. M., we cannot possibly do this work on those con- ditions the hours longer, the pay less." Mr. M." But we had to take the job at a low price or * * * would have, and then you'd have no work at all. It will only last a week or two, and then comes back the old work and the old wages." [ The " week or two " passes over, and no change. ] "Can't change," he says; "that firm * * * down street won't let us." One of the girls " Well, I'll go home and work no more for you." Another girl (follows her out)" Oh ! how I wish I had a home to go to I But I haven't. I must work and work on on till I die ! " [ SCENK Greenwood Cemetery. ] "Whose grand monument is that? How much did it cost?" " That is Mr. M.'s monument, and it cost eighty thousand dollars." " What ! Mr. M. of the long hours and low wages? " Yes ! that was the man. [ A literal fact. ] And yet don't despair ! Of the best Reformers I ever knew, two were millionaires and two lawyers. Nature still lives in that class. If she didn't these pages had never seen the light. EGOTISM Every man is to himself the centre of the Universe. From such a stand- point few are likely to make a depreciating estimate of themselves. Bather the reverse. And so much so that it has given birth to the significant word " egotism." To this rule, no doubt, there are exceptions. But the gentle- man whose example I present forms the one only distinct exception to it that I have ever known. The capacity which grasped first principles at first sight, and the active devotion he threw into their service, indicate at once the statesman and the patriot. But added to those was another capacity, as remarkable in its place. He was a born writer as well as a " born gentleman." * His correspondence flowed from his quill, clear, fluent and unstudied, as his language in conversation. And yet not only did he not assert this accomplishment but he positively disclaimed it. II a fact or incident would strike him as remarkable, he would note it in his diary. *So called by his associates. OR, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 205 Nothing could be more concise, lucid and well-judged than those sketches. Yet he would by no means admit that they were so, and he always denied my request to have any of them, published sub rosa. To fix more distinctly his estimate I shall have to relate an incident which I would not relate if I had less respect for the truth and more respect for men's captious opinions. Talking of inequalities ho said to me: "Nature has given me capacity in business to make money. What she has given to you is in the higher sphere of intellect." Now, the truth was that his mind was cooler, clearer, far more haraiomously balanced than mine. If it never took pitches so high it never took stoops so low. It was a bird always on the wing, always main- taining its onward flight in all hours. To what objects the records in this book sufficiently indicate. NATURE'S "POLITICAL ECONOMY." In 1845, when my heart and hopes were high, at the head of the Anti- Bent Movement, I find this picture so graphic, so sorrowfxil recorded in the paper I then published in Albany : "How IT WORKS IN ENGLAND. The abomination which has so long overspread the earth the blight the leprosy of landthiefism is departing and must utterly depart from among men. God has marked it for destruc- tion. In the decree that ENLIGHTENMENT should go forth, THE DOOM or LANDLORDISM went forth also. The "Beast of the Revelations !". His thousand years is up, upon the earth, and he returns to the Hell he came from. Bead the following statement of an English laborer, William Parry, of Charlton: " ' I have come twenty miles to tell my distress. I have six children, a wife and myself to maintain on eight shillings per week, bread being fifteen pence per gallon. A gallon a day, being one pound to each, is what wo want in my family. Then there is clothing and firing wanted, and house rent to pay but there is nothing to pay for them. The relieving officer sent me an order for one of my children to go into the workhouse. I could not part with ne'er a one. I had the cries of my poor children, which were piercing to my heart, ' Don't send me, father ! don't send me ! ' Was not that enough to try a man, without the pressure of starvation? I spoke a few words at a meeting at.Upavon, and master told, me the farmers might have done me some good but for that. I wa'nted potato land, but master wanted eight pounds an acre for it. I could not pay that. If I could get THREE ACRES at the same price, that the farmers get it-^-t wo pounds an acre I could provide for myself and family. But they won't agree to it.' " There is more solid, practical information in that man's statement than in ten volumes on " Political Economy." Wilkio Collins said to -the farmers of Norfolk, " for the love of Christ give those laborers what will enable them to live." By the same Sacred Name 206 tfHU Ot>D fcOO* 01* TBH NINETEENTH CENTUKY J let me invoke help to enlighten those Disinherited men to teach them that God created plenty of land for them all, and that of all the Impiety that ever was committed on this earth robbing that land from them was the greatest Impiety. Many a Christian man and woman have given Charity many a bequest was made for charitable purposes. Was ever an object so holy as to let the Light of God's Benevolence into the dark minds of the people? It is only enlightenment ever can lift them out of their wretched condition. "CIVILIZATION." The word has been associated with civility forbearance kindliness, etcetera and hence has derived a respect that does not at all belong to it. I do not by any means assail those things when I execrate all established Civilizations The Duke of Argyle thus describes the criminal " Civiliza- tion " which this book assails, and in which himself takes so prominent a part: "We cannot contend that a civilized condition involves any of the higher elements of character. It is a consequence of that instinct that leads us to identify our own passions and our own sympathies to any brotherhood [ even the brotherhood of land thieves ] to which we may belong, whatever that brotherhood may be. Men of great refinement may be, and often are, exceedingly corrupt. And what is true of individuals is true of communi- ties. The idea of Civilization is in itself separate from the idea of virtue." Does not this justify my undying hostility to the thing called "Civiliza- tion " ? Does it not everywhere exist only to pamper and spiritually degrade a few men, and oppress, degrade, and in the ultimate starve and murder the great bulk of the Human Family? Embosomed in the Kepublican virtues, and there alone, can a true Christian Civilization exist. Don't insult Heaven and outrage common sense by giving that name to the Brigandage of England ! On looking over the facts embodied in this book, and especially in the Appendix, do we not find that the ruling forces in this country are more corrupt, more base, more blood-thirsty than they are even in England? A Great Movement is about to arise to dethrone those corrupt men, and dis- rupt and scatter their insane accumulations. My time is not long here now, but I hope to see them overthrown and the Eepublic restored to its primitive purity. And that hope rests on a Supreme Providence. OK, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 207 TITLES Congress being a temporary two-year-old steward, and all its acts repealable, could not give title to what belongs to all the people and to posterity. Pennsylvania first levied a " Royalty " on all the coal mined and carried away. Then her political "one-year-olds" hocus-pocused spu- rious titles to the Coal Companies which titles are of very necessity waste paper. Forty years ago the rocks and swamps constituting most of Manhattan Island were so unusable, so fortified in their natural ruggedness, as to be unapproachable even by speculative greed. No MAN CLAIMED OWNEK- SHIP of the rocks and swamps, till the love of fresh air, freedom and some green possibilities reared in interstices of the rocks brought several settlers first and then a great many to build shanties on them. The political rogues enthroned in New York Municipality exercised the first ownership of the Sahara of rocks and swamps. Charged rent to the settlers, and after a time forged titles to rich profit-mongers who wanted grand mansions in which to repose their evening of life, made happy by their unjust trading. Bo out come cable brigades, swing the cables round the shanties and throw them to the ground. And if any spirited man spoke of resistance, the police pack first and then the newspaper pack opened howl on him for daring to oppose himself to "the law" drawn up by scoundrelly Corporation attor- neys and rushed through the bargain-and-sale shop established in Albany. HELP ALL ABOUND.- -The man working for wages has no help but his two hands. The man on even a small piece of land may have -a strut of turkeys, a flock of geese and a crowd of chickens, all out picking up some- thing for him. Volunteer pigs, too, rooting up bacon for him. Emit trees grown wherever the rain and sunshine fall, would help him. A couple of cows would lend him a hand, and even an undersized pony stands ready to work for him. Pigeons would fly home to him, each with a pie on his back, and the whole country is his grazing ground for a stock of bees. Every season presents him its variety of work. His mind employed as well as his person, planning experimenting, learning. And " The wish that ages have not yet subdued In man, to have no master but his mood," is realized. No slavish obsdiQUCQ to a. boss. No cheating him out 208 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY J of his natural wages. No sudden loss of the job either to him or to his children. Well, we'll see nbout it. ELECTIONS They are just closed. Ever returning they bring a con- fused selfishness into almost every household. Scarcely one but has some friend it desires to see elected simply for the place, the " spoils." Thus the healthful stirring-up of mind which elections would be in a pure system is turned into a spreading and confirming of corruption and mental degra- dation. It costs ten, perhaps twenty, millions to gather up the public will, and it is not gathered up. And if it were it is not worth the grathering-up a mere reflex of corrupt newspapers and political spouters. That is the present condition. All resulting from the Boundless power to Tax. SAMPLES. JAY GOULD'S BRITISH " CIVILIZATION." August, " Ten in a cell in Kings County Jail. Intense suffering. Th<3 interior like a furnace." " Forty in Loredo Jail, Texas. Seventeen escape to the Rio Grande. Two hundred shots are fired at them in the water. All but three kilted or recaptured. Mexicans firing across to -save them." Win. Creever left to stand on nothing at 13. Imprisoned five years in a " Reformatory." Time up. But not free. Forced to the brutalizing life of the forecastle. After one voyage to Liverpool leaves it for work in the New York Bible House. Five taxeaters of the city have "law" to drag him back to the "Reforming" hell. "What for? "he asks: "I'm at work and living with my mother." They take out the handcuffs, and at the thought of going back to the " Reformatory" he dashes himself to death out of the three story window. The news scribbler said, he had " no reason to dislike the Reformatory." That " his statement was not believed by the officials, but they made no inquiry." His statement was true. I called on his mother, at 174: Delancey Street a German woman, of pleasing address. She sobbed hysterically. " He was a tall, handsome youth," she said, and added this unsophisticated woman added "How many young men are driven to destruction by not getting a fair start in life?" But what care our "Scum " politicians "how many" go to destruction? Are those politicians, or are they not, rebels to the Will of The Most High? Did not the OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DATS. 209 Divine Power create a benevolent, bountiful supply for the wants of all? Is not the Divine Will trampled out of sight by the junketing plunderers who reign in Washington? OUTBAGING NATUKE. Ballet master, interviewed: . "Yes. We advertised, and a hundred girls present themselves. We select by the age and height and weight. Under 20, height five feet, weight 135, won't do. 120 is about the right development." " Girls," he continues, "understand, you are to wear tights and short dresses." ' He selects 35. The rest go away disappointed. " There is no difficulty," ha adds, "till they come to rehearsal. That makes some of them wince." This exhib- ition of themselves is an outrage on Nature. How many of them would " wince " out from him only for the two executioners, Hunger and Naked- ness, standing outside ! Is it necessary to add that this, too, is chargeable to the supreme " Scum " assembled in Washington? With the lands sur- veyed, prepared, and a path out to them, there would Boon be a scarcity of ballet girls. And now we have some $150,000,000 of surplus revenue, and we have been so tied up by Sherman and the corrupt Congress that we cannot apply it to pay detet without giving the bond lords the " market price,'' which is now 113, and if we went in to buy it would soon be 120 or more. England can reduce interest on her debt at anytime, offering the bondholder his principal if he declines the reduction. Another proof that we "follow England in all her abominations, and exceed her in most." Instead of paying off our debt, it is now coolly proposed to begin with forty millions in building new ships to "protect" our sailing profltmongers, or prepare for any war they might drag us into. The profit-hunters need no protec- tion if they obey the laws where they visit. But the naval families need " protection," to live a life of well-fed sloth rob, insult and spit upon the '"common citizen." DEATH PENALTY. Mr. Phillips is, as usual, on the right side. He is deeply read on the subject, and brings armies of texts, commentations, and interpretations to his aid. Dr. Cheever is his principal opponent, a .d the Doctor says: " 'Whoso sheddeth man's blood by man shall his blood be. 210 THB ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY; shed.' (Gen. ix., v. 6.) This is the citadel of our argument, commanding and sweeping the whole subject." Mr. Phillips contends that the original may be translated, " by man will his blood be shed," making it a prophecy, not a command. But if it be " shall," and if it were a law of the Jews, has it any authority over us? Jewish law authorized the father to slay the son authorized "stoning to death ' for a breach of morality? Does Chris- tianity accept the one? Does not the Saviour rebuke the other? What need, therefore, wasting shot on this " citadel of the argument"? The solid question is : Did society do all its duty to the criminal? Did it give him a good bringing up, and what poor Mrs. Creever called "a fair start in life"? If it did not, how dare it speak of killing him? OUB CONDITION OUR DANGEK. Our diplomatic leeches with their return cargoes of Royal snob- bery have done their work. And now when the "noble" tourist returns from America he has "met all through the States a growing friendliness to England." He has found in their Sunday books imported pictures of Queen Victoria riding out, and talk like this underneath the pictures: "All the Queen's subjects love her most dearly for her many virtues and the pattern she sets us of being not only a good Queen but a dutiful daughter, an affectionate wife and a good mother. Do you see that boy riding beside her? He will be King of England." Here is a distinct, dangerous, deliberate falsehood, forged to mislead the children and poison their minds. On the very day that human idol was crowned 80,000 Englishmen assembled in Newcastle-upon-Tyne to denounce this whole Royal Impiety. Those Sunday books don't tell the children that this human idol of a "good Queen " costs half a million of pounds sterling every year wrung from people who are even clothed in rags and starving for food ! If the school children don't cry out, "Wouldn't it be nice to have a good Queen?" it is not the fault of the profit-hunting publishers and the clerical School Trustees, 6ft, THS SPIRIT 0* CHtVALfct IK kODltttH DAYS. 2ll Then "Lord" Backer opens his distressed mouth and speaks in this way : "The League is too strong for me. I'll go to the United States and buy land, and its 'enlightened laws,' for the 'dollar now in hand paid,' will give me a vested right.' " To do what? Why, only to rack, and starve, and murder our citizens. The "right" to do this "vested" in himself now, and the heirs of his dead body forever ! He has bought the " right," he has paid for the " right," and the thing we call " law " will execute the "right " even to the extreme of murder, as with United States troops it has murdered the farmers of Colorado ! And our caucus-born rogues think all this can be done. And the gaping speculators think it will continue. And the mad thief Kail- raiders and indeed all the thieves count that the British horrors have been fastened on us forever. That there is such a network of "vested " plunders that we never can grapple with them at all. They may be slightly mistaken. They do not seem to know that there is just one steel wedge that, driven under them, will upturn their whole mad Impiety. Take a look at the wedge. Here it is : There EXISTS NO TITLE to land save the occupancy title of the man who cultivates a farm. None ! For the conclusive reason that there NEVER DID EXIST a power King, Cromwell or Congress which had authority to give such title. This Sublime Truth is plain and patent to all honest men. It has been again and again demonstrated in this book. But it is of such vital, such vast, such all-reaching, never-ending importance that I must again and again urge it in these concluding pages. Mind and money, viciously directed, are destroying the Kepublic. Mind and money, virtuously directed, alone can preserve it. Have we the mind? We have. Standing on the rock of Truth we are an overmatch for the most adroit fencing-master of Error stuck in the quicksands of Falsehood. Who are the men that started Ireland to her feet? that carried dismay into Lords and Commons? that shook and are now shaking the social world? It is not necessary 212 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTtJEY J here to say who 'they;were, but it may be pertinent 'to say that the intellect of one of those men was never swathed with a. college cobweb. Have \ve money? How much would ten cents a week some more, some less from the wages and mortgage slaves amount to? There are twenty or thirty millions of them. "But they wouldn't give it." Just stop 'that calumny. The money is there, waiting for the collector. But have we the energy and skill to collect it? Ask the hundreds of Benefit Societies. Life, spirit, sot T L ! is all that is wanted. Have we writers and orators to stir those up? Have we business management, to give the writers and the orators a hearing? to circulate the writings and let the orations be heard everywhere in every corner? That we have all those elements of success within our grasp no thoughtful man Can doubt. Is there not one descendant of the Bevolutionary heroes to make head against our danger? Are the descendants of even the "Minute Men "all dead? Phillips! Emerson! Is there another? Kouse, rouse! Form a nucleus that will attract round you all that is true and virtuous in the Bepublic. Those who remember Ireland will be with you to a man. UndeT God there is no other way to save the country from being amalgamated with that murdering, Infidel nation called England. May that Divine Power inspire you to give this one last chance to the Bepublic ! The hearts of the people are sound of all the people whom honest work has preserved from selfish wickedness. Baise the standard, and they will rush to your side. HINTS FOB LAND BEFOBM OBATOBS. FIEST The Young Irelanders were merely " Tenant Bight "men. Man's right to the land never entered their minds. Middle class men of talent they were, who aimed to substitute their own power for that of O'Coimell. Dispersed and discouraged, in '48 they dis- appeared, chiefly into the ranks of the liberal Whigs." OB, THE STOUT OF CHTVALBT IN MODERN DATS. 213 SECOND Interregnum. In which the Phoenix Society arose sec- retly and merged openly into the "Fenian Brotherhood." Object a revolution : an Irish Kepublic. Man's right to the land spoken of, but little heed given to it. Fenian prisoners in Dublin ably defended by Isaac Butt. His popularity thereby. He starts " Home Rule " a mere control of roads, bridges, Grand Juries, etc., and even that under Viceroyal veto. A " Home " declaration, too, that they would defend the landlords in what they called their "vested rights." "Obstruction" in the House of Commons then came on the stage. And that was "something to look at, if it was nothing to eat." But the Irish World vollied both shams off their legs, and threw up for the first time "THE IBISH LAND FOB THE IKISH PEOPLE." Bound and round it the people instantly rallied. The famine helped. Home Rule was struck down, and the Land League established. Gladstone's sham Land Bill and coercions brought out the manifesto of "No Rent." The issue now is between the lords and dukes and American dollars. The dukes to evict the dollars to sustain the evicted. If the dollars hold out the longest, the dukes big and little will be bankrupt, and the Gov- ernment in such a "fix" as never was government before. Every branch of the League, therefore, and every friendly Society, must now become a centre of weekly collection from five cents upward. Half a million of dollars (100,000 sterling) can easily be collected each week. A part of it will bankrupt the dukes and break down the British Government ; and the balance will be on hand to nullify our Congressional forgeries called titles, and restore the American lands and mines to the American people. First in order is gather- ing up "the sinews of war." Our lands in the hands of thief Bonanzas and domestic swindlers and imported lords. Our mines in the clutch of scrambling rogues. Even our ponds and running streams, that belong not to us but to posterity. The wretched monomaniacs who have seized these lands and mines and waters are at war with Nature. They cannot use them they would be happier without them. 214 THE ODD BOOK OP THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J V ' -**-. ; > *"*=:" -' ' ' " r -*" f 3 * * v-fc*.. i>..' " Reason's whole pleasure, all the joys of sense, Lie in three words health, peace and competence." * Those three things the monomaniacs may have nothing more. "We don't intend to sacrafice ourselves and our posterity to appease their madness their man-killing madness their British land-thief madness. In their life this madness is a sore perplexity to them. And what is it at their death? Somebody has written : " Accumulated with such anxious care, Bequeathed will be to gaping, thankless heir." Thackeray, in "Vanity Fair," pictures the sad condition of an old man, poor and dependent on " friends " who wish to get rid of him, and the still worse condition of the rich man, surrounded by people whom Bryon indicates in this way : " Sweet is a legacy, and passing sweet The unexpected death of some old lady Or gentleman of seventy years complete, Who've made us youth wait too, too long already For cash, or an estate, or ' country seat.' " Speak those truths to the rich. And if you point to the exit of A. T. Stewart, it will do no harm. Of how to live and how to die this book furnishes more than one Chivalrous example, of the true American citizen. Don't forget that population is pressing in on the one side machinery on the other. Don't forget that Hayes and his co- traitors sent orders to their tax-eating consuls to fish up the wages that European workmen can manage to half-starve upon that those wages were published at Government expense in 15,000 volumes and sc&ttered broadcast over the country by the Washington traitors. To prepare our workers for what was to come. Don't forget that street-firing drill was made a science, to murder our citizens if they should rebel against the starvation wages. And don't hide away the fact that a discovery in chemical science has been made that EQUAL- IZES the man-killing business, and puts an end to the reign of bullets and bayonets and brute force. And remember that the settlers in OB, THE SPIRIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 215 Colorado, who had irrigated their farms twenty years before, were swindled out of them by a Pacific Railroad, which had deflected its map over those grounds, and, armed with a corrupt decision of a local United States Court, drove those men from their homes called out the United States troops, murdered seven of them, and imprisoned all the rest. For ' ' contempt and resistance " to this atrocious knot of politicians, calling itself a Court of the United States! As I close, the President's Message is out, and it is ominous of evil. Our late war was a great harvest to all the public rogues. Another war would be as great a harvest. We have profit-hunting ships and man-killing ships sailing up and down through our " foreign relations." If desired, it will go hard or they will be able to fish up some pretext for a war. The possibility of a domestic broil with Utah also has "money in it." Our revenue is increasing and our debt could be paid in a brief time. National Banks would then fall asunder, and national money take their place. A great evil to the banks avertible by another war and a new debt. Besides, there would be jobs, contracts, robberies of all kinds, rested on the new debt. All scope, in this Message, is given to army, navy, foreign relations, banks, deposits, and so on. Not a word to the domestic affairs of the country. Clouds of evil loom up through the Message, and a blast from Washington can give those clouds any shape the political rogues may determine. Action, sharp and sudden, must confront them mental and moral action. Get together the "sinews of war" 1 The sole use we have for a man-killing Navy is to provide for political chickens hatched in Annapolis to brutalize our youths in the forecastle to insult our citizens by declaring that they cannot rise higher than a " petty officer " to guard our sailing-about profit- / hunters and, finally, to fish up that most desirable thing for our 216 THE ODD BOOS OF THE JttkrTEEm CEffTtJKY; political thieves in Washington and elsewhere a War, with its contracts, robberies, debts, and all other attendant evils. This they are likely to accomplish before the Peru Ambroglio is ended. Elaine (mackerel Elaine) and his Minister Christiancy, are giving each other the lie direct. And Elaine* mackerel Elaine has sent a challenge to all Europe, daring them to interfere in the settlement between conquering Chili and conquered Peru. And this pro- found Mr. Elaine informs all Europe that the United States must have supreme control over the ship canal across the Isthmus. Justifies this by the unjust example of England in respect to the short route to India. Wherever England marches, Mr. Elaine is quite ready to follow. In more things, too, than in this Ship Canal. He is gone, to be sure, from the head of affairs, but his spirit remains in Washington. Hurra ! for the " foreign entanglements " that George Washington warned us against. THE QUESTION OP INTEREST. It is now an accepted doctrine by nearly if not all Reformers that to take interest or usance for the use of lent money is both unnatural and immoral, and is, besides, next to shutting up the Creator's Gifts from the Creator's Children the most deadly means of enslav- ing men and nations. In the present mad epidemic of selfishness that reigns over the world, this doctrine seems to be incontrovert- ible. But whether the evil lies in the mere taking of interest on money, or the use that is made of it when taken, may well be in- quired into. To take it and build it up in an ever-increasing pile is an outrage upon common sense a monument of the meanest insanity that can afflict the human mind. At every quarter-day the monument throws * In the debate on Victoria's mackerel, Blaine declared it would be more honorable to give the millions to somebody who didn't pretend to have giren us any value for them and next day he voted to give "Vic" the millions ! And such are the men is there one of them a whit better? to whom the interests and the honor of this Republic are entrusted? OB, THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 217 but a shower of bricks at his feet. The man has no use for them only the work of building them on the top of the pile, where they will add to the shower to come down on the next quarter-day. In looking up at the growing pile the eye takes a moral squint and hardly can see anything else. Used for such a purpose, the taking of interest is an evil second only to monopoly of the land. But taken by a large-hearted, benevolent man, it may be turned to a positive good, instead of an evil. It may be likened to the purifying law that, raising vapor from the stagnant marsh, rains it down again in fructifying showers over adjoining land. Here is a "smart fellow.'* By his work he can gain $1,000 a year. By employing himself, and using others as he now is used, he can realize $5,000 in the year. To enable him to do so, I lend him $10,000, and I say to him, "Keep to yourself all you can make, and when yoU are done return me the $10,000," Or, I say to him, "It is my wish to help others along, as I have helped you. Therefore, I condition that you shall pay me interest at seven per cent, that I may continue my help to others in their need. In the one case that "smart fellow " keeps, like the stagnant marsh, the whole gain buried in his own selfishness. In the other case, a part of the interest would exhale up and condense into reviving showers so far as its volume would extend. This symbol- izes exactly what wise, unselfish men would do what the three principal characters presented in this book did do, each through an administration of thirty or forty years. Peter Cooper did a special hedged-up measure of good by his accumulations gleaned, it may be, from under-wages and over-profitsthings surely more repre- hensible than taking interest. SKETCH OP SIR GrAVAN DUFFY. Not an individual man of the Young Irelanders dreamt of anything but a stupid, sordid softening of the land yoke on the 218 THE OBD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY, neck of Ireland.* And just as "Sir Gavan" proclaimed nis own disgrace, when he sought the royal tail and pinned it to nis coat skirt ; so now he exhibits his slavish soul in a full acceptance of She land-thieves as embodied in the Sham of Gladstone. If they will only make their thieving a little less their right to steal, so far as Sir Gavan has power, he will by no means suffer any man to question. And so he comes out and asks, What was the Young Irelanders' complaint against the land system? And he replies :- " Because it kept the tenant in perpetual poverty left him open to eviction coerced his vote on election day sent his children to a forbidden school made him pull off his caubeen in the presence of his master sent in his duty fowls (and he might have added duty work) gave his improve- ments to his lord brought the Crowbar Brigade in at the tail of the famine sent judges in gowns, and soldiers in jackets, to quiet resistance forbade him by law to be prosperous and contented." These natural outbranches of the great Upas Tree were all that annoyed Sir Gavan. It was exercise, at /east, and amusement to swing the literary bill-hook at them. But the tree itself ! No ! Sir Gavan was too fast a brother of the land-thieves to permit an axe in your hand or a stroke at the root of it. To this rarely distinct specimen of the ' ' decorated " sham I should not give the slightest attention, save to help on the poetic justice that he invites now at the nearing close of his career. Lest men might have forgotten him and that career his desertion of Ireland in her darkest hour (in the face of the Great Famine) his blaze of glory at the antipodes, as "Her Majesty's Minister'' his past submission to, and his present endorsement of, the GKEAT LAND LIE even the wagging tail to his name, carried about with him all these might have sank quietly into oblivion if he had only kept quiet kept himself away from the public gaze. But the man had so basked in prosperity, power, and "royal distinctions" that he did not *They proposed, John Mitchel assenting, that out of six stacks in the "Haggard," one should go to county cess, three to the laborer, and the remaining two to the land-thief. \NjtsTCAT KOAD. <2A&0cto^m<^ I"""; ^e^^v / **m. s OB, THE SPIBIT OP CHIVALRY IN MODERN DAYS. 219 know himself. And so he comes forward and offers his political carcass to a public, dissection that will be a substantial gain to political science. And yet I cheerfully admit that he was an able sham. He invented that scathing rebuff, " 'Vested rights' ! vested balderdash !" At page 18 of the Irish section I took occasion to refer to just such men. At page 167 I threw a brief criticism at Mr. Cowen, M. P. for Newcastle-upon-Tyne pouring forth his just indignation on Captain Gladstone of the national banditti, and on Forster (usually called Buckshot), his second in command. In that criticism I did, in one sense, less than justice to Mr. Cowen. His scathing philippic was leveled, I think, wholly at those odious surface quacks never deepening into the Great Primal Wrong of the Human Family. That murderous Wrong has so long held possession of my own mind of my very being that I over- looked the fact that it is only just beginning to enter into the mind of the public that it took two years of "hesitation" even of Par- nell before he accepted it. Mr. Cowen acted bravely, in all things, up to the light that had reached him. It was the spirit of an independent Englishman that carrried him away, with Disraeli, from his political associates, in pursuit of what he deemed (oh ! how mistakenly !) the greatness of England. It was the same manly spirit that ranged him on the side of oppressed Ireland, and presented him a foe to Gladstone, at least as (and in one sense a great deal more) formid- able than any of her own sons. May the All- Wise inspire him to become the Great Apostle of England to rouse her robbed and murdered ones to a sense of their status on this earth. House them to a sense of their own manhood, rights, dignity. Surely there is no man in England so worthy to be chosen FROM ABOVE to this high mission this highest, greatest, holiest mission that ever was confided to man. I communicated with Mr. Cowen very recently on this momentous subject, and sent him an outline of this book. I am encouraged by his reply, a fac simile of which is here presented. If Mr. Cowen takes up this work this mission all the Proletarians of England, in field and in factory, will rally round his flag and make it a wind- ing-sheet for Landthiefism. 220 THE ODD BOOK OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY J EBBATA -In times not long ago "Errata " was a standing page. I must revive it. At page 12 an r is wanted ; page 20 wants^a y In and a d out, and ry instead of yr ; 21 wants a the in ; at 22 i for a ; at 45 / inverted and an e too much ; at 46 a for e ; at 47 e for a ; at 49 ao for oa ; at 53 an our too much ; at 57 hg for gh ; at 68 a t too much ; at 69 I for i ; at 74 a t too much ; at 83 s too much ; at 94 the too much ; at 95 a for e ; at 98 o for a ; at 105 w and e inverted ; at 107 p for n ; 111 wants an h in and a T out, and to instead of oi ; at 116 t in and Me out, and o for i ; at 123 den of omitted ; at 125 not omitted, and i for p ; at 120 o for a ; at 133 d wanted ; at 140 an in too much, and a for p r at 146 drive ought to be driven ; at 157 the too much ; at 161 h wanted ; 164 wants an h in and a t and a d out ; at 170 a d wanted ; at 171 gi for ig; at 174 the out and re for er\ at 175 c for e\ at 179 y too much ; at 180 n for d ; at 183 two errors of type, and encouragement mis- spelled ; at 184 wive ought to be wife, same page wants a the out and a c in ; at 185 I wanted ; at 192 " 1839 " instead of " 1838 " ; at 196 a d too much ; at 197 officers imperfect ; at 203 n inverted ; at 206 6 too much. This does not refer to the American section, The "Errata " is a relic a curiosity now nearly obsolete. That I revive it adds a little to the " oddness " of THU ODD BOOK. CONCLUSION. If this book has shown tltat MAN'S DISINHERITANCE is the great primitive curse of the earth many other men and many other books have also shown it. If it has presented the ruin so often worked by the attempt to make Metal a currency, or the "basis" of a currency other and abler hands have done the same thing. If it has tried to prove that an unbounded power to tax is a direct signal to the most active rogues of a nation to rush in and rule it other men, and even States, have illustrated the same principle. But if this book has shown that, freed from such governing rogues, an INDIGENOUS CIVILIZATION would spring up and nourish in the United States better, purer, higher than ever yet appeared in the world then has this book given to a great, Vital Truth its first public expression, irir fa0k of APPENDIX. As a pilot balloon to this book I published "A War of Classes: How to Avert It." It contained "The Deserted Village," and mot- toes and illustrations the best I could command. I purpose to re-print it singly, with observations and a sketch of the author and his surroundings. It ought to be in the hands of every man and woman and boy and girl not only as a patriotic inspiration, but as an easy stepping-stone from the ordinary songs and rhymes up to a taste for and appreciation of classic poetry. Bound up with "Our Natural Eights" (as contained in this volume), it will make a most judicious present especially from one young person to another young person, but by no means excluding the old. It has been said of " A pleasant city Who has not seen it will be much to pity." "Much to pity," indeed! There are thousands of "pleasant cities" in the world, but there is only one " Deserted Village" and the man or the woman or the boy -or the girl who has not seen it is indeed "much to pity." To lose its exalting and refining influence to never have dwelt over its incomparable pictures of rural life to never have seen the Desolator, wallowing in sloth, luxury and crime, as Goldsmith unveils him it is no figure of speech to say, that man is indeed "much to pity." The scenes presented in this immortal work are at once so beautiful and so sorrowful that it was essayed to break their force THE DESERTED VILLAGE. by denying their accuracy. Goldsmith refers to this circumstance in his dedication to Joshua Reynolds, the celebrated painter, thus : " Several of our best and wisest friends concur in the opinion that the depopulation it deplores is nowhere to be seen, and the disorders it laments are only to be found in the poet's imagination. To this I can scarce make any other answer than that I sincerely believe in what I have written ; that I have taken all possible pains, in my country excursions for three, four or five years past, to be certain of what I allege, and that all my views and inquiries have led me to believe those miseries real which I her^ attempt to display." In dedicating his other remarkable poem, " The Traveler," to his brother Henry, he greets him as "a man who, despising Fame and Fortune, has retired to Happiness and Obscurity on forty pounds a year." And in "The Traveler ". itself he thus appeals to that brother : " Have we not seen, at pleasure's lordly call, The smiling, long-frequented village fall? Beheld the duteous son, the sire decayed, The modest matron and the blushing maid Forced from their homes? a melancholy train, To traverse scenes beyond the western main." "The Deserted Village" forms an easy and beautiful stepping- stone from a crude taste for rude rhyming street ballads, etc., up to a true taste, and appreciation of the classical. In this respect, I can convey no idea of its usefulness to the young, and even to the older who aspire to a correct literary taste. Romantic skirmishing against Land Robbery has, through the past centuries, woke many a moonlight echo in Ireland. Menta 1 skirmishers have reconnoitered it, especially in the last fifty years. And now when nations are confronting it now when its patched mantle (patched over with "orders" of "noble" rogues and "honor- able" rascals) is being torn from its back let us press in Oliver Goldsmith to help us. He is the first, and in one point of view the ,greatest, Reformer of us all. The man who helps to circulate "The Deserted Village " has not lived in vain. I present these brief specimens ; I)1GSEBTED VILLAGE. " Oh, Luxury ! thou curs'd by Heaven's decree, How ill-exchang'd are things like these for thee\ How do thy potions, with insidious joy, Diffuse their pleasures only to destroy ! Kingdoms by thee, to sickly greatness grown, Boast of a florid vigor not their own ; At every draught large and more large they grow, A bloated mass of rank unwieldy woe ; Till sapp'd their strength, and every part unsound, Down, down they sink, and spread a ruin round." And this grand Invocation to Poetry : "And thou, sweet Poetry I thou lovliest maid, Still first to fly where sensual joys invade ; Unfit, in these degenerate time* of shame, To catch the heart, or strike for honest fame ; Dear charming mymph, neglected and decried, My shame in crowds, my solitary pride ; Thou source of all my bliss, and all my woe, Thou found'st me poor at first, and keep'st me so ; Thou guide by which the nobler arts excel. Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee well ; Farewell ; and oh ! where'er thy voice be tried, On Torno's cliffs, or Pambamarca's side ; Whether where equinoctial fervors glow, Or winter wraps the polar world in snow ; Still let thy voice, prevailing over Time, Redress the rigors of the inclement clime ; Aid slighted Truth with thy persuasive strain, Teach erring man to spurn the rage for gain ; Teach him that states of native strength possest, Though very poor, may still be very blest ; That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay, As ocean sweeps the labor'd mole away ; While self-dependent power can time defy, As rocks resist the billows and the sky." I give the above though it is least easiest to be understood in the whole poem. All before it flows in a clear ripple, like the fol- lowing : " Sweet Auburn ! lovliest village of the plain, Where health and plenty cheered the lab'ring swain ; Where smiling Spring its earliest visit paid, And parting Summer's ling'ring bloom delayed." THE SONGS OF THE UNITED IKISHMEtf. THEY were originally, about 1794, gathered together and printed in a small book entitled " Paddy's Kesource." At that period the songs of a nation were considered a very formidable power. Indeed one authority went so far as to exclaim : " Give me the making of the songs of a nation and I will give you the making of its laws." "Without claiming such a power for songs at the present day, it is certain that they exert great influence, espe- cially over young and enthusiastic minds. Enthusiasm is the one impetuous foe that tyranny most dreads, and Liberty, when the conflict comes, can most surely rely upon. The songs here presented come down to us a sacred memory ! In another part of this hand-book some light, heretofore suppressed, is thrown on a most important point of the history of that day. There it will be seen that what the bravery of our fathers won at the last decisive conflict their inadvertent confidence lost. Meanwhile let me ask with an inspired poet of our own day : M Who fears to talk of Ninety-eight? Who blushes at the name ? When cowards mock the patriot's fate Who hangs his head for shame? He's all a knave or half a slave That slights his country thus; But a true man. like you man. Will fill your glass with us." The close affinity between the French and the Irish peoples has never been made so signally apparent as it is in these songs. It is noticeable, too, that in them a shade of foreboding is often manifest a foreboding of what was to come ? Some of the songs are of high poetic merit. In all sound judgment, aspirations the most exalted, and devotion to principle the most intense. Here and there indeed frequently there is a dash of humor and sarcasm almost equal to some of the prose passages in " Billy Bluff." At any rate, I am proud that a combination of circumstances has enabled me to preserve this precious remem- brance of the men of " Ninety-eight ! " I hope it and the in- imitable satire of Billy Bluff will be taken home and cherished by Irishmen, and the sons and grandsons of Irishmen, as I have cherished and x reserved them for the last fifty years. As the History of Ireland at this period was closely connected with the American Eevolution, those relics will be interesting to the American citizen of the present day. As a rare literary cu- riosity they will arrest the attention of the man of letters every- where and in all time. THOMAS AINGE DEVYB -SPECIMENS OF "SONGS OF THE UNITED IRISHMEN." THE BUSHLIGHT. In the gay domains of France, where the graces skip and trip, sir, A famous light arose, which they called a will-o'-the-wisp, sir, This light it shone as bright and clear as Moses' famous bush-light, But the Emperor of Germany swore 'twas but a rushlight. And he puffed at the rushlight, he pulled at the rushlight, But all that he could do, he could not puff out the rushlight. The Don he curled his whiskers, and the little King of Naples, sir, Likewise the King of Turin, and they did what they were able, sir, With a host of foes from Tuscany, determined to crush light Though all Italy was squalling, they could not put out the rushlight The " Tigress of the North," so famed for spoil and plunder, sir, Whose eyes can send forth lightning, with a voice as loud as thunder, sir, With her petticoats raised such a wind as she surely thought would crush light But it only served to fan the flame that issued from the rushlight. Her crafty Prussian neighbor, rejoiced at this resistance, Affected still to lend his aid, but kept aloof his distance ; For though he screwed the bayonet on, yet he resolved to push light, And puny was the blast he blew at putting out the rushlight. Poor purblind, cuckold, Johnny Bull, begins to fear at home, sir, That the people will lead him a dance, 'cause under him they groan, sir, But Freedom's sons now form the line, tyrants tremble at the sight, The rush is dipped, the flame is caught ; see ! 'tis spreading glorious light. Huzza for the rushlight ! Huzza for the rushlight ! Johnny Bull, your wig's on fire, blazing with the rushlight CHTJBCH AND STATE, OB THE BECTOB'S GBEED. TUNE "Slack Joe." A Bector I am, do you mind what I say ? In the church every Sunday I preach and I pray, With my black coat, and cravat so white. Ye men of my parish, I pray you take heed, Till I give you a sketch of my time-serving creed; My creed it is cash, and my stipend salvation, For which I'd destroy all the swine in the nation, With my black coat, etc. I believe in my church, I believe hi my manse, I believe that religion is all a romance; With my black coat, eta. I believe that the only two comforts of life Are counting my stipend and kissing my wife; I believe that the people were born to be slaves, To be pilfer'd and plunder'd by us artful knaves, With our black coats, eta I believe that my head is the store-house of senses From which the pure gospel I freely dispense, With my black coat, eta. As it was forbid by an ancient divine, To throw precious pearls to ignorant swine; Complying with this, my ambition should be To keep them still bond slaves, ourselves being free With our black coats, etc. I believe that my brethren all think me sincere, For at church evey Sunday I read a long prayer, In my black coat, etc. And if they want grunting, I'll make the house rinj?, For at grunting they know me to be just the thing, I'll sigh and I'll groan, turn my eyes up to Heaven, For no other cause than the tithe that is given To buy black coats, etc. And now, my dear friends, for the sake of connexion, I'll end my discourse with a word of reflexion; In my black coat, etc. To believe as the great folks, for better for worse^ Is the only sure method of filling the purse ; Which method I'll follow, in spite of detraction; I'm sure of my pay while the court has- protection From the black coats, eta. BONGS OB THX Tm resolved my opinion shall be the same still With the court, whilst in pow'r, let them be what they wilL With my black coat, etc. Should they become Jews, I would join them in that, My faith in religion, I'd throw to the cat ; For my creed it is cash, and my stipend salvation, For which I'd destroy all the swine in the nation, With my black coat, etc. THE EIGHTS OF MAN. Trom " God Save the King." God save the rights of manl Give him a heart to scan Blessings so dear ! Let them be spread around. Wherever man is found, And with the welcome sound Bavish his ear ! See from the universe, Darkness and clouds disperse; Mankind, awake! Reason and truth appear, Freedom advances near, Monarchs with terror hear See how they quake I Long have we felt the stroke ! Long have we borne the yoke, Sluggish and tamo; But a new era shines, Enlight'ning all darkon'd mind| Spreading to distant climes, Liberty's flame ! Let us with France agree, And bid the world be free, - Leading the way. Should tyrants all conspire, Fearless of sword and lire. Freedom shall ne'er retire, Freedom shall sway ! Godlike and great the strife, Life will indeed be life, When we prevail; Death in so just cause, Crowns us with loud applause^ And from tyrannic laws, Bids us all hail! O'er the tyrannic pow'ro, Big indignation lowr's, Ready to fall! Let the rude savage host, In their long numbers boast, Freedom's our mighty trust, Spite of them all. Fame ! let thy trumpet sound. Tell to the world around, Frenchman are free. Tell ribbons, crowns, and stare, Kings, traitors, troops and \var% Plans, councils, plots and jar*, We will be free. God saye the rights of man Give him a heart to scan Blessings so dear; Let them be spread around, Wherever man is found ; And with the welcome sound Kavish his ear ! THE TEEE OF LIBEBTY. TUNE " Roalin Castle" The great reformation approaching, we hail ! 'Gainst statesmen and knaves, truth and reason prevail With rapture the heroes of liberty see, Preparing the soil of the globe for the trer\ Still hoping that freedom triumphant will sway, Whilst the voice of the people shall hail the new day, And end the dark councils of traitors combin'd A downfall of tyrants, and peace to mankind ! Ye Irish, for courage in battle renown'd For freedom and riches alas, empty sound ! Triumphant we came from the field and the main, To be conquer'd and plunder'd by statesman again Away with the splendor and pomp of a court; Our toil shall no longer the baubles support; No longer the slaves of a statesman or king, Inspired by the muses of Freedom we sing. Te trees of corruption in courts ye abound. OF THB The fruits ye produce are a curse to the ground; In the soil where ye flourish no other can grow I But see how the axe at your root aims the blow; Ever dear be the day, ever sacred the deed, Ever dear be the day on which millions were free! Yes, dear be the day which restor'd reason's sway, And fill'd royal robbers with rage and dismay. Still be firm, Hibernians still nobly disdain, And always the rights of your country maintain, Till, with souls of aversion, mankind shall arise, Burst the bands of oppression, and please the Allwise. May Heaven guard the people and their rights that are dea^ May they crush all their foetnen where e'er they appear i And end the dark councils of traitors combined, A downfall to tyrants and peace to mankind. THE JOVIAL FEIENDS. TUNE" When bidden to the Wake or Fair. n My jovial friends with social glee, The flowing can we'll quickly pass; Each breast will warm to liberty, While whiskey crowns each sparkling glaas A bumper filled, the toast shall be, Give us death or liberty ! While Gallia's sons with martial fire, And warm with patriot ardor glow ; While they to warlike deeds aspire, And panting long to meet the foe. To Gallic arms by land and sea, We'll drink success with three times thim, May French exertions never cease Till Europe shall reformed be, And union, liberty and peace, Succeed oppression's fell decree. Then every freeman's toast will be Union, peace and liberty. THE STAE OF LIBEETY. TUNE-" General Wolf." O'er the vlne-coyer'd hills and gay regions of France, See the day-star of liberty rise ! Through the clouds of detraction, unwearied advance, And hold its new course through the skies* tttflTED IBISHMEfc. An effulgence so mild, with a lustre so bright, All Europe with wonder surveys ; And from deserts of darkness, and dungeons of night, Contends for a share of the blaze. Let Burke like a bat, from his splendor retire, A lustre too strong for his eyes, Let pedants and fools his effusions admire, Entrapped in his cobwebs, like flies ; Shall frenzy and sophistry hope to prevail * Where reason opposes her weight ? When the welfare of millions is hung in the scale, And the balance yet trembles with fate ? Ah ! who 'midst the horrors of night would abide, That can taste ctie pure breezes of morn ? Or who that has drank of the crystuline tide, To the feculent flood would return? When the bosom of beauty the throbbing heart meets, Ah ! who can the transport decline ? Or who that has tasted of liberty's sweets, The prize but with life would resign ? But 'tis over high Heav'n the decision approves Oppression has struggled in vain ; To the hell she has formed Superstition removes ; And Tyranny bites his own chain. In the records of time a new era unfolds, All nature exults in its birth His creation, benign, the Creator beholds, And gives a new charter to earth. O catch its high import, ye winds as ye blow ! O bear it ye waves as ye roll ! From ^regions that feel the sun's vertical glow, To the farthest extremes of the pole. Equal rights, equal laws, to the nations around, Peace and friendship its precepts impart ? And wherever the footsteps of man shall be found, May he bind the decree on his heart. At page 101 Irish Section is an account of how I procured and preserved that imcoinparable satire, "Bluff and Firebrand." I here- with subjoin specimens of it. I printed 2,000 copies of it, and the same number of the "Songs of the United Irishmen." They are all gone. But I have the plates, and can print more if required. Every Means should now be pressed into the service. BILLY BLUFF AND SQUIRE FIREBRAND. "O. your honor, I did expect that they would stop at the sign where the United Irishmen meet; the sign that your honor hates so much." " What, the sign of Adam and Eve ? " ' The very same^- the father and mother of us all." " I always thought it an impudent, immodest, rebel- lious sign. Can there be greater impudence than to suppose or say that we are all from one stock gentry and commonality, lords and beggars, from the same first parent? ? " *' No, no, Billy, the thing is impossible in the presence of God." " So it surely is, your honor." '* And then, what an immodest sight; both as naked as the hour they were born, and everybody peeping at them from behind and before. But the worst of it all is, that it is the sign of liberty and equality. They had liberty, for they walked about without anything to control them but the walls of a big garden, nearly half the size of all Europe. They had equality, that's certain ; and every rascal claims relationship and equality with his bet- ters on that account ever since. It is for these reasons that the United Irishmen meet in that ' receptacle ' but I'll soon down with it; I'll soon banish Adam and Eve, and their damn'd liberty and barefaced equality." " How will your honor do it ? " " How will I do it ! Why, I'll write to my lord, who will write to the general, the general will order the colonel, the colonel will order the lieutenant-colonel, the lieutenant-colonel will order the captain, the captain will order the lieutenant, the lieutenant will order the ensign, the ensign will order the sergeant, and the ser- geant will order the soldiers to cut it down with their swords; and there will be an end to Adam and Eve." " O, your honor, that will be fine : it just puts me in mind of the story of the staff, and the dog, and the kid, and the bush of blackberries." " 1 don't know what the devil it puts you mind of, but it puts me in mind of my duty. Well, go on about the plot." ' Your honor, 1 have told you all I saw, but what I heard I cannot tell, for they spoke so low I could not hear them, only some dropping words." " Then where the d 1 is the plot ? " " Your honor knows that the plot must have been very deep, when they durst not speak out, when they both rode on one horse, and when they went into that wicked place." " Well, what were the dropping words you heard ? ; ' " ' Ireland,' for one; alter a little, * Union,' then ' Independence ; ' after that * Slavery ; ' then again ' Union.' After that I could not hear a word for above a mile. At length, I heard ' Liberty yet,' then I heard only three words' Caution. Obedience, Death.' " ' It is very bad, Billy, d d bad, and d d deeptobesur6; but who can make a plot out of it? His Majesty's Attorney-General could manage such a matter, to be sure, but how could we fill up the intermediate parts ? " " E'dad, as I am an honest man, if your honor makes up the middle, I'll swear to the whole." " That will do, Billy, that will do completely; I'll have that part settled. In the meantime, go to the kitchen and get some broth. There's Mr. Noddle- drum arrived. Go to the kitchen, Billy, arid make yourself comfort- able." " God bless your honor." " Mr. Nodd.'edrum, I am very happy to see you." " Neighbor Firebrand, your^ei \ ant, I am equally grlad to seo you, I do assure you." FIRE. Please to take a chair. NOD. Well, Mr. Firebrand, anything particular in the packets this morning ? FIRE. No, nothing to call particular ; some details about the Arch- duke changing his position, which shows his prudence and great general- ship. NOD. Any thing from Italy ? FIBB. No, very little. It appears Bonaparte's army is almost ruined, notwithstanding the trifling advantages lately gained over General Wurmser. Two hundred thousand men will certainly arrive from Hun- gary in the course of a fortnight, to drive the French entirely out of Italy. NOD. -That would be good news, Mr. Firebrand. BILLY BLUTF AND SQUIKB FIREBBAND. not appear, I think, that the junction of the two fleets had any other object than to exercise their men; and it is generally be- lieved that the equinoxial tempests, which are excessively severe in the Bay of Biscay, will drive them, every ship, to the bottom; indeed there <3an be little doubt of it. NOD. Why. 'tis true, such an event is not impossible ; but I never build too much on contingency. What wiU be, will be, Mr. Firebrand ; that, I believe, may be admitted as an undoubted truth. Anything from fche West- Indies ? FIRE. No, not a syllable. Yes, there is some mention of the yellow fever, but nothing very important. Government can easily supply the place of any men carried off by that pestilence ; we have men and ships plenty. What think you of our times at home, Mr. Noddledrum ? NOD. That's a hard question, I acknowledge. I have often heard it said that ' time is wise,' out whether past, present, or future, d'ye see, I do not know; but my Lord Mquntinumble is in a devil's pother about the times ; I had a letter from him yesterday ; he is most certainly very much frightened. Here is a hand bill which is privately circulated everywhere, which he enclosed me; he says it ought to fill every man in the country with dread and fear: HAND BILL. The last speech, confession, and dying words of the Times, which was executed on Alarm Hill, on Thursday, the 7th instant, tor the wilful and bloody murder of Tyranny, Superstition, and Hypocrisy Whereas, I was born of a wise, industrious, and provident parent, who supplied me with all knowledge, experience, and virtue, suited to my station. Having occasion to 300 the perfidy of courts, the arrogance of princes, the duplicity of statesmen, th3 bigotry of fools, the roguery of knaves, the struggles of despotism, and the triumph of freedom, I was led into daily temptation. I was, at one and the same time, blamed ana blaming, exposing and exposed; in me did wickedness thrive; in me was every villainy attempted, in me was the sword of war continued unsheathed, and in me has the liberty of opinion bceu stifled with the penalty of the forfeiture of life. For these atrocities I have been condemned to death, and die an unheeded and unregretteci monitor of the works of God. THE TIMES. FIBB. A very insinuating hand bill, Mr. Noddledrum. I don't at all wonder, upon my s 1, that my lord Mountmumbie should be sur- prised and alarmed and petrified at such unaccountable insinuations. No man can be too particular in exposing circumstances. NOD. Well, but neighbor Firebrand, the great question is, whether the times brought on the circumstances, or the circumstances the times ? There's the point, Mr. Firebrand there's the di faculty; show me the man who can clearly draw the distinction. FIBB. Why. Mr. Noddledrum, there is something puzzling in the questipn, or riddle, or whatever it is. But I'll tell you what there is one thing clear. That all things are very dark at present. NOD. All things are dark, if silence and quietness are darkness. But there is one comtort little said is soon mended. FIRE. Silence ! by G , Mr. Noddledrum, if the present silence goes on it will turn the world not only dumb but deaf. But I have hit upon some real plans that I hope you will approve of; all men should set tneir heads to work at the present time. A man is no man who will not do something. The last time I planned the county road over the big hill, to accommodate my lord's quarry, you agreed, and we carried it; now give me your assistance, and I am sure we'll do. My first plan is to swear the county. NOD. To swear the county ! FIRE. Yes, to swear the county ; not a comity meeting, but a county ewearing. NOD. Well, and what then ? FIKE. O, my dear sir, the happiest consequences, the very happiest 9ousequeuces must ensue. Loyalty will be found out; silence will be BILLY BLUFF AND SQTHRE FIREBRAND. obliged to speak out; my lord will know the chaff from the wheat; all things will then be known that ought to bo known ; all things will then be seen that ought to be seen, and all will be convinced, and satisfied, and happy. NOD. Why, Mr. Firebrand, we may try, I say we may try. But there Is one thing m my mind which weighs with mo about this forced swear- ing * A man convinced ag.'iinst his will Is of the same opinion still." FIRE. No matter about that; my idea Is new, and large, and grand. NOD. I'll be glad to hear it. FIBE. Why, it is this : I will get a bible on a new plan ; one that will produce awe, and terror, and veneration, and loyalty, and piety, and love, and allegiance. For, do you see, Mr. Noddledrum, a fellow now-a- days thinks no more of switching the primer, as as he calls it, on a little common, dirty, custom-house, thumb-bible, than he would think of swallowing a glass of whiskey. Now I will get Lord Mountmumble to lay my plan before government. The bible must be the size of a large chest of drawers, made of wood, painted, gilt, lettered, and bound like the outside of a book, and just so large that when turned edge-wise it may be brought in at the door of a church, meeting-house, or chapel. Instead of being called the Holy Bible, it shall be called the Koyal Bible, and there shall be on the back, these words, in great gold letters, M AX- EM1CO ROYALICO BJBLlCO. Now, my dear Noddledrum, is it not as clear as noon-day that when the church is full, or when the chapel is full, or when the meeting-house is full, and the royal bible in the middle, every man will swear at the word of command ? My lord, or the agent, or the clergyman, gets up, and says with a loud voice: " SWEAR AM,! SWEAR ALII! HWEAR ALL!" NOD. And what will they swear ? FIRE. First, the oath of allegiance, which will be printed on one side of the bible, and by the way ot explaining the whole meaning of it, there will be the following addition printed likewise: " And furthermore, I do so'crnnly swoar that, the king being a constituent part ot the constitution, the constitution is therefore perfect, and entitled to all men's veneration and obedience. " And furthermore, I do solemnly swear that the House of Commons, being a branch of the constitution, is a house of wisdom, a house of purity, a house of virtue, and the real, true, faithtul representative of the people. " Furthermore, I do solemnly swear that the Borrougha, being a part of our constitution, are the great source of our liberties, insomuch as they are never bought or sold ; that the men who represent them are freely chosen, and never receive the wages of corruption. " And furthermore, I do solemnly swear that the House of Lords, being a branch or the constitution, is endowed with all knowledge, and goodness, and patriotism, to the end of the world and lorever. " And furthermore, I do solemnly swear that the Church as by law established, being a branch of the constitution, insomuch as she is the lawful spouse ot the State, is a pure, vir- tuous, royal and divine Church, the supporter of kings, the receiver of tithes, the oncour- *ger of agriculture, the promoter of peace, and the saviour ot men's souls. " And furthermore, I do solemnly swear that whatever is told me by my landlord is right, whether true or false; that no man can have'virtue or common sense who is not rich in land; that the more money Is given to courtiers, the happier will the people be, and that a reform in parliament would be the ruin of the country. ' And all this I swear, without hesitation or reservation, on the great new royal bible, named, called, aud denominated according to act of parliament XAXEMICO ROYALICO BIBHCO." There is an explanation for you, Mr. Noddledrum ; there's an oath that may be called ai> oath, and goes '- +-he root narrow, and meaning of the Dir.LY BLUyiT AND SQUIRE S1REBBAND. allegiance oath. It cost my lord Mountmumble, councillor Elthorside, and myself, three days and nights to bring it to the perfection you see. NOD. It is, no doubt, very comprehensive and very significant; but suppose the people refuse to take it ? FIBE. That's impossible. The size of the book will frighten them; the splendor of it will dazale them; the novelty of it will captivate them, the loyalty of it will charm them. The idea of it is so big, it will drive all other ideas out of our heads, and they will swear instantly, without dread or fear. Besides, Mr. Noddledrum, there is a speech to be delivered on such occasions, which speech was made at th3 same time with the oath; it will be given gratis with the book, and will run thus: " All pood people, take re notice, that the times in which you live are times ol wonder and times of peril; observe that your forefathers lived before you, and that your children will live alter you, and that, therefore, ye all live in the middle ol time, which is most im- portant to yon, and of which you should take heed. To assist and support you in your pres- ent alarming state of ignorance and inattention, the present wise and good administra- tion, in whom you live, move, and have your being, hath had commiseration on your dan- ger nd distress, and forthwith hath sent this royal hible for your relief and instruction. This noble and disinterested clemency extends to the poor as well as the rich, showing and demonstrating unto you the impartiality of onr laws and wisdom of our rulers. Hith- erto you have been mocked with trifling, insignificant and petty bibles, fit only for common oaths between subject and subject; but very unworthy and unflt for securing the subject's loyalty to his king. Whence it folio ws that all oaths and obligations heretofore taken or entered into by you, either voluntary or involuntary, shall be swallowed up, lost, and anni- hilated in the solemnity, magnitude, and importance of the present sacred oath of allegi- ance, and which will fill you with wisdom, with piety and patriotism, as shall more fully appear by the said oath and its explanation, as printed ou the left side of MAXEMICO ROY- ALICO BIBLICO There's a speech for youthere's eloquence and conviction, persuasion, all together. Could Cicero have equalled that ? Could Charles Fox or Arthur O'Connor match it ? No, faith, it would be far from their hand. That puts an end to all disputes, all doubts, all fears at once. NOD. But pray, neighbor Firebrand, would not an oath taken on this huge wooden bible, which puts me in mind of the monstrous wooden horse that took Troy, be a hollow, empty, good-for-nothing wooden oath. FIBE. By no means ; for, to make all things sure and certain, I will have enclosed in each a new, large guinea bible. NOD. And would not this guinea bible do without a large case ? FIKE. In ordinary times it might ; but these are extraordinary times. and require extraordinary measures; besides I will candidly confess I have another view in this scheme. NOD. What is that ? FIBE. Why, the French may come, wars may happen, blood may be spilled, throats may be cut ; should not every man have a hiding place in the hour of danger, who wishes well to his own safety V NOD. What then ? FIRE. Why, 1 have contrived a trap door in the side of the bible. When the day comes that drums beat, trumpets sound, and cannons roar, by H s, let them fight that will fight, I'll creep in and lie down with Moses and the prophets. What think yoii of that ? NOD. I must confess there is a deal of contrivance in all that; but as to the wisdom or necessity of it, I will not take upon me to say. But pray Mr. Firebrand, what will be on the right side of the royal bible ? FIBE. The questions, Mr. Noddledrum, the questions. NOD. What questions ? FPRE. Every man will be questioned on his oath. Here are the ques- tions prepared and ready, which will be all printed on the right side of the big bible. QUESTION 1st. What is your name ? BILLY BLUFF AND SQUIRE FIREBRAND. 2d. Do you know any secret of which everybody else knows ? 3d. Did you ever meet a large body of men where nobody saw you ? 4th. Did you ever take an oath not to tell any body that you did take 5th. Did you ever talk treason with any person in private, where there was no person to hear you ? 6th. How many United Irishmen are yet to join the Union as they 7th. How long will it be till the whole nation becomes United ? 8th. Is not the silence that prevails in the country a proof of uproar and rebellion ? 9th. Ought not every man who complains of the king's ministers, and who asks a reform, be hanged ? 10th. If the United Irishmen in the different jails of the kingdom are put to death, will not all their brethren who are not in jail DOW their heads to the ground, lick the dust, and pray for their persecutors till the end of the world ? These are the ten primitive questions, which are to be printed in room of the ten commandments. Many smaller questions will no doubt arise as the examination goes on. NOD. Now, neighbor Firebrand, I am at a loss to know where all this will end. This is driving very fast; and drovers will tell you that, when cattle are driven too fast, they will either give up, run off the road, or turn upon their drivers. For my part, it has always been a maxim with me that easy and fair goes far in the day. . I have, to be sure, joined in getting the two young men imprisoned for shooting the wood- cock ; in putting farmer M in the stocks for striking my lord's spaniel that worried his lamb ; I assisted you in levying the double fine off the old Quaker for not paying his tithes ; I gave my consent to have the muskets taken out of the two popr men's houses, because they were not qualified to keep them ; and I joined in promoting the loyal depre- dations of the Orangemen. God forgive me. No surer proverb hi my mind than " It is a long lane that has no end." FIRE. Aye, Mr. Noddledrum, has it come to that V Foregad, I feared as much. I thought I saw you wavering for some time past. A melan- choly affair. Wifl you be so good as to oblige me with your reason for this change ? NOD. I can't tell how it happened, but things came strangely about. Last Wednesday three weeks upwards of three hundred reapers came to cut down my pats. I thanked them, told them my oats were all cut but one field, which was not ripe. I offered them drink, which they re- fused ; I forced thirty-seven of my own tenants, who were among them, to stay and dine with me. I asked them what all this was for ; and I understood that it all proceeded from my having turned off the two spies you hired for me, and from my giving orders that Barmy Foam, the guager, should bring me no more stories about his neighbors. FIBE. So then the two spies are discharged without having sworn away a single life ! NOD. They certainly are. FIBE. Good God ! and Barmy Foam, my lord Mountmumble's old footman, is gone, too ! NOD. He is no longer to bring news to me. FIBE. So much the more pity ; by my s 1, the fellow could squeeze loyalty out of the dregs of a beer barrel, and smoke treason in a roll of tobacco. NOD. No matter, I wash my hands clean of them all. FIBE. Then you may say that you wash your hands clean of all information respecting the country. Give up spies and informers, and you give up the king and constitution ; J see nothing else. There's Bluff; now you have no conception what news I get from him. Early and late he's on the watch, nothing escapes him, and he's ready at any moment to swear any thin? that would serve the cause. Thero'a BILLY BLUWT AND BQTJXRE ETEEBRAJTIX nothing wanting: now, to have things on a proper footing, but to htff* jury by trial, instead of trial by jury. NOD. How do you mean ? FIRE. Why, instead of having a parcel of silly, senseless, conci' entious blockheads chosen in every county. I would recommend to have a true, staunch, tried jury to travel the circuit: a jury that would not flinch ; a jury that would stick to their orders. In short, I would have them every man sworn to find such verdicts as the crown lawyers desired. Then let me see the man who dare say or think that adminis- tration ever did wrong, or ever will do wrong; that a reform was wanting, that public virtue was wanting, or that anything was wanting but halters and gibbets. E'gad, I would make short work of it. So you see, Mr. Noddledrum, you and I have got different views of things now. NOD. So it appears. FIEE. Well, but how did you and your tenants part ? I suppose you made them all drunk. NOD. Hearty: just hearty. They sung songs, drank toasts, and made merry. My heart, do you see, warmed to the boys, and I joined them in everything. They sung a favorite song, "Erin go bragh,"and when they came to a verse that says : Let's love one another, and never more part O ! ' Standing up. we were grasped in each others hands around the table; my heart melted within me ; the tear stood in my eye ; the rogues took me in the moment of my weakness, seized their glasses, and in a bum- per drank Union to Irishmen ! I swallowed it at one mouthful. It was no sooner down than a new and inexpressible sensation ran through all my frame; my head was filled with ecstacy and my heart with joy. I thought I was enchanted. Another song and another bum- per crowned my delight. The boys got up, departed with three huz- zas. I went to my bed-chamber, ordered the bed to be brought from be- hind the wall where you said I could sleep in safety, and, instead of undressing in the dark, as you do, I ordered two candles to be placed on the table. I threw my pistols into the fire, and my blunderbuss out at the window; I gave my fusee to the gardener ? and bid him shoot mag- Fies; I ordered the groom to take the two pitchforks into the stable: gave the pole and bayonet to the butler, to stab rats in the cellar; and I ordered Jean Jelly, the housekeeper, to take my broad sword and de- fend herself against Hosier's ghost, which, she says, haunts her every night in her sleep. I tumbled into bed and slept for ten hours, the only sound sleep I got these fourteen months. I would not give what happi- ness I have enjoyed since for Lord Mountmumble's estate. An honest man need not be afraid ; and I remember a text that my grandfather used U> preach on four times in the year : ' The wicked fleeth when no man pursueth.' For my part, I will take the chance with my country, and live and die in peace ; so, Mr. Firebrand good morning to you. FIEE. Sir, your servant The man is mad out of his senses The old scoundrel 1 his damn'd proverbs have turned his head Drank Union to Irishmen! He'll take chance with his country! He'll die in peace ! H 1 and d tion ! (Enter Billy Bluff in great haste.) "Tour honor, your honor! news, news horrid nows!' "What news?" "The vessel's lost!" ' What vessel?" " The vessel that was bringing over the bloodhounds from the West Indies to hunt the United Irishmen 1 She's taken by the French." " The devil take her and them both." "Here's a horrid song." 'What about?" "About Lord Mal- mesbury, and the peace, and a journey to Paris 1 How he and a hair- dresser fought a duel ; and how a republican coachman told him," on the youth of America would be the forecastle of the ship and the New York dance house. To build and equip one "Ironclad" and keep her in service lor a year would endow fifty agricultural and scientific schools, each on a thousand- acre farm. And which would be best the Schools or the Ironclad ? The great historical fact now stands forth that this Republic has. through this one fundamental mistake, (the boundless power to tax left In the hands of the politicians.) been a murdering during many years. If it had not unparalleled vitality it would have been stone dead long before now. Let us join together and save it. Under this new and purifying arrangement Republican Institutions will get fair play. When there will be no spoils there will be no plunderers. Patriotic men will naturally take control, and good laws in all things will naturally supersede the evils we now endure. Intelligence and efficiency in every department of the Republic will move steadily on. confined to their path, just as the street railcar is confined to its iron track. The Re- vised Constitution A\ill be the confining rail, beyond or out of which the business of the public can by no means be driven. Efficiency and hon- esty will prevail in every department as naturally as ever cause produced its effect. Its sunshine will throw light into the hearts of the uprising Democracies of Europe, and it will strike the knell of coming,' doom into the hearts of monarchy, oligarchy, land-stealing, and all the "royal" and " noble " and " right honorable " villanies that afflict the world. THOMAS A. DEVYR intends to found a Movement to carry out this GREAT CHANGE of limiting the power to tax. In the meanwhile, look out for the " Odd Book of the Nineteenth Century." now going through the press. Communicate with him at Greenpoint. N. Y. " What art thou freedom ? Thou art not as impostors say, A shadow soon to pass away : A superstition and a name. Echoing from the cave of fame; Fur the laborer thou art bread. And a comely table spread ; From his daily labor come, In a neat and happy home. "What is slavery? It is to work and have such pay. As just keeps life from day to day ; In your frame, as in a cell, For the tyrants use to dwell ; Bo that you for him art made, [spade ; Loom, and plough, and sword, and With, or without your own will bent, To his defence and nourishment." SHELLED. BRITISH ARISTOCRACY. See these inglorious Cincinnati swarm. Farmers of war dictators of the farm ; Their ploughshare was the sword in hireling hands, Their fields manured with gore of other lands. Safe in their barns, those Sabine tillers seat Their brethren out to battle why V For rent; Year after year they voted cent per cent, Blood, sweat, and tear-wrung millions. Why for rent; The peace has made on general malcontent. Of those high market patriots war was rent; Their love of country millions all misspent, How reconcile? By reconciling rent. And will they not repay the treasures lent? No. down with everything and up with rent. Their good. ill. health, wealth, joy or discontent. Being, end. aim, religion rent, rent, rent. A CONTRAST. Never was presented a more momentous contrast than by those two pictures on the following pages. They ought to be enlarged and elaborated by artists and engravers in the highest order of the Art. In. large size for framing. On India proof paper, with the expression of face preserved in the groups of each picture. Of suffering, sorrow and despair in the one group. Of courage, manhood and exultation in the other. Beautifully executed and framed, they would form at once the most interesting and instructive pictures that ever adorned either court or cottage. I suppose the two plates would cost $300. I will commence a subscription for the purpose with ten dollars. Who comes next? "This is the hour of heroes." AUTHOR OF "TnE ODD BOOK." And now, brothers, I take my leave, at least for the present. I have given you my experience of fifty years. And I offer you such advice as that long experience suggests. I had vowed a war against Land Monopoly till either it or I should die. " Our Natural Eights " (see ante) was my gage of battle to them. Five years ago, ere I entered the Irish World office, I had commenced this book. I then thought the old Thieves would outlive me, and I named my volume "MEMORIES or A LOST LITE." I don't think so now. Since that time and especially in the last two years a change has come over the order of battle, and now I have reasonable hope that I will yet live to see the last of the Thieves. And I hope to leave a memory behind me, that I helped to make honest men of them. \ P F= \ \ * /} % If 2c jdesk of any DILITY University of Californu Richmond, CA 94804-4698 ALL BOOKS MAY BE RECALLED AFTER 7 DAYS 2-month loans may be renewed by calling 5 ^(^642-6753 1-year loans may be recharged by bringing books to NRLF Renewals and recharges may be made 4 days prior to due date DUE AS STAMPED BELOW 19? MAR 2 3? MAY 8 1992 FEB 2 1 2001 v . 1 , \992 Hofo . DV6U. AUG A |3:dc CIRCUI ATION