THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES 9 '*.* * * VftYAYAVY THE ROMANCE OF OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Works of Mary Caroline Crawford The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees $1.50 The Romance of Old New England Churches 1.50 The College Girl of America 2.00 Little Pilgrimages Among Old New England Inns 2.00 St. Botolph's Town 2.50 L. C. PAGE & COMPANY New England Building, Boston, Mass. SIR HARRY FRANKLAND (S& jagg fUmtattr* of Ettglatti Mary Caroline Crawford Jluthor of ' ' The Romance of Old Neta England Churches, " "The College Girl of America, ' ' etc. LC PAGE- ^-COMPANY BOSTONS PUBLISHERS Copyright, 1902 BY L. C. PAGE & COMPANY (INCORPORATED) All rights reserved Ninth Impression, December, 1909 COLONIAL PRESS Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. S intends & Co. Boston, U.S.A. College Library FOREWORD rHESE little sketches have been written to supply what seemed to the author a real need, a volume which should give clearly, com- pactly, and with a fair degree of readable- ness, the stories connected with the surviv- ing old houses of New England. That de- lightful writer, Mr. Samuel Adams Drake, has in his many works on the historic mansions of colonial times, provided all necessary data for the serious student, and to him the deep indebtedness of this work is fully and frankly acknowledged. Yet there was no volume which gnvo entire the tales of chief interest to the majority of iii 963597 FOREWORD readers. It is, therefore, to such searchers after the romantic in New England's his- tory that the present book is offered. It but remains to mention with grati- tude the many kind friends far and near who have helped in the preparation of the material, and especially to thank Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Co., publishers of the works of Hawthorne, Whittier, Longfel- low, and Higginson, by permission of and special arrangement with whom the selec- tions of the authors named, are used ; the Macmillan Co., for permission to use the extracts from Lindsay Swift's " Brook Farm " ; G. P. Putnam's Sons for their kindness in allowing quotations from their work, "Historic Towns of New England" ; Small, Maynard & Co., for the use of the anecdote credited to their Beacon Biogra- phy of Samuel F. B. Morse ; Little, Brown & Co., for their marked courtesy in the iv FOREWORD extension of quotation privileges, and Mr. Samuel T. Pickard, Whittier's literary ex- ecutor, for the new Whittier material here given. M. c. o. Charleston, Massachusetts, 1902. " All houses wherein men have lived and died are haunted houses." Longfellow. " So very difficult a matter is it to trace and find out the truth of anything by history." Plutarch. "... Common as light is love, And its familiar voice wearies not ever." Shelley. " . . . / discern Infinite passion and the pain Of finite hearts that yearn" Browning. 'Tis an old tale and often told." Scott. CONTENTS Page Foreword iii The Heir of Swiff s Vanessa 11 The Maid of Marblehead 87 An American-Born Baronet 59 Molly Stark's Gentleman-Son 74 A Soldier of Fortune 90 The Message of the Lanterns 104 Hancock's Dorothy Q. 117 Baroness Riedesel and Her Tory Friends 180 Doctor Church : First Traitor to the American Cause 147 A Victim of Two Revolutions 159 The Woman Veteran of the Con- tinental Army 170 The Redeemed Captive 190 New England's First " Club Woman " 21 In the Reign of the Witches 225 Lady Wentworth of the Hall 241 An Historic Tragedy 251 Inventor Morse's Unfulfilled Ambi- tion 264 Where the " Brothers and Sisters " Met 279 vu CONTENTS Page The Brook Farmers 293 Margaret Fuller : Marchesa d'Ossoli 307 The Old Manse and Some of Its Mosses 324 Salem's Chinese God 341 The Well-Sweep of a Song 356 Whittier's Lost Love 366 Yin LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Page Sir Harry Frankland (See page Jfi) Frontispiece Whitehall, Newport, R. I. 31 Royall House, Medford, Mass. Pepperell House, Kittery, Maine 66 General Lee's Headquarters, Somer- ville, Mass. 94 Christ Church Paul Revere House, Boston, Mass. 104 Dorothy Q. House, Quincy, Mass. 123 Riedesel House, Cambridge, Mass. 145 Swan House, Dorchester, Mass. 164 Gannett House, Sharon, Mass. 188 Williams House, Deerfield, Mass. 193 Old Witch House, Salem, Mass. 225 Governor Wentworth House, Ports- mouth, N. H. 246 Fairbanks House, Dedham, Mass. 260 Brook Farm, West Roxbury, Mass. 296 Old Manse, Concord, Mass. 324 Whittier's Birthplace, East Haver- hill, Mass. 380 THE ROMANCE OF OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES 11 TOWHERE in the annals of our / ^ history is recorded an odder phase of curious fortune than that by which Bishop Berkeley, of Cloyne, was enabled early in the eighteentli century to sail o'erseas to Newport, Rhode Island, there to build (in 1729) the beautiful old place, Whitehall, which is still standing. Hundreds of interested visitors drive every summer to the old house, to take a cup of tea, to muse on the strange story 11 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTEEES with which the ancient dwelling is con- nected, and to pay the meed of respectful memory to the eminent philosopher who there lived and wrote. The poet Pope once assigned to this bishop " every virtue under heaven," and this high reputation a study of the man's character faithfully confirms. As a stu- dent at Dublin University, George Berke- ley won many friends, because of his handsome face and lovable nature, and many honours by reason of his brilliancy in mathematics. Later he became a fel- low of Trinity College, and made the ac- quaintance of Swift, Steele, and the other members of that brilliant Old World liter- ary circle, by all of whom he seems to have been sincerely beloved. A large part of Berkeley's early life was passed as a travelling tutor, but soon after Pope had introduced him to the 12 Earl of Burlington, he was made dean of Derry, through the good offices of that gentleman, and of his friend, the Duke of Grafton, then Lord Lieutenant of Ire- land. Berkeley, however, never cared for personal aggrandisement, and he had long been cherishing a project which he soon announced to his friends as a " scheme for converting the savage Americans to Chris- tianity by a college to be erected in the Summer Islands, otherwise called the Isles of Bermuda." In a letter from London to his life-long friend and patron, Lord Percival, then at Bath, we find Berkeley, under date of March, 1723, writing thus of the enter- prise which had gradually fired his imag- ination : " It is now about ten months since I have determined to spend the residue of my days in Bermuda, where I trust in Providence I may be the mean 13 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES instrument of doing great good to man- kind. The reformation of manners among the English in our western plantations, and the propagation of the gospel among the American savages, are two points of high moment. The natural way of doing this is by founding a college or seminary in some convenient part of the West Indies, where the English youth of our plantations may be educated in such sort as to supply their churches with pastors of good morals and good learning a thing (God knows) much wanted. In the same seminary a number of young American savages may also be educated until they have taken the degree of Master of Arts. And being by that time well instructed in the Christian religion, practical mathematics, and other liberal arts and sciences, and early imbued with public-spirited principles and inclina- tions, they may become the fittest instru- 14 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ments for spreading religion, morals, and civil life among their countrymen, who can entertain no suspicion or jealousy of men of their own blood and language, as they might do of English missionaries, who can never be well qualified for that work." Berkeley then goes on to describe the plans of education for American youths which he had conceived, gives his reasons for preferring the Bermudas as a site for the college, and presents a bright vision of an academic centre from which should radiate numerous beautiful influences that should make for Christian civilisation in America. Even the gift of the best dean- ery in England failed to divert him from thoughts of this Utopia. " Derry," he wrote, " is said to be worth 1,500 per annum, but I do not consider it with a view to enriching myself. I shall be perfectly 15 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES contented if it facilitates and recommends my scheme of Bermuda." But the thing which finally made it possible for Berkeley to come to America, the incident which is responsible for Whitehall's existence to-day in a grassy valley to the south of Honeyman's Hill, two miles back from the " second beach," at Newport, was the tragic ending of as sad and as romantic a story as is to be found anywhere in the literary life of England. Swift, as has been said, was one of the friends who was of great service to Berke- ley when he went up to London* for the first time. The witty and impecunipus dean had then been living in London for more than four years, in his " lodging in Berry Street," absorbed in the political intrigue of the last years of Queen Anne, and sending to Stella, in Dublin, the daily 16 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES journal, which so faithfully preserves the incidents of those years. Under date of an April Sunday in 1713, we find in this journal these lines, Swift's first mention of our present hero: " I went to court to-day on purpose to present Mr. Berkeley, one of our fellows at Trinity College. That Mr. Berkeley is a very ingenious man, and a great philosopher, and I have mentioned him to all the ministers, and have given them some of his writings, and I will favour him as much as I can." In the natural course of things Berkeley soon heard much, though he saw scarcely anything, of Mrs. Vanhomrigh and her daughter, the latter the famous and un- happy " Vanessa," both of whom were set- tled at this time in Berry Street, near Swift, in a house where, Swift writes to Stella, " I loitered hot and lazy after my morning's work," and often dined " out 17 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of mere listlessness," keeping there " my best gown and perriwig " when at Chelsea. Mrs. Vanhomrigh was the widow of a Dutch merchant, who had followed William the Third to Ireland, and there obtained places of profit, and her daughter, Esther, or Hester, as she is variously called, was a girl of eighteen when she first met Swift, and fell violently in love with him. This passion eventually proved the girl's perdi- tion, and was, as we shall see, the cause of a will which enabled Dean Berkeley to carry out his dear and cherished scheme of coming to America. Swift's journal, frank about nearly everything else in the man's life, is signifi- cantly silent concerning Esther Vanhom- righ. And in truth there was little to be said to anybody, and nothing at all to be confided to Stella, in regard to this un- happy affair. That Swift was flattered to 18 find this girl of eighteen, with beauty and accomplishment, caring so much for him, a man now forty-four, and bound by honour, if not by the Church, to Stella, one cannot doubt. At first, their relations seem to have been simply those of teacher and pupil-, and this phase of the matter it is which is most particularly described in the famous poem, " Cadenus and Vanessa/' written at Windsor in 1713, and first pub- lished after Vanessa's death. Human nature has perhaps never before or since presented the spectacle of a man of such transcendent powers as Swift in- volved in such a pitiable labyrinth of the affections as marked his whole life. Pride or ambition led him to postpone indefi- nitely his marriage with Stella, to whom he was early attached. Though he said he " loved her better than his life a thou- sand millions of times," he kept her 19 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES always hanging on in a state of hope de- ferred, injurious alike to her peace and her reputation. And because of Stella, he dared not afterward with manly sincerity admit his undoubted affection for Vanessa. For, if one may believe Doctor Johnson, he married Stella in 1716, though he died without acknowledging this union, and the date given would indicate that the ceremony occurred while his devotion to his young pupil was at its height Touching beyond expression is the story of Vanessa after she had gone to Ireland, as Stella had gone before, to be near the presence of Swift. Her life was one of deep seclusion, chequered only by the oc- casional visits of the man she adored, each of which she commemorated by planting with her own hand a laurel in the garden where they met. When all her devotion and her offerings had failed to 20 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES impress him, she sent him remonstrances which reflect the agony of her mind : " The reason I write to you," she says, " is because I cannot tell it you should I see you. For when I begin to complain, then you are angry; and there is some- thing in your looks so awful, that it strikes me dumb. Oh ! that you may have but so much regard for me left that this com- plaint may touch your soul with pity. I say as little as ever I can. Did you but know what I thought, I am sure it would move you to forgive me, and believe that I cannot help telling you this and live." Swift replies with the letter full of ex- cuses for not seeing her oftener, and ad- vises her to " quit this scoundrel island." Yet he assures her in the same breath, " que jamais personne du monde a ete aimee, honoree, estim^e, adore"e, par votre ami que vous." 21 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES The tragedy continued to deepen as it approached the close. Eight years had Vanessa nursed in solitude the hopeless attachment. At length (in 1723) she wrote to Stella to ascertain the nature of the connection between her and Swift. The latter obtained the fatal letter, and rode instantly to Marley Abbey, the residence of Vanessa. "As he entered the apart- ment," to quote the picturesque language Scott has used in recording the scene, " the sternness of his countenance, which was peculiarly formed to express the stronger passions, struck the unfortunate Vanessa with such terror, that she could scarce ask whether he would not sit down. He an- swered by flinging a letter on the table; and instantly leaving the house, mounted his horse, and returned to Dublin. When Vanessa opened the packet, she found only her own letter to Stella. It was her death- 22 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES warrant. She sunk at once under the disappointment of the delayed, yet cher- ished hopes which had so long sickened her heart, and beneath the unrestrained wrath of him for whose sake she had in- dulged them. How long she survived this last interview is uncertain, but the time does not seem to have exceeded a few weeks." Strength to revoke a will made in favour of Swift, and to sign another (dated May 1, 1723) which divided her estate between Bishop Berkeley and Judge Mar- shall, the poor young woman managed to summon from somewhere, however. Berkeley she knew very slightly, and Mar- shall scarcely better. But to them both she entrusted as executors her correspondence with Swift, and the poem, " Cadenus and Vanessa," which she ordered to be pub- lished after her death. 28 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Doctor Johnson, in his " Life of Swift," says of Vanessa's relation to the misan- thropic dean, " She was a young woman fond of literature, whom Decanus, the dean (called Cadenus by transposition of the letters), took pleasure in directing and interesting till, from being proud of his praise, she grew fond of his person. Swift was then about forty-seven, at the age when vanity is strongly excited by the amorous attention of a young woman." The poem with which these two lovers are always connected, was founded, ac- cording to the story, on an offer of mar- riage made by Miss Vanhomrigh to Doctor Swift. In it, Swift thus describes his situation : " Cadenus, common forms apart, In every scene had kept his heart ; Had sighed and languished, vowed and writ For pastime, or to show his wit, But books and time and state affairs 24 OLD NEW EXGLAXD ROOFTREES Had spoiled his fashionable airs ; He now could praise, esteem, approve, But understood not what was love : His conduct might have made him styled A father and the nymph his child. That innocent delight he took To see the virgin mind her book, Was but the master's secret joy In school to hear the finest boy." That Swift was not always, however, so Platonic and fatherly in his expressions of affection for Vanessa, is shown in a " Poem to Love," found in Miss Vanhom- righ's desk after her death, in his hand- writing. One verse of this runs : " In all I wish how happy should I be, Thou grand deluder, were it not for thee. So weak thou art that fools thy power despise, And yet so strong, thou triumph'st o'er the wise." After the poor girl's unhappy decease, Swift hid himself for two months in the south of Ireland. Stella was also shocked by the occurrence, but when some one re- 25 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES marked in her presence, apropos of the poem which had just appeared, that Va- nessa must have been a remarkable woman to inspire such verses, she observed with perfect truth that the dean was quite capa- ble of writing charmingly upon a broom- stick. Meanwhile Berkeley was informed of the odd stroke of luck by which he was to gain a small fortune. Characteristically, his thoughts turned now more than ever to his Bermuda scheme. " This provi- dential event," he wrote, " having made many things easy in my private affairs which were otherwise before, I have high hopes for Bermuda." Swift bore Berkeley absolutely no hard feeling on account of Vanessa's substitu- tion of his name in her will. He was quite as cordial as ever. One of the witty dean's most remarkable letters, addressed to Lord 26 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Carteret, at Bath, thus describes Berkeley's previous career and present mission : " Going to England very young, about thirteen years ago, the bearer of this became founder of a sect called the Immaterial- ists, by the force of a very curious book upon that subject. . . . He is an absolute philosopher with regard to money, titles, and power; and for three years past has been struck with a notion of founding a university at Bermudas by a charter from the Crown. . . . He showed me a little tract which he designs to publish, and there your Excellency will see his whole scheme of the life academico-philosophical, of a college founded for Indian scholars and missionaries, where he most exorbi- tantly proposes a whole hundred pounds a year for himself. . . . His heart will be broke if his deanery be not taken from him, and left to your Excellency's disposal. 27 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES I discouraged him by the coldness of Courts and Ministers, who will interpret all this as impossible and a vision; but nothing will do." The history of Berkeley's reception in London, when he came to urge his project, shows convincingly the magic of the man's presence and influence. His conquests spread far and fast. In a generation represented by Sir Robert Walpole, the scheme met with encouragement from all sorts of people, subscriptions soon reaching 5,000, and the list of promoters including even Sir Robert himself. Bermuda became the fashion among the wits of London, and Bolingbroke wrote to Swift that he would " gladly exchange Europe for its charms only not in a missionary capacity." But Berkeley was not satisfied with mere subscriptions, and remembering what Lord Percival had said about the protection and 28 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES aid of government he interceded with George the First, and obtained royal en- couragement to hope for a grant of 20,000 to endow the Bermuda college. During the four years that followed, he lived in London, negotiating with brokers, and otherwise forwarding his enterprise of so- cial idealism. With Queen Caroline, con- sort of George the Second, he used to dis- pute two days a week concerning his favourite plan. At last his patience was rewarded. In September, 1728, we find him at Green- wich, ready to sail for Rhode Island. " To- morrow," he writes on September 3 to Lord Percival, " we sail down the river. Mr. James and Mr. Dalton go with me; so doth my wife, a daughter of the late Chief Justice Forster, whom I mar- ried since I saw your lordship. I chose her for her qualities of mind, and her un- 29 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES affected inclination to books. She goes with great thankfulness, to live a plain farmer's life, and wear stuff of her own spinning. I have presented her with a spinning-wheel. Her fortune was 2,000 originally, but travelling and exchange have reduced it to less than 1,500 English money. I have placed that, and about 600 of my own, in South Sea annuities." Thus in the forty-fourth year of his life, in deep devotion to his Ideal, and full of glowing visions of a Fifth Empire in the West, Berkeley sailed for Rhode Island in a " hired ship of two hundred and fifty tons." The New England Courier of that time gives this picture of his disembarkation at Newport : " Yesterday there arrived here Dean Berkeley, of Londonderry. He is a gentleman of middle stature, of an agreeable, pleasant, and erect aspect. He 30 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES was ushered into the town with a great number of gentlemen, to whom he behaved himself after a very complaisant manner." So favourably was Berkeley impressed by Newport that he wrote to Lord Perci- val : " I should not demur about situating our college here." And as it turned out, Newport was the place with which Berke- ley's scheme was to be connected in history. For it was there that he lived all three years of his stay, hopefully awaiting from England the favourable news that never cama In loyal remembrance of the palace of his monarchs, he named his spacious home in the sequestered valley Whitehall. Here he began domestic life, and became the father of a family. The neighbouring groves and the cliffs that skirt the coast offered shade and silence and solitude very soothing to his spirit, and one wonders not 81 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES that he wrote, under the projecting rock that still bears his name, " The Minute Philosopher," one of his most noted works. The friends with whom he had crossed the ocean went to stay in Boston, but no solici- tations could withdraw him from the quiet of his island home. " After my long fatigue of business," he told Lord Perci- val, " this retirement is very agreeable to me ; and my wife loves a country life and books as well as to pass her time contin- ually and cheerfully without any other conversation than her husband and the dead." For the wife was a mystic and a quietist. But though Berkeley waited patiently for developments which should denote the realisation of his hopes, he waited always in vain. From the first he had so planned his enterprise that it was at the mercy of Sir Robert Walpole ; and at last came the 32 crisis of the project, with which the astute financier had never really sympathised. Early in 1730, Walpole threw off the mask. " If you put the question to me as a minister," he wrote Lord Percival, " I must and can assure you that the money shall most undoubtedly be paid as soon as suits with public convenience; but if you ask me as a friend whether Dean Berkeley should continue in America, ex- pecting the payment of 200,000, I advise him by all means to return to Europe, and to give up his present expectations." When acquainted by his friend Percival with this frank statement, Berkeley ac- cepted the blow as a philosopher should. Brave and resolutely patient, he prepared for departure. His books he left as a gift to the library of Yale College, and his farm of Whitehall was made over to the same institution, to found three scholar- 33 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ships for the encouragement of Greek and Latin study. His visit was thus far from being barren of results. He supplied a decided stimulus to higher education in the colonies, in that he gave out counsel and help to the men already working for the cause of learning in the new coun- try. And he helped to form in Newport a philosophical reunion, the effects of which were long felt. In the autumn of 1731 he sailed from Boston for London, where he arrived in January of the next year. There a bishop- ric and twenty years of useful and honour- able labour awaited him. He died at Ox- ford, whence he had removed from his see at Cloyne, on Sunday evening, January 14, 1753, while reading aloud to his family the burial service portion of Corinthians. He was buried in the Cathedral of Christ Church. 34 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Of the traces he left at Newport, there still remain, beside the house, a chair in which he was wont to write, a few books and papers, the organ presented by him to Trinity Church, the big family portrait, by Smibert and the little grave in Trinity churchyard, where, on the south side of the Kay monument, sleeps " Lucia Berkeley, obiit, the fifth of September, 1731." Moreover the memory of the man's beautiful, unselfish life pervades this sec- tion of Rhode Island, and the story of his sweetness and patience under a keen and unexpected disappointment furnishes one of the most satisfying pages in our early history. The life of Berkeley is indeed greater than anything that he did, and one wonders not as one explores the young preacher's noble and endearing character that the dis- traiight Vanessa fastened upon him, though 35 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES she knew him only by reputation, as one who would make it his sacred duty to do all in his power to set her memory right in a censorious world. 36 THE MAID OF MARBLEHEAD all the romantic narratives which enliven the pages of early colonial history, none appeals more directly to the interest and imagination of the lover of what is picturesque than the story of Agnes Surriage, the Maid of Marble- head. The tale is so improbable, according to every-day standards, so in form with the truest sentiment, and so calculated to sat- isfy every exaction of literary art, that even the most credulous might be forgiven for ascribing it to the fancy of the ro- mancer rather than to the research of the historian. Yet when one remembers that the scene 37 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of the first act of Agnes Surriage's life drama is laid in quaint old Marblehead, the tale itself instantly gains in credibility. For nothing would be too romantic to fit Marblehead. This town is fantastic in the extreme, builded, to quote Miss Alice Brown, who has written delightfully of Agnes and her life, " as if by a generation of autocratic landowners, each with a wilful bee in his bonnet." * For Marble- head is no misnomer, and the early settlers had to plant their houses and make their streets as best they could. As a matter of stern fact, every house in Marblehead had to be like the wise man's in the Bible: " built upon a rock." The dwellings them- selves were founded upon solid ledges, while the principal streets followed the nat- ural valleys between. The smaller divid- 1 "Three Heroines of New England Romance." Little, Brown & Co. 38 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ing paths led each and every one of them to the impressive old Town House, and to that other comfortable centre of social in- terests, the Fountain Inn, with its near-by pump. This pump, by the bye, has a very real connection with the story of Agnes Surriage, for it was here, according to one legend, that Charles Henry Frankland first saw the maid who is the heroine of our story. The gallant Sir Harry was at this time (1742) collector of the port of Boston, a place to which he had been appointed shortly before, by virtue of his family's great influence at the court of George the Second. No more distinguished house than that of Frankland was indeed to be found in all England at this time. A lineal de- scendant of Oliver Cromwell, our hero was born in Bengal, May 10, 1716, during his father's residence abroad as governor of the 39 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES East India Company's factory. The per- sonal attractiveness of Frankland's whole family was marked. It is even said that a lady of this house was sought in marriage by Charles the Second, in spite of the fact that a Capulet-Montague feud must ever have existed between the line of Cromwell and that of Charles Stuart. Young Harry, too, was clever as well as handsome. The eldest of his father's seven sons, he was educated as befitted the heir to the title and to the family estate at Thirkleby and Mattersea. He knew the French and Latin languages well, and, what is more to the point, used his mother tongue with grace and elegance. Botany and landscape-gardening were his chief amusements, while with the great litera- ture of the day he was as familiar as with the great men who made it. As early as 1738, when he was twenty- 40 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES two, he had come into possession of an ample fortune, but when opportunity of- fered to go to America with Shirley, his friend, he accepted the opening with avid- ity. Both young men, therefore, entered the same year (1741) on their offices, the one as Collector of the Port, and the other as Governor of the Colony. And both rep- resented socially the highest rank of that day in America. " A baronet," says Reverend Elias Na- son, from whose admirable picture of Bos- ton in Frankland's time all writers must draw for reliable data concerning our hero, "a baronet was then approached with greatest deference ; a coach and four, with an armorial bearing and liveried servants, was a munition against indignity ; in those dignitaries who, in brocade vest, gold lace coat, broad ruffled sleeves, and small- clothes, who, with three-cornered hat and 41 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES powdered wig, side-arras and silver shoe buckles, promenaded Queen Street and the Mall, spread themselves through the King's Chapel, or discussed the measures of the Pelhams, Walpole, and Pitt at the Rose and Crown, as much of aristocratic pride, as much of courtly consequence displayed itself as in the frequenters of Hyde Park or Regent Street." This, then, was the manner of man who, to transact some business connected with Marblehead's picturesque Fort Sewall, then just a-building, came riding down to the rock-bound coast on the day our story opens, and lost his heart at the Foun- tain Inn, where he had paused for a long draught of cooling ale. For lo ! scrubbing the tavern floor there knelt before him a beautiful child-girl of sixteen, with black curling hair, dark eyes, and a voice which proved to be of bird- 42 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES like sweetness when the maiden, glancing up, gave her good-day to the gallant's greeting. The girl's feet were bare, and this so moved Frankland's compassion that he gently gave her a piece of gold with which to buy shoes and stockings, and rode thoughtfully away to conduct his business at the fort. Yet he, did not forget that charming child just budding into winsome woman- hood whom he had seen performing with patience and grace the duties that fell to her lot as the poor daughter of some hon- est, hard-working fisherfolk of the town. When he happened again to be in Marble- head on business, he inquired at once for her, and then, seeing her feet still without shoes and stockings, asked a bit teasingly what she had done with the money he gave her. Quite frankly she replied, blushing the while, that the shoes and stockings were 43 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES bought, but that she kept them to wear to meeting. Soon after this the young col- lector went to search out Agnes's parents, Edward and Mary Surriage, from whom he succeeded in obtaining permission to remove their daughter to Boston to be edu.- cated as his ward. When one reads in the old records the entries for Frankland's salary, and finds that they mount up to not more than 100 sterling a year, one wonders that the young nobleman should have been so ready to take upon himself the expenses of a girl's elegant education. But it must be remem- bered that the gallant Harry had money in his own right, besides many perquisites of office, which made his income a really splendid one. Certainly he spared no ex- pense upon his ward. She was taught reading, writing, grammar, music, and em- broidery by the best tutors the town could 44 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES provide, and she grew daily, we are told, in beauty and maidenly charm. Yet in acquiring these gifts and graces she did not lose her childish sweetness and simplicity, nor the pious counsel of her mother, and the careful care of her Marblehead pastor. Thus several years passed by, years in which Agnes often vis- ited with her gentle guardian the residence in Roxbury of Governor Shirley and his gifted wife, as well as the stately Royall place out on the Medford road. The reader who is familiar with Mr, Bynner's story of Agnes Surriage will re- call how delightfully Mrs. Shirley, the wife of the governor, is introduced into his romance, and will recollect with pleasure his description of Agnes's ride to Roxbury in the collector's coach. This old mansion is now called the Governor Eustis House, and there are those still living who remem- 45 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ber when Madam Eustis lived there. This grand dame wore a majestic turban, and the tradition still lingers of madame's pet toad, decked on gala days with a blue rib- bon. Now the old house is sadly dilapi- dated; it is shorn of its piazzas, the sign " To Let " hangs often in the windows, and the cupola is adorned with well-filled clothes-lines. Partitions have cut the house into tenements; one runs through the hall, but the grand old staircase and the smaller one are still there, and the mar- ble floor, too, lends dignity to the back hall. A few of the carved balusters are missing, carried away by relic hunters. In this house, which was the residence of Gov- ernors Shirley and Eustis, Washington, Hamilton, Burr, Franklin, and other nota- bles were entertained. The old place is now entirely surrounded by modern dwell- ing-houses, and the pilgrim who searches 46 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES for it must leave the Mount Pleasant elec- tric car at Shirley Street. Yet, though Agnes as a maid was re- ceived by the most aristocratic people of Boston, the ladies of the leading families refused to countenance her when she became a fine young woman whom Sir Harry Frankland loved but cared not to marry. That her protector had not meant at first to wrong the girl he had befriended seems fairly certain, but many circum- stances, such as the death of Agnes's father and Frankland's own sudden elevation to the baronetcy, may be held to have con- spired to force them into the situation for which Agnes was to pay by many a day of tears and Sir Harry by many a night of bitter self-reproach. For Frankland was far from being a libertine. And that he sincerely loved the beautiful maid of Marblehead is certain. 47 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES He has come down to us as one of the most knightly men of his time, a gentleman and a scholar, who was also a sincere follower of the Church of England and its teach- ings. Both in manner and person he is said to have greatly resembled the Earl of Chesterfield, and his diary as well as his portrait show him to have been at once sensitive and virile ; quite the man, indeed, very effectually to fascinate the low-born beauty he had taught to love him. The indignation of the ladies in town toward Frankland and his ward made the baronet prefer at this stage of the story ru- ral Hopkinton to censorious Boston. Rev- erend Roger Price, known to us as rector of King's Chapel, had already land and a mission church in this village, and so, when Boston frowned too pointedly, Frankland purchased four hundred odd acres of him, and there built, in 1751, a commodious 48 , OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES mansion-house. The following year he and Agnes took up their abode on the place. Here Frankland passed his days, content- edly pursuing his horticultural fad, an- gling, hunting, overseeing his dozen slaves, and reading with his intelligent companion the latest works of Richardson, Steele, Swift, Addison, and Pope, sent over in big boxes from England. The country about Hopkinton was then as to-day a wonder of hill and valley, meadow and stream, while only a dozen miles or so from Frankland Hall was the famous Wayside Inn. That Sir Harry's Arcady never came to bore him was, per- haps, due to this last fact. Whenever guests were desired the men from Boston could easily ride out to the inn and canter over to the Hall, to enjoy the good wines and the bright talk the place afforded. Then the village rector was always to be 49 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES counted on for companionship and breezy chat. It is significant that Sir Harry care- fully observed all the forms of his relig- ion, and treated Agnes with the respect due a wife, though he still continued to neglect the one duty which would have made her really happy. A lawsuit called the two to England in 1754. At Frankland's mother's home, where the eager son hastened to bring his beloved one, Agnes was once more sub- jected to martyrdom and social ostracism. As quickly as they could get away, there- fore, the young people journeyed to Lis- bon, a place conspicuous, even in that day of moral laxity, for its tolerance of the alliance libre. Henry Fielding (who died in the town) has photographically de- scribed for all times its gay, sensuous life. Into this unwholesome atmosphere, quite new to her, though she was neither maid 50 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES nor wife, it was that the sweet Agnes was thrust by Frankland. Very soon he was to perceive the mistake of this, as well as of several other phases of his selfishness. On All Saint's Day morning, 1755, when the whole populace, from beggar to priest, courtier to lackey, was making its way to church, the town of Lisbon was shaken to its foundations by an earthquake. The shock came about ten o'clock, just as the Misericordia of the mass was being sung in the crowded churches ; and Frank- land, who was riding with a lady on his way to the religions ceremony, was im- mersed with his companion in the ruins of some falling houses. The horses attached to their carriage were instantly killed, and the lady, in her terror and pain, bit through the sleeve of her escort's red broadcloth coat, tearing the flesh with her teeth. Frankland had some awful moments for 51 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES thought as he lay there pinned down by the fallen stones, and tortured by the pain in his arm. Meanwhile Agnes, waiting at home, was prey to most terrible anxiety. As soon as the surging streets would permit a foot passenger, she ran out with all the money she could lay hands on, to search for her dear Sir Harry. By a lucky chance, she came to the very spot where he was lying white with pain, and by her offers of abundant reward and by gold, which she fairly showered on the men near by, she succeeded in extricating him from his fear- ful plight. Tenderly he was borne to a neighbouring house, and there, as soon as he could stand, a priest was summoned to tie the knot too long ignored. He had vowed, while pinned down by the weight of stone, to amend his life and atone to Agnes, if God in his mercy should see fit 52 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES to deliver him, and he wasted not a moment in executing his pledge to Heaven. That his spirit had been effectually chastened, one reads between the lines of this entry in his diary, which may still be seen in the rooms of the Massachusetts Historical Society in Boston : " Hope my providential escape will have a lasting good effect upon my mind." In order to make his marriage doubly sure, he had the ceremony performed again by a clergyman of his own church on board the ship which he took at once for Eng- land. Then the newly married pair pro- ceeded once more to Frankland's home, and this time there were kisses instead of cold- ness for them both. Business in Lisbon soon called them back to the Continent, however, and it was from Belem that they sailed in April, 1750, for Boston, where both were warmly welcomed by their for- mer friends. 58 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES In the celebrated Clarke mansion, on Garden Court Street, which Sir Harry purchased October 5, 1756, for 1,200, our heroine now reigned queen. This house, three stories high, with inlaid floors, carved mantels, and stairs so broad and low that Sir Harry could, and did, ride his pony up and down them, was the wonder of the time. It contained twenty-six rooms, and was in every respect a marvel of luxury. That Agnes did not forget her own people, nor scorn to receive them in her fine house, one is pleased to note. While here she practically supported, records show, her sister's children, and she welcomed always when he came ashore from his voyages her brother Isaac, a poor though honest sea- man. Frankland's health was not, however, all that both might have wished, and the en- tries in the diaries deal, at this time, al- 54 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES most entirely with recipes and soothing drinks. In July, 1757, he sought, there- fore, the post of consul-general to Lisbon, where the climate seemed to him to suit bis condition, and there, sobered city that it now was, the two again took up their residence. Only once more, in 1763, was Sir Harry to be in Boston. Then he came for a visit, staying for a space in Hopkin- ton, as well as in the city. The following year he returned to the old country, and in Bath, where he was drinking the waters, he died January 2, 1768, at the age of fifty-two. Agnes almost immediately came back to Boston, and, with her sister and her sister's children, took up her residence at Hopkin- ton. There she remained, living a peace- ful, happy life among her flowers, her friends, and her books, until the outbreak of the Revolution, when it seemed to her 55 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES wise to go in to her town house. She entered Boston, defended by a guard of six sturdy soldiers, and was cordially re- ceived by the officers in the beleaguered city, especially by Burgoyne, whom she had known in Lisbon. During the battle of Bunker Hill, she helped nurse wounded King's men, brought to her in her big dining-room on Garden Court Street. As an ardent Tory, however, she was persona non grata in the colony, and she soon found it convenient to sail for England, where, until 1782, she resided on the estate of the Frankland family. At this point, Agnes ceases in a way to be the proper heroine of our romance, for, contrary to the canons of love-story art, she married again, Mr. John Drew, a rich banker, of Chichester, being the happy man. And at Chichester she died in one year's time. 56 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES The Hopkinton home fell, in the course of time, into the hands of the Reverend Mr. Nason, who was to be Frankland's biographer, and who, when the original house was destroyed by fire (January 3, 1858), built a similar mansion on the same site. Here the Frankland relies were carefully preserved, the fireplace, the family portrait (herewith reproduced )> Sir Harry's silver knee buckles, and the famous broadcloth coat, from the sleeve of which the unfortunate lady had torn a piece with her teeth on the day of the Lis- bon disaster. This coat, we are told, was brought back to Hopkinton by Sir Harry, and hung in one of the remote chambers of the house, where each year, till his de- parture for the last time from the pleasant village, he was wont to pass the anniver- sary of the earthquake in fasting, humilia- tion, and prayer. The coat, and all the 57 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES other relics, were lost in April, 1902, when, for the second time, Frankland Hall was razed by fire. The ancient Fountain Inn, with its " flapping sign," and the " spreading elm below," long since disappeared, and its well, years ago filled up, was only acci- dentally discovered at a comparatively recent date, when some workmen were dig- ging a post hole. It was then restored as an interesting landmark. This inn was a favourite resort, legends tell us, for jovial sea captains as well as for the gentry of the town. There are even traditions that pirates bold and smugglers sly at times found shelter beneath its sloping roof. Yet none of the many stories with which its ruins are connected compares in interest and charm to the absolutely true one given us by history of Fair Agnes, the Maid of Marblehead. 58 AN AMERICAN -BORN BARONET of the most picturesque houses in all Middlesex County is the Roy all house at Medford, a place to which Sir Harry Frankland and ' his lady used often to resort. Few of the great names in colonial history are lacking, in- deed, in the list of guests who were here entertained in the brave days of old. The house stands on the left-hand side of the old Boston Road as you approach Medford, and to-day attracts the admira- tion of electric car travellers just as a century and a half ago it was the focus for all stage passenger's eyes. Externally the building presents three stories, the 59 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES upper tier of windows being, as is usual in houses of even a much later date, smaller than those underneath. The house is of brick, but is on three sides entirely sheathed in wood, while the south end stands exposed. Like several of the houses we are noting, it seems to turn its back on the high road. I am, however, inclined to a belief that the Royall house set the fashion in this matter, for Isaac, the Indian nabob, was just the man to assume an attitude of fine indifference to the world outside his gates. When in 1837, he came, a successful Antigua merchant, to establish his seat here in old Charlestown, and to rule on his large estate, sole mon- arch of twenty-seven slaves, he probably felt quite indifferent, if not superior, to strangers and casual passers-by. His petition of December, 1737, in re- 60 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES gard to the " chattels " in his train, ad- dressed to the General Court, reads : " Petition of Isaac Royall, late of An- tigua, now of Charlestown, in the county of Middlesex, that he removed from An- tigua and brought with him among other things and chattels a parcel of negroes, designed for his own use, and not any of them for merchandise. He prays that he may not be taxed with impost." The brick quarters which the slaves oc- cupied are situated on the south side of the mansion, and front upon the court- yard, one side of which they enclose. These may be seen on the extreme right of the picture, and will remind the reader who is familiar with Washington's home at Mount Vernon of the quaint little stone buildings in which the Father of his Country was wont to house his slaves. The slave buildings in Medford have re- 61 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES mained practically unchanged, and accord- ing to good authority are the last visible relics of slavery in New England. The Royall estate offered a fine example of the old-fashioned garden. Fruit trees and shrubbery, pungent box bordering trim gravel paths, and a wealth of sweet- scented roses and geraniums were here to be found. Even to-day the trees, the ruins of the flower-beds, and the relics of mag- nificent vines, are imposing as one walks from the street gate seventy paces back to the house-door. The carriage visitor and in the old days all the Royall guests came under this head either alighted by the front en- trance or passed by the broad drive under the shade of the fine old elms around into the courtyard paved with small white peb- bles. The driveway has now become a side street, and what was once an enclosed gar- 62 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES den of half an acre or more, with walks, fruit, and a summer-house at the farther extremity, is now the site of modern dwel- lings. This summer-house, long the favour- ite resort of the family and their guests, was a veritable curiosity in its way. Placed upon an artificial mound with two terraces, and reached by broad flights of red sand- stone steps, it was architecturally a model of its kind. Hither, to pay their court to the daughters of the house, used to come George Erving and the young Sir William Pep- perell, and if the dilapidated walls (now taken down, but still carefully preserved) could speak, they might tell of many an historic love tryst. The little house is octagonal in form, and on its bell-shaped roof, surmounted by a cupola, there poises what was originally a figure of Mercury. At present, however, the statue, bereft of 68 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES both wings and arms, cannot be said greatly to resemble the dashing god. The exterior of the summer-house is highly ornamented with Ionic pilasters, and taken as a whole is quaintly ruinous. It is interesting to discover that it was utility that led to the elevation of the mound, within which was an ice-house ! And to get at the ice the slaves went through a trap-door in the floor of this Greek structure! Isaac Royall, the builder of the fine old mansion, did not long live to enjoy his noble estate, but he was succeeded by a second Isaac, who, though a " colonel," was altogether inclined to take more care for his patrimony than for his king. When the Revolution began, Colonel Royall fell upon evil times. Appointed a councillor by mandamus, he declined serving " from timidity," as Gage says to Lord Dart- 64 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTREES mouth. Royall's own account of his move- ments after the beginning of " these trou- bles," is such as to confirm the governor's opinion. He had prepared, it seems, to take pas- sage for the West Indies, intending to em- bark from Salem for Antigua, but having gone into Boston the Sunday previous to the battle of Lexington, and remained there until that affair occurred, he was by the course of events shut up in the town. He sailed for Halifax very soon, still intend- ing, as he says, to go to Antigua, but on the arrival of his son-in-law, George Er- ving,and his daughter, with the troops from Boston, he was by them persuaded to sail for England, whither his other son-in-law, Sir William Pepperell (grandson of the hero of Louisburg), had preceded him. It is with this young Sir William Pepperell that our story particularly deals. 65 The first Sir William had been what is called a " self-made man," and had raised himself from the ranks of the soldiery through native genius backed by strength of will. His father is first noticed in the an- nals of the Isles of Shoals. The mansion now seen in Kittery Point was built, in- deed, partly by this oldest Pepperell known to us, and partly by his more eminent son. The building was once much more extensive than it now appears, having been some years ago shortened at either end. Until the death of the elder Pepperell, in 1734, the house was occupied by his own and his son's families. The lawn in front reached to the sea, and an avenue a quarter of a mile in length, bordered by fine old trees, led to the neighbouring house of Colonel Sparhawk, east of the village church. The first Sir William, by his will, made the son of his daughter Elizabeth and of Colo- 66 ROYALL HOUSE, MEDFORD, MASS. PEPPERELL HOUSE, KITTERV, MAINE OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES nel Sparhawk, his residuary legatee, re- quiring him at the same time to relinquish the name of Sparhawk for that of Pep- erell. Thus it was that the baronetcy, extinct with the death of the hero of Louis- burg, was revived by the king, in 1774, for the benefit of this grandson. In the Essex Institute at Salem, is pre- served a two-thirds length picture of the first Sir William Pepperell, painted in 1751 by Smibert, when the baronet was in London. Of this picture, Hawthorne once wrote the humourous description which fol- lows : " Sir William Pepperell, in coat, waistcoat and breeches, all of scarlet broad- cloth, is in the cabinet of the Society ; he holds a general's truncheon in his right hand, and points his left toward the army of New Englandere before the walls of Louisburg. A bomb is represented as fal- 67 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ling through the air it has certainly been a long time in its descent." The young William Pepperell was grad- uated from Cambridge in 1766, and the next year married the beautiful Elizabeth Roy all. In 1774 he was chosen a member of the governor's council. But when this council was reorganised under the act of Parliament, he fell into disgrace because of his loyalty to the king. On November 16, 1774, the people of his own county (York), passed at Wells a resolution in which he was declared to have " forfeited the confidence and friendship of all true friends of American liberty, and ought to be detested by all good men." Thus denounced, the baronet retired to Boston, and sailed, shortly before his father-in-law's departure, for England. His beautiful lady, one is saddened to learn, died of smallpox ere the vessel had been 68 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES many days out, and was buried at Halifax. In England, Sir William was allowed 500 per annum by the British government, and was treated with much deference. He was the good friend of all refugees from Amer- ica, and entertained hospitably at his pleasant home. His private life was irre- proachable, and he died in Portman Square, London, in December, 1816, at the age of seventy. His vast possessions and landed estate in Maine were confiscated, except for the widow's dower enjoyed by Lady Mary, relict of the hero of Louis- burg, and her daughter, Mrs. Sparhawk. Colonel Roy all, though he acted not un- like his son-in-law, Sir William, has, be- cause of his vacillation, far less of our respect than the younger man in the mat- ter of his refusal to cast in his lot with that of the Revolution. In 1778 he was publicly proscribed and formally banished 69 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES from Massachusetts. He thereupon took up his abode in Kensington, Middlesex, and from this place, in 1789, he begged earnestly to be allowed to return " home " to Medford, declaring he was " ever a good friend of the Province," and expressing the wish to marry again in his own country, " where, having already had one good wife, he was in hopes to get another, and in some degree repair his loss." His prayer was, however, refused, and he died of smallpox in England, October, 1781. By his will, Harvard College was given a tract of land in Worcester County, for the foundation of a professorship, which still bears his name. It is not, however, to be supposed that in war time so fine a place as the Royall mansion should have been left unoccupied. When the yeomen began pouring into the environs of Boston, encircling it with a belt of steel, the New Hampshire levies 70 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTEEES pitched their tents in Medford. They found the Royall mansion in the occupancy of Madam Royall and her accomplished daughters, who willingly received Colonel John Stark into the house as a safeguard against insult, or any invasion of the estate the soldiers might attempt. A few rooms were accordingly set apart for the use of the bluff old ranger, and he, on his part, treated the family of the deserter with con- siderable respect and courtesy. It is odd to think that while the stately Eoyalls were living in one part of this house, General Stark and his plucky wife, Molly, occupied quarters under the same roof. The second American general to be at- tracted by the luxury of the Royall man- sion was that General Lee whose history furnishes material for a separate chapter. General Lee it was to whom the house's echoing corridors suggested the name, Hob- 71 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES goblin Hall. So far as known, however, no inhabitant of the Royall house has ever been disturbed by strange visions or fright- ful dreams. After Lee, by order of Wash- ington, removed to a house situated nearer his command, General Sullivan, attracted, no doubt, by the superior comfort of the old country-seat, laid himself open to sim- ilar correction by his chief. In these two cases it will be seen Washington enforced his own maxim that a general should sleep among his troops. In 1810, the Royall mansion came into the possession of Jacob Tidd, in whose family it remained half a century, until it had almost lost its identity with the timid old colonel and his kin. As " Mrs. Tidd's house " it was long known in Med- ford. The place was subsequently owned by George L. Barr, and by George C. Nichols, from whose hands it passed to that 72 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTREES of Mr. Geer, the present owner. To be sure, it has sadly fallen from its high estate, but it still remains one of the most interesting and romantic houses in all New England, and when, as happens once or twice a year, the charming ladies of the local patriotic society powder their hair, don their great-grandmother's wedding gowns and entertain in the fine old rooms, it requires only a slight gift of fancy to see Sir William Pepperell's lovely bride one among the gay throng of fair women. 78 MOLLY STARK'S GENTLEMAN- SON the quaint ancestral homes still standing in the old Granite State, none is more picturesque or more interesting from the historical view-point than the Stark house in the little town of Dunbarton, a place about five miles' drive out from Concord, over one of those charm- ing country roads, which properly make New Hampshire the summer and autumn Mecca of those who have been " long in populous city pent." Rather oddly, this house has, for all its great wealth of his- torical interest, been little known to the general public. The Starks are a conserv- 74 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ative, as well as an old family, and they have never seen fit to make of their home a public show-house. Yet those who are privileged to visit Dunbarton and its chief boast, this famous house, always re- member the experience as a particu- larly interesting one. Seldom, indeed, can one find in these days a house like this, which, for more than one hundred years, has been occupied by the family for whom it was built, and through all the changes and chances of temporal affairs has pre- served the characteristics of revolutionary times. Originally Dunbarton was Starkstown. An ancestor of this family, Archibald Stark, was one of the original proprietors, owning many hundred acres, not a few of which are still in the Starks' possession. Just when and by whom the place received the name of the old Scottish town and royal 75 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES castle on the Clyde, no historian seems able to state with definiteness, but that the present Dunbarton represents only a small part of the original triangular township, all are agreed. Of the big landowner, Archibald Stark, the General John Stark of our Revolution was a son. Another of the original proprietors of Dunbarton was a certain Captain Caleb Page, whose name still clings to a rural neighbourhood of the township, a cross- roads section pointed out to visitors as Page's Corner. And it was to Elizabeth Page, the bright and capable daughter of his father's old friend and neighbour, that the doughty John Stark was married in August, 1758, while at home on a furlough. The son of this marriage was called Caleb, after his maternal grandfather, and he it was who built the imposing old mansion of our story. 76 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Caleb Stark was a very remarkable man. Born at Dunbarton, December 3, 1759, he was present while only a lad at the battle of Bunker Hill, standing side by side with some of the veteran rangers of the French war, near the rail fence, which extended from the redoubt to the beach of the Mystic River. In order to be at this scene of con- flict, the boy had left home secretly some days before, mounted on his own horse, and armed only with a musket. After a long, hard journey, he managed to reach the Royall house in Medford, which was his father's headquarters at the time, the very night before the great battle. And the general, though annoyed at his son's manner of coming, recognised that the lad had done only what a Stark must do at such a time, and permitted him to take part in the next day's fight After that, there followed for Caleb a 77 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES time of great social opportunity, which transformed the clever, but unpolished New Hampshire boy into as fine a young gentleman as was to be found in the whole country. The Royall house, it will be remembered, was presided over in the troublous war times by the beautiful ladies of the family, than whom no more cultured and distinguished women were anywhere to be met. And these, though Tory to the backbone, were disposed to be very kind and gracious to the brave boy whom the accident of war had made their guest. So it came about that even before he reached manhood's estate, Caleb Stark had acquired the grace and polish of Europe. Nor was the lad merely a carpet knight. So ably did he serve his father that he was made the elder soldier's aid-de-camp, when the father was made a brigadier-general, 78 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES and by the time the war closed, was himself Major Stark, though scarcely twenty-four years old. Soon after peace was declared, the young major came into his Dunbarton patrimony, and in 1784, in a very pleasant spot in the midst of his estate, and facing the broad highway leading from Dunbarton to Weare, he began to build his now famous house. It was finished the next year, and in 1787, the young man, having been elected town treasurer of Dunbarton, re- solved to settle down in his new home, and brought there as his wife, Miss Sarah McKinstrey, a daughter of Doctor William McKinstrey, formerly of Taunton, Mas- sachusetts, a beautiful and cultivated girl, just twenty years old. It is interesting in this connection to note that all the women of the Stark family have been beauties, and that they have, 79 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES too, been sweet and charming in disposi- tion, as well as in face. The old mansion on the Weare road has been the home dur- ing its one hundred and ten years of life of several women who would have adorned, both by reason of their personal and intel- lectual charms, any position in our land. This being true, it is not odd that the coun- try folk speak of the Stark family with deepest reverence. Beside building the family homestead, Caleb Stark did two other things which serve to make him distinguished even in a family where all were great. He enter- tained Lafayette, and he accumulated the family fortune. Both these things were accomplished at Pembroke, where the major early established some successful cotton mills. The date of his entertain- ment of Lafayette was, of course, 1825, the year when the marquis, after laying the 80 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES corner-stone of our monument on Bunker Hill, made his triumphal tour through New Hampshire. The bed upon which the great French- man slept during his visit to the Starks is still carefully preserved, and those guests who have had the privilege of being entertained by the present owners of the house can bear testimony to the fact that the couch is an extremely comfortable one. The room in which this bed is the most prominent article of furniture bears the name of the Lafayette room, and is in every particular furnished after the man- ner of a sleeping apartment of one hundred years ago. The curtains of the high bed- stead, the quaint toilet-table, the bedside table with its brass candlestick, and the pictures and the ornaments are all in har- mony. Nowhere has a discordant modern note been struck. The same thing is true 81 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of all the other apartments in the house. The Starks have one and all displayed great taste and decided skill in preserving the long-ago tone that makes the place what it is. The second Caleb, who inherited the estate in 1838, when his father, the bril- liant major, died, was a Harvard graduate, and writer of repute, being the author of a valuable memoir of his father and grand- father. He collected, even more than they had done, family relics of interest. When he died in 1865, his two sisters, Harriett and Charlotte, succeeded him in the pos- session of the estate. Only comparatively recently has this latter sister died, and the place come into the hands of its present owner, Mr. Charles F. Morris Stark, an heir who has the tra- ditions of the Morris family to add to those of the Starks, being on his mother's side a lineal descendant of Robert Morris, 82 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the great financier of the Revolution. The present Mrs. Stark is the representative of still another noted New Hampshire family, being the granddaughter of General John McNeil, a famous soldier of the Granite State. Few, indeed, are the homes in America which contain so much which, while of intimate interest to the family, is as well of wide historical importance. Though a home, the house has the value of a museum. The portrait of Major Stark, which hangs in the parlour at the right of the square en- trance-hall, was painted by Professor Sam- uel Finley Breese Morse, the discoverer of the electric telegraph, a man who wished to come down to posterity as an artist, but is now remembered by us only as an inventor. This picture is an admirable presenta- tion of its original. The gallant major looks down upon us with a person rather 83 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTKEES above the medium in height, of a slight but muscular frame, with the short waist- coat, the high collar, and the close, narrow shoulders of the gentleman's costume of 1830. The carriage of the head is noble, and the strong featijres, the deep-set, keen, blue eyes, and the prominent forehead, speak of courage, intelligence, and cool self-possession. Beside this noteworthy portrait hangs a beautiful picture of the first mistress of this house, the Mrs. Stark who, as a girl, was Miss Sarah McKinstrey. Her portrait shows her to have been a fine example of the blonde type of beauty. The splendid coils of her hair are very lustrous, and the dark hazel eyes look out from the frame with the charm and dignity of a St. Cecilia. Her costume, too, is singularly appropriate and becoming, azure silk with great puffs of 84 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES lace around the white arms and queenly throat. The waist, girdled under the arm- pits, and the long-wristed mits stamp the date 1815-21. The portrait of General Stark, which was painted by Miss Hannah Crownin- shield, is said not to look so much like the doughty soldier as does the Morse picture of his son, but Gilbert Stuart's Miss Char- lotte Stark, recently deceased, shows the last daughter of the family to have fairly sustained in her youth the reputation for beauty which goes with the Stark women. Beside the portraits, there are in the house many other choice and valuable antiques. Among these the woman visitor notices with particular interest the fan that was once the property of Lady Pep- perell, who was a daughter, it will be re- membered, of the Royall family, who were 85 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES so kind to Major Caleb Stark in his youth. And to the man who loves historical things, the cane presented to General Stark when he was a major, for valiant conduct in de- fence of Fort William Henry, will be of especial interest. This cane is made from the bone of a whale and is headed with ivory. On the mantelpiece stands another very interesting souvenir, a bronze statu- ette of Napoleon L, which Lafayette brought with him from France and pre- sented to Major Stark. Apropos of this there is an amusing story. The major was a great admirer of the distinguished Bonaparte, and made a collection of Napoleonic busts and pictures, all of which, together with the numerous other effects of the Stark place, had to be appraised at his death. As it happened, the appraiser was a countryman of limited 86 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES intelligence, and, when he was told to put down " twelve Bonapartes," recorded " twelve pony carts," and it was thus that the item appeared on the legal paper. The house itself is a not unworthy imi- tation of an English manor-house, with its aspect of old-time grandeur and pictur- esque repose. It is of wood, two and a half stories high, with twelve dormer windows, a gambrel roof, and a large two-story L. In front there are two rows of tall and stately elms, and the trim little garden is enclosed by a painted iron fence. On either side of the spacious hall, which ex- tends through the middle of the house, are to be found handsome trophies of the chase, collected by the present master of the place, who is a keen sportsman. A gorgeous carpet, which dates back fifty years, having been laid in the days of the beautiful Sarah, supplies the one 87 OLD :N T EW ENGLAND ROOFTREES bit of colour in the parlour, while in the dining-room the rich silver and handsome mahogany testify to the old-time glories of the place. Of manuscripts which are simply priceless, the house contains not a few; one, over the quaint wine-cooler in the dining-room, acknowledging, in George Washington's own hand, courtesies ex- tended to him and to his lady by a member of the Morris family, being especially in- teresting. Up-stairs, in the sunlit hall, among other treasures, more elegant but not more interesting, hangs a sunbonnet once worn by Molly Stark herself. Not far off down the country road is perhaps the most beautiful and attractive spot in the whole town, the old family burying-ground of the Starks, in which are interred all the deceased members of this remarkable family, from the Revolutionary Major Caleb and his wife down. Here, 88 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES with grim, towering Kearsarge standing ever like a sentinel, rests under the yew- trees the dust of this great family's hon- oured dead. A SOLDIER OF FORTUNE "/^^^HE only time I ever heard Wash- i ington swear," Lafayette once re- marked, " was when he called General Charles Lee a l damned poltroon/ after the arrest of that officer for treason- able conduct." Nor was Washington the only person of self-restraint and good man- ners whose temper and angry passions were roused by this same erratic General Lee. Lee was an Englishman, born in Cheshire in 1731. He entered the British army at the age of eleven years, was in Braddock's expedition, and was wounded at Ticonderoga in 1758. He also served for 90 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES a time in Portugal, but certain infelicities of temper hindered his advancement, and he never rose higher in the British service than a half -pay major. As a " soldier of fortune " he was vastly more successful. In all the pages of American history, in- deed, it would be difficult to find anybody whose career was more interestingly and picturesquely checkered than was his. Lee's purpose in coming to America has never been fully explained. There are concerning this, as every other step of his career, two diametrically opposed opinions. The American historians have for the most agreed in thinking him traitorous and self- seeking, but for my own part I find little to justify this belief, for I have no diffi- culty whatever in accounting for his soldierly vagaries on the score of his temperament, and the peculiar conditions of his early life. A man who, while still 91 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES a youth, was adopted by the Mohawk In- dians, who bestowed upon him the sig- nificant name of Boiling Water, who was at one time aid-de-camp and intimate friend of the King of Poland, who ren- dered good service in the Russian war against the Turks, all before interesting himself at all in the cause of American freedom, could scarcely be expected to be as simple in his us-ward emotions as an Israel Putnam or a General John Stark might be. General Lee arrived in New York from London, on November 10, 1773, his avowed object in seeking the colonies at such a troublous time being to investigate the justice of the American cause. He travelled all over the country in pursuance of facts concerning the fermenting feeling against England, but he was soon able to enroll himself unequivocally upon the side 92 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of the colonies. In a letter written to Lord Percy, then stationed at Boston, this eccen- tric new friend of the American cause himself, it must be remembered, still a half-pay officer in the English army expressed with great freedom his opinion of -England's position: "Were the prin- ciple of taxing America without her con- sent admitted, Great Britain would that instant be ruined." And to General Gage, his warm personal friend, Lee wrote : " I am convinced that the court of Tiberius was not more treacherous to the rights of mankind than is the present court of Great Britain." It is rather odd to find that General Charles Lee, of whom we know so little, and that little scarcely to his credit, occupied in the military court of the American army a position second only to Washington ; he was appointed a major-general on June 17, 93 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES 1775, a date marked for us by the fact that Bunker Hill's battle was then fought. Not long after his arrival at the camp, General Lee, with that tendency to independent ac- tion which was afterward to work to his undoing, took up his quarters in the Royall house. And Lee it was who gave to the fine old place the name Hobgoblin Hall. From this mansion, emphatically remote from Lee's command, the eccentric general was summarily recalled by his commander- in-chief, then, as ever after, quick to ad- minister to this major-general what he con- ceived to be needed reproof. The house in which General Lee next resided is still standing on Sycamore Street, Somerville. When the place was occupied by Lee it had one of those long pitched roofs, descending to a single story at the back, which are still occa- sionally met with in our interior New 94 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES England towns. The house was, however, altered to its present appearance by that John Tufts who occupied it during post- Revolutionary times. From this lofty dwelling, Lee was able to overlook Boston, and to observe, by the aid of a strong field- glass, all the activities of the enemy's camp. Lee himself was at this time an object of unfriendly espionage. In a " separate and secret despatch," Lord Dartmouth in- structed General Gage to have a special eye on the ex-English officer. That Lee had resigned his claim to emolument in the English army does not seem to have made his countrymen as clear as it should have done concerning his relation to their cause. Meanwhile, General Lee, though sleep- ing in his wind-swept farmhouse and watching from its windows the movements of the British, indulged when opportunity 95 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES offered in the social pleasures of the other American officers. Rough and unattrac- tive in appearance, he seems to have been a kind of Cyrano de Bergerac, " a tall man, lank and thin, with a huge nose," he had, when he chose, a certain amount of social grace, and was often extremely entertaining. Mrs. John Adams, who first met General Lee at an evening party at Major Mifflin's house in Cambridge, describes him as look- ing like a " careless, hardy veteran," who brought to her mind his namesake, Charles XII. " The elegance of his pen far ex- ceeds that of his person," commented this acute lady. In further describing this evening spent at Major Mifflin's home, in the Brattle mansion, Mrs. Adams writes: " General Lee was very urgent for me to tarry in town, and dine with him and tho ladies present, but I excused myself. The 96 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES general was determined that I should not only be acquainted with him, but with his companions, too, and therefore placed a chair before ine, into which he ordered Mr. Spada (his dog) to mount, and present his paw to me for better acquaintance." l Lee was very fond indeed of dogs, and was constantly attended by one or more of them, this Spada being a great, shaggy Pomeranian, described by unbiassed critics as looking more like a bear than a harmless canine. In this connection, it is interest- ing to know that Lee has expressed himself very strongly in regard to the affection of men as compared with the affection of dogs. This love for dogs was, however, one of the more ornamental of General Lee's traits. His carelessness in regard to his * Drake's " Historic Fields and Mansions of Mid- dleaex." Little, Brown & Co., publishers. 97 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTBEES personal appearance was famous, and not a few amusing stories are told of the awk- ward situations in which this officer's slovenliness involved him. On one of Washington's journeys, in which Lee ac- companied him, the major-general, upon arriving at the house where they were to dine, went straight to, the kitchen and de- manded something to eat. The cook, taking him for a servant, told him that she would give him some victuals directly, but that he must first help her off with the pot a request with which he readily com- plied. He was then told to take a bucket and go to the well for water, and was actu- ally engaged in drawing it when found by an aid whom Washington had des- patched in quest of him. The cook was in despair when she heard her assistant ad- dressed by the title of "General." The mug fell from her hands, and dropping 98 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES on her knees, she began crying for pardon, when Lee, who was ever ready to see the impropriety of his own conduct, but never willing to change it, gave her a crown, and, turning to the aid-de-camp, observed: " You see, young man, the advantage of a fine coat; the man of consequence is in- debted to it for respect; neither virtue nor ability, without it, will make you look like a gentleman." l Perhaps the most remarkable episode in all Lee's social career, was that connected with Sir William Howe's famous entertain- ment at Philadelphia, the Mischianza. This was just after the affair at Monmouth, in the course of which Washington swore, and Lee was taken prisoner. Yet though a prisoner, the eccentric general was treated with the greatest courtesy, and 1 Drake's " Historic Fields and Mansions of Mid- dlesex." 99 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES seems even to have received a card for the famous ball. But, never too careful of his personal appearance, he must on this occasion have looked particularly uncouth. Certainly the beautiful Miss Franks, one of the Philadelphia belles, thought him far from ornamental, and, with the keen wit for which she was celebrated, spread abroad a report that General Lee came to the ball clad in green breeches, patched with leather. To prove to her that entire accuracy had not been used in describing his garb at the ball, the general sent the young lady the very articles of clothing which she had criticised ! Naturally, neither the ladies nor their escorts thought any better of Lee's manners after this bit of horse-play, and it is safe to say he was not soon again invited to an evening party. Mrs. Hamilton and Mrs. Mercy Warren both call Lee " a crabbed man." The latter 100 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES described him in a letter to Samuel Adams as " plain in his person to a degree of ugliness; careless even to impoliteness; his garb ordinary; his voice rough; his manners rather morose; yet sensible, learned, judicious, and penetrating." Toward the end of his life, Lee took refuge in an estate which he had pur- chased in Berkeley County, Virginia. Here he lived, more like a hermit than a citizen of the world, or a member of a civilised community. His house was little more than a shell, without partitions, and it lacked even such articles of furniture as were necessary for the most common uses. To a gentleman who visited him in this forlorn retreat, where he found a kitchen in one corner, a bed in another, books in a third, saddles and harness in a fourth, Lee said : " Sir, it is the most convenient and economical establishment OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES in the world. The lines of chalk which you see on the floor mark the divisions of the apartments, and I can sit in a corner and give orders and overlook the whole without moving from my chair." * General Lee died in an obscure inn in Philadelphia, October 2, 1782. His will was characteristic: "I desire most ear- nestly that I may not be buried in any church or churchyard, or within a mile of any Presbyterian or Baptist meeting- house; for since I have resided in this country I have kept so much bad company that I do not choose to continue it when dead." In this will, our singular hero paid a tribute of affectionate remembrance to several of his intimate friends, and of grateful generosity to the humble depend- ents who had adhered to him and minis- 1 Sparks's " Life of Charles Lee." Little, Brown A Co. 102 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES tered to his wants in his retirement. The bulk of his property for he was a man of no small means was bequeathed to his only sister, Sydney Lee. to whom he was ever devotedly attached. 103 THE MESSAGE OF THE LANTERNS rHERE are many points of view from which this tale of Paul Revere may be told, but to the generality of people the interest of the poem, and of the historical event itself, will always centre around Christ Church, on Salem Street, in the North End of Bos- ton the church where the lanterns were hung out on the night before the battles of Lexington and Concord. At nearly every hour of the day some one may be seen in the now unfrequented street looking up at the edifice's lofty spire with an expression full of reverence and satisfaction. There upon 104 the venerable structure, imbedded in the solid masonry of the tower front, one reads upon a tablet : THE SIGNAL LANTERNS OP PAUL REVERE DISPLAYED IN THE STEEPLE OF THIS CHURCH, APRIL 18, 1775, WARNED THE COUNTRY OF THE MARCH OF THE BRITISH TROOPS TO LEXINGTON AND CONCORD. If the pilgrim wishes to get into the very spirit of old Christ Church and its historical associations, he can even climb the tower " By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, To the belfry chamber overhead, And startle the pigeons from their perch On the sombre rafters, that round him make Masses and moving shapes of shade " 105 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES to look down as Captain John Pulling did that eventful night on " The graves on the hill, Lonely and spectral and sombre and still." The first time I ever climbed the tower I confess that I was seized with an over- powering sense of the weirdness and mys- tery of those same spectral graves, seen thus from above. It was dark and gloomy going up the stairs, and if John Pulling had thought of the prospect, rather than of his errand, I venture to say he must have been frightened for all his bravery, in that gloomy tower at midnight. But, of course, his mind was intent on the work he had to do, and on the signals which would tell how the British were to proceed on their march to seize the rebel stores at Concord. The signals agreed upon were two lanterns if the troops went by way of water, one if they were to go 106 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES by land. In Longfellow's story we learn that Pulling " Through alley and street, Wanders and watches with eager ears, Till in the silence around him he hears The muster of men at the barrack door, The sound of arms and the tramp of feet, And the measured tread of the grenadiers, Marching down to their boats on the shore." It had been decided that the journey should be made by sea ! The Province of Massachusetts, it must be understood, was at this time on the eve of open revolt. It had formed an army, commissioned its officers, and promulgated orders as if there were no such person as George III. It was collect- ing stores in anticipation of the moment when its army should take the field. It had, moreover, given General Gage whom the king had sent to Boston to put down the rebellion there to understand 107 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES that the first movement made by the royal troops into the country would be considered as an act of hostility, and treated as such. Gage had up to this time hesitated to act. At length his resolution to strike a crip- pling blow, and, if possible, to do it with- out bloodshed, was taken. Spies had in- formed him that the patriots' depot of ammunition was at Concord, and he had determined to send a secret expedition to destroy those stores. Meanwhile, however, the patriots were in great doubt as to the time when the definite movement was to be made. Fully appreciating the importance of secrecy, General Gage quietly got ready eight hundred picked troops, which he meant to convey under cover of night across the West Bay, and to land on the Cam- bridge side, thus baffling the vigilance of the townspeople, and at the same time con- 108 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTREES siderably shortening the distance his troops would have to march. So much pains was taken to keep the actual destination of these troops a profound secret, that even the officer who was selected for the com- mand only received an order notifying him to hold himself in readiness. " The guards in the town were doubled," writes Mr. Drake, " and in order to inter- cept any couriers who might slip through them, at the proper moment mounted patrols were sent out on the roads leading to Concord. Having done what he could to prevent intelligence from reaching the country, and to keep the town quiet, the British general gave his orders for the em- barkation ; and at between ten and eleven of the night of April 18, the troops des- tined for this service were taken across the bay in boats to the Cambridge side of the river. At this hour, Gage's pickets were 109 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES guarding the deserted roads leading into the country, and up to this moment no patriot courier had gone out." Pulling with his signals and Paul Revere on his swift horse were able, how- ever, to baffle successfully the plans of the British general. The redcoats had scarcely gotten into their boats, when Dawes and Paul Revere started by different roads to warn Hancock and Adams, and the people of the country-side, that the regulars were out. Revere rode by way of Charlestown, and Dawes by the great highroad over the Neck. Revere had hardly got clear of Charlestown when he discovered that he had ridden headlong into the middle of the British patrol ! Being the better mounted, however, he soon distanced his pursuers, and entered Medford, shouting like mad, " Up and arm ! Up and arm ! The regu- lars are out ! The regulars are out ! " 110 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Longfellow has best described the awak- ening of the country-side : " A hurry of hoofs in the village street, A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark, And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet ; That was all I And yet, through the gloom and the light, The fate of a nation was riding that night ; And the spark struck out by that steed, in its flight, Kindled the land into flame with its heat." The Porter house in Medford, at which Revere stopped long enough to rouse the captain of the Guards, and warn him of the approach of the regulars, is now no longer standing, but the Clark place, in Lexington, where the proscribed fellow- patriots, Hancock and Adams, were lodg- ing that night, is still in a good state of preservation. The room occupied bj " King " Han- Ill OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES cock and " Citizen " Adams is the one on the lower floor, at the left of the entrance. Hancock was at this time visiting this par- ticular house because " Dorothy Q," his fiancee, was just then a guest of the place, and martial pride, coupled, perhaps, with the feeling that he must show himself in the presence of his lady-love a soldier worthy of her favour, inclined him to show fight when he heard from Revere that the regulars were expected. His widow re- lated, in after years, that it was with great difficulty that she and the colonel's aunt kept him from facing the British on the day following the midnight ride. While the bell in the green was sounding the alarm, Hancock was cleaning his sword and his fusee, and putting his accoutre- ments in order. He is said to have been a trifle of a dandy in his military garb, and his points, sword-knot, and lace, were 112 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES always of the newest fashion. Perhaps it was the desire to show himself in all his war-paint that made him resist so long the importunities of the ladies, and the urgency of other friends! The astute Adams, it is recounted, was a little an- noyed at his friend's obstinacy, and, clap- ping him on the shoulder, exclaimed, as he looked significantly at the weapons, " That is not our business ; we belong to the cabinet." * It was Adams who threw light on the whole situation. Half an hour after Revere reached the house, the other express ar- rived, and the two rebel leaders, being now fully convinced that it was Concord which was the threatened point, hurried the mes- sengers on to the next town, after allowing them barely time to swallow a few mouth- * Drake's " Historic Fields and Mansions of Mid- dlesex." Little, Brown & Co., publishers. 113 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES fuls of food. Adams did not believe that Gage would send an army merely to take two men prisoners. To him, the true ob- ject of the expedition was very clear. Revere, Dawes, and young Doctor Pres- cott, of Concord, who had joined them, had got over half the distance to the next town, when, at a sudden turning, they came upon the second redcoat patrol. Prescott leaped his horse over the roadside wall, and so es- caped across the fields to Concord. Revere and Dawes, at the point of the pistol, gave themselves up. Their business on the road at that hour was demanded by the officer, who was told in return to listen. Then, through the still morning air, the distant booming of the alarm bell's peal on peal was borne to their ears. It was the British who were now uneasy. Ordering the prisoners to follow them, the troop rode off at a gallop toward Lexington, 114 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES and when they were at the edge of the vil- lage, Revere was told to dismount, and was left to shift for himself. He then ran as fast as his legs could carry him across the pastures back to the Clark parsonage, to report his misadventure, while the patrol galloped off toward Boston to announce theirs. But by this time, the Minute Men of Lexington had rallied to oppose the march of the troops. Thanks to the in- trepidity of Paul Revere, the North End coppersmith, the redcoats, instead of sur- prising the rebels in their beds, found them marshalled on Lexington Green, and at Concord Bridge, in front, flank, and rear, armed and ready to dispute their march to the bitter end. " You know the rest. In the books you have read How the British regulars fired and fled How the farmers gave them ball for ball, From behind each fence and farmyard wall, 115 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Chasing the redcoats down the lane, Then crossing the fields to emerge again Under the trees at the turn of the road, And only pausing to fire and load. " So through the night rode Paul Revere ; And so through the night went his cry of alarm To every Middlesex village and farm A cry of defiance and not of fear, A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door, And a word that shall echo for evermore ! For, borne on the night wind of the past, Through all our history, to the last, The people will waken and listen to hear The hurrying hoof beats of that steed, And the midnight message of Paul Revere." 1 1 " Paul Revere's Ride : " Longfellow's Poems. Houghton, Mifflin & Co., publishers. NOTE. Mr. W. B. Clarke, of Boston, has called the writer's attention to a pamphlet entitled : "PAUL REVERE'S SIGNAL. The True Story of the Signal Lanterns in Christ Church, Boston. By the Rev. John Lee Watson, D. D. New York, 1880." which seems to offer convincing proof that Cap- tain Pulling, Paul Revere's intimate from boy- hood, and not sexton Robert Newman, as is generally believed, was the "friend" mentioned in Revere's journal, and performed the patriotic office of hanging the lanterns. 116 HANCOCK'S DOROTHY Q. rHE Dorothy Q. of our present interest is not the little maiden of Holmes's charming poem " Grandmother's mother ; her age I guess, Thirteen summers, or something less ; Girlish bust, but womanly air ; Smooth, square forehead with uprolled hair, Lips that lover has never kissed ; Taper fingers and slender wrist ; Hanging sleeves of stiff brocade ; So they painted the little maid. On her hand a parrot green Sits unmoving and broods serene." but her niece, the Dorothy Q. whom John Hancock loved, and was visiting at Lexing- ton, when Paul Revere warned him of the redcoats' approach. This Dorothy hap- 117 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTREES pened to be staying just then with the Reverend Jonas Clark, under the protec- tion of Madam Lydia Hancock, the gov- ernor's aunt. And it was to meet her, his fiancee, that Hancock went, on the eve of the 19th of April, to the house made fa- mous by his visit. One imaginative writer has sketched for us the notable group gathered that April night about the time-honoured hearthstone in the modest Lexington par- sonage : " The last rays of the setting sun have left the dampness of the meadows to gather about the home ; and each guest and family occupant has gladly taken seats within the house, while Mrs. Jonas Clark has closed the shutters, added a new fore- log, and fanned the embers to a cheerful flame. The young couple whom Madam Hancock has studiously brought together exchange sympathetic glances as they take 118 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES part in the conversation. The hours wear away, and the candles are snuffed again and again. Then the guests retire, not, to be sure, without apprehensions of ap- proaching trouble, but with little thought that the king's strong arm of military authority is already extended toward their very roof." * Early the next morning, as we know, the lovers were forced to part in great haste. And for a time John Hancock and his companion, Samuel Adams, remained in seclusion, that they might not be seized by General Gage, who was bent on their arrest, and intended to have them sent to England for trial. The first word we are able to find con- cerning Hancock's whereabouts during the interim between his escape from Lexing- ton, and his arrival at the Continental Drake. 119 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Congress, appointed to convene at Phila- delphia, May 10, 1775, is contained in a long letter to Miss Quincy. This letter, which gives a rather elaborate account of the dangers and triumphs of the patriot's journey, concludes : " Pray let me hear from you by every Post. God bless you, my dear girl, and believe me most Sincerely, Yours most Affectionately, John Han- cock." A month later, June 10, 1775, we find the charming Dorothy Q., now the guest at Fairfield, Connecticut, of Thaddeus Burr, receiving this letter from her lover : " MY DEAR DOLLY : T am almost pre- vail'd on to think that my letters to my Aunt & you are not read, for I cannot ob- tain a reply, I have ask'd million questions & not an answer to one, I beg'd you to let 120 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES oie know what things my Aunt wanted & you and many other matters I wanted to know but not one word in answer. I Really Take it extreme unkind, pray, my dear, use not so much Ceremony & Re- servedness, why can't you use freedom in writing, be not afraid of me, I want long Letters. I am glad the little things I sent you were agreeable. Why did you not write me of the top of the Umbrella. I am sorry it was spoiled, but I will send you another by my Express which will go in a few days. How did my Aunt like her gown, & let me know if the Stockings suited her; she had better send a pattern shoe & stocking, I warrant I will suit her. ... I Beg, my dear Dolly, you will write me often and long Letters, I will forgive the past if you will mend in future. Do ask my Aunt to make me up and send me 121 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES a Watch String, and do you make up an- other and send me, 1 wear them out fast. I want some little thing of your doing. Remember me to all my Friends with you, as if named. I am Call'd upon and must obey. " I have sent you by Doctor Church in a paper Box Directed to you, the following things, for your acceptance, & which I do insist you wear, if you do not I shall think the Donor is the objection : 2 pair white silk "> which stockings 4 pair white thread ) I think will fit you 1 pair black satin ^ Shoes, the other, 1 pair Calera Co. ) Shall be sent when done. 1 very pretty light hat 1 neat airy summer Cloak 2 caps 1 Fann " I wish these may please you, I shall be gratified if they do, pray write me, I will attend to all your Commands. 122 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES " Adieu, my dear Girl, and believe me with great Esteem & affection, " Yours without reserve, " JOHN HANCOCK." * It is interesting to know that while Miss Quincy was a guest in Fairfield, Aaron Burr, the nephew of her host, came to the house, and that his magnetic influence soon had an effect upon the beautiful young lady. But watchful Aunt Lydia prevented the charmer from thwarting the Hancock family plans, and on the 28th day of the following August there was a great wedding at Fairfield. John Hancock, president of the Continental Congress, and Miss Dorothy Quincy were joined in mar- riage in style befitting the family situa- tions. The noted couple went at once to Phila- l Nevt England Magazine. 123 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES delphia, where the patriot lived at inter- vals during the remainder of the session. Mrs. Hancock seems to have been much of the time in Boston, however, and occa- sionally, in the course of the next few years, we catch delightful glimpses through her husband's letters of his great affection for her, and for their little one. Under date of Philadelphia, March 10, 1777, we read : " I shall make out as well as I can, but I assure you, my Dear Soul, I long to have you here, & I know you will be as expeditious as you can in coming. When I part from you again it must be a very extraordinary occasion. I have sent everywhere to get a gold or silver rattle for the child with a coral to send, but can- not get one. I will have one if possible on your coming. I have sent a sash for her & two little papers of pins for you. If you do not want them you can give them away. 124 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES . . . May every blessing of an Indulgent Providence attend you. I most sincerely wish you a good journey & hope I shall soon have the happiness of seeing you with the utmost affection and Love. My dear Dolly, I am yours forever, " JOHN HANCOCK/' After two years and a half of enforced absence, the President of the Continental Congress returned home to that beautiful house on Beacon Street, which was unfor- tunately destroyed in 1863, to make room for a more modern building. Here the united couple lived very happily with their two children, Lydia and Washington. Judging by descriptions that have come down to us, and by the World's Fair repro- duction of the Hancock House, their man- sion must have been a very sumptuous one. It was built of stone, after the manner 125 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES favoured by Bostonians who could afford it, with massive walls, and a balcony pro- jecting over the entrance door, upon which a large second-story window opened. Braintree stone ornamented the corners and window-places, and the tiled roof was surrounded by a balustrade. From the roof, dormer windows provided a beautiful view of the surrounding country. The grounds were enclosed by a low stone wall, on which was placed a light wooden fence. The house itself was a little distance back from the street, and the approach was by means of a dozen stone steps and a care- fully paved walk. At the right of the entrance was a recep- tion-room of spacious dimensions, provided with furniture of bird's-eye maple, covered with rich damask. Out of this opened the dining-room, sixty feet in length, in which Hancock was wont to entertain. 126 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Opposite was a smaller apartment, the usual dining-room of the family. Next adjoining were the china-room and offices, while behind were to be found the coach- house and barn of the estate. The family drawing-room, its lofty walls covered with crimson paper, was at the left of the entrance. The upper and lower halls of the house were hung with pictures of game and with hunting scenes. The furniture, wall-papers and draperies throughout the house had been imported from England by Thomas Hancock, and expressed the height of luxury for that day. Passing through the hall, a flight of steps led to a small summer-house in the garden, near Mount Vernon Street, and here the grounds were laid out in ornamental box- bordered beds like those still to be seen in the beautiful Washington home on the Potomac. A highly interesting corner 127 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREEfc of the garden was that given over to the group of mulberry-trees, which had been imported from England by Thomas Han- cock, the uncle of John, he being, with others of his time, immensely interested in the culture of the silkworm. Of this beautiful home Dorothy Quincy showed herself well fitted to be mistress, and through her native grace and dignity admirably performed her part at the re- ception of D'Estaing, Lafayette, Washing- ton, Brissot, Lords Stanley and Wortley, and other noted guests. On October 8, 1793, Hancock died, at the age of fifty-six years. The last re- corded letter penned in his letter volume was to Captain James Scott, his lifelong friend. And it was to this Captain Scott that our Dorothy Q. gave her hand in a second marriage three years later. She outlived her second husband many years, 128 residing at the end of her life on Federal Street in Boston. When turned of seventy she had a lithe, handsome figure, a pair of laughing eyes, and fine yellow ringlets in which scarcely a gray hair could be seen. And although for the second time a widow, she was as sprightly as a girl of sixteen. In her advanced years, Madam Scott re- ceived another call from Lafayette, and those who witnessed the hearty interview say that the once youthful chevalier and the unrivalled belle met as if only a summer had passed since their social intercourse during the perils of the Revolution. 129 BARONESS RIEDESEL AKD HER TORY FRIENDS rHE most beautiful example of wifely devotion to be found in the annals connected with the war of the Revolution is that afforded by the story of the lovely Baroness Riedesel, whose husband was deputed to serve at the head of the German mercenaries allied to the king's troops, and who was herself, with the baron and her children, made prisoner of war after the battle of Saratoga. Riedesel was a gallant soldier, and his wife a fair and fascinating young woman at this time. They had not been long mar- ried when the war in America broke out, 130 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES and the wife's love for her husband was such as to impel her to dare all the hard- ships of the journey and join him in the foreign land. Her letters and journal, which give a lively and vivid account of the perils of this undertaking, and of the pleasures and difficulties that she expe- rienced after she had succeeded in reaching her dear spouse, supply what is perhaps the most interesting human document of those long years of war. The baroness landed on the American continent at Quebec, and travelled amid great hardships to Chambly, where her husband was stationed. For two days only they were together. After that she returned with her children to Three Rivers. Soon, however, came the orders to march down into the enemy's country. The description of this journey as the baroness has given it to us makes, indeed, 131 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES moving reading. Once a frightful cannon- ade was directed against the house in which the women and the wounded had taken refuge. In the cellar of this place Madam Riedesel and her children passed the entire night. It was in this cellar, indeed, that the little family lived during the long period of waiting that preceded the capitulation made necessary by Bur- goyne's inexcusable delay near Saratoga. Later the Riedesels were most hospitably entertained at Saratoga by General Schuy- ler, his wife and daughters, of whom the baroness never fails to speak in her journal with the utmost affection. The journey from Albany to Boston was full of incident and hardship, but of it the plucky wife writes only : " In the midst of all my trials God so supported me that I lost neither my frolicsomeness nor my spirits. . . ." The contrast be- 132 tween the station of the Americans and of the Germans who were their prisoners, is strikingly brought out in this passage of the diary : " Some of the American gen- erals who were in charge of us on the march to Boston were shoemakers; and upon our halting days they made boots for our officers, and also mended nicely the shoes of our soldiers. They set a great value upon our money coinage, which with them was scarce. One of our officers had worn his boots entirely into shreds. He saw that an American general had on a good pair, and said to him, jestingly, 1 1 will gladly give you a guinea for them.' Immediately the general alighted from his horse, took the guinea, gave up his boots, put on the badly-worn ones of the officer, and again mounted his horse." The journey was at length successfully accomplished, however, and in Massachu- 188 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES setts the baroness was on the whole very well treated, it would seem. " We remained three weeks in wretched quarters at Winter Hill," she writes, " until they transferred us to Cambridge, where they lodged us in one of the most beautiful houses of the place, which had formerly been built by the wealth of the royalists. Never had I chanced upon any such agreeable situation. Seven families, who were connected with each other partly by the ties of relationship and partly by affection, had here farms, gardens, and magnificent houses, and not far off planta- tions of fruit. The owners of these were in the habit of meeting each other in the afternoon, now at the house of onei, and now at another, and making themselves merry with music and the dance living in prosperity united and happy, until, alas! this ruinous war severed them, and left 134 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES all their houses desolate except two, the proprietors of which were also soon obliged to flee. . . . " None of our gentlemen were allowed to go into Boston. Curiosity and desire urged me, however, to pay a visit, to Madam Carter, the daughter of General Schuyler, and I dined at her house several times. The city throughout is pretty, but inhab- ited by violent patriots, and full of wicked people. The women especially were so shameless, that they regarded me with re- pugnance, and even spit at me when I passed by them. Madam Carter was as gentle and good as her parents, but her husband was wicked and treacherous. She came often to visit us, and also dined at our house with the other generals. We sought to show them by every means our gratitude. They seemed also to have much friendship for us; and yet at the same 135 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES time this miserable Carter, when the English General Howe had burned many hamlets and small towns, made the hor- rible proposition to the Americans to chop off the heads of our generals, salt them down in small barrels, and send over to the English one of these barrels for every hamlet or little town burned down. But this barbarous suggestion fortunately was not adopted. "... I saw here that nothing is more terrible than a civil war. Almost every family was disunited. . . . On the third of June, 1778, I gave a ball and supper in celebration of the birthday of my hus- band. I had invited to it all the generals and officers. The Carters also were there. General Burgoyne sent an excuse after he had made us wait until eight o'clock in the evening. He invariably excused himself on various pretences from coming to see 13G us until his departure for England, when he came and made me a great many apolo- gies, but to which I made no other answer than that I should be extremely sorry if he had gone out of his way on our account. We danced considerably, and our cook pre- pared us a magnificent supper of more than eighty covers. Moreover, our court- yard and garden were illuminated. As the birthday of the King of England came upon the following day, which was the fourth, it was resolved that we would not separate until his health had been drank; which was done with the most hearty attachment to his person and his interests. " Never, I believe, has ' God Save the King,' been drunk with more enthusiasm or more genuine good will. Even both my oldest little daughters were there, hav- ing stayed up to see the illumination. All eyes were full of tears ; and it seemed as 137 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES if every one present was proud to have the spirit to venture to this in the midst of our enemies. Even the Carters could not shut their hearts against us. As soon as the company separated, we perceived that the whole house was surrounded by Americans, who, having seen so many peo- ple go into the house, and having noticed also the illumination, suspected that we were planning a mutiny, and if the slight- est disturbance had arisen it would have cost us dear. . . . " The Americans," says the baroness, further on, " when they desire to collect their troops together, place burning torches of pitch upon the hilltops, at which signal every one hastens to the rendezvous. We were once witnesses of this when General Howe attemped a landing at Boston in order to rescue the captive troops. They learned of this plan, as usual, long before- 138 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES hand, and opened barrels of pitch, where- upon for three or four successive days a large number of people without shoes and stockings, and with guns on their backs, were seen hastily coming from all direc- tions, by which means so many people came together so soon that it would have been a very difficult thing to effect a landing. " We lived very happily and contented in Cambridge, and were therefore well pleased at remaining there during the captivity of our troops. As winter ap- proached, however, we were ordered to Virginia [because of the difficulty of pro- viding provisions], and in the month of November, 1778, set out. " My husband, fortunately, found a pretty English wagon, and bought it for me, so that as before I was enabled to travel comfortably. My little Gustava 139 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES had entreated one of my husband's adju- tants, Captain Edmonston, not to leave us on the way. The confiding manner of the child touched him and he gave his promise and faithfully kept it. I travelled always with the army and often over almost im- passable roads. . . . " I had always provisions with me, but carried them in a second small wagon. As this could not go as fast as we, I was often in want of everything. Once when we were passing a town called Hertford [Hartford, Connecticut], we made a halt, which, by the by, happened every fourth day. We there met General Lafayette, whom my husband invited to dinner, as otherwise he would have been unable to find anything to eat. This placed me in rather an awkward dilemma as I knew that he loved a good dinner. Finally, however, I managed to glean from what 140 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES provisions I had on hand enough to make him a very respectable meal. He was so polite and agreeable that he pleased us all very much. He had many Americans in his train, though, who were ready to leap out of their skins for vexation at hearing us speak constantly in French. Perhaps they feared, on seeing us on such a friendly footing with him, that we would be able to alienate him from their cause, or that he would confide things to us that we ought not to know. " Lafayette spoke much of England, and of the kindness of the king in having had all objects of interest shown to him. I could not keep myself from asking him how he could find it in his heart to accept so many marks of kindness from the king when he was on the point of departing in order to fight against him. Upon this ob- servation of mine he appeared somewhat 141 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ashamed, and answered me : ' It is true that such a thought passed through my mind one day, when the king offered to show me his fleet. I answered that I hoped to see it some day, and then quietly retired, in order to escape from the embarrassment of being obliged to decline, point blank, the offer, should it be repeated.' ' The baroness's own meeting with the king soon after her return to England, in the autumn of 1780, when the prisoners were exchanged, is thus entertainingly described : " One day when we were yet seated at table, the queen's first lady of honour, my Lady Howard, sent us a mes- sage to the effect that her Majesty would receive us at six o'clock that afternoon. As my court dress was not yet ready, and I had nothing with me proper to wear, I sent my apologies for not going at that time, which I again repeated when we had 142 OLD NEW ENGLAND HOOFTREES the honour of being presented to their Maj- esties, who were both present at the recep- tion. The queen, however, as did also the king, received us with extraordinary gra- ciousness, and replied to my excuses by saying, l We do not look at the dress of those persons we are glad to see.' " They were surrounded by the prin- cesses, their daughters. We seated our- selves before the chimney-fire, the queen, the princesses, the first lady of honour, and myself, forming a half- circle, my husband, with the king, stand- ing in the centre close to the fire. Tea and cakes were then passed round. I sat between the queen and one of the prin- cesses, and was obliged to go over a great part of my adventures. Her majesty said to me very graciously, ' I have followed you everywhere, and have often inquired after you ; and I have always heard with 143 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES delight that you were well, contented, and beloved by every one.' I happened to have at this time a shocking cough. Observing this, the Princess Sophia went herself and brought me a jelly made of black currants, which she represented as a particularly good remedy, and forced me to accept a jar full. " About nine o'clock in the evening the Prince of Wales came in. His youngest sisters flocked around him, and he em- braced them and danced them around. In short, the royal family had such a pecul- iar gift for removing all restraint that one could readily imagine himself to be in a cheerful family circle of his own station in life. We remained with them until ten o'clock, and the king conversed much with my husband about America in German, which he spoke exceedingly well." From England the baroness proceeded 144 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES (in 1783), to her home in Brunswick, where she was joyfully received, and where, after her husband's triumph, they enjoyed together respite from war for a period of four years. In 1794, General Riedesel was appointed commandant of the city of Brunswick, where he died in 1800. The baroness survived him eight years, passing away in Berlin, March 29, 1808, at the age of sixty-two. She rests beside her beloved consort in the family vault at Lauterbach. Her Cambridge residence, which for- merly stood at the corner of Sparks Street, on Brattle, among the beautiful lindens so often mentioned in the " journal," has recently been remodelled and removed to the next lot but one from its original site. It now looks as in the picture, and ia numbered 149 Brattle Street A little street at the right has been appropriately 145 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES named Riedesel Avenue. Yet even in his- tory-loving Cambridge there is little famil- iarity with the career of the baron and his charming lady, and there are few persons who have read the entertaining journal, written in German a century and a quarter ago by this clever and devoted wife. 146 DOCTOR CHURCH: FIRST TRAI- TOR TO THE AMERICAN CAUSE W~ T"ERY few old houses retain at the Ms present time so large a share of the dignity and picturesque- ness originally theirs, as does the home- stead whose chief interest for us lies in the fact that it was the Revolutionary prison of Doctor Benjamin Church, the first-dis- covered traitor to the American cause. This house is on Brattle Street, at the corner of Hawthorn. Built about 1700, it came early into the possession of Jona- than Belcher, who afterward became Sir Jonathan, and from 1730 till 1741 was 147 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES governor of Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Colonel John Vassall the elder was the next owner of the house, ac- quiring it in 1736, and somewhat later conveying it, with its adjoining estate of seven acres, to his brother, Major Henry, an officer in the militia, who died under its roof in 1769. Major Henry Vassall had married Pen- elope, sister of Isaac Royall, the proprietor of the beautiful place at Medford, but upon the beginning of hostilities, this sprightly widow abandoned her spacious home in such haste that she carried along with her, according to tradition, a young companion whom she had not time to restore to her friends ! Such of her prop- erty as could be used by the colony forces was given in charge of Colonel Stark, while the rest was allowed to pass into Boston. The barns and roomy outbuild- 148 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES ings were used for the storage of the colony forage. - . It is highly probable that the Widow Vassall's house at once became the Amer- ican hospital, and that it was the resi- dence, as it was certainly the prison, of Doctor Benjamin Church. Church had been placed at the head of an army hospi- tal for the accommodation of twenty thou- sand men, and till this time had seemed a brave and zealous compatriot of Warren and the other leading men of the time. Soon after his appointment, he was, how- ever, detected in secret correspondence with Gage. He had entrusted to a woman of his acquaintance a letter written in cipher to be forwarded to the British commander. This letter was found upon the girl, she was taken to headquarters, and there the contents of the fatal message were de- ciphered and the defection of Doctor 149 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Church established. When questioned by Washington he appeared utterly con- founded, and made no attempt to vindicate himself. The letter itself did not contain any intelligence of importance, but the dis- covery that one, until then so high in the esteem of his countrymen, was engaged in a clandestine correspondence with the enemy was deemed sufficient evidence of guilt. Church was therefore arrested at once, and confined in a chamber looking upon Brattle Street. Some of his leisure, while here imprisoned, he employed in cutting on the door of a closet : "B CHUBCH, JR." There the marks still remain, their sig- nificance having after a half century been interpreted by a lady of the house to whom 150 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES they had long been familiar, but who had lacked any clue to their origin until, in the course of a private investigation, she determined beyond a doubt their relation to Church. The chamber has two windows in the north front, and two overlooking the area on the south. Church's fall was the more terrible be- cause from a height. He was a member of a very distinguished family, and he had been afforded in his youth all the beet opportunities of the day. In 1754 he was graduated at Harvard, and after studying with Doctor Pynchon rose to considerable eminence as a physician and particularly as a surgeon. Besides talents and genius of a sort, he was endowed with a rare poetic fancy, many of his verses being full of daintiness as well as of a very pretty wit. He was, however, somewhat extrava- gant in his habits, and about 1768 had 151 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES built himself an elegant country house near Boston. It was to sustain this, it is believed, that he sold himself to the king's causa To all appearance, however, Church was up to the very hour of his detection one of the leading patriots of the time. He had been chosen to deliver the oration in the Old South Meeting-IIouse on March 5, 1773, and he there pronounced a stirring discourse, which has still power to thrill the reader, upon the massacre the day cele- brates, and the love of liberty which inspired the patriots' revolt on that memo- rable occasion. Yet two years earlier, as we have since discovered from a letter of Governor Hutchinson, he had been anony- mously employing his venal pen in the service of the government! In 1774, when he was a member of the Provincial Congress, he was first suspected 152 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of communication with Gage, and of re- ceiving a reward for his treachery. Paul Revere has written concerning this : " In the fall of '74 and the winter of '75 I was one of upwards of thirty, chiefly mechanics, who formed themselves into a committee for the purpose of watching the movements of the British soldiers and gaining every intelligence of the Tories. We held our meetings at the Green Dragon Tavern. This committee were astonished to find all their secrets known to General Gage, although every time they met every member swore not to reveal any of their transactions except to Hancock, Adams, Warren, Otis, Church, and one or two others." The traitor, of course, proved to be Doctor Church. One of his students who kept his books and knew of his money embarrassment first mistrusted him. Only 158 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES treachery, he felt, could account for his master's sudden acquisition of some hun- dreds of new British guineas. The doctor was called before a council of war consisting of all the major-generals and brigadiers of the army, beside the adjutant-general, Washington himself presiding. This tribunal decided that Church's acts had been criminal, but re- manded him for the decision of the General Court, of which he was a member. He was taken in a chaise, escorted by General Gates and a guard of twenty men, to the music of fife and drum, to Watertown meeting-house, where the court sat. " The galleries," says an old writer, " were thronged with people of all ranks. The bar was placed in the middle of the broad aisle, and the doctor arraigned." His de- fence at the trial was very ingenious and able : that the fatal letter was designed 154 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES for his brother, but that since it was not sent he had communicated no intelligence ; that there was nothing in the letter but notorious facts; that his exaggerations of the American force could only be designed to favour the cause of his country; and that his object was purely patriotic. He added, in a burst of sounding though un- convincing oratory : " The warmest bosom here does not flame with a brighter zeal for the security, happiness, and liberties of America than mine." These eloquent professions did not avail him, however. He was adjudged guilty, and expelled from the House of Repre- sentatives of Massachusetts. By order of the General Congress, he was condemned to close confinement in Norwich jail in Connecticut, " and debarred from the use of pen, ink, and paper," but his health failing, he was allowed (in 1776) to leave 155 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the country. He sailed for the West Indies, and the vessel that bore him was never afterward heard from. Some people in Church's time, as well as our own, have been disposed to doubt the man's treachery, but Paul Revere was firmly convinced that the doctor was in the pay of General Gage. Revere's state- ment runs in part as follows : " The same day I met Doctor Warren. He was president of the Committee of Safety. He engaged me as a messenger to do the out-of-doors business for that committee ; which gave me an opportunity of being frequently with them. The Fri- day evening after, about sunset, I was sitting with some or near all that com- mittee in their room, which was at Mr. Hastings's house in Cambridge. Doctor Church all at once started up. 'Doctor 156 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Warren/ said he, * I am determined to go into Boston to-morrow.' (It set them all a-staring.) Doctor Warren replied, 'Are you serious, Doctor Church? They will hang you if they catch you in Boston.' He replied, ' I am serious, and am deter- mined to go at all adventures.' After a considerable conversation, Doctor Warren said, ' If you are determined, let us make some business for you.' They agreed that he should go to get medicine for their and our wounded officers." Naturally, Paul Revere, who was an ardent patriot as well as an exceedingly straightforward man, had little sympathy with Church's weakness, but to-day as one looks at the initials scratched by the pris- oner on the door of his cell, one's heart expands with pity for the man, and one wonders long and long whether the vessel 157 * OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTEEES on which he sailed was really lost, or whether he escaped on it to foreign shores, there to expiate as best he could his sin against himself and his country. 158 A VICTIM OF TWO REVOLUTIONS /N the life of Colonel James Swan, as in that of Doctor Benjamin Church, money was the root of all evil. Swan was almost a fool because of his pig-head- cdness in financial adversity, and Church was ever a knave, plausible even when proved guilty. Yet both fell from the same cause, utter inability to keep money and avoid debt. Colonel Swan's history reads very like a romance. He was born in Fifeshire, Scotland, in 1754, and came to America in 1765. He found employment in Bos- ton, and devoted all his spare time to books. While a clerk of eighteen, in a 159 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES counting-house near Faneuil Hall, he pub- lished a work on the African slave trade, entitled, " A Discussion of Great Britain and Her Colonies from the Slave Trade," a copy of which, preserved in the Boston Public Library, is well worth reading for its flavour and wit. While serving an apprenticeship with Thaxter & Son, he formed an intimate friendship with several other clerks who, in after years, became widely known, among them, Benjamin Thompson, after- ward made Count Rmnford, and Henry Knox, who later became the bookseller on Cornhill, and finally a general in the Con- tinental army. Swan was a member of the Sons of Lib- erty, and took part in the famous Boston tea-party. He was engaged in the battle of Bunker Hill as a volunteer aid of War- ren, and was twice wounded. He alo 160 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES witnessed the evacuation of Boston by the British, March 17, 1776. He later be- came secretary of the Massachusetts board of war, and was elected a member of the legislature. Throughout the whole war he occupied positions of trust, often re- quiring great courage and cool judgment, and the fidelity with which every duty was performed was shown by the honours con- ferred upon him after retiring to civil life. By means of a large fortune which fell to him, he entered mercantile business on a large scale, and became very wealthy. He owned large tracts of land in different parts of the country, and bought much of the confiscated property of the Tories, among other lands the estate belonging to Governor Hutchinson, lying on Tremont Street, between West and Boylston Streets. His large speculations, however, caused him to become deeply involved in debt. 161 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES In 1787, accordingly, he started out anew to make a fortune, and through the in- fluence of Lafayette and other men of prominence in Paris, he secured many government contracts which entailed im- mense profit. Through all the dark days of the French Revolution, he tried to serve the cause of the proscribed French nobility by perfecting plans for them to colonise on his lands in America. A large number he induced to immigrate, and a vast quan- tity of the furniture and belongings of these unfortunates was received on board his ships. But before the owners could follow their furniture, the axe had fallen upon their heads. When the Reign of Terror was at its height, the Sally, owned by Colonel Swan, and commanded by Captain Stephen Clough, of Wiscasset, Maine, came home with a strange cargo and a stranger story. 162 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES The cargo consisted of French tapestries, marquetry, silver with foreign crests, rare vases, clocks, costly furniture, and no end of apparelling fit for a queen. The story was that, only for the failure at the last moment of a plot for her deliverance, Marie Antoinette would also have been on the sloop, the plan being that she should be the guest at Wiscasset of the captain's wife until she could be transferred to a safer retreat. However true may be the rumour of a plot to bring Marie Antoinette to America, it is certain that the furniture brought on the Sally, was of exceptional value and beauty. It found its resting-place in the old Swan house of our picture, to which it gave for many years the name of the Marie Antoinette house. One room was even called the Marie Antoinette room, and the bedstead of this apartment, which 163 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES is to-day in the possession of the descend- ants of Colonel Swan, is still known as the Marie Antoinette bedstead. Whether the unhappy queen ever really rested on this bed cannot, of course, be said, but tradition has it that it was designed for her use in America because she had found it com- fortable in France. Colonel Swan, having paid all his debts, returned in 1795 to the United States, accompanied by the beautiful and eccentric gentlewoman who was his wife, and who had been with her husband in Paris during the Terror. They brought with them on this occasion a very large collection of fine French furniture, decorations, and paint- ings. The colonel had become very wealthy indeed through his commercial enterprises, and was now able to spend a great deal of money upon his fine Dorches- ter mansion, which he finished about the 164 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES year 1796. A prominent figure of the house was the circular dining-hall, thirty- two feet in diameter, crowned at the height of perhaps twenty-five feet hy a dome, and having three mirror windows. As originally built, it contained no fireplaces or heating conveniences of any kind. Mrs. Swan accompanied her husband on several subsequent trips to Paris, and it was on one of these occasions that the colonel came to great grief. He had con- tracted, it is said, a debt claimed in France to be two million francs. This indebted- ness he denied, and in spite of the per- suasion of his friends he would make no concession in the matter. As a matter of principle he would not pay a debt which, he insisted, he did not owe. He seems to have believed the claim of his creditor to be a plot, and he at once resolved to be a martyr. He was thereupon arrested, and 165 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES confined in St. Pelagie, a debtor's prison, from 1808 to 1830, a period of twenty-two years ! He steadfastly denied the charge against him, and, although able to settle the debt, preferred to remain a prisoner to securing his liberty on an unjust plea. . . . He gave up his wife, children, friends, and the comforts of his Parisian and New England homes for a principle, and made prepara- tions for a long stay in prison. Lafayette, Swan's sincere friend, tried in vain to pre- vail upon him to take his liberty. 1 Doctor Small, his biographer, tells us that he lived in a little cell in the prison, and was treated with great respect by the other prisoners, they putting aside their little furnaces with which they cooked, that he might have more room for exercise. Not a day passed without some kind act i " History of Swan's Island." 166 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES on his part, and he was known to have been the cause of the liberation of many poor debtors. When the jailor introduced his pretended creditor, he would politely salute him, and say to the former : " My friend, return me to my chamber." With funds sent by his wife, Swan hired apartments in the Rue de la Clif, opposite St Pelagie, which he caused to be fitted up at great expense. Here were dining and drawing rooms, coaches, and stables, and outhouses, and here he invited his guests and lodged his servants, putting at the disposal of the former his carriages. in which they drove to the promenade, the ball, the theatre everywhere in his name. At this Parisian home he gave great dinners to his constant but bewil- dered friends. He seemed happy in thus braving his creditors and judges, we are told, allowed his beard to grow, dressed 167 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES a la mode, and was cheerful to the last day of his confinement. His wife died in 1825, and five years later the Revolution of July threw open his doors in the very last hour of his twenty- second year of captivity. His one desire upon being released was to embrace his friend Lafayette, and this he did on the steps of the Hotel de Ville. Then he re- turned, July 31, to reinstate himself in prison for St. Pelagie had after twenty-two years come to stand to him for home. He was seized almost immediately upon his second entrance into confinement with a hemorrhage, and died suddenly in the Rue d'fichiquier, aged seventy-six. In his will, he donated large sums of money to his four children, and to the city of Boston to found an institution to be called the Swan Orphan Academy. But the estate was found to be hopelessly insolvent, 168 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES and the public legacy was never paid. The colonel's name lives, however, in the Maine island he purchased in 1786, for the purpose of improving and settling, a project which, but for one of his periodic failures, he would probably have success- fully accomplished. 169 THE WOMAN VETERAN OF THE CONTINENTAL ARMY SAMPSON GAN- NETT, of Sharon, has the unique distinction of presenting the only authenticated case of a woman's enlist- ment and service as a regular soldier in the Revolutionary army. The proof of her claim's validity can be found in the resolutions of the General Court of Massachusetts, where, under date of January 20, 1792, those who take the trouble may find this entry : " On the petition of Deborah Gannett, praying com- pensation for services performed in the late army of the United States. 170 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES " Whereas, it appears to this court that Deborah Gannett enlisted under the name of Robert Shurtleff, in Captain Webb's company in the Fourth Massachusetts regiment, on May 21, 1782, and did actu- ally perform the duties of a soldier in the late army of the United States to the twenty-third day of October, 1783, for which she has received no compensation ; " And, whereas, it further appears that the said Deborah exhibited an extraor- dinary instance of female heroism by dis- charging the duties of a faithful, gallant soldier, and at the same time preserved the virtue and chastity of her sex unsus- pected and unblemished, and was dis- charged from the service with a fair and honourable character; therefore, " Resolved^ that the treasurer of the Commonwealth be, and hereby is, directed to issue his note to said Deborah for the 171 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES sum of 34, bearing interest from October 23, 1783." Thus was the seal of authenticity set upon as extraordinary a story as can be found in the annals of this country. Deborah Sampson was born in Plymp- ton, Plymouth County, December 17, 1760, of a family descended from Governor Bradford. She had many brothers who enlisted for service early in the war, and it was their example, according to some ac- counts, which inspired her unusual course. If one may judge from the hints thrown out in the " Female Review," a quaint little pamphlet probably written by Debo- rah herself, and published in 1797, how- ever, it was the ardent wooing of a too importunate lover which drove the girl to her extraordinary undertaking. Two copies of this " Review " are now treas- ured in the Boston Public Library. 172 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES In the first chapters, the author dis- courses upon female education and the like, and then, after a sympathetic analysis of the educational aspirations of the heroine (referred to throughout the book as " our illustrious fair "), and a perora- tion on the lady's religious beliefs, de- scribes in Miss Sampson's own words a curious dream she once had. The young woman experienced this psychic visitation, the author of the " Re- view " would have us believe, a short time before taking her final step toward the army. In the dream, a serpent bade her " arise, stand on your feet, gird yourself, and prepare to encounter your enemy." This, according to the chronicler's inter- pretation, was one underlying cause of Deborah's subsequent decision to enlist as a soldier. Yet her mother's wish that she should 173 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTTIEES marry a man for whom she felt no love is also suggested as a cause, and there is a hint, too, that the death in the battle of Long Island, New York, of a man to whom she was attached, gave the final im- pulse to her plan. At any rate, it was the night that she heard the news of this man's death that she started on her perilous undertaking. " Having put in readiness the materials she had judged requisite," writes her chron- icler, "she retired at her usual hour to bed, intending to rise at twelve. . . . There was none but the Invisible who could take cognisance of her passion on assuming her new garb." She slipped cautiously away, and trav- elled carefully to Bellingham, where she enlisted as a Continental soldier on a three years' term. She was mustered into the army at Worcester, under the name of 174 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Robert Shurtleff. With about fifty other soldiers she soon arrived at West Point, and it there fell to her lot to be in Captain Webb's company, in Colonel Shepard's regiment, and in General Patterson's brigade. Naturally the girl's disappearance from home had caused her friends and her fam- ily great uneasiness. Her mother re- proached herself for having urged too constantly upon the attention of her child the suit of a man for whom she did not care, and her lover upbraided himself for having been too importunate in his wooing. The telephone and telegraph not having been invented, it was necessary, in order to trace the lost girl, to visit all the places to which Deborah might have flown. Her brother, therefore, made an erpedition one hundred miles to the eastward among some of the family relations, and her 175 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES suitor took his route to the west of Mas- sachusetts and across into New York State. In the course of his search he visited, as it happened, the very place in which Deborah's company was stationed, and saw (though he did not recognise) his lost sweetheart. She recognised him, however, and hearing his account to the officers of her mother's grief and anxiety, sent home as soon as opportunity offered, the follow- ing letter : " DEAR PARENT : On the margin of one of those rivers which intersects and winds itself so beautifully majestic through a vast extent of territory of the United States is the present situation of your un- worthy but constant and affectionate daughter. I pretend not to justify or even to palliate my clandestine elopement. In 176 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOETREES hopes of pacifying your mind, which I am sure must be afflicted beyond measure, I write you this scrawl. Conscious of not having thus abruptly absconded by reason of any fancied ill treatment from you, or disaffection toward any, the thoughts of my disobedience are truly poignant. Neither have I a plea that the insults of man have driven me hence: and let this be your consoling reflection that I have not fled to offer more daring insults to them by a proffered prostitution of that virtue which I have always been taught to preserve and revere. The motive is truly important; and when I divulge it my sole ambition and delight shall be to make an expiatory sacrifice for my trans- gression. " I am in a large but well regulated family. My employment is agreeable, although it is somewhat different and more 177 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES intense than it was at home. But I appre- hend it is equally as advantageous. My superintendents are indulgent; but to a punctilio they demand a due observance of decorum and propriety of conduct. By this you must know I have become mistress of many useful lessons, though I have many more to learn. Be not too much troubled, therefore, about my present or future engagements; as I will endeavour to make that prudence and virtue my model, for which, I own, I am much in- debted to those who took the charge of my youth. " My place of residence and the adjoin- ing country are beyond description de- lightsome. . . . Indeed, were it not for the ravages of war, of which I have seen more here than in Massachusetts, this part of our great continent would become a paradisiacal elysium. Heaven condescend 178 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES that a speedy peace may constitute us a happy and independent nation: when the husband shall again be restored to his amiable consort, to wipe her sorrowing tear, the son to the embraces of his mourn- ing parents, and the lover to the tender, disconsolate, and half -distracted object of his love. " Your affectionate " DATJGHTEB." Unfortunately this letter, which had to be entrusted to a stranger, was intercepted. But Deborah did not know this, and her mind at rest, she pursued cheerfully the course she had marked out for herself. The fatigue and heat of the march op- pressed the girl soldier more than did bat- tle or the fear of death. Yet at White Plains, her first experience of actual war- fare, her left-hand man was shot dead in 179 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the second fire, and she herself received two shots through her coat and one through her cap. In the terrible bayonet charge at this same battle, in which she was a par- ticipant, the sight of the bloodshed proved almost too much for her strength. At Yorktown she was ordered to work on a battery, which she did right faith- fully. Among her comrades, Deborah's young and jaunty appearance won for her the sobriquet " blooming boy." She was a great favourite in the ranks. She shirked nothing, and did duty sometimes as a common soldier and sometimes as a ser- geant on the lines, patrolling, collecting fuel, and performing such other offices as fell to her lot. After the battle of White Plains she received two severe wounds, one of which was in her thigh. Naturally, a surgeon was sent for at once, but the plucky girl, 180 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES who could far more easily endure pain than the thought of discovery, extracted the ball herself with penknife and needle before hospital aid arrived. In the spring of 1783 General Patterson selected her for his waiter, and Deborah so distinguished herself for readiness and courage that the general often praised to the other men of the regiment the heroism of his " smock-faced boy." It is at this stage of the story that the inevitable denouement occurred. The young soldier fell ill with a prevailing epidemic, and during her attack of un- consciousness her sex was discovered by the attendant physician, Doctor Bana. Imme- diately she was removed by the physician's orders to the apartment of the hospital matron, under whose care she remained until discharged as well. Deborah's appearance in her uniform 181 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES was sufficiently suggestive, as has been said, of robust masculinity to attract the favourable attention of many young women. What she had not counted upon was the arousing in one of these girls of a degree of interest which should imperil her secret. Her chagrin, the third morn- ing after the doctor's discovery, was appre- ciably deepened, therefore, by the arrival of a love-letter from a rich and charming young woman of Baltimore whom the sol- dier, " Robert Shurtleff," had several times met, but whose identity with the writer of the letter our heroine by no means suspected. This letter, accompanied by a gift of fruit, the compiler of the " Female Review " gives as follows : " DEAK SIR : Fraught with the feel- ings of a friend who is doubtless beyond your conception interested in your health 182 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES and happiness, I take liberty to address you with a frankness which nothing but the purest friendship and affection can pal- liate, know, then, that the charms I first read on your visage brought a passion into my bosom for which I could not ac- count. If it was from the thing called LOVE, I was before mostly ignorant of it, and strove to stifle the fugutive; though I confess the indulgence was agreeable. But repeated interviews with you kindled it into a flame I do not now blush to own : and should it meet a generous return, I shall not reproach myself for its in- dulgence. I have long sought to hear of your department, and how painful is the news I this moment received that you are sick, if alive, in the hospital! Your complicated nerves will not admit of writing, but inform the bearer if you are necessitated for anvthing that can con- 183 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES duce to your comfort. If you recover and think proper to inquire my name, I will give you an opportunity. But if death is to terminate your existence there, let your last senses be impressed with the re- flection that you die not without one more friend whose tears will bedew your funeral obsequies. Adieu." The distressed invalid replied to this note that " he " was not in need of money. The same evening, however, another mis- sive was received, enclosing two guineas. And the like favours were continued throughout the soldier's stay at the hos- pital. Upon recovery, the " blooming boy " re- sumed his uniform to rejoin the troops. Doctor Bana had kept the secret, and there seemed to Deborah no reason why she 184 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES should not pursue her soldier career to the end. The enamoured maid of Baltimore still remained, however, a thorn in her con- science. And one day, when near Baltimore on a special duty, our soldier was sum- moned by a note to the home of this young woman, who, confessing herself the writer of the anonymous letter, declared her love. Just what response was made to this avowal is not known, but that the attract- ive person in soldier uniform did not at this time tell the maid of Baltimore the whole truth is certain. Events were soon, however, to force Deborah to perfect frankness with her ad- mirer. After leaving Baltimore, she went on a special duty journey, in the course of which she was taken captive by In- dians. The savage who had her in his 185 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES charge she was obliged to kill in self-de- fence, after which there seemed every prospect that she and the single Indian lad who escaped with her would perish in the wilderness, a prey to wild beasts. Thereupon she wrote to her Baltimore admirer thus : " DEAR Miss : Perhaps you are the nearest friend I have. But a few hours must inevitably waft me to an infinite dis- tance from all sublunary enjoyments, and fix me in a state of changeless retribu- tion. Three years having made me the sport of fortune, I am at length doomed to end my existence in a dreary wilder- ness, unattended except by an Indian boy. If you receive these lines, remember they come from one who sincerely loves you. But, my amiable friend, forgive my imper- 186 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES fections and forget you ever had affection for one so unworthy the name of " YOUE OWN SEX." No means of sending this letter pre- sented itself, however, and after a dreary wandering, Deborah was enabled to rejoin her soldier friends. Then she proceeded to Baltimore for the express purpose of seeing her girl admirer and telling her the truth. Yet this time, too, she evaded her duty, and left the maiden still unenlight- ened, with a promise to return the ensuing spring a promise, she afterward de- clared, she had every intention of keeping, had not the truth been published to the world in the intervening time. Doctor Bana had been only deferring the uncloaking of " Robert Shurtleff." Upon Deborah's return to duty, he made the culprit herself the bearer of a letter to 187 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES General Patterson, which disclosed the secret. The general, who was at West Point at the time, treated her with all possible kind- ness, and commended her for her service, instead of punishing her, as she had feared. Then he gave her a private apartment, and made arrangements to have her safely con- ducted to Massachusetts. Not quite yet, however, did Deborah abandon her disguise. She passed the next winter with distant relatives under the name of her youngest brother. But she soon resumed her proper name, and re- turned to her delighted family. After the war, she married Benjamin Gannett, and the homestead in Sharon, where she lived for the rest of her life, is still standing, relics of her occupancy, her table and her Bible, being shown there to-day to interested visitors. 188 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES In 1802 she made a successful lecturing tour, during which she kept a very inter- esting diary, which is still exhibited to those interested by her great-granddaugh- ter, Mrs. Susan Moody. Her grave in Sharon is carefully preserved, a street has been named in her honour, and several patriotic societies have constituted her their principal deity. Certainly her story is curious enough to entitle her to some distinction. 189 THE REDEEMED CAPTIVE F all the towns settled by English- men in the midst of Indians, none was more thoroughly peaceful in its aims and origin than Deerfield, in the old Pocumtuck Valley. Here under the giant trees of the primeval forest the white- haired Eliot prayed, and beside the banks of the sluggish stream he gathered as nucleus for the town the roving savages upon whom his gospel message had made a deep impression. Quite naturally, there- fore, the men of Pocumtuck were not dis- quieted by news of Indian troubles. With the natives about them they had lived on peaceful terms for many years, and it was 190 OLD NEW ENGLAND RQQFTREES almost impossible for them to believe that they would ever come to shudder at the mere presence of redskins. Yet history tells us, and Deerfield to-day bears witness to the fact, that no town in all the colonies suffered more at the hands of the Indians than did this peaceful village in Western Massachusetts. In 1702 King William died, and "good" Queen Anne reigned in his stead. Follow- ing closely upon the latter event came an- other war between France and England, a conflict which, as in the reign of William and Mary, renewed the hostilities between the French and English colonies in Amer- ica. At an early date, accordingly, the set- tlement of Deerfield discovered that it was to be attacked by the French. At once measures were taken to strengthen the fortifications of the town, and to prepare, so far af possible, for the dreaded event 191 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES The blow fell on the night of the twenty- ninth of February, 1704, when Major Her- tel de Rouville, with upwards of three hundred and forty French and Indians, arrived at a pine bluff overlooking Deer- field meadow, about two miles north of the village a locality now known as Petty's Plain. Here he halted, to await the appropriate hour for an attack, and it was not until early morning that, leav- ing their packs upon the spot, his men started forward for their terrible work of destruction. Rouville took great pains not to alarm the sentinels in his approach, but the precaution was unnecessary, as the watch were unfaithful, and had retired to rest. Arriving at the fortifications, he found the snow drifted nearly to the top of the palisades, and his entire party en- tered the place undiscovered, while the whole population were in profound sleep. 192 OLD NEW EXGLAKD ROOFTREES Quietly distributing themselves in parties, they broke in the doors of the houses, dragged out the astonished inhabitants, killed such as resisted, and took prisoner the majority of the remainder, only a few escaping from their hands into the woods. The house of Reverend John Williams was assaulted at the beginning of the attack. Awakened from sleep, Mr. Will- iams leaped from his bed, and running to the door found the enemy entering. Call- ing to two soldiers who lodged in the house, he sprang back to his bedroom, seized a pistol, cocked it, and presented it at the breast of an Indian who had followed him. It missed fire, and it was well, for the room was thronged in an instant, and he was seized, bound without being allowed the privilege of dressing, and kept standing in the cold for an hour. Meanwhile, the sav- ages amused themselves by taunting him, 193 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES swinging their hatchets over him and threatening him. Two of his children and a negro woman were then taken to the door and butchered. Mrs. Williams was al- lowed to dress, and she and her five children were taken captives. Other houses in the village were likewise at- tacked, one of them being defended by seven men, for whom the women inside cast bullets while the fight was in progress. But the attacking force was an over- powering one, and De Rouville and his men had by sunrise done their work most successfully with torch and tomahawk. The blood of forty-nine murdered men, women and children reddened the snow. Twenty-nine men, twenty-four women, and fifty-eight children were made captive, and in a few hours the spoil-encumbered enemy were en route for Canada. Through the midwinter snow which cov- 194 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ered the fields the poor captives marched out on their terrible pilgrimage. Two of the prisoners succeeded in escaping, where- upon Mr. Williams was ordered to inform the others that if any more slipped away death by fire would be visited upon those who remained. The first night's lodgings were provided for as comfortably as cir- cumstances would permit, and all the able- bodied among the prisoners were made to sleep in barns. On the second day's march Mr. Williams was permitted to speak with his poor wife, whose youngest child had been born only a few weeks before, and to assist her on her journey. " On the way," says the pastor, in his famous book, " The Redeemed Captive," " we discoursed on the happiness of those who had a right to an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens; and God for a father and friend ; as also it was our 195 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES reasonable duty quietly to submit to the will of God, and to say, ' The will of the Lord be done.' ' Thus imparting to one another their heroic courage and Christian strength and consolation, the captive cou- ple pursued their painful way. At last the poor woman announced the gradual failure of her strength, and during the short time she was allowed to remain with her husband, expressed good wishes and prayers for him and her children. The narrative proceeds : " She never spake any discontented word as to what had be- fallen her, but with suitable expressions justified God in what had happened. . . . We soon made a halt, in which time my chief surviving master came up, upon which I was put into marching with the foremost, and so made my last farewell of my dear wife, the desire of my eyes, and companion in many mercies and afflictions. Upon our 196 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTEEES separation from each other, we asked for each other grace sufficient for what God should call us to." For a short time Mrs. Williams re- mained where her husband had left her, occupying her leisure in reading her Bible. He, as was necessary, went on, and soon had to ford a small and rapid stream, and climb a high mountain on its other side. Reaching the top very much exhausted, he was unburdened of his pack. Then his heart went down the steep after his wife. He entreated his master to let him go down and help her, but his desire was re- fused. As the prisoners one after another came up he inquired for her, and at length the news of her death was told to him. In wading the river she had been thrown down by the water and entirely submerged. Yet after great difficulty she had succeeded in reaching the bank, and had penetrated 197 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES to the foot of the mountain. Here, how- ever, her master had become discouraged with the idea of her maintaining the march, and burying his tomahawk in her head he left her dead. Mrs. Williams was the daughter of Reverend Eleazer Mather, the first minister of Northampton an educated, refined, and noble woman. It is pleasant, while musing upon her sad fate, to recall that her body was found and brought back to Deerfield, where, long years after, her husband was laid by her side. And there to-day sleeps the dust of the pair beneath stones which inform the stranger of the interesting spot. Others of the captives were killed upon the journey as convenience required. A journal kept by Stephen Williams, the pastor's son, who was only eleven years old when captured, reflects in an artless way every stage of the terrible journey: 198 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES " They travelled," he writes, " as if they meant to kill us all, for they travelled thirty-five or forty miles a day. . . . Their manner was, if any loitered, to kill them. My feet were very sore, so I thought they would kill me also." When the first Sabbath arrived, Mr. Williams was allowed to preach. His text was taken from the Lamentations of Jere- miah, the verse in which occurs the passage, " My virgins and my young men have gone into captivity." Thus they progressed, the life of the captives dependent in every case upon their ability to keep up with the party. Here an innocent child would be knocked upon the head and left in the snow, and there some poor woman dropped by the way and killed by the tomahawk. Arriv- ing at White River, De Rouville divided his forces, and the parties took separate 199 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES routes to Canada. The group to which Mr. Williams was attached went up White River, and proceeded, with various adven- tures, to Sorel in Canada, to which place some of the captives had preceded him. In Canada, all who arrived were treated by the French with great humanity, and Mr. Williams with marked courtesy. He proceeded to Chambly, thence to St. Francis on the St. Lawrence, afterward to Quebec, and at last to Montreal, where Governor Vaudreuil accorded him much kindness, and eventually redeemed him from savage hands. Mr. Williams's religious experiences in Canada were characteristic of the times. He was there thrown among Romanists, a sect against which he entertained the most profound dislike profound to the degree of inflammatory conscientiousness, not to say bigotry. His Indian master was deter- 200 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES mined he should go to church, but he would not, and was once dragged there, where, he says, he " saw a great confusion instead of any Gospel order." The Jesuits as- sailed him on every hand, and gave him but little peace. His master at one time tried to make him kiss a crucifix, under the threat that he would dash out his brains with a hatchet if he should refuse. But he did refuse, and had the good for- tune to save his head as well as his con- science. Mr. Williams's own account of his stay in Canada is chiefly devoted to anecdotes of the temptations to Romanism with which he was beset by the Jesuits. His son Samuel was almost persuaded to embrace the faith of Rome, and his daugh- ter Eunice was, to his great chagrin, forced to say prayers in Latin. But, for the most, the Deerfield captives proved intractable, and were still aggressively Protestant 201 when, in 1706, Mr. Williams and all his children (except Eunice, of whom we shall say more anon), together with the other captives up to the number of fifty-seven, embarked on board a ship sent to Quebec by Governor Dudley, and sailed for Bos- ton. A committee of the pastor's people met their old clergyman upon his landing at Boston, and invited him to return to the charge from which he had, nearly three years before, been torn. And Mr. Will- iams had the courage to accept their offer, notwithstanding the fact that the war con- tinued with unabated bitterness. In 1707 the town voted to build him a house " as big as Ensign Sheldon's, and a back room as big as may be thought convenient." This house is still standing (1902), though Ensign Sheldon's, the " Old Indian House in Deerfield," as it has been popularly 202 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES called, was destroyed more than half a century ago. The Indian House stood at the northern end of Deerfield Common, and exhibited to its latest day the marks of the tomahawk left upon its front door in the attack of 1704, and the perforations made by the balls inside. The door is still preserved, and is one of the most interest- ing relics now to be seen in Memorial Hall, Deerfield. For more than twenty years after his return from captivity, Mr. Williams served his parish faithfully. He took into his new house a new wife, by whom he had several children; and in this same house he passed peacefully away June 12, 1729, in the sixty-fifth year of his age, and the forty-fifth of his ministry. Stephen Williams, who had been taken captive when a lad of eleven, was redeemed in 1705 with his father. In spite of the 203 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES hardships to which he had been so early ex- posed, he was a fine strong boy when he returned to Deerfield, and he went on with his rudely interrupted education to such good effect that he graduated from Har- vard in 1713 at the age of twenty. In 1716 he settled as minister at Longmeadow, in which place he died in 1872. Yet his manhood was not passed without share in the wars of the time, for he was chap- lain in the Louisburg expedition in 1745, and in the regiment of Colonel Ephraim Williams in his fatal campaign in 1755, and again in the Canadian campaign of 1756. The portrait of him which is here given was painted about 1748, and is now to be seen in the hall of the Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, within four- score rods of the place where the boy cap- tive was born, and from which he was carried as a tender child into captivity. 204 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES It has been said that one of the greatest trials of Mr. Williams's stay in Canada was the discovery that his little daughter, Eunice, had been taught by her Canadian captors to say prayers in Latin. But this was only the beginning of the sorrow of the good man's life. Eunice was a plastic little creature, and she soon adopted not only the religion, but also the manners and customs of the Indians among whom she had fallen. In fact and feeling she became a daughter of the Indians, and there among them she married, on arriving at woman- hood, an Indian by whom she had a family of children. A few years after the war she made her first visit to her Deerfield rela- tives, and subsequently she came twice to Massachusetts dressed in Indian costume. But all the inducements held out to her to remain there were in vain. During her last visit she was the subject of many 205 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES prayers and lengthy sermonising on the part of her clerical relatives, an address delivered at Mansfield August 1, 1741, by Solomon Williams, A. M., being frankly in her behalf. A portion of this sermon has come down to us, and offers a curious example of the eloquence of the time : "It has pleased God," says the worthy minis- ter, " to incline her, the last summer and now again of her own accord, to make a visit to her friends ; and this seems to en- courage us to hope that He designs to answer the many prayers which have been put up for her." But in spite of these many prayers, and in spite, too, of the fact that the General Court of Massachusetts granted Eunice and her family a piece of land on condition that they would remain in New England, she refused on the ground that it would en- danger her soul. She lived and died in 206 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES savage life, though nominally a convert to Romanism. Out of her singular fate has grown another romance, the marvel of later times. For from her descended Rev- erend Eleazer Williams, missionary to the Indians at Green Bay, Wisconsin, who was in 1851 visited by the Due de Joinville, and told that he was that Dauphin (son of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette), who, according to history, died in prison June 9, 1795. In spite of the fact that the evidence of this little prince's death was as strong as any which can be found in history in relation to the death of Louis, his father, or of Marie Antoinette, his mother, the strange story first pub- lished in Putnam's Magazine for Febru- ary, 1853 gained general credence, even Mr. Williams himself coming gradually to believe it. As a matter of fact, however, there was proved to be a discrepancy of 207 OLD NEW ENGLATsT) ROOFTREES eight years between the dates of Williams's and the Dauphin's birth, and nearly every part of the clergyman's life was found to have been spent in quite a commonplace way. For as a boy, Eleazer Williams lived with Reverend Mr. Ely, on the Con- necticut River, and his kinsman, Doctor Williams, of Deerfield, at once asserted that he remembered him very well at all stages of his boyhood. Governor Charles K. Williams, of Ver- mont, writing from Rutland under date February 26, 1853, said of the Reverend Eleazer and his " claims " to the throne of France, " I never had any doubt that Will- iams was of Indian extraction, and a de- scendant of Eunice Williams. His father and mother were both of them at my father's house, although I cannot ascertain definitely the year. I consider the whole story a humbug, and believe that it will 208 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTEEES be exploded in the course of a few months." As a matter of fact, the story has been exploded, though the features of the Reverend Eleazer Williams, when in the full flush of manhood, certainly bore a jemarkable resemblance to those of the French kings from whom his descent was claimed. His mixed blood might account for this, however. Williams's paternal grandfather was an English physician, not of the Deerfield family at all, and his grandmother the daughter of Eunice Williams and her redskin mate. His father was Thomas Williams, captain in the British service during the American Revolution, and his mother a French- woman. Thus the Reverend Eleazer was part English, part Yankee, part Indian, and part French, a combination sufficiently complex to account, perhaps, even for an unmistakably Bourbon chin. 209 NEW ENGLAND'S FIRST "CLUB WOMAN " T~"WEN to-day, in this emancipated li twentieth century, women minis- ters and " female preachers " are not infrequently held up to derision by those who delight to sit in the seat of the scornful. Trials for heresy are likewise still common. It is not at all strange, therefore, that Mistress Ann Hutchinson should, in 1636, have been driven out of Boston as an enemy dangerous to public order, her specific offence being that she maintained in her own house that a mere profession of faith could not evidence sal- 210 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES vation, unless the Spirit first revealed itself from within. Mrs. Hutchinson's maiden name was Ann Marbury, and she was the daughter of a scholar and a theologian one Francis Marbury who was first a minister of Lincolnshire and afterward of London. Naturally, much of the girl's as well as the greater part of the woman's life was passed in the society of ministers men whom she soon learned to esteem more for what they knew than for what they preached. Theology, indeed, was the at- mosphere in which she lived and moved and had her being. Intellectually, she was an enthusiast, morally an agitator, a clever leader, whom Winthrop very aptly de- scribed as a " woman of ready wit and bold spirit." While still young, this exceptionally gifted woman married William Hutchin- 211 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES son, a country gentleman of good character and estate, whose home was also in Lin- colnshira Winthrop has nothing but words of contempt for Mrs. Hutchinson's husband, but there is little doubt that a sincere attachment existed between the married pair, and that Hutchinson was a man of sterling character and worth, even though he was intellectually the infe- rior of his remarkable wife. In their Lin- colnshire home the Hutchinsons had been parishioners of the Reverend John Cotton, and regular attendants at that celebrated divine'? church in Boston, England. To him, her pastor, Mrs. Hutchinson was deeply attached. And when the minister fled to New England in order to escape from the tyranny of the bishops, the Hutch- insons also decided to come to America, and presently the whole family did so. Mrs. Hutchinson's daughter, who had mar- 212 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ried the Reverend John Wright Wheel- wright another Lincolnshire minister who had suffered at the hands of Arch- bishop Laud came with her mother. Besides the daughter, there were three grown sons in the family at the time Mrs. Hutchinson landed in the Boston she was afterward to rend with religious dissension. So it was no young, sentimental, unbal- anced girl, but a middle-aged, matured, and experienced woman of the world who, in the autumn of 1634, took sail for New England. During the voyage it was learned that Mrs. Hutchinson came primed for religious controversy. With some Puritan ministers who were on the same vessel she discussed eagerly abstruse theological ques- tions, and she hinted in no uncertain way that when they should arrive in New Eng- land they might expect to hear more from her. Clearly, she regarded herself as one 213 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTKEES with a mission. In unmistakable terms she avowed her belief that direct revelations are made to the elect, and asserted that nothing of importance had ever happened to her which had not been revealed to her beforehand. Upon their arrival in Boston, the Hutch- insons settled down in a house on the site of the present Old Corner Book Store, the head of the family made arrangements to enter upon his business affairs, and in due time both husband and wife made their application to be received as members of the church. This step was indispensable to admit the pair into Christian fellowship and to allow to Mr. Hutchinson the privi- leges of a citizen. He came through the questioning more easily than did his wife, for, in consequence of the reports already spread concerning her extravagant opin- ions, Mrs. Hutchinson was subjected to a 214 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES most searching examination. Finally, however, she, too, passed through the or- deal safely, the examining ministers, one of whom was her old and beloved pastor, Mr. Cotton, declaring themselves satisfied with her answers. So, in November, we find her a " member in good standing " of the Boston church. From this time forward Mrs. Hutchin- son was a person of great importance in Boston. Sir Harry Vane, then governor of the colony and the idol of the people, was pleased, with Mr. Cotton, to take much notice of the gifted newcomer, and their example was followed by the leading and influential people of the town, who treated her with much consideration and respect, and were quick to recognise her intellec- tuality as far superior to that of most mem- bers of her sex. Mrs. Hutchinson soon came, indeed, to be that very remarkable 215 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES thing a prophet honoured in her own community. Adopting an established cus- tom of the town, she held in her own home two weekly meetings one for men and women and one exclusively for women at which she was the oracle. And all these meetings were very generously attended. Mrs. Hutchinson seems to have been New England's first clubwoman. Never before had women come together for inde- pendent thought and action. To be sure, nothing more lively than the sermon preached the Sunday before was ever dis- cussed at these gatherings, but the talk was always pithy and bright, the leader's wit was always ready, and soon the house at the corner of what is now School Street came to be widely celebrated as the centre of an influence so strong and far-reaching as to make the very ministers jealous and fearful. At first, to be sure, the parsons 216 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES themselves went to the meetings. Cotton, Vane, Wheelwright, and Coddington, com- pletely embraced the leader's views, and the result upon Winthrop of attendance at these conferences was to send that official home to his closet, wrestling with himself, yet more than half persuaded. Hawthorne's genius has conjured up the scene at Boston's first " parlour talks," so that we too may attend and be one among the u crowd of hooded women and men in steeple hats and close-cropped hair . . . assembled at the door and open windows of a house newly-built. An earnest ex- pression glows in every face . . . and some press inward as if the bread of life were to be dealt forth, and they feared to lose their share." In plain English Ann Hutchinson's doctrines were these : " She held and advo- cated as the highest truth," writes Mr. 217 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Drake, " that a person could be justified only by an actual and manifest revelation of the Spirit to him personally. There could be no other evidence of grace. She repudiated a doctrine of works, and she de- nied that holiness of living alone could be received as evidence of regeneration, since hypocrites might live outwardly as pure lives as the saints do. The Puritan churches held that sanctification by the will was evidence of justification." In ad- vancing these views, Mrs. Hutchinson's pronounced personal magneti^fi stood her in good stead. She made many converts, and, believing herself inspired to do a cer- tain work, and emboldened by the increas- ing number of her followers, she soon became unwisely and unpleasantly aggres- sive in her criticisms of those ministers who preached a covenant of works. She seems to have been led into speaking her 218 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES mind as to doctrines and persons more freely than was consistent with prudence and moderation, because she was altogether unsuspicious that what was being said in the privacy of her own house was being carefully treasured up against her. So she constantly added fuel to the flame, which was soon to burst forth to her undoing. She was accused of fostering sedition in the church, and was then confronted with charges relative to the meetings of women held at her house. This she suc- cessfully pVried. It looked indeed as if she would surely be acquitted, when by an impassioned dis- course upon special revelations that had come to her, and an assertion that God would miraculously protect her whatever the court might decree, she impugned the position of her judges and roused keen resentment. Because of this it was that 219 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES she was banished " as unfit for our so- ciety." In the colony records of Massachu- setts the sentence pronounced reads as follows: "Mrs. Hutchinson (the wife of Mr. William Hutchinson) being con vented for traducing the ministers and their min- istry in this country, shee declared volun- tarily her revelations for her ground, and that shee should bee delivred and the Court ruined with their posterity; and thereupon was banished, and the mean- while she was committed to Mr. Joseph Weld untill the Court shall dispose of her." Mrs. Hutchinson passed next winter ac- cordingly under the watch and ward of Thomas Weld, in the house of his brother Joseph, near what is now Eustis Street, Roxbury. She was there until March, when, returning to Boston for further trial, she was utterly cast out, even John 220 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Cotton, who had been her friend, turning agairfst her. Mr. Cotton did not present an heroic figure in this trial. Had he chosen, he might have turned the drift of public opinion in Mrs. Hutchinson's favour, but he was either too weak or too politic to withstand the pressure brought to bear upon him, and he gave a qualified adhesion to the proceedings. Winthrop did not hesitate to use severe measures, and in the course of the struggle Vane, who deeply admired the Boston prophetess, left the country in disgust. Mrs. Hutchinson was arraigned at the bar as if she had been a criminal of the most dangerous kind. Win- throp, who presided, catechised her merci- lessly, and all endeavoured to extort from her some damaging admission. But in this they were unsuccessful. " Mrs. Hutchin- son can tell when to speak and when to 221 hold her tongue," commented the governor, in describing the court proceedings. Yet when all is said, {he " trial " was but a mockery, and those who read the proceed- ings as preserved in the " History of Massachusetts Under the Colony and Prov- ince," written by Governor Hutchinson, a descendant of our heroine, will be quick to condemn the judgment there pro- nounced by a court which expounded theology instead of law against a woman who, as Coddington truly said, " had broken no law, either of God or of man." Banishment was the sentence pro- nounced, and after the church which had so lately caressed and courted Mrs. Hutch- inson had in its turn visited upon her the verdict of excommunication, her husband sold all his property and removed with his family to the island of Aquidneck, as did also many others whose opinions had 222 brought them under the censure of the governing powers. In this connection it is worth noting that the head of the house of Hutchinson stood right valiantly by his persecuted wife, and when a committee of the Boston church went in due time to Rhode Island for the purpose of bringing back into the fold the sheep which they ad- judged lost, Mr. Hutchinson told them bluntly that, far from being of their opinion, he accounted his wife " a dear saint and servant of God." The rest of Mrs. Hutchinson's story is soon told. Upon the death of her husband, which occurred five years after the banish- ment, she went with her family into the Dutch territory of New Netherlands, set- tling near what is now New Rochelle. And scarcely had she become established in this place when her house was suddenly as- saulted by hostile Indians, who, in their 228 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES revengeful fury, murdered the whole fam- ily, excepting only one daughter, who was carried away into captivity. Thus in the tragedy of an Indian massacre was quenched the light of the most remark- able intellect Boston has ever made historic by misunderstanding. Hawthorne, in writing in his early man- hood of Mrs. Hutchinson (" Biographical Sketches "), humourously remarked, Seer that he was : " There are portentous indi- cations, changes gradually taking place in the habits and feelings of the gentler sex, which seem to threaten our posterity with many of those public women whereof one was a burden too grievous for our fathers." Fortunately, we of to-day have learned to take our clubwomen less tragically than W inthrop was able to do. 224 IN THE REIGN OF THE WITCHES of the most interesting of the phenomena to be noted by the stu- dent of historical houses is the tenacity of tradition. People may be told again and again that a story attributed to a certain site has been proven untrue, but they still look with veneration on a place which has been hallowed many years, and refuse to give up any alluring name by which they have known it A notable example of this is offered by what is uni- versally called the Old Witch House, sit- uated at the corner of Essex and North Streets, Salem. A dark, scowling build- ing, set far enough back from the street 225 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES for a modern drugstore to stand in front of it, the house itself is certainly sufficiently sinister in appearance to warrant its name, even though one is assured by authorities that no witch was ever known to have lived there. Its sole connection with witch- craft, history tells us, is that some of the preliminary examinations of witches took place here, the house being at the time the residence of Justice Jonathan Corwin. Yet it is this house that has absorbed the interest of historical pilgrims to Salem through many years, just because it looks like a witch-house, and somebody once made a muddled statement by which it came to be so regarded. This house is the oldest standing in Salem or its vicinity, having been built before 1635. And it really has a claim to fame as the Roger Williams house, for it was here that the great " Teacher " lived 226 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES during his troubled settlement in Salem. The people of Salem, it will be remem- bered, persistently sought Williams as their spiritual pastor and master until the General Court at Boston unseated the Salem deputies for the acts of their con- stituents in retaining a man of whom they disapproved, and the magistrates sent a vessel to Salem to remove Mr. Will- iams to England. The minister eluded his persecutors by fleeing through the wintry snows into the wilderness, to become the founder of the State of Rhode Island. Mr. Williams was a close friend and confidential adviser of Governor Endicott, and those who were alarmed at the govern- or's impetuosity in cutting the cross from the king's colours, attributed the act to his [Williams's] influence. In taking his departure from the old house of the pic- ture to make his way to freedom, Williams 227 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES had no guide save a pocket compass, which his descendants still exhibit, and no reli- ance but the friendly disposition of the Indians toward him. But it is of the witchcraft delusion with which the house of our picture is connected rather than with Williams and his story, that I wish now to speak. Jonathan Cor- win, or Curwin, who was the house's link to witchcraft, was made a councillor under the new charter granted Massachusetts by King William in 1692, and was, as has been said, one of the justices before whom the preliminary witch examinations were held. He it was who officiated at the trial of Rebecca Nourse, of Danvers, hanged as a witch July 19, 1692, as well as at many other less remarkable and less revolting cases. Rebecca Nourse, aged and infirm and universally beloved by her neighbours, was 228 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES accused of being a witch why, one is unable to find out. The jury was con- vinced of her innocence, and brought in a verdict of " not guilty," but the court sent them out again with instructions to find her guilty. This they did, and she was executed. The tradition is that her sons disinterred her body by stealth from the foot of the gallows where it had been thrown, and brought it to the old home- stead, now still standing in Danvers, laying it reverently, and with many tears, in the little family burying ground near by. The majority of the persons condemned in Salem were either old or weak-witted, victims who in their testimony condemned themselves, or seemed to the jury to do so. Tituba, the Indian slave, is an example of this. She was tried in March, 1692, by the Justice Corwin of the big, dark house. She confessed that under threats 229 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES from Satan, who had most often appeared to her as a man in black, accompanied by a yellow bird, she had tortured the girls who appeared against her. She named accomplices, and was condemned to imprisonment. After a few months she was sold to pay the expenses of her lodging in jail, and is lost to his- tory. But this was by no means the end of the matter. The " afflicted children " in Salem who had made trouble be- fore now began to accuse men and women of unimpeachable character. Within a few months several hundred people were arrested and thrown into jails. As Gov- ernor Hutchinson, the historian of the time, points out, the only way to prevent an accusation was to become an accuser oneself. The state of affairs was indeed analogous to that which obtained in France a century later, when, during the Reign of 230 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Terror, men of property and position lived in the hourly fear of being regarded as " a suspect," and frequently threw suspi- cion on their neighbours the better to re- tain their own heads. We of to-day cannot understand the madness that inspired such cruelty. But in the light of Michelet's theory, that in the oppression and dearth of every kind of ideal interest in rural populations some safety-valve had to be found, and that there were real organised secret meet- ings, witches' Sabbaths, to supply this need of sensation, the thing is less difficult to comprehend. The religious hysteria that resulted in the banishment of Mrs. Hutchinson was but another phase of the same thing. And the degeneration to be noted to-day in the remote hill-towns of New England is likewise attributable to Michelet's " dearth of ideal interest." 231 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES The thing once started, it grew, of course, by what it fed upon. Professor William James, Harvard's distinguished psychologist, has traced to torture the so- called " confessions " on which the evil principally throve. A person, he says, was suddenly found to be suffering from what we to-day should call hysteria, per- haps, but what in those days was called a witch disease. A witch then had to be found to account for the disease ; a scape- goat must of necessity be brought forward. Some poor old woman was thereupon picked out and subjected to atrocious tor- ture. If she " confessed," the torture ceased. Naturally she very often " con- fessed," thus implicating others and damning herself. Negative suggestion this modern psychologist likewise offers as light upon witchcraft. The witches sel- dom cried, no matter what their anguish 232 OLD NEW EXGLAND ROOFTREES of mind might be. The inquisitors used to say to them then, " If you're not a witch, cry, let us see your tears. There, there ! you can't cry ! That proves you're a witch ! " Moreover, that was an age when every- body read the Bible, and believed in its verbal inspiration. And there in Exodus (22:18), is the plain command, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." Cotton Mather, the distinguished young divine, had published a work affirming his belief in witchcraft, and detailing his study of some bewitched children in Charlestown, one of whom he had taken into his own family, the better to observe the case. The king believed in it, and Queen Anne, to whose name we usually prefix the adjec- tive "good," wrote to Governor Phips a letter which shows that she admitted witchcraft as a thing unquestioned. 233 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROQFTREES It is in connection with the witchcraft delusion in Salem that we get the one instance in New England of the old Eng- lish penalty for contumacy, that of a vic- tim's being pressed to death. Giles Corey, who believed in witchcraft and was instru- mental in the conviction of his wife, so suffered, partly to atone for his early cowardice and partly to save his property for his children. This latter thing he could not have done if he had been con- victed of witchcraft, so after pleading " not guilty," he remained mute, refusing to add the necessary technical words that he would be tried " by God and his country." The arrest of Mrs. Corey, we learn, fol- lowed closely on the heels of that of Tituba and her companions. The accused was a woman of sixty, and the third wife of Corey. She seems to have been a person of unusual strength of character, and from 234 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the first denounced the witchcraft excite- ment, trying to persuade her husband, who believed all the monstrous stories then cur- rent, not to attend the hearings or in any way countenance the proceedings. Per- haps it was this well-known attitude of hers that directed suspicion to her. At her trial the usual performance was enacted. The " afflicted girls " fell on the floor, uttered piercing shrieks, and cried out upon their victim. " There is a man whispering in her ear ! " one of them sud- denly exclaimed. " What does he say to you ? " the judge demanded of Martha Corey, accepting at once the " spectral evidence." " We must not believe all these distracted children say," was her sensible answer. But good sense was not much regarded at witch trials, and she was con- victed and not long afterward executed. Her husband's evidence, which went 285 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES strongly against her, is here given as a good example of much of the testimony by which the nineteen Salem victims of the delusion were sent to Gallows Hill. " One evening I was sitting by the fire when my wife asked me to go to bed. I told her that I would go to prayer, and when I went to prayer I could not utter my desires with any sense, nor open my mouth to speak. After a little space I did according to my measure attend the duty. Some time last week I fetched an ox well out of the woods about noon, and he laying down in the yard, I went to raise him to yoke him, but he could not rise, but dragged his hinder parts as if he had been hip shot, but after did rise. I had a cat some time last week strongly taken on the sudden, and did make me think she would have died presently. My wife bid me knock her in the head, but 236 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTREES I did not, and since she is well. My wife hath been wont to sit up after I went to bed, and I have perceived her to kneel down as if she were at prayer, but heard nothing." Incredible as it seems to-day, this was accepted as " evidence " of Mrs. Corey's bewitchment. Then, as so often happened, Giles Corey, the accuser, was soon himself accused. He was arrested, taken from his mill, and brought before the judges of the special court appointed by Governor Phips to hear the witch trials in Salem. Again the girls went through their per- formance, again there was an endeavour to extort a confession. But this time Corey acted the part of a man. He had had leisure for reflection since he had tes- tified against his wife, and he was now as sure that she was guiltless as that he him- self was. Bitter, indeed, must have been 237 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the realisation that he had helped convict her. But he atoned, as has been said, to her and to his children by subjecting him- self to veritable martyrdom. Though an old man whose hair was whitened with the snows of eighty winters, he " was laid on his back, a board placed on his body with as great a weight upon it as he could endure, while his sole diet consisted of a few morsels of bread one day, and a draught of water the alternate day until death put an end to his sufferings." Rightly must this mode of torture have been named peine forte et dure. On Gallows Hill three days later occurred the execution of eight persons, the last so to suffer in the Colony. Nineteen people in all were hanged, and one was pressed to death in Salem, but there is absolutely no founda- tion for the statement that some were burned. 238 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES The revulsion that followed the cessa- tion of the delusion was as marked as was the precipitation that characterised the proceedings. Many of the clergy con- cerned in the trials offered abject apologies, and Judge Sewall, noblest of all the civil and ecclesiastical authorities implicated in the madness, stood up on Fast Day before a great congregation in the South Church, Boston, acknowledged his grievous error in accepting " spectral evidence," and to the end of his life did penance yearly in the same meeting-house for his part in the transactions. Not inappropriately the gloomy old house in which the fanatical Corwin had his home is to-day given over to a dealer in antique furniture. Visitors are freely admitted upon application, and very many in the course of the year go inside to feast their eyes on the ancient wainscoting and 239 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES timbers. The front door and the overhang- ing roof are just as in the time of the witches, and from a recessed area at the back, narrow casements and excrescent stairways are still to be seen. The original house had, however, peaked gables, with pineapples carved in wood surmounting its latticed windows and colossal chimneys that placed it unmistakably in the age of ruffs, Spanish cloaks, and long rapiers. 240 LADY WENTWORTH OF THE HALL one of those pleasant long even- ings, when the group of friends that Longfellow represents in his " Tales of the Wayside Inn " had gathered in the twilight about the cheery open fire of the house at Sudbury to tell each other tales of long ago, we hear best the story of Martha Hilton. We seem to catch the poet's voice as he says after the legend from the Baltic has been alluringly related by the Musician: " These tales you tell are, one and all, Of the Old World, Flowers gathered from a crumbling wall, Dead leaves that rustle as they fall ; Let me present you in their stead Something of our New England earth ; A tale which, though of no great worth, Has still this merit, that it yields 241 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES A certain freshness of the fields, A sweetness as of home-made bread." And then, as the others leaned back to listen, there followed the beautiful ballad which celebrates the fashion in which Martha Hilton, a kitchen maid, became " Lady Wentworth of the Hall." The old Wentworth mansion, where, as a beautiful girl, Martha came, served, and conquered all who knew her, and even once received as her guest the Father of his Country, is still in an admirably preserved state, and the Wayside Inn, rechristened the Red Horse Tavern, still entertains glad guests. This inn was built about 1686, and for almost a century and a half from 1714 it was kept as a public house by generation after generation of Howes, the last of the name at the inn being Lyman Howe, who served guests of the house from 1831 242 OLD NEW ENGLAND HOOETREES to about 1860, and was the good friend and comrade of the brilliant group of men Longfellow has poetically immortalised in the " Tales." The modern successor of Staver's Inn, or the " Earl of Halifax," in the doorway of which Longfellow's worthy dame once said, " as plain as day : " " Oh, Martha Hilton ! Fie ! how dare you go About the town half dressed and looking sol " is also standing, and has recently been decorated by a memorial tablet In Portsmouth Martha Hilton is well remembered, thanks to Longfellow and tradition, as a slender girl who, barefooted, ragged, with neglected hair, bore from the well " A pail of water dripping through the street, And bathing as she went her naked feet." Nor do the worthy people of Portsmouth fail to recall the other actor in this mem- 243 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES orable drama, upon which the Earl of Halifax once benignly smiled: " A portly person, with three-cornered hat, A crimson velvet coat, head high in air, Gold-headed cane and nicely powdered hair, And diamond buckles sparkling at his knees, Dignified, stately, florid, much at ease. For this was Governor Wentworth, driving down To Little Harbour, just beyond the town, Where his Great House stood, looking out to sea, A goodly place, where it was good to be." There are even those who can perfectly recollect when the house was very venerable in appearance, and when in its rooms were to be seen the old spinet, the Strafford por- trait, and many other things delightful to the antiquary. Longfellow's description of this ancient domicile is particularly beautiful : " It was a pleasant mansion, an abode Near and yet hidden from the great highroad, 244 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Sequestered among trees, a noble pile, Baronial and Colonial in its style ; Gables and dormer windows everywhere Pandalan pipes, on which all winds that blew Made mournful music the whole winter through. Within, unwonted splendours met the eye, Panels, and floors of oak, and tapestry ; Carved chimneypieces, where, on brazen dogs, Revelled and roared the Christmas fire of logs. Doors opening into darkness unawares, Mysterious passages and flights of stairs ; And on the walls, in heavy-gilded frames, The ancestral Wentworths, with old Scripture names. Such was the mansion where the great man dwelt." The place thus prettily pictured is at the mouth of Sagamore Creek, not more than two miles from the town of Ports- mouth. The exterior of the mansion as it looks to-day does not of itself live up to one's preconceived idea of colonial mag- nificence. A rambling collection of build- ings, seemingly the result of various " L " expansions, form an inharmonious whole 245 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES which would have made Ruskin quite mad. The site is, however, charming, for the place commands a view up and down Little Harbour, though concealed by an eminence from the road. The house is said to have originally contained as many as fifty-two rooms. If so, it has shrunk in recent years. But there is still plenty of elbow space, and the cellar is even to-day large enough to accommodate a fair-sized troop of soldiery. As one enters, one notices first the rack in which were wont to be deposited the muskets of the governor's guard. And it requires only a little imagination to pic- ture the big rooms as they were in the old days, with the portrait of Strafford dictating to his secretary just before his execution, the rare Copley, the green dam- ask-covered furniture, and the sedan-chair, all exhaling an atmosphere of old-time 246 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES splendour and luxury. Something of im- pressiveness has recently been introduced into the interior by the artistic arrange- ment of old furniture which the house's present owner, Mr. Templeton Coolidge, has brought about. But the exterior is " spick-span " in modern yellow and white paint ! Yet it was in this very house that Martha for seven years served her future lord. There, busy with mop and pail " A maid of all work, whether coarse or fine, A servant who made service seem divine I " she grew from childhood into the lovely woman whom Governor Wentworth wooed and won. In the March of 1760 it was that the host at Little Harbour exclaimed abruptly to the good rector of St. John's, who had been dining sumptuously at the manor- house: 247 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES " This is my birthday; it shall likewise be my wedding-day, and you shall marry me ! " No wonder the listening guests were greatly mystified, as Martha and the portly governor were joined a across the walnuts and the wine " by the Reverend Arthur Brown, of the Established Church. And now, of course, Martha had her chariot, from which she could look down as disdainfully as did the Earl of Halifax on the humble folk who needs must walk. The sudden elevation seems, indeed, to have gone to my lady's head. For tradi- tion says that very shortly after her mar- riage Martha dropped her ring and sum- moned one of her late kitchen colleagues to rescue it from the floor. But the col- league had quickly become shortsighted, and Martha, dismissing her hastily, picked up the circlet herself. Before the Reverend Arthur Brown was 248 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES gathered to his fathers, he had another opportunity to marry the fascinating Martha to another Wentworth, a man of real soldierly distinction. Her second hus- band was redcoated Michael, of England, who had been in the battle of Culloden. This Colonel Michael Wentworth was the " great buck " of his day, and was wont to fiddle at Stoodley's far into the morning for sheer love of fiddling and revelry. Stoodley's has now fallen indeed ! It is the brick building marked "custom-house," and it stands at the corner of Daniel and Penhallow Streets. To this Lord and Lady Wentworth it was that Washington, in 1789, came as a guest, " rowed by white-jacketed sailors straight to their vine-hung, hospitable door." At this time there was a younger Martha in the house, one who had grown up to play the spinet by the long, low 249 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES windows, and who later joined her fate to that of still another Wentworth, with whom she passed to France. A few years later, in 1795, the " great buck " of his time took to a bankrupt's grave in New York, forgetting, so the story goes, the eternal canon fixed against self- slaughter. But for all we tell as a legend this story of Martha Hilton, and for all her " cap- ture " of the governor has come down to us almost as a myth, it is less than fifty years ago that the daughter of the man who fiddled at Stoodley's and of the girl who went barefooted and ragged through the streets of Portsmouth, passed in her turn to the Great Beyond. Verily, we in America have, after all, only a short his- torical perspective. 250 AN HISTORIC TRAGEDY hundred years ago there was com- mitted in Dedham, Massachusetts, one of the most famous murders of this country, a crime, some description of which falls naturally enough into these chapters, inasmuch as the person punished as the criminal belonged to the illustrious Fairbanks family, whose picturesque home- stead is widely known as one of the oldest houses in New England. In the Massachusetts Federalist of Saturday, September 12, 1801, we find an editorial paragraph which, apart from its intrinsic interest, is valuable as an example of the great difference between 251 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES ancient and modern journalistic treatment of murder matter. This paragraph reads, in the quaint old type of the time: " On Thursday last Jason Fairbanks was ex- ecuted at Dedham for the murder of Miss Elizabeth Fales. He was taken from the gaol in this town at eight o'clock, by the sheriff of this county, and delivered to the sheriff of Norfolk County at the boundary line between the two counties. " He was in an open coach, and was attended therein by the Reverend Doctor Thatcher and two peace officers. From the county line in Norfolk he was conducted to the Dedham gaol by Sheriff Cutler, his deputies, and a score of cavalry under Captain Davis; and from the gaol in Dedham to the place of execution was guarded by two companies of cavalry and a detachment of volunteer infantry. " He mounted the scaffold about a 252 OLD 1STEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES quarter before three with his usual steadi- ness, and soon after making a signal with his handkerchief, was swung off. After hanging about twenty-five minutes, his body was cut down and buried near the gallows. His deportment during his journey to and at the place of execution was marked with the same apathy and indifference which he discovered before and since his trial. We do not learn he has made any confession of his guilt." As a matter of fact, far from making a confession of his guilt, Jason Fairbanks denied even to the moment of his execution that he killed Elizabeth Fales, and his family and many other worthy citizens of Dedham believed, and kept believing to the end of their lives, that the girl com- mitted suicide, and that an innocent man was punished for a crime he could never have perpetrated. 253 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES In the trial it was shown that this beau- tiful girl of eighteen had been for many years extremely fond of the young man, Fairbanks, and that her love was ardently reciprocated. Jason Fairbanks had not been allowed, however, to visit the girl at the home of her father, though the Fales place was only a little more than a mile from his own dwelling, the vener- able Fairbanks house. None the less, they had been in the habit of meeting fre- quently, in company with others, en route to the weekly singing school, the husking bees and the choir practice. Both the young people were extremely fond of music, and this mutual interest seems to have been one of the several ties which bound them together. In spite, therefore, of the stern decree that young Fairbanks should not visit Miss Fales at her home, there was considerable 254 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES well-improved opportunity for intercourse, and, as was afterward shown, the two often had long walks together, apart from the others of their acquaintance. One of their appointments was made for the day of the murder, May 18, 1801. Fairbanks was to meet his sweetheart, he told a friend, in the pasture near her home, and it was his intention at that time to persuade her to run away with him and be married. Unfortunately for Fairbanks's case at the trial, it was shown that he told this same friend that if Elizabeth Fales would not run away with him he would do her harm. And one other thing which militated against the acquittal of the accused youth was the fact that, as an inducement to the girl to elope with him, Fairbanks showed her a forged paper, upon which she ap- peared to have declared legally her inten- tion to marry him. 255 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES One tragic element of the whole affair was the fact that Fairbanks had no definite work and no assured means of support. Young people of good family did not marry a hundred years ago without think- ing, and thinking to some purpose, of what cares and expense the future might bring them. The man, if he was an hon- ourable man, expected always to have a home for his wife, and since Fairbanks was an invalid, " debilitated in his right arm," as the phrasing of the time put it, and had never been able to do his part of the farm work, he had lived what his stern forebears would have called an idle life, and consequently utterly lacked the means to marry. That he was something of a spoiled child also developed at the trial, which from the first went against the young man because of the testimony of the chums to whom he had confided his 256 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES intention to do Elizabeth Fales an injury if she would not go to Wrentham and marry him. The prisoner's counsel were two very clever young lawyers who afterward came to be men of great distinction in Massa- chusetts no others, in fact, than Harri- son Gray Otis and John Lowell. These men advanced very clever arguments to show that Elizabeth Fales, maddened by a love which seemed unlikely ever to end in marriage, had seized from Jason the large knife which he was using to mend a quill pen as he walked to meet her, and with this knife had inflicted upon herself the terri- ble wounds, from the effect of which she died almost instantaneously. The fact that Jason was himself wounded in the struggle was ingeniously utilised by the defence to show that he had received mur- derous blows from her hand, for the very 257 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES reason that he had attempted (unsuccess- fully, inasmuch as his right arm was im- paired) to wrest the mad girl's murderous weapon from her. The counsel also made much of the fact that, though it was at midday and many people were not far off, no screams were heard. A vigorous girl like Elizabeth Fales would not have submitted easily, they held, to any such assault as was charged. In the course of the trial a very moving description of the sufferings such a high-strung, ardent nature as this girl's must have undergone, because of her hope- less love, was used to show the reasons for suicide. And following the habit of the times, the lawyers turned their work to moral ends by beseeching the parents in the crowded court-room to exercise a greater vigilance over the social life of their young people, and so prevent the 258 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES possibility of their forming any such at- tachment as had moved Elizabeth Fales to take her own life. Yet all this eloquent pleading was in vain, for the court found Jason Fairbanks guilty of murder and sentenced him to be hanged. From the court-room he was taken to the Dedham gaol, but on the night of the seventeenth of August he was en- abled to make his escape through the offices of a number of men who believed him innocent, and for some days he was at liberty. At length, however, upon a reward of one thousand dollars being offered for his apprehension, he was captured near Northampton, Massachusetts, which town he had reached on his journey to Canada. The gallows upon which " justice " ulti- mately asserted itself is said to have been constructed of a tree cut from the old Fairbanks place. 269 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES The Fairbanks house is still standing, having been occupied for almost two hun- dred and seventy-five years by the same family, which is now in the eighth genera- tion of the name. The house is surrounded by magnificent old elms, aqd was built by Jonathan Fairbanks, who came from Sowerby, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England, in 1633. The cupboards are filled with choice china, and even the Fairbanks cats, it is said, drink their milk out of ancient blue saucers that would drive a collector wild with envy. The house is now (1902) the home of Miss Rebecca Fairbanks, an old lady of sev- enty-five years, who will occupy it through- out her lifetime, although the place is con- trolled by the Fairbanks Chapter of the Daughters of the Revolution, who hold their monthly meetings there. The way in which this property was 260 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES acquired by the organisation named is in- teresting recent history. Miss Rebecca Fairbanks was obliged in 1895 to sell the house to John Crowley, a real estate dealer in Dedham. On April 3, 1897, Mrs. Nel- son V. Titus, asked through the medium of the press for four thousand, five hundred dollars, necessary to purchase the house and keep it as a historical relic. Almost imme- diately Mrs. J. Amory Codman and Miss Martha Codman sent a check for the sum desired, and thus performed a double act of beneficence. For it was now possible to ensure to Miss Fairbanks a life tenancy of the home of her fathers as well as to keep for all time this picturesque place as an example of early American architecture. Hundreds of visitors now go every sum- mer to see the interesting old house, which stands nestling cosily in a grassy dell just at the corner of East Street and the short 261 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES " Willow Road " across the meadows that lie between East Street and Dedham. This road is a " modern convenience," and its construction was severely frowned upon by the three old ladies who twenty years ago lived together in the family homestead. And though it made the road to the village shorter by half than the old way, this had no weight with the inflexible women who had inherited from their long line of an- cestors marked decision and firmness of character. They protested against the building of the road, and when it was built in spite of their protests they declared they would not use it, and kept their word. Constant attendants of the old Congrega- tional church in Dedham, they went per- sistently by the longest way round rather than tolerate the road to which they had objected. That their neighbours called them " set 262 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES in their ways " goes, of course, without saying, but the women of the Fairbanks family have ever been rigidly conscien- tious, and the men a bit obstinata For, much as one would like to think the con- trary true, one seems forced to believe that it was obstinacy rather than innocency which made Jason Fairbanks protest till the hour of his death that he was being unjustly punished. 263 INVENTOR MORSE'S UNFTJL- v FILLED AMBITION rHE first house erected in Charles- town after the destruction of the village by fire in 1775 (the coup d'etat which immediately followed the battle of Bunker Hill, it will be remem- bered), is that which is here given as the birthplace of Samuel Finley Breese Morse, the inventor of the electric telegraph. The house is still standing at 203 Main Street, and in the front chamber of the second story, on the right of the front door of the entrance, visitors still pause to render trib- ute to the memory of the babe that there drew his first breath on April 27, 1791. 264 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES It was, however, quite by accident that the house became doubly famous, for it wa during the building of the parsonage, Pastor Morse's proper home, that his little son came to gladden his life. Reverend Jedediah Morse became minister of the First Parish Church on April 3d, 1789, the very date of Washington's inaugura- tion in New York as President of the United States, and two weeks later married a daughter of Judge Samuel Breese, of New York. Shortly afterward it was de- termined to build a parsonage, and during the construction of this dwelling Doctor Morse accepted the hospitality of Mr. Thomas Edes, who then owned the " old- est " house. And work on the parsonage being delayed beyond expectation, Mrs. Morse's little son was born in the Edes house. Apropos of the brief residence of Doctor 265 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Morse in this house comes a quaint letter from Reverend Jeremy Belknap, the staid old doctor of divinity, and the founder of the Massachusetts Historical Society, which shows that girls over a hundred years ago were quite as much interested in young unmarried ministers as nice girls ought ever to be. Two or three months before the settlement of Mr. Morse in Charlestown, Doctor Belknap wrote to his friend, Ebenezer Hazard, of New York, who was a relative of Judge Breese : " You said in one of your late letters that probably Charlestown people would soon have to build a house for Mr. Morse. I let this drop in a conversation with a daughter of Mr. Carey, and in a day or two it was all over Charlestown, and the girls who had been setting their caps for him are chagrined. I suppose it would be something to Mr. Morse's advantage 266 in point of bands and handkerchiefs, if this report could be contradicted; but if it cannot, oh, how heavy will be the disap- pointment. When a young clergyman set- tles in such a town as Charlestown, there is as much looking out for him as there is for a thousand-dollar prize in a lottery; and though the girls know that but one can have him, yet ' who knows but I may be that one ? ' " * Doctor Morse's fame has been a good deal obscured by that of his distinguished son, but he seems none the less to have been a good deal of a man, and it is perhaps no wonder that the feminine portion of a little place like Charlestown looked for- ward with decided interest to his settling among them. We can even fancy that the girls of the sewing society studied 1 Drake's " Historic Fields and Mansions of Mid- dlesex." Little, Brown & Co., publishers. 267 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES geography with ardour when they learned who was to be their new minister. For geography was Doctor Morse's passion ; he was, indeed, the Alexis Frye of his period. This interest in geography is said to have been so tremendous with the man that once being asked by his teacher at a Greek reci- tation where a certain verb was found, he replied, " On the coast of Africa." And while he was a tutor at Yale the want of geographies there induced him to prepare notes for his pupils, to serve as text-books, which he eventually printed. Young Morse seconded his father's pas- sion for geography by one as strongly marked for drawing, and the blank margin of his Virgil occupied far more of his thoughts than the text. The inventor came indeed only tardily to discover in which direction his real talent lay. All his youth he worshipped art and followed (at 268 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES considerable distance) his beloved mis- tress. His penchant for painting, exhibi- ted in much the same manner as Allston's, his future master, did not meet with the same encouragement. A caricature (founded upon some fracas among the students at Yale), in which the faculty were burlesqued, was seized during Morse's student days, handed to President Dwight, and the author, who was no other than our young friend, called up. The delinquent received a severe lec- ture upon his waste of time, violation of college laws, and filial disobedience, with- out exhibiting any sign of contrition ; but when at length Doctor Dwight said to him, " Morse, you are no painter ; this is a rude attempt, a complete failure," he was touched to the quick, and could not keep back the tears. The canvas, executed by Morse at the 269 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES age of nineteen, of the landing of the Pil- grims, which may be seen at the Charles- town City Hall, is certainly not a master- piece. Yet the lad was determined to learn to paint, and to this end accompanied Allston to Europe, where he became a pupil of West, and, it is said, also of Copley. West had become the foremost painter of his time in England when our ambitious young artist was presented to him, but from the beginning he took a great interest in the Charlestown lad, and showed him much attention. Once in after years Morse rela- ted to a friend this most interesting anec- dote of his great master : " I called upon Mr. West at his house in Newman Street one morning, and in conformity to the order given to his servant Robert always to admit Mr. Leslie and myself even if he was engaged in his private studies, I was shown into his studio. 270 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES " As I entered a half-length portrait of George III. stood before me on an easel, and Mr. West was sitting with his back toward me copying from it upon canvas. My name having been mentioned to him, he did not turn, but pointing with the pencil he had in his hand to the portrait from which he was copying, he said, ' Do you see that picture, Mr. Morse ? ' " ' Yes, sir/ I said, ' I perceive it is the portrait of the king.' " ' Well/ said Mr. West, ' the king was sitting to me for that portrait when the box containing the American Declaration of Independence was handed to him.' " ' Indeed/ I answered ; * and what ap- peared to be the emotions of the king? What did he say ? ' " * His reply/ said Mr. West, * was char- acteristic of the goodness of his heart : " If they can be happier under the govern- 271 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ment they have chosen than under me, I shall be happy." ' " * Morse returned to Boston in the autumn of 1815, and there set up a studio. But he was not too occupied in painting to turn a hand to invention, and we find him the next winter touring New Hampshire and Vermont trying to sell to towns and vil- lages a fire-engine pump he had invented, while seeking commissions to paint por- traits at fifteen dollars a head. It was that winter that he met in Concord, New Hamp- shire, Miss Lucretia P. Walker, whom he married in the autumn of 1818, and whose death in February, 1825, just after he had successfully fulfilled a liberal com- mission to paint General Lafayette, was the great blow of his young manhood. The National Academy of Design 1 Beacon Biographies : S. F. B. Morse, by John Trowbridge ; Small, Maynard & Co. 272 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Morse helped to found in New York in 1826, and of this institution he was first president. About the same time we find him renewing his early interest in elec- trical experiments. A few years later he is sailing for Europe, there to execute many copying commissions. And on his return from this stay abroad the idea of the telegraph suggested itself to him. Of the exact way in which Morse first conceived the idea of making electricity the means of conveying intelligence, various accounts have been given, the one usually accepted being that while on board the packet-ship Sully, a fellow passenger rela- ted some experiments he had witnessed in Paris with the electro-magnet, a recital which made such an impression upon one of his auditors that he walked the deck the whole night. Professor Morse's own statement was that he gained his knowledge 273 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of the working of the electro-magnet while attending the lectures of Doctor J. Free- man Dana, then professor of chemistry in the University of New York, lectures which were delivered before the New York Atheneum. " I witnessed," says Morse, " the effects of the conjunctive wires in the different forms described by him in his lectures, and exhibited to his audience. The electro- magnet was put in action by an intense battery ; it was made to sustain the weight of its armature, when the conjunctive wire was connected with the poles of the battery, or the circuit was closed ; and it was made to ' drop its load ' upon opening the cir- cuit." Yet after the inventor had made his dis- covery he had the greatest difficulty in getting a chance to demonstrate its worth. Heartsick with despondency, and with his 274 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES means utterly exhausted, he finally applied to the Twenty-seventh Congress for aid to put his invention to the test of practical illustration, and his petition was carried through with a majority of only two votes ! These two votes to the good were enough, however, to save the wonderful discovery, perhaps from present obscurity, and with the thirty thousand dollars appropriated by Congress Morse stretched his first wires from Washington to Baltimore wires, it will be noted, because the principle of the ground circuit was not then known, and only later discovered by accident. So that a wire to go and another to return between the cities was deemed necessary by Morse to complete his first circuit. The first wire was of copper. The first message, now in the custody of the Connecticut Historical Society, was dictated by Miss Annie G. Ellsworth, and 275 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the words of it were " What hath God wrought ? " The telegraph was at first regarded with superstitious dread in some sections of the country. In a Southern State a drought was attributed to its occult influences, and the people, infatuated with the idea, levelled the wires to the ground. And so common was it for the Indians to knock off the insulators with their rifles in order to gratify their curiosity in regard to the " singing cord," that it was at first extremely difficult to keep the lines in repair along the Pacific Railway. To the man who had been so poor that he had had a very great struggle to provide bread for his three motherless children, came now success. The impecunious artist was liberally rewarded for his clever in- vention, and in 1847 he married for his second wife Miss Sarah E. Griswold, of Poughkeepsie, the daughter of his cousin. 276 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES She was twenty-five when they were mar- ried, and he fifty-six, but they lived very happily together on the two-hundred acre farm he had bought near Poughkeepsie, and it was there that he died at the age of seventy-two, full of honours as an in- ventor, and loving art to the end. Even after he became a great man, Pro- fessor Morse, it is interesting to learn, cherished his fondness for the house in which he was born, and one of his last visits to Charlestown was on the occasion when he took his young daughter to see the old place. And that same day, one is a bit amused to note, he took her also to the old parsonage, then still standing, in what is now Harvard Street, between the city hall and the church and there pointed out to her with pride some rude sketches he had made on the wall of his sleeping-room when still a boy. So, though 277 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES it is as an inventor we remember and honour Samuel Finley Breese Morse to- day, it was as a painter that he wished first, last, and above all to be famous. But in the realm of the talents as elsewhere man proposes and God disposes. 278 WHERE THE "BROTHERS AND SISTERS" MET Tt TO single house in all Massachusetts / ^ has survived so many of the vicis- situdes of fickle fortune and car- ried the traditions of a glorious past up into the realities of a prosperous and useful present more successfully than has Fay House, the present home of Radcliffe Col- lege, Cambridge. The central portion of the Fay House of to-day dates back nearly a hundred years, and was built by Nathaniel Ireland, a prosperous merchant of Boston. It was indeed a mansion to make farmer-folk stare when, with ita 279 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES tower-like bays, running from ground to roof, it was, in 1806, erected on the high- road to Watertown, the first brick house in the vicinity. To Mr. Ireland did not come the good fortune of living in the fine dwelling his ambition had designed. A ship-blacksmith by trade, his prospects were ruined by the Jefferson Embargo, and he was obliged to leave the work of construction on his house unfinished and allow the place to pass, heavily mortgaged, into the hands of others. But the house itself and our story concerning it gained by Mr. Ireland's loss, for it now became the property of Doctor Joseph McKean (a famous Harvard in- structor), and the rendezvous of that pro- fessor's college associates and of the numer- ous friends of his young family. Oliver Wendell Holmes was among those who 280 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES spent many a social evening here with the McKeans. The next name of importance to be con- nected with Fay House was that of Edward Everett, who lived fiere for a time. Later Sophia Willard Dana, granddaugh- ter of Chief Justice Dana, our first minis- ter to Russia, kept a boarding and day school for young ladies in the house. Among her pupils were the sisters of James Russell Lowell, Mary Channing, the first wife of Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson, and members of the Higgin- son, Parkman, and Tuckerman families. Lowell himself, and Edmund Dana, at- tended here for a term as a special privi- lege. Sophia Dana was married in the house, August 22, 1827, by the father of Oliver Wendell Holmes, to Mr. George Ripley, with whom she afterward took an active part in the Brook Farm Colony, of 281 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES which we are to hear again a bit later in this series. After Miss Dana's marriage, her school was carried on largely by Miss Elizabeth McKean the daughter of the Doctor Joseph McKean already referred to a young woman who soon became the wife of Doctor Joseph Worcester, the com- piler of the dictionary. Delightful reminiscences of Fay House have been furnished us by Thomas Went- worth Higginson, who, as a boy, was often in and out of the place, visiting his aunt, Mrs. Channing, who lived here with her son, William Henry Channing, the well- known anti-slavery orator. Here Higgin- son, as a youth, used to listen with keenest pleasure, to the singing of his cousin, Lucy Channing, especially when the song she chose was, " The Mistletoe Hung on the Castle Wall," the story of a bride shut up in a chest. " I used firmly to believe," 282 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the genial colonel confessed to the Radcliffe girls, in reviving for them his memories of the house, " that there was a bride shut up in the walls of this house and there may be to-day, for all I know." For fifty years after June, 1835, the house was in the possession of Judge P. P. Fay's family. The surroundings were still country-like. Cambridge Common was aa yet only a treeless pasture, and the house had not been materially changed from its original shape and plan. Judge Fay was a jolly gentleman of the old school. A judge of probate for a dozen years, an overseer of Harvard College, and a pillar of Christ Church, he was withal fond of a well-turned story and a lover of good hunting, as well as much given to hospi- tality. Miss Maria Denny Fay, whose memory is now perpetuated in a Radcliffe scholarship, was the sixth of Judge Fay'a 283 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTKEES seven children, and the one who finally became both mistress and owner of the estate. A girl of fourteen when her father bought the house, she was at the time re- ceiving her young-lady education at the Convent of St. Ursula, where, in the vine- covered, red-brick convent on the summit of Charlestown, she learned, under the guidance of the nuns, to sing, play the piano, the harp, and the guitar, to speak French, and read Spanish and Italian. But her life on Mt. Benedict was suddenly terminated when the convent was burned. So she entered earlier than would other- wise have been the case upon the varied interests of her new and beautiful home. Here, in the course of a few years, we find her presiding, a gracious and lovely maiden, of whom the venerable Colonel Higginson has said : " I have never, in looking back, felt more grateful to any 284 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES one than to this charming girl of twenty, who consented to be a neighbour to me, an awkward boy of seventeen, to attract me in a manner from myself and make me avail- able to other people." Very happy times were those which the young Wentworth Higginson, then a col- lege boy, living with his mother at Vaughan House, was privileged to share with Maria Fay and her friends. Who of us does not envy him the memory of that Christmas party in 1841, when there were gathered in Fay House, among others, Maria White, Lowell's beautiful fiancee; Levi Thaxter, afterward the husband of Celia Thaxter ; Leverett Saltonstall, Mary Story and William Story, the sculptors? And how pleasant it must have been to join in the famous charades of that circle of talented young people, to partake of re- freshments in the quaint dining-room, and 285 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES dance a Virginia reel and galop in the beautiful oval parlour which then, as to- day, expressed ideally the acme of charm- ing hospitality ! What tales this same par- lour might relate! How enchantingly it might tell, if it could speak, of the graceful Maria White, who, seated in the deep win- dow, must have made an exquisite picture in her white gown, with her beautiful face shining in the moonlight while she re- peated, in her soft voice, one of her own ballads, written for the " Brothers and Sisters," as this group of young people was called. Of a more distinctly academic cast were some of the companies later assembled in this same room Judge Story, Doctor Beck, President Felton, Professors Pierce, Lane, Child, and Lowell, with maybe Longfellow, listening to one of his own songs, or that strange figure, Professor 286 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Evangelinus Apostolides Sophocles, oddly ill at ease in his suit of dingy black. In his younger days he had been both pirate and priest, and he retained, as professor, some of his early habits seldom being seated while he talked, and leaning against the door, shaking and fumbling his college keys as the monks shake their rosaries. Mr. Arthur Oilman has related in a charm- ing article on Fay House, written for the Harvard Ghraduates Magazine (from which, as from Miss Norris's sketch of the old place, printed in a recent number of the Radcliffe Magazine, many of the inci- dents here given are drawn), that Professor Sophocles was allowed by Miss Fay to keep some hens on the estate, pets which he had an odd habit of naming after his friends. When, therefore, some accomplishment striking and praiseworthy in a hen was related in company as peculiar to one or 287 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES another of them, the professor innocently calling his animals by the name he had borrowed, the effect was apt to be start- ling. During the latter part of Miss Fay's long tenancy of this house, she had with her her elder sister, the handsome Mrs. Greenough, a woman who had been so famous a beauty in her youth that, on the occasion of her wedding, Harvard students thronged the aisles and climbed the pews of old Christ Church to see her. The wed- ding receptions of Mrs. Greenough's daugh- ter and granddaughter were held, too, in Fay House. This latter girl was the fas- cinating and talented Lily Greenough, who was later a favourite at the court of Napo- leon and Eugenie, and who, after the death of her first husband, Mr. Charles Moulton, was married in this house to Monsieur De Hegermann Lindencrone, at that time 288 Danish Minister to the United States, and now minister at Paris. Her daughter, Suzanne Moulton, who has left her name scratched with a diamond on one of the Fay House windows, is now the Countess Suzanne Raben-Levetzan of Nystel, Den- mark. In connection with the Fays' life in this house occurred one thing which will par- ticularly send the building down into pos- terity, and will link for all time Radcliffe and Harvard traditions. For it was in the upper corner room, nearest the Wash- ington Elm, that Doctor Samuel Oilman, Judge Fay's brother-in-law, wrote " Fair Harvard," while a guest in this hospitable home, during the second centennial cele- bration of the college on the Charles. Rad- cliffe girls often seem a bit triumphant as they point out to visitors this room and its facsimile copy of the famous song. Yet 289 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES they have plenty of pleasant things of their own to remember. Just one of these, taken at random from among the present writer's own memories of pretty happenings at Fay House, will serve : During Duse's last tour in this coun- try, the famous actress came out one after- noon, as many a famous personage does, to drink a cup of tea with Mrs. Agassiz in the stately old parlour, where Mrs. Whitman's famous portrait of the presi- dent of Radcliffe College vies in attract- iveness with the living reality graciously presiding over the Wednesday afternoon teacups. As it happened, there was a scant attendance at the tea on this day of Duse's visit She had not been expected, and so it fell out that some two or three girls who could speak French or Italian were priv- ileged to do the honours of the occasion to the great actress whom they had long 290 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES worshipped from afar. Duse was in one of her most charming moods, and she listened with the greatest attention to her young hostesses' laboured explanations concerning the college and its ancient home. The best of it all, from the enthusiastic girl-students' point of view, was, however, in the dark-eyed Italienne's mode of say- ing farewell. As she entered her carriage to which she had been escorted by this little group she took from her belt a beautiful bouquet of roses, camellias, and violets. And as the smart coachman flicked the impatient horses with his whip, Duse threw the girls the precious flowers. Those who caught a camellia felt, of course, especially delighted, for it was as the Dame aux Camellias that Duse had been winning for weeks the plaudits of ad- miring Boston. My own share of the 291 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES largesse consisted of a few fresh, sweet violets, which I still have tucked away somewhere, together with one of the great actress's photographs that bears the date of the pleasant afternoon hour passed with her in the parlour where the " Brothers and Sisters " met, 292 THE BROOK FARMERS of the weddings noted in our Fay House chapter was that of Sophia Dana to George Ripley, an event which was celebrated August 22, 1827, in the stately parlour of the Cam- bridge mansion, the ceremony being per- formed by the father of Oliver Wendell Holmes. The time between the date of their marriage and the year 1840, when Mr. and Mrs. Ripley " discovered " the milk-farm in West Roxbury, which was afterward to be developed through their efforts into the most remarkable socialistic experiment America has ever known, 293 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES represented for the young people joined together in what is now the home of Rad- cliffe College some dozen years of quiet parsonage life in Boston. The later years of George Ripley's life held for him a series of disappointments before which his courage and ideals never failed. When the young student left the Harvard Divinity School, he was appointed minister over a Unitarian parish which was gathered for him at the corner of Pearl and Purchase Streets, Boston. Here his ministrations went faithfully on, but inasmuch as his parishioners failed to take any deep interest in the social questions which seemed to him of most vital concern, he sent them, in the October of 1840, a letter of resignation, which they duly ac- cepted, thus leaving Ripley free to enter upon the experiment so dear to him. The Ripleys, as has been said, had al- 294 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ready discovered Brook Farm, a pleasant place, varied in contour, with pine woods close at hand, the Charles River within easy distance, and plenty of land whether of a sort to produce paying crops or not they were later to learn. That win- ter Ripley wrote to Emerson : " We pro- pose to take a small tract of land, which, under skilful husbandry, uniting the gar- den and the farm, will be adequate to the subsistence of the families ; and to connect with this a school or college in which the most complete instruction shall be given, from the first rudiments to the highest culture." Ripley himself assumed the responsibility for the management and success of the undertaking, and about the middle of April, 1841, he took possession with his wife and sister and some fifteen others, including Hawthorne, of the fann- 295 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES house, which, with a large barn, was already on the estate. The first six months were spent in " get- ting started," especially in the matter of the school, of which Mrs. Ripley was largely in charge, and it was not until early fall September 29 that the Brook Farm Institute of Agriculture and Education was organised as a kind of joint stock company, not incorporated. A seeker after country quiet and beauty might easily be as much attracted to-day by the undulating acres of Brook Farm as were those who sought it sixty years ago as a refuge from social discouragement. The brook still babbles cheerily as it threads its way through the meadows, and there are still pleasant pastures and shady groves on the large estate. The only one of the community buildings which is still standing, however, is that now known as 296 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES the Martin Luther Orphan Home. This house was built at the very start of the community life -by Mrs. A. G. Alford, one of the members of the colony. The building was in the form of a Mal- tese cross with four gables, the central space being taken by the staircase. It contained only about half a dozen rooms, and proba- bly could not have accommodated more than that number of residents. It is said to have been the prettiest and best fur- nished house on the place, but an examina- tion of its simple construction will confirm the memory of one of its occupants, who re- marked that contact with nature was here always admirably close and unaffected. From the rough dwelling, which resembled an inexpensive beach cottage, to out-doors was hardly a transition, it is chronicled, and at all seasons the external and internal temperatures closely corresponded. Until 297 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES lately the cottage wore its original dark- brown colour ; and it is still the best visible remnant of the early days, and gives a pleasant impression of what the daily life of the association must have been. Gay and happy indeed were the dwellers in this community during the early stages of its development. Ripley's theory of the wholesomeness of combined manual and intellectual work ruled everywhere. He himself donned the farmer's blouse, the wide straw hat, and the high boots in which he has been pictured at Brook Farm ; and whether he cleaned stables, milked cows, carried vegetables to market, or taught philosophy and discussed religion, he was unfailingly cheerful and inspiring. Mrs. Ripley was in complete accord with her husband on all vital questions, and as the chief of the Wash-Room Group worked blithely eight or ten hours a day. Whether 298 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES this devotion to her husband's ideals grew out of her love for him, or whether she was really persuaded of the truth of his theory, does not appear. In later life it is interesting to learn that she sought in the Church of Rome the comfort which Rip ley's transcendentalism was not able to afford her. When she died in 1859 she had held the faith of Rome for nearly a dozen years, and, curiously enough, was buried as a Catholic from that very building in which her husband had preached as a Unitarian early in their married life, the church having in the interim been pur- chased by the Catholics. With just one glimpse of the later Ripley himself, we must leave this interesting couple. In 1866, when, armed with a letter of intro- duction from Emerson, the original Brook Farmer sought Carlyle (who had once de- scribed him as " a Socinian minister who 299 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES had left his pulpit to reform the world by cultivating onions "), and Carlyle greeted him with a long and violent tirade against our government, Ripley sat quietly through it all, but when the sage of Chelsea paused for breath, calmly rose and left the house, saying no word of remonstrance. It is, of course, however, in Hawthorne and his descriptions in the " Blithedale Romance " of the life at Brook Farm that the principal interest of most readers cen- tres. This work has come to be regarded as the epic of the community, and it is now generally conceded that Hawthorne was in this novel far more of a realist than was at first admitted. He did not avoid the impulse to tell the happenings of life at the farm pretty nearly as he found them, and substantial as the charac- ters may or may not be, the daily life and doings, the scenery, the surroundings, and 300 even trivial details are presented with a well-nigh faultless accuracy. The characters, as I have said, are not easily traceable, but even in this respect Hawthorne was something of a photog- rapher. Zenobia seems a blend of Mar- garet Fuller and of Mrs. Barlow, who as Miss Penniman was once a famous Brook- line beauty of lively and attractive dispo- sition. In the strongest and most repel- lant character of the novel, Hollingsworth, Hawthorne seems to have incorporated something of the fierce earnestness of Brownson and the pathetic zeal of Ripley. And those who best know Brook Farm are able to find in the book reflections of other well-known members of the community. For the actual life of the place, however, readers cannot do better than peruse Lindsay Swift's recent delightful work, 801 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES " Brook Farm, Its Members, Scholars, and Visitors." There was, we learn here, a charming happy-go-luckiness about the whole life. Partly from necessity, partly from choice, the young people used to sit on the stairs and on the floor during the evening enter- tainments. Dishes were washed and wiped to the tune of " Oh, Canaan, Bright Ca- naan," or some other song of the time. When about their work the women wore short skirts with knickerbockers; the water-cure and the starving-cure both re- ceived due attention at the hands of some of the members of the household ; at table the customary formula was, " Is the butter within the sphere of your influence ? " And very often the day's work ended in a dance, a walk to Eliot's Pulpit, or a moon- light hour on the Charles ! During the earlier years the men, who 302 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES were in excess of the young women in point of numbers, helped very largely in the household labours. George William Curtis occasionally trimmed lamps, Charles Dana, who afterward founded the New York Sun, organised a band of griddle- cake servitors composed of " four of the most elegant youths of the Community 1 " One legend, which has the air of prob- ability, records that a student confessed his passion while helping his sweetheart at the sink. Of love there was indeed not a little at Brook Farm. Cupid is said to have made much havoc in the Community, and though very little mismating is to be traced to the intimacy of the life there, fourteen marriages have been attributed to friendships begun at Brook Farm, and there was even one wedding there, that of John Orvis to John Dwight's sister, Marianne. At this simple ceremony Will- 303 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES iam Henry Charming was the minister, and John Dwight made a speech of exactly five words. Starting with about fifteen persons, the numbers at the farm increased rapidly, though never above one hundred and twenty people were there at a time. It is estimated, however, that about two hundred individ- uals were connected with the Community from first to last. Of these all the well- known ones are now dead, unless, indeed, one is to count among the " Farmers " Mrs. Abby Morton Diaz, who as a very young girl was a teacher in the infant department of the school. Yet though the Farmers have almost all passed beyond, delicious anecdotes about them are all the time coming to light. There is one story of "Sam" Lamed which is almost too good to be true. Larned, it is said, steadily refused to drink milk on 304 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTHEES the ground that his relations with the cow did not justify him in drawing on her reserves, and when it was pointed out to him that he ought on the same principle to abandon shoes, he is said to have made a serious attempt to discover some more moral type of footwear. And then there is another good story of an instance when Brook Farm hos- pitality had fatal results. An Irish baronet, Sir John Caldwell, fifth of that title, and treasurer-general at Canada, after supping with the Community on its greatest delicacy, pork and beans, returned to the now departed Tremont House in Boston, and died suddenly of apoplexy ! This baronet's son was wont later to refer to the early members of the Commu- nity as " extinct volcanoes of transcen- dental nonsense and humbuggery." But no witty sallies of this sort are able to 305 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES lessen in the popular mind the reverence with which this Brook Farm essay in idealism must ever be held. For this Community, when all is said, remains the most successful and the most interesting failure the world has ever known. 306 MARGARET FULLER: MARCHESA D'OSSOLI .^NY account of Brook Farm which fl should neglect to dwell upon the part played in the community life by Margaret Fuller, Marchesa d'Ossoli, would be almost like the play of " Ham- let " with the Prince of Denmark left out. For although Margaret Fuller never lived at Brook Farm was, indeed, only an occasional visitor there her influence pervaded the place, and, as we feel from reading the " Blithedale Romance," she was really, whether absent or present, the strongest personality connected with the experiment 307 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Hawthorne's first bucolic experience was with the famous " transcendental heifer " mistakenly said to have been the property of Margaret Fuller. As a matter of fact, the beast had been named after Cambridge's mosjb intellectual woman, by Ripley, who had a whimsical fashion of thus honouring his friends. According to Hawthorne, the name in this case was not inapt, for the cow was so recalcitrant and anti-social that it was finally sent to Coventry by the more docile kine, always to be counted on for moderate conservatism. This cow's would-be-tamer, not wishing to be unjust, refers to this heifer as having " a very intelligent face " and " a reflective cast of character." He certainly paid Mar- garet Fuller herself no such tribute, but thus early in his Brook Farm experience let appear his thinly veiled contempt for the high priestess of transcendentalism. 308 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Even earlier his antagonism toward this eminent woman was strong, if it was not frank, for he wrote : " I was invited to dine at Mr. Bancroft's yesterday with Miss Margaret Fuller, but Providence had given me some business to do for which I was very thankful." The unlovely side of Margaret Fuller must have made a very deep impression upon Hawthorne. Gentle as the great ro- mancer undoubtedly was by birth and training, he has certainly been very harsh in writing, both in his note-book and in his story of Brook Farm, of the woman we rec- ognise in Zenobia. One of the most inter- esting literary wars ever carried on in this vicinity, indeed, was that which was waged here some fifteen years ago concerning Julian Hawthorne's revelations of his father's private opinion of the Marchesa d'Ossoli. The remarks in question oe- 309 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES curred in the great Hawthorne's " Roman Journal," and were certainly sufficiently scathing to call for such warm defence as Margaret's surviving friends hastened to offer. Hawthorne said among other things : " Margaret Fuller had a strong and coarse nature which she had done her ut- most to refine, with infinite pains ; but, of course, it could be only superficially changed. . . . Margaret \ias not left in the hearts and minds of those who knew her any deep witness of her integrity and purity. She was a great humbug of course, with much talent and moral reality, or else she could never have been so great a humbug. . . . Toward the last there ap- pears to have been a total collapse in poor Margaret, morally and intellectually; and tragic as her catastrophe was, Provi- dence was, after all, kind in putting her 310 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES and her clownish husband and their child on board that fated ship. . . . On the whole, I do not know but I like her the better, though, because she proved her- self a very woman after all, and fell as the meanest of her sisters might." The latter sentences refer to Margaret's marriage to Ossoli, a man some ten years the junior of his gifted wife, and by no means her intellectual equal. That the marriage was a strange one even Mar- garet's most ardent friends admit, but it was none the less exceedingly human and very natural, as Hawthorne implies, for a woman of thirty-seven, whose interests had long been of the strictly intellectual kind, to yield herself at last to the impulses of an affectionate nature. But we are getting very much ahead of our story, which should begin, of course, far back in May, 1810, when there was 311 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTHEES born, at the corner of Eaton and Cherry Streets, in Cambridgeport, a tiny daughter to Timothy Fuller and his wife. The dwelling in which Margaret first saw the light still stands, and is easily recognised by the three elms in front, planted by the proud father to celebrate the advent of his first child. The garden in which Margaret and her mother delighted has long since vanished ; but the house still retains a certain dignity, though now divided into three separate tenements, numbered respectively 69, 72, and 75 Cherry Street, and occupied by a rather migratory class of tenants. The pillared doorway and the carved wreaths above it still give an old-fashioned grace to the somewhat dilapidated house. The class with which Margaret may be said to have danced through Harvard Col- lege was that of 1829, which has been 312 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTBEE8 made by the wit and poetry of Holmes the most eminent class that ever left Harvard. The memory of one lady has preserved for us a picture of the girl Margaret as she appeared at a ball when she was sixteen. " She had a very plain face, half-shut eyes, and hair curled all over her head; she was dressed in a badly-cut, low-neck pink silk, with white muslin over it; and she danced quadrilles very awkwardly, being withal so near-sighted that she could hardly see her partner." With Holmes she was not especially in- timate, we learn, though they had been schoolmates ; but with two of the most con- spicuous members of the class William Henry Channing and James Freeman Clarke she formed a lifelong friendship, and these gentlemen became her biog- raphers. Yet, after all, the most important part 313 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of a woman's training is that which she obtains from her own sex, and of this Mar j garet Fuller had quite her share. She was one of those maidens who form passion- ate attachments to older women, and there were many Cambridge ladies of the college circle who in turn won her ardent loyalty. " My elder sister," writes Thomas Went- worth Higginson, in his biography of Margaret Fuller, " can well remember this studious, self-conscious, over-grown girl as sitting at my mother's feet, covering her hands with kisses, and treasuring her every word. It was the same at other times with other women, most of whom were too much absorbed in their own duties to give more than a passing solicitude to this rather odd and sometimes inconvenient adorer." The side of Margaret Fuller to which scant attention has been paid heretofore is this ardently affectionate side, and this 314 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES it is which seems to account for what has always before appeared inexplicable her romantic marriage to the young Marchese d'Ossoli. The intellect was in truth only a small part of Margaret, and if Haw- thorne had improved, as he might have done, his opportunities to study the whole nature of the woman, he would not have written even for his private diary the harsh sentences already quoted. One has only to look at the heroic fashion in which, after the death of her father, Margaret took up the task of educating her brothers and sisters to feel that there was much besides selfishness in this woman's make- up. Nor can one believe that Emerson would ever have cared to have for the friend of a lifetime a woman who was a "humbug." Of Margaret's school- teaching, conversation classes on West Street, Boston, and labours on the Dial, a 315 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES transcendental paper in which Emerson was deeply interested, there is not space to speak here. But one phase of her work which cannot be ignored is that performed on the Tribune, in the days of Horace Greeley. Greeley brought Boston's high priestess to New York for the purpose of putting the literary criticism of the Tribune on a higher plane than any American newspa- per then occupied, as well as that she might discuss in a large and stimulating way all philanthropic questions. That she rose to the former opportunity her enemies would be the first to grant, but only those who, like Margaret herself, believe in the sisterhood of women could freely endorse her attitude on philanthropic subjects. Surely, though, it could not have been a hard woman of whom Horace Greeley wrote : " If she had been born to large 316 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES fortune, a house of refuge for all female outcasts desiring to return to the ways of virtue would have been one of her most cherished and first realised conceptions. She once attended, with other noble women, a gathering of outcasts of their sex, and, being asked how they appeared to her, replied, ' As women like myself, save that they are victims of wrong and misfor- tune.' " While labouring for the Tribune, Mar- garet Fuller was all the time saving her money for the trip to Europe, which had her life long been her dream of felicity; and at last, on the first of August, 1846, she sailed for her Elysian Fields. There, in December, 1847, she was secretly mar- ried, and in September, 1848, her child was born. What these experiences must have meant to her we are able to guess from a glimpse into her private journal 317 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTREES in which she had many years before re- corded her profoundest feeling about mar- riage and motherhood. " I have no home. No one loves me. But I love many a good deal, and see some way into their eventful beauty. . . . I am myself growing better, and shall by and by be a worthy object of love, one that will not anywhere disappoint or need forbearance. ... I have no child, and the woman in me has so craved this experience that it has seemed the want of it must paralyse me. . . ." The circumstances under which Mar- garet Puller and her husband first met are full of interest. Soon after Miss Fuller's arrival in Rome, early in 1847, she went one day to hear vespers at St. Peter's, and becoming separated from her friends after the service, she was noted as she examined the church by a young man of gentlemanly 318 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES address, who, perceiving her discomfort and her lack of Italian, offered his services as a guide in her endeavour to find her companions. Not seeing them anywhere, the young Marquis d'Ossoli, for it was he, accom- panied Miss Fuller home, and they met once or twice again before she left Rome for the summer. The following season Miss Fuller had an apartment in Rome, and she often received among her guests this young patriot with whose labours in behalf of his native city she was thoroughly in sympathy. When the young man after a few months declared his love, Margaret refused to marry him, insisting that he should choose a younger woman for his wife. " In this way it rested for some weeks," writes Mrs. Story, who knew them both, "during which we saw Ossoli pale, dejected, and unhappy. 319 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES He was always with Margaret, but in a sort of hopeless, desperate manner, until at length he convinced her of his love, and she married him." Then followed the wife's service in the hospitals while Ossoli was in the army outside the city. After the birth of their child, Angelo, the happy little family went to Florence. The letters which passed between the young nobleman and the wife he adored are still extant, having been with the body of her beautiful baby the only things of Margaret Fuller's saved from the fatal wreck in which she and her two loved ones were lost. One of these letters will be enough to show the tenderness of the man : " ROME, 21 October, 1848. " MIA CABA : I learn by yours of the 20th that you have received the ten scudi, 320 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES and it makes me more tranquil. I feel also Mogliani's indolence in not coming to in- oculate our child ; biut, my love, I pray you not to disturb yourself so much, and not to be sad, hoping that our dear love will be guarded by God, and will be free from all misfortunes. He will keep the child for us and give us the means to sustain him." In answer to this letter, or one like it, we find the woman whom Hawthorne had deemed hard and cold writing : " Saturday Evening, " 28 October, 1848. "... It rains very hard every day, but to-day I have been more quiet, and our darling has been so good, I have taken so much pleasure in being with him. When he smiles in his sleep, how it makes my heart beat! He has grown fat and very fair, and begins to play and spring. You 321 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES will have much pleasure in seeing him again. He sends you many kisses. He bends his head toward me when he asks a kiss." Both Madame Ossoli and her husband were very fearful as they embarked on the fated ship which was to take them to America. He had been cautioned by one who had told his fortune when a boy to beware of the sea, and his wife had long cherished a superstition that the year 1850 would be a marked epoch in her life. It is remarkable that in writing to a friend of her fear Madame Ossoli said : " I pray that if we are lost it may be brief anguish, and Ossoli, the babe, and I go together." They sailed none the less, May 17, 1850, on the Elizabeth, a new merchant vessel, which set out from Leghorn. Misfortune soon began. The captain sickened and 322 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES died of malignant smallpox, and after his burial at sea and a week's detention at Gibraltar, little Angelo caught the dread disease and was restored with difficulty. Yet a worse fate was to follow. At noon of July 18, while they were off the coast of New Jersey, there was a gale, followed by a hurricane, which dashed the ship on that Fire Island Beach which has engulfed so many other vessels. Margaret Fuller and her husband were drowned with their child. The bodies oJ the parents were never recovered, but that of little Angelo was buried in a seaman's chest among the sandhills, from which it was later disinterred and brought to our own Mount Auburn by the relatives who had never seen the baby in life. And there to-day in a little green grave rests the child of this great woman's great love* 323 THE OLD MANSE AND SOME OF ITS MOSSES "6 F ?HE Old Manse >" writes Haw - t thorne, in his channing intro- duction to the quaint stories, " Mosses from an Old Manse," " had never been profaned by a lay occupant until that memorable summer afternoon when I en- tered it as my home. A priest had built it ; a priest had succeeded to it ; other priestly men from time to time had dwelt in it; and children born in its chambers had grown up to assume the priestly char- acter. It is awful to reflect how many ser- mons must have been written here! . . . Here it was, too, that Emerson wrote 324 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES ' Nature ; ' for he was then an inhabitant of the Manse, and used to watch the Assyr- ian dawn and Paphian sunset and moon- rise from the summit of our eastern hill." Emerson's residence in the Old Manse is to be accounted for by the fact that his grandfather was its first inhabitant. And it was while living there with his mother and kindred, before his second marriage in 1835, that he produced " Nature." It is to the parson, the Reverend Will- iam Emerson, that we owe one of the most valuable Revolutionary documents that have come down to us. Soon after the young minister came to the old Manse (which was then the New Manse), he had occasion to make in his almanac this stir- ring entry : " This morning, between one and two o'clock, we were alarmed by the ringing of the bell, and upon examination found 325 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES that the troops, to the number of eight hundred, had stole their march from Bos- ton, in boats and barges, from the bottom of the Common over to a point in Cam- bridge, near to Inman's farm, and were at Lexington meeting-house half an hour before sunrise, where they fired upon a body of our men, and (as we afterward heard) had killed several. This intelli- gence was brought us first by Doctor Sam- uel Prescott, who narrowly escaped the guard that were sent before on horses, purposely to prevent all posts and messen- gers from giving us timely information. He, by the help of a very fleet horse, crossing several walks and fences, arrived at Concord, at the time above mentioned ; when several posts were immediately dispatched that, returning, confirmed the account of the regulars' arrival at Lexing- ton and that they were on their way to 326 / OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Concord. Upon this, a number of our minute-men belonging to this town, and Acton, and Lincoln, with several others that were in readiness, marched out to meet them ; while the alarm company was preparing to receive them in the town. Captain Minot, who commanded them, thought it proper to take possession of the hill above the meeting-house, as the most advantageous situation. No sooner had our men gained it, than we were met by the companies that were sent out to meet the troops, who informed us that they were just upon us, and that we must retreat, as their number was more than treble ours. We then retreated from the hill near the Liberty Pole, and took a new post back of the town upon an eminence, where we formed into two battalions, and waited the arrival of the enemy. " Scarcely had we formed before we 327 saw the British troops at the distance of a quarter of a mile, glittering in arms, advancing toward us with the greatest celerity. Some were for making a stand, notwithstanding the superiority of their numbers, but others, more prudent, thought best to retreat till our strength should be equal to the enemy's by recruits from the neighbouring towns, that were continually coming in to our assistance. Accordingly we retreated over the bridge; when the troops came into the town, set fire to several carriages for the artillery, destroyed sixty barrels flour, rifled several houses, took pos- session of the town-house, destroyed five hundred pounds of balls, set a guard of one hundred men at the North Bridge, and sent a party to the house of Colonel Bar- rett, where they were in the expectation of finding a quantity of warlike stores. But these were happily secured just before 328 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTEEES their arrival, by transportation into the woods and other by-places. " In the meantime the guard sent by the enemy to secure the pass at the North Bridge were alarmed by the approach of our people; who had retreated as before mentioned, and were now advancing, with special orders not to fire upon the troops unless fired upon. These orders were so punctually observed that we received the fire of the enemy in three several and sep- arate discharges of their pieces before it was returned by our commanding officer; the firing then became general for several minutes; in which skirmish two were killed on each side, and several of the enemy wounded. (It may here be ob- served, by the way, that we were the more cautious to prevent beginning a rupture with the king's troops, as we were then un- certain what had happened at Lexington, 329 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES and knew not that they had begun the quarrel there by first firing upon our peo- ple, and killing eight men upon the spot.) The three companies of troops soon quitted their post at the bridge, and retreated in the greatest disorder and confusion to the main body, who were soon upon their march to meet them. " For half an hour the enemy, by their marches and countermarches, discovered great fickleness and inconstancy of mind, sometimes advancing, sometimes return- ing to their former posts; till at length they quitted the town and retreated by the way they came. In the meantime, a party of our men (one hundred and fifty), took the back way through the Great Fields into the East Quarter, and had placed themselves to advantage, lying in ambush behind walls, fences, and buildings, ready 830 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES to fire upon the enemy on their re- treat." l Here ends the important chronicle, the best first-hand account we have of the battle of Concord. But for this alone the first resident of the Old Manse deserves our memory and thanks. Mr. Emerson was succeeded at the Manse by a certain Doctor Ripley, a ven- erable scholar who left behind him a repu- tation for learning and sanctity which was reproduced in one of the ladies of his family, long the most learned woman in the little Concord circle which Haw- thorne soon after his marriage came to join. Few New England villages have re- tained so much of the charm and peaceful- ness of country life as has Concord, and 1 " Historic Towns of New England." G. P. Put- nam's Son*. 331 few dwellings in Concord have to-day so nearly the aspect they presented fifty years ago as does the Manse, where Haw- thorne passed three of the happiest years of his life. In the " American Note-Book," there is a charming description of the pleasure the romancer and his young wife experienced in renovating and refurnishing the old parsonage which, at the time of their going into it, was " given up to ghosts and cob- webs." Some of these ghosts have been shiveringly described by Hawthorne him- self in the marvellous paragraph of the in- troduction already referred to: "Our [cler- ical] ghost used to heave deep sighs in a particular corner of the parlour, and some- times rustle paper, as if he were turning over a sermon in the long upper entry where, nevertheless, he was invisible, in spite of the bright moonshine that fell 332 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTREES through the eastern window. Not im- probably he wished me to edit and publish a selection from a chest full of manuscript discourses that stood in the garret. " Once while Hillard and other friends sat talking with us in the twilight, there came a rustling noise as of a minister's silk gown sweeping through the very midst of the company, so closely as almost to brush against the chairs. Still there was nothing visible. " A yet stranger business was that of a ghostly servant-maid, who used to be heard in the kitchen at deepest midnight, grind- ing coffee, cooking, ironing, perform- ing, in short, all kinds of domestic labour ; although no traces of anything accom- plished could be detected the next morn- ing. Some neglected duty of her servitude some ill-starched ministerial band 838 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES disturbed the poor damsel in her grave, and kept her at work without wages." The little drawing-room once remod- elled, however, and the kitchen given over to the Hawthorne pots and pans in which the great Hawthorne himself used often to have a stake, according to the tes- timony of his wife, who once wrote in this connection, " Imagine those magnificent eyes fixed anxiously upon potatoes cooking in an iron kettle ! " the ghosts came no more. Of the great people who in the flesh passed pleasant hours in the little parlour, Thoreau, Ellery Channing, Emer- son, and Margaret Fuller are names known by everybody as intimately connected with the Concord circle. Hawthorne himself cared little for society. Often he would go to the village and back without speaking to a single soul, he tells us, and once when his wife was 334 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES absent he resolved to pass the whole term of her visit to relatives without saying a word to any human being. With Thoreau, however, he got on very well. This odd genius was as shy and ungregarious as was the dark-eyed " teller of tales," but the two appear to have been socially dis- posed toward each other, and there are delightful bits in the preface to the " Mosses " in regard to the hours they spent together boating on the large, quiet Concord River. Thoreau was a great voy- ager in a canoe which he had constructed himself (and which he eventually made over to Hawthorne), as expert indeed in the use of his paddle as the redman who had once haunted the same silent stream. Of the beauties of the Concord River Hawthorne has written a few sentences that will live while the silver stream con- tinues to flow : " It comes creeping softly 335 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES through the mid-most privacy and deepest heart of a wood which whispers it to be quiet, while the stream whispers back again from its sedgy borders, as if river and wood were hushing one another to sleep. Yes; the river sleeps along its course and dreams of the sky and the clustering foliage. . . ." Concerning the visitors attracted to Concord by the great original thinker who was Hawthorne's near neighbour, the ro- mancer speaks with less delicate sympathy : " Never was a poor little country village infested with such a variety of queer, strangely dressed, oddly behaved mortals, most of whom look upon themselves to be important agents of the world's destiny, yet are simply bores of a very intense character." A bit further on Hawthorne speaks of these pilgrims as r< hobgoblins of flesh and blood," people, he humourously 336 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES comments, who had lighted on a new thought or a thought they fancied new, and " came to Emerson as the finder of a glittering gem hastens to a lapidary to ascertain its quality and value." With Emerson himself Hawthorne was on terms of easy intimacy. " Being happy," as he says, and feeling, therefore, " as if there were no question to be put," he was not in any sense desirous of metaphysical in- tercourse with the great philosopher. It was while on the way home from his friend Emerson's one day that Hawthorne had that encounter with Margaret Fuller about which it is so pleasant to read because it serves to take away the taste of other less complimentary allusions to this lady to be found in Hawthorne's works: "After leaving Mr. Emerson's I returned through the woods, and entering Sleepy Hollow, I perceived a lady reclining near 837 OLD KEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the path which bends along its verge. It was Margaret herself. She had been there the whole afternoon, meditating or read- ing, for she had a book in her hand with some strange title which T did not under- stand and have forgotten. She said that nobody had broken her solitude, and was just giving utterance to a theory that no inhabitant of Concord ever visited Sleepy Hollow, when we saw a group of people entering the sacred precincts. Most of them followed a path which led them away from us; but an old man passed near us, and smiled to see Margaret reclining on the ground and me standing by her side. He made some remark upon the beauty of the afternoon, and withdrew himself into the shadow of the wood. Then we talked about autumn, and about the pleas- ures of being lost in the woods, and about the crows whose voices Margaret had 338 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES heard ; and about the experiences of early childhood, whose influence remains upon the character after the recollection of them has passed away; and about the sight of mountains from a distance, and the view from their summits ; and about other mat- ters of high and low philosophy." Nothing that Hawthorne has ever writ- ten of Concord is more to be cherished to-day than this description of a happy afternoon passed by him in Sleepy Hollow talking with Margaret Fuller of " matters of high and low philosophy." For there are few parts of Concord to which visitors go more religiously than to the still old cemetery, where on the hill by Ridge Path Hawthorne himself now sleeps quietly, with the grave of Thoreau just behind him, and the grave of Emerson, his philosopher- friend, on the opposite side of the way. A great pine stands at the head of Haw- 839 OLD NEW ENGLAND EOOFTREES thorne's last resting-place, and a huge un- hewn block of pink marble is his formal monument. Yet the Old Manse will, so long as it stands, be the romancer's most intimate relic, for it was here that he lived as a happy bridegroom, and here that his first child was born. And from this ancient dwelling it was that he drew the inspira- tion for what is perhaps the most curious book of tales in all American literature, a book of which another American master of prose * has said, " Hawthorne here did for our past what Walter Scott did for the past of the mother-country; another Wizard of the North, he breathed the breath of life into the dry and dusty mate- rials of history, and summoned the great dead again to live and move among us." i Henry James. 340 SALEM'S CHINESE GOD the romantic figures which grace the history of New England in the nineteenth century, none is to be compared in dash and in all those other qualities that captivate the imagination with the figure of Frederick Townsend Ward, the Salem boy who won a general- ship in the Chinese military service, sup- pressed the Tai-Ping rebellion, organised the "Ever-Victorious Army" for whose exploits " Chinese " Gordon always gets credit in history and died fighting at Ning Po for a nation of which he had be- come one, a fair daughter of which he had married, and by which he is to-day wor- 341 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES shipped as a god. Very far certainly did this soldier of fortune wander in the thirty short years of his life from the peaceful red-brick Townsend mansion (now, alas ! a steam bread bakery), at the corner of Derby and Carleton Streets, Salem, in which, in 1831, he was born. This house was built by Ward's grand- father, Townsend, and during Frederick's boyhood was a charming place of the com- fortable colonial sort, to which was joined a big, rambling, old-fashioned garden, and from the upper windows of which there was to be had a fascinating view of the broad-stretching sea. To the sea it was, therefore, that the lad naturally turned when, after ending his education at the Salem High School, he was unable to gain admission to the military academy at West Point and follow the soldier career in which it had always been his ambition to 342 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES shine. He shipped before the mast on an American vessel sailing from New York. Apparently even the hardships of such a common sailor's lot could not dampen his ardour for adventure, for he made a num- ber of voyages. At the outbreak of the Crimean war young Ward was in France, and, thinking that his long-looked for opportunity had come, he entered the French army for ser- vice against the Russians. Enlisting as a private, he soon, through the influence of friends, rose to be a lieutenant; but, be- coming embroiled in a quarrel with his superior officer, he resigned his commis- sion and returned to New York, without having seen service either in Russia or Turkey. The next few years of the young man's life were passed as a ship broker in New York City, but this work-a-day career soon 343 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES became too humdrum, and he looked about for something that promised more adven- tures. He had not to look far. Colonel William Walker and his filibusters were about to start on the celebrated expedition against Nicaragua, and with them Ward determined to cast in his lot. Through the trial by fire which awaited the ill-fated expedition, he passed unhurt, and escaping by some means or other its fatal termina- tion, returned to New York. California next attracted his attention, but here he met with no better success, and after a hand-to-mouth existence of a few months he turned again to seafaring life, and shipped for China as the mate of an American vessel. His arrival at Shanghai in 1859 was most opportune, for there the chance for which he had been longing awaited him. The great Tai-Ping rebellion, that half- 344 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Christian, wholly fanatical Uprising which devastated many flourishing provinces, had, at this time, attained alarming propor- tions. Ching Wang, with a host of blood- crazed rebels, had swept over the country in the vicinity of Shanghai with fire and sword, and at the time of Ward's arrival these fanatics were within eighteen miles of the city. The Chinese merchants had appealed in vain to the foreign consuls for assistance. The imperial government had made no plans for the preservation of Shanghai. So the wealthy merchants, fearing for their stores, resolved to take the matter into their own bauds, and after a consultation of many days, offered a reward of two hundred thousand dollars to any body of foreigners who should drive the Tai-Pings from the city of Sungkiang. Salem's soldier of fortune, Frederick T. 345 Ward, responded at once to the opportunity thus offered. He accepted in June, 1860, the offer of Ta Kee, the mandarin at the head of the merchant body, and in less than a week such was the magnetism of the man had raised a body of one hundred foreign sailors, and, with an American by the name of Henry Burgevine as his lieu- tenant, had set out for Sungkiang. The men in Ward's company were desperadoes, for the most part, but they were no match, of course, for the twelve thousand Tai- Pings. This Ward realised as soon as the skirmishing advance had been made, and he returned to Shanghai for reinforce- ments. From the Chinese imperial troops he ob- tained men to garrison whatever courts the foreign legation might capture, an ar- rangement which left the adventurers free 346 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES to go wherever their action could be most effective. Thus reinforced, Ward once more set out for Sungkiang. Even on this occasion his men were outnumbered one hundred to one, but, such was the desperation of the attacking force, the rebels were driven like sheep to the slaughter, and the defeat of the Tai-Pings was overwhelming. It was during this battle, it is interesting to know, that the term " foreign devils " first found place in the Chinese vocabulary. The promised reward was forthwith pre- sented to the gifted American soldier, and immediately Ward accepted a second com- mission against the rebels at Singpo. The Tai-Pings of this city were under the leadership of a renegade Englishman named Savage, and the fighting was fast and furious. Ward and his men performed many feats of valour, and actually scaled 847 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the city wall, thirty feet in height, to fight like demons upon its top. But it was with- out avail. With heavy losses, they were driven back. But the attempt was not abandoned. Re- tiring to Shanghai, Ward secured the assistance of about one hundred new for- eign recruits, and with them returned once more to the scene of his defeat. Half a mile from the walls of Singpo the little band of foreign soldiers of fortune and poorly organised imperial troops were met by Savage and the Tai-Pings, and the bat- tle that resulted waged for hours. The rebels were the aggressors, and ten miles of Ward's retreat upon Sungkiang saw fight- ing every inch of the way. The line of retreat was strewn with rebel dead, and such were their losses that they retired from the province altogether. Later Savage was killed, and the Tai- 348 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Pings quieted down. For his exploits Ward received the monetary rewards agreed upon, and was also granted the button of a mandarin of the fourth degree. He had received severe wounds during the campaigns, and was taking time to recuperate from them at Shanghai when the jealousy of other foreigners made itself felt, and the soldier from Salem was obliged to face a charge before the United States consul that he had violated the neu- trality laws. The matter was dropped, however, because the hero of Sungkiang promptly swore that he was no longer an American citizen, as he had become a naturalised subject of the Chinese em- peror! Realising the value of the Chinese as fighting men, Ward now determined to or- ganise a number of Chinese regiments, officer them with Europeans, and arm and 349 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES equip them after American methods. This he did, and in six months he appeared at Shanghai at the head of three bodies of Chinese, splendidly drilled and under iron discipline. He arrived in the nick of time, and, routing a vastly superior force, saved the city from capture. After this exploit he was no longer shunned by Europeans as an adventurer and an outlaw. He was too prominent to be overlooked. His Ever- Victorious Army, as it was afterward termed, entered upon a campaign of glorious victory. One after another of the rebel strongholds fell before it, and its leader was made a mandarin of the highest grade, with the title of admiral-general. Ward then assumed the Chinese name of Hwa, and married Changmei, a maiden of high degree, who was nineteen at the time of her wedding, and as the daughter of one 350 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of the richest and most exalted mandarins of the red button, was considered in China an exceedingly good match for the Salem youth. According to oriental standards she was a beauty, too. Ward did not rest long from his cam- paigns, however, for we find that he was soon besieged in the city of Sungkiang with a few men. A relieving force of the Ever- Victorious Army here came to his assistance. He did not win all his victories easily. In the battle of Ningpo, toward the end of the first division of the Tai-Ping rebellion, the carnage was frightful. Outnumbered, but not outgeneralled, the government forces fought valiantly. Ward was shot through the stomach while leading a charge, but refused to leave the field while the battle was on. Through his field offi- cers he directed his men, and when the 851 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES victory was assured, fell back unconscious in the arms of his companion, Burgevine He was carried to Ningpo, where he died the following morning, a gallant and dis- tinguished soldier, although still only thirty years old. In the Confucian cemetery at Ningpo his body was laid at rest with all possible honours and with military ceremony be- coming his rank. Over his grave, and that of his young wife, who survived him only a few months, a mausoleum was erected, and monuments were placed on the scenes of his victories. The mausoleum soon be- came a shrine invested with miraculous power, and a number of years after his death General Ward was solemnly declared to be a joss or god. The manuscript of the imperial edict to this effect is now pre- served in the Essex Institute. The command of the Ever- Victorious 352 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES army reverted to Burgevine, but later, through British intrigue, to General Gor- don. It was Ward, however, the Salem lad, who organised the army by which Chinese Gordon gained his fame. The British made a saint and martyr of Gor- don, and called Ward an adventurer and a common sailor, but the Chinese rated him more nearly as he deserved. In a little red-bound volume printed in Shanghai in 1863, and translated from the Chinese for the benefit of a few of General Ward's relatives in this country a work which I have been permitted to examine the native chronicler says of our hero : " What General Ward has done to and for China is as yet but imperfectly known, for those whose duty it is to transfer to pos- terity a record of this great man are either so wrapped in speculation as to how to build themselves up on his deeds of the 353 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES past time, or are so fearful that any com ment on any subject regarding him may detract from their ability, that with his last breath they allow all that appertains to him to be buried in the tomb. Not one in ten thousand of them could at all approach him in military genius, in courage, and in resource, or do anything like what he did." In his native land Ward has never been honoured as he deserves to be. On the contrary, severe criticism has been accorded him because he was fighting in China for money during our civil war, " when," said his detractors, " he might have been using his talents for the protection of the flag under which he was born." But this was the fault of circumstances rather than of intention. Ward wished. above everything, to be a soldier, and when he found fighting waiting for him in 354 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES China, it was the most natural thing in the world for him to accept the opportunity the gods provided. But he did what he could under the circumstances for his country. He offered ten thousand dollars to the national cause and was killed in the Chinese war before the answer to his proffer of financial aid came from Minister Anson Burlingame. It is rather odd that just the amount that he wished to be used by the North for the advancement of the Union cause has recently (1901) been bequeathed to the Essex Institute at Salem by Miss Elizabeth C. Ward, his lately deceased sis- ter, to found a Chinese library in memory of Salem's soldier of fortune. Thus is rounded out this very romantic chapter of modern American history. 355 THE WELL -SWEEP OF A SONG rHAT the wise Shakespeare spoke the truth when he observed that " one touch of nature makes the whole world kin " has never been better exemplified than in the affectionate tender- ness with which all sorts and conditions of men join in singing a song like " The Old Oaken Bucket." As one hears this ballad in a crowded room, or even as so often given in a New England play like " The Old Homestead," one does not stop to analyse one's sensations; one forgets the homely phrase; one simply feels and knows oneself the better for the memories 356 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTKEES of happy and innocent childhood which the simple song invokes. Dear, delightful Goldsmith has wonder- fully expressed in "The Deserted Village ; ' the inextinguishable yearning for the spot we call " home " : "In all my wanderings round this world of care, In all my griefs and God has given my share I still had hopes, my long vexations past, Here to return and die at home at last," and it is this same lyric cry that has been crystallised for all time, so far as the American people are concerned, in " The Old Oaken Bucket." The day will not improbably come when the allusions in this poem will demand as careful an explanation as some of Shake- speare's archaic references now call for. But even when this time does come, and an elaborate description of the strange old custom of drawing water from a hole in 357 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES the ground by means of a long pole and a rude pail will be necessary to an under- standing of the poem, men's voices will grow husky and their eyes will dim at the music of " The Old Oaken Bucket." It is to the town of Scituate, Massachu- setts, one of the most ancient settlements of the old colony, that we trace back the local colour which pervades the poem. The history of the place is memorable and in- teresting. The people come of a hardy and determined ancestry, who fought for every inch of ground that their descendants now hold. To this fact may perhaps be attributed the strength of those associa- tions, clinging like ivy around some of the most notable of the ancient homesteads. The scene so vividly described in the charming ballad we are considering is a little valley through which Herring Brook pursues its devious way to meet the tidal 358 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES waters of North River. " The view of it from Coleman Heights, with its neat cot- tages, its maple groves, and apple orchards, is remarkably beautiful," writes one appre- ciative author. The " wide-spreading pond," the " mill," the " dairy-house," the " rock where the cataract fell," and even the " old well," if not the original " moss- covered bucket " itself, may still be seen just as the poet described them. In quaint, homely Scituate, Samuel Woodworth, the people's poet, was indeed born and reared. Although the original house is no longer there, a pretty place called " The Old Oaken Bucket House " still stands, a modern successor to the poet's home, and at another bucket, oaken if not old, the pilgrim of to-day may stop to slake his thirst from the very waters, the recollection of which gave the poet such exquisite pleasure in after years. One 359 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES would fain have the surroundings un- changed the cot where Woodworth dwelt, the ponderous well-sweep, creaking with age, at which his youthful hands were wont to tug strongly ; and finally the mossy bucket, overflowing with crystal nectar fresh from the cool depths below. Yet in spite of the changes, one gets fairly well the illusion of the ancient spot, and comes away well content to have quaffed a draught of such excellent water to the memory of this Scituate poet. The circumstances under which the pop- pular ballad was composed and written are said to be as follows: Samuel Wood- worth was a printer who had served his apprenticeship under the veteran Major Russell of the Columbian Centinel, a jour- nal which was in its day the leading Fed- eralist organ of New England. He had inherited the wandering propensity of his 360 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES craft, and yielding to the desire for change he was successively in Hartford and New York, doing what he could in a journalistic way. In the latter city he became asso- ciated, after an unsuccessful career as a publisher, in the editorship of the Mirror. And it was while living in New York in the Bohemian fashion of his class, that, in company with some brother printers, he one day dropped in at a well-known estab- lishment then kept by one Mallory to take a social glass of wine. The cognac was pronounced excellent. After drinking it, Woodworth set his glass down on the table, and, smacking his lips, declared emphatically that Mallory's eau de vie was superior to anything that he had ever tasted. " There you are mistaken," said one of his comrades, quietly ; then added, " there certainly was one thing that far surpassed 361 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES this in the way of drinking, as you, too, will readily acknowledge." " Indeed ; and, pray, what was that ? " Woodworth asked, with apparent incred- ulity that anything could surpass the liquor then before him. " The draught of pure and sparkling spring water that we used to get from the old oaken bucket that hung in the well, after our return from the labours of the field on a sultry summer's day." No one spoke ; all were busy with their own thoughts. Woodworth's eyes became dimmed. " True, true," he exclaimed ; and soon after quitted the place. With his heart overflowing with the recollections that this chance allusion in a barroom had inspired, the scene of his happier childhood life rushed upon him in a flood of feeling. He hastened back to the office in which he then 362 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES worked, seized a pen, and in half an hour had written his popular ballad : "How dear to this heart are the scenes of my childhood, When fond recollection presents them to view ! The orchard, the meadow, the deep-tangled wild- wood, And every loved spot which my infancy knew, The wide-spreading pond and the mill which stood by it, The bridge and the rock where the cataract fell; The cot of my father, the dairy-house nigh it, And e'en the rude bucket that hung in the well, The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket, The moss-covered bucket which hung in the well. " The moss-covered vessel I hail as a treasure ; For often at noon when returned from the field, I found it the source of an exquisite pleasure, The purest and sweetest that nature can yield. How ardent I seized it with hands that were glowing I And quick to the white-pebbled bottom it fell ; 363 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTKEES Then soon with the emblem of truth overflow- ing, And dripping with coolness it rose from the well, The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket, The moss-covered bucket, arose from the well. "How sweet from the green mossy brim to receive it, As, poised from the curb, it inclined to my lips! Not a full blushing goblet could tempt me to leave it, Though filled with the nectar that Jupiter sips. And now, far removed from the loved situation, The tear of regret will intrusively swell, As fancy reverts to my father's plantation, And sighs for the bucket which hangs in the well, The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket, The moss-covered bucket which hangs in the well." Woodworth's reputation rests upon thii one stroke of genius. He died in 1842 at the age of fifty-seven. But after almosi 364 OLD NEW ENGLAND KOOFTREES fifty years his memory is still green, and we still delight to pay tender homage to the spot which inspired one of the most beautiful songs America has yet produced. 365 WHITTIER'S LOST LOVE /~N the life of the Quaker poet there is an unwritten chapter of personal his- tory full to the brim of romance. It will be remembered that Whittier in his will left ten thousand dollars for an Ames- bury Home for Aged Women. One room in this home Mrs. Elizabeth W. Pickard (the niece to whom the poet bequeathed his Amesbury homestead, and who passed away in the early spring of this year [1902], in an illness contracted while decorating her beloved uncle's grave on the anniversary of his birth), caused to be furnished with a massive black walnut 366 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES set formerly used in the " spare-room " of her uncle's house the room where Lucy Larcom, Gail Hamilton, the Gary sisters, and George Macdonald were in former times entertained. A stipulation of this gift was that the particular room in the Home thus to be furnished was to be known as the Whittier room. In connection with this Home and this room comes the story of romantic interest. Two years after the death of Mr. Whittier an old lady made application for admission to the Home on the ground that in her youth she was a schoolmate and friend of the poet And although she was not en- titled to admission by being a resident of the town, she would no doubt have been received if she had not died soon after making the application. This aged woman was Mrs. Evelina Bray Downey, concerning whose schoolgirl 367 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES friendship for Whittier many inaccurate newspaper articles were current at the time of her death, in the spring of 1895. The story as here told is, however, authentic. Evelina Bray was born at Marblehead, October 10, 1810. She was the youngest of ten children of a ship master, who made many voyages to the East Indies and to European ports. In a letter written in 1884, Mrs Downey said of herself: " My father, an East India sea captain, made frequent and long voyages. For safe- keeping and improvement he sent me to Haverhill, bearing a letter of introduction from Captain William Story to the family of Judge Bartley. They passed me over to Mr. Jonathan K. Smith, and Mrs. Smith gave me as a roommate her only daughter, Mary. This was the opening season of the New Haverhill Academy, a sort of 368 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES rival to the Bradford Academy. Subse- quently I graduated from the Ipswich Female Seminary, in the old Mary Lyon days." Mary Smith, Miss Bray's roommate at Haverhill, and her lifelong friend though for fifty years they were lost to each other was afterward the wife of Reverend Doctor S. F. Smith, the author of " America." Evelina is described as a tall and stri- kingly beautiful brunette, with remarkable richness of colouring, and she took high rank in scholarship. The house on Water Street at which she boarded was directly opposite that of Abijah W. Thayer, editor of the Haverhill Gazette, with whom Whittier boarded while at the academy. Whittier was then nineteen years old, and Evelina was seventeen. Naturally, they walked to and from the school together, 369 and their interest in each other was notice- able. If the Quaker lad harboured thoughts of marriage, and even gave expression to them, it would not be strange. But the traditions of Whittier's sect included dis- approval of music, and Evelina's father had given her a piano, and she was fasci- nated with the study of the art proscribed by the Quakers. Then, too, Whittier was poor, and his gift of versification, which had already given him quite a reputation, was not considered in those days of much consequence as a means of livelihood. If they did not at first realise, both of them, the hopelessness of their love, they found it out after Miss Bray's return to her home. About this time Mr. Whittier accom- panied his mother to a quarterly meeting of the Society of Friends at Salem, and one morning before breakfast took a walk 370 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES of a few miles to the quaint old town of Marblehead, where he paid a visit to the home of his schoolmate. She could not invite him in, but instead suggested a stroll along the picturesque, rocky shore of the bay. This was in the spring or early summer of 1828, and the poet was twenty years old, a farmer's boy, with high ambitions, but with no outlook as yet toward any profession. It may be imagined that the young couple, after a discussion of the situation, saw the hopelessness of securing the needed consent of their parents, and returned from their morning's walk with saddened hearts. Whatever dreams they may have cherished were from that hour abandoned, and they parted with this un- derstanding. In the next fifty years they met but once again, four or five years after the morning 371 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES walk, and this once was at Marblehead, along the shore. Miss Bray had in the meantime been teaching in a seminary in Mississippi, and Whittier had been edit- ing papers in Boston and Hartford, and had published his first book, a copy of which he had sent her. There was no re- newal at this time of their lover-like rela- tions, and they parted in friendship. I have said that they met but once in the half -century after that morning's walk; the truth is they were once again close to- gether, but Whittier was not conscious of it. This was while he was editing the Pennsylvania Freeman, at Philadelphia. Miss Bray was then associated with a Miss Catherine Beecher, in an educational movement of considerable importance, and was visiting Philadelphia. Just at this time a noted Massachusetts divine, Reverend Doctor Todd, was announced to preach in 372 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES the Presbyterian church, and both these Haverhill schoolmates were moved to hear him. By a singular chance they occupied the same pew, and sat close together, but Miss Bray was the only one who was con- scious of this, and she was too shy to reveal herself. It must have been her bonnet hid her face, for otherwise Whittier's remark- ably keen eyes could not have failed to recognise the dear friend of his school- days. Their next meeting was at the reunion of the Haverhill Academy class of 1827, which was held in 1885, half a century after their second interview at Marble- head. It was said by some that it was this schoolboy love which Whittier commemo- rated in his poem, " Memories." But Mr. Pickard, the poet's biographer, affirms that, so far as known, the only direct reference made by Whittier to the affair under 373 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES consideration occurred in the fine poem, " A Sea Dream," written in 1874. In the poet, now an old man, the sight of Marblehead awakens the memory of that morning walk, and he writes : " IB this the wind, the soft sea wind That stirred thy locks of brown ? Are these the rocks whose mosses knew The trail of thy light gown, Where boy and girl sat down ? I see the gray fort's broken wall, The boats that rock below ; And, out at sea, the passing sails We saw so long ago, Rose-red in morning's glow. Thou art not here, thou art not there, Thy place I cannot see ; I only know that where thou art The blessed angels be, And heaven is glad for thee. " But turn to me thy dear girl-face Without the angel's crown, 374 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES The wedded roses of thy lips, Thy loose hair rippling down In waves of golden brown. " Look forth once more through space and time And let thy sweet shade fall In tenderest grace of soul and form On memory's frescoed wall, A shadow, and yet all I " Whittier, it will be seen, believed that the love of his youth was dead. He was soon to find out, in a very odd way, that this was not the case. Early in the forties, Miss Bray became principal of the " female department " of the Benton School at St. Louis. In 1849, during the prevalence of a fearful epi- demic, the school building was converted into a hospital, and one of the patients was an Episcopal clergyman, Reverend Will- iam S. Downey, an Englishman, claiming to be of noble birth. He recovered his health, but was entirely deaf, not being 376 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES able to hear the loudest sound for the re- mainder of his life. Miss Bray married him, and for forty years endured martyr- dom, for he was of a tyrannous disposition and disagreeably eccentric. Mrs. Downey had never told her hus- band of her early acquaintance with Whit- tier, but he found it out by a singular chance. When Reverend S. F. Smith and his wife celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of their marriage the event was mentioned in the papers, and the fact that Mrs. Smith was a schoolmate of Whittier was chron- icled. Mr. Downey had heard his wife speak of being a schoolmate of the wife of the author of " America," and, putting these two circumstances together, he con- cluded that his wife must also have known the Quaker poet in his youth. He said nothing to her about this, however, but wrote a letter to Whittier himself, and sent 376 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES with it a tract he had written in severe denunciation of Colonel Robert G. Inger- soll. As a postscript to this letter he asked : " Did you ever know Evelina Bray ? " Whittier at once replied, ac- knowledging the receipt of the tract, and making this characteristic comment upon it: " It occurs to me to say, however, that in thy tract thee has hardly charity enough for that unfortunate man, Ingersoll, who, it seems to me, is much to be pitied for his darkness of unbelief. We must re- member that one of the great causes of infidelity is the worldliness, selfishness, and evil dealing of professed Christians. An awful weight of responsibility rests upon the Christian church in this respect." And to this letter Whittier added as a postscript : " Can you give me the address of Evelina Bray ? " Mr. Downey at once 377 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES wrote that he was her husband, told of his service of the Master, and indirectly begged for assistance in his work of spread- ing the gospel. At this time he was an evangelist of the Baptist church, having some time since abandoned the mother faith. And, though he was not reduced to poverty, he accepted alms, as if poor, thus trying sorely the proud spirit of his wife. So it was not an unwonted request. Of course, the poet had no sympathy with the work of attack Mr. Downey was evidently engaged in. But he feared the girl friend of his youth might be in des- titute circumstances, and, for her sake, he made a liberal remittance. All this the miserable husband tried to keep from his wife, who he knew would at once return the money, but she came upon the fact of the remittance by finding Whittier's letter in her husband's pocket. 378 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES Naturally, she was very indignant, but her letter to Whittier returning the money was couched in the most delicate terms, and gave no hint of the misery of her life. Until the year of his death she was an occasional correspondent with the poet, one of his last letters, written at Hampton Falls in the summer of 1892, being ad- dressed to her. Their only meeting was at the Haverhill Academy reunion of 1885, fifty-eight years after the love episode of their school-days. When they met at Haverhill the poet took the love of his youth apart from the other schoolmates, and they then exchanged souvenirs, he receiving her miniature painted on ivory, by Porter, the same artist who painted the first likeness ever taken of Whittier. This latter miniature is now in the possession of Mr. Pickard. The portrait of Miss Bray, representing her 379 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES in the full flush of her girlish beauty, wearing as a crown a wreath of roses, was returned to Mrs. Downey after the poet's death, by the niece of Whittier, into whose possession it came. Mrs. Downey spent her last days in the family of Judge Bradley, at West New- bury, Massachusetts. After her death some valuable china of hers was sold at auction, and several pieces were secured by a neighbour, Mrs. Ladd. The Ladd family has since taken charge of the Whittier birthplace at East Haverhill, and by this chain of circumstances Evelina Bray's china now rests on the Whittier shelves, together with the genuine Whittier china, put in its old place by Mrs. Pickard. It was not because of destitution that Mrs. Downey made application to enter the Old Ladies' Home which Whittier en- dowed, but, because, cherishing until the 380 OLD NEW ENGLAND ROOFTREES day of her death her youthful fondness for the poet, she longed to live during the sun- set time of her life near his grave. In all probability her request would have been granted, had not she, too, been suddenly called to the land where there is neither marriage nor giving in marriage. THE END. 381 INDEX Adams. John, 96. Adams, Mrs. John, 111. Adams, Samuel, 119. Agassiz, Mrs., 290. ATford, Mrs. A. G., 297. Allston, 270. Antigua merchant, 60 Auburn, Mount, 323. Bana, Doctor, discovers Deborah Sampson's secret, 181 ; sends letter to General Patterson, 188. Bancroft, 309. Barlow, Mrs., 301. Barr, George L., buys Royal 1 House, 72. Bartley. Judge, 368. Bath, 13 ; death of Frankland at, 55. Beck, Doctor, 286. Belem, Frankland sails from, 53. Belknap, Jeremy, letter of. 265. Berkeley, Bishop, 11 : student at Dublin University, 12; fellow at Trinity College, 12; life as a tutor, 12 ; reception in London, 28 ; marriage, 29 : sails for Rhode Island, 30 : arrives at Newport, 30 ; writes " Minute Philosopher," 32 : bequeaths books to Tale College, 33 ; dies at Oxford, 34 ; portrait by Smlbert, 35. Bermuda, proposed college at, 13. " Bllthedale Romance," 300, 307. Bradley, Judge. 380. Bray. Evelina, born at Marblehead. 368. Brook Farm Institute of Agriculture and Education organised. 296. " Brothers and Sisters " at Fay House, 292. Brown, Rev. Arthur, 248. Rrownson. 301. Brunswick, triumphs of Riedesels at, 145. 383 INDEX Burgevlne, Henry, 346. Burlingame, Anson, 355. Burgoyne, 56, 136. Burr, Aaron, 123. Burr, Thaddeus, 120. Bynner's story, Agnes Surriage, 45. Cadenus and Vanessa, poem, 24. Caldwell, Sir John, 305. Carlyle visited by Ripley, 299. Caroline, Queen (consort George Second), 29. Carter, Madam, 135. Cary Sisters, 367. Channlng, Bllery, 334. ('banning, Lucy, 282. Channing, Mary, 281. Channing, William Henry, 282, 314. Chambly, Baroness Kiedesel at, 131. Charlestown City Hall, 270. Chichester, Bng., 56. Child, Professor, 286. Christ Church, Boston, 104. Church, Doctor, 122; fall of, 147; imprisoned, 150; education of, 151 ; delivers Old South Oration, 152 ; tried at Watertown, 154 ; confined in Nor- wich Jail, 155; lost at sea (?), 156. Clark, Rev. Jonas, 111. Clark, Mrs. Jonas, 118. Clarke mansion purchased by Frankland, 54. Clough, Capt. Stephen, 162. Codman, Mrs. J. Amory, 261. Codman, Martha, 261. Columbian Centinel, 360. Coolidge, J. Templeton, 247. Corey, Giles, pressed to death, 238. Corey, Mrs. Martha, condemned as witch, 234. Corwin, Justice Jonathan. 226, 228. Cotton, Rev. John, 212, 221. Courier, New Entjland, 30. Congress, Continental, 120. Copley, 270. Crowninshield, Hannah, 85. Curtis, George William, at Brook Farm, 303. Dana, Charles. 303. Dana, Dr. J. Freeman, 274. Dana, Edmund. 281. Dana. Sophia Willard, 281 : marries George Ripley, 293 ; goes over to Rome, 299. Danvers, 228. Dawes at Lexington, 114. Deerfleld, 190. Diaz. Abby Morton, 304. Dorothy Q. at Lexington, 112, 117 ; marries John 384 INDEX Hancock, 123 : marries Captain Scott, 128 ; re- ceives Lafayette, 129. Downey, Evelina Bray, 367. Downey, Rev. William S., 375, 376. Drew, Mr. John, 56. Duse, Eleanora, at Fay House, 290. Dunbarton, Stark House at, 74. Dwlgbt, John, 303. Dwlght, Marianne, 303. Dwigbt, President of Yale College, 260. Edmonston, Captain, 140. Elizabeth, loss of the Ossolls on, 322. Eliot, John, at Deerfleld, 190. Ellsworth, Annie ;.. 275. Emerson, Ralph Waldo, at The Manse, 325 ; Haw- thorne and, 337. Emerson, William, at The Manse, 325. Endlcott, Governor, 227. Ervlng, George, at Medford, 63. Essex Institute, 67 ; Ward bequest to, 355. Eustls, Madam, 46. Everett, Edward, 281. Fairbanks, Jason, 252 ; trial of, 258 ; escape of, 259 ; banging of, 259. Fairbanks, Jonathan. 260. Fairbanks, Rebecca. 260. Fairbanks, Chapter D. K . 260. " Fair Harvard " written in Fay House, 289. Fales, Elizabeth, 252 ; murder of, 257. Fay House. 279. Fay, Maria Denny, 283. Fay, P. P., 283. Felton. President. 286. Fi>-liliii:-', Henry, describes Lisbon, 50. Fire Inland Beach, loss of the Ossolls off, 323. Fountain Inn. Mnrblehead, ft.S. Frankland, Charles Henry, 39 ; born in Bengal, 39 ; collector of Boston port, 39 : meets Agnes Surrlage, 43 ; adopts Agnes Surrlage, 44 ; builds home at Hopklnton. 48 ; dies at Lisbon, 55. Franks, Miss. 100. Fuller. Margaret, at Brook Farm. 301 : born In Cam- bridge. 312 ; Joins Tribune staff. 3T6 : at Concord. 338; goes abroad, 317; marries Ossoll, 320; is lost at sea. 322. Fuller. Timothy, 312. Gage, General, at Boston, 107 ; In correspondence with Church, 149. Geer. Mr., present owner Royall House, 73. George First. 29. George Third entertains the Rledesels, 142 ; West's anecdote of, 271. 385 INDEX Oilman, Arthur, 287. Oilman, Dr. Suinuel, 289. Goldsmith, 357. Gordon, " Chinese " 341. Greeley, Horace, 316. Greenough, Lily, 288. Greenough, Mrs., 288. Griswold, Sarah E., 276. Hamilton, Gail, 367. Hancock, John, at Lexington, 111 ; letters of, 120, 122 ; marries Miss Quincy, 123 ; occupies home on Beacon Street, 125 ; dies, 128. Hancock, Lydia, at Lexington, 118. Hartford, Conn., Riedesels entertain Lafayette at, 140. Haverhill Academy, 368. Haverhill Gazette, 369. Hawthorne writes of Sir Wm. Pepperell, 67 ; goes to Brook Farm, 295 ; writes of Margaret Fuller, 310 ; at The Manse, 324. Hlgglnson, Col. Thomas Wentworth, 281 ; writes of Margaret Fuller, 314. Milliard at The Manse, 333. Hilton, Martha, 242 ; marries Governor Wentworth, 248. Hobgoblin Hall, 72. Hollingsworth, 301. Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 280. Honeyman's Hill (Newport, R. I.), 16. Hopkinton (Mass.), 48; home of Frankland burned, 57 ; residence of Frankland, 55 ; Agnes Surriage at, 55. Howard, Lady, 142. Howe, Sir William, 99, 136, 138. Hutchinson, Ann, Mrs., 210 ; arrives In Boston, 214 ; holds meetings, 216; accused of heresy, 218; en- tenced, 220; banished, 222; murdered, 224. Hutchinson. Governor, 222, 230. Inman's Farm, 326. Ireland. Nathaniel, 279. Isle of Shonls, 66. James, Professor William, 232. Johnson, Doctor, 20, 24. Kittery Point, 66. Ladd, Mrs., 380. Lafayette entertained by Starks, 80 ; on Washington and Lee, 90 ; entertained by John Hancock, 128 ; received by Madame Scott, 129; dines with Bar- oness Kledesel, 140; visits George Third, 142. Lane, Professor, 286. Larcom, Lucy, 367. Lamed, " Sam," 304. 886 INDEX Lauterbacb, family vault of Riedesels at, 145. Lee, General, at Itoyall House, 71. Lee, General, in British army, 90 ; arrives in New York, 92; at Medford, 94; at Somerville, 95; dies in Virginia, 103. Lee, Sydney, 103. Lexington, affair at, 110. Lindencrone, De Hegermann, 288. Lisbon, Frankland at, 50 ; earthquake at, 51 ; Agnes Surriage's experience at, 56 ; Frankland consul- general at, 55. Longfellow, 286. Louisburg, 67. Lowell, James Russell, 281. Lowell, John, 257. Luther, Martin, Orphan Home, 297. Mucdonald, George, 367. Marblehead, Maid of, 37 ; Town House, 39 ; Fountain Inn, 42 ; Whittier at, 371. Marie Antoinette, plot to rescue, 163. Marley Abbey (residence of "Vanessa"), 22. Marshall, Judge, 23. Massachusetts Historical Society, 53. Mather, Hev. Cotton, 233. McKean, Elizabeth, 282. McKean, Joseph, 280. McKinstrey, Sarah, marries Caleb Stark, 79 ; por- trait of, 84. McNeil, Gen. John, 83. Michelet, 231. Minot, Captain, 327. Morris, Robert, 82. Morse, Rev. Jedediah, 265. Morse. Samuel F. 15.. 83 ; birthplace of, 264 ; student at Yale, 269 ; studies painting In Europe, 270 ; returns to America. 272; paints Lafayette, 272; invents the telegraph, 273. Moulton, Mr. Charles. 288. Moulton, Suzanne, 289. Sii son. Rev. Ellas, 41. Newman, Robert, 116. Nichols, George C., buys Royall House. 72. Norris, Miss, 287. Nourse, Rebecca. 228. " Old Oaken Bucket," 356. Orvls, John, marries Marianne Dwight, 303. Osftnli, Angelo, Marchese d'. 320. Oraoll. Mitrchesa d 1 (See Margaret Fuller). OtU. Harrison Gray, 257. Oxford, death of Berkeley at, 34. Page, rapt. Caleb. 76. Pennsylvania Freeman, 372. 387 INDEX Pepperell, Sir William. 1st, 66. 1'eppsrell, Sir William, 2d, at Medford, 63 ; gradu- ated, 68 ; marries Miss Hoyali, 68 ; denounced, 68 ; sails for England, 68 ; dies, 69. Pepperell, Lady, 85. I'epperell House built, 66. Percival, Lord, 13 ; letter from W T alpole, 33. Phips, Governor, 233. Pickard, Elizabeth W., 366. Pickard, Samuel, 374. Pierce, Professor, 286. Porter House in Medford, 111. Prescott, Doctor, at Lexington, 114, 326. Price, Kev. Uoger, 48. Pulling, Captain John, 106, 107, 110, 116. Quebec, Baroness Riedesel at, 131. Quiney, Miss, 120 ; marries John Hancock, 123. Raben-Levetzan, Suzanne, 289. Radcliffe College, 279. Radclifle Mayazine, 287. Revere, Paul, 104, 110, 111 ; writes of Church, 156. Revolution, Agnes Surriage in, 56. Riedesel, Baron, 130; entertains Lafayette, 140; vis- its George Third, 142 ; returns to Brunswick, 145 ; dies at Brunswick, 145. Riedesel, Baroness, 130 ; letters of, 131 ; lands in America, 131; reaches Cambridge, 134; dies at Berlin, 145 ; Cambridge street named for, 146. Ripley, Doctor, 331. Ripley, George, 281 ; marries Sophia Dana, 293 ; goes to Brook Farm, 295 ; visits Carlyle. 299. Rouville, Maj. Hertel de, 192. Royal! House visited by Frankland, 45 ; built at Medford, 60. Royall, Isaac, the nabob, 61. Royall, Col. Isaac, proscribed, 69 ; leaves land to Harvard, 70. Russell, Major, 360. Salem, Isaac Royall to sail from, 65. Saltonstall. 285. Sampson, Deborah (Gannett), 170; early life, 172; enlists in Continental Army, 174; writes her mother, 176; in battle of White Plains, 179; sex discovered by physician, 181 ; receives love letter, 182; returns to her home, 188; marries, 188; conducts lecture tour, 189. Savage, 347. Scituate, 358. Scott, Sir Walter, 340. Schuyler, General, at Saratoga, 132; daughter of, 135 Sewall, Judge, 239. Shirley, governor Massachusetts, 41. Shirley House, 45. 388 INDEX Shurtleff, Robert (See Deborah Sampson). Sleepy Hollow, 338, 339. Smibert paints Berkeley, 35 ; paints Sir Wm. Pep- perell, 1st, i.T. Smith, Mary, 38 ; marries S. F. Smith, 369. Sophia, I'rincess, and Madame Kiedesel, 144. Sophocles, ICvaugelinus Apostolides, 287. . Sparhawk, Colonel, <>